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2021_well: Rejects・OKs (B-list)

Hello, here is my list! Wasn't sure what format to copy this year, so I copied not! Took everything I'd rated this year, ranked it, chopped it in half, and here we are! Some of these albums are awful! Some of them are pretty okay! Look on as the former turns into the other, and I'll write something longer and soppier when the big list comes around. よいお年を!
86A Day To Remember
You're Welcome


#186
lolcore

not music

1%
85Weezer
Van Weezer


#185
hard rock

"one of the greatest pop songwriters of all time" - ronwa5215

3%
84Lana Del Rey
Chemtrails Over The Country Club


#184
comatose americana

barely music

3.1%
83Burzum
Uruk Hai (Unreleased Material 1988-1994)


#183
bedroom black metal

not human (JUST KIDDING i luv washed up fascist murderers who love their families what a guy)

4%
82Atreyu
Baptize


#182
metal

midlife crisis failed-pop metal

4.5%
81Steven Wilson
The Future Bites


#181
progressive pop

just please fucking not

4.7%
80Loathe (UK)
The Things They Believe


#180
ambient

rejected carpet simulator

4.9%
79Krallice
Demonic Wealth


#179
black metal / dungeon synth

shitstain of the year

5%
78Dry Cleaning
New Long Leg


#178
post punk

the first (and worst!) of many post-punk disappointments to come

5.4%
77Ashnikko
Demidevil


#177
tiktok trappop

best 1.0 of the year

5.5%
76Kanye West
Donda


#176
hiphop / gospel / godcomplex

hahahahahahahahahahahahaha

6%
75Lorde
Solar Power


#175
pop

Making weed a little more uncool, one useless song at a time

6.7%
74Yukiga Futte Uresii
Chuusuu no Romero


#174
noise

stupid fuckin noise

6.9%
73Rebecca Black
Rebecca Black Was Here


#173
irony pc muzak pop

i am sorry rebecca black you deserve better

7%
72Porter Robinson
Nurture


#172
EDM

""""life affirming""""

7.5%
71Hurry Up, Brothers
All is Beautiful. I'm Okay to be Alive..


#171
post rock

boring as shit post rock [1]

8%
70God Is an Astronaut
Ghost Tapes #10


#170
post rock

boring as shit post rock [2] ft. boring as shit riffs

8.1%
69Lorem Ipsum
Vivre encore


#169
chamber / skramz

no i will not take ur classical screamo seriously

8.5%
68Kishi Bashi
Emigrant


#168
americana

no kishi, americana kishi, why'd'ya have ter fuckin DO IT kishi

8.7%
67Girl In Red
if i could make it go quiet


#167
pop

"a sErIOus LaCk of seRoToNIn"

8.8%
66Arca
KICK ii


#166
deconstructed pop

latinjank you shouldn't dance to

8.9%
65Arca
KicK iii


#165
deconstructed pop

computerjank you mustn't dance to

9%
64NECRY TALKIE
FREAK


#164
pop rock

not what i want from cutesy jpoprock dammit where are the HOOKS why does the twee never end i am crying

9.5%
63Turnstile
Glow On


#163
post-as-all-fuck hardcore

""""doo YOUu evennn liykk haradxoxccore?""""

9.6%
62Bo Burnham
Inside (The Songs)


#162
~comedy

not funny / not that smart / definitely overproduced / partially authentic / reliant on visual humour /

Oh, this is about the music? LOL

10%
61clairo
Sling


#161
indie pop

not an album i remember in the slightest

10.5%
60Poppy
Flux


#160
pop altrock

from annoying gimmick to skramz queen to boring af non-entity

10.6%
59Portrayal of Guilt
Christfucker


#159
crust/black metal/emo

oh i know this game *shits on amplifier and jerks riffs into brain erasing anti-order*

11%
58Viagra Boys
Welfare Jazz


#158
post punk

relatively listenable lame post-punk

12%
57Between the Buried and Me
Colors II


#157
progressive metalcore

as far as dead on arrival memes go this is asdfghjkl;

12.1%
56Cara Neir
Phase Out


#156
blackened chiptune

lol nerds

13%
55Godspeed You! Black Emperor
G_d's Pee AT STATE'S END!


#155
GY!BE

boring as shit post-rock [3]

14%
54Billie Eilish
Happier Than Ever


#154
pop

a huge leap forward for billie pirate eilish, you bet your salt she has a 3 in her somewhere

15%
53Circa Survive
A Dream About Love


#153
alternative

The more things change the more they stay the same *except* the opener is a Circa song I vaguely like! Congratulations.

15.5%
52Every Time I Die
Radical


#152
metalcore

I've listened to this surprisingly much for a boring album I do not like; have concluded it has some good tracks! A Colossal Wreck! but still, it is boring and overlong and not good.

16%
51Converge
Bloodmoon: I


#151
gothic hardcore postmetal

scary group of industry veterans go gothic amdram. sunday afternoon horrorhouse whateverfest

16.5%
50Hail the Sun
New Age Filth


#150
post hardcore

this band has survived a decade(?) without firing their vocalist and everything they do is consequently a little bit incredible

16.6%
49King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard
L. W.


