As the internet keeps rolling on, the pool of bedroom producers, garage rockers and cafe singer-songwriters available for a listen opens wider and wider. Make no mistake, it’s made for petabytes of dross. Once in a few hundred hours though, you hit on something great, a hard to pronounce group from an unfamiliar corner of the musical world that you swear it makes all those clicks worth it.
We’ve collected our 10 favorite such albums of 2014. The genres are scattered from minimalist house to vintage country, but each has that ear-perking “something” meriting encouragement, if only just a year-end blog post. Here’s to them:
10. Delta Spirit, “Into The Wide”
plunge headlong into the emotional arena rock they teased on their self-titled album. As tacky as that may sound, the album is their most organic outing since the band’s debut, almost counter-intuitive to the idea of arena rock. Swelling anthems are a dime a dozen here, and almost all are worthy of doing 100 mph, top-down on Route 1 (esp. “From Now On”). There are other styles unheard elsewhere in the band’s catalogue, like the earthen ballad that the album takes its name (which may or may not tease Tenacious D’s “Wonderboy”). If you’ve never heard the band before, start with this and work your way back. Then see them live as soon as possible.
9. “Flight Facilities, “Down To Earth”
With “Down To Earth,” Australian DJ duo Flight Facilities have made the understated splash of the year. Well-known in Australia and the U.K., the producers seemingly have yet to touchdown in the United States, save for circles of dedicated listeners who’ve passed their debut around on the internet with the knowing smiles usually reserved for a good joint. They are Australia’s sand and surf answer to , complete with a grip of impressive guests (Giselle, Reggie Watts, Kylie Minogue et al.) and an underground hit or two (2010’s “Crave You” in particular).
8. Octave Minds, “Octave Minds”
Classical piano and club bangers are worlds away from each other in terms of setting and fan demographics. But that didn’t stop pianist/composer Chilly Gonzales and electronic producer Boys Noize from joining up to make Octave Minds. Gonzales’ knack for timeless composition that was at the peak of its power in his 2012 album “Solo Piano II” plays surprisingly well with the skittering production tendencies of Boys Noize. The album highlight comes in Chance The Rapper’s free association jazz rhyming on “Tap Dance,” an equal showcase of the talented rapper, pianist and producer.
7. Torn Hawk, “Letap Cry And Do Push-Ups At The Same Time”
studio is like the cutting room floor of every B movie you’ve never seen. You can almost see the fog banks rolling in over soon-to-be werewolf-infested high schools (“Under Wolf Law”), the hero walking towards the glowing sunset (“She Happens”) and the town gathering in the square to pick up the pieces (“Because of M.A.S.K.”). Itap an unsettling listen, even though itap mostly major, tapping into that just pre-digital age of magnetic tapes and cheesy special effects that managed to rattle our cage more than the most realistic CGI.
6. Ninos Du Brasil, “Novos Mistérios”
Imagine a mute, feverish James Murphy marooned deep in the Amazon for a year with a box of synthesizers and a copy of ProTools and you’ll have an idea of what to expect here. “Novos Mistérios” (or “New Mysteries”) is more complex than that, and certainly deviates from this formula (the almost tribal “Sepultura,” for one). But they capture the same playful, semi-live house energy that perfected in their time, albeit with a scoop or two more of the unfamiliar. A mystery worth investigating.
5. Blake Mills, “Heigh Ho”
Impossibly gifted guitarist gained most of his public face time backing up Fiona Apple on her most recent tour. Thatap just a footnote on his inevitable rise to prominence, though, as Mills’ sophomore album is his proper coming out party. It never ventures far from the singer-songwriter-guitarist roots we’ve heard in so many iterations before, but his unmistakable ability in all three categories puts “Heigh Ho” a cut above. “If I’m Unworthy” starts the album in an unexpected blues vamp and one of its finest uses of just a guitar and a set of pipes, though the unconventional “Don’t Tell All Your Friends About Me” steals this tight show.
4. Magic Fades & Soul Ipsum, “Zirconia Reign”
“Zirconia Reign” isn’t the sort of album that commands your attention like many on this list. Itap concern is textures, auditory and physical. So the story goes, each of these track was inspired by a physical reaction with an object, accelerated by, as duo Magic Fades says, “kush, coffee and tonnes of La Croix pink grapefruit soda water.” Each track does seem to have its own distinct contours: the roiling tumble of “Spa Finder,” the chipper instability of “Micro Rave Suite.” Itap not suited to soundtrack any particular emotional peak or nadir, but instead attracts with its own strange gravity, out of context of any imaginable setting.
3. Sun Kil Moon, “Benji”
If you pay attention to indie blogs, maybe this one wasn’t such a sleeper. Still, “”’s distressing subject matter probably turned off many prospective listeners before they got past track one. Terrible true stories abound here, delivered simply by a classical guitar and a decidedly narrative-focused half-sing on the part Mark Kozelek. His willingness to be vulnerable is startling, the stories even more so—“Carissa” provides an early gut-check. If you’re willing to give it a chance, it’ll stay with you like few albums in 2014.
2. Sturgill Simpson, “Metamodern Sounds in Country Music”
Sturgill Simpson’s oddly conscious country music is a little bit outlaw and a little bit psychonaut. Itap McConaughey country, in other words, and it couldn’t have come at better time—country has been in dire need of a reawakening since the early eighties (plus McConaughey is on a roll right now). Instead of lamenting runaway dogs, Simpson waxes poetic about existence, the philosophies and substances we use to make it bearable, and death. It doesn’t start that way—the first verse of the first song is all God, the devil and lakes of fire—but it all turns on a line about halfway through the first song and never looks back. Reptile aliens made of light and a treatise on DMT follow—not to mention a honeyed voice rivaling anything you’ll hear on top 40 country.
1. Todd Terje, “Itap Album Time”
Tacky, campy, goofy —all these descriptors describe Norwegian producer Todd Terje’s latest. Itap all in the name, “Album Time,” a tie-loosening title that throws its hands up at the dogged importance music lovers vest in the album. Terje is more concerned with having fun than making a perfect LP. In the process, he comes up spades in both categories. Try and listen to “Preben Goes To Acapulco” without smiling or resist nodding along to the cover of “Johnny And Mary.” It might just be the most fun album of the year, critics be damned.
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Dylan Owens is Reverb’s all-purpose news blogger and album reviewer. You can read more from him on , or the comment sections of WORLDSTARHIPHOP.
