Album of the year 2020

2020 Best

* Kelpe - Run With The Floating, Weightless Slowness

Gentle, bucolic sync synth meditations that were much needed in the early months of 2020.

* KhalilH2OP - Seid

Chaotic, cut up urban soundscapes that feel genuinely futuristic.

* Leo Takami - Felis Cats and Silence

A quiet, joyful interplay of jazz guitar and ambient interludes that really work together.

* Nathan Fake - Blizzards

Shuffled, shifting beats and great sound design.

* Nubo - Nu Vision

Intricate Japanese neon sound collage out of left field.

* V. Kristoff - Sydra

If anything deserves to be called dreampunk it’s this.

* Autechre - Sign

Autechre makes their prettiest and most enjoyable album in years.

* Domenique Dumont - People on Sunday

Electronic listening music of the first order.

* Fools - Fools Harp, Vol. 1

Grizzly Bear’s drummer tries his hand at library music thing with excellent results.

* Hotspring - Obit for Sunshade

Ruminating post rock daydreams.

* Jam City - Pillowland

Noisy pop anthems with tenacious hooks.

* Kevin Morby - Sundowner

The apocalyptic American folk record somebody had to make this year.

* Dylan Henner - The Invention of the Human

Hypnotic vocal collage.

* Quicksails - Blue Rise

Prog electronics that’s not afraid to get noisy to get the point across.

Don't forget Freddie gibbs & the Alchemist - Alfredo!

  On 12/2/2020 at 5:16 PM, Extralife said:

Extralife AOTYs for 2020

I think our tastes overlap a fair bit. Will check some of these out. Thanks for linking everything.

  On 12/24/2020 at 10:45 AM, thumbass said:

Don't forget Freddie gibbs & the Alchemist - Alfredo!

Boldy James had a record with Alchemist this year too I think. I really liked The Versace Tapes that came out this year but it has a different producer who made the beats.

  On 11/22/2020 at 6:30 AM, Ayya Khema said:

Kettel- Dwingeloo Life Extension.  https://kettel.bandcamp.com/track/bear-creek . This is not the ambient album I expected from Kettel, much darker then what he normally goes for. Very unique ambient album, never heard anything quite like it. https://kettel.bandcamp.com/album/dwingeloo-life-extension

 

This is good. Thanks for the tip. 

Glad to read I’m not the only one around here to love Jam City / his 2020 LP. Such a talented producer.

oh shit new d-lo album list just dropped. here's  most everything new that i listened to this year

exceedingly good

Kruder & Dorfmeister - 1995 (how can anyone hate this.. just such a great vibe)

Alva Noto - Xerrox Volume 4

Chromeo - Quarantine Casanova

Atom TM - (grew on me a lot, sounds amazing)

Aleksi Perälä - Spectrum Series (esp. 4, 5, 6) (coincidentally here is my Colundi Playlist choice selections of ALL colundi material for those overwhelmed)

Autechre - Plus

Monolake- Archaeopteryx

good and with projected listening beyond 2020

The Orb - Abolition of the Royal Familia (was not expecting to like it a lot in the end)

Michael Vallera - Window In (really great Fennesz style stuff)

Haircuts for Men - 1985 and 1989

Wagon Christ - Recepticon

Luke Vibert Presents Amen Andrews

Regis - Hidden In This is The Light That You Miss

Daniel Avery - Love + Light (really stupid title tho)

