Tag Archives: H31R

In Search of the 23 Best Albums of 2023: The 23 Best Albums of 2023!

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Back in the misty dawn of time, I set out to catch up on new music. I think the era was called 2021?

In any case, in this distant eon I listened to critics choices for the best albums of the 2010s. I did the same for 2020. And then I set out to listen to new releases month by month throughout 2021, so I could come up with the 21 best albums of 2021. That was so much fun that I did it again in 2022, and found the 22 best albums of 2022.

There are links to the 2020, 2021, and 2022 albums in the posts above, but if you’d like an all-in playlist for each year, I have that on Spotify (I’ll be moving these to YouTube Music eventually, for reasons to be explained below):

What do you do when you have best albums lists for three years in a row/? You go for four! And so I continued my monthly review in 2023:

( January/February/March April May June July/August September October/November/December )

In all, I listened to 1,071 albums released in 2023. I then whittled that down as follows:

  • Based on first listen, I ended up with 265 “yes” and “maybe” picks
  • I re-listened to that 265, and got 148 semi-finalists
  • Those 148 then got a final re-listen resulting in…

The 23 Best Albums of 2023!

Aesop Rock, Integrated Tech Solutions– Oh the old school bass, synth, and drum machine sounds! It’s a very deliberate invocation, as the 80s IT-theme, occasional appearance of video game sound effects, and shout-outs to everything from Salt-N-Pepa to Mr. T make clear. It’s not purely an exercise in nostalgia though- the flow and the mix often feels very modern. Aesop Rock has produced some of my favorite hip hop of the past few years, and I’ll happily add this to that list!

Christian Kjellvander, Hold Your Love Still– Moody and atmospheric guitar-driven music, replete with minor chords, and haunting vocals with literate and philosophical lyrics. The musical and vocal range may be limited, but this Swedish-born, Seattle-raised singer-songwriter with indie lo-fi roots more than makes up for that with the power he runs through his music.

CMAT, Crazymad, For Me– You know those Irish singer-songwriters with a wicked wit and playful inventiveness who are lush pop vocalists with a strong country flavor? Well, Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson, aka CMAT is one of those. Actually, I don’t know how many more of those there are, but she’s a damn good one, and I love it!

Esther Rose, Safe to Run– I was looking forward to this given that her album How Many Times made my top 21 in 2021. And here again we have her delightfully sincere vocals, emotionally literate storytelling, and utterly authentic feeling for country, pop, rock, and their fit together. I initially wasn’t sure if I was totally sold on the track sequencing, but damn does every single individual song hold up.

Gina Birch, I Play My Bass Loud– This album from Raincoats co-founder Burch has got the dissonant sound of early post-punk, experiments with rhythm, intriguing work from her eponymous bass, and a familiar feminist edge. If it does sound of an era, well, she was one of the founders of that era, and everything here is still oh so relevant.

Grace Potter, Mother Road– My Vermont home team girl Grace Potter is in peak form here- rocking, rootsy, musically tough, lyrically feisty. This is a nearly perfect fusion between formula, form, and function. And the album even pulls off a conceptual through-line!

H31R, Headspace– Going in knowing there were 14 songs in 25 minutes and a parental advisory certainly had me feeling well-disposed. The low-fi glitchy beats and effects, spare mix, and smart and outspoken lyrics justified this inclination. There’s a lot of freshness on this collaboration between New Jersey producer JWords and Brooklyn rapper maassai.

Homeboy Sandman, Rich– Smart, positive, and often funny left of center lyrics, a pleasant conversational flow, and a varied and clever musical mix. This Queens rapper has been around for fifteen years, and it shows in how comfortable and confident he is doing his thing here. And the album reminds me how much hip hop that relaxes a little and gets into the details of small everyday life still has to say.

Joanna Sternberg, I’ve Got Me– Quirky vocals, with sharp dense emotionally internal lyrics and slightly off-kilter acoustic instrumentation. It’s often kind of sing-song, and deliberately artless, but vulnerable. All-in-all, this NYC-based singer, songwriter and visual artist is producing delightful music that I want to hear more of!

Logic, College Park– The structure of this album is literally Logic and his friend taking a drive around College Park, Maryland on the eve of his first live performance, dropping in on people and places along the way. That gives us the frame, and then the muscular musical mix, strong beats, interesting and varied flow, and self-aware narration lend it depth. At more than an hour it is a tad on the long side, but structure, contents, and fun keep it going. His 2022 album Vinyl was one of my honorable mentions, and l can see that’s no fluke!

Marnie Stern, The Comeback Kid– Blistering guitar work, booming power pop sound, 80s synth overtones, an exuberance and edge to the mix, and a unique vocal presence. All right, Marnie, all right! I also love the way she messes with us, like the second track about the sound being hard to take, which keeps layering on sonic challenges as it goes. The title refers to her decade off of new releases, but you sure couldn’t prove it by how much virtuosity is on display here.

Nat Myers, Yellow Peril– A Korean-American Blues musician, which is a story I like. But even better, it is as fine a genuine-feeling dynamic set of steel guitar traditional blues as you are going to find. It never felt less than fun and true for a single track.

