[Dr. Spaceman]

Thanks to Doc and O for the comments on my TV Top 20! And to O, haha! I had less to say about Louie mostly because I have written so much about it over the years (as it ranked #2, #1, and #1 for its first three seasons), so all I had to say about it this year was the stuff that related to season 4. But sure, if you want to read into it that way go ahead .

Now, I know this is a music message board, and most people don't give a **** about TV, so i'm now fully in MUSIC MODE. I am still rearranging some albums in the lower spots of my Top 40, as it has proven to be difficult to whittle it down to just 40. Most years I post a list of all the albums that just missed, but I don't know if i'll have time this year. If I do, i'll post that after the main list.

But for right now, i'm going to post my complete albums history for my previous eleven year-ends! For the first two, I don't have complete lists, so you'll have to make do with what's there.

If you are into hints/easter eggs, let me throw this at you: one of these year-ends in particular is a giant precursor to this year's Top 40 Albums list. In what way? I can't tell you, as that will ruin the fun, but if you look hard enough at my list this year, you will see a direct reference to one of these lists from the past eleven years. Which, as I was compiling, I genuinely didn't do on purpose! It just came out that way, which I was pleased with. I'll be sure to bring it up again when I get to that portion of this year's list, for those of you who want to know/care:

----------------------------------------------------------

2013:

40. Arcade Fire - Reflektor
39. Caitlin Rose - The Stand-In
38. Tegan and Sara - Heartthrob
37. Jason Isbell - Southeastern
36. Arctic Monkeys - AM
35. Mudhoney - Vanishing Point
34. Guy Clark - My Favourite Picture of You
33. Diane Birch - Speak a Little Louder
32. Hanni El Khatib - Head in the Dirt
31. nine inch nails - Hesitation Marks

30. Daft Punk - Random Access Memories
29. Eminem - Marshall Mathers LP 2
28. Bombino - Nomad
27. The Lonely Island - The Wack Album
26. MGMT - MGMT
25. Flaming Lips - The Terror
24. CHVRCHES - The Bones of What you Believe
23. Heidecker & Wood - Some Things Never Stay the Same
22. Thee Oh Sees - Floating Coffin
21. Paul McCartney - New

20. Queens of the Stone Age - Like Clockwork
19. Vampire Weekend - Modern Vampires of the City
18. Mavis Staples - One True Vine
17. Drake - Nothing was the Same
16. Bill Callahan - Dream River
15. Kanye West - Yeezus
14. The Band Perry - Pioneer
13. Pistol Annies - Annie Up
12. Run The Jewels - Run the Jewels
11. Fuzz - Fuzz

10. Ty Segall - Sleeper
09. Danny Brown - OLD
08. Cass McCombs - Big Wheel and Others
07. Yo La Tengo - Fade
06. Brandy Clark - 12 Stories
05. So So Glos - Blowout!
04. Neko Case - The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You
03. Mikal Cronin - MC2
02. Ashley Monroe - Like a Rose
01. Superchunk - I Hate Music

2012:

40. The Avett Brothers - The Carpenter
39. Sara Watkins - Sun Midnight Sun
38. Bruce Springsteen - Wrecking Ball
37. Norah Jones - Little Broken Hearts
36. Japandroids - Celebration Rock
35. Frank Ocean - Channel Orange
34. The Walkmen – Heaven
33. Dinosaur Jr. - I Bet On Sky
32. Bob Dylan – Tempest
31. Jimmy Cliff – Rebirth

30. Lambchop - Mr. M
29. Graham Parker & The Rumour - Three Chords Good
28. Dr. John - Locked Down
27. Titus Andronicus - Local Business
26. Roc Marciano – Reloaded
25. ZZ Top - La Futura
24. The Mountain Goats - Transcendental Youth
23. Bobby Womack - The Bravest Man In The Universe
22. Sharon Van Etten – Tramp
21. Mount Carmel - Real Women

20. Future – Pluto
19. Thee Oh Sees - Putrifiers II
18. Ceremony – Zoo
17. Spider Bags - Shake My Head
16. Tenacious D - Rize of the Fenix
15. The Darkness - Hot Cakes
14. Gentleman Jesse - Leaving Atlanta
13. Kelly Hogan - I Like To Keep Myself in Pain
12. Jack White – Blunderbuss
11. Screaming Females – Ugly

10. Dwight Yoakam - 3 Pears
09. Rufus Wainwright - Out of the Game
08. The Shins - Port of Morrow
07. Bob Mould - Silver Age
06. Fiona Apple - The Idler Wheel
05. Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, m.A.A.d. City
04. Redd Kross - Researching the Blues
03. Aimee Mann – Charmer
02. A.C. Newman - Shut Down the Streets
01. Ty Segall Band – Slaughterhouse (Ty Segall & White Fence – Hair/Ty Segall – Twins)

2011:

40. Coldplay – Mylo Xyloto
39. Red Hot Chilli Peppers - I'm With You
38. Raphael Saadiq - Stone Rollin'
37. Kendrick Lamar - Section.80
36. Jessica Lea Mayfield - Tell Me
35. Dum Dum Girls – Only in Dreams
34. The Lonely Island - Turtleneck & Chain
33 Phonte – Charity Starts at Home
32 The Stepkids – The Stepkids
31 Boston Spaceships - Let It Beard

30. Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi – ROME (Starring Jack White and Norah Jones)
29. Beastie Boys – Hot Sauce Committee Part Two
28. Adele – 21
27. Paul Simon – So Beautiful or So What
26. The Mountain Goats – All Eternals Deck
25. Foo Fighters – Wasting Light
24. Cass McCombs – Humor Risk
23. Patrick Stump – Soul Punk
22. Bill Callahan – Apocalypse
21. Heidecker & Wood – Starting from Nowhere

20. Nick Lowe – The Old Magic
19. Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Mirror Traffic
18. E-40 – Revenue Retrievin’: Overtime Shift/Graveyard Shift
17. My Morning Jacket – Circuital
16. Black Lips – Arabia Mountain
15. The Ettes – Wicked Will
14. DJ Quik – The Book of David
13. Wye Oak – Civilian
12. The Decemberists – The King is Dead
11. Ty Segall – Goodbye Bread

10. Drake – Take Care
09. Pistol Annies – Hell on Heels
08. Wilco – The Whole Love
07. Jay-Z/Kanye West - Watch the Throne
06. EMA – Past Life Martyred Saints
05. Thee Oh Sees - Carrion Crawler/The Dream
04. Sloan - The Double Cross
03. Kurt Vile – Smoke Ring for My Halo
02. Wild Flag - Wild Flag
01. ****ed Up - David Comes to Life


2010:

40. The Parting Gifts - Strychnine Dandelion
39. Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - I Learned the Hard Way
38. Belle and Sebastian - Write About Love
37. Weezer - Hurley
36. Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part Two (Return of the Ankh)
35. Brian Eno - Small Craft on a Milk Sea
34. Sarah Harmer - Oh Little Fire
33. Kurt Vile - Childish Prodigy* (was released in 2009, but didn't realize that when I ranked it)
32. Gorillaz - Plastic Beach
31. Ryan Bingham & The Dead Horses - Junky Star

30. Neil Young - Le Noise
29. Ty Segall - Melted
28. She & Him - Volume Two
27. Rick Ross - Teflon Don
26. The Walkmen - Lisbon
25. Mavis Staples - You Are Not Alone
24. Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Mojo
23. Devo - Something for Everybody
22. The Dead Weather - Sea of Cowards
21. Elvis Costello - National Ransom

20. The New ****ographers - Together
19. The National - High Violet
18. Janelle Monae - The ArchAndroid (Suites II and III)
17. Broken Bells - Broken Bells
16. Grinderman - Grinderman 2
15. The Hold Steady - Heaven is Whenever
14. John Legend & The Roots - Wake Up!
13. The Apples in Stereo - Travellers in Space and Time
12. The Roots - How I Got Over
11. The Black Keys - Brothers

10. The Foreign Exchange - Authenticity
09. Robyn - Body Talk
08. Jamey Johnson - The Guitar Song
07. Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
06. LCD Soundsystem - This is Happening
05. Big Boi - Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty
04. Superchunk - Majesty Shredding
03. Ted Leo and The Pharmacists - The Brutalist Bricks
02. Titus Andronicus - The Monitor
01. Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

2009:

40. Weezer - Raditude
39. Norah Jones - The Fall
38. Converge - Axe to Fall
37. Grant Lee Phillips - Little Moon
36. Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest
35. Rick Ross - Deeper Than Rap
34. Jay-Z - The Blueprint 3
33. Method Man & Redman - Blackout! 2
32. Mastodon - Crack The Skye
31. Bob Dylan - Together Through Life

30. Eminem - Relapse
29. Miranda Lambert - Revolution
28. Karen O & The Kids - Where The Wild Things Are
27. Willie Nelson and Asleep at the Wheel - Willie and The Wheel
26. Pearl Jam - Backspacer
25. The Bird and The Bee - Ray Guns Are Not Just the Future
24. Jarvis Cocker - "Further Complications"
23. Boston Spaceships - Zero to 99
22. Them Crooked Vultures - Them Crooked Vultures
21. The Lonely Island - Incredibad

20. Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion
19. The Mountain Goats - The Life of the World To Come
18. Pink Mountaintops - Outside Love
17. The Dead Weather - Horehound
16. UGK - UGK 4 Life
15. The Ettes - Do You Want Power
14. DJ Quik & Kurupt - BlaQKout
13. Monsters of Folk - Monsters of Folk
12. Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
11. Coconut Records - Davy

10. Mos Def - The Ecstatic
09. Yo La Tengo - Popular Songs/Condo ****s - ****book
08. Dinosaur Jr. - Farm
07. Girls - Album
06. Rancid - Let The Dominoes Fall
05. Wilco - Wilco (The Album)
04. The Flaming Lips - Embryonic
03. U2 - No Line On The Horizon
02. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz!
01. Raekwon - Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. II

2008:

40. The Killers - Day & Age
39. Coldplay - Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends
38. Taylor Swift - Fearless
37. Aimee Mann - @#%&*! Smilers
36. ****ed Up - The Chemistry of Common Life
35. The Walkmen - You & Me
34. T.I. - Paper Trail
33. Erykah Badu - New Amerykah Part One (4th World War)
32. Q-Tip - The Renaissance
31. Flying Lotus - Los Angeles

30. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
29. Ryan Adams & The Cardinals - Cardinology
28. Gnarls Barkley - The Odd Couple
27. Metallica - Death Magnetic
26. Lil Wayne - Tha Carter III
25. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
24. The Foreign Exchange - Leave It All Behind
23. Sons and Daughters - The Gift
22. Black Milk - Tronic
21. Portishead - Third

20. Jenny Lewis - Acid Tongue
19. Hercules & Love Affair - Hercules & Love Affair
18. Santogold - Santogold
17. The Raconteurs - Consolers of The Lonely
16. Raphael Saadiq - The Way I See It
15. Kaiser Chiefs - Off With Their Heads
14. Young Jeezy - The Recession
13. Beck - Modern Guilt
12. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
11. Elbow - The Seldom Seen Kid

