2020 in Review
AOTY 2020 IS HERE. Is it 2021? Yes. Does it feel any different than 2020? No. Therefore, here we go.
In spite of the shit show the world is and was, we ended the year with some truly great new sounds. Hyperpop started at a high point in the early months, but was overtaken by an onslaught of rap, pop, and indie releases—among them were Yves Tumor, Fiona Apple, The Weeknd, Tame Impala, and Freddie Gibbs. Despite the surge of releases due to the pandemic, every new album had its moment, from Charli XCX’s how i’m feeling now to Taylor Swift’s weeks-apart releases Folklore and Evermore. At Wesleyan, we launched a poll for favorite albums of the year and we are pleased to confirm that we are a school full of Phoebe Bridgers stans. Among Aural Wes, though, the top albums of the year were a touch more varied. Check em out.
Amy
Evidently 2020 was the year of lowercase album titles. I like it. The pandemic, as much as it sucked, allowed us all this special window into what happens when our favorite musicians’ toolboxes are severely limited--no live shows, limited ability to collaborate in live sessions, no tours, no in-person interaction with listeners. To many people who make music, this might have been a nightmare, but to me, a mere listener, I loved it. I lived for all of these spontaneous releases without the wild buildup and tour announcements and shit that just feels way outside of the music. All that said, I am still DYING for reportedly-upcoming stuff by Rostam, Arlo Parks, and Rihanna in 2021, but one of the coolest things of this year has been the minute-notice of album and single releases. It’s a phenomenon that was common in years before but thrived in this social moment.
In terms of my picks themselves, I was just really feeling… women? All of these albums are sit-in-bed-jump-up-and-dance blastable, and it feels like a lot of my chosen music fulfilled that very specific need. Charli xcx’s how i’m feeling now bears this energy of angsty joy, and radiates love--for a partner, for friends, for yourself. In the hyperpop scene, it feels surprisingly (refreshingly?) grounded in interpersonal emotion. Adrianne Lenker’s late-October releases, songs and instrumentals, completely caught me off guard. I am not typically such a fan, but a fascination with the simple arrangements (woman playing guitar) and lyrics (woman loving woman) completely my reticence to her sound. I could listen to her hum and pluck chords for hours on end. I don’t have much original to say about Phoebe Bridgers’ Punisher, except that when I shared “Graceland Too” with my dad after it made me cry in the car, he laughed at the line about serotonin. If you haven’t listened to it yet, what are you doing??? I didn’t have as strong feelings for Soccer Mommy’s color theory, her fourth album, but I immensely appreciated that it was a new sound for her. Sophie Allison, Soccer Mommy herself, has in the past fallen into traps where swaths of songs sound identical: moody, whining grunge about girlhood annoyances; color theory gives those themes a deeper soul and pushes the sound toward something more reminiscent of Natalie Imbruglia in 2006. I like it. To round out my top five of 2020, I have to talk about Bartees Strange. I have never heard anything like Live Forever. Literally never. I can’t wait for whatever Strange throws in the blender next--this cocktail of punk, hip hop, and indie pop makes me want to scream along. To more screaming along in 2021.
Honorable Mentions: Adrianne Lenker, instrumentals; Yaeji, WHAT WE DREW; Fiona Apple, Fetch the Bolt Cutters; Flo Milli, Ho, why is you here?; Lady Gaga, Chromatica
Jacob
Music has always been an important marker in my life to remember moments in time. 2020 has made this even more important, helping me unscramble and piece together memories of what has been a year marked by periods of time, one vastly different than another. Since the world has changed literally every single day, each album that has come out throughout the year has been released into a different world than the one that came before it.
I’ll Take Care of You came out when I was abroad in London last spring. I remember listening to the song Running as I was taking off on an early morning connecting flight from Munich to Berlin, looking out the window. This song eventually became the song I listened to every time I took off for the rest of my trip, including on my flight home after European flights were banned and my program was canceled. Makaya McCraven’s beat on top of Gil Scott-Heron’s words, “because I always feel like running” became a marker and an anthem for me throughout the year, and those words have a much more important meaning to me now looking back on this year. From a time when I was running to where everything became still.
Heaven to a Tortured Mind came out during the first month of quarantine, weeks before my 21st birthday. This one just blew me away and opened up a new form of rock n roll for me. It wasn’t what I traditionally thought as rock, but it was a type of rock that I could get up and dance to. I listened to this one the night it came out, closing my eyes in bed trying to fall asleep. But it did exactly the opposite for me. It was a jolt of energy that I needed at a time where every single day was repetitive and where I felt at a loss of energy. I’ve felt the same energy in this album during its first listen through as I do now. At the same time, this album almost feels like it goes by in a dream. This will be one of the albums that I remember from the beginnings of a quarantine that stretched from weeks to months. An album rooted at a time where the next day was unpredictable and unplannable.
