FEATURE:
Turntable Gold
IN THIS IMAGE: The cover for Phoebe Bridgers’ new 12”, Copcat Killer/IMAGE CREDIT: Rough Trade
Rough Trade’s Top-Ten Albums of 2020
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I would not normally write…
IMAGE CREDIT: Rough Trade
about some other sites top-ten albums of the year, as I have decided my own and everyone has a different view. The reason why I wanted to highlight Rough Trade’s top-ten (they also did an extended top-hundred best albums too) is that there are new versions and releases from some of the artists who feature in the list – including Phoebe Bridgers. I would recommend everyone buy these releases on vinyl – as I’ll be putting in links throughout -, but it is great that there are fresh treats to accompany albums that defined this year. It has been a tough year for every artist, but there have been some great releases. Even though some of these exclusives and extra releases are already sold out – Phoebe Bridgers’ Copycat Killer is all out on pre-release, but keep an eye for new deliveries and availability -, I would urge people to buy the original albums and, where they can, the new treats. Here are the ten albums certified to be the best from 2020 by the bods at Rough Trade. If you have not already got these albums then you will need to add them…
IN THIS IMAGE: The cover for Rina Sawayama’s forthcoming 12”, Sawayama Remixed/IMAGE CREDIT: Rough Trade
TO your collection.
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SAULT - Untitled (Black Is) (Forever Living Originals)
“Amidst the pandemic that ravaged the globe in 2020, a centuries-old injustice fought to the fore and demanded to be seen and to be heard. The death of George Floyd ignited worldwide outcry, weary were Black people from the countless cases of systemic racial discrimination, abuse and oppression. Enough is enough.
Enter SAULT, the mystery music making UK collective with an album that delivers equal parts grace and charge, manoeuvring through disparate sub-genres to create a magnificent medley of exaltation. Rarely has there been an artistic statement this stirring, this staggering, this powerful.
It's a hard life, fighting to be seen
It's a hard life, we were born to lead
Oh, be on your way
Things are gonna change
If history is just, the battle cry bong of 2020’s alarm clock will reverberate for decades to come. It’s time to 'WAKE UP’, the revolution has come and Black Is it’s soundtrack”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/sault/untitled
Bonus Release: 5, and 7 on blue vinyl
Release Date: 10th November (5)/20th November (7)
“Repress alert. The incredibly elusive band Sault release their debut album 5 on Vinyl via independent record label Forever Living Originals. The record fuses African, soul, funk and post-punk vibes amongst other flavours. With support from Radio 6's Lauren Laverne and USA's KWRC and KEXP, the band are set to go from strength to strength becoming one of the most prolific bands of 2020 with a barrage of material up their sleeves”.
“Without pausing for breath and hot on the heels of their exhilarating debut album 5, the elusive Sault return with their sophomore full length titled 7. The signature hybrid of funk, dance, post-punk, soul and disco is front and centre once again, confidently delivered with their typical fearless nature. If 5 had you out of your seat, 7 will have you dancing in the streets....Spread the word, Sault are back at it!”
Phoebe Bridgers – Punisher (Dead Oceans)
“Punisher hears Phoebe Bridgers sculpting a night terror into a daydream. Hers is a musicality of the disguise and the costumes are multiple. Like the insect that wears its skeleton outwards - she adorns a polished carapace that hides a candid nature. She plays dead like a rolled up spider, then unfurls in a scream. On this album, Bridgers talks to the deceased, arranging a bouquet of lyrical details to lay on the tomb of a singer whose life was taken long ago. Here, orchestral strings stitch up an oozing wound that gushes with memories. There, she brandishes a fist full of glow sticks to fight the dread that lurks in the dark”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/phoebe-bridgers/punisher
Bonus Release: Copycat Killer
Release Date: 4th December
“Copycat Killer is a 12” featuring 4 exclusive new versions of songs from Phoebe Bridgers’ wildly acclaimed Punisher album. Collaborating with arranger Rob Moose (Sufjan Stevens, The National, Bon Iver, Vampire Weekend, Jay-Z), these are brand new orchestral arrangements of the songs Kyoto, Savior Complex, Chinese Satellite and Punisher, all given a luscious revamp that is sure to delight any fans of Phoebe’s album and serve as perfect gateway for new listeners into what makes her one of the most special artists of 2020 and beyond. Limited to 1500 copies worldwide, a Rough Trade shop exclusive”.
