This is the last Tuesday Morning 3 A.M. column.

I’ve been thinking about how to write this one for a year or so, ever since I made the decision to end TM3AM at the close of 2020. Of course, when I decided to draw the curtain, I had no idea the year we would be in for, and no idea how that year would change my perspective on things.

While 2020 has been a never-ending nightmare of isolation and anxiety, it’s also paradoxically drawn me closer to the most important people in my life, and it’s made me even more certain that I want to spend my precious time differently. I’m not the same person I was 12 months ago, and I’m sure what I have to say now will be different from what I imagined I would have to say, back in another lifetime.

This column has been a part of my life for 20 years. Well, I say that, but it’s actually been more like 23 years. I started chronicling my life as an obsessive fan of new music back when I worked for Face Magazine. I’m not absolutely sure where the name came from. It’s a double reference to Simon and Garfunkel and to midnight sales at record stores, which used to take place on Tuesday mornings. But I have no idea why I thought of those things together and came up with Tuesday Morning 3 A.M. All I can tell you is that it’s the best name I have ever thought up for anything.

If you count the Face Magazine incarnation, TM3AM has been written in six states. It was a constant as I moved around the country, searching for my magnetic north. I started the online version of it in Tennessee in 2000, back when dial-up was still a thing and downloading a song on Napster took like 18 hours. (Not that I ever did that.) I started writing it for me, and emailed it out to a few friends. I know people who are still reading this from that initial email list, and I can’t tell you how wonderful that makes me feel.

I wrote this thing once a week, more or less, while working at a weekly newspaper in Indiana, while working at a factory in Maryland, while writing for a daily paper in Illinois, while maintaining my own Patch.com website for the town I still live in, while translating particle physics into English at Fermilab, and now while writing about all kinds of different things at my new place of employment. It has outlasted every relationship I’ve had (and I have had a few while writing it), and it has brought so many new people into my life.

It’s that last one that I am most grateful for. I certainly don’t want to list everyone I’ve met as a result of doing this column, for fear of leaving some people out. But the friendships and relationships it has brought me have meant the world to me, and I hope to keep talking about music with all of you. Even if you just count the conversations and concerts with people I have met through this column, TM3AM has been a net positive in my life.

So why am I ending it? Well, for the same reason I started it, really. I love music, and writing about it each week was detracting from that love. I don’t know how to put it any more plainly. Listening to music is one of the greatest joys of my life, and for the past few years that has been overshadowed by the constant need to have something to say about that music, or to defend my tastes. It’s like I have often said: You should keep doing something only until it isn’t fun anymore. And then you should do it for another couple years just to make sure it isn’t fun, before finally giving it up.

But listen, all that is beside the point. When it’s time to let something go, it’s just time. Tuesday Morning 3 A.M. has been a part of my life for 20 years. I can barely fathom that, honestly. I don’t even have words for how different my life is now than it was 20 years ago, but if I want to remember what I was thinking in just about any given week from those 20 years, I can go back and read it. That’s amazing to me. I’m proud of the fact that I kept at it, that I wrote more than 1,000 of these things, that what started as a writing exercise grew into a significant part of my weekly life.

If you’ve been with this column from the start, I don’t even know how to thank you. That’s not to say that I’m not grateful for everyone who has discovered TM3AM at any point in its history. Even if you only read one of these, I’m thankful. But here at the end, I wanted to say a special thanks to those who have been reading for 20 years. When I think about that, about people making my words a part of their lives for two decades, I confess I get emotional. I’m beyond thankful for that. Like, there isn’t a word for how thankful I am for that.

One person I will name, who has been with me for all of these 20 years, is Mike Ferrier. He designed the website you are reading now, and the one you may have read before that. He’s been a constant source of encouragement, and deserves my most public thanks for everything he has done for TM3AM.

Music continues to be the best. I started this as a way of chronicling what my life was like. How excited I get, still, at new album announcements from my favorite artists. How delighted I am to discover new songsmiths, and to get in on the ground floor of their careers. How engrossed I can still get in an album, blocking out all other sensory information and getting lost in the music. How my experience of music influences the way I see the world, the way I interact with people, the way I approach most everything. I hope, by collecting 20 years of these moments, that I wove a bigger picture of what it’s like to be someone like me. If I’ve helped you understand the obsessive music fan in your life a little better, I consider that my job done.

Even though this column is ending, my love of music will continue, most likely until they put me in the ground. I hope, if our paths have crossed, that I have spoken to your love of music too, and hopefully sparked it in some way. For all the words I have poured into this, I still feel like that love is beyond description, that my desire to explain and share it was an impossible one. Music is beyond us all. We do what we can, but we are stumbling around in the dark, trying to describe the indescribable.

So this is the last Tuesday Morning 3 A.M. column, at least for now. I will still have the login code for this website, and I may pop in here and there when the mood strikes me. I’m still working out new ways to share my love of music with the world, and I’ll make sure to mention those here when they become more concrete. For now, let these 20 years of scribblings stand by themselves. I don’t know what I intended to say in this space, but right now, I feel like there are only two words that matter.

