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End of the decade lists
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| Woony |
RA hasn't released theirs yet but I'm curious as to what you guys think would be some good top picks. More mainstream publications seem to all stack their top 10 albums with Kanye, Kendrick Lamar and Frank Ocean. I suppose the whole star-power and personality focus of rap and pop makes it easier to focus on a few artists. But I'm really not sure if there are even any records anywhere near as canonical for electronic music, since it's gotten so spread out and diffuse and there's just so much music. Like, I couldn't even think off any surefire consensus picks for the top 10 on top off my head. The first ones that came to my mind were Voices From The Lake - Voices From The Lake and AFX - Syro (both of which got a rare 5/5 from RA) but neither of these have been especially influential in terms of generating new trends and sit more in their own little world.
RA's top pick for the 2000s was Villalobos' Alcachofa. While that certainly doesn't capture all of the 2000s, it seems as good of a pick as any. Could you think of any record like that for the 10s? |
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| SYSTEM-J |
Two that immediately spring to mind are John Talabot - Fin and Bicep - Bicep. I didn't even particularly like Bicep's album, but there's no denying they've been probably the most important producers of the last ten years in terms of influence, and the album capped off a run of huge club hits, had good reviews from mainstream music press and sold a bucketload of copies, hitting the UK Top 20 album charts. Glue alone has about 11 million hits on Youtube and 25 million on Spotify.
As for Fin, it strikes me as the equivalent of something like Trentemoller - The Last Resort or Leftfield - Leftism, where a much-anticipated album fully lives up to expectations and becomes effectively an immediate classic.
Elsewhere, I'd say the likes of Scuba - Triangulation, Minilogue - Blomma and Skee Mask - Compro might not have been cross-over hits, but they're all textbook great albums. I've got my own personal favourites from the last ten years that are more niche, but I'll wait until the decade is actually over before making any kind of list. |
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| Sykonee |
| Are we talking Best, or Most Influential? Because if the latter, we really cannot deny Skrillex' Scary Monsters, can we. |
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| Woony |
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Two that immediately spring to mind are John Talabot - Fin and Bicep - Bicep. I didn't even particularly like Bicep's album, but there's no denying they've been probably the most important producers of the last ten years in terms of influence, and the album capped off a run of huge club hits, had good reviews from mainstream music press and sold a bucketload of copies, hitting the UK Top 20 album charts. Glue alone has about 11 million hits on Youtube and 25 million on Spotify.
As for Fin, it strikes me as the equivalent of something like Trentemoller - The Last Resort or Leftfield - Leftism, where a much-anticipated album fully lives up to expectations and becomes effectively an immediate classic.
Elsewhere, I'd say the likes of Scuba - Triangulation, Minilogue - Blomma and Skee Mask - Compro might not have been cross-over hits, but they're all textbook great albums. I've got my own personal favourites from the last ten years that are more niche, but I'll wait until the decade is actually over before making any kind of list. |
Oh wow, I had no idea Bicep got that huge. In my mind they were still underground house producers. Influential in what way though? Do you think the current en-vogue trance-revival can be traced back to them?
I think James Blake has undoubtly made the biggest impact on popular music overall but none of his albums have reviewed especially well in electronic music circles. Like, his debut album seems to be considered to be a masterpiece by people in pop and indie circles but at the time people in electronic music thought it was just watered down from his more radical early singles.
| quote: | Originally posted by Sykonee
Are we talking Best, or Most Influential? Because if the latter, we really cannot deny Skrillex' Scary Monsters, can we. |
Hmm, good point but I was thinking more in terms of underground stuff. That Skrillex record got a 1,5 from RA. Also, records that were influential historically but haven't aged very well seem to never fare particularily well because of recency bias. |
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| planetaryplayer |
| to be fair, one person gives the score for a particular review. as for end of decade i can't even remember last year. maybe drumcode wins the decade :mad: |
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| SYSTEM-J |
| quote: | Originally posted by Woony
Oh wow, I had no idea Bicep got that huge. In my mind they were still underground house producers. Influential in what way though? Do you think the current en-vogue trance-revival can be traced back to them? |
To be honest, there's an element of "Great Man Theory" about trying to attribute whole trends to individual artists or albums. Leftfield may have popularised the fusion of house music with dub, but the evolution of British soundsystem culture into raves made it almost inevitable. They simply did it earlier and better than most.
Similarly, a '90s revival was always on the cards - just look at clothing fashion in 2019 - but Bicep did it earlier and better than most. What set them apart was when they started making tunes like Just and Higher Level which were no longer mere pastiche but mash ups of the entirety of the '90s - house, garage, breakbeat, ambient house "sunrise" tunes - into one genreless melting pot. Without them you wouldn't have DJ Seinfeld, Brame & Hamo, Trance Wax or 90% of the lush breakbeat tunes that close every DJ's set in 2019. |
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| Lews |
Fin was the first that came to my mind.
What about Dominik Eulberg - Diorama? |
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| LoveHate |
| stefano noferini has to be somewhere on the list, he doesn't get enough credit for the whole tech house wave. |
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| 72hrpartyanimal |
| Dixon!!! and the Innervisions crew. I remember hearing about him and then eventually seeing him in the mid 2000's. Not much was known about other then folklore. Now in the 2010's, the man has become a beast and has caught the eye/ear of those who don't normally follow his type of music. |
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| SYSTEM-J |
We're talking about albums, you dopes.
| quote: | Originally posted by Lews
What about Dominik Eulberg - Diorama? |
That's a nice album. I haven't listened to it in years actually. But it's more one of those "my personal favourites" selections than the kind of mythical, tribe-uniting classic album Woony is searching for in his eternal quest to find the grand narrative of electronic music. |
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| Sykonee |
| What I wonder is if J' was still writing for Cokemachineglow (no, stop laughing, bear with me...!), and was tasked to provide a write-up on another four (4) albums that would have made that website's Best Of 2010s list, What Would Those Four Albums Be? |
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| Woony |
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
That's a nice album. I haven't listened to it in years actually. But it's more one of those "my personal favourites" selections than the kind of mythical, tribe-uniting classic album Woony is searching for in his eternal quest to find the grand narrative of electronic music. |
Well, that was precisely my question. Do these records even exist anymore in dance music? It's very possible that they just don't but the fact that every single non-dancemusic list seems to agree on the same 10 or 20 records made me curious.
And I mean, sure, we can talk about personal favorites but then I'd need a month or two go back to remember everything that even came out this decade. There's so much nice music with no crossover potential out there now that it's difficult to even talk about it without just getting overwhelmed. |
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