#100 - Transference by Spoon
#99 - Something For Everybody by Devo
#98 - Burners by Robedoor
#97 - Wake Up by John Legend & The Roots
#96 - Lucky Shiner by Gold Panda
#95 - The ArchAndroid by Janelle Monae
#94 - Fang Island by Fang Island
#93 - Graphic As A Star by Josephine Foster
#92 - LP4 by Ratatat
#91 - Thin Thin Line by Kath Bloom
#90 - Cerulean by Baths
#89 - Cosmogramma by Flying Lotus
#88 - Revenue Retrievin': Day/Night Shift by E-40
#87 - I See The Sign by Sam Amidon
#86 - Wilderness Heart by Black Mountain
#85 - Alive As You Are by Darker My Love
#84 - Dirty South Dance 2 by A-Trak
#83 - Jet Lag by Josiah Wolf
#82 - Autre Ne Veut by Autre Ne Veut
#81 - King Of The Beach by Wavves
#80 - The Sellout by Macy Gray
#79 - Bears, Mayors, Scraps & Bones by Cancer Bats
#78 - Maniac Meat by Tobacco
#77 - Genuine Negro Jig by Carolina Chocolate Drops
#76 - Freiland Klaviermusik by Wolfgang Voigt
#75 - Everything In Between by No Age
#74 - Nothing Hurts by Male Bonding
#73 - Crystal Castles (II) by Crystal Castles
#72 - Further by The Chemical Brothers
#71 - Majesty & Decay by Immolation
#70 - Heaven Is Whenever by The Hold Steady
#69 - Phosphene Dream by The Black Angels
#68 - The Social Network (OST) by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross
#67 - The Brutalist Bricks by Ted Leo And The Pharmacists
#66 - Allo Darlin' by Allo Darlin'
#65 - God Willin' & The Creek Don't Rise by Ray Lamontagne & Pariah Dogs
#64 - Tall Hours In The Glowstream by Cotton Jones
#63 - Crush by Abe Vigoda
#62 - Blue Giant by Blue Giant
#61 - Scratch My Back by Peter Gabriel
#60 - Leave Your Sleep by Natalie Merchant
Two discs of poetry, nursery rhymes and lullabies. It's difficult to take in all at once, but at times it's hard to shake the idea that this is what Merchant's voice was made for.
#59 - Golden Archipelago by Shearwater
#58 - Crazy For You by Best Coast
#57 - Forget by Twin Shadow
#56 - The House by Katie Melua
#55 - Swim by Caribou
#54 - Black Noise by Pantha Du Prince
#53 - Lisbon by The Walkmen
#52 - Stone Temple Pilots by Stone Temple Pilots
#51 - The Guitar Song by Jamey Johnson
Perhaps more than any other genre, country music albums are notorious for their filler. Not so here. At 25 songs, this wealth of new-traditionalist country, with occasional outlaw tendencies, should go far in persuading the anti-country crowd to come home to roost.
#50 - Abuse by Wormrot
The owner of record label Earache downloaded this Singapore grindcore band's album illegally, and was so impressed he signed them. Take that RIAA!!!!! Would you care to hear a blast beat cover of "Rich" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs done in 45 seconds? It's on here. Plus, they make me think of Discordance Axis, which can never be a bad thing.
#49 - Grinderman 2 by Grinderman
Nick Cave's side-project at times rivals his work with The Bad Seeds. Much tighter than their debut, Cave snarls, spits and howls with a ferocity rarely seen since the 90's. In album highlight "Kitchenette," Cave's libertine come-on to a housewife, he is at his most lascivious, but that's why we all love him in the first place.
#48 - Teflon Don by Rick Ross
Former Miami correctional facility employee and apologist Rick Ross trims the fat (sic) and drops his leanest (sic) and most focused album to date. On Teflon Don Ross finally discovers irony - a necessity to overcome rap mediocrity - woven throughout eleven tracks of shameless boasting. But somehow it all works really really well.
#47 - Treats by Sleigh Bells
The cover shows a tower pyramid of cheerleaders with all of their faces scratched out. You ain't kidding. Melding riffs from power metal and punk, with hip-hop beats and an ex-teen girl band vocalist makes for one of the more original and indelible listens of the year. The 32 minutes fly by, but you'll be pounding your fists and cheering long after.
