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: 'this was supposed to be fun' by epic beard men (sage francis & b. dolan)

Okay, and this ruled too - enjoy!

Next up... man, I really want to finish off that Trailing Edge episode for the quarter, but Billie Eilish is right around the corner afterwards, I promise - stay tuned!

album review: 'this was supposed to be fun' by epic beard men (sage francis & b. dolan)

Not going to mince words: this was one of my most hotly anticipated hip-hop projects of 2019.

And if you're familiar with Epic Beard Men from their killer EP Season 1 last year - or hell, from any of the solo projects of Rhode Island MCs Sage Francis or B. Dolan - you'd completely understand why. Hell, I'm a little stunned why there doesn't seem to be more hype within the hip-hop underground: stellar MCs with expressive delivery that helped lay the groundwork of emo rap, delivering a collaborative project off a really strong EP that's sure to be rife with progressive and activist politics in an era where that is more the rage than ever, if there's a moment for this duo to be dropping an album, it's now! And while the EP had primed the pump, I knew that the full album was probably set to solve my minor gripes with that project, giving more room to modulate tone and incorporate a broader subset of acts and production to lend the project diversity. And considering they picked up Slug from Atmosphere, Wu-Tang affiliate Blue Raspberry, and Yugen Blakrok, whose great sophomore project dropped earlier this year, it looked like all the pieces were in place for this to work - so no more wasting time, what did we get from This Was Supposed To Be Fun?

the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2018 (VIDEO)

Legit surprised that I forgot to post this - well, enjoy!

the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2018

There are years where I struggle with this midyear list, sometimes in years overloaded with quality that force me to make some painful cuts, or years that are a little more scant I'm stuck with what seems like a smaller list... and still have to make painful cuts. 

And thus it feels odd that building this 2018 midyear list is perhaps one of the easiest I've ever assembled, and since I'm not about to assume I'm getting good at this, I'm genuinely curious why that might be. I will say that outside of hip-hop, other genres don't seem to be having an exceptionally strong year - great albums in rock and country and metal but few that really went over the top in terms of quality, and I'd argue pop has had it even worse. But more than that, even the records that just missed the cut - Beach House, Iceage, Parquet Courts, Against All Logic, and especially Phonte - while they were truly terrific releases, I'm not precisely torn up that they had to miss the cut, as they all have a considerable shot for the year-end as my tastes evolve and change. 

So given that this is my fifth list like this, you know the rules: the albums and songs have to have been reviewed in 2018, and while I'm fairly certain you'll all know what's going to top this list, I'll add that there are songs from The Trailing Edge that have a chance to wind up in the individual songs, because there really were some incredible cuts there. So let's not waste any time and start with...

video review: 'season 1' by epic beard men (sage francis & b. dolan)

Yeah, I know I'm late to the punch with this one, but I'm thrilled to cover it all the same - definitely check this one out, you've got no excuse not to!

Next up, let's head towards a country return long in coming - stay tuned!

album review: 'season 1' by epic beard men

It's hard for me to get excited about a lot of mainstream hip-hop these days. Of course that's not saying that it's all bad or that we don't have artists who stand out, but when even Kendrick phones in his verses and the #1 song on the Hot 100 is a Drake song that I still don't think I could remember if I tried, it's not exactly a good situation. And then I see artists like XXXTENTACION and 6ix9ine who feel so damn one-dimensional and I'm left thinking about the artists who paved the lane for emo rap but who could still turn in with aggressive production and bruising wordplay...

And enter Sage Francis and B. Dolan, two Rhode Island MCs known for spoken word poetry, thorny, hard-hitting bars, and the sort of raw, vulnerable subject matter that most MCs would never dare put on wax. Both of these men have made my year-end lists - Sage Francis with Copper Gone and B. Dolan with Kill The Wolf - and considering their long-running friendship and mighty beards, I knew it'd only be a matter of time before we got a team-up of some variety. And yeah, it's just a free eight song EP, but considering it's not much shorter than that upcoming XXXTENTACION album with eighteen songs, I'd prefer to hear from the genuine article in this scene first, even if again I'm a little late to the punch covering it. So all right, what did we get on Season 1?