10. Kanye West - 808s and Heatbreak
09. Al Green - Lay It Down
08. David Byrne & Brian Eno - Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
07. The Black Keys - Attack & Release
06. My Morning Jacket - Evil Urges
05. She & Him - Volume One
04. The Roots - Rising Down
03. TV On The Radio - Dear Science
02. The Gaslight Anthem - The '59 Sound
01. The Hold Steady - Stay Positive

2007:

40. Interpol - Our Love to Admire
39. Fall Out Boy - Infinity on High
38. The Field - From Here We Go Sublime
37. Pharoahe Monch - Desire
36. Freeway - Free At Last
35. The Shins - Wincing The Night Away
34. Talib Kweli - Eardrum
33. 1990s - Cookies
32. Miranda Lambert - Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
31. Devin the Dude - Waitin' to Inhale

30. Foo Fighters - Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace
29. Beastie Boys - The Mix-Up
28. M.I.A. - Kala
27. Bad Religion - New Maps of Hell
26. Bedouin Soundclash - Street Gospels
25. Prodigy - Return of the Mac
24. Little Brother - Getback
23. Panda Bear - Person Pitch
22. The White Stripes - Icky Thump
21. Menomena - Friend and Foe

20. Kaiser Chiefs - Yours Truly, Angry Mob
19. Justice - †
18. Common - Finding Forever
17. Marrdest Mouse - We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Snak
16. Nine Inch Nails - Year Zero
15. Tim Armstrong - A Poet's Life
14. Feist - The Reminder
13. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
12. Dinosaur Jr. - Beyond
11. UGK - Underground Kingz

10. The Hives - The Black and White Album
09. Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
08. Bruce Springsteen & The E-Street Band - Magic
07. Wilco - Sky Blue Sky
06. Against Me! - New Wave
05. Kanye West - Graduation
04. Jay-Z - American Gangster
03. The Good, The Bad & The Queen - The Good, The Bad & The Queen
02. Radiohead - In Rainbows
01. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver

2006:

40. Outkast - Idlewild
39. Wolfmother - Wolfmother
38. Incubus - Light Grenades
37. Snoop Dogg - The Blue Carpet Treatment
36. The Killers - Sam's Town
35. Justin Timberlake - Futuresex/Lovesounds
34. Nelly Furtado - Loose
33. The Dixie Chicks - Taking the Long Way
32. Cat Power - The Greatest
31. The Game - Doctor's Advocate

30. Method Man - 4:21... The Day After
29. The Evens - Get Even
28. Greg Graffin - Cold as the Clay
27. Mastodon - Blood Mountain
26. Lily Allen - Alright Still
25. Tom Petty - Highway Companion
24. Pearl Jam - Pearl Jam
23. Mr. Lif - Mo' Mega
22. John Mayer - Continuum
21. The Decemberists - The Crane Wife

20. Busta Rhymes - The Big Bang
19. T.I. - KING
18. MURS & 9th Wonder - Murray's Revenge
17. The Raconteurs - Broken Boy Soliders
15. Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere
15. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
14. The Flaming Lips - At War With The Mystics
13. Bob Dylan - Modern Times
12. Neil Young - Living with War
11. Rhymefest - Blue Collar

10. Thom Yorke - the eraser
09. Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
08. Bruce Springsteen - We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions
07. Clipse - Hell Hath No Fury
06. Beck - The Information
05. TV On The Radio - Return to Cookie Mountain
04. Lupe Fiasco - Food & Liquor
03. The Roots - Game Theory
02. Ghostface Killah - Fishscale
01. J Dilla – Donuts

2005, the very first year I did a Top 40 Albums list. The year prior I only did a Top 30 Albums list.

40. Various Artists - Tony Hawk's American Wasteland soundtrack
39. Wolf Parade - Apologizes to the Queen Mary
38. Death Cab for Cutie - Plans
37. Nada Surf - The Weight is a Gift
36. Depeche Mode - Playing the Angel
35. Juelz Santana - What The Game's Been Missing
34. Fort Minor - The Rising Tied
33. Maximo Park - A Certain Trigger
32. Stephen Malkmus - Face the Truth
31. Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine

30. The Game - The Documentary
29. Gorillaz - Demon Days
28. Little Brother - The Minstrel Show
27. LCD Soundsystem - LCD Soundsystem
26. The Go! Team - Thunder, Lightning Strike
25. The White Stripes - Get Behind Me Satan
24. Audioslave - Out of Exile
23. The Mars Volta - Frances the Mute
22. Oasis - Don't Believe the Truth
21. Dwight Yoakam - Blame the Vain

20. David Banner - Certified
19. The Darkness - One Way Ticket to Hell... and Back
18. Queens of the Stone Age - Lullabies to Paralyze
17. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
16. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
15. The Bravery - The Bravery
14. Paul McCartney - Chaos and Creation in the Backyard
13. Nine Inch Nails - With Teeth
12. Coldplay - X&Y
11. Dangerdoom - The Mouse and the Mask

10. Neil Diamond - 12 Songs
09. Hot Hot Heat - Elevator
08. Franz Ferdinand- You Could Have It So Much Better
07. Bloc Party - Silent Alarm
06. Kaiser Chiefs - Employment
05. Common - Be
04. Kanye West - Late Registration
03. Weezer - Make Believe
02. Foo Fighters - In Your Honor
01. Beck – Guero

Top 30 Albums of 2004. ATRL has deleted this thread, but I did post the top five in the Top 40 Albums of 2005 thread:

05. The Hives - Tyrannosaurus Hives
04. Bad Religion - The Empire Strikes First
03. Kanye West - College Dropout
02. Beastie Boys - To The 5 Boroughs
01. U2 - How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb

---------------------------------

And the ____ Albums of 2003 list has long since been deleted, but I do remember that my #1 album was...

01. The Darkness - Permission to Land

-----------------------------

As for this year's list? I don't know what my eventual release plan for it will be, if i'll work on it and post it all in one big post, or if i'll do twenty this week and twenty next week. I am very committed to finishing it though, with write-ups!! WATCH THIS SPACE!

[TC]

It's great to look back on all these lists from past years. I think it's fitting that 2006 (one of the two years of Benjammin', and the year it was heaviest on hip hop) brought the most hip hop at the top of the list! Also great to see how things evolve over time, and examine both the similarities and the wild differences between your lists and mine.

Bring on the albums!

[Bloomers]

There's so many albums that I love that if I were to quote all of them, it might just be the whole list (Still though, Yes! Sufjan in 2006 and LCD Soundsystem's multiple appearances, Drake popping up twice, Crack The Skye AND Blood Mountain, Daft Punk, Queens Of The Stone Age, Kanye, Thee Oh Sees, Flying Lotus... )

Let me just say that the album list for this year come soon enough!

[AshleeSimpsonFan]

The Bones of What you Believe and Random Access Memories! that was my favorite album of 2013
Robyn - Body Talk! that one is amazing!.

[V3$$3L.]

The fact that I hadn't even dropped by this thread

*command + F's some names*

You undoubtedly have some of my favorite albums of this decade and last among your lists. Like always, can't wait to see what I overlooked, underrated and to discover some new stuff as well.

[Dr. Spaceman]

40. Coldplay – Ghost Stories

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH KIDS, LET ME TELL YOU ALL A SPOOKY SCARY GHOST STORY ABOUT CHRIS MARTIN AND GWYNETH PALTROW’S CONCIOUS UNCOPULING. Read that in a tone that is half local B-Movie horror host on public access and half Bob Saget on How I Met Your Mother.

In all seriousness, Coldplay have been a perennial mainstay on my Top 40 Albums list over the years. They have never missed the cut! I know they are a very easy band to goof on (any band that traffics in earnestness like they do is an easy target), but they haven’t disappointed me yet. I may not count them among my favourite bands/artists, but whenever a song of theirs comes on Shuffle I never skip it, and am reminded how much I enjoy them. Ghost Stories is a bit of a departure from their past work, but I have really grown to love it over repeated listens. In fact, as I listen to it again now as I type this write-up, I worry I am charting it too low. A definite “grower” album. The opening of the first track “Always in my Head” sounds like a Brian Eno Ambient album, and more directly Eno-y than the previous two albums that Eno actually worked on. It sets the tone nicely for the album as a whole, which is a really concise (at 42 minutes it’s Coldplay’s shortest album since Parachutes, which is only 30 seconds or so shorter) and cohesive artistic statement. It is hardly an original comparison, but this might be Coldplay’s 808s and Heartbreak, an album that grew its reputation over years and is now considered to be some people’s favourite Kanye album. I think time will be similarly kind to Ghost Stories.

I also just love the variety of collaborators Coldplay worked on with this album, my favourite being Houston rap production god Mike Dean, a chief architect of the many classic ‘90s Rap-A-Lot Records albums, on “Another’s Arms,” . Now i’m just trying to imagine Chris Martin doing a song with Bushwick Bill and it is a wonderful visual!

Favourite Songs:
01. Midnight
02. Oceans
03. Always in my Head



39. Lana Del Rey – Ultraviolence

After the ill-received performance by Lana Del Rey on SNL in January 2012, radio host/hero Tom Scharpling defended her on his show The Best Show by saying her next career move should be to remake The Velvet Underground & Nico album, with The Black Lips as her backing band. I guess Lana must have heard “Black Keys” instead, as she decided to work primarily with Dan Auerbach on her Born to Die follow-up Ultraviolence. And it was an excellent decision, as Ultraviolence is the first time I have really responded to LDR’s music.

Now, I know this is an “album list” but I am going to be honest (or keeping it 100, ala Larry Wilmore): outside of my first initial listens, I can’t listen to this album beginning-to-end. It is not at all a slight to what LDR, Auerbach and the other producers accomplished here, but it’s more that at nearly 60 minutes of dirge-like songs that average out to 4:30/5+ minute songs, it’s a tough and taxing listen, for me personally. However, when you’re in the right mood for it, it really does connect with you. The Auerbach-produced songs are my favourite, and I appreciate the unconventional song structures they came up with on this. Like on “West Coast,” the mid-song breakdown on that is really bold, a move that i bet all the label A&R guys freaked the **** out over. “This is supposed to be your lead single?!? Why don’t you keep it at the same tempo??” I appreciate when artists follow their inspiration and don’t follow notes, as it tends to lead to distinct moments that make songs more memorable. In general, I just really love the collaboration between LDR and Auerbach, and how the longer song lengths lead to great, building to catharsis moments, like the killer guitar solo by Auerbach about 4 minutes into “Shades of Cool.” I hope Ultraviolence is the first of many albums that LDR and Auerbach make together, as I think they have figured out something special here that can only grow and develop more with additional albums.

