What made a great club track in 2020? Given that many people across the world haven't stepped foot inside a nightclub since March, it's a strange question to answer. But what we do know is that the past 12 months have produced more wonderful pieces of electronic music than we could possibly listen to. Many producers knocked out tunes at a dizzying rate, as creating and sharing music became a crucial lifeline for artists in a world with no gigs. It may have been a lost year for clubs, but club music, in its many forms, lived on.

- Eris Drew
  Fluids Of Emotion
  Interdimensional Transmissions
  
  When "Fluids Of Emotion" came out in February, Matt Unicomb's review asked, "Could this be the house record of the year?" Eris Drew's track makes a strong case for the title, all psychedelic breakbeat house with the same feeling of controlled chaos you get from her quick-fingered mixing of old rave records. The bounding drums, the uplifting harpsichord, the misty-eyed vocal sample: it's all put together with the love and intense emotion that defines Drew's signature sound. "It's the kind of track that unites a dance floor, so I hope I'm lucky enough to be on one when it gets played," Unicomb said. Most of us are still waiting for that opportunity. Luckily, the charm of "Fluids Of Emotion" feels timeproof, a rapturous feeling encased in wax.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Nazar
  Bunker feat. Shannen SP
  Hyperdub
  
  Guerrilla, the illuminating debut album by Nazar, taught us something about the Angolan civil war. Rarely has electronic music tackled complex themes—politics, bloodshed, trans-generational trauma—in such a raw and compelling way. "Bunker," the second collaboration with London DJ and curator Shannen SP, was inspired by real-life events in Luanda in 1992, when Nazar's two older sisters barricaded themselves inside hotel rooms to avoid being found by government death squads. The anxiety is there in the helicopter whirrs and the cocking of guns. Both artists murmur lyrics in the detached drone of the shellshocked. Is that a knock at the door? The whole thing makes for harrowing listening. But still you go back for more.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify
- Vytamin
  Outer Rim
  Terra Firma
  
  It's like something from a nightmare: you release the biggest bomb of your life at a time when dance floors don't exist and socialising has been virtually outlawed. Not only that but your track is exceptionally festival-ready, all cosmic synths and fat breakbeats—the soundtrack, in other words, to a life-affirming dance floor moment. The good news is that "Outer Rim" isn't likely to be shelved any time soon. Tracks this special deserve a proper runout once parties return. Ravers must experience this beautiful banger in all its glory.
  
  Listen: Youtube
- DNGDNGDNG
  Hiperborea
  On The Corner Records
  
  Peruvian duo Dengue Dengue Dengue planned a new alias for 2020's festival circuit. Abbreviated to DNGDNGDNG, the alias hasn't yet had a chance to live out its original intentions, but it was behind one of the year's standout EPs. Continentes Perdidos channels the mystical sound of, as the name translates, lost continents. On the highlight "Hiperborea," DNGDNGDNG excavate and innovate their Afro-Peruvian heritage. The record is rooted in the unpredictability of polyrhythmic structure; your ears try to follow one rhythm and before long, you're lost in a jungle full of them.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Andrew Ashong & Kaidi Tatham
  Washed In You
  Kitto Records
  
  Andrew Ashong's last two releases—a collaboration with Theo Parrish and the go-to soul of his self-titled EP—date back to 2012 and 2014, so by October of this year we were long overdue another hit of his silky smooth voice. His 2020 mini-album, Sankofa Season, was well worth the wait, especially with the added bonus of broken-beat hero Kaidi Tatham on the buttons. "Washed In You," the effortlessly cool lead single, is everything you could wish for from the collaboration. Tatham's production pedigree shines through the skippy drums and roaming arrangement. His lush keyboard playing is the perfect accompaniment to Ashong's voice, as well as having its own moments to take centre stage. Sankofa Season marked the beginning of a new label project for the pair, Kitto Records. Hopefully there's more to come, and sooner rather than later.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify
- INT *era
  548
  Acting Press
  
  INTe*ra is Vancouver's Hashman Deejay with PLO Man and C3Deee, two of the artists behind Acting Press. Aqueduct, their only release this year, shows what makes this label cult favorite, with six tracks that float between cosmic techno and a modern update of '90s West Coast ambient (see: Spacetime Continuum and his essential label, Reflective). "548" hovers gracefully between those sounds. Its atmosphere is part deep-sea, part deep-space, with a stepping techno pulse that enhances its weightless feel and a nine-minute runtime that makes it easy to get lost in. These guys do lush, transportive techno better than anyone, and this one showed them at the top of their game.
- Kush Jones
  Strictly 4 My CDJZ Vol. 8
  Self-released
  
