You could have it so much better.....with the ILM albums of 2005

ILM could use a little more rockism.

My number two album is Annie but didn't vote for it because it's from last year. That is 100% the fault of ILM, again thanks. It can be included on my official list because 2004 albums I failed to listen to are eligible but felt wrong to vote for it on ILM.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/low.jpg

Comment:

Shaken by personal crisis, these slow-mormons abandon the church of neo-dull, presenting us this ominously beautiful revelation.
Joe Schoech

other ilxors said:

this is *amazing*. i'm sure i've said before on ilm that i've only got into the last 3 or 4 albums when the next one's come out, giving me some kind of filter to view the older one through, but this has got me straight away. maybe it's because of the election, maybe because of my personal life right now, but it just sounds fantastic - like they've finally delivered on the album they've been threatening since "dinosaur act".
toby November 3rd, 2004 11:43 PM.

Everyone seems to agree that the "classic" Low songs (Death of a Salesman, Walk Into the Sea, etc.) are great, regardless of how they feel about the rest of the album. Your description of "When I Go Deaf" is spot-on -- yes, the song's second half completely disrupts the mood and tone of the first half.
Many people are frowning upon this -- I am smitten with it. In most Low songs, almost every note sounds so meticulously crafted, as if every sound you hear is there for a specific purpose, with absolutely nothing left behind by accident. Certainly, the slow tempos have a lot to do with this, because each note is accentuated and separated from the others that much more.
Then we hit the second half. On its own, I love the fuzzed-out, grungy timbre in Alan's guitar here. But more to the point, after all the delicacy, and all the attention to the smallest details in their songs, suddenly Low have broken out into a chaotic sprawl and it sounds like they're about to completely lose their shit. The chorus isn't sung as much as it is heaved out of Alan and Mimi's lungs, and it's probably the most unrestrained that they've ever sounded on record. The raw emotion of this portion of the song completely floors me.
Obviously I'm not criticising anyone's taste or opinion here, I'm just writing down what I hear and how I feel about the album.
MindInRewind January 27th, 2005 6:10 PM

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/sigurros.jpg

Comment:

Sigur Ros, "Takk...". Here I sit, going through the motions of another failed attempt to describe Sigur Ros' "Takk..." without having the finished product turn out like a description of a shit Mum album written by a twee indie fuck. What's the point of writing about how "Se Lest" feels like a soaring, Peter Pan-like excursion over a twinkling Disneyland when I can't stand the way those words look on paper? Why write about how "Heysatan"'s four minutes serve as an exhausted, extended sigh that help the album tail off into nothingness better than any final chord could? There is no point.
Barry Bruner

other ilxors said:

so far this is great! totally hilarious coldplay-style-riffage, but they're real good at it.
sean gramophone August 4th, 2005 9:05 AM.

Ugh. They get worse with every album.
Melissa W August 4th, 2005 9:30 AM.

It's so frickin' BLAND for aural nirvana, by rote. I've never heard a band so dedicated to being DRAMATIC/BIG/BEAUTIFUL sound so dull, and that includes Godspeed, who I detest. So yeah, I dislike them for musical reasons, that way that they cheapen the sublime. Aim for Mont Blanc, get a Thomas Kinkade landscape.
That said, in the 'I am amused' department, two flacks on the NRO website were talking about being fans of theirs today, with one saying, "It's like Enya if Enya were rock."
Ned Raggett September 23rd, 2005 2:38 AM.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/deerhoof.jpg

Comments:

other ilxors said:

The new Deerhoof is fucking gorgeous. Believe the hype. They've stopped MeltBananaing it up and started making pastoral pop. Will latch itself to college radio like a sucking tick covered in glitter paint.
Whiney G. Weingarten July 22nd, 2005 7:29 PM.

I just have to say it again. Brilliant! Like the sun bursting through on a cloudy day. I don't think anyone will top this one for years.
marybeth August 10th, 2005 7:21 PM.

This album is awesome, but I really can't fucking take her voice anymore. I love that weird, sort of incongruous afro-pop sounding track. It came in right when I was starting to get bored.
Hurting November 3rd, 2005 5:32 AM.

