My 25 Favorite Albums of 2018

2018 was a pretty transformative year for my music taste. While I still don't know shit about the technical side of the form, this was the year that I began trying to pay as much attention to the artistry of albums as I do films.

[Written in 2018]
There’s some old friends and a lot of new faces because hip hop was overwhelmingly mediocre as a whole this year and I had to broaden my horizons. There’s one man who would have multiple appearances on this list but I refuse to promote him anymore because he’s a stupid idiot who doesn’t know how to STFU. I once thought I would defend him to my death, but he has torn my heart out and disappointed me in ways I never thought possible. He’s been damaging both to hip hop, and to the wonderful, wonderful culture in general. I hope he falls down a well and gets stuck like Baby Jessica.

25. Sure Sure - Sure Sure

Not much substance in this album, but it’s a helluva lot of fun and has great production. In the overcrowded scene of L.A.-based indie pop bands these guys sit near the top. Bonus points to their vocalist for not singing every song in that grating falsetto all those bands seem to do.

Listen if:
-you have nothing better to listen to
-you enjoy sunshine-y bops

24. Robyn - Honey

There’s some elite electro-pop jams on Robyn’s album Honey. I have a complicated relationship with it though. Forgive me for my gender normativity, but it’s girly AF, and I have to watch compilations of the NFL’s biggest hits after I listen to it to repair my insecure masculinity.

Listen if:
-you enjoy music that sounds like it’s made of glitter
-you’re sexy and you know it
-you know of a cute place on the beach where they do really nice food

23. Hinds - I Don't Run

An all-female garage rock band from Madrid, Spain: these chicks have all the energy. The singer who sounds like she’s from Transylvania is still my favorite. It’s a great summer album to play in the car.

Listen if:
-you’re down with the Spaniards
-you like when sometimes lyrics don’t make sense because of language barriers

22. Future - BEASTMODE 2

I’ve never been the biggest fan of Future but BEASTMODE 2 is something else. Future showing his introspective side makes for an alluring listen, but the majority of the credit for the album’s success goes to Zaytoven’s lavish and layered production. Future and Zay are creating Luxury Trap. I like to imagine that there’s some high-end cocktail lounge in Atlanta where BEASTMODE 2 plays through all the cigar smoke and low-lighting as fancy, rich people sip cognac and expensive martinis while discussing yacht expenditures.

Listen if:
-you like to be fancy but also like to retain your street cred
-you think auto tune and somber string sections/piano melodies are a match made in heaven
-the WiFi lit

21. Mountain Man - Magic Ship

Mountain Man is vocalist Amelia Meath’s (of the electro-pop duo Sylvan Esso) side project. She and two other musicians (Molly Erin Sarle and Alexandra Sauser-Monnig) create some nice down-home Appalachian folk music, and it’s really quite delightful. Their harmonization is beautiful and you can tell each member brings their own special something to the songwriting. From the airy romanticism of “Slow Wake Up Sunday Morning” - “The light/It moves/Across this room/Like it could reach us, honey” - to the the more traditional folk sensibilities of “Blue Mountain” - “Where the blueberries are a-bloomin’/I’m gonna make some blueberry wine” - to the mystery of the song “Fish,” with lyrics like a cross between Edgar Allen Poe and H.P. Lovecraft - “And I pulled/And what I saw I’d never seen/What came to light the glowing green/Heaving, breathing light/I looked into its eye.” My favorites however are Amelia Meath’s freewheeling whimsy on “Stella,” and “Underwear,” which has one of the most Amelia Meath-est lines I’ve ever heard, with her singing “All I want in this world is a chill pair of underwear.” Put that over some dance-y synths and it’s a Sylvan Esso song.

