I realize I’m probably picking a bad time (entire Replacements discography and all) to trot out a laundry list of random-seeming records that you just Have to Download Now! but… let’s just call it Save For Later-bait? Ok, cool.

I’ve posted here before about leaning on lists to augment my all-consuming music nerd habits, but December and January (aka year-end up wrap-up time) turns list scouring time into list drowning time. And, well… I love it. The whole year-end list clusterfuck gets a bad rap — it’s overwhelming, it’s arbitrary, it caters to ugly hivemind sensibility, etc etc. But honestly, the sheer amount of artists and records and songs I discover and come to love makes me quickly shelve any inclination I have toward petty list-hate snark.

I thought it might be worthwhile to share a list of some of my recent discoveries (and obsessions) and to give props to the fine excavators who lit the way. The list is currently spiraling out of control, no thanks to today’s arrival of Village Voice’s (always fascinating) Pazz n’ Jop poll coverage, which, among the great essays and master rankings, allows me to see the individual ballots of many writers I admire. So basically, it never ends. And that’s great.

Bad Sports, Bad Sports
From: Raven Sings the Blues

This record deserves its own post, really. I’m just gonna quote myself from somewhere else:

Obviously, punk in 2010 is a bit of a formalist exercise. We’ve heard the 1-4-5 chord progression, the aggro sneers, the chunky distortion. But when a band nails sweet-punk, that kind of almost-bubblegum that sounds like it’s played in a trashcan, I get knock-kneed. Records like these shouldn’t be so hard to come by. With any genre that’s become a bit rote, songs are king. And man does Bad Sports have ‘em.

To make a (way too long) story short: If you like Jay Reatard, the Exploding Hearts, the Boys, melodic punk music, pretty much anything on In the Red… get Bad Sports. Trust me.

It also must be said that Raven Sings the Blues is a phenomenal blog. Full disclosure: Andy, who runs the site, is a personal friend and old colleague. He specializes in the intersection of garage rock, drone, avant folk and all matters of psych. He is extremely ahead of the curve. Running shit, even.

Connie Converse, How Sad, How Lovely
From: Other Music

Almost buried at the bottom of Other Music newsletter, this record has ruled me for the last month or so. It’s a neat story, sure (’50s home recordings of a woman who just up and left her home one day and… never came back), but the music itself is pretty revelatory. Complete with some flubs and some talking bits, the intimate Carter Family-esque folk ditties on How Sad feel extra confessional. Just a supremely nice recording. That may sound backhanded, but I mean it as honest praise. Every time I listen to this record I just think, “Wow. This is SO. NICE.”

Richard Skelton, Landings
From: eMusic -> New This Month -> Most Downloaded

Even after working at eMusic for two years, I still get lost on the site. And I love that. Yesterday, after browsing Freshly Ripped, I decided to see what some of the past month’s most downloaded albums were. I was sure I’d missed some gems. Charts are one thing, but by navigating using the Browse page, you can just scroll and scroll and scroll until you hit these pages of strangely somewhat-popular albums. Sometimes it’s a trance remix collection and sometimes it’s Richard Skelton’s Landings.

In ‘08, I had some real down-the-rabbit-hole moments with Skelton’s harrowing Marking Time and when I saw Landings appear amidst my maniacal scrolling, I was psyched. Skelton records are typically stark and kinda scary, using echo-laden strings, treated piano and buzzing atmospherics to acheive a pretty dire mood. It’s beautiful, though, trust me!

Instra:mental, “Watching You”
From: Darkstar’s XXJFG’s mix

As much as I routinely find dance music that really moves me (natch), I’m resigned to the fact that I’ll never know as much as my favorite electronic honchos. So, gladly, I seek help. 20 Jazz Funk Greats is a blog that writes a lot about dark electronic music — dubstep, italo, 2-step, UK funky, etc etc. I don’t wanna pigeonhole them too much, but usually there’s a synth or drum machine in the (usually great) song or mix they’re posting.

