Guardian writers pick their favourite underheard songs of the year, from hip-hop to pop to country
You might’ve missed this track from London-based rapper Ashden because it came out in late November, on his EP Grace, and isn’t technically a single (there aren’t any on the EP, he tells me). Ashden is somewhat enigmatic, both producing and rapping after starting out within a hip-hop collective years ago. Grace follows his 2017 EP Conversations with Friends and two 2022 collaborative EPs under the alias Benny Berlin, with rapper and friend No Baking Soda. Here, Shoes shoves you directly into the club, bodies heaving, as a skittering beat gives way to the thump of 4/4 bass. Think Vince Staples in his working-with-SOPHIE, Big Fish Theory days and you’ll be close. Parts of the production evoke a brooding, stripped-back take on Detroit techno and dub rooted in hip-hop, before the track suddenly swerves towards 90s house two minutes in. This is one of those irresistible songs that ends sounding nothing like it started – and begs to be replayed. Tshepo Mokoena
