It being the list time of year, I thought I'd get Playlouder's summings up going with my top 20 (well nearly) albums of the year. The criteria is largely as follows:
Grinderman - 'Grinderman'
Nick Cave and the hoary old coves of Grinderman knock out a record of sexually frustrated garage rock & roll that makes the laughable yet much-touted Black Lips look pre-pubescent by comparison. Seeing them play the songs live for the very first time at ATP was one of the gig highlights of 2007.
Liars - 'Liars'
Strategic reversal and rewriting their own rule book is yet again the name of the game for Liars as they abandon the conceptual to write an album intended to evoke the teenage reaction of falling in love with music for the very first time.
One More Grain - 'Pigeon English'
Alright so I might be biased on this one, but the mangled brass, amenable drones and lyrical evocations and explorations of 'Pigeon English' are a million miles from those elements of the British folk/jazz leftfield, wandering around Green Man with a copy of the Guardian stuck out of its arse.
KTL - 'KTL 2'
Stephen O'Malley of Sunn O))) teams up with electronic manipulator PITA for the KTL project. KTL stands for Kindertotenlieder - (translates as "Songs on the Death of Children"), the name of a theatre piece for which the duo provided music, which itself derives its name from Mahler's musical interpretation of poems by Friedrich Ruckert. The four tracks on 'KTL 2' are exercises in glacial dynamics, the treble-heavy counterpoint to Sunn O)))'s brutal bass drones.
Burial - 'Untrue'
Burial own/owns the late months of 2007, and rightly so - this incredible record's deep atmospherics mark the perfect soundtrack to the winter nights in the city, where you never leave the house save under the anxious sodium lights and skeletal branches of pitiful trees. Goes a treat played next to Joy Division's 'Closer'.
Simon Bookish - 'Trainwreck/Raincheck'
Mr Bookish's second album will, alas, end up being a great lost masterpiece after murky business at his label means that you can't actually buy the thing. It's a crying shame, as his brilliantly crafted electronics and eccentric narrations of dreams of train journeys and job interviews make for a compelling listen.
Jenny Hoyston - 'Isle Of'
Erase Errata frontlady goes out on her own for a brilliantly diverse, upbeat record.
The Fall - 'Reformation Post TLC'
Although not any where near as good as last record 'Fall Heads Roll', which in turn is a little below 'The Real New Fall LP', 'Reformation...' starts brilliantly, with the now sadly departed American line-up delivering three formidable, thick browed dirges that culminated in the magnificent 'Fall Sound'. If you can get over the meandering rework of 'White Line Fever' and dubious 'Das Boot', the strident 'Systematic Abuse' at the end of the album emphasises that The Fall are still one of the finest groups still dealing with that guitar/bass/drums modus operandi.
ILiKETRAiNS - 'Elegies To Lessons Learned'
Although this album only really made sense when I read up on the historical characters and events that provided the grist to iLiKETRAiNS mill, they make defiantly English and deeply romantic paens to the past quite unlike anyone else. It's a shame they seem to have acquired the joyless league of baldheaded men (and women) who blight the British Sea Power fanbase, mind.
Tenebrous Mitchell - 'The Havering'
Most miserable record of the year, hands down. Gerry Mitchell will always get compared to Arab Strap man Aidan Moffatt as he's Scottish, doesn't sing, and is somewhat on the dour side, but that's doing him a disservice. 'The Havering' is as visceral and uncompromising a record as you'll hear this year.
Einsturzende Neubauten - 'Alles Wieder Offen'
Although not quite as good as the likes of 'Perpetuum Mobile' and 'Silence is Sexy', the elegant 'Alles Wieder Offen' sees Neubauten continuing to debunk the cliché that they're a bunch of jackhammer operators with a penchant for raffish goth attire.
PJ Harvey - 'White Chalk'
I've found the PJ Harvey's mastery of the piano throughout 'White Chalk' to make it her most engaging record to date, be that through her powerful eulogy of the Dorset countryside, or the usual brilliantly executed gubbins about death and loss.
Von Sudenfed - 'Tromatic Reflexxions'
The fearsome combination of the bullets of Mark E Smith's garrulous snapping with bitter propellant from the aggressive electronics of Mouse on Mars is a marriage made, if not in heaven, than in the psyops division of the great campaign 'gainst the perfidious spread of the forces of Pigeon Detective wrong-doing.
Robert Wyatt - 'Comicopera'
One of the funniest things I will ever see occurred when Brian Eno gave Wyatt a Genius award or similar at the Mercury Music Prize the other year. Eno was supposed to be wheeling Wyatt offstage down a specially installed ramp, but old egghead preferred instead to wave breezily at the crowd, leaving the legendary Wyatt to plummet uncontrollably down the wings. The current global situation probably had a lot more to do with the writing of this brilliant record, one would think.
Electrelane - 'No Shouts, No Calls'
Sadly probably also their swansong, 'No Shouts, No Calls' was Electrelane's finest hour, and a fine conclusion to a terrific decade-long journey via farfisa squalls and, er, the same three metronome drumbeats.
HTRK - 'Nostalgia'
HTRK's punishing grind is a must for anyone keen on the idea Antipodeans heading to Berlin in search of European gloom, and channelling it through complex dynamics, sound of despairing miners trying to dig themselves out.
Chrome Hoof - 'Pre-Emptive False Rapture'
Just as brilliant as Chrome Hoof are in their caped and goaty glory, 'Pre-Emptive False Rapture' is a ridiculous, futuristic, inspiring record.
LCD Soundsystem - 'Sound of Silver'
My Pop Record Of The Year, 'Sound of Silver' spawned one of the best singles in ages. 'All My Friends' even trounces Battles 'Atlas' which, let's face it, gets more than a little annoying after you've heard it deployed for the umpteenth time when some piss-poor DJ decides that the indie kids needed waking out of their clumsy-footed lager stupor.
Vile Imbeciles - 'MA'
Tom Waits being sick on a hot shovel over the juddering rhythms of VI's self-branded "Death Jazz", and another brave release from the White Heat stable.
Alan Vega - 'Station'
Suicide hero files his anger at the state of the world via an album of mid-life industrial rave and collaborations with his wife and son.