Joey’s Top Ten Albums of 2022

Here it is folks, the big event. I went all in on this feature last year, and I think I’ve done even better this year. I was pretty shocked at how many very good albums I had to cut even from the honorable mentions.

You’ve maybe noticed there’s no section this year for stuff I missed in 2021. That’s because I both did a great job in 2021 and because I didn’t go back looking for a lot.

Here we go! See you next week for the best TV of 2022.

10. Wet Leg
by Wet Leg

Nothing here touches their three 2021 singles, but they apply the same lessons: the arena rock moves of “Too Late Now” are on “Angelica,” the perfect pop bullying of “Wet Dream” is on “Ur Mom,” and while they don’t repeat their mission statement “Chaise Longue,” everything here serves it in its own way. In the year where I’ve finally had it with British talky postpunk, I’m entirely relieved to receive the one with some pop sense. And “Too Late Now” comes alive as a conclusion, a sincere moment after a half hour of irony.

Listen: “Ur Mum”

9. SOS
by SZA

You see? This is why I don’t put these out in December. It’s true that December is mostly barren, but just in the last ten years we’ve had monster albums by Beyoncé, D’Angelo, Run the Jewels, Taylor Swift, and now SZA come out after most editorial lists are already released. Anyway, expect an apology tour next December, because SZA has realized she can start swinging. Ctrl was clean and sensible, SOS is a glorious mess, fun and spontaneous in ways its predecessor lacked. She goes many places here, but shitty exes might want to skip this one: “Smoking On My Ex Pack,” “I Hate U,” “Ghost in the Machine,” and “F2F” are a murderer’s row. It’s been great to see SZA’s ascent, and SOS cements her status as one of the most singular artists of the era.

Listen: “F2F”

8. Ashley McBryde Presents: Lindeville
by Ashley McBryde

Ashley McBryde put together this ensemble concept album by locking herself and her collaborators in a house for a week and just writing. The result is something like a country The Who Sell Out, complete with fictional advertisements to remind you of the concept. Lindeville paints its so-named fictional town through its personals section, its canine friends who know too much, and its communal bonfires whenever some asshole guy gets caught cheating. So there must be a few of them, because an alarming number of these songs insist that everyone is cheating on everyone. Kooky as hell and brief but not slight, Lindeville is the best country music of the year.

Listen: “Brenda Put Your Bra On”

7. Aethiopes
by billy woods

It’s been interesting to see billy woods finally catching on, but it’s understandable that it’s been slow-going. People aren’t really looking for albums that open with “I think Mengistu Haile Mariam is my neighbor” when they’re thinking about their top five rappers of the moment. So I submit Aethiopes for your consideration: “Multiverse Benzino/Rode back on a black Pegasus/Medusa’s head in a sack/Senegalese twists snakin’ out the bag” gives you an idea of how his flow is more like a tumble, and it’s in character to catch him rhyming “blessin'” with “rhododendron” and “thickness” with “rictus.” Deep dive essays like this (I genuinely highly recommend this) into woods not only escape ridiculousness, it feels like his works demand them. I slightly prefer his 2019 album hiding places with Kenny Segal because its powerful music more effectively punctuates his intense train of thought, but producer Preservation’s ear for international music very well serves these anxiety-inducing beats. Aethiopes is that gift of an album that never gets old because your job as a listener is never truly done, which is rough because with five albums since 2019, woods is extremely prolific. The work is never done.

Listen: “No Hard Feelings”

6. Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You
by Big Thief

Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You is a real statement album, a coronation of sorts for a group that’s been in the conversation for best band for a bit now. Their great 2019 efforts U.F.O.F. and Two Hands were entirely separate styles cordoned off from each other, so here they’ve put it all in one place, modeled after those legendary double albums you hear about where a band tries anything and can’t fail because their chemistry is just too good. The throw-everything-at-the-wall approach especially works well for Lenker, whose lyrics have gotten substantially more surreal, on some real Bringing It All Back Home shit. Rock to “Little Things,” boogie to “Spud Infinity,” just vibe to “Time Escaping,” because Dragon New Warm Mountain pleases in so many different ways.

Listen: “Time Escaping”

5. The Lakes of Zones B and C
by Emperor X

The Lakes of Zones B and C is successful largely for the same reasons Western Teleport and Oversleepers International were – you should revisit those albums, there’s a great chance you’re underrating them – but this outing is characterized by a feeling of despair, sardonically inserting “There’s no need to give ourselves a hernia, the real heavy lifting’s for the young” into the colossal opener. It keeps going: “God built an arsenal, and now there’s a hole in the beach,” “No one imagined we’d be winners in the long run,” and uh, “We’ll die.” But despite the heaviness, Chad Matheny’s music is never a downer, because the way he paints this bleak picture is too engaging. People cry “like luminant plankton,” Matheny calls out the Metaverse, and he includes various assertions about the afterlife’s transit situation (no one’s on the freeway or the bicycle lane in Heaven, there’s no parallel parking in Hell). If that’s still too heavy for you, there’s a quietly catchy song about a brave hummingbird making it through a storm. We can only hope for that.

