LIST: Best Albums of the Decade (according to me)

     I remember vividly the last album I listened to before the 20th century came crashing down into a pile of rubble at the feet of a monster known as Y2K.  Just before my family headed to a friends’ house for a New Years’ party, I could be found lying on my bed, lights off, headphones on, discman spinning Fiona Apple’s When the Pawn… (cool). I don’t know what I was thinking about, but I do know that those songs were rotating in my head when I saw the ball drop and prayed the world’s computers didn’t crash and when I ran out onto the golf course behind my friends’ house to see fireworks light up the January sky.
     At some point earlier this year, I set out to document the decade in music as I have experienced it since the lights went out on the party that was 1999.  What follows are 35 albums that I believe were the best.  Many other albums I’ve heard were also good (and there are admittedly many great ones I never heard at all), but these albums have the unique characteristics of being ‘good' and are notable because they have somehow had an impact on my life.   All in all, I’ve found it’s been a pretty amazing decade for music, despite the fact that a great deal of my time was spent listening to bands that never existed in it (Pavement, Archers of Loaf, etc.).  I understand this list seems disjointed, inconsistent, and puzzling, but such is life, such was the decade. Soak up the circularity and enjoy. 

35. Demon Days: Gorillaz (2005)
I cannot think of any other group that mixes rock, R&B, hip hop, political commentary, and cartoons any better. Damon Albarn is somehow still an absolute genius. While I wasn't blown away with the ubiquitous lead single, "Feel Good Inc.," the rest of the album, including "Kids with Guns" and "DARE," are excellent. It's an admittedly over-the-top record, with choirs, guest musicians, etc, but it all feels justified when the songs are this good and the vague concept concerning the future of the planet/end of the world is this intriguing.


34. Fevers and Mirrors: Bright Eyes (2000)
I consider the ability to induce feelings of joy, fear, sadness, and nausea simultaneously to be very unique--but somehow this album evokes those feelings in me. I could barely listen to it at first because its haunting trembles troubled me, but as I listened more, I realized how good this album which focuses on clocks, calendars, and scales really is. The album is centered around forlorn frustration, yet once the hiss of childhood audio tapes and faux radio interviews die out and "A Song to Pass the Time" appears at the end of the album, there is a calm peace about the whole thing that so accurately captures adolescence it's frightening.


33. A Lesson in Crime: Tokyo Police Club (2006)
Yes, this is a 16-minute, 7-song EP, but I could not discount it considering the fact that it has been one of the discs I played most this decade. Though I enjoyed their debut full-length album released in 2008, I found this shorter, faster, looser release to be far superior. It is paranoid, shaky, and full of handclaps. In just a short EP, the band feels fully-formed and develops a buoyant sound that's unique and exciting.

32. Sea to Shining Sea: Love As Laughter (2001)
In my high school mind, the best way to find out about new bands was to mine a record label's website and listen to samples from all the bands on the label's roster.  For various reasons, the label I hung onto most strongly during that time was Sub Pop. I tried out a song from Love as Laughter (I think it was "Temptation Island") and quickly had to haul myself to some record store in Georgetown to find the record I often referred to as the 'pink album.' It's a roughly produced record that fuses driving rock, psychedelia, and scuzz into something I still can't help but want to listen to. This album has somehow achieved 'old standby' status in my mind.

31. The Meadowlands: The Wrens (2003)
This record is the music of frustration and a perfect album to listen to in the car.  Songs like "Happy" are constructed perfectly to build and release at just the right moment.  There is something in the honesty in these songs of heartache that most anybody could relate to. It is astonishingly engaging from the cricket chirps of "The House that Guilt Built" all the way to the wails over the piano of "This Is Not What You Had Planned," which is pretty exceptional for an hour-long album. They tell me a new Wrens record may appear in 2010, which would assuredly be a great start to the next decade.

30. Remember the Night Parties: Oxford Collapse (2006)
This band is another gem from the Sub Pop roster, whom I fortunately got to see before they broke up in 2009. The record fits very well with the second half of the decade for me, as its subject matter is indicative of the transition from youth to adulthood. They have a kind of angular throwback indie sound that I was oft longing for this decade. "Please Visit Your National Parks" would be for me one of the top 10 songs of the decade, easily.

29. Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?: The Unicorns (2003)
I cannot think of any band that had a aesthetic this decade similar to The Unicorns.  They had a mythical, mystical quality about them, which is fitting for a band named after a mysterious imaginary creature. It is difficult to walk the line between kitschy joke and dead-on seriousness as well as the band does on this album. Everything is jangly and weird and funny and almost childish, yet a lot of the songs focus on sickness, death, and, well, ghosts. Though I was put off by the band at first, once I 'got' it, I wasn't able to put it down.

28. Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not: Arctic Monkeys (2006)
It would be easy to overlook this band as just an overhyped British dance rock band that basically writes songs about going out, drinking, and meeting girls. While much of that is still true, now that the dust has settled, it appears the songs really are incredibly strong and are able to weather whatever hype surrounded the album back then. Regardless of how I may look on the dancefloor, I can't help but want to be on one with the rocking danceable rhythms of this album. It has just just enough muscle and just enough cleverness to make it stand out amongst other British bands of similar form this decade.

27. Stephen Malkmus: Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks (2001)
This is not a Pavement record, but it seems closer to one than any of the other S.M. + Jicks albums from this decade. Sure, S.M.'s lyrics focus more on narrative and the album doesn't twist and turn like you would expect a Pavement record to, but it's still S.M. and all the songs are still catchy and smart. The slowly drifting "Church on White" and lazy step of "Pink India" have fit so perfectly with the nascent warmth of spring that such time of year would now feel odd without them. I don't know if this was much of a step forward for my musical hero, but there must be something worthy in this album since I became overwhelmingly obsessed with it in 2001, 2004, and then again in 2009.

26. 100 Days, 100 Nights: Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings (2007)
This album sounds like it was recorded in another time. It could easily sit alongside some of the best Motown records of the 1960s and most people wouldn't be able to tell the difference. The songs have the classic funk/R&B instrumentation and passionate, soulful vocals from Sharon Jones. I saw this group in Finland (yes, Finland) and was blown away by Sharon Jones's stage presence (she is the female James Brown) and the massive size of the step-synchronized Dap-Kings. Much of that energy and spunk translates directly into this record, which I always find myself spinning more often than I think I would.

25. Merriweather Post Pavilion: Animal Collective (2009)

This will forever be remembered as the album that launched Animal Collective into the stratosphere. The leap can be heard in the scope of the album, which feels expanded out towards space. It's not a pop album, but songs like "My Girls" and "Summertime Clothes" are as accessible as almost anything the band had recorded before. It's incredible that a band can evolve so greatly, so quickly yet still retain the essence of what makes it unique. On MPP, the band quell a bit of their campfire singalong rage, but remain creative, forward-looking, and engaging.

24. Relationship of Command: At the Drive-In (2000)
Once upon a time, I wanted nothing more out of music than a cheap adrenaline rush that occasionally would compel me to throw shoes and/or pieces of furniture around my room. While such qualities could be found in many albums, only a few also made me want to listen when I was in a calmer state of mind. Relationship of Command, the major label debut and swansong of At the Drive-In, fits such a bill.  The record swirls and spins and forces itself into your ears, which I find fantastic. While I've enjoyed some Sparta and Mars Volta material this decade, I'd be much more pleased if they all dropped what they've been doing and got the old band back together again.

 
23. Gimme Fiction: Spoon (2005)
I could make the argument that Spoon has been the 'band of the decade.' All their albums have been incredibly solid and they have remained at the forefront of 'indie consciousness' from beginning to end. All this being said, I think Gimme Fiction is the best of the lot. All the best elements of the band are there: Britt Daniel's wispy white boy soul, dancing piano lines, towering and sinking melodies. The songs are all indefinably strong and passionate, from the punchiness of "The Beast and Dragon, Adored" to the pulsing and collapsing of "My Mathematical Mind." Gimme Fiction sounds, like very few albums this decade, like a hardworking, honest American band committed to perfecting its craft.

22. Circulatory System: Circulatory System (2001)
By the time I saw Circulatory System perform live, I was already a huge Olivia Tremor Control fan, but I hadn't heard much of Will Cullen Hart's post-OTC project. Their performance spun me around, blew my mind and prompted me to buy the band's self-titled debut after the show. Though in some ways more somber and spacey than the final OTC album Black Foliage, this record builds on that album in producing an expansive and muted psychedelic collage of sounds and words. Though most of the post-Elephant 6 world of this decade wasn't as exciting to me as the one that gave birth to it, I still found this album to keep the type of odd experimentation and melodic songcraft of the collective alive into this new century.

