MUSIC 2023: top 7 non-album releases

Here's the (almost) best of the rest category. As always this ranking only consists of releases, which I own in some physical form. Like the title says here's the top seven of everything which is neither a studio nor live album. Re-issues are also excluded, while split albums form an exception from the rule. So taken into consideration were singles, EPs (I know, the distinction between album and EP can be foggy sometimes), split releases and compilations. And damn, I almost put Effluence's "Liquified" at the top, even though I heavily argued that it's indeed an album before. But then I realized that it already had been out there as a CD in 2022, so it didn't qualify anyway.

TOP 7 non-album releases 2023:

1. LAIBACH - Love Is Still Alive
   
   
   
   If you ever wanted to fail really badly at something, just try to unravel and seperate all levels of  irony and earnestness, of ridiculous fun and highbrow art in the work of Laibach! On its own their "Iron Sky: The Coming Race" soundtrack walking bass Country song couldn't be a greater cliché, yet it's also a fitting and successful homage to the movie "Dark Star". But then in the next step turning this song into a full-blown eight-part space odyssey, which travels through all kinds of styles and moods is borderline ingenious. The sheer fact of this being from the same group stunning us with the deeply moving orchestral "Alamut" performance this year, makes the EP even better.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. OTAY:ONII - 夢​之​駭​客 Dream Hacker
   
   
   

   Few artists have impressed and touched me as profoundly as Chinese-American singer and experimental musician Lane Shi Otayonii this year. Her performance at Roadburn already won my ranking of favorite festival shows and this new mini album, which consists of entirely different songs than she played there,  came within a whisker of repeating that victory. On "Dream Hacker" her range of inspiration and expression between Eastern tradition and Western Pop culture seems more boundless and unpredictable than ever. Not from this world!
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. ZAÄAR / SPINTRIA - Genesis of Cycplopean Sorcerer
   
   
   

   The secret to a great split release is combining artists, who feel like different sides of the same coin, so their individual contributions add up to more than just the sum of playing times. WV Sorcerer Productions bringing together Belgian primeval Free Jazzers Zaäar and Tennessean trio Spintria's wild genre hopping from Drone and Dungeon Synth to Prog, Metal, Grind and Jazzcore is a paramount example of how this is done. Both bands' longtracks alone are already fantastic, but the whole of this barbarically beautiful LP is an epic Avantgarde masterstroke.
    
   
   
   
   
   
   
4. SARMAT - Dubious Disk
   
   
   

   And now that we have entered the world of musical Avantgarde extremism it's only logical to continue with Sarmat's debut CD/DVD, on which the band introduces us to their own brand of Extreme Metal / Jazz Fusion with a significantly extended rendition of the "Determined To Strike" album track "Disturbing Advances". In my book we can set this as the gold standard for this specific genre hybrid.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. GGGOLDDD - PTSD
   
   
   

   Even more electronically minimalistic than "This Shame Should Not Be Mine" this EP also continues the album's concept by exploring life after the trauma caused by the abuse thematized there. Three songs of "PTSD" are new, the other two are alternative versions of tracks from older albums in the recent sound of the Dutch Post Post Everything band.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
6. KING DUDE - Songs From The 1940s - vol 1 & 2

   
   

   

   You didn't expect to find a double 7" with Great American Songbook classics from the 1940's here? I wouldn't have bet on this happening either. But thanks to T.J. Cowgill bidding his alter ego King Dude farewell with his most Folk / Country release ever here we are now. Mostly performed just on acoustic guitar with ambient sprinkles on top and drenched in his typical cavernous echo, songs like "Oh Death" or "Riders In The Sky" expose their eeriest side, which makes this EP the perfect male companion (or counterpart) to Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter's "Saved!".
   
   

   
   
   
   
   
7. 夢遊病者 - Skopofoexoskelett
   
   
   

   With a plethora of Classical, Jazz and ethnic instrument guest musicians and singers the enigmatic Far Beyond Post Black Metal trio Sleepwalker returns with four tracks almost impossible to pin down in terms of genres or even music-historical time frame or continents associated with their inspiration. The only thing holding this amazing creative chaos back from ascending higher on this list is its dramatic lack of length. Being even shorter than the predeccessing "Noč Na Krayu Sveta" the twenty-five minutes of this so-called album seriously just aren't enough.
   
   

favorite MUSIC 2023 - all my lists:

TOP 23 albums   |   TOP 7 live albums   |   TOP 5 reissues
TOP 7 non-album releases   |   TOP 23 live shows

GGGOLDDD - PTSD

Ok, that was weird. First I got a notification that the package was about to arrive, but then it didn't come for days and the tracking service told me that my postal code was wrong. Maybe the sender had messed up the number? When I finally got it, the address was alright though, but the tracking said it had been misdirected - and a sticker on it claimed otherwise, that I had commanded it to be stored for several days... No, I didn't?

Of course I could have easily avoided all that confusion if I had just bought the new Gggolddd EP at the merch table in Hamburg the other day - but when I ordered it I simply didn't know that I would be attending that show as support of Cult of Luna yet.

Fittingly I also displaced that lovely little thank you note by Milena Eva only a minute before I took the pictures below and for the life of me just can't unearth it, even though there are only so few places it could possibly be. Can't get my stupid head around it. Really weird.

Well, thank you for letting me get that off my chest! But what about the music?

