The Vinyl Factory's 20 Best Albums of 2017 So Far

Venezuelan producer Arca typically makes compelling, lyrical music without saying a word, twisting digital dissonance and gorgeously rendered synth tones into songs you could practically hang on the walls of the Guggenheim. But on his self-titled third album, words become the focus. While an abrasive, intricately programmed instrumental like \"Castration\" says a fair bit on its own, \"Anoche\" and \"Piel\" reach a spellbinding new level for Arca, as he sings Spanish-language poetry about shedding identities and the messiness of love over truly haunting textures.

日本語は英語の後に続きます。 Voted #1 Urban Album of 2017 by MOJO "Is Binker Golding the new Sonny Rollins? The new Coltrane? Or both? Like those R&B-rooted sax colossi, Golding and powerhouse drummer Moses Boyd shake ass first, stroke beards second" - MOJO "...A rollicking trip through a landscape rich in the sounds of now — funk, grime, hip hop — and those of a multidimensional future" - EVENING STANDARD When Binker Golding and Moses Boyd’s debut album Dem Ones was released in Summer of 2015 it kickstarted a sensational year for the young saxophone and drums duo, who won a string of awards including 2015 MOBO Awards: Best Jazz Act, Jazz FM Awards 2016: UK Jazz Act of the Year and Breakthrough Act of the Year and the 2106 Parliamentary Jazz Awards: Jazz Newcomer of the Year. Their new record Journey to the Mountain of Forever is a story album on two discs: the first features the duo on their own while for the second they are joined by saxophonist Evan Parker, trumpeter Byron Wallen, harpist Tori Handsley tabla player Sarathy Korwar and drummer Yussef Dayes. The sessions took place on 21-22 July 2016, and were recorded completely live from Mark Ronson’s Zelig studio direct to a 1960’s Studer C37 1/4” tape machine at Gearbox’s studio - no edits, drop-ins or mixing down. So, travel with us from the “realm of the now” to “the realm of the infinite” meeting along the way Shamans, the great Besbunu, the Ultra Blacks & various other tribes, monsters & characters whilst immersing yourself in their strange rituals, potions, music & a world which has no end. But, beware of the Jahvmonishi plant! ----- 英国ジャズ・シーン新世代の旗手としての立場をすっかり確立させた、サックス奏者ビンカー・ゴールディングとドラマーのモーゼス・ボイド。 2015年のデビュー・アルバムの『デム・ワンズ』が全くのふたりだけによる録音だったのに対し、セカンド・アルバムである今作は彼ら以外のさまざまなゲスト・ミュージシャンを交えた、より大掛かりな演奏を繰り広げている点が特徴だ。参加ミュージシャンはユナイテッド・ヴァイブレーションズのメンバーで、カマール・ウィリアムスとユセフ・カマールを結成して『ブラック・ フォーカス』(2016年)を出し、テンダーロニアスのルビー・ラシュトンなどでも演奏してきたドラマーのユセフ・デイズ。2020年にはトム・ミッシュとのコラボ・アルバム『ワット・ カインダ・ミュージック』が話題を呼んだ。そして、インド系の血筋のドラマーおよびパーカッション奏者として知られるサラティー・コールワールがタブラ演奏で参加している。 レコーディングは2016年7月21日、22日にロンドンのゼリグ・スタジオで行なわれた。ここは『デム・ワンズ』を録音した場所でもあり、エンジニアのリカルド・デミアンなどスタッフはそのときと同じ面々が引き継いでいる。『ジャーニー・トゥ・ザ・マウンテン・オブ・フォー エヴァー』というアルバム・タイトルは、神話や神々、モンスターなどが存在するファンタジーの世界から来ている。物語は『ザ・レルム・オブ・ナウ』と『ザ・レルムズ・オブ・ジ・インフィニット』というふたつのパートから成り、その中には祈祷師の叫びがあり、ベスブヌという神の声があり、大暗黒の谷や火の森があり、創世記の輪廻転生などがある。『ザ・レルム・ オブ・ナウ』のパートはビンカーとモーゼスのふたりのみの演奏で、第2部の『ザ・レルムズ・ オブ・ジ・インフィニット』に入ってゲスト・ミュージシャンが参加する構成となっている。トータルで80分を超える壮大で深遠な音楽絵巻で、トリ・ハンズリーのハープやサラティー・コールワールのタブラが、古代の神話を呼び覚ますような霊的な雰囲気づくりに貢献している。

Planet Mu are very excited to announce Jlin's long awaited second album “Black Origami”. A percussion-led tour de force, it's a creation that seals her reputation as a unique producer with an exceptional ability to make riveting rhythmic music. “Black Origami” is driven by a deep creative thirst which she describes as “this driving feeling that I wanted to do something different, something that challenged me to my core. Black Origami for me, comes from letting go creatively, creating with no boundaries. The simple definition of origami is the art of folding and constructing paper into a beautiful, yet complex design. Composing music for me is like origami, only I'm replacing paper with sound. I chose to title the album "Black Origami" because like "Dark Energy" I still create from the beauty of darkness and blackness. The willingness to go into the hardest places within myself to create for me means that I can touch the Infinity.”  Spirituality and movement are both at the core of “Black Origami”, inspired largely by her ongoing collaborations with Indian dancer/movement artist Avril Stormy Unger whom she met and collaborated with at her debut performance for the Unsound festival – ”There is a fine line between me entertaining a person and my spirituality. Avril, who collaborates with me by means of dance, feels the exact same way. Movement played a great role in Black Origami. The track "Carbon 7" is very inspired by the way Avril moves and dances. Our rhythms are so in sync at times it kind of scares us. When there is something I can't quite figure out when it comes to my production, it’s like she senses it. Her response to me is always "You'll figure it out". Once I figure it out it's like time and space no longer exist.”  Similar time shifting/folding/disrupting effects can be heard throughout the record – especially on “Holy Child” an unlikely collaboration with minimalist legend William Basinski. She also collaborates again with Holly Herndon on “1%”, while Halcyon Veil producer Fawkes' voice is on “Calcination“ and Cape Town rapper Dope Saint Jude provides vocals for “Never Created, Never Destroyed“. Jlin will be touring extensively this year and is currently lining up appearances including Sonar festival. She also has plans to collaborate with acclaimed UK choreographer Wayne McGregor who played her music recently on Radio 4's Desert Island Discs and described her music as “quite rare and so exciting".

While folktonica innovator Juana Molina has always explored unease, even her longtime fans may be surprised by the all-consuming darkness of *Halo*. Gone are the gorgeous acoustic melodies and gently humming rhythms, replaced by abstract swirls of skittering beats and electronic drones that rumble with dread. Her trademark vocal experiments remain, but they’ve grown ominous. She pitch-shifts herself into an unearthly choir on “Sin Dones,” and layers ghostly harmonies over the rattling groove of “In the Lassa.” Despite its forbidding surface, *Halo* also flickers with moments of fleeting beauty, and the slippery hooks are captivating in their strangeness. Lock into its eerie pulse, and it’s another bewitching trip.

Even in the increasingly crowded field of electronic music, Kelly Lee Owens’ debut album arrives as a wonderful surprise. An album that bridges the gaps between cavernous techno, spectral pop, and krautrock’s mechanical pulse, 'Kelly Lee Owens' brims with exploratory wonder, establishing a personal aesthetic that is as beguiling as it is thrillingly familiar.

In the two years since *To Pimp a Butterfly*, we’ve hung on Kendrick Lamar\'s every word—whether he’s destroying rivals on a cameo, performing the #blacklivesmatter anthem *on top of a police car* at the BET Awards, or hanging out with Obama. So when *DAMN.* opens with a seemingly innocuous line—\"So I was taking a walk the other day…”—we\'re all ears. The gunshot that abruptly ends the track is a signal: *DAMN.* is a grab-you-by-the-throat declaration that’s as blunt, complex, and unflinching as the name suggests. If *Butterfly* was jazz-inflected, soul-funk vibrance, *DAMN.* is visceral, spare, and straight to the point, whether he’s boasting about \"royalty inside my DNA” on the trunk-rattling \"DNA.\" or lamenting an anonymous, violent death on the soul-infused “FEAR.” No topic is too big to tackle, and the songs are as bold as their all-caps names: “PRIDE.” “LOYALTY.” “LOVE.” \"LUST.” “GOD.” When he repeats the opening line to close the album, that simple walk has become a profound journey—further proof that no one commands the conversation like Kendrick Lamar.

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The album that finally reveals a superstar. Sampha Sisay spent his nascent career becoming music’s collaborator à la mode—his CV includes impeccable work with the likes of Solange, Drake, and Jessie Ware—and *Process* fully justifies his considered approach to unveiling a debut full-length. It’s a stunning album that sees the Londoner inject raw, gorgeous emotion into each of his mini-epics. His electronic R&B sounds dialed in from another dimension on transformative opener “Plastic 100°C,” and “Incomplete Kisses” is an anthem for the broken-hearted that retains a smoothness almost exclusive to this very special talent. “(No One Knows Me) Like the Piano,” meanwhile, makes a solid case for being 2017’s most beautiful song.

Visible Cloaks’ Reassemblage is a collection of delicately rendered passages of silence and sound that invokes – and invites - consciousness. The foundation of the duo's second album could be described as translingual or polyglottal, working within an eastern / western feedback loop of influence, Fourth World ambiguity, and the universality of human emotion. For More Info: shop.igetrvng.com/collections/all/products/rvngnl37

The Wire - ‘Jazz Album of the year’ Bandcamp - The Best Albums of 2017 (All Genres - #18) Bandcamp - ’The Best Jazz Albums of 2017’ Bandcamp - ‘Editors Favourite Albums of 2017’ (Marcus J Moore) The Vinyl Factory - ‘Top 50 albums of 2017 (all genres) #15’ Stereogum - ‘The Best Jazz Albums of 2017’ (#2) The Bird Is The Worm - ‘Album Of The Year’ Contemporary Jazz Club - ‘Best Jazz Albums Of 2017’ Treblezine - ‘Best Jazz Albums Of 2017’ “..Gilles Peterson will be all over this..” - The Quietus “…let Ahmed take you on a beautiful journey of forward-thinking jazz compositions.” - Twistedsoul “its potent mix of post-bop lyricism and modern fusion soundscaping makes connections with both head and heart.” - Dave Sumner, Bandcamp “Even if you’re not familiar or terribly interested in jazz, Ahmed’s music deserves your attention, and she’ll most likely make you second guess your thoughts on jazz.” - Headphone Nation Bahraini-British performer, Yazz Ahmed, is transforming what jazz means in 2017. This trumpet and flugelhorn-playing artist has worked with Radiohead and These New Puritans, experiments with electronic effects, and combines sounds from her shared heritage to author a new narrative for the genre. Part of the new wave of artists credited with stirring up the sound, including Kamasi Washington, Yussef Kamaal, Sons of Kemet and The Comet is Coming, Yazz Ahmed is thrilled by the possibilities of making something new. “I feel like I’m a part of modernising jazz and connecting it with audiences today,” Yazz says. “It’s exciting.” Her new album ‘La Saboteuse’ is a deep exploration of both her British and Bahraini roots. Ably assisted by musicians including Lewis Wright on vibraphone, MOBO-winning new jazz kingpin Shabaka Hutchings on bass clarinet and Naadia Sherriff on Fender Rhodes keyboard, it’s composed of undulating rhythms, Middle Eastern melody and Yazz’s sonorous trumpet lines. The record sounds like the passage of a desert caravan, bathed in moonlight. The theme of ‘La Saboteuse’ is the sense of self-doubt that Yazz feels when she is creating, personified in a female saboteur, an anti-muse that spurs her into action. “Giving ‘her’ a name has really helped me to identify those negative voices we all get,” she says. “I know what it is and I know how to combat it.” ‘La Saboteuse’ will be released in four chapters incrementally, unravelling the story, before the full version is available. Each chapter has its own cover, with beautiful illustrations by Bristol artist Sophie Bass. “I feel really touched, nobody’s created art from my music before, it’s really special,” Yazz says. Yazz spent her early childhood in Bahrain, her paternal homeland, before moving to London with her English mother at the age of nine. There, she became fascinated by her grandfather’s trumpet playing, and vowed to learn the instrument herself. “My grandfather, my mum’s dad, was a trumpet player, and I was quite taken by him, inspired. I wanted to learn the trumpet at school.” Jazz became her chosen form of expression, because “I loved the spirit of the music, the freedom. There’s a lot of joy, mystery. I connected with it”. Yazz’s sound is unique. Her take on jazz weaves in Arabic melodies to evocative, cinematic effect. “I love the sounds of Arabic music. The traditional folk singing is so heartfelt, elemental and passionate. I absorbed it as a child, but only in the past few years has it come to the surface in my playing and writing. I want to embrace my culture and my British jazz heritage, the music my grandfather played to me.” Jazz has traditionally been a male-dominated sphere, though Yazz is challenging that notion. To start with she found it a hindrance, but has been empowered by a new wave of women musicians. “There are more female jazz musicians and attitudes are changing,” she says. “People see that women can play just as well as the men. But there are still areas that haven’t caught up with the rest of society. It’s getting better, but we can do more.” Future-facing and fascinating, Yazz Ahmed is part of a glimmering new constellation in the jazz firmament. And her next project is destined to take her further into the stars. “I’m planning to write a piece inspired by the ever-changing structures of the universe,” she concludes.