Lists
DIFFERENT KITCHEN’S FAVORITE ALBUMS OF 2012
As I was saying on a recent post on The Kitchen Facebook page, I always have the same issue every year when it comes time to do these year-end wrap-up lists: what criteria should they be based on? Should I do them by ‘best’, my favorites or most ‘popular’ and how do you define best and most popular anyway?? Each approach can generate very different lists, at least based on my ‘eclectic’ tastes.
This year is especially tough though. Despite what some cynics might argue, it was a really good year for music from my point of view and I liked a lot of albums. There’s probably about three or four of them that could make a strong case for being my favorite of the year, but as for the rest? I liked them all pretty much equally but at different times, for listening under different circumstances to the point where the exercise of trying to rank them verged on becoming meaningless. What does it mean to be my eighth favorite album versus my thirteenth, or twenty-first and what criteria would I be using to make those distinctions that I could share with readers that would be of any value to them?
So in the end I decided that just listing these albums alphabetically was the best way to go. But for those of you who like the competitive aspects of list-making and the horse race and list-based nature of news that our 24/7 blog and social media-powered world has given us, let me say that my most-played albums over the course of 2012 were The Slakadeliqs‘ The Other Side of Tomorrow, Miguel‘s Kaleidoscope Dream, THEESatisfaction‘s awE naturalE and Saukrates‘ Season One. And if you still wanna get into a conversation about what the ‘best’ albums were, I’m gonna have to add Cold Specks‘ I Predict a Graceful Expulsion, Killer Mike‘s R.A.P. Music, METZ‘s self-titled banger and also the Kendrick Lamar good kid, m.A.A.d city and El-p Cancer 4 Cure albums, neither of which is even on my list, to the conversation as well. And when you consider all the non-commercial ‘street’ mixtapes and EPs, neither of which are categories that are super well-covered by my list, then yeah, there really was more good music than anyone could really reasonably expect to properly enjoy or get through over the course of last year.
Given all that though, hopefully, there’s some albums on my list that will still be new to you. Maybe you’d heard of some of these titles but hadn’t actually heard them. Or you saw them in these pages but dismissed them as just another post to fill up space and time and hopefully catch your attention (but didn’t really). Maybe now though you’ll decide to explore them based on The kitchen‘s year-end co-sign! After all, that’s kind of the point of these wrap-ups, no? See what you might have missed or compare what someone else liked and deemed ‘worthy’ (by whatever criteria) and see how it matches up with your own tastes, or not!
Just ‘cos we’re into a new year now is no excuse to jettison everything from the last one. If there’s one thing I’ve struggled with over the almost ten years I’ve done this site, it’s trying to not get caught up on the ‘Be first or post only new stuff’ treadwheel that seems to snare other bloggers and sites. We try to maintain a standard at The kitchen where, while we might not cover everything or be the first to cover something, you can be sure that the stuff we do cover is great or at least worth your attention on some level or another. Our goal is to try and continue to do that over the next year and, if we can get our sh-t together, also have some treats to celebrate our tenth year anniversary in the fall. You’ve been warned!
And now to the list…
2012 FAVORITE ALBUMS
The Alchemist, Oh No, Gangrene – Vodka & Ayahuasca
Azari & III – Azari & III
Cold Specks – I Predict a Graceful Expulsion
Curren$y – The Stoned Immaculate
DJ Premier & Bumpy Knuckles – KoleXXXion
Flying Lotus – Until The Quiet Comes
Game – Jesus Piece
Kanye West Presents – Good Music Cruel Summer
Hot Chip – In Our Heads
Jai Nitai Lotus – Something You Feel
R. Kelly – Write Me Back
Killer Mike – R.A.P. Music
KJ – Water
METZ – METZ
Miguel – Kaleidoscope Dream
Mint Condition – Music @ The Speed Of Life
Georgia Anne Muldrow – Seeds
Nneka – Soul Is Heavy
Frank Ocean – Channel Orange
Phenomenal Handclap Band – Form & Control
Planet Asia – Black Belt Theatre
Saukrates – Season One
The Slakadeliqs – The Other Side of Tomorrow
SonReal & Rich Kidd – The Closers
Tame Impala – Lonerism
THEESatisfaction – awE naturalE
Tyga – Careless World
Previously on The Kitchen:
– DIFFERENT KITCHEN’S FAVORITE SONGS OF 2012
– The Best Of The Kitchen 2011 – Albums
DIFFERENT KITCHEN’S FAVORITE SONGS OF 2012
Ordered alphabetically ‘cos honestly I couldn’t really discern where to rank every track on this list but be clear “Adorn” by Miguel was pretty much my favorite song of the year and Jean Grae and Scrufizzer: you both blew my mind with your tracks.
