TW: Brief/vague mentions of suicide, death, and drug abuse.
Like many people, I compiled a list of my favorite songs, EPs, and albums of 2021. I spent over 71,000 minutes on Spotify this year, which is a personal high. I work in a very solitary environment and spend nearly six hours per shift listening to either music or podcasts (and most of my podcast listening is done on Stitcher- so my time consuming auditory media is well north of 100,000 minutes). From Taylor Swift’s re-releases of “Fearless” and “Red” to newcomers in the pop-punk scene Meet Me @ The Altar and Magnolia Park releasing solid and catchy EPs, 2021 was a great year in music for my tastes.
In compiling this list, there was never a doubt in my mind what the top album of the year would be. From the day it was released, I knew that Umbra by Grayscale would be my pick for the best release of 2021. Hailing from Philadelphia, Grayscale began as a pretty straightforward pop-punk band, although their sound has morphed into something more unique and nuanced in the years since. I didn’t get into them until mid-2019 when I remember listening to their Fearless Records debut, Adornment, in 2017. It didn’t catch me right away, in fact, I had them confused with another (now-defunct) pop-punk act who released an album a few months later for quite some time. Their 2019 album Nella Vita was one of those albums that came into my life when it needed to. The themes of love and loss- especially in the contexts of nostalgia, suicide, and drug abuse- were representative of emotions that I was ready to embrace. That album gave me the nudge to examine and delve into those feelings. It was an experience with an album that I hadn’t had in several years. Because that was such a powerful album for me, I was afraid that I wouldn’t like Umbra; that Grayscale would be yet another band that I liked one album of and pretty much ignored forever after.
From the first listen, though, I knew Umbra would be just as powerful for me as Nella Vita was. The genuine and complex emotions that wove their way through previous releases continued on through Umbra. The band grew musically, in a major way. They are even less tethered to pure pop-punk than they were on the previous album. Other musical influences- from 70s and 80s pop to modern rock to gospel to a hundred other things- are all showcased, while still residing within the generalized scene they came up in.
I’m obviously not going to pretend that I know vocalist/lyricist Collin Walsh’s life, but I feel as though we’ve had some similar experiences based on his writing. As I mentioned above, loss of love and friends and family in various manners are all things I’ve struggled with. Since I was a teenager, I’ve found that music and lyrics are how I can best express how I feel, and not being able to find music that matched the experiences I’ve had in the last eight years of my life has been an odd experience. Nella Vita and now Umbra have matched up closer to the emotions and experiences that I’ve had than anything else has. As an example, on the track “King of Everything”, he expresses more conflicting than revering feelings toward the suicide of his cousin. A close friend of mine died by suicide in 2016, and I’ve rarely allowed myself to feel anger towards him- and knowing that other people also deal with similar emotions to what I have in the wake of a suicide is comforting. It almost seems taboo to have these particular feelings at times, or at least it has for me. The chorus mentioning seeing someone throw away the major experiences they could have had in favor of ending their pain is something I have struggled with in the wake of suicide and overdose deaths of loved ones, and especially my close friend.
PHOTOSENSITIVITY WARNING
I have other examples of how the lyrics on this album have impacted me- in “Without You”, the line “without you, I can love the crazy parts of my brain again” was incredibly similar to how I’ve felt in past relationships, both romantic and with friends and family that I had to leave behind in the name of personal growth. The parts in “Dirty Bombs” about embracing who you are instead of existing within the context of other people is something I’ve contended with (and I think that’s a pretty universal experience). Loving someone with an addiction, tearing each other apart because of your addictions and mental health issues, is a theme reflected in several songs, and I can relate to that deeply. Then there’s “Motown”, which uses metaphor as well as explicit imagery, which is just a fun song about sex.
I know that this is a lot to put on one album, on eleven songs. I don’t generally like things a normal amount- I go all-in on the things that I like. Maybe it's the bipolar disorder, or maybe it’s just a quirky thing my brain does. Even if I didn’t hyperfocus on things or feel everything so intensely, I think this album would have still been at the top of my list. The songs are well-written, and despite the often heavy lyrical content, fun to listen to.
Anyways, here’s the entire Top 10 list:
Umbra - Grayscale
Red (Taylor’s Version) - Taylor Swift
XOXO: From Love and Anxiety in Real Time - The Maine
Sour - Olivia Rodrigo
Halloween Mixtape - Magnolia Park
Inside - Bo Burnham
Star-Crossed - Kacey Musgraves
Blood Moon - Converge + Chelsea Wolfe
Happier Than Ever - Billie Eilish
MONTERO - Lil Nas X
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