Olivia Tremor Control - Black Foliage (1999)

Olivia Tremor Control's album Black Foliage is the type of record The Beatles would have made if they stuck together after Abbey Road, took even more insane amounts of psychoactive drugs and wrote music whilst their brains were slowly deteriorating. In short it is a beautifully psychedelic mishmash of gorgeous melodies, innocuous lyrics and a sense that you are experiencing a beautiful nightmare from which you can not wake.

Black Foliage feels cold and calculated in the warmest possible way. Random horn overdubs come blaring out of nowhere, string sections jut in and out, over and under recordings. It's host to some amazing key-changes as well, taking a section that used to feel peaceful and beautiful and turning it around to feel its insidious inner darkness. Every transition, as jarring as weird as it can seem, somehow feels right. The album is littered with four second segueway tracks which don't feel like anything more than the organic bumpiness in an otherwise smooth train-ride. This is one album you need to listen to multiple times before forming an opinion on.

Most albums can be classified as either a summer or winter album. This album is an anomaly because it sounds different depending on the season you play it in. Its inhuman, strange and industrial qualities make it a fitting listen for Winter but its soothing vocals and cutesy lyrics make it a great album to listen to in the sunshine.