COMPUTER DATA - Seele

Autechre - Sign

Morphology - Horta Proxima

dgoHn - Undesignated Proximate

Cut Copy - Freeze, Night

Hearts Basking - Phantom Touch

I begrudgingly admit that I liked it a lot

Tame Impala - The Slow Rush

just fine thanks

Omar Souleyman - Shlon

The JD’s - The Texas Chain Store Manager

Aril Brikha - Dance of a Trillion Stars

Roger and Brian Eno - Mixing Colours

East Man - Prole Art Threat

Oneohtrix Point Never - Magic

good, clean, disposable fun

Against All Logic - 2017-2019

RX-101 - Serenity

Volruptus - First Contact

Bogdan Raczynski - Debt EP

Luke Vibert Presents Modern Rave

Khruangbin - Mordechai

Robert Hood - Mirror Man

others may like but not really for me, also possibly not good

Squarepusher - Be Up A Hello

Vladislav Delay - Rakka

Cylob - All the stuff that came out this year lol

interesting and worth a listen

Konx-om-Pax - Return to Cascada

Overcoats - The Fight

The Fear Ratio - They Can’t Be Saved

Sufjan Stevens and Lowell Brams - Aporia

Luke Vibert Presents Rave Hop 

Vladislav Delay - 500 Push Up

Daniel Avery, Alessandro Cortini - Illusion of Time

Actress - Karma & Desire

Krust - The Edge of Everything

Loraine James - Nothing EP

Hyph11e - Aperture

underwhelming / overrated / disappointing 

Grimes - Miss Anthropocene

Aleksi Perälä - Oscillation 1 & 2

Ital Tek - Outland

Upsammy - zoom

Rian Treanor - File Under UK Metaplasm (could have been great and I loved the last one but just missed the mark for me)

Machinedrum - A View of U

if this was 2013 i would like it

Yaeji - What We Drew

Com Truise - In Decay Too 

whatever / same as it ever was / forgettable

Oval - Scis

Nathan Fake - Blizzards

Thundercat - It is what it is (title says it all really)

Atom TM, Jacek Sienkiewicz - Stal

DMX Krew - Ghost Bubbles

Shinichi Atobe - Yes

Too fucking christian

Sufjan Stevens - The Ascension

lol

The Weeknd - After Hours

Yves Tumor - Heaven To A Tortured Mind

Fiona Apple - Fetch The Bolt Cutters

Best Rereleases

Monolake - Gobi EP 2020 Edit

Prince - Sign O The Times (This was amazing, the unreleased shit rocked)

FSOL - Cascade 2020 (does this go here??)

  On 12/24/2020 at 4:45 PM, dr lopez said:

oh shit new d-lo album list just dropped. here's  most everything new that i listened to this year

 

exceedingly good

Kruder & Dorfmeister - 1995 (how can anyone hate this.. just such a great vibe)

Alva Noto - Xerrox Volume 4

Chromeo - Quarantine Casanova

Atom TM - (grew on me a lot, sounds amazing)

Aleksi Perälä - Spectrum Series (esp. 4, 5, 6) (coincidentally here is my Colundi Playlist choice selections of ALL colundi material for those overwhelmed)

Autechre - Plus

Monolake- Archaeopteryx

 

good and with projected listening beyond 2020

The Orb - Abolition of the Royal Familia (was not expecting to like it a lot in the end)

Michael Vallera - Window In (really great Fennesz style stuff)

Haircuts for Men - 1985 and 1989

Wagon Christ - Recepticon

Luke Vibert Presents Amen Andrews

Regis - Hidden In This is The Light That You Miss

Daniel Avery - Love + Light (really stupid title tho)

COMPUTER DATA - Seele

Autechre - Sign

Morphology - Horta Proxima

dgoHn - Undesignated Proximate

Cut Copy - Freeze, Night

Hearts Basking - Phantom Touch

 

I begrudgingly admit that I liked it a lot

Tame Impala - The Slow Rush

 

just fine thanks

Omar Souleyman - Shlon

The JD’s - The Texas Chain Store Manager

Aril Brikha - Dance of a Trillion Stars

Roger and Brian Eno - Mixing Colours

East Man - Prole Art Threat

Oneohtrix Point Never - Magic

 

good, clean, disposable fun

Against All Logic - 2017-2019

RX-101 - Serenity

Volruptus - First Contact

Bogdan Raczynski - Debt EP

Luke Vibert Presents Modern Rave

Khruangbin - Mordechai

Robert Hood - Mirror Man

 

others may like but not really for me, also possibly not good

Squarepusher - Be Up A Hello

Vladislav Delay - Rakka

Cylob - All the stuff that came out this year lol

 

interesting and worth a listen

Konx-om-Pax - Return to Cascada

Overcoats - The Fight

The Fear Ratio - They Can’t Be Saved

Sufjan Stevens and Lowell Brams - Aporia

Luke Vibert Presents Rave Hop 

Vladislav Delay - 500 Push Up

Daniel Avery, Alessandro Cortini - Illusion of Time

Actress - Karma & Desire

Trust - The Edge of Everything

Loraine James - Nothing EP

Hyph11e - Aperture

 

underwhelming / overrated / disappointing 

Grimes - Miss Anthropocene

Aleksi Perälä - Oscillation 1 & 2

Ital Tek - Outland

Upsammy - zoom

Rian Treanor - File Under UK Metaplasm (could have been great and I loved the last one but just missed the mark for me)