Listen: “Communists in Luxury”

4. Blue Rev
by Alvvays

Twee torchbearers Alvvays have shapeshifted. I mean, they still write a lot of twee pop songs, but now there’s a bit more push and pull, more drama, more variety. And they’re drenched in guitar. Blue Rev is proof of five years well spent, a great demonstration that just as importantly as writing big choruses they’re executing the heck out of them. After just one listen you’ll be along for the big rousers: “When you walk away better be for good,” “You know it happens all the time, it’s all right,” “Moving to the country, gonna have this baby,” “He’s only one follow away!” It definitely thins towards the end, but that doesn’t lessen the thrill of a long dormant band so strongly realizing itself.

Listen: “After the Earthquake”

3. Natural Brown Prom Queen
by Sudan Archives

Natural Brown Prom Queen is a flex. Sudan Archives can do it all: she can sing, she can rap, she can write, she can produce, but her foundational skill is actually her training in the violin. Though this album’s main theme is her struggles with body image and her path through it with self-love, the star is simply her talent, turning in a casually great R&B song on “Ciara,” a gentle earworm on “Freakalizer,” a buzzsaw banger on “OMG BRITT,” a dizzying rap display on “NBPQ (Topless),” and obviously the crown jewel that is “Home Maker.” It really feels like she can do anything, and more importantly, it feels like she knows it.

Listen: “Home Maker”

2. Expert in a Dying Field
by The Beths

The band that sang “You Wouldn’t Like Me” seemed to shrink down even further on its second outing, so it was quite the experience to hear their sound completely open up this cycle. There is suddenly a confidence in their anthems about their own tepidness.

Their power pop has both more power and more pop, “Silence Is Golden” more vicious than previous rockers “Uptown Girl” and “Not Getting Excited,” and “Knees Deep” is their strongest hook to date. I’ve sometimes not been sold on their epics (“Little Death,” “Not Running”), but “2am” is such a strong finale, a truly convincing piece of evidence for Elizabeth Stokes mastering even more than just her bread and butter power pop. Expert in a Dying Field is a bold evolution from one of my personal favorite bands to one of the best rock bands working today. Experts in, well, yes. You get it.

Listen: “Head in the Clouds”

1. RENAISSANCE
by Beyoncé

This time last year, I was pretty unsure about how the new Beyoncé album cycle would go. Ages have passed since Lemonade, and while she hasn’t been absent since, EVERYTHING IS LOVE and The Lion King: The Gift weren’t especially encouraging signs. Had her dominance run its course? Was there still space for an unchallenged Queen?

Well, there is: Donna Summer. While RENAISSANCE didn’t command discourse the way Lemonade did, it brilliantly sidesteps these unreasonable expectations by putting out her most fun album since B’Day, a dance album not just for the dancers, but for nerds. Beyoncé doesn’t attempt to conquer this music. Though her braggadocio hasn’t lost a step, this is a deeply humble album, paying respect to dance music legends like Robin S, Grace Jones, and of course Nile Rodgers and Donna Summer. You can spend hours scanning the writer and producer credits and WhoSampled, finding songs you don’t know and songs you don’t know that you know. Or just learning about people. I was listening to “PURE/HONEY,” was like, “who’s that?” and learned about Moi Renee, a New York City drag queen legend.

But of course it’s not just that she’s done her homework. RENAISSANCE is the album of the year not just for the head but for the hips. “VIRGO’S GROOVE” sounds like a classic Michael Jackson song. “CUFF IT” sounds like peak Chic. “ALL UP IN YOUR MIND” lets A.G. cook. And while “SUMMER RENAISSANCE” might not be among the album’s finest songs, ending with Donna Summer is the gesture that embodies the album: by going back in time and paying such tribute to the history of the music, Beyoncé has made her own entry in the dance music canon, and it’s one of the finest dance albums ever made. It’s also, and this is saying quite a bit, her finest album. Too classy.

Listen: “PLASTIC OFF THE SOFA”

The Next 15

11. Miranda Lambert: Palomino (Listen: “Geraldene”)
12. Let’s Eat Grandma: Two Ribbons (Listen: “Levitation”)
13. The Mountain Goats: Bleed Out (Listen: “Wage Wars Get Rich Die Handsome”)
14. Soul Glo: Diaspora Problems (Listen: “Gold Chain Punk (whogonbeatmyass?)”)
15. Plains: I Walked With You A Ways (Listen: “Abilene”)
16. Pusha T: It’s Almost Dry (Listen: “Diet Coke”)
17. Grace Ives: Janky Star (Listen: “Lullaby”)
18. Camp Cope: Running with the Hurricane (Listen: “Sing Your Heart Out”)
19. Craig Finn: A Legacy of Rentals (Listen: “Birthdays”)
20. The Regrettes: Further Joy (Listen: “Show Me You Want Me”)
21. MUNA: MUNA (Listen: “Home By Now”)
22. The Paranoid Style: For Executive Meeting (Listen: “Barney Bubbles”)
23. Cheekface: Too Much To Ask (Listen: “We Need A Bigger Dumpster”)
24. Horsegirl: Versions of Modern Performance (Listen: “Anti-glory”)
25. Romero: Turn It On! (Listen: “Talk About It”)

