When compiling a list like this, I inevitably question my motives. What am I trying to communicate? What do I love about this music? What do I love about any music?
I love music that sounds familiar as much as I love music that sounds odd. I love pop, jazz, and rock. I love punk. I love noise. I love music that fights against oppression. I love music that prays for understanding, for forgiveness. I love beautiful sounds, soulful sounds, ugly sounds. I love metal that lets its belly sag over its pants and growls.
There are a bunch of albums that should be here but aren’t—GNX, Chromakopia, Wall of Eyes, Death Jokes, Big Sigh, and so many others that I’m forgetting—but I limited myself to 50 and I couldn’t bear to lose any of the ones I’d already typed.
Most of all, I think I love music that confounds me, makes me ask: What even is this?
Mamaleek’s Vida Blue probably does that more than Kim Gordon’s The Collective, if I’m being honest, but, come on. Kim Gordon is 71 years old, is jumping up and down in high heels, is freestyling over trap beats and detuned guitars.
I love that so much.
50. Blood Incantation: Absolute Elsewhere (Century Media Records)
49. Tyshawn Sorey: The Susceptible Now (Pi Recordings)
48. The Last Dinner Party: Prelude to Ecstasy (Universal Music)
47. NewDad: Madra (Fair Youth)
46. St. Vincent: All Born Screaming (Total Pleasure Records)
45. Nathy Peluso: GRASA (Sony)
44. Beyoncé: Cowboy Carter (Columbia Records)
43. Beth Gibbons: Lives Outgrown (Domino Recording Co.)
42. TORRES: What an enormous room (Merge Records)
41. Anna Butterss: Mighty Vertebrate (International Anthem)
40. Amaro Freitas: Y’Y (Psychic Hotline)
39. Nubya Garcia: Odyssey (Concord)
38. Nilüfer Yanya: My Method Actor (Ninja Tune)
37. Charles Lloyd: The Sky Will Be There Tomorrow (Blue Note Records)
36. SML: Small Medium Large (International Anthem)
35. Mount Eerie: Night Palace (P.W. Elverum & Sun)
34. Helado Negro: Phasor (4AD)
33. Arooj Aftab: Night Reign (Verve)
32. Meshell Ndegeocello: No More Water: The Gospel of Jam (Blue Note Records)
31. Shabaka: Perceive its Beauty, Acknowledge its Grace (Verve)
30. Doechii: Alligator Bites Never Heal (Top Dawg Entertainment)
29. 070 Shake: Petrichor (Def Jam Recordings)
28. Kamasi Washington: Fearless Movement (Shoto Mas)
27. Beings: There is a Garden (No Quarter Records)
26. Six Organs of Admittance, Shackleton: Jinxed by Being (Drag City)
25. Charli xcx: BRAT (Atlantic Records)
24. Becky and the Birds: Only music makes me cry now (4AD)
23. The Cure: Songs of a Lost World (Universal Music)
22. Jean Dawson: Glimmer of God (P+)
21. Milan W.: Leave Another Day (Stroom) | [Album of the Week]
20. Holy Tongue, Shackleton: The Tumbling Psychic Joy of Now (AD 93)
19. Magdalena Bay: Imaginal Disk (Mom+Pop)
18. Better Lovers: Highly Irresponsible (Sharptone)
17. Mannequin Pussy: I Got Heaven (Epitaph)
16. Jessica Pratt: Here in the Pitch (Mexican Summer)
15. Mary Halvorson: Cloudward (Nonesuch Records)
14. Chat Pile: Cool World (The Flesner)
13. Fontaines D.C.: Romance (XL Recordings)
12. Cindy Lee: Diamond Jubilee (Superior Viaduct)
11. Arab Strap: I’m totally fine with it don’t give a fuck anymore (Rock Action Records)
10. King Hannah: Big Swimmer (City Slang)
9. Dirty Three: Love Changes Everything (Drag City)
8. Christopher Owens: I Wanna Run Barefoot Through Your Hair (True Panther Records)
7. Nala Sinephro: Endlessness (Warp Records)
6. Badbadnotgood: Mid Spiral (XL Recordings)
5. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds: Wild God (Bad Seeds Ltd)
4. smiling broadly: for a moment i saw myself as inexorably beautiful (smiling broadly)
3. Mamaleek: Vida Blue (The Flesner)
2. IDLES: TANGK (Partisan Records)
1. Kim Gordon: The Collective (Matador Records)