Machinedrum - A View of U

 

if this was 2013 i would like it

Yaeji - What We Drew

Com Truise - In Decay Too 

 

whatever / same as it ever was / forgettable

Oval - Scis

Nathan Fake - Blizzards

Thundercat - It is what it is (title says it all really)

Atom TM, Jacek Sienkiewicz - Stal

DMX Krew - Ghost Bubbles

Shinichi Atobe - Yes

 

Too fucking christian

Sufjan Stevens - The Ascension

 

lol

The Weeknd - After Hours

Yves Tumor - Heaven To A Tortured Mind

Fiona Apple - Fetch The Bolt Cutters

 

Best Rereleases

Monolake - Gobi EP 2020 Edit

Prince - Sign O The Times (This was amazing, the unreleased shit rocked)

FSOL - Cascade 2020 (does this go here??)

Expand  

Ah I forgot to add The Orb to my list. That was surprisingly good.

Haven’t listened to Chromeo in years - might need to give this a listen.

there was a lot of talk about albums "we needed in the pandemic" from the music press and the only one that was actually what we needed was chromeo's:  a funny, pithy set of tunes turning covid lemons into lemonade. Some hilarious lines in there and as ever, some fun grooves.

BEST ALBUM: Hate Forest - Hour of the Centaur

THE REST:

Gunna - Wunna

Arca - Kick(!)

Machinedrum - A view of you

The alchemist - the price of tea in china / alfredo

The autechre - sugn/plis

Andrea - Ritorno

Oneothrix Point Never - Magic

Paysage d'Hiver - im wald

Urfaust - Teufelsgheist

Vladislav delay - Rakka

Zora Jones - Ten Billion Angels

yves Tumor - heaven to a tortured mind

Against all logic 2017-2019

Ka - descendants of cain

Gabor Lazar - Source

Thundercat - It is what it is

  On 12/24/2020 at 11:08 PM, Ivan Ooze said:

 

Gunna - Wunna

 

Tell me it ain't so Ivan....

  On 12/24/2020 at 11:13 PM, thumbass said:

Tell me it ain't so Ivan....

I skeet on her chest, she kissin my ball

dr lopez dry humping that new tame impala, i should get a pass for skeeting with gunna

You should both get a cooldown from music if you guys think those albums have any quality to them, sorry boys.

  On 12/24/2020 at 11:43 PM, thumbass said:

You should both get a cooldown from music if you guys think those albums have any quality to them, sorry boys.

nah

woah cool lots of stuff to check out with these new posts. 
 

@dr lopez have you checked out atom's post  releases from this year? (.9 and .99999999999999 or whatever?)

  On 12/24/2020 at 1:31 PM, Nil said:

Glad to read I’m not the only one around here to love Jam City / his 2020 LP. Such a talented producer.

Yeah that was one of my most pleasant surprises for me since none of his earlier stuff did much for me. His new direction is great. 

  On 12/24/2020 at 11:48 PM, Ivan Ooze said:

nah

Was just joking around of coursee,

Alsooo

merry christmas everyone!

  On 12/24/2020 at 1:31 PM, Nil said:

Glad to read I’m not the only one around here to love Jam City / his 2020 LP. Such a talented producer.

This is the Jam City who produced a good chunk of the Kelela album, right? Will need to give that a listen then.

I have another late entry that I don't think has been mentioned in here:

Yawning Man - Live at Giant Rock

it's still Clown Core. guys.. sorry. 

  On 12/25/2020 at 9:57 AM, manmower said:

This is the Jam City who produced a good chunk of the Kelela album, right? Will need to give that a listen then.

Yes. I believe he supervised the whole LP production, and wrote/produced some of the tunes (such as LMK <3), right ? A new Kelela album would be absolutely lovely.

  On 12/25/2020 at 12:33 AM, kuniklo said:

Yeah that was one of my most pleasant surprises for me since none of his earlier stuff did much for me. His new direction is great. 

May I suggest revisting his previous output now that you've gelled with Pillowland ? No matter how different his LPs are from each other, Pillowland feels like a logical evolution IMO.

+1 for a new Kelela in 2021

Against All Logic, anyone?

  On 12/26/2020 at 2:50 PM, thumbass said:

Against All Logic, anyone?

this and telas were great