Laughing Stock of the Year 2023
All the good stuff from the year of our lord 2023
Hello there, and welcome to edition 45 of Laughing Stock. It’s time for our highly anticipated, widely reported, some say ‘cherished’ ‘good stuff from the year’ edition, where editors Rich Walker and Connah Roberts, alongside long standing contributors and all round good guys Will Palmer and Sam Hartford, share the things they’ve most enjoyed from the world of music this year. Strap yerselves in…
BUT FIRST…although we don’t really do ranking here at LS (these lists are just highlights of our favourite music things with individual album lists included), we do like to award an Album of the Year. 2023’s garland goes to Laurel Halo’s stunning Atlas. A mesmerising, atmospheric, quiet tour de force, at once feeling light and densely textured, it’s like forest bathing, but at dusk so it’s a bit unsettling. Featuring a host of LS favs including last year’s AOTY winner Coby Sey (not his last mention in this round up), Bendik Giske (who’s own self titled album form this year is a winner too), and Lucy Railton, it’s a work that will stand the test of time with a collection of musicians who have summed up the last few years of forward thinking production. Snatches of sound and melody wash over you, coming and going like half remembered dreams, echoing the likes of The Caretaker and Arthur Russell, whilst also being incredibly singular. There’s a moment on ‘Sick Eros’ when the strings swell into a melody that you are sure you recognise but you won’t be able to grasp it, it’s gone before you can get hold of it, and it epitomises the wonder of this exceptional LP.
Finally before we get into the meat of it, we put our favourite songs in a rolling 2023 playlist which by any measure is a delightful listen, have a go of it via Apple or Sp*tify.
Rich
Kelela’s return
It’d been a long six years since Kelela released Take Me Apart, and I was starting to wonder if she’d become disillusioned with music, maybe never to be seen again. Then late last year she resurfaced with the ambient rnb of ‘Washed Away’, and Kelela season was in full swing. Her album Raven was well worth the wait, a pulsating, club ready masterpiece of future rnb that you could also play at the afters, and it’s become my most listened to album of the year. Whether it’s the smooth footwork of ‘Contact’ or the bright ache of ‘Enough For Love’, every track hits home and couldn’t have been made by anyone else but Kelela. Her live show was a lot of fun too, something I termed ‘Kelela-oke’ as it was literally just her and a DJ playing the backing tracks, but it was done in such a positive, Berlin nightclub kinda way, and with that voice, she absolutely pulled it off. Welcome back Kelela, please don’t leave this realm for so long this time.
Honour’s ascent
There’s nothing I like more than a shadowy act. Who are they? Where do they come from? Why don’t we know anything about them? It still carries an air of cool about it, but who cares about any of those things when the music is this good? At one point I genuinely thought it was Dean Blunt, but it’s not, having confirmed so seeing them live at PAN’s 15th birthday show in Paris, a hypnotic, dry iced shrouded show that floated by like a half forgotten dream. After a couple of long form single songs in the shape of EPs last year, their debut album Àlááfíà on the ever reliable PAN came fully formed this year, all atmosphere and quiet drama to rival Space Afrika. Their sound is a mix of a lot of what LS holds dear, and I reckon they have a masterpiece in them somewhere in their future.
The Blue Hour
It’s been another quietly brilliant year for ambient music, with superb albums from the likes of Laurel Halo, Loscil & Lawrence English, 70386344357, Maria W Horn & Mats Erlandsson, Noriki Tujiko, Cole Pulice and Pan American to name a few. But the finest collection for me was Somewhere Press’ gorgeous compilation The Blue Hour, 50 minutes of sublime music to stare out of a window to. ‘The Blue Hour’ refers to that time between dusk and nightfall, and this music beautifully encapsulates that special post-golden-hour hue perfectly.
Model/Actriz’s incendiary live show
Having enjoyed their album Dogsbody released early on in the year, particularly the buzzing ‘Mosquito’, I was keen to catch them live as I’d heard they were something to behold. Little was I prepared for what was probably my favourite gig of the year, an industrial-genre-smashing giddy, queer, raw, burningly physical, fervent whirlwind of a show. It was a thrilling 45 mins or so as frontman Cole Haden gyrated, pulsed, positively throbbed on stage and more so on the floor amongst the audience as the diverse crowd formed a mosh pit immediately, arms, legs, bodies flailing as the band pounded us with their sexy, industrial groove. I never want to see 4 lads with guitars stand steadfast still on stage ever again after this. Catch them if they come round again, you won’t be disappointed.