  Kush Jones is committed to releasing 40 volumes of Strictly 4 My CDJZ. For anyone who follows the prolific producer's output, this goal seems well within reach. Opening the eighth volume of the EP series, "Bleep Bloop" is a clear standout from the series so far. There's punchy bass, soaring pads that drop and ascend like hovering airplanes, and as the cut's cheeky title references, an almost piercing melody that trickles throughout.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Soundcloud
- Anz
  Loos In Twos (NRG)
  Hessle Audio
  
  Anz was one of 2020's success stories. First she turned heads with her mammoth spring/summer dubs 2020 mixtape, showcasing over 50 original tracks. Then she landed on Hessle Audio, an essential label for the kind of hybrid UK dance music she makes and plays. Her status as Manchester's new hero was cemented with "Loos In Twos (NRG)," where old-school rave synth stabs and breakbeats conspire for a lunging rhythm that sounds like it was designed to knock the needle off the record. Like so much of her music, it's a rush of energy and a ray of much-needed sunshine, a SAD lamp for a world without dance floors.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Terrence Dixon
  Galactic Halo
  Axis Records
  
  The great thing about electronic music is that new trends appear periodically, giving us all a dose of something fresh. The other great thing is that some artists never change. Terrence Dixon belongs to the latter camp, a Detroit maverick who for 25 years has put out a steady stream of reliably excellent cosmic techno. This year's contribution to the canon was the Galactic Halo LP, which looked ahead to life on a strange planet in the year 2976. The standout track was "Quasar," a wonderfully simple roller built from a few bleeps and bloops ducking and diving across a firm pulse.
  
  Listen: Axis Records
- Pub
  Summer
  Ampoule Records
  
  "Summer" is an anomaly on this list, as it was first released in 2000, during the golden era of dub techno. The Glaswegian artist Pub re-released it as a single this September, together with another glitchy ambient masterpiece on the flip. For many of us, this opened the floodgates to a vast and somewhat elusive discography, both his own and that of his prolific label, Ampoule. "Summer" sprawls out over 16 minutes, wandering leisurely and striking a perfect middle ground between ambient and dub techno. Its free-flowing, blissed out atmospheres will work perfectly for fans of Deepchord, Barker or Jan Jelinek.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Novelist
  Stay With Me
  Self-released
  
  Novelist wore several hats in 2020—UK drill rapper, house producer, jungle MC—but the most surprising and compelling was the silky '80s sound of "Stay With Me." This love letter to Jesus, which came complete with a catchy chorus and belting sax solo, spotlighted the London artist's pop appeal and songwriting chops. There was a deeper message, too. Uploaded to Bandcamp the day before a major Black Lives Matter protest in London, "Stay With Me" was about remaining strong and hopeful in the face of adversity.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify
- Karenn
  Shoes Off
  Voam
  
  If there was a prize for the year's weirdest banger, it would have to go to Karenn's "Shoes Off." Blawan and Pariah lightened up their joint project in the past couple of years, from the artwork and track titles on their label, Voam, to the extremes of this trancey number. The austerity of their last label, Works The Long Nights, is a distant memory. That's not to say the new music doesn't bang as hard, but the pair seem intent on drawing more fun and unusual sounds out of their arsenal of hardware. "Shoes Off" is Exhibit A. Somehow a playful melody, gritty kicks and rips of bass gel together. For a moment you would be forgiven for thinking you're listening to Four Tet or Bicep, until the snarling bassline boxes you square in the face.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Wata Igarashi
  Eruption
  WIP
  
  The first two releases on WIP, the new label from Wata Igarashi, caught the Japanese techno maestro in a serene mood. By the third, he was back on the dance floor. "Eruption" is like listening to 2020 in microcosm. The mood begins pleasantly enough, before an industrial scrape, faint at first, swells to a deafening roar, the sound of planes crashing and buildings collapsing. A flash of white noise, then, quick as anything, the thunder slips away, leaving the kick drums and churning bassline, only this time there's something else too, all feathery and glorious. Light, perhaps, at the end of the tunnel.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Soundcloud
- Donato Dozzy
  The Tao
  Samurai Music
  
