Looking Back To Go Forward - Albums of 2011 (Part One)

Here at Bobbins Towers, we've been casting our minds over the last year, attempting to make sense of the flurry of music released and distill it down in notational form so we can officially make peace with 2011, seal it off for good, and batten down the hatches to prepare ourselves for the next onslaught of crazy sounds. As this list is reaching you ocularly in January of 2012, rather than December last (or even November, as it is for some obsessive bastards and their list-seeking thrills), you'll no doubt surmise that this means we do things a little differently - and slowly; so it is with our undisputed Album of the Year. An album that was elsewhere neglected in lists, perhaps because the sheer scale of its impact hadn't been properly processed when the typing frenzy began. I'm talking, of course, about Boston Legal alumni William Shatner's opus Seeking Major Tom.

On every conceivable level, William Shatner's Seeking Major Tom spoke of a defining artistic statement. The heroic cover art, the maddeningly obtuse roster of special guests (Bootsy Collins, The Strokes' Nick Valensi and Sheryl Crow?!), the heightened sense that we were lucky enough to be hearing a rock opera in extremis, to say nothing of the octogenarian's phenomenal vocal range on the Black Sabbath classic Iron Man. For those of you who didn't think he had it in him, shame on you. For the rest of us, it was a record truly worthy of the adjective Shatneresque, and nothing else that was unwary enough to set foot in 2011's release schedule stood a chance. Bill, we salute you.

And yet, one man cannot drive music on alone, the very embodiment of a thankless task, and luckily 'TekWar Will' was aided and abetted by several other fantastic artists in other spheres. While not quite the supernova of quality as the above, they could at least co-exist in the same solar system. So without further ado, here's a grouping of 10 personal highlights (excluding my Top 5, to follow shortly) from the last year. It is by no means definitive, but a good indication nonetheless of what was keeping my interest these twelve months past.

15. Shangaan Electro - New Wave Dance Music From South Africa

The title pretty much sums up everything you need to know here. A compilation of upbeat and exuberant acts that make incredibly beatific music that often sounds like it's moonlighting as a soundtrack for a never-released Mega Drive game. Certainly one of the most purely joyful records you're likely to hear this or any other year.

14. Opeth - Heritage

To say this album split the Opeth fanbase down the middle would be excessively generous, as many long-term fans derided the overt prog-rock and psychedelic (i.e. non-metal) influences that laid the foundations for Heritage. But this was merely the fruition of a long-held love of '70s music from frontman Mikael Akerfeldt that had been signposted before on 2003's Damnation. Speaking personally, the likes of The Devil's Orchard were a welcome sign of invigoration within the band's ranks following their last album Watershed, which was a bit of a stinker by the band's imperious standards.

13. Polar Bear Club - Clash Battle Guilt Pride

Did I mention I really, really love Hot Water Music and their creamy post-hardcore goodness? No? Well, I do. The astute will have already cottoned on to the fact that this band is not Hot Water Music, but they tread a similar line in melodic, gritty punk rock that tips the hat to the Gainsville, Florida natives but marks out some space for themselves. Worth it for the opening trio of songs alone.

12. Tyler, The Creator - Goblin

A record dismissed by some as an overlong, overcooked mess, Goblin is certainly not without its flaws. Bracing and often highly distasteful subject matter combine with a slow languorous pace to create a record that is self-indulgent but admirable for bucking many of the expectations it was saddled with prior to release. The trick is to see 'hits' like Yonkers, She and Tron Cat for what they are, relative light relief on a record of bracing nihilistic thought. This is album as personal exorcism.

11. Grails - Deep Politics

While this record may not be openly political, at least not in the conventional wisdom, it is at least deeper than Rick Santorum (fnar). From the inscrutable and faintly ominous cover artwork to the constantly evolving series of sonics held within it, Deep Politics follows its own singular path, with scant regard for conventional song structure or the easy path. Though not as intoxicatingly dark as the band's ongoing Black Tar Prophecies series, the likes of I Almost Grew My Hair and I Led Three Lives in particular compel the listener to submit, like a particularly pesuasive dom (or domme).

10. Decapitated - Carnival Is Forever

A welcome return from a band previously bedevilled by tragedy and setbacks, Carnival Is Forever also saw Poland's death-metal kings branch out, interspersing their alternately technical and groove-centric extremity with some inimitably weird designs, and granting them a new lease of creative life in the process.

9. Machine Head - Unto The Locust

Never really 'got' The Blackening. Yup, I know. Probably renders my opinion on this Machine Head record invalid 'n' all, but I didn't get round to listening to it properly. This however, is immense, some of the most crushing material this band has ever concocted, and it all seems somehow nastier in places. Certainly, the band are in a more adventurous mood than they've ever been and it pays dividends throughout.

8. Wild Beasts - Smother

This album has drifted in and out of my favour since it was released last May, but in the last few weeks it started to make sense all over again. Fittingly, for an album filled with the longueurs of besotted lovers and sexual partners, it takes its own sweet fucking time, but when tracks like End Come To Soon finally lock on to the listener's limbic system, it hits with an almost metronomic precision. I'd still rate the band's barmy debut Limbo, Panto above this, but this is a band who might only be at cruising speed still, their creative well far from fully tapped. Interesting note: this album was recorded in Snowdonia, which should be henceforth exploited for tourist purposes.

7. La Dispute - Wildlife

A new discovery for me this year, Michigan's La Dispute craft a heady brew, taking influences from Glassjaw to meWithoutYou to Shellac and then run with it into the penumbra. And even if they don't fully transcend those influences, the power inherent within the likes of a Departure and the boy-with-a-gun storytelling that propels King Park, are gripping enough that it doesn't matter. As with Wild Beasts, they have their card marked as ones to watch.

6. Rustie - Glass Swords

An album with a spiritual home in the eighties, a mindset linked to nineties rave, and the production techniques of today, Glass Swords could have been a horrible mish-mash. Although it occasionally skirts dangerous territory, it never gets sucked in and keeps a tight rein on proceedings. Anyone who believes that dance music is creatively bankrupt or simply not fun anymore should give this record a listen, and then slap themselves silly for being seven shades of wrong.

To be continued...