25 Best Albums of 2018 (#25–11)
Dutch metal thrashers, Korean Art-pop and the world’s scariest saxophone. This was the music of 2018.
25. De Oord- FLUISTERAARS & TURIA
Well, I can definatively say I wasn’t expecting this to be my metal record of the year. This two song split from Dutch thrashers FLUISTERAARS & TURIA (I really want to put a few more “A”s in there so it reads FLUISTERAAAAAAAAAAAARS) is one of the most engrossing metal releases I’ve heard all decade. Side-A “Oeverloos” opens with a headstomping churn that wouldn’t have felt out of place on an Alice in Chains album before expanding into a grinding wall of sound. “Aan den Golven der Aarde Geofferd” slips into more traditional black metal territories, but refuses to sit still for a moment, riding blast beats and brutal guitars. Both are testiments to how much metal has mutated this decade, and how proudly some bands can plumb its depths for more riches.
24. No Time For Heavy Hearts- Mauro Meloni
“Wish we were like trees she said/ We’d grow strong and green toward the sky”
Look, my time in Argentina definately influenced the list, but had you placed No Time for Heavy Hearts on my plate last year, next year or in 2505, I would have loved it regaurdless of time or geography. This mini-LP from Buenos Aires folky-boy Mauro Meloni is the coziest country album since Joan Shelley’s radient self-titled. In a year that often felt outright hostile toward hope, Meloni’s keening tenor, laced with deep wells of nostalgia, was a welcome respite. Listen to the mounring country cry of “Rearview” and tell me Nashville doesn’t need a little Argentine flair.
23. 무너지기 (Crumbling)- 공중도둑 [Mid-Air Thief]
Pychadelic-indie-pop-folk-electronica from Korea. The internet is generally terrible, but this would have been some lost gem in any other era. Now we get to enjoy it in all its goofy glory. No one seems to know who is exactly behind Mid-Air Thief, but they don’t seem to be mysterious on purpose. It’s much too fun for that sort of studious background. Instead, it sounds like following a hyperactive kid as they play with their action figures, settings, allanences and themes shifting without notice, but still contained in one magical world.
22. How to Socialise and Make Friends- Camp Cope
“And he expected that I was gonna fail and run back/ Well fuck that”
It’s a tough gig when just being a woman in rock is a political statement unto itself. We should be well, well passed this, but continuing issues of sexual assault and harassment from bands and record executive alike, as well as the ever present misogyny in mainstream rock, makes it a hard proposition. But Camp Cope uses the opposition as fuel for the fire. On “The Opener” the Aussie quartet screams through Georgia “Maq” McDonald’s freight train of a voice. “Tell me again how there just aren’t that many girls in the music scene/ It’s another all-male tour preaching equality,” she hollers. But between the larger political statements are a series of small details, devastating portraits of tour life and anxiety. But that’s McDonald’s greatest strength, making it all more personal.
21. On Dark Horses- Emma Ruth Rundle
“What Devil, what shape is shifting now?”
Emma Ruth Rundle’s continuing exploration of gothic-country descends as her label mate Chelsea Wolfe dives deeper into black metal mythologies. It’s a good balance, with Rundle following in the footsteps of, not just Wolfe, but the scorched sound of Earth and King Dude. Hard to say if On Dark Horses is her most desolate album, but it’s certainly her most personal. She wields anthemic crushers (“Fever Dreams”) and stark meditations (“Races”) with equal ease, letting On Dark Horses morph from song to song ratcheting up the tension even between the songs, every note waiting with bated breath for when everything will burst with an Explosions in the Sky like climax. And with the remarkably empathetic “You Don’t Have to Cry” closing the album, Rundle’s made a frightfully dark record with pockets of light shining through.
20. Hereditary- Colin Stetson
There’s an argument to be made that Colin Stetson has been making perfect scary movie fodder for his whole career. When I interviewed him he said he wanted to make an “insectile tone” with his woodwinds and goddamn did he ever do it. Hereditary, even sans context with the terrifying movie it’s attached to, goes down as one of the most horrifying albums of the decade, alongside Ben Frost’s A U O R A and The Haxan Cloak’s Excavation. But both of those nutters were using synths and guitars. Stetson creates the swirl of dread with saxophone and clarinet. He’s a wizard I tell you. A dark, to be feared, wizard.
19. Aviary- Julia Holter
“I am in love, what can I do…there is nothing else.”
Love’s a scary thing, few artists pinpoint just how maddening and labyrinthine it can be. But, leave it to chamber scholar Julia Holter to properly make her own labyrinth of terrifying beauty to explain her churning emotions. Aviary was described “the cacophony of the mind in a melting world” and actually lives up to it. Over a mammoth hour and a half, Holter explores freaked out jazz improvisations, mutated indie-pop, lounging classical scores, midnight odes to lost loves and, legitimately, maybe the most beautiful song made this decade. Early in the album she yelps “hysteria!” with glee, inviting you to simply succumb to the madness and the beauty.
18. DAYTONA- Pusha-T
“A rapper turned trapper can’t morph into us/ But a trapper turned rapper can morph into Puff”
Pusha’s previous full-lengths felt overstuffed. He was at his best over lean, weird beats that seem stripped down to the tendons. All this pop excess? It just got in the way of Pusha’s stark flow. And, finally, he grinded out the bullshitless album he always needed. Clocking in at just 21 minutes, Pusha dominated Drake, rocked the best Kanye beats in recent memory and unequivocally proved himself the dopest man in the room on Daytona.
