Year In Review: Rajan Lakhani's Top Albums Of 2021

Words: Rajan Lakhani

I’m doing things a bit differently this year and writing a general review of the music I listened to in 2021, instead of doing short reviews of my top 10. Rest assured, you can still see my top 10 below, and I’ve curated a best of 2021 playlist that starts with songs from my top albums before moving into my favourite songs from the year.

Year In Review: Rajan Lakhani's Top Ten Albums Of 2020

Words: Rajan Lakhani

It was so tempting given the challenges of 2020 to only listen to music that you know and love, to provide some comfort and reassurance while the pandemic was changing our daily lives. And that’s of course absolutely justified. But my favourite moments listening to music have been discovering something new, the first time hearing a record and how you can’t wait to hear it again. So here are my favourite albums of 2020, and hope you find something that you enjoy that you hadn’t heard before.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Pop Tracks From 2019 That You May Have Missed

Words: Saam Das

Having already skipped past the whole of 2020 for our recent top tracks list of 2019, we figured we'd compile a bonus list of more pop-led offerings from the same year that you may well have missed. Again, we've tried to mix in some of the more well known acts such as Carly Rae Jepsen and Charli XCX with some lesser known ones, opting for an alphabetical order approach.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Tracks You May Have Missed From 2019

Words: Saam Das

 

Fair to say, 2020 has been a weird one so we've decided to look back a bit further pre-everything-going-to-pot, and highlight some of our top tracks from 2019 that you may have missed. We've gone for a bonanza of bigger names (with an unexpected deference to artists beginning with the letter 'B') as well as lesser known acts like Julietta and Sacred Paws. All great songs, we hope you agree.

Year In Review: FADED GLAMOUR Top Films Of 2019

Words: Saam Das

The 2020 Oscars have been and gone so it seems appropriate for us to drop a list of our top films of 2019. Before we get to our best of, a hat-tip to some honourable mentions that might have made the list on another day, in another mood. Not forgetting all those films we missed, including Oscar-winning doc 'For Sama' and Eddie Murphy's comeback in 'Dolemite Is My Name'.

Year In Review: FADED GLAMOUR Top TV Shows Of 2019

Words: Saam Das

Another year, another list of our favourite TV shows. 2019 was dominated by HBO, but not always for good reason as 'Game Of Thrones' came to a divisive end. However, 'Peep Show' co-creator Jesse Armstrong's second season of 'Succession', the small screen adaptation of 'Watchmen', and the dramatic retelling of 'Chernobyl' were all tremendously well received. Unfortunately, they escaped our viewing this year, and before we get into our top ten TV shows of 2019, we've got a couple of honourable mentions.

Year In Review: FADED GLAMOUR Top Albums Of 2019

Words: Rajan Lakhani & Saam Das

If you thought you'd escaped another "best albums of 2019" list, then you thought wrong. We've collated our top albums of 2019 below, nipping it down to a lean fifteen, ordered alphabetically to avoid mummy and daddy fighting. Honourable mentions include the likes of Fontaine DC's fearsome 'Dogrel', Charli XCX's poptastic 'Charli', Thom Yorke's 'ANIMA', and Slipknot's visceral return 'We Are Not Your Kind'.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Things On Telly In 2019 Thus Far

Words: Saam Das

With half of the year well and truly outthaway, to semi-quote Australian noughties indie giants The Vines, we've decided to throw the spotlight on some of the best shows on TV in 2019 thus far. Some caveats to begin with, we haven't seen the monstrously acclaimed 'Chernobyl' nor caught up with the final season of 'Game Of Thrones' but nonetheless, we do have ten bits of programming for you to catch up on.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Tracks From 2018 That You Might Have Missed

Words: Saam Das

We're just over halfway through 2018, and while many are reviewing this year's best releases, we're going to look a bit further back - to ten of the best 2018 tracks that you might have missed. It follows our list of top tracks from 2018 but focusses on some songs that might have escaped your earbuds. For your listening pleasure, and in alphabetical order, here are ten more brilliant tracks from 2018.

