JAW Awards Music Awards BEST 2023

(all of them!)

Welcome back the site’s most cold-blooded annual honour call of congratulatory fluff!

Intro!

The year is about to end: it is time for new JAWs. I don’t know what JAW stands for. It is a new and deeply prestigious award – so much so that 2022 saw just one (!) JAW awarded, for best debut This was because I was too busy screaming into a paper bag last year about how many quality records had come out to pull up my gloves and choose which ones to reward (unless they were from fresh meat). It was a great year!

2023 is an altogether different story: an abundance of chaff and my own arbitrarily higher motivation levels have sustained six (!) JAWs this year! Find out what these are overcompensating for on literally every other year-end list (including the one I will inevitably publish later), but for now get yourselves set for: folk record, pop record, metal record, [[hard/metal/]] grind -core record, banger record and EP of the year. There will be no AOTY winner drawn from a pool exclusively made up of LPs because I have just enough grey matter to recognise what a silly idea this is and has always been. There will be no AOTY winner drawn from a pool including all formats because I’ll be dropping an exhaustive year-ranking as a list later – so no redundant double-posts!

Finally, observing the age-old principle that two solipsistic angels of jank are almost always preferable to one, I shall be joined by MiloRuggles, who will add his thoughts to each category so that you don’t have to! Milo, d’ya wanna kick us off with a quick overview of what kind of year it’s been?

MiloRuggles:

It’s been the kind of year that makes you wonder what kind of year it’s been. A tenuous peace lingers under threat of eviction from powers far greater. Something is looming, perhaps good, perhaps bad, certainly indifferent in the way life-altering forces tend to be. I’m writing in cursive in the bathtub. I fear I may develop a fondness for Lana Del Ray.

I’m not sure any of the music I’ve heard this year has effectively straddled this mysterious zeitgeist. Scores of truly admiral genrework infest the lands; true literature is at a premium, if you catch my pretentious waft. Breathe deep, baybee.

Without trainspotters like Johnny out there monitoring the tracks, I would have had very little luck this year. With that in mind, I’d like you all to rejoice in this magnificent occasion, the grand exhuming of worthy art as witnessed by the wielder of our website’s largest and pointiest pickaxe. Welcome, bienvenue, wilkommen, sit the fuck down and actually listen to this shit, because the Johnny Awards Wank is bigger than Oasis.

Well, that’s sweet to hear: we haven’t even started yet, and zakalwe is already entering an apoplectic cope. Without further ado:

JAW #1: WHAT THE FOLK?!

Folk may be timeless, but this is no excuse to keep up with the folk of our, uh,  times. Some of this list would have been a formidable addition to any year, a couple of them do feel particularly well-placed for the here and now. Folk overall wasn’t quite one of my chief highlight genres for this year, but neither was it remotely disappointing – there was a solid crop of solid records to pick from here, so get digging!

Best of the Almost-Best

Sangre de Muerdago – O Vento que Lambe as mi​ñ​as Feridas

This Galician dark folk act is back with a timely follow-up to 2020’s Xuntas, and although their arrangements have become denser and their atmosphere a little thicker with (could it be!) bonfire smoke, their knack for dirgelike whimsy has hardly missed a beat. I found this a less inviting record than Xuntas, and if it took until the drone-folk album highlight “Eu chorei, chorei” to pin down exactly what those elusive qualities were in aid of, then it still ties itself together in fine style.

Minwhee Lee – 미​래​의 고향 (Hometown to Come)

Minwhee Lee is a cool egg: between her involvement in the raucous freak folk duo Mukimukimanmansu (2011-2013) and the richer tones of her award-winning solo debut Borrowed Tongue (2016), she’s cut a distinctive slice out of the international folk market from Korea. Hometown to Come is perhaps her most delicate record so far: the song progressions are enigmatic and patient as anything she’s put her name to, while its gorgeous chamber arrangements make it an appetising gateway. In you dig!

Tenhi – Valkama

Valkama is a perfect antidote to my usual gripes with quote-unquote dark folk: overbearing feints at said darkness and overreliance on the heavy repetition of edgy melodies (you can practically trace the thought-paths of the target demographic imagining these coming from an electric guitar). Not this time! Valkama is patient as hell, offering a generous chance to get thoroughly lost before it lays on its most ear-catching moments. There’s an undercurrent of peace and contentment that grounds its more oppressive moments, and while its 80+ minute runtime does have a lot of meander to negotiate, it makes an admirable effort here. Possibly the best artwork of the year, too.

RUNNER-UP

Paavoharju – Yön mustia kukkia

Another Finnish prestige act, though of an entirely different flavour to Tenhi: Paavoharju have a history of fleshing their playful brand of folk out with psychedelic, electronic and, uh, hip hop influences. There’s a conversation to be had about how much novelty value is at play here, but it flies out the window on Yön mustia kukkia – true to its horror-adjacent artwork, this thing is pure chills from start to finish. Its weave of styles is itself ambitious, but no less so than the atmosphere it shoots for as a whole, a ghoulish fever dream that waxes and wanes between spellbinding highlight tracks and the murky middle-distance. One of the most unique albums I’ve heard this year for sure, though it’s a little short of the overall wallop it would need to snag the top spot.

