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User
Soundoffs 20
Album Ratings 412
Objectivity 54%
Last Active 12-18-22 9:45 am
Joined 02-17-18
Review Comments 703
| Best 25 Albums of 2022 (12-1)
List continued. | | 28 |  | Alvvays
Blue Rev
12 The opening line from Alvvays’ debut single Archie, Marry Me is my all-time most misheard lyric. For many months I thought the song’s protagonist, “expressed explicitly (their) contempt for macaroni”. Just shows I never really engaged with the song lyrically – a truth the title alone should have alerted me to. And for two albums, this summarised my relationship with Alvvays, irrepressibly catchy melodies swirling around my mind and the odd phrase belted out at full volume as I bopped along while driving; there was no real connection. Then after a longish hiatus Blue Rev came along and initially, I was a little disappointed; where were the hooks? The memorable, sing-along moments that used to shadow me through the day long after I’d stopped listening? I knew it was good; I could sense the progression, the expansion in sound, the superior musicianship and songwriting. | | 27 | | Alvvays
Blue Rev
12 But after 15 listens, I’d still wake up with Adult Diversion or Plimsoll Punks running through my head, and try as I might, I couldn’t recall one melody from the new album besides Very Online Guy. So I persisted, engaged with the lyrics, dove deep, and it clicked; Blue Rev is their best album. The chaotic hustle of Pharmacist, the quotable and most-like-their-earlier-stuff Easy on Your Own, the jangly Smiths-esque guitar of Pressed, the power-pop punk energy of Pomeranian Spinster, the pure brilliance of album-defining standout Belinda Says… The more I listen, the more I find to love, the more the melodies – subtler, more mature, but no less immersive – worm their way into my subconscious. I still find myself waking up with Adult Diversion playing silently to an audience of one, but now it has been joined by Easy on Your Own, Many Mirrors and Tom Verlaine. Class. 4 (85) | | 26 |  | Wet Leg
Wet Leg
11 Wet Leg includes three classic singles: Chaise Longue, Wet Dream and Angelica. It’s a great strike rate for a debut album and although it’s undeniable the other nine songs vary in quality, Wet Leg deserved to be lauded for the undiluted brilliance of those three tracks alone. Playfulness and a mischievous sense of humour elevate Wet Leg’s best moments: “Would you like us to assign someone to worry your mother? Excuse me? (What?)” The inspired Mean Girls reference leading to a now iconic interaction between Isle of Wight friends Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers in Chaise Longue has become the defining moment of their live set. Wet Dream is overflowing with memorable lines; the Buffalo ’66 reference; the obscene licking of the windscreen; and the savage, “What makes you think you're good enough to think about me when you're touching yourself?” | | 25 | | Wet Leg
Wet Leg
11 Angelica is a thumping rock song, and no lyrical loafer either with the protagonist attending parties bearing lasagne and ray guns, and the highly infectious, “I don't wanna follow you on the 'Gram” pre-chorus. Elsewhere, some mediocrity – true – but also a handful of accomplished indie highlights such as giddy opener Being in Love, the slightly obscene Ur Mum and the live favourite Oh No, (I’m still undecided if the lyric, “You're so woke, Diet Coke” is brilliant or shit – probably a bit of both if I’m being honest). Too Late Now comes close to being a fourth all-timer; atmospheric guitars and an oddly Sonic Youth-type vibe giving way to a semi spoken word bridge and a lyric that probably sums up Wet Leg better than any other: “I just need a bubble bath to set me on a higher path.” Calm the fuck down… Wet Leg is one of the best debuts for a long while. It’s fun. It’s different. It doesn’t take itself seriously. It has substance. And it’s exactly what indie needed in 2022. 4 (85) | | 24 |  | Lucrecia Dalt
¡Ay!
10 ¡Ay! may or may not be Spanish for “Oh!” depending on the reliability of Google Translate. As for the rest of the lyrics, they’re mostly incomprehensible to me even after translation. Apparently ¡Ay! is a concept album about the experiences of an interdimensional consciousness named Preta who obtains dead human skin cells from the hydrosphere, forms a material body and interacts with the Earth environment. Okay. Not sure I get any of that from the music, but whatever the lyrics are about is inessential to enjoying the extraordinary Latin jazz/electronic/bolero/experimental amalgam Dalt has created. As the opening organ notes of No tiempo transition into flutes, clarinets and chimes, it is apparent this is going to be an intimate, cerebral listen. The unhurried tempo continues as El Galatzó brings the percussion to the front of the mix to accompany Dalt’s spoken words (something about cosmological electromagnetic fossils if Google Translate is to be believed). | | 23 | | Lucrecia Dalt
¡Ay!