  A Donato Dozzy drum & bass EP had been coming. His DJ sets have been incorporating more and more D&B, he has released a 170 BPM remix for Samurai Music already, and his label Spazio Disponibile has issued two 12-inches of half-time mind-melters from Mike Parker. "Tao," the title track from Dozzy's EP for Samurai, is a technical marvel and a fresh approach to 170 (or 85) BPM, borrowing heavily from his slow-release style of techno. The EP as a whole is another inspired, diagonal step in his discography.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Soundcloud
- Azu Tiwaline
  Magnetic Service
  Livity Sound
  
  Azu Tiwaline's sultry take on "meditation music" draws you into a deep and expansive listening experience. Refractions of her more dance-focused project Loan periodically pass through Magnetic Service, producing dub and minimal techno apparitions. All her releases under this moniker look to music as the coupling between humans and the natural world. Inspired by local environmental soundscapes in the El Djerid region of southern Tunisia where she lives, the EP has an elemental richness, thanks in part to her use of field recordings and atmospheric synths.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- ELLES
  summers_of_love
  Naive
  
  "End Of The Night" comes as the relaxed, four-to-the-floor closer of an EP focused on electro and 2-step, like the exhausted but blissful finale of a good night out. It's a sumptuous cut of dream-house with warm pianos, blissful sustain strings and ELLES' shyly deadpan vocal delivery. What really makes this track special is all the little moments—the touches of bird song, the cymbal crashes after the breakdown, the way the vocals start to stutter and phase—that send chills down your spine. These are the ingredients that bittersweet club anthems are made of.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Nico
  Six Rooms EP
  Akita Club
  
  Before releasing music as Nico, Mexican artist Nicolas Guerrero appeared on labels like L.I.E.S., Styles Upon Styles and Blank Slate, under the guise of White Visitation or WV. Since 2018, he has departed from the barreling techno of that alias, veering towards a more colourful and open-hearted sound. His 2020 mini-album Six Rooms goes further, in Nico's own words, "away from the club and into empty houses and abandoned pools." He has a way with vocal chops and syncopated drums—which attracted the keen ears of Batu's Timedance and Midnight Shift—and he deployed both gracefully on the Six Rooms highlight "One Day."
  
  Listen: Bandcamp
- TYGAPAW
  Run 2 U
  Naafi
  
  "Run 2 U" is one of so many tracks released this year that longs to be played in a club. Tygapaw's debut album, Get Free, manages to be both tender and barreling, exploring self-liberation with meditative spoken word and dopamine-laced, '90s-Detroit influenced techno. Roughshod and bursting with energy, "Run 2 U" sits somewhere near the middle of the album. It's so entrancing that you might want run it back before continuing the journey.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
- Giggs
  Straight Murder (Giggs & David) feat. Dave
  No Bs Music
  
  Giggs and Dave, the two big stars of UK rap, couldn't be more different: Giggs is all presence and cheeky punchlines, while Dave is pure lyrical wizardry. Turns out, their styles complement each other. "Straight Murder (Giggs & David)," their second collaboration, showed both rappers at the top of their games, Dave relentless and razor-sharp, Giggs somehow both jovial and vicious. The wordplay is mind-blowing. And let's give a special shout-out to KeyzMusic, the man behind one of the best and most chilling beats of 2020.
  
  Listen: Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
  
  2020
  Track of the year
  
  India Jordan
  For You
  Local Action
  
  India Jordan wrote For You to document the process of coming to terms with their queer identity. Taking cues from happy hardcore, drum & bass and house, the record opens with blissful house tracks "I'm Waiting (Just 4 U)" and the title track, recalling the late-night euphoria of last year's DNT STP MY LV. The "you" here refers to Jordan, who has recently come out to the public as non-binary.
  
  There's a feeling of triumph that emanates from "For You." The track shows Jordan's knack for chopping and looping vocal samples, this one employing the amorous hook of Change's "You Are My Melody." The loop never gets old, and as satisfying as the final climactic breakdown of the track is, when the familiar hook comes back around, it makes you wonder why it left in the first place. But the vocals aren't all that make the track pop. "For You" is swaddled in an addictive sunny feeling, thanks to funky guitar riffs, seesawing '80s synths and rousing percussion. The track captures the dizzying joy of finding true love—in this case, the love of one's self.
  
  Listen: Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud

2020

Track of the year