Welcome citizens of the world to the grooviest of grooves, the most delicate of delicious delicacies, the most select selection ever assembled in a lair beneath an extinct volcano, in an undisclosed equatorial location.
You have all been flown in by wyvern for the most coveted award show of all, the annual 1537 prizes. Which are universally acknowledged as the greatest awards ever in the whole history of culture, thought and stuff like that.
So without further ado, on with the prizes.
Firstly, the Kevin ‘Geordie’ Walker Memorial Award for the records with the best cover art bought in 2023. The nominees are:
Juicy Lucy the understated, tasteful nude-ish lady wallowing in fruit approach to cover art was an option for bands back in 1969, several years before sexism and/or taste was invented. The cover masks an excellent and surprisingly hard, raucous blues rock LP. I salute it here in all its fruity Vertigo glory.
Aphex Twin Blackbox Life Recorder* a wonderfully complicated fold-out cover wrapped (warped) in a hyper-realistic, hyper-detailed cover that really plays tricks on your perception, even without the associated app. A stunner.
Green Lung This Heathen Land. As usual cover artist Richard Wells elevates a brilliant LP into an event. There is more wit and artistry in the gazetteer** style of the inserts and sleeve, than some whole genres muster in a decade.
The winner is, drum roll please Mr Kruper, Green Lung!!
Now as you finish your starter course of implausible vegetables tempura-style, served with a sleazeberry jam reduction, let us have another award. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Van Conner Memorial Award for the Top 10 LPs of 2023.
CIVIC Taken By Force
Yeah, this is what I want, what I really really want. Two-fisted, blue collar, surging, tuneful, occasionally dead-eyed and fucked-up punky Australian rock. There is a preternatural assurance about this lot and Taken By Force sounds like an LP that has really been built to last, an LP that has the trick of sounding like it has been part of the fabric for years already.
There’s something new and classic here and a big shout out to Rob Younger’s production too. Such a brilliant album.
Green Lung This Heathen Land
It was so, so close this year! Green Lung’s hymn to all that is dark and weird in the crags, moors and deep forests of their homeland. There are some tremendous rock outs going on right here, but each and every track polished tight and right and served up in a brilliant tune.
I really have been waiting since I was 12 for a band to write about the Pendle witches and the Wild Hunt appearing over Dartmoor. In any other year this would have been my #1.
Upchuck Bite The Hand That Feeds.
Absolutely superb punkers from Atlanta, edging towards fast aggressive hardcore territory, but playing it tuneful and clever. Singer KT is a real force of nature on record giving it her all, as though her life depended on it. The bass sound on the album is excellent, kudos to bassist Ausar Ward and producer Ty Segall. Tune after tune after tune … ‘Freaky’ is a stand out, as is the Pixies-tastic ‘Crashing’.
Robert Finley Black Bayou
I’ve discovered this awesome new type of music, you won’t have heard of yet, it’s called the blues, its from America and it really is very now. This is a fabulous album, full of gospel and grit from my new favourite 69 year-old blind army veteran/carpenter. Black Bayou is full of great moments, none better than the shaggy croc story of ‘Alligator Bait’ and the ridiculously libidinous ‘Miss Kitty’. Scorching.
Max Richter Sleep: Tranquillity Base
Everybody’s favourite composer of 8hr ambient classical snooze music^ looks at his work from a more electronic standpoint. As a lullaby for an over-saturated frenetic age this works beautifully. I find its stillness really moving. Top value for money as a 31-minute EP too.
Iggy Pop Every Loser
I was never a fan of the Josh Homme-adjacent Iggy reboot but I did really enjoy Every Loser. I’m really not a fan of Andrew Watt’s production in general, but he gets it very right here as a bunch of cool guys drop in and out (star guest = Eric Avery) but never make the LP sound bitty. Some great torso shots in the booklet give me what I crave, some very good performances from Mr Pop and some tracks that are absolutely worthy of him; ‘Strung Out Johnny’, ‘The Regency’ and ‘New Atlantis’ being my faves.
Soul Glo Diaspora Problems
Wild US hardcore that throws SOAD, Bad Brains, Public Enemy, New Kingdom, Descendants, Death Grips and Flipper into a hyper-caffeinated mix fit for our ADHD-inflected times. It takes a while to get your ear in, so to speak, but when you do Diaspora Problems can be like riding a hurricane. Ideas just fizz and spasm uncontrollably throughout every single track here. Hugely impressive stuff.
Tinariwen Amatssou
Scaling back the guest stars and choosing to record the LP in Algeria and at a camp in Mauritania works a dream for the Tuareg’s 9th album. There is something decidedly spiritual and a touch sadder about this offering, a hymn for the oppressed wherever they find themselves now. Daniel Lanois and Fats Kaplin add some nice, yet unobtrusive touches here and there but as always the ensemble is king. Needless to say fans of a certain type of sandy guitar sound will not be disappointed.
Laurel Canyon
Confusingly named young Philadelphians play wonderfully raw grunge-adjacent rock n’ roll. Hugely fuzzed off and fucked out guitars surge up against some rather niftily disguised tunes and stadium ready dynamics hidden in the whirl. I heard it in Probe Records one lunchtime and grabbed it there and then.
Aphex Twin Blackbox Life Recorder
I’m cheating, cramming in a 14-minute EP here, but hey a) Van Halen released LPs this long and b) any music from Richard D. James feels like a real event. Putting the superb packaging aside, we are served up a trio of percussive throbbers and hitters, alongside a remix of the first track which is basically a completely different piece of music. The title track ‘Blackbox Life Recorder 21f’ manages to be both soothing and stirring in equal measure and oddly warming.
So after all that excitement we shall have a short recess while KISS reform, retire and then try and sell you a new Greatest Hits LP, followed by Alive 7 – yeah, the full 15 minutes.
Okay so the winner of the Benjamin Zephaniah Memorial Award for the best old stuff bought in 2023 goes to:
Sonny Rollins Alfie
A brilliant jaunty LP with hidden bonus melancholy, flame-lit by Rollins’ intensity and intelligence suborned to the light and groovy. My mate Martin played it to me and I bought it before I’d left his house that evening; I can’t afford to hang out with him anymore.
So before my hired goons^^ take your wallets and throw you out to make your own way home as best you can a quick word of thanks. For all of you who read and comment, I thank you as this blog helps me to stay relatively sane and enthusiastic about things. For those who just read, thank you too, it is appreciated.
See you next year.
1214 Down (still).
PS: a surprisingly violent sucka, this:
*I am afraid life’s too short to piddle about with all the various numbers and lower-case letters in the title, so Blackbox Life Recorder it is.
**not an easy word to spell, that.
^not a dig, I think Sleep is incredible and I eagerly await the 12LP box set that they must surely release of it one day, having burned through From Sleep so many times now.
^^I’ve always fancied having some goons on my payroll, I’ve never seen them advertised though.