Albums of the 00's

The NME has published their top 50 albums of the decade. The top 10 looks something like this...

Quote :

1. The Strokes - Is This It
2. The Libertines - Up The Bracket
3. Primal Scream - xtrmntr
4. Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
5. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Fever To Tell
6. PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea
7. Arcade Fire - Funeral
8. Interpol - Turn On The Bright Lights
9. The Streets - Original Pirate Material
10. Radiohead - In Rainbows

AITB made the list at number 30.

So, are they right? Is 'Is This It' the best album of the last 10 years? Discuss. Post your own list.

I've had nothing better to do at work today, so I've put together my own top 10 of the last decade...

1. Elbow - Asleep In The Back
2. The Strokes - Is This It
3. I Am Kloot - Natural History
4. The Libertines - Up The Bracket
5. The Streets - A Grand Don't Come For Free
6. Athlete - Vehicles and Animals
7. Plan B - Who Needs Actions When You Got Words
8. Jamie T - Panic Prevention
9. Bright Eyes - Lifted or The Story Is In The Soil Keep Your Ear To The Ground
10. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

Where the fuck is Kid A? That NME list is ridiculously predictable...

Kid A is further down the list, as is Asleep In The Back. The only one I own is "In Rainbows" so I can't really comment on whether I think it's right as I've not heard the others.
I would have included
Patience - George Michael
Brainwashed - George Harrison
Perfect Symetry - Keane
Invincible Summer - K D Lang
Accelerate - R.E.M.
and of cource The Seldom Seen Kid
Lesley

Didn't much care for that list (I mean, The Strokes?!?!?! Didn't we all get over them about 15 minutes after that album came out? ), though I would have to sit and have a think about what I'd put in my top 10. Other than AITB and TSSK, which I think definitely rank up there.

ChrissieInFL wrote:

Didn't much care for that list (I mean, The Strokes?!?!?! Didn't we all get over them about 15 minutes after that album came out? )

I disagree. I think 'Is This It' is as brilliant today as it was when it came out in 2001. More importantly though, it massively changed the face of music. Lots of the best albums since are endebted to it, many of today's great bands probably wouldn't even exist without it.

Aprt from TSSK, in no particular order.......

The Seldom Seen Kid - Elbow
Standing In The Way Of Control - Gossip
Up The Bracket - Libertines
Silent Alarm - Bloc Party
Hour Of Bewilderbeast - Badly Drawn Boy
Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
Whatever People......- Arctic Monkeys
Echoes - The Rapture
Lost Souls - Doves
Glasvegas - Glasvegas

Best albums in the last 10 yrs....lemme think...

Peter Gabriel - UP
Elbow - Asleep in the back
Mogwai - Mr. Beast
Engineers - selftitled
Coldplay - Parachutes
Radiohead - Hail to the thief (because Ok Computer was from the last millenium...and Kid A I needed too much time until I started to like it )
The Secret Machines - Now here is nowhere
Espers - Espers II
New Model Army - Eight
Augie March - Strange Bird

maybe I forgot some...but that ones came to my mind when I think of my fave records in the last dekade...

Misspelt Yoof wrote:

ChrissieInFL wrote:

Didn't much care for that list (I mean, The Strokes?!?!?! Didn't we all get over them about 15 minutes after that album came out? )

I disagree. I think 'Is This It' is as brilliant today as it was when it came out in 2001. More importantly though, it massively changed the face of music. Lots of the best albums since are endebted to it, many of today's great bands probably wouldn't even exist without it.

And which great bands are these that formed after 2001?

Ted wrote:

And which great bands are these that formed after 2001?

Arctic Monkeys? Franz Ferdinand?

Have The Strokes had such a profound impact on the 2000's? As with all polls, it tells you as much about who voted as much as who was voted for. And as for The Libertines? Meh.

Wouldn't Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys have existed anyway? Have Alexes Turner and Kapranos directly cited The Strokes as an influence? If so, fair enough, but all bands are influenced to a greater or lesser degree by what has gone previously, as were The Strokes themselves, but very few bands cause a seismic shift in the paradigm: Like Nirvana did in the 90's, for example. I'm not convinced that the Strokes would come under this category. All they provided was a refreshing update of the NY garage sound of the 70's and 80's.

Mr Woman wrote:

Have The Strokes had such a profound impact on the 2000's? As with all polls, it tells you as much about who voted as much as who was voted for. And as for The Libertines? Meh.

Wouldn't Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys have existed anyway? Have Alexes Turner and Kapranos directly cited The Strokes as an influence? If so, fair enough, but all bands are influenced to a greater or lesser degree by what has gone previously, as were The Strokes themselves, but very few bands cause a seismic shift in the paradigm: Like Nirvana did in the 90's, for example. I'm not convinced that the Strokes would come under this category. All they provided was a refreshing update of the NY garage sound of the 70's and 80's.

I agree, Mr Woman. The Strokes didn't do anything that merits long-term admiration; this is probably best evidenced by the fact that, when they released their second album, it was met with a lukewarm critical and public reception because it sounded a lot like the first album...the moment for that sound had already passed, and it didn't have the staying power to sparkle as brightly after we all heard it the first time. And as for bands that came in their wake, I think that all the sound-alikes that clogged the airwaves with derivative stuff after the Strokes' intial success helped to dilute the power of that whole garage revival.

