Essentials
Britsound's TOP 10 BRITISH ALBUMS OF 2008
2008 has produced some excellent British albums, and we are only interested in recommending only the very best of them - so that you save both time and money when you choose what to buy and listen to. So we are proud to present our Top 10 Best Albums of 2008. Our list of runner-ups is at the bottom of this page as well. So, sit back and enjoy our list of the VERY best of 2008...
10. Air Traffic – Fractured Life (EMI)
Having been described by the NME as being like "Supergrass covering Little Richard," Air Traffic's debut album demonstrates a band that uses a palette of rich colors and emotions to great effect, and unashamedly so. At times sounding as vivacious as The Cure (think "Why Can't I Be You") and as contemplative as Coldplay (think "Fix You"), Air Traffic have set the bar high for a band that only formed a couple of years ago in Bournemouth. There are many highlights, but when vocalist Chris Wall soars on the chorus of "No More Running Away," it's simply breathtaking and reveals their natural talent for creating piano-led music that deserves to be taken seriously. It's noteworthy when a band can produce a debut album of such breadth and scope. Watch Air Traffic carefully in 2009.
9. Frightened Rabbit – Midnight Organ Fight (Fat Cat)
Hailing from Selkirk, Scotland, Frightened Rabbit's second album, Midnight Organ Fight, is a dark horse that yields its secrets languorously over repeated listens. The songs here clearly reflect the dark hues of the Celtic environment in which they were written, with the recognizable Scottish accent and abrasive lyrics of Scott Hutchinson revealing an undeniable Gaelic texture to the music. Similarly, the lyrics are also dark, as when Hutchinson sings that he thinks he'll "save suicide for another year" in "Floating in the Forth." Yet what makes this album truly special is the beauty that is rendered from the darkness. What emerges is an incandescent emotional purity that heartens even whilst it is steeped in melancholy. Building from acoustical foundations, these songs often swell to anthemic crescendos: from the pounding "The Modern Leper" to "Head Rolls Off," the future is anything but frightening for Frightened Rabbit.
8. Coldplay – Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends (EMI)
A lot has been written of the influence of Brian Eno in the writing and recording of this album. Many have said that Coldplay were not brave enough and did not leave their comfort zone in their writing sessions, even despite Eno’s involvement. Yet this album has a residual impact that stays with the listener long after the album has finished. Experimentation did pay off, as evidenced in the delicious guitar loop of "Strawberry Swing" and the way in which the instrumental "Life in Technicolor" bookends the album. But this album most resonates when Coldplay are at their simplest. Chris Martin's vocal and piano on the final title track of the album is a reminder that there is only one Coldplay, and what they do they continue to do very well indeed.
7. Marillion – Essence (Happiness Is the Road) (Racket)
Marillion's 15th album—and a double one at that—Happiness Is the Road, is split into two discs, the first Essence and the second The Hard Shoulder. It is Essence that deserves attention here. Listening to an album cannot very often deliver an experience that is more than the sum of its parts. Much like the powerful overall totality of OK Computer, Marillion's Essence is a richly layered album that offers deep satisfaction through the cumulative fruition of its songs. It is an outright disgrace that this band is not recognized and celebrated for continuing to write music that is clearly passionate and challenges both the band who wrote it and the fans who listen to it. You can tell this album is wrought from the absolute desire to write music that has true, durable value. The fact is that they pull it off, and pull it off in a way that is almost heroic in its sincerity. Steve Hogarth sings that you cannot "trap the spark," but in many respects that is exactly what they have done.
6. Rob Dickinson – Fresh Wine for the Horses (Fontana International)
Formerly lead singer with Catherine Wheel, Rob Dickinson's first solo effort has all the hallmarks of an album crafted with care over a long period of time. Originally released in the UK in 2005, this delayed release in America benefits from an extra CD of acoustic songs as well as the addition of the thoughtfully penned "The End of the World" (a moving tribute to the film Withnail & I). It's not just Dickinson's ability to marry melodic guitar hooks with lyrical profundity, but the way in which the album's arc goes from the uplifting "My Name Is Love" to the mournful conclusion of "Mutineer" makes it a journey worth taking. As Dickinson sings, "there ain't no room on board for the insincere," and with this album being borne from such strong convictions, he surely means it.
