I’d started Uni in 1995 the week Oasis’ (What’s The Story?) Morning Glory came out and Britpop ruled those first years there, but by 1998 I’d found the sounds that continue to mean the most to me. The indiepop of The Boy With The Arab Strap, Breaking God’s Heart and Peloton, and the inventive, playful, expansive Deserters Songs and The Three EPs. Perhaps there’s never been another year with five great but not faultless records which could better summarise my favourite music

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1hESzyKqdqkXhic1HbpjOb?si=L926tsRTTOquJsCr9JmdXQ

The Lucksmiths – Untidy Towns “First things first I have a happy secret.” For the longest time that secret was this great band called the Lucksmiths. The boys always knew how to open an album. Thenewvinylvillain

Sodastream – Turnstyle Between 1997 and 2006, the pair released four albums, four EPs, and toured the world playing with the likes of Yo La Tengo, Smog and Low, as well as appearing at the first ever All Tomorrows Parties at the request of Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch fortherabbits

Belle and Sebastian – This Is Just A Modern Rock Song “We’re four boys in corduroys/We’re not terrific but we’re competent”, sings Stevie Jackson at the climax of B&S’s slowburn Velvets homage. Only B&S could make self-effacement sound so epic. nme

Belle and Sebastian – Is It Wicked Not To Care? showcases their breezy and, sure, “twee” sensibilities with a touch of ’70s English folk-rock for good measure. The vibraphone twinkles, the Hammond simmers, but it’s Campbell’s vocals that make the song the standout that it is. When she asks, “Will you love me till I’m dead?”, it comes across as both sweet and oddly inconsequential. If the answer to the question is no, that doesn’t mean this isn’t still a moment worth sharing. treblezine

Cinerama – You Turn Me On I think David Gedge is a seriously, seriously underrated songwriter and lyricist. I know some say It’s all teenage angst and miserableisms etc and he should just bloody cheer up, and act his age… blah blah blah! There is that side to his music of course, songs about lost love and regret. And that’s what generally people think of when you mention The Wedding Present or Cinerama.

But then there is the other side of his songwriting, just like ‘You Turn Me On’.
A song about meeting someone and the feelings you have for them that surpass anything you thought you’d ever feel again…

So correct me if I’m wrong, but the feelings you have when you meet someone very special surely don’t change as you get older.
And I’m pretty damn sure that the feelings you have when it all goes horribly wrong don’t change as you get older either.

Let’s face it, as far as I’m concerned he’s written about my life… (the up’s, the down’s and pretty much everything in between…) But I guess I’m still full of teenage angst, and I’m definitely a bit of a miserable bugger. But maybe not as much as I used to be though. Spoiltvictorianchild

Hefner – Hello Kitten Bloody hell, it’s rammed! And when homecoming anti-heroes Hefner burst straight into ‘Hello Kitten’, the best wank anthem since ‘Turning Japanese’, it soon becomes apparent that Darren Hayman is going to be struggling to make himself heard over Camden’s biggest indie karaoke session since – well, didn’t hear anyone singing along at The Fall round the corner last night anyway nme

Hefner – The Sweetness Lies Within The contents of these two CDs are as hornily obsessed with fucking as a Lil’ Kim brag-track but also constantly worry at the real-world problems around how to get, and keep, a partner. Don’t front; you’ve been there. Hayman writes in the sleevenotes that he’d “gone about two years without a shag” when he wrote these songs and that hallucinatory quality of believing that you’re fit to lie between the knees of angels whilst simultaneously grimly hoping that the librarian stamping your books recognises your inner-beauty from them radiates from this music…

From when I first heard this record, sometime not too long after its original release a decade ago, Breaking God’s Heart has been a well that has never run dry for me, that has affected me in times of break-up and new love. Hopefully this reissue programme will mean that these songs may finally get the chance to move as many people as they deserve to. drownedinsound

Grandaddy – AM 180 By combining cheap electronic instruments with an organic rock band setup, Under the Western Freeway feels futuristic in a quaint way, like a space shuttle stitched together from dumpster diving and junkyards pitchfork

