With October all but done, let us pay our respects to the month’s brightest and boldest offerings, including career benchmarks for prolific songwriters (Kurt Vile), crystalline and catchy singles from folks with records out soon (IAN SWEET, Wings of Desire) and grand previews of what’s to come in 2024 (Willi Carlisle, Yard Act). Narrowing this list down to just 15 entries was a nearly impossible feat, but we got it done. Without further ado, here are the 15 best songs of October 2023, and catch up on September’s entries here. —Matt Mitchell, Music Editor
Atka: “Eye in the Sky”
Atka’s last single, “Lenny,” was one of my favorite tracks of September. The London and Berlin-based singer/songwriter has done that again this month, with the spectral “Eye in the Sky,” a track embossed in darkness and beautifully spine-rattling. “Just a smudge against the ashen sky, ask the people how they’re getting by,” Atka sings. She reflects on a period of grief, as she begins seeing a lost love in every place she goes—as if her waking steps after trauma are being analyzed by bygones. “I’ve seen the days fold up like paper towns, twirl my dress in his frown, just drifting away,” it goes. Atka’s run of singles this year have been nothing short of beautiful. I’d wager there’s a Best of What’s Next in her future if this momentum stays true. —Matt Mitchell
Cyrus Nabipoor: “Jóga”
Cyrus Nabipoor may be merely one of the stars in the vast constellation that is the Portland jazz community but lately he’s been shining brighter than most. His fluid, flexible playing and sharp trumpet tone has kept him busy as a go-to sideman and session player while leading his own ensembles that tackle everything from traditional New Orleans style jazz to the more modern take that folds in the influences of hip-hop and electronic music. The first single from Nabipoor’s upcoming solo debut In Lieu of Tears falls into that latter category. A cover of a fan favorite of Icelandic icon Björk, the tune is gently cracked open by Nabipoor’s driving playing and the thunderhead breadth of his backing band. The downpour and lightning strikes within the song still feel shocking no matter how many times I spin this one. —Robert Ham
Future Islands: “The Tower”
We can all rejoice: Future Islands are back. After dropping a few singles—“King of Sweden” and “Deep in the Night”—earlier this year, the Baltimore synth-pop heroes have properly announced their seventh studio album, People Who Aren’t There Anymore. New single “The Tower” is quintessential Future Islands. I can’t think of a band who is constantly fine-tuning their own trademark better than these four guys. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it—or so they say. But even then, Future Islands are still finding new ways to polish a diamond on “The Tower.” Be it through the pulsing teardrop synthesizers from Gerrit Welmers or the precise percussion from Michael Lowry or the underscoring melody from William Cashion, the song aches and wiggles across a sonic pattern that is as dense and refreshing as it is rewarding. As always, Samuel T. Herring continues to be one of the best bandleaders in the world; Future Islands make it all look easy on “The Tower.” —MM
Hotline TNT: “Out of Town”
The latest massive hit from recent Third Man Records signees Hotline TNT, “Out of Town” doesn’t know whether it wants to be a shoegaze gem or an emo anthem—and we love it dearly for that very reason. Bandleader Will Anderson does his self-proclaimed best Paul Westerberg impression, tapping into his Minnesotan roots and singing about, as he puts it, “losing someone you’re excited about before you even realized you had strong feelings about ‘em.” “Out of Town” is packed to the brim in melody, and you can reap those rewards once you mine through the distortion. It’s a track that demands to be played loud, and who are we to deny such an enigmatic slice of brilliance what it craves? —MM
IAN SWEET: “Smoking Again”
IAN SWEET delivers love-sick drama with the third single from their upcoming album SUCKER. “Oh, I’ve been a mess / Haven’t slept / Started smoking again,” Jilian Medford sings, as her dreamy vocals float around the beat. It’s an honest confession of the consumption of heartbreak and how we lose ourselves trying to be okay again. The track continues the album’s theme of lost love that is all-encompassing; “Smoking Again” delivers its message through a poppy beat and lyrics I’m sure many of us can relate to, making it a quintessential heartbreak anthem. —Olivia Abercrombie
Katy Kirby: “Table”
