End of 2020!

 Hello friends,

it has definitely been way too long since I made any meaningful posts but despite the silence I still wanna make my annual end of the year post. Even with all of the ruckus with the virus and everything I spent most of my year in travel. My work is now such that I travel all over Europe visiting port cities and doing my thing at shipyards (service of particular electrical systems on vessels of all kinds). I enjoy my job and I enjoy the travel, even the restrictions made the travel more enjoyable as there are less lines at the airports. But with good things also came the bad as I did eventually contract the virus. As luck would have it I got it somewhere during my last return trip of the year so I'm spending the holidays in isolation with relatively mild symptoms.

On a brighter side Spotify came to Croatia finally this year. It's a platform that I never paid much attention to as most of the music I listen is from files on my PC but a friend of mine gifted me a spot on his premium package and I've been enjoying it a lot and I listened to much more music this year than compared to previous two years combined almost (lowest playcounts of all time for me according to lastfm were past two years). Generally I stuck to what I knew but I did discover a couple of albums that I want to share and also a couple of Sun Ra albums as well. I just have to sit down and actually post them. With that in mind and now that I'm more accustomed to my work (ie it's less stressful now) I should be able to write more. But you know how it goes already - no promises. :)

2020 in music

As usual at the end of this post you will find all of the albums I've liked from this year. I didn't go too much in depth for this year, most of this stuff I heard by word of mouth or I already followed these bands from before. If I had to pick a definite favorite then I would pick the new Havukruunu album. For my taste it is maybe too happy but somehow all of it fits together so well. It's grand and it's majestic but I love it, sounds very sincere. It feels like they finally nailed the sound that they wanted to do all along. A couple of more favorites from the list would be the new Korgonthurus (very good traditional black metal with fantastic pained screaming vocals), Nimbifer (only a demo but very concise and promising, all of their stuff so far has been great), Slift (stoner is not a genre I often visit but this one felt super fresh and fun) and Sweven (ex Morbus Chron) made a very melancholic and beautiful album that sounds to me like the whole thing is one long song.

While most of my listening this year was dedicated to metal music I did hear a couple of albums from other genres. Most notably the Sun Ra Arkestra led by Marshall Allen has released their first album after more than two decades of silence. It is much more vocal focus than I would like and most of the songs are interpretations of old material but all of it is quite good. Standout tracks for me are obviously the new ones written by Marshall. I was worried it might be too normal but weirdness starts around the middle and it was a warm reminder that they don't fuck around when free improvisation is concerned. Aside from Ra I also really liked the Black Magick SS album, some folks are avoiding it out of political ideology and I have no problem with that but I like it (sans potential nazi ideology). I think it's a fantastic little album that is pushing the ideas and styles brought on their last two albums. The synths are super strong on it and the pink is more than justified in terms of tones. I didn't like it at all when I first heard it but it crept back on to me one song at a time.

Another notable event for me in music was that I managed to attend the Im Wald "private" premiere of the album in Switzerland. It definitely was an interesting experience even if it "just" was listening to black metal with strangers. This was my first time in Switzerland and I absolutely adore the country, I wanna go back there for some holidays again. The moment I saw the forests and mountains and the small town where he lives - all of his music I've been listening to years and years clicked instantaneously. The albums itself is... alright? Generally it's pretty good but I think it's bloated, a lot of fat could be trimmed and nothing would change. It was nice seeing that the guy behind Paysage d'Hiver genuinely enjoys the music he makes and is generally a very loveable and down to earth guy so in a way I can excuse the self indulged time length purely because of his personality. Attending that event was definitely an experience I will cherish for the rest of my life. I was pretty sad that the album got leaked beforehand as it hurt the guy pretty badly (from what I could tell from his posts) but also surprised it took a lot of time to leak. In the end it all turned out ok, a lot of people bought and loved the album.

With all that out of the way here are all the albums I've liked in alphabetical order:

Black & Death metal:

Abigor - Totschläger (A Saintslayer's Songbook)
Afterbirth - Four Dimensional Flesh
Akantha / Hajduk /Nimbifer / Sørgelig - Ruins of Humanity
Arkhtinn - Astrophobia (split w Starless Domain)
Ars Magna Umbrae - Apotheosis
Awenden - Golden Hour
Battle Dagorath - Abyss Horizons
Black Curse - Endless Wound
Bone Awl - An Obelisk Marks The Line
Cemetery Filth - Dominion
Dearth - To Crown All Befoulment
Faidra - Six Voices Inside
Fluisteraars - Bloem
Havukruunu - Uinuos Syömein Sota
Imperial Triumphant - Alphaville
Inquisition - Black Mass for a Mass Grave
Invincible Force - Decomposed Sacramentum
Khors - Where the Word Acquires Eternity
Korgonthurus - Kuolleestasyntynyt
Malicious - Deranged Hexes
Mystras - Castles Conquered And Reclaimed
Nimbifer - Demo II
Obsidian Tongue - Volume III
Omegavortex - Black Abomination Spawn
Oranssi Pazuzu - Mestarin Kynsi
Ossaert - Bedehuis
Paysage d'Hiver - Im Wald
Perdition Temple - Sacraments of Descension
Porta Nigra - Schöpfungswut
Precambrian - Tectonics
Putrid - Antichrist Above
Serment - Chante- Ô Flamme de la Liberté
Skáphe - Skáphe 3
Spectral Lore & Mare Cognitum - Wanderers Astrology Of The Nine
Svrm - Занепад
Sweven - The Eternal Resonance
Titaan - Itima
Ulcerate - Stare Into Death And Be Still
Voidsphere - To Sense|To Perceive
Warp Chamber - Implements Of Excruciation
Yaldabaoth - That Which Whets the Saccharine Palate
Ygg - The Last Scald

Everything else:

Andrew Jackson Jihad - Good Luck Everybody
Black Magick SS - Rainbow Nights
Bohren & der Club of Gore - Patchouli Blue
Boris - NO
Botanist - Photosynthesis
DJ Poolboi - it's good to hear your voice
Elder - Omens
Hail Spirit Noir - Eden in Reverse
Haunt - Mind Freeze
Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids- Shaman!
Lychgate - Also Sprach Futura
Mamaleek - Come & See
Midnight Odyssey - Ruins of a Celestial Fire
Slift - Ummon
Sun Ra Arkestra - Swirling

That's it for 2020! See you all next time and happy new year!