So given that my first year of university is all but over, and I am facing the prospect of four months before another lecture, I’ve been really looking forward to getting back into the whole blogging thing. Whilst this sentence has the obvious makings of another thinly-veiled attempt at imitating Pitchfork Media which will last until June, before I ultimately sneak back into the shadows with a Mercury Prize post and Albums Of The Year as a rather underwhelming Christmas present. And if that be it, then that be it. I’d rather it wasn’t, but c’est la vie. As a result, I figured before I crack onto single album reviews and the like, I figured I should give a general overview of my thoughts on 2016 so far.
However, I hate to say this, but despite the numerous high-profile album releases over the past five months, there hasn’t been an album that has really captured my imagination, and enabled me to view this year as another great year for music, as 2014 and 2015 so definitely were. The fact is, until about three weeks ago, only two albums had really made a significant splash in the music community. The first confirmed the status of a legend, but also made us aware of his mortality, and the second could be described as “the out-takes of To Pimp A Butterfly“.
Not to say that this year has had its share of promise. We’d been waiting for the new Kanye album, eventually titled The Life Of Pablo, for months, yet the overall result was rushed, inconsistent, and was the first album Kanye may have ever fronted which doesn’t explore something fundamentally new for the genre. This was a massive shame, though for me it was somewhat unavoidable. After the release of two completely different albums, with 2010’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy exploring maximalism more than any album of this decade, and 2013’s Yeezus doing the exact opposite, as an exercise in raw, intense production, where was Kanye supposed to go?
Indie circles have also experienced their share of disappointment. The release of the new album Junk by French rock band M83 displayed how a band who shot into the public eye with the calculated and epic anthem album Hurry Up, We’te Dreaming could make such a valiant effort to reinvent themselves that they completely lose sight of what was proven. I also wasn’t particularly impressed by the new PJ Harvey album The Hope 6 Demolition Project. Whilst her 2011 album Let England Shake, one of the best albums of that year, was a lyrical stroke of genius in the ability to express her politics in terms of imagery, this time around the lyrics are almost hilariously preachy. And if there’s anything that I, as a student, want to avoid, its preachy left-wing liberals trying to make protest music.
Of course, despite, as per, starting on rather a grave note, I have to confess it has made me rather worried. Albums aren’t like films. There’s no Oscar season for albums. Album followers can’t relax about the fact that Batman vs. Superman: Dawn Of Justice is ranked the 7th best film on IMDb, but come December the good films will have been released. Unfortunately, whilst I’m still waiting for that album to come out which really take my breath away. Regardless, it hasn’t all been bad news…
Therefore, in this post, I’m going to give my 5 Albums Of Note from 2016 so far. Of course, more than 10 albums of note have been released of note this year, and I should also confirm that this is not a “Best of 2016” list (as shown as I’ll do the albums in alphabetical order). I’m simply going to write a little bit about some albums that have caught my attention over the past few months, and pray that 2015 will have some competition starting soon.
I’ll just go through the general disclaimers first…
Albums That Need Listening: Beyonce – Lemonade (once released on Spotify), Chance The Rapper – Coloring Book (to be released on Spotify next week), Skepta – Konnichiwa
Albums That Need Re-Listening: Radiohead – A Moon Shaped Pool (have only listened to an interrupted, incomplete version on BBC 6Music; will wait for Spotify)
Albums That Are Good But Aren’t On The List: Anderson Paak – Malibu, Death Grips – Bottomless Pit, DIIV – Is The Is Are, Esperanza Spalding – Emily’s D+Evolution, James Blake – The Colour In Anything, Jessy Lanza – Oh No, Kendrick Lamar – untitled unmastered, Teleman – Brilliant Sanity
Moving on…
The 1975 – I Like It When You Sleep, For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It
It is fair to say that this album surprised me more than any other album released this year. Not in a Kid A style, though this is partially my own doing. I’ve always grouped the 1975 with bands like Lawson, faux-boybands who are like One Direction with guitars. However, you won’t see 1D releasing a 74-minute monster of an album any time soon. Even werider were the artists who lead singer Dan Healy was citing. These included indie legends Talking Heads, atmospheric post-rock group Sigur Ros, Scottish electronic duo Boards Of Canada, and soul singer D’Angelo. Whilst I can’t say that I exactly heard a remastered version of 1980’s Remain In Light, this album actually contains viable pop hits expected from a band which has as much popularity as The 1975 do. Songs are structured, interesting, and lyrically not a complete waste of space, like many other pop albums this year. And whilst it is a hefty lump of pop, which is probably at least 30 minutes longer than needs be, it’s refreshing to see a band so heavily set in their genre pulling a few risks.
Anna Wise – The Feminine: Act I
Having risen to recognition on the site of Kendrick Lamar’s outstanding records good kid, m.A.A.d city and To Pimp A Butterfly, Anna Wise is no stranger to massive statements. However, feminism as a political topic has not been widely discussed in terms of albums. Of course, there has been the odd Beyonce track, or even Grimes saying “But I’m only a man, and I do what I can”, but as opposed to the kind of topics discussed by Kendrick Lamar, feminism is somewhat avoided at the risk of being seen as alienating. Whilst that basically confirms the problem, if anybody isn’t going to be phased by that problem, its Anna Wise.
I won’t even sugar-coat it, this album is a political statement. Whilst the production reminded me a bit of LP1 in its minimalism, its the lyrics that are important, and they hit very hard. I can’t say its exactly immediate hearing “So they’re calling you a bitch, calling you a slut, ‘cos you dressed up, ‘cos you dressed down” as the intro to BitchSlut, and if the album was any longer than 15 minutes it would just be lengthy complaining. However, as a concise burst of intensity it is very effective, and I’m looking forward to Act II.
David Bowie – Blackstar
It would be fair to say that if any person has been so prevalent in 2016 so far, it could easily be David Bowie. Due to how leftfield this album is thematically, with much darker undertones than Bowie has ever explored prior to Blackstar, I’m sure a lot of people, maybe not as starstruck by this album as I was, will claim that this album is only getting recognition due to Bowie’s death. And oddly enough, I actually agree with them, though not in the way they intend for.
This event has the most similarities to Freddie Mercury’s passing from AIDS. The fact is Mercury, like Bowie, appreciated that he was a legend. The thing is, legends don’t just die. He needed a farewell. A requiem. And after his diagnosis of HIV, Mercury wrote The Show Must Go On, in my opinion the best Queen song they recorded. People may not have cottoned on to it at the time, but this song is Mercury’s farewell. He sings “Inside my heart is breaking, my make-up may be flaking, but my smile still stays on”. Mercury not only realised what this song meant, but he appreciated it.
The main difference is that Queen were never an album band, always known for their singles, whereas David Bowie is known for his album work, with the likes of Low, The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars, and Hunky Dory which, along with Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours, is probably the best British album of the 70’s. Hence, what better way for Bowie to leave than with an album? So, whilst I did credit this album prior to his passing, his death made this album one of the most poignant, thematically-strong albums of the decade so far.
Emma Pollock – In Search Of Harperfield
When I listen to a new album, I always go into it with the idea that this could be a phenomenal album. This could be the album that competes with Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs for album of the decade. Whilst that may be asking a bit much, it means that first impressions are critical, and if there’s anything that Emma Pollock’s In Search Of Harperfield has, its a great intro. This song is bombastic, whilst conjuring up this beautiful image (“Will you dip your toe gently in the water, send the ripples home, whipping up a storm”), and I’ll admit I was hooked from then on.
Fortunately, the quality of this album doesn’t falter, whilst still offering everything from fast-paced synth-laced electric guitars in Parks and Recreation, to the gorgeous sensuality of Alabaster, which reminded me rather a lot of last year’s Natalie Prass album, and the beautiful intertwining of harmony and lyrics feels like it came out of Julia Holter’s Have You In My Wilderness.
Kaytranada – 99.9%
Canadian electronic producer Kaytranada has become the last of a craze of producers finally releasing albums. The first I heard of it was the 2013 album by Immunity by Coldplay producer Jon Hopkins. This was followed in 2014 by It’s Album Time! by Norwegian producer Todd Terje, with its fantastic 70’s latin beats creating an album full of colour. Whilst I love both of these albums, the thing both of these albums suffer from is inconsistency. Todd Terje’s album has some really funky, disco beats paired with great instrumentation for full-bodied, fulfilled songs, but suffers from large amounts of filler that disrupt the continuity of the album.
Therefore, I was really glad when Kaytranada was seen to have brought a massive variety of artists to work on this album, from all genres. From soul singers Anderson Paak and Craig David, to electronic artists AlunaGeorge and Little Dragon, and even to jazz drummer Karriem Riggins. Amazingly, Kaytranada manages to stay true to all of these genres, whilst simultaneously maintaining a cohesive structure, and this really impressed me.
During 2015, I knew I wanted to really focus on listening to as many new releases as possible, so that I could actually make a valid, personal, opinion on the year’s best music. As a result, I wasn’t too sure what t expect. This is painfully clear reading Day 4 of my 30 Day Challenge from January, where I probably copied all of the albums that some website said were due in 2015. Most of it is right to be fair, but to save you scrolling through a load of irrelevant posts, I’ll sum it up: anyone who released an album in 2012 was due to release one this year. Unfortunately, I didn’t pay too much attention to 2012, so whatever appeared this year would be a pleasant surprise.
And what a year its been! We’ve heard all sorts of brilliant albums, from rap to heavy metal to electronica to very-hipster-indie-alternative, albums to laugh and cry over, albums to brood over, and a few that will undoubtedly go down in history.
We even had our share of disappointments, which are always fun to find! So, before I crack onto my Top 20 Albums of 2015, here is a preliminary award:
Most Overrated Album of 2015
Winner: Father John Misty – I Love You, Honeybear
For the majority of the year, the leader of this category was jazz saxophonist Kamasi Washington, with his debut effort The Epic. This album did uncover a gaping hole in album analysis, as a result of its quite extraordinary structure. Kamasi Washington’s album is almost three hours long, full of big stories told entirely in jazz. Frankly, it became clear that no matter how bad an album is, if the overall goal is massive and impressive enough, reviewers will fall head over heels for whatever it is.
In other words, why would a 172-minute, 19 track, triple album called The Epicever get good reviews? Because it is a 172-minute, 19 track, triple album called The Epic. I will confess I did warm to this album, mainly when I realised it wasn’t supposed to be experienced in one giant chunk of pure, unadultered jazz.
