Doris… Day of reckoning

100 best albums of 2013 countdown: 80-71

Published on December 26th, 2013 | Jonny Abrams

Gather round, gather round: it’s Rocksucker’s 100 best albums of 2013 countdown Christmas special bonanza!

You see, we listened to an absolute shedload of albums this year and conferred varying degrees of merit, in quail form, upon them based on our own spurious criteria.

Now we bring you our favourite hundred of them, counted down in order arbitrarily/for fun. Let’s have a good look at you, numbers 80-71…

80. Hejira – Prayer Before Birth

What we said…

At once luxurious and unsettling… Hejira don’t so much make music as conjure it, scoop it out of a sacred place in some other dimension.

Click here to read our review of Prayer Before Birth in full!

79. Goldfrapp – Tales of Us

What we said…

A throwback to the sound of their gold-certified 2000 debut Felt Mountain, which is to say that it’s bewitching, spellbinding, all of those things… Tailor-made for snuggling up to like a warm blanket.

Click here to read our review of Tales of Us in full!

78. The Pure Conjecture – Gendres

What we said…

The classic soul-tinged feel of previous LP Courgettes is flaunted by the Dick Dale surf-rock riffing of “Surfin’ Sunset” and the wry Byrds/Teenage Fanclub jangle-pop of “Roadworks on Memory Lane”.

Click here to read our review of Gendres in full!

77. Jim James – Regions of Light and Sound of God

What we said…

Builds on the mix of dark, velvety cinema atmosphere, bang-on pop instincts and satisfyingly shuffling grooves that characterised his most recent album with day job band My Morning Jacket.

Click here to read our review of Regions of Light and Sound of God in full!

76. Latyrx – The Second Album

What we said…

While not without a sense of fun, The Second Album still courses with the righteous anger that’s always bubbled up through the progressive, highly literate flows of constituent pair Lateef the Truthspeaker and Lyrics Born.

Click here to read our review of The Second Album in full!

75. Neon Neon – Praxis Makes Perfect

What we said…

Based on the life of left-wing political activist Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, Praxis Makes Perfect is a fair bit mellower than its predecessor, with Gruff Rhys and Boom Bip going from sounding in debt to the ’80s to outright mimicking it.

Click here to read our review of Praxis Makes Perfect in full!

74. I Am Kloot – Let It All In

What we said…

Feels like the band reverting to their original course after the diversion-of-sorts that was the thematically cinematic/cinematically thematic Sky at Night, but it’s hard to argue when the songs are this strong.

Click here to read our review of Let It All In in full!

73. Kanye West – Yeezus

What we said…

West earns the right to cast his rod out (no, not like that) purely by dint of, you know, actually taking risks and trying new things with his music, which alone would place him several rungs above virtually all of his mainstream contemporaries.

Click here to read our review of Yeezus in full!

72. Phoenix – Bankrupt!

What we said…

Steeped in luxuriant and ingenious flashes of lateral thinking without conceding pop ground… A succinct, ten-track album’s worth of bang-up and up-to-date pop music.

Click here to read our review of Bankrupt! in full!

71. Earl Sweatshirt – Doris

What we said…

Presumably trying to ignore all of his own hype and just knuckle down to making an album, Earl Sweatshirt has served up some impressive lyrical gymnastics and hypnotic beats, something Jay-Z has been incapable of for many years now.

Click here to read our review of Doris in full!

Artists: earl sweatshirt, goldfrapp, hejira, i am kloot, jim james, kanye west, latyrx, neon neon, phoenix, the pure conjecture

About the Author

Jonny Abrams Editor of Rocksucker and the website's founder, Jonny is passionate about the music he listens to, both good and bad, as well as interviewing his favourite musicians.