Foreword
This year, I went big. I listened to over 500 projects in hopes of leaving no stone unturned. In addition to my usual sources, I added Bandcamp to my rotation, whose weekly radio show was a trove of oddities and shiny bits. Did my experiment of casting the widest net possible improve the haul? In the end, I discovered my wide net was actually a post hole digger – I deepened my already defined tastes, continually choosing jazz-influenced music that tends to be slightly left-of-center. It made choosing the cream of the crop quite the chore, but made the final product a set of 50 deeply enjoyable experiences.
I have to bring up some albums made this year by some of my favorite artists that didn’t make the list. Brainfeeder artists Louis Cole and Domi & JD Beck both came out with jazz pop records this year with extremely high highs (“I’m Tight” is probably my song of the year) but plenty of middling tracks. Blake Mills produced albums by Jack Johnson and Marcus Mumford which both exceeded my expectations. Moonchild came out with a more-of-the-same Neo-soul record which is good background music. Richmond rapper Robalu Gibsun came out with “Keep Going!” this year, and it would have made the list if not for some production that was overshadowed by most national acts. Finally, SZA dropped a huge release in “S.O.S.” in December that, disappointingly, I just couldn’t get into. The singles are pretty good and her talent is obvious, but I just found myself wishing I was listening to her previous release, “CTRL”, which felt more novel and slightly less “Top-40”. Plus, “Hit-Different” which is one of the best songs of the decade, is nowhere to be found here.
I see why food bloggers write so much before getting to the recipes – I could go on forever about my experience this year in music. Below is the Spotify playlist for this year’s Top 50. Enjoy.
The List:
50-41
50. Ghais Guevara – There Will Be No Super Slave – Chipmunk Soul • Aggressive • Hip/Hop
49. Sam Gendel – blueblue – Gloopy • Experimental • Jazz
48. Quinn Oulton – Alexithymia – Alternative • Hazy • R&B
47. Chat Pile – God’s Country – Anti-establishment • Grungy • Hardcore
46. Koma Saxo with Sofia Jernberg – Koma West – Unique • Forestlike • Jazz
45. FKA Twigs – Caprisongs – Light • Astrological • Pop
44. JID – The Forever Story – Dedicated • Impressive • Hip-Hop
43. Mané Fernandes – Enter the Squigg – Strange • Technical • Jazz
42. Ásgeir – Time On My Hands – Pleading • Gentle • Alt Rock
41. Mount Kimbie – MK 3.5 Die Cuts | City Planning – Poppy Hip-Hop | Blocky Electronic
40-31
40. Open Mike Eagle – A Tape Called Component System with the Auto Reverse – Classic • Reflective • Hip-Hop
39. Alabaster DePlume – Gold – Precious • Emotive • Experimental Jazz
38. R. A. P. Ferreira – 5 To The Eye With Stars – Jazzy • Poetic • Hip-Hop
37. The Weeknd – Dawn FM – Stadium Filling • Angelic • Synth Pop
36. Pinegrove – 11:11 – Environmentalist • Twangy • Folk Rock
35. Oren Ambarchi – Shebang – Repetitive • Evolving • Experimental
34. Perfume Genius – Ugly Season – Sinister • Ballet Soundtrack • Experimental Pop
33. Brent Faiyaz – Wasteland – Stoned • Selfish • R&B
32. Leland Whitty – Anyhow – Unbothered • Sweeping • Jazz
31. The Smile – A Light for Attracting Attention – Groovy • Dynamic • Rock
30-21
30. Contour – Onwards – Dark • Mellow • R&B
29. Little Simz – No Thank You – Subtle • Soulful • Hip-Hop
28. Big Thief – Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You – Sweet • Campfire • Folk Rock
27. Jarv – The Amalgam – Youthful • Old School • Hip-Hop
26. Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn – Pigments – Expansive • Diverse • Experimental
25. СОЮЗ – Force of the Wind – Easy Going • Effortless • Faux-Brazilian Rock
24. Paul Bender – How to Forget – Warm • Melodic • Soft Rock
23. Beyonce – Renaissance – Queer • Celebratory • Dance
22. Guerilla Toss – Famously Alive – Synth-Heavy • Technicolor • Pop
21. Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul – Topical Dancer – Forward • Subversive • Dance
20-11
20. Barney McCall – Precious Energy – Colorful • Appreciative • Jazz/R&B
19. Mamalarky – Pocket Fantasy – Playful • Mildly Psychedelic • Alt Rock
18. The Koretown Oddity – ISTHISFORREAL? – Disorienting • Existential • Hip-Hop
17. Sohan Wilson – Love Is The Key – Retro Jazz Fusion • Milky Beat Tape
16. Makaya McCraven – In These Times – Rhythmic • Thoughtful • Jazz
15. Eliza – A Sky Without Stars – Bare • Intimate • R&B
14. Photay with Carlos Niño – An Offering – Ethereal • Mysterious • Ambient
13. Kendrick Lamar – Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers – Piano-laden • Personal • Hip-Hop
12. Daphni – Cherry – Exciting • Driving • House
11. Tim Bernardes – Mil Coisas Invisíveis – Earnest • Elegant • Soft Rock
10-1
10. Sessa – Estrela Acesa – Slow • Moonlit • Tropicália
