Immersive SquadIt’s tempting to call 2020 a lost year for local music. The cancellation of live shows, the shuttering of venue after beloved venue, the ever-present dread of pandemic isolation, financial insecurity… take your pick. With so much awful shit clamoring for our attention, seeking out new music wasn’t exactly top priority. But as our favorite local records show, great music will always make its way into the world. Some of it will inform our worldview, provide new perspectives, or give voice to buried emotions. Some of it will lift us up when we’re feeling downcast or provide peace and insight at a time when everything feels like its going off the rails. The point being that no year is truly lost when it produces music this exciting and exceptional.
With 2021 on our doorstep, it’s good to be thankful and look forward to what promises to be a far less exhausting year. And if all you want to do is take 2020 out back, put it out of its misery, and forget it forever, that’s understandable too. But before we pop the corks and FaceTime family and friends to ring in the new year, here are our picks for 20 records that made the last 12 months a little more tolerable, vibrant, and interesting.
There Is No Year
Chaotic, complex, and thrilling, There Is No Year isn’t an album you settle into comfortably. Like its two predecessors, the third full length from Algiers is agitated and fierce, a forceful (and sometimes hopeful) musical reckoning for a world on fire. Musically it takes the band’s sprawling mix of influences—taut post-punk, clattering industrial, free jazz, ghostly electronica, harsh noise, and more—and stretches them into all manner of beguiling and unnerving shapes. Meanwhile, vocalist Franklin James Fisher serves as both preacher and seer, his fiery sermons and soulful reflections guiding the listener through the carnage of capitalist greed, systemic racism, and hate. The resulting LP is dark and difficult, yes. But it’s also a potent reminder of what can happen when art and politics successfully collide and intertwine. – Guillermo Castro
Bad News Darlin’
Andrea & Mud’s Bad News Darlin’ is chock full of down-on-their-luck characters and honky tonk thrum. The duo offers a narcotic blend of absurdity with enough gas to get your ass going. Their songs are brilliantly rendered with sweeping panoramas of sound whether it’s Andrea Colburn’s vivid stories or Mud Moseley’s rat-a-tat-tat chicken-picked Telecaster. It’ll make your Spotify playlist feel like it’s a jukebox, and you’ve got enough quarters to last all night. – Ethan Fogus
uncertain/ty
Although I’m just beginning to make my way into this record, it’s clear that Anna Griffith and her cohorts have crafted something expansive and deeply intimate. Tracks like “stress dream” and “pickles” echo and swoon with a kind of lulling intensity, pulling the listener into the heart of Griffith’s soul-baring reflections. Elsewhere, “fire escape” and “ghost home” showcase a more upbeat and propulsive sound, injecting some needed zip into bandanna’s rangy folk rock aesthetic. Overall it’s a winning mix of beauty and drive, combing gorgeous songcraft with the youthful energy of a house show. – EF
Read the full review of uncertain/ty.
State X-Ray
On the new record from CRT, everything is fractured and torn. Bent up and blown out. On the most primal level, it’s a splintered mass of contortionist knots tied taut with barbed wire. Menacing jack tracks. Razor-sharp metallic funk. When it thumps, it does so with cold, violent insistence like cops kicking down your door. When it breathes (very rarely does it breathe) the air is soaked in apprehension. And yet, buried beneath the album’s harsh, grating exterior lies a burning heart beating with ecstatic grooves. – GC
Read the full review of State X-Ray.
how it feel
In a world full of copycats, standing out is almost a revolutionary act. There are many reason why I’ve grown to love DavidTheTragic, but chief among them are his ingenuity and instincts. Dude is simply unafraid to buck trends and lean into whatever oddball ideas come to him. And guess what? It always works. How it feel takes the brash energy of last year’s Bender and runs it through a surrealist filter. It’s deranged and innovative, delivering bizarre ad-libs and narcotic melodies in equal measure. But most importantly, it’s eminently enjoyable, proving that a quixotic flow and carefree exuberance never need get in the way of a memorable hook. – Avery Shepherd