Last night, Billie Eilish became only the 2nd person in history to sweep the Grammys’ “Big 4” categories and the third to even win all four of the awards over a career. Do you think it might be possible that music labels are trying desperately to find the next off-kilter teenage success story? Tate McRae is a 16-year-old from Alberta who attracted quite a bit of attention on YouTube with her covers – largely, of Eilish songs – and has now received the fast track to working with some of the best producers in the game, including Eilish’s superstar brother FINNEAS, who co-wrote one of the songs here with Billie herself. I hate to so overtly measure someone’s work up against someone else’s, but McRae’s vocal delivery and lyrical content clearly draw heavy inspiration from someone who is rapidly becoming the voice of a generation. However, while her music isn’t as groundbreakingly unique as Eilish’s, McRae proves that with an injection of her own personality the style is going to stick around for a while. With more traditional pop sensibilities applied to the dark bedroom-pop framework that’s running rampant in the industry, McRae delivers 5 pretty great pop tracks here to appeal to those who are just a little creeped out by Eilish’s horror imagery.
All you have to know about how attitudes towards pop culture are changing as the generations shift is represented in how the 2nd song on this project, “all my friends are fake,” came to be. Featuring some rather poetic lyrics in the verses about how certain people are a perfect match for handling someone else’s pain, the chorus immediately throws the flowery language out the window and bluntly repeats its title. McRae called this “title clickbait,” throwing something that everyone has felt at one point or another – that, by the way, wasn’t born from any of McRae’s actual experiences – in the middle of her personal diary. And it really does hurt when most of the music drops back and she blurts out “fake” in a pained whisper.
Most of this project functions in the same way, dropping relatable lines in the middle of highly personal content. You’d think that hearing the ramblings of a 16-year-old would strongly appeal to that demographic, but wouldn’t be able to cross many boundaries, but the direct, confessional way McRae writes about her own experiences and what goes on in the deepest recesses of the mind of someone born to an anxiety-riddled generation in a terrifying world is endlessly fascinating. The title, after all, is all the things I never said.
The project opens with the track “stupid,” which is built around a somber acoustic guitar loop and builds up to a trap-beat drop in the chorus – pretty standard radio fare at the moment, but we haven’t heard a voice quite like McRae’s used with these traditional formulas yet. Just as lilting and vulnerable as Eilish’s, but with a bit more of a powerful punch behind it when she needs to articulate something, McRae tells the story of how she recognizes that her IQ drops a few points when she’s around a less-than-spectacular guy, but she just can’t stay away. It’ll be a tall order getting any of these choruses out of my head for weeks, but this is one of the better ones here, her syncopated vocals and the persistent guitar melody linking up to create a sneakily hidden dancehall rhythm. It’s the sound that’s been making the entire world move for years now and has become embedded in the pop consciousness. Eilish lends her pen to the track “tear myself apart,” and the rattling bass and densely layered harmonies certainly recall the dramatics and hip-hop balladry of a track like “when the party’s over.”
The best tracks here might actually be the only two that weren’t already released beforehand, “that way” and “happy face.” “happy face” sees her reaching new heights in her vocal range with one of the most immediately memorable melodies, but “that way” is easily one of the most emotional tracks here. McRae uses her heartbreakingly specific lyrics to describe a friendship that always comes tantalizingly close to taking the next step but never does, the friendship itself on life support as it hangs around in an awkward limbo. There’s not much supporting McRae’s sorrowful vocals here than some muted percussion hits and slowly moving piano chords, but she doesn’t need it – she has enough conviction and genuine heartfelt emotion behind what she’s saying to make the listener hang onto her every word. Each chorus subtly adds a new musical element, building tension as McRae becomes increasingly exasperated, then finally drops back as she delivers the final line a cappella, her voice crumbling into a strained croak.
It’s true that McRae does draw a lot from what makes Eilish’s music so successful, but it’s successful for a reason: we all needed someone to bluntly outline was actually going on in the twisted minds of the youngest occupants of our planet, those belonging to that demographic especially. McRae tells her own stories here, and has the catchy pop instincts and sharp songwriting ability to make her fully stand out on her own. I can’t wait for a full project.
Favourite Tracks: that way, stupid, happy face
Least Favourite Track: all my friends are fake
Score: 8/10
Alt-pop singer-songwriter Halsey’s third studio album Manic is meant to be a journey into the way her mind works – named after her bipolar disorder, formerly referred to as manic depression. Sonically, it’s certainly a fitting title as the project dips tentatively into quite a few genres, all smoothed over with the glossy psychedelic pop sheen that some of her biggest tracks are known for. For an album with a concept and a sonic palette this interesting, it comes as a big surprise that it’s far from memorable outside of a couple of very strong singles. Halsey has always been an artist that seems like she doesn’t know exactly where she wants to go – during her last, very 90s-pop inspired era, she became offended when people referred to her as a pop singer rather than alternative. While there are some great individual tracks here and her songwriting certainly continues to improve, touching on some very powerful personal material, as a creative musical vision Manic plays it safe all too often for what it could have been.