#149
psychedelic noodle

lol i didn't even bother rating butterfly 3000, but this band is boring and should stop flexing their increasingly strained chemistry and maybe one day make a decent album again

16.7%
48Fawning
Illusions of Control


#148
dream pop

Bad cocteau twins tribute, but how bad can such a thing really be?

16.8%
47Black Midi
Cavalcade


#147
post progressive noisebore

real ones amongst us will remember with relish the day they told that scampy loud smart-kid at the back of the class with too many party tricks to fuck off back to winchester. it wasn't even their fuckin birthday in the first place.

16.8%
46Manchester Orchestra
The Million Masks of God


#146
indie rock

bedwetter indie 101

16.9%
45Olivia Rodrigo
SOUR


#145
pop

no better excuse than fresh hurtbreak to hit payday from other people's songs

17%
44Deafheaven
Infinite Granite


#144
shoegaze

Opening pair is surprisingly solid; the rest is at least a brave attempt from this insecure directionless joke of a band

18%
43Modest Mouse
The Golden Casket


#143
indie rock

This album is average-to-bad and Isaac Brock is a crank who long since lost his touch, *but* "Never Fuck A Spider On The Fly" is one of my favourite awful songs of the year and I've jammed it about 6x as much as anything else from this. Fantastic trashheap guilty pleasure with a good ol' feelgood chorus; this album gets a generous bump as such.

18.5%
42Genghis Tron
Dream Weapon


#143
progressive post-cybergrind?

Tones and performances on this are actually pretty neat, but I don't rate the vocals or their approach to guitars or the songwriting, so alas.

19%
41Neon Bunny
Kosmos


#141
K-R&B

Vaporous bedroom smoke mhwwwn

19.5%
40Magdalena Bay
Mercurial World


#140
pop

There's so much tryhard overworked LA cringe here that I vaguely wish I hated it, but there are also enough good ideas that I even-more-vaguely wish I believed in the hype. Confusion not appreciated, but best sub-3 of the year!

20%
39Portrayal of Guilt
We Are Always Alone


#139
emo/black metal

acceptable spook-rawr

21%
38Piana
Raula


#138
ambient pop

Piana, no! After 2014's largely fantastic glitch/ambient pop sortof career opus Muse, her soporific ladyship took 7 years out of the full-length circuit to trotout this plinky-plonk meandering snooze. A shame. But not quite a bad album. Ok.

22%
37King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard
Butterfly 3000


#137
psych-synth

Whoops, looks like I lied in the L.W. blurb (#149) - I did hear this! And then I forgot all about it. What a rude awakening. Goodbye.

22.3%
364s4ki
Castle in Madness


#136
j-pop

the ugliest, most tastetless album i've heard all year maybe. 4s4ki is probably going to blow up at some point, but she can hold down a mic so ig there is hope

22.5%
35Maria Arnal i Marcel Bages
Clamor


#135
art pop / glitch pop

warm and wry putative glitch pop that does not bop

22.9%
34Pan Daijing
Jade


#134
post industrial

is post industrial a genre hmmmmhmmmmmm this happened. new album next month maybe it will be better

23%
33Squid
Bright Green Field


#132
post punk

More invested in mining the absolute limits out of every single individual idea and relatively unwanky compared to their Windmill brethren. What do they want for it? I have no honour and no medals for them.

23.5%
32Thy Catafalque
Vadak


#131
avant-black-folk-metal

From Naiv's slick-as-an-eel genre fusion to this load of overgunned riff salad - really??? Chugga chugga cheesecake.

24%
31Anneke van Giersbergen
The Darkest Skies Are The Brightest


#131
singer/songwriter

I love Anneke, you love Anneke, we all love Anneke (but these acoustic tracks are very far from her best alas). I don't think her lyrical style suits these kind of songs at all - still, lovely voice.

26%
30Gang of Youths
Total Serene


#130
alt rock / chamber pop

One really great GOY guyrocker followed by two chamber nonentities. What to do, what to say?

26.1%
29Doja Cat
Planet Her


#129
pop/R&B

2021 regret #104: trying to (kinda) plug Doja Cat on sputnikmusic.com. lol. cya losers, hope you get some next year

27%
28Spangle call Lilli line
Remember


#128
indie

When great longstanding indie bands do REALLY UNREMARKABLE things dammit

27.5%
27Shlimp Warc
Thgie Drsow


#127
experimental ??

i still do not know what to make of this lol ffs milo. v glad for its existence, but not enough to rank it above albums that i plan on returning to at some point in my lifespan

28%
26Dai Dai Dai
The absurd is the essential concept and the first truth


#126
noise pop / alt-idol

Not nearly as awesome as their rainbows-of-death standout LP last year, but there's some fun chaos to be had here

29%
25Yukika
Timeabout,


#125
k-pop

Not nearly as awesome as her sensational debut last year, but Yukika always packs a bop or two or more. Shame she's ditched much of her vintage sound.

