Top 10 Best Pop Albums of 2021
Kenya
6
Over the year, fans were gifted with impressive veteran comebacks, solid sophomore projects, and stunning debuts from some of the genre's rising stars.
There's a reason why Pop continues to be the most consumed genre on an annual basis, even if mainstream outlets don't always give the artists their proper praise.
here is my ranking of the 10 best pop albums that dropped this year
1)Planet Her by Doja Cat
With no skips( maybe imagine) Planet Her showcases Doja Cat’s genre-fluidity and innate talent, solidifying her current and future place in music.
On tracks like “I Don’t Do Drugs” and “Been Like This,” Doja is a seductive singer with vocal chops that rival many of her pop counterparts.
And on records like “Need To Know” and “Get Into It (Yuh),” she is a fierce rapper with a knack for witty wordplay and metaphors. Though you can clearly identify some of Doja’s influences on the record (she directly shout outs Nicki Minaj on one track), Planet Her doesn’t sound like an imitation of anything else.
Instead, it’s effortlessly authentic to the silly and eclectic personality we’ve seen from Doja Cat on her social media accounts. Whether you consider it a pop album or a rap album, Planet Her proves that Doja Cat has undeniably arrived as a superstar.
Planet Her sends us spiraling through uncharted territory in search of new sensations. It’s the guiding principle behind tracks like “You Right,” “Options,” and “Need To Know,” the latter of which features some of the most imaginatively delivered raunch to have ever graced the airwaves: “I can’t stand it, just one night me / Spank me, slap me, choke me, bite me.”
She’s just as magnetic, though, when forgoing that pursuit of pleasure — songs like “Been Like This” and ”Alone” stand out not for their apathy but for the generational malaise that
Doja effuses their barren skies with.
All of this, of course, precedes the Juul pod of a summer anthem “Kiss Me More,” further punctuating the replayability of this journey. That’s the real thrill of Planet Her — knowing how quickly you can return to it, and how exhilarating it will be.
2)Montero by Lil Nas X
If any artist defined 2021, it was Lil Nas X, who proved that a black, queer and unapologetically sex-positive pop-rap artist can be a superstar. From pole dancing into hell before gracing the devil with a lap dance to being pregnant and giving birth to the album in hospital, Lil Nas X has become a Gen Z juggernaut.
This scintillating debut demonstrates his ability to incorporate R&B and rock into his TikTok-conquering bops while collaborating with everyone from Elton John to Megan Thee Stallion. Along the way, he subverts hip-hop tropes with a casual shrug: "I don't f**k bitches, I'm queer," he spits knowingly on the chart-topping single Industry Baby. Most excitingly of all, it looks like this wildly talented 22-year-old is only just getting started.
Refusing to cater to his critics, MONTERO is Lil Nas X’s way of fearlessly flipping the industry on its head. Making it his mission to be a voice for a generation of queer kids, the album explored themes of self-hatred and struggling with self-acceptance whilst describing what it means to be happy and at peace with one's self.
Taking fans on a personal journey of self-discovery with tracks like That’s What I Want, Sun Goes Down, and Tales of Dominica, Lil Nas X won the world over with his artistic growth and confidence bagging himself five GRAMMY-nominations including Album of the Year and Record of the Year.
3)Sour by Olivia Rodrigo
In the face of massive No. 1 single “drivers license” and Goliath-sized expectations, Sour heralds a pop rookie with veteran tendencies. It’s refreshing and concise, as Olivia Rodrigo takes a blunt approach to the breakup album.
While the heartbreak and treachery she sings about on standout “traitor” can feel ambiguous, her words are not. It’s clear that Rodrigo’s bread and butter is autobiographical breakup tracks.
However, her most impactful songwriting comes on the album’s closer, which goes in a different direction. On “hope ur okay,” Rodrigo writes about two people she used to know who have had to survive difficult family circumstances, domestic abuse, and as detailed in the second verse, a family’s vitriol toward a young LGBTQ teen’s partner.
She sings, “Does she know how proud I am she was created / With the courage to unlearn all of their hatred?” At times, you can see Rodrigo’s age in the specifics of the stories she weaves, but it goes mostly unnoticed because of her overall maturity.
She’s a massive hit with Gen Z, but it’s millennials who have transformed the Olivia Rodrigo craze into nostalgia-fueled viral tweets and self-deprecating memes about how a girl 15 years their junior can be hitting the nail so precisely on the head.
