Top 10 Albums of 2023

It’s been another crazy year of music, and with that, another year where I try to listen to as much music as possible. There will be another top 10 that comes out with my top 10 albums that I heard this year that didn’t come out this year. I found a lot of music retrospectively that I think deserves to be highlighted as well. With that being said, Here is my Top 10

10. André 3000 – New Blue Sun – It’s rare that music reminds me to sit still. I can count on one hand the amount of albums that have mentally teleported me to a warm bed where I just rested and truly felt reborn and rejuvenated after the listen. This album did that, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. I’m not new to ambient albums, which I’d definitely ‘classify’ this album as, but it had been a while since I had listened to a long form piece of work like this. Long track names that would bring a nostalgic tear to emo and post hardcore fans of the 2000’s aside, André Benjamin crafted a beautiful piece of art in 2023. It genuinely forced me to sit still and just breathe, and I felt calmer by the end of it. Some moments were tenser than others, and I wouldn’t call this a relaxing album through and through, but definitely one where I enjoyed the experience I had and I find myself putting this album on more and more when I need to let my mind wander. Favorite Track:

9. T-Pain – Under The Covers – Anyone who knows me knows I love T-Pain and that I constantly talk about how great of a singer he is. For a lot of folks, the NPR Tiny Desk Perforamce really opened their eyes as to how good he was. Hearing this covers album was something I didn’t know I needed, but I loved it. I loved hearing his interpretation of Black Sabbath’s ‘War Pigs’ and him opening up “A Change Is Gonna Come” was incredible.

8. Olivia Rodrigo – GUTS – It took me a while to come around to listening to this album, and I honestly don’t know why. Around the time she did her BBC 1 Live Lounge set where she covered Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season”. When I revisited this project, I was floored with what I heard. I found that Olivia sounded a lot more mature and ‘older’ than she did on SOUR. Tracks like “Vampire”, “Logical” and “Lacy really stood out to me, with “Lacy” flooring me with the chord progression and overall story telling. It made me go back and check out “SOUR”, and while I don’t know how often I’ll return to this album in the following years, I love the energy of it. I love how it sounds like Olivia is having the time of her life. It’s fun, it’s punk, it’s introspective, and it’s a great addition to her catalog.

7. Paramore – This Is Why – Paramore is one of my favorite bands, and I was beyond excited to know that they had a new project coming out this year. Since they dropped “This is Why” back in 2022, I was unreasonably excited for the bands’ 6th studio album. This album took the band in a new direction, at least to me, and I really enjoyed it. I’m notorious for not liking post-hiatus Paramore albums on first listen, and then LOVING them a year later, but this clicked with me immediately. “Crave” stood out to me like a sore thumb in the best of ways with it’s rock influences that brought me slightly back to their first 3 albums, while “Figure 8” and “You First” made me dance while enjoying their newer sound. It’s fascinating to me how far Paramore has come and grown in terms of their sound. I love the direction they are heading in, and this album really cemented how versatile and incredible the band is with their art.

6. Fall Out Boy – So Much (For) Stardust – On paper, I should be as big of a fan of FOB as I am Paramore, but for some reason, FOB flew past me. I decided to check out this album due to a coworker of mine who’s a massive FOB fan, and I was really surprised how much I loved this project. This album was explosive in sound, but the band maintained Patrick’s wistful lyrics that are clever yet catchy. I also felt this album was a return to form for the band, as their previous albums felt a little less focused than this project.

5. McKinley Dixon – ‘Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?’ – If not for Dead End Hip Hop, I wouldn’t have found a lot of the hip hop music I’d learn to love. While I could write a whole article on just them, I’ll point out that Myke C-Town highlighted this album in the DEHH 2022 Mid Year Top 5. I checked out this album a few weeks after that live stream, and I was shocked I hadn’t heard this album before. This album felt like a breath of fresh air amongst all the music I was listening to. The live jazz sound of this album elevated it to new levels, and McKinley’s lyricism is top notch. This lyric alone on “Sun I Rise” made me a fan of this album: “Said I became a better liar as I’ve gotten older/Is it ’cause the tongue got sharper, or ’cause my heart got colder?”. That being said, my favorite track off this album has to be “Tyler Forever”, that chorus is too hype.

4. Victoria Monet – JAGUAR II – V Monet is just stunning as an artist. I had no idea she was doing a sequel to JAGUAR, but I was happy to see it. It admittedly took me a minute to listen to this project, but once I did, I had it on repeat for weeks non stop. Everything on this album would be incredible to play in the summer with some friends. Hearing “On My Mama” was a take-your-breath away experience between the bass line and how well Victoria was flowing on the track. I also think this album really encapsulates Monet’s personality and fun loving nature.

3. Boygenius – The Record – This was the album I was looking forward to the most this year. I had no idea the boys were going to drop a full length LP to follow up the self-titled EP from 2018. I don’t know what I expected from this album, but I got a great experience from it, and I think the band did a fantastic job exemplifying their lyricism and storytelling. Between 12 songs, I got a great listening experience and I was fortunate to catch them live at MSG, which really heightened the experience for me. I do wish that it wasn’t as easy to identify who wrote what songs. For example, I’d love for Phoebe to write a song in that more rockier style that Julien brought to “Satanist”, or for Lucy to try sparser instrumentation, but I love what I got, I just wanted to hear them ‘out of their comfort zones’ a bit more. Favorite track of mine is a coin toss between “Cool About It” and “Not Strong Enough”, but I think the latter is going to take the cake just off of the harmonies in the bridge and the songwriting from an instrumentation standpoint. It made me want to throw things, that’s always a win.

2. Killer Mike – MICHAEL – I had no idea a solo Killer Mike album was on the menu for this year. I figured it wasn’t going to happen amongst all of the Run The Jewels albums/features, and touring. Yet somehow, Michael Render found a way to gift us the Rap album of the year with MICHAEL. This was the introspective album I always wanted from Killer Mike. I enjoy hearing activist Michael, player Michael, and Atlanta business owner Michael, but I always wanted to hear the ‘origin’ story of Michael, and I got that with this project. But I didn’t just get an origin story, I got to practically read the diary of Killer Mike as he exposes his fears, his childhood, and his successes, all in one project. Surrounded by the loss of his mother and grandmother, while also seeking out understanding from the world, Killer Mike took us through how he dealt with grief, how he carries himself with ‘being a man’ and also some key events in his life that made him who he was. As if that wasn’t enough, he got us another Andre 3000 verse to add to the growing list of features Andre has absolutely murdered, but for the first time in a LONG time, ‘Dre didn’t outrap the owner of the song. Favorite song for this album is tough cause I listen to everything so often, and it changes with this project, but today it’s “SHED TEARS”.

1. Gracie Abrams – Good Riddance – I didn’t know who Gracie Abrams was at the beginning of this year. Spotify randomly advertised her album to me when it dropped and the album cover intrigued me. When I first listened to it, only one or two songs stood out to me. I didn’t ‘get it’. Yet something kept calling me back to the project. I sat down with the lyrics and really tried to digest her words, and they clicked on the third listen. This album is nothing short of a masterpiece, to me. Gracie expresses her fear of growing up while interlacing what seems to be the end of relationship. As someone who was still reeling from the end of their relationship, this album came in at a perfect time. It held me and told me that everything would be okay, even when I wasn’t sure if it would be. The first verse of “I Should Hate You” is possibly my verse of the year and it was a verse that I wish I wrote. The instrumentation and arrangements on these songs is sparse, but what she ‘lacks’ in instrumentation/arrangements, she makes up for in her song writing. This album gave me the same feeling that Julien Bakers’ “Turn Out The Lights” gave me, and that was a sense of understanding and closure.