No-No Boy, Electric Empire– You may find other indie rock albums with peerless chamber pop melodic instincts. You may find other musical efforts that mix in aspects of Asian musical traditions with integrity and without appeal to novelty or fetishization. You may find other nuanced and thoughtful explorations of identity and history. But I would propose that you will rarely find all those things together and done at such a high level. No-No Boy is the project of Asian-American singer, songwriter, and scholar Julian Saporiti, and this is his third album. It was a slow burn, but it really got me.

Olivia Rodrigo, GUTS– I like Olivia Rodrigo for her knack for combining chart-worthy dance/pop hooks and rocking breaks with lyrics that are somehow simultaneously bubblegum and yet acidly sharp and searing. There are a host of young female artists in this space now, but even among them she is a standout, and her plaintive and sometimes astonishing purity of voice adds another whole level to it. This is a worthy follow-up to her debut level, and an inspiring down payment on more to come.

Palehound, Eye on the Bat– Thrashy guitar with just enough poppy melody, on point vocal phrasing during both slow/quiet and loud/fast interludes, and lyrics that paint real life stories but load them with emotional meaning. Band frontperson El Kempner severely undersells when they say, “it’s kind of like journal-rock, just all of my biggest fears splurted onto some vinyl, no different from writing a diary, really.” This is their fourth album, and I look forward to hearing more!

Prewn, Through the Window– This seems constantly on the edge of being too narrow-band in sound, but also hits so many notes I like- anguished vocals, minor chords, feedback, distortion, and reverb. It can be difficult to penetrate to the dark heart of what is going on here, but the fact that there is a harrowing song about literally killing and frying every fish in the sea gives you some indication. I’m not entirely sure what Izzy Hagerup of Massachusetts is up to, but I dig it!

Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter, Saved!– Avant garde artist Kristin Hayter has shed her Lingua Ignota persona, and released a gospel inspired album on which she, by her own recounting, reaches, “new levels of unhinged, spiritually and sonically.” I mean, okay, I can get behind that! And in fact, it’s amazing. The spiritual yearning is sincere, but the traditional vocal and piano arrangements of the songs are mutated through the influence of electronica, metal, and noisy distorted experimental music. The results are jarring, unsettling, and sometimes abrasive, but it never feels gimmicky, and the evocative and uncanny nature of the songs that result lends itself to the quest.

Roger Waters, The Dark Side of the Moon Redux – The natural objection here is the hubris of redoing a classic, but I admire musical hubris, and if anyone has a right to re-approach this material, it’s Roger Waters. The next issue is the inherent thorniness of covers (which, again, I love), but the good news here is this meets my criteria for “gold standard” of a cover- not a too-faithful reproduction (because what would we need that for since we have the original?), but also something that substantively engages with and honors the original in some form. Waters has produced a version of these songs that isn’t a novelty or a copy, but instead pulls out their original air of darkness even more sharply and comes from the point of view of a worn yet wise observer of life. In other words, he brings the perspective of an 80-year-old self to the music he made as a 30-year-old. The effect is truly compelling.

slowthai, UGLY– I liked this British hip hop artist’s 2021 album Tyron quite a bit. This album is just as skillfully done, but more coherent and more serious. It has a brooding weight and propulsive energy as he really gets inside to wrestle with his life.

The Hives, The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons– This album is single-handedly making me believe in the 2000s garage rock revival again. And with more than a little flavor of the Jam, Stiff Little Fingers and the rockier side of post-punk. There is nothing new here. But that’s gloriously the point!

Thee Headcoats, Irregularis (The Great Hiatus)– Rollicking blues rock! With the classic name checks to prove it, bolstered by a determination to be, as one song here puts it “pretty original nevertheless”. Like the “Leader of the Pack” inspired “Leader of the Sect” or album-closer “The Kids Are All Square”… The album came about when Billy Childish’s friend and musical inspiration Don Craine of the Downliners Sect died in February 2022. Childish teamed up with his former bandmates from his ’90s group Thee Headcoats and Craine’s bandmate Keith Evans to record a memorial EP. They all enjoyed that experience enough that they decided to cut this reunion LP. I love what it does so much!

U2, Songs of Surrender– Regular readers will know that I like a good concept album. This “new” album from U2 scores highly in that regard. The band presents new recordings of forty songs from throughout their career with a stripped-down acoustic approach, in four sets of ten chosen by each band member. As you might imagine, this ends up being a little long, as in, around two and three quarter hours. But it is worth it- the treatments and sometime lyrical reworkings expose anew the power of the songs, and as a set it sounds very coherent. You may think me mad, but I think this works!

Who is She?, Goddess Energy– Sweet melodies, bright chords, driving music right on the centerline between pop and punk, and energetic charmingly artless vocals. All of this, and odes to Movie Pass, Marianne Williamson, and telling off Anne Hathaway’s haters. How can I not be smitten? This “supergroup” of members of local Seattle bands Tacocat, Lisa Prank, and Chastity Belt makes some real magic together.

