Here are all of the 2020 albums that I listened to in 2020;
1 is for records that I was really into;
2 is for albums that I liked — maybe even quite a bit — but which didn’t set my world on fire;
3 is essentially the ‘thanks, but no thanks’ section
If super-long lists of titles aren’t your thing, at the end of each year I publish a more complete look at my favourite 20 albums.
1
Against All Logic — 2017-2019
Ellen Allien — Auraa
Fiona Apple — Fetch the Bolt Cutters
Daniel Avery — Love + Light
Beabadoobee — Fake It Flowers
Phoebe Bridgers — Punisher
Beach Bunny — Honeymoon
The Beths — Jump Rope Gazers
Biffy Clyro — A Celebration of Endings
Caribou — Suddenly
Oliver Coates — skins n slime
Miley Cyrus — Plastic Hearts
Dua Lipa — Future Nostalgia
Deftones — Ohms
Dogleg — Melee
Empress Of — I’m Your Empress Of
Four Tet — Sixteen Oceans
Georgia — Seeking Thrills
Selena Gomez — Rare
Grimes — Miss Anthropocene
Haim — Women in Music Pt. III
Halsey — Manic
Holy Fuck — Deleter
Joywave — Possession
K-LONE — Cape Cira
Kölsch — Now Here No Where
Melt Yourself Down — 100% Yes
Nightports & Betamax — Nightports w/ Betamax
Run the Jewels — RTJ4
Surfer Blood — Carefree Theatre
Taylor Swift — folklore
Taylor Swift — evermore
Waxahatchee — Saint Cloud
Hayley Williams — Petals for Armor
Wolf Parade — Thin Mind
2
Actress — Karma & Desire
Adulkt Life — Book of Curses
Ambrose Akinmusire — on the tender spot of every calloused moment
Algiers — There is no Year
altopalo — farawayfromeveryoneyouknow
Amaarae — The Angel You Don’t Know
Ambar Lucid — Garden of Lucid
…And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead — X: The Godless Void and Other Stories
Arca — KiCk i
Ólafur Arnalds — some kind of peace
Austra — Hirudin
Autechre — PLUS
Autechre — SIGN
Badge Époque Ensemble — Self Help
Julianna Barwick — Healing is a Miracle
William Basinski — Lamentations
The Bats — Foothills
Bent Arcana — Bent Arcana
Matt Berninger — Serpentine Prison
Jenny Beth — TO LOVE IS TO LIVE
Brandan Benson — Dear Life
Bing & Ruth — Species
Lavinia Blackwall — Muggington Lane End
Blossoms — Foolish Loving Spaces
Bohren & Dee Club or Gore — Patchouli Blue
Bombay Bicycle Club — Everything Else Has Gone Wrong
Boniface — Boniface
Bright Eyes — Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was
Brijean — Walkie Talkie
BRONSON — BRONSON
Bush — The Kingdom
Le Butcherettes — DON’T BLEED
Will Butler — Generations
Celer — Future Predictions
Cerrone — DNA
Ian Chang — 属 Belonging
Ben Chatwin — The Hum
Charli XCX — How I’m Feeling Now
Nels Cline — Share the Wealth
clipping. — Visions of Bodies Being Burned
Avishai Cohen — Big Vicious
Cold Years — Paradise
Cornershop — England is a Garden
Cut Copy — Freeze, Melt
DaBaby — BLAME IT ON BABY
Daniel Davies — Signals
Dan Deacon — Mystic Familiar
Helena Deland — Someone New
Destroyer — Have We Met
Katie Dey — mydata
Diet Cig — Do You Wonder About Me?
Dream Wife — So When You Gonna…
Bob Dylan — Rough and Rowdy Ways
Ela Minus — acts of rebellion
Elder — Omens
Eminem — Music to be Murdered By
En Attendant Ana — Juillet
Hazel English — Wake UP!
Nathan Fake — Blizzards
Field Music — Making a New World
Fleet Foxes — Shore
Fontaines DC — A Hero’s Death
Nils Frahm — Empty
John Frusciante — Maya
Future Islands — As Long As You Are
Childish Gambino — 3.15.20
Glass Animals — Dreamland
GoGo Penguin — GoGo Penguin
Ellie Goulding — Brightest Blue
Laura Jane Grace — Stay Alive
Ariana Grande — Positions
Gregor — Destiny
Guided by Voices — Mirrored Aztec
Habibi — Anywhere But Here
Half Waif — The Caretaker
Hannah — Lomelda
Heathered Pearls — Cast
The High Water Marks — Ecstasy Rhymes
Eric Holm — Surface Variations
Homeboy Sandman — Don’t Feed the Monster
Honey Cutt — Coasting
Horse Lords — The Common Task
Houses of Heaven — Silent Places
Howling — Colure
Hypoluxo — Hypoluxo
I Don’t Know How But They Found Me — Razzmatazz
Inventions — Continuous Portrait
Ital Tek — Outland
iyla — OTHER WAYS TO VENT
Nicolas Jaar — Cenizas
Nicolas Jaar — Telas
Jacaszek — Music For Film
Jaga Jazzist — Pyramid
Yves Jarvis — Sundry Rock Song Stock
Jay Electronica — A Written Testimony
Jenny O. — New Truth
Jónsi — Shiver
Faten Kanaan — A Mythology of Circles
Kehlani — It Was Good Until It Wasn’t
Madeline Kenney — Sucker’s Lunch
Alicia Keys — ALICIA
The Killers — Imploding the Mirage
Kllo — Maybe We Could
Krust — The Edge of Everything
Kygo — Golden Hour
Lianne La Havas — Lianne La Havas
La Roux — Supervision
Lady Gaga — Chromatica
Låpsley — Through Water
Adrianne Lenker — songs
Fenne Lily — BREACH
Loma — Don’t Shy Away
Loving — If I Am Only My Thoughts
Mac Miller — Circles
Laura Marling — Song for our Daughter
Rob Mazurek / Exploding Star Orchestra — Dimensional Stardust
Zara McFarlane — Songs of an Unknown Tongue
Medhane — Cold Water
METZ — Atlas Vending
Blake Mills — Mutable Set
MinaeMinae — Gestrüpp
Kylie Minogue — DISCO
Mint Julep — Stray Fantasies
Alanis Morisette — Such Pretty Forks in the Road
Mura Masa — R.Y.C.
