2020: My 30 Favorite Albums

 30. Deep Sea Diver - Impossible Weight

29. Empty Country - Empty Country

28. The Killers - Imploding the Mirage

27. I Break Horses - Warnings

26. Laura Marling - Song For Our Daughter

25. Khruangbin - Mordechai

24. Caribou - Suddenly

23. Jessie Ware - What's Your Pleasure?

22. Soccer Mommy - color theory

21. Bartees Strange - Live Forever

20. Perfume Genius - Set My Heart On Fire Immediately

19. Retirement Party - Runaway Dog

18. Doves - The Universal Want

17. I Love Your Lifestyle - No Driver

16. Beach Bunny - Honeymoon

15. The Districts - You Know I'm Not Going Anywhere

14. Everything Everything - RE-ANIMATOR

13. Dua Lipa - Future Nostalgia

12. Fiona Apple - Fetch the Bolt Cutters

11. Vundabar - Either Light

10. Hamilton Leithauser - The Loves of Your Life

9. Teenage Halloween - Tennage Halloween

8. Eve Owen - Don't Let the Ink Dry

7. Jeff Rosenstock - NO DREAM

6. Nation of Language - Introduction, Presence

5. Pottery - Welcome to Bobby's Motel

4. Dogleg - Melee

3. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - Sideways to New Italy

2. Andy Shauf - The Neon Skyline

1. Fleet Foxes - Shore

2020: The Songs (20-11)

Playlist Link

20. Nation of Language - September Again

While Introduction, Presence could be marketed as "what The National would sound like as a new wave band," this track is probably the one that fits that description least. Sure, there are the baritone vocals and the general lingering sense of dread and unease in the backing music — that keep that in common — but the sickly dance floor vibe on display here is novel enough to give the song its own identity separate from the star band comparison.

19. Bartees Strange - Mustang

With nods to The Pains of Being Pure at Heart and The Antlers and "Beasts of the Southern Wild" all by the time the first chorus break rolls around, it seems like "Mustang" is a song indebted to influences while also sounding nothing like them. At least, not the namechecked ones. This track is a rocker in 4th gear throughout, releasing tempo build-ups only to immediately re-spool them and do it over again.

18. Fiona Apple - Heavy Balloon

There's just enough echo on Apple's voice here to make it sound like this track was recorded in a sprawling, totally empty concert hall. The responding backing vocals in the chorus sound like they're coming from 15 rows away from the microphone. The timpani and jingle bells(??) also feel like they're chiming in from just offstage. There's so much space in between every element of this song that it sometimes feels like it's barely held together, but through it all is Apple's growl, the doomsaying voice that dares to fill those empty spaces with yelps of apparent nonsense like "I spread strawberries / I climb like peas and beans ... and I'm busting at the seams" that frame the more lucid lyrics about depression and managing moods.

17. Jeff Rosenstock - State Line

Announced by a morse code guitar transmission, "State Line" consistently builds on itself across its barely-three-minute runtime from an expanding chorus, to rah-rah backing vocals, to a shreddy, pummeling breakdown outro. It barely matters that Rosenstock doesn't have the "best" singing voice, and honestly its the genuine edge that that voice provides to his songs that also elevates "State Line" from a Decent punk song to a Really Good one.

16. Dogleg - Kawasaki Backflip

I'm not convinced this year's little taste of post-punk/post-grunge what-have-you that's more prominent this year than in others is going to last for me, but if it doesn't, man what a ride. "Kawasaki Backflip" wastes absolutely no energy, efficiently cramming hooks and transforming verses and choruses enough to make every second feel different from any that came before it. There's no truly no segment longer than, like, two seconds that sounds exactly like any other part of the song. It's great, and leaves zero feelings of monotony that a song under two-and-a-half minutes could really ill-afford to have anyway. It just leaves you with one question: You gonna be the fire or the wind?

15. Pottery - Texas Drums Pt. I & II

A delightfully weird group jam sesh that, yeah, features drums high in the mix. Were you expecting a xylophone or something? Well, if you were, at least you get some cowbell. You could tell me that the first half of this song is the result of someone leaving a mic hot during a riff and getting inspired, and that the second half is the same...except with a little bit of shrooms involved. The haunted house megaphone vocals are sometimes barely even understandable, but it doesn't feel like it matters. This song's got a little bit of everything, and if its two halves both click for you, it might even feel like the same big weird party.

