The 2023 End of Year music lists thread

Fader - The 50 best albums of 2023
https://www.thefader.com/2023/12/12/best-albums-of-2023

https://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/2180-the-faders-50-best-albums-of-2023/

1. a.s.o. - a.s.o.

Bandcamp - The Best Experimental Music of 2023
https://daily.bandcamp.com/best-of-2023/the-best-experimental-music-of-2023

By Marc Masters

Bandcamp - The Best Metal Albums of 2023
https://daily.bandcamp.com/best-of-2023/the-best-metal-albums-of-2023

Stereogum’s 50 Favorite Songs Of 2023
https://www.stereogum.com/2245293/best-songs-of-2023/lists/year-in-review/2023-in-review/

10 selections each by 5 writers

Mapped By What Surrounded Them - 2023 Favorite Albums
https://mappedbywhatsurroundedthem.blogspot.com/2023/12/2023-favorite-albums.html?spref=tw

50 albums ranked

1. Model/Actriz - Dogsbody

Australian radio station, Double J

Double J - The 50 best albums of 2023
https://www.abc.net.au/listen/doublej/music-reads/features/50-best-albums-of-2023/103191268

https://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/2181-double-js-50-best-albums-of-2023/

1. Caroline Polachek – Desire, I Want To Turn Into You

EOY lists are really overwhelming aren't they. Usually I would check the ones that are somehow aligned with my taste in search of discoveries, but the next year I can't remember which they were, and then it seems everyone and their grandmother have a list, or even two or three: overall list, reader's lists, individual lists, genre lists, lists with a theme, radio lists, song lists, and I can't know if it is a good or bad sign when an album appears on several. Not that I depended on them, it was always rather the pleasure of looking for confirmation bias, but this lack of authority / authoritativeness is deeply disturbing.

It's wild to think there was a time in like 2000 where SPIN would drop a list of 20 album and I would go "Man, I gotta check out that Quasimoto album" and now there's like 20 billion sites all doing Top 100 lists and nobody cares about any of it

One thing that's really fascinating to me is how these sites def are trying to court younger audiences by contending with, say, K-pop and drill and Latin trap and 100 Gecs but really refuse to deviate from the Boomer brain of "media outlets," the Gen X brain of "internet articles" and the Millennial brain of "listicles."

The Vice lists of years past always blew my mind because I’d never heard of anyone on them, even in passing.

Stereogum’s 50 Favorite Songs Of 2023

FYI I have been writing one of Stereogum's most popular monthly columns for seven years now and have never been asked to vote in their album or song polls. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

idk digging through eoy lists is great, i always find some gems i hadn't heard previously

NPR songs (123)

https://www.npr.org/2023/12/12/1215355752/best-songs-2023

As always, just as list fatigue starts setting in, Raven Sings the Blues shows how it's done right.

https://www.ravensingstheblues.com/2023-favorites/

Reissues

https://www.ravensingstheblues.com/2023-favorite-reissues/

the Financial Times best pop albums of the year (unranked)

The Chemical Brothers: For That Beautiful Feeling
Lana Del Rey: Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd
Jonny Greenwood and Dudu Tassa: Jarak Qaribak
Kelela: Raven
Lankum: False Lankum
Nation of Language: Strange Disciple
Ryuichi Sakamoto: 12
Sampha: Lahai
Paul Simon: Seven Psalms
Kali Uchis: Red Moon in Venus

https://www.ft.com/content/56529cee-c132-4da7-9501-5fcdaa6fad99

lol, pvmic

since when did the ft start doing unranked indexes

aquarium drunkard, RA and NPR lists are ususally good listens

will check out the p4k rap list too

but yeah, it is pretty overwhelming

safe to say more music is released and written abt every year?

idk digging through eoy lists is great, i always find some gems i hadn't heard previously
― ufo, Tuesday, December 12, 2023 11:02 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

That would mean opening and working through the lists and it sounds like that would take a lot of time and create some sort of Stockholm syndrome

DJ Mag’s top albums of 2023
https://djmag.com/features/dj-mags-top-albums-2023

In 2023, electronic music artists around the world used long-form works to showcase both range and specialism. DJs and producers best known for club-ready works explored personal themes through dream-pop, jazz and ambient, while others returned to the dancefloor with renewed vitality. Among fusions of hip-hop, amapiano, dub, dancehall and R&B we had dialled-in demonstrations of jungle, techno and deep house at their purest. Here, DJ Mag contributors select their personal favourite albums of the year, offering an unranked overview of the sounds that made the past 12 months so memorable for electronic music in all its forms

I think this is where the ILM EOY playlists are helpful.

