Over the next four days I’m going to do what every other bore worth his salt does at this time of year, and that’s writing a big list showing off all the records I bought this year. I list them in reverse order of preference. Or I just put them all in a hat and drew lots. See if you can guess which. I might as well have drawn lots, because coming up with twenty decent albums that weren’t reissues of some sort was like shitting a building.

To be honest, it hasn’t been a vintage year for music. This year I’ve preferred to buy music from the past, because I worked out that there must be so much better music from the period zero to 2005 than music from today. Which is obviously true because even the top album on this list probably wouldn’t have made it into the top five of last year’s list. If I didn’t separate reissues and whatnot into their own separate list, they would have taken up most of the top ten.

Why has this year been so rubbish? Mostly because the media has been collectively masturbating to the boring drones of The Arctic Monkeys to the exclusion of almost everything else. These dullards are the future of music? I certainly hope not, because they could hardly sound less contemporary. It’s just like when The Strokes became huge five years ago for re-hashing the seventies. What is around the corner? There must be something… please?

Right. What you’re getting today is my list of top albums from #20–#11. The series will be rounded off with a top ten, and in between you’ll get a couple of other posts of other stuff. Enjoy!

20. FM3 & Dou Wei — Hou Guan Yin

A pleasant little album. There’s not much else to say about it. If you liked the music on the Buddha Machine, give it a shot. Even if you didn’t much like the Buddha Machine, you could well like this — although I’ve not spotted anybody else giving it much attention.

What I said about it at the time

19. Pulp — The Peel Sessions

You see, I couldn’t even resist including this one. Although it isn’t technically a re-release, there is not a single piece of music on this record that isn’t at least five years old. It compiles all of Pulp’s Peel Sessions — including the 1983 session which Jarvis hoped would never be released — and some other live bits and bobs. It’s certainly an interesting listen, even if they hit the odd bum note. A must for any Pulp fan.

What I said about it at the time

18. Plaid & Bob Jaroc — Greedy Baby

This audio-visual collaboration was hit by many delays, and it seems as though it was a right pain to make. Sounds like it will be a disaster, but it actually isn’t bad. Which is quite surprising really, considering how boring Plaid’s recent music has tended to be. Both the music and the visuals vary in quality from track to track, but overall this is not too shabby — as long as you’re not expecting too much.

What I said about it at the time

17. Malcom Kipe — Lit

I wasn’t too keen on this album at first. It seemed okay, but nothing particularly special. But I really grew fond of it. I found that it was a great album to listen to in the summer. Very nice stuff indeed. A bit like the Plaid album, as long as you’re not expecting anything revolutionary, you might well enjoy this.

What I said about it at the time

16. Clark — Body Riddle

The damp squib of the year. After all the hype, and the amazing Throttle Furniture EP that came out at the start of the year, this album was a bit of a disappointment. Perhaps this was because expectations were so high, but I just found this album a bit underwhelming. In fact, I thought the freebie EP that came with it, Throttle Clarence (a collection of music from the Clarence Park era), was much better! If you lump in Throttle Furniture and Throttle Clarence, Body Riddle would easily enter the top ten; maybe even the top five. Body Riddle on its own, though, is a disappointment.

What I said about Body Riddle and Throttle Clarence at the time
What I said about Throttle Furniture at the time

15. London Sinfonietta — Warp Works & Twentieth Century Masters

This is yet another album where none of the music came from 2006. Oh well. This is a compilation of highlights from the celebrated Warp Works concerts that explore the links between contemporary electronica a la James and Jenkinson and ‘avant garde’ composers of the twentieth century such as Steve Reich and John Cage. There is plenty of interesting music here. I know I’ll certainly be investigating Karlheinz Stockhausen more in future. Perhaps the most intriguing parts of the album are the bits where classic Aphex Twin and Squarepusher tracks are re-worked for acoustic and performed by London Sinfonietta. The results are sometimes patchy, occasionally rewarding — but certainly interesting.

What I said about it at the time

14. Thom Yorke — The Eraser

It’s certainly been a good year for frontmen to be breaking away from their successful bands to pursue a solo career. Yorke is the first of three in my list, but his was the most disappointing album. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting too much. To be honest, it is quite an average album. But there are some great moments. My particular favourite is ‘Black Swan’, which like grey funk; cold but groovy. There is too much of the old fuzzy pampered rockstar politics as well. He ensured that carbon emissions were kept to a minimum, and he did this by chopping down more trees than was strictly necessary.

13. Boards of Canada — Trans Canada Highway

A lot of people have gone off Boards of Canada now. I guess the novelty has worn thin. I thought The Campfire Headphase was pretty poor, but the Trans Canada Highway EP is a little gem in my opinion. It gives you what you’re looking for as a Boards of Canada fan, without resorting to re-hashes or minor variations of their most-loved albums. What a track ‘Skyliner’ is!

