My Favourite Albums Of 2013
10. Phosphorescent - Muchacho
Matthew Houck has always been an interesting artist, sometimes going full on country (as with his Willie Nelson cover album, To Willie) and sometimes as the oh-so-cool lo-fi alternative rock guy. My favourite guise I must admit has been the latter, on his breakthrough album Pride (particularly the incredible track A Picture Of Our Torn Up Praise) but his latest album seems to marry the two sides in probably his most successful effort overall. It's certainly his most shiny album so far, although his world-weary voice is still there, but this time his love of Americana is tempered with electronic instrumentation, from drum patterns to synth lines. The songwriting is as strong and melodic as every and still full of heartbreak and maybe a few drunken nights. This is certainly Houck's best record since Pride.
9. My Bloody Valentine - mbv
It was such an exciting moment when My Bloody Valentine's much delayed and long talked about comeback album was released with no warning on February 2 earlier this year. Only available to buy on the band's newly relaunched website not surprisingly it immediately crashed as eager fans who have been waiting over 20 years for new My Bloody Valentine music (and quite a few who weren't even born when the band last released an album) tried in vain to download it (legally) at long last. I remember, way past midnight, finally getting it and finally hearing that beautiful noise once again and it was amazing that an album that essentially continued on from where Loveless left off could still sound so daring and contemporary and also was so complete and coherent despite being recorded over such a long period of time. So much better than I ever expected, here's hoping it won't take so long for the next one.
8. Anna Calvi - One Breath
I really wanted to include Anna Calvi, the icy cool British singer/songwriter and ace guitarist, because I unfairly overlooked her striking debut in my end of year list in 2011 despite listening to it quite a bit when it first came out. This isn't just to make up for that though as her second album, One Breath, to my ears anyway, is even better than her Mercury-nominated debut. There's something really cinematic about Calvi's dark and atmospheric music, particularly the lead single from the album, Eliza, which was accompanied by a sinister video of Calvi running through a dark forest chasing a mysterious figure that looked like herself. But that's Calvi's music all over, both chilling and thrilling, with gothic, flamenco and classical influences. Britain has a great reputation for producing incredible female artists and Calvi is as unique and brilliant as they come, plus the fact that she can play a mean guitar doesn't hurt either.
7. Haim - Days Are Gone
When I saw Haim live at the end of last year it cost me just £8 and was in the tiny King's College Student Union hall. The band, made up of three sisters, only had an EP and a couple of singles under their belt, which we lucky few who had cottoned on early loved and sang along to, much to their surprise and delight. A year on and things couldn't be more different for the hugely likeable trio. Now they are bonafide pop stars, with their huge selling debut album available to buy in just about every supermarket (the sign of success these days) and a tour in big venues that sold out in minutes. One listen to their first album, Days Are Gone, though and you'll understand why: this is pop music at its absolute best. It's danceable yet smart, musically clever drawing its influence from everything from R&B, 70s soft rock to 80s synth pop to current alternative music, yet simple and melodic enough for everyone to sing along to. After hearing their first EP, Forever, back in the summer of 2012, this album seemed to live up to its title and take forever to come along but it really was worth it.
6. Waxahatchee - Cerulean Salt
I really don't know much about Katie Crutchfield, the singer-songwriter behind the alternative rock act Waxahatchee but her second album, Cerulean Salt really struck a nerve with me. It may be because it sounds so utterly 90s, like the female American indie albums from the likes of Juliana Hatfield and Mary Timony that meant so much to me in my teen years. There's been quite a few lately obviously influenced by that era (and I don't blame them, it was a great time for brilliant and strong female alternative artists) from Speedy Ortiz to Joanna Gruesome, but Waxahatchee's album was my favourite of the bunch. It's a girl on a electric guitar, sometimes with just a little or sometimes no accompaniment and sometimes on a fuzze-out grungy 90s trip, featuring melodic hooks and a cool lo-fi feel. There's no doubt that Crutchfield is one to watch if this album is anything to go by.
5. Neko Case - The Worse Things Get The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight The More I Love You
Alt-country goddess Neko Case has never made a bad album: her incomparable voice, her cool attitude, that dark noirish style and smart sense of humour, as well as an individual sense of song structure that makes everything she writes sound unique yet completely classic, has borne her well. Each album she has made has been inimitable and distinct onto its self and her latest is no exception. When I first heard it though it was evident that this was one of the saddest and darkest albums she has made yet, albeit with moments of light and quirky humour, so it came as no surprise to me to hear that it was written after the death of Case's parents and her beloved grandmother and a period of depression that left her unable to write or do anything. "My mother, she did not love me" she heartbreakingly sings on Nearly Midnight Honolulu. It's such a brutal feeling you can't help but be moved by her pain: it's achingly stark and beautiful. Not that everything is downbeat, the loud and fast I'm A Man is triumphant and unrepentant and shows Neko's punk rock roots brilliantly. This is a simply wonderful record and if there's beauty in grief this is surely it.
