I’ve had the idea of making Mixcloud mixes based on a ‘19 from Year / 20 from Year’ format for awhile (as there’s a good ring to that + it makes for a perfect mix cd length), but it wasn’t until participating in one of those “post 4 albums that came out when you were 14” social media things…

…when it occurred to me that it’d be a fun project to go back through EVERY YEAR that I’ve been alive and make a mix out of the music that came out during that calendar timeframe. And not only would it be a nice mix of nostalgia & discovery/rediscovery for my ears, but it would also give me a new recurring blog post / Mixcloud topic that I could run with for a good stretch of blahg time. Because I’m an old.

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So, let’s jump all the way back to when holy shit what even was 2021? I mean, all things considered, I suppose I really didn’t have a “bad” year, on a personal level, BUT, at the same time, I’m not even sure that “good” years exist anymore in this frustratingly stupid late stage capitalism timeline that we seem to be collectively stuck in.

But, thankfully, I started leaning into my personal training on how to be underemployed & still survive contentedly back in the latter half of 2017 (aka: I started focusing on my own work/projects, regardless of whether anyone was paying me to do the work, or even asking me to do the work + I started redefining how I define being successful, and not worrying about how other people would define it), which has come in quite handy for keeping a healthy perspective during these pandemic years (2021 being either year 2 or 20, depending on what you factor into your equation). It also probably helps being a “music blogger”, as lockdowns don’t really prevent me from staying at home and not earning money for my unskilled labour…

…and one thing that remains true every single year, no matter how insane it gets that we keep letting the worst people be in charge of everything that effects the quality of all our lives, more & more artists keep making more & more great music. And 2021, as much of a shit show as it was, it was also another great year for the art of making music that helps us feel connected in small but important ways.

And here’s 20 examples from my headphone space:

20 FROM ‘21 - TRACKLISTING

Now, as always, I wouldn’t necessarily say these are “THE 20 BEST” of 2021, but based on my recent deep dive + past listening experiences, I would say that these are definitely some of the best ones. Also, just like every other year since forever, there was A LOT of nice music that came out in 2021 and it’d be impossible to perfectly capture it all in 20 tracks anyways. So the artists featured in this mix are a good combo of the music I personally resonated highly with this year + music that I was vibing with while putting the mix together. But, as always, the main focus is on creating a mix that flows nicely from one track to another, which means albums I had intentions of trying to fit in & albums which you might think “how could you not include?!” just never fit in before the 20-track limit was hit and the mix was done.

But if you’d like to dive a bit deeper into just how good 2021 was for ear drums, you can check out my 20X21=420 TUNES FROM 2021 Spotify playlist for an over 24 hour deep dive experience:

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But since the corporate streamers of the world are a great discovery / old FM radio replacement tool AND NOT a very good/fair ‘financially support the people who actually make the music’ tool (as the technology is currently being used), I have also recreated this ‘20X21=420 Tunes From 2021’ playlist on Buy Music Club, which means you can find easy Bandcamp links to almost everything featured (about 40 tracks from the Spotify list were not available on Bandcamp, but since I had to make 100s of cuts to get my ‘songs liked in <insert current year>’ playlist down to 420 tracks, I was able to find plenty of worthy replacements and keep the ‘listen/buy on Bandcamp’ version of the list to 420 as well). So, make sure to check that BMC list out, whether it be a Bandcamp Friday or not…

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And if you’d ever like to extend the ‘soundtrack-by-HI54-mixtape’ vibes all day, go press the play button over on MOUN.TOWN/RADIO (which’ll play one HI54 mix tape after another, all day — with new/old HI54 Mixcloud mixes like the mix tape above added to the top of ‘MTR - SIDE A’ and ‘MTR - SIDE B’ every Wednesday). Or you can also listen to all the HI54 Yearbook Mixes one-after-the-other with this Mixcloud playlist.

ALSO also: HI54LOFI is in the Mixcloud Select program, which means you can now support the making of these mix tapes & the artists included on them with a monthly subscription (while also unlocking offline listening of hundreds of HI54 mix tapes for yourself) — y’know, if you’d be interested in something like that (or nobody would be mad at you if you wanted to make a one-time “thanks for the stuff” donation of your choice to HI54LOFI over here, or even if you just told someone else that they might like what they’d find over on the ol’ HI54.BLOG… that stuff helps too!).

And, final finally… if you hear something you like in this latest episode (or just in general out on the internets today), make sure to check out the people making the stuff you like and show them a little bit of love / support / appreciation (in whatever ways you can) — because everybody wins if we all start sharing some more metaphorical coffees/beers/cheers with the people making the things that make things a little bit better (and maybe we can also start giving way less to the people out there always trying to keep things shitty?).

Put good things in, good things come out.

Put good things out, good things come in.

Put good things on loop.

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JEREMY / @HI54LOFI

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