Sparklehorse – Hundreds of Sparrows Mark Linkous’ second album as Sparklehorse shines an old light on impossible things. He found the purity of pop music and then lacerated it with the quirks and imperfections he cherished pitchfork

Mercury Rev – Opus 40 You don’t need to know a thing about Mercury Rev to appreciate what a wracked place the band was in when it recorded its 1998 masterpiece, Deserter’s Songs. Almost every note communicates emotional fragility and nostalgia for lost love, lost youth, lost dreams. Its songs are mournfully orchestral, shivering with woodwind and romantic but unstable strings. Its musical interludes, crackling as though transmitted by gramophone, are unsettling: a desolate piano murmurs to itself in I Collect Coins, then argues with a scraped violin in The Happy End (The Drunk Room). Jonathan Donahue, recovering from an alcohol-fuelled breakdown, sings of life inside “the suicide machine” and recurring dreams of fractured relationships, in a high voice crushed by experience yet radiant with hope theguardian

Silver Jews – Random Rules I’m one of those people who got into the Silver Jews by way of Steven Malkmus’s involvement instead of being an avid reader of David Berman’s poetry. I purchased American Water first, and while Malkmus certainly holds up his end of the bargain (especially on “Night Society”), it was, to my then-surprise, Berman’s lyrics that kept me coming back for repeated listens.

Any number of Berman’s lines or songs could be cited as fan favorites, but to me, every aspect of “Random Rules,” American Water’s opening track, represents the best of the Silver Jews. I’ve actually seen the song’s first line (“In 1984 I was hospitalized for approaching perfection”) scrawled inside a bathroom stall once, which is stunning given that Berman begins the second verse by plainly stating, “I know that a lot of what I say has been lifted off of men’s room walls.” Did I sit on the very toilet that inspired Berman to write his finest song?

And what I said about picking favorites from the Silver Jews’ songbook is just as applicable to “Random Rules” itself—almost every line would be eligible for best-loved status. Personally, the choice is obvious. The final two lines of the third verse (“So if you don’t want me, I promise not to linger / But before you go I gotta ask you, dear, about that tanline on your ring finger”) comes at the song’s emotional peak, and is directly followed by my favorite musical aspect of the song—the soft yet piercing trumpet that transitions the verses to the chorus-like moments.

No one would ever call David Berman a great singer. He seems to know that singing in a monotone voice gives his lyrics the best possible forum from which to deliver their messages. But at the climax of “Random Rules” he raises his tone very subtly to match his words’ gravity, and doing so serves as the confirmatory stamp of the song’s greatness—greatness that’s impossible even for lyrically oblivious listeners like myself to miss. Stylusmagazine

Elliott Smith – Waltz #2 (XO) the third song on XO, is Elliott Smith’s certain masterpiece. It’s got a roadhouse, Wild West, player-piano feel to it. And the tune, with its staccato ¾ beat, takes Smith back to Cedar Hill, the suburbs of Texas with his mother, Bunny, and stepfather, Charlie. There’s love in “Waltz #2 (XO),” but a deeper impulse is anger, aimed squarely at Charlie. Brilliantly laid out in metaphorical cloakings, the song’s a secret life history, summarizing Elliott’s feelings about the Cedar Hill atmosphere and the intricacies of his relationship with mother and stepfather. He was always exceptionally worried about the possible hurtfulness of his lyrics. The thought that they might cause harm pained him. So a habit was established according to which he’d begin songs directly, explicitly autobiographically, then revise away from fact toward vagueness and abstraction. Choice specifics grounded the song, but meanings trailed off into obscurity. Emotionally, it was an elision of the personal—there but camouflaged—a self-erasure. He was in the songs, they were him, it was his personal past reconsidered, the sum total of who he was, but they were more too, a mix of voices, first, second, and third person, all getting a word in, all with something crucial to say. “XO,” as Smith told an interviewer in 1998, means “hugs and kisses,” the sort of thing people throw in at the end of letters. A more arcane, connotative meaning was “fuck off.” “But that’s a really rare meaning I didn’t know about,” Elliott explains, apparently sincerely slate

