The 50 Best Albums of 2023
In certain Decembers, a list of the year's best albums feels like a fireworks display. 2023 may have been short on flashes and booms, but it was rich with smaller fires: no less intensely gorgeous, more approachable and built for heat, not spectacle. And while it might be tempting, as many have argued at many points in the format's history, to take this lack of consensus as proof of its diminished value as a popular art form, we look at things a different way. In a year short on albums that draw a mob, it's easier to see what might have otherwise been ignored for the treasure it is. (And at a moment when recordings lacking a critical mass of listeners have been deemed ineligible for royalties by a certain streaming service, that thought might be worth lingering on.)
Here's our proof. In the following list, you'll find albums that have been celebrated widely, and others that we're pretty sure you won't see on any other year-end offering. Every single one of them is loved intensely by a member of NPR Music's team.
In keeping with that vibe, we're offering this list of our favorite albums in a different wrapping this year. For the first time since 2015, our 50 best albums of the year aren't ranked, but listed in chronological order by release date. (You'll notice that the first came out in the closing weeks of 2022, though it lingered in our ears — and lodged in our hearts — far into 2023.) In case you need a bit more guidance and like to scroll, we have bestowed a special honor on a dozen of them: crowns to designate those we recommend to anyone looking for a spark, or a slow burn.
= the best of the best
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SZA
SOS
Release Date: December 9, 2022
Six years ago, SZA completely changed the trajectory of R&B and a generation. In an industry that runs on facades of perfection, Gen Z fawners have dubbed SZA "mother" for her blunt, sometimes-contradictory but always-gnawingly-honest lyrics set to lilting harmonies.Solána Rowe herself is no longer the second-guessing 20-something of Ctrl days, and her sophomore release, SOS, proves it by pulling no punches. She offsets a sanguine outlook on love ("Snooze") with odes to bloody revenge ("Kill Bill"), indie-pop angst ("Ghost in the Machine"), acoustic toxicity ("Nobody Gets Me") and bad bitch mood boosting ("Smoking on my Ex Pack") — every track is another jewel to her crown. Though SOS landed right at the end of 2022, SZA has bobbed and buoyed all 2023 with record-breaking sales, chart-dominating singles, an international arena tour and yet another wave of Grammy nominations. Altogether, this collection of melodic stunts brings a whole new meaning to the old adage of "Smooth seas never made a skilled sailor." —Sidney Madden
The Latin Dead
Eyes of the World
Release Date: February 14
Nearly three decades after Jerry Garcia's death, interest in the Grateful Dead's songbook has never waned; in fact, it has only grown over time. Guitarist John Kadlecik, who comes from the post-Grateful Dead musical circle (Further, Dark Star Orchestra, Melvin Seals & JGB), teamed up with Oscar Hernández, a pianist/composer/arranger/producer and leader of Spanish Harlem Orchestra, for an innovative run through Dead's music that has been approached from all kinds of directions except this one. The Latin Dead's Eyes of the World is a collection of tightly arranged interpretations that reveal the nuances of melody and composition that sometimes gets taken for granted during long jams. For an Afro Caribbean music-loving Deadhead like me, this album is a dream come true. Bob Weir recently announced he would abandon the rock format to use a symphony orchestra to explore the band's music; in that light, The Latin Dead's approach adds another path on the long, strange trip that is the Grateful Dead. —Felix Contreras
Tianna Esperanza
Terror
Release Date: February 17
Someone coming to Tianna Esperanza's music without knowing her story might think they've been transported through time. But the portal is unstable: Is this the croon of a cabaret singer in Weimar Berlin, all smoke and decadence? Or are we in one of the jazz clubs where Nina Simone staged her arched-eyebrow protests? At one point on Terror, her debut album, this young queer biracial woman raised in Cape Cod sings from the perspective of the Harlem bookstore owner Lewis Michaux, who was born in the last years of the 19th century, yet her "Lewis" has the patchouli scent of classic Erykah Badu. "Three Straight Bitches From Hell" somehow marries Gil Scott-Heron's flow with PJ Harvey's drive as Esperanza calls out the women who've broken her heart. The granddaughter of Paloma McLardy, drummer for The Raincoats and The Slits, Esperanza embraces the impiety that is her punk inheritance, but she also values the beauty of her burnished contralto and the funky lyricism she shares with her mentor, Valerie June. Like that Americana innovator, Esperanza reimagines the past in ways that feel almost futuristic — beyond categories, beyond eras. She makes her own space. —Ann Powers
Iris DeMent
Workin' on a World
Release Date: February 24
Political awareness often begins at the kitchen table, in the living room, even at the family piano. With — steward of one of the most treasured and timeless voices inhabiting our moment — brings disinformation-addled listeners back to such intimate realms. Her stepdaughter (and album co-producer) encouraged DeMent to shape songs from her anxieties and hopes about the current mess of global crises; they headed to Nashville and gathered a band that does full justice to music with the warmth of folk, the reach of gospel and the