billy woods’ annus mirabilis
billy woods has been making underground rap music since 2002, one of those ‘if you know, you know’ GOAT rappers. I didn’t know, not until 2020’s Brass LP, a collab with the equally brilliant Moor Mother. I was hooked. And now it seems like the rest of the world has caught up, because woods has had quite the year, making the two best rap albums in his solo effort Maps and We Buy Diabetic Test Strips with ELUCID as Armand Hammer. His lyrics tend towards incendiary social commentary, his flow is somehow casual and urgent at the same time, and as I found out when seeing Armand Hammer live, he’s a vital performer too. Both albums are destined for the upper echelons of many an end of year list; sit up and pay attention, there’s no one around doing it better than woods.
We’re In Love
‘If you rewrite your life, may I still play a part? In the next one, will you find me? I’ll be the boy with the pink carnation pinned to my lapel, who looks like hell and asks for help’. Once an emo, always an emo. boygenius (and specifically Lucy Dacus) spoke to me like I was a 15 year old hormonal mess and I cherished it.
Rainy x Space Afrika’s ‘A Grisaille Wedding’
The whole album from Manchester’s underbelly scene kings Rainy Miller and Space Afrika is thrilling, but prey tell me, has there been a finer back end run on an album this year than that from the Coby Sey led stunner ‘The Graves at Charleroi’ to closer ‘Bobbies Reprise’? No, no there has not. Like an album precision engineered in a lab to appeal to LS, it’s a culmination of everything that makes Miller and Space Afrika so special, bringing along most of their gang and some big name newcomers (Iceboy Violet! Richie Culver! Mica Levi! RenzNiro! More Eaze!) for the ride, it’s a late in the year stunner. Reviews in Pitchfork and features in national press point to the fact that people are finally starting to pay attention to the most vital scene in the country at last.
Tirzah GOAT-ing
Out of nowhere LS fav Tirzah reappears with an album based around a single drum loop from music god Mica Levi and lo, it was one of the best albums of the year. Featuring diametrically some of Tirzah’s most immediate and most knotty songs yet, it’s a masterpiece of contrived simplicity, atmosphere and beauty. She’s three for three, and shows no sign of letting up.
Hessle Audio: saving dance music 2023
Maybe it’s me, but this year I wasn’t really thrilled by much dance music (distinct from electronic music which had a fantastic year!). There were the brilliant Michael J Blood releases, Surgeon’s and Tzusing’s pummeling techno LPs, and a handful of proper bangers like Floating Point’s ‘Birth4000’ and Finn & Private Joy’s huge ‘What’s Coming Over You?’, but on the whole it felt a little flat - see Overmono’s boring debut album. But there’s always an exception to the rule, and that came in the shape of Hessle Audio, the label run by the holy trinity of Ben UFO, Pearson Sound and Pangea, who put out non-stop heaters to save the dance genre. Brilliant EPs by Olof Dreijer, Anz and Toumba all hit the right beats one after the other, but it was Pangea’s own Changing Channels that really lit up the year. Seven absolute whoppers that can’t help but put a massive shit eating grin all over your face, brightening the autumn with its massive bangers. ‘Installation’ and the undeniable ‘If’ were my personal highlights, but the whole thing kicks off. God bless Hessle, and all who sail in her.
Stop Making Sense on the big screen
It’s de facto the greatest concert film of all time, by one of the greatest bands of all time, shot by one of the best directors, and hipster production kings A24 gave all of us too young to catch it the first time round the chance to channel our inner David Byrne in the cinema. What a crisp, brilliantly remastered film this is, every detail of the immaculately choreographed show captured in stunning clarity, I cried out of sheer joy twice, once during ‘Heaven’, my all time favourite Talking Heads track, and then during the one-two knockout of ‘This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)’ and ’Once in a Lifetime’. Never have I wanted to be someone so much as 1984 David Byrne with his mad dancing in his flawlessly louche suits and to die for curtains. I am so pleased I got to see this on the big screen, it’s the closest to seeing Talking Heads live most of us are ever going to get.
My Top 10 Albums of the Year:
Rat Heart & The Peanuts - The Pamela Peanut Kitchen Sessions
Wednesday - Rat Saw God
Tirzah - trip9love…???
