Link to the playlist (featuring 3 songs from each of the Top 20 Albums is located at the bottom of this post.
What is the future of the album as a form of art in a world where fifteen second sped-up snippets bastardized by the users of the world's most popular application makes overnight superstars? It certainly could have seemed bleak but, that didn't stop every musician or band that didn't release something in 2021 from pulling out all the stops for their "post-Pandemic" albums. Without any non-Beyonce'/Bad Bunny/Harry Styles albums showing any staying power on the charts, the door was wide open for many other soon-to-be legacy acts to reclaim their status as heavyweights and yet, outside of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Pusha T and shockingly enough, Tears for Fears, there were more exciting NEW artists than anything else. That and a few still young blossoming acts were enough to make this massive year in music have the quality match the quantity. This year I kept the EPs separate from the LPs (though the lines between the two get blurrier with each passing year)
My Top 5 EPs of 2022 (and no, I did not cover a ton of ground here)
5. Khruangbin & Leon Bridges - Texas Moon
4. Mariah The Scientist - Buckles Laboratories Presents: The Intermission
3. FKA Twigs - Caprisongs
2. Empress Of - Save Me
1. Aldn - Good Grief
A neat mixture of funk, R&B, art pop, dance music and pop/punk-leaning hyperpop in there and here are a few of the albums that just missed the cut for the upcoming bloated countdown...
Honorable Mentions
Armani Caesar - The Liz 2
First Aid Kit - Palomino
Hot Chip - Freakout/Release
Hurray For The Riff Raff - Life On Earth
Lykke Li - Eyeye
Perfume Genius - Ugly Season
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Return Of The Dream Canteen
SZA - SOS
Zach Bryan - American Heartbreak
Again, those all actually MISSED the cut so, here are 50 albums I thought were better in 2022, good luck catching up on all the music missed along the way...
#50. Soccer Mommy - Sometimes, Forever
Standout Track: "Shotgun"
Maybe we should all call upon Rick Rubin and Oneohtrix Point Never when our sound starts to get a bit repetitive? On a total whim, The first new vinyl I've ever bought.
#49. Pool Kids - Pool Kids
Standout Track: "Talk Too Much"
A great band to get into if you miss the less experimental/harder-hitting Paramore songs of the mid-00s.
#48. Florence + The Machine - Dance Fever
Standout Track: "Girls Against God"
Now five for five on definitively good albums, Florence digs through the sounds of all her previous work for a project that could have been a greatest hits for many others.
#47. Kehlani - Blue Water Road
Standout Track: "Any Given Sunday (ft. Blxst)"
Kehlani really won me over with their third studio album, a feel-good R&B record that deserved to dominate the charts.
#46. Tears For Fears - The Tipping Point
Standout Track: "Long, Long, Long Time"
Eighteen years removed from their last release, these eighties alt-rock legends casually dropped a project nearly on par with The Hurting and Songs From The Big Chair.
#45. Yard Act - The Overload
Standout Track: "Tall Poppies"
This UK band's debut was nominated for the Mercury Prize as they breathed new, sarcastic air into the post-rock genre in 2022.
#44. Saba - A Few Good Things
Standout Track: "A Simpler Time (ft. Mereba)"
Saba becomes more melodic on his widest sounding album to date, solidifying his name in the blogosphere as one of the bigger names in rap going forward.
#43. Smino - Luv 4 Rent
Standout Track: "Ole Ass Kendrick"
Smino wears his influences on his sleeves for this ambitious, sprawling and enthralling 50-minute listen.
#42. Hatchie - Giving The World Away
Standout Track: "Lights On"
A bit of a nineties underground pop-rock throwback reminiscent of Shirley Manson's Garbage. A void that was needed to be filled in my life, personally.
#41. Benny The Butcher - Tana Talk 4
Standout Track: "Billy Joe"
"Johnny P's Caddy (ft. J. Cole)" starts an absolutely stellar run of nine out of twelve tracks produced by The Alchemist.
