Favourite Album For Each Year Of The 2010s

General Gibberish Forums The Pool Room
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So it all comes down to this…the current decade.

The 2000s quiz showed a wide variety of music tastes coming to the fore as we largely seemed to get sick of what the mainstream radio stations were playing and so went looking elsewhere for our music buzz.

I know that I continued to source my music from various sources on the web, whilst also keeping any ear open for new music from artists that I was already aware of.

So, without further ado I give you the "Favourite Albums For Each Year Of The 2010s’ thread:

Enjoy

2010 Band Of Joy - Robert Plant

2011 Forever So - Husky

2012 Psychedelic Pill - Neil Young & Crazy Horse

2013 All Day Venus - Adalita

2014 Motherload - The Graviators

2015 The Story Of Sonny Boy Slim - Gary Clark Jr

2016 Hour Of the Nightingale - Trees of Eternity

2017 Under Your Spell - The Birthday Massacre

2018

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LOL

I’m not even gonna try this one

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He he. Likewise. Be lucky if I’ve bought an album from each year…

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Fixed.

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2013 - Daft Punk - Random access memories

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I gave it a go…
2012: Keep You Close - dEUS
2015: The Magic Whip - Blur
2017: The Sky’s In Love With You - Ups and Downs

The end.

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The war on drugs - lost in the dream. Clearly best album of this decade.

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Think I’ll be one of the few spoilt for choice lol

2010 - Nightmare by Avenged Sevenfold
2011 - American Tragedy by Hollywood Undead
2012 - Wish Upon A Blackstar by Celldweller
2013 - Vengeance Falls by Trivium
2014 - Massive Addictive by Amaranthe
2015 - Ire by Parkway Drive
2016 - Transmissions by Starset
2017 - The Sin And The Sentence by Trivium

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Here are the only six albums since 2010 that I could truly say I really enjoyed and played heavily and could call faves. Three of them contain the same people pretty much (Women, Viet Cong/Preoccupations) which makes it even sparser.

Women - Public Strain (2010)
Viet Cong - s/t (2015)
Girlpool - Before The World Was Big (2015)
These New Puritans - Hidden (2010)
Slowdive - s/t (2017)
Preoccupations - s/t (2016)

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I’m back here, just need to go through the list and work out which of the many albums from this decade that I love were released in which year. (I’m normally a bit behind!) But I can honestly say there’s lots of stuff that I love and that is meaningful to me.

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2010 Jef Neve: Imaginary Road
Neve is a talented composer from Begium who also writes symphonies. Saw him perform this with his trio at Wangaratta. Exuberant performance with terrific drumming.

2011 Matana Roberts: Coin Coin Chapter 1
An avant-Garde artist originally from Chicago who made her way busking in the New York Subways, this visceral work, inspired by the slave heritage of her forebears, still makes my hair stand on end.


2012 Neil Cowley Trio: The Face Of Mount Molehill
Really doesn’t matter, and I’m not sure if he still is, but he was ‘statistically the most listened-to pianist on the planet’ thanks to his gig with somebody called Adele. My daughter likes the latter and wasn’t impressed when I told her the former’s playing was front and centre. Anyway I was listening to him well before that and IT REALLY DOESN’T MATTER. This piece is just gorgeous, gets me every time.

2013 John Hollenbeck: Songs I Like A Lot.
If Maria Schneider resurrected the big band, John Hollenbeck is carrying the torch. His complex and inventive arrangements take these tried and true hits into new dimensions.

2014 Brad Mehldau: 10 Years Solo
Mehldau has spent his career futilely rejecting comparisons with Jarrett. Here he does a SunBear and releases a 4 cd set of his solo excursions. Does for the 80s and 90s what Jarrett did from the American Songbook.

2015 V J Iyer Trio: Break Stuff
Iyer is the New York jazz mafia’s chosen one and boy he’s good. Born in the US but with one foot still in Delhi, this work is dedicated to the hip hop DJ Robert Hood and it’s locked in.
PS I tried to get into Kamasi Washington’s 2015 acclaimed ‘The Epic’ but, I don’t know, I kept thinking it was the incarnation of Charles Lloyd, and Charles ain’t dead yet.

2016 Stu Hunter: The Migration
Stu is so lucky. An ambitious artist, brimming with talent and a love for big ensembles, and from OZ - who actually gets to develop and see his music performed. How rare is that.

