Another twelve months pass and we move into the fourteenth year since I started putting words down on the wordpress-paper of this blog. It becomes harder and harder each year to find the motivation to keep writing, not because the music is less compelling but the format feels like a deteriorating asset. I recently saw an editor of a high profile publication say that his best advice to young people was to pursue a more technical format rather than writing. Video reviews, tiktok song discovery, podcasting, insta reviews – whatever, just not asking the shortest attention spans in human history to sit down and read as we dance about architecture. But I have even less interest in making short form video content than I do this so this is where we find ourselves – you, finally about to read some real ass music and me, spending several hundred minutes online for the sum ottal of fifty-six pageviews. One thing hasn’t changed in those fourteen years – artists are still finding ways of surprising me. I love a well crafted record but I love an unexpected record even more. Shoutout to that artists like the ones you’re about to listen to who made me feel something in 2023. Long live.

 

 

20. Arches
KAWAII (and Banshee)

Starting this list of in much the same way as I live my life generally, maxed out with indecision. When faced with these two vastly different Aches records in the knowledge I could only pick one, I chose the one that stood out the most against the rest of this list – ‘KAWAII’. It’s verging on Porter Robinson territory with pitch shifted angel vox, light guitar lines and plenty of production padding. It builds into an explosion of 808s with that woodblock sound that had me thinking peak Cashmere Cat but ultimately it was the feeling conveyed through those vocals that had me hooked. Special shoutout to ‘BANSHEE’, worth tracking down too so as to see the polar opposite side of their music.

 

19. Felivand
Not Your Fault

Real talk, I actually had Feli’s ‘Miss My Baby’ as my chosen track for this slot but at the eleventh our I detoured to Not Your Fault, the other single she bequeathed to us this year. While Miss My Baby has those glorious keys and driving garage percussion, ‘Not Your Fault’ is the sort of record that will stick with you for years ahead. It’s songwriting that cuts to the quick, affection in the blood of every word and vocal melodies that are quite simply world class. If Felivand’s rise doesn’t continue unabated then there’s illuminati at play – she simply must succeed, I demand it.

 

18. Agung Mango
ALMOST FAMOUS (ft. Melody Napoleon)

I’m contractually obligated (to my own soul) to include Mango in every best of list and even though it’s felt like a relatively quiet year for him this year in some ways, this record is certified. The hook, the swelling climactic ending with Melody Napoleon and Mango with his ever-incredible vocal tone all make for something that I didn’t know he had in his wheelhouse in terms of pure cinematic qualities. We knew he could spit, but this is moody magic.

 

17. Superdeath
It’ll be ok

A fixture in last years list, Super Death gets a return entry thanks to ‘It’ll be ok’, one of a brace of singles he released this year. What I appreciate most is the growth in his work since last year – which isn’t to say that last year’s LP wasn’t a glorious monsterpiece but these two songs show such different aspects to the artmaking process for Super Death, this one pivoting to a far more at peace and optimistic headspace than anything he’d release prior (while still be preeeety intense of course). His other 2023 offering ‘White Lady Getaway’ is an almost Prodigy-esque heater and it’s worth investigating both if you’re not across his work prior. His electronic production is coming to the fore which has thickened out the mixture of sounds in his arsenal.

 

16. Elle Shimada
MONONOKE

Violinist come producer Elle Shimada is sweet sixteen in this years best of and many are already saying she shoulda be higher. First in Tokyo and now outta Naarm, Elle’s production fingerprints are so perfectly articulated while her intelligence as an executive producer sees her bring in all the right hitter on all the right tracks. ‘MONONOKE’ sees her invite fellow Meolbournite Jamahl Yami to spit his energies across swelling waves of strings, drum n bass, harmonized vocals, gliding 808s and blasts of ambient synth. She lends some Japanese lyricism to the mix and broth they cook up ultimately tastes like no other. There’s so much vision and cleverness to this project, we simply must respect it.

 

15. GC Oconnor
Love On High

Admittedly something about the track title had me hooked just because it vaguely made me think of Coltrane’s A Love Supreme but given this one a just 60 seconds and i reckon you’ll clock where the magic lies. GC Oconnor was almost certainly making music in one shape or another prior to this year but 2023 was the advent of the GC Project and the Soul Lament that she released last month. This was the first single she released under the moniker and though I can see why she didn’t include it in the five tracker since sonically it stands apart. It’s produced by The Goods in a way that puts me in mind of Beach House’s twinkling dust and GC slowly croons through the haze, an attention on lyrical colour and context rather than storytelling.

