Best Songs of 2023

Thirty tracks make the cut for Gone Gazing’s Best Songs of 2023. A genre-spanning collection of songs from legacy acts to groundbreaking new artists, look back on a year of great music by celebrating your favorites and discovering gems you may have missed. Listen along at to our Best Songs of 2023 Playlist as you read.

We haven’t heard anything from Everything But The Girl since just before the turn of the century.

A synthy jangle done up in a chummy club tempo, no one would know they’re dancing to EBTG if you were to put this track on. Not forgotten, just missed for some time, this new imprint is signatural in its tenderness, telling us the words told by anonymous faces to those they meet in public spaces.

It’s something we can all relate to, estrangement in a crowd. But “No One Knows We’re Dancing” is also about the rhythm of dance and the meaningful ways it plays upon stranger engagements in our social lives, out and about at 5 p.m. on Sundays.

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Georgia Hubley leads the somber “Aselestine” – a nostalgic reflection on past love. The narrator recalls those buried memories when faced with the image of their former partner, contrast against their lonely conclusion.

Acoustic strumming echoes around Hubley’s vocals, cutting through the isolation. Before the final verse, defined by acceptance of change and separation, Yo La Tengo whispers a heavenly solo, indie serenity.

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Two new bands. Punk music without guitar. The digital rage and what not.

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Redveil delivered the insanely fun track off his April EP leading up to his Water 2 Fire tour earlier this year. “captain” is a testament to himself, relishing in astonishing achievements as a 19-year old rapper and producer and one of the most exciting names in hip-hop. Aye, Aye, Captain!

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“The Glory of the Ocean” is the 8-minute baptismal opening to one the best metal records in recent history. Tearing through the track’s deceiving runtime, it is an exemplary song standing alone.

For the greater glory, it also serves as a walkabout gallery tour of Agriculture’s self-titled and all that their album has to offer an ecstatic world.

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Hello Mary’s lo-fi grunge sound rings true on their self-titled album, and “Sink In” captures everything exciting about the trio. A methodic, taunting guitar welcomes the listener, and subdued vocals on the opening verse lulls us into a false security.

A distorted wall of sound, shredding guitar kicks up into an explosive chorus. Crashing drums season the finale’s huge breakdown, the repeating motif blissfully spinning away, carried out on the waves.

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The cousins are back and silly as ever!

Lamar, still short in the tooth; Keem, a cheeky bastard. Blasé about their goings ons and trading poetic license to embellish a background FIFA match, they pass lines casually like one would pass a game controller on the couch.

“The Hillbillies” showcase the chemical mixing of their respective styles. After past banner years from both artists, quiet retreat is expected, but it’s exceptionally fun to retreat alongside them, tripping on down the shorelines.

That’s no pond. That’s a deep deep deep deep ocean.

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Methodical drum breaks course through the subdued opening verse, detailing the epilogue of a failed relationship. As the chorus unfolds, massive guitars sing an infectious indie melody that Slow Pulp is well known for crafting.

Remnants of the broken distortion linger through the second verse like feelings for the narrator’s lost “summer hit” – stuck in her head until the next bop comes along.

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It is so fetch. Here, read our Mean Girls review and see for yourself.

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Experimental pop artist yeule blends punk riffs and pounding electronica to ecstatic heights on “sulky baby.” They reflect on past struggles in their lyrics, forged by the trauma in a powerful ode to their younger self. A sound reminiscent of a Grimes and grunge-era beabadoobee lovechild, layered melodies power glitchy choruses, sounds of the future meeting past.

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Presenting the other, other rap duo from this year: Armand Hammer. Rapper Billy Woods and all else artist Elucid have been under the flappy guise of the long-gone capitalist figurehead for years in the underground, literally.

Seeking succor in the wee morning hours, or craving absolution to intrusive thoughts, they’ve got you. In an appeal to post-Covid indifference, Armand Hammer is here to show you who cares and what to care about.

As an added thing, one half of the hoe-frighteners appear on this track, crushing up the beat throughout. Peggy lays a choppy stumble-go theme down for Siri to mull over and pretend not to hear.

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Pulsing synths open Slowdive’s everything is alive, a heartbeat swallowed up during the opening minute of the album. As their signature guitar tone finally comes in, everything is alive, a sonic canvas drowning in oil, pastel, ink.

Slowdive meditates on the passage of time, aging, death, all amidst crushing walls of sound, lyrics only reaching a whisper. Yet it is heard, echoing through the cavernous shoegaze landscape, a blurry prayer.

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Welcome to my EYE-land, see the beauty in the music.

Welcome to my MY-land, hope you like this, you’re ain’t choosing.

Welcome to my I-land, see the album we adored it.

Welcome to my Island, hope you hear her, she ain’t moving.

DEESIIIIIIIIRRRREEE!

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Isolation is a furnace. Its coals blistering, charring all within. Through slits in the door, you can see outwards, but the heat maligns and blurs. Nobody can see out but you, only you, and only in the way you see.