Always one to play into the power of a good surprise, whether it be unleashing a dizzying string of syllables or a provocative bar that will get Twitter talking for months, Eminem’s 11th studio album Music To Be Murdered By came with absolutely no warning. Most people seem to agree that the majority of Eminem’s output for the last decade hasn’t quite been able to match up to the thrilling novelty of his earlier days – but Kamikaze was certainly a step up from the dismal Revival, and this one is yet another step in the right direction. Of course, there is still no shortage of corny dad jokes and subpar hooks, but in addition to his technical toolkit and wordplay – which is still nearly unmatched even as he nears 50 – quite a bit of what has been going wrong for Eminem lately is mended here, including his beat selection as he links back up with the increasingly prolific Dr. Dre, tossing aside lacklustre pop features, and finally finding a way to say something powerful about the social issues he has recently begun addressing in song. Inspired by the works of Alfred Hitchcock, whose voice appears throughout, even standing at over an hour in length its hard to say that this project isn’t, at least, highly entertaining.
The social media experiment slash performance art piece slash genuine musician that is Poppy has certainly been one of the most fascinating and consistently disorienting musical developments to follow over the past several years. Transitioning from YouTube videos featuring absurdist and satirical social commentary to music where she taps into a friendly, cheerful robot persona with lyrics steadily getting more murderously violent as her videos once did, Poppy has since broken free from her agreement with the mastermind behind it all and taken a new creative direction. After allegations rang out from around the music industry of producer and director Titanic Sinclair’s manipulative ways, Poppy has distanced herself from him and seems to have abandoned the character they created together, acting normally in interviews and getting quite personal about her dealings with him on this new project. Still, with her lyrics as apocalyptic as ever, it’s hard to be sure, and that’s part of the beauty – and terror – of Poppy.
Selena Gomez has described her first album since 2015 as a “diary,” and if you wanted to know exactly what’s been going through her mind during the many struggles she’s had since then, it’s essentially all here in crystal-clear detail. After some highly-publicized health struggles – both physical and mental – and a lengthy breakup with a certain Canadian pop heartthrob, she finally returns, and as one of the dual lead singles repeatedly states, “Look At Her Now.” While we can’t fault her for the many delays and restructurings this album has undergone, I certainly didn’t expect it to turn out quite this cohesive and compelling. This is an album in line with the image of the shattered, but strong, tangible and human pop star that something like thank u, next presented so well, as Gomez uses upbeat dance-pop production and lyrics centred around self-love as an opportunity to move past the pain. After all, going through trauma can’t be easy when you’re one of the world’s most-followed people on Instagram.
Another decade of music comes to a close, and here are the greatest full-length projects this year had to offer. Happy New Year!
Who could have ever predicted this one? Even though his sense of an overarching creative vision seems to be gone as he embarks on a new personal journey, this is still the most talented working producer and sometimes that talent alone is enough to make a project like this one enjoyable. Despite a couple of lyrical shortcomings, we’re here for the sound of the project first and foremost. I’ve always thought Kanye would do a great job making a gospel album – it’s in his roots, and could hearken back to the soul samples of his past. Some of the choral arrangements for the Sunday Service Choir here are pretty stunning, and he can still carry tracks like “Follow God” with the strength of his charisma and personality. Even if it’s all about Jesus.
The deep-voiced Irishman evades the sophomore jinx by taking a lengthy 5 years to come out with this one. Hozier burst onto the scene as a complete disruption to the norms in mainstream music with “Take Me To Church” and ended up with quite a few people trying to emulate him. Here, he still sounds fresh as ever in the lane he essentially created while some of those followers fail to adapt. With a bit more of a hard-rock edge than before, he runs through some pretty high-concept songs with the poetic and smartly metaphorical songwriting we’ve come to expect from him. Hozier sounds like he simultaneously celebrates love (or music, or what have you) and is a little scared of it, many of his songs giving off an eerie quality as though he dreads this powerful, all-encompassing thing about to take over his body and make him act involuntarily.
We’ve reached the point where the people beginning to complain about being born in the wrong generation are talking about the early 2000s, when the Internet was just bursting onto the scene and the biggest artist in the world was none other than Britney Spears. Slayyyter makes it abundantly clear that she would have been front and centre at every single one of her concerts, blending the glossy and over-the-top styles of pop for the Myspace generation with futuristic modern production. She’s mentioned in interviews that she’s simply out to make “tacky songs that are just fun” and she certainly achieves that here, but at the same time prevents the songs from being disposable by adding a litany of production quirks and an injection of her wild personality that will keep listeners coming back.
