2017: The Growers & Showers

With an abundance of new sounds, new music and new visual experiences to consume, we've compiled a list of the top 17ish things to have come out of 2017. Playlist of for those who wish to reminisce on 2017 for ever more here.

1. Valeras - Colour Me EP

Valeras kicked off 2017 with music worth sticking on repeat in March, and we've still not taken it off loop. Having done a pretty extensive amount of gigs this year, the rebrand has definitely set them in good stead and you won't be hearing anything less about them from us any time soon.

Interview with Valeras here and here.

2. Gorillaz - Saturn Barz

As if a 26 track long album wasn’t enough, the great return of Gorillaz included this glorious video of our favourite cartoons in 360. The seven year break clearly did some good for this lot.

3. The Moonlandingz - Interplanetary Class Classics

The most exciting album of the year by far. Johnny Rocket has never transcended us so far out.

Interview with The Moonlandingz here.

4. The Amazons - The Amazons

With summer dawning on us rapidly, The Amazons threw this out into the flames with an equally smashing launch party.

Interview with The Amazons here and here.

5. Weirds - Swarmculture

A rip-roaring journey through mass destruction, every second of this album makes us crave another physical decimation in one of their pits and we can only pray that the near year brings new tunes.

Interview with Weirds here.

6. Alex Cameron - Candy May

Cameron is quite the character, he is simultaneously everything there is to love and loath about the middle aged cis white man. Yet somehow this makes him uncomfortably charming. The iconic dancing, the vest, the greasy hair - this video truly has it all.

7. HMLTD - To The Door / Music

Although Kinkaku-Ji nearly tipped the other singles into the spotlight, nothing can quite beat these two down and dirty bopping groovers. If any of the bands on this list are going to erupt in 2018, I promise you it’s going to be this collection of high fetish-high glam-heavy-Artpoppers.

8. Sundara Karma - Explore

At the peak of summer came the single from their long awaited, new and improved debut album Youth Is Only Ever Fun In Retrospect. This track packed enough groove and funk to carry us through till the new year and showed that they are capable of drastic progression.

9. Ariel Pink - Another Weekend

An official sadboy™. Where the concept came from for this melancholy video we're completely unsure but if it makes sense to Ariel Pink it makes sense to us.

10. Quotsa - Villains ALBUM

The introduction speaks for the whole album. Massive.

11. King Krule - Dum Surfer

We've got a soft spot for anything Archy Marshal but he's definitely peaked here. The contrasts, the compliments Dum Surfer took us everywhere and further.

12. Palm Honey - Starving Hysterical Naked

Although they've released a couple of new bits this year, they've really upped their game with their absolutely faultless live sets. It's a rise and fall through a deep wave of consciousness that you not only witness but become deeply absorbed into. Definitely not ones to sleep on in 2018.

Interview with Palm Honey here.

13. Courtney Barnet And Kurt Vile - Over Everything

The combined mystic forces of Barnet and Vile culminated into the most delightfully tranquil video. Their voices seemingly separated at birth are perfectly emphasised by the mis-match of audio and visual which gives a very slight unnerving separation from the consumption.

14. The Wytches - Double World

The ooky spooky foursome made this Halloween extra ooky kooky with this AA side, the epitome of everything Wytches with a delightful Sludge Version to accompany it.

Interview with The Wytches here.

15. King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - Flying Microtonal Banana

The band so far in the future they needed someone to make a new microtonal guitar especially for this album. Really no one else could ever compare to King Gizz, and their ability to create so much content and yet still be so varied is truly admirable. (Rest assured all 5 of their 2017 releases were strong contenders).

16. Trudy And The Romance - Junkyard Jazz EP

Something to drink Whisky to alone in the dark. Or equally just get drunk on the EP. Is the a place I can go? Right, here.

17. Yonaka - Bubblegum

From the glorious Heavy EP this video really encapsulates the Devine female energy that front woman Theresa so naturally exudes. It’s refreshing, it’s sexy but it’s certainly not pathetic and feeble. This is all about dominance and 2017 definitely needed some of that.

18. (we lied)

Flamingods - Hyperborea

For an accidental find at a small festival in Oxford, Flamingods have certainly resonated with us this year. Not sure what you'd be searching to stumble across this culmination of noises but it's surely something that's not meant be found, but rather find you. The full length track on this single incites some level of ego death, even if only for those 13 minutes that ascend time and space.