2017 Alister Spence Trio: Not Everything But Enough
Love this trio and I love this CD, me and the other three dozen who have heard it. It’s a 2 disc affair, the first of Spence’s coruscating and infectious compositions and the second a free for all of spontaneous creations. The three musicians are the cream of Australia’s crop and the drumming is sublime. If you’re into drums listen to the clip as Toby Hall starts with brushes and later switches to sticks. Nothing ear splitting or excessively flashy but a master class in how a drummer can do so much more than count the beat and yet still tether the band to the groove. If there’s a better drummer in OZ, post her, or him, please.

2018 John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble: All Can Work
2018 Kate McGarry/ Keith Ganz /Gary Versace Trio: The subject Tonight is Love
OK the year ain’t out but either of these releases would have topped many previous years. No youtube clips but both are on Spotify. The McGarry might make you cry and the Hollenbeck make you gape as he stretches big band boundaries. Too close to call just yet.
The music goes on. Next!

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2010 The Dead Weather - Sea of Cowards
(Fav Track)

2011 Eddie Vedder -Ukulele Songs

2012 Lana Del Rey - Born to Die

2013 Tomahawk - Oddfellows

2014 James - La Petite Mort

2015 Faith No More - Sol Invictus

2016 The Jezabels - Synthia

2017 Grandaddy - Last Place

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OK, here is my list. Different methodology this time as I figured if it was on my laptop or phone it was relevant to this. Unlikely that there is too much that hasn’t made it into 1s and 0s on my laptop/phone, which wasn’t necessarily true earlier.

Videos seem to be the go. I might separate them out into another post, because there will be words in this one.

  1. This was my most difficult year of the decade as I was still in the sleep deprived state of early parenthood. I have gone with Ana Tijoux - 1977. I came to this a couple of years later when in South America, and have enjoyed it a lot.

  2. This was an interesting year, I really thought I would select one of PJ Harvey - Let England Shake, or The Decemberists - The King is Dead, or maybe if I was to go out on a limb Tuneyards - Whokill. But when I reviewed the albums of the year the answer had to be Of Monsters and Men - My Head is an Animal. This album was very important to me, and really is a fantastic, epic, pop album

  3. This was a difficult year again. The honorable mention goes to Cat Power - Sun, an album that just works as an album (as much as CP disappoints as a live artist), but my favourite album from 2012 was Grimes - Visions.

  4. Again this was a difficult year. There are a number of honourable mentions, but I’m going to go with Speedy Ortiz - Major Arcana. This was difficult, as I also absolutely love chvrches - The bones of what you believe and Zola Jesus - Versions, and find Standish/Carlyon’s Deleted Scenes is a go to album to put on when I just need to get an assignment done.

  5. I didn’t feel was as important to me as some others. I’ve gone for St Vincent - St Vincent. I feel like this could go either way when I look back in 20 more years.

  6. I didn’t plan to double up, but Grimes - Art Angels is my pick here as it was more important to me than other albums from that year. Honorable mentions : Bully - Feels Like, Sleater Kinney - No Cities to Love

  7. There was no doubt here that I was going Camp Cope - Camp Cope. There’s a number of HMs (that I have genuinely rated, and some would have been #1 in other years): Savages - Adore Life, Teeth and Tongue - Give Up On Your Health, Thao and the Get Down Stay Down - Man Alive and even the quirkiness of Katie Dey - Flood Network.

  8. It’s only just been and gone, so there’s a fair chance that there’s something from 2017 that I haven’t even got to yet. But right now Cable Ties - Cable Ties

It’s an interesting little arc with a curve through some electronic pop and ending back with a couple of albums that could have fitted nicely into a 90s list. Will be interesting to see where it goes from here.

(my most anticipated 2018 albums - Camp Cope and Dark Fair, I’ll report back…)

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And now here’s the clips

Ana Tijoux

Of Monsters and Men

Grimes

Speedy Ortiz

St Vincent

Grimes (I chose the least stylised carnage of the videos from this album. Any other would have ended in a lot of blood…)

Camp Cope …this really could be what happens if you put my 90s Melbourne CD Collection through some sort of algorithm…and I love it!

Cable Ties. I love this track, in spite of the lack of video…

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2010 - Is the hardest year for me, great albums by The National, Kanye, Arcade Fire and LCD Soundsystem. But ill go with my favourite which was Four Tet - There is love in you.

2011- Bon Iver - Bon Iver but I did give, watch the throne a flogging that year too.

2012 - Alt J - An Awesome Wave

2013 - Id like to say Daft Punk but i actually listened to Yeezus more.