#40. Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul - Topical Dancer
Standout Track: "HAHA"
Sometimes the artsier, more experimental music just needs a good beat that you can dance to and Topical Dancer delivers just that with a sly wink to the listener.
#39. The Smile - A Light For Attracting Attention
Standout Track: "You Will Never Work In Television Again"
Radiohead with more lively drumming from Sons of Kemet's Tom Skinner? Sign me up.
#38. Danger Mouse & Black Thought - Cheat Codes
Standout Track: "Belize (ft. MF Doom)"
Danger Mouse belongs in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the way he effortlessly meshes his style alongside a cavalcade of musicians, now including The Roots' rap god Black Thought.
#37. Westside Gunn - 10
Standout Track: "Peppas (ft. Black Star)"
Technically his fourteenth mixtape (NOT an album?), Westside Gunn enlists on some famous friends like Run The Jewels and A$AP Rocky to add some more variety to the underground rapper's continued stretch of independent success.
#36. Rex Orange County - Who Cares?
Standout Track: "If You Want It"
A nightmarish 2022 where this feel-good record was absolutely buried by rape allegations Rex was just cleared of. Now, worth the revisit I'd avoided for months.
#35. Let's Eat Grandma - Two Ribbons
Standout Track: "Insect Loop"
The most emotionally affecting music yet for the young, experimental UK pop duo.
#34. Kevin Morby - This Is A Photograph
Standout Track: "Stop Before I Cry"
Speaking of effective emotional journeys, this deadpan-delivering indie rocker's seventh album is by far his best to date as well.
#33. Denzel Curry - Melt My Eyez See Your Future
Standout Track: "Ain't No Way (ft. 6lack, Rico Nasty, J.I.D, Jasiah and Kitty Ca$h)"
Combining western themes with a forward-thinking rap album gives Denzel Curry his breakthrough project after years of hype.
#32. Sharon Van Etten - We've Been Going About This All Wrong
Standout Track: "Come Back"
Van Etten's transition from folk music to indie pop-rock star hasn't sacrificed her artistic integrity yet and now, she has bops to go along with her long track record of darker songs.
#31. Ravyn Lenae - Hypnos
Standout Track: "Satellites"
Ravyn Lenae fits perfectly in 2022 as this year's breakthrough voice in R&B on her debut album featuring Steve Lacy, Mereba, Smino and Foushee'.
#30. Regina Spektor - Home, Before and After
Standout Track: "Coin"
Twenty years of critical acclaim and yet, this album seems to have flown under publications' radars for no reason other than... voter fatigue? Regina Spektor is a legend: before, currently and after.
#29. Sunflower Bean - Headful Of Sugar
Standout Track: "Roll The Dice"
A poptimistic look at indie rock in 2022 that doesn't feel designed for clicks as a band's genuinely underappreciated breakthrough.
#28. 070 Shake - You Can't Kill Me
Standout Track: "Stay"
070 Shake is ever so close to getting the acclaim she deserves as her sound has become finely tuned and grimier on her second LP.
#27. Pusha T - It's Almost Dry
Standout Track: "Dreamin Of The Past"
King Push dropped another album full of timeless bangers featuring pre-hate speech Kanye and post-Minions Pharrell production. This might be the most memory-holed time capsule of a 2022 album we have considering his uncertain future post-G.O.O.D. Music label.
#26. Jockstrap - I Love You Jessica B
Standout Track: "Greatest Hits"
Completely genreless music from a Black Country, New Road member and her producer friend Taylor Skye's wildly forward-thinking production. Now, we just need to work on that band name...
#25. Joji - Smithereens
Standout Track: "Glimpse Of Us"
In no way does this 29-minute, 9-track album feel like a finished project but, Joji's voice does not grow tiresome in the way that his bloated debut struggled with. Perfect music to stare out the window and reflect to.
