2011 in music.

[New Damage]

Gold Cobra was album of the year, obviously.

Seriously though, for me it was probably Wasting Light also, it made me a Foo Fighters fans and also hate myself for turning down the opportunity to see them because I wasn't fussed when I was asked. If not Wasting Light, possibly Childish Gambino's EP. Outside of those two, the 20th Anniversary Digitally Remastered version of Nirvana's "Nevermind" is stellar, but I guess that doesn't count. I also really like Thrice's "Major/Minor" and Charlie Simpson's "Young Pilgrim" too.

[Skummy]

Outside of "Neptune" which, as I said, is a runaway winner of Album Of The Year for me, there's some others I've absolutely loved.

- William Shatner's "Seeking Major Tom" is hilarious, but actually a damn sight better than it has any right to be.

- 8in8's download-only album "Nighty Night" is magnificent, especially "Nikola Tesla" and "The Problem With Saints", which I expected to be a bit of a novelty (it's written and sung by Neil Gaiman), but is actually an awesome track.

- Wolves In The Throne Room's "Celestial Lineage" is fantastic, though very much following the same path of their previous work. Bloody good, though.

- Tom Waits' "Bad As Me" is a little unfocused, and far from his best work, but it's strong enough to make the list. Plus, it's Tom fucking Waits.

- Thurston Moore's "Demolished Thoughts" is absolutely gorgeous, especially "Benediction". With it looking very much possible that Sonic Youth may be breaking up, I wouldn't complain if Thurston opted to dedicate more of his time to beautiful introspective acoustic stuff.

- Steven Wilson's "Grace For Drowning" is magnificent - probably my favourite work of his in a long term. It's got the extravagant prog rock edge of what he normally does, but never feels half as self-indulgent, and all flows beautifully.

- Richard Warren's "The Wayfarer" is something of a sleeper hit - really fucked up, dark, twisted country that I've been gradually falling in love with for the past couple of weeks.

- PJ Harvey's "Let England Shake" is brilliant, possibly her best complete album in years.

- John Maus' "We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves" reminds me of early Ultravox, and a lot of great synthpop, while never feeling like an experiment in '80s nostalgia, so that's brilliant.

- Hank Williams III's "Ghost To A Ghost/Gutter Town" is probably the best thing he's ever done, and has some genuinely amazing moments.

- Faust's inexplicably awesome comeback continued with "Something Dirty", which is just absolutely intense and mind-blowing music.

- Duane Eddy's "Road Trip" is a surprisingly fresh-sounding, and sometimes very heavy, instrumental masterpiece.

- David Lynch's "Crazy Clown Time" was pretty great, too.

And Billy Childish and Luke Haines both having new albums out this week is a great late boost for the year, too.

For individual songs, can't go wrong with Lykke Li's "Sadness Is A Blessing", Foster The People's "Pumped Up Kicks", Mariachi El Bronx's "48 Roses", My Morning Jacket's "Holding On To Black Metal",

Some fantastic re-issues out too - Nirvana, Sonic Youth, The Fall, hell even Les Rallizes Denudes got a deluxe reissue out.

On the other hand, though, disappointments of the year came courtesy of Kate Bush (twice!), Dengue Fever, Emmylou Harris, Jello Biafra, Twilight Singers, Poly Styrene and Wild Beasts (who continue to get duller with each album).

All in all, I'd say it was a pretty awesome year for music - not much that took my fancy in the pop sphere, though I still love Cee-Lo, and I love Aloe Blacc's "I Need A Dollar", but an awful lot of really cool stuff has come out. I've not really been doing as much seeking out new stuff either, so I think it's a damn good show considering I haven't been as actively looking for good new music as I have been in previous years.

On a personal note, in terms of live music, best gigs of the year go to Faust at Field Day, and The Tiger Lillies at Soho Theatre.

[Bushmeister]

2011 was cool as all hell, and really picked up into hyperdrive over the summer-early autumn, at least for me. Tons of great stuff across the board from all the genres I love, and even some amazing outliers from everywhere and everything. Some random thoughts:

- more estabilished death metal bands released quite lackluster showings: Decapitated, Exhumed, Fleshgod Apocalypse and Jungle Rot did pretty much nothing for me on repeated listenings. Really only Origin and Immolation stayed up to snuff on their most recent ventures.

- European BM fucking slew across the board this year, with new Blut Aus Nord, Glorior Belli, Corpus Christii, Arckanum and Tsjuder especially owning bones.

