Best Albums of 2012

[Yii]

it's time to go.

[jon abbey]

it isn't, really.

edit: I mean, feel free to put your list here whenever you want, but there are still four weeks left in the year, and I never understand the rush, especially from those who don't have a deadline of some kind to meet (the Wire's year essentially ends in October every year). as always, I will post mine on Jan 1.

[RFKorp]

yeah, it usually takes me until around March to finish digesting what came out from january to december of the prior year.

[mono tony]

beak>> on my list

[926am]

I'm usually a year or two behind anyhow.

[jon abbey]

another point is that the EAI and related world seems to get seriously backloaded towards Nov/Dec releases the last few years. releases that are just out that I doubt anyone here has heard even half of yet (I certainly haven't): 3 on IMJ, 3 on Wandelweiser, 2 on Consumer Waste, 1 on Potlatch...

[Jacques Oger]

another point is that the EAI and related world seems to get seriously backloaded towards Nov/Dec releases the last few years. releases that are just out that I doubt anyone here has heard even half of yet (I certainly haven't): 3 on IMJ, 3 on Wandelweiser, 2 on Consumer Waste, 1 on Potlatch...

It's just because they don't want to appear on the best lists and stay underground.

[Dan Warburton]

it isn't, really.

Word.

[Stephen]

The Wire says:

01 Laurel Halo – Quarantine
02 Sun Araw & M Geddes Gengras meet The Congos – Icon Give Thank
03 Actress – R.I.P
04 Jakob Ullmann – Fremde Zeit – Addendum
05 Jason Lescalleet – Songs About Nothing
06 CC Hennix & The Chora(s)san Time-Court Mirage – Live at the Grimm Museum Volume 1
07 Bob Dylan – Tempest
08 Julia Holter – Ekstasis
09 Carter Tutti Void – Transverse
10 Ricardo Villalobos – Dependent and Happy
11 Scott Walker – Bish Bosch
12 Josephine Foster – Blood Rushing
13 Fushitsusha – Mabushii Itazura Na Inori
14 Keiji Haino & Jim O’Rourke & Oren Ambarchi – Imikuzushi
15 Death Grips – The Money Store
16 Emptyset – Medium
17 Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland – Black Is Beautiful
18 Andy Stott – Luxury Problems
19 Various – Wandelweiser und so weiter
20 Morton Feldman – Crippled Symmetry: At June in Buffalo
21 Richard Skelton – Verse of Birds
22 The Bohman Brothers – Back on the Streets
23 Kendrick Lamar – good kid, m.A.A.d. city
24 Michael Pisaro & Toshiya Tsunoda – Crosshatches
25 Bass Clef – Reeling Skullways
26 Aaron Dilloway – Modern Jester
27 Killer Mike – R.A.P. Music
28 Shackleton – The Drawbar Organ EPs / Music for the Quiet Hour
29 Rhodri Davies – Wound Response
30 Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti – Mature Themes
31 Wadada Leo Smith – Ten Freedom Summers
32 Thomas Koner – Novaya Zemlya
33 Annea Lockwood – In Our Name
34 Earth – Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II
35 Lee Gamble – Diversions 1994-1996
36 Heatsick – Deviation
37 Duane Pitre – Feel Free
38 Raime – Quarter Turns Over a Living Line
39 Swans – The Seer
40 Mark Ernestus presents Jeri-Jeri with Mbene Diatta Seck – Mbeuguel Dafa Nekh
41 Cooly G – Playin’ Me
42 Traxman – Da Mind of Traxman
43 DJ Rashad – Teklife Volume 1: Welcome to the Chi
44 Charles Gayle Trio – Streets
45 Frank Ocean – Channel Orange
46 Pye Corner Audio – Sleep Games
47 Peter Cusack – Sounds from Dangerous Places
48 Pelt – Effigy
49 DVA – Pretty Ugly
50 Peter Brotzmann & Masahiko Satoh & Takeo Moriyama - Yatagarasu

[Dan Bennett]

On the basis of what I've heard from it I don't particularly disagree with that... pretty nice list.

Really not keen on that Araw/Congos disc (listening to it first time today as it happens inspired by playing the thoroughly ridiculous Hotline Miami. Thought it was just plain bad - and I've been enjoying other Sun Araw of late) and there are things missing that I'd include, but there's a lot on there that I've really enjoyed.

By all accounts a well deserved placement for mr Reynell. Yet to hear much from it, but there's a copy in my house.

[johnson]

Yeah, I always just roll December onto the next year's list. So this is for 12/11 - 11/12.
These things can never really be definitive anyway; I know that sooner or later I'll hear something from 2012 that belongs here, be it one of these three Catharine Lamb discs that I haven't got to quite yet or something I hear 15 years from now.
So here's what I enjoyed most from the past 12 months, during the past 12 months and not including anything on my own label:

