Over the past few years, DiS has used the annual year-end 'listing season' to highlight a few of our writers' favourite records that, for one reason or another, slipped through the cracks and failed to garner the attention they deserved. In these incre»
...a collection of folky musings and ghostly field recordings. These are songs about apple groves and howling winds, of thatched roofs, bleating sheep and people greeting you in the street. The songs capture the essence of the Old Country, the sacred cow of emigrants: idealized by those who’ll never get it back, neglecting to recall the reasons why they left it all behind. And yet, Fogarty is a young man still.»
The World Is A House On Fire is the perfect soundtrack for all the places you've never been and all the films you've never seen, nor never will. »
Distance. Separation. Sadness. Pain. A spark of wit, a soaring voice and a lonely piano. Ladies and gentlemen, the great lost masterpiece of 2012.»
...it feels rather like the inner workings of some vast machine - solid, heavy, intricate, and tactile. The textures and patterns here are hypnotic, and on higher volumes, truly punishing. It is most definitely of 2012, and I mean that in the best way possible. It feels like the latest entry in a nebulous timeline, the result of years of influences, from electronic music and beyond. At the same time, whether intentionally or not, this menacing whirlpool of a record feels apt for a year in which international fear and confusion seemed to reach unprecedented levels.»
As the music media clamour to look relevant by tenuously finding three future records to lump together and call a trend or scene for 2013, early signs are they've decided it is time for rock to return. This is obviously ridiculous and suggests bass guitars and Brylcream have laid about being unloved for a decade, but even so it'd be a shame if a bunch of great records released this year got penalised for being ahead of the curve.»
2012: The Year Bagpipes Broke?»
“Every record I’ve participated in has been idea-driven, rather than any desire to be punk or something more general than that. I find music is most interesting when there’s a very specific idea at the heart of a song or an album or someone’s work as a whole.” - Slim Twig»
Never taking an eye off the dancefloor, the Philadelphian songwriter’s Brainfeeder debut, Totem, is rushing glitch-driven dystopic pop, swept on a bleakly orchestral breeze of electronic swarm, sheepgut and ivory. There’s an artiness of composition that’s intrusive and ambiguous, but never too pleased with itself. From the psychological, K-holing tumble of ‘Footless’ to ‘Object Mob’’s suppressive, jazzy clutter, there’s an inward curiosity that’s expertly tethered to a basic structure of forward-momentum.»
Over the past few years, DiS has used the annual year-end 'listing season' to highlight a few of our writers favourite records that for one reason or another, slipped through the cracks and failed to garner the attention they deserved. »
Initially, there was plenty of reasons to steer clear of this record – mainly the fact that Josh Tillman’s previous solo albums had been so, so dull, the drummer from Fleet Foxes stripping away the wide-eyed wonder of his bandmates to sing po-faced folk songs. Then, there was the story behind Fear Fun, that Tillman was depressed with his lot, quit the day job, moved to LA and had decided to write a novel. Clean shaven, short-haired and wearing a fairly preposterous pseudonym, it seemed that Tillman had given up a cushty job in a massively successful band to plow a particularly lonely furrow. »
The sound of one man noodling around in a very fluid way on a guitar? It doesn’t, on the surface, sound terribly appealing. And yet it is, and it works.... Like all the best ambient music, you can stick The Union / A Hem of Evening on in the background and leave it to run on pleasantly as you ignore it, but it works best when you crank it up and let if fully come to life. There are beautifully meandering guitar labyrinths to get lost in here, and becoming thoroughly lost is a pleasure... The Union / A Hem of Evening is one of the real treasures of 2012.»
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