NoNewWaveNoFun Top 100 Tracks of 2023: 20-1
So here it is, Merry Christmas! Everybody's having fun (Apart from those working in the retail and service sectors). I thought I might as well try and join in with the season of goodwill and embrace what little human warmth there seems to be left in the world - so here is my final ill-thought-out gift of the year to you*.
*Unlike stockists of an unwanted Air Fryer, we don't take returns.
In the most calculated and protracted countdown of 100 of the best things of a thing committed to a blog, this one takes the mince pies. We're finally down to our top 20 tracks of the year. So take a read of why we chose them, have a listen to each track and and then you can go and crack open a beer with a Chocolate Orange and forget that this sorry rigamarole ever began.
Merry Christmas everyone!**
**Apart from the panel that docked Everton Football Club 10 points.
They can do one.
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20) Wombo - Slab
Hailing from Louisville in Kentucky, Indie Rock trio Wombo served up one of the finer EPs of the year with Slab and it's the title track that stands out. Released by the ever-reliable Fire Talk Records, the track creates a blend between a compelling groove, choppy guitars, and a nonchalantly delivered vocal.
19) William The Conqueror - Somebody Else
The lead single from their Excuse Me While I Vanish album, 'Somebody Else' saw William The Conqueror come of age with maturity. The track is as uplifting as it is doused in melancholy and sees them wade into waters previously reserved for The National with consummate ease.
18) Sparks - The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte
Legends sometimes find it hard to do anything vaguely creative when they release new material; it's not easy to get out of a creative rut when there's a financial legacy to seal as well. Thankfully, Sparks are no such band. The title track from their The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte album crackles with more inventive zest than many bands young enough to be their Grandchildren could achieve. Accompanied by a brilliant, smile-inducing video with Cate Blanchett's improvised dancing et al, it's one of their best in years.
I've Got Me - the debut album from New York's idiosyncratic folk songwriter Joanna Sternberg - took as much inspiration from the classic songs written in the Brill Building as it does from contemporaries. 'People Are Toys To You' is a fine example where the two worlds collide; the classic wry pop of Carole King being played around with by Joanna Newsome's whimsical eccentricities. A top drawer song by a top-drawer talent.
16) Young Fathers - Geronimo
Although technically released in 2022 as a single, 'Geronimo' by Young Fathers was a track on their 2023 album Heavy Heavy, so counts by default. I make the rules here remember? In all seriousness, I could have picked any of the tracks from that inventive, forward-thinking album, but it's this track - that reflects on the complexities and contrasts of life with classic Trip Hop sentiments - that hits hardest and hasn't waned since I first heard it.
15) Retropxssy - Speeding
A new artist to many, North London's Retropxssy released her 'Speeding' single in the summer; and what a single it is! Clocking in at way under 2 minutes it's the shortest track on the countdown, but not one second is wasted on this finely crafted banger. You just can't help but be swept away by its Timbaland-inspired production that should have turned many more heads than it did. Expect to see much more of her genre-defying antics in 2024.
Those of you joining us for the first time will be unaware of how NNWNF has forged links with the Brooklyn underground this year; more on that later. Two-Man Giant Squid produced one of that scene's most thrilling albums in the shape of Intro To Basement (read our review HERE) One of the undoubted standout tracks is 'Progress', an electrifying single that builds with impressive intensity and climaxes with gusto. Sure to be a moshpit favorite at any future gigs the band has planned.
13) Slaney Bay - EST
It's the bands that get better and better, slowly and deliberately that have the most pull to me and Slaney Bay seem to have that knack down. The band has been slowly improving their repertoire since their early days amid the pandemic. 'EST' is a single from their Why Does Love Mean Loss? E.P. expands their sonic palette further than they'd managed previously without swamping the songwriting and threatening to overwhelm it. A difficult trick to pull off and one that in lesser hands would fail to be so wonderfully cohesive.
Welsh Rapper/Producer/Musician/Beatboxer - and just about anything else he turns his hat to - Ren Gill, has had a hell of a year. His talent had bubbled under the surface for several years, but misdiagnosed Lime Disease and subsequent Psychosis meant fighting for his life more than fighting for his career. His second album Sick Boi managed to combine themes of personal salvation, universal truths, and blueprints for a better humanity. In the latter camp, 'Money Game Part 3' laid bare the excesses of the Post Capitalist world with wit, drama, tension, and storytelling that is fiercely intelligent, yet ultimately relatable. The video has to be experienced in full. Staggering stuff.
11) Human Interest - All My Friends
Returning with an E.P of exponential growth was East London's Human Interest, a collection of tracks that reveled in togetherness despite the existential nature of its name: Empathy Lives in Outer Space (review HERE) 'All My Friends' sticks out as the track that hangs the whole E.P together. It's a Ballard to the lonely, depressed, downtrodden; a plea to come together and find solace in each other, however difficult that may be. It's a message that is sung beautifully in unison with just the right air of melancholic, country-tinged guitars.
One of the finest songwriters of the last 20 years rarely does much wrong, so when Sufjan Stevens returned with his tenth studio album Javelin, it was almost inevitable the songs would be amongst the finest I'd hear this year. What I didn't expect was for him to produce an album just as rich and full of inventive twists and turns as any in his history. The sprawling 8-minute epic 'Shit Talk' epitomises that with increasingly complex, but beautiful arrangements of brass and woodwind illuminating a delicate tale of emotional upheaval.
