2018 Albums of the Year [Top 20]
- Zachery Moats
- Feb 3, 2019
- 11 min read
Updated: Jan 11, 2020
We are wasting no time, because I have too many great albums to share. Let’s get to it by glancing over the rest of the top 50 starting once again with Wild Pink’s Yolk in the Fur.
50. Wild Pink – Yolk in the Fur
49. Kadjha Bonet – Childqueen
48. LUMP – LUMP
47. Matt Maltese – Bad Contestant
46. Kathryn Joseph – From Where I Want the Wake Is
45. boygenius – boygenius EP
44. Beach House – 7
43. Natalie Prass – The Future and The Past
42. Neko Case – Hell-On
41. Troye Sivan – Bloom
40. Ezra Furman – Transangelic Exodus
39. Tim Hecker – Konoyo
38. Iceage – Beyondless
37. Half Waif – Lavender
36. Amanda Shires – To the Sunset
35. Snail Mail – Lush
34. Mount Eerie – Now Only
33. Ought – Room Inside the World
32. Low – Double Negative
31. Grouper – Grid of Points
30. Robyn – Honey
29. Hop Along – Bark Your Head Off, Dog
28. Kacey Musgraves – Golden Hour
27. Virginia Wing – Ecstatic Arrow
26. Lucy Dacus – Historian
25. Leon Vynehall – Nothing is Still
24. Tirzah – Devotion
23. Years & Years – Palo Santo
22. Jon Hopkins – Singularity
21. Father John Misty – God’s Favorite Customer
Now here is the moment you have been waiting for: to see if your favorite album made the top 20.
20. Typhoon – Offerings
19. Kamasi Washington – Heaven & Earth
18. Kali Uchis – Isolation
17. Blood Orange – Negro Swan
If I have learned anything these past few years listening to vast numbers of albums, it is to look for a strong variety of drums on Blood Orange records. Negro Swan is no different. The drums have become what I gravitate to on Dev Hynes’ records. The drums form these beautiful, diverse foundations for each track. If his last record, Freetown Sound, evoked the sounds of Michael Jackson, Negro Swan is Dev Hynes sitting front and center with his own sound, unapologetically and unabashedly himself. The textures on top of the drums from the keyboard on tracks like “Jewelry” and the horns on “Take Your Time” add layers that draw the listener deeper and deeper. The themes of the record as a whole are best encapsulated by the opening track, “Orlando,” where on the outro we hear “you know what? My…eternal resolution will be to ‘do too much.’” Negro Swan is about Dev finding his place in a world where he cannot seem to fit in. The album encapsulates his journey to this point, to embracing who he is, to doing too much. Blood Orange actually performed an NPR Tiny Desk concert last week. It is well worth your time. It evokes many of the same feelings Negro Swan does. It is simultaneously a look into the window of Dev Hynes’ soul and Dev Hynes stepping out of that same window saying, “This is who I am, and this is where I belong.”
16. IDLES – Joy As An Act of Resistance
15. Anna Calvi – Hunter
I am almost ashamed to admit that before this record, I didn’t know Anna Calvi. This album is an absolute powerhouse, a punch to the mouth. Anna Calvi has some of the best control over her voice from any 2018 album. She has the ability to push and pull instrumentals on the basis of her vocals. As I continue to listen again and again, I am floored. She can make her voice so small and have it absolutely explode. Sometimes this happens on the same track like “Don’t Beat the Girl out of My Boy.” (Which is a top 3 song title of 2018.) None of this is to speak about the instrumentals themselves, which are often absolutely ruthless. Tracks like “Don’t Beat the Girl Outta My Boy” showcase Calvi’s skill on the guitar. There also are tracks like “Hunter” whose instrumental sounds like it could’ve been included in Twin Peaks. Musically, this album stuns me every time I spin it. Thematically and lyrically, I have not even begun to touch the surface with Calvi’s songwriting. Each of the layers of this album carve out a space for you to ruminate and bang your head all at once.
14. DJ Koze – Knock Knock
13. Marlon Williams – Make Way For Love
12. Yves Tumor – Safe in the Hands of Love
11. US Girls – Inn a Poem Unlimited
10. Confidence Man – Confident Music for Confident People
From the opening moments of Confident Music for Confident People, the instrumental starts bouncing. For the next 41 minutes, that bouncing does not stop. I came into this record with all my preconceived notions about dance and electropop records, including my distaste for repetition and lack of variety over 5-minute and longer tracks. I had those notions blown out of the water. The way Confidence Man completely switches the beat halfway through songs, sometimes even three times in a single song, had me audibly wondering the direction each track was taking. To be able to completely change the tone of a track and not lose a step is impressive enough, but most of these songs are around 4 minutes. To be able to pull that off and effectively end with a different song than you started with floored me. Confidence Man does not stick with just a handful of instruments either. They run the gauntlet here. None of this is to mention that “Catch My Breath” is one of best dance records I have heard in the past 20 years.