- Dirty Knobs. "Field Recordings From The Edge Of Hell". BWWOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM.

anyways, I am still trying to whittle down my top 10 for the year, but here are the albums that have so far made it through the cuts:

Sunsmasher - "LoudMammothianCult"

Ssaliva - "Thought Has Wings"

Battles - "Gloss Drop"

Das Racist - "Relax"

Blut Aus Nord - "777 Sect(s)"

Glorior Belli - "The Great Southern Darkness"

Corpus Christii - "Luciferian Frequencies"

Dirty Knobs - "Field Recordings From The Edge Of Hell"

Gridlink - "Orphan"

A Dancing Beggar - "Follow The Dark As If It Was Light"

Easily Embarrassed - "Tales Of The Coin Spinner"

Belphegor - "Blood Magick Necromance"

Celestial Aeon Project - "The Fall Of Ragnaros"

Graveborne - "Pure Negativity"

Endstille - "Infektion 1813"

Mochipet - "Hello My Name Is Mochipet"

Charts And Maps - "Dead Horse"

.... yeah. LOTS of good stuff this year.

[tristy]

I feel like a lot of people slept on albums by EMA and Steven Wilson. They didn't get the credit either of them deserved for making amazing pieces of work, in particular Steven Wilson. EMA's album was beautiful in it's own way, too, I thought. Definite favorites of the year. James Blake's self-titled and the Enough Thunder EP are my two favorite pieces of music this year, though, besides Tyler, The Creator's GOBLIN. I know GOBLIN by heart, from the intro to the last song, and I still listen to at least one song off the album a day still. Girls new album has grown on me quite a bit, but I still like their debut more.

I think my favorite discoveries this year have been tUnE-yArDs and WU LYF, though. Probably Ice Age, as well.

[Bodom]

The Strokes "Angles", Jane's Addiction "The Great Escape Artist", and The new Andrew Jackson Jihad all come to mid for me.

[ROC]

To those praising the PJ Harvey record, it totally deserves the accolades. Great stuff all around.

That said, St. Vincent, the Vivian Girls, and Fucked Up blew me away this year. The Vivs got me in that they have a thin genre of throwback surfer girl punk that could wear thin quickly (like Wavves has for me), but god this album was more concentrated and impressively well-written lyrically. St. Vincent put out the best record of the year in Strange Mercy because goddamn is it a brilliant encapsulation on the beauty standard. And Fucked Up made a badass rock opera from punk hollering. Which is awesome.

[Mr Evil Guy]

i really liked cults, youth lagoon, lo-fi-fnk, hooray for earth, future islands, foster the people, architecture in helsinki, the drums, john maus, kendrick lamar, bon iver and pains of being pure at heart this year. all of them would be in my list, prob youth lagoon #1 cause that album is filthier than my browsing history

[Steeb]

MEG!

[Dingle]

Absolutely loved Wasting Light after disliking the past couple of Foo albums (last one I bought was One by One in 2001/2). I'm surprised to see that you think Radiohead's new album was well received though, since everyone I know found it to be their worst effort and a dent on their usual ability to constantly release quality material year after year. I felt like 'King of Limbs' was to Radiohead, what 'The Resistance' was to Muse. It had too much Thom Yorke influence and nowhere near enough guitars - sure they moved away from 'regular' instruments by 'OK Computer', but even 'In Rainbows' had a lot of decent guitar lines that are done alongside Yorke's need for weird drum beats, off-time cymbal smashes and warbly bass notes. I liked 'Codex' and 'Lotus Flower' and I think that's about it.

I need to go listen to more music from this year, clearly.

[Lowerdeck]

Even "Run The World" which most of me hates BIG time there's still a little part of me that likes some of the beats. That's the problem with being an electro fan - sneakily good samples and beats sneaking into otherwise annoying songs.

When I hear that crap at work, it just sounds like I'm at a strip club.

Lyrics are terrible, the beat shouldn't excuse that.

[RPS]

For those looking for a good compilation of EOY lists... According to acclaimedmusic.net,

Top 25 acclaimed albums

1. Harvey, PJ Let England Shake
   
2. Bon Iver Bon Iver
   
3. Blake, James James Blake
   
4. Fleet Foxes Helplessness Blues
   
5. Weeknd, The House of Balloons
   
6. St. Vincent Strange Mercy
   
7. Vile, Kurt Smoke Ring for My Halo
   
8. Destroyer Kaputt
   
9. tUnE-yArDs WhoKill
   
10. M83 Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
    
11. Waits, Tom Bad as Me
    
12. Girls Father, Son, Holy Ghost
    
13. Radiohead The King of Limbs
    
14. Metronomy The English Riviera
    
15. Horrors, The Skying
    
16. Wilco The Whole Love
    
17. Li, Lykke Wounded Rhymes
    
18. Shabazz Palaces Black Up
    
19. Jay-Z & Kanye West Watch the Throne
    
20. Fucked Up David Comes to Life
    
21. Adele 21
    
22. Wild Beasts Smother
    
23. Drake Take Care
    
24. Yuck Yuck
    
25. Real Estate Days
    

And songs:

1. M83 Midnight City
   
2. Lana Del Rey Video Games
   
3. Tyler, The Creator Yonkers
   
4. Adele Rolling in the Deep [2010]
   
5. James Blake The Wilhelm Scream
   
6. Foster the People Pumped Up Kicks [2010]
   
7. Bon Iver Holocene
   
8. Real Estate It's Real
   
9. Radiohead Lotus Flower
   
10. tUnE-yArDs Bizness
    
11. Fleet Foxes Helplessness Blues
    
12. The Rapture How Deep Is Your Love?
    
13. St. Vincent Cruel
    
14. Destroyer Kaputt
    
15. Girls Vomit
    
16. Jay-Z and Kanye West Otis
    
17. The Black Keys Lonely Boy
    
18. SBTRKT feat. Yukimi Nagano Wildfire
    
19. Nicki Minaj Super Bass
    
20. Cut Copy Need You Now
    
21. Lykke Li I Follow Rivers
    
22. Frank Ocean Novacane
    
23. Adele Someone Like You
    
24. EMA California
    
25. Metronomy The Look
    

[thatshortguy]

I didn't wanna do eet...but I did eet anyways.

20 Favorite Albums of '11 (In Order From 'OMG' to 'ite')

1. TV On The Radio - Nine Types of Light

2. Foo Fighters - Wasting Light

3. Incubus - If Not Now, When?

4. Battles - Gloss Drop

5. Cake - Showroom of Compassion

6. Death Cab For Cutie - Codes & Keys

7. They Might Be Giants - Join Us

8. Mutemath - Odd Soul

9. Chickenfoot - Chickenfoot III

10. Primus - Green Naugahyde

11. Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist

12. Switchfoot - Vice Verses

13. Panic! At The Disco - Vices & Virtues

14. Dream Theater - A Dramatic Turn of Events

15. Opeth - Heritage

16. Blink-182 - Neighborhoods

17. Yes - Fly From Here

18. Eddie Vedder - Ukulele Songs

19. Sum 41 - Screaming Bloody Murder

20. Florence & The Machine - Ceremonials

[SRN]

Right, since I am not going out I'll do one as well.

1. Das Racist - Relax

2. Dirty Knobs - Field Recordings from the Edge of Hell

3. Devin Townsend - Deconstruction

4. Liturgy - Aesthetica

5. Charts and Maps - Dead Horse

6. Battles - Gloss Drop

7. Snake Oil - Snake Oil

8. Rising - To Solemn Ash

9. Krallice - Diotima

10. Marduk - Iron Dawn EP

And since we are apparently doing more than 10, I'll add more.

11. Sólstafir - Svartir Sandar

12. Origin - Entity

13. Mary Fahl - From the Dark Side of the Moon

14. BADBADNOTGOOD - [self-titled]

15. Disma - Towards the Megalith

16. WU LYF - Go Tell Fire to the Mountain

17. The William Blakes - Music Wants to be Free

18. PJ Harvey - Let England Shake

19. Nicolas Jaar - Space Is Only Noise

20. Cormorant - Dwellings

21. Oranssi Pazuzu - Kosmonument

22. Shabazz Palaces - Black Up

23. Beastie Boys - Hot Sauce Committee, Part Two

24. Powder! Go Away - Laika Still Wants Go Home

25. Lil B - I'm Gay (I'm Happy)

EDIT: Fixed. I really should've done this list when I wasn't half-asleep.

[METALMAN]

Someone else who likes Nicolas Jaar! You're so cool SRN.

[SRN]

I loved Space Is Only Noise. I still haven't heard his new EP but I plan on rectifying that today.

[RPS]

Yeah SRN list is pretty awesome.

[SRN]

Honorable mentions goes to Primus, Esoteric, who released the heaviest album of the year, no doubt, SBTRKT and Troels Abrahamsen's Unset. Unset is much like "that kind" of electronic music that I mentioned in my previous post; you know, the dubstep inspired minimalistic approach that James Blake and Nicolas Jaar have also taken, although it is quite a lot faster than either Blake's self-titled and Space Is Only Noise.

[ROC]

I don't think EWB has been graced by my rambling anger over how awful James Blake is yet. It's too "dense" (read: needlessly dreary) to be sexual, his voice is sub-Michael McDonald, and his lyrics say nothing to me. There's been way better musical experimentation, and way less pure grating this year.

(Also, Beyonce's "Countdown" is wonderful.)

[tristy]

I wish we could still minus posts. Because that would be one of them. James Blake is amazing.

[Rich]

2011 had new Los Campesinos! and M83, this pleased me a lot.

M83 in particular is immense