People kind of went bonkers for Darkstar’s “Aidy’s Girlfriend is a Computer”, and not without reason. It’s possibly the most accessible 12″ from Hyperdub yet — it’s glitchy and nuanced, but it’s also kind of as close to the Postal Service as the esteemed label will ever come. Clipped vocals, gently stuttering drum programming. 20JFG says “Aidy” is another in the line of Hyperdub’s “hypnotic phantom digi-diva bass hymnals,” and, well, I’m not gonna say it any better than that.

HOWEVER, I find that Instra:mental’s “Watching You” succeeds in ways that “Aidy” only hints at. They are of the same strain of digi-diva bass hymnal (ha), but somehow “Watching You” feels… weightier. It has more space. More bass. Less cuteness and more ominous-ness. I’ve listened more to this song in the last month than anything else. By far. It makes me sad that we don’t have it on eMusic, but I just had to share it.

Final note (swear): The best-of list posted at the top of the JFG post with the Darkstar mix is essential. It was put together by one of their writers who also has a leftfield modern R&B blog (So Bones) that is also essential. That is all.

Interbellum, Over All of Spain the Sky is Clear
From: Jayson, over the cubicle wall

Sometimes… occasionally… you can discover things by, like, talking to people. This is a wonderful, subtle, beautiful album of modern classical (?), ambient (?) or some such inadequate genre tag. Thanks Jayson! (He did not know I was putting together an overly-long post about “discovering stuff” when he called this out to me. Wassup serendipity.)

David Sylvian, Manafon
From: The Wire

Sadly, I don’t think you can get Sylvian’s stuff anywhere digitally. I’ve never listened much to Japan, but Sylvian’s late-period solo stuff is miles away from the pomp-rock of his former band. He put of some of my favorite records of the decade (the Derek Bailey and Fennesz-assisted Blemish and his criminally underrated collaboration with Burnt Friedman under the name Nine Horses) and Manafon is predictably, singularly unnerving and wonderful.

Side note: Did anyone see Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd? ‘Cause Johnny Depp’s singing voice is oddly similar to David Sylvian. Like, creepily so.

Lloyd Miller, A Lifetime in Oriental Jazz
From: FACT Magazine (Best Reissues)

God knows how I missed this. Chris Nickson reviewed it for us (glowingly) but even though I… freakin’… WORK HERE… sometimes things get lost in the shuffle. So in case you missed it too, here’s your chance. I’m just gonna quote some of Chris’ review here because it is HIGHLY persuasive:

When it comes to unknown geniuses, Dr. Lloyd Miller ranks high on the list. Born in California, he’s not only a virtuoso jazz pianist and clarinettist, but also a leading authority on Iranian music — he spent several years living there, even presenting a weekly TV programme in Tehran.

This eye-opening trawl through his little-known back catalogue shows just how he’s pioneered musical dialogues between cultures; not just Western and Iranian, but also Indian and Vietnamese.

So, yeah. Don’t walk… RUN!

Finally, here are some records that have grabbed me, but I haven’t had a chance to fully digest yet. It never ends, remember?!

Oneohtrix Point Never, Rifts
From: 14tracks.com

Redshape, The Dance Paradox
From: Little White Earbuds

Paul White, The Strange Dreams of Paul White
From: FACT Magazine (Best Albums)

eMusic’s User Poll for the Best Albums of 2009 is going on right now! Take a few minutes to review your playlists, scan your hard drive, search the site and scratch your head, then VOTE HERE for your favorites.

The ballots have been flooding in this year, and we’re just as curious as you are to see who comes out on top.

Deadline for voting is December 15. Our Top 60 of 2009 will begin rolling out one week from today, with your picks arriving the week after.

