The Best Albums of 2022

By Oluwatunmise Akinfeleye, Vice President

2022 was a historic year for music. Popular acts returned, new acts burst onto the scene, and artists continued to push sonic boundaries. Among the ambitious projects released last year, I have compiled the ten albums that provide the most fulfilling listening experiences. The albums in this list are ranked in order of my overall enjoyment of each with the others.

10. Beware of the Monkey - MIKE

The arguable forerunner of the [sLUms] movement in rap, MIKE delivers again with “Beware of the Monkey.” His poetic, spoken word-like delivery and unorthodox audio mixing may throw new listeners for a loop, but once acquainted with his style, the artistry becomes hard to ignore. MIKE’s penchant for soulful samples and melancholy subject matter make for some of his discography’s most hard-hitting yet ambient songs. Standout songs include the contemplative “WEARY LOVE” and the misleadingly upbeat “No Curse Lifted (rivers of love).”

9. SICK! - Earl Sweatshirt

Earl Sweatshirt’s “SICK!” was partially fueled by the forced introspection many underwent during the COVID-19 pandemic. With lines like “Sometimes the pain sits and festers into hate, beloved,” the album aims to bring you into Earl’s headspace during the lockdown. Listeners can expect to encounter Sweatshirt’s unique lexicon paired with alternative trap beats ranging from bouncy to somber. Standout songs include “2010” and “Lobby (int).”

8. 2 Alivë - Yeat

Yeat is truly a phenomenon. “2 Alivë” is his fourth studio album since his exponential rise to fame began in 2021, making him already more prolific than several of his peers. Throughout this project, it seems like he has his own language. Lines including words like “bopper” and “twizzy” are delivered with authority. When you listen to the tracks on this album, be prepared to hear the word “tonka” several times in several different cadences and nod your head every single time. It feels like he has found a formula for widespread appeal. Expect to hear the artist’s signature bells and outlandish adlibs throughout. Standout songs include “Poppin” and “Jus bëtter.”

7. Flawless Like Me - Lucki

The king of the underground returns with one of his best projects yet. At first, it may seem like this album has just the standard trap subject matter, but now and then, a poetically morbid line reveals something deeper beneath the flexing. Standout songs include “13” and “ARCHIVE CELINE.”

6. Hypochondriac - Brakence

The “dropout” singer has shattered expectations with his second studio album, “hypochondriac.” Seamlessly blending the pop, country, and punk genres with lyrics lamenting his failed relationships and struggles with drug abuse, Brakence is undoubtedly a generational talent. Each song fades into the next, making for a wholly different experience when the album is played front to back. This is different from the album to play on shuffle. Seriously, trust me. Standout songs include “5g” and “argyle.”

5. Gemini Rights - Steve Lacy

With ten songs, running a total of just over 35 minutes, “Gemini Rights” proves the age-old adage “less is more.” True love continues to elude Lacy throughout the project as he lays bare his psyche over piano and guitar. Sometimes it seems he doesn’t mind this chase, like in “Buttons,” while songs like “Bad Habit” prove that there are moments when he can’t bear it. Standout songs include “Static” and “Cody Freestyle.”

4. Mr. Money With The Vibe - Asake

Afro-pop sensation Asake undoubtedly lives up to the “vibe” in the title of this album. With infectious melodies and body-shaking instrumentation, “Mr. Money With The Vibe” is a masterclass in the Afrobeats’ method. Standout songs include “Organise” and “Peace Be Unto You.”

3. Love, Damini - Burna Boy Burna Boy continues to trailblaze and push the African sound forward with “Love, Damini.” This album has pain, joy, lust, and, most importantly, love. Standout songs include “Science” and “Toni-Ann Singh (feat. Popcaan).

