We must warn you, for starters: this is not a popularity contest. This is not a selection based on massive listening on Spotify, YouTube or Soundclound. For that reason, it is not a list of the best songs of the year either, a type of ranking/classification that can only obey personal criteria. Because, who has the power to decide what is good or bad in artistic terms, in terms of creation? Criticism can only serve as a guide, encouraging you to discover or not. Whether you like or dislike it is up to each individual.
On the other hand, the most heard does not necessarily mean the best. But if we agree that the best song is the one capable of signifying a moment, capturing its time, rising in terms of relevance (social, cultural, economic or political) above the rest and summarizing what happened, then those that follow could be considered as such. Because each of them has something to say about this turbulent 2023.
Let's say then the most memorable songs (some of them). Because how can a queer rereading of reggaeton not be memorable. Or a postpunk blow that puts sexism in its place. Or a harmonious anti-capitalist power pop melody. Or a house anthem in defense of freedom and sexual enjoyment. Or a traditional rhythm that vindicates the legacy of ancestors or racialized heritage. Or any of the compositions of artists, like those below, who do not set limits and go one step further, musically and lyrically. That the majority turn out to be women – and not a few, gender dissidents – is also worth considering. The sign of the times moves like this:
Just for the genius of transforming the piano riff from Ike Turner's Getting Nasty
The centerpiece of his fifth album, No Thank You, such a filigree connects five decades of musical legacy to the greater glory of the present, while giving new testimony to the lyrical honesty of its creator: “Cut from a different pair of scissors / from the same fabric that my dear ancestors / That's why this shit gives you chills.” Winner of the Mercury Prize 2022, which recognized her as the best British artist, she now leads the nominations for the MOBO Awards 2024, the awards that reward music of black origin.
Hammer at the ready, the South Korean producer, composer, singer and DJ from Queens (New York) returns three years later to explode stereotypes. In her appetite for destruction (the typical thing of discovering that life is not what you had been told and, on top of that, they despise you for being racialized), Kathy Yaeji Lee crushes styles and genres, pulverizing any stylistic limits, from synth pop to deep house, from ambient to jazz, from techno to classical and roots music, with a mood that oscillates between nihilism and euphoria.
That's what With a Hammer is about, their first album after several EPs and mixtapes, from which this tune rises with its little helium voice as a perfect example of 21st century synthetic pop. Watch out for the surprising final break, a furious cascade of broken rhythms that has set the standard: if drum'n'bass has sneaked into the hackneyed R formula
Does arctic reggaeton exist? It exists, and we refer to the proof. That Karin Dreijer Andersson also perpetrates it makes sense: the Swedish artist, previously in the company of her brother, Olof, as the Knife, and now alone (although he produces here), is an expert in causing cold sweats and building atmospheres of fire and ice. Radical Romantics, the third album of her personal project –after six years of recording absence–, is precisely about (strange) loves, (sexual) obsession and carnal desire (violent, even), explored from the new queer perspective/identity her.
Any of the dozen songs that make up it could appear on a best-of list on its own merits, but the invitation to revisit this gothic-robotic dembow (“Lips, fists, a mouth full of words, whatever works” ) is unmarked with a note. If in Sweden they don't have their own term for perrear, they are already taking a long time to invent it.
Knowing how the controversial Californian rapper spends her time, it's funny that she chose one of the most elegant tunes from Burt Bacharach and Hal David's repertoire to distribute trash among her haters. Playing in a loop, just the suggestive intonation of Dionne Warwick (the singer who immortalized her, in 1964) and the silky trumpet that underlines her voice, Walk on By creates an instantly catchy production, a virtue to which the shameless phrasing of the hip hop star in this full-fledged declaration of principles – or war, depending on how you look at it – (“Yes, bitch, I stand by what I said / I’d rather be famous than loved,” he raps in the catchy chorus).
