#this is his version of the Pablo waiting meme

[leclercskiesahead]

Scuderia Ferrari Admin when there’s no on-track action

[i-am-very-very-tired]

With the impending release of his fifth studio album — the first since the four-time platinum, Grammy-nominated 2016 Views — Drake has many questions surrounding him. Can he again move a million units in a week? Can he prove all the doubters wrong after two years of ghostwriting allegations? Can he top “Hotline Bling” or “One Dance”? Can More Life overtake Take Care as Drake’s undoubted classic album?

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But also, can he, like so many artists in 2016 — Beyoncé (Lemonade), Solange (A Seat at the Table), Rihanna (Anti), Kanye West (The Life of Pablo), Young Thug (Jeffery) — take risks on his new album, exposing a deeper version of himself? Drake and his legion of fans — and his seemingly equal number of detractors — are waiting with bated breath for March 18 to see what the 6 God has been cooking up. But before we can call the new project “classic” or “trash,” before we spend the next few weeks debating the best and worst tracks, here’s the most important question that Drake has to answer: Can he stop attempting to control women?

Over the past eight years, Drake’s built up a reputation as being the compassionate and less threatening (read: soft) rapper who appears on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, cuddles up with professional athletes, and gets tattoos of Aaliyah. He’s played the role of Nice Guy by constantly smiling, and apparently wearing his heart on his sleeve. This appeals to the sensitivities of the women in his fan base. But, as is often the case with these so-called nice guys, Drake plays the charmer — he’ll call you beautiful, open doors for you and send you smiley-face emojis — but the minute he has sex with you, or you move on to someone else, he turns into Michael Ealy in The Perfect Guy.

Drake’s corniness, outward kindness and lack of sexual aggression has been misinterpreted as an overarching respect for women. He’s even been referred to as a feminist. But Drake is as much a feminist as Rachel Dolezal is a black woman. His entire catalog is steeped in respectability politics, accepting women so far as their body count goes.

Those songs pale in comparison to “Shot For Me,” “Marvin’s Room” and “Practice.” They are Drake at his worst.

While he’s constantly praised Nicki Minaj over the years, Drake belittled the Grammy-nominated artist during his beef with her former boyfriend, Meek Mill — Is that a world tour or your girl’s tour? — implying that it’s emasculating for a man to receive second billing to his significant other.

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As with stars of rock and country music, almost every successful rapper today, from Jay Z to Future to Chance the Rapper, has at some point performed lyrics that objectify or exploit women. J.Cole’s music has taken on more social justice elements over the years (Drake has spoken out for black causes as well). But Cole, in a 2013 song, called women “b—–s” —I got smart, I got rich, and I got b—–s still/And they all look like my eyebrows: thick as hell — and patriarchally dismisses female sexuality on 2014’s “No Role Modelz”:

My only regret was too young for Lisa Bonet, my only regret was too young for Nia Long/Now all I’m left with is hoes from reality shows, hand her a script the b—h probably couldn’t read along

Even so-called progressive rappers fall into this trap, namely the androgynous Young Thug and the genderfluid Young M.A.

Sometime between Drake’s early rise and his third mixtape being converted into 2009’s So Far Gone, the rapper known for singing about his romantic feelings and the pressure of newfound fame — with a flow that made every 16 bars sound like the hottest verse ever — became his own worst enemy. Drake, known for hits like 2009’s “Best I Ever Had” and 2010’s “Find Your Love,” became synonymous with quote-heavy memes on social media, and fake Twitter accounts such as @drakkardnoir pumped out fake deep quote after fake deep quote.

But the rapper’s verses about loving and being proud of college-educated, independent women — Sound so smart like you graduated college/Like you went to Yale but you probably went to Howard — paved the way for hypermasculine diatribes against the sexual agency of seemingly any woman he’s ever encountered. Through an examination of Drake’s four studio albums, plus mixtapes, collaborative projects and guest features, it is clear that the man who made music for folks who couldn’t get over their exes was himself struggling with the basic concept of “moving on.”

While So Far Gone doesn’t count as a studio album — it was his final mixtape before signing with Universal Republic — it gave listeners a sneak peek into the troublesome lyrics Drake would release in subsequent years. On the soothing track “Houstatlantavegas,” he raps about “saving” an exotic dancer from a strip club:

You go get f—– up and we just show up at your rescue/Carry you inside, get you some water and undress you.

I give you my all and the next morning you’ll forget who or why, or how, or when/Tonight is prolly ’bout to happen all over again.

Thank Me Later, Drake’s 2010 debut studio album, features the rapper slut-shaming women for having previous sexual partners. From “Karaoke” (I hope that you don’t get known for nothing crazy/Cause no man ever wants to hear those stories ’bout his lady) to “Miss Me” (Work somethin’, twerk something, basis/She just tryna make it so she’s right here getting naked. I don’t judge her, I don’t judge her/But I could never love her) to “Thank Me Now” (Alohas to women with no ties to men/That I know well, that way there are no lies), Drake positions women with previous sexual experience as undesirable. On the Rihanna-assisted “Take Care,” he seems to open up to the idea of women having sexual agency, relenting I’ve asked about you and they told me things/But my mind didn’t change and I still feel the same.