We’re more than halfway done with our Best of the Decade countdown now, and starting to hit the big names. Here’s where the rubber meets the road, where we move past minor personal faves and into the game-changers (which leads me to the following confession: I’m responsible for the R. Kelly pick. He is a loathsome human being, but that record is as close to a Marvin Gaye album as I’ve heard in the 21st Century). So with the arrival of Conor at #40, we’re starting to hit the meaty part of the list. So I have to ask — any guesses at #1? Any albums you personally think are shoo-ins for the Top 40?

So I have to be honest: assembling our Best of the Decade list was incredibly intimidating.

Best of each year? No problem. The scope is smaller, we all have a fair idea of which records should be included, and the squabbles about placement are more fun, more relaxed.

But Best of the Decade? Man oh man. I was surprised at how tough it was, and how many times the list was re-jiggered until it felt something close to right. And even then!

I’m happy to announce that we’ve begun rolling out our list in the US today (UK, EU and CA begins 11/23) — you can get a look at 100 – 81 here. Looking at it now, I really do feel like the list reflects our singular, obstinate taste. Where else will you see a list where Olof Arnalds appears between Ciara and Usher?

But our coverage extends past a simple list. We’ve asked all of our columnists to contribute a page to our eMusic Yearbook. Each writer was assigned a different year in the decade, and each one wrote about the music they felt defined that year. We begin with Hua Hsu’s take on the year 2000 here.

And that’s not all! We’ve also compiled 8 themed lists to make sure that no albums fall through the cracks — lists that focus specifically on breakthroughs in hard rock and metal, classical, hip-hop and a few other surprise spins of our choosing. We’ve also got the Decade’s Best Audiobooks, posting one week from today.

As always, we come to you for feedback — as the list rolls out, let us know: what are your favorites? What albums do you think we were crazy to include? And what albums were we crazier to leave out?

It’s been up over the weekend, so I’m sure quite a few of you have already seen what came out of our member (hi Tim) poll of favorite, underrated and overrated artists and albums. The real treat? Bon Iver is apparently all three, and indeed there was a lot of crossover between all three results.

In terms of overrated, a result that we deemphasized a bit on the proper hub page, Vampire Weekend won easily. More than double that of number two. None of that was surprising. It is clearly the most real-world visible of anything new that we pushed this year.

Underrated was what I was excited to see, just because it’s such a broad and poorly defined word that it invites a million different kinds of responses, and so any sort of consensus was going to surprise me. But we definitely saw one with the 20 records we listed: all had at least ten votes from people, and in a vote that saw thousands of records get mentioned, that was notable. Most pleasing to us was seeing Blackblack make that list — we always felt like Blackblack got shorted on what is a very good record, and so to hear that back from some portion of the membership was gratifying.

Overall, I enjoyed the results to all of the member polling. Certainly indie rock was well-represented — it was, indeed, the only thing represented, as is always the case — but taken as a whole, it feels like a nice, round picture of eMusic and the folks who use it came out of this. Hope you feel the same. Happy holidays, everybody!

The conclusion below the cut!

9. Deastro, Keeper’s
I remember the day we listened to this at the office for the first time — we all knew, immediately, that Randy was something special. My love for this record has only grown since then — a testament to what one kid can do with some simple equipment and a whole lot of imagination. Every song on this makes me feel like I’m living inside Legend of Zelda. And that’s just fine by me.

8. R.E.M., Accelerate
It’s no secret by now that I’m probably the big “dad rock” guy in editorial. There is no record I argued about more in 2008 than this one. I’m not going to launch a huge defense — it’s a sentimental favorite, and I’ve gotten over feeling self-conscious about loving this band. I waited 11 long years for something that sounded like this from Buck, Mills & Stipe, and Accelerate still continues to scratch that itch. So there. When I was a kid, Stipe was my favorite member. These days it’s Buck by a mile.

7. Shearwater, Rook
Gorgeous, sprawling art rock, songs about birds that are really songs about all of us. I didn’t fully appreciate this band until this record — it was the first time, for me, they came into their own, creating something unapologetically ambitious. Every time I hear this, I think of Tilt-era Scott Walker (a record that sounds a lot more straightforward now than it did when it was released). I have probably played this record’s title track somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 times.

