lazy lines

It feels like forever since I made the effort to blog so in lieu of ‘quality’ content here’s a non-exhaustive list of things I’ve been enjoying in lockdown:

New music:
Anna Burch - If You’re Dreaming (Heavenly Recordings / Polyvinyl Record Company)
Car Seat Headrest - Making a Door Less Open (Matador)
Do Nothing - Zero Dollar Bill E.P. (Exact Truth / The Orchard)
EOB - Earth (Capitol Records / Polydor)
Fiona Apple - Fetch the Bolt Cutters (Epic)
Juniore - Un Deux Trois (Outre Disque / Le Phonographe)
Lanterns on the Lake - Spook the Herd (Bella Union)
Nada Surf - Never Not Together (City Slang / Barsuk Records)
Nap Eyes - Snapshot of a Beginner (Jagjaguwar)
The Orielles - Disco Volador (Heavenly Recordings)
Penfriend - The Only Way Out Is Through (free download when you join the Correspondent’s Club)
Peter Bjorn and John - Endless Dream (Ingrid)
Sorry - 925 (Domino Recording Co. Ltd.)
Tame Impala - The Slow Rush (Island Records, Interscope Records, Fiction Records, Caroline International)
Unloved - Strange Effect (Heavenly Recordings) 
Wilsen - Ruiner (Dalliance Recordings)

Old(er) music but new to me:
Elvis Costello & The Attractions - Live at the El Mocambo (Universal Music Group International)
Nap Eyes - I’m Bad Now (Jagjaguwar / Paradise of Bachelors)
Norma Tanega - Walkin’ My Cat Named Dog (New Voice Records)
Yin Yin - The Rabbit That Hunts Tigers (Les Disques Bongo Joe)

Podcasts
Stadio
Ornstein and Chapman

Television/Radio
Charlie Brooker’s Antiviral Wipe
Duncanville
The Good Place
Mindhunter - season 2
Tiger King

Miscellaneous
Offbeat - archive playlists here and upcoming schedule here
Sea Change Festival online
Tim’s Twitter Listening Parties

Recommendations are very welcome! ;)

Based on my last.fm stats for the past year here’s a grid of my most played 2016 releases (excluding compilations and re-releases). Interestingly (or not) the list contains six debut full-length releases from 20 different labels! 

‘A Moon Shaped Pool’ just edges out Angel Olsen’s ‘My Woman’ as my album of the year but it was a close run thing. Big Thief’s ‘Masterpiece’ was my favourite debut album from 2016 so i’m quite excited about their imminent UK tour and the Nottingham stop-off at Spanky Van Dyke’s next month.

I suspect a few other albums would’ve made the cut for this list if they were slightly longer e.g. David Bowie’s ★ and my (current) favourite of Thee Oh Sees’ two 2016 releases ‘An Odd Entrances’. The latter was also released very late in the year (early December) and isn’t available for streaming on Spotify at the time of writing.

Speaking of the streaming behemoth, here’s a little playlist I put together of some of my favourite tracks from the past year. According to their December mail-out I listened to 521 artists and 1,781 unique tracks in the past year. My last.fm stats meanwhile tell me that I scrobbled 940 artists and 11,088 tracks. I’m aware that I listen to an awful lot of music but I didn’t really appreciate just how much until I did a bit of digging! Here’s to many more hours of happy listening in 2017.

Keep reading