Here is a playlist of the essential 100 (or so) tunes to come out of Scotland.
This best of Scottish soundtrack for 2019 is an diverse journey into hip hop, alternative, dance, house, electronica, indie, punk, post-grunge, post-rock, nu and old folk, even hints of classical and often a combination of some or all.
It's a mix of the known, little known and the unknown, leftfield and mainstream, immediate pop anthems and challenging experimental projects.
This list has been whittled down from a not very shortlist of nearly 300 compiled throughout the year.
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 1 (100-76)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 2 (75-51)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 3 (50-26)
Part 4- 25-1
25 Nani - Control
An immaculately executed and mesmerizing lo-fi sparce-electro first single from the exciting Edinburgh-based musician/songstress recorded for a debut EP at Alison House Studios. "I am an artist of some kind, because if I don't call myself then no-one will," she says.
24 Hessian Renegade - Bread and Circuses
A relentless R Rated social disaffection rant from the Glasgow duo's Oral Spiel EP with an 'off with their heads' tirade featuring experimental twists of hip hop, acid-industrial synths and a metal growl.
23 C Duncan - Care
The sign off to Health, my choice as SAY Award 2019 winner is a treasure of a two minutes with all the hallmarks of a church hymn without God.
22 Kevin McKay - Hallelujah
Producer and owner of Glasgow Underground teamed up with house artist David Penn for this arms-to-the-sky gospel house makeover of a fairly obscure Randy Crawford song. This is a classic-sounding, lovingly crafted highlight from the dance veteran's album of covers No Samples Were Harmed In The Making Of This Record.
21 Gerry Cinnamon - Canter
Castlemilk's everyman answer to Billy Bragg aka 34-year-old Gerard Crosbie managed over 13m plays (at last count) of this mainly acoustic singalong belter about someone who was clearly a wee bit of a w*nker more than half the time.Obvious choice for a GMX remix, methinks.
He became the first unsigned act to sell out Glasgow's Hampden Park, with his biggest headline show. Tickets went within hours last month. He will play the 50,000-capacity show at Scotland’s national football stadium on July 18 next year.
20 Human Pyramids - 4000 Miles
An irresistibly uplifting genre-bending combination of neo-classical, chamber music and alternative pop put together by Scottish composer Paul Russell from the Power Pose album which was due to be released on Christmas Day.
All this and 3500 miles more than The Proclaimers.
=19 Cafolla - 1985
While it makes an apt political statement about how we must learn from the mistakes of 80s, this clear standout from the crowdfunded Glasgow-based's artist's debut album Cowboys and Africans is the kind of searing soulful pop-rock-funk - with crunching but brief guitar solo - that you might think had been lost over 30 years ago when Prince pumped out Purple Rain.
"Thatcher snatched my milk, back in 1985. Broke my country into pieces, fed us lie after lie. Does this all seem familiar in 2019? Nothing will ever change no, when God still saves the Queen!"
=19 Neshiima - Treason
The Glasgow four-piece throw hardcore, metalcore, rap metal, electronics yes and quite possibly a kitchen sink into this ferociously potent thrash up underpinned by the sharpest of hooks and melodies from their second EP Green. Plus nods to Linkin Park.
18 Chlobocop - Who's Dat
An infectious R Rated R&B infused killer track from the debut EP from the fresh Glasgow rapper who laid down her very first vocals at a friend’s high-rise flat in Maryhill.
17 The Kidney Flowers - Small Fingers
This is a stomping, trashy, punky, riffing cracker that has been rehashed from an old self-released EP and sounds like a mighty collision of the Pixies, The Fall, The Walkmen and the Wedding Present in one blistering cut from the stunning debut album from the three-piece Glasgow 'musically primitive fast food enthusiasts' who just might be my new favourite garage combo. Watch out Idles.
16 Lewis Capaldi - Someone You Loved
Whoever broke the Bathgate crooner's Heart has made him millions. A number one single across the world from that the guy next door whose music has no bearing on his crazy social media appearances.
15 Blanck Mass - House vs House
A scream and a percussive rapid-fire vocal sample ushers in this eight-minute house-tinged synth epic and first single from the cracking fourth album of Benjamin John Power, who is also half of electro noise duo F*ck Buttons. The Edinburgh-based electro fiend topped this list last year with Odd Scene.
14 TNGHT - Serpent
Hot Glasgow producer Hudson Mohawke's and Canadian producer Lunice make a welcome comeback after helping to usher in trap seven years ago, to produce this bone-shudderingly spiralling pulp of warped bass and percussion topped off with what sounds like an native American war cry.
13 Sega Bodega - U Suck
The ultimate R Rated R&B-influenced diss where the Glasgow-raised producer - a regular on this end of year list - potty mouths through the funkiest of Drake-esque grooves. The song is the first taste of his forthcoming debut album.
12 Mungo's Hi Fi ft Eva Lazarus & Max Romeo -Babylon Raid
A stunning roots-sampling reggae vs grime reworking of Max Romeo's classic Three Blind Mice telling the familiar tale of a party stopped by the authorities from the Glasgow-based soundsystem and production unit's latest album More Fyah.