Another album which I expected a lot more from was Platform by electronic artist Holly Herndon. I just felt there was far too much going on, so much so that I simply couldn’t keep up with whatever Herndon was trying to achieve. My most accurate analogy for this album is “Grimes on crack”. (Unfortunately, given that Grimes 2012 album Visions, a massive triumph in my opinion, was mostly written over a three week period, in which she was high for all of it. Hence, I will amend it to “Grimes on more crack than she was on when she wrote Visions“)
However, when it comes to 2015’s Overrated Albums, Father John Misty takes the cake. Firstly, on a musical front, this album is very dull. No song on this album seems to have any shred of ingenue to associate to it, with repetitive ideas, very abrupt endings to every song, and oddly placed strings (an aspect which, interestingly, was used very well this year).
This album seems to have more problems lyrically, which is interesting given that almost all of the album’s credit stemmed from its lyrics, being described as funny and cheeky, maybe even borderline cute. I Love You, Honeybear seems to try to tell the story of a young man, at the far end of his awkward teenage years, in his search for love. Frankly, “awkward” is the perfect word to describe this album’s lyrics. In lead single Chateau Lobby #4 (in C for Two Virgins), whose title itself doesn’t offer too much hope, he says “Baby be gentle it’s my first time, I’ve got you inside”. This is the not the kind of adorable awkwardness of two star-crossed lovers that Father John is trying to get at. It’s the complete opposite. It’s cringe-worthy. Very much so.
In Bored in the USA, he even resorts to fake laughter for his jokes. I understand why canned laughter is needed in most sitcoms as a gap in which to laugh between speech (even if that really annoying laugher in the laughter track ruined 3rd Rock From The Sun for me beyond Season 2). However, do we really need it when some guy is explaining why he can’t seem to masturbate any more? No. Just no.
Of course, these albums were obvious anomalies, so without further ado, I’m going to move on to something more positive!
Top 20 Albums of 2015
20. Leftfield – Alternative Light Source
It’s normally quite tricky for a band to translate an album to a live setting. On the one hand there are artists such as Son Lux who, whilst providing a hugely enjoyable set at Green Man Festival, only created limited excitement for his 2015 release Bones. On the other hand, you get bands like Viet Cong whose live set left something to be desired, despite the roaring intensity of their debut album. Leftfield, however, seem to get the balance right, providing both from speakers and through headphones the kind of intensity that makes your hair stand on end. This album, their first since 1999, contains the crunchy synths and lengthy build-ups, not unlike Fuck Buttons or Jon Hopkins, that gives this album the texture to display that Leftfield haven’t lost touch of how to create great music.
19. Various Artists – Hamilton
I’ve always enjoyed movie soundtracks, especially the ones that tell the story of the film in itself. However, I’d never considered soundtracks to musicals. Normally, the ones that immediately spring to mind are Les Miserables, or American Idiot, but those have already been done. Do you know what hasn’t been done? A musical telling the story of Alexander Hamilton, referred to as “the ten-dollar Founding Father without a Father” and his ascent to becoming one of the most influential men in American history. But it’s not quite there until the typical showtune style is combined with hip-hop and R ‘n’ B to produce one of the most unique sounds this year.
Writer and lead actor Lin-Manuel Miranda was questioned regarding the diversity of the cast, given the white populace of the era. However, Miranda argued that this cast represents the true America, and he hasn’t picked a better stage to display that. Very surprisingly, this soundtrack, unlike anything else made, works from the very beginning and does not let go.
18. Caravan Palace – <|°_°|>
If you were to ask a film critic what the best film ever was, what would they say? The Pianist? Schindler’s List? 12 Years A Slave? It’s become a bit of an issue in the film industry that good films have to concern grevious, heavy topics, and light-heartedness isn’t as well received. According to the IMDb Top 250, the top comedy is the brilliantly-made and hilarious Intouchables at 39th place, but even this film has its emotional moments. The same is to be said for the music industry. However, French electro-swing band Caravan Palace slice straight through that.
“Electro-swing”…not exactly the most common of genres… but it works so well in creating music that seems to exist solely for providing a little slice of European-inspired joy for our busy lives. This album is interspersed with saxophones, xylophones, upbeat synths, fast pace and jazz piano, which would never fail to put a smile on your face in the first place, so 39 minutes of it can’t hurt.
17. Songhoy Blues – Music In Exile
Moving on from Caravan Palace wanting to have fun, no band knows the value of joy in music better than Malian blues group Songhoy Blues. All four of them living in Northern Mali, where music was banned, they fled to the the South and found each other. From then on, they have treated music like a gift, describing every gig they do as a “celebration”. Now, if that’s not a reason for having a good time then I don’t know what is.
This “fun” is really well translated in their debut album Music In Exile. This album still retains the raw sounds of Africa paired, but is paired with guitar in loads of different ways: from Ibibio Sound Machine disjointed electric in songs such as Irganda, to the gorgeous acoustic guitar in Mali. This album is an experience in itself, and something that almost demands enjoyment.
16. FKA twigs – M3LL155X
One of the aspects of FKA twigs’ debut LP1 that resonated with me was her use of silence, yet whilst I still admire the skill with which she separated all the sounds in her album, I understand that the silence had to be there, simply for reasons of logistics. When every single note and texture is intricately produced, as LP1 was, how can you make a full-length album with a sound more full and rich? This is what her three EPs have allowed FKA twigs to do, and no less in her newest EP M3LL155X (pronounced “Melissa”).
It has become clear that an FKA twigs release is about more than the music on the disc. Whilst the music on this album has a rich texture, whilst still displaying twigs’ immense production skills, especially on songs like third track In Time, the style of this album is stretched to everything else about it. Even the name, which only highlights that when it comes to originality, FKA twigs is in a league of her own.
15. Carly Rae Jepsen – E.MO.TION
I don’t listen to many albums written by artists who normally feature on the radio, but nobody really does. Why listen to 11 tracks in a given order when five of the them are already singles, and therefore the only ones worth listening to? That does beg the question of why the remaining tracks aren’t singles. Is it just filler so that another godforsaken album can be released? Or does it show that maybe some thought has actually gone into the album? Not normally, as the singles generally appear at the beginning of the album, meaning that they last just as long as the attention span of the average 12-year-old girl lusting over Justin Bieber. Carly Rae Jepsen, being as awesome as she is, doesn’t fall into that trap.
Every track displays Jepsen’s brilliant talent for writing pop songs. Obviously, there is the very catchy and radio-friendly track I Really Like You, which is an obvious attempt to replicate the masterpiece that is Call Me Maybe, but the production on every other track is fantastic. You get the wonderful builds in songs like Making The Most Of The Night, arching synths in All That not dissimilar to Tame Impala, and the almost sombre vibe in many songs, especially my album highlight Run Away With Me. Whilst the lyrics may have done with a little more polish, this is a really solid pop record, which deserves the credit it is receiving.
14. C Duncan – Architect
“I’ll be gone by Winter” sings Christopher Duncan in the final song of his debut album. This has a beautiful irony to it, given that this album has been criminally overlooked, so much so that his album doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page. Yet the 12 songs of dream-pop-meets-classical harking back to his classical upbringing work an absolute treat not only regarding the creation of 12 songs that gel together, yet also those that work individually, something often sacrificed for the greater good of the album. This is particularly impressive, as not only do these 12 tracks display some of the greatest range in any album (from the hushed Silence And Air to the almost Pulp-like Here To There), but also penultimate track As Sleeping Stones, a strong contender for Song Of The Year.
13. Natalie Prass – Side By Side
Regardless of my utter excitement of seeing Natalie Prass at Green Man Festival, I was curious to see what would happen. Her debut album is full of gorgeous string and brass instrumentation, giving the album a wonderful sense of fullness and satisfaction. However, can a 29-year-old indie artist touring her debut album really bring a 30-man orchestra on tour? Unfortunately, she didn’t, yet the resulting sound was stripped down in such a way that another sort of dimension was revealed. This is exactly what she did on My Baby Don’t Understand Me and Christy from her live EP. Rather than using trumpets, the build up of the repeated “Our love is a long goodbye” in the former was achieved via wonderfully arranged guitar, and her voice in Christy takes on a deeper tone, offering a point of view to the song I never would have considered.
In regard to the three covers on this EP, a great deal of bravery is being displayed. How many artists have the audacity to not only cover, but almost reinvent, a classic song like Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound Of Silence? And the ability to translate Grimes’ fist-punchingly catchy REALiTi in a jazz style, and as a decent album closer, is quite a skill. Prass somehow manages to defy expectation, even if she was a little self-deprecating in assuming Grimes’ opinion would be “jazz shit”.
12. Oneohtrix Point Never – Garden Of Delete
Definitely one of the most abstract albums of 2015, G.O.D (coincidence?), whilst being rather difficult to follow even after a few listens, was engaging and enthralling from the very beginning. It’s full of really odd synths, used ingeniously by Daniel Lopatin to create every atmosphere possible: from the exciting intro and Ezra to the ambient SDFK to the really creepy Child Of Rage.
It is rather difficult to describe an album as abstract as this…which is all the more reason for you guys to give it a listen!
11. Courtney Barnett – Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit
For anyone who has had any interest in this blog, you probably remember that I embarked on a 30-Day Challenge in January to write 30 posts in 30 days. Whilst I succeeded (kind of…), quite a large chunk of the posts were either boring, or irrelevant, or simply short, simply because I haven’t had anything to write about. In Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit, Australian rocker Courtney Barnett seems to suffer the exact same infliction. This means that whilst every song ‘theme’ is pretty weird and, in itself, possibly not worthy of song-status, Barnett has made an art of weaving these ideas into an album, that can almost act as an overview of her life unfolding. Like Seinfeld, a programme about nothing, simply demonstrating the inanity of life.
Barnett’s themes in this album are all over the place, ranging from house prices in Depreston, to global warming in Kim’s Caravan, to buying groceries in Dead Fox (“Jen insists that we buy organic vegetables and I must admit I was a little sceptical at first, a little pesticide can’t hurt.”). Frankly, on a musical level, this album isn’t even that impressive, with repeating themes and motifs forming the basis of the majority of the album, but the lyrics make up for everything. It’s hard not to laugh at the irony of Barnett’s creativity arising out of the seeming lack of it.
10. Tame Impala – Currents
After the release of their 2012 album Lonerism, in particular of the song Feels Like We Only Go Backwards, Australian band Tame Impala now have an extremely important role to play in UK student life. They have officially taken the role as “the band you listen to when you want to give the impression you know about music”. This is why in every bar and cafe at UCL, you will always find Tame Impala blaring out of the speakers. Fortunately, given the quality of their new release Currents, I have no problem with that.
