IAceI's Top 20 Albums

[IAceI]

So I have decided that since they seem to be all the rage right now, and I have just recently given all my albums artwork and ratings, that it would be sensible to do my list now. So basically let me give you a break down of how it works – this is a list of what I believe to be my 20 favourite albums that I have on my iTunes player. Anything with over a 4* rating was eligible and obviously all 5* albums feature at the top of the list. I’m not saying that one album is better than the other, and certainly not saying one artist is better than the other – as I will no doubt mention a few times as I go through the list.

Best of/compilation albums, EPs and Live albums do not count – however there will be an award for my favourite of all three. I will try and update nearly every day with the next album in the list and have a bit of a countdown. I doubt it’ll be a highly anticipated list but it might be a decent read for some of you, although I doubt there’ll be too much on here that people don’t already know. As much as this list is billed as my favourite 20 albums, it is essentially just the ones I gave the highest ratings to so there will be some albums I’ve loved for years – and there’ll be a few that I’ve only had for a few months, I don’t particularly believe to be a top 20 album it has to be a 10 year classic that everyone worships.

Enough rambling.

IIIIIIIIIIIT’S TIME…. FOR OUR MAIN EVENT OF THE EVENING….

So my self-indulgent award ceremony has finally begun so I can showcase to you 7 (optimistic hopes, I know) my favourite albums that I have. Now my 6 albums with a 5* rating all feature obviously, accompanied by 14 albums with a 4* rating. A further 10-15 albums were cut from the list that were also eligible with 4* ratings. Which is quite odd as I’m quite harsh on my reviews, so there were more than I realised.

*****

AWARD ONE: AND THE WINNER OF THE BEST COMPILATION/BEST OF ALBUM GOES TO….

HIGH TIMES: SINGLES 1992-2006 by JAMIROQUAI (*****) [2006]

A list of the best of something just wouldn’t be complete without the funny hat wearing spaz dancing Jay Kay leading Jamiroquai to an award. What I love about Jamiroquai is that it’s something totally abstract to what most people listen to, but it seems everyone loves it. It leaves my second choice album “The Singles” by Feeder behind in the dust which was a 3 stroke 4* album. Dubbed as “acid jazz” or “funk” or “disco” or whatever, it’s not particularly a mash of genres that would get you up the runway. But it works. And it’s almost as if Jamiroquai have made this genre their very own. High Times is a collection of some of Jamiroquai’s greatest tracks of their existence including the amazing “Canned Heat” and “Deeper Underground” which is from the Godzilla movie. A phenomenal collection of tracks that show why Jay Kay is a millionaire at least forty times over.

My Favourites: “Space Cowboy”, “Virtual Insanity”, “Canned Heat”

*****

So I’m sure many of you know that I am quite a big Inme fan so it may surprise you to know that none of their albums will feature on this list, despite all three of them holding a 4* rating. First to go was their latest album “DayDream Anonymous” which was one of the earlier albums to get cut when the list was whittled down from some 25-30 4* albums. Then as the final albums were making way for the final list both “White Butterfly” and “Overgrown Eden” were gone. It may mean my love for them isn’t as great as I perhaps thought if none of their efforts can break into my top 20. But nonetheless, I will continue to love this band who I believe are preparing work on a 4th album.

*****

AWARD TWO: AND THE WINNER OF THE BEST LIVE ALBUM GOES TO….

LIVE IN A DIVE by STRUNG OUT (*****) [2003]

Okay so maybe this award is just here for the sake of promoting this phenomenal live album as I’m not sure I even own any other live albums, but even if I did they would struggle to compare to this fantastic listen. Strung Out show why they are one of my favourite bands (if not my favourite) on the go right now as they have some of their greatest songs pre-Exile in Oblivion time. My main problem is the lack of “Gearbox” and “Solitaire”, and possibly “Kill Your Scene” as well but it seems pointless as it’s still 20 fantastic songs which has the near perfect run of “Barfly”, “Savant” and then “Exhumation of Virginia Madison” – which seems just epic live. There is also the ending of “Matchbook” (Book! You torrent making pisskittens!) which is a fitting ending (and they have a lot of great ending songs to pick from.)

My Favourites: “Exhumation of Virginia Madison”, “Matchbook”, “Savant”

*****

Another omission from this list is from a band I have, I believe, the full discography of… or at least just about. Alkaline Trio do not feature on the list, From Here to Infirmary unable to crack the top 20 list. Despite this I still think they are a great band, sans the wankery that was “Agony & Irony” (although Calling All Skeletons was awesome). They are one of the first bands that started bringing me over to a more rock/punk type of music from what I was previously listening so there’s always that part of me that will really like Alkaline Trio. Oh and I also loved “Crimson”, so if you didn’t you can fuck off.

