I Don't Hear A Single Albums Of The Year 2022 : Top 10

So we arrive at the Top 10! As mentioned previously, it has been a really difficult task putting these albums in order. My choices may not be your choices, but I think we have a varied 100 and there is something in it for everyone.

Well done Bandicoot! It has been a great year for Wales with some fine albums emanating from a great country. Strangely, for a UK site, Bandicoot have the first British Album Of The Year on IDHAS on the 7th Occasion.

01 Bandicoot - Black After Dark       IDHAS Review

02 Richard Öhrn - Sounds In English       IDHAS Review

03 Dot Dash - Madman In The Rain       IDHAS Review





04 The Mommyheads - Genius Killer     IDHAS Review

05 The Beths - Expert In A Dying Field      IDHAS Review

06 Spygenius - Jobbernowl      IDHAS Review

07 Toni Tubna And The Stockholm Tuba Sect - When The Magic Went Wrong       IDHAS Review

08 Best Bets - On An Unhistoric Night         IDHAS Review

09 The Tambles - Scraping By        IDHAS Review

10 Outtacontroller - Come Alive        IDHAS Review

Finally, a mention for one album that didn't appear. The one main rule for the IDHAS100 is that an album has to have been reviewed on I Don't Hear A Single. Chris Church's Darling Please wasn't reviewed here, due to me reviewing it for a magazine that insisted that I did not review it elsewhere. I thought Chris would benefit from this bigger audience. There is a real possibility that the album would have been in this Top 10 if it had been reviewed.


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Toni Tubna And The Stockholm Tuba Sect - When the Magic Went Wrong

 

I have The John Sally Ride's John Dunbar to thank for recommending this. John correctly describes it as the sort of album that Martin Newell should make and I feel a little guilty, as I've long been a fan of Folkstone's Ian Button through his many adventures, but I had no idea he was up to this.

Ex Death In Vegas and Thrashing Doves and currently Papernut Cambridge. Co- Founder of the superb Gare Du Nord Records label and Producer of Lawrence's Go-Kart Mozart, the man never stops. It was during a tour as drummer for The Catenary Wives that the story of Toni Tubna began.

I won't go into the whole story as you can read that on the Bandcamp site. Briefly, Button wrote emails to his bandmates during the tour about an ill fated magician called Toni Tubna, an anagram of his name. Those stories became a book and eventually a team up with art historian and lyricist, Scott Thomas Buckle. This album is the result.

What an album it is! Essentially a concept album, When The Magic Went Wrong is a wonderful slice of Toy Town Psych Pop mixed with Baroque Pop and Music Hall. Gentle but intriguing, at times it is Inspired Pop Music.

Clash Of Minds even treads into 60s Kinks territory. The Mayor Of Bridlington stands alone as a special song that would be lauded from the rooftops if written by Andy Partridge or Robyn Hitchcock. When The Magic Went Wrong, the opener, has an arrangement more in line with Alan Price or Peter Skellern.

This isn't a joke album, it is a quaint beautifully written and arranged affair. Having been through email, book and album, it would probably stand being a musical. A complete surprise to me, this album is getting played and played. Highly Recommended!

You can listen to and buy the album here. A reprint of the original book can also be bought here.

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