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Gorwitz’s Top Albums of 2021

25. Black Midi – Cavalcade

I LOVE Black Midi. I do not, however, love Cavalcade. Steering hard into their proggiest leanings, the most name-checked band in reviews of Cavalcade is Primus, which is about all you need to know. What’s funny is, I love prog (you’re looking at the head of the Prog Club subsection our local Record Club, which meets exclusively at a booth at the CC Club). But with prog, you have to take the good with the bad. If you’re going to define your sound as “experimental” there are going to be a few that fizzle, and the middle section of Cavalcade is full of meandering segments that don’t really go anywhere (think more The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway than Shine on You Crazy Diamond). However, the highs—“John L” “Dethroned”—are so visceral and thrilling that Cavalcade still makes the cut, even if it’s the most “difficult” album on this list to hit play on track 1 and stay with all the way through the conclusion of “Ascending Forth.”

24. Painted Shrines – Heaven and Holy

If Black Midi has diametrical opposite on this list, it’s probably the homespun grandeur of Painted Shrines’ Heaven and Holy. If you think it reminds you of Woods’ heyday, well pardner you’re in luck, because Painted Shrines is the moniker of Woods’ frontman Jeremy Earl, along with Glenn Donaldson. I’ll be the first to admit I’ve found Woods’ recent experiments in pop-perfection to be some of the best work they’ve ever done, but for those longing for the shaggier Americana of Songs of Shame era Woods, Heaven and Holy delivers. Gentle harmonies float over jangly guitars, as your mind is transported to a country lane while fall leaves slowly circle down to the ground. If The Byrds and The Feelies had a feral baby, it’d be Painted Shrines.

23. Special Friend – Ennemi Commun

You know when you have that band that you try to get your friends into and for whatever reason no one else will bite? Well, for me that band this year was Special Friend. The duo’s songs are not the most complex, often repeating basic patterns, so I get how it can be not the most engaging / challenging listen, but for anyone who loves the guitar-heroics portion of Yo La Tengo records, Ennemi Commun is worth a listen. Marrying simple but propulsive drums with squalling guitars (and hushed vocals), Ennemi Commun is basically if someone made an entire record out of “Cherry Chapstick.” If only anyone else saw it that way.

22. The Weather Station – Ignorance

Ignorance is easily the most polished album on this list, which is normally something I avoid, but for The Weather Station the overall professional sheen works decidedly in their favor. I believe the album is a cautionary tale about the apocalyptic onset of climate change, but as someone who pays almost no attention to lyrics, I'll admit that thematic cohesion largely escapes me. What does come through, however, is how each song’s elements are perfectly produced and fit together in a.m. radio gold. Tamara Lindeman’s contralto is crisply balanced by strings straight out of Abbey Road and jazzy drumming that succinctly keeps things moving without drawing attention to itself. I’m sure if I actually paid attention to the words I’d have deep things to say about the roll of this album in the ongoing disaster of world existence, but since I haven’t I’ll continue to luxuriate in its silky ‘70s sounds.

21. L’Rain – Fatigue

I read a review of Fatigue that called it R&B musique concrete, and while that might be a turn off for some people, I was like, “where do I sign up?” (Answer: apple music/spotify). But that really is the most apt description of this at times familiar at times confounding record. Essentially it sounds like an old R&B album run through a blender. Some tracks feel like background / samples stretched out to song length, while others are perfectly conventional. The whole thing has a dreamy quality, like listening to the idea of a song rather than the song itself (that’s not a knock btw).

20. Goat Girl – On All Fours

On All Fours is the quintessential grower on this list. While on first blush everything is perfectly competent and well produced, with its emphasis on moody atmospherics and chill grooves, Goat Girl aim not to impress on the first listen, but rather on the 7th. Though it sounds nothing like Portishead, there is something spiritually connecting these groups (besides both being from England of course). Whereas Portishead is all staccato, stuttering hip-hop beats, Goat Girl melts their sound down into a liquid languor, what Stereolab would sound like if they weren’t into jazz. “Sad Cowboy” would perfectly soundtrack one of Spike Spiegel’s adventures.

