It's the Vinyl Countdown: #1 "Wall of Eyes" by The Smile / "TANGK" by IDLES

It's a tie! Counting down my five favorite records released in 2024

Janeen McCrae

Jan 01, 2025

“A tie?! Is this a joke?

“What a cop out. Janeen, seriously. It’s a COUNTDOWN list. A countdown LIST.

“The choice when you get to 1 is 1.

“ONE!

“For a COUNTDOWN LIST You must CHOOSE ONE RECORD to stand atop ALBUM OF THE YEAR MOUNTAIN!

“There can be only ONE!”

Bah. You and your mathematics. You and your shouting. You and your pre-programmed heart.

Delete that hard drive of pre-conception. Music has long been dominated by the concept of #1. Through the existence of lists like this. The charts. The Top Ten. Number 1 in sales! Number 1 in streams! Number 1 tune used on a TikTok!

Music is a product—was a product—and now, according to the subscription model, it’s a service.

A service.

How about Of Service.

Music is made to be of service. To be of service to our hearts.

Subscribe to that.

The answer to Number One can be Two. Standing between the one perfect response of the body—the perfect feeling, the perfect mood that defines a whole year—and a definitive response is an imperfect choice. A choice between two things loved in different ways for different reasons.

The only solution in a moment like that is to waffle on the decision and call it Two.

Two records of service. Serving to remind me to conduct myself with curiosity, with wonder, and with conviction. With openness, with vulnerability, and with precise intent.

Oh yeah. I will subscribe to that.1

So yeah, I chose TWO records as my number ONE. The Smile, “Wall of Eyes” and IDLES, “TANGK”. Two releases that set my heart down a path for an entire year. A path of comfort. Familiarly. Challenge. Joy.2

You’re still shaking your head.

“Cop. Out.”

The internet has made you hard. But OK. Shit. I mean, if you’re saying it must be one or the other because there is only black and white in this world, then BOOM! It’s The Smile’s, “Wall of Eyes.” It’s not a tie. No contest. Wall of Eyes is incredible. The End.

“Great, I can stop reading.”

Please don’t.

Hear me out. I’m going somewhere with this and I’m going to figure out where I’m going with it as we go. I mean, I know. I’m just not sure if I can articulate it.

Of service to. Response incoming. Inflamed consciousness burning. Sublime tingle in our lashes. Nuance in the gravy of our joints.

By way of set up, let me say this: Both are great records, released within a month of each other at the beginning of 2024 (The Smile3, January. IDLES, February.) Both releases consumed me whole. I was completely swallowed by them, digesting in the stomach of their glorious whale bodies for weeks, before dissolving into a blissful puddle of yes.

From that point on, every new record released in 2024—by The Lemon Twigs, Fontaines D.C., Father John Misty, just to name a few I picked up—stepped into this blissful puddle to be baptized by my opinion.

“Yeah,” I’d say, feeling their presence as they rippled through me. “You’re great. But are you better than Wall of Eyes? Are you this better than TANGK?”

The comparative answer was always no. And as for the two yardsticks themselves? Even back then, I couldn’t decide which one I loved more. TANGK or Wall of Eyes? TANGK or Wall of Eyes? I kept pushing the decision off, splashing about in my puddle, figuring I’d call it once I’d dried off.

And here we are. And this is me. Calling it a tie.

Lame.

Weaksauce.

No!

As standalones they stand alone. Powerful. Vibrant. Mind bending. Tall. But put them together and view them as a unit? I have concluded that they are two sides of the same coin.

My lucky, 2024 coin.

This coin, which I slipped furtively into my pocket at the beginning of the year—one side TANGK, one side Wall of Eyes—became a familiar to me. Something to touch and gain comfort from. I kept it there, in my pocket, in amongst the lint and mile-long Costco receipts, mingling with my car keys and getting warm and cozy.

I reached for this coin in times of stress. In times of trouble and confusion. Times of straight up malaise. Reaching into the pocket I felt the coin between my fingers and… Hmm. Perhaps I have taken this metaphor too far for one cannot play a coin. OK. I put one of those records on my turntable or cued it up on my phone and played.

I was instantly soothed.

Everything is alright. Everything will be alright.

And through all this, this coin—my metaphorical coin of comfort and stability—became more than just the currency against which other currencies (other vinyl releases) were judged.

It became my confidant and my friend. The mood modifier. TANGK was great for bike rides. Wall of Eyes nailed walks and people watching. Both could bring me out of a funk. Both colored me amazed at the talent of these bands. Both made me want to be a better artist and to share more with the world.

I learned from these records.

Be complex. Be vulnerable.

Be intellectual and open. Be curious and dumb.

Be quiet. Be loud.

Be you.

Cop out? No. I don’t need to choose between these two records. I don’t need to choose between heads or tails. Two sides, one coin. Just keep flipping. Enjoy both. Music. Response.

The mission of “It’s the Vinyl Countdown” was to find the 2024 releases that I responded to most strongly. To identify the ones that I couldn’t stop thinking about. That I couldn’t stop playing. That I couldn’t stop flipping.