If we add a video clip to match, with its wigs, its body painting and its trademark macabre-occult imagery (painting the city red is a metaphorical way of saying causing a carnage/massacre), it becomes impossible not to capitulate before this self-proclaimed “demon”. By the way, Warwick is delighted with her sampling: thanks to Doja Cat, she has returned to number one half a century later.
Nostalgia is no excuse for the (unexpected) return to action of the Tracey Thorn-Benn Watt couple. Her eleventh album picks up the pulse where they left off, 24 years ago, in style with the masterful Temperamental (1999), as if time had not passed. Thorn's voice has gained depth, with a hint of harshness, while Watt demonstrates that she has not lost an iota of expertise for contemporary dance rhythms.
All in all, Fuse shows a certain existential unease, of which this song is the flagship: a melancholic hymn to lost youth, an emotional narration of the days of deep house and roses – with its affectionate portrait of characters – in Lazy Dog, the club/session London Sunday show led by Watt as a DJ between 1998 and 2003: “It's five in the afternoon on Sunday, no one knows we're dancing.” It deserved more exposure, but let's see which centennial is going to give accounts on TikTok to the wisdom of a couple of sexagenarians. The soundtrack that Euphoria has missed here.
Mother of urban rhythms in these regions, Alba Farelo consolidated her phenomenal international reach in the middle of the year with the remix/continuation of this canonical reggaeton, which not only adds the flow of the Puerto Rican Young Miko and the Dominican Tokischa as superpowers, but also turns her original hetero-macho reading upside down with such stellar collaborations: the first is openly lesbian, while the second confesses to being bisexual. There, serving well for hers G
The first number one in Latin America for the Barcelona artist – from Vilassar de Mar – will be included, of course, in her long-awaited release, La Joia (in reality, almost an album of greatest hits, which also includes Real G, Sexy, Mi Lova or Sin carné), which will finally be published in January 2024, with an immediate tour, thus chaining three consecutive years without being able to stop succeeding. She keeps flying, she doesn't land.
Aspiring to heaven, finding God, from infernal positions (“The boy you are today is not the result of the absence of pain,” he expresses at one point) is a constant in the work of one of the most fascinating, disturbing personalities. and impenetrables of current creation. He (or elle, who also admits the neutral, non-binary pronoun) calls it “being horny between two worlds”, a spiritual formula that defines – and simplifies – his fifth album now, Praise A Lord Who Chews but Which Not Consume, more direct and, in some way, accessible.
Like an afro and transvestite alter ego (more, if possible) of Alan Vega in his Suicide days, the one who collaborated with Shayne Oliver in the urban cult label Hood By Air insists on his sonic kaleidoscope of R
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8lMAIYpMfs
“And you keep working, it is better not to work, something will have to change, something is going wrong,” sings the Pamplona quartet in what is surely the composition that brings their still fresh third album, Ahora (released in October), closest to the sparkling indie pop dynamics from its beginnings, before the current surrender to electronic gadgetry (with a vintage sound, it would be missing).
In fact, Mal is one of the few songs in which the keyboards, sequencers and rhythm machines of another time do not command the melody, in its case more indebted to the psychedelic underground paisley and jangle pop of the early nineties than to indietronica. in which almost everything else abounds (try Bang, which goes like a shot with that almost onomatopoeic chorus; the atmospheric K2 or the beautiful Two Passengers). For that matter, Oihana (guitar and voice), Leire (bass), Lauri (drums) and María (keyboard) continue to search for those vocal harmonies that suit their repetitive rhythmic patterns so well. And to his proverbial lyrical retreat. National Treasure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7jzzvKxgZ8
The jewel in the crown of the Barbie soundtrack is this wild vehicle with a hyperpop injection engine... tricked out. Built on the infectious synth riff of Robyn's Cobrastyle (2006) and a full-throated chorus that makes Mickey's own, that cheerleader anthem by Toni Basil (one hit wonder of Nuevo Olero in 1982), everything seems so familiar that it was impossible that she would not have won this race (the British artist, by the way, has a serious obsession with cars).
