With 2015's midway point (ever so slightly) in the rearview, we've decided to take a look back at what already feels like a banner year for music: two Afro-Cuban twins from Paris wove their traditional music through modern hip-hop and electronic sounds; a solemn UK indie kid waxed gorgeously nostalgic about a golden age of rave he didn't even live through; Southern blues rock got a much-needed injection of Sound & Color; every song on a surprise album (mixtape?) charted on the Billboard Hot 100.
It was all too much for us to boil 2015 down to 25 of the best albums so far, so we cut it where we could reasonably afford to, at 27. And so, without further ado: Exclaim!'s Top 27 Albums of 2015 So Far.
Click next to read through the albums one by one, or use the list below to skip ahead to your favourites.
Exclaim!'s Top 27 Albums of 2015 So Far:
27. Ibeyi
Ibeyi
(XL)
It's not every day that an act emerges who are able to seamlessly blend authenticity with uniqueness, but Ibeyi's self-titled debut did exactly that. You can feel the generations of culture that bedrock this record — Yoruba chants, minimal percussion, Cuban flair — but they're altered, ever so slightly, with subtle electronic elements, so that Ibeyi is undoubtedly a modern record.
Just listen to "River" to see this era-spanning M.O. at work: the track's chanting sits atop a hip-hop beat, and sound as if the two were a commonplace combination. It's this stylistic marriage, along with Naomi and Lisa-Kaindé Diaz's sublime harmonies, that make this one of 2015's best releases so far.
Daryl Keating
26. Torche
Restarter
(Relapse)
Torche's sludge-laden stoner metal is certainly full of weight and fuzz, but the tone and texture that they wield consistently sets them apart from their peers. Where so much sludge goes for gloom, they aim for sweet, hot sunshine; while the guitar tone is still full of tar, it evokes the sticky heat of city asphalt rather than bubbling pitch. Their 2012 album Harmonicraft was a union of profound heaviness with a delicious, sickly sweet pop sensibility and truly unfuckwithable hooks and melodies, as catchy as a wad of gum in your hair.
Restarter, however, ups the ante considerably in terms of depth and heaviness, and the result is something blisteringly infectious but also deliciously doom-laden. "Bishop in Arms" is an exercise in demolition, showcasing positively crushing drums and allowing Steve Brooks the opportunity to really push his vocal performance, while faster and more upbeat bombers like "Blasted" and "Loose Men" prove that they haven't set their pop-inflected tendencies aside, but rather have married it all the more closely with a deep and threatening aggression. Restarter is a record you can't let your guard down around.
Natalie Zina Walschots
25. Buffy Sainte-Marie
Power in the Blood
(True North)
It's highly gratifying to see the long-undervalued Buffy Sainte-Marie receive such a positive response to her new album, Power In The Blood. The fire in the belly of the 74-year-old folk music legend still burns bright, and the record stands as one of the very best of her illustrious career. It's a sprawling and stylistically diverse work, one featuring three different producers (Chris Birkett, Jon Levine and Michael Philip Wojewoda) and an elite list of players. She revisits some of her earlier songs and comes up with strong, politically charged new material.
Call this Buffy a vampire slayer; she takes precise aim at polluters and merchants of corporate greed on "Uranium War" and the title track (a collaboration with Alabama 3). Her voice is as distinctive and potent as ever, equally effective in conveying anger and tenderness, as on the haunting ballad "Ke Sakihitin Awasis."
Kerry Doole
24. METZ
II
(Sub Pop)
With their debut, Toronto's METZ minted a successful, noisy vehicle for navigating concrete jungles of crappy apartments cluttered with rats and empties, and it was heard around the world. For their second record, METZ — the ever-industrious, wilfully abrasive antipreneurs they are —scrutinized their prototype, homed in on its strengths and reprogrammed their particularly prickly Rube Goldberg guitar, drums and bass machine to process a new set of anxieties, knocking asses with a broomstick boot all the while.
METZ are a working band, and even if the soundscape's a little bleak, from the moment they punch the clock to II's end half an hour later, the economy of blood, sweat, abused instruments and battered distortion pedals it demanded pays off by making playgrounds of landfills and spinning lines into circle pits.
Tom Beedham
23. Paradise Lost
The Plague Within
(Century Media)
We've come to realize that when metal bands "go back to their roots," it is, at best, boring and unconvincing. You can go back sonically, but you can't go back to the same headspace you were in as young buck 20-year-olds intent on taking on the world at any cost. Unless you're legendary doom metal band Paradise Lost, that is: on The Plague Within, the band make good on the promise they've been teasing us with over the past couple of almost-return-to-form discs, and the results are amazing.
This album sends shivers down my spine the same way Paradise Lost classics Draconian Times and Shades of God do; the band's rockin', stadium-doom approach to the genre is almost as vital as it's ever been. Couple this stunning album with the latest from guitarist Gregor Mackintosh's doom/death band Vallenfyre, and you'll quickly realize that sometimes old dogs do it best.
Greg Pratt
22. Michael Rault
Living Daylight
(Pirates Blend)
Right from the beginning, Michael Rault's Living Daylight exudes energy and character that isn't found too often in rock today. He's fun, and never really that serious, choosing to poke fun at his sadness with Syd Barrett-esque cuts like "Dancing With Tears In My Eyes."
The grooviness is what makes this record great, as bongo-laden jams like "Real Love (Yeah)" harken back to the high points of glam rock. Rault even leaves room for a quiet, intimate closer with friendship anthem "To All My Friends," which finishes off one of the most solid rock releases of the half-year with style and a nice emotional touch.
Corey Henderson
21. Shamir
Ratchet
(XL)
In many ways, releasing Ratchet as a debut album was a serious gamble. After serving up serious vocals on his well-received Northtown EP, Shamir wisely cribbed from its bouncier cuts to lay down the framework of his first full-length. Then, instead of delivering a homogenous package of electro-disco bangers, he doubled down on the softer cuts as well, making for an eclectic and alluring package.
