Drone
In the latter part of this year I’ve had HYbr:ID I by Alva Noto on near-constant rotation while writing; it’s the album that most consistently pushes me into a flow state, and because I’ve done so much writing this year, by default I suppose this is my favourite album of 2021. A close contender is 7.37/2.11 by Perila, similarly ghostlike and similarly impossible to describe when not actually listening to it. My other favourite drone albums of the year are Rakka II by Vladislav Delay and Fringe by Felisha Ledesma, and my favourite field recordings are on dawn, always new, often superb, inaugurates the return of the everyday by the always excellent Kate Carr.
Modern composition
Two unexpected delights of this year were also two revisitations of favourites from previous years. Teenage Lontano by Marina Rosenfeld features teenagers singing acapella RnB, snippets of which were previously featured on the wonderful Plastic Materials in 2009. Oren Ambarchi’s Live Hubris is, fairly obviously, a live version of 2016’s Hubris, which was among my favourite albums of that year. I loved The Changing Account by G.S. Schray, which evokes both Tortoise and Talk Talk’s Laughing Stock. Other favourites this year include Harmattan by Klein, Wild Up’s rendition of Julius Eastman’s Femenine, Cracks by Bendik Giske as well as Giske’s untitled collaboration with Pavel Milyakov, both of which stood in nicely for the absence of new Colin Stetson material other than his soundtrack work, and Dog Mountain by Laurin Huber and Antiphonals by the ever-reliable Sarah Davachi.
Weird / electronica / hip hop
One of the most notably weird albums this year was Deep England by Gazelle Twin & NYX, which is at once pagan, folk-horror and decidedly modern. It also features ‘Fire Leap’ from The Wicker Man, which gets extra points. A lot of my favourite electronica seems to be inspired by Dean Blunt’s and Inga Copeland’s muttered, hazy quasi-hip-hop productions dating all the way back to Black is Beautiful in 2012 – from Dean Blunt’s own BLACK METAL 2 to Fast Fashion by Lolina (aka Inga Copeland herself) to the tonally similar SHILOH: Lost For Words by John Glacier, the marvellous Blue Hills by Jonnine, and Equal Amounts Afraid by LA Timpa. Finally, What Is Normal Today? by Not Waving is a total departure from their recent downbeat style, instead dizzying, queasy and propulsive techno.
Indie / rock
At this stage in their long career, it seems unreasonable to expect new things of Low, and yet they seem increasingly intent on burying their angelic voices beneath distortion and sheer noise. I’m happy to say that HEY WHAT is all the better for it, and contains some of my favourite moments of any album this year, and is almost up to the standard of the incredible Double Negative from 2018. Henki by Richard Dawson & Circle came in almost too late to feature on this list, but it’s quickly risen to become an album I can’t stop playing, particular the later songs which indulge Dawson’s hitherto-unknown liking for metal. I returned often to three excellent post-rock albums this year: Bright Green Field by Squid, Cavalcade by black midi and For the first time by Black Country, New Road, all of which owe a debt to other, better bands (notably Slint), but since when did all music have to be entirely original? Another indie album with clear influences was Anything Can’t Happen by Dorothea Paas, at her best when channelling Joni Mitchell jamming with Crazy Horse. My favourite afrobeat albums were Afrique Victime by Mdou Moctar and Kologo by Alostmen. Other notable releases I enjoyed were Half Mirror by Chorusing and CHUCKLE by Alpha Maid.
Pop / vocal
Reason to Live by Lou Barlow is probably his most accessible album, and perhaps sometimes mawkish, but still terrific. If I’d spent more time driving this year, I’m pretty sure I’d have listened to Daddy’s Home by St. Vincent a lot more. Flock by Jane Weaver channels Stereolab pleasingly, Rhinestones by HTRK is an utter joy and was my favourite music for relaxing this year, along with the divine Hanazono by Satomimagae.
Compilations / reissues
My favourite compilation by a country mile was Rocksteady Got Soul from Soul Jazz. Then, in order of preference: Cameroon Garage Funk (Analog Africa), A Little Night Music: Aural Apparitions from the Geographic North (Geographic North) and Two Synths A Guitar (And) A Drum Machine: Post Punk Dance Vol.1 (Soul Jazz). As for reissues, the standouts for me were Kid A Mnesia by Radiohead and Radar of Small Dogs by Stephen.