Ákos Rózmann - 12 stationer VI
Alex Charles - Study for Paper, Shortwave Radio, Plastic and Metal
Andrea Borghi - Musica per Nastro (Tape Music)
Andrea Neumann / Bonnie Jones - Green Just As I Could See
Anne-James Chaton with Alva Noto and Andy Moor - Décade
Bérangère Maximin - No One Is An Island
Brume - Krieg
Bruno Duplant & Philo Lenglet - La Moindre des Choses
Bryan Eubanks / Jason Kahn – Energy (Of)
Christina Kubisch - Licht Himmel
Clay Gold - Breathing to Death
Derek Piotr - Airing
Eric Lanham - The Sincere Interruption
eRikm - Transfall
Ferran Fages ‎- Life Best Under Your Seat
Grischa Lichtenberger ‎- and IV [inertia]
Half An Abortion - Anamorphic Household Whelmer
iky iky - Sjön
Jérôme Poirier - The Seventh Tenant
John Butcher - Bell Trove Spools
Kassel Jaeger - Deltas
Keith Fullerton Whitman - Generators
Kevin Drumm - Relief
Kyoka - iSH
Lee Gamble - Diversions 1994-1996
Lionel Marchetti - Madame Morte
Marlo Eggplant - Crisis As Opportunity
Mats Lindström ‎– МИГ
Matt Earle, Timothy Green, Adam Sussman, Massimo Magee - Opera
Mika Vainio ‎- Fe₃O₄ - Magnetite
Mike Shiflet - Merciless
Mites ‎- Passing Resemblance
Motion Sickness of Time Travel - Traces
Nazoranai [self-titled]
Oren Ambarchi - Audience of One
Oren Ambarchi - Sagittarian Domain
Paulo Chagas + Wilhelm Matthies - Markings [lark]
Philip Sulidae - Recordings of a crepuscular event
Richard Kamerman - None For The Money
Robert Hampson - Signaux
Russell Haswell - Factual
Sabrina Siegel - Piano Breath (action music)
Steve Peters + Steve Roden ‎– Not A Leaf Remains As It Was
Tyler Keen - Lattice
Vanessa Rossetto - Exotic Exit
Wade Matthews - A Short Explanation
Zbeen - K-frame

[Jesse]

the wire ignores john cage shock, but includes sun araw, so there's that.

[jon abbey]

By all accounts a well deserved placement for mr Reynell. Yet to hear much from it, but there's a copy in my house.

more informed analysis of this box, great to see. "it exists, so it must be great." maybe it is, but I for one would like to see something more in depth, and 'gasp' even critical if necessary in parts. admittedly it's a beast to process.

edit: and coincidentally, John Eyles wrote a bit about it today:

http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article ... MAOvrZ5hT4

[jon abbey]

and that's not even to be critical on my part, I think it's pretty clear that the box is the best thing Simon's ever put out, although admittedly that's in part because I have a decidedly lower opinion of most of his catalog than some others seem to. I just hate the way people react to box sets in general, one reason I stopped doing them after the first one I did (I could have put ErstLive batches into boxes, EL001-005, 006-008+contact, 009-012).

Killer Mike is on there a year too late probably, last year's record was I think better than this year's. nice to see him there anyway.

[cheapmachines]

Abul Mogard - "Abul Mogard" - (VCO Recordings)
Altar of Flies - "Let New Life Rise In The Face Of Death" - (Hästen & Korset)
Aqua Dentata - "March Hare, Kraken Mare" - (Beartown Records)
Dale Cornish - "Glacial" - (Entr'acte)
Eliane Radigue - "Feedback Works" - (Alga Marghen)
Jaakko Vanhala - "Here Be Lions" - (Sprachlos Verlag)
John Macedo - "Silt" - (Beartown Records)
John Wall / Mark Durgan "139" - (Entr'acte)
Joke Lanz / Dylan Nyoukis - "Stream Of Unconscious Volume 7" - (Stand-Up Tragedy Records)
Kevin Drumm "The Back Room" - (Self Released)
Lee Gamble / CM von Hausswolff - "Stream of Unconscious Volume 8" - (Stand-Up Tragedy Records)
Martins Rokis - “Live Recordings 2009-2011“ - (Uzusounds)
Reed Evan Rosenberg - "At The End of an Endless Stream" - (Accidie Records)
Robert Hampson - "Répercussions" - (Editions Mego)
Various Artists - "dotolim USB" - (Dotolim)

[Dan Bennett]

I for one would like to see something more in depth

Couldn't agree more. But I don't see how that prevents me from giving such slight congratulations to AT and all involved for this little bit of recognition - which is all I was trying to do.
I've not heard it, but a fair few people I know have, and have said only positive things about it - hence "by all accounts" and declining to say anything myself about its quality.

and then this:

more informed analysis of this box, great to see. "it exists, so it must be great."

A complaint about lack of "informed analysis" in a post you seem not to have read too carefully.

[Daniel Jones]

I really liked this a lot:

[Jacques Oger]

I am not big fan of these lists.
But for sure, there is one which can't be ignored: September.

[Dan Bennett]

10 things I really enjoyed with no attempt to be definitive (there's a lot on all the lists so far that I want to hear, but won't get around to for a while):

Kevin Drumm - Relief
Cat Lamb - Three Bodies Moving
Morton Feldman - Crippled Symmetry Live at Buffalo
Stephen Cornford - Binatone Galaxy
Julia Holter - Ekstasis
Ben Vida - Esstends Esstends Esstends
John Wall & Mark Durgan - 193
Robert Lepenik - Postpeno
Ignacio Agrimbau - Anatomy of the Self Vol II
Rhodri Davies - Wound Response

I nearly put Helena Gough's Knot Invariants disc on purely because I think it's so much better than the reviews it got - but honestly much as I think it's a good record, I just don't love it as much as her earlier cds. Well worth anyone's time though.

[jon abbey]

I am not big fan of these lists.
But for sure, there is one which can't be ignored: September.

The Wire managed to.