NO DREAM came out a little bit further into quarantine when I was (surprise!) still at my house. This album was a great welcome into the summer of 2020. This album will come to define the warmer months of 2020. There is so much anger in this album. Whereas the other albums I listened to, especially Heaven to a Tortured Mind, are very fantastical in their visuals, NO DREAM is quite literally an album that wakes you up (i.e. Jeff screaming “it’s not a dream” for 30 seconds). It felt like two parallel images of a year that felt like a dream. One image, “crank the white noise and pretend we’re asleep,” and the other, “it’s not a dream it’s not a dream.”
Lianne La Havas’ self-titled album is maybe the most gorgeous album I’ve heard all year. I remember taking a 45 minute detour on a drive just so I could listen to it through again during the end months of the summer. This album feels incredibly raw and calls very little attention to its production style compared to her other albums. Her voice came blasting through and gave me the chills in almost every single one of these songs. I can’t wait to hear this one live in 2021 (please?!?!)!
Fontaines’ D.C’s A Hero’s Death is hands down my favorite album of 2020. I was going to see them in Ireland in April, but alas. This follow up to their stellar debut album Dogrel went in a different direction but feels like it redefined what a punk album could be. This album isn’t one steady build up but finds itself going in so many different directions. In what seems like a revival of Irish punk, with groups like IDLES and Girl Band, Fontaines finds itself going in a unique and different direction. Their sophomore album is full of punk songs but expands their sound to include Irish folk ballads within the arc of the album. At first, it doesn’t seem like it’ll all fit together, but somehow they find a way to make it work. I’m super excited to see where they go next!
Honorable Mentions : Bartees Strange - Live Forever, Run the Jewels- RTJ4, Sault - Untitled (Black is), Sault - Untitled (Rise), Waxahatchee - Saint Cloud, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit - Reunions
Asa
In this oppressively terrible year, the world of music could most often bring the simplest joys—joys like learning that Grimes named her child after the best Burial song, or hearing Lil Uzi Vert rap like he was a token machine at the arcade. So, without further ado, here are some thoughts on the albums that gave me the most joy:
Moses Sumney’s grae is undefinable. It is an album, but was released in two pieces. It weaves through soul, r&b, jazz, folk, and post-punk, but always sounds distinctly like Sumney, with his glassy high notes, rich analog sound palate, and sharp lyrics. And while the album is ostensibly about Sumney and his own self identity, the album is about how identity is forever-changing, undefinable, something one cannot pin down in a song or album. grae, in all, is a gorgeous, forever mutating thing that hits like an 18-wheeler right when it needs to. Also, Moses Sumney gets extra points for being the best dressed musician of the year.
El-P and Killer Mike never stop making thunderous music for blaring lights and bouncing venues, and they never stop telling you that they’re better than everyone else, but they also, on RTJ4, they never stop getting political. There is no separation between “party songs” and “political songs”. Everything is political and a party. Killer Mike, who is especially stunning on this album, swerves into deeply thought and immensely personal verses with no warning. He constantly reminds of the conditions in which he can be rapping, and raps with the fluidity of breathing. And considering it came out in June, RTJ4 was the electro-rap jet-fire blast back out of our houses and into (safely) marching in the street.
In an effort to say something surprising about a Phoebe Bridgers album that has felt as ubiquitous and perfectly fitted to a particular Wesleyan aesthetic as buying Carhartt pants on Depop, I leave you with this observation. In the music video for the Punisher song “I Know The End”, Bridgers makes out with an old woman. I think that image sums up the album. It contains visual distinctivities—the odd couple making-out is self explanatory, and Punisher captures Bridgers at her most breathtakingly vivid. It’s immersive—the way the image pulls your eyes is similar to how Punisher’s bubbling ambience and sharp production and arrangements pull your ears. And it’s sad—the video’s triumphant intimacy reminds us of the intimacy the pandemic took away, and, well, Punisher is just a really melancholic 40 minutes. But, if you want to feel sad, there is really nothing better to spend 40 minutes listening to. And if you want to feel weird, watch the “I Know The End” music video.
Code Orange’s Underneath is probably the most tastelessly brilliant punk rock record I’ve ever heard. It sounds like plugging the metallic hardcore meltdowns of bands like Converge into the Matrix. It is the only album where when I listen to it, I simultaneously imagine people slamming into each other in a moshpit, and Keanu Reeves strapping himself into computers and dodging bullets. Also, every few songs, Code Orange suddenly break into huge, punch the sky choruses, like Evanescence but much better. It is not “cool” music. It is not the equivalent to wearing a Slipknot t-shirt ironically. Code Orange sound like they love Slipknot. Underneath is something that no self respecting liberal arts student should admit to listening to. And yet, it is endlessly energetic, smart, and catchy. There was nothing I wanted to jump around to more while locked up in my house during the pandemic, and there is nothing that came out in 2020 that I could recommend more highly.