Favourite Songs:
01. Shades of Cool
02. Cruel World
03. Sad Girl




38. Weezer – Everything Will Be Alright in the End

Some background for the majority of the ATRL audience: When I signed up to ATRL on June 9, 2002, I joined the board as “weezerandmobyfan,” mostly because Weezer’s Maladroit and Moby’s 18 came out the same day the month prior (May 14!), and I really loved them. Though in all reality, the scales were tipped mostly in Weezer’s favour. As many old-time ATRL members can attest to, Weezer was my sentimental favourite band, the band I knew the most about, even if newer, flashier bands/artists took its spot in the intervening years. As my tastes began to change a bit, I always held out a flame for the =W=, with the only time they ever really disappointed me was The Red Album, an album I have a difficult time defending. Also in the intervening years, I became sort of known as an apologist for their lesser liked albums such as Raditude (charted at #40 in 2009) and Hurley (#37 in 2010). I don’t want to rehash my old arguments, as you can just read the Raditude and Hurley write-ups which I still stand by (though writing it today I would have been nicer to Make Believe, which i’ve started to really enjoy again). Now that you know my background with Weezer, I can now describe my feelings on the album many feel is the grand “return-to-form” for them, which I have complicated feelings with.

I obviously like this album a lot, else it wouldn’t be charting. That said, I don’t think it’s that much of a considerable leap in quality between it and Raditude/Hurley. In fact, I think Hurley is definitely the better album. I also used to think Raditude was better than EWBAITE, but i’ve softened my stance there, so i’ll just say if they aren’t tied, EWBAITE maybe beats it by a hair. I guess part of the reason people see this as a return to form is because it’s the easy magazine narrative to write, Weezer returning with their Blue Album/Green Album producer Ric Ocasek, and Rivers directly stating that he is bringing it back “like it’s 94” on lead single “Back to the Shack” (which i’m not fond of). I am not trying to “throw shade,” as it were, on this album, as again I am thrilled for Weezer’s success and mostly like this album a lot, but I just wish more people gave the previous two albums a chance, as they really aren’t that far off in quality I feel. I guess we just need to wait for the Deluxe Edition Reissues of Raditude and Hurley for people to revaluate them, just like what happened with some of Paul McCartney’s Wings-era albums that people trashed in the ‘70s as frivolous nonsense, but now decades later they see how many truly strong pop songs are on those albums. Basically, i’m trying to say Hurley is Weezer’s Ram and Raditude is their McCartney II haha.

Talking about the album itself now, I do like that they have continued the trend of Raditude/Hurley in bringing outside songwriters to co-write the songs. Like Patrick Stickles from Titus Andronicus, who co-wrote and plays guitar on “Foolish Father,” Bethany Cosentino from Best Coast co-writing/appearing on “Go Away,” and my favourite bit of collaboration: Justin Hawkins from The Darkness co-writing album highlight “I’ve Had It Up To Here.” SO GOOD. The Darkness, now there’s another band that I could spend paragraphs defending, saying how their last album Hot Cakes is one of the best pop-rock albums of the past five years, but i’ll save that for another time. I also like the Futurescope trilogy that closes out the album, it’s quite cool. Now one thing I want to make clear, before I wrap this up: if EWBAITE got you back into Weezer that is the greatest news I could hear. I am thrilled! I am just stating my own personal opinion on the band, an opinion that is rarely expressed, so I feel the need to voice it. I know i’m in the minority here, but as long as it converts/brings back old Weezer fans into the fold, then that will always warm my =W= shaped heart. Speaking of, I really need to get that checked out.

Favourite Songs:
01. I’ve Had It Up to Here
02. Futurescope trilogy
03. Cleopatra




37. Phish –Fuego

Would I have ever predicted that one day I would chart a Phish album over a Weezer album? Absolutely not! I am as shocked as you are! But if i’m being honest with myself, I have played Fuego more than EWBAITE and enjoy it more overall. Which is why I want to formally change my ATRL screen name to “phishandmobyfan.” Wendell, could you do that for me?

My first real exposure to Phish was through the essential comedy podcast Analyze Phish, which is hosted by Scott Aukerman and Phish superfan/Parks and Recreation writer Harris Wittels, as Wittels tries to convert Aukerman into a Phish fan. It is mostly a comedy podcast, and none of the clips of Phish’s live stuff that Harris plays ever converted me (out of context clips rarely do), but they put Phish on my mind more often than they were in the past. And with the release of their first new studio album in five years, I decided to give it a fair shot. And I was surprised to find out how much I ended up enjoying it! And I did all of this entirely sober! How many sober Phish fans are out there? Two?

Now the thing with Phish is, their lyrics can be very, very silly. I mean you listen to the opening track, which starts off with some great Pink Floyd-y instrumental bits, and it opens with them shouting “I’M A SAILORS GIRL, THE BEST IS YET TO COME, ROLLING IN MY FUEGO, I DO MY OWN STUNTS, I SEE GUILTY PEOPLE, ANGELS BLOWING HORNS,” which leads into another instrumental break. Those are supremely silly lyrics, and I imagine they could be a barrier of entry for a lot of people. But if you let the song play out, you get a really cool guitar solo, and the overall atmosphere of it (provided by veteran classic rock producer Bob Ezrin) is pretty terrific. The next track, “The Line,” is maybe my favourite on the album, which is a quite beautiful song about college basketball player Darius Washington, Jr., how he missed two free throws at the end of the Final Four Michigan State game. And while i’m not even a hardcore college hoops guy, that is a sentiment we can all relate to, when “you step up to The Line.” The way the song builds throughout really gets me inspired, and i think if you were to play this song to someone who had no knowledge Phish did it, they would be into it. I also quite like “Devotion to a Dream,” (the one-two punch of “The Line” and “Devotion to a Dream” is one of my favourite album sequences of the year), the funky “555,” and the earnestly beautiful “Waiting All Night.” I have problems with “Wombat,” which is one of their comedic songs. I guess i’m not that wrapped up in the Phish lore to understand that one, a song that involves rapping, slide whistles, and a chorus that talks about Abe Vigoda. But overall, I was quite impressed with Fuego. While I can’t see myself following Phish live any time soon, i’m glad I was able to look past my negative preconceptions and enjoy this album on its own terms.

Favourite Songs:
01. The Line
02. Devotion to a Dream
03. Waiting All Night





36. Leighton Meester – Heartstrings

phishandmeesterfan? Let’s go with that, Wendell! This is another album that I loved very unexpectedly this year. I was a dedicated Gossip Girl viewer for the first two seasons, and enjoyed her role as Queen B, but the music she made after GG, in the more dance-orientated vein, didn’t appeal to me much. Heartstrings is a complete 180, as its sonic palette is more singer/songwriter, late 90s/early 00s VH1 pop like Tori Amos. It is a very specific sound she is cornering, and since I have many fond memories of that era of music, it is very irresistible to me. Her collaborator on the album was producer Jeff Trott, whose resume reads very much like VH1’s Greatest Hits*, so it’s no surprise they landed on this sound. The songs have very earwormy hooks, songs you can envision playing over the PA at your local Safeway that you sing along to yourself as you grab a box of Cheerios (which is a complement!). And at only 9 songs (31 minutes long!), it is a very easy album to just put on and listen to in its entirety. I hope she makes more albums in this vein, as this was one of the great surprises of the year for me. If you like music of this style, you should definitely give it a shot.


*Sheryl Crow, Colbie Caillat, Jason Mraz, John Paul White of Civil Wars, Augustana, Rob Thomas, Cider Sky, Guster, Natasha Bedingfield, Michelle Branch, Meiko, Holly Conlan, Liz Phair, Joe Cocker, Stevie Nicks, Counting Crows, Marc Broussard, among others.

Favourite Songs:
01. Sweet
02. La
03. Run Away

[Dr. Spaceman]

35. Broken Bells – After the Disco

James Mercer is one of the absolute modern day greats at coming up with a melody. He manages to find chord progressions in each song that take you by surprise and leave you speechless on first listen. The last Shins album, Port of Morrow, is a perfect pop/rock album (ranked #8 on my 2012 list), and one that only gets better with time. His 2014 reunion with Danger Mouse on After the Disco, the first full-length Broken Bells album since 2010, is also very good, though it doesn’t reach Port of Morrow’s heights. Mercer works well with Danger Mouse, as Mercer comes in with the very well-structured songs, and Danger Mouse throws his standard Theremin and other Halloween-period instruments on top of it (which reads as a dig, but I like DM’s style!). My favourites from After the Disco (or rather, After the diSSSSCOO, to give it the James Mercer pronunciation) include first single “Holding on for Life,” the driving “The Changing Lights,” the slinky “Control,” and the regal “The Remains of Rock & Roll.” I hope we don’t have to wait another long period for the next Broken Bells album, as I really enjoy how they work together.

Favourite Songs:
01. The Changing Lights
02. Control
03. Lazy Wonderland




34. Bob Mould – Beauty & Ruin

Ha, just realized I charted Bob Mould’s last album Silver Age at #7 in 2012, so James Mercer is once again back-to-back with Mould. I did not plan that! And by the way, this was not the precursor I hinted at in the Albums History post. That comes much later.

It is hard to follow-up the “Return to Form” album, the album that takes you “Back to Basics.” You get a lot of great publicity for it and great reviews, but the follow-up album will tend to be seen as underwhelming by default. As what’s the narrative for it? “I’m Still Here”? Not nearly as compelling. That’s what all-time great Bob Mould was forced to deal with in the making of Beauty & Ruin. And while the album is not as immediately engaging as Silver Age was, it is no less rewarding. The album is darker than Silver Age, with it opening with the slow, brooding “Low Season,” which is a terrific song, though maybe not the best way to kick off an album. The album that follows is a bit punchier than that and moves at a brisk pace (36 minutes). The reason why the album has darker subject matter is because the writing/recording of the album was influenced by the death of Mould’s estranged father, so obviously there’s more emotional ground to cover. That influence is felt all over the record, even in the supremely hooky/pop gem “I Don’t Know You Anymore,” which on the surface is a fun song to pogo with, but when you actually listen to the lyrics... well, i’ll just let this verse from the song do the talking: “I play back everything we did But all the words are out of phase/ And so the tape rewinds inside my head Shedding but it can't be saved/ Pushing record when I wanted to play The message is clear how you pushed me away/ It's more than I can take.” Which leads into the chorus (“I don’t know you anymore Name and face have been obscured/ Change them if you want but I don’t know you anymore”), all performed and sung over one of Mould’s catchiest pop/rock songs ever. Hiding dark subject matter over light/poppy presentation is one of my favourite tricks in music (which is why I am a huge Steely Dan fan), as it gives you a reason to listen to the songs repeatedly. I love the whole album, and Moud’s current backing band (Jason Narducy on bass and DA GAWD Jon Wurster on drums) is as strong as he has ever worked with. Mould at age 54 shows more youthful exuberance than most people half his age and I hope we continue getting these strong Mould albums every couple of years.

Favourite Songs:
01. I Don’t Know You Anymore
02. Hey Mr. Grey
03. Kid with Crooked Face



33. U2 – Songs of Innocence

Before I talk about the actual album, let me talk briefly about the whole iTunes kerfuffle: I thought it was one of the most overblown news stories of the year, a case of a few loud publications on the internet (Vulture, Gawker, various tech sites that don’t even cover music) starting a narrative that people followed. Look, I know U2 aren’t the coolest band to like, and people have very reasonable reasons to not like the band, I get that and it’s fine! I have no problem with that. I just had a real problem with the overall tone of the media for those 2-3 months. A fact that often is forgotten in that period: “24 of the band's titles had reached the top 200, and the U218 singles album struck the top 10 in 46 countries. The Joshua Tree from 1987, 1991's Achtung Baby, 1983's War and two versions of the singles collection are currently in the U.S. top 50, with 1988's Rattle and Hum and 1984's The Unforgettable Fire following close behind.” So while the general narrative is that EVERYONE hated getting the album for free, that was clearly not the case. It renewed interest in the band with tons of people! You can not like Songs of Innocence for artistic reasons, but don’t hate it because some snark-hut told you that “everyone is outraged” that they got a new U2 album for free.

