“In the midst of a global pandemic that has dominated 2020—roaming across a cinematic soundscape in flux, and surveying darker, perhaps stranger chasms—(artists) draw inspiration and energy from a year of solitude and uncertainty.” ~ AKOUSMATTER.
Igloo contributors Alan, Chris, Clint, Eric, Godefroy, Philippe, Pietro, Tom, and Robbie compiled an extensive list of favorites from 2020 (and it’s likely we missed a few too). After covering hundreds of releases in 2020, many notables—including links to their respective Igloo reviews or release pages—are cataloged here. As usual, there are no winners or runners-up as the lists are alphabetized by artist and selected tracks are featured on our Soundcloud playlist. Shifting into a new decade, we’re looking forward to another round of (post-pandemic) exp-electronic music in 2021.
“I’m not sure that art can be produced by computer. It may just be my limitations as a programmer. And it may be that someone will come along and apply machine learning in a way that’s actually emotionally gratifying. But for me personally, I can’t build systems that do that.” ~ Sean Booth / Autechre (nytimes.com) 2020
LONG PLAYERS ::
214 :: Exposure to Winds (20/20 Vision)
4T Thieves :: Cities of the Future / Liminal Space (Rednetic)
Adam Jay :: Inoperable Data (Detroit Underground)
ADJ :: Selected Transmissions From The Pyramid (For Those That Knoe)
AES Dana :: Inks (Ultimae)
Alva Noto :: Xerrox Vol. 4 (Noton)
AKOUSMATTER :: AKOUSMATASM 2 (Self Released)
Analytica :: Analytica (Ice Machine)
Anthéne :: Collide (Home Normal)
Arovane :: Gestalt (Puremagnetik)
AUSKLANG :: Resonanz (Self Released)
Autechre :: AE_LIVE 2016/2018 (Warp)
Autechre :: SIGN / PLUS (Warp)
Benoît Pioulard :: A Few Moments In (Disques d’Honoré)
BLAEN :: Semi Lunar Canals (Augsmatic Diaspore)
BLAEN :: Strategy Of Desire (Concrete Collage)
Bluetech :: Underwater Cities (Behind The Sky)
bvdub :: Wrath & Apathy (n5MD)
Cabaret Voltaire :: Shadow of Fear (Mute)
Carbinax :: Flex / Gone To Ground (Self Released)
Carlo Giustini :: Gli Spiriti Della Marca (Vaagner)
Cathode Ray Tube :: Katabasis (M-Tronic)
Celer :: For The Meantime (Longform Editions)
Christopher Bissonnette :: The Wine Dark Sea (Dronarivm)
citizenGreen :: Unearthed (High Grade Media)
Clocolan :: It’s Not Too Early For Each Other (Castles In Space)
Colin Dyer :: Cypher (Schematic Music Co.)
Cult48 :: Catalog 1 (Self Released)
Daiki F :: Mountain Sons (Rednetic/Sound Miyadaiku)
Dalham :: Alderson Loop (Castles In Space)
Dahlia’s Tear :: Descendants of the Moon (Cryo Chamber)
Daniel Avery :: Love + Light (Phantasy / Mute)
Daniel Avery & Alessandro Cortini :: Illusion of Time (Mute)
Datacrashrobot :: Embedded System (Diffuse Reality)
Digitonal :: Set The Weather Fair (Just Music)
Dimensional Holofonic Sound :: Seeing Is Believing (Self Released)
Dohnavùr :: You Can and You Shall (Werra Foxma)
Echo Canyon :: Skinner/Subside (Untitled-1)
EEDL :: Unstored (Lapsus)
EKS.Center :: Murmurations (M-Tronic)
Everyday Dust :: Mirrors (Sparkwood)
Faex Optim :: Let’s Pretend (Carpe Sonum)
Florence :: Analogue Expressions (Delsin)
Furrows :: A Thin Veneer (Courier Sound)
Gamardah Fungus :: 10 Yr Compilation: Singles, Rarities, Remixes (Self Released)
Generation Lossless :: Portrait In Circuit (Self Released)
Geneva Skeen :: Double Blind (Room40)
Giuseppe Falivene :: Echoes, difffusions (Shimmering Moods)
Grischa Lichtenberger :: KAMILHAN, il y a péril en la demeure (Raster)