This new album retains everything good about Lonerism, whilst also making it far more approachable, with an added smoothness to the album. The incredible baselines still play a key role in many of the songs, namely The Less I Know The Better and New Person, Same Old Mistakes. Synths are still featured everywhere, creating the heavenly atmospheres of ‘Cause I’m A Man and Eventually. Kevin Parker has even spent more time polishing the guitar lines, creating the brilliant hooks of songs like Let It Happen, which is undoubtedly one of the catchiest tracks of 2015.
9. Beach House – Depression Cherry
I’ve always said that more songs have made me shed a tear than films. However, not many have almost brought me to that point in the middle of a record store. That is what Levitation, the opener to Beach House’s fifth album Depression Cherry, almost achieved. Beach House are no strangers to inciting emotion through music, as a dream-pop band who wrote Take Care in 2010, one of the major tear-jerkers. However, Levitation displayed a new atmosphere that was all-absorbing, and with Victoria Legrand’s soft vocal line singing “You should see, there’s a place I want to take you”: I was hooked. Levitation is, in my opinion, the best album opener I’ve heard all year, and if you don’t want to listen to the rest of this album after hearing it, I don’t know what will.
Thankfully, this album does represent Beach House taking a risk, moving away from the method they applied to Teen Dream in 2010 and Bloom in 2012, which is a sure-fire way of producing gorgeous albums. Lead single Sparks features guitar distortion of the kind I’ve never heard Beach House try before, and the soft, cushy atmosphere I described in Levitation also appears in Space Song and PPP amongst others. Therefore, not only does Depression Cherry suffice as a standard Beach House album, but also as a sign of good things to happen.
8. Mew – +-
Danish rockers Mew have, since the 90’s, been honing their skills creating massive stadium rock anthems, which is a bit of an issue given that they haven’t quite made it to that stage (literally!) yet. They’re not big enough to have a stadium tour, yet they can never be a start-up act because they would just blow the main act completely out of the water. This did mean that whilst the end of their set at Green Man, in which they performed their most popular anthem from 2003 in Comforting Sounds, a massive song full of loud noises and big statements, I can’t help but think they just needed more people for the experience to be genuinely what they were after.
Fortunately, they do seem to be able to translate this big sound into headphones and, against all odds, create an actual cohesive album out of it! New album +- contains the big sounds we love to associate with Mew, in tracks like the opening song Satellites (an ode to the worldliness and accessibility created by television, and also possibly the most grandiose song ever written about ‘movie night’), Interview The Girls and, a must for any Mew album, the massive finale Cross The River On Your Own. It does also boast an greatly appreciated range, from the almost vulnerably intimate Making Friends to the noise rock of Witness. Did they really need a 10-minute-long penultimate track? Probably not, though this album is still a joy.
7. Sam Lee – The Fade In Time
In 2015, Sam Lee has shown himself to be the real jack-of-all-trades. Whilst his previous album, A Ground Of Its Own, was mainly steeped in his familiar folk origins, this year he went al out regarding originality, taking inspiration from everything from gypsy folk to Irish traditional songs. All of these specific genres arose as a direct result of a tradition, yet combining them in this way creates something that would clearly happen if everyone was brought together to create one giant, inter-traditional album.
Of course, he hasn’t done this on his own. For this album he became “Sam Lee and Friends”, with a much stronger instrumentation than his debut. There are drums, strings, odd instruments I’ve never seen before, all coming together to produce this massive piece of work. You open with Jonny O’the Brine, probably the most adrenaline-fuelled folk song I’ve ever heard, though the album does become more intimate. I loved the sample taken from an interview about song Lord Gregory, which displays the amount of research and history that has gone into making this album.
The album cover features Lee sitting in front of what looks like a hoarder’s front room, but this amalgamation of ideas and inspirations is a perfect analogy to what this album truly represents.
6. Public Service Broadcasting – The Race For Space
Lots of albums like to try and tell a story in their songs. It’s often considered to be a sure-fire way of creating good albums, as structure is an inherent part of both a story and a good album. Often, these kinds of albums get branded as ‘concept albums’, and thus ‘too indie’. But The Race For Space by Public Service Broadcasting isn’t even a ‘story’ as such. It’s a documentary!
Yes, this is rather odd of an album, but the key thing about good documentaries is that they aren’t just informative: they’re inspirational. I still remember watching the three part documentary by Prof. Alice Roberts Origins Of Us, regarding the physiological evolution of humans over 7 million years. This documentary inspired me so much that it ended up forming the first line of my personal statement to study Natural Sciences. That is what a good documentary can do.
The Race For Space works in a very similar way, looking at the story of space travel from the first inspirations to the Apollo 17 mission. As this album is made almost entirely from samples, it features the passion of John F. Kennedy’s Rice University speech (“We do not do it because it is easy. We do it because it is hard.”), the devastation of the Apollo 1 disaster in Fire In The Cockpit, and ultimately the excitement of the Apollo 8 and Apollo 11 missions, with The Other Side and Go! respectively. The build-ups is both of these songs, especially in The Other Side are simply awe-inspiring, and really make this album more than a crappy documentary.
5. Jamie xx – In Colour
Whilst I don’t scold the decision to award the Mercury Prize to Benjamin Clementine’s At Least For Now, I still have to stand by my decision. The fact is, this is the album that British music has been waiting for. The last time a British album made such a splash in the music community was probably Radiohead’s Kid A in 2000, and its 9.3 rating by Pitchfork Media makes it the best reviewed British album by Pitchfork since 2003, when Boy In Da Corner by the-then-19-year-old Dizzee Rascal was awarded 9.4. But, more than all of the albums mentioned here, the important thing that Jamie xx does in this album is completely transcend the genre.
As I said in my Mercury Prize review, whilst this is branded as “electronica”, only electronica reviewers don’t like this album, because is it really electronica? I don’t think so. It’s simply an album by a producer who knows how a really good album is made, and that deserves unending credit.
I also need to mention again the vibrancy of this album. I honestly believe that this album cover is the best album sleeve of the year. It may not be the most thought-provoking or the most unique (I see umbrellas like this all over London), but it is not only really gratifying to look at, but also represents the album perfectly, along with the album title. Joy radiates from this album, even in the interludes like Just Saying, which offers character to the following track. Quite frankly, when listening to this album, we know there will always be Good Times.
4. Miguel – Wildheart
When most people try and write about sex, it almost always comes across as crass, even in really good albums. Jarvis Cocker, probably the most famous aficionado of this kind of music, in legendary album Different Class wrote lyrics such as “I really love it when you tell me to stop” and “You should take me seriously…’cos I’ve been sleeping with your wife for the past sixteen weeks”. FKA twigs was slightly more artistic in LP1, if not more descriptive, but it does beg the question of how they got away with it.
Miguel, however, despite being as…’creative’…with his descriptions, especially in songs like the valley, manages to make songs that portray sex as more of a beautiful thing than dirty. In fourth song Coffee, a song so suggestive of sex that the single was named Coffee (F*cking) (“Word play turns into gun play, Gun play turns into pillow talk, Pillow talk turns into sweet dreams, Sweet dreams turns into ‘Coffee’ in the morning” *wink*), he also writes “I wish I could paint our love, each moment in vibrant hues”. Isn’t that lovely? Whilst this theme is more prevalent in the first half of the album, it definitely sets the mood.
This album, thankfully, is not only a lyrical stroke of genius. I love the guitar throughout the entirety of this album, especially songs like leaves, face the sun and waves, in which the guitars compliment Miguel’s engaging voice perfectly. He also isn’t afraid to focus more on the raw production, which clearly pays off in songs like DEAL, which opens with a more jolty synth, and …going to hell which opens with a smoother, though borderline creepy, style to ease you into the song. Every track in this album has something that makes it really stand out, and that has made Miguel’s Wildheart one of the greatest successes this year.
3. Kendrick Lamar – To Pimp A Butterfly
Whilst rap and hip-hop aren’t my preferred genres, it seems to be that this year was a fairly slow year for them. Yes, there have been some solid releases, such as Vince Staples’ Summertime ’06,DS2 by Future and D’Angelos’s critically acclaimed Black Messiah. but it was difficult to consider these albums as anything but solid records. This is surprising given that at the beginning of 2015, the music world was preparing for what may have been one of the biggest years in rap. D’Angelo had already released his album in the US, and we were predicting new albums from the likes of Drake, Frank Ocean and Kanye West. However, of those three names (other than the Drake mixtape), no albums were released. One theory for why this occurred stands out quite considerably: no matter how good any of these albums would be, they would pale in comparison to To Pimp A Butterfly.
The fact is, not only may Kendrick Lamar have written the best rap album in recent years, but he may have also released the most important and necessary album of the century so far.
To Pimp A Butterfly is an album with big sounds and big ideas. ‘Big sounds’, regarding the massive orchestration of this entire albums, with countless producers and musicians all focussed on Kendrick’s goal, is characteristic of really critically acclaimed rap albums, with Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy a perfect example. Yet whilst this album is excellent, Kanye’s lyrics leave room for improvement. Kendrick, in 2o15, cuts straight through that, with songs such as The Blacker The Berry already anthems for a generation. Kendrick Lamar, since the release of 2012’s good kid, m.A.A.d city, has had to accept his place as one of the only positive influences from his region of Compton, and has already gone on to change the lives of the people who live there via his music. Despite his notorious modesty, Kendrick Lamar claimed that his album would be as influential as Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, even copying the title’s pattern. If Kanye was saying that, maybe we’d be cynical, but Kendrick Lamar doesn’t make these vast claims without reason.
The album opens with the explosive Wesley’s Theory, an ode to actor Wesley Snipes, an example of when celebrities cannot deal with their new found wealth, of which Kendrick was at a risk. This song contains masterful base from the almost legendary Thundercat, and features the equally legendary George Clinton. This then moves into the jazzed-up For Free? (Interlude), which contains some of the best rapping on the entire album. This is also a perfect example to display that even though this album is a ‘rap’ album, it’s so much more. It’s almost every genre you could think of, from the jazz in the second song, to the almost dreamy themes of These Walls, even taking influence from alternative, with song Hood Politics co-produced by indie troubadour Sufjan Stevens, and features a sample from his electronic-based 2010 album Age Of Adz.
