TranscendNoise

10. Trouble & Mike Will Made It – Edgewood The best rap album came in the form of Edgewood and newcomer Trouble. If there is something like a ghetto symphony or a Bildungsroman in rap, Edgewood would be both. The immersion Mike Will Made It creates through his nocturnal beats is impeccable. After the introduction “Real Is Rare / Edgewood” we are thrown into the action with “The Woods” interlude, helicopter swirling, a man running and cursing. Following, the collage “It's In Your Hands” might be the best Raime track without the UK duo laying down a bass that bursts your skull. The prayer, calling upon God to reaffirm your standing as a gangster and wishing for the safe journey of a young one open up a world without even giving slight narrative pointers. It is just in the sound and feeling that the scene is set and the following tracks are to unfold. Mike Will and Trouble did not weigh down their tracks with skits or interludes, the changes happen by Mike Will´s beats an...

20. Rolo Tomassi – Time Will Die And Love Will Bury It This is the definite album grappling with the dynamics of hard/soft this year. Rolo Tomassi have been growing and subtly shifting a sound that was close to prog-rock to another beast altogether. It is in the ambient moments, the uncertainty of the drifting glaciers bursting into flame that Time Will Die shines, as a vocal pair and a sonic outfit, Rolo Tomassi are able to live in both worlds an be completely centered when doing so. Songs like “Risen” or “Aftermath” live by Eva Spence and her ability to toe the line of electropop and performances by Björk or Imogen Heap. Here the band converts their huge amount of energy into delicate bursts of hope and reconciliation, well knowing they could plunge into chaos by moments notice. For when they go metal, harshly shouting by way of James Spence, they sound like nu-metal kids that never learned anything but shredding. While this dynamic might sound as dated as the idea of nu-metal, ...

30. Siavash Amini & Matt Finney – Gospel I've written quite a lot on the sonic world of Clawing and had the incredible chance to pick Matt Finney´s brain about his life and creation. Gospel , however, I didn´t highlight enough and this despite it becoming my favorite Finney moment of 2018 and at that one of the most jarring edifices of abuse and trauma, I ever listened to. With Siavash Amini at the helm, bringing to life three haunting soundscapes that feel like living inside Silent Hill´s hospitals and small neighborhoods, Finney went deeper into his past and explicitly stated what close listening unearthed in his previous work. The horrors of becoming a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of your own father, the aftermath that deals with unheard prayers to God and a religion unable to help in the real violence humans inflict upon each other. Maybe the thing that always pulls me towards Finney´s music is the fact that he is equally at loss as the next victim, his trademar...