Hirotaka Shirotsubaki :: Slowdance, Lowtide (Self Released)
Hotel Neon :: Moments (Sound in Silence)
HRYM :: Organik (Dyadik / Touched Music)
Ian Boddy :: Modulations (DiN)
Itai :: Zeros and Twos (TruthTable)
Ital Tek :: Outland (Planet Mu)
ITSU :: HAR1 (Detroit Underground)
IX :: Personal Energy Device (Pyramid Transmissions)
Jehnny Beth :: To Love Is To Live (20L07)
Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith :: The Mosaic of Transformation (Ghostly International)
Keiss :: Urban Utopia (Touched Revolutions)
KiloWatts :: Eight Experiments (KiloWatts Music)
Kiln :: Astral Welder (Ghostly International)
KMRU :: Peel (Editions Mego)
Lamasz :: Nature Morte (Past Inside the Present)
Lee :: Alcyonian (Concrete Collage)
Letters From Mouse :: Watching (Music Is The Devil)
Letters From Mouse :: Proto Human (Kahvi Collective)
Loden :: Paraiso (Self Released)
LoFi Freq :: Lost In The Wires (Detroit Underground)
Lorenzo Senni :: Scacco Matto (Warp)
Lorn & Dolor :: Zero Bounce (Wednesday Sound)
Martin Nonstatic :: Treeline (Ultimae)
Mary Lattimore :: Silver Ladders (Ghostly International)
Merrin Karras :: Northwest Passage (A Strangely Isolated Place)
Mitoma & Weldroid :: MXW (Soun)
MLTPLX :: EPONYM (Detroit Underground)
Monolake :: Archaeopteryx (Imbalance Computer Music)
Nalepa :: Thoughtforms (Self Released)
Nine Inch Nails :: Ghosts VI: Locusts / Ghosts V: Together (The Null Corporation)
NNYz? :: Reveries (Self Released)
Nordvest :: Grøndal (Suction)
North Atlantic Drift :: Pillars (Polar Seas)
Nuanæ :: For Everything That Rises Must Converge (Paracusia Media)
NULLPTR :: Future World (Central Processing Unit)
Ocoeur :: Everything (n5MD)
øjeRum :: Selected Percussive Works ’98-2001 VI-VIII (Opal Tapes)
Onepointwo :: Θέρος (Woodford Halse)
Panama Fleets :: Golden Age of Alpinism (Sparkwood)
Patricia :: Maxyboy (Ghostly International)
Pausal :: Melatonia (Past Inside the Present)
PBS73 :: Super Electric Voyage (Magic Square)
Pretty Sneaky :: Pretty Sneaky (Mana)
Proswell :: Amaterasu / Remixes by Friends (Touched Music)
Qebo :: APRDKT (Detroit Underground)
Radek Rudnicki :: Re: conet_c (Github / Wave Folder)
Rafael Anton Irisarri :: Peripeteia (Dais)
Rime Trails :: The Light of Setting Suns (Self Released)
Rival Consoles :: Articulation (Erased Tapes)
RTR :: PlanetX / Symmetriades (Analogical Force)
RX-101 :: Serenity (Suction)
Scanner :: An Ascent (DiN)
Single Cell Orchestra :: Remember The Future (Celldom)
Skurken :: Zetorr (Touched Music)
Skytree :: Infraplanetary (Timewheel)
Snowbeasts :: Energy (M-Tronic)
Snowbeasts + Solypsis :: Fever Dream (Ohm Resistance)
Snowbeasts & Solypsis :: Snowbeasts & Solypsis (Component)
Soul Flask :: The Twilight of Flight (Werra Foxma)
Squarepusher :: Be Up A Hello (Warp)
SubtractiveLAD :: Mercy (Self Released)
Sunao Inami :: 2018—2019 (Electr-ohm)
Syl Kougaï :: Modular Series • Season-01 EP1-EP3 (Self Released)
Tape Loop Orchestra :: Returning One (Tape Loop Orchestra)
The Fear Ratio :: They Can’t Be Saved (Skam)
The JDs :: The Texas Chain Store Manager (Pretension)
The Loop Union :: Serendipity (Werra Foxma)
The Midnight :: Monsters (Counter)
The Orb :: Abolition of the Royal Familia (Cooking Vinyl)
The OST :: The OST (Self Released)
thme :: that’s what it will be like (whitelabrecs)
Tim Koch :: Scordatura (Self Released)
Tokee :: Stages (Mahorka)
Tomoroh Hidari :: 小さな夢達 (Mahorka)
Trichome :: Cognitive Dissonance (Schematic Music Co.)
