“Why the fuck did he post the Grouper album in here.

Boarding = dead.” - Pavement Ist Rad (in the Metal Thread)

#90.




Grouper - Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill
(718 Points, 15 Votes)

US Chart Position: n/a

UK Chart Position: n/a

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "I had the best experience playing this album on a long drive the other week. It's easy to apply whatever music you're listening at any given moment to your surroundings; when the music plays and you're by yourself, you can imagine it as the soundtrack to the imaginary movie you star in. Anyway, here I was driving in the morning past farmland north of Eugene, Ore. This would not be the most fascinating movie, OK. But I kept seeing these small dirt storms form out in the unplowed fields to the left while the lovely "Fishing Bird (Empty Gutted In The Evening Breeze)" played on repeat. I'm not sure this album is the perfect road trip music for everyone-- I'd certainly caution against playing it late at night when you're already sleepy, or operating other heavy machinery as it plays-- but since these songs seem to appear and then vanish into the air, the mini-tornadoes gathering themselves together lazily out of the wind and the dirt seemed the ideal, hypnotizing accompaniment." (8.2)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists:

Ranked Highest By: ____________________________, undo (#4)

Amazon Link

Great record.

I don't think a NAIR P4K BNM has ever been that low. Still, I quite enjoyed the music of Beach House.

what does this one sound like? i'm intrigued...

also surprised how low Beach House is... granted it wasn't high on my list either...

I had it in the top 10. I imagine a few of my favorites won't be that high up.

I'm embarrassed that I know what this means.

Glad to see my obligatory #30 vote for Imperial Wax Solvent likely pushed it into the top 100.

“btw, this Air France is good.” - Bobzilla

#89.




Air France - No Way Down - EP
(737 Points, 9 Votes, One #1 Vote)

US Chart Position: n/a

UK Chart Position: n/a

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "As with many other gifted pop and Balearic artists, Air France also happen to be sticky-fingered. Their sources are varied, yet the pleasure isn't recognizing the different sonic elements, but in relishing their almost supernatural co-existence. "Beach Party" lifted its hook from Lisa Stansfield. The No Way Down title track directly quotes the Happy Mondays. The melancholy intro that precedes Go! Team-esque horns and cheers on "June Evenings" is from late-1980s TV fantasy-romance "Beauty and the Beast", as are the children's voices on "Collapsing at Your Doorstep", describing both the show's fantastical underground world and the joy of being with someone you love. If No Way Down is about a place that doesn't exist, it's a place where fairy tales are true and where old pop culture ephemera can-- in Air France's fertile musical imagination, at least-- live happily ever after." (8.6)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: Rajexico (#1)

Also Ranked By: RoBKoZ (#2)

Amazon Link

dunno what NAIR means but the rest makes sense

been trying to puzzle that one out too

hairless?

me too

if you dare wear short shorts...

ditto

“she's like MIA Soundsystem or something” - Eskimo Kisses

#88.




Santogold - Santogold
(744 Points, 15 Votes)

US Chart Position: #74

UK Chart Position: #26

Charting Singles: "Creator" (#44 Singles Sales), "L.E.S. Artistes" (#36 Modern Rock)

Pitchfork Review: "For much of Santogold, White is channeling and recombining a series of indie icons: Debbie Harry, Kim Deal, Ari Up, Joe Strummer, and Karen O. On "My Superman" she captures the imperious swoop of Siouxsie Sioux and drapes it over the kind of stern electro Goldfrapp used to make. "I'm a Lady" marries ska-pop verses to a strutting Elastica chorus. "Lights Out" finds a fascinating middle ground between the Pixies and the Go-Go's.

This could turn the record into a spot-the-reference game, but White glues it together first with the backing harmonies she uses to sweeten most tracks, and second with her love of space and echo. The early 1980s fascinate her, and I'd guess a big part of why has to do with the era's cross-breeding of rock, punk, and reggae. A trio of songs-- "You'll Find a Way", "Shove It", and "Say Aha"-- evoke that moment when rock's aggression met reggae's drive and depth, and it makes for Santogold's most thrilling sequence. "Say Aha" in particular is perfect new wave bubblegum-- 2 Tone keyboards, phaser effects, a stomp-ready chorus, and a surf guitar solo to finish. As if to ward off accusations of revivalism, it leads into "Creator", a grimy arcade funk jam that's Santogold's heaviest and most successful electronic move." (7.1)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: Wolfgang (#3)

Amazon Link

wow.

figured top 50 if not top 30 for that

Got the Stereolab record the week it came out. Really loved it for about ten days. Then I stopped listening to it, apart from maybe "Three Women." Kind of like eating at Taco Bell: Tasty, but it didn't stay with me long.

eh, I expected the singles to do well but not necessarily the album.

