Phew! Well, that was a rollercoaster. The highs! The lows! The winners! Those who walk away empty handed! It’s all too much to bear! The face of electronic music has changed forever and once again a golden Keytar Axeman has been the bringer of dreams, and the shatterer of hopes.

Thankfully that time has come again, y’know the one, the time when we all loosen our collective bow-ties and sip the last of the champagne. The time when we reflect on this year’s proceedings and who’s lives have been totally altered by the electronic rumors Awards 2012…

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The electronic rumors Awards: BEST SONG –electronic rumors’ top 20 songs of 2012

Winner: MNDR – #1 In Heaven

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The electronic rumors Awards: HALL OF FAME– electronic rumors’ Hall Of Fame inductee 2012

Inductee: Daft Punk

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The electronic rumors Awards: READER’S CHOICE

Winner: Ian McGlynn – Gold Morning Mend (TEEEL reMix)

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The electronic rumors Awards: BEST ALBUM – electronic rumors’ top 20 albums of 2012

Winner: The Presets – Pacifica

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The electronic rumors Awards: BEST VIDEO

Winners: Starcadian – St^rs & Punks Jump Up (Feat. Dave 1) – Mr. Overtime

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The electronic rumors Awards: BEST REMIX – electronic rumors’ top 20 reMixes of 2012

Winner: The Knocks & Fred Falke – Geronimo (Lenno reMix)

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The electronic rumors Awards 2012: ELECTRONIC RUMORS’ 2012

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The electronic rumors Awards 2012

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Annnnnnnnnd…we’re outta’ here. 2012 done and dusted. We’ll see you lot in the new year.

Peace!

Follow @electronicrumor

This is it!

It’s been an odd year for ElectroPop, Nu-Disco, SynthWave, Nu-Italo, Dreamwave, Indie-Electro, Minimal Synth, SynthPop etc…. Whereas last year provided us with a steady stream of tunes, this year’s classic tracks seemed to come in fits and spurts, and some of the best tunes of the year came from unlikely sources. In the world of ElectroPop particularly, 2012 birthed a handful of acts that are sure to become big players in the genre over the next twelve months.

As ever, apologies to those who didn’t make the list, to those we forgot about and apologies to ourselves as we’ll probably be kicking ourselves when we remember that one track that slipped out minds when compiling the list. But there’s no turning back now.

MNDR have been on our radar for a few years now, but it was 2012 that Amanda Warner and Pete Wade ramped things up a gear. This début album, Feed Me Diamonds, was an amazing collection of tracks that really deserved the critical acclaim that was heaped upon it. It’s the album’s lead single, #1 In Heaven, that takes our top spot. A deliciously subversive slice of ElectroPop, a rough ‘n’ ready electronic anthem inspired by the story of Patty Hearst. MNDR’s sound is so unique, both musically and in Amanda’s vocal style, that whenever they release a new track it’s like a breath of fresh air. Non-conformist ElectroPop that found a massive place in our hearts.

01: MNDR – #1 In Heaven

♫ MNDR – #1 In Heaven

*

…and the rest of the list:

02: Moonlight Matters (Feat. Gustraph) – Come For Me

♫ Moonlight Matters (Feat. Gustraph) – Come For Me

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03: Starcadian – Girls Of Midnight

♫ Starcadian – Girls Of Midnight

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04: Avec Sans – Heartbreak Hi

♫ Avec Sans – Heartbreak Hi

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05: Chew Lips – Hurricane

♫ Chew Lips – Hurricane (Radio Edit)

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06: Visitor – Coming Home

♫ Visitor – Coming Home

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07: Goldroom (Feat. Chela) – Fifteen

♫ Goldroom (Feat. Chela) – Fifteen

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08: Chvrches – Lies

♫ Chvrches – Lies

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09: Charli XCX – You’re The One

♫ Charli XCX – You’re The One

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10: Queen Of Hearts –  Neon

♫ Queen Of Hearts – Neon

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11: Jacques Lu Cont – Church

♫ Jacques Lu Cont – Church

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12: Ronika – Automatic

♫ Ronika – Automatic

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13: Mitch Murder (Feat. Kristine) – Feel The Air

♫ Mitch Murder (Feat. Kristine) – Feel The Air

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14: Touch Tone – Home Away From Home

♫ Touch Tone – Home Away From Home

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15: Russ Chimes – Back 2 You

♫ Russ Chimes – Back 2 You

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16: MiGHty mOUse – Moments In Space

♫ MiGHty mOUse – Moments In Space

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17: Scarlet Soho – When The Lights Go Out

♫ Scarlet Soho – When The Lights Go Out (Radio Edit)

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18: Leitbur – Think Of Tomorrow

♫ Leitbur – Think Of Tomorrow

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19: Shiny Toy Guns – Fading Listening

♫ Shiny Toy Guns – Fading Listening

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20: Arcade High – Blacktop Rendezvous

♫ Arcade High – Blacktop Rendezvous

*

As always, you should definitely pick up some of this music, it all comes highly recommended and most can be purchased here:

Follow @electronicrumor

Remember 1995? When French Electro legends Daft Punk were “that band with the dog video”? Da Funk was a big hit in our household, but there’s no way I would have predicted the stratospheric career they would have, them releasing one of the greatest records of all time, and influence Daft Punk would have on everything I listened to since. Then they released Around The World, I think that’s when the penny dropped.