Shall we talk about the coin?

I’m calling it my lucky “Wall of IDLES” coin.

Heads AND tails. Let’s make the call together.

Flip 1

Heads = Precise (Wall of Eyes)
Tails = Chaotic (TANGK)

The absolute compositional precision of the Wall of Eyes album as a whole is breathtaking. I have no breath. The musicianship. The craft. Yes, it feels technically advanced, but it also feels lazy and loving at the same time. It is an effortless stroll through complicated subjects and even more complicated musical structures.

The precise choices. The purposeful space. The loud and then soft of it.

Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood (do I need to mention The Smile is their side-project?) have never met a time signature they couldn’t tickle into submission and this record is littered with absolute mind-benders. Add to that relaxed bass runs, crisp Jonny Greenwood wizardry, and tight Tom Skinner beats. Ye, gads.

It's hard to pick an example because I think all 8 tracks are the example. But hey, let’s just take Side A, track 1 “Wall of Eyes”, the title track as our flag. At one point, Thom helpfully counts the beat—sings it—for a while to show us how it’s done and to help out those following along at home.

Is that still you? (One, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five)
With the hollow eyes (One, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five)
Change to black and white (One, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five)
So strap yourself in (One, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five)

I don’t have hollow eyes. My eyes are wide and amazed with it. Precise time signatures. Precise execution. It’s so deceptively effortless. So skillful.

Side A, Track 2 “Read the Room” is a lesson in… I’m not sure what exactly? Tom Skinner’s drumming? It’s jazz, it’s psych. It’s… sike! Don’t look to me for answers. All I know is that it is what it is and it is fantastic.

On the tails side of this coin flip and we have Chaotic. Chaotic good, to be precise (if you want to bring precise into it.) The feel of the tracks on TANGK —and even within the tracks themselves—jumps around. It feels very different from your usual IDLES record, and while it is exposing their soft underbelly, there’s still enough unpredictable rough charm to blow your hair back when it needs to.

Which is what I mean by chaotic. This is music that changes direction. It zigs when you think it’s gonna zag. It’s imperfect in a perfect way. Where “Wall of Eyes” is like a vapor that creeps around the room and slowly enters your body and heart via a weird osmosis, TANGK kicks in the door, makes itself at home on your settee, asks “How was your day, Love?’ before kindly offering to massage your feet.

Loud and soft. Understanding and curious. Precise and chaotic. Both can be two sides of the one coin.

I should note here—not that it has anything to do with anything—that I find the pressing of TANGK on vinyl to be quite terrible. So terrible that I bought a second pressing on orange vinyl to see if I could get a good one. It’s… still meh. Muddy. I would’ve expected a Nigel Godrich record to sound better than this (the digital download sounds great, so I know it’s the pressing.) This softer side of IDLES—less head kicker songs—could’ve done with a pressing as precise as The Smile’s. But then again, a rough edges pressing does fit the chaotic theme. My quest for a better pressing will continue.

Flip 2

Heads = Earnest (TANGK)
Tails = Philosophical (Wall of Eyes)

While both records feel vulnerable, they strike me as vulnerable in different ways. One is earnest. One is philosophical. Allow me to explain.

TANGK feels like a journey of learning. Of being open to the confusion of emotion. Wall of Eyes feels more like commentary on how others are affecting the trajectory of your life and our world. Both these statements are gross generalizations, but that’s because you’re viewing it as a whole. I’m cherry-picking lines and songs.

Take the earnestness of these lines from Side B, Track 2 “Grace” on TANGK.4

No god, no king
I said love is the fing

It’s so sweet and I’m such a soft touch that I could cry. Love is all. It is the fing. Noting is above it. I don’t know if it hits me so hard because of the current political and social climate, but that one: Straight from the heart.

Or this from Side A, Track 3 “Pop Pop Pop”

Freudenfreude, joy on joy (Joy on joy)

Experiencing joy through the joy of others? Innocence is bliss. Love it.

On the Philosophy side of the coin—the Wall of Eyes side—there stands the vulnerability (or more accurately a questioning perhaps?) of the world and attempted understanding of it. We are questioners of circumstance and of what exactly is going on around us in Side 2’s, Track 1, “Friend of a Friend.”

All of that money
Where did it go?
Where did it go?
In somebody's pocket
A friend of a friend
All the loose change
Loose change

A lil’ dose of social commentary to get you thinking about the machinations of society. Or of history—Remember: this is a COVID-era lockdown record. We are only now seeing where some of those loans went. How does that make you feel? Is your philosophy being dictated by class consciousness right now? Compare that to the internal reflection of this line from Side 1, Track 2 “Teleharmonic.”

Will I make the morning, I don’t know.

These are confusing times and pulling out one line to illustrate a point is manipulative. I know that. But whether we are questioning our relationships to the world or to each other, the philosophy of who we are and what we believe in affects the trajectory of our consciousness restructuring as we age. Will we make it? I don’t know. That’s for philosophy to work out.

