12 月 17 日，postrock-instrumental 聯合 arcticdrones.com 進行了第七年年度後搖專輯評選。
從 2018 年發布的 700 餘張專輯中首先選出了近 300 張入圍專輯，裡面不乏如 Mogwai、This Will Destroy You 和惘聞等大牌樂隊，具體名單可以點擊這裡。
去年採用歌迷投票機制，評選出的 50 大後搖專輯，前 10 名分別是：
1. Mogwai – Every Country’s Sun
2. Godspeed You! Black Emperor – Luciferian Towers
3. And So I Watch You From Afar – The Endless Shimmering
4. This Patch Of Sky – These Small Spaces
5. Sleepmakeswaves – Made Of Breath Only
6. Hammock – Mysterium
7. Do Make Say Think – Stubborn Persistent Illusions
8. Balmorhea – Clear Language
9. Junius – Eternal Rituals For The Accretion Of Light
10. Amenra – Mass VI
與去年不同的是，今年並未採用樂迷投票機制，而是由音樂界專業人士進行評選。
所以榜單公告裡說「某種程度上，它可以歸結為個人品味，但同時它也是今年最吸引人，最有動力，最有活力和最具治癒性的 50 張專輯」（it boils down to personal taste, to what intrigued, motivated, fueled and healed us most this year）。
評選標準特別說明：並沒有考慮專輯長度，受歡迎程度，是否主流或是否有廠牌支持。
所以 50 大專輯裡從擁有悠久職業生涯的卓越樂隊到一些地下樂隊發的 EP，幾乎都有覆蓋，「只要他們能提供卓越的音樂（delivering remarkable music）」。
專輯被分為兩個組，每組 25 張專輯，按照字母順序排列。
與以往不同的是，每張專輯都有一句話作為點評，但是比較主觀，所以筆者並未做翻譯，你可以挑選自己感興趣的觀看。
A Film In Color – They March In Endless Circles推薦理由：Bringing a sense of pensive gloom and simmering tension in equal measures, They March in Endless Circles is a highly compelling package that pulls you into the dark reaches of the human condition.
Autumn Creatures – Funeral Garden
推薦理由：The interplay here between sharp heaviness and reflective ambience, topped off by strings and spoken word narrations, is brilliant. But it is the underlying emotive essence seeping deep into your bones that makes Funeral Garden one of the best post-rock albums of 2018.
Cataya – Firn
推薦理由：Infused with a mild dose of post-black elements, Firn is a remarkable slab of post-metal which takes almost a symphonic quality as the album evolves.
Crippled Black Phoenix – Great Escape
推薦理由：Combining psychedelia, post-rock, 70’s classic rock and electronica into their own dark progressive brew, Crippled Black Phoenix paint a dreary yet captivating aura with Great Escape. Pink Floyd fans will find a lot to like here.
Epic45 – Through Broken Summer
推薦理由：Continuing their tradition of blending the most appealing qualities of ambient, electronica, dream pop, shoegaze and post-rock into their own sound, epic 45’s first album of new material makes the wait worth it. Deeply sincere music that at times takes you to childhood memories, other times to the drizzly British countrysides.
Grottos – Tethys
推薦理由：From crushing metal blasts to progressive/djent-y grooves, there is no let up in pace and quality throughout Tethys.
Have The Moskovik – Papier Vinyle
推薦理由：The French band’s string-heavy sound, interspersed with speech samples, gives Papier Vinyle a distinct personality. An aesthetic record that flows in a storytelling fashion and takes you through many moods.
Hundred Year Old Man – Breaching
推薦理由：A sonic battering ram bombarding you with thick and dense wall of sounds delivered with aplomb. The-six piece from Leeds put out one of the most impressive post-metal albums of this year.
Ingrina – Etter Lys
推薦理由：On their debut full-length, the French six-piece straddle the line between untamed aggression and rhythmic propulsion that results in a grand spectacle of noise landing somewhere between Rosetta and Russian Circles.