And there you have The 23 Best Albums of 2023! But wait, there’s more! For a limited time only we can make you the special offer of 77 “honorable mentions” to round out our list to a nice even 100:

  • 100 gecs, 10,000 gecs– I do love me some hyperpop! This particular St. Louis duo’s iteration is equal parts synth bedroom pop, autotune, and thrashy guitar feedback excess, and is high energy, silly, and total sincere.

  • Alan Palomo, World of Hassle– Originally from Mexico, composer, producer, and songwriter Alan Palomo has apparently been making beautiful and catchy genre-bending music since the late 00s but has remained off my radar until now. The loss is mine! This lush, catchy, and smart amalgam of electro and 80s soul had me smiling and bopping my head the whole time!

  • Alice Longyu Gao, Let’s Hope Heteros Fail, Learn and Retire– The title lets you know there’s a point of view, which is great. But even better is the mix of energetic, wacky, and experimental on display here as it combines electronic, sing-song, noise rock, and high-octane dance music. This Chinese-born American singer, songwriter, DJ, and performance artist has it going on!

  • Angel Bat Dawid, Requiem for Jazz– Meant as a deliberate response to the “Jazz is Dead” line that has been kicking around since the 1959 film The Cry of Jazz, this extraordinary album by Chicago composer, clarinetist, and educator Dawid holds a literal requiem mass for the form that both celebrates it and turns it inside out, both in service of what jazz has meant in the Black world, and what something new in its spirit could mean. It’s orchestral, experimental, dissonant, exuberant, and incantatory.

  • Ava Max, Diamonds and Dancefloors– I do appreciate good dance music, and this starts off on the right note in terms of energy, production, catchiness, and verve. And it keeps going at the same level track after track. Ava Max is now my second-favorite Albanian-American musical powerhouse! (Sorry Ava, Action Bronson got there first.)

  • BabyBaby_Explores, Food Near Me, Weather Tomorrow– Musically quirky, distorted and dissonant, lyrically snarky, and vocally weird, without losing the through line of darkly inflected guitars and drums. This Providence Rhode Island trio is an exemplar of what post rock can do. I want more!

  • Be Your Own Pet, Mommy– Powered by the true force of nature Jemina Pearl, Be Your Own Pet released one of my favorite albums of the 00s, Get Awkward, and then promptly imploded. The ensuing years saw her grow up, start a family, and emerge even stronger and more in charge, and their old garage rock swagger plus her enhanced substance are a great combination here. Not to mention which, the album opens with a BDSM song. What’s not to like?
  • Big Freedia, Central City– This album from New Orleans-based rapper Big Freedia is overflowing with humor, booming bawdy energy, and classic mix motifs. This is apparently a subgenre known as “bounce music”. It’s musically delightful, and heaven knows this is a historical moment where exuberant energy from a gender nonconforming gay man who embraces femininity is extremely welcome.
  • Bun B/Statik Selektah, Trillstatik 2– There’s a light sprightly feeling to much of the lyrical and musical mix of this collaboration between Texas hip-hop legend Bub B and East Coast producer Statik Selektah, but also depth in its portraits of life. The vocal flow doesn’t always keep up but is also often affecting, and, considering the album was recorded live in one twelve-hour session, this is pretty amazing!

  • Bush Tetras, They Live In My Head– Excellent moody minor chords rock, somewhere between post-punk and 90s, and vocals with a haunted, plaintive edge. It turns out this New York band has been kicking around since the late 70s and was one of the early No Wave bands, which tells you why they sound like everything between. They’re OG!

  • Butch Walker, Butch Walker as…Glenn– Walker started off heading a glam metal band in the 80s and has ventured over all kinds of territory since then. This album finds him engaged in a very specific kind of character- it presents the persona of “Glenn”, a burned-out musician playing a cheap and rowdy bar. You’ll hear hints of Billy Joel, Springsteen, and Jackson Browne here, as well other similar voices. The concept sound is thus inherently a little derivative, but it feels fantastically sincere.

  • Ceci Bastida, Every Thing Taken Away– What I read about her was, “Since moving from Tijuana, Mexico, to the United States, the former Tijuana No! keyboardist and singer Ceci Bastida has released records and podcasts extending the Latinx punk tradition.” What I have to say is, this album is brilliant, nervy, electronic and rocking, with stripped-down beats, fun, and attitude!

  • Chase & Status, 2 Ruff, Vol. 1– Stuttering beats, glitchy sounds, metallic bass like looming dread, and the vocal autotuning actually works, turning them into urgent yet distorted prophetic voices. Dread that you can dance to! This U.K. drum’n’bass/dubstep duo has apparently been kicking around since the early 00s, and I’m told this is less polished and more like a mixtape that their usual albums. Amen!

  • Cheater Slicks, Ill-fated Cusses– Echoing clangy guitars, a thick feedback-laden background, and vocals that are consciously artless. They’ve been in the Boston music scene since the late 80s, and it turns out they can still bring it. It sounds like punk, it sounds like garage rock, it sounds like the snottier reaches of 80s hardcore.

