“I would never speak for them, ‘cause I got more respect than that
These snakes get off the ground, wrap around they brother's neck for that.”

"I'm hard to please, yeah
Give me what I want."

“"Go on ahead without me.”

“I was in the whip, ridin', me and my bitch
We was listenin' to us, no one else, that's it
That's a flex, just a bit, let me talk my shit.”

"By the way, there are no money-makers on this record
This time, I’m exploring the loser’s point of view."

“You and I were together, even though we both knew better.”

“Barack Obama lookin at me. Sup?” Was there a better flex in 2020? Johnny Venus, one member of the sprawling rap collective Spillage Village, opens “Baptize” by broadcasting from the stage he knows his group deserves. “Baby, I'm a king, I'm a god, a thug,” Venus raps. “My verses will live if I die from slugs.” But Venus, along with co-rappers Doctur Dot and J.I.D., are less beatific and more prophetic on the rest of the song, looking at the domain of God from angles alternately humorous, sincere, poetic, and direct. “Baptize” encourages an empathy both revolutionary and older than our most pervasive evils: “Everybody know Jesus hang with the hoes, killers and the criminals,” Dot spits. “Gon 'head, tilt your head back, hold your breath for the ritual.” Written in quarantine, “Baptize” urges the listener to find their inner light to put our mundane and tragic present into a hopeful and healing context. — JD

“Is anybody really up for this one? If I don’t hold nothing back?” Bartees Strange asks rhetorically as he sprints headfirst into the blockbuster chorus of “Mustang.” It’s a calling card for Strange’s cathartic brand of indie rock and an anthem for anyone who has decided to embrace any element of life with all the energy they can muster. Strange has made the choice to forge forward in life. “Mustang” urges you to do the same.

On “Chill” Popcaan paints a picture of where most of us would have rather been this past summer: worry-free on a Jamaican beach. FIXTAPE’s opening track is fun and airy, its xylophone clinks offering up the perfect backdrop for the dancehall star to find a groove, foreground his laidback delivery, and unleash one of the album’s catchiest hooks. “Nah do no work / Nuh inna work mood today,” he intones. Same. — SE

“Circles,” taken from the posthumous album of the same name, finds Mac Miller in an contemplative mood as he analyzes self-destructive behavioral patterns over pillow-soft guitars and percussion. It’s bittersweet to hear someone we lost so young be so self-aware, but Miller’s inherent humanity shines through — as does his desire to grow artistically. — DR

Putting an overdue end to a shitty relationship is tricky, but Nigerian singer Tems puts her best foot down over bouncy Afropop production on “Damages.” With her pattering delivery, she self-assuredly reminds her ex what he’ll be missing out on (“Can you be wise / cos I’m a prize bebe,”) before taking on the track’s soaring hook — perfect for singing along at the top of your lungs when you’re over it, too. — SE

Much of what you need to know about Michigan punks Dogleg can be found in the video for “Kawasaki Backflip,” which is set in a garage and mostly features the band smashing shit up with baseball bats. Watch it on mute and you’ll probably still get some sense of guitarist and lead singer Alex Stoitsiadis’s voice, the way he bears his teeth as he hunches into his lyrics suggesting that there’s something purgative about his delivery. With the sound all the way up, though, you’ll understand why Dogleg were one of the year’s most captivating rock bands. They hurry through riffs and fills in a way that belies the doubts that Stoitsiadis so clearly carries in his lyrics. “We can destroy this together / But you don't talk to me!” he screams before the chorus kicks. Fifteen seconds later, he can be seen beating a skateboard into splinters with a mallet, quite happy to destroy things on his own. — ARR

Every immaculately rendered image on Winston Cook-Wilson’s “Good Guess” — "They're building that building with that tiny crane / From phony stone and plastic panes” — leads to a hopeless misapprehension: “Good guess, lover, try again.” The Brooklyn-based songwriter has always been reverential of the past, but, as he realizes that he’s stuck with nothing but photos and memories and regrets, that reverence melts away, his piano chords decomposing and breaking apart, leaving upright bassist Carmen Rothwell and electric guitarist Ryan Beckley to solo and improvise in their wake. With this pared down band, Cook-Wilson is confident enough to take real risks with his structure and delivery. On “Good Guess,” those risks pay off to heartbreaking effect. — ARR