Earlier this summer, Katy Kirby unveiled “Cubic Zirconia,” which we crowned as one of the best songs of August (and the #1 song of the month in my heart). It was, and remains, a beautiful, buoyant story of queer love. Now, Kirby’s pointed her focus to “Table,” her upcoming sophomore album Blue Raspberry’s title track. It’s a tender, buzzing ballad that swells into a massive, epic finale about Kirby’s upbringing as a home-schooled kid in an evangelical Christian family. “He pours a pool of salt in my hand, showing me how I ought to throw a little bit over the surface like rain, the surface like rain,” she sings. “On the wicked and righteous, the laymen and saints.” —MM
Kurt Vile: “Another good year for the roses”
Philadelphia singer/songwriter Kurt Vile is returning with a new project, an EP called Back to Moon Beach that’s set to arrive next month. It’s his first major release since his 2022 album (watch my moves) and, last Friday, it boasted the incredible lead single “Another good year for the roses”—one of Vile’s best songs in years. The track was co-produced by Cate Le Bon and features instrumentation from Stella Mozgawa. At five-and-a-half minutes, it’s got everything a peak Vile track needs: drawling piano, downtempo, peculiar vocal musings and a million-dollar guitar solo that carries on forever. It’s perfect and everything you could ever want. —MM
Mannequin Pussy: “I Don’t Know You”
Mannequin Pussy are back, set to release their first full length album since 2019. “I Don’t Know You” is an intimate look into what they have in store: and it’s near perfect. The Philly rockers take you from heaven to hell and then back again, with swirling synths giving way to abrasive, punky distortion. To commemorate the announcement, the group has released the single “I Don’t Know You,” a follow-up to the electrifying title track “I Got Heaven.” “I Don’t Know You” is a gradual but searing number. The dreamy synths that open the track are pulled to Earth by folksy strings and lightly crashing cymbals. “I know a lot of things,” vocalist Marisa Dabice sings. “But I don’t know you.” In the words of Dabice, “I Don’t Know You” is just a song about having a crush, and like the thrill of infatuation, the melodies of “I Don’t Know You” rise and fall; Mannequin Pussy brings them to a heavy, droning intensity, before eventually letting them fizzle out at the track’s swirling end. —Madelyn Dawson
Marika Hackman: “Hanging”
Marika Hackman’s “Hanging” is the definition of a slow burn, and we can’t get enough of it. It’s the second single released in anticipation of her newest album Big Sigh (after “No Caffeine”) and it begins soft, slow and unassuming—with Hackman’s sweet vocals gently echoing off the edges of the mix. She’s hurting, and she holds nothing back in metaphor or imagery to show us that—as she sings, “I know you don’t mean it / But I’m breaking like a wound.” At around the halfway point, the track’s instrumental almost fully drops out, leaving us caught between Hackman’s quivering cadence and an impossibly tense silence. Hackman, though, does the impossible throughout the course of the song: She lets go. Drums, guitar and violin punch and pulse through a newfound loudness, exploding through the track’s previous understatedness. Hackman vocalizes—or, rather, almost yells—over them, singing “You were a part of me / I’m so relieved it hurts.” It is only here, when she finds the past tense to assert over the loudness, that we are able to breathe a sigh of relief. —MD
Odetta Hartman: “Dr. No”
Odetta Hartman delivers the gothic blues-inspired “Dr. No,” a far cry from the cowboy soul she’s known for. It’s a surprising yet successful delve into a spooky, neo-soul sonic world. Filled with atmospheric synths, intentionally hushed vocals and cascading riffs, the track transports you to a monstrous landscape of wandering souls. Hartman described “Dr. No” as “a raucous requiem for lovers lost and former selves” and, with its dark soundscape paired with her silky vocals, I see its place as a haunting love song. I’m ready to don a long white gown and walk the halls of an abandoned mansion, thinking of my failed relationships with this song as the soundtrack. Dramatic? Possibly. But this song demands it. —OA
Sheherazaad: “Mashoor”
Arooj Aftab is doing right by all the attention and acclaim she has received in the past few years by helping support and amplify the work of other artists of South Asian descent like San Francisco bred Sheherazaad. Named after the legendary character from The Thousand and One Nights, this brilliant new talent grows from that rich ground where traditional and modern musics are cross-bred. Her unhurried vocals and the light bed of percussion behind her speaks to the centuries old sound of India and Pakistan with the front facing guitar work sounds inspired more by the American Primitive tradition. No matter what the breakdown of her influences, the universal feeling this song evokes is one of pure bliss. —RH
