Confirmed Albums
Albums that have been confirmed to be at or near completion, without a set release date, but should see release early in 2013.
AlunaGeorge – Body Music
Expected June on Island
The hype around AlunaGeorge in the UK has hit overdrive recently as the duo’s most recent single “Your Drums, Your Love” has (deservedly) found fans in all corners of the music-loving community. The pressure is on the youngsters to now deliver on their debut full length. They have decided to call it Body Music which suggests it’s music to dance to – something they’ve already proven themselves brilliant at making – but also all about the physical connections and desires which they’ve already touched upon aplenty in the songs we’ve heard. This one doesn’t arrive until the summer, so we’ll hopefully get to hear more singles before then, but in the meantime the tracks that we do already have from AlunaGeorge will keep us both sated and excited.
– Rob Hakimian
Anamanaguchi – Endless Fantasy
Expected spring on TBA
There’s been a curious lack of explosively hooky power-pop-via-chiptune-laced-instrumental-rock in the musical landscape since the summer of 2010 – which, coincidentally, is when Anamanaguchi put out their last set of music, a series of singles that included heavyweights like “Airbrushed” and “My Skateboard Will Go On.” Gladly, though, the drought ended last week when the group released new single “Meow” and simultaneously announced their new album Endless Fantasy, due out in “spring.” No word on an official release date yet, but trust that, whenever it does come out, it’ll be a thoroughly rad (and I don’t throw that word around for just anybody) listen.
– Ryan Stanley
Baths – TBA
Expected early-mid 2013 on Anticon
If you are waiting for a Baths album about butts, you’re unfortunately going to have to look elsewhere. Producer Will Weisenfeld has decided to take a more streamlined approach with his upcoming 2013 release, focusing more on the structured nature of tracks and leaning toward his pop-centric side. Also worth mentioning is his recent inclusion of a full band, which, on the surface is a huge step from his busy “one man with a trigger and crazy dexterity” shows — it’s a step many solo artists like Washed Out have taken, but with the level of power Weisenfeld already carries in his performances, it could be a perfect match.
– Andrew Halverson
Coma Cinema/Elvis Depressedly – TBA
Expected throughout 2013 on TBA
Mat Cothran spends a lot of time quitting Coma Cinema on tumblr and twitter, but despite his best efforts to put the dog to sleep it seems he can’t stay away. After a groundswell of support (a forthcoming retrospective tape of Cothran’s downer-rock under that moniker sold out in one day) it seems that Coma Cinema lives again: just last week he released a demo as the 30th installment of an ongoing tumblr project from Sam Ray entitled 420 Love Songs (which is just what it sounds like). Cothran says that the ever elusive fourth Coma Cinema album will be released in 2012 as well as two Elvis Depressedly albums and maybe more. Either way, given how great both of his 2012 releases (Mickey’s Dead and Hotter Sadness) were and on the basis of that first demo, “Satan Made A Mansion,” it would appear that Cothran is headed for a special 2013 as well.
– Colin Joyce
Disclosure – TBA
Expected 2013 on PMR
2012 was quite the year for Disclosure. The sibling duo of Guy and Howard Lawrence released the seminal The Face EP, which, along with it’s standout, “What’s In Your Head,” made all sorts of noise (including topping both our 2012 EP and track lists) in their home country of Britain, some of which has found its way to American shores in recent months. Disclosure also released “Latch” last year, a liquid smooth vocal house cut and lead single from their upcoming 2013 PMR LP. It looks like the duo could be making a more pop-oriented move with their full-length, and based on what we’ve heard so far it’s a move we’re betting they’re more than able to pull off.
– Will Ryan
The Haxan Cloak – TBA
Expected early 2013 on Tri Angle
The Haxan Cloak’s 2011 self-titled debut via Aurora Borealis is one of the most wildly experimental and atmospherically enrapturing ambient/drone records in recent memory. Multi-instrumentalist Bobby Krlic pairs together blackened electronic textures with grimy, detuned strings to create tactile and swampy haunted house soundtracks more than worth exploring. It’s exciting enough Krlic has a follow up in the works, but the British musician’s pairing with left field electronic heavyweight, Tri Angle, is enough to get downright giddy about. The label and Krlic have been pretty quiet about the record and when it might come out, but this is us waiting with baited breath.
