Best Albums of 2021 - PILOT’S PICKS
It seemed like in 2020 we pressed pause and learned how to do yoga, make bread, dig up old sounds, connect with who we really are and so on.
2021 otherwise came full of makeovers (amen) and the realisation that it would be impossible to rebuild ourselves in just a year, but it was a good start that we had time to understand that. What was not missing in 2021 were wonderful albums. Maybe you've already checked the list of the best albums of the year — and I'll tell you, it's worth using these holidays to sit down with a coffee or a drink and listen to each one carefully, because artistically speaking 2021 was delicious (or at least some pleasure was had amid so much sadness).
The PILOT Staff are here to share with you our favourite albums of the year...here we go.
SAULT - NINE
As a songwriter, I am a person attached to lyrics. I like listening to an album while reading or paying attention to the narrative. Then, I like to stop and listen to it alone before I start listening to it as background noise. The albums that I chose have this in common: a narrative that I related to or that made me think and understand something.
Generally, if you look up SAULT on music websites the first paragraph will read “the mysterious British band”. This buzz around them doesn't make much sense to me. I think the band makes a statement in their music and positioning (e.g. not giving interviews or not appearing on social media), but there is nothing mysterious about that — quite the contrary. They raise extremely clear flags in their lyrics and behaviour (or non-behaviour) making this placement part of the whole process. SAULT turned out to be my favourite and most listened to band of the year, and part of why is due to the general manifesto that they deliver.
I remember the first time I read Tzara and Hugo Ball's Dada Manifesto, an extremely artistic manifesto that I believe embodies Buddhist themes and maintains relevancy in both movements. Artistic manifestos that put a certain anarchy on the table, politicizing through art, are not the norm in the music industry. However SAULT does this without fear and has managed to not only engage, but build a loyal audience, without the usual mechanisms of the industry. NINE is an album that makes you shiver, and the fact that it was only made available for download for 99 days was genius (don’t worry, you can still find it somewhere on YouTube).
My Favourite Track: "Fear"
Carolina Souza Cruz, Head of Music.
NIGHTMARES ON WAX - SHOUT OUT! TO FREEDOM…
It wasn't intentional to choose albums that make us take a deep internal dive, but this one somehow makes me meditate without the pressure of worrying about having the correct posture, you know? I have the impression that when we start something it may be necessary to stick to a certain habit. Things really start to work when we let go and get into a flow free of constraints or preconceived ideas. This was the feeling that SOTF gave me when I first listened to it. I think that in the end, during these years confined at home, there were some themes to be observed, and this album made me observe them with love. Watching the live stream of the release (available on YouTube) confirmed this even more. The album features Greentea Peng, Haile Supreme, Mara TK, Shabaka Hutchings, Sabrina Mahfouz and Pip Millet.
My Favourite Track: “Own Me”
Carolina Souza Cruz, Head of Music.
Squirrel Flower - Planet (i)
Planet (i) is somehow an album not about the pandemic that is also the most relevant album we have. Planet (i), written mostly pre-pandemic, depicts a fictional planet called Squirrel Flower (a.k.a. Ella Williams' imagination) that she jokes that people will settle on once they’ve destroyed Earth. Marissa LoRusso of NPR points out that the theme of destruction is everywhere on this album, from the tornados of “Desert Wildflower” and floods of “To Be Forgotten,” to the breaking down and building up of her own ego on “Roadkill.”
The album opens with “I’ll Go Running,” a track about the pressures of being an artist, with the promise of being “newer than before” becoming anthemic. The record then moves through a clever take on the (sometimes crowded) category of ‘boys will be boys’ songs with “Hurt A Fly” proclaiming the freedom in being alone. In “To Be Forgotten” Ella Williams creates wildly immersive music on even the softest songs, where “Pass” and “Roadkill” could feel filler by some artists, Williams’ execution makes them sound whole. Whether you like it or not, there isn’t an afterthought to be found on Planet (i).
Planet (i) is sometimes rock, sometimes indie songwriter, sometimes both, and it is nothing if not autobiographical. Ella Williams writes about herself with the sensitivity and observation of someone on their sixth album, not their second. When talking to Stereogum about the closing track, “Starshine,” Williams offered her wise-beyond-her-24-years take:
“There’s no use in trying to make yourself small or to hide from the pains of life. You’ll
still be burned from the sun, you’ll still experience loss and sadness and all and everything. That’s the ebb and flow of life. It’s better to just live and don’t let it pass.”
My Favourite Track: “Roadkill”
Erin Pattie, Music Columnist.
Sloppy Jane - Madison
Madison was not recorded in a studio, in a bedroom, in a house, in a car, on the road, or anywhere else people have been making this year's records. It was location scouted, created for, and recorded in a cave in West Virginia. Sloppy Jane, the project of songwriter, musician, and composer Haley Dahl, belayed pianos, dangled wires of mostly analog equipment from a car, and crawled down into the cave from 3 p.m. to 8 a.m for two weeks in service of Dahl’s heartbreak-healing vision. The result is softer, fuller, and echo-ier than almost any other album this year. It’s a whole new sound from an old favorite band.
In its earliest iteration, Sloppy Jane was a punk band (that even included Dahl’s high school friend Phoebe Bridgers on bass) that wrote visceral songs like “Glitterspit,” a tale of a bulimic who eats glitter so when they purge it looks pretty. Even though the band has moved toward a full chamber rock sound for this project, that doesn’t mean Dahl has shied away from the macabre in her songwriting. From the murderous “Judy’s Bedroom” to the score-like qualities of the opening, horror has always been and continues to be an aspect of Dahl’s creations.
