Compared with previous years, I haven’t actually listened to much new music in 2011. Of the relatively small number of albums I did buy this year, only a few were newly released in 2011, the rest were older releases but new to me. Instead I spent a lot of time listening to old favourites, things I’ve been listening to for awhile now: Wolf Parade, Placebo, the Smiths, Queen, Bloc Party, Stars, the XX and so on.

As for new music from 2011: Los Campesinos! are a long-time favourite band of mine, and they released a new album this year, Hello Sadness. White Lies are a band that dominated my playlists last year, and released another album this year, Ritual. The Joy Formidable are a new discovery for me, and they released their album Big Roar earlier in the year. Those three are my favourite new albums from 2011. 

In addition, Frightened Rabbit and We Were Promised Jetpacks are two great Scottish bands that I discovered for the first time this year, although their albums are not new releases. Those are my favourite not-new-but-new-to-me albums of the year.

While I do listen to and enjoy music, it’s not one of my major obsessions, so I’m not too bothered by the fact that this year I haven’t really explored much new music. The above bands and albums, to my tastes at least, have provided some great music for listening to this past year.