The Best Pop Music of 2023
https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/best-pop-music-2023/

Opulent disco-pop, R&B hook-up jams, raging hot-mess anthems: These are the songs and albums that defined the year in pop music

TAGS
BEST OF 2023
100 GECS
AMAARAE
ASAKE
OLAMIDE
AVALON EMERSON
CARLY RAE JEPSEN
CAROLINE POLACHEK
CHAPPELL ROAN
CHARLI XCX
CHRISTINE AND THE QUEENS
EASYFUN
FEVER RAY
JESSIE WARE
KALI UCHIS
KELELA
KYLIE MINOGUE
LANA DEL REY
LIV.E
MARÍA JOSÉ LLERGO
MURA MASA
ELECTRONIC
POP/R&B
EXPERIMENTAL

DAZED The 20 best tracks of 2023
https://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/61561/1/the-20-best-tracks-of-2023-pinkpanthress-icespice-eartheater

Spotify playlist
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4r7smCV42VU8KABfz5tzJh

recommended listening:

totally blissed out brilliance riyl insides, laika, one dove

14. JAMES K & HOODIE, “SCORPIO”

There’s something very special about “Scorpio” that I can’t really pinpoint. The track, a collaboration between New York artist James K and Hoodie, is a sleepy trip-hop ballad that stays with you in a way that cradles you at your core. In a dream but still wide awake, drifting into digital fragments and buried deep in a memory somewhere. James K’s ethereal vocals are otherworldly and puts me in the kind of wistful mood that you find yourself in when travelling to distant places, led by the beautiful refrain: “So let it go, don’t be a cell to yourself.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bX6QWmGxCiE

Listening to new music does indeed take time. While many here are up to the task, I can understand that some don't want to spend the time populating a playlist, looking at the artist's Bandcamp and RYM pages, circling back to reviews, etc. Of all my network of personal friends who are lifelong music geeks, I only know of a couple who bother. I do it so they don't have to, and in my year-end summary I include separate lists with clusters of subgenres to help those looking for certain sounds and styles.

Currently I'm working through the RSTB, as nearly half are new to me. The last two are both Chicago based projects on Drag City that I slept on, the experimental ambient folk of BCMC (Cooper Crain and Bill MacKay) and Axis: Sova. This blurb had my attention: "The fuzz that surrounded the band in the past is burned away with an acid splash of neon glow and chrome glare. Sova brought a vision of Devo, Wire, and Toni Visconti to Segall’s studio door, but the band have also burrowed deep into the android heart of Tubeway Army’s sound, scratching deep into their cauterized soul. Further into the caustic creep of the album, the band slides a few slices of Magazine, Soft Boys, Twinkeyz, and Simply Saucer into the synapses as well."

Abysmal Hymns - the Top 10 Hardcore Albums of 2023
http://abysmalhymns.blogspot.com/2023/12/the-top-10-hardcore-albums-of-2023.html

highly recommended

3- Svalbard - "The Weight of the Mask"

track from the album

SVALBARD - How To Swim Down (OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cd5hh2BfsMM

expansive euphoric ethereal

James K song was also on Crack’s list. Great song very trip hop revival.

happy to see the sam goku record on a list (dj mag) (i discovered it from tim f's list)

Listening to new music does indeed take time. While many here are up to the task, I can understand that some don't want to spend the time populating a playlist, looking at the artist's Bandcamp and RYM pages, circling back to reviews, etc. Of all my network of personal friends who are lifelong music geeks, I only know of a couple who bother. I do it so they don't have to, and in my year-end summary I include separate lists with clusters of subgenres to help those looking for certain sounds and styles.