2014 - War on Drugs - Lost in a dream

2015 - Tame Impala - Currents

2016 - James Blake - The colour in anything

2017 - The XX - I see you

There is still quality music being played you just have to dig a little deeper these days.

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2010 This Is the Warning - Dead Letter Circus
2011 Living Undesigned - Trial Kennedy
2012 Battle Born - The Killers
2013 AM - Arctic Monkeys
2014 Turn Blue - The Black Keys
2015 Nothing But Thieves
2016 Animal - Big Scary
2017 Forgetting the Future - British India

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2010: Opus Eponymous - Ghost
2011: Gloss Drop - Battles
2012: Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend! - Godspeed You! Black Emperor
2013: Surgical Steel - Carcass
2014: Freeman - Freeman
2015: Meliora - Ghost
2016: Godweensatan: Live - Ween
2017: Postself - Godflesh

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I’m going to go HAM with this one because as previously discussed I couldn’t participate properly until the last decade, and not only is this the last decade but this was when I really got into music properly (probably started in 08/09). So hope this isn’t boring, appreciate feedback.

2010:
Honourable mentions:
Brandon Flowers - Flamingo. First solo outing and he does it well. Only The Young is my favourite song of all time.
Best: Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
I know he’s a ■■■■■■■■ and drinks his own bathwater and I’m sure a lot of you oldies probably write him off but this is his magnum opus and cements him as a bona fide genius capable of making incredible music. I quite liked Graduation which was his previous album, got into a few tracks but then went the alternative rock route and never tried Hip Hop. Saw this got album of the year in several publications so had to check out the fuss. First year of Uni, listened to this every day on my commute for about a half a year. Incredible. There is not a SINGLE weak song on this album and every song can stand up in its own right. The mood, feel, themes, samples, guest appearances, my goodness. This is easily one of my favourite albums of all time.
Listen to: Every song. Start to finish. But: So Appalled, Devil In a New Dress, this:

2011:
This is the hardest year I’ve done so far. Had 3 belter albums.
Honourable Mentions: Shabazz Palaces - Black Up, TV On The Radio - Nine Types of Light.
Best: Handsome Furs - Sound Kapital.
TVOTR were incredibly unlucky so I’m going to give a brief review to this one then. Probably don’t know a single album that’s a better exemplar of “Whole package way better than the sum of the parts.” Just a very good album that flows incredibly and lacks a weak song (I’ve said that twice in 2 reviews but honestly couldn’t think of more than a couple more that I could say that about). Very good band who did their best work on this.
As for Handsome Furs - they are the product of Wolf Parade’s guitarist and his then wife. 3 albums, 2 OK ones and then this cracker. Very simplistic electronic rock that is just very good. Every song on it is good (there I go again…) and it has a couple of my favourite songs ever on it. Love the feel of this whole thing.
Listen to: What About Us, Repatriated, and mainly Cheap Music and this, would be in my top 10 of all time.

2012:
Honourable Mentions: Alt-J - An Awesome Wave, Father John Misty - Fear Fun. The Killers - Battle Born had a couple of great songs but too many shockers.
Best: Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, m.a.a.d City.
This was my first exposure to Kendrick having missed his debut section.80 and it’s just incredible. Concept album about his growing up, really takes you on a journey and really solidified my love for good hip hop. Can’t say much about it other than that it’s probably also in my top 10 and probably 5 albums of all time. Like Kanye’s MBDTF it just reminds me of a certain period in my life and I may have listened to this north of 50 (100?) times. Unlike Kanye it has 1 or 2 “ok” songs but probably has a stronger top 4. Also like Kanye (who had Rick Ross) it has one of the better cameo verses supplied by Drake.
Listen to: ■■■■■, Don’t Kill my Vibe, Backseat Freestyle, Poetic Justice, this:
(Skip the first 20 second intro). Drum machine and synth line here are absolutely fkd (lyrics/flow/drum machine drop just after 1:20 may be one of my favourite moments in any song ever).

