Top 25 Albums of the 2000s

After reading Pitchfork’s Pitchfork’s top albums and songs lists, I was inspired to come up with my top albums list.*  If you have a couple spare hours, click through the songs list for awhile and listen to some of the embedded songs.  Maybe you missed something; a decade is a long time.

*I can’t imagine coming up with a top X songs list.  Comparing albums is difficult but at least you can come up with some basic metrics (album depth, how much you want to listen through a whole album at once, etc.), but for songs I got nothing.  Is “Destroy Everything You Touch” better than “Mein Herz Brennt”?  I have no idea!

Sure, my list isn’t as authoritative and I haven’t heard every culturally relevant album of the decade.  A year from now my ordering could be completely different or I might have entirely new entries from albums that I just haven’t heard yet.

My first attempt started with a goal of my top 25 albums, but this ballooned up to 30 albums that I found I just had to include on a decade-long list.  Then 35, then 50.  But for me, there really wasn’t a huge difference between, say, the #32 album (Röyksopp – Melody AM) and the #49 album (Space Manoeuvres – Oid).  So we’re down to 25 albums for the purpose of brevity.

Note that I ruled compilations ineligible for this, which disqualifies albums like Nick Warren’s Reykjavik mix (almost certainly a top 25 entry).  Ok, well, technically Nah Und Fern is a compilation, but I’m using it as a stand-in for the four albums that comprise it.  The albums are so interconnected in theme and aesthetic, I don’t think I could choose a distinct favorite.

1. Radiohead – Kid A (2000)
2. The National – Boxer (2007)
3. Aphex Twin – Drukqs (2001)
4. Radiohead – Hail to the Thief (2003)
5. LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver (2007)
6. The Smashing Pumpkins – Machina/The Machines of God (2000)
7. Editors - The Back Room (2005)
8. Interpol - Turn on the Bright Lights (2002)
9. Asobi Seksu – Citrus (2006)
10. Boards of Canada - The Campfire Headphase (2005)
11. Thom Yorke - The Eraser (2006)
12. Mindless Self Indulgence – Frankenstein Girls Will Seem Strangely Sexy (2000)
13. Ulrich Schnauss – Far Away Trains Passing By (2001)
14. Radiohead - In Rainbows (2007)
15. The Orb – Okie Dokie It’s The Orb on Kompakt (2005)
16. Beck - Guero (2005)
17. The Avalanches - Since I Left You (2000)
18. Ulrich Schnauss – A Strangely Isolated Place (2003)
19. Boards of Canada – Geogaddi (2002)
20. Faded Paper Figures – Dynamo (2008)
21. The Orb - Cydonia (2001)
22. Gas - Nah Und Fern (2008)
23. The Field - From Here We Go Sublime (2007)
24. The Knife - Silent Shout (2006)
25. Gorillaz - Demon Days (2005)

Just missing the cut (in no particular order): Electric Six – Fire, Manitoba – Up in Flames, DJ Shadow – The Private Press, Dan Deacon – Spiderman of the Rings, Passion Pit – Manners, Gnarls Barkley – St. Elsewhere, Kid Koala – Some of My Best Friends Are DJs, The Shins – Wincing the Night Away, Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavilion, The (International) Noise Conspiracy – Survival Sickness

Most unknown from top 25: Faded Paper Figures – Dynamo

Most critically derided from top 25: The Orb – Cydonia

Barely missing the cutoff date: Nine Inch Nails – The Fragile (released at the end of 1999, this would have been a contender for #1)

Wanted to include in top 25 but could in no way justify it: The Bug - London Zoo, Nobukazu Takemura – Hoshi no Koe, Deepchord Present Echospace – The Coldest Season

Wouldn’t be surprised if they entered the top 25 in the future: The Dead Weather – Horehound, Asobi Seksu – Hush, Fleet Foxes – Fleet Foxes

Decade winner: Thom Yorke

Coming up with this list was a little strange, as it mixed albums like Machina that I was essentially raised on almost ten years ago with albums I didn’t discover until this year like Faded Paper Figures’ Dynamo.  I swear I could change this list around a dozen times be no less satisfied or dissatisfied with it.

Picking the #1 album was pretty difficult.  For a long time I had Boxer as the top entry.  Plus, I didn’t really want to pick Kid A, as it’s #1 on almost every top albums list I’ve read.  Kid A really is a great album, but I think I view it differently than a lot of people.  For many, they viewed it as an avante-garde step for rock and a musical revolution.  Coming from an electronic music background, I viewed it more as a natural progression of electronic and rock music.  Kid A takes a lot of cues from “IDM” artists like Aphex Twin, but Radiohead just did it so damn well.

Arbitrary song of the day: Nina Simone – Sinnerman (Felix Da Housecat’s Heavenly House Mix)