The Butterflies of Love – Rob A Bank just about happening, being as it is one of the most listless, indolent records that you will hear in your dismal little lives. Jeffrey Greene murmurs about the invigorating power of a hopelessly lost love, concluding with confusing candour, “You make me feel like I could rob a bank” nme

R.E.M. – At My Most Beautiful Stipe’s voice is soft and demure as he finds the romance in mundane details — his lover is exceedingly patient when listening to his stilted poetry; he saves their phone messages to hear their voice; he’s always pleasantly surprised that they always say their name when leaving a voice mail “like I wouldn’t know it’s you.” If you have a heart, there’s only one way to respond to all of this: Awwwwwwwwwww!

Stipe seems remarkably vulnerable in this song; just helplessly in love. The title is “At My Most Beautiful,” and crucially, he makes it clear in the second verse that he only feels beautiful in the reflection of his lover’s adoration. It’s not the most assertive sentiment in the world, but it’s humble, honest, and emotionally true. Popsongs

Club 8 – Missing You One would probably classify them as “Swedish synth-pop”. That’s true, but… their music has changed greatly over the years. You’ll find a big difference between their 1998 pop single “Missing You”, the globally inspired dance music of 2010’s The People’s Bandand their last album, 2015’s dark quiet-storm album Pleasure. Erasingclouds

Helen Love – Long Live The UK Music Scene Essentially a female version of The Ramones with junk shop keyboards, Helen Love’s nearest brush with fame was this hugely sarcastic attack on the current musical gatekeepers, which alternates between presenting them as dominant bullies and as impotent, moribund dinosaurs. My only disagreement here is that I think the Longpigs & Bluetones are perhaps not the worst offenders to be singled out, but on the whole, this is a complete joy.haonowshaokao

Shed Seven – Chasing Rainbows we were in Germany and it was absolutely chucking it down outside. It was quite dark and horrible and it was late afternoon. We waited for the gear so we could go and do our soundcheck, and I think we all just wanted to come home. If I remember rightly, me and Paul were just sat on the tour bus and he pulled out his guitar and came up with the main riff. The words just came out all in one go – it was quite strange. It’s a song about being homesick, I guess. Songwritingmagazine

Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci – Let’s Get Together (In Our Minds) a tearjerker folk psych winner allmusic

Catatonia – Road Rage They’ve shown they’ve got the trousers to back up the mouth. But we’re still waiting for the knockout punch nme

Delgados – Clarinet Back in the day, much of the stuff John Peel played I’d first loathe but slowly come to love. (The Fall being the most classic example.) But the Delgados I initially didn’t dislike, I just dismissed. It didn’t seem challenging so much as unmemorable, pretty tunes maybe but no substance, another chip off the indie block. Only by increments did I work my way round to them.

And their music should work that way, should slowly creep up on you. Particularly with their career-highlight album ’Peloton’they managed to pull off the same magic trick as the later Velvets, without ever sounding imitative of them. They often start off with a simple melodic line, only to mess with it. Lyrics are at once erudite and elusive, hinting at dark deeds which couldn’t be spoken of openly. Remember that soporific drink that Mia Farrow’s made to sup in ‘Rosemary’s Baby’, the one where she complains about the undertaste? Delgados songs are similar, initially sounding sweet but gradually revealing a bitter residue. As John Cale once said, “a nice way of saying something nasty.”… Like a stubborn stain that won’t scrub out, even for a shirt you want to wear for your Saturday night, melancholy couldn’t be removed from the Delgados story. Lucidfrenzy

Delgados – Pull The Wires From The Wall made John Peel’s All-Time Festive Fifty in 2000 Lucidfrenzy

Eels – PS You Rock My World It is fair to say that Mark Oliver Everett (also known as E) did not have an easy time when his band, Eels, had their big breakthrough with their debut album Beautiful Freak. After years of battling depression and addiction, his sister Elizabeth took her own life. Not long after, his mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer and in between tour dates, E came to her house and cared for her as her health deteriorated. When she died, he was the last living member of the Everett family and he was devastated. Friends and other family members from his extended family would continue to die and he did not take it lightly. Yet, E also realised that he was in a position to overcome the losses because he found catharsis in writing and recording songs. In his autobiography, Things the Grandchildren Should Know, he notes that this is what really distinguished him from his sister. He had a way to deal with his grief, his fears, his failures, and his difficult childhood that was not open to her. Using his music, he started to work through the deaths around him and the resulting album was Electro-shock Blues, a deeply sad and personal album that still manages to be full of pure beauty, and to end on a message of hope.