Kelela - Raven
Laurel Halo - Atlas
billy woods & Kenny Segal - Maps
Romance - Fade Into You
Nourished by Time - Erotic Probiotic 2
Rainy Miller & Space Afrika - A Grisaille Wedding
Nicey Blues - Exit Simulation
Connah
DJ Danifox - Ansiedad
The whole 34 minutes of this album is great; it could be one track. No matter where I have put it on, people’s heads have nodded. Think how rare that is for a complete album. One that can create a feeling in a room or a car for everyone who is listening. It also encapsulates beautifully the work of Príncipe over the last few years.
Bar Italia - Tracey Denim
Wasn’t really expecting to like this album as much as I did this year. Still unsure whether it proves how easy it is to write 2-3 minute love songs as a traditional band or how ripping off an era of New Labour, brit pop, and easy access to housing in all major cities in the UK – and cheap booze and cigarettes – craves for a time were better. The album adds to this current time of irony folding in on itself – authentic cafes; Two Shell’s the lot mix; indie sleazy; Arsenal constantly releasing pre-match jackets designed by Tony Adams. Never got the chance to see them live too but supposedly meant to be really shit. Nice.
Horace Ferguson - Sensi Addict
A reissue I continued to play throughout the hot, long summer we always get now. Out of nowhere this album smacked me right in the face. Filed it right into an album everyone should hear. A classic.
Bo Harwood and John Cassavettes - No one around to hear it
Just this one song, from another impeccable compilation from Time is Away, has had a big impact on me since its release. It’s truly beautiful and more so because after reading how it is recorded only seems to make it more personal. Supposedly John Cassavetes, pre recording on your phone days, used all first take recordings to soundtrack his movies, such as this one here. At the time when this was released Bo Harwood was furious, upset that such a raw version was used and released. But this makes the song all the more honest.
Joy’s - Archive 09-10 - EP
After listening to these tracks for well over ten years, and also being fortunate to hear some of them out in clubs during that time, it was a surreal moment to see that they had been released digitally. My favourite out of the collection has always been ‘Ladywell’; a brilliant house song that you can never get bored of.
Call Super - Eulo Cramps
I once read that if a painter is any good, you instantly know it’s their work without seeing any information about the painting (think Franz Kline, Agnes Martin etc etc). If you take this idea to music, I think it rings true – the best are instantly recognisable. Call Super is one of those artists. From his first release to this, his second full length album, all has a texture no other producer can create, and Eulo Cramps is the culmination of his various releases.
Romance - Fade Into You
‘Fade Into You’ by Mazzy Star. Wow, what a song. When seeing Romance had released an album with this as the title, I was hoping the song was going to get a Romance rework. Alas, it wasn’t to be. What we do get instead is another brilliant album regardless, which dreams you off to another world, like last year’s Once Upon A Time. Also, a special mention should go to Romance’s score of La Collectionneuse, which was presented earlier in the year at Oto. Magical.
Heather Stebbins - At the end of the sky
I don’t know what it is like to be at the end of the sky. The idea of flying makes me feel uneasy, the more you think about it, the more incomprehensible it is. On each flight this year, I always thought about what it would be like if the engine suddenly failed. This album reminded me of that and, likewise, I was reminded of it. If you’re looking for that feeling, take a flight and put this on.
My Top 10 Albums of the Year:
Laurel Halo - Atlas
Tara Clerkin Trio - On The Turning Ground
DJ Danifox - Ansiedad
Call Super - Eulo Cramps
Horace Ferguson - Sensi Addict
Bar Italia - Tracey Denim
Heather Stebbins - At the end of the sky
Romance - Fade Into You
Rezzett - Meant Like This
Kassem Mosse - Workshop 32
Will
Joanna Sternberg
There’s something miraculous in listening to an album for the first time and it feeling lovingly well-worn, like you’d listened to it for not just the entirety of this life but countless other lives. That rare feeling hit me when I first played Joanne Sternberg’s mid-summer release, I’ve Got Me. Sternberg’s rich musical heritage evokes the Greenwich Village folk revival scene of the 1960s, and there are certainly vocal similarities with Joni Mitchell and Carole King, but it’s her songwriting that really elevates this release beyond the album’s rudimentary surface. Her devastating lyrics belie the simpler folk tone: “I'm so glad I met you, you helped me see, just how very much I hate me,” (‘People Are Toys To You’) has Sternberg musing on the unravelling of a relationship and her own introspective self-examination. There’s heart on your sleeve and then there’s this. The stripped back piano makes ‘Drifting On A Cloud’ soar, Sternberg seems happy but there’s a fog of gloomy ambivalence in her own admission of happiness: “How long ago has it been? I wished for this so long, I don't know what was wrong.” A vague melancholia abounds, like something you half-remember your parents playing 20 years ago, but this is an album of new classics and one you’ll be playing year after year.
