Best electronic albums of 2020: these special mentions will not be intimidated by a mop

It's time for a penultimate set of special mentions, consisting of albums I flipping loved but couldn't find space for in my final Top 25.

This lot are filed in my notes as, and I quote, "jungle / dirty". As with previous notes, it's a misnomer. All of the "jungle" is drum 'n' bass. And it's hardly dirty: it's not as if I'm going to sloosh this lot with a mop to make them sound better.

Calibre rummaged in his archives yet again for Shelflife Six (Signature) a selection of sharp-suited soulful drum 'n' bass pleasers. Really good fun, and a superb entry album if you're investigating the busy beats of d&b music. On similar lines, the ever-reliable J Majik produced another corker in the form of Always Be (Infrared), his breezy Bukem sounds delivered with a warm hug (copyright Electronic Sound issue umpteen).

dgoHn's Undesignated Proximate (Love Love Records) was a darker drum 'n' bass listen, but no less liquid. It's just the liquid was a heavily fortified sherry rather than oil: just listen to that woozy swagger of Robin's Windmill. It was great to see the return of Krust, member of Roni Size’s Reprazent's back in the day. The Edge of Everything (Crosstown Rebels) was a thrilling listen: lots of robust rolling beats with synths so threatening, you half expect them to pounce on you the moment you drop your guard.

Moving away from drum 'n' bass now. I suppose this is the "dirty" stuff. Pinch's astonishing new album was, as I wrote in one review, "UK bass music with a nocturnal gloom": the wobbling basslines on Reality Tunnels (Tectonic) seemed to emanate from somewhere deep in our psyche. Gábor Lázár's more minimal Source (Planet Mu) was equally bassy and wobbly, his cut-down production style playing ping-pong with frequencies with skilful abandon.

Finally, Cylob was a busy bunny this year: one of the albums he put out was the squelchy One Less Pitch (Cylob Industries) with acid so corrugated, you could make it into a shed. It's a strangely tense listen, but then again everything's strangely tense, so I'm not complaining. *mops self*

 

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Best electronic albums of 2020: please do not throw these special mentions off a cliff

Throughout this countdown, there will be many albums that didn't make the final list but still deserve to be festooned with garlands and cocaine and fresh puppies. Welcome to the first selection of 'special mentions'.

Firstly, I try not to include compilations in my Best Albums list, but I have to give a tip of the hat to the blistering Alterity from Houndstooth. In a piece of especially quality journalism, I described this album in Electronic Sound as sounding "like a bunch of synth modules being chucked off a cliff. Like, properly chucked with a run-up and everything." That was meant to be a good thing.

Another compilation worth a nod is PlanetMµ25. The sauciest thing to ever come out of Worcester, Mike Paradinas's Planet Mu celebrates its silver anniversary with some of my favourite artists, including Ital Tek, Gábor Lázár and Bogdan Raczynski. Right good treat.

Back to artist albums. Here are some dark, dubby delights that deserve a special mention despite not making my final 25. Following rereleases of his early albums, it was great to get some glorious new glitch from Pole in Fading (Mute). This was utterly hypnotic, as was Recondite's haunting Dwell (Ghostly International), an album which took one minimal monotone and turned it into something as immersive as falling into a pool of Diet Pepsi (I really like Diet Pepsi).

Let's also not forget Life Cycles (Cultivated Electronics), a lively collection of old rusted electro from the archives of Orbital’s early label-mates The Advent (1995's Elements of Life is still worth a listen). Finland's Morphology achieved a vintage feel too on the echoing electronics of Horta Proxima (FireScope Records). I'm amazed this didn't make my final 25. And finally, I loved the haze that emanated the smoked-out techno knees-up going on at the heart of Matt Karmil's ace STS371 (Smalltown Supersound).

More special mentions to come. And more countdown to come. Stay tuned.

 

 

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Best electronic albums of 2018: eleven

11 – Gábor Lázár – Unfold (The Death of Rave)

Hungarian sound-sculptor Gábor Lázár ambushes rave, throws it into the trunk of his car, drives into space, grabs it by the scruff of its neck and hurls it into another galaxy.

Unfold takes rave's gurn-face and turns into art. Alongside the synthetic electro of Squeeze, there’s strangled rave sirens (Elastic) and drunkenly wandering chord stabs (Repeater), all of which points towards club culture – yet far beyond it too.

It has the overdriven aesthetic of Rustie and Errorsmith, with all the buttons turned up to red, and the minimalism of Lorenzo Senni, with all the buttons turned down to, er, a low-level colour. White? Black? Not brown. Let's not talk about brown again.

Most remarkably, and this has probably not been said before, Gábor Lázár can drive a fricking car into space. Shove that down your submarine pipe, Elon Musk.

If you're following this blog live, that's it for today. I'm going to take a nice rest, then fire up the countdown again at 9am tomorrow, with the top ten best electronic albums of 2018. Yes!



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