Best Songs of 2018

   

     This has really been a BIG year for me and Justine. First, we got married, then we moved to England, then we moved back in October, got new jobs, got a condo and got approved for our newest member of the family, Zoe! She's a little silver tabby, and we're picking her up in a week. Fun way to kick off the new year. I also decided it might be nice to have the blog reflect the year we had, so the background will now rotate in pictures I took while we were in the UK.

     Let me just preface this first of several end of the year posts by saying that I found myself with less standout Songs, EPs, and Albums to make up end of the year lists. This doesn't necessarily mean that there was less "good" music this year, just that the genres that I'm more interested in didn't deliver as much as previous years for me. Because of this, there are a few surprise picks on these lists that I might not normally choose among other years. As with last year I'm going to not restrict these lists by number, but include as many items that I feel stand close enough in a group to warrant being "Best" in my opinion. I plan to create lists for Songs, EPs, Albums, and a bit of a change for me: Films. I saw a lot of good movies this year, and many truly connected with me. I hope to speak on movies more in the future as well. A final point before getting into the list, don't expect them all by the end of 2018. I'll be going well into January as well, these things take time.

10. Voices - Dead Feelings

     This track showed up on one of my Track Roundups when it was released and again, I have revisited it again and again. I haven't listened to Frightened enough to give a firm opinion on it, but this Single stuck with me for a long while. Peter Benjamin's vocals are an acquired taste, but once they click, it really clicks. The pure emotion and despair his wails can invoke are very potent. I don't even know how to label this track, aspects of it are very 80's new wave in spirit while the accompanying blastbeats and vocals are quite obviously Black Metal.

      Though Voices rose from the ashes of the once disbanded Akercocke, and drew heavy comparison and critique from fans of Akercocke, Voices have transformed themselves into a truly unique band which may outshine Akercocke in time to come.

9. Immortal - Mighty Ravendark

     Immortal have always been a sort of joke band in the world of Black Metal, it's not a detraction however; everyone loves them. Former Frontman Abbath has become an icon in Black Metal, and is one of the main figureheads who does not take himself religiously serious. Abbath is one of the few members of the Black Metal community who seems to actually enjoy what he does. He also has elevated Immortal's music videos to viral legend, who else is going to run across a mountaintop while playing a guitar.

     The point is, Immortal has always been able to make some very quality Black Metal while still maintaining their sense of fun, mostly because of Abbath. So when he left, many were wondering how the remaining two members would live up to their grim and frostbitten spirit. They lived up to and surpassed expectation with their newest album, and "Mighty Ravendark" is as epic and victorious a track as Immortal has ever created.

8. Travis Scott - R.I.P. Screw

     While other songs off of Astroworld may have had more success (Sicko Mode, Stargazing) this one connected with me the most. Houston's Travis Scott pays tribute to another local legend, the late DJ Screw, famous for Chopped & Screwed versions of hip-hop songs. The influence this sound has had on modern hip-hop is absolutely undeniable: it seems that every famous rapper has a slower, hazed out song which is directly Screw influenced.

     "R.I.P. SCREW" is a direct homage to the man, even boasting a composition which almost asks to be Chopped and Screwed itself. This is an extremely melodic and euphoric song, it's actually quite beautiful. Everything is in place, while still sounding a bit loose and natural. This is undoubtedly one of the songs I've listened to most this year.

7. George Clanton - Make It Forever

     I featured this song as well in another one of my Track Roundups, but George Clanton's Slide inflenced a lot of my listening habits this past year. I have a like/hate relationship with Indie music, as can be read about elsewhere. I have to give credit to George Clanton to helping me almost entirely 180 on Indie Music.

     "Make It Forever" is a very classic 90's sounding Indie-Pop track. It was one of the songs released in 2018 which was not Metal which I listened to most, so I figured it appropriate to include here.

6. Mournful Congregation - The Rubaiyat

     When making this list, I found it pretty easy to pick ones out based on the fact that I knew I would be including them or had listened to them a lot this year, but for this one it was a bit different. I loved this album, and still do. It's hard to constantly listen to, simply because of the nature of Funeral Doom Metal but Mournful Congregation make it quite easy to listen casually. Their songwriting prowess and mood they deliver is undeniably great.

     The depth of Damon Good's vocal performance makes this album unique in the plethora of Metal releases this year, the song itself is laden with huge sounding Church Organs. That in itself is enough to make me happy.

