Human is such a different album that Rag’N’Bone Man almost needs a new name. (His earlier work, particularly Disfigured, suited it much better).

But all that withstanding, this new style suits Rory Graham so much better that it’s hard to complain. From the opening (titular) track, Graham totally dominates Human. In fact, his old style was so dominating musically that I had no idea Graham was this good of a singer!

Nearly every track is worth writing about. The afore-mentioned title track is a stunning opener that capitalizes on everything that Human is about: swaggering bass lines, blues influence, and a huge pop sheen overtop of everything. “Bitter End” is a track that simmers thanks to an incredible performance from Graham. “Be the Man” is incredibly pop-heavy, but Graham’s baritone voice carries it through the entire song.

There are some songs that are particularly strong. “Love You Any Less” is a song that will no doubt capture the radio the same way Sam Smith does. It’s an incredible, raw performance from Graham overtop of a remarkably bare backing track that lets his voice breathe.

“Die Easy” is an a cappella performance that simply captivates. There’s nobody with a voice like Graham’s on the market.

Even his older tracks, like “Wolves”, are given a bit of a sheen make-over here that put an extra focus on Graham’s voice. But “Wolves” doesn’t sit as well with this new, cotton candy style that Graham’s performing as now.

And the occasional track features a hip hop performance, which is something that Graham was doing in 2014 too (with a Vince Staples nod then). But these days, it doesn’t sit as well.

When the old Rag’n’Bone Man collides with the new one, there’s a slight disconnect.

But despite that, the debut record from one of the most intimidating voices in neo-blues is an astounding effort, and one that I’ve been listening to again and again over the past week. It’s easy to get into, and it sticks in your head. Rag’n’Bone Man is one of the most promising new performers of the past five years.

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For Solange, this groovy combination of R&B, pop, funk, and hip hop nearly outgrows her sister Beyoncé’s shadow. There are songs on here that will go down as some of the year’s best: “Cranes in the Sky”, “Mad” (which might be the best track Lil Wayne’s ever been on), and “Don’t Touch My Hair” — the album’s standout by far.

These songs are about being black, to be sure. After all, this is 2016. After To Pimp A Butterfly, it feels like every record from a figure in the black community is a statement about black realities. But more importantly, A Seat at the Table is about being a woman.

Because its tracks are mixed with spoken word interludes from important men and women in Solange’s life, A Seat at the Table feels authentic. This is a coming of age record that’s about being a woman, but it’s also about being Solange. While the record isn’t as incendiary as Lemonade, the songwriting here is intimate and the production is warm enough that it feels like Solange is sharing this with you in hopes you’ll empathize with her.

That’s what makes so many of these songs — even less noted tracks like “Where Do We Go” — work so well. I’m a white guy from Canada; I don’t know anything about the world Solange sings about. I can never claim to have recognized it. But A Seat at the Table makes me feel like I’ve experienced it, and I empathize with the plight of black womanhood in America in 2016.

“I’m weary of the ways of the world,” Solange sings on “Weary”. “Be weary of the ways of the world.” On my second play through of A Seat at the Table, I find myself nodding along. I empathize, but I’m also convicted in this. As a white man, I am part of the problem. Can I be part of the solution?

A Seat at the Table is a powerful record. I believe, and hope, it can create dialogue like this in our communities. So yes, this is Solange’s best record. She’s finally come into her own. The music is beautiful and her style is just right. She’s not trying to imitate anybody else (or if she is, she’s hiding it well). It’s a great record.

But it doesn’t matter that this is her best record. None of that matters. Solange wants our attention, and she’s got something to say. It’s time to listen.

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In other words, Wild Belle is a breath of fresh air in what usually feels like a sea of mediocrity.

Their sophomore album is, by all accounts, not a slump in any way. It feels like an experiment: the duo’s style continues to morph from one song to the next, with one track feeling jazzy (like the opener Mississippi River) and the next taking clear inspiration from reggae (Losing You).