I mean someone needs to develop a patch that edits out her voice.
Hurting November 3rd, 2005 5:34 AM

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/wolfparade.jpg

Comment:

I am not a particularly big fan of Modest Mouse, nor would I call myself a fan of "indie rock." I love this album.
Also, I consider "actual music" to be much more important than lyrics. This is one of the very few bands I listen to because of both music and lyrics.
They sucked live.
sovietpanda

Rate Your Music: 50 Best albums of 2005
http://rateyourmusic.com/feature/2005
With reviews

after an exciting 40-31, it's all gone very indie again, sigh. I live in hope tho'.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/kelleypolar.jpg

Comment:

other ilxors said

A really gorgeous production; the real strings are predictably incredible, the harmonies are lush and crystal-clear, the synths amazingly glowing. Plus Morgan co-produced it, so there is a lot of of Metro Area DNA in the rhythm tracks.
Definitely one of the best sounding records I've heard all year (and the tracks are great too.)
Michael F Gill August 30th, 2005 11:39 AM.

I do hear Geist's production but I don't think you can overstate the impact of so many lyrics, it gives a record a totally different aesthetic and appeal. Perhaps the reason alot of people are very into this (who may or may not like Metro Area, and if they don't, so what, let's not crucify them) is because such a strong presence of vocals makes it less of a knowing producer/purist album than Metro Area's record.
I don't mean that as a criticism either, but the Kelley Polar Album is definitely more song based, and also I think the vocals make it alot more pop and catchy than Metro Area.
(it's actually way closer to the Unclassics mix than the Metro Area album, which I also prefer!)
In response to Sean, I think the reason I had a very over the moon response is because the record has an instant impact, I mean, I am still pretty much bowled over by the first track. The best answer I can give you is that I think it's a brilliant pop record, and people are still kind of smacked across the face by that kind of thing in a weird out of leftfield way, especially when it's an artist they haven't heard of or heard before, and again this is all speculation on my part.
I hate characterising people as newbies based on their enthusiasm so hopefully that won't happen here if it's not too late.
Ronan October 25th, 2005 2:40 PM.

let me restate before i piss anybody else off: i really like the kelley polar album, except i hear it like an IDM record, not a house record - i agree w/ susan's statement but i would probably ease back on "leading up to nothing" (less polemical pls) and i would go ixnay on "childish ideas" (though there are certainly ideas about genre ... maybe ways of playing w/ genre that are specific to IDM)
i guess what is fascinating about kelley polar is that it plays w/ genre in an unexpected direction - instead of the usual IDM tricks (electro w/ references to musique concrete, jungle w/ references to gabba + grindcore) we have this sort of mid-tempo electronic album (the reference to PLAID upthread was spot-on) that references disco in the way autechre integrates influences like xenakis or zoviet france, or arthur russell integrates terry riley - i guess a corollary to what i am saying is that this is different in the way that early jungle artists incorporated ragga and the way deep house artists incorporate gospel + jazz music.
vahid November 24th, 2005 12:25 AM.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/clientele.jpg

Comment:

Reverb seems like such an intrinsic element of the Clientele's sound that it's hard to imagine them actually removing it. But that's what their producer does, or at least minimizes it since you'll never fully drain the honey from the hive. And while I can't say this necessarily sounds better than the Violet Hour, it does reveal the core of their pop-lovin' heart. Which allows some supremely catchy songs like "My Own Face Inside the Trees" and "When I Came Home From The Party" to flourish, and invites a little more investigation into their impressionistic lyrics. Plus … there's strings!
Keith Sawyer

other ilxors said:

What I've heard of Strange Geometry is gorgeous - Louis Philippe string arrangements, Alasdair never sounding better and a spoken-word piece that'll knock your socks off. They seem to have got the pro-studio richness without losing their signature sound. Clever boys.
Michael Jones June 19th, 2005 10:38 AM.

It's really rather good.

Just more of the same, but it sounds wonderful. It doesn't seem like as many people are going to be talking about them here this year, which is sort of a shame, but then what more can you say except this sounds like the last two Clientele records, maybe a bit more structure than The Violet Hour and it's also got some lovely orchestral flourishes. I love it.
Adam In Real Life August 19th, 2005 3:38 AM.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/ladytron.jpg

Comment:

other ilxors said:

I can't say I'm disappointed but I think the best tracks were on the sampler. My favourite is still "All The Way" (I think it's even my favourite Ladytron song so far). But "White Light Generator" sounds like a bit of a mess to me. I'd prefer it if it had more structure. Still, there are a few nice surprises ("Soft Power", "High Rise"). I'm not very familiar with Light and Magic but this album feels very, very dark and ocasionally very cold too, which is part of what I expect from Ladytron.
daavid August 15th, 2005 5:28 AM.

