My Top 19 Albums of 2019 (Part 1)

As a fervent believer that you shouldn't play Christmas songs after December 25th, I wanted to get something new up on the blog today, but as I've not quite completed my compilation of the year's best albums... here's the first half*, which I managed to complete last week.

For someone who professes to not know much about new music and is always whinging on about how the charts mean nothing to me after the 20th Century... I don't half find a load of records to listen to. I'm kind of glad that chart music largely leaves me cold these days, because if it didn't I'd never find the time to keep up with all that AND all the nonsense below.

As in previous years, I've limited my Best Of list to the big number on the calendar, hence 19 albums in 2019. But I could easily have done 30, like Brian. (Always ahead of the crowd.)

I won't bore you with the runners-up. Regular readers will have heard me going on about most of them already, and as usual there will be a few stragglers that stretch out into the new year.

This list is only a snapshot anyway. The Top 3 are pretty much set in stone, but the rest could move up and down a bit depending my my mood. There are some fine records here though, and though they won't all be to your taste, I hope you find something among them that tickles your fancy.


19. Better Oblivion Community Centre - Better Oblivion Community Centre

Phoebe Bridgers and Conor Oberst. Not sure what brought them together, but it works.

Top Track: Dylan Thomas

"I'm taking a shower at the Bates Motel..."

18. Amanda Palmer - There Will Be No Intermission

Baring all, an artist in every sense of the word... yet one who keeps her sense of humour.

Top Track: A Mother's Confession

"But at least the baby didn't die..."

17. Lloyd Cole - Guesswork

Lloyd's been listening to John Grant. Not immediately a success, but it grows...

Top Track (this week): Night Sweats

"I'm thinking about rhyming righteous

With might just

And I might just

And I'm not fooling around"

16. Jesse Malin - Sunset Kids

A comeback, in this house anyway.

Top Track: My Little Life

"People think I'm cold

Or just antisocial

I just don't know what to say

Sometimes"

15. Chip Taylor - Whiskey Salesman

He'd only been writing songs for 55 years before I discovered him.

Top Track: Whiskey Salesman

"It's funny how you can learn more by keeping your mouth shut

Than by talking"

14. Richard Hawley - Further

Time may change, but thankfully, Richard Hawley does not.

Top Track: Time Is

"Time is on your side right now

But time can change"

13.  Robert Forster - Inferno

Listened to on the back of the Go-Betweens documentary, Right Here, which gave me a renewed appreciation for Forster.

Top Track: No Fame

"And if I bust out and the highway is really the key

Everyone can follow, everyone can overtake me"

*Keen mathematicians among you will already have worked out that that's not quite half of 19... but it's as far as I got before the lurgy struck me down.

More soon.