10 Atemporal establishes a swinging bolero groove and the vocals (about timeless rocks and xenocrystals) are sultry and seductive. Dicen features a pulsing synth and understated trumpet, while La desmesura plays up the seamy jazz club atmosphere. The most up-tempo track is the lively Bochinche (maybe about bipedal plastic crypsis) and the album concludes with the tense, brooding Enviada (eternal meringues?) and blissed-out lullaby Epilogo (mercifully, an instrumental). Lyrical confusion aside, I have fallen asleep to ¡Ay! most nights since first hearing it two months ago; it’s languid pace, swaying rhythms, organic instruments, subtle electronics and alluring vocals just do it for me. ¡Ay! is idiosyncratic, incomparable and exceptional. 4.5 (86) | | 22 |  | Big Thief
Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You
9 Beautiful, but bloated. I am conflicted when trying to rate Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You; if I kick out four songs I have a leaner, tighter 16-track album that is one of a superior year’s five best. As is, I have a sprawling, frequently extraordinary goliath that feels like a deluxe version of a classic album – B-sides and all. But I am obligated to rate was is presented, not what I have reorganised. Change is a low-key but effective opener; gently introducing the contemplative nature of the album. I love Time Escaping, especially the shambolic clutter of the music in the verses. Its successor - the demented, nonsensical Spud Infinity – is even better; “When I say heart, I mean finish, the last one there is a potato knish, baking too long in the sun of Spud Infinity.” Okay then… | | 21 | | Big Thief
Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You
9 Depending on mood, Sparrow’s melody can feel somewhat grating, but it carries the memorable lyric, “She has the poison inside her, she talks to snakes and they guide her” which regularly defeats all other couplets on Dragon… to consolidate its hold on your subconscious for hours. Sparrow is also an important nexus in the album – a structurally important counterpoint to what came before and is yet to come. Little Things is just class and I won’t hear a word against it. But here things start to straggle… The interlude-like Heavy Bend is adequate but unremarkable, and Flower of Blood is a great B-side unnecessarily included; some adore it, but for me it is superfluous and incongruous. More salient is the dark Blurred View with its odd percussive effects and eerie overtones. Dragon… takes a restorative detour into alt-country territory with Red Moon and Dried Roses before the momentum-slaying duo of Wake Me Up to Drive and 12000 Lines – both perfectly lovely, but, well… inessential. | | 20 | | Big Thief
Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You
9 Happily, it’s almost all amazeballs from here; Simulation Swarm is the album standout and one of the best tracks of the year – gentle melody, cryptic lyrics and an endearing guitar solo – no histrionics, only the highest quality songwriting. Love Love Love adds much-needed crunch, and The Only Place is gorgeous. Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You suffers from parental separation anxiety, but even with the bloat, it is remarkable. Without it, it is magnificent. 4.5 (87) | | 19 |  | Metric
Formentera
8 Opening your album with a 10-minute epic titled Doomscroller which can’t decide if it wants to be a stomping synth banger, intimate piano ballad or guitar-driven indie colossus is a daring statement of intent, but happily it all works thrillingly well; by the time you’re singing along with Emily Haines’, “Oh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-oohs” you feel like you’re three songs in already. The momentum continues with All Comes Crashing and What Feels Like Eternity – the latter impossible not to sing along with, especially when the false ending gives way to a final euphoric burst. The title-track adds depth and texture, but is the only song I don’t look forward to, even if I recognise its importance to the album’s structure, and succumb to the gorgeous instrumental section and strings of the finale. | | 18 | | Metric
Formentera
8 Enemies of the Ocean seems made for open-air festivals with its soaring, if somewhat shallow chorus, but it’s apparent Formentera’s flame may be flickering… and then the strongest back section of any album released in 2022 hits and it's nothing but wildfire from here on in. The endearingly ear-worming melodies of I Will Never Settle, the electro-rush force of False Dichotomy, the exhilarating retro of Oh Please and the irresistible dopamine effect of Paths in the Sky leave you wanting to start the album again, but skipping straight to track 6. But then you remember how monumental Doomscroller is… great, great album. 4.5 (88) | | 17 |  | Perfume Genius
Ugly Season
