Hype 5 // Best Tracks Of 2015

Music in 2015 will go down in history reminding us all to the shocking terrorist attacks during an Eagles of Death Metal gig at Paris’ legendary Bataclan club. In the wake of the atrocities, superstars like U2, Foo Fighters and Prince postponed concerts or cancelled entire tours. The only one who spit in the face of fear was good ol’ Madonna who went to Paris and splashed out on a few chords of her classics on Place de la République. Nevertheless, concertgoers will remember those vicious pictures from Bataclan when planning to purchase tickets for future live perfomances. Horror, please no more!
Speaking of Madge, 2015 wasn’t the year of highest sales figures for the Queen of Pop. Although containing a near-new-classic with Living For Love, Madonna’s Rebel Heart was floundering at lower positions in international charts. Poor album sales are not one of Adele‘s biggest issues. Adele returned triumphantly with 25, selling trillions of copies and another billion of digi downloads. Musically, we tend to prefer Lana Del Rey‘s slow-burning melodrama and all-American, cinematic romanticism on Honeymoon to Adele’s collection of well-accustomed crescendo R&B ballads as an outcome from a knotty production process consuming more than two years.
So step aside for 2015’s real innovators: Lovely Grimes scrapped one whole album, threw a demo tape of a highly catchy tune onto social media and presented her own vision of REALiTi with Art Angels, a headstrong DIY production between post-punk and immaculate pop. British combo Young Fathers broke out of the ghetto and released the pounding SHAME, taken off their album White Men Are Black Men Too. Las Vegas’ shimmering nu-disco child Shamir cranked it up with his highly inventive dance-floor finesse from electro flamboyance Ratchet. This year also saw Venezuelan producer Arca at the forefront shaping mainstream from underground. With his deathly, ice-blipped digital compositions being injected into the sounds of Kanye West, FKA twigs and Björk, Arca’s influence has been astonishing. Aside from Arca’s weird release of his second album Mutant, he joinded forces with Shayne Oliver for Wench, reconstructing the sounds of Cher, t.A.t.U. and Fatboy Slim into a 15-minute monster track called Galvanize.
2015 was definitely Björk’s year, a time for a unique statement from the Icelandic super-artiste over her own state of vulnerability and cure, releasing Vulnicura, one of her most intimate, ambitious and innovative works to date. Alongside its raw combination of electronica and orchestral arrangements, a spectacular canon of interactive videos for Stonemilker and Mouth Mantra, Vulnicura sent Björk out for a string of superb concerts, all presenting an army of a string orchestra, plenty of greatest hits, quirky headpieces and costumes and breathtaking fireworks.