Welcome to part 2 of our roundup of favourite albums of 2020, a year of extremes, surprises, innovation and isolation. Out of crisis comes great art, and this has proved so, with great work by old timers as well as young upstarts. The album has never been more important in a year when little live music was possible. Below there is also a list of honourable mentions, but how do you filter down so many from more than 500 picked up on our albums section this year? It’s never going to be perfect, but it’s all about the experience.
Part 1 of this year’s selection is here.
Marlowe – Marlowe 2
Excellent follow-up to their eponymous 2018 debut album, American producer L'Orange and rapper Solemn Brigham combine again in superbly agile, slick, skilful hip hop project that more than matches the last, and again brings together what might be defined as old-school, clean, fast rapping without autotune or vocoder, clever sampling and scratching. It's loaded with amusing, offbeat old-film or other media inserts and fabulous changes of pace, with subjects racing through social commentary, police brutality, and poverty and a whole lot more on the absurd state of the world Standout tracks include Future Power Sources, Later With It, and Spring Kick across 18 tracks short and long. Out on Mello Music.
Marlowe – Future Power Sources
Khruangbin – Mordechai
This third album from the American quartet who draw on a variety of influences, from East Asian surf-rock, Persian funk, and Jamaican dub to western funk and hip hop and psychedelia, could well be their breakthrough. They've largely been an instrumental band before, but this one features vocals on most tracks, and their smooth fusion of styles is beginning to catch on. Recently profiled on New Songs on this site, So We Won't Forget is one of the standout tracks played by Laura Lee on bass, Mark Speer on guitar, and Donald Ray "DJ" Johnson Jr on drums, but also the beautifully funky Time (You and I). Their music feels like sitting on a deserted beach or desert, watching fabulous sunsets, sipping cocktails, such as on Father Bird, Mother Bird, or the beautifully rhythmic Pelota, sung in Spanish. A smooth fusion of delight. Out on Dead Oceans.
Khruangbin – So We Won’t Forget
Agnes Obel – Myopia
Fourth album from the Danish singer-songwriter is a work of elevated beauty and originality. There are echoes of mid-80s Kate Bush, Cocteau Twins, early Goldfrapp and Fever Ray, but this is because this also feels like another landmark, her ethereal sound made by a cohort of classical string and percussion accompanists joining her own light piano touch, and that blow-down-bottle effect on vocals. from Camera's Rolling to Island of Doom to Broken Sleep to Won't You Call Me. Elevating, otherwordly, graceful, and nerve-tingling. Out on Deutsche Grammophon.
Agnes Obel – Broken Sleep
This Is The Kit – Off Off On
Sublime new release by Kate Staples and co – clever, slick and tender with that distinctively beautiful voice of pinpoint clarity, bringing a delicate fusion of folk and pop. After Moonshine Freeze – leading Kate’s Ivor Novello nomination, she went on tour with the National. Now with a welcome return in just with renewed vivacity, standout tracks include the galloping, banjo finger-picking This Is What You Did, as well as No Such Thing, Coming To Get You Nowhere and the title track. Eleven gorgeous, uplifting, clever and ethereal new songs. Out on Rough Trade.
This Is The Kit – This Is What You Did
Nadia Reid – Out Of My Province
Possessing a beautiful voice, the New Zealand-born singer, now based in Richmond, Virginia is a true gem of country-soul, all her guitar-based songs restrained musically, letting those sublime vocals shine out. A series of love and relationships songs include wonderful tracks Best Thing, Oh Canada, and the outstanding, pain-edged Get The Devil Out, which we previously highlighted on Song of the Day. Out on Spacebomb Records.
