Best Music of 2020
What a year! I got to see 1 concert so…that counts as best. (It still was really great—Cheekface & Bad Moves). Otherwise, ummm, good year huh! At least there was great sounds (here’s the playlist, coming in at juuuust under… gulp, many hours) https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4bWZiqmfxkqPoLJbhAR0gf?si=5f4128ba1fe24077
2020 Albums of the year
The Soft Pink Truth: “Shall We Go on Sinning so that Grace Can Increase” (amazing)
Baxter Drury “The Night Chancers” (amazing)
Anna Von Hausswolff “All Thoughts Fly” (so pandemic appropriate)
Clarice Jensen “The Experience of Repetition as Death” (even more pandemic appropriate)
Porridge Radio “Every Bad” (sad as hell)
Bad Moves “Untenable” (a fun rock album! maybe not super 2020 appropriate)
Seth Bogart “Men on the Verge of Nothing” (also fun as hell)
Sorry “925”
Olafur Arnaulds “Some Kind of Peace” (hope he found it)
Fiona Apple “Fetch the Bolt Cutters” (my favorite release of hers)
Open Mike Eagle “Anime, Trauma, & Divorce” (so good, so 2020)
Theo Alexander “Animadversions” (beautiful)
Deeper “Auto-pain”
Lithics “Tower of Age”--No Wave as fuck. In my eyes it started the pandemic no-wave Renaissance
Sweeping Promises “Hunger for a Way Out” (most 2020 track)
Melenas “Dias Raros”
Hiroshi Yushimura “Green” (rerelease). Unbelievably beautiful
Moondog “Oceans” (rerelease). Moondog forever
Ekkehard Ehlers and Stephan Mathieu “Heroin” (rerelease). Maybe the most touching album of all time. Or at least the one with the most effective bookended tracks