2024 End of Year Roundup

 

Photo by Ankhesenamun on Unsplash

Welcome to my 2024 end of year roundup. It's been a funny year for several reasons, and this is going to be a shorter post than usual, but rest assured that my annual songs of the year series of posts will be coming soon.

Gigs

I didn't go to many gigs this year, in fact, the only gig I did get to was Helen Mccookerybook and David Lance Callahan at the Tallyrand in Levenshulme in April. I could have gone to see Allie X play at Gorilla and, while I did consider going, in the end I ruled it out because I wasn't that keen on the new album. 

Album of the year

The Last Dinner Party, Prelude To Ecstasy

Perhaps the most hotly anticipated debut album of the year, nay decade. And they did not in any way disappoint. 

A tight, highly atmospheric album of glam rock inspired melodramas and anthems which satisfies on every level. 

Event of the year

Florence + The Machine, Symphony of Lungs at the BBC Proms, Royal Albert Hall.

It goes without saying that I would have loved to have attended this concert, but as it was taking place in the early days of September on a weekday, I had absolutely zero chance of getting the time off work. I'm not sure I could have afforded the ticket, hotel and coach or train fares anyway. Luckily the BBC broadcast it twice, once live on Radio 3 and secondly about a month later on BBC2, where this unique 'Symphony of Lungs' could be appreciated in its full sumptuous sonic and visual splendour. It's being released on vinyl and CD in March, so naturally I have it on pre order. 

Books I've read and loved this year

Tamora Pierce, Tortall: A Spy's Guide

Tim Mohr, Burning Down The Haus

Paul Hanley, Sixteen Again

Oliver Postgate, Seeing Things

Kirk Field, Rave New World

Lizzy Stewart, Alison

Chris and Jenn Sugden, High Vaultage

DBC Pierre, Vernon God Little

John Green, The Fault In Our Stars

Top 5 Detective TV Show themes 

5) Sister Boniface Mysteries

4) Death in Paradise

3) Mrs Sidhu Investigates

2) Whitstable Pearl

1) The Turkish Detective

Articles I've found interesting/enjoyable this year

How the rental crisis is threatening the UK's music scenes by Laura Molloy (NME)

I am facing my second no-fault eviction in two years. Renting is broken by Ruby Lott-Lavigna (Open Democracy)

The Death of Shame by Jonn Elledge (The Newsletter of (Not Quite) Everything)

After 14 years of dead ends, here are three ways Labour can rejuvenate UK public transport by Jonn Elledge (The Guardian)

295 Days Gone by Jonn Elledge (The Newsletter of (Not Quite) Everything)

Fad's Army by Jonn Elledge (The Newsletter of (Not Quite) Everything)

I, for one, will mourn Twitter by Jonn Elledge (The New Statesman)

multi-storied #36: The idyll by Samanth Subramanian (multi-storied)

Memoir Draft: Chapter 1. Going into Care by Matt Taylor (Underclass Hero)

'Blue Plaque' at Walthamstow Tesco honours lettuce that outlasted Liz Truss by Martin Belam (The Guardian)

Songs of the year will begin on the 10th of December

Pandemic pop music: Or, why Allie X's Cape God should be up there with Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia in the end of year lists

Earlier this year, probably not long after the UK went into lockdown, a number of well placed and well respected music journalists in the UK began to remark upon a specific 2020 music theme: Party albums for the pandemic age. 

Lady Gaga's Chromatica, a back-to-my-roots slice of hedonistic turbo charged pop which was released in late May, was one example of the emerging oevre, but the main release people referenced again and again was Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia, which was released on 27th March 2020, four days after the UK went into lockdown. 

Listening to Future Nostalgia, it's easy to see why so many critics fell for it: It's exuberant, assertive, confident and stylish in tone. It's also good hedonistic pop music, providing positive vibes and escapism at a time when people were, and still are, unable to go out to nightclubs and dance the night away. It arrived at the perfect moment. Not only was the album positively reviewed upon its release but it was also shortlisted for the Mercury Music Prize and will, undoubtably, feature highly in many critics and publications end of year lists. 

I have listened to Future Nostalgia a few times now and, while I do quite like it, I didn't really get why it had been given such a rapturous reception.

That was until I listened to Canadian art pop star Allie X's 2020 album, Cape God. 

Like Future Nostalgia, Cape God provides a confident serving of stylish and hedonistic pop music. But its overall mood is decidedly darker, foreboding and off kilter. Which might account for it receiving less attention than the Dua Lipa album.

Cape God was released on February 21st 2020, pre a lot of the world's Covid lockdowns and before many countries had fully realised the extent to which they were going to be impacted by the virus and what kind of a year it was going to be.

An album with moody, dark imagery that also features X's trademark subversive lyrics (this is the woman who rhymed 'Casanova' with 'Fuck me over' on 'Casanova' after all) it is clever, complex, sophisticated pop with many a dance floor banger ('Super Duper Party People', 'Devil I Know', 'Rings A Bell', 'Life Of The Party') but which also wraps discordant, complex themes in ambitious synth pop ('Fresh Laundry') and addresses a series of atypical relationships and related difficulties. 'Love Me Wrong' for example, a collaboration with Trove Sivan, is a swirlingly off kilter slice of pop baroque whereas the slinky 'Susie Save Your Love' sings of wistful bisexual longing in a duet with Mitski. Musically the song  nods to mid 1980s Prince and the Revolution as well as the Lady Gaga and Florence Welch duet, 'Hey Girl'. 'Madame X' meanwhile, presumably in no way related to last years Madonna album of the same name, is a gothic ballad featuring a modern day La Belle Dame Sans Merci at its heart. 

Perhaps the most haunting track on this most atmospheric of albums is 'Life Of The Party' a song which, at face value, is a turbo charged banger set to rival anything on Chromatica or Future Nostalgia. Listen to the lyrics though and the story takes a distinctly darker turn:

I was the life was the life of the party

They stripped me down like a Barbie

They say I kissed the king

But I don't remember anything

The troubling nature of this is underscored at the apex of the song with X's blurred and groggy muttering of the following:

Oh I'll never forget

But I don't wanna forget

Hope I never forget

Oh I wanna forget

Oh I'll never forget

But I don't wanna forget

I hope I'll never forget

Oh I wanna forget

It hints at sexual assault while delivering unyielding pounding electro beats, something Noga Erez also did with 2017's 'Pretty', which was about a sexual assault in an Israeli nightclub. The contrast between content and style in both cases making for pretty disturbing listening. 

In its attention to cohesion and detail Cape God comes across as a loving and ambitious homage to electronica, art pop and the LGBT+ community. It feels both dark and joyous, troubling and euphoric, and it builds on Allie X's earlier work in a very satisfactory way.

She has surpassed herself with this album and that should really be acknowledged.