Valance Drakes :: Freedom Is Its Own Kind Of Salary (laaps)
Vcam :: Arconide (n5MD)
V-Stók :: Aquatic Rituals (Amek Collective)
Wagon Christ :: Recepticon (People of Rhythm)
William Basinski :: Lamentations (Temporary Residence Limited)
Wirewound :: Discharger (Kaer’Uiks)
Yaporigami :: Decoded Sphere (Virgin Babylon)
Yaporigami :: IDMMXX (The Collection Artaud)
Zake :: Orchestral Studies Collectanea / Unfurled Works (Past Inside the Present)
“In the midst of a global pandemic that has dominated 2020—roaming across a cinematic soundscape in flux, and surveying darker, perhaps stranger chasms—I drew inspiration and energy from a year of solitude and uncertainty.” ~ AKOUSMATTER, 2020
EXTENDED PLAYERS / SINGLES ::
214 :: Si View (Cultivated Electronics)
Alg0rh1tm :: Artificial Omnipotence (Teorema / Diffuse Reality)
Ascent :: The Maw (Renraku)
Ben Lukas Boysen :: Mirage (Erased Tapes)
Bochum Welt :: Seafire Remixes (Central Processing Unit)
Brainwaltzera :: Brainwaltzera Remix (Touched Music)
Caramel Chameleon :: Solitario (030303)
Carl Finlow :: Romboid Assassin (Lone Romantic)
Cignol :: Guidance Release (Distant Worlds)
Cold Colors :: Le Part De L’ombre (Femur)
Composite Profuse :: North Electric Mist (Onrijn)
Core Alter :: Voice Array (Kaer’Uiks)
Cutting Room :: The Night Chemist (brokntoys)
Dadub :: A Sun Called Moon (Ohm Resistance)
Diasiva :: Asunder (Acroplane)
DJ DESOBEDIENTE :: Excepción 2020 (Massage Brain Cult)
Dr.Nojoke :: Post Techno Crisis (Goldmin Music)
Eoism :: Collapse Yourself (Pulse Drift)
Esem :: Chaos Crop (Self Released)
Eusebeia, Atiq & Arlow :: Transfiguration (Mindtrick)
exm :: LS16 (Touched Revolutions)
Golden Fangs :: Golden Fangs (Concrete Collage)
Grandbruit :: Oratoire (Healing Sound Propagandist)
Ignatius :: Bundle Drift (Buried In Time)
Infinite Scale :: The Value of Accessibility (VLSI)
illektrolab :: Paranoid Android (brokntoys)
Ital Tek :: Dream Boundary (Planet Mu)
Jérôme Chassagnard :: Childhood (Hymen)
Kero :: Highways (Detroit Underground)
London Modular Alliance :: London Modular Alliance (brokntoys)
Mantle Of Gets :: Sba Per, Puffing like an Adder, and Vanity Board (Uchelfa)
Michael Valentine West :: Stillness Is A Virtue (Subcontinental)
Molez :: Álomkór (Self Released)
Myoptik :: The Burnt Wonga Story (Kaer’Uiks)
ΠΕΡΑ ΣΤΑ ΟΡΗ :: REVANCHE (Evel)
ΠΕΡΑ ΣΤΑ ΟΡΗ :: святой ISO (Self Released)
Neud Photo :: Dreamz (Mysidian)
Nuron / As One :: La Source (De:tuned)
Ochre :: Understory (Mystic & Quantum)
oliviaway :: stillness (Self Released)
Ossa :: Violent Wig Store Robbery / Suki Swims (Schematic Music Co.)