“Rabbit” lingers in the furnace. A tale of lonely upbringing and the worldview that loneliness forms. A repeating piano line moves through the song, a constant amidst the boiling heat.

“Rabbit” is reserved, a contemplative track that also reminds how the furnace blinds. That metal door waiting to be pushed open. Outside of it, the mundane truth. Inside is comforting.

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2023 was a ploddingly slow year for hip hop and rap releases, with few major artists putting out studio material and fewer early acts flooding in with new stuff. The exception being Sexyy Red.

Her response to this drought started subtle with a single drop that would’ve made this list standalone, then remixing said single with Nicki Minaj and then dumping the best rap mixtape of the year on the poor unsuspecting peasantry.

The already iconic “Pound Town” duology is so impudently laid down, you can’t help but laugh along with Sexyy’s gall and clever songwriting. We went with “SkeeYee” since it so effortlessly takes itself seriously and disregards any future attempts from artists stumbling to keep up and because it’s just so catchy. And on top of everything, she toured her sold out fall shows while pregnant… are you kidding me??

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Beabadoobee released stacked catalogue of singles through 2023, with features from Clairo, Aminé, and Laufey. Slipping under the radar was July’s “The Way Things Go” – a postmortem on her seven year long relationship to some boring white guy. Contemplating distance and fading memories, beabadoobee’s acoustic arrangement creates a cheerful tone, fit for accepting loss and moving on.

The track was long teased in snippets across social media as a work in progress, and was infamously used by her ex-boyfriend and ex-best friend to hard launch their relationship on Instagram. A jab at the traitorous duo now sits immortalized in beabadoobee’s orchestral hit. 2023’s biggest bag fumblers.

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I first heard “Vampire Empire” played by a street musician in Vermont. A possible refugee from last evening’s Big Thief concert, they had their camping stool set in the middle of clay-red cobbles and had placed their guitar case out in front in a classic move to catch dollar tips and linty change.

I was latecoming to their set, they had already started their second round of “you give me chills” on the loosest set of acoustic strings I’ve ever seen. Nonplussed, I wanted to ask the guitarist why their melody sounded so familiar, or worse, open Shazam and see for myself. Yet before I could truss up the courage to do either, the song was over, and they were packing up.

My purpose for being in the street briefly forgotten I tossed the pittance from my pocket into the guitar case, a subtler gesture than clapping but still intended as small recompense for their makeshift performance. Receiving a weary smile, we then switched away our brains to busier moments brought on by the morning. I never asked the name of the song.

After hours of brooding over all the possible rhymes for “pills” I sank into some music to hopefully rid myself of the transient earworm only to see Big Thief had put out a studio recording of their unreleased live favorite “Vampire Empire.” That was the same day.

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Charli XCX contributed to the soundtrack for the billion dollar Chevy Blazer ad that was Greta Gerwig’s Barbie. “Speed Drive” is a frantic pop track, perfect for a choreographed chase scene or for achieving up to 29MPG on the highway in the brand new Chevy Blazer.

With a tasteful interpolation of “Hey Mickey,” Charli XCX inspires bubblegum pink nostalgia for the heyday of Barbie, best listened to in Chevy’s new midsize SUV perfect for Barbie, Ken, and the whole family: the 2024 Chevy Blazer. Special financing available at your local Chevy dealer.

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Geese the conundrum. Threatening to cast themselves headlong into the indie alternative bundt-shaped canon with 2021’s Projector, they make this leftmost turn at the last second. 3D Country is the culmination of eclectic influences from big spaces, yet still in the same octave as their debut.

If you actually look up their “3D Country inspiration playlist” on streaming stuffs, you may read a different story, but draw the same conclusion… Geese are not to be trifled with. The titular “3D Country” is their great odyssey into unknown country, fly on!

Me taking my time machine back to the 30s to play 3D Country for the Sons of the Pioneers.

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Panda Bear’s montage of indecisiveness amidst the ticking clock is a dreamlike trance. Instruments float in and out of scene, one-off sounds filling a quiet void, en masse a dynamic musical atmosphere. Pacing guitar, cuts of Hayley Williams, electric sprinkles form a canopy of stars, sonic galaxies to explore.

In that dream, a constant existential tick looming as the world melts. One dream to the next, falling into nightmares. Floating amidst the stars, crashing out of orbit, I can’t tell. I haven’t heard the original, I don’t want to, I can’t tell.

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Aphex Twin releasing new material is my roman empire. Spotify cannot count the quiet days’ worth of hours tacked on to looped listens of Selected Ambient Works 85-92 and Volume II; I actually think they have excluded it from their data mining algorithm as skewed data.

It has been since the days of Pandora radio that we’ve gotten an album and since the 1-year-ish anniversary of the PlayStation 2 that Drukqs, a masterpiece, was released.