The album’s best tracks are the ones that are the most blatantly focused on the hook. There’s a lot of great moments here, and it’s easy to miss some: every track is peppered with great ideas. The more immediately memorable tracks include Cannonball, which has a great riff and sax line, Giving Up On Your (which feels as garage rock as this record ever could), and The One That Got Away, which feels like a tremendous slow burn (and a couple great verses).

Wild Belle is willing to flirt with slower, more melancholic tracks too. The best of those is It Was You (Baby Come Back to Me), which is a multi-layered track that impresses with both its styling and its composition. The chorus is particularly captivating.

Much of Wild Belle’s success is clearly owed to Natalie, who handles the vocals throughout most of the record. Her voluptuous vocal style is both attractive and unique, making her instantly recognizable despite the pop genre’s more familiar trappings.

But moving beyond vocals, Elliot’s musical additions are everything. The best tracks on Dreamland are filled with musical ambition that feels unparalleled in pop, and I suspect much of these ideas are the saxophonist’s contribution. Tracks like Throw Down Your Guns could have drowned in predictable mediocrity if it wasn’t for some surprising musical twists outside of the chorus; it’s these fascinating hooks that often separate Dreamland from the rest of the pack.

In short: Dreamland is one of the best albums of the year, a real treasure and a breath of fresh air in a genre that people don’t always associate with originality.

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Ritchie wants you to know that he’s the real deal. The actor, known better for playing Grey Worm in Game of Thrones, comes out of the gate strong, clearly with something to prove. Werld Is Mine grabs you and doesn’t let you go, and every track from that moment on feels like gravy.

It’d be easy to write about every song and simply say that they’re great, good, or wonderfully ambitious despite their failures. Jumping from bass-ridden back beats to orchestral symphonies backing him up, Ritchie is comfortable singing, rapping, or doing both at the same time.

More impressive is how open the album is: Ritchie is candid about everything from depression to problems with his therapist (Never Better), and struggles with his young adulthood on record for all of us to hear. In I Can Change, an early standout, he sings about his insecurities during the chorus and raps about his misdemeanours of youth during the verse, all overtop of a smooth R&B beat. (Young & Stupid explore similar problems). And it’s rare that two songs sound alike (compare Cowards to the others referenced as another example).

Raleigh Ritchie is clearly overflowing with ideas.

The biggest success of You’re a Man Now, Boy is how Ritchie manages to make all of these ideas as a cohesive whole — even when they don’t always work as well. Despite the occasional odd moment or misplaced beat, the album always remains approachable.

The album’s second-biggest success is that Raleigh Ritchie never feels like Jacob Andersen, successful television actor. It feels like a friend, going through some of the same struggles you are, sharing them with you. You’re a Man Now, Boy feels like a voyeuristic peek at Ritchie’s diary.

Raleigh Ritchie’s debut is a hook-laden, genre-bending trip down urban streets with a friend. It’s relatable. It’s catchy. It’s the rare debut that feels like it’s coming from an artist you’ve known for years.

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The band tries to avoid being locked down as R&B, saying they’d prefer to be called pop. And with all the synths and beats overtop of their music, along with the generous production value of the record, it sounds like that category might be a better fit for them anyway.

But despite the polish of the record, Wet still remains incredibly raw emotionally. These songs are intimate in a way that pop records actively avoid: singer Kelly Zutrau invites the listener into a world of heartbreak for the entire runtime. Each song is about what sounds like one horrible relationship, leading Clash Music to thank the man who broke her heart.

And it’s true that Wet may have just released the definitive breakup record, but for those of us who aren’t going through an emotionally scarring loss or heartbreak, it might be a bit much for many of us. And Wet’s biggest downfall is that they don’t have any upbeat songs that are a little more, well, radio-friendly.

Despite that fatal flaw, though, Wet is an interesting record for its level of candidness. It’s rare that a record captures an artist at this vulnerable of a moment, and it will prove to be an interesting time capsule when Wet produces a (hopefully more diverse) sophomore follow-up.

