The SoundBite

Little Simz -  GREY Area In 2019, it is only fair that the best straight-up Hip-Hop album would come from Little Simz, the English MC who has been making waves for the last five years across the pond. It's a concise and breezy album, without the usual filler or purposely short tracks meant only to increase Spotify streams. In other words, in the saturated Rap community, it's a breath of fresh air, a moment where a promising young artist takes the reigns and definitively lays claim to her rightful place as one of the best of her generation. ~9.0

FKA Twigs -  MAGDALENE Coming off her lauded debut and a string of critically acclaimed EP's, Twigs has left me lukewarm for the most part (outside of a pretty surprising acting performance in 2019's   Honey Boy ). But   Magdalene   proves the exception to the rule of sophomore albums - a tight and potent futurist R&B that maintains her requisite Arca-ism's while focusing on her melodicism. Despite the left turn, Twigs ends up sounding much more comfortable, delivering most of her lines in hushed ruminations until her characteristic upper register comes pouring out. Even a Future verse can't bring her down. ~9.0

Ana Frango Elétrico -  Little Electric Chicken Heart Immediate  and carefree MBP by way of Gal Costa and Buena Vista Social Club. In her vintage mindset, Ana Frango Elétrico emerges sounding like a veteran bandleader presenting a wide array of accomplished studio-lifers. All these experts coming together for the innate honor to work under her tutelage. But in reality, Ana is only 22 years old and this is only her second studio album. Hopefully, she doesn't lose her youthful exuberance by the time she really recruits those "experts". ~9.0

Sharon Van Etten -  Remind Me Tomorrow           Of all the artists here, Sharon Van Etten may prove to be the most consistently heartbreaking and emotive. On each new album, she manages to string together long term dissolution with both triumph and loneliness in a way skirts confessionalism in favor of pure theatre. Each album seems to bring Van Etten's personal life, her eccentricities, and foibles back into the purview, but with a growing maturity and artistic confidence to help carry the load. So when Van Etten released her fifth album, one recorded during pregnancy and at the heights of her fame and artistic strength, it was sure to be exactly what we hoped to expect from the visionary artist. ~9.0

Jamila Woods -  Legacy! Legacy! Legacy! Legacy!  is Woods at her most expansive, and cerebral. Each track devoted to a famous black artist, she is able to draw from her inner turmoil and pay tribute to those who laid the groundwork for her success. As Wood's second album, it both solidifies her own legacy and that of her role in African-American culture. Legacy - ✔, Legacy -  ✔ . ~9.0

Aldous Harding -  Designer Aldous Harding, the artist, has gotten increasingly more pop-centric and approachable as her music has developed over the years. Maybe as a byproduct, Aldous Harding, the person, has become increasingly more  bizarre  and  eccentric  since her stellar sophomore album  Party .  Designer  proves to be exactly in the right place at the right time for Harding, giving her a break-out album that has led to her increasing exposure in 2019 and simultaneously her critical zenith. ~9.0

Purple Mountains -  Purple Mountains          Following David Berman's suicide, It's not that it's more clear what his thought process was behind Purple Mountains' lone release. In fact, it's always been pretty obvious what this album was about, but maybe that's what makes it so heartbreaking. An enchanting, funny and blunt fixation on death and loneliness,  Purple Mountains  is not just a swan song, but the climax of an immaculate career from one of our greatest songwriters. ~9.0

Office Culture -  A Life of C rim e S ophisti-pop by way of Brooklyn, New York ends up yielding many comparisons to the dense cityscapes of England's Joe Jackson and Prefab Sprout, but Office Culture owes more to its bureaucratic namesake than to any late-night parties. In reality,  A Life of Crime   is a drawn-out and beautiful trip through the first hour of a New Years' day spent alone at a low-lit bar outside Bed-Stuy. ~9.0

Tame Impala - The Slow Rush A lot has happened since 2015; Britain voted to leave the EU, China’s  shuttle landed on the far-side of the moon, Donald Trump was elected, Aston Martin unveiled a new electric car and Tame Impala’s Currents grew to become one of the most unlikely cross-over hits of the decade. While supporting that album the band became festival headliners and Tik Tok fodder, but in the five years since its release fans have been champing at the bit for their long-awaited follow-up. Currents proved to be a critical success as well, coming in towards the top of many year-end lists and standing out as the best album of the year by anyone not named Kendrick Lamar. But in the five years since, people have wondered what direction Kevin Parker and Co. would be taking the outfit, whether they would soldier on with the Hip Hop and  dance-oriented flavors that defined their previous album or return to the transformative psych-rock that came before it. The Slow Rush ...

Horse Lords - The Common Task If you aren’t familiar with Baltimore’s Horse Lords; up until this point, they have been positioning themselves as just one of many instrumental projects (if not a promising one) that pulls its motivation from the experimental and noise rock pioneers that came before them. Whether it be Terry Riley, La Monte Young or noted inspiration Glenn Branca, they have helped to carry the torch of those eclectic musicians who in the past were relegated to the shadows of the music press but nowadays can be respected outside of their outsider traditions. Branca himself often advocated for those talented artists who were either too weird or too unsuccessful to get anywhere, acknowledging that it would be the following generations that would discover and champion their music. Horse Lords define that sense of artistic curiosity, slowly fine-tuning their sound over time while simultaneously attempting to push off in different directions. While on2012’s self-titled debut...

Cate Le Bon -  Reward Cate Le Bon's fifth album marks her first real foray into veteran-territory, having released two break-out albums back to back,  Reward  finally gives her the chance to put her feet up. However, Reward is also the sound of ambition on a grander scale, a work that's less focused on pop earworms and more on cementing Le Bon as an iconoclast. ~9.0

Big Thief -  Two Hands The second and better of the two Big Thief albums released this year solidifies their role as bonafide Indie stalwarts, contributing one of their strongest albums yet and further cementing Adrianne Lanker's inconceivable win streak. With lead single, "Not" landing on Obama's Best of 2019 playlist and with its debut on Colbert, Big Thief prove that they are no longer anyone's best-kept secret. ~9.5

Angel Olsen -  All Mirrors One of the most beautiful and well-crafted albums by  any  singer-songwriter in recent memory, Angel Olsen's lush fourth album somehow overshadows her sublime breakout on 2016's  My Woman  and proves she's only getting better with age. If this isn't her masterpiece, I'm not sure how she can top it. ~9.5