The 10 Best Albums We Heard In January
Every December, the NPR Music team peruses 11 months' worth of albums and songs and crams its collective reflections and critical assessments into a handful of big lists. This year we've decided to dissect the torrent of new releases as they're happening and share a list of the most notable albums and songs from each month. January featured a couple of consensus favorites: We loved Sharon Van Etten's for its sonic adventure and deeply personal revelations on love and motherhood; Pedro The Lion's first official album in 15 years, , delivered potent tales of lost youth and the universal struggle to fit in a troubled world. Other highlights on our multi-genre list include Florence Price, a pioneering African American composer in the Jim Crow era, Belgian-Congolese DJ and producer Nkisi, the electro-folk of