Although her surprise summer record folklore might have put the skill front-and-centre, rich, realist storytelling has been a significant part of Taylor Swift’s oeuvre since her earliest records. “dorothea,” the classic-in-waiting at the centre of Swift’s ninth album evermore, like Red’s “The Lucky One,” takes the form of a letter written to a young star. The Dorothea of the song’s title is “a queen sellin' dreams, sellin' makeup and magazines” who, years before, was beguiling the song’s unnamed narrator with those same charms. Over a bed of amiable piano and acoustic guitar that owes more than a little to The Replacements’ “Androgynous,” the song’s narrator can’t help but wonder if Dorothea was better off before she hit it big. “The stars in your eyes shined brighter in Tupelo / And if you're ever tired of bеing known for who you know / You know you'll always know me, Dorothea,” Swift sings, the lilting, run-on melody undoubtedly evermore’s most beautiful. Where the narrator of “The Lucky One” spoke with wisdom, the person addressing “dorothea” can’t help but come off as foolhardy — Tupelo “is the same as it ever was,” and Dorothea is satisfied, grown-up, in the big city. It’s a satisfying twist on a theme that Swift has been drawn to her whole career and, although far from autobiographical, is a neat vision of where she is now: empathetic, comfortable in her fame, and, as a storyteller, more vivid and generous than ever. — SD

On the pop charts, teenage angst is often represented by rap that’s overmedicated, overproduced, or both. osquinn’s “OK I’m Cool” takes a more homespun approach — a cloudy, filtered beat, vocals that seem transmitted from the loneliest corner of a party — to create an anxiety dream with a white-knuckled pace. “I got eyes on the back of my head, I can see shit, I know when to dodge, when you stab me in the back, bitch” she raps on the chorus of a song that spans paranoia and self-loathing. osquinn’s chief pursuit, however, is the desperate pursuit of an even keel: “I hate when I'm not textin' you, I hate when you're not textin' me,” she raps, “Feel like there's a barricade because I can't say anything.” The whole song thrums with the deep pain of getting a one-word response to a paragraph-long message. — JD

“I remember my life as if it's just some dreams that I don't trust.” Phil Elverum, a.k.a. Mount Eerie, is the unreliable narrator of his own musical journey on “Microphones in 2020,” a 44-minute epic poem revisiting the Microphones alias that made him a star of independent music. The moniker is just a device to probe the deeper creation of ‘Phil Elverum,’ specifically the key music and events of his life: a lonely viewing of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, seeing Stereolab and Bonny “Prince” Billy perform live, living in a “punk house” and recording songs after doing the dishes. Was he 23? 17? He can’t remember. Elverum’s vivid, flawed remembrances are especially poignant in a song that directly rejects the trappings of nostalgia. Instead, Elverum surrenders himself to currents, to the fact that some things are totally out of his control. “I will never stop singing this song,” he coos, “it goes on forever.” — JD

The story of a straight man hooking up with a gay man is usually told with pity, revulsion, or a smirk. Not so in Perfume Genius’ version: “Jason,” the highlight of Mike Hadreas’s fifth record Set My Heart On Fire Immediately, is a sweet and strange vignette that’s equally revealing of, and empathetic towards, each party involved, channelling both the titular character’s anxiety and the narrator’s mixture of pride and curiosity without condescending or moralising. Rich with detail both in its lyrics (“We were 23, Breeders on CD,” goes one line, perhaps my favorite of the year) and its instrumentation (harpsichord by Hadreas’ husband and bandmate Alan Wyffels gives this the redolence of a folktale) “Jason” draws rich narrative from the kind of moment that’s usually treated as footnote. — SD

Any conversation on the great 2-for-2s of 2020 would be remiss to leave out Lisbon-via-West London producer Nathan Jenkins, who delivered ample end-of-the-world yacht pop across a pair of fantastic EPs, We Had A Good Time and Heaven Is Over. The title track of the former is cinematic to the degree that it feels destined for an end credits sequence, minus any of the schlock associated with that. It swells with gratitude — even if Jenkins wasn’t singing on the track, his production would be enough to convince anyone that it really is better to have loved and lost, like the proverb always told us. But more than just a post-breakup balm, “We Had A Good Time” went down like a daiquiri in the typhoon of bad news that was this year. There were once good times, and good times will be had once again. — SM

If Koffee does one thing particularly well, it’s capturing moments of gratitude even in our darkest days. “Pressure” sees the wise-beyond-her-years Jamaican star leaning into the basslines of traditional reggae to combat the chaos of the world around her with a healthy dose of hope. “Mi ah send up a prayer fi betta living /I cya bawl so a betta mi sing.” And sing she does. Elevated in remix form through the addition of new vocals from reggae legend Buju Banton, “Pressure” feels powerful enough to inspire a redemption story in each of us. — SE

The fact that there were few better years than 2020 for a song featuring the hook “Fuck the boys in blue” aside, RMR’s “Rascal” was the viral hit the internet didn’t know it needed. From its tender piano interpolation of "Bless The Broken Road" by Rascal Flatts to the emotional delivery of the song’s mysterious star, “Rascal” has all the hallmarks of a timeless classic, albeit one featuring lyrics about life in the trap, scammers, and finding a plug.

