Best electronic albums of 2019: lovely earworm soup

For the last time in this best albums countdown, let's park the rollercoaster for a moment and smell the candyfloss. Here's a longlist of music heavyweights who failed to make the final cut: they're totally good and brilliant, but I kicked them to the kerb like a sassy Simon Cowell.

First up in this best-of-the-rest is Kornél Kovács and the thoroughly likeable Stockholm Marathon (Studio Barnhus). What starts as sugar-sweet vocal pop becomes a sun-glazed soup of instrumental  earworm after instrumentalearworm. Not that I'd drink a soup filled with worm ears. It sounds disgusting.

Jacques Greene got his epic on for Dawn Chorus (LuckyMe), which balanced the bright boldness of Jamie Xx and the scuzzed darkness of Clark. Jenny Hval dived into some sparkly electronics on The Practice Of Love (Sacred Bones Records), a seventh studio album fired off while writing a novel – hashtag multitasking. And Signals Into Space (Les Disques du Crépuscule) was the soft-focus return of Ultramarine, techno's answer to Channel 4's Watercolour Challenge.

The ever-filmic Amon Tobin was in an ambient mood on the intricate Fear In A Handful of Dust (Nomark). Flying Lotus was as generous and as overwhelming as ever on Flamagra (Warp Records), a work pepped up with a strange appearance by David Lynch. And although I thought Modeselektor's Who Else (Monkeytown Records) was a mixed affair, there was enough fried gold to make this longlist.

And finally here are some giants of electronic music who I've consumed in small portions in 2019, but haven't absorbed enough to include in my final list. Because I can't knowingly give full recommendations, I shall describe each album with a meaningless simile. James Blake's Assume Form (Universal Music) was like a hot toaster on a day trip to a dog-strewn beach. Hot Chip's A Bath Full of Ecstasy (Domino) was like a hovercraft balancing atop the concept of green. And finally, Metronomy's catchy Metronomy Forever (Because Music) was like a metronome catching the metro with a, er, gnome, um, er, jeez, this is worse than the fruit puns. *destroys computer with chainsaw*





Scroll the full best-of-2019 list here.

Best electronica albums of 2011: numbers 4 to 2

We are approaching the Album Of The Year much in the same way an astronaut with an upside-down map is heading for the sun. By the time you finish reading this blog post, you should be in a position to try and guess the winner of this year’s top accolade.

Meanwhile, let’s check out the nearly gang in our penultimate collection of also-rans. Once that's done, we'll crank up the Top Of The Bleeps theme music with numbers 4 to 2.

[This is part three. Click here for part one. Click here for part two. Click here for part four.]

Some also-rans

I’m very sad to exclude Björk, especially after her triumphant performance of the Attenborough-tastic Biophilia (One Little Indian). She had a Tesla coil for crap’s sake. However, although she is on top of her game right now, it’s not really electronica of the Fat Roland On Electronica variety.

At the very bottom of their game is Paris’s own Justice, whose new album Audio, Video, Disco (Ed Banger) was such a mess, I wasn’t sure if Spinal Tap were having a seizure: at first amusing then just painful and sad. Imagine The Who teaming up with David Guetta. No, it wouldn’t be fantastic, you’re wrong. In 2011, Justice made me cross.

Mark Pritchard and Steve Spacek’s Africa HiTech project was a joy to the ears: 93 Million Miles (Warp) was bristling with bass and bad attitude – but not a top ten spot. Also not in the top ten is Biosphere, whose nuclear-themed concept album N-Plants (Touch) was gorgeous and just okay at the same time, while SBTRKT’s SBTRKT (Young Turks) was filed along with Nero in the grey bin next to my desk marked ‘pop’.

4 - Modeselektor - Monkeytown

In 1998, Thom Yorke threw a rabbit into the headlights and set the standard for guest vocalists on Unkle’s debut Psyence Fiction. It’s remarkable then that he should return all these years later and equal that achievement on Modeselektor’s third album Monkeytown (Monkeytown). It’s not the first time they have worked together, of course, but the tracks Shipwreck and This are hypnotic and beguiling.