Further Top 50

Amanda Shires: Take It Like A Man (Listen: “Hawk for the Dove”)
billy woods: Church (Listen: “Pollo Rico”)
Charli XCX: CRASH (Listen: “Constant Repeat”)
FKA twigs: CAPRISONGS (Listen: “tears in the club” (ft. The Weeknd))
Gangs of Youth: angel in realtime. (Listen: “in the wake of your leave”)
Gogol Bordello: Solidaritine (Listen: “Take Only What You Can Carry” (ft. KAZKA))
JID: The Forever Story (Listen: “Dance Now” (ft. Kenny Mason))
Jockstrap: I Love You Jennifer B (Listen: “Greatest Hits”)
Kendrick Lamar: Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers (Listen: “N95”)
Kiwi jr: Chopper (Listen: “Unspeakable Things”)
Momma: Household Name (Listen: “Rockstar”)
My Idea: CRY MFER (Listen: “Cry Mfer”)
Petrol Girls: Baby (Listen: “Baby, I Had An Abortion”)
Pillbox Patti: Florida (Listen: “Suwannee”)
Porridge Radio: Waterslide, Diving Board, Ladder to the Sky (Listen: “Back to the Radio”)
Sabrina Carpenter: emails i can’t send (Listen: “Vicious”)
SASAMI: Squeeze (Listen: “Make It Right”)
S.G. Goodman: Teeth Marks (Listen: “All My Love Is Coming Back To Me”)
Sorry: Anywhere But Here (Listen: “Let The Lights On”)
Spoon: Lucifer on the Sofa (Listen: “The Hardest Cut”)
The Interrupters: In The Wild (Listen: “In The Mirror”)
The Smile: A Light For Attracting Attention (Listen: “You Will Never Work In Television Again”)
The Weeknd: Dawn FM (Listen: “How Do I Make You Love Me?”)
The 1975: Being Funny in a Foreign Language (Listen: “I’m In Love With You”)
Vince Staples: RAMONA PARK BROKE MY HEART (Listen: “AYE! (FREE THE HOMIES)”)

Honorable Mentions

Alex G: God Save The Animals (Listen: “Blessing”)
Amber Mark: Three Dimensions Deep (Listen: “What It Is”)
Anxious: Little Green House (Listen: “In April”)
Arctic Monkeys: The Car (Listen: “There’d Better Be A Mirrorball”)
BabyTron: Bin Reaper 3: Old Testament (Listen: “MySpace”)
Bad Bunny: Un Verano Sin Ti (Listen: “Tití Me Preguntó”)
Bartees Strange: Farm to Table (Listen: “Heavy Heart”)
beabadoobee: Beatopia (Listen: “the perfect pair”)
Beach Bunny: Emotional Creature (Listen: “Karaoke”)
Carly Rae Jepsen: The Loneliest Time (Listen: “The Loneliest Time” (ft. Rufus Wainwright)
Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer (Listen: “Mantra”)
Danger Mouse & Black Thought: Cheat Codes (Listen: “Belize” (ft. MF DOOM))
Daphni: Cherry (Listen: “Cherry”)
Dry Cleaning: Stumpwork (Listen: “Don’t Press Me”)
DYLAN: No Romeo (Listen: “Someone Else”)
dynastic: I know there’s something left for you (Listen: “caldecott” (ft. Polygon Cove))
Future Girls: Year Long Winter (Listen: “Defeat Repeat”)
GloRilla: Anyways, Life’s Great (Listen: “Tomorrow 2” (ft. Cardi B))
Harry Styles: Harry’s House (Listen: “Late Night Talking”)
Hatchie: Giving the World Away (Listen: “This Enchanted”)
Hurray for the Riff Raff: LIFE ON EARTH (Listen: “PIERCED ARROWS”)
JER: Bothered/Unbothered (Listen: “Clout Chasers!”)
King Princess: Hold On Baby (Listen: “For My Friends”)
Little Simz: NO THANK YOU (Listen: “Gorilla”)
Maren Morris: Humble Quest (Listen: “Humble Quest”)
MJ Lenderman: Boat Songs (Listen: “You Have Bought Yourself A Boat”)
Nilüfer Yanya: PAINLESS (Listen: “stabilise”)
No Age: People Helping People (Listen: “Compact Flashes”)
Oso Oso: sore thumb (Listen: “pensacola”)
Pictoria Vark: The Parts I Dread (Listen: “Wyoming”)
Pigeon Pit: Feather River Canyon Blues (Listen: “Milk Crates”)
Pool Kids: Pool Kids (Listen: “That’s Physics, Baby”)
PUP: THE UNRAVELING OF PUPTHEBAND (Listen: “Totally Fine”)
Ribbon Stage: Hit with the Most (Listen: “Playing Possum”)
Saba: Few Good Things (Listen: “Come My Way” (ft. Krayzie Bone))
$ilkMoney: I Don’t Give A Fuck About This Rap Shit, Imma Just Drop Until I Don’t Feel Like It Anymore (Listen: “I Ate 14gs of Mushrooms and Bwoy Oh Bwoy”)
Special Interest: Endure (Listen: “Concerning Peace”)
Steve Lacy: Gemini Rights (Listen: “Mercury”)
Superchunk: Wild Loneliness (Listen: “Wild Loneliness”)
talker: In Awe of Insignificance (Listen: “For The Sake Of It”)
Tegan & Sara: Crybaby (Listen: “Smoking Weed Alone”)
The Chats: Get Fucked (Listen: “6L GTR”)
The Linda Lindas: Growing Up (Listen: “Oh!”)
The Wonder Years: The Hum Goes On Forever (Listen: “Wyatt’s Song (Your Name)”)
Tom Zé: Língua Brasileira (Listen: “Metro Guide”)
Two Shell: Icons (Listen: “Pods”)
Various Artists: Dig Me In: A Dig Me Out Covers Album (Listen: “The Drama You’ve Been Craving” by Tunde Adebimpe)
Wednesday: Mowing the Leaves Instead of Piling ’em Up (Listen: “Perfect” (ft. MJ Lenderman))
Yumi Zouma: Present Tense (Listen: “Astral Projection”)
100 gecs: Snake Eyes (Listen: “Torture Me” (ft. Skrillex))

