TOP FUNF - WG EDITION

1. Deathprod - Dead People's Things
Still for me one of the most densely atmospheric things I've ever heard. Hearing Deathprod for the first time completely blew my mind, for a while people I lived with would know when I was in a pretty bad way because this track or Cloudchamber would be coming from behind my closed door. It wasn't the sort of thing that I wallowed in though, it was really because it gives you another space to inhabit than the one you are currently in.

2. Fugazi - Rend It
"My love song went wrong". Even when I was 16 and me and everyone else I was friends with (2 people total) were listening exclusively to youth crew, Fugazi was sill this weird thing I was obsessed with and couldn't explain why. When End Hits came out I got given it to review for the zine I was writing because the other guy didn't like 'muso shit' (LOLZ) and I was like 'what the fuck is this music, I need to know what this is right now'. I don't believe they have ever made a bad song. Also, Instrument is probably my favourite music documentary of all time.

3. Godspeed - Monheim
I was living in the US for a few months and generally listening to a lot of speed metal and thrash, wearing sleeveless denim jackets, repelling girls etc. and a friend of mine was talking on the phone and said "hang on I'll ask - Wes, do you want to go to see Godspeed You Black Emperor tonight?" and I shrugged and said why not. It was at a church in the freezing winter in Connecticut. They played on a dias in front of a huge pipe organ, with one small light so they could see and a 16mm projector showing their film footage onto the domed ceiling. We were all sat in pews, leaning back, craning our necks to watch the projections, and it was the most intense experience I have ever had. Completely rewired my brain in terms of musical performance, which to me before was all about on-stage energy and loudness and guitars. I absolutely would not be living the life I have now had I not gone to that gig. They played Monheim (it was on the Skinny Fists tour) and the sound was so immersive that I think I actually got a kind of hypnotized and was in some weird hypnagogic state. That was the first time I became interested in acoustics, resonance, sound dynamics too.

4. Will Oldham - You Will Miss Me When I Burn
Oldham has written so many amazing 'songs for a sad man' that I sometimes forget until, in the middle of a record, I come across this or Another Day Full of Dread or Black or I See A Darkness. This is one of those 'fuck you, world' tracks for me, being a gentleman of a certain disposition. There's so many amazing versions that he's done of this as Palace, Bonnie Prince/Will Oldham, all of them have some other thing going on. That's the thing about Oldham, everything is interpreted from different angles each time it's played live. He was fucking great in Old Joy too. Plus, Jonny Cash covered him, you can't fuck with a motherfucker like that

5. Supersilent - 6.2
Man, those fucking Norwegians. This is the first record that opened me up to improvisation and loose structures, as well as totally opening my mind to how amazing brass instruments can sound when played outside of the traditionally accepted style. Helge Sten (Deathprod) is also in this. Supersilent do not rehearse, they just get together, record a big load of improvisation, and then Rune Grammofon puts it out. Mental. I once decided to test my tolerance for drink when I was living alone in a mansion in a forest, and watched the Supersilent 7 DVD on my laptop, drank 2/3 of a bottle of Jack, and then was sick everywhere. Watching that DVD makes me feel dizzy now, for real, it is amazing. Everyone come over and drink whiskey with me and watch it sometime.