I utterly failed at making a “best of 2021” list this year, as is often the case. I just don’t make lists like I used to, and I was never much of a list maker to begin with. I really did try, but the list never came together. Instead, today, here are three strong favorites I kept going back to, all from before 2021:
▰ Ben Monder uploaded, early during the pandemic, on May 15, 2020, this video of his elegant dissection of the classic song “Never Let Me Go”:
▰ The Michele Rabbia (drums, electronics), Gianluca Petrella (trombone, sounds), and Eivind Aarset (guitar, electronics) 2019 trio album, *Lost River* (ECM). Beautiful, hyperminimal ambient jazz. I love when music sounds like less than the sum of its parts: [ecmrecords.com](https://www.ecmrecords.com/catalogue/1552560452).
▰ I started listening to this instrumental version of the classic Grace Jones track [“Slave to the Rhythm,”](https://youtu.be/Rsi4dt-CdMc) produced by Trevor Horn, when Robbie Shakespeare, the great bass player, died. There is no official instrumental version, but this one, uploaded in October 2018, was constructed by a YouTuber who goes by Pacalo, and who appears to construct instrumentals for tracks that don’t have them (also check out INXS’ “Never Tear Us Apart” and Pet Shop Boys’ “Suburbia”).