As always, here are some Spotify playlists. The first includes a song from all of the albums in this article, the other is just the top ten albums in their entirety. See you next year (or next week if you care about TV).

Joey’s Top Ten Songs of 2022

I had a blast with music in 2021, and for most of 2022 I figured I couldn’t bring the same heat to this year’s lists. And though I’ve done a bit more December cramming than usual, I’m pleased to say that I’m pretty satisfied with what I’ve got here, especially because now it’s become more difficult than ever to stay on the pulse of popular music, especially without immersing myself in TikTok. Maybe I’ll have to take the dive in 2023.

As always, I’m featuring my top ten songs and then giving you some further listening after, complete with Spotify playlists.

10. “Simulation Swarm”
by Big Thief

On an album with so many directions and so many standouts, this is the one that stops the show. Originally unveiled in an Instagram Live the first month of the pandemic, “Simulation Swarm” eagerly takes the “Shine A Light” position as the emotional climax in the album’s seventeenth slot. Three vivid yet vague verses start to come into focus before the reveal: Adrianne Lenker is thinking about Andrew, the older biological brother she’s never met. It’s quite the twist that Lenker has dedicated her sweetest, most tender love song not to a lover, but to a brother.

9. “Pharmacist”
by Alvvays

One of the finest moments in music this year was the instant the guitars hit on “Pharmacist,” letting loose Alvvays’ dreamier, louder sound five years after their last album. Short, sweet, to the point, “Pharmacist” is the despair at someone else’s happiness, trying to go home only to realize it’s a time, not a place. Then the self-reassurance “it happens all the time” – the wilting “happens” another of the year’s finest moments, as Jeff Tweedy noticed – ultimately only giving way to an even more tragic thought: “I know I never crossed your mind.” Alvvays has other more impressive lyric sheets this time out for sure, but “Pharmacist” just lands such a punch.

8. “ALIEN SUPERSTAR”
by Beyoncé

I didn’t expect to be up for more Beygency propaganda, but she’s pulled me back in. No longer satisfied with her command over this world, she’s making like Goku and taking on the universe. Though she keeps the WhoSampled page fresh throughout, it’s that close encounter with the hovering synth over the chorus that puts this into orbit, those “Oh baby, I’m…” bits enough to make one never doubt her again.

7. “Speeding 72”
by Momma

Narrowly defeating yet another worthy entry from Maren Morris, “Speeding 72” is the driving anthem of the year. Funny enough, I less hear the direct influences in this than I hear ghosts of ’90s revivalists past Yuck, but of course I’m won over by the Pavement shout out, even if “Harness Your Hopes” and Beabadoobee mean they’re en vogue anyway. But at its heart, “Speeding 72” is about the excitement of moving to the next thing, coming from a complicated place (at best) but then finding someone clamoring “keep me in your car.”

6. “F.N.F. (Let’s Go)”
by Hitkidd & GloRilla

A breakup?! No way. A block party. If there’s discussion at all about GloRilla’s ex-as-of-ten-seconds-ago, it’s purely incidental. “F.N.F.” is focused on the freedom: “Hoppin’ out in red lights, twerkin’ on them headlights.” Finally, a breakup anthem to pump you up.

5. “Cate’s Brother”
by Maisie Peters

Trial ballooned on TikTok, “Cate’s Brother” was so ferociously beloved by Maisie’s fans (even before they’d heard its incredible refrain) that she was pressured into pumping this song out ASAP. And it’s catnip, the gushing ’80s guitars perfectly carrying a three minute diatribe about the millisecond you get a little too obsessed with someone before even hearing a word. Taylor Swift: This could be you right now, but you playin’.

@maisiehpeters

i played cate the verse i wrote about her brother and it went like this u gotta watch til the end #originalsong #bestfriends #livelaughlove

♬ original sound – maisie peters

4. “Bad Habit”
by Steve Lacy

Steve Lacy’s name has definitely been out there for a while, obviously with his band The Internet but also with a few odd features, but this was usually as a secondary figure. So it’s pretty shocking that he’s front and center in the pop song of the year, but it also makes sense that said song is about a guy in the background. “Bad Habit” is just too broadly relatable, a moment of romantic fright focused less on the missed opportunity and more on the mental situation that will create more of them. The year’s most inescapable yet undeniable song.