There was even a hint of simple rock in his lead single i, which scared a few people into the possibility that Kendrick was giving in to radio. Fortunately, he proves us all very wrong with the album version, which was recorded live, and provides a thrilling end to the album, and a perfect transition to the 12-minute Mortal Men which, if not overindulgent with his discussion with the ghost of 2Pac and his recital of poetry, is a fantastic and unique ending to the Big Ideas offered by this album.
2. Natalie Prass – Natalie Prass
When I first listened to Natalie’s Prass’ debut album, and realised that it could well be my favourite album of 2015, I knew I was going to end up in this position: how does a 29-year-old Virginian singer-songwriter create an album better than Kendrick Lamar? In the end, Natalie Prass is very simple: it’s a middle-class, educated, white album, by a middle-class, educated, white girl, about middle-class, educated, white shit. And it’s awesome.
I am a sucker for a break-up album. It may make me sound like some sort of schadenfreude, but it’s true. Fiona Apple’s The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than The Driver Of The Screw And Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do discusses the almost sinister connotations of a break-up (“I could liken you to a shark, the way you bit off my head, but then again I was waving around a bleeding open wound.”), whilst Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago has a more melancholy vibe, with his acoustic guitars and layered vocals. Most break-up albums, however, consist of everything from anger, to depression, to despair, to acceptance. Natalie Prass excels in all of these.
Lead single Bird Of Prey is more curious. Despite its quite disquieting analogy of her ex-boyfriend to a “Bird of prey, with a heart like the night”. However, the music video is colourful, and she seems to smiles as she repeats “heart like the night”, “heart like the night”. It’s as if she’s shielding her pain with a tough outer shell. This vulnerability is embraced more in the Violently, a gorgeous string-soaked ballad describing how now she fights to stay away (“And I’ll break all my bones, ’cause they all, they all want you.”). However, this can only result in the acceptance in the heartbreaking outro It Is You, in which she claims “So many things will fill my life but only one will do: it is you”.
The production in this album is also breathtaking. Despite Prass’ soft voice, main producer Matthew E. White still manages to incorporate brass and strings into this album. The strings are used beautifully and in every situation: the build-up of “Our love is a long goodbye” in opening track My Baby Don’t Understand Me, the jolty Christy, or a call to the beginning of the album in the Reprise. Whilst the brass is used less frequently, it is used even more skilfully to compliment the delicacy of her voice. As Violently peaks, you hear a burst of trumpets, as if her situation is nigh-on triumphant. They play a similar role in the wonderful Never Over You, which provides a kind of ending before the Mary-Poppins-esque It Is You, with its all-encompassing strings and wind instruments. Every single song in this album has a piece of production where you can do nothing but think “That is a stroke of genius”. This makes Natalie Prass the kind of album that appears maybe once a year (see 2014, Are We There by Sharon van Etten: album of 2014. But we’re not here for that…).
1. Grimes – Art Angels
I am without a doubt that some of you will probably be quite confused that there are albums I have placed about To Pimp A Butterfly, especially if you’ve read my review and see how much I admire it. The fact is that Grimes’ Art Angels isn’t a political call-to-arms, nor is it a commentary on racism in the USA. However, whilst Kendrick’s album is significant on a cultural and social level, I believe that Grimes’ albums is significant on an artistic level. You only need to see the album cover to see where I’m coming from.
When I first read about Grimes’ follow-up to her delightfully creative Visions, whilst obviously being excited, she explained that all of the songs would be really different to each other. This made me slightly sceptical. Of course, you don’t want to listen to an album that is repetitive, but it must have a sort of structure. Was Grimes just going to go all out and create something completely non-cohesive? Having listened to this album many times, it is clear how disparate this album is. But in a masterful twist of events, Grimes has wrapped this album like a big, eclectic, three-eyed Christmas gift into one of the most well-structured albums of the year.
You can see all sorts of influences in this album. You have the bubble-gum pop song of California, which honestly brought me back to Taylor Swift’s 1989, at least in a vocal sense. Flesh Without Blood and Belly Of The Beat are gloriously catchy without screwing your brain over too much, and then you have Kill V. Maim, one of the most inventive and crazy tracks I’ve ever heard. This, along with Venus Fly, describing an interrogation given by Grimes and Janelle Monae, were definitely two of my favourite tracks of the year.
Another thing this album did was show a brilliant evolution of Grimes as a musician, which I couldn’t have predicted after the uniqueness of Visions. She’s become more experimental in her vocal performances, experimenting with her higher register in laughing and not being normal, and her piercing screaming in SCREAM and Kill V. Maim (“You gave up being good when you declared a state of WAR!!!!”). In contrast, she isn’t afraid to slow things down. REALiTi has a much more easy-going beat, which contrasts amazingly with the eerily beautiful Pin. And she precedes final song Butterfly with a beautiful interlude in Life In The Vivid Dream, a smooth, flowing acoustic guitar with a soothing side to Grimes’ voice. She wasn’t lying when she said it was disparate…
This disparity only confirms Grimes’ innate talents as an artist. Whilst Kendrick Lamar’s album was fantastic in its inter-generic nature, he was aided by dozens of musicians in the seeking of his overhanging goal. Art Angels, however, was made by three people: Aristophanes (Taiwanese rapper; contributing vocals for SCREAM), Janelle Monae (contributing vocals for Venus Fly) and Grimes (literally everything else. Even the album cover). This just confirms that if any one person this year has written an album that should go down in history, it’s Claire Boucher: Grimes.
So, what’s in store to treat us next year? Of course, we are all highly anticipating the release of Kanye’s new work SWISH, with Frank Ocean and Drake hoping to challenge him (which, according to general consensus, nobody has been able to do this decade so far). In the more indie circles, M83 have confirmed that they will be releasing a follow-up to their 2011 double album Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, which features undoubtedly one of the best outros ever written. Punk band Savages have announced a follow-up to their intense debut album Silence Yourself, and PJ Harvey will be releasing the follow-up to Let England Shake, the closest an album could get to a political thriller. Radiohead and Gorillaz have also been hinting at new work for a while, so maybe that’s an exciting possibility too?
Regarding less likely outcomes, the release of LCD Soundsystem’s Christmas song Christmas Will Break Your Heart, in a ideal world this would imply a comeback. Also, as a Mancunian, I’m very excited by the prospect of a new Stone Roses album, which may catapult them back to legendary status worldwide, which Second Coming seemed to ruin in 1994.
And maybe, just maybe, Chromatics, who promised the release of album Dear Tommy for Valentine’s Day 2015, will finally get round to releasing it…
It’s that time of year again: my compulsory annual power-rankings for the Mercury Prize. I would apologise for not having written since February…but I’m not going to, because it might be the topic of a future article…or not.
I do have my 2015 Review of Music to come late December, but for the meantime, I’ve listened to and analysed the 12 nominees for this year’s Mercury Prize.
This year seems to offer something similar to last year’s list, having taken a step back from the mainstream and focussed on trying to find artists who are trying to do something new which, in the end, is what the Mercury Prize tries to promote. Previous winners such as Klaxons and Portishead have found themselves at the forefront of a genre which then takes off. Whilst this didn’t occur after Talvin Singh won in 1999 for his eclectic mix of electronic and bhangra, there’s still something to be said for his creativity.
(Un)fortunately, electronica-bhangra doesn’t feature on this list, but there is quite a variety including soul, hip-hop, dream-pop, and many others, which should make this list somewhat interesting…
12. Roisin Murphy – Hairless Toys
I had to listen to this album quite a few times before I decided to place this bottom of my list this year. Last year, I put Young Father’s Dead in 12th place (below Royal Blood’s dreadful racket of an album) only to find that it won. In the end, I didn’t listen to this album as much, as it’s one of the longer ones, and didn’t figure for me first time, so I just left it.
Roisin Murphy’s Hairless Toys is, for lack of a better description, awkward. There are motifs that don’t hit the ear properly. There are lyrics that are just questionable. In Exploitation, Murphy repeats the line ‘Who’s exploiting who?’ to imply the sexual overtones, but instead sounds like a repeating advert against diamond mining in Sierra Leone. The word ‘exploit’ is a weird one to. Just try saying ‘exploit’, and annunciate. It doesn’t really tip off the tongue, does it? Well that’s what it sounded like, and it just made this album tough to appreciate.
Listen to: Evil Eyes
Odds: 14/1
11. ESKA – ESKA
ESKA is one of the more annoying albums on this list as it was never streamed on Spotify. It means the annoying large gaps between songs (especially long if WiFi is acting up), and sometimes even adverts. But even from what I’ve heard, this album seems to be a pretty standard attempt at creating a sort-of-world-music album and, well, not. Laura Mvula did the exact same thing in 2013 when she released Sing To The Moon (incidentally, that took 11th place as well on my 2013 list. Coincidence? Probably…).
I will confess, as a result of the while YouTube mess, this isn’t an album I’ve paid too much attention to, but from what I have heard, it is a little bit of a snoozer. Even with all of the instruments and effects and electronics implemented into this album, it just felt pretty dull, and so I’m not too convinced of its success this year.
Listen to: Shades Of Blue
Odds: 8/1
10. Florence and the Machine – How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful
Everyone loves a little bit of Florence. It’s hard not to. Florence Welch et al. have a gift when it comes to creating massive stadium rock tracks which, paired with some nifty epilepsy-causing light displays and big screens, can create a brilliant night. Her third record, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, contains some really great examples of Spectrum-like songs, such as intro Ship To Wreck and second song What Kind Of Man. These are excellent specimens, but what about the rest of the album?
The issue with Florence is that the minute you get past the massive rock ballads, what’s left? Whatever it is, it doesn’t sound much like Florence. But how can it, when the basic foundation of ‘Florence and the Machine’ is stadium anthems? It means that the slower, smaller songs, such as Delilah and Caught are nowhere near as interesting as they could be. What is interesting is that whilst these songs are not designed to rival the lead singles, it’s almost like they try to be as maximalist as the rest of Florence’s great records, with big choirs and grand pianos, but it just ends up feeling like a bit of an anti-climax. And that is a word Florence, of all people, doesn’t like to hear.
Listen to: What Kind Of Man
Odds: 20/1
9. Aphex Twin – Syro
After a 13-year LP hiatus, in which, apparently, the world dance music scene was left seemingly without purpose, given Aphex Twin’s almost godlike status in the dance music world, Richard D. James finally released Syro to rave reviews, with many considering this album to be one of the best of 2014, even with FKA twigs and East India Youth providing exquisite albums as part of this genre. So when I found out that this album was on this list, I had mixed feelings.
