Best album of the 2000's

[Davey]

There's a big thread over on the Steve Hoffman site (http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=84342) with a lot of somewhat predictable choices, like Dylan's Love and Theft, and Radiohead's Kid A, and Wilco's YHF, and Green Day's American Idiot and Brian Wilson's Smile, and all the rest of the big name artists. But one that went mostly unnoticed at the time by me has been getting all of my attention lately, Low's Trust from 2002. Wow, what a nice record. Seems to combine all of their talents and techniques in one place. Some Cowboy Junkies, and Byrds and VU and Wilco and Joy Division and Galaxie 500 and Radiohead and CSN&Y and all the rest. Great stuff. Thought I already had enough albums by Low so skipped the last 2, but I was wrong. Still think Lost in the Fire might be their best, mainly because it just flows so perfectly and has the Steve Albini touch, but this one seems to be their most diverse and is my favorite at the moment. Surprisingly only gets 3.5 stars from AMG, but works much better than that for me. I'd initially been scared away by the Tchad Blake production since he sometimes gets a little overdramatic for my taste, which is fine for power pop type music, but this still has the sound I like of Low, just a little more eclectic and bold at times. And the liner notes only give him mixing credit so maybe his input wasn't that much overall. Opening with a luscious and mournful reinterpretation of the traditional spiritual with "[That's How You Sing] Amazing Grace" (I knew this girl when I was young, She took her spikes from everyone, One night she swallowed up the lake, That's how we sing amazing grace), followed by one of their best rockers yet in "Canada" ('cuz you can't take that stuff to Canada). Unknown Pleasures Deux? Maybe not, but it does hold a lot of magic.

So what's your pick?

[bacchanal]

Anything John Frusciante has done this decade has my vote (esp the solo stuff and the most recent rhcp album).

[Slosh]

One of these:

McLusky Do Dallas
Enon High Society
Stephen Malkmus Face The Truth
Pinback Blue Screen Life or was it Summer In Abaddon?
Super Furry Animals Rings Around The World
Wilco A Ghost Is Born Yeah, I like it better than YHF
Andrew Bird The Mysterious Production Of Eggs
The Wrens The Meadowlands
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
Tapes n' Tapes The Loon
The Black Heart Procession Amore Del Tropico
Calexico Feast Of Wire or Garden Ruin
Spoon Gimme Fiction or Girls Can Tell
Arcade Fire Funeral
Built To Spill Ancient Melodies Of The Future
The Decemberists Castaways & Cutouts or Picaresque
The Dismemberment Plan Change
Earlimart Treble & Tremble
Modest Mouse The Moon And Antarctica
The Notwist Neon Golden
Rogue Wave Descended Like Vultures
Sparklehorse It's A Wonderful Life
Wayne Robbins & The Hellsayers The Lonesome Sea

Depends on my mood.

[Davey]

One of these:

McLusky Do Dallas
... yada yada ... bunch of others ... yada yada ...
Wayne Robbins & The Hellsayers The Lonesome Sea

Depends on the moon.
Hey Slosh, nice list, even though lots of my favorites are missing. Nice one pulling up Wayne and the Boys there at the end. But isn't there one or two that really reach for the sky? Sure bet? Can't lose? Highly recommended? Love among the ruins? I have the same problem, although I tend to get really involved in the sound of an album for long periods so my favorite changes to whatever is my latest obsession. This week, Low. Couple weeks ago, Lift To Experience and their sprawling Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads, or the new Willard Grant Conspiracy, or Black Heart Procession, or whatever. Funny, I was just thinking this morning that I'm not really a religious person, but a lot of the music I'm drawn to is very spiritual. Maybe something like a moth to the flame. Or the light at the end of the tunnel. Or the darkest hour is just before the dawn :)

[tentoze]

Probably Willard Grant Conspiracy's Regard The End, but lately, Willie Nile's Streets of New York would be a very strong contender as well.

[Slosh]

I'm not at all a religious person (because I have thoughts :), as Lewis Black would say) but I may as well put Sixteen Horsepower Folklore on the list. Good music is good music, even if I don't believe in the tooth fairy.

[Slosh]

Oh yeah, and Grandaddy . . . can't decide between Slump or Sumday or Fambly Cat.

Ah, what the hell. I'll say Sumday is my favorite album of this 1000 years so far.