Nadia Reid – Best Thing
Phoebe Bridgers – Punisher
"When the speed kicks in / I go to the store for nothing/ And walk right by / The house where you lived with Snow White / I wonder if she ever thought / The storybook tiles on the roof were too much/ But from the window, it's not a bad show/ If your favourite thing's Dianetics or stucco." Second album from the 25-year-old indie artist from LA singer is a meditative, beautifully reflective set of 11 songs partly fuelled with the bitterness of her ex-relationship with disgraced musician Ryan Adams. It's full of offbeat, dry killer lines, and the soundscapes are mesmerically floaty. Her love songs are more about what those feelings have on people's lives and her curiosity is fierce and her analysis intelligent. I See You is the most direct about Adams, while Kyoto and I Know The End are about the disappointments of touring. Intelligent, eccentric, and alluringly inventive. Out on Dead Oceans.
Phoebe Bridgers - I See You
Tony Allen & Hugh Masekela – Rejoice
Ten years ago two of Africa's greatest artists, who spent much time also working separately with the great Fela Kuti, finally got together and collaborated. The unfinished sessions languished in the tape vaults, and after Masekela's death in 2018, Allen and producer Nick Gold finally got round to working on the recordings to bring out this record, described as “a kind of South African-Nigerian swing-jazz stew”, featuring also Tom Herbert (Acoustic Ladyland / The Invisible), Joe Armon-Jones (Ezra Collective), Mutale Chashi (Kokoroko) and Steve Williamson. And rejoice we can as drums and trumpet duel gloriously. Out on World Circuit.
Tony Allen & Hugh Masekela – We’ve Landed
Róisín Murphy – Róisín Machine
Ireland's queen of dress-up disguises and funky dance grooves since the Moloko days returns with a fabulous new LP that captures 70s disco with more from the 90s and 00s with her own eccentric mischievous twist, and extra infusion through a collaboration with Sheffield producer Richard Barratt. Lead single Narcissus, as previously highlighted back in January on our Song of the Day section, is a tribute, not merely musically, but also visually to the glamorous 1970s Italian TV star Raffaella Carrà. But there's much more to this album with many brilliant dance numbers with bleeps, squiggles, and grandiose sounds underpinned by a passionate frustration behind the phrase at the beginning of Simulation "I feel my story is still untold". Key tracks include the flamboyant, otherworldly sounds and speeding up downward spirals of Kingdom Of Ends, the walking pace Something More, the fabulous syncopations of We Got Together, the humorous Murphy's Law, and belting disco classic Jealousy. Murphy is full of dark, fatalistic humour, but shining hope. Impossible not to love or dance to. Out on Skint/BMG.
Róisín Murphy – Kingdom of Ends
Bob Dylan – Rough and Rowdy Ways
From Murder Most Foul, a 17-minute epic of storytelling beauty with the JFK assassination as focal point, but of course about so much more about America itself, laid across gentle piano and violin, to the gentle ballad I Contain Multitudes, to the bluesy False Prophet, a cover of an obscure 1954 B-side by Billy “The Kid” Emerson, all released before, but included on this album, there were signs that Bob was back with new work of profound quality. And thankfully that's the case, with a particular emphasis on what help shaped him outside of folk, recalling 1950s rhythm and blues and early pop, in particular the rather beautifully descending I’ve Made Up My Mind to Give Myself to You. And there's also plenty of lyrical playfulness too, with the very humorous My Own Version, citing Shakespeare, Homer’s Iliad, Bo Diddley and Martin Scorsese, and a host of famous dead figures of note. Bleakly beautiful, doomladen strange and clever. As he sings on I Contain Multitudes: "I'm a man of contradictions, I'm a man of many moods." Out on Columbia.