So we’d like to welcome Daft Punk, as the third inductee into the electronic rumors Hall of Fame. Following Kraftwerk and The Human League, they were the obvious choice. I can’t think of many tunes, from the obvious Nu-Disco pounders to the less immediately clear Minimal Synth jam, that don’t owe Daft Punk some kind of musical debt. We’re they the first to do what they do? Of course not, but they did it best, injected French House with a musicality previously absent and did what they did with such flare, such stylistic brilliance and such joy that they became one of the biggest groups in the world. Homework established the duo as a Dance music force to be reckoned with. Encompassing French House, Acid and Electro it was an album that cemented the reputation of ultra-creative talents, but it was Discovery that dropped a bomb on music, reinventing Nu-Disco for a Pop crowd, introducing Funk to the Techno loving masses and influencing electronic music for years to come. The more abrasive Human After All album that followed laid the groundwork for the mid-2000’s resurgence of big Electro. Whilst their 2012 Tron: Legacy soundtrack disappointed many Dance music fans, for those of us who love electronic music and soundtrack it was an amazing and evocative album.

Daft Punk have always been pencilled-in as the third inductee into the Hall Of Fame (we know the next three years worth too!), but now, as we go into 2012 that promises both a new Daft Punk album and a festival tour, it seems like this is a fitting time to give them their undisputed place in the Hall Of Fame.

♫ Daft Punk – Around the World

♫ Daft Punk – Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

♫ Daft Punk – The Grid

Buy Daft Punk’s music from:

Follow @electronicrumor

It’s the return of the optimistically titles Reader’s Choice award.

Just to be clear, this isn’t the result of a poll, and the criteria is pretty limited, but it is a nice compilation of what was popular on electronic rumors this year. It’s a run down of the most popular downloads we’ve hosted on the site. Of course this leaves a lot of track out in the cold. track that were streaming only/non-downloadable, tracks that we were requested no to re-host for download, tracks that were only downloadable in exchange for a Facebook ‘like’, a Tweet or an email address, videos we posted, or tracks that didn’t make a post at all. But of all the track we re-hosted for download these were the most clicked on.

New Jersey based SynthWave producer TEEEL allowed us to premiere his reMix of fellow NJ resident, singer/songwriter, Ian McGlynn back in May. It’s a lush, synthy, track that boarders on Chillwave at times and seemed to go down really well with readers. Which is no surprise as it’s a passionate piece of electronic bliss.

01: Ian McGlynn – Gold Morning Mend (TEEEL reMix)

♫ Ian McGlynn – Gold Morning Mend (TEEEL reMix)

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…and the rest of the list:

02: Foster The People – Don’t Stop (Color On The Walls) (Futurecop! reMix)

♫ Foster The People – Don’t Stop (Color On The Walls) (Futurecop! reMix)

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03: Miss Kittin – Life Is My Teacher

♫ Miss Kittin – Life Is My Teacher

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04: Man Without Country – Puppets (Citizens! reMix)

♫ Man Without Country – Puppets (Citizens! reMix)

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05: Shiny Toy Guns – Fading Listening (Treasure Fingers Epicfadewave Mix)

♫ Shiny Toy Guns – Fading Listening (Treasure Fingers Epicfadewave Mix)

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06: Gotye (Feat. Kimbra) – Somebody That I Used To Know (Walter Sobcek reMix)

♫ Gotye (Feat. Kimbra) – Somebody That I Used To Know (Walter Sobcek reMix)

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07: Lindbergh Palace – Days Don’t Fade (Johan Agebjörn & Le Prix reMix)

♫ Lindbergh Palace – Days Don’t Fade (Johan Agebjörn & Le Prix reMix)

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08: YACHT. – Second Summer

♫ YACHT – Second Summer

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09: La Zebra – A.S.S. (After School Special) (Reflex reMix)

♫ La Zebra – A.S.S. (After School Special) (Reflex reMix)

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10: St. Lucia – We Got It Wrong (Starsmith reMix)

♫ St. Lucia – We Got It Wrong (Starsmith reMix)

*

As always, you should definitely pick up some of this music, it all comes highly recommended and most can be purchased here:

Follow @electronicrumor

Despite the fact that we are living in the age of the single and EP, we were overjoyed when we looked back on the year and found so many album release we had been rocking too in 2012. Which just proves to us that the album isn’t dead and true creative still want to present a body of their work as a piece of art. Some musicians still have a story to tell.