It’s often revealed to be the truth that the most gifted stand-up comedians are also some of the most depressed people around. In another universe, Hobo Johnson might have been Robin Williams. Displaying a shocking and sometimes even too personal level of vulnerability but always coating his existential sadness in some eccentric and hilarious punchlines, Johnson functions more as a spoken-word poet than anything, often caring little about the confines of musical meter or meandering away from the subject at hand for extended periods of time. It’s an absolutely fascinating look into someone’s mind and how it functions that also features an elongated skit that imagines an intelligent society of cockroaches forming and ultimately destroying themselves with nuclear warfare … after the humans destroy themselves with nuclear warfare.
An album so story-driven it came with its own accompanying full-length movie conceptualized and directed by Martinez herself, the eerie and soft-spoken predecessor to Billie Eilish continues the story of her devious, infantile Cry Baby character by, what else, sending her through school. Continuing to offer the most dark and twisted sides of everyday situations delivered in the sweetest possible voice, Cry Baby deals with everything from body image issues to leering teachers, almost every track addressing specific issues pertaining to the current political moment through the lens of growing up in the oftentimes terrifying place that is school. She even drops a nod to her current situation through Cry Baby’s story on “Show & Tell,” a track where Martinez addresses the rampant sexism in the music industry.
Mr. Chainz has had quite the inconsistent career, but he always succeeds when he lets his personality shine through. As far as punchline rappers go, he’s likely the best we have barring the re-emergence of Lil Wayne in prime form, and he certainly drops quite a few outlandish and quotable lines across this project over some of the best beats he’s ever rapped on. Executive produced by LeBron James(!), Chainz actually dials back on the comedy for about half the album and addresses some more serious topics, but maintains the cartoonish personality we love, even using it to help accentuate his points. If 2 Chainz cares about this stuff, so should everyone. Across the project he reflects on gun violence in his neighbourhood in his younger days, even calling out multiple friends he’s lost by name, and his mentality that the only way to make it out is to become a rapper or a basketball star. With features ranging from Kendrick Lamar to Ariana Grande, he also drops some serious bangers on top of all that.
The Australian DJ and future-bass pioneer has had quite a lot of influence over the sound of pop music lately, and brings it all together here with his most experimental work yet. The entire album sounds like one continuous, shifting and changing track over a magical 38-minute runtime – if you weren’t looking at the tracklist as you listen, it’d be almost impossible to discern when the songs switched over. Most of the tracks contain elements of the previous couple, with certain motifs reappearing sporadically over the course of the album. It’s easy to zone out and get lost in this world, especially when Flume keeps things engaging with his trademark complexity in his rhythmic patterns. Most of the grooves here don’t hit exactly as you expect them to, but the odd quirks are what makes it so special.
Another great concept album this year, GoldLink sets out to demonstrate his versatility in a big way by essentially taking listeners on a world tour of the many different forms of music that spawned from the African diaspora, running through genres like Afrobeat, reggae and dancehall, and good old trap music native to his hometown in the DMV. Most of the tracks feature artists more comfortable in the genre, many even speaking their native languages, which only serves to elevate the authenticity. The fun part is that he deliberately structures Diaspora so that certain sounds stick together, letting listeners spend a couple nights in one locale before being whisked halfway across the world. Of course, GoldLink himself might be one of the most underrated technical rappers in the game and deftly glides overtop of each one of these beats with his smooth and charismatic delivery. He puts forward a laid-back, understated kind of confidence that’s hard to replicate.
When word got out that Anderson .Paak’s backing band were going to be releasing an album of their own, we knew they would be bringing the funk. The band actually stated that they wanted to model this one off of Santana’s Supernatural. While using the defining retro-soul sound that helped .Paak break out onto the scene with Malibu, the band do quite a bit of work to set themselves apart by expanding that style to a wide-ranging list of features spanning from Daniel Caesar to the Griselda Records squad to the late Mac Miller. The tracks without a feature present are actually some of the best here, elevating the rhythmic complexity while keyboardist T.Nava fills in the vocal blanks through his talkbox. 40 straight minutes of head-nodding old school thrills.
Seems like dating Shawn Mendes is pretty great. Titling your album Romance is a pretty bold move, but it’s fair to say Cabello addresses all the ins and outs pretty comprehensively across these 14 tracks. With all the pop producers of the moment, including Louis Bell, Benny Blanco and Billie Eilish’s brother Finneas O’Connell, on your side, in addition to those seriously impressive vocal acrobatics she’s capable of pulling off, we get a compact and endlessly relistenable collection of fantastic pop tracks dealing with some subject matter that clearly touches on some pretty personal places for Cabello. Anchored by the personalized Latin flair that she adds to most of her biggest hits, all of Cabello’s hand-wringing about exactly when, where, how and who is right for a romantic night culminates in the stunning “First Man,” a slow ballad where she convinces her father that Mendes really might be the one. And oh yeah, that song that’s been in your head literally all year is here too.
