Best albums and tunes of '08

what's your fave or most listened tunes and albums this year?

here's couple of end of the year charts to start with:

Gilles Peterson's listings: http://blog.myspace.com/gillespeterson

Benji's selection: www.bbc.co.uk/1xtra/benjib/

Mashi's faves: www.beyondjazz.net/viewtopic.php?t=16042

do you think it was a juicy year releaswise?

Joined: 01 Apr 2008 Posts: 31

Ah, now that's easy. In no particular order:

Sonar Kollektiv Orchester's Guaranteed Niceness, http://www.commercial-break.biz/guaranteed_niceness.html -- lovely arranged acoustic nu jazz.

Jazz Re:freshed's compilation, Jazz Re:freshed Vol 1, http://www.commercial-break.biz/jazzrefreshed_vol1.html -- a decent mix of neo soul and broken beats.

2000 Black's A Next Set A Rockers, http://www.commercial-break.biz/a_next_set_a_rockers.html -- features numerous soulful broken beat faves.

Oh, and creeping in, I'd say Reel People's Seven Ways To Wonder, http://www.commercial-break.biz/seven_ways_to_wonder.html -- not as good as their last LP, but it still includes some great tracks, like 'Outta Love', with its top-notch string arrangements.

In my humble opinion, this quartet of recordings did the business...

2000Black - A next set a rockers: I'm still addicted to this album. never gets boring..

for me, the album of the year is clearly zen badizm

(period)

then comes the erykah badu album (her yet best!), followed by kaidi tatham, flying lotus, hercules & love affair (certainly one of my most played albums), 2000black, jose james (was this really 2008?) and lastly the great collaboration between carl craig & moritz von oswald. most of these were in gilles charts, sorry for not being able to delivery anything new

what else?

grace jones did a solid comeback, the album has a couple of nice tracks - not as outstanding as her work from the 70s or 80s. jamie lidell did an okay follow-up to the great debut. i was really disappointed by the morgan geist album (the vocals!) and hope for the upcoming metro area. nothing overly-exciting from sonar kollektiv this year either (well, neujazz was a nice compilation - but only a compilation), but i hear there's a new dimlite in the pipeline! i almost forgot there was a new plantlife album, sounded just like the first, no?

dubstep? i didn't understand the hype about the burial album, though the one before wasn't bad. i liked many tracks from the benga album, but it felt more like a collection of tracks - not an album. i liked the headhunter album though and the latest skreamizm is the best since volume 2!

last.fm tells me i also listened a lot to m83 (like if air was good) and to minilogue.

rediscovered albums? young disciples and tek 9!

idleberg, what u think of martyn or 2562?

Saul, Solemn: yeah 2000black lp is a winner

i like 2562 a lot, good to see he's having more success than under his dogdaze monicker. he also bridges the gap between bruk and dubstep skillfully. don't know the album though, only single tracks. is there also more downtempo dubstep from him?

Joined: 24 Aug 2008 Posts: 70 Location: São Paulo Age: 28

i wrote a little something on this.. with the conclusion to link back here

looking forward to listen to the kaidi album, still havn't received it. so my vote goes to ZEN BADIZM as album of the year!

idleberg: yeah 2562 made his break through with this moniker. as for more chilled dubstep, try Scuba out: www.xlr8r.com/podcast/2008/11/dubstep-2008-scuba

Tetsuo: agreed totally but as you wrote in your blog i also like to discover new or slept over releases/hints from these end of the year lists. Freedom School Records with IG's and Kaidi's lps stole the show this year for sure!

Joined: 09 Apr 2003 Posts: 3643 Location: Gent (BE) Age: 28

Next to regulars Kaidi Tatham and 2000Black — obvious but brilliant nevertheless — I also thoroughly enjoyed these:

Soulphiction - Do You Overstand
Jamie Lidell - Jim
Fanatix - This Thing Of Ours
Unforscene - Fingers And Thumbs
Talc - Licensed Premises Lifestyle
Lars Barthkuhn - The New Continent
Smith & Mudd - Blue River
Liquid Spirits - Music
Roland Appel - Talk To Your Angel

lars bartkuhn also wins my title for the worst cover-artwork of the year

Joined: 06 Apr 2006 Posts: 21 Location: LA

best of 2008 would have to go to dego/kaidi = 2000black, a next set a rockers, the next generation,
solid future soul broken cuts

Here's a link to my show & Top 10 of '08.

http://beyondjazz.net/viewtopic.php?t=16033

1. Kaidi Tatham - In Search of Hope [Freedom School]
2. Incognito - Tales from the Beach [Heads Up]
3. Quasimode - Sounds of Peace [Geneon]
4. Nicola Conte - Rituals [Schema]
5. Part Time Heroes - Meanwhile [Wah Wah 45s]
6. 2000 Black - A Next Set A Rockers [Third Ear]
7. Lars Bartkuhn - The New Continent [Sonar Kollektiv]
8. Jackson Conti - Sujinho [Kindred Spirits]
9. J.A.M - Just A Maestro [Victor]
10. Esperanza Spalding - Esperanza [Heads Up]

There was a lot of great stuff that came out this year. Reel People's album was exceptional, but technically came out in 07, but it would definitely be up there for me.

Lot's of big disappointments this year for me too, unfortunately. Atjazz, Jazzanova, Ed Motta, and Jazztronik all were let downs imo.

Lots of great house came out this year too, exciting stuff from Prime Numbers & Deep Explorer, and lots of good soulful stuff too.

Rather hard breaking stuff down into a top 10 though, I even take mine with a grain of salt.

a-groove, sorta agreed with your let downs.

there were not so happy changes this year on the radio front: Gilles Peterson's show got dissed into a midweek late night slot. Patrick Forge Cosmic Jam is over. Deviation is kool but Domu's shows were better imho.

thankfully there are tons of good podcasts around

Joined: 10 Jan 2006 Posts: 20

I actually liked the Jazzanova record. Granted, in the context of some of the other albums mentioned, and in the context of some of their own records, it may not be as great. But I loved it - probably one of my favorites for the year.

I somewhat agree on Atjazz though. The production is perfect, and I really liked it at first. I still think it's a good record. But it left me wanting more melody. That said, the worst of Atjazz is still better than a lot of other music out there. It definitely beats my biggest disappointment of the year... *cough* Kanye *cough...

Regarding the Atjazz...

A lot of the productions were really sparse and didn't quite achieve the deep sound he's capable of. Album exclusive highlights were definitely "Fantasy" and "With You", which are incredible tracks, and "I Forgot You" was quite good as well, but some of them just left me going "...huh?" Like "Underlined" (Marc Rapson did this way better) and "Parallels" (which Sygaire killed on the remix treatment). At least he put out some good remixes this year.

and Re: Jazzanova...

To be honest I did like about 1/2 of the tracks, but the other half really didn't mesh with me. Namely, the tracks with Thief, Ben Westbeech, and Phonte's oddly placed rap song. So again, not a "bad" album by any means, but when a group sets the benchmark that high, only can only really expect greatness.

Oh yeah, also I finally gave some dubstep stuff a serious listen.

http://thebpm.podomatic.com/entry/2008-12-10T11_46_34-08_00

interesting "soulful" (?) dubstep show there.

I really like this guy Ramadanman www.myspace.com/ramadanman

Martyn is pretty good too...