TWENEEK18: SOTYs
I know it's so damn late in the game but I decided I had to do this for me, if not for any other good reason. Regardless, I hope you enjoy (: |
| 100 |  | Sophie
Oil of Every Pearl's Un-Insides
"Ponyboy" |
| 99 |  | Twenty One Pilots
Trench
"Jumpsuit" |
| 98 |  | Avantist
Terasoma
"this_could_be_it_" |
| 97 |  | Novo Amor
Birthplace
"Anniversary" |
| 96 |  | Father John Misty
God's Favorite Customer
"Just Dumb Enough to Try" |
| 95 |  | Something and the Whatevers
Epic Fail
"Everything Is Boring" |
| 94 |  | Night Verses
From the Gallery of Sleep
"Copper Wasp" |
| 93 |  | La Luz
Floating Features
"My Golden One" |
| 92 |  | Elise Davis
Cactus
"Married Young" |
| 91 |  | Johanna Warren
Gemini II
"Hopelessness Has Done Nothing for Me" |
| 90 |  | Low
Double Negative
"Tempest" |
| 89 |  | Wye Oak
The Louder I Call, the Faster It Runs
"Join" |
| 88 |  | Miya Folick
Premonitions
"Premonitions" |
| 87 |  | Pinegrove
Skylight
"Skylight" |
| 86 |  | Ravyn Lenae
Crush
"Sticky" |
| 85 |  | Marissa Nadler
For My Crimes
"For My Crimes" |
| 84 |  | LUMP (UK)
LUMP
"Hand Hold Hero" |
| 83 |  | Iglooghost
Steel Mogu
"Dark Mogu" |
| 82 |  | Mathias Eick
Ravensburg
"Girlfriend" |
| 81 |  | Courtney Barnett
Tell Me How You Really Feel
"Need a Little Time" |
| 80 |  | Foxing
Nearer My God
"Grand Paradise" |
| 79 |  | Tomberlin
At Weddings
"Self-Help" |
| 78 |  | Florence and the Machine
High as Hope
"Hunger" |
| 77 |  | The Voidz
Virtue
"All Wordz Are Made Up" |
| 76 |  | IDLES
Joy as an Act of Resistance
"Colossus" |
| 75 | | Foxing
Nearer My God
"Lambert" |
| 74 |  | Let's Eat Grandma
I'm All Ears
"Whitewater" |
| 73 |  | MGMT
Little Dark Age
Little Dark Age |
| 72 |  | Field Division
Dark Matter Dreams
"It's Not Gonna Be Alright" |
| 71 | | The Voidz
Virtue
"Pyramid of Bones" |
| 70 |  | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"A Boat to an Island Pt. 2 / Agatha's Song" |
| 69 |  | Emma Ruth Rundle
On Dark Horses
"You Don't Have to Cry" |
| 68 |  | Boygenius
Boygenius
"Me and My Dog" |
| 67 |  | Typhoon (USA-OR)
Offerings
"Ariadne" |
| 66 |  | Tropical Fuck Storm
A Laughing Death in Meatspace
"Antimatter Animals" |
| 65 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"Murmurations" |
| 64 |  | Big Red Machine
Big Red Machine
"Lyla" |
| 63 |  | All The Luck In The World
A Blind Arcade
"Starboard" |
| 62 |  | mewithoutYou
[Untitled]
"9:27a.m., 7/29" |
| 61 |  | Judas Priest
Firepower
"Spectre" |
| 60 |  | Shannen Moser
I'll Sing
"Your Window Seat" |
| 59 |  | Damien Jurado
The Horizon Just Laughed
"The Last Great Washington State" |
| 58 |  | Toby Driver
They Are the Shield
"470 Nanometers" |
| 57 |  | A Beacon School
Cola
"It's Late" |
| 56 | | Florence and the Machine
High as Hope
"100 Years" |
| 55 | | Typhoon (USA-OR)
Offerings
"Rorschach" |
| 54 |  | Mid-Air Thief
Crumbling
"These Chains" |
| 53 |  | Shakey Graves
Can't Wake Up
"Abiophobia" |
| 52 |  | The Republic of Wolves
shrine
"Bask" |
| 51 |  | Haley Heynderickx
I Need to Start a Garden
"Untitled God Song" |
| 50 |  | Tash Sultana
Flow State
"Blackbird" |
| 49 | | Field Division
Dark Matter Dreams
"This How Your Love Destroys Me" |
| 48 |  | Ezra Furman
Transangelic Exodus
"No Place" |
| 47 | | Tomberlin
At Weddings
"I'm Not Scared" |
| 46 |  | Noname
Room 25
"Prayer Song" |
| 45 | | mewithoutYou
[Untitled]
"Michael, Row Your Boat Ashore" |
| 44 |  | Hop Along
Bark Your Head Off, Dog
"Not Abel" |
| 43 | | Field Division
Dark Matter Dreams
"Farthest Moon" |
| 42 |  | Daughters
You Won't Get What You Want
"The Reason They Hate Me" |
| 41 | | Pinegrove
Skylight
"Rings" |
| 40 | | Big Red Machine
Big Red Machine
"Gratitude" |
| 39 |  | Ben Salisbury and Geoff Barrow
Annihilation
"The Alien" |
| 38 |  | Melody's Echo Chamber
Bon Voyage
"Desert Horse" |
| 37 |  | Soccer Mommy
Clean
"Wildflowers" |
| 36 |  | Blurred City Lights
Volker
"Argue Till We Die" |
| 35 |  | Hot Snakes
Jericho Sirens
"I Need a Doctor" |
| 34 | | Boygenius
Boygenius
"Stay Down" |
| 33 | | Iglooghost
Steel Mogu
"Mei Mode" |
| 32 |  | Kacey Musgraves
Golden Hour
"Oh, What a World" |
| 31 | | Foxing
Nearer My God
"Nearer My God" |
| 30 |  | Carpenter Brut
Leather Teeth
"Leather Teeth" |
| 29 |  | Murder by Death
The Other Shore
"Space" |
| 28 |  | Sigh
Heir to Despair
"Aletheia" |
