Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Ken's Most Anticipated Albums of 2016


With all the upcoming albums in 2016, five really have captured my interest to the point of obsession. They include brand new artists, returning favorites, and dream collaborations.

Mothers - When You Walk a Long Distance You Are Tired - Ever since I first heard "Too Small For Eyes," I've been listening to Mothers pretty much constantly. Considering I they only have four songs on Spotify, that means I should have burnt them out, but I keep going back. I don't think I've ever had such anticipation for a debut since Benjamin Booker, which I consider very high praise. 

The I Don't Cares - Wild Stab - Paul Westerberg and Juliana Hatfield are a dream combination I didn't know I needed until it existed. They've kept the details of their debut album as The I Don't Cares pretty quiet. All we know about it is that it will be called Wild Stab and at the end of October it would be released "soon." I'm betting this will be one of those surprise "Here it is!" releases, hopefully soon.

Adia Victoria - TBD - Almost a year ago, I first heard Adia Victoria's "Sea of Sand" and immediately fell in love with it's dark, gothic alt-country. I assumed we'd have an album by mid summer at the latest, but here we are a year later and we have a total of three songs by Adia Victoria. Last month she announced that she had signed to Canvasback/Atlantic Records, so we might finally get the album I've been waiting a year for.

Ghostface Killah & MF Doom - DOOMStarks - It's been ten years since Ghostface Killah and MF Doom first announced they were making an album together, and it appears that it will finally be released in February. Ghostface is the most consistently great rapper out there, releasing two albums that just barely missed my best of 2015 cut, and MF Doom, while nowhere near as prolific as Ghostface, has yet to release anything that's not amazing. A ten year incubation period makes me a bit nervous, but could these two really make anything less than spectacular?

Anthrax - For All Kings - Anthrax isn't the type of band we typically cover as they don't exactly fit into the whole neo-folk/indie rock thing we're normally all over. But I've loved Anthrax ever since an older neighbor let me listen to 'I'm the Man" when I was 11. There's a lot of talk about this being their best album ever, which sounds virtually impossible 30-plus years into a band's existence. But 2011's Worship Music was shockingly great, and "Breathing Lightning" could have been one of the biggest songs of 1988.

Other new releases I'm excitedly anticipating are ones from Thao & The Get Down Stay Down, Casket Girls, De La Soul, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Julie Rhodes, and David Bowie.

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