Beyond the Yorkie bombs are other highlights: the hotstepping German Clap, the digital urgency of the loping Grillwalker, the emotive melody on the PVT-collaboration Green Light and the absurd hip hop of Pretentious Friends (“the pâté was fabulous!”).

We’re so spoilt with this Berlin duo’s dexterity, confidence and (whisper it) pop sensibilities, it almost seems a shame that the claustrophobic Shipwreck b-side Dull Hull isn’t on show too.

Unstoppable, bass-driven, ear-hugging digitalism: this is the rise of the town of the monkeys. Come on my ‘selektor.

3 - Plaid - Scintilli

Plaid are a duo that arose from godfathers of bleepery The Black Dog and became the techno musician’s techno musician, much in the same way that Stewart Lee is the comedian’s comedian and your great granddad is the racist’s racist.

Until now, Spokes was their best post-1990s album: it had amazing tunes but, unlike actual spokes, didn’t quite hang together as a whole. Scintilli (Warp) is the scintillating icing on the, um, spoke cake.

Opening with jingling guitars, which brings to mind 2001’s Eyen, we’re quickly smothered with choral sorrow and their trademark awkward chord progressions. Eye Robot brings in the fuzzy techno, Thank leads us into the cheery eeriness seen on many a Plaid album and by the fourth track, the anthemnic Dr Who work-out of Unbank, we’re ready for a tea break. The rest of the album careers from sunny dance numbers (African Woods) to sheer strangeness (Talk To Us), but it’s all perfectly Plaid.

This band has spent five years dabbling in other media, most notably for their audio-visual project Greedy Baby, but they have been in danger of seeing their traditional fans drift off. In that respect, Plaid have checked themselves and produced their best album for at least ten years.

2 - Martyn - Ghost People

The Brainfeeder label was the success story of 2010, with important releases from Lorn, Teebs and The Gaslamp Killer, and a crucial partnership with Ninja Tune. They were responsible for the return of Mr Ozio this year and they were even a headline feature in the Guardian a month or two ago.

All along, however, I felt that without a Brainfeeder-labelled album from their godlike founder Flying Lotus (he releases on Warp), they’d never quite crack it. They just needed something... something extra. I don’t know. Something indefinable. A ghost, maybe.

Ghost People (Brainfeeder) is a spectre to behold and should be the album that propels Brainfeeder into the premier league. I’m mixing metaphors again. Martyn has produced an aural dystopia in which shards of rave and techno have darkness cast upon them until they glisten molten musical antimatter.

Popgun could just be bouncy Joy Orbison dubstep with the occasional vocal grunt, but the atmospherics lift the sound into something greater than its parts. The driving Bauplan is so beautifully melodic, you either want to go for a run or a cry. And the choppy We Are You In The Future sounds like the theme music for every techno track ever recorded. Everyone is trying this sound, but Martyn does it best.

I wrestled over the decision whether to make Martyn’s Ghost People my album of the year or not. But no. There is another. A debut album so great, so absorbing, with such unique production, it ought to have every kid with a smidgen of soul mimicking his sound. Stay tuned, dear reader, for my Album Of The Year 2011.

[This is part three. Click here for part one. Click here for part two. Click here for part four.]

Snurvive the snowpocalypse with snowtronica

Fat Roland would like to advise listeners of serious disruptions to music due to the severe weather conditions, which are likely to continue tomorrow. Electronica listeners are advised not to listen to or make tunes except for the most essential artists.

These are those essential artists:

- Anything by The Avalanches (via Stuart Durber)

- Anything by the Chemical Brrrs (geddit? via Isaac Ashe)

- Anything by Max Tundra (via Dirty Protest) 

- Biosphere: Polar Sequences (via Dial)

- Digitonal: Snowflake Vectors (via Dan Brearley)

- For delayed journeys, Faithless: Take The Long Way Home or Miss You Less See You More (via A Strangely Isolated Place)

- Herrmann and Kleine: Catch A Snowflake (via Dan Brearley)

- Joy Electric: Walking In A Winter Wonderland (via John Mark Cullen)

- Leftfield: Melt 

- Mike and Rich: Mr Frosty (via LUDD)

- Moby: Snowball (via Ben Edson) 

- Modeselektor: The White Flash (via Daniel Stirling)

- Monolake - Infinite Snow (see forthcoming album review, prob'lee on Saturday)

- The Orb: Little Fluffy Clouds (of snow. Via Stuart Durber)

- Trentemoller. (While The Cold Winter Waiting, I reckon. Via Isaac Ashe.)

