My favourite 160 albums of 2018

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OK so this is a very personal chart of albums I’ve enjoyed in 2018. I’m aware, as ever, that it’s extremely long, but I genuinely believe all these records have something to recommend them, and I want to shine a light on a weight of valuable music that might not have shown up on many other end of year lists.

Take the ordering with a pinch of salt; it gets a bit random after the first 50 or so, to be honest.

1. Yo La Tengo – There’s A Riot Going On (Matador)
2. Kamasi Washington – Heaven And Earth (Young Turks)
3. The Necks – Body (ReR Megacorp)
4. Maisha – There Is A Place (Brownswood)
5. Garcia Peoples – Cosmic Cash (Beyond Beyond Is Beyond)
6. Arctic Monkeys – Tranquillity Base Hotel & Casino (Domino)
7. Jon Hassell - Listening To Pictures (Pentimento Volume One) (Ndeya)
8. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – Hope Downs (Sub Pop)
9. The Skiffle Players – Skiff (Spiritual Pajamas)
10. Ty Segall – Freedom’s Goblin (Drag City)
11. Kurt Vile – Bottle It In (Matador)
12. Ryley Walker – Deafman Glance (Dead Oceans)
13. Jeff Tweedy – Warm (dBpm)
14. Red River Dialect – Broken Stay Open Sky (Paradise Of Bachelors)
15. Sarathy Korwar – My East Is Your West (Gearbox)
16. Lonnie Holley – Mith (Jagjaguwar)
17. Brigid Mae Power – The Two Worlds (Tompkins Square)
18. Weeping Bong Band – Weeping Bong Band (Feeding Tube)
19. Makaya McCraven – Universal Beings (International Anthem)
20. Stephen Malkmus – Sparkle Hard (Domino)
21. Eiko Ishibashi – The Dream My Bones Dream (Drag City)
22. Richard Swift – The Hex (Secretly Canadian)
23. Wet Tuna – Livin’ The Die (Feeding Tube)
24. Harmony Rockets –With Peter Walker - Lachesis/Clotho/Atropos (Tompkins Square)
25. One Eleven Heavy – Everything’s Better (Kith & Kin)
26. Scott Hirsch - Lost Time Behind the Moon (Scissor Tail)
27. Cath & Phil Tyler – The Ox And The Ax (Thread)
28. Cave – Allways (Drag City)
29. Nathan Bowles – Plainly Mistaken (Paradise Of Bachelors)
30. Meg Baird & Mary Lattimore – Ghost Forests (Three Lobed)
31. Unknown Mortal Orchestra – Sex & Food (Jagjaguwar)
32. Cat Power – Wanderer (Domino)
33. Tuluum Shimmering – The One That Touched The Sky (Tuluum Shimmering)
34. M Geddes Gengras – Light Pipe (Room40)
35. Liam Hayes – Mirage Garage (Weird Vacation)
36. Prana Crafter – Bodhi Cheetah’s Choice (Beyond Beyond Is Beyond)
37. Cypress Hill – Elephants On Acid (BMG)
38. Oh Sees – Smote Reverser (Castle Face)
39. Ryley Walker – The Lillywhite Sessions (Dead Oceans)
40. Pusha T – Daytona (GOOD Music/Def Jam)
41. Elephant Micah – Genericana (Western Vinyl)
42. Nathan Salsburg – Third (No Quarter)
43. Jack White – Boarding House Reach (Third Man)
44. Park Jiha – Communion (Tak:til)
45. Cavern Of Anti-Matter – Hormone Lemonade (Duophonic)
46. Jim O’Rourke – Sleep Like It’s Winter (Newhere)
47. Gwenifer Raymond – You Were Never Much Of A Dancer (Tompkins Square)
48. Szun Waves – New Hymn To Freedom (The Leaf Label)
49. Sunwatchers – II (Trouble In Mind)
50. David Crosby – Here If You Listen (BMG)
51. Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids – An Angel Fell (Strut)
52. The Breeders – All Nerve (4AD)
53. Daniel Bachman – The Morning Star (Three Lobed)
54. Anderson .Paak – Oxnard (Aftermath)
55. Papa M – A Broke Moon Rises (Drag City)
56. Joseph Shabason – Anne (Western Vinyl)
57. Third Eye Foundation – Wake The Dead (Ici D’Ailleurs)
58. Träden – Träden (Subliminal Sounds)
59. Ben Lamar Gay - Downtown Castles Can Never Block The Sun (International Anthem)
60. Hot Snakes – Jericho Sirens (Sub Pop)
61. Israel Nash – Lifted (Loose)
62. Arve Henriksen – The Height Of The Reeds (Rune Grammofon)
63. Cowboy Junkies – All That Reckoning (Proper)
64. Rosali – Trouble Anyway (Scissor Tail)
65. Low – Double Negative (Sub Pop)
66. Phil Cook – People Are My Drug (Psychic Hotline/Thirty Tigers)
67. Richard Thompson – 13 Rivers (Proper)
68. Janelle Monae – Dirty Computer (Wonaland/Bad Boy)
69. Hailu Mergia – Lala Belu (Awesome Tapes From Africa)
70. Ty Segall – Fudge Sandwich (In The Red)
71. Mary Lattimore – Hundreds Of Days (Ghostly International)
72. Joan As Police Woman – Damned Devotion (PIAS)
73. White Denim – Performance (City Slang)
74. Courtney Barnett – Tell Me How You Really Feel (Milk)
75. Saariselka – Ceres (Longform Editions)
76. Brendon Anderegg – June (Thrill Jockey)
77. Die Wait Watchers – Suspension Of Disbelief (Idea)
