The Best Music of 2020
The top 12 albums and 50 songs of a very strange year
Here’s the playlist of my top 50 songs of 2020 (list below, along with top 12 albums)
Every December, when I sit down to take stock of the last 12 months, my first inclination is always to describe the year that’s passed as unprecedented. From the macro— the world news stories, the political movements, the natural disasters, the economy climbing or crashing — to the individual moments — friends getting married, having children, going to grad school, buying homes, moving, changing jobs — every year, at the end of it, it just feels like so much has happened.
As adults, we lose the mile markers of time passing that we have as kids: entering a new grade, the cycle of sports seasons, and summer vacation. Meanwhile, our perception of time is always accelerating — remember how long a year felt when you were a kid? There’s this low-level, nagging terror that it wouldn’t be completely impossible to look up and realize five years have passed without you noticing.
2020 is a year where unprecedented doesn’t even begin to tell the full story. There is a near-zero risk of any of us forgetting this year anytime soon (and if we do, we certainly have much larger things to worry about). The talking heads have repeated this descriptor, along with other choice idioms that skyrocketed in popularity this year (‘the new normal’ is my personal favorite oft-repeated phrase that means nothing). All of us learned more than we ever hoped to about asymptomatic spread, comorbidities, and eventually, vaccination distribution strategy and how if we only could be more like Israel we’d be well on our way to guaranteeing summer ‘21 would be the official kickoff to the roaring 20s.
Music played a very interesting role during this very interesting year. Artists struggled with whether they should release finished albums if they weren’t able to tour. Lady Gaga initially delayed Chromatica because an arena pop album released four weeks into a global pandemic felt like it may not be reading the room. When it became clear that while we’d all prefer to dance at shows, bars, houseparties, or clubs, with that option no longer on the table, dancing in our living rooms to Rain on Me certainly beat not dancing to it at all.
Even before the pandemic hit, nostalgia was strong in music in early 2020 — The Weeknd’s Blinding Lights doesn’t officially sample A-Ha’s Take on Me, but listen to that intro and tell me it doesn’t sound like that was on heavy rotation (along with Rod Stewart’s Young Turks) when that track was being put together. The synths in The 1975’s If You’re Too Shy (Let Me Know) and Dua Lipa’s entire album (the aptly-titled Future Nostalgia) are heavily influenced by the 80s, and I’d argue their popularity is due in part to our desire for the familiar: hearing things we recognize in the midst of otherwise massive uncertainty and general chaos around us gives us comfort, and we needed as much of that as we could get this year.
Other artists created pandemic albums — Charli XCX, less than six months after releasing her latest album, declared she’d create a DIY quarantine album in six weeks, live-streaming the entire process: letting her fans hear demos, vote on art, and share feedback on song titles and singles. The entire process felt both voyeuristic and collaborative, but also like a potential future of the medium, where artist and audience co-create albums in tandem. Taylor Swift made folklore in isolation, inventing characters and worlds and telling the intertwining stories between them all in an indie-folk record that felt like a reinvention, and then did it again five months later with evermore. Each of these records provided a window into how hypercreative artists would create art when unencumbered by labels, A&R, rollout plans, and PR circuits (or, at the very least, each was orchestrated very well to make us believe this).
None of us has been to a concert for ten months at this point (excluding the hyper-wealthy, the hyper-selfish, the science-deniers, and some reckless Floridians), and the experience of music in isolation is bizarre. Was there a song of the summer for 2020 if there were no late-night communal performances on bar rooftops, raucous wedding dance floors, or sing-a-longs belting lyrics out of house party windows? (Yes, there was, and it was WAP.)
How strange is it that we haven’t heard music around groups larger than our roommates, families, or partners for almost a full year? I’ve thought about that day, when we can all safely gather and listen to music and dance together again — hearing all of these songs that we’ve individually listened to the last ten months, finally played, for the first time, in a group setting — surrounded by friends and strangers, and smiles uncovered by masks. The feeling of collective relief and elation and our appreciation for how wonderful it is to hear amplified music, surrounded by people again—I, for one, absolutely can’t wait for that. That moment will be a feeling I most certainly won’t ever forget. Unprecedented, even 😜.
Without further ado, the best music of 2020:
Top 12 albums of 2020
12. the weeknd — after hours
11. freddie gibbs — alfredo
10. dua lipa — future nostalgia
9. the strokes — the new abnormal
8. glass animals — dreamland
7. the 1975 — notes on a conditional form
6. jay electronica — a written testimony
5. taylor swift — folklore
4. mura masa — RYC
3. taylor swift — evermore
2. charli xcx — how I’m feeling now
1. mac miller — circles
Top 50 tracks of 2020
50. you’ll miss me when I’m not around — grimes
49. positions — ariana grande
48. rockstar (BLM remix) ft roddy ricch — dababy
47. something to rap about ft tyler the creator
46. 33 days ft gnash & anna clendening — keenan
45. lonely ft benny blanco — justin bieber
44. wap ft megan thee stallion — cardi b
43. you’re too precious — james blake
42. royl — chloe x halle
41. fixer upper — yard act
40. the divine chord ft mgmt, johnny marr — the avalanches
39. the scotts ft travis scott — kid cudi
38. don’t start now (regard remix) — dua lipa
37. tyler herro — jack harlow
36. laugh now cry later ft lil durk — drake
35. feel away ft james blake, mount kimbie — slowthai
34. 7 years — charli xcx
33. oceansize — oh wonder
32. chicken tenders — dominic fike
31. champagne problems — taylor swift
30. if you’re too shy (let me know) — the 1975
29. call my phone thinking i’m doing nothing better ft tame impala — the streets
28. rain on me ft ariana grande — lady gaga
27. heartless — the weeknd
26. involved. — gabriel duran
25. rington (remix) ft charli xcx, rico nasty, kero kero bonito — 100 gecs
24. life is good ft drake — future
23. the last great american dynasty — taylor swift
22. teenage headache dreams ft ellie rowsell, wolf alice — mura masa
21. enemy — charli xcx
20. bad decisions — the strokes
19. what’s poppin (remix) ft dababy, tory lanez, lil wayne — jack harlow
18. forever (separate but together) — chvrches
17. are you even real — james blake
16. blind — role model
15. happy (acoustic) — oh wonder
14. brooklyn bridge to chorus — the strokes
13. bullies — baby keem
12. the box — roddy ricch
11. going out — role model
10. mood (remix) ft justin bieber, j balvin, iann dior — 24kgoldn
9. hooligan — baby keem
8. closure — taylor swift
7. good news — mac miller
6. heat waves — glass animals
5. live like we’re dancing ft georgia — mura masa
4. looking for me — paul woolford, diplo, kareen lomax
3. claws — charli xcx
2. circles — mac miller
1. lonely star — oh wonder
🙏 Huge thanks to everyone who shared music with me this past year, and especially to Ramsay Kubal, Nathan Carter, Ramon Simms, Hillary Bush, and Marie Sbrocca for thinking of me when they found great new music throughout the year.
Here’s to hoping that the start of 2021 is in no way emblematic of the next 11.5 months, and that everyone stays safe, masks up, and gets vaccinated, and we all get to enjoy music together again when we’re on the other side of this.
