2020, for all its flaws, was a year filled with kickass new music. Despite being the hardest ever year for musicians and touring artists, especially in the independent, alternative world, our favourite bands and artists kept creating and gave us the gift of music to sustain and help us get through a time we will remember as one of the toughest in history. Having a lot of time on my hands, and having made the resolution to keep up with the scene, I lent an ear to everything. Artists I hadn't paid attention to before, names I didn't know well, recommendations, everything was fair game.

It is the reason why there is no ranked list of the releases of the year, because I cannot and do not really want to compare completely opposed genres and styles. How do I compare metalcore and folk-pop? Pop-punk and folktronica? The correct answer is I don't. I have a top six, but, most importantly, I have a jumble of albums that have helped along the way, brought a smile to my face, proved to be the perfect soundtrack for a sunny day, a rainy day, or a bottom-of-the-bin brain day. That's what we're celebrating today.

I want to start with live albums.

I usually pay very little attention to live recordings, for reasons that elude me. This year, two managed to catch my eye, and I have a sneaky little feeling that it is because they involve some of my very favourite artists. One of them is the Live At Asbury Park by Aaron West And The Roaring Twenties. For those who aren't in the know, AW20 is the side project of The Wonder Years' Dan Campbell, who is one of my favourite songwriters, musicians, and all-around people. The two studio albums attached to it, We Don't Have Each Other and Routine Maintenance, are a story based on the life of a fictional character, Aaron West. I got to see it performed live twice at the end of last year, and, shocker with me, it ended in tears. There will be songs you listen to, in life, and you think they are lovely acoustic songs, they have a nice vibe to them, and then, you register the lyrics? The saddest line you have ever heard during your time on Earth will hit you straight in the gut. That's the basic summary of Aaron West's discography. Two studio albums, a bunch of songs here and there, and a live record compiling raw sadness and pain. I was meant to see Aaron West And The Roaring Twenties as a full band experience before Slam Dunk, this year, which would have included brass instruments, and hopefully fewer tears, but, you know. 2020 was who she was as a year. In the meantime, I have Live At Asbury Park, a record player, and a whole lot of tears to sustain myself.
Though I will always live for the hope I find in Runnin' Toward The Light. What a song.

I will use the verb discovered for the second half of this very short list, as opposed to talking about a release. It popped up on Spotify, but I have no recollection of the band ever mentioning it, and I have no idea if it was meant to be something more than "something that, one day, popped up on Spotify." It's the triple j live at the Wireless, in Melbourne, by The Story So Far. I think it helped to fill the void of not seeing a band I had become so used to seeing all the time and everywhere, but, then again, does anything fill the void at all? Maybe it was just here to remind me of the great times I had, and hopefully will still have, appearing everywhere, one beached whale-like crowdsurf at a time. Lord, I miss seeing The Story So Far everywhere. Just like live albums tend to do, it allowed me to pay more attention to the instruments, the quality of the playing, and the details I cannot necessarily hear when I am caught in a moment, beaten up in a moshpit, taking in the atmosphere instead. Also, if you must know, it's a little corny, but the first minute of Solo absolutely destroyed me.

I miss the era of split EPs. I miss bands teaming up to release music together. I miss bands collaborating more together, come to think of it.
Split EPs, though deserving of their own post, gave me some songs I adore. The first one that comes to mind is Clairvoyant by The Story So Far, part of an EP with Stick To Your Guns. Imagine what a tour that would be! 

There was only one split EP that I found this year, which is nowhere near enough. It hailed from somewhere between Melbourne and Tasmania, a little bit of both. It was announced through minimal promotion, just pictures of coffee makers and tags on Instagram posts, and it gave us two of the loveliest songs of the year. It was the Slowly Slowly x Luca Brasi split EP, and a part of me will always be annoyed that I missed out on the vinyl and the coffee maker. (Damn shipping fees, timezones, and vinyl hoarders)
Slowly Slowly's half of it, Slow Learner, is a short acoustic number packed with feelings. The vocal delivery and lyrical vibe are very reminiscent of the band's first album/EP/musical situation/whatever anyone wants to call it, Chamomile. It was released the day after my birthday, and I listened to it for the first time in my brother's car, under the pouring rain.
It was perfect.
Finally lending my ears to Luca Brasi, this year, filled part of a gap in my heart. Despite the heavy lyrical content, their half of the split, Yossarian, feels comforting. There is something comforting about Luca Brasi in general, something that feels like the sunshine warming you up, and road trips with the windows down. I can't quite put my finger on it, but feelings like these make more sense to me than describing music in elaborate genres and technical words.
Music is now something that feels like weather types and activities.

