2007 Retrospective Pt. 1

BIG YEAR END LIST TIME

Alright, first I'm gonna start with labels.

10. Diynamic
09. Ed Banger
08. Hospital
07. Dial
06. liebe*detail
05. BPitch Control
04. Perlon
03. hello?repeat
02. Kompakt
01. Cadenza

Cadenza is on top for releasing consistently amazing releases and really ushering in the great Romanian producers like Petre Inspirescu and Rhadoo. Kompakt had a great year, as did hello?repeat, and Perlon released some standout singles (Waiting 4 A Way?). BPitch Control had Modeselektor albums and mix CDs, with a new Camping comp as well. liebe*detail mastered the art of split singles, and fellow Hamburg label Dial released albums from both Pantha and Efdemin. Hospital released loads of good singles this year as well as maintaining the best podcast out there, and Ed Banger was certainly all the rage, and has the back catalog to justify their popularity. Diynamic released great house records this year and should be one to watch out for in later years. M_nus was not as strong this year as it has been, with some boring releases that sound similar and some downright awful ones. The False stuff kind of makes up for it though. Labels that were also good are Get Physical, Hyperdub, Rekids, Traum and !K7. It'd be hard to choose only 20 labels, let alone 10, but there they are.

Now Mix CDs/Compilations

10. Kompakt - Total 8
09. Modeselektor - Boogy Bytes Vol. 3
08. Steve Bug - Fabric 37
07. Steve Bug - Fuse Presents...
06. Ellen Allien - Fabric 35
05. Shackleton and Appleblim - Soundboy Punishments
04. Booka Shade - DJ Kicks!
03. Ewan Pearson - Fabric 35
02. Marcus Intalex - Fabriclive 35
01. Dixon - Body Language Vol. 4

Finally, albums.

10. Matthew Dear - Asa Breed [Ghostly International]
Dear produces pop music under his real name with some great results. Certainly a record all can enjoy, it contains more conventional songs from Dear, but still with a dark, techno leaning.

09. Pantha du Prince - This Bliss [Dial]
True to the title, this is one blissed out album. Ambient but still techno, it's the warmest record released all year.

08. Melchior Productions Ltd. - No Disco Future [Perlon]
Thomas Melchior's album takes house music and strips it down to the bare bones. Minimal, yet funky as hell, every track on here is golden.

07. Gui Boratto - Chromophobia [Kompakt]
Gui Boratto's rise to fame was quick after "Arquipélago" was released on K2, and his LP released early this year showed that this quick rise to fame didn't shake him. Some of the best cologne-flavored house/techno on here, perfect for the dance floor and headphones.

06. Modeselektor - Happy Birthday! [BPitch Control]
The ape-loving Berliners returned with an LP drawing influences from all over the board: dubstep, euro-crunk, garage, techno, early rave music, hip-hop, IDM and neo-trance (Holden, Apparat, etc.). Every track is madness, with bass annihilating your ear drums. No one is like them, and they bring a craziness and sense of fun to Berlin that is sometimes so desperately needed.

05. Justice - † [Ed Banger/Vice]
The current backlash against them is may be due to the exposure they've gotten and a lot of people liking them, but since when did that make something bad? Definitely the best up-tempo party album of the year, and one the most dedicated hipsters really can't deny. 2007 was definitely Justice's year, and they deserve it.

04. Burial - Untrue [Hyperdub]
Listen to this in the rain in south London and you'll begin to see where this is coming from. Not party dubstep by a long shot, but represents the side of dubstep seen on labels such as Skull Disco (so many comparisons can be made to the "Blood on My Hands" original and Villalobos remix that I won't even start). Meticulously put together, it's an album that automatically puts you into a certain mindset.

03. Ricardo Villalobos - Fabric 36 [Fabric]
A huge departure from what Ricardo has been producing for the past two or three years, Fabric 36 shows what he is like as a DJ. While he is known for long, meandering, experimental releases, he rarely plays such pieces out, opting for house sets with a bent towards the more experimental. This shows him as a DJ perfectly, playing the productions that he saves for his sets rather than releasing, and creating an album that you can easily dance to.

02. Radiohead - In Rainbows
It took them awhile, and anyone who listened to the bootlegs from the last tour knew most of these songs. That didn't make the album any less of a pleasant surprise, as only after this came out do the songs make sense together. Radiohead here show a human side to themselves that they've kept hidden since Kid A, and, while Kid A and Amnesiac are masterpieces, it's good to have some humanity back in their music. In fact, In Rainbows is strong enough to, in time, unseat OK Computer or Kid A as their best work.

01. False - 2007 [M_nus]
The idea of one person appearing twice on a chart like this is pretty ridiculous, but this was certainly Matthew Dear's year for all of his aliases [except the criminally underused Jabberjaw]. But while Asa Breed focused on writing more conventional electro-pop songs, here Dear did what he does best: making some of the best minimalist techno out there.

Albums that deserve mention:
Digitalism - Idealism
Efdemin - Efdemin
Apparat - Walls
Supermayer - Save the World
The Field - From Here We Go Sublime

Later I hope to do a big chart of the top 20 or so singles of the year, with audio files and everything. I might just never do it though.