2. 2 Slizzy 2 Sexy (Deluxe) - Cash Cobain, Chow Lee

New York artists Cash Cobain and Chow Lee have cemented their positions as the horniest rappers on the planet. This project is the most fun lis- ten of the year, with insanely bouncy instrumentals and classic samples. For a good reason, it is impossible to be bored while listening to this album. Most lyrics describing their relationships with women are too explicit to write here, layered over hip-shaking jersey club instrumentals. Cash Cobain shows why his production is a cut above the rest and why you must know these beats are from “Cash, not YouTube.” Chow Lee steals the show with his unreasonably catchy hooks and adlibs that are earworms in their own right. These two are currently shaping the future of music in New York. Standout songs include “JHOLIDAY2” and “HORNITOS.”

1. Mr. Morale & The Big SteppersKendrick Lamar

This placement should not come as a surprise to us all. No other album released in 2022 reached the level of musical genius that Kendrick Lamar’s fifth studio album continuously displays from track to track. This project is focused on Lamar’s emotional struggles that come with his position as the greatest rapper of our generation. Family issues, toxic masculinity, and transphobia in the Black community are a few topics tackled with immense lyrical ability and polished production. Standout tracks include “Count Me Out” and “Silent Hill.”

The Atlantic

By Oluwatoyin Kupoluyi, Writer

I don’t know my mother’s tongue I can’t swim across the Atlantic in hopes of drowning myself in my nation’s words maybe the ocean between me is too far to be translated but my mother always adds a little extra pepper in every meal and calls them all their traditional names maybe to remind us where we were born where our seeds were planted and watered before eventually being transplanted into a different country my father always tells me to wear my name with pride for it carries with it a nation that it holds the power of my real home that Naija remembers my name no matter how far I drift from her I call myself a Naija baby for I may have left home, but home never left me cause, see, Lagos still remembers me Nigeria still lives in my heart, and she calls me her daughter she lives in my coils in my thick accent when I drift from my home, she always reminds me that the dirt that I was planted in still lies here forget Burna Boy. You are the African Gaint that I am a legacy, and I carry within myself Nigeria’s future that I am kidnapped girls never found that I am a teacher striking in universities across Nigeria that I am the uneducated girl in nations that seem to have no hope

The Word Artist

By Perpetua Uduba

People ask me who I am, And I tell them, I am a word artist. My words are my art. They paint a portrait of me, They sculpt my truest character They’ll even draw my heart’s desire… My art is my words. I am a word artist.

The Panthers

By Oluwatoyin Kupoluyi, Writer

Ode to the panther no longer caged

To the panther who was raised in chains

That knew only enslavement from birth

Hand-fed lies after lies

How did you make your key?

How did you forge freedom out of hope

How did you build a rebellion out of silence

To the panther who was raised in chains

How did you keep your midnight Black and write your freedom that I am the child killed by Boko Haram that I am a teenager holding up endSARS signs who refused to be silenced that I am a citizen affected by corrupt politicians who take and hide money from people in need I am the burning ballots of a corrupt voting system that I am the people who have never forgotten where they are from the ones who kept their language no matter how hard they tried to burn it off their tongue that I am people who refused to be enslaved that I am nations that refused to be colonized that I am women that never take no for an answer that I am teenagers who march till the soles of my feet ache that I am young children who make something out of nothing that I am the rebelling slave, call me nat turner that I am burning slave ships that I am body buried in the ocean because death is better than enslavement that Harriet lives through me, I am unseen railroads meaning that I am freedom for my people that I am angry, and anger is corrosive that I am fire and fire burns that I am a sharpened knife, so my words WILL make you bleed that I am broken glass that will be made into a weapon that I am the ocean, so I nurture. provide a home for thousands of creatures But I am the ocean, so my anger is dangerous that I am bamboo beads on braids that don’t ever shut up Naija says tell them your name so I say in my mother’s tongue

To the panther who birthed a rebellion out of chains your name lives on.

Modern Day Mona Lisa

By Stanichar Pierre

Blame Game

By Jazela Wright

Sitting in the dungeon, I looked at the high tower and wondered how I got here. Silver spoon in their mouths, broken one in mine, wondering how’s that fair?

Let’s play the blame game in this broken system and see who wins.

Is it the people in high places today? Or the enslavers way back then?

Blue Monday by Annie Lee reflects the image of you and me.

When you wake up in the morning, I see your fatigue, you get irritated and snap— Now the blames is on me.