Very happy with this. I am hearing "Harmonium"/"Jenny Ondioline"-era Stereolab in lots of this (esp. "High Rise") but magnified to cartoonish levels of heaviosity. "AmTV" is Lightning Bolt playing the B-55's. I was baffled by the MBV comparisons in relation to "Sugar", but "White Light Generation" is totally "Soon" (although more "Nothing Natural" perhaps).
604 is kind of a benchmark-perfect record for me, and this is totally different to that, but there is this weird cloak of flawlessness wafting over the whole thing.
Alex in Doncaster August 12th, 2005 2:29 PM.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/saintetienne.jpg

Comment:

other ilxors said:

The bastards.

The bastards.

They've done it again.

Wrong-footed me. Dared me to shrug my shoulders at the top of this thread.

And then I listened to the thing, on my Discman, on a 31-degrees-in-the-shade Saturday, walking from Oxford Street to Chalk Farm.

The benign abandonment of these sunny, empty streets in the Bloomsbury/Euston/Regent's Park triangle.

The only shop open in Great Titchfield Street was - you guessed it - a tanning salon (not, alas, the Tropicana Tanning Salon).

In a semi-derelict newsagents just off Wells Street to buy a much-needed bottle of water, the elderly proprietor invites me to admire her nice young terrier.

Round the nexus of the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital. Blocks of flats which look like displaced houses from the road which ran parallel to the Thwaites brewery. A white-haired, tanned, pullovered fiftysomething wanders past me with a watering can. He is probably extremely well-known, but I don't stop to look at him.

Jumping over the end of Cleveland Street, the Tower looking down upon me ruefully, and not quite protectively.

Even the main traffic lights on Euston Road appear to change in super-slow motion on a day as liquid as this.

Down the shadowed side of Osnaburgh Street, across from the former insurance office where Laura briefly worked too many years ago, below the windows of the flat where once Kenneth Williams lived; a smaller and pokier place than you'd expect. Two dusty front windows, only one open. Everything in this street appears to be on the brink of turning into dust - disused factories, Houses which don't seem to House anyone -
"throws a gown over every place I've been
And every little dream"

The long, peopleless procedural that is Albany Street. Almost peopleless, at any rate. A group of backpacking students stop at a pub, and realise dolefully that it's not open yet. "Don't worry," says one, "there's another one just up the road that's definitely open." And indeed there is - the Cafe of Good Hope. Across the street from where Henry Mayhew once lived.

The communality of the poor. Everybody talks about the enclosed individual prisons of London. No one ventures outside their room, talks to anyone else, etc.

"I walk these side streets alone"
But you wouldn't know it from round about Robert Street. There's an estate there, not quite the Regent's Park Estate from whence sprang Flowered Up and where the components of Militant Esthetix continue to dwell. People amble out, smiling, talking to each other, passing cordial greetings, eyeing me with suspicion. Should I be here?
"She knows this has to end"

It's easy to feel out of place. I rest my legs at a bus stop. Two people join me; a crew-cut twentysomething in shorts and iPod, swaying his arms and tapping his feet, enraptured, glancing around to see if anyone else can feel it, but I can't even hear what he's listening to. To my left, a distinguished-looking, grey-haired, bespectacled fiftysomething, possibly an Independent leader writer, looking benign rather than bemused.

The church at Redhill Street whose clock seems to have long stopped. The nearly luminous redbrick which runs in the little side street behind it, but which proves to lead to nothing except the sectioned-off wall of a school playground. I make my way back to the main drag, and a black woman looks at me exceptionally dubiously.
The shops here are standard, but perhaps all that is needed. A Post Office which at 11:45 in the morning is already closed. A dry cleaners. A betting shop. A tanning salon (and no baker). A piano shop. Why the piano shops in out-of-the-way locations? I recall Courtney Pianos in Botley Road, across the street from where once we lived. The idea was that once we got a proper house we'd get in a piano (there wasn't enough room for one in the flat) and I'd teach Laura to play it.

Further down, past more closed-down depots and warehouses, along whose walls I walk directly as the shade does not penetrate more than a couple of inches beyond them, the street becomes distinctly more rural (you could almost be walking down a street in Harrogate, or Blantyre) and delicately more opulent. To my left, the complex of backs-to-the-street Cumberland Terrace pied-a-terres wherein '70s rock stars hang their spurs during the week. To my right, past the TA barracks, I suddenly see Cherry Tree Lane from Mary Poppins, identical in every detail and blossom. Park Village West - what is this elysium doing on the outskirts of Camden? And such transcendence is not limited to those of affluent means; back in the estate, there was a block called Kelso House. Through the entrance portal I can view an unbelievably light and colourful bouquet of garden and enchantment. Also closed off to me.