#24. Thus Love - Memorial
Standout Track: "Family Man"
Clearly influenced by the alternative gothic bands of the 1980s, this trio's debut sounds far breezier than its predecessors.
#23. Guerilla Toss - Famously Alive
Standout Track: "Heathen In Me"
Another entirely singular standout, this noisy Boston-based art pop band had four years off to rediscover a glitchier, PC music-inspired sound and they still incorporated rock into this project seamlessly.
#22. Metric - Formentera
Standout Track: "Doomscroller"
The Canadian indie rockers' eighth album is right up there behind 2009's Fantasies as their second strongest in their 25th year of existence. "Doomscroller" stands out as my #9 song of 2022.
#21. The Districts - Great American Painting
Standout Track: "Long End"
Moments on Great American Painting, the band's fifth album sound like U2 with its larger than life sound. One of those bands that had been hiding in plain sight for me this past decade.
#20. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Cool It Down
Standout Tracks: "Wolf", "Spitting Off The Edge Of The World (ft. Perfume Genius)", "Different Today"
After a nine-year hiatus, the early-00s rock band retuned with Cool It Down, the more natural follow-up to 2009's It's Blitz! than 2013's Mosquito. "Burning" is what "Heads Will Roll" would sound like if it were about climate change while "Spitting Off The Edge Of The World" enlisted on the help of Perfume Genius for a more modern, completely original to this band sound. My lone complaint is that at eight tracks and just over a half-hour, this album was too short.
#19. Tove Lo - Dirt Femme
Standout Tracks: "True Romance", "2 Die 4", "Grapefruit"
Heralded as the first Tove Lo album that the whole family could enjoy, Dirt Femme is the least dirty yet most femme album of the expert Swedish pop songwriter. It's a shame that the "Habits (Stay High)" hasn't broken through on mainstream pop radio in years when she's following all of the right trends inadvertently in the moment. "2 Die 4" is a song that much like many of the biggest overplayed hits of 2022, reinterpreted an old song ("Popcorn" by Hot Butter) except this instance was actually an improvement with lyrics added over the original instrumental track.
#18. Beyonce' - Renaissance
Standout Tracks: "Virgo's Groove", "America Has A Problem", "Pure/Honey"
Sliding over to the dancefloor at 40, the finest living musician of today crafted an hour-long project dedicated to house music and the ballroom scene that needed a bounce-back after COVID shut down the clubs in 2020. Purely a vibes record that is some of the most fun, upbeat music to dominate the charts in years (the only thing I can think of since Lady Gaga's The Fame Monster was Dua Lipa's 2020 album, Future Nostalgia), the production, the transitions and the twists and turns on this thing ("America Has A Problem" and "Church Girl" sound NOTHING like their titles read) have made it the consensus #1 album of list season and I'm not mad at it despite preferring 17 others in this crazy stacked year.
#17. Brakence - Hypochondriac
Standout Tracks: "Introvert", "Venus Fly Trap", "5G"
A late entry into the field of contention, now 21-year old Randy Findell (aka: Brakence) dropped this album on December 2nd (2 weeks prior to his birthday) and it feels like the emo rap-adjacent hyperpop album that the very online genre has been waiting for. If you like unexpected vocal toning shifts that would otherwise sound wonky if they weren't so clearly intentional, this is the album for you. He goes from screaming the closing of "Introvert" to softly crooning on the album closer "Hypochondriac" and at that point, the sheer fluidity of both the vocals and lyrics are so familiar to the listener's ears that Hypochondriac becomes sickly beautiful in a way.
#16. J.I.D. - The Forever Story
Standout Tracks: "Kody Blu 31", "Sistanem", "Surround Sound (ft. 21 Savage and Baby Tate)"
J.I.D.'s foray into widespread critical acclaim came despite his most-played song of the year being that very awkward Imagine Dragons feature. No, the 32-year old had been bubbling under year-end lists for a while now and his third studio album delivered on all of the hype going into it. This is Atlanta's answer to Good Kid, M.A.A.D. City even if the storytelling isn't nearly as consistent, there's just as many hits and a true banger in "Surround Sound" to match the "Swimming Pools (Drank)" era of Kendrick's discography.