Thank Me Later was also at times a celebration of independent women – appreciating women’s “book smarts and street smarts” on “Shut it Down” and “Fancy” — but set the foundation for 2011’s Take Care, which was, at that point, the peak of Drake’s overt misogyny and objectification of women. On Take Care, which won Drake a Grammy for best rap album — he continues his focus on sex workers with “Lord Knows”:

To all these women that think like men with the same intentions

Talking strippers and models that try to gain attention.

Even a couple porn stars that I’m ashamed to mention.

“Under Ground Kings” (Sometimes I need that romance, sometimes I need that pole dance/Sometimes I need that stripper that’s gon’ tell me that she don’t dance) even creates a binary of acceptable and unacceptable behavior. While Drake has an infatuation with exotic dancers, he also makes it clear that admiration only goes as far as sex. “Trust Issues,” which Drake said he made for “fun” and thus didn’t include on the album, has Drake playing into the thoroughly debunked myth that women can’t want sex as much as men, rapping And it’s probably why I’m scared to put the time in/Women want to f— like they’re me and I’m them.

Those songs, though, pale in comparison to “Shot For Me,” “Marvin’s Room” and “Practice.” They are Drake at his worst, going beyond the behaviors of the paternalistic and disapproving ex. He goes from telling a woman she’s drinking away the pain she feels due to leaving him on “Shot For Me” — Yeah, I’m the reason why you always getting faded — to cursing out another for finding happiness with a new lover on “Marvin’s Room” (F— that n—-a that you love so bad).

Despite admitting that he’s a flawed individual in the latter song, in the former he tells the woman that he “made” her and calls her a “b—-.” This then leads to Drake’s most confusing and disturbing song to date, “Practice.” While acknowledging that women can have sex — the song is about a woman having multiple partners — Drake then spins it to his advantage: All those other men were practice, they were practice/Yeah, for me, for me, for me, for me. He senses “pain and regret” in the woman from her past, and then reluctantly accepts the fact that she has casual sex. He tops the song off with an uncomfortable, familial request: You can even call me daddy, give you someone to look up to.

But, Drake can still change. His lyrics paint the picture of a man who is constantly questioning himself.

It’s 2016’s “Hotline Bling” that ignited the re-examination of Drake’s entire catalog. The song is the rapper’s second-best-selling single of all time (behind fellow Views track “One Dance”), and won him two Grammys at last month’s award show. Not to mention, the visuals for the song will go down in music history as one of the most memorable music videos of all time.

But while the chorus is equal parts infectious and mesmerizing, Drake sneaks in two verses and a bridge full of “reductive stereotypes” and body-policing lyrics about an old fling. Whether about said woman “wearing less and goin’ out more” or “going places where you don’t belong,” Drake makes it apparent that he’s offended that she has the audacity to move on with her life. By the end of the song, Drake’s become so desperate that he’s even concerned that the woman is “bendin’ over backwards for someone else.” Textbook narcissism.

His guest appearances have been a mixed bag as well. On rapper The Game’s 2011 track “Good Girls Go Bad,” Drake raps Who’s still getting tested?/Where’s all the women that still remember who they slept with? and a year later added to 2 Chainz’s “No Lie”:

She could have a Grammy, I still treat her a– like a nominee

Just need to know what that p—- like

So one time is fine with me.

Over the past couple of years, Drake has put out two mixtapes, a solo effort If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, and What A Time To Be Alive with Future. His male chauvinism can be found on tracks “Legend,” “Energy” and “Madonna” and repeatedly calls a woman “ungrateful” for living her life without him on “Diamonds Dancing.” As writer Tahirah Hairston pointed out, Drake has also had questionable lyrics on “Wu-Tang Forever,” “Own It,” “Furthest Thing,” “I’m The Plug” and even notable feminist Beyoncé’s “Mine.”

Back in October, Drake released three tracks from his upcoming More Life album — “Fake Love,” “Sneakin’,” and “Two Birds, One Stone.” Looking solely at those tracks, it appears Drake has let up a little on his control, instead rapping about success, fake friends and his long list of haters. Even his appearance on labelmate Nicki Minaj’s diss to Remy Ma, “No Frauds,” he steers clear of trying to preserve women’s sanctity.

For nearly a decade now, Drake has wrapped up his alarming lyrics inside catchy, Instagram-caption-worthy choruses and tunes. The “light-skinned Keith Sweat” gets away with this because he carefully crafted a “nice guy” persona that deflects the criticism that, say, a 21 Savage, Kodak Black or the Migos would receive.

For many men, Drake’s attitudes reflect their own attitudes and desires, which in turn reflect a patriarchal society that views women as sexual objects meant to be gazed at. For women, they’ve had to deal with sexism in the arts since the beginning of time, so choosing to not enjoy an artist because of his views on sexuality would mean giving up on music all together. And at the end of the day, Drake is just that good at his job, unquestionably the most influential and popular musician in the business right now.

But Drake can still change. His lyrics paint the picture of a man who is constantly questioning himself, consistently trying to become a better person, whatever that entails. From So Far Gone to More Life — age 22 to 30 — he’s learned all the lessons life can teach, from whom to trust to what forms of happiness money and fame can buy. But it seems he’s yet to learn that women aren’t sexual objects. They’re human beings. If the only women of the world were all exactly like the women he seems to respect — his mother or Rihanna or Aaliyah or Serena Williams — we’d call him Aubrey the Riveter. But, they aren’t the only women who deserve his respect.

