Daveportivo's Cultural Evaluation Facility

Okay I have to admit due to a snafu with my list where I had the same Kanye West album in two different places the Rapture ended up a little higher than I expected. Now while musical this album is a long way from the top thirty, in terms of influence it stands head and shoulders above its peers. The noughties were an interesting decade for rock music, as via the medium of indie they managed to concur the radio, the tv, your record collection but also thanks in large part to the Rapture rock and roll once again took hold of the dance floors. Bands remembered its just as much fun to dance as it is to mosh. While the Rapture weren't the finished article they were the pioneers and effectively slapped the entire world in the face with a wet tuna when they dropped House Of Jealous Lovers in 2002. It's odd, that track sounds kind of formulaic and even dated today but in 2002 there was nothing else like it. They brought the beats and hooks of dance and combined it with the bite of rock music. Repeating the lead vocal over and over like a Daft Punk record. How exactly did the Rapture get ahead of the game? Well you only have to look at the production team DFA basically James Murphy & Tim Goldsworthy and as we well know everything that James Murphy touches turns to awesome and immediately sounds fresh and different. Ultimately that's what the Rapture were in 2003 they were fresh, and they were different. You can hear Murphy's touches across the album on the hypnotic I Need Your Love and even on the downbeat Open Up Your Heart which feels like the forerunner of New York I Love You. Everything about the Rapture's trademark sound, the yelping vocals, the looping precussion, the spiky guitars and of course the grooves have all been assimilated and bettered, but Echoes is where it all began. So if your looking at your scenester record collection and you see Friendly Fires, Foals or Passion Pit, stop thinking your record collection is so cool and brave because it isn't. It took balls for the Rapture to do it 2003, it took balls for Franz to take it mainstream, these days Foals are about as exciting and creative as the Pigeon Detectives just no one has the balls to say it. So thank you Rapture, we may not love you, but we owe you a great debt of thanks, you taught the rock and roll world how to dance again, without having to sound like the acid wankery of the *shudder* Happy Mondays. As if we didn't owe New York enough already this decade.

So thanks to our previous entry rock was fully embedded on our nations dancefloors but by 2006/07 it was all getting a bit stale, everything was sounding too similar we needed something new. The Rapture faded away, and Franz strayed from the dance floors to the festival fields. Enter Klaxons, they brought a drug fueled D.I.Y ethic to the table. They were different, just like the Rapture before them, they looked different, covered in crazy hoodiest, whack nineties T shirts and day glo colours, and best of all they sounded different taking a love of early nineties rave records they streamlined it and created Nu-Rave, it wasn't all that new it was basically fast punk guitars with sirens and bleeps, but in 2006 it sounded like Klaxons had come from some underground super club on the planet Glagemek. Klaxons brought more than just funky danceable music they had the coolest vocals, a combination of sci fi crooning, cultist chanting and desperate punk screams, it was brilliant. No band since Franz had arrived with such a huge set of sure fire dancefloor slayers Atlantis To Interzone was the frantic crazy first and last word on Nu-Rave, Gravity's Rainbow was their trademark epic, Golden Skans was their etherial hands in the air moment, Magick was Interzone Mark II the agressive dance floor killer and of course their was the sublime reworking of It's Not Over Yet one of the truly great covers. However the Klaxons were determined to stay one step ahead, and knew they had to outgrow the scene they had created and raise above, that's why sure fire stompers like their cover of The Bouncer were dropped. Instead big bouncy numbers like Totem On A Time Line, the apocalypitic punk of Four Horsemen and the gloriously ludicrious death march of Isle Of Her made the cut. Klaxons never really were Nu-Rave, that happened to be something they stumbled accross on there way to stardom. Klaxons were just too creative, they exude big brave music, you could create a new concept or scene out of each track on the album. Ultimately whatever comes next for Klaxons they will always be remembered for Myths Of The Near Future the minute they took the conventions of pop music, and hell the conventions of what we thought we knew about Klaxons, and span them around and around so fast we lost all sight of where we started, we just knew that we'd arrived somewhere new, and somewhere from which there could be no return.

By the end of the 90s weren't you just begging for someone anyone to knock U2 of there little perch, since Achtung Baby they'd just been writing the most boring uninteresting music imaginable and getting grammy's and awards no matter how uninspiring their work was. Thankfully Parachutes had been the warning shot, and now with A Rush Of Blood To The Head Coldplay were coming for U2's crown of stadium rulers of rock and rolls. Now in 2009 the world seems right again we have Muse, Kings Of Leon, Killers and Coldplay ruling the stadium scene, but back in 2002 it really did seem like no one would be able to displace U2. However, when that first drum beat and then the huge jangling riff of In My Place kicked in we new Coldplay had done it. They had struck the perfect balence, the one U2 used to toe so well, between huge wide screen pop music and brutally honest music. There's just something so believeable about Chris Martin's voice when he croons "I Was Scared, I Was Scared, I Was Tired And Underprepared"

your inclined to believe him. Whereas when Bono sings the big emtoional chorus you feel like he's shooting for a vodaphone comercial or the soundtrack to match of the day. When Coldplay presented this album to their label they must have been licking there lips, almost every track was perfectly suited to a multi million selling single. Obviously there was the Clocks, In My Place, God Put A Smile Upon Your Face and of course the magnificent The Scientist which remains Coldplay's greatest single. However, the thudding pounding opener Politik with its gorgeously upfront lyrics and simple hook could have been released. Then there's the big wide screen festival field filling majesty of Daylight and of course the sure fire single that never was in the lovely Warning Sign. What makes Coldplay so great and so bloody popular is their honesty. Chris Martin is a clever bloke, and Coldplay are clearly a clever band, but when it comes to songwritting they are straightforward, blunt and honest. Chris Martin will never be acused of being Morrissey but sometimes being direct is more powerful and potent than witty wordplay ever can be. The sentiment is simple but when Chris Martin crooned "Yeah The Truth Is, That I Missed You, So" hearts melted accross the world. A Rush Of Blood To The Head proved that the best music doesn't have to be as witty as an Oscar Wilde play and it doesn't have to aim to save the world, sometimes a sentiment as simple as "I love you" sung beautifully with a delicate arrangement is all you need.

The career of the Red Hot Chili Peppers will always be one of the most remarkable in pop history. Listening to the slap bass bollocks they released throughout the eighties its amazing that they are now one of the world's biggest bands that your mum and your little sister will happily listen to. They started out so counter culture, so drug riddled so crazy and now their so huge, uplifting and well mainstream. While the previous three phrases would have most running for cover and uttering the phrase sold out, this was never true of the Chilli Peppers, they simply aged an matured from party animals to mature rock stars. Age has suited them splendidly. There zaniness makes them stand out from the likes of U2 and Coldplay but it no longer drives away fans. Large thanks has to go to Rick Rubin who on Blood Sugar Sex

Magic saw there potential, and with By The Way he not only crafted there best album but there most popular to boot. This was the moment when the Chilli's really got their sound under control By The Way and Can't Stop are huge bouncy radio killers, that appeal to everyone becuase they rock hard but have killer sugar sweet hooks, its a tough trick to pull off, and yet they still feature Antony's silly rapping and Flea's slap bass, yet it just feels right. While those tracks are immediate thrills the album really hits its peak when the Chilli's are writing huge wide screen anthems that feel like they are booming out from the top of mount everest. The three punch combo of This Is The Place, Dosed and Don't Forget Me are irresistable. John's guitar playing is just sublime, from the subtle bits to the huge soaring riffs that accompany the chorus, it's spot on, and Antony's songwriting is at its most elloquent and beautiful, Dosed and Don't Forget Me can stand shoulder to shoulder with Under The Bridge. It's amazing how this abbrasive drug feuled punk has become a soulful emotional songwriter. It's the slow epic stuff that steals the show, but its nicely counter balenced by fun summertime anthems Cabron and On Mercury. While the Chilli's will always divide critical opinion By The Way will always stand as their greatest album the moment they became genuine mainstream headline superstars, with some momumentally epic songwriting.