VOIR DIRE
Earl Sweatshirt and The Alchemist’s VOIR DIRE had arguably the sample of the year in ‘Mancala’, riffing on Sister Ida Maxey’s ‘God Has Smiled On Me’, creating a gospel-inspired, nostalgic head-bopper. The record is a rare journey into something approaching rap-traditionalism for Earl, I wouldn’t mind if he planted a flag here a little longer.
Rediscovering R.E.M.
I was never a massive R.E.M fan. I remember vaguely chuckling along to ‘Shiny Happy People’ on Kerrang, totally unaware of the track’s rumoured prozac-laden context. Season two of the TV show The Bear changed all that for me. Michael Stipe’s keening voice featured heavily on the soundtrack and I became particularly addicted to 1994’s ‘Strange Currencies’. I replayed it over and over as I would have done when I was 11, screaming out “these words, you will be mine” with the speaker at full volume as I cooked or cleaned the house. ‘Half A World Away’ became a real comfort listen for me, most of the time making me tear up on my walk home from Tesco. From there, I cycled through albums Out Of Time, Automatic For The People and Monster, accumulating in me belting out ‘Man On The Moon’ during karaoke on one of those sticky summer nights where you never expect to end up at karaoke.
MIKE… again
In 2023, Beware of the Monkey and Burning Desire cemented MIKE as the leading luminary of the New York underground. Prolificness has come at the expense of quality for some of his peers, but MIKE only seems to get better and more ambitious as he experiments with form, all while collaborating with more interesting artists. The standouts on Burning Desire are ‘Let’s Have a Ball’, featuring mark william lewis’ lush, deep vocals and ‘should be!’, where Lila Ramani exudes ethereality.
My burning heart
Sufjan Stevens was back and he was more heartbreaking than ever. The last few years have seen a slew of collaborations with the likes of Angelo De Augustine, Timo Andres and Conor Hanick, but this represents his first proper solo work since 2020’s synth-inspired The Ascension. Javelin, however, has more in common with his 2015 masterpiece Carrie And Lowell, there’s those familiar arrangements of spindly strings, flutes and rising choral voices. It’s as intimate and tender a work he’s ever produced, made all the more shattering when you understand the personal pain he went through during the writing and recording process. Sufjan’s contemplation of love, death and piety are nothing new (there’s passages in ‘Everything That Rises’ that read like a Christian worship song), but Javelin feels like the dazzling amalgamation of his soul searching. The result is wondrous to behold.
Sinéad R.I.P.
Deeply treasured, highly misunderstood and absolutely one of a kind. ‘Icon’ gets bandied around a lot these days, but Sinéad O’Connor epitomised it. “But this is the last day of our acquaintance, I will meet you later in somebody's office, I'll talk but you won't listen to me.”
Church of Sage
Ways of Knowing has Sage Elsesser finding inspiration from gospel and soul, the shackles of 2020’s superb Songs of Sage: Post Panic! are not totally off but certainly loosened, and he feels more relaxed in himself. Sage has shown he has an ear for more R&B focused tracks in recent times (see his feature on Babeheaven’s ‘Make Me Wanna’), but Ways of Knowing finds him embracing this more fully. There’s also exaltation and extolment. ‘Phases’, with its sample of Rudolph Stanfield’s ‘Whisper A Prayer’, is ludicrously uplifting. It’s smooth, cerebral and everything we’ve come to expect from Sage.
Alt-country round-up
A spectrum of country-influenced indie rock absolutely dominated this year. Wednesday’s colossal Rat Saw God is seemingly everyone’s album of the year and deservingly so, evoking suburban Americana through the trappings of home on the range. Elsewhere, Florry’s country influence is much more obvious. Their August release The Holey Bible is wistful and playful, combining bedroom pop fuzz with the tinny jingle-jangle of the cowbell and the twang of the banjo. PACKS’ Crispy Crunchy Nothing from March falls under the alt-country umbrella that Wednesday occupy, think Soccer Mommy in a cowboy hat. This is the second full-length from Madeline Link and there’s some lovely, sleepy slacker tracks on this, peaking with ‘EC’ and ‘4th Of July,’ where Link has an uncanny habit of melding nuanced lyrics with a sense of slumber.
