This is my top 20 tracks of 2020, as usual, I could swap out this 20 and switch in another but after much soul searching I’ve settled on these. I hope you find something you like in here.
As usual they’re in no particular order.
There’s a Spotify playlist at the end as the embedded player is being weird.
Human Impact
November
This is a band made up of band members from Swans, Unsane and Cop Shoot Cop and it’s about as true a sound you’ll get today of that NY noise rock that hung around in the mid 90’s. It’s a heavy blast of nostalgia but it sounds like Cop Shoot Cop at their best and is a snarling beast of a song. The swagger of the bass line, the rising keyboards standing in for a brass section, it’s a sound you don’t hear anymore, so it’s great to hear it done so well.
Midwife
Anyone can play Guitar
Not the first song to be called that, but it is the best song with that name. This is just so laid back, fuzzy guitar, reverb soaked vocals and a simple drum machine pattern. It’s so slight it could float away but that works as a strength here and the whole song soars.
bow church
Defend
Bow Church’s album jumps between styles a lot but this track is firmly on the old school rave, big room techno side of things. It reminds me of the Prophet by CJ Boland in a way and that’s high praise in these parts. It’s a long build but when the song breaks you can feel where the dry ice and strobes are going to be assaulting you. Again, this is a plus point. Built with rave synths and acid squelch this is something I’d love to hear in a dark room with too large a P.A for the size of the room.
Colin Phils
La Fin
Colin Phils’ album sits somewhere between prog and math indie rock, which is a very strange place indeed to find yourself. This is the highlight from it. Simple guitar figures lead to the song building but never exploding, with the male and female voices trading off each other. It’s a hard song to describe, just really sweet, slightly unusual sounding indie rock.
Paradise Lost
Darker Thoughts
PL doing what they do best. Heavy and melodic, really leaning into the Goth side of the band. Both Nick’s clean and harsh vocals are fantastic, big riffs accented with a violin to give a sense of lightness to what might become very claustrophobic.
Hidden Mothers
Beneath, to the earth
This is the second song this band released. This is pretty incredible as you don’t get on this list easily. (If I do say so myself) Mixing blackened post metal and screamo of all things this is a melodic if face melting metal. Even with the blastbeats and shrieking they seem to prefer the slower tempos, riffing with bursts of melody and power. And that’s what I’m here for.
Phoxjaw
Bats for Bleeding
I was sure this song was a tribute to Bauhaus. I mean the singer sounds like Peter Murphy, the band sounds like Bauhaus and the lyrics are some silly guff about vampires and Elivs. It’s the most fun song on the album and I was sure it was a wry goth in joke.
Watched a video with the band talking about it and not a peep about goth anything, they said the keyboards were trying to sound like Ray Manzarek. So what do I know eh?
But death of the author and all that and I’m keeping my Bauhaus angle.
Enjoy, it’s great fun. (If you like that kind of thing.)
The Flaming Lips
Flowers of Neptune 6
There’s a sadness that only the Lips can bring you. It’s low key and lost but somehow is still beautiful. This song is a perfect example of what they do best. A song about people’s lives falling apart shouldn’t sound like a hug but it does.
Eleanora
Korre
Another scremo track, it seems that it’s a genre that I have been missing out on, but to be honest, those vocals take a lot of getting used to. But if you can deal with the screaming, throat shredding vocal there’s a lot to love here. There’s some post metal goodness going on with the hardcore driving parts pushing the song and keeping it razor sharp
Brassica
Storm 87
So this sounds like mid 90’s Orbital. It would be a really, really good Orbital song. So, unsurprisingly, I love it.
Late Night Final
The human touch
The main songwriter for Public Service Broadcast put this out as a solo project. It’s a chilled piece electronica, building for 3 minutes of tense hum, into what could be the sound of the sun coming up. Layers of synths and vocals just keep building into a beautiful warm hug of a track.
Svalbard
The Currency of Beauty
Svalbard are fucking furious. They’re a band who are sick of the world’s bullshit and are raging against it. Here, the anger is aimed at how women are treated. It’s 3 minutes of harcore fury, with Serena’s voice straining, almost breaking rage before the song breaks and finally slows down. “Physical beauty isn’t currency, I am not more valuable if I am pretty” is not fucking about and neither are Svalbard.
exhalants
Lake song
I’ve described this before and will again as Shellac covering Slint’s song, Good Morning Captain, while using a trumpet player.
It’s got the muttered spoken word vocal and has the cheek to build to the plaintive cry of “I miss you”. But it is enough of its own song to not only be worth your time as it is to be on this list.
Fragile X
Panzer Kunst
With a title like that you’d expect this to be the dark, foreboding slab of dark almost industrial electronica. Devastating when played loudly enough for the bass to grind you down while still having a light enough touch for it never to become unpleasant or unlistenable.
They you realise where the name comes from and feel a bit silly (It’s the martial art in Battle Angel Alita)
Crippled Black Phoenix
House of Fools
CBP lost their vocalist that had been working with them for the last album so drafted in different people for their new album. This song features Vincent Cavanagh from Anathema. It’s a perfect match. His warm voice works well with this gothic masterpiece of post metal.
Dvne
Omega Severer
The Scotish Prog Metal masters may have pushed their album to next year (Boooooo!) but this taster makes me so excited for it. This is a perfect mix of catchy and heavy with the clean and harsh vocals trading off perfectly. The riffs are huge but the star of the song is the female vocal that comes in, performing a wordless vocal line that reminds me of Pink Floyd’s Great Gig in the Sky, as a counterpoint to the guitar solo and it makes the song soar. If the rest of the album is this good then I have my album of the year picked already.
Run the Jewels
The Yankee and the brave
Mike and El are finally getting the respect they’ve deserved for a long time now, with RTJ 4 riding high on all of the end of the year lists, and rightly so.
This track isn’t one that’s going to get all the column inches, this is more fun than the other more political tracks on the album. This is more like the narration of an 80’s tv show, with the video feeling like a back door pilot, as an animated Mike and EL-P get fucked up and run afoul of the cops.
Killer Mike is on fire here and as an album opener it kicks the door in and sets up one of the albums of the year.
Just don’t watch the video the first time you listen to the song, it’s far too distracting.
In Parallel
Threat of heaven
I could have picked any of the songs from the EP this track comes from, they’re all good but this is a mix of Slowdive lovelines, with a touch of Goth bass chug and a nice, satisfying wall of noise at the end. It won’t change your life but it will make your ears ring.
A.A Williams and Mono
Exit in Darkness
A.A. Williams was invited to collaborate with Mono on this track with just one ep to her name. (It’s an amazing ep to be fair) It’s a perfect mix of both acts, carrying A.A’s fragile, almost Goth music with Mono’s post rock drama. I’d say it’s the best thing Mono has done in a very long time. It’s just a beautiful, fragile song that never explodes the way you’d expect but is all the better for it.
Octa Octa
I need you
In a year that needed it, this is another hug in song form. A simple vocal hook repeated it, some warm keys and an almost drum and bass drum pattern skittering over the track. Despite not changing much it never outstays it’s welcome and always fits like a huge warm jumper keeping you warm and safe.
That metaphor may have gotten away from me a bit but when you listen to the son you’ll understand.
Here’s the Spotify playlist of them all.
The ways of exile 