Top 20 RGV albums of 2020
This tense historic year slowed down a lot of activity, but the music never stopped. Our Rio Grande Valley musicians put their hearts into their output in 2020. Some used their increased time spent at home to finetune their craft, others challenged themselves to find ways to collaborate more than ever. Local creatives sound inspired like never before. The lack of live shows didn’t fracture our independent music community. Through resilience, online networking, and countless charity and activist causes, the scene feels truly united. As they have done so much for the community, let’s look back on some of their finest albums of 2020. Check out our Top 20 RGV Singles of 2020 as well.
20. Secrets Told In Silence - I Love You . . . I’m a Ghost
Using various shades of 2000’s radio rock, from hard rock to goth metal, can easily turn to a cringey butt-rock sound, but with impressive lead guitar work, a full wall of sound, and Ellie Juarez’s vocals flying over the mix, this album can hold its own.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
19. City of Dawn - Let’s Be Free Together/ Until We Can No Longer Walk
Technically a double single, but as long as an EP, these two songs complement each other as a hopeless/hopeful pairing. The desolate dronal slabs turn to orchestral ambience for a brighter new beginning, leaving a long lasting impression when all is said and done.
18. J-Sea - Sea Level
J-Sea is showing his disdain for haters and love for his team with cinematic Trap beats and R&B smoothness. These waves are dark, dense, and powerful.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
17. Andres Sanchez - Secret Stages
Video game soundtracks can still deliver, even when the video game doesn’t exist. There’s a strong sense of curiosity and exploration throughout these minimalist nostalgic vignettes.
16. I Killed Techno! - Young, Dumb, & Dead
Spookily rudimentary electronics, wounded shrieks, and cyber-punk energy make IKT’s message more gripping, whether he’s singing about police brutality, body image issues, or a dedication to a dead friend. It might just be IKT’s most IKT album.
15. Library Hours - Every Day Feels the Same
Poetically hyperbolic lyrics and frantic vocals shouted over cluttered drums and rapid light guitars — it’s a faithful midwestern emo experience that hits as hard today as it did 20 years ago.
14. Planet Grim (self-titled)
Cloud rap psychedelia and youthful conviction form the foundation of this hip-hop album full of exuberant stream-of-consciousness raps and blissfully hazy beats.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
13. Veronique Medrano - La Novela
Pushing forward a classic tejano style to a fun modern sensation has made Medrano a voice among tejano revivalists.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
12. Suicide Tongue - Oblivious Animals
Horrorcore beats and brawny rap flows. Evolve and company sound fierce, savage, and disturbed. After multiple releases this year, he’s still hitting his stride.
11. Opian - The Quarantine Files
Opian shows how adventurous electronic experimental music can be. With a background as a metal musician, his sound is as playful as it is intense, and as elegant as it is thunderous.
10. Common Girl (self-titled)
This blurry and expansive trek has the cold mystique of outer space and the warmth of a safe arrival. Post-punk electronics and ghostly vocals drenched in reverb and chorus find their path to us every time.
9. CANA! - Luvfield
A bedroom pop version of retro Latin freestyle music. The melodies and synths are sparkling, misty, and colorful, while the drum machines and bass are spellbindingly danceable. The performances by singer Danica Salazar are so sublime for such a humble sound
8. Royal Angst - Fuchsia Motel
Paying homage to grunge and other forms of 90’s alt-rock, Royal Angst made a focused and highly-inspired album that didn’t hold back on the studio effort, songwriting depth, or difficult subject matter.
7. Fronterawave (self-titled)
A nice spin on the lo-fi hip hop movement. These border-themed mixes are serene, beautifully warped, and full of homegrown pride.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
6. Beaches - ✧~~✧ vol. IV
Dance and R&B remixes that hit you from every angle — powerful beats up front, vocal samples swirling around, off-to-the-side melodic fills. It’s a soothing sound that also packs a punch.
5. Boiz - Everywhere I Go
It was the RGV’s summer album of 2020, but the enjoyment is year-round. Gliding melodies, opulent production, and glowing vocals - these Boiz are pop masterminds everywhere they go.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
4. Valley Swerve - ONI-ISM
Japanese internet culture is fashionable for many American pop and hip-hop projects today, but J-horror and folklore are rarely utilized, like on Valley Swerve’s magnum opus. With dark occult auras and 90’s UK rave styles, a bold new branch of lo-fi hip hop was formed.
3. honeyflowers - Shimmer
An indie pop album that’s boldly vulnerable and endearingly awkward. Enchanting textures and sweet longing vocals make it a magical runtime put together with some serious compositional prowess.
Click here to listen on Apple Music
2. Futuro Conjunto (self-titiled)
After making a compilation album with local musicians to capture the essence of the Rio Grande Valley in 2018’s “Wild Tongue,” Charlie Vela and Jonathan Leal aimed even higher in 2020 with Futuro Conjunto — a speculative fiction album set in the RGV’s future. The project has it’s own backstory of a later history afflicted by natural disaster, war, pollution, and civil unrest. It’s a cautionary tale, but also a celebration of our resilience and unique culture. There is plenty of humorous dialogue and deep exposition throughout the album, with immersive sound design that sets the listener in a live DIY concert played by different fictional bands with their own genres and stories. Every song hits home and hits hard — from the bachata-infused space balladry of “Amor superno,” the emo howls and commemorative trumpets of "El Huracán del Valle,” to the mezmorizing accordian runs of “La Madre de Las Estrellas,” played by Esteban Jordan’s son. It’s ambitious, massive, and a testament to the sprawling creativity of our region.
1. That Guy Montag - Mdop
Who is That Guy Montag? A pop culture movie junkie with a fake Brooklyn accent and an affinity for jazzy music from before his time. He shares his interests in the most bizarre, but inviting, joyride of an album that vividly captures the casual RGV experience in songs about friendship, tough love, materialism, the nine-to-five grind, and cynicism. His pointblank flows emulate the “golden age” hip-hop era, while the boom-bap beats make great use of jazz, R&B, and bossa nova samples that are sometimes moody and abstract, and other times bright with classic swag. One of the best examples is the triumphant “Pozole,” which uses Sunny & The Sunliners’ “Should I Take You Home” as he shares the spice of life with his crew. True to his flawed and conflicted character, after spending two songs being weary of superficial women, he gives in to temptation in “Sex Sauvage.” It builds upon the breezy “Escola Em Luto” by Wilson Simonal before a seductive porno bass groove changes the entire premise as raunchy chopped & screwed raps turn this into an immediate earworm of a song. Conversations from movies like Wolf of Wall Street, Swingers, and Reservoir Dogs establish themes of most tracks. The most devastating usage comes in “Doc,” with its brutally nihilistic dialogue from the show Louie. “Pick a road and go down it, or don’t. People are born sometimes with no eyes, with no face. Nobody CAAARRRES.” The lively music dancing behind it makes it a humorously dark moment. Above all the musical and thematic elements, is Montag’s personality. He’s a straight shooter, a hustler, but also a bro. As enigmatic as this album can be, the best part is Montag’s air of familiarity.
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