2019 In Review - Anteater's Top 30+ Albums

Anteater · 12-06-2019, 10:03 PM

15. Biota - Fragment For Balance

Genre: Ambient / Avant Electroacoustical-Folk / RIO
Put On A Playlist With: Univers Zero, Comus, Henry Cow

So, these guys go back a long way to the late 70's...and whilst I haven't followed their career in depth every step of the way, they are pretty much living gods in regards to compelling but strange chamber folk with a peerless grasp on jazz and classical principles. Other than guys like David Tibet or maybe The Legendary Pink Dots, there just aren't that many groups working at Biota's level for such an extended period of time. Fragment For Balance marks their 40th anniversary, and these 26 cuts take you to some interesting places. On 'Rivers Apart', for example, they bring in sax and some creepy dissonant piano chords out of the damn blue. Brillliannnnt.

14. Pictured Resort - Pictured Resort

Genre: Surf Rock, City Pop, J-Rock
Put On A Playlist With: Boris, Hitomitoi, Boredoms, Stereolab, Toshiki Kadomatsu, The Beach Boys

Fresh like a good sunrise, Pictured Resort do a remarkable job at summoning the hazy, long-forgotten summer dreamscapes of Japan's golden era of 80's pop, though filtered through a decidedly more melancholic lens of a 90's / 00's set of genre influences. In that sense, they sound like Boris or the Boredoms who suddenly got a strong desire to become a Californian surf pop band. And it works!

13. Lana Del Rey - Norman Fucking Rockwell!

Genre: Singer-Songwriter
Put On A Playlist With: Joni Mitchell, Stevie Nicks, Fiona Apple, Sally Oldfield

She's basically turned into contemporary music's answer to Joni Mitchell in a lot of ways, but whatever the comparisons this is the first record from Lana that I've really felt represents her full potential as an artist. It's ambitious, but not in a boring way like Beyonce's Lemonade or similar outings. From pitch-perfect 'Mariners Apartment Complex' to the 9 minute tour-de-force 'Venice Bitch', this is record with some massive highs. And even when it borders on getting too "navel-gazey", it's way better than anythng else out like it right now and shows it at every turn.