3. “American Teenager”
by Ethel Cain

Not since “Merry Go ‘Round” has a great song been so biting about small town USA, but Ethel Cain sets “American Teenager” apart by instead sending things skyward, putting together such an emotionally convincing piece of heartland rock that Obama missed the implications. The point is actually that the hopefulness is the tragedy, the character begging “Jesus, if you’re listening, let me handle my liquor” and fighting off doubt with promises of better things to come: “Just give it one more day, and you’re done,” “It’s just not my year.” Like the next one will be.

2. “Happy New Year”
by Let’s Eat Grandma

In addition to genius collaborator SOPHIE dying in 2021, co-lead Jenny Hollingworth’s boyfriend Billy Clayton died after a battle with cancer in the spring of 2019, after which the childhood best friends canceled their US tour and found themselves living apart for the first time. Communication between the two broke down, and they struggled to get to the bottom of their rocky period. And despite all that, through multiple deaths and hardship, here we are. Two Ribbons is one of the year’s most underrated albums, an emotional wallop, and its finest song is its opener by Walton about how the two found each other again: “I’d wanted the old us back,” “and now we’ve grown in different ways.”

“Because you know you’ll always be my best friend, and look at what we made it through.”

Happy new year to you.

1. “Expert in a Dying Field”
by The Beths

Sometimes you hear a song and think, okay that’s the best thing they’ll ever write. “Expert in a Dying Field” is such a moment, Elizabeth Stokes absolutely stuffing the thing with heartstabbers: “I can flee the country for the worst of the year, but I’ll come back to it,” “All of my notes in a desolate pile I haven’t touched in an age,” “I can close the door on us but the room still exists,” “Love is learned over time!” And then she repeats that desperate, mocking HOW DOES IT FEEL as rueful and haunting as Bob Dylan’s.

With this, Stokes puts herself in the company of today’s greatest songwriters. “Expert in a Dying Field” is the best rock song of the last several years.

The Next 15

11. Beyoncé: “CUFF IT”
12. Emperor X: “False Metal”
13. The Mountain Goats: “Training Montage”
14. The Beths: “2am”
15. MUNA: “What I Want”
16. FKA twigs (ft. Shygirl): “papi bones”
17. Ashley McBryde, Caylee Hammack, Brandy Clark, & Pillbox Patti: “Bonfire at Tina’s”
18. Special Interest (ft. Mykki Blanco): “Midnight Legend”
19. The Regrettes: “Barely on My Mind”
20. Maren Morris: “Circles Around This Town”
21. MUNA: “Anything But Me”
22. Camp Cope: “Running with the Hurricane”
23. The Beths: “Knees Deep”
24. Baby Queen: “LAZY”
25. The Weeknd: “Take My Breath”

Honorable Mentions

Alex G: “Runner”
Amanda Shires & Jason Isbell: “Not What You Want”
Beyoncé x Ellie Goulding: “BREAK MY SOUL (Girl Talk Remix)”
Chat Pile: “Why”
Megan Thee Stallion: “Plan B”
Phoenix (ft. Ezra Koenig): “Tonight”
Plains: “Problem With It”
SASAMI: “The Greatest”
Sudan Archives: “NBPQ (Topless)”
talker: “Don’t Want You To Love Me”
The 1975: “Part of the Band”

And as always, here are Spotify playlists to go with this feature, first of all the songs listed and then of just the top ten.

Joey’s Top 10 TV Shows of 2021

Yes, 2021 again! A year of TV good enough that it inspired me to make these lists, but not good enough to inspire me to finish them. And 2022 has shown just how good a year of TV can really be. So after my best songs and albums list on January 1 and 2, expect an even more stacked TV list the following week.

10. The Owl House
season 2, first half
10 episodes (now 41 total)
stream: Disney+

Like the path that Gravity Falls took before it, The Owl House was assuredly going to get more dark and plot-intensive after its lighter first season. Though 2021 only offered us ten half-hours, The Owl House met the challenge and upped the ante, especially shining in triptych episode “Knock, Knock, Knockin’ on Hooty’s Door.”

9. Reservation Dogs
season 1
8 episodes (now 18 total)
stream: Hulu

Reservation Dogs is about both the ordinary and the extraordinary, well-defining the Oklahoma reservation and the hope-crushing monotony our heroes feel subsumed by while also occasionally popping off into dreamlike zaniness. While the first half of the first season is a great introduction, the show starts really going for it in the latter four episodes.

8. Ranking of Kings
season 1, first cour
11 episodes (23 in season 1)
stream: Crunchyroll

Not many anime have felt as good as Ranking of Kings, the fantasy tale about a deaf child whose birthright is stolen from him. The story of Bojji is the main attraction, but while the show introduces many of its other characters as caricatures – like Bojji’s wicked stepmother and stepbrother – where it really shines is expanding these characters and making Bojji just the largest branch of a wildly satisfying plot. It’s also just so refreshing for a shonen anime to look like this does.

7. Arcane
season 1
9 episodes
stream: Netflix

It’s bewildering to see animation look so unique and so expensive. If you can make it past Imagine Dragons in the opening credits, your eyes will be instantly treated to the best-looking show around. Likewise, it’s gone pretty all out with its story, its three-act structure expertly working its major beats through the whole cast. With a bit of an edge, Arcane is a rare Western cartoon geared towards more mature audiences, and it’ll be a joy when it comes back, I dunno, three years later.

