...but most of all you've let ILX down: What are the most disappointing records of 2013?

What have you been really looking forward to this year that's turned out to be massive letdown?

YYYs - Mosquito

laura marling, yeah yeah yeahs, lady gaga and young dro were probably the albums i was most excited by and most disappointed on actually hearing

to a lesser extent, hyetal and guido both followed up incredible debuts with kinda-dull retreads

I didn't know there was a new guido album!

don't be too excited apparently

it's not bad as such it's just...not grabbing me like the first one did

sort of three-star disappointment rather than "oh wow this is a turkey"

actually, glasser fits in there too :/

Polica - Shulamith (review here) I loved the first album so much - totally grew on me since it appeared in the lower regions of EOY2012. Then Tiff came out and I was totally psyched for this new album, but Shulamith just doesn't have the tunes, I'm very sad to say.

Donato Dozzy's Plays Bee Mask... After the previous two albums, I was super excited to hear some more dubbyt ambient techno from him, but PBM turned out to a be pretty conservative and somewhat dull ambient piece. (Okay, I admit that when I bought, I didn't know it's actually remix album based on someone else's work, but that still doesn't excuse the dullness.)

I quite liked that one, but I'm more familiar with Bee Mask's work than DD and yeah I prefer BM's work on his own to that one. It's not terrible though and it's quite interesting to think about how all the remixes are different takes on the same original track IIRC.

Danny Brown (sorry)

Boards of Canada

^

My answer is probably Kayo Dot. It has some great moments (mostly the first two tracks) but it also has about an hour's worth of what I'd describe as fairly ineffectual widdling. Most fans have really liked it though, so what do I know?

black hearted brother. disappointing considering the high points of those involved

The Knife - Shaking The Habitual. Three or four killer tracks and a lot of stuff that just isn't as interesting as it thinks it is.

I'm going to go with the Dawn Richard album as well, a few incredible moments but as a whole it's such a leaden trudge. Whatever alchemy existed in the studio last year made Armor On seem light and effortless whereas this is just weary sounding.

The Knife - Shaking The Habitual. Three or four killer tracks and a lot of stuff that just isn't as interesting as it thinks it is.

― Matt DC, Friday, November 15, 2013 11:37 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

For me it's the best thing they've ever done. My album of the year so far.

Boards of Canada

― gotta lol geir (NickB), Friday, November 15, 2013 11:28 AM (18 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Someone had to say it!

I didn't have great expectations for the BoC album is the first place after The Campfire Headphase. In the end it turned out slightly better than I expected - ie a pretty good but completely unsurprising listen.

i like both the knife and dawn richard albums even more now than i did when i first heard them - dawn is almost certainly my year-end #1, the knife in the top 20 probably

I must confess I was a little taken in by all the hype around BoC and after all that wait too. Was really hoping they'd developed in a more interesting way.

I like BoC album as a kind of background-listening experience. Most of their best stuff takes a few revisits to totally sink in and I've noticed a lot of tracks work especially well in isolation, as part of a comp or whatever. Otherwise when I listen tot the album I hear it as more of an OST to a post-apocalyptic documentary or something, and in that respect it works out a well for me.

even i will say that BoC are one of the most overhyped acts out there, and i'm a big fan.

I quite liked that one, but I'm more familiar with Bee Mask's work than DD and yeah I prefer BM's work on his own to that one. It's not terrible though and it's quite interesting to think about how all the remixes are different takes on the same original track IIRC.

I didn't mean to imply the album is bad (it's an enjoyable enough, but IMO it's lacking of any sonic innovation), just that it was a big disappointment, because I really really liked the previous two DD albums (Voices from the Lake was my #1 album of last year). And yeah, different remixes of the same track is a cool idea, but I think that too has been done more interestingly by other artists. (Pole's R is the first example to come to mind, that's a top-notch experiment, that one.)

The stupid hype-and-faff around the still non-existent Beyonce album probably more disappointing than anything here. Except maybe Mosquito.