Thank you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

You’ve been lovely, and it’s been my joy and honor to write for you for the past 20 years. Be good to each other. I will miss you.

One last time, with feeling:

See you in line Tuesday morning.

All right, everyone, the faster we get through this list, the faster 2020 will be over. And if there’s a year I have more desperately wanted to be over, I cannot remember it.

What you’re about to read represents some of the brightest spots of my year. 2020 was marked by fear and isolation, by health scares and unwelcome diagnoses, by rapid change and slow-motion movement. It was also full of reminders that I know the best people, and renewed commitments to remain in touch with those people. There have been bright spots amidst the darkness, and it’s good to remember that.

There’s also been good music, and it’s important to remember that too. The list that follows is a personal one, and if you disagree, that’s fine. One of the reasons I am ending this column is that I’ve grown weary of defending my own personal taste. The things I like will not strike others the same way, and that is sometimes hard for me to remember. There are plenty of records – dozens, in fact – that could make a list like this one, and it’s all down to what moves you.

It’s amazing to me, though, that my last top 10 list ends with me in complete critical agreement with pretty much everyone. This year’s top album was so good, and so right for this moment, that it was undeniable. No iconoclastic choice from me this year. Just a big ol’ stamp with the words “I AGREE” engraved in it. The rest of the list won’t be as obvious, I don’t think, but the top choice has been clear for a long time.

Anyway, your mileage may vary. For me, these were my favorite albums from a long and lonely year.

#10. Vanessa Carlton, Love is An Art.

I chose this one over my “number elevens,” as I listed last week, because I love a good evolution. If you haven’t been keeping up with Vanessa Carlton since “A Thousand Miles,” you’ve missed some quiet yet tremendous artistic growth. This isn’t a knock on “Miles,” which is still a superb pop song, but if you’re looking for that youthful exuberance here, you won’t find it. Love is An Art is an immersive collection of mature songwriting, with often bizarre yet beautiful production by Carlton and Dave Fridmann. It’s the kind of album that makes no sense on first listen, but falls into place the more you get to know it. Love is An Art is (forgive me) a thousand miles from the piano-pop of her past, and charts a strong path for her future.

#9. Matt Wilson and his Orchestra, When I Was a Writer.

Matt’s brother Dan made headlines this year by reuniting Semisonic, but it was the lesser-known Wilson who made the biggest impact on me. When I Was a Writer is a lovely set of songs, performed with a scaled-down band of stringed instruments (including banjo and harp), and it sounds like a mix of bluegrass and chamber music. This setting is perfect for Wilson’s worn voice and songs about finding hope where you can. “Real Life” is one of the year’s finest, but you won’t be able to stop humming “Decent Guy” or “Come to Nothing” either, and with “Mental Patients” Wilson has basically written an anthem for all of us. Here’s hoping this is just the start of this orchestra’s run.

#8. Tim Minchin, Apart Together.

You know this record is good if it made this list mere weeks after its release. Australian Tim Minchin is widely known as a musical comedian and a composer of stage shows like Matilda and Groundhog Day. Apart Together is his first “real” album, and if you’ve been missing the heartfelt specificity of Ben Folds, Minchin’s work here will scratch that itch. This is a gorgeous album of big productions, but it is the detailed and heartfelt lyrics that steal the show. Minchin can still be funny – “Leaving L.A.” is a riotous chronicle of his miserable time in the title city, writing an animated film that went nowhere. But gems like “I Can’t Save You” and “I’ll Take Lonely Tonight” deliver with a wellspring of emotion Minchin has often kept hidden. If this is just the start of Minchin’s “serious” recording career, I look forward to following his work forever.

#7. Phoebe Bridgers, Punisher.

Phoebe Bridgers’ extracurricular work in Boygenius and Better Oblivion Community Center will not prepare you for Punisher, a moody, dark, beautifully produced piece of work that is only “folk music” by the barest of associations. The music here is ethereal and otherworldly, which stands in lovely contrast to Bridgers’ lyrics. They’re full of tiny little details that draw you into her worlds, while she keeps the big moments at the edges, telling stories often by not telling them. The final song, “I Know the End,” is one of the greatest achievements of the year, an apocalyptic breakdown that slowly ratchets up until it explodes in fanfares and screams. This record is every bit as good as you’ve heard it is.

#6. Weiwu, Are You Perfect Yet.

Weiwu is Michael Gungor’s one-man project following the demise of his eponymous band. But don’t worry about that. No amount of familiarity with Gungor’s previous work will give you any idea what Are You Perfect Yet sounds like. This is progressive, electronic, noisy, danceable, meditative and deeply spiritual stuff, exploring Gungor’s fascination with Hinduism and with many different kinds of music. Some of this is clearly indebted to The Age of Adz, but the way this one takes you by the hand and leads you on a journey is pure Michael Gungor. I’ve never quite heard anything like this, an outpouring of imagination and wonder on an impressive scale. Check it out here.

