Dear reader: For some reason, I can’t make embed YouTube videos into this blog anymore, so you can’t listen/watch along to a sample of each of my favorite albums while you read. I need to ask my tech gurus at Vassar to help me fix this problem… but, oh look, it’s winter break. Until then, I invite you to click on the hyperlinks underneath each album — they’ll pop out a YouTube page and won’t lose your place on this post — or just enjoy this YouTube playlist of all 14 videos.
Barry Can’t Swim – Loner
This album activated the serotonin in my brain that was dormant ever since hands-in-the-air “big beat” electronica faded away from my rotation. More, please!
https://youtu.be/5zsxlZeMhi8?si=BRIzvdUyLZ8o_E1U
Cate Le Bon – Michaelangelo Dying
Another reliably lovely wash of melancholy and lust from Cate Le Bon, who now has three excellent albums I’ll always associate with our pandemic times..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3nONEnGgpI
Kelli Scarr – Greater Mysteries
Two albums made in the Hudson Valley left a deep impression this year. The first takes an enchanting voyage of personal awakening, layering Kate Bush-style mythopoetry over Talk Talk’s improvised stillness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxngk0VgT1E
Hannah Cohen – Earthstar Mountain
The second album finds a Californian millennial escaping to the idyllic Catskills — don’t hate, they’re floating much of the economy out here — for twinkling folk-rock and yeah some Instagram poses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwbu8QCXcc
Turnstile – Never Enough
Ambient interstitials? Zenyatta Mondatta guitar echoes? When was the last time I had this much fun listening to a hardcore punk album?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfk1Su1Q8SI
james K – Friend
The ingredients that are recognizable, but james K combines into them into icy, hypnogogic tonic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ji5by6AYNNA
The Convenience – Like Cartoon Vampires
Old-school, noughtys-era indie rock interests me less and less, but this New Orleans duo won me over with clever formalism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nLTsLfEHYg
Castle Rat – The Bestiary
This New Jersey heavy metal band recorded their best album yet to accompany their must-see, Dio-on-a-DIY-budget concert experience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWRmjkPgZkY
Kills Birds – Crave EP
Discovered on a lowly Creem playlist, “Behind” became my single of the year. Haven’t heard self-destructive rage against the social machine with such conviction like this since, what, Courtney before Kurt?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbhCvoaOF_g
Die Spitz – Something To Consume
Speaking of young women’s rage: the blistering, rambunctious attack of L7 has found a new owner.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VB01l-V_vAE
Stereolab – Instant Holograms On Metal Film
Revived after a 15-year hiatus, simply the greatest art rock band of our generation doesn’t miss a beat with this new high-point in their many-peaked discography.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cg69OglydeE
Population II – Maintenant Jamais
This French-Canadian trio fuses Moog synths, krautrock jams, and space-rock quests into an invigorating blast of an album.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jF1bnqOaHfU
The Dears – Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful! Life Is Beautiful!
Staying in Quebec, the Dears add a dash of glitter rock to their middle-aged pop noir. Few others know how to create a mood with an opening track (not below).
https://youtu.be/5on0yk-lx4o
Anika – Abyss
So Anika has a music career outside her much-missed Mexico City band Exploding View? Her English-nanny-with-a-concussion vocals will always have a place in my heart.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqv5zf5MZJM
Pulp – More
Oh Pulp, I’m sorry I bailed on your New York return this year — the first time I’ve let expensive tickets go unused. “I was wrestling with a coat hanger, can you guess who won?” Help the aged.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-27a1ugJX8U