Well... except for Fiona Apple.
I think Fetch The Bolt Cutters is the best album of 2020. That take is very cold, many lists call it the best album of the year. Instead, I’ll try something hotter: with Fetch The Bolt Cutters, Fiona Apple has established herself as an equal songwriter to American treasure Bob Dylan—maybe even better. Dylan can tell a million stories about loners and iconic figures and generally hold your ears, but Fiona Apple tells a million stories about herself that make you invariably punch the wall or break down crying. And sure, Dylan has songs about philosophy and politics, but Fiona has songs about where politics and philosophy interact with and face consequences in the real world. Her politics have life; they spit and snarl. And when it comes to what is behind the lyrics, there is no comparison. Fiona battles Dylan’s simple guitar with an album that is the sonic manifestation of her subjective sensory experience. FTBC’s instruments were recorded in her living room; the percussion is her banging on her own walls. The rhythmic propulsion mimics Fiona moving through her own life. Dylan is always Dyan, and Fiona Apple is always, commandingly, Fiona Apple. I know this paragraph is incredibly ridiculous and hyperbolic, but my bottom line is, if Bob Dylan can win a Nobel prize, just give Fiona one already, especially after FTBC. 2020 deserves nothing less than her giving her infamous 1997 VMAs “this world is bullshit” acceptance speech to assembled world leaders at a Nobel Prize ceremony.
Honorable Mentions: All 4 Moor Mother albums - Circuit City, Who Sent You? (w/ Irreversible Entanglements), True Opera (w/ Mental Jewelry), Brass (w/ Billy Woods); Perfume Genius - Set My Heart On Fire Immediately, Boldy James & Sterling Toles - Manger on McNichols, Lil Uzi Vert - Eternal Atake
Luca
Finally, 2020 is over! It has been a long and exhausting year because of this I forgot about a lot of the music that came out this year. But looking back at all of the music I listened to this year I realized there was a lot of music that had an impact on me! For me, the stand out of all of these choices was Wednesday’s sophomore album I Was Trying to Describe You To Someone. Compared to their first album this album is much darker and chaotic at times. But, through the three heavily distorted guitars and power of the band, Karly Hartzman's lyrics seem to center all of the chaos. Creating a cluster of emotions that can still be discerned as relatable at times and despite these chaotic elements there still seems to be a fragile happiness throughout it. Nick Reinhart’s solo project DIsheveled Cuss shows his capability of being a “normal rock song band”.” As better known for being the guitarist for math rock band Tera Melos, Nick Reinhart creates an album reminiscent of bands such as Weezer and Teenage Fanclub. But still captures his unique guitar playing and songwriting abilities. Phoebe Bridgers Punisher is another example of what Phoebe Bridgers does best. Working Men’s Club's self-titled debut combines post-punks sound with acid house and techno to create a brilliant synthpop album. Also, Yves Tumor's genre-bending album Heaven to a Tortured Mind is an amazing experience. For kind of a dreadful year, these albums made it enjoyable for just a bit!
Sam
At the start of quarantine with more time on my hands then ever, I found myself listening to less new music and falling back on my comfortable classics, playing the same two or three dozen songs over and over again trying to find some semblance of normalcy. The first new albums that I really dove into as I slogged through essays from home and spent more time in my room doomscrolling on my phone than ever before were Jeff Rosenstock’s No Dream and Fiona Apple’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters.
No Dream is the most recent project from Long Island (Strong Island represent baby!!) born and long-time music scene figure Jeff Rosenstock. Honestly, every single song on this album feels special and at 13 tracks it never feels repetitive or tired. He alternates between anxiety-driven head-bangers like “The Beauty of Breathing” to the Ska inspired anthem “Monday at the Beach” to more meditative songs like the closer, “Ohio Tpke.” Unlike any other artist Rosenstock is able to capture the feeling of feeling helpless in a society that will exploit you and your beliefs if it means making a profit, and as a result feels like a perfect send-up of the insane and depressing time we’re living in.
Fiona Apple’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters has received so much praise from about every single music publication that there’s not much new to add. In all honesty, I still remain in awe of this album and all of the things that Apple was able to accomplish with it. The songwriting is consistently incredible as she, similar to Rosenstock but with her stunning and unique poetic voice, looks out at the fucked up world we live in. The instrumentation is layered and gorgeous. Almost every song on this album hasn’t left my mind since I first heard them, and I doubt they will soon.
Circles, Mac Miller’s posthumous album, feels like as perfect a send-off for a life lost too soon as we could get. I admittedly was never much of a Mac Miller fan, which made this album’s sheer beauty take me by surprise even more. With much of the album produced by Jon Brion, the man who helped produce Blonde, Late Registration, and countless captivating film scores, it makes sense that its instrumentals are just incredible. Soft, lush instrumentation is matched perfectly with Miller’s pensive, melancholy lyrics. This album feels therapeutic, not longing for what could have been but celebrating what was, providing some bit of closure on the life of a person who had so much more to give to the world.
