Gina Birch (The Raincoats) - I Play My Bass Loud Gina Birch (The Raincoats)

The music you love in life isn’t always foreground but it has its own place in your heart ready to be remembered, to suddenly push everything else to one side and become centre stage all over again. For me this has happened so many times with The Raincoats, from their life-changing debut single, Fairytale In The Supernarket to its just as good follow-up, No One’s Lttle Girl, to Moving, their slightly under-valued third album with its wild rhythms and sweet singing. So many magical shows too, always with Gina’s loping, fluent bass playing and sometimes eccentric vocals an essential focal point. Not only was she foreground in 2023, she kind of owned it. Is there a music person of the year? Mine is Gina Birch. At the core of her audacious takeover was the bold, brilliant album, I Play My Bass Loud, and a series of shows that made us all feel that we’re part of an amazing counterculture that will not be broken. Not only that, she had her own gallery show of raw art paintings and fronted the Women In Revolt show at The Tate. I Play My Bass Loud, beautifully produced by Youth, is funny, angry, tender and incredible. You can never have too much bass.

- Stephen Pastel