[MindGoneHaywire]

I've never spent any time at Steve Hoffman's site, it seemed like a bigger Rocky Road, and I pollute that place & waste enough of my time there as it is. I know there's probably some good discussions there, but I just haven't made it there. But then, again, I'm not really an audiophile. That said, seeing those names you're dropping sounds like more than I'd probably give credit to; I don't think they'd make too many Rocky Road lists, but that could be a flawed presumption.

I'd name a few of those usual suspects--Dylan, at least, and the Green Day rec for sure. I'd add the White Stripes' Get Behind Me Satan, which I prefer to Elephant, and Beck's Sea Change & Guero both. Nick Cave, Abbatoir Blues/Lyre Of Orpheus, Neil Young's Greendale...can't say I'd put up any of the Tom Waits recs, though, although I did think they were decent. Nor the last Johnny Cash, sorry, I know it was relatively well-received, but I thought the first three were much better.

I would say Petra Haden Sings The Who Sell Out, though that's likely too much of a novelty. SMiLE's a sentimental choice, but its impact was muted a bit for me since I've been grooving on boots (primarily the fantastic version supplied by Brad H) for years. But, um, Madeleine Peyroux's Careless Love, for sure, & maybe the very nice live Brubeck date from 3 years ago on Telarc, the first Jane Monheit album, though of course those are...not rock. Neither is Bebel Gilberto's Tanto Tempo. But, hell, arguably, neither is the Dylan.

Rock? Randy--Welfare Problems, The Little Killers, Nick Curran & the Nitelifes--Player!, Asylum Street Spankers--Mercurial, The Hives--Veni Vidi Vicious, the d4's SixTwenty, Jet's Get Born.

Stuff that rocks less? The Innocence Mission recs from a couple of years ago, the Ditty Bops, and Ray LaMontagne's sublime Trouble.

Eminem's 2nd & 3rd recs, maybe the 4th, maybe not. Any other rap? Maybe MC Paul Barman, and a cacophony of ideas that stand out amongst tons of dreck. Can't see the point in mentioning names who can come up with great singles but seem to think selling albums is a great idea.

The Arctic Monkeys rec stands out as the best rock'n'roll rec in quite some time; along with the White Stripes rec, the Green Day rec, & the 2nd Libertines album, probably my favorites of the decade to date. Along with one that deserves not to be forgotten, and probably as good as any of these, Joe Strummer's Streetcore.

[jrhymeammo]

OST by PUTS, Mind over Matter by Zion I, and Violent by Design by JMT. They are all Hip Hop. I'm having the hardest time getting back into newer rock music. All 3 albums combined dont even reach 100,000 copies. Damn wankers taking food away from their plates............ What happend to buying music?

[Dusty Chalk]

I'd have toa gree with Neon Golden as a contender. Also dig Matt Elliott's solo stuff, The Mess We Made and Drinking Songs. Sure do dig Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds' what's-the-word-for-having-two-apexes twin-peak-tical Lyre of Orpheus/Abattoir Blues. Neubauten's Silence is Sexy is considered 2000 by Wiki, so...that one; otherwise, Perpetuum Mobile. And, of course, Sigur Rós' ().

EDIT: I forgot to make my usual qualification that I'm sure I forgot something, and I did: Porcupine Tree, Lightbulb Sun.

EDIT #2: I'm sure I forgot something else, but I have no idea what it is yet.

[likeitloud]

I like 80's and 90's rock, but some new stuff has gotten my attention;

Velvet Revolver.......Contraband
Disturbed......10 Thousand Fists
Saliva....Survival Of The Sickest
Godsmack...IV
Audioslave...Out Of Exile

There are others, But one of these is always in my player.