21. Speakerboxxx/The Love Below: OutKast (2003)
At the time, I probably concluded "Hey Ya!" would be the best song of the decade (and maybe it is), but there really are a lot of other amazing songs on this double album.  It is frankly enormous--really two separate albums, one orchestrated by Andre 3000 and the other by Big Boi. They are both chock full of hits, hysterical interludes, head-scratching experimentation, and danceable beats with nods to just about any and every musical style imaginable. OutKast have always been able to mold their propensity for the bizarre into something accessible, and nowhere is that more evident than on this release. 

20. Mclusky Do Dallas: Mclusky (2002)
This is one of the most hilariously vitriolic albums I've ever heard. It has the up-tempo catchiness of a Pixies record and an astute mix of over-the-top aggression and bouncing melody. The songs are all pretty short, loud, and quite possibly capable of ripping your face off. "To Hell With Good Intentions" is a prime example of what makes the album so great: it is lyrically ridiculous, it is hostile, it explodes and crashes with no regard for human life.

19. The Moon & Antarctica: Modest Mouse (2000)
The Moon & Antarctica is the perfect title for this album: it is dripping with darkness, cold, isolation. It's still the same old bending, discomforting Modest Mouse, but more subdued, looking up to the sky instead of to the west.  The album is a bit of a rollercoaster, drifting from joy and exuberance to anger to deflation.  Thematically, the songs are connected by outer space and reflections on troubling issues of life and death. The contrast and connection between consecutive songs like "Dark Center of the Universe" and "Perfect Disguise" are stunning and artfully done and are indicative of the mastery on this album of song placement and the utilization of all parts to form a complete whole.

18. We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed: Los Campesinos! (2008)
I admit this album is short, and relatively recent, but with just their second release, Los Campesinos! were able to refine and perfect their unique sound. Everything is bouncy and jangly and pulling in a million different directions, with violins, xylophones, chimes, and keyboards ringing alongside the standard guitar, drums and bass. Lyrically, there are few bands who have been able to smartly capture the frustration of love lost and the spinning of dying youth as well as Los Campesinos!. "Ways to Make It Through the Wall" and "Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown #1" are explosive and comforting and get my blood pumping and feet tingling. I can't ask a lot more of my music than that.

17. Broom: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin (2005)
One of my first experiences with SSLYBY came via a YouTube video for the song "Pangaea," which features a tour of the band's neighborhood in Missouri through the eyes of a toy brontosaurus. I was immediately hooked by the modesty and seeming innocence of this band in its visual representation and sound. The album is simple and far from earthshattering, but it does contain extremely well-constructed indie pop songs that sound appropriate in almost any setting. There's a kind of hand-in-pockets, shrugged shoulders aesthetic about the band which I appreciate. "I Am Warm and Powerful" would certainly be in any top 10 list of songs I could make for this decade, as it perfectly captures the band's sound and focus on lazy youthful confusion.

16. Rated R: Queens of the Stone Age (2000)
I have never been able to adequately explain to anyone what 'stoner rock' really means. The few times I've used the phrase, I imagine people thought I was talking about 'jam' music a la Grateful Dead and their progeny. QOTSA are a far shout from that type of music, and just a few seconds of "Feel Good Hit of the Summer" should resolve any confusion. The music on Rated R is heavy, driving, and seems to come in and out of focus with every breath. While the band did benefit from Dave Grohl's adroit drumwork on their next album, Songs for the Deaf, I think this album better captures what I like about the band in terms of piecing together aggression, melody, and fuzz. The appearance by Mark Lanegan's vocals on "In the Fade" solidifies this album as complete and epic.

15. Transatlanticism: Death Cab for Cutie (2003) 
An earlier version of myself would have likely been aghast that this band would be considered in my top 800 albums of the decade. I readily admit I used Death Cab as a whipping boy for wimpy, bland indie rock that seemed to be especially prevalent in the earlier parts of this decade. However, once I actually sat and listened, this album, along with We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes, actually began to make sense to me. I started to see the beauty in restraint and the skill Ben Gibbard was able to employ in capturing mood and moment. The band owns the top two most-played songs on my iTunes and I am as likely to think of "The New Year" or "Expo '86" when I look back on the 'college years' as any two songs, as hard as that may be for me to admit.

