My Favourite Albums

Yellow Magic Orchestra are, of course, a legendary electronic group with a vast and delicious range of sounds permeating their work. Much like Kraftwerk, they have immense, industrial-infused work that drifted into lush, bouncy synthpop in the 1980s, and it's this stuff that remains some of my favourite work.

Naughty Boys is a tongue-in-cheek pop classic, featuring the impeccable Kimi ni Mune Kyun, and the delight and fun that oozes from it is delectable. It's a record that's just so, well... cute.

Beyond that, there's also a sombre soulfulness that creeps in, aided by beautifully muddy minor chords and rich, wooden percussiveness.

The boys are naughty, and that's why we love them. There's a beautiful playfulness here that works so well with the more melancholy aspects of the production. Loves it.

Come on girl, it's Woodface.

This is another album that I enjoy for both its comical elements (the very first line of the album is "not everyone in New York can pay to see Andrew Lloyd Webber") and its richly emotional elements (Weather With You). It's a beautifully layered thing, with lovely clarity in its mixing. And 'It's Only Natural' starts with a funny old-timey car horn honk. So they are bringing some of the clown aesthetic in from their predecessor group, Split Enz (another massive favourite band of mine).

Also, the cover is so cute and good. There's a touch of the fantastical here, and I love that.

When I came across the music video for Bowling Alley on YouTube, I knew instantly that I had a new favourite artist. When I listened to Audrey's full debut album, it was confirmed. There is such a wonderful specificity to her lyrics, and I love how she incorporates pop-culture references in a way that feels both so natural and genuinely revealing.

Take Phoebe, a song about moving to New York and being kind of a weirdo and watching Friends for the first time. It has this beautiful way of wrapping up deeply relatable and profound introspection in the aesthetics and ideals of a modern (and somewhat nostalgic) media diet.

It's so sweet and good, and the music feels particular and soft and satisfying - from the straightforward acoustic guitar to the mad synths on Sue Me. Ugh. Perfect.

Plinky plonky synth ecological metallic sadness god I love Depeche Mode so much!!

Depeche Mode's early work delights me because unlike their later, more industrial stuff, here they sound like innocent, almost cherubic boys. I love the simple, righteous lyrics ("Taking from the greedy / Giving to the needy"), I love Martin Gore's desperately sweet vocals, and of course, I love all the sampled metallic clunks and such.

Smooth weird synthetic strings and wailing and crying create an iconic sort of hopeful misery. Lovely soundscape, nothing quite like it. Blessed Liverpudlians.

This album has that beautiful post-punk crunch to it. Lots of cymbals, a bassline looming, a guitar that sounds like a small creature searching for something in the woods, and Ian McCulloch's smooth, gentle voice pleading and searching and grasping. Young desperation, bottled. Do it clean.

Supreme bittersweet noodling. Take Me Dancing has the most beautiful soaring hope within, and a gorgeous music video that reflects it perfectly. Two young, fresh people in stuffy yet beautiful workwear dance chaotically and laugh like children in an empty office. One of the greatest.

The album on the whole is a dancey, melancholy affair. Insecurity and anxiety shape the songs, and come out gorgeous. Happy. Scared. Let's go to the shops. Everything is new. Treat me like a Lover is my favourite.

Unbelievable. Pop heaven. Incredible synth madness and, you guessed it, a constant bittersweet undertone. The suffering is palpable, and it makes the joy all the sweeter. Love pours out. IN YOUR FANTASY, DREAM ABOUT ME, AND ALL THAT WE CAN DO WITH THIS EMOTION.

This album is back to back bangers, but what I really love about it is the overarching sense of living a life of cringe. Throughout, Carly is kinda like, oh my God, I suck and stink. And yet she is also barrelling forward. Suffering and being broken into little pieces and feeling an overwhelming sense of desire and pain and love and fun is the name of the game. Onward, says Carly Rae Jepsen. Always onward. Hell yes.

Caroline Polachek, you are an incredible woman. Dancey, crunchy, effervescent, surprising. A perfect record with a perfect cover. Scintillating dreamscape. A song about how good it feels to get your bag. Exhilaration - heady and intoxicating. It's like drinking the forbidden fizzy lifting drinks.

I love the expressive, inventive feel to these songs. They soar and glide, and then they wink at you. We're having fun! No we're not! Great percussion, beautiful voice, playful spirit.

Dark, gothic, scary, trapped in a cave feel. You're being hunted. By a synthesizer. Oh my God.

Susanne Sundfør crafts an incredible landscape of lonely, alien darkness here. At times it feels a bit frightening. At other times, magical. Like coming across an ancient Dwarven ruin.

Africa is a great song, but Rosanna is an even greater song.

This album rocks hard. What else can I say? There's a drama to the whole thing, incredible passion and cool, funky guitar. That's Toto.

Steampunk-themed album of my dreams.

Thomas Dolby crafts a really gorgeous, particular soundscape here. Laden with synth, but also taking care to incorporate the sounds of an age gone by - the faraway sound of old radio, and so on. Above all, it's a beautiful exercise in pop as melancholic and sweeping. The whole world is here, and all time passes. Here is the imagined sense of wonder at an alternate universe world's fair. And I'm dancing.

WHY DO WE...... CRUCIFY OURSELVES???? EVERY-HEE-DAY... I CRUCIFY MYSELF. AND NOTHIN' I DO IS GOOD ENOUGH FA YOUUUU

This album is so raw. Tori's voice like a woman climbing out of a well, wracked with pain and rage. Then the piano comes in, a character soft and harsh all at once. There is a descent into incredible cartharsis through her wispy, winding lyrics and frenetic, unstoppable force. Soft and ghostly, then wrung-out in climbing anger. So good.

It's literally scary and spooky. Ian Curtis's evil little voice, like a demon or a member of the civil service, booming through. The crazed, harsh basslines. The dismal tone. Wow.

This is such a seminal gothic masterpiece, thick and murky, but it's Shadowplay in particular that stands out to me. Like being stuck in a hedge maze at night. And when Bernard Sumner's soft voice is allowed to peek through, it's such a perfect contrast against the low and desperate Ian sound. Mwah!