19. Nite Jewel – No Sun

As I age, Nite Jewel is emblematic of those bands I still consider “new” even though they’ve been around for over a decade. I guess that’s just what happens with music that comes around while you’re in your mid 20s. Because you first heard it when you were young, it forever retains a tinge of youth. No Sun is a fitting record to discuss this phenomena, because it is decidedly a “mature” album. Miles away from the lo-fi experiments of Good Evening (a record I absolutely loved in 2009), No Sun is a melancholy, mannered reflection on a failed marriage. The coldness of the beats meets the coldness of the subject matter, to create a haunting dissection both of pop music and a lost relationship.

18. Dry Cleaning – New Long Leg

While Dry Cleaning first grabbed my attention with the Boundary Road Snacks and Drinks E.P., they take a major leap forward with their proper full-length debut, New Long Leg. While Boundary Road employed the same flat intoned spoken lyrics from Florence Shaw to more or less the same effect, on New Long Leg they employ her non sequitur observations to entirely different effect by pairing them with instrumentation straight off a Buzzcocks or Television record. The guitar playing here is some of the best of the year, and the rhythm section is equally up to the task, transforming Shaw’s flat delivery into starkly vivid, thrilling music. Consumed as a whole, New Long Leg can get a bit repetitive, but the highs here are equal to anything else released this year.

17. Ovlov – Buds

With Buds Ovlov continue their recent winning streak following 2018’s excellent Tru. Ovlov are one of those bands that I don’t get why they aren’t more popular / receive more critical praise, but then I’m reminded that that’s kinda the whole point of this “indie rock” thing, whatever that terms means at the end of 2021. While they’re clearly indebted to the Dinosaur Jr. “heavy” guitar take on power pop, Ovlov are no mere revivalists. Through their combination ear-worm surprisingly light melodies, crunchy guitars, and punchy drums, Ovlov have consistently turned out gem after gem. Not for the faint of heart, but neither for the heartless, if you like your guitars loud, even here in 2021, then Ovlov is the band for you.

16. Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders, & the London Symphony Orchestra – Promises

I know in past versions of this list I’ve enjoyed declaring jazz “back,” and I’ve done it so many times that I think its just a given we no longer have to have to champion. Now that we can just assume jazz’s critical relevance in the 21st century, we can start to analyze the trends within jazz rather than the entire genre’s return from the dead. 2021 was the year of ambient jazz, and honestly I couldn’t be happier. Nothing better encapsulates jazz’s current status than Promises. Sanders, a hold over from jazz’s last moment of critical relevance, partners with a maven of the current electronic music scene, Floating Points, and the London Symphony Orchestra (sure, why not) to thrilling results. Through its constant repetitions of small passages and themes, Promises captures the key to both Sander’s cosmic jazz of the late ‘60s early ‘70s and ambient electronic music of the late 2010s. With each cycle, the music subtly varies, all the while striving ever higher towards the heavens.

15. Nation of Language – A Way Forward

If you don’t love ‘80s synth rock in the vein of Depeche Mode and Human League, I don’t know if you’ll love Nation of Language, but if you do love that stuff, then A Way Forward will scratch you right were you itch. Perfectly melding Ian Devaney’s somber baritone—which would fit right in on a Tears for Fears record—with luscious synths, this is the new romantic music for people who still walk around thinking they’re a character in a John Hughes movie. No one is reinventing the wheel here, but on a A Way Forward Nation of Language build on an excellent debut to create a truly impressive young body of work.

14. King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – Butterfly 3000

King Gizzard have no business being this good after putting out so many damn albums (according to my unofficial tally on Allmusic it’s their 18th, but I feel like that’s an undercount), but here we are. I’ve always enjoyed King Gizzard, especially in the incidental moments where I’ve caught them live (standing next to Lady Gaga at Le Poison Rouge was definitely a trip), but they’ve never been a key act for me. That all changed with Butterfly 3000. Out are the psychedelic jams, in are tightly wound krautrock and motoric (which, lets admit, is still a bit jammy, albeit in much smaller packages). If Neu! just wanted to have fun and had more arpeggiaters, it would probably sound something like Butterfly 3000. Things get off to a hard charging, bouncy, delightful start with “Yours,” and the album sustains that hard driving energy all the way till the conclusion of the title track. “Shanghai” was one of my favorite songs of the year, its electro funk is simply irresistible.

13. Squid – Bright Green Field

Have you ever wondered what Dismemberment Plan would sound like if they were trying to be The Fall instead of the Pixies? Well, the answer is Squid’s Bright Green Field, and it is excellent. Of the trio of Black Midi, Squid, and Black Country, New Road, Squid are the most discernibly “british” of the three. All nervy energy and razor-sharp guitars, with bratty speak-sing lyrics, Bright Green Field feels like a lost relic from the moment when the Manchester scene of Joy Division evolved into the Madchester of Stone Roses and Primal Scream. Squid posses the dancy energy of those Madchester bands while still hewing closer to the punk music of their Manchester forbears. With multiple songs stretching past the 8:00 mark, often times a Squid song will morph back and forth from arty experimentation to raw punk attack within the same song. I initially had Bright Green Field as my favorite of the trio of arty British punks on this list, but Ollie Judge’s vocal delivery can become a bit grating across the entirety of album, so I ended up slotting Black, Country New Road just ahead. However, when taken in smaller portions, Squid are making some of the most arresting, challenging music of the year.

12. Hand Habits – Fun House

Fun House is the album Meg Duffy has been building to, both across a series of interesting one-off experiments this year (see, Yes/And), and over their young career. I like placeholder, but Fun House is a major leap forward, both in terms of production and songcraft. Having played with both Kevin Morby and War on Drugs, Fun House feels like they’ve learned a few tricks from the Drugs when it comes to incorporating electronic elements into heartland guitar rock. Case in point, “Aquamarine” is almost pure pop, but it nevertheless feels perfectly at home amongst Fun House’s more guitar-centric cuts, such as “Gold/Rust” or the excellent opener “More than Love.” Having perhaps been previously best known for their backing roles in bigger bands, with Fun House Meg Duffy has fully become a star in their own right.

11. Black Country, New Road – For the First Time

2021 was another banner year for young post punk experimental brits. Like Black Midi (“Track X” even name checks them) and Squid, Britain is rich with bands like Black Country, New Road combining the energy of (post) punk, the free-form experimentation of prog, and the chug of rock to create truly compelling, vital music full of the brashness of youth. For the First Time is composed of six songs, most of which stretch beyond six minutes and two of which are over 8. Via an off-kilter combination of jazzy drumming, jittery vocals, sax & violin (?!) and buzzsaw guitars, Black Country, New Road are slightly above their peers on this list, leading us boldly into the new. While it starts off a bit conventionally (you know, minus the klezmer influenced opener “Instrumental”), around the midpoint of “Science Fair,” as the guitar and sax enter a manic squalling duet, a synthesizer suddenly cuts in, and the album achieves lift off and never looks back. Too visceral for prog, too avant garde for punk, For the First Time fully lives up to its name.

10. Avalanches – We Will Always Love You

Alright, this is cheating a little bit, but you know what, it’s my list so aint nobody going to take me off to critics jail for including an album technically released in 2020 on my 2021 list. We Will Always Love You came out on December 11, 2020, after most outlets, including this humble one, had already compiled their year-end lists. So why not take the opportunity to give it its flowers (a phrase I only use to ask, where did it come from? If 2021 had a most over-used phrase, it was “to give __ their flowers.”) Loosely inspired by the love affair of Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan (that’s her on the cover), and the Golden Record launched into deep space on the Voyager probe, We Will Always Love You is an album of interstellar love pop perfection worthy of late period Daft Punk. Featuring contributions from Dev Hynes, Leon Bridges, Tricky (?!), and Kurt Vile, among many others, you’ll be hard pressed to find better pop music from any year.

9. Spirit of the Beehive – ENTERTAINMENT, DEATH

Ah yes, welcome to the strangest release on this list, by a decent margin. If you want to know what ENTERTAINMENT, DEATH is all about (I hate when bands use all caps, come on guys, we get it) you need look no farther than the two and half minutes of opener “ENTERTAINMENT” to know what Spirit of the Beehive are all about. What starts out as blaring, borderline unlistenable bursts of noise, resolves after about 50 seconds in a gently strummed (albeit, modulated) acoustic guitar, which then resolves into clean acoustic strums with gently pretty baritone singing and even some strings thrown in for good measure. I’ve been chasing an album that sounds anything like Broken Social Scene’s perfect You Forgot it in People since 2002, and ENTERTAINMENT, DEATH is the closest I’ve ever come. While Spirit of the Beehive are no Broken Social Scene in terms of both scope and ambition, they share the Canadian collective’s interest in bending pop conventions to create off-kilter beauty throughout ever changing song structures.