Now, onto the album itself: U2 defined a lot of my year, not just because of Songs of Innocence, but also the January premiere of the new podcast U Talkin’ U2 to Me, hosted by Scott Aukerman and Adam Scott. It was my favourite podcast of 2014, as both Aukerman and Scott are big U2 fans, who have their own various preferences to which eras/albums they like or don’t like. It really got me back into the band in a big way. U2 was one of the first bands I ever really got into, around All That You Can’t Leave Behind, and I think their back catalogue is so rewarding to go back and listen to. Sure, Bono says his fair share of goofy things, but the music always brings me back. And in the lead-up to this album, I was very interested to hear how Danger Mouse’s style would mesh with U2. I am a big Brian Eno/Daniel Lanois fan, and love all the work they have done with the band in the past, but I was interested to get some new blood added into the mix.

I think SOI is a very good album, though I can understand how some long-time U2 fans would be turned off by it. Ryan Tedder’s co-production on various tracks (i’m thinking of “Song for Someone” and “Every Breaking Wave”) is very modern/poppy, and the antithesis to the Eno/Lanois housestyle, but I kind of enjoyed that change, really. I think lyrically the album is especially strong, as I can’t recall the last U2 album that went this nakedly personal. “The Miracle” is on the surface kind of a big dumb rock song (and I initially rolled my eyes at the Joey Ramone parenthetical), but once you actually listen to the song and hear how it’s about how the members of U2 snuck in to see a The Ramones concert, and watching Joey Ramone perform live gave teenage Bono the confidence to sing in public, it becomes quite uplifting and sweet. Also songs titled “Cedarwood Road,” the street where Bono grew up, “Raised by Wolves” about the Dublin bombings of 1974; the lyrics are really one of the top draws to SOI, which you can’t say for every U2 album. I also love songs like “Volcano,” which could have been on WAR, and “Raised by Wolves” also sounds very much like an early ‘80s U2 song. And in general, the back half of the album, which is the half that mostly has Danger Mouse as solo producer, is very good (“The Troubles” in particular is such a Danger Mouse song, sounding straight out of his ROME album. So much so I had to check the credits at first to check if it was Norah Jones singing on it, not Lykke Li). It’s not my favourite U2 album (I think No Line on the Horizon, which I charted at #3 in 2009 and stand by, is a very underrated and amazing album), but I think it is a strong album and i’m bummed that this whole iTunes media uproar overshadowed it.

Favourite Songs:
01. Raised by Wolves
02. Volcano
03. The Troubles




32. Olivia Jean – Bathtub Love Killings

A note: Jack White’s Lazaretto will not chart on my Top 40 Albums list. I love the album, but as my Top 40 Albums list became very full with albums, I thought I could leave White off, as i’ve written about him practically every year for almost a decade. Which leads me to......

Bathtub Love Killings is the debut album from Olivia Jean, who is most well-known for fronting The Black Belles, the band most well-known for recording “Charlene II” (I’m Over You) with Stephen Colbert I liked the Black Belles’ album a lot (it just missed my 2011 list), but Olivia Jean’s debut is even better. Like he did on the Black Belles album, Jack White produced Bathtub Love Killings, and you can tell, as his unmistakeable Third Man Records signature sound is felt throughout. That’s all the credit I will give him though, as Jean is a force of nature. She wrote every song, and is an incredible multi-instrumentalist, playing the majority of the instruments heard on the album. She shows way more dynamics on her own then she did with The Black Belles, as you get songs as varied as the fierce garage rock opener “Mistakes,” followed by the playful cocktail piano strut of “Merry Window.” I also love “Green Honeycreeper” (“HONEY I’M A GREENHONEYCREEPER, YOU CAN’T STEP OUT ON ME!”), the badass “Excuses” (“I’m always making a big excuses for you. ‘Til I get what’s mine, you’re going to be denied.”), and really, the whole album is so great. I have a feeling this will be one of those albums I regret ranking this low, as I can only sense it getting better. And yes, it’s better than Lazaretto IMO, which should all the recommendation you need to check it out!

Favourite Songs:
01. Green Honeycreeper
02. Excuses
03. After the Storm



31. Chumped – Teenage Retirement

I love every single thing about Chumped. Their band name, that they named their first full length album Teenage Retirement, their album cover, and most importantly, their music. Chumped is a pop-punk band of people in their late teens/early 20s, and their sound is very reminiscent of the ‘90s. A person on Twitter came up with an amazing comparison, saying “It's like Veruca Salt, Blink 182, and the Mallrats Soundtrack had a baby.” I would also throw in Canadian pop-punkers Gob (especially on track 3 “Coffee”), and one of my all-time favourite bands Superchunk. Now the great thing about this is while their sound is a throwback, their subject matter is not. They are writing about Real Teenage ****, which we can all relate to at any age. The opening track “December is the Longest Month,” is a great melancholy jam (the chorus goes “December is the longest month and you've got 30 days to blow. Just need some time to be alone. Just let me go. Just let me go.”), and speaking of jams, the perfectly titled summer love anthem “Hot 97 Summer Jam” is excellent (“We’re reading books, we’re drinking coffee, I’m looking at you, you’re looking through me. I would wait for you all summer long, and you would turn me away, I would wait for you all summer"). Lead vocalist Anika Pyle has such a great voice that really makes you feel the longing in every word she sings. I just love Chumped a lot, and they were easily one of the best discoveries I made in 2014. I hope to see more from in the future, and I bet if their next album is as good/better than Teenage Retirement, they could definitely be a top ten contender.

Favourite Songs:
01. Hot 97 Summer Jam
02. December is the Longest Month
03. Songs About Boats

----------------------------------

NEXT UP: More albums! Maybe ten more? Maybe twenty more? I don't like to promise dates, but i'll try to get some sort of albums set up before the end of Sunday. Thanks again for all the comments! It might sound trite, but I genuinely mean it when I say they mean a lot to me.

[TC]

YESSSSSS albums!! With review-length write-ups that could each be articles on their own!! With proper reviews like these that you've taken the time to write, you've done a great job of convincing me to listen to the albums I haven't heard yet.

Of the ones I have: Broken Bells, Coldplay, and Lana Del Rey just missed my own list-- nice detail on "West Coast" talking about the mid-song breakdown.

Your write-up for Weezer basically destroys everything I said about the album, hahaha. I enjoy that we come from such different places on Weezer right now. Me, the casual fan who has subscribed to a lot of the popular themes in recent years. You, the knowledgeable fan who has thought this all the way through and is, honestly, right.

The whole mess surrounding U2 meant that I never gave Songs Of Innocence the chance I probably should have. Honestly, my patience had already worn thin from them being on the goddamn roof at The Tonight Show, so when that whole iTunes kerfuffle happened, I was just like, that's it, I don't care, I'm checking out. And then I felt bad when Bono got hurt because I was reminded, oh yeah, they're actually one of my favorite bands and I'd be really sad if anything ever happened to them, hahaha. Anyway, I'm with you that No Line On The Horizon was incredible.

Bring on the next set!!

[Bloomers]

Ghost Stories! I was expecting that album to be some Ultraviolent concept album half The Raven/half The King Of Limbs with plenty of Werewolves and Frankensteins. It wasn't. and that meant it took some time to grow on me, even though I've always loved them. They're maturing as a band. More than 13 years since their debut, they're men now. Better make sure there is plenty of silver at their Bar Mitzvah just to be on the safe side though...

Now I remembered the premise of my post. And that was to see you knocked my muffin top off by linking to one of my all-time favorite songs in the Ghost Stories post.

Strangely, I expected the same thing from Ultraviolence as Ghost Stories. The album grew on me as I began to like its various Shades of Cool. I love the album now. Definitely here for future collabs with Black Lips and finally Black Moth Super Rainbow.

I didn't know all those co-writer contributed to that Weezer album I love those guys and have loved Weezer also (since Beverly Hills, please don't hold that against me ) I haven't heard it yet though except for one song. I need to.

We each had Broken Bells on out lists. I haven't heard anything else except for Songs Of Innocence which I liked ok.

I'm definitely going to have to check the things here I don't know probably starting with Phish

Originally posted by Amazing Lyrics

“I’M A SAILORS GIRL, THE BEST IS YET TO COME, ROLLING IN MY FUEGO, I DO MY OWN STUNTS, I SEE GUILTY PEOPLE, ANGELS BLOWING HORNS,

Oh yeah. I'm going phishing

And a band called Chumped? Yes please

[Calvin McHobbes]

Reading through your thread always reminds me that you listen to like 10x more music than I do and could easily do a top 100 if you wanted to. Jack White not being in the top 40 is crazy!

Great write ups, as always. The Phish one is especially great. You even almost convinced me to listen to Lana Del Ray's album! Olivia Jean and Chumped was convincing enough though! I'll check em out on da toob.

I can see how the narrative around Weezer's 'return to form' would annoy, but I guess I never really looked it at like that. It actually reminded me a lot of Marshall Mathers LP 2 from last year. What Eminem had been doing since 2002 was fine, producing plenty of great hits, but THIS is what I want from him, and THIS is what I want from Weezer. I didn't even know I wanted it until I heard it though! Totally agree with you on Make Believe though. I was shocked to see how low I ranked it back in 2005 considering how highly I think of it today. Maybe that will happen with Raditude and Hurley eventually!

[Dr. Spaceman]

30. Old 97’s – Most Messed Up

Rhett Miller opens the tenth Old 97's album with the mission statement: "We've been doing this longer than you've been alive. Propelled by some mysterious drive. They still let me do it, as weird as it seems. I do it most nights, and then again in my dreams." The 5:52 song "Longer Than You've Been Alive" is a tremendous ode to the life of an aging rockstar in 2014, and has numerous quotable lines ("Some nights might have been a triumph of rock, while some nights I might have been checking the clock" "Now you just do it because it's what you do. Now they throw underwear instead of money at you"), all under the backdrop of the Old 97's trademark cowpunk ferocity. It's one of the greatest songs of the year by anyone.

The Old 97's have been a band for 22 years and have made my Just Missed section a couple times in the past for some good albums. Most Messed Up, however, is the best Old 97's-related album (including Rhett Miller's solo albums) I have heard. Their work of the past five years or so was more gentle, softened, though still very good. Most Messed Up, on the other hand, is an album all about rock lore and debauchery. Songs like "Let's Get Drunk and Get It On," "Wasted" ("Tonight I want to get wasted with you"), "This Is the Ballad" ("This is the ballad of drinking rye whiskey and sleeping til 2 on a warm afternoon"), and the outstanding title track ("I'm the most messed up mother****er in this town!"), which includes one of Rhett Miller's most unhinged performances and has another great defining line for why they went in this direction: "There's only so many words you can rhyme with heart." The Old 97's are lifers and have nothing left to prove, so it's always so exciting to get an album like this from people this deep into their career that rocks harder and just overall feels like the product of people half their age. There is nothing "old" about this album, beyond the lingering effects from the night before that they now feel as they get older. Tommy Stinson from The Replacements plays electric guitar on the album, who knows a thing or two about unhinged rock performances, and he adds a great deal to the proceedings. If you haven't listened to an Old 97's album before, Most Messed Up works as a great starting off point.