Pioneer VSX1015TX
JBL Northridge E150 Powered Sub
JBL 4410A Studio Monitors(Front)
JBL Northridge E30(Surrounds)
JBL Cinema Vison CVCEN50 Center
JBL Northridge Satellites(Back Channel)
Pioneer Elite DV45A DVDA/SACD
Panasonic DVD F86K
Sony RCD W500C CD PLAYER/REC
AR Interconnects
Cobalt 14G Wire
Sanus Stands
XBOX 360 (Just Added)

As Long As My Brain And Fingers Work I'm Cool...Edward Van Halen:5:

[Stone]

One of these:

McLusky Do Dallas
Enon High Society
Stephen Malkmus Face The Truth
Pinback Blue Screen Life or was it Summer In Abaddon?
Super Furry Animals Rings Around The World
Wilco A Ghost Is Born Yeah, I like it better than YHF
Andrew Bird The Mysterious Production Of Eggs
The Wrens The Meadowlands
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
Tapes n' Tapes The Loon
The Black Heart Procession Amore Del Tropico
Calexico Feast Of Wire or Garden Ruin
Spoon Gimme Fiction or Girls Can Tell
Arcade Fire Funeral
Built To Spill Ancient Melodies Of The Future
The Decemberists Castaways & Cutouts or Picaresque
The Dismemberment Plan Change
Earlimart Treble & Tremble
Modest Mouse The Moon And Antarctica
The Notwist Neon Golden
Rogue Wave Descended Like Vultures
Sparklehorse It's A Wonderful Life
Wayne Robbins & The Hellsayers The Lonesome Sea

Depends on my mood.

No Mastodon, huh?

[ForeverAutumn]

It's so hard to remember them all. I'll take these for starters....

Andrew Bird The Mysterious Production Of Eggs
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
The Honeydogs 10,000 Years
Luke Doucet Broken and other Rogue States
Dream Theater Octavarium
Green Day American Idiot
The Trews House of Ill Fame

[Mike]

One of these:

McLusky Do Dallas
Enon High Society
Stephen Malkmus Face The Truth
Pinback Blue Screen Life or was it Summer In Abaddon?
Super Furry Animals Rings Around The World
Wilco A Ghost Is Born Yeah, I like it better than YHF
Andrew Bird The Mysterious Production Of Eggs
The Wrens The Meadowlands
The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
Tapes n' Tapes The Loon
The Black Heart Procession Amore Del Tropico
Calexico Feast Of Wire or Garden Ruin
Spoon Gimme Fiction or Girls Can Tell
Arcade Fire Funeral
Built To Spill Ancient Melodies Of The Future
The Decemberists Castaways & Cutouts or Picaresque
The Dismemberment Plan Change
Earlimart Treble & Tremble
Modest Mouse The Moon And Antarctica
The Notwist Neon Golden
Rogue Wave Descended Like Vultures
Sparklehorse It's A Wonderful Life
Wayne Robbins & The Hellsayers The Lonesome Sea

Depends on my mood.

Nice list there Slosh, I think I would agree with most of those but throw a few more into the mix like…

Beck - Sea Change, with a great production by Nigel Godrich this one stands the test of time for me

Grandaddy – Sumday, this is one does it for me, I think I played it at least once a week for about a year

Low – Great Destroyer, I prefer the more raucous sound this one has

Twilight Singers – As Played By, subsequent releases just don’t stand up to this one

DCFC – Transatlantacism, again this is the pinnacle of DCFC for me

Wheat – Per Second Per Second, great slice of indie pop

Thievery Corp – Cosmic Game, they were going off the boil for me until this was released, perfect blend of East meets West sounds

Libertines – Libertines, their second album just before they broke up, it’s a shambling mess but it works for me

And a bunch of others like…

Sufjan Stevens – Seven Swans
My morning Jacket - Z
Air - Walkie Talkie
British Sea Power – Open Season
Drive By Truckers – Decoration Day
Elbow – Cast Of Thousands
Doves – Lost Souls
Bloc Party – Silent Alarm
Snow Patrol – Final Straw

[BinFrog]

Pearl Jam - self titled
Rush - Vapor Trails

(both could use remastering to get rid of clipping issues)

[Stone]

Low – Great Destroyer, I prefer the more raucous sound this one has


I think I do too, although Things We Lost In the Fire is a great one too. I like Trust, but I'd take the other two over it.

As far as my own pick, I think I'd go with either Blueberry Boat or The Meadowlands, but I haven't give it a lot of thought.

[Snowbunny]

I'm sure it wouldn't make many Top 100 Lists, but it makes mine.

Joe Henry - Scar

This album bridges all genres in my opinion. Much like Andrew Bird. Something for every one, including brilliant lyrics. Many times I've tried to find out why he called the opening track on the album, "Richard Pryor Addresses a Tearful Nation", to no avail.