Listen if:
-you like hearing Amelia Meath do her Amelia Meath thing
-you enjoy soft harmonies
-you’re an ever-daydreaming, dirty-footed child who chases dandelion spores across the mountainside
-you consume liquids by swigging them out of a big ‘ol jug

20. Parquet Courts - Wide Awake!

Danger Mouse! I’m not warning you about a rodent, that’s the alias of musical auteur Brian Burton who produced this album and he’s amazing. Parquet Courts first hooked me with their titular single, “Wide Awake,” a funky, Talking Heads-ish jam that’s quite a romp. Then, with the final line of their opening track, “Total Football,” they reeled me in, when lead singer Andrew Savage shouted one of the most beautiful and poetic short sentences in the English language: “And fuck Tom Brady!” Parquet Courts’ anger doesn’t dissipate from there; they have had it up to here (I’m holding my hand up right above my eyeline, so you know it’s serious). Savage is a talented songwriter and Wide Awake! is probably the first or second most overtly political entry on this list. On the album’s second track, “Violence,” the singer launches into a tirade about the exponential normalization of violence in American society. He repeats the line - “Violence is daily life” - throughout the chorus, and opens the second verse by growling - “Savage is my name because savage is how I feel/When the radio wakes me up with the words ‘suspected gunman’.”

On the following track, “Before the Water Gets Too High,” Savage laments the lack of action world leaders are taking against climate change, even in the face of insurmountable evidence, woefully warning - “Glass barely bends before it cracks.” Not every song on the album is sociopolitical, but it’s an invigorating listen the whole way through, and a fascinatingly vibrant rock album.
Listen if:
-you enjoy political diatribes set to music
-you like some funk in your punk
-socialist ideology makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside
-you believe collectivism and autonomy are not mutually exclusive

19. JID - DiCaprio 2

JID can rap. His impressive versatility shines through across DiCaprio 2, highlighting his lively rhyme schemes and the seemingly 1,000 different flows he can switch between on the flip of a dime. He’s a force of nature. With how prodigious JID’s technical skills are, if he can up his songwriting ability and come out with some crossover hits, he might be challenging some people for the throne in the upcoming years - and having been signed to J. Cole’s label, Dreamville, last year, it’s entirely possible he has the resources he needs to make a play.

Listen if:
-you enjoy animated rapping
-you want to hear bars on bars on bars
-you want to exclaim “Sweet Mary Martha!” when JID transitions between flows at the push of a button

18. George Fitzgerald - All That Must Be

I accidentally deleted this write-up.

17. Miya Folick - Premonitions

If there’s any justice in the world, Miya Folick’s debut album Premonitions will open the gates to pop stardom. Her jaw-dropping voice and extraordinary vocal control allow her to sing like a light breeze, cool and comforting, before swelling up and blowing you halfway to Timbuktu like a gale force wind (still not sure if Timbuktu is a real place or not. It’s one of those things from childhood that you always hear about, like quicksand, but then you grow up and nothing ever comes of it). Miya absolutely soars over the sweeping production on this album, and “Freak Out” is going to be one helluva stadium anthem. On the song “Deadbody,” one of the album’s highlights, Miya reflects on past traumas and declares war against sexual abusers. She belts out - “Don’t want your money for my silence/I don’t care who knows my name/Don’t tell your friends that I’m a lyin’/To convince them I’m insane/Over my dead body” - before electing herself to the vanguard to support other survivors, proclaiming - “I need you to know I’m not powerless/My strength lies within my gentleness/And I’m already hurt so now I don’t have to hide/And I hold all the heads of my brothers and my sisters high.” She’s one the most emotive singers on this list, and what I really appreciate about her, apart from her voice and the openness of her songwriting, is the small little vocal flourishes she adds into her performances. It demonstrates how skillful truly adept singers are at turning their voice into an instrument.

Listen if:
-you’re a fan of Florence + the Machine
-you enjoy powerful voices that can trickle like a stream or crash down like a tidal wave
-ya like flourishes
-you generally don’t like to talk about the idiosyncrasies of an obvious fool

16. Travis Scott - ASTROWORLD

It’s just good. ASTROWORLD is the most (rightfully) self-assured hip hop album this year, and as a result there’s not really a bad song on it. Travis is definitely a gifted producer, but his greatest talent is curation. Whether it’s beats and samples, or other artists, he knows exactly how, when, and where to use any given element (example: recruiting Thundercat and John Mayer to play on the spacey track “ASTROTHUNDER” [a title which also sounds like a bomb-ass Pokémon attack]); he’s basically a director.