What I said about it at the time

12. Hot Chip — The Warning

This album is proof that all a half-decent band needs to get exposure is a major label deal. Everybody is banging on and on about Hot Chip at the moment — and for good reason. This is quite a good, enjoyable album. But I prefer their previous album, Coming on Strong. I shouldn’t complain though. It’s great to see such good music getting so big. So full marks in that respect.

11. DAT Politics — Wow Twist

This was my introduction to DAT Politics. I didn’t like this album much at first. Its pace was unrelenting, and there was very little variation in style (with the exception of ‘Fake Friend’). But after a while it really grew on me. If you like brash and colourful electronics, you can’t really afford to miss this.

Right, that’s the first ten sorted out. Tomorrow I will bring news of three sloppy turds.

(NB. You might notice that in the current batch of album reviews I’m writing at the moment, the albums are getting progressively older. Yup, I’m just writing a bunch of reviews that I didn’t have time / energy to write at the time.)

At last, a CD of these concerts has been released. Warp Works is a collaboration between Warp Records and the London Sinfonietta designed to explore the links between the electronic music of the likes of Aphex Twin and Squarepusher and contemporary classical music, “in the belief that the different kinds of music shed light on each other.”

A lot is made of this supposed association between the two genres. A lot of the associations drawn are pretty tenuous. The claim that Richard D. James is the modern equivalent of Mozart seems particularly fanciful. But this CD successfully highlights the similarities between IDM and avant-garde twentieth century music without going too far up the bum.

The CD begins with a pair of prepared piano pieces by Aphex Twin. Although they are untitled on this CD, spotters will notice that these are performances of ‘Jynweythek’ and ‘Hy A Scullyas Lyf A Dhagrow’ from DrukQs. For these tracks, Richard D. James took inspiration from John Cage’s invention of the prepared piano. A piano is specially set up with chains, screws and whatever else the musician can think of. Each note makes an exotic sound. Playing the prepared piano is like having an exotic percussion ensemble.

Also included are specially arranged versions of classic tracks by Aphex Twin and Squarepusher. Results are mixed. The tracks chosen for reinterpretation were surely not chosen for their accessibility or ease of translation. Indeed, the translation is positively uneasy. Maybe that was the point. Still, it is fascinating to hear ‘Afx237 V.7′ being played by an orchestra.

Undoubtedly the most successful reinterpretation is that of ‘Polygon Window’. It sounds like the London Sinfonietta had real fun playing this rip-roarer, and the audience clearly loved it as well.

Not all of these performances made it to the CD though. Notably absent is ‘Pete Standing Alone’, originally by Boards of Canada. Surely a recording must exist, because I’m sure I heard this on Radio 3 when they broadcast one of the concerts. Also missing is ‘Port Rhombus’, originally by Squarepusher.

With the reconfigurations of classic Warp tracks now making up just four of the tracks, the rest of the double CD is left for performances of pieces by avant-garde composers. This is where the listener is rewarded the most.

I had never heard of Conlon Nancarrow before, but I am now interested to learn more about his music. Nancarrow, just like today’s masters of electronic music, was interested in music that humans couldn’t possibly play. He used player pianos to achieve this. But ‘Study no. 7′ is presented here in an version for human players. It’s a complex but fun listen. My brother said that it sounded like cartoon music. I can see his point. It’s whimsical in that way. I would love to hear a piano-only version of this.

More familiar names appear on this CD aswell. Steve Reich’s ‘Violin Phase’ is a captivating listen. I would have liked more information on how this was performed. Only one player is listed, so I’m guessing the rest was done with electronics or tapes. Whatever, it’s a real treat to the ears.

Five of John Cage’s Sonatas & Interludes for Prepared Piano also make an appearance. Sonatas & Interludes is a favourite of mine, and it’s interesting to hear just how different these performances sound to the cheapo Naxos CD that I own. I guess it is all part of John Cage’s interest aleatoric music, that two performances of the same piece could sound so different. I could end up seeking out more versions of Sonatas & Interludes for this reason.

Meanwhile, Karlheinz Stockhausen is a famous composer that I’ve never had the inclination to investigate. At first, I found the piece included here, ‘Spiral’m a bore. But I have found repeated listens rewarding. This will spur me on to investigate further.

All-in-all, Warp Works & Twentieth Century Masters is a very interesting album. It avoided being merely a gimmicky attempt to shoehorn electronic and classical music together. Instead, composers who did genuinely share ideas and approaches with today’s popular electronic music makers were deliberately chosen. The comparison between Mozart and Aphex is rubbish. But the similarities between Nancarrow and Squarepusher are fascinating.

There might be noticeable absences in the tracklisting, but you really cannot complain about what you are given here. This is a top selection of brilliantly performed avant-garde music. It will almost certainly encourage me to dip my toe in this arena further than just Reich and Cage.

• Warp Works & Twentieth Century Masters website
• 2004 review of Warp Works & Twentieth Century Masters
• London Sinfonietta
• Warp Records