Leave it up to the prolific members of BROCKHAMPTON to release an album this good in the midst of an incredibly difficult situation. Written while adjusting to life without arguably the face of the group, Ameer Vann, who was removed by their own members after sexual assault allegations, there are quite a few tracks here that are a lot more subdued, sad, and even violently angry as the remaining members cope with their conflicted feelings towards their former friend. For an off-the-wall rap collective known for their upbeat and progressive hip-hop beats, this came as a surprise to most of their core audience. Still, one of the greatest things about BROCKHAMPTON has always been the interplay, camaraderie and genuine friendship that is easily felt through their fun-loving interactions on the mic – those bonds are still there, though displayed in a different way, and perhaps all the more stronger for it. And don’t worry – a couple hard-hitting rap tracks are still here too.
Tove Lo has really been coming into her own as one of the most promising faces amidst the boundary-pushing pop crowd, and this is likely her best collection of songs yet. Self-described as an amalgamation of “dirty pop, sad bangers, and badass collabs,” Tove Lo continues to deal with any and all of her emotions on the grimiest dance floor she can find, getting rid of her pain with an innocent kiss here and there. That kind of subject matter usually makes for some compelling and downright heartbreaking material lyrically, but it’s even better when the music it’s accompanied by actually sounds more like that club setting, as she draws more influence from house music on this one and even teams up with one of its biggest faces in Jax Jones. Her vocals are pristine and soaring as always, and she and her collaborators have dreamt up some of her most instantly anthemic melodies, delivering it all through the lens of a yellow cartoon cat meant to serve as an extension of Tove Lo herself.
If Kim Petras isn’t absolutely ruling the world 5 years from now, something has gone very wrong. I honestly believe that she has the best ear for pure pop music melodies in the entire industry right now, and I hope to see her star rising very quickly in the coming years. While Clarity is not a full-fledged album and more of a collection of singles, there’s not a single miss amongst them. Flexing her incredible vocal range across some deliciously fizzy synthpop bangers and modern hip-hop production, what shines through the most is just how much she adores the pop music format and formulas and has a blast getting to participate. It’s why she doesn’t necessarily step into the role as a pop music mad scientist, dissecting, innovating and pushing it forward like some of her contemporaries – she simply takes existing things she loves, and does them bigger and better, putting the Kim Petras stamp on things with her goofy ad-libs and ability to almost make a caricature of herself. If you’re looking for the simple joys of music to throw your hands up in the air to, there’s no better place to look.
2019 was Lizzo’s year. With not one, but two, massive hit songs that were actually from 2017 and earlier, everyone steadily realized this year that they’ve been completely missing out on this multitalented Prince protege. Her off-the-cuff effortless charm is hilarious across the board here and she drops quotable and fun rap lyrics while also translating her loud, unapologetic nature into passionate and impressively soulful R&B material. Lizzo’s all-out celebration of all aspects of her identity is genuinely inspiring – it’s easy to see why she has been an icon in the LGBT community for years, I’ve never heard messages of self-confidence come off like they’re the easiest, most obvious thing to follow. “If I’m shining, everybody gotta shine,” she proclaims on standout track “Juice.” Songs written for the primary purpose of being a feel-good anthem can often elicit eye-rolls, but Lizzo is both authentically herself and inclusive enough that it’ll make anyone want to join her party. She represents the perfect antithesis to the wave of sadness taking over popular music right now. The quintessential “getting ready to go out” album.
This is one of the most mind-bending and disorienting pieces of music I’ve ever heard in my life, and it only gets better and better with every new listen. This is the theme song of a sleep paralysis demon. This is the nightmarish product of melting down everyone making popular music right now, combining them into a Frankenstein’s monster who wishes it had never been created and then uploading that consciousness into a robot hell-bent on destroying humanity. 100 gecs are experimental producer Dylan Brady and vocalist Laura Les, and they’re essentially making music they know is ugly. But that’s what makes it so beautiful. Throwing genre conventions out the window and directly into a giant blender waiting below, there is absolutely no predicting what sounds are going to enter your ear canal as you journey through their haunted house. Switching from hip-hop rhythms to black metal to electronic screeches to the most cheerful pop melodies to ska on a dime, there is nobody even close to pushing the limits of what music itself can represent like 100 gecs, and I’m both excited and terrified for what they come up with next.
Following up 2018’s rap-heavy Oxnard album only a couple months later, .Paak returns to what I believe are his absolute best strengths on the much more soulful Ventura. Filtering everything through the lens of sunny soul backtracks and his feel-good charisma that creeps into every syllable, he brings back the perfect balance of his half-sung, half-rapped bouncy cadence and tongue-in-cheek lyrics, alongside some seriously impressive soul cuts featuring some absolute legends including Smokey Robinson, Andre 3000, Brandy and even the late Nate Dogg, who was clearly a huge inspiration for .Paak’s style. With a little more political undertone – he throws some pretty hilarious shade at a certain orange President and delivers a verse from the perspective of Colin Kaepernick – .Paak examines his soul roots more than ever before and tries his hand at things like “Reachin’ 2 Much,” a 6-minute neo-soul jam session that Lalah Hathaway lends her otherworldly scatting and polyphonic abilities to. Anderson .Paak is so multitalented that it seems that nobody can agree on what exactly it is that he does best. But what we do know is that every time he drops an album, it’s not going to disappoint.