It’s a very underrated skill in hip hop, which is the most collaborative genre in music. And the album credits on this thing read like an IMDb page. Seriously, go look at the ASTROWORLD Wikipedia page. There’s gotta be close to 100 different names milling about the track list. It’s the musical equivalent of a blockbuster, and it sounds like it too. I really want to know the budget on this thing.

Listen if:
-you enjoy production that’s eclectic, yet cohesive
-you like booger sugar
-your middle name is Banger Alert

15. Dirty Projectors - Lamp Lit Prose

Dirty Projectors’ Lamp Lit Prose is a wholly satisfying indie record full of well-written songs, bright and playful instrumental melodies, and gorgeous vocal harmonies and features. Lead singer-songwriter David Longstreth brought in an assortment of guests from across the indie community to add some extra flavor to the album. Syd (of The Internet) bounces back-and-forth with Longstreth on the intro track “Right Now”; the ladies of Haim pop in to harmonize on the chorus of “That’s a Lifestyle,” a political song criticizing the tendency of those in power to consume and manipulate the powerless for their own benefit; Amber Mark joins on the soulful and uplifting track “I Feel Energy”; singer-songwriter Empress Of appears on the cinematic “Zombie Conqueror,” which sounds like it could be a Tenacious D tune; Rostam (formally of Vampire Weekend) and Robin Pecknold (of Fleet Foxes) form an indie dream-team with Longstreth on the folksy, lovestruck ballad “You’re the One”; and the veteran music artist Dear Nora comes through on the closer “(I Wanna) Feel It All,” by far the most experimental track on the album (it sounds like a jazz standard arranged by Alfred Hitchcock). After Dirty Projectors’ self-titled project last year - an affecting, mournful breakup album in the wake of Longstreth’s split with girlfriend and bandmate Amber Coffman (who would also leave the band) - it’s encouraging to hear the artist high-spirited and optimistic again on Lamp Lit Prose (with the exception of “That’s a Lifestyle”).

Listen if:
-indie jams are your jam
-you like delightful, sometimes quirky guitar melodies that make your soul feel renewed
-you feel energy

14. Alina Baraz - The Color Of You

Alina Baraz’s voice is the nectar of the gods. I hope that her voice is the last thing I hear before I die, and that the afterlife is me floating on an inner tube across the cosmos, carried lazily along by the waves of Alina’s voice. If death is anything less than that I’ll be really disappointed. Although I did pledge myself eternally to the Cult of Cthulhu in a fairly unbreakable blood oath, so it’s definitely possible that they resurrect me as an abomination to all living creatures once the elder god awakens. We’ll see how it goes I guess. The production on The Color Of You consists of sparkly, spacey electronic beats coated in the shadowed, moody sensuality of contemporary R&B: a combination of sounds which conjures up images in my mind of astronauts gyrating on the moon, as thousands of tiny disco balls descend upon them. My favorite track on the album, “Electric,” one of two duets Alina performs with the young pop phenom Khalid, has the pair crooning over a dusky beat that makes the atmosphere ripple. Listening to it feels like being embraced and caressed by the world’s sexiest thunderbolt, which I’m pretty sure is the highest compliment someone can give to a piece of music. So there’s that.

Listen if:
-you’re a lil music bee and want some sweet voice nectar
-you believe duets between Alina Baraz and Khalid could lead to world peace
-you were resurrected as an abomination by a cult of the apocalypse and just want to feel some tenderness

13. Caroline Rose - LONER

LONER easily has my favorite cover art of the year. I had never heard of Caroline Rose before, but I find the image of the doe-eyed artist - towel hanging around her neck, dressed in a track suit, and lighting up the 20-or-so cigarettes jammed in her mouth - infinitely funny. It grabbed my attention so hard I had to give it a listen; it’s an amazingly shiny hook. This project reminds me a bit of Parquet Court’s Wide Awake! in how it often wraps serious and personal subject matter in a layer of ecstatically vibrant production. Funk influences pervade the instrumentation of both albums, leading to a dance-y vibe, although LONER seems equally, if not more, shaped by poppy surf music (think B-52s). Caroline Rose herself describes the bubbly track, “Bikini,” as a “riot grrl feminist surf punk anthem,” and while I don’t exactly know what that means, it seems very fitting.