Ison – Andromeda Skyline
推薦理由：Less an album and more of a cosmic lullaby that is as expansive as it is explorative.
Jyocho – The Beautiful Cycle Of Terminal
推薦理由：Pulling from a pleasingly wide range of styles and genres with absolute ease – indie, math rock, pop, post-rock, folk, to name a few –, The Beautiful Cycle of Terminal is a flash flood of creative depth that packs in oodles of cheery vibes, melody and complexity.
Kaschalot – Whale Songs
推薦理由：Full of forward-looking, energetic and hook-laden tunes, Whale Songs could be one of the best math-y post-rock debuts to come out since And So I Watch You From Afar’s 2009 self-titled.
Mass Culture – Primal | Ephemeral
推薦理由：Prominent and forceful bass lines, blistering riffs and drums, blackened shriek vocals hammered together into a massive edifice that crushes everything in its path.
Minsk / Zatokrev – Bigod
推薦理由：The outcome of a joint creative process between Illinois’s Minsk and Basel’s Zatokrev, Bigod is an outstanding piece of heavy music that finds the perfect mix of ferocity and bleakness.
Reformat – The Singularity
推薦理由：Adventurous, inventive, forward-thinking, The Singularity is a pure electro-rock ecstasy evoking the exotic world of 』80s sci-fi movies. An absolute gem for fans of Adebisi Shank, 65daysofstatic, Trans Am, and early M83.
Respire – DÉnouement
推薦理由：Laden with weighty themes like trauma, addiction, and guilt, Dénouement is a tour de force of both arrangement and execution. With a dazzling, multifaceted sound – punctuated with brass instruments and strings –, the Canadian band explores everything from post-hardcore to screamo, post-rock, and blackgaze in just 36 minutes.
Rilf – Three Stories For Numbers
推薦理由：Just what you』d expect from the Japanese supergroup. Further blurring the lines between ambient, shoegaze, and post-rock, Three Stories for Numbers is a dark, introspective EP with dynamic peaks and valleys, thick and heavily distorted guitars topped of with pristine vocals of Calu.
Sinistro – Sangue Cassia
推薦理由：The Portuguese band expand their horizons, fine-tune their sound, wrap their doom metal bedrock with blankets of post-rock, a gothic darkness, and the wispy vocals of Patricia Andrade. The result is an excellent record that sucks the listener into its ethereal vortex.
Soldat Hans – Es Taut
推薦理由：A collection of immersive, mostly grotesque, dronescapes that coalesce into one creative whole that sits in the upper echelon of dark and experimental music realms.
Sonance – To Possess You Entirely
推薦理由：With sporadic GY!BE-esque sections bleeding into a metallic backbone that is suffused with bestial ferocity, abrasive textures and nihilistic tones, British noisemakers』 new album is a majestic piece pushing the boundaries of heavy music.
The Ocean – Phanerozoic I: Palaeozoic
推薦理由：Cruising through the six periods of the Palaeozoic era with a lyrical narrative depicting Nietzsche’s concept of eternal recurrence, the newest offering of the prog/post-metal heavyweights The Ocean is one of their tightest to date.
Toundra – Vortex
推薦理由：Encapsulating everything good in the Spaniards』 oeuvre thus far while introducing a desert vibe to their sound, Vortex is as impressive in its multi-layered dynamism as in its atmospheric depth.
Trna – Earthcult
推薦理由：A wildly powerful 66-minute opus featuring never-ending blast-beat-and-tremolo-riff sections, Earthcult is not just a highlight of the Russian trio’s career to date but an album hard to top this year in the blackgaze and blackened post-metal dominions.
Way Station – The Way Of Minstrel
推薦理由：The combination of a tremendous atmospheric tone with a ghostly edge in the background and tight arrangements that bring shivers to your spine from start to finish is what makes The Way of Minstrelshine.