I'm only familair with the last YYY's album really. What was disappointing about Mosquito just out of interest?

YYYs, Gaga, QOTSA and - after a long period of trying to convince myself I liked it - the Knife. The BoC album, surprisingly, has ended up in my Top 20.

Good thread idea.

was worried this thread might be construed as being a bit negative but seems okay so far

famous last words right?

The Pistol Annies album was rather terrible - which is strange given that Ashley Monroe's solo record was great.

I almost said Magna Carta but that would imply that I expected a great Jay-Z album in 2013.

magna carta failed to meet even my low expectations of it

Polica - Shulamith (review here) I loved the first album so much - totally grew on me since it appeared in the lower regions of EOY2012. Then Tiff came out and I was totally psyched for this new album, but Shulamith just doesn't have the tunes, I'm very sad to say.

― Pingu Unchained (dog latin), Friday, 15 November 2013 11:03 (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yep, this is my biggest disappointment of 2013

Donato Dozzy's Plays Bee Mask... After the previous two albums, I was super excited to hear some more dubbyt ambient techno from him, but PBM turned out to a be pretty conservative and somewhat dull ambient piece. (Okay, I admit that when I bought, I didn't know it's actually remix album based on someone else's work, but that still doesn't excuse the dullness.)

― Tuomas, Friday, 15 November 2013 11:14 (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I really like this album! I'm a fan of Bee Mask but hadn't heard any previous Dozzy.

Also disappointing in a three- rather than five-star way: Paavoharju Joko sinä tulet tänne alas tai minä nousen sinne - it's a decent album but nowhere near being as life-changing as the first two.

Haven't got round to hearing the Paavoharju yet, but there have been a few things on Fonal in the last couple of years that didn't quite live up to previous records.

like half my top 10 is in this thread, what the hell

(the knife, laura marling and dawn richard, mainly. I'm sure I'll have a lot more to say next month, but The Knife is a victim of everyone thinkpiecing it to death and abandoning it, Laura Marling is a victim of no one actually paying attention to the narrative, and Dawn Richard is a victim of it coming out in like January. I'm reserving a few albums in my top 10 because I'm sure they'll show up here eventually.)

disappointment from me probably icona pop, although I sort of called it around "Nights Like This"

I like the Knife album just fine when I listen to it but it feels to big and unwieldy that I almost never do.

Some calculated list of the worst albums of the year:
http://www.albumoftheyear.org/ratings/worst/2013/

...I totally missed the Wolfgang Voigt one.

That Delphic record was a total stinker though.

Voigt record was so unexpectedly horrible, like a bad joke.

black hearted brother. disappointing considering the high points of those involved

Gotta disagree, Jim. I've found this gets better with repeated listens so if you've only given it a couple of spins, try again.

They Might Be Giants - Nanobots would be my pick, though I wasn't really expecting all that much to be honest.

YYYs, co-sign.
I didn't get particularly excited about the David Bowie either, but I know I'm the only one.

Snoop Lion :(

Phoenix

oblivians, danny brown, beautiful swimmers

all of those go in the just-ok-not-mindblowing category for me

hunx and his punx new one was bad although I wasn't a mega-fan before (looove shannon and the clams though)

I liked the Yeah Yeah Yeahs album ...

i know ppl love it but i've been unable to get into doris

Oh yeah, I second Danny Brown.

Danny Brown record is alright, did you really have such high expectations?

yeah I loved XXX. this one's a fall-off. I do listen to it still but I skip a bunch of tracks.

It's definitely a mixed bag. I ackowledge the first half for what it is, but jam out the second half as a mad guilty pleasure. Best thing about Danny Brown th is Danny Brown.

Ergh on my iPads on a train, fill in the gaps for that post.