14. Sonic Nurse: Sonic Youth (2004)
This actually is the only album from 2004 on the list, which is somewhat surprising. While I obviously really liked Murray Street, I found myself listening to this album a lot more over the course of the decade. It feels more like a complete Sonic Youth album than its predecessor, balancing Kim Gordon, Lee Ranaldo, and Thurston Moore numbers along with pop culture references and timely political commentary that I had come to appreciate in SY's repertoire.  It is much more rough-around-the-edges and confident effort from the band than Murray Street. The album artwork is stunning and its songs solidified the fact that the band was able to create exciting material more than two decades after its inception.

13. Is This It: The Strokes (2001)
Perhaps this is unfair, but I think if The Strokes had been able to hold my attention beyond this album, Is This It would probably be rated much higher. Today, they have been in my eyes a one-trick pony. This album, however, does what a lot of people say it does in capturing the style and music of the times with great precision and ease. The songs are all laid back and cool, yet they are well-formed and enjoyable to listen to. They created a hype around the New York scene and injected a good deal of excitement about the potential of indie rock music in the new millennium. It is really difficult to imagine this decade without this album.

12. The Body, The Blood, The Machine: The Thermals (2006)
I really liked the first two albums from the Thermals, but it was not until this one came out that I realized they were what I would consider to be a 'great' band.  Their songs grew in sophistication and complexity and the subject matter they tackled got deeper and more political. The songs really capture a lot of the confusion over the growing wave of religious fervor in the American political landscape during the decade. The album is aggressive, fast, full of religious imagery, and contains the penchant for melody and sing-along lyricism that I had appreciate in earlier Thermals works.

11. The Argument: Fugazi (2001)
Sometime in 2003 I think it was, I declared this to be, far and away, the best album of the decade thus far. While I've cooled on it a bit since then, I still believe it's an incredible album. It is, like most Fugazi releases, an ambitious foray into progressive hard rock with a decidedly social and political slant. The band still has a lot of important things to say and they are able to do so in an assertive and engaging manner. If this happens to be the last Fugazi album, it would be fitting since it fully captures the strength of the band in melding post-punk, angular guitar rock, and thought-provoking lyrics.

10. Oui: The Sea and Cake (2000)
This is an album and a band that I would have likely never come across if it weren't for my uncle. He recommended this record one day when I was in high school and there have been few stretches since that time that I haven't listened to it. For that age, it was not what I typically listened to: it was understated, it was calming, the vocals were delivered almost as a comforting whisper. It has always felt appropriate on a sunny, spring morning or on a lazy afternoon of lounging. It took me a long time to fully understand what was so great about it and how delicate music and nonsensical lyrics could be awe-inspiring works of art. Learning to like this album was akin to admitting that gentle breezes are better than strong winds.

9. Since I Left You: The Avalanches (2000)
I bought this album on a whim in high school and have never regretted that decision.  This album is maddening, pieces falling from all directions to form some type of frightening collage of a night of dancing/staying home alone/counting hours in an insane asylum. It's incredible how well the album fits the confusion and inundation of sounds so prevalent in this decade, considering how it came out at its very beginning. Though many have tried, I haven't heard any recording since so effortlessly mash together disparate sources into a complete and captivating picture.

8. Kid A: Radiohead (2000) 
Because it has been listed time and again as the 'album of the decade,' I almost didn't include it here. However, it's been impossible for me find a way to leave it off. Thinking back to when I first heard it, I remember believing I was listening to the most 'advanced,' boundary-pushing sounds out there. Granted, my knowledge of music back then was greatly limited, I still feel like it holds up after almost a decade as being a daring and stunning masterpiece. It was a departure in some ways from OK Computer, but it was also a great leap forward. The album is moody and internal and somehow encapsulates a lot of the uneasiness about modern life.


7. Microcastle: Deerhunter (2008)
I do not buy the argument that several years must pass before an album can be considered 'great.' I cannot say that I will feel the same way about this album in five years' time, but I do know that right now, it is one of the best records I've ever heard. It seamlessly melds the best of some of my favorite bands like the Beach Boys and My Bloody Valentine in its exploration into melody and noise. It is a record to me that sounds important, begs to be listened to repeatedly, yet it possesses a type of forlorn modesty. The emotional and sonic purging in songs like album closer "Twilight at Carbon Lake" are downright stunning.  All in all, it's the record I was hoping I'd hear this decade even if I didn't realize it.
 
