2020: The Year in Music

For 2020, I am selecting my top 5 albums, but here are some honorable mentions (in no particular order) in another year of great music:  

• Bob Nanna Celebration States (New Granada)
• Owen The Avalanche (Polyvinyl)
• Adrianne Lenker songs (4AD)
• Mountain Time Music for Looking Animals (Spartan Records)
• Christian Lee Hutson Beginners (Anti)
• Bob Dylan Rough and Rowdy Ways (Columbia)

Here is a playlist to listen to while you read (or whenever you want). It includes a song from each of the honorable mentions and the must-listen tracks from each of the top 5:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0sHv2LL8y9xDrDI9YiGnYa

Without further ado, here we go!

5. Bully Sugaregg (Sub Pop) Listen on Spotify

Must Listen Tracks: "Add It On," "You," "Where to Start"

Review: It was November, and I needed a punch in the face. My music sensibilities have certainly softened through the years, but I do always seek an album or two to get my heart racing (and usually my legs, too). The kind people at Spotify sent me an email a month earlier with Bully on my release radar. I had listened to them before because of a recommendation I received from a friend, but their previous album hadn't really connected with me, and I had nearly forgotten it. Digging through my release radar, I remembered seeing that Bully had released a new one. From the first screams in "Add It On," I was hooked. Here was power, speed, everything I wanted in November: songs to run to, songs to rage to. The mix of punk with indie guitar sensibilities kept me engaged, as the album rolls up and down vocal and tempo hills. Lead singer (and really the whole band at this point) Alicia Bognanno has such vocal control, the scream-singing has power while she can let off the gas and showcase the beauty in her voice. The soft and slow moments serve to showcase the loud and fast ones. Sugaregg is the best album to work out to released in 2020, and that's what you need to know.

4. Soccer Mommy color theory (Loma Vista Recordings) Listen on Spotify

Must Listen Tracks: "circle the drain," "yellow is the color of her eyes," "lucy"

Review: Sophia Allison has done it again. Soccer Mommy is becoming a regular on my countdown in years they release a new record. color theory teeters on the edge of the Lilith Fair sound, but with indie sensibilites, and much better lyrics. If there were any downsides to the album, it was that all of my favorite songs, including the three above along with the opener "bloodstream," were released as singles prior to the album's release. The other tracks are great, but I don't feel like they left much to discover. Allison's minor-key chord structures provide a fitting accompaniment to the dulcet tones of her voice. The album is dark and rich in guitar textures, and it goes down smooth, like a cup of creamy coffee. Drums play a much bigger role on this album than her previous releases, creating a fuller array of music. The sounds are reminiscent of the 90s, but are rooted in today, giving the record a nostalgic, yet fresh sound that will keep me coming back to it for years to come.

3. Nada Surf Never Not Together (Barsuk Records) Listen on Spotify

Must Listen Tracks: "So Much Love," "Just Wait," "Looking for You"

Review: So when your favorite band releases a new record, you always expect it to be the record of the year. This expectation is a lot to live up to, but that isn't what I got, at least not initially. There were more keyboards than I expected and a very polished (sometimes overly so) vocal treatment. I blamed the new collaboration between Matthew Caws and new bandmember Louie Lino, who engineered The Proximity Effect and produced the magnum opus Let Go with Nada Surf. But after listening and listening and listening, I discovered that Never Not Together wasn't the album I wanted, but it was the one I needed. The sensitivity of Caws and the ever-present appeal to love (always) and the explicit command to "slow down" were necessary to survival this year. "So Much Love" serves as  a reprise for "Always Love," here over a decade later. Caws also brings back the talky verses reminiscent of "Popular" all the way from 1996 in "Something I Should Do." The track that has grown on me most is "Just Wait," which proclaims:

        So when it feels too big

        And you can't find your place

        Got too many choices

        Are you the only one

        Who doesn't know their way?

        There're so many noises

        (Ooh) You're gonna be just fine

        (Ooh) It might take some time

        But you gotta know it's gonna be okay

        Just wait

        Just wait

When one of my heroes tells me it's going to be okay, I tend to listen. Caws also takes a jab at toxic masculinity in "Matilda," in which he recounts the ways he was mocked for his feminine qualities when younger. I can definitely reciprocate those feelings, except my bullies didn't even have to feminize my name. Nonethless, here I am, a fully developed, reasonably confident, mostly-well-adjusted adult. I survived, too, Matthew, and have let go of the bitterness. The album climbed the chart with each new listen, eventually ending up here at number 3. 

 2. Bright Eyes Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was (Dead Oceans) Listen on Spotify

Must Listen Tracks: "Calais to Dover," "Tilt-A-Whirl," "Forced Convalescence"

Review: In an interview with Conor Oberst this year, I heard him say that he hoped that the new album brought people joy in a time when joy was needed. It's not something you usually associate with Bright Eyes—joy—but it is 2020, so here we are. Down in the Weeds . . . brought me immeasurable joy in this, the year of the pandemic. "Forced Convalescence" in particular is very apropos. Oberst teams up with Mike Mogis to create that unique Bright Eyes sound. With each record, the question comes up, is this the last Bright Eyes record? It took nine years to get an answer this time, but they answered in emphatic fashion with their best record since 2005's I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning. In retrospect, this album may end up getting the nickname, the hammer dulcimer album, but Mogis's addition adds a layer of sound not previously present on Bright Eyes records. Conor's voice also always tends to be a bit more tremulous when singing on Bright Eyes recordings, which just makes me fall in love with his music all over again. The lyrics, as always, are brilliant, from the narrative "Calais to Dover" (my favorite track), to the optimistic "Dance and Sing" (weird, I know), to the more melancholic "Persona Non-Grata." Since its release, the album has been heavy in my rotation and was the record that I wanted to most own on vinyl from this year's releases (mission accomplished). Keep it coming, Conor.

1.Phoebe Bridgers Punisher (Dead Oceans) Listen on Spotify

Must Listen Tracks: "Kyoto," "Chinese Satellite," "I Know the End"

Review: When will the music world be able to dethrone Phoebe Bridgers and Conor Oberst? Never, I hope. Last year, their collaborative record under the name Better Oblivion Community Center was far-and-away the best album of the year. In Punisher, we have been gifted with a masterpiece, a rarity in a record that appeals to such a wide audience: Pitchfork loved Punisher, so did any fans, then, in a twist of fate that no one could have predicted, the Grammy's saw fit to nominate Bridgers for four awards, which means, well, I guess I am paying attention to the Grammy's this year. The album has such a large draw because with each listen, I fall in love with a different moment or song, as if it is the first time hearing it. The singles were what immediately stood out because I had played them into the ground in antici . . . pation for the album. After a few listens, Ifell in love with the final track, "I Know the End" (watch the music video and you can scream along while watching Phoebe make out with an old lady). The next earworm that infected me was "Chinese Satellite," which is perhaps the best song I have ever heard about the search for God (at least that is what I think it's mostly about). It is a song about God, searching for connectedness, the afterlife, and our mortality. Bridgers puts on a weird (in a good way) and comical persona, but her lyrics and sound are mature and developed, leaving me wondering how this is just her sophomore LP. The layering of instrumentation on this alternative/indie/folk/rock masterpiece will work their way inside of you. The track that is currently climbing the charts of my mind's ear is "Moon Song," a song about lost love, or unrequited love at the very least. It's still growing on me. The question remains: will anyone be able to top this album in the 2020s? Yeah, Phoebe Bridgers might be able to do it. Maybe.