29.5%
24Ben Howard
Collections from the Whiteout


#124
indie [post]folk

etcetc., yes a lot of these songs are not particularly good, and very few of them *sound* good (cue the Aaron Dessner Is An Untrustworthy Bellend jingle), but but but I can't help but give credit to Far Out, Sage... and Rookery for giving this thing some measure of leggage. Benny boi isn't lost yet!

29.6%
23Musk Ox
Inheritance


#123
neofolk

Undeniably impressive in its way, but I trim my neck hair and haven't played Skyrim in years. Get skillcapped.

29.7%
22Adjy
The Idyll Opus (I-VI)


#122
indie emo folk

corny corncore corn anthems for cornhole theatre kids (no, not the cool ones; the CORN ones!!!!)

29.8%
21Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders & The LSO
Promises


#121
minimalizzzzm

This year is an elevator and this album has been playing for so long that I no longer have any idea if we're going up or down.

29.9%
20St. Vincent
Daddy's Home


#120
pop

St. Vincent returns to make sloppy work of a controversial concept; it pans out surprisingly inoffensively, but she does drop a handful of modest winners, cajole Jack Antonoff into doing something worthwhile for potentially the only time this year, and raise the game on the disappointing Masseduction. Fair shits.

34%
19Slow Crush
Hush


#119
shoegaze

JesperL is ticklish as fuck, I can tell. This album is alright and sometimes good and sometimes boring

35%
18Black Country, New Road
For the first time


#118
post punk

Process of elimination says that BCNR are the best of this year's postpost-punk UK boredom spawn. Their songwriting is a bit cumbersome but overall workable, and the is-it-apathy? vox is *just* tongue in cheek enough to warrant the kind of pretentious hand in pants delivery it recurrently chokes over. Their klezmer influence is whatever, but ig kudos for having an ear for drone and dissonance. Still not a great album, but Sunglasses gives me hope

35%
17Tomahawk
Tonic Immobility


#117
post-noise rock

Once-hip noise rock sublimating into stale dad rock. Bless you, Mike Patton - you knew it'd happen some day

35%
16Druida
Musgo


#116
folktronica

Bleep guitar bloop bloop folk ok

35%
15Kauan
Ice Fleet


#115
post rock/metal

borderline redeemable post-rock [1]

36%
14The World Is a Beautiful Place...
Illusory Walls


#114
emo / post rock

Hick hack hock HECK, this one is a pain to rank!

Reasoning:

Infinite Josh first half: 5/5
Infinite Josh second half: 2.5/5
rest of album: relatively turgid 3/5.

Anywhere below IU and above Tomahawk seems appropriate; one of the better records severely overrated this year I guess

37%
13Foxing
Draw Down the Moon


#113
indie rock

Believe me, this is exactly the kind of trite woo-hoo singalong anthem indie I would *love* to hate on, but as it happens only half the tracklist is embarassing to listen to and the rest is actually pretty good! Beacons woo-hoooooo

37%
12CHVRCHES
Screen Violence


#112
pop

2021's middle-of-the-road pop landmark; neat concept, decent sound, good lyrics, handful of decent songs, couple of colossal stinkers, no real stunners, alas. This was not a great year for pop!

38%
11Mogwai
As the Love Continues


#111
post rock

borderline redeemable post rock [2] - Midnight Flit, Pat Stains and a bunch of other songs

39%
10Cynic
Ascension Codes


#110
prog metal

Nerd solace with messy production. I guess one of the most reassuring albums of the year?

40%
9Hayley Williams
FLOWERS for VASES / descansos


#109
indie folk

It takes time to appreciate Hayley Williams' DIY bedroom record. Almost one year on, I guess it's alright.

41%
8Rachel Lime
A.U.


#108
art pop

Artsy synthy chillpop. Almost good! Decent spread of ideas, but hooked I am not :[

43%
7IU
Lilac


#107
K-Pop

I cannot tell the difference between good songs and really bad songs on this album, but there are lots of them and almost all bang.

Especially "Ah puh". What an instantly adorable banger. K-Pop supremacy on a plate, and I ain't even a believer.

Let's call this the first probably-decent album of the list! A milestone! Cheers IU

45%
6Yoasobi
The Book 2


#106
J-Pop

yeah, they played it by the book alright

46%
5Fievel Is Glauque
God's Trashmen Sent to Right the Mess


#105
lofi jazz pop

This band have fantastic titles and a lot of charm! Wish I could say more nice things about them, but alas this felt piecemeal and I did not get it all that much

46.5%
4The Notwist
Vertigo Days


#104
indietronica

Wish I liked this more + "Ship" is one of the year's most underacknowledged bangers, but a lot of it gets lost in a big shimmery krauty haze

47%
3Tricot
Jodeki


#103
math rock / pop rock

After hitting my top 10 last year with the best album of their career, Tricot revert to overproduced pop-rock things that are sometimes catchy and sometimes annoying. Top 10 on the B-list ain't awful, but they've got better in them

48%
2Thrice
Horizons/East


#102
post hardcore / alternative

Thrice have good ideas again, but do they have their mojo??? Bet.

49%
1The Antlers
Green to Gold


#101
indie

I guess it figures for this list to be topped by the most inoffensive album of the year. Green to Gold is lovely and pure and utterly forgettable. I appreciate it.

50%
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