#5. Hum, Inlet.

There were a few surprise album drops this year, but for my money, none were as surprising as the return of Hum. Their previous two, 1995’s You’d Prefer an Astronaut and 1998’s Downward is Heavenward, before I even knew where Champaign, Illinois was. The best word I have for their sound is immersive. The guitars are so thick and heavy that they cease to sound like guitars after a while, and the music floats you along like a turbulent ocean. Inlet is the same, but more so – the songs are longer, the riffs more massive, the sound even more enveloping. After 22 years away, Hum may have made their finest record. Surprise!

#4. Darlingside, Fish Pond Fish.

Darlingside, that Boston band with the incredible harmonies, has been a favorite for some time. But with Fish Pond Fish they complete their transformation into something almost indescribably beautiful. There’s a spectral quality to much of this record, a sense of ancient wisdom and otherworldly grace. The harmonies are still the main draw, and they are unspeakably wonderful from first song to last here. But the songs are stunning too. There’s a sense of warmth and optimism to this record, particularly on the luminous closer “A Light On in the Dark,” that felt like a soothing balm, even in the year’s darkest moments. Everything I wanted the Fleet Foxes album to be, this one was. Hear it here, as soon as you can.

#3. Ella Mine, Dream War.

Ella Mine is, without a doubt, my favorite discovery of 2020. Barely out of college, Mine has crafted a stunningly confident and sweeping debut album, one that plays like a single piece of music. Inspired by her own horrific experience with mind-altering pain medication, Dream War offers some of the most hard-won hope of the year, taking you to the edge of despair and then finding the glimmers of love and inspiration that bring us back from the brink. There’s no way Mine could have known how much an album like this would be needed in 2020, how relatable her journey through darkness would be in this bleak midwinter. But it feels like 2020, like crawling through isolation and pain to reach the other side. I could mention highlights here, like “Water’s Rise” or “Wheel of Love,” but Dream War is best heard as a whole. So block off an hour and hear it. You won’t regret it. Of everyone on this list, Ella Mine is the artist whose next work I am most excited to hear.

#2. Sufjan Stevens, The Ascension.

The Ascension is a difficult album. It is practically dripping with pain, regret, betrayal, depression and inner turmoil, and when it reaches its conclusion after 82 minutes, that conclusion is utterly bleak. It is a lament writ large, for lost faith in God and in institutions, and taking it all in feels like being drowned over and over again. It is also an absolutely phenomenal piece of music, up to the impossibly high standards set by Stevens’ own catalog. Focusing almost entirely on electronic sounds, Stevens creates wind-blown landscapes and wildernesses for his beleaguered pilgrim to walk through, and though you may not want to keep going with him toward this particular destination, the album carries you along masterfully. This is one of the most brilliant cries of desperation I have ever heard, transforming both Stevens and the listener along the way, and its climax, the stunning title track, will hollow you out. I didn’t listen to this album too often this year, but when I did, it left a shadow over my heart. If your 2020 was a wrenching experience, taking you from every safe harbor you have known and making you question everything you hold dear, Sufjan Stevens has made the perfect soundtrack. It hurts. It’s beyond amazing, but it hurts.

And I almost considered it the most fitting album to top the list this year, considering… well, everything. But only briefly. The real story of the year is about living through trauma, about finding hope in hard places, about becoming more fully yourself. And that’s the story of the album that rightfully sits at this list’s peak.

#1. Fiona Apple, Fetch the Bolt Cutters.

It’s almost a cliché at this point to note that Fetch the Bolt Cutters is brilliant. Fiona Apple has been a tremendous songwriter and record-maker for some time, but it is here, for the first time, that we get a true sense of the scope of her talent. This is the first one that sounds like pure uncut Fiona. Made at home, it features household objects as percussion, off-kilter yet wonderful harmonies, songs that don’t go anywhere that you expect them to, and an overall feel that threatens to fall apart at any time, but never does. Every element works so well with every other element here, and I cannot imagine these songs any other way.

But it’s the songs that make this the astonishing experience it is. Apple has always been honest, but here she opens a vein, candidly discussing the experiences that have kept her down, kept her quiet, kept her from being her true self. The album’s title comes from a line in a television show, spoken by a character about to free a kidnap victim, and the entire feel of this record is of someone cutting through the chains that have held them down. “Under the Table” is exhilarating in its simplicity, Apple refusing to rein herself in for anyone. The title track is a low crawl to freedom, Apple repeating to herself that she has been stuck where she is for too long.

This is also a record about finding inspiration and hope in unlikely places. “Shameika” is a wonderful song about an offhand moment that Apple has carried with her for most of her life, and it brought her and the real Shameika together again after decades apart. “Relay” is a powerful reckoning with the way evil perpetuates, while “For Her,” one of the rawest and most harrowing songs here, ends with a confrontation over buried trauma, and the retaking of one’s power. It’s a pretty amazing 2:44, containing worlds and multitudes.