The winner is one of the most highly-rated, but under-fanfared albums of the year. The return of Australian ElectroPop heroes The Presets with their first album since 2008’s Apocalypso, Pacifica. We can’t help but feel that Modular Recordings and their PR really dropped the ball with this one. Confusing release scheduling, minimal use of social media and nonexistent use of popular music services meant that the album slipped by largely unnoticed. I have friends who love The Presets but didn’t even know they had a new album out. Which is a pity, as Pacifica is a truly stunning piece of work. An intelligent, funny in places, masterclass in ElectroPop and Dance music. Floating effortlessly from genre to genre, mood to mood, Pacifica has something for everybody as The Presets casually wander into the room and show the Indie-Electro crowd that’s cropped up in the last few years how it’s done.

01: The Presets – Pacifica (Modular Recordings)

♫ The Presets – Promises

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…and the rest of the list:

02: Jupiter – Juicy Lucy (Grand Blanc)

♫ Jupiter – One O Six

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03: MNDR – Feed Me Diamonds (Ultra Records)

♫ MNDR – U.B.C.L.

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04: Parallels – XII (Marigold Productions)

♫ Parallels – Time Will Crawl

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05: Pilotpriest – Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Self Released)

♫ Pilotpriest – Thief

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06: Mitch Murder – Selection One (Self Released)

♫ Mitch Murder – Metro City Breakers

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07: Chad Valley – Young Hunger (Cascine)

♫  Chad Valley – Tell All Your Friends

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08: Lovelock – Burning Feeling (Interasjonal)

♫ Lovelock – Love Reaction

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09: Cinnamon Chasers – Dreams & Machines (Modus Records)

♫ Cinnamon Chasers – Dreams & Machines

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10: Lindstrøm – Smalhans (Smalltown Supersound)

♫ Lindstrøm – Rà-Àkõ-St

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11: Miami Nights 1984 – Turbulence (Rosso Corsa Records)

♫ Miami Nights 1984 – The Getaway

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12: Karin Park – Highwire Poetry (State Of The Eye Recordings)

♫ Karin Park – Restless

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13: Kid Kasio – Kasiotone (Self Released)

♫ Kid Kasio – Over And Over

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14: Com Truise – In Decay (Ghostly International)

♫ Com Truise – Dreambender

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15: Sébastien Tellier – My God Is Blue (Record Makers)

♫ Sébastien Tellier – Cochon Ville

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16: TEEEL – University Heights (Synthemesc Recordings)

♫ TEEEL – 88MPH

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17: The Penelopes – Never Live Another Yesterday (Pour Le Monde)

♫ The Penelopes – Summer Life

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18: Tommy – Outer Space Adventurer (Self Released)

♫ Tommy – Blast Off Into Space

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19: Baron Von Luxxury – The Last Seduction (Self Released)

♫ Baron Von Luxxury (Feat. Little Boots) – That Disco Beat

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20: Bright Light Bright Light – Make Me Believe In Hope (The Blue Team/Aztec Records)

♫ Bright Light Bright Light – Love Part II

*

As always, you should definitely pick up some of this music, it all comes highly recommended and most can be purchased here:

Follow @electronicrumor

Best Video. Another tough category. We’ve cheated a little this year and delivered two winners, but when it came down to these two we really couldn’t choose between them, no matter how hard we tried, so here we are with two winners.

They are two very different clips too. On the one hand we have Brooklyn based producer Starcadian and his critically acclaimed DIY effort for his track Hea^rt. Directed by Starcadian & Rob O’Neill, the Hea^rt video is a love letter to 80s VHS Sci-Fi, that also somehow manages to flow naturally with the track, the idea of being isolated in deep space acting as a perfect metaphor for the subject matter of the song itself. It’s a gentle, introspective video that deserves repeated viewings to fully absorb.

And on the other hand we have the neon soaked world of Maxime Bruneel’s video for Punks Jump Up (Feat. Dave 1)’s Mr. Overtime. A clip that is a visual treat for the eyes and an almost nightmarish ( at times) symphony of colour and shade. We cannot think of a more perfect video for this track, both visually and conceptually. I also wondered how Bruneel knew what the inside of my head looked like.

As always, you should definitely pick up some of this music, it all comes highly recommended and most can be purchased here:

Follow @electronicrumor

So, here we go. The first award. Like many of our top-twenties this year the final list for the Best reMix category came as much as a surprise to us than anyone. But we can’t argue with the results, these are the tracks that rocked us hard this year.