On the one hand, I knew that I had an opportunity to listen to a ‘great’ album which I had overlooked last year. On the other hand, I realised that this list might be a little more difficult than expected.
So when I put my headphones on for my first listen, I was so excited. But, really unfortunately, I couldn’t, and still cannot, think of why this album is supposed to be so good. During my first listen, as I walked from my flat to university, I realised about 40 minutes in that I had actually forgotten that Syro was even playing. That’s good when you are just looking for something to wash over you, but when you’re looking for a masterpiece, is background music really sufficient?
In the end, that’s what Syro is: background music. I won’t lie and say that it’s bad background music. This album is superbly arranged, and richly textured to create a beautiful atmosphere. But once the atmosphere has been created, then what? Well, not much in the case of Syro.
It does take skill to create an instrumental album with a story. Jon Hopkins succeeded with Immunity in 2013, and Fuck Buttons did create the best album ever written (see 50 Best Albums Ever post from January) with Tarot Sport in 2009. However, I’m not sure how much Aphex Twin has really achieved on this album.
Listen to: minipops 67
Odds: 12/1
8. Gaz Coombes – Matador
20 years after Britpop was in its prime, we’re currently in a phase where all of the bands have pretty much broken up, yet the frontmen are still trying to make something of themselves. Generally, it can go in one of two ways. On the one hand, they could go off and create Oasis-Mach-2-do-you-think-they’ll-notice-we’re-not-Oasis in the name of Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds. On the other, they can do a Damon Albarn and become a general Renaissance man of music, including creating Gorillaz, one of the most forward thinking bands of our generation.
So, what has Supergrass frontman Gaz Coombes been up to? Well, neither of those. His second solo album Matador isn’t quite a remake of the whole devil-may-care outlook of Supergrass, but it still isn’t that massive a transition. This album is a decent album that is easy to listen to. But is it anything special? I don’t think so. So when I see adverts all over the London Underground describing this as his ‘masterpiece’, I can’t help but feel a little cynical. Whilst songs such as The English Ruse are fast-paced and about as exciting as Coombes will get, there are a few snoozers on this album too. The Girl Who Fell To Earth has the capacity to be a great song, but instead is uninspired. The song is supposed to be a bit of a stab at technology taking over our lives. ‘Blinded by computer love’ he will sing. But didn’t Radiohead cover that via OK Computer over 18 years ago? Inspired much…
The link to the whole ‘matador’ theme is also somewhat disappointingly understated, via a single 85 second song right at the end (plus maybe the intro song Buffalo. But unless Spain has spontaneously altered its culture, or I am suffering from a lack of culture, buffaloes and matadors don’t mix…this could be awkward…). Coombes ends the album with ‘I’ll take the pain and the scars of war, ‘cos I’ll face the beast and fight like a matador’. In contrast, in For Free (Interlude), Kendrick Lamar said ‘I need forty acres and a mule not forty ounces and a pitbull, bullshit, matador, matador’ in reference to the iconic Uncle Sam as a matador against Kendrick, the bull, deceiving him like America deceives black men into the false idea of success.
Now that, Mr Coombes, is how you make a matador analogy.
Listen to: 20/20
Odds: 16/1
7. Wolf Alice – My Love Is Cool
As one of the bigger albums on this list, Wolf Alice have already garnered acclaim from reviewers and artists alike for their debut My Love Is Cool, and rightfully so. They have written a very well-structured album, which peaks and calms at the correct times, and it is also one of the easier albums to listen to here. Lead singer Ellie Rowsell is refreshingly versatile as well, ranging from the almost tense intro Turn To Dust, to the explosive climaxes in songs such as You’re A Germ. This makes her, and indeed the rest of the band, one of the biggest breakthrough artists of the year in the UK.
Whilst this album is overall very good, there are a couple of awkward moments. Take the third song Your Loves Whore. What’s with the random gaps? And main single You’re A Germ, suffers from lyrics such as
They won’t win the Mercury Prize though. It’s nothing to do with their album, which is a pretty solid effort, but because they are a bit of a walking cliche. They remind me a bit of a heavier London Grammar, whose 2013 album If You Wait, was pretty understated regarding its quality. That was a sound I haven’t heard before. Wolf Alice just seem like a bit of an amalgamation of every band with a female singer and guys playing the rest of the instruments. And in that respect, despite a good quality album, I would be very surprised if they come out as winners.
Listen to: Silk
Odds: 7/1
6. Ghostpoet – Shedding Skin
Obaro Ejimiwe is currently experiencing his second round of the Mercury Prize, after 2011 nomination for Peanut Butter Blues and Melancholy Jam. It’s not surprising, therefore, that both of these albums are pretty similar. It’s almost as if Ejimiwe has taken a bit of a Beach House post-Teen Dream approach to album writing in that ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ (except the first of their 2015 albums Depression Cherry, which is gorgeous).
Fundamentally, it means this album is pretty good. Opener Off Peak Dreams sounds eerily similar to the opener of Speech Debelle’s 2009 winner Speech Therapy, with its somewhat held-back approach to expressing the real message of the song. Ejimiwe also capitalises on his distinctive singing style, with its almost drowsy/’swag’ feel signified by the drones at the end of each phrase. It’s a really good style, which puts you at ease whilst listening to the album, but he does pull it off every single time.
At lease Ellie Rowsell rewards listeners with her impressive vocal range. Ejimiwe, as a ‘kind-of-hip-hop’ artist, probably doesn’t feel the need to display a range of that calibre. However, it would be nice to have seen him take a step back from this repeated sound.
Regardless of this factor, this is still an album worth listening to. Yes there are downpoints, as any album has, with songs such as the six-minute Be Right Back, Moving House, which never seems to end. But Ghostpoet has made use of his impressive production with his sparse electric guitars and backing vocalists, particularly on songs like Yes, I Helped You Pack, which does provide sufficient interest to keep this album turning over.
Odds: 8/1
5. Benjamin Clementine – At Least For Now
Baroque pop is something that isn’t really heard much nowadays. Sure, people say that good music is stuck back in the 60’s and that it’s been downhill since then, but when was the last time a new release really felt like it came from that kind of era. Tame Impala’s 2012 release Lonerism felt like a 70’s record, and dozens of artists, from Arctic Monkeys to Django Django, have tried to rip off The Beatles. But there’s something distinctly fake about all these records in reference to a proper era-album. Clementine, however, cuts straight through that. Whilst his music seems like a jazzed-up Belle and Sebastian, possibly one of the best baroque pop bands around, Clementine’s voice also harks back to a style almost derivative of Nina Simone.
Even the content is somewhat old-fashioned in that respect. In Adios, one of the many excellent songs from this record, he apologises for jumping into the train, ‘I waited but no one came’. Who sings about trains in today’s music? The idea of the train seems to be fundamentally vintage, and this style is very clearly translated out towards the rest of the album.
Unfortunately, this is precisely why he probably won’t win the Mercury Prize: no matter how good this album seems to be, it doesn’t have enough of a forward-thinking spirit. It would be awesome if this album inspired artists to bring back this kind of music from the depths of time, but the idea of a man singing at his piano with a glass of wine and cigarette smoke around isn’t currently the music scene’s cup of tea.
Listen to: Nemesis
Odds: 9/2
4. Slaves – Are You Satisfied?
Isn’t amazing how musicians are allowed to be cynical and angry about literally everything? They’re all Champagne Socialists, vegan, Buddhist, and believe all army funding should be redirected towards arts funding.
Okay, maybe that stereotype isn’t the most accurate, but when it comes to being angry about current affairs, Slaves have pretty much got it covered. But what is really good about this album is that despite all the crap, they’ve come out with a very solid punk-rock record. I like to think of them as similar to Royal Blood, except where Royal Blood just decided to make as much noise as possible, thus creating a pretty unbearable album, Slaves translate the ‘noise’ into something which, if removed, will not have created as solid an album.
More than anything else, this album is completely full of energy, courtesy of the endless stream of guitar distortion, the band’s roars-rather-than-singing and the general pace of the album. Whilst a couple of the songs closer to the end feel a little like filler, there isn’t a point in this album at which you are waiting for something to happen. This is amplified with songs such as intro Hunter, which manages to create excitement and build using just one riff. Another highlight of the album is outro Sugar Coated Bitter Truth, which, although not as noisy as the rest of the album, deserves credit in that it displays Slaves’ talent at not being a one-trick-pony, which is always the biggest worry regarding punk-rock. The genre needs bands that provide a bit of spice when all other bands sound the same. Slaves may be one of those bands.
Listen to: Hunter
Odds: 12/1
3. SOAK – Before We Forgot How To Dream
I think Tumblr would relate with this album…
Normally, that would be an insult on this blog, given my deep-rooted hatred of Tumblr as a breeding ground for exclusion, hatred and teenagers feigning depression in order to appear cool. SOAK does seem to try and fit the bill in this album of the ‘tormented teenager/myth of the artist’ who believes, like most of Tumblr, that in order to have feelings or opinions you must be damaged inside. Yes, this album may be oozing with more hormones than an alcoholic’s pituitary gland, but fundamentally it is a teenage album BY A TEENAGER.
This is probably why most of the reviewers credit her for being ‘wise beyond her year’, and having written profound, provocative, intelligent lyrics. The album opens with ‘the teenage heart is an unguided dart’. How Tumblr…but adults aren’t sick of it, so they will lap this stuff up until the cows come home. And if that wasn’t enough, just to prove how ‘deep’ this album is, the album cover and the music videos are all done in drab black and white, normally against a cold beach backdrop.
I do think it is a shame that the lyrics are the only things discussed about this album, because this album is pretty good going. It’s got all sorts of layers going on, and her somewhat distorted vocals compliment the harmonies beautifully. This, I believe, is where Bridie Monds-Watson is ‘wise beyond her years’. This is a really original album and a wonderful display of new talent which hopefully, in the coming years, will try and approach something more…not Tumblr.
