This year I’ve listened to well over a hundred albums. My prolific listening binge resulted in some wonderful new discoveries (a Porcupine Tree here, a Shugo Tokumaru there) and, of course, saw me indulging in my usual vices (Keenan and Coheed to name a two). Overall, this list represents a marriage of my two impulses… with a divorce that’s probably just around the corner.

1. Blond Redhead
23
The year’s best album. The highlight of my year. 23 takes Radiohead’s superlative sound and elegantly marries it with the sensual howl of PJ Harvey. This alchemy creates not only Blond Redhead’s best album to date but an album that stands out amidst a year full of stand-out albums. When a friend of mine said that 23 was good and all but “all songs sound the same,” I said I didn’t see that as a problem see as how every song is perfect.

2. Nine Inch Nails
Year Zer0/Year Zero Remixed
At times a bold return to Trent Reznor’s industrial past (just about every track evolves into a grinding sputtering of splendid sounds), at others a seedy pop gem, and at all times it’s a brazen concept album that works surprisingly well as an interactive gimmick that takes the listener down a gothic rabbit hole and spits us out into a barren parallel universe not unlike our own. Ground zero for Reznor’s dystiopic narrative journeys from our current mess in Iraq, to George W’s puritanical entitlement, to a future where industry and religion suffocate the infrastructure and envelop us in a postapocalyptic world where the sun passes the sky a final time. But the story didn’t end there for Reznor and a slew of collaborators returned once again to deconstruct the mess even further on the impressive Year Zero Remixed. Is there any way Reznor will top this flawless album? I don’t know but I wouldn’t say no to a Year One.

3. Porcupine Tree
Fear of a Blank Planet
From the opening sound of a click-clacking keyboard to the CD cover graphic of a light casting its hypnotic blue glow on a young child’s face to that line about MTV “for the pills in me” (or something like that), this prog metal concept album is bombastic as shit but, in its own way, perfect. I actually never heard of this decades-spanning band until this year and it just took a few seconds into the album’s first song to make me a fan. In fact, I listened to Fear of a Blank Planet (love the play on words) more than any other released this year. In addition, the sprawling sit-com length (but anything but funny) track “Anesthetize” just about saved me in those many freeway commutes into to the dreadful land known as Orange County. Kinda Tool, kinda Floyd and kinda great.

4. The Bravery
Self Titled
The year’s most baffling release. Nobody talked about this follow-up album from The Bravery. Hell, nobody liked it, period. Here’s how bad it got: after downloading the sucker I decided to buy it and the guy at Amoeba actually made fun of me! Poor Bravery, indie music hipsters don’t like them and the mainstream rejected this album for… crappy Killers b-sides. I can’t figure out where the love’s gone because the album is a vast improvement on their dance-y breakout album. On Sun, every track bears meaning, soul and melody. There’s hardly a dull moment in here and, okay, call it derivative but there’s so much passion in here that it’s hard to complain. Yet people did. And I, in turn, complain about the complainers.

5. Justice
†
The year’s best dance album! Which is saying a lot coming from someone who doesn’t (or can’t?) dance. Justice made techno fun again by leving the monotony to dour acts like The Field. This one moved me… literally. And, side note: crush of the year goes to Uffie, who, on “The Party,” raps her cocky heart out about being hot, saying “no to stilettos because I might get drunk off my ass and I don’t want to fall” and having us fellas digging “all the carrots o-round my neck.” No arguments here.
6. Puscifier
V for Vagina
Am I the only one in the world placing this album on a “best” list? If I’m not I’d like to meet the person who places it higher to ask what’s wrong with them. V for Vagina is, for my money, this year’s most inexcusable indulgence. It’s crass, silly and often stupid (“this lady’s got the thickness, can I get a witness” the single jingles). I know all this to be true yet I couldn’t help falling in love with the Pus. This album grew on me in a huge way. Ho-humming lyrics filled with oedipal shout-outs, mother/Gaia imagery, cool-ass 90s strumming and Maynard’s voice that vacillates between ghoulish growl and falsetto moans. All proved addicting. Oddly enough, the fact that radio stations and iTunes censored every mention, utterance and even spelling of the word “vagina” exposes the media’s patriarchal fear of women. Does this album dispel such phobias? Who knows, all I do know is that I love vagina. And the album’s not that bad either, hehe.

7. Radiohead
In Rainbows
“You are all I need” Radiohead sings on a track of the same title. Many of us would say the same back to the band. A Radiohead album making the list should be no surprise. What can I say: I’m in league with, well, the world in loving this band. Objectively, they’re the best in town (or any town for that matter) and, even more objectively, this album is truly bold for a band with such a moniker. Radiohead made headlines for their commercial venture into liberating choose-your-own-price record company freedom and while that’s great, it should also make headlines for it’s impressive skill because if it wasn’t any good who would care? For one, I found this album quite easy to appreciate after the inconsistent Hail to the Thief. The key to vibing with this Rainbow’s otherworldly sound is understanding Thom Yorke’s admission that the band went for minimalism this time around. In what, upon first glance, may sound like a refashioning of Yorke’s solo album this album is actually a work of restrained genus. Listen, then listen again, then live with, then love.