 

14. Jem Cassar-Daley
The King of Disappointment

Only when Jem is an artist known house to house, nationwide, seven albums deep with people debating which songs within her canon are her true greats will I believe that Australia has any respect for songwriting. Year on year she drops songs beautifully sung, beautifully record but more than both, written direct to the soul. Her hooks are unmatched, her feelings ever laid bare with rarely more than the simplest production accompaniment. These are pure songs, records direct to and from the spirit. JCD the realest.

 

13. Jim Alxndr
Sticks and Stones

Given that Jim has worked with pop artists as lofty as Carly Rae Jepsen, seeing him drop a record that literally started with a chorus wasn’t a great surprise. What WAS a surprise though was how he nailed my runt heart with that singular post chorus line – ‘and when you think it’s over, you find it’s only just begun’. I found myself actively angry on each listen when he went to a bridge instead of that post chorus line but hey, Jim’s the sounds guy, I’m just the lad that tells you to listen to Jim. ‘Sticks and Stones’ feels like the type of record James Blake might make if he was cooking on uppers – something I’ve frankly always wanted to hear. Now you can too.

 

12. KHYA
maryjane

Before KHYA even breaths a word over this record the mood is set, fifteen seconds of dimension expanding ambience, the room broadened out wide. So when that vocal does arrive, it shimmers so delicately that it feels like you could lightly pluck it from the air as it floats within that roomy production. Interestingly she offered up a handful of remixes of the same track that gave peephole views of a world in which those vocals exist so differently. It’s a record dedicated to the great green deity and truly I think we’d all be so lucky to find someone who speaks of us with half the affection that KHYA does the kush. That’s amore.

 

11. Yawdoesitall
DOOFENSHMIRTZ

Yaw brought in the whole crew for DOOFENSHMIRTZ and was justified in doing so given that many hands made light work of this one. He’s been a mainstay of Sydney hip-hop for some years now (Armadillo a few years back is a mandatory listen for anyone who wants some catalogue) but 2023 has seemingly been a good one for his profile with some great collab heaters in the bank. Everyone turned up on DOOFENSHMIRTZ, DEVAURA and TAWANDA both offering up stunning introductions that have led to further stock investments (see #8 in this list).

 

10. DYSI
Over Again

I don’t know what’s pining more on this record, DYSI’s vocals or that bassline (bit of a bassline theme to a few of the picks this year, allow it). This brand new Boorlo vocalist came in hot with a voice that taps into your deepest needs, your latent desires and that shared wish we all have for Arsenal to win the Champions League this season. And while there’s that undercurrent of desire, there’s also this unexpected tone to his voice that suggests he’s smiling way through the track. Rightly so too, because DYSI knows he’s cooked up a real one with ‘Over Again’, comfortably the best song from the five tracker he dropped in August and primed to soundtrack your next relationship breakdown.

 

9. 1tbsp
No Nein

The roundest, warmest, chunkiest wobs are the linchpin of this record from Max Byrne aka 1tbsp fka Golden Vessel. What’s a wob a I hear you ask? Well one simply must hear a wob to understand the nature of a wob and in turn deep the true spirit of a wob. When you feel the wob, you know the wob and when you know the wob? Well there’s nothing you can’t do. It was giving Two Shell in the way the vocals were treated and that may well be the highest praise I can offer a producer in 2023. Spin this in let your muscle fibres hit those fast twitch zones.

 

8. Devaura
KETAMINE (ft. Chandler Jewels and Ash Swaze)

Her second slot in this top 20 after appearing slightly down the list on Yaw’s DOOFENSHMIRTZ, Devaura’s managed an unexpected impact on my year given her relatively light footprint in terms of actual output. She’s quality over quantity and there’s something to be said for moderating your releases so that every foot forward is a thundering stomp. ‘KETAMINE’ is racy as hell and though I’m not spinning it around my kids anytime soon, the NSFW lyrical moments have been a mainstay in my office and car. We know now more than ever that DEVAURA can spit and she bringing in Ash Swaze and Chandler Jewels on this record to add vocal colour to parallel her harder bars was an inspired decision. Take a moment to give Chandler his flowers for this production too, the jersey vibes lending bounce and potency.

 

7. Hector Morlet
We’re So Tight It Hurts

I’ve been on the Morlet train for a hot minute (mor-lay, by the way, so you don’t make the same mistake I did for a good year+) but this record felt like such a monumental step forward for big hec. This is the sort of bassline that’ll hit like drunkard in a zorb ball bouncing you ass first onto the grass with a look of shocked incredulity on your stupid face. His falsetto highs partnered with that bassline give this a lowkey kevin parker aspect but I genuinely don’t know if kevvo has ever gonna quite this funked. While kev’s trying to tell me that the less I know the better, hec’s throwing the curtain wide and strutting his business real obvious like.