  • Colter Wall, Little Songs– This is such a lyrically, vocally, and musically full-bodied and genuine invocation of the heyday of 70s Outlaw Country (with occasional dashes back all the way to Hank Williams) that I can barely process that it’s coming from a 28-year-old Canadian. Well done 28-year-old Canadian, and somebody please let pop country radio know!

  • Danny Brown, Quaranta– Oh, I like the mix here! Muscular, surprising, full of glitches, stutters, computer samples. The flow and the lyrics likewise have a knack for hooks, and being varied and interesting. Thank you Detroit rapper Danny Brown (and associated collaborators) for reminding me what fun hip hop can be.
  • Debby Friday, Good Luck– This Nigeria-born, Canada-based artist has been known for rave-inspired dystopian sci-fi works. How could i not love that conceptually? And actually, it’s artistic, lurching, almost like a hardcore electronic dance music. I’m in!

  • Deerhoof, Miracle-Level– I love Deerhoof, but there are a few things here that further set it apart as their oeuvre goes. It’s their first all-Japanese album and recorded live in a professional studio, another first for them. Perhaps because of that, it’s got tautness, clarity, and sometimes even a relaxed jam feeling on top of their usual off-kilter mix of sweet melody and noisy anarchy. It doesn’t feel as held-together as their best albums, but it is interesting all the way through.

  • Detwat, HiTech– I have learned that ghettotech is a fusion of electro, techno, ghetto house, and Miami bass that has arisen from Detroit’s club scene. I’ve also learned that I love this. It’s very fresh! It shows the verve of both good hip hop and electronic, with stuttering energy, humor, and a sophisticated mix.

  • Dhani Harrison, Innerstanding– Knowing he’s George Harrison’s son, I went in with a certain semi-conscious expectation, and ended up encountering something more daring and experimental. To be sure there are hints of the sunny hazy side of 60s and 70s rock here, but also aspects of electronic, experimental, shoegaze, and noise rock as well. He reminds me of one of my favorites from last year, Particle Kid (aka Willie Nelson’s son Micah), in the way he both enhances and subverts the musical legacy that he’s inherited.

  • Dhanji, RUAB– I like the old school soul G-funk samples, the sometimes-dizzying kaleidoscope mix, and the challenging experimental sounds of this 25-year-old rapper from Ahmedabad, India. Much of it isn’t in English, and much of the time I don’t care! US hip hop could learn a thing or two about shaking things up a little from this youthful debut album.

  • DJ Ramon Sucesso, Sexta dos Crias– I kind of love this! It’s grating, lurching, but also delightful in it’s use of multiple aspects of hip hop, house, techno, and 2000s EDM styles. A little deliberately rough to get through, but this 21 year-old Brazilian DJ-producer’s album is confirming for me that I need to check out some more baille funk!

  • Eli Escobar, The Beach Album– Nice classic hip hop and electronic sounds (think electro, house, early techno) and a smart varied mix. This album knows (as one track says) that it is “taking us back.” And leans into it full force, to excellent effect! Escobar began playing records, throwing parties, and making beats as a late-’80s teen, and his love for a familiarity with the evolving NY dance scene shows up here in the best kind of way.

  • Feeling Figures, Migration Magic– Crunchy and fuzzy guitars! Female vocalists! Punk and yet pop instincts! 10 songs in less than 30 minutes! It isn’t the most groundbreaking thing every, but you can’t fault a thing about how it’s done, and I likes it!

  • Florry, The Holey Bible– Country rock from this Philadelphia band with a 90s alt country feeling to it, but more than a dose of 70s sunshine, and playful wit in vocals, lyrics, and arrangement. All this is delivered without sacrificing the feeling of authenticity, and genuine emotion.

  • Foyer Red, Yarn the Hours Away– A weird, nervy, jerky, rock, multi-layered, sing-songy, with gonzo synths. If more people were as inventive with pop rock as this Brooklyn band, it would be a grand world!

  • Goat, Medicine– The opening starts with a suitably growling distorted guitar that sounds like a 70s psyche rock freakout. Track two has a bit of an ornate pop feel to it, backed up by EDM effects. The third track combines strains of all of these and pumps up the echo. And so it goes on from there! My sources tell me that Goat is a Swedish alternative and experimental fusion music group, released in the US on the Sub Pop label. I tell my sources I dig this!
  • Greta Van Fleet, Starcatcher– I mean, Great Van Fleet is a forgery, right? But their forgery of Zeppelin, Rush, and other 70s hard rock luminaries on this album is so true to the original and exquisitely delivered, I can’t help but love it as a work of art in its own right. Rock on, young lads!

  • Grian Chatten, Chaos for the Fly– This debut studio album by Irish musician Grian Chatten (best known as the lead singer for Fontaines D.C.) has the raw edge of his work with them, but also a delicate orchestration which lightens the emotional heaviness and brings new depth and subtlety, and a hint of sweetness, to his sound.
  • Immaterial Possession, Mercy of the Crane Folk– Jangly and unnerving hints of post-punk, the Doors, the medieval trippy bazaar side of psychedelia, and horror aspects of goth and industrial. It doesn’t sound totally coherent, sometimes the flow is a little off, but this Georgia quartet has something interesting going on!