14. Vundabar - Jester

When I was younger, I wasn't the biggest fan of bands that were "genre-bending" or who made big jumps in style between albums. I'm not sure if the latter applies to Vundabar so much, but I do know they're real tough to pin a genre label on. In the same way, I have a hard time putting a name to what "Jester" is. I mean, it seems straightforward enough, and doesn't stray into the fringe like something off Merriweather Post Pavilion or whatever. But it's not really "rock" and it's not really "emo" and it's not really one of anything; it's a blend of styles, of hooks, of jams that make a seemingly "normal" indie rock song into something that feels more subtle and complex. I could just be projecting, but even at its most basic, stripped of my subjectivity, this is a song that oozes cool confidence...alright yeah maybe we can't do away with every scrap of the subjective after all. The vibe is too powerful.

13. Laura Marling - Fortune

From here on up, there are a number of "pretty" songs. "Pretty" is a good way to earn points with me. But there might not be a more "beautiful" song than this one. Marling's voice is crystal clear and basically flawless, cooing and lilting above a single acoustic guitar and an occasional swell of strings. It self-edits, keeping things simple so as to let Marling be the star of this lullaby, exclusively to its benefit. It's transfixing.

12. Fleet Foxes - Sunblind

An alternate take on "pretty." There's far more production here than in Marling's lullaby, but instead of feeling excessive or crowded, "Sunblind" unfurls like a sky above an open field that stretches to the horizon. Like most of the best Fleet Foxes song, Robin Pecknold's paid incredible attention to harmonies and layers, gently piling one atop the other, each one filling the gaps left behind by its forebear. It's a song of sunshine and clean air, comfortable and carefree.

11. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - Cars In Space

If the drumbeat chugs relentlessly, if there is a minimum of three guitars operating at once, if the breakdown is fire, and if your whole foot taps up and down reflexively, you're listening to a RBCF song. Specifically, you're probably listening to this one, even if the lot of those conditions applies to many, many other RBCF tracks. "Cars In Space" trades lead vocals, which actually doesn't happen all that often despite the band having three lead vocalists, but each verse and chorus inhabits the same headspace. Nothing feels compartmentalized. And it all leads up to the grandest breakdown in the band's catalog from 2:45 on. It rips, slaps, jangles, bops, all the best bouncy verbs.

2020: The Songs (30-21)

Playlist Link

30. Teenage Halloween - Stationary

May I always remain a sucker for fist-in-the-air punk, forever enthralled by successful build-and-releases, and captivated by music that's cool with sounding a little less than perfect. It's also a pretty neat trick that a track called "Stationary" crams about 4 or 5 segments of rhythm into barely more than 2:30. It's over almost before you realize, but it's got enough of a rush packed in that you feel like you spent twice as long listening to and absorbing it all.

29. Fiona Apple - Newspaper

Nothing about Fetch the Bolt Cutters is "easy" to listen to. The music is raw from toe to tip, arrangements to lyrics, and you can pick any one of its tracks as the one that cuts deepest. It's all incredibly strong in the face of overwhelming vulnerability needed to put songs like this out into the world. This track, addressed to the current partner of Fiona's/the narrator's ex, is one big warning; of manipulation, of doomed love and fatal attraction, and the unbridled urgency of Apple's delivery is enough to spike your blood pressure. It's hard to call any of this song "pretty," because it doesn't feel like the right word, but the swell of the choruses into a choir of the damned backhandedly compliments her company as "wearing time like a flowery crown," trying to spare her from a similar fate, is pretty gorgeous in its own unique way. Like a lot of Apple's work, there isn't much else that sounds like this.

28. The Districts - Changing

I don't consider "mid-tempo" to be a sin. I really don't. I feel like that label gives songs a bad rap. But when you have something like this song, which gets hot but never really boils over, the pacing feels just right. There's enough reverb and echo to make the choruses sound huge compared to the fairly sparse verses, and those builds really give this song character.

