Well, Spotify has ‘Wrapped’, but this here is ‘Decanted’; the Song Sommelier album picks of 2023.

I’ve no doubt you have a favourite album. Chances are though, that your favourite album is an old one. One that you got to know deeply. You know the track listing (maybe sides one/a and two/b if vinyl is your thing) and most of the lyrics. You know the cover intimately (and maybe even the inner sleeve design). Possibly, you will know who produced and engineered it and where it was recorded. You might have a bunch of these records - your very own classic collection. But how about recent albums - released over the past few years? Do you count any albums released in the last five years in your classic collection?

In Jeff Tweedy’s (very entertaining) book ‘Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back)’ Tweedy talks about his Dad's favourite songs and how he listened to them (hilariously and maddeningly) one song at a time. He obsessed over a single song, played it to death and then finally, after several months, moved on to another song. Growing up, my own parents had an album collection of about a dozen vinyl records and a similar quantity of album cassette tapes. These included The Beatles’ Help and Rubber Soul along with Gilbert O’ Sullivan’s I’m a Writer, Not a Fighter and ELO’s Discovery. Before the CD era kicked in, it was common for (non-aficionado) households to contain just a handful of records. But in the streaming era we are bombarded weekly with scores of new releases. Many of them are excellent and a huge number are really very good. The album, contrary to any expectations at the start of the century, is a stronger format than ever. It remains the main currency of the business and the format every artist aspires to create. But with such volumes, how does a curious music fan really get to know an album these days as we used to in those simpler times? Being honest with yourself, how many times have you played an album end-to-end this past year? Now, taking an individual album title, how many times have you played that one record right through? 

My preferred method of listening these days is to filter through lots of music (a necessity really, when ignoring new stuff is not an option) and then picking out a record that I think is the one. I’ll then play that record 2-3 times end-to-end and then decide whether or not to buy the vinyl. If I do buy the vinyl it is going to get played - at least a few more times - over a long period. Streaming remains the filter mechanism, mostly. 

Each year, I’ll pick out 12 favourites and post these on the Song Sommelier ‘Decanted’ page. These 12 are the ones I’ve played the most, with most of them added to my vinyl collection too. I’d recommend these records to any music fan and will sing their praises well into the future. To my ears, some of these albums - those higher up on the list - are classics. They are true examples of the format - great songwriting (with little or no filler), production, track sequencing, and perhaps also held together by a strong concept or theme. 

In a rebuttle to anyone who doesn’t rate modern music or thinks that all modern life is rubbish, or that albums aren’t as good as they used to be - I enjoy many of these records as much as I do my own list of all-time classics. Even if I cannot honestly say that I’ve played them nearly as many times.

Happy musical 2024!

VV BROWN: AM I BRITISH YET?

The music industry does not quite know what to do with an album like this, yet by rights, it should have topped the album charts and swept awards lists. VV Brown and collaborators interweave pop and poetry to tell the history of the black British experience. It could all be horribly preachy but because the record is so damn entertaining as well as being an impressive, ambitious work of art, it provides the education free of charge. As a result, VV Brown has pushed beyond the boundaries of what an album can be. And in 2023 that really is something. Musically, it is Erykah Badu, Michael Kiwanuka, Dawn Richard and Stevie Wonder all at once. But the poets provide the power and pathos. And the production and use of samples slap. 

It’s superb. It won’t make a dent in the charts yet VV Brown has created a ding in the universe and made her very own piece of black British history.

Discovery credit: personal recommendation from Emmanuel Legrand