A decent enough year overall.
10. Julia Holter - Ekstasis
A very original and wildly creative album, with some echoes of Broadcast and Kate Bush. Ekstasis is like dreamy pop music filtered through broken spectacles. However if the album had a little bit more focus it could have featured higher on my list. Can't wait to hear what she does next.
9. Wild Nothing - Nocturne
A timeless album that harks back to the classic indie of yesteryear yet sounds completely fresh and modern. There's not one bad song on this album and it's consistency scores it extra bonus points.
8. Chairlift - Something
This album contains some of the most downright infectious songs I've heard all year, and best of all it doesn't sound one bit forced or contrived. Caroline Polachek has an amazing voice and puts it to some good use on these songs. I wish all pop music could be like this.
7. Swans - The Seer
It can be a lot to take in on one listen, but both discs on this double album have a great mixture of beautiful folk songs and darker, more menacing numbers. This album is right up there with
Children Of God and
Soundtracks For The Blind as the finest Swans albums.
6. Sharon Van Etten - Tramp
A beautiful and very melancholic album which contained one of the best singles of the year in 'Serpents'. The album doesn't quite match her previous album
Epic but it comes within touching distance.
5. Sigur Rós - Valtari
Sigur Rós returned to our ears with the gorgeously ambient
Valtari, big improvement from previous album
Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust. The album seems to take the middle ground between
( ) and Jonsi & Alex's
Riceboy Sleeps album yet still sound like a fresh direction for the band.
4. Yppah - Eighty One
This album can be loosely labelled as trip-hop, but it seems to defy all definition as it takes in a multitude of influences, including indie rock. It's hypnotic, laid-back downtempo grooves and uplifting, swirling keyboards, samples and guitars transport your head to another dimension.
3. Bat For Lashes - The Haunted Man
Trying to top
Two Suns was always going to be difficult. It's difficult to judge whether she did or not but she pretty much damn equaled it. The Haunted Man is a more stripped down and streamlined effort than her previous two albums but still packed plenty of killer tunes.
2. iamamiwhoami - kin
There must be something in the water in Sweden. iamamiwhoami comes across as a more upbeat and groovier Fever Ray, probably due to the vocal similarities between Jonna Lee and Karin Dreijer Andersson. Nevertheless this collection of weird and artful electropop made for an unforgettable album and one of the defining albums of 2012 for me.
1. BATS - The Sleep Of Reason
Their debut
Red In Tooth & Claw was excellent, but this is even better. Their brand of unhinged and energetic math-rock makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Also, how many bands have lyrics which seem like they're been taken from a science lab report? Brilliant stuff.
Honorable Mentions:
Portico Quartet -
Portico Quartet, Tame Impala -
Lonerism, Godspeed You! Black Emperor -
'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!, Allo Darlin' -
Europe, Beach House -
Bloom, Japandroids -
Celebration Rock, Mirrorring -
Foreign Body, School Of Seven Bells -
Ghostory, Chromatics -
Kill For Love, Gojira -
L'Enfant Sauvage
Into the Great Bin of Many Sorrows
Grimes -
Visions, Memoryhouse -
The Slideshow Effect, Ringo Deathstarr -
Mauve, Band Of Horses -
Mirage Rock, Whirr -
Pipe Dreams