2020 Musical Wrapup | 2022 in Other Media: Music)

I’m going to go ahead and post this because I don’t think another musician will Rock My World in the next 15 days. It could always happen, but I’ll edit if that’s the case. 2023 wasn’t a huge year for discovering new artists, as I mostly listened to those I already loved. My absolute favorite from 2022, Morgan Wade, released her second album in the late summer. “Psychopath” marked a departure from moody/dark country and took her closer to the fields of rock and pop. Accordingly, she announced a tour with Joan Jett and Alanis. Allison Young, who was one of the many artists who made 2020 tolerable to me, teamed up with Joshua Lee Turner to form a band called “The Bygones”. My favorite production by them so far is a cover of “Honey Pie” by the Beatles, which is utterly adorable, but YT won’t let me embed it. Trying another video:

Favorites-since-2019-even-though-McDuck-left-them Lake Street Dive did a cover of “The Neighbor Song” that I loved the sound of Rachael Price in. Granted, Rachael Price could read the phone book and I’d think “ooh, la la”. Going to try embedding a video that will give you a hit of LSD even if it’s not the song I intended. Even better if it does, because has McDuck. (McDuck was a big part of my first LSD experience, “Walking on Broken Glass“, in 2019.)

As mentioned, Morgan did a second album with a very different sound than her original “Reckless“. It was all over the place, musically. Interesting, she has at least two songs that reference Ernest Hemingway. That’ll be a trivia question one day, surely.

For comparison, check out “Losers Look a Lot Like Me“, which is melancholy in lyrics despite the very catchy, up-beat sound — and her original sound, embodied in a song like “Mend“. Love that West Virginian accent — in her mouth, or in Sierra Ferrell’s, whose revitalization of the Old Time sound has thrilled me for the last few years.

On the exact opposite end of the spectrum — away from the raw and real to the wholly artificial and produced — this was a year AI-generated music arrived and fascinated me. Part of me knows it’s fake, part of me knows it’s unfair to the voice actors whose talents are being used without their permission to create new content, but at the same time….”MY FAVORITE CHARACTERS ARE SINGING!!!”

I listened to an absurd amount of RDR2 AI covers this year. This is “Sadie Adler” singing a song from the game, but there are also productions of ‘her’ singing 1980s country tunes like “That’s the Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia”, and of other members of the gang singing songs that are all over the place. Some fit the theme of the game (“The Highwayman”), and others are wildly anachronistic (Arthur and John singing “Old Town Road“, for instance, or Sean “I Was Born Boirnin’ Down Manor Houses” McGuire singing ‘Come Out, Ye Black and Tans”). There’s also the non-RDR2 stuff, like Frank Sinatra singing Green Day and Amy Winehouse.

Far and away the biggest musical moment for me was Star Trek Strange New Worlds‘ musical episode, “Subspace Rhapsody”. I have listened to its songs every week since the episode aired, and I was so mesmerized by it that it inspired a post. My three favorites were “Status Report”, “How Would That Feel?“, and of course — “We Are One”. The musical episode is notable because it’s not a novelty episode: there’s serious character development throughout, especially in Christine Chapel and Spock’s songs which are set to the same basic tune but at very different pitches — and are very different moods. Season 2 sold me on La’an and her actress, Christina Chong — a professional singer. She stars in “How Would That Feel?”

Also in the realm of “music from other media”, I loved the entire soundtrack of Mon Oncle, and much of Stardew Valley. The latter’s “Feast of the Winter Star” is so gosh-darn Christmassy.

Now, on the subject of new-to-me artists…..a friend sent me this music video and said “I’ve known you for fifteen years, this is your jam.” She was correct. Laufey is my jam.

In August, I heard of Oliver Anthony the same way everyone else did — but I’m surprised YT didn’t reccommend him before, since “one man, one guitar, lots of feelings” is one of the main bits of youtube I listen to — especially on channels like Western AF and Gems on VHS. At a Halloween party one of the guests and I went on an Oliver Anthony karaoke tear for a bit. Fun was had by all. Remy, the libertarian Weird Al, did an immediate parody mocking government employees. More my speed, though, was another friend who knows of my love for the Harmony Club recommending Ashley McBryde’s “Cool Little Bars”. I’ve liked most of what I’ve heard from McBryde, like “Gospel Night at the Strip Club” and “Whiskey and Country Music“. (What do you mean, country music has a drinking problem? It can stop anytime it wants.)

Rounding off the list is a piece I heard through Jazz Hop Cafe, a channel that does wonderful mood mixes. I’ve listened to their “Coffee to Go” once per day for most of the year — I’ve heard it over a hundred times, at least. One piece I heard first in one of their mixes is “Riding my Bike to the End of the World”, which has a lofi jazz sound with occasional bike bells. It’s not the sort of thing one can sing along with (unless you can do bicycle bell noises) , but I like listening to it.

Wait, wait. I can’t post this without mentioning the utterly catchy (and funny) Charlie Parr piece, “I Ain’t Dead Yet”. Just listen to the first 5 seconds and see if you can stop.