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Emeritus
Reviews 107
Approval 96%
Soundoffs 127
News Articles 30
Band Edits + Tags 62
Album Edits 78
Album Ratings 3493
Objectivity 66%
Last Active 01-12-23 5:14 pm
Joined 08-27-12
Review Comments 20,969
| Top 20 of 2020
This year has unsurprisingly been the slowest for music and film yet, with none of my ratings going beyond 8.5/10. However, that doesn’t mean there hasn’t been plenty of great music from a wide variety of artists, with genres like pop and indie rock, ambient electronic, and progressive rock/metal. | | 20 |  | Hayley Williams
Petals for Armor
The Paramore frontwoman delivers a solid pop rock release. | | 19 |  | Figueroa
The World As We Know It
Amon Tobin using an alias to make more good weird music. | | 18 |  | Matt Berninger
Serpentine Prison
The frontman of The National delivers a quality indie rock release. | | 17 |  | EOB
Earth
Ed O’Brien from Radiohead delivers a quality indie rock release channeling Achtung Baby. | | 16 |  | Intronaut
Fluid Existential Inversions
Quality progressive metal | | 15 |  | Caspian
On Circles
Quality post-rock | | 14 |  | Deftones
Ohms
A more fluid and cohesive release than Gore but not as strong to me as far as the songwriting is concerned. About half of the songs are excellent and I really like the album flow. They returned to having great production which is nice as well. | | 13 |  | Destroyer
Have We Met
Pretty chilled out for them, with some great singles and a few other standouts too. This is an underrated 2020 release and deserves more attention, as most anyone can enjoy it. | | 12 |  | My Morning Jacket
The Waterfall II
Not as strong as the original Waterfall, but a very solid part 2 that continues the psychedelic bliss. | | 11 |  | Gorillaz
Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez
Gorillaz are back and return to the experimentation and genre-bending of their classic releases. | | 10 |  | Ulver
Flowers of Evil
A laid back extension of their 1980s goth/synthpop style with more guitars and steady rhythms pretty much from beginning to end. While the unpredictable shifts in tone and experimentation from The Assassination of Julius Caesar is missed, this is still a solid effort. | | 9 |  | Oneohtrix Point Never
Magic Oneohtrix Point Never
More fluid and psychedelic than his last few. | | 8 |  | Tennis
Swimmer
This is a sleeper of 2020, very ‘80s pop rock that reminds me of Everything But The Girl. Almost every track is very strong. | | 7 |  | Tim Bowness
Late Night Laments
The prolific Tim Bowness keeps churning out great material, with this being a highlight of his solo career. | | 6 |  | Sweven (SWE)
The Eternal Resonance
It was sad news when the band responsible for the best death metal of the 2010s, Morbus Chron, called it quits a few years ago. Thankfully the main guy came back with this new project, and it’s even more progressive and ambitious than the first band. | | 5 |  | Four Tet
Sixteen Oceans
A beautiful ambient electronic record from a musician that keeps getting better and better these past few years. | | 4 |  | Phoebe Bridgers
Punisher
Simultaneously more subdued and adventurous than Stranger in the Alps, Phoebe Bridgers expands her songwriting talents and continued excellent lyrics for a sublime sophomore effort brimming with nocturnal atmosphere. Just look at that gorgeous album cover. | | 3 |  | The Avalanches
We Will Always Love You
Another quality release from them, despite too many tracks in general, some less than 10 seconds long. | | 2 |  | Fleet Foxes
Shore
Fleet Foxes opt for a more rhythmic folk rock direction that pays off wonderfully, with off kilter melodies within traditional songwriting. Sound like an extension of Helplessness Blues. | | 1 |  | Tame Impala
The Slow Rush
Tame Impala surprised fans with the more R&B and disco-oriented pop album Currents in 2015, lessening the ‘60s classic rock influences and musically entering the 21st century. The Slow Rush does not represent a comparable renaissance for the Tame Impala sound, but continues with blissed out psych-pop and representing a fitting sequel to Currents. The production is of course excellent, and the middle run of songs are some of the best Kevin Parker has recorded to date. The Slow Rush feels expansive and optimistic, embodying a successfully escapist, sunnier mindset during such a challenging year like 2020. | |
TalonsOfFire
12.15.20 | Folklore by Taylor Swift is just under my top 20. I quite like "Exile" and most of the odd-numbered tracks. Evermore is like a 5/10. The Ascension by Sufjan and Shiver by Jonsi were disappointments but had their moments, also around 5/10 for both of those. What were your favs of the year? | DavidYowi
12.15.20 | I'm really glad people have started to come around on TSR, I wouldn't say it's the best Tame Impala but I'd say it's his most consistent record. | nightbringer
12.15.20 | Really good to see love for 1 and 15. | TalonsOfFire
12.16.20 | The Slow Rush deserves more love, only slightly below Currents for me. Its so consistent and addictive. | Lord(e)Po)))ts
12.16.20 | 19 is honestly probably tobins best side project, so cool. 8 crept onto my aoty list which was very unexpected. 4 did as well, criticisms aside. Four tet is just a dude btw, not a group | TalonsOfFire
12.16.20 | Right, good catch. MagicOPN is better than Age Of for me now, didn't start that way but it's a grower. | juiceviaorange
12.17.20 | Great list! A lot of these made my list as well. Deftones and Destroyer were my top 2 and Gorillaz was my #4. | Lord(e)Po)))ts
12.17.20 | "MagicOPN is better than Age Of for me now, didn't start that way but it's a grower."
Agreed | TalonsOfFire
12.20.20 | The Avalanches grew on me more, bumped it up like six places in my ranking. | TalonsOfFire
12.30.20 | FYI, The Avalanches would've been in the staff top 10 if it had been released earlier. | rabidfish
12.31.20 | the new FF is way better than crack-up. | TalonsOfFire
12.31.20 | I guess it's down to preference, Crack-Up is a more unpredictable and abstract which I like. | rabidfish
12.31.20 | more unpredictable and abstract? probably. infinitely less engangig than the rest of their discog, too. | TalonsOfFire
12.31.20 | Those first 5 songs are stunning, and On Another Ocean is amazing. The t/t is really good too. | guitarded_chuck
12.31.20 | Most of these were relatively disappointing releases imo aside from Avalanches which imo would be on the Staff List if they actually had taste | TalonsOfFire
12.31.20 | Like I commented yesterday, The Avalanches would've been in our top 10 if it were released a little earlier. Ideally that would mean it could be eligible for next year, but I doubt it. | TalonsOfFire
09.13.22 | The Avalanches has grown on me even more, in 3rd place now. |
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