He knows that. But it begs the question: Does he care?

Martenzie is a writer for The Undefeated. His favorite cinematic moment is when Django said "Y'all want to see somethin?"

[malta-vpn]

The best Christmas movies and TV shows to watch on Netflix

With much of us cooped up in our residences as well as divided from our friends and family, it can be a very grim time. Fortunate for us, there s lots of holiday magic to be located this Christmas. Netflix launched a ton of wonderful Xmas original movies as well as collection. So if you sanctuary t yet saw the lengthy awaited final thought to the Christmas Prince trilogy, A Royal Infant, here's your chance    Kristin Davis plays a mommy who plans a charming trip to Africa with her husband after their son heads away to college. Unfortunately for her, her husband selects a divorce rather. Certainly Davis determines to go to Africa anyway, probably to Eat Pray Love her impending separation blues away. And also considered that it s a holiday film, the chances seem astronomically high that she s misting likely to fall for Rob Lowe, that plays her pilot on her leg to Zambia. Additionally, Netflix guarantees us there are child elephants. netflix americana Captivate your brain with the coolest information from streaming to superheroes, memes to computer games. Snowstorm on Xmas Eve? Check. Secondary school seniors? Examine. An essential party to go to as well as a swiped keg? Inspect. If this isn t Xmas Superbad fulfills every John Hughes film ever, I ll be extremely let down. Kiernan Shipka will ideally be playing some sort of blonde Molly Ringwald. This animated initial originates from Despicable Me co-creator Sergio Pablos and also includes a fantastic actors of voice actors consisting of Jason Schwartzman, Rashida Jones as well as J.K. Simmons. It s additionally regarding a postal staff member, however I m going to provide it the benefit of the doubt that it s full with Xmas magic. Vanessa Hudgens ends up being pals with a medieval knight that winds up in present-day Ohio. I m presuming this is going to be a Christmas-version of Kate & Leopold, which I m entirely OK with. Plus, Emmanuelle Chriqui co-stars and also the tween lady in me is very thrilled to see if she s still as beautiful as she remained in Snow Day. A radio DJ widower and also daddy of 4 loses his task right prior to Xmas, due to the fact that obviously they live in a world loaded with uncaring beast human beings. Chances are high this is misting likely to be the biggest tearjerker on the checklist. If you haven t seen A Christmas Royal prince or the sequel A Xmas Prince: The Royal Wedding celebration, quit what you're doing and also instantly go watch them. The movies concentrate on Amber, a reporter that openly lies to the international leaders of the imaginary country Adevia which I m pretty sure would be illegal? Yet Netflix doesn’t appear too worried about exactly how laws work in Adevia and also winds up weeding their royal prince. In the second flick, they obtain wed. This time around they're having a baby. Sorry for the looters. Vanessa Hudgens stars as not one yet two characters-- and also of course, among them is a princess. Taking ideas from Mark Twain s The Royal prince and the Destitute, The Princess Change sees skilled baker Stacy replace Girl Margaret Delacour, Duchess of Montenaro, that s hopeless for break of the limelight. But things obtain made complex along with pleasant, lovely as well as all that great stuff, when she discovers a regular life may be a long-term dream. If you like it, take a look at The Princess Change: Switched Again. The politest, loveliest and also most delightfully British show in the affordable cooking scene is true blessing us with one more holiday. It s difficult to state what I'm most excited about, but it ll probably be co-host Noel Fielding s outstanding outfits. The rainbow sweatshirt in the coupon image is everything. Cant wait till Nov. for your British Baking solution? Don t sweat. The present season is still streaming new episodes every Friday. What a gorgeous calamity of a show. I cannot wait for Nicole Byer s Christmas themed jokes and all the horrible looking Santas in store for us. Plus, this period has a multitude of hilarious celebrity judges, from Maya Rudolph to Jason Matsoukis. Dennis Quaid is playing a character called Don Quinn. I'm not also going to inform you what the story s about. I just want you to invest the rest of your day questioning if he was used the role due to the fact that it s so similar to his own name, if Quaid had Netflix change the character s name to another comparable to his, or if it's a complete coincidence. When I finally get a possibility to see Merry Happy Whatever, I expect to invest the whole duration of the film disputing this very important inquiry. Netflix additionally declares the personality highly thinks there's the Quinn way ... and the upside-down. What does it all imply? Please feel free to tweet me your conspiracy theory concepts now. A Christmas-themed period of Sugar Thrill? Yes please! Netflix has made certain we ll have lots of food preparation reveals to enjoy this holiday, and I'm right here for it. This season includes a number of guest courts, consisting of Tiffani Thiessen and also Olympic gold medallist Meryl Davis.

[rpgmgames]

June’s Featured Game: Living Playground: The Witch’s Puppets

DEVELOPER(S): Meaka ENGINE: RPGMaker XP  GENRE: Supernatural, Puzzle WARNINGS:   Both implied and shown violence to the children, Emotional abuse, Blood SUMMARY: With what starts as a simple day at the park, siblings Tony, Pablo, and Octavio are once again caught up in a series of strange circumstances such as strange pocket dimensions, coordinated monsters, and more geese than anyone could ever want to see in their lives. Stranded with them are Haze and Seal, two witches who seem to be connected with whatever nonsense is going down. As witches tend to be.In the simplest of terms, this game is about friendship and relating to others, both the good and the bad. With an unfortunate focus on the bad. It will be mostly straightforward with only one ending. 

Download the demo here!

Our Interview With The Dev Team Below The Cut!

Introduce yourself!  *Hi hello I'm Meaka. I've been kicking around the RPG Maker scene since like 2012 with my first game release in 2014. Whether that makes me but a wee RPGM baby or a seasoned veteran is probably dependent on how "long" you'd consider that h-haha. I'm an animator and illustrator, so visual development is my strong suit.

What is your project about? What inspired you to create your game initially? *Meaka: The Witch's Puppets is best summed up as "a game about friendship." Part of my motivation for creating it was simply personal catharsis: it deals heavily with circumstances that impacted my own life greatly and affects how I interact with people to this very day. Beyond real-life experiences, a big inspiration is Hatoful Boyfriend: Holiday Star in terms of how emotionally raw and powerful it is while also carrying on its sense of humor.

How long have you been working on your project? *Meaka: Far too long oh man. As a reference, my first game took me maybe six to eight months on and off to complete. I'm. almost 3 years into The Witch's Puppets and while I can probably hope for the best in terms of my completion rate, it's been a wild ride. (Did you know I thought it'd only take a year? 2014 me, how innocent you were...)

Did any other games or media influence aspects of your project? *Meaka: I say this like everywhere and I'm sorry if I'm repeating myself, but a huge inspiration for my art in general is the Kirby series. It has such a flawless blend of cute-to-macabre that I absolutely love and hope to capture that same feeling in my own work! Living Playground was inspired by the usual "RPG Maker/ Wolf RPG Editor" games (mostly Ib and Alice_mare) which led to it's "kind of horror but not really" flavor.

Have you come across any challenges during development? How have you overcome or worked around them?   *Meaka: In all honesty, just staying motivated three years into a project is difficult. I'm absolutely ecstatic to be making this game and bring it to people for them to play, but it's so easy to be excited about the cool parts and hit a wall production-wise when it comes to the mundane and tedious parts, particularly programming events that tend to be made up of a ton of conditional branches, variables, and occasionally will crash RMXP. So I give myself breaks on occasion and try to switch it up between whether I work on visual assets or RPG Maker programming, and sometimes I flip over to side projects (be it jam games or just other art).

Have any aspects of your project changed over time? How does your current project differ from your initial concept? *Meaka: From my initial concept, beyond certain themes and characters, they're two entirely different storylines. I actually gutted the entire script and started over at least twice during the course of production because of things not flowing well, weird writing choices by me, or just ideas that I slowly realized weren't that good. In particular, a very big part of some rewriting came from having some friends look over my script + game doc and pointing out some flaws that were from too much personal investment. If you're ever in a tight spot and not sure if stuff reads right, get some friends to beta read for you!

What was your team like at the beginning? How did people join the team? If you don't have a team, do you wish you had one or do you prefer working alone? *Meaka: In my first game it was just me until I threw it at some people to beta test. That was an interesting experience. For the Witch's Puppets, I commissioned music from the absolutely amazing ProjectTrinity and needing to consolidate my ideas and express them in a way for someone to create music for it helped me commit to my ideas and also helped me put into words what I couldn't really describe well beforehand. I haven't really had the chance to work fully on a team. I'd sure love to, but I fear my hectic life schedule would hold back whatever team I would want to join.

What was the best part of developing the game? *Meaka: I may be an animator and used to this by now, but there's something really magical about making your characters and putting them into a thing and then they move around. It just feels really nice. Also for me, I love telling stories and entertaining people, so I hope that my games allow me to do that! Whenever someone offhand mentions they enjoy something I make, it fills me with the warm fuzzies. (And don't even get me started on fanart. I literally cry.)

Looking back now, is there anything that regret/wish you had done differently? *Meaka: I absolutely want to 100% go back and remake Living Playground one day. It was the best I could do at the time, but now that I know so much more about what RPG Maker can and can't do, I want to go back and fix all those little things and make it more of what I wanted it to be. ... Also cut back on the ham-fisted attempts to be scary, maybe.

Once you finish your project, do you plan to explore game's universe and characters further in subsequent projects, or leave it as-is? *Meaka: I've already kind of done that! The Witch's Puppets is a sequel-but-not-really. And also Retail Hell, my Horror Funhouse jam project, is set in the same universe. As for the future, I can't say for sure that I'll make another game with the same characters, but I love the playground kids so I would never rule out the possibility of making something containing them again. Whether it's a game or not, that's a problem for Future Meaka to figure out.

What do you look most forward to upon/after release? *Meaka: It might be conceited of me, but I hope to see it give some sort of positive impact on people, even if just a little! I'd like to hope my little Friendship Game helps someone out if they're in a rough patch and at least makes them smile for a bit. Also I cannot wait to shitpost with wild abandon. Bad memes, here I come.

Is there something you're afraid of concerning the development or the release of your game?  *Meaka: I always low-key fear my files corrupting and losing everything, but since I am paranoid and keep a ton of back-up copies, I don't think that's going to be an issue. There's also a small part of me that is worried about people completely missing the point, but at that point I guess it would fall on my writing...!

Question from last month's featured dev: Which of your characters do you feel like you'd get along with the most? *Meaka: Strong Pickle. There is no other answer.

Do you have any advice for upcoming devs? *Meaka: Google Drive, Dropbox, and Mediafire are good friends and back up your stuff! Also, there will be days when making your game will not be fun. You will open your version of RPG Maker and look at it with dread. Keep going. Even if it's just one event a day, one spriteset at a time, keep on poking at that game. It just seems daunting because you know what you want it to be and you're looking at the beginning of the beginning. You can do it!!!

We mods would like to thank Meaka for agreeing to our interview! We believe that featuring the developer and their creative process is just as important as featuring the final product. Hopefully this Q&A segment has been an entertaining and insightful experience for everyone involved! 

Remember to check out Living Playground: The Witch’s Puppets if you haven’t already! See you next month! 

- Mods Gold & Platinum 

[voodoochili]

My Year in Music - Albums

You guys know how 2016 was an atrocious year that everybody hated and wanted to end months before it was over? Let’s revisit it so I can talk about some music I liked!

Thanks to the magic of Spotify Premium and the horror of the outside world, I listened to more new albums in 2016 than I ever have before in a single year. I was able to rank 50 albums worthy on putting of a best list, and I left out a ton that either did not make the cut or I haven’t spent enough time with. Yet it was such a fantastic year for music that I am sure there are plenty of excellent albums that I missed. While 2016 did not boast a singularly transcendent album like 2015′s To Pimp a Butterfly or 2014′s Black Messiah, it boasted a deep bench of excellent albums--an onslaught so overwhelming that my Spotify listening list nearly collapsed under its own digital weight. Anyway, enough jibber-jabber, here are the albums that stuck out to me as the cream of the crop (Yes, I left off Blonde on purpose).

Check ‘em out after the jump:

THE TOP 20:

20. Radiohead – A Moon Shaped Pool: A typically beautiful record from the world’s foremost paranoid androids, A Moon Shaped Pool is the first Radiohead album to fully integrate the arranging powers of guitarist Jonny Greenwood into the group’s sound. After spending much of the past decade as Paul Thomas Anderson’s go-to film scorer, Greenwood’s orchestral mastery nearly overtakes Thom Yorke’s falsetto as the record’s focal point. Marrying the glitchy electronics of the band’s early ‘00s output with soaring strings and minimalist piano, highlights like “Glass Eyes,” “Present Tense,” and “Daydreaming” stand up to the best material of the group’s career. The best moment of the record for me: finally hearing the impossibly sad studio version of “True Love Waits,” after spending nearly a decade obsessing over the live recording.

19. Beyoncé – Lemonade: In which pop culture’s most infallible figure opens up about her marital woes, enlisting the full power of some of the biggest names in the music industry to affirm her greatness. Lemonade is an album with towering singles (“Formation,” “Sorry”), but also a collection of spectacular moments, from the New Orleans-style horn rave-up at the beginning of “Daddy Lessons,” to the moment Jack White comes in at the chorus of “Don’t Hurt Yourself,” to her pained vocal runs towards the end of my favorite track, “All Night.” An audacious follow-up to the artistic and strategic brilliance of BEYONCÉ, Lemonade proves that Beyoncé will never simply rest in the limelight, but that she will forever use her station to empower, experiment and push music forward.

18. Isaiah Rashad – The Sun’s Tirade: “I got the music for the vibers,” chants Isaiah Rashad on “Rope/Rosegold,” and he’s not kidding. But it’s such a unique vibe, simultaneously laid-back and aggressive, with liquid, jazzy production that evokes the Dungeon Family at its most introspective. Isaiah invites us into his head, and whether he’s fighting off fans impatient with his long break between albums, reflecting on his nearly fatal battle with drugs and alcohol, or simply talking shit, his evocative pen and pronounced drawl bring out the best in each instrumental.

17. Kanye West – The Life of Pablo: Enough people have written enough about Kanye West in 2016, but here I go anyway. Whether or not the man has completely lost his rocker, he remains one of our greatest sonic architects. Each track on TLOP flows seamlessly into the next, building an exhilarating sense of forward momentum hurdling toward the tragic triptych of “FML.” “Real Friends,” and “Wolves” (keep Frank, I can take or leave Vic and Sia). If Kanye could just rein in his grossest impulses (I don’t need to hear about bleached anything, thank you very much), the album would place much higher on my list. Then again, if Kanye had any impulse control, he wouldn’t be Kanye, would he?

16. YG – Still Brazy: When YG emerged several years ago with “Toot It and Boot It,” who could have predicted that the charismatic, but seemingly- dunderheaded rapper from Compton could become one of our most reliable purveyors of political rage? A paranoid masterpiece of modern G-Funk with 4K production value, Still Brazy is a worthy follow up to My Krazy Life, my second favorite album of 2014. Still Brazy lacks the narrative cohesion of its predecessor, making up for it with a seething anger against the police, haters, the people who shot him outside his studio, and especially Donald Trump. We live in brazy times, and we’re lucky to have YG to give voice to our fear, confusion, and righteous fury.

