These Are the 12 Biggest Albums to Look Out For in 2017

It’s been well documented – 2016 was a banging year for music, but 2017 looks to be hot on its heels. The momentum seems to have carried over, and even in the first few weeks we’ve already had some pretty outstanding releases courtesy of The xx, Bonobo, Wiley and Brian Eno.

A lot of big artists have things cooking for 2017, some already have titles and release dates locked, others are just vague distant specks, hurtling towards us, vibrating with sheer excellence. Of course, it will probably turn out that when the time comes to reflect, 2017’s best albums will largely be the ones we never saw coming. In the mean time though, here are 12 to keep an eye out for.

 

1. Sampha – Process (Feb 3rd) 

You might not know Sampha directly, but if you’ve listened to anything SBTRKT, Jessie Ware or Drake of late, chances are you’ve heard his voice. The thing is though, the South London native is also a gifted producer, and he’s finally putting a full album out. The aptly named Process has taken so long to arrive partly because Sampha has been so taken up with helping a litany of other big hitters (Solange, Frank Ocean, Kanye West) out with their stuff, but if the two singles already released are anything to go by, this should be something very special. It’s due to come out on the 3rd of February.

 

2. The Free Nationals – Obituaries (TBA)

Anderson Paak was the one to watch in 2016, and he’s been hinting at collaborations with everyone from Flying Lotus to Q-Tip. A few days ago, he jumped on Twitter to announce that his band, The Free Nationals, will be releasing their first full LP in 2017. The accompanying Instagram post suggests that the album will be called Obituaries, but that’s by no means a certainty. No official release date yet, but Paak will be doing on tour to support Bruno Mars in April, so it could be possible that the release will happen some time around then.

 

3. Gorillaz – TBA

The build up for the next Gorillaz release – their first since 2010 – has been fairly excruciating. First we had a few mysterious images on Instagram, then a kind of visual storybook explaining where all the band members had been. Not long after that, talk began to circulate about featured artists (Snoop Dogg, De La Soul and Vic Mensa are all confirmed) and now we’ve started seeing the members dropping individual mixes on Soundcloud. Finding out what Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett’s two-dimensional children are going to do next is almost as exciting as the album itself, but not quite. No release date as yet.

 

4. Immolation – Atonement (Feb 24th)

Immolation have a hard-earned reputation as one of the most determined bands in death metal. Through nine albums, they’ve stuck to their signature style, honing and improving. Their last full release was in 2013, which makes the looming prospect of Atonement even more exciting – they’ve had almost 4 years to work on it. The Yonkers-based band have already released one track, and it looks to be just as brutal as the rest of their recent material. Atonement drops on February 24th.

 

5. Zach De La Rocha – (TBA)

Zach De La Rocha has been working on a solo LP for what feels like a lifetime, but it’s looking pretty certain that 2017 will be the year that it finally makes landfall. The official announcement was made back in September, accompanied by a new track, the El-P produced ‘Digging for Windows’. On the strength of this track, and his recent guest spots on both of the latest Run the Jewels albums, it looks like we’re in for something special. De La Rocha has always been a rapper, but he’s never had a full album’s worth of room to map his bars to beats and samples, rather than drums and thrashing guitars. No set release date as yet.

 

6. The National – (TBA)

It’s been a rather upsetting 3 years and 8 months since the last The National album, and although it’s understandable, given their schedule, we’re starting to get twitchy. Basically every album they’ve ever released has been excellent, and they’ve yet to display so much as a wrinkle. In 2015, they teased the new album with ‘Sunshine on My Back’, and in 2017 we’re finally going to see the fruits of their labour. Once again, The National don’t have a single bad album to their name, so it’s hard to overstate just how good this one is probably going to be.

 

7. The Cinematic Orchestra – (TBA)

Just like The National, it’s been years since The Cinematic Orchestra dropped an album on our laps, but for them it’s been even longer – almost a decade in fact. In October, they released the achingly gorgeous ‘To Believe’, featuring Moses Sumney on vocals, and promptly set off on tour, flanked by the likes of Submotion Orchestra, Gilles Peterson and Thundercat. It’s all gone a bit quiet now, but what’s certain is that we’ll be seeing a new album this year, we just don’t know exactly when yet.

 

 

8. St. Vincent – (TBA)

St. Vincent is another artist who has been steeply improving as her career has a progressed. 2017 marks the 10 year anniversary of her debut release, and to mark it, she’s putting out a brand new album some time this spring. She’s stated that it’s inspired by recent political events, which implies that it’s going to be an angry, defiant body of work (or we might find out that she’s a closet Trump supporter, perish the thought). She’s also said, fairly confidently, that this is her best work to date.

 

9. Oddisee – The Iceberg (Feb 24th)

Oddisee, as I’ve said many times, is one of the best names in hip-hop right now, and he’s not getting anywhere near enough attention. The Good Fight was one of the best albums released in 2015 full stop, and even The Odd Tape was tantalisingly strong effort, even if it was just a beat tape. He’s always explored deep, interesting ideas in his lyrics, either introspectively (he’s a Sudanese Muslim by origin) or outwardly, and if ‘Things’ is anything to go by, that hasn’t changed. The Iceberg is due out on February 24th.

 

10. Nine INch Nails – (TBA)

Just before Christmas, Trent Reznor surprised and delighted us all by releasing Not the Actual Events, a storming power-pack of an EP, demonstrating that the band has been hard at work. He went on to say that the band would be very active in 2017, and that there would be much more new material. That seems like a pretty ironclad indication that we’ll be seeing a full-length follow up to 2013’s Hesitation Marks, and with film-scoring cohort Atticus Ross now a full member of the band, we could be looking at the band’s best full LP since the astonishing Year Zero back in 2007.

 

11. Drake – More Life (TBA)

More Life was originally set to drop last year, but it ended up being delayed, seemingly because Drake is still tinkering with it. He’s gone on record saying that he wants it to be like “the soundtrack to your life”. If any upcoming album is assured to hit the top of the charts, it’s this one. Drake has also said that it will all be original music from him, which probably means a limited number of producer and featured artist credits, which is far from a bad thing. No release date has surfaced, but the amount of noise surrounding this album is almost deafening now, so expect Drake to drop some news soon, probably in a uniquely Drake sort of way.

 

12. Jam Baxter – Mansion 38 (TBA)

2016 was a very, very good year for High Focus, with Ed Scissor & Lamplighter, Fliptrix, Ocean Wisdom and Dabbla all absolutely killing it. Now comes the turn of Jam Baxter, who I would argue, on a technical level, is probably the best rapper on the label. Just before Christmas, he unveiled the video for ‘Teeth Marks’ and my goodness it’s impressive, in almost every conceivable way. Baxter has always been good at wrapping his bars around abstract concepts and really working hard to paint a picture in your mind. The fact that he’s once again backed by producer Chemo makes this new album even more important.