Beach House do nothing for me. Tried twice to get into them, failed both times.
That Grouper disc however is some gorgeous shit.

this is going to be the most severe bottom 50 > top 50 ever, isn't it

only if you overlook Narrow Stairs.

“With this promo and the World Series 'steal a base steal a taco' promo, all I need now is a dessert promo to finish the full meal.” - ParticleHustler

#87.




Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy
(750 Points, 10 Votes, Two #1 Votes)

US Chart Position: #3

UK Chart Position: #2

Charting Singles: "Chinese Democracy" (#34 Hot 100, #5 Mainstream Rock), "Better" (#20 Mainstream Rock)

Pitchfork Review: "Perhaps the most striking aspect of Chinese Democracy is that it's about the fifth-most shocking Guns N' Roses album. Sure, it's difficult to endure both Use Your Illusions in one sitting, but there's something fascinating about how the bombastically lonely "Estranged" could share disc space with the junior-high politicking of "Civil War", "Yesterdays"' concise, sepia-toned pop, and the critic-baiting tantrum "Get in the Ring". Had that record been a career-ender, it would've been a fitting finale. Instead, Axl took 17 years to, we hoped, explore new textures, manipulate songwriting conventions, seek out challenging collaborators, or delve into unfamiliar genres for inspiration. Yet on the way to being this decade's Sgt. Peppers, Chinese Democracy became its Be Here Now-- a record of relatively simple, similar songs overdubbed into a false sense of complexity in a horrorshow of modern production values." (5.8)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: Montana, blackswede (#1)

Best Buy Link

Wow. Most of the best electronic albums of the year (Jacaszek, Bruno Pronsato, Move D) gone already. Still, at least they made the list. Add Grouper and Air France and you get a pretty fucking fantastic start.

EDIT: And then we get Chinese Democracy beating all of them...

this is gonna be a weird year...

“I picked it up yesterday, and dang it's perty” - norton

#86.




Calexico - Carried To Dust
(755 Points, 19 Votes)

US Chart Position: #98

UK Chart Position: #55

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "Multi-instrumentalist Jacob Valenzuela gets his first Calexico co-lead vocal here, sharing the mic with guest Amparo Sanchez on the Spanish-language "Inspiración", which has the album's boldest borderland horn part and a freaky underlying organ ostinato. Other guests include Jairo Zavala, who partners with Burns on the dark chorus of "Victor Jara's Hands", and Iron & Wine's Sam Beam, who lends his soft harmonies to the sensuous flamenco-dub slide of "House of Valparaiso". The album's final third is darker and harder, moving from the desert surf of "El Gatillo (Trigger Revisited)" to the sawing, mournful cello of "Falling from Sleeves" to the icy, spooky soundscape of closer "Contention City", a slow drift of electric piano, glockenspiel, and otherwordly steel guitar featuring Doug McCombs of Tortoise and Brokeback.

Carried to Dust, therefore, is more in the band's usual Southwestern jazz/country/rock/tejano mold than their last, but it's not as diffuse or far-ranging as Feast of Wire. Ultimately, this is the type of record this band is suited to making, and it richly rewards repeat listening-- details and melodies that seem buried or understated eventually come to fore, slowly revealed in a mixture of organic warmth, welcome variety, and subtle complexity." (8.3)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: "In The Reins" (with Iron & Wine, #64 of 2005), "Garden Ruin" (#67 of 2006)

Ranked Highest By: wakingrufus (#3)

Amazon Link

Awesome. Also LOL at Pitchfork calling the songs "simple and same sounding" while voting Fleet Foxes #1 of the year. The album had too much going on and hurt their delicate indie ears.

GnR putting another dent in Raj's prophecy.

Montana flies the Regular Rock flag high and damns the poo poo ting ting

Still, with 2 #1s and the best it could do was 87.

That Calexico album is pretty good.

I'm only 1 for 14 so far (The Fall) but haven't heard some of these at all. Don't know how I missed the Calexico with all the hundreds of others I heard this year.

“i like any chick that keeps her legs apart.” - tweed

#85.




