You are reading my albums-of-the-year countdown. I'm live-blogging 36 blog posts over two days. I've got a Tesco delivery arriving tonight because I haven't got time to go out. Just blog, blog, blog. Two full days. And I'm loving it. Here is the penultimate pick of Top 50 albums before we move into the Top 20.
Wordcolour: The trees were buzzing, and the grass. (Houndstooth)
What a poetic title. This London composer’s debut album utilises voice and performance artists to produce a beautifully beguiling assortment of charming, characterful instruments. Its spoken elements come across as a bit Mike Oldfield, and that’s no bad thing these days. Complex IDM smooths into something more perspex thanks to super-smooth production. And ‘I am sixty years old and trying salvia for the very first time’ is the best track title in this entire countdown.
Civilistjävel!: Järnnätter (FELT)
“Is there truth to the long-lost recordings backstory of Sweden’s Civilistjävel!, or is it smoke and mirrors? This debut on Copenhagen’s FELT opens with the suffering metallic gasps of a rusty iron lung. Warm microbeats bring to mind the mouldy bass fuzz of 1990s B12 and Autechre... Backstory or no backstory, what smokable smoke and lickable mirrors.”
Tangerine Dream: Raum (Kscope)
“The album is built on Froese’s old Cubase arrangements alongside an Otari tape archive stretching back 45 years. Not that it’s easy to tell the old from the new: this is a superbly kinetic flow of symphonic instrumentals… It might be a long time since, say, the more primal sequences of Phaeda, but with music this positive and transformative, Edgar Froese’s Dream is unlikely to be forgotten.”
This is part of a series of the Best Electronic Music Albums of 2022. Read it all here.
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