French Kiwi Juice is a special record. It’s electronic music, yes, but its appeal lies so far beyond that. Hip hop fans are going to find a lot to love here. (Based on “Skyline” alone, I’m hoping Chance the Rapper taps FKJ to write a few beats for him.) Jazz fans will find a lot to love too — listen to the saxophone in “We Ain’t Feeling Time”!

French Kiwi Juice embraces loops, but it’s so texturally nuanced that it’s hard to describe it in those terms. It’s easy to see why the album is getting embraced all over social media: it’s transcendent.

“Lying Together” riffs off hip hop. “Die with a Smile” feels like vintage jazz music coming together with electronic synths.

Without a doubt, part of the lightning in the bottle comes from FKJ’s Parisian background. There’s such a mixture of culture and ideas here that the music could only come from Europe. FKJ is at a point where he’s still sucking up great ideas. The producer is still in his mid-twenties, at a point where he’s not done grabbing inspiration from wherever it’s available to him.

The best tracks on the record, for me, are the jazzy ones and the oddities. I love “Go Back Home”, which has a pop-influenced chorus and a glitchy beat that would have belonged in Kanye West beats circa 2003.

It’s hard to talk in depth about FKJ’s debut. It doesn’t have the raw vocal power of any of the most-talked about musicians of the past couple years. But his textural take on French house is so superb that it bears discussion only in superlatives.

I can’t recommend French Kiwi Juice enough. It’s one of the most consistently exhilarating debuts of the past couple years, and it’s been on steady repeat for the past two weeks.

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Take “Hard Liquor”, the opening track. It’s more energetic than anything was on Tremors, with a beat and chorus that get stuck on your head for days. (I also love the “tremor” beat at the beginning of the track; it’s an acknowledgement of where SOHN is coming from even while he’s revealing where he’s going).

“Conrad”, on the other hand, melds this energy with a blues and soul rhythm that captures the style du jour without betraying SOHN’s sensibilities. That reveals a trend throughout the album: while SOHN’s electronic sound is always more soothing and restrained than some of his contemporaries, he’s not afraid to embrace trends.

At the same time, though, not everything here is trendy. “Proof” sounds like old-school Justin Timberlake melded with some of Radiohead’s ambitious stylings, a sound that certainly won’t be popular with many. Similarly, “Falling” feels like the most percussive track on Rennen. It reminds me so much of what Radiohead was doing with In Rainbows, or what Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor were playing with on The Social Network soundtrack.

For me, these tracks are the ones where SOHN eschews trends and embraces what he loves. They are, without a doubt, the best tracks on the record for my taste. But that’s not to say the rest of the record is bad; arguably, the presence of catchy and mainstream tracks like “Hard Liquor” make the experimentation of “Falling” so much sweeter.

The album’s pacing is impeccable. If there’s one thing that SOHN’s inarguably gotten better at, it’s pacing his record. It was hard to listen to Tremors on a loop. Each track was good, but the record’s overall pacing was fatiguing. With Rennen, that’s not the case.
I know many will disagree — and a lot of other critics already have — but I think Rennen is, taken as a whole, a better record than Tremors. It’s more accessible and has a stronger pacing, and SOHN is able to maintain his impeccable production and style even while he embraces more mainstream sounds.

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But it’s more than the sensational songwriting and her velvety voice that makes NAO’s debut stand out from the rest of the pack. Her approach to R&B is so different from that of her contemporaries that it’s hard to ignore.

Hailing from the UK, where most of her peers are aiming for the sound du jour of minimalistic R&B, NAO’s style is densely layered and sonically maximal. She doesn’t bother with stripping back; instead, it feels like she throws every one of her ideas at the record and only removes them if they don’t stick.

That’s evident even in her vocal stylings: as a trained jazz singer, NAO brings a vocal sensibility to the genre that feels more like the complex pop attitude of Janet Jackson crossed with the deep soul of Aretha Franklin. She brings jazz’s off-beat melodies and accents, but hits those beats with her voice instead of a saxophone. It’s incredibly effective.