FOLK OF THE YEAR

Lankum – False Lankum

No question about this one – agreement on False Lankum‘s supremacy within Sputnik’s folk cohort is one of the very few compelling strands of consensus I’ve seen on anything this year. It’s easy to get the wrong impression of this one: while the label drone-folk is easy to bandy about and the delicious menace of opener “Go Dig My Grave” suggests a full 71 minutes of unsustainable suspense, this record lives and died on timeless folk songwriting  chops and soulful performances, and it’s as accessible as it is emotionally available (which is to say, very). Its most compelling moments for me are arguably its least high-on-style: “Newcastle” and SOTY frontrunner “Lord Abore and Mary Flynn” have a rare power in the way freeze time and spin simple narratives into such profoundly touching dramas, and nothing I’ve heard from any genre this year has quite tapped into this to the same effect. False Lankum is an instant keeper – I just look forward to seeing how it ages.

Uninvited: Sufjan Stevens, Boygenius, The Tallest Man on Earth

Honourable Mentions: Renge, John Francis Flynn, Tiny Ruins, Complete Mountain Almanac, Drawn Bow

Milo’s final word:

Scholars of Old maintain that folk is for the people, but hold on to your weird square hat because Scholars of New are having to compartmentalise new languages of shared experience; it seems we’re less attached to songs of universal Love and Hate or freewheelin’ polemics for the common Volk than we were in folk’s heydey – peep the (popular) folk who were denied entry to Johnny’s swanky soiree and spot the difference: folk is now for the person.

But stay on that fucking phone, even if you have to suffer an arsenal of tinny tunes while you hold. Hold and hold fast! If the present is too overwhelmingly dull for your rounded receptors, transport yourself. Johnny’s choices here inform us that the time is actually /not/ now, even if your intention is to wallow. We know too much, and modernity’s mire has become too tepid for catharsis. Escape elsewhere, anywhere, even if it’s to the tragedy-laden shores of Old Éire.

****

JAW #2: POPTIMAL CRIME

Coldest take of all time: pop sucks every year / every year has excellent pop. The system has chewed half my left leg off at this point, and still has some way to go. Love the pop! Hate poptimism! Hate pop! Here is your stupid pop list:

Best of the Almost-Best

Neggy Gemmy – CBD Reiki Moonbeam

I pulled one of my bigger U-turns of the year on Neggy Gemmy (beep beep): my first couple of spins through her latest saccharine pop-house ADDaydream returned a firm verdict of overstylish vacuous dance candy – and it kinda is exactly that! But why shouldn’t it be? The last thing the likes of airheaded cruiser “Black Ferrari” and (beep beep) “Beep Beep” need is a feint at Serious Meaning – yet they both thrive on magical beat switches, and an endless imagination for the most obnoxiously catchy vocal inflections in the damn boat? Mmm. CBD Reiki Moonbeam feels great because it is great – this thing is one of the year’s most smartly-crafted offerings of pure dumb gratification!

Doja Cat – Scarlet

Scarlet massively scales back the sensuous R&B that Doja Cat put front and centre on 2021’s Planet Her, dialling up hip hop and dishing out by far her most aggressive offering to date. If it’s a little overlong, it makes up for it through being less spotty and highlight-centric than her usual fare, and – above all – through providing one of the year’s most valuable mask-off windows for the (*cough*) internet’s crop of piteous men-shaped jokes who will happily eat up however much incomprehensible reprobate nonsense when it comes from inarticulate heathens in poorly-advised body paint, but feel compelled to infantilise anything approaching a coherent statement when it comes from a woman several increments more sure in her own skin than they are (often while drooling out the other corner of their mouth at whichever pop trend better meets their preferences for palpable insecurity, be it Olivia Rodrigo or Hannah Diamond). Boys be mad that I don’t fuck incels / Girls hate too, gun to their pigtail, whew – wonder which keyboards are clattering there!

Anyhow, Doja Cat’s trademark husky purr has been a pop mainstay for a good few years now, and it’s a joy to hear her finally match it with enough rap clout to inevitably blow off half the ponderous shite destined to clog up both user and staff lists (neither of which I have seen at the time of writing). Scarlet is gas, and I for one have had an ace time dealing with it.