I've also had several beers.

i know ppl love it but i've been unable to get into doris

doris is definitely a candidate if you're talking "thought it would be a best of the year contender but instead it's just a pretty good record." I do like it tho, especially Hive.

is it troll-y to say m b v

nah

I didn't get particularly excited about the David Bowie either, but I know I'm the only one.

― kinder

I'm with you on that one. It's about as good as his last two albums which are both 6/10.

Also like a lot of other people Yeah Yeah Yeahs has to be the big one. Why did it take them so long to make such a half arsed tired sounding record.

I'd add the new Sebastien Tellier album. I loved his last three albums so much but this one is nothing but filler and one blatant rip off of his best song.

Neon Neon is another big one for me. That first album was so good but this album is completely throwaway.

It really is hard to top Jay-Z imo. That record actually makes me re-assess everything.

oh, also, do singles count? because mutya keisha siobhan is probably my #1 disappointment in that arena

Also, those mini-documentaries made the Jay-Z release so much worse.

oh, also, do singles count? because mutya keisha siobhan is probably my #1 disappointment in that arena

― katherine

That's a good one. The whole campaign has been disappointing really.

I had high hopes for the latest Intronaut, turns out I only particularly like two songs on it.

Yeah Phoenix was disappointing too. It's been a bad couple of years for GAPDY.

No one's mentioned Justin Timberlake yet?

I would add MGMT and Dizzee but did anyone expect anything else? Dizzee's catastrophically disappointing if you think of Boy in Da Corner but he's been on this trajectory for years. Once you've done a football record with James Corden anything goes.

dawn richard, kurt vile, boc (based on the lead single, i don't normally like them much), the knife

i liked the kurt vile- and also his ep w/ sore eros

Pleasantly surprised by the undisappointments this year: Pet Shop Boys, Primal Scream, MIA, Goldfrapp and Arctic Monkeys all improving considerably on their last records, at a point where I'd almost given up on them.

Daft Punk and Dismemberment Plan

Marling's album from this year is my favourite of hers i think.

Enjoyed the Phoenix album more than most, but haven't been compelled to play it in months - feels sort of like Wolfgang The Lesser Version, and with stuff like HAIM and the 1975 coming out in the second half of the year it's felt a little less vital.

Goldenheart is an admirable achievement, but it's harder to love than Armor On

Would add Timberlake to my list of disappointments, as well as Daft Punk.

Re: MKS, there was a rumour a couple of weeks ago that they were dropped from their label, which seems untrue given that they're currently touring the UK, but the lethargy of their campaign has been painful.

I didn't have high hopes for either DP album but I was surprised by how little I liked both of them.

i was excited to hear roy harper's new album when my s.o. brought it home from the library the other night. he put it on, i was mildly disappointed (then pleasantly surprised by the last half). now there's this and i'm super bummed.

:(

also wtf, Kurt Vile record is his best full-length so far imo

Daft Punk
Gaga
Justin Timberlake (x2)
Jay-Z (I foolishly thought it might be okay after Watch the Throne, but...no)
Goldfrapp (Prefer slick electro Goldfrapp to wispy ballad Goldfrapp anyway, though)

The Deerhunter album was a big disappointment for their fans I think, but as someone who has never really given a rat's arse about them before I really enjoyed it.

i find i often like a band's album that their fans dislike, esp when i generally dislike the band, - eg merriweather post pavilion

I love that Deerhunter album.

I had hoped I'd like the second Ebony Bones album more than I do.

Amazed that any Daft Punk that followed Human After All could be considered a disappointment but maybe people have blocked that out and see it as the follow-up to Discovery.

Watain - Wild Hunt
The Devil's Blood - Tabula Rasa

xp some of the Human After All material was redeemed by the Alive 2007 album/tour, so the slate had been cleared for a while.

i keep going back and forth on daft punk because i think it's good but at the same time it has diminishing returns and every week it seems like there's a couple albums coming out in that genre that are better or more interesting.

