Best Records of 2018

  1. Luke Stewart – Works for Upright Bass and Amplifier (Astral Spirits)
  2. Stephanie Richards – Fullmoon (Relative Pitch)
  3. Mary Halvorson – Code Girl (Firehouse 12)
  4. Weasel Walter – Skhiizm (ugEXPLODE)
  5. Sarah Bernstein’s Unearthish – Crazy Lights Shining (Phase Frame Music)
  6. Jeremiah Cymerman – Decay of the Angel (5049)
  7. Fay Victor’s SoundNoiseFUNK – Wet Robots (ESP-Disk’)
  8. Andrew Barker Trio – Avert Your I (Astral Spirits)
  9. James Brandon Lewis-Chad Taylor Duo – Radiant Imprints (Off)
  10. Brandon Lopez – Quoniam Facta Sum Vilis (Astral Spirits)
  11. Anteloper – Kudu (International Anthem)
  12. Artaud – Cábala (Fort Evil Fruit)
  13. Jen Shyu – Song of Silver Geese (Pi)
  14. Patrick Shiroishi – Tulean Dispatch (Mondoj)
  15. Devin Gray – Dirigo Rataplan (Rataplan)
  16. Han-earl Park, Catherine Sikora, Nick Didkovsky – Eris136199 (self-released)
  17. Dustin Carlson – Air Ceremony (Out of Your Head)
  18. Ensemble Fanaa – Ensemble Fanaa (Bandcamp)
  19. Adam Hopkins – Crickets (Out of Your Head)
  20. Cataclysmic Commentary – Audience Participation (Eschatology)

Special mention

Because we limit our ‘best of’ list to one record per bandleader or co-leader, collaboratively led bands sometimes are underrepresented. That was the case this year, and we want to make special mention of four collaboratively-led bands that made superb record releases this year that we would have loved to include on the above list.

  • Thumbscrew – Ours (Cuneiform); Theirs (Cuneiform)
  • Blacks’ Myths – self-titled (Atlantic Rhythms)
  • Sandy Ewen & Weasel Walter – Idiomatic (self-released)
  • Andrew Barker & John Dikeman – All Things Are Possible (Phantom Ear)

Historical Releases of the Year

Label of the Year

Cisco BradleyBest Records of 2018