#46 - Sisterworld by Liars
"I found her with my scissors...I drag her body to the parking lot." And so begins New York post-punker's Liars' fifth album, possibly the weirdest thing you'll hear all year. A dramatic change in style from their debut, a la Radiohead and Kid A, be warned, repeated listens increasingly reward and unsettle.
#45 - Band Of Joy by Robert Plant
Plant follows his Grammy winning folk rock record with Alison Krauss...with THIS folk rock record of, um, covers. Was he playing it safe? Perhaps. What did he accomplish? Only the modern-day standard, the mothership of covers albums; the best of its breed since Willie's Stardust, and that's good company. I can't ever to listen to the originals again.
#44 - Volume Two by She & Him
Oh Zooey. You practically steal The Happening and (500) Days of Summer. And then you transport me to a 50's malt shoppe in my headphones. Your quirkiness effortlessly informs the austerity with which you croon, over splendid M Ward melodies that I just cannot stop humming. By Volume 3 you just might outdo your husband's band.
#43 - Plastic Beach by Gorillaz
Damon Albarn, I mean 2D, trades monster singles for a monster album, and the best Gorillaz offering to date. There's no "Dare" or "Feel Good Inc." on here, but then there's no "Fire...Monkey's Head either." Just a surprisingly consistent and textured electro-hip-hop gem. Oh, it has Bobby Womack too. Blur who?
#42 - Almost Everything I Wish I'd Said The Last Time I Saw You by Wakey! Wakey!
Maybe I should start watching One Tree Hill, if music like this is on it. Channeling the nineties as if his life depended on it, one-man band Mike Grubbs one-ups his influences by not wasting a single solitary second with filler. Who knew I had to wait 20 years for the decade's best alternative pop rock album?
#41 - Shut Up, Dude & Sit Down, Man by Das Racist
Seemingly without agenda and depth of meaning, atypical Brooklyn trio Das Racist dropped 37 tracks over two mixtapes, spitting the most hilarious, intelligent rhymes of the year. Empirical raps, dripping with irony, erudition, and hyperliterate cultural references, let you take away what you will. Plus they are 50 cents.
#40 - Black City by Matthew Dear
The best album of the last twenty years David Bowie never made. Electronic avant-garde pop DJ Dear has finally crafted an album for the foreground, but it might take you a while. Elastic beats, synth-pop, and dark vocals woven into a microhouse fabric makes for a dark, enchanting listen.
#39 - Our Inventions by Lali Puna
A month ago this was a lot farther down. But every time I listen (it has become the soundtrack to my dreams) it creeps up a little further. Everything on here you've heard before. But with each spin, I feel, not only at home, but completely safe, bathed in a warm, rapturous, mid-tempo sonic blanket. What it lacks in brilliance, it achieves in radiance.
#38 - After by Ihsahn
Scandinavian black metal pioneer Ihsahn completes his trilogy with this rather uncategorizable offering. Elegiac, sweeping, majestic, epic, and jazzy??!?! Post-Opeth, the first adjectives are all acceptable now. But bursts of saxophone catapult this maestro into new realms of progressive metal.
#37 - Love Remains by How To Dress Well
Like a flashlight haze through negative space, occasionally finding and highlighting rock-solid, raw emotion, How To Dress Well surround us in lo-fi, overmodulated vocals, and otherworldly textures and soundscapes, creating one of the most seductively haunting albums of the year.
#36 - Learning by Perfume Genius
If Jamie Stewart had the chance to score a David Lynch film it might sound like this. One man, one out of tune piano, sparse orchestrations, and the most hauntingly gorgeous album of the year. "Mr. Petersen," about a relationship with a HS teacher, does not judge or condemn, merely relates. Learning indeed.
#35 - The Union by Elton John & Leon Russell
There is Tumbleweed Connection, and there is The Union. And then there's all that stuff in between. Elton retuns to his blues rock roots, and as far as I'm concerned can stay there. Anyone who thinks he is adult contemporary, listen up. This man is a rock 'n roll god.
#34 - Love King by The Dream
The sequencing on this album is phenomenal. Listen how "Sex Intelligent" leads into "Sex Intelligent (remix)." Without a track of filler, the second chapter of The-Dream's Love Trilogy is some of the smoothest, most catchy R&B around. And makes you realize just how awful Prince is these days.