Brazilian artist Sessa combines elements of Bossa Nova and other popular Brazilian music of the 60’s and 70’s to create an atmosphere of familiarity and openness, yet the sound is modern and distinctly Sessa. The acoustic guitar and voice are at the forefront, only accompanied by bass, light percussion, a couple of background singers, and occasional waves of high strings. There are moments of grooviness – the fantastic “Pele da Esfera” has the most memorable bass lines of the year – but for the most part the listener receives a sense of breeziness. For music so airy to be entertaining, it must engages the listener. Sessa does this by creating moments of repetition and moments of movement. What starts as a lullaby turns into a dream, and without realizing it, your seat turns into a cloud and you float along the guitar passages as you look up and discover the most beautiful birds, strings chirping, in view then out of view just as quickly. The album’s sense of the natural gives the most calming sensation. If an album is going to be calm, I want it to be calm to the extreme, to render me senseless and nearly immobile, and this project does just that.
9. Lonely Pirate Committee – Too Much Fun – Distorted Guitar • DIY • Rock
Naming your album “Too Much Fun” is an invitation for the listener to say “I’ll be the judge of that.” In this case, I’m here for it. This album is reminiscent of 00’s emo with touches of Animal Collective and The Mars Volta. The distorted guitars layer over keyboards and novel bass riffs, while vocals and horns harmonize to fill any remaining space. The edge comes from the unpredictability in the songwriting. It sounds like there could be standard structures like verses and choruses, but trying to nail down a certain number of bars as hook is a more complicated task, as some of the high points of the would-be chorus are just the tail end of the verse. Or sometimes the chorus melts into a breakdown which melts into a frenzy of hair shaking jams. The energy is infectious and feels like it would be perfect in a damp college kid’s basement. It’s not all blown-out and in your face. Lonely Pirate Committee are sensitive and display their musicality by knowing when to back off a bit. Ripping passages that cause clipping can be next to acoustic guitar riffs and back again as in “Rockmesilly!” This Cleveland area band has a really small following but I think they deserve a much bigger one, as their ingenuity in songwriting and production proves they can hang with anyone.
8. Samora Pinderhughes – Grief – Touching • Mournful • Jazz
Dark, inspirational, grand, ghostly, and vulnerable are some of the feelings that come to mind when thinking about composer Samora Pinderhughes’ deep-reaching “Grief.” Through-composed and improvised jazz pieces separate larger vocal works like necessary pauses in a tough conversation. And a tough conversation is what Samora wants us to have, not just about grief and loss but about everything life has to offer. Pianos light the way for Pinderhughes’ shaky but earnest voice and guest vocalists and instrumentalists supplement his vision of reconciliation and recovery. Immanuel Wilkins delivers an intensely emotional saxophone solo on centerpiece “Masculinity.” An prog-like electric guitar ostinato provides the backbone to an impressive ballad on the title track “Grief.” This music aims to be both reflective and introspective and to be a conversation starter on the meaning and function of feelings. It is heavy in one way, but it is also approachable, begging to for the listener to relate and inviting them to sit down with this.
7. Black Midi – Hellfire – Dystopian • Theatric • Rock
The circus is coming and it will destroy you. The opener to Hellfire feels like you are trapped in a nightmarish coliseum, waiting for the stampede to come trample you. The following track “Sugar/Tzu” lifts you above the calamity and seeks to show you the absurdity within it. Black Midi delivers an absolutely incredible, insane performance on Hellfire which rivals last year’s Cavalcade. In truth, I favor Cavalcade slightly due to its slightly less campy atmosphere, but Hellfire brings everything you want in a modern prog rock record: Technical playing, otherworldly vocal performance, and an overarching story with a satisfying conclusion. The closer “27 questions” is an Act III to remember, if hard to decipher or comprehend, due to the sudden confusion and terror induced. It’s hard to pick out a single instrumental highlight since all of the instrumentalists have nearly perfect precision. I saw them live this year and the talent on display was stunning, but drummer Morgan Simpson was simply on another level, and it shows here. If you listen to one heavy rock album this year, let it be this one.