Fetch the Bolt Cutters could easily have been an angry album, but it isn’t one. It’s a wise one, a guidebook on forgiveness and perseverance and love. Closer “On I Go” is a mantra, Apple noting that she’s been in a rush to prove herself before, and now she only moves to move. This album is the product of years of healing, and if there has ever been a year in which we needed to hear the sound of healing, it’s this one. It doesn’t flinch from the darkness, but it learns to walk with it toward the light. That is the story of 2020 to me, and no one told it better than Fiona Apple.

And that’s it. This is the 21st of these top 10 lists I have been privileged to write for this column, and will likely be the last. Thanks to everyone for reading. Hope your holidays are merry and bright, as much as they can be. Come back next week as I bring this thing in for a landing.

See you in line Tuesday morning… and to all a good night.

Things are well and truly coming to an end now around the Tuesday Morning offices. (Those offices consist of a dining room table, an office chair and a stack of CDs, but go with me here.) There’s a little sadness seeping in as I put a bow on 20 years of this thing. But there’s also a new sense of engagement with music, and I hope that carries forward.

Let me explain. For 20 years now, I have anticipated many new releases with the intent of writing about them. I’ve thought about how to frame my observations even on the first trip through, and while that has always been an enjoyable process for me, lately it’s felt like an obligation. But this week I heard Paul McCartney’s new album, McCartney III, for the first time, knowing I would not be writing about it. And the experience was really different.

For one thing, I like McCartney III, especially for what it is: an old man messing about in his home studio, doing whatever he wants. If I were writing about it, I would frame it in reference to the previous McCartney albums (which it does not approach, in terms of quality) and would likely launch into a spirited defense of Sir Paul’s right to just have a good time. He’s 78 years old, and he sounds it here – his voice is weak, and these songs largely take the easy path. But he did this all on his own, in the middle of a pandemic, at 78. That’s pretty cool.

See, though, I’m doing it. I’m writing about it. And the point is, I listened to McCartney III for the first time this week without worrying about what I would say about it. And I had fun. It was a joyous 45 minutes of total connectedness to a piece of music. And I definitely look forward to more of those in the future.

First, though, we have to talk about the year that was. Though 2020 was a nightmare on a lot of levels, the music that came my way this year stands out as pretty damn extraordinary. My top 10 list is done, and while the top three have been set for a while, I did have some inner debates about the bottom seven. In the end, I chose the ones I liked best, even if they’re not necessarily the most impressive or relevant.

And I also have a dozen honorable mentions, which I will get to in a moment. First, one last time, let’s talk about the rules for these lists. I came up with this set of criteria more than two decades ago, and it has served me well. My top 10 list will always consider only new full-length albums of primarily original material released between January 1 and December 31 of a given year. That means no live albums, no EPs, no covers projects and no compilations of previously released material.

It’s like a song I can sing at this point. Just typing that out one final time made me feel good. I’m going to miss this end-of-the-year ritual.

Anyway, those criteria did not leave out as many albums this year as they have in prior years. If I could nominate an EP, it would probably be Semisonic’s You’re Not Alone, an all-too-brief return propelled by some classic Dan Wilson songwriting. If I could nominate two EPs, I would choose Threesome Vol. 1, by three Jellyfish alum under the name The Lickerish Quartet.

If I could nominate a box set of previously released material, it would be The Book of Iona, a comprehensive look at the studio output of an absolutely brilliant band. If I could nominate two, I would choose Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time, the gorgeous, sumptuous all-in-one collection of the Divine Comedy’s vastly underappreciated work. Those with the means and time to dive into these sets should absolutely do so.

And if I could nominate songs by themselves, I would stand up for Michael Penn’s “Revival,” marking his first new tune in 14 years. It turned out to be prophetic, and I’m so glad. Janelle Monae’s single “Turntables” did the same, and hopefully signals something new on the near-term horizon for her. Monae remains one of the best musicians we have. And if I could nominate an album on the strength of one song, it would be Good Luck With Whatever by Dawes, which is mostly pretty good, but in “Didn’t Fix Me” sports one of my very favorite musical moments of 2020.

But we’re not here to talk about albums I couldn’t honor with a slot in the list. Rather, we’re here to discuss the ones that fell just shy. Every one of these enriched my year, and if any one of them turned out to be a favorite of yours, well, I won’t argue. Here are 12 records I also loved in 2020.

The year started off well with Derek Webb’s long-in development Targets. A deceptively brief and simple rock record, there’s a lot happening under the surface of this one, and songs like “Good Grief” really helped to add perspective to these COVID times. (It’s funny how music written without specific hard times in mind can truly help navigate them.) Nada Surf then knocked it out of the park with Never Not Together, on which these long-running pop tunesmiths chose love and forgiveness, over and over. It remains one of the most relentlessly positive records of the year, without ever slipping into corniness.