If you tack on the 2010s’ “Ether,” “Story of Adidon,” and you’ve got the grittiest, nastiest rap album made this decade. Throwing parties that rattle entire city blocks one second, pulling some John Wick shit on his enemies the next, Daytona was delivered with the undeniable confidence that didn’t need any flash or gloss. It was self-evident. “How can you relate when you’ve never been great?” Pusha once growled, and Daytona wasn’t so much a burst of distance between him and the competition but lapping every rapper around him.
17. Third- Nathan Salsburg
On last year’s finest folk album, Joan Shelley’s stormy guitar work and honeycomb voice was matched by the fluttering strings of partner in crime Nathan Salsburg. But playing second fiddle (second six string?) to Shelley didn’t suit Salsburg, he needed to get out his own tunes. The appropriately titled Third album from Salsburg is virtuosic without being wanky. A hard balance to find in the world of solo guitar. But his homespun, folky sound is charming and entrancing first, impossibly impressive after.
16. Childqueen- Kadhja Bonet
“Every morning there’s a chance to renew.”
Karen Carpenter transported to a psychedelic Eden. Count me in. Kadhja Bonet is one of the few musicians that really can be called a generational talent. Channeling her inner-Stevie Wonder, she played nearly every note on Childqueen and showed off the sort of stunning pipes that seem impossible to naturally get in the era of autotune. The opening coo of “Joy” seems teleported in from a California pleasure palace of the Inherent Vice variety, “Delphine” matches its titular mystic with alluring aplom and the hard-nosed funk of “Mother Maybe” is a frightening reminder that Bonet can rock harder than 90% of actual rock bands. And, quick reminder, Childqueen is her full length debut.
15. Dionysus- Dead Can Dance
A scholarly look at the god of wine and madness, researching his cult then using a made up language as the primary form of exploration. Even for Dead Can Dance these are some heady heights. But the duo are less here to an academic thesis and much more in the mood to get your body moving. For Dionysus was the god of debauchery after all, and it would be a disservice to him not to fully embrace the lust, the insanity and movement that comes with him.
Split into two “Acts” Dionysus does evoke majestic, terrifying images of secluded forests, priestess chanting through bloody rituals and a breakdown of sanity through song. It’s a thrilling journey to take, just make sure you don’t get too lost in the hedonism….
14. Animal- Ainda Dúo
“Quiebro al extrano/ Que habita en mi/ No es nesesario/ Para seguir”
Hey, North America, the southerners are outpacing us in Indie-pop. We’re falling behind!
While living in Buenos Aires, Ainda Dúo was the second best show I saw (after David Byrne so, no small feat). Their delicate, yet regal form of indie/folk/pop was a sweeping as it was charming. Esmeralda’s classically influenced voice strides confidently across a slate of stately pianos and fuzzy guitars while Yago’s quivering pipes affect the sound with a sense of nostalgia and childhood. In the indie-arms race, we may have already lost.
13. 2012–2017- A.A.L. (Against All Logic)
“Oooooooh you’re gonna love me”
Brown graduate, political firebrand, genre-inventor, there’s a lot of labels of sterling quality you can throw on Nicolas Jarr. But, lately, dancefloor prankster hasn’t been one. Thankfully, 2012–2017 came to reprove that Jarr’s heady electronic music could still be outrageously fun. Best of all, these are throwaway tracks, recorded over the implied titular time span between “real” projects. And, yet, this might be Jarr’s finest work period. It’s a surreally joyous experience, Jarr playing dress up in the clothes of Daft Punk, Aphex Twin and U.K. rave and often improving on the original intent.
But that might be too serious for this album. This is more about feeling than anything else. The James Brown worthy groove of “This Old House is All I Have” needs no explanation, nor does the gossamer gorgeousness of “I Never Dream.” And the chimpmonked funk of “Know You” is so self-explanatory, it feels dumb as rocks. But that’s Jarr’s best trick, you can feel him grinning behind every beat.
12. Light It Up- Moon Hooch
Ok, ok, ok it’s an EP. It barely lasts 10 minutes. It should not be on this list. But I’ll be damned if it doesn’t get some recognition, because I didn’t have more fun with any other piece of music that Light it Up in 2018.
This is the closest we’ll get in studio to recrating Moon Hooch’s hallucinatory live show. Over three songs, the trio shows off every uncanny ability they have, from EDM through two saxaphones, punishing jazz moshpits and anthemic fist pumpers. Look, it’s going to take you longer to read this than just listen to the damn thing. Just be warned, place all breakable objects far, far away from your flailing limbs when this thing hits.
11. Cocoa Sugar- Young Fathers
“Good men are strange, bad men are obvious”
“I’ve never seen wicked men face the fear/ I’ve only seen brave men face the tears” so starts the conflicted, convoluted, combustible Cocoa Sugar. Despite being Young Father’s most accessible album yet, it’s a record on the edge, constantly fighting with its own DNA, threatening to burst apart from internal tension at any moment. So it goes from a group that fuses hip-hop, soul, electronic, boy band and rap together.
The catchiest song on Cocoa Sugar barely has any words on it, it’s most regal sings “I wanna be king until I am,” it’s most anthemic admits mortality and failure. But Young Fathers don’t just live in the limbo, they thrive in it. Coca Sugar feels startlingly, terrifyingly alive in the inbetween.