Listen to: B a noBody
Odds: 12/1
2. C Duncan – Architect
As some of you may know, I moved to London a couple of months ago to study at UCL. The Mercury Prize nominations were announced about a month later, and suddenly, the walls of the London Underground were being covered with adverts for these albums. Gaz Coombes was quite a common one, his bewildered facial expression almost in awe at the review reading ‘masterpiece’. Benjamin Clementine had a simple blue and red advert with his album cover. Even Florence, Florence who has taken the world by storm, decided to join the game with an advert at Kings Cross St Pancras Station. But not C Duncan…
This was where the split between the nominees was seen. The BBC showed a statistic that sales of Eska’s album had risen by 2,965%. And this isn’t difficult to believe: an unknown album gets a nomination for (arguably) the most prestigious prize in British music, obviously the fan base will increase! And whilst C Duncan will have experience an increase in sales, it won’t be of 2,965%. Why? Because the only advert I saw for C Duncan’s album was a piece of paper on a little side street off Brick Lane (for my Mancunian friends, one of the main Curry Miles of London).
To be brutally honest, who is actually interested in a dream-pop album infused with classical training? Not Londoners, who seem to preserve the necessity of running around like headless chickens. Seriously, you’re in a rush at 7:30 am. Why didn’t you just get up earlier? Odd…
Despite this, C Duncan has obviously written an exquisite gem of an album. Edith Bowman called him an ‘architect of music’, in reference to the album title, and it’s true! Opener Say is calm and eases you into Duncan’s dreampop world. He Believes In Miracles is rich and layered, and provides a chink of the album’s optimism. And As Sleeping Stones, with it’s transforming harmonies and intertwining vocals, may be one of my highlights of 2015.
The album finally finishes with the effervescently beautiful I’ll Be Gone By Winter, somewhat reminiscent of Badly Drawn Boy’s Epitaph. Not only does it leave you satisfied that the album is complete, but it gives the impression that anything else would just be unnecessarily excessive. Frankly, C Duncan couldn’t have done anything more.
Odds: 20/1
1. Jamie xx – In Colour
There’s a brilliant moment about half-way through Jamie xx’s solo debut In Colour. Interlude Just Saying has just finished, and has returned the album to a form of relative calm. A motif echoes from a single synthesiser, and into the harmony, Oliver Sim sings. ‘You want to disappear in a crowd. Just a stranger in a room’. It is the first time that clear vocals are heard during the album, and it hits hard.
This album is full of these kind of moments; moments that make every song different. One of the main reasons why this album is better than all the others on this list is that Jamie xx hates filler. Every song has a role, even songs such as Hold Tight which, though it doesn’t feel like a song that makes progress, imagine listening to Loud Places immediately after Stranger in a Room without a break. Can you imagine? It’s not even worth thinking about…
In Colour is a suitable title for this album too. This album is full of vibrancy. Songs like Obvs and I Know There’s Gonna Be (Good Times) make you want to get up and dance (and his DJ set at Green Man Festival was glorious). This is a drastic contrast to SOAK (ultimately, in my opinion, the only person stopping Jamie xx from winning), who seems to gain enjoyment from taking vibrancy and eating it (or, more likely, just being very passive-aggressive towards it). Even the album cover can’t really get more vibrant than literally every single colour. And fortunately, an album as depressing in content as Before We Forgot How To Dream hasn’t won since Portishead’s Dummy in 1995.
This album, though, has had split reception. However, the people who don’t rate this album as first class are normally electronica fans. For the sake of bookkeeping, In Colour has been branded as ‘electronica’. But it isn’t really. Would Young Thug really contribute to an electronica album? This album is clearly far more forward-thinking and unique than any other album on this list, and thus if it doesn’t win, I will be asking questions.
As many of you may know, the Oscars, the most prestigious evening in film, is being broadcast tomorrow! Normally, with the prospect of film rewards and legendary celebrity selfies, most people would be incredibly excited about this day. But this year is a little different, in that these Oscars are desperately predictable (in contrast to the Grammys where, thank god, Beck took the only important award of the night for his album Morning Phase instead of Beyonce or Sam Smith). Take the four main acting categories. Not only has the winner of each of these categories been the same in almost every award over the past couple of months of award season, but the nominees have been almost identical as well!
So, to spice things up a bit both for me and for you, I’m going to take a more interesting approach. I am going to remove the outright winner from the list of nominees and then make my judgement based on the rest of them. In this way, I can express an opinion that might be more entertaining for everyone involved, and everyone is happy!
Alright, here goes…
Best Film
Outright Winner: Boyhood
My Winner: Birdman and Whiplash
Admittedly, it’s rather difficult to find a convincing reason not to give this award straight to Boyhood. It’s a fascinating film logistically and artistically speaking, whilst still acting in a deeply personal way. However, it was not the only film to deliver this year. I have declared Birdman and Whiplash as joint winners of my alternative award.
Birdman is a piece of cinematic genius, both from an acting perspective (Birdman is the only film to have a nomination in three acting categories) but from a cinematographic and technological perspective. The whole technique regarding no cuts in between scenes and one camera shots is something that is highly revolutionary in film, yet is still unlikely to take off given how difficult it must be to do so. That’s a shame, because the effect created by this technique is incredible and develops the entire experience of film watching.
Whiplash, however, is rather a long shot in terms of winning the coveted award. It’s not as much of a breakthrough as many of the films nominated, but it was still tense, compelling and unique. It is interesting how tense this film actually is, given that there are no bomb threats or wars or anything one would normally be tense about in a film. It’s just about a drummer and his conductor, but the performances in this film are so thorough and effective, that again the experience of watching the film was only exemplified. So whilst I would absolutely love to see Whiplash win this award, it’s hard to drag attention away from some of the others.
Best Actor in a Leading Role
Outright Winner: Eddie Redmayne (The Theory Of Everything)
My Winner: Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game)
To be honest, when I was figuring out who I would support regard this award, I always assumed it would be Michael Keaton for his performance in Birdman, and whilst Keaton does kill it in this film, I can’t bring myself to support him in light of Cumberbatch’s portrayal of Alan Turing in The Imitation Game. Cumberbatch delivers a genial two-faced performance, reflecting both his attitudes to his associates whilst decrypting enigma and the emotional challenges he faces regarding his homosexuality. His acting was engaging and emotional, and it’s difficult to see why this race has been so one-sided in the favour of Redmayne.
Best Actress in a Leading Role
Outright Winner: Julianne Moore (Still Alice)
My Winner: Reese Witherspoon (Wild)
I’m at a bit of a disadvantage regarding this award, having not actually seen any of the five films nominated. However, I still feel at complete liberty to recommend Witherspoon to win this award. Having already won in 2006 for her portrayal of Joan Carter Cash in Walk The Line, we already know what she is capable of. But Wild is one of those films which is completely carried by one actor, as she spends so much of the film alone on screen. I can imagine her performance being similar to James Franco’s incredible performance in 127 Hours, where he is present in every scene. In one of these scenarios, the performance must be absolutely spot on, and so I would not be surprised if Witherspoon surprises everyone else tomorrow night.
Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Outright Winner: JK Simmons (Whiplash)
My Winner: Edward Norton (Birdman)
Whilst I am still stating an alternative winner for this award, I do still believe that JK Simmons must win this award, with his harsh portrayal of conductor Terence Fletcher being lauded as one of the defining performances of the past year. However, I did promise to deliver an alternative, and so I’m hedging my alternative money on Edward Norton in Birdman. This guy is so energetic throughout this film, and represents the epitome of cocky actors on Broadway at the moment. He manages to drag the limelight onto him whenever on screen, even within what is probably the greatest ensemble cast in years.
Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Outright Winner: Patricia Arquette (Boyhood)
My Winner: Emma Stone (Birdman)
As mentioned in the last paragraph, the ensemble cast for Birdman, including Keaton, Naomi Watts and Zach Galifianikis, is definitely the finest of the last year. Given Emma Stone’s limited screen time in this film, the fact that she got a nomination reflects how effective her portrayal was of Keaton’s daughter, who is still trying to find herself and meaning in her life. It is angsty and emotional, and, like Norton, she stands out within the cast she has found herself in, and that deserves real credit.
Best Directing
Outright Winner: Richard Linklater (Boyhood)
My Winner: Wes Anderson (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Unfortunately for Anderson, he doesn’t really stand much chance against an indie film troubadour who spent 12 years perfecting a film. Linklater will already have a nice big gap on his shelf for the Oscar he undoubtedly has coming his way, and deservedly so. However, especially along with Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s directing of Birdman, Wes Anderson deserves real credit for the work he has done on The Grand Budapest Hotel. This film is so representative of Anderson’s original style of film, with camera angles, colourful sets and lines no other director would have the guts to use. This has made Grand Budapest Hotel so sleek in its nature, more so than any other film made over the last year, and I’m presuming that is all down to Mr Anderson.
Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
Outright Winner: Anthony McCarten (The Theory Of Everything)
My Winner: Damien Chazelle (Whiplash)
Frankly, I have absolutely no idea how this differs to an award for “Best Adapted Screenplay”, but I want Whiplash to win as many awards as possible. Fortunately, if the BAFTAs have anything to say, Whiplash has most of the Sound awards in the bag, but I guess another award isn’t a disaster…
Best Writing (Original Screenplay)
Outright Winner: none
My Winner: Wes Anderson (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
I think this is one of the few awards that isn’t essentially already predetermined, with what I believe is basically a three way tie between Boyhood, Birdman and The Grand Budapest Hotel. However, like the BAFTAs, I would award this film, yet again, to Wes Anderson, basically for the same reasons as why I would award him Best Director. It is far too unique to be cast over…
So there you have it! Whilst most of these predictions will undoubtedly be wrong, I would consider just one correct response to be a victory for this post.
If you have any opinions of your own please comment below!
So here it is! The final post of my 30 Day Challenge, and I have really brought it down to the wire, with this article being published probably 10 minutes before midnight of the 30th, but at least I made it! And so as a point of reference, I thought I’d talk a little about my experiences regarding one of my blogging career’s most pivotal points.
If any of you have seen Morgan Spurlock’s revolutionary documentary Supersize Me, in which he eats three McDonald’s meals a day for 30 Days (and simultaneously popularised the idea of the 30 Day Challenge), you may recall, I think, that whilst he struggled through the entire month, there were two particularly low points: Day 3 and Day 11. He mentioned that when he quit smoking, the third day was always the worst. It’s sufficient time to be hit by the consequences of the challenge, but not long enough for a tactic or pattern to have emerged regarding it. He did say that after Day 3 it was plain sailing, but in the McDonald’s challenge that was proving wrong, showing that at Day 11 he felt most ill and most bloated.