This coin flip gives me vulnerability as seen through the flips of earnestness (a kind of intellectual naivety really, one that I experience often AKA believing love has power), and a philosophical understanding of presence/reality. The lesson when I play these records is to not lose sight of the truth. The truth of what we believe and the truth of how things are.

Earnest philosophies. I can only hope I am wired that way.

Flip 3

Heads = Energy (TANGK)
Tails = Subtlety (Wall of Eyes)

Energy is not chaos and subtlety is not precision. Let’s just be clear on that (that’s why Flip 3 is different to Flip 1.)

Energy is temperature. Hot. You feel it surging. You feel it lifting you from your chair. You feel it propelling you to action. Good and bad energy. Good and bad action. There is no confusion on this one. This is good. My favorite song on TANGK, the song I have played more than any song, both in my home and while riding my bicycle, is Side A, Track 2,"Gift Horse.”

It’s probably because of hook-y bits like this:

Watch-watch my-my steed-steed go-go far-far

Or this absolute belter of a section:

(Go)
Look at him go
Look at him go
Look at him go
(Look at him go)

But this is the one that gets me every time. Attitude and message. Hook, line and sinker.

Fuck the king
He ain't the king, she's the king

I’m not even going to get into the surging of power at the end of Side A, Track 4, “Roy.” You get the point.

This is energy. This can be harvested by your body and used to propel you through life.

Subtlety—which is its own flavor of energy—is pure power channeled with furtive skill. It creeps in with a song like Side 2, Track 2, “I Quit” (the grower track on Wall of Eyes) and don’t forget the absolute sneak attack UNIT of an elephant in the room with Side 2, Track 3, “Bending Hectic.”

This song is about a car crash (Thom and car crashes nearly taking his life, it’s a vibe) but while the words are compelling, it’s the subtlety of how it creeps into your skeleton to blow your bones up from the inside when we get to THE GOOD BIT. You don’t expect it. It catches you by surprise. Off guard. Jonny bending his strings. Car tires squealing around corners on a mountain road.

This is subtle energy. Same coin, like a said. These things are connected.

Because I’m not saying that it’s a black and white/heads and tails thing. I’m not saying there’s no subtlety in IDLES and no energy in The Smile. What kind of Heathen from Eton do you take me for? (Deep cut IDLES fan reference there). My point is: heads and tails. Spin the coin into the air and it becomes a blur of your vision. A ball. A blend. Both records are energetic and pull no punches. Both are coy and strategic in their style of delivery.

Two things can be true at the same time, as they say.

Subtlety doesn’t mean quiet. Energy doesn’t mean loud. When I listen to these records, I am reminded that we are not—nor do we have to be—what people perceive us to be. We can be both sides of the coin. We are nuanced. Again, that word.

And in the words of “Bending Hectic”:

No one's gonna bring me down, no
No way and no how
I'm letting go of the wheel

Let go of the wheel, Janeen. What happens happens.

Flip 4

Heads: Whole Pie (Wall of Eyes)
Tails: Individual Slices (TANGK)

This one’s simple. Wall of Eyes, start to finish, is a near-perfect record in every way. The flow of the tracks compels me to play it top to bottom, in the order in which the artist(s) intended. I don’t do it out of some kind of stubbornness—it’s perfectly curated into the order it was always born to be. It is the complete package. It works together as a WHOLE PIE.

There is not a skippable track on Wall of Eyes. Well… let me caveat that by saying the very last track is the weakest for me and I umm and haha about it. I ask myself: if this song were track 6, would I skip it? I will never know. But it’s the last one on the album and as a result I don’t skip it. It just plays out. And—confession—it has played out so many times that I kind of like it now. Well played, The Smile!

That’s why I saw ‘near perfect record’. One potentially skippable track. I worry I am being too harsh. Maybe it is perfect? There’s part of me that thinks I set out to find something wrong with every record I listen to. If it were perfect, the hunt would be over. No point anyone making anything after that. No one gonna do any better.

It is a whole pie, though. I eat the whole thing, every listen.

TANGK is not the whole pie. It is comprised of individual—and delicious—slices. And by this I mean some tracks are skippers for me. For example, I could do without Side B, Track 2, “Hall & Oates.” Also, Side B Track 5, “Gratitude”, but I will confess that I skip that one because I get skeeved out by the phrase ‘grotty tooth.’ It makes me shiver.

There are glorious slices of pie on TANGK—that’s my point—but I don’t feel you need to play it in order. You can jump from track to track. That’s why it’s not a WHOLE PIE. Shuffle is fine on TANGK if you’re listening on MP3s, but I think shuffle hurts Wall of Eyes.

Regardless.

What is my overall Wall of IDLES coin flip lesson?

Easy. All pie is delicious.

ALL PIE!

I will eat all the musical pies.

Tomorrow is 2025 and the promise of a new coin to put in my pocket. What will it be? When will it arrive? I’ve pre-ordered two new releases that will arrive in the new year so far—Lambrini Girls and The Darkness “Dreams on Toast.” I can’t wait to see what else is on my musical horizon. Here’s to the expansion of my mind with new music.

Did you enjoy this series? What were your favorite releases for the year? Let me know below.