6. Okada Takuro – Betsu No Jikan – Formless • Abstract • Jazz
I immediately marked “Betsu No Jikan” as a contender for album of the year due to its scope and sheer beauty. A largely improvisational work, guitarist Okada Takuro lays the groundwork for his orchestra to create sweeping environmental landscapes across six sprawling tracks. Scene is favored over melody here in an attempt to create something new out of the familiar. “Sands” is breezy and new age, “Deep River” could take place in the countryside, while “Moons” is cosmic with uncertain gravity. Drummer Shun Ishiwaka is given liberty here to abandon his role in then rhythm section and instead add percussive flourishes equal to those playing melodic instruments. Additional percussionist Carlos Niño (featured with Photay, #14 above) helps with this as well.
Actually, the odd piece out is the opener “A Love Supreme” featuring the distinct sound of Sam Gendel (featured above, #49). This Coltrane cover is more of an abstraction than a replication, similar to those found on Gendel’s “Satin Doll.” Saxophone processed through a harmonizer on top of light, unsteady, percussive clinks could be evocative of stacked fourths in the piano and ride cymbal, but the overall effect is immersive and futuristic.
Music can be memorable when there is a distinct focal point for the listener’s ear to follow. Betsu No Jikan defies this convention, instead becoming memorable for the way it washes over the listener, and in this way it borders on ambient jazz. It doesn’t demand your attention, but rewards it with a return on investment,
5. Nduduzo Makhathini – In the Spirit of NTU – Weighty • Percussive • Jazz
I’m giving my jazz album of the year to Nduduzo Makhathini for the ancestral “In the Spirit of Ntu”. This album arose during a turbulent period in South Africa’s recent history. The COVID pandemic coupled with sustained economic and racial inequality in the country led to a series of looting and fires centered in the city of Durban. In an interview with The Conversation, Makhathini says, “I’m going to burn inside until my ancestors show up because this needs to change. I think about fire in a symbolic way.” He leans on rituals and chants as a groundwork, using multiple percussionists and composing repeating forms while employing his contemporary jazz language. Opener “Unonkanyamba” is driving and bounces openly, “Omnyamba” features Makhathini’s vocals in tandem with his piano, while “Re-amathambo” is divine and solemn with beautiful horn sweeps over subtle piano accompaniment. The range is apparent but the message is singular: South Africa’s black majority is suffering and a great healing is necessary. What attracts me to the music is the weightiness of each moment. Every instrument feels crucial and the playing is intensely serious, not to mention technically and artistically impressive. To me this is an unmissable piece of work for fans of all types of jazz.
4. Lynn Avery & Cole Pulice – To Live and Die In Space And Time – Spacy • Digital • Experimental
I covered “To Live & Die In Space & Time” in my mid-year review (see here) of smaller works, because I found it heartbreaking and stunning, but I didn’t expect its impact to be so long lasting. When I think about the most emotional instrumental performances this year, the wind playing on this project tops the list. “The Sunken Cabin (Night)” is the most notable track for its jarring use of wind synthesizer, bending and echoing, wailing, crying. It’s painful. It would be incomplete without the underlying synth pads and piano counterpoint, but it is hard to overstate the physical impact of Cole’s pleading on top of it all. For me, this demands a headphones-on experience and patience. The first half of the album is a pleasant trip through the natural world and the second half is an inquiry into and conversation with finality. It’s a niche experience, but one I found myself returning to a lot this year.
3. Daniel Rossen – You Belong There – Somber • Collosal • Alt-Rock
Daniel Rossen makes the kind of music that I want to make: Strong, dramatic, and with songwriting driven and carried by harmony. You Belong There is a showcase of Rossen’s talents as a guitarist, singer, and songwriter and acts as a window into his life. It’s largely about his life since leaving New York City and moving to rural New York and subsequently New Mexico. It’s not a lonely record, despite it being his first solo project after leaving his longtime band, Grizzly Bear. Instead, it is lush and impressive, centered by Rossen’s guitar work and supplemented by a chorus of voices and strings. The arrangements feel exact, as if scored for orchestra. At times it feels inspired by classical orchestral music – using tension and resolution, presenting themes and building upon them – but the execution is clearly contemporary. Rossen’s voice soars over everything, providing the melody to deep and rich harmonies. At the end of “Celia”, his voice splits into three or four, crescendoing across an intense progression to signal the destination of our journey, a highlight from an album full of highlights. There are no real joyful spots on the album, save for some moments of levity on “Repeat the Pattern”. Instead, we get some more unsettling moments like the tingling “Tangle” where the piano repeats some chromatic patterns or moments of tension like on “You Belong There” where rumbling strings create an ominous sticky feeling. This 10-track story is winding and colorful. It combines the best parts of Grizzly Bear with an open sound and a natural beauty which would do well to accompany a long walk in the woods or a dark night by the fireplace.
