Listed below are the best albums of the 2000s as calculated from their overall rankings in over 59,000 greatest album charts. (Chart last updated: 2 hours ago).
"This is dance pop at its finest. Top tracks are opener "feel the love", "out there on the ice", "lights and music", "hearts on fire" and "far away". The opening tracks feel both synthetic and warm. cut copy has a pet shop boys quality to them of putting out these processed dance pop tunes with so...""This is dance pop at its finest. Top tracks are opener "feel the love", "out there on the ice", "lights and music", "hearts on fire" and "far away". The opening tracks feel both synthetic and warm. cut copy has a pet shop boys quality to them of putting out these processed dance pop tunes with somewhat flat vocals that still have a warmth and heart to them. Hits "lights and music" and "hearts on fire" typify this sound at their best. Both songs are like subtle party jams -- they don't blast out like basement jaxx or rivet like daft punk, but make you wanna dance in a new order -sorta way. Very groovy album in an understated kind of way."[+]Reply
"Infectious, immediate and relentless math rock greatness. Foals' debut is just filled with this unrestrained momentum bursting through every song. I may be biased because I've listened to it so much, but there isn't a skippable track on this album. Quite possibly my favorite math rock record ever...""Infectious, immediate and relentless math rock greatness. Foals' debut is just filled with this unrestrained momentum bursting through every song. I may be biased because I've listened to it so much, but there isn't a skippable track on this album. Quite possibly my favorite math rock record ever.
Favorite tracks: Olympic Airways, Balloons, Hummer, Cassius"[+]Reply
"I've know the band and this album for a few years now - West Ryder was my entry point and love that. I also enjoyed this, their debut album, but after a 2020 re-listen I had forgotten how good it was - Club Foot, Reason is Treason and Processed Beats open the album and are all great along with L....""I've know the band and this album for a few years now - West Ryder was my entry point and love that. I also enjoyed this, their debut album, but after a 2020 re-listen I had forgotten how good it was - Club Foot, Reason is Treason and Processed Beats open the album and are all great along with L.S.F.
But I hadn't fully appreciated the last few songs on the album with Test Transmission, Cutt Off and Butcher Blues now all landing with me - I think my taste and appreciation has changed since 2016 when I joined this site and started to really open up what I was prepared to listen to. This has also helped me reappraise older albums as well."[+]Reply
"HOMEGROWN You're a poem of mystery You're the prayer inside me Spoken words like moonlight You're the voice that I like (Faded From The Winter) Sub Pop almost didn’t make it. No. I don’t mean the grunge years. That was a given. No matter how improbable it seemed at the time. You just couldn’t kee...""HOMEGROWN
You're a poem of mystery
You're the prayer inside me
Spoken words like moonlight
You're the voice that I like (Faded From The Winter)
Sub Pop almost didn’t make it. No. I don’t mean the grunge years. That was a given. No matter how improbable it seemed at the time. You just couldn’t keep that much talent - Nirvana, Soundgarden and Alice In Chains in particular - from going big. Seattle was going to blow. It was just a matter of time. Hair metal beckoned a correction. Metal had gone adrift way too far into the seas of cheese. A hard tack was in the cards.
No. I’m taking about the rebirth. In the late 90s. Sub Pop was on its knees. Internal mutinies were plotted. Hell, even co-founder Bruce Pavitt wanted to call it quits.
But not Jonathan Poneman. Poneman’s a lot like us. A music junkie. Addicted to the process of discovery. Finding that next musical high. That next big thing. That new sound. That’s right. Poneman of Sub Pop fame is a music addict just like us. And in the late 90s, he was desperately trying to jumpstart his once proud grunge behemoth Sub Pop. And by being a super music geek, Poneman pulled off one of the most successful rebrands of a record label in rock history. First came the The Shins Oh Inverted World. But no industry rests and Poneman needed to prove that Sub Pop was no longer just a grunge label. After all, with the Nicklebacks splashing in Puddles of Mudd 3 Doors Down, grunge or Sub Pop was hardly hip anymore. Quite the opposite.
And he found it. After countless hours of listening to demo after demo after demo. He got that rush all over again. Finding Sam Beam baring his soul on an old demo tape. And there was magic there. No studio trickery. No band. Just Beam channeling Appalachalia into his bedroom. Channeling a campfire that never was. And this is the power of imagination. He made an a lo-fi Appalachian album. Call it lo fi indie if you want. The setting tell us to do so. The record label tells us to do so. Hell Allmusic compares it to Sebadoh. But the songs. The voice. The slide guitar. That banjo. They tell us differently.