It raises multiple questions, but the most important of them is about labelling the record. Is it fair to call For All We Know R&B when it’s so deeply rooted in jazz and soul as well? I’d argue that it is — as often as the rules of the genre are broken, they’re also embraced.

What’s most powerful, I think, is the way that NAO removes the autobiographical element of so many current R&B records, and replaces them with massive female-driven moments of power. Clearly taking inspiration from women like Beyoncé, there are moments throughout the record when For All We Know feels more like a call to feminism and self-respect than it does anything else.

If NAO’s debut has any problems, though, it’s the sheer length of the record. It’s not that the songs are bad; it’s that many of the fine songs (like “Adore You”) are outpaced by the magic of tracks like “Fool to Love”, “Girlfriend” and “In the Morning” (a personal favourite of mine). It’s a long record that could have been improved by NAO making some choices on the editing floor (although what she could have cut, I don’t know).

With all that being said, NAO’s debut record is interesting because it has the dramatic length and pacing — as well as story-telling capability — of 90s hip-hop. But it’s also got the technique of jazz, the trappings of R&B, and the impossible-to-ignore sympathies of great soul. All guided by NAO’s sensational voice.

It’s hard not to recommend NAO as one of the year’s standout records in any genre. Unlike her peers in R&B, NAO isn’t going for minimalism. She’s gunning for stardom, and with massive talent and equally massive hooks, it’s going to be hard for her to miss.

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Hearing the admission was unsettling for those of us who kept up with the show (or the criminal case), but hearing it on a pop record feels all the more disturbing.

That’s not to say that Shura’s music is disturbing. Most of it feels like it straddles the line between modern pop and throwback electronica-influenced work. Take “Nothing’s Real,” which is the first “real” track on the record after the introduction. With a bass line that feels like it’s walking, the chorus feels influenced by the 1980s — Jackson in particular. But the chorus, and Shura’s vocal approach, is thoroughly locked into the 21st century. The bass line is overwhelmed by synth, and Shura’s vocal work builds into an emphatic, almost shouted final line.

Her vocal performance betrays the fact, though, that this album would have fit right in amongst the women making music in the ’80s. Even tracks like Touch fit right in to that decade. The album imbibes vibes from that era without ever sounding anything less than modern and twenty-first century, which is a feat in and of itself, but perhaps more impressive is Shura.

For a debut album, Shura sounds remarkably self-assured — even if she doesn’t trust herself or her emotions anymore, as the title of the record (and the content of the songs) suggests. For her, the record is her way of announcing liberation from her emotions during a particularly difficult time in the hospital. She’s a free woman, one bound to struggle with the difficulties of liberation — as she openly does throughout the record — but one who’s striving to become fully self-aware. “2Shy” is the embodiment of the entire record, the moment where it comes together thematically.

Within that framework, Nothing’s Real is the definition of what a good debut should be: Shura is sure of what she is, but grappling with the details. As her skills become more honed, I look forward to even more records in the future.

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Take Wall F——k. This is an exceptionally thick track, with more layers than I could think to count, and not a single spoken word. It’s an assault, sonically, but it doesn’t feel aggressive so much as it just feels deep and bass-filled. Yes, there’s lots of music like it, but there’s so little that feels so inventive in its light touches.

There’s a reason Flume is such a success. If he weren’t so good at adding pop inflection to big remixes, he’d be making intellectual electronic ambience like Tycho. It’s Streten’s ability to marry both ambience and production value that makes him such a wunderkind.

If there’s ever a rough spot on Skin, it’s some of the rap contributors that appear throughout. These tracks are often weaker than the others, if only because the rappers can’t hold a candle to Flume’s production.

But despite that, it’s hard not to recommend those tracks. Smoke & Retribution is far from my favourite track on the record, but it’s hard not to talk about it because the production work is so wildly inventive. The beat Flume has come up with is almost completely alien, totally different from what we’re used to hearing.

