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2009 is gone; 2010 is here! I hope we've all recovered from New Year's and we're ready for some more albums...
Much like Alicia Keys a few blocks back, the fabulous Norah Jones has been a solidly great artist for the entire time we've known her, which was the greater part of the decade. Her first album in 2002,
Come Away With Me, won me over nearly instantly, and I've been in the "Norah Jones rules" column ever since. Memorable singles like "Don't Know Why," "Sunrise," and "Thinking About You" are just as great now as they were then. Now on her newest album,
The Fall, Norah has broken the mold a bit, making a concept album about a fledgling relationship and incorporating some different sounds and styles that we haven't heard before. The album shines all the way through, from the first track and single, "Chasing Pirates," all the way to the end of the album with "Man Of The Hour," in which Norah delightfully declares that the only one you can really count on to be there for you all the time is your dog.
I always like it when great bands come out of nowhere. This one I think I discovered in the spring thanks to some kind of top downloaded indie albums list. If you have been hanging out in Scotland since 2001, you might know that
My Maudlin Career is actually Camera Obscura's fourth album, but it's the first one I've heard. It's quite the throwback of an album, with some clear '60s pop influence going on throughout many of the tracks, especially the opener "French Navy," one of my favorites. I was lucky enough to score free tickets to see them perform live in May or June or so. They're really a charming, awkward band; they don't speak much, but when they do, it's pretty fantastic. The album closer "Honey In The Sun" is their best song by far; it was a spectacle to behold in a live performance, and it has enough happy energy to keep you going for quite some time. Ironically, not so maudlin after all.
Chicago's own Kid Sister, known in her non-stage life as Melisa Young, has certainly made a name for herself on her impressive debut album,
Ultraviolet, which finally hit the shelves earlier this year after a handful of singles that dated all the way back to 2007. Kid Sister combines traditional hip-hop stylings with unbelievably strong, synth-infused backing beats (there's that synth again; seems to be a 2009 trend, at least on my list). You can tell Melisa is proud of her roots as she emphatically announces,
everybody from the best side, I'm reppin' the midwest, right? on the excellent single "Right Hand Hi." That's something I can support. Both the inflection of her voice and the content of her lyrics are unique and different than you'd expect from the average female MC, which makes the album even better. Infectious tracks like "Life On TV;" "Daydreaming," the collaboration with Cee-Lo; "54321;" and "Big N Bad" rank among my favorites. Melisa's personality really shines in this fun collection of songs. I hope to hear much more from Kid Sister in the future.
There have already been so many wonderful new artists I've found thanks to the iTunes Store this year (it's really a music discovery place these days, not just a store), and you can add another to that list with Anya Marina, an artist who has previously dabbled in all kinds of fields; she was once an aspiring actress, a radio DJ in San Diego, and a comic. She launched herself out of obscurity and into a solidly building career in singing and songwriting by making her way onto the
Grey's Anatomy and
Twilight: New Moon soundtracks. Don't be misled by the general awfulness of those two items; Anya's music is much greater than the drivel that's happening on the screen while you're hearing her in the background. She has a sweet voice that also sounds wonderfully mischievous. Anya's songs are complex, lyrically; poppy and delightful, musically; and diverse, instrumentally, with horns and who knows what else popping off. The track I discovered first was "Vertigo" early this year; other fantastic songs on the album include "Afterparty At Jimmy's," "Cowboy," and the greatest one of the entire bunch, the enthralling "All The Same To Me."
It would be a near-impossible mission to one-up
Riot!, the pop-infused collection that launched them to worldwide stardom, so instead Paramore decided to take a different direction for their most recent album,
Brand New Eyes. The band famously struggled through much of 2008, and
Brand New Eyes is an album that reflects a decidedly changed Paramore, one that has matured and has been through that whole cycle of becoming so popular that you don't know what's real anymore. As a result, gone are the pop-punk anthems, replaced by straight-up rock songs with deeper meanings, more reflective lyrics, and harder instrumentals. "Ignorance" rocked the summer, and I've also enjoyed the more recent release, "Brick By Boring Brick." While the album isn't as memorable to me as
Riot! was, Hayley is as great of a singer as ever, it's still a good time, and I'm interested to see where Paramore goes from here.
The prospect of finishing the whole thing this weekend is looking more and more bleak as we go on, but I guess miracles have happened in the past, so... the top 20 albums remain! It's all coming your way soon.
La Roux, Rihanna, Lily Allen and Pearl Jam 
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