"We need some space"
"I said I'd miss my mates"
I'm now at the top of Albany Street, at the junction where the outflow from Camden meets the back end of London Zoo.

"Let's build a zoo!...Here they come! Two by two by two by two..."
I opt not to suffocate in the drowning human traffic of Camden proper so make my way down Gloucester Avenue, past the LMC, before emerging at Chalk Farm, en route to one of the most magical days I can remember having for a long, long time.

"Stars above us/Cars below us/Nothing can touch us, baby"
Tales From Turnpike House is about escape. The Stars are regularly referenced in contrast to the "grey" (and recall the grey-on-white-on-grey design of the Finisterre sleeve; what was that about "I love to get lost in the city" and how did that end up as "Slow down at the Castle?").

(in Ryman's 253, remember, the fatal tube crash occurs at the Elephant and Castle - the End of the Line. Beyond that, it's the multiple Congo deltas of Old Kent, Walworth, Camberwell, every man for himself)

It's about a day in a dozen lives; A Grand Don't Come For Free multiplied by side one of 'Til The Band Comes In with a libretto by Georges Perec and scored by - well, scored by the Rivers (the absence of rivers is tangible in the record's story).

There isn't much unalloyed joy in TFTH; the nearest thing to an uplifting song being the hopelessly hopeful "Sun In The Morning," and even the temporary rooftop relief of "Stars Above Us" is tempered by the knowledge that, 14 years after "Nothing Can Stop Us," the reassuring reflex is now "nothing can touch us." The fear of being touched ("Side Streets" is remarkable; music by Tom Jobim, lyrical plot by "Robert De Niro's Waiting." The not-particularly-hidden deathwish of "Maybe I'll get it tomorrow") means that no one can touch you; or, like Gary Stead, you end up drinking yourself into - more drinks. He'll lambast his long-suffering partner or the "Aussie bar staff" playing the Red Hot Chili Peppers, but he invariably ends up buying another round at the Hatton Fan.

The remarkable way in which the rhythm template from "My Heartbeat" is used as a springboard for other diversionary/introductory tactics on "Milk Bottle Symphony." The echoing fade of "away" into non-human static on "Slow Down At The Castle." The perversity of "A Good Thing" being far more Xenomania-sounding than the two Xenomania-assisted songs (but how Xenomania-like was "Shower Scene" from Finisterre?) and piercing something vital with Cracknell's "it's all for nothing" refrain.

The way in which the frustrated vaudeville waltz of "Relocate" suddenly atomises into an abstract Julian Opie landscape straight off the bluer corners of Sound Of Water halfway through, and how apt it is that David Essex now sounds more like Bowie than ever ("Sounds like a load of balls!").

The heartbreaking instrumental fragment of "The Birdman Of EC1" which appears to have flown off somewhere between the Cocteau Twins' "Beatrix" and Plaid's "Eyen."

And "Teenage Winter" - my God, what a song, what a closedown, what a last-bit-of-Escalator Over The Hill gone pop, where all the disparate voices return for their reluctant curtain calls as the stage collapses around them - nothing's what it used to be, that two copies of "Every Loser Wins" don't add up to a winner, that a Subbuteo '81/2 catalogue in the drawer ISN'T A SUBSTITUTE - and we realise horribly what growing up actually means; not so much the halycon grief of Pet Sounds, but "mums with pushchairs outside Sainsbury's with tears in their eyes."

