Viernes 1 Jun 2012, 4:51

Plenty of artists have slipped under my radar. From the time I stopped buying the NME (about 1997) to about 2007, I listened pretty much exclusively to dance music and vinyl became my thing by the turn of the millennium. I didn't buy too many albums, had no idea what Pitchfork or Drowned In Sound were and had never heard the word "hipster". So it was no shock that there was a whole world of music waiting from the point, about 5 years ago, when I took up my old listening habits again. Given the normal release cycle for artists, it was taking a few years for some bands to even register but, by 2012, I thought that surely there was nothing new to pick up on - unless it was a brand new artist, of course. How wrong I was. Enter Chromatics, Chairlift, School of Seven Bells and a few others. So, pleasant surprises has been one theme of the past 6 months.

Another has been the resurgence of established British bands. I'm talking about Orbital, Saint Etienne and Hot Chip (who can now surely call themselves 'established' after a brilliant fifth album in 8 years, possibly their best). On the same theme, all it would take now to complete 2012 is a return-to-form for Underworld with their Olympics project (well, the music is coming), a cheeky Autechre album (unlikely) and a breathtaking return from Boards Of Canada (less likely than that).

The last theme, though, is that the bar has been raised. 2012 is a much, much better year than 2011 already.

1. Chromatics - Kill For Love
A very strong contender for album of the year, Kill For Love is full of gems. Main man Johnny Jewel said that he actually held back a whole stack of pop tunes from this album so that it didn't sound too samey. Whilst I wouldn't have had a problem with that, I wonder if the presence of the longer instrumental tracks over the 90-minute running time gives much needed space for the pop tunes to breathe?
Chromatics open with a bold statement - a cover of Neil Young's Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black), renamed simply Into The Black. You get Chromatics's trademark guitar sound, very much a Disintegration-era The Cure sound, Ruth Radalet's half-angelic, half-bored vocals and, just when you were starting to wonder why the album has been described as Italo-disco, in come the electronics to see the tune out. Kill For Love follows, opening with a fanfare of electronics, and is a very tight, very melodic New Order / Depeche Mode-style tune. You'd think it would have to go downhill from there but the first 6 tracks are, in fact, excellent. I adore the simplicity of Lady, the mournfulness of Back From The Grave and the glam rock style of The Page. These Streets Will Never Look The Same has been a real grower for me, the most Italo-disco thing on the album. It opens with an Edge Of Seventeen guitar lick, piano and metronomic rhythm, before a heavily auto-tuned male voice (not sure if it's Jewel himself) sings of heartbreak - but the best thing about it is the build from about 4 minutes in, with arpeggiated synths taking us home. Well, you couldn't have Italo-disco without arpeggio, could you?
Another major highlight comes near the end of the album: in The River, Ruth Radalet is waiting for a lost love, all alone is a big, beautiful, desolate world; the imagery of the moon, a freight train, headlights, streets and the river capture this perfectly, and her vocals combine with the guitar line beautifully. It's essentially the same tune as Symmetry's Streets Of Fire, and the desert sunset/sunrise scene on the cover art of Themes For An Imaginary Film always come to mind when I hear the tune.
If I was being picky, I'd say that, overall, the lyrics of Kill For Love are sometimes slightly cliché, but I've always valued melody, rhythm and emotional weight of the music over words (my favourite band is New Order, after all). Kill For Love oozes all of these things.

2. Burial - Kindred
My friend Electrophile888 has convinced me that EP's deserve their place on 'best albums…' lists; in the age of the MP3, with its focus on individual tracks, singles don't mean as much anymore and EP's would risk being overlooked if they weren't held up against albums. Kindred more than stands up to the rest. Burial's sound has developed; it's a fuller sound, with stronger hints of techno and (it pains me to use this acronym) IDM. The three tracks are very different but equally engaging. Kindred is Burial's dubstep sound taken forward a few paces, Loner is reminiscent of early 90's The Black Dog and Ashtray Wasp is… well, it's that good that it defies description.

3. Chairlift - Something
I'm just listening to this album again after a gap of a few months and it's even better than I remember. Something has consistently good songs, most of which have distinct mid-to-late 80's instrumentation - but the subtler, more intriguing kind, with riffing bass and percussion flourishes, rather than the overblown and bland 'big drums' sound that Summer Camp hit upon last year. It reminds me a little bit of early A-ha, in some ways. I can't get enough of Caroline Polachek's voice and I also love the awkwardness of the album art. This awkwardness also crops up on a couple of the best songs: I Belong In Your Arms and Amanaemonesia both seem to have verses and choruses stitched together but both parts work so well in isolation that it doesn't matter. The chorus to Amanaemonesia is stunning - Polachek swooping and soaring with her vocal, and great mood-changing keyboard stabs. Elsewhere, Turning does a pretty great impression of a Robin Guthrie-produced Lush. There's good variety across the 11 tracks and the only average tune is Cool As A Fire which, tellingly, is the only point on Something where Chairlift try to play it straight.

