The Top 30 ALBUMS of 2019: Part One (#21--30)...

It's been a great year for albums so without further ado, here we go:








21. Avey Tare Cows On Hour Glass Pond:

the search for intimacy and connection powers the best work of Portner’s catalog (the longing “Grass,” the anxious “Peacebone,” the lovestruck “Bluish,” among others), and on Cows on Hourglass Pond, it returns to the fore after a half-decade of sonic wandering. The record finds Portner fruitfully preoccupied with the contours of aging; whether he’s accentuating the positive (the bubbling “What’s the Goodside?”) or probing humanity’s fixation on the unattainable (“Taken Boy”), Portner’s lyrics radiate a relatable combination of wary optimism and well-earned bittersweetness without ever tipping over into the realm of sanded-off platitudes. (CONSEQUENCE OF SOUND)






22. Beck Hyperspace:

The emotional arc of Hyperspace can be exhausting, especially if it hits close to home. But for fans, it may feel more important that the record has an emotional arc at all. Beck's past few records have featured many excellent songs, but lately it's been hard to shake the feeling that he's grown more interested in engaging with music on formal terms than exploring deeper feelings. On Hyperspace, he's not hiding anything. We happen to know more about his personal life at the moment than usual, but we don't need to in order to connect. Anyone can recognize the sound of someone trying their best to pull themselves together. (NPR)






23. Bayonne Drastic Measures:

the crystalline production of Drastic Measures marks a departure from Primitives, Bayonne’s entirely self-produced and more loosely structured full-length debut. In shaping the immaculately composed album, Sellers partly drew inspiration from the sublime melodicism of 1960s symphonic pop. “I spent a lot more time thinking about the little subtleties than I ever had before, and putting more thought into the meaning behind the songs and the best way to get that across,” he says. (CITY SLANG)






24. Michael Kiwanuka Kiwanuka:

right from opener ‘You Ain’t the Problem’, when the muffled opening bars blossom out into a glorious, Supremes-style call to action, and through to the brilliant orchestration on closer ‘Light’, there is a swagger and snap about the record. It’s filmic; a widescreen set of beautiful songs that, vitally, allows deeper investigations in terms of content and sound to be carried out elsewhere. There is a feeling throughout that on this release, Kiwanuka recognises that he has the power, and all the time in the world, to get things down on tape. (THE QUIETUS)






25. Brittany Howard Jaime:

Alabama Shakes singer and guitarist Brittany Howard steps out on her own in more than one way. She sings, writes, plays guitar and drums, and produces herself (with Shakes bassists Zac Cockrell, drummer Nate Smith, and keyboardist Robert Glasper as an occasional backing band). She opens up with stories about her upbringing. “He Loves Me” speaks to experiencing faith apart from the formalities of religion, while “Georgia” recalls growing up while having same-sex crushes in the devout South. “Goat’s Head” revisits learning that people didn’t approve of her parents’ interracial union through the memory of a gruesome prank. The uniqueness of these experiences is mirrored in the music, a mélange of styles touching on funk, rock, soul, hip-hop, and synth-rock, making disparate noises feel closer together by nature of Howard’s wide-ranging tastes and powerhouse musical chops. (VULTURE)






26. Ariana Grande Thank U, Next:

as Ariana moves from strength to strength, her steadiness as an artist incorporates more diverse ideas. This is pop but there is a now cultural aspect that has kicked it. Trying to identify what has caused this can be tricky but what is clear: she's growing up into a woman right before our eyes even while retaining her mischief nature.






27. Lafawndah Ancestor Boy:

it is left to the listener to piece through these lyrical asides to find meanings of his or her own rather being led by the nose, which only makes Ancestor Boy all the more thrilling, especially when its driven by such an effective, powerful production. ‘Joseph’ is a sepulchral ballad with piercing lyrics that place romance as a panacea to the world’s ills: “Wherever you go/You will be safe in this world” Lafawndah murmurs sensually on a bed of glimmering synths. It’s a slower moment amid the raucousness of most of Ancestor Boy and a rare moment of direct meaning. ‘Ancestor Boy’ in comparison is more peculiar, a rollicking dubstep-tinged banger that looks into the past to consider the singer’s –and all of our – ancestry: “Did he come from the water?/Did he come from the sky?/Did he come from the mountains?”. Lafawndah leaves these questions hanging as the music, all pounding percussion and industrial clamour, sweeps over you like a tide. It’s the majestic highlight of an incomparable album. (THE QUIETUS)






28. The Raconteurs Help Us Stranger:

they say absence makes the heart grow fonder and that’s surely the case for The Raconteurs after being away for the past eleven years. White breaks through the gates running on the opening two tracks before settling down into some subdued blues rock that he’s at home most.