  • Indigo De Souza, All of This Will End– Oh these earnest young things who so effortlessly combine singer-songwriter vulnerability, dance music fun, and crunching 90s guitar rock! There is a whole crop of them out these days, and we are blessed for it. Though it didn’t quite make my 2021 list, this North Carolina singer’s album Any Shape You Take caught my eye for the same strengths of musical inventiveness and emotional rawness that are on display here.

  • Jad Fair/Samuel Locke Ward, Happy Hearts– I found this to be nearly unclassifiable, in a good way. It comes across as almost a sing-song children’s album, except awkward, adult, and sometimes dark, with a good feeling for sweet melody, and plain vocal delivery. It definitely shows that this comes from a wildly inventive place- Jad Fair, prolific ever since he started with his brother David as Half Japanese during the mid-’70s, went into overdrive during the 2020s. During this period, he was contacted by Samuel Locke Ward, a home taper from Iowa with a strong D.I.Y. aesthetic. Working remotely, they began making one song per week, leading to this album.

  • Jeff Rosenstock, Hellmode– It starts off with an anthemic punky power-pop query about whether love will outlast finding out the singer has fucked up. From there, sometimes emo-earnest, sometimes punky overdrive, (and often snarky). It reminds me of a space somewhere between early Green Day, your 00s emo de jour, and Harvey Danger. I am told that he, “is an American musician, multi-instrumentalist, singer and songwriter from Long Island, New York. He is known for his former bands Bomb the Music Industry! and The Arrogant Sons of Bitches, as well as for his work as a solo artist and as a composer for Craig of the Creek. He is the founder of Quote Unquote Records, the first donation-based record label.” Well all right!

  • Jockstrap, I<3UQTINVU– I<3UQTINVU (“I Love You Cutie, I Envy You”) is a remix compilation from this UK duo’s 2022 album I Love You Jennifer B. I found that album to be too polished and muted, but these reworkings are anything but. The glitchy beats and vocals, spare mix, and ability to go EDM, experimental, and rocking sometimes all at the same time really stand out. There are genuinely surprising moments throughout, and the sound is familiar enough to be accessible, but also challenging and a promise of new possibilities.

  • Joe Jackson, Mr. Joe Jackson Presents Max Champion in What a Racket!– The album is presented as the work of the fictional Max Champion, a turn of the century music man. As such, it’s thoroughly in early 20th century music hall style. This is what we call “high concept”. And, in the hands of someone less skillful than Joe Jackson, it might be extremely annoying. But what actually results here is a flawless set of songs that sound totally period but also feel contemporary and alive, and if the whole thing reads a bit like an album-length treatment of “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite”, well apparently I needed that and didn’t even know!

  • Joell Ortiz/L’Orange, Signature– Producer L’Orange joins with Ortiz to re-interpret his 2021 album Autograph (hence Signature, get it?), in the process producing a new “old” album. New in that the reinterpretation stands on it’s own, “old” in the sense that they mine some classic sounds. I like the lurching offbeats, unusual and powerful mix, positive ownership of the lyrics, and the swagger and power of the flow.

  • JPEGMafia & Danny Brown, Scaring the Hoes– This collaboration between innovative Detroit rapper Brown (who already has an entry further above) and Brooklyn-based JPEGMafia (aka Barrington DeVaughn Hendricks) is a dizzying breathless ride. The flow is blistering, the mix experimental and kaleidoscopic, and the fun they had in making it is manifest.

  • Kate Davis, Fishbowl– Oh the crunching guitars. The driving songs. The melodies! The crystal-clear vocals and emotionally literate lyrics. I do so enjoy what Kate Davis does

  • Kesha, Gag Order– Wow! I did not know a lot about Kesha beyond some vague sense she was dance-related. Which she is, but also raw, ragged, angry, powerful, spiritual, musically varied, and given to unusual production choices. Compelling all the way through!

  • Laura Cantrell, Just Like a Rose: The Anniversary Sessions– Well that is some lovely countrified electric Americana! Full of brightness and clarity, with lyrics and chord changes that have a feeling for authentically honoring country while bringing in pop rock energy. Cantrell has been recording in this vein since the late 90s, and this is her 6th solo album (raising a family and having to work for a living having taken a lot of her time along the way).

  • Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real, Sticks and Stones– Willie Nelson’s son is here with some good old-fashioned country (a la outlaw) and rock (a la southern rock and 70s singer songwriter). It’s not the newest sound in the world, in fact anti that, but it is a great delivery of said sound that never rings false.

  • Macklemore, Ben– As your contemporary pop superstar hip-hop goes, Macklemore is top of the crop. It’s heavily produced, but the production flourishes are earned, and in service of substantive lyrics and a winning persona. Even the ubiquitous guest star mania is well-deployed.

  • MJ Lenderman, And The Wind (Live and Loose!)– This live album from Asheville singer-songwriter Lenderman is full of distorted guitars, sometimes in a country vein, sometimes more like southern rock or even noise rock. All topped with a yearning drawled melancholy to the vocals, and a lyrical side featuring heartache, humor, and oddly poingant slices of life.