Reality check: I am NOT like Poneman. AT ALL. I just think I am. I let other people do my dirty work. You won’t catch me going through random demos looking for gold. EVER. It’s never happened. It never will happen. Shit, I didn’t even have any patience with those CMJ comps that would get mailed to my door back in the day. There’s tons of undiscovered gems out there. I just let other people find them for me. Thanks, BEA! Thanks, Spin! Thanks, Pitchfork! Thanks, Trouser Press and all the other countless lists I've scoured for the next fix. (Luckily, for all of us, I possess something called INSIGHT. That means I’m aware of my own shortcomings. I can see and more importantly smell my own pile of bullshit. Some people do not have this! They do not even realize that they shit! But more on this at another date.)
Allmusic tries to connect this album to Sebadoh/Sentridoh and the lo-fi indie rock of the early 90s. But that’s bullshit. Sebadoh always felt neatly nestled in the indie rock universe. A logical and necessary part of it. This doesn’t. This is all its own. Even more so than Oh Inverted World.
The problem with a lot of projects on this scale - one man bands in a bedroom- is that the songs can start to sound a like. Which is understandable. I mean it’s just one guy after all. In his bedroom. But this album completely bucks that notion as each song sounds distinct. Unique. The whole album somehow growing stronger as it travels along. Beam sent Poneman two albums worth of demos, and Poneman chiseled them down to this one record. A good editor is so underrated!
Grade: A+. I really don’t know how Poneman did it back it the early 2000s. First the Shins and then this. He definitely deserves more credit since both albums sounded like nothing else at the time. Now we take the whole Indie Folk scene for granted. Plus they each came with their own identity. Their own mystique. Hell even the album title - The Creek Drank the Cradle - sounds like an old fable. Biblical in nature. It has this recorded in obscurity home vibe mystique to it. And neither The Shins nor Iron & Wine would ever quite capture that again despite continued success. Something other worldly. Like from an old radio station left behind by the Dharma Initiative. Something that would be playing down in that old hatch while Desmond waited around to push the button. To save the world. It was like you were being let in on this secret world. Something apart yet parallel to our own. And this album climbs out of that hatch an into the sunshine. No longer Lost on a desert island, a desert bedroom but rising high among the indie greats to number 16. "[+]Reply
"This is where Nightwish began taking it into the stratosphere. Their first 4 albums were good, but this album is truly excellent. Tarja's outstanding vocals were far more balanced between rock and opera on this album - a balance that the band would continue striking after firing her. Wish I Had a...""This is where Nightwish began taking it into the stratosphere. Their first 4 albums were good, but this album is truly excellent. Tarja's outstanding vocals were far more balanced between rock and opera on this album - a balance that the band would continue striking after firing her. Wish I Had an Angel and Nemo were the big hits, and rightfully so. Ghost Love Score gave fans an all-out symphonic assault - a taste of what would come on Nightwish's next two albums - and, quite frankly, perhaps the two best albums in the entire symphonic metal genre - Dark Passion Play and Imaginaerum."[+]Reply
"Spoon's always funky. You wouldn't know it by the lead single "the beast and dragon, adored" from "gimme fiction", their most complex song to-date. Spoon's into the funky, catchy, short single format -- leave 'em wanting more routine. While "beast" is a good song, it's not as representative of th...""Spoon's always funky. You wouldn't know it by the lead single "the beast and dragon, adored" from "gimme fiction", their most complex song to-date. Spoon's into the funky, catchy, short single format -- leave 'em wanting more routine. While "beast" is a good song, it's not as representative of their usual indie pop/rock groove funk that they bring on the rest of this album (and all their other albums that i own). "two sides / monsieur valentine" is a song black sheep boy would've made for "the stage names" if they were trying to hit early 80s pop instead of mid-70s prog rock. "i turn my camera on" brings THA BASS and is probably tied for the best track with "sister jack" and "i summon you". For Spoon, it's more about the pure, unadulterated, make-the-beatles-want-to-reform simple pop gems than lyrics. Like on "i summon you" and that simple acoustic guitar lick and soft drum; the lyrics just roll off effortlessly as another fabric of the song as a whole ("you got the weight of the world coming down like a mother’s eye / And all that you can / All that you can give is a cold goodbye"). They brings some tricks too, like the reverb/gate of "sister jack" or they xylophone-like FX of "the infinite pet". I always have a blast putting on a Spoon album."[+]Reply