29. Marika Hackman Any Human Friend:

in Marika Hackman’s telling, life as a twenty-something in a major city means nights where you kiss strangers, consume substances, and stay up until it becomes light again. It also means nights where you stay inside of your apartment and talk to no one. This polarity is the basis of the British singer-songwriter’s third album, Any Human Friend, which is a singular, extraordinarily horny, and occasionally bleak pop record largely about the complexities of queer desire. (PITCHFORK)






30. Jay Som Anak Ko:

proves the emergence of a stylistic auteur in indie rock. There’s little apparent by way of concept, lyrical wit, and aesthetic quirk — qualities that illuminate the work of many of Duterte’s colleagues — but ambience, style, and ingenuity are well at work, making the album a vibe-y classic worth hanging onto. (TINY MIXED TAPES)

THE TOP 100 SONGS OF 2019: PART FOUR...

the penultimate batch with some truly outstanding content:










21. Best Life (Danny Brown):

Brown is sober and reflective here. The soulful vibe of the song juxtaposed with Brown’s own reminiscences and regrets from his youth (“Get up out the hood, find a way out/ Route I’m on, either death or jail house/ Wanna get away from all this stress/ For me mama just wanted the best“) results in a song with the feel of vintage Wu-Tang Clan at their peak, sans the Shogun Assassin dialogue. It’s bittersweet, complicated even, but when Brown says, “Ain’t no next life, so now I’m tryna just live my best life,” he sounds the most at ease he’s ever been. To see him show off his Domino’s Pizza Rolex, it’s clear that he’s sincere about that. (TREBLE)






22. All I Need (Five Steez & Mordecai):

a stunning mix of ideas that indicate Steez has been listening to that very famouns Mary J Blige and Method Man jam AND Ms. Fat Booty.






23. Half Manna Half Cocaine (Freddie Gibbs & Madlib):

the newer yet sure-footed fuck boi anthem.






24. Ibtihaj (Rapsody feat. D'angelo & GZA):

a reverential nod to Ibtihaj Muhammad, the US national team fencer who became the first Muslim American woman to wear a hijab while competing during the 2016 Olympic games.






25. The Lost Angels Anthem (Blu feat Kezia):

not many can run through tracks this simply yet cleanly.






26. Taste (Ty Segall):

the feverishly frazzled loops of the album’s opener, “Taste”, gives a helter-skelter rush with Segall droning, “Our salivating makes it all taste worse,” that call to mind the mad eyes of Mans. (THE LINE OF BEST FIT)






27. The One (Marika Hackman):

wryly works humour in its sexual intent.






28. Dance (Megan Thee Stallion):

Megan really found the pocket of the melody here and her flow feels relentless as a result. There’s a pounding oscillation to the delivery that has Meg feeling like a bullet train, without having to become messy and breathless. Her technical rapping ability is so admirable. Amidst all her aesthetic plays and her range of lyricism, one thing remains true: Megan Thee Stallion came here to motherfucking rap. “He was nervous, ‘cause I’m gangster.” Another simple line that sounds worth its weight in gold, all because Megan is the meanest. (DJ BOOTH)






29. Screwed (Janelle Monae):

embodies the occasional, devil-may-care nihilism experienced by queer people of color living under a surveillance state. It also contains one of the funkiest and technically impressive basslines you’ll hear on an album already in awe of Chic and George Clinton.






30. Cellophane (FKA Twigs):

this song, which ends her sophomore album MAGDALENE on a devastating note, describes in simple, universal terms how a relationship can crumble from internal and external pressures. “Didn’t I do it for you?” she repeats over the track’s sparse piano-and-percussion instrumental. “Why won’t you do it for me / When all I do is for you?” Those plaintive lyrics are hammered home by the best vocal performance of twigs’ still-young career, with her voice rising and plummeting with trembling emotion. (TREBLE)







31. Outside (MorMor):

captures loneliness so well.






32. Part Of The Math (Panda Bear):

when Lennox finally opens his mouth, it’s to sing, “It comes out of nowhere/Like a rope/Wrapping tighter and tighter/Round the throat.” The shuffling beat is a throwback to 1990s rock/electronic fusions, like Screamadelica-era Primal Scream; Lennox’s lyrical lapses into ironic hemming and hawing suggest a character that’s part George-Michael Bluth, part Donnie Darko. (PITCHFORK)






33. Ill Wind (Radiohead):

deserves, given its quality as a song, to be highlighted in a way that only a proper studio release can. Hopefully it doesn’t slip between the cracks for too many; it’s a sublime and wonderful track and a firm testament to the superlative reputation of the group over the past three decades. (TREBLE)






34.Black Balloons Reprise (Flying Lotus feat. Denzel Curry):

dire social justice warning.






35. Tipped In Hugs (Avey Tare):

the little growling moments all add up.






36. Juice (Lizzo):

the big girl energy that has become as ubiquitous as it is infectious.






