A God-awful Small Affair

For a few brief moments in 2012 the whole idea of an Azealia Banks/Angel Haze feud seemed exciting and worth watching. Then came the diss tracks, which seemed to just focus on each other's hairlines and who came first. Basically, it's been a long time since either of them put out an EP, mixtape or single that was remotely interesting, let alone good, and I'm now in the position where anything released by either of them is about as exciting as the prospect of an Ashanti album. Her stubbornness and steely grit has definitely made her an exciting prospect though, and while half of that attention will filter into the whole "leaking her own album" aura of petulance about her, some of it trickled into her music and the devastatingly personal cover of Cleaning Out My Closet - in which she details her sexual abuse at the age of seven - made listening to her an uncomfortable mixture of awe and awful. On Dirty Gold , unfortunately, the latter rings truer. The pr...

So another Christmas has just passed and with it another Rebecca Ferguson album cycle; but does her sophomore effort offer any more than Heaven did when it comes to sustaining us for the rest of the year? Well, no, but it comes a lot closer. There's always going to be a cosy element about Ferguson that prevents her from setting charts alight during the summer months, and that's fine: her voice is so distinctive that trying to grab a spring dance hit or an autumn hip hop feature would be bizarre. The problem is that last year's (and the year before that's) charts were dominated by someone with a very similar-sounding album to this. The Sand é . For now, Ferguson doesn't have the ubiquity to turn her into the UK's most defiant television-guest-with-shit-hair, so she wins that battle by default, but it's a risk to play it safe today and there were fears she'd blur into the background after this. What Ferguson has in her favour though is that voice,...

Where does one start with introducing this one? 2013's standout pop event was the sudden release of Beyonce's fifth studio album, hands down. Not that there was much competition: Lady GaGa was at a creative nadir, Katy Perry was borrowing Sara Bareilles songs and Britney might as well have thrown herself in a blender, it would've made a better noise (and impression on the charts) than Britney Jean. Aggravating three very strong online fan communities out of the way, and over a month after the release, it's probably time to tackle this review. Production-wise, there's a stellar lineup as usual. Pharrell, Ryan Tedder, The-Dream and Timbaland all make reappearances, whilst new talents to Beyoncé's roster include Sia, Boots, Justin Timberlake and Miguel. Her music has always come under scrutiny for having so many helping hands but with such a talented collection it's hard not to get excited; but at this stage in her career it's actually what's so u...

Whether or not this actually is their third studio album, it feels weird that an act as new and fresh as Death Grips are already at that third stage. Following their progress since The Money Store (and I'm sure that's far too late on for me to have an opinion, for some people) has been entertaining to say the least: whether acting like dicks or photographing them, the band are probably the most talked-about right now. They've always had the material to back it up, though: The Money Store is by far their strongest album, and NO LOVE DEEP WEB had plenty of stand-out moments that make it more fun to listen to than the debut. A year on from that, though, and the usual downward spiral of backlash, trend-followers finding other new flavours, and label complaints has left their second surprise release greeted a little lukewarmly. In a 2013 Autumn that was all about sudden releases (behave) - a month exactly before the Beyoncé spectacle - perhaps the biggest talking point ...

In any other year, a lot of these LPs would've slotted in quite nicely to the top ten. 2013 was such a strong year for albums, though, that it resulted in them just falling short. #20 - "Right Thoughts, Right Words, Right Action" - Franz Ferdinand It didn't exactly set the world on fire and that's a little upsetting. The Scottish band put out one of their finest albums to date last year and it was worth the wait. #19 - "Bankrupt!" - Phoenix Another band we'd been waiting since 2009 to hear from again were the Frenchmen Phoenix - time spent probably accumulating all of those seventy one tracks for the deluxe edition's second disc. You'd be forgiven for sticking to the first, though, since it was a bag of electronic goodness and fist-pumping anthems. #18 - "Torres" - Torres An album that sits perfectly on the fence between poignant balladry and ballsy grunge sounds, I'd heartily recommend this to a...

With the aim of trying to get 2014 underway (or rather, the last few albums of 2013 anyway), this'll only be split into two parts: the first thirty, and the top twenty! #50 - "Mosquito" - Yeah Yeah Yeahs OK, so, brace yourselves because this first list of ten has some positively appalling artworks on display. The first is the 4th YYYs LP, and although far from the best it made enough of a pleasant listen to creep onto this list right here. #49 - "Apocalypse" - Thundercat Not nearly as ugly is Stephen Bruner's face, which adorns the front of his Thundercat project's second effort. It's been a pretty big year for him - worming his way onto the GTA 5 soundtrack and continued great work with Flying Lotus - and whilst this wasn't quite as wonderful as his debut it's a pretty groovy album nonetheless. #48 - "Spreading Rumours" - Grouplove There is a sneaking suspicion that this band are secretly a bit terrible...