RA’s Best of 2018
My contributions to Resident Advisor’s 2018 end-of-year package, published the week of December 10, 2018.
object blue – Act Like It Then
Object Blue released two excellent EPs this year. “Act Like It Then,” from her debut release, is teasingly antagonistic, and samples Cardi B, one of the year’s most commanding personalities. Rattling percussion amps up the chaos until a vocal line, spoken in Mandarin, briefly slows everything down for a moment of introspection.
Marie Davidson – Work It
On “Work It,” Marie Davidson is your motivational speaker. “Now, I don’t wanna see any fake-ass workers / I need real builders.” Neither the assembly line rhythms nor Davidson’s charming voice will let you clock out now. A standout from Davidson’s Working Class Woman, “Work it” sounds like a health goth SoulCycle anthem for the late capitalism era—in the best possible way.
Schacke – Automated Lover
Last month we called Kulør 001—the first release on Courtesy’s new label—”an excellent primer on Copenhagen’s fast techno scene,” which nods to the city’s trance era three decades prior. The compilation’s highlight, “Automated Lover” by Schacke, is crunchy and dark, until labyrinthine synths wind through the atmosphere to create something as heavy as it is weightless.
Julia Holter – Aviary
It’s easy to get wrapped up in the intense, loud moments of Aviary, when atonal chords clash or Julia Holter’s voice soars over her orchestra playing at forte. But it’s the quiet moments in this 90-minute, cinematic masterwork that are most affecting and lasting, the meditative spaces between the overwhelming outbursts. The droning organ on “Another Dream,” the sweet strings of “Words I Heard,” and the gentle piano carrying “In Garden Muteness” are shelter when the rest of the world sounds like “Everyday Is An Emergency.”
Find all of RA’s year-in-review coverage here.
Marissa Cetin 