In a viral video featuring Pharrell Williams reacting to an early version of Rogers’ song “Alaska” when she was still a music student at NYU, he compared her to the “genius” of a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, that is, a new and exciting mix of established forms. While it might not be the most innovative pop debut ever, the combination of her mature, emotive and deeply soulful voice with the upbeat percussion of HAIM’s brand of indie-pop and the songwriting approach of a folk or Americana singer creates that blend he was talking about. Perhaps one of my favourite things a musician can do really well, Rogers has completely mastered the art of the slow build, and she certainly has the vocals to back it up and accentuate the biggest instrumental moments with flourishes of soul and vocal acrobatics. Seeing Rogers live provides all you need to know about how rhythmically oriented she is, dancing wildly and feeling the need to move some part of her body to hit every tiny tick of her unusually complex backing tracks for her style. These are pop songs that draw out tension and release it in the most euphoric, celebratory choruses, and she got some help from some of the best producers in the business (Greg Kurstin, ROSTAM) to help add all the flourishes she needed. The most artistically sound, fully realized debut since Billie Eilish’s first mixtape.
Superproducer Mark Ronson has already lent his production techniques to a variety of timeless hits over the years, but his solo albums have always been a little inaccessible until now. This is where he finally gets to flex his muscles and create a near-flawless collection of the pop and soul music that he loves so much. He brings the best out of quite a few vocalists who seem like they should be in very different places, from King Princess to Camila Cabello to Miley Cyrus to Lykke Li, and each one of the choruses here captures that Robyn vibe of dancing with tears in your eyes, submitting to the all-encompassing, cathartic groove and getting swept up in the music while the emotions flood outwards. A concept album of sorts that sees all of its protagonists uncertain about where their relationship status lies in the early hours of the morning, the transformation of their sadness into these empowering melodies is something to behold, especially when they’re handled by someone who can make them sound this good this consistently.
In an interview I did with Carly earlier this year (no, I still can’t believe it happened), she told me that the single word she would use to describe this album – and really, her entire career – was “longing.” The enduring appeal of Jepsen’s music is that it’s so easy to miss how profoundly sad quite a bit of it is in the upbeat 80s synthpop jams that she and her producers pull off so well. She also told me that, inspired by songs like Billie Holiday’s “My Man,” she always approaches songwriting with the aim of “milking melancholy in a way where it becomes poetic.” Jepsen couldn’t have been gifted with a better set of vocal chords for communicating exactly what she wants to – she has the ability to hide just the slightest, most devastating tiny bit of sadness in her seemingly cheerful tone, colouring all of the fantasies she dreams up about running away with her song’s subjects with the somber reminder that they are just that – fantasies. Luckily, there are also a couple of tracks that finally see her sing about full-blown romance, and the results are just as invigorating. Jepsen is one of the greatest pop songwriters out right now, and while her last project was an impossible act to follow, Dedicated shows that she can always be counted on for a good time, or at least, the appearance of one.
The year’s biggest breakout star, it speaks to the fact that consumers are looking for something new in a world of peak trap that an album this weird was one of the year’s most successful. Written and produced entirely by Eilish and her brother Finneas – a serious anomaly in the pop world, take a look at the extensive personnel list of any other major album – the teenager’s whispery, eerie cadence is essentially designed specifically with the headphone user in mind, her vocals quiet but still giving off the impression of singing directly to you. Or, right behind you. Finneas’ layering of his sister’s vocals across the board are one of the most impressive feats in music of the year, especially on tracks like “when the party’s over.” Eilish establishes a character with “bad guy” and then sets out to envision an entire world, complete with tiny details that you really have to be paying attention to to hear, whether it’s the sounds of the party as Eilish’s friends slowly kill themselves via substance abuse on “xanny,” that unsettling scraping on the absolute punch-to-the-face of a track “you should see me in a crown” or the ambulances arriving after she climactically jumps off the roof on the heart-wrenchingly tragic track “listen before I go.” Eilish certainly covers a lot of dark material, but she’s been embraced as the queen of generation Z, and represents the reality. An ASMR popstar, watching her career progress further should be a treat.
