Another year, another year end list! 2017 was another great year for music. We’d like to share with you our favourites of the year!
We have two ground rules for staff on this:
-Staff aren’t allowed to list Neptoon label releases. Obviously we love them, otherwise we wouldn’t have put them out! (We didn’t release any this year, so it doesn’t apply anyways)
-No listing anything from your own label or band (meaning Tim can’t list anything from Kingfisher Bluez, Ben can’t list storc, Josh can’t list Fashionism, Night People, or his Easy Money reissue).
We’re still waiting to get everyones list, but here’s a couple to start. We’ll add them as we get them.
Ben
I kind of cheated by making two separate top 10 lists this year…but it was even hard narrowing it down to that! Both lists are in alphabetical order.
New titles:
-Ball – S/T
-Boris – Dear
-Chelsea Wolfe – Hiss Spun
–King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – 4 way tie since they put out four killer albums: Flying Microtonal Banana / Murder Of The Universe / Sketches of Brunswick East / Polygondwanaland / and probably the 5th soon to be released album too….(The fifth album didn’t quite make the cut for me).
–The Murlocs – Old Locomotive
-Peach Pit – Being So Normal
–Power Trip – Nightmare Logic
–Ride – Weather Diaries
–Thundercat – Drunk
–Ty Segall – S/T
Reissues/Compilations:
–Brown Acid Fourth/Fifth Trip
–Function Underground (Now Again)
–Golem – Orion Awakes
–The Heads – Relaxing With…
–Jackie Shane – Any Other Way
–Marijata – This Is Marijata
–Mulatu Astatke – Mulatu of Ethiopia
–The Stooges – Highlights From the Funhouse Sessions
–Tapiman – Hard Drive
–Warfaring Strangers: Acid Nightmares
Josh
There are lots of good punk records this year. Usually I have a hard time but this became pretty easy to sort out. In no particular order, here some top new punk/hardcore releases that are mandatory listens for 2017.
-Amyl and the Sniffers – Big Attraction/Giddy up 12″ (Homeless)
-Institute – Subordination 12″ (Sacred Bones)
-Exit Order – Seed of Hysteria 12″ (La Vida Es Un Mus)
-Haram – When You Have Won You Have Lost 12″ (La Vida Es Un Mus)
-Lebenden Toten – Static 12″ (Iron Lung)
-Typical Girls Compilation – Volume 2 12″ (Emotional Response)
-Dauðyflin – Ofbeldi 12″ (Iron Lung)
-Total Control – Laughing at the System 12″ (Alter)
-Pura Manía – Cerebros Punk 12″ (CVRecs/Hysteria)
-Tarantula – S/T 7″ (Lengua Armada Discos)
Honorable mentions: Rixe, Rata Negra, Barcelona, Midnight
Peter
-Wolf Alice – Visions of a Life
-LCD Soundsystem – American Dream
-Emily Haines – Choir of the Mind
-Robyn Hitchcock – S/T
-Slowdive – S/T
-Louise Burns – Young Mopes
-David Gilmour – Live at Pompeii
-Destroyer – Ken
-Noel Gallagher – Who Build The Moon?
-Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie
Rob
-Bjork – Utopia
-Cigarettes After Sex – S/T
-Gentle Party – Jouska
-Jackie Shane – Any Other Way
-Just A Season – All The Stars Are Out Tonight
-The Orange Kyte – Grow It Right
-Peach Pit – Being So Normal
-Ride – Weather Diaries
-Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings – Soul Of A Woman
-Slowdive – S/T
Sky
1. Arcade Fire – Everything Now
2. Björk – Utopia
3. Brian Eno – Reflection
4. Godspeed! You Black Emporer – Luciferian Towers
5. Mister Heavenly – Boxing the Moonlight
6. Mount Eerie – A Crow Looked at Me
7. Sparks – Hippopotamus
8. Sufjan Stevens + Others – Planetarium
9. Timber Timbre – Sincerely, Future Pollution
10. Visible Cloaks – Reassamblage
Tim
Here are my top ten albums from 2017 (I excluded artists I’ve released music for- just as an arbitrary way to cut this list down to only 10)
1 – Slowdive – S/T
2- Sleaford Mods – English Tapas
3- Kendrick Lamar – Damn
4- Rainer Maria – S/T
5- Los Campesinos- Sick Scenes
6- Saint Etienne – Home Counties
7- Jens Lekman – Life Will See You Now
8- Madeline Kenney – Night Night at the First Landing
9- Harvest Ministers – Back to Harbour
10- Cigarettes After Sex – S/T
