It’s a new year, which means that the Best of 2022 lists are all officially here. With so many lists out there, who has time to read all of them?
Turns out: We do. But because you probably don't, we rounded up all the Top 10 lists we could find, smashed 'em together in a big spreadsheet and spit out overall Top 10 lists for the year's best albums, songs, books, video games, TV shows and movies. You're welcome.
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The Best Albums Of 2022
10. ‘Natural Brown Prom Queen,’ Sudan Archives
With daring lyricism and classical influences, singer and multi-instrumentalist Sudan Archives’ second album “Natural Brown Prom Queen” is a psychedelic road trip through electronic beats, sparse violin notes and trappy influences. Standout tracks “OMG BRITT,” “Ciara” and “Freakalizer” are melodic and punchy, with lyrics delivered as rap that morphs into emotionally soothing storytelling about identity, femininity and power. There’s no individual genre that can define this 18-track masterpiece — Sudan Archives is a one-woman band, in complete command of your listening.
[TimeOut]
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9. ‘Caprisongs,’ FKA twigs
At first, the interstitial skits that spackle “Caprisongs” — lots of positive self-talk and manifestation woo-woo — felt like a distraction, but they’re obviously here to show us how a pop singer prone to solemnity got herself in tune with the universe enough to channel this fantastic, life-affirming fizz.
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8. ‘Harry’s House,’ Harry Styles
[Styles] has never been a one-note pop prince – evidenced from his first solo single, 2017’s woozy “Sign of the Times.” But on “Harry’s House” — its title a nod to another of his muses, Joni Mitchell and her 1975 song, “Harry’s House/Centerpiece” — Styles cements himself as a canny songwriter as well as a mischievous charmer. Any pop behemoth who can squeeze in a sample of The Brothers Johnson (“Daydreaming”) as well as craft a tender ballad about the effects of emotional childhood trauma (“Matilda”) is worthy of celebration.
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7. ‘Wet Leg,’ Wet Leg
Witty yet warm and stupidly fun, this self-titled debut saw the pair follow in the footsteps of their Domino labelmates Arctic Monkeys and Franz Ferdinand with an idiosyncratic style, personality and class, delivering an album that not only lived up to the hype, but slapped a much-needed smile back on the face of British guitar music.
[NME]
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6. ‘Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You,’ Big Thief
It is an uncommonly warm and generous record, 20 songs in all—flitting from campfire folk (“Change”) to clanging cosmic rumination (“Time Escaping”) to countrified hoedown (“Spud Infinity”) in its first three tracks alone—and it solidifies Adrianne Lenker’s place as one of the greatest songwriters to emerge in the last five years. “Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You” is not really an indie-rock album, at least not in the way that Two Hands was. There is no successor to “Not” here, nothing that belongs on a mid-2010s indie mood board. Instead, it revels in the earthy, joyously uncool tones of a ’70s hippie-folk record excavated from a garage sale. It is Big Thief’s loosest album and most ambitious album all at once.
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5. ‘Midnights,’ Taylor Swift
Each song is high-concept, of course, in its own way, especially lyrically, from the emo-erotica of “Lavender Haze” to the ready-for-group-chanting self-deprecation of “Anti-Hero” to the provocative takes on female-alpha supremacy in “Karma” and “Mastermind.” When the best pop songwriter of this century can create something this strictly personal and even idiosyncratic and have it become the music event of the year, that’s not a mass mind-meld to take for granted.
[Variety]
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4. ‘Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers,’ Kendrick Lamar
After 1,855 days, the GOAT returned with an anarchic collection of songs birthed from a place of sweet self-awareness — both in how he is perceived and who he knows himself to be. On its introductory track, “United in Grief” — a timely and multitude-holding triad of words in and of itself — we hear a poetic unraveling of the Compton-native’s thoughts, which are then further shared unsparingly as the album runs. That grief is later cushioned by the pleasures of having a “Rich Spirit” full of bountiful boundaries and a “Die Hard” essence. In that dance, and the fine balance of being both known and in continued maturation, Kendrick is imperfectly perfect.
[Complex]
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3. ‘Motomami,’ Rosalía
[Rosalía] joins the ranks of fellow top female artists who produce themselves, like Bjork, Sia and Charli XCX (which we’re only pointing out because female producers never seem to get the credit they deserve) — and every song is rooted in her stunning voice. “Motomami” is one of the most innovative and audience-challenging albums of the year — let alone for a major artist — and it’s a testament to her audience and her trust in them that it’s met with such success.
[Variety]
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2. ‘Un Verano Sin Ti,’ Bad Bunny
”Verano,” divided into “Lado A” & “Lado B,” was designed to bring you on an emotional roller coaster across its two halves, climbing to an early high with the furious mambo “Después de la Playa.” From there, it hurtles listeners through intense perreo (“Me Porto Bonito”), feel-good reggae (“Me Fui De Vacaciones,“) and dembow (“Tití Me Preguntó“) cuts, before decelerating with bossa nova (“Yo No Soy Celoso”) and smooth melodic soul (“Ojitos Lindos”). Each song on the album has its own purpose and each lyric and melody its own story, and the whole thing adds up to an album vivid and exciting enough to make the album the year’s biggest in America without a single stateside pop radio hit or English-language song. It’s Bad Bunny’s world, and we’re all just hopping around in it, pretending that summer isn’t over yet.
1. ‘Renaissance,’ Beyoncé
Over the years, Beyoncé’s music has served every function: It can lift a disheveled spirit, vault femme erotics, or treat the wounds of a devastating relationship. But “Renaissance” eclipses Bey’s previous statements of hard-won self-love and romantic resilience. It does more than revere the dancefloor; it bottles its joy, conviviality, and verve, all while transcending the condition of homage. Its affirmations electrify the body, coursing through the veins like a life-saving shot of adrenaline: Consider the lines “Don’t even waste your time trying to compete with me/No one else in this world can think like me” on “Alien Superstar,” or, “It should cost a billion to look this good” on “Pure/Honey.” As the world burns, “Renaissance” invites us to remember what it’s like to feel good.
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Honorable Mentions
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“Big Time,” Angel Olsen
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“Gemini Rights,” Steve Lacy
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“Blue Rev,” Alvvays
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“It’s Almost Dry,” Pusha T
A Note On Methodology
We wish we could say there was a super fancy algorithm that combed the internet and did this for us. But the truth is that the entity doing the internet combing was a human Digg Editor, and calculations were performed by an Excel sheet that ingested and re-ranked all the lists we fed into it (briefly: #1 ranked items received 10 points, #2 ranked items got 9 points... down through #10 ranked items, which got 1 point; items on unranked lists all got 5.5 points).