#33 - The Wild Hunt by The Tallest Man On Earth
Guttural, primal, thoroughly organic, and full of timeless melodies that make you forget it's just a guy and a guitar. Traditional singer/songwriter structure with progressive folk leanings from a man who is not even thirty-years-old. "King of Spain" is one of the greatest songs ever recorded.
#32 - I'm New Here by Gil-Scott Heron
The spoken word/street poet's first album in sixteen years refuses to find this venerable icon behind the times. Forcing folk, poetry and glitch together, sometimes into the same track, creates a tension which contrasts the poignant way he flips a stereotype of a broken home into an ode to the strong women who raised him.
#31 - Write About Love by Belle & Sebastian
Like watching a Merchant/Ivory film from the nineties, B & S deliver another seemingly effortless, enthralling work of art. They stick pretty close to their formula, but they absolutely nail it over an eleven-song-cycle about love lost, found, bitter, sweet, immersive, alienating, sarcastic and trenchant.
#30 - Go by Jonsi
You can't blame Sigur Ros frontman for wanting to rock out a little, and explore 3:30 minute song structures, as he does on his debut. With Earth-friendly lyrical themes, the real beauty here is his succulent voice, icelandic English, and the way the spiritous, almost tribal drums and accompaniment seem to embody mother nature herself.
#29 - The Fool by Warpaint
The best bands can conjure the most unexpected meanings out of simple lyrics. Just when I think I have this all-girl, gothic, art rock four piece from L.A. all figured out, they switch things up, with tricky time signatures, odd tempo drumming, or by changing vocalists. Influences like The Cure show strong in their brooding, enchanting, harrowing debut LP.
#28 - Body Talk by Robyn
Show this girl some love. With no less than three EPs dropped in 2010, this "best of" collection of cuts from each of them captures Robyn putting the "dance" into dancehall. Her unique style of techno-pop delivers 14 club (and road trip) ready tracks. Do yourself a favor and check out the EPs for the songs missing from here.
#27 - Sea Of Cowards by The Dead Weather
"Shake your hips like battleships. All the white girls trip when I sing at Sunday service," spits Jack White with the band that is quickly making The White Stripes his side-project. But he mostly takes backseat to Mosshart, who leads this fuzzed-out, dirty, garage rock revival like a champion.
#26 - Heartland by Owen Pallett
Multi-instrumentalist Pallett is like a baroque Sufan Stevens. Though Pallett tends to have a more confrontational theological subtext, his masterful arrangements just become more inviting as they become more ornate.
#25 - Blackjazz by Shining
The most fun I had all year listening to a metal album. It draws from industrial, black, and avant-garde metal, but the real fun starts with the horns kick in. Unlike anything you have ever heard before. Pure chaos in album form; this would sound unbelievable live. Oh and they do a cover of 21st Century Schizoid Man (the 2nd time this song appears on this list.)
#24 Halcyon Digest by Deerhunter
Self-described ambient-punk band, Deerhunter achieves timelessness with this artistic breakthrough. Just don't mistake their cover for Antony & The Johnsons, though their music evokes a similar sadness and nostalgia, which Cox has stated, refers to the way we edit our memories to be how we want to remember things. I wonder if he's seen Lost Highway.
#23 - The Age Of Adz by Sufjan Stevens
Speaking of Sufjan...I was upset to hear that he hadn't followed up Illinoise with a soundtrack to another one of the 50 states...upset for as long as "Futile Devices" lasted. A radical departure for Stevens, off the heels of the brilliant "All Delighted People," culminates in a 25 minute epic bursting with musical innovation. He's not f--king around.
#22 - Homeland by Laurie Anderson
"O Superman" is one of the ten best songs ever recorded. 28 years later she's still got it. A performance art piece turned album, of mostly critical shots at the prior administration, Anderson's at-times abstract poetry is brutal and unflinching, but always revelatory, having never lost her sardonic wit.
#21 - Hidden by These New Puritans
Experimental art-rock album made up of moments. Each track is either a moment, or a bridge between moments, like eleven mini-soundtracks to the best trailers never made. The label's press release says the album includes 6 foot Japanese Taiko drums, a 13 piece brass and woodwind ensemble, a children’s choir, and Foley recording techniques.