27. Everything Everything - Black Hyena

EE are a very political band, and they're not super subtle about any of it, but the way Jon Higgs writes his lyrics and delivers the lines can give things that would look ridiculous on paper this strange level of credence. "Black hyena gonna bite the idiot" doesn't read like the world's most cutting insult, but as the pre-chorus leading into the spectral proclamation of "At last! Hello, re-animator!" it sure sounds like it's got heft the words alone couldn't convey.

26. Beach Bunny - Promises

There's something so youthfully invincible about this song that I'm obsessed with. It, like "Dream Boy" before it on this list, is a song about pining, but with an added layer of inner conflict that catapults the chorus into the sky. And anyway, who can't connect with a line like "Part of me still wants you, part of me wants to fall asleep?"

25. Phoebe Bridgers - Kyoto

Arguably one of the most fascinating people working in music right now, Bridgers has added layers (and horns!) to her sound on her sophomore album to really great effect. And while this track's got its own underpinnings and tinges of sadness, the smarts and wittiness of the lyrics are as sharp as anything else she's produced so far.

24. Pottery - Hot Heater

To borrow from David Letterman in a post-performance plaudit to Future Islands a few years back, I'll take all of this ya got. This new-order Devo/Talking Heads fusion is the perfect balance of weirdness, jam, and groove. And a guttural grunt or two, can't forget that. Whatever you want to call the mutt formed from the mixture of all those ingredients, it's hard to deny that it just sounds like a lot of fun.

23. I Break Horses - Neon Lights

Listening to this song reminds me of the first I Break Horses song I ever heard, "Winter Beats," which immediately captivated me. And "Neon Lights" does a few of the same things that "Winter Beats" did, only bigger and better. The tempo builds faster, the vocals are clearer and higher in the mix, and there's more "pop" than "dream" in this bit of dreampop. There are multiple moments of catharsis, a bunch of little notes that seem to float on in your head even longer than they might've intended to.

22. Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit - Be Afraid

As far as general life lessons go, "be afraid, be very afraid, but do it anyway" is a pretty good mantra. There's a lot to gained both from being cautious and eventually saying "fuck it" anyway (covid is not one of these things you gain from, so don't even), so it's always nice to get a little push in the back to go for something we're not 100% sure about.

21. Vundabar - Burned Off

There is such much about Vundabar's Either Light that feels airy and fun, and this track leads the charge. From the schoolyard bounce of the guitar/xylophonic keyboard hopscotching along the verses on through Brandon Hagen's squawks to the gentlest of headbanging sections in the second act (seriously, you can bang your head to it, I tried), there's an infectious energy to the enterprise I could feed off of for days.

2020: The Songs (40-31)

Playlist Link 

40. Georgia - Never Let You Go

Sometimes you've just gotta indulge your industrial-goth dance-rave side. I'm not even really sure if that comes off as unkind, but like every other adjective I'm using in these lists I promise it's meant as a compliment.

39. I Break Horses - I'll Be the Death of You

And...maybe you could call this one industrial-goth too? While it's decidedly less dance-y and more shoegaze, it aims high and hits some really massive peaks. The stretch from 1:20 through 1:45 in particular just feels like it's demanding you to listen with the volume way up, and that's before going up another half-notch for the following chorus. After all that, it makes the slow outro feel like a chance to exhale.

38. Andy Shauf - Neon Skyline

There's something so captivating about Andy Shauf's voice, clearly one of the most unique and distinct not just on this list but anywhere, really. It's gently lilting, heavily accented in a Canadian way I can't quite pin down, and manages to lend both fragility and credence to the stories he tells in his songs. In this one, the first and title track off his LP from this year, he sets the stage for what's essentially a concept album. It works separate from the rest of the story for its effortless hook (just try and get that piano lick and do-do-do out of your head quickly) and wry humor. It's the first chapter of a pretty sad story, but Shauf still comes across as the kind of guy you'd want to be friends with and cheer up anyway.