A few awesome EPs graced the virtual shelves of streaming apps this year, and some struck my attention, big time.

I have always been picky about "reimagined" type of materials. If I am a sucker for acoustic music, I don't want my favourite bands to slap an ambient beat over a song with the vocals turned down and call it a day. It's lazy and unimaginative. If I am going to dig something reimagined, it has to give me a whole new take on the song. It has to pack on the feelings and give me a way to rediscover it, appreciate its intricacies and details, bleed the emotions from the lyrics dry. It has to live up to the implications of the term "reimagined."
Two of such EPs gave me all of those feelings this year.

The first was the second volume of The Wonder Years' Burst And Decay series. See, no one said anything about it being a series. I just want the hope of it all. The Wonder Years acoustic is the best thing since sliced bread, it might even be better, and it gives you the opportunity to rediscover the band's music. You get more places and more moments when you're going to burst out crying every single feeling that has ever crossed your heavy heart. While Washington Square Park gave me all the hope and shoulder-to-cry-on type of vibe I needed when it first came out, Passing Through A Screen Door was a swifter kick to the stomach, an existential crisis of a song amped up to the max. Weirdly enough, this is a compliment. Passing Through A Screen Door, despite being unbelievably sad, remains my favourite TWY song, a solid companion when my brain makes me feel like I have quite literally fucked up my whole life.

The second one was Between The Kitchen And The Living Room, by Alex Lahey. First of all, the title is a reference to 2019's I Want To Live With You, and, if you know me, you know I am the biggest nerd for songs and albums that reference each other. Second of all, I loved that it was all recorded in Alex's apartment during quarantine, every song in a different room. Everyday's The Weekend was dubbed the Laundry Version and came attached to one of the sweetest music videos of the year, full of kitties, puppies, and hope for the future. The weirdly eye-opening and relatable I Haven't Been Taking Care Of Myself was recorded from the hallway. It genuinely felt like a reinvention of the music, a moment when an artist took the cards they were dealt with and made something beautiful out of it. It was lovely, peaceful, and quiet, and, believe you me, my brain needed the break. 

As far as original EPs go, a couple have stood out to me, too. I noticed more than I usually do, this year, and while I appreciate all the effort and creativity artists have put in their newer material, not everything struck a chord. Such is life. 

If there were ever any favourites as such, the title would be won by Good At Feeling Bad by Best Ex. I have been through this dozens of times before. Everyone knows Mariel Loveland is one of my favourite artists, and most importantly, songwriters in the world. I simply adore the way she can paint a picture with her words, make every line a snapshot of a precise moment, and, at the same time, deliver it in a way that leaves space for your personal experience to grow. The shimmery, glittery pop sound mixed with emotional lyrics is a deadly combination, the best of both worlds. Immersing myself in Best Ex's music always feels like being given a best friend to hold your hand while you're overcoming all the obstacles, the times life brings you down, the boys that will break your heart, the ever going conflict between hope for a brighter future and the anxiety of right now. It always feels like being less alone. Good At Feeling Bad is the kind of music that makes you want to dance your heartbreak away with a sugary sweet drink in hand, go on stupid, yet unforgettable adventures with your friends, or maybe give yourself a makeover, à la 2000s coming-of-age film, but maybe not just for the wardrobe. Maybe I could do with a brighter exterior, but maybe I could shine a light on the inside and start believing that I will be okay. This is what Best Ex feels like.

Another EP I adored this year was World In Colour by Luke Rainsford. I have been following Luke's various musical endeavours for the past almost-five years, and if you think this means I liked Layover, you are right. Listening to World In Colour again yesterday afternoon, I found myself missing them making every possible line-up just that little bit better. World In Colour is all I could possibly want from Luke's music.
Tip Toe is one of the most joyous, hopeful songs I have heard during this hell hole of a year, and I spent many a walk in the fields listening to it and resisting the call of the truly awful dad-dancing. (At least, the people in the village would have had a valid reason to stare at me.) Lack is one hell of a deceiving track, perfectly associating some of the most heartbreaking lyrics I have ever heard to unbelievable catchiness. Frame and In Spite Of All My Worry weren't new, and they took me back to the one time I got to see Luke play this year, in Birmingham, in support of Cory Wells. It was a lovely night I miss dearly. Despite being on the sad, so, so fucking sad side of everything, they feel comforting, somewhere in the memory of that one night. I don't have a lot of very good words for this, which completely defeats the point of me writing any of this. Just know there is something so infinitely special about Luke Rainsford and their music, something I wish everyone in the world could see.
(For future reference, when we have live music again, I WILL make up for all the dad-dancing I missed out on, which I know sounds like a threat. It is. I would like to use this opportunity to formally apologise in advance.)

