ALC #3: ISLES

[Applerill]

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Isles by Bicep

Sorry for the delay, Everyone. As I told many people in the Discord, I still don’t know what words to use to describe my favorite album of the year so far. Chances are several of you’ve heard it, because you know an album is mainstream when the Apple Music page has special VR animations. But there’s something so simultaneously soft and ethereal and pulsating and boppy about this album that fills me with joy and wonder. I hope you really like it.

[Repo]

Great pick! I was actually thinking of picking this as my AOTW and now I don't have to!

I love when EDM is done with warmth and emotion. And the production is perfectly vibrant and punchy. So much EDM sound two-dimensional (to me) and yet this just pops out and feels alive and cozy.

Will listen again tonight and perhaps comment more, but his is one of my faves for this year for sure.

Perhaps I'll post my top ten for January 2021 tomorrow night as well on this thread. Would love to see what others are thinking about this great (musical) year so far.

[kokkinos]

A rather safe/conventional choice, but that doesn't make it any less great, it's one of the first 2021 albums I listened to and pushed me to further discover new releases. Electronic music is not exactly my cup of tea, but this manages to avoid my main issue with this genre which is repetitiveness - especially when it is excessive and pointless - , here you will find enough progression to keep your interest throughout. A particularly ear-catching aspect of the album was the vocal samples, they added so much character to the overall sound and gave it an identity. Also, Atlas is a fantastic track, head and shoulders above the rest of the album.
By the way, has anyone listened to their debut? Based on a couple of reviews I checked, it appears equally promising.

[PossiblyMichigan]

Music for the k-hole.

The singles I've heard for this record are solid, and Bicep's previous record had some tour de force moments a la Glue. Thoughts to come

[LedZep]

This was my third listen, and it's just getting better and better. Lovely little deep house jam, it continues climbing up my chart. The features are fire. A few of the songs can be a bit monotone at certain parts, but overall I don't think there was a song I explicitly didn't like. All around good choice for ALC. As for their debut, I've heard it back in 2017 when it was released but haven't revisited in some time. I liked it about as much iirc.
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Finally updated the overall chart

2020s
90s

[Mercury]

I really like this album a lot. Atlas is indeed an excellent song and single and hearing it first before the release of the album is what got me hyped about the full length. I like when vocal snippets are integrated into electronic music and they do it quite well all over this album.

There are a few songs that are the more atmospheric and slower variety that lose me a bit, but whenever it does lose me it usually throws me a bone with an absolute banger shortly thereafter. For example the way "Lido" kinda loses me briefly and then X comes and gets me right back.

Briefly this was my fave album of 2021, and is stil top 10. and I plan on listening a couple times this week again to kinda check my temperature on my feelings towards it.

Great pick, charli.
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-Ryan

ONLY 4% of people can understand this chart! Come try!

My Fave Metal - you won't believe #5!!!

[KitchenSink]

I had fun with this. It's interesting that this album seems to take equal amounts of influence from the the likes of Burial and the Warp records crowd as it does from more mainstream largely mid-late 2000s dance music sources; it's core is still this kind of straightforward but fairly ethereal post-dubstep sound, but I hear hints of more rave-ready progressive trance and Pendulum-style quasi-dnb floating around the edges, kinda lands it at an interesting middle point of sad-in-bedroom listening or dehydrated-at-rave listening (and in either case, to concur with PossiblyMichigan, it's k-hole time). I like like occasional use of LFO type synths and the almost OPN-esque implementation of synthesized vocal samples (kinda wish there was more of both), and while the choice of percussion tones is largely functional at best, every so often (see X) you get these really creative clanging metallic arrays that just mesh so well with the wobbling synths, almost reminds me of U-Ziq's 90s work to some extent, unfortunately moments like this don't happen as often as I'd like, and more often than not I feel like a lot of the choices around rhythm and percussion get staid and predictable pretty fast, and some of the synth melodies feel pretty derivative and uninspired. I'd say there's definitely a few real high points, and overall I feel lightly positive about it, but same for a few more special moments it's a bit forgettable. I feel like there's some serious wasted potential here because when this album is like ON on it hits this rare sweet of complex-made-simple arrangements that I find both danceable as hell and genuinely interesting to listen to and/or just absorb; basically I feel like this album doesn't need to play it so safe as often as it does because these two have illustrated they are more than capable of delving into less conventional dance music territory still remaining beautifully accessible. It's frustrating, because I do like it, but I feel like all the pieces are there for me to like it so much more if they were just arranged differently; it's even more frustrating because some sections are arranged just like that, but such moments are aggravatingly fleeting. I bet the remix album would slap. Idk maybe I'm not just k'd out enough to experience this like I'm supposed to (but hey still makes my chart at this point regardless, albeit not as high as it probably does in a directly adjacent alternate reality)
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A Variety of Artists

[RoundTheBend]

Sometimes albums in this direction feel a little limited in timbre/dynamics and fart sounds (last one kidding), but I feel like this blasted the doors open. Nice listen for sure. Warm, solid energy, atmosphere stuffs. Balanced but not boring.

[musicoed]

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