#20 - The Foundling by Mary Gauthier
A very personal, autobiographical, folk-country concept album of life as an orphan, and of confronting your birth mother decades later. Gauthier's imagery is some of the most poetic ever put to music, with feelings of lameness manifested as hurricane winds, nightclub singers, and walking into a river until your hat floats away.
#19 - Interpreting The Masters Vol. 1 by The Bird And The Bee
Endlessly listenable, and even better than the originals. Why? All but one song is a note for note, vocal inflection for inflection, perfect replication of a Hall & Oates' hit single. Inara George doesn't even change pronouns, efforlessly crooning over Kurstin's loungy electro-pop. I can't think of better musical respect paid.
#18 - What Is Love? by Never Shout Never
Bright Eyes meets Justin Bieber!! Go ahead and laugh, but at 19, for his age, Christofer Drew Ingle has crafted something near-perfect and untouchable. An album of completely frank, gut-wrenching teenage honesty, AND irresistable melodies. Most artists would be lucky to nail one aspect, and sadly (for him) he will never be able to repeat.
#17 - The Suburbs by Arcade Fire
The worst Arcade Fire album. That should say something. After months of deriding its lofty pretentions, big sounds, and claims on the U2 and Coldplay torch, it finally wore me down. While I'm not sure this album draws any conclusions I can't reach myself by going to Wal-Mart, this is a massive album from a group that will soon either explode, or implode.
#16 - Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son Of Chico Dusty by Big Boi
Another foray into the pimp lifestyle by 1/2 of Outkast, but still fresh as can be. There isn't a syllable in the English language Big Boi cannot cram into a rhyme, and this should lay to rest once and for all that he is just that guy with Andre whatshisname. Danceable, uncompromising, and extremely proficient.
#15 - How I Got Over by The Roots
Man I miss Tribe Called Quest. Jimmy Fallon's house band recalls them like nothing before. Sampling Monsters of Folk and Joanna Newsom may give them hipster cred, but the economy and focus and instrumentation of this masterpiece is what makes this the best album they have ever released...and the only reason I watch Jimmy Fallon. Philly represent.
#14 - Astro Coast by Surfer Blood
Surfer punk and indie rock collide amidst Weezer-esque (Pinkerton-era) pop culture proclamations ranging from wrestling metaphors, to awkward sexual advances on the couch while watching David Lynch's Twin Peaks. The band to watch in 2011. Slightly harder and less produced than Vampire Weekend, but just as much chemistry.
#13 - Contra by Vampire Weekend
"In December..." Speaking of VW, this January release kept me singing the whole year. These Ivy League bandmates have a wicked ear for instrumentation and melody, eschewing the traditional sophmore slump, and turning indie rock on its ear by drawing from vast musical styles. A complete bar-raise from their debut, sans the pigeonholing. "...drinking horchata."
#12 - Recovery by Eminem
His first album that has not cracked my yearly top ten, and his first non-concept release. While nowhere near as indelible or classic as The MM LP or The Eminem Show, these 17 of the 44 tracks the rapper has released in little over one year, maintain his reigning position as one of, if not the, most technically proficient and breathtaking in the game.
#11 - Together You And I by Barton Carroll
Folk music doesn't get any more straight-forward, earnest, or obdurate as this. Completely unpretentious and unstylized, Carroll has crafted ten perfect melodies, with pitch-perfect harmonization, and lyrics that manage to be both playful and cynical, sometimes at the same time. Sometimes mastering the basics IS an improvement on them.
Countdown EXTRA
Apollo Kids by Ghostface Killah was released too late for consideration on this list, but it more than earns its place there, knocking Spoon off. Don't let the recycled title and horrible cover art fool you, this is pure Ghost, and his best album since his masterpiece, Fishscale. Thankfully, more hip-hop than Ghostdini, Tony Starks proves the best street storyteller around.
Countdown EXTRA
I didn't get around to listening to this album until it was too late for inclusion on this list, but it deserves to be on here, knocking Devo off. Bar none, the best black metal album I have heard all year. This French band completes its trilogy of albums about God, Satan and Man, with this blistering, alive, raw, complex song cycle that never lets up.