As a description of No Pressure's self-titled EP, I will use a comment I read on a Nate The Mate YouTube video: "Parker literally Beyonce'd us with that EP and I'm grateful." 
No Pressure is the newest project from The Story So Far's Parker Cannon, and one of the best parts about it is that it was dumped on a scene that was not expecting any of it, no explanation, nothing, just five songs, take them or leave them, and then, that was it, aside from a vinyl and cassette tape release. It felt like "Hi, have some music, bye now." No Pressure's music is fast and energetic, reminiscent of two of my great loves in life, early-2000s pop-punk, and early The Story So Far. It's very in your face, and that's what I like so much about it. It's here, yours for the taking, the enjoying, the loving, and that's quite literally it. Weirdly enough, as a huge TSSF fan, what I love the most about it is the early-2000s influence, because it takes all the best from that era, and mixes it with the best from our present time. It has a nostalgic vibe, it feels like it could have been huge at a time when film soundtracks were basically blink-182 and Sum 41 albums, but it doesn't feel stuck in the past. No Pressure perfectly mix nostalgic influences and a modern sound.
You know, when you listen to a band who cites old school blink-182 and American Pie style pop-punk as their influences, and all they do is try to emulate everything from that era to a point when it feels outdated when it was released three days ago? That's the trap No Pressure doesn't fall into. Despite having no information whatsoever on background and influences, it's obvious at least some inspiration came from somewhere early this century. At the same time, it was done by a group of musicians and artists who know what they're doing, who know how to combine styles without falling into soulless imitation and clichés. Quite simply put, it's really fucking good, and I hope that at some point in the future, it gets a live show. The money I would pay to hear those five songs in a tiny, health-and-safety hazard, hot mess of a room. 

The last of the EPs does everything I am unable to do in life: keep it short and sweet. This year, as previously mentioned, I have connected a lot with Homesafe's music, and, to my rare unbridled joy, the four-piece released a two-song EP in April, entitled What's Mine Is Yours. It felt like, almost unannounced, the band dumped some of their best material on us, and left us (me) to deal with all of the feelings. Slide and Down are both heaven in musical form, all about love and being here for someone, about wanting to do something and save yourself. They are quiet, simple, but delicate melodies, the harmonies are pure perfection, and the result has that sneaky little power of making the world around you just that little bit quieter. Down ended up the unlikely soundtrack for a tour music video, and there aren't many things I love more than tour footage turned into music videos, unless they have dogs, which this one does. (Down also ended up near the top of the list of my favourite songs released this year, and by Homesafe in general.) I said it before, but when this is all over, when we have live music again, I want my experience to include at least one Homesafe show, and these songs definitely influenced the idea (and better make the setlist).

I know there were many more EPs released this year, some of which really good, too, more critically acclaimed, I don't doubt, less unknown, too. But these are the ones I played the most, the ones that came up first when I thought about EPs. If I may, as a last present of sorts, because too much music is better than none, I would also recommend State Champs' Unplugged EP, because Crying Out Loud made me, well, cry out loud, and Mat Kerekes' Songs For Breanne and Amber Park, because his solo music is one of the loveliest and most comforting there is.

Let's begin with a story you may or may not have heard. It all depends if a, you know me personally, b, you have been reading this blog for a long time, or c, all of the above.
I grew up in France and, due to the COVID crisis, I have had to move back home. I now live in a tiny village north of Paris without traffic lights or a decent-sized car park for me to learn how to skateboard, and I am exposed to mainstream French culture daily. 
I try, sometimes. Over breakfast, I will sit in front of the only music channel we've got (by music, I mean they're playing the same ten music videos on loop for most of the day, until you get to 7pm and then, you can move on and watch about five episodes of Pawn Stars on loop, before there's a low-budget action film, possibly starring Jean-Claude Van Damme) and I will attempt at finding something I like about the video in front of me.
The thing is, the vast majority of the time, the positive things I find are "I like her outfit" or "I like that guy's windbreaker," so it isn't going very well.

French mainstream culture is something utterly and intrinsically bizarre. A part of our collective psyche still believes in the French cultural exception, some outdated concept that leads us to have quotas of music that has to be in French on the radio and believe the sun shines out of our national backside. And at the same time, France seems to have completely given up on promoting music of any kind. You'll have the odd segment on the news, usually featuring someone who hasn't been on television in fifteen years, or someone related to an already famous artist, and that's pretty much it. We have one musical program, a classic called Taratata, but it's on at, like, eleven in the PM, in other words, not at a time when anyone is in front of the television, and the artists on it are usually famous already anyway.
The bulk of what's in the solitary, abandoned music channel is trendy rap about women and crimes, tacky rap about smoking weed and fancy cars with music videos filmed in football stadiums, remixes of ten-year-old songs, and white men with guitars and fedoras singing about how beautiful life is, how they love the village where they're from, and how we need to protect the Earth and the polar bears (but they're probably still eating foie gras at Christmas). Most of these songs have been written by the same dude. The only rock song we've got on there is the unexplainably present Summer Is A Curse by Australian pop-rock band The Faim. Why? No one knows.
This is, in all honesty, quite depressing. 