My disappointment came more from all the build up this year (the list of collaborators, the accompanying interview vids, etc) than Human After All

Yeah, it was hyped to the sky and back and it really shouldn't have been. All of it was true...the album that was delivered is the album that was promised. It's just missing songs, or songs that I'd like to hear more than one time, rather.

yeah, daft punk left me cold. way too much flamboyant fannydangle, not enough banging tunes. get lucky sounded so effortless and sharp too

people who start their sentences with yeah

Pleasantly surprised by the undisappointments this year: Pet Shop Boys, Primal Scream, MIA, Goldfrapp and Arctic Monkeys all improving considerably on their last records, at a point where I'd almost given up on them.

― Deafening silence (DL)

Agree with all of these apart from Arctic Monkeys who I'm just really not a fan of. Pet Shop Boys following one of their weakest albums so quickly with one of their best was a great moment. Tales of us might just be my favourite Goldfrapp album now. I wasn't expecting anything from the MIA album but I've been enjoying it a lot. I'd add Suede here who made an album so great that it almost made me forgive them for their last album which really was heartbreaker.

This year's Fall album was really terrible but so was the last one so not sure I can say I was expecting that much from it. I'm sure they'll do one of their return to form albums in another couple of years.

I surprised folks are down on the Laura Marling record. It's probably my favorite of the year overall.

Pretty sure it's only one person itt that's called it a disappointment.

I thought Daft Punk, MBV, and Haim were all slightly disappointing, probably because my expectations were too high. On the other hand I also had high expectations for the Knife album, but it continues to amaze me with every listen (the one-cd version) and is by far my favorite album of the year

2013 wasn't such a great year for (my kind of ) music imo

I think I'm just impressed by fewer things now. This isn't a reflection of how much or how little great music is out there. I'm just choosier.

it's the same thing as saying it's not so great for YOU

was a GREAT year from over here, so...

i'm GLAD for you

i KNOW, right?

For the life of me, I couldn't locate any magic in that Suede record.
So many people I know really love it, so I kept going back to it, but... felt really stodgy to me. A 'will this do?' approximation of Suede-ness.

MGMT stunk up the house too. 'Congrats' was the first record by them I liked, so I was ready for a long and fruitful career as an mgmt fan. Alas.

for me it's Mount Kimbie, no doubt.

and the Lapalux record to a lesser extent (a lot of the tracks are ruined by being overly busy, too many layers imo)

Daft Punk and Dismemberment Plan

Yeah, D-Plan OTM

I had a good year

for me it's Mount Kimbie, no doubt.

― festival culture (Jordan)

Haven't heard the new one, but I saw them play last night and there were an awful lot of ones I didn't recognise with wimpy singing in.

I would rather hear from the folks that are struggling to manage what they like.

Laura Marling is a victim of no one actually paying attention to the narrative

i'll cop to this, i haven't paid attention to the lyrical narrative because the music sends me to sleep and there are no tunes. (i don't think she's a victim of this, it was a pretty well-received album - not much disappointment narrative about it at all)

cosign MIA and goldfrapp as really brilliant surprises that i wasn't expecting; would add eve to that as well (lip lock is certainly one of the year's most underrated albums - it's not statementy or unusual, eve's never been like that, but it's just sharp and to-the-point and banging), and sky ferreira (not that i knew what i was expecting, just that most of her career had consisted of half-interesting, not-quite-there music). was also pleasantly surprised by a$ap ferg (having been underwhelmed by a$ap rocky), young galaxy (having thought their previous was mimsy nonsense) and julia holter (having found her previous kinda impenetrable)

MKS's campaign has been horrible and "flatline" a merely adequate and kinda unexciting single BUT "lay down in swimming pools" is one of the trax of the year and they've killed it live. and there's nothing else to judge them on! (yes, that is disappointing in itself, i know)

i thought the AlunaGeorge album might turn out to be good but urgh God.

that was a poor effort alright

Five Spanish Songs by Destroyer was a bit of a letdown. It's good, just not great (like everything else he's done). Maybe if I spoke Spanish?

