The Avalanches - 2016 - Wildflower

 I first heard The Avalanches in 2000, probably from Napster, when the Melbourne act released Since I Left You, which is a classic, came out. Innovators of a sort of techno/sample/funk/DJ hybrid, it is seamlessly glorious. So, I guess it stands to reason why I am not featuring an album that is so important, and it is because when they finally released their second album some fifteen-plus years later, they were long-forgotten (if remembered at all) and they delivered an album so impressive that a generation of fans thought they were brand new. Listening to it again recently, I loved it even more then I thought I did. I don't even really care for the most famous song on the album, "Frankie Sinatra", but love almost every other song. Often when I envision listening to my "vinyl" record collection.. I am living above a bar in Hoboken or somewhere out east, myself a facsimile of Billy Joel at his coolest (1977) and coming home from a shift somewhere (piano bar?) and putting on a record at 3 AM to come down from the coke... a good glass of wine. And in that scenario, this is the perfect album.

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