*****

AWARD THREE: AND THE WINNER OF THE BEST EP GOES TO…

GOD DON’T MAKE NO TRASH –or- UP YOUR ASS WITH BROKEN GLASS by THE FALCON (****) [2004]

So unlike the previous two awards, this one was actually closely contested. A betting man would have assumed that Brian Fallon in some way would have took this award with my shortlist consisting of both “Senor and the Queen” by The Gaslight Anthem and “Every Little Secret” by his previous work – This Charming Man. There was a fourth album that I had on the shortlist that I feel is worth a mention – “Have You Heard?” by Ghost Town Trio which I got a while ago and was completely taken in by. A great listen that I could repeat all day every day. Ultimately though, the winner was this fantastic piece by super-band consisting of Lawrence Arms’ Brendan Kelly and Neil Hennessey, Alkaline Trio’s Dan Adriano and for this EP only Todd Mohney of Rise Against who was unable to take part in the full length album. On the actual EP front I can imagine Kelly’s vocals are very take it or leave it for most, for me they’re very much take it. I love listening to him, I love his angst and I love his song writing. It’s just a winning combination, and with Mohney on guitar there just seems to be that little added dimension that was maybe lacking from the full-length album, but made up for in other areas. Also all the songs, like the EP, have alternate names.

My Favourites: “Huffing the Proverbial Line off the Proverbial Dong –or- The Blood and the Frog”, “Building the Perfect Asshole Parade –or- Scratching Off the Fleas”

*****

So with the pre-ceremony awards over we will now countdown my top 20 albums. A surely fantastic thing to be a part of I’m sure you’ll all agree, feel free to guess at what might appear – I’m sure some will know my tastes pretty well and can get a good idea – but at the same time I think there may be a couple of surprises for you in store so keep looking.

This first album is something I should probably have had a long, long time ago but never got round to. I eventually went back and picked it up and am glad I did – some great songs on it. For me this is an album with some good songs on it, and three in particular that really, really stand out.

COMING IN AT 20 IN THE TOP 20 ALBUM COUNTDOWN IS…

20. DEJA ENTENDU by BRAND NEW (****) [2003]

Brand New are one of those true angst filled emo bands that put certain particular “emo” bands in the shade and told to shut up. At the same time they have many critics but I guess that’s what this sort of music is about. With their surprisingly buff lead vocalist and guitarist Jesse Lacey penning some fantastic songs this album squeaks in at 20 in my list. I’m sure everyone wants to know what the 3 stand out tracks for me are, well they are – in no order – “Sic Transit Gloria… Glory Fades”, “The Quiet Things That No One Knows” and the incredible “Guernica” which just has the most face melting chorus riff ever - mixing slow with fast, quiet with heavy it’s just a phenomenal song and probably my favourite Brand New track of them all. Follow up album “The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me” was also a great listen but for me falls a bit short of this great effort.

My Favourites: “Guernica”, “The Quiet Things That No One Knows”, “Sic Transit Gloria… Glory Fades”

*****

Coming next... number 19 on the list, which isn't as far removed from one of the awards as you have already seen. Till then!

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

The Best Of Jamiroquai comes in second for me only behind the mighty Best Of Blur album.

[Liam]

I have the Jamiroquai one, but it falls behind my two Depeche Mode singles collections.

[YI]

Jamiroquai = Pretty good singles collection to be fair. I must say, the fact "Deeper Underground" is their only number 1 single, despite being possibly my least favourite single (I mean, it's still great, but it's a smidge dull for a Jamiroquai tune), is a travesty. They deserve better.

InMe, I like the odd song here and there, but I just don't think as an album band they're that strong. Some really good tunes though. "Soldier" off the last one was an absolute CHOOOON!!! I LOVE, LOVE, the singer's voice. It's quite sad that out of the crop of bands like Hell Is For Heroes, Lost Prophets, InMe, Hundred Reasons etc, it's Hell Is For Heroes and InMe who seemed to fade more into obscurity (although InMe nowhere near the level of HIFH), when they had two of the most fabulous/original sounding vocalists the UK have produced in years.

Strung Out, naturally, EPIC! The lack of "Lost Motel" in top tunes, makes me though. That being said, the quality of tunes on here is immense. The lightning fast version of "Everyday", the reworking of "...Virginia Madison", old school tunes like "Support Your Troops"/"In Harms Way", fuck it, it's all epic. Besides "Razor Sex", which is one of the few SO songs I can't get away with...although, when I actually heard it live (they opened with it), it was admitedly fucking amazing, but I still can't get away with it here or on AAP. I agree with "Gear Box", but EVERY album, whether they are by Strung Out or not, suffers from not having "Gear Box" on it (besides, you know, STWB).

The lack of Alk3 surprises me. Although I rank "Maybe I'll Catch Fire (UK Edition bitches)" head and shoulders above their other stuff. "Agony & Irony" was fucking terrible though. I'm really not sure whether to go see them when they come. I mean, I kind of want to, but, I don't...the support looks shite, and well, fuck it. I wont be going. And "Do You Wanna Know?" with Dan doing a Queen style bridge is the best tune on "Agony & Irony", actually I think "Lost & Rendered" is but the sound effects and handclaps and the faux-evilness ruin it, fucking retarded. The album sucked so much out of me (as well as every fucker in punk doing one), I'm not even excited at the prospect of the Matt Skiba acoustic solo album he's apparently doing...a few year ago, I'd have killed for the thing.

Falcon EP is epic. The Falcon are epic. Personally I'd prefer more Falcon to more Lawrence Arms. Brendan Kelly is seriously my god. The man is a fucking legend...want proof?;

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...ideoid=45004156

FUCK YEAH!!

Oh, and they should have stuck with the "Building The Perfect Asshole Parade" for the album.

Brand New. Quite possibly the greatest live set I've ever seen. Jeremy Enigk pulled out due to illness, which had me all , but Brand New did 2 hours solid. Did their stuff in chronological order, and did "Deja..." in its entirety, sans, one song I believe (can't remember what song). Like, they went off after the "Deja..." stuff, if they'd just called it a night then, I'm pretty sure nobody would have been disappointed, but they came back out and rocked through 5 or so songs from "...Devil and God...". I've said it a million times, but the coolest visual to close a gig I've been to ever is Jesse Lacey hanging down like a demented monkey from a set of MASSIVE speakers, screaming down the ending to "You Won't Know". Interesting you bring up "Guernica" too. That song will forever be associated with the only 'injury' I've got at a gig, when I got a blackeye in the pit. Great album, although personally I prefer Devil & God.

[probablyoliver]

My favourite thing about InMe was that when they played at the local, the lead singer couldn't get the jukebox to work and ended up getting really pissed off about it, and now every band that plays there uses the jukebox as a way of judging whether or not they're better than InMe.

[YI]

My favourite thing about InMe was that when they played at the local, the lead singer couldn't get the jukebox to work and ended up getting really pissed off about it, and now every band that plays there uses the jukebox as a way of judging whether or not they're better than InMe.

MiMi Soya and The Auteur are playing your way March 1st...go...and play 'Ro's 'jukebox'........and take photos.

I also loved how InMe randomly appeared supporting Pendulum in their tour in December...random line-up, but would have been fucking amazing to see.

Edited January 13, 2009 by YI

[IAceI]

My favourite thing about InMe was that when they played at the local, the lead singer couldn't get the jukebox to work and ended up getting really pissed off about it, and now every band that plays there uses the jukebox as a way of judging whether or not they're better than InMe.

MiMi Soya and The Auteur are playing your way March 1st...go...and play 'Ro's 'jukebox'........and take photos.

I also loved how InMe randomly appeared supporting Pendulum in their tour in December...random line-up, but would have been fucking amazing to see.

I think that was cancelled actually. I think InMe pulled out because they couldn't afford it

Also I feel I'm going to regret some of my choices and orders, I'm probably going to keep tinkering with it because obviously my tastes change right up until the near end. At the end of the day it's a top 20 but some of them I guess can be interchangeable, and also it's my opinion obviously but that means nothing anymore. So yeah - I'm sure no one will but if we can obviously refrain from "fuck off is such and such better than such and such" but we'll take it as it goes. Comments and stuff are obviously great, promote some discussion and the like

Edited January 13, 2009 by IAceI

[IAceI]

IN NINETEETH PLACE OF THE TOP 20 LIST IS…

19. UNICORNOGRAPHY by THE FALCON (****) [2006]

Having already appeared on the list with the best EP award, The Falcon make their second venture into the awards list coming in at 19th in the top 20 album list. As I said with the EP, the full length album seems to lack that little something that was on the EP due to Todd Mohney’s appearance on guitar. The album is done as a three-piece band with Kelly and Hennessey doing some of the guitar work from Mohney’s absence. The album still manages to capture the fantastic Kelly’s raspy vocals perfectly and with his incredible song writing ability the album just goes from one good song to the next. It’s chocked full of variety but still manages to remain a good, simple punk-rock album. There’s the real Chicago feel about it but also on “Celebutard Chronicles” there almost feels like an A Wilhelm Scream feel to it. One of those albums you have a favourite song off, then listen to it again and your favourite song changes to something else. A lot of great stuff on here and Brendan Kelly’s snarly vocals are fantastic. Re-workings of “”The Routes We Wander” and “Building The Even More Perfect Asshole Parade” feature, with the latter seeming a tad short of the EP version. It seems more cleaner which doesn’t seem to work for me, also seems to have toned down Andriano’s bass from the original version – still a good song though.