15. Maxwell – blackSUMMERS’night: In a hype-driven, fast paced music industry that churns through artists as fast as it produces them, Maxwell works at his own pace. Released seven years after the confusingly titled BLACKsummers’night, Maxwell’s latest is a blissful oasis, a “Lake By The Ocean” if you will (you will!), tucked away from trends in mainstream urban music. Forever concerned with matters of the heart, Maxwell eschews the neo-soul of his early work. He refracts the sound grown-and-sexy icons from Seal to Sade, masterfully flexing his divine falsetto over liquid future-funk on “All The Ways Love Can Feel,” wallowing in bluesy murk on the epic “Lost,” and lamenting his devotion to an unfaithful lover on “Gods.” It’s been over two decades since Maxwell first introduced us to his Urban Hang Suite, yet Maxwell remains a unique and mysterious presence—one who lets his considerable talent speak for himself.

14. Shearwater – Jet Plane & Oxbow: Shearwater’s Jonathan Meiburg uses his intricately-crafted songs as bedrock for orchestral, ornate arrangements. Jet Plane & Oxbow finds Meiburg enlisting the services of composer Brian Reitzall (the man behind the original scores for Lost in Translation and the Friday Night Lights movie, among others) to create a tapestry of arresting synthetic sounds. Together, Meiburg, Reitzall and the band create a modern near-masterpiece of synth rock. Standout tracks include the gurgling, slowly-building “Backchannels,” the menacing bassline and disorienting orchestra of sound effects on “Filaments,” the Unforgettable Fire-style bombast of “Radio Silence,” and especially the gorgeous, generational power-ballad “Wildlife in America,” a soaring rumination on the seeming impossibility of the American dream.

13. Young Thug – JEFFERY: Possibly the most eccentric and enigmatic figure in the world of modern Hip-Hop (which is saying a lot), Young Thug’s decision to name his latest “mixtape” after his government name seemed to indicate a more personal approach to his art. Turns out, it didn’t really happen that way, with JEFFERY bringing the same gonzo melodies and glorious non-sequiturs of his previous releases. What’s new?: the dude levels the fuck up when it comes to his rhyming, especially on the opening and closing tracks. JEFFERY is a revealing look into Thugger’s mind and possibly into his artistic process. Each track on the tape is named after an influence or personal hero (and one named for “Harambe” because in order to be a meme, you have to be aware of memes I guess), and many of them consciously ape and inhabit the styles of the namesake. “Future Swag” imitates Future’s clipped, rhythmic cadence over a bouncing 808 Mafia production. “Wyclef Jean” is steeped in the music of the Caribbean, creating a thrilling hybrid of trap music and roots reggae. My favorite track on the project changes every day, but right now it’s probably “RiRi,” which boasts Jeffery’s most affecting, impassioned vocal to date. “IF YOU WANT IT YOU GOTTA EAAAAARN IT,” Thug barks (like a goddamn seal), and by God I think he’s earned it.

12. Field Music – Commontime: The long-standing project of brothers Peter and David Brewis, Field Music performs angular, fractured pop songs that often buck standard songwriting conventions. They have melodies for days, buried under addictive herky-jerk rhythms and droning keys. The result is a disorienting but addictive swirl of distinctly British art rock, echoing the dueling songwriter avant-pop of XTC, the fanciful working-class heroics of Roxy Music, and the pop adventurism of the Synchronicity-era Police. Commontime features some of the catchiest guitar-based music I heard all year, with the choruses from “The Noisy Days Are Over,” “Disappointed,” and “It’s a Good Thing” occupying a disproportionate amount of real estate in my cerebral cortex since January.

11. Danny Brown – Atrocity Exhibition: The dominant story in much of Hip-Hop is a rags-to-riches narrative, a triumphant tale from bricks to Billboards, from grams to Grammies, etcetera. Nobody in Hip-Hop, however, makes you feel the rags part of the story as deeply as Danny Brown. To Danny Brown, extreme poverty is not merely a life stage to overcome, but a trauma with aftershocks that never go away. “Some people think I think to much/I don’t think I think enough,” raps on “Rolling Stone.” His third straight classic since 2011’s XXX, Atrocity Exhibition, named after the discordant opening track to Joy Division’s notoriously bleak Closer, is a typically gritty expedition into Danny Brown’s consciousness, with outrageous punchlines counterweighting visceral depictions of debauchery and dark observations about his rough early life. Teaming up with production partner Paul White for 10 of the 15 tracks, Atrocity Exhibition finds Danny weaving his rhymes through an appealing industrial murk, equally reminiscent of RZA’s production on Liquid Swords and This Heat’s darkest sound collages. He soberly recalls his life as a low-level crack dealer on “Tell Me What I Don’t Know,” seethes a quiet despair on “Downward Spiral,” and frenetically proclaims his rhyming supremacy on “When It Rain.”