Cosign BoC, Daft Punk, Delphic, Glasser and YYYs.

I'll add Emika (not bad, but more of a mixed bag than the debut), and were it anticipated, Medicine.

There's still more than enough in 2013 to keep me engaged.

Fall Out Boy, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Phoenix (this one has grown on me, but still disappointing), Ghost B.C.

Yeah, Ghost were a drag this year.

This Laura Marling album is pretty cool on first listen. There's some Zeppelin in there.

I love the Laura Marling album, surprised to see it pop up here. It's my favorite of hers yet.

should clarify re: kurt vile that his was the least disappointing of my disappointments. it's a good album. i just had unreachably high hopes after smoke ring, which i loved.

i thought the AlunaGeorge album might turn out to be good but urgh God.

Had actually forgotten I was anticipating that one at some point. What a stinker.

gaga, justin, icona pop (which is the most sadface of them all), the gatsby soundtrack. also i'm trying to not expect the worst about 'britney jean'

2013 has really been about exciting upstarts rather than decadent royalty, for me anyway. Feel like pop is in the process of reconfiguring what it wants to be and a lot of acts from the previous five years or so feel suddenly irrelevant.

oh I thought of one: colin stetson. can't take the iver.

yeah, not terrible, but a letdown after vol 2

That Ghost BC album is cobblers. I was looking forwArd to hearing it as I'd heard great things but strip away the ghoulish theatrics and you've got very little left.

dug it, still do

(not that there isn't effort involved)

re t-sex, it's immediately wrong from the get-go bc instead of comparing dinos to birds he's comparing them to crocodiles???

lol wrong window

but also to ducks (who are huge, apparently)

My bloody valentine. Should have been kept in the cupboard it lived in for twenty years.

no

The MBV album feels like a really good example of Shield's own vernacular and something that would have been mindblowing had it been made in 1993 but instead it's just sort of warmly comforting. Which is fine, and it's a record I really like, but it just doesn't feel like a record of such lengthy gestation, and expectations were just so phenomenally high it couldn't really live up them. The last couple of tracks do feel like experiments that should have been left back in the 90s though.

oh also no one's mentioned the-dream yet somehow so I will

Disappointments, I've had a few:

Dawn Richard
Gaga
Danny Brown
Holy Ghost!

Did anyone expect The-Dream album to be very good though?

i feel like most people either were still on The-Bus and that album wasn't gonna sway them or are like me and a cursory listen to the album affirmed that it was a good idea to stay off

Thing about the Knife album is that geeking out over the sociological implications of production choices seems like it wd be such an ILX thing so the fact that its thread has lain dormant for some months now is kind of an implicit admission that it ended up a failed enterprise. At one point, I figured it was bcz they hadn't unpacked that aspect enough. Now I feel like the tunes just aren't there.

Agree about Dawn and mbv as well, and wd throw in Windhand and Le1f's Fly Zone.

can't say i followed it too closely but wasn't the response to the weeknd album a bit muted? just remember seeing a fairly low pitchfork rating for it and people just don't seem to have talked about it much. not a fan btw so i might have just missed all the rave reviews

black flag was disappointing but only in the sense that it existed at all

2013 only confirmed that music itself continues to disappoint after a promising run from 1909 to 1974 that suggested there might still be life left in the suppurating old carcass

2014 needs to be considerably better else i might disinvest in this outmoded artform completely

only hologram xenakis can save us now

Jackson & His Computerband - Glow

Smash was sublime, and I was beyond ecstatic to hear a followup was to be out this year. Alas, it's not just meh, it's kinda terrible. There's maybe 2 good tunes on it

Nakh otm

only hologram xoasis can save us now

Thing about the Knife album is that geeking out over the sociological implications of production choices seems like it wd be such an ILX thing so the fact that its thread has lain dormant for some months now is kind of an implicit admission that it ended up a failed enterprise. At one point, I figured it was bcz they hadn't unpacked that aspect enough. Now I feel like the tunes just aren't there.

