AOTY #20. The Skull Defekts - The Skull Defekts

The Skull Defekts have long acted as the backbone of the Swedish experimental underground, but since their 2011 breakthrough "Peer Amid," the group has emerged at the vanguard of a new wave of radical Scandinavian rock music.
For this record they said, ''This is our last album. The Skull Defekts has been an important part of our lives. It is no longer.'' and trust me, this Sweden’s spikiest, boundry-oblivious rock group give one last hurrah you will remember.

 

Daughters

Daughters, the Rhode Island-based noise impresarios, have confirmed that their highly-anticipated and much speculated about full-length album, You Won’t Get What You Want, arrives on Oct. 26 via Ipecac Recordings. “We find ourselves at another reveal,” offers singer Alexis Marshall. “With ‘The Reason They Hate Me’ we break from the narrative for a meditation on opinions and their assertion. For those insisting their critique is art: they’ve got a name for people like you.”

 

Tropical Fuck Storm

Hailing from Melbourne, Australia, Tropical Fuck Storm channel the broody and menacing sound of Nick Cave as well as leader Gareth Liddiard's previous band, the Drones.
TROPICAL FUCK STORM ARE MORE THAN JUST YOUR AVERAGE SUPERGROUP.


ps. Probably one of the best albums for this year.

AOTY #12. '68 - Two Parts Viper

Two Parts Viper is a monumental achievement for ’68 displaying countless raw emotions and oozing with attitude. It demands attention and sneers at all conventions and perimeters. Be it gimmicky or incredibly clever, ’68 have shed their skin and created something completely original, something that’s as beautiful and delicate as it is ruthless and fierce.

AOTY #17. METZ - Strange Peace

“Their whiplash of distortion is made with precision, a contained chaos. But you would never talk about them like that. Because METZ are not something you study or analyze,” wrote Liisa Ladouceur in Exclaim! “They are something you feel: a transfer of energy, pure and simple.” In other words: to feel something, fiercely and intensely, but together, not alone.

Has A Shadow

Psychedelia has always meant something pretty serious in South America. Brazil's tropicalia movement helped to subvert and protest against a military junta, and this tradition has spread across the continent. Has A Shadow are picking up this baton in the 21st century, with the duo's heavy duty psychotropic excursions gradually earning an international cult audience.

Bulbul

Austrian noise-rock band. Initially a one-man band, formed by Raumschiff Engelmayr that later transformed into a trio. They recorded a new longplayer (TR 085, 2002) and started to tour europe disguised as chickens, ladies or sunflowers. Due to many live cooperations with leonid soybelman (ne zhdali, kletka red), kknull (zeni geva), dieb13, franz hautzinger a.o. from the jazz/noise scene, the electroexperimental label mego caught some attention and did the "12" maxi „drabule“ (mego 66, 2004).