4. David Bowie - The Next Day
I really didn't think we would ever see another record from Bowie, he seemed so happily retired and content to let his extraordinary legacy speak for itself. So when he suddenly announced The Next Day, which he had been secretly working on, out of the blue no one could have been happier than me. And it really didn't disappoint either. I had the single, The Stars (Are Out Tonight), on repeat for a week until the album itself emerged and then the entire thing was filled with so many treats it was impossible not to play them all over and over. It's incredible that at 66 and after ten years since his last release that Bowie could come back and still be so brilliant and so relevant, sounding both contemporary and classic, and most of all completely him. I thought Bowie's noughties releases, Heathen and Reality, were both rather underrated in the Bowie catalogue but The Next Day is undoubtedly, for me anyway, the best of them all. It's so good to have him back.
3. Janelle Monáe – The Electric Lady
Some people complained that The Electric Lady was overlong or not as good as her debut, The ArchAndroid, but for me it was her best release yet and interesting, clever and innovative throughout. There's something utterly compelling and inspiring about Monáe: I love the way she dresses in cool, stylish uniforms not allowing herself to be exploited in anyway, completely in control of her style and her artistry; I love the fact that this album is the third in her epic seven-part concept series called Metropolis, using sci-fi visions about the future to make a commentary on the politics in the present day; and I love her brilliant blend of so many different styles of music, from classical to rock to R&B to rap to alternative to psychedelic pop, to make a sound that is entirely her own. It's no wonder so many other great artists have lined up to work with her on this record including Erykah Badu, Solange and best of all, Prince, on one of my favourite tracks on the album, Givin Em What They Love. In fact I think Prince is probably the easiest artist to compare her to in terms of defying categorisation and her pure talent in performing. I really can't wait to see her live.
2. Angel Olsen - Half Way Home
This album actually came out at the end of 2012 in the US but since it didn't make it to these shores until 2013 it happily makes this list. Certainly I had never even heard of Angel Olsen until a friend recommended her to me in August and at that point I had just missed her UK shows. Luckily I got to see her live supporting Neko Case and her voice and beautiful intensity was everything I had hoped it would be, even if it wasn't really appreciated by the blinkered Neko fans in the audience. There's something about this record that reminds me of early Cat Power, it's certainly as stark and achingly lovely but it's her rich and emotion-filled voice that hits me in the heart. I hate to overuse the word as I'm wont to do but it is quite simply, beautiful. Sometimes she sounds like sad Appalachian folk singer, sometimes a lonesome country queen, other times an icy cool alternative artist. Her voice goes from a wail to a croon sometimes within the space of a line and sings of lost love, isolation and old age, and it's all as sad, graceful and captivating as it sounds. Angel Olsen is easily my favourite discovery of the year.
1. Alela Diane - About Farewell
Despite the fact that I've never been divorced (or even married), some of my favourite albums - the ones that have meant the most to me - have strangely enough been divorce albums. I'm talking Dylan's Blood On The Tracks, Mark Olson's Salvation Blues, Richard & Linda Thompson's Shoot Out The Lights and of course, Fleetwood Mac's Rumours. Now I can add to the list Alela Diane's stunningly moving and achingly honest About Farewell, all about her split from husband and bandmate Tom Bevitori (and from the sound of the lyrics, due to his infidelity). "I've heard that the brightest lights cast the biggest shadows, so honey I've got to let you go" she sings on the title track and it remains bleak, introspective and utterly captivating throughout its ten perfect tracks. This is Alela's Blue: it is very much in mood and feel a successor to Joni Mitchell's starkly beautiful masterpiece. Like that record the instruments are simple and sparse, adding to the sorrowful atmosphere. Musically it harks back to Alela's first record, The Pirate's Gospel, which was just her and a guitar, but here she is more mature and world-weary. It's a delicate and moving album and while it may not be groundbreaking, it's raw with emotion and full of gorgeous melodies. Thankfully Alela herself has moved on and is happily in a new relationship with her first baby born only a few months after this album came out. I imagine it's a difficult record for her now to listen to but I think it is easily her best one yet. Sometimes the best art really is borne out of the worst pain.
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