ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2022 - 21st Anniversary Edition

Was 2022 a good year for albums? The answer, as anyone old enough to be on this board can tell you, is the same as it was for any year since the advent of the 78 rpm record: it was as good a year as the time you put in.

Kurt Vonnegut famously noted that genius is as common as flowers, which is to say it's surely not everywhere, but it's also not that hard to find if you're looking. Well, we love music, to coin a phrase, so we had our ears wide open. Those 186 ears listened to 918 nominated albums, enough to account for two months of waking life if a single spin would do you. Of course, you won't find your favorites with just one play. So we listened again. And again and again, sometimes for a week, sometimes for a year. We listened until the rhythms and noise and strum and thrum and lyrics and flow and bleep and honk and joy and pain were scored indelibly into our memory. Then, with 918 albums well and truly Deep Listened, 93 sets of hands typed off 93 neat little lists of our crème de la crème, each name on the list so incredibly personally loved that we would be prepared to stand by our choices in a court of law.

So was 2022 a good year for albums? If you're seriously asking, we are prepared to offer 685 reasons why it was. And eventually we will! But what an unwieldy discography that would be to lug around, even in the digital era. What say we narrow it instead to 77? That's an auspicious number for the folks around here, one that would include every disc that got at least eight shared votes from our ballot pool. In the atomized 2020's, when everyone's ability to listen to most anything they want immediately and without impediment is unquestioned, that ever-so-slight buzz represents a raving consensus.

To be fair, our small sample size means that we had any number of blind spots. You won't find much contemporary classical or tejano or C-Pop or Norwegian rap in the mix. You could ably break down our more touted nominees into four neat categories:

• Undeniable pop and rock blockbusters: Beyonce, Rosalía, Kendrick, Taylor, The Smile
• Genre standouts: Makaya McCraven, Wizkid, Miranda Lambert, Shygirl, Pusha T
• Critical darlings: Big Thief, Beth Orton, Moor Mother, Björk, Wet Leg
• Board favorites: Real Lies, The Soft Pink Truth, Fievel is Glauque, Junior Boys, Asake

This is the Top 77 Albums of 2022 Spotify Playlist:
http://open.spotify.com/playlist/74uEDKSzf9JAsiEuPs7g4Y

This is the Top 77 Albums of 2022 Tidal Playlist:
https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/fe7c7d5a-a866-45fb-879a-e77d27bc624e

This is the Nearly Complete Top 77 Albums of 2022 Nominations Spotify Playlist, with over 550 albums, 8800 songs and 638 hours of music:

http://open.spotify.com/playlist/45AL48bS1jzEgT7xqSZiXq


If anyone wants to clone matching playlists on YouTube / Amazon Music / Tidal / The Mythical Virtuous Corporation, it would absolutely be more than welcome here. Feel free to post those and we’ll edit them into the intro once they’re fully updated.

Your admins for this poll are myself (posting, playlisting), Moka (posting, graphics) and Seandalai (organization and vote tabulation).

Posting sample tracks from winning albums to share choice cuts is recommended but please make sure that, as a courtesy to folks without a high-speed internet connection, you refrain from posting embedded YouTubes so that this thread can load at a manageable speed. YouTubes can (and should!) still be posted as hyperlinks. If you're unsure how that works, click the “Show Formatting Help" button below the Submit Post button and it will explain how to use hyperlinks on ILX.

As in past years, bragging rights are available for whoever accurately names our #78 before the end of the poll.

Also as in past years, the conversation is more than half the fun, so please freely contribute your appreciation, slander and confusion as each album is revealed. For once, we can look forward to the discourse!