PDF :: Pistel Drukman Farmer (Self Released)
Recue :: Fathoms & Akrasia (MethLab)
Richard Devine :: SYSTIK (BL_K Noise)
Rico Casazza :: Purplewave (Dionysian Mysteries)
Roel Funcken :: Dragomane Misinize (Bion Glent)
Rorquals and Dead Circuits :: Symbiosis (Courier Sound)
Satoshi Kanno :: MONOC (ADSR Collective)
Silicon Scally :: Dormant (Central Processing Unit)
Sphere² :: Dimension Beast (Inpuj)
Somatic Responses :: The Dogma of Function (Errorgrid)
The Jaffa Kid :: Soft Celebration (Gated)
Tokee & Tapage :: The Collider Circle (Hymen)
Tom Hall :: Bestowed Order On Chaos (Errorgrid)
Tulpa :: Checks Cashed (TruthTable)
utem kaure :: smell of flowers (Self Released)
Valance Drakes :: Not Taking This Gratitude For Granted (Abstrakt Reflections)
Vhsceral :: Me Time (Renraku)
Widdendream :: Wave of Silence (Kernkrach)
“Restricting myself to the bare minimum, I like to think I toyed with the imperfections of the hissing sounds to create beautiful overlapping textures, like a still life painting slowly taking form” ~ Pier-Luc Tremblay (Nature Morte, PITP) 2020
COMPILATIONS ::
√∆1 (Massage Brain Cult)
5YA CD (Evel)
10 Years (Abstrakt Reflections)
Alien Transmissions Vol 1 (Pyramid Transmissions)
Australian Bushfire (Part 1) / (Part 2) (Touched Music)
Carebots (Bass Agenda)
CARJACK CITY Volume II – Electronic Boogaloo (Roulette Rekordz)
Clear Memory 004 (Clear Memory)
Communication Themes Volume 9 (Renraku)
Compiler – Level 2 (Xephem)
Decima Circuits: Cottage Industries 10 (Neo Ouija)
Distant Arrays 01 EP (Satellite Era)
Eastern Depths IV (Mahorka)
Exhibit A (Aud-Art)
Exhibition #100 (Audiobulb)
Found Sound 2 (Touched Music)
Healing Sounds from Past Inside the Present (Past Inside the Present)
Home Normal (Home Normal)
Hole (X4)
Kollektion 7 (Katabatik)
MOACD1 (Móatún 7)
PANICDEMIA (Élan Vital)
PlanetMµ25 (Planet Mu)
Portals (Behind The Sky Music)
Reverberations of Stone (Ohm Resistance)
Seventh Listen (People Can Listen)
Strange Selectors (Werra Foxma)
Symbiosis by Rorquals and Dead Circuits (Courier Sound)
tʌntrə II (Neotantra)
Tone Science Module No.4 Form and Function (DiN)
Touched Electronix 005 (Furthur Electronix)
Twenty Years Away (n5MD)
Onderwereld (Cultivated Electronics Ltd.)
Urbi Et Orbi 4 (MinimalRome)
“Every time, I put on headphones, pull up a cat and just appreciate the bizarre and wonderful experience of giving my musical mind a very strange sort of ritualized workout.” ~ Evan Snyder (igloomag.com) 2020
REISSUES / REMASTERS ::
Abfahrt Hinwil :: Links Berge Rechts Seen (Deluxe Edition) (Lapsus)
Brothomstates :: Rekobn-Tich-Ey EP (Self Released)
DUIR :: The Stout Guardian of the Door (2020 Remaster) (Songs from the Oak)
exm :: Overscore (+) (Touched Music)
Isophlux Records 1995-2000 (Isophlux)
Kruder & Dorfmeister :: 1995 (G-Stone)
Metamatics :: Vogue Casio 96 (Self Released)
Metic :: Matrix Blaster EP (Soft Computing)
Michael Fakesch :: Marion (20th Anniversary Edition) (Bit-Phalanx Music)
Novel 23 :: Retrospective (Self Released)
port-royal :: Flares (15th Anniversary Remaster) (n5MD)
r beny :: Seafoam & Dust (Dauw)
Stephen Mallinder :: Pow-Wow (Ice Machine)
Tomoroh Hidari :: On Waikiki Beach EP (Ivory Bunker)
rRine :: Eaciv+ (Touched Music)
“The power of music; to show us a glimpse of a life beyond our world, our family and our circumstances.” ~ Chang Terhune (igloomag.com) 2020
“Timeless sounds, further exploring the seemingly limitless extents of the electronic music continuum.” ~ Clint Anderson (igloomag.com) 2020
BEST OF 2020 SOUNDCLOUD SELECTIONS ::
