The biggest music moments of the year were all about maximalism. Whether embodied by the shocking pink of the Barbie soundtrack or the glittering costumes of Taylor Swift’s record-breaking Eras tour, pop went big in 2023.
It’s interesting, then, that so many of The Independent’s favourite albums over the past 12 months have been quieter affairs. Our writers fell for insular, pastoral folk from Flyte, Billie Marten and boygenius, the moony ballads of Lana Del Rey and Mitski, and the eerie Irish folk-rock of Lankum and Grian Chatten.
Of course, we loved the louder moments, too, immersing ourselves in the bonkers world of Psychedelic Porn Crumpets and the sexually liberated, full-throttle thrills of Janelle Monae. From ambitious orchestral works to voodoo funk and acid folk, here are our favourite albums of 2023.
30. Kesha – Gag Order
“This is where you f***ers pushed me/ Don’t be surprised if s*** gets ugly,” warns Kesha on her fifth album, Gag Order. Her rage comes after she lost a 2016 court battle seeking to be released from a contract to producer Dr Luke, whom she claims “sexually, physically, verbally, and emotionally abused” her over a decade. Produced here by Rick Rubin, the singer’s trauma squirms through a snakes’ nest of trippy, experimental electronica alive with slippery ear-worm hooks. Helen Brown
29. Psychedelic Porn Crumpets – Fronzoli
AI has taken over, man is bound for Mars and our species’ last hopes lie in the hands of a character named Captain Gravity Mouse. Welcome to the demented world of Psychedelic Porn Crumpets’ sixth album Fronzoli, the latest scrambled dispatch from the Australian psych-pop scene where Detroit garage, math punk, acid folk and sumptuous melodic psychedelia are loaded into the Large Hadron Collider and blasted into each other at intergalactic velocities. Observers will discover previously theoretical particles of Pixies, MC5, Arctic Monkeys, Pond, Tame Impala and The Beatles in the resulting fusion, and declare Fronzoli another big bang of modern psych. Mark Beaumont
28. Roisin Murphy – Hit Parade
When she turned 50 this year, Murphy found herself “amenable to some playful silliness” and made the most danceable record of her career. Her freewheeling emotions – running the gamut from joy to sorrow, spitting rage to shrugged acceptance – are set to richly textured Balearic backdrops crafted by Germany’s DJ Koze. There are funk guitars, electronic bleeps and wallops of golden brass. Murphy makes the most of her voice: it growls, purrs, swoops, and soars. She finds her inner dove on the romantic “CooCool” and repeatedly snarls “f***’s sake” in response to the various frustrations of “The House”. What fun! HB
27. Thomas Bangaltar – Mythologies
Having shed his Daft Punk helmet after the French electronic duo disbanded in 2021, Thomas Bangalter swapped synths for a symphony on his first full-length project in 20 years. Mythologies, an orchestral score composed for Angelin Preljocaj’s ballet of the same name, is an extraordinary and ambitious work that reveals the beating heart behind that robot mask. “Les Amazones” bursts with life; a flurry of violins like a thousand wings beating all at once and a cello full of character. “Le Minotaure” lowers its head in a menacing grumble of bass and snarling strings, as suspenseful as the Jaws theme. A work of Odyssean proportions, pulled off with panache. Roisin O’Connor
26. Mitski – The Land is Inhospitable And So Are We
Loaded with pedal steel, fiddle, chirruping cicadas, howling dogs, and Tex-Mex trumpet, is The Land is Inhospitable and So Are We – an album, which finds the woman widely hailed as “America’s best young songwriter” sounding like Nancy Sinatra’s vengeful ghost, as she mines a rich, dark seam of swooning Americana. The songs all feel like boozy, nocturnal confessions: “As I got older I learned I’m a drinker,” Mitski croons, “Sometimes a drink feels like family.” Later, she tries and fails to sell her soul to the devil at midnight. HB
25. The Rural Alberta Advantage – The Rise & Fall
Since Neutral Milk Hotel entered the wilderness, Toronto’s The Rural Alberta Advantage have been upholding the demented fuzz-folk mantle, albeit infused with the misty enormity of the Canadian landscape. This fifth album, The Rise & Fall, perfects their magical concoction of frantic pace, powerful folk rock songcraft, clattering noise and haunting melody, now embellished with modern synthetic touches and a fresh grandeur in the likes of “Real Life” and “10ft Tall”, a towering tune, caught mid-demolition. MB
Avelino
24. Everything But the Girl – FUSE
On their first album in 24 years, Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt make a church of their mature electronica. Songs are structured around vaulting arcs of yearning melody, shining with stained glass synths. They explore the modern challenges of “microaggressions and human transgressions”, and remind us to forgive ourselves our trespasses. The melancholy is balanced by wit and bouncy beats on tracks like “No-One Knows We’re Dancing”, about a guy driving a Fiat Cinquecento and dryly recording the lifestyle of an EU lawyer. “He does London, Paris, Munich” sings Thorn, like a sarky Sade. HB
23. The Kills – God Games
Bones rattle, hip-hop horns blast, Alison Mosshart croons like a sci-fi Siouxsie Sioux and a hex is cast on LA. If these are God’s games, the devil is the referee. Having been evolving their garage rock exotica for two decades, The Kills are virtually uncategorisable on their sixth album, God Games, where corroded dub, voodoo funk, insidious gospel, junk shop pop and even a bit of flamenco calypso (added to “Better Days” by Beck) make exhilarating experimental backdrops for Mosshart and Jamie Hince’s soulful musings on religion, tabloid infamy and lockdown paranoia. Indie rock 2.0. MB
