My 10 Favorite Albums of 2023
SZA, boygenius, Noname & more
Welcome! This year, as I’ve done the past several years, I present to you my favorite albums released since January (with one exception). I didn’t go as in-depth as I did last year in whittling down these selections; I simply listed the albums I enjoyed this year in my Notes app and put stars next to my favorites. These are those albums. As always, I’m in no way confident enough in my music taste to call these the “best” albums of the year. But they are the ones I loved more than others (in no particular order).
Without further ado, here are my favorite albums of 2023:
SZA: SOS
SZA released SOS in December 2022, but I felt most of its impact on my life throughout 2023. In February, for the first stop of her SOS tour, Elizabeth and I saw SZA at the Schottenstein Center in Columbus (Jaelani Turner-Williams wrote beautifully about the night in this Rolling Stone piece). With the venue only five minutes from our apartment, we chose comfort and went to the show in sweats. Feeling our age, we sat back and watched the teens record themselves singing along to Omar Apollo. When SZA took the stage for her first arena tour ever, she sounded amazing. Her confidence ripped through the speakers.
This surprised me because, earlier in the day, I read a fantastic piece from
that discussed SZA’s hesitancy with superstardom. But it was evident while SZA was performing, and throughout the album, that she had something to say even if they weren’t the words we would choose. This year’s Spotify Wrapped helped cement the hold “Snooze” had on my life in 2023. It’s one of those songs you can’t help but get lost in. SOS is an impressive album with so many aspects of SZA on display, and I couldn’t get enough.boygenius: the record
Earlier this year, I wrote “We’re In Love,” an essay on boygenius, friend crushes, and being known. In the piece, I wrote:
“While much has been written about boygenius’ friendship during this cycle for the band’s latest album… this recurring theme does seem to point to not only an appetite for closeness but re-contextualizing friendship in a culture that glorifies romantic love.”
The band made up of Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker & Lucy Dacus put their love for one another on full display in 2023 and produced a record—the record—that makes you want to hold your people close.
From the moment I first heard the record during a listening party and people shushed the room to ensure we could all hear, I knew this album was worth listening closely to. I didn’t want to miss any parts of it—and I’m glad I didn’t.
Larry June & The Alchemist: The Great Escape
We stood looking at the ocean from a mid-century modern home off the coast in Malibu—one we could only dream of affording. Julien stepped up behind us and let the words fall from his lips, “You can accomplish anything with a solid plan.” We spent the rest of the trip reciting different lines from The Great Escape, a rapper-producer collab between Larry June and The Alchemist: “I got different businesses,” “Now they got AI that could turn me into A.I.,” and more.
I wouldn’t say Larry June is the CEO of LLC Raps just yet, but bro’s definitely got a Forex Flow. Boardrooms over bars. Like he said on “Summer Reign,” featuring Ty Dolla $ign, “I’m more focused on ownership, not the fame.” Even though June’s music reeks of Black capitalism, his relaxed vocal tone over production from The Alchemist can make anything sound good. When he raps, “Start a corporation and bet on yourself every time,” I’m like, I don’t know, man. I guess I could.
Daniel Caesar: NEVER ENOUGH
We’d ask each other in hushed tones, “Do you still listen to Daniel Caesar?” Nine times out of ten, the answer was yes. He dared us to cancel him, but he had just released an all-time R&B album, Freudian. Many granted his wish, but I’ll be completely honest: CASE STUDY 01 still got some plays from me.
This year, upon the release of his latest full-length project, NEVER ENOUGH, Caesar finally gave what many fans considered a proper apology: “I was wrong, and I’m sorry about that… What happened, happened because I deserved it, because I knocked the domino over and set a course in motion.”
With songs like “Let Me Go” and “Always,” Caesar makes it clear why his music felt so difficult to give up in the first place. He’s always prone to take things to a weird place like he does with “Homiesexual,” a song I referenced in my boygenius essay, but the standout tracks on this album really stand out. They’re more than enough.
McKinley Dixon: Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?
“Congrats on this monumental achievement, this beautiful work in service of our folks,” Hanif Abdurraqib posted on Instagram when McKinley Dixon dropped Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!? That’s how I discovered the project.
Abdurraqib is featured on the album’s intro aptly named, “Hanif Reads Toni.” The album’s title is an homage to novels by Toni Morrison, whom Dixon calls “the greatest rapper of all time.”
As an admirer of Morrison’s literature, this album intrigued me. What I discovered was a 10-track ensemble with various expressions of jazz and the type of writing that made me want to highlight everything just like I would with a Toni novel.
For Rolling Stone, Dixon told Andre Gee, “[Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?] is the first record of mine where everything went exactly how I wanted it to go.” You can hear that satisfaction on tracks like “Run, Run, Run,” and “Live! from the Kitchen Table.” If this is your introduction to Dixon, I hope you’ll spend time with his work.
Valee & Harry Fraud: Virtuoso
Harry Fraud had a great year, also collaborating with one of my favorite rappers Curren$y on his 2023 album, VICES. For Sterogum, Tom Breihen wrote, Fraud, a regular collaborator with French Montana and others during the mixtape era, “understands the kind of bright, minimal beats that fit Valee’s very particular style.” This understanding is clear on tracks like “Vibrant,” which features Action Bronson, and “About That,” featuring 03 Greedo.
