a.s.o.music’s a.s.o. is our No. 1 album of the year. It’s dream-pop for an abandoned megacity airport terminal in a William Gibson story, conspiring for an album that does not seek to mirror what came before to create its power. That’s not to say it runs from the past: there are strands of trip-hop — a genre of greyscale samples, atrophied breakbeats, and ennui rendered rapturous — as well as its more demure sibling downtempo, where dub’s inherent sexiness was integrated into rakish Eurodisco. But it’s in their confluence where something radical happens. Mere appropriation of the Gen X Soft Club aesthetic this album gestures to will be the goal of most ‘90s-mining artists; a.s.o. have a much deeper well of intention. It’s what makes a.s.o a success rather than imitating styles of music created three or four decades ago, and how the album glides out of their echoes and into one of its own. Hit the link in bio for our full list of the 50 best albums of 2023. #FADER2023 #aso