  • Morgan and the Organ Donors, M.O.D.s– Holy retro soundscapes! Driving, chiming guitars, cracking drums, harmonies. You will hear some 60s girl-group, some garage rock, some pop side of punk, some 80s jangle, some 90s riot grrrl. And it never sounds less than organically whole and fresh, which isn’t an accident. Morgan and the Organ Donors are a band made up of four friends who play a few shows a year at a bar they like in Olympia, Washington. Except the friends are former Bikini Kill drummer Tobi Vail on drums, as well as two K Records artists, James Maeda of Spider & the Webs and Olivia Ness of C.O.C.O., on lead guitar and bass.

  • Mozart Estate, Pop-up! Ker-ching! And the Possibilities of Modern Shopping– Based on the name of the album alone I went in already half in love. What a delight then to hear a perfectly-delivered version of the most exuberant varieties of pub rock, early UK new wave, and UK 80s alt pop acts like Squeeze and The Beautiful South. It is in all wise a familiar sound, but so beautifully rendered that I cannot get mad at it!

  • Noname, Sundial– Smart metaphysical poetic hip hop, positive but with plenty of raunch and bite, disarmingly approachable vocals, and a compelling swirl in the musical mix including jazz, gospel choruses, Brill Building pop, and classic 80s beats.

  • Oddisee, To What End– Oddisee is the stage name of Brooklyn-based Sudanese-American hip-hop artist Amir Mohamed el Khalifa. The pure dynamism of what he puts out here musically, lyrically, and mixologically is extremely winning! It reminded me of certain veins of personal story directed 2000s hip-hop (think Jay-Z or Kendrick Lamar), with some of the feelings and concerns of conscious hip-hop.

  • Olivia Jean, Raving Ghost– Olivia Jean is the lead of the “garage goth” band the Black Belles and, incidentally along the way, Jack White’s newest wife. I mention those only because both factors, maybe, give you a clue to what her musical POV is. Swinging, retro, and vaguely sinister on the first track, slightly punky power pop on the second, a metal feeling on the third. And later, there is the version of “Orinoco Flow” that turns it into a girl-group/punk number. It may all be a little formulaic, but damn it’s a good formula- Olivia Jean is a cool rocking righteous chick, and I am here for it!

  • Open Mike Eagle, Another Triumph of Ghetto Engineering– This Chicago MC really delivers on the album title! Great attitude and presence, a smart and interesting low fi mix, hooky and poetic with both positivity and darkness.

  • Owl City, Coco Moon– I heard this was from an electronica collective, which put me a little on edge. In fact, it turns out to be electronic , but in the way, for example, the Postal Service is electronic. And in truth reminds me of the brighter and more quirky side of Ben Gibbard’s work. Somewhere between deep storytelling and high-energy summer fluff, and unusually informed by the artists’ Christianity. Per Wikipedia: “Owl City is an American electronic music project created in 2007 in Owatonna, Minnesota. It is one of several projects by singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Adam Young, who created the project while experimenting with music in his parents’ basement.” Three cheers for experimenting with music in parent’s basements!

  • Pink Navel & Kenny Segal, How to Capture Playful– The dense and quirky flow and lurching left-field mix here caught my attention up front. The intelligence of the geeky pop culture-obsessed lyrics and varied and unusual sample and mix choices kept me tuned in. This collaboration of innovative L.A. producer Kenny Segal and nerd culture aficionado and Massachusetts hip hop artist Pink Navel (aka Devin Bailey) is great!

  • Pretenders, Relentless– The album opens with a bruising start almost at home in grunge. At other times it feels like an old blueswoman holding court. Or punk returning. Or 80s hard rock radio. But Chrissie Hynde’s voice is unmistakable, and her chords still chime like bells. It ends on an oddly muted note, but the darkly textured songs throughout commanded my attention.
  • Quasi, Breaking the Balls of History– Janet Weiss did not take her summary dismissal from Sleater Kinney lying down, instead joining with her ex-husband to put out the first new Quasi album in ten years. Quasi has been a reliably interesting and challenging band since the 90s, and they’re still in the game here. By turns crunchy, shimmery and shoegazey, and kaleidoscopically weird, this is a delightful listen from start to finish.

  • RAYE, My 21st Century Blues– Sophisticated emotional R&B informed by hip hop, full of musical surges and a voice that is remarkable for precision of phrasing and versatility. The album also grapples with real life- abuse, relationships gone bad, emotional and physical bottoming out, in a way that feels authentic but is still pop music smooth.

  • Ron Gallo, Foreground Music– A blistering guitar open with echoing vocals is an effective way to worm your way into my heart. But he was already there thanks to his album PEACEMEAL being in my top 21 list for 2021. As for this album, is it extremely self-referential? Entirely tongue in cheek? So musically and lyrically fucking clever you don’t care which? Yes! And yet, though undeniably often wacky, it’s not all fun and games, there’s a heart of furious dissent. Is there a better contemporary protest song than the sharp and yet ultimately poignant, neo-psych “BIG TRUCK ENERGY” or a more anguished love song than “I LOVE SOMEONE BURIED DEEP INSIDE OF YOU”?

