Best electronic albums of 2018: this bit mentions a monkey and belly-dancing

I hope you're enjoying my countdown of the best albums of 2018, and that you're bitterly resenting these constant interruptions of albums that didn't make the final 20.

I missed a couple of old reissues. Smith & Mighty reminded us of how good they were on Ashley Road Sessions 88-94 (Punch Drunk). And following the rerelease of his classic classic ‘If You’re Into It, I’m Out of It’, covered elsewhere in these blog posts, Christoph De Babalon’s brought us some drum ‘n’ bass rarities with Exquisite Angst (A Colourful Storm). Listen to that awkward drum loop of Are You Talking To Me? – no wonder Thom Yorke counted himself as a fan of De Babalon’s work.

Now other stuff. The summer vibes were strong in the laid-back Detroit cuts of Jay Daniel’s Tala (Watusi High), while I enjoyed the wonky jazz of Palanquin Bearing Monkey on Yoshinori Hayashi’s Ambivalence (Smalltown Supersound). Ooo yes, and I can't forget the mystical ritualism of Aisha Devi's DNA Feelings (Houndstooth) – a strange but fascinating listen.

Also not quite making the cut were the belly-dancing beats of TSVI’s Inner Worlds (Nervous Horizon), which mixed Sufi percussion with grubby grime rhythms. Finally for this section, the caustic sound of Renick Bell’s Turning Points (Seagrave) led the charge for code-based algorave, while Tadd ‘Dabrye’ Mullinix had the entire history of rave on his mind when making X-Altera’s X-Altera (Ghostly International), throwing a lot of jungle and techno at the wall, making the wall sound really good.





Scroll all of the best 2018 electronic albums by clicking here.