The Gaslight Anthem: “Autumn”
The most recent single from The Gaslight Anthem’s upcoming comeback album History Books, “Autumn,” is the best offering so far—which says a lot, given just how good the first three tunes (“History Books,” “Positive Change” and “Little Fires”) were. It’s a sharp turn from the punk rock that has become definitive of The Gaslight Anthem’s sound over the years, as frontman Brian Fallon takes a much more subdued, low-key approach to his own crooning. He’s contemplative and reflective, trying to make sense of the “traffic” in his head and the destinations of our “favorite, faded memories.” “I hate the way that time goes, crashing over like a steamroller,” Fallon sings. “I wish I could do my life over, I’d be young better now.” It’s a beautiful song that’ll stick with you, and it’s one of Fallon’s very best instances of songwriting—a true document of how, even 20+ years into this thing, The Gaslight Anthem are still growing up. —MM
Willi Carlisle: “Critterland”
“Critterland” feels familiar, especially if you grew up in a town that tried to carve out a destiny for you and admonish any strangeness from your bones, from your DNA. This push-and-pull between being a leftist queer kid in a small town greatly populated by Appalachian transplants and blue-collar folk raised to exile their own if they don’t fall in line, I can feel it all over again across all four minutes of “Critterland.” “In the decade of our lovin’, we have grown to not-so-young. I have come to know the seasons by the lashing of your tongue, but propane gently sputters, there’s spring water in our tap,” Carlisle reflects. “Oh, why can’t we feel the peace of this sweet dog upon our laps?” The language is visceral and relentless, as he considers what life the people nearby will let him live and how the animals are kinder to their young than the family, folks and strangers he calls his neighbors—and even himself.
It’s a banjo-and-harmonica tune that centers Carlisle’s beautiful tenor vocals and his honest, patient and empathetic gaze across the world before him. He doesn’t possess the twang of the country mainstream; rather, it embellishes the grit and the density of a singer like Townes Van Zandt. “And when the marauders come, ’cause the apocalypse is nigh, I want my rifle on my shoulder and my lover by my side. I want to be the kinda man that stands his ground and dies, take my fiddle and my good hat and go out in style,” Carlisle sings. “I’ll do it all for family, not for glory or a God, in the war that’s ragin’ ‘tween the haves and the have-nots.” It very well might be the most devastating country song of 2023—in fact, I’ll wager that it certainly is. —MM
Wings of Desire: “Chance of a Lifetime / I Will Try My Best”
I legitimately knew nothing of UK duo Wings of Desire, like, three months ago—and now I can’t get enough of them. Chloe Little and James Taylor just keep releasing singles, all of which are going to be collected into a mixtape type of record called Life Is Infinite in December. I particularly loved “A Gun in Every Home” a while back and, now, they’ve dropped two bonafide heaters: “Chance of a Lifetime” and “I Will Try My Best.” It’s a double single, so I’m considering them both for inclusion here—and also because I truly can’t pick between the two, if I’m being honest. “Chance of a Lifetime” is a guitar-driven track that sounds exactly what Bruce Springsteen playing post-punk would sound like. The harmonies, the instrumentation, the crystalline vibes—they’re all immaculate and turn into an amalgam of cosmic density. “I Will Try My Best” ditches the Springsteen bravado and adopts a true singer/songwriter confidence, as if Taylor is standing before a small-time club aching his heart away—yet he and Little can’t help but make such a grand entrance and exit, meshing glittering arrangements with a chemistry that is unfathomably aces. I don’t know how to explain it without sounding silly. Wings of Desire are the best band I’ve discovered in a long time. —MM
Yard Act: “Dream Job”
After they released the epic eight-minute single “The Trench Coat Museum” earlier this summer, I was certain that Yard Act’s second chapter was going to be just as dense and massive—and it is, but in a completely different way. Announcing their sophomore record Where’s My Utopia?, the UK rockers unveiled a dashingly catchy and plentifully rapturous dance track that takes cues from LCD Soundsystem without losing their own ridiculously intoxicating charm. It’s here where Yard Act continues to build out their own world. “Dream Job” is, immediately, one of the band’s best songs they’ve ever made, and it’s a bonafide dance album that demands to be played on repeat. I’ll take more of this direction, please. —MM
Listen to a playlist of these 15 songs below.