Death of the dance album part 2

At the start of last year, I wrote that 2007 could be the year that the dance album becomes obselete. As I type this, looking at a shelf full of great releases from last year, I concede how wrong I was. 2007 was not the year that the dance album died. 2008 is. By contrast, the adjacent shelf, set aside for this year's albums, is a lonely place, with just a few releases. Even the most optimistic person cannot deny that the first eight months of this year has been woefully short on good albums. Of course, this doesn't mean that there is no good music out there: pretty much every week of 08 has been marked by the release of a number of excellent EPs, while the internet is awash with great DJ mixes. I don't buy the argument that any given 12-month period represents a nadir for music production. However, what I can accept is that the album format has not yielded an impressive catalogue of music this year. However, it's not to late for a glut of greatness and I remain optimistic that the big bags of unopened mail in my office will yield new treasures and hitherto unexplored possibilities. Do you feel the same -  or do you think 2008 has been notable for great albums? If so, which ones do you recommend?

Comments

[Steve]

I guess it depends on what you mean by "great." If you mean incredibly enjoyable through and through, Shed's "Shedding the Past," Bruno Pronsato's "Why Can't We Be Like Us," Prosumer & Murat's "Serenity" and Andy Stott's forthcoming collection all fulfill that for me (to say nothing of "Osborne" or the new Theo Parrish or Kerri Chandler albums). I suspect the same will be true of Dave Aju's debut.

But if you mean something breath-taking, genre-defying (or redefining), landmark "great," I suppose you're correct. But standards that high are bound to lead to disappointment. Just like every year doesn't yield a "Exile on Main St." or "Electric Warrior" etc. for rock music, not every year is bound to offer a new, I don't know, "Alcachofa," "M-Series" or "Vocalcity."

What I would posit, however, is that as society has gained greater control over how it consumes music and in what doses (mp3 players), the overall number of great albums being released has dropped significantly. Sales have dropped, too. The album isn't as important so people aren't saving their best material for them.

And now I'm just ranting.

[Sam]

I'll second Steve re. the Andy Stott collection. I love his stuff - although because it's a compilation of older releases I'm not sure that it qualifies as a 2008 album exactly. I still haven't got round to listening to the Bruno Pronsato yet. Really must do that.

To be honest, almost every year I'm disappointed by the lack of solid dance albums released. Luckily, they do slip through the cracks from time to time e.g. the aforementioned "Alcachofa".

[Daragh]

Interesting point about the effect of mp3 players. I made a concious decision to start buying more albums and mix CDs earlier this year but I've not had a huge number of purchases since then.

Something I really enjoyed this year was the Radioactiveman album - again it was hardly boundary pushing but nonetheless every tune from start to finish was rock solid, well produced and thoroughly enjoyable. And he was excellent live at Sonar as well. I'll second both the Pronsato and Prosumer albums too, for similar reasons.

This year has mostly been about enjoying things live for me - I've been out a lot more than in the last few years and have been to two festivals (Sonar and Antipop) so far, with a third to come in the shape of Electric Picnic. Good for the soul, bad for the bank balance!

[Sotek]

Yup, there's been a shortage of good albums this year (so far). Anyway... here's a few I really liked:

Flying Lotus - Los Ageles // Warp
Mental Overdrive - You are Being Manipulated // Smalltown Supersound
Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours // Modular
Studio - Yearbook 2 // Information
Newworldaquarium - The Dead Bears // NWAQ
Move D & Benjamin Brunn - Songs From The Beehive // Smallville
2562 - Aerial // Tectonic

[chrisdisco]

well i'd question the basic premise of this - that there was ever a stage when there were lots of good dance/techno albums. it is a format this kind of music has always struggled with in my opinion, and the hit rate on successful, complete albums is always pretty low. so for me 2008 is basically the same as other years. and as always, there are a couple of really special, inspirational albums amongst the almost theres, mediocre, and the just plain crap.

for me, the two real standouts of 2008 have been:

shed's 'shedding the past': i think this is a really bold distinctive and complete album. he tries to push his sound forward and completely succeeds. a special effort.

move d + benjamin brunn 'songs from the beehive': such an amazing organic feel to the whole thing. and the tracks just get better and better as the album progresses. again, it coheres so well - d + brunn manage to create an impressive, distinct soundscape. love it.

the other albums i've really like this year are:
prosumer + murat tepeli - 'serenity'
rod modell - 'insense and black light'
newworldaquarium - 'the dead bears'

[ed]

hmm, could be a bunch of stuff. i released an album this year (see the myspace etc endplug) but it had been due to come out late 2007, got plenty of good press, then the distributor (Amato) went bust, taking all the hype and a thousand odd copies with it. the album finally crept almost unnoticed onto shelves 4 months later. since distro's going bust seems to be a theme of recent times, one wonders how many other albums have been sent down the pan by such industry happenings...

also in a time of declining sales, labels and artists are turning to other ways of seeing if they can generate interest. i know of one artist who did a series of high profile bootlegs, gave them away for free and managed to make a name for himself amongst the hipster blog community. a few years ago, that option wouldn't have been open, so i suppose he'd have been more likely to do an album to raise his profile.... :\

blah blah raises questions about the necessity / viability / relevance of the album format in this day & age blah blah....

[ed]

er, when i say 'high profile bootlegs' i mean that they garnered themselves a high profile by being picked up by the trendy blogs. not that they were in some way intrinsically high profile!

[b0b]

Incredible the number of people who have heard shed's "shedding the past" as it has not been released yet, there's no samples online yet, and it's not available on P2P. Magic happens!

[barry]

b0b, you can listen to the shed album here, maybe that's what everyone else is doing?!

www.tailored-communication.com/sheddingthepast/

for me, it's the best LP so far this year. not an immediate record, but the best ones never are.

the new world aquarium is a keeper, and 2562. electronic-ish, jape and m83.

two artists i would like to hear flex their muscles over 70 minutes: tobias and sven weisemann.

but overall, it comes back to the same old question about dance music albums: is it (or was it) a genre that suits the long-player format? looking at the walls around me, the answer remains the same: mostly no.

(good to have you back richard!)

[Brophy]

Bob - the reason a lot of people who post here know the Shed album already is because a lot of them are reviewers / DJs etc, plus they are too honourable to put it up on a P2P(!)

Barry - would tend to agree with you about the album format and electronic music. Most of my favourite 'albums' are actually mixes, I-F, Mills etc. Having said that, the Andy Stott collection which I have been listening to since I got back kind of bucks that trend. I'd also agree that the Prosumer album works well in that format, as does the two Burial albums and the latest Claro album (which I know a lot of people didn't dig for various reasons). What I think doesn't work in this format is a collection of 10 club tracks....

[barry]

andy's release doesn't really buck the trend though, does it? it's a compilation of singles! (it's top too...)

[Brophy]

andy's release doesn't really buck the trend though, does it? it's a compilation of singles! (it's top too...)- sorry, what i meant was that it bucks the trend in it being a body of electronic music that sounds good listened to in one go at home. The fact that it has been available before makes it even more interesting to hear in a new context....