Update + Arbitrary List! · 1:44am Jan 11th, 2017
Okay, first of all, the important business. After some delays due to the holidays, I'm more or less done with Chapter 2 of The Mystery of the Cipactli Glyph, pending feedback from my prereaders. I expect to have it up by the end of the week, if not sooner.
Completely unrelated topic below.
For whatever reason, I decided to indulge in some nostalgia from my college years. Back in the early 2000s, I was really into music, and like many young music aficionados, I would dutifully compile Top Ten lists at the end of every calendar year, despite the fact that nobody ever had any reason to pay attention to them. I fell away from the practice as I grew older, not because I stopped listening to new music, but because eventually I realized that it didn't really matter if I had listened to a great album within the first twelve months of its release. Good music tends to age well.
That said, I decided to see how many releases from 2016 had actually stuck a chord with me over the previous year, and I was pleasantly surprised to recall five of them with little difficulty. And here they are (with standout tracks, where possible).
5. Various Artists, Nyarlathotep
I'm a big fan of dark ambient music, and the Cryo Chamber label is home to some of the best artists in the niche. This three-disc album is basically a massive collaboration between 20 or so artists, which each disc being a single mixed track. The whole album can be found on the label's YouTube channel, but because I've got four more spots to get to, I'll just post the first track here.
4. Fujiya & Miyagi, EP1
The first of a three-EP set from one of my favorite bands, who are not, as their name suggests, a Japanese duo, but are actually four white guys from the UK.
3. School of Seven Bells, SVIIB
I've already posted extensively about this band, which was a major influence on my Petriculture stories. After the passing of their guitarist, this is more than likely their final album.
2. Underworld, Barbara, Barbara, We Face a Shining Future
This is easily the album I listened to the most in 2016. As a side note, around the 2-minute mark of this video, you get to experience that weird thing that happens when your association of particular words to MLP is so strong that it changes your interpretation of other forms of pop culture.
1. Mogwai, Atomic
Before I heard this album, I had only known of Mogwai from their reputation. Afterwords, I realized what all the fuss was about. The opening track alone is staggeringly beautiful, and at no point does it stop being beautiful.
oh dude, Underworld :D