Lykke Li - Youth Novels
(764 Points, 20 Votes)

US Chart Position: #18 (Heatseekers)

UK Chart Position: #112

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "The foundation for the successful songs tends to be voice and bass: the bass thick with reverb, the voice cute and close-up. Around this Yttrling-- who co-writes all the tracks-- places other instruments: splashes of piano or woodblock, petite guitar phrases, keyboard buzzes. The trick-- and they pull it off over and over again-- is to bring all the elements together on the chorus for a big hooky payoff. Of course for this to work they need strong choruses-- "I'm Good, I'm Gone", "Let It Fall", "Hanging High", and others provide them. Standout "Dance Dance Dance" has one of the stickiest refrains on the album, and one of the most audacious instrumental builds-- close-mic'ed bass, tippy-tappy percussion, and then suddenly a cheeky sax nudging its way into the track and scrapping puppyishly around its edges. If you don't smile at that, Lykke Li is probably not for you." (7.8)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: worrywort (#5)

Amazon Link

“Fits in with the Winehouse, Duffy aping of the music of that period in the UK right now.” - Mitchell

#84.




The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age of the Understatement
(782 Points, 17 Votes)

US Chart Position: #111

UK Chart Position: #1

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "Turner wisely decides not to compete in the crooner sweepstakes, letting his voice retain its usual charming grittiness. Kane, from near Liverpool, sings in a voice that blends in as naturally as if they were brothers. So if you hear only the caustic vocals and lavish arrangements of faster-paced tracks like "Only the Truth", the Last Shadow Puppets are exactly what you'd expect Arctics-with-strings to sound like. This single-mindedness hampers songs like "The Chamber" or "I Don't Like You Any More", which work fine on their own but offer little to distinguish themselves when following The Age of the Understatement's stirring first half. As on both Arctics albums, though, Turner keeps a tender surprise up his sleeve. The first minute of finale "The Time Has Come Again" strips away all but neatly picked acoustic guitar and a 22-year-old's panging nostalgia for a few years earlier. "Don't go too soon/ She went too soon," Turner and Kane harmonize, as strings rise up to meet them, whatever people say they are, and everything else." (7.7)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: Meldrick Lewis (#5)

Amazon Link

And I like LSP at least ten times more than Arctic Monkeys.

I wouldn't go quite that far but I'm in a similar boat. Nice to see it make the cut.

Apart from the myriad ways this comparison doesn't work, voting Chinese Democracy #1 on your personal year-end list is like voting The Eagles' The Long Run best album of all time.

Sure, you could make a case for it, but somebody made a case for carbonating chocolate milk and bottling it once, too.

I imagine the execs at Geffen who thought releasing Chinese Democracy was still a good plan are in the same place as the guys who dreamed up Chocola.

“I haven't listened to Mogwai in a long time, but how can you argue with something like 'I'm Jim Morrison, I'm Dead?'” - Dark Heat

#83.




Mogwai - The Hawk Is Howling
(789 Points, 15 Votes)

US Chart Position: #97

UK Chart Position: #35

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "At the risk of contrition, I wish this wasn't the case. Mogwai-- for me and for many-- have meant an awful lot. There have been moments that I've wished all music would sound more like Mogwai-- brazen, strong, and redemptive or atmospheric, reserved, and cool. But the only reason I keep listening to The Hawk Is Howling is because Mogwai's name is attached. Hawk makes marginal stylistic advances that it could stand to omit, and it lightly retreads stuff that needs no recapitulation. I hope Mogwai make another great album soon, and I hope it sounds nothing like EP+2, Young Team, or Rock Action. Really, I wish Mogwai could just forget what "Mogwai" sounds like. Maybe then, they'd finally make another record that doesn't glance backward at outdated obligations. Mostly, though, I hope Mogwai doesn't make another album that sounds like Mr. Beast or The Hawk Is Howling-- that is, another bland reduction of splendid antecedents." (4.5)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: "Mr. Beast" (#79 of 2006)

Ranked Highest By: RabbiSchmoiley (#2)

Amazon Link

Well they had to recoup some of the nearly two decades of financial losses incurred while waiting for Wackxl to get his shit together.

1.5 million copies sold in one month, outdoing In Rainbows all of 2008 sales worldwide:


http://www.mediatraffic.de/albums-2008.htm

“This thing fucking sears.” - Senor Cardgage Again

#82.