It comes as something as a surprise to discover that I’ve written more this year than during any year to date. How I found time to put down 215,000 words, despite long weeks of being unable to write anything at all due to coronavirus-panic paralysis, self-doubt and the requirement of homeschooling two young children for six entire months, I really can’t explain. Still, that’s what happened, and I must have put in intense sessions during the weeks in which I did write, as this was also the year I spent most time at my desk: 290 hours in all.
And this is what I published in 2020:
Gwenifer Raymond’s take on Fahey-esque primitive Americana is heightened by the knowledge that her melodies in Strange Lights Over Garth Mountain are inspired by the Welsh valleys and folklore. Laura Cannell continues a terrific run of form with the distinctly folk-horror collection The Earth With Her Crowns. Beholder by Julia Reidy offers dizzying, ringing guitar textures in which I can lose myself for hours, and similarly the more fragile improvisations on Welsh harp on Telyn Rawn by Rhodri Davies. Dirty Three drummer Jim White, along with Marisa Anderson, provides more immediately digestible melodies in The Quickening, though still as complex as his best work. Kate Carr proves herself to be one of the most interesting current field recordings artists with no less than three releases this year, the pick of which are the stunning Fabulations and The Thing Itself and Not the Myth.
This year, all of my psychedelia needs unrelated to Sun Ra were catered for The Totemist by Ak’chamel, The Giver Of Illness, which sounds like Sunburned Hand of the Man with heatstroke. Love/Dead by Olan Monk defies easy categorisation, though I suppose it’s much minimal techno as anything, though so dark and strange that it’s as if all the lights go out as soon as it begins, and equally so with Metal Preyers by Metal Preyers, which Boomkat describes as ‘chopped & screwed gristle meets ballistic singeli and mutant electro-acholi’, which, though baffling, is presumably accurate. Visions of Bodies Being Burned by clipping. is as hallucinatory as hip hop gets. Finally, Scis by Oval is a more enjoyable album than the new Autechre, for me, and certainly more frantic.
The Night Chancers by Baxter Dury may not make me as deliriously happy as his earlier Happy Soup, but it’s still chock-full of his self-deprecating wit, and contains some of my favourite lyrics of the year: Carla’s got a boyfriend / He’s got horrible trousers / And a small car … Carla’s got a boyfriend / I might take care of him, to be honest. Similarly, Pillowland by Jam City doesn’t quite hit the heights of their earlier Dream a Garden, but prods the same hauntological parts of the mind, so that you could convince yourself not only that you’ve heard each track before, but also that each was in fact a key part of the soundtrack to your childhood. Set My Heart On Fire Immediately by Perfume Genius features soaring melodies and straightforwardly brilliant songwriting. Shades by Good Sad Happy Bad is rough and enthusiastic, and a useful reminder that Mica Levi was already excellent within Micachu and the Stripes before she became Britain’s best composer of film scores. Magic Oneohtrix Point Never by Oneohtrix Point Never is surprisingly direct, melodic and memorable, featuring plenty of guest artists and vocals. Finally, Laura Cannell makes another (very different) appearance in this list under the name Hunteress, playing around with synth pop on The Unshackling, and succeeding wildly.
The artist I’m most grateful to have discovered this year is Beverly Glenn-Copeland, whose compilation Transmissions: The Music Of Beverly Glenn-Copeland I found staggering – a bizarre array of styles, equal parts inspirational and mawkish, and an odd sort of forward-hauntology in which e.g. Massive Attack tracks are evoked ahead of time, and a sense that the songs alter each time I listen to them. Other than that, I loved Temporary Residence’s anthology Field Works: Ultrasonic featuring Felicia Atkinson, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma and Machinefabriek.
Of more recent films (i.e. from the last decade), my absolute favourite was The Souvenir (Joanna Hogg, 2019), which I couldn’t stop thinking about for all sorts of reasons, and the knowledge that there’s an upcoming second part is tantalising. Bait (Mark Jenkin, 2019) was delightful in all respects, the best film about film that I’ve seen for a while. I found Pain and Glory (Pedro Almodovar, 2019) surprisingly affecting, particularly Antonio Banderas’ performance. The Personal History of David Copperfield (Armando Iannucci, 2019) was the most fun I’ve had with a recent film, in part due to the pleasure of spotting favourite TV character actors. I loved Aniara (Pella Kågerman & Hugo Lilja, 2018) – exactly my sort of setup, about a Mars migration that turns into an endless voyage – the intertitles signalling greater and greater timescales alone were powerful. And though I loved A Bigger Splash (Luca Guadagnino, 2015) in every respect, Ralph Fiennes’ creepy dancing remains its most memorable moment.