Reol – Black Box

For a record I all but passed over at its time of release, uh, Black Box has a respectable amount of staying power! And, given that it’s largely a compilation of singles created with a disparate range of producers over the last two years, it’s surprisingly cohesive! And, and, and, for all doesn’t have the same feisty edge as 2020’s Kinjitou or the same excess as 2016’s Σ etcetc., it does, uh, bang? Reol herself is still easily one of the most proficient and personable vocalists working with pop this unashamedly upscale, and we can apparently still trust her to throw a firecracker into what in anyone else’s hands may well have been tepid electropop. Stacked might be slightly overselling it, but Black Box packs one of this year’s highest earworm quotients and easily enough energy to tide over stray misgivings. 

amaarae – Fountain Baby

If you ain’t been following, this chunk of the list is primarily devoted to bangers and middle fingers, and while amaarae isn’t exactly short of either, she brings a very healthy level of mystique and suspense to proceedings. Fountain Baby is so smooth in its alteration between R&B chillouts (“Big Steppa” and “Co-Star”) and feistier bops (“Angels in Tibet”, “Wasted Eyes”) that it’s almost a struggle to strip it for highlights. amaarae’s sensuous tones are wonderfully pliable to either mode, and if she occasionally takes a step too far into the wrong neighbourhood (pour one out for “Sex, Violence, Suicide”‘s misplaced pop-punk-pander), then this is still quite easily one of the year’s most consistent pop-adjacencies.

There is no RUNNER-UP for this section.

edit: actually, fuck – reviewing the final draft of this list and just realised I forgot to add (or even rate!) Fever Ray.

Fever Ray can be the RUNNER-UP, but I am not writing a new blurb -_-

RUNNER-UP

Fever Ray – Radical Romantics

Radical Romantics is (probably) the second-best pop record of the year. It is very good.

POP OF THE YEAR

yeule – softscars

I used to love yeule for coming off like a semi-corporeal matrix of mutually sabotaging bundle of programming errors that somehow, desperately still clung onto life; I now love yeule for setting a precedent for dissociating to the brink of non-existence only to bounce back and live your best life in a technicolour burst of vital impulses and stray emotions. Their strength as a vocalist and (judging from the show I caught a few days ago) their confidence as a live performer have grown in leaps and bounds, and the number of delicate flourishes they pack into songwriting this ruthlessly tight has to be heard to be believed. After my mixed feelings over the earliest singles, I had no expectation of offering yeule another crown so soon after their masterpiece Glitch Princess (2022), but in a year peppered with tepid retreads of familiar conceits (see all uninviteds), softscars has been the most bracing, affirmative fix on offer.

Uninvited: Taylor Swift, Kanga, Lana del Rey, Hannah Diamond, Caroline Polachek, Ashnikko

Honourable Mentions: Ana Frango Elétrico, Tkay Maidz, Jessie Ware, George Clanton, Red Velvet, Kylie Minogue, fromis_9, Everything But the Girl, Zutomayo, Ashnikko [2]

Milo’s final word:

Confession time: the face poking out of the top of this trenchcoat only represents a third of the personage that resides within. Don’t bounce these boiz just yet though, for this is merely a preamble to the real confession: between the three of us, in our combined thirty-one years of experience and supposed love for all things music, none of us have heard any of the MAJOR HIGHLIGHTS presented above outside of the one with the (deserved![?]) heavy head.

What we can tell you with ready assurance is that in the year 1989, following some shady dealings with a rapidly dissolving Soviet Union, Pepsi became the proud owner of what was purported to be the world’s sixth largest naval fleet. Coincidentally, following the (re)release of 1989 in 2023, it seems that Taylor Swift is set to become the next corporation to militarise. Watch this space.

Well, uh, if that ain’t a definitive take, I don’t know what i-

granite’s even finaler word

i also haven’t heard a bunch of this but i’ll give my takes

• neggy gemmy: skimming and “gemmy juice” is great. she says she was inspired by listening to a bunch of early 2000s basic dance music stuff i.e. discovery/rooty/kylie/etc. which is cool and i can definitely hear, especially kylie

• doja cat: i’ve liked pretty much every doja hit i’ve heard, including “paint the town red” and listening to this i think i’m definitely listening to it in full. i know a lot of people didn’t like this but idk why, seems very fun.

• reol: i wish i had the energy to get into this but it is cold and dark where i live

• amaarae: this one i’ve heard and it’s great. good intro to the genre too if you’re new to it

• yeule: fantastic, top 10 of the year for me, perfect angst music in that it feels equal parts furious and accepting. they incorporate rock really well into their usual style really well here. gonna be crying to “software update” for years to come i’m sure

ok i’m sick of reacting directly to things here one by one so i’ll skip the rest (except to say caroline and hannah, while overhyped, are still quite good). time for my extra shoutouts and comments. by which i mean i’ll be searching “pop” on my rym profile and rambling for a while.

first off, “boy’s a liar pt 2” is the song of the year. perfect pop song, best chart topper in a while, love to see pinkpantheress, ice spice, and mura masa all getting that much recognition and success. heaven knows (and her one-off barbie single “angel”) by her was good too. babyxsosa made a self-titled EP/album/whatever that’s like, art pop i think, it’s really powerful, top 10 for me as well. disappointed by there only being 2 not 7 easyfun EPs but they were pretty good anyway. alan palomo (aka neon indian) had a cool synthpop album that went under the radar, i think a lot of people would enjoy it. erotic probiotic 2 by nourished by time is really, really good, just try the first track. radio red by laura groves was soft and calming in the best way.

other good stuff: newjeans, avalon emerson, astra king, jam city, jessy lanza, lauren mayberry, even addison rae. there was a ton of great pop music this year (like every year!!). i can hear distant riffs so i better get out of here before the metal gets too audible

Good call lol…

****

JAW #3 METAL THRVNE

Milo sez who wears Ozzy’s crown in the land of 1000 metal genres? I say there is only one true metal, and we shall alchemise the balls out of the year until we find it! This one goes out the the, uh (*checks notes*) krvstiest of the krvsty kvltest of the kvlt!

