Was in Manchester the other day and had half an hour for lunch and a quick look in Fopp and came out with 3 albums from 2014 that would have passed me by otherwise.

Joan as Police Woman – The Classic. Never heard of them before but a smashing album. Starts off with a distinct 60’s Motown sound to it and then moves toward a more modern offering with just a hint of gospel to it. Vocals are strong and the lyrics excellent – highly recommend

Next up was Rival Sons – Great Western Valkyrie. Beautiful produced and played heavy Southern Rock. Track 1 is strong and the album grows from there. Heavy guitar rifts and just the right amoutn of distortion added to the instruments and vocals to give it an edge.

Finally The War on Drugs – Lost in the Dream. Superb smoldering US indie rock. A rareity of an album these days in that it is one that really needs to be played from start to finish in order as it is a musical journey so often missing from the iPod generations’ music. Downtempo and on the mellow vocals make for a pleasing listen.

Anyone else got any recommendations? Any genre but stuff that didn’t make the mainstream.

Jamie T’s new album. Got very little air play

The Hum by Hookworms
Seeds by TV On The Radio
Plowing into the Field of Love by Iceage
The Best Day by Thurston Moore
Nobody Wants to be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave by The Twilight Sad
Liminal by The Acid
Amphetamine Ballads by The Amazing Snakeheads
Mess by Liars
Present Tense by Wild Beasts
Morning Phase by Beck (Don’t listen to Kanye!)

I’ll see yer war on drugs and raise you with Sun Kil Moon’s Benji. Definitely not derivative Springsteen/Dylan influenced
😉

Toujours – Sabrina. Ex of Brazilian Girls. Half German half Italian living in Paris. Multilingual (hardly surprisingly).

Are We There – Sharon Van Etten. Kind of folky heart on the sleeve stuff.

Warpaint -Warpaint. American indie female band aiming at the mainstream.

Dream River – Bill Callahan. Ok, this was actually late 2013, but my most played album of 2014. IMHO probably the greatest singer/songwriter on the go at the moment.

Biggest tune of 2014

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIWjz1M7ffQ[/video]

Biggest night of 2014

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzP1XC51kro[/video]

Generic breakdown that I could pinpoint the minute the first bar was up, drag n’ drop pre set loops albeit compressed, in fact I’ve prob got those exact presets in NI Komplete 10, sounds like something I’d hear emanating from a river island store in a concrete dungeon shopping centre.

Most definitely not the biggest tune of 2014, all my opinion of course, your opinion obviously differs and that’s cool – were all different.

Edit : ha-ha, I thought you were serious but I now realise you were trolling, cracking!

quick look in Fopp

Er, you were in the centre of Manchester and chose Fopp over God’s own record shop, Piccadilly Records?

Go and sit in the corner and think about what you’ve done.

Can I just recommend an album for 2015.

The Unthanks; Mount the air. Folky goodness with haunting harmonies.

*googles Joan as policewoman*

Can I just recommend an album for 2015.

In that case I’ll recommend Natalie Prass… 😀

“The Way” by the Buzzcocks

bl00dy marvellous

Joan as Policewoman is great….seen her live a few times, she is amazing. Her previous album The Deep Field is even better (IMHO).

Going to see The War on Drugs in 2 weeks …. Fantastic album. Also agree with The Buzzcocks and catching them again in May this year

I would put up My Sad Captains ‘Best of Times’ … Slow burn but then you love it all

Urge for Offal by Half Man Half Biscuit. Just as brilliant as all their other albums. “Iron age mums are haunting my cagoule”.

+1 for The Best Day

And I’ll add The Silver Globe by Jane Weaver if anyone likes a bit of a Stereolab/Broadcast/St Etienne vibe.

Err, don’t know Piccadilly Records [hangs head in shame]. Always liked Fopp when it was in Sheffield so tend to go there.

Will be sure to rectify my error and go to Piccadilly next time I’m in town.

Will check out some of the other recommendations too.

+1 for rival sons, very Zeppelin-esq. But I bought it in 2014 so didn’t really miss it

Future Islands – singles

Mine are:

Royal Blood – Royal Blood

Blitz Kids – The Good Youth

Pulled Apart By Horses – Blood

Run the Jewels 2 is better than the first IMO.

Our Love by Caribou is good

No others spring to mind right now

Try the Timbre Timbre album from last year. It’s bloody lovely.

This thread has filled my Spotify play queue for the next couple of days!

My favourite albums of 2014
Pup – Pup
Karma To Burn – Arch Stanton
The Hold Steady – Teeth Dreams
Royal Blood – Royal Blood
The Menzingers – Rented World
The Gaslight Anthem – Get Hurt (not as good as their previous albums but still well worth a listen)

The Twilight Sad – Nobody Wants to Be Here and Nobody Wants to Leave

A beautiful album by a superb band, all their back catalogue is worth a listen.

Status Quo – Aquostic.
Sat listening to it now and thoroughly enjoying it.

Favourites from last year would be Spoon, Ex-Hex, Steve Gunn, Caribou, Aphex Twin, Glass Animals and Real Estate.

So far this year Sleater-Kinney and Viet Cong have been played the most.

I’ll chuck in Mogwai-Rave Tapes also for those running out of stuff to listen to

Death from above 1979 – The physical world

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqBYHrw9_ys[/video]

Just bookmarked this thread and I’ll check out the albums later. Thanks guys.

This is a good taster of the Steve Gunn album if anybody fancies a listen….they guy is amazing.

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXvOc-WIKDo[/video]

Joan as Police Woman – The Classic. Never heard of them her before but a smashing album. Starts off with a distinct 60’s Motown sound to it and then moves toward a more modern offering with just a hint of gospel to it. Vocals are strong and the lyrics excellent – highly recommend

Joan Wasser, worked with Anthony & The Johnstons, Rufus Wainwright, was the girlfriend of Jeff Buckley when he drowned.
Brilliant artist, very nice person if you get the chance to meet her after a gig.

Bokmarking for later.

Wild Beasts – Present Taste

Broken Bells – After the Disco

Ben Howard – I Forget Where We Are