8. Pantha du Prince
The Bliss
The title says it all. In a year cluttered with overrated techno (The Field? Hot Button??), so-so stuff (Burial) and a small measure of great ones, none were as pitch perfect as The Bliss. With a metallic sound that transcends the very word minimalism, this album took me back to –of all things– 90s PC videogames with their futurist sounds. That may sound shallow but give me a break; I’m no authority on this kind of music. In place of articulation all I can say is that it grabs me, it bothers me, or it finds me indifferent. This one grabbed me so hard it left marks.

9. Shugo Tokumaru
Exit
Blew me away. And I’m not easily blown.

10. Coheed and Cambria
No World For Tomorrow
I said Puscifier was the year’s biggest cheeseball indulgence but I may have spoke too soon. This second concept album from Coheed is… um, you see, the emo, Jimmy Eat World sounding prog band finds a way to… damn, there’s no excuses, I just like it, okay!

Gruff Rhys
Candylion
Allow me to explain. First, Gruff, the lead singer of one of my favorite bands Super Furry Animals, had a benchmark year. Not only did he reach the heights of solo artists with the fun and flighty Candy Lion, but he also quietly released of the year’s best with Hey Venus. Having only listened to the import album Venus once I’m not going to rank it in 2007 but, the greatness of that album aside, that doesn’t mean I’m going to let this sweet, sweet Candy slip by my taste buds.

!!!
Myth Takes
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Gruff Rhys
Candylion
Allow me to explain. First, Gruff, the lead singer of one of my favorite bands Super Furry Animals, had a benchmark year. Not only did he reach the heights of solo artists with the fun and flighty Candy Lion, but he also quietly released of the year’s best with Hey Venus. Having only listened to the import album Venus once I’m not going to rank it in 2007 but, the greatness of that album aside, that doesn’t mean I’m going to let this sweet, sweet Candy slip by my taste buds.

PJ Harvey
White Chalk
By loosing the gnarled, horny edge of her last album and embracing her softer, Tori side, Harvey’s splendid new album settles in a comfortable zone that is far from cutting edge yet a minor revelation for any fan of Harvey. The saddest sounds of the year were also the most fulfilling. And, hey, anything sounding this good that isn’t Feist feed down our throats gets a check-plus in my book.

Spoon
Ga ga ga ga ga
…full of goodness. Is it possible for Spoon to release anything less than top shelf material? On the first listen to Ga ga etc. I was underwhelmed and thought so, but by the twelfth I realized how wrong I was. This Spoon album is their most laidback yet also their most memorable. In place of an impossibly catchy single like “Turn My Camera On” or “Way We Get By” is an album full of solid tracks (Japanese Cigarette Case happens to be my favorite) with a sound so straight forward the effect is casual wonder.

Stars of the Lid
8
Imagine if the transcendent last minute of Radiohead’s Kid A album spanned two hours. Soft and serene but never repetitive, this violin heavy spaced-out Jazz album envelopes with atmosphere. The perfect background soundtrack of the year.

The National
Boxer
Another new discovery for me. I remained ignorant of this Ohio indie rock act until this year when my blessed roommate and music guru forced me to hear The National. An album full of drab sounds made almost fun via the contrapuntal lyrics. This is the kind of album to listen to after the bar closes and room clears. And being that I don’t drink that’s saying something.

Daft Punk
Alive 2007
Watch in amazement as these robots rock “Robot Rock” in addition to ass-load of blissful self mash-ups. The synthesis of songs makes for one of the more ambiguous live albums I’ve ever heard. More, so much more than just a live album, this is a reimagining of an entire oeuvre. What’s more, the band’s rendition of “Harder, Faster, Stronger”/”Around the World” puts Kanye to shame.

Shaffenfeld
Private Cinema
A last minute addition that I fell in love with.

Kemialliset Ystävät
Self-titled
Bong-bling-verrrrberrrrr-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-whoooooooooooshhhhhhhhhhh…….hhhhhhhhh……ptfffff.

Grinderman
Self-titled
Raw, even for Cave. Eschewing the fuzzy gospel transcendence of his last album this new side project returns Cave to his angry, punk roots.

Wu Tang Clan
8 Diagrams
Rap you can’t put a lid on. Any band that can rap about Mark Wahlberg in Shooter, 28 Weeks Later and the Death Star is a band I like. Don’t listen to the other clan members, RZA’s a genus. A mad genus, but a genus. Wu forever!

Liars
Self-titled
This impressive, wobbly-wrock follow-up to “Drum’s Not Dead” proves that album’s title truer than ever. Can’t wait to seem em’ live in 08.

Ian Ball
Who Goes There
In a year without a real Gomez album, this honest if a bit slight effort does me good.