Q's Top 50 Albums of 2008

[METALMAN]

Even Q knows better than that.

[Skummy]

More importantly, it lacks Earth, Asva, Jonathan Richman, The Fall, Robert Wyatt, Wild Beasts, Toumani Diabate, Harvey Milk and countless other actually good and interesting albums that came out this year.

Like I said, though, some of the bands on there are alright, even if outside of Portishead none of them did anything especially new or interesting with their new albums; Nick Cave's latest is just Grinderman Pt. 2 a.k.a The Midlife Crisis Nick Cave Sings The Doors Album, Black Mountain's isn't a patch on the last album...Hercules And Love Affair and Lykke Li probably deserve to be up there for creating some of the best and most interesting pop this year, but there's a distinct lack of anyone ploughing any new ground, innovating, or pushing forward in any way, shape or form - Metallica? AC/DC? Randy Newman? Paul Weller? Neil Diamond? Oasis? I know most of the music press live in a constant state of blissfully nostalgic denial, but they can't possibly fail to realise that it's 2008 and, yes, I know half of my list are older bands/artists too and I'm a massive hypocrite, but at least none of them (with the possible exception of Jonathan Richman) have released an album that simply rests on their laurels and rehashes the same dross they've been churning out for the past decade or more.

And the less said about The Last Shadow Puppets' "I heard a Scott Walker album once" shite or The Raconteurs the better.

[MalaCloudy Black]

WTF? Grinderman and Dig sound nothing like The Doors. Worst comparison ever.

[Skummy]

Not so much Grinderman, Dig! moreso...and it's somewhere between The Doors and The Stooges, that whole horribly macho RAWK thing they've got going on, it's all about "COME AWN", "YOU KNOW WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT", "ALRIGHT NOW", "YEAH BABY". I much prefer my Nick Cave to me insular and moody or, if he must be upbeat, he should be slightly unhinged and ranting and raving, not regressing into some kind of teenage rockstar fantasy. It's all a bit Uncle Nick at a wedding. He's old enough to know better. Plus, the whole fuss about Grinderman was that it was something so apart from the Bad Seeds, and in every interview promoting it he rubbished the idea that recording that album would have any influence on the next Bad Seeds album....but it did. Really obviously. One mid-life crisis album was enough.

Edited December 4, 2008 by Man With The GoldenGrahams

[TheRyno]

I haven't heard any of those albums. But I've heard lots of 2008 releases and bought at least a dozen on CD.

Is my taste in music really that marginal?

Same here. Sometimes I think about that too, if I've been alienating myself by listening to things away from the mainstream. Sure, it's difficult to talk to other people about music but fuck it, I like what I like.

[hackerjack]

1. Kings of Leon – Only By The Night - great band. worst album. Should never be number 1.

...

50. Dido – Safe Trip Home - probably shit

Where is Cardinology? And several others I like?

Interesting how most of your comments say that somethign should be lower or that you havent heard it so its probably shit.

How can they all deserve to be lower? Surely to be lower there have to be better albums to take their place!

[YI]

1. Kings of Leon – Only By The Night - great band. worst album. Should never be number 1.

...

50. Dido – Safe Trip Home - probably shit

Where is Cardinology? And several others I like?

Interesting how most of your comments say that somethign should be lower or that you havent heard it so its probably shit.

How can they all deserve to be lower? Surely to be lower there have to be better albums to take their place!

...they deserve to be lower...because they aren't the top 50 albums of 2008. "Should be lower"...as in..."It's a good album, but there's been like 20 other albums released this year better than it, but should still be on the list".

It's not particularly difficult to work out.

Edited December 11, 2008 by YI

[METALMAN]

1. Kings of Leon – Only By The Night - great band. worst album. Should never be number 1.

...

50. Dido – Safe Trip Home - probably shit

Where is Cardinology? And several others I like?

Interesting how most of your comments say that somethign should be lower or that you havent heard it so its probably shit.

How can they all deserve to be lower? Surely to be lower there have to be better albums to take their place!

I could name several better ones for you. But I can't be bothered. Just accept that there are.

[GA!]

Does anyone have the NME's Top 50 Albums list?

[ADG]

Yes.

1 MGMT ~ Oracular Spectacular

2 TV on the Radio ~ Dear Science

3 Glasvegas ~ Glasvegas

4 Vampire Weekend ~ Vampire Weekend

5 Foals ~ Antidotes

6 Metronomy ~ Nights Out

7 Santogold ~ Santogold

8 Mystery Jets ~ Twenty One

9 Kings of Leon ~ Only by the Night

10 Friendly Fires ~ Friendly Fires

11 Neon Neon ~ Stainless Style

12 Crystal Castles ~ Crystal Castles

13 Fleet Foxes ~ Fleet Foxes

14 Laura Marling ~ I Cannot Swim

15 The Last Shadow Puppets ~ The Age of Understatement

16 Ladyhawke ~ Ladyhawke

17 Elbow ~ The Seldom Seen Kid

18 Late Of The Pier ~ Fantasy Black Channel

19 Fucked Up ~ The Chemistry of Common Life

20 Spiritualized ~ Songs in A and E

21 Lightspeed Champion ~ Falling Off The Lavender Bridge

22 Oasis ~ Dig Out Your Soul

23 ScarlettJohansson ~ Anywhere I Lay My Head

24 Bon Iver ~ For Emma, Forever Ago

25 Portishead ~ Third

26 The Verve ~ Forth

27 Hercules and Love Affair ~ Hercules and Love Affair

28 British Sea Power ~ Do You Like Rock Music?

29 Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds ~ Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!!

