I’ve never felt more overwhelmed by new releases than I did by the deluge of 2012. I’m not complaining, but it does make compiling this sort of year-end list feel almost pointless—how can you ever be sure you’ve heard everything worthwhile? All the same, it wasn’t hard for me to choose five favorite international recordings.
Sidi Touré, Koïma (Thrill Jockey) For his austere 2011 debut, Sahel Folk, this Malian singer and guitarist recorded a collection of duets at his sister’s home in Gao. For its even better follow-up, he booked a proper studio in Bamako with a band, resulting in a richer, more propulsive sound. On Sahel Folk Touré seemed happy to yield center stage to his partners, and on Koïma he leads only as a vocalist, though he wrote the songs and their multilayered arrangements—his acoustic guitar plays a purely rhythmic role, but his singing has never sounded more authoritative and soulful.
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Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City and Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange In a year when many listeners and even many musicians have come to doubt the continued relevancy of the album format, two of the strongest arguments in its favor come from young artists creating complex, ambitious LPs driven by conflicts in their lives that turn out to be simple to describe. One is by a charismatic rapper attempting to reckon with his experiences growing up in Compton, California; the other is by an eccentric R&B singer trying to figure out love. Both demand to be listened to start to finish every time, and they deserve it.
The mixtape finally goes mainstream It’s been more than a decade since the rap mixtape first gained a foothold with listeners unaccustomed to buying music at liquor stores, but major acts outside hip-hop are only now starting to appreciate its artist-friendly qualities—most notably the freedom it offers to experiment with edgier sounds without worrying about commercial potential. R&B singers such as Jeremih and Lloyd have used the format to slip from the confines of their well-groomed images, while nominally pop singers such as Charli XCX have used it to launch campaigns for mainstream recognition.
Meshuggah at House of Blues 5/15 The Swedish kings of progressive death metal specialize in an alien sort of tension—their “grooves” often sound like nests of massive eccentric gears milled from blocks of a gray extraterrestrial alloy—and at one of their shows, where shuddering detonations of light flare in time with the colossal riffs, resisting that tension is as futile as struggling against the gravity well of a collapsing star.
Pig Destroyer, Book Burner (Relapse) When I heard the blastbeat that punches through the sampled movie dialogue at the start of Book Burner‘s lead track—a classic Pig Destroyer maneuver—I instantaneously forgave the five trying years the Richmond grindcore masters made me wait for a new full-length. And every time J.R. Hayes’s maniacal, red-eyed screams erupt from the mix—alongside Scott Hull’s devastating guitar riffage—I imagine that somewhere an angel gets its wings.
The annual race to crown the greatest albums of the year produces so many lists that you’d think every half-decent piece of music would turn up on at least one of them. But of course plenty of excellent albums escape notice—especially albums by artists whose audiences are mostly local. With that in mind, here are my top five overlooked releases by Chicago acts.
