Music
To be perfectly honest, this whole section is probably the reason I’m doing this listicle gumbo in the first place.
In many ways, the year was pretty disappointing with many albums that had high hopes for simply failing to deliver in my books (that’s why you won’t see any Trophy Eyes or Enter Shikari on this year’s list - sorry, boys), but in other ways, it’s been a total treat.
As with every year, I’ve expected albums to storm my top ten only for them to be disrupted with shock belters. I found myself obsessed with albums that shot out of the dark (Tyler, The Creator, RAT BOY and Superorganism have become a fleeting personality of mine in the past), and this year is no different.
So, with some predictable appearances and barnstormers in tow, this is my 2023 in music.
The Land is Inhospitable and So Are We
10
Mitski
It took me a minute to engage with this record as it strips away many of the things that I love about Mitski’s songwriting, but it soon became clear that there are no absences here. Mitski pulls open her ribcage on this album, and it’s one of the year’s most tender and vulnerable albums because of it.
9
Pain of Truth
There’s little that can be said about Pain of Truth that accurately reflects what they are in the way that the opening riffs of Not Through Blood can, but take it from me - when it comes to pure, vitriolic, violent NYC-style Hardcore, nobody is doing it quite like this band right now. The album is basically a modern Hardcore mates-fest, and though for anyone else that might feel like a cop-out, it gives Pain of Truth’s new output a collaborative spirit that most bands in the genre can only dream of finding. A two-stepper’s dream.
Not Through Blood
boygenius
8
Stick Phoebe Bridgers in anything and I’ll show up, but her combo with Lucy Dacus and Julian Baker is far more enigmatic than I’d expected. It’s bizarre to call them a “supergroup” as that implies a certain flashiness - the record is anything but, and the band proves in mere moments with this album that they’re worthy of all of their praise. Indie Pop with tenderness, but that never loses track of its pulse.
the record
Green Lung
7
Never in my life has an album, in less than a few songs, made me want to crank psychedelics and swing into the air with a sword, but Green Lung has proved that my expectations of my emotions when it comes to Stoner Rock weren’t all found. A maddening concept record that holds up its atmosphere right until the end, drawing the listener into a bizarro occult world. Smoke a joint and climb onto the moors with this album blaring, and you’ll never feel closer to the history our lands were built upon. Madness.
This Heathen Land
6
Code Orange
We all knew The Above would appear here, so let’s keep shit tight - it was hard to know what to expect from Code Orange when they released the Nine Inch Nails-adjacent Take Shape (in which Billy Corgan shows up for some reason?!? cool), but I had faith that they’d push their boundary-pushing approach to metal further than ever, and they truly delivered. Every song tells a brand new story and yet never falls away from the icky enlightenment of The Above’s crinkled atmosphere. It’s hard to shape into words, so it’s lucky that Code Orange have brought it to life with an uncharacteristic clarity for their genre. Code Orange is still the future of heavy music, in case you needed a reality check.
The Above
5
Pest Control
Don’t Test The Pest by Pest Control is a G-Force test. I had no idea who they were when they opened this year’s Outbreak Fest, but they proved in moments that they’d earned their spot there with what is just some really fucking good thrash.
Reinventing the wheel is for chumps, obviously, and Don’t Test The Pest is further proof that thrash is genuinely better than ever. I would choose a speedy blast of fury like this over the oldhead picks any day, and Pest Control have proven in a short runtime doesn’t mean shit when it comes to dropping something of pure quality. The album title checks all the way out.
Don’t Test the Pest
Dying Wish
4
I have fought the corner of Dying Wish from their very first EP, and while they were once in my book the future of Hardcore, they’ve transformed into the past of Metalcore - and in all sincerity, they’re doing it better than the titans ever were.
I sincerely no longer give a shit about the Killswitch Engages and As I Lay Dyings of the world, as when bands like Dying Wish are delivering such biting, empowered, furious Metalcore in 2023, there’s no reason to look anywhere else. Emma Boster is a whirlwind and stands as one of the best vocalists in heavy music right now, and the old-school support she gets from the rest of the band elevates Symptoms of Survival not only to Dying Wish’s best record, but to one of my favourite Metalcore records of all time. They work damn quickly, and to follow them as they’ve made the changes that they’ve made to their sound has been exhilarating.
Symptoms of Survival
3
The Path to Righteousness
As one of the very first Hardcore bands I fell in love with, I knew that The Path to Righteousness would either prove this band as an EP band trapped by its style, or one that could take over the world. Grove Street is the latter.
They’re still the same band in many ways, but the ambition, grooves and tongue-in-cheek sense of humor that has made them so fun to watch grow has shot up exponentially. Another Crossover Thrash record that proves it ain’t dead, The Path to Righteousness is the most fun I’ve had with an album in 2023, turning out riffs and groves that stay danceable and violent without losing the charms of what brought fans to the doorstep of the Families in the first place. It’s been a long time to wait for a full-length, but if The Path to Righteousness proves anything, it’s that GSF still ain’t nothing to fuck with.
2
The first real shock to me this year after only knowing Sabrina Teitelbaum as the artist who made the belt-along ballad Kiss City that my girlfriend couldn’t stop playing in the car, was just how dense her style would prove to be on her self-titled record.
Borrowing from the pop culture and alt-rock stylings of the early oughts, Blondshell’s style doesn’t feel like it’s something built from stolen parts - it feels more like a loving homage to the classics. Blondshell, as a record, is humble even in spite of its razor-sharp lyrics and bombastic and emotional in equal measure. The anthems soar, but they never pull away from the heart of the record, and it’s only elevated as a whole by its diversity and effortless shifting. Blondshell caught me at the right time as I revisited the alt-rock of the ‘90s, and she’s perhaps the best modern reflection of the genre we’ve got right now.
Blondshell
1
Wisecrack
I couldn’t have predicted just how swept away I’d be by Haley Blais, and more specifically, her sophomore record Wisecrack.
Her full-length debut Below the Salt is a fun and peppy contemporary record, and while I had a good time with it, I wasn’t prepared for the introspection that would come with Wisecrack, an album that feels like a baring of the heart that you’d only get elsewhere in a therapy session. There are moments of sorrow and self-reflection here that take immense courage, and yet, there’s still enough boppy fun in Survivor’s Guilt and brash, raucous noise permeating The Cabin to keep it from sinking into a sappiness that many records in Wisecrack’s orbit have a habit of finding.
It’s been years since I’ve been so impressed by an album that knows what it is so clearly, and with a beautiful tenderness, Haley Blais has already made a record for the ages that flew too far under the radar of many. I’ve spent so many years warring albums against each other to decide my favorite album of the year, but this time, the decision couldn’t have been easier.
Before you go…
Here’s a playlist of my highlights from each of these albums, as well as a pinch from my honourable mentions. hope u like it x