While the wonderful music that emerged in 2019 still commands heavy rotation here at Albumism HQ, we’re already giddy with anticipation for the crop of new albums on the horizon in the new year. Here, we’ve identified the 30 albums we’re most excited to lay our ears upon in 2020, based on the information available to date, which is admittedly scarce for select titles.
As the respective album details and as-yet-to-be-announced release dates emerge, we’ll provide additional coverage, streams and reviews. In the meantime, check out the list below and be sure to let us know which forthcoming albums are on your wishlist for the year ahead!
MARIA MCKEE | La Vita Nuova
Release Date: March 13th | Pre-Order
Previewed by Mike Elliott
The former driving force behind groundbreaking '80s cowpunk rock & roll legends Lone Justice, Maria McKee has been quietly building a fascinating body of solo work over the past 30 years, the last being 2007's acclaimed Late December. In March, she returns with the highly-anticipated La Vita Nuova.
Both deeply personal and musically progressive, La Vita Nuova finds McKee calling upon inspiration from the likes of John Cale, Scott Walker, and David Bowie as well as Sandy Denny and Kate Bush. With no formal classical training—and unable to read a note of music—McKee composed and arranged the nineteen-piece orchestral arrangements heard on the album, guaranteeing La Vita Nuova will be her most ambitious project to date.
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JAMES MCMURTRY | Title TBD
Release Date: TBD
Previewed by Mike Elliott
Following up the universally lauded Complicated Game from 2015, one of Americana's most respected songwriters returns in 2020 with an as-yet-untitled new album. McMurtry told SoundandSoulOnline.com that Ross Hogarth—who previously worked on 2002's Saint Mary of the Woods—is producing and Darren Hess returns on drums, along with Sean Hurley on bass, and Austin, Texas legend David Grissom on guitar (with supposed contributions from another Austin icon, Charlie Sexton). Looks like this is shaping up to be a little more electrified than his last effort.
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MELANIE C | Title TBD
Release Date: TBD
Previewed by Quentin Harrison
From her lauded UK summer stadium tour with the Spice Girls, to her equally impressive solo gigs with the LGBTQ+ performance troupe Sink the Pink, Melanie C has been burning up the live stage in 2019. And this is to say nothing of the 20th anniversary of her blockbuster debut album Northern Star (1999). However, Ms. Chisholm found the time to issue “High Heels,” a kinetic slice of dance-pop that seemingly points to a new path separate from the initial projection of her pursuing a covers album. It is rumored that her eighth album will be due out sometime in 2020, which is when Chisholm will reveal the final shape of her next long player.
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MANDY MOORE | Silver Landings
Release Date: March 6th
Previewed by Quentin Harrison
Photo: Lauren Dukoff
Having taken a decade away from music after the reveal of her sixth album, the gorgeous Amanda Leigh (2009), Mandy Moore is set to unleash her seventh record Silver Landings in early March. This effort will also be buoyed by a supporting tour in the spring. The set’s two lead-off singles “When I Wasn’t Watching” and “I’d Rather Lose” have already gotten solid critical praise for their lush California pop/rock sound. One assumes that their parent album will receive a similarly warm reception upon its release.
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ALANIS MORISSETTE | Such Pretty Forks In The Road
Release Date: May 1st
Previewed by Mark J. Marraccini
This is the longest we’ve ever waited for a new Alanis Morissette album—almost eight years since 2012’s Havoc And Bright Lights—but come May 1st the wait will be over when she releases her ninth studio LP Such Pretty Forks In The Road.
With the punchy and confessional lead single “Reasons I Drink” as the first glimpse into what inspires Morissette to write these days—almost twenty-five years after Jagged Little Pill catapulted her into superstar status—it’s clear she’s still looking inward and bravely revealing to the world the interior struggles that she refuses to be embarrassed about or silenced by.
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THE 1975 | Notes On A Conditional Form
Release Date: February 21st | Pre-Order
Previewed by Andy Healy
In a very Douglas Adams kind of way, The 1975 will release the final piece in their trilogy of four parts, the eagerly anticipated Notes On A Conditional Form next month. Whilst the advance tracks have stayed true to The 1975 ethos, you never really know what you'll get with a new album and whether the lads will be using it to close a chapter or kick a hole into an exciting new one.
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AGNES OBEL | Myopia
Release Date: February 21st | Pre-Order
Previewed by Justin Chadwick
Offering further testament to Blue Note Records’ penchant for cultivating a roster of class-act caliber artists, Agnes Obel is set to release Myopia, her first album for the storied label—and her fourth studio effort overall—next month. As evidenced by lead single “Island of Doom,” the follow-up to the hauntingly beautiful Citizen of Glass (2017) promises to showcase and expand the Danish singer-songwriter’s enthralling combination of musical adventurism and vocal versatility, while delving deeper into the psychology that informs her songs. “The albums I’ve worked on have all required that I build a bubble of some kind in which everything becomes about the album,” Obel explains in an official statement. “Paradoxically, for me I need to create my own myopia to make music.”
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PET SHOP BOYS | Hotspot
Release Date: January 24th | Pre-Order
Previewed by Mark J. Marraccini
With the release of Pet Shop Boys’ Agenda EP in April, we got a peek into the satirical and somber music Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe had been working on. None of the four songs on the mostly cheeky offering, though, will be included in Hotspot—their upcoming fourteenth (!) studio album due on January 24th.