The Gutter Twins - Saturnala
(796 Points, 16 Votes)

US Chart Position: #117

UK Chart Position: #54

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: " The project's sense of familiarity, however, is not a negative. "Each to Each" revisits the eerie electronica of the Twilight Singers' debut, a welcome compliment to Dulli's vocals courtesy of guitarist Jeff Klein and synth player Natasha Schneider. With its odd chorale intro and a string arrangement that shifts chords tectonically, "Idle Hands" builds to a chorus that could scale a skyscraper. Scavenging the gutter, though, Dulli and Lanegan come across some new flourishes. Discordant strings add tension to opener "The Stations", which marches along at a midtempo before Schneeberger's churchly organ raises it aloft. Before the Twins can build to the expected finale, the song simply fades out, redemption thwarted. "God's Children" settles into a Whigsy blaxpoitation mood before drummer Greg Wieczorek hammers out a soaring chorus. "Who Will Lead Us?" is part folk and part gospel, so subdued that the tension never releases but bubbles into "Seven Stories Underground".

With a billion cigarettes between them, the Twins are well matched vocally: Lanegan sings like he's rising from the dead, Dulli like he's falling from grace. Together, they can make a line like "We're gonna have some fun" sound utterly sinister, which lends these lecherously slow burners their peculiar gravity. Lanegan sings "All Misery / Flowers" like a Tom Waits song, his vocal delivery tripping against the song's rhythms as he conjures junkie afflictions: "Little girls might twitch at the way I itch, but the way I burn, it's a son of a bitch." Dulli closes the album with "Front Street", which begins, somewhat morbidly, with the chirping of birds. It's no joke, but a chiaroscuro contrast with the song's pitch subject. "People to use, lovers to break, handful of pills, no life to take," he sings, flirting with the masochist lover/confidence man he perfected 15 years ago on Gentlemen and seemed to abandon with the Twilight Singers. " (7.8)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: Nick (#2)

Also Ranked By: MuteSuperstar (#4)

Amazon Link

I know. Getting 90 minutes' sleep today means I will simultaneously make more and even less sense than usual all afternoon.

I'd like to make a humble plea to keep the record sales argument out of this thread.

Just a humble request, make of it what you will.

Agreed.

Saturnalia was very good.

I guess Dig Out Your Soul wont be charting?

haha

as a Lanegan & Dulli fanboy i gotta admit i was kinda let down by it...

not that i didn't enjoy plenty of it, but it was more like a 6.5/7 record when i'd hoped/expected an 8.5/9

Electronic-wise it's now mostly just a matter of waiting to see how high Radio Scarecrow can soar.


I'm quite happy to overlook DCFC any chance I get

“among other things, i'm totally loving the fast-strumming rhythm guitar.” - DrJimmy

#81




The Dodos - Visiter
(812 Points, 20 Votes)

US Chart Position: n/a

UK Chart Position: n/a

Charting Singles: n/a

Pitchfork Review: "The first quarter of Visiter marries those impulses with fantastic results. The banjo playing and female harmonies on opener "Walking" echo Michigan-era Sufjan, but the connection ends at Long's stridently confident vocal delivery. That song immediately segues into the maniacal "Red & Purple", a bewilderingly worded love song accompanied by a toy piano and fuzzy bass. And after the brief "Eyelids" comes "Fools", which has been bouncing around the web in some form for months, and is fast becoming the Dodos' signature tune-- although it may soon be eclipsed by the rollicking, Feelies-esque "Jodi".

From that point on, Visiter alternates between longer, more improvisatory material and near-interludes, which can leave a slightly spotty impression on its first few listens. With more exposure, the record reveals the celebratory acoustics of Led Zeppelin III or a more song-oriented take on tourmates Akron/Family. Playing with infectious fervor, Long runs through tricky blues-boxing and molten slide riffs on the galloping "Paint the Rust" and the second half of the epic "Joe's Waltz"." (8.5)

Artist's Previous Rankings on Our Albums Lists: n/a

Ranked Highest By: liquidheaven (#4)

Also Ranked By: phlowtron (#5)

Amazon Link

re: Rajexico

Lindstrøm might do okay.

Don't know if Radio Scarecrow has a chance at top 50, but it's probably going to be in the upper reaches of 51-100.

That's it for today. We'll do twenty tomorrow and Wednesday and then the top 40 on Friday with blurbs. Tomorrow we'll also do the comps. and misc. polls. It will be sombtastic.

Thank fuck for that.

I have things I need to be doing.