We choose to sit here and let our tears define us. Let’s not play the blame game, Lord knows the finger’s going to get pointed back at us.

What it means to be a

The enslaved person goes beyond the chains, because it seems our master lives beyond the grave.

We hate the system we live in, and love to cry for the victim but posses the blood of kings and Queens are running in our system.

We glorify the struggle with no plans to move forward. A spit on our ancestors’ grave

For us to take accountability would be considered a mercy.

Weakness and strength two sides of the same coin. Let’s toss it and see what we get

Our ticket from the dungeon to the high tower.

Times Like These

By Diana Moreno

My thoughts are eating me alive

Telling me to hide

How I truly feel Inside

But

I don’t know how to get by Without you by my side

Please show me the light

Where I can see the end Of all of this

Is this truly it?

Is this where it all ends?

I don’t even know where It all began.

Do you know where we stand?

It’s starting to make sense

Since it started on a deserted Island

Where it is just my hand

In the fire

Never mind, you don’t get it

What it is to carry

Ooh, it’s getting heavy

My mind is no longer steady Sailing away

Begging me to stay

But I ran out

Of what to say.

I need you to speak up Tell me

All our highs and lows

Where it all went wrong Tell me, and I’ll go Was my love ever enough?

I’ll walk away forever

From the thought of us

If you tell me

Did I ever measure up?

Ossein Phonograph

By Christopher Jean-Pierre, Video/Audio Editor

I feel the groove

No man’s land

The side of a desert highway

Where my friends and I hang out

It’s a party

I feel the groove

Slide in another episode Of the dinner

My eyes are glued to your skull Dreams pour from my afro

I feel the groove

The sound is approaching Catastrophic the metal tears like paper Due to high velocity, 74mph Put it behind you

This poem was published in an “Expressions 2021 Poetry Collection.”

Alma Peligrosa

By Sophia Camulaire

Tu alma peligrosa se está cortando. Como caer del cielo, tu corazón se rompió por la tierra muy ajena. Y lo encuentro.

Cuando la vi, se ve enferma, oscura y peligrosa. Camino más adentro de ti buscando algo distincta, algo dorada, algo pura.

Goliath

By Seyhandra Benjamin

Times like these Is when I need you The most. my mind spirals in the midst of the rise and fall of my chest in rhythm as air fills my lungs.

thoughts heading towards a drain that flushes my system. overwhelmed by the fear of the acknowledged, my motion remains still. physically.

i feel it. it runs deep.

1 see it. it towers me.

i shall become like you then. a demanding moon and sky have shown me you are: complex, wicked like me, expected and yet hidden from i shall become like you then. running deep. feel me. tower over you. see me. i shall become like you.

Encontré una sonrisa, y yo le sonrei. Pero no mucho.

Y me pregunté, ¿Porqué los santos duelen demasiado? Hay mucho dolor en un alma peligrosa.

Cada noche se grita, Dios sálvame, Dios protegeme, Dios amame, nada pasa. Y nada pasará porque un alma peligrosa no grita, solo muera.

Congratulations Class of 2022!

Photos by Andrew Candio

Own It

By Stanichar Pierre

My Black illuminates any room

I don’t just glow

I bring life.

I am art without the paint bristles to show for it

No color on your palette can create me

No canvas can fit my curves

Hair so loud it breaks the glass reflecting my inner beauty.

I tell the story of a mother and a daughter

Whose relationship is intertwined like a three-strand twist done on a Good Friday or Easter Sunday.

Look into my eyes and see generations

Flip the page and see how far we’ve come.

Book thicker than the bible

Tears flood the room

My family didn’t get the chance to build an ark when violence came through holy water quenches my sweet melanin.

Yes, Black don’t crack slipped you the recipe Lock it up and put it in a safe Mr. Krabs style Cause you’ll never get a piece of This. Chocolate. Cake.

My Black is Irreplaceable Fragile

Controversial Strength

Pain

Constitutional

So put that in your campaign.

No need to recognize it in your media or song lyrics.

My Black is beautiful

My Black is youthful My Black is me