An ode to the safety found in familiar, physical connection, it’s an undeniable witness to everything this foursome does well musically. At just 26, she delivers her (exceptionally well-written, mind you) verses with a near devastating knowing. In a time when we see a cry for help on social media elicit nothing a hit on the like button, or a quick comment of support, “People, I’ve Been Sad” asks us to truly connect emotionally. DaBaby feat. In the case of Little Big Town, one of the most transgressive acts in Nashville, they arrive softly, wrapped in honeyed, four-part harmonies. !” you’ll be too busy dancing to ask the burning question: “Huh?” — Dave Holmes, Caylee Hammack may be new on the Music City scene—her debut album arrived just this year—but you’d never guess it by listening to her sing. Perfume Genius and Dua Lipa had us dancing in our homes, Thundercat and Angelica Garcia dug deep to reach new heights, and long-running acts like the Strokes, AC/DC, and Stephen Malkmus reminded us that rock isn't dead. These are our 100 favorite albums of 2020. Who knows, and who even cares; when the gospel choir pops in from nowhere to declare “THAT’S GOSSIP!! In hindsight, they read like an artist’s social distancing diary. The Orielles ask “Can you re-align the boundaries of my sensory home,” and while I have no idea what that even means, I lean toward yes. All rights reserved. © 2021 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. Artists like Run the Jewels have provided anthems for a civil rights movement. One of mine arrived late on The Lone Bellow’s February LP, Half Moon Light in the form of “Martingales.” “If yesterday is too heavy,” lead singer Zach Williams pleads, with his full-throated, rasp-lined instrument, propped up over warm acoustics by his bandmates’ harmonies, “put it down.” Put it down. Beverly Glenn-Copeland, Transmissions: The Music of Beverly Glenn-Copeland 2. Clubs remain closed. The Weeknd, "Blinding Lights" 2. Across an ocean of steel guitar, it’s a song about growing up, from someone who's done it. Beyoncé, "Savage (Remix)" Houston, we got a problem! But music saw us through it all. There were no festivals. — Matt Miller, Revolutions come at every decibel. It’s a soothing meditation on the mysteries of life, the perfect sonic cushion to ease our increasingly chaotic day-to-day. Stream songs including “Physical”, “Don't Rush (feat. You can’t argue with science Every product was carefully curated by an Esquire editor. January 4, 2021. With the first single from his upcoming Reunions album, the alt-country firebrand makes the case for speaking your mind, especially if your voice is shaking. Headie One)” and more. It turns out, on The Slow Rush, the musical mastermind at once embraced the future and the past, all at once. TOP 100 Songs of 2021 - Best Hit Music Playlist 2021 DJ Snake & Selena Gomez - Selfish Love (Official Video). The defiant—and at times sing-songy—cut sees Apple tell off a fancy man at a fancier party for thinking he can control what comes out of her mouth. Echoes of that era are all over the current pop charts, but with just one album under her belt (her second, dubbed Future Nostalgia, arrives this year), few are doing it better than Dua Lipa. Imagine Dragons - Follow You (Official Music Video). J.T. Kevin Parker’s crowds had grown more bro-y with each passing year, as his shows embraced a more pulsing club mentality. Take five minutes to discover the sounds of the powerful and protean piano. And this song is an ineffable reminder to never stop fighting. The Best Music Videos of 2020 — Year in Review Homebound ballets, rainbow choreography, currency bonfires, and an empty Coliseum are just some of the indelible images from the year in music. There were no sunsets at outdoor amphitheaters. It’s about parties, or rumors, or ancient Egypt, or the Renaissance, or all of it, or none of it. “I want you to know that I’m in love,” she sings, “but I don’t want you to feel comfortable.” The bliss of young romance with a twist of ‘90s indie angst, from what might be my album of the year. TOP 100 Songs of 2021 (Best Hit Music Playlist) By redmusiccompany. Your support powers our independent journalism, Available for everyone, funded by readers, Our critic’s picks, from righteous old-school hip-hop via euphoric retro pop to classic American songwriting, The year will be long remembered for recitals to an empty Wigmore Hall, car-park Puccini, Ravel as animation – and one man and his piano…, We