I probably listened to less new music this year than any year in the last decade, although I definitely listened to each new record more, which was very much my intention at the start of the year. I also reverted to buying physical copies of music wherever possible (either on vinyl or on CD), which lead to me setting up my old stereo in my study and only really listening to digital music through Spotify or when I was on the move.

Did this change the sort of music I listened to? I don’t think so, but I definitely found myself exploring the back catalogues of several of the artists responsible for the records below in a way I probably wouldn’t have in previous years, and I think that might have lead to the list being slightly more biased towards established artists I already owned music by than new discoveries and more diverse genres.

The list I’ve come up with for this year (in alphabetical order) is:

Aldous Harding - Party Belle & Sebastian - How to Solve Our Human Problems (part 1) The Big Moon - Love in the 4th Dimension Big Thief - Capacity Bjork - Utopia British Sea Power - Let the Dancers Inherit the Party Cigarettes After Sex - Cigarettes After Sex Colter Wall - Colter Wall Conor Oberst - Salutations Destroyer - Ken The Fall - New Facts Emerge Father John Misty - Pure Comedy Here Lies Man - Here Lies Man Idles - Brutalism The Indelicates - Juniverbrecher Lorde - Melodrama Los Campesinos! - Sick Scenes Lost Horizons - Ojala Mac DeMarco - This Old Dog Mark Eitzel - Hey Mr Ferryman Michael Head & The Red Elastic Band - Adios Señor Pussycat The National - Sleep Well Beast The New Pornographers - Whiteout Conditions Richard Dawson - Peasant Ryan Adams - Prisoner Slowdive - Slowdive Sun Kil Moon - Common as Light and Love are Red Valleys of Blood This is the Kit - Moonshine Freeze The Unthanks - Diversions vol. 4 : The Songs and Poems of Molly Drake The Wedding Present - George Best 30 Yorkston/Thorne/Khan - Neuk Wight Delhi All-stars