  • Rosa Pistola, Cumbiaton Total– Well this was wonderful! Such lively, varied, and over the top hip-hop and dance music glee. Per Bandcamp: “Cumbiaton Total is a headfirst dive into Mexico City’s raw and unique take on the reggaeton sound, and its rising recognition. Compiled by NTS with Rosa Pistola (a central figure at the heart of the scene), the release coincides with a mini-documentary that explores the community spirit around the scene, with interviews and footage of the artists that feature on the release.”  It is entirely in Spanish, but so fun I don’t care that I can barely understand a single lyric.

  • RP Boo, Legacy Volume 2– The spare excellence, stuttered pop culture sampling, and driving repetition of these DJ mixes reminds me of the 90s heyday of this kind of music. And indeed, Kavain Space, aka RP Boo, had gotten his start DJing in the Chicago house music scene of the 90s and was already legendary for developing the “footwork” style before he began finally publicly releasing his mixes in the 2010s. This sample collects mixes from the 00s, but it’s new to us. And excellent!

  • Ruen Brothers, Ten Paces– An atmospheric indie rock with cowboy ballad flavorings, minor chords, and weird western themes. How am I not going to fall for this? I’m NOT not! Turns out on subsequent investigation that they are an English duo infatuated with American music a la rockabilly. Well, okay lads!

  • Ryan Davis & the Roadhouse Band, Dancing on the Edge– Spontaneous feeling stripped down Americana-flavored indie rock with articulate personal lyrics and transparent vocals. It has an often-upbeat feeling, but with an undertow of complexity and sadness. Louisville Singer-songwriter Davis has headed the band State Champion, started a music festival, and founded a DIY record label, and here on his first solo outing he proves to be a dynamic voice worth listening to.

  • Sextile, Push– Dance instincts, a stuttering electronic beat, and a punk heart. All Music Guide tells me this LA band is “Alternative/Indie Rock, Indie Electronic, New Wave/Post-Punk Revival”. Whatever they are, I like it!

  • Shamir, Homo Anxietatem– An unusual vocalist with a surging voice, music that’s equal parts new-wave, electronic dance, folk, and hard rocking (with a bonus blues song thrown in), and a powerful point of view. This Las Vegas native is a bundle of talent who has been beaming out great indie pop since 2012, and he’s showing no signs of slowing down.

  • SKECH185, He Left Nothing for the Swim Back– NY-based hip-hop artist SKECH185’s fiery social and political truth-telling and producer Jeff Markey’s swirling, lurching sonic mix of sounds combine for a powerful package.

  • Sleaford Mods, UK Grim– I was on the fence about this the way I was about their last album. There’s the sameness and simplicity, but also the power in the simplicity, the propulsive poetic barrage, and the witty trenchant and literate rant attached.

  • Snooper, Super Snooper– Punk in a vein that reminds me of early Jam and American hardcore, but also includes playful distortion, drum machines, and sound effects reminiscent of new wave, hip hop, and electronic music. The album rips through 14 songs in 23 minutes without every losing vitality and fun. I am now more than halfway in love with this Nashville band!

  • Sweeping Promises, Good Living Is Coming for You– Such a bright clear classic new wave sound! They wouldn’t sound out of place on a circa 1983 double-bill with Missing Persons. Which is not to say there is anything inauthentic here, behind the slinky synthy excellence, there’s some genuine heft and personality to the vocals of lead singer Lira Mondal. Dagnabit, I think I love this Kansas by way of Austin by way of Boston by way of Arkansas band!

  • Teke::Teke, Hagata– Their album Shirushi made my 2021 Honorable Mention list, and this one is charming me in a similar fashion. Eclectic, alternately serrated and swinging, with an edge of dark frenzy and a hefty dash of mirthfulness. Yes, it is all in Japanese, and no that doesn’t matter, the wealth of its sonic landscape is well worth the journey.

  • TERRY, Call Me Terry– Ringing jangly propulsive guitars, walls of synth sound, catchy refrains, delightfully artless vocal phrasing delivering elliptical lyrics. Listening to this felt like I was in a great part of the alt 80s, yet also contemporary. Three cheers little Australian indie band!

  • The C.I.A., Surgery Channel– You know, this sounds a bit like a surgery channel! It leans toward a nervy sharp-edged post-punk, with more than a hint of the rawer end of 90s alt bands like Babes in Toyland, but also some chilly electronic/synth work a la Kraftwerk. This turns out not to have been released by a national intelligence agency, but by musical auteur Ty Segall, his wife Denée Segall, and Emmett Kelly of Cairo Gang. I really like it, and I don’t even feel the need to be clandestine about it!

  • The Go! Team, Get Up Sequences, Pt. 2– Get Up Sequences, Pt. 1 was one of my honorable mentions for 2021, and Part 2 is entirely as charming. Imagine a high school AV team made an album exuberantly mixing electronic dance, international music, and hip-hop with liberal use of synthesizer. This gives you some sense of what this Brighton, UK six-piece band is up to, and it is glorious!
  • The Men, New York City– With the band name, and the album name, you might expect getting a rocking outing that would fit in well with the garage rock revival of the early 00s. And you would get it! Not the most original thing ever, but joyful noise well delivered.

