Burial

Between 1998 and 2000, Berlin artist Pole made three incredibly evocative electronic albums, titled 1,2 and 3. Dark, vibrant and infused with static and fuzz, Pole’s “modern city dub” reflected on techno’s spatial framework, with most of the actual beats removed. But even though that trio of records seemed to open a new world of sound to exploration, they became a creative cage for the artist, one he’s yet to find a way out of.

No surprise that it took another artist to point the way, but the confidence with which London mystery man Burial maps a new path on his debut is striking. You won’t hear a more beautifully nocturnal record this year. Though linked to the U.K.’s dubstep scene—his beats have the same stuttering kick, and the Hyperdub label is run by Kode9, a top dubstep artist—Burial is nonetheless an anomaly. He neither deejays nor performs live, and his anonymity has prompted Net conspiracists to wonder if he’s really Kode9 or someone from Berlin. But Burial has less to do with dubstep (or genre of any sort) than an alluringly atmospheric vibe, sounding like something recorded in a sexy, menacing near future that’s always a few days away. Rather than rattling chests, bass is used more as a textural element; it joins spectral vocal samples and fields of crackle in washing over inventive drum programming that could be danced to, but is far better for nighttime driving. Everyone knows it’s a dark world out there; Burial is what it sounds like. — Mike Wolf