Top 100 Music Albums of the 2010s
by 
FlorianJones 
Anything with a write-up was in my top 50 at the end of the decade, in December of 2019.
As of today (June 14, 2022), 6 of those original top 50 have dropped into 51-100. None of them have dropped off the list entirely.
- Chart updated: 06/14/2022 23:15
- (Created: 11/26/2014 05:57).
- Chart size: 100 albums.
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This chart is currently filtered to only show albums from 2011. (Remove this filter)
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Top Tracks: Montezuma, Helplessness Blues, The Shrine / An Argument
After Fleet Foxes’ debut in 2008, audiences (as they are wont to do) were quick to draw comparisons to predecessors. Being a debut that drew heavily on previous decades, yet displayed an excess of talent, the comparisons were both numerous and flattering. Sophomore effort Helplessness Blues makes good on any expectations that came from the debut while also expanding the richness of their sound. These songs are fuller, and more extravagantly orchestrated, yet they maintain a balance that gives the more intimate moments ample space to breathe. As much as I admire the progression, the most striking aspect of Helplessness Blues is not musical. This album (as wonderful as it sounds) would be similarly accomplished if it had no instruments at all. Frontman Robin Pecknold’s work here leads to a new comparison. No longer a sonic comparison, but a lyrical one, he evokes the work of Bob Dylan. Much like Dylan, Pecknold alludes to universal experience through intimate personal detail, and in many regards takes on the voice of his generation. Conveying the sensibilities of one’s own generation through music is hardly unique – In this collection of musings I praise Car Seat Headrest’s Will Toledo for the same thing, but not since Dylan has someone filled the role with such poetic grace as Pecknold. The album opens straight away to the following lines…
So now I am older than my mother and father when they had their daughter. Now what does that say about me? Oh, how could I dream of such a selfless and true love. Could I wash my hands of just looking out for me?
There is clarity to those lines. Like most of his generation, he’s reached a tipping point. He lives with the impression that past generations got their shit together younger than he possibly can. Where some of his contemporaries may have blamed their elders, or the ever enigmatic “system”, Robin looks inward. He struggles with self-doubt. He blames himself while also longing for an ideal that is constantly out of reach for many individuals. It may be a less satisfying route, but it’s more grounded, and it’s honest. Helplessness Blues, as the title implies has many similar lamentations, but it is not without hope. On the title track he sings…
I was raised up believing I was somehow unique – like a snowflake, distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you’d conceive. And now after some thinking I’d say I’d rather be a functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me.
Again, Pecknold delves into society’s often unrealistic ideals, revealing to the audience his own realistic approach. Interspersed in moments like this, I also find that Robin excels at littering his speech with concise imagist details that bring life and color to the world of the album. A line from The Shrine reads “In the morning waking up to terrible sunlight, all diffuse, like skin abused, the sun is half its size.” It’s a palpable form of description. Each and every one of these twelve tracks is rich with similarly evocative and textural verse. It is sure to be interpreted differently by each listener, but with that, Helplessness Blues finds its staying power. To the extent that it doesn’t land with the same impact to each listener, it won’t land the same with an individual over time. Poetic interpretation will vary with experience. In twenty years I’ll still be listening, but I won’t be hearing the same words. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
After Fleet Foxes’ debut in 2008, audiences (as they are wont to do) were quick to draw comparisons to predecessors. Being a debut that drew heavily on previous decades, yet displayed an excess of talent, the comparisons were both numerous and flattering. Sophomore effort Helplessness Blues makes good on any expectations that came from the debut while also expanding the richness of their sound. These songs are fuller, and more extravagantly orchestrated, yet they maintain a balance that gives the more intimate moments ample space to breathe. As much as I admire the progression, the most striking aspect of Helplessness Blues is not musical. This album (as wonderful as it sounds) would be similarly accomplished if it had no instruments at all. Frontman Robin Pecknold’s work here leads to a new comparison. No longer a sonic comparison, but a lyrical one, he evokes the work of Bob Dylan. Much like Dylan, Pecknold alludes to universal experience through intimate personal detail, and in many regards takes on the voice of his generation. Conveying the sensibilities of one’s own generation through music is hardly unique – In this collection of musings I praise Car Seat Headrest’s Will Toledo for the same thing, but not since Dylan has someone filled the role with such poetic grace as Pecknold. The album opens straight away to the following lines…
So now I am older than my mother and father when they had their daughter. Now what does that say about me? Oh, how could I dream of such a selfless and true love. Could I wash my hands of just looking out for me?