Favourite Songs:
01. Longer Than You've Been Alive
02. Most Messed Up
03. Intervention



29. Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – Hypnotic Eye

As a kid/teenager, one of the favourite discussions to have is what is your fantasy rock band line-up. Of course it usually devolves into everyone just forming Led Zeppelin, which is understandable. If I were to play this game in 2015, my fantasy rock band line-up would have to be Mike Campbell, Benmont Tench, Ron Blair, Scott Thurston and Steve Ferrone, otherwise known as The Heartbreakers. And sure, throw Tom Petty in there. He's pretty good, too.

I have been a big Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers fan for a lot of my life, with Petty's Highway Companion ranking at #25 in 2006, and the last Heartbreakers album Mojo ranking at #24 in 2010. Hypnotic Eye is another winner from the most Taken for Granted rock band around. The songs are all quite good, but the real attraction here is the performances from all the band members. In that regard, it's one of the best Heartbreakers albums I have heard, as they are all so in tune with one another. You could spend your time listening to the album focusing just solely on Benmont Tench's piano/organ work and be thoroughly entertained. And Mike ****ing Campbell. jeepers creepers. Who's better than Mike Campbell?? And if there was a Grammy category for Best Individual Performance by a Band Member Over An Album, Campbell would have my vote. One of my favourite songs on the album is "U Got Me High," which has an AMAZING bass line. Petty performs bass on the song AND THE BASS LINE IS CATCHIER THAN THE SONG ITSELF. How many hummable bass lines are there anymore? Also on "U Got Me High" is the unbelievable thing where Petty plays lead guitar through the right channel, and Campbell plays lead guitar through the left channel. It is, to quote the great Jason Mantzoukas, NEXT LEVEL BONKERS.

Not to short-change the songs themselves, as I think songs like "Fault Line" (written by Petty and Campbell), the mystical "Red River," and "Forgotten Man" are very good. But the reason to seek this album first and foremost is just to listen to a band that has been around for nearly 40 years (though Stan Lynch left and Howie Epstein died, with Ferrone and Thuston as more recent additions, but the general core of the band has been around that long) at the peak of their powers playing with such skill and playful expertise with each other. It's a true joy to listen to.

Sidenote: Benmont Tench released a really good solo album in 2014 called You Should Be So Lucky. It features all-star instrumental guest spots from Petty, Ryan Adams, Blake Mills, Ringo Starr, Don Was, Gillian Welch and Jeremy Stacey. If you're into The Heartbreakers, it's definitely worth your time.


Favourite Songs:
01. Red River
02. Fault Lines
03. U Got Me High



28. Sturgill Simpson – Metamodern Sounds in Country Music

My first exposure to Sturgill Simpson was through his Network Television Debut on the Late Show with David Letterman on July 14, 2014, and I was instantly impressed. I then decided to check out his album and loved it. As someone who likes a lot of modern country music, I am kind of tired of the "this is REAL country" narrative that floats around people like Simpson. Why are we trying to make these dividing lines? And it makes everything feel very conservative. No wonder Taylor Swift left Nashville! I'll have more to say about this topic when I enter the top ten. Back to the topic at hand, I really like Sturgill and Metamodern Sounds in Country Music is very good. If you haven't heard it yet, you should! I was happy to hear that he recently signed to a major label, so his next album should be a huge deal. I hope it brings him a lot of success, as he seems like a solid guy.


Favourite Songs:
01. Life of Sin
02. Turtles All The Way Down
03. Living the Dream



27. Common – Nobody’s Smiling

When the Best Rap Album Grammy nominees were announced, a lot of scorn was placed on them. I am not going to wade into that whole thing, but the reason I bring it up is because Common's album Nobody's Smiling was one of the albums nominated. Common's current rep is that he's soft, the guy who Bill O'Reilly started a fight with, and spent years in Calgary filming AMC's Hell on Wheels. Who cares about Common in 2015? You should, though, as Nobody's Smiling is the best album he's made since Finding Forever (which I ranked at #18 in 2007).

Nobody's Smiling is a 41 minute concept album about Chicago's current high crime rate/the crisis of black-on-black violence. Which sounds understandably like a bit of a downer, but since the album is produced entirely by Chicago institution/legend No I.D., it also bangs. A spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down, as hip-hop pioneer Mary Poppins once said. There aren't a lot of guest spots on the album, but the artists that do appear are well-curated, and mostly young MC's, which is a nice gesture. For example, prior to Nobody's Smiling, I had never heard of Chicago female rapper Dreezy (not to be confused with You Know Who), but her spot on "Hustle Harder" is one of the highlights of the album. First single "Kingdom" has one of the best beats of the year, and it features one of the most promising rappers around today in Vince Staples! He rises to the challenge and kills it in one of his most high-profile appearances to date. If Staples isn't already on your radar, change that. I expect 2015 will be a big year for him. Oh and Big Sean also shows up, and opens "Diamonds" with his "OHHHHHHHHHHHHH," which almost made me crash my car the first time I heard it. But he was surprisingly not terrible on the song, so that's something!

My favourite song on Nobody's Smiling has nothing to do with the Chicago violence concept though. It's the beautiful final track "Rewind That." The song begins with Common talking about his early days starting out alongside No I.D., but after the first verse it turns into a tribute song for the late, great J Dilla. Common shares his experiences meeting Dilla for the first time, how he gave him a beat for free, how they made "The Light" together and finding out Dilla was sick for the first time. At the end of the second verse he says "Wish we could have that time back, oh we can, yo man, rewind that!" and DIlla's trademark siren plays, and it makes me teary eyed every time. The song later includes old audio of Common talking about how much he loves Dilla's production work, "I'mma work with him whenever I can." And the track ultimately ends with an audio clip of Dilla himself saying "Common ok for me, ok it's definitely not a Common album, but it's Common." It's a poignant note to end on, as we're approaching the ten year anniversary of Dilla's death next year. I will probably have more to say about this in 2016, but Dilla's Donuts remains one of the most lasting albums I have ranked at #1. Some albums you put at #1 you grow out of, but that never happened with Donuts. Listening to it now, it sounds just as exciting and vital as it did nearly ten years ago. R.I.P. Jay Dee.

Anyway, back to Nobody's Smiling. If you have liked Common in the past, but felt he had gotten a bit disengaged with rap, please make sure to listen to Nobody's Smiling. He is focused, it's a compact length, and makes excellent points about serious issues in a non-preachy way.


Favourite Songs:
01. Rewind That
02. Kingdom featuring Vince Staples
03. Nobody's Smiling featuring Malik Yusef



26. Don’t Stop or We’ll Die – Gorgeous

When I placed Don't Stop or We'll Die's 2011 EP One of the Gang in my Just Missed section at the time, I said if it wasn't an EP it would have definitely made it onto the main list. I ended the write-up by saying: "Whenever they decide to release a full-length, and it's up to the quality of One of the Gang, it's a shoo-in for my Top 40 Albums list." Now all these years later, Don't Stop or We'll Die have released their long-awaited first full-length album, and it made the main list! Congrats guys! *Balloons fall down*

Don't Stop or We'll Die are an amazing comedy/piano-based pop rock band that consists of comedians/comedy writers Paul Rust, Harris Wittels and Michael Cassidy. Some of my favourite songs of theirs include "Austin and Ace" ("Who do you think you are, Austin Powers? Who do you think you are, Ace Ventura?"), "The Getaway Grandmothers Club" (a tale of how a group of grandmothers take a trip to Branson, Missouri high on mushrooms), and the incredibly catchy "She's Got Titties (In All The Right Places)" (which includes one of the greatest lines ever in a song: "Squeeze your titties on my Apple Jacks." It makes more sense in the context of the song haha. The tone is goofy not sexist!). The key to why I am a big fan of their music, however, is not solely because of the comedy, as I am also a fan of Rust and Wittels' comedic work on their own. What always brought me back to those EP's, and now their album Gorgeous, is that all the songs are well-crafted and catchy. Rust is a hardcore Weezer fan, and you sense a lot of that influence coming through, as well as some Ben Folds. It's also the Weird Al principle: Weird Al would not be beloved if he just wrote thrown together joke songs. Why people love him all these decades later is because of the songs which are always expertly crafted.

Gorgeous is a great 29 minute blast of fun, featuring some of their finest songs to date. The catchiest is probably "Lisa," an organ-based jam that tells a story about girls named Lisa and Tina who love eating pepperoni pizza, but they "THREW AWAY THE CRUSTS." The bridge of the song describes it further: "AND THE CRUST WAS ALL BROWN. SHE THREW IT ONTO THE GROUND...... AND THEN SHE ATE THE REST!" It is the catchiest and most danceable song you will ever hear about eating pizza (sorry Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). I also like the mournful piano ballad "Where Can a Nerd Find an Egg That's Square?" The bridge for that song might be the most Pinkerton-era Weezer moment on the album, as Rust sings "Why can't the magic happen to me?!?! Why can't the MAGIIIIIIIIIIIIIC happen to me???" The second magic is especially very Rivers Cuomo inspired, which I love. Also the rollicking "The President's Beer," ("Speeding down the highwayyyyyyy... with the President's beer. Gotta get a cold one to the most bold one toooooniiiight"), the MGMT-like "Charleston Chew" ("Oh little boy you're messing up my house now! This is why we can't have nice things in this house now! With the Mountain Dew and Charleston Chew in my house now!") and the ridiculous "Dusty Meadow" (which starts off innocent enough, talking about animals in a dusty meadow, and then devolves into a snake "toking up on his grandpa's reefer getting baked," "YOU KNOW THEY'RE TOKING... THEY'RE TOKING SO GOOD."). This is pure fun, and at under 30 minutes, it is a very easy album to listen to over and over again.


Favourtie Songs:
01. Where Can a Nerd Find an Egg That's Square?
02. Lisa
03. Dusty Meadow

[Dr. Spaceman]

25. The Black Keys – Turn Blue

Turn Blue was a departure for Akron's favourite sons (not named Ike Bart), as after the monumental success of El Camino, they did not strive to write 3 minute 30 second hits. They instead fully immersed themselves with frequent producer Danger Mouse and crafted a very moody record that is maybe the least immediate album they have ever made. If you are in the mood to appreciate it though, it is very appealing and envelopes you instantly. This is an amazing headphones album, you can't appreciate this on ****** laptop speakers/earbuds. There's no way. Get your best pair of headphones and just sit with the album, eyes closed, and you will be taken on a sonic journey. My favourite song easily is the opening track "Weight of Love," which opens with that killer guitar screech, and ultimately ends up giving you a transporting chorus that's as good as they've done. Last track "Gotta Get Away" is definitely the outlier here, though it is very good. I do appreciate though that the Black Keys didn't make an album full of those sorts of songs, as that's what El Camino was. Dan Auerbach, Patrick Carney and Danger Mouse got together in a studio and just made the music they wanted to make, for themselves, and I appreciate that over hit-seeking, always.