So what does this list say about The Kitchen and music in 2012? I wouldn’t want to speak definitively to those questions (others, feel free to weigh in with your own thoughts in the comments section though) but I would say the list, I think, does a pretty decent job of reflecting all the varied sounds that The Kitchen has always supported over our entire history and of course, in particular this past year.
We’ve never been a pure hip-hop blog (hence our name and goal of striving to be ‘different’) but rep the culture to the fullest, everything from the most ig’nant of-the-moment club bangers to super-lyrical or left-of-center underground joints by indie, unsigned or foreign artists. We won’t claim to outdo the EDM blogs out there but we were listening to those sounds (or their precursors) before many of the kids who run the ‘tastemaker’ blogs in that space were old enough to even know what house music was and feel like our tastes sometimes unearth sounds and talent that don’t fit within the blinkers of their preconceived but approved ‘trendy’ sounds. And tell me how many of the rap bloggers out there feel comfortable enough to post straight-up pop stuff that doesn’t have some cred-grabbing featured rapper on it or some cool punk or indie rock with no ‘urban’ connection to it at all?
Happily enough, I feel like the momentum seems to be towards more and more people with that sensibility with each passing year and you know what? I think that’s a great sign for music and where it’s going or could go moving forward. Growth and evolution, always. Music will never die if artists keep adhering to that ethos and I think they are and have been. Music’s not dead…
2012 FAVORITE SONGS:
2 Chainz feat. Kanye West – Birthday Song
Alley Boy feat. Pusha T – Your Favorite Rapper
Azealia Banks – 1991
CashOut – Cashin’ Out
French Montana – Pop That feat. Rick Ross, Drake & Lil Wayne
Jean Grae – Kill Screen
Youngblood Hawke – We Come Running (The Knocks Remix)
Hint – Aliens Enter feat. T Fly
ivanunknown – So Close So Far
Killer Mike – Big Beast feat. Bun B, T.I. and Trouble
Meek Mill – Amen feat. Drake and Jeremih
Miguel – A D O R N
Mocky – Little Bird
Nas – The Don (Produced by Salaam Remi, Da Internz & Heavy D)
NotestoSelf – All of the Above
Redman – White People Are Rioting
Scrufizzer – #RapRave
Skrillex & Damian Marley – Make It Bun Dem
Spek Won – Pulp Fiktion feat. Keisha.Leisha
Tasha the Amazon – Scallywags feat. Cola of Wifetaker
T.I. – Like That
WatchTheDuck – Poppin’ Off
Kanye West feat. Big Sean, Pusha T, 2 Chainz – Mercy
Yung Nate – Work
Xzibit feat. King Tee & Tha Alkaholiks – Louis XIII (prod. Dr. Dre)
Check out the soundcloud player with a playlist set of all these tracks within (an abbreviated version of this playlist is also available on RDIO, some of the non-commercial or unsigned track were not available on there…):
Previously on The Kitchen:
– The Best Of The Kitchen 2011 – Singles
[Playlist] Different Kitchen – December ’12 Picks from RDIO
Previously on The Kitchen: November ’12 RDIO Picks
My Predictions for the 2012 Polaris Music Prize Short List
Inspired by the homie, Stu, here’s my best guess of what albums will be short-listed for the 2012 Polaris Music Prize. This is based on nothing more than intuition, wild supposition and (a lot of) wishful thinking so don’t pillory me if I am way the f-ck off from the actual list which will be announced today (July 17) on Sirius channel 152 on SiriusXM and CBC Radio 3:
01. A Tribe Called Red – A Tribe Called Red
02. Azari & III – Azari & III
03. Cadence Weapon – Hope in Dirt City
04. Cold Specks – I Predict A Graceful Expulsion
05. Drake – Take Care
06. Feist – Metals
07. Grimes – Visions
08. Handsome Furs – Sound Kapital
09. The Slakadeliqs – The Other Side of Tomorrow
10. Patrick Watson – Adventures in Your Own Backyard
Wild cards: Cœur de Pirate, Leonard Cohen, Mares of Thrace, Sandro Perri, PS I Love You and The Weeknd.