=11 OK Button - Verso
A simply beautiful exploration of grief and the effects of isolation by the Glasgow three-piece underpinned by a cleverly crafted beatific orchestral-synth underbelly from multi-instrumentalists Nassim Donald and Adam Falkner and topped off with the exalted voice of Amber Wilson.
=11 Joesef - Don't Give In
Influenced by Motown, jazz and hip hop, this classy bedroom pop is underpinned by a Aztec Camera-style laid back guitar strum leaving room for the golden voice of this special Glasgow singer to soar. The newcomer managed to sell out the legendary King Tuts Wah Wah Hut without having released any music at all online, a feat previously accomplished by Lewis Capaldi.
10 Steve Mason - Rocket
The best compliment you could pay this soaring standout about love, depression, disappointment and ultimately hope from the fourth solo album by the former front man of The Beta Band is it is the kind of dramatic epic that would not sound out of place on his previous band's acclaimed Three EPs.
9 Blanck Mass- Death Drop
Benjamin John Power comes closest to his black metal vs drone electro vs house experimental EP of last year on this brutal rollercoaster of rage and crashing keyboards. A gripping standout from his fourth album Animated Violence Mild written throughout 2018, at a studio outside of Edinburgh.
8 HYYTS - Bullet
A seductively classy mid-paced R&B influenced sparkler which Justin Timberlake would kill for from this exciting Glasgow soul-pop duo's debut EP. It was co-written and produced by Gary Clark, best known as the main man with Danny Wilson who hit the upper reaches of the charts in the 80s with Mary's Prayer.
7 Nani - Your Eyes
A bewitching DIY synth-pop gem with a keyboard hook that has whispers of China Crisis from the Edinburgh-based music technology student who produces music from her room. The video features her walking her toy dog around the capital.
"This one is a bit personal. It is putting yourself in someone else's shoes, that's the basis of it," she says.
6 Lewis Capaldi - Bruises
Pathetically self-pitying? Or is it just the authentic melodic laid bare cry of break-up insecurity emotionally articulated by Scottish popular culture's man of the moment. It's the latter. Who needs Ed Sheeran.
5 Chvrches - Death Stranding
After an okay (by their huge standards) last album, the Glasgow electropop masters are back at their very very best with this insatiable singalong anthem swamped in melancholy and neat drops.
It became the lead single off the LP Death Stranding: Timefall, full of songs inspired by the newly released video game. Hideo Kojima, the game creator, said: "You can cry just by listening to this song." It's not just hype.
4 Anna Meredith - Inhale Exhale
London-born and Edinburgh-bred composer, performer and producer gave her twist on Vivaldi's Four Seasons last year, only to show this year she can create a wonderfully hypnotic synth-pop song and sing on what is an instant highlight from her mercurial FIBS album.
The song is underpinned with lyrics exploring a more sinister and pessimistic take on what ‘living’ or having a ‘wild time’ might be like for "a cautious person like myself".
She sings:"You say you’re dancing in the deep end, but to me it looks like drowning".
3 C Duncan - Talk Talk Talk
The sublime opening track from the third album from the Glasgow musician and the first away from his bedroom studio, also moved him away from his introspective art pop on this, into synth pop gem territory. But typical of the Scot who received a Mercury Prize nomination for his debut album Architect, it remains sounding like nothing else around, with signature layered harmonies and a gorgeous hooksome middle eight.
“Talk Talk Talk is about miscommunication. It’s about not realising that you’re actually on the same page as someone and how a misperception can drive you apart. However, it’s also about realising this and rebuilding bridges," Duncan says.
2 Wuh Oh - Pretty Boy (Hudson Mohawke Remix)
Glasgow-producer Wuh Oh, aka Peter Ferguson teams up with Hudson Mohawke for a mindblowingly original classical meets post-electro music with cellos and xylophones thrown in for good measure.
"One day something in my brain exploded and it was as if I could suddenly see what made the chord progressions and melodies work. I got mega obsessed with harmony and since then I’ve never stopped searching for magic note combinations I don’t understand yet: those greeny-purple chords," Ferguson says.
1 Goodnight Louisa - Hollow God
“Bettys got her head in the oven again." So starts this spinetingling, highly charged, emotionally dark but hopeful cinematic-pop debut single from Louise McCraw who fronted the underrated Edinburgh band Skjør.
It is dedicated to a little boy in the accompanying video, her uncle, Michael. He died ten years after the footage was shot as the result of a tragic car accident.
"I drew a lot of inspiration from Michael to write this song, that no matter when we think we've lost someone, they still live within us, in the curve of an eye, through the length of a nose, through our mannerisms, we will carry them forever," she says.
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 1 (100-76)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 2 (75-51)
Top 100 Tunes from Scotland in 2019 Part 3 (50-26)
This is the Spotify playlist.
This is the YouTube playlist.
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