For me it's probably cos there's been so much stuff out this year I've barely had a chance to go back to things, even things I really like. Plenty of geeking out when this came out of course, and it's not exactly everyday listening. Not that that's a disservice, it's supposed to be a bit of a bumpy ride.

The Knife is my most-played record this year but I don't bump thread every time it's on

lol nickb

xp Agree with Alfred. The Holy Ghost! album is rotten.

I mean, I can listen to it some more, see if the songs open up to me, I guess re The Knife

Goodie Mob, Chelsea Light Moving, Nine Inch Nails, Mark Lanegan, Ciara, Demi Lovato, Mudhoney

only on ilx could you have this thread and not a single mention of Yeezus haha

i was a smidge disapointed by drake

gaga, justin, icona pop (which is the most sadface of them all), the gatsby soundtrack. also i'm trying to not expect the worst about 'britney jean'

Well, yes to all of these (with Justin T maybe more Pt 2 than Pt 1). I've heard some of Britney Jean. Expect the worst*.

*"Work Ditch" down from 7 to 37 in one week - the hourglass has run out on this kind of pop, which, as also mentioned above, now seems suddenly, and horribly, dated.

xpost to Soto and DL: sorry to hear about the Holy Ghost! being so dissappointing/rotten. Love the first but haven't gotten around to hearing the new one yet.

I'll hesitantly add Moderat's II. Maybe I'm missing out on the good tracks because I inadvertently got the single LP version but I find it very boring.

Holy Ghost grew on me a little after I initially thought it was pretty bad. I wouldn't call it rotten but definitely not as good as the last one.

I would rather hear from the folks that are struggling to manage what they like.

being disappointed just shows we care.

- sky ferreira (incredible lead single plus one other good song plus a lot of lazy half-written overextended synth-pop bleh)
- gaga (which i'm only listening to now and man what an unfun mess)
- dawn richard (yawn)
- panic! at the disco (which i wasn't expecting much of and ended up being way worse than i imagined)

panic! hasn't been the same since ross + walker left

forever a pretty. odd stan

- sky ferreira (incredible lead single plus one other good song plus a lot of lazy half-written overextended synth-pop bleh)

divorce papers in the mail, son

only on ilx could you have this thread and not a single mention of Yeezus haha

far exceeded my expectations tbh!

divorce papers in the mail, son

completely mystified than anyone's affection for that record can survive three listens

smh @ multiple appearances of dawn richard here

Sleigh Bells - Bitter Rivals

smh @ multiple appearances of dawn richard here

it's so goddamn long and unwavering

it's meant to be unwavering!! resolute, hard-won, a marathon.

it is very long but there isn't actually a song i wouldn't want on it

I would say Daft Punk but I disliked "Get Lucky" from the jump and was pretty sure going into it that I wasn't going to dig the album

I just started playing the Dawn Richard album again, it's breathtaking IMO

I still love the Daft Punk album even though everyone else seems to think it's massively uncool. It's a solid work of art with lots of little details to admire.

would say daft punk except i could tell very early on in the hype cycle that it would be shit

It definitely has its moments (Northern Lights, 86, In Your Eyes, Break of Dawn) but there are so many tedious walking-paced clunkers like Goliath and Pretty Wicked Things in there that it just destroys the album's momentum, and a lot of the ballads aren't differentiated or interesting enough. I really don't get how anyone could consider it a visionary masterpiece or whatever.

I think I said back on the original thread that it reminds me of when rock bands on their third or fourth album start to believe their own hype and try and make this big epic statement album and in doing so lose the spark that made them great in the first place. Also the track makes me cringe in how melodically unambitious and tiny Dawn seems up against the backdrop of Clair de Lune, when presumably the opposite was the intention.

