Well, this year was a doozy!!! It truly gave 2020 a run for its money. Things pretty much imploded, here and in Ethiopia. There were times that even music disinterested me, or simply felt distasteful? I don’t know. In true music-head fashion, however, that didn’t last forever. Instead, I was reminded and warmed by music’s true potential for helping people heal, galvanize, and experience unbridled joy (especially when we needed it most). Here are my favorite songs of the year.
Let’s try to not projectile vomit at the mere mention of ‘looking back at this year.’ If anything, music (and other forms of entertainment) has been the thread by which we (I) are ~hanging in there~ (barely). Not to belabor a point, but this year has been a hot mess. And not in a cute way either, if there’s such thing. Beyond The Pandemic™, Ethiopia, the country I deem my true spiritual home, the genesis for all of me (and from where the music on my yearly lists derive from), is experiencing widening crises. Namely, a war that sees no end. May love, hope, and faith sustain us, justice prevail, and the war end.
My mood and spirit have thus soured much at the end of this year. When so much has gone awry, the one constant has been the music that served as a (light! fun!) soundtrack to this thriller/sci-fi/horror movie of a year. Here are my favorites.
Nostalgia is always at a high at the end of the year, so it’s certainly on swole at the end of the/THIS DECADE. Alas, just like that, the 2010s are soon over! Because music is my ~art language~, I can’t help but reminisce on the musical moments that defined the decade for me—moments of pure hype, musical trajectories and trends, I CAN GO ON AND ON. For instance:
When inspiration is high, so can creative output… was such apparently the opposite in 2019?? Whether the past few years provided enough musical goodness to runneth over into this year, or political/social optimism waned and affected the musical climate, I DON’T KNOW. In any case, since 2019 did not provide much in exciting and memorable music (was there even a lack in volume of songs?!), I praise adjacent years for music that has longevity and have hope for redemption in the year to come. All of this to say, in the many years I’ve ranked my personal favorite Ethiopian songs, this will be the first year that I simply could not. I can only make sure you didn’t miss the songs that certainly warrant regular rotation. Find them here, in no particular order.
Every year I do this thing where I inflict pain upon myself by “selecting” and “ordering” my favorite songs of the year. I’ve been doing it since 2011 but have been selecting my favorite ~Ethiopian ones since 2015. It has now become a sadistic tradition of mine and one I don’t plan on stopping anytime soon, really!
Before starting this blog, the home for my selecta~ aspirations has been Tumblr or HabeshaLA.com. Since I insist on thinking about and sharing my favorite songs, I figure this blog will also serve as a home for my picks. My disclaimers always go as such: these songs are (some) of MY favorites, packaged to fit a pretty number (30 seems to be it this year); they are based on mostly superficial sources (deep cuts don’t always make my lists though they definitely have/do); and my sourcing stems from the Internet, mostly (Hope Entertainment, Oromp3, Arif Zefen, Minew Shewa, etc etc). After sorting through a year’s worth of songs (which were uniquely filled with Dr. Abiy tributes and Addis-Asmara love songs) and some deliberation, here’s a non-all-encompassing list of my favorite songs of 2018 (which could look different tomorrow)!