The Best Music of 2021 — The Top Shelf, Low Brow Review
The second annual ranking of albums and singles from a year where dancing and headbanging simply had to be done in equal measure
[This edition is too long for email, so click here to read the Best of 2021 on the website!]
Hello and Happy New Year, babes! I hope you all had a safe and joyous New Year’s Eve and that, if you’re unabashed in your lust, you’re enjoying all of the Pete Davidson content from last night. For the second annual Top Shelf, Low Brow Best Of the Year review, we’re once again putting the bow on the last year once and for all by talking a bit about the thing that propelled the year to the finish line and kept us sane throughout: the music. 2021 saw so many artists working outside the confines of traditional album structures to release strong one-off singles and collaborations, while others released full-length records that bounced between genres with exciting fluidity.
Because music is so subjective, I really only want to touch on the best and not the worst. We don’t do worst here! Only Low Brow, and if you’ve been a subscriber from the top of the year, you certainly know what made it onto that list. So what follows are the Top 9 songs and albums of 2021. Why nine and not ten? Because nine fit into a perfect square grid on Instagram, and I’m nothing if not subservient to the godly hand of social media.
Top 9 Songs of 2021
09. “mememe” by 100 Gecs
As someone who was never able to get into the noise-heavy crash and clash of 100 Gecs previously, even after TSLB-favorite Charli XCX jumped on the remix of “ringtone,” I was certainly shaken to my core upon realizing that “mememe,” the first single from the band’s upcoming sophomore album, pivots slightly more toward a mainstream, predictable structure without ever sacrificing any of the group’s signature hardened electronica. “mememe” begins simply enough by repeating the song’s central mantra (“you’ll never really know anything about me”) before dropping headfirst into a wall of guitars and glitching synths. Co-leads Dylan Brady and Laura Les trade off verses to wade through murky memories of past relationships before once again working their way up to the same drop from the song’s opening, each chorus’ production more finely tuned than the previous. If 2020 was about trying to cope with unforeseen, uncontrollable circumstances, 2021 was about allowing yourself to feel all of the rage about a year lost while beginning to move forward—and “mememe” is the year’s most earwormy electronic headbanger to make sure the past is sent off with a cold, deserved smirk.
08. “White Dress” by Lana Del Rey
Physically, I am in bed with coffee, but mentally and spiritually, I am down at the Men in Music Business Conference. “White Dress,” the opening track of the first (and best) of Lana Del Rey’s two 2021 releases, Chemtrails Over the Country Club, Del Rey manages to replicate all of the best, most interesting songs of her career so far with a new sense of urgency and intelligence. “White Dress” may sound like it had more of a fitting place on 2019’s excellent Norman Fucking Rockwell!, but it’s deceptively the perfect introduction to Chemtrails and Del Rey’s newer, more languid works. Mentions of Sun Ra and simpler times fall from her lips before she closes her eyes and dives into a memory, maybe imagined: “When I was a waitress, wearing a white dress/Look how I do this, look how I got this…/Down at the Men in Music Business Conference/Down in Orlando, I was only nineteen.” Del Rey’s voice rises and falls into almost a raspy whisper as she repeats herself. There’s plaintive pain and nostalgia scattered around her and within her, with only stark-white iconography to jolt a memory. It’s a testament to Lana Del Rey’s continued talent and artistry: she can sing about things that have no relation to your own experience and make them feel like a memory long-forgotten.
07. “Bouncin’” by Tinashe
Is there anyone more exciting than Tinashe? Free of a record label contract, she continues to make the most irresistible, infectious music of her career. “Bouncin’” is no different, with its bounding production and fast-paced, flirty vocal delivery that sees Tinashe hoping that the dirty pics she’s sending will be so good they “make it to the cloud.” Paired with its equally astonishing video, where Tinashe and dancers make an entire set of trampoline choreography look completely effortless, “Bouncin’” finds Tinashe at the top of her game, relishing every opportunity to show us exactly who put her there: herself. And she’ll be damned if you’re not coming with her.