World’s End Girlfriend – Meguri
推薦理由：Written in remembrance of a lost one, Katsuhiko Maeda’s latest EP is a profound articulation of grief and loss. While the title track is (another) stellar example of Maeda’s unorthodox melding of digital noise, synths and strings in multiplex patterns, 「See You Again」 is an epitome of ambient minimalism.
1099 – Blindpassasjer
推薦理由：With their new release, Norway’s 1099 delves more into jazz territory without compromising their post-rock leanings and thrives on creating an aural journey rife with both emotion and smart songcraft.
Below A Silent Sky – A View From Afar
推薦理由：Ticking many of the sub-genre boxes of metal – from post to doom, sludge and progressive –, A View From Afar is heavy without being heavy-handed, largely thanks to the band’s narrative approach to their songwriting.
Bound – No Beyond
推薦理由：Pervaded by shoegaze echoes with post-rock and doom embellishments, No Beyond is a soulful album that has a great balance between soothing and cathartic.
Celestial Wolves – Call Of The Void
推薦理由：Call of the Void is content-wise anything but void; full of sharp riffage and atmospheric undertones that will appease fans of post-rock and beyond.
Degree Of Arc – Raptures
推薦理由：From the contemplative and healing quietude of 「Milestone」 and 「Raptures」 to the ascending and uplifting riffs of 「Limbo」 and 「Defilade」, Raptures is a richly satisfying experience that has something for every instrumental music listener.
DÛrga – De Lira Ire
推薦理由：Seizing the underdeveloped niche between post-rock and post-hardcore, De Lira Ire is a huge step up from the Spanish trio’s previous work on all musical aspects and will particularly please fans of such acts like Viva Belgrado, Envy, and The Tidal Sleep.
El Ten Eleven – Banker’s Hill
推薦理由：Banker’s Hill is pretty much the signature sound of El Ten Eleven, and (yet another) testament to the 「less is more」 ethos. Soft guitar melodies and hooky bass lines float on top of plenty of electronic bits, culminating in lighthearted music that radiates warmth.
Feed Me To The Waves – Before This Wilderness Consumes Us
推薦理由：The five tracks on Before This Wilderness Consumes Us weave to form a tapestry of an instrumental story, one that is bristling with a Scandinavian sense of melancholy and cinematic in its delivery.
God Is An Astronaut – Epitaph
推薦理由：A grittier and gloomier affair than we are used to from God is Astronaut – but no less impressive, Epitaph is a distinguished addition to an already impressive body of work.
Hammock – Universalis
推薦理由：Tracks like 「Thirst」, 「Scattering Light」, and 「We Are More Than We Are」 hearkens back to the duo’s earlier opuses like Kenotic and Raising Your Voice… Trying to Stop an Echo where they were probably at their best. And as in almost all Hammock releases, what Universalis lacks in variation is well compensated by the immense emotive power of their music.
Holy Fawn – Death Spells
推薦理由：Drifting along in an astral state over the course of its one-hour runtime, Death Spells is a beautiful crossover album, mixing shoegaze, post-rock, and ambient with a blackened edge.
Hyedra – Hyedra
推薦理由：Straightforward, solid post-metal from Spain, oozing spirit and dynamism in a flawless musical delivery and featuring moments akin to bands like Russian Circles and If These Trees Could Talk.
Kiova – An End In Motion
推薦理由：An End in Motion is thematically a downright display of the grimy underbelly of human nature; and instrumentally a terrific blend of beauty and brutality, coming across like Oathbreaker-meets-Neurosis.
Le_mol – Heads Heads Heads
推薦理由：From the first half reminiscent of early Mogwai, to the darker and more experimental tracks 「Temperatures Will Drop – Pekoppa」 and 「7udud Lurati Ta3ni 7udud 3alami」, and to the epic closer 「The Sun Like A Sneaky Keyhole View Of Hell」, the two-piece loop orchestra from Vienna is at the top of their game here.
