BEST MUSIC 2013
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I'm well aware that making year end lists is an exercise in futility, setting frames on music where there is none, freezing a number on a pleasure that fluctuates daily, and arrogantly put theoretical words on the works of artists that are otherwise intimate and personal. But it is also more simple than that: just a moment of the year where I enjoy going back on a tremendous amount of tunes that changed my daily life at some points. Like gathering your whole family around a turkey, chit chat about the last 50 weeks or so. The landscape is vast, and I try to find some familiarity and surprises, something to bring back home and frame on my wall.
It was a big year for music. I have to say that number 1 to 10 on this list toggled quite a few times, before I chose to award a few tenth of additional points to originality rather than sheer beauty. The Playlist is here. Listen at will.
These are some sounds that I wish to cast appart from the rest of my favoritew albums. "Sounds" is the good word, as these albums revere more into drone/electro/ambient/texture/glitches territories. Or something like that. (click here)
What a year ! At the opposite of 2012, where half of my favorited music was from newbies I never heard about before, including Alt-J, 2013 was kind of an all-stars indie battle, with some of my favorite bands putting out strong come-back albums, all in maturity, vision and re-invention. A sophomore album that is really good is meant to rejoice the crowds and the critiques equally, making of 2013 a quite unanymous year, where everybody agrees on the bests and worsts come back stories (it is also true for your 24th album, Mr. Bowie). I never thought Kanye would top his 2010 dark and twisted Masterpiece. I never thought I would jump onboard so eagerly with Vampire Weekend and Arctic Monkeys, two of indie-rock's hailed geniuses that never made it for me in the past (include the Black Keys here too). I was not even over listening to Kendrick and The Tallest Man On Earth when Suuns, We Are Wolves and Doldrums dropped some of the best music of the year, all from their independent studios of Montreal. Foals was there early too, all loud and controlled, all pleasant. How satisfying is it too, when two of the best commercial performances of the year, Justin Timberlake and Daft Punk, also ended up giving out some of their greatest music to date, both 7 and 8 years since their last proper output.
Then there were also the unexpected surprises, all hitting so hard, in the right spot, all in newness and timeless swag. 75 Albums !?!? Is that like that new Academy Awards' Best Picture list that seems to nominate everything the year had released that is not Fast and Furious or Paranormal Activity ?? My list is not exactly the Best of All The Music of The Whole Year, but simply a list of all the records I played to my ears, that made me want more of the same, and yeah it means A LOT of records. All of this was on repeat at one point or the other, and I have to stress that everything in the top 30 spots got me obsessed to the point that I feel most of these records are stronger then some of the top 10 of 2012. (click here)