37. Caribou - Home

It takes a special kind of talent to chop and scramble other sounds and phrases and still manage to make them sound beautiful in their disfigured state. While maybe that's a bit too brutal of an adjective for a song like this, because this sampling feels far less hack-and-slash and way more surgical, with loops and hits trimmed down to what feels like the exact right millisecond. And Dan Snaith's voice barely has a jagged edge to it. As one of those "sum is greater than its parts" tracks, it risks being engineered to death, but stays comfortably clear of that danger.

36. Doves - Carousels

In like a lamb, out like a lion. An unassuming, cloudy intro of the phrase "the universal want" (the album's title) in what sounds like a bunch of different languages soon gives way to skittering, nervous drums and what I imagine the tougher older brother of the guitars on Coldplay's "Strawberry Swing" would sound like. It's arena rock for an arena-less time, but it doesn't feel any tougher to imagine the big venues this sound could fill with ease.

35. I Love Your Lifestyle - Align!

I'm a not-so-secret stan for Swedish rock. I love what they're doing over there (and that they're bringing it here). What's more surprising is how firmly I've latched on to the emo revival movement. This is stuff I never would've touched when I was younger. Maybe this one feels more accessible because it's more post-rock than Taking Back Sunday, with its call-and-response chorus/bridge thing feeling more like an echo of itself than a battle cry for the sad. And it all swirls together for a big build and release in the song's second half, with a swooping guitar-led breakdown into a more propulsive take on that call-and-response. It's one you'd fire up your phone's flashlight for (but don't actually do that when we all go to shows again please).

34. Dogleg - Cannonball

This is not the last Dogleg song on this list, but it is almost definitely the hardest. This song is crushing, dealing less in blast beats than it does in wave crashing stop-and-gos that get more and more urgent until Alex Stoitsiadis unleashes an unholy snarl that just chills me every time I hear it. It can overpower you with sheer brute force, but the character and emotion in Stoitsiadis's voice just feel like they add to the stakes. It's supercharged even as a midtempo punch dance. It's knives.

33. White Reaper - Walk Idiot Walk (The Hives Cover)

You can't hear this unless you buy the Save Stereogum compilation. It's worth buying just for this track alone (but you'll get so much more), and fans of the original have to admire just how perfect a fit this is for both band and song. Listen to it and you'll understand (and also help keep Stereogum independent in the process! Google it).

32. HAIM - Up From a Dream

When this group does it right, they can really nail it. It's not afraid to get a little messy (that solo is about as frantic a cut as I've heard from the group in three albums now) when it's not ambling along atop a giant rubber band ball of a bass line. The harmonies are really nice, too. Maybe every production choice isn't needed, but the vast majority of what's there works as a catchy, summery jam.

31. Hamilton Leithauser - Cross Sound Ferry (Walk-On Ticket)

Something I will not bother to fact check holds the top spot on my list of favorite factoids from songs on this entire list: That the person providing backing vocals on this song is a teacher from the school Leithauser's kids attend. I don't care if it's not actually true, I believe it and want it to be true. Can you imagine if you were a teacher and you had to teach the kid(s) of an indie rock legend? The guy who sang "The Rat?" And then he learned you can sing and invited you to sing on his next album?? It's too awesome to not be real, keep it to yourself. Also, this song is great. It actually feels like a ferry ride at points, a bit gray, misty, and windy on the top deck. Don't let that get lost beneath that factoid that is definitely true.

2020: The Songs (50-41)

Playlist link

50. Teenage Halloween - Clarity

It isn't easy to pull off an earnest punk song that doesn't go short on feelings. "All-day jobs are capitalist," "gentrifying is so careless, nobody cares that they're complacent," "sick of all of my friends dying" all ring out as pretty basic truths of The Frustrated. The raw edges in Luke Hendricks's voice fit the mood perfectly, and the soaring surges in the brief choruses of "Clarity! Clarity! Clarity!" seem to fall between pleas and shouts of triumph. Hits pretty hard for a song barely over 2 minutes.

49. Dua Lipa - Cool

One of the best parts about a lot of the tracks on Future Nostalgia, for me, is how full and spacey the rhythm sections can be. There's a patient, gently plodding bass line above a slowly staccato keyboard foundation that just makes the vocals sound like they're floating. And of course, being an A-list pop star means the production values are almost stiflingly high. A lot of care goes into putting songs like this together, making sure each hook and effect lingers in your ears even after the song ends. Without getting melodramatic, "Cool" has all the exuberance you want out of a song that feels like a summer night down the shore: Enough self-assurance to be relaxed, but enough lust for life to still feel like going out to get it.