7 Ugly Season is a 52-minute mood piece that somehow manages to be the best Perfume Genius album to date. There is no Slip Away or Describe to bop along with and play loud at parties – Pop Song comes the closest – but the holistic experience of listening to the album in full is unrivalled in his discography. The first three tracks establish an aura that could almost be described as ambient music, and the last two minutes of Herem when the techno beat arrives is sublime. Falsetto vocals predominate and Hellbent aside, the album is a somewhat floaty, almost delicate, listen. Scherzo provides an interesting piano-driven interlude towards the middle that is the strongest reminder of how the music was originally an accompaniment for a contemporary dance piece; it is an extremely visual arrangement that inescapably embodies movement. | | 16 | | Perfume Genius
Ugly Season
7 Eye in the Wall is the absolute standout with its pulsing electronics and enveloping atmosphere, but Ugly Season, Photograph and Hellbent are also glorious. While the title-track contains unsettling lyrics, “Turned from God. Slick with rot… knee deep and filthy”, Hellbent is the heaviest and most disturbing song on the album; convulsing helicopter-like synths and chaotic electric guitar build to a crashing climax that shatters any reverie the listener may have been lulled into. Ugly Season isn’t going to fill a dance floor, but it is the perfect listen for those wanting an immersive musical experience, even if, lyrically at least, it perhaps lacks a little depth. 4.5 (89) | | 15 |  | Weyes Blood
And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow
6 In the six weeks I have lived with And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow my disappointment with its lack of grandiose melodies and chord progressions in comparison to Titanic Rising has evaporated, and been replaced with a fierce appreciation of a more subtle, but no less potent approach. Mering’s voice is resplendent, and the arrangements are lush, and put simply… gorgeous. With time and repeated listens, each song has grown and developed into an essential component of an indispensable album. Lead single It's Not Just Me, It's Everybody initially seemed weak, insubstantial, whereas now I can’t wait to lie back, close my eyes, and let its beauty seep into me. Children Of the Empire is the biggest sounding track on the album and is pretty damn special. And although I still struggle a little with the vocal melody in Grapevine’s chorus, the sublime pre-chorus makes up for it. | | 14 | | Weyes Blood
And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow
6 But the epicentre of the album is God Turn Me into a Flower, an astounding, shattering, sparse career statement that manages to sound colossal with little more than a few piano chords and Mering’s mesmerising, yearning voice, “You see the reflection and you want it more than the truth.” Drum programming features prominently in the mix of Twin Flame and it owns a delicate melody that takes you by surprise on the second or third listen. And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow is a response to the Covid-era, as regenerative album highlight The Worst is Done urges, “They say the worst is done, and it's time to go out, grab onto someone.” Indeed, the guiding theme of the album is post-pandemic disconnection as Mering observes, “Living in the wake of overwhelming changes, we've all become strangers, even to ourselves”; And in the Darkness, Hearts Aglow does its best to reconnect, and it’s a glorious 46 minutes listening to it try. 4.5 (89) | | 13 |  | Bjork
Fossora
5 The divisive late career output of Bjork Guðmundsdóttir… Where are the melodies? Is she making music for anyone other than herself anymore? Why isn’t it like Vespertine? Or Homogenic? It’s just art for art’s sake and it’s unenjoyable... Fossora is a challenging listen, but it’s also Björk’s best album in two decades. There’s more awareness of her audience here than on Utopia; as one reviewer put it, it’s like Björk has been careening off on a transcendent individual odyssey and leaving us all behind for the past decade, but on Fossora she’s paused and looked back to check we’re still there. Fossora is more grounded, more accessible, but still unashamedly uncompromising. I was one of those left stranded with Utopia, but I’ve caught up again now. There isn’t one weak song, (or at least one track that I fail to appreciate), and there are moments of intense percussive energy that I haven’t felt since Earth Intruders. | | 12 | | Bjork
Fossora
5 Atopos is stunning, and here and on the title-track, Björk collaborates with Gabber Modus Operandi to create a jubilantly abrasive rave that gloriously complements Fossora’s themes of earthiness, connectedness and ancestry. Björk uses the technique of voice-as-instrument more prodigiously than ever post-Medúlla; Mycelia and Sorrowful Soil are almost entirely vocally-driven and Ancestress, (an ode to Björk’s maternal line) is similarly minimalistic. Allow returns to the flutes of Utopia, but with more success, and Fungal City is a playful treatise on parenting choices, “Should I soften the blow of life on him? Cotton wool cocoon him?” Most challenging of all is Victimhood; for some the incongruence of the instrumentation, melodies and vocals is just too jarring, for others, it is sublime and culminates in an album highlight. On Fossora, Björk sounds rejuvenated and inspired. I’ve caught up – you can float off again now insuppressible mushroom spore; I will try to follow. 4.5 (90) | | 11 |  | Kelly Lee Owens