(xpost - it's a trek rather than a marathon)

ha well, I adore "Pretty Wicked Things" so I'm guessing we're not going to be swaying each other with reasoned arguments anytime soon

in summation, nyah nyah you're wrong

The existence of the second 20/20 Experience is very disappointing.

looking fwd to the new dawn richard, gauging from the singles

hope it's a bit leaner than this years tho calling PWT a clunker is o_O to me

Speaking of heavy-handed nonsense, I gave the new Arcade Fire album another play today and that definitely belongs here as well, although I don't think that even counts as a disappointment after the last album.

a lil mad @ u for slagging off 'wonder 2' upthread

"Wonder 2" does sound kind of like a discarded track from Third Eye Foundation's Semtex so I get not being blown away by it

yeah I made the 3EF comparison myself as soon as I heard it! but that doesn't make it any less awesome imo

'in another way', 'only tomorrow' and 'wonder 2' justify the 20-year hiatus & unlimited when's-he-coming-back hype tbh, those three songs are absolutely phenomenal & no album containing them can be a disappointment

"Only Tomorrow" is one of my favorite songs of the year, yeah

the only disappointing thing about the justin timberlake record was that, after the first singles appeared, anyone still expected it to be good

definitely feel disappointed by the weeknd album, but that could also just be a feeling of exhaustion at his aesthetic - he made four albums this year and last. the new album does sound different than his older stuff, but kind of just more radio-ready, less singular than the best parts of his mixtapes.

Mosquito is the one that comes immediately to mind. Absolutely loved It's Blitz!, and I was hoping the new YYY's LP would grow on me, but it didn't. The Neon Neon album Praxis Makes Perfect is the only other one that springs to mind, I found that one incredibly bland. There are albums that came out this year (such as Flaming Lips' The Terror and Daft Punk's Random Access Memories) that I liked at first but gradually found myself listening to less and less, but I got no feeling of "disappointment" from them. As for the stuff I do like, well it's very fair to say there's a lot of that. It's been a good year for music for me.

would say daft punk except i could tell very early on in the hype cycle that it would be shit http://www.wyonation.com/forum/images/smilies/jack.gif

daft punk is definitely the most disapointing, i mean come on

I find it kinda sad if the Daft Punk album isn't good; I dug "Get Lucky" and was meaning to check out the album one of these days. But if it really samples "Clair de lune", that sounds like the worst thing ever! Songs like that shouldn't be sampled by anyone except melodramatic rappers.

can't believe someone would sample one of the most recognizeable melodies in music despite not being a rapper

Daft Punk didn't sample CDL. That was Dawn Richard.

Ah, okay. I thought Matt DC's post was about Daft Punk, since it was in the middle of DP discussion.

can't believe someone would sample one of the most recognizeable melodies in music despite not being a rapper

Of course you can sample anything you want, but my point was that classical piano samples rarely (if ever) work, except in melodramatic rap tunes (like "Für Elise" in Nas's "I Can").

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfvtBNtT6F0

tuomas you have intrigued me enough to start a classical piano samples thread, there must be plenty of good non-rap examples

I don't think the Holy Ghost! album s a disappointment, though I had expected it might be given how much I love the first one and how I wasn't sure where they could go from there.

Phoenix album was a little disappointing. Drake album very disappointing. I liked the Knofe a little more than I expected to, but don't exactly get an urge to listen to it often/at all.

The issue is less with Dawn sampling Clair de Lune and more that she is content to wander around within a miniscule part of its melodic range so she just sounds tiny and lost.

Daft Punk was the least disappointing album of the year for me, in the sense that I didn't expect much and discovered it was really really good.

I think the Daft Punk album is a remarkable achievement but I'm saving my apologia for the EOTY poll.

It's fun(ny) to watch the hype and backlash cycles for Daft Punk. Just like Human After All people went from "yay! Daft Punk is back" to "this is pretty terrible" in, like, four months. Though that was completely justified in the case of Human.

is it really a hype/backlash cycle or just different groups of people to start with?