While you’re waiting, here’s the prior two decades of yearly album threads to explore:

The ILX Readers Poll 2002 - RECORDS OF THE YEAR
ILx'ers Top Albums of 2003
ILM TOP ALBUMS OF 2004
You could have it so much better.....with the ILM albums of 2005
***What's that coming over the hill? It's the 2006 ILX ALBUMS POLL RESULTS***
**********Hot damn it's THE ILX 2007 POLL RESULTS, part 2**********
TOP 10 NOW: //////////////shawty got poll poll poll poll poll poll poll (part II: 2008 ALBUMS)///////////////
(TOP 5 TODAY, MOFOS!) Yo P&J, I'm really happy for you, Imma let you finish, but ILX had the greatest 2009 poll of all time! All time! (2009 ILX Albums Poll Results)
ILM'S TOP 77 ALBUMS of 2010 (NOW COUNTING DOWN THE TOP TEN)
ILM's Top 77 ALBUMS of 2011
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2012
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2013
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2014
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2015
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2016
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2017
ILM’s Top 77 Albums of 2018
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2019
ILM's Top 77 Albums of 2020
ILM’s Top 77 Albums of 2021

Moka will get the ball rolling on Monday morning. Best time of the year everybody! Enjoy!

Great intro, but I do want to point out that Norwegian rap is bad, and you shouldn't listen to it.

Also, great work to all the poll runners. Thank you so much for doing this. Can't wait to see the list. Top 10 for Asake?

Great post forks!

Great stuff I have been waiting anxiously for this for the past two monthd

Great intro, but I do want to point out that Norwegian rap is bad, and you shouldn't listen to it.

Eh, maybe if you went back to the mainstream 10-20 years ago. There's been a lot of very respected underground or underground-gone-mainstream groups and projects the last decade, some of which I quite like. I don't think Scandinavians are all that comfortable listening to their neighbours' rap acts, though.

kinda hoping we have 100 posts about Norwegian rap before Moka starts in the morning; would be a thread very much in character

Seems I threw quite a few points at "board favourites" myself this year, from the above categories.

Thanks for the not inconsiderable preparatory toil, poll-runners!

it's a bit weird to seemingly spoil a bunch of the placements already (some are obvious sure but not all) but please don't confirm if you actually did

Are we going albums first this year ?

Eh, maybe if you went back to the mainstream 10-20 years ago. There's been a lot of very respected underground or underground-gone-mainstream groups and projects the last decade, some of which I quite like. I don't think Scandinavians are all that comfortable listening to their neighbours' rap acts, though.

― abcfsk, Monday, January 30, 2023 8:25 AM (twenty-two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'd love for you to try and change my mind in the WorldWide Rap thread. I've heard a bit for work-related reasons, and I mostly just think it's okay trap? I think we can agree it's better than Sweden, though.

I just think the productions in Denmark are better. Like how this backpacker-trap track breaks out in a jersey club beat towards the end.

excited

great intro

think i like the idea of doing albums before tracks

excited!

i mean 2022 was a genertally horrible year, why not cap it off with some bitter in-fighting, a bunch of wrong opinions and a general sense of alienation?

(just joking, u know i love you)

A wonderful kickoff there.

it's a bit weird to seemingly spoil a bunch of the placements already (some are obvious sure but not all) but please don't confirm if you actually did

― ufo

Yeah, it's a great post aside from that, but unless some of them missed out it's too spoilery for me.

What are people's opinions on Finnish rap?

My favorite Norwegian rap track is "Nå Om Da'n" by Gatas Parlament. The hook is just "Forgot About Dre" translated into Norwegian and over a sample of Steely Dan's "Home at Last."

So Undeniable Taylor released yet another album ?

love the intro, forks (but next time please no y/n spoilers), but it made me a bit nervous as well. I don’t want to get myself into hot legal water, so could I please retract my ballots if it’s not too late? between you and me, I can’t claim to have put them together in anything resembling a judicious manner, I’m afraid. I hang my head in shame.

ufo/emily/breastcrawl: no spoilers. those are all artists who, in the course of 2022, had significant and spirited discussion on their respective performer or genre threads in ways that make them "more touted nominees"

undeniable taylor won the royal rumble over the weekend

Thank you so much for that brilliant intro, forks!

Poll will begin shortly!

I voted for none of the artists mentioned in the intro, feel like I'm slowly getting further and further away from ilm hivemind

hopefully enough of us from without the hivemind imposed some sort of darklife on proceedings at least

We’ll start with a tie. I couldn’t for the life of me find a review in english for this album. Only placement in the poll with a review in non-english.

I'm pretty sure I did

https://i.imgur.com/dso4C84.png
#76: Javiera Mena - Nocturna - 154 points - 6 votes
javiera mena

“Nocturna” es así, una excelente y bien armada producción realizada en pandemia y en la vuelta a la normalidad, donde afloran noches de bares y discotecas y también vestigios del encierro y vida entre Santiago de Chile y Madrid de Javiera.

It wouldn't be an ILM EOY without her.

huh. virtually no talk on the thread either, though I don't suppose that will be the last such case

ooooh wouldya just look at those graphics? nice work, moka!

I think this Javiera Mena album had virtually no promotion. Super hard to find reviews of it online and almost no discussion which is weird considering how well regarded she is critically.

https://i.imgur.com/HDRYa72.png
#76: Arctic Monkeys - The Car - 154 points - 6 votes
Arctic Monkeys - The Car

The Sheffield band’s latest exists in some kind of kitsch pocket universe where people sit around in vintage Gucci watching Roger Moore James Bond movies for days on end, subsisting purely on irony.

With The Car as their preferred vehicle of choice, Alex Turner and co’s next journey is one of heartbreak and reflection, with a soothing undertone and the occasional foray into disco-era David Bowie for good measure.

wow, this almost missed out! didn't vote for it or anything but it's the first of their albums i've genuinely liked

the only thing I listened to on The Car was "There'd Better Be a Mirrorball" which is some very odd Bowie pastiche if ever I've heard it

I thought the Javiera Mena graphic was Justin Bieber at first

Hahah it does look like bieber

tidal playlist is here: https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/fe7c7d5a-a866-45fb-879a-e77d27bc624e

I spent most of 2022 catching up on music from 2021, so I didn't vote in this poll. But I'm looking forward to get up to speed. Javiera Mena's 2010 album is an all-timer for me, so I'm excited to check this one out.

that's....just the album cover? lol

Huh, Arctic Monkeys? Really? Is this a notable departure for them or something?

I'm surprised The Car is so low, but then it is one that I consciously decided not to vote for because it wasn't really grabbing my attention and I assumed plenty of others would vote for it anyway

xp

it sounds a lot like their last one

unless it turns out moka is javiera mena's graphic designer too

it sounds like their last one but notably better imo

Lol, what was the last one? Was THAT a notable departure for them or something?

enjoying the Javiera Mena album, not really tempted to switch over to the arctic monkeys album

cover looks a Sam Prekop photo

Basically what I'm saying is that Arctic Monkeys as I know them are pretty bad, and I'm not sure why you'd expect them to place well in an ilx poll!

yeah they're basically austere lounge-pop now, nothing like the first few albums

this javiera mena album has a nice kpop bite to it which i'm v much enjoying

And by the same token, I'll bet the time thing going on in the first track is way more intricate than most proggy imago fare (11/16 I think? But meant to sound like a Dilla beat).

I liked the opening track! And a cute time signature on its own doth not extravagance make. I actually gave it all another listen after Tim said his bit and started to see what it was going for a bit more

still the all time best jazz joke pic.twitter.com/S8W15O8iEq

— alex (@shitshowdotinfo) February 7, 2023

I was unnecessarily terse the other night - obv people will like what they like. I think Nabozo’s summation above is good though.

oh god no, i absolutely deserve it every time

The first track / title track of the Hikaru Utada record is quite familiar. It's making me think of an old tv show theme but can't place it. I quite liked that one and the marseille track

In the upper part of the poll, The Soft Pink Truth is a nice discovery for me, somewhere between Studio and Luomo on my crude map (map isn't crude, I know). I don't mind an album being long when it's vast, springlike, playful, friendly.

Gave the Adigéry a proper listen last night finally - good stuff and like it when the highlights come later in the album (true in my case at least).

saer: good to know I’m not the only one, BAD sounds a lot like a tv theme but I’m on the same boat, can’t quite place which one it reminds me of.

Oh my god, imago, a "cute" time signature? Really? If you're into something and it has one chord that is slightly discordant you'll praise it as unparalleled creative genius, but when given proof that something you're not into uses complex technique you dismiss it as "cute"? That is so patronising.

