The 10 Best Indie Pop Albums of 2011
The 10 best indie pop albums of 2011 prove that our most interesting musicians can express themselves within the essential pop song form while changing how we think about music.
Popmatters Picks The Best Musi
The 10 Best Dance Songs of 2016
From the '90s-flavored house of London-based Antony & Cleopatra to French electronic duo You Man, here is a collection of songs from DJs, producers, and electronic musicians that continue to push the frontiers of artistic expression.
The 15 Best R&B/Soul Albums of 2016
2016 has been a banner year for soul music of all stripes with a number of momentous debuts and returns to form from veterans. All the while, soul music keeps pushing forward.
The Best Pop Singles of 2016
Celebrating the songs this year that operated within the constraints of "radio music", truly a genre all its own, and produced excellent results.
The 10 Best Shoegaze and Dream Pop Albums of 2016
Twenty years on, in 2016, shoegaze -- and its demure twin sister, dream pop -- is a continuing presence and influence on guitar music.
The Best Avant-Garde and Experimental Music of 2016
Today's experimental artists tend to locate reference points in the familiar -- or even hyper-familiar in the case of 2016 masterpieces like the Avalanches' Wildflower or Bon Iver's enigmatic 22, A Million.
The 15 Best Americana Albums of 2016
This year's Best of Americana list may place the greatest distance between the genre and country music of any list we've compiled in recent years.
The Best Hip-Hop of 2016
In a year full of uncertainty and pessimism, the ever-stretching definition of what it means to be “hip-hop” was a welcome reprieve.
Form Follows Function: ‘The Life of Pablo’ and ‘Blonde’ Challenge the Notion of an Album
Kanye West and Frank Ocean have created imperfect perfect albums which invert our notions of flaws and challenge our perception of the album as an art form.
The 20 Best Electronic Albums of 2016
Electronic music is one of the broadest-reaching genres by design, and 2016 highlights that as well as any other year on record.
The 12 Best World Music Albums of 2016
There’s no short list that can be truly comprehensive of all the music in a single country, much less a planet, but there are always a few promising places to start.
The 70 Best Albums of 2016
From genre-busting electronic music to new highs in the ever-evolving hip-hop scene... from soul and Americana to rocking and popping indie... 2016's music scenes bestowed an embarrassment of riches upon us.