Thanks Chez for posting about these! ^_^ The only one of your top 10 I knew was Nocturne, thanks to Club Bizarre (sorry I didn't get around to entering the current one) which is truly atmospheric, but I've now given a play to each one - the David Holmes one sounds good, I first heard his song My Mate Paul on Radio 1 in 1996 two years before it became a Top 40 hit, but don't recall anything from him after 2000 so it's a nice surprise that he's still making music. Can I Come Home was a stirring first listen - I can see how that became your favourite of the year.

Ah, Can I Come Home is a great choice for #1, really stood out to me when I listened to the album. Hadn't heard Zenith but Kavinsky does fit in with the cool synthwave style so it's sounding pretty great listening to it.

 

Similarly The Lightning was a great highlight on the Arcade Fire album, instant even though I didn't take much else from it.

Giving Can I Come Home a listen now and I'm really loving it - I love the very toned-down melody at the start and then it just continues to build with some fab instrumentation in there. Fab choice of #1!

 

Thanks for posting this Chez, I've enjoyed following along!

:hi: :heart: finally doing the EOY comments / replies that I wanted to do, definitely not months later than originally intended or anything :whistle:

 

Since I last commented these are my favourites that appeared here:

 

35. Grimes – Shinigami Eyes

33. Metric - Doomscroller

25. Wet Leg – Chaise Longue

24. Regina Spektor – Up the Mountain

22. Gorillaz feat. Tame Impala & Bootie Brown – New Gold

21. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Spitting off the Edge of the World

19. Caroline Polachek – Sunset

18. Daniel Avery & HAAI – Wall of Sleep

15. World’s End Girlfriend & CRZKNY – BLACK BOX FAKE FACT

13. Royksopp feat. Alison Goldfrapp – Impossible

12. Arctic Monkeys – There’d Better Be a Mirrorball

10. Bdrmm - Three

8. Julien Bracht - Nocturne

4. Daniel Avery - Higher

3. David Holmes feat. Raven Violet – It’s Over, If We Run Out of Love

2. Kavinsky feat. Prudence & Morgan Phalen - Zenith

1. Highasakite – Can I Come Home

 

So, plenty to love here :wub:

 

I'm not sure why 'Autopsy' has never properly connected with me (not that you needed my support with that in BJSC, an easy $ma$h) but I really enjoyed 'Can I Come Home' in the Pop Forum Song Contest so I approve of that #1 pick ^_^ gave it 5 points in amongst a pretty stacked line up (with things like 'Less Than Zero', 'Frankenstein' and 'Free Yourself' that had already been favourites for months). Aw at the write-up about why the lyrics of that song / album connected with you a lot <3

 

I hadn't come across your #2 yet when you originally posted about it (definitely not 8 months ago or anything xx) but I remember you sending it to me after I had watched Drive for first time and I enjoyed the cinematic feel a lot, plus the other song 'Renegade' that you recommended was great with its fabulous synths and escapist feel, both still on my shuffle playlist ^_^

 

Some wonderful song contest highlights from yourself here (you had quite a lot of robbed moments last year -_-) with Bdrmm, David Holmes feat. Raven Violet, Julien Bracht and World’s End Girlfriend & CRZKNY <3 Bdrmm's latest album was a good listen if you've not checked that out. It's literally just dawned on me that I have come across the name Raven Violet as a feature before on a song called 'Strange Effect' by Unloved, I believe it had some kind of tie to Killing Eve but yeah, that is a great, haunting song too. Your Julien Bracht entry was in the last Club Bizarre contest I hosted and it was an instant standout <3 thanks for that artist discovery as I've continued to keep him on my radar ever since ^_^ I remember that World’s End Girlfriend song having such a chilling effect on me on first listen but in a good way :lol: that was a fab edition of Unknown Pleasures, as it always is tbh.

 

Did you end up checking out Daniel Avery's album? :thinking: if not then I'd highly recommend, one of my favourite electronic releases of last year <3 the Röyksopp album trilogy - all from 2022 - was good too if you still want to check them out, I'm in awe of the quality that they're still putting out - especially across three albums. I haven't been *totally* on top of albums myself, I only listened to The Car by Arctic Monkeys a couple of months ago when wanting to familiarise myself with all Mercury Prize nominated albums (I blame it originally being overshadowed by Taylor Swift's album coming out in the same week :P) but was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it, although 'There’d Better Be a Mirrorball' was always an instant highlight - what a gorgeous, Bond-esque moment from them :wub:

 

Caroline Polachek has been a total revelation for me <3 it took until 'Welcome To My Island' for a lightbulb to go off in my head, but since then, I've retrospectively loved the likes of 'Billions' and 'Sunset' so much more, I really admire the effortless genre hopping on her new album, still my AOTY so far. I went back and listened to her previous album and Chairlift stuff too and am pretty in awe of her talent in general, hopefully someone I can see live one day. I've also been a Wet Leg convert after initially not connecting with 'Chaise Longue', was cool to see that not only getting a performance at the Mercurys last year but the BRITs too.

 

Finally... 'Doomscroller' and 'New Gold' were both massive #1s for me so hooray for them both appearing here even if they were originally forgotten :kink: I love how much the forum has taken to the former, with it doing pretty well in ROTD so far. 'New Gold' is my favourite Gorillaz song in quite some time, even if more of a Tame Impala sound. I guess they're a forever shapeshifting act when it comes to musical styles anyway.

 

Fantastic stuff Chez, will try and be less of a liability with commenting next time :kink: