Favorite Recordings of 2023: Part One — Some Honorable Mentions
These albums aren't going to appear on my Top 36 of 2023 list (coming soon). But I enjoyed all of these, and could make a case for any of them to show up somewhere on that list.
I listened to music from hundreds of albums in 2024, carrying on my everlasting search for music that dazzles the imagination and nourishes the soul. In each of the last several years, that annual search has led me to about thirty albums that I know I will continue to revisit with gratitude. I’ve been doing this — the year-end favorites list routine — since my early teens, and it’s been a meaningful ritual. As I look back through my lists, I can track my education in music, my increasing appreciation of beauty and poetry, my awakening conscience, and my evolving curiosity about the world around me. I can also see how my exploration, which began with the “Christian music” industry, led me beyond those limiting walls into a much wider world of music, finding God at play in all genres, all cultures.
Do my picks have any particular distinction? What makes an Overstreet list distinct? I’m not sure. I love music across the spectrum of genres. But I particularly love albums if they are more than just a collection of songs — if they’re greater than the sum of their parts, cohering to give us a creative exploration of larger questions and themes. Best of all, if the artists’ attention in lyrics and in music move my attention beyond mundane matters to a deeper sense of beauty, mystery, and truth — that is, the stuff of Love and God (which are, in my experience, synonymous) — then I will want to come back again and again. That’s the great irony of art: The profound is experienced in the particular. The ways of transcendent grace are received through the fleeting singularities of this broken nature. What art has to offer comes through specificity, not generalization; through suggestion, not preaching; through strangeness and surprise, not straightforwardness.
That is to say, life is too short for me to give much time to music about crushes, breakups, and the artist’s own ego… unless I find poetry there that turns my attention to something so much bigger than questions about the artist’s own affairs. I return again to a realization I made several years ago: I’m not as interested in what a work of art is “about” as I am interested in what that work of art loves. If the song seems to exist to glorify the artist and their appetite for attention, I’m out. But if the song is in love with beauty, with surprise, with language, with mystery, with meaning… that’s my jam.
Lana Del Rey — Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd
Del Rey’s writing is so literary, her sound so lush, her characters so tragic, that I’m always up for at least two times through an album. Occasionally, I find myself wondering where the line is between dwelling on self-destructive characters and wallowing in stories of self-destructive behavior. But I’ve listened to this one through several times, partly because I think her artistry as a lyricist continues to grow, but also because the songs on this album have some playfully surprising turns that I keep wanting to relive.
The War and Treaty — Lover’s Game
I seem to be drawn to married couples who commit themselves to careers in music — you’ll see more of these couples on my final list of favorites. I’ve enjoyed Michigan’s duo of Tanya Blount-Trotter and Michael Trotter, Jr. for several years now. And I think this record may be my favorite showcase of their vocal powers so far. They might have made it easy on themselves by pursuing a career of singing other people’s songs. But their songwriting here is impressive.
boygenius — The Record
A very popular critics’ favorite in 2023, The Record was something of a disappointment to me. I’m including it here because I enjoyed it very much. (I have a hard time imagining a project from any of the boygenius members — Lucy Dacus, Julien Baker, or Phoeboe Bridgers — that I wouldn’t enjoy.) But every time I listen to it, I realize that I would trade it for a new solo album by any one of these singer-songwriters. The songs feel to me like tracks that would have been b-sides for their recent releases.
Here are three tracks that I find memorable and worth replaying frequently.
Olivia Rodrigo — GUTS
She’s a star, sure. More importantly, she’s mature enough to address subjects like bad breakups with a heavy dose of humor. This isn’t the self-obsession that turns me off to so many pop idols. This is playful. This is surprising. This is really, really fun. I really hope she has the support and the wisdom to make a journey in which her art matures along with her.
The Mountain Goats — Jenny From Thebes
This was the year in which I finally got The Mountain Goats. I’ve enjoyed their lyrics for a long time. But seeing them live was a revelation. On the records, I’m so busy giving attention to John Darnielle’s lyrics and speak-sing vocal style that I have a hard time giving much serious attention to the individual elements of the band. But seeing them in concert at ZooTunes (the summertime lineup at the outdoor venue on the grounds of Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo), I was delighted by the fact that every performer makes a strong impression, and by how they generate a unique and surprising set list for each show, giving us a tour through many records in their substantial catalogue. So, when Jenny From Thebes arrived, I was already familiar with some of it, and I found myself listening to so much more than their dynamic, idiosyncratic front man.
Hiss Golden Messenger — Jump for Joy
Is this my favorite record from M.C. Taylor? Time will tell. But the joy, the prophetic vision, the playful savoring of the Scriptures… there’s a lot to love here. “It’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there,” Dylan laments. And, like Dylan, Hiss Golden Messenger can remind us that the darkness is just a shadowy valley, and if we push through it we will find that there is a light that never goes out … just waiting to be rediscovered beyond it.
Arlo Thomas — Soft Machine
Such graceful vocals, such personal and particular lyrics, such irresistible tunes. After her outstanding debut and this delightful follow-up, I intend to show for any future Arlo Parks record.
I hadn’t heard Sternberg until this, and I can’t listen to this record without feeling like I’m getting a personal performance in my own home from a trusted friend who is honest, direct, playful, and bound to delight audiences everywhere.
I played this album as often as anything else that came out this year because of hot Aftab, Iyer, and Ismaily invited me into a meditative space for creative writing.
Son Lux — Alternate Forms
I’m already a big fan of Son Lux, and their album Lanterns is one of my favorites. The invitation to experience the album again for the first time in this wholly re-imagined version was intriguing, and I’m thrilled with the results. It’s best experienced after listening to Lanterns, but even without that record this would be a major headphones event.
Clark — Sus Dog
Once again, we didn’t get a new Radiohead album this year. But this was an enthralling distraction from that — made even sweeter with an appearance by Thom Yorke.
Cat Power — Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert
I’ve missed her. And while I will continue to hope for new material, this was a joy — beginning… to the big Judas! moment… to “Like a Rolling Stone.”
James Yorkston — The Great White Sea Eagle
The Scottish folk artist continues who dazzled me in 2021 with The Wide, Wide River is back with another album of creative collaborations — featuring Nina Perssons of The Cardigans — that I would want to play frequently if I owned a pub and wanted to cultivate an old-world UK ambience.
Slowdive — everything is alive
The spirit of the ‘90s is alive in Slowdive. If you’re looking to scratch itches caused by missing Depeche Mode, The Cure, and John Carpenter soundtracks, well… you can always look up recent work by those names. But I recommend this too!
Wilco — Cousin
I won’t pretend that I’m not disappointed. I’m still hopeful that the greatest Wilco album is yet to arrive. Still, Cousin is an album of subtle pleasures that will probably intrigue only longtime Wilco fans. While it only has three or four tracks that make me sit up and pay attention, I’m grateful to know they’re still around and still trying new things — specifically, this time, working with producer Cate Le Bon, who returns them to a sonically experimental edge. I just miss that adventurous impulse, that quality of, um… infinite surprise that led to the revelations of Being There, Summerteeth, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, and A Ghost is Born.
Come back and browse again!
I may add more albums to this list over the next couple of weeks.
And my big list of 36 favorites is coming very soon.
Always glad to see this each year. It's Olivia Rodrigo, not Rodriguez, fyi