30 Hot Chip ~ Made in the Dark

31 Coldplay ~ Viva La Vida

32 Mogwai ~ The Hawk Is howling

33 Deerhunter ~ Microcastle / Weird Era Cont.

34 Los Campesinos! ~ We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed

35 Cass Mccombs ~ Dropping The Writ

36 Frightened Rabbit ~ The Midnight Organ Fight

37 Primal Scream ~ Beautiful Future

38 Beck ~ Modern Guilt

39 Chairlift ~ Does You Inspire You

40 The Kills ~ Midnight Boom

41 These New Puritans ~ Beat Pyramis

42 Alpinisms ~ School of Seven Bells

43 Black Kids ~ Partie Traumatic

44 Lykke Li ~ Youth Novels

45 The Black Keys ~ ttack & Release

46 Blood Red Shoes ~ Box Of Secrets

47 The Gaslight Anthem ~ The ‘59 Sound

48 Ida Maria ~ Fortress Round My Heart

49 Bloc Party ~ Intimacy

50 Heartbreak ~ Lies

[METALMAN]

Dear Science, wasn't that good...

Frightened Rabbit should have been higher!

[GA!]

I didn't realise university students and fans of 'Skins' got to vote on the NME top 50 list.

Edited December 11, 2008 by GA Christmas Special

[Skummy]

Who else would? It's the NME.

[GA!]

I wish I was as cool as them, going on Facebook by day, faking having a good time in clubs by taking lots of pictures to put on my Facebook by night.

[Mr Evil Guy]

Dear Science, wasn't that good...

Frightened Rabbit should have been higher!

Yes. Yes it was. :@

[METALMAN]

It was good. I won't argue that. Just not that good.

[ROC]

Dear Science, wasn't that good...

Frightened Rabbit should have been higher!

Yes. Yes it was. :@

SECONDED. :@

Though, a lot of that list is hype-based, TVotR's record is actually pretty damn awesome. I will say that Scarlett over like everything else it's above, even Coldplay, is fucking ridiculous.

But other than that, it's pretty close to what I'd expect a Brit top 50 list to be.

[Zaz]

Dear Science, wasn't that good...

Frightened Rabbit should have been higher!

Yes. Yes it was. :@

SECONDED. :@

Though, a lot of that list is hype-based, TVotR's record is actually pretty damn awesome. I will say that Scarlett over like everything else it's above, even Coldplay, is fucking ridiculous.

But other than that, it's pretty close to what I'd expect a Brit top 50 list to be.

So I searched Frightened Rabbit after realising they were a semi-famous group and came across this thread. They were listed at the NYE party I was at last night, but I'm not sure if I saw them play or not (there were 3 different levels with live bands playing at all times on 2 of them, so I didn't see them all). What are they like? (Edit: Actually, are these the guys that had a dude playing both keyboard and guitar? Hah, I vaguely remember watching them, turning to a mate and going 'These guys aren't very good' before we left to go to another floor >_>)

The Teenagers were also there and they were pretty damn awesome, they were on stage when it hit midnight, and more-or-less got every good looking girl on the floor up on stage to party with them >_>

Edited January 1, 2009 by Zaz

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

Of those I purchased the Sigur Ros and Goldfrapp albums.

The Sigur Ros album is beyond excellent and is the best album of the year from my limited experience.

I also got the Mogwai album (on the NME list) which is pretty epic.

Away from the list I got "Velocifero" from Ladytron (very cool) and the Jonquil album "Lions".

I also got Fujiya & Miyagi's "Lightbulbs" which is good but I think I prefer "Transparent Things.

To be honest most of my music money is spent filling in my back catalogue of required albums. 2007 was spent filling up on chilled out stuff like Mogwai, Sigur Ros and Boards of Canada.

This year was more upbeat.

Edited January 1, 2009 by ChrisSteeleAteMySanta

[Keith Kannon]

Dear Science, wasn't that good...

Frightened Rabbit should have been higher!

Yes. Yes it was. :@

SECONDED. :@

Though, a lot of that list is hype-based, TVotR's record is actually pretty damn awesome. I will say that Scarlett over like everything else it's above, even Coldplay, is fucking ridiculous.

But other than that, it's pretty close to what I'd expect a Brit top 50 list to be.

So I searched Frightened Rabbit after realising they were a semi-famous group and came across this thread. They were listed at the NYE party I was at last night, but I'm not sure if I saw them play or not (there were 3 different levels with live bands playing at all times on 2 of them, so I didn't see them all). What are they like? (Edit: Actually, are these the guys that had a dude playing both keyboard and guitar? Hah, I vaguely remember watching them, turning to a mate and going 'These guys aren't very good' before we left to go to another floor >_>)

The Teenagers were also there and they were pretty damn awesome, they were on stage when it hit midnight, and more-or-less got every good looking girl on the floor up on stage to party with them >_>

Yeah, I saw them (Frightened Rabbit) live with Biffy Clyro a few weeks ago and they where awful. The crowd really didn't like them. The other support band, People In Planes sounded pretty cool though.