ILM's Top 77 ALBUMS of 2011

http://i.imgur.com/blwLa.jpg

52. Aerosmith The Mountain Goats — All Eternals Deck (342 points, 12 votes)

P4K: DNP
P&J: 65

Spotify

as well as those cuts off this marling album, i recommend "alpha shallows" and "what he wrote" off the last one

i've always got time for a mountain goats record

good mtn goats alb, they've had a nice run going after i lost interest for a bit

shit, i think i meant to vote for this one but forgot. i'll have to check my ballot when i get home.

sourdoire valley song really kicked my ass

kendrick was in my top 20 somewhere i think but i can't recall if marling was on it. would've voted "the beast" in tracks poll if i'd voted there, for sure

Love the mountain goats but still haven't picked this up. Assume it's quality.

It's quality. I liked the last one a bit more, but this is a really good album.

Hahahaha. Think I voted for the MG album before this, but didn't even hear this one. Perfectly willing to believe it's good, though.

Also, those Laura Marling lyrics are terrible.

Laura Marling's voice is more open and her resonance is slightly deeper, but there are strong similarities between the two of them.

KT Tunstall follows the "start soft/tenderish and build in intensity" pattern on her big songs and Laura Marling doesn't seem to ever growl.

"Black Horse and Cherry Tree" did not sound wholly out of place played amidst the tracks on this album; the biggest difference was in production glossiness, with thickness of arrangement coming in second.

laura marling is much more interesting and cathartic a lyricist than kt tunstall, and much less polite a performer

The second half of this is completely wrong based on this album? This is the epitome of polite singing/performing!

kt is straight-up adult contemporary and marling is a pretty expansive talent who makes darker, more compelling music?

It would be more accurate to say KT Tunstall would get played on commercial adult-contemporary and Laura Marling would get played on NPR; the first three tracks on this album have sparse Jewel-with-strings arrangements that might knock them off the playlist but there's nothing going on in performance or lyrics that makes it as unmarketable/unknowable-to-the-masses as you are claiming.

btw I am totally abstaining from talking about the Mountain Goats album aside from saying "Age Of Kings" is fucking badass, love those strings to death

i didn't say anything about marling's marketability

What I'm saying is Laura Marling is also straight-up adult contemporary, it's just that you like her!

I don't know about "High Hawk Season". There's some dude trying to class it up in the background.

back up yall

Perfume on the list! hell yeah JPN was my #1.

I love Nakata's production but what really gets me about that record are the vocals. On this record more than the previous 3, the girls voices are less manipulated overall (besides the Nakata freakouts in Nee and Glitter) and allowed more individuality.

After listening to it so much I've gotten better at distinguishing their voices. The harmonies are so rich here, especially on Spice where the 2 part harmonies segue into 3 and back to 1 again. I love that shit.

Plus Perfume are the most attractive group on this list by far.

well, not "some dude", but you know.

xpost

http://i.imgur.com/1PkG5.jpg

51. Demdike Stare — Tryptych (347 points, 16 votes, one first place vote)

P4K: DNP
P&J: 74

I like that Demdike Stare, glad to see it make it even though it didn't fit on my ballot.

not heard it but liked the one in last years poll

I keep meaning to get stuff by these guys

Kind of meh about Laura Marling, this is the kind of thing I should lap up but leaves me cold. I'd much rather one of the two June Tabor albums which was nominated came up.

I like that Demdike Stare, glad to see it make it even though it didn't fit on my ballot.

― Regional Tug (irrational), Tuesday, January 31, 2012 6:50 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^ This. Great band.

Glad this placed, I managed to fit it in at the bottom of my ballot. They're great at atmospheric horror-movie vibes and they manage to keep those vibes fresh over three CDs and I think that's a ballot-worthy achievement.

they have a good name - it rolls off the tongue. found this out from their bio:

Demdike (aka Elizabeth Southern) was the ringleader of the Pendle Witches. Accused of three murders, she died in prison in 1622 before coming to trial.

▲▲▲▲††††††▲▲▲▲

RIP

Isn't Tryptych just a rerelease of their last three albums? I only really got into one of their tracks - Haxan Dub, which is amazing.

http://i.imgur.com/ljupi.jpg

50. Hatchback — Zeus and Apollo (350 points, nine votes, two first place votes)

P4K: DNP
P&J: DNP

Spotify

that was a great album

like that was actually a great album

xp Tryptych contains the three LPs from 2010 but also adds a lot of new material.

i love laura marling and am glad to see her place and disappointed to see djp hating. not as good as the second or first album, imo, but still a strong release -- i think she's really benefited from incorporating more Americana + southern gothic type influences into her music

Hatchback album is very good but I didn't vote for it.

i didn't vote in this because i could probably think of like six albums that i really even listened to properly last year but this was maybe my number one

well you could have just voted for Hatchback then...

Hatchback is the new mondeo pop?

Yeay! at Ferraro, Grouper, Demdike. Although 'Alien Observer' stands out of the two Grouper 'A I A' albums. I love Ferraro, his conceptual goofballiness, how damn distinctive he is no matter what pallette he's operating with. I kind of fell out of love with Oneonhtrix/Lopatin this year and fell more for JF.

XP

Hatchback = nice

I didn't consider voting Demdike bcs of the reissue element. Gah.

I am not familiar with Hatchback.

http://i.imgur.com/bkiPl.jpg

49. Moon Duo — Mazes (350 points, 12 votes)

P4K: DNP
P&J: 419

Happy to see Moon Duo! It was a late cut from my ballot, so thanks people.

<333 demdike but i didn't vote for tryptych bcz yeah reissue part

almost read 'hatchback' as 'horseback' (who i did vote for)

yeah idk i have like opinions about tracks but its like my god its such an effort to listen to an album. i usually just get into a couple of tracks straight away and move on to something else before i've properly listened to the whole album. the hatchback is weird in that its kindof an ambient album but it is seriously riveting all the way through. like i just get hypnotised by it and go fully zen.

I didn't really fall for Moon Duo until hearing it on teh vinyl. Mastering + production job = stunning...I think James Plotkin was involved. Great record.

like i feel the cosmos vibrate, my chakras are opening can you feel my healing winds etc

hatchback = balearic stuff right? i have a few tracks by them but didn't hear that album

Moon Duo! Nice! One of my favorite things yet to come out of the Wooden Shjips axis.

her voice and the spooky atmosphere esp. in the beginning of that laura marling song "the beast" reminds me so much of michelle shocked's first record "the texas campfire tapes" that it hurts. is she michelle's daughter?

the Demdike album felt like more of a 2010 thing to me, so didn't really think about voting for it. Not sure it would have made my ballot anyway.

xps basically what everyone else said

Hatchback is one of the dudes from Windsurf (lol)