There’s no denying that 2023 was the year of Taylor Swift. Her tour set all sorts of records, including here in Seattle, where she caused record-breaking seismic activity; she saved the NFL just by showing up (debatable if this is a good thing); then her concert film revitalized post-Barbenheimer cinema; and of course she was the person of the year. This was, without a doubt, peak Taylor Swift (arguably as big a peak as anyone has ever had) and while you can feel another backlash coming on (and also people just naturally starting to look for someone new to worship) as a relative newcomer, this has been a lot of fun. That said: despite releasing two albums and being the artist I listened to the most, Taylor Swift will not be appearing on my top 10 this year. And the very simple reason for that is that the majority of Swiftie-ing I did was a playlist of the Eras Tour setlist, most of which did not come out in 2023. To make up for that, I’ll give you some Taylor opinions after the break.
This summer I ranked all of Taylor’s albums, again largely based on which songs made the Eras setlist. Here they are:
- folklore
- evermore
- Red
- Fearless
- Midnights
- Lover
- 1989
- Speak Now (demerits for being two words)
- Reputation
- Taylor Swift
I feel pretty good about that, maybe I should have reviewed them all again when I wrote this post but whatever. And here are my top 10 Taylor Swift songs:
- New Romantics
- evermore
- august
- Love Story
- mirrorball
- Mastermind
- exile
- invisible string
- Red
- Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince
So yeah, folklore baby. I suffer no delusions that I’m anything but some basic bitch who fell in love with her collaborations with The National and Bon Iver. But I figured I needed to write something like this, because the truth is I spent more time on TS than any of these albums I’m about to list. Forgive me! In fact, I think maybe none of the albums I listed this year came out later than June? I just kept going back to Eras! Wow, need to refocus in 2024. OK, now for my actual top ten…
Let’s start here: Samia is an unexpected nepo baby, being the daughter of Kathy Najimy. I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING. Anyway, this album is pretty good and “Mad at Me” is one of my most-listened-to songs from last year. Could’ve put a bunch of stuff here, but I went with this. Some additional albums I liked that I think other people would say are better: Olivia Rodrigo’s GUTS, The New Pornographers’ Continue as a Guest, Meg Baird’s Furling, Kelela’s Raven, Yo La Tengo’s This Stupid World, Jamila Woods’ Water Made Us, and of course Jessie Ware’s That! Feels Good! Also, since I mentioned my stats, my #1 most-listened to song of 2023 is this one from sapphic Gundam, somehow.
I haven’t heard anything else Lil Yachty has done, but even I know enough that Let’s Start Here was a departure for the rapper. This album is much closer to psychedelic rock, definitely invoking Pink Floyd and contemporaries like Tame Impala, with whom he did a remix in 2022. I think there’s an urge in criticism to hold established artists to higher standards, even when they try something new, and I’m a bit more lax in that area (I also liked the André 3000 flute album). Fuck the comparisons to older albums or other artists, only one question matters: do I like listening to it? And the answer is yes, I listened to this album a lot, creepy AI-generated album art and all!
In a year without a new HAIM album to obsess over (they were part of my Eras playlist), The Aces are maybe the next best thing. A band led by two sisters that does pop songs about their experiences dealing with homophobia and racism? Ooh that’s some yummy yummy catnip for ol’ Seany. Sign me the hell up. By the time they got to the guitar solo on the third track, “Always Get This Way”, like my investment in a single GameStop stock, I was all in.
The Japanese House is like if Taylor Swift was actually queer and skipped directly to evermore to start her career. Working with Matty Healy and George Daniel from the 1975 and Justin Vernon from Bon Iver, her second album, In The End It Always Does, was for me a more accessible and consistent — if less cohesive — experience than her first (although my favorite track is still “Dionne” from the Chewing Cotton Wool EP). Heartache is fun!
Did your bingo card have me including anonymous South Korean shoegaze on my list? Probably. If not me, then who? Actually I could imagine John fuckin’ with this. Nobody may know who Parannoul is, but that isn’t stopping us from enjoying their fucking luscious-ass music. It’s very rare that songs that just kind of explode all over you like this are actually cathartic and soothing, but those words definitely haven’t left my mind since the first listen. It probably helps that I don’t speak Korean and have no idea what it’s all about. As above, so below.
This feels like a bit of a cheat. Every Day Like the Last is technically a compilation album, consisting of mostly songs Wye Oak has put out since their last official album, 2018’s The Louder I Call, the Faster It Runs (there are in total three brand-new songs). So it had an advantage in that I already kind of loved most of this album before it even was one. But Wye Oak is my second favorite duo in the business (new Beach House when?) and I’ve had their solo projects on my lists the last couple years so I couldn’t just NOT include an actual, official half hour from them. Do what you must, I have already won.
Without even looking up Andy Shauf (not to be confused with Andy Stack from Wye Oak), I knew he was Canadian. Only a Canuck could create such a relentlessly pleasant album. Norm just oozes warm maple syrup and ketchup-flavored chips, but in a like low-effort, casually sexy, vaguely dangerous way. Because if you pay attention to the lyrics (never recommended) it is apparently an album about a stalker. It also has one of the funniest origin stories of any album ever: Shauf wanted to write music that was a little more open to interpretation after he was confused when he watched Mulholland Drive and his computer froze for 10 minutes. Like he thought the silent, frozen screen was part of the movie. We’ve all been there, right? Good stuff!
Oh man, you’re not going to believe the incredible, true-life story of how I got into Desire, I Want to Turn Into You. I still remember it all these months later: Colin was like “have you checked the new Caroline Polachek record?” Or maybe he said album, I don’t remember that well. Colin seems like someone who would say record though, at least for music he respects. Anyway, I was like “no?” And he was like, “but I thought you liked the band Chairlift?” And I was like “what’s that got to do with anything?” And Colin was like “she’s the singer from Chairlift.” And I’ve had this on repeat ever since. It’s good to have friends!
Mid Air is the debut dance-pop album from Romy, one of the members of The xx, who, unlike Chairlift, are ostensibly still a band, so I had my ears out for more new shit from them. It’s a tribute to the gay clubs that helped Romy figure out who she was, and thus contains a bunch of music that’s gonna make you sweat. Real bops and jams and all that jazz (note: no jazz). It’s also got my favorite horny lyric of the year: “She’s on my mind but I wish she was under me.”
The boys were back in town this year so it had to be them, right? I had so much fun seeing them and Carly Rae Jepsen and Illuminati Hotties this summer. The boys have gotten a lot more popular this year (having an actual album will do that) and I enjoy how they’ve been using that power. Did you know that their promotional music video compilation video the film was directed by Kristen Stewart? Or that the music video for “Cool About It” was directed by Lauren Tsai, a former Terrace House contestant who went on to have a role in Marvel/FX’s Legion? Yeah, this is my vibe. These are my people.