| 27 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"Towing the Line" |
| 26 |  | Wild Pink
Yolk in the Fur
"Lake Erie" |
| 25 |  | The 1975
A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships
“I Always Wanna Die (Sometimes)”
Zapping straight into the heart of millennial obsession with death and the meme of suicide, this song came along at just the right time in my late college years to broadcast my not-so-quiet frustrations at the day-to-normalcy that's driven it's way into my life. Parts Oasis and "1979," this is nothing short of a monumental and heartfelt poignant anthem for a generation that always feels dead on the inside. |
| 24 |  | Ghost (SWE)
Prequelle
“Rats”
Bringing boundless joy to the subjects of death and the collapse of civilization, Ghost topples over their previous sound and distills a godly (sorry, satanly) form of pop metal that even they couldn't come close to topping on their own album. This is just one of those songs that makes me feel happy beyond anything else thanks to that hilarious chorus and one of the best outros of the year. |
| 23 | | Big Red Machine
Big Red Machine
“Forest Green”
The pit of regret in my heart was almost immediately filled by this song early in the summer, the clattering drums and looping bass emanating warmth despite its artificially. And even though it was slightly ruined for me by my friend (perhaps rightfully) musically comparing it to "a flaccid penis," its always a tune that'll mean the world to me. |
| 22 |  | Lucy Dacus
Historian
“Timefighter”
While Dacus might've ended up being one of the more overrated artists of the year for the hipsters' embracement of her plain aesthetic of indie folk/rock, this tune stands as an inarguable slab of monolithic blues rock, shifting between loud and soft with nuance, grace, and more balls than the majority her male contemporaries this year. |
| 21 | | Soccer Mommy
Clean
"Scorpio Rising”
This heart wrenching melodrama of a ballad works through its gutpunch lyricism and the performance of soccer mommy's narration. As she takes on her iconic/ironic self-depreciating yet lovable drawl, she becomes everyone we've ever known from our high school years. Her teleportation of us to that time is effortless. She finds the beauty and frailty of everyday life and love in a way so simple it's astounding, and yet, no one else thus year captured it as she did. |
| 20 | | mewithoutYou
[Untitled]
“Julia (or, ‘Holy to the LORD’ on the Bells of Horses)”
This song feels like it was buried underneath ages of rock and concrete before emerging with all its anger and violence contrasted against the lightness and sweet melodies peering out that its afraid to admit to. It's mammoth in size and in emotion and it plowed its way onto this list slowly but surely. |
| 19 | | Haley Heynderickx
I Need to Start a Garden
“The Bug Collector”
A bittersweet ode to the protective side of love, "The Bug Collector" takes some intricate guitarwork and frames it against some truly strange instrumental choices to create a song far more harrowing, moving, and complex than it might seem at first glance. |
| 18 | | Foxing
Nearer My God
“Gameshark”
Brandishing all the fire and fury that fetishizing the apocalypse should have, this song, like its parent album, feels like a force of nature signaling an imminent and necessary change in rock music, shifting it into something weirder, something angry, and something far more dangerous. |
| 17 | | Hop Along
Bark Your Head Off, Dog
"How Simple”
A beaming smile of a song, “How Simple” still lays bare themes of broken hearts and spitting in the face of second chances. We nevertheless learn to celebrate her transition of life as we do our own. Also you're straight lying if you don't think that chorus is one of the best and catchiest you've heard all year. |
| 16 | | Shannen Moser
I'll Sing
"Haircut Song”
Another important song in Neek’s Broken-Hearted Summer (TM), this little ditty is probably the simplest of any others this high on the list. And yet, it deserves its spot just as any other thanks to its charming vocal performance and open-hearted lyrics, combined with a winning country twang that tugs at the heart and hints at a surprising amount of depth for a song of its short stature. |
| 15 | | Hop Along
Bark Your Head Off, Dog
"Prior Things”