My Favourites: “When I Give the Signal, Run!”, “Unicorn Odyssey”, “Little Triggers”

*****

Fall Out Boy, despite being hated by many, are actually a band I really like. I think they can change their sound very well and seem to keep going fresh but I do believe sometimes they border on the idiotic in what they try. It may not come as a surprise then that the album that was on the shortlist for this was their first effort “Take This To Your Grave”. Despite what people think of them now, I encourage people to go and listen to this album – it’s far removed from most of their work now and has some great songs on it in “Reinventing the Wheel to Run Myself Over” and “Sending Postcards from a Plane Crash” amongst other great songs. Well worth a listen. Despite this though, they did fail to make the list but I still regard the album as a very good listen.

Coming next… number 18 on the list comes from the a band that formed after the lead vocalist left the original band to pursue a solo career, leaving them on an indefinite hiatus. The album is the only full length release by the band and continues the punk rock theme that album #19 has begun. For the record, the original band has now reformed. Till then!

Edited January 14, 2009 by IAceI

[YI]

I don't particularly agree with the Todd Mohney thing. I mean, I love him because he was in my favourite incarnation of Rise Against (circa RPM...it pains me to ago against my man Dan Precision ), I feel on the album they're a lot more fluid and cohesive as a band than they were on the EP. Great album. Also on the same top 3 tracks as me, in the same order.

Interesting note about that EP, I remember I searched for like 3 months for the thing (on the interweb/soulseek/limewire, all that jazz) and it was NOWHERE (I think I managed to track down like one tune, in the end I bought the fucker)...and then suddenly people clicked onto who they were and it was EVERYWHERE, really pissed me off.

Fall Out Boy, I whole heartedly agree. AMAZING album. One of the pop-punk classics.

And #18, while your clue doesn't make the most sense, I think I figured it out...I'm banking on a longshot! (Okay, you already told me on MSN that's right, but I wanted to do my little 'pun' (that ain't a pun, but don't know what to call it) thing )

[IAceI]

PLACING AT EIGHTEENTH IN THE TOP 20 LIST IS…

18. IN A MILLION PIECES by DRAFT (****) [2006]

The Draft is the resulting band when Hot Water Music went on an indefinite hiatus after Chuck Ragan left to pursue a solo career. With Hot Water Music having reformed it’s unclear whether The Draft will ever come back and produce a follow up to this fantastic album, although a 4 song EP was released the following year. A real gritty album with some really great songs, a nice punk rock effort that doesn’t leave out some great fills and melodies to give it that little bit more. Not to mention some captivating lyrics that just draw you in. It’s one of those albums you can almost forget about entirely, then come back and listen to and you remember just how fantastic it is and remember every detail about every song and what makes it so good – it’s almost as if you’ve never been way. Wollard taking centre stage with the vocals really pays off as he has a really striking voice that works well with this type of music. An album really worth listening to that you will come back to time and again and no matter when, it’ll still be a great listen.

My Favourites: “Lo Zee Rose”, “Bordering”, “Longshot”

*****

YI reminded me of this yesterday, when he himself had just remembered, of how fantastic “Searching For The Hows and Whys” by Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly is. It’s not that I’d forgotten, I have the album down as 4* but like YI had claimed, it’s rare I get to the end of the album, I usually listen to a select few songs and then just switch to something else. Not that I’m bored, it’s just what I seem to do with this album. And by never getting to the end of it you also fail to hear the great yet kind of bizarre song featuring Kate Nash. While they’re both of kind of the same ilk and kind of appealing to similar audiences, I don’t know, it just seems like an odd matching, even more so when Nash’s lines seem quite dark and well, really quite hot to be brutally honest. I do love the album as a whole even thought it might border too much on the slightly over the top political scale but I guess that’s part and parcel of music nowadays – although it’s rather odd for a quite mainstream artist to be so involved I suppose. Still a good album, but unfortunately for the fans – it doesn’t feature on this list.

Coming next… the album that places in seventeenth is the album on this list that I have heard most recently to make the list. I think I’ve had the album little over a month but yet it manages to come into the list by virtue of being fucking awesome. As a little clue – front man of band goes acoustic. Till then!

