Bingo Little’s Best Of 2023

Here we all are again at the awards show at the end of the universe. A peek into the other side of the Afterword, away from all the banjos and beards and whatnot, to a land populated by an insufferable Gen Xer with an inelegant Peter Pan complex and a deeply unfashionable belief that music not only did not reach its zenith in the 70s but has in fact only continued to improve with the passage of time.

If you’d each like to look under your seat, you’ll find a crate of rotten produce to reflect your indignation and a vuvuzela to help drown out the atrocious racket with will shortly emanate from this thread. Those among your number less temperamentally inclined to what we all know lies ahead are advised to seek the nearest exit post haste. Those made of sturdier stuff are advised to buckle up, pour yourself a stiff one and dive on in.

2023 was a year of highs and lows. Lots of parties, lots of laughs, some fabulous days out in fabulous company, but also having to watch friends and family go through tough times, and trying to find the best way to support them. The post-Covid world feels a little darker and harsher and more people than previously seem to be, to crib from Paul Simon, struggling from here to get there. We can’t always help that journey, but I’ve done my best to ensure that those in my orbit are at least not lonely along the way.

On the music front, I thought it was a strong year, but then I always do. There was certainly greater competition than previously for a spot on this list – in certain years past it’s more or less written itself, whereas this time round there’s been quite a bit of “kill your darlings” action. Regrettably no place for the likes of Lil Yachty’s mind-blowing “Black Seminole”, Wednesday’s “Hot Rotten Grass Smell”, Sampha’s “Spirit 2.0” or anything at all from the likes of boygenius, Caroline Polachek, Tove Lo, Suki Waterhouse, Kaytramine, or the wonderful Yaeji. Huge absences, one and all.

But this is the end of year list; hard decisions must be made. And with that understood, let’s see what made the cut.

1. Rumble – Skrillex, Fred Again

“Rumble” was released on 4 January 2023, marking what must surely be the soonest into a year I’ve ever heard a song and known it would make this list.

It’s a weird tune with a super distinct vibe that sort of sits between a few genres, but that bass and that vocal were just undeniable from the off. It was everywhere in 2023, and when I look back at the year I suspect it’ll be the first track that jumps to mind. Plus: it enabled the year to begin with a lyrical Ribena reference. An immediate classic, all told.

Oh, and while I’m here the Skrillex album was a proper return to form with some absolute monsters on it too.

2. Freedom 2 – Kwengface, Joy Orbison, Overmono

The sound of Summer 2023 from where I was sat, this record received more play than is decent and delighted me every single time. Two Step production and a Drill flow – what a concept. More of this in 2024 please.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9Ym7YZ7PMc

3. Blow Out – Overmono

Overmono supplied a number of contenders for this year’s playlist. Their album, “Good Lies” was frequently on the proverbial turntable right across 2023, they ably assisted on the beat for “Freedom 2” (above), and their fondness for attack dogs in their cover art was also greatly appreciated.

Blow Out eventually got the nod over the likes of “Is U” and “So U Kno”, partly because it eschewed textspeak in its title, but mainly because it didn’t really sound like anything else I heard this year; a humming, rattling, pressure cooker of a track which hopefully signposts the future for their sound. Bonus points for the vocal, which sounds like it’s saying “fish” at the end of each line of the verse.

Overmono also served up the best Boiler Room set of 2023. Check it out, it’s epic. Can’t wait to see what they do next, and hopefully get the chance to catch them live.

4. Baby Again – Fred Again, Skrillex

If 2022 was the year Fred Again began to break through, 2023 was the year he went fully supernova. At the start of last year he seemed surprised to draw a few thousand to his shows. By this Summer, he was drawing Biblical crowds at Glastonbury and selling out the Ally Pally for multiple nights.

Inevitably, this provoked a backlash (most amusingly in the descriptor “Emo House Coldplay”, which did raise a chortle), but it didn’t seem to put much of a dent in him. His music was everywhere this year, and his shows were further improved by his collaborations with Skrillex and Four Tet, of which this tune is but one more fruit.

“Baby Again” is the sound of a large number of people getting very excited indeed. It is EDM napalm, designed and primed to be sprayed liberally across the top of a crowd with catastrophic results. Possessed as it is of one of the great “lights out” drops in modern music, it is party rocket fuel and I absolutely bloody love it.

