Most record-grubbin’ folks I know are still catching up to 2020’s explosion–our cohort are still learning about the previous year’s bounty right now and likely will be til the Ides of March. In the past, I’ve usually been able to muster 10 new releases by the end of January to post as a list, but this year I was only halfway there by February’s dawning. Plus, I was flat worn out–not just from all those varied and vital slabs from the worst year in modern history, but from the worst year in modern history. Maybe we’ll look back (and the music will be able to help us do listen back) and be able to say, “We needed those tragedies, large and small, to finally motivate us to clean house”; I’m not holding my breath.

However, simply from really needed to do something to get my mind off of a layer cake of frustrations, I’ve cobbled together a Top 10 for 2021. Will any of these still be in my Top 100 on December 31? I’m less confident than ever, but could our world of musicians suffer from “striver’s fatigue”? We shall see. The simple presence of Messiaen in the list is a sign of struggle (one of my very favorite classic composers, and interpreted quite thrillingly by the group responsible–but come on!).

1. Peter Stampfel: Peter Stampfel’s 20th Century in 100 Songs
2. Various Artists: Allen Ginsberg’s The Fall of America–A 50th Anniversary Musical Tribute
3. Yvette Janine Jackson: Freedom
4. Various Artists: Indaba Is
5. Madlib: Sound Ancestors
6. Jazmine Sullivan: Heaux Tales
7. Founders: Songs for the End of Time
8. Joe Lovano, Marilyn Crispell, and Carmen Castaldi: Garden of Expression
9. Yasmin Williams: Urban Driftwood
10. Ensemble 0: Performs Julius Eastman’s Femenine