The song tells a simple story; it all starts with a funeral.

Sitting down on the steps of the old post office / the flag was flying at half mast / and I was thinking ‘bout how everyone is dying / And maybe it’s time to live

After realising this, he stops being bothered by small things, maybe even finds humour in them; it’s all right if an old woman at a gas station mistakes him for an employee – it is time to live now! Oneweekoneband

Neutral Milk Hotel – Holland, 1945 I’ve talked about this album with a lot of people, including Pitchfork readers and music writers, and while it is loved in the indie world like few others, a small but still significant number despise it. Aeroplane doesn’t have the near-consensus of top-shelf 90s rock artifacts like, say, Loveless, OK Computer, or Slanted and Enchanted. These records are varied, of course, different in many ways. But in one key respect Aeroplane stands apart: This album is not cool.

Obsessed as it is with the textures of the flesh and the physical self as an emotional antenna, listening to Aeroplane sometimes seems to involve more than just your ears.

Then there’s the record’s disorienting relationship to time. The instrumentation seems plucked randomly from different years in the 20th century: singing saws, Salvation Army horn arrangements, banjo, accordion, pipes. Lyrical references to technology are hard to fix. Anne Frank’s lifespan from 1929 to 1945 is perhaps the record’s historical center, but the perspective jumps back and forth over centuries, with images and figures sucked from their own age and squirted out somewhere else. Pitchfork

Royal Trux – The Banana Question doesn’t so much evoke the sound of a classic-rock band blaring out of a cheap transistor radio as one trapped inside of it, strangled by circuitry and choking on static. Pitchfork

Lambchop – The Saturday Option This is an album about love—romantic love, sure, but mostly musical love. Lambchop emerge on this record as a band that reaches out into the world, that collects what another man spills and makes something new and warm out of it. This is an album about the joy of influence, not the burden.pitchfork

Billy Bragg & Wilco – California Stars Named for a Coney Island street where Woody Guthrie lived in the late Forties and early Fifties, Mermaid Avenue is a collection of recently discovered Guthrie lyrics now set to music for the first time. It’s also nothing that the previous work of those involved could have led anyone to expect. Rollingstone

“California Stars” has become a live staple at Wilco shows; its easy sing-along breathed to life courtesy of the steady beat held by ex-Wilcoer, Ken Coomer consequenceofsound

Roddy Frame – Reason For Living There’s not really much sonic difference from an Aztec Camera release, as every album was basically a Roddy Frame solo affair… a pleasure throughout the ten tracks, as he never fails to register sweet emotion or frolicking joy allmusic

Badly Drawn Boy – I Need A Sign This hastily arranged John Peel tribute has, appropriately, the shambolic but spirited feel of the late DJ’s programme. Following I Am Kloot and an acoustic Nine Black Alps, the “headline act” arrives without a sound check or rehearsal. It’s been a long time since Badly Drawn Boy – aka Damon Gough – did a gig this small. Venues like this can be a great leveller. However, backed by bass, drums and flute, occasionally just his own guitar and trademark scruffy hat, Gough’s 40-minute appearance explains why Peel championed his extraordinary talent. Gough’s gifts have always sat unsteadily on those unkempt shoulders. “This reached number 12 in Peel’s Festive 50,” he says, bewildered, introducing the rarely played I Need a Sign as “crap“. But he no longer fools around drunkenly onstage because he doesn’t have the confidence to perform straight. This is as direct and heartfelt a performance as he’s given. Theguardian