78. Khruangbin – Con Todo El Mundo (Dead Oceans)
79. Howlin Rain – The Alligator Bride (Silver Current)
80. Natalie Prass – The Future And The Past (ATO)
81. Makaya McCraven - Where We Come From (CHICAGOxLONDON Mixtape) (International Anthem)
82. Tuluum Shimmering – Dancing In The Seven Skies (Tuluum Shimmering)
83. Amen Dunes – Freedom (Sacred Bones)
84. Prana Crafter – Enter The Stream (Sunrise Ocean Bender/Cardinal Fuzz)
85. Beast – Ens (Thrill Jockey)
86. Steve Reich – Pulse/Quartet (Nonesuch)
87. Fatoumata Diawara – Fenfo (Shanachie)
88. Will Oldham – Songs Of Love And Horror (Domino)
89. Doug Paisley – Starter Home (No Quarter)
90. Eleanor Friedberger – Rebound (Frenchkiss)
91. Imarhan – Temet (City Slang)
92. Christine And The Queens – Chris (Because)
93. Marisa Anderson – Vloud Corner (Thrill Jockey)
94. Neil Young – Paradox (Reprise)
95. Vince Staples – FM (Def Jam)
96. Julia Holter _ Aviary (Domino)
97. Glenn Jones - The Giant Who Ate Himself and Other New Works For 6 & 12 String Guitar (Thrill Jockey)
98. Kacy & Clayton – The Siren’s Song (New West)
99. Jerry David DeCicca – Time The Teacher (Impossible Ark)
100. Alela Diane – Cusp (All Points)
101. William Basinski & Lawrence English – Selva Obscura (Temporary Residence)
102. Matthew ‘Doc’ Dunn – Lightbourn (Cosmic Range)
103. Thom Yorke – Suspiria (XL)
104. Andrew Bernstein – An Exploded View Of Time (Hausu Mountain)
105. Gas – Rausch (Kompakt)
106. Ali Shaheed Muhammad & Adrian Younge – The Midnight Hour (Linear :Labs US)
107. Sarah Louise – Deeper Woods (Thrill Jockey)
108. Sleep – The Sciences (Third Man)
109. Jim James – Uniform Distortion (ATO)
110. Tony Allen & Jeff Mills – Tomorrow Comes The Harvest (Blue Note)
111. Egyptology - Sure Les Autres Mondes (Hands In The Dark)
112. Earl Sweatshirt – Some Rap Songs (Tan Cressida/Columbia)
113. Jerry David DeCicca – Burning Daylight (Super Secret)
114. Unknown Mortal Orchestra – IC-01 Hanoi (Jagjaguwar)
115. Charles Bradley – Black Velvet (Dunham)
116. Oren Ambarchi & Jim O’Rourke – Hence (Editions Mego)
117. Seabuckthorn – A House With Too Much Fire (Bookmaker Records/La Cordillère)
118. Circles Around The Sun – Let It Wander (Rhino)
119. Andy Jenkins – Sweet Bunch (Spacebomb)
120. Leon Vynehall – Nothing Is Still (Ninja Tune)
121. The Other Years – The Other Years (No Quarter)
122. Tim Hecker – Kpnoyo (Kranky)
123. Alva Noto – Unieqav (Noton)
124. Nat Birchall – Sounds Almighty (Tradition Disc)
125. The Goon Sax – We’re Not Talking (Wichita)
126. Sarah Davachi – Gave In Rest (Ba Da Bing)
127. Wooden Shjips – V (Thrill Jockey)
128. Elvis Costello & The Imposters – Look Now (Concord)
129. Mountain Man – Magic Ship (Bella Union)
130. Kelly Moran – Ultraviolet (Warp)
131. Neneh Cherry – Kong (Smalltown Supersound)
132. Gaye Su Akyol – Istikrarli Hayal Hakikattir (Glitterbeat)
133. The Dead Tongues – Unsung Passage (Psychic Hotline)
134. Jackie O Motherfucker – Bloom (Textile)
135. The Fossil Lickers – The Fossil Lickers (Blue Hole)
136. Infinite Music – A Tribute To La Monte Young (Fire)
137. Jess Williamson – Cosmic Wink (Mexican Summer)
138. Andrew Tuttle – Andrew Tuttle (Room40)
139. Byron Westbrook – Confluence Patterns (Umor Rex)
140. Dire Wolves - Paradisiacal Mind (Cardinal Fuzz/Feeding Tube)
141. Tashi Wada With Yoshi Wada & Friends – FRKWYS Vol 14: Nue (RVNG Intl)
142. Charalambides – Tom & Christina Carter (Drawing Room)
143. Jennifer Castle – Angels Of Death (Paradise Of Bachelors)
144. J Mascis – Elastic Days (Sub Pop)
145. Anna & Elizabeth – The Invisible Comes To Us (Smithsonian Folkways)
146. Julian Cope – Skellington 3 (Head Heritage)
147. Joshua Abrams – Excavations (Feeding Tube)
148. Matthias Puech – Alpestres (Hands In The Dark)
149. Vive La Void – Vive La Void (Sacred Bones)
150. Sons Of Kemet – Your Queen Is a Reptile (Impulse!)
151. Tropical Fuck Storm – A Laughing Death In Meatspace (Joyful Noise)
152. Mind Over Mirrors – Bellowing Sun (Paradise Of Bachelors)
153. Joe Armon-Jones – Starting Today (Brownswood)
154. Daniel Avery – Song For Alpha (Phantasy Sound)
155. The Turbans – The Turbans (Six Degrees)
156. Catrin Finch & Seckou Keita – Soar (Bendigedig)
157. HC McEntire – Lionheart (Merge)
158. The Magpie Salute – High Water I (Mascot)
159. Ben Bertrand – NGC 1999 (Les Albums Claus)
160. Jason Stein's Locksmith Isidore - After Caroline (Northern Spy)

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