The Naked and Famous — Recover
Nap Eyes — Snapshot of a Beginner
The Necks — Three
Nine Inch Nails — Ghosts V: Together
Nine Inch Nails — Ghosts VI: Locusts
No Age — Goons Be Gone
No Joy — Motherhood
Nothing — The Great Dismal
Noveller — Arrow
Agnes Obel — Myopia
of Montreal — UR FUN
Okay Kaya — Watch This Liquid Pour Itself
Oneohtrix Point Never — Magic Oneohtrix Point Never
Open Mike Eagle — Anime, Trauma, and Divorce
Pabst — Deus Ex Machina
Pantayo — Pantayo
Pantha du Prince — Conference of Trees
Jeff Parker — Suite for Max Brown
Patricia — Maxyboy
Pearl Jam — Gigaton
Perfume Genius — Set My Heart On Fire Immediately
Pet Shop Boys — Hotspot
Phase Fatale — Scanning Backwards
Phoxjaw — Royal Swan
Pia Fraus — Empty Parks
Laurence Pike — Prophecy
Pinegrove — Marigold
Pole — Fading
Poppy — I Disagree
Post Animal — Forward Motion Godyssey
Profligate — Too Numb to Know
Protomartyr — Ultimate Success Today
Pure Reason Revolution — Eupnea
Purity Ring — WOMB
Ratgrave — Rock
Real Estate — The Main Thing
Recondite — Dwell
Rejoicer — Spiritual Sleaze
The Rentals — Q36
Max Richter — Voices
Rival Consoles — Articulation
Romare — Home
Ana Roxanne — Because of a Flower
Rina Sawayama — Sawayama
Say Hi — Diamonds & Donuts
Loranzo Senni — Scacco Matto
Sepultura — Quadra
Shadow Show — Silhouettes
Six Organs of Admittance — Companion Rises
The Smashing Pumpkins — CYR
Sorry — 925
Bruce Springsteen — Letter to You
Squarepusher — Be Up a Hello
Squirrel Flower — I Was Born Swimming
Sufjan Stevens — The Ascension
Bartees Strange — Live Forever
The Strokes — The New Abnormal
Moses Sumney — græ
Takeleave — Belonging
Tame Impala — The Slow Rush
Thaba — Eyes Rest Their Feet
Thao & The Get Down Stay Down — Temple
This is the Kit — Off Off On
Thundercat — It Is What It Is
TOPS — I Feel Alive
Tough Age — Which Way Am I?
Trace Mountains — Lost in the Country
Rian Treanor — File Under UK Metaplasm
Tunng — Tunng Presents… Dead Club
Jeff Tweedy — Love is the King
Twin Atlantic — Power
Tycho — Simulcast
Oded Tzur — Here Be Dragons
U.S. Girls — Heavy Light
Unfolding — Initial State
Vladislav Delay — Rakka
Rufus Wainwright — Unfollow the Rules
Max de Wardener — Music for Detuned Pianos
Washed Out — Purple Noon
Ben Watt — Storm Damage
The Weeknd — After Hours
Devon Williams — A Tear in the Fabric
Hilary Woods — Birthmarks
Yamaneko — Spirals Heaven Wide
yMusic — Ecstatic Science
Yukon Blonde — Vindicator
Yves Tumor — Heaven to a Tortured Mind
070 Shake — Modus Vivendi
The 1975 — Notes on a Conditional Form
3
Katie Gately — Loom
Green Day — Father of All…
IDLES — Ultra Mono
Kesha — High Road
King Krule — Man Alive!
Lil Uzi Vert — Eternal Atake
Magnetic Fields — Quickies
Marilyn Manson — WE ARE CHAOS
Nuvolascura — As We Suffer from Memory and Imagination
Sigur Rós — Odin’s Raven Magic
The Silence — Electric Meditations
Jan St. Werner — Molocular Meditation
Wrangler — A Situation
Wrekmeister Harmonies — We Love To Look At The Carnage