Super Furry Animals – Ice Hockey Hair the closest Britpop came to the adventuring spirit of the Beatles. Their indie rock, psychedelic pop, dance, country, glam and space-folk mashup was as pioneering as their aesthetic was madcap – they sang witty songs about unicorns and alien abductions, toured festivals in an army tank, filled stages with yetis and milk floats, and almost convinced Creation Records to buy them an aircraft carrier, which they’d planned to turn into a nightclub… The best song of the 90s theguardian

Comet Gain – Jack Nance Hair originally released on journalist Everett True’s now defunct Mei Mei label. A semi-spoken declaration of purpose, Feck takes turns with fellow vocalist Rachel Evans to comment on the importance of “going home and listening to records with stained sleeves” and “getting back that fire and making your feelings known.” Its message burns with urgency: “Believe in art/ Believe in yourself/ Contradict yourself.” Pitchfork

The Beta Band – She’s The One This band, you see, are my favourite of all time. I should probably point out that ‘The Three E.P.s’ is my favourite album of all time, too. Double whammy. That’s because The Beta Band are the greatest of all time, and if you don’t agree then you are wrong wrong wrong and you frankly have a stupid lying face.

… perhaps the most beautiful moment throughout their entire catalogue. It combines all of my favourite Beta elements: those relentless, driving vocals with daft lyrics propelled by insistent acoustic guitar. The bicycle horn is back. Vocals are sped up into a summery chipmunk choir, and the Keith Moon-esque drums come joyously clattering in, accompanied by an electric guitar submerged in so many effects it sounds like a wurlitzer organ, that spins around and around. It’s glorious. Clashmusic

The Beta Band – Needles In My Eyes It’s the perfect introduction to this indie rock chimera. There’s the lollop of the Happy Mondays. The groove of early Verve. The cut and paste ingenuity of DJ Shadow. Arguably it’s better than any of the band’s subsequent ‘proper’ releases. They were the bedsit Pink Floyd. The band that for years Radiohead would have chewed off their own limbs to be. Nme

Clinic – Cement Mixer Clinic’s first three singles, ‘IPC Sub Editors Dictate Our Youth’, ‘Monkey On Your Back’ and ‘Cement Mixer’, were nigh-on perfect transmissions from a lone voice against contemporary blandness. They’re a good introduction to Clinic’s natty mix of agit-pop sentiment and phantasmagorical sonics theincrediblekulk

Asian Dub Foundation – Buzzin I must admit that hip hop and drum and bass really is not my cup of tea, maybe it`s a generational thing but there are one or two artists that I’ll make an exception for and one is East London formed Asian Dub Foundation, They were and still are an electronica band that combines musical styles such as rapcore, dub, dancehall and ragga. The group also embraces traditional rock instruments such as electric bass and guitar, which acknowledges a punk rock influence. Their music is known for its dub-inspired basslines, guitar parts inspired by the traditional Indian instrument the sitar and fast rapping. Maximumvolume

Six By Seven – 88-92-96 perhaps best displays the Pink Floyd influence. The song is a mini-epic of pessimistic vocals and sonic textures. Chris Olley effects an almost note-perfect Waters tone midway through the song, and the band builds tension through wailing guitars allmusic

Stereo Total – Supercool Normally, when I have a record to review, I station myself at a writing desk, dim the lights, press play, and tap my forehead Winnie the Pooh-style, doing my best to give the album the honest, perspicacious, open-minded, serious, earnest, and committed critical attention it deserves. Stereo Total laughs in my face. They squirt a watergun at my crotch, and then they make a lot of noise with guitars and drums and synthesizers. I giggle; I dance; I do the snorkel, baby. This carries on for about 16 songs ”” a melt-in-your-mouth 45 minutes of poppy abandon ”” and then I laugh and laugh and wish I was touring dirty Düsseldorf hostels with them. tinymixtapes

Afghan Whigs – 66 Be sure to put this one on your Valentine playlist. Rockremnants

Hole – Celebrity Skin Celebrity Skin was a perfect title for the album that would arise from this period of glamour and sobriety. Through the gowns, healthy glow and diet of “movie-star food” she was beginning to embody what it meant to be an A-lister. As with everything Love has done, the music, lyrics and themes of Celebrity Skin deconstructed the concept, picking off the healing scab of her public reinvention to rehash the wounds of her past. Fittingly, the title track and album overall begins with a manifesto-like verse: “Oh, make me over/I’m all I want to be/A walking in study/In demonology.”

