Best of 2014, part 2

Welcome to the second part of our Best of 2014 blog entry, where we reveal ProgActive's Top 10 songs and instrumentals for the year ending tonight.

10. THE PINEAPPLE THIEF: Bond (from Magnolia)
The British guitar driven art rock group The Pineapple Thief is a long standing favorite of mine, so it comes as no surprise that the best songs from their most recent album make it to the year's Top 10 - particularly since Magnolia sounds to me a little better than their previous effort, 2012's slightly disappointing All the Wars. Bond is the new album's closing track: a short, effective, slightly melancholic and even desperate sounding song that I instantly liked when listening to the album for the very first time back in September.

9. FAITH NO MORE: Motherfucker (single)
The punk-ish American rock group Faith No More released six studio albums between 1985 and 1997, then quit. After a long pause, there are now once again signs of life. A seventh album will be coming out next spring, ending an 18-year long (!) break, and the first single taken from it was released about a month ago. And what a fun filled rock song it is! Initially, I though I would give Motherfucker a honorary mention only, but after re-listening to it a couple of times I was convinced. The song is definite Top 10 material, and I am eagerly waiting for the full length album release.

8. IQ: Hardcore (from The Road of Bones)
The British neo-progressive rock group IQ began their career in the early eighties, at around the same time with Marillion. Their musical style has changed much less than their perhaps more famous colleagues who are now just another pop rock group. Last spring's The Road of Bones is an ambitious progressive rock album that once again awakened me to their existence: I had completely missed 2009's Frequency but have now listened to both albums repeatedly. Hardcore is a ten-minute epic that exemplifies everything that has always been good about IQ.

7. ANATHEMA: Take Shelter (from Distant Satellites)
So, there is one track on Distant Satellites after all that I consider to be Top 10 material: the beautifully composed closing track of the entire album that is more restrained than many others on it when it comes to instrumentation. In this song, Anathema begins with quiet tones and even though the soundscape widens and gains volume later on, there are never such nervousness inducing, loud guitar riffs as on many other equally beautiful tracks on the album. Anathema are still working in their prime, and I am excited to hear what kind of work they will succeed in producing next.

6. PEPE WILLBERG: Leikitään (from Pepe & Saimaa)
We have now entered Top 6 which, like I wrote earlier, marks the beginning of real masterpieces on the list. What we have here is something unheard of: not only is there a Finnish song on our "year's best" list but it is actually quite high on it. Leikitään (in English, Let's Play) opens Pepe Willberg's album Pepe & Saimaa which was released last spring and immediately caught attention over here. Willberg is a veteran rocker, having began his career already in mid-sixties. Recently he has spent years under radar but this lovely album with even some classical influences marks an astonishing comeback.

5. THE PINEAPPLE THIEF: Coming Home (from Magnolia)
My favorite track from Magnolia is short but has nonetheless a great impact. Coming Home embodies everything that was always great about guitar rock but also adds The Pineapple Thief's unique artistic excellence into the mix. The end result is arguably greater than the sum of its parts, yet there is definitely nothing to complain about those parts. Bruce Soord and his bandmates have veered further away from progressive rock with their latest two album releases; my wish for them would be to turn back and make again something like the undying classic What Have We Sown? (2007).

4. HAKEN: Crystallised (from Restoration)
Last year, we had a 20-minute progressive rock epic at #9 on the list; this year, we have one at #4. Before 2013, I used to create separate ranking lists for songs that are under ten minutes and over, since then I have given that up. Crystallised shows that it is perfectly possible to evaluate longer and shorter works using the same criteria. True; successful longer form always tends to impress more, but when making longer tracks the artist always runs a risk of including weaker passages. This is particularly true here: in places, Haken's masterwork is Top 2, maybe even Top 1 material. In others, it sounds a bit artificial. Eventually I felt that fourth place on the list would suffice.

3. HAKEN: Earthlings (from Restoration)
Last year, we had the same artist at #1 and #2. This year, we have one at #3 and #4. In many ways, the beautiful Earthlings is actually weaker of the two Haken songs, but its strength lies in that there are really no weak passages in it. There are in Crystallised. A much quieter work, it is a lovely song that is enjoyable throughout and carries virtually no flashes of overtly technical instrumental solos and sequences that are Haken's trademark but can at worst sound like virtuosos bragging with their playing skills. This group is currently perhaps the greatest hope of progressive rock's future in the world.

