Chris Richards in The Washington Post:
“Streaming” music. Sounds so simple, so peaceful, right? If you’re listening closely, though, you know that contemporary pop is a much choppier body of water, oceanic in its breadth and volume. In little sips and big gulps, I’ll be keeping track of my new faves with the following list of 2023’s best recordings — organized chronologically by release date — and I’ll be updating it continuously throughout the year.Ice Spice, ‘Like…?’ YouTube
If you loved “Munch (Feelin’ U)” — a standout single that I described last year as cold, hard proof that this Bronx rapper “knows exactly how and where to exhale her rhymes into drill music’s sleek architecture, offering a breathy human counterpoint to the alien bass lines, the glitchy hi-hats, the antiseptic synth melodies that tend to hide out in the corner” — here are five more songs where that came from.
More here.