2017, the year of the solo star: Ed Sheeran, Dua Lipa and Taylor Swift reign supreme
2017, the year of the solo star: Ed Sheeran, Dua Lipa and Taylor Swift reign supreme
Independent.ie
Divide. It's an album title that's perfectly apt considering how polarising Ed Sheeran's music is. He's either loved or loathed. No middle ground.
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Divide. It's an album title that's perfectly apt considering how polarising Ed Sheeran's music is. He's either loved or loathed. No middle ground.
Happily for Sheeran, though, a great number of people adore his music and Divide was one of the biggest selling albums of the year, even when it came to vinyl, a format one wouldn't necessarily associate with the Englishman and his cheerful tunes about Galway girls.
And he was the most-streamed artist of 2017 across the globe, too. He may have sold out six summer stadium shows in this country in a matter of minutes, but his popularity seemingly knows no boundaries.
If it felt as though it was impossible to escape Sheeran this year, that may have because he was the guest-of-choice for a slew of big-name artists. He appeared on Taylor Swift's new album and Eminem's comeback record, Revival (released this weekend). And last week his duet with Beyoncé, 'Perfect', topped the US chart.
Solo artists had a great 2017. Just ask comparative English newcomer Dua Lipa, who was the most-streamed female artist this year. It helped that so many of the songs on her self-titled debut album were cast-iron bangers. But few would have imagined that "this authentic voice of young British womanhood," as one critic put it, would out perform the Beyoncés and Katy Perrys of the world.
Taylor Swift followed up her massive 1989 album with another strong offering, Reputation. It featured the songwriting and production skills of Jack Antonoff, the former guitarist with Fun - remember them? - and his talents played a part in the successes of two of the year's most acclaimed albums, Lorde's Melodrama and St Vincent's Masseduction.
It was a good year for rap, too, with Kendrick Lamar king of all he surveyed. Damn topped many of the year-end polls for albums of the year and it reminded us that there are few writing as compellingly and passionately about the divided states of America.
And he wasn't the only one from hip-hop's nursery of Compton, LA, to leave a mark on 2017. Vince Staples excited many with his second album, Big Fish Theory, which took rap and electronica into exciting places.
Many noted that rock seemed to retreat further into the margins this year, but there were some outstanding albums, especially from American bands. The National returned with an album (Sleep Well Beast) inspired by middle-age crises and a failing marriage - with some of the raw lyrics co-penned by frontman Matt Berninger's wife, Carin Besser.
Grizzly Bear kept up their high standards with the absorbing Painted Ruins and LCD Soundsystem's comeback album, American Dream, continued to showcase James Murphy's fascination with David Bowie.
Elsewhere, the War on Drugs delivered a rock album in the classic sense in the outstanding A Deeper Understanding. It reminded many of Tom Petty, one of the many iconic stars who died this year. A goodbye too to Chuck Berry, Gregg Allman, Chris Cornell and Walter Becker.
Although 2017 felt like an especially strong year on the release front, there were some very disappointing offerings from big names, too, not least Arcade Fire's Everything, Everything. Both the album and its accompanying marketing campaign suggested this once most indispensable of bands had disappeared up their own rear ends.
Both Björk and Fever Ray could have told them how to make intriguing, avant-garde music with the former's Utopia and the latter's Plunge ensuring that pop can be thrillingly strange when the mood takes it.
On the domestic front, U2 were front and centre - something that must be galling for those who thought the band were on a downward spiral creatively this decade.
Their Joshua Tree tour was the first time they had revisited an album in their catalogue and it was a triumph. The first 40 minutes of their Croke Park date were especially brilliant as they rolled back the years to 1987. Everybody in the stands was on their feet from the moment Larry Mullen begun the drumbeat to 'Sunday Bloody Sunday'- they began with a four-track preamble incorporating War and The Unforgettable Fire) - and they didn't take their seats for the remainder of the show.
Later in the year, Bono was embarrassed by revelations about tax avoidance in the Paradise Papers and early singles from the Songs of Experience album hinted at a band floundering. But the album itself was a triumph and its second half is probably the strongest sustained batch of songs since Achtung Baby.
The self-styled "folk miscreants" Lankum - formerly known as Lynched - excited many with a raw and passionate trad album, Between the Earth and Sky. Featuring the singular vocals of Radie Peat, it attracted some euphoric critical praise in the UK.
There was much acclaim for the Irish hip-hop trio Rusangano Family, who won the Choice Music Prize for their fine debut album, Let the Dead Bury the Dead. They were among a large cohort of so-called 'New Irish' to demonstrate how exciting and varied so much homegrown music is today. A shout out, too, to Soulé, Loam and Hare Squead - we will likely be hearing plenty of all three in 2018.
It was an especially busy year on the festivals front - proof, if you needed it, that the recession is a distant memory for most. The evergreen Electric Picnic sold out quickly, while hardy perennials like Body & Soul and Indiependence went from strength to strength, and Other Voices continues to hold a special place in the hearts of music lovers.
There was no return for an Oxegen-like festival although the non-camping Longitude in Dublin's Marlay Park seems to be thriving despite having a line-up and vibe this year that was entirely different to last year.
A number of shows stand out. LCD Soundsystem were in outstanding form in Dublin's Olympia in September, although they did get themselves involved in a Twitter spat over this country's restrictive abortion laws.
Elsewhere, Future Islands delivered the goods on a balmy summer's night in the Iveagh Garden -still one of the best venues in the country for outdoor concerts.
There was much to celebrate in the delightful songs of Jens Lekman - the Swede seems to play Whelan's every time he comes here - and the couple of hundred people who witnessed the Syrian-American singer-songwriter, Bedouine, deliver a gorgeous and beguiling set at Dublin's Grand Social are unlikely to forget it any time soon. Her self-titled debut is one of those under-the-radar albums that bewitches the listener if given a chance.
It may have sold a microscopic fraction of what Ed Sheeran's achieved, but if there's one artist you need to hear over the Christmas period, it's her.
Indo Review
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