My Top 10 LPs of 2008:
Andrew Liles & Daniel Menche -The Progeny of Flies
best album ever made about the life-cycle of small winged insects… Liles is also heavily involved in the ongoing C93 reissue program – his remix of Nature Unveiled is well worth hearing…
Current 93 – Birth Canal Blues
the End is nigh, apparently – but hopefully not before the release of the next album…
Death In June – ‘Black Angel – Live!’
DIJ’s Greatest Hits, unplugged… ‘Symbols of the Sun’, my favourite song of the year, was on this recording, probably my favourite album of the year…
Death In June – The Rule of Thirds
Douglas P confronts mortality on this elegiac album of pared-down acoustic songs…
Down In June – Covers… Death In June
sort of like the Cardigans do Joy Division – love me love me, say that you love me, you wolf-grey Adonis, you…
Various Artists – Auteur Labels: Les Disques du Crepuscule 1980-1984
this Belgian label ruled amongst black polo-neck-wearing youth in the early 1980s – here’s all the best stuff on a single disc…
Various Artists – John Barleycorn Reborn: Dark Britannica
era-defining collection of wyrd folk from around the British Isles…
Various Artists – We Rise Above
superb introduction to new Russian netlabel Lomeanor, specialising in neofolk, neoclassical and dark ambient…
Various Artists – Where Tattered Clouds Are Stranding
terrific double-disc compilation of neofolk and dark ambient from around Europe…
Various Artists – Wilde Jaeger
subtitled Alpine Myths and Masked Rites, this was a bizarre collection of neofolk, black metal and dark ambient, with superb sleeve/booklet photography… and you thought Austria was all Klimt and Wiener schnitzel…
Most played album which wasn’t a new release: Various Artists – Ultra-Lounge vol 1: Mondo Exotica
Martin Denny, Les Baxter et al transported me back to the space-age optimism of the 1950s…
Best TV show: Fringe
The X-Files upgraded and redefined for the 00s – and one of the leads is a statuesque Melburnian…
Best film: Australia
Big, bold, brash and populist – but enough about me… this might be the most important Australian film of the 00s – and very interesting to witness the ongoing spat over its merits between academics in the Australian press…
Best book: Drew Daniels – 20 Jazz Funk Greats
One half of Matmos writes a brilliant book about TG’s most poptastic LP – all music journalism should be this good…
Best live performance: Patti Smith & Philip Glass, Melbourne, Oct 2008
Smith, Glass and Lenny Kaye rocked the house in a tribute to Allen Ginsberg…
Favourite Australian public moment: PM Kevin Rudd says “Sorry”
Best tram ticket: the one with the Medieval Imagination design
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