Listen if:
-you know what a “riot grrl feminist surf punk anthem” is
-you saw the cover of the album and thought “damn, that is some funny shit, I tell ya whut” (the voice in your head doesn’t necessarily need to take the form of a dirty-mouthed Hank Hill, but mine does)

12. Superorganism - Superorganism

There’s been a fascinating post-pop movement occurring within young, Gen Z music artists. The London-based band Superorganism is one of the stars of this post-pop movement, along with another of my favorites Billie Eilish, and their music seems to be a reaction to, and a rejection/deconstruction of, the hyper-glamorization and artificiality of the pop stars of previous generations (pop superstar Lorde can be seen as sort of a transition point into the movement). On their self-titled debut album, Superorganism throws very non-traditional production into the mix as well. Their songs are a disarming wall of sound effects, kooky vocal samples, and pitched voices, that contrast the gloomy lyrics sung by lead vocalist Orono Noguchi.

These artists (including Eilish and Lorde), favor creative control and individuality to being trendsetters, and often sing about the alienation they feel from their peers and/or society in general. Their lyrics are dour, self-aware, self-referential, amazingly irreverent, often empowered (despite the dourness), satirical, and full of dark, dry humor (imagine if April Ludgate was a songwriter). Whether it’s Lorde cheerfully singing - “Might get your friend to drive but he can hardly see/We’ll end up painted on the road/Red and chrome/All the broken glass sparkling/I guess we’re partying” - on “Homemade Dynamite”; Billie Eilish theatrically crooning - “My boy loves his friends like I love my split ends/And by that I mean/He cuts ‘em off” - on “My Boy”; or Orono groaning - “I know you think I’m a psychopath/A Democrat lurking in the dark/This sucks, I’m the Kmart soda jerk” - on “Something For Your M.I.N.D.”: I’m here for all of it. In fact I will swear a blood oath and pledge myself to these talented young women right now because truthfully I’m starting to have second thoughts about the whole being resurrected as an abomination thing and I’m really looking for an out.
Listen if:
-you wanna be hip with the youths
-you’re aware of the advanced social structures of prawn
-you wish you were a prawn
-you are a prawn and want to feel appreciated

11. Mount Eerie - Now Only

I had to purge all my jokes before I got to #11. Now Only is pure, raw, naked honesty. It’s not an album that can be listened to in bits and pieces, and the songs aren’t made for playlists. This project is Phil Elverum’s (Mount Eerie) follow-up to last year’s critically-acclaimed A Crow Looked at Me, which documented the death of his wife, and the effect it had on him, in painstaking, heart-wrenching detail. Now Only continues that same journalistic songwriting of Elverum’s; he enters into the same territories of stripped honesty and brutal reality. The singer-songwriter candidly describes his mourning and his journey through grief, as he continues to raise their young daughter. He sings about how weird it is to be playing these extremely personal songs to crowds of people and the uneasiness he feels making money from them. He sings about the day he and his wife first met and how quickly they fell in love with each other, and he sings about their last moments together as she gasped for breath and he watched her pass. He sings about sobbing as he eats breakfasts after he puts on one of her records and sees the look of recognition on his daughter’s face at the singing voice. It’s as human as music can get. If you do decide to give this a listen, I recommend A Crow Looked at Me first, because Now Only is very much a continuation. Now Only is not quite as painful as the previous project, and it’s hopeful to hear Elverum slowly moving forward one foot at a time, but it’s still not easy listening. What it is, is an extraordinary documentation of the human experience, a tribute to the memories we have of those we love, and a practice in empathy. You’ll make it through Now Only with a reaffirmed belief in the value of human life, and a better understanding of the impact our lives and deaths have on those who love us, as well as renewed appreciation for all those we hold dear.