― Fastnbulbous, Wednesday, December 13, 2023 7:54 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'm guessing a lot of us here play this role in our social circles

I do but most of my friends are the “only 12 records in my collection” sort of folk. The ones who are more curious have wildly differing taste from my own so it’s fun when we do find an album or artist that we both love but it’s becoming more uncommon as we grow older.

Marissa Moss and Natalie Weiner's top country songs and albums of the year:

https://dontrocktheinbox.substack.com/p/issue-35-our-favorite-songs-and-albums
https://www.stereogum.com/2244742/the-10-best-country-albums-of-2023/lists/year-in-review/2023-in-review/

That Doc Watson Tribute album that Weiner put at number 1 is excellent.
https://iamapilgrim.bandcamp.com/album/i-am-a-pilgrim-doc-watson-at-100

Best Jazz of 2023 (Stereogum)

I wrote this, and also got 18 artists to contribute their favorite albums of the year. Surprised by how many other jazz players loved Meshell Ndegeocello's album (which I admit I didn't even listen to).

Love the format. Didn't know about that Hargrove record, and now I'm checking out the Koma Saxo since I didn't know anything about it. It can be hard to find the right line once you start overtly chopping and editing live takes like this but so far it's done really well.

The 50 best metal albums of 2023 - as voted by the readers of Metal Hammer
https://www.loudersound.com/features/fan-voted-best-metal-albums-of-2023

That Doc Watson Tribute album that Weiner put at number 1 is excellent.
https://iamapilgrim.bandcamp.com/album/i-am-a-pilgrim-doc-watson-at-100

― Indexed, Wednesday, December 13, 2023 11:07 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Should have mentioned that this features a number of ILM favorites: Jeff Parker, Yasmin Williams, Rosanne Cash, Dolly Parton, Steve Earle, Bill Frisell...

...yeah, that Koma Saxo is so good...

The Wire's Releases of the Year 2023
https://www.thewire.co.uk/audio/tracks/the-wire-s-releases-of-the-year-2023

had missed the new Fire! Orchestra album

listening now, sounds great

they are a thrill live

Clash - Albums Of The Year 2023
https://www.clashmusic.com/features/albums-of-the-year-2023/

https://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/2192-clashs-albums-of-the-year-2023/

1. Sampha – Lahai

I listened to that Doc Watson tribute a ton early in the year.

Resident Advisor Top Albums 2023

https://ra.co/features/4293

speaking of country ... Bandcamp's best country (and "country-ish") of 2023:

https://daily.bandcamp.com/best-of-2023/the-best-country-music-of-2023

the fader's songs of the year: https://www.thefader.com/2023/12/14/100-best-songs-2023

Raven Sings the Blues - albums

https://www.ravensingstheblues.com/2023-favorites/

part 3 from Cardiff based, GIITTV

GIITTV: Albums of the Year for 2023, 25-1
https://www.godisinthetvzine.co.uk/2023/12/15/giittv-albums-of-the-year-for-2023-25-1/

https://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/2203-god-is-in-the-tvs-albums-of-2023/

1. Corrine Bailey Rae – Black Rainbows

MAGNET, is this magazine/ music website still going, trad indie rock incoming...

MAGNET's Top 25 Albums of 2023
https://magnetmagazine.com/2023/12/14/magnets-top-25-albums-of-2023/
https://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/2200-magnets-top-25-albums-of-2023/

1. Guided by Voices - Nowhere to Go But Up

Not to be too pedantic, but technically Magnet listed all three 2023 GBV albums as their #1.

Bandcamp - The Best Electronic Music of 2023
By Joe Muggs·
https://daily.bandcamp.com/best-of-2023/the-best-electronic-music-of-2023

Complex - The Best Albums Of 2023
From smooth R&B projects to hard-hitting rap albums and an unexpected project that made its way to the top—these are Complex’s picks for the best albums of 2023.
https://www.complex.com/music/a/j-mckinney/best-albums-2023

1. Gunna, A Gift & A Curse

Wow, Magnet has Blondshell at #2, that's cool