6. TV on the Radio, Dear Science
TVOTR’s artier impulses have left me cold in the past, but this record was a mindblower, a dazzling fusion of soul and pop. It’s the art rock record Prince would make, if Prince ever decided to make an art rock record. But even though much ink has been spilled over how accessible this record is, it still is powered by a pounding heart of darkness. TV on the Radio have met the enemy, and he is us.

5. Frightened Rabbit, The Midnight Organ Fight
I’m convinced that anyone who really gets into this record does so for the lyrics, not the music. A harrowing portrait of romantic obsession, The Midnight Organ Fight slices the skin and readies the salt over and over and over again. It’s a bracing, difficult listen, instantly gripping and frighteningly relatable.

4. The Roots, Rising Down
Here’s where I get mad. So, look. Lil Wayne. He’s fine, right? He’s a clever lyricist. The Carter III was a terrifically rewarding record. But how in the world it is outpacing Rising Down on every critics’ poll is a mystery to me. (Actually, no, it’s not a mystery to me at all, I just don’t want to get all cynical and nasty). And if you wanna get into it with me in the comments section, I am ready to chuck the gloves off and go. To me, the Roots are one of the most inventive and visionary bands in popular music. Period. Their fascination with the possibilities of sound is second only to Radiohead. The jag they’ve been on for the last few years has been absolutely riveting, each record a little darker and a little more paranoid than the one that came before. You don’t just listen to songs on Rising Down — you listen to the whole thing, start to finish. I already said my piece about this record here, so I’m not going to belabor it. All I’ll say is this: for the last six years, the Roots have been finding new and breathtaking ways to re-write There’s a Riot Goin’ On. This might be their best work yet.

3. Headlights, Some Racing, Some Stopping
No one at eMusic loves this band as much as I do — except maybe Amishi — and I’ve learned to accept that. I played the hell out of this record in 2008, from start to finish, over and over. It’s not any kind of grand pop reinvention, it’s just full of sturdy, memorable pop songs that retain their charm by the five-hundredth play. It also feels like an album — the first song starts small and goes huge, and every subsequent song seems to build and build and build. One of my favorite live bands currently working, Headlights are all spirit and fire.

2. Portishead, Third
Yancey and I were talking the other day about how everyone seems to have forgotten this record came out. I can’t imagine how — it’s a straight-up fever dream, a whole huge nightmare of sound that smashes to pieces the old Portishead aesthetic and replaces it with lurching, Munchian grotesques. Beth Gibbons’ voice has never sounded more chilling, and she howls against the stark, percussive backdrop like a ghost writhing her way through a combine. Utterly riveting and fascinating, Third is the long, dark night of the soul.

1. Erykah Badu, New AmErykah Pt. 1: 4th World War
Absolutely perfect. Not a note on this sounds forced or accidental — from the limber, opening groove of “AmErykahn Promise” the straight neo-soul closer “Honey,” New AmErykah works like a complete statement, a heady, hazy stumble through fucked-up 2008 America. Badu’s voice is languid and mysterious, and the way she winds it across the reggae groove of “The Healer” is still startling months after its release. No album summed up 2008 for me better than this one. How perfect that the ‘promise’ the record implied arrived — fully and finally — this past November.

For perhaps the first time in a long time, I didn’t really obsess over compiling my year-end Top 20 this year. There are a number of reasons for this — I felt like most of my choices were pretty well-represented by the eMusic list, and I felt like every other year-end albums poll was declining in significance (both personally and globally).