It is also understood that Charli was one of the first chosen by Mark Ronson to give meaning and cohesion as a producer to the playlist of the Greta Gerwig film. This Barbie is fast and furious. She feels, Dua Lipa.
The single that a couple of months ago previewed what will be the fourth album by Marisa Dabice's band (to be released at the beginning of next March) is equally useful for noise and rage. The singer, guitarist and leader of the Philadelphia quartet literally lets her hair down in this denunciation of political manipulation through emotional means and the religious hypocrisy of our days, saturated with guitars.
Although the electric strikes of Maxine Steen give way for the occasion to the prominence of Colins Reginsford's bass, whose pulsations dominate a development in a punk key that is released cathartically in the chorus, sublimated by a power pop melody that takes us back to the best moments of nineties indie rock : “Oh, I have heaven inside me / Oh, I am an angel (heaven inside me) / sent to keep you company.” And then they go and make a great Victorian agro-folk horror video clip.
An unfortunate comment regarding hormone blockers in trans infants, who uncovered their terf vein via social networks to the astonishment of the legion of fans who have sustained their long career (mostly LGBTIQ), put the most extravagant show on the brink of cancellation of the pop divas, just when she had just released what happens to be her best album to date.
Complex in structure, whimsical in melodies and even artistically pretentious, Hit Parade is everything you would expect from the multi-faceted Irish music, multiplied by ten. And that hardly makes concessions, more ambitious in rhythms and sounds than ever, assisted by DJ Koze in the production (overproduction, sometimes). The move comes out perfectly in this load of danceable depth, which replicates the rhythmic scheme of Lil' Louis' French Kiss, a house standard since 1989, inducing trance and hedonistic abandon. Murphy's law says that there is no greater space of freedom and security than under the mirror ball.
Zero doubts and plenty of evidence that the young American singer-songwriter and actress with Filipino roots must have fallen in love with Weezer, Breeders, Redd Kross and other alternative rock luminaries. from the nineties to light her second album, Guts, perfect rrriot girl filter for tiktokers.
And, yes, it was a good idea. Rodrigo escapes Taylor Swiftism and the Lanadelreyfication of his debut through grunge teenage rage, power pop energy and (Californian) punk attitude, playing thunderous guitar, bass and drums with sparkling results (even the supposed ballad Vampire ends up unbridled). urgently). That everything in this second single, from the syncopated rhythm to the intonation, to the irony, refers to the Chaise Longue of Wet Leg (revelation of 2022) is not going to be a coincidence either.
Eight songs, 20 minutes. Aroa, Maite, Irene and Raquel rush through their eclectic debut because why waste time. Good luck, girl, she's going at cruise missile speed more out of a punk creed than in response to the immediacy and inattention that social media imposes today, with tunes that should last as long as a reel on TikTok.
Those of this Madrid quartet are a resounding slap to the record business and concerts/festivals, to a system, in general, with domination of sexist origin, in its claim of space for women, also with regard to the right to enjoy of his sexuality. That is specifically what this speech is about, which begins acoustically, with a wooden guitar, a bit like Julieta Venegas, until she bursts into a happy post-punk guitar crescendo. “You're not going to meet a hotter aunt than me,” there, with two ovaries.
It is not the first time that the New York singer-songwriter (reinvented as a Californian femme fatal) reveals her demons, personal and professional, but American Whore - which is how the title of this meta-composition is read, the fourth track of Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, their ninth album – is simply tremendous. Just over seven minutes of heartbreaking narration (autofiction?), however performed with indolence.
As lyrical as it is musically complex, it unfolds in two parts. The first, accompanied only by piano and guitar, is the story of a disaffection: family (the strange figure of her mother, to whom she almost never refers), media-work (how she is perceived and how much she is criticized ) and loving-sexual (“This is no longer about having someone who loves me / Now, this is the experience of being an American whore”). That's when she explodes, saying: “If I told you I was raped, do you think anyone would think I didn't ask for it? / I didn't ask for it / (but) I'm not going to testify either / I've pretty much screwed up my story already.” The second, dedicated to a certain Jimmy (perhaps the Scottish musician Barrie-James O'Neal, the boyfriend who gave her a bad life and to whom she dedicated Ultraviolence), is even more brutal, underlined by the alteration of the melody, suddenly a succession of dragged beats, between trip hop and dubset. What an exorcism.