As the politely pretty strings blend with understated guitar hooks and ---- bittersweet vocal twang, this album closer fittingly seems to be obsessed with finality. Ending, and how beautiful just how necessary it is for there to be a beginning in next time. This is a tune that digs under your skin and puts happiness in your mind when you least expect it. It's still hard to show it, but you can feel it beginning to grow. |
| 14 |  | Juliana Daugherty
Light
"Player”
Here is a song drugged into passivity, chugging along with simple strumming and pattering before slowly getting its bearings, eventually blossoming into a vibrant, multichormatic bridge that takes full advantage of its melodic synths, haunting vocals, and surprising scope. If it wasn’t clear, this is one of the most unique sounds in indie folk to come out in a year literally filled to the brim with them. More like this next time please Juliana Daugherty. |
| 13 | | Tash Sultana
Flow State
"Pink Moon”
Another slow-burning track, Tash Sultana brews a storm over clanging acoustic strumming and her soaring, apocalyptic vocals. In the single most effective lightning strike effect I've heard in a long while, she lets loose and delivers an incredibly violent and affecting guitar solo before simmering back down over a simple riff. It's structureless bliss. |
| 12 |  | Ought
Room Inside The World
"Desire”
When this pleasant post-punk stomp unfurls in surprising ways into a surreal gospel-inspired soul-wrenching croon, I was the last person prepared. I was even less prepared for how something so strange and vocals so weird to break my heart more and more each time I give it a listen. And it's something I feel will mean something more to me as I grow old. There's such truth to this man's poetry, even if I'm not of an age to fully grasp it yet. |
| 11 | | Miya Folick
Premonitions
"Thingamajig”
Deceptively subtle, Miya Folick carves out a frighteningly unique sound out of a barebones atmosphere. Despite how small her elements might sound on their own, a desperate vocal loop, chiming bassy synths, and her boundless vocals, they combine to fill more space than almost any other song this year. It all comes together to a sort of anti-climax, one far more affecting than any out of place actual climax could’ve been on here. “Only you know what to do now. Only you know what to do.” |
| 10 | | Foxing
Nearer My God
“Five Cups”
Emotive and free flowing, "Five Cups" emphasizes the best of Foxing's latest offerings in its quiet grandeur. It feels among the most natural of all these tracks, floating from one section to the next with both a sense of purpose and fate. It's certainly not the most immediate, but it's easily builds into one of the most rewarding songs of the year. |
| 9 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"Bird on a Wing”
The undeserving bastard child of Noonday Dreams, this song in a way serves as peaceful culmination of all its disjointed sounds into something whole and self-reflexive. Making peace with its folk and ambient roots in a way perhaps more satisfying than anything on its parent album, this song is dreamy in the same way as all of those songs, yet it reaches deeper into sounds and feelings that will always make me regret its exclusion. |
| 8 |  | Anna von Hausswolff
Dead Magic
"Ugly and Vengeful”
This song is a terrifying behemoth concoction of everything that can make music scary, with wailing guitars, ethereal vocals, and walls of sound that provide doomsaying from the very beginning until it catapults the listener slowly but surely into the literal stuff of nightmares—if they had a soundtrack, it would be this. Oh, did I mention that its also just plain fantastic and musically game-changing? The only downside is its gargantuan length, of which it makes the most of yet one still can imagine what could’ve been done with a more compact offering… which we may or not be exploring later. |
| 7 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"A Boat to an Island on the Wall”
A perfect example of the uniqueness of this album, this early album track plays off like an emotional centerpiece in its dance between chiming guitars falling into chirping synths. Swelling strings and distant sound effects fill the cracks of this hushed tale of infidelity and guilt, and maybe love in the least likely of places. If you can’t tell, this is one of those that’s just impossible to adequately describe, and another that’ll sneak up on you in the least likely of moments. |