Old habits die hard, though, and I ended up throwing together a Top 20 at the last minute just to satisfy myself, and to tie up my 2008 listening habits with a tidy little bow. I don’t think I need too much more preamble — below the cut is the first half of my Top 20 Albums of 2008

20. Taylor Swift, Fearless
So to cut right to the chase: I love mainstream pop music as much as I love independent music. I’ve always had kind of restless tastes, and I don’t see much need to rule out certain albums just because they were produced under the aegis of corporate rock. I get as frustrated with knee-jerk “all pop sucks!” declarations as I do with the noodle-headed trolls who plague our message boards around this time every year. Music is music, and I don’t see any reason why a person can’t like Okkervil River and Gorgoroth and Rihanna and Barrington Levy and Unrest. There is perhaps no greater irritant to the eMusic community than Taylor Swift; day in and day out her debut sits atop our charts, elbowing aside other indie albums that are perhaps a bit better and generally misrepresenting our catalog to people who happen to stumble in unawares. Here’s the thing about Taylor Swift, though: she’s a fucking great pop songwriter. The songs on Fearless go straight for the heart, capturing all the nervousness and vulnerability of adolescence, summoning effortlessly those feelings of first love and first heartbreak. That her knack for a hook and startlingly nimble prose gets consistently dismissed is a bit frustrating. To put it another way: it’s awfully easy to dismiss something as “just a pop record” when you’ve never tried to write one yourself.

19. Panic at the Disco, Pretty, Odd
I would argue that there is a whole lot on this record that eMusic regulars would love. Far from the theater-dork emo that characterized their debut, Pretty, Odd gets its marching orders from Sgt. Pepper. It’s a brash, bright psych-pop masterpiece, as intricate and nuanced as anything by the Elephant 6 collective with bigger hooks and brainier lyrics.

18. Al Green, Lay It Down
The Al Green comeback record people have been promising for the last few years finally arrives. Sweet, subtle, soulful and masterfully controlled, Lay It Down sounds like some late-game sequel to Al’s timeless Belle Album. I have played the title track for countless people, all of whom initially refuse to believe it’s not some lost B-Side from the ’70s. Green’s voice is as heavenly as ever, and the songs here burrow deep into the heart. A treasure.

17. Sam Phillips, Don’t Do Anything
I’ve been arguing that Sam Phillips has been unjustly underrated for years now. This is another haunting collection of folk songs, delivered in Phillips’ inimitable Goth drawl. It’s like Kristin Hersh, only darker. Mostly a protracted rumination on her divorce from T-Bone Burnett, Phillips dives down deep into the black water and doesn’t come up for air once.

16. The Foreign Exchange, Leave it All Behind
I kept waiting for this record to catch on at eMusic, and it never happened. D’Angelo-style neo-soul boasting surprisingly fluid and flexible vocals by Little Brother’s Phonte. This is pure midnight love, the kind of record you put on when you have a long night of, ahem, business ahead of you. It works just fine in the daytime, too. It’s not so much a collection of songs as it is one protracted groove.

15. Rotten Sound, Cycles
Finnish death metal done right. This is my white-knuckle terror pick of ‘08, 70-second songs that hammer and hammer and hammer and then stop short. A few years ago, there was a Weekly World News story about a bunch of scientists in Alaska who were trying to record the sound of the earth’s core when they drilled too deep and, according to the esteemed Weekly World News, ended up recording Hell. This record is what I’d imagine that tape sounds like.

14. <3 Svanvhit!, Parti a Island
If someone, somehow could get <3 Svanvhit! (pronounced 'Mee-na ah Three Svan-Queet', and meaning "less than three white swans") to SXSW, they would be next year's can't miss indie-rock sweethearts. To see this band live is to fall in love with them — they are wound up, rambunctious Icelandic teenagers, and their live set is absolute energy. I have seen them transform whole rooms in Reykjavik, and watched waves of joy crash over crossed-arm cynics. They are a force of nature, one of the best bands I've seen live in the last 5 years. It is agonizing — agonizing! — that they are never going to get the attention they deserve. Their debut, Parti a Island, for now only available as a CD-R with a hand-crafted cardboard sleeve, goes far to capture that exuberance. Cockeyed pop that recalls Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, <3 Svanhvit! are the remedy that po-faced indie rock so desperately needs. Someone, please, sign this band.

