Winter busted open the doors of my fair city this week and punched Berliners square in the kisser. To add insult to injury, this week began the hard slide to the end of the academic term. Looks like yer boy gonna be slidin’ to Christmas like…
To add injury to insult my daughter has been going hard in the paint, slam dunking on my fragile feelings, à la old skool Shaq Attack, shattering my backboard day after day.
So this week, to combat the trifecta of the winter blues, workplace stress, and child abuse, I spent as much time as I could with headphones on, tuning out, but tuning in. Seeking an escape. Going home. Sorta.
Now, as regular readers know, I dig into new album releases every Friday. I’ve compiled my favorite albums of the year and have been listening to my darlings of 2023 on repeat. 33 stunning albums, with love from me to you.
I’m eager, honored even, to share this playlist with you. Why? Because it’s helped me feel better all year. It’s been good for me. I want it to be good for you.
I want to write about it. But it’s too much to write about as an aggregate. What do I have to say about 33 albums? I’m not even sure I have much to say about one album. I mean, what’s the value of writing about music?
Someone, maybe Monk, said that writing about music is like dancing about architecture. Sounds about right.
But I have this platform and I have the playlist and I want to connect you to this music. But I’m not so interested in describing music. I just wanna say, “this shit is legit. So listen.”
On Tuesday night, as per every Tuesday night, I had my weekly fellaship with Scott Robbin, Sausage King of Chicago. I was telling him about my obsession with this playlist and my urge to share it, as publi We talked music and writing and where the two do and don’t meet. We also talked through child abuse and the impossibility of parenting. Our discussion had me pining for home.
Yo. My life in Berlin is charmed. I shouldn’t complain. But immigrant life has it’s baked-in yearnings. There’s no place like home, especially when that home is the City of Big Shoulders.
So this week, I leaned hard into my nostalgia for home by diving deep into the five of the finest 2023 releases from Chicago artists. I want to share these albums with you because I legit believe they might bring you the escape, the respite, and the joy that they brought me this week.
I’ll start with one of my favorite albums of the year, the Resavoir project by Chicago composer and producer, Will Miller (of Whitney fame).
Miller and Co. recorded this composition in a studio in the old Hammond B3 organ factory on Chicago’s NW side (which I wrote about in another nostalgic edition of The Sabbateur). It’s groovy, but not too groovy. It’s synth-heavy without feeling synthetic. There’s a sweetness, but it’s not saccharine. It’s gentle, but it has drive. There’s motion, but it’s meditiative. Variations on a theme, it’s a journey. It takes you somewhere, but doesn’t drag you anywhere. And the flute! Big ups to the flautist.
Last week, I wrote about getting horney. And between the flute on Resavoir and Derrick Gardner’s trumpet, I’m tempted to title this edition of the Sabbateur, Still Horn-ey. But I won’t, because I don’t wanna be that guy. But sweet heavens can Gardner blow a horn.
While Gardner is now living in Canada, he and his brother (on trombone) are Chicago born and raised. Garner recently took a pilgrimage to Ghana, home of his ancestors, and returned with this to say. I can’t speak to how his time in Ghana informed this work (I listened closely and wondered, but still). But it’s definitely inspired and exploratory. I love love love the trumpet. I dare say you should too. Gardner is among the most powerful, confident, savvy players out there. The sweep of the compositions is broad but precise. Enjoy.
Jamila Woods went to St. Ignatius on the West Side of Chicago before pursuing African studies at Brown. Her new album, Water Made Us, is kinda perfect. It’s been on heavy rotation since it came out a couple months ago.
The album is teeming with Baduizms. But I’m cool with that. A friend recently complained to me that an album I shared with her sounded “just like the Beatles”. And that’s bad how?
This is album is all about love. I don’t take to that easily. That said, it’s not about “butterflies and fireworks” love. Rather she explores love as “a garden to tend to”.
She grapples with love and relationships. How does she grapple? Well, she gets her tarot cards read to help her decide whether to stay or go, reminding me that tarot is totally a thing again now. I guess it was always a thing. But still.
She opines on time. On trust. On the poetry of it all.
She asks herself, she asks us, how to navigate relationships “when everyone is good, and no one is.”
She reminds us that we never leave relationships, we just go somewhere new.
She’s young and queer, Black and brilliant. I’m none of those things. But through sheer artistry, poetry in motion, she opens to the door for me to met her where she’s at. I feel super connected to her work.
It took me a few more listens than I care to admit before I realized that, while this is indeed a love album, it’s an album about self-love.
From the West Side to the South Side, from poet to poet, Noname went to DeLasalle Institute, across from Comiskey Park. Or whatever you sellouts now call where the White Sox play.
I think what I most dig about this album is how much Noname cares. Like a lot. She’s disgusted by the litany of lies and injustices. She has a righteous sense of moral indignation. She has a vision for a better world. She’s combative on these tracks. But she’s humble and humorous, and I dig that too.
Now this next band is more Humboldt than humble; more NorCal than ChiTown. But Object Heavy has been on heavy in my rotation since Love & Gravity dropped in January.
So how does this Humboldt soul outfit fit into my humble tribute to hometown heroes? Well, friends, that dashing fella—stage right on keys—is Chicago soulman and keyboardist extraordinaire, Brian Swizlo. Swiz and I go back to the early 90’s when we both had long hair. I would be more jealous of his gorgeous mane if I wasn’t busy being jealous of his keyboard chops. Swiz is legit! And the band is tighter than a gnat’s ass. But Love & Gravity can be kinda loose, certainly not too aggressive. Think Rufus. Roy Ayers. Funkadelic. Look, I might be biased. Swiz is the nicest kid on the block and I have such fond memories of him. But hear for yourself. Here. Do this. Just listen to the opening track. By my reckoning, if you have any soul, you’ll stick around for a while.
Okay. I have a few minutes before I have to git it together to get work. Just enough time for this honorable mention…
Hailing from Oak Park, IL—where the Black and white folk unite to keep the poor folk out—this year, US Youth Poet Laureate, Kara Jackson dropped Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love? In the lead up to her gig in Berlin this fall, I listened a lot, hoping she would answer the question she posed. She didn’t. But she’s special.
Alright kids. There. I did it. I danced about architecture. I could’ve just said “this shit is legit. So listen.” But I danced for ya. Now here is the Chicago playlist with the six albums I danced about. Do yourself a favor and tune in.
Oh hey, it’s that time of the year, don’t forget to dive into my 100% Guaranteed to Knock Your Stockings Off Christmas Playlist.
Oy. All this before the kid and the sun rise. Heeere weeee go. Happy Fridayyyy!
Hugs n’ Soul,
DL
I’m learning how rituals that mark time matter to me. So this year, I am carving out an hour or so on Friday to sit quietly before my family wakes to write about what I obsessed about that week. If you enjoy this weekly reflection, please subscribe so I can send it to you every Friday.