Combined with his arresting countertenor voice, Ratchet presented Shamir as one of the most unique presences in pop music, one we didn't realize we needed until he showed up fully realized. And as mature as Shamir is for his age, Ratchet shows us a glimpse into the inner workings of today's youth, a combination of disaffected suburban ennui with an infectiously candid spirit.
Scott Simpson
20. Young Fathers
White Men Are Black Men Too
(Big Dada)
To follow their Mercury Prize-winning Dead LP, Young Fathers concocted a bold and vital work that makes a strong argument for the return of the "alternative" tag. From the album's provocatively inclusive title to the Scottish trio's adamant refusal to limit or corral their influences under any recognizable banner, every aspect of their presentation seems designed to act in opposition to compartmentalized thinking. Their melting pot of sound is deeper than TV On the Radio's at their Cookie Mountain best, repurposing tools and re-contextualizing sonic tricks from classic pop, soul, dub, hip-hop and blues as comfortably as they do from punk, metal, experimental, electronic, a myriad global folk sounds and anything else that has crossed their internet-age ears.
What they draw and form from that vast soup of flavours is remarkably harmonious, even in its moments of starkest contrast. Kendrick Lamar may have dropped the year's most masterful genre statement, but no other album is as fiercely dedicated to carving its own path in the contemporary music landscape as White Men Are Black Men Too.
Scott Gray
19. Jessica Pratt
On Your Own Love Again
(Drag City)
Jessica Pratt's whimsical yet intimate sophomore record pulls listeners even deeper into her folk-flecked world. Recorded in apartments in Los Angeles and San Francisco, the four-track recordings that fill On Your Own Love Again bring together the songwriter's humble, close-mic'd whispers, plucked guitar strings and, on at least one occasion, the off-in-the-distance wail of an emergency vehicle.
Simply fascinating are "Strange Melody," which seemingly has Pratt paying homage to the "do do do" passage of Duran Duran's "Rio," and the tape-melting, pitch-shifted qualities of "Jacquelyn in the Background." The album touches on themes of extreme loneliness, with the closing title track capturing dispiritedness perfectly with its pastoral classical guitar and haunted coos. "Back, Baby," however, takes the sting out of solo living with an optimistic pledge to focus on things to come, a necessary move in 2015.
Gregory Adams
18. Blur
The Magic Whip
(Parlophone/Warner)
If there is a motto to attach to Blur's eighth studio album, it's undoubtedly "Good things come to those who wait." After an unlikely reunion in 2009, Blur slowly and carefully made their return without really committing to much other than some large outdoor gigs.
Prompted by a five-day layover in Hong Kong, The Magic Whip isn't merely a comeback album, but one of the band's best yet. It's the soundtrack to a 40-something life, far removed from the days of Britpop and now full of melancholy and reflection, but also bursting at the seams with curiosity and initiative. Graham Coxon described it as "sci-fi folk music," but Blur's first album in 12 years is so much more than that. It's the sound of a band hungry again and, in many respects, better than ever.
Cam Lindsay
17. Tobias Jesso Jr.
Goon
(Arts & Crafts)
It's refreshing to see so much positive attention paid to an album as earnest, honest and wistful as Tobias Jesso Jr.'s Goon. Originally a bass player by trade, the North Vancouver native later found his true musical voice, releasing this gorgeously stark debut album just a few years after learning to play the piano. The resulting 12 tracks find Jesso Jr. using his new instrument to help craft heartbreaking tales of love and loss that come off as cerebral but never syrupy, retro but never novel.
With a dream production team behind the boards, made up of the Black Keys' Patrick Carney, the New Pornographers' John Collins and former Girls bassist JR White, Goon is remarkable in the way it manages to capture Jesso Jr.'s charming vulnerability, often leaving in musical mistakes and miscues. It's a rare debut album that finds a musician so bravely revelling in his insecurities.
Daniel Sylvester
16. Napalm Death
Apex Predator – Easy Meat
(Century Media)
Even now, Napalm Death have their finger firmly on the pulse of the grindcore scene — and metal scene as a whole — they helped shape. Their latest masterpiece, arguably their best since 2000's Enemy of the Music Business, finds the socially conscious band calling foul on corporate labour practices, and doing it in style.
While Napalm Death can still put pedal to the metal — much of the album grinds by — it's the leftfield elements they incorporate here that help push the band to new heights: take the droning, cult-esque chants of the title track opener, the winding beginning of "How the Years Condemn" or the foreboding "Dear Slum Landlord," for example. Just be sure not to get whiplash when the 'core suddenly takes over again.
Bradley Zorgdrager
15. Sleater-Kinney
No Cities to Love
(Sub Pop)
In 2006, Sleater-Kinney went on indefinite hiatus. As one of the few remaining flag bearers of the '90s Riot Grrrl movement, their farewell was significant not only because of the feminist wave they represented at the time, but because their ground-shaking rock flair filled a space that, years later, still felt empty. In 2015, we are fortunate enough to have myriad bands that exemplify a wide range of female perspectives, but there is still only one Sleater-Kinney.
No Cities To Love is a return to form for Carrie Brownstein, Corin Tucker and Janet Weiss, who have all kept busy in the interim with other bands. Here, though, the tried and true dynamics of the three are immediately palpable: the barbed riffs, the breakneck drums and the stunning vocal trade-offs communicate an urgency that can be felt throughout every political and personal battle Sleater-Kinney fight in these songs. They're wild and weary, but they never gave in, and as a result, they're still one of best rock bands today.
Melody Lau
14. The Weather Station
Loyalty
(Paradise of Bachelors/Outside Music)
It feels like Tamara Lindeman (aka the Weather Station) has been working up to this; some critics have even suggested that Loyalty, her third album, might be the folk album of the year. Recorded at La Frette Studios in France (the same place in which Feist recorded The Reminder) with Afie Jurvanen (Bahamas), Loyalty explores loyalty — to friends, family, lovers and ideas; to making music, for example.