The more I thought about this, I started to have a hard time narrowing down 10 albums to list. I have 14, and I really wouldn't want to leave any of them off. In no particular order:

1. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
*Phenomenal album -for these guys, the Art of Noise is more than just a band name.
2. Elbow - Asleep In The Back
3. Elbow - The Seldom Seen Kid
4. Iron & Wine - The Creek Drank the Cradle
5. Bjork - Vespertine
6. Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
7. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
8. My Morning Jacket - Z
9. Mew - And the Glass Handed Kites
10. Arcade Fire - Funeral
11. Yo La Tengo - I Am Not Afraid Of You and I Will Beat Your Ass
12. Sigur Ros - ( )
13. Radiohead - In Rainbows
14. Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere

Hey Chrissie - You've put down Arcade Fire twice - I haven't heard it - is it twice as good as the others?!

ticky wrote:

Hey Chrissie - You've put down Arcade Fire twice - I haven't heard it - is it twice as good as the others?!

Ahhh, shizzznit...it's good, but not THAT good! Thanks for the point-out, Ticky, I'll edit that. Just a bit groggy today; up late last night and not quite with it yet!

Mr Woman wrote:

Wouldn't Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys have existed anyway? Have Alexes Turner and Kapranos directly cited The Strokes as an influence?

Alex Turner was one of the artists to vote in the NME poll. He cast his vote for 'Is This It'.

'Is This It' was released at a time when the radio was full of dirge like Travis, Turin Brakes, Starsailor and Toploader. The Strokes' success opened the door for bands like The White Stripes, The Libertines and Franz to take the mainstream. They wouldn't have been able to do this without 'Is This It' laying the groundwork.

The Times have published their 100 best albums of the decade today, with SSK at number 10.

The Times Top Ten is:

1. Kid A - Radiohead (alright Ted? )
2. Back To Black - Amy Winehouse
3. In Rainbows - Radiohead
4. Speakerbox - Outkast
5. Blackout - Britney Spears
6. Is This It? - The Strokes
7. Coles Corner - Richard Hawley
8. Elephant - The White Stripes
9. Raising Sand - Robert Plant & Alison Krauss
10. The Seldom Seen Kid - Elbow

The narrative on the Elbow entry says
"Grumpy northern indie achievers - the adjectives were all lined up for Elbow's career obituary when from nowhere they served up a masterpiece. Guy Garvey's grown-up lyrics and delivery give a whole new meaning to the word tender"

Asleep In The Back doesn't make top 100 Judging by recent comments, other highlights are Arctic Monkeys (11 & 37), Wilco (25), Arcade Fire (35), and Flaming Lips (36)

I think it goes to prove that taste in music is arbitrary but it looks most agree that In Rainbows is as good as many say it is. Not so sure about Britney Spears but I've always loved Black To Black.

Also, I'd note that there are some geographical factors to be considered; I really doubt that someone like Richard Hawley would've gotten on any "top 10 of the decade" lists here in the US, just because his name/music aren't as well known here, and that might be true of a few oher British artists as well. Not that these artists aren't worthy of a spot on the lists, but just that they might not have made as big a splash here and so were overlooked in favor of artists that were better known here.

The Times list was overall significantly more comprehensive than the NME one but still had some truly baffling choices in there. Great to see Boards Of Canada within the Times list...they are so much better than The Strokes there are no superlatives large enough to describe the gulf in musical ability and influence. The Strokes changed the face of music? Funny, I didn't notice...

Ted wrote:

The Strokes changed the face of music? Funny, I didn't notice...

You clearly weren't paying attention then!

Misspelt Yoof wrote:

Ted wrote:

The Strokes changed the face of music? Funny, I didn't notice...

You clearly weren't paying attention then!

Is This It is number 4 in The Guardian's 'album of the decade' list. They have this to say about it...

The Guardian wrote:

The impact of the first Strokes album was immediate and dramatic. But if private school-educated New Yorkers Julian Casablancas, Albert Hammond Jr, Nick Valensi, Nikolai Fraiture and Fabrizio Moretti hadn't followed their lo-fi punk-rock instincts, their world-changing moment might never have happened.

Despite Rough Trade's initial advice, and sessions in England with Pixies producer Gil Norton, Casablancas and co insisted on recording their album in producer Gordon Raphael's tiny basement studio, amid the sleaze of Lower East Side Manhattan's Avenue A, with nothing but a few pictures from the Victoria's Secret lingerie catalogue taped on a wall for distraction. The results were appropriately dangerous and subterranean: a ragged yet elegant wall of guitar sound led by Casablancas's croon, all drenched in a claustrophobic, after-hours hedonism that perfectly captured the jaded shrug of the album's title.

Released in August 2001, at a point where nu-metal and sub-Oasis "dad-rock" ruled the guitar roost, Is This It's irresistible songs, inventive guitars and savvy rewiring of the Velvet Underground and CBGB's decadence, reintroduced fans to the benefits of sexy songs, simple punchy production, arty arrogance, and, with the Motown and Tom Petty-influenced Last Nite, the joys of making rock'n'roll records that can fill a dancefloor. Suddenly, lumbering masculinity was out, and post-punk alienation, good clothes and guitars you can dance to were in.

The musical and visual debt that the Libertines, Franz Ferdinand and Arctic Monkeys owe to the Strokes is obvious. But noughties pop stars who are gleefully rediscovering disco, electro and synth-pop also started here, as the commericial success of Is This It made every forgotten art-pop experiment of the late 70s and early 80s instantly hip and ripe for reinvention.

Is this where we get to see Misspelt Yoof sitting with his arms folded, looking pleased with hmself?

pffft no Hey Ma

Mr Woman wrote:

Is this where we get to see Misspelt Yoof sitting with his arms folded, looking pleased with hmself?

Not at all. It's good to have someone who can put the argument far more eloquently than me (or the NME!) on board though!

oneofthethree wrote:

pffft no Hey Ma

Surely said in jest Hey ma(te) ?

A good album that merits a 7.5/10 but no more........