Year-end lists always seem doomed to become outdated. Am I really expected to have heard all the best songs of 2022 in 2022? Itâs never going to work, theyâll seep through over the course of the following year or years. But giving it six weeks is better than nothing, so here we are in mid-late February.
1. Tomberlin, âStonedâ.
Stoned indeed: woozy, baffled, bodily undone.
2. Camp Cope, âRunning with the Hurricaneâ.
Camp Cope perfected a bassy, blunt melancholy with How to Socialise & Make Friends; here they donât so much break from that template as turn it to otherâaffirmative? aggressive?âpurposes.
3. Caroline, âGood Morning (Red)â.
The yearâs most something-new-on-every-listen song, its most capacious.
4. Christian Lee Hutson, âAge Differenceâ.
Lyric of the year: âDo my impression of John Malkovich critiquing food in prison / At first it isnât funny, then it is, and then it isnât.â
5. Big Thief, âChangeâ.
A panoply of possibilities on such a sprawling, immersive album by the absolute best in the game, but this most plaintive and stubborn lament just edges the rest.
6. Rachika Nayar ft. Maria BC, âHeaven Come Crashingâ.
Sounds for the silentest disco.
7. The Aâs, âWhy Iâm Grievingâ.
A path not taken from an archive not delved-into; a peppy sad spurt of jolly heartbreak.
8. Black Country, New Road, âSnow Globesâ.
Iâm still not sure if this songâs about going mad, getting old, living through winter, all three, or none.
9. Arctic Monkeys, âBody Paintâ.
Searching, insistent: like Alex Turnerâs got you caught in a lie.
10. Stella Donnelly, âColdâ.
This couldâve been any of Stella Donnellyâs songs where the lilt of her voice is always dropping into conversationality, but this one, where she ends the conversation, full-stop, shuts me up the most.
11. Martha, âIrreversible Motionâ.
So many of these songs are about little things, like the bones of the inner ear; this one maybe more than all the others.
12. Florist, âRed Bird Pt. 2 (Morning)â.
A delicate retrospective collage, a slow bashful loving appreciation, a puzzled amazed asking-why, a cautious comfort.
13. Aldous Harding, âFeverâ.
Aldous Hardingâs songs have this wonderful, dignified refusal to cohere; this one just lopes, or loafs, in and out of view.
14. Meg Baird, âWill You Follow Me Home?â.
The way Meg Bairdâs vocals stay half-submerged here is what gets me: âWill You Follow Me Home?â goes from lazy river to maelstrom without you quite noticing.
15. Brian Eno, âMaking Gardens Out of Silenceâ.
If you ask me, âMaking Gardens Out of Silenceâ is a panorama from the time after humans, built from salvage by whatever-comes-next.
16. Hurray for the Riff Raff, âSAGAâ.
A lot of these songs express a specifically 2022 kind of bafflement. âSAGAâ doesnât know how to get past this condition either, but itâs pushing against the boundaries.
17. Lana Del Rey, âWatercolor Eyesâ.
You think you know someoneâs schtick, but they surprise you.
18. Black Belt Eagle Scout, âMy Blood Runs Through This Land".
Alternating between wordlessness and breathlessness, either way keeping on building to something.
19. Jake Xerxes Fussell, âLove Farewellâ.
Stoic and stolid, Jake Xerxes Fussell bets on metaphor but couldâve made do with just rumble, growl and twinkle.
20. Ezra Furman, âAlly Sheedy in The Breakfast Clubâ.
Secret-telling in movie-theatre darkness.
21. Letâs Eat Grandma, âHappy New Yearâ.
Letâs Eat Grandma have the saddest synths but this oneâs rose-coloured.
22. Joshua Burnside, âLouis Mercierâ.
Time-travel klezmer-pop that jostles you like a cobbled towpath.
23. Beth Orton, âWeather Aliveâ.
When talking songs become singing songs so sylphlike and effortless.
24. Sault, âLife We Rent but Love Is Freeâ.
Sounds like certain small parts of London, for certain small moments, on busy summer days in the past.
25. Bill Callahan, âCoyotesâ.
One for slickrock and sagebrush, which are not without their romance.
26. Yard Act, âTall Poppiesâ.
A self-consciously small story, a kitchen-sink drama, a talking head, no denouĂŠment.
27. Angel Olsen, âAll the Good Timesâ.
A rhinestone widescreen production, a road movie on a soundstage.
28. Beach House, âHurts to Loveâ.
Generationally speaking, the ending of Skins series 1 still packs a fair bit of a punch, so rewriting âWild Worldâ by Cat Stevens makes more sense than youâd think.
29. The 1975, âThe 1975â.
Imagine taking âAll My Friendsâ and making it about your cock and itâs still good; that takes rare talent.
30. Craig Finn, âBirthdaysâ.
Comforting because it really is nice to know thereâs someone in this world whoâs always known you, and comforting because itâs Craig Finn doing Craig Finn stuff with his big dumb Craig Finn voice.
31. Julia Jacklin, âLydia Wears a Crossâ.
A bodily song: knees, eyes, clothes, adornments.
32. AnaĂŻs Mitchell, âOn Your Way (Felix Song)â.
You get the sense AnaĂŻs Mitchell finds nothing all that difficultâeulogising, philosophising, doing justice to a life, picking out the pithiest reminiscences, in just under three minutes she bowls it all over.
33. Billy Woods, âPollo Ricoâ.
Intrusive thoughts, compulsion to repeat. A personal history of madness.
34. Bright Eyes, âArc of Time (Time Code) (Companion Version)â.
This year Bright Eyes re-recorded some of the songs from the 2000s I love/hate the most. âArc of Timeâ gets remade without the beats or the keys, but stays smart and wry and death stays on its mind.Â
35. Fred again.., âBerwyn (all that i got is you)â.
Fred again..âs songs are urban explorations, entries to Londonâs subterrene.
36. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, âSpitting Off the Edge of the Worldâ.
37. The Big Moon, âLadye Bayâ.
38. Drive-By Truckers, âThe Driverâ.
39. Ethel Cain, âAmerican Teenagerâ.
D. H. Lawrence wouldâve liked Ethel Cain and her Great American Hauntedness.
40. Girlpool, âButterfly Bulletholesâ.
Such a shame to lose Girlpool in 2022 but they were four or five bands in just two people, they gave us a lot.
41. The Beths, âExpert in a Dying Fieldâ.
This one speaks for itself.
42. NilĂźfer Yanya, âShamelessâ.
Breathless, almost somehow fleshless, rattling ribcage xylophone.
43. Mesadorm, âSoap Operaâ.
Skew-whiff boiler-hiss robot pop.
44. Porridge Radio, âBack to the Radioâ.
Porridge Radioâs skills are in cacophony, cataclysm, crisis, ruination, disaster mismanagement.
45. Wet Leg, âToo Late Nowâ.
Every introspection needs a wise-crack or two.
46. Wilco, âTired of Taking It Out on Youâ.
Aged 29, I had chickenpox recently; I recovered but itâs made looking in the mirror interesting, all these new small markings on the same face.
47. Plains, âHurricaneâ.
The lyrics to âHurricaneâ read like an apology, but Katie Crutchfieldâs voice always sounds a little barbed to me; thatâs what makes this work, I think.
48. Daniel Avery, âHigherâ.
Frenetic travel in place.
49. Kevin Morby, âBittersweet, TNâ.
Kevin Morby hits all the requirements, he straight-Aâs being a country singer.
50. Beabadoobee, âYouâre Here Thatâs the Thingâ.
In 2023 I resolve to continue to love silly rhymes, campfire rhythms, dewdrops and holding hands.