Supergroup Lo Tom reunited for a second (and reportedly final) outing, and its quick-hit songs bowled me over. David Bazan’s lyrics shine, while Jason Martin’s guitars strike with an intense ferocity. “Start Payin’” was a superb first taste (and the best way to launch a Kickstarter campaign I may have ever seen), and the record never came down from those heights. Everything Everything, on the other hand, put the guitars aside for their fifth record, Re-Animator, and turned out one of their best efforts. The thick synths fit this group’s fractured art-rock style perfectly.

It was an angry year full of angry songs, so it was the perfect time for Midnight Oil to return. Their first effort in 18 years, The Makarrata Project, is a collaboration with the first nations people of Australia, and an impassioned plea for justice. It’s also awesome. But no one did angry-at-the-world quite the way Glenn Kaiser did it this year. The former Resurrection Band frontman took aim at the Trump administration and the politics of religion on the stripped-down Swamp Gas Messiahs, and the result both sings and stings.

Several songwriters took bold steps forward this year, and a few of them are on the list proper. One that almost made it is Chris Stapleton, whose third album, Starting Over, delivers a front-to-back experience. Stapleton’s songs here are streets ahead of his previous efforts (which were also quite good), and his voice and arrangements are raw and emotional. Same goes for Margo Price, who also gave us a third album, That’s How Rumors Get Started, that showcased her terrific songwriting. “I’d Die For You” is one of the most graceful and glorious numbers of the year, easy.

The big surprise this year, though, was Taylor Swift, whose two albums – Folklore and Evermore – saw her confidently leaping into the realm of literary songwriter. Collaborating mainly with the National’s Aaron Dessner, Swift told stories and spun images across these two records, and married them to low-key folk to create several small-scale wonders. While it’s true that the best songs from these two long albums could have made one single stunner, it’s Folklore that has the edge with me on the strength of beautiful songs like “Seven” and “Invisible String.” I know she’s eventually going to go back to her pop style, but I hope she hibernates here for a while longer, because what she’s done here is her best work.

And finally, we have three albums that I would consider the number elevens, albums that were all in very close contention for the final list. Start with Elvis Costello, who, even after 31 albums, knows how to deliver. Hey Clockface is a diverse collection of spitting tirades and painterly snapshots, set to unfailingly interesting and melodic music. He’s an absolute master, and here’s further proof.

Then there is Kathleen Edwards, who returned this year after an eight-year hiatus. Total Freedom is not just the name of her record, it is the feeling these songs evoke. Edwards is so good that she can even make her ode to her rescue dog a compelling piece of music, and when she turns her eye toward the folly of love, or – as she does on the extraordinary “Simple Math” – the wonder of lifelong friendship, the results are magnificent. Here’s hoping she never leaves us again.

And then we have Brian Transeau, better known as BT. I’ve been a fan of this electronic music wunderkind since his earliest work in the 1990s, and with The Lost Art of Longing, his 13th record, he delivers another masterpiece. Over 93 minutes, Transeau and his collaborators create one blissful moment after another, like magic tricks. “The Light is Always On” became an anthem for me this year, and the rest of the album is so good that it’s barely even a highlight. There’s no shortage of electronic music available, but if you want a fully human experience, Transeau remains in a league of his own.

And that’s it. I hope you’ll join me next week for the 2020 Top 10 List, and then the following week as we bid this year, and this column, goodbye.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

Forgive me for being a downer, but it doesn’t feel like Christmas at all this year.

It’s not just the spring-like weather, either. Every year around this time I pack up my presents head east to Massachusetts for an extended break with family and friends. I treasure that time, and thanks to the wretched pandemic, I won’t be making that trip this year. I’ll be here, using Zoom to connect with loved ones and pretending that it’s enough. But it isn’t.

I know, this is a sad way to open what will be my last Christmas music column, but I can’t help it. I have negative cheer this year. I’m doing my best to get into the spirit. I’m watching Christmas movies. I’m stopping to look at lights displays. And in a complete abandonment of my usual rules, I have been listening to Christmas music since October. The old favorites, from Sufjan Stevens to Harry Connick to Josh Garrels, are getting play around my house, and it’s helping.

It wasn’t the best year for new Christmas music, but I’m certainly playing the jingle bells out of some of 2020’s offerings. The best of this year’s Christmas offerings satisfy the three sides of my fandom. (Yes, you can be a fan of Christmas music. It’s a thing.) Let me explain.

First, and probably most prominently, I want to hear the Christmas canon. I love Christmas songs, and I can only think of a couple (“Domenic the Donkey,” for example) that I would turn away. The familiar sing-along Christmas tunes will always find room at my inn. And this year, like every year, there is no shortage of interpretations of that canon.

