Dork's Albums of 2021

‘Harlecore’ is a truly thrilling creation.

In embracing music’s most rewarding artform, Zara Larsson has yet again affirmed her place on the brightest of billboards.

As the long-awaited follow up to ‘Turn Out the Lights’, this album feels desperate to not retread old ground.

Pinballing wildly in mood between heartbreak and lovestruck, it’s as much of a rollercoaster ride as real life is at this age.

‘The World Within Our Bedrooms’ contains so much beauty and subtle colours that it demands a return trip to make sure every inch of it is explored thoroughly.

Second effort ‘On All Fours’ instantly feels like a stronger brew. More expressive and never playing safe.

Channelling those growing, loving, losing and learning vibes that so truncate leaving your teens and entering your twenties, it’s refreshing to hear it done with such vibrancy. 

Delving into the full emotional spectrum, ‘life’s a beach’ is an album that might sound dreamy, but underneath the surface those waters run deep.

This is raw, unadulterated punk with no prefix that can only come from a band with immense amounts of talent and character.

‘Who Am I?’ is a lot of things. It’s a pop record from the recent past, an album that looks deep within but projects strongly outwards too. But what it most certainly isn’t is a one-trick pony. Pale Waves were always better than that.

As each track unfolds, it feels as though you are watching Lucy through the lens as she returns to her coming-of-age years.

‘Bullseye’ is bold and bigger than life, covering all bases while still giving the impression that there’s even more to come — a perfect debut record.

With a pain at times so real that it can almost be touched, its smartest trick is turning it into something approaching euphoria with its mix of poetry and exhilarating dance beats.

‘If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power’ is Halsey’s definitive artistic breakthrough.

It’s her lyricism that is the star of the show. Her biting self-examination resides at the core of every track and lays her every flaw and insecurity for all to see.

A record that exists in the gaps of modern life that most other bands skip over, ‘New Long Leg’ sticks its head in your kitchen cupboards, worries about Brexit, waits for the bins to get collected, feels paranoid, gets its leg pissed on in the big Sainsbury’s. Modern life is delightful!

Packed with energy, snark and absolute bangers, it goes above and beyond what their debut managed to achieve in every conceivable way.

This album is absolutely Little Simz’s magnum opus – it’s earth-shatteringly beyond what has come before, no easy feat considering her debut is one of the most revered of the past few years.

Claud can do it all and ‘Super Monster’ is the realisation of a long appreciated yet underrated musical talent flourishing.

Bravely putting his own life under that same microscopic attention to detail that coloured so much of his debut, it is a bold leap forward in all the ways that matter.

Like that friend that always makes everyone else feel great, Remi Wolf is the seretonin shot 2021 needed. The next greatest pop star on the planet has arrived.

As a debut, it is a sublime body of work from the kind of artist who is meticulous in all aspects of her craft.

‘Blue Weekend’ is a triumph. In the context of the world around it, though, it feels even more than that. It’s special.