1 |
TeraBrite |
"PILLOWTALK" |
single |
It doesn't even matter whose songs they're covering. |
2 |
Little Jinder |
"Puzzel" |
Allting suger |
Sparklyshimmering Swedish poptronica. |
3 |
Kitten |
"Fall on Me" |
single |
Ringing, crashing widescreen giant-chorus pop. |
4 |
Cardiknox |
"Wild Child" |
single |
Brash, whirring-gear hyperpop. |
5 |
Mint Julep |
"Small Memory" |
Broken Devotion |
Pulsing, lyrical gauze-pop. |
6 |
Pinkshinyultrablast |
"The Cherry Pit" |
The Cherry Pit +1 |
Either the first or second most self-explanatorily-named band in the world. It's them or Bolt Thrower. |
7 |
Ihsahn |
"Mass Darkness" |
single |
Symphonic Norwegian everything-metal. |
8 |
Rotting Christ |
"In Nomine Dei Nostri" |
Rituals |
This is what it sounds like when your forgotten monuments wake up and crush you. |
9 |
Cirith Gorgor |
"Salvator" |
Visions of Exalted Lucifer |
Mordor hates tourists. |
10 |
Germ |
"I'll Give Myself to the Wind" |
single |
Roaring Australian blackgaze. |
11 |
CHINAH |
"Colder - Single Edit" |
single |
Stark, glassy vapor soul. |
12 |
Maya Payne |
"We Are the Wild" |
single |
Slow, defiant synth-pop cross between "Die Young" and "Fight Song". |
13 |
nrwy |
"No Cause For Alarm" |
Not Now |
In addition the Seed Vault, they remember how to make big British indie guitar rock in Norway. |
14 |
Electric City |
"Take Control" |
The Wilderness |
Maybe there's a lion on the cover because they just like lions. Maybe he sings like that because he's just straining earnestly to hit the notes. Maybe there's a terrible "rap" in the middle of one of these over-earnest Hinder-like too-alt-to-be-actually-alternative song as a bit of self-deprecating irony. Or maybe this is a crowd-funded, cartoonishly stereotype-fulfilling Christian "hard"-rock band that I will be the only atheist to ever play, much less put on a playlist with a band called Love of Lesbian. |
15 |
Love of Lesbian |
"El Yin y el Yen" |
single |
Gruff, exuberant Spanish indie punk. I don't think they're singing about the inner glow of God's great love, but it's not like I actually translated the Spanish, so it's hard to claim it matters. |
16 |
Río Roma |
"Caminar de Tu Mano" |
single |
Glorious Mexican pop/trad boy-band duo. |
17 |
Algora |
"La Fábrica de las Guapas" |
single |
Blocky, almost chip-tuned Madrid indie-pop. |
18 |
Twin River |
"Antony" |
single |
Vancouver jangle-gaze. |
19 |
Mogwai |
"U-235" |
single |
A couple slight, soundtracky ambient meditations. |
20 |
Dear Jack |
"La storia infinita" |
Mezzo Respiro |
Magnificent Italian arena-pop-rock. |
21 |
Chiara Dello Iacovo |
"Vento" |
Appena sveglia |
Apparently in Italy even TV talent-shows are used to identify disconcertingly talented singer-songwriters. |
22 |
ADIAM |
"Quiet Desperation" |
single |
My favorite, as far as I know, Eritrean/Swedish singer returns sounding a little like FKA Twigs crossed with Rihanna. |
23 |
Postiljonen |
"How Can Our Love Be Blind" |
single |
Dreamy Swedish synth-pop. |
24 |
Nord & Syd |
"Åt helvete med allt" |
single |
Portentous Swedish orch-pop. |
25 |
Kerridge |
"FLA 1" |
Fatal Light Attraction |
Shaped, but relentless, but conscious, but abrasively unwelcoming pulsebeat noise-art. |
26 |
Kid Antoine |
"Bodypaint" |
Bodypaint +2 |
Instrumental nightbus future-footwork post-grime sound-designer thing. |
27 |
Omnium Gatherum |
"The Pit" |
single |
