There are people who’d have gone from reception to graduation in the time it took The Avalanches to get off their sample-clearing backsides and release a second album. I kept a faith that was looking increasingly stupid, wishful and, frankly, futile all those years, but was improbably repaid. Wildflower – I’m not going to review it now; I did that quite comprehensively here – was almost everything I wanted, and certainly good enough to top my 2016 list, even if half that impetus was powered by nostalgia.
Nostalgia – that’s what The Avalanches are built on. ‘Because I’m Me’, Wildflower’s riotous, sunshine intro, pulls from The Honey Cone and 1950s street sounds to recreate The Jackson 5 (with some J Walter Negro-style block party rap) and makes you hug yourself to have them back.
“Ohhh Frankie Sinatra,” sings J2 because she knows what’s coming next, but not here. J1 likes the anonymous kid’s voice. That’s the feedback. The rest is dancing.