Locomotora – Vuodet, Vuoret
推薦理由：While there’s a melancholic beauty that permeates Vuodet, vuoret, it also maintains a cold and remote feel, making for an emotional package that stays clear of over-emotional cliches. It is also full of rich instrumentation – an assortment of cello, violin, bass trombone and trumpet, alongside guitars and drums.
Long Distance Calling – Boundless
推薦理由：Representing a back-to-roots approach, Boundless showcases a skillful effusion of muscular riffs that progress into more atmospheric parts and finely tuned melodic sensibilities that is sure to excite fans of the band’s high point, Avoid the Light.
Modsdive – Four Wet Hands
推薦理由：Mixing influences from math rock and progressive rock with off-kilter tempo changes and imaginative riffs, the South Korean band delivered a refreshing take on the genre without sacrificing any of post-rock’s emotive depth.
Movement Of Static – Naegleria
推薦理由：On their debut full-length, the Greek band let their high-pitched guitars build off one another within a cosmic frame and created an exciting record that is heavy, ambient, and stratospheric all at once.
Ocean Districts – Doomtowns
推薦理由：Drawing its inspiration from the Cold-War era nuclear tests, Doomtowns has a powerful emotional pull amongst its gritty cannon, loaded with bone-chilling riffs that never lose their mystique.
Pleiades – For The Future
推薦理由：Displaying a strong songwriting prowess, For the Future is abrasive and melodic at the same time. While there’s a daunting political undercurrent running subtly throughout this short EP, a glimmer of hope emerges at its conclusion.
Raum Kingdom – Everything & Nothing
推薦理由：It takes just 22 seconds for Everything & Nothing to start hitting you like a ton of bricks. 「Face your demons, don’t blame them」, the band’s self-description, is an apt summation of what you』ll hear in this record.
Sagor Som Leder Mot Slutet – II
推薦理由：Compared to their debut, this album finds the Swedish post-metal quartet showcasing tighter compositional base, greater variation, and better production that all combine into an immersive atmospheric experience.
Shadow Universe – Speaking For Clouds
推薦理由：Wonderfully atmospheric piece that is also clear-headed in its purposes. Appropriately depicted by its beautiful artwork, Speaking for Clouds shines out with its spacey, transcendent vibe that comes through throbs of synths, keys, and field recordings.
Vorcha – Liberosis
推薦理由：Standing out with its excellent dynamics and pacing, the Texans』 sophomore album packs in a lot of soaring guitar riffs and invigorating textures in its brief 26 minutes.
Winterlight – The Longest Sleep Through The Darkest Days
推薦理由：An exquisite hybrid of stirring organ sounds, electronic elements and the traditional guitar-drum setup that ranges in mood from melancholy to nostalgia and to pastoral simplicity.
\ 寫在後面
今年 50 佳專輯熟面孔並不多，大家可能只對 WEG、太空人和 Hammock 有一些印象。
對所期待的大團專輯，如惘聞《看不見的風景》、Mogwai《KIN》、Inspirative 《Inertia Pt.1》、This Will Destroy You《New Others Part Two 》、Sleep Dealer《Memories》，There’s A Light 《A Long Lost Silence》等等，皆未進入榜單。
在去年大團領導榜單之後，主辦方希望今年推薦一些小眾的專輯，讓一些小眾但質量高的樂隊受到人們的關注，從而促進後搖滾的發展。
本來筆者想做一個歌單，但是好多樂隊並未在國內 app 有音源，所以願意嘗鮮的朋友可以移步 Bandcamp 收聽。
跟以往一樣，本年度 50 大後搖專輯的封面依舊會被做成手機壁紙，供大家取用。
想收去年 50 大專輯封面手機壁紙可以點擊👉 這裡。
無論如何，昴宿也算是今年的一個驚喜。
祝好。