The definitive soundtrack of a year that was. Apparently fully conceptualized in only a couple of weeks via a couple of drunken healing sessions with her closest friends, who also happen to be her frequent musical collaborators, Grande pours out all of her pain from her awful year into these tracks, and comes out on the other end having learned from her experiences, a much stronger person as a result. Matching a feat only achieved by The Beatles with the album’s first three singles as she occupied the entire top 3 of the Billboard Hot 100, Grande’s music was so overwhelmingly human that it managed to reach out and touch almost everyone that listened to it. Released less than a year after her celebration of finding love, Sweetener, thank u, next functions as its dark, realist cousin, shattering the image of the picture-perfect, larger-than-life pop star – and people were relieved. With this project, Grande was able to masterfully control her own narrative, jumping ahead of people’s expectations and subverting them. We all thought “thank u, next,” the song, was going to be a drama-inciting diss, not a gracious, genuine thank you. We were all expecting slower, sadder music, not the unapologetic declarations that yes, of course she’s sad, and she’s not going to fake otherwise to anyone. Being this vulnerable after everything that happened is one of the most badass things she could have done.
Norman Rockwell was a painter famous for idealized, patriotic depictions of American life – much like most of Lana Del Rey’s subject matter before this latest, greatest album. For an album that takes these concepts and completely deconstructs them, rendering them a useless and broken ideal to strive for, what a perfect title is the emphatic Norman F**king Rockwell! – if only for the fact that its recent nomination for Album of the Year will have the Grammys fully displaying it on live TV. Del Rey’s voice is soft and psychedelic, drawing inspiration from the singer-songwriters of the 60s and 70s while demonstrating that she’s one of the most incredibly poetic, evocative songwriters working at the moment. Del Rey relinquishes the fantasies that have interested her her entire life as she surveys the current state of her nation, finally giving up and dejectedly telling it like it is. Masterminded by Jack Antonoff, who loves to dive into these dense, conceptual albums and set them up like a fully-realized story – take a look at Lorde’s Melodrama – Del Rey is just as allusive as ever, drawing lyrical reference to her heroes as she sarcastically addresses all of the mess around her, pretending to be above it all, but deep down knowing that she’s just as doomed as the rest of us. Who knew that after a career of trying so hard to be as edgy as possible that dropping the facade would result in her masterpiece?
Robert Pattinson, what did you DO??? Twigs thankfully returns to grace us with her presence after four years away from the spotlight, but she certainly had her reasons – in addition to all of the messy relationship drama, Twigs had to undergo surgery in May 2018 to remove numerous tumours from her uterus, a process that she describes in painful physical and emotional detail on a couple of occasions here, as it had an effect on her ability to be there as a participating member of the relationship as much as she would have liked to. Telling her story from the perspective of the Biblical character Mary Magdalene, one of the most traditionally villainized characters but perceived as much more misunderstood and complex than many realize in Twigs’ eyes, she sets out at subverting ancient archetypal roles placed on women through her own story of pain, heartbreak, and the strength she discovered at the centre of it all. Combining her operatic singing style with some of the most spastic, percussion-heavy instrumentals of her career, these tracks are visceral and honestly pretty unsettling at times as Twigs distorts her vocals to mirror her discomfort. She addresses her loneliness and the fragility of love, among other subjects, with indirect, flowery language, but there’s something about the way she delivers them that makes you understand exactly what she means. FKA Twigs combines avant-garde creativity with hard-hitting and frank emotion, and creates an unforgettable experience.
Charli XCX has been making some of the most forward-thinking, futuristic pop music for a while now, and I honestly didn’t think it could get much better than 2017’s Pop 2, but here we are. Teaming up with the PC Music crew, most notably its figurehead A. G. Cook, Charli takes a look at what it means to be classified pop music and turns it on its head, and in traditional Charli fashion, takes a bit of a step back and lets her curated selection of some of the genre’s greatest minds take the spotlight in the strange and wonderful worlds she’s created. Featuring both glitchy, distorted sad love songs like “I Don’t Wanna Know” and synth-heavy dancefloor-fillers like “Click” and “Gone,” the greatest thing about the project is just how well she manages to include and play off of other people. Kim Petras steals the show with a verse. Troye Sivan and Charli sound nearly unrecognizable on “2099,” which sounds like it was written by a really, really good artificial intelligence program trying to understand how pop music works. The track “Shake It” completely alters itself multiple times to cater to featured artists like Big Freedia and CupcakKe. HAIM, Clairo and Sky Ferreira are all here. Still, the album is titled after Charli herself, and she gives us some of her most personal writing yet tackling her mental health, insecurities and her paranoia that everyone around her simply wants to leech off her fame. It’s her self-titled work, and it just might be her career’s highlight.
