The 2020 end of year music lists thread

I’ve heard 7, heh. The Cyrillus Kreek and Lina_Raül Refree are essential listening imo.

Ha, I was just about to post that. One of about three lists I pay attention to.

It’s a great list if we go by those tiny blurbs alone.

I see your point, jon, and don't disagree-- but my first- and second-hand experiences have shown me that the acts of list-making and "putting numbers on the art" create uniformly negative psychological effects on the content creators regardless of the placement or perceived success of the sorted work

Ted's list is great, excellent new classical choices in there :)

I wasn't too hot on that Field Music album, after liking basically all the previous ones

Love that Louise Bock album on the Ted Gioia list, will almost certainly make my list too. Very intrigued by Lina_Raül Refree - "Contemporary Fado with Synthesizers" sounds awesome.

Also <3 to fgti

Premiere Recording of Ravi Shankar's Only Opera

This is intriguing.

that lina raul refree record is awesome, and lives up to the capsule description

lists are bad and bum me out yet i cant stop clicking on this thread

is this the first time one of gioia's favorites was nominated for the album of the year grammy?

To Pimp a Butterfly made his list in 2015, for a start.

lists are bad and bum me out yet i cant stop clicking on this thread

Do you think he meant to use this image?

http://tedgioia.com/sitebuilder/images/boltcutters-149x150.jpg

Not sure why that didn't embed. The Fiona Apple album.

Gioia annoys me often, but I admire him for doing a 100-entry alphabetical list with no regard for genre. (And yeah, another vote for the Lina_Raül Refree record. I interviewed them both way back in January.)

I guess it depends on what you take out of EOY lists?

Personally speaking I don’t really care about ranked lists (but they’re pretty useful to know if you’ll care for the rest of the list or to get an idea of the styles pushed throughout the year in that site) and I mostly glance EOY lists to listens to things out of my comfort zone. The lists where I’ve only listened to two or three albums are my favorites each year and I’ve found some of my favorite albums of all time by reading those.

From the more “pop-oriented” singles list/ I do find it fun to read the reasoning on why something like “Rain on Me” or “WAP” or whatever are the songs of the year.

I’ll say that I enjoy that there has been an increasing shift on consensus picks from the major publications. There was a couple of years where it was immensely boring seeing the same albums and singles in every list.

Yes and yet Fiona Apple seems destined to be the consensus pick this year (already #1 for COS, Paste, and Stereogum, and #2 for Mojo and Uproxx), and the perhaps cynical / overly-generous-to-their-influence question I have is: Would that consensus have emerged as clearly without the Pitchfork 10.0?

No music has ever sounded quite like it tbf.

hmm

Combing through that Gioia list one split minute at a time has made me realize that at least 3/4 of it is Not For Me (too many comfortably positive vibes tbh) but I’ll definitely be checking out: Bab L’ Bluz, Karuna Trio, Louise Bock, Max de Wardener and Yukihiro Atsumi.

I already mentioned the Cyrillus Kreek and Lina_Raül Refree but the John Luther Adams and Kitgut Quartet are quite good as well. Am struck also by the high quotient of ECM-affiliated artists who released their material via other labels this year – a conscious bias on Gioia’s part?

I have no problem with Fiona Apple being the consensus pick this year. In my ears it sounds as if it was recorded at home, during cabin fever. It almost sounds like a live recording, very rough around the edges which works so well in this particular set of songs.

Re: Gorilla vs. Bear, Helena Deland reminds me of Men I Trust a bit, another Montreal act I shouldn’t like on paper but enjoy anyway, mostly because of the melancholy undertow.

Hehe GvB also loves Men I Trust and I think their song Tailwhip was in his top 20 of the 2010s (completely on board with that pick)

I adore that palm mute bass sound they use

Their bassist really is great. Turns out Men I Trust have collaborated with Helena Deland already, so it’s a predictably small world.

I just need to know all the hot 2020 rap tracks besides “jungle”

I guess there’s a thread for that

i regret to inform you that most of the rap tracks on that thread aren't as good as "jungle" (assuming you're talking about shootergang kony)

yah

the consensus pick this year should be i disagree by poppy, i have spoken

all of these lists are jokes because they do not include i disagree by poppy. especially rym

None of them seem to include the Ariana Grande album, so they’re all full of shit to some degree.

i hope poppy wins the metal poll here

Hmmmm

ted gioia list is always a highlight and fun to read. probably the only list i really care about excepting those my friends make.

"balafon sketches" by contours — this should interest some of the ECM / cherryhead / "obscure sound" ilxors i think

The Bab L'Bluz album is officially this year's first big find for me off the EOY lists. They're great.

Not every track is a winner but I like it a lot too.

"balafon sketches"

shake it!

Revolver Magazine
Top Albums of 2020

25. Imperial Triumphant - Alphaville
24. Touché Amoré - Lament
23. The Acacia Strain - Slow Decay
22. Ozzy Osbourne - Ordinary Man
21. Avatar - Hunter Gatherer
20. Necrot - Mortal
19. Puscifer - Existential Reckoning
18. Mrs. Piss - Mrs. Piss
17. Mr. Bungle - The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny Demo
16. Nothing - The Great Dismal
15. Gulch - Impenetrable Cerebral Fortress
14. Lamb of God - Lamb of God
13. Marilyn Manson - We Are Chaos
12. Poppy - I Disagree
11. Higher Power - 27 Miles Underwater
10. Ghostemane - Anti-Icon
9. Killer Be Killed - Reluctant Hero
8. Spirit Adrift - Enlightened in Eternity
7. Bring Me the Horizon - POST HUMAN: SURVIVAL HORROR
6. Run the Jewels - RTJ4
5. Loathe - I Let It In and It Took Everything
4. Body Count - Carnivore
3. Greg Puciato - Child Soldier: Creator of God
2. Code Orange - Underneath
1. Deftones - Ohms

http://www.revolvermag.com/music/25-best-albums-2020

finally a real list

I believe the Mrs. Piss album is actually titled Self​-​Surgery.

We discussed it a bit upthread fwiw.

Huh, don’t see it... anyway, sorry to be a PEE-dant! (Geddit?)

Sorry, I meant the Revolver list as a whole.

x-post-- Amanda Petrusich's favorite album of 2020 ... is from 2018:

She's the New Yorker critic. She picked the 2018 album "No. 1" from Etran de L'Air who are a guitar band from Niger. The rest of her list includes : Adrianne Lenker albums; Mary Lattimore -Silver Ladders; Dua Lipa -Future Nostalgia; Fiona Apple -Fetch the Bolt Cutters; Jyoti- "Mama, You can Bet!"; Bob Dylan- Rough and Rowdy Ways; Fleet Foxes- Shore; Freddie Gibbs & the Alchemist - Alfredo; Phoebe Bridgers- Punisher

She gave Honorable Mentions to- Taylor Swift; Megan Thee Stallion; Natalia Lafourcade- Un Canto por Mexico Vol. 1; Kehlani; Jay Electronica; The Strokes; Waxahatchee

https://consequenceofsound.net/2020/12/top-50-albums-of-2020/full-post/

i think consequence of sound might be more rolling stone than rolling stone are these days

Why do they list the “origin” of every artist?

Jessie Ware has been ranked way too low in every list so far

Definitely. I'm not sure if it's because it came out more recently but I've been very surprised to see Kylie placing above Jessie and Roisin in lots of the lists so far

i like the kylie album but i was pretty confused by that yeah

gen xers be gen xing