Best Albums of 2023
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Best Albums of 2023
It’s been a long haul, but here we are at nearly the end of 2023, and at the end of our Best of 2023 coverage. We showed off our favourite album covers, some amazing EPs (or mini albums, call them what you will), a good few hours worth of the best songs the year had to offer, and now, we have our list of the top 20 albums of 2023.
Starting back in September, all of our volunteers were asked to consider their favourite albums of the year. We narrowed down the 100 or so picks from that list to a mere 20 albums over the following months, with the goal of representing the incredible diversity of Canadian music and the incredible diversity of our volunteer’s tastes in one list.
See an album you loved on this list? Buy it! Post about it! Send a link to a friend! Canadian bands and artists, more than anything, depend on you, the audience, to keep going. Don’t see anything you already loved? Well, don’t you worry: every single album represented here is fucking good. From the homegrown folk-rock of Avalon Tassonyi’s sophomore record Candlenighting to the wall of noise that is Tunic’s Wrong Dream, there is something for everyone here. Finishing a record at all these days is a minor miracle; that there are 20 of them that are this good is a sign of how vibrant and special our little Canadian music scene is.
With this article, the Cups N Cakes Network is going on our annual Christmas break. We’ll be back in the middle of January with our list of releases that slipped through the cracks in 2023, as well as our most anticipated albums of 2024.
Thanks so much for reading; we’ll be back in 2024.
#20 - ce qui nous traverse
Particules Sainte-Barbe // Kingfisher Bluez
Particules Sainte-Barbe is an epilogue of sorts to ce qui nous traverses’ 2021 double LP Le sacre de Sainte-Barbe. That record was originally going to be a triple LP, inspired by the house in the Quebecois village of Sainte-Barbe where the band wrote and recorded the album. It’s hard to define; it’s jazzy, ambient, experimental, sort of groovy, with lots of unexpected twists, turns, and earworms along the way.
- Sean Davis Newton
#19 - Mother Tongues
Love in a Vicious Way // Wavy Haze Records
Presented in a tight, ten-song, half-hour package, Love In A Vicious Way(Mother Tongues’ self-described “cyber-psych opus”) gleefully (and rapidly) bounces between raucous and reverential. Love stands out as one of the best albums of 2023, as much for its captivating mix of surreal feeling and chaotic playfulness, as for the truly rampant musical talent on display.
- Josiah Snell
#18 - THEE RETAIL SIMPS
Live on Cool Street // Total Punk Records
Montreal’s Tha (or Theee) Retail Simps exploded onto our radar this year with the grittiest garage rock we’ve heard in years. Completely embodying the genre, The Simps assaulted our senses with a record so raw it sounds rougher and tougher than most bands demos…. and trust us, this is a good thing. The Simps embody the swagger, and “zero fucks given” attitude needed to confidently pulls off garage rock/punk this good.
- Jeff MacCallum
#17 - Avalon Tassonyi
Candlelightning // Vain Mina Records
The opening two tracks on Avalon Tassonyi’s sophomore record Candlelightning are, pound for pound, the best opening tracks on any release this year. They’re the sort of songs that sound like they’ve always existed, it just took the right person to pluck them out of the air. The rest of the album somehow keeps pace with the openers, and makes for another excellent release from Vain Mina records (who also put out our number 2 pick last year, Eliza Niemi’s Staying Mellow Blows). Probably my most listened to record this year; suffice to say, I’m excited to see what Avalon Tassonyi does next.
- Sean Davis Newton
#16 - Zoon
Bekka Ma’iingan // Paper Bag Records
Daniel Monkman’s sophomore album Bekka Ma’iingan arrived this April in a pastel haze, enveloping us in fuzzy layers of blissful reverb and entrancing us with songs that beckon us inward, into the misty guts of an artist unafraid to seek out all of the grief and the love that makes us who we are. Bekka Ma’iingan is a dreamlike excursion into the fog of time, of memory, of self, and it is a luminous work from one of the finest artists I’ve had the privilege to cover.
