Top 10 Albums of 2019

In any normal year I'd probably have been shouting out for Undress by The Felice Brothers an album of rip roaring Americana tunes or alt folk Big Thief 's first album of the year U.F.O.F. or even In The Morse Code of Brake Light by Canadian Indie Folk band The New Pornographers. I'd be bigging up Irish folk band Lankum's, The Livelong Day, 2020 by Richard Dawson and The Avett Brothers, Closer Than Together but ultimately none of them were good enough to make the final cut.

So as follows,

Best album of 2019- Big Thief's second album of the year - Two Hands (Indie folk - USA)

Joint 2nd

Tallest Man on Earth – I Love You, It’s A Fever Dream (alt folk Sweden)

BCUC – The Healing (African rhythms - Soweto South Africa)

The Good Ones -  Rwanda, You Should Be Loved (African folk - Rwanda)

The Murder Capital – When I Have Fears (Indie Punk - Ireland)

Wilco – Ode to Joy (Americana - USA)

Bryce Dessner, Eighth Blackbird Bonnie 'Prince' Billy – When We Are Inhuman (alt folk - USA)

Better Oblivion Community Center -Better Oblivion Community Center (Indie - USA)

Fontaines DC - Dogrel (Indie Punk - Ireland)

Bruce Springsteen – Western Stars (Americana - USA)

So in summary 5 for USA, 2 for Ireland and 1 each for Sweden, South Africa and Rwanda. O for UK.

Categories?  Well as the ultimate arbitrator for my list I'll say 3 Folk (of sorts), 2 Indie Punk, 2 African, 2 Americana and 1 Indie.  Which probably sums up my musical taste quite nicely as we are about to enter the '20's.  Let's hope they roar..

I'd say that is pretty much my taste in music as we are about to enter the '20's.  Let's hope they roar. So all in all 2019 has been a great year and if the pattern continues bring on 2059.

PS - Reissues/re-releases - I loved the A Certain Ratio 4 cd box set of remixes, ACR:Box.  I also bought a couple of Chess/Stax soul and quite a few rare Ska compilations.