the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2019 (VIDEO)

Oh, and I did this. And outside of a few editing hiccups (UGGGHHH) this turned out well. Enjoy!

the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2019

So for one of the first times when I'm making this midyear retrospective, I have to introduce a major caveat: I'm putting together this list before listening to the long-awaited return collaboration between Freddie Gibbs and Madlib. Make no mistake, I want to hear it and it'll probably get a ton of praise from me given how much I loved Pinata, but it's also going to be a project I'll need time to process and I don't want to rush a review before the midyear and risk delays, so if you're wondering why that's not here, that's why.

But it's also important to highlight that even if that album is as amazing as I hope it'll be, it would face some stiff competition this year! I highlighted last year how even despite getting a pretty reasonable spread of albums it was easy to put things in position, and I wanted to say it'd be same here... until I truly took a look at how many truly stunning albums we've gotten in the first half of 2019! Country has delivered in spades, underground hip-hop is firing on all cylinders, I've got solid cuts from rock and punk and metal, and even pop and R&B have given me some choice cuts. As such, this is one of those years I've had to make some painful cut to whittle this list down to twelve albums and twenty-four songs outside those albums, and just like last year, I have to stress just because an album didn't make this midyear list is no guarantee it won't make the year-end, or that positions won't evolve or change. Also - and I feel this important to emphasize - if you're expecting to see some big name critical darlings here... well, suffice to say 2019 has been a year where I'm flying down a very different path than many mainstream critics, so if you're looking for certain albums... go check to see if I've reviewed them, that's all I'm saying.

And given that this is the sixth one of these lists I've assembled, I've got twelve albums, twenty four songs not otherwise on those albums, and let's start with...

video review: 'into the blue' by alice wallace

Okay, I know I'm late to the party with this one, but it's really something special, especially if you're into indie country - definitely check it out!

Next up... you know, I feel like some dense underground hip-hop, so stay tuned!

album review: 'into the blue' by alice wallace

So I've said a number of times before one of the biggest problems with indie country is how it can really struggle to get the word out surrounding new acts - internet-driven groundswell has started to take more shape over the 2010s, but it's been scattered at best, and too often I find myself going back to dig up acts where if they hadn't slipped below the radar I'd have given them a ton of acclaim.

And Alice Wallace is a pretty striking example of this - a California-based singer-songwriter, she's been putting out albums since the beginning of the 2010s with a pretty damn striking voice and a fondness for yodeling, but what really captured my interesting was her 2015 album Memories, Music & Pride, where the songwriting took a measurable step up along with production that picked up more detail, refinement, and muscle. And it's tough to nail down an easy comparison for her sound - a little more stately and neotraditional than Karen Jonas' gritty early material but not as inclined towards pop as Caitlyn Smith or cutesy as Kacey Musgraves, as observational as Brandy Clark but not quite as wise just yet. But hey, that comes with time, and Memories, Music & Pride probably deserved a solid review back in 2015, it's a great album, so you can bet I was curious about her follow-up this year with Into The Blue - so what did we get?