GGGOLDDD - PTSD (fade red to blue vinyl 12") (2023)

The about 19 minutes of this release directly continue where "This Shame Should Not Be Mine" ended, both musically and conceptually, as they continue the half-electronic direction of the album - but with the relatively minimal current touring line-up of four members - and address the post-traumatic stress caused by the singer's experiences of aussault, which were the subject of album.

Five songs, sharp, simple and clear, emotional and analytical, close and distanced. Catchy, but also moving beneath the sonic surface. Three compositions are completely new, while "He Is Not" and "Old Habits" are new arrangements of songs from "Why Aren't You Laughing" and "No Image".

If the Post Post Everything sound of the synth/guitar/electro-drum-heavy music alone still has you on the verge of considering the purchase, the actual physical copy is a good argument in its favor.
The vinyl comes in different colour variations, which as far as I can judge are all looking great, but especially the cutout cover is quite impressive. A clear case of design fitting content. Beautiful.

CULT OF LUNA, GGGOLDDD and SLOW CRUSH live at Grünspan, Hamburg (October 24th 2023)

Somehow this tour had only been in the back of my mind as happening somewhere in late October somewhere in Hamburg. Since I had already been quite busy this month I initially didn't even consider going there - until I did. After I realized that I had spend less money on merch than expected so far, I got curious on Monday night. Where was it again? Uebel & Gefährlich? Knust? Ah, Grünspan - haven't been there since December 2017! And even though the venue would be crowded the following night I luckily still got a ticket at around 1 AM.

(Maybe that was due to Paradise Lost also playing in Hamburg the same night - or it was karmatic balance for me missing out on tickets for The Hirsch Effekt coming Saturday, which is very annoying, since they're playing right here in Ruralistan, actually only a couple of minutes from my workplace in Aukrug... damnit.)

Only three hours later - if you don't count sleep, commuting and office- I was already on my way to Hamburg, so I wouldn't miss the quite early doors open.

SLOW CRUSH

Speaking of 2017. That was also the year I spontanously decided to change my Roadburn running order and found myself being enchanted by a rather unknown Belgian band on the smallest stage in the Cul de Sac.
Slow Crush have had quite a journey since then, but musically they didn't change their course. So finally meeting them again my perception of the quartet unsurprisingly hasn't changed much. The idea is the same, the execution got better, as the band has gained a lot of  experience and confidence. 

They are still so quintessentially just Heavy Shoegaze that I  can't find much else to say about them. To be honest, the band name really does almost all the work for me. Their show was weighty and weightless, here, now and far away, floating in a faint beautiful dream. Wonderful.

GGGOLDDD

My third time seeing Gggolddd in the flesh - and it has always been different. But since on this tour they were only playing songs from their incredibly moving and important allbum "This Shame Should Not Be Mine" plus their recent EP "PTSD", which follows the same electronic premise, the stylistic gap between the breathtaking "Shame" premiere at Roadburn last year and this recent show wasn't that drastic. There still was one though, because the Dutch band showed up with a sparse line-up of just four members. Switching instruments between synths, electronic drum pads and guitars brought some variety from song to song, but overall this was Gggolddd at their most minimalist (if you don't count unplugged performances).

It suited the material and once again put the presence of singer Milene Eva very much in focus, as she sang about her harsh personal experiences. I loved it, but I must admit that the show didn't resonate with everyone as much. And despite all the respect I feel for this band I hope that they will find back to - not necessarily the Post Everything Rock sound of before, but to a larger format nonetheless. Because as sufficing their approach is right now, their other shows were ultimately much stronger and I don't see very much room for further exploration of this small Electronica incarnation of the band.   

CULT OF LUNA

Ok, let's put it out there: Concerning Cult of Luna's studio work I have developed kind of a spoiled snobbish attitude. It's just not quite enough for me to sit down and listen to. Something's missing - and that something's probably for a great part Julie Christmas. Their collaboration and its live performance have raised the bar quite high. But of course the Norwegian wall of Post Metal powerhouse still is a very worthwhile live experience on its own, too.

In this tour package Cult of Luna were also a logical culmination, because it felt like you put the sound of both very different support bands Slow Crush and Gggolddd together - and then put their own ultra heavy hypnotic riff might, epic long track form and Johannes Persson's brutal growl on top of it.
Speaking of the frontman: For a band which always performs as silhouettes, with all the spots and stroboscopic effects pointed at the audience, his stagehand had to readjust his cable and mic stand quite often, because he messed it up during Rock star posing, haha.

Boy, have I been fucking spoiled this month! It sounds and also feels a little arrogant to notice that I've seen at least two - maybe three - shows recently, which were definitely even more colossal than this mountainous Post Metal asteroid. But if you don't have the comparison to Laibach's "Alamut" and Swans yourself and call me a delusional fantasist now - I get it. Because, man, what a force are these six guys!

Cult of Luna (without Julie) still won't be an album band for me soon though. Technically they bring enough variety with interesting rhythmic shifts (always convenient to have two drummers) and atmospheric layering, but apart from my favorite tracks of the night, there's still a lot of stuff, where the songwriting and the constant over the top aggressive yelling just doesn't speak to me much.
It's a huge, enormously impressive facade, which does a fantastic job of intimidating and overwhelming you if you experience it towering in front of you live, but I'm not sure if there's always actually a lot of depth behind it. Or in simpler words: It's just not for always and everwhere for me, so even though I highly enjoyed the show, I was also glad that it ended when it did, just in time before it became a task.

So that was my Tuesday night this week. Pretty awesome. Clearly one of the most well spent this year. Would gladly watch all three bands once again.