So here's Scar. And the real mystery, of course, is where he pulls these songs out of, how he knows the things you thought only you knew, and how he makes the music sound like these fluctuations of inner weather. Joe's always had a gift for songs about the utter and absolute misery of love, and in "Mean Flower" it's stretching him on the rack to a new pitch of unbearableness; yet in the title song, the prospect of two damaged souls truly seeing into one another verges on a state of grace. More artfully than ever, he's mixing textures and genres, from tango "Stop" (his "uncover" of Madonna's single) to blues dirge ("Richard Pryor Addresses a Tearful Nation") to neo-'70s jazz-funk ("Nico Lost One Small Buddha"), while always sounding exactly like himself. (Told you he listened to Duke Ellington.) And he's made his single smartest choice of collaborators: on "Richard Pryor," the free-jazz giant Ornette Coleman bestows a solo that's the perfect aural analogue of the spiritual free-fall in the lyric.

Scar captures that sense of wonder when you've dared to wish for a fresh impossibility and something more than you thought you deserved drops right out of heaven -- after you've worked your ass off. It's Joe Henry's best record. Hands down. So far.


- David Gates
February 2001

[Stone]

Joe Henry - Scar


This is an album I just never "got." I can last a few songs, then I'm just ready to turn the stereo off completely. I just think the style doesn't suit me. I should pull it out and give it another try, though.

[Snowbunny]

This is an album I just never "got." I can last a few songs, then I'm just ready to turn the stereo off completely. I just think the style doesn't suit me. I should pull it out and give it another try, though.

I think you either like it or you don't. I doubt that its a grower, Stoner.

Do you not at least like the first track?

Sometimes I think I've almost fooled myself
Sometimes I think I've almost fooled myself--
Spreading out my wings
Above us like a tree,
Laughing now, out loud
Almost like I was free

I look at you as the thing I wanted most
You look at me and it's like you've seen a ghost
I wear the face
Of all this has cost:
Everything you tried to keep away from me,
Everything I took from you and lost

Lights shine above me, they're like your eyes above the street
Lights shine below me, they're like stars beneath my feet
I stood on your shoulders
And I walked on my hands,
You watched me while I tried to fall
You can't bear to watch me land

Take me away, carry me like a dove
Take me away, carry me like a dove
Love me like you're lying
Let me feel you near,
Remember me for trying
And excuse me while I disappear
-- Joe Henry, “Richard Pryor Addresses a Tearful Nation”

Maybe you're just not smart enough. :ciappa:

But then again, I'm listening to Johnny Cash singing, "I'm doing all right for country trash!"

Snowb

[Slosh]

No Mastodon, huh?I guess I'm kind of metal'd out. Although I think Remission is bar none the best metal album since, say, Sepultura Roots, pretty much the only time I listen to anything that heavy is when friends put something on.

I don't think it's 'cause I'm mellowing out either (always liked other stuff besides metal, even when I was like 13). I'm just bored with it I guess. Metal hasn't gone anywhere interesting for me in at least ten years. Sooner or later I'm sure something new and different and good will come along but I don't really look for it much anymore.

NP: Ugly Casanova Sharpen Your Teeth

[Davey]

I'm sure it wouldn't make many Top 100 Lists, but it makes mine.

Joe Henry - Scar

This album bridges all genres in my opinion. Much like Andrew Bird. Something for every one, including brilliant lyrics.

Yeah, baby, yeah! That is a good one, and of course one of my favorites too since I'm also a person, like yourself, with an appreciation of the fine arts. Course, that doesn't prevent me from liking this lowbrow rocknroll crap that Joe Henry cranks out too :)

I didn't care as much for the more subdued and melancholy jazz style on the last one, but Short Man's Room and Trampoline and Fuse and Scar are all aces with me. Major talent. Hope the next one moves on to something new and previously unheard again.

I was looking at the yearly lists of my favorite albums of the last few years at my site and there really are a lot of great albums that I could name. Hard to pick just one, but did want to acknowledge how good that Low album sounds right now, even though it's not seriously my favorite of the decade.

But back at the ranch, ...

Many times I've tried to find out why he called the opening track on the album, "Richard Pryor Addresses a Tearful Nation", to no avail.

Tell me more about how you came up with that title, "Richard Pryor Addresses a Tearful Nation."