8. Armand Hammer & the Alchemist – Haram

While 2021 was an excellent year for hip hop in general, it was an exceedingly good year for the Alchemist. Coming off 2020’s excellent Alfredo with Freddie Gibbs, in 2021 the Alchemist put out the excellent Bo Jackson with Boldy James (just on the outside looking in on this list) and my personal favorite, Armand Hammer’s Haram. Billy Woods and Elucid continue their own hot streak, and by pairing with the Alchemist’s production, they’ve hit their creative peak with Haram. Though neither is the most technically gifted rapper, when Woods and Elucid come together as Armand Hammer there is an alchemy (pun!) that turns their street tales into hypnotic flows that envelope you in their imagery. Without ever breaking a sweat, Armand Hammer’s verses will carry you away into a sonic world entirely of their own creation.

7. Water From Your Eyes – Structure

All year, I kept yelling at anyone that would listen “Water From Your Eyes’ Structure is the most interesting album I’ve heard in some time!” However, no one would listen. (*Insert Abe Simpson “Old Man Yells at Cloud” newsclipping here*). First of all, its called “Structure” so they’re telling you in advance they’re dealing with the forms (in the platonic sense) of music itself. Then, there’s that crazy cover art. A white field, an abstract geometric pattern, and a figure (but one that is only barely recognizable as such). All are in black white and gray. So again, they’re telling you they’re dealing with the relationship of the figural and the abstract, which is quickly born out in the music itself. The first track, “When You’re Around” is pure pop; hell it sounds like Camera Obscura. Then, things take a sudden right turn with second track “My Love’s” (even the tile is left in abstract incompletion, my love’s what? The possessive is left unresolved) which sounds more like the Knife than most anything else I can think of, with its stark industrial beats and sudden blasts of white noise. All of this is before we even get to the fact that there’s two songs called “Quotations,” one whose title is enclosed within actual quotation marks (the second one, which closes the album) and one which isn’t. Oh, and they’re too versions of the same song, the first abstract, the second pop. What does all this mean? I’m not exactly sure, but it’s damn fun to think long and hard about. Barthes 4 eva!!!

6. Low – Hey What

The only reason that Low’s Hey What doesn’t get the “strange” crown from Spirit of the Beehive is because, coming on the heels of 2018’s absolutely insane(ly gorgeous) Double Negative, Hey What seems relatively staid by comparison (emphasis on the “relatively”). While Double Negative took everything that Low had ever done and run it through a time and tone altering blender until it became almost unrecognizable (like a copy of a copy of a copy, or Basinski’s Disintegration Loops), Hey What works in the opposite direction, taking the shreds of molten industrial sounds from Double Negative and building absolutely beautiful pop songs out of the molten shards of music. The semi title track “Hey” perfectly encapsulates what the album is all about. Built upon a woozy loop of sound that sounds like a doppler-shifting window air conditioner, Mimi Parker’s crystal clear vocals suddenly come in over the top like a ray of sun glinting off a glacier, as that single word “Hey” echoes to infinity, breaking up the verses exactly like a chorus, and then for the last four minutes the song beautifully cycles out through its own echoes, like the sound of the ocean as imagined by electric sheep.

5. Cory Hanson – Pale Horse Rider

Better known as the frontman of the Ty-Segall-featuring Wand, Cory Hanson steps out on his own for the exquisite Pale Horse Rider. For the first few bars of “Paper Fog” Pale Horse Rider sounds a bit like Cut Worms’ George-Harrison revivalism, but then around the 2:20 mark it does what Cut Worms and so many likeminded bands have failed to do, it transcends its ‘70s folk rock influences with some truly genuine oddity. Giant buzzing synths (electric guitars? I genuinely struggle to tell the two apart sometimes) fill the stereo spectrum, and the album achieves eerie lift off, and doesn’t look back from there. The whole thing sounds like an off-kilter trip through late night Los Angeles, like a lost soundtrack for Mullholland Drive, but one that was recorded in Laurel Canyon. This is one of the most inventive folk-rock records I’ve heard in some time, and one I wish garnered more attention than it has so far attracted.