I could point to every track on the record and say something great about it. Skin is the sort of album that’s worth listening to from beginning to end, with good headphones on, and enjoying while knowing as little as possible about it. The pleasant surprises are part of the journey. And the final track is… Well, Beck guests on it.

With that in mind, I want to leave you to listen to Skin without me spoiling some of its best moments. If you like electronic music, you’ll love Flume’s Skin. It’s one of my favourite albums of the year so far.

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And that’s to say nothing of the rest of the album.

Moderat consistently has one foot stepping forward and the other looking back on this record, even with the cover art (clearly drawn on a computer, but only because you can see the pixels that reveal that to be the case). It’s an interesting contrast.

That being said, Moderat has become more of a pop group than ever before with this release: there’s little to no ambient elements of the record, and the group has focused instead on making pop music viewed through the veil of electronic. Some fans will undoubtedly cry foul, but this has been the mission all along (and Moderat has been preparing fans for the change since II).

As a result of the decision to sacrifice ambient tracks and instead focus on vocal-led work, III feels much more emotional than its predecessors. The highs are much higher than they’ve ever been on a Moderat record.

I think the opening tracks are the weakest on the record, and it continues to pick up steam towards its end point. I’m always surprised when an album’s best track is in the latter half of its mid-section, which is why I wanted to draw special attention to Reminder. In reality, though, the whole thing gets really good with Ghostmother, which has an incredible vocal performance that is both hauntingly human and somehow surreally electronic at the same time.

These tracks are the ones where Moderat decided it was now time to play with the notions of what people expect from an electronic record. The final track, Ethereal, is one of the album’s strongest, ambient thanks to its vocal work instead of the instrumentation.

In the 1980s, there was a movement where the last track of the record was reserved as both a summation of what the album was and where the band intended to go next. Intentions would often change later, so the last track was rarely a hint or a warning as it was thought to be, but it always seemed like such a novelty. Ending an album with a promise of what the future might hold always felt bold.

With III, it feels like Moderat is doing the same thing: as the album builds, it’s both a love letter to what came before and the sound of what’s coming from Moderat in the future. IV will be their chance to pull a Zeppelin and blend it all together. Ethereal promises something like that. Given the level of detail Moderat has always put in their music, I have no doubt they’ve thought this through. III is their strongest work yet, and its potential already has me excited for the next collection of work from the group.

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Take Not My Real Life, for example: mixing jazz and electronics with an Alt-J-inspired guitar riff yields a brilliant opening riff and movement that kicks off the song into a high-energy territory, despite the fact that almost all of the band’s competitors have veered off into lazy lethargy at this point.

It’s also a great comparison back to Radiohead: this is clearly a rock track, imbued with all sorts of other genres and surprising in influences that take the song in unusual directions.

If the rest of the alt-electronic, contemporary R&B genre is becoming a glorified echo chamber, Polyenso is a fresh take on it. The vocal work throughout is stupendous, but unlike their competitors, Polyenso never get stuck in a rut and focus on the vocals exclusively. They always serve the songs.

It’s this sort of exploration that litters the album. /// (A Pool Worth Diving In) has all the hallmarks of the prototypical contemporary R&B song, but it’s secondary influences — like jazz and trip hop — elevate the song to a new level that’s beyond what one might typically associate with the genre.

I’ll circle it back to Radiohead one last time, because /// (A Pool Worth Diving In) captures exactly what made Kid A so great in its bridge: Polyenso uses vocals as another instrument, hitting each note quickly with the force of staccato, repeating them until the singer is nearly breathless. It’s a beautiful moment that, at least for me, serves as the high point of the song.

As a sophomore album, Pure in the Plastic is anything but a slump. It’s clearly the band’s superior record; they’ve come into their own. But it’s also significant for the genre. It’s rare that it feels like there’s space for another band in a well-established, typical genre, but Polyenso has earned themselves a seat at the table. I hope everybody else takes notice. From my understanding, the lead single is I.W.W.I.T.I.W.