06. “Forever 21” by Number One Popstar
Number One Popstar, the tongue-in-cheek indie pop project from artist and musician Kate Jean Hollowell, churned out some of the best singles of 2021—you’d be hard-pressed to ignore the melancholic desperation of last September’s “Tv”—but last spring’s “Forever 21” was the hit that truly went under the radar. From the moment it opens with its sparkling synths and drums, it’s impossible to not be overcome with a potent wave of nostalgia, recalling some scene from some John Hughes movie you half-watched one time while folding laundry. The opening lyric, “I don’t want to grow up, be told what to do,” would certainly align with that aesthetic, until Number One Popstar casually glides into the existential. “Forever 21, forever hot and young/I just don’t know, now/I don’t want to die now, I don’t want to die now.” Paired with its marvelous, unforgettable video which finds our popstar dancing around a discount store done up in old-age makeup that belies the moves of someone actually on Osteoperosis meds, it all becomes even more clear: “Forever 21” isn’t just about not wanting to grow up, it’s about realizing that you're already an adult and that it’s too late to go back, and all of the fear of mortality that comes with that realization. What’s there left to do, other than try to dance through your knowledge of certain demise and relish any catharsis that you can find along the way?
05. “Troubled Paradise” by Slayyyter
If you’ve heard any of Slayyyter’s music prior to 2021, it would be easy to write her off as another internet-buoyed, hyperpop fad that wouldn’t last past the dawning of a new decade. But the title track from Slayyyter’s official debut album would prove you wrong. “Troubled Paradise” is a soaring heartbreak pop anthem, packed with adrenaline and undeniable pulse, complete with a bold 70-word bridge, that then gets repeated! On her 2019 self-titled mixtape, Slayyyter was hesitant to sing about much more than black motorcycles and feeling “daddy as fuck,” but on “Troubled Paradise” she allows herself to do what all pop stars must do at some point: open up. Still full of questions for an old flame, she ponders the answers she’ll never get over a pounding bassline of drums and synths. “It’s a joke to you, I’ve got feelings too!/Oh, what will you do, when no one loves you?/Took me, used me up/Was I sweet enough?” she sings in the bridge. Slayyyter’s ambitions are much larger than her initial faceless SoundCloud beginnings may have suggested, and “Troubled Paradise” is proof that she’s more than capable of achieving them.
04. “MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)” by Lil Nas X
What more is there to write about the song that fired up conservatives, Christians, and brand lawyers alike with its unapologetic lyrics and boldly erotic, gloriously gay accompanying video? Lil Nas X is a child of the internet and a svengali of the social media age, and he understood that it has simply been too long since the days of pop stars being accused of being card-carrying members of the Illuminati with every new release. Ten months later, “MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)” still feels as fresh and absolutely fucking head-spinning as it did back when Lil Nas X released it in March 2021 after an extended period of teasing. Its themes of unabashed queer sexuality were not just audacious, but courageous, and “MONTERO (Call Me By Your Name)” heralded the coming of our first Black, queer popstar—one who wasn’t afraid to go even deeper on his debut album. You’d have a difficult time finding anything hotter in 2021 than Lil Nas X proudly stating “I wanna feel on your ass in Hawaii/I want that jetlag from fuckin’ and flyin’/Shoot a child in your mouth while I’m ridin’!” He doesn’t know how to not take big, exhilarating swings. And thank god.
03. “Coconuts” by Kim Petras
If you’ve been keeping up with this newsletter, you know that there’s no way this song wouldn’t be on this list. “Coconuts” is the anthem that us big-tittied bitches have been begging for for years, and Kim Petras was kind enough to tickle her margari-ta-tas over the ivories to give it to us. To some, “Coconuts” may feel like it’s just a TikTok-trendy novelty song, good for nothing more than a few initial laughs at the witty double entendres that fall all over the track like its titular tropical fruits—and they’d sort of be right—but to me, “Coconuts” is so much more. It’s a cheeky disco track that never takes itself seriously, even for a second, which is part of its unending and disarming charm. It’s not just a song about having delicious big naturals, it’s about celebrating those plumptuous beauties and bouncing them in the face of anyone who tries to make you feel bad about having them. And really, you don’t even have to be equipped with a massive rack like me or Kim Petras, “Coconuts” is a state of mind, a destination off the coast of Saint-Tropez, just left of your prefrontal cortex or whichever part of our lizard brains makes us rip ourselves apart every time we look in the mirror. And, come on, it’s just not getting any better than “So juicy and so ripe, you wouldn’t believe/I give ‘em different names, Mary-Kate and Ashley.” Miss Petras placed her pen between her coconuts and pushed as hard as she could, and what resulted was pure silly magic.