Lp.8
4 It’s pre-dawn. A dangerous time on Australian roads in the outback as it’s when the kangaroos wake up, and hitting a kangaroo might be the last thing I ever do – they are not small. I’m setting off across the Nullarbor Plain, an 1100km stretch of road connecting the east and west of Australia through remote arid country and my chosen soundtrack is LP.8 – a first listen of the new album from Kelly Lee Owens. I’m already apprehensive, not sure what to expect, and then the monotonous, menacing throb of Release kicks in. There’s an urgency, and a sense of danger. I drive into the unknown. I am on edge. Alert. Voice temporarily relieves the tension, for about 20 seconds, and then a reverberating industrial thrum brings it all back again. In the background, a foreboding, atmospheric drone lingers. | | 10 | | Kelly Lee Owens
Lp.8
4 Anadlu happens, and gradually, four minutes in, I realise how beautiful everything has become – dawn has broken, and so has the tension; the drone has morphed into a dreamy inspiriting harmony and the intense pounding feels more like a heartbeat, like survival. S.O (2) and Olga follow with an aimless, listless non-energy; I soak up the sparse scenery, and succumb to the nothingness. Nana Piano meanders along harmlessly for three and a half minutes before seemingly finding momentum, and a purpose. With the onset of Quickening, it is apparent that the danger had not subsided, just awareness of it, as the alien crackling and discordant blasts attest. The sun is up. The terrain has been revealed. And it is empty and inhospitable. | | 9 | | Kelly Lee Owens
Lp.8
4 But there is now impetus, an appetite to act, and as the vocally-driven One affirms, “Anything is possible…You are the world you create”. The machine-like sibilance and omnipresent threat fully emerge from the shadows in Sonic 8, but now they are being engaged, not with apathy, but with action: “This is an emergency, this is a wake-up call”. The horizon unfurls precipitous cliffs plunging into azure water as desert meets ocean. The world is beautiful. We need to protect it. Feel it. Experience it. LP.8 is very special to me. 4.5 (90) | | 8 |  | Ethel Cain
Preacher's Daughter
3 “This crackhead makes beautiful music” is the pinned comment on YouTube for Ethel Cain’s Crush video – and it’s at least half accurate. Preacher’s Daughter is a startling and ambitious work that demands complete immersion to fully appreciate. The sprawling album is nearly entirely composed of slowcore melodramas regularly topping the six-minute mark. It takes time to digest… but as the year has moved on, so has my appreciation and respect for what is a staggering release. Preacher’s Daughter is a concept album containing elements of Americana that tells the story of a fictional Ethel Cain and her history of abusive childhood, lost love and domestic violence leading to hard drugs, prostitution, and eventual kidnap, murder and cannibalisation. If that sounds both hackneyed and absurd at the same time – that’s because it is. | | 7 | | Ethel Cain
Preacher's Daughter
3 But Cain’s lyrics, songwriting and compelling vocals make you overlook the over-familiarity of the first half of the story, and then embrace the tragedy of the ridiculous climax and post-mortem conclusion - she doesn’t just inhabit this world, she lives it. It is clear there is enough personal truth in these lyrics that Cain is revealing some part of her psyche on multiple levels, and it is a deeply moving listen. American Teenager is (terrific) pop, the rest is not. Indeed, Ptolemaea is one of the most devastating and memorable tracks of the year (that scream!) – requiring two consecutive instrumentals for the listener to recover before the magnificent Sun Bleached Files declares that, “God loves you, but not enough to save you.” Elsewhere, A House in Nebraska and Thoroughfare are highlights, and only Gibson Girl somewhat stalls the momentum. Not sure if Anhedönia is a crackhead or not, but she sure has empathy for that world, and yes, she does indeed make beautiful music. 4.5 (91) | | 6 |  | Sudan Archives
Natural Brown Prom Queen
2 “I just wanna have my titties out, titties out, titties out…” is not the kind of poetic virtuosity I am usually attracted to, and creative simile aside, nor is, “Your finger up my pussy like a honey stick” or, “Milk me, just milk me (just milk me), suck all the yuck right out of it (milk, milk)”. But we can’t have everything we want, and fortunately, everything else on Natural Brown Prom Queen is near flawless. Sudan Archives could probably be described as neo-soul, but there are enough stylistic shifts and surprising genre change-ups (sometimes within the same song) that the tag seems inadequate. NBPQ (Topless) is so frenetic that the fifth or sixth tonal shift arrives around the two-minute mark – yet it somehow manages to sound cohesive, and never contrived or unnatural. Parks holds it all together with her mercurial vocals and mastery of instrumentation. | | 5 | | Sudan Archives
