the aural year at PIAIL towers.

If you’re reading this then you’ve probably got end of year lists coming out of your ears by now. So rather than go over those albums which have been bandied about, we will endorse said well-loved music (Fleet Foxes, MGMT, TVOTR, Bon Iver), and respond with a few lesser appreciated albums and tracks. What we noted about 2008 was a decline in end of year lists agreement with each other; more obscurities have crept their way onto EOY lists, marking a tidal shift in listening habits away from the album. So here’s five records that we could both agree are awesome and (sometimes) overlooked; then five from Ben and five from Jen*:

The Bug - London Zoo (Ninja Tune)
As Ben burbled on about on Blog Fresh Radio, this record is a fantastic conflation of London black music styles - the undulations of ragga, soca and dancehall, the paranoid murk of dubstep, the scatterbrained lurch of grime, and a glimpse of 2-step’s cheesy soul, all of it glued with a bombed-out production style.

The Bug - Angry (feat. Tippa Irie)

Fuck Buttons - Street Horrsing (ATP)
Fuck Buttons’ euphoric noise blew us away; colourful ear-bleach, arresting and disarming the senses to overload. To make a sweeping generalisation, this year has seen massacred synths, feedback and static play a bigger part in music that’s generally considered ‘accessible’.   

Philip Jeck - Sand (Touch)
Jeck’s individualistic scratched manipulation came together wondrously for Sand, in which forgotten memories of sound peep through into ones consciousness. We get the feeling this was more talked about than actually heard this year - make sure you seek it out.

Philip Jeck - Chime Again

Herbie Hancock et al - Hear, O Israel (Jonny Records)
The cream of post-bop NY jazz laying down a composition by a 17-year old composer, for a Jewish prayer ceremony, with a rabbi and Jewish maidens respectively reciting scripture and warbling over the top of it, in 1968. You couldn’t make it up, and it’s ridiculously compelling and beautiful.

Herbie Hancock et al - Micho Mocho

Various - African Scream Contest (Analog Africa)
2008 was characterised by a number of persistencies, most notably Africa. The audio produce of the continent rose to prominence in Western circles through a number of channels, in particular, the Nigeria Special compilations from Soundways Records; African infused pop from Vampire Weekend; and glowing Afro-hop from Esau Mwamwaya. Best of all though was African Scream Contest, a compilation which contains occasional screaming, but mostly revels in the continent’s melodic and rhythmic glory; an acutely superior funk played out in brass and percussion, unfamiliar vocal stylings, electric guitars and primitive synths.   

Napo De Mi Amor Et Ses Black Devils - Leki Santchi

Ben’s picks
(he won paper scissors stone and gets to go first.)

Ecstatic Sunshine - Way
Hugely underrated and overlooked set of drones vs pretty guitars - uplifting, intricate, heaving.

Ecstatic Sunshine - B

Janelle Monae - Metropolis: The Chase Suite
Little Richard reincarnated as a female cyborg for first installment of four-piece concept album. Makes the American Apparel sock hop of VV Brown look very tedious indeed.

Janelle Monae - Sincerely, Jane.

Motorpsycho - Little Lucid Moments
Epic, soulful Scando prog - chucks everything at a wall and it all sticks.

Motorpsycho - Year Zero (A Damage Report)

Foals - Antidotes
Africa done with mathmatical minds and absolute clarity, and doesn’t forget the heart.

Foals - Two Steps, Twice

Dennis Wilson - Pacific Ocean Blue
Just essential - California heat haze rising off every song.

Dennis Wilson - Time

Jen’s picks
(she lost paper scissors stone and has to go last.)

Luomo - Convival (Huume)
Glossy minimal hooks; sweet electronic understatement; gnawing beats.

Luomo - If I Can’t

Alexander Tucker - Portal (ATP)
Free-folk chanting; humble, persistent, cyclic spectacular.

Alexander Tucker - Here

Abe Vigoda - Skeleton
Tropicali-punk. lo-fi jangling & fractious hooks.

Abe Vigoda - Dead City/Waste Wilderness

Liquid Liquid - Slip In & Out Of Phenomenon
Post and pre; old but new to me; the start of the cricket music made into a grinding tribal epic. Rhythmic structured delirium.

Liquid Liquid - Optimo

Growing - Lateral (The Social Registry)
Churning; flexing; scoured and repainted. drones: all channels occupied.

Growing - Swell

Other Notables include: Aeroplane; History Clock Records; Italians Do It Better; Ratatat; Watussi; El Guincho; “Blind”; Atlas Sound; Man Man; Sublime Frequencies; Larkin Grimm; Free Blood; Arch M; Gang Gang Dance (we got here late); “Viva La Vida”; Dent May; Earth; Excepter; the Four Tet remix of Born Ruffians; Sir Victor Uwaifo; vintage pop pastiche by Richard Swift and Jamie Lidell; ”Fascination”; Julianna Barwick.

Of course there were disappointments, but in the spirit of a fresh new year we turn over a new leaf and forget the failures; the promises which weren’t delivered; that which missed the mark and that which quashed expectations. The sounds of 2009 are already upon us, may they blossom and flourish in our new media utopia…

*we placed no restrictions on our lists other than music released in 2008. Hence the compilations and reissues.