Listen if:
-you want to cry
-you don’t want to be functional for a few hours
-you want to cry some more
-you’ve been feeling disconnected lately and need a brimming refill of compassion

10. Vince Staples - FM!

In a bit of a down year for hip hop, Vince Staples came through with a golden moment when he proclaimed himself to be “Crippin’ Björk” on the song “FUN!” 

It displays both Staples’ eccentricity, and his weirdly accurate sense of self. He’s one of the most intelligent and consistent dudes making music, and his trademarks are stamped into FM!: immaculate beat selection, innovative flows, and braggadocio gangsta raps woven in with socially conscious one-liners and the cold realities of life in the projects, that create a tapestry of Vince’s home, Long Beach, California, where gang violence still reigns, and it’s survival of the fittest - kill or be killed. He opens the album on “Feels Like Summer” with the lines - “Summertime in the LB wild/We gon’ party ‘til the sun or the guns come out.” The album’s final track, “Tweakin’,” has Vince discussing his success and the deaths of his friends. He ends the song and the album by rapping - “Had me up in church at a young age/Shoulda had the n**** at the gun range/Woulda been a lot more useful, shit/Who up in the pulpit, truthful shit/Rich or poor people gon’ use the shit/Might as well go and get used to it/Tryna get rich, get everybody fed/But everybody dead.” Vince has never been one to hold back, and FM! has the feel of a wild party that ends tragically and abruptly.
Listen if:
-I had you at “Crippin’ Björk”

9. Playboi Carti - Die Lit

I think Playboi Carti’s Die Lit has not just the best hip hop production of the year, but the best production of the year: period. Handled almost entirely by the young, up-and-coming virtuoso Pi’erre Bourne - who I’m pretty sure has music running through his veins, as in his blood cells are shaped like actual music notes - the production on Die Lit is distinct, vivid, surreal, futuristic, and downright hypnotic at times. Bourne constructs beats into golden thrones fit for space emperors and pharaohs, but instead he gets Playboi Carti. That’s far from a bad thing though as Carti’s minimalism actually complements the production much better by allowing it to shine through; it’s very symbiotic. I can’t say that Carti is a talented lyricist, singer, or rapper, but he has a surprisingly strong sense of melody, ethereal flows, and he’s one of the most idiosyncratic vocal performers in hip hop. There’s sections of songs, and sometimes entire verses, where it sounds like Carti is only pronouncing half of each word he’s saying. Most of the back half of “Pull Up” he’s just making goofy noises, and he gives himself such a bizarre vocal inflection on “FlatBed Freestyle” that it sounds like he’s speaking another language. I doubt I’m the first person to have noticed this, but his performance is legitimately impressionistic. (HOT TAKE ALERT!) Die Lit is Art Trap. Carti and Bourne favor conveying mood rather than establishing a clear picture of anything, and this is not at all an uncommon objective in the new generation of hip hop artists. It’s an engrossing evolutionary step in the genre as increasingly more artists - in what’s being seen as hip hop’s punk phase - shift focus to rampantly expressive performances and the kinetic energy of their music, rather than the abundant lyricism and storytelling that’s always been integral to the genre (it’s base really).

Listen if:
-you want to hear sensational, mesmerizing production
-you desire to be a part of hip hop’s punk phase
-you think this selection is trash and I’m spouting a bunch of pretentious B.S. nonsense but also you’re sort of intrigued

8. The Beths - Future Me Hates Me

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! That’s my excitement level every time I listen to this debut album from the New Zealand indie rock band, The Beths, and boy howdy do they do a remarkable job of representing the rock part. I don’t know if anyone had more fun making music this year than the drummer of The Beths, who joyfully smashes away on every track. He is now my favorite musician, but I refuse to look his name up because it’s probably something stupid like Ken Shlorpy, and not what I want his name to be, and what I call him in my head, which is Ben Glorpy - OR - the greatest and most accurate name a drummer could possibly have: General Drummy Drumsalot (although I bet his real name is Beth Beth as the band’s name indicates). Future Me Hates Me gets me so damn amped that every time I listen to it I start uncontrollably marching back-and-forth (as my close friends know I tend to happy march when my brain becomes unexpectedly flooded with endorphins [and when I listen to classic Ke$ha party jams]. Also it’s scientifically proven that marching is the funnest way to move probably). Also also, the band is from New Zealand! The lead singer sings words with a New Zealand accent! Literally the world’s best accent! What more do you want!?