It's the kind of record that keeps giving on repeat listens, from the chorus of "Floodplain" to the little mounting vibraphone ding that playfully marks the abrupt end of the album. You can linger on Lindeman's lyrics, too. I puzzled over a line about the subtlety of canyons, then suddenly realized it's an apt metaphor for Lindeman's writing: it goes deep, sometimes only hinting at the dark chasms the lines glance at as they pass by.
Sarah Greene
13. Alabama Shakes
Sound & Color
(ATO)
Alabama Shakes stayed true to their name and shook things up with their Southern-fried blend of blues, rock and soul on 2012 debut Boys & Girls, and they've done it again with this year's Sound & Color. Even with more elements added to the mix, including strings, electronic drum textures and a small vocal chorus, the Shakes continue to swiftly handle all their chosen genres, largely due to Brittany Howard's powerful, emotive vocals, which provide a clear focal point among the expansive instrumentation.
Don't let the monochrome cover fool you; Sound & Color covers a vast expanse of sonic territory, and further cements the Shakes as one of today's most inventive rock groups.
Matt Bobkin
12. Natalie Prass
Natalie Prass
(Spacebomb)
Natalie Prass is hardly new to songwriting, but it wasn't until this year that the 29-year-old Richmond, VA-raised, Nashville, TN-based singer finally delivered her self-titled debut album. Having cut her teeth with a pair of fairly under-the-radar EPs and a stint as Jenny Lewis's keyboard player, Prass paired up with her childhood pal and producer Matthew E. White to make the record, and the result is mesmerizing.
Natalie Prass presents a baroque pop paradox, offering listeners saccharine, breezy and romantic-sounding songs that, upon further listening, actually serve better as a biting soundtrack to the pitfalls of love. Gorgeous, delicate-sounding numbers like "My Baby Don't Understand Me Anymore" and "Your Fool" actually document the dissolution of relationships, while "Christy" is an ambitious, orchestral ode to betrayal.
The album does end on an optimistic, genuinely romantic note, however, with sugary, starry-eyed ballad "It Is You" wrapping up a stellar debut offering with some serious Disney princess vibes. And even if the syrupy sound is for the most part a mask, Natalie Prass is a delight to listen to from start to finish.
Sarah Murphy
11. A$AP Rocky
AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP
(Polo Grounds/RCA)
Since the tribute-paying artwork for AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP was released and eccentric singles "L$D" and "Everyday" bounded into the sonic stratosphere, it was clear we'd be seeing A$AP Rocky at his most inspired and left-field on his sophomore album, two-and-a-half years removed from the release of his debut and five months since the tragic death of his mentor, friend and A$AP architect, A$AP Yams.
With a leak that gifted the interwebs the LP a week early, that's precisely what fans were given on the long-awaited 18-track project. Danger Mouse is in the executive producer seat, and production from Kanye West, Mark Ronson, Jim Jonson and Clams Casino donate to Rocky's psychedelic experience. With revealing pen-work, multidimensional production and opulent theatrics, AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP is easily one of the strongest hip-hop releases of the year so far. Yams would be proud.
Samantha O'Connor
10. Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experience
Surf
(Independent)
As savoury, early summer surprises go, Chance the Rapper's new album, Surf, released in late May as a free download via iTunes, is pretty hard to top. That the album is billed as a Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment project is fitting, given the true collaboration going on between Chance and his band across Surf, which blends rap, soul, gospel, spoken word, marching band-style horns and many other music tidbits, to wondrous effect. But that doesn't begin to reflect the long list of contributors both big and small that also feature on the record in some capacity, with Busta Rhymes, Erykah Badu, J Cole, Big Sean and Migos's Quavo being only the most prominent of the bunch.
Longtime supporters may be pleased and none too surprised with the Social Experiment crew's work here, but the iTunes move was no doubt aimed at a much wider audience, and this higher level shine is definitely resulting in many turned heads amongst the previously uninitiated.
Kevin Jones
9. Viet Cong
Viet Cong
(Flemish Eye)
Between the critical and public backlash over their controversial moniker and the band's half-hearted apology, it would seem the bulk of the conversation about Viet Cong during the first half of 2015 has largely ignored their music. That's a shame, because the Calgary group's self-titled debut is a Molotov cocktail of ambient noise, labyrinthine post-punk and psychedelic guitar squalls that provide welcome respite from the stasis of modern rock music.
Anchored by drummer Mike Wallace — a commanding physical force even when playing with a broken arm, as was the case during one of the band's recent tours — songs like "Continental Shelf" and the sprawling, 11-minute closer "Death" translate even better in a live setting. While it's not the only record on the heavier side of rock to receive a Polaris Music Prize nomination this year (see: White Lung's Deep Fantasy, METZ's II), it's certainly the boldest.
Max Mertens
8. Björk
Vulnicura
(One Little Indian)
Chronicling heartbreak from the first inkling that her relationship was coming apart through to the healing and rejuvenation that followed the separation, Björk's Vulnicura is a starkly honest portrait of her experience with the universal theme of loss. Working with producers the Haxan Cloak and Arca, she created a varied landscape of beats that burble underneath her complex and soaring string arrangements, the combination working to support her strong, sorrowful vocals.
Unlike her last release, 2011's Biophilia, where she strived to connect technology and music while working to develop new music education curriculum in Iceland, Vulnicura is less concept than catharsis, which makes the album stand out even in Björk's substantial discography; its stripped-back honesty, and the feeling of sheer sense of purpose driving Vulnicura, make it as necessary as it is beautiful.
Anna Alger
7. D'Angelo & the Vanguard
Black Messiah
(Sony)
Okay, so technically D'Angelo & the Vanguard's Black Messiah came out in late 2014, but given the protracted wait for it, we can ruminate on its greatness for a little longer. After years of anticipation and doubt, Black Messiah arrived not when it was most requested, but when it was most needed.
Musically, it's a perfect funk and analogue soul compound that is uniquely D'. Thematically, love is as present as ever, but louder yet is the desire for social change, be it challenging our unsustainable ways in "Till It's Done (Tutu)" or the painfully prescient call against police oppression, "The Charade." Black Messiah is timely, but not of its time; it's the impetus towards a beautiful future, marinated in and informed by sounds of the past.