It feels wrong to put a greatest hits album in a greatest album list, but in this case it just felt right. Girls Aloud have put out continually excellent albums since their debut, and picking one above the other would be fruitless as after all it is the hits that made Girls Aloud who they are and so damn important. The Sound Of Girls Aloud is ultimately the best collection of pop songs produced this decade, and its a tribute the hit machine that is xenomania that there output has remained so strong. Girls Aloud have continued to compound presumtions by being cooler and better than their peers. Remember when Nu-Rave was big? Well the periods defining track wasn't Atlantis To Interzone it was ridiculously sublime Something Kind Of Oooh. Girls Aloud are least we forget, just a regular bunch of girls. Chosen through the Popstars tv series, god that seems along time ago, and it shows, Sarah Harding is just a rock chick who spends most her time gatted outside of indie clubs, Cheryl is just a semi charming northern oik, and I could go on but you get the point. I think it's this down to earth core that has made them immune to criticism, it gave them legitimate sex appeal rather than plastic coating of photo edit suite, even NME wouldn't dare bash them. So everyone likes them as people, so surely we can rip on their evil pre produced pop music, well no we can't, because they won't ever put a foot wrong, first there was the incredible Sound Of The Underground could there be a better first single? They realized before Mcfly and Busted that to be credible in the post Strokes world you need guitars and damn good songwriting and Girls Aloud came flying out the gate. They of course followed it up with No Good Advice that was just dripping in sex. But they kept evolving, do I even need to describe Love Machine? Honestly, the riff is superb, the kind that used to pop up on Micheal Jackson records and lyrically its a delight. It's not all immediate thrills there's the genius of Biology the best and most intricately crafted pop song of the decade. The only weakness in Girls Aloud were the ballads I'll Stand By You is to soppy and sentimental, Girls Aloud were always best when they were concuring dancefloors with camp club stompers like Jump, The Show and Wake Me Up. It's an absolute war crime that the mind boggling awesome Call The Shots and the divine The Promise came out after this best of, as ideally they'd be front and centre, but it's the only real misfire. This is a historical document of Britian's greatest hit makers, and biggest media pop star icons. This was the decade that pop music was reclaimed from Steps, A1 and the Spice Girls and became cool and credible once more. If I told you in the nineties the winners of Pop Stars would be standing proud atop festival stages without having to dodge a single bottle you'd never have believed me. It's a crazy world where Girls Aloud have more rockstar credibility than My Chemical Romance.

Does anybody really care about Trip Hop anymore? It really was one of those scenes that either you were there and you loved it or it didn't register with you and outside of the name you probably don't even know what it is, if you even know it exists at all. Despite recent albums you don't really hear anyone raving about Tricky or Massive Attack these days, they seem like relics of an older time, trying to get an 16 year old Arctic Monkeys fan to appreciate Massive Attack is...well it is a massive waste of time. However when Portishead announced they would be returning a decade later with a new LP, well then from the darkest depths of your memory came haunting memories of beautiful music and the tender voice of Beth Gibbons. And people were excited again. Because while musical trends will change Portishead and Dummy in particular remained bloody brilliant. But people wouldn't settle for a watered down retred that would ruin all our memories, if a band as serious and big as Portishead were coming back they had to get it right. Just like in the 1990s they had to be new, different, powerful and like nothing we'd ever heard before. Third therefore was a real revelation, it managed to symoltaniously preserve Portishead's legacy and revitalise their sound making them feel vital once more. Machine Gun was our first taste and you'd be forgiven for thinking Portishead had gone industrial, with a pulsating beat, that sounded like a computer malfunctioning and sizzling, and then the error message flashing ten times in rapid order. Wrapped around all the seething electro was Gibbons tender spirit trail vocals, fragile and beautiful, instantly it was more relevant than anything Trent Reznor had done since Portishead were last record. You soon realize that while the music may change Gibbons voice is the constant, and after all it should be, because her voice is what made Portishead so special in the first place and slower tracks (dare I say ballads?) The Rip and Small are of unmatched quality. The later ends up like a 1990s rave dying a slow death, like the fair ground rave from a horror show. The instruments are muffled and unclear for the most part creating a brooding psycheldic effect, almost like a bad trip that your being guided through by Gibbons heavenly vocal. So Portishead are back, they grown and developed, and transitioned to once again be haunting a beautiful. All in all we like Portishead, they dissapear hide in the shadows and just when we need them they emerge out of the deepest darkest depths of our mind with a great album. They will never been mainstream but they have created a unparrelled legacy of artistic quality.