- Harman Burns
#15 - The Painters
The Painters // Eel Records
The Painters’ new self titled release is the first after a long period of silence for the Montreal based band. Their debut release, 2016’s Speck of Dust was a fantastic first outing, and it’s long awaited follow-up does not disappoint. The whole record plays like an audiotape soaked sunrise, full of excellent songcraft reminiscent of the late 1960s. The trick up it’s sleeve, however, is the marriage of jangly country tinged pop songs to a very 2023 style of warm, analog sounding recordings. “Can’t You Tell” is a particular highlight; it takes a few turns, from acoustic waltz to the warbled out bluegrass fiddle, to the almost Vince Guaraldi/Charlie Brown Christmas vibe to the song once everything comes in. Each song takes you to a lot of sonic destinations in its runtime, all of it bound together by lyrics and structures that make the whole thing feel coherent.
It’s an easy album to just leave on repeat, the kind you would just leave in the CD player in your car for months, always happy to listen to it whenever you remember to turn the stereo on. For fans of Alex G and the Flying Burrito Brothers, and the album’s best tracks genuinely live up to the best of both of those artists.
- Sean Davis Newton
#14 - GHOSTWOMAN
Hindsight is 50/50 // Victory Pool
Southern Alberta has semi-arid climates that make desert-like landscapes. The “Badlands” boast geological formations that stun when explored. “Fairy Chimneys” crop up from the eroded landscapes. Prairie rattlesnakes and horned lizards hide amongst prickly pear cacti as hawks fly overhead looking to make them their next meal. This area of Alberta is where Evan Uschenko started Ghost Woman, and perhaps inspired the band's musical direction. After re-releasing his first two albums through Full Time Hobby, we finally got new music from Uschenko with Hindsight is 50/50. The album builds off the “desert-psych” sound we’ve come to expect from Ghost Woman with Uschenko’s perfectly crafted psychedelic guitar tones that blissfully soar over a steady rhythm section. The psychedelic leanings of each Ghost Woman release bring such a pure perfection to the genre that we’d surmise Evan Uschenko must have had some significant journeys into the Badlands.
- Jeff MacCallum
#13 - Home Front
Games of Power // La Vida Es Un Mus Discos
Edmonton Post-punk band Home Front’s newest release, Games of Power, is a wondrous melange of influences and styles. The first song “Faded State” starts with a sort of wailing synthesizer, which gives way to a melody, before transforming into a full blown 80s synth pop anthem. This first track is really representative of the melding of different styles I referred to earlier; the synths are obviously gothy as hell, but the driving guitar, yelling, and the gorgeous crew vocal chorus remind me of punk acts like Wednesday Night Heroes, who Home Front member Graeme Mckinnon was a part of. I remember being shown the music video for Home Front’s first single and being really excited for what was to come from this band, and I am glad to report they are still bumping out Synthy, gothy, Post-punk bops.
- Kaden Peaslee
#12 - Devours
Homecoming Queen // Self-Released
150 words is a meager allowance to summarize a record that carries the full gravitas of Devours’ Homecoming Queen. Like,for chrissakes, someone just give this guy a cool mil, please, and turn him loose in the studio so he can make the gay synthpop version of Dark Side of the Moon already.
Oh, wait, nevermind, he already did, and he pulled it off 100% DIY, because he is a literal goddamn genius who doesn’t wait for the key to the executive washroom to be handed over before he shits out a gold record.
But fuck, man, albums have no business being this good when they come from some dinky Canadian town that no one really cares about (don’t @ me bro, you know it's true), but the guy is just so unrelentingly honest and dedicated to his craft, and absolutely embodies everything that I associate with punk, in all the best possible ways. This is beauty as defiance, and I’m living for it!