Sidenote on this album: I found out very late after the fact that the album title "Turn Blue" comes from Cleveland public access host Ghoulardi, who hosted a sort of horror movie show, and "Turn Blue" was one of his catchphrases. Why do I bring it up? Well, Ghoulardi was the creation/portrayed by TV legend Ernie Anderson, otherwise known as Paul Thomas Anderson's father! How cool is that? P.T. Anderson's production company is even called the Ghoulardi Film Company! I hope this means we will get a Paul Thomas Anderson-directed Black Keys video in the future. That would be my dream!

Favourite Songs:
01. Weight of Love
02. In Time
03. Turn Blue




24. Ryan Adams – Ryan Adams

The last time Ryan Adams charted on my Top 40 Albums list proper (he just missed the cut in 2011 for Ashes & Fire) was in 2008 for Cardinology (#29). So i'm very happy that in 2014 he finally got back onto the countdown with this self-titled album, which might be the best Ryan Adams album I have heard yet. Of course I haven't heard every Ryan Adams album, as he has around one hundred of them (roughly), but I have heard a large swath of them!

What sets this album apart from the past albums I have heard is a strong pop sensibility. Adams worked mostly on this album with the little-known pop giant Mike Viola. I first became aware of Viola through his work on the Walk Hard soundtrack, where he produced/co-wrote many of the songs (including "A Life Without You (Is No Life At All)" "Dear Mr. President," and "Beautiful Ride"). He has such a strong sensibility and he is one of the best kept secrets in music. So this partnership with Adams is a great union, as it focuses Adams' creative impulses and gets Viola's sterling work heard by a larger audience.

The overall sensibility of this album is very much early '80s rock, which first single "Gimme Something Good" (one of my Top Ten singles of the year) did a great job of previewing. It's very '80s Tom Petty, Don Henley, Stevie Nicks, with big, big hooks, jangle-y candy-coated guitar work. They should have put this album out on cassette! My favourite non-Gimme Something Good tracks include "Am I Safe," "Stay with Me," "Tired of Giving Up," and "Kim." But at 42 minutes, it's a great album to just let play through. If you have ever felt like you would enjoy Ryan Adams' work but felt it was hard to grasp/find a starting point, Ryan Adams (the album) is for you. This is as immediately appealing an album as I have ever heard from him.

Favourite Songs:
01. Gimme Something Good
02. Tired of Giving Up
03. Am I Safe



23. The New Basement Tapes – Lost on the River

This album should be terrible. Just look at that pompous album cover! For those who don't know, The New Basement Tapes is a project produced/headed by T. Bone Burnett, where he was given unfinished 67-era Bob Dylan lyrics from Dylan himself. Dylan asked T. Bone to do something with them, so T. Bone called up five artists to form The New Basement Tapes: Elvis Costello, Jim James from My Morning Jacket, Marcus Mumford from Sanford and Son, Taylor Goldsmith from Dawes and Rhiannon Giddens from the Carolina Chocolate Drops. They got together on March 2014 at the famous Capitol Records building for a few weeks to make an entire album using these unfinished lyrics. Oh, and there would be a documentary crew filming it all for a Showtime doc that would coincide with the release of the album. Doesn't all of that sound very unnatural and the least conducive environment for artistic expression? The surprise is, however, that the album is really quite tremendous, and features many career-best songs from all the artists assembled.

The key to enjoying this album is to not associate this album with Dylan and The Band's legendary The Basement Tapes. It is not even close to the same situation: a bunch of (mostly) rich musicians getting together in the fancy high-end Capitol Records building is not at all similar to Dylan and The Band camping out in a little house in the woods (dubbed Big Pink) in upstate New York in 1967. But what the album ultimately reveals (and the Showtime doc also shows, which I would recommend watching) is that the collaboration leads to a wonderful environment of artists helping each other out, helping co-write songs, come up with different melodies/chord changes. In particular the experience worked wonders with Marcus Mumford, someone who I was originally not that fond of. But working with Taylor Goldsmith (him and Mumford co-wrote a couple songs together. including highlight "Kansas City") frees him up of the standard M&S dull bombast, and has him singing some mighty appealing songs with genuine open-hearted hooks. Jim James, who I adore, also has lots of fun in this environment. His songs ("Down on the Bottom," "Nothing to It," "Hidee Hidee Ho #11," "Quick like a Flash") share James' playfulness, as he giggles a couple times, and just generally sounds like he's having the time of his life. Goldsmith's solo songs are very pensive and beautiful ("Liberty Street" and "Card Shark" have two of the most alluring melodies on the album). Costello, the closest thing to a contemporary to Dylan, sinks his teeth into the songs (especially on "Six Months in Kansas City"), and does the closest job to honouring what Dylan likely would have done with the unfinished lyrics. And new-comer Rhiannon Giddens, who I previously wasn't aware of.... incredible. Her voice is sensational, every song she sings is goosebump-inducing. One of the highlights of the Showtime documentary is her struggle in figuring out how to crack "Lost on the River," as her version (which she co-wrote with Mumford) is initially more upbeat, uptempo. But at the 11th hour, she strips it all down, just a guitar, her voice, and a few backing singers, and delivers the definitive take on "Lost on the River." She is set to release her own T. Bone Burnett-produced album next month, and it's high on my list of albums I am looking forward to most in 2015. I expect it to deliver, so you should be seeing it on next year's Top 40 Albums list.

At 74 minutes, this is definitely an album you can compile in your own particular way. But I would recommend listening to all of it on your first listen, and I expect you'll end up impressed with it. If you were turned off by the presentation/concept of it (which is understandable!), but like one/many/all of the artists listed in the group, you should do yourself a favour and check it out. It was a nice surprise, and isn't the dry history lesson that it looks like on paper. It's fun! Really! And it is really fascinating to hear the different takes on the same lyrics, which happens a few times on the album.

Favourite Songs (hard to do with a 20 song album like this, so i'll switch it up)
Jim James: Nothing to It
Marcus Mumford: Kansas City ("When I Get My Hands On You" is very good, too, and also very different from M&S)
Taylor Goldsmith: Card Shark
Elvis Costello: Six Months in Kansas City (Liberty Street)
Rhiannon Giddens: Lost on the River #20




22. Thee Oh Sees – Drop

John Dwyer's San Francisco garage rock institution Thee Oh Sees have also been an institution on my own year-ends over the past few years. Their first appearance was in 2011 (#5 for Carrion Crawler/The Dream), followed by 2012 (#19 for Putrifiers II), and then finally in 2013 (#22 for Floating Coffin). Now in 2014, they are back in the #22 spot! Did not plan that! It was an eventful year for Dwyer and company, as the big news was that Dwyer announced that Thee Oh Sees were breaking up! Which caused great sadness from me and other fans of experimentally hooky garage rock/psych, and then all of a sudden it was announced that this new Oh Sees album Drop would be coming out. Hmmmm? The best I can make of it, due to the credits on Drop, is that Dwyer wanted to go it alone, and meant that Thee Oh Sees in its original form (which included the amazing Brigid Dawson on keyboard/backing vocals) was ending, but not Thee Oh Sees name. Dwyer mostly played all the instruments (vox, guitars, bass, synth, percussion, mellotron, noise), and also enlisted garage rock heavy hitter Chris Woodhouse (who among other things, produced the Ty Segall Band album and Oh Sees' Carrion Crawler/The Dream) to play drums/bass/mellotron. Oh, and the great Mikal Cronin played alto sax on three songs! That's pretty awesome. Drop is another dependably great release from Dwyer, with some of my favourites being "Camera," "The Kings Nose" (love the skipping) and "The Lens" (which has a killer outro). I look forward to what Dwyer brings us in 2015, and i'm sure i'll be ranking/talking about it in a year's time.

Additional note: Dwyer also put out a solo project in 2014 called Damaged Bug, which is more electronic-based. I haven't listened to it nearly as much as Drop, else it would have had a shot at charting. But if you are a fan of Dwyer, it is definitely worth your time.

Favourite Songs:
01. Penetrating Eye
02. Camera
03. The Kings Nose



21. Rancid – Honor is All We Know

Speaking of institutions! Tim Armstrong has always been one of my favourite figures in music, especially with his most well-known band Rancid. I have seen them in concert twice (the October 1, 2006 show remains if not THE best, one of best and most satisfying shows I have ever experienced) and they are just one of those bands that has stuck through with me all these years later. I will always have a soft spot for them and their music is comfort food to my soul.

Honor is All We Know, their eighth studio album and first since 2009's Let the Dominoes Fall (which ranked at #6), will not convert them any new fans. They aren't doing anything new. It's just a Rancid album. For fans of the band though, that is as comforting a phrase as you could hear. A Rancid album means Armstrong's authoritative grumble-singing, Lars Frederiksen shouting his heart out, Matt Freeman's superb bass playing and even more superb gravelly voice, songs about friendship and having each other's backs (Rancid was bromance before the term bromance ever existed), Armstrong singing about how he has "Sham 69, roots reggae on my temple" (on album highlight "Collision Course," which also features Lars singing about "playing Pac-Man at the record shop"), and the greatest ska-revival songs made by anyone ("Evil's My Friend" is SO GOOD). It's just 32 minutes of punk scene lifers proving they've still got it all these decades later. Through all the drugs, hardships and everything else that has transpired, Rancid is still making new music and they are still better than most bands you can name. Long may they run.

Favourite Songs:
01. Collision Course
02. Evil's My Friend
03. Diabolical ("one man gives an opinion, the other man takes offense" AKA, The Song About Twitter)

------------------------------------

NEXT UP: Surprise.... MORE ALBUMS! I'll try to have ten more on Monday or Tuesday.

Thanks to TC, Bloomers, and O for the comments! All three of them were very well thought-out and thorough. I greatly appreciate it. If I had more time, I would comment on each one individually. By the way, Bloomers, loved the amount of 30 Rock references you put in your comment. Very impressive work!

[Bloomers]

I haven't listened to about half of these, but they all are intriguing and something that I will have to check out eventually. It was nice to see what you had to say on Thee Oh Sees. First, thank you for reminding me that I need Putrifiers II. It's their only recent-ish album I don't own and I need to rectify it. I love how as a project Thee Oh Sees are constantly producing music, which is nice and keeps us satisfied, but you can also see the evolution and progression in their sound. (I also added "Damaged Bug" to my wish list, because I have slept on it)

I like 'Turn Blue.' Strangely, it kind of mirrors Ultraviolence; in its structure at least. Maybe it's because of Dan, but they're both 11 track albums with a 6 minute opener and a more catchy and accessible closer. I just thought it was an interesting parallel. I definitely agree with what you said about "Weight Of Love" being great and that "Gotta Get Away," while a highlight, is essentially them getting away in their El Camino.

Your comment on Big Sean was pretty great also. I had a good chuckle over it Glad you didn't crash your car. The guy tries though, you got to give him that. I can't help but like Mr. Ariana and his usual goofy clumsiness. You did make me really want to listen to the album. I liked Common's last (if his last was 'The Dreamer/The Believer.'

