Best Albums of 2023, with comments from Elena Tonra of 4AD band Daughter.
Best Albums of 2023, with comments from Elena Tonra of 4AD band Daughter.
With 20 + Music Recommendations
As this year comes to a close, I’d like to present my new music highlights of 2023 in the form of album recommendations.
This year, only two of my top twenty albums were released on a major label. The rest were issued courtesy of independent labels. I think that says a lot about the music industry right now. The further withdrawal of artist development, the risk adverseness, the doubling down on mainstream dross by the three majors. Equally and more encouragingly it shows that the independent sector, while not necessarily thriving, is very much alive and supporting the most interesting artists out there. As ever. A vital element in the music ecosystem.
Many independent labels featuring here are well established, perhaps better able to weather economic storms with back catalogue reissues, as well as frontline new music. Some albums here have master rights owned outright by the artist, a growing theme, especially for more mature profile acts post major deals, alongside newer DIY artists. One artist here, Penelope Trappes, released her record on her own label. Another, Bdrmm, had their record released on Mogwai’s label, Rock Action. I hope to see more support for the independent and DIY sector in 2024. Remember if you love a record, it sounds better on vinyl, if you can afford it…
Anyway, let us focus on the music itself.
This year my favourite record is Stereo Mind Game by three-piece Daughter, which I believe to be a much-overlooked gem.
Some people have called it a grower, it grabbed me straight away. Stereo Mind Game’s twelve tracks were produced by the band’s own Igor Haefeli, and mixed by Ben Baptie. Josephine Stephenson added orchestration. Coming seven years after their previous, this is Daughter’s third studio album. Released on the legendary 4AD, a label now in its fifth decade, and part of long standing independent powerhouse Beggars Group.
Be On Your Way, was the first track I heard prior to the album’s release.
Daughter’s vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, Elena Tonra, describes Be On Your Way as “the first song where it felt like, ‘oh, we’re making an album now’, I think up until that point, we were working on a lot of songs, but this was the first one where I was like, ‘this feels like the direction, like the door into the record”.
Party, the second song I heard from the new work, and the album’s third, is where the album title is taken from, and the lyric; ‘she’s a rattlesnake, some stereo mind game’. Elena comments that Party is “reflecting on the moment I decided to stop drinking alcohol, and written years after that decision. It celebrates moving forward from it. It’s quite upbeat and I think that’s a really good contrast to the lyrics.”
The sound of Dandelion is wonderful. In theme it is made of ghosts, memories, and old photographs. Elena adds some perspective; “I was talking about the time passing, and your surroundings changing, and you just feel like you are just there with this phone or whatever it is, just frozen in the time while everything around you is moving”.
‘I only came here to tell the truth. Have one small glass of red, then, shoot home’ Elena repeats the vocal as Dandelion builds to a crescendo with some remanence of Johnny Marr’s work in The Smiths
Neptune has a fragile beauty. “The vocal in this song is the first take. It has a rawness to it, which is what the song needed… It’s mainly a conversation with myself, but about love as well”.
Future Lover. “It’s about longing for someone but there’s a playfulness to it – a little tiny bit of humour. The song is actually really old, and the last one we finished”. Featuring a sense of longing with the vocal line ‘sweet nothings from the ghost in the room.’
Swim Back ‘I didn’t realise how much water is involved until after writing the record. It’s interesting, I can’t swim”.
The process behind the lyrics for Junkmail was more experimental, “The method of writing was different, … I wanted to take a word from each bit of junk mail or advert onto a piece of paper and let my mind link up everything”.
“We’re all interested in having electronic and acoustic elements together” says Elena. “How big can the live sound feel, and how textual the electronics can feel. We tried to push both of those to a new level for us”.
Daughter’s Stereo Mind Game is my favourite album of 2023.
It’s followed by Slowdive’s return with Everything Is Alive as a top three favourite.
Harp’s Albion, released this week is also in my top three. Harp is Tim Smith, the former Midlake artist, collaborating with Kathi Zung, with this new project. Kind of sounding like a strange mystical folk Seventeen Seconds,…perhaps. Listen for yourself to the list below. Nabihah Iqbal and Blur make up the top five. The Blur album really surprised me in positive ways, with tracks such as Barbaric and The Narcissist, their best album in a long time.
I’ve noticed, in some sense, gravitating toward more gentle and soothing sounds this year – perhaps a symptom of, and remedy for, the turbulent and challenging times we are living through.
Here’s to next year, and another year full of new music… show your love to artists by supporting their work.
Here is the full run down of my albums of 2023:
Favourite Albums from 2023:
1. Daughter - Stereo Mind Game - 4ad
2. Slowdive - Everything Is Alive - Dead Oceans
3. Harp - Albion - Bella Union under license to PIAS
4. Blur - The Ballad of Darren – Blur under license to Parlophone/Warner
5. Nabihah Iqbal - Dreamer - Ninja Tune
6. Beach House - Become EP - Bella Union
7. Devendra Banhart – Flying Wig – Mexican Summer
8. Ghost Woman – Hindsight 50/50 – Full Time Hobby
9. Bdrmm – I Don’t Know – Rock Action
10. Sleaford Mods - U.K. Grim - Sleaford Mods under license to Rough Trade records ltd
11. The Church – The Hypnogogue – Communicating Vessels
12. Anohni & the Johnson’s - My Back Was a Bridge for you to Cross - Rebis music under license to Rough Trade records ltd
13. Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs - Land of Sleeper - Rocket Recordings
14. Queens of the Stone Age - In Times New Roman - QotSA under license to Matador
15. Beach Fossils – Bunny – Bayonet Records
16. Aphex Twin – Blackbox Life Recorder EP – Warp
17. Lost Girls – Selvutsletter – Smalltown Supersound
18. Mitski – The Land is Inhospitable and So Are We – Dead Oceans
19. Penelope Trappes – Heavenly Spheres – Nite Hive
20. Protomartyr – Formal Growth In The Desert - Domino
Worth Mentioning: