The 2023 End of Year music lists thread

Rolling Stone’s Top 50 Albums of 2023

01. SZA – SOS
02. boygenius – the record
03. Tainy – DATA
04. Lil Yachty – Let’s Start Here.
05. Olivia Rodrigo – GUTS
06. Paramore – This Is Why
07. Mitski – The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We
08. billy woods & Kenny Segal – Maps
09. Victoria Monét – JAGUAR II
10. Zach Bryan – Zach Bryan
11. Blondshell – Blondshell
12. Chappell Roan – The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess
13. Noname – Sundial
14. KAROL G – MAÑANA SERÁ BONITO
15. Sufjan Stevens – Javelin
16. Becky G – ESQUINAS
17. ANOHNI and the Johnsons – My Back Was A Bridge For You To Cross
18. Jessie Ware – That! Feels Good!
19. JPEGMAFIA & Danny Brown – SCARING THE HOES
20. Janelle Monáe – The Age of Pleasure
21. Lana Del Rey – Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd
22. Young Nudy – Gumbo
23. Christine and the Queens – PARANOÏA, ANGELS, TRUE LOVE
24. Kesha – Gag Order
25. Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit – Weathervanes
26. Amaarae – Fountain Baby
27. Wednesday – Rat Saw God
28. Caroline Polachek – Desire, I Want To Turn Into You
29. Kali Uchis – Red Moon In Venus
30. Miley Cyrus – Endless Summer Vacation
31. Model/Actriz – Dogsbody
32. Bad Bunny – nadie sabe lo que va a pasar mañana
33. NewJeans – Get Up
34. Troye Sivan – Something To Give Each Other
35. Drake – For All The Dogs
36. Water From Your Eyes – Everyone’s Crushed
37. Asake – Work Of Art
38. KAYTRAMINÉ – KAYTRAMINÉ
39. Veeze – Ganger
40. Kara Jackson – Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love?
41. U.S. Girls – Bless This Mess
42. Samory-I – Strength
43. Megan Moroney – LUCKY
44. Jenny Lewis – Joy’all
45. Kylie Minogue – Tension
46. Everything But the Girl – Fuse
47. L’Rain – I Killed Your Dog
48. Gunna – a Gift & a Curse
49. Yo La Tengo – This Stupid World
50. Dominic Fike – Sunburn

I know all those have been posted before but I wanted to make it a bit easier to see.

Rolling Stone:

65 The Rolling Stones, ‘Hackney Diamonds’

83 The Rolling Stones feat. Lady Gaga and Stevie Wonder, ‘Sweet Sounds of Heaven’

actually sort of sad that the album didn't make it higher.

― djmartian rocks

Thanks for keeping us updated!

Yeah going after Sufjan considering the relentlessly tough year he’s had seems like a particularly low and ill-considered blow. You don’t need to like dude’s music, but maybe find some other way to spend your time than needlessly tearing people down online.

lol that was literally the first post i've ever made about him

Not sure how that’s relevant. Why spend any time at all writing that type of post in the first place?

Tu estas oyendo pwso pluma? Bajale poquito me despertastes

Re: Sufjan, I have empathy for his personal circumstances.

But no one is owed niceness or silence around art that they put into the world— perhaps the emphasis could have been on why some of us don’t care for his music rather than off-kilter (and arguably offensive) taunts, but I really want to push back against the idea that art about an artist’s personal tragedy should be cordoned off from criticism. In a similar vein, art about an artist’s personal tragedy isn’t automatically worthy of praise!

I haven’t listened to the new Sufjan and won’t, as I have never liked anything he has ever done and don’t really see that changing. I hope he recovers and is able to find peace through music and whatever means he finds fit. I just don’t want to listen to it.

celebrity boxing match: sufjan v peso FITE

winner gets aoty

actually a mortal kombat style fighting tournament might be the way to finally get rid of these lists and really put the substance of the music properly on the back burner.

"Artist x would not be successful if they weren't white" is an intrinsically unknowable statement, every white artist benefits from white privilege that's how it works, but I think has been a more valid point of discussion regarding white artists working in majorly Afro-American genres. Within a genre like indie I don't think it can mean anything beyond "I don't think this is very good".

the only privilege I'm seeing in these lists is American privilege (with a side-order of British, fine)

lol you can sub in "the history of popular music in the last 100+ years" for "these lists" and that statement would still be true tbh

Many xposts Oh of course it’s legitimate to criticize an album even if its creator suffered tragedies while making it, but none of the people here dunking on Sufjan are engaging with this particular album. You guys just hate his music in general and expect critics to share your hatred.

Record Collector magazine has an unexpected number one and probably the only magazine to have a Hawkwind album on their list.

https://x.com/sparksofficial/status/1730652009144132089?s=46&t=zQbxLGLurMqWqcXnRpq5zA

List doesn’t appear to be on their website.

I don't expect critics to share my hatred, fwiw— I'm just voicing my dissatisfaction with critical consensus, particularly around artists whose output I find largely mediocre pablum.

I mean more broadly, critical consensus (especially around what I would consider a legacy artist like Sufjan) always needs to be called into question.

Which is part of the fun and frustration of these year-end lists. That's all! (I'm posting like a millennial, apologies)

Fester's Lucky 13: 2023 Year-End Summary
https://fastnbulbous.com/lucky-23/

Spotify Mix | 2023 Breakdown: Genre Lists | Reissues | New OldDiscoveries |  Videos | Television | Books | Fester's Favorite Things

1. Large Plants – The Thorn
2. Spirit Adrift – Ghost at the Gallows
3. Graveyard – 6
4. Baroness – Stone
5. Body Type – Expired Candy
6. Blood Ceremony – The Old Ways Remain
7. Queens Of The Stone Age – In Times New Roman . . .
8. Royal Thunder – Rebuilding the Mountain
9. Lucid Sins – Dancing in the Dark
10. Spidergawd – VII
11. The Tubs – Dead Meat
12. Civic – Taken by Force
13. Geese – 3D Country
14. The Fierce & The Dead – News From the Invisible World
15. Protomartyr – Formal Growth in the Desert
16. Hollow Hand – Your Own Adventure
17. The Church – The Hypnogogue
18. Emile – Spirit
19. David Eugene Edwards – Hyacinth
20. Motorpsycho – Yay!
21. Patio – Collection
22. Witch Ripper – The Fight After the Fall
23. Skull Practitioners – Negative Stars
24. Glass Hammer – Arise
25. The Black Waves – Sonic Maze
26. DoctoR Doom – A Shadow Called Danger
27. Squid – O Monolith
28. White Canyon & The 5th Dimension – Gardeners of the Earth
29. Kanaan – Downpour
30. DIIE – The Right Hand of the Devil
31. Black Helium – UM
32. Mansion – Second Death
33. REZN – Solace
34. Rose City Band – Garden Party
35. Sorcerer – Reign of the Reaper
36. Panopticon – The Rime of Memory
37. Dream Wife – Social Lubrication
38. Egyptian Blue – A Living Commodity
39. Druid Fluids – Then, Now, Again & Again
40. Wytch Hazel – IV: Sacrament
41. Legendry – Time Immortal Wept
42. High Spirits – Safe on the Other Side
43. Narrow Head – Moments of Clarity
44. Peter Gabriel – i/o
45. PJ Harvey – I Inside the Old Year Dying
46. Bas Jan – Back to the Swamp
47. Cable Ties – All Her Plans
48. Ghost Woman – Hindsight is 50/50
49. Do Nothing – Snake Sideways
50. Spiritual Cramp – Spiritual Cramp
51. The Heavy Minds – Beyond Gloom
52. Howling Giant – Glass Future
53. Kanaan – Diversions Vol. 2: Enter the Astral Plane
54. Futuropaco – Fortezza di Vetro Vol. 1
55. The Keening – Little Bird
56. Church Of Misery – Born Under A Mad Sign
57. Flyying Colours – You Never Know
58. Frankie and the Witch Fingers – Data Doom
59. Giöbia – Acid Disorder
60. Restless Spirit – Afterimage
61. Eyelids – A Colossal Waste of Light
62. Edena Gardens – Agar
63. Edena Gardens – Dens
64. Haunt – Golden Arm
65. Rival Sons – Darkfighter
66. Green Lung – This Heathen Land
67. Godthrymm – Distortions
68. Witchskull – The Serpent Tide
69. Holy Wave – Five of Cups
70. The Bright Light Social Hour – Emergency Leisure
71. Bush Tetras – They Live in My Head
72. Nemegata – Voces
73. The Coral – Sea of Mirrors
74. Night Beats – Rajan
75. Lamp of the Universe – Kaleidoscope Mind
76. Vanishing Kids – Miracle of Death
77. Tomb Mold – The Enduring Spirit
78. Travo – Astromorph God
79. Raze Regal & White Denim Inc – Raze Regal & White Denim Inc
80. Godflesh – Purge
81. Maggot Heart – Hunger
82. Me And My Kites – A Safe Trail
83. Teke::Teke – Hagata
84. The Murder Capital – Gigi’s Recovery
85. Blood Lightning – Blood Lightning
86. Krypta – Outo laakso
87. Agusa – Prima Materia
88. RVG – Brain Worms
89. Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium
90. Rain Parade – Last Rays of a Dying Sun
91. Demons My Friends – Demons Seem to Gather
92. Harp – Albion
93. Lankum – False Lankum
94. Another Heaven – IV: Heaven Sent
95. The Loving Paupers – Ladders
96. The Routes – Reverberation Addict
97. Amplifier – Hologram
98. Crown Lands – Fearless
99. Dopelord – Songs for Satan
100. Ritual King – The Infinite Mirror

table otm across the board. i harbor no ill will for sufjan.

(and if we're being transparent here: i remember really enjoying seven swans for a while one summer about a decade ago. haven't played it since, but my memories of it are that it's a really nice album and anyone who made it should be proud.)

For me, Seven Swans and Age of Adz are streets ahead of the rest of his stuff.

even I like AOA!

will get around to the new one eventually

the opening track of the new one is very adz-y and there's lots of little adz-y touches throughout the whole album too, but it's nowhere near as full-on except for the opener

Anyway, Sufjan is Greek

You can be Greek and white.

Ik I was just being a dillhole

i have to just assume that illinois being kinda twee made austin incandescent with rage 18 years ago and he still hasn't recovered or heard anything else by sufjan since then

― ufo, Friday, 1 December 2023 18:35 (yesterday) link

Michigan actually but guilty, pretty much. Well, I heard the two songs in Call me by your name but every time I replay the tearful ending scene in my head, I replace the “visions of Gideon/is it a video?” one with ‘Janitor’ by Suburban Lawns.

lol not even close for me... 18 years ago i was living, eating, and breathing the field mice so if anything, he wasn't twee enough for my bitchass.

there are different varieties of twee, tho.

popbuzz Best Albums of 2023

https://www.popbuzz.com/music/features/best-albums-2023/

Maura Johnston approved Chappell Roan takes Album of the Year

1. Chappell Roan - The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess

riyl 80s pop Madonna, Cyndi Lauper.

xxp but you're right that it isn't tweeness exactly that put me off him, more what i perceived as a kind of piety. it's also quite a drafty record (his voice is very breathy, he's good at notating gusts and flurries) and that can be grating as much as it can be alluring.. idk

like the danielson family were pious in a more overtly religious sense than sufjan, whose piety seemed mainly filial... and that's where his "milquetoast whiteness" becomes a problem for me, i think. because hearing a raving lunatic like deliver this kind of stuff comes across very differently to a boy-next-door

the only things there that are really consistent across sufjan's career are that his voice is breathy and he's religious, quite often more overtly than on michigan, but also often weirder about it

Love this Chappell Roan album! My favorite find from the year-end lists so far.

Dan Nigro's been a busy guy this year huh.

Sputnikmusic - Best Albums of 2023
https://www.sputnikmusic.com/topalbums.php

sputnikmusic is a user music ratings database similar to RYM, with a strong focus on Metal and Rock.

Top 200 Albums are ranked for 2023, currently Panopticon are number 1 with the album, The Rime of Memory.

Bandcamp

Panopticon - The Rime of Memory
https://thetruepanopticon.bandcamp.com/album/the-rime-of-memory

atmospheric black metal

Quietus Albums Of The Year 2023
https://thequietus.com/articles/33662-the-quietus-top-100-albums-of-2023-norman-records

The Quietus Albums Of The Year 2023

summary

1: Lankum – False Lankum
2: PJ Harvey – I Inside The Old Year Dying
3: Teeth Of The Sea ­– Hive
4: La Nòvia – La Baracande
5: John Francis Flynn – Look Over The Wall, See The Sky
6: Musta Huone – Valosaasteen sekaan
7: Khanate – To Be Cruel
8: Abstract Concrete – Abstract Concrete
9: Danny Brown – Quaranta
10: Mariam Rezaei – BOWN
11: Shit And Shine – 2222 And Airport
12: The Inward Circles – Before We Lie Down In Darknesse
13: Brìghde Chaimbuel – Carry Them With Us
14: Slauson Malone 1 – Excelsior
15: Rắn Cạp Đuôi Collective – *1
16: PoiL Ueda – PoiL Ueda
17: Bill Orcutt – The Anxiety Of Symmetry
18: La Tène – Ecorcha / Taillée
19: Surgeon – Crash Recoil
20: Babybaby_explores – Food Near Me, Weather Tomorrow
21: Philip Jeck & Chris Watson – Oxmardyke
22: L'Rain – I Killed Your Dog
23: Shirley Collins – Archangel Hill
24: Lost Girls – Selvutsletter
25: Annelies Monseré – Mares
26: Gazelle Twin – Black Dog
27: Moundabout – An Cnor Mór
28: Apostille – Prisoners Of Love And Hate
29: MC Yallah – Yallah Beibe
30: James Ellis Ford – The Hum
31: Lunch Money Life – The God Phone
32: Nabihah Iqbal – Dreamer
33: Lisa O'Neill – All Of This Is Chance
34: UKAEA – Birds Catching Fire In The Sky
35: Hey Colossus – In Blood
36: Alexander Tucker & Keith Collins – Fifth Continent
37: Yaeji – With A Hammer
38: Aho Ssan – Rhizomes
39: Benefits – Nails
40: Nuovo Testamento – Love Lines
41: Kelela – Raven
42: Babau – Flatland Explorations Vol. 2
43: EP/64-63 – EP/64-63
44: ØXN – CYRM
45: Sleaford Mods – UK GRIM
46: JAAW – Supercluster
47: Skull Practitioners – Negative Stars
48: Raphael Rogiński – Tálan
49: Polobi & The Gwo Ka Masters – Abri Cyclonique
50: Enola Gay – Casement
51: Matana Roberts – Coin Coin Chapter Five: In The Garden
52: Bell Witch – Future's Shadow Part 1: The Clandestine Gate
53: Algiers – Shook
54: O Yama O – Galo
55: Ruth Anderson & Annea Lockwood – Tête-à-tête
56: KMRU – Dissolution Grip
57: Mendoza Hoff Revels – Echolocation
58: Fever Ray – Radical Romantics
59: James Holden – Imagine This Is A High Dimensional Space Of All Possibilities
60: Billy Woods & Kenny Segal – Maps
61: Noname – Sundial
62: a.P.A.t.T. – We
63: Natalia Beylis – Mermaids
64: Cassandra Miller – Traveller Song / Thanksong
65: Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – Land Of Sleeper
66: Sourdurent – L'Herbe De Détourne
67: Flesh & The Dream – Choose Mortality
68: TORPOR – Abscission
69: Årabrot – Of Darkness And Light
70: Sparks – The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte
71: Yfory – Yfory
72: Mozart Estate – Pop-Up! Kerching! And The Possibilities Of Modern Shopping
73: Synthfreq – Vol. 1
74: Nihiloxica – Source Of Denial
75: House Of All – House Of All
76: One More Grain – Modern Music
77: Colin Stetson – When We Were That What Wept For The Sea
78: Nicky Wire – Intimism
79: Jellyskin – In Brine
80: Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter – SAVED!
81: Kevin Richard Martin – Black
82: Yossari Baby – Inferiority Complex
83: Zhao Cong – 55355
84: Stephen O'Malley & Anthony Pateras – Sept duos pour guitare acoustique & piano préparé
85: Spirit Possession – Of The Sign…
86: KASAI – J/P/N
87: Godflesh – Purge
88: Anjimile – The King
89: Moussa Tchingou – Tamiditine
90: DeVon Russell Gray / Nathan Hanson / Davu Seru – We Sick
91: MXLX – Saint
92: Maxo – Even God Has A Sense Of Humor
93: Dodo Resurrection II – A Treatise On Ceremonial Magic
94: The Stargazer's Assistant – Fire Worshipper
95: Rezzett – Meant Like This
96: John Zorn – Homenaje A Remedios Varo
97: ANOHNI And The Johnsons – My Back Was A Bridge For You To Cross
98: Oozing Wound – We Cater To Cowards
99: Niecy Blues – Exit Simulation
100: Call Super – Eulo Cramps

an unusually normal top 2 for the quietus!

There's some good stuff on that list that won't be on any other list. There's also a whole load of standard Quietus rubbish. But focusing on the positives, it's good to see Anjimile, Kristin Hayter, James Holden, Algiers and above all MXLX (who won't be on any lists save this one and my own) get props

The Quietus are absolute fiends for promoting their house favourites come what may. Maybe that's a nice thing. If I was in Teeth Of The Sea, Arabrot or Shit And Shine I'd certainly think so lol

Must be some mistake though as I can't see 'Gnod' in there. They must have somehow not released anything this year

Also, that House Of All is fucking rancid. Okay enough out of you lad

oh there's plenty of stuff i've never heard of as usual, at least a little of which should be worthwhile. just surprised at the top 2 being critical favourites for once

the Lankum album is almost precision-designed to win the Quietus AOTY tbf, and PJ Harvey is a sort of looming everpresence behind a lot of UK music (which I have to admit even as a non-fan)

if you want an insight into the parlous, awful state of UK art-rock and experimental atm though, surfing through this will give you some idea. we are dying out here

Good to see Oozing Wound on there. Everybody listen to Oozing Wound.

will give 'em a spin! as i say, i'll try a few not-heard-ofs out from that list just in case.

it always occurs to me that i'd probably be a fair candidate for a quietus contributor if i wasn't always so keen to torch all my bridges with them. DORAN. DORAN I WILL WRITE ABOUT CARDIACS WANNABE BANDS FOR YOU AND YOUR SILLY ZINE

Oozing Wound album is good. Thymme from Cheer-accident features on a few tracks!

the James Holden album was… not very interesting! Best records on there are the Surgeon, Gray/Hanson/Seru, and the Stetson.