Bob Dylan – My Own Version of You
Run The Jewels – RTJ4
A fourth release by Killer Mike and El-P that couldn't have been more timely in the wake of the George Floyd death and subsequent protests across the US and other parts of the world. It was due in the autumn, but was put forward, wrongfooting mainstream press, but not here at Song Bar of course. It offers comes with a free download and hard copy proceeds go to the Mass Defense Committee, is a network of lawyers, legal workers and law students providing free legal support for political activists, protesters and movements for social change. And it could also be the hip hop pair's best – uncompromising, playfully clever, politically charged lyrics, but full of musical invention and accessibility. Walking In The Snow refers to the killing of Eric Garner but could so easily be Floyd: “You so numb you watch the cops choke out a man like me/Until my voice goes from a shriek to whisper—‘I can’t breathe’/And you sit there in the house on couch and watch it on TV." But there's also dark humour throughout. Yankee And The Brave is set around a fictional TV show in which the pair have respective characters with Yankee (El-P) and the Brave (Killer Mike), mirroring their baseball teams, the New York Yankees and the Atlanta Braves where the pair set out their intentions for the album. Single Ooh La La, featuring Greg Nice and DJ Premier is anarchic fun, with a video shot before Covid-19 or current protests in which money ceases to have any value. JU$T, with guests Pharrell Williams and Rage Against The Machine's Zack de la Rocha tackles slave traders shown dollar notes, and the final epic 11th track, which builds like a jazz composition, A Few Words For The Firing Squad includes moving confessions about grief and hopes for the future. Sharp, eloquent, slick, and emotional. Out on RBC / BMG
Run The Jewels – A Few Words For The Firing Squad
Rina Sawayama – Sawayama
Debut from the Japanese pop artist is a fascinating mixture of powerful pop in all sorts of guises. A feel of Britney Spears’ Toxic on the song XS, heavy, baby metal on STFU, breathy pop on Comme Des Garçons, Lady Gaga sounds on Akasaka Said, R&B on Bad Friend, stadium rock on Who's Gonna Save You Now?, romantic chimes on Tokyo Love Hotel. She even has hair that's a bit like that of Billie Eilish. At the beginning of Chosen Family she says: "Where Do I belong?" That's a good question, but she certainly has a great voice and a huge musical range. This is a career that could go anywhere, including up and up. Out on Dirty Hit.
Rina Sawayama – XS
Perfume Genius – Set My Heart On Fire Immediately
Veering between mainstream and startlingly experimental, this fifth album by Mike Hadreas, American singer from Des Moines of Greek descent, is backed by stellar musicians Jim Keltner, Matt Chamberlain and Pino Palladino. The single On The Floor is a soaring, shuffling pop tune of beautiful guitar flecks, but there's a lot of variety on offer. Early 60s American pop on Whole Life, to reverb-rich early 90s alt-rock on Describe, Without You’s acoustic pop, On the Floor with has a funk reminiscent of 80s Scritti Politti. From Elvis to Cyndi Lauper, harpsichord- punctuated baroque pop of Jason, and gliding steel guitar and Balearic rhythm of Without You, his returning theme, as a gay artist, is to subvert concepts of masculinity and traditional roles. Out on Matador.
Perfume Genius – On The Floor
Fleet Foxes – Shore
Released suddenly as something of a surprise, Robin Pecknold and co return for their fourth album and despite the doom and gloom of the year, is a work is described as acelebration of life, honouring lost musical heroes, from David Berman to John Prine, Judee Sill to Bill Withers. Warm, embracing, positive in tone, the sound echoes earlier work, such as on Helplessness Blues, and with rich vocal harmonies and shimmering instrumental work, such as on Sunblind and Young Man’s Game, Can I Believe You, the springtime optimism of Jara, the almost whisperingly stroked guitars and strings on Lightweight. A long album at an hour, but filled with evoked skies, rivers and fields, a melancholy, but also very uplifting beautiful tonic during tough times. Out on Anti.
Fleet Foxes – Sunblind
BC Camplight – Shortly After Takeoff
The third instalment in his so-called Manchester Trilogy, and fifth overall, following Deportation Blues, the American singer-songwriter and honorary Mancunian Brian Christinzio's latest is something of a masterpiece of piano-pop originality, packed with strange sounds, synths mixed with old-school rock'n'roll, catchy tunes and hilariously dark, self-deprecatory lyrics full of killer one-liners and quick-sand suction, ironically painful jokes, centred around various phobias and passing age of 40 and other forms of personal turmoil from mental illness to alcoholism. Classic songs here line up one after the other like bar bottles, from Back to Work, I Only Drink When I'm Drunk, I Want To Be In The Mafia, Cemetery Lifestyle to Ghosthunting. Out on Bella Union.
