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Top 25 singles of 2019 (Part I)
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 22/12/2019
» As promised last week, we've gone back through the 200 or so singles we reviewed over the past 12 months, narrowing them down to our favourite 25. But before we get on with the first part of the list, here's what we learned in 2019.
Beauty in banality
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 17/11/2019
» The year 2014 was quite an exciting one for music. On the Top 40 front, we had a handful of inescapable earworms, like Pharrell Williams' Happy, Iggy Azalea featuring Charli XCX's Fancy and Taylor Swift's Shake It Off. Elsewhere, new talents like FKA twigs and Arca came out with their cutting-edge debut albums (LP1 and Xen, respectively). Standing among those high profile releases was Total Strife Forever, the debut record by English musician William Doyle, who at the time went by the moniker East India Youth.
This woman's work
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 24/11/2019
» "A woman's work/ A woman's prerogative/ A woman's time to embrace/ She must put herself first," the opening verse of Mary Magdalene from FKA twigs' latest full-length album is sung from the perspective of a fallen woman whose fate runs parallel to that of the titular figure. Following her much publicised break-up with actor Robert Pattinson as well as some serious health issues, the English artist finds common ground with the Biblical character.
The age of angst
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 01/12/2019
» Maybe it's a sign of the times, but taking a look at the young, emerging artists of today, you might notice that a great many of them tend to speak openly about their anxieties and insecurities. Much like her contemporaries Mitski, Hana Vu and Beabadoobee, 18-year-old singer Griff channels all of these feelings through unfiltered lyrics that read like a page out of her diary.
The grey area
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 10/11/2019
» To this day, no one can really say for certain what happened to Dear Tommy, a supposed follow-up to Chromatics' stunning 2012 opus Kill For Love. According to the popular (and, perhaps, most credible) myth, the record and its previously released singles were scrapped entirely by the band's producer Johnny Jewel, re-recorded, and then … silence. Dear Tommy, it seems, is being put on the back burner, and in its place we have their latest release, Closer To Grey, instead.
Off the leash
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 20/10/2019
» "Dogs whine to communicate their physical, mental and emotional states..." At first glance, Dogwhine's artist bio reads like the opening to a freshman's college essay. Then, out of the blue, what initially appears to be a direct quote from the dictionary turns into a sly jab at the absurd prohibition on political gatherings of five or more people imposed by the junta: "Not all whines are created equally. Sometimes dogs gather to whine in group. When they come together more than five, they often get chased or taken away." Like hip-hop firebrands Rap Against Dictatorship who brought us the brilliant anti-junta Prathet Ku Mee (What's My Country Got), this Bangkok five-piece are unapologetically political from the outset.
Blast off into the not-too-distant past
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 27/10/2019
» Beadadoobee's backstory is one we're all familiar with: aspiring artist puts out a clip of themselves playing acoustic guitar in their bedroom on YouTube. The video goes viral, et voilà, a star is born. For Manila-born, London-based singer-songwriter Bea Kristi, it all began in 2017 with a cover of Karen O's The Moon Song and her own composition, a two-minute-long acoustic number called Coffee. The latter, set to simple guitar chords and earnest lyrics, has since inspired several covers performed by fans all around the world.
Death Becomes Us
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 03/11/2019
» Well, what do you know -- Foals have managed to pull it off after all. The English indie-rock mainstay finally follows up their Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost Part 1, released back in March, with the second and final instalment. In Part 1, frontman Yannis Philippakis and co got political with tracks like Exits and Sunday while dutifully filling the quota for danceable indie bangers with On The Luna and In Degrees. On the production side, it swung from indie rock and new-wave to funk and disco -- a classic Foals album through and through.
Forever is a long time
B Magazine, Chanun Poomsawai, Published on 29/09/2019
» Let's be frank, bands like Metronomy are hard to come by these days. Call us myopic, but we honestly can't think of any up-and-coming groups who would be savvy enough to come up with classic indie jams like A Thing For Me, The Look, The Bay and Everything Goes My Way. A knack for blending eclectic genres seems to come naturally to the UK quartet, a gift that served them especially well from 2008's Nights Out through to 2014's Love Letters.