Believe me, I tried everything to get rid of it [laughs]. I didn't set out to address my interest in Richard Pryor in a song. It wasn't so deliberate. The song just presented itself to me, and I realized, as I was writing it, what it was about and where it was going. After I wrote the song, the title presented itself, kind of at the end. I thought it was ludicrous and I tried to get rid of it, but it seemed like a thread on a sweater: You better just leave it alone, but then you start pulling on it and the whole thing comes apart. I really thought that somehow, even if I couldn't exactly, literally account for it, that [the title] gave you a handle as to how to listen to the song, and it was a subtitle to the song, in a way.

I imagined him, his thoughts about himself and this country, and I imagined the nation listening to him and having a response to what he was saying and giving him a response about where he was and who he became, but that's all after the fact. It's easy to have ideas and clarity in retrospect. [Songwriting is] a lot more mysterious than that to me. The process is a lot more mysterious.

[Stone]

Maybe you're just not smart enough. :ciappa:



Or maybe it just sucks. :prrr:

[Ex Lion Tamer]

After some deliberation, I have a tie.

The Moon and Antarctica - Modest Mouse

and

White Blood Cells - The White Stripes

[Snowbunny]

Or maybe it just sucks. :prrr:

:prrr::ciappa:

Oooh, Maffy has a good suggestion we both might just agree on.

[Swish]

:prrr::ciappa:

Oooh, Maffy has a good suggestion we both might just agree on.


Now that's funny.

Swish Baby

[Davey]

Wheat – Per Second Per Second, great slice of indie pop
Wheat would be high up there on my list too, but not that one. I do like it, but Hope And Adams is the classic for me. Same with a couple of your other picks. Love the first Libertines but only lukewarm on the second one. Nothing by Elbow compares to their debut. Agree with you kind of on the Twilight Singers, though I quite like the next one too. Nothing like that sublime first one that sat in the vaults aging like fine wine for all those years. Still like the manic BSP debut singing about insects better than the more laidback god in an oil stain on the next one. But Snow Patrol? Now that's just goofy http://forums.audioreview.com/images/icons/icon6.gif

[Stone]

:prrr::ciappa:.

What exactly are you offering me (that Maf apparently suggested)?

[superpanavision70mm]

FLAMING LIPS Yoshima Battles the Pink Robots
BELLE & SEBASTIAN Dear Catastrophe Waitress
BECK Sea Change
BRANDTSON Hello, Control
PALOALTO Heroes and Villains
ELLIOTT False Cathedrals and Song in the Air
RADIOHEAD OK Computer
DEPECHE MODE Playing the Angel
THE STILLS Logic Will Break Your Heart
NADA SURF Let Go
THE MUSE Origin of Symmetry
BRIGHT EYES Lifted or the Story is in the Ground
SIGUR ROS ()
THE 88 Kind of Light and Over and Over
JIMMY EAT WORLD Bleed American
ERASURE Union Street
ZWAN Mary Star of the Sea
JULIANA THEORY Emotion is Dead

and many many more that I can't think of at the moment

[Dusty Chalk]

ELLIOTT False Cathedrals and Song in the Air! I love Song in the Air. Good call. I was just listening to Photorecording earlier today.
RADIOHEAD OK ComputerUh, not really of the oughts.

[Snowbunny]

What exactly are you offering me (that Maf apparently suggested)?

Hahahahahaha!

I meant Moon and Antarctica and apparently the Moon showed up! :ciappa:

[Snowbunny]

Another nominee for the best of 2000's...

no more shall we part - nick cave and the bad seeds - 2001

One of the most beautifully disturbing albums in my collection.

:: And No More Shall We Part

And no more shall we part
It will no longer be necessary
And no more will I say, dear heart
I am alone and she has left me

And no more shall we part
The contracts are drawn up, the ring is locked upon the finger
And never again will my letters start
Sadly, or in the depths of winter

And no more shall we part
All the hatchets have been buried now
And all of birds will sing to your
beautiful heart
Upon the bough

And no more shall we part
Your chain of command has been silenced now
And all of those birds would've sung to your beautiful heart
Anyhow

Lord, stay by me
Don't go down
I will never be free
If I'm not free now

Lord, stay by me
Don't go down
I never was free
What are you talking about?

For no more shall we part
And no more shall we part

Snowie