Our prayers hearkened, Richard D. James rose on the 21st day and saved us from electronic music purgatory. The short EP is out now. It is a fine release, more than we’ve asked for, more than we’d come to expect and hopefully it will stave off the voracious rabbit-holing, until I start listening to Selected Ambient Works again.

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My first video game was The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. One of its lasting influences on me comes from the soundtrack of Gerudo Valley – ever since, I fiend for Spanish guitar. “Sunset” scratches that itch.

Caroline Polachek’s fiery romance boils the valley, pushing Link to find his princess. Gorgeous vocalizing casts longs rays across the Hylian Crest. Ferocious claps in tune to sinking footsteps amidst the dunes. Onwards to the fortress, powered by a pop masterpiece.

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I’d like to introduce our next story. It’s about a guy named Rat, that’s about all I will say.

For the love of all things Bob Dylan.

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Big Thief spins a cosmic romance, chronicling the narrator’s life from the creation of the universe, the age of dinosaurs, her birth, life, death, and rebirth, all matter, all in the universe, driven by her love.

The honest folk number is driven by Adrianne Lenker’s genius songwriting and cascading guitar. It’s greatest achievement though, is forcing a whole audience of pretentious indieheads to admit they like a country song.

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Squid is manic and jazzy, kind of like the deep ocean cephalopods they’re named after. They both suck up their outside environment and expel it forcefully, propelling themselves into empty space, rinsing wounds with salt and repeating.

“Green Light” is the English band’s vented vacuum escape from the slower numbers on their puzzling album O Monolith. There is much we still don’t understand about squids and Squid, but we know they are recluse observers. Their eyes are wide and take in multitudes, so it’s no wonder we’re still deciphering their Pleistoscenic lyrics.

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Snail Mail’s Valentine (Demos) EP offers a rare look into Lindsey Jordan’s mind at work, a usual perfectionist sharing early, stripped-down versions of her Valentine hits. “Easy Thing” was left off of the 2021 record, now shared for the first time this year.

A Velvet Underground-like guitar riff carries through the whole song’s simple arrangement, framing a disillusioned story of love and the desire to rekindle it. The rumination on self worth, intimacy, and misguided affection fits into the greater themes of Valentine, and the quiet pleas of “Easy Thing” show just how painful heartbreak can be.

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Paramore’s revelatory track is good, so good in fact that it encourages even better covers. The best songs allow musicians across time to resuscitate old ballads in new light. If the substance is lacking in writing, a reinterpretation rarely does any additional good for the song and nothin’ for me. This one though, this one does somethin’ for me.

One of the boys, the genius Julien Baker somehow made an already good Paramore song into an even more Paramore sounding Paramore power ballad. When it clicks, as it must’ve for Baker, “Thick Skull” hits like an epiphany.

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The shining moment of Live at Bush Hall comes in a ten-minute epic. Starting as a quiet piano ballad sung by pianist May Krenshaw, layers of saxophone and strings creep in until the great crescendo, a signature BC,NR finale.

Krenshaw narrates a haunted story of self-doubt. She pleads, “Don’t waste your pearls on me, I’m only a pig,” to her companion after discovering she can fly. Doing the impossible yet still feeling undeserving, electing to rot through insecurity and rejecting the companion’s care.

As the rest of the band comes in after the final lyrics, we take flight, up through the mess, away from it all, a soundtrack to our rise and eventual crash.

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To capstone a year of good and bad music and everything between is a tender dance number. Kelela sings for all the “Happy Ending”s we may wish for in life.

To expect life to be conclusive and finite, with definite punctuation would be misguided, but to simply wish for things to turn out well is natural. With all the turns life takes in a single day, to see things for even a moment as unspoiled and definitive is human after all. I think the point stands that we might see potential in life and it’s tendency to turn out well. It just takes some moving.

So, dance on in the year ahead and Gaze upon all happy endings you’ve known and will come to know.

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Infinity Repeating is a gorgeous fusion of RAM‘s disco pop influences with The Voidz’ experimental rock expertise. Casablancas’ muted, seductive performance against a jazzy drum beat and alluring bass lines yields a beautiful, bittersweet song that demonstrates how special creative collaboration can be.

The cryptic lyrics form a loop, the speaker trapped in mundane life, a repetitive cycle they’ve been living in forever. Feeling isolated and trapped, always experiencing the, “two old friend coincidences,” he longs to escape. He admits he used to love this life, but times have changed, he’s grown, and doesn’t want to be stuck anymore – “it’s not how we used to do.”

Breaking up in 2021, nearly three decades into their career, Daft Punk’s members are the two old friends. At a crossroads, living as robots for twenty-eight years, the life of musical innovators is all they know. They broke the cycle, let go of those coincidences, and moved on.

Daft Punk leave’s an enormous legacy behind, which will continue living on. Thomas and Guy-Manuel are now free from their infinity repeating, a hopeful tale of change defining their euphoric finale.

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Check out the full playlist containing all of Gone Gazing’s Best Albums of 2023 and read about our Best Albums of 2023. Had a lovely year gazing with you. On to the next.