Year In Review: Top Twenty Tracks Of 2018 (#10-1)

Words: Saam Das

Following up from part one of our list of top tracks of 2018, which featured the likes of Young Fathers and Metric, we have our undoubtedly much anticipated countdown of the top ten below. We've also put together a Spotify playlist of the whole shebang if that's more of your thing.

Year In Review: Top Twenty Tracks Of 2018 (#20-11)

Words: Saam Das

People often bemoan the sheer volume of music (and indeed, entertainment) currently on offer - services like Bandcamp, Soundcloud and Spotify have millions of tracks available. Which is actually kind of great. So much wonderful music out there. We've put together a two-part list of our favourite tracks from 2018, and you can check out the first half below.

Year In Review: Fifteen Of The Best Live Performances Of 2018

Words: Saam Das

We've had the pleasure of going to a number of gigs and festivals across the year and across the lands - from our native London to Sussex coastal voyages to Rockaway Beach and The Great Escape, with a cheeky debut visit to Handmade Festival in Leicester. We've collated fifteen of our favourite live sets of 2018 below.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Films Of 2018

Words: Saam Das

As ever, the recent Oscar nominations lead to discussion of what is and isn't worthy of celebration across the last year or so of film. This list of our favourite films of 2018 may evoke a similar response from some readers. Alas, a number of 2018's acclaimed films have escaped our attention ranging from Alex Garland's Netflix Original 'Annihilation' to Bollywood comedy-drama 'Pad Man', and there's plenty of honourable mentions to address first.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Albums Of 2018

Words: Rajan Lakhani

Rajan here. It's been a tough ask to cut down my favourite albums of 2018, with excellent records by the likes of Beach House, Father John Misty, Janelle Monae, Jeff Tweedy and Boygenius just missing out on the top ten below. Tracks from these albums do however make it onto a Spotify playlist, alongside my other favourite songs of 2018, so check that out after you've read the list of ten of the best albums to come out last year below.

Year In Review: Twelve Of The Best Things We Saw On TV In 2018

Words: Saam Das

It's been another bumper year for television, and we're here to provide you with some of our favourite TV shows of 2018. Of course, it's never possible to catch everything we've wanted to - recent additions to that list include John Malkovich's new iteration of Hercule Poirot, 'The ABC Murders', and Netflix's new choose-your-own-adventure 'Black Mirror' episode from the caustic genius that is Charlie Brooker. Nonetheless, here are our twelve best TV programmes of 2018, in alphabetical order and spoiler-free.

Year In Review: Ten Of The Best Tracks You May Have Missed In 2017

Words: Saam Das

Attention may be starting to move towards the best tracks of 2018 thus far, but we thought that before entertaining that option, we'd look back at some of the best songs you might have missed from 2017. Stellar tracks like 'Don't Kill My Vibe' from new Scandi star Sigrid and 'Love' from the evergreen Lana Del Rey could have appeared but their popularity means that we've decided to focus on some potentially overlooked gems instead.

Year In Review: Saam Das' Top Tracks Of 2017

Words: Saam Das

How do you solve a problem like summing up the best songs of 2017 into an easily digestable list? Well, you take a while and then mercilessly cut it down to your top ten tracks of 2017. Showing my working, efforts like Mikey Me's advert-soundtracking 'Doin' Me' and Dan Black's dreamy return can count themselves unlucky to miss out. After much deliberation, here's my top ten of 2017:

Year In Review: Saam Das' Top Ten Films Of 2017

Words: Saam Das

The Oscars will be arriving shortly, celebrating the best in film over the last year or so, and with that in mind, it seems there's still time to reflect on my top films of 2017. Check out the list below, alongside some honourable mentions:

Year In Review: Rajan Lakhani's Top Ten Albums Of 2017

Words: Rajan Lakhani

Following up my top tracks of 2017 comes a list of my favourite ten albums of the past year, including promising newcomers and returning giants. The YouTube playlist below will also handily take you through a song from each record.

Year In Review: Rajan Lakhani's Top Tracks Of 2017

Words: Rajan Lakhani

Kicking off our Best Of 2017 features with a selection of my favourite tracks of the last year, many of which soundtracked (and helped ease) the commute into work. In no particular order, here are thirteen of the best tracks of 2017, accompanied by a YouTube playlist for your viewing and listening pleasure: