National Album Day 2022 – Celebrating Debut Albums
In 2018, the British Phonographic Industry and the Entertainment Retailers Association came together to create National Album Day. An initiative to celebrate the album format, joined by the Josephine Artist Awards in France.
Each year, National Album Day follows a different theme. Previous themes included women in music, “don’t skip” or the 1980s. This year, the focus is on debut albums and the important step they represent in an artist’s career. For the occasion, some debuts are reissued, like I Should Coco by Supergrass, Illmatic by Nas or Emergency on Planet Earth by Jamiroquai.
IDOL takes the opportunity to present some debut albums released in 2022.
agajon - nag champa
Label: Kabul Fire Records
Press: “Three years after the breakthrough EP, his debut album NAG CHAMPA really proves how agajon can roll the Parliament synthesizers over soulful productions.” MusikExpress
Noa Emi - The Mental Traveller
Label: Kommerz Records
Press: “Noa Erni combines the two most beautiful trivialities in the world: good wine and dope beats.” Cashmere Radio
Serge Ibaka - ART
Label: Ouenzé
Press: “Serge Ibaka just made some history for an NBA player … on Spotify” USA Today
Jacques - LIMPORTANCEDUVIDE
Label: Recherche & Développement
Press: “Gone into exile in the Moroccan Atlas, the electro musician returns with a first album crossed with the pleasure of real instruments and the fragility of everyday sounds.” Le Monde
Lalalar - Bi Cinnete Bakar
Label: Bongo Joe
Press: “On this album with dark lyricism, the three rockers mix folkloric instruments and metal guitars, eighties synths and indus electro.” Télérama
Miynt - Lonely Beach
Label: B3Sci Records
Press: “The songs embody Miynt in her most raw and pure form, dancing between psych-rock textures and experimental pop arrangements that continue to define an unparalleled edge for Miynt and her output.” Broadway World
mynameisleonidas - mynameisleonidas
Label: Kitsuné Music
Press: “The enigmatic producer / musician has delivered this bass heavy banger, pulling in elements of bass, world and hip-hop together into something both unique and effortlessly present.” Back Seat Mafia
Jasmine Myra - Horizons
Label: Gondwana Records
Press: “It’s well-sequenced and plays through like a journey, with the opening warmth of Prologue setting up the modern-edged Horizons with its strong opening guitar melody and solo, majestic horns and a subtle propulsive litl. […] If it’s just the start it will be exciting to hear what Jasmine Myra does next.” London Jazz News
Quinn Oulton - Alexithymia
Label: DeepMatter Records
Press: “Fragmented R&B dipped into aspects of electronica, his soulful approach aims at some form of connection.” Clash Magazine
Emma Rawicz - Incantation
Label: Bridge The Gap
Press: “Rawicz combines a sound that covers the range from the rasping drawl to an enveloping warmth in more lyrical passages, with a strong instinct for the well-chosen phrase, sense of space and pacing a solo. This is a fine album from an exciting, young band.” London Jazz News
PARK (Frànçois & the Atlas Mountains x Lysistrata) - PARK
Label: Vicious Circle
Press: “A collegial and intense album. A project under high indie rock influence, where lightness and radicalism manage to mix well.” Les inRocks
DJ Piper - A Dream in a Dream
Label: Kommerz Records
Press: “DJ Piper channels his unbridled creative energy to release a multi-faceted instrumental album that evokes memories of the golden era of hip-hop.“ Faze Mag
Sam Redmore - Universal Vibrations
Label: Jalapeno Records
Press: “After establishing himself first as a DJ and then as a remixer, Sam Redmore is now making a name for himself as an original producer of quality global grooves that can light up any dancefloor.” Actua News
UTO - Touch the Lock
Label: InFiné / Pain Surprises
Press: “The Parisian duo’s debut full-length harnesses controlled chaos, offering an engrossing introduction to their prismatic synth pop.” Pitchfork
Coming soon
Quasi Qui - Downloading a New Operating System
Label: microqlima / Release date: November 4th
Press: “This pair is shaping up to be a power-player of dark-pop indie, with ‘Epoch’ and ‘Gentle Squeeze’ both displaying a keen instrumental apt, with deep bass and danceable groove. They definitely hold onto the darkness in the sound, though. Think MGMT’s Little Dark Age, but again, fresher.” Far Out
Silvan Strauss - FACING
Label: Kabul Fire Records / Release date: November 4th
Press: “Silvan Strauss is a musically as well as technically outstanding jazz drummer who is stylistically more diverse than almost any musician.” JazzZeitung