Rina Sawayama – Sawayama (Dirty Hit)
“Sawayama is an album that morphs musical elements into a giant megazord of monster pop, built to defeat the drab mundanity destroying our lives. It’s sassy R&B, beach-ready house, crass nu-metal and ultra-pure-neon-pop-power, all stuck together with PVA glue and glitter. But Sawayama is not only a love letter to the pop music Rina (and I) grew up hearing on promo CDs that came with Smash Hits Magazine, it is an anxious exploration into her own multi-cultural identity, and the technicoloured and composite nature of our own personalities. Beneath the atomic power is fragility, and most importantly humanity”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/rina-sawayama/sawayama
Bonus Release: Sawayama Remixed
Release Date: 27th November
“To celebrate the success of Rina Sawayama’s breakthrough debut album SAWAYAMA, Dirty Hit and Rough Trade shops present this exclusive, limited edition 12” vinyl featuring a number of remixes and cover versions - including a brand new remix of Bad Friend by Dream Wife.
The vinyl is also the first time fans can get their hands on Rina’s cover of labelmates The 1975’s Love It If We Made It, alongside her showstopping cover of Lady Gaga’s Dance In The Dark. The exclusive release is completed by Brazilian drag star Pabllo Vittar’s club-ready remix of Comme Des Garçons (Like The Boys) and the Bree Runway-featuring XS”.
Laura Marling - Song for Our Daughter (Chrysalis Records & Partisan Records)
“This album arrived in the thick of a global lockdown, and I don’t think you could have found a voice more suited and comforting than Laura’s at that moment in time. Her sound has evolved from fragile, complicated vulnerability to maternal love and maturity, all at the tender age of 30. The graceful melodies will embrace you, the words will kiss you on the forehead. Marling’s most straight-forward album is also her most tranquil, clear and idyllic to date. I’m not crying, you’re crying”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/laura-marling/song-for-our-daughter
Bonus Release: The Lockdown Sessions
Release Date: 4th December
“A selection of songs by Laura Marling, taken from the latest album Song For Our Daughter. These were recorded at home during the Covid-19 lockdown earlier this year. this limited 10" features stripped back and gorgeous acoustic versions of Song For Our Daughter, Fortune, Hope We Meet Again, and The End Of The Affair”.
Jarv Is - Beyond the Pale (Rough Trade)
“The Pulp frontman narrates a journey through evocative and explorative instrumentation that is totally sublime. "THIS IS NOT A LIVE ALBUM – it’s an ALIVE ALBUM" reads the press release. After recording various live concerts throughout 2018, this record is the result of a collaborative writing project with audiences, informed by the band's ever-developing performances. These are tracks with expressive, textured sounds. Meditative songs sit alongside pacy, beat-driven odes. An undeniable collaborative enterprise, Jarvis' vocals as captivating as ever”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/jarv-is/beyond-the-pale/lp-plus
Bonus Release: Suite for Iain and Jane / House Music All Night Long (All Night Long Gonz Extended Version)
Release Date: 4th December
“The LP features music scored by Jarvis Cocker for film-makers Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, which featured in their Neil Gaiman-inspired TV series Likely Stories and on an episode of comedy series Urban Myths about Salvador Dali and Alice Cooper. Along with music from those soundtrack recordings, which include Richard Hawley, this exclusive collection also boasts a band that featured members of JARV IS... and Portishead's Adrian Utley performing several compositions live at the BFI in 2016.
House Music All Night Long (All Night Long Gonz Extended Version) is mixed by Chilly Gonzales”.
Dream Wife - So When You Gonna… (Lucky Number)
“A band who inspire, promote and radiate inclusivity, Dream Wife's undeniable friendship and dynamic creative output is about as infectious as it gets. A stirring set of songs that lift, punch, and play, while also pausing for tender thought and rather poignant clarity.
A confident and utterly engrossing album from a band firmly at the helm of their own creative calling”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/dream-wife/so-when-you-gonna
Bonus Release: IRL – Live In London 2020
Release Date: 10th November
“Following the recent release of their Top 20 charting second album So When You Gonna..., Dream Wife (Alice Go, Bella Podpadec and Rakel Mjöll) now release live album IRL – Live in London 2020. Fortuitously recorded by their FOH engineer at London's Peckham Audio this past January, it documents what was expected to be the band’s first of many shows of 2020. Featuring highlights from their first and second albums, plus the previously unreleased song Cheap Thrills, the recording has undoubtedly captured a blistering performance that showcases the trio's trademark ferocity.
Dream Wife say that
“The rock show is the beating heart of this band. We cut our teeth as a unit playing relentless DIY tours before ever releasing music. We often describe recordings as a snapshot of a song at a moment in time, but understanding them as living, breathing, transforming entities through the rock show. Kicking off this year we imagined 2020 to be seriously getting back to touring, to playing shows, to letting these songs live. But... 2020 has not been what anyone expected it to be.