9) dust - Alternator
Aussies Dust was a band I came across from this year's Focus Wales showcase festival in sunny Wrexham (Read our review HERE). A pulsating blend of post-hardcore rage, post-punk rhythms, and dark jazz discordance is not always an easy listen, but when they get it right on debut album et Cetera, etc, the rewards are tangible. The track with the hardest punch is the blistering 'Alternator' that flies out of the blocks on the b of the bang. It's an exhilarating, powerful track that doesn't let go until you're fully in its control.
8) Shelf Lives - Off The Rails
Anglo-Canadian Electro Punks Shelf Lives must have been one of the hardest-working acts on our list this year. Countless tours, festivals, and promos all lead to the late-year release of E.P. You Okay? (review HERE) - a collection that drips with anger, sarcasm, and frustration but makes you want to dance with reckless abandon. This is an effortlessly cool track and Johnny's repeated intro of "no fuckin' way man" rings around in your head for several minutes after it finishes. Sabrina's vocals are incendiary and she positively yelps out over the frantic and menacing guitar. Pure brilliance.
One of the finer debut albums of the year was from Chicago's former Youth Poet Laureate Kara Jackson; a work that combined her intricate use of carefully constructed wordplay with sparse acoustic guitars and otherworldly soundscapes. The superb 'dickhead blues' encapsulated this, with lyrics that cut to the chase about the dawning realization that someone is not as they seem. That sense is combined with a recognition that Jackson herself has become "..pretty top-notch" and deserves much better. The shift from anger at others to self-affirmation plays out with a dreamy arrangement that is designed to cushion and not smother.
6) Protomartyr - Polacrilex Kid
I'm running out of superlatives for Detroit natives Protomartyr. I rarely write about them now, because I feel like it's just too much in the way of fanboying. I'm not shy about such things, but there has to be an end somewhere right? Well, that somewhere isn't here and now. A highlight of yet another album crammed full of them - 2023's Formal Growth in the Desert - 'Polacrilex Kid' ponders life big questions under the specter of trying to give up smoking; Polacrilex being the generic name for nicotine chewing gum often used as an aid for giving up. With delivery dryer than the Desert that gives the album its name, singer/lyricist Joe Casey is never far from giving in to his demons as he bounces between love and hate over chiming guitars and a driving rhythm section.
You may have heard me wax lyrical about Brooklyn's Mary Shelley before. After seeing them four times at Focus Wales and subsequently interviewing them for our first podcast (Listen HERE), if felt like they'd completely take over the blog entirely at one point. Summer single 'Goin' To The Beach' was also in our countdown at 21, but it was the new single 'She's a Star' that gatecrashed into our top 5. An unorthodox tale of unrequited love, it's a single that sees the band at their most direct with soaring vocals, excellent melodies, and a radio-friendly sheen that takes them to a new level. With an E.P. due in 2024, there's plenty more to come from this exciting act.
4) Fever Ray - New Utensils
One-half of Electro Pop legends The Knife, Karin Dreijer went on to form the larger-than-life Fever Ray. The release of the third album Radical Romantics was a typically brash affair and their impressively theatric performance at Glastonbury saw their stock rise even further. 'New Utensils' sounds like it's been beamed down from another realm entirely; melodies dance and intertwine with each other with such insistent vigor that it's difficult to keep track at first. The complex interplay is glorious though and Dreijer's sometimes euphoric, sometimes sinister vocal inflections work perfectly. Not an easy listen, but certainly one to be persisted with. Dance music with deep intelligence and soul.
There's been a storm raging in Teeside for several years and in 2023, we finally felt the full brunt of what it had to offer. Benefits released their debut album Nails; a blistering noise and electro record that drew the battle lines clearly in the sand of the Post Brexit wasteland we now inhabit. The standout track was the single 'Warhorse', built on foundations of military drums and electronic stabs that are designed to be right in your face. Frontman Kingsley Hall is spitting feathers at the privileged elite and their sycophants on this track as he implores "Do not beg, Do not bow, Do not curtsy". Do however, find yourself inspired.
2) Ren - Seven Sins
A second entry in the top 20 for an undoubted contender for album of the year. Ren's Sick Boi saw the rapper explore the inner depths of his psyche after years of suffering from Lime Disease and Psychosis. The track that laid it bare the most was the incredible 'Seven Sins', which vividly described the pain and hallucinations that Ren experienced at his lowest points. The result is an extraordinary mish-mash of genres that showcases his impeccable wordplay, delivery, production skills, and aura. A true star has finally exploded into life in 2023 and - health permitting - Ren is far from done yet.
1) English Teacher - The World's Biggest Paving Slab
So here we are, our Top Track of 2023. It should be practically impossible to narrow this down and choose the one that had the biggest impact continually since its release and in many ways, it was. However, the choice this year was destined to come from one of this year's standout bands.
Leeds' English Teacher have been a band on many lips this year and like many buzz bands, they're sometimes talked about in such glowing terms that it's difficult to know where the hype ends and the truth begins. I'll be honest, they took a while to click with me. But when they did, I almost instantly felt like a fool.
I am a fool, but let's not get into that.
Our track of the year is 'The World's Biggest Paving Slab', a single so good that I still get the same rush of excitement I did when I first heard it. It's a song that incorporates almost everything that is great about the UK alternative music scene in 2023; Lily Fontaine's fiercely intelligent barbed lyricism, her vocals that sometimes become spoken word, soaring chorus' that positively levitate above the rest of the song, and a band that intuitively have the magic 'it' factor - whatever that may be. There's a disregard for the rule book here too: this isn't Post Punk it's got too much soul and this isn't Dream Pop it's too jagged, yet it manages to breath new life in to both tired genres. 'The World's Biggest Paving Slab' is almost the perfect Indie Rock record and I offer no apologies for saying so.
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Listen to the full 100 tracks in order or dip in at your leisure with this handily curated playlist.
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