I maintain that the breadth of music right now is the reason it is the most exciting time to be enthusiastic about it. Over the course of the past few years it's become increasingly clear that independent artists have been given greater and freer opportunities to craft their own unique vision, and it's no coincidence that this crests with the rise in acclaim and popularity of the queer underground that continues to show their ambition to push past pre-existing expectations of what shape music can take. Of course, that is just an exemplar snapshot of the flourishing musical landscape right now (a damn huge one, mind you), but gosh, it's still exciting to think about. Before sailing into the next decade, it's worth quickly shining a light on some music in 2019 that draws stylistic parallels with few others, at least not obviously. I struggle to tell if I've heard anything quite like these ten records.
I'd like to think that I can be forgiven for posting this a month early — it gives you an early chance to find out whether you've missed something before putting together your own snazzy 2019 lists!
(Migro)
Spoken Word / Sound Collage / Electroacoustic
Taunting you for even attempting to make sense of it, hearing anybody be this unbound on a microphone with electro-acoustic screeching behind her isn't an everyday spectacle. All the Many Peopls is a satire of absolutely everything that comes to mind in this hodge-podge of 21st century, Internet-age absurdity and turmoil, as Walshe theatrically whimpers and screams and rambles about absolutely anything, hard-switching from one topic to the next. You might think it's a load of crap, you might think it's genius, but it is entertaining, for sure.
(Run For Cover)
Hypnagogic Pop / Glitch Pop
Katie Dey herself wishes to ignore restriction in what shape she can take and the music, though fluid from track to track, really sounds like her heart is beating out of her chest from excitement. This is her most personal record to date, so elaborately honest about dysphoria and isolation to the point where she sounds as if she is reaching out to connect with you. The first time I listened to Solipsisters, it tugged downwards on my heart like a child that accidentally let go of a birthday balloon. The almost-aquatic ambience of the album starts making sense once the track “Dissolving” seeps in, as if to take a deep dive through liquid psyche. The album sounds gorgeous from the get-go, drums crack like your ears at the end of a flight, synthesiser melodies sway side to side like buoys on stormy water. An audiovisual experience about being more than our physical bodies, with music better described in images than it is in “synonym” Google results.
(Blueberry)
Post-Industrial / Glitch / Iranian Folk Music / Sound Collage
A psychological unraveling of love-struck anxiety. This stands as a near-perfect demonstration of how to program an album that sounds as if it is slowly piecing itself together as quickly as it is falling apart, sculpted with nonsensical sounds that all make sense in tandem. At no point does it sound like a pastiche of something else. The entire album sounds like an uneven revving of tension that only burdens the narrator until she can no longer take it on the shocking midpoint of the album, “Ditectrice”. It isn't some random jumpscare in the middle, it functions as a reset button that wipes all the tension clean, scattering all the pieces of the record everywhere to be rebuilt again like a game of Buckaroo.
(Self-Released)
Ambient / Folktronica / Radio Broadcast Recordings
A Day In Bel Bruit sounds like the spirit-kindling of an abandoned community. It is overwhelming and surprisingly anxious for how calm it remains, like several different memories colliding and spilling out; an escape to a new place and the details of it are built upon the many radio transmissions that are chopped-up, washing into each other over the course of these tracks. Glistening, really waiting to be heard, and the closing track's sentiment of loss really tears at the heartstrings.
(InsideOut)
Art Rock
Bent Knee are the unsung heroes of rock music right now, a band that pay tribute to the progressive and theatrical forerunners before them but clearly operate in their own crazy lane. This is their best record so far, punching heavy but never forgetting to have fun, as "Cradle of Rocks" sounds like the hectic soundtrack for the ceiling of a disco party collapsing while the intimate balladry of "Bird Song" finds Courtney Swain's voice rippling back over itself multiple times towards the end like the constant relapsing of a specific memory. I think Bent Knee are incredible 'painters' if not just excellent musicians in tandem, managing to make their music sound larger than life in non-cliché ways.