Michael J. Warren
6. Drake
If You're Reading This It's Too Late
(Cash Money)
None of the songs on Drake's surprise release If You're Reading This It's Too Late sound like they were explicitly designed to be bangers, yet we all found hits in tracks like "10 Bands," "Jungle" and especially "Know Yourself," and not one or two, but every single song from the album was on the Billboard chart simultaneously. Surely, community college music professors will soon dedicate weeks of digital media courses to Too Late's release story.
Musically, Too Late is the sound of Drake and 40 at the top of their game. With nothing left to prove, they coast across these 17 tracks (19 on the CD) breezily, conveying a new type of braggadocio, in which a rapper can pull back and chill because they don't have to worry about anyone snatching the crown. If You're Reading This It's Too Late isn't even Drake's proper 2015 album (Views From the 6 supposedly arrives later this year), but it'll take a hell of a lot for it to be bumped from our year-end lists.
Josiah Hughes
5. Courtney Barnett
Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit
(Mom + Pop)
If 2013's warmly received The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas, and a series of rousing live performances over the last year, raised expectations in music circles for Courtney Barnett's first full-length, few would have predicted that the 20-something Australian would become the breakout star of 2015. None of the praise should come as a surprise though, so intoxicating is Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit's blend of sharp riffs, early '90s college rock noise and playfully wry, stream-of-consciousness couplets.
Barnett's lyrics may deservedly garner much of the attention, but they shouldn't obscure the trio's exceptionally crisp playing and clever arrangements — the swirling organ that colours "Debbie Downer," subtle backing vocals and backwards guitars in "Dead Fox," the bluesy, psych-tinged coda of "Small Poppies" — that make Sometimes… such a rewarding, addictive pleasure and ensure that the album loses none of its power over the several dozen listens required to catch all of the singer's memorable punchlines.
Thierry Côté
4. Sufjan Stevens
Carrie & Lowell
(Asthmatic Kitty)
After a decade experimenting with everything from electronic avant-pop to Christmas music to conceptual orchestral pieces, Carrie & Lowell is Sufjan Stevens' most focused and folksy album to date. Inspired by the death of his estranged mother in 2012, this beautiful 11-song cycle does away with Stevens' ambitious tendencies in favour of more delicate, restrained balladry. Acoustic guitar, piano and ambient synth textures provide the gorgeous backdrop for a devastatingly honest portrayal of his mother's life, and his grief at her loss.
And yet, while the circumstances are harrowing, Carrie & Lowell is ultimately about forgiveness and love. "Should Have Known Better" begins with feelings of depression and abandonment, but as the arrangement beautifully unfurls, Stevens offers a glimmer of hope for the future: "My brother had a daughter / The beauty that brings, illumination."
Alex Hudson
3. Father John Misty
I Love You, Honeybear
(Sub Pop)
The premise of I Love You, Honeybear is incredibly simple, and truthfully, not all that original: it's the story of a relationship. But where love letters often fail by spiralling into cringe-inducing poetry and saccharine sentiments, Tillman's document of his relationship with his wife Emma bursts with unadorned beauty. By refusing to sugarcoat something so deeply complicated, Tillman illuminates the true magic of human connection, in all its best and worst moments, instead of novelizing it.
There's semi-delusional infatuation ("Chateau Lobby #4 (In C For Two Virgins)"), helpless jealousy ("Nothing Good Ever Happens at the Goddamn Thirsty Crow") and even aggressive self-loathing ("Ideal Husband"). It's always clear that the pain, confusion and uncertainty of dedicating oneself completely to another is ultimately worth it, but never so much as on the gorgeous, life-spanning closer, "I Went To The Store One Day." The bar has been raised, Romeos.
Matt Williams
2. Jamie xx
In Colour
(Young Turks)
The name of Jamie xx's solo debut is no winking hyperbole. With his band the xx, the DJ, drummer and producer presented a monochromatic sound; here, he's painting with a full sonic palette, touching on a host of musical tropes — house, UK bass, dancehall, Northern soul — to produce a big-tent dance record that also functions as a private headphone masterpiece.
From the dark menace of opener "Gosh" through to the record's de facto anthems, "I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times)" and "Loud Places," there's a sense that these tracks are going to hit hard whether you're in a field of 10,000 festival goers or on a lonely, late-night transit ride. The latter's opening line, delivered by xx bandmate Romy Madley-Croft — "I go to loud places to search for someone to be quiet with" — doubles as the record's MO.
Dance music has always been about the collective spirit, but its politics, which are too often lost on today's maximalist-minded DJs, were always personal. In Colour doesn't espouse any political point of view, per se, but in making a record that tears down musical walls, Jamie xx managed to once again make dance music personal.
Ian Gormely
1. Kendrick Lamar
To Pimp a Butterfly
(Universal)
How do you build on a classic major label debut? How do you remain true to your West Coast roots while remaining innovative and enticing more minds to get blown? In the immortal words of Coolio, you better make a left.
Kendrick Lamar's funktastic good kid, m.A.A.d. city follow-up, To Pimp a Butterfly, is more nuanced, less reverent and harder to digest than its vaunted predecessor. Trends get slew-footed; ideas flourish; a spoken word motif in which he slowly reveals what he's learned since being a good kid teases listeners until the record's poignant end.
Yanking the race examination, George Clinton influences and raw pain of great rap music past (see: early Ice Cube, 2Pac) and bleeding it all out of the sharpest pen in the modern game, Kendrick takes the risks we want our greats to take. The scrappy Compton poet could've landed on this list for "The Blacker the Berry" alone; instead, he's made another full-on modern rap classic.
Luke Fox
It was all too much for us to boil 2015 down to 25 of the best albums so far, so we cut it where we could reasonably afford to, at 27. And so, without further ado: Exclaim!'s Top 27 Albums of 2015 So Far.
Click next to read through the albums one by one, or use the list below to skip ahead to your favourites.