#15. Ari Lennox - Age/Sex/Location
Standout Tracks: "Hoodie", "Pressure", "Outside"
Ari Lennox is one of the best vocalists we have right now and her set at Coachella this year was one of my family's favorites. 2019's Shea Butter Baby I was fully on board with and should revisit more often than I have because I'm pretty sure Age/Sex/Location is the better album but, I can tell there's still an untapped level that Lennox's vocals can stretch to that we have yet to hear in studio. Keep an eye out for this 31-year old R&B star because she's ascending into superstardom before the decade is done with help from some collaborators like Jermaine Dupri, Summer Walker and J. Cole.
#14. Dehd - Blue Skies
Standout Tracks: "Stars", "Bad Love", "Window"
This ragtag group of weirdos really threw me off from what I was expecting of them as their fourth album was only my introduction to the Chicago trio. Lead singer Emily Kempf and company might be easy to pick out of a lineup of bands but, good luck guessing that they're the creators of the finest surfer rock record to come out in a very long time (seriously, what a gem of a forgotten genre!). Alternating between Kempf and Jason Balla's voices keeps their sound fresh through all 32 minutes and 34 seconds. Any longer and it might have lost a couple spots on this countdown.
#13. Beach House - Once Twice Melody
Standout Tracks: "Pink Funeral", "Illusion Of Forever", "Runaway"
These dream pop stalwarts have yet to drop a bad project eight albums deep into their run and as a personal favorite of mine, of course they were going to be high on this list. The length of this double album never bothers me and at this point if you're a fan of Beach House, you're in and if you aren't? you're out. The album cover perfectly conveys just how simplistic yet cinematic this 18-song project is that differentiates it from their previous 2018 Album of the Year (imo), 7.
#12. Wet Leg - Wet Leg
Standout Tracks: "Ur Mum", "Chaise Longue", "Too Late Now"
An internet summary of 2022 would be highlighted by Harry Styles maybe spitting on Chris Pine at the Don't Worry Darling premiere, Leo Messi doing World Cup stuff (I hate soccer but, it did dominate for a few weeks in the Winter), a montage of fluctuating gas prices and worker strikes all soundtracked by "Wet Dream". Hopefully they don't fall too in love with their own passive quirkiness ala Dry Cleaning but if they do, who cares? They can still fucking rock.
#11. Maggie Rogers - Surrender
Standout Tracks: "That's Where I Am", "Honey", "Anywhere With You"
Admittedly this one has fallen a bit flatter on revisitation but, Rogers voice soars above it all as she is going to try her damnedest to deliver off of the potential that her 2019 debut Heard It In A Past Life garnered so much praise for. "Horses" is a powerful track that gives off "Fight Song" energy without the cringe and a galactic difference in production quality. "That's Where I Am" was my #2 song of 2022. "Anywhere With You" could have fooled me into thinking Jack Antonoff produced it when he's nowhere near this album somehow. All in all, Rogers is giving a home to actual #GirlPower motivational anthems and acoustic songs with unique lyrical touches that we haven't really heard a ton of since KT Tunstall in the late-00s. I don't even think this woman has reached her zenith yet either.
#10. The Weeknd - Dawn FM
Standout Tracks: "Out Of Time", "Gasoline", "Take My Breath"
Exceeding the excess of a pop Goliath like 2020's After Hours and the biggest hit in U.S. charting history ("Blinding Lights") was not going to be easy. While Dawn FM's airplay was practically radio silence in comparison to its predecessor, this still might just be The Weeknd's best album to date. Dawn FM looks absolutely bonkers when written out but I'll try to describe it anyways... A concept album whose theme is a radio station that plays as one transitions into the afterlife DJ'ed by Jim Carrey. Yes, that Jim Carrey. Abel Tesfaye continues to be one of the most original thinkers in popular music this century and he's still got those Michael Jackson-esque vocals plus he got a spoken word interlude worthy of not skipping from frequent MJ collaborator and music icon Quincy Jones.