No if, no buts, no metalcore, no grindcore! Trve metals only.

Best of the Almost-Best

Liturgy – 93696

Firstly, perhaps most importantly, I have no idea of what the title 93696 pertains to and little interest in enlightening myself – the same can be said for most aspects of Liturgy’s platform and background mythos, which are crusty parchment caught in a howling wind of screeching guitars, screechinger strings, choral jank, glitch jank, pentatonics of pain, and the inevitable almighty (Yes! A Liturgy- ) BURST BEATS! This record is epic and hates epic – if there’s any good, honest, traditional, stupid joy to be had here, it’s in watching it draw itself up to ridiculous peaks only to abruptly shred itself for spare parts like God muscling his way into a Spirited Away screening to belch out the end of the days. 93696 is still ridiculous, and it is definitely altogether too fucking much, but this band are well above proof-of-concept at this point and at least a respectable proportion of this record is just as viable for low-brow bangers as it is for sky-nosed nepo baby wank. Bonus points for filtering out more posers than any other record I can name this year.

Bell Witch – Future’s Shadow I: The Clandestine Gate

Funeral doom duo’s Bell Witch’s long-awaited follow-up to 2017’s astounding Mirror Reaper may not set the same standards for sorrow and majesty as its predecessor, but it does reassert the duo’s mastery of their craft. The first 20 minutes of Future’s Shadow I: The Clandestine Gate are practically a triumphant welcome back, and that the album/song spend so much of its following runtime dragging its belly against the bottom of the valley instead of reaching prematurely for a similar peak is as impressive as it is deserving of every scrap of patience you can throw of it. Bell Witch’s visions of desolation and shrewd manipulation of (you can’t stop me) the crushing weight of time itself are still one of the most beautiful forces at play in metal.

Dodheimsgard – Black Medium Current

Aight, so there are four answers to question of Best Experimental Boundary-Ravaging Toilet-Clogging Metal of the Year and, uh, actually all of them are represented on this list – but Dodheimsgard is surely the choice that has most summed up that appeal to the most people! With production as slick as a sphynx cat’s arse and vocals that would have set the audience on fire given a turn at your local panto, this arthouse reinvention of black metal mystique is full of bold gestures that chime very nicely with the part of me that now (irrefutably!) recognises Blood Inside as Ulver’s best record. I’m increasingly drawn to the perspective that, questions of musicianship and songwriting aside (and questions of brutalty not even on the table), so much of good metal comes down to the question of who can and cannot wear kitsch – Dodheimsgard surely clear that hurdle.

RUNNER-UP

Sleepwalker – Skopofoboexoskelett

As Cedric Bixler-Zavala once put it in a nothing-lyric for the ages, jagged pulp sliced in my veins – if there’s anyone out there who’s spent the follow two decades attempting to manifest that aesthetic, then, uh, Sleepwalker have finally found the answer? In a swirl of black metal queasiness, lurching blues onslaughts, noxious harmonised leads, and rhythms that rarely (if ever) seem to settle into a stable groove, this is the album to give form to erratic sequences of contrasts this year – that it does so in so many guises across such a succinct runtime is just another feather in its cap. I normally take a dim view of black metal acts who make passes at psychedelia – the likes of Oranssi Pazuzu, Thantifaxath and Blut Aus Nord are either too self-serious or too monotonous in their razzle-dazzle for my liking – but this thing is so imaginative in the way it continually reboots its weirdo brand of off-kilter engagement that I seem to have been looking in the wrong places all along.

METAL OF THE YEAR

Kostnatění – Úpal

Alright, forget the experimentation, forget the dissonance, forget the microtonal scales, forget the contorted fucking riffage – this is perhaps the only metal (and-not-grind) albums of the year that gets me outright wired. You’d be hard-pressed to fingerpoint this within any given part of the album’s constituent elements (other than its righteously unvarnished production), but there’s a livewire energy here that brings an almost punkish wallop to the table. The performances here practically crackle with attitude to the point that terming it such innocuous things as technically impressive or strikingly imaginative is a swing and a miss – if you’re appreciating this from a safe distance, you’re missing out on the chief thrill. Úpal is straight-up nasty in its willingness to grab the listener by the throat, and if it extends similar treatment to the dissoshit playbook (which ain’t been played with such exhilaration since at least they-who-must-not-be-named’s 2016 record about conjoining sloppy boners, or what have you), then we’re just that much more spoiled for reasons to slam that wiry crown down on its horny ol’ head. Excellent!