The song’s visuals — full of ski masks, bulletproof vests, and lots of weapons — only add to its non-sequitur charms. “Rascal”’s confounding juxtaposition took over Twitter in no time back in February, much more for its surprising sincerity than its satire. RMR doesn’t necessarily fit the usual stereotype of a mysterious cowboy riding in to save the day but, then again, who needs a horse when you have a Wraith? — SE

Helen Ballentine wrote “Places/Plans” shortly after quitting a cool-sounding but ultimately unsatisfying job at an art gallery in Los Angeles. She was spending time at home, wondering about her future, afraid that she’d be worth less in the eyes of her peers if she didn’t have a career in the arts to pin herself to. “Do you think that I’m going places?” she asks here, doubt creeping into her delivery. “Does it matter if I'm a really good friend? / That I'm there when you call and when your shows end?” By the time Ballantine released her self-titled debut EP with this as the opening track, with the world on pause and human connections all but cut off, those questions obviously resonated more deeply. But it’s not just uncanny timing that sets “Places/Plans” apart. As delicate as a spider’s web and just as carefully constructed, it introduces Ballantine as a deeply thoughtful singer-songwriter. — ARR

It’s not clear exactly when in the last decade Bob Dylan wrote or recorded “Murder Most Foul,” the long, free-associative ballad he released by surprise in late March. In fact, across these 16 minutes, as Fiona Apple’s piano yawns and Dylan growls through American history from the Kennedy assassination on, very little makes easy sense: the detours through the Great American Songbook, the Shakespeare allusions ‘round every corner, the constant flashbacks to Dealey Plaza. So take it as an allegory or a text to be decoded if you have nothing better to do — you won’t be alone. But it’s more rewarding to hear this for what it is: a playful song rooted in disaster, one of late-era Dylan’s most beautiful and confounding pieces. — ARR

This was the first song that many people heard from Ash Gutierrez, the 15-year-old small-town North Carolinian better known as glaive, and it serves as a perfect introduction to the work he uploads to SoundCloud between Zoom classes and gaming sessions. “Astrid” burns like a sparkler, its twinkly guitar riff hurrying into a thudding, minimal chorus, looping back around, and abruptly fizzing out. The whole thing lasts 100 seconds. It also has one of the best opening lines of any song this year, though it’s easy enough to miss between Gutierrez’s slurred delivery and the sudden burst of energy from the programmed drums: “Yeah, you look so pretty in that dress, but I'd look better.” — ARR

If Spotify advertising Bladee’s three-album run this year means anything, it’s that Drain Gang vaulted wildly close to pop’s upper echelon in 2020. In an alternate timeline where touring was feasible this year, and Ecco2k had been able to open for Yves Tumor as some righteous deity originally intended, they honestly might have gotten there. It sure feels like they’ve already arrived on “Girls just want to have fun,” a euphoric collaboration between the Swedish comrades and trusted producer Whitearmor. It’s a heart-pounding mad dash toward everlasting bloom, and whether that is or isn’t out of reach is irrelevant. Their desire is ephemeral though, and as soon as they really get going, they’re already switching gears: “Let me go, you can’t hold onto ghosts / Fold in on myself, I fold so so close,” Ecco cries, piercing the clouds with his falsetto. By the time you’ve latched onto what they’re throwing down, they’re already kilometers ahead. It’s untouchable brilliance. — SM

Since the release of her debut album Introducing over a decade ago, U.S. Girls’ Meg Remy has proven herself a shrewd and ruthless critic of late capitalism, one with the ability to concisely take to task not just the symptoms of a sick society, but the cause, too. “4 American Dollars,” the funky, irresistible opening track of her seventh (and best) album Heavy Light,, perfects that form, scrutinizing the rotting wreckage of American society circa 2020 with wit and economy.

Listen to “4 American Dollars” on repeat, and you’re likely to hear a new line of commentary in Remy’s vocals, now more reminiscent of Kylie Minogue than they’ve ever been, each time. Across the song’s blistering six minutes, Remy interpolates Martin Luther King, Jr. (“You’ve gotta have boots if you wanna lift those bootstraps”) and skewers the myth of the American Dream, invokes the dollars taken liberally from workers, and alludes to the increasing indie label/major label royalty gap created by the streaming economy. (Nobody comes out of “4 American Dollars” unscathed — the track’s wry hook of “You can do a lot with 4 American dollars!” obliquely tipping the hat to its label, 4AD.) The lyrics are universal for a reason: these injustices, and thousands more, are intertwined, and can only be stopped at the root. In Remy’s world, there’s only one universal experience: “No matter how much you get to have / You will still die, and that’s the only thing.”

