Music Banter - Anteater's 30 (ish) Favorite Albums Of 2014

10 Great Albums That Nearly Made The Cut For 2014

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Tigerforest - The Tides Of Day And Night
A particularly lush breed of ambient/house/electronica strains that coalesces into some of the best cinematic wallpaper you've near heard. Great soundtrack material!

Jane Weaver - The Silver Globe
Absolute masterclass psychedelic singer-songwriter outing with a surprisingly sharp sense of experimentation clawing its way out of the mix. Think Linda Perhacs meets Hawkwind at their grooviest and most engrossing and you'll get the hype.

Dave Kerzner - New World
2014 had some absolutely stellar throwback albums to that late 70's Pink Floyd/Alan Parsons vibe I like so much (including The Endless River itself), but out of all of the ones I spent time with, New World is the one that comes closest to that theoretical album everyone wanted Waters and company to make after 1994 but never did. Kerzner has a great moody voice for the harmonies, and the cast of people he's assembled on this sci-fi concept album (including Keith Emerson and Steve Hackett) is second to none.

Mammothor - Tyrannicide
Hard 'n heavy blues rock goodness with a metal edge at times. They've got an interesting early 90's swagger that makes me think of early Kyuss or even Uriah Heep around that same period, but good headbanging is good no matter the year of it's creation.

Riot - Unleash The Fire
The latest incarnation of America's original heavy metal band and their seal-headed murderous mascot Johnny had a lot of competition last year, but Unleash The Fire grew on me so much by December that it was a hard call to leave it out of my original list. That being said, half of this lineup was on Thundersteel back in '88 and the energy is simply out of this world. And that album cover...hell, how can you not get jacked just looking at it?

Sonic Station - Next Stop
I've got a keen ear for 80's melodic rock, but Next Stop is a rare example of a great album in the style that takes time to grow on you. The first Sonic Station record from a few years back was absolutely killer, but this one lacks that debut's immediacy for the most part (though 'Stopped Beating' and Toto-esque opener 'Amelia' both work reallllly well). Nobody beats Work Of Art in the AOR department these days, but this album fares well.

Issues - Issues
Very, very divisive album here: some people think R&B-core is everything that's wrong in modern metal, whilst others see it as a positive step forward (and away) from the stagnant world of nu-metal. As for me, I treat this brand of "melodic" metalcore like anything else: if there's some good hooks and ideas in there somewhere, count me in. Otherwise why bother? In this case, the elevating factor here is the clean-singing Tyler Carter, who sounds like a long lost New Jack Swing superstar buried somewhere in Babyface's back catalog. Beats the hell out of Linkin Park anyway....

Perfect Beings - Perfect Beings
What if Yes had never appeared in the 70's, but instead been one of those jazzy, power-pop influenced indie rock bands like The Reign Of Kindo that formed in the late 90's? These guys go a long way to answering that question, and the results range from strange to beautiful, and sometimes a little bit of both on this debut.

Anubis Gate - Horizons
Coming out alongside the Teramaze album last year on Nightmare Records, Horizons is a more experimental and less "in your face" affair, playing around more with song structure and atmosphere establishment. Great singleworthy material abounds though, especially 'Hear My Call' and opening tour-de-force 'Destined To Remember'. The progressive/power metal metal world is a very crowded one, but Anubis Gate have been at the head of the class since 2004. Truth be told, Horizons would have been in my top ten in a different year!

Incognito - Amplified Soul
Like the rising and setting of the sun or phases of the moon, you can always count on British acid-jazz progenitors Incognito to deliver absolutely cracking albums filled to the brim with exquisite soul, funk and jazz-fusion influenced compositions, but this album is without a doubt the grooviest thing I've heard from them since 2004's Adventures In Black Sunshine. Only a handful of bands have been around long enough to get a songwriting approach down to science without losing vitality in their craft, and these guys make it look insanely easy.