Blasting Finnish death metal. I'm still mad at myself for not overcoming jet-lag to go see the triple-um bill of Omnium Gatherum, Insomnium and Enisferum when I had the chance last year. |
28 |
The Resistance |
"I Welcome Death" |
Coup De Grace |
Swedish melodic-death-metal veterans re-group to take death metal back to an elemental near-hardcore intensity. |
29 |
Sivik |
"Time" |
single |
Sultry indietronic r&b. |
30 |
Beshken |
"Safekeeping..." |
Closed Doors 4 |
808s and pitch-shifters. |
31 |
LANCO |
"Long Live Tonight" |
single |
It's only a matter of time until Nashville finishes sneakily reconstructing pre-Zooropa with click-tracks and a slight twang and calling it "country music". |
32 |
Exclusion |
"Wonderland - Original Mix" |
single |
Chirpy trance-step. |
33 |
Waylander |
"Balor of the Evil Eye" |
The Light, The Dark and the Endless Knot |
The new death-metal Motörhead. |
34 |
Pity Sex |
"Burden You" |
single |
Somehow post-punk, post-Sarah and neo-shoegaze all at once. |
35 |
Sundara Karma |
"A Young Understanding" |
single |
Interpol + The Killers. There are worse ideas. |
36 |
Nothing But Thieves |
"If I Get High - II" |
single |
Radiohead was once going to be a rock band. |
37 |
Only Shadows |
"Be Still" |
Be Still +1 |
But you can always tell when a band is a ROCK BAND in their own hearts. |
38 |
D=OUT |
"Shin Gi Tai" |
Shin Gi Tai |
Stylistically-peripatetic visual-kei-as-avant-garde-metal. |
39 |
9mm Parabellum Bullet |
"Hangyaku No March" |
Hangyaku No March / Dark Horse / Daremo Shiranai / Mad Pierrot 4 |
Similarly circus-bright nervous-energy j-rock. |
40 |
The Mirraz |
"Majika Soukitaka Yappa Soukimasuyone Haihai Desuyone Sittemasu" |
Shirubupure!!! |
Quasi-industrial cartoon j-dance/rock even rainbow-stranger than the other two. |
41 |
Journalism |
"Faces I" |
single |
Shimmery Brooklyn indie-post-rock. |
42 |
Instinct |
"Na život a na smrť" |
single |
Rousing Slovak pop-rock. Such a terrible name-choice. Were there no Slovakian words left? |
43 |
Sara |
"Synkkä matkustaja" |
Synkkä matkustaja +2 |
Also badly named: excellent Finnish retro-synthpop-ists. |
44 |
Farewell Dear Ghost |
"We Were Wild Once" |
Skin 4 |
Breathy, soaring Viennese indie-rock. |
45 |
Alexi Lalas |
"Small Time Pretender" |
It's a Better Version of You |
Soccer commentator, never-surrender writer of mild-mannered power-pop songs. |
46 |
The Bergamot |
"Forget About Tomorrow" |
Tones |
Painfully-Brooklyn artisanal husband-wife stomp-and-pourover duo. |
47 |
Palestra |
"Bad Moon Rising (feat. Candace Devine)" |
single |
Creedence Clearwater Robotics. |
48 |
Mia Dyson |
"Tearing up the Lawn" |
Right There |
Ragged Australian roots-punk. |
49 |
Bunnydeth♥ |
"Candy Man Theme: Sweet Wounds - Abridged" |
Sweet Wounds - Single 3 |
Cosmic gamecore weirdness. |
50 |
Lacey Sturm |
"Impossible" |
Life Screams |
Former singer of Flyleaf. God likes guitars. |
51 |
Steph |
"Liebe." |
single |
Germans also like guitars. |
52 |
Michael Neil |
"Saturn's Turn (Melancholia)" |
The Rings of Saturn |
Ambient epicore. |
53 |
Takashi Suzuki |
"Ondo" |
Water and Air |
Ambient ambientcore. |
54 |
The Jezabels |
"Stand And Deliver" |
Synthia |
Exciting indie band short-circuits normal developmental path and jumps straight to giant astonishing, unapologetic rock maybe-masterpiece. |
55 |
Aedliga |
"Surrogate Centuries" |
Surrogate Centuries +1 |
This is still me. Arguably even more me than usual. |