2. Soul Glo – Diaspora Problems – Rapturous • Uncompromising • Punk
If you listen to one heavy rock album this year (*checks notes*), well then you have room for two, listen to this one as well. I’m not super qualified to rate punk music, as I don’t listen to a ton of it, but this stood out to me as something special. Philly hardcore punks Soul Glo let you have it on their debut for Epitaph records. This album is absolutely CARRIED by the insane vocal performance by screamer Pierce Jordan. Across 12 tracks, Jordan unleashes an all-out assault through 40 minutes of brutal, lightning fast jams. From the opener, “Gold Chain Punk (whogonbeatmyass?)” to “Jump!! (Or Get Jumped!!)((by the future))”, we hear all of the exclamation points, but no other punctuation as Jordan rarely pauses for a breath. His tone is angry and aggressive, but lyrics uncover a need to cope with the hardships life brings. The guitar shreds and the drummer keeps up, blasting away, you can practically see the sweat splashing off the cymbals. “Driponomics” shows the band’s ability to weave hip-hop and industrial sounds into their hardcore aesthetic, which shows up in the closer “Spiritual Level of Gang Shit.” Jordan raps proficiently and is a nice reprieve (if you can call it that) from the aural pins and needles. The draw to Diaspora Problems is the commitment and the speed. Most rewarding when played loudly, you want to feel like you’ve been on a rollercoaster but only attached to the ride by your jacket sleeves. It is a lot, but it’s a fresh musical experience and makes me want to explore the genre way further, and I’m really excited to see what Soul Glo comes out with next.
1. Madison Cunningham – Revealer – Well-Crafted • Bright • Folk Rock
It was a normal trip to Trader Joe’s. Sunny Sunday afternoon, running errands, flipping through radio presets for the few minutes I had in the car. The local Charlottesville radio station announces some new music that they are about to spin, a new track called “Hospital.” All alone, an electric guitar hits this nutty, bluesy riff and then another, and I was absolutely blown away. Madison starts singing and it is perfect. Then the pre-chorus comes in and the whole band comes together perfectly. “I am always one man dooooown” – the hook hits and I’m struck. I find myself sitting idly in the grocery store parking lot, staring through the display console, barely remembering to cut the engine as I soak in every detail in. I didn’t find out the name of the artist until a few weeks later, when I heard the same song play on the same radio station, and when I did, I was eager to give the whole album a try.
While many of the above albums succeed in their ability to surprise, explore, and forge new paths, Revealer succeeds by wearing its identity proudly and perfecting the little things. Each song is considered and aware of its surroundings. On “Anywhere,” Cunningham’s voice compliments the wavy guitar lines, easily guiding us in and out of mixed meter. Guitar is always at the heart of these compositions, setting the pace and mood as if in a leadership role. There is always space in the recording for it so that it is never swallowed, only enhanced by deep bass guitar, melodic vocals, and occasionally string or synth embellishments. Some of the recording quality reminds me of Blake Mills’ work, like some effects on the creeping “Collider Particles” or the low end on “Hospital”. Revealer’s producer, Tyler Chester, toured with Mills, and I have a feeling some of the sounds on the album have a sprinkle of Mills’ influence. The record sounds rich and dynamic and has roots in Americana, folk, and blues, but is unmistakably rock, with indie rock and jazz influences.
Madison’s voice is immaculate. It is understated if anything, she never gets close to belting range, but it is commanding, flexible, and beautiful. The melodies she writes for herself are flowing and familiar. On “Life According to Raechel,” a song about losing her grandmother, she starts, “Once your girl, I’m always your girl,” following the implication steadily up to the assuring tonic. The emotional center to the record, this song strikes me every time I hear the opening riff. Tentatively, the guitar follows the root note with a dissonant second interval which is halfway between a concurrence with the first note and a departure from it. To me, this is the equivalent of the uncertain feeling, “It’s going to be okay, but what if it’s not?” This simple, but touching device is emblematic of the way every song is created. The songs are designed to evoke feelings and release truths, and they neither linger too long or hit too subtly. Madison’s writing is masterful and emotional, fulfilling every expectation I have and gaining my trust as a listener so that I can let go and just enjoy the music exactly as it is.
End of List
I hope you enjoyed reading! I would love to talk music all day, so let me know what music you were into this year, or if you liked any of the albums I have on my list. If you would like any personalized recommendations (listening to albums you aren’t fully enjoying can be a slog), I would be happy to curate an experience for you.
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