But at least the mums with pushchairs can still connect on even an elementary level; the narrator of "Sun In The Morning" returns for a grief-stricken "Goodnight" as Tony Rivers' "Our Prayer" harmonies seem to indicate that there won't be another morning. Another potentially perfect day lost. No reassurance. Park your bike in the alley.
And yet there is an escape route. Or perhaps it's a dream within a dream in the same way as that central demo section of the third Bill Fay album. I don't know whether I would have reacted to TFTH in as passionate a way as I have if there hadn't been Up The Wooden Hill, a quarter-hour taster for an upcoming "children's record." Because in these 15 or so minutes exists the life and spirit more or less absent from the main album's story. "You Can Count On Me" is Chinn and Chapman reshaping Cornelius' "Count Five Or Six." "Barnyard Brouhaha" dares to be one nanoinch's breath away from "Crazy Frog." "Let's Build A Zoo" and "Excitation" together give us perhaps the sexiest vocal performances of Cracknell's career - here she's happy, mischievous, provocative; Deee-Lite x Mud + Sweet Exorcist (and get that "suffragette" line in "Excitation"! For kids, did they say?).
But then there's something else. The hidden ending to the album proper. David Essex returns in "Bedfordshire" presumably having been convinced to move to the country. With his hitherto unheard son, he ventures to take him on a walk, and there's an immensely poignant acoustic reverie (not that far from Van Morrison's "Coney Island," really) which sounds as though the cynical old geezer has rediscovered life via his child ("It's green 'cos - that's the colour of Thunderbird 2!" "You're right, son! You're absolutely right!"). Here, we are moved away from the easy associatives of old Small Faces album tracks (but here's another reason for my passion - calling songs "Up The Wooden Hill To Bedfordshire" or "Night Owl" means you're inadvertently referencing The Songs Of Our Lives) towards something more affecting. But more real? At the end, Essex turns towards his child, towards us, and informs us that "If you close your eyes, you can see anything you like." So they may well still be in Turnpike House. But they have managed to realise the wonder of what's on their doorstep. Maybe.

But "Night Owl" returns us to the grief of "Goodnight" - Cracknell sitting alone, downstairs, at midnight, paranoid about the creak on the stairs (it's the same protagonist as "Side Streets"), wondering what she could have done to make her life better. A children's album? Only in the same way that side two of Tiger Bay was a children's album. The urge to return to childhood. The fear of now. The fear of death, violent or natural.

On the bus home, some considerable time later, there is a young girl sitting at the front of the top deck of the bus. As the bus crosses Waterloo Bridge she gives an involuntary gasp of shock and wonder. It was obviously the first time she'd seen the view. What Saint Etienne tell us is that we all gave that gasp at some stage in our lives - in my case, when I was no more than five or six - and that the challenge is to recapture that gasp and make it work for you, so that your existence can be (re)turned into (a) life.
Marcello Carlin June 20th, 2005 8:34 AM.

Anyone who's ever liked any indie-rock but generally thinks it's all a bit not for them at least not these days should maybe try Wolf Parade. I think they're great.

Never really got into the Kelley Polar album.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/outhud.gif

Comment:

other ilxors said

I really hoped Donut would be wrong, but wow, what a letdown! They stopped doing brilliant post-punk style stuff for THIS plastic artificial sounding crap? Please no more mentions of this alongside the new LCD Soundsystem or New Order, please.
Bimble February 3rd, 2005 7:53 AM.

I think this album is great, especially the first half. The sequencing is really nice. I've always admired the broader sonic palette that Out Hud brings to the neo-dance-punk party, but tracks like "It's For You" and "One Life to Leave" and "How Long" are also really catchy from a pop angle. (Especially since I don't hear the vocals as "indie" trying to be pop or dance, like !!!: no, they're cool and rhythmic and kinda breathy and totally pop unto themselves.) (Oh, and Donut, I only have Interstate, but I don't hear Pell Mell at all in Out Hud: Pell Mell always seemed to me like a post-rock band that no scene wanted to accept, but way more organic and warm and, I dunno, heartland-sounding than Out Hud.)
jaymc March 28th, 2005 9:27 PM.

I've always admired the broader sonic palette that Out Hud brings to the neo-dance-punk party, but tracks like "It's For You" and "One Life to Leave" and "How Long" are also really catchy from a pop angle.
Jaymc is correct. Additionally, this record doesn't sound like it's saying "this is a band" or "this can be reproduced live" or "we care that this is reproduceable live". The fact that the vocals are so faceless adds to the house-ness, and they don't really seem indie at all. They're very detached yet rhythmic (as has already been said). The Severed Heads comparison is interesting and superficially correct, but they're coming from very different places, and again the overall vibe I get from the Out Hud record is Tom Tom Club as opposed to something on Nettwerk. There's something almost Balearic (vague term I know) about this record too.
Spencer Chow March 28th, 2005 10:14 PM.

That St Et was the first release by them that did absolutly nothing for me after rapidly diminishing returns since Good Humour(Finisterre had like 2 great tracks). Not a shock to see them place high on an ILM poll tho.