I know that everyone is susceptible to the "my taste is what is objectively good" fallacy (especially me! I do it so much!) but honestly my dude, you need to rein it in. People are not cowards for making quiet music! Sometimes they choose to intentionally! I genuinely enjoyed your chess reactions b/c it seemed like you were realising that sometimes music can serve other purposes than being all-encompassing extravagance - sometimes it can help you focus, sometimes it can bring you peace. I'm worried this paragraph is moving into me being patronising in turn, so I will stop, but "cute"? Gahhh.

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/cute

meaning 3 intended

i even said in the post that I'd gone back and rethought my approach to the music! it just seems obvious to me that using an unusual time signature isn't on its own a sign that something is going to be an overwhelming or unusual sonic experience, all about the context of such techniques. just like a dissonant chord on its own is nothing without the chords around it!

and i was responding in turn to the slightly patronising 'yeah imago thinks everything he likes is soooo complex but can it even 11/16' cmon lol

this is what happens with no tracks rollout, we get tetchy. forks' fault this

Meaning 3 is definitely patronising, though. It's "affected cleverness", which is basically saying it's pretentious, or "not actually clever but it thinks it is". And I still think you're assuming that overwhelming or unusual are the primary barometers of quality - they are indicators that I will probably like something too, which is why we share a lot of tastes, but they're not the ONLY thing to look for.

ILx polls would be much more boring without you around so I'm not really that tetchy. On the other hand, I genuinely did take offence wrt the "cute" comment, and it's not even an album I've got any stakes in defending.

next ballot poll: rank time signatures by cuteness

i really wasn't intending to imply that the song was pretentious! (i even said i liked it in the original post!) just that yeah okay, it has a neat time signature, which helps it settle into a cool, unusual groove, but it was much more 'relaxing' and 'calming' than 'mindblowing' or 'spectacular'. and yes, i possibly do overrate the latter qualities as compared to the former (insofar as they're distinct; of course there can be overlap!), which as i am always learning on here, not only have their place but can make for music that is very great

as i say, i was also responding to the idea that stuff i like is all mouth and no trousers when it comes to musicality. so maybe there was a TINY edge to the choice of word. but really, i would never call Makaya McCraven pretentious, nor really any other music

and i was responding in turn to the slightly patronising 'yeah imago thinks everything he likes is soooo complex but can it even 11/16' cmon lol

You bring it on yourself (or at least bring it out of me, lol). For me, digging into that very unusual time signature for a whole track and really squeezing all the juice out of it, while doing it in this very smooth way that can almost pass unnoticed (in comparison to say, the Horse Lords record which screams POLYRHYTHMS at you, and I like that too), is much more sophisticated than attention deficit-style constant changes. People like what they like of course, but yeah you did come off as a bit dismissive.

xp

the guitar solo on "the know untitled" is: "relaxing," "calming," "mindblowing," "spectacular"

i guess 'sophistication' is the alchemy by which the relaxing becomes the mindblowing and despite posting here for 17 years i haven't really quite gotten it yet. more Steely Dan required

going to use this opportunity to ask whether anyone has any idea what time signature is used on "I Am Damo Suzuki" as the internet seems to have no answer to this.

no i do get why this MM album is an interesting artistic move. rather than letting it rip in an improvisatory and sonically open-ended setting, these are attempts at control and composition and that is ofc valuable; quite a few of them seem to work rather well. it is ofc my own prejudice in favour of sonic extravagance that sees me hark back to the 'wilder' stuff he did before, but as a fan of eloquent composition i'm equally happy to hear jazz that works within tighter bounds. that comet is coming album was a good example of something that worked within simple-ish (although still discursive) song-structures but had the sonic oomph i'm after. helped that it was basically a techno album lol

what are you talking about? mcraven was hardly a free jazz guy and his work process was always assembling loops from session and constructing records going back to in the moment. i feel like you just make shit up sometimes.

it seems like two different parts in 4/4 that don't quite sync up with each other

xp

but there is an underlying rhythm behind both of them, somewhere, I can feel it

I mean both drums and the guitar parts

i think it's in 4/4 with the occasional bar in 3 thrown in

maybe for the drums - but also bear in mind the guitar parts, they sound completely out of sync but there is some sort of underlying rhythm behind both.

what are you talking about? mcraven was hardly a free jazz guy and his work process was always assembling loops from session and constructing records going back to in the moment. i feel like you just make shit up sometimes.