It seems that when ever band threatens to get huge, I mean really big, stadium big, they have to make a choice, after a while of finding their own way and carving out a fan base, they have to make a choice, they can either be U2 or they can be Radiohead. Unfortunately Kings Of Leon chose U2, but I wouldn't have wanted them to pick Radiohead, they should have just chosen to be Kings Of Leon. While I wouldn't try to deny the awesomeness of Sex On Fire, Use Somebody or Crawl, Only By the Night just doesn't have the pizzaz and the awesomeness of Because Of The Times. This was the album that took Kings Of Leon to headline status, let us not forgot, no one knew a word of Sex On Fire when they headlined Glasto or embarssed Razorlight at Reading. This was the sound of a band being themselves. It was hard and gritty but it was equally parts wide screen and epic. There was the monster chant along of On Call that Kings of Leon always threaten to make but then their was the romp and stomp of Black Thumbnail and McFearless. They had the tender tracks too, while it may not be a number one like Use Somebody the beautiful tender Knocked Up showed off just as much soul, and was even more emotional affecting. It still remains the fans favorite when it comes to working the heart strings. Of course it doesn't get much more wide screen that album closer Arizona, this song is fucking huge, the guitar soars like a eagle flying over the vast Arizona desert while Calob howl is at its most fragile and most affecting. Then there was the dirty sexy aggresive groove of My Party with guitars that go from Queens of the Stonage, through Red Hot Chilli Peppers before dropping into classic Leon. Vocally Caleb is on thrilling form, doing his (second) best Pixies impression "You Talking About My Baby / I Could Flip You Upside Down And I could Mop This Place", visceral, funky, vital. Then of course there's Charmer so it owes its entire existance to the Pixies but who cares because this is as good as the quiet loud dymanic gets and Caleb's scream is exhilarating. While I'll settle for Kings of Leon over Stereophonics anyday, a part of me will always wish we could get the multi facet Kings who made Because Of The Times back, whatever happens this was their make it or break it record, and they made it bigger than any of us could of possibly dreamt.

Sometimes you just have to sit up and say "wow" that's beautiful. That was the case for the majority of the record buying population when they first heard Fleet Foxes, The Sun Giant EP or saw a Fleet Foxes liveshow. They are just a band who blow you away and leave you speechless. There's been plenty of Psychedelia in this list already but this is the second "oddball" (I put that in quotes as only idiots think its odd) folk album. Joanna Newsom must be rather annoyed, I bet she didn't think anyone would beat Ys as the most lavish, well arranged, mind blowing folk album of the decade. What makes Fleet Foxes even more remarkable is that not only is it beautiful and unexpected, its so accesible. It's verging on pop without ever really being mainstream. It's amazing to hear a track as lavish and different as White Winter Hymnal forcing its way onto XFM let alone Radio One. When it comes to Fleet Foxes, while the guitar work, piano lines and string arrangements are phenominal and varied (honestly on each track everything is in its right place) it's the vocal harmonizing that is unparrelled. There is no more beautiful sound than when the harmonies combine for a coo or a "oooooh o oooooh" on Heard Them Stirring. There's something very uplifting about this album it soars majestically like the sun shining down on a summers day. Even in a sombre mood, the wood and string arrangements on a track like the opening to Your Protector you can't help but be galvanized by this music, then when the huge sweeping chorus comes in and the rumbling precussion thumbles along your just carried along with it. Fleet Foxes is a remarkable work, the music is so well layered, everything comes in at just the right time, each sweep, scrap, beat or coo, it's lovely. I can't imagine how long it must have taken them to perfect these works, they feel so effortless natural but they can't just make this stuff up on the fly, can they? Fleet Foxes is both thrilling and pleasent, its continually suprising without ever feeling abbrasive, their not dangerous, but their not boring or placid either, then you realize searching for adjectives is pointless as this is rare perfect album. All is how it should be, this is truly a work to be admired.

