Sam Thiel

Prefer not to say (Album) — Tanger

Putting this album in the 'Bass Music' category is perhaps not doing it justice. This album is absolutely massive, consisting of 3 seperate discs with a total of about 1h15m of music. While the album is almost entirely electronic, it jumps between genres seamlessly but frequently. Tanger is truly a jack of all trades, master of all of those same trades, and despite the genre shifts the album maintains an extremely high level of quality throughout. The one truly spectacular thing about this album is that all 24 of its songs are set up to be played in order, and they all have clean transitions between them. To get the full experience you'll have to go to YouTube, but I've found that a 1s crossfade on Spotify works pretty well.

I have many favorites from this album, but I'll pick a couple that are more in the Bass Music direction; I would reccomend listening to Womp Womp, specifically after listening through wise mystical magical wizard fish and hearing the transition. I would also reccomend listening to weka sina, which is a song written in the conlang Toki Pona—you don't need to understand the lyrics to enjoy the song.

Raise The Black Flag (Album) - Teminite

Raise the Black Flag is the quintessential Piratestep album, in my opinion. Expect sick bass-y drops combined with triple meters and shanty-style melodies. And, of course, expect the classic Teminite flair, with impeccable sound design and incredible solos. There are a lot of different adjectives you could use to describe this album, but I think "awesome" is the best descriptor I can give.

My favorite songs from this album include the title track, Raise the Black Flag, as well as Sail Away and Sesh the Seven Seas, for entirely seperate reasons that would take pages to explain. If you listen to just one song from the album, I recommend Sail Away, I find it to be the most powerful and emotional of the three.

Dogma Resistance (Album) — RIOT

If you like heavy music—dubstep and/or metal—then this is the album for you. RIOT have developed a truly deep identity as far as their sound goes, and Dogma Resistance is a great example of some of their best work. Dogma Resistance is an album that is headbangers from start to finish, and I advise that you take breaks as to not give yourself a concussion.

This album has an underlying story arc, which isn't super explicit, but has enough care that you should listen to the album top-down. However, if you're short on time, you should listen to the absolutely legendary song Overkill. You will not regret it.

The Machine (Album) — RIOT

The Machine is the sequel album to Dogma Resistance, pulling on many of the same genres and sounds from Dogma Resistance, while still feeling like a fresh new chapter for RIOT. If you liked Dogma Resistance, you will enjoy The Machine.

Like Dogma Resistance, I reccomend a top-down listen. Aside from that, I would listen to either Alien Threat or Metallicious. These are the songs most reminiscent of Dogma Resistance, and they serve a similar function in this album as Overkill did in the prequel.

Deltarune Chapter 3+4 Covers — Dethraxx

When Deltarune Chapters 3+4 came out, I was expecting some fantastic covers of the songs to follow. Dethraxx absolutely knocks it out of the park, and so they earn their spot on this list of mine. In particular, the "Raise Up Your Bat" cover was one of the first high-quality vocal covers of the song, which gained it immense popularity.

I've included my three favorite songs by Dethraxx here, even though they have several more. Hammer of Justice is my favorite of the three.

Hollow Knight: Silksong

While the soundtrack for Hollow Knight was already very good, the soundtrack for Silksong is absolutely incredible. Christopher Larkin has done a fantastic job with the music and sound design in this game, and I could go on for hours talking about the music in the context of the game.

However, in an attempt to keep things mostly spoiler-free, I will simply list my three favorite songs. Widow, Choral Chambers, and my absolute favorite, Phantom.

Undertale: 10th Anniversary Remixes

Growing up at the time I did, I was obsessed with two things more than anything in my teenage years: Undertale, and Monstercat. So you can only imagine my excitement when Monstercat Official Undertale Remixes were announced.

The interesting thing about this album is that theres a lot of genuinely unique takes on these songs. I would give this a listen through, but in particular I'm fond of the chiller take on Hopes and Dreams that Haywyre did.

Note: For the particularly pedantic, I should specify that not every song in this category is technically a "Vocaloid" song, since not every vocal synth is a vocaloid. However, I wanted to keep the category name short. Anyway, Teto World Domination.

Constant Companions (Album) - Jamie Paige

Constant Companions is a light and energetic Vocaloid album that has an absolutely spectacular tracklist. Jamie Paige has earned rightful fame for this album as well as all of her other work. The entire album has a sweet tone with absolutely spectacular lyricism; nearly every line is a string of 5$ words, and it all flows together perfectly.

This album is full of repeated melodies and lietmotifs, so it pains me to only suggest a couple songs. You should listen to the whole album. However, if nothing else, listen to Machine Love, the final song on the album. This is the song that the album is known for. ROT FOR CLOUT is also well-known, and also excellent. My "sleeper pick" of the album would be Liason.

1-800 — bbno$, Ironmouse

It takes a lot for my to enjoy a "pop" artist in any sense; its really not my scene most of the time. bbno$ has caught my attention several times, though. Partially due to his internet presence, but also because his songs I find have an energy to them thats hard to match with other pop music.

1-800 I particularly like for its sound design and the collaboration with Ironmouse, which is certainly unexpected if you don't know much about bbno$. I also have a love for any song that makes it sound like you're in a sci-fi car race, but I never really liked the trends of Phonk as a genre.