Exclaim!'s Top 27 Albums of 2015 So Far:
- 1. Kendrick Lamar - To Pimp a Butterfly
- 2. Jamie xx - In Colour
- 3. Father John Misty - I Love You, Honeybear
- 4. Sufjan Stevens - Carrie & Lowell
- 5. Courtney Barnett - Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit
- 6. Drake - If You're Reading This It's Too Late
- 7. D'Angelo & the Vanguard - Black Messiah
- 8. Björk - Vulnicura
- 9. Viet Cong - Viet Cong
- 10. Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experience - Surf
- 11. A$AP Rocky - AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP
- 12. Natalie Prass - Natalie Prass
- 13. Alabama Shakes - Sound & Color
- 14. The Weather Station - Loyalty
- 15. Sleater-Kinney - No Cities to Love
- 16. Napalm Death - Apex Predator – Easy Meat
- 17. Tobias Jesso Jr. - Goon
- 18. Blur - The Magic Whip
- 19. Jessica Pratt - On Your Own Love Again
- 20. Young Fathers - White Men Are Black Men Too
- 21. Shamir - Ratchet
- 22. Michael Rault - Living Daylight
- 23. Paradise Lost - The Plague Within
- 24. METZ - II
- 25. Buffy Saint-Marie - Power in the Blood
- 26. Torche - Restarter
- 27. Ibeyi - Ibeyi
27. Ibeyi
Ibeyi
(XL)
It's not every day that an act emerges who are able to seamlessly blend authenticity with uniqueness, but Ibeyi's self-titled debut did exactly that. You can feel the generations of culture that bedrock this record — Yoruba chants, minimal percussion, Cuban flair — but they're altered, ever so slightly, with subtle electronic elements, so that Ibeyi is undoubtedly a modern record.
Just listen to "River" to see this era-spanning M.O. at work: the track's chanting sits atop a hip-hop beat, and sound as if the two were a commonplace combination. It's this stylistic marriage, along with Naomi and Lisa-Kaindé Diaz's sublime harmonies, that make this one of 2015's best releases so far.
Daryl Keating
26. Torche
Restarter
(Relapse)
Torche's sludge-laden stoner metal is certainly full of weight and fuzz, but the tone and texture that they wield consistently sets them apart from their peers. Where so much sludge goes for gloom, they aim for sweet, hot sunshine; while the guitar tone is still full of tar, it evokes the sticky heat of city asphalt rather than bubbling pitch. Their 2012 album Harmonicraft was a union of profound heaviness with a delicious, sickly sweet pop sensibility and truly unfuckwithable hooks and melodies, as catchy as a wad of gum in your hair.
Restarter, however, ups the ante considerably in terms of depth and heaviness, and the result is something blisteringly infectious but also deliciously doom-laden. "Bishop in Arms" is an exercise in demolition, showcasing positively crushing drums and allowing Steve Brooks the opportunity to really push his vocal performance, while faster and more upbeat bombers like "Blasted" and "Loose Men" prove that they haven't set their pop-inflected tendencies aside, but rather have married it all the more closely with a deep and threatening aggression. Restarter is a record you can't let your guard down around.
Natalie Zina Walschots
25. Buffy Sainte-Marie
Power in the Blood
(True North)
It's highly gratifying to see the long-undervalued Buffy Sainte-Marie receive such a positive response to her new album, Power In The Blood. The fire in the belly of the 74-year-old folk music legend still burns bright, and the record stands as one of the very best of her illustrious career. It's a sprawling and stylistically diverse work, one featuring three different producers (Chris Birkett, Jon Levine and Michael Philip Wojewoda) and an elite list of players. She revisits some of her earlier songs and comes up with strong, politically charged new material.
Call this Buffy a vampire slayer; she takes precise aim at polluters and merchants of corporate greed on "Uranium War" and the title track (a collaboration with Alabama 3). Her voice is as distinctive and potent as ever, equally effective in conveying anger and tenderness, as on the haunting ballad "Ke Sakihitin Awasis."
Kerry Doole
24. METZ
II
(Sub Pop)
With their debut, Toronto's METZ minted a successful, noisy vehicle for navigating concrete jungles of crappy apartments cluttered with rats and empties, and it was heard around the world. For their second record, METZ — the ever-industrious, wilfully abrasive antipreneurs they are —scrutinized their prototype, homed in on its strengths and reprogrammed their particularly prickly Rube Goldberg guitar, drums and bass machine to process a new set of anxieties, knocking asses with a broomstick boot all the while.
METZ are a working band, and even if the soundscape's a little bleak, from the moment they punch the clock to II's end half an hour later, the economy of blood, sweat, abused instruments and battered distortion pedals it demanded pays off by making playgrounds of landfills and spinning lines into circle pits.
Tom Beedham
23. Paradise Lost
The Plague Within
(Century Media)
We've come to realize that when metal bands "go back to their roots," it is, at best, boring and unconvincing. You can go back sonically, but you can't go back to the same headspace you were in as young buck 20-year-olds intent on taking on the world at any cost. Unless you're legendary doom metal band Paradise Lost, that is: on The Plague Within, the band make good on the promise they've been teasing us with over the past couple of almost-return-to-form discs, and the results are amazing.
This album sends shivers down my spine the same way Paradise Lost classics Draconian Times and Shades of God do; the band's rockin', stadium-doom approach to the genre is almost as vital as it's ever been. Couple this stunning album with the latest from guitarist Gregor Mackintosh's doom/death band Vallenfyre, and you'll quickly realize that sometimes old dogs do it best.
Greg Pratt
22. Michael Rault
Living Daylight
(Pirates Blend)
Right from the beginning, Michael Rault's Living Daylight exudes energy and character that isn't found too often in rock today. He's fun, and never really that serious, choosing to poke fun at his sadness with Syd Barrett-esque cuts like "Dancing With Tears In My Eyes."
The grooviness is what makes this record great, as bongo-laden jams like "Real Love (Yeah)" harken back to the high points of glam rock. Rault even leaves room for a quiet, intimate closer with friendship anthem "To All My Friends," which finishes off one of the most solid rock releases of the half-year with style and a nice emotional touch.