- Shaun Lee
#11 - ALL HANDS_MAKE LIGHT
“Darling the Dawn” // Constellation
With the arrival of their rapturous new project ALL HANDS_MAKE LIGHT, Ariel Engle and Efrim Manuel Menuck have channeled their formidable talents to create a breathtaking opus of ecstatic beauty and sublime exultation. Their debut album “Darling the Dawn” shimmers with a strange, talismanic power, one so completely imbued with magnificent purpose that it practically ripples with latent energy, threatening to burst loose of its corporeal confines at any moment.
Drawing on their long relationship as friends and collaborators, the duo overflows with unrestrained brilliance, suffusing every breathless moment of the album with gravity and poetic grace. Engle’s oceanic voice drifts over Menuck’s synthesizer arrangements, sometimes soaring, sometimes fizzing and sputtering on the verge of electrical combustion. The sheer scope of the music is awe-inspiring, like witnessing the calving of a glacier or the rising of the sun.
The word “album” doesn’t feel large enough; closer to a monument, or obelisk maybe. Listening to “Darling the Dawn” is a vast, transportive experience— the kind of experience that leaves you sitting in silence long after the final sound fades out, feeling grateful, full, and lucky to be alive. Somehow more than alive: distinctly aware of your own humanity, your finiteness, your flimsy being-in-a-body-ness; but your boundlessness, too. Your ability to imagine the infinite; your body, which is trillions of moving parts; your breath, which is the universe. And life moves on, as it must: it is late. Go to sleep, and rest. The dawn will come, as it always does, as it always will. As it must.
- Harman Burns
#10 - Charlotte Cornfield
Could Have Done Anything // Polyvinyl
Charlotte Cornfield’s 2023 record Could Have Done Anything is another very strong outing from the Ontario based songwriter. Album opener “Gentle Like the Drugs” is a neo soul tinged piano ballad, with Cornfield singing harmonies with herself at key moments in the track. “You and Me”, meanwhile, stands as one of the finest love songs of the year. It’s a little slice of joyful power pop goodness, and one of the most sincerely touching lyrics Cornfield has written. Other highlights include the more narrative based “The Magnetic Fields”, detailing going on a date to see The Magnetic Fields, and a few too many drinks. It’s one of the most vulnerable moments on a record that’s full of them, but something about Cornfield singing almost unaccompanied about a presumably true story is genuinely affecting. Could Have Done Anything expands Charlotte Cornfield’s sonic vocabulary, while maintaining the detached melancholy of her lyrics that give her records such a special point of view.
- Sean Davis Newton
#9 - Faith Healer
The Hand That Fits the Glove // Mint Records
The playful and witty songwriting of Faith Healer is immediately showcased within seconds of the first track “The Game“. Its minimalist and unique production floats under the direct and poetic lyrics from Jessica Jalbert with an ease and subtlety that is incredibly soothing and satisfying. The transitions and shots within the songs feel very thought out while still feeling natural and comfortable to the band. The immediate touchpoints I think of are Weyes Blood, Broadcast, and even some of the more contemporary pieces from Badbadnotgood.
One of the freshest things about this record is that it has unique moments within each song, like the outro to “Grind”, with its reverse guitar lines and spacious production to end the track off. The title track “The Hand That Fits The Glove” is a crushing ballad filled with freak folk vocals and strings reminiscent of John Cale and Nico from the Velvet Underground. If you’re looking for a smooth and eclectic musical experience, then this record is for you. Enjoy.
- Ben Lock
#8 - Tunic
Wrong Dream // Artoffact Records
With harshness, cruelty, and piercing noise, Winnipeg’s very own Tunic have struck again with their latest project Wrong Dream. It’s a viscous and fast paced album, true to Tunic’s style, but with a more pronounced and in your face approach. The vocals are aggressively right in your face, right in front of you, rather than buried in the mix and part of the cacophony that happens on a lot of noise rock. The drumming is crisp and tight and not over encumbered with unnecessary fills, and cymbals that never got to see what compression and EQ looks like. The guitar drips with mood and vibe without ever having to play solos or repetitive lead melodies.
