See all best of 2021 coverage.
2021 Best of | Best albums | Best songs | Irish albums | Irish songs | Podcast episodes | Guest selections
10.
CMAT
I Don’t Really Care For You
Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson is a songwriter, the kind of master of wordplay and songcraft that means every song the Irish artist releases is a must-listen.
‘I Don’t Really Care For You’ is one of three singles CMAT released this year, alongside ‘2 Wrecked 2 Care’ and ‘No More Virgos’.
The song is a variation on the theme of CMAT’s debut single ‘Another Day (KFC)’, where our protagonist is pre-occupied with a failed relationship. This time the ex has told her ‘I don’t really care for you,” but there’s a parallel in how CMAT continues to mentally examine the relationship.
“Oh the Marian Keyes of it all / rewriting everything I do,” she sings as she sips a Bacardi Breezer to a bright country-flecked full-band arrangement.
CMAT addresses the ex and chastises her own role in the relationship with her typically razor-sharp lyric-writing – “I just spent seven hours looking at old pics of me / trying to pinpoint where the bitch began / Somewhere after the Passion of Christ and before I had an Instagram.”
But really, her behaviour, or perceived behaviour, is a reflection on how it ended abruptly – “all you did was hurt yourself / and let me take the blame / I loved you like a mirror so I guess. I’ve done the same.”
Like the devastating line in ‘I Wanna Be A Cowboy Baby!’ where she says “wanna stop relying on men who are bigger than me,” here, our hero cries “why did I have to co-depend on another old man? / I see how that has left me in the past.”
It’s a cutting line that rings through with regret and pathos – and those are feelings that CMAT has proved she is capable of expressing in a myriad of ways in her nascent career.
9.
Jungle
Keep Moving
You have to hand it to Jungle. They keep making the same song over and over. But, it’s such an evocative one that you can’t even stay mad. ‘Keep Movin’ is up there with their best work and the video is as always, ace.
8.
BadBadNotGood, Karriem Riggins, Arthur Verocai
Beside April
I heard a lot of great instrumental jazz this year but Canadian trio BadBadNotGood’s ‘Beside April’ is mind-altering modern psych jazz with guest drumming from Karriem Riggins and a hand from Brazilian composer Arthur Verocai.
7.
SZA
Good Days
There was hardly a voice more soothing and suited to a year in largely suspended animation than SZA’s.
Originally released on Christmas Day 2020, ‘Good Days’ does its best to offer self-care. The timbre in her voice, a warm and expressive thing, the way she jumps between notes.
“Still want to try / still want to believe in good days.”
‘Good Days’ was a year long comfort.
6.
Overmono
So U Kno
Overmono were one of my lasting obsessions this year. The brothers Tom and Ed Russell have made music separately as Truss and Tessela respectively.
In contrast to the obnoxious club classic, Tessela’s ‘Hackney Parrot’, Overmono’s music is mostly clean lines and minimal elements, even their For Those I Love remix is relatively instrumentally sparse.
‘So U Kno’ is a 2021 take on garage / post dubstep with an R&B sample. It is pristine and arctic and recalls Burial in tone. I had it on repeat all summer, while yearning for a dark basement to hear it in.
5.
Saint Sister
Karaoke Song
Saint Sister’s ‘Karaoke Song’ marks a subtle shift in their sound with more rhythmic and electronic tones embedded into the band’s synth and harp folk, while clearly being about a banger of a night of karaoke that involved greasy big band 1999 Mousse-T-produced dance hit ‘Sex Bomb’ by Tom Jones.
The “I wish that I could call you when I’m sober,” line punctures the song with mournful melancholy.
Saint Sister’s Where I Should End is one of our Irish albums of the year.
4.
Dry Cleaning
Strong Feelings
Ok so, anyone who’s heard our Songs of the year podcast will have heard me realise mid-discussion that I featured Dry Cleaning’s ‘Scratchcard Lanyard’ in last year’s list so I’m switching it up to include ‘Strong Feelings’, ehich also was one of my most-played songs this year.
Florence Shaw’s spoken word vocals are full of meaning, microscopic intonation, and somehow aren’t pure nonsense, as the band play a tightly intertwined arrangement, creating a strange and pleasing sort of musical mirage.
3.
Kojaque
Town’s Dead
The title track from Kojaque’s 2021 album samples Gilla Band’s ‘Going Norway’, and introduces a frenetic beat and bassline, that Kevin Smith is easily able to match (“Wanna be a real big deal like Christ or Brexit”), with a tone and intonation is what sells this and makes it such a repeat banger, and lyrics that reference Dublin city’s housing crisis, gentrification and serves a generational call to arms.
Lyrically this is an earworm – his
You could try the house share, try rentin’
Bit of money for the landlord’s pension
Heads are gonna roll soon, no warning
This town’s not dead it’s just dormant
Town’s Dead is one of our Irish album of the year.
2.
Little Simz, Obongjayar
Point And Kill
A highlight from Little Simz’ marquee fifth album Sometimes I Might Be Introvert, ‘Point And Kill’ is a Fela Kuti Afrobeats-inspired single with production by Inflo (whose work is also heard on SAULT and the latest record from someone called Adele).
Nigeria-born and London-based singer Obongjayar is a key part of the appeal here, the interplay between himself and Simz’ verses give this song its shine.
1.
Self Esteem
I Do This All The Time
‘I Do This All The Time’ is a partly-spoken word track about the expectation as one moves through the world – a stirring cathartic song that is a hand on the shoulder, an embrace of the self, a “chin up mate”, in a mardy accent.
Rebecca Lucy Taylor’s second Self Esteem album Prioritise Pleasure, and its mission statement lead single, arrived in a trying year, as a totem of personal strength and self-care. ‘I Do This All The Time’ is a song of uplifting intimacy, addressing inner criticism, guilt, and personal admonishment.
Taylor includes a personal origin story in quoting negative criticism that a previous band manager used against her (“You’re moving around too much, and you need to stand still be more like Mairead, shh / Stop showing off”), and empowers those words with the distance of time and therapy.
You’re beautiful and I want the best for you
But I also hope you fail without me
It was really rather miserable trying to love you
The choral backing and strings offer a further embrace, and the song goes deeper than an Insta caption. It’s a case of prioritising yourself, along with the album’s core value of prioritising pleasure.
Navigating life and moving forward as the best version of yourself is a complex, duplicitous and often contradictory system and ‘I Do This All The Time’ does the necessary work.
The Nialler9 Best Songs of 2021 Playlist
See all best of 2021 coverage.
2021 Best of | Best albums | Best songs | Irish albums | Irish songs | Podcast episodes | Guest selections