[YI]

I love The Draft album. Wollard really came into his own here as a vocalist (reminds me, I have his 'solo' album under the name of "Chris Wollard & The Ship Thieves" from last year to still listen to), but when in the Hot Water Music dynamic, alongside Ragan, he's just blown out of the water. "Lo Zee Rose" is an absolute 'skint mans' anthem. As a whole it's probably more consistent than any HWM album, outside of "Caution". Quality tracks. I still love how 'random' the beginning of "Bordering" is, on first listen I was like "WHAT THE FUCK!?!? SYNTH STRINGS!?!?!" No "New Eyes Open" in the best tunes though. Absolutely EPIC chorus.

Apparently a follow-up was in the works for last year, but with the reformation of Hot Water Music (or, Chuck Ragan rejoining "The Draft" ) it appears to have gone on the backburner. Also gutted I had to miss them and The Bouncing Souls a couple of years back because I had flu.

And 17 might get you some flack from a couple of people around here. But I enjoyed it.

Edited January 15, 2009 by YI

[IAceI]

COMING IN AT NUMBER SEVENTEEN IS…

17. LOVE IRE & SONG by FRANK TURNER (****) [2008]

First of all - fuck off. This album is great, as someone who has just recently got into Turner I picked up this effort – slightly belated. And immediately I was taken in by it, so much that within about less than a month it’s fast become one of my favoured albums as shown by its placing here. There’s something fantastic about the simplicity of an acoustic album like this, it really forces you to focus on the fantastic lyric writing which just seems like a typical mans view on life. It’s foot tappingly catchy, it draws you in and keeps you involved with just this really great atmosphere that it seems to create – at least for me. I think part of what really brings me in with Frank is his fantastic voice, his sort of southern/London/posh amalgamation vocal style is awesome to listen to and his lyrics seem simple yet fresh and innovative. Favourite song is easily “To Take You Home” which has a really awesome chorus and just the sort of song I could listen to all day. Hell, the whole album I could listen to all day – and I have a few times to tell you the truth. I’ll leave you with my favourite lyrics from the album, “But honey I was lonely on the road I was all on my own, Hanging outside at the back of a death metal show, I saw you standing there with your hair down low, a kink in your step that made me want to know if you’d like to take me home.”

My Favourites: “To Take You Home”, “St. Christopher Is Coming Home”, “I Knew Prufrock Before He Got Famous”

*****

How fucking awesome is “The Redder, The Better” – the initial EP by Polar Bear Club? Like… really… how fucking awesome is it? Very fucking awesome is the answer. I’ve been listening to it so much recently it’s ridiculous, for a 5-track EP it set such a high standard for the album to live up to – which for me it didn’t manage to do. But I truly believe that this EP is top notch. Election Day is just an awesome opener, it kind of sums up what to expect from Polar Bear Club in the long run – if they had more songs of this style, I honestly believe I would be bigging them up every second I could. “Shiny roads, take me home, streetlights illuminate the thoughts I can’t escape” is just absolutely epic and I feel they could have worked it into the song a couple of more times and made it even better, because I can’t help but think after listening to it that it was awesome – but I just wanted to hear those lines a couple more times. Resent and Resistance for me is probably the weakest track, but that’s not to say it isn’t good. It’s a bit slower and more gritty with some good lyrics, one of those that seems to pale a bit in comparison to the better songs – but has it’s own style that makes it great. His Devotee was the first song I heard from Polar Bear Club I believe, got this lovely little intro. Later on PBC do what they do best, a little gentle part of the song before just exploding with some snarly lyrics – in this case “You have an eye for the ill fated.” It just makes you want to rock the fuck out. Also the EP has a really epic closing song too in Most Miserable Life. Starting with the awesome lyrics, which pretty much are synonymous to this song with me now and continue throughout the whole track pretty much; “We fucked our ears, we fucked our throats, screaming for the sake of what we love most.” You just get the feeling Polar Bear Club really fucking love making the music that they make.

Coming next… Number 16 is another acoustic number, this time it’s not front man going solo but instead lead guitarist going solo when his mates fuck off to be angry in another band for a while. Or the other way round, he might have fucked off first. Either way, acoustic and it’s really awesome. Till then!

Edited January 16, 2009 by IAceI

[YI]

Frank Turner is amazing, one of those men that can really captivate an audience. I wasn't MASSIVE on Million Dead, so I guess I took his transition to this kind of material better than others. "St Christopher Is Coming Home" is an absolute tune. Come February I'd have seen him 3-times in the past 10 or so months, the man's an absolute touring machine. It would in fact be more, but his tour post "Love Ire & Song" didn't take in a Newcastle date, despite being twice the size of the one he did before, which did.