There is clarity to those lines. Like most of his generation, he’s reached a tipping point. He lives with the impression that past generations got their shit together younger than he possibly can. Where some of his contemporaries may have blamed their elders, or the ever enigmatic “system”, Robin looks inward. He struggles with self-doubt. He blames himself while also longing for an ideal that is constantly out of reach for many individuals. It may be a less satisfying route, but it’s more grounded, and it’s honest. Helplessness Blues, as the title implies has many similar lamentations, but it is not without hope. On the title track he sings…
I was raised up believing I was somehow unique – like a snowflake, distinct among snowflakes, unique in each way you’d conceive. And now after some thinking I’d say I’d rather be a functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me.
Again, Pecknold delves into society’s often unrealistic ideals, revealing to the audience his own realistic approach. Interspersed in moments like this, I also find that Robin excels at littering his speech with concise imagist details that bring life and color to the world of the album. A line from The Shrine reads “In the morning waking up to terrible sunlight, all diffuse, like skin abused, the sun is half its size.” It’s a palpable form of description. Each and every one of these twelve tracks is rich with similarly evocative and textural verse. It is sure to be interpreted differently by each listener, but with that, Helplessness Blues finds its staying power. To the extent that it doesn’t land with the same impact to each listener, it won’t land the same with an individual over time. Poetic interpretation will vary with experience. In twenty years I’ll still be listening, but I won’t be hearing the same words. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
8,554
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
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[First added to this chart: 06/14/2022]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
863
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
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Top Tracks: Savage Night at The Opera, Suicide Demo for Kara Walker, Kaputt
2011 was the year of revivalism. Painting with broad strokes, that’s a negative statement. Revivalism is typically derivative. It often presents itself in the form of rehashed concepts with utter disregard for originality. Yet, using those same broad strokes, many of the year’s best works were revivalist. Part of what sets Kaputt apart is that it’s not entirely clear what’s being revived. We’ve got almost as much saxophone as we do vocals from frontman Dan Bejar. A few minutes into Savage Night Night at the Opera, we’re treated to a short but sleek guitar solo. We’ve got backup singers sounding like the girl groups of 1960s Detroit. Downtown gives us a taste of the kind of swelling synths that brought fame to New Order. Song for America sports an adult easy listening drum beat with pride. Suicide Demo for Kara Walker opens with a charmingly beautiful flute solo. Resting at the album’s heart is a well selected title track where all these features coalesce into a swirling amalgam of everything Dan Bejar so clearly loves. On paper, Kaputt is all over the map. Bejar’s borrowing from everything sumptuous and smooth with no regard for time or place of origin, yet somehow, everything feels entirely at home. Even aspects almost doomed to feeling kitsch are elevated by Bejar’s unyielding sincerity. At the end of it all is Bay of Pigs (detail). Functioning as a deconstruction of what’s at play on the rest of the album, this nearly twelve-minute statement builds itself up from a meandering start to a bombastic conclusion, for not only the song, but the entire album. [First added to this chart: 09/11/2015]
2011 was the year of revivalism. Painting with broad strokes, that’s a negative statement. Revivalism is typically derivative. It often presents itself in the form of rehashed concepts with utter disregard for originality. Yet, using those same broad strokes, many of the year’s best works were revivalist. Part of what sets Kaputt apart is that it’s not entirely clear what’s being revived. We’ve got almost as much saxophone as we do vocals from frontman Dan Bejar. A few minutes into Savage Night Night at the Opera, we’re treated to a short but sleek guitar solo. We’ve got backup singers sounding like the girl groups of 1960s Detroit. Downtown gives us a taste of the kind of swelling synths that brought fame to New Order. Song for America sports an adult easy listening drum beat with pride. Suicide Demo for Kara Walker opens with a charmingly beautiful flute solo. Resting at the album’s heart is a well selected title track where all these features coalesce into a swirling amalgam of everything Dan Bejar so clearly loves. On paper, Kaputt is all over the map. Bejar’s borrowing from everything sumptuous and smooth with no regard for time or place of origin, yet somehow, everything feels entirely at home. Even aspects almost doomed to feeling kitsch are elevated by Bejar’s unyielding sincerity. At the end of it all is Bay of Pigs (detail). Functioning as a deconstruction of what’s at play on the rest of the album, this nearly twelve-minute statement builds itself up from a meandering start to a bombastic conclusion, for not only the song, but the entire album. [First added to this chart: 09/11/2015]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
