stubermania

Amirite? But hey, even in the darkest of times, there were some bright spots—200 of them to be exact, as evinced by my playlist of the year’s most enjoyable quarantunes/COVID-core/pandemica.

Here are my Top 20 albums of 2020, from A to Yves:

The Avalanches - We Will Always Love You

The Chats - High Risk Behaviour

Death Valley Girls - Under the Spell of Joy

The Dears - Lovers Rock

The Flaming Lips - American Head

Fontaines D.C. - A Hero’s Death

Jade Hairpins - Harmony Avenue

Jessie Ware - What’s Your Pleasure

Mourning [A] BlkSTAR - The Cycle

No Joy - Motherhood

Nyssa - Girls Like Me

The OBGMS - The Ends

Owen Pallett - Island

Porridge Radio - Every Bad

Sault - Untitled (Rise)

Thurston Moore - By the Fire

TV Freaks - People

U.S. Girls - Heavy Light

Wares - Survival

Yves Tumor - Heaven to a Tortured Mind

And these were the 20 best uses of screen time to take your mind off the impending apocalypse:

American Utopia

Better Call Saul (Season 5)

Curb Your Enthusiasm (Season 10)

Da 5 Bloods

The Dark Divide

The Go-Go’s

The Good Lord Bird

The Haunting of Bly Manor

How To With John Wilson

I Know This Much Is True

I’ll Be Gone in the Dark

I May Destroy You

Industry

The Last Dance

Lovecraft Country

The Mandalorian (Season 2)

Promising Young Woman

Run

The Third Day

Zappa

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In a year where all corners of the music industry experienced unfathomable upheaval and hardship, I was grateful to have the opportunity to put my byline on these pieces:

At Stereogum: my 20th-anniversary retrospective on Primal Scream’s still-radical XTRMNR. 

At NOW Magazine: To preview of Wavelength’s 20th-anniversary celebrations, I put together a list of 10 largely forgotten albums that defined Toronto in the year 2000.

At Spotify for Artists: I spoke to several musicians about how they’ve adjusted to the new post-COVID normal. Orville Peck and Sarah Harmer shared their pointers for performing livestream shows. By contrast, Tim Burgess of The Charlatans UK, Joe Talbot of IDLES, Murray Lightburn of The Dears, and Linnea Siggelkow, a.k.a. Ellis, discussed their novel strategies for staying connected with fans while isolating—without performing. And Jehnny Beth of Savages talked about diversifying her skill set to include TV talk-show host duties. 

At Ticketmaster: A view of the COVID crisis from the promoter’s perspective—I spoke to Shaun Bowring of The Garrison and Baby G in Toronto about becoming a full-time advocate for independent venues in Canada seeking government relief.

At Pitchfork: I reviewed 25 records for the site this year, but I was especially stoked to write about Wares’ Survival, The Flaming Lips’ American Head, The Rolling Stones’ Goats Head Soup reissue, Death Valley Girls’ Under the Spell of Joy, and TV Freaks’ People. 

At Q on CBC Radio One: I produced the show’s interviews with Meg Remy of U.S. Girls, David Arquette, Lucy Liu, Machine Gun Kelly, Sam Roberts, and David Cross, among others. 

And I had a great time on the Alphabetical Fugazi podcast going deep on the Red Medicine quasi-ballad, “Forensic Scene” (while also doing a practice run of my future TED Talk, “Fugazi are The Beatles of Post-Hardcore”).  

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Though it may seem pointless to put together a Best Concerts of 2020 list, I was able to catch a few stellar sets before everything went dark (and at least one after). I can only hope my 2021 list will be a lot longer. 

Chastity @ The Casbah (1/15)

Owen Pallett @ Hamilton Winterfest (2/8)

U.S. Girls @ The Paradise Theatre (2/15)

Ellis @ The Casbah (3/5)

The Sadies @ the York Parkade rooftop (9/27)

I realize this Tumblr’s been sprouting tumbleweeds, but here’s a quick recap on my year that was, beginning with my quasi-chronological 150-track/12-hour survey of tunes that soundtracked pivotal moments of my year, made me hit "repeat" the first time I heard 'em, or simply managed to burrow their way from the background to the foreground.

Here’s my Top 20 for 2019, from A to Yves:

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Here are 11 things I worked on this year that I thought turned out pretty good. Let the hyperlinking begin!

First up—my Stereogum deep dive into Mercury Rev's star-studded full-album tribute to Bobbie Gentry.

Also at Stereogum, I wrote an appreciation for the retiring Peter Frampton, a.k.a. the most over-exposed yet underrated rock star of the '70s.

At Pitchfork, I put together a collection of The Best Rolling Stones Songs That Don't Really Sound Like The Rolling Stones.

And despite being firmly ensconced on the Pitchfork geezer beat the past couple of years, this year marked my debut for the Sunday Review. I tried to reconcile my lingering mixed feelings over Pavement's Terror Twilight here... 

...and relived the golden age of pre-millennial paranoia (and post-hardcore) with my take on ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead's Madonna.

I wrote my first feature for Bandcamp Daily on Toronto's preeminent avant-gardist-turned-soft-rock-boogie-baron Matthew 'Doc' Dunn and his psych-jazz collective The Cosmic Range.

I got to have some really illuminating conversations with some amazing musicians for Spotify for Artists. I talked to Ladan Hussein (the artist formerly known as Cold Specks) about how she found her way back to music after being diagnosed with schizophrenia.

I spoke with Murray A. Lightburn about what it's like to often be the only person of colour at your own shows.

And I talked to Sharon Van Etten and The National's Aaron Dessner about why taking your kids on the road isn't the ideal way to achieve a work/life balance.

At Spotify for the Record, I put together a beginner's guide for Anglo listeners on delving into the (now streamable) back catalogue of Lucio Battisti, aka the Italian Gainsbourg/Scott Walker/Bowie/Billy Joel.

And over at the CBC Radio One program Q, I produced this interview with Peaches about her 20th anniversary, which also included a handy life-hack for getting around saying the word "jizz" on public radio.

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Lastly, these were my 10 favourite shows of the year: 

Orville Peck w/ Persons @ The Casbah, 1/4

Laraaji @ Boxcar Sound, 4/13 (represented here by a pre-performance photo of his glorious gong)

TV Freaks w/ Absolutely Free @ This Ain’t Hollywood, 4/18

Danko Jones @ Club Absinthe, 5/7

The National @ Pier 8, 6/22

Tame Impala @ Budweiser Stage, 7/26

Fontaines DC @ The Phoenix, 9/13

Fly Pan Am @ This Ain’t Hollywood, 9/25

Stereolab @ Danforth Music Hall, 10/2