It’ll be interesting to see what Fred does next. His ascent has been meteoric, he has played two of the best live shows I’ve ever seen (perhaps even the best outright) and now he has his sounds and his audience the question is whether he’ll settle in or continue to experiment and find interesting musical partners. Fervently hoping for the latter.

5. Hollywood Baby – 100 Gecs

So then to what Spotify informs me is my most-played song of 2023. I believe this to be largely the work of my children, who love 100 Gecs, but I have to confess to also having a hand in bestowing that lofty honour.

I actually first heard Hollywood Baby last year at a Gecs gig, and knew it to be a bit of a banger, so it was a delight to see it formally released alongside what was, all told, a pretty decent and consistent album. Somewhere in “Hollywood Baby” I detect the unmistakeable spirit of Andrew W.K. – that combination of being too dumb to really be so dumb yet smart enough to deploy all the sonic tricks that make you want to leap around the room and overturn furniture.

“Hollywood Baby” is nothing short of a neural A-Bomb. It torches the synapses, pulverizes the cerebral cortex and returns one to a state of nature whereby the only single unifying instinct that remains is to party. And perhaps to hunt. Which would explain all the dead squirrels in my garden.

6. Meltdown – Travis Scott

Characteristically gothic in vibe and featuring a couple of great beat switches, “Meltdown” was the pick of Scott’s self-consciously Kanye-aping big return album and also gave us one of the great live music moments of 2023; Drake appearing on the balcony at a Lil Yachty show to send the crowd absolutely fucking berserk. Proper scenes.

7. Making The Band (Danity Kane) – Earl Sweatshirt

Another big step forward in the ongoing development of Earl Sweatshirt. There’s something really gratifying about watching the Odd Future kids grow up and produce work of this quality (see also: directly below).

There were a couple of other Early joints that might have made this list (shout out here to the magnificent “The Caliphate”), but in the end it had to be “Danity Kane”, because the production was unlike anything else I heard in 2023. The chittering snares, the spooky-ooky spiritual vibes, the 70s Incredible Hulk samples, the way it all just halts at the end. The perfect backing for Earl to take his flow to new levels. Can’t wait to see where he goes from here.

8. Sorry, Not Sorry – Tyler The Creator

What a strange and glorious career Tyler is having. From the enfant terrible stylings and gross out lyrics of his first chapter to the wilful experimentation of his second, and here on to the point where he’s in grave danger of starting to look like a wise elder in his early 30s.

“Sorry, Not Sorry” showed once again that he can do anything, go anywhere. Is this even a Hip Hop beat? Not really – where are the drums? It’s mainly just a single looped sample of “He Made You Mine” by Brighter Side of Darkness with Tyler chatting over the top, and yet he makes it work. No braggadocio, just a laundry list of regret and a resigned “fuck em” to sign it all off.

9. Lean Beef Patty – JPEGMAFIA, Danny Brown

The counterpoint to Sorry, Not Sorry is “Lean Beef Patty”, which has been fascinating me for months with its hyperactive, pixel art production, its absolute refusal to sit still for a moment and that almighty first drop: “This ain’t what you want/no this ain’t what you want”. Christ.

For my money, JPEG is producing some of the most interesting production out there right now; he’s right up there with Metro Boomin and the Alchemist, albeit coming from a much more Backpack direction.

Superb work here also from Danny Brown, surely in contention for the post of best MC in the game right now, and who also delivered a fantastic album of his own in 2023.

Also a truly great first line: “First off, fuck Elon Musk”. Lol.

10. Theory of Mind – Kublai Khan, Texas

The inevitable heavy tune. I remain easily pleased by neanderthal hardcore tracks where nearly everything drops out and shoves the drummer to the fore. I also like the way this song deploys the trick early, leaving plenty of time for merciless riffage. On the flip side, I have no idea what the singer is on about, and I’m too scared to look it up. It shall remain a tender mystery.

11. Kill For Your Love – Labrinth

“Kill For Love” is right up there with my very favourite songs of 2023. It’s got the lot; great production, great vocals, great lyrics. It’s even great for karaoke. It is the tune from this year which has most frequently provoked an immediate “what’s this?” from visitors to my home, and amongst the songs I have listened to most.