9. Parquet Courts – Wide Awake!
I enjoyed this album immensely the first time I listened to it, but it was not till I had a friend tell me how much he loved Wide Awake! that I returned to the album. I fell in love all over again. I wish I could’ve tapped him to write this, because I know how much he loves it. Analyzing the bass guitar all over this record could take up this entire space. On tracks like “Total Football,” Parquet Courts embraces the sounds of rollicking guitars just to continue to distort and twist those sounds on their heads throughout the rest of the album. It results in consistently infectious instrumentals, layered with punk tendencies from both vocalists, Andrew Savage and Austin Brown. Wide Awake! feels so familiar – a territory treaded over time and time again at the height of garage rock and punk rock – yet with entirely new vigor and life. It is an album that refuses to abide by conventional notions of rock, spinning off that formula on “Total Football” to give listeners tracks like “Before the Water Gets Too High” and “Wide Awake.” For that life anew, I would like to extend a thank you to that friend whose recommendation spurred my return to Wide Awake! and aided the realization of the magic of punk born again.
8. Let’s Eat Grandma – I’m All Ears
Woah, this one is an odd record with undoubtedly the best band name in this entire countdown. There are synths all over this record, and that is enough for me love your record apparently. But it doesn’t stop there, the ways such synths are deployed keep you on your toes. Sometimes they form the background layers of the track and other times they break down the track over the chorus. Sometimes those two happen in the same track (“It’s Not Just Me”). The synths even change tones in that track, remaining muted and lower over the verses just to pitch up and come to the forefront on the chorus. The whole mood of the record is captured wonderfully on that specific track. Once you have fallen in love with Let’s Eat Grandma on “It’s Not Just Me,” let yourself take a hard left for “Hot Pink.” This band is not satisfied with just being the best use of a synthesizer in 2018, they wanted bigger, better, and weirder. I am so enamored with the synthesizers and oddities that I have not discussed the songwriting and vocal abilities. Oh, and this duo? They are younger than me. So, who knows what I am doing with my life, but it certainly is not this badass.
7. The 1975 – A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships
I tend to listen to an album and then move onto the next one immediately after. This makes sense given how much music I desire to get through. Every once in a while though, an album sinks its claws into me to the point where I cannot stop listening. The 1975’s A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships did that. It is an album that defies genre. It will move big, boisterous pop into acoustic tenderness. “I Like America and America Likes Me” sounds like a Bon Iver B-Side. “I Couldn’t Be More In Love” (a personal favorite of mine) sounds like a late-90’s/early 00’s Brian McKnight R&B jam. (I guess I will plug some Brian McKnight here because that guy made some great songs about heartbreak that helped melodramatic middle school Zach pretend he knew what heartbreak felt like). The album dips its toes in numerous big topics in modern society, driven by the contradiction of being more connected than ever and feeling more isolated than ever. The exclamation point on that theme comes from the one-two punch of “I Couldn’t Be More In Love” and “I Always Wanna Die (Sometimes).” Somehow, A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships works as an exorcism of sorts for The 1975’s lead singer Matthew Healy and an incredibly relatable album for those feeling disassociated from everyday interaction.
6. Christine and The Queens – Chris
Look, I know I said I had prejudice against dance records, so it would seem odd that another album driven in large part by its dance sensibilities would appear, but this was a year for throwing out preconceived notions. Similar to Robyn’s Honey, Christine and The Queens’ Chris just exudes life. The intersection of dance, electronic sounds, and funk spring forth from the instrumentals all over this record. I have set out to relisten to this record just to not even make it past the lead track “Comme si” without running it back. It is so undoubtedly infectious: the way Héloïse Letissier breaks up individual syllables on the chorus, the funky bass, the exploding electronic sounds on the outro adds up to a track that will be stuck in your head the whole day. I know from experience. Good luck trying to get it out. As I continue to explore the album, I just keep coming back to how absolutely smooth the incorporation of Letissier’s voice and the variety of sounds happens. Most of the album evokes the feelings of letting a wave in the ocean take you ashore. You do not have to do any of the work, just let Christine and the Queens bring you home.
5. The Internet – Hive Mind
My love of this album must begin and end with the fact that the song I listened to the most in 2018 was “Stay the Night.” Evoking the feeling of Teddy Pendergrass’ “Come Go with Me” but somehow even smoother, “Stay the Night” is a perfect track. A song that from the beginning knows what it is going to be. A song that is approached with the tenderness and soft nature of someone yearning for connection. Syd gives us a wildly understated vocal performance on the song too. To move to the album as a whole and calm down a mild amount, this album is tour de force (okay, didn’t calm down). A wonderful amalgamation of sounds from R&B to funk to hip hop to jazz and even some blues, Hive Mind adapts the blueprint of what makes a great R&B record into something their own. The funky basslines courtesy of Steve Lacy, the stirring vocal performances largely supplied by Syd, and Matthew Martin’s unassuming drums will find their way into your heart never to come out again.