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All that being said, it seems like he’s largely been forgotten. I didn’t see him on anybody’s end-of-year best-of lists. And to be clear, that’s insane: he put out one of the best throwback R&B records of the past ten years with Coming Home, and deserves nothing less than all the success coming to him.

Coming Home excels because it’s a rare modern romance: it’s sweet and sugary without ever dipping into excess, unlike many of Bridge’s contemporaries. Coming Home isn’t about chasing tail; it’s about chasing love. It’s about being lovesick and forlorn about it. It’s also about being in love.

It’s also a total ear worm. Better Man and River espouse everything great about Leon Bridges: they hit that perfect mesh of when blues and gospel collided in the 1960s and created early R&B. And the songs get stuck in your head for days.

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Many people said Bowie’s 2013 comeback record, The Next Day, felt like a retrospective record. Perhaps fittingly, Bowie’s final work sounds like he was looking to the future and deciding what alien sounds would infiltrate rock music next.

Not unsurprisingly — for a number of reasons — he landed on jazz. Blackstar is a beautiful record filled with gorgeous jazz overtones and some songs that just eke it — like the title track and the now-haunting Lazarus. Apparently, Bowie was listening to a lot of Kendrick Lamar (like the rest of us, I guess). That’s not a joke; that’s according to what he told NPR.

But of course, Bowie was originally a sax player. It should come as no surprise that he loved jazz music, or that he would come back to it for what he ultimately knew would be his last record. It’s fascinating that the end of his career would not only see him embracing his roots, but also looking to the future.

But ultimately, what makes Bowie’s final record so special is that he’s using it to say goodbye to everybody who loved his music. He’s giving us a way to grieve. Few artists are so considerate. Few records are as beautiful, haunting, and thoughtfully made as Blackstar. I suspect we’ll be talking about this for years to come.

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A couple years later, Mayer would release a much more popular live record called Keep Me Where The Light Is, both a popular lyric and a reference to his desire for fame and happiness. That record is a sham. This is the real deal. It features Mayer singing his own songs, with stripped-back guitar and a fantastic duo of musicians accompanying him (Gravity is particularly stellar here), but it also includes a ton of covers of popular blues song done in what now feels like the trademarked Mayer style.

A lot of people compared early Mayer to Buddy Guy, which might be a bit much — particularly with the benefit of hindsight. But what hindsight has also revealed is how much Mayer got right about the blues. What Quentin Tarantino is to blaxploitation films, John Mayer is to the blues: a white man paying such incredible homage to what’s typically been considered a black genre (with roots going as far back as slavery), that it’s hard to consider him anything less than a genius in most circles. But John Mayer’s just a man who listens to a lot of blues. It shows. Try! is an essential part of any respectable blues fan’s library.

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His album has been described as a merger of folk and hip hop, and while I’m not sure that’s the best description, it might be as close as you can get. Beats and acoustic guitars intermingle, people sing in a chorus arrangement, and then Raury begins rapping. It’s like Fleet Foxes or Boy & Bear adding hip hop to their repertoire, and it works way better than you’d imagine.

The best of the bunch, from a songwriting perspective, is Love Is Not A Four Letter Word. He pairs slamming an ex-girlfriend with a vocal background soothingly singing “I miss you” on repeat in a choral arrangement. It’s truly stunning, and revealing of an emotional capacity well beyond his own years.

When Raury gets popular — if he’s not there already — I think there will be people who compare his production skills to Kanye West, thanks to his unique ability to surprise and entertain with what sounds like obvious connections between un-obvious sounds. But he’s really more like Common: he’s coming in with a unique perspective on the sound and the scene, and he’s rapping about things that are a little counter-cultural to the hip hop scene. If you ask me, rappers like him are the future of this genre. Check out Woodcrest Manor II for a taste of where this music is going.

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