Don't make me link to the 1985CDR Go! thread AGAIN...

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c23/unterwasser/sleaterkinney.jpg

Comment:
With their seventh album in ten years, and the first in three, Sleater-Kinney may be slowing down, but they're not mellowing out. In fact, The Woods is the most poundingly vicious album they've ever done. The key to their refreshing new approach is using Dave Fridmann, no fan of their earlier work, to light a fire under their butts. Indeed, Janet Weiss sounds like she's using John Bonham's femur bones for sticks, while Corin Tucker's vocal work reaches a primally powerful peak. Near the end of the album, song structure is abandoned for hypnotic jams. It's not a perfect album, but if Sleater-Kinney can manage to write songs to match their best from Call the Doctor and Dig Me Out with this new sound, they'll be the best rock band on the planet, male or female.
AS Van Dorston

other ilxors said

I original liked this record, but as I listen to it I can't help but notice the lack of hooks. For an album that's supposed to hearken back to the Deep Purples and Zeppelins....where are the fucking TUNES? I guess it's a symptom of of the majority of indie rock albums these days, but damn. It may sound nice, but it's samey samey samey. Gimme something I can sink my teeth into....they've done it before ("Dig Me Out," "Little Babies," "You're No Rock n Roll Fun"), but not here. The album might have teeth, but if you're looking for hooks, go somewhere else.
PB June 2nd, 2005 3:37 PM.

I finally got around to buying this today. Hey, it's good! I like the rawking. I made the mistake of reading the lyric sheet on the subway home (I had nothing else to read), which gave me a little bit of a sinking feeling. But once I put it on, the lyrics didn't bother me at all. They're one of these (many) bands who would be better off not printing lyric sheets. The words sound fine with the music. And the music sounds fine too. On first impression, solider than either of the previous two. They sound like they kind of found their feet again. And speaking of feet, Janet has one of the heaviest kick-drum stomps around, gah-lee. This record really makes me want to see them play again. I hope they do the 10-minute freak-out in concert.
gypsy mothra June 22nd, 2005 8:17 AM.

i'm just listening to this now. i know fuck-all about sleater-kinney, but i like this album a lot. it is intense and seems to be ripping my crappy speakers to shreds, which is no bad thing. i need to listen to it on my proper stereo. preferably, i feel, on vinyl.
grimly fiendish July 10th, 2005 8:52 PM.

Tell more more about what you mean.

If anyone has any outstanding* blurbs can they send them asap. I thank you.

*or even mediocre

Going by St Etienne's placements in the 90's polls, I thought it was clear that they have a large fan base here.

-- Rockist_Scientist (Al__suca...), January 13th, 2006 11:25 AM. (RSLaRue) (later)

haha--how could that possibly be positive?

wow. otm.

also i don't get this list anymore. i don't understand the cross section of people who voted

and the clientelle is SO BORING

i don't understand the cross section of people who voted

i don't understand why some of ILM's most vocal personalities didn't vote, and i think that's what might give the list a rather skewed feel. still, i am thoroughly enjoying it, odd though it might be. top work, billy.

50. Smog - A river ain't too much to love
49. Franz Ferdinand - You could have it so much better...
48. Maximo Park - A certain trigger
47. Depeche Mode - Playing the Angel
46. Annie - Anniemal
45. Juan Maclean - Less than Human
44. Dangerdoom - The Mouse and the Mask
43. Daft Punk - Human after all
42. Bright Eyes - I'm wide awake it's morning
41. My Morning Jacket - Z
40. Tom Vek – We have sound
39. Alan Braxe & Friends – The Upper cut
38. Konono no.1 – Congotronics
37. Stephen Malkmus – Face the truth
36. Ellen Allien – Thrills
35. The White Stripes - Get behind me Satan
34. Missy Elliot – The Cookbook
33. Fiona Apple =- Extraordinary machine
32. Patrick Wolf – Wind in the wires
31. Madonna – Confessions on a dancefloor
30. Low - The Great Destroyer
29. Sigur Ros - Takk
28. Deerhoof - The Runners Four
27. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary
26. Kelley Polar - Love songs of the Hanging Gardens
25. The Clientele - Strange Geometry
24. Ladytron - The Witching Hour
23. Saint Etienne - Tales from Turnpike House
22. Out Hud - Let us never speak of it again
21. Sleater Kinney - The Woods

Top 20 TBA

- predictions?

(only two that I voted for made the list so far)