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Daughters
Daughters' release You Won't Get What You Want it one of Sean Warkentine's 2018 favourites.
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Best of 2018: Sean Warkentine

Follow our look back at 2018

The Top 200 of 2018

The definitive list of the best records of 2018 - including electronic, hip hop, international, jazz, loud and folk roots & blues.

Best of 2018

Full Best of 2018 lists from Programmers and Contributors

!earshot National Top 200 of 2017

For January to December 2017
TW  Artist - Title - (Label)
1 Alvvays Can Con
Antisocialites - (Polyvinyl)
2 Mac DeMarco Can Con
This Old Dog - (Royal Mountain)
3 Austra Can Con
Future Politics - (Pink Fizz)
4 Timber Timbre Can Con
Sincerely, Future Pollution - (Arts & Crafts)
5 Faith Healer Can Con
Try ;-) - (Mint)
6 Broken Social Scene Can Con
Hug of Thunder - (Arts & Crafts)
7 Homeshake Can Con
Fresh Air - (Royal Mountain)
8 Daniel Romano Can Con
Modern Pressure - (You've Changed)
9 Whitehorse Can Con
Panther In The Dollhouse - (Six Shooter)
10 Do Make Say Think Can Con
Stubborn Persistent Illusions - (Constellation)
View the full !earshot Top 200 of 2017

Specialty Charts #1s
Electronic Austra - Future Politics - (Pink Fizz)
Hip Hop Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels 3 - (Run the Jewels, Inc.)
InternationalThe Souljazz Orchestra - Under Burning Skies - (Do Right! Music)
Jazz Ugly Beauties - Strange Attractors - (Self-Released)
Loud Mastodon - Emperor Of Sand - (Reprise)
Folk/Roots/BluesRose Cousins - Natural Conclusion - (Outside Music)

Edited by Magnus Thyvold

Share your choices in the comments...

Sean Warkentine
Music Director, CKXU 88.3 FM, Lethbridge, AB
https://ckxu.com
Programmer of Something to Write Home About (Wednesdays, 6~7pm local)

Best 10 Albums of 2018 (alphabetized)

Abul Mogard - Above All Dreams - (Ecstatic)
Does this person actually exist? Even if it is solely the romantic idea of a retired factory worker producing these sounds, the album stands as yet another glamorously simple work by “him.”
https://abulmogard.bandcamp.com/album/above-all-dreams

The Armed - Only Love - (No Rest Until Ruin)
One of the few releases I can think of that manage to seamlessly span the realms of intensely vicious hardcore and immensely catchy postpunk, while using electronics to fill the space between.
https://thearmed.bandcamp.com/album/only-love

Daughters - You Won’t Get What You Want - (Ipecac)
I can say I don’t love it as much as any of their previous, but, well, I kept listening to it over and over. They undoubtedly continue to push their signature sound in new unexpected directions.
https://daughters.bandcamp.com/album/you-wont-get-what-you-want

Frontierer - Unloved - (Self-released)
Pure chaos. The heaviest album I’ve heard in years.
https://frontierer.bandcamp.com/album/unloved

Ian William Craig - Thresholder - (130701)
Those crisp vocal loops that distort and waver on the tape cause a feeling like few other albums can.
https://ianwilliamcraig.bandcamp.com/album/thresholder

Leon Vynehall - Nothing is Still - (Ninjatune)
Travels between lush ambience and cloudy hip-hop breaks while maintaining a clear line to jazzy samples from the more distant past.
https://leonvynehall.bandcamp.com/album/nothing-is-still

Low - Double Negative - (Sub-Pop)
To quote myself, it's like they finally learned that my favourite ever track by them was that 15-minute drone track, 'Do you Know How to Waltz,' and they rewarded my patience for another drone track with an entire album of it.
https://lowtheband.bandcamp.com/album/double-negative

Skee Mask - Compro - (Ilian)
A more experimental idm-genre take on the 90s sound that Against All Odds was famous for this year.
https://iliantape.bandcamp.com/album/itlp04-skee-mask-compro

SUMAC & Keiji Haino - American Dollar Bill Keep Facing Sideways, You're Too Hideous To Look At Face On - (Thrill Jockey)
I loved SUMAC’s solo album, Love in Shadow, from later on in this year, but the improvisatory collaboration of this release caught my attention far more so. Haino is in his mid-60s, but the energy he releases here is timeless above the pummelling metal.
https://sumackeijihaino.bandcamp.com/album/american-dollar-bill-keep-facing-sideways-youre-too-hideous-to-look-at-face-on

Witxes - Orients - (Consouling Sound)
An impressive album of ambient synths that effortlessly move through chord progressions and textures leading to sudden distorted beats at unexpected moments.
https://witxes.bandcamp.com/album/orients

 

Best Reissues of 2018

Alanis Obomsawin

Alanis Obomsawin - Bush Lady - (Constellation Records)
Originally released in 1988, this jawdropping amalgam of experimental composition backing traditional indigenous folksongs created a folk chamber pop experience that transcended the amazing Jeremy Dutcher work of this year.
https://alanisobomsawin.bandcamp.com/album/bush-lady

Lingua Ignota - All Bitches Die - (Profound Lore)
As a hulking mass of industrial noise, religious reference, distorted drone, and severe determination by a survivor, it provides the fiercest of responses to the cowardice of abuse and the systemic protection of it. Originally a Master’s of Fine Arts project, its extremely limited release in 2017 received a necessary re-issue this year.
https://linguaignota.bandcamp.com/album/all-bitches-die-2

 

 

 
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