Uninvited: Katatonia, Blut Aus Nord, Enslaved, Esoctrilihum, Thantifaxath

Honourable Mentions: Panopticon, Horrendous, Moonlight Sorcery

Milo’s final word

Much of civilised society enjoys listening to metal. Nobody can seem to agree on why. Some claim a tenuous connection to Nordic notions of stoicism, others put spikes on their wrists and Windmill Kick strangers at gigs. Rare are those that see metal’s potential for expression outside the bounds of suffering and anger. Common are those who enter a state of heedless heat whenever gain-laden guitars riff and/or skronk immodestly.

Johnny, as far as this crowd can theorise, is interested in histrionics. Don’t hate him—it’s a fair response. Try explaining the core tenets of metal to an anthropologist, and watch as they murmur “mmmhhmm” and scribble down something in shorthand that you’ll never understand. From power metal to grindcore (metal credentials pending) the mode of expression is remarkably similar, and can mostly be differentiated across a spectrum of self-seriousness (as perhaps bordered by the aforementioned subgenres). Johnny likes his metal to know how ridiculous it is, although where he stands on operatics and Wyrms is known to few.

Aligning with the audience’s expectations all the way up through the penultimate pick, Johnny’s favourites wear their girdles happily, perform their songs defiantly, and leave you thinking, “that was silly-as-all-shit, but also great?”

And then he picks a vaguely dissoblack album as his favourite because it’s actually produced to sound like a band in a room, and the crowd eddies out of the stadium in shocked silence.

****

JAW#4: NASTY SHIT

As not-so-subtly implied earlier on and conveniently expounded by Milo, metal-metal this year (and most years!) is far better suited to spooky theatrics than to the debased bloodlettings that attract such a stigma around the ‘heavy’ in its trusty ol’ title.

For those chasing more primal thrills, uh, we’re crossing the bridge to the hardcore-affiliated spinoff camps to get your arse beat and your metabolism balanced. Be warned that this was an almost unreservedly dreadful year for metalcore, and that unless you’re on board with the way grind stepped up to the mark and fecking carried that torch, now is as good a time as any to peace out. 

Best of the Almost-Best

Crisis Sigil – God Cum Poltergeist 

It took me until hearing the opening 19 seconds of “Halo Generator Breaking Down” almost a hundred times over while editing the SputRoyale chronicle video to fully get this record – before then, I found its palette (breakneck chaos ft. a hundred digital bells and whistles, all hostile) vastly attractive and its performances appropriately unhinged, but struggled to engage with the intermittent pacing within and between each song across a full listen. Main event Ada Rook’s stellar UGLY DEATH NO REDEMPTION ANGEL CURSE I LOVE YOU last year never traded abrasion or momentum at the expense of the other – why should her full-tilt grind project be any different? Or so I thought! Turns out this impeccably-titled record is so high on rocket fuel that disjointed stop-start chaos is largely an excellent look for it. Sure, it’s more of an acquired taste than I initially bargained for (and sure, the lengths “Halo Generator…” was able to go to hook me were far beyond what most records would be entitled to), but thing is just so gleefully chaotic that its thrills don’t always have to be a lowest-common-denominator rush. Its manic cyber-bronco pacing is plenty infectious in itself – and once you’ve clocked that, you’ve got one of the year’s wildest rides at your fingertips. 

The HIRS Collective – We’re Still Here

This firebrand queercore duo kick the damn gates of this list down with an armada’s worth of friends and kindreds, and fuck me it’s a delight to hear their noise. One of two records this section that takes a joyously open approach to collaboration, We’re Still Here fills its ranks with a huge roster boasting Geoff Rickly, Frank Iero, Anthony Green, Jeremy Bolm, Justin Pearson, Escuela Grind, The Body, Melt-Banana and a zillion others, with features delivering everything from incisive nuance (“You Are Not Alone”) to anti-capitalised bloodlust (“Last King Meets Last Priest”), all over a uniformly vicious set of beatdowns that demand the listener either rejoice in the collective spirit of solidarity-in-anger or piss themselves off to another record. I initially complained that the album’s production was too polished, and that its grit and heft came from the vocals and dynamics. I’ll stand by this as an aesthetic critique, but dig into the substance – those lyrics! those voices! – and the righteous, marginalised fury brimming over practically every facet of this thing is so palpable that quibbling over grit is a fool’s errand.

