Year in Review 2021: Music

If you’re wondering why this list looks different than in previous years, read this.

Best Miscellaneous

• “a.i. lo-fi #1” by Adam Neely (2020)

• “Tea, Milk & Honey” by Angie McMahon (2021)

• “You Wouldn’t Have to Ask” by Bad Books (2010)

Toward the beginning of 2021 I got tired of only having the 500 or so songs on my phone to listen to in the car, so I pulled out the old iPod Classic to see if it still worked. Looking through it I found out that there were actually a lot of songs on the iPod that weren’t on my computer, including this absolute gem. So I spent several months going through song by song, manually syncing my two libraries to make sure nothing got messed up, with the eventual goal of using my iPod as my primary music device. Unfortunately it died its final death right after I finished this arduous process, but even if this were the only song I’d rediscovered it would’ve been worth it.

• “Am I Doing it Right?” by Alex Lahey (2019)

• “Dino’s” by Alex Lahey & Gordi (2021)

• “Mansions of Los Feliz” by Eels (2010)

• “To Be American” by Gabriel Kahane (2021)

Contemporary singer/songwriters generally don’t seem write to very compelling music about politics, but Kahane manages to hit the mark musically and lyrically here. There are (I think) 4 or 5 different piano tracks (one or two are electric and one might actually be a hammered dulcimer but still) and they all sound amazing; I’m 10 times more likely to love a song if it’s got a well-recorded, well-produced piano track, let alone more than one. There’s also an electric guitar that’s remarkably understated, weaving in and out periodically to add a little color. The percussion is a jaunty mix of sounds that keeps the song from feeling staid or overly somber. Kahane’s voice is good as ever, rich and warm in keeping with the piano, and his falsetto on the chorus breaks in exactly the right way.

Lyrically, Kahane finds a balance between nostalgia for a seemingly innocent past and recognition of what that innocence obscured, and looks ahead towards the troubled future wrought by past ignorance. And then there’s that ending: “One criminal’s soft defeat / Can’t change the fact that we’re broken.”

• “Grass Is Blue” by Gordi (2021)

• “Peace Signs” by IDLES (2021)

I’m not a big enough Sharon Van Etten fan to really be sold on the whole epic Ten project, but this track did stand out. “Peace Signs” is one of my favorite songs of hers, and while there’s an engaging tension in her rock-but-reserved style, I definitely enjoy IDLES’s completely unleashed take as well.

• “Hide And Seek” by Imogen Heap (2005)

I confess, when I first encountered this song through Scary Pockets’ version, which I still think is actually pretty good, I did go and check out the original and was like “Oh, it’s just the vocals, seems boring” and moved on with my life. Fortunately, watching the Scary Pockets video again I forgot that I’d already decided I didn’t like the original and this time around when I listened to it I was like “Oh, it’s just the vocals, that’s cool.”

And even that’s an understatement, though an understandable one if you’re just listening to it on earbuds. Throw this baby on some good headphones or speakers, though, and “cool” doesn’t even scratch the surface of how good it is. This is the kind of song that you just close your eyes and let envelope you, and the fact that Heap is able to achieve that with just her voice and some effects is astounding.

• “Feeling That Way” by Journey (1978)

I like to imagine a Journey fan in 1978, and this is the first song off of Infinity that they hear, and they’re just chilling out listening to Greg Rollie and then that chorus kicks in and they sit up going “Whoah, who the heck is that?!” It makes me happy. I also like the part in the middle of the 2nd post-chorus when Steve Perry is like, “Wait I think I got one more in me” and just cuts in with a 3rd chorus. A fun time.

• “Who Are You” by Joy Oladokun (2021)

• “Red Door” (and other singles) by Julien Baker (2017-2019)

When I went to Bandcamp to get Julien Baker’s latest album (see below) I found out that she’d released several singles I hadn’t known about, so I grabbed those as well. They’re all worth checking out, but “Red Door” is by far my favorite. It’s a bit of a different sound for Baker, and it’s nice to see her continue to stretch her sound in little ways—the outro especially, which I think might qualify as jazz? Whatever it is I’m into it. And I of course love that guitar riff.

• “Nobody Waits” by Mal Blum (2020)

• “Freedom Feels” by Mattiel (2021)

• “Rano Pano” by Mogwai (2011)

• “Ae Fond Kiss” by Rachel Sermanni (2013)

• “Out of Season” by Soft Machine

Best Albums

• Piano Salt by Angie McMahon (2020)

Piano Salt is pretty much exactly what it sounds like—that is, if you’re familiar with Angie McMahon’s 2019 album, Salt. Where that is very much a guitar album, this is very much a piano album, recreating 5 of the tracks off Salt with mostly just piano and vocals (there’s also one track that’s recreated with guitar and wurlitzer, and a Bruce Springsteen cover). McMahon refers to this as a “stepping stone” between albums, presumably a way of letting go of the sonic identity of Salt so she can feel free to expand her sound moving forward.