Dream team
Blockhead’s late year release Aux brought together an indie rap dream team, with features from billy woods, Armand Hammer, Danny Brown, Navy Blue and Aesop Rock amongst others. It’s reminiscent of Rawkus Records’ Soundbombing series of the early 90s, like an end of year scrapbook celebrating 2023’s MVPs. At times, it feels like the album's collaborators are all huddled into one room, lounging about and riffing off each other. It’s relaxed but there’s still plenty of depth. It’s the most traditional of the rap albums on this list yet one of the most eclectic.
My Top 10 Albums of the Year:
Joanna Sternberg - I’ve Got Me
Wednesday - Rat Saw God
Sufjan Stevens - Javelin
Boygenius - The Record
MIKE - Burning Desire
Caroline Polachek - Desire, I Want to Turn Into You
billy woods & Kenny Segal - Maps
Tim Hecker - No Highs
Navy Blue - Ways of Knowing
Earl Sweatshirt & The Alchemist - VOIR DIRE
Sam
Westermann - An Inbuilt Fault
What a set of pipes this man has on him. Ethereal control, gliding through notes like a fucking arrow. The vocal offspring of Joni Mitchell, Orlando Weeks, James Blake, Arthur Russell. When I saw him at Yes he delivered a great but remarkably shy set; having to grow into , almost wincing at his own captivating talent. You want to shout ‘’don’t worry pal, you’re mint’’ but that is the reserve of gig crowd knobhead behaviour. If you need proof of Westermann's credentials then start with 2020's Your Hero is Not Dead. There's arguably more pound for pound highlights on the synth infused, pop-folk predecessor but his album this year is progressive and rich, cementing his place as a maverick artist. The usual intimacy is laden throughout the lyrics but on An Inbuilt Fault there's an increased dose of self-grappling and existential questioning to the narrative. Relatable for many of us. Not that the sound strays into anything too melancholy, fortified by collaboration with Big Thief's James Krivchenia there's now a more organic and freeing instrumental arrangement. Evidenced no better than ‘Pilot Was a Dancer’ where Westermann lets things go for a winding and joyous 2 minute outro.
K-Lone poppin off
‘Balloons’ goes the title and there is an inflatable bounce to this infectious dancefloor bleeper. Sort us a can of Red Stripe and a sticky floor, we’re good to go. It's a hallmark of K-Lone's wider work and the ingredient that makes his tunes such an accessible and entertaining listen. So summer-set ready that it feels remiss to be writing about it while I'm wearing two pairs of socks with the wind swirling in the darkness outside my window. In 2023 the Wisdom Teeth label co-founder offered us up Swells, it's skillfully put together, playful and darting; a bubbling of drumbeats and jangly synths. There’s always a sweet undercurrent of house jams, though some more experimental and low key forays exist in ‘Volcane’ & ‘Multiply’. Only ‘Love Me A Little comes close to replicating the aforementioned ‘Balloons’ as a certified banger, but much like the album's artwork (a simplistic papery collage of a sea and sun cliffside landscape,) it's a warm and breezy listen. Nothing is overworked. K-Lone is producing tantalising stuff, keep an eye on him.
Speakers Corner Quartet with Coby Sey
I've only given the rest of this album a cursory listen for now, but the opening number is one that's planted a flag on the hill that is my top listens of 2023. A notable recurring theme is the littering of guests that appear on each track; Tirzah, Mica Levi and Sampha being some of the standout names, but the highlight is On Grounds and the oh so heavenly vocals of LS favourite Coby Sey. It's a superbly cohesive, atmospheric song that builds up until your ears submit and allow your head to be flooded with tranquillity. The live recording from Portico is well worth a watch if you want an even more elevated experience. Bra-bloody-vo Coby.
Shirley Hurt
Technically a late December 2022 release but I didn’t come across this self-titled gem until well beyond that. Which kind of feeds into the point I’m about to make. I’m baffled this hasn’t received more attention, nevermind acclaim. Comparisons with Aldous Harding are inevitable, accurate and a huge compliment. Maybe she’s just got this niche sewn up, but on this record Hurt is also proving her mastery of the indie folk alchemy. She’s making music with a wand, a voice that shifts from husky to delicate with ease. It’s winter, wait for a crisp early morning, get the big puffer out, go on a walk, contemplate some things, let this soundtrack it.
There you go, as promised, all the good stuff. Dive in, have a go, find something to cherish. Or don’t, we’re not the boss of you. See you in 2024.
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