13. Okkervil River, The Stand-Ins
I said my piece about this record in my eMusic review, so I probably don’t need to go on much further. I came around on this band recently, thanks to some impassioned electioneering by Maris, and am sad I waited so long to discover them. Will Sheff is a cunning lyricist, and his prose is scalpel-sharp. For me, The Stand-Ins handily bests its predecessor, but I think I am alone in that camp.

12. Breathe Owl Breathe, Ghost Glacier
I love these songs — pure, childlike, stirring and deeply, deeply moving. Anyone who does not get goosebumps from “Playing Dead” should check for a pulse

11. Black Mountain, In the Future
I know a lot of people cooled on this record, but to me this is blacklight rock at its best, humid as pot clouds and laid-back as a high school burnout. Since I was a dork in high school, I am living vicariously through this record. Real burnouts would probably hear this and laugh. And then knock my books out of my hand and punch me in the stomach.

10. Gaslight Anthem, The 59 Sound
The debate rages in the user reviews about whether or not we are all on dope for picking this as our number one. My response to those accusations goes like this: “Miles Davis & the Cool.”

The Users’ Poll countdown continues!

First, I just wanted to say that rifling through the comments so many users included with their polls was awesome and enlightening. Picking comments like this one (about Spiritualized):

“I saw them live at ACL and rocked out literally so hard I threw up my hands during their last song and said ‘Sorry I can’t take it anymore.’ The set ended with me hugging a guy I didn’t even know who had blue flames coming out of his head (note: no drugs were involved)”

…out of an Excel spreadsheet was definitely one of the best ways I could think of to spend my day. Reading these uncommonly interesting/funny/insightful comments made me feel good all over again about the community we have here and made me realize AGAIN how unique it us…for edifying comparison, go to any music blog, click to read the “Comments” section, and then, while reading, try not to feel your faith in humanity draining away. Anyway. Go us. The full Users’ Poll list (as of now) is up here, by the way.

So here are the latest batch of albums:

59. Atlas Sound – Let The Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel
58. Destroyer – Trouble In Dreams
57. Fuck Buttons – Street Horrsing
56. Deastro – Keepers’
55. Marnie Stern – I Should Really Have Let My Label Reps Talk Me Into A Different Title…..
54. The Weepies – Hideaway
53. Horse Feathers – House With No Home
52. Army Navy – Army Navy
51. Pete and the Pirates – Little Death
50. The Cool Kids – The Bake Sale
49. Old Crow Medicine Show – Tennessee Pusher
48. Ratatat – LP3
47. Nine Inch Nails – The Slip
46. The Rural Alberta Advantage – Hometowns
45. Mates of State – Re-Arrange Us
44. Fucked Up – The Chemistry of Common Life
43. Damien Jurado – Caught In The Trees
42. The Avett Brothers – The Second Gleam EP
41. Marching Band – Spark Large
40. Ladytron – Velocifero

Couple of thoughts/reactions:

YEA DEASTRO! So great to see this on here; we’re all super-proud of him and that record really is something special. Also, the RAA, yay! In general, a really eclectic bunch of records this time around, with some hip-hop poking its head through (maybe more rappers just need to rhyme about eating Fruity Pebbles?); the new Nine Inch Nails, which I know makes Joe happy; that Fucked-Up record, which I have heard only through the cubicle wall, but which is steadily inching up my list of Things To Do; the Army Navy, which is just straight mid-’90s power pop revivalist stuff, a great pop-rock record; and PETE AND THE PIRATES!

Stay tuned tomorrow for the next batch: what will we see? Without giving anything away, I’ll just say that things stay interesting right up to the end.

As a flurry of music best-of lists are slowly unveiled on eMusic throughout December, I figured I’d throw my book picks at you today in one swoop. You can find the complete list of 21 titles here.

