Best Songs of 2017

2017 was a really rather miserable year, but hopefully 2018 will be better. It wasn't all that bad in terms of music, but I'm busy during the holidays and exam period, so I didn't have time to sort out best albums. I also didn't listen to as many as last year, so it would've been hard to really honestly rank them. These 'best songs', or rather, my (40) favourite songs, are also in order of release, so this list is not a ranking. The whole thing is on spotify, but if you want a little more explanation and notes on my favourite records of the year, read on.

Album Reviews: September

A little late, but I'm here with a selection of September records.

Album Reviews: Spring

Here is my extremely late recap of the spring albums I've listened to - better late than never, I guess. At this point I doubt I'll do a monthly of summer either, especially since there are less releases altogether; so hopefully I'll pick up the regular schedule in September.

Top 40 Songs of 2016

This is my last blog post for the year - my favourite 40 songs of the year. These are not actually the 40 songs I listened to the most - I tried to limit myself to 1-2 songs per artist so as to be more representative of what I listened to throughout the year. Here is the spotify playlist (with a few songs replaced, because spotify still doesn't have everything) - I think it makes for a nice playlist to listen to between the two holidays.

In any case, whether you read the (extremely long) music list below - Happy New Year!

Top 10 Albums of 2016

I tried to narrow my favourite albums down to 5, but even managing 10 was a bit hard, so I made an extended list this year. I've done reviews of all of these before, so here I'll only shortly comment on why I think these particular albums stand out above the rest that I've listened to in 2016. As always, the list is heavily subjective (almost as much as the soon-to-come Top 40 of 2016).

Album Reviews: November

November is busy and this poor college student has had more breakdowns that she could count on one hand, but nevertheless, here is the next - and last for the year - installment of the monthly album reviews. As such, regrettably, I haven't had the time to check out many new releases, but what I did check out was of really high quality, so they shouldn't disappoint.

Album Reviews: July-August

The combination of a busy summer and the lack of many great or interesting releases makes for this two-month combo. I really didn't have time to discover new music. On the other hand, the defining musical experience of the summer was listening to Be'lakor's new album whilst traveling in Croatia - somehow it's the perfect summer metal record and I doubt it won't end in the top five, with all the memories stuck to it now.

Album Reviews: February

Hey there. I know that these days - despite my plans - I just don't write here as much. I don't have the time to write the more in-depth posts I'd want to, and I don't have the patience to write a usual one, say, about fashion (I didn't even have time to follow the fashion weeks). The one thing (thing, as in, beside people and necessary activities) in my life I always value enough to spend time on is music. So if nothing else, the album reviews are going to be here for a while.

February was a good month, especially compared to January - good heavier and more technical records, and some of my definite contenders for year-end lists.

Album Reviews: January

No reviews for December - it's pointless among all the year-end lists, and then it's exam period, and then it's already the end of January, so I don't think it'll ever happen. I'm sure I missed many releases in this past month as well, not having spent much time scouring for new music, but at least the banner looks very unified in its colour scheme.

Best Songs of 2015

Songs, songs, songs - it's even harder to pick out a top 40 than to pick out 10 albums. There's no such thing as a bad year or a good year for songs - there are always great ones out there. As with the albums, these songs largely reflects my personal taste - too weird for the common people, really not heavy enough for metalheads - and is largely independent of the actual "goodness" of songs.

As per usual, links are in the descriptions (the song titles), but the songs are available on 8tracks and Spotify (although 3 songs are missing in the latter). As per usual, the post is extremely long.

Best Albums of 2015

The last Monday of the year is Music Monday with the best - my favourite albums now, and my favourite songs coming in a later post. I must say, despite some highly anticipated records of some of my favourite bands, 2015 was a little less impactful for me (album-wise) than 2014. However, paired with the fact that I listened to more albums than ever before, the choice wasn't particularly easier.

Album Reviews: November

November: the hell month with increasingly less sleeptime. This of course means that I barely had time to listen to new records - so this month only has 3 (well, sort of). At least it's short.

Album Reviews: October

Paragraph one: here's the usual stuff. Paragraph two: it's short, because life. I don't even know why I'd bother writing an introduction after all this time. October was good and gloomy, so if that's your thing, proceed as you want; otherwise, be warned.

A Halloween Playlist

This comes with the usual warning: only for lovers of all things metal. Here you can listen to it on 8tracks, and after the break there's a track-by-track breakdown with youtube links, for those who don't want to listen to the whole length. (And in case 8tracks skips some songs, which it sometimes does.)

Album Reviews: September

I'm here with the newest batch of album releases. It's not really that September had that many more great records - more so that there are loads of releases in September for some reason. Fall fashion? Fall albums? Is it like the summer season and Christmas for movies? Unfortunately, this also means I have no way of properly listening to them all, what with the semester starting and a shitload of university work to be done. I listened to about a dozen new albums, but narrowed it down to these seven - for some reason or other, these were the ones I listened to the most.

Album Reviews: August

It's time for the next album review post. I didn't expect much of the August batch of releases, and it didn't deliver much, but I kind of feel like I'm still disappointed. But I was also in the mood to write negative reviews, so bad ones are happily included as well. On the other hand, September still promises to be awesome, and at least this way I could catch up on a few interesting records I missed.

Album Reviews: July

A little late with it, but here's the July review of albums! Because of my internship, I didn't have that much time to keep up, and because it's summer, I also kind of forgot I was supposed to write it. However, it's been a reasonably good month, though what I'm really excited for is September - as far as new releases go, not about school, of course.

A Music Tag

It's Monday again, a day which would normally be like any other day in the summer, but adult life isn't as kind. I have my internship, which is rather fun, only I have to bike an obscene amount in very hot weather for absolutely no money. But at least I feel like I'm doing something relatively useful.

Anyway, after concluding the same song titles series I wanted to do a Music Monday which would possibly include me gathering some of my favourite songs to dump on the (admittedly very small) unsuspecting readership. I found this tag on (Hungarian blogger) Bree's blog, which I promptly stole. The real challenge was not to include too many songs from my absolute favourites, so I tried to stick to one song per band.
(Long post ahead with youtube links!)

Album Reviews: June

June was kind of weak concerning metal releases, slightly better in other genres - which I just don't really listen to these days. I also had considerably less time to spend on listening to new music due to exams and more exams. I did look through June releases afterwards too, and still nothing really stood out to me even genre-wise; I guess after being spoiled in May it was a slight disappointment. In any case, summer month are always less busy.

Summer Playlist II

Hey, it's the summer solstice!

It's kinda fun that it's on a Sunday. I wish I was in some kind of stupid independent drama where I would go with my friends into the forest, up on a mountain, and wait for the sunset on the year's longest day. Accompanied by a metal soundtrack, cause that's what I'm all about.

Here it is on 8tracks.