Music 2023

Posted on in music

People were posting spotify wrapped, and I got jealous, so I’ll ramble about songs that stand out from this year.

General music

ye hui mei album cover

周杰倫 - 三年二班 / Jay Chou - Class 3-2

Even apart from how cool it sounds and how the lyrics make me emotional, this song was the most important one of my year because it was my way into listening to C-pop and other Chinese music. I had been struggling to do that for ages, because I knew it would help me learn Mandarin. And it really did help in all sorts of ways!

王玮 & 赵婷 - 回到山沟沟 (DJ何鹏版)

Truly a cursed piece of music but I love it and it reminds me of, to date, the happiest period of my life, which fell in 2023. Found from this clip

KIRA - VOICE

In 2023… I tried really hard to create an ambitious original work, via various methods, and failed repeatedly. One of those attempts was a VN called Latency, which had nothing wrong with it. I just realised I wasn’t enjoying the VN making process enough to continue.

VOICE is a song that reminds me of Latency (I even wanted to make a music video for it to promote the VN) and weirdly, at this point feels like it’s the only thing I have left of Latency at all. I abandoned it so fast, I don’t really think of the story anymore unless I listen to this song.

Sea Power - Fire Escape in the Sea

A fuller version of a song from the Disco Elysium OSTS. It perfectly captures that peaceful, melancholy, damaged but hopeful feeling from the game. Another one that makes me emotional, in a positive ‘appreciating life’ sort of way.

Other songs I listened to a lot…

I mostly listened to SHRS though.

Vtuber music

Why am I separating it…? I guess because I don’t exactly count these songs as part of my music taste. The singers are personal online presences so it’s a different experience.

message delivered from the departed youtube thumbnail

Mika Melatika - Message, Delivered From the Departed. ft. audioTopia

I love the sincere emotion paired with gently catchy music. And the Javanese rap sounds awesome.

Enna Alouette x keiki - Mushroom

Ennaaaaaaaaaa

Everything Goes On - Porter Robinson (Altare Regis cover)

His voice is unreal, it sounds so eboy and soothing. Got me to dip my toe into Porter Robinson.

ECHO - Crusher-P (Meloco Kyoran & Doppio Dropscythe cover)

I haven’t listened to this one that much because it’s so intense, but I watched a lot of Doppio this year and it’s a good showcase of his signature ‘let’s turn everything into lore references, narratives and voice acting’ which I’m so fond of. They don’t even know what scary is!!!!

Special mentions