100 Songs I Liked In 2023

 

As always, my official end of the year lists will start on December 29th with my 20 favorite albums of 2023.  But there's so much great music out there that my album post could never cover all of the things I enjoyed over the past 12 months.  So this list is an additional rundown, one that highlights songs from albums that won't be appearing on the top 20 in a few days.  I'm including songs from my five honorable mention albums, so if you see something on here from an album you love, who knows, maybe that album is ranked somewhere between 21 and 25 for me.  And this year I'm running so late that I actually haven't finalized my top 20, so there could be a song from an album that sneaks into that list at the last minute.  I've been going with 100 songs for this list for that past few years, but this time I really had to stretch and find some tracks to stretch to those last few slots.  Hopefully you enjoy these picks and find some new music to get into!

100 Songs I Liked in 2022

As always, my official end of the year lists will start on December 29th with my 20 favorite albums of 2022.  But there's so much great music out there that my album post could never cover all of the things I enjoyed over the past 12 months.  So this list is an additional rundown, one that highlights songs from albums that won't be appearing on the top 20 in a few days.  I'm including songs from my five honorable mention albums, so if you see something on here from an album you love, who knows, maybe that album is ranked somewhere between 21 and 25 for me.  I keep expanding the amount of songs I do for this list, starting at 50 and then expanding to 75, before finally landing on 100 last year.  I doubt I'll ever increase it from there because I like my free time, but I did have to cut some songs to get it down to the 100 count.  Hopefully you enjoy these picks and find some new music to get into!

My 50 Favorite Albums of the Decade: 2010-2019

Part of the joy of being one man with a blog and not an important publication is that I don't feel any pressure to make an albums list that contextualizes the decade.  Nobody's reading this, so I don't need to fit anything in because it's "important" or "groundbreaking."  No, this list is only concerned with what "slaps" and "goes hard."  The real criteria was slightly more complicated, but only slightly.  In choosing my favorite albums of the decade, I thought about the records that meant the most to me at the time they came out, but often an album can seem great in the year of its release and then you never return to it.  So I also made sure to give credit to the albums that I returned to most often and the ones that still held up when I did my relistening throughout this year in preparation for this list.

They say that the music somebody listens to in their adolescence is the era that resonates the most with them and for me that's true, because if I had to choose, I'd probably say I enjoyed the music of the 2000s more than I enjoyed what the 2010s had to offer.  But that's not to say I didn't think this was a good music decade.  You could stretch the list you're about to read out to 100 picks and it would still include albums I love.  The early part of the decade saw the bombast of the 2000s give way to sleeker, more electronic based sounds, which led many writers to declare that rock music was dead. But really, it was just that great rock music was coming from different places.  Particularly in the last half of the 2010s, there was a boom of women making excellent DIY, punk, and music indebted to 90s alt-rock.  Meanwhile, as rap became the dominant force in our culture, and pop continued to be embraced more as a genre worthy of serious consideration, both scenes gave us terrific examples of the form.  Music was thriving all around, and it's ultimately a good thing that the wealth is being spread and not coming from the traditional modes of yore.

So let's celebrate all the 2010s had to offer...

The rules: In order to maximize the amount of variety on this list and ensure that certain artists don't clog it up, I've limited myself to one album per act.  If a certain artist made albums under two different projects -- like Julian Casablancas with The Strokes and The Voidz, for example -- they would both be eligible.  For my yearly lists, I usually consider EPs, but for this decade list I didn't really include EPs into consideration.  There is one exception, but that EP feels so massive and made such a splash that it's basically an album.  And in this day and age, a mixtape is the same thing as an album so naturally those are included.  Other than that, the window of eligibility includes anything released between January 1, 2010 and December 31, 2019.

My 20 Favorite Albums of 2019

These music lists are always the hardest to write an intro for, because there are so many genres and narratives, it's hard to sum it all up into one cohesive statement.  2019, at least for me, was a continuation of trends already known to be true, particularly in the rise of poptimism and the diminishing of traditional indie rock.  This year, rap and pop music take up a whole 50% of my top 20 list, which is higher than it's been since I've started making lists.  Unfortunately, that still doesn't mean there is any Billie Eilish on here.  I apologize to the zero teens reading this.

The rules: Everything is the same as usual.  The window of eligibility for this list is anything released between January 1, 2019 and now.  This list can include albums, mixtapes, EPs, and anything in between.  I'm praying that nothing substantial comes out in the twilight hours of the year.  You never know with surprise releases these days...

My 20 Favorite Albums of 2018

How do you sum up 2018 when it comes to music?  You can't, so I'll give a list of just a few of the phases of music discourse from this year: Kanye West produced five albums in five weeks, Drake and Pusha T had a beef in which a secret child was revealed, Beyonce and Jay-Z released a surprise album that everyone forgot about three days later, Eminem had a psychotic break in a Youtube video, Travis Scott rapped "She thought it was the ocean, it's just a pool," critics tried to convince us that The 1975 are good.