Madison boasts some of the more disturbing imagery of the year, like “Please tell them I was eaten by monsters in caves/That they spat up my bones and I could not be saved” in “Jesus and Your Living Room Floor” and “But yesterday, I saw a man kicking a dog in the street/And from the distance, I thought that you might be the man/And God, I wanted that dog to be me “ in “The Constable.” “Judy’s Bedroom” and “Lullaby Formica” are performed with such a tonal contrast to their subject matter that they become simultaneously funny and nightmarish, but against the piano and Dahl’s versatile voice, it never sounded so sweet.
Haley Dahl is all over this album, in the compositions, in the humor, in the lyrics, in the transitions. I think Sloppy Jane is one of the bands that has gotten us closest to full performance art and the concept album, which can be tricky to execute, and Madison could have failed if it wasn’t so earnest. There is a longstanding GoFundMe left from just before the recording of Madison where Haley Dahl said she wanted to eat the suit she wore every day for a year. The black suit she discovered in the midst of heartbreak allowed her to express the sorrow she was experiencing in a way she felt she couldn’t before. The suit Dahl wears now is velvet blue, and so maybe making an album in a cave is as healing as she says it is. For those of us who can’t hunt down all the caves in West Virginia, the gut-wrenching, celebratory, soft, and loud parts of Madison will more than suffice.
My Favourite Track: “Party Anthem”
Erin Pattie, Music Columnist.
St. Vincent - Daddy’s Home
Daddy’s Home was an album that grew on me. When the first single, “Pay Your Way In Pain” came out, I did truly think “oh no, this is going to be a bad album.” I wasn’t in love with the singles that came out or the SNL performance and as a big fan of the depth and chaos of Marry Me and songs like “Los Ageless,” I was geared up to be underwhelmed.
But then the album came out and I listened. And I listened again.
Daddy’s Home is the second collaboration between Jack Antonoff and St. Vincent, both in writing and producing. I wasn’t sure how I would feel about Annie Clark becoming a part of the Antonoff Cinematic Universe that seems to be sweeping from pop into indie and alternative, but the songs Antonoff did contribute writing to are still in line with the albums sound and writing style. But St. Vincent’s strongest songs like “Live In The Dream” and “My Baby Wants A Baby” still come together when she’s doing her own thing, offering her musings on legacy, fame, and isolation.
I fell in love with the song “Live In The Dream,” which Clark refers to as her Pink Floyd tribute and is the only track on which she is the sole vocalist. It’s a perfect encapsulation of the best parts of Daddy’s Home, boasting a minimalist style for her verses and a swelling chorus, finishing with a guitar solo that adds a layer of dynamism before fading back to the beginning piano.
It wasn’t until I saw St. Vincent live at Pitchfork that I developed a new appreciation for Daddy’s Home. “Pay Your Way In Pain” was infinitely more fun, the slower songs became a well timed dance break for the audience, and I got to see how the album fit in with her past works. “...At The Holiday Party” somehow worked in a series of MASSEDUCTION tracks. “Digital Witness” and “Down” were a natural introductory pairing. “The Melting of the Sun” and “Fear The Future” were a perfect ending.
Daddy’s Home isn’t my favorite St. Vincent album, and I don’t even know if it’s my favorite album of the year or not, but it’s certainly the album I returned to the most if my Spotify Wrapped is any indicator. The album reinforces a lot of the things I love about St. Vincent: the unique space she’s carved out in pop music, the power she has with just vocals and guitar, and the fact that I have no idea what she’ll do next. I can’t wait.
My Favourite Track: “Live In The Dream”
Erin Pattie, Music Columnist.
Faye Webster - I Know I’m Funny haha
If there was one thing I needed to learn in 2021, it was how to relax. Coming in and out of lockdowns, there was a rush of work and pressure to overcome – living life at 60 miles per hour with no break. Faye Webster’s fourth album I Know I’m Funny haha provided a well-needed escape from it all, with its breezy melodies that lull you into a deep meditative state. Webster, a 23 year old indie-folk artist from Atlanta, effortlessly weaves together human emotion and music that wouldn’t seem out of place in an NYC hotel lobby – it’s uniquely brilliant, making it my top pick for 2021. Fusing elements of indie genres with classic country and jazz isn’t an easy task, but I Know I’m Funny haha is effortless. “Better Distractions,” the album’s opening track, paints a picture of the speaker yearning and asking “will you be with me?” to that person they can’t forget. If you’re only going to listen to a track from this album, this is the one. Not only is it a comforting listen (thanks to its jazz-esque piano), but it sets the tone for the rest of the record – a beautiful, smooth rollercoaster of emotion. It was also on Obama’s annual playlist in 2020, so you know it’s that good. Other highlights include “Cheers,” for fans of the indie rock sound, and the relatable lyrics of “A Stranger”, for anyone that just wants to “cry for no reason at all.” Fans of Phoebe Bridgers and Big Thief, this is for you.
My Favourite Track: “Better Distractions”
Isadora Spencer, Music Columnist.
Fred Again - Actual Life
This album does such a beautiful job of capturing the present moment through voice memos and audio clips. It summarizes the feeling of hope and hopelessness during the pandemic in such a refreshing way and it will definitely get you off your feet.
My Favourite Track: “Angie (I've Been Lost)”
Shahar Roda, Head of Graphic Design.