02. “Happier Than Ever” by Billie Eilish
“Happier Than Ever,” the title track from Billie Eilish’s blisteringly good sophomore album, is a lot like Eilish herself: disarming and quiet for a spell until it unexpectedly explodes into a cacophony of emotion, undeniable and always relatable. What begins as a soft rumination on a breakup that finds Eilish wondering if an old flame still reads her interviews and switches the avenues to drive past her house eventually picks itself up and shatters its structure into a million pieces, each one heavy with rage and regret until there’s nothing left to do but sing at the top of your lungs. Once “Happier Than Ever” has transformed itself from a lounge song to a pop-rock anthem, Eilish finds herself unable to hold back anymore, firing off a fit of digs and questions that will never have an answer pleasing enough to fully let go of. “I don’t talk shit about you on the internet, never told anyone anything bad/’Cause that shit’s embarrassing, you were my everything/But all that you did was make me fuckin’ sad!” It’s all broken now, the relationship will never be what she had hoped it would turn into, but it’s still impossible to let go of—at least right now. Finally, Eilish lets one final plea rip into the universe: “Just fuckin’ leave me alone!” The song is mighty and massive, leaving itself hanging in the air like smoke long after its guitars have fizzled out. With “Happier Than Ever,” Eilish proves once again that she’s adept in harnessing the power of her emotions, but here she’s finally unafraid to be loud and plainly annoyed. She’s searching for the catharsis she may never get, but her candor allows us to absolve some of the pain for her.
01. “Need to Know” by Doja Cat
In 2021, Doja Cat ran circles around everyone with her playful raps and ear for song design, and nowhere was that more evident than “Need to Know,” the second single off her sophomore album Planet Her. “Need to Know” is sonic sexual hedonism, and Doja Cat is doing tantric tricks up, down, and all around its melodies. From the moment she declares, “I don’t really got no type, I just wanna fuck all night!” in the song’s first fifteen seconds, it’s clear that we’re about to be treated to some of the most shameless fun we could possibly have—like watching Showgirls for the first time and Doja Cat is our Nomi Malone. Oscillating with breathless versatility between singing and rapping, Doja’s pulling not one single punch. It’s not just “What’s your size?” it’s “Need it in me like a Chuck E. need Cheddar.” Who else? Doja’s wordplay and punchlines have never been better, and it all culminates in the truly hilarious and unforgettable lines “Sorry if I gave a random erection/Probably thinking I’m a telekinetic/Oh, wait, you a fan of the magic?/POOF! Pussy like an Alakazam!” Truly how is she this good? It’s actually astonishing. Comparing her pussoir’s erection-giving abilities to a telekinetic Pokemon? That’s just something that simply no one else would be able to pull off, and certainly not with 100% earnestness. In 2021, there was an endless need for joy, pleasure, and indulgence, and Doja Cat made sure that we would get as much of it as she could possibly give.
Top 9 Albums of 2021
09. star-crossed by Kacey Musgraves
It’s sort of impossible to come off of a breakthrough album that won Album of the Year at the Grammys and replicate that success, but the further we get from the release of Kacey Musgraves’ fifth studio album, the better it proves itself to me. Expectations were high for Musgraves this time around, after all, she’s known for her writing and this was her big post-divorce album, surely it was going to say something revolutionary and unexpected and about life and love lost. In actuality, star-crossed told us more about love in a quieter, face-value, pop-leaning way. Musgraves’ voice is as sumptuous and lovely to listen to as ever on songs like “cherry blossom” and “justified,” and here she delves into more sonic experimentation than she ever has more, playing with autotune on “good wife” and jazz instrumental breaks on “there is a light.” Her swings don’t always hit it out of the park, and the closing track, a cover of “gracias a la vida” would’ve been better left off the album despite Musgraves’ own attachment to it, but star-crossed still manages to be a stellar showcase of Kacey Musgraves’ writing and voice. What will be really fascinating is to see where she goes next, past the hurdle of releasing her first album after taking home the gold.