BC Camplight – Cemetery Lifestyle
Laura Marling – Song For Our Daughter
Brought forward from the planned August date due to the strange circumstances of 2020, the popular folk-pop singer-songwriter's seventh LP is based around the idea of advising an imaginary daughter on how to equip herself as a woman for society, and offering her “all the confidences and affirmations I found so difficult to provide myself”. The tone is at times almost angry, as if Marling is not addressing a child, but dressing down her younger self, such as the country-ish Dylan-twang Strange Girl ("Oh girl, please – don’t bullshit me."). But this is melodious, beautiful work, whether via acoustic guitar or piano-led, rich string arrangements or polished production, inspired by Joni Mitchell of course, and 70s Paul McCartney solo era, from For You, to Blow by Blow to Held Down and The End of the Affair. The album also comes with a short, melancholy preview video, set in a country idyll. A reflective, emotional, mental spring clean of an album that endures. Out on Partisan/Chrysalis.
Laura Marling – Strange Girl
Lanterns on the Lake – Spook The Herd
Fourth album from the Newcastle indie five-piece fronted by Hazel Wilde confronts the difficulties of the present with a moody, stormy, slow simmering mix of piano, guitar, percussion and beautiful vocals. The nine songs, including the title, are pointed comment at the dangerously manipulative tactics of ideologues - from hopelessly polarised politics, social media, addiction, grief and the climate crisis. The album is packed with beautifully telling, killer lines. When the climate apocalypse comes, and let us hope it never does, at least there’s something as superb as this to go out on. Out on Bella Union and PIAS.
Lanterns on the Lake – Every Atom
The Cool Greenhouse – The Cool Greenhouse
After last year’s Crap Cardboard Pet EP, an excellent debut and perhaps the most refreshing, original album of the week. As previously highlighted on Song of the Day with the songs The Sticks, and London, the band led by talking vocalist Tom Greenhouse, is a mix of driving krautrock, oddball psychedelia and echoes of The Fall with fabulous ironic humour and idiosyncratic, killer phrases. Greenhouse is a dry, wry wit with a distinctive delivery, lingering with ironic indulgence over consonants, skilfully picking out images, conversations, observations of life's absurdities like a sharp-eared, eye-swivelling urban bird. The Sticks captures the blandness life in a dull town, Cardboard Man narrates from the point of view of a Trump/Johnson/Cameron shallow politician/celebrity amalgam, Smile, Love! addresses casual sexism, Life Advice is a swirl of philosophical encounters, while Dirty Glasses looks into skewed, or clear perceptions. "Y’see the purpose of this band / Is to offer a glasses cleaning service / At a very reasonable price." A wonderful view then, of the everyday and off-beat, through a prism of 11 musical, poetic gems. Out on Melodic Records and Bandcamp.
The Cool Greenhouse – The Sticks
Sufjan Stevens – The Ascension
An ethereal as well political eighth album by the American artist, and the first since 2015's acclaimed, exquisite, and heartbreaking Carrie & Lowell that was fuelled by the death of his mother. The Ascension is less delicate, and at times verges towards electropop, but while Stevens's voice soars again both gently and powerfully, the tone is less personal grief than the last, more anger and despair at the state of his country, particularly current leader he refers to as Donald Duck. The key, final track, as recently highlighted on our Song of the Day section is America, a 12-minute epic with a dark, disturbing classical section. Religion and spirituality is a running theme here, and appears to be from a personal struggle with his own faith, with a sense of both sadness and menace on the title track. Video Game is a protest against herd mentality, Sugar attacks popularism and cliche but also seeks the short-term rewards of sweetness, while Goodbye To All That has several killer lines of dark humour. Lamentations mesmerically forms a fusion of psalmic pop, and several other tracks, such as Ativan, have a sense of some disembodied voice combined with the sort of big and arrhythmic beats you mind find on a Björk album. A long but beautiful album of elevated disquiet. Out on Asthmatic Kitty.