Oddly enough, this challenge was fairly similar for me. If you were to read the very first posts, you will be aware that by Day 3 I was already running out of ideas, and by Day 11 (or maybe slightly later), I literally had nothing to write about, leading to some of the most mundane things I have ever written on a laptop. And when I had to make up for lost ground in the last week, I was full of ideas, making publishing of these posts a simple task, relatively speaking. Therefore, one thing that this challenge did teach me was a lesson on perseverance. Maybe it was just the threat I set myself at the beginning regarding failure on the World Wide Web, but it did show that if you do write enough rubbish, you can achieve something like this.
In his TED talk about 30 Day Challenges, Matt Cutts says that one thing he achieved from all of his various activities was time being much more memorable. as it worked for this challenge? I guess it’s hard to tell so early on. Whilst 2014 seems years away, this month has gone pretty quickly, due to all the stuff that was going on outside of this blog. However, events that took place throughout January 2015, which I normally would have forgotten, will be easily recallable upon simply reading a post.
One of the lessons Matt Cutts also learnt was that small, sustainable changes are much more likely to stick than huge challenges. I like to think of this challenge as one of the larger ones, because slicing a good chunk out of my evening to write is quite a commitment, and will never, ever stick. I do like to think, though, that this blog has encouraged me to do more writing, and to not enter into one of my numerous blogging hiatuses. So as I mentioned in one of my more mundane posts, blogging every Sunday at least will commence on Sunday 1st February 2015. Are you guys pysched?????? I bet you are!!!!!!!
I guess, then, we will have to wait a while to see whether this challenge has actually taken its toll anywhere other than proving to myself that I have worrying amounts of free time when I have coursework to do. Regardless, whilst at point it has seemed unnecessary and exhausting, I don’t regret undertaking this challenge and am proud of both the entertaining posts I’ve written and showing that the Internet is not that scary a place after all.
But to celebrate, I thought I’d finish with some of my favourite album outro songs (yes, I had to finish on a musical not).
See you soon guys!
Lisa Hannigan – Lille (from Sea Sew)
Elbow – Friend Of Ours (from Seldom Seen Kid)
The Smiths – Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others (from The Queen Is Dead)
The Stanley Brothers – Angel Band (from the soundtrack to O Brother, Where Art Thou?)
Arcade Fire – In The Backseat (from Funeral)
Vampire Weekend – Young Lion (from Modern Vampires Of The City)
Given that I had to write two posts this evening, originally I was planning on Day 29 being super disappointing and irrelevant. However, after my reply to this post received more likes than the original, Benjamin Williams has returned for a second appearance in a week! To talk about something maybe a bit more…easy to understand this time. At least for a few of you…
Thanks again to Benjamin, and enjoy!
I’ve been brought back to help Daniel suffer through his poor life choices.
Fun fact: I’m ginger
Less fun fact: I am called a carrot person
More fun fact: Dolphins are still endangered. Hehehe.
So, I am called a carrot. This is not only confusingly offensive, ““Oi, root vegetable dickhead!” (?)”, but also factually incorrect. If I were to be a carrot in this sense, I would have green hair and be from Essex, hence carrots are obviously victimised in society as no-one truly sees them as who they are, orange with green hair.
I could have written this about real stereotypes and prejudices, but they don’t interest me. Gingers are systematically insulted throughout their lives, unless they are beautiful and/or Ron Weasley, but the question is why?
*Insert pictures of Nicole Kidman (or any famous awesome ginger) and Rupert Grint looking awful*
(A message from Daniel: Amy Adams is cooler than Nicole Kidman AND more ginger. Take that Benjamin!)
Well let’s look at history. Traditionally, Satan has been seen as a ginger goat, yet the goat community have not suffered at all from this. I assume this causes the God-fearing to hate the auburn race, but what else? Gingers have always been associated with having tempers, because obviously our heads are burning, cos they are orange? Geddit? #banter. Oddly enough, this actually happens nowadays because gingers are victimized to the point of exhaustion.
Maybe it’s similar to the victimisation of black people? I mean, the first modern slaves were Irish, and some must have been ginger. It’s the initial fear of a difference in physical appearance that causes people to insult and keep gingers at a distance, because change is scary, and the world is full of wimps.
The range of insults always confuses me as well. I understand many, such as Duracell™ or Wotsit, but some of the origins of these insults are mysterious. For example, why are gingers called ginger nuts? Why are they called ginger in the first place? We would have to delve into linguistics to find out, and it would probably relate to some sort of Celtic, because they have the largest concentration of gingers, but how did that come to mean the same thing as a spicy herb? (It’s a herb, I checked Wiki)
South Park is also responsible for this abuse. I mean, many people were pretty neutral about gingers, had a friend who was ginger, didn’t really care about freckles or whatever. But now, we are like vampires, because we burn in sunlight, freckles are marks of the devil and we have no soles. #nogingerfishmongers
I’m kind of waiting for the most recent cultural revolution to fully finish. Currently, “redheads” are being seen more and more as a desirable thing in women, with ginger-philiac traffic on pornography websites shooting up in recent years.
So, all of you gingers out there, gear up for a huge amount of sexual intercourse in future, and do more thigh exercises, because the revolution is going to be upon us, and you better be ready.
Right now, as most of my friends would vouch, I’m on a bit of a cultural island, with no permanent resident other than me and Ed, though he lives in a particularly remote corner of this island (no offence Ed, of course *wink*). Of course, I share interests with many of my friends, whether it be playing classical guitar with Qesser, singing Frontier Psychiatrist with Yusuf, or sharing Gianina’s interest in indie film. This has led to the question of how I actually ended up here. Nobody in my family shares my musical interests (except, to an extent, my grandma, who introduced me to the wonders of such eras as the Greenwich folk scene), I am the only one who has ever taken an interest in biology, and when I tried to describe Birdman to them, they just burst out laughing.
So in this post, I thought I’d talk a little about literature, because I’ve not really done that in a while…
Except for trains, reading must have been my first ever real interest. I had watched Sesame Street from an early age, a TV programme I still swear by, and therefore was a competent reader before most of my friends had even begun to try. My dad used to always read to me and my sister before bed, probably my most avid memories as a kid, and these books were awesome.
Of course, Roald Dahl was always an idol of mine. I’ve read most of his books, and enjoyed all of those I had read (except The Witches. That was some scary stuff right there.) I remember the excitement I experienced of first reading the descriptions of the wacky Willy Wonka, and the sadness of watching the BFG get picked on by the other giants, or the confusion of the virtuoso grasshopper in James and the Giant Peach. However, none of these books had such a profound effect on me as Matilda.
I still recall all the emotions I felt whilst reading this book: from the novel events of the Wormwood household, to being creeped by the evil Agatha Trunchbull, to affection for Miss Jennifer Honey. It’s also suitable, given my situation, that Matilda found peace and inspiration by reading. This masterpiece is so typical of Dahl’s famous style too. Whilst his books are mainly children’s books, each still contains a moral, even if it means applying it in a rather R-rated fashion. The disrespectful and sickly Twits end up being crushed by their own weight. Fantastic Mr Fox leaves the three psychopathic farmers to die of starvation whilst waiting for him to emerge from a hole. Four children die in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for being greedy and selfish. Even Tim Burton didn’t go that far!
A similarly named literary influence as a kid was the Irish writer Roddy Doyle who, whilst bagging himself a Man Booker Prize for his inventive and unique novel Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, wrote some pretty good children’s literature too! My main memory of his work was the incredible Meanwhile Adventures, which track the story of the Mac family, all undertaking various tasks, whether it be running up stairs, taking short cuts to Las Vegas or avoiding a big pile of poo. In fact, this book was such a revelation to the Jacobson household that, upon returning this book to the library, my dad declared it as the best children’s book he had ever come across. To which the librarian agreed.
However, at some point I did have to grow out of Dahl and Doyle, and this was when I became embroiled in series. This was a fairly dark period of my literary life spanning from Year 4 to about Year 8. By Year 8, the only books I was bothering to read were books in the Cherub series, which were all a load of rubbish, and I’m disappointed i my 12-year-old self for immersing himself so forcefully in them. There were also the Diamond Brothers books by Anthony Horowitz, which were/are amazing, and the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz, which was not. However, the pinnacle of my series reading had to be Caroline Lawrence’s Roman Mysteries.
It may be the only series in which I am proud to have said that I read so many of them. This is because they were more than just a plot (which, admittedly, never really changed): they were faction. This meant that whilst the plots were fictional, the scenario was real. Thus, I was able to learn al about the port of Ostia and the gladiatorial games and Roman imperialism, all from the comfort of a book for teenagers. These books inspired me to study Classical subjects at school, something that continued from the age of 11 to October 2014 where, in the light of university applications, I was forced to drop A-Level Classical Greek. My study in Classics has opened so many doors, whether it be reading Homer and Sophocles in the original Greek, to analysing literary techniques in tragedy, to being able to say I did A-Level Greek. And it’s all down to Caroline Lawrence.
As a result of all of these inspirations, I have now found myself on my own little literary island. This includes everything from the beautiful poetic techniques of Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita to the plain mad Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut to the classic Jane Eyre. Even works that aren’t considered masterpieces, such as Alan Bennett’s The History Boys or David Nicholls’ Starter for Ten, are books without which I don’t know where I would be. Honestly, Brian Jackson from Starter for Ten is 18 (almost like me), a student of Bristol University (where I received my first university offer), has people make fun of him for his taste in music (like me), is clumsy (like me), is blissfully clueless about politics and philosophy (like me), loves University Challenge (like me), is hopeless around girls (like me), is socially clueless (like me) and has an issue with spots (like me). Genuinely, if any book was a biography of my own life, it would have to be Starter for Ten.
And on top of that, it is absolutely hilarious.
So if there was to be a conclusion from this huge tangeant, it would probably be to make your kids read Roddy Doyle, avoid Cherub and READ STARTER FOR TEN! You will not regret it.
When I started this challenge, I always assumed there would be a post in which I rant about political correctness, and what better time would there have been to write about it than after the Charlie Hebdo attacks? However, I decided not to write about Charlie Hebdo when it was more prevalent. Fortunately for me, though, another news story has emerged, which has caused me to, again, become equally frustrated with the kind of society we live in.
A few days ago, a news story emerged regarding Benedict Cumberbatch, one of Britain’s most beloved actor, who caused outrage when he used the term ‘coloured’ regarding black actors. I have many coloured black friends, and if I was in the somewhat surreal situation of having to describe their skin colour, I would say black, and I like to think none of them would be particularly offended by that. But when Cumberbatch, who was supporting coloured black actors, comes under such heavy fire for use of a term, I just can’t comprehend how this incident could override the fact that Cumberbatch obviously isn’t racist or whatever.