So yeah...it was a wild year.  Let's just get to the list.

The rules: Everything is the same as usual.  The window of eligibility for this list is anything released between January 1, 2018 and now.  This list can include albums, mixtapes, EPs, and anything in between.  I'm praying that nothing substantial comes out in the twilight hours of the year.  You never know with surprise releases these days...

Favorites: March and April 2018

Favorites is a monthly feature that offers up quick thoughts on media, both new and old, that I've recently enjoyed.

Movies
Blockers
Unlike many others, I don't think the trailers for Blockers made the film look bad.  Instead, it just made it seem like a different movie than it ends up being.  Sure, all of the broad hijinks with the parents trying to stop their daughters from having sex on prom night is still there, but the finished product is much more sweet than the trailer lets on.  The film ends up being an endearing look at the anxieties of three parents facing the prospect of empty nest syndrome, and it constantly lampshades the insanity and double standards of their quest.  As a lover of teen movies, I wish it focused more on the girls' stories -- all three actresses are terrific, but Geraldine Viswanathan in particular steals the show -- but I was still satisfied with what it gave the audience.

Game Night
2018 is apparently the year of the surprising studio comedy, because Game Night is another one that came out of nowhere.  While Blockers in the warmer film, Game Night has more laughs, getting tons of mileage out of the way it heightens this night that has spun completely out of control for its protagonists.  Plus, it has Canadian sweetheart Rachel McAdams fully committing to her wild goofball role.

Thoroughbreds
I had been anticipating Thoroughbreds since it premiered at Sundance last year, and it did not disappoint.  This debut film from Cory Finley is a delightfully dark bit of formal rigor, full of austere shots that match the moral emptiness of its two murderous teen protagonists, played excellently by Olivia Cooke and Anya Taylor-Joy.


Music
Belle and Sebastian - How to Solve Our Human Problems Pts. 1-3
Belle and Sebastian are one of my top 10 favorite bands of all time, so I was pretty dismayed by the fact that I didn't love Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance back in 2015.  It's got some solid songs like "Allie" and "Cat With the Cream", but for the first time one of their stylistic switch-ups -- this time, solid gold disco -- didn't work for me.  Their How to Solve Our Human Problems series of EPs, released one month apart between December and February, work to win over those who were put off by their previous full-length.  It still retains some of their recent dancy leanings, but those songs are stronger and more concise than before, not to mention being balanced out by a majority of songs that feel like classic B&S.  Not enough people seem to be talking about this collection, most likely due to the odd release strategy, but combine these EPs and they make for a strong 15-song comeback album.

Empath
The DIY punk scene in Philadelphia just keeps producing great bands, and the latest to rise out of it is the trio Empath.  What makes them stand out is that they're a little more noise-pop than their peers.  I generally don't go for music that has a heavy noise influence like this, but their sugary hooks and clean guitar breakdowns that bubble up from the smear of sounds makes for a compelling dynamic.  If you're new to the band, their recent EP Liberating Guilt and Fear is a great place to start.

Frankie Cosmos' performance on Juan's Basement
When I was a burgeoning indie kid, I loved watching Pitchfork's Juan's Basement video series, where bands performed live sets in a dingy New York basement.  (This Beach House performance is still transcendent and other-worldly).  I was happy to learn that the show was not only back after a 10 year hiatus, but it also featured a new installment from Frankie Cosmos, where they play their incredible new album in its entirety.  Stick around for the band interview at the end, which is a batch of delight all on its own.


Television
The Terror
Horror may be the hardest genre to do well on TV.  There's something about returning to a show's world week after week that doesn't lend itself to be scared as well as a contained two-hour film does.  The Terror, the AMC adaptation of Dan Simmons' best-selling historical horror novel, takes up that challenge and succeeds.  The show follows two ships from the British Royal Navy that disappeared while trying to navigate the Northwest Passage in harsh conditions.  It's not necessarily a terrifying show, but it mounts its dread so slowly and skillfully.  Even before mysterious things start occurring to the characters, there's a foreboding that soaks the series, thanks to its desolate tundra setting.  The first season is a little over halfway done, and if it sticks the landing, it will be one of the most impressive seasons of a horror show in a while.


Miscellaneous
Molly Ringwald's essay on John Hughes (essay)
If you're on Twitter, you've probably already read this Molly Ringwald piece from The New Yorker, but it's worth sharing just in case.  Ringwald offers a wonderful, measured take on the man whose work help put her on the map, and how she's had to reckon with the more problematic elements of those movies.  It's better, more nuanced writing than most culture critics who do this for a living could muster.