  • The Reds, Pinks & Purples, The Town That Cursed Your Name– I love the shimmery achy thing that they do here, an invocation of hazy summer days listening to the Cure in the alternative 80s. It’s suffused through with a lyrical nostalgia as well. It is rather same track to track, but a gorgeous sameness.

  • Thy Slaughter, A. G. Cook & Easyfun, Soft Rock– The glitchy mix, degraded sound effect kaleidoscope, and over the top melodic fragmented songs are super fun. Even if this collaboration of artists from London-based record label/art collective PC Music doesn’t quite come together with an album’s coherence, things like this that give me hope that pop music may eventually find its way to a genuine “new”. Or at least an “interesting”!

  • Tyler Childers, Rustin in the Rain– You could be forgiven for thinking that you had fallen into some kind of country music historical review here, with hints of the outlaws, the Burrito Brothers, and the 70s and 80s Nashville Sound. But you’ll get hints along the way of a modern sensibility animating things- references to e-mail, tips of the hat to electronic music, a country ballad cast as an ode to a same sex partnership. Six albums in, this 32-year-old singer songwriter remains a vital sign that a country that embraces both the old and the new is possible.
  • Van Morrison, Accentuate the Positive– Gadzooks, he’s done it! After a string of COVID conspiracy screed albums, his last album was a skiffle and covers-heavy outing that I rather liked. But it still had a hint of COVID rant about it, and continued the bloated 1 1/2-2 hour length of those other albums. Here we have all covers, a one hour run length, and a relaxed master having fun with rock, country, & R&B standards. If it’s not revelatory, it works from start to finish.

  • Wild Billy Childish & CTMF, Failure Not Success– The attitude and snark! The wordplay! The sure feel for decades of ass-kicking rock! Opening with a spot-on cover of “Love Comes in Spurts”! Yes, it’s his second entry on this post alone, but I’ll say the same thing I did when I put his 2021 album Where The Wild Purple Iris Grows on my honorable mention list for that year- How did I not hear of Billy Childish until now?!?!

  • Willie Nelson, Long Story Short: Willie Nelson 90 (Live at the Hollywood Bowl)– You may think I’ve lost my mind! It’s not that common to get a live album that works as a fully satisfying album. It’s even rarer for me to sign off on something that clocks in at more than 3 hours. And, as a (largely) covers album, this even breaks the cardinal rule of having the same song appear more than once! Nevertheless, this live album of a concert at the Hollywood Bowl celebrating Willie’s 90th birthday is a delight from start to finish. It starts with a hefty set of great covers by many obvious choices, with some brilliantly unobvious ones thrown in as well, and then a thirteen song set of Willie himself teaming up with various luminaries, ending in a rendition of “Happy Birthday”. I may be hallucinating, and it’s not something you could listen to in full every day, but I think this is an essential piece of the legacy of an essential American musician.

  • Witch, Zango– “On their first album in nearly 40 years, the Zamrock pioneers prove their malleable, genre-spanning style still sounds like the future.” So says Pitchfork, and I don’t disagree! It reminds me of the sunny rock/soul crossover of the late 60s a la Sly Stone, the African polyrhythms informing new wave, good old fashioned crunchy 90s guitar rock, and other things besides. The musical approach is so fresh and alive I’ve got to consider it!

And there you have even more ! The 23 Best Albums of 2023, and 77 honorable mentions.

If an all-in playlist for the the 23 best would be appreciated, I have you covered on YouTube Music (as mentioned above, I’m switching to YouTube Music because of the artist’s protest against Spotify mass-demonetizing musicians that weren’t “popular enough”):

And if you’d like a “list only” version, I can respect that:

The 23 Best Albums of 2023

  1. Aesop Rock, Integrated Tech Solutions
  2. Christian Kjellvander, Hold Your Love Still
  3. CMAT, Crazymad, For Me
  4. Esther Rose, Safe to Run
  5. Gina Birch, I Play My Bass Loud
  6. Grace Potter, Mother Road
  7. H31R, Headspace
  8. Homeboy Sandman, Rich
  9. Joanna Sternberg, I’ve Got Me
  10. Logic, College Park
  11. Marnie Stern, The Comeback Kid
  12. Nat Myers, Yellow Peril
  13. No-No Boy, Electric Empire
  14. Olivia Rodrigo, GUTS
  15. Palehound, Eye on the Bat
  16. Prewn, Through the Window
  17. Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter, Saved!
  18. Roger Waters, The Dark Side of the Moon Redux
  19. slowthai, UGLY
  20. The Hives, The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons
  21. Thee Headcoats, Irregularis (The Great Hiatus)
  22. U2, Songs of Surrender
  23. Who is She?, Goddess Energy

Honorable Mention


To all the faithful brethren, sistren, and otheren who enjoyed this ride in 2023, rest assured that, while medical conditions have sputtered our start a bit, I am planning on a 2024 review. In face, doing so is vital to a 2025 project I have in mind. About which, announcements sooner or later…