Top 89 of 2019: Purple Current
December 10, 2019
Welcome to the 2019 Purple Current Top 10!
A couple notes for you: 1) You'll note that this list does not contain any Prince, even though plenty of great music came out in 2019. We decided to focus on music that was first released in 2019, as opposed to reissues, vault digs et cetera. It felt right. . .we will certainly also be celebrating all the great music that came out from Prince's catalog. 2) You also might be wondering who voted on these songs! I tabulated top tens from all of our DJs, our resident Prince blogger Jay Gabler, our Managing Digital Producer Brett Baldwin and our Program Director Jim McGuinn.
Nicole Bus – "You"
Tank and the Bangas – "Ants"
Lady Midnight – "Say It (feat. Proper-T)"
Seratones – "Gotta Get To Know Ya"
Annie Mack – "I Don't Like You"
Nur-D – "Black Wizard Wave"
Dua Saleh – "Sugar Mama"
DJ Shadow – "Rocket Fuel (feat. De La Soul)"
Mavis Staples – "Change"
Lizzo – "Tempo (feat. Missy Elliott)"
Nicole Bus
Nicole Bus had a huge hit around the globe with "You." It's no surprise given the favorites of Purple Current staff that an athletic R&B performance over a sample also famously used by Wu-Tang (on "C.R.E.A.M.") would garner a lot of votes. If you haven't spent part of 2019 screaming all the lyrics to "You" in the shower, you better step up, there's not much time left.
Tank and the Bangas
I fell in love with Tank and the Bangas this year. We've been following Tank and company since they won the Tiny Desk competition a handful of years ago, but honestly I didn't expect a record this funky, thoughtful and song-oriented. Sometimes when a group comes off as a wild, funky spectacle, I'm nervous they won't come across in the studio. In this case, I was thoroughly impressed by how Tank came off in the studio.
Lady Midnight
Right now Lady Midnight is a Minnesota treasure but soon she is going to belong to the world. She dropped a great mixtape towards the beginning of 2019 but no one was ready for how incredible her proper debut, Death Before Mourning was. It still gets a lot of spins around our office and we can't wait to share her music with the world. If you want to dig deeper, check out this in-studio session between Lady Midnight and Purple Current's own Andrea Swensson.
Annie Mack
If you aren't aware of Annie Mack yet, it's time to go catch this woman live. She has a voice so strong I've seen it fill the room at outdoor festivals. She's lived it, she can sing it and her band is top notch. And the writing on I Don't Like You is everything a rockin' blues number should be: sassy, grooving and memorable.
Mavis Staples
You thought Melody Cool wasn't going to make it to the top ten? When Mavis sings, we listen. She sounds great with Ben Harper both doing the writing but also handling the production and the guitar playing. It's no knock on what Tweedy and Staples did together, but it's my hope that there is more music to come from the Mavis/Harper team.