(Self-Released)
Glitch Pop / Alternative R&B
“Deconstructed” is the word for the decade, as musical styles get stripped down and re-sculpted to present much more abstract and nuanced ideas. It’s hard to even begin to describe what Body Meat is influenced by, as every next minute it seems a track is shifting to a new phase, which gives Truck Music a lot of strength for something so short-breathed. Frantic as it is, it is a musical fusion that grows more beautiful with every next off-kilter and sour detail you become accustomed to—like a magic eye puzzle, you discover more and more. Sam Hockley-Smith hilariously described it as a record that "proves everything can fit if you don’t give it enough time to sound wrong". Apt.
(Le Saule)
Free Folk / Avant-Folk / Sound Poetry / Electroacoustic
Léonore Boulanger’s concept here is to play with vowel and consonant sounds and not the words themselves — language errors are amok, she switches languages on several tracks and most of what you hear being sung is derived from vocal warm-up exercises. As a result, the album comes off as a pile of nonsense but it’s refreshing, especially as each track seems to have no real limits on what textures to group together to create a stimulating electro-acoustic chamber folk sound poetry hullabaloo. It’s therapeutic, too, every little click and crank and discordant melody feels so clear in the song and not buried by all its counterparts, it’s like a box of toys coming to life and scrambling to get out.
(Boiled)
Afrobeat / Electronic / Experimental Rock
Fet.Nat are a band like no other, inspired clearly by the Rock In Opposition movement, which is going to guarantee yourself some idiosyncrasy if your other big influence to draw from is afro-beat. The four-piece have snark, and their 2017 EP Gaoler begins with a track "Trust Cops" that sounds un-sturdy and ugly, with the headiness of a protest, giving you the impression of satire. It's clever, and Le mal is an album that pulls no punches. The rigid drum groove on opening track “Tapis” is interjected by atonal quacking, the squawking akin to roostering bird noises and tampered recordings of people rambling in French. Does it make sense? No, and that’s the best part. It’s body music in a new fashioned sense, make whatever primal movements you want and start chanting along with the mantras on “Patio Monday” if you want.
(Glitterbeat)
North African Music / Industrial Rock
Ifriqiyya Électrique are a unique collective. They are formed by two travellers whose trip to Tunisia provided them both a juvenating spiritual awakening and new connections to North African musicians who shared the same ambitions that they did, eventually spawning their debut Rûwâhîne in 2017 that merges the seemingly unlikely worlds of North African traditionals with noisy, clattering industrial rock. Their vibratos enchant the air while the ground underneath is abrasive and menacing, yet intoxicating from the power of rhythm alone. Laylet el Booree is laser-focused in comparison to their debut — less hopping down branches of a stylistic mind-map or adventurous narrative, and more for finding the few cool things they want to do and sticking to them for the entirety of the album. Thankfully these ‘things’ are bloody good. Deep inside I feel this urge for a cathartic release. It feels like freedom! It feels like unlikely worlds have merged and gates have been opened! How something can make you wanna swing your hips side to side and take shelter for the upcoming world war is something I cannot fathom, but there’s even a sense of solidarity in this music too. Non-Western musical fusion is magical and makes you wish you paid more attention.
(Speak & Spell)
Bit Music, Death Industrial, Glitch
If the genre of power electronics is supposed to be repulsive, harsh, disturbing, violent... then what would powerless electronics sound like?
I described Powerless Electronics' (formed of duo G and Q) music earlier in the year as the sounds of breaking through the physical make-up of the world. This was in response to their self-titled debut (Powerless Electronics), but I think their follow-up here manages to expand in this in ways that push the minimal abstractions to their limit, truly. The strongest asset is that despite the harsh sonic palette, the composition resembles familiar styles — the second track sounds like the equivalent of a big brass band performing a free jazz piece, and the ostinato on track three is a hooky loop that whimsically floats up, up, up and then down, down down, disorienting you by breaking musical rules that you expect to be followed. It keeps you guessing with these discordant melodies that follow a rhythmic pattern but refuse to meet you halfway.
There's surely a lot more, but these are the ten that I've chosen to shine a spotlight on for now. Until then, see you next time!
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