Sufjan Stevens – The Ascension
Doves – The Universal Want
Welcome return for the Manchester indie rock trio of Jimi Goodwin and twins Jez and Andy Williams with their first album for 11 years. It's almost as if they've never been away, with this very sounding like them at their heights of Some Cities and The Last Broadcast - emotive, passionate and rich, noisy layers of sound. Opener Carousels builds powerfully with syncopated rhythms, I Will Not Hide has an acoustic energy, Cathedrals of the Mind spins on some electronica with guitar, Prisoners soars ethereally with pumping momentum, and it's a very strong, consistent album throughout, possibly their best ever. Out on Virgin.
Doves - Carousels
Låpsley - Through Water
Beautiful stillness, intelligent lyrics and icy clarity of voice mark this exquisite return LP after four-year gap by the English singer-songwriter Holly Lapsley Fletcher, who by acknowledgement has clearly influenced the delivery style of Billie Eilish. The songs Womxn and First, for example, exhibit a mature, smooth electro-pop, with a sensual crispness, dealing with such issues as female self-confidence. “I look, I breathe, I feel like a woman”. Sadness Is A Shade Of Blue is a typically fine track, and sums up the colour and feel of this clear, clean, cold water feel to the album. Out on XL Recordings.
Låpsley – Speaking Of The End
The Pictish Trail - Thumb World
First album since the acclaimed Future Echoes (2016), this is a gorgeous work of electro-acoustic psych-pop from Johnny Lynch, the eccentrically amusing and charismatic inhabitant of the Hebridean island of Eigg and label boss of Lost Map Records. Fire Recordings are however releasing this one, hopefully introducing a wider audience to this strange Beta Band-ish, creative world of alien abductions and endless scroll thumbing, always tenderly inventive, with key tracks including Lead Balloon, the exquisite Slow Memories and the gently joyous dance number Turning Back. Out on Fire.
The Pictish Trail – Slow Memories
Saint Saviour – Tomorrow Again
Beautiful vocal work that echoes the sound of folktronica’s Tunng, who also make this year’s list, are among about the attributes of this delicately wonderful third album by Stockton-on-Tees’ Becky Jones that ranges from the sparse eccentricity of Aldous Harding to panoramic baroque-rock grandiosity of Scott Walker. Guest vocalists include Badly Drawn Boy, Bill Ryder Jones and WIlly Mason who all seamlessly and gently back her pure, high voice. Standout tracks include Rock Pools, Home, Breton Stripe, Animal I, and Kites. On on VLF Records.
Saint Saviour - The Place I Want To Be (feat. Badly Drawn Boy)
IDLES – Ultra Mono
Continuing their onwards trajectory with ever increasing acclaim after blistering live performances and first two albums Brutalism (2017) and Joy as an Act of Resistance (2018), this third LP sees the Bristol broaden their sound but also not let up on the visceral vitriolic anger of previous releases. What's so potent and ironic about Joe Talbot and co is that their angry, white English delivery could potentially be loved by the very "gammon" type of those they attack (such as in the Brexit-inspired Model Village), recalling the heady days of when gigs by the Specials in late 1970s were attended by racist skinheads who who too thick to listen to their lyrics. No prisoners who compromises or taken this time either, as well as Talbot's powerful turn of phrase, the guitar whip up a bristle-down-the-neck storm on many tracks, including War, anti royalty track Reigns, and Mr. Motivator which like much of the album, contains many several hilarious lines. Ne Touche Pas Moi features former Savages singer Jehnny Beth, Jamie Cullum plays piano on Kill Them With Kindness, and Hymn offers a darker, slower, different sound. Yet another blistering release of clever, acerbic brilliance. Out on Partisan Records.
IDLES – Model Village
Rufus Wainwright – Unfollow the Rules
The flamboyant American-Canadian comes with a return to lush, opulent pop, rich in orchestration, humour, delicate emotion and touching moments. An encounter with fans in Bexhill-On-Sea (yes really) inspired the ballade This One’s for the Ladies (That Lunge!). The title track, perhaps the best, is a fabulous piano-based track that begins with a stillness, his distinctive voice quivering above, then builds to a powerful crescendo, a song that wouldn't be out of place in his classic albums Want One and Want Two. Devils & Angels (Hatred) is full-on electro orchestral pop. Ticks every Rufus box. Out on BMG.