Well, I have some new music to listen to a check out, so I'm a satisfied guy so thanks! All the ones I haven't heard sounded promising, but Sturgill, The Old 97's and Don't Stop Or We'll Die all sound right up my alley; and a special shout-out to Rancid for California Love!

Also, 30 Rock is my favorite show. I don't get to reference it enough in my everyday life. Glad you appreciated those allusions. One day I want a Queen of Jordan spin-off. I wish Netflix would make it happen!

[AshleeSimpsonFan]

Ghost Stories is an alright album, so much better than their previous one! UV was a disappointment for me though... Turn Blue

[TC]

This is an amazing set, in that I have listened to zero of these 10 albums. But that's what I love about Ben's top 40 albums! I come here every year to make discoveries, and I am never disappointed. You have just given me the gift of 10 albums to check out. And your reviews are always so in-depth and entertaining.

Of the albums here, I'd guess that I'd be most likely to enjoy Common, The Black Keys (I listened to "Fever" obviously but didn't give enough time to the full album), and Thee Oh Sees. We'll see!

BRING ON THAT TOP 20

[Vato]

GREAT writeup on Turn Blue
Rancid released an album? Why did I not know this?

[Dr. Spaceman]

20. Wilko Johnson & Roger Daltrey – Going Back Home

Wilko Johnson is the greatest guitar player you have never heard of. Though if you live in the UK, there's a good chance you know of him, through his work in seminal '70s pub rock band Dr. Feelgood. Johnson has a very particular style of playing, very jagged-y, and once you listen to it for the first time, you will always be able to spot his work. Very distinctive. One person who is a famous admirer of Johnson is legendary The Who vocalist Roger Daltrey. They met for the first time at an award show in 2010, and hit it off instantly, as they learned they shared similar musical interests. After that meeting, they vowed to work with together in the future. Sadly in January 2013, Johnson was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, which was a shock. The news of that diagnosis lent an added sense of urgency in getting the two together to cut an album. So, in November 2013, they got together in a tiny studio in Uckfield, in South East England, and invited a few players (including the amazing Mick Talbot, keyboardist/founder of The Style Council) and made Going Back Home in just one week.

Going Back Home is a tremendous album, all sleazy Pub Rock, upbeat, ramshackle. All of the songs (with the exception of a cover of Bob Dylan's "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?") were written/co-written by Johnson, some new and some covers of old Dr. Feelgood songs. There's a reason why Wilko Johnson gets top billing, as while he doesn't sing, his guitar playing/songwriting takes the lead, and Daltrey is a fine, fine partner. Going Back Home is the best Daltrey has sounded on record in a long time. You see The Who give live performances on TV, and Daltrey can't hit the same high notes that he once did in his younger days. On Going Back Home, he adopts a lower register, and it really suits him. He snarls, growls, and shows as much personality as he would if he sang his high notes from the 60s/70's. It's just a different style. What I also love about this album is, even though Johnson's cancer diagnosis frames the album, it is not mentioned in song once. Johnson just knew going in that this might be the last album he ever recorded, and lets it all out. He has something to prove, his possible last will and testament to why he is one of the great rock guitarists in history. The great news, however, is that on October 23, 2014 (months after the release of Going Back Home), he proudly announced that he is officially cancer free! Such wonderful news.

This album didn't get a lot of attention in North America, which is a damn shame. I saw certain rock veterans chart on some of these website/publication year-end lists, albums that weren't nearly as good or as stirring as Going Back Home. This album has so much life in it, so joyous, and it was again recorded only in a week. I think any kind of band, whether they have been around for a month or forty years, could learn some lessons from that. They don't need to fret in the studio for months on end working on a single drum part. Just invite a core group of players, go in a studio, press record and see what happens. You can't produce something as sinister as "Sneaking Suspicion," a song with a riff so huge it could chop your head clean off, in isolation over multiple takes. That comes from raw passion; raw playing from someone who thinks this could be the last take of his storied career. Now that Wilko Johnson is thankfully cancer free, I hope this means we get another Johnson/Daltrey album in the future. The world needs it.

Favourite Songs:
01. Sneaking Suspicion
02. All Through the City
03. Ice on the Motorway
Honourable mention to "Keep it Out of Sight," especially for Mick Talbot's unbelievable organ solo



19. Run the Jewels – RTJ2

IIt be feelin' like the life that I’m livin' man, I don't control
Like every day I’m in a fight for my soul
Could it be that my medicine’s the evidence
For pigs to stop and frisk me when they rollin' round on patrol?
And ask “why you’re here?”
I just tell 'em cause it is what it is
I live here and that’s what it is
He chimed “you got a dime?
I said “Man, I’m tryin' to smoke and chill
Please don’t lock me up in front of my kids
And in front of my wife
Man, I ain’t got a gun or a knife
You do this and you ruin my life
And I apologize if it seems like I got out of line, sir
Cause I respect the badge and the gun
And I pray today ain't the day that you drag me away
Right in front of my beautiful son”
And he still put my hands in cuffs, put me in the truck
When my woman screamed, said “shut up”
Witness with the camera phone on
Saw the copper pull a gun and
Put it on my gorgeous queen
As I peered out the window
I could see my other kinfolk and
Hear my little boy as he screamed
As he ran toward the copper begged him not to hurt his momma
Cause he had her face down on the ground
And I’d be much too weak to ever speak what I seen
But my life changed with that sound

Killer Mike’s first verse on “Early” is one of the best verses of the year. I feel like that’s all that needs to be said, but i’ll also add that I love that James McNew (from Yo La Tengo!) plays bass on “Early.” Really cool. I love all of RTJ2, maybe not as much as the first album, but that’s just personal preference. Both are superb, and I look forward the eventual RTJ3 sometime in the future.

Favourite Songs:
01. Early featuring BOOTS
02. Blockbuster Night part 1
03. Oh My Darling Don't Cry



18. YG – My Krazy Life

YG’s My Krazy Life is not just the best hip-hop debut of the year, it’s the best hip-hop album, period, of 2014. My Krazy Life comes from the grand tradition of debut albums from rappers, which often turn to be the best albums they ever make. More than any other genre I can think of, amazing debuts in hip-hop are the most common. Because they have been working for this goal for however many years they have been working as an artist, and they want to let out all of their life experiences/ideas on their first album. It’s when they are at their most hungry. That’s why albums like Snoop Doggy Dogg’s Doggystyle, Nas’ Illmatic, Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt, 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’ or most recently Kendrick Lamaar’s Good Kid, m.A.A.d City (though it’s too early for him), still resonate all these years later as career benchmarks for all of them. Hardcore fans might have preferences to later albums in their careers, but it’s really their debuts that people go back to fondly. YG shares a lot of traits with those albums (in particular Doggystyle), as My Krazy Life feels like an album. This is not a collection of songs, a collection of hit singles where he works with the hot producers of the era, this is YG and DJ Mustard crafting a 46 minute album, sequenced to perfection. I love the album as a whole, but the first half in particular is super strong, as well sequenced a first half as you will hear in 2014. I also really like closing track “Sorry Momma,” with Ty Dolla Sign, with the soulful saxophone feeling like great throwback. The album opens with a clip of YG’s mom yelling at him that he “better not be outside with them gangbangers.” And with it closing “Sorry Momma,” which is self-explanatory (“You ain’t gotta worry now them days is over”), it makes for a very satisfying arc. You feel like you learn about him and his life through those 46 minutes, which is exactly what it shares with all these great hip-hop debuts.

I am sure his second album will be great, as well, as he’ll continue to partner with DJ Mustard and push sonic boundaries, but I doubt it will have the same immediacy as My Krazy Life. It’s hard to replicate those kinds of moments, as once you find success you become out of touch, and then you turn into Jay-Z shouting out Basquiat paintings (“Is this cool? Is this hip? Why don’t I say twerk Miley twerk. That will be hip with the kids!” Jay-Z right now is no better than Denny’s Social Media Manager). But even if he never comes close to topping My Krazy Life, it will still always be there for all of us to revisit whenever we want to.

Favourite Songs:
01. Left, Right featuring DJ Mustard
02. Sorry Momma featuring Ty Dolla Sign
03. Bicken Back Being Bool



17. Ex Hex – Rips

I first became aware of D.C.’s Mary Timony through her being in Wild Flag, who were responsible for my #1 single of 2011 in “Romance” and #2 album for their self-titled debut. I was sad to hear that Wild Flag were disbanding for the time being (not for personal reasons, more logistical reasons, as Carrie Brownstein put it), as I was hoping we would get another album. In 2014 we got major news on two fronts, one being that Sleater-Kinney were reforming (which is Brownstein and Wild Flag drummer Janet Weiss) which was incredibly exciting news. The other big news was that Timony was putting together her own band, called Ex Hex, and that their debut for Merge Records would be out in 2014. And boy, did it deliver! Totally filling the Wild Flag part in my heart that needed filling, this is such an amazing album. 35 minutes, no frills, catchy punk-inspired garage rock. This is everything I look for in an album like this, so I feel i’m underrating it on my list. Two of my favourites are “Beast” (“AND IN THE MORNING YOU HAVE SECOND SIGHT”), and The Modern Lovers-inspired “Radio On” (“RADIOOOOOOOO ON. WHOA-OH-OH-OH-OH-OH). This is a difficult album to describe in words, as there’s no larger story about it, it’s just a punk vet forming a new band, and it’s just a complete pleasure to listen to.

Favourite Songs:
01. Beast
03. Radio On
03. War Paint



16. Fu​cked Up – Glass Boys

When track 1 of Glass Boys starts (“Echo Boomer”), the first thing you hear is a music box. That music box is followed by huge drums that feel like they are being played on Mount Olympus, followed additionally by Fu​cked Up’s standard multi-track Wall of Guitars. That’s how Fu​cked Up decides to open their follow-up to the complete triumph that was David Comes to Life (my #1 album 2011), and it’s perfect. Fu​cked Up were smart in following David up with a concise (42 minutes) non-concept album that rocks as hard as anything they have done. That said, it’s ironic that Glass Boys is a bit less accessible than the 77-minute rock opera, but that’s just the Fu​cked Up way. Everything is upside down! It really is a great album though, and as the Dollar Menu Dickens himself Tom Scharpling said in a year-end review piece about the album: “it will make sense after the next album comes out.” A lot of the best albums ever could be thrown in that category, albums that take time to grow on you until they become some of your favourites ever. But even living with the record for less than a year, I am finding a lot of pleasures in it.

I also like how Fu​cked Up brought in some really cool guests to appear on the album. The legend J. Mascis is on “Led by Hand,” George Pettit of defunct Canadian hardcore heroes Alexisonfire comes out of screaming retirement to guest on “The Great Divide,” but the most unexpected guest appearance of all has to be Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip appearing on “The Art of Patrons.” Mid-way through the song you hear Downie’s trademark bellow singing these words “IT’S THE PRIVILEGE OF MASS DELUSION!” I’m not sure non-Canadians can begin to fathom what a weird moment this is. The Tragically Hip are probably the most popular Canadian rock band of the past three decades, dozens of their songs are rock radio staples. To think of a good analogy, imagine if on the new Ty Segall album you all of a sudden heard Bono singing “IT’S THE PRIVILEGE OF MASS DELUSION!” That sort of gets at what a strange pairing this is, but they really mesh well together oddly, and I give major props to Damian and Fu​cked Up for making it happen. A truly historic CANCON moment!