#9. Alt-J - The Dream
Standout Tracks: "Get Better", "Philadelphia", "Hard Drive Gold"
"Get Better" may be the only single from this album to make my end-of-year countdowns but, it was my #1 song of 2021 and that carries a ton of weight. Outside of that song, "Philadelphia" is genuinely weird and fits in with experimental classic Alt-J tracks like "Breezeblocks" while "U&Me" and "Hard Drive Gold" were great choices for singles as they both stand out for their catchiness. This is also the first album of the English band's four where I don't grow tired of Joe Newman's awkward, gangly vocal performances. A relatively restrained look for the rare 2010s indie rock band that's still scoring big critically.
#8. Little Simz - No Thank You
Standout Tracks: "X", "Broken", "Gorilla"
The latest possible entry to the Top 50 in 2022, No Thank You was released on December 12th and as a result, missed many of the biggest publications' year-end lists and to what gain? More clicks for being considered "first" in the #ListSeason market? Pathetic. This deserves way more praise or at the very least, more eyes and ears than it has received. Little Simz might just be the greatest living rapper regardless of country, gender or any other qualifiers people want to put on her music. The 28-year old's fifth album is another instant classic that still doesn't reach into commercial sounding music for more streams or clicks. She just drops bars over heavily classic instrumentals and more gospel-sounding choirs than previously hinted at on 2021's brilliant Sometimes I Might Be Introvert. She is a one-person modern day equivalent to A Tribe Called Quest.
#7. Momma - Household Name
Standout Tracks: "Speeding 72", "Rockstar", "Motorbike"
With all of the praise I've given to originality in this countdown, it feels important to note that I'm not entirely against ripping off another sound or genre just so long as it sounds excellent. Momma are a modern-day band sent from the nineties in a time machine to teach today's kids about The Breeders like they're Steve Buscemi sporting a skateboard in the local high school hallways. The singing and harmonies are pleasant enough but, the real story here is in the finely tuned garage band style of school friends Etta Friedman, Allegra Weingarten and drummer Zach CappittiFenton. Now out of college, this band's third album was my first introduction to them and it's pure comfort food for my ears with how much this band sounds like they could soundtrack a 90s-based remake of Freaks & Geeks or something of that ilk. They do not miss on a single track and it's instantly nostalgic for those times with friends that we all want to relive as these three are living it out on tour.
#6. Black Country, New Road - Ants From Up There
Standout Tracks: "Snow Globes", "The Place Where He Inserted The Blade", "Basketball Shoes"
So much internet discourse has surrounded these next two albums that it's almost nauseating to try to think of new ways to talk about either of them. Starting with Black Country, New Road's sophomore project, Ants From Up Here, the likely final album for the band's lead singer Isaac Wood, who left the band due to mental health management. If it's true that Wood is done, this album immediately jumps into the same pantheon as other seemingly one-and-done or one-record wonders (shorter-lived bands with one true classic project) like Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures or Amy Winehouse's Back To Black or even Lauryn Hill's The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. Even without that oddity being a defining trait for their record, this album could still go toe-to-toe with the (currently-in-musical-purgatory-due-to-their-lead-singer's-accusations) Arcade Fire classic albums Funeral and The Suburbs in terms of it's breadth of ideas and song lengths (No, not it's bread of sounds as in "Bread Song") and collage of instrumentation. What a way for this band to go out in it's previous form as Wood's singing sounds like a man broken on every single track, whether triumphant in tone or tragic. I just never know where the song is going from minute-to-minute on this thing and there's lyrical oddities like name-dropping Billie Eilish on multiple tracks that just keep the listener engaged on the edge of their seats like this shit is Top Gun: Maverick or something.