GridLink – Coronet Juniper

Three grind legends (+one thoroughly proficient bassist) step back into the fold and deliver a tech-grind mini-opus that posits a worthy successor and legitimate rival to their crowning work Longhena. What a perfect comeback! Although its emphasis on melody has understandably broadened Coronet Juniper‘s audience beyond anything else here, GridLink are all about extremes, and the marathon of energy and proficiency that this thing lays down in precisely the right number of seconds is as much the work of veteran athletes as it is a surprise to hear that they can still channel such intensity after so many years out (from this band, at least). The riffs themselves are a mean piece of work, but the chief joy here lies in  hearing that wild ol’ group chemistry fire on ol’ four cylinders through as many boss levels as you can throw at them – no less given that the band appears to have split once more. Talk about good things lasting… 

RUNNER-UP

Closet Witch – Chiaroscuro

Where did this come from? In what was an already a baller year for grind, Closet Witch’s November appearance upended my longstanding trinity of what I’m going to call grind+ records (Crisis Sigil/GridLink/[the eventual winner]) with a brutally succinct volley of genre fundamentals (by way of powerviolence) and did such merciless things to my blood pressure that I can’t help but give it the nudge here. Back-to-basics may have been the way to go, but don’t think for one second that this is a creative slouch: Chiaroscuro‘s second half in particular showcases a bold and distinctive range of rhythmic strategies if that’s what you pretend to be here for. At once the murkiest and most violent record in this section, it could well have taken the crown for net nastiness, but it’s a little too fleeting to leave quite the same mangled wake as our actual winner…

BEATDOWN OF THE YEAR

Chepang – Swatta

In news that will surprise absolutely no one who has followed me at all this year, Chepang’s Swatta is the nastiest piece of work I’ve heard in 2023 and my favourite record from any metal/hardcore-adjacent genre. It’s, uh, a lot, and I have made a point to return to it sparingly but intently – as the grindcore equivalent of a quadruple album, it needs a good deal of space to sink its hooks in, but it vindicates itself with barrage after barrage of familiar thrills, freak experiments, liberal acts of self-destruction, and stunning reinventions of yesteryear’s genre constraints. The apex duo of “Ba” and “Na” might just be the most electrifying thing I’ve heard from a new record in heavy music since I was in high school (saxophones can cut themselves out as non-novelty additions to metal!), and the mutant relish with which the core Chepang outfit reinvent themselves from song to song with a delirious series of features on the record’s third side is on par with the HIRS Collective for haywire collaboration. Swatta is huge in all senses, and it strikes me as a thoroughly essential record – I look forward to seeing what kind of shadow it casts across the next few years.

Uninvited: Chamber, END, Johnny Booth, Humanity’s Last Breath, Invent Animate, The Callous Daoboys, Lotus Eater Machine, Portrayal of Guilt

Honourable Mentions: EYES, Xiao, MSPaint, Dreamwell, ostraca, Great Falls, moreru

Milo’s final word

Is grind maximalist or minimalist? Is Johnny a rogue AI or a benevolent cyborg? Will there ever be another good metalcore album? These questions and more will be ignored by the panel.

*Incoming transmission from the rocks in Milo’s head*

~~THERE IS BEAUTY IN SIMPLICITY. IT MAKES THINGS MORE SIMPLE. COMPLEXITY IS HARD TO SENSE MAKE OF. KEEP MY RIVERS UNMUDDIED. KEEP MY SKIES FREE OF TRAILS. JOHNNY’S LIST OF GRIND ALBUMS IS ALMOST TOO COMPLICATED. BROADRICK WOULD SHIT. CLOSET WITCH SAVED THE YEAR IN NOVEMBER~~

The panel has reached a unanimous decision. The verdict finds all of these albums worthy of beatdown glory. This year grind is maximalist, Johnny is a monkey with a typewriter, and metalcore is shit.

MarsKid is here for some reason

Hello. I am coming out of my cage and doing just fine, thank you for asking. I’ve been recruited on the basis that I am sadly entrenched in all things -core to the point where I cannot escape it. So allow me to refute the above claims–

Wait. This year for metalcore highkey sucked.

Suck-age is expected in a genre replete with copycats or groups playing up to yesteryear’s trends, but it felt like 2023 was a gallery of disappointment. Correct, Invent Animate, Johnny Booth et. al. are not allowed at the family luncheon and I am putting out a restraining order on any up-and-coming -core act that thinks ETID worship is the Bible or that ERRA is all there is to… uh, ‘progressive’ metalcore. Dire scenes all around. I wouldn’t include Humanity’s Last Breath here due to them being of advanced suck-age standards, but that’s splitting hairs at this point. Lotus Eater Machine deserve better than being tossed in with these lifeless husks. 

The saving grace ultimately came from unexpected corners: Great Falls, a disgustingly noisy, angry unit composed by a set of seasoned metalcore veterans who cut their teeth on the 90s & early 2000s circuit, and Dreamwell, who must be in any conversation for Most Improved Artist. Hell, the latter group does metalcore better than most did this year.

All in all, I came in here like a bat outta hell ready to roast the absolute shite out of Johnston Wellerton and well, I got nothing. Maybe the grind obsession is bordering on fetishization/a blindspot favouritism that Johnerson is not yet aware of, but again, that is splitting hairs and I don’t want to go bald. These are good picks.