Some of both. I've definitely noticed people who've gone from one extreme to the other, though not necessarily around here.

from the Holy Ghost! album I've kept "Bridges and Tunnels," "It Must Be the Weather," and "You and Your Hand," all three as solid as any track on the debut.

I liked YYYs album a lot but haven't played it since May; I suspect it'll sound fresh when I relisten to it in December.

I really, really, REALLY like the YYYs album

It's a good album, but I was expecting MAGNIFICENT things from When Saints Go Machine this year and instead I got a few good tracks and a little too much extraneous fannydangle from them. System Of Unlimited Love is still superb and there are a few others, but it's just not as good as Konkylie.

I think the YYYs is only a disappointment in that it's so terribly patchy when compared to It's Blitz. I like the Holy Ghost album, but it's pretty patchy too.

(xpost)

re WSGM, I love love LOVE "System of Unlimited Love" but it's... weird? telling? creepy? that they chose to do that video for it in The Year of Blurred Lines controversy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cug2qoJpMX4

can't watch the vid at work - what happens?

sexy strippers grind on poles, quite quite hot tbf

All the videos I've seen have centred around movement of the human body - parcours, ballet etc... maybe this is an extension of that?

feel like the directors of that vid (two women i think) went all out to make the dullest pole-dance vid possible

The Uncle Acid album wasn't anywhere near as good as their initial two. I went from all-out loving them to seeing them live to hearing the newest record to complete indifference within a matter of months.

Yeah, second the Uncle Acid. What a drag.

^ cosign

So fannydangle is happening eh

it's happening.

Another minor disappointment: Jonathan Wilson Fanfare, not bad, just not as amazing as the last one.

I was huge fan of Husbands when it came out and the Savages album never really lived up to that.

uncle acid is a good answer, i don't generally get so attached to anything good anymore that i believe there has to be MORE of it to come. but since their last album came out of nowhere i did feel like that.

i think 'mind control' would have benefited from a different mix. i was listening to it the other night and picking up more on the smearier guitar bits, if they were more prominent then maybe the backing-off on the monster riffs would have seemed like less of a disappointment. it still sounds good, it's just not compulsive like the last one.

mano le tough, yyys, koze initially kinda (just absurd expectations on my part in retrospect), dawn richard (ditto), goodie mob, timberlake 2, factory floor, kimye video

It's a good album, but I was expecting MAGNIFICENT things from When Saints Go Machine this year and instead I got a few good tracks and a little too much extraneous fannydangle from them. System Of Unlimited Love is still superb and there are a few others, but it's just not as good as Konkylie.

― Pingu Unchained (dog latin)

Yeah I haven't gone back to this one as much as I thought I would. Konkylie is pretty my favourite album of the decade so far and at first I though they'd almost equaled it. Now apart from a few tracks (Mannequim, System of Unlimited, Iodine and Slave to the Take in Your Heaven) I really can't remember a lot about the album. Probably need to give it another play soon but when I got Konkylie I just could not stop playing it.

Pixies

i don't generally get so attached to anything good anymore that i believe there has to be MORE of it to come.

I have finally started to be more like this. If there has been a spate of good x for a couple years, I now tend to think: this will probably dry up soon. (That doesn't mean I don't keep looking for more of whatever it is, but my expectations are low.)

The new Audacity record - on paper it shouldn't be much different than "Mellow Cruisers" but for various reasons I can play that one endlessly and the new one is gathering dust.

Sadly, No Age.

Phoenix, YYYs, BOC already mentioned.

Justin Timberlake in a way, glad he is doing what he wants to and it's actually good but part pf me wanted the same amount of single material as the last albums.

Mannequin, System of Unlimited, Iodine and Slave to the Take in Your Heaven

Yeah, exactly the same ones I go back to. They're all incredibly strong tracks that rival even the best bits on Konkylie but WSGM seem to be suffering from the same 'all surface no feeling' disease as Poliça this year.