– Will Ryan
Julia Brown – Close To You
Expected February on [self-released]
BPM favorites Teen Suicide called it quits at the end of 2012, but Sam Ray (of Ricky Eat Acid and Heroin Party) couldn’t keep his poppy inclinations quiet for long. Alongside Alec Simke (also of Teen Suicide) and John Toohey, Ray has made what he’s called his pop record. On Teen Suicide’s old Facebook feed, he said “If you liked Teen Suicide because of pop songwriting and melody you’ll probably like the new band, but if you just liked the really overdramatic drug addict depression catharsis stuff you’ll be disappointed and I’m glad.” Whenever Ray peeled back the noise on Teen Suicide tracks, he displayed a carefully honed knack for hooky melodies, and given his comments it sounds like we can expect more of that side of his songwriting.
– Colin Joyce
Justin Timberlake – The 20/20 Experience
Expected early 2013 on TBA
In amongst the gleeful frenzy caused by rumours of an imminent musical comeback – which isn’t to say his turn in The Social Network plus appearances on SNL parodying everyone from New Jack Swing groups to Bon Iver haven’t been supremely entertaining – a fellow music site posited the following question on their Facebook page: “Justin Timberlake is our generation’s __________?” Answers ranged from “Leo sayer” to “Number one douche,” “Smallpox” to “wasted embryo.” All these people, bluntly, are fucking idiots. While JT’s unveiling of a mere countdown was a tad anticlimactic, there’s every reason to believe that the alleged new record, featuring Timbaland manning the buttons, is going to be nothing short of amazing. FutureSex/LoveSounds wound up our 58th best record of the decade and while debut Justified may not have been as masterfully consistent, it gave us two stone cold classic pop singles and about three more great ones besides. Compared to 2003, pop music is in the doldrums, and with André 3000 selling razors and Missy in record label purgatory, if anyone’s going to bring it back, Justin’s the man. Still sceptical? So were people when “Tearin’ Up My Heart” dropped fifteen years ago. Get on board or get left behind. History won’t absolve you.
Update: Timberlake’s now-confirmed new album is to be called The 20/20 Experience – hear the Timbaland-produced single “Suit & Tie” here.
– Gabriel Szatan
The Knife – Shaking The Habitual
Expected April on Mute
The 00s were a bizarre period for countless reasons musically, but one of the more heartening curiosities to emerge from the digital swamp is how a Swedish brother-sister duo in Venetian masks quietly became one of the most celebrated acts of the entire decade, in spite of a relatively thin catalogue to their names. Shaking The Habitual is only their third studio release (excluding the collaborative drone-opera piece with Mt.Sims & Planningtorock), seven years in the making, although both Dreijer siblings put out stellar releases in 2009 under aliases: Karin brought glacial, brooding electronica on the eponymous Fever Ray and Olof unwound complex experimental techno as Oni Ayhun with OAR003. Then there’s 2006’s phenomenal Silent Shout, a smattering of fabled live outings, the indelible modern classic “Heartbeats”…do I even need to type this all out? IT’S THE FUCKING KNIFE. GET EXCITED.
– Gabriel Szatan
Motion Sickness of Time Travel – Various Releases
Expected throughout 2013 on various
By the time you’re reading this, Rachel Evans’ second album of 2013 will likely have already seen release. After the Perennials EP for Boomkat and a split with Imperial Topaz for Tranquility Tapes, any normal musician might let things cool down for a while, but Evans’ blog suggests that she has at least two more tapes forthcoming under her own moniker, not to mention six more releases that she’s collaborating on in the works. Her productivity puts even Ty Segall to shame, but after such breathtaking drones last year on both her self-titled release under the Motion Sickness Of Time Travel banner and the organic malaise of her collaboration with her husband, Grant Evans, as Coyote Image Classic, she’s gotten to the point where everything she puts out is worth at least a listen. Garage rock hermits be damned, you’ll never keep up with the prolificacy and consistency of the Evanses.
– Colin Joyce
My Bloody Valentine – LP3
Expected 2013 (but we doubt it) on Island
Perhaps our most anticipated of the coming year is shoegaze rockers My Bloody Valentine’s follow-up to 1991’s Loveless. Perhaps the most insoluble figure in music, frontman Kevin Shields announced in an interview with NME back in November that the record would finally see the light of day in 2013.
