Best Albums of 2022

I promise these records are worth your time

The first time I ever assembled a year-end best of list was published in January, 1982. I was not aware that this was something music writers did. I’d been editing and writing Jet Lag, a fanzine, for two years at that point, and we had added staff members who started asking for space to list their faves of 1981. So, naturally, I went along and did it, too. I’m very certain that I was absolutely convinced my list was definitive, even though I obviously had not begun to hear a representative sample of any year’s music.

For the record, that initial burst of choices included the Embarrasment’s self-titled EP; Ellen Foley’s Spirit of St. Louis (an album that was basically written and produced by Mick Jones and his Clash mates, and one which I don’t think I’ve listened to since about 1982);  Joan Jett’s Bad Reputation; Magazine’s Play; and the Psychedelic Furs’ Talk Talk Talk. Garland Jeffreys’ Escape Artist and the Undertones Positive Touch received honorable mentions. My fave singles (or songs that should have been singles, as I labeled the list) included two St. Louis bands – the Felons with “Love ‘n’ Skank,” and the Obvious with “Surf’s Up Gang” – and three funk hits – “Super Freak” by Rick James, “Controversy” by Prince, and “Burn Rubber” by the Gap Band.

Since then, I’ve published lists of what I considered to be the best albums of the year some 41 times, and honestly, I don’t stand by many of them. Unlike some critics, I don’t put in the work to re-listen to and comparatively analyze the best records I hear in any twelve-month period. I do try to include the records that made the strongest lasting impression on me, but invariably, especially as I’ve come to hear hundreds of albums every year thanks to an easy access to promos and the internet, I forget things which really struck me at some point. It’s always easier to think of favorites from the last few months than of something I enjoyed at the beginning of the year.

That said, I recognize the value of these lists. I’ve read dozens of them over the last six or seven weeks, and I’ve found quite a few records I had overlooked, not to mention some that I’ve given a fresh listen after seeing how much other writers liked them. And, I know for a fact that most people do not share my obsessive compulsion to hear so much new music all the freaking time. For those people, narrowing down my recommendations to just a few records becomes something manageable that allows them to discover something they may have otherwise missed.

I also have been asked a few times to turn in my top ten this year, and that produced a quandary. One list I turned in to KDHX in late November didn’t get published until a few days ago. But after I wrote it in stone, I heard an album released in early December that just might be my favorite record of 2022. In fact, when I voted in an online tribute to the late lamented Village Voice Pazz and Jop poll, I put that record in the number one slot (as opposed to the alphabetical order I use everywhere else) and debated over which album needed to come off the list. That faux Pazz and Jop list, switched back to alphabetical order, became my top ten on the Euclid Records Facebook page.

Now, however, I think I want to put the record I took away back in the top ten, and pull off another one that had made it through three iterations but which has receded further into my memory with every time I thought about it. And meanwhile, I heard a hip hop record  that came out in October that may be better than the hip hop record  I put in my top ten before, but which I’m not ready to commit to until I play it some more. So, what I’m saying, I think, is that I’m about to give you a list of ten records I really liked this past year which may or may not be the best of 2022 but which are absolutely wonderful albums. Back in 1982, my Jet Lag colleague Tony Renner wrote about his own list, “Don’t like nothin’ else; never have, never will.” We really did love Creemmagazine back then. That’s something I can’t say, even tongue in cheek, though, as I’ve lived long enough to know my tastes will always change, and the best I can offer is a conviction that I’m saying what I believe to be true at this moment.

So, the best albums of 2022 were:

Adeem the Artist – White Trash Revelry

Buck 65 – King of Drums

Elvis Costello – The Boy Named If

Madison Cunningham – Revealer

Mary Halvorson – Amaryllis

Hedvig Mollestad – Maternity Beat

David Murray – Promethia

Willie Nelson – A Beautiful Time

Rosalia – Motomami

Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway – Crooked Tree