With Sour, Rodrigo covers the misfortunes that come with love, loss, and growing up, championing outcasts with angst as she says what pretty much everyone is thinking: “God, it’s brutal out here.” —
4)Justice by Justin Bieber
More than a year after releasing the polarizing project Changes, Justin Bieber returns to form on his sixth studio album, Justice.
Singing about his two most important relationships—with God and with his wife Hailey Baldwin Bieber—Justin pulls off a project full of stadium anthems that span several genres. Justin experiments on Justice, venturing down somewhat unfamiliar (but not altogether surprising) avenues as he teams up with everyone from Nigerian superstar Burna Boy to Florida newcomer Dominic Fike.
Justice might be Justin’s most cohesive project yet. The married star mixes his penchant for hitmaking with deeply personal confessions, letting listeners in on just how much his life has changed in recent years. There’s a sense of finality on some of these songs, an odd feeling for a 27-year-old pop star who is still racking up gaudy streaming numbers.
On the album’s penultimate track “Anyone,” Justin sings, “If it’s not you, it’s not anyone / Lookin’ back on my life, you’re the only good I’ve ever done.” Maybe after over a decade of scrutiny, the reason he sounds so focused is because he’s finally found the peace and purpose he’s been looking for all along
5) 30 by Adele
The hugely anticipated latest instalment in Brit superstar Adele's catalogue was widely billed as her "divorce album" and 30 certainly lays bare the heartbreak and turmoil of a marriage ending, but it also expresses a sense of personal and creative liberation from an artist who has grown up in the spotlight.
While the first single release Easy on Me offered familiar piano ballad territory, Adele's distinctly confessional, frequently wry songwriting weaves through nu-classic soul territory (My Little Love, where she addresses her young son, is devastatingly beautiful).
It also takes in a pop hook-up with Max Martin (Can I Get It), a jazz interlude sampling piano great Erroll Garner, and nods to Carole King and Amy Winehouse (on the concluding Love Is A Game). It's raw and smooth, worth hearing in sequence (Adele seemingly caused a fracas by removing the "shuffle" option on Spotify), and definitely a keeper
6)If I Can't Have Love, I Want Power by Halsey
In late August, six weeks after welcoming her first child, Ashley "Halsey" Frangipane released this bold concept album "about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth".
Produced by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross of industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, it swaps the singer's previous electro-pop sound for something grungier.
On standout banger Honey, which features Dave Grohl on drums, she mixes bitter and sweet like iconic alt-rock hitmakers Garbage. It's a viscerally intense listen from start to finish, but the folky ballad Darling offers a chink of light amid the captivating musical gloom.
7)Star crossed by Kacey Musgraves
Star-crossed, the fifth album from pop-country hybridizer Kacey Musgraves, is a concept record informed by divorce, soul-searching, therapeutic mushroom trips, and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
The album traces a marriage from its giddy early days through a rough ending, moving from the high hopes of “good wife” and the dizzying rush of infatuation of “cherry blossom” through the lonesome yearning of “camera roll,” the sizzling spite of “breadwinner,” and the gutting perseverance of “keep lookin’ up” and “there is a light.”
Star-crossed is a subtler mixing of pure pop sweetness and roots-rock acoustics than 2018’s Golden Hour, which won Album of the Year at the Grammys; you think “breadwinner” and “cherry blossom” are going to pull big dance-pop moves like a Dua Lipa record, but they turn inward at the chorus, piling on guitars and synth sounds straight from the ’80s Fleetwood Mac playbook.
This sage recalibration of adult-contemporary aesthetics isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but no one is doing it better than Musgraves.
8) In The Meantime Alessia Cara
In many ways, In the Meantime feels like it completes a trilogy of albums chronicling both Alessia Cara‘s rise to fame and the unease that comes along with becoming a fully grown human being without your consent.
The album is sonically and lyrically her best work yet, and proves that any process of healing is never black or white and does not exist on a straight line.
Most importantly, nothing on an Alessia Cara album ever feels like filler, even when that might’ve been its purpose.
Even on shorter offerings like “Lie to Me” or “Clockwork”, the singer’s pensive lyrics remain nothing short of spellbinding for the demographic of introverted, home-bodied youngsters she first recruited back in 2015 with “Here”.
While many music critics found fault with an “unfinished” quality of songwriting on her sophomore effort, The Pains of Growing, Cara has returned to finish the assignment on In the Meantime, creating another compelling body of work that feels both complete and necessary to share.