In a world where it seems like the album format is slowly dying, nobody used it better than Tyler, the Creator. In what is probably the most compelling, focused narrative told by a deliberately sequenced set of tracks that I’ve ever heard, Tyler retreats into the monstrous character of Igor to take a deep dive into a tumultuous romantic experience he personally had while coming to terms with his sexuality, something that he had repressed all of his life as a result of the rap culture he thrives in (as told on his previous project, Flower Boy). While it’s impossible to tell just how much was embellished to fit Igor’s unhinged nature and how much was real life, Tyler tells the story of falling in love – real love – for the first time, only to have it ripped away when his interest divided his attention between him and a woman. Igor turns violent with murderous rage, ultimately realizing the error of his ways, grappling with complicated feelings towards his love interest, finding a more important self-love, and finally hoping to remain friends with the one who instilled such powerful feelings in him, not losing contact entirely with someone so important. Entirely self-produced, containing both darker spins on the sunny synths that coloured Flower Boy and definitely containing echoes of some of his musical heroes like Pharrell Williams and Kanye West, who both appear on the album as features, Tyler is a master of painting the most evocative of moods with his production to match what he’s saying. Spoken-word skits from comedian Jerrod Carmichael act as a guide, transitioning from one part of the story to the next and articulating how Tyler is feeling. IGOR is a rollercoaster of emotions from beginning to end, and I can only be happy that Tyler seems to have emerged out on the other side with a happy relationship, learning from all the pain he lays down here. It was certainly an experience listening to him figure it all out. We’ll see where he goes from here.
One of the most fascinating developments in music this year was just how much power video-sharing app TikTok had in the formation of breakout stars. Aside from a certain country-rap crossover, this was easily the catchiest melody to come out of the app.
Betty Who probably has one of the best ears for pop melodies in the industry right now. While she usually has the high-octane 90s dance tracks down, this one falls more in line with a slower, passionate boy-band cut complete with some retro percussion sounds in the mix.
ROSALÍA exploded onto the scene as a global superstar this year with her refreshing modernization of traditional flamenco styles. Millionària is the first track she recorded in her mother tongue, Catalan, and she sounds confident and comfortable as she half-jokingly prays for endless piles of money.
Ezra Koenig and his band full of Ivy League music nerds’ approach to beautifully blending the simple and the complex was sorely missed, even if Father of the Bride didn’t quite measure up to their past works. A long track built around a great central melody that eventually winds through multiple instrumental solos, they describe the current political climate through Biblical metaphors in typical Vampire Weekend fashion.
Calm down, Internet. While The Big Day was certainly a misstep in Chance’s career, it’s nowhere near as awful as many make it out to be. Try to tell me you’re not smiling when that syncopated piano beat drops for the first time and Chance starts gliding over it with his giddy, excitable cadence. The man drops a Road Runner “meep-meep.” He’s too lovable to hate.
While we’re on the subject of unlikely collaborations, my goodness. In the middle of a bunch of relatively sanitized (but maddeningly catchy) pop tracks, Post Malone drops a scorching hard-rock banger where he and Travis Scott keep pace with an absolute legend on the kind of dark and spooky instrumental he thrives on. If you needed any more confirmation rappers are the new rockstars, here it is.
Superproducers Jack Antonoff and Top Dawg Entertainment’s Sounwave link up with vocalist Sam Dew, who lends his soulful falsetto to Antonoff’s warm synthpop chords and Sounwave’s spastic percussion. Oh yeah, and the video features St. Vincent’s Annie Clark with a crowbar. At this point, everything Antonoff touches is gold – that’s the metal and the RIAA certification.
One of my most played songs of the year, this one is perfect for an energy boost or mood lifter of any kind. Built around little more than a slightly menacing trumpet melody and rumbling bass, Denzel Curry demonstrates that he has one of the most commanding mic presences in the game right now as he barks his self-aggrandizements with glee.
This one really took its time to grow on me. Maybe it’s the colder air outside that somehow fits the vibe of the track perfectly. In any case, Swift’s songwriting (not to mention her impressive vocal range) has always been her strongest suit, and this is one of the most earnest and genuine love songs you’ll hear all year.
She’s back for the first time in six years, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. La Roux dives into the current landscape of underground pop without hesitation and emerges on the other side with a seven-minute 
It seems like this one is pretty polarizing online – you either completely love or hate it. I certainly give props to BANKS for linking up with one of the most forward thinking artists in the game and creating something completely unique – the track essentially sounds like two playing at once to symbolize a couples’ argument, the singer’s two voices overlapping in a confusing jumble that’s anchored by steady, thunderous claps and gospel chords.
The Weeknd continues to step confidently into his role as a modern-day Michael Jackson with a new wave track that sounds like it comes directly from the Stranger Things soundtrack and fits his new look (80s-inspired pimp and/or movie drug kingpin?) perfectly. Straight from the Swedish pop godfather himself, Max Martin, the man ensures that main synth lead will burrow its way deep into your cerebellum.
Sometimes I think they might be doing this whole pop music thing better overseas than they are here. There’s something about the infectious melodies and interplay between the members of huge K-pop groups like TWICE, and they’ve been delivering great material all year. A high-energy track with a couple fun production twists throughout, the track moves through a couple distinct musical sections like most of the best in the genre do.