5. Yves Tumor ft. Oxhy & Mary Puce - Hope In Suffering (Escaping Oblivion and Overcoming Powerlessness)

     American producer and Experimental musician Sean Bowie, better known by his stage name of Yves Tumor has had a big year. Releasing his unabashedly open album this year in Safe in the Hands of Love, he caught my attention from the outset with the Oni-esque album cover, an Oni is a Japanese Demon and I was expecting this album to be very dark and twisted because of that. Well, the album is mostly a very introspective and beautiful peek into Bowie's life and personal thoughts. In a weird spot on the album is "Hope In Suffering..." This song is Dark. It's an electronic mish-mash of a very somber minor chord progression played out through droning notes, and a distorted and voice filtered incanted poem. The atmosphere of this track alone is enough to have it stand out in the rest of the album:

"Cannot force the hand to stab itself

Unmerciful, unmerciful, unmerciful, unmerciful

All the world in delusion and might

Staying humble and wearing my skin as a batter

Castrate that skin

Breathe my former thunder that rules the day

Bring the tide in and rule it from its grave

And rule that image

Scrape that image"

4. Funeral Mist - Cockatrice

     I have spoken before about how I usually don't like traditional Black Metal, I normally find it quite boring and repetitive. In metal, it's always significant when a bad which has been inactive for a long time comes back for a new album. This is the case with Funeral Mist, this is their first full length album in 9 years and they truly delivered with it. It is a relentless and powerful army march of an album.

     Album highlight for me is "Cockatrice", the first four minutes fly by with an unrelenting blastbeat and then the first bit of melody comes through with the very Dunkelheit-esque keys. After this, the song fades out and leaves the keys to be the only thing you hear besides blowing wind. Undoubtedly the most powerful scream of the year comes forth from sole member Arioch and closes out the rest of the song, which ends up being in my opinion the strongest Extreme Metal song of the year.

3. Denzel Curry - CLOUT COBAIN | CLOUT CO13A1N

     I didn't listen to a lot of Hip-Hop this year, but I was most impressed by Denzel Curry's TA13OO out of all that I listened to, even over Kanye and Kid Cudi's KIDS SEE GHOSTS. The entire album is so diverse and proficient in covering such a wide variety of sounds and emotions. Lead singles typically don't connect with me more than other songs on an album, but "CLOUT COBAIN" is such a strong single I couldn't help but put it here. The hook is an earworm and is so catchy. I know that's not a great reason to include it on a list alone, but there it is. 

    The message is so relevant for modern Hip-Hop as well, as more and more artists are being asked to be like animals being asked to perform for fans, as opposed to people with agency over what they would like to do, or even simply do what's right for them. "I just want to feel myself, you want me to kill myself" that should be the tell for the meaning right on it's own.

2. Cirith Ungol - Witch's Game

     When I mentioned I was impressed by Funeral Mist's return to form after 9 years, I didn't mention that Cirith Ungol would pretty much make that statement irrelevant. "Witch's Game" is the first thing Cirith Ungol has recorded in 28 years. Four out of the five current members of the band return from their last incarnation, and vocalist Tim Baker started singing for them in 1976, four years after their inception as a band. So there you go, this band is almost 50 years old.

     Anyway, the song is great. It is a great epic Doom Metal song, and I actually find myself liking it a lot more than some other Cirith Ungol material. It definitely holds up to their original albums. The song's inclusion here is as much for the fact that this is such a great song as it is for how impressed I am considering the circumstances.

1. YOB - Beauty in Falling Leaves

     You will see this album popping up elsewhere on my other end of the year lists, rest assured. YOB's Our Raw Heart struck me emotionally more than any other album this year. Mike Scheidt and co. poured everything into this album, and it is such a positive and uplifting look at life and death.

     "Beauty in Falling Leaves" is the most serene Doom Metal song I have ever heard, yes it's distorted enough at points to be considered as such but the emotion and power permeating through the 16 minutes is powerful enough to put this song at the top of my list. I'm not really a live music guy, I know many people get addicted to going to shows. I only really enjoy going if it's an all time favourite band of mine (e.g. Opeth), or if I'm with my Dad. That being said, I couldn't imagine going to a YOB show and not feeling some type of way about this passage onwards throughout the rest of this song.