- Various: Tribute To Antarctica (via Mrcopyandpaste)

- Wisp: Frozen Days (via Smucker)

Do add your own snow-themed electronica / IDM in the comments below. Or tweet it and tag it #snowtronica. Together, we can get through this if only we listen to the right music.

Why, H, why did it all have to end?

This week, I have been mostly feasting on Moderat.

Moderat is a portmanteau. A what? Exactly. It's a perfect marriage of two Berlin musicians: the cold, hypnotic Modeselektor (described by the duo as "Russian crunk") and techno entrepreneur Apparat.

They last hammered together an EP, Auf Kosten Der Gesundheit back in 2002, when the world was still newly mourning the demise of Steps. Oh H "Ian" Watkins, where are you now? Sob...

...where was I? Oh yes. Anyhoo, a month or two back, Modeselektor and Apparat picked up their rusty nails and hammered together something much more impressive. A whole Moderat album (pictured).

Moderat is all-analogue, recorded where Bowie put Heroes to tape, and it piddles pop sensibilities up against a drizzle of dubstep and a serious slab of sub-atomic bass woofery.

It is melodic and (yeeks) catchy, and brings to mind Apparat's work with Ellen Allien. The album's got a touch of icicle on its edges, though, and the German rapping may well turn you off when you ogle some of the tracks on their MySpace page.

Like New Years Day to the sound of Autechre

My recent drunken dabbles into the world of art included We Were Spending Precious Time, when some slightly stalky art types followed me around Manchester and documented my journey in an exhibition.

Part of the deal was me writing text for the exhibition, which was cut up and displayed amid a woven route on the wall of Manchester's Green Room.

Here, for the first time is that text. This is exclusive. You may want to write the word 'exclusive' inside a ten pointed star in red marker pen on your computer screen. That's how exclusive this is.

My journey traced recollections of profound silences in music events...

Three music events with three silences: one terrifying, one reflective, and one with its own strange beauty.

We started in the cold desolation of Jersey Street, where I recalled a terrifying clubbing experience at Sankey's Soap. Some, um, medication sent my body temperature into a dangerous downward spiral: the sweaty electro faded to silence as my vision tunnelled and I faced my own mortality. I recovered with the help of a friend and I was dancing again by the end of the night, but it scared me; silence has never felt so lonely, especially in the crowded vitality of Sankey's.

Track this journey: Why not play Modeselektor's 2000007 with the volume turned down?

Our next stop was Nexus Art Cafe on Dale Street. The Christian community Sanctus 1 meets here, and I am their resident DJ. I bed their services with ambient electronica, so whatever is happening -- people chatting, people taking communion, candles being lit -- there is a constant soundtrack of Boards Of Canada, Global Communication and the like. Silence in churches can be filled with fidgety echoes, but when I fade the music in Sanctus 1, the silence seems pronounced and, I hope, more reflective.

Track this journey: Why not play Susumu Yokota's Grass, Tree And Stone with the volume turned down?

We finished our journey on the balcony of Dukes 92 in Castlefield, where I remembered the days after the IRA bomb. The council threw a huge party here, with 808 State, fireworks and 20,000 party people. Other areas of town were windowless and wasted. The empty streets had a strange silence filled with unattended shop alarms -- like New Years Day to the sound of Autechre. The sparkles of glass strewn over concrete made Piccadilly Gardens more beautiful than it will ever be again.

Track this journey: Why not play 808 State's Cubik with the volume turned down?

Reviews: Repeat Repeat, Soma Compilation & Gescom

Woo, I'm still buzzing from seeing Autechre, LFO and Graham Massey on Friday. But more about that later. Have some reviews to keep you going.

>Filter this
Artist: Repeat Repeat
Title: Squints (LP)
Label: Soma
Listen like a mother here

I don't waffle much about 4/4 house music on the Fat Roland blog, but I'm willing to make an exception for Repeat Repeat. Here we have a debut album of hypnotic grooves, with beats that snap and click rather than stamp and punch. It's mesmerising and ever so slightly different from anything you have heard before. As subtle as the film Fargo and as off-kilter too.

>Filter this
Artist: Various
Title: Soma Compilation 2006 (LP)
Label: Soma
Listen like a sister here

And while we're on a Soma tip, this compilation album is the cream of their smooth techno releases from 2006 and therefore is as essential as a badger handbags (which are very essential indeed, especially if you're a badger). Featuring among others Alex Smoke and The (legendary) Black Dog, it's made even better by top techno-nobs Slam and Modeselektor on remix duty. It's a little housey for me, but its quality cannot be underpanted... er, I mean, underestimated.

>Cut off this
Artist: Gescom (a.k.a. Autechre)
Title: Mini Disc (LP)
Label: Touch
Listen like a mad uncle here

I have absolute respect for Autechre, and the fact they released this, the first ever minidisc-only release. In fact, I really like this album because it's the only record I know designed to be played on a 'random' setting, but I absolutely can't recommend it because the Fatblog is all about getting people to salivate over electronic music, and this sequence of 88 short noises just ain't going to get the juices flowing. Having said that, I can't resist giving you the entire track listing here. Deep breath: 1 Cut Begin 2 Cut Begin (Continued) 3 Cut Begin (Continued) 4 Cut Begin (Continued) 5 Cut Begin (Continued) 6 Cut Begin (Continued) 7 Cut Begin (Continued) 8 Amendment 84 9 Helix Shatterproof 10 Newer Beginning 11 Newer Beginning (Continued) 12 Polarized Beam Splitter 13 Polarized Beam Splitter (Continued) 14 Polarized Beam Splitter (Continued) 15 Polarized Beam Splitter (Continued) 16 Polarized Beam Splitter (Continued) 17 Inter 18 R M I Corporate Id 1 19 Pricks 20 Pricks (Continued) 21 Pricks (Continued) 22 Pricks (Continued) 23 Devil 24 Is We 25 Is We (Continued) 26 Dan Dan Dan 27 Dan Dan Dan (Continued) 28 Dan Dan Dan (Continued) 29 Dan Dan Dan (Continued) 30 Shark 31 Shark (Continued) 32 Shark (Continued) 33 Shark (Continued) 34 Shark (Continued) 35 Shark (Continued) 36 Shark (Continued) 37 1D Shapethrower 38 Shoegazer 39 Vermin 40 Vermin (Continued) 41 Vermin (Continued) 42 Hemiplegia 1 43 MCDCC 44 Gortex 45 Alf Sprey 46 Interchangeable World 47 Interchangeable World (Continued) 48 Interchangeable World (Continued) 49 Cranusberg 50 Cranusberg (Continued) 51 Cranusberg (Continued) 52 Raindance 53 Horse 54 New Contact Lense 55 Of Our Time 56 Crepe 57 Crepe (Continued) 58 Crepe (Continued) 59 Crepe (Continued) 60 Wab Wat 61 'MC 62 Peel 63 I G E 64 Knutsford Services 65 Fully 66 Fully (Continued) 67 Squashed to Pureness 68 Squashed to Pureness (Continued) 69 Squashed to Pureness (Continued) 70 Squashed to Pureness (Continued) 71 Yo! DMX Crew 72 Go On 73 Stroyer 2 74 - 75 (Continued) 76 Shep 77 Langue 78 Poke 79 Poke (Continued) 80 Poke (Continued) 81 Poke (Continued) 82 Hemiplegia 2 83 Territory of Usage 84 Territory of Usage (Continued) 85 Tomo 86 Tomo (Continued) 87 R M I Corporate Id 2 88 Pt/Ae. Did you get all that?

Fat Roland recommends Boomkat for your music purchases.