6. You Forgot It In People: Broken Social Scene (2002)
This album to me represents my idea of Canada (which makes sense, since about half that country's population has at some time been a member). It was odd how it came into my life--I acquired mp3s of the songs in a piecemeal fashion, eventually realizing that it formed a complete and near-flawless album. I would describe it as 'epic,' not only in its massive sound, but in the way that listening to it is like going on a journey rather than listening to a collection of 'really good' songs. Listening to this album whole is like having an experience. The guitar sound is gargantuan and deep. Though the songs appear to be extremely disparate in form and function at first blush, they all work together to create a spherical whole. You Forgot It In People would likely also get my vote for best album title this decade, and it somehow fits the record's content perfectly.

5. Agaetis Byrjun: Sigur Ros (2000)
I don't believe I have ever listened to this album while anyone else was around. I don't think I've ever played it in my car (which is where I like to listen to most music).  Something about this record makes me want to be alone in my room (usually in the dark). It is unlike anything I've ever heard before, and I have an inadequate vocabulary to accurately describe it. There are no recognizable words (I don't speak Hopelandic), no catchy melodies, no propelling beats, yet it somehow possesses everything it needs. It is a dark, enigmatic mass in my mind that is always revealing something new and puzzling. It adeptly displays the how music can express what cannot be shown through words and images.

4. Veckatimest: Grizzly Bear (2009)
Though it was released only months ago, this album latched onto my ears and has not let go since.  While Yellow House was good, this record builds upward from that album's understated elements to construct a fully-formed picture of place and time. The harmonies are gorgeous, the sounds expand and contract with incredible force, and the songs are complex without being overbearing. Listening to this album while winding through the fog in Bar Harbor, Maine this past summer somehow made it all make sense to me. There is something dark, yet calming about this album. It fully captures for me the end of the decade in terms of artistic pop expression and the height of indie music becoming mainstream in the album's impressive run on the Billboard charts.

3. Source Tags & Codes: ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead (2002)
In terms of complete spins on my stereo, this album would probably win for being played the most times this decade. I bought it at some music shop in Alexandria in high school and have had a hard time putting it down since.  Every note, hiss, and yell on this album seems to be in the right place.  It is difficult to meticulously and perfectly orchestrate 11 songs, yet make them feel and sound as if they were totally spontaneous and organic. Like in most of the albums near the top of this list, there is an incredible range of emotion and volume on this album.  Several tracks grow from intense quiet to later explode into waves of crashes and booms. A great deal of this band's image has been tarnished by sub-par subsequent releases, but this album still to me seems to be breathing and living and haunting me, which is part of why I think it's so great.
 
2. White Blood Cells: The White Stripes (2001)
As one of the most 'important' indie rock albums of the last 10 years, White Blood Cells blew the roof off the 'rock revival' taking place at the beginning of the decade and took the White Stripes' popularity to new and unexpected heights.  The album has an incredible balance, matching hard, bluesy rock numbers with equally compelling gentle ballads and country stomp. It also doesn't hurt to have one of the greatest album openers of all time in "Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground" which, in a few short seconds, convinced me at the time that they were the greatest band in the world. This album, hearkening back to what I like best about 'rock music,' made this band an undying obsession for me for most of the first half of this decade.

1. Strawberry Jam: Animal Collective (2007)
It has all come down to this, down to peacebones and fireworks once again. I had been eagerly awaiting this album, having become obsessed with Feels and having seen the band play a few months before in Asheville.  Strawberry Jam greatly exceeded my lofty expectations at the time and somehow still does. It incorporates everything I dig about Animal Collective--a kind of primal rage, bizarre bubbly sounds that require second and third listens to fully take in, as well as an incredible understanding of captivating melody. Some of the songs are terrifying and maddening, while others are more reflective and reserved. There is any incredible amount of depth and breadth for a 9-song, 43 minute album. In my hypothetical top-10 songs of the decade, "Fireworks" would be, far and away, number one. I really can't say a lot more about this album, but it definitely opened my eyes and defines to me what was great about music in this nameless decade.