I did do some research, and found that people regarded this term as ‘outdated’, and harked back to an era in which racial inequality was regarded as the norm. However, I have heard the term ‘coloured’ be used recently, and there has never been any reaction. This will always lead to the same point, for me at least, regarding racism in our current society, being that whilst racial slurs obviously do exist, dwelling on non-racist remarks, which may just be misunderstandings, will never achieve racial equality, or any equality for that matter.
Fortunately, Cumberbatch has received plentiful support from coloured black actors, in particular David Oyelowo, who has been lauded for his performance of Martin Luther King Jr. in the Oscar-nominated film Selma. Oyelowo told the BBC that “to attack him for a term, as opposed to what he was actually saying, I think is very disingenuous and is indicative of the age we live in where people are looking for sound bites as opposed to substance.” I like to think he’s got that spot on.
Oyelowo has been in the media recently as he, surprisingly, wasn’t nominated for Best Actor at the recent Oscars. This has been part of a major controversy where of the twenty individuals nominated for acting awards this year, not a single one is black. Again, this is such a major example of people trying to find examples of racism in situations where racism simply doesn’t exist. No, there are no coloured black actors nominated, but there are also no Muslim actors, Jewish actors, half-caste actors (sorry, turns out I’m not allowed to say that), no gay actors, no Russian actors, no actors from Manchester, who have been nominated. Where are their advocates! In fact, JK Simmons represents the only bald actor nominated for an Academy Award this year. What sort of world do we live in…
I’m rather good at digging holes for myself in these sorts of situations, but I’m not at all trying to deny the existence of racism, nor am I trying to diminish how awful racism is. I am, however, trying to point out the novelty of the arguments of anti-racism organisations, such as Show Racism The Red Card (who have been particularly angry with Cumberbatch, who happens to be an albino white actor), who seem to think that equality will be achieved by demonising mistakes, instead of supporting education and proper steps to achieving equality. Maybe I’ve just been living under a rock, but I never knew how derogatory ‘coloured’ was as a term. Does that make me racist? I like to think it doesn’t, because as a Jew, I’ve certainly succumbed to my share of racist comments, and I don’t like it one bit.
This is probably why I normally avoid posts like this one, but what the heck! I’m four from the end of my challenge. So there.
As I said, I do dig holes for myself, and as a result I have been accused of just about everything. I was accused of sexism because I travelled to Israel during school for my cousin’s Bar Mitzva, and not another cousin’s Bat Mitzva (even though I did). I’ve been accused of racism for saying that maybe David Oyelowo didn’t receive an Oscar nomination for Best Actor because five other actors were better, and they just happen to be albino white. I’ve been accused of homophobia for not understanding ‘pansexuality’. I’ve been accused of Islamophobia for saying that the people at Charlie Hebdo shouldn’t have been killed, and that Islam isn’t a religion centred around peace, even though I went on to describe how no religion is really a religion of peace. You may be questioning this, but I assure you I am none of these things whatsoever. There. Disclaimer done.
Seinfeld, the ultimate sitcom, is often cited as developing the term “not that there’s anything wrong with that”, with reference to homosexuality in particular. In the episode The Outing, it is published in a local newspaper that Jerry and George are a gay couple, and not only was watching them run around convincing people they weren’t gay completely hilarious, but their approach to it was also very interesting. It showed that whilst they didn’t want to be considered homosexual, they also didn’t want to be considered homophobic, so have to repeat this phrase multiple times throughout the episode.
In conclusion, of course all of these phobias and isms are factors preventing any peace on this Earth from arising. However, where are we going to get to by demonising the Cumberbatches in this world who simply make mistakes? Shouldn’t we be focussing on the actual racists and homophobes and anti-Semites and sexists?
So, as you may be aware, Day 25’s post was posted courtesy of Mr Benjamin Williams who, as you may have gathered from reading the most recent post, is…unique. If you haven’t read it yet, you should check it out here:
Therefore, I have been left with the somewhat surreal task of not only having to defend dolphins from this onslaught of contempt and irrational thinking, but also living up to Benjamin’s astounding ability for both terrible puns and highbrow references…so here goes!
The first thing that is drastically wrong with this post is Benjamin’s severe lack of the sociology of cetacean mammals (a topic which, for the sake of the argument, I am determining myself qualified to talk about). He claims that “dolphins will attack porpoises without reason”. An evolutionary biologists, such as me or Laurie (hi Laurie!!!!!! for the third time…), will claim that every action undertaken by any living species occurs for one reason and one reason only: to increase the chances of reproduction and, thus, the survival of alleles. Especially in the wild, where so much energy is wasted between trophic levels that every kilojoule of energy is precious, no animal would ever, ever do something as energy-consuming as attack something “for no reason”. It would only hinder their ability for expression of their alleles. And why porpoises in particular? Why not trout or plankton or blue whales?
I did find the article claiming that dolphins kill porpoises for fun. In the Daily Mail. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, this awfully short article represents everything that is wrong with nature journalism. Check it out here, at your peril:
Mr Williams then goes on to describe the relentless ‘taunting’ that seems to occur between flat-nosed and bottleneck dolphins. The key thing to remember here is that whilst both of these species live off the same diet, in the same habitat and are very closely related, they have fundamentally different alleles, and thus are different species. Therefore, they are in fierce competition their entire life over, well, just about everything. As a result, violent nature must take her toll, in much the same way that I would probably get beaten up if I found myself bumping into the wrong type of people in a dark alleyway at the wrong time of night. Or even day. In a light alleyway.
Moving on from the biology, Benjamin then moves on to describe the sort of inhumane (or in…dolphane?) acts which dolphins seem to absorb themselves in, citing a few deaths ad a few casualties. However, knowing Benjamin, he’d probably be fully aware that, on average, 150 people are killed every year by coconuts. Yet whilst you see Benjamin advocating for dolphin-unfriendly tuna, where is his huge beef against Bounty chocolate bars? He would probably have a huge issue with them in hindsight, but did he write a post about that? Not here he didn’t…
Then he goes on to mention how we should eat dolphins. This might be some issue for Benjamin, given the fact that he is Jewish, and so follows Kosher. He would say that dolphins don’t have scales, and so aren’t kosher. Then he would be reminded that dolphins are mammals, though this still wouldn’t help him that dolphins neither chew the cud nor have split hooves. So sorry, Benjamin, but your Dolphin Melt might have to wait…
So that’s about all I have to say in reply, other than to teach Benjamin a valuable lesson about virtue.
Amidst the rush to make up on the posts I missed during my mocks before the deadline on the 30th, I’ve been (un)lucky enough to earn myself a guest writer…Benjamin. Some of you may remember this ginger-haired fellow as the guy with whom I have a deal regarding video games (he even said he’d buy it for me on Steam…but I don’t have Steam *evil grin*). Being the sort of guy who wants to make his opinions known to everyone, no matter how mad, he has written a post on something very close to his heart: dolphins. More specifically, dolphin hating.
I am aware of how irrational this sounds, but I’ll post his opinions below, and then I’ll be making some sort of reply in the next post. But for the meantime…here’s Benjamin!
I hate dolphins.
As quoted from A Chronicle of a Death Foretold by the late Gabriel Garcia Marquez, in the original Spanish, “Pensaba que su serenidad no era inocencia sino cinismo,” or in English, “I thought his calmness was not due to innocence, but instead cynicism.” This is relevant because in my eyes, dolphins that you see playing in the sea or being used in therapy are actually just biding their time until they can overthrow their human overlords and kill us.
Now, as this is a blog, and you were expecting something based on music or Ebola instead of me, you would expect a lacklustre rant. But I assure you, you are mistaken!
I have compiled a large database of dolphin knowledge over the last few years; it doesn’t hurt to know your enemy.
So for starters, dolphins kill lots of things… It has been observed in nature that dolphins will attack porpoises without reason, which is pretty evil when you consider that they are related somehow biologically and porpoises are smaller and weaker. They also bully other types of dolphin, e.g. if a bottlenose wandered into a group of flat nosed dolphins, he would be bitten and attacked relentlessly, sometimes even killed! Dolphins have also been seen to “play” with birds by attempting to drag them underwater and playing catch with small sea creatures. Modern dolphins would call that “banter.”
Dolphins even kill children, human children! If little Timmy floated off on an inflatable while you were embroiled in an argument with your spouse who looks a lot fatter than she did 4 years ago, when they find his body, it could be covered with dolphin bite-marks.
Also, there have been many cases of dolphins going “mental” and attacking people. Tikkum the orca killed 3 trainers in Seaworld, the people who fed and cared for him. Tiao the dolphin killed someone and injured 29 others in open water, when they were trying to be friendly. George the dolphin hospitalized 2 adults, bit children and tried to push a child out to sea.
Not. Nice.
I have a Big Issue™ with Dolphin-Friendly™ fish as well. I think it wastes a lot of money and makes the whole process more inefficient. First of all, it doesn’t even work effectively. Only the fishing of Albacore fish is completely dolphin-friendly, so someone may have killed Flipper for your tin of John West tuna. Plus why should we have to protect dolphins? They are apex predators in their environment; one or two getting caught in a net won’t make a difference as they thrive by being top of their food chain. Also, if people eat shark, why do they not eat dolphin? That would be a cool thing to try!
But I will attempt to add some credibility by balancing my argument a little. It may be the humans’ fault, but it may be the dolphins’ fault also. Mitzi the dolphin, who played Flipper in the TV show, killed itself. Now, this could be due to the overwhelming glamour of the modern Hollywood lifestyle, or that even the creature itself didn’t believe that it deserved life and committed suicide honourably. Swimming with dolphins is illegal without a permit, so, does that mean that people can’t be trusted with the dolphins unsupervised, or can dolphins not be trusted with us????
When dolphins are caught for study or for Seaworld, they are caught inhumanely and killed if they escape, so maybe it’s our fault they don’t like Seaworld. Then again, everyone likes Seaworld, so I find that hard to believe. Flipper’s trainer hated looking after his dolphin so much that now he is trying to stop dolphin captivity. Either that or he hated the conditions they were living in, I don’t remember. Plus, there has been no credible evidence of dolphin therapy working. You could say it is a Plaice-ibo. Ha…. Oh dear….
But to conclude, I think dolphins are evil, but then again, who I am to think that? As a human, a member of a species that has killed millions of other creatures, all of whom did not deserve it as much as dolphins, maybe we are the most evil…
My Factless Autobiography 