9)Happier Than Ever Billie Eilish
How does an artist follow When We All Fall Sleep, Where Do We Go, Billie Eilish‘s bona fide smash debut? It skyrocketed Ms. Eilish into the stratosphere, such that she only had two choices for a sequel.
One, she could repeat the formula of her first album, with subversively moody lyrics in ballads and alt-pop soundscapes. Or, two, she could take a sharp left turn to an unexpected destination.
Cleverly, she and brother/producer/co-writer Finneas chose a third option. They leaned into her mood swings, dug deeper into her whispery and ethereal vocals, but then they dressed the songwriting in jazz stylings (“my future”), bossa nova (“Billie Bossa Nova”), electropop (“GOLDWING”, “OverHeated”, and rock (the title track).
Those who achieve fame tend to produce records that unpack the criticism, insecurity, and loss of privacy that accompanies the achiever’s ascent. Eilish does exactly that here, relaying her experiences with the public (and often male) gaze (“Not My Responsibility”), with the changes in her relationship to music and herself (“Older”), and with her evolving understanding of personal and systemic power dynamics (“Your Power”)
Eilish continues to be a quiet singer with loud lyrics. What’s on display now is her mastery of letting her lyrics breathe so that she never crowds the rhythm.
Happier Than Ever is likely a sarcastic title, given the world’s struggle with the pandemic and Eilish’s individual growth. But the lessons she’s learning are genuine, fashioned into vignettes that do more than capture the moment.
Rather, she has infused these tracks that bump, pulse, and groove with a demonstration of how much distance she can cover through only the tiny steps mega-fame will afford. Fortunately, that means Billie Eilish is still on the move.
10) =, Ed Sheeran
As one of the biggest pop artists in the world, when Ed Sheeran decides to return, it’s going to cause quite a commotion.
For =, the UK songwriter doubled down on his album naming trope, but little else remained the same.
Veering as close as he ever has to full-blown pop material, Sheeran didn’t abandon his keen sense for lyrics and catchy melodies, just turned everything up to eleven. After getting married and having a child, he reached a new level in his personal life, and = reflects a new side of his career, too
#2021WrapUp #Music #MustWatchMovies
There's a reason why Pop continues to be the most consumed genre on an annual basis, even if mainstream outlets don't always give the artists their proper praise.
here is my ranking of the 10 best pop albums that dropped this year
1)Planet Her by Doja Cat
With no skips( maybe imagine) Planet Her showcases Doja Cat’s genre-fluidity and innate talent, solidifying her current and future place in music.
On tracks like “I Don’t Do Drugs” and “Been Like This,” Doja is a seductive singer with vocal chops that rival many of her pop counterparts.
And on records like “Need To Know” and “Get Into It (Yuh),” she is a fierce rapper with a knack for witty wordplay and metaphors. Though you can clearly identify some of Doja’s influences on the record (she directly shout outs Nicki Minaj on one track), Planet Her doesn’t sound like an imitation of anything else.
Instead, it’s effortlessly authentic to the silly and eclectic personality we’ve seen from Doja Cat on her social media accounts. Whether you consider it a pop album or a rap album, Planet Her proves that Doja Cat has undeniably arrived as a superstar.
Planet Her sends us spiraling through uncharted territory in search of new sensations. It’s the guiding principle behind tracks like “You Right,” “Options,” and “Need To Know,” the latter of which features some of the most imaginatively delivered raunch to have ever graced the airwaves: “I can’t stand it, just one night me / Spank me, slap me, choke me, bite me.”
She’s just as magnetic, though, when forgoing that pursuit of pleasure — songs like “Been Like This” and ”Alone” stand out not for their apathy but for the generational malaise that
Doja effuses their barren skies with.
All of this, of course, precedes the Juul pod of a summer anthem “Kiss Me More,” further punctuating the replayability of this journey. That’s the real thrill of Planet Her — knowing how quickly you can return to it, and how exhilarating it will be.
2)Montero by Lil Nas X
If any artist defined 2021, it was Lil Nas X, who proved that a black, queer and unapologetically sex-positive pop-rap artist can be a superstar. From pole dancing into hell before gracing the devil with a lap dance to being pregnant and giving birth to the album in hospital, Lil Nas X has become a Gen Z juggernaut.
This scintillating debut demonstrates his ability to incorporate R&B and rock into his TikTok-conquering bops while collaborating with everyone from Elton John to Megan Thee Stallion. Along the way, he subverts hip-hop tropes with a casual shrug: "I don't f**k bitches, I'm queer," he spits knowingly on the chart-topping single Industry Baby. Most excitingly of all, it looks like this wildly talented 22-year-old is only just getting started.