Polar Bear Club are an absolutely epic band. "Marathon" were basically a band that never amounted to much, I mean their EP "Songs To Turn The Tide" was a solid effort ("Bombs Make Lousy Tourniquets" is a tune) and their album was really fucking awesome (and was where Scott's voice really started to shine through), but they never got anywhere in terms of popularity (I admit to only finding out about them through the actions of band members post-breakup). But, them breaking up was the best thing they actually did, as it led to Aaron Scott starting his fabulous "Attica! Attica" project and a couple of the others started "Polar Bear Club", who are basically one of the hottest prospects in the punk-rock scene at the minute. The EP is absolutely phenomenal and really got the ball rolling with them, they kind of appeared shortly after the disbanding of Hot Water Music, so fans of HWM needed a new band to put their stock in, especially given a lot of the 'orgcore' favourites (Dillinger Four etc.) seemed to be on some form of hiatus, and Polar Bear Club soon got bigged up no end. The album was great stuff (#30 on my 2008 album list), albeit not as strong as the EP, but at the end of the day that just goes to show how impressive this EP actually is, as it's hard to maintain that kind of quality for a whole album. Can't wait to see them live in February, going to be absolutely nuts.

Edited January 18, 2009 by YI

[IAceI]

IN AT NUMBER SIXTEEN ON THE TOP 20 LIST IS…

16. FOUR ONE FIVE TWO by SUNDOWNER (****) [2008]

“I massacred the afternoon”, a lovely beginning to a quality album by Lawrence Arm’s member Chris McCaughan when his band mates were too busy playing in the Falcon. Like the album before a phenomenal acoustic album for the most part (it’s not all strictly acoustic and stuff, but it is an acoustic album no less) and just really blows your socks off. “Steal Your Words” is just a fantastic opener and really sets the tone for what is a great album, the following song “This War Is Noise” is probably his most readily available and continues in the same way of Steal Your Words. It’s quite quickly paced, beautiful lyrically but at the same time powerfully written and the song “This War Is Noise” gives us the appearance of Jenny Choi with her backing vocals singing, oddly enough ‘This War Is Noise.’ Also Neil Hennessey (The Lawrence Arms, The Falcon) also appears with acoustic bass sections apparently. The album in terms of songs is just one great song after another with “The Sea Of Lights”, “Traffic Haze” and “Midsummer Classic” all great tracks but for me just the build up to acoustic version of “My Boatless Booze Cruise” – A Lawrence Arm’s cover. If you’re looking for an acoustic album to listen to then I say pick this up, the whole thing is fantastic – it manages to find a winning, working formula but doesn’t make it seem redundant by the end of the album. The album closes on “Audio Geography”, which is essentially just Chris singing with the occasional guitar strum. At the same time it’s an absolutely awesome song, one of my favoured on the album. Get this album. Get them all, but get this one too!!

My Favourites: “Steal Your Words”, “My Boatless Booze Cruise”, “Audio Geography”

*****

Coming next at fifteen is an album that once again steers this list in a completely different direction. Listened to this album a lot when I was a bit younger, like… most days and still listen to it semi-regularly now. Virtually a big band in their own right now and they didn’t need their famous creator to help them along the way.

[YI]

Sundowner is pretty damn good. Only problem comes in that he's basically just playing punk-rock songs acoustically, as opposed to songs with 'legitimate' acoustic arrangements. Still, they're still some killer tunes. The first three tunes, along with "Endless Miles" are easily my favourites.

No random tidbit. So I'll go back and reference the GCWCF one, which I missed...fuck, Kate Nash's cameo is erection inducing.

15, I'm completely stumped. I've got all of the ones so far, but this one, absolutely no idea. And fuck...got it. 2nd album was fucking amazing, but so often overlooked, outside of the singles. The first had some great stuff but was a bit mismatched and all over the place.

Edited January 18, 2009 by YI

[IAceI]