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 8 February 2023 16:50 (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i get that 'universal beings' was a studio creation too but it definitely feels much looser (and at times noisier) than the new one, to me! forgive me if they are made exactly the same way

i mean this has a different feel, but i think that's the mark of a great artist, a lot of his albums have different a different character to a degree but they all feel very of a piece (imo)

The drums are in 4/4, the guitar is sometimes synced up in a straightforward 4/4 phrase and sometimes phasing or off.. if it was a more recent album I'd guess it was done on a computer or a sampler, since way easier to chop an odd loop or slide things around than play it. Maybe just an intentionally odd use of a delay or misaligned tape?

xp I know there's a thread for asking what time signature something is but I can't find it

Yeah MM's whole thing is chopping up pieces of live recordings and studio sessions to make his records, they've always been a blend of live & constructed. Some were definitely more lo-fi for sure.

off to start a new poll: cutest time signature

i'm voting 3/4 because awwwwwwww look how funny he walks but he's still able to do it!! great job, friend!

On "Damo Suzuki" I think what's happening is that the drum pattern is off a half-beat from the bass and guitar line. They're all in 4/4 but out of sync. But also the guitar and bass wander around a lot, not in a time signature way but in a "not always on the beat" way.

If you get the chance to see MM live, you may see him in a noisier, freer mode (you also may not). When I saw him last summer, I was a bit surprised that his band opened with an AACM "little instruments" style free improv — that might've been mostly down to the presence of Junius Paul, who iirc is an active AACM member, but as ums said it's testament to his impressive range, skill, and sensitivity as an artist & collaborator. Anyway, very little of what they played that night sounded much like any of the albums.

This discussion prompted me to listen to In These Times on headphones yesterday for the first time in a while — in partial defense of imago I do think it's easy to slip into thinking of this extremely pretty album as background music, and I'd gotten into the habit of playing it primarily during dinner with friends — and there were details in the mix I hadn't noticed before. The soft beauty of the album is built out of intricate materials

Hadn't thought of this before, but the difference between the titles In the Moment and In These Times strikes me as significant for the differing approaches taken, even merely at the banal level of how long he worked on the latter

tipsy mothra, that's how I hear it as well

xxp

For whatever it’s worth, the new one felt a lot more inviting to me than Universal Beings did - but maybe I’ve changed.

in these times he definitely leans more into orchestration, the strings and harp, sort of david axelrod vibes that make it feel unique in his catalog

If you get the chance to see MM live, you may see him in a noisier, freer mode (you also may not). When I saw him last summer, I was a bit surprised that his band opened with an AACM "little instruments" style free improv

interesting, the one time i saw him was a the walker art center and he was playing this composed piece that spliced in spoken word/interviews from civil rights activists with a sort of meditative art film presentation that had been created for the show, i think this might have been a one-off performance though

When I saw him last it was a trio with Junius Paul and a guitarist, tons of polyrhythmic drumming and soloing. Missed him with a larger group (at a larger venue) last time but I heard it was fantastic and intense.

ILM's Top 77 Tracks of 2022: 17th Anniversary Edition

slowly working my way through the spotify list.

so far

love and knew it

real lies
big thief
the soft pink truth
makaya mccraven

love it and didn't know it before

sudan archives
junior boys (this is not what i thought they were like, i guess i thought they were like basement jaxx or something?)
dawn richards & spencer zahn

like it
rosalia
SZA
beyonce
the beths (i think future me hates me is always gonna be "the one" for me)

not for me

charlotte adigery & bolis pupal

The latest Junior Boys album is a bit of a shift for them, they were more moody synth-pop before (so never really like Basement Jaxx)

may have confused junior boys with vague memories of junior senior

i should’ve voted for the asake album

may have confused junior boys with vague memories of junior senior

― karl...arlk...rlka...lkar..., Wednesday, February 15, 2023 9:20 AM (fifty-six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

haha i think that's it

I think junior boys may be junior senior's children?

no that's junior senior jr.

I was today years old when I learned that Senior co-wrote and co-produced Born This Way...

if senior was born this way, does that mean that junior was born that way too?

(sorry, we’re having a bit of a lull on the tracks rollout thread)

I just learned that a month or so ago!

their sound is clearly junior boys' own thing