Under the Radar's Top 100 Albums of 2015

Under the Radar's Top 100 Albums of 2015

Original Source →

99.

Salad Boys - Metalmania
September 18, 2015
Critic Score
72
5 reviews

98.

June 15, 2015
Critic Score
79
6 reviews

97.

May 12, 2015
Critic Score
78
18 reviews

Dumb Flesh is a vast leap forward for Power's solo career, which peels back flesh from bone to reveal a throbbing, palpitating polyrhythmic masterpiece.

95.

November 13, 2015
Critic Score
78
32 reviews
It is a complex beast of shade and mood, and it's Lopatin's best work yet.

94.

August 7, 2015
Critic Score
78
28 reviews

Abyss, like any Wolfe album, is a vast and immersive sonic universe, and her deepest and most personal yet.

93.

Briana Marela - All Around Us
August 21, 2015
Critic Score
64
7 reviews

All Around Us is a worldly, global, and harmonious 43 minutes. Marela's fascination lies with sound manipulation and digital music creation tools, techniques (like vocal looping) she employs throughout the album to deepen her already full sound.

91.

Baio - The Names
September 18, 2015
Critic Score
68
10 reviews

90.

September 11, 2015
Critic Score
76
19 reviews
On his seventh long player, Hawley sheds some of the embellishments and the feeling is that of returning to a warm home. A warm home full of terrifically sad songs.

89.

Talk In Tongues - Alone with a Friend
May 19, 2015
Critic Score
68
3 reviews

88.

April 21, 2015
Critic Score
78
28 reviews

It's difficult, ambitious, and very diverse. And while it's fun to see such a promising band trying to make big leaps, Foil Deer only succeeds when Sadie Dupuis and company stick to their roots.

87.

March 3, 2015
Critic Score
69
34 reviews

This feels like little more than a competent game of catch-up for three years away, with Purity Ring now following in the footsteps of others, in a genre where they once led the pack. 

86.

April 28, 2015
Critic Score
73
20 reviews
By trying to be the band everyone wants them to be, BRAIDS have sacrificed the qualities that made them so captivating. And that is one hell of a shame.

85.

Boxed In - Boxed In
January 19, 2015
Critic Score
76
4 reviews

With Boxed In, Bayston comes as close as anyone in creating cerebral dance pop that works for the non-EDM dance music enthusiast as much as the experimental electronic rock enthusiast.

84.

Small Black - Best Blues
October 16, 2015
Critic Score
62
6 reviews

83.

March 17, 2015
Critic Score
79
26 reviews

82.

September 25, 2015
Critic Score
67
13 reviews

While some tracks just aren't that interesting ... Savage Hills Ballroom has highlights worth celebrating. Three albums in, Youth Lagoon will likely remain as lauded as before.

81.

May 19, 2015
Critic Score
80
10 reviews

80.

June 2, 2015
Critic Score
75
16 reviews

One of the rare new acts with a truly original sound.

79.

Here We Go Magic - Be Small
October 16, 2015
Critic Score
71
11 reviews

78.

September 25, 2015
Critic Score
75
17 reviews

77.

March 10, 2015
Critic Score
80
20 reviews

Fresh Blood is a much more consistent album than its predecessor. But with it, White has lost some of the sparkle that makes him so compelling. It's a balance he needs to put right.

75.

October 9, 2015
Critic Score
80
21 reviews

The songs on The Agent Intellect are fuller, longer, and more meaningful.

74.

September 11, 2015
Critic Score
79
10 reviews

Empress Of tackles heartbreak and passion through a refreshingly feminist lens. Girl power never sounded so good.

73.

October 30, 2015
Critic Score
73
13 reviews

71.

October 16, 2015
Critic Score
78
23 reviews

Are You Alone? extends some of the same sounds of Magical Cloudz's debut album, Impersonator, but the music seems stretched and more expansive.

70.

Patrick Watson - Love Songs For Robots
May 12, 2015
Critic Score
70
18 reviews

For long-term admirers, it’s standard Watson fare; a series of bucolic, slow-winding country-tinted melodies led by his majestic falsetto swoop.

69.

March 10, 2015
Critic Score
71
26 reviews
Butler draws on rustic instrumentation and blustery hooks to provide zip to an album oozing gusto and a good old-fashioned sense of song.

68.

September 11, 2015
Critic Score
79
8 reviews

La Vie Est Belle / Life Is Beautiful, sees him scoop handfuls of intricate synth and bright horns, spread his fingers wide, and spill them through the gaps like sand in an hourglass.

67.

Girls Names - Arms Around a Vision
October 2, 2015
Critic Score
73
10 reviews

66.

May 5, 2015
Critic Score
72
12 reviews
If Gardner's studio ingenuity tends to outshine his songs, the record's sonic puzzles are beguiling enough to signal a clear step forward for one of neo-psych's more promising new disciples.

65.

August 28, 2015
Critic Score
82
34 reviews

That's the cloud Poison Season is under-it's not bad, and it certainly has its moments. But on the heels of Kaputt, it can be a frustrating, uneven listen.

64.

Telekinesis - Ad Infinitum
September 18, 2015
Critic Score
74
8 reviews

Ad Infinitum is perhaps Telekinesis' most experimental album to date, but it never gives up on the heartfelt soul that we've come to expect.

63.

January 13, 2015
Critic Score
71
30 reviews
To be sure, Ronson's album is extremely proficient, excellent with its little witticisms and hints of vanity ... but while these folks have the funk, they're just short of sex appeal.

62.

February 24, 2015
Critic Score
72
12 reviews
This all accumulates in a playful, honest and passionate release from one of Britain's most innovative bands.

60.

Nicolas Godin - Contrepoint
September 18, 2015
Critic Score
75
12 reviews

58.

June 30, 2015
Critic Score
84
23 reviews

The music on Summertime '06, Staples' debut, is uniformly great, with spare, booming beats allowing Staples' sneakily technical rhymes to dart in and out of the rhythm. It's a vital entry from a burgeoning new star.

57.

May 18, 2015
Critic Score
77
36 reviews
Plenty of the tracks would fit right at home on the dance floor, but this is much more versatile than that. It is an album full of pop glitter, Hot Chip's signature grooves with hypnotizing melodies and dizzying ambience.

56.

January 20, 2015
Critic Score
80
30 reviews

55.

March 31, 2015
Critic Score
73
23 reviews

Escape From Evil is the most direct, and accessible album Lower Dens have yet made, augmenting their more experimental, Krautrock predilections with the buoyancy of brighter melodies while crafting nuanced, humanist pleas for compassion.

54.

May 19, 2015
Critic Score
75
29 reviews

The Las Vegas native's debut LP is a luminously cool engineering of synths and beats that will no doubt furnish the dancefloors of hipster hangouts across the globe.

53.

April 27, 2015
Critic Score
79
45 reviews

The Magic Whip is far from perfect and it's far from the best album by a band whose greatest strength I've always considered to be their hits. It has to count as a success though, because Blur sound like a band from 2015 rather than 1995.

52.

September 11, 2015
Critic Score
65
24 reviews

It's an easy record to listen to all the way through, front to back, which is a rare thing. It's a very good Beirut album, but the hope remains that Condon has at least one great one in him.

51.

San Fermin - Jackrabbit
April 21, 2015
Critic Score
68
12 reviews

Jackrabbit isn't as smooth as its older brother: it's a heavier record, and demands more from the listener.

Original Source: http://www.undertheradarmag.com/lists/under_the_radars_top_100_albums_of_2015/
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