AT FIFTEENTH PLACE IN THE TOP 20 ALBUM LIST IS…

15. GORILLAZ by GORILLAZ (****) [2001]

Virtual band Gorillaz stormed to success, not only in native UK – but worldwide – when they hit the airwaves with their opening effort, their self-titled album “Gorillaz”. A shock hit in USA gave Gorillaz a much bigger role and essentially made them better known than Damon Albarn’s main work, Blur due to their international success. What I think draws people to them is their versatile style with something that just seems to appeal to everyone, while second effort Demon Days proved to produce the bigger hits their first album makes the cut for me based on something that will come to be quite prominent in this top 20 list, the fact that it holds a lot of memories for me to a certain extent. This was the first Gorillaz album I owned and without knowing it at the time it exposed me to a lot of different musical tastes that maybe I was sceptical about at first. The album utilises a lot of guests to help on particular songs, something that was used even more in the second album. I’ve always had a big crush on the opening two songs “Re-Hash” and “5/4”, and then as my musical tastes began to broaden and develop so to speak, songs that I was maybe edgy towards initially soon became favourites “Man Researcher (Clapper)” would be a great example of this, “Double Bass” and “Rock The House” as others as well. Spawning big hits out of “Clint Eastwood” (which has the equally awesome “Ed Case Mix” which is just as good as the original) and also 19/2000 – which also has the Soulchild Remix, which again is a great mix of a great song. For me it’s quite daring to put a remix of the top 2 songs on the album, because there seems like there’d be a divide of one or the other, but for me at least, I love all versions equally. There’s also the brief, but awesome, “Punk” which is a nice, short interlude if anything and “M1 A1” for me seems very much like a British single of the 1990’s although perhaps a little “darker” than the more sunshine and shag we were used to then. When it kicks in at 2 minutes or so though you can really feel Albarn and his typical style kick in. Awesome album.

My Favourites: “Clint Eastwood”, “Rock The House”, “5/4”

*****

Back by popular demand… random tidbit time! YI briefly mentioned them with the Polar Bear Club stuff, but when Marathon broke up they went on to form new stuff. One of those formations was “Attica! Attica!” which spawned the great album “Dead Skin/Dried Blood” which was a staple part of my music diet for a long time without a doubt. I was regularly listening to the album and subconsciously divided it into two halves pre-intermission and post-intermission, naturally. For me, the album starts off good, great even, but it finishes fantastically. Writing this also makes me think I should have got this in the top 20 but perhaps by virtue of not listening to it a while it didn’t quite make the cut. If you are going to randomly decide to hunt down any this guys stuff, I really, really, really, strongly recommend “Flamethrower”, the closing song. From the moment I first heard this song to when I just listened to it again (some 10 seconds ago from writing this) I loved it. There’s just this phenomenal part where the computerised drum comes in around the 2 minute mark with the beautifully lyrics, “We’ve all gone insane, Riding on this runaway train, Hurtling us towards out dark, dark age, where war and famine rage.” It’s just a really awesome song, but there’s other great stuff. “Blackout” which showcases some lovely piano skills and a change in tempo for the album, but also a great story and more beautiful lyrics of “And so we all sat down, and I raised a glass of wine, and declared a toast to meeting these old friends, and someone played guitar, and kids banged pots and pans, and we all song old songs, the ones that no one can forget.” The whole song is just really great and is about how a traveller cuts the power to a town which forces everyone come and spend time together, and despite everyone enjoying it, when the power comes back everyone returns to their old ways of sitting and watching TV. If you listen to it enough, it does make you sit up and think ‘Fucking hell, why not just sit with a few friends, get a couple of drinks and have a crack and a laugh.’ And for me, that’s what a song should do.

Coming next! 14… already? This album is another turn, I’m not really sure how to describe it but it’s anywhere between electro/rock/indie and the band came to the nations attention when they began an NME tour in 2008 and released this great album. Till then!

[YI]

"Tomorrow Comes Today" is and epic tune, but nothing touches "Clint Eastwood", so fucking good. As a whole it's not a patch on the 2nd album, it's too choppy and there's a bunch of tunes on there they could really do without.

Attica! Attica! is amazing stuff. "We'll Always Be Home" is hands down my favourite tune, just his voice solo, with long organ chords coming in later on, it shouldn't work, but it does. But at the minute I'm really digging "Blackout" at the minute, the 2nd half of the album is so good, with those two, "A Dirge For The Underground" (I SWEAT IS MORE THAN BLEEDING STAGE MAKE-UP!! OUR WORDS AREN'T TRITE THEY'RE BLOODY DANGEROUS!!!!), "Flamethrower" and "The Party Party", epic stuff.

#14....seriously? I mean, it's not offensive (), but like, the album seriously weren't that good. Although, track #8 is fucking HUUUUUUUUGE!!!