The production feels hype, and fresh, and will feel very familiar to those fans of other Canadian noise bands like METZ. Wrong Dream really is a complete package of an album, it's well thought out, authentic to who the band is, as well as performed and recorded by some exceptionally talented people. This album has easily earned its place at the discussion for best of the year.
- Nigel Young
#7 - Joseph Shabason
Welcome to Hell // Telephone Explosion Records
Welcome to Hell was a VHS skate video produced by Toy Machine back in 1996. In its opening moments, a demonic apparition tears through the cathode fabric of the screen and laughs monstrously, and we see grainy footage of cops and consumers overlaid with bitterly sarcastic American flags. Then, skateboarding.
It was a landmark contribution to the tradition of the artform/sport, and one that multi-instrumentalist composer and overall genius Joseph Shabason consumed eagerly as a kid, wearing out his copy after hundreds of watches. It fused into his brain somewhere in the same folds and crevices as jazz, forming there some unholy union of improv, style, and trailblazing individuality; of players coming together on the scene and ripping it up. Twenty-seven years later, this train of thought culminated in a new score for that old beat-up VHS tape, resulting in a freewheeling and kaleidoscopic album, aptly titled Welcome to Hell.
For Shabason’s vision of the inferno, the music is a hell of a lot of fun. Featuring standout performances by players like Thom Gill and Phil Melanson, the songs joyride through the abyss with wonderful abandon. While many of his earlier albums and singles were marked by a certain tendency towards the drifting, the ambient and smooth, here Shabason twists and flips the songs into frenetic shapes and colors, as uninhibited as the pixelated figures riding on the screen. It is a bracing, virtuosic display of unbridled talent, no less frenzied and stylish than its inspiration and namesake. There may be less bruises and skinned knees in Shabason’s version, but the ride is just as wild, just as absurd, and just as fun.
- Harman Burns
#6 - Begonia
Powder Blue // Birthday Cake
From the first moment, her soaring vocals untethered and unaccompanied, Begonia’s Powder Blue hits the ground full-steam and absolutely enthralling. As the follow up to her 2019 breakout, Fear, Powder has a lot to live up to, but the album’s self-assured vulnerability immediately shatters any worries of a slump. There isn’t a weak song here, but highlights are “Marigold”, “Married by Elvis”, and particularly album-opener “Chasing Every Sunrise”.
“Chasing Every Sunrise” deserves more than a mention. The first track on an album has to pull triple duty, grabbing the listener’s attention, setting the atmosphere, and establishing the album’s themes. It might seem like an oddly slow place to start, but “Chasing” is exactly the seductive, confounding song this album needed as a hook.
Like many of my favourite albums, Powder Blue begins and remains confidently unpredictable. Songs shift tempo in a blink, instruments drop in and out of focus, lyrics sway the line between sentimental and sly. Music like this doesn’t come along all that often, but when it does, it’s always worth your time.
- Josiah Snell
#5 - DEBBY FRIDAY
GOOD LUCK // Sub Pop
After a string of heavy-hitting singles and EPs, including the brooding and fearsome DEATH DRIVE EP from 2019, DEBBY FRIDAY has graced fans at last with her trailblazing debut album GOOD LUCK. The masterful songcraft on display matched with her peerless charisma and take-no-prisoners attitude earned the album a well-deserved Polaris Prize win, and from even the most cursory perusal it’s immediately evident why. FRIDAY’s deeply melodic sensibilities sprawl over blackened beats and bludgeoning instrumentals, never a step out of place, never relenting, never compromising.
