As another year folds out, it is time once again to look back and take stock or the highs and lows, before a fresh year rolls in. 2011 has had its moments and has overall been a rather good year, and trying to extract a list of twenty albums from the hundreds, thousands possibly, that I have listened to, loved, hated, reviewed or not, tried to make sense of or misunderstood seems a pretty restrictive effort at best. Still, it is always good to look back and realise that some records have made more of a mark than others, some almost imperceptibly. So, here is, in twenty records, what 2011 was made of…

1.

JENNY HVAL
Viscera
Rune Grammofon

Review:
There is such urgency throughout this record that it is quite astonishing how Hval manages to retain any lightness in her music, but she does, and [Helge] Sten picks up on just enough to bring it all to life in sprightly bright colours and tones. Continue Reading »

AFRICA HITECH
93 Million Miles
WARPCD199
Warp Records 2011
11 Tracks. 58mins19secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP | DLD US: CD | LP | DLD Boomkat: CD | LP | DLD iTunes: DLD Spotify: STRM

Africa Hitech dropped a substantial first EP of broken dubstep and hip-hop-infused grooves just over a year ago, setting the hype machine in full swing in the process. The project of Mark Pritchard (of Global Communication/Jedi Knights/Harmonic 313 fame) and Steve ‘Spacek’ White, the idea of Africa Hitech came out of a desire to blend Detroit techno, soul and Jamaican dancehall. This was first synthesized into the razor-sharp urban textures of Blen, which was followed a few weeks later by an even more hard-hitting second offering, Hitecherous.

Fast-forward a year, and 93 Million Miles takes the pair’s original template and expands it to full length format. Continue Reading »