There’s more than a few tracks in here that, had you asked us in November what our list would have been, we wouldn’t have brought up. But after reviewing the tunes of the year many of them were pure “of course!” moments, including the winner.

Our love for Finnish producer Lenno has never been much of a secret. Although still criminally underrated, Lenno is making some of the finest big-room Disco in the world. I always get the feeling that Lenno is exactly what I wanted Madeon to turn out like. The big beats, the driving cut-up Disco, pumping main-room sound and the complete mastery of Pop melodies make any Lenno track perfect for peak-time dancefloors. After coming to our attention last year, this year has been pretty great for Lenno, finally making his mark on the scene with some storming reMixes for St. Lucia, Martin Solveig, Atlas Genius, Gracias X JTT and our favourite reMix of 2012, Lenno’s take on The Knocks & Fred Falke’s Geronimo. The track is Disco-House at it’s finest, full of euphoric moments and a thumping groove. We can’t wait to hear what Lenno has in store for 2013.

01: The Knocks & Fred Falke – Geronimo (Lenno reMix)

♫ The Knocks & Fred Falke – Geronimo (Lenno reMix)

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…and the rest of the list:

02: Punks Jump Up (Feat. Dave 1) – Mr. Overtime (Club Version)

♫ Punks Jump Up (Feat. Dave 1) – Mr. Overtime (Club Version)

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03: Little Boots – Headphones (Dimitri From Paris Extended reMix)

♫ Little Boots – Headphones (Dimitri From Paris Extended reMix)

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04: Touch Tone – Home Away From Home (Leisure Council reMix)

♫ Touch Tone – Home Away From Home (Leisure Council reMix)

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05: Final DJs – Gossip Country (Justin Faust reMix)

♫ Final DJs – Gossip Country (Justin Faust reMix)

06: Moonlight Matters (Feat. Gustraph) – Come For Me (Punks Jump Up Freestyle Mix)

♫ Moonlight Matters (Feat. Gustraph) – Come For Me (Punks Jump Up Freestyle Mix)

*

07: Penguin Prison – Fair Warning (Muffin reMix)

♫ Penguin Prison – Fair Warning (Muffin reMix)

*

08: Alex Metric & Charli XCX – End Of The World (The Big C reMix)

♫ Alex Metric & Charli XCX – End Of The World (The Big C reMix)

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09: Ghosthouse – Stop Drop & Roll (Miami Nights 1984 reMix)

♫ Ghosthouse – Stop Drop & Roll (Miami Nights 1984 reMix)

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10: Aeroplane (Feat. Jamie Principle) – In Her Eyes (Louis La Roché reMix)

♫ Aeroplane (Feat. Jamie Principle) – In Her Eyes (Louis La Roché reMix)

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11: Punks Jump Up X Dubka (Feat. Saint Saviour) – Feels Good (Moonlight Matters reMix)

♫ Punks Jump Up X Dubka (Feat. Saint Saviour) – Feels Good (Moonlight Matters reMix)

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12: Sohight & Cheevy – High School (Final DJs School’s Out reMix)

♫ Sohight & Cheevy – High School (Final DJs School’s Out reMix)

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13: Yuksek – The Edge (Aeroplane reMix)

♫ Yuksek – The Edge (Aeroplane reMix)

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14: Holy Ghost! – It’s Not Over (Dimitri From Paris Erodiscomix)

♫ Holy Ghost! – It’s Not Over (Dimitri From Paris Erodiscomix)

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15: Shelby Grey (Feat. Ricco Vitali) – Wild Youth (Goldroom reMix)

♫ Shelby Grey (Feat. Ricco Vitali) – Wild Youth (Goldroom reMix)

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16: Reflex – Wavering (JBAG reMix)

♫ Reflex – Wavering (JBAG reMix)

*

17: A.N.D.Y. & Vicente – El Barrio (Jay Lamar & Jesse Oliver reMix)

♫ A.N.D.Y. & Vicente – El Barrio (Jay Lamar & Jesse Oliver reMix)

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18: Hervé (Feat. Ronika) – How Can I Live Without You? (Make It Right) (MiGHty mOUse reMix)

♫ Hervé (Feat. Ronika) – How Can I Live Without You? (Make It Right) (MiGHty mOUse reMix)

*

19: La Zebra – A.S.S. (After School Special) (Reflex reMix)

♫ La Zebra – A.S.S. (After School Special) (Reflex reMix)

*

20: The Penelopes – Sally In The Galaxy (Edwin Van Cleef reMix)

♫ The Penelopes – Sally In The Galaxy (Edwin Van Cleef reMix)

*

As always, you should definitely pick up some of this music, it all comes highly recommended and most can be purchased here:

Follow @electronicrumor