Rufus Wainwright – Devils & Angels (Hatred)
Sault – Untitled (Black Is)
Another double header - after last year's superb matchstick cover albums '5' and '7' of soul, gospel mixed with other genres, both released very much under the radar, the mysterious band returned with another excellent LP that this time has Black Lives Matter as a central theme. Soul is the central genre again, but the album also contains other elements including African chants and stripped-down drums to enjoy. Wildfires appeared featured on our New Songs section, with elements of 1970s Marvin Gaye, as well as Gnarls Barkley's Crazy, the as whole album includes skit messages of black positivity, and on such songs as Black, or the slow, soulful Miracles ("I will rise") as well as outrage at police crimes and racist cultures. Out The Lies is a hand-clapping protest call-and-response, Stop Dem is a brilliantly oddball rhythmic number, Hard Life is like acoustic trip-hop soul, Don't Shoot Guns Down is a dry, drum-based protest, while Sorry Isn't Enough builds from slow melancholy to powerful refrains, with Bow a brilliant piece of African-style dance. Perhaps the mystery profile helps the message and the music, but if those behind the project include the London-based musician called Dean Josiah and soul singer Cleo Sol, then they are to be congratulated on this work. Out on Forever Living Originals.
Sault – Bow (with Michael Kiwanuka)
Sault – Untitled (Rise)
Another fantastic album of transcendently timeless funk, gospel and soul from the mysterious, publicity shy collective - a core trio that includes producer Inflo, aka Dean “Wynton Josiah behind the desk on Michael Kiwanuka's last album. It's the second one this year after Untitled (Black) and two in 2019. This one is possibly the best of the four, another double LP with a variety of sounds that point more to the dancefloor, featuring a cross of genres such as Brazilian batucada percussion on the song Strong, a Rio carnival feeling on Street Fighter and The Beginning & The End. Smooth soul comes on Son Shine, and the predominant theme is race issues, police violence and more, with the chants of Rise Intently, the 90s syncopated soul of Free, the talking You Know it Ain't, No Black Violins in London, and the beautifully moving address to a Little Boy. Again with musical echoes of noughties Gnarls Barclay, and 90s Soul II Soul, Massive Attack, Dana Bryant, and Young Disciples, this is again also outstanding and original work. Out on Forever Living Originals.
Sault - Strong
Nick Hakim – Will This Make Me Good
Following his acclaimed, but underexposed 2017 album Green Twins, this new LP comprises songs that defy structure. Listening to it is like sinking into a wonderfully huge sofa while smoking a massive joint. Hakim's style is a woozy form of funk, echoing a slowed down Parliament crossed with Curtis Mayfield with a whole new sound of his own. There are tangible elements to cherish here. Qadir, previously highlighted on Song of the Day, is a gorgeously sad tribute to a dead friend, WTMMG is full of absorbing, unexpected sounds, Bouncing is mischievously the very opposite of its title, All These Instruments is supremely catchy. This a truly different, perhaps even revolutionary record that will take you pleasurably elsewhere. Out on ATO Records.
Nick Hakim – Bouncing
Witch 'n' Monk – Witch 'n' Monk
Fusions of seemingly incompatible generes are always an attraction at The Song Bar and this is a prime example, with the Anglo-Colomban duo of Heidi Heidelberg and Mauricio Velasierra combining respectively, a classically trained soprano singer who plays spiky prog-punk riffs on guitar while using looper pedals and a multi-instrument flautist. This debut LP is recorded in rural Wales and in a former Stasi bunker in Berlin. What more could anyone want when you get prog-thrashy guitar riffs with panpipe melodies, great guest percussionists and and Bollywood strings? From opener Escarbando to the postpunk Coal Mine, to oodles of melodies on Outchant, it's rich, sometimes almost too complex blend, but one to savour and admire. Out on Tzadik Records.
