Linked is an ongoing, live-updated spreadsheet of the releases I've listened to this year. This curation exists because the vast majority of modern output isn't worth your time. Between low-effort bedroom experiments and AI-generated slop, the signal-to-noise ratio is abysmal. Anything landing at 3.50 and above is worth your attention.
My rating schema:
0.00 —> 1.00: Genuinely offensive, zero-effort garbage. I am putting as much effort into listening to this as you did into creating it.
1.01 —> 2.00: Terrible, and I want that known.
2.01 —> 2.99: There's a spark here, but it completely misses the mark.
3.00 —> 3.49: Decent enough, but I won't be returning to it.
3.50 —> 3.75: Solid; worth a revisit.
3.76 —> 3.99: High quality.
4.00 —> 4.50: Very high quality; will return often.
4.60 —> 4.99: Exceptional. Heavy rotation.
5.00: Perfect from front to back. Genre-defining.
I've also decided to add my raw listening notes. They are immediate "on first listen" notes to each release from someone with no clue what they're doing.