survey the best albums from the experimental edges of classical, jazz and more, from ambient sludge to blissful electronica, Away from the English-language mainstream was a world of mindblowing sound from Indian raga to Malian mayhem, and Tony Allen and Hugh Masekela’s final work, Folk artists this year drew inspiration from China, south Asia and the wildness of the sea on the way to making stirring and vital music, Alongside archive recordings from Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, and inventive new releases by Maria Schneider and Carla Bley, 2020 had plenty of spectacular fusions, The pristine club-pop on this energetic album owes a great debt to the musical past but sounds magically, wonderfully of the moment, Sawayama picks her way through formative musical loves to produce a risk-taking musical cocktail of R&B, goth rock and video game soundtracks, Mike Hadreas’s most accomplished and confident album yet is a subtle journey of transformation and acceptance, The first of two incredible albums released by the band this year is weapons-grade R&B and luxuriates in being unapologetically Black, Katie Crutchfield’s new sobriety led to a move away from rollicking indie and toward a calmer, Americana-informed sound that reels you in, The trio relaxed, expanded their sound and created their first masterpiece, full of relationship vignettes that felt true to life, The rapper keeps his signature upbeat melodies and humour, while urgently pursuing a deep take on the systemic checks that mar Black British life, Swift retreated to a country cabin to create a lockdown album full of imagined characters, dark musings and intimate moments, deepened by a new richness to her singing, Sumney’s playful, genre-splicing second album showed a man determined to present life in all its richness and contradiction, In this terrible year, Rain on Me seemed to face the nightmare head on – and then deliver you from it. —Matt Miller, “Care” is a perfect gateway into 20-year-old British-Filipina Beatrice Laus’ debut album Fake The Flowers. But, Mike wrote these in response to another murder of an unarmed Black man, that of Eric Garner in 2014. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io, The Best Cookbooks (and Cocktail Books) of 2020, “Space Samba (Disco Volador Theme),” The Orielles, “People, I’ve Been Sad,” Christine and the Queens. But the most surprising song on a set full of pure creative energy stuns in its normality. Spend 5 minutes digging a little deeper into the best parts of music. There was no real song of the summer. Sound Of 2021. On Neon Skyline, every song works as one linear narrative, and its title track sets the scene and the characters, and establishes the laidback attitude that defines the set. We catch brilliant glimpses: The striking, subversive storytelling of Gone Home ; the wild potential of a procedurally-generated galaxy in No Man’s Sky . Loraine James (photo by Ekua King), Lyra Pramuk (photo by George Nebieridze), Yaeji (photo by Dasom Han), Beatrice Dillon (photo by John Phillips/Getty Images for … “I've heard of God the Son and God the Father,” they sing, brazenly, “I’m just looking for a God for the daughters.” It’s a theme that ebbs and flows throughout their ninth album, Nightfall. The latest full-length release for the singer-songwriter features one original written by Steve Earle and 10 songs written by his late son, Justin Townes Earle, who passed away in August 2020. —Dave Holmes, Over a lush, Mazzy Star-esque groove, 22-year-old Los Angeles singer-songwriter McRae takes us to a college party where an African-American woman finds herself code-switching for a charming white guy: “Twirl my hair, watch my voice jump the octave/I don't like who I am for you, white boy.” She’s described her sound as “Tracy Chapman writing music for Adele while studying for the vocab section of the SAT,” and with an equally frank and stunning second single “Wolves” just out, we think she is poised to be massive. Selena Gomez, 'Ice Cream'. When you think about the headlines that dominated in 2020—unprecedented pandemic, halted economies, mass unemployment, impossible-to-contain fires—that an explicit ode to female pleasure would not just cut through, but take over front pages and prime time, should rattle your bones. Music, Film, TV and Political News Coverage Best Albums of 2020 - Rolling Stone From Taylor Swift's folk surprise to Bob Dylan's best album in 20 years: the 50 Best Albums of 2020 — Dave Holmes, After