Refusing to cater to his critics, MONTERO is Lil Nas X’s way of fearlessly flipping the industry on its head. Making it his mission to be a voice for a generation of queer kids, the album explored themes of self-hatred and struggling with self-acceptance whilst describing what it means to be happy and at peace with one's self.
Taking fans on a personal journey of self-discovery with tracks like That’s What I Want, Sun Goes Down, and Tales of Dominica, Lil Nas X won the world over with his artistic growth and confidence bagging himself five GRAMMY-nominations including Album of the Year and Record of the Year.
3)Sour by Olivia Rodrigo
In the face of massive No. 1 single “drivers license” and Goliath-sized expectations, Sour heralds a pop rookie with veteran tendencies. It’s refreshing and concise, as Olivia Rodrigo takes a blunt approach to the breakup album.
While the heartbreak and treachery she sings about on standout “traitor” can feel ambiguous, her words are not. It’s clear that Rodrigo’s bread and butter is autobiographical breakup tracks.
However, her most impactful songwriting comes on the album’s closer, which goes in a different direction. On “hope ur okay,” Rodrigo writes about two people she used to know who have had to survive difficult family circumstances, domestic abuse, and as detailed in the second verse, a family’s vitriol toward a young LGBTQ teen’s partner.
She sings, “Does she know how proud I am she was created / With the courage to unlearn all of their hatred?” At times, you can see Rodrigo’s age in the specifics of the stories she weaves, but it goes mostly unnoticed because of her overall maturity.
She’s a massive hit with Gen Z, but it’s millennials who have transformed the Olivia Rodrigo craze into nostalgia-fueled viral tweets and self-deprecating memes about how a girl 15 years their junior can be hitting the nail so precisely on the head.
With Sour, Rodrigo covers the misfortunes that come with love, loss, and growing up, championing outcasts with angst as she says what pretty much everyone is thinking: “God, it’s brutal out here.” —
4)Justice by Justin Bieber
More than a year after releasing the polarizing project Changes, Justin Bieber returns to form on his sixth studio album, Justice.
Singing about his two most important relationships—with God and with his wife Hailey Baldwin Bieber—Justin pulls off a project full of stadium anthems that span several genres. Justin experiments on Justice, venturing down somewhat unfamiliar (but not altogether surprising) avenues as he teams up with everyone from Nigerian superstar Burna Boy to Florida newcomer Dominic Fike.
Justice might be Justin’s most cohesive project yet. The married star mixes his penchant for hitmaking with deeply personal confessions, letting listeners in on just how much his life has changed in recent years. There’s a sense of finality on some of these songs, an odd feeling for a 27-year-old pop star who is still racking up gaudy streaming numbers.
On the album’s penultimate track “Anyone,” Justin sings, “If it’s not you, it’s not anyone / Lookin’ back on my life, you’re the only good I’ve ever done.” Maybe after over a decade of scrutiny, the reason he sounds so focused is because he’s finally found the peace and purpose he’s been looking for all along
5) 30 by Adele
The hugely anticipated latest instalment in Brit superstar Adele's catalogue was widely billed as her "divorce album" and 30 certainly lays bare the heartbreak and turmoil of a marriage ending, but it also expresses a sense of personal and creative liberation from an artist who has grown up in the spotlight.
While the first single release Easy on Me offered familiar piano ballad territory, Adele's distinctly confessional, frequently wry songwriting weaves through nu-classic soul territory (My Little Love, where she addresses her young son, is devastatingly beautiful).
It also takes in a pop hook-up with Max Martin (Can I Get It), a jazz interlude sampling piano great Erroll Garner, and nods to Carole King and Amy Winehouse (on the concluding Love Is A Game). It's raw and smooth, worth hearing in sequence (Adele seemingly caused a fracas by removing the "shuffle" option on Spotify), and definitely a keeper
6)If I Can't Have Love, I Want Power by Halsey
In late August, six weeks after welcoming her first child, Ashley "Halsey" Frangipane released this bold concept album "about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth".
Produced by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross of industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, it swaps the singer's previous electro-pop sound for something grungier.
On standout banger Honey, which features Dave Grohl on drums, she mixes bitter and sweet like iconic alt-rock hitmakers Garbage. It's a viscerally intense listen from start to finish, but the folky ballad Darling offers a chink of light amid the captivating musical gloom.