On Being Needy (blog post)
Lex Croucher has come up before in my favorite series, when I talked about her podcast Make Out With Him, and she's being mentioned here again because she's great!  This time I wanted to talk about her recent blog post on bad relationships, and when to recognize that you're not being needy, it's just that you and the other person have different expectations of the relationship.  I recently just ended a longtime friendship that was very important to me for similar reasons, so I found this very helpful to read.  Maybe it will help you out too.

Pandora at Animal Kingdom
Despite being a lifelong Florida native, I only became a Disney World enthusiast recently as an adult.  I've been to the Magic Kingdom a few times in my life but I had never been to Animal Kingdom or Epcot, so my most recent trip was the perfect chance to go and experience the new section of Animal Kingdom based on James Cameron's Avatar.  My family and I chose to go on the Na'vi River Journey first since the line for Flight of Passage was an insane three hour wait.  River Journey is a standard raft-based dark ride but it's the best version I've seen, full of amazing effects and gorgeous music.  Later in the day when the Flight of Passage line went down, we rode that as well and it was another incredible experience.  If you've been on the Forbidden Journey at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, this is a similar motion simulator experience, except maximized times 100.  The simulator screen is blown out to huge portions and the riding seat is so advanced that you really feel like you're riding a banshee in Pandora.  If you're not into rides, there's still some great scenery in the theme world.  I particularly liked the Swotu Waya drum ceremony that plays once an hour.  Overall, the experience was totally worth the trip.

Paste's piece on The Assassination of Gianni Versace (article)
I thought the second season of FX's American Crime Story was absolutely brilliant.  While it may not have been as buzzworthy and entertaining as the first season, which centered around the OJ Simpson trial, but in many ways it was more challenging and moving.  So it was pretty disappointing to see many critics being so dismissive and underwhelmed by the season.  That's why I loved this Paste article, which not only captures the power of the series, but also rightfully calls out critics on their biases against its subject matter.

50 Great Songs From 2017

On December 29th, my "20 Favorite Albums of 2017" list drops, but there's so much good music out there that one list couldn't fully represent what the year had to offer.  It's hard to make an album that's consistently great from start to finish, especially in an age where individual songs are given more and more importance.  So this list is intended to pay lip service to some great standalone songs.  All of these come from albums that won't be on my top 20 list, either because it's a great song on a mediocre album, or one on an album that's good but not quite good enough to crack the top tier.  So, without further ado, here's a list of fifty standalone songs, listed in alphabetical order (I limited myself to one song per artist):

My 20 Favorite Albums of 2016

There were two prevailing narratives in 2016.  The first one, obviously, was the amount of deaths we had from legendary musicians.  David Bowie, Prince, Phife Dawg, Leonard Cohen -- the list goes on.  2016 was a rough year all around, and these deaths didn't help matters, but at least there was comfort in knowing that many of these artists left behind terrific final albums.

The second trend from 2016 is how much consensus there seems to be when it comes to top 10 lists.  Year-end lists can sometimes be a useful tool for finding interesting albums that you may have overlooked in the last 12 months, but take a look at the best-of lists from every major publication and you'll see the same 10-12 albums on almost every single list.  Once you scroll down on this post you'll see that even I fell victim to that, which is a little disappointing, but hey, you can't help what you like.  Still, it's a shame that there were so few surprises in 2016.  From January 1st, it could've been predicted that people like Beyonce, Chance the Rapper, Kanye West, and Radiohead would take the top spots on critics' lists at the end of the year if you were told that they were releasing albums. The only album from a big name artist that seems to be considered a disappointment is Drake's underrated Views.  Poor Drake.

But let's not breeze by the most important bit of news from this year: despite dominating the political sphere, white people are losing when it comes to music.  The last few years have been marked by the larger music community declaring the death of indie rock, and while that hand-wringing feels a little too paranoid, it's hard not to notice that rap and R&B artists are beginning to occupy the critical conversation more and more.  After all, six of the seven artists at the top of Pitchfork's Best of Albums of 2016 list are black, something that would've been unheard of 10 years ago. Eight of the albums on my list are by black artists as well (11 if you count honorable mentions).  So shout out to black people for now.  You've got to imagine the dudes in The National are sitting around plotting their revenge though.

The rules: Due to the constant changing of the way music gets released, anything can be an album for the sake of this list.  You especially have to play fast and loose given the fact that many rap mixtapes function as albums anyway.  So LPs, mixtapes, 40-minute songs, EPs if they're good enough -- they're all albums to me!  If something got released in another country in a previous year, but got an American release this year, it works on a case-by-case basis (although there are no examples of that this year).  Otherwise, the eligibility window is that the album has to have been released between January 1, 2016 and today.  So now with that bit of business out of the way, on to the actual list...

