Best of 2018 - First 5 (Post 1)

This is my... I guess 20 part series where I look in a little more detail at each of my top 2018 tracks through Spotify. 

Track	Artist	Album	Comments
Noriko's Story	Levox	The Dynasty Chronicles	I don't know how I found this one, but this was one of my favorite finds this year. I love the traditional bamboo flute influences - I've had a soft spot for far eastern chamber music for ages - and it is balanced here perfectly with the hip hop beat. I think what really takes this to the next level are the occasional empty spaces, as well as the repetitive loops stuck in throughout. The structure draws heavily from mu-ziq style breakbeat (or even Skrillex style bro-step) where there is a melody developed that comes in and out through the interruptions of the harder and slightly more discordant beat breaks. As a side note - the rest of this album is solid and generally stays around this theme. Its all worth checking out.
Wishbone	nervous_testpilot	Music for Code	This quickly became one of those songs where I found myself humming it subconsciously - the depth of the bass is superb, with just enough modulation to make you think. It always resists the temptation to turn into dubstep though. At times you think its going to turn into chiptunes, but again, it resists those urges as well. You know what the reference is for this one? Its Halo 2 - Halo 2 had a much hyped soundtrack with input from Incubus if I recall correctly, but honestly it was kind of meh. However, there was one moment where the level opened up and you were walking across a bridge between archipelagos and the skybox was stunning, and this track kicked in, and for 25 seconds you weren't slaying aliens, you were in a different world just out of your mind lost in wonder. That is this song. The album isn't quite a full album, probably more like an EP, but the rest of the songs are great as well. Its a shorter but entirely coherent piece of work, and deserves any and all praise it gets.
Last Kiss	ARTY	Glorious	This one makes me laugh - I have no idea where this came from or how I stumbled across it, but good god, it just is... I don't know... it? Such a random little track in the middle of an album that doesn't otherwise use this sound, but here we are. The funny thing is, ARTY is a pretty big mainsteam EDM name, and even though he goes into downtempo from time to time, I've never really felt that strong of a connection. I don't know why he made this one - I honestly think it was either a thought experiment or just a listening break on the album - but I'm glad he did, and I'm glad I got to live it.
Burn - Magic Man Remix	Ellie Goulding Magic Man	Burn (Remixes)	Haha - this song shows up every year that Spotify provides me with a year end list. I love it. I love it. I love Ellie Goulding. I love this remix. I love Burn. I wish I could go back to 2009 or whenever last.fm started pushing her music and experience it again for the first time. But since I can't go back in time I will just continue listening to this song until I die. Editor's Note - As I was writing these little retrospectives, I ended up just putting this on repeat for the rest of the day and had to pick up the rest the next day. What is life even?
Ice Cream Cake	Red Velvet	The 1st Mini Album‘Ice Cream Cake’	Those who have known me and my musical tastes for a couple years should also know that my favorite musical guilty pleasure is Top 40 female bubblegum pop - Keisha, Kelly Clarkson, Madonna, Hillary Duff, you get the idea. Thus, I've toyed with the idea of listening to K-Pop for a while but never really took the jump. Well - this year I went hard into it. I spent most of my time with the all female groups, and generally stuck to the pop side of things. The power ballads weren't my favorite, and the rap side of things is cool, but wasn't quite my taste. However, the all female groups singing this sort of upbeat pop is 100% quality. Unfortunately I haven't quite figured out how this stuff gets released, and thus far my discovery has been very scattershot. Still - I'm ok with this being the first K-Pop pick on this list.