The list is conspicuously missing the true AotY, Blue October, however, which can only mean Johnny is discriminatory against the month of October. Hitting my Twitter rn to cancel him, the Taylor Swift fans will back me.  

*sigh* for what it’s worth, I do wish I’d spent more time with Great Falls and potentially cleared space for it in the list proper. I am failed! If it weren’t for the next section, my mood would never recover…

****

JAW #5: BEATS & BANGERS 

There can be no year without bangers. Where are they? Who banged the hardest? What shapes are they going to beat you into? Who butters the bread? Read…

Best of the Almost-Best

Stimming – Elderberry

Known since the dawn of [Latest_wave] Sputcore as the dainty prince of deep fuckin’ house who seduced the dancefloor-allergic crowd with a spindly orchestral flourish, Stimming c.2023 has apparently decided that he no longer cares for your instant gratification of catchy melodies. Elderberry throws down a minimal techno gauntlet that will starve your attention span within an inch of its wretched stupid life, only to shoot it back to its best with monstrously resonant bass tones and steady beat switches for the ages. This album is overcompensation for the feeble man: you do still need it.

Kinoteki – Dawn of the Final Hour

Dawn of the Final Hour left an indelible mark on my year, if only by being a rare record to drive me to the brink of insanity when I sat down to review it. Here we go agaaaaa uh yes, this here [___] is still a fractious breakbeat synapse-breaker, zooted off with vocal samples miraculously strong enough to vindicate the hysterically insistent lengths to which they’re repeated. It is cracked album. I love it, and nothing else this year has scratched the same itch as persistently or creatively.

Lauren Bousfield – Salesforce 

Kinoteki almost went the full distance on its own, but no current_decade bangers list can be complete without a fuckoff degenerate breakcore firestorm that breaks all the rules of good taste and refashions them in the likeness of its recently disfigured worst enemy. Lauren Bousfield holds that fort so effortlessly that I practically breathed a sigh of relief as soon as I realised she was on my longlist, and the year is saved! Now, Salesforce may not have quite the same serrated genius as Bousfield’s it-record Palimpsest (2021????), but it does beef up her production enough that the low end of her mix finally slaps some og the arse it was destined to *pow*. Ada Rook jumps on board to spit death and horror over a sublimely abrasive early highlight, and if this record peaks a little early, then it still dishes out such a glut of twisted thrills that you’ll barely notice the comedown. 

RUNNER-UP

Sofia Kourtesis – Madres 

Perhaps the most enlightened choice for this year’s sleeper hit!? And for good reason! There are several points over the course of this Latin house cocktail of delights where Sofia Kourtesis subtly shifts gears from backgrounding whichever hazy bar night you just wish you’d discovered her record from, to throwing a spotlight you onto you-yes-you wherever in the establishment you happen to be.

I’m amazed how many pockets of space she fleshes out, and with such vitality – there’s the dancefloor for those who own the night and know (“Si Te Portas Bonito”) and for those whose hearts are beating a little too hard over that_hot_thing they haven’t yet found the game to approach (“Habla Con Ella”); there’s the broken conversation, cold air and songs half-heard in the smoking area outside (“Funkhaus”); there’s the glorious mindlessness of hitting the perfect level of more-than-a-little-waved and riding the night without taking anything in, the flow of time gone out the window (“El Carmen”), and – most disarmingly – there’s the meaningful conversation you never expected to have, when the music and all other voices disappear into empty space and what turns out to be the peak of the night shyly draws itself together (“Moving Houses”).

This is a good night! It’s infectiously vocal-centric, generously warm-hearted, effortlessly approachable, and just demands to have at least two tracks on each and every one of your year playlist. Which ones you choose will doubtless spell out where your party has been. 

BANGER OF THE YEAR 

Kumo 99 – HeadPlate

Okay, right, fucking hear me out on this one: yes, this is an eleventh hour addition and has the benefit of a gazillion binged listens within the past week, yes I am still buzzed and ratty from this shit, and yes maybe Madres did deserve the top spot – I do feel a little bad about that, and I hope it gets your top spot, you toasty backseat fuck.

While I’m not 100% sure that HeadPlate is quite the best album in this section, it is without question the hardest banger – it’s less standoffish than Stimming, less reliant than Lauren Bousfield and Kinoteki on brittle e-jank, and far more likely to land you bruised ribs if you catch it live than Madres. Kumo 99’s brand of slick, vocal-heavy breakbeat hardcore bangs precisely the right amount – which is to say A Lot ((though not so hard that it all gets a little silly)). It avoids bells and whistles in favour of menacing basslines and impeccable beat switches, leaving vocalist Ami Komai to front the record’s personality. This she does with (uhm!) epic vitriol interspersed poignant windows of vulnerability! She is fabulous! I love how easily this record gets me pissed without making me feel like a straight meathead! The number of savage putdowns here may not carry beyond the Japanese language, but [checks watch] actually yes they do, because the energy levels here do the talking. Fuck your homework. Hit it. Fun year?