The tracks themselves are well-selected, each new arrangement showcasing hidden depths in each song, with “Keeping Time” probably being the most successful at adding something new without losing too much of what made the original so great. I don’t know that any of these could replace the original for me—”Slow Mover” just doesn’t sound quite right without that chugging guitar riff, and “Pasta” feels a bit too plaintive—but fortunately Angie McMahon is not George Lucas and this is not 1997, so there’s no reason both versions can’t coexist peacefully. And of course there are the two most important elements that remain consistent across both albums, namely McMahon’s songwriting abilities and her unbelievably good voice, a mix of Florence Welch and Joni Mitchell that can be as vulnerable as it is powerful.

• Gris (Original Soundtrack) by Berlinist (2018)

• How Long Do You Think It’s Gonna Last? by Big Red Machine (2021)

• Jamie by Brittany Howard (2019)

• Hug of Thunder by Broken Social Scene (2017)

• Young Shields EP by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone (2006)

• What’s New, Tomboy? by Damien Jurado (2020)

• Get Bleak by Ducks Ltd. (2021)

Honestly Ducks Ltd. doesn’t immediately seem like my kind of band. They make the kind of jangly, washed out pop rock that usually, for me, tends to kind of blend together into one vaguely headache-inducing haze.

Fortunately, lead singer Tom Mcgreevy’s vocals are mixed in such a way that you can actually hear the lyrics, and they’re pretty good lyrics. Take this sample from Get Bleak‘s title track:

“And it’s that instinct of your’s to get retaliation first
That is chief among the reasons that when your ambition bursts
It’s against the bulwark of your nature”

It’s lines like these that give the songs some solidity and keep them from floating in one ear and out the other. That’s not to say the music’s bad, but you’d be hard pressed to tell the difference between “Get Bleak”, “Gleaming Spires”, and “Oblivion” if you were just listening to the instrumentals. The music is mainly there to buoy the vocal, and it does that job well.

• I Know I’m Funny haha by Faye Webster (2021)

• As Long As You Are by Future Islands (2020)

Future Islands is one of those bands that I’ve stumbled across half a dozen times and every time I’ve been like “Oh yeah, they’re interesting, I should check them out” and then never do. Except this year I finally did, and they’re great. Whether you’re into Samuel Herring’s idiosyncratic vocals will probably make or break your enjoyment, but I think he’s a taste that can be acquired, and it’s worth it for their special brand of emotive synthwave.

• imaginary deadlines by fuvk (2021)

fuvk’s Bandcamp description just says “audio journal 2016 –” and that definitely feels right. Her songs are intimate little snippets, often mulling on a single idea for just a couple minutes. imaginary deadlines takes her spare, bedroom pop aesthetic and builds it out a bit, with more instrumentation and collaboration, as well providing more ear candy in the production. It feels like a more complete expression of what she’s always been doing, and it’s exactly what I wanted.

• twentytwenty by fuvk (2021)

Given what was going on in 2020…and still is…it’s not surprising that twentytwenty is a more back-to-basics album than imaginary deadlines (which, while released in 2021, appears to have its origins in 2018/2019). The list of collaborations has shrunk drastically, and most of the songs have that particular melancholy that you get from multiple acoustic guitars gently picking out minor-key arpeggios—which is to say most of the songs feature multiple acoustic guitars gently picking out minor-key arpeggios…and are melancholy.

Also, I don’t know what it is about that stutter in the middle of “will i see you soon” but it gets me every time.

• pink elephant by Gracie Folds (2016)

There’s an obvious comparison to make here, and yes, there’s definitely some Regina Spektor influence in these songs. Not only do a few of Folds’s arrangements recall the more baroque choices of Spektor’s early work, but also the song “emily” seems too similar to Spektor’s “One More Time With Feeling” to not be a deliberate homage or adaptation (not that that’s a bad thing, or that “emily” doesn’t hold up on its own merits).

Lyrically Folds writes about exactly what you’d expect a teenager to write about (but, like, a mature teenager), but with an honesty and emotional maturity that leans away from melodramatic exaggeration. And despite being only 5 songs there’s a thematic consistency that makes it feel like a coherent album, not just an EP of unrelated tracks. Any artist would be lucky to have this strong a showing so early in their career.

