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It’s probably no surprise that as we reach the top four (or five if you like) we also Cover of First Two Pages of Frankenstein by The National get to the two albums The National released in 2023. The first, “First Two Pages of Frankenstein”, was trailed with a big reveal early on in the year, while the second, “Laugh Track”, was dropped all of a sudden in October. Once I got to know both albums, I swung between liking each one more for a while, hence putting them both at the same point in the list and not considering each separately.

For the purposes of this list, we can consider both albums as one homogeneous collection of songs, though some reviews did pick out that “Laugh Track” has more live drums and the songs on that latter album are looser and longer than their “… Frankenstein” counterparts. I think there are songs that are similar to one another on both albums, and that for those tracks, the song on the first album is a bit better than the one on “Laugh Track”. Some of the songs on “Laugh Track” are almost invisible on the first few listens, songs like “Dreaming”, “Hornets” and “Tour Manager”, though the latter of those three has become one of my favourite songs on both albums.

It would be remiss of me to claim that this is a placeholder for any number Cover of Strange Disciple by Nation of Language of (quite different sounding) song based albums that came out this year (Yves Tumor, Wilco to mention two) but it feels that way. This album came high up my list of listens because it’s a very good breakfast album, one to listen to while getting the Day started - though there are also some bangers on here too.

Nation of language are a three piece band from New York. I think one of them is famous for being in a band I’ve not heard of (or is that their producer, I must do some fact checking) and two of them are married, even going so far as to have had a gofundme or whatever for the band as a present at a wedding. (That doesn’t give off future “we are a duo now” vibes at all!)

Grails are one of those bands who always get played a lot at my house. Cover of Anches en Maat by Grails There’s something about their slow incremental instrumental pieces that my brain just loves to get lost in. Anches en Maat, their first album in six years or so, and the first with the entire band in the studio together since 2008, is their most Grails-y album in a long time.

There isn’t a great deal I can write about The Ancient Truth without sounding vague and anodyne. Cover of The Ancient Truth by Maara While I try to come think about different forms of music and go into some analysis of what makes one album more interesting than another, sometimes you end up just saying “this album is great because I like it and I always have a good time listening to it.”

As you get older nostalgia becomes an ever important part of listening to music. Cover of Fuse by Everything But The Girl It often feels like the business relies on convincing an aging population of fans to part with their money on new versions of old material. It’s nostalgia, the feeling of recapturing something you loved in your youth, that often makes this acceptable. Of course it’s also nice to get new music from your favourite bands, especially when it’s as good as “Fuse”.

Radical Romantics, the third album by Fever Ray was released in April. I bought a copy on red vinyl which is a beautiful sight to behold. Cover of Radical Romantics by Fever Ray I listened to a lot when it was released but eased up a bit until listening to it a couple more times while writing this list. It’s a great collection of songs, probably better than their second album “Plunge”. The cover art is just as scary though.

Agartha is the debut album by Japanese electronic artist Wata Igarashi. Cover of Agartha by Wata Igarashi I don’t really know much about him, but I do know that I enjoy releases on the German record label Kompakt and I have really enjoyed Japanese techno in recent years. Over lockdown I discovered Haruomi Hosono’s “Polyharmony” album and re-discovered the work of Shinichi Atobe, particularly their album “Love of Plastic”. Both of those albums could be future understated classics and while both are by Japanese artists working in electronic music, there the comparison ends.

Another year (nearly) over and so starting from tomorrow, I’m going to count down my top 10 albums of 2023. The rules are:

Well, it’s been a while since I wrote my last Civ VI leader post about Amanitore of Nubia and there’s been a whole host of new leaders and personas added to the game since then. Among these the number of Chinese leaders has increased from two to five. Therefore it’s probably a good time to start writing about one of them, and where better to start than the OG himself, Qin Shi Huang. The recent leader pass has created a new persona for him but today we shall focus on his original version, which is now referred to in-game as his “Mandate of Heaven” persona.

It strikes me that it is better to sit and think about what you need to do, rather than endless try out new tools and hoping you end up with a use for them. I’m not saying that innovation is bad, or that you shouldn’t stretch yourself into some new spot once in a while, but you will become more valuable to others if you can identify what it is you are supposed to be doing and then use your existing skills to get that job done. Don’t go looking at galleries of tools and techniques in service of finding something to do. Trust me, I know from experience that it is a great way to spend a hell of a lot of time not getting anywhere in particular.

So today my random album script picked out “Bright Lights” by Ellie Goulding, an album I wasn’t sure I’ve ever listened to. I looked in my music library and there it was! As a result this is not so much an album revisit as an album visit.

I’m a massive fan of hot chocolate. Recently a friend recommended M&S hot chocolate flakes. Thanks to a promotion it was about half the price of the Montezuma’s hot chocolate discs that we usually buy. The Montezuma’s ones are lush (that’s official hot chocolate tasting terminology) but in this economy anything that saves a bit of money has got to be good right?