Perhaps the most traditional of these is A Ben Rector Christmas, the first holiday album from the nerdy-clever singer-songwriter. Rector’s own music is often as warm and cozy as an evening by the fireplace, and his Christmas album follows suit. It begins with an anomaly, Rector’s own “The Thanksgiving Song,” which is about a different holiday all together. But it’s typical Rector, a piano-led tune about home and family that is more than a little bittersweet this year.

The rest of A Ben Rector Christmas is cozy and comfortable, full of low-key renditions of songs I will never grow tired of. “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year.” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire).” Rector’s voice is nothing special, but he sings these songs well, and he even pulls off a moderately swinging take on “This Christmas,” a song that John Legend, to name one, knocked out of the park last year. A Ben Rector Christmas is simple and heartfelt. It doesn’t aim for more than that, but it doesn’t need to.

Also in the traditional mode is one of the most delightful surprises of this holiday season: If the Fates Allow, which is nothing less than a Hadestown Christmas album. Hadestown, if you don’t know, began life as an album by the brilliant Anais Mitchell and went on to become a celebrated Broadway show. It’s an adaptation of the Orpheus and Eurydice story from Greek mythology, and it features a trio of singers as the Fates, introducing and commenting on the action.

And now the three singers who played the Fates in the original Broadway show – Jewelle Blackman, Yvette Gonzales-Nacer and Kay Trinidad – have reunited to sing a whole album of Christmas tunes. (If the Fates Allow, get it?) That this thing exists is sort of incredible. It’s wonderful, but that shouldn’t shock you. Blackman, Gonzales-Nacer and Trinidad are great singers, their voices intertwining beautifully, and the arrangements are superb. This take on “Sleigh Ride,” for example, made my inner harmony geek sit up and take notice more than once.

The traditional songs are wonderful – I am not sure I’ve ever heard a more shimmering version of “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming” – but for me, the highlight here is a song I didn’t know. “Winter Song” is a Sara Bareilles tune, and my feeling on her work should be clear by now. “Winter Song” is absolutely stunning, and this rendition makes me cry each time. Seriously, I am listening and crying right now. It would be embarrassing if there were anyone around.

If the Fates Allow is a fine mix of songs you’ll know and songs you’ll discover, and the three main voices turn even the songs you’ll know into spellbinding experiences. It’s just a great piece of work, and of the traditional Christmas albums I heard this year, it’s easily my favorite.

One thing I love about Sufjan Stevens’s two Christmas box sets, though, is that while he shows reverence to the existing canon, he does his very best to add to it. Stevens is the most prolific contributor of new Christmas songs, but every year there’s at least one artist who tries their hand at penning an album of originals and nudging it out into the holiday marketplace. It’s a brave thing to do, I think, given that the last song to truly enter the canon was Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You,” back in 1994. And yet someone always tries it.

This year it’s Jamie Cullum, the prodigiously talented English jazz-popper. He’s titled his record The Pianoman at Christmas, and it features ten new songs with a Christmas flavor. And I have to tell you, it’s pretty great. Cullum’s voice is unimpeachable, of course, but these songs are so delightful, and they sport full big band and orchestral arrangements that serve them well.

“Hang Your Lights” is just joyous, like a forgotten Rat Pack tune, winking at you the whole time: “Put yourself at the top of my tree and you can hang your lights on me.” “Turn On the Lights” is a big pop song with urgent strings, while “So Many Santas” is a Cab Calloway-inspired jazz shimmy. The sentimental “How Do You Fly” is lovely, and Cullum’s light touch helps it soar. All told, while none of these ten songs sound poised to replace the likes of “White Christmas,” they’re all excellent, and I’ll certainly be spinning this one for years to come.

The third side is one I don’t mention too often here, but it’s the side that is constantly looking for new expressions of faith. In the Christian tradition, Christmas is preceded by advent, four weeks of longing and waiting and hoping, and this year I think that the meditative nature of advent is more than fitting. There are a lot of Christmas albums, and many of them give my faith-filled side plenty to chew on. But there aren’t a lot of advent albums, not a lot that try to express that particular aching.

Caroline Cobb’s A Seed, A Sunrise is an advent album. It’s one of two she offered through Kickstarter earlier this year, and it’s exactly what I hoped it would be. It’s the kind of album with bible verses referenced for each song, but in the best Sara Groves tradition, Cobb tells these stories with artistry and humanity. “We Wait For You” (and is there a more advent song title than that?) starts things on the perfect note, Cobb tying the start of Jesus’s life with its end, and capturing the longing of those who believe.

Every one of these seven songs does the same. “Comfort, Oh Comfort” is melancholy and gorgeous, with a warm cello and gentle guitar picking, while “Joy (As Far As the Curse is Found)” moves forward on a skipping rhythm, telling the Christmas story in a familiar yet somehow new way. Closer “There Will Be a Day” is probably my favorite, its gentle piano underpinning a song of faith and trust.

I definitely understand that advent music is not for everyone, and that my own complicated relationship with Christianity makes an album like this more appealing for me. But if you are also in the market for something like this, I highly recommend Cobb’s work. You can hear and buy at her website.