I watched a lot of classic films this year, partly as a response to lockdown, but also partly because I’ve developed new habits: I no longer fret about not finishing a film in a single session, and I’ve been watching them via BFI Player and MUBI on my (admittedly large-screened) phone, often starting at 5.30am after being woken by my youngest son. Watching films like this, with chunky headphones, in bed in the dark, has been the closest simulation of a cinema setting.
My immediate response to the announcement of the first lockdown was to panic-read substantial classic novels I’d always intended to read. Middlemarch (George Eliot, 1872) worked as intended: I found it totally absorbing and entirely reassuring. I suspect that Candide (Voltaire, 1759), Mrs Dalloway (Virginia Woolf, 1925) and Lanark (Alasdair Gray, 1981) and The Third Policeman (Flann O’Brien, 1967) will each be influential on my own writing in the coming years. My favourite horror novel was Thérèse Raquin (Émile Zola, 1867), which packed a punch partly because I didn’t realise it was going to be a horror novel. My most important reading discoveries in 2020 were the novels of Richard Yates, my favourites so far being The Easter Parade (1976) and Revolutionary Road (1961), the latter being as great a Great American Novel as The Great Gatsby. My most exciting discovery of 2020 was the Jorge Luis Borges-endorsed, proto-SF novella The Invention of Morel (Adolfo Bioy Casares, 1940).
In terms of more recent works, my favourites were A Cosmology of Monsters (Shaun Hamill, 2019), which has one of the most absorbing first chapters of any book I’ve read, Annihilation (Jeff VanderMeer, 2014) which I can’t believe it took me so long to get around to reading, and The Wall (John Lanchester, 2019) which made me seethe with envy. I read a lot of non-fiction for writing research purposes, but the factual books I enjoyed most for ‘fun’ were High Static, Dead Lines: Sonic Spectres & the Object Hereafter by Kristen Gallerneaux (2018) and Deep Fakes and the Infocalypse: What You Urgently Need To Know (Nina Schick, 2020).
It’s been a great year for TV drama. My wife and I binged both series of the hysterical (in all senses) Succession, I was entirely won over by the calm pace of Normal People, and the decidedly more frenetic I May Destroy You seemed to redefine the possibilities of TV drama with every episode. Staged was an impressively comprehensive and complex response to the first coronavirus lockdown, and was very funny to boot. Upright was the TV show that most upset me, offset by all the tremendous joy, and was probably my favourite TV show of the year. Armando Iannucci’s space workplace comedy Avenue 5 turned out to be far better than expected, and I hope there’ll be more to come. The most exhilarating TV I saw this year was World’s Toughest Race: Eco-Challenge Fiji, closely followed by the meticulous, gorgeous and subversive Anaïs Nin adaptation Little Birds. And, likeeveryone else, I thought The Queen’s Gambit was staggeringly good all round.
After around eight years without videogames, purchasing a half-decent laptop this autumn has allowed me to dabble in games I’ve missed in the interim period, though anything particularly open-world or particularly recent stutters like crazy – for which I’m grateful, as I’m terrified of losing too much time to gaming at the expense of work. Still, I managed to work through Portal-esque puzzle game The Talos Principle (2014), Tomb Raider (2013) and Rise of the Tomb Raider (2015) (the latter better than the first in the new trilogy but representing an almost unsurmountable graphical challenge for my PC). I enjoyed Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments (2014) far more than expected, appreciating the slow pace. I admired a huge amount of What Remains of Edith Finch (2017), which as well as providing a compelling story, acted as a showcase for the possibilities of videogames – particularly the scene involving slicing the heads off fish on a production line whilst simultaneously guiding a prince around a kingdom whilst also learning about the fragile mental health of the factory worker in question. But the only game that I truly loved was Firewatch (2016), in which the player fulfils a patient role as a lookout in a Wyoming forest, whilst developing a relationship with your supervisor over walkie-talkie. The landscape is stunning, the nudges along the path of the narrative subtle, and the story is deeply affecting, perhaps partly because the game is over within three hours or so.
A bunch of HOPE ISLAND articles have appeared online in the last couple of days:
Tim Major 
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