4. Orbital - Wonky
Have you ever heard a comeback album this good? Wonky exceeds expectations (I'd have settled for less) and manages to blend a little bit of every stage of Orbital's career with some forward-leaning tunes. I've read one or two reviews of this album on RYM that are critical of Orbital's dated style. I don't mind that, having been a fan pretty much from the start, but I think this overlooks the the Hartnoll brothers' experimentation with dubstep (Beelzedub) and, er, wonky (Wonky). Both tracks work for me, especially Wonky. Orbital have always dipped into other genres of dance music, a sign of their punk attitude, and it keeps them vibrant. They've been trying to perfect the short-form track for a few albums now and, for the first time, it works really well here. The standout tracks Straight Sun and Where Is It Going?, for example, waste no time getting going and don't hang around either. I do get the feeling that the looking-back, looking-forward approach on Wonky is a one-off and I expect the next album to converge more on a particular direction. I just hope they don't take another 8 years to release it!

5. Beach House - Bloom
Bloom is very, very good. There is something mystifying about the melodies that Alex Scally and Victoria Legrand conjure up. They are instantly gratifying, yet also draw you in, revealing more on each listen. Tunes like Wishes, for example, only sink in after a few plays whereas others, like Wild, were instantaneous. As an aside, I used to own a basic Casio keyboard in the late 1980's and recognise the rhythms from both Wild and Lazuli. I think they were called 'rock 2' and 'rock 1', unless I'm mistaken…somebody out there must know!
Bloom also sounds very very similar to Teen Dream. I'm not being lazy in comparing the two albums; at times there are specific sounds and motifs that mimic tunes from Teen Dream - compare New Year and Norway, for example. On the one hand, this is no bad thing: their last album was a classic, in my opinion and, since the strength of their music is based on melody rather than production, a similar sounding collection of brilliant tunes is good enough for me. On the other hand, I think that Beach House now find themselves at a crossroads. They can either continue to remake the same album, for diminishing returns, or can try something new.

6. Hot Chip - In Our Heads
I'm only a few listens in and already I'm thinking that this could possibly be Hot Chip's best album, topping even The Warning. I've realised that I much prefer Hot Chip when they have one eye on the dancefloor, rather than when they churn out the ballads. The balance betwen the two is, of course, the hallmark of any decent (and traditional) pop act, and Hot Chip are well-established now. So much so that they're skilled enough to mimic both Blur (Look At Where We Are) and Paul McCartney (Always Been Your Love) when they want to. What I really like about In Our Heads is that on top of a salvo of strong opening tracks (just as on previous albums), there are some brilliant, longer tunes too in Flutes and Let Me Be Him.

7. John Talabot - ƒin
This is a slow-burner. I was surprised to see that I've played the album about 16 times since the spring because I've never really gone crazy about it. Maybe Talabot's secret is that he's consistently good at what he does and understands subtlety. Apart from one standout (Destiny), nothing else is astonishing but there's lots of flowing excellence, with a run of 6 tracks in the middle of the album, from Journeys to H.O.R.S.E. that work beautifully.

8. School Of Seven Bells - Ghostory
Right, let's get this out of the way first: Ghostory sounds like Curve. I happen to love early Curve, although haven't listened to anything beyond Doppelgänger because I didn't really take to it as much as their first 3 EP's. Nor have I heard any School Of Seven Bells before Ghostory. But what I have heard is a very close match; it's uncanny. My last.fm friend alin1 doesn't think it matters, and he's a bigger fan of both bands than I am, so I'm not going to argue.
He's got a point, because this is a great album. It is constructed from the bottom-up. Tight, shivering, crashing rhythms. Lush, driving, melodic bass. Shoegazing, jangling, chiming guitars. Double-tracked, breathy, angelic yet steely vocals. Fragments of melody, but the best thing about the tunes is the combination of these fragments into a layered whole. Lyrics I have hardly noticed, but then I was never going to. This isn't the kind of music you need lyrics for; you just need the voice. The Night has every single ingredient I've just mentioned, and the bell chimes of Benjamin Curtis's guitar mark out the space in the tune. Lafaye is nothing short of a great pop song, with a lovely, purring low end and a chorus that lets Alejandra Deheza stretch her voice out; it's a liberating sound. Low Times is another highlight for me. It reverberates with energy and urgency, driven by pulsing bass (on the off-beat, as with many a trance tune) and Alejandra's spelling lesson. The only slight misstep is the My Bloody Valentine-impersonating When You Sing, which follows the formula of Soon just a bit too closely.

9. Liars - WIXIW
I'm a newcomer to Liars, really, having only dipped into Sisterworld on Spotify and I was put off by the jarring blasts of guitar. WIXIW is a different kind of sound, dominated by claustrophobic electronics, clipped rhythms, brooding bass, ghostly guitars and Angus Andrew's desolate voice. After low-key beginnings, the first highlight is the single, No.1 Against The Rush, with it's muted funk and ascending synth line. A Ring On Every Finger is close to Matthew Dear territory and WIXIW is the most oppressive, discordant tune on the album. His And Mine Sensations is another very good track with a tight, minimal groove, underwater bass and a brilliant picked guitar line. It's a coherent album that nods in the direction of Kid A and that's no bad thing.

10. Saint Etienne - Words And Music By Saint Etienne
After a gap of 7 years, Saint Etienne prove that not only do they still have it, but that they are enjoying their music as much as ever. This is a concept album about what pop music means to people who are absorbed in the culture - or rather, what it means (and meant) to Bob, Pete and Sarah, and their 80's references overlap with mine. It's probably the most 'pop' album they've made and Tim Powell and Nick Coler (ex-Xenomania) and Richard X have a hand in 8 of the tracks, including the perfect pop of Tonight, DJ and When I Was Seventeen. They're not to everybody's tastes, and maybe you had to grow up with them, I'm not sure, but I don't think Saint Etienne will ever do any wrong, for me.