So that’s what has been playing here during this non-Christmas-y Christmas. Music, of course, is the thing that gets me through the dark times. I hope that wherever you are and however you are spending this extraordinary holiday season, that you have something that gets you through it. Peace on Earth, goodwill toward men.

Next week, the honorable mentions of 2020.

See you in line Tuesday morning.

If all goes to plan, this should be the final set of record reviews published as part of the weekly Tuesday Morning 3 A.M. I’m not sure what I’m going to do going forward – I love writing about music so much that I might pop in here every once in a while, but of course I haven’t really thought about it. So I’m thinking of these as the last ones.

And as befits my end-of-TM3AM philosophy, they’re nothing special. Just another five CDs I wanted to talk about. This column was initially intended as a chronicle of the life of a new music fanatic, and its raison d’etre for all these years has been to discuss new music. So here’s my last stab at doing just that.

Smashing Pumpkins, Cyr.

I couldn’t resist one last barely-listened-to-it seat-of-my-pants new album review in this spot, and Cyr is the biggest thing to come out last week. I bought it on Friday, so I’ve barely made it through this beast once. I’m somewhat embarrassed by how many TM3AM reviews were done this way, barely scratching the surface of some pretty involved records. I publicly reversed course on one of those once (Mutemath’s Vitals), but trust me that my appreciation for some of the albums I wrote about too quickly has grown over time.

I don’t know if that will happen with Cyr, though. I have a complex relationship with Billy Corgan, who is still one of the most ambitious and excessive musicians to come out of the ambitious, excessive 1990s. I’m still a big fan of the peak Pumpkins work, which includes Siamese Dream, Mellon Collie, Adore and its attendant b-sides collections. Even the castoffs from this period were pretty great. But with Machina in 2000, something broke, and Corgan has yet to fix it.

That’s not to say that he hasn’t turned out good work since then. I enjoyed albums like Oceania and Monuments to an Elegy, though I cannot for the life of me remember anything about them now. And I like Cyr, the second Pumpkins album since their three-fourths reunion in 2018. But man, there’s just nothing memorable about this. It’s a 20-song, 72-minute monster loaded with enough synths that Corgan sounds like he’s auditioning to soundtrack the next Stranger Things season, but none of those songs really connect.

Some of them are fine. “The Colour of Love” kicks things off in decent fashion. The title track has an appealing synth line. Corgan’s voice works well with this style, and Jimmy Chamberlain is still a powerhouse behind the drum kit (when Corgan remembers to use him). But this album goes on and on and on, with almost nothing rising above the tide of mediocrity. “Wyttch” is memorable, but mainly because it’s bad, Corgan shouting “Samhain” like a deranged Danzig fan. But with “Starrcraft” it’s back to pleasant synths and melodies that just kind of… are, with nonsense lyrics that fail to connect.

I don’t know if this synthpop direction is a permanent one, or just a long experiment released in full here. Either way, Cyr doesn’t pay back dividends for the time you will invest in it. It isn’t bad, but there’s so much of it that just sits there. The idea that Corgan might learn from this and rein things in next time is laughable – he’s working on a 30-plus-song sequel to Mellon Collie and Machina right now, as I understand it – but the best of his post-‘90s work has also been his most focused. This is the opposite of that, and even if his best songs lie in the final quarter of this thing – spoiler: they don’t – you’ll be too bored by the time you get there to appreciate them.

Beki Hemingway, Earth and Asphalt.

I don’t know Beki Hemingway, but I know lots of people who do. She belongs to a special group of artists in my mind: those I discovered at Cornerstone. The annual Cornerstone Festival was one of my favorite sojourns, a week of great music from a largely unheralded pocket of the music world with some of my favorite people. On my first day at my first Cornerstone I saw Beki Hemingway play, and I bought her album Words for Loss for Words right away. I’ve been following her work ever since.

I once said that Beki has two gimmicks: great songs and a great voice. Her latest, which I helped Kickstart, hasn’t changed my thinking on that at all. Earth and Asphalt was recorded in Ireland, where Hemingway and her husband/musical partner Randy Kerkman live now, but it still sounds like it sprouted from American soil.  There’s some country, some folk and some rock and roll here, and Hemingway delivers all of them with conviction, her voice solid and strong.

The whole album is a highlight, but I’m particularly fond of “Lay Your Burdens Down,” with its crunchy riff and big chorus; the anthemic “We’re Not Going Anywhere”; and the layered, lovely waltz “Hurricane.” I’m also a fan of “Cost Me Everything,” a darker yet hopeful ballad that stands with Hemingway’s best writing. But really, Earth and Asphalt is all very good, and more evidence that Beki Hemingway should be a household name, especially in alt-country circles. Check it out here. (Hey, it’s Bandcamp Friday again in a couple days, so maybe check it out then, too.)