I am an enormous sucker for the “hey”s and “ooh” which punctuate the end of certain lines here, and for the way the whole song simply dissolves into some Scatman John action in place of a final verse. Magnificent.

12. Vampire – Olivia Rodrigo

You’ve all heard it, even (and especially) those of you pretending not to have. Another stellar vocal, another brilliant recriminatory lyric, only this time wrapped up in a song that just builds and builds and builds until the mania washes over you and you’re forced to surrender entirely. Those hammering pianos after the second verse were one of the moments of the year – I laughed out loud at the sheer unexpected joy of them.

As I listen back to “Vampire” for the thousandth time, the thought occurs that there is something of Elton John about this record. Maybe the way it’s structured, or how the piano moves from subtlety to abrasion. Or perhaps simply because it’s a tune I can readily imagine people listening to decades hence.

What a way to demonstrate you have more than one album in you.

13. Shy Boy – Carly Rae Jepsen

Not sure there is anyone active in contemporary music with stronger B-side game than CRJ. The Loveliest Time served up a number of contenders for this list (“Psychedelic Switch” represent!), but this ended up the standout. In many ways it’s Carly Rae by numbers, but when the numbers are this strong you may as well run with them.

14. Hold Me Down – Elvis Depressedly

I was pretty much down for this from the artist name onwards. There’s something of the Magnetic Fields in his work in singer-songwriter Elvis Depressedly’s work to date (check out “Sober No More”), but this felt like a new direction. The fingerclicks, the organ, the auto-tune – it’s built like a Hip Hop track, it’s so simple it must have been difficult to come up with and – most importantly – it absolutely slaps.

“Will you hold me down/I said fuck school I dropped out”. Awesome.

15. Beso – Rosalia, Rauw Alejandro

Push come to shove, this is my single favourite song of 2023.

“Vampiros” is the track that got all the attention on the mini-EP from which his hails, and “Beso” is admittedly the sort of emo Reggaeton that typically passes without too much appeal, and yet….

It’s a love song between Rosalia and Alejandro, her fiancé. The video shows their lives together, the lyrics track their apparent devotion.

“Beso” contains some of my absolute favourite imagery of the year. It’s all hysterical romance that will echo beyond the infinite, gothic majesty and teenage poetry, and I absolutely heart that about it. It also contained the following (translated) in the pre-chorus, which I have read over and over again and enjoyed each and every time.

“The best thing I’ve got
Is the love you give to me
It smells of tobacco and melon
And a Sunday in the city
If you wait for me
I could double the time
I could tie heaven up
And give it to you entirely”

“It smells of tobacco and melon/and Sunday in the city”. Utterly glorious. Something in there reminds me of the poetry of Isabel Allende.

But what really lifts it all above the rest is Rosalia’s vocal. It’s lush and strong and vulnerable. She is an impossibly gifted performer and she takes this material and sells it so hard that you really believe it, because she really seems to believe it too.

Obviously, the couple broke up within six months of this being released. Which is also perfect.

16. The Deal – Mitski

Mitski returned triumphant this year with her best album yet, incorporating a number of tracks which vied for attention and could lay claim to a place in these hallowed halls.

However, one tune among them ultimately stood alone. “The Deal” is a very odd song indeed, veering between bucolic calm and hammering sturm und drang, and it also happens to be possessed of what was unquestionably my favourite lyric of 2023. A lyric so good you could extract it from the song outright and simply publish it as a short story. It’s also concise enough that I can give you the whole thing here:

“There’s a deal you can make on a midnight walk alone
Look around, listen close, hear it fall from above
It will ask what you’d give and what you’d take for it in return
I once went on such a walk and I found that I’d said
“I want someone to take this soul
I can’t bear to keep it
I’d give it just to give
And all I will take are the consequences
Will somebody take this soul?”
Then of course, nothing replied, nothing speaks to you in the night
And I walked my way home, there was no one in sight
Save a bird perched upon a streetlight, watchin’ me
So, I stopped and let it watch ’til I found that it said
“Now I’m taken, the night has me
You won’t hear me singin’
You’re a cage without me
Your pain is eased, but you’ll never be free for
Now I’m taken, the night has me”
There’s a deal that I made
There’s a deal that I made
There’s a deal that I made
There’s a deal”

Beyond the obvious shades of Edgar Allan Poe, I love love love the idea of a story in which the narrator is simply desperate to relieve themselves of their accursed soul, and offers it up asking nothing in return. I’ve read novels with far weaker concepts than this.