Edited January 20, 2009 by YI

[IAceI]

FOURTEENTH PLACE GOES TO…

14. YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU’RE GETTING YOURSELF INTO by DOES IT OFFEND YOU, YEAH? (****) [2008]

Okay this may seem like a pretty odd choice so just let me try and get my point across. This style of music is something I’d never really experienced much of, I knew of Daft Punk and I did enjoy them – but I wasn’t a massive fan in the respect I had albums (although I do now have Discovery) or anything like that. To a degree Does It Offend You, Yeah? take their music to a slightly different route of what Daft Punk do anyways – it’s got a more punkish feel to it almost. If I had to describe this band I’d go with electro-indie-dance-punk-rock almost. Or just basically throw out every genre I know and see what stuck. Now 2008 for me was very much, especially the early months, “when are Foals going to release their albums.” That eventually dropped late February/early March time and I was anticipating that on being my “album of the year” but it didn’t even manage to displace this little gem I had just stumbled across. I first came across Does It Offend You, Yeah? when I saw The Cribs were embarking on an NME Shockwaves Tour with them, and also Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong and The Tings Tings. Undoubtedly The Ting Tings have catapulted to the head of the table but for me their album doesn’t even hold a candle to this effort.

Maybe they get a bit of added praise from the fact that I didn’t know what I was going to get, in some cases the album title was pretty apt for me because I really didn’t know what to expect from this band. I think I’d heard “We Are Rockstars” but even then the album is a mash of all sorts of songs ranging from the dirty electroy punk vibes, to almost straight up indie songs so that wasn’t a particularly good marker. The first song to really capture my attention on this album was track two, “With A Heavy Heart (I Regret To Inform You)” which not only for me is a fantastic song but it uses the tried and tested method of ‘going quiet and then exploding’ which happens at around the 3:10 mark when the song just essentially melts your face off and makes me want to get up and dance in the most spasticated of fashions. “Dawn of the Dead” and “Doomed Now” seem to explore more straight up indie songs and the album sums up perfectly with a fantastic 3 track finish. “Being Bad Feels Pretty Good” has that little catchy bass riff, showcases the lyrical and vocal ability more than most songs and is just something you feel familiar with when you listen. “Weird Science” however is just weird but oh so wonderful. No real audible lyrics but just the sort of thing you could move to if it came on, albeit you’d be moving very awkwardly to it, but it’s just got that youthful feel of it that screams ‘mass people rocking out without a care in the world’. The regular album closes up shop with “Epic Last Song” which again revists the more ‘indie’ vibes of other songs also using more vocals than a lot of their stuff. A really good chorus and just the sort of album you can get lost in, maybe the last song isn’t quite ‘epic’ as such. But it sounds better than ‘Nearly Epic Last Song’ so I guess it works. Fucking awesome album and something a bit different to listen to.

My Favourites: “With A Heavy Heart (I Regret To Inform You)”, “Being Bad Feels Pretty Good”, “Weird Science”

*****

Andrew Jackson Jihad is one of those bands where I just seem to love everything they do. And I think it’s all really good, I have their split album with Ghost Mice at 4*, and so is their EP “Only God Can Judge Me” and their full length “People Who Can Eat People Are The Luckiest People In The World”. But at the same time none of them seem to have that special something that makes them want to be in my Top 20 list. I mean, “People II: The Reckoning” is perhaps the darkest, most sinister but absolutely awesome AJJ song there is. “There’s a bad man in everyone, no matter who we are. There’s a rapist and a Nazi living in our tiny hearts. Child pornographers and cannibals and politicians too, there’s someone in your head WAITING TO FUCKING STRANGLE YOU.” How can you not love that? It’s awesome. But at the same time I feel that while their good songs are really, really good some of their stuff is maybe just a bit too much filler or not striking enough for me to warrant a place on the list. It’s not that I don’t think they’re good enough, as they truly are awesome with some fantastic lyrics and just some very angry men with fantastic beards but… just not enough. I just thought it was funny how they seem to fall into that category of “I think all their stuff is really, really great… but none of it can quite make the grade.” Sort of like InMe, but I’d take InMe over AJJ any day. Nostalgic and all that.

Coming next… 13 already, and I’ll get an update up quickly! 13 is once again a turn of musical genres for the list. Seattle outfit with beautiful lyrics infused with indie rock music with a nice experimental twist and just a really relaxing album that at the same time could almost make you want to get up and dance to a point. Was going to a put a cheesy cryptic clue in but it would have been pretty shit. Till then!

[METALMAN]

Oh I think I've finally been able to guess one of these correctly.

[IAceI]

To be fair, my descriptions are shit.

I never proof read, and then when I look over the posts and go to edit it fucks up my images for some reason. So I just generally have YI guessing at me on MSN. I'll try and stick up the review later on as I'm about 4 days behind where I'd like to be so I wanna see if I can catch up. When I get to the top 10 the random tidbits should all be finished up and done so the reviews will be quicker and easier to read, also want to bring in an element of suspense to the top 10 so I'll see what I can work out. Midway stage will also get a little review of what we've had so far. It's all very thought out and professional unlike some lists you see.