"ZEN MASTER CALLAHAN I started out in search of ordinary things Like how much a tree bends in the wind… (Jim Cain) Love is the king of the beasts And when it gets hungry it must kill to eat (Eid Mad Clack Shaw) Bill callahan is a naturalist. An observer of life. Like some modern day equivalent of ...""ZEN MASTER CALLAHAN
I started out in search of ordinary things
Like how much a tree bends in the wind… (Jim Cain)
Love is the king of the beasts
And when it gets hungry it must kill to eat (Eid Mad Clack Shaw)
Bill callahan is a naturalist. An observer of life. Like some modern day equivalent of Thoreau hanging out at Walden’s. His observations are both objective and reflective. He’s the observer from without looking within. Not passing judgement. Just observing. Detached. Allowing the world to come to him at its own pace. In its own time. Just simply observing how life is instead of how he wants it to be. Callahan’s easily one of the finest lyricists of the last twenty-some years. Each time I listen to a line from one of his songs it has the ability to take on new meaning. Like the poetry of a zen master, his poetry is endless. Expansive. Taking you deeper & deeper with each reading. Each spin.
And Callahan has also mastered a genre I never would have thought I of all people would even tolerate never mind LOVE - Adult Contemporary! Mind you, this is adult contemporary for FREAKS. And somehow, someway he even one ups the mighty Nick Cave as the best adult contemporary artist of the indie kingdom. Which is saying a shitload because, let’s be honest, Nick Cave invented this genre for pete’s sakes.
And each song offers up many a hidden treasure. Chocked filled with little touches. Little embellishments. For instance, in “Eid Ma Clack Shaw” he occasionally shouts out a “Pow! POW!” as if he’s karate chopping some old Ikea furniture. to bits. (Please do NOT inform me that he’s really just saying “How”. Jeez don’t ruin it for me. That’s not nearly as cool. xp) Or take the drums on “All Thoughts Are Prey.” They start as gently echoes as some hallucinating guitar winds through the song, but then all of sudden at about the one minute mark the drums become maniacal, a beast coming to life, frothing and whipping itself into a fury as the song progresses. Becoming more & more chaotic. Free. And all the songs are tricked out like this. Subtle intricate beauty that slowly reveals and unfolds upon the listener. Seemingly changing with each spin. Yes, these songs are alive. And Callahan’s simply channeling what he feels into these songs. Normally I HATE when an album is embellished with strings and horns and the like. I mean they can sound so fake. So Phony. But not here. Oh No! They’re inventive. Constantly changing as the songs need them to. Unlike so many string arrangement that sound just thrown in as an afterthought by some producer who doesn’t even understand the song nor the artist. No. These arrangements are clearly part of the song themselves. Living, breathing entities that shift and change as the song does. As the song breathes. And just perhaps these are the most tasteful strings ever done for a rock record EVER.
Grade: A+. The finest adult contemporary recording ever recorded. It stands as the gold standard for the entire genre. A touchstone with which to compare similar entities such as Lambchop or Tindersticks and yes even the master himself, Nick Cave. And I seriously thought about vaulting this fully realized album all the way to number ONE. But… Not yet. And so it perches itself like a bird in a tree at number three. "[+]Reply
"One of the most captivating and gorgeous ambient records out there. I remember being somewhat bored once Pop 4 came along. But now this is one of the best records of the 2000's. Probably Top 10 material in my book. Wonder how I would have felt of this record in the year 2000. Probably wouldn't ha...""One of the most captivating and gorgeous ambient records out there. I remember being somewhat bored once Pop 4 came along. But now this is one of the best records of the 2000's. Probably Top 10 material in my book. Wonder how I would have felt of this record in the year 2000. Probably wouldn't have liked it due to being 5 during that time. But 22 year old me finds this a must listen."[+]Reply
paladisiac | Helpful? (Log in to vote) | +2 votes (2 helpful | 0 unhelpful)
A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.
Repo | Helpful? (Log in to vote) | +2 votes (2 helpful | 0 unhelpful)
A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.
junodog4 | Helpful? (Log in to vote) | +3 votes (3 helpful | 0 unhelpful)
A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.