Corey Henderson
21. Shamir
Ratchet
(XL)
In many ways, releasing Ratchet as a debut album was a serious gamble. After serving up serious vocals on his well-received Northtown EP, Shamir wisely cribbed from its bouncier cuts to lay down the framework of his first full-length. Then, instead of delivering a homogenous package of electro-disco bangers, he doubled down on the softer cuts as well, making for an eclectic and alluring package.
Combined with his arresting countertenor voice, Ratchet presented Shamir as one of the most unique presences in pop music, one we didn't realize we needed until he showed up fully realized. And as mature as Shamir is for his age, Ratchet shows us a glimpse into the inner workings of today's youth, a combination of disaffected suburban ennui with an infectiously candid spirit.
Scott Simpson
20. Young Fathers
White Men Are Black Men Too
(Big Dada)
To follow their Mercury Prize-winning Dead LP, Young Fathers concocted a bold and vital work that makes a strong argument for the return of the "alternative" tag. From the album's provocatively inclusive title to the Scottish trio's adamant refusal to limit or corral their influences under any recognizable banner, every aspect of their presentation seems designed to act in opposition to compartmentalized thinking. Their melting pot of sound is deeper than TV On the Radio's at their Cookie Mountain best, repurposing tools and re-contextualizing sonic tricks from classic pop, soul, dub, hip-hop and blues as comfortably as they do from punk, metal, experimental, electronic, a myriad global folk sounds and anything else that has crossed their internet-age ears.
What they draw and form from that vast soup of flavours is remarkably harmonious, even in its moments of starkest contrast. Kendrick Lamar may have dropped the year's most masterful genre statement, but no other album is as fiercely dedicated to carving its own path in the contemporary music landscape as White Men Are Black Men Too.
Scott Gray
19. Jessica Pratt
On Your Own Love Again
(Drag City)
Jessica Pratt's whimsical yet intimate sophomore record pulls listeners even deeper into her folk-flecked world. Recorded in apartments in Los Angeles and San Francisco, the four-track recordings that fill On Your Own Love Again bring together the songwriter's humble, close-mic'd whispers, plucked guitar strings and, on at least one occasion, the off-in-the-distance wail of an emergency vehicle.
Simply fascinating are "Strange Melody," which seemingly has Pratt paying homage to the "do do do" passage of Duran Duran's "Rio," and the tape-melting, pitch-shifted qualities of "Jacquelyn in the Background." The album touches on themes of extreme loneliness, with the closing title track capturing dispiritedness perfectly with its pastoral classical guitar and haunted coos. "Back, Baby," however, takes the sting out of solo living with an optimistic pledge to focus on things to come, a necessary move in 2015.
Gregory Adams
18. Blur
The Magic Whip
(Parlophone/Warner)
If there is a motto to attach to Blur's eighth studio album, it's undoubtedly "Good things come to those who wait." After an unlikely reunion in 2009, Blur slowly and carefully made their return without really committing to much other than some large outdoor gigs.
Prompted by a five-day layover in Hong Kong, The Magic Whip isn't merely a comeback album, but one of the band's best yet. It's the soundtrack to a 40-something life, far removed from the days of Britpop and now full of melancholy and reflection, but also bursting at the seams with curiosity and initiative. Graham Coxon described it as "sci-fi folk music," but Blur's first album in 12 years is so much more than that. It's the sound of a band hungry again and, in many respects, better than ever.
Cam Lindsay
17. Tobias Jesso Jr.
Goon
(Arts & Crafts)
It's refreshing to see so much positive attention paid to an album as earnest, honest and wistful as Tobias Jesso Jr.'s Goon. Originally a bass player by trade, the North Vancouver native later found his true musical voice, releasing this gorgeously stark debut album just a few years after learning to play the piano. The resulting 12 tracks find Jesso Jr. using his new instrument to help craft heartbreaking tales of love and loss that come off as cerebral but never syrupy, retro but never novel.
With a dream production team behind the boards, made up of the Black Keys' Patrick Carney, the New Pornographers' John Collins and former Girls bassist JR White, Goon is remarkable in the way it manages to capture Jesso Jr.'s charming vulnerability, often leaving in musical mistakes and miscues. It's a rare debut album that finds a musician so bravely revelling in his insecurities.
Daniel Sylvester
16. Napalm Death
Apex Predator – Easy Meat
(Century Media)
Even now, Napalm Death have their finger firmly on the pulse of the grindcore scene — and metal scene as a whole — they helped shape. Their latest masterpiece, arguably their best since 2000's Enemy of the Music Business, finds the socially conscious band calling foul on corporate labour practices, and doing it in style.
While Napalm Death can still put pedal to the metal — much of the album grinds by — it's the leftfield elements they incorporate here that help push the band to new heights: take the droning, cult-esque chants of the title track opener, the winding beginning of "How the Years Condemn" or the foreboding "Dear Slum Landlord," for example. Just be sure not to get whiplash when the 'core suddenly takes over again.
Bradley Zorgdrager
15. Sleater-Kinney
No Cities to Love
(Sub Pop)
In 2006, Sleater-Kinney went on indefinite hiatus. As one of the few remaining flag bearers of the '90s Riot Grrrl movement, their farewell was significant not only because of the feminist wave they represented at the time, but because their ground-shaking rock flair filled a space that, years later, still felt empty. In 2015, we are fortunate enough to have myriad bands that exemplify a wide range of female perspectives, but there is still only one Sleater-Kinney.
No Cities To Love is a return to form for Carrie Brownstein, Corin Tucker and Janet Weiss, who have all kept busy in the interim with other bands. Here, though, the tried and true dynamics of the three are immediately palpable: the barbed riffs, the breakneck drums and the stunning vocal trade-offs communicate an urgency that can be felt throughout every political and personal battle Sleater-Kinney fight in these songs. They're wild and weary, but they never gave in, and as a result, they're still one of best rock bands today.