Listen if:
-you want to happy march
-you want to imagine me happy marching to this album
-you want to happy march as you imagine me happy marching to this album
-Hurray New Zealand

7. Janelle Monáe - Dirty Computer

Janelle Monáe made an album that’s somehow both extremely political, and undeniably feel-good. That’s not a combination you’d think would be possible, but Monáe executes flawlessly on the funkadelic Dirty Computer. The album is a celebration of her accomplishments as a Queer Black woman in America, a celebration of all women, and a smooth takedown of the Patriarchy by way of Janelle’s supremely confident and overt sexuality (she’s got sauce y’all, she’s got all of the sauce. We could all learn a little something from Janelle Monáe about self-love). On “Django Jane,” a song which proves Janelle could probably rap circles around most emcees, she declares - “And we gon’ start a motherfuckin’ pussy riot/Or we gon’ have to put ‘em on a pussy diet/Look at that, I guarantee I got ‘em quiet/Look at that, I guarantee they all inspired.” The album is just hit-after-hit-after-hit, and “Screwed,” “PYNK,” and “Make Me Feel” are all song of the year material. Her success and recent establishment in the mainstream is well-deserved, and Dirty Computer BETTER win Album or the Year at the Grammys. I swear to god if Beerbongs & Bentleys wins I’m going to jump into a volcano.

Listen if:
-you like empowered women who drip swag
-you like music with a message
-you want to witness a new, multifaceted cultural icon bloom forth into the mainstream

6. U.S. Girls - In a Poem Unlimited

In a Poem Unlimited is a substantive piece of work from experimental pop musician Meghan Remy - under her pseudonym U.S. Girls - and it’s the project that impressed me the most this year. The production on the album is shockingly diverse, and the song themes are adamant and heavy hitting. The trippy opener “Velvet 4 Sale” fantasizes about women launching an armed revolt against oppressive men. “Rage of Plastics” is a 70s-style jazz rock (along the lines of Steely Dan) cover of a 2013 folk song about a chemical plant causing infertility in its workers. On “M.A.H.”, over glitzy disco production, Remy decries Barack Obama’s use of drones in the Middle East during his presidency, which resulted in hundreds of civilian deaths, including children, and she stresses the importance of confronting our personal demons on “Rosebud.” The brutal song “Incidental Boogie” uses the fuzzy, distorted guitar riffs of an industrial rock instrumental - that sounds like something from a Nine Inch Nails song - to set the mood, as Remy sings from the perspective of a domestic violence victim who can’t escape toxic, brainwashing relationships.

Draped in late-60s psychedelic rock, the singer orders a cold, nonreciprocating lover to beat it on the liberating “L-Over.” Another album standout, “Pearly Gates,” might be the most disturbing and affective song on the project; a propulsive beat drives the track as Remy reflects on the nightmarish scenario of sexual assault following women into the afterlife, where St. Peter forces women to have sex with him in order to get into heaven. The final tracks are “Poem,” an anti-capitalist plea backed by effervescent electronic production, and “Time,” a mind-bending, Pink Floyd-like odyssey. U.S. Girls is an artist worthy of your attention and love, and In a Poem Unlimited is a deep, dense, rewarding listen that packs a helluva punch.
Listen if:
-you enjoy amazing songwriting
-you believe unique and varied production is the key to a successful album
-you like your pop music confrontational and thought-provoking