Okay I'm going to have to hold my hands up I got this one completely wrong. I've got Lily's two album the wrong way around, This should be in the 80s and Alright Still should be just missing out on the top twenty. Ultimately though who cares, because both albums deserve to make the list and it's Allen's overall influence and musical talents that are far far far more important than the individual merits of Lily's albums. It's Not Me, It's You perfectly demostrates one of Lily's absolute greatest skills and what is fast becoming the Lily Allen trademark: Juxtaposition. Yes Juxtaposition, I love that word, basically the secret to Lily Allen is how playful and sweet her voice and her musical arrangements are. Take the brilliant Not Fair Lily sings sweetly and without irony in her voice over a nice cuetsy country stomp, sounds like a nice normal pop romp right? Wrong. Lily takes the sweetness and turns it on its head by singing about such macabre and cycnical themes. "I Lie Here In The Wet Patch In The Middle of The Bed / I'm Feeling Pretty Hard Done By I've Spent Ages Giving Head" not only is that the best cuplet written by a woman in twenty years, it's so devilishly subversive. It's constrasting sugary sweet innocence, with bitter cynicism. Isn't that what girls do best after all? Look completely sweet but then turn out to be as dirty and cynical as any bloke. Could there a better sign of the times than Lily slamming a guy for being the absolute perfect boy friend but being shit in bed so he has to go? Then there's the Fear "I want loads Of Money, And Fuck Loads Of Diamonds / I Here People Die While There Trying To Find Them" while this seems like a straight forward slam of consumerism, it's not its much more subtle, Lily is a self admitted shopaholic and her issues with weight are well known so when she sings "I'm Not A Siant, But I'm Not Sinner / Everythings Cool As Long As I'm Getting Thinner / I Don't Know What's Wrong And What's Right Anymore" it's remarkable asute and open songwriting for someone her age. Its this kind of introspection, and the multiple levels and readings of her songs that make them so brilliant. Funny thing is, I don't think she puts half as much effort into writting them as critics do analysising them, I bet she just opens her mouth and honesty spews out. Kind of like the equally honest anti-Chris Martin. Oh I nearly forgot the songs are catchy as fuck too hence them spending near milleniums in the top ten. Elsewhere Lily's second album both deals with grand themes (God, Growing Old, George Bush) and ones personal to her family and past, it's a brave effort, and whether you give it a critical thumbs up or thumbs down along with Alright Still its a perfect time capusule of our time.

Never has an album had a more appropriate title in music history. When the world final got to hear this record for the first time everyone must have collectively smiled. After all the nerves, fears and panic about this album and how it would turn out, it was like the weight had been lifted off the worlds shoulders when everyone in unison could say it was bloody fantastic! Sometimes the story leading up to an album is just as important as the album itself, this is certainally evident on Is This It, Alright Still and Whatever People Say I Am That is What I Am Not but there was no more powerful or tragic story than that of Smile. Originally writting and recording started in 1966 after Good Vibrations but the band fell apart and relations became strained and heated and the great Beach Boys masterpeice was lost. Then the tragedy really set in as allegedly spured on by hearing the Beatles opus A Day In The Life Brian spiraled into depression, drugs, and obsesity. He reportedly wouldn't leave his room becoming depressed and a cocaine addict, and was reported to be suffering from Bi-Polar and depression. In the meantime his two brothers died, leaving Brian left as the last Beach Boy. So when the world heard he was going to complete Smile we were all pretty worried by the prospect. The result blew us away, telling the story of traveling from Plymouth Rock to Hawaii, the album was goofy and heart warming. It wasn't Pet Sounds but it blew away all expectations. Good Vibrations sounded better than ever and in many ways was a triumphant symbolic message to say Brian's okay and he's back. Performing it live at Glastonbury was a truly fantastic moment probably lost on the thousands who were dancing and singing along in the sunshine. While the album is full of fantastic pop (see Heroes And Villians) its the slower more downbeat reflective moments when the albums full power is felt, when considering all that it took to get to this point Surfs Up and Old Master Painter You Are My Sunshine have a special power. Musically the arrangements are wonderful and the production sublime. While in many ways the album is tragic, it still manages to puts a smile on your face, as arguably the greatest American song writer has left a fitting final reminder of his brilliance and a perfect epitaph to his Brothers and the legend of The Beach Boys.