reckonslepoisson

[reckonslepoisson]

Cool World, Chat Pile (2024)

Chat Pile on Cool World do as before – despondent and thunderous, the sentiment clearer than ever  – though aren’t quite as dynamic, and the mix is a little flatter. I like my sludge best with a bit more non-sludge, thereby emphasising the sludge’s sludginess. 

Pick: ‘Shame’

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Collective Obsession, 4s4ki (2024)

A pretty by-the-numbers EP for 4s4ki, not as bouncy or head-spinning as her best – but still, y’know, pretty good. 

Pick: ‘second demise’

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3AM (La La La), Confidence Man (2024)

Confidence Man’s whole thing is brainless fun; for their third album the foursome move to London, absorb (even more) British dance influences and produce, as expected, lots of big, brainless hits. 3AM (La La La), as one might logically expect of something so unapologetically in-the-moment, ends up a little empty. 

Pick: ‘I Can’t Lose You’

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Sable, Bon Iver (2024)

Justin Vernon may never have been quieter or more delicate than he is on Sable, not even on For Emma was he so subdued. Instrumentally bare or baroque (Pecknold-esque, Vernon turning to his fellow ‘00s indie darling a few decades on), the focus here is therefore near-entirely on the songwriting. Some of that songwriting warrants that focus (‘Things Behind Things Behind Things’) and some not so much. 

Pick: ‘Things Behind Things Behind Things’

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Scarlet Lamb, Yuné Pinku (2024)

Slinky and dancey, Scarlet Lamb may break the first rule of being cool (trying) but still succeeds. Impeccable in its lane.

Pick: ‘Don’t Stop’

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Revelator, Elucid (2024)

Less haunting ghost, more apocalyptic prophet; Elucid packs punches on Revelator not just in his lyrics – as before – but in his beats, too. In all, his best solo work yet.

Pick: ‘The World Is Dog’

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Nuestros mejores deseos (2020), Solo postres (2024), Ramper

Ramper’s highs are like Neutral Milk Hotel’s Balkan blare bits, drawn out and built up to with slowcore post-rock melancholy.

Pick(s): ‘Nuestros Mejores Deseos’, ‘Un Miembro Fantasma’

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Cutouts The Smile (2024)

The Smile’s second album of 2024! That’s right! Another Yorke/Greenwood release in this good Year of Our Lord! Only this one is full of not particularly interesting, mostly plodding synthwork.

Pick: ‘No Words’

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The Hard Quartet, The Hard Quartet (2024)

Just some guys – legends, even – rocking out. What you gonna do, stop ‘em? I certainly won’t but, admittedly, all have been responsible for far more catchy, tuneful, memorable work than this.

Pick: ‘Hey’

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Honey, Caribou (2024)

If one is to believe the hype/PR, Caribou’s latest is among the biggest forays into AI-assisted music yet (by a serious and popular musician). Dan Snaith mines the depth of everything ever recorded by humankind, harnessing AI’s near-total knowledge to produce… a purely perfunctory, serviceable dance music record. The point is entirely lost on me.

Pick: ‘Broke My Heart’

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Brat and It’s Completely Different but Also Still Brat, Charli XCX (2024)

At best, Charli XCX’s remix album features tracks made genuinely better by reflections and additions, shaped by relationships and artistic visions; at worst, it’s blunt proof of the cons of indulging your not-so-talented mates. Nearly all Completely Different is inessential, though bits are very likeable.

Pick: ‘Everything is Romantic (feat. Caroline Polachek)’

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Vanishing Act II: Ultimate Reality, Clarence Clarity (2024)

What was once agile and clever, a constant and delightfully head-spinning barrage of sounds and styles, hooks and callbacks, now feels a bit contrived. While there are flashes of the old Clarence Clarity on Ultimate Reality, catchy tunes shrouded in oddity, audial hypermobility clearly doesn’t come quite so easily to him as it used to. 

Pick: ‘Allatonceness’

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Galore, Oklou (2020) 

Oklou’s new age-daubed ambient pop stretches out her precious, exact melodies into a sound genuinely distinct in its gorgeousness. It is no wonder that Galore has grown quite the fanbase in the years since its release. 

Pick: ‘Unearth Me’

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The New Sound, Geordie Greep (2024)

To be pedantic, not so much the new sound as a new sound; yet Geordie Greep was always fresh and so this, refreshed freshness, is regularly captivating. While more Steely grooved and Quixotically narrated than anything Black Midi did, Greep can’t keep himself from goofy prog and bouts of blaring crunch, though I’m admittedly taken aback by the sheer amount of George Gershwin strutting musical theatre to this thing. 

Pick: ‘Holy, Holy’

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“NO TITLE AS OF 13 FEBRUARY 2024 28,340 DEAD”, Godspeed You! Black Emperor (2024)

How many now? How many more, with each passing minute? As of October 17, 42,438 – at least. A remarkable title in how it puts its reader, its listener in the spotlight; things were catastrophically awful, yet they are now even worse – but by what margin? Yet one should note the other remarkable feature of NO TITLE: its quality. This is among GY!BE’s mightiest releases, one listeners will return to for its intricately mighty sonic architecture – and that returning is important. At whatever point in time one revisits NO TITLE it will act to remind listeners of atrocity, and refuse them permission to forget. How many now? How many more?

Pick: ‘BABYS IN A THUNDERCLOUD’

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The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker (1959) I’m John Lee Hooker (1959)John Lee Hooker 

Way before John Lee Hooker went electric, his music electrified. On Country Blues the rhythm may steadily march but blinding bolts of electric blue flash through his constant and unfiltered romance and devotion, jolts of intoxication, obsession, a sort of lust that leads wherever it must. I’m John Lee Hooker and actual electricity, of course, heightened it all, made it flashier with more obvious rhythmic variety and accentuated pangs.

Pick(s): ‘How Long Blues’, ‘Dimples’

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Eskimo, The Residents (1979)

Eskimo is among the more accessible and watertight Residents concepts. While the mocking of representations of indigenous people is noble, Eskimo is compositionally not quite as gripping – in academic or entertainment value – as the likes of Duck Stab and Not Available.

Pick: ‘Birth’