10. Chance The Rapper – Coloring Book: In 2016, Chance The Rapper finally shunted his label as the Next Big Thing to embrace his destiny as one of the Current Big Things. Few artists of any age, genre, or era can match his contagious exuberance, charisma, and skill. All of these attributes come out in full-force on Coloring Book, his third mixtape. Supercharged with gospel choirs, heavenly brass, and an assist from an assortment of music superstars and talented local friends, Coloring Book was a ray of light in a dark year. Coloring Book lacks much of the impish charm of Acid Rap, and trades much of that album’s social consciousness for earnest biblical pronouncements, but it radiates a special type of warmth and instills a sense of hope that I could not find elsewhere this year. I do not have the same relationship with God that Chance The Rapper does, but I can appreciate the way his spirituality informs his intense, infectious love for his friends, his family, and his infant daughter. The world is a better place for having Chance in it, and, remarkably, this is still just the beginning.

9. Cymbals Eat Guitars – Pretty Years: The best band to spring from Staten Island since the dawn of the Wu-Tang Clan, Pretty Years is the fourth and best album from Cymbals Eat Guitars. Long-time purveyors of surround sound shoegaze pop, this album finds the group demonstrating their songwriting chops, ranging from the hardcore stylings of “Beam,” to the Explosions in the Sky meets jangle-rock of “Have a Heart,” to the “Spirit in the Night”-esque saxophone stomp of “Wish”, to the titanic slow build of closer “Shrine.” On Pretty Years, the band embraces a more personal style of lyricism, writing songs about specific days and events. With producer John Congleton collecting the band’s ringing guitars and stampeding drums into a formidable explosion of sound, the epic expanse of the instrumentals combines with the specific and personal lyrics to illustrate the divine beauty of everyday life.

8. Kendrick Lamar – untitled unmastered: Though the songs that comprise untitled unmastered emerged from the To Pimp a Butterfly sessions, it does them a disservice to call them outtakes. They have no names, just numbers and dates, and they do not quite fit into the intricate TPAB narrative; but these songs, especially the four in the record’s incredible back half, are among his most musically adventurous and sharply written tracks to date. Less frenetic and more laid back than much of its parent album (the Thundercat basslines have more room to breathe, the strings and horns are sparing, but effective), untitled unmastered is a thought-provoking and often humorous reflection on Kendrick Lamar’s career and a meditation on a young black man’s position in society today. My favorite track: the swirling, gorgeously odd, Cee-Lo Green-assisted “untitled 06,” a triumphant ode to the artistic spirit.

7. Noname – Telefone: Noname is an inspiration, an old soul trapped in the body of a 25-year old rapper from the South Side. She rocks a conversational, poetic flow, rhyming about grief, violence in Chicago, and abortion with an earned wisdom and a feather-light touch, illuminating a perspective too often ignored in the media today. Produced by a cadre of fellow Chicago prodigies, including Saba, Phoelix, Cam O’bi, and Monte Booker, Telefone is one of the most beautiful albums I heard all year; warm, jazzy, and forward-thinking. Chiming bells and schoolyard xylophones intersect with steel drums, handclaps and sine waves, providing an ideal bedrock for Noname’s plainspoken wisdom: “When the sun is going down/and the dark is here to stay/I picture your smile/like it was Yesterday.”

6. Anderson .Paak – Malibu: After building his name the L.A. rap underground and finally breaking through on Dr. Dre’s Compton, Anderson .Paak introduced himself to a rapt national audience in 2016 with countless guest spots and two excellent albums. Anderson .Paak was probably my favorite live act of the year; a charismatic combination of James Brown and Clyde Stubblefield. I saw him in front of a good-sized crowd at a side stage Austin City Limits, leading his crackerjack group of Free Nationals as an energetic frontman and a virtuosic drummer. With Malibu, .Paak proves to be the rare superlative live act to fully translate his talent and energy to the recorded realm. Malibu is a summery slice of Anderson’s Southern California, blending funk, Hip-Hop, and R&B into a signature style, complete with an infectious half-sung/half-rapped delivery and a pro’s sense of songwriting classicism. The cascading chorus on “Heart Don’t Stand a Chance” is one of the soaring musical moments of the year, and Brian Cockerham’s bassline on “Come Down” transforms Hi-Tek’s unlikely sample of the Israeli national anthem into a funk monster. Joyful and endlessly replayable, Malibu is the ideal soundtrack to L.A.’s everlasting summer.

5. David Bowie – Blackstar: It is impossible to discuss Blackstar without mentioning this, so here it goes:

Blackstar is the final album from one of the most original and iconic artists of the past century, a goodbye letter to his fans that he recorded knowing full well that he might not live to see its release.

Bowie littered his lyrics with abstruse references to his impending demise, making an already haunting album even more profound. However, even if Bowie survived the year, the unapologetically strange and experimental Blackstar would rank among his greatest releases. The epic, atonal title track is one of Bowie’s masterstrokes, twisting through effortless tempo and mood shifts, accompanied by terrifying, yet often darkly funny lyrics. Bowie’s pitch black sense of humor also elevates “Lazarus” from maudlin to essential, as Donny McCaslin’s saxophone mournfully accents the artist’s depiction of his final days. Bowie’s final transmission to ground control is “I Can’t Give Everything Away,” a poignant, discordant ballad that illuminates Bowie’s single regret: that he will not be able to gift the world anymore art.