#5. Kendrick Lamar - Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers
Standout Tracks: "Mother I Sober (ft. Beth Gibbons of Portishead)", "We Cry Together (ft. Taylour Paige)", "Father Time (ft. Sampha)"
K. Dot goes to therapy and the world pretends to forget about another instant classic from the only Pulitzer Prize-winning musician to cameo at the Super Bowl. There's so much depth in the average Kendrick Lamar album that of course he incorporates tap-dancing all over the album. Hamilton was a massive moment for solidifying rap as having a place on broadway. Of course, there's a track that's literally the world's most toxic couple arguing over an Alchemist beat. It's not like the explicit scenery in Eminem's "Stan" was met with criticism, quite the contrary as he performed that song at the Grammy Awards with Elton John. OF COURSE, he had to sprinkle in vaccine and cancel culture bars because the only thing he said in the past five world-altering years was "Smokin' on your top fives tonight". Enlisting of the help of controversial rapper (and just overall not-good guy) Kodak Black, the world's biggest mystery artist of the moment not named Frank Ocean (Sampha), underrated actress Taylour Paige and long-unheard yet not forgotten Portishead frontwoman Beth Gibbons, this double album covered a lot of ground. It's an uncomfortable listen for everybody at completely different moments I've found and its highlights are strung about as well. As far as the concept of Kendrick pulling a Tony Soprano and getting heavily honest in his therapy sessions about sex addiction and his upbringing? It's fucking brilliant and he's the only rapper capable of doing it at this level right now though I do think he tore down some walls here, opening up the possibility for more therapeutic verses from up-and-coming rappers in the future. It doesn't feel like it now but, this COULD be the 2020s Man On The Moon: The End Of Day for how many it inspires.
#4. Alex G - God Save The Animals
Standout Tracks: "Runner", "Mission", "Blessing"
Alex G has been a bit of an underground anomaly that has grown into a favorite of mine. No, he's not pumping out projects at the same rate as King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard (23 albums in ten years) but the Philadelphia-based singer/songwriter's ninth album comes before the age of 30. Alexander Giannascoli finally got an album of his to chart on the Billboard 200 with some proper marketing behind his indie folk sound by appearing on late night talk shows and just being his charming, chill self and not some character like Mac DeMarco (who I do respect a whole lot and like quite a bit of his music but like... what's his deal and why do I have to care about what his deal is?). Much like on 2017's Rocket (now my #2 favorite Alex G album), there are plenty of glimpses into experimentation on tracks like the layered and chipmunk-ified vocal effects on intro "After All" or the heavily-distorted intro to "Blessing" that turns into a whispered nu metal track? (no seriously, what the fuck is this song?!) Alex is not done dipping his feet into the muddy waters of bluegrass country/folk music or indie rock songs that turn into college radio hits like "Runner" and I feel like this dude could keep up the quality of his sound for as long as he lives if he somehow avoids burning out.
#3. Viagra Boys - Cave World
Standout Tracks: "Creepy Crawlers", "Troglodyte", "The Cognitive Trade-Off Hypothesis"
Another concept album that definitely alienated some of the original Viagra Boys fan-base. While the Swedish post-punk rock band stuck to their lyrical themes of black comedy and describing their own sound as that of a "Punk Rock Loser" that only comes 'round to "fuck shit up", they also really started to dig into politics in a move I can only imagine was inspired by the late John Prine's influence and of course, -gestures at the state of things since the release of their previous album-. Cave World delves deep into the topics of conspiracy theories and the stubborn belief that change can be prevented and should not be as inevitable as it is. In fact, this entire album's main thesis says that we should disregard any and all progress to the point that we should revert to our "caves" and "Return to monkeys". It's all said with such boisterous sarcasm over such incredible grooves that I find it impossible to just roll my eyes and skip over, it's hilarious. If all that sounds like too much? Skip "Creepy Crawlers" and dig into "Troglodyte" instead. It's a song about the sort of people who wish to inflict harm upon others with whom they have fundamental disagreements that could easily just be thrown aside and ignored but no, the main character of this song has other ideas. If nothing else, it's a fascinating album lyrically that devolves into sheer anarchy on multiple occasions.