08. Chemtrails Over the Country Club by Lana Del Rey
Lana Del Rey may have started 2021 on a rocky road fending her way through twisting statements about appropriation and artistry, but her art has always managed to transcend whatever is going on with her public persona. Chemtrails Over the Country Club, the crazily-named seventh studio album from Del Rey is the singer’s first of two 2021 releases, but it’s by far more enchanting than the sometimes muddled Blue Banisters. The album’s title track is gorgeous and hypnotic, with evocative lyrics that combine Del Rey’s early writing tropes and the storytelling strength of 2019’s Norman Fucking Rockwell!. “White Dress” and “Tulsa Jesus Freak” are humid and hazy trips through parts of the American south, while “Breaking Up Slowly” and “Wild at Heart” are filled with beautiful melody work that’s enough to bring Chemtrails at the heels of Del Rey’s best late-period work. It’s certainly not her best album, but it’s never not interesting. And that’s more than many artists can say seven albums in.
07. 333 by Tinashe
On her second studio album after severing ties with her restrictive, visionless record label (RCA, you’re on watch) 333, Tinashe opens her third eye and cascades through new dimensions of sound and art, creating her most electrifying and immediate work yet. Tinashe has never been good with being boxed in by one genre, and so on 333, she tries a little bit of everything: glitch-hop on “X,” dreamy, sun-soaked Transcendentalism on “333,” radio-ready R&B on “Pasadena,” and just about anything else you could ever want from one of the most versatile artists working right now. 333 is slick and shining, unable to be pinned down, just like the artist at its core.
06. Mercurial World by Magdalena Bay
In 2021, there was no period when the chance to dive into a dream went untaken. Mercurial World, the full-length debut from California indie-pop duo Magdalena Bay, often feels like it exists entirely in a dreamscape. Its production feels at once nostalgic and unquestionably contemporary, and singer Mica Tenenbaum’s soft voice and lively, winking lyrics recall the best songs from groups like M83 and Miami Horror. Mercurial World’s synth-pop doesn’t necessarily crash over you like tidal waves, but before you know it you look around and you’re floating in a sea, colored with glittering rainbow gasoline that smells of berries and metal. “Dawning of the Season” and “Secrets (Your Fire)” contain some of the catchiest melodies of last year, and “Chaeri” masters one of the greatest pop songwriting tricks: masking melancholic sadness with deceptively delicious production, making it hard to realize you’re vibing with devastation and regret until you listen to the lyrics five replays in.
05. 4 New Hit Songs by Doss
Yes, it may be only four songs long, but on her second EP and her first release in over seven years, Doss manages to do more in just 15 minutes than most artists/producers can do in quadruple that time. Doss’ relative anonymity and unhurried release schedule may only add to her cool factor, but nothing on 4 New Hit Songs ever feels unapproachable. There’s something here for everyone, if only you let yourself find it in the music. “Puppy,” a song named for a nickname an ex once gave her, was written after meeting up again with that person after some years apart. It’s filled with twinkling synth blossoms that convey a collective whir of possibility and what-ifs, but Doss is smart enough to never make things as simple as they could be. The bouncy synth melodies on “Look” are filled with charisma and effervescence, while “Strawberry” feels like a hazy summer afternoon with its soft shoegaze. “On Your Mind,” the EP’s final track, is exactly what the best loves, or at least infatuations, feel like: irresistibly kinetic, pulsing to a crescendo of euphoria you forgot was even possible until you came across it once more.
04. Troubled Paradise by Slayyyter
The best releases of the year were the ones that saw artists taking big, bold swings, and Slayyyter’s Troubled Paradise is no exception. On her official debut, Slayyyter ditches the shiny, hot pink aesthetics and predictable electronic stylings of her self-titled mixtape and instead oscillates through genre at warp-speed, songs often sounding totally different from the one that came before. Throughout some parts of the album, you can hear her warring with herself: “how vulnerable can I become without alienating the people that want the shallow lyrics and thumping dance beats?” She works through it in the music, structuring the record from the most “Slayyyter” songs in the front half to the even more experimental ideas in the back. But, happily, it’s always a huge, rainbow collision of ideas that totally work. “Venom” and “Dog House” are antagonistic thrill rides, “Butterflies…” is a thumping interlude that ends way too soon, and the pop-rock excellence of “Over This!” genuinely sounds like it belongs on Lindsay Lohan’s 2004 album Speak. “Letters” finds Slayyyter stripped down and honest, finally out from under all that heavy production. It’s a gorgeous track, one that suggests that Slayyyter has even more to offer than bitch tracks and oral sex anthems (though “Throatzillaaa” is an instant classic). Here’s hoping that on her next outing, Slayyyter dives even deeper into her psyche to create something totally unexpected. In the meantime, Troubled Paradise is more than enough fun while she works her way there.