It saddens me that there’s more than one recently deceased promising young rapper on this list – he’s only been gone for 21 days. I had already tapped this track for a list like this back in February, as I was completely fascinated with what is essentially Juice’s hip-hop interpretation of an early 2000s pop-punk track. The piano melody in the beat is absolutely beautiful, and Juice’s Auto-crooned vocals really communicate his genuine distress. Hearing some of these lines now is pretty heartbreaking.
The latest female country star to embrace her pop crossover potential, this is one of the tracks where she really gets to unleash her vocal power. With a chorus featuring trap hi-hats and layered, harmonized vocals that show off the best parts of her high range, Morris is here to take exactly what she wants with some assertive and direct lyrics.
A short but sweet collaboration with the best feature artist you can get right now, Cordae and .Paak spit some quotable bars back and forth at each other over a J. Cole-produced beat. They contemplate their problems that aren’t really problems at all due to how much fun they’re having living the lavish rapper lifestyle, .Paak taking over the track a bit (as usual) with his no-nonsense hook.:format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-13197713-1549777781-5853.jpeg.jpg)
In a year where (hopefully) pop’s next-in-command Kim Petras dropped two albums and a bunch of other loose tracks on us, the best one of all was actually one from all the way back in January that never landed on an album at all. Although it’s a much moodier track, it uses her party-starting “woo-ah” ad lib better than ever, weaving it into the rhythms of the chorus as she flexes her stunning high notes and stresses out over her ex moving on before she does.
Climate change banger alert. Our impending demise has never sounded quite this good as Kero Kero Bonito combine the adorable Casio-toned 8-bit J-pop musical stylings of their past with their newer forays into some much darker and more poetic lyrical content. Sarah Bonito’s chipper voice is tinged with the slightest hint of sadness as the band envisions a future where the human race is wiped out as the world’s forests burn to the ground.
I’m quite honestly still unable to listen to this song without getting a little choked up, regardless of how public the space may be. The most powerful lyrical content of the year, Marina speaks about visiting memorial sites of catastrophic historical events and feeling like the world is teetering on the edge of another. For all her life experiences, she still has a lot to learn about what being human means – but the underlying message of the track is love and connection. The final chorus hitting is when the tears start flowing.
I love when a full track is built around a unique, singular take on a familiar song concept, and it’s no surprise that a brilliant writer like Julia Michaels is involved in doing so. A heartbreaking track that sees a separated couple’s thoughts immediately snapping to each other after a minor earthquake shook their hometown, trying to convince themselves – seemingly unsuccessfully – that if the world was truly ending tomorrow, the other would come over for one final passionate night, all their petty disagreements rendered meaningless.
When Rogers performs this song live, the room is washed with deep blue lights that slowly move across the room and project lapping waves on the walls, making it appear as if the whole concert venue is underwater. That’s certainly the impression that the quieter, contemplative verses of the track give off before the chorus launches into a beautifully harmonized 90s girl group section as Rogers criticizes herself for not being able to just make the move on him already – Rogers called it an ode to the “sparkly feeling of possibility” in an interview. Who knew the nerdy white girl from Maryland had so much pure soul in her voice?
It’s abundantly clear how much Doja Cat draws inspiration from animated and quirky female rappers like Nicki Minaj, and when you combine that demeanor with a better understanding of pop culture and memes and a blazing feature verse from someone who puts everything she has into her delivery and honestly verges on trap metal at times, you get a song that’s simultaneously one of the hardest rap tracks of the year and endlessly fun at the same time – there’s “Bodak Yellow” energy in this. It’s also rather impressive that they stay on a single rhyme scheme for the entire song – it takes skills to come up with that many.
How in the world was this not a number one hit single? To some, the Fifth Harmony alum might be the Kelly Rowland to Camila Cabello’s Beyonce, but she’s the one sounding comparable to Queen Bey’s early solo work with energetic and fun tracks like this one – complete with the marching band style trumpet hook. There are so many little things that put this song over the edge, whether it’s the little silences at the most energetic part of the choruses or the way she holds the note on an “n” syllable, the unconventional style replaying in your mind as something unique. Normani is ready to be the breakout star of 2020 with her debut album.
What is there to say about this song that hasn’t already been said? Rolling Stone noted that it sounds like “centuries of American music were all building up to these 113 seconds of genius,” and I couldn’t agree more. “Old Town Road” was built off of a concept of genre-mashing so hilarious that Lil Nas X was able to harness everything he knows about the Internet and keep the joke going all year, gaming the system by releasing ridiculous remix after remix and ultimately breaking the all-time record for most weeks at #1. By the time the Walmart yodel kid hopped on a remix and absolutely killed it, I knew I was witnessing something legendary. Ride on, Lil Nas. Ride on.
LSD – Labrinth, Sia & Diplo Present… LSD
Cage The Elephant – Social Cues
Lizzo – Cuz I Love You
Anderson .Paak – Ventura
Sara Bareilles – Amidst The Chaos
Khalid – Free Spirit
Nav – Bad Habits
Yelawolf – Trunk Muzik III
Billie Eilish – WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?