Also, if you like “harper” but can’t stand the buzzing, grab the demo version.

• Little Oblivions by Julien Baker (2021)

• We Share Phenomena (Instrumental Version) by Lambert & Dekker (2018)

Like I said, a good piano track is the way to my heart. In recent years I’ve really grown to love when you can hear the actual mechanical noises of the piano—done well, there’s truly nothing like it.

• Passenger by Lisa Hannigan (2011)

• Today We’re The Greatest by Middle Kids (2021)

• Strangers To Ourselves by Modest Mouse (2015)

• This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About by Modest Mouse (1996)

Just amusing myself thinking of the aneurysms people would have if they knew I had both of these Modest Mouse albums on the same Best Of list.

• Aromanticism by Moses Sumney (2017)

• Sweden by The Mountain Goats (1995)

So, I listened to 11 Mountain Goats albums in 2021 (and I think I’m only, like, half way through their discography), and while they all had at least a few songs on them that I liked (indeed, some of my favorite songs are on albums that otherwise failed to grab me), I’m not going to try to stuff all of them in here. Instead I offer a few representative samples from the albums that I enjoyed most consistently, even if it means leaving out “High Does #2” and “This Year.”

• Tallahassee by The Mountain Goats (2003)

• Transcendental Youth by The Mountain Goats (2012)

• We Shall All Be Healed by The Mountain Goats (2004)

• DROOL by Nnamdï (2017)

Nnamdï is easily one of the most talented people currently making music, and yes, all his stuff is this weird—some of it is weirder.

• Zephyrus by The Oh Hellos (2020)

The fourth and final entry in TOH’s series of EPs named after the four winds of ancient Greek myth. It’s been fun to see them develop over the course of this project, and they definitely ended strong. While Boreas probably has my two favorite songs on it (“Boreas” and “Rose”), I do think Zephyrus feels the most cohesive of the bunch. Now that we have all of them it might be fun to listen to them as one album. Or rather, double album, given that it’s 28 tracks and 79 minutes. Which is actually I think about 10 minutes short of a double album. Clearly they need to make one 10-minute song to wrap it all up, which I would absolutely be here for.

• I Wasn’t Only Thinking About You… by Oh Pep! (2018)

It’s funny, because it might seem like Oh Pep! being on this list is just yet another product of my apparent obsession with Australian pop music, but my introduction to Oh Pep! was actually back in 2015 when they did a Tiny Desk Concert, and that was at least 2 years before I started getting obsessed with Australian pop music. It just takes me a while to get around to listening to things sometimes. Anyway, this is a great album.

• Thirstier by Torres (2021)

A popular topic of conversation I’ve seen amongst music nerds is 3-album runs, when a band or artist has 3 great albums in a row. For whatever reason 3 seems to be the sweet spot of rare enough to be notable but achievable enough to be worth talking about. All of which is to say, Torres is definitely on a hot streak with the run of Three Futures, Silver Tongue, and Thirstier, all of which are among the best rock albums of the last 10 years.

• You And Me And Everything by Tōth (2021)

• Sympathetic Magic by Typhoon (2021)

Speaking of 3-album runs, Typhoon is on a roll too. Following 2018’s Offerings was kind of an impossible task, but they certainly made an able attempt—though this album actually feels more like a sequel to 2013’s White Lighter, with similar thematic interests and even an explicit reference in “Masochist Ball” to that album’s “Caesar”. That kind of linking helps to cohere an album otherwise lacking in the kind of narrative and thematic throughlines that helped make Offerings such a tour de force. Song-for-song, though, Kyle Morton and crew are still at the top of their game.

Also my brain won’t let me get away with not pointing out that the guitar part in “And So What If You Were Right” is clearly echoing Offerings‘ “Chiaroscuro”, so it’s not like there’s no connection to that album.

• The Disintegration Loops II by William Basinski (2014)

The Disintegration Loops series are the result of Basinski attempting to convert old tape loops to digital format; as the tapes were read they fell apart, with each loop around being more deteriorated than the last. Rather than try to preserve the tapes or throw them out, Basinski chose to record them, and by recording them, destroy them. There’s an obvious (though no less affecting) poignancy there, but what also interests me is how he created ephemerality out of repetition, as each recurrence of a loop is a version of that loop that didn’t exist before and ceased to exist after, completely subverting the reusability that is usually integral to a loop’s function in music.

Of course, I’m not one to go in for experimental music just because it’s conceptually compelling or philosophically intriguing, so it helps that the recordings are also beautiful.