Now that Peggy Gou has moved to radio/video with a textbook song, it's good to know that we have electronic producers that maintain their positions in the underground. The American Maya Bouldry-Morrison is, in these circumstances, the heroine of the year thanks to an EP, Dreams of A Dancefloor, which sounds like an invitation to the party, from night to day and vice versa.
That the dance floor is also a balm for anxiety (as a trans artist, she knows this very well) is reminded by these almost 12 minutes of trance induced by a progression of synthesizers and sequencers in which the cosmic techno-house of the Detroit school (Underground Resistance, Model 500) and the tech-funk of a Dave Clarke. Like being propelled into the stratosphere, and barely realizing how much you've sweated on the trip.
In a year in which there have been cakes – metaphorical – to occupy the throne of pop divinity, the veteran Australian star has eaten her direct rivals (Dua Lipa, Jesse Ware, Ke$ha, Miley, even the revitalized Carly Rae Jepsen) without blinking. First with Padam Padam, a synth-pop gem that advanced their sixteenth studio album and that instantly went to the Olympus of gay anthems, and then with the song that titles the album, Tension.
Why should the latter take precedence over the first? Well, because it neither wants to be cool by using sensationalism nor appeal to mega-hits from the past, taking charge of its innocuous frivolity: a surrender to the piano house of the nineties (the European one, preferably Italian), with erotic-festive themes and self-referential lyrics (“Call me Kylie-lie-lie / Don't imitate-ta-tate / Cool like a sorbet-bet-bet”). And on top of that, in the video she pays tribute to Nastassja Kinski from Paris, Texas, including a pink angora minidress, to show that hers has also always been a fantasy.
The one from the R
He demonstrates this again with his second album, Raven, in which he takes his electrified rhythm and blues one step further, both in sound textures – broken and abstract rhythms, jungle, garage, ambient – and in lyrical introspection (his life experience as racialized and queer woman). Just a few weeks ago, she also previewed RAVE'N, The Remixes, which she will release in February with extended and remixed versions to enjoy in the dark (of the club or the room). In the hands of the Californian Flexulant and the Canadian BAMBII, for example, the intimate Closure becomes a deep house time bomb, with the afro-sexy addition of the new verses rapped by the sensational Brazy, the self-proclaimed Nigerian it girl who will not be forgotten lose sight of in the near future.
The song that brings together in sensitive terms all fans of pop/rock with bangs and looking at the ground (shoegaze, as they say), regardless of their generation. Touching hearts, the alliance of American female indie luminaries formed by Julien Baker, Lucy Dacus and Phoebe Bridgers – a supergroup, they call it – has arrived at the doors of the Grammys, with two nominations for their debut album, the record (best album of the year and best alternative music album), and two others for what was their second single (recording of the year and best rock performance), which sounds like a stadium anthem to chant loudly: “I don't know why I am the way I am, no Strong enough to be your man.”
Dacus's evocative voice rides pristine guitars and ethereal synthesizers, and together they reach paroxysm in a glorious bridge: "Always an angel, never a god," he repeats, reformulating that of "never the bride, always the bridesmaid" that alludes to loss of confidence and imposter syndrome. What Taylor Swift (an intimate of Bridgers, also famously ex-Paul Mescal) would have given to sign it.
Desire, I Turn into You is the album (her second) that confirms the New York singer, songwriter and producer as the new Kate Bush, an artist capable of playing with pop, folk and electronic music as she pleases and with excellent results. . And I Believe, the song that confirms how much it must have impressed her to discover Ti sento by Matia Bazar (1985), according to her own confession.