7)Star crossed by Kacey Musgraves
Star-crossed, the fifth album from pop-country hybridizer Kacey Musgraves, is a concept record informed by divorce, soul-searching, therapeutic mushroom trips, and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
The album traces a marriage from its giddy early days through a rough ending, moving from the high hopes of “good wife” and the dizzying rush of infatuation of “cherry blossom” through the lonesome yearning of “camera roll,” the sizzling spite of “breadwinner,” and the gutting perseverance of “keep lookin’ up” and “there is a light.”
Star-crossed is a subtler mixing of pure pop sweetness and roots-rock acoustics than 2018’s Golden Hour, which won Album of the Year at the Grammys; you think “breadwinner” and “cherry blossom” are going to pull big dance-pop moves like a Dua Lipa record, but they turn inward at the chorus, piling on guitars and synth sounds straight from the ’80s Fleetwood Mac playbook.
This sage recalibration of adult-contemporary aesthetics isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but no one is doing it better than Musgraves.
8) In The Meantime Alessia Cara
In many ways, In the Meantime feels like it completes a trilogy of albums chronicling both Alessia Cara‘s rise to fame and the unease that comes along with becoming a fully grown human being without your consent.
The album is sonically and lyrically her best work yet, and proves that any process of healing is never black or white and does not exist on a straight line.
Most importantly, nothing on an Alessia Cara album ever feels like filler, even when that might’ve been its purpose.
Even on shorter offerings like “Lie to Me” or “Clockwork”, the singer’s pensive lyrics remain nothing short of spellbinding for the demographic of introverted, home-bodied youngsters she first recruited back in 2015 with “Here”.
While many music critics found fault with an “unfinished” quality of songwriting on her sophomore effort, The Pains of Growing, Cara has returned to finish the assignment on In the Meantime, creating another compelling body of work that feels both complete and necessary to share.
9)Happier Than Ever Billie Eilish
How does an artist follow When We All Fall Sleep, Where Do We Go, Billie Eilish‘s bona fide smash debut? It skyrocketed Ms. Eilish into the stratosphere, such that she only had two choices for a sequel.
One, she could repeat the formula of her first album, with subversively moody lyrics in ballads and alt-pop soundscapes. Or, two, she could take a sharp left turn to an unexpected destination.
Cleverly, she and brother/producer/co-writer Finneas chose a third option. They leaned into her mood swings, dug deeper into her whispery and ethereal vocals, but then they dressed the songwriting in jazz stylings (“my future”), bossa nova (“Billie Bossa Nova”), electropop (“GOLDWING”, “OverHeated”, and rock (the title track).
Those who achieve fame tend to produce records that unpack the criticism, insecurity, and loss of privacy that accompanies the achiever’s ascent. Eilish does exactly that here, relaying her experiences with the public (and often male) gaze (“Not My Responsibility”), with the changes in her relationship to music and herself (“Older”), and with her evolving understanding of personal and systemic power dynamics (“Your Power”)
Eilish continues to be a quiet singer with loud lyrics. What’s on display now is her mastery of letting her lyrics breathe so that she never crowds the rhythm.
Happier Than Ever is likely a sarcastic title, given the world’s struggle with the pandemic and Eilish’s individual growth. But the lessons she’s learning are genuine, fashioned into vignettes that do more than capture the moment.
Rather, she has infused these tracks that bump, pulse, and groove with a demonstration of how much distance she can cover through only the tiny steps mega-fame will afford. Fortunately, that means Billie Eilish is still on the move.
10) =, Ed Sheeran
As one of the biggest pop artists in the world, when Ed Sheeran decides to return, it’s going to cause quite a commotion.
For =, the UK songwriter doubled down on his album naming trope, but little else remained the same.
Veering as close as he ever has to full-blown pop material, Sheeran didn’t abandon his keen sense for lyrics and catchy melodies, just turned everything up to eleven. After getting married and having a child, he reached a new level in his personal life, and = reflects a new side of his career, too
#2021WrapUp #Music #MustWatchMovies
Comments (6)
0/500
New Comments（6）
Kanye West update
Popfressor
Montero all the way
Lucky Humble KE
good list
Davince Legend
Love Doja cat the most
Jaymez Kaytah
@Kofi Essilfie Dennisafw59:
Likewise
Kofi Essilfie Dennisafw59:
Great musicians and I love them all.
Kofi Essilfie Dennisafw59
Great musicians and I love them all.
great i love this