2. IQ: The Road of Bones (from The Road of Bones)
The title track of the new IQ album is an exercise in perfection. It has been designed like a mathematical formula that I know can be a turn off for some. When music sounds like it has been engineered, it loses a lot of spontaneity. In some cases it is a turn off even for me, but here the whole thing works so perfectly that you cannot help but listen in awe. Beginning very quietly and sustaining that tone for nearly two thirds of its running time, The Road of Bones peaks in a heavy metal-ish sequence that gives me chills almost every time, only to return back to quieter notes for its closure. The veteran British group has created a modern progressive rock masterpiece.

1. ENGINEERS: It Rings So True (from Always Returning)
This year's winner is however not progressive rock. My old favorite Engineers has astonished me with year's best level performances before, such as Stake to Glory (2005) and Helped By Science (2009). Now, they did it again. It would be too much to say that on their new album they returned to form - most of the album is really only middling in terms of songwriting quality - but its standout track immediately felt like the year's greatest achievement after I had listened to it only a couple of times in August. Nothing else ever came close. Engineers are pure magicians when it comes to writing unforgettable melodies, and here their talent once again shines like no one else's.

Best of 2014, part 1

Another year in music is almost over, so it's time for ProgActive to once again select its best achievements. As before, we won't be discussing entire albums but individual tracks. And like last year, we will divide this issue into two parts: today, we will go through some overall observations and assign honorary mentions to five songs that we felt were exemplary but didn't quite make it to our Top 10. Then, on New Year's Eve, we will publish our actual Top 10.

Last year, Steven Wilson took the first two spots on the list with his masterpieces from The Raven That Refused to Sing album. In 2012, the winner was one of Wilson's projects, namely Storm Corrosion. This year, as far as we know Wilson hasn't released anything so we will finally have someone else win. Unlike Wilson, one of our past favorites Anathema has released a new album which is worth mentioning here, so let's begin with its opening track The Lost Song Part 1.

It has been challenging to evaluate and rank Anathema's latest release. The group continues to make fine music, but their arrangements have become a little too noisy for me. Many of the album's tracks start well, like the one embedded above, only to get marred by earache inducing electric guitar work towards the end. Excellent compositions, not so enjoyable execution. This is the main reason why I have ended up handing them honorary mentions, even though many tracks on the album such as parts 2 and 3 of The Lost Song and Dusk (Dark Is Descending) are really good.

Another group with a lengthy history and roots in much heavier material than what they currently play, is Swedish Opeth. They released their new album Pale Communion in late summer and while it was a really decent effort, sounding much more like genuine seventies prog than metal, I have had a hard time picking any standouts from it. Overall, a very good album but there are few individual tracks to get really excited about. Here is our favorite, an instrumental called Goblin that at least fully deserves its honorary mention.

2014 was not particularly enjoyable for seventies prog fans in some other respects. Just think about it: both Yes and Pink Floyd released new albums and both of them were among the weakest releases in the genre! The new Yes album Heaven & Earth sounds like the group should already have quit; the new Pink Floyd album The Endless River for the most part contains hugely disappointing, extraneous material from The Division Bell sessions two decades earlier and has been promised to be the group's last effort. Fine, but wouldn't it have been a grander exit to have left this virtually useless compilation unreleased and been content with The Division Bell as their swan song?

So, no honorary mentions to those two, I was just wondering aloud. All three of our remaining ones go to beautiful instrumentals that are pretty compositions but don't really have the edge that would have been required to enter our actual Top 10. First up is the Texan post rock group This Will Destroy You whose new album Another Language was released in mid-September without much fanfare. I probably wouldn't have even noticed, had the album not appeared in Spotify and had that service not sent me a notification e-mail about it. I felt that it wasn't a particularly strong release overall but there were a couple of pleasant tracks on it, the most memorable of them the somehow fragile sounding The Puritan.