Natural Brown Prom Queen
2 And the lyrics turn out to have more depth than immediately apparent; those outed titties? Turns out they only appear after she reveals the reasons her musical duo with twin sister Cat failed, and reflects on the difficulties facing black women in the music industry – it’s more about gender independence than exhibitionism. Now back to that voice… Parks possesses a versatile and powerful weapon, but it’s not Diva-like – there’s no histrionics or overbearing vibrato – just a variety of compelling vocal styles and effects that effortlessly marshal attention. The richness of the music is overwhelming; I’m not very adept at identifying instruments, but it feels like there’s around 10 or 15 more in each song than on the entirety of most albums. And more heterogeneity too; Parks is American, but there’s a strong African feel to many of these tracks, and research reveals Cameroonian and Sudanese influences. | | 4 | | Sudan Archives
Natural Brown Prom Queen
2 As for individual tracks, nearly all have a distinct personality, but the standouts include the boomy, addictive Selfish Soul, the road-trip sing-a-long ChevyS10, the explicit Milk Me and the smooth R&B of Freakalizer. And yeah, lyrically there are a few verses that don’t really do it for me, but with some digging there is depth, and also a number of quotable lines that I find myself singing aloud at inconvenient times, “Gorgeous and arrogant”, “I got a cousin in Chicago”, “Oh, my God, Britt” and of course, the socially isolating (when I’m singing it anyway), “I just wanna have my titties out”. Natural Brown Prom Queen is the most fun I’ve had listening to music all year. 4.5 (94) | | 3 |  | Beach House
Once Twice Melody
1 Melody is everything. Mood is more. My drug of choice was MDMA; the feeling of wellbeing, of being able to reach into the unknown… I loved who I was when I was on it, and I loved who other people were too. But like all drugs, there are side-effects, and reality eventually won out for me. Once Twice Melody makes me feel like a pill is just kicking in. I judge music on how it makes me feel, and nothing… nothing… has made me feel like this for a long time. Legrand’s vocals, sometimes elevated and luminous, sometimes low-pitched and sonorous, choreograph mood and atmosphere masterfully in a manner not unlike those epic trance tracks from the late 90s which alternated between spacious synths and cavernous beats; her vocals have never before been weaponised with such artful manipulation. The layered effect of the songs induces wave after wave of lush euphoria ebbing and flowing in an unremitting loop. | | 2 | | Beach House
Once Twice Melody
1 Superstar – the finest song of their career – is transcendent: the emotional intensity; the layers; the vocals; the melodies; the synths; the strings; the sublime guitar outro… the immensity of all its elements in seamless harmony overwhelms enough to effect tears. And I don’t even know why I’m crying.
Once Twice Melody, released in four stages, will forever remain fragmented for some – each part retaining its own unique personality. For me, there is CD 1 and CD 2 – the former cohesive, orchestral, orgasmic… and the latter more diverse, more experimental, and only marginally less serotonin-inducing. Only You Know is the most shoegaze they have ever sounded, Hurts to Love the most pop, and the dark Masquerade unlike anything they’ve ever released previously. | | 1 | | Beach House
Once Twice Melody
1 The other leviathan on this list – Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You – indulged four or five unnecessary moments, Once Twice Melody includes only one – The Bells; an appealing song, but the only one that doesn’t sound like an evolution, or that wouldn’t sound incongruous on an earlier album. Once Twice Melody is the culmination of an incubation period lasting fifteen years and seven albums; it feels like the archetypal Beach House album, as if everything before has been building to this moment, and is the crescendo of their career. Where they go from here, I can’t fathom, but Once Twice Melody soundtracked my year. Nothing else made me feel like this in 2022. 5 (97) | |
MetalMarcJK
12.18.22 | Once Twice Melody is probably my favorite album of 2022, as well. Great pick, and great write-up! | markjamie
12.18.22 | Thank you. Thought I was the only who loved it so much. | mkmusic1995
12.18.22 | Nice list! Love the Ethel Cain and Weyes Blood albums too! | mardin65
12.23.22 | Awesome list. Weyes Blood is my top 10 |
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