Frankie Cosmos packs a world of wit and emotion in 28 minutes on "Next Thing"

Frankie Cosmos, the moniker of 22 year-old Greta Kline, interestingly tows the line between buzz genres of the recent past and present.  From her soft, childlike voice to her plucky junk-pop instrumentation, her sound resembles the kind of twee music that was popular with indie blogs in the mid-2000s.  But at the same time her personal, deeply emotional lyrics fit in perfectly with the 20-something singer-songwriter resurgence of the last few years.  It's a style she honed over her dozens of Bandcamp releases and fully realized on her 2014 gem, Zentropy.  But after an achievement like that at such a young age, she could've easily flamed out and failed to live up to her limitless potential.  Thankfully, her latest record Next Thing is as far from a disappointment as an album can possibly be.

It turns out that Fit Me In, the gauzy electronic EP she released last November, was just an experimental detour, because Next Thing gets back on the road paved by Zentropy.  It's another album of sharp, indie pop songs that bury genuine craft under the guise of simplicity.  And like her previous LP, this latest offering keeps things brief at 15 songs and 29 minutes.  Despite that short running time, Next Thing never seems like it's robbing the listener of material.  Kline doesn't feel the need to drag things out or repeat choruses, because everything lands with the appropriate weight the first time around.  These songs get in and out before you have a chance to get sick of them.  They even manage to shift and turn in their little 90-second spans.

But the real draw is Kline's lyrics, which manage to be breathtaking while working on a small scale.  Unlike some of her peers (like, say, Waxahatchee), she doesn't often rely on flowery language to get her point across.  Instead, her poetry is more plainspoken.  There's room for metaphor, but Kline's straightforward writing makes the particular banalities of which she speaks hit harder.  Next Thing frequently reads like a diary.  One page is her expressing happiness for her friends ("Embody"), then the next is her confronting dark thoughts and insecurities about a relationship ("Too Dark").  A few pages later she's exploring a different object of affection ("On the Lips").  These songs all sit beside one another and combine to form a compelling emotional portrait.  Everything feels so present tense too; they're songs ripped straight from her very own headlines.  I wouldn't be surprised if "Tour Good," a song about the moment-to-moment feelings of being on the road, was written while she was on tour.

All of this would be terribly navel-gazey were it not for two major factors.  First, the songs are so insistently catchy that the album could merely be enjoyed as a collection of charming pop songs.  From the sickly sweet swing of "On the Lips" to the bouncy chug of "If I Had a Dog," it's got indelible melodies to spare.  The second element that saves these songs from feeling self-indulgent is the sly sense of humor that Kline tucks just underneath all of her musings.  "I know I'm not a lake" she says, to joke about her lack of depth on the seemingly tossed off "Outside With the Cuties."  She starts off "I'm 20" with the line "I'm 20 / washed up already" and you can practically hear her winking.

The best albums have as much life in your head as they do in your ears.  In that case, Next Thing is going to go down as one of the best albums of 2016.  Albums that came out last week have already been erased from my mind, but ever since this one came out a month ago it's been rattling around up there.  Kline's songs feel like a whole universe.  She references her real friends, her dog, her brother -- you have to bring in your own knowledge to get the first names she drops.  But the feeling of intimacy is enough even if you don't do the extra credit.  You may not know who the Gaby or Owen she mentions in her songs are, but by the end of Next Thing, you feel like you know who Greta Kline is.

My 20 Favorite Albums of 2014

Last year, I wrote about how many different narratives there were for music in 2013.  On the other hand, 2014 was a year that seemed to have no narrative at all (which maybe was a narrative in and of itself?).  Coincidentally, this was not a great year for music.  It was one full of good albums, because every year has good albums, but much less great ones than previous years in this decade.  There were also no real event albums like there were last year, which gave us Yeezus, Modern Vampires of the City, and Random Access Memories, among others.  And even the ones that got many people talking this year -- like Benji or Lost in a Dream -- I wasn't crazy about.

It was, however, a good year for women, at least judging by my list.  12 of the picks on my list are either by women or bands fronted by women.  So shout out to the ladies, I guess!  (Anti-shout out to rap music, which didn't fare as well.  Only one of the albums in my top 20 is a rap release.)

The rules: Due to the constant changing of the way music gets released, anything can be an album for the sake of this list.  You especially have to play fast and loose given the fact that many rap mixtapes function as albums anyway.  So LPs, mixtapes, 40-minute songs, EPs if they're good enough -- they're all albums to me!  If something got released in another country in a previous year, but got an American release this year, it works on a case-by-case basis (we'll see an example of that later).  Otherwise, the eligibility window is that the album has to have been released between January 1, 2014 and today.  That means Beyonce's self-titled album, which came out during the last week of 2013 but will probably appear on one or two 2014 lists, is not eligible for this one.  (Spoiler: it wouldn't have made it anyway.)  So now with that bit of business out of the way, on to the actual list...