6. Station Eleven
limited series
10 episodes (7 in 2021)
stream: HBO Max

The narrative ambition of Station Eleven is pretty astonishing. Jumping liberally across space and time, each episode has its own hook, whether it takes place in a collapsing city, an airport, a small apartment, or a hospital. A startling beginning and an emotional ending put Station Eleven in rare esteem among limited series.

5. How To With John Wilson
season 2
6 episodes (12 total)
stream: HBO Max

There’s really nothing like How To With John Wilson. I get how that’s a pretty easy statement for anything with Nathan Fielder involvement, but the vibe of watching the man with the camera giving often trite narration to plain moments is so uniquely captivating. Then suddenly, John Wilson will find a weirdo. Perhaps it’s a person obsessed with Avatar (2009). Perhaps it is a Second Life land baron. It will always be a total marvel that John Wilson gets these people to open up to him. Season two is a step up for this main reason: John has found more weirdos this time out.

4. ODDTAXI
limited series
13 episodes
stream: Crunchyroll

ODDTAXI is truly humble. It weaves its web of mischievous, city-slacking animals so casually, not trying too hard to sell a rapping porcupine, a puma hellbent on fulfilling his dreams with a gacha game, or a gibbon trying to salvage his happiness through dating apps. A bit like the first act of Durarara!!, ODDTAXI builds an interconnected city and brings it all together in the best anime miniseries in a long time.

3. Mare of Easttown
limited series
7 episodes
stream: HBO Max

Two mysteries, a murder and a disappearance, hang over Easttown, and the disgruntled people of the small town hang all of their frustrations on Mare, who in turn has a recent divorce and the suicide of her eldest child hanging over her. The character drama is fantastic, but the whodunnit is the beast that sends Mare over the top, with so many suspects, twists, and shocking action setpieces. In the era of the prestige miniseries, Mare of Easttown is among the very finest.

2. Yellowjackets
season 1
10 episodes (7 in 2021)
stream: SHOWTIME

Dynamite. Yellowjackets is clearly something special from the jump: a ’90s high school girls’ soccer team flies to the national championship only to crash into the Canadian wilderness. As we follow the girls devolving and the wilderness getting spooky, we also see the survivors living their lives in the present day until their past starts bubbling up again. Though filled with death and horror, Yellowjackets is an absolute blast, and it’ll be great to greet it in early 2023.

1. Succession
season 3
9 episodes (29 total)
stream: HBO Max

Now they’re just showing off. The story of four siblings vying for their megabillionaire daddy’s favor has been great its past two seasons, but only now has stepped into rarefied territory and is making a serious run to join the greatest live action dramas of the past twenty years. The characters and dialogue are all clicking in that special way you sometimes see, and now more than ever its comedy makes its drama seem that much less strained, particularly when something so cringeworthy occurs that you have to pause and pace around for ten minutes before continuing. And of course, even before this season Succession was notable for its killer tentpole moments, and “All The Bells Say” did not disappoint. If they can keep this up, we’ll be talking about Succession for a very long time.

Honorable Mentions

For All Mankind, season 2
Hacks, season 1
Invincible, season 1
I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, season 2
Only Murders in the Building, season 1
Squid Game, season 1
The Expanse, seasons 5 & 6
The Underground Railroad, limited series
The White Lotus, season 1

Joey’s Top 10 TV Episodes of 2021

Yeah, this is a little late! Got really bogged down when it should have come out and then it became a whole thing. But I’m getting this out of the way now to unclog this drain for when I put the 2022 TV lists down it in early January.

Let’s get started, yeah?

10. “Wheel of Fire”
Station Eleven
episode 1
stream: HBO Max

Oh. Great. Just what we needed in December, 2021. An hourlong episode about the swift disintegration of Chicago as a kill-everyone pandemic hits it like a tidal wave. This is a panic attack of an episode, and while the show’s ultimate worth lies in its emotional conclusion, this hour sticks in my memory the firmest.

9. “Together Again”
Adventure Time: Distant Lands
episode 3?
stream: HBO Max

It’s no “Obsidian,” but the final Adventure Time chapter – “Wizard City” was released out of order – brought us deep into the future to see the final chapter of Finn and Jake’s friendship: death. An old tension between the two arises when Jake waxes philosophic, appreciating the poetry and beauty of the end, but Finn still needs his friend. A beautiful second ending to an incredible series.

8. “The Monster You Created”
Arcane
season 1, episode 9
stream: Netflix

Though I imagine the cliffhanger won’t wind up as cataclysmic as it feels in the moment, this pressure cooker of an episode is an excellent culmination of a wild season, and it promises a second season which tears down the walls of the first.

7. “Where I Really Come From”
Invincible
season 1, episode 8
stream: Amazon Prime

Invincible’s premier ends with a real doozy of a twist, and “Where I Really Come From” pays it off so wildly with some of the most brutal cartoon violence I can remember, and the conversation that follows its horrifying climactic fight is just as harsh.

6. “California Dreamin’”
Reservation Dogs
season 1, episode 7
stream: Hulu

As Reservation Dogs finally gets to That Thing we’ve been waiting to learn about, it also gets to That Thing that Elora has been dying to know. All of this on the back of the longest driver’s test ever.