When we put on this small intimate ‘sort of’ secret gig for fans & friends at Peckham Audio back in January we thought it was the first but, as it turns out, it was going to be the only for a very long time. We truly believe in the transcendental power of live music; that you have the power to go somewhere together. We can’t wait to commune with you IRL, at the rock show; to share sweat and joy and rage and grief and energy and love. But for now, we offer you a snapshot of our only rock show of 2020. We offer you a little bit of that energy and rawness and connection captured digitally. It's not quite the same. But don’t worry we'll be together, we will be loud, and we will be unapologetically present soon. Lots of love, Your Wives xxx”
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – Viscerals (Rocket Recordings)
"Therapy through noise." Nigel House.
Powerful, primal, passionate music-making. An infectious, ambitious, raucous, riff-driven record. A workout of sheer musical magnitude and absolutely their best yet”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/pigs-pigs-pigs-pigs-pigs-pigs-pigs/viscerals
Bonus Release: Off Cuts
Release Date: 10th November
“In April 2020 Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs released their third Viscerals – an album which showed an enormous leap forward in confidence, adventure and sheer intensity. Incisive in its riff-driven attack, infectiously catchy in its songcraft and more intrepid than ever in its experimental approach, Viscerals is the sound of a leaner, more vicious Pigs, and one with their controls set way beyond the pulverising one-riff workouts of their early days. Selected as their Album of the Month for April, the band accompanied the release in Rough Trade stores with Off Cuts, an exclusive, limited edition CD. Containing previously unheard versions of tracks taken from all three Pigs albums and recorded in studios across the UK, Off Cuts presents rawer, more immediate, more intense versions of the songs you all know and love - making it an essential listen for all Pigs fans and all fans of heavy, fuzzed rock! Heeding the many requests Rocket have had since April, they have decided to do a very limited, one-off vinyl pressing of Off Cuts. Featuring new artwork and pressed on stunning purple and black splattered vinyl, this is a must have release and is limited to just 1,000 copies”.
Bdrmm – Bedroom (Sonic Cathedral)
“Sometimes an album comes along that grabs you and doesn’t let you go, like a boa constrictor, only wrapping you more tightly in its grip, slowly increasing its intensity, until your head explodes. Bedroom is that album, a full-on submergence in a swirling pool of gothic shoegaze, abundant with suffocating jams and life-saving attacks of adrenaline. But amongst the violent storm, once you succumb to its slow motion destruction, you too will find peace beyond the desolation”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/bdrmm/bedroom
Bonus Release: Live at the Nave
Release Date: 10th November
“Other than a socially distanced gig in a Hull car park in September, a live stream to help save the venues in their hometown from closure and their memorable stripped-down street set for Rough Trade Transmissions back in July, bdrmm haven't played a live show since January. For anyone who has fallen in love with their brilliant debut album, Bedroom, during the long, lean months of 2020, this exclusive five-track EP is the closest you're going to get to one for now. Recorded live to tape at The Nave studio in Leeds back in August, it finds the band in ferocious form, running through four tracks from the album, before closing with a searing, soaring version of their 2019 single Shame. It's a brilliant reminder of what a potent live force bdrmm can be”.
Porridge Radio - Every Bad (Secretly Canadian)
“Porridge Radio’s intensity feeds on feelings turned sour that rise and fall through Dana Margolin’s mouth in a range of escalated, climactic moments. Like a gluttonous heart who must purge and expel its emotions in order to gorge again. Margolin’s sharpened nerves are used as a weapon against her personal demons. Somewhere between the abrasion of its searing riffs and melodic incantations, Every Bad is a soul-cleaning album that drenches you in the multifaceted nature of a lyric that evolves when hurled over and over again”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/porridge-radio/every-bad
Bonus Release: Every Bad - BBC Session
Release Date: 10th November
“In March 2020, Porridge Radio headed into the BBC studios to capture 4 songs from their Every Bad album, in their live, vital form. This EP captures the beautiful, wild and powerful energy of their performances that everyone has been so sadly missing in 2020. Featuring Sweet, Long, Pop Song and Circling, it’s a fantastic document of a band at a big turning point in their lives, right as the wildly praised album Every Bad was about to come out. The year has not been short on accolades for Porridge Radio - a mercury prize shortlisted album, multiple albums of the year nods and a plethora of critical acclaim”.
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - Sideways to New Italy (Sub Pop)
“Wait up, is that disco I hear? A brighter, twangier outing than the debut, fuelled by bolder experimentation, all the while retaining that sure-fire sound we have come to define this talented band by. Oh, and those extended guitar-driven instrumentals we know you are all drooling for? This has it all and then some.
Immerse yourself in this sun soaked triumph built with the sweetest grooves going. They've done it again”.
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/rolling-blackouts-coastal-fever/sideways-to-new-italy
Bonus Release: Sideways to New Italy – Demos
Release Date: 20th November
“Limited four song 12" featuring demos from the stunning second album Sideways to New Italy. The demos are perfectly formed but a little rawer. The jangling guitars are all present and correct and utterly joyous but it's the vocals that give these cuts the edge with an almost Nikki Sudden / Dan Treacy influence”.