Melody Lau
14. The Weather Station
Loyalty
(Paradise of Bachelors/Outside Music)
It feels like Tamara Lindeman (aka the Weather Station) has been working up to this; some critics have even suggested that Loyalty, her third album, might be the folk album of the year. Recorded at La Frette Studios in France (the same place in which Feist recorded The Reminder) with Afie Jurvanen (Bahamas), Loyalty explores loyalty — to friends, family, lovers and ideas; to making music, for example.
It's the kind of record that keeps giving on repeat listens, from the chorus of "Floodplain" to the little mounting vibraphone ding that playfully marks the abrupt end of the album. You can linger on Lindeman's lyrics, too. I puzzled over a line about the subtlety of canyons, then suddenly realized it's an apt metaphor for Lindeman's writing: it goes deep, sometimes only hinting at the dark chasms the lines glance at as they pass by.
Sarah Greene
13. Alabama Shakes
Sound & Color
(ATO)
Alabama Shakes stayed true to their name and shook things up with their Southern-fried blend of blues, rock and soul on 2012 debut Boys & Girls, and they've done it again with this year's Sound & Color. Even with more elements added to the mix, including strings, electronic drum textures and a small vocal chorus, the Shakes continue to swiftly handle all their chosen genres, largely due to Brittany Howard's powerful, emotive vocals, which provide a clear focal point among the expansive instrumentation.
Don't let the monochrome cover fool you; Sound & Color covers a vast expanse of sonic territory, and further cements the Shakes as one of today's most inventive rock groups.
Matt Bobkin
12. Natalie Prass
Natalie Prass
(Spacebomb)
Natalie Prass is hardly new to songwriting, but it wasn't until this year that the 29-year-old Richmond, VA-raised, Nashville, TN-based singer finally delivered her self-titled debut album. Having cut her teeth with a pair of fairly under-the-radar EPs and a stint as Jenny Lewis's keyboard player, Prass paired up with her childhood pal and producer Matthew E. White to make the record, and the result is mesmerizing.
Natalie Prass presents a baroque pop paradox, offering listeners saccharine, breezy and romantic-sounding songs that, upon further listening, actually serve better as a biting soundtrack to the pitfalls of love. Gorgeous, delicate-sounding numbers like "My Baby Don't Understand Me Anymore" and "Your Fool" actually document the dissolution of relationships, while "Christy" is an ambitious, orchestral ode to betrayal.
The album does end on an optimistic, genuinely romantic note, however, with sugary, starry-eyed ballad "It Is You" wrapping up a stellar debut offering with some serious Disney princess vibes. And even if the syrupy sound is for the most part a mask, Natalie Prass is a delight to listen to from start to finish.
Sarah Murphy
11. A$AP Rocky
AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP
(Polo Grounds/RCA)
Since the tribute-paying artwork for AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP was released and eccentric singles "L$D" and "Everyday" bounded into the sonic stratosphere, it was clear we'd be seeing A$AP Rocky at his most inspired and left-field on his sophomore album, two-and-a-half years removed from the release of his debut and five months since the tragic death of his mentor, friend and A$AP architect, A$AP Yams.
With a leak that gifted the interwebs the LP a week early, that's precisely what fans were given on the long-awaited 18-track project. Danger Mouse is in the executive producer seat, and production from Kanye West, Mark Ronson, Jim Jonson and Clams Casino donate to Rocky's psychedelic experience. With revealing pen-work, multidimensional production and opulent theatrics, AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP is easily one of the strongest hip-hop releases of the year so far. Yams would be proud.
Samantha O'Connor
10. Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experience
Surf
(Independent)
As savoury, early summer surprises go, Chance the Rapper's new album, Surf, released in late May as a free download via iTunes, is pretty hard to top. That the album is billed as a Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment project is fitting, given the true collaboration going on between Chance and his band across Surf, which blends rap, soul, gospel, spoken word, marching band-style horns and many other music tidbits, to wondrous effect. But that doesn't begin to reflect the long list of contributors both big and small that also feature on the record in some capacity, with Busta Rhymes, Erykah Badu, J Cole, Big Sean and Migos's Quavo being only the most prominent of the bunch.
Longtime supporters may be pleased and none too surprised with the Social Experiment crew's work here, but the iTunes move was no doubt aimed at a much wider audience, and this higher level shine is definitely resulting in many turned heads amongst the previously uninitiated.
Kevin Jones
9. Viet Cong
Viet Cong
(Flemish Eye)
Between the critical and public backlash over their controversial moniker and the band's half-hearted apology, it would seem the bulk of the conversation about Viet Cong during the first half of 2015 has largely ignored their music. That's a shame, because the Calgary group's self-titled debut is a Molotov cocktail of ambient noise, labyrinthine post-punk and psychedelic guitar squalls that provide welcome respite from the stasis of modern rock music.
Anchored by drummer Mike Wallace — a commanding physical force even when playing with a broken arm, as was the case during one of the band's recent tours — songs like "Continental Shelf" and the sprawling, 11-minute closer "Death" translate even better in a live setting. While it's not the only record on the heavier side of rock to receive a Polaris Music Prize nomination this year (see: White Lung's Deep Fantasy, METZ's II), it's certainly the boldest.
Max Mertens
8. Björk
Vulnicura
(One Little Indian)
Chronicling heartbreak from the first inkling that her relationship was coming apart through to the healing and rejuvenation that followed the separation, Björk's Vulnicura is a starkly honest portrait of her experience with the universal theme of loss. Working with producers the Haxan Cloak and Arca, she created a varied landscape of beats that burble underneath her complex and soaring string arrangements, the combination working to support her strong, sorrowful vocals.
Unlike her last release, 2011's Biophilia, where she strived to connect technology and music while working to develop new music education curriculum in Iceland, Vulnicura is less concept than catharsis, which makes the album stand out even in Björk's substantial discography; its stripped-back honesty, and the feeling of sheer sense of purpose driving Vulnicura, make it as necessary as it is beautiful.
Anna Alger
7. D'Angelo & the Vanguard
Black Messiah
(Sony)
Okay, so technically D'Angelo & the Vanguard's Black Messiah came out in late 2014, but given the protracted wait for it, we can ruminate on its greatness for a little longer. After years of anticipation and doubt, Black Messiah arrived not when it was most requested, but when it was most needed.
