Listening Clark :: Class Of 2023 :: Module One
Hey…
So, we are already a whole month into 2023, eh?
Well, I say “already”, though my honest feeling is that this six-week month has been inexorable; January is typically the shut-in month of the Gregorian Calendar anyway, the Monday of the year where everyone does the best they can to get back on track, ignore the crushingly doomy news cycle and tunnel-vision their way to February with as little emotional turbulence as possible, because normally by Tuesday the hangover is gone, we have all finally stopped crying and the week can officially start.
One resolution I made to myself before January reared its troll-like head with “New Year, But Worse” tattooed across its brow, was to make an effort to write more, as 2022 was one of notable neglect on that front, and to remedy that one of the first things I am trying to do is catalogue my listening of new material better, offering up a non-numerated top ten of the better recordings I have listened to each time I get to the nice round number of 50.
That’s right, I have been that much of a shut-in/low on money/grasping on existential straws of sanity this month that I have already listened to 50 new albums, mixtapes and extended-plays that were released since the very first day of the year, and in the name of content, I am going to write a lengthy appreciation post about the ten better ones that might be worth your time also, because I’m just that wordy and nice or something…
Still with me? Nice, here go then…
Listening Clark :: Class Of 2023 :: Module One
Ambient 23 – Moby
Helping to destem the anxious ills of January as early as its second day, prolific electronic pontificator Richard Melville Hall returned with another ambient engorgement of mellow riches for the more anxiety-ridden amongst us to be subsumed by. Conceived from old school drum machines and synthesisers, this two-and-a-half-hour treatise of auditory brain-crease-balm is as long a sit as Moby’s previous ambient releases and often devolves into inconsequential ephemera, but is never less than tastefully transportive, a comforting palette cleanser to politely kick, or at least gingerly tap, the year off with.
CACTI – Billy Nomates
Having ridden a high crest of critical admiration since her debut solo release in 2020, Tor Maries continues to draw such praise with her second album, bolstered by her prominence on BBC6 Radio alongside plaudits from the likes of Iggy Pop and Florence Welch. Describing her output as part of the avant-garde, anti-commercial “no-wave” movement, Billy’s unvarnished charisma resonates glowingly as her sweet harmonies traverse emotionally spiky terrain with equal amounts grit and humour, concocting a brand of alternative pop that ironically heralds only more success to likely be attained throughout the rest of 2023.
Crépuscule I & II – Tujiko Noriko
More soul fire-quelling ambience this way plays courtesy of experimental artist Tujiko Noriko’s twelfth solo album, the composer taking a more cinematic cue inspired by her recent dalliances with the visual medium to produce an early contender for some of 2023’s most beautifully rendered music. Though use of brass instrumentation and Noriko’s own vocals can be heard, the album by is described as “synthetic music with a deep human presence”, evoking a tone that summons constellations that can only be seen in the darker, deeper reaches of space, but not without sacrificing a warm humanity that radiates throughout.
Gigi’s Recovery – The Murder Capital
The Irish post-punk quintet have done well to keep their fans’ anticipation wanting since the first single from their second album arrived last summer, and now we have the full album proper they can officially stake claim of vaulting over the fabled sophomore slump with the same iconoclastic flair that announced their arrival back in 2019. Gigi finds the band expanding their thematic breadth of working-class life with more finite storytelling characters and arcs, complete with even bigger walls of trenchant sound reverberating with an anger that rings true with galvanizing consternation.
Graffiti In Space – Strategy
Back onto the transportive flying-through-space vibes, this time from Portland producer Paul Dickow under his Strategy mix-name via Oakland’s Constellation Tatsu imprint, though Dickow’s sound takes a more dub-appropriate modus operandi compared with Noriko’s ambient swoonage. And whilst it also doesn’t quite scale the same heights as Crépuscule’s travails into soothing sonics, Dickow still displays an exemplary knowledge of and instinct for ambient techno grooves and breaks that do well to suggest more exciting diversions to come.
Married In Mount Airy – Nicole Dollanganger
In possession of a wisp that seems to be more indebted to childlike apparitions plaintively singing at you from the attic than your typical folk singer-musician, Nicole Dollanganger has carved out quite the gothic niche for herself since her debut album back in 2012, and her seventh album cements this status arrestingly. Drenched in haunting atmospherics and armed with a true storytelling prowess, Dollanganger’s latest offers a vision of the American heartland that is as romantic as it is disconcerting, hewing to a foreboding sense of nostalgia which has no doubt left many a dreamer ruined in desolation.
Saccades – Rian Treanor & Ocen James
It is collaborations like that between UK electronic music-meister Treanor and Acholi musician James that help keep otherwise jaded listeners like me interested, especially when the results are as vitally propulsive as their first collaborative LP. Having met during recording sessions for Treanor’s previous album, the Rotherham-raised producer was keen to isolate his inspiring sessions with James and wanted to herald them with a set that sees both men go toe-to-toe in terms of inspirational riffs and jams where Treanor’s state-of-the-art production technique marries James’ formidable playing to at times wondrous effect.
The Mind Of A Saint – Skyzoo & The Other Guys
Inspired by the FX series Snowfall to the point of referencing the show’s lead character in the title, Gregory Taylor’s eleventh long-player sees the songwriter and rapper, along with production outfit The Other Guys, sample key moments in the show’s six-year run to give a stirring audio accompaniment to the series’ exploration of one man’s rise as a drug dealer during the crack cocaine epidemic in 1980s Los Angeles, helping to flesh out the motivations and sacrifices of the anti-hero as well as helping to vividly render one of the darkest moments in the history of the City of Angels’ African American population.
Time’s Arrow – Ladytron
As if to make sure that January had at least one tasty synthpop trifle for those ridden with such inclinations to savour over this most wary of calendar months, the stalwart electropop quartet of Marnie, Mira, Daniel and Reuben did their homework and delivered the goods on album number seven. Awash with their customary synthy shimmers, Time’s Arrow finds the band in a more contemplative mode than their last eponymous effort, though rest assured that this certainly doesn’t mean that there is a dearth of typically gorgeous, moody pop moments.
12 – Ryuichi Sakamoto
Closing this entry out, we have the return one of the world’s most celebrated composers re-entering the fray with his first solo album in six years that was inspired after a heavy second bout with that most evil of illnesses in 2021. With that in mind, a long dark journey into the soul is expected, and whilst there is plentiful horror and uncertainty to be found in Sakamoto’s work here, it is also incredibly moving, the elder statesman of contemporary classical music finding light in the most existentially wrought of headspaces to arrive, if not quite at hope, certainly a peaceful and dignified resolve.
And there we have it, theydies and gentlethems, my first Best 10 of 2023. Did you have a chance to listen to these at all, do you agree with my picks or was there something I left out. Though it is unlikely you would be able to change my opinion, it will still be fun to discuss such things, so please leave a comment below.
Now if you excuse, I’ve got to get some love in the Internet-sourced air, as it very much were…
xxxo