2013:
This is the anti-2011. Didn’t have anything that made me go crazy.
I liked: Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels. Breath of fresh air in a genre that can get a bit droning at times (hip hop).
The Strokes - Comedown Machine. Very good just not incredible.
The Growlers - Hung at Heart. Love this band, their next two are great but there’s a few too many poor songs on this to elevate it.
Let’s go with one of my favourite songs on the year since no album really seized the prize:

2014:
Honourable Mentions:
Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels 2
D’Angelo - Black Messiah

This is another close one so quickly:
Julian Casablancas + The Voidz - Tyranny. The two singles were great (particularly the epic Human Sadness) and the whole album has a great theme not to mention being a style of music I’ve never heard prior or since. If you put the time in to working out what the HELL is going on there are some great songs.
Best: The Growlers - Chinese Fountain.
This just has a GREAT feel and sound. Surf/beach rock where every song flows beautifully into one another. These guys have become one of my favourite bands, lucky enough to see them a few months ago. The 2 strongest songs are very good which are:
Listen to: (Big Toe, Love Test) and especially Dull Boy, THIS (one of the best ever):

2015:
■■■■ this is another hard one.
Honourable Mentions: Grimes - Art Angels. Brandon Flowers - The Desired Effect (very unlucky not to tie for first place - check out Lonely Town which is one of the better songs I’ve ever heard).
Going to split this one, sorry.
Best 1: Drake - If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late.
I love everything about this. Word is he signed a 4 album deal with his label and after releasing 3 he released this one to get out of his contract. He dropped it without any fanfare and the cover art and title is consistent with this theme. It’s so simple in sound, it’s as if he just recorded this over a weekend and put it out the next week. So many good tracks of Drake just at his arrogant best and he knows it. Star67 into Preach is one of the better 2 punch combos I know of on an album. Closes so well with 6PM in New York. The song styles are so non-standard/weird but it’s just all so good.
Listen to: Legend, Star67, Preach, You & The 6, 6PM in New York (no Youtube, go find it all on Spotify)

Best 2: Father John Misty - I Love You Honeybear.
Love this so much. A concept album full of modern folksy cutesy love songs mostly written about his life and wife but with a cynical, jaded, funny twist. One song is a beautiful song about his wife, another about him dating some random bimbo that he hates. Another is about his jaded depression with modern life, another a modern rethink of “We Didn’t Start the Fire.” This guy is a genius, I really like it all and encourage everyone to listen to this one (some people might not like the other albums I’ve mentioned but I think everyone can enjoy this one).
Listen to: I Lovey You Honeybear, Chateau Lobby #4, Holy ■■■■, this:

2016:
Honourable: Ryan Downey - Me & Her (very quirky 20 min EP from a guy from Melbourne - try it out), Nick Cave & TBS - Skeleton Tree
Best: The Growlers - City Club.
This one was pretty easy. I take a LONG time to get into albums but this one I liked on the first listen. Julian Casablancas of The Strokes produced this one so if you like them you’ll find this familiar yet fresh. Can’t say much more than I really really really like it all. The cover art may be one of my favourites ever too.
Listen to: Vacant Lot, Night Ride, Blood of a Mutt, When You Were Made, this:

2017:
Honourable: Father John Misty - Pure Comedy. This one was hard to split too. This is probably the smartest, most prescient, pointed, insightful yet funny album I’ve ever heard. It’s a natural progression from his previous album, but this one is less about love and his wife and more about how the entire world is going in the toilet. It could also be titled: “2017: The Album.” Recommend you listen to every single song with lyrics in front of you and just enjoy. Total Entertainment Forever, Leaving LA, Two Wildly Different Perspectives and the 2 closing tracks. But you really need the whole thing.

Best: Creeper, Eternity In Your Arms.
The reason I gave the other album a pump up was because “intellectually” I feel like FJM’s should be my favourite of the year and one of my favourite of all time… and it is… it’s so heavy and “smart” and all but this one…I just can’t stop listening to this fkn album. It’s punky/emo and the lyrics make me feel so lame and guilty but this is one of the first albums since Kanye’s in 2010 where every single song could conceivably be a single. The dark lyrics make me cringe as I said but I just love the music itself so much and cannot stop listening to it. It’s a joy from start to finish and it’s so refreshing to be “obsessed” with an album for the first time in a few years.
Listen to: Every song. But… Black Rain, Misery, Room 309, Winona Forever, this:

I think that’s the longest post I’ve ever made on Blitz… sorry for the essay, I hope some of you got something out of it and maybe found some new music (I’m sure no-one did).

Be interested to hear any thoughts.

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I generally can’t do albums, always feel like 3-4 songs are so far ahead of the rest i lose interest.

but MBDTF and good kid maad city are ones that I can listen to in their entirety.

Jcole’s forest hills drive too.

and hip hop isn’t even my favourite genre. just reckon those albums are too good.

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Nick Cave & TBS - Skeleton Tree Was the last best album i’ve heard from start to finish. Very moving written after the death of his son.