Indescribable band The Armed returned this year with their new album Perfect Saviors (Sargent House), and they put on some pretty killer live shows (including when we caught them with Queens of the Stone Age). They’ve got more dates coming up (including some gigs with Model/Actriz this weekend), and now vocalist Tony Wolski (also of Genghis Tron) has made us a list of his favorite albums of 2023.
Model/Actriz makes the list, as does Yves Tumor, yeule, Zulu, Danny Brown & JPEGMAFIA, and more, and Tony gives interesting, in-depth commentary on each pick. Read on for what he had to say.
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Tony Wolski’s 12 Favorite Albums of 2023
Model/Actriz – Dogsbody
I’m so excited that The Armed is playing a couple shows with these guys this month—Dogsbody absolutely destroys. This is also one of my favorite sounding modern records. The production blows me away. The timbre is challenging (lots of higher frequency treble-oriented sounds, distortion, metal clanks and clacks, etc) yet there’s a ton of space and clarity. And they pay respect to the long history of unicorn bands going back to Suicide that generate earworms from tracks with very little true melodic information in their arrangements. It’s like if LCD Soundsystem produced a Wolf Eyes record.
Water From Your Eyes – Everyone’s Crushed
One of my favorite bands of all time is Public Enemy. There’s such an overt embrace of “assemblage” in their beat-making and I think the result is so exciting. And yes, I know that turntable-based assemblage is kind of the foundation of that era of hip-hop, but PE really, really just went for it. It’s a bunch of crazy shit that shouldn’t go together, but sort of does—and unlike many of their counterparts, there’s ZERO effort to gloss that fact over for the audience. If anything, they instead push it front and center. Right in your face. The tracks always sound like they’re about to fall apart but never do. This album does exactly that to a very, very different effect in a very, very different genre. My bandmate Randall got me hip to this one and I am so thankful for it. Oh also, the album title is sick. Terminator X makes an indie rock album.
Yeule – softscars
Stunning 360 degree artistic execution. This is not an example of music coming secondary to content or some shit like that. This is an artist realizing their fullest, truest vision in every format and mode of communication. Fantastic voice. Banger songs. Great album.
Yves Tumor – Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds)
More great production and a phenomenal mix. Probably the strongest first three songs on any album in recent memory, and the rest of it rips too. Honestly, this one’s on everyone’s lists I’m sure and they probably have a lot more unique insight so I’ll keep this one short. I just think it’s a great record.
Zulu – A New Tomorrow
Best hardcore record of the year! In a post-Turnstile world with hardcore seemingly being split between an industry having its gold-rush 80’s hair metal moment, and “true heads” almost turning their version of it into a very self-aware, terminally-online meme-based thing…it was hard to parse through some of the noise to still get to the shit that feels real and urgent. This record feels exactly that though. Concise messaging that’s never just sloganeering. Makes me wanna run through a brick wall. Stoked I got to catch them on tour a couple of times this year too.
Protomartyr – Formal Growth in the Desert
I’m very lucky to be friends with these guys but they truly are one of my favorite bands too. A constant source of inspiration. This album is a great example of a band over a decade into its existence, still consistently showing some serious growth while staying true to their voice. Production hits a beautiful sweetspot between accessibility, some serious scope and interesting arrangement choices, and the retention of the grit and “Detroit-y-ness” that makes them sound like themselves. The album art is absolutely haunting too. The cover is shot by Trevor Naud who also directed the “Make Way” music video which is similarly hypnotic. Beautiful work. Proud to be from the same hometown.
Queens of the Stone Age – In Times New Roman
Queens are the greatest rock band that currently exists by a mile or so. This album is pretty gorgeous. There’s some truly gnarly tones on there, but it’s still all somehow packaged together in a way that appeals to weirdos and normies alike. It was incredible to play some shows together this year and see these songs come to life in some huge rooms.
Danny Brown & JPEGMAFIA – Scaring the Hoes
This is probably my second favorite album of the year. Talk about “assemblage.” This thing just destroys front to back—absolutely relentless. It also has a beautiful and total willingness to destroy itself in terms of conventionality/fidelity/listener expectations in order to create the piece of art that it deserves to be. It has a magnificent irreverence to performances themselves. It’s all about the end result. Fearless shit.
Danny Brown – Quaranta
Two Danny Brown albums in 2023—what a year. Quaranta proves that Danny can dial it back and still be just as thrilling as he is at his most cartoon-ish. Endlessly clever, this album reminded me a little bit of “The Hybrid” in that there were voices and deliveries that were more understated (or dare I say “serious”) in a way that I haven’t heard from him in quite some time. So sick that he put this out the same year as “Scaring the Hoes.” Such scope. What a treat for the fanbase.
KNOWER – FOREVER
This band absolutely destroys. It’s no secret that Louis Cole is an absolute force on drums. But Genevieve Artadi is the unsung MVP of this, making effortless melodies that get stuck in your head for days out of such unprecious, understated staccato utterances. Her approach is the exact opposite of flashy but it’s technically really impressive. And unpretentious talent is the best kind. This album rules.
Wolf Eyes – Dreams in Splattered Lines
More Detroit love. Wolf Eyes Rules. This one feels a bit like the sonics of pre-Sub Pop Wolf Eyes with the songwriting considerations and production of post-Third Man Wolf Eyes. It gets more “terrifying” than anything I’ve really heard since “The Driller” (I wanna specify I’m talking about truly “I wanna turn this off because I’m scared” scary, not just dismal/dread-inducing). “Days Decay” feels like an unheard “pop single” from aughts-era Wolf Eyes and it really rips. This album rules. This band rules. I hope they exist forever.
The Armed – Perfect Saviors
Is it lame to plug your own band in your year-end list? Probably! Luckily I’m old, lame and I don’t give a shit. I’ve never been more proud of anything I’ve been a part of creatively in my life. This was an incredibly challenging album for us to make in that we were wrapping up the ULTRAPOP cycle/trilogy (Only Love, ULTRAPOP, Perfect Saviors)—fully reimagining what commercial radio COULD be without going to a lot of our “safety blanket” techniques, all while trying to retain everything that makes us “us”. It was a lot. But I’m absolutely thrilled by what we created. I also got to work with such an incredible stable of friends and collaborators—it was truly an inspiring (albeit challenging) process. It feels good to finish something that has largely been a singular focus for nearly a decade of our output. And equally freeing to do whatever it is that comes next. So yeah, I don’t care if this is corny. I listen to this shit full blast all the time. I’m not here to lie to you. This album rips, so it’s on the damn list.