The album plumbs some of the same sonic depths as early releases like BITCHPUNK and DEATH DRIVE, with blown out basslines and ultra-crushed percussive blasts sketching out the blackened contours of bangers fit for dim basements and abandoned warehouses. Contrasting this, FRIDAY also flexes her power as a bona fide pop icon, slipping on the role like a well-worn pair of heels on lead single “SO HARD TO TELL.” Her range is remarkable, and she manages this versatility without sacrificing a shred of aesthetic cohesion, which is a testament to her command of the sticky trappings of genre signifiers as well as her spellbinding presence as a performer. It is a powerful, moving album full to the brim with guts, spirit, and brilliance, and a remarkable achievement from an artist in her prime, with nowhere to go but up.
- Harman Burns
#4 - La Sécurité
Stay Safe! // Mothland
La Sécurité presents one of the strongest (and grooviest) debut records of the year with Stay Safe!. The Montrealers draw profoundly from 80s pop, using driving synthesizers, fast tempos, and call-and-response melodies. Samuel Gemme’s production will surprise you in delightful ways, with quirky synths and layered sound effects conjuring spaceship dashboards or cartoon amusement parks.
Singer Éliane Viens-Synnott takes the lead on crafting the album’s attitude, lifted high by infectious riffs that she pairs with teasing lines, quasi-spoken word verses, or snarled dismissals. Lyrics alternate between French and English without a care, and she knows when to sink into softer moments, letting the swing of the song take the forefront.
What stands out most is the fun that La Sécurité are having throughout the album’s run, adding double-time rhythms and head-nodding basslines. They also aren’t afraid to get weird – my favourite track “Waiting for Kenny” has a hilarious sense of urgency, and “Hot Topic” summons a brash riot grrrl essence that demonstrates their dancefloor dominance.
Stay Safe! is perfectly unsuitable as an album title. Each track takes risks that pay off brilliantly, and the band’s ethos is just as bold. La Sécurité’s unique sound and personality make this record a standout among the year’s releases.
- Paige Adrian
#3 - NOBRO
Set Your Pussy Free // Dine Alone Records
The first track of NOBRO’s Set Your Pussy Free features a cheerleader-like chant of the band’s own name (“N-O! B-R-O!”), kicking off the album with fearless energy and foreshadowing a collection of anthemic tunes to come.
NOBRO have been on the Montreal scene since 2014, touring extensively and opening for major bands like Blink 182 and Alexisonfire. The four-piece infuse their brand of high-energy garage punk with the passion and humour of their Riot Grrl forebears, offering songs by equal turns political, exuberant, and deeply fun.
Highlights include “Let’s Do Drugs,” a hilariously nostalgic ode to the gaffes of early teen party days, “Delete Delete Delete,” which chronicles helpless nights glued to the internet in a paralysis of mutual consumption, and “Where My Girls At,” a supremely catchy pop-punk narrative that recounts the herstory of the band in their own words.
NOBRO celebrate loner-outcast sentiments, teen rebellion that bleeds into twenty-something disillusionment, and a rejection of vapid self-improvement in favour of filling the void with pathological love, party drugs, and rock and roll. The album expresses a politics of joy—of revolution glimpsed through creation, destruction, and quiet quitting—and closes with another anthemic bop: “Gimme More (Party Through the Pain),” in which they issue desperate and cathartic demands for affection: “Even losers need love!” Coming in at #3 in our list of favourites, this album deserves all the love it’s been getting.
- Ava Glendinning
#2 - TEKE :: TEKE
Hagata // Kill Rock Stars
As Andre 3000’s New Blue Sun has undeniably proven, we’re in our flute era in 2023. The recent attention to the unassuming wind instrument means that audiences were primed to receive Montreal septet TEKE::TEKE’s incredible sophomore album, Hagata. This is a genre-smashing, Japanese language, flute and guitar album, people, so buckle up.
