2021 YEAR-END REVIEWS: UPSIDE DOWN

With another complicated year in the books, we offer this look back at the year-in-music, Upside Down style. 2021 offered plenty of sounds to get lost in, and below you can explore some of our favorites. Most of these exist in some physical capacity, but a few exist solely in the digital realm. Presented here in alphabetical order, with new releases at the top and reissues/archival music afterwards. Tune in to Upside Down on Monday January 10 when we offer a look back at the year that was, with a sampling of most everything highlighted here (we may need to spill into January 17, TBD). Thanks for listening! New Music Lea Bertucci: A Visible Length of Light (Cibachrome Editions) Blue Chemise: Flower Studies (B.A.A.D.M.) Bons: Peri Bathous (Spillage Fete) Chateau: Chateau I (Hobbies Galore) Evan Cheadle: Fault Line Serenade (Victory Pool) Cindy: Standard Candle Demos (Paisley Shirt) Circuit des Yeux: -io (Matador) Colleen: The Tunnel and The Clearing (Thrill Jockey) Chris Corsano & Bill Orcutt: Made Out of Sound (Palilala) Cuticles: Acquaintances Or (Spik & Span) Andre Ethier: Further Up Island (Telephone Explosion) Euphoria Journal: Did You Find My Letter? (Regional Attraction) Flowertown: Time Trials (Paisley Shirt) Rob Frye: Exoplanet (Astral Spirits) The Fulmars: The Lost Ones (Hüüpnootsche Platen Un Kassetten) Maxine Funke: Séance (A Colourful Storm) The Gabys: The Gabys (All Gone) Grouper: Shade (Kranky) Russell Hoke: The Melancholy Traveler (Round Bale) YL Hooi: Untitled (Efficient Space) Ibex Clone: From Nowhere (no label) Ignatz & De Stervende Honden: Saturday’s Den (Ultra Eczema) JJ Ulius: Vol. 1 (Mammas Mysteriska Jukebox) Kathy Leisen: Proof (Synchro System) Low: Hey What (Sub Pop) Alex Macfarlane: Waving (Hobbies Galore) Bill McKay and Nathan Bowles: Keys (Drag City) Merope: Salos (Stroom) Roxanne Métayer: Éclipse des Ocelles (Morc Tapes) Millard: Kicking a Hole (Home & Garden) Monokultur: Ormens Vag (Mammas Mysteriska Jukebox / Ever/Never) Moon Reflecting: Non G.M.O. Rain Dance (Goaty Tapes) Motorists: Surrounded (Bobo Integral / We Are Time / Debt Offensive) Myriam Gendron: Ma Delire – Songs of Love, Lost & Found (Feeding Tube / Les Albums Claus) Natural Information Society with Evan Parker: Descension O.O.O.C. (Eremite) New Bums: Last Time I Saw Grace (Drag City) Onion Engine: Bulbs (no label) Powers/Rolin Duo: Strange Fortune (Astral Editions) Present Electric: The Continuous Monument (Paisley Shirt) The Reds, Pinks and Purples: Uncommon Weather (Slumberland / Tough Love) Rhyton: Pharaonic Crosstalk (Feeding Tube) Emily Robb: How to Moonwalk (Petty Bunco) RRA: Moon Dancing (The Conservatory) Nala Sinephro: Space 1.8 (Warp) Steven R. Smith: In the Spires (Cold Moon) Steven R. Smith: The Growing Surface EP (Worstward) The Steelers: I Like the Way You Flower (no label) The Telephone Numbers: The Ballad of Doug (Meritorio) Vacant Gardens: Obscene (Tall Texan) Wedrowiec: They Wander, Don’t Use the Feet (Sloow Tapes) XR: XR (no label) Richard Youngs: CXXI (Black Truffle)               Archival   Jane Arden & Jack Bond: Anti-Clock (Low Company) Karen Black: Dreaming of You (Anthology) David Chesworth & Bill McDonald: Drive Time (Chapter Music) Jay Clarkson: Kindle (Rose Hobart) Alice Damon: Windsong (Morning Trip) The Fall: Live at St. Helens Technical College 1981 (Castle Face) Henri Guedon: Karma (Outre National) Baligh Hamdi: Instrumental Modal Pop of 1970’s Egypt (Sublime Frequencies) Reiko and Tori Kudo: Tangerine (A Colourful Storm) Tori Kudo: Tori Kudo at Goodman 1984-1986 (Voice of Ghost) Art Lown: Piper Oz the Hound (Anthology) Kevin McCormick & David Horridge: Light Patterns (Smiling C) Hailu Mergia & The Walias: Tezeta (Awesome Tapes from Africa) Moonlove: May Never Happen (Concentric Circles) Leo Nocentelli: Another Side (Light in the Attic) The Same: Sync or Swim (Freedom to Spend) Linda Smith: Til Another Time (Captured Tracks) Sweet Inspirations: Sweet Inspirations at Muon (An’Archives) Tangled Shoelaces: Turn My Dial (Chapter Music) Hessel Veldman & Nick Nicole: The S.M. Tape (Albert’s Basement / Tapeways) Yumbo: The Fruit of Errata (Morr Music)