Gig Reviews
The Smile
K.B. Hallen, Copenhagen, DEN - 13/3
Album Reviews
Best Music Of 2013: Staff Picks
Previous Nextauthor PP date 05/01/14
Year 2013 is drawing to close in the coming days, which means you've already been bombarded by best of lists from friends, fans, bands, and magazines alike. Not ones to skip out on a party, Rockfreaks.net staff has of course also put together lists of what we thought qualified as best music in 2013, separated into two articles of the editors behind the site and the regular staff. Each staff member was asked to put together a list of his or her choosing, where the criteria was simple: if you're reading this article three year's time from now, which albums do you think should be specifically highlighted as the ones worth mentioning from 2013.
During 2013 our writers collectively covered close to a thousand albums with reviews and checked out even more outside of our duties, most of them in all genres imaginable within the realm of rock music and beyond. We have specialists in each style, and all of us have eventually carved our own niche of styles to cover, which explains why our lists are so different from one another. After all, every genre has its highlight reel albums if you're willing to dig deep enough, and we've done just that for you in this article. There are a number of albums that creep up on multiple lists, however, and these are usually ones with particular cross-genre appeal.
In any case, the top 5 on all lists are all brilliant albums which, if you haven't checked out yet, you should consider listening to. Because after all, if people who listen to music 365 days a year combing through releases argue that these are the best albums from the past year's worth of releases, then surely that warrants at least a few listens to figure out why that might be the case.
Without further ado, I present you Best Music of 2013: Staff Picks. PP
DR is our resident post-rock specialist, although his tastes diverge also towards revivalist emo, alternative, and occasionally indie rock.
- 1. The National - Trouble Will Find Me (indie / alternative)
- 2. The World is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die - Whenever, If Ever (emo / post-rock)
- 3. Polyenso - One Big Particular Loop (indie / experimental)
- 4. Laura Stevenson - Wheel (singer/songwriter)
- 5. Captain, We're Sinking - The Future is Cancelled (emotional punk rock)
- 6. Touché Amoré - Is Survived By (emotional hardcore / post-hardcore)
- 7. Deafheaven - Sunbather (post-metal)
- 8. O'Brother - Disillusion (rock / grunge)
- 9. Restorations - LP2 (post-rock / punk rock)
- 10. The Speed of Sound in Seawater - First Contact (math rock)
When it comes to representing the Danish metal heads, MST is our guy. You might even argue he is the scene.
- 1. Abyssal - Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius (blackened death metal)
- 2. Vallendusk - Black Clouds Gathering (black metal)
- 3. Summoning - Old Mornings Dawn (black metal)
- 4. Redwood Hill - Descender (post-metal)
- 5. Ævangelist - Omen Ex Simulacra (death metal)
- 6. Hamferð - Evst (death metal) (doom metal)
- 7. The Ruins Of Beverast - Blood Vaults (The Blazing Gospel Of Heinrich Kramer) (black metal)
- 8. Finntroll - Blodsvept (folk metal)
- 9. Obsidian Tongue - A Nest of Ravens in the Throat of Time (black metal)
- 10. buioingola - Dopo l'Apnea (drone metal / sludge / post-metal)
MN is one of our newer additions at RF.net, covering a diverse range of metal genres from the mainstream to the various forms of -core to the more underground stuff.
- 1. Soilwork - The Living Infinite (melodic death metal)
- 2. Heaven Shall Burn - Veto (metalcore / melodic death metal)
- 3. Tesseract - Altered State (djent / post-metal / progressive)
- 4. Rotting Christ - Kata Ton Demona Neaftou (black metal)
- 5. Chthonic - Bú-Tik (melodic death metal)
- 6. Stormlord - Hesperia (black metal / symphonic metal)
- 7. Carcass - Surgical Steel (extreme metal / death metal)
- 8. Children Of Bodom - Halo Of Blood (melodic death metal)
- 9. Kvelertak - Meir (black metal / rock'n'roll)
- 10. Sigur Rós - Kveikur (post-rock)
HES is another new addition within the Rockfreaks.net review staff; her specialties lie within indie rock, mainstream rock, and related genres, with the occasional forays into other styles as well.
