Personal List: Top Tapes for Tabs Out 2018

OK.

Everybody done? Satisfied? We’ve seen the good lists, the lists of everybody’s favorite music this year, and as always, it’s been a great year for music. It’s never not a great year for music. There’s always something fantastic to hear.

So lists are weird for me. My formative music-listening years were spent listing things in order of how much I liked them, to compartmentalize what I was hearing into some sort of language I could use to communicate relative worth to others. That way of approaching music makes very little sense to me anymore, and maybe, correspondingly, has played a part in how difficult it is for me to talk about music outside of this one-way street of written communication. I tell you what I like. You read it and take away what makes sense to you.

But I also don’t just write for myself; I’ve got some obligations now, writing for Tabs Out, Cassette Gods, and Tiny Mix Tapes. I have quotas to fill. And, apparently, lists to compile. Well, I don’t HAVE to compile lists, but I did, because I wanted to help, and, as I mentioned, there’s ALWAYS good music to heave your way. So it is my duty if not my privilege to present you my personal Best of 2018 Cassette List that I submitted to Tabs Out.

Take it with a HUGE grain of salt.

There are 75-ish tape releases here. The only reason I couldn’t get to 200 is because I don’t have the time to listen to everything. Do note: if your tape isn’t on here, it’s likely because you didn’t send it to me, so I didn’t know about it. I pay attention to what crosses my path. That’s the only way I can do it – otherwise I’d completely drown.

The order of this is ridiculous, and you can switch around so much of it. I actually did a TINY bit of tweaking to this list – the one I submitted to Mike at Tabs Out had about ten fewer tapes on it, but then I saw the final TO list and realized I’d forgotten some. I rectify that here.

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1. Carey – The Great Southeastern Dissatisfaction (Nullzone)
2. Mukqs
   1. 起き上がり(Doom Trip)
   2. Slug Net (Unifactor)
3. somesurprises – alt (Doom Trip)
4. Seth Graham – Gasp (Orange Milk)
5. Visitors – Nature Documentary (Nullzone)
6. Mako Sica / Hamid Drake – Ronda (Astral Spirits)
7. Tropical Interface – OM1 (Orange Milk)
8. Energy ☆ – Energy ☆ (Galtta)
9. Budokan Boys – That’s How You Become a Clown (Tymbal Tapes)
10. Niedowierzanie – Lumiere (Lighten Up Sounds)
11. Honnda – Maraschino Mic Drop (Orange Milk)
12. x.nte – CLOUD2 (Nullzone)
13. I am just a pupil – The White Album (Crash Symbols)
14. Matthew D. Gantt – Isomorphs (Oxtail)
15. New Hard Folk – New Hard Folk (Unifactor)
16. Dotson – De/termination (Already Dead)
17. Matthew Ryals – Machine Memory (Oxtail)
18. Faxada – Paraa (Darling Recordings)
19. They Will Burn Us to Ashes – They Will Burn Us to Ashes (Saga House)
20. Andrzej Nowak – A View of Wilderness (Mondoj)
21. Substrates – Lethean
22. Marc Aubele – Sport (Ingrown)
23. Mudd Corp – Oh. Snap. (Third Kind)
24. Emerging Industries of Wuppertal – Traditions from a Vestigial Intranet (Strategic Tape Reserve)
25. Various – These Carbon-Composite Poles Are Made for Walking (Strategic Tape Reserve)
26. German Army – Kowloon Walled City (Nullzone)
27. Yves Malone – The Most of What You Need Is All You’ll Ever Have (Third Kind)
28. Manville Heights – The Future Was Yesterday (Ingrown)
29. Andy Loebs – About Me (Terry Tapes)
30. Gabor Bonzo – Wad (Terry Tapes)
31. Event Cloak – Vague Definition (Never Anything)
32. Peter Kris – Error Into the Sun (Never Anything)
33. Lafidki – Derichan (Bezirk/Chinabot)
34. More Eaze
    1. Conveyance (Lillerne)
    2. a l4ngu4g3 (Tymbal Tapes)
35. Mortuus Auris & the Black Hand – Cinjusti (Tymbal Tapes)
36. Various Artists – Doom Mix Vol. II (Doom Trip)
37. Fire-Toolz – Interbeing Remix Vol. 1 (Suite 309)
38. Larry Wish – How More Can You Need? (Field Hymns)
39. Shane Parish – Child Asleep in the Rain (Nullzone)
40. Adderall Canyonly – Lucid in a Wasted Way (Nullzone)
41. Life Education – Psychic Yeoman (Nullzone)
42. Tiger Village – Tact (Orange Milk)
43. Ebauche – Formic Syntax (Cosmic Winnetou)
44. Navel – The Gnome’s Pond (Cosmic Winnetou)
45. Linden Pomeroy and Nicholas Langley – Are We Not Drawn Onward to New Era (Third Kind)
46. Bus Gas / Amulets – split (Spring Break Tapes)
47. Günter Schlienz – Tristan Magnetique (Otomatik Muziek)
48. Nicolas Gaunin – Noa Noa (Artetetra)
49. La Tredicesima Luna – Oltre L’ultima Onda del Mare (Lighten Up Sounds)
50. Crazy Bread – Vocoder Divorce (Astral Spirits)
51. He Arrived by Helicopter – The Shiny Hostel (Very Special Recordings)
52. Giant Dwarf – Kicking Bones (Very Special Recordings)
53. Perrache – Une Cassette Comme Les Autres (Taping Desk O-phon Mania)
54. GDFX – Young Ox Restraint (Mondoj)
55. Böhm – Transients (OTA)
56. Bonus Beast – More Decay 2 (Tingo Tongo)
57. Machine Girl – The Ugly Art (Kitty on Fire)
58. Tucker Theodore – LSG (Antiquated Future)
59. Jax Deluca – Organs in the Wind (ACR)
60. Amulets – Future Fog (Muzan Editions)
61. Purelle – Gotta Have It! (Galtta)
62. Charles Barabé – De La Fragilité (Astral Spirits)
63. M. Crook and Oxherding – Soft Moon (Distant Bloom)
64. The Tender Band – One Small Step (Dead Definition)
65. yama-no-kami – kakusareta (OTA)
66. Bary Center – Betrayal (Always Human)
67. Kibble – Lapses (Bonding Tapes)
68. Building Castles Out Of Matchsticks – To Dream Outside the Lines (Do You Dream of Noise?)
69. Brett Naucke – The Back of the Garden (Unifactor)
70. Marta SmiLga – Lunar Maria, Vol. 1 (Crash Symbols)
71. Nicholas Langley – Entropy Soundtracks and Ambients, Vol. 2 (Third Kind)
72. CDX – All Night (Suite 309)
73. The Casual Sexists – What’s Wrong With Being Sexy? EP / You Can’t Make Me EP (House of Zed)
74. Sparkling Wide Pressure – Find a Frame (Park 70)
75. Günter Schlienz – Liederbuch (Muzan Editions)
76. Pajjama – Womb (Orange Milk)