5. “True Colors”
Amphibia
season 2, episode 20
stream: Disney+

Amphibia is perhaps the most humble of this new wave of story-focused children’s cartoons, forwarding its plot with occasional nudges and then with slightly more frequent nudges. Which is why it’s totally fucking nuts when “True Colors” cold knocks the dominoes down, beginning with like five different payoffs and ending with about five different twists.

4. “Gganbu”
Squid Game
season 1, episode 6
stream: Netflix

Though Squid Game went massively viral due to the insidious theatricality of its games, the fourth event drops all of this and gives us a heartrending but suspenseful episode focused on character relationships. Of course, the show proceeds to eventually waste basically all of this and even actively tries to ruin this episode. Still! This one’s a real triumph while it lasts.

3. “How To Appreciate Wine”
How To With John Wilson
season 2, episode 2
stream: HBO Max

Most episodes of How To With John Wilson revel in mundane absurdity, and for a while “How To Appreciate Wine” seems like more of this, beginning with a young man whose hobby is collecting and eating expired military rations and a bowling ball company whose hook is that it scents its balls. But even there, the outrageous moments are already more frequent, and by the time you get to John’s story about his college a capella group or the journey to meet the CEO of Bang energy drinks, you’ll be spinning. It’s disorienting, and it doesn’t help you to appreciate wine in the least.

2. “All The Bells Say”
Succession
season 3, episode 9
stream: HBO Max

You could really pick anything from the last three or four episodes of Succession’s third season, but “All The Bells Say” in particular rises to the occasion, bringing you the seismic shifts of past season finales and then some.

1. “The Last One”
To Your Eternity
season 1, episode 1
stream: Crunchyroll

Maybe it’s a little unfair to credit “The Last One” quite so much. After all, it’s mostly just a straight upreplication of Yoshitoki Ōima’s first chapter of her manga of the same name, probably one of the best individual chapters of manga ever.

A white orb is sent to earth, where it takes the form of a rock in the snow. One day a wolf dies near it, and it takes the form of that wolf. It sets off, where it meets a boy, the fallen wolf’s owner, who’s delighted to see his dear pet again. This boy was left years ago to care for the sick and elderly while most of his people set out hoping to find greener, warmer land. Now he’s alone, and upon the return of his pet wolf he decides to set out himself and find his tribe again. He and “Joann” embark on their quest, with the boy cheerfully imagining what “fruit” might be like.

I won’t spoil how it ends, because you should watch it right now even if you don’t plan on picking up the series – the above embedded video is the whole thing put on YouTube for free by Crunchyroll. “The Last One” is powerfully simple, packed with gutpunching moments and a mindblowing resolution.

Building A Better Lover

Sometimes when an artist puts out an album of 18 or 19 songs, it signifies confidence, a point in an artist’s career where they’ve found a can’t-fail groove in their creative process. Even the filler sounds like magic. So is Lover Taylor’s Sign o’ The Times?

I mean, you already know the answer. Lover, though not among her very worst, is probably on the lower end of Taylor’s discography. Still, there’s a lot of promise, right? That front half is really nice.

So I asked Twitter earlier this year to rank all 18 tracks on Lover with the hope of being able to authoritatively pare it down without anyone accusing me of playing favorites. Depending on how the tiers shake out, I planned on keeping 10-14 tracks. In parentheses are the mean rankings of each song.

The Classics

1. “Cruel Summer” (3.15)

“Cruel Summer” is a very odd Taylor Swift song. It’s such a unique bit of pop alchemy, which is maybe why she neglected to release it as a single (instead opting for “ME!,” “You Need To Calm Down,” “Lover,” and “The Man”). She managed to release six (!) singles for Reputation, so it’s a little odd she couldn’t do the same for the better, deeper album. But yeah, not a shock to see “Cruel Summer” up top. It’s probably her most beloved post-1989 song. Its median ranking was a flat 2.0. 30% of voters rated it #1. 55% rated it top two. 75% rated it top three. “Cruel Summer” is real good, y’all.

2. “Cornelia Street” (3.45)

For listeners eager for a new masterpiece to go with “All Too Well” or “Enchanted,” “Cornelia Street” was pretty quickly identified. I think it feels probably a little less special than those do, but that’s a tall comparison and this is still top tier Taylor.

The Choice Cuts

3. “Lover” (5.85)

People love “Lover.” I think its music is a little too gentle and compared to her best love songs doesn’t give me a ton to latch onto. I’d go as far as saying it’s a little plain. But it’s a strong third, per The People, and it’s not particularly controversial.

4. “Death By A Thousand Cuts” (6.25)

Kind of a cool kid pick for best song here, yeah? It’s one of those songs that reminds you that she could just kind of do this forever. Listening to it makes me dearly miss when her music had a bit more zip. Hope we can get back to that.

5. “Paper Rings” (6.35)

A lot of cringe Taylor moments come from when she tries to have it both ways. You can’t be both cool and uncool, and here she goes full uncool and it’s always magic when she does that.

Still Killer

6. “The Archer” (8.35)

A favorite of fans who don’t really like Taylor Swift very much and regard 1989 as far greater than anything else she’s done. A very good dream pop song, but not the kind of thing I subscribe for.