This album has been in the works since 1996 and has undoubtedly been scraped and started from scratch numerous times. At one point it was reported that Shields had turned in over 60 hours of music of various styles to Island Records, some of it influenced by jungle music.
Despite the band reuniting to tour 2007 and reissuing their back catalog just last year, we’ve yet to hear a single note of new My Bloody Valentine material since Loveless so who knows what it truly will sound like. I’m not entirely sure this will actually see release this year, but I’m sure we’ll hear it before Detox.
– Evan Kaloudis
The Octopus Project – TBA
Expected 2013 on TBA
The Octopus Project have been putting out albums of beautiful, largely instrumental psych pop for over ten years now, and 2013’s newest album will be their fifth – you wouldn’t be wrong to call them veterans. Over the past decade, few groups have popped up that matched the group’s idiosyncratic sound and unpredictable nature, and it’d be a safe bet to say that, whatever their newest effort ends up sounding like, it’ll be one of the more unique blips on your radar. And, judging from stunning lead single “Whitby” (a rare vocal track), it might be one of the most satisfying too.
– Ryan Stanley
Phoenix – TBA
Expected April on Glassnote
Phoenix’s 2009 album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, was a brilliant record that contained some of the biggest indie rock hits of the past half a decade – “Lisztomania,” “1901” – so it goes without saying that word of a new LP after three-and-a-half long years of silence is pretty big news. It remains to be seen whether or not the new material can match Wolfgang‘s highs, but, like, I suspect, most music fans, our hopes are set pretty high.
– Ryan Stanley
Soulja Boy – Promise
Due out early 2013 on S.O.D.
Are you not anticipating this??
– Ryan Stanley
Various Artists – After Dark II
Expected early 2013 on Italians Do It Better
Johnny Jewel is on a roll. Ending 2011 with the vast landscapes of sound that he created with Symmetry’s Themes For An Imaginary Film and carrying that momentum through the near-universally beloved neon glow of Chromatics’ Kill For Love, the Italians Do It Better labelhead and producer has proved himself an impeccable curator and an even better practitioner of the syrupy waves of modded Analog synths that make up the Italians Do It Better DNA. Even after a year as accomplished as that, Johnny Jewel spent December cloistered in his studio, hard at work on the the next of his label compilations, After Dark II. We’ve heard excerpts from Chromatics’ contributions to the comp, and those sound by all considerations as perfectly constructed as Kill For Love’s best moments. When we reached out to Johnny Jewel for an interview at the end of 2012, he respectfully declined, but Alexis Rivera, who handles much of the business side of Italians Do It Better, dropped this little tidbit, that After Dark II is “the best album [they] have ever done.” So yeah, let’s hope this one sees the light of day soon.
– Colin Joyce
The Weeknd – TBA
Expected out this year on Universal Republic
No one in R&B is quite on the level of Abel Tesfaye. The Canadian singer-songwriter and producer released three stunning, album-quality mixtapes for free in 2011, and proceeded to blow up, tour, get signed, and reissued his mixtapes with Universal Republic in 2012.
The Weeknd is so dead-set on releasing his next studio album in 2013, he’s even got the folders on his desktop and everything (lol). But honestly, if it sounds anything like the Trilogy bonus tracks or one-off Smiths-sampling track “Enemy” it’ll sure to be another fantastic release that countless babies are conceived to.
– Evan Kaloudis
Yeah Yeah Yeahs – TBA
Expected spring on TBA
The Yeah Yeah Yeahs have kept quiet for nearly three years now, but they’ve stayed busy curating festivals, working on badass cover tunes touring with other groups, and collaborating with some of the most unlikely of their peers. As the minds behind one of the garage rock revival’s seminal releases Brian Chase, Nick Zinner and Karen O have proven themselves to be one of the more adaptable groups to emerge in the early aughts. The arty electropop of 2009’s It’s Blitz seemed so natural that it was hard to believe Fever to Tell and Show Your Bones preceded it. While a change-up of the same magnitude seems doubtful with LP4, it’s equally likely that we won’t get what we’re expecting.
– Brendan Frank