4. SOPHIE – OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES
Okay, maybe I should just face it at this point. I like dance music. Though SOPHIE’s album could hardly be qualified as anything similar to the other records evoking dance music patterns. OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES comes out with its lead track in modest fashion. The track is so muted, SOPHIE lulls you into drifting along with her beautifully layered vocal performance. Boy, are those notions dispelled quickly when “Ponyboy” starts. The muted electronic and industrial sounds from the opening tracks take over. After this track, you think you know what you are in for. Trust me, you don’t. OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES is an unrelenting sonic adventure all its own. It is an album that slows down just to speed back up. An album that breathes out while simultaneously gasping for air. It is also another album that sees an artist so unabashedly saying “this is who I am,” even if that who is somewhere beneath the machinations and terrifically layered electronic pulses. OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES is a record that you are going to discover new quirks and twists each time you listen. So keep listening.
3. serpentwithfeet – soil
serpentwithfeet’s debut record soil contains some of the best songwriting of 2018. The way he paces himself throughout the course of each song, knowing when to interrupt the haunting drum beats and when to ride them, evokes an eerie feeling of someone desperately trying to regain control as everything slips out of his hands. That sentiment is mimicked throughout the lyrics as well. No song on soil sees serpentwithfeet tear open his chest quite like “mourning song.” With lyrics such as “It’s too much work/to be the monster and miss you too,” “I’m annoyed with clothes today/I’d rather swaddle myself in sorrow today,” and “I don’t want to be small small sad/I want to be big big sad/I want to make a pageant of my grief,” you cannot help but feel the immense pain. There is an air of grief, mourning, jealously, and obsession layered throughout the record that will leave you stunned as the machinations of the instrumentals continue to churn through your head.
2. Mitski – Be the Cowboy
Part scathing, part cathartic, and part joyous, Be the Cowboy is all magnificent songwriting. Mitski has been a favorite of mine since 2016’s Puberty 2, but even my expectations for Be the Cowboy were totally shattered. The power Mitski evokes in her songwriting is bar none. The opening “Geyser” is bursting at the seams. Even her vocals feel as though they are on the precipice of tearing through your headphones. Then the song just ends. Now you are onto digesting the rollicking electronic sounds of “Why Didn’t You Stop Me?” reminiscent of New Order. I have debated Mitski and the number one album of 2018 endless times in my head. I have been consistently stunned by the way she crafts each individual short track with a burst of such energy and immensely strong songwriting. Over 32 minutes, there is not a single wasted second. As I listen once again writing this, I still do not know how she packed such enormous sounds and lyrics into such small spaces. I am in love. Look, I am not saying I’d die for Mitski, but I’m also not saying I wouldn’t. Be the Cowboy cemented Mitski as one of the foremost names in modern music for me.
1. Janelle Monae – Dirty Computer
Janelle Monae demonstrated her ability to do anything and everything on Dirty Computer. In many ways, Dirty Computer is a culmination of the past few concept records that Monae has put together (The Electric Lady and The ArchAndroid). In other ways, it feels like Janelle crafting the future she wants to see. “Crazy, Classic, Life” feels immensely hopeful and inspiring, at points crafting images and sounds evocative of Black Mirror’s San Junipero. “Django Jane” feels like a call to realize such a future. It is also a completely fucking clinic on how to rap with the swagger of a million emcees. Musical influences are plentiful here, many of them resting on the shoulders of giants such as Prince and Stevie Wonder. But there is also something entirely new here. I have discussed genre-bending numerous times throughout this countdown, but with Dirty Computer, it seems to be a step beyond such a bending. The fusion of diverse sounds from pop to R&B to funk to various electronic sounds is something Monae’s own. “Black girl magic, y’all can’t stand it.” With Dirty Computer, I am not sure if it matters what we can stand because Janelle Monae is going to keep giving us all we can handle. We should only be so lucky.
There you have it. The best albums from an entire year’s worth of music. If you do not listen to another album in 2019 (don’t do that to yourself, please keep listening), make it either Janelle Monae’s Dirty Computer or Mitski’s Be the Cowboy. All of my other writing series will continue as planned moving forward, and I will see you for another iteration at the end of 2019. If it’s anywhere close to 2018, I cannot wait to see what the year has in store for us musically. Until then, let me know what your favorite record was from 2018, if I missed it, or if you think I should’ve slotted it even higher.
As always, thanks for reading.
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