Beck – Nobody’s Fault But My Own The sound of broken-hearted, disconsolate and psychedelic Beck… the song you play as you sit in the dark of your room, rueing the day past. Even the title is dripping in introspection theguardian

The Jesus And Mary Chain – Cracking Up from its opening Duane Eddy-style riff, through the frantic tambourine, to the doomy piano notes at the conclusion, would deserve to land higher than No 35 in any chart in a more just universe. It was a titular cry for help, documenting the disintegration of the siblings’ relationship and William Reid’s mental state. Theguardian

The Notwist – Chemicals Radiohead might have received the vast majority of acclaim for their similarly-styled 2000 album Kid A, but The Notwist beat them to it a couple years earlier…. The gorgeous “Chemicals” sounds exactly what New Order would sound like if they were led by as cutting edge a programmer as Gretschmann, a perfect blend of organic instrumentation, electronic tones, and cut-and-paste IDM sampling popmatters

The Aislers Set – Long Division The outfit’s mastermind, Amy Linton, had previously fronted Henry’s Dress, a cornerstone of Slumberland Records’ early roster and a bridge between Britain’s bygone C86 glory and the U.S. indie-pop scene that exploded in the ’90s. Terrible Things Happen, like the remainder of the Aislers Set’s full-lengths, came out on Slumberland as well, and it marked a sea change. Up to that point, punky jangle had been the order of the day, a singsong, buzzsaw whirlwind that Henry’s Dress exemplified. Linton tried new things on Terrible Things Happen: layered harmonies, dynamic shifts between distorted riffs and acoustic strumming, adventurous arrangements, and dreamy, chanson ambience straight out of a David Lynch Roadhouse pitchfork

Pernice Brothers – Wait to Stop In 1999… Pernice Brothers played the (Trinity college, Dublin) ball, along with Supergrass and others. The band members have very particular memories of the event. “The cream of British society sends their children to this school,” says guitarist Peyton Pinkerton. “And there were people shagging up in trees. All dressed to the nines, mind you.”

“We were playing ‘Wait To Stop,’” says bassist/producer Thom Monahan. “We’re standing in front of 1,500 to 2,000 drunk Irish kids in formal gowns, all dancing wasted-as-fuck to that song. We always said that was the make-out song”. Magnetmagazine

Graham Coxon – That’s All I Wanna Do the sound of one of Britain’s most talented songwriters sticking his head in a bucket of chopped liver and moaning for 11 tracks nme

Pulp – Like A Friend Pulp had a way with songs that start quiet and eventually rupture into a dramatic second act… Recorded for the soundtrack for the 1998 film Great Expectations… The beginning is good, but its clean-toned, vaguely wandering guitar part kind of exists to lead towards the conclusion. Then it happens at 1:43. The full band comes in, immediately emphatic with snare hits keeping a 4/4 pulse along with one of the only guitar parts in Pulp’s catalog you could describe as “chugging.” Jarvis rattles off a list of some of his best kiss offs (“You are the body hidden in the trunk,” “You are the party that makes me feel my age”) before running down into a last exasperated “Let me tell you now/It’s lucky for you that we’re friends.” It’s a vicarious bit of primal scream, sonically and lyrically everything you ever wanted to unleash at someone who’s let you down again and again. That might sound dark, but really the song is almost exultant — like the narrator and listener alike have kicked out the demons and can move on clearer-eyed. Stereogum

Cornelius – Chapter 8 “Seashore and Horizon” The Japanese music media isn’t big on “all-time” lists, but when the mood strikes, Cornelius’ third proper album always winds up in the top ten… opens with Robert Schneider and Hilarie Sidney of the Apples In Stereo performing a very Apples-in-Stereo-sounding song. But before a minute can pass, someone hits the stop button on a cassette player, and Oyamada jumps in with his own interpretation of sweetly sung indie-pop, the sort of number that could easily slide into the Elephant 6 catalog. Then the player clicks again, the tape rewinds, and the Apples come back in frame.

