Okay so I'm starting this early as I image it will take awhile to write, and you may cry madness! Why on earth start a year end list when there are still six months left? Well you'd be right, it's pretty dumb especially as four lads from Sheffield called the Arctic something or others have a new album on route. But I'm making an early start and it's always free to be ammendend. I'll certianly save the Singles List till the very end. I'll reposted the finished article (with ammendments) at christmas time to see how things have changed.
Keep in mind this is my list! I will try to be fair, I haven't listened to every album of the last ten years, and I will certianly pick albums that mean the most to me, but I while endeavour to pick not simply the artistically best album but also the most important, culturally, and those whose infulence spreads far and beyond their immediate peers. Also Historical significance will factor hugely, I'm sure that will give away at least two of the picks.
100. The Ringleader of The Tormentors - Morrissey
(Sanctuary Records 2005, Tony Visconti)
Just incase you weren't 100% sure whose list this is we start with a Morrissey record. The first decade of the noughties marked the triumphant return of Morrissey with I Am The Quarry he was welcomed with open arms and came out firing with two of his greatest ever singles Irish Blood and First Of The Gang. Yet it was not a great album, filler surrounding great singles, Ringleader was the first good album of his return, with lush operatic arrangements as seen on the blugdening Life Is A Pigsty, and some awesome singles most prominently You Have Killed Me. The album hung together nicely, and was suitably over the top, seeing Morrissey exploring themes of sex "I have explosive kegs betwixt my legs", funny stuff. A classic no, but the return to form of a nation treasure.
99. Vida La Vida Or Death And All His Friends - Coldplay
(Parlephone 2008, Brian Eno)
This was a tough call, I left out alot of albums, good albums, to give Vida La Vida its place, but ultimately it came down to a shoot out between U2's No Line and this album, and Coldplay won out. The two albums draw parrell not just because they have the same producer but because both albums showed two of the World's biggest bands attempting to flex their creative muscles, but not too much. Coldplay won out, because Vida La Vida was braver, bolder and frankly much more exciting. It had big arrangements with strings, african drums and a noticable lack of guitar hooks. But for all there experimentation their still the syrupy songwriters who brought us the limp but massively popular X & Y and Chris Martin just can't help but write huge pop songs. They may be chessey but unlike U2 they've shown genuinely revolutionary spirit and I'd rather hear Vida La Vida and Violet Hill anyday than anything by the fucking Script.
98. Only By The Night - Kings Of Leon
(RCA 2008, Jaquire King & Angelo Petragalia)
Here we have the first album that I don't particularly like that's made the top 100, infact it may be the only album I'm not a fan of in the list. However no top 100 list could be complete without it. This was the album that took all the hard work of the three previous efforts, which had got steadily more superb with each and every release, and turned Kings Of Leon into the biggest band in the world. Effectively this album turned King's of Leon from the Southern Strokes/Pixies (Strokies?) into U2. Oozing with massive stadium sized anthems Sex On Fire, Use Somebody, Crawl, etc... Whether they will continue to rule the world and slide artistically remains to be seen but this is the moment Kings Of Leon became a big fucking deal, and your kid sister probably started listening to them.
97. Vol. 3: The Subliminal Verses - Slipknot
(RoadRunner 2004, Rick Rubin)
Okay come in close, real close, no closer than that, yeah that's close enough, I'm going to whisper something your not supposed to say. Do you know why Slipknot started making geniunely Great albums not just Great Metal albums? *hushed tones* It's because Corey releasized that Stone Sour had what Slipknot lacked, yep that's right, Stone Sour made Slipknot great. Now luckily I'm only friends with one gerson who really likes metal so I shouldn't have too many death threats. By taking the formulae of Iowa a step forward bringing the mainstream gleam of Stone Sour's clear reverses and huge choruses, to Slipknots insane aggresion and mental rhythm section, Slipknot created a world straddling monster in Subliminal Verses. It's Slipknot's Black Album and their second best. The album is loaded with, whisper it, pop gems and festival favorites (The Blister Exists, Duality, Before I Forget, Vermillion Part 2). Good by Rap-Metal fad hello Superstardom!
96. Death Magnetic - Metallica
(Warner Bros. 2008, Rick Rubin)
We've already had one album on this list that saw the return of a musical hero, Morrissey went away, we realized we sorely missed him, and he reminded us why we loved him in the first place. This is Metallica's come back album, problem is....Metallica never went away. They just got shit, really really shit, they literally did everything a credible metal band should not do. The Black Album was fine it was their moment in the sun, however everything that follows just got steadily more embarsing culminating in the Some Kind Of Monster Movie. Thankfully Rick Rubin got his hands on Metallica, there hectic lives chilled out and they got back to doing what they do best, thrashing on guitar. Rick told them to remember what it felt like after Ride The Lightening when they were still hungry. As a result we got a mid life crisis album four men trying to recapture their youth, its hit and miss, but it's solo rific, thank you Kirk, and it gave us two new Metallica classic singles The Day That Never Comes and the awesome but silly All Nightmare Long. Shame about the awful title.
