Ode To The Big Sea

'Riceboy Sleeps' was released July this year, it's easily one of the
best chillout albums of the year. Jónsi happens to be the singer for
Sigur Rós - which explains a lot.

Not to be missed.

North London based produced Lukid released his album 'Foma' early this
year. It's instrumental hip-hop at it's finest, but darker than you
may be expecting. Last.fm cites artists such as Lone and Dimlight as
being similar, I can kind of see what they're getting at.

Sin Fang Bous is a relative unknown Icelandic guy called Sindri Már
Sigfússon, he doesn't even have a Wikipedia page as of writing.

His sound is indie folk, quite psychedelic at times. It's kinda like
Panda Bear meets Arcade Fire, but not really. Awesome stuff though.

The Veil's album 'Sun Gangs' was released just before the summer and I
keep coming back to it. I reckon it's one of the best indy/alt rock
releases this year.

Although The Veils have been around a while I'd not heard of them
before, seems their lineup is ever changing, the original members
split just weeks after their debut release! This album was made in
London and was produced by Graham Sutton - turns out he's worked with
British Sea Power, another band I quite like.

Swedish neo-soul/hip-hop, she reminds me a bit of Erykah Badu. The
album is really smooth, nice, soulful and an impressive debut.

I had the privilege of attending the debut performance of The Crimson
Wing score performed live by The Cinematic Orchestra at the Union
Chapel. It was stunning.

The music is incredible, even without watching the film.

Sample based hip-hop produced by Doom. Need I say any more?

Not content with releasing only 2 amazing albums this year, Bibio has
just released 'The Apple And The Tooth'. Granted there are more
remixes than new material on it but it's all top quality.

I was lucky enough to see him play a DJ set live this week just gone,
if you get the chance to see him do not pass it up, he was awesome!

Favourite track of the night was the new Lone mix of 'All The
Flowers'. It's all about the flip near the end.

There is little information to be found on the internets about Dorian Concept. I found him through the magic that is the recommendation system on Last.fm

His sound is difficult to pigeonhole, i'd say it's experimental electronic hip-hop (even if the track i've posted isn't hip-hop).

Either way it's really good.

Released earlier this year, 'Wall Of Arms' is the 2nd album from
british indie band The Maccabees. The whole album is really strong,
its not just regular old indie as it's got trumpets and horns and all
sorts - it was produced by Markus Dravs who has worked with Bjork and
also with Arcade Fire on their album 'Neon Bible' (which is also
great) and explains a lot.

It's thoroughly worth a listen.