5. British Sea Power – Do You Like Rock Music? (Rough Trade)
Presumably the question is rhetorical, as British Sea Power bounce back to form with their strident third album that is at once immediate and also demonstrates a new-found maturity in songwriting. Eschewing the obligatory recording studio in London, British Sea Power opted instead for a series of "adventures" in Canada and Eastern Europe. The result is a record trimmed of excess in favor of raw and earnest melodic rock. Cases in point are the heavy guitar-driven choruses of "Waving Flags" and "Canvey Island" juxtaposed with the spacious guitar-flecked verses in between. Unafraid to take risks, this album delights as much as it surprises. For example, the instrumental song "The Great Skua" is an epic hidden gem that somehow evokes a lingering dark, sorrowful energy. The focus is back, and it clearly shows in this great album.
4. The Subways – All or Nothing (WEA)
From the opening pounding riffs of ‘Girls & Boys”, The Subways second album All Or Nothing is gloriously self-assured, almost fuelled by a certainty that their debut album didn’t have. Moving from themes of self-reflection on their debut album Young For Eternity to exploring themes of society and lead singer Billy Lunn’s place within it, this second album is delivered with dynamite intent, and with a sense of urgency. It seems that they have somehow managed to enlarge their sound, maybe it was the guidance of producer Butch Vig, or maybe it was the maturation of their songwriting in the three years since their last album, but The Subways have made a blistering album that proves that they are serious contenders. Highlights are many; the joyous hearty strumming and chorus of “Move To Newlyn”, and the final song “Lostboy” with its cello and banjo infused atmospherics as Billy Lunn sings “It was so odd, the way we came about, the way we locked our horns, we fell apart and glued our hearts together.” What is most exciting is the feeling that after this album it feels like this band is possible of pulling off almost anything.
3. Kate Rusby – Awkward Annie (Pure)
With a voice that simply shimmers over the softly plucked strings of an acoustic guitar, British folk-singer Kate Rusby's Awkward Annie is a sumptuous album so powerfully understated that it conquers through the sheer force of its likeability. The harmonies are achingly beautiful and the production is impeccable. Perfection exists in the harmonic glow of "High on a Hill" and "Planets," which prove that Rusby is a huge talent who deserves to become very well known. There is even a spirited and cheeky cover of The Kink's The Village Green Preservation Society. In many respects this album is timeless.
2. Elbow – The Seldom Seen Kid (Geffen)
Always outsiders and considered by many of being worthy of greater acclaim and attention, Elbow have been plowing their own way in the British music industry for years. The fact that their fourth album won the Mercury Music Prize, coming from a band that has been making music for over 18 years, demonstrates the creative longevity of this band. The "seldom seen kid" is Bryan Glancy, a friend and musician who died suddenly in 2006, and the impact of this event resonates through the album. We don't need to have known Glancy personally, as Guy Garvey articulates the bedrock emotions and insights of his grief so well. If rock music is at its most important when it chronicles the highs and lows of the human condition, then this album is incredibly significant. Grief, loss, and acceptance are all here. "Never very good at goodbyes - so gentle shoulder charge - love you mate" sings Garvey in "Friend of Ours," and at that moment his loss is ours too.
1. Goldfrapp – Seventh Tree (Mute)
It is difficult to express the many reasons why this album is the album of the year, because there are simply too many of them. Many fans who embraced the cool electronica of Goldfrapp's previous album, Supernature, were surprised when Goldfrapp returned in their fourth album to the acoustical roots of their debut Felt Mountain—except this new album is truly unique, the culmination of a journey that has taken place over four albums. Seventh Tree is full of acoustically based songs that are at times stridently Beatlesesque and at others wondrously fragile; a wonderful blend of emotional outpouring and endearing mischievous whimsy. It’s the kind of album you always hoped would be made some day, an album unafraid of beauty and melody, delicate yet bravely resilient in its emotions. Listening to this album is rather like opening a music box full of clowns and diamonded jesters, with the joyous colors of the harlequin infusing the music and lyrics with a fragrance of childish imagination. It’s an album of pastels and pastorals, of “bright blue Saturdays” and pavements that “smell after rain.” Yet it’s also an album of sorrow. Behind the jester’s mask is a true disconnectedness, and even pain. Alison Goldfrapp sings in “Monster Love” how “everything comes around bringing us back again, here is where we start, and where we end.” In “A & E” the swirling anthemic finish rises from the picture of a woman in a backless dress on a hospital ward, having taken pills so “the pain started to slip away.” You cannot fail to be moved by listening to this album. Such an album is a huge risk, but Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory have created a staggering achievement and it is deservedly the 2008 Britsound Album of the Year.
Compiled by RQ
(c) 2008 Britsound & Britsound.com