The synth bursts of the jewel of the Italian cult group sound almost carbon copy, while Polachek projects his voice to infinity, with an operatic falsetto, in a chorus that in turn shows a certain resemblance to the Désenchantée of the great Mylène Farmer in the eurodance version by Kate Ryan. Hence the echoes of dosmilera dance production. The song is also dedicated to her colleague and friend Sophie, the British art-pop star who died prematurely due to an accident three years ago. “I don't know, but I think we'll have another day to be together,” she sings to him.
The of k-pop, ese R
And Rainy Days by V, the last of the members of the boy band BTS to make his solo debut, because you have to throw flats to appear in a crooner style, with a lazy Chet Baker-style halftime, embroidered by a jazzy piano (be careful to the video clip, filmed on the top floor of the Torres Blancas building in Madrid). The best of both: that they pass the orthodoxy of the genre through the triumphal arch.
It was seen coming, which has been on an unstoppable rise for at least a couple of years, and it is now official: Mexican (or regional Mexican) music is the phenomenon of 2023. There are not enough hands to count the number of songs that have conquered the main American sales list in all these months, not to mention that first nomination for the Latin Grammys for Peso Pluma as a revelation artist thanks to a genre that even has the blessings of Bad Bunny.
And now also with those of the Californian of Jalisco descent Becky G, who has entirely dedicated her third album, Esquinas, to exploring – and reclaiming – her Chicano roots. Between versions of classic mariachis and their own songs that abound in different traditional styles (some with renowned collaborators such as Iván Conejo or Peso Pluma himself), this Cries in Spanish synthesizes the feeling of the album: a sad Sierreño – emo variant of music northern – in a duet with another cross-border star, the young DannyLux. They call it a vein-cutting song for a reason.
Nominated as co-author of Lift Me Up, the elegiac lullaby of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever that marked the return of Rihanna, Temilade Openiyi stood at the Oscars in a voluminous cloud dress that came to say: “Here I am and Now you are going to see me, but fine.” The song did not win, but, from her seat at the epicenter of entertainment culture, the young Nigerian singer-songwriter finally became visible to the world. There was news about Tems already in 2018 with that sensational Mr. Rebel that put her in the spotlight of hip hop/R stars
And, suddenly, silence, barely broken by a collaboration at Beyoncé's Renaissance. The promise of her debut album was delayed sine die, until in early October she released this lustrous Afrobeat mid-tempo, a reminder of her talent (the music video was also directed by herself). The cherry on top of what has also turned out to be a successful year for African pop (Arya Starr, Tyla, Davido, Asake, Amaarae, Rema with Ice Spice...).
With his twink ethics and aesthetics (young man who is barely over the legal age, with a normative ephebic appearance, in gay slang), the Australian pop star inaugurated the summer causing a stir. As a song that premiered their third album, Something to Give Each Other, it sounded like a declaration of intentions: a quick hit thanks to an ultra-hummable chorus and a house-based rhythmic pattern (inflected in samba house, a very mid-late nineties substyle). which inevitably leads to the dance floor.
But then there was everything that underlay it: the proclamation of the right to hedonism and absolute sexual freedom of a generation that no longer admits its own excuses or outside interference. As long as there are passing lovers, cold beer and friends with whom to sweat in a club until dawn, why else. The Fastlove in zeta version, without the bad experience that George Michael had to go through. Be careful that the video clip is not for all sensitivities, that is why it is broadcast censored on commercial channels.
The song of the 21st century sounds like this, just as hyperbolic, but sustained by a barrage of bass drum and bass that reverberates in the heart. It is the most revealing, ambitious cut from Ultrabelleza, the Cordoba native's second album, with that amazing break of broken rhythms about which she even raps: “I am the story of those who survived / wars that they did not choose.” A verse that, right now, can only give you goosebumps.
It would be easy to say that she picks up flamenco experimentation where Rosalía left off with El mal qué (2018), but Pozoblanco's is much more powerful in its melismas and arabesques, prodigious vocal ringlets that unravel between synthesizers and electronic percussion. It can't be more beautiful, and committed, and modern and cool.
I hope Something to mention, the debut of the Galician Laura LaMontagne