Snow Patrol – Velocity Girl What makes Songs for Polarbears special, and probably the strongest Snow Patrol release, is that it manages to balance everything out so fantastically. Too often bands get one dimensional, Snow Patrol eventually fell into this trap. On this album songs filled with vitriol are sung at ballad pace, and love songs are screamed. Cynicism and earnestness walk hand in hand. Pop sensibility and indie experimentalism combine. Songs for Polarbears has been all but forgotten, but anyone who appreciates creative, intelligent, heartfelt music should give it a try. Sputnikmusic

Ash – Jesus Says It is fairly well known that a bands second album is among their toughest releases. How many bands have exploded onto various music scenes with promising, brilliant and successful debut albums, only to fade from the map as early as their follow-up? Admittedly this is often because these second offerings aren’t as good as their predecessors, but there is more than one meaning behind the term ‘difficult second album.’ Ash’s second full length, Nu-Clear Sounds is a prime example of this sputnikmusic

Stereophonics – The Bartender And The Thief Sometimes brown things can be quite good…But when it comes to music, brown– or any of its shades (khaki, tan, taupe, burnt sienna, etc.)– is the last color I want to hear.

…loud music engineered and crafted for Britain’s summer festival circuit that practically guarantees a perennially muddy experience. Picture it: as the Stereophonics chug soupy chords from the main stage, skinny drunk kids line up for the Portaloos, caked in brown. There you have it. Pitchfork

Drugstore – El President With the help of Thom Yorke, this tribute to former Chilean president Salvador Allende (ousted and killed in 1973) gave Drugstore their only top 20 hit. Forfolksake

Babybird – Bad Old Man this is not a fluffy pop, this is…. what is this? Trip-hop? Alternative? Indi? I’m not even sure. It’s dark, it’s menacing, the video clip is …intense. Is it…dare I say it with the piano and strings…lounge?? Is it evil lounge? Nobody told me that we could write evil lounge songs. Allsignificantbattles

The Divine Comedy – National Express What a filthy, disgusting, revolting, nauseating little record this is! Summed up in one utterly crass but nonetheless deeply psychologically revealing lyric, we find all the reasons we’ll ever need to hate The Divine Comedy… This is mock-pop. This is the work of an ‘artist’ who thinks himself superior to his art form and despises his audience. Nme

The Danielson Famile – Rubbernecker Oh, man, the wonder of The Danielson Famile was that they came from a devout religious family, led by the enigmatic and talented big brother, Daniel Smith, and included all his little brothers and sisters. They wore doctors and nurses outfits and sang weird, weird, weird songs.

“They can’t possibly be Christians,” someone once declared within earshot to me once. “They’re too weird!” Therecoup

Half Man Half Biscuit – A Country Practice Blackwell takes to task a country that would rather spend its money on end of the century celebrations instead of investing in the NHS, TV production companies, the cult of celebrity, opinionated weather forecasters (‘I quite like a bit of drizzle, so stick to the facts!’), the general tedium of life and laments the passing of an old age pensioner (‘and the last thing she sees in her life is Sting singing on the roof of the Barbican’)

While there were better received and better selling albums released during 1998, few remain as brilliantly potent and undimmed. Backseatmafia

Masters of the Hemisphere – Everybody Knows Canada While superficially not all that different from many other Kindercore acts, Masters of the Hemisphere have songwriting smarts and instrumental and arranging chops that set them apart. Allmusic

Skypark- Bicycle Boy Bringing the innocent sophistication of melodic pop with a boy and girl vocal exchange to San Francisco, Skypark’s tales of summer crushes and broken hearts were a mainstay throughout their brief career discogs

Cat Power – Cross Bones Style Claiming it was inspired by Madonna, Marshall filmed a video tribute of the Material Girl for “Cross Bones” in the style of “Lucky Star.”… Someone who also loves Cat Power is … Dave Grohl who once described Marshall’s voice as “the most satisfying orgasm I could imagine.” Dontforgetthesongs365