Instead Hotspot will feature ten new songs written by Tennant and Lowe (except for the glittery dance-pop lead single “Dreamland” with co-writer Olly Alexander of Years & Years). In a recent BBC Radio 6 interview, Tennant revealed that Hotspot will sound more “analogue-y” and if the mature wistfulness of the album’s gorgeous second single “Burning The Heather” is any indication, perhaps we’ll be presented with a more emotionally diverse collection of songs that’ll remind us of PSB classics like Behaviour (1990) or Very (1993).
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THE ROOTS | End Game
Release Date: TBD
Previewed by Jesse Ducker
It appears that this is the year that The Roots drop End Game, their long-gestating seventeenth album. After …And then You Shoot Your Cousin (2014), the Philadelphia pioneers are long overdue to give us more; it’s been by far the longest time between releases by the crew. But between the group’s role as the house band for Jimmy Fallon’s The Tonight Show, the mega-successful Questlove Supreme podcast, and a pair of acclaimed EPs by lead emcee Black Thought, some wondered if the album would ever see the light of day. However, with the recent release of “Feel It (You Got It),” it appears that things may be back on track. With any luck, we’ll hear another legendary piece of work from The Roots before year’s end.
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RUN THE JEWELS | Run The Jewels 4
Release Date: TBD
Previewed by Jesse Ducker
Fans of Run The Jewels spent much of 2019 hoping that the duo, made up of Michael “Killer Mike” Render and Jaime “El-P” Meline, would grace us with the fourth album. Alas, RTJ4 remained under wraps, as the pair continued to record and refine the music. However, towards the end of the year El-P promised that the group would deliver their newest release in early 2020. Beyond that, still not much is known. El-P has been assuring fans that RTJ4 will be the “hardest” album they’ve ever recorded. He’s also been teasing fans with snippets of lyrics from the project via his Twitter account. So far, it’s been enough to keep their audience salivating for what will hopefully be another tasty offering.
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SAM SPARRO | Boombox Eternal
Release Date: February 21st
Previewed by Quentin Harrison
From 2014 up through to 2016, Australian pop vocalist Sam Sparro released the Quantum Physical EP series, an ambitious project that allowed him to fly free from the major label machinations that undercut Return To Paradise (2012), his last full-length album. Now, Sparro is returning to the long player format with Boombox Eternal. His third record promises to deliver on Sparro’s penchant for pop-soul precision and expound on it even further. Sparro continues to be an exciting and challenging voice in popular music a decade after the arrival of his 2008 eponymous debut.
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SWAMP DOGG | Sorry You Couldn’t Make It
Release Date: March 6th | Pre-Order
Previewed by Mike Elliott
It was 50 years ago when Swamp Dogg gave us the immortal Total Destruction To Your Mind (1970) and its classic title track. After several decades of ups-and-downs, the one-of-a-kind soul-belter, producer, and songwriter returns with Sorry You Couldn't Make It.
While it's billed as his first "country" album, Swamp Dogg (real name, Jerry Williams, Jr.) has long been involved in the genre, co-penning the Johnny Paycheck classic "She's All I Got" way back in 1971. For his new album, he's joined by John Prine on several numbers and if the first single "Sleeping With You Is A Dragg" is any indication, we can expect a countrified soul-drenched modern classic in early March.
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TAME IMPALA | The Slow Rush
Release Date: February 14th | Pre-Order
Previewed by Justin Chadwick
“A lot of the songs carry this idea of time passing, of seeing your life flash before your eyes, being able to see clearly your life from this point onwards,” Kevin Parker said of Tame Impala’s forthcoming fourth studio album during a recent New York Times interview. “I’m being swept by this notion of time passing. There’s something really intoxicating about it.” Auguring a deeper level of lyrical introspection to coincide with the intoxicating, genre-blurring arrangements that have come to define Tame Impala’s signature sound, the oxymoronically titled The Slow Rush is slated for a Valentine’s Day arrival and promises to be one of the year’s most intriguing releases.
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JESSE WARE | Title TBD
Release Date: TBD
Previewed by Justin Chadwick
In the two years since Jessie Ware released her triumphant third studio LP Glasshouse (2017), she has stayed plenty busy, largely owing to her full-time maternal duties and her successful Table Manners podcast. Thankfully, she has also found the time to release a trilogy of sublime singles in the form of “Overtime,” “Adore You,” and “Mirage (Don’t Stop),” all of which represent the harbinger of more divine sounds and dynamic vocals to come. Though details have yet to emerge, a fourth studio affair is rumored to be on the horizon, and as I’ve grown accustomed to with Ms. Ware’s music, I’m all ears.
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BEN WATT | Storm Damage
Release Date: January 31st | Pre-Order
Previewed by Mark J. Marraccini
Photo: Antonio Olmos
When an artist of Ben Watt’s caliber announces a new album, you stand up and take notice. According to Watt, his upcoming fourth solo album Storm Damage was birthed from a heavy combination of personal loss (his half-brother unexpectedly passed away in 2016) and his personal anger at “the political world casually detonating around me.”
The four singles released so far from the album—“Sunlight Follows The Night,” “Irene,” “Balanced On A Wire” and “Figures In The Landscape”—present Watt lyrically tangling with parenthood, life changes, interpersonal contracts, and adversity. With the album’s sonic inclusion of what he refers to as “impressionistic ‘found sounds’ that I adapted from online public-domain recording archives,” Storm Damage sounds like it’ll be Watt’s most inspired and adventurous solo offering yet.
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