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Monster is the obvious stand-out track early on in the album: a big, sing-along chorus that would fit in well at a night club is balanced out by a quieter verse that plays well and gives the duo a sense of dynamics that many of their contemporaries lack.

The production really shines here. Lyrically, this band isn’t singing anything you haven’t heard before. The vocals aren’t meant to be any more than soft texture though. As they dance between falsettos and sexually tinged, softly sung verses, the duo makes it clear that they’re not interested in so much what they have to say but how they say it.

Treating the vocals as an instrument frees them up to explore with almost industrial-like rhythms on tracks like Slow, or the R&B-laden Gone, where the vocal work lacks mystery but aids in providing context to the brashness and power of the instrumentation.

The totality in production makes Colours feel like an impenetrable wall, a giant slab of R&B-tinged industrial pop that feels like an attack on your senses. The duo wants to be noticed and demands to be heard, but they make it inescapably clear they’re not interested in being known for their vocals. They want you to listen to the whole package.

By the time you’re done listening to Ivory, though, you’re wondering what’s next for the band. The success of Colours’ debut hinges on how they grow for its follow up, and what they have to say next. It’s a launching point for what is (hopefully) a successful career.

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So Boucher put Grimes on hold for a little while to come up with new material. When the material did flow, it really flowed: there were over 100 songs written for Art Angels, most of which I don’t think we’ll ever hear — and Boucher has made it clear that these tracks are all part of Grimes records we wouldn’t be interested in anyway.

The result of all this writing, re-writing, and experimentation is Art Angels: a celebration of pop set against Grimes’ hallmark sunny sounds and weirdness. The opening three tracks are worth listening to as examples: an instrumental opener that’s simply bizarre leads into the radio-friendly California before the whole thing explodes into the decidedly not-for-radio Scream.

Those three tracks serve as a wonderful synopsis of the record: pop tracks like Belly of the Beat sit against oddities like Kill V. Maim (which might be the record’s best track), often dwelling in some sort of strange tension that makes the entire record feel oddly balanced in its leanings.

Despite these seemingly opposing directions — one experimental, and one radio-friendly — Grimes is able to hold it all together with uncompromising focus and unbridled imagination. Ultimately, the album feels like it’s two steps ahead of everybody else: pop music that’s laser-focused on experimenting with form and style, often to the point of flying off the tracks, all while remaining accessible.

It’s a miracle that these songs are accessible at all, though. Grimes isn’t writing love songs: on Kill V. Maim, she sings “I’m only a man; I do what I can,” words that feel completely defiant to the male-driven institution that is pop music. Throughout the record, Grimes practically screams for her freedom as an artist, experimenting with post-electronic noises and genre-pushing ideas that are more like middle fingers than love letters.

The consequence of all this is that it feels like Boucher is entirely avoiding anything personal with Grimes. There’s a sense of detachment throughout the record: it’s massively ambitious, but it’s also clearly a performance. Boucher isn’t involved on as personal of a level. While the vision is entirely hers, the world feels like a meticulously crafted production of her Grimes alter ego.

It begs the question: can pop music, in its truest form, be more personal? Or does it require detachment? Is Grimes answering the question, or has Boucher merely discovered that Grimes is at the unique intersection of performance and experimentation that allows her to drag a genre forward at the expense of herself?

Regardless of the answer, Art Angels is one of 2015’s strongest records, and a glimpse into the future of pop in an age where anything is possible.

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Apple summarizes their style as electronic folk, but I think that betrays it a little bit. These four songs are beautiful and calming displays of electronic ambient music. It’s like the folks behind Fleet Foxes decided to sing choral arrangements overtop of electronic music: it’s layered, gorgeous synth.

What makes The Japanese House so compelling is that, beneath all the layering and autotune work, there’s a clear soul. This isn’t a quality unique to The Japanese House — it’s been a visible trend in electronic music for a couple years — but The Japanese House excels at pairing it with a sense of minimalism that really puts a focus on the vocal arrangements. So while the music is clearly electronic, it sounds incredibly human and organic.

I think these guys have a good thing going and I can’t wait to hear more.

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