37. Acid King (Malibu Ken):

telling the story of New York murderer Ricky Kasso and his victim Gary Lauwers. Aesop Rock has mentioned this infamous 1984 case in passing before, a small-time dispute between a drug dealer and user that spiraled into a cause celebre. Law enforcement and the media lifted Kasso’s love of heavy metal and purported connections to Satanism into the spotlight, and the ill-fitting “Satanic panic” of the day would stretch far into the future. Aesop Rock’s master-class rhymes describe these players and their scene in harrowing fashion, and with nods to personal connections—Aes grew up in the same county as Kasso, and shared his affinities for metal and LSD. It’s not every day someone drops a single couplet that manages to sum up most of a man’s doomed life, but “Same year Bowie dropped/Two horns hatched and matured to gore Northport’s ’84” hangs early in the air, with the rest of the song dedicated to filling in the gory details of damaged people who spent a fateful night in the woods. All this, and as Rock’s words fly past at his standard ludicrous speed it’s really Tobacco who’s the tone-setter here. His memorably minimal synth line is as creepy and sad as the rap narrative it supports. (TREBLE)





38. Where’s The Catch? (James Blake feat. Andre 3000):

it never hurts to have Dre driving support on your track but Blake really owns his own here too.






39. Hey, Ma (Bon Iver):

a blush of shimmering chords signals a rejection of the sepulchral, electronic detritus that defined his last album 22, A Million, though Vernon borrows a certain metronomic tension from “666 ʇ” in the slow, digital pulse running throughout the track. (SPIN)






40. Noon Rendezvous (Prince):

for all his flair and theatrics when Prince stripped everything down to just vocal delivery, the quality and pureness is always stunning.

THE TOP 100 SONGS OF 2019: PART THREE...

and we resume...









41. Gold Past Life (Fruit Bats):

it's as if the band is channeling their inner Bee Gees.






42. Love Feasts (Liz Brasher):

and they say contemporary rock is dead.






43. Martyr (Sevdaliza):

here, rock drums, Spanish guitar, and sneering violin cozy up against glitchy beats and Sevdaliza’s fierce vibrato, juxtaposing the artificial and the natural. (MEDIUM.COM)






44. Heathen (Adia Victoria):

shows that no matter what a stunning simple song that is well crafted will always win out.






45. Spark (Kilo Kish):

this new electronic turn is interesting.






46. Let’s Go On The Run (Chance the Rapper):

amid the underwhelming tracks on his long-awaited album, Chance shines here.






47. Cheap Queen (King Princess):

presents an artist in full control of her aesthetic, able to bend it in various directions without losing her sense of self. For that song, she wades past her music’s electronic fringe into full-on synth-pop. (STEREOGUM)






48. Like A Girl (Lizzo):

everyone's doing girl empowerment tracks but the many elements Lizzo pulls together here are dizzying yet funky.






49. Song 31 (Noname feat. Phoelix):

running under the tap of her silky delivery is the fire.






50. Binz (Solange):

like a little magic trick, the drums never break on “Binz,” they just lay in the pocket, a circuitous tapping on the hi-hat, the warm-up to a soul explosion that never arrives. Instead, the beat simmers on low, a glorious, too-brief slice of song easy to overlook in the big stew. (PITCHFORK)







51. Comme Si (Christine and the Queens):

"a carnal call for sensuality and a call to dissolve as a way to exist and mend. It’s also a love song to the pop song format that changed my life, because with music I got to be who I wanted to be." (PITCHFORK)






52. History Repeats(Brittany Howard):

Howard steps up to deliver some subdued yet blistering jazz funk.






53. Exits (Foals):

doesn’t simply rehash the old britrock ethos, but charges it with something evolved. The song starts with this crisp snare countdown that lands confidently on a swaggering beat. Drums and bass set the tone, an off-beat throbbing that sounds like an all black, leather jacket stride down a Brooklyn alley. Guitar punctuates at the end of each bar, the brash side eye at gawkers. (ATWOOD MAGAZINE)






54. 4AM (Spielbergs):

doesn’t qualify as interest-piquing nomenclature, but the song compensates with Spielbergs’ usual hopeful rush of guitars, drums, and vocals competing to crowd each other out in the mix. “It’s 4AM, and I feel like giving up!” goes the gargantuan chorus. The implied message in the music: He’s not giving up! Feedback slices through the mix, the rhythm section churns, and the whole big thing happens. (STEREGUM)






55. Bad Guy (Billie Eilish):

uses murky vocals and a stylistic off-pop fusion with minimalist backing instrumentals to weave a hypnotic track. In a feminist twist, the lyrics subvert the idea of a “bad guy” in the relationship, instead stating that she, herself, is tougher. Eilish’s vocals are the showstopper—the hushed yet dark whispering is novel without being gimmicky. Bad Guy is a song of serious power and empowerment. (TREBLE)






56. Uncertainly Deranged (Bayonne):

sounds like what Animal Collective should still sound like.






57. Way Out (Big Joanie):

a loving ode to their city and emotional growth.






58. Unshaken (D’angelo):

his spin on western soul is refreshing and leaves one wanting more.






59. Can’t Believe The Way We Flow (James Blake):

his return to form manifest.






60. Off My Feet/ Westside Rider Anthem (Matt Martians):

smoothly cruising down the street.