I have a feeling that this year has been weaker than 2013, and that is not only due to Steven Wilson's absence. I am looking at the final Top 10, to be published on New Year's Eve, and it seems that even there, only the Top 6 represents true greatness. What is encouraging about it is that, of those six tracks, three are genuine, wall-to-wall progressive rock which promises good things for the genre in the future. Complicated, artistically ambitious rock is still alive and well. The remaining three tracks in top six also border on prog but should be classified as art rock. One of them bears classical influences, one is reminiscent of nineties guitar rock and one sounds like an exceptionally moody pop song. We'll get into more details in only two days.

One of the first album releases of the year was Rave Tapes by Scottish post rock group Mogwai, an old favorite, out on 20 January. We found their instrumental Heard About You Last Night immediately after that which was only about three weeks after compiling the Best of 2013. That led to thinking that with that track, the next year's best list had already started to form. Well, OK, no. Mogwai does deserve to be mentioned but the track is not quite strong enough to enter our Top 10.

Compiling "the best of the year" lists immediately when the year ends always leaves one slightly in doubt. I am fairly certain that I have succeeded in finding most of the best the year has had to offer, but there is always the possibility of unintended omissions because some new song still remains among those I have not heard. In fact, that is a certainty; it is another thing altogether if hearing all those missed tracks had actually caused a significant change on the list.

For example, I have heard several really good 2013 tracks that I had not heard when I compiled last year's list, but that didn't seem to matter much. Only The One You Are Looking for is Not Here by Katatonia and Heartstrings by Frost* would have been mentioned but would not have affected the list by much. Katatonia's song is so good that it might have robbed the tenth place from Boards of Canada; Frost* would have been outside Top 10 anyway. Trusting that this year is not much different, I will publish my Top 10 with confidence.

Finally, we return to Anathema whose new album Distant Satellites also contains one pleasant instrumental that I like but which isn't quite Top 10 material. The track is called Firelight and it has been embedded above. We are now content with our five honorary mentions for tracks that were considered for inclusion in the Top 10 but didn't quite make it. On 31 December, we will get to the ones that did.

Top 250: #1 - #5

ProgActive has been using Apple's iTunes regularly since early April of 2006. At first, with a 60 GB iPod and later with more recent and advanced devices. During these 8 years and 8 months, the counters for individual tracks have never been reset. Roughly four years ago, a faulty iTunes update caused a loss of over a month's worth of playing statistics, but otherwise we still have complete playtime information stored that has accumulated all the way from 2006.

When we started this series on 8 June this year, there were 6,236 tracks in ProgActive's iTunes collection. Back then, we decided that we wanted to find out what the most played tracks in the collection after approximately 98 months of listening were. So we stopped the counter on 6 June at 6 in the morning and have been listing those favourites since. Time has finally come to finalize this series with the best of the best: Top 5.

5. Clean Coloured Wire, by Engineers
(Three Fact Fader, 2009)

The British shoegazers Engineers are the only group that have succeeded in getting not one or two but three entries in our Top 10. In the previous entry, we already discussed Stake to Glory (#8). Now, we have reached the masterful opening track of their pinnacle album Three Fact Fader (2009) and there will still be a third one further ahead. Clean Coloured Wire is already their tenth song in the Top 250, meaning that their grand total is going to stand at eleven. Quite an achievement; they beat even Porcupine Tree. But not an undeserved one, as you can hear below.

For a long time we weren't aware that the song is actually using a sample. The electronic loop that the song begins with and which runs all the way through it has been lifted from a track called Watussi, by the West German group Harmonia; the opening track of their 1974 album Musik von Harmonia. Knowing this did lessen our excitement about the greatness of the track a little but it is nonetheless a magnificent piece of modern, pitch perfect pop music with some art rock thrown in for good measure. That said, there is still one track on this very same album that outshines it.

4. The 1978, by Steven Wilson
("Harmony Korine" single B side, 2009)

We are not entirely sure if the correct year here is 2008 or 2009. Steven Wilson released his first solo album (using his own name, anyway) Insurgentes towards the end of 2008. At some point, there was also a two disc Deluxe Version of the release that contained a few extra tracks on the second disc. The last one of these had no title then, but was named The 78 when it was released as a "B side" to the song Harmony Korine (#61) which was released as a vinyl single in 2009. Embedded below is a fan made video for the song.