#10 - Micah P. Hinson & The Pioneer Saboteurs
I can't believe this has not been released in the states yet. Whatever frontier these pioneers inhabit, it is near the end of the world. Gothic, romantic, apocalyptic country - side A has the most gorgeous music you'll hear. Each song teems with consequences, vividly delineating a world where emotion isn't the answer, it just raises the stakes.
#09 - There Is Love In You by Four Tet
Electronic art and IDM; either you like it or you don't. But while "Angel Echoes" kicks things off pleasant enough, at some point during "Love Cry," Kieran Hebden finds the perfect beat, layers the perfect textures, and drives this electronic art into my very being, taking over. This isn't wallpaper...it is like pure intellect delivered in sound waves.
#08 - Teen Dream by Beach House
See how many times you repeat "Zebra" before letting the whole album play. It's easier the second time, as each song slowly reveals itself. Dream pop duo transfoms themselves on their third album, stepping up their songcraft with endless hooks and wisely replacing their trademark shoegaze reverb with the clarity of lush, idyllic soundscapes and textures.
#07 - This Is Happening by LCD Soundsystem
The dance album of the year. One man whirlwind James Murphy is responsible for nearly every single sound heard in this sweeping 80 minute masterpiece. Layered grooves adorn kitschy, hyper-observant lyrics laced with irony, producing a relentlessly seductive club banger that somehow manages to come across both coy, and wicked cool.
#06 - The Monitor by Titus Andronicus
In the Civil War the USS Monitor and Virginia became the first ironclad battleships to engage in combat, ending in a tie. Now, imagine this as a metaphor for a doomed relationship, and 13th Gen. suburban angst, against guitar-driven indie rock, rooted in New Jersey/New England local color. A truly one-of-a-kind concept album. A monolithic achievement.
#05 - Have One On Me by Joanna Newsom
If I said this 120 min long, 3x LP work was recorded by an acclaimed folk singer/songwriter harpist, would you need to be further persuaded? I don't blame you...it certainly is not something you would put on at any old time. Until you listen to it. Then it becomes this big, baroque, masterful, comforting, inviting necessity for any music lover.
#04 - Welder by Elizabeth Cook
The best country album in almost ten years. Cook's extreme nasal twang ironically makes her too country for the Wal-Mart crowd, which figures, but is shameful because there are at least six solid hits waiting on this album. She mines depths of emotion I never thought possible in country music, with lyrics both intimately personal, and wildly imaginative.
#03 - High Violet by The National
An album to wallow in, alone, with all regrets, questions, and worries piled, threatening to drown you. Airtight melodies, explosive band chemistry, deep, brooding, but ultimately comforting lead vocals, and universal soul-searching lyrical themes and imagery. The album of The National's career, and the best friend around that will fit in your mp3 player.
#02 - Queen Of Denmark by John Grant
I purposely haven't used the adjective "beautiful" yet, the only word for this out-of-nowhere triumph. 70'sish light rock, classic orchestral arrangements by Midlake, and ingenious lyricism cast in a new light themes of sexual identity, drug addiction, alienation, and the death of love. The album Rufus Wainwright has been trying to make for ten years.
#01 - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy by Kanye West
This juggernaut is nothing less than a 21st Century Pet Sounds. Flawlessly executed and sequenced, West's vision is so singular, so focused in its exhumation of braggadocio atrophying into insecurity and regret, that it easily becomes the only rap album in music history to cut this close to the bone of the human condition. But is it really a rap album? Take a look at the album's credits sometime; "All Of The Lights" has most of the record industry on it. Sampling or incorporating just about every genre in music history, it can be argued that West has created his own, and the stylistic contradictions endlessly play off each other, beginning with Nicki Minaj reciting Roald Dahl's twisted version of "Cinderella," and culminating with stand-up comedian Chris Rock acting out the album's bleakest, most misogynistic moment. Put your headphones on for this. Not a second is wasted in pushing you towards the edge West is already teetering on. This music is life itself. The most passionate, organic, artistic expression in popular music I think I have ever heard. Every MC gives everything they've got, and Minaj's career turn in "Monster" will never be topped for as long as humans have ears. I used to think Late Registration was the bomb. MBDTF is the nuclear fallout, and the pop music landscape will never be the same; the bar is now set to unreachable heights. Marshall Mathers, Jay-Z, Outkast, etc, your albums have all been bested. Go buy the album.
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