Musically, it's a perfect funk and analogue soul compound that is uniquely D'. Thematically, love is as present as ever, but louder yet is the desire for social change, be it challenging our unsustainable ways in "Till It's Done (Tutu)" or the painfully prescient call against police oppression, "The Charade." Black Messiah is timely, but not of its time; it's the impetus towards a beautiful future, marinated in and informed by sounds of the past.
Michael J. Warren
6. Drake
If You're Reading This It's Too Late
(Cash Money)
None of the songs on Drake's surprise release If You're Reading This It's Too Late sound like they were explicitly designed to be bangers, yet we all found hits in tracks like "10 Bands," "Jungle" and especially "Know Yourself," and not one or two, but every single song from the album was on the Billboard chart simultaneously. Surely, community college music professors will soon dedicate weeks of digital media courses to Too Late's release story.
Musically, Too Late is the sound of Drake and 40 at the top of their game. With nothing left to prove, they coast across these 17 tracks (19 on the CD) breezily, conveying a new type of braggadocio, in which a rapper can pull back and chill because they don't have to worry about anyone snatching the crown. If You're Reading This It's Too Late isn't even Drake's proper 2015 album (Views From the 6 supposedly arrives later this year), but it'll take a hell of a lot for it to be bumped from our year-end lists.
Josiah Hughes
5. Courtney Barnett
Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit
(Mom + Pop)
If 2013's warmly received The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas, and a series of rousing live performances over the last year, raised expectations in music circles for Courtney Barnett's first full-length, few would have predicted that the 20-something Australian would become the breakout star of 2015. None of the praise should come as a surprise though, so intoxicating is Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit's blend of sharp riffs, early '90s college rock noise and playfully wry, stream-of-consciousness couplets.
Barnett's lyrics may deservedly garner much of the attention, but they shouldn't obscure the trio's exceptionally crisp playing and clever arrangements — the swirling organ that colours "Debbie Downer," subtle backing vocals and backwards guitars in "Dead Fox," the bluesy, psych-tinged coda of "Small Poppies" — that make Sometimes… such a rewarding, addictive pleasure and ensure that the album loses none of its power over the several dozen listens required to catch all of the singer's memorable punchlines.
Thierry Côté
4. Sufjan Stevens
Carrie & Lowell
(Asthmatic Kitty)
After a decade experimenting with everything from electronic avant-pop to Christmas music to conceptual orchestral pieces, Carrie & Lowell is Sufjan Stevens' most focused and folksy album to date. Inspired by the death of his estranged mother in 2012, this beautiful 11-song cycle does away with Stevens' ambitious tendencies in favour of more delicate, restrained balladry. Acoustic guitar, piano and ambient synth textures provide the gorgeous backdrop for a devastatingly honest portrayal of his mother's life, and his grief at her loss.
And yet, while the circumstances are harrowing, Carrie & Lowell is ultimately about forgiveness and love. "Should Have Known Better" begins with feelings of depression and abandonment, but as the arrangement beautifully unfurls, Stevens offers a glimmer of hope for the future: "My brother had a daughter / The beauty that brings, illumination."
Alex Hudson
3. Father John Misty
I Love You, Honeybear
(Sub Pop)
The premise of I Love You, Honeybear is incredibly simple, and truthfully, not all that original: it's the story of a relationship. But where love letters often fail by spiralling into cringe-inducing poetry and saccharine sentiments, Tillman's document of his relationship with his wife Emma bursts with unadorned beauty. By refusing to sugarcoat something so deeply complicated, Tillman illuminates the true magic of human connection, in all its best and worst moments, instead of novelizing it.
There's semi-delusional infatuation ("Chateau Lobby #4 (In C For Two Virgins)"), helpless jealousy ("Nothing Good Ever Happens at the Goddamn Thirsty Crow") and even aggressive self-loathing ("Ideal Husband"). It's always clear that the pain, confusion and uncertainty of dedicating oneself completely to another is ultimately worth it, but never so much as on the gorgeous, life-spanning closer, "I Went To The Store One Day." The bar has been raised, Romeos.
Matt Williams
2. Jamie xx
In Colour
(Young Turks)
The name of Jamie xx's solo debut is no winking hyperbole. With his band the xx, the DJ, drummer and producer presented a monochromatic sound; here, he's painting with a full sonic palette, touching on a host of musical tropes — house, UK bass, dancehall, Northern soul — to produce a big-tent dance record that also functions as a private headphone masterpiece.
From the dark menace of opener "Gosh" through to the record's de facto anthems, "I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times)" and "Loud Places," there's a sense that these tracks are going to hit hard whether you're in a field of 10,000 festival goers or on a lonely, late-night transit ride. The latter's opening line, delivered by xx bandmate Romy Madley-Croft — "I go to loud places to search for someone to be quiet with" — doubles as the record's MO.
Dance music has always been about the collective spirit, but its politics, which are too often lost on today's maximalist-minded DJs, were always personal. In Colour doesn't espouse any political point of view, per se, but in making a record that tears down musical walls, Jamie xx managed to once again make dance music personal.
Ian Gormely
1. Kendrick Lamar
To Pimp a Butterfly
(Universal)
How do you build on a classic major label debut? How do you remain true to your West Coast roots while remaining innovative and enticing more minds to get blown? In the immortal words of Coolio, you better make a left.
Kendrick Lamar's funktastic good kid, m.A.A.d. city follow-up, To Pimp a Butterfly, is more nuanced, less reverent and harder to digest than its vaunted predecessor. Trends get slew-footed; ideas flourish; a spoken word motif in which he slowly reveals what he's learned since being a good kid teases listeners until the record's poignant end.
Yanking the race examination, George Clinton influences and raw pain of great rap music past (see: early Ice Cube, 2Pac) and bleeding it all out of the sharpest pen in the modern game, Kendrick takes the risks we want our greats to take. The scrappy Compton poet could've landed on this list for "The Blacker the Berry" alone; instead, he's made another full-on modern rap classic.
Luke Fox