It seems that my philosophy about what makes for a good audiobook has changed over the course of the past year (2008 was the first full year that audiobooks have been available on eMusic). At first I thought that the number one goal of an audiobook should be to make your commute or your road trip or your workout feel a little bit shorter. Books that you listen to, much more so than books that you read, should provide a distraction, an escape, good times. And there are a whole bunch of books on this list that totally deliver in that regard–behold the comic dexterity of stalwart writer/narrators Sedaris and Vowell, the lose-yourself-in-the-action momentum of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the foulmouthed glee of Chelsea Handler. These are the kinds of books that are made for the audio format.

At the same time, I found myself delving into heavier topics, and I was surprised by how immersed (entertained!) I could become in supposedly more “difficult” books–ones I’d usually prefer to read on the page. I was blown away by Uwem Akpan’s visceral evocation of life in the poorest of African villages in his debut story collection, Say You’re One of Them. MacArthur Genius Alex Ross’s The Rest Is Noise opened my eyes and ears to classical music from the past century with eloquence, grace and enthusiasm–I have lots of downloading to do! And NY Times war reporter Dexter Filkins managed to make the War on Terror feel more immediate, more urgent, more personal than any other account of the crisis in the Middle East I have ever read before. I chose the abridged edition of The Forever War as my favorite audiobook of the year, mostly because this version is read by the author and therefore feels even more intimate. It’s truly a must-listen.

21 Rock On by Dan Kennedy
20 The Portable Atheist by Christopher Hitchens
19 Buyology by Martin Lindstrom
18 The Bin Ladens by Steve Coll
17 Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler
16 The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie
15 The Thing About Life Is One Day You’ll Be Dead by David Shields
14 Acedia and Me by Kathleen Norris
13 The Snowball by Alice Schroeder
12 Our Story Begins by Tobias Wolff
11 A Wolf at the Table by Augusten Burroughs
10 When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris
9 In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan
8 Physics of the Impossible by Michio Kaku
7 Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt
6 The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell
5 Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan
4 McSweeney’s Field Recordings, Vol. 2
3 The Rest Is Noise by Alex Ross
2 The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
1 The Forever War by Dexter Filkins

Today we begin unveiling the user poll results, and here’s our first batch of records:

100 Grouper, Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill
99 Port O’Brien, All We Could Do Was Sing
98 Jason Collett, Here’s to Being Here
97 The Whigs, Mission Control
96 Passion Pit, Chunk of Change EP
95 Stereolab, Chemical Chords
94 Lambchop, OH (ohio)
93 The Last Shadow Puppets, The Age of the Understatement
92 Mount Eerie, Lost Wisdom
91 Flogging Molly, Float
90 TOBACCO, Fucked Up
89 Burial, Unture
88 Tift Merritt, Another Country
87 James Taylor, Covers
86 Eli “Paperboy” Reed, The True Loves Roll With You
85 Vivian Girls, Vivian Girls
84 Yeasayer, All Hour Cymbals
83 My Brightest Diamond, A Thousand Shark’s Teeth
82 Gang Gang Dance, Saint Dymphna
81 The Stills, Oceans Will Rise
80 Eagles of Death Metal, Heart On

Some notes: more than 10,000 ballots were filed. By far the biggest response we’ve ever had. Everyone was asked to vote for ten albums, and we ranked those in creating those lists: a first place vote was worth ten points, a second place vote worth nine points, etc. From there you get the ranking that you see above.

On the hub page, there are comments about each album. These came from the poll results, and there are some really great one-liners in there. One goof on our part, though, was that we didn’t ask for people’s names, so none of these are credited. If you get quoted by us, be sure to point it out!

There’s not a lot of crossover so far — glad to see Grouper make your list though! — but I think we’ll see more as we go on. Finally, there will be specific Top 20 lists for the UK, EU and Canada going up next week, too.