95. Black Holes And Revelations - Muse
(Helium 3 2006, Rich Costley)
I have no idea why but I kept trying to find ways to keep this album off the list, despite the fact that it's clearly better than the previous five records, even though it turned Muse into stadium rock gods, was loaded with great singles and huge bombastic tunes. Problem is this record is amazing live, it's just a bit meh on record. I was considering Year Zero, The Slip, Hail Destroyer and The Coral for this slot but when it came down to it I thought about this album, its just too big, too good, to be left off my list, despite the gag reflex triggering Invincible and the Depeche mode mining Map Of Problamatique, despite the fact that Matt Bellamy is still wailing on about the apocalsypse, and despite the fact that as every album pases we realize that Muse will never be as good on record as Radiohead, they are leagues apart. Then it came to me, I summed it up so suncinctly, the reason why I should stop dithering and include this album, its just so simple......it fucking Rocks!
94. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
(XL 2008, Rostam Batmanglij)
Don't you just want to hate the Vampire Weekend, there so fucking annoying, critical darlings, A-Punk would never get off the TV and the Radio and then they fucking re-released it. They look so lame yet everyone finds them so cool, don't you just want to punch them? Then you think about it, you listen to the album again, and you remember why you and everyone else fell in love with them in the first place. You want to hate them but you can't, it's just a lovely album, and that's the word, it's not rock and roll, but it's not puss-rock, it's just a lovely peice of music from start to finish. Ultimately Vampire Weekend is the cute girl in the high school movie, she's gorgeous, nice to everyone, works for charities, helps old people against the road, you want to hate her so much but then you realize hang on, she's actually a nice person, I'm being a total dick. I'll say it one more time a lovely record topped off by the beautiful single and stunning video for Oxford Comma now lie down on the beach, enjoy and let summer and all your troubles pass you by.
93. Someone To Drive You Home - The Long Blondes
(Rough Trade 2006, Erol Alkan & Steve McKay)
NME have a knack of hyping bands to the moon for no real reason then canning them in reviews and pretending like it never happened. Long Blondes got the hype, got a great review, but then faded and never really caught fire. This is a great shame as their debut offering was a sublime slice of indy pop awesomeness, full of sweet pop songs with great hooks and subtle songwritting. The Long Blondes fleetingly felt like the heirs to Pulp with their down to earth love and lust songwritting. Unfortunately the Blondes have disappeared and never got the popularity this superbly crafted debut deserved, but those lucky enough to believe the hype have a collection of twelve prestine pop songs. For Tweleve tracks Kate Jackson was the love child of Jarvis Cocker and Deborah Harry.
92. Future Sex/Love Sounds - Justin Timberlake
(Jive 2006, Timberland & Rick Rubin)
Now is this album technically worthy of the 100? Well that's debateable but I say hell yes. Regardless this album is too important not to include, because this is the decade when pop music went from the cringe inducing embarssement 90s (see Steps, S Club, Spice Girls) to creative critical awesomeness. It would be ludicrious to review this decade without a Timberland record, he shaped America pop music like no other this decade, he's faded dramatically and seems bereft of ideas now but back in 2006 he hit his creative peak with the best American Pop Artist of his generation. Of course this album is loaded with filler, it's a pop album
for god sake, but it's sexy, sleek, it doesn't overstay its welcome, its subversive and vital. The title track says it all, it's got a funky arse creative beat, it's dripping with cool and Justin Timberlake is singing like a sex offender. The pinnacle of US pop music.
91. Alright, Still - Lily Allen
(Regal 2004, Mark Ronson)
It's kind of poetic justice that these two albums ended up side by side, as I'd just talked about the pinnacle of US pop and their revolution, now it's time for the UK revolution that totally dwarfes Beyonce and Timberlake. Little miss Allen changed everything with this album, its hard to talk about this album without falling into cliche but Lily in one fail swoop became the Bob Dylan of the Asbo generation. High praise indeed, but this album is vital, it killed the warbling bollocks of Pop Idol dead in its tracks. Here is a girl who writes her own songs, with incredibly witty and socially cutting
lyrics, this isn't a album of great singles, this is an album that people in particularly girls 14-25 can relate to, it's their lives.
The album is full of cynicism but its anything but cynical, this album is genuine and right on the money. It opened the door for a plethora of imiators some good some not so good. Lily Allen was to Pop music what the Strokes were to rock. Critically this album is full of flaws, and some duff tracks (Take What You Take) but this was a wake up call to every pop singer young and old, the rule book had just been torn up and rewritten. Not her best work but the spark that started the fire, rest assured we'll be seeing Lily again on this list.
End of Part One....should be an interesting comment section if anyone disagrees, but then again there are 90 more to come so no moaning yet.
0 comments:
Post a Comment