tay's 21 favorite songs of 2021
~my year-end list pt. 1 + honorable mentions~
as the year winds down, i figured it’s a great time to revisit some of my favorite media experiences from 2021. my music listening was a little all over the place this year — i started off streaming through TIDAL, then i revisited Spotify for a brief stint and even tried out Soundcloud Go+ before resorting back to Apple Music. the spatial audio feature was definitely a factor in my decision. so you can imagine that it may have been a little difficult to track what i listened to overall and (with what frequency).
luckily for me, last.fm helped me gauge this data across platforms and according to that app, my top songs of the year only varies slightly from my most-listened songs of the year. i typically spend the beginning of a new year catching up on all the music i missed from the year prior, so it’s not really surprising that a heavy amount of my listens in quarter 1 were 2020 releases. the following images are what my most-played songs were according to last.fm and Apple Replay:
i’ve compiled my own list of favorites based on these two data sets and my own recollection. honestly, i’m going to let the songs speak for themselves for the remainder of this post. i’ll have a little more to say about some of the tracks in my next newsletter as they factor into my favorite albums of 2021 list. without further ado, here are my favorite tracks of 2021, counting down from 21 to 1.
“Baby Powder” by Jenevieve
“Jelly” by Phabo
“Fellowship” by serpentwithfeet
“Empty Beach” by Coco
“Lay With Ya” by Isaiah Rashad feat. Duke Deuce
“Woman” by Little Simz feat. Cleo Sol
“It’s Our Love” by Thee Sacred Souls
“Leaf High” by Priya Ragu
“Palms” by Gus Dapperton feat. Channel Tres
“Gravity” by Brent Faiyaz & DJ Dahi feat. Tyler, the Creator
“Nasty Girl” by Sevyn Streeter feat. BIA
“Loving Body” by Bobby Oroza
“Bout It” by Liv.e
“Wild Jasmine” by Joy Crookes
“A Bitch Curious” by AG Club feat. Sam Truth
“Many Times” by Dijon
“Karma & Friends” by Cautious Clay
“Onion” by Rowena Fysx
“TRUTH” by AG Club feat. Sam Truth and redveil
“FIX URSELF!” by JPEGMAFIA
“Talk Down” by Dijon
honorable mentions:
“Peloton” by IDK
“Wat U Sed” by Isaiah Rashad feat. Doechii & Kal Banx
“Smokin Out the Window” by Silk Sonic
“Two Face” by L’Rain
“Photo ID” by Remi Wolf & Dominic Fike
“Remember” by Smerz
“Busy” by Erika de Casier
“Too Sweet” by India Shawn feat. Unknown Mortal Orchestra
“Things to Like and Not Like in America” by Nick Hakim and Roy Nathanson
“Pull Up” by Bathe
i’ve also compiled these songs and more into a year-end playlist for a total of 101 tracks i loved in 2021, which i’ll share once the album list goes live. catch you then <3