7. “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince” (8.55)

Hard to imagine, but here she writes a song even more Lana Del Rey than “Wildest Dreams,” complete with chirpy little “okay!” bits that would slot right at home on Born To Die. It’s good.

8. “Daylight” (8.70)

Massively popular with fans who think “Clean” is top ten Taylor. It has the highest standard deviation of any song here (5.45!), possibly revealing that some people have just not made it to track 18 of Lover very often.

9. “The Man” (8.95)

Obviously this it Taylor at her most indulgently girlboss outside of the “Bad Blood” music video, but she definitely pulls it off. Come on! This shit’s a blast. Cringe, but the kind I’ve signed up for.

10. “I Think He Knows” (9.40)

I’m a little baffled here. Most people that voted preferred “I Forgot That You Existed” to “I Think He Knows,” which I think is a perfect little pop song that’s emblematic of the strengths of her approach in her pop era.

Iffy

11. “I Forgot That You Existed” (10.30)

“I Forgot That You Existed” puts Taylor’s most annoying foot forward, doing the weird rap thing where she goes “in my feelings more than Drake” and the like. Its median ranking was 9, even beating “I Think He Knows” and obliterating “False God” and “Soon You’ll Get Better.” But it’s controversial. Its standard deviation of 5.36 is only lower than that of “Daylight.” Two people had this at #2, which is just entirely inexcusable, but unlike other songs in the front half of the album, some folks dared to put this one low.

12. “False God” (11.05)

Very interested to hear “False God” supporters explain themselves because this one is so fucking weird to me. I suppose it’s good that irreverence is clearly the point because the sexual imagery just comes out wrong. Sonically fits the album pretty darn well but ends up feeling tedious anyway.

13. “Soon You’ll Get Better” (11.35)

Very sweet. It’s great that she wanted to do another “The Best Day,” because that’s just one of her best songs. But it feels a little stiff, so it’s a little less successful at jerking any tears out.

The Filler

14. “Afterglow” (12.70)

Kind of occupying the role of “The Lucky One,” where it’s the thing that most people will forget was even here. “The Lucky One” deserves better. I don’t really think this does. Solid, serviceable, not more. Should probably be above “False God,” though.

15. “London Boy” (12.85)

Look, maybe I’m a dick about this cringe-ass song. The Clash got to make “Ivan Meets GI Joe” on their longest album and everyone’s fine with that. Some sick fucks like “Piggies” or “Wild Honey Pie.” I actually think the verses on this sound fine, but my goodness the chorus and bridge are decidedly Not It.

Unloved

16. “It’s Nice To Have A Friend” (13.85)

A strong candidate for Taylor’s most boring song, pre-2020 division. So-named because it doesn’t have any itself.

17. “You Need To Calm Down” (14.30)

The music video for “Mean,” a great song about how critics (perhaps correctly…) criticized Taylor’s Grammy performance with Stevie Nicks, opens with a gay-coded young man being bullied by football players. Certainly a worthy cause for 2011, but an odd conflation of conflicts, no? Whatever, not a big deal. Fast forward to 2019, and the first verse of “You Need To Calm Down” is about haters in Taylor Swift’s mentions and the second is about homophobia. I don’t want to make too big a deal out of this, two nickels isn’t very many, but it’s weird that it happened twice, right? I think Taylor has trouble compellingly framing the songs about her haters. I think “Mean” worked because it’s detached enough to achieve a sort of universality. I mean, also because it sounds good and doesn’t feature Taylor rapping. I’m not sure how she figured people had the stomach for two straight indulgently irritating lead singles. Speaking of…

The Abomination

18. “ME!” (16.20)

It is absolutely heartbreaking that Taylor believed in this Playhouse Disney self-belief anthem so much that she made it this album’s lead single and enlisted Brendon “High Hopes” Urie to turn in what might just be the most annoying vocal performance of all time. This kind of thing might be more appreciated if she debuted it on Yo Gabba Gabba! (and again, leave Brendon at home).

The New Album

The top ten are obviously in. The question is whether to leave it at that, add just “I Forgot That You Existed,” or add that plus “False God” and “Soon You’ll Get Better.” I’m pretty torn!

Over half of people think “I Forgot That You Existed” should be in a nine-songs-long version, so I suppose I’ll keep that – though I’ll note the 25th and 75th percentile ranks for “I Think He Knows” are 4.75 and 12.25 vs “I Forgot That You Existed”‘s 6.00 and 15.00 (!). I kind of think both “False God” and “Soon You’ll Get Better” are very clearly below the clearly-in songs. And they’re both so awkwardly slow and weighty that they muck up sequencing. You can crucify me for this, but I really did try to include them. Nothing worked!

So…it’s the first ten songs of the album plus “Daylight.” Maybe we didn’t need a poll to figure it out. But at least we’ve verified this truth with science.

Here is Lover in brief…Lvr.

1. “I Think He Knows”
2. “Cruel Summer”
3. “Paper Rings”
4. “Lover”
5. “The Man”
6. “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince”
7. “Cornelia Street”
8. “The Archer”
9. “I Forgot That You Existed”
10. “Death By A Thousand Cuts”
11. “Daylight”