This year's chart is very much a continuation of last year's. Quite a few artists are making a reappearance, and many of the same styles are still going strong. Lots of garage, bassline and house, and the UK dominance is crushing. Watching over it all is the towering presence of Flava D, who's firmly established herself as one of the most consistently brilliant producers in UK dance music, both solo and together with messieurs Q and T in garage supergroup T Q D.
The only slight change of direction came from discovering nthng, whose pummeling, emotive workouts in the borderlands between dub techno, early trance and house, had me enthralled. This inspired me to revisit early 90s trance and techno, which led to the unearthing of some gems of which I was previously unaware. This obsession also led to my only new mix this year.
2017 was also the year I finally got round to reading Simon Reynolds's Energy Flash, which played a substantial role in keeping the rave revival theme going.
The harrow of nostalgia continues to be phase-locked to approximately 20-25 years behind the present; thus the years 1992-1997 now seem like glory years in the same way that 1982-1987 did in 2007. It is quite fitting that the top spot this year is claimed by a track entitled 1996.
My favourite artist of the last few years, John Maus, is missing from the chart despite releasing a new album in 2017. This might seem surprising, but the new songs somehow failed to have the appeal of the majestic We Must Become the Pitiless Censors of Ourselves from 2011.
All the tracks in the chart come with embedded audio players underneath, from YouTube or otherwise. The vast majority of tracks from the older charts do now also have audio added.