Love Coma

Chris Taylor is another songwriter from this spiritual-minded corner of the music universe, but he’s one I missed completely at the time. I first heard of him through his extensive solo career, and then only because my friends Jeff Elbel and Jeffrey Kotthoff worked with him. I’ve caught on more now, and though he’ll never be my favorite Taylor, he’s a prolific and interesting musician.

Also, he had a band in the ‘90s that flew totally under my radar. Love Coma apparently released two albums, one in 1993 and the other in 1996, before disbanding. Even more interesting, Love Coma’s guitar player was Matt Slocum, who you might know better for his work in Sixpence None the Richer. Well, color me intrigued, so when Taylor and Slocum reunited with the rest of the band and made a new Love Coma album this year, I snapped it up.

And it’s pretty good. Taylor and Slocum have a push-pull dynamic – Taylor’s a rough and tumble three-chord rock guy and Slocum more of a spinner of atmospheres – that works well throughout this record. Slocum works his magic over the simple grooves that make up these songs, and Taylor’s cigarettes-and-coffee voice grounds everything. The jangle-pop “Boomerang” is probably my favorite song here, but it all works for me, especially as a whole. Check it out, and try some of Taylor’s solo work while you’re at it.

Lauren Mann, Memory and Desire.

Completing the Cornerstone trifecta, we have Lauren Mann. I discovered this Canadian songwriter at the Gallery Stage of the Cornerstone Festival back in 2010, and I’ve been a fan ever since. Mann writes emotionally resonant, piano-led songs with a touch of Carole King, which is a huge compliment from me. She’s made several increasingly excellent albums, and now, fresh off a divorce and a period of reconstruction, she’s made what might be her very best.

It’s also her most intimate, full of straightforward diary entries about loss and love. “Forgiveness” is superb, a lament and an anthem in one, while “Waves” rides some gorgeous guitar atmospheres to tell a tale of perseverance. “Where do we go from here” might be something of a cliché, but it’s clear she’s singing that line from a deeply felt place. “Galaxies” is a wonder, a song of separation that uses its metaphor perfectly. Through it all her songwriting and singing voices are in fine form, and the production is dreamy and beautiful.

Memory and Desire is largely muted in comparison to Mann’s previous work, but this feels like an important album for her to have made. And there are moments of cathartic hope, like “Sing It Out Loud” and the delightful closer “Circus in the Sky.” In all, I think it’s the most complete piece of work Mann has given us, accomplished and confident and unafraid. I’ve recommended a few purchases here for Bandcamp Friday, but if you’re looking for an artist worthy of your support, Lauren Mann is worth a listen.

BT, The Lost Art of Longing.

Honestly, it’s just luck of the draw that put this new BT album in the final position here, but I’m happy that this will be the final review of this incarnation of TM3AM. I first discovered Brian Transeau’s work while interning at Face Magazine in Portland, where this column got its start, and I reviewed Ima and Movement in Still Life in those pages. I was drawn in by collaborations with Tori Amos and Mike Doughty, but I thought he was a genius then, and I still think so.

BT’s music has soundtracked my journey from that moment to this one. I was three years into the online TM3AM when Emotional Technology knocked me for a loop. A lot of Transeau’s innovations on that record are more commonplace now, but it still sounds like an extraordinarily detailed, beautifully written electro-pop album. These Hopeful Machines gave me songs to sing as I left my newspaper job, and A Song Across Wires was a perfect backdrop for my jump into science communication.

All of which is to say that Transeau was here at the start of this column, and he’s here at the end of it too. The Lost Art of Longing is his 13th, and at 93 minutes, it’s just as ambitious as anything he’s done. It is one of 2020’s most perfect pop albums, song after song here achieving a kind of transcendence that BT seems to traffic in as a matter of course. Longtime vocal partner Christian Burns joins him here, along with a host of new voices, including Nation of One and Iriana Mancini.

At the heart of it all is a kind of uplift, a spirit of hope that elevates this music. A song like “Walk Into the Water,” which extends past 10 minutes, is one beautiful high point after another, all of them designed to fill you with joy. Transeau made his name as a producer of unfathomable complexity, stutter-cutting his way through his first few albums. The Lost Art of Longing smooths a lot of that out – it’s more open, spacious, pure. “The Light is Always On” is a favorite here, the richness of Mangal Suvarnan’s voice bringing this ode to togetherness alive.

Man, every single track here is wonderful, and I’m so glad I get to write about another brilliant BT album before I sign off. It’s nice to know that even after 20 years, Transeau is still using his gift to improve the world. His music has gotten me through a lot these past two decades, and as I wrap up this final column of reviews, it’s good to have him here, enriching my life once again.

And that’s it. My last set of reviews. Next up it’s Christmas music, then honorable mentions, then the top 10 list, and a farewell column. That’s the roadmap to the end of TM3AM. I’m certain to say this again and again over the next month, but thank you all for reading, and for coming along on this journey. Four left. Let’s do this.

See you in line Tuesday morning.