| 6 | | Anna von Hausswolff
Dead Magic
"The Mysterious Vanishing of Electra”
While it might not be the world-ending cataclysm that “Ugly and Vengeful” is, “Electra” is a much sleeker of a tool. A merciful six-minutes in length, instead of going for the scope of that track, this instead takes aim with an emotional silver bullet, again building into a bridge of immense density and nuance, brining together maybe the most intense ending to a song on this list with a deafening, heartfelt caterwaul, with pulsing guitars and muscular organs that launch all the power of its Greek tragedy namesake in one finishing blow. |
| 5 |  | S. Carey
Hundred Acres
"Emery”
It’s hard to believe that I’ve been loving this song for only a little over a year given how deeply its become intrenched in my psyche. It’s been there for love and loss, success and failure, always remaining a bedrock of emotion for me to pour myself into no matter what I’m feeling. Between the eclectic drum patterns and drop-dead gorgeous strings there’s hope, guilt, sadness, joy, depression, and ascension all written into it, and it’s all on you as to what you choose to take form it at any given moments. |
| 4 |  | Jack White
Boarding House Reach
"Over and Over and Over”
Easily the biggest grower of the year for me (I didn’t even like this the first time I heard it, and now look where it’s ended up), this is also the biggest, baddest, rock track of the year for me. Perfect medication for my ADD mind, it zips and zaps from genre to genre second to second all while maintaining that muscular riff and hyper-egotistical lyrics. It’s a pump up jam for any moment, and has had me dancing through tons of tough situations by pure adrenaline and stamina alone. It’s gotta be one of the most fun songs to air guitar ever. Also, it just goddamn makes me happy. |
| 3 | | Typhoon (USA-OR)
Offerings
“Empiricist”
Well here we are. I have two songs left to go, and yet this feels like an ending for me. I’ve spent more time with this song than any other on this list, and like “Emery” its gotten me through so so much, though this is decidedly much more somber. It’s a history of sorts, a history of a single life through all the moments of weakness that we’d rather just forget, yet it strengthens those moments and recognizes them as essential to who we are—I’m blathering, but what I mean is this means a lot to me. Any one of hyper-melodic themes will hit me at any given moment, and I’ll immediately be thrown into a rollercoaster of my past year through it when it calls for me to throw it on. It’s a journey, a memory, and a history. My history. |
| 2 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
"The Defeat”
This violent, lurching monster of a song turned out to be the only thing that could come close to dethroning its king from the throne. Filtered through some seriously bitter stream-of-consciousness lyrics, “The Defeat” endlessly ponders the self-destructive nature of man in the most colorful and exciting way possible. A never-ending stream of drum strikes flicker through like the lights on the highway where crash after crash occurs, and the ghostly guitar lines do little to get in the way of the chaos of the throbbing bass below, flittering above in a haunting way before giving way to the final fight: strings swelling against the oppressive bass line that has been hiding under the song from the very beginning. |
| 1 | | Ben Howard
Noonday Dream
“Nica Libres at Dusk”
The purest, single most vibrant musical work of art this year lies here in the heart of this song. That guitar tone (you know the one I mean) blossoms periodically to free the heart from all the stress and anger that ails it in the verses, promising hope and truth to an audience that knows it very might well be lying, but the lie is so so sweet that any doubts are understandably ignored. The song transports us. Out of our homes, out of our cars, out of our lives, to an imaginary haven of beauty and peace that doesn’t exist outside of our ears in this moment, but that doesn’t stop it from being the closest we’ve ever gotten to pure carefree bliss since we’ve started looking. |
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