Sheldon’s 2023 Album Catalog

Two of my personal goals in 2023 are to 1) listen to an album that’s new to me (in its entirety) each week and 2) write more. Since one of those is much more measurable than the other and I’m pretty sure I didn’t write anything new in 2022, we’re just going to combine these suckers into one year-long living blog post. I’ll update this doc every Friday with a new album rating and any changes of heart from albums past.

I’m not a music critic or a musician but I do own three guitars. Do with that what you will. You should receive these ratings as a commentary from someone responding solely to my own sonic appreciation. I haven’t fully landed on how I’m going to rate these… Regardless, I’m gonna call it shellyscorr after my Twitter handle. We’ll see, I guess. Simple 1–10 with decimals for now.

I’m also curating a partner playlist of all my favorite tracks from this project. You can follow it here. Hope this helps you avoid that obligatory listen to something you know you don’t like or puts you onto something you wouldn’t have previously considered!

Week 0, December 30, 2022

Stankonia — Outkast — 2000

Pitchfork Rating: 9.5
The Needle Drop: N/A (he does rank this as their best album fwiw)
Rolling Stones 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2020): #64

shellyscorr: 9.7

Decided to start with a safe, undeniable, staple in the hip-hop genre that I really should have listened to ages ago. It’s just one of those ones I never got around to. As a baby of the 90s and kids of the 00s, OutKast has a special place in the mythology of my own musical history. They scored the world around me while I remained relatively unaware of quite how influential they were to the culture and the future of what would become my favorite genre. Try and mention something’s cleanliness around an elder millennial without hearing “so fresh and so clean clean”.

From the hits to the impeccable features, Stankonia has only gotten better 22 years later. My only critique is that it’s a little long for my taste. Thankful to finally make my way through this masterpiece. Historically, this album hasn’t been for everyone. It’s definitely for me.