The song’s rich but hyper-familiar palette — a compelling melange of cocaine funk, girl-group harmonies, and the aforementioned Kylie vocals, set to a disco beat — serves, like much of Remy’s music, as sublime metaphor for a cultural climate with no ‘new’ left to mine, historical pop signifiers ricocheting off each other without context or grounding. If that sounds a little heady, don’t worry — “4 American Dollars” might be a perfect portrait of a rotten system but, with its undeniable beat and unforgettable hook, it’s a perfect escape from it, too. — SD

There are very few coups left in music, but a Beyoncé feature is definitely one of them. So it was a flex when Megan Thee Stallion revealed a remix of her already viral "Savage" with a fellow Houston icon on board. "Savage'' gives Bey the opportunity to reaffirm what we already knew — that she is one of the better major league rappers out there. She goes bar for bar with Megan, firing off lines about OnlyFans and unforgiving jeans with a bespoke wit and confidence. Meg's original verse, meanwhile, remains a masterclass in self-preservation and braggadocio. In a year when feeling cognizant of which day of the week it was — never mind being "classy," "bougie," or "ratchet" — "Savage" was a break-in-case-of-emergency pick-me-up from two artists whose connection feels completely natural. — DR

“Dragonball Durag” didn’t inspire some great revelation in me about the previous year. It is not remotely representative of 2020’s tumult and devastation. It is a silly song about an unapologetic nerd trying to get laid. Other songs on Thundercat’s fantastic It Is What It Is reveal less-goofy contours of the funk-fusion musician’s heart, from grief to love to whatever lies beyond the mortal coil. But “Dragonball Durag” is honest, too, in its sheer goofiness: Thundercat repeatedly asks the object of his affection “How do I look in my durag?” in between flexing (“Do you like my new whip? Watch me go zoom zoom” is a highlight) and admitting “I may be covered in cat hair, but I still smell good.” Thundercat delivers these lines like he was recording them naked on a bearskin rug, his bouncing bassline giving off the warmth of a roaring hearth. More than once this year, I felt like I was losing myself, but “Dragonball Durag” was always there to remind me of the power in embracing every facet of our individuality. — JD

Seven years ago, HAIM wrote the perfect commitment-phobic love song. “The Wire,” Danielle, Este, and Alana’s first great single, was a sweeping epic about freaking out at the final moment, letting something slip by because you can’t handle the pressure. Animated by a glam-rock stomp and squeaky-clean radio-rock licks, it cleanly distilled HAIM’s vision, a stadium-ready rock song about the strange, murky in-betweens of romance, not the highs or lows. The song’s tumbling hook was an alarmingly casual kiss-off: “Well, I know, I know, I know, I know, that you’re gonna be okay anyway.”

On “The Steps,” the anthemic centrepiece of the band’s third album Women In Music Pt. III, HAIM are back in the same position they were in on “The Wire,” contemplating what might be the final moments of a relationship. This time, though, a lack of commitment isn’t the problem. “The Steps” is Adam Driver and Scarlett Johannson’s punch-the-wall fight from Marriage Story, Albert Brooks and Julie Hagerty having it out at the Hoover Dam in Lost In America, the kind of knock-down drag-out that only happens when there’s too much love in the room. Achieving independence is the holy grail of breakup songs, the ultimate goal, but Danielle wields her own potential aloneness like a threat here, a false alarm to jolt some life into a despondent partner: “Every day I wake up and I make money for myself / And though we share a bed, you know that I don't need your help / Do you understand?”

Frustrated though she sounds, “The Steps” transcends the emotional muck of 7am screaming matches and thinly-veiled threats. There’s a fine grit to the production of this song, the meat-and-potatoes rock of “The Wire” stripped raw, its imperfections and nicks plain to see. Danielle, Este and Alana are singing higher than usual here, which gives their vocals an urgent, pleading, addictive quality. (It reminds me of Japandroids’ “The House That Heaven Built,” another ludicrously propulsive rock song with a melody nearly out of its singer’s reach.) That cathartic, clenched-fist rage sets “The Steps” apart as the ultimate anti-anthem: a rallying cry for anyone who has ever screamed for understanding and received nothing in return. — SD