Witch 'n' Monk – Escarbando [part 1]
Wu Fei and Abigail Washburn – Wu Fei and Abigail Washburn
A wonderful album that brings together folk traditions from China and the US by these respective female artists. And there's rich history to their instruments. Wu Fei is a Chinese-born, Nashville-based folk musician guzheng specialist, her instrument hailing from 2,500-year-old zither-like tradition. Washburn meanwhile plays clawhammer banjo, an instrument brought to the US by west African slaves, he reminds us, her liner notes tell us, not the Appalachians. And as the world shares rather a lot now, what spreads here is fabulous music, merging together like the waters in their combined songs, with vocal harmonies adding to the magic. Standout tracks include Four Seasons, as well as Water Is Wide/Wusuli Boat Song. Out on Smithsonian Folkways.
Wu Fei & Abigail Washburn – Water Is Wide/Wusuli Boat Song
Dana Gavanski – Yesterday is Gone
Exquisite debut from the Toronto singer-songwriter, previously featured on Song of the Day, who sings with great tenderness, clarity, subtlety and minimalism, adding deft, light touches of guitar, bass, drums, with tinklings of other instruments, ably helped by producer Mike Lindsay of Tunng. From One By One, Catch, Good Instead Bad, to the title track, her style has the class and timing of Cate Le Bon, paced perfectly, with wonderful maturity and timeless love and reflective songwriting that will resonate for years. Out on Full Time Hobby.
Dana Gavanski – Catch
Honourable mentions (in no particular order)
Shabaka and the Ancestors – We Are Sent Here By History
Daniel Avery & Alessandro Cortini – Illusion of Time
Pottery – Welcome To Bobby's Motel
Thurston Moore – By The Fire
Tiña – Positive Mental Health Music
Working Men's Club – Working Men's Club
Sun Ra Arkestra – Swirling
Planet Battagon – Trans-Neptunia
Caribou – Suddenly
Tom Misch + Yussef Dayes - What Kinda Music
The Orielles – Disco Volador
A Certain Ratio – ACR Loco
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – Viscerals
Mr Ben & The Bens – Life Drawing
Oneohtrix Point Never – Magic Oneohtrix Point Never
Sorry – 925
Pokey LaFarge – Rock Bottom Rhapsody
Adrianne Lenker – Songs and Instrumentals
Jackie Lynn – Jacqueline
The Beths – Jump Rope Gazers
Peter Broderick – Blackberry
Open Mike Eagle – Anime, Trauma and Divorce
Bruce Springsteen – Letter To You
Neil Young – Homegrown
Hen Ogledd – Free Humans
Gorillaz – Song Machine Season One: Strange Timez
Black Thought – Streams of Thought Vol. 3: Cane & Able
Marie Davidson and L'Oeil Nu – Renegade Breakdown
Bright Eyes – Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was
International Teachers of Pop – Pop Gossip
JARV IS … – Beyond The Pale
NZCA Lines – Pure Luxury
Margaret Glaspy – Devotion
Mark Lanegan – Straight Songs of Sorrow
Deerhoof – Future Teen Cave Artists
Michael Sheehy – Distance is The Soul of Beauty
Caleb Landry Jones – The Mother Stone
Brigid Dawson and the Mothers Network – Ballet of Apes
Brigid Mae Power – Head Above The Water
Jehnny Beth – To Love Is To Live
White Denim – World as a Waiting Room
The Irrepressibles – Superheroes
Keleketla! – Keleketla!
Jockstrap – Wicked City
Oh Sees (Osees) – Protean Threat
Hania Rani – Home
bdrmm – Bedroom
This is part 2 of our roundup of favourite albums of 2020. Here is Part 1:
Fiona Apple to Lianne La Havas to Yves Tumor: favourite albums of 2020 – Part 1
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Taken from a whole year of listening, this only a selection of recommended listens not a catalogue of releases nor full reviews. Feel free to recommend more and comment below. You can also use the contact page, or find more on social media: Song Bar Twitter, Song Bar Facebook. Song Bar YouTube, and Song Bar Instagram. Please subscribe, follow and share.
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