4. Helado Negro – Far In

Roberto Carlos Lange continues his recent excellent run of form with Far In. If you liked Helado Negro’s last record (2019’s excellent This is How You Smile) then Far In is a winning continuation of that album’s form. Gentle, bouncy electronics pair perfectly with Lange’s soft-spoken vocals. Just as electronic dance music had its Balearic phase like 10 years ago, Helado Negro brings a sense of “chill” to electro pop. This is music for dusk strolls and porch sits, for introspection that is still capable of arresting your wayward attention. You’re never going to dance to these tracks, but they port in dance music’s focus on the texture of rhythm to create pop music crafted around a few simple elements that nevertheless completely fill the audio spectrum; the music is sparse but inviting, like a well appointed living room in an old home. Instead of saying “far out” this music asks you to gaze “far in,” trippy, but introspective and connective.

3. Nala Sinephro – Space 1.8

I mentioned above that 2021 was the year of ambient jazz, and as much as Pharaoh Sanders and Floating Points are respective icons, this years best ambient jazz record was from newcomer Nala Sinephro, and it wasn’t even close. Sinephro plays modular synth and harp, so the Alice Coltrane comps are inevitable (not a bad thing!), but Sinephro crafts a sound all her own by giving equal weight to the “ambient” as she does to the “jazz.” It helps the album also features multiple horn players, including current stalwart of the London scene Nubya Garcia, which helps keep Space 1.8 grounded in the red-hot present of London jazz. In the late ‘50s jazz entered its “cool” phase with Miles’ Birth of the Cool, and it seems like ambient can be to 2020s jazz what cool was to the ‘50s. Instead of emphasizing speed and virtuosity, this is music that reveals in tone and mood. Instruments float into and out of the mix, as the whole thing just seems to levitate. Sinephro is an impressive new talent, and I can’t wait to see where she goes from here. Ladies and gentlemen, we are floating in Space 1.8.

2. Tyler, the Creator – Call Me if You Get Lost

I used to champion Kanye on these pages because he was out there swinging for the fences on each successive release, wildly changing up his style from album to album but still putting out pop masterpieces despite all the various styles he was experimenting with. Now that Kanye has receded into gospel mediocrity (I actually enjoyed moments on Donda, but not the entirety of the experience) that mantle of “King of Pop” has passed to Tyler, the Creator. I LOVED Igor when it came out, and now that more time has passed I think its arguably the best album of the last 5 years, if not the last 10. Just as Igor was a radical stylistic shift for Tyler, Call Me if you Get Lost is an equally big swerve, even if it brings him squarely back into the lane of quote-unquote “rap.” The opening run of “SIR BOUDELAIRE” through “LUMBERJACK” is peerless hip-hop perfection (my favorite being “CORSO”). Then, the album takes a sharp turn into flute-featuring Cali chill with “HOT WIND BLOWS” (featuring an amazing verse from Wayne, himself continuing a recent return to form). I could do with a little less DJ Drama across the album, but his silly non sequiturs are a fun throw back to Wayne’s mixtape days, so I can’t really complain. Finally, things come to a fascinating (penultimate) conclusion on “WILSHIRE,” with its nearly nine minute narration of the speaker’s fascination with a non-single lady. The autobiographical has always played a key role in Tyler’s public image and music, so I understand the internet’s fascination with who the subject of “WILSHIRE” is supposed to be, but in a key showing of Tyler’s growth, the music stands all on its own without having to take recourse to his personal backstory to explain its import. “We got our toes out!”

1. W.H. Lung – Vanities

I haven’t seen Vanities get a lot of love on year end lists, so let me give you the 411. W.H. Lung are a bunch of kids from Manchester who make dance music with live instrumentation. LCD Soundsytem is a clear influence, so you can understand my interest. Their 2019 debut, Incidental Music, was perfectly aight, showed some promise, but it’s on Vanities that they take their big leap. According to a profile I read on Stereogum, the members of W.H. Lung spent the run up to Vanities clubbing at a place called the White Hotel on the outskirts of Manchester, and it shows. Every track on Vanities is bursting with the energy of the club, while still being grounded in the structures and run times of “pop/rock” music. Things get off to a roaring start with opener “Calm Down” and never look back. The siren chant of “Calm Down” is ironic, as it serves to get you hyped for everything that is to come. The whole album is driven by hard charging synths and pulsing bass, which really get cooking on second track “Gd Tym.” It’s not that Vanities doesn’t have its slower moments. Just as Hot Chip perfectly melded bangers and ballads on all of their (excellent) records, W.H. Lung do the same, with the bleary-eyed “Ways of Seeing” probably my favorite song of the year. If you love New Order / having a good time, pop in Vanities and let it sweep you away to a night at the club, even if you’re just dancing alone in your own living room.