My best guess is that Feist will take the grand prize although the dark horse (no racism intended) are the two hip hop albums by Cadence Weapon and Drake and maybe Cold Specks. Wanna know how I actually voted though? Then hit the jump. In the meantime, if you don’t have time to go through all forty albums again (or, tsk tsk, for the first time), then enjoy this handy 2012 Polaris Prize Long List I created via Rdio. (As always, only snippets will play for non-subscribers so sign up to hear the full tracks and a gazillion other tracks.)
Brendan Philip’s Top 10 Album Picks For 2011
10. Blood Orange – Coastal Grooves
This is a self-produced album by the multi-talented/instrumentalist Dev Hynes (formerly of Test Icicles and Lightspeed Champion) with a seedy nostalgic, 80s downtown New York feel. A conceptual piece, that moves at a very slow and steady pace but is very atmospheric, if you give it a fair chance there is a lot to like about this. The bass is really the thing to watch out for on this album, it’s a really dark centerpiece that works so well.
*Notable Tracks: Sutphin Boulevard, Can We Go Inside Now.
9. Gil-Scott Heron/Jamie xx – We’re New Here
A remix project that doused a lot of light on Heron‘s rather bleak narratives; the original album, ‘I’m New Here’ was not something I actually got through. Although Jamie xx functions as the MPC wiz in British Goth R&B band, The xx, here he offers a freer expression and alternate reality to his intricate compositions and of course paired with the brilliance of Gil-Scott Heron, this certainly makes for a great listen on a bus ride or actually in the club, which I feel is an additional charm when you think about Heron.
*Notable Tracks: Ur Soul and Mine, I’ll Take Care of You.
8. The Weeknd – House of Balloons
The Weeknd – House Of Balloons by The_Weeknd
For sure this is a no-brainer for most people that this would appear on an end of year list. But to be honest I was beside myself on this one because I didn’t love everything that was featured here, but then my objective side came into play and I realized that sometimes we are very comfortable and when we’re introduced to new sounds with no reference or context it isn’t always easy to digest. With all that said, this is a very precise piece of work that ironically to mostly everyone outside of Toronto is shrouded in mystery. There are some great samples used from Beach House and Siouxsie and the Banshees and all around really engaging songs that make you feel like the best way to hear the music at a party is through the bathroom wall… where perhaps another party is happening. I don’t think I need to say much more than that because if you haven’t heard this you probably don’t have the Internet.
*Notable Tracks: What You Need, Party/After Party, Coming Down.
7. A$AP Rocky – LiveLoveA$AP
I will openly admit that when I first heard this, I didn’t give it much of a chance but at the encouragement of a few friends I threw it on the iPod and walked with it. So I suppose it goes without saying that it really grew on me and indulged my raw-er sensibilities quite a bit. A$AP is the crew, Rocky is the star on this ‘mixtape’, but there are other members who shine here and I’m sure have their own projects ready for deployment with all the Houston swag that makes this project really deliver. A$AP as an emcee has a great flow and is concerned with what you would think a young dude would be concerned with.
*Notable Tracks: Peso, Trilla, Brand New Guys.
6. Van Hunt – What Were You Hoping For?
From its strange cover photo to its adventurous music, this is an evolution for an artist that it wouldn’t hurt if you got to know them. Having started as an R&B artist, not to mention having Randy Jackson as his manager (YEAH, THAT RANDY!) it is a wonder why a lot of people aren’t familiar with Van Hunt… their loss I suppose. If you listen to his work in succession, the material found on this album makes perfect sense, it takes the kind of maverick twists and turns found in Prince‘s career, that also means it is incomparable to anything I’ve heard. Sliding from punk to country to funk, to songs about ass and cross dressing, it may be safe to say there is something here for everyone… even if your indulgences aren’t as out there as Van Hunt expresses his.
*Notable Tracks: Watching You Go Crazy Is Driving Me Insane, Falls (Violet), Eyes Like Pearls.
Hit the jump for Brendan’s #5-1 picks….