5. A Sunny Day In Glasgow
Sea When Absent
Are you looking for a band to fill your shoegaze needs for the next 23 years while My Bloody Valentine goes on another hiatus? Boy, have I got the band for you. A Sunny Day In Glasgow take big risks and get big rewards with unconventional structure and a cacophony of synths and guitars. The vocal deliveries of Annie Fredrickson and Jen Goma make for a beautiful juxtaposition, cooing against the wall of noise--Christ-figures calming the tempest.
Listen:
"In Love With Useless (The Timeless Geometry In The Tradition of Passing)"
"MTLOV (Minor Keys)"
4. Protomartyr
Under Color of Official Right
Protomartyr are trying their very hardest to just be Joy Division...and they succeed gloriously. From Joe Casey's baritone, sombre vocals, to the strangely high-pitched basslines, to the staccato, hard-strung guitar chords that sound like they aren't vibrating enough, this band is perfecting the "depression punk" that Ian Curtis et. al. invented all those years ago. They even count Iggy Pop as one of their biggest influences (though, who doesn't these days?). The music is sensational, the album structure is tight. There is no room for error here, and Protomartyr make none.
Listen:
"Ain't So Simple"
"Pagans"
3. Swans
To Be Kind
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn, ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn, ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn, ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn, ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn. But seriously, this album is insane. You have to listen to truly understand the call of the Yellow King.
Listen:
"A Little God In My Hands"
"Oxygen"
2. St. Vincent
St. Vincent
"The hardest thing to do is be yourself." Annie Clark a.k.a. St. Vincent has apparently been telling herself this for years, and she was finally allowed to do so on her fourth album. Given, though, how amazing her previous work has been to this point when she was putting on the masks of others, we could not imagine the wonder and beauty contained in what St Vincent's true self would be. Her emotion is more heartfelt, the strangeness of the sounds more ominous, and every song is crucially and brutally brought forth in fantastic aural color. Annie has earned the right to call herself: St. Vincent.
Listen:
"Birth In Reverse"
"Digital Witness"
1. EMA
The Future's Void
When listening to EMA's sophomore album, you find yourself immersed in an overwhelming sense of dread. Though this is not the point of the album, it can't help but constantly tell you just how little we are compared to our creations. The internet is bigger than us, the government is bigger than us, Apple is bigger than us. Let us join together in the celebration of AI, by drowning in a wash of noise and beautiful violence. The album title, from a grammatical standpoint, is infuriatingly vague: is the future void, or does the future posses a void? How can the latter be possible; how can an abstraction of time own a vacuum of space? Perhaps there is hope; the future is void, but waiting to be filled with our lives and inventions--a way of saying "the future is open." However EMA meant for the title to be interpreted, it is obvious the foreboding mood and oppressive sound says, "here is the end, here is nothing." The future is indeed void, and the void stares back.
Listen:
"Satellites"
"So Blonde"
"Smoulder"
"When She Comes"