- 1. Benjamin Gibbard - Former Lives (indie / singer-songwriter / pop rock)
- 2. Depeche Mode - Delta Machine (alternative / new wave / electronic)
- 3. Sigur Rós - Kveikur (post-rock)
- 4. To Kill A King - Cannibals with Cutlery (indie rock)
- 5. Walk The Moon - Tightrope EP (alternative / indie rock)
- 6. Far Away From Fiji - You've come a long way (indie rock)
- 7. Vampire Weekend - Modern Vampires of the City (indie rock)
- 8. Backslashes and Bad Ideas - There's No Place Like Home (pop punk / alternative)
- 9. Titles - Modern Sounds In Science Fiction (indie rock)
- 10. System and Station - System and Station (indie rock)
Lærke joined Rockfreaks.net earlier this year, and she has since then covered a wide variety of styles and genres ranging from post-hardcore to metalcore and indie rock to punk rock. These are her picks from 2013:
- 1. The Safety Fire - Mouth Of Swords (progressive metal / djent)
- 2. The Story So Far - What You Don't See (pop punk)
- 3. Bring Me The Horizon - Sempiternal (metalcore / post-hardcore)
- 4. Have Mercy - The Earth Pushed Back (emo / alternative / indie)
- 5. Steven Wilson - The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories) (progressive rock)
- 6. Alkaline Trio - My Shame Is True (punk / alternative)
- 7. August Burns Red - Rescue & Restore (metalcore)
- 8. Hands Like Houses - Unimagine (post-hardcore / emo / alternative)
- 9. The 1975 - The 1975 (indie / pop / rock)
- 10. TesseracT - Altered State (djent / post-metal / progressive)
Jon is a recent addition to our UK staff. His tastes lie within pop punk / post-hardcore / alternative rock, with far too many guilty pleasures within pop/electronic, but he has nonetheless picked a number of site-wide favorites on his best of list from 2013.
- 1. Bring Me The Horizon - Sempiternal (metalcore / scene / post-hardcore)
- 2. A Day To Remember - Common Courtesy (pop-hardcore / metalcore / pop punk)
- 3. Fall Out Boy - Save Rock and Roll (mainstream rock / pop rock)
- 4. Biffy Clyro - Opposites (alternative rock)
- 5. AlunaGeorge - Body Music (pop / electronic)
- 6. Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience (pop)
- 7. Vinny Vegas - The Big White Whale (alternative / emo / progressive)
- 8. Disclosure - Settle (electronic / dubstep / house)
- 9. The Wonder Years - The Greatest Generation (realist pop punk / emotional pop punk)
- 10. The JCQ - Mechanical Young (post-hardcore)
Michael is our newest addition to our staff. Clean vocals are not among his favorites; hardcore and various styles of metalcore/deathcore, however, are very much so. check out his favorites for 2013 below:
- 1. Misery Signals - Absent Light (progressive hardcore / metalcore / melodic hardcore)
- 2. Counterparts - The Difference Between Hell and Home (melodic hardcore)
- 3. Colossus - Time & Eternal (metalcore / deathcore)
- 4. Killswitch Engage - Disarm the Descent (metalcore)
- 5. Terror - Live By the Code (hardcore)
- 6. Leaders - Indomitable (hardcore / metalcore)
- 7. Hatebreed - The Divinity of Purpose (hardcore)
- 8. Into the Flood - Vices (metalcore / deathcore)
- 9. Shai Hulud - Reach Beyond the Sun (metalcore)
- 10. Alter Bridge - Fortress (alternative rock / progressive rock)
And that just about covers everything from 2013 from the Rockfreaks.net staff perspective. We're not done yet, though. Next week we'll see an article covering the favorite albums by our readers. Until then, adios!