 

6. Honeybeam
Technically

Sometimes you gotta let the artist speak for themselves and honeybeam’s own bio speaks to her art better than I could ever hope to. “Honeybeam craft an intricate and colourful world of optimistic melancholy underlined with pure joy, elation and surprise at existing and the wonderful ability to feel.”
What stands out most to me is the idea of ‘surprise at existing’, a transcendent weirdness in the fact that we are here, breathing and alive, taking in sensation against the galactically overwhelming odds. Real name Maya Adamson, she goes out of her way to make sure her music is imbued with that same kind of wonder and everything from the guitar lines to the vocal melodies feel like an internal monologue made public. This song is akin to experiencing the everyday as if it was anew, magic in the simplicity of existence. Kinda nice to take that step back and appreciate the fact we exist huh.

 

5. Mali Jo$e
KEEP UP!

Mali deserves all the flowers for what he cooked up in 2023 but similarly I deserve some credito for whittling down this years Mali catalogue to just one track. Really but, how to choose a single track when the options are hyper-valid across the board. Man saw his previous three years workload and said “let’s do it all again in 2023″. The ethic has been ridiculous, his fingers on the conveyer belt time and time again as he gave us hot-ass flows and a project that spanned dimensions. I went with KEEPup because by my guts it was the best reflection of his blooming craft, an example of his movement into rapped hooks and the flows we’ve always known he had in his Arsenal but have slowly grown to some of the best in the nation. He’s the Gabriel Jesus of aus hip-hop, work ethic high and flair to boot – the haters might wanna look at data metrics but true heads know the craft.

 

4. Lamira
Dame

Lamira can hold the honour of being the highest ranked artist on this fair list that could be considered a true artist discovery for me this year, having never heard the name prior to 2023. Venezualan born and semi-recently migrated to Sydney she wasted no time in giving us the debut single from this project in the form of Dame replete with criminally under-viewed MV. High energy reggaeton vibes are the order of the day and Lamira infuses every bar of this record with latin flow and supreme confidence. Her delivery is immaculate, every vocalization infused with swathes of personality. My 2023 needed this song though my car speakers are significantly worse for wear since its arrival. Shoutouts to a real one.

 

3. Middle Kids
Bootleg Firecracker

A band whose every subsequent drop is, against the odds, better than the last? That’s personal growth baby. I don’t delude myself into thinking that I’m introducing anyone to Middle Kids in 2023 but if I can get you to re-entertain this ephemeral little record then I’d consider my job done. Give it three minutes, breath in the guitar tone and see yourself on the outskirts of town as a relationship hits diverging paths. This song is that decision, the risk vs reward of taking a chance on something dangerous, someone special. Consume in tandem with the music video for the full visceral experience.

 

2. Friday*
Beaming

I almost worried for Friday* because it feels like he dropped a career high single so early into his journey and set himself an unattainably hligh bar for every subsequent release. Can you imagine if Coldplay dropped… *checks notes* ‘A Sky Full of Stars’ on their first EP? Ludicrous! Beaming is the kinda songwriting that channels such a complicated network of feeling that it’s nigh on impossible to identify just what you should be feeling in the wake of it. It’s morose but hopeful, introspective and wandering like a stream of consciousness in a moment of reflective tranquility. The warmth of the sun filtered through the thin veneer of sheer curtains, a close friend that’s just an acquaintance now. It’s an transcendent experience, it’s direct to the memory stream, it’s all heart.

 

1. DoloRRes
BOSCO

I can’t tell you how many times I went back and forth between Beaming and BOSCO for the mantle of my favourite song on the year but ultimately I landed on DoloRRes due to his sheer ingenuity of production and construction. He takes these synthetically laced vocals, cascading, discordant synths and a pulsing kick drum and cooks it all up into an arctic broth. Simply put, it sounds like little else released locally or otherwise. That, and its had me repeating ‘cura, cura, cura’ at my work desk so frequently that I’ve been given a long term sound embargo (aka workplace bullying even if HR told me to get out of their office? Like, that’s your job?). It’s a record of contractions, high energy but icy calm, languages butting up against each other as DeloRRes weaves between Italian and English and club production with rapped verses making a slightly more common partnership than it would’ve been a handful of years ago. DoloRRes a real one, there’s no two ways about it and this song is his moment for 2023.