4. Schoolboy Q – Blank Face LP: 2016 was an amazing year for L.A. rap, and while Anderson .Paak, Kendrick, and YG released some of the year’s most exciting music, Schoolboy Q surpassed them all with the epic Blank Face LP. Working with many of the game’s brest producers (The Alchemist, DJ Dahi, Cardo, Tyler, The Creator, etc.) on this expansive, cohesive sound collage, Schoolboy Q snarls his way through 72 near-flawless (sorry “Overtime) minutes of straight gangster shit. Still a master of declarative, rhythmic hooks, Q refines his stream-of-consciousness verses, painting a gritty, and often terrifying, picture of Figueroa Street and South Central with humor, viciousness, and pathos. Blank Face boasts one of the year’s best basslines on the title track, two of the year’s broadest and best guest verses of the year in E-40’s “Dope Dealer” spot and Kanye’s batshit takeover of “THat Part,” and a convincing rap/rock hybrid on opener “TorcH.”

3. KING – We Are King: Bolstered by songwriting brilliance and gorgeous vocal harmonies, Los Angeles trio KING makes velvety, 1800-threadcount R&B. Comprised of sisters Paris and Amber Strother and “musical soulmate” Anita Bias, KING compiled extended mixes for five years worth of singles, plus some stellar original tracks, into We Are King, a powerful introductory statement. Theirs is a special brand of dreamlike soul, with genius-level chord progressions and angelic vocal harmonies, finished with a sumptuous production value. With its gentle groove and inviting lushness, We Are King is the perfect balm to melt away stress at the end of the day (it’s also a pretty decent hangover cure).

2. A Tribe Called Quest – We Got It From Here, Thank You For Your Service: When Phife died in March 2016, it seemed like a particularly cruel way for the story of A Tribe Called Quest to end. Little did we know that Q-Tip, Phife, and Ali Shaheed Muhammad had another trick up their sleeves. The fact that this album is exists--and is this amazing--is a miracle. The key, as always, is the interplay between Q-Tip and Phife. The two genius emcees bounce phrases off one another, finishing each other’s thoughts with witticisms and profound statements of truth. Jarobi White, formerly a glorified hypeman, makes us wonder why he didn’t rhyme on more tracks to begin with. The group dynamic extends to the guests such as Busta Rhymes, Consequence, Kendrick Lamar, and more, who seamlessly join Tip and Phife’s mindmeld for some of the best work of their careers. We Got It From Here… is the apotheosis of Tribe’s career, as the collective shows righteous anger towards racism and authoritarianism (“We The People,” “Conrad Tokyo”), sees hope in the future of music (“Dis Generation”), and, most touchingly, mourns the loss of their brother Phife Dawg (”Lost Somebody”). Despite the shadow of loss that hangs over the album, it’s a remarkably fun, engaging, and thought-provoking listen, and it was my most played album in the aftermath of the election.

1. Pinegrove – Cardinal:

“I’ll be sitting on the outskirts if you wanna talk about it/Things in there are getting so loud”

In a year when nearly every major pop and rap star released an album and some of the greatest artists of all time said goodbye, the album that hit me the hardest was a 30-minute debut by a modest band from my dad’s hometown of Montclair, NJ. The group, led by frontman/songwriter Evan Stephens Hall, mines a homespun blend of 00’s indie rock, emo, and alt-country—a nostalgic, yet novel approach, which when coupled with Hall’s voice creates a frisson that I felt from no other band this year. The eight songs on Cardinal twist and turn, avoiding traditional verse-chorus structure, instead building emotional peaks and valleys around Hall’s stories, dotted with pearls of matter-of-fact wit and wisdom. The centerpiece is “Aphasia,” a jaw-dropping feat of songwriting about the struggle to put feelings into words—it gradually builds up steam until it reaches a brilliant little song-within-a-song (!) and culminates with a cathartic guitar solo. “Aphasia,” and much of the rest of Cardinal, is so casually brilliant that it almost angers me, but hopefully there are many more moments like that in this young band’s future.

THE REST:

21. Kaytranada – 99.9% 22. The Avalanches – Wildflower 23. Terrace Martin – Velvet Portraits 24. BJ The Chicago Kid – In My Mind 25. Big Thief – Masterpiece 26. Ultimate Painting - Dusk 27. Skepta – Konnichiwa 28. Solange – A Seat at the Table 29. School of Seven Bells – SVIIB 30. Kevin Gates – Islah 31. Cass McCombs – Mangy Love 32. Jessy Lanza – Oh No 33. Underworld – Barbara Barbara We Face a Shining Future 34. Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – Ears 35. Badbadnotgood - IV 36. Sturgill Simpson – A Sailor’s Guide to Earth 37. ANOHNI – Hopelessness 38. Leonard Cohen – You Want It Darker 39. King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Nonagon Infinity 40. Crying – Beyond The Fleeting Gales 41. Leon Vynehall – Rojus 42. Mitski – Puberty 2 43. Saba – Bucket List Project 44. Joyce Manor – Cody 45. Black Mountain - IV 46. Kornel Kovacs – The Bells 47. Lambchop – FLOTUS 48. Japanese Breakfast – Psychopomp 49. Nao – For All We Know 50. D.R.A.M. – Big Baby D.R.A.M.