five years, the wait for new music from the producer-DJ-xx band member has officially ended. The best song of 2020: Rain on Me by Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande In this terrible year, Rain on Me seemed to face the nightmare head on – and then deliver you from it Published: 1:00 AM Since their song “Girl Crush,” off 2014’s truly excellent Pain Killer LP, broke out, igniting a debate about whether or not it promoted pro-gay content—“I want to taste her lips/ Yeah, ’cause they taste like you,” Karen Fairchild sings, soaked by jealousy—the act has embraced its ability to transform from the mainstream’s center. But for me the heart of the record is this ballad, written for Laus’ boyfriend, filmmaker Soren Harrison. This was a year in which we listened in little ways, maybe privately even—a one-on-one back-and-forth that in a strange way might have brought us closer to the music. There’s space in this song—in the dialed back production, between each word—begging you to react, to truly share this experience. The 25 Best Classical Music Tracks of 2020. (Songs like “Sugar Coat” are absolutely must-listen fare.) Artists like BTS, Bad Bunny, and Fiona Apple provided hope, escape, and cathartic dance parties. The 50 best albums of 2020 We’ve collated our writers’ ‘best of’ lists and crunched the numbers in a big old music ranking machine. “We don’t take requests, we won’t shut up and sing/Tell the truth enough, you’ll find it rhymes with everything.” And for Isbell, it’s not just talk: on March 3rd, he did a Super Tuesday fundraiser for Alabama Senatorial candidate Doug Jones. Below is only a small sampling of the music we heard in 2020. What’s most astonishing is that he’s able to take each of these parts and blend them into a package for the modern festival circuit. I’ve loved every previous album and seen each tour, but over the years, my excitement, undeservedly, faded. —Dave Holmes, “Be afraid, be very afraid, but do it anyway”: The exact right message at the exact right moment. “When I wrote that chorus, I was like, ‘All right, we’re going to make this a little bit of a light at the end of the tunnel,'” Crutchfield told Rolling Stone of the song. — Matt Miller, “They wanna judge me from what they heard I do / It’s a big conspiracy,” J Hus sings on the title track of his sophomore album. BTS channels the terror and frustration of 2020 into a hip-hop song that manages to be peppy and cathartic, swaggering and vulnerable all at once. Things are exhausting. Bruno Mars, Anderson .Paak, Silk Sonic - Leave the Door Open [Official Video]. In the next year, you will be able to find this playlist with the next title: TOP 100 Songs of 2022 (Best Hit Music … Wizkid’s fourth LP Made in Lagos relates his journey around the world, while emphasising his connection to his home country. It’s perhaps the least pretentious concept album you'll find—and by the end of this opening track, Shauf has already made a great friend out of you. With a chunky, chugging synth line and a shout-your-heart-out chorus—“Come on! “The flesh we roam this earth in is a blessing, not a promise,” Electronica says near the end of his verse, one of the most wise and elegant lyrics I’ve heard in a song all year. But Swift maintains that she attempted in this song to use her music to tell stories from different perspectives. Yes, this year brought chaos like none other in recent history. Jdot Breezy - Camera C (Official Music Video) (Dir. No matter if it’s autobiographical or not, “betty” marks a bold step forward from music’s greatest storyteller. Megan Thee Stallion feat. And with vivid, striking details Electronica and Jay-Z rap over a sample of “A Hymn” by Khruangbin. — Madison Vain, The 60 Best Movies to Stream on Netflix Right Now, The 14 Best Tracksuits to Wear Every Damn Day, He Invented a Pasta That Puts Spaghetti to Shame, This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. Dua Lipa gave us a much-needed excuse to move. — Matt Miller, I’m constantly astonished by the range and scope of Grimes’s music. —Matt Miller, The title of this English indie band’s second album Disco Volador translates to Disco Flying, I guess, and though it may not make sense on the page, put on this track and tell me you’re not out of your chair within fifteen seconds. The UK’s biggest song of 2020 is The Weeknd’s Blinding Lights, the Official Charts Company can confirm.. There are dystopian club bangers, near-ambient techno, and soaring sci-fi synth ballads.