03. MONTERO by Lil Nas X
I already wrote an extensive piece on this album back during its release weekend last September, so I’ll keep this somewhat brief: Lil Nas X’s MONTERO is nothing short of a triumph right out of the gate. By allowing his queerness to face front, Lil Nas created a captivating album that’s not just filled with the stellar pop and rap tracks he’s known for, but astonishingly vulnerable storytelling that has a proclivity for finding catharsis from the inevitable pain of growing up gay. Standout album cuts “LOST IN THE CITADEL” and “VOID” find Lil Nas trying to navigate love and heartbreak, trying not to drown in the traumas of his past, a task never as easy as one might hope. MONTERO unquestionably signals the coming of a superstar, one that’s endlessly important for those like him watching from afar.
02. Happier Than Ever by Billie Eilish
Peeling back the darkness of her debut album and letting herself bathe in light on the cover of her sophomore album, Billie Eilish unexpectedly shed any kind of persona that had been projected onto her, a struggle that Eilish often wars with in her music. Eilish spent the first year of the pandemic forced to put everything on hold, causing her to come face to face with every demon and trauma she had incurred since becoming famous before she could take a driver’s test. In her bedroom with her sole producer/brother Finneas, Eilish worked through things at her own pace, letting herself breathe and have fun along the way. Eilish is perhaps her most captivating when picking apart the societal structures surrounding womanhood and sex on songs like “Your Power” and the one-two punch of “Not My Responsibility” and “OverHeated,” the former a spoken interlude about the public’s relationship to her body plucked from the tour she had begun just before March 2020. “Oxytocin” and “NDA” are dark and unpredictable, reminding us that we never quite have any actual idea what a Billie Eilish song is going to sound like. But nothing is so good as the blistering rock of the title track and the scintillating lounge singing of “Billie Bossa Nova,” a song that has been far too overlooked on 2021 Best Of lists. “Billie Bossa Nova” is breathlessly sexy, a gentle caress. “You better lock your phone, and look at me when we’re alone,” Eilish commands softly. How could anyone resist, if only to see what might possibly come next?
01. Planet Her by Doja Cat
There was no one in 2021 who was working quite so deftly at the top of their game as Doja Cat. After the huge breakthrough success of her sophomore album Hot Pink, Doja Cat had the world at her feet and nowhere to go but up. And up she went, out of this world and onto her own: Planet Her, a kaleidoscope of color and sound that’s impossible to pin down—and gloriously so. No song here sounds anything like another, Doja Cat is completely chameleonic, deploying nasally raps and vocal affectations as often as she nails hilarious punchlines and astonishingly smart wordplay. Though Planet Her is packed with stellar collaborations, Doja Cat is never willing to let herself be overshadowed (okay, maybe a little bit by JID’s insane verse on “Options”), but she always knows how to pair herself perfectly with her featured artists. The album is loaded with thrilling choices, like the harpsichord that opens and twinkles through “Payday” and the silk-soft melodies of “Love to Dream.” But Planet Her is at its best when Doja is being her most Doja, like on the TikTok-ready floor-collapser “Get Into it (Yuh)” and the edgelord sex anthems about fucking all night (“Need to Know”) and being tempted to cheat on your man (“You Right”). Planet Her is as colorful and vivacious as its David LaChapelle-photographed cover, always remaining supremely Doja. As she hops between genres at warp speed, it’s impossible not to fall in love with her endless charm—even when she’s at her most chaotic, she’s simply beguiling. Planet Her is an album perfect for 2021: it’s a call back to both the dancefloor and a stranger’s bedroom, but it takes just enough time to stop and take note of the moment. There’s simply no telling what will come next for Doja or for any of us, but for now, the moment is all that matters.
Thanks for joining me again this year! What did I leave off? What would you have chosen? Yes, I know, I’m still grappling with leaving off Normani’s “Wild Side” myself! But maybe if she’d release a damn album…