As great as Harmony Korine is, The 78 is way better, proving once again that it is not uncommon for B sides to beat their A sides. More a straightforward hard rock song than a progressive effort, it grabs you right at the start with its excellent percussion loop and never lets go. Electric guitars are loud and kind of hard to the ear; lyrics very simple and exceptionally pessimistic - sounding like something that Wilson's bandmate Aviv Geffen might have written.

3. Helped By Science, by Engineers
(Three Fact Fader, 2009)

The third and final Engineers song in our top 10 is their greatest masterpiece. The British group's eleventh track on the entire list is a perfect achievement in mellow pop music that has been on repeat for long enough to reach top three. Not only is it a great composition; what makes it stand out is the way it manages to change key in the middle of a bar and do it without sounding artificial or contrived. We have been mesmerized by this song ever since we heard it for the first time and cannot help but recognize its genius. Just listen to it below and see if you agree.

There is little else we can think of to write about our favorite British shoegazer band. Three Fact Fader is their best album so far. They have followed it with two more releases: In Praise of More (2010) and Always Returning (2014), both of which have been considerably more uneven albums than their near perfect predecessor. Hopefully the group will continue their good work for years to come and perhaps repeat the success of their release from five years ago.

2. Chronos Deliverer, by Glass Hammer
(Chronometree, 2000)

Here is the highest ranking debut on the list. The American progressive rock group Glass Hammer now appears on it for the first time. This happens here, on second place - talk about a one hit wonder! Glass Hammer's 2000 album Chronometree contains this absolutely perfect piece of keyboard driven symphonic prog that we have been playing over and over again. Besides its peerless composition, another great detail about the song is its genial use of female choir that works immensely well. Somehow the group has managed to keep nearly all of their music out of YouTube, so here is a Grooveshark link instead.

Choros Deliverer - Glass Hammer

Glass Hammer have always been great admirers of progressive rock legends Yes. This should be perfectly obvious from Chronos Deliverer already. But even more revealing is the fact that the entire album Chronometree is an intentional homage to that other group's output. And to complete said homage, singer Jon Davison was chosen to actually join Yes a couple of years ago, as their new lead singer. This meant a hiatus for Glass Hammer since Davison isn't allowed to work with other projects during his stay in Yes, however long it may be. We haven't been very excited about the rest of Glass Hammer's output although some of it is pretty good - here is the shining exception that can be qualified as a genuine masterpiece.

1. Milliontown, by Frost*
(Milliontown, 2006)

ProgActive's number one track ever is safely ahead of its competition. No other song comes even close to the number of times it has been played. What's even more impressive is that number in relation to the track's running time. It surprises even us that the song we have played by far the most times in our iTunes collection runs well over 26 minutes. You would think that a shorter track would have a much easier task to climb this high but here is the exception to really challenge that rule, or at least the assumption of its existence.

Milliontown is a magnum opus that consists of several parts, like many of the similar seventies 20-minute prog classics did. It is the single greatest piece of modern progressive rock that we know of, which largely explains why it has become number one on our list already some years ago and has successfully held that position since. It represents all that is best in the genre; an endless flow of invention that has been composed and is played with unmatched virtuoso. In particular, it is John Mitchell's guitars and Andy Edwards's drumming that pack an unparalleled punch.

To close this series, some history data. We have been interested in the most played tracks in our collection before and it seems that initially it was Once by Blackfield, now outside top 10, that held the top spot for a long time during the early years. It wasn't until January 2008 that Bravado by Rush took the first place - only to temporarily lose it back to Once during spring, then reclaim the throne come next fall.

Following this, Bravado was our number one track for nearly two years, until some time in the summer of 2010 Chronos Deliverer (now #2) took the top spot, with Milliontown a close second, and Bravado dropped to third place. Finally, some time in late 2010, Milliontown overtook Chronos Deliverer and has been number one ever since. And, as the very last note: since 8 June this year, Helped By Science has actually overtaken Chronos Deliverer for the second place but still far behind Milliontown.