48. Everything Everything - Arch Enemy

I think you'd have had a hard time persuading 22-year-old me to think he'd eventually get so into highbrow political art rock, but the thing about Everything Everything is that they just make it so easy. There's urgency in each song, and a lot of foreboding feelings surrounding all of RE-ANIMATOR. "Arch Enemy" bubbles along like industrial flubber, the assembly-line drums getting a bit more...animated as the bass and guitar flutter about in the choruses as Jon Higgs bleats "You put the poison into me, now I'm lonely without you" in his trademark falsetto.

47. Loose Buttons - Something Better

I'm hesitant to call songs that tip a hat to the mid-2000s as "throwbacks" because, dear god the aging, but there's a pretty distinct 2005-06 feel to the megaphoned vocals and ever-so-slightly frazzled guitar pedaling. I like it! It sounds a lot like my college radio DJing days, so you'll always get a place on my lists when you do this good a job bringing me back there.

46. Frances Quinlan - Your Reply

Speaking of distinct, it's hard to mistake the Hop Along lead's voice when it goes hunting for those higher notes. Here, on a solo effort, Quinlan hits a highlight with this more deliberate, almost pazz-and-jop kind of single. Its piano verses sound like something that should soundtrack a traveling montage in a movie or TV show. It feels bright and airy, even if the lyrics smack of something a bit more heartbroken or forlorn. It's catchy and smart. Boxes: Checked.

45. Beach Bunny - Dream Boy

A hooky powerpop jangle that bops around the stage earnestly, "Dream Boy" is one of a couple of examples on Honeymoon that beseeches some great unknown to requite lead singer Lili Trefilio's love. It's a song about knowing and being true to yourself, and sticking up for that even if it means that love has to go unrequited for a little longer. Better than matching for matching's sake.

44. La Roux - 21st Century

Created and produced in the (titular) 21st century, this song often feels like it's from anytime but. All I see when I close my eyes and hear the easy chord progressions stepping up and down are big hairdos, lots of eyeshadow, and rollerskates. It's got an obvious groove but stays away from being "danceable," hardly to its detriment.

43. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - She's There

Even for a RBCF song, this song starts fast out of the gate, every instrument chiming in at once at a 4-minute mile runner's pace. And running feels appropriate, since the band describe the track as “that feeling in a dream where you need to be somewhere, and you don’t really know why, but you are determined to overcome every obstacle to get there," and the music video tries to recreate that exact scenario. It is, exactly like you might think for basically any RBCF song, very catchy and instantly toe-tappable.

42. Bartees Strange - Boomer

From a guy who reinterpreted National songs to cobble together a covers EP, this is pretty definitively Not The National. It's more like alt-country TV On the Radio, which is kind of a wild thought in and of itself to me. Whatever you liken it to, it rocks, and barely stops to take a breath. It's captivating, and sounds like it would absolutely bring a house down on tour. I only miss concerts a tiny bit.

41. Perfume Genius - Without You

I'm incredibly hard-pressed to come up with an artist who can put together songs that are altogether operatic, wounded, angelic, and...grooveable like Mike Hadreas. Every song isn't like this one, and if it were then each Perfume Genius album would be emotionally exhausting instead of just some kind of fascination. This is a capturing of a particular moment when you start to fall for someone, or even just the realization that you fell for them long ago. Timing isn't really relevant; it's a celebration of that moment, whenever it comes and however hard it hits, and it resonates for just as long.

2020: The Songs (100-51)

 Even the worst years can still manage to shell out some good tunes. If nothing else, we got that.

Here's the bottom half of my 100 favorites from this year to get things started. Throw it on shuffle, poke around for a band you like, listen to it in order or scramble it all up any which way; it's your oyster. The top 50 will arrive in their usual batches of 10 soon, and the playlist below will be completed. The ranking is in reverse of the number listed next to each song (e.g., Land of Talk's "A/B Futures" is #100), if that matters to you.

Enjoy!