3,794
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
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Top Tracks: Minnesota WI, Holocene, Hinnom TX
Bon Iver’s 2007 debut was a small affair. It was a grand musical statement told predominantly in whispers by a single man left alone. The first half minute of Perth from sophomore record Bon Iver, Bon Iver could almost convince you that the ensuing album was to be the same. It wasn’t. Perth, it turns out, is one prolonged crescendo. It opens at first with a delicately strummed guitar, but before we even hear Justin Vernon’s sweet falsetto, a snare drum marches into the mix. The track builds and builds and builds. First there’s a full drum kit and electric guitars; then violin and viola, alto and bass saxophone, trumpet and French horn. According to the liner notes, over fifty instruments appear on Bon Iver, Bon Iver played by a dozen individuals – a stark contrast to the seven out of nine tracks on For Emma, Forever Ago that featured only Vernon himself. From here on out, Bon Iver is a community affair. But for all that did change, it’s remarkable what didn’t. The music is still unmistakably Bon Iver. Justin Vernon’s rich baritone and graceful falsetto multitrack through each other with ease. His lyrics are as impenetrable as ever, but their evocative nature taps into something vibrant and universal. Bon Iver has become the de facto sad white man music, but nothing precludes it from being about anybody or anything. It’s driven by feeling, and despite our varying circumstances, it’s virtually impossible to not feel something when listening. Bon Iver, Bon Iver is rich, warm, and inviting. This is as sincere and human as music gets. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Bon Iver’s 2007 debut was a small affair. It was a grand musical statement told predominantly in whispers by a single man left alone. The first half minute of Perth from sophomore record Bon Iver, Bon Iver could almost convince you that the ensuing album was to be the same. It wasn’t. Perth, it turns out, is one prolonged crescendo. It opens at first with a delicately strummed guitar, but before we even hear Justin Vernon’s sweet falsetto, a snare drum marches into the mix. The track builds and builds and builds. First there’s a full drum kit and electric guitars; then violin and viola, alto and bass saxophone, trumpet and French horn. According to the liner notes, over fifty instruments appear on Bon Iver, Bon Iver played by a dozen individuals – a stark contrast to the seven out of nine tracks on For Emma, Forever Ago that featured only Vernon himself. From here on out, Bon Iver is a community affair. But for all that did change, it’s remarkable what didn’t. The music is still unmistakably Bon Iver. Justin Vernon’s rich baritone and graceful falsetto multitrack through each other with ease. His lyrics are as impenetrable as ever, but their evocative nature taps into something vibrant and universal. Bon Iver has become the de facto sad white man music, but nothing precludes it from being about anybody or anything. It’s driven by feeling, and despite our varying circumstances, it’s virtually impossible to not feel something when listening. Bon Iver, Bon Iver is rich, warm, and inviting. This is as sincere and human as music gets. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
8,343
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
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Top Tracks: Cruel, Surgeon, Strange Mercy
Much of what was happening in the indiesphere of 2011 was soft. It wasn’t all necessarily “soft rock” (although some of my personal favorites drew heavy inspiration from the yacht rock of yesteryear) but most of it lacked real teeth. Albums like Bon Iver, Bon Iver, Kaputt, Helplessness Blues, or The Year of Hibernation were smooth and familiar. They were easy pills to swallow. I clearly don’t mean this as a slight, given that I praise those very albums elsewhere on this list for their impressive songcraft. The thing is, Annie Clark has that songcraft too. Strange Mercy may not be my favorite album of 2011, but nothing can beat those three singles stacked back to back on the A-side. These are pop songs that deserve nothing less than placement in the upper echelons. Annie’s got the voice too – a voice so sweet, alluring, and effortlessly pretty that it could be the envy of any of her contemporaries. She doesn’t rest on any of those laurels though, because she’s really, wholly, in love with her guitar. Well, let me tell you, that guitar has teeth. Annie can do just about anything with that guitar. It churns, it bounces, squelches, gurgles, shrieks, zings, sears, lurches, skronks, and executes any other overly florid adjective music writers like to attribute to guitars (to be fair, most music writers have spent far too much time trying to describe the sound a guitar makes), but it is all so unmistakably Annie Clark. Annie’s guitar tone is, to this day, one of indie rock’s most distinctive voices. Guitar would go on to fill a larger role on St Vincent’s self-titled Strange Mercy follow up, but it’s here that Annie strikes the best balance between the rabid energy of her shredding and her tastefully subdued pop stylings. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Much of what was happening in the indiesphere of 2011 was soft. It wasn’t all necessarily “soft rock” (although some of my personal favorites drew heavy inspiration from the yacht rock of yesteryear) but most of it lacked real teeth. Albums like Bon Iver, Bon Iver, Kaputt, Helplessness Blues, or The Year of Hibernation were smooth and familiar. They were easy pills to swallow. I clearly don’t mean this as a slight, given that I praise those very albums elsewhere on this list for their impressive songcraft. The thing is, Annie Clark has that songcraft too. Strange Mercy may not be my favorite album of 2011, but nothing can beat those three singles stacked back to back on the A-side. These are pop songs that deserve nothing less than placement in the upper echelons. Annie’s got the voice too – a voice so sweet, alluring, and effortlessly pretty that it could be the envy of any of her contemporaries. She doesn’t rest on any of those laurels though, because she’s really, wholly, in love with her guitar. Well, let me tell you, that guitar has teeth. Annie can do just about anything with that guitar. It churns, it bounces, squelches, gurgles, shrieks, zings, sears, lurches, skronks, and executes any other overly florid adjective music writers like to attribute to guitars (to be fair, most music writers have spent far too much time trying to describe the sound a guitar makes), but it is all so unmistakably Annie Clark. Annie’s guitar tone is, to this day, one of indie rock’s most distinctive voices. Guitar would go on to fill a larger role on St Vincent’s self-titled Strange Mercy follow up, but it’s here that Annie strikes the best balance between the rabid energy of her shredding and her tastefully subdued pop stylings. [First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
2,626
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Buy album
- #Sponsored
[First added to this chart: 01/20/2015]
Year of Release:
2011
Appears in:
Rank Score:
582
Rank in 2011:
Rank in 2010s:
Overall Rank:
Average Rating:
Comments:
Total albums: 6. Page 1 of 1
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Top 100 Music Albums of the 2010s composition
| Year | Albums | % | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 11 | 11% | |
| 2011 | 6 | 6% | |
| 2012 | 7 | 7% | |
| 2013 | 5 | 5% | |
| 2014 | 9 | 9% | |
| 2015 | 15 | 15% | |
| 2016 | 13 | 13% | |
| 2017 | 12 | 12% | |
| 2018 | 7 | 7% | |
| 2019 | 15 | 15% |
| Artist | Albums | % | |
|---|---|---|---|
|
|
|||
| Kendrick Lamar | 4 | 4% | |
| Tame Impala | 3 | 3% | |
| Frank Ocean | 3 | 3% | |
| Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds | 2 | 2% | |
| Vince Staples | 2 | 2% | |
| Earl Sweatshirt | 2 | 2% | |
| Angel Olsen | 2 | 2% | |
| Show all | |||
Top 100 Music Albums of the 2010s chart changes
| Biggest climbers |
|---|
| Up 41 from 52nd to 11th Black Up by Shabazz Palaces |
| Up 34 from 82nd to 48th Reflections by Hannah Diamond |
| Up 26 from 99th to 73rd Moth by Chairlift |
| Biggest fallers |
|---|
| Down 35 from 26th to 61st Pom Pom by Ariel Pink |
| Down 28 from 21st to 49th The Age Of Adz by Sufjan Stevens |
| Down 24 from 48th to 72nd Benji by Sun Kil Moon |
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Other decade charts by FlorianJones
| Title | Source | Type | Published | Country |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 50 Music Albums of the 2020s | FlorianJones | 2020s decade chart | 2022 | |
| Top 100 Music Albums of the 2010s | FlorianJones | 2010s decade chart | 2022 | |
| Top 80 Music Albums of the 2000s | FlorianJones | 2000s decade chart | 2017 | |
| Top 26 Music Albums of the 1990s | FlorianJones | 1990s decade chart | 2020 | |
| Top 30 Music Albums of the 1980s | FlorianJones | 1980s decade chart | 2020 | |
FlorianJones has created 4 other 2010s decade charts - click here to explore them all.
Top 100 Music Albums of the 2010s ratings
Average Rating = (n ÷ (n + m)) × av + (m ÷ (n + m)) × AVwhere:
av = trimmed mean average rating an item has currently received.
n = number of ratings an item has currently received.
m = minimum number of ratings required for an item to appear in a 'top-rated' chart (currently 10).
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N.B. The average rating for this chart will not be reliable as it has been rated very few times.
Showing latest 5 ratings for this chart. | Show all 6 ratings for this chart.
| Rating | Date updated | Member | Chart ratings | Avg. chart rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ! | 02/17/2018 15:30 |  Davy | 441 | 87/100 |
| ! | 06/28/2017 17:14 | weston | 80 | 87/100 |
| ! | 02/20/2017 19:20 | Seab | 2,005 | 93/100 |
| ! | 06/01/2015 22:53 |  Applerill | 974 | 75/100 |
| ! | 04/15/2015 13:21 |  andy_hunter | 87 | 88/100 |
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From weston 06/28/2017 17:15 | #193348
Nice! I agree 2015 was the strongest year so are. And I like the stuff you've thrown at the end.
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SaulCortes1992 04/02/2015 20:04 | #138629
SaulCortes1992 04/02/2015 20:04 | #138629
Excellent Chart!
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