“Hagata,” according to lead singer Maya Kuroki, “is a very deep word, something present but also something leftover from someone or something no longer there… like waking up from a dream.” This term couldn’t be a more perfect summary for an album that resonates simultaneously with traditional Japanese hogaku, 80s prog and punk, and trans-continental 1960s surf-rock. Hagata pays homage to cultural touchstones of the past, yet persists as fresh and relevant, standing tall as one of the best albums of 2023. Understanding Japanese would help to further appreciate Hagata, but the thoughtful composition and formidable performances found on the record keep listeners enthralled from start to finish (FYI: there are translations on the band’s website).
My personal stand-out track is “Onaji Heya” (translation: Same Room), which describes paranoia and feeling trapped. These themes are augmented by repetitive atonal guitars and synths, a tense soundscape which Maya’s fierce vocals soar over. Band leader Sei Nakauchi Pelletier describes the track to Brooklyn Vegan as “new territory for TEKE::TEKE; however, familiar territory to each of us individually. The dissonance, the noise, those are elements we love and play with in other projects.” Don’t worry, the dissonance and noise is followed immediately by “Me No Haya”, some of the most ethereal and soothing flute performances on the album.
Hagata is an album that, when finished, fills you with the emotion of “hagata” - reminiscing on the feelings left behind, as if you’ve awoken from the wildest dream you’ve had all year.
- Penelope Stevens
#1 - Super Duty Tough Work
Paradigm Shift // Next Door Records
Winnipeg based Super Duty Tough Work’s sophomore album, Paradigm Shift, is a fiery and unapologetic record that isn’t scared to call power to account. Brendan Grey and company have worked many years on the road to build a faithful live audience, performing since 2014 at shows and festivals across Canada and receiving a Polaris long list nod in 2020. Those who have had the pleasure of seeing them live will know how they instantly draw you in with their raucous attitude and honest charm. Following their acclaimed debut EP, Paradigm Shift is a confident statement from an experienced and talented group of musicians.
Paradigm Shift continues with their jazz inflected roots, but dials back their typical energy to amplify Grey’s sobering themes. The production is also understated and effective, tinged with warm lo-fi textures that fit perfectly with the 90s jazz hip-hop vibes. Grey’s rhymes flow effortlessly as he wields a particularly piercing eloquence to deliver his message. With calls to Rage Against the Machine, the Black Panthers, painter Kehinde Wiley and more, there’s no chance of missing the political message of Paradigm Shift. The themes come from an honest place of restless defiance against the Canadian status quo and serve as a cogent indictment of the systemic racism that was baked into our society from its inception. “And then these pigs kill a brother they don’t act like it’s strange, but if I say ‘fuck the police’ I get pulled off stage? Of course, that’s the logic of the great white north.”
Amidst the politics, Grey processes grief and sadness after losing a number of people that were close to him. Sadness and anger drive the tone of the record, optimism rarely manages to seep past Grey’s mix of morose lamentations and indignant rage. The undeniable high point of the album comes with “Guillotine Dreams,” a fiery shot at colonial power, it delivers one of the most memorable lines in recent memory: “while you singin’ god save the queen, the only place I’m tryin’ to see Liz’ face is in a guillotine”
Following the rage of “Guillotine Dreams” is a shift to sadness in “Grey’s Lament.” Brendan mourns complacency, hypocrisy, police brutality, parasites in the music industry, and the culture of consumption that he sees all around him. But amidst his lament is a flicker of liberation, a drive to rise above and seek the authenticity that seems increasingly more rare. “That’s why my circle smaller than the box their mind’s confined in, there’s too many people’s actions and words aren’t in alignment, you’re supposed to be ahead of the curve not behind it”
Paradigm Shift’s weighty themes are pinned down throughout the entire record by immaculate percussion, occasional flashes of R&B vocals, warm keys, and smooth horns. Grey is a drummer himself, and Super Duty Tough Work’s percussive instincts are unmatched in most hip-hop today. Grey flows effortlessly alongside intuitive drums that know exactly when to drive and when to take the passenger seat. With that musical rapport as a backdrop for Grey’s potent themes, Super Duty Tough Work made the album of the year with Paradigm Shift.
- Clay Geddert