5. Christine and the Queens - Chris

French singer, songwriter, and producer Christine and the Queens - now just going by Chris - crafted an electropop funk album that is nothing but earworms. Entirely self-produced, with the exception of “Girlfriend,” this album is danceable and at times melancholy, but mostly shows an artist finding their authentic voice, and shaping it into a force of nature. Speaking about the contrasting nature between this album and her 2014 debut, Chaleur humaine, Chris said, “The first album was born out of the frustration of being an aberration in society, because I was a young queer woman. The second was really born out of the aberration I was becoming, which was a powerful woman - being lustful and horny and sometimes angry, and craving for this will to just own everything a bit more and apologize a bit less.” She demonstrates this newfound, confident sense of self from the jump when on the opening track, “Comme si,” she declares - “There’s a pride in my singing/The thickness of a new skin/I am done with belonging.” Chris’s penchant for vocal layering hits supernatural levels of beauty throughout the album, and for not being a native speaker her English songwriting is thoroughly impressive. It’s very similar to Janelle Monáe‘s Dirty Computer in themes and genre, but Chris’s electronic twist on the poppy funk production make it slightly more appealing to me. It’s one of the most well-rounded albums of the year.

Listen if:
-you’re a Janelle Monáe fan
-you like French accents and occasional Frenglish singing
-you enjoy when singers layer their vocals and self-harmonize your ears into transcendency
-you’re lustful and horny and sometimes angry

4. Earl Sweatshirt - Some Rap Songs

It’s uncommon for an established music artist to randomly go avant-garde, but Earl Sweatshirt is not a common artist, and that’s exactly what he did on the accurately titled Some Rap Songs. Only 3 of the 14 tracks on the album run 2 minutes or longer, and the experimental production, mostly handled by Earl himself, is full of psychedelically looped soul, jazz, and R&B samples that would make MF DOOM and Madlib proud. The 24-year-old rapper is one of those artists who seem to mysteriously disappear from existence between each project, but his growth as an artist is always apparent each time he resurfaces. While still suffused with his anarchic, fuck-the-world mentality, Earl addresses his mixed feelings towards fame, his struggles with mental illness, and the death of his estranged father on Some Rap Songs. On the distorted and sludgy “Peanut,” a track that encapsulates Earl’s mental state, he turns an “ayy” rap into one of the most personal songs on the albums, touching on his depression and the disassociation he felt burying a father he had little contact with. He raps, “Get the fuck back, you moving like they cut your ‘caine, ayy/Lick the nut sack, zooted in some tear-aways, ayy/Flushin’ through the pain, depression, this is not a phase, ayy/Picking out his grave, couldn’t help but feel out of place/Try and catch some rays/Death, it has the sour taste/Bless my pops, we sent him off and not an hour late/Still in shock and now my heart out somewhere on the range.” Some Rap Songs is lyrically parsed down compared to his other projects, but his internal rhyme schemes are still something to behold, and the album cuts deep. He turned his pain and struggle into a unique and incredible piece of art, and while I’m all for this type of music, I truly hope he’s able to find some peace because he sounds like he’s really going through it.

Listen if:
-you like complex rhyme schemes
-you enjoy production that occasionally makes you feel like you’re having a mental breakdown
-you’re a sad Madvillian

3. Haley Heynderickx - I Need to Start a Garden

Haley Heynderickx’s I Need to Start a Garden has the type of poetic, witty songwriting that gives me lifeblood; it’s a hidden gem of an indie folk album, and a brilliant debut. Between all the times it softens my heart, there’s levitous lines that legitimately make me laugh out loud (p cool that I made it 22 descriptions before going buck with the alliteration. Spellcheck also tells me levitous isn’t a word and I tell spellcheck to shove it up their spellhole). The second song on the album is possibly my favorite track of the year. Over a gorgeous acoustic guitar melody, Haley attempts to console a partner who’s projecting their paranoia and fears onto various insects around their home. My favorite part of the song comes in the third verse when she playfully concedes that the angry millipede on the carpet is “staring with a vengeance.”