I first learned about Valee on Throwing Fits’ episode with Fake Shore Drive’s Andrew Barber, who manages the Chicago rapper. During the episode, Barber, an advocate for Chicago’s rap scene, describes Valee as the most interesting man in hip-hop. Just last year, Barber tweeted, “[Valee] says he's not doing music anymore, just sculptures.”
I’m glad that wasn’t true because we wouldn’t have gotten Valee rapping along with Saba and MAVI on “Watermelon Automobile.” Particularly this line: “Bitch not from here, she thought Ruth Chris was somebody white.” The album is filled with subtly hilarious bars like that.
Noname: Sundial
Noname has been a fascinating artist to keep up with, particularly how she navigates her politics in a music scene whose biggest stars opt for palatability. A few years back, Noname declared she didn’t want to keep performing for predominantly white crowds. “I don’t want to dance on a stage for white people.”
In the few years since then, Noname has leaned more fully into Black radicalism and revolutionary politics, primarily promoting her book club which now has multiple chapters across the United States and connects people both inside and outside carceral facilities with radical books. This year, I joined the Columbus chapter and have loved getting to build community through political education.
On Sundial, Noname seeks to deepen contradictions. But the songs are too good to keep everyone away. As Craig Jenkins wrote for Vulture, “The album’s provocations seem designed to inspire people to either think intently or just buzz off, and the play doesn’t always go as planned.” On “Namesake,” even when she calls out your favorite artists, including herself, you can’t help but bop along to the bridge. This album is multi-layered and, at the same time, still accessible.
Mick Jenkins: The Patience
Mick Jenkins opens The Patience rapping, “Ain't under no spell, I know you smell what a n—a cookin, I'm hungry as hell.” It’s clear he wants it. Even on “Pasta,” Jenkins raps at a pace that makes you want to catch your breath. It fills up your insides until you realize you’re standing and don’t know when it happened.
“He’s rapping like he has something to prove, but not to the listener, to himself,” wrote Donna-Claire for Passion of the Weiss. “He’s 32 years of age and, if I had to wager a guess, disgusted by the classification as a middle-class artist—an artist who bubbled up out of the underground but didn’t quite shatter into the upper echelon of mainstream success.”
“Fuck a concept,” Jenkins told Brandon Hill for Okayplayer. “I’m just making good music.” And it’s true. Jenkins rap his ass off on The Patience. While I’ve listened to some of his earlier projects in past years, this is the first album of his that made me believe. I’m looking forward to diving back into Jenkins’ catalog off the strength of this record.
Vada Azeem: WE FORGOT GOD WAS WATCHING.
I first heard about Vada Azeem as I started getting settled in Columbus a few years ago, but I didn’t begin spending significant time with his music until this year when my friend, Aaron, told me I needed to tap in. Aaron had gone to a listening party for Azeem’s latest album, WE FORGOT GOD WAS WATCHING. He reported back it was the real deal—and I gotta tell you, bro wasn’t lying.
WE FORGOT GOD WAS WATCHING. is a sample-heavy project but, in no ways, does it feel overdone; rather, the production feels artful—as does Azeem’s writing. Especially at a time when rappers and their fans debate André 3000’s comments about not feeling like he has anything to rap about at 48 years old, Azeem shared similar hesitations in an interview with Matter News’ Andy Downing.
“There’s an age limit the world puts on hip-hop that it doesn’t put on anything else, and it doesn’t put it on jazz or rock or country or any other genre, really,” Azeem said. “And I think I was buying into that, like, man, whatever I was able to accomplish through music, it’s over. I’m older. I have a family. Why am I rapping?”
Now further into his healing, Azeem’s latest album is him moving beyond the doubts and embracing himself as a husband and father. “I reemerged to take back everything that’s mine,” he rapped on “ARMOR of GOD.” After years of rapping as part of Fly Union and later solo as L.e. for the Uncool, it’s great to hear Azeem spit with so much clarity about who he is and what he wants.
Cleo Sol: Gold
We can’t always control how and when we hear about certain artists, but I’m glad I finally made time to listen to Cleo Sol. On a flight home recently, I pressed play on Sol’s latest album, Gold, and was immediately impressed by her voice. Soon, I realized the project was more of a devotional. Announcing the album’s release, Sol tweeted, “this album was made for God, to honour and give thanks, always.”
Back when I regularly attended church, I felt most connected to God through the music. Even now, there are times when I’m listening to a song and sense that inner fullness I’d feel during worship. Easing back into the plane seat, I rested into my body as Sol began singing, “There will be no crying.” Later in the song, she declares, “One thing that I need, is to be free / Life's a battle that don't scare me.”
Although my relationship to religion and understanding of God have evolved, Sol’s words reminded me I still want the same thing: liberation. Gold is an expression of what that freedom feels like. “Cleo Sol’s music is medicine,” wrote Jazmin Kylene for Ones to Watch. “Her soul bearing honesty, gentle compassion for the roughness of her edges, and guidance as she holds the hand of her younger self speak to a generation doing their best to do their best.”
Jorja Smith, Noname, Daniel — love this list. and thanks so much for linking out to my SZA story. in a recent newsletter, i wrote about writing it https://shinebrighthq.substack.com/p/sza-and-malibu-and-how-i-wrote-that