Favourite Songs:
01. Sun Glass
02. The Art of Patrons
03. Paper the House



15. Nikki Lane – All or Nothin’

This is such a great album. I have loved Nikki Lane for a few years, after her very good debut album/single “Walk of Shame,” and when I heard that Dan Auerbach was working with her on a second album I did a backflip. What a perfect marriage of artist and producer. And while i’m still recovering from that ill-advised backflip (next time I will just clap to myself), her album All or Nothin’ more than lived up to the high expectations. These are strong, strong songs, kicked off by single “Right Time” (one of my top 10 singles of 2014). I like how the album alternates between tear in my beer ballads (“You Can’t Talk To Me Like That” is outstanding, as is “Out of my Mind”), and F.U. kiss-offs (“MA-MA-MA-Man Up,” the organ-drenched “Wild One”). I also just loooove the title track, which has sort of a different feel to the rest of the album. The feel I get from it is very Dusty Springfield, how it could be side-by-side with “Son of a Preacher Man” in a jukebox at a roadside diner. There’s also the great country duet “Heart’s on Fire,” which features Dan Auerbach, which if Lane and Auerbach toured together would be the ideal barn-burner closer to the show. And of course there’s also the killer “Sleep with a Stranger,” **** I love it all! This is a great album that bridges country and rock perfectly.

Favourite Songs:
01. All or Nothin'
02. Wild One
03. You Can't Talk to Me Like That



14. Sloan – Commonwealth

There are many reasons to love and respect Sloan: that all four members have been together since the band’s inception in 1991, that they have one of the best track records for a modern rock band, many other reasons. But what I love about them is they are always pushing. They are never complacent, just making an album to cash a check. They are lifers who want to continue exploring what it means to be a relevant rock band after 2+ decades. What else is there to do? In 2006 they released Never Hear the End of It, a 30 song, 76 minute magnum opus that mostly plays continuously, bridging multiple different kinds of musical genres. It is not the most accessible album they have made, but for my money it’s probably their best (either it or Navy Blues). In 2014, they tackled another pretty imposing task: Commonwealth is an album that gives all four band members their own side of the album. A classic old school double album! The album begins with Jay Ferguson’s Diamond, followed by Chris Murphy’s Heart, Patrick Pentland’s Shamrock, and Andrew Scott’s Spade. Every album has songs by all four band members interspersed throughout, but this is the first time they have been so concentrated together and it was a novel idea.

A project like this tends to lead to choosing sides, which one is your favourite. And it’s such a difficult task, as I love all of them. I maybe lean Chris Murphy overall? But then I listen to “Cleopatra” or “We’ve Come This Far” and you realize that Jay Ferguson’s Kinks-style pop is irresistible, but then you hear “Keep Swinging” (Downtown” or “13” (Under a Bad Sign) and realize Patrick Pentland’s riff-ready muscle rock is amazing (most of Sloan’s huge hits over the years have been Pentland compositions), and then you hear Andrew Scott’s singular 17:49 song suite “Forty-Eight Paintings,” which is so him. My long run-on sentence point being, Sloan is the Voltron of music. They are who they are, and if one member left they would be worse off. The chemistry of these four particular styles of writing/playing colliding gives us Sloan, and I am so thankful that they are still here making music as strong as they have ever made this deep into their career.

Favourite Songs (from each member):
Ferguson: We’ve Come This Far
Murphy: Carried Away
Pentland: 13 (Under a Bad Sign)
Scott: well.... His Only Song On The Album haha. Forty-Eight Paintings



13. Beck – Morning Phase

One of my favourite record reviews of the year was Sasha Frere-Jones’ review of Morning Phase in The New Yorker*. While I have a different perspective of Beck’s career (the thesis of the review was that Morning Phase was the first album he felt that it finally all “clicked” for Beck, with the sub-head of the piece saying “Beck puts it all together”), it really articulates beautifully what makes Morning Phase such an important album in Beck’s career. Let me quote the final paragraph of it, which boils it down (though you should read the whole thing):

This combination of thick, generous sound with emotionally direct lyrics makes “Morning Phase” feel not like an examination of genre or a formal experiment but like a summoning of energy. It is not hard to believe that, as Beck said, he had experienced “a frustration over the years trying to get a certain feeling into a recording.” This time, he went on, “the sessions were just me, and whatever engineer I could get. There was no producer other than me. I just had my band. It was a lone endeavor.” This may be why the album hits so hard, in spite of its laid-back and inoffensive exterior. “Morning Phase” is the sound of one person telling us how he made it to the dawn, surrounded only by his closest friends. I can’t imagine someone who couldn’t find some succor or beauty here. This is the mellow gold that Beck told us about two decades ago, without knowing what it was.

See how he tied Mellow Gold into his last sentence? That’s why he is paid the big “Rock Critic” bucks! For my own feelings, Beck has long been a touchstone artist for me, going back to that same Weezer/U2 period I have talked about in previous write-ups this year. The first time he charted, in 2005 for Guero, he ranked at #1 right off the hop. And his next two albums (2006’s The Information and 2008’s Modern Guilt) ranked at #6 and #13 respectively. He has about as good of a record with me as any artist, and while Morning Phase is tied with Modern Guilt as his lowest ranking, I am 100% certain that this is a better album than Modern Guilt. You know what Morning Phase was for me this year? This sounds as cliché as it gets what with its album title, but it was my breakfast album for a long stretch. I associate the first line of “Morning” (“Woke up this morning, found a love light in the storm”) with eating a bowl of Cheerios looking outside at the new day beginning (second appearance by Cheerios in this year-end. I’m not getting paid under the table by General Mills, believe me lmao). I like Morning Phase more at this point than Sea Change, as while Sea Change is excellent in theory, I find its songs very hard to take in succession. Sea Change makes me want to slit my wrists, while Morning Phase makes me hopeful, upbeat about the future. Final song “Waking Light” is the best of all, the perfect thematic capper to the album. I mean, lyrically what’s a better chorus than “When the memory leaves you, somewhere you can’t make it home, when the morning comes to meet you, open your eyes with waking light.” Off the top of my head, I can’t think of a better hopeful waking up to a start new day song. I’m thrilled Beck is back after years away, and i’m glad he gifted us with this tremendous album, a top-tier Beck album in his discography.

*That said, maybe my least favourite record review of the year was SFJ’s review of U2’s Songs of Innocence, which also was in The New Yorker. He has range!

Favourite Songs:
01. Waking Light
02. Blue Moon
03. Morning

[Dr. Spaceman]

12. Foo Fighters – Sonic Highways

The overall experience of Sonic Highways was one of the best music-related things I enjoyed this year. The Worldwide Pants-produced HBO docu series was an essential component to getting more out of the songs on the album. I have authority to say this as I actually didn’t listen to the full Sonic Highways album until early December when the series ended. I really loved the experience, as each week I would hear a brand new song, understand the background of it/what certain references in the song mean, and then the next episode would give me another song/city. I listened to the album that way as the series went on, adding songs one at a time, and it was such a unique experience that I wished more people went through. I mean, obviously these songs aren’t that inaccessible without the album, Foo Fighters are not in the business of making “inaccessible” songs. They make huge, soaring songs with big hooks for all ages to enjoy. I’m just saying the experience I had, with watching the series on its own without knowing the songs beforehand, was very thrilling. I read some reviews of the record in early November, and a lot of them even said as much “this song is less compelling to me,” etc. And I wanted to give them a Three Stooges-style headsmack, and say “you numbskull! There’s a companion series airing at the same time that will help you do your job better!” I know most people can’t afford HBO, but if you’re a music writer/critic, and there’s extra material out there for you to get more out of the album, and you don’t go for it? Baffling.

Sonic Highways was the album that got me back into the Foo Fighters in a big way. As while I loved Wasting Light, and think there are really strong songs on there, I didn’t feel the same emotional connection to it as I do now with Sonic Highways. I mentioned this on my singles list, but when you watch the D.C. episode, as you learn about Dave Grohl’s hardcore/activist roots, and then listen to “The Feast and the Famine” at the end of the episode? It is incredibly inspiring. There’s also “Outside,” the song from the L.A./Joshua Tree episode, which talks about the amazing desert space/studio, and features an unbelievable solo from Joe Walsh. The moment in the episode where Walsh performs his studio, to a star-struck/slack-jacked Taylor Hawkins, is one of the highlights of the series. His solo gives the song a very cool ‘80s Lethal Weapon soundtrack feeling. The most moving episode is probably the Seattle episode, for obvious reasons. In advance reviews, I remember reading many reviews that said they couldn’t connect to “Subterranean,” which not to sound like a broken record, the episode does an amazing job of giving emotional context to the song. And “I Am a River,” which might sound cornball without the New York episode, also becomes very moving, as it directly relates to the NY studio space/NY history.

One of the other complaints i’ve read about the album is that, no matter which city the band was in, the songs just sound like Foo Fighters songs. There’s a great moment in the Nashville episode where the band has cowboy hats on, and are about to get out a steel guitar, and Grohl shuts that **** down instantly. For the reason being that they needed to stay true to who they are, their sound, rather than superficially just make a country song, or a jazz song in New Orleans. As Grohl correctly pointed out in an interview, could you imagine how much crap they would have gotten in if they DID do that?? I flashback to U2’s Rattle & Hum, which critics at the time ravaged them for, for appropriating other genres/artists in a pompous way. Where the influence of the cities come into play (and this again becomes more overt when you watch the HBO series) is through the lyrics, the personal experiences they have in the various cities. Like how in the L.A. episode you hear Pat Smear talk about his experiences with The Germs, which was a short time as Darby Crash committed suicide only three years into the band (note the parallels between Smear and Grohl). I love both the album and series for those personal reminisces, as other musical history docs exist. Sonic Highways is about what Grohl and the band members have gone through, the memories that trigger them as they step foot in the different cities. As much a personal documentary as it is a musical history documentary, which is what made the show so unique, and it comes through on the album. If you are at all on the fence about the album, please find a way (legally or illegally) to watch the complete series, and I guarantee your opinion will change for the better. I admire Grohl for having the vision to pull this off, and i’m glad i’m back into a being big fan.

Favourite Songs:
01. The Feast and The Famine
02. Outside
03. Subterranean

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NEXT UP: The final eleven albums! I promised an update today, but didn't have enough time to write my #11 write-up, so i'm just tacking it on with the top ten. I'll try to have all eleven write-ups on Friday, if not early Saturday just before cut-off. Since these are my top ten albums (now eleven), I will have a lot to say, so i'm giving myself that time to get it right.

Thanks for all the comments, everyone! I really love reading them.

[Superiore]

RTJ2 and My Krazy Life are objectively some of the best material of the year. I listen more to mainstream music but I recognize when something's better

[V3$$3L.]

Two of your those albums in that eight-LP stretch are on my list!

I should give Sonic Highways another shot, I guess.