Uninvited: HEALTH, Kassem Mosse, Xploding Plastix (sorry). Major perk of this section is that there’s less Sputtrash to wade through!

Honourable Mentions: midxna, Kaizo Slumber, Anunaku, DJ Trax, James Holden, Andrea (if one counts him as a ‘banger’!), Aoki Takamasa (ditto), Rắn Cạp Đuôi [3], TDJ, (fuckit) Kikuo, (I guess) G Jones, every banger-beater in the Pop and EP sections (whomstve I refused to include twice because double-blurbing the same artist/album on the same list is death).

Fuck, I forgot to peep the new Rubio – Milo, have you heard this? 

Milo’s final word

huhwhatwait?! i’ve been periodically checking in on her all year and didn’t know this happened. hold my sampler

Okayokay new Rubio is lovely and should be heard by all—more of a scattershot collection of pop loosies than the patient moodfest that makes Mango Negro lowkey essential (listen to it you utter fools!) but wait, what year is it?

The year of the fucking banger is what year it is. Realish talk; there was a lot to like in 2023, but not a lot of albums you’d bring home to your folks, ya know? On this dark desert highway, Johnny’s bangers represent the most essential genrefied collection this year. Finding love is hard — finding a good time is not, and thank fuck for that.

****

JAW #6: inEPtitude

The following are my EPs of the year. They are short; the blurbs shall be short! This comes at no cost to significance – fuck you if you’ve ever turned your nose up at EPs! There will be no AOTY list after this one – this is all you’re getting (and tbqh all I have time to spam out). Who’s the ineptitude now? 

Best of the Almost-Best

Saya Gray – QWERTY

Saya Gray was the most exciting new talent of last year – her debut 19 MASTERS was and is the work of zany genius! She is too cool for a coherent follow-up, so instead QWERTY is a zany mess – her vision for haunting indie folk fragility finds itself dynamited with breakbeats, impromptu metal riffs, and songwriting that forces 2 + 2 to = …2? Okay?!

Yunè Pinku – BABYLON IX

Yunè Pinku’s debut EP Bluff was a whip-smart reinvention of breakbeat and house as moody bedroom music, and it’s a joy to hear her latest outing BABYLON IX go one step further and flesh out a more tender plane of dreamspace. These delicately crafted pop songs underpinned are by savvy beat work and do great work cementing her as an artist to watch – her year is coming, I can feel it!

Priori – Pareidolia

Trance for people who love techno and hate trance? Or, alternatively, trance! Veering on the ambient side of the genre, these four tracks take that trademark sense of euphoric wonder and present it on ice – it’s not the more forthcoming package for those looking for cheap thrills, but the atmosphere here is splendid (and those lovely, aqueous beats&bass aren’t too bad either).

RUNNER-UP

Skee Mask – ISS009

Hot on the heels of 2021’s landmark record Pool, Skee Mask is back to cement his status as everyone’s-favourite-electronic-artist-who-everyone-knows with what appears to be his version of no-nonsense dancefloor fuel. Breaks and garage beats churn through these four tracks, the central pair among his most playful and muscular, while the bookends “UWLSD” and “Bandprobe Dub” return a healthy dose of the liminal bliss-out we loved him for on Pool. A great still at the top of his game!

EP OF THE YEAR

moreru – l0V3L3​$​$​R0BxT

Revoltingly catchy noisecore dismemberment of every speck of loneliness and self-loathing you may or may not harbour, with all the idiocy, dispassionate tragicomic winking-to-clearly-depressed-reflection, and inadvertent fuck of pain that accompany them. Extraordinary release – original, unlikable, irresistible. Blazes a trail no one will be stupid enough to follow. Should have been shortlisted for the Nasty Shit category too, but no one should ever write words about moreru and there’s no shitting way I’m doing it twice on one list. Best Valentine’s Day release of all time. 

Uninvited: Better Lovers, Yellowcard, Manchester Orchestra, Adjy

Honourable Mentions: Aphex Twin, LOVElution, Kraus, Yukika, Kayoko Yoshizawa, TDJ

Milo’s final word

Extended fucking Play records, huh? I’ve still got one of my fingers on metal’s rather erratic pulse; I am still a person, and therefore folk is still allegedly for me; I still perv on pop dancing away at the cocktail party while I’m stuck discussing which Arab Strap album is the saddest in a corner that smells like stale cigarettes — these are neatly bordered areas of discourse with rules and traditions that I can at least pretend to care about and comment on, but, uhm, what on God’s Fucked Earth can I tell you about 2024’s EPs on a holistic level?

There were many. Some were good (see above). Some were bad (see above). Most of them were shorter than your average LP. Some of them were not. Perhaps 2024 will be the year that we draw a distinct, sub-30-minute line and put an end to this taxonomical daymare.

…and if that (rightly!) seems absurd, just think about how ridiculous it is that the Definitive Ranking of each year is defined by its specific exclusion of EPs (what are these), live albums and compilations. Get broke, you nerd trash.

JAW will return next year, uh, Merry Christmas?