Sometime in January, I threw together a list of my favorite albums from 2020. Ever since, I've been meaning to post it here... and now it's almost March.
Please note that this list is in no particular order.
how i’m feeling now - charlixcx
For the first few months of 2020, I coasted along, listening to and creating playlists. (See, for instance, my chronicle of the pandemic.) how i'm feeling now was the first album that I really got obsessed with last year. It contains some of the first songs I heard that were clearly written about the pandemic, when we were all first getting used to being stuck in one place and unable to see our friends. And it was also my introduction to hyperpop.
Highlight lyric: "I'm so bored (woo!) / Wake up late, eat some cereal / Try my best to be physical / Lose myself in a TV show / Staring out to oblivion / All my friends are invisible / Twenty-four seven, miss 'em all" -anthems
Fetch the Bolt Cutters - Fiona Apple
Fetch the Bolt Cutters came first on enough 2020 album rankings to make #1 on Metacritic, and for good reason. I can't begin to express how much I love it. According to Spotify, it was my top album of the year.
"Kick me under the table all you want / I won't shut up, I won't shut up" - Under the Table
Gore - Lous and the Yakuza
This album is an example of the Spotify recommendation albums getting me perfectly. The debut album of this Belgian-Congolese singer showed up on my home page when it came out, and I listened to it while walking along the Mississippi river during my lunch break. I recommend checking out the Tiny Desk Concert that came out a few weeks ago. And if you don't speak French, there are some lyric translations available online.
"Je n'sais plus fermer les yeux / Je vis mon rêve alors je no dors pas" ("I no longer know how to close my eyes / I'm living my dream, so I don't sleep")
Future Nostalgia - Dua Lipa
Disco is back, y'all. (See this Atlantic article on the subject.) I listened to it while I was working out this morning. All of these songs are catchy, and when I listen to them I can imagine myself dancing at the club (which, at this point, feels about as real as the fantasy book I'm reading). The extended version of the album, Future Nostalgia (The Moonlight Edition), just came out last week.
"No matter what you do, I'm gonna get it without ya / I know you ain't used to a female alpha" -Future Nostalgia
Spotlight - Jessie Ware
Disco is Back: Part II. I don't have a ton to say about this album, but I wholeheartedly enjoyed it. Some excellent pandemic escapism right here.
Highlight lyric: "Ooh la la / Open up the door, you know I like it / Ooh la la / Chivalry was dead but you revived it" -Ooh La La
Mad Love - Infinity Song
In 2018, I fell in love with Victory's The Broken Instrument. Infinity Song is comprised of Victory Boyd and her four siblings, and they brought me the album that I needed upon returning to pandemic life after the aforementioned disco escapism. It's about family, love, and resilience, and it helped me through the latter part of 2020. This album was a blessing in a hard year.
Highlight lyric: "We go up together / We come down together / No matter the weather / All for one / One for all" -Family
THE S(EX) TAPES - FLETCHER
Once again, the Spotify algorithm nailed it. Queer pop-- what more can I ask? This is really an EP, but I felt like it had the scope of the full album in the seven songs. Catchy and emotionally raw, THE S(EX) TAPES has me hoping for a longer album from FLETCHER in the future.
Highlight lyric: "My bedtime is the darkest / That's when I'm brokenhearted / The nighttime is the hardest / It'd be easy if I hated you" -If I Hated You
Ungodly Hour - Chloe x Halle
Ungodly Hour is a really fun album. Like Infinity Song, Chloe x Halle fall into the category of family making music together, and they do it really well. "Tipsy" (murder that boy if he doesn't treat you right) and "Busy Boy" (he's dating so many girls he's not worth my time, but god is he hot) are especially fun. I also enjoyed the more emotionally vulnerable songs, like "Overwhelmed" and "Baby Girl." I heard about this album from the podcast FANTI, and I am so glad they mentioned it and brought it into my life.
"Better, baby, better treat me better / Better than those other guys who change up like the weather / It is such a shame that they went missing, they can't find 'em now / Oh, I wonder how I accidentally put them in the ground" -Tipsy
Bad Vacation - Liza Anne
I first heard Liza Anne when she opened for Lucy Dacus in fall of 2019. (I miss going to concerts.) Bad Vacation is what I call a "mental health album," because it deals with mental health topics in a way that I find constructive and comforting on a bad day. (See, for instance, "I Shouldn't Ghost My Therapist.")
"I needed sun and a soft breeze / You were like sand in my ice cream" -Bad Vacation
I’m Your Empress Of - Empress Of
I'm beginning to notice a theme, because this album also features family-- Empress Of's mother shows up three times in the album. I've listened to "Love Is A Drug" most of all the songs on the album, because it's just so damn catchy. But like Empress Of's 2018 album Us, the album works really well as a whole.
"Shoul've been one kiss / Should've been one fight / For me to see you're sick / But I let myself sink" -Should've
Always Live for Always - Skott
I listened to one song by Skott ("Amelia," which is on my Gaylist), and then Spotify kept throwing Skott's singles into my Release Radar. The songs are all so catchy, and they imagine full stories in a similar way to Taylor Swift's 2020 albums.
"And Midas, you're used to hearing that you're something / Above the ordinary, golden / You wanna be the one and only / Doesn't it get lonely?" -Midas
The Fight - Overcoats
As with Liza Anne, I heard Overcoats for the first time in concert. When I was in college they did a concert at my school, and it was phenomenal. Their first album, YOUNG, became very close to my heart, and The Fight does the same. At its heart, the album is about friendship and getting through hard times together-- see, for instance, "I'll Be There."
"What good are these new shoes / I bought if I can't leave my room / 'Cause he hasn't called?" -New Shoes
INDUSTRY GAMES - CHIKA
INDUSTRY GAMES is Chika's first EP. Like Chloe x Halle, CHIKA was recommended to me by the podcast FANTI. (It's not a music podcast, but they do have excellent taste.) After I heard about her, I listened to the Tiny Desk Concert and fell in love.
"And the whole world is conversating 'bout your waistline / And mental health days make you guilty, 'cause you waste time / I'm fighting everybody demons but can't face mine / Baseline, use all that pain and anger and just make rhymes" -Balencies
Everything is Beautiful / Everything Sucks - Princess Nokia
Princess Nokia released this angel/devil pair of albums on the same day. In "The Conclusion," she says, "All my albums differ, and I am really proud of that," and it's true that all of her albums are unique and powerful in their own way. Everything is Beautiful is generally wholesome, confident, and happy, though it certainly gets real about hard times (see "Wash & Sets," for instance).
Everything Sucks is more pessimistic, but it's also really fun-- look at "Harley Quinn" and "I Like Him," for instance. I also had fun listening to "Gross" after my annual canoe trip last summer.
"I know that I'm perfect the way God had made me / And I thank my parents for the life they gave me / Have you told your parents that you loved them lately? / I look like my mama in the 1980s" -Everything is Beautiful, "Green Eggs & Ham"
"Sketchers lookin' like Balenciaga / Thrift clothes lookin' like the prada / Whole fit lit, it cost me nada" -Balenciaga
Finally, the five albums below were not released this past year, but I listened to them a lot and this post wouldn't be complete if I didn't mention them.
- 1000 gecs - 100 gecs
- Shifted - Harpeth Rising
- WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? - Billie Eilish
- Brol - Angèle
- Saves The World - Muna
What were your favorite albums of 2020? Did you listen to any of these? Leave a comment!