There are so many beautiful uses of language here, so many memorable phrases: “I’d give it just to give/and all I will take are the consequences”, “Your pain is eased but you’ll never be free/for now I’m taken the night has me”. We need more of this type of thing; brilliant ideas, brilliantly executed.

17. Will Anybody Ever Love Me? – Sufjan Stevens

This one almost feels like cheating. Sufjan Stevens probably produces beautiful, delicate music in his sleep and this really isn’t doing anything we didn’t already know he can do. And yet….

“Will anybody ever love me/for good reasons, without grievance, not for sport/will anybody ever love me/in every season pledge allegiance to my heart/pledge allegiance to my burning heart”.

Oof. I’m very glad I didn’t hear this one as a teenager.

18. Goldie Hawn – William Prince

Apologies as I cannot recall who first posted this on the Afterword, but thank you to whoever it was because it’s beautiful and I listened to it all year. Sweet surrender indeed.

19. Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Boulevard – Lana Del Rey

I spent quite a lot of this year listening to the previous Lana album (Blue Banisters) as she seems to be producing great music quicker than I can now consume it. Consequently, the album of the same name as this song did not get the attention it clearly merits.

I know A&W is the song we’re all meant to pick here, but I’m going to trust my ever-so-civilian instincts and go for the first single. DYKTATUOB is one of my favourite things Lana has yet done, which is a high bar to clear. It sweeps in like a Summer storm blown in from the coast, rattling the shutters on the windows as it passes.

The song contains a number of lyrical moments which could very easily stand as emblems for the entire Del Rey oeuvre, most notably “Open me up/tell me you like it/fuck me to death/love me until I love myself”. At this stage in proceedings you could have simply read those words aloud and most of us would know exactly who wrote them. I mean: “Love me until I love myself” – you almost have to laugh, it’s so brilliantly on the nose.

It’s ace, she’s fantastic and I trust 2024 will be the year she’s finally recognised as probably our greatest working lyricist (narrowly edging Taylor, obvs).

20. Oral – Bjork, Rosalia

Full disclosure: this has only been out two weeks, but it blew me away on first airing and I have been listening to it non-stop ever since.

Built around a vocal originally discarded by Bjork circa Homogenic, paired with backing by Rosalia, it’s a winter swirl of ice and fire, with Sega Bodega’s production mixing strings and syncopated dancehall rhythms. It’s simultaneously warm and cold blooded, Nordic and Latin, full of self-restraint, longing and sensuality. “Just because the mind can make up whatever it wants/doesn’t mean that it’ll never come true”.

I must be getting old, because there’s something about hearing the Bjork of old sing, in this particular vocal style which she has largely abandoned in the intervening years, which turned back the clock for me and had me a little misty eyed. God, what a voice.

The video is utterly fucking terrible, but the song is majestic.

21. To Be Honest – Christine & The Queens

I suspect that for the rest of my life I will remember what it felt like to watch this song performed at close quarters. Devastation, redemption, fear, hope.

22. None of Us Have But A Little While – Lonnie Holley, Sharon Van Etten

I didn’t really know what to make of this the first time I heard it. It’s so simple and so direct that it probably shouldn’t work. Maybe it even doesn’t work, I dunno.

But it does something for me. There was more than one moment in 2023 when this song popped up on the headphones and brought peace and calm to troubled waters. “None of us have but a little while”. A-fucking-men, brother

If you’ve not heard it, please do check it out. I suspect it’s marmite, but that means at least one other person might love it.

And there we have it. To those who made it this far, I salute you. To those who have never heard of Taylor Swift, I say: may 2024 be your year. To the rest of you I say: a very Merry Christmas, and may the good lord shine a light on you. See you all back here next year for the infliction of further horrors.

I’ll see if I can get the full playlist to work in the comments.

Peace

BL

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