After coming out with Bandana, an amazing collaborative album with Madlib, so recently it’s hard to believe that Freddie Gibbs could release anything as good. Alfredo matches it. Gibbs is the perfect complement to legendary producer The Alchemist’s consistently amazing instrumentals, helped by some great features from Rick Ross, Conway the Machine, and Tyler, the Creator. At just 10 tracks and 35 minutes, Gibbs flows on every sample-laden beat with ease and a laid back swagger that only he could accomplish.
Punisher really does live up to the hype. It took me a while to see it, but there was a solid two week period where it was all that I listened to. The way Phoebe Bridgers writes lyrics is just so blunt and honest and comforting. Combined with heart-wrenching guitar and harmonies, this album hit me unlike any other this year.
Honorable Mentions: Fleet Foxes - Shore, Open Mike Eagle - Anime, Trauma and Divorce, Playboi Carti - Whole Lotta Red, Sufjan Stevens - The Ascension, Run the Jewels - RTJ 4, It Is What It Is - Thundercat
Teddy
When the Great Quarantine began, I envisioned a time of wide music exploration. I thought that the significant down time would be filled with finding new artists and broadening the horizons of my Spotify catalog. Instead, music in 2020 was largely a coping mechanism. When looking back at my top albums of the year, I realized that much of it is a return to familiarity. To say I discovered nothing new would be a lie, but what remained in the rotation were songs and albums that comforted me. Here’s what helped me get through this bizarre year:
Undoubtedly, the most appropriately named album of the year is The Strokes’ The New Abnormal. Yes, I know this album wasn’t Is This It and I know The Strokes aren’t the same band they were in 2001. But this album has the sound and familiarity that activated the nostalgic neurons in my brain. The New Abnormal played while I read Lizzy Goodman’s Meet Me In The Bathroom and wondered what it would be like to be born in 1978. “Ode To The Mets” may be my favorite song of the whole year.
Sticking with that familiar feeling is Freddie Gibbs’ second album in just about 11 months. Alfredo, the product of Gibbs along with The Alchemist is 35 minutes of the best beats and bars. Every line delivered by Gibbs feels off the cuff in that Jay-Z first-take-in-the-studio style. This album flows from start to finish thanks to perfectly placed samples and brilliant production. The cherry on top is a laid back Tyler, The Creator feature on “Something to Rap About.”
Tom Misch and Youssef Dayes’ What Kinda Music is the grooviest part of my list. This record feels like a 45 minute jam session that makes you immediately want to go practice guitar and drums. Each track is rhythmically complex but not pretentious. It’s hard to write exactly what kinda music this is (pun intended). It’s feel good and brighten your day music.
My freshman year roommate is from Philly. Like all Philadelphians, it was impossible to stop him from going on and on about how Wawa is the greatest establishment east of the Mississippi. Naturally, after listening to this talk for months on end, I developed a hatred for the place. When I visited later that year and finally was able to try it, I wanted to be underwhelmed. I tried to hate it. I couldn’t. I felt a very similar experience with Phoebe Bridgers’ Punisher. Every music blog I went on and every person I talked to raved about this album. I approached Punisher with the same mindset that I had when I walked into Wawa that first time. And again, to my surprise, I couldn’t help but loving it. Top to bottom Punisher is an album I have thoroughly enjoyed since my first listen this summer. I don’t have much to add about it that you haven’t already heard so instead I’ll leave an accurate lyric for my thoughts on the record: “I wish I wrote it, but I didn’t so I learn the words,” – Phoebe Bridgers on Chinese Satellite
It’s difficult to pick a single favorite or best album of the year. It only felt right to go with my most listened to album since its release, Fleet Foxes’ fourth album, Shore. Shore is the perfect autumn album. It’s the soundtrack to the leaves changing colors. The record is comfortably familiar in that Fleet Foxes harmonic style, but it’s not just a boring repeat. A lot of my enjoyment of this album is for sentimental reasons. Any ‘Album of the Year’ list is going to be subjective, so I’d like my subjectivity to be transparent. I became a Fleet Foxes fan because of my brother. We’ve shared songs and concerts and conversations but never a new album until this one. The music feels both melancholic and uplifting. Ultimately, Shore was that one album I could always turn to at any time of day in any mood, and it has become my Album of 2020.
Honorable Mentions: Tame Impala - The Slow Rush, Cory Henry - Something to Say, Maggie Rogers - Notes from the Archive: Recordings 2011-2016, The Weeknd - After Hours, Future Islands - As Long As You Are, Chloe x Halle - Ungodly Hour, Childish Gambino - 3.15.20
Tim