#2. The 1975 - Being Funny In A Foreign Language
Standout Tracks: "Part Of The Band", "All I Need To Hear", "About You"
Today's biggest band in the world (BTS is in the military and Coldplay only counts in years where they put out GOOD albums) has boomeranged from pompous to quality to annoying to thoughtful to overbearing to understated. Matty Healy and the boys have had one hell of a decade in the limelight and Being Funny In A Foreign Language seems to be their apex. With assistance from the ever-present Jack Antonoff, The 1975's sound gets turned down a bit here on their fifth album in turn for a more commercial sound. Unwilling to ultimately sacrifice all of themselves for a hit as big as 2013's "Chocolate" however, the band adds in a few TMI-lyrics to turn off the soccer moms and continues to act bizzarely on stage (eating raw meat shirtless before making out with random fans of all types) to stop the world's dads just short of considering them a real band. This is how The 1975 maintains their rabidly online, Tumblr-core fanbase all these years after Tumblr faded into irrelevancy (can we bring it back, please?). By releasing pure fan-service tracks like "Robbers" follow-up "About You" and romantic ploys like "All I Need To Hear", this band is doing the whole "Being in a band" thing pretty damn well even if this is just a glorified Bleachers greatest hits album with better singing and Phoebe Bridgers' backing vocals.
The #1 Album of 2022
Rosalía - Motomami
Standout Tracks: "Delirio Del Grandeza", "Hentai", "Saoko"
Prior to 2022, I had no opinion nor desire to cover any music from any other languages barring the few Christine & The Queens songs that she'd keep in french for her homeland. Even after hearing El Mal Querer in 2019 and liking quite a bit of it, I did not go into Rosalía's third album expecting to have any type of takeaway other than one or two bangers and maybe a showstopping vocal performance on a ballad or something involving a cool visual aspect. Instead, what I experienced on that fateful night in March was an awakening and a revelation that could change how I review music going forward. I already discussed "Saoko" as the 40th best song of 2022 but, that song went from banger to unexpected jazzy piano instrumental in no-time and threw me for a loop. Part-Yeezus, Part-22 A Million, Part-Sophie inspired, 100% Rosalía, Motomami uses the Spanish equivalent for the term "Biker Chick" and turns the entire album into a celebration of reinventing one's self in a celebration of freedom. The now 30-year old artist's third album dips into genres of Spanish music I was completely ignorant towards coming into the calendar year. Yes, reggaeton and flamenco music I was already very familiar with to the point where I'd grown tired of those genres but that's where Rosalía's voice saved the day. Bachato, Bolero, Dembow, mambo, hip-hop, art pop, electropop are all jam-packed into this thing and show up unexpectedly throughout the 16-track collection and it's not like this album went without controversy either as some Latin American listeners note her cultural appropriation as Rosalía was born in a whiter latin country, Spain. I'm not touching that topic any further but it doesn't seem like any classic album is truly a classic without some conflict whether internal (Rumors by Fleetwood Mac) or external (the reaction to Nine Inch Nails' The Downward Spiral). Do me a favor and don't ignore this album simply because of the language barrier, it's worthy of everybody's time whether you want to hear a ballad titled "Hentai" (don't google without Rosalía's name attached) or a Soulja Boy interpolation behind an acoustic guitar on "Delirio Del Grandeza". This album actually made me give Bad Bunny's record-breaking Un Verano Sin Ti the time of day (I graded it a "B") and has made me want to seek out more foreign-language albums upon future recommendations. A life-altering album and my lone A+ of 2022.
Here is a playlist featuring songs from the Top 20 Albums of 2022.
