As we reach the conclusion of another year, it’s time to take stock of all we’ve gained and lost. Moreover, it’s a time to anticipate all that the New Year promises. Will there be an orderly US Election in 2024, or will they dive headlong into Civil War? More importantly, what is Taylor Swift going to do next? Enquiring minds want to know.
2023 in New Music was a grand exploration of many different moods and mindsets. What touched my soul most vividly are the following five albums. These are my five favourite albums of 2023, in contention for the highly-coveted New Music Jason Prize. Once again they will be listed in chronological order, based on their Release Dates.
Stephanie Lamprea – 14 Récitations
Released: February 10, 2023
My Shortlist begins with the most unorthodox album among all my favourites of the year. Stephanie Lamprea is a Colombian-American Soprano vocalist based in Glasgow, Scotland. Composed in 1977-78 by Greek composer Georges Aperghis, 14 Récitations is series of pieces written for solo voice. Imagining the Sheet Music for these works, while Lamprea inhabits the Music, is a giddy pleasure of the listening experience. If someone wants to gift me a copy, I’d be ever so pleased. She performs as though her voice is not doing what she wants it to do. She halts and stutters while the realization overcomes her, and with it you can hear the fear, the anger, the sadness, and ultimately the despair and madness. Some of the most challenging passages (mostly wordless, but for some broken French) I’ve ever heard are performed with confident bravura. Touches me as a person who lives with Multiple Sclerosis, having experienced the frustration of my body not working properly.
Rahill – Flowers At Your Feet
Released May 12, 2023
This album is the Dark Horse, among all my favourites. Iranian-American Singer/Songwriter Rahill Jamalifard’s debut album Flowers At Your Feet has quietly endeared me to its lyrical charms, having missed it on my Mid-year List. A mostly Downtempo affair, Rahill paints a vivid picture of a young woman trying to make sense of life on her own terms. Family is important to Jamalifard, and she gives reverence, particularly on Ode To Dad. But the album is not without its hooks, from the bouncy “doo-doo” singalong of I Smile For E, to the call-and-response (featuring Beck, inexplicably) of Fables. Not a bad one in the bunch.
Big Blood – First Aid Kit
Released June 9, 2023
South Portland, Maine’s Big Blood is a Family Band, which already feels like it has a weird smell to it. Historically, Family Bands have been created by domineering parents in search of Fame and Glory. I can’t say for certain that Caleb Mulkerin isn’t forcing his life partner Colleen Kinsella, or his daughter Quinnissa to write and sing their latest album, First Aid Kit. My assumption is that it’s a happy arrangement with well-adjusted humans. And the star of the show is thirteen year-old Quinnissa. The voice chimes with ringing clarity right from the start of In My Head. There’s a Ronnie Spector precociousness to her sound as she sings of the teenage frustration of being unable to talk to her crush on 1000 Times. There’s a tonal purity when Quinnissa and Colleen harmonize. When the elder takes the lead, such as with the haunting Makes Me Wonder (for Ma’Khia Bryant) the emotion is just as pure.
Justice Cow – my dad died
Released September 5, 2023
Families are a funny thing. They can be the backbone of who you are as a person. Sometimes in spite of themselves. Jessica Kion’s father taught her how to play piano. As Justice Cow, she has gone on to create the most tear-inducing album of the year. my dad died celebrates the life, and mourns the premature death of her father, due to alcoholism. I don’t know what it would be like to be raised by a parent with such a crippling disease, but I imagine the emotions are mixed, and deep. Kion lays her emotions out in full view right from the start of the record. Waiting For A Haunting imagines a ghostly conversation with her father. Unrelenting lays bare the hardships endured because of her father’s illness, before gloriously dissolving. On Read The Room she regrets the time she lashed out at her father when he was beyond control. On Just Like You, she lists the many things that her father gave her. Despite his downfalls, she endears to be like her old man. Jessica’s voice cuts right to the heart. Devastating.
Sampha – Lahai
Released October 20, 2023:
I referred to the Rahill album as the “Dark Horse” of the year, but what’s great about 2023 is how many of my favourites are of the “creeper” variety, in that it took some time to realize the hidden greatness within. Take Sampha’s Lahai: it was released in late October, but it wasn’t until quite recently (after seeing his NPR Tiny Desk Concert six weeks later) that my ears truly opened. Lahai is a delicate masterpiece, with multiple moving parts that work in consort with each other. Nothing overwhelms Sampha’s warm-toned voice, and the vocal arrangements are rich and nuanced. Glorious.
Who will take the Prize? Check back next week, Sunday, December 31 for the presentation of the 2023 New Music Jason Prize at 9 am EST.
New Music Jason’s Picks 