Finding out it isn't the same in every country is still bamboozling to me. (Is bamboozling a real word? It now is.) A part of me believed it was the same everywhere across the world, a planet of mainstream culture promoting the sons and daughters of your already famous people, and not much else. The rest of me knew it wasn't so, but it didn't stop me from being bewildered when I realised it.

Having "alternative" as my favoured genre of music and half of my favourite bands being Australian led me pretty early on to find out what triple j is. For those who don't know, it is THE radio station down under, and its most famous segment is called Like A Version, in which artists cover other artists' songs. About a year ago, a random man in Sydney told me it was a government radio, and it entirely blew my mind. 
Since the start of 2020, I have delved pretty deep into Australian music, and have often fallen into a deep dark hole of triple j videos on YouTube. (It's surprisingly easy. You'll listen to a song by an artist you like, and the suggestions will be a person you've never heard of covering Linkin Park or Avril Lavigne and, if you're like me and a sucker for a cover, you're there until the end of time, watching people perform In The End with a harp.) 
A lot of bands and artists I appreciate, which, again, fall under the "alternative" umbrella, have been performing live from the studios and been broadcast for the country to hear, at a time of day when people are likely to have the radio on, ie, not the middle of the night. 

A couple of days ago, something else about triple j and the multiple videos I have been watching hit me. 
There are quite a lot of women involved in the process, and a lot of these women are playing rock music, pop-punk music, alternative music, are playing the guitar, the bass, or the drums. See, our representation of women in French mainstream music is limited to a very small amount of categories: 

a- R'n'B singers with songs that don't always mean anything at all, but then again, maybe I'm too old to get it. (No matter what anyone ever leads you to believe, "tu hors de ma vue" is not a grammatically correct sentence in French.)
b- Girls next door with acoustic guitars who whisper into a microphone and are really pretty with minimal makeup on, and usually sing about love, but in metaphors that make no sense to the general public, but then again, maybe I'm not middle-class and cosmopolitan enough to understand.
c- Mylène Farmer. She's been majorly famous since the eighties, every single one of her songs is either about death or sex, again in metaphors I'm not sure I understand. To the best of my knowledge, she's the only French woman who consistently sells out stadiums and arenas all by herself, and she's got a bit of a rockstar mystique about her. Too bad she's also made it her mission to choose young protégées and have them sing sexually charged songs when they're sixteen.

Again, finding out it wasn't like that in every other country in the world blew my mind. You mean to tell me that some other places celebrate women in different genres? Invite women on the radio and they play instruments, and they are relatable, and don't have to fit into a certain category? You must be lying.
Except it's a real-life thing that's happening in Australia.

I understand it was a long-winded, roundabout way of getting to a list of music made by Australian women I have been enjoying a lot in 2020.

Before I get into the heart of things, I will go back to my first love when it comes to music made by Australian women: The Veronicas. Identical twins Jess and Lisa Origliasso, originating from Brisbane, have entered my life in circumstances I don't remember when I was seventeen. I remember downloading their debut album The Secret Life Of... and playing it every morning on my way to school on my old MP3 player, thinking this was the real deal. I had found IT! Girls in a pop-rock band! Girls playing the guitar! Girls in a rock band that wasn't fictional! Something to fill the pop-punk Avril Lavigne-shaped hole in my heart! 
(I wasn't a big fan of The Best Damn Thing at the time and I couldn't relate to pink-haired Avril anymore, I was seventeen and life was a struggle, leave me alone.)
It's been a disgusting amount of years since I was seventeen, but I still love every minute of The Secret Life Of..., and I still know it all off by heart. Even though I had no clue they were Australian at the time, they were my introduction to what I would like to call The Badass Women Of Australia. A part of me freaked out a little (a lot) when I saw them on a big screen in the train station in Brisbane. Live music is but a distant memory, but I would LOVE to see them live someday. According to hearsay, they had a wall of death going on at Good Things Festival in late 2019. How sick is that? 
(Side note: Good Things Festival had Parkway Drive and The Veronicas on the same lineup, and I have rarely heard of any festival which catered to every part of my personality like that.)