On the whimsical “Untitled God Song,” Haley brainstorms different personality traits for her god. In the second half of the song she sings - “When you’re drunk near a sunset/Look straight in her eyes/She’s the quick glimpse of heaven/Forgetting her headlights are on.” Many of her lyrics have the feel of being stream-of-conscious, and nowhere is this more apparent than “Oom Sha La La,” where Haley comes up with such home run lines as - “If you don’t go outside/Well, nothing’s gonna happen.” Haley Heynderickx is the type of writer I aspire to be and I want her to be my best friend.
Listen if:
-you want to giggle at funny lines
-you like-a da folk
-you think every insect in your house has a vendetta against you

2. Lucy Dacus - Historian

Historian was my favorite album midway through the year, and just barely got edged out to number 2. It contains some of the year’s best and most relatable songwriting, the indie rock instrumentals are fantastic, and Lucy’s smooth yet powerful voice is like melted butter with boxing gloves. The breakup song “Night Shift” has Lucy telling an ex - “You got a 9 to 5, so I’ll take the night shift/And I’ll never see you again if I can help it.” The outro on “Nonbeliever” is probably something that’s gone through the head of every 20-something who feels like they’ve still got a ways to go; she repeats, “Everybody else, everybody else looks like they’ve figured it out.” On “Yours & Mine” Lucy woefully sings - “I’m afraid of pain/From where it comes/And where it falls.” The song was inspired by protests against police brutality and racism, and Lucy tells bigots to step off in the most southernly polite way: “For those of you who told me I should stay indoors/Take care of you and yours.”

The singer-songwriter confronts life and death over some heavy guitar riffs on “Timefighter,” and on the similarly themed “Next of Kin,” she finds solace in mortality and the imperfections of life; over the bridge she croons, “Sweet relief, I will never be complete.” Historian cements Lucy Dacus as an indie phenomenon, and I’d like to nominate her to national-treasure status. We must protect her at all cost.
Listen if:
-you like boygenius, the band Lucy is a part of with Julien Baker and Phoebe Bridgers
-you like voices that can caress your cheek like a lover one second and turn your ass to grass with a knockout punch the next
-you like women who rock the heck out

1. Camp Cope - How to Socialise & Make Friends

How to Socialise & Make Friends from the Australian alternative rock trio Camp Cope is my favorite album of the year. It is an unbelievably cathartic listen, and it gets better and better with each play. Lead singer Georgia Maq is angry and frustrated and heartbroken and absolutely fed the fuck up with all the people who bring her down. Her voice is perfect for rock music, it’s raw and pure and crackles with emotion. Everything she feels, you feel. Her voice often soars thousands of feet into the sky, but it’s less like a majestic phoenix, and more like a wise, haggard old eagle, that’s been chained to a rock and beaten down for a century, until after years of struggle it finally breaks loose and launches itself off a cliff peak, carried upwards by the drafts of releasing all the bullshit, unrestrained and free. Maq’s songwriting is brutally honest, introspective, impactful, and unafraid. The opening song “The Opener,” is a takedown of her toxic ex and the rampant sexism within the music industry. She tells her self-absorbed, self-important ex - “If I was hungry then you were starving/Now tell the dead man that you’re the one dying.”

Despite the poor treatment, she demonstrates her inner-strength through compassion and understanding on the album’s self-titled second track - “Yeah you shoulda seen his book collection/It was all ‘how to socialise and how to make friends’/Yeah I guess we both got our problems/And areas to improve/And I know one of mine is to go a night without sympathising with you.” On the album’s most haunting song, “The Face or God,” Maq achingly sings about being sexually assaulted by her musician ex-boyfriend, and the betrayal she felt - the betrayal many women likely feel when abused by someone within the entertainment industry - when everyone glossed over it and wrote her off because someone so talented couldn’t possibly be capable of such repugnant behavior. Broken-hearted and abandoned she softly sings, “They said your music is too good.”

Her resolve throughout the album is one of the highlights however, and every time she triumphantly belts out lyrics, you can feel the monolithic stone she’s lifting off her chest: music as therapy. The final song, “I’ve Got You,” is a beautiful and extremely emotional ode to her late father, who passed away from complications due to prostate cancer. She has an endearing moment of levity in the third verse when she sings of a conversation she had with her hospitalized father - “And you said there’s broken links in your brain/And I said it’s okay, mines exactly the same.” It’s a truly outstanding album, and an emotional journey, with nonstop moments of raw, transcendental catharsis.
Listen if:
-you want your soul to feel free and replenished