050. Danny Brown – Atrocity Exhibition (Warp) (2016)

The title is apt for what is possibly one of the most demented hip-hop albums in recent memory. Atrocity Exhibition at times feels like an odd subversion to the typical tales of drug and excess and braggadocio that frequent hip-hop. It’s a boastful display of all of the above, yet also pushes it to such shocking extremes that it starts to read like a truly desperate cry for help, screeching in Danny Brown’s signature howl over the intense, blaring instrumental. At other times, Brown takes a step back, pitches his voice an octave lower, and takes a genuinely self-reflective look at the situations that got him where he is today. At both times, the album keeps you on your toes. (EW) (LISTEN)

049. LCD Soundsystem – This Is Happening (DFA / Virgin / Parlophone) (2010)

James Murphy, as frontman of LCD Soundsystem and founder of the ultra-hip DFA imprint, did so much to define the Noughties, and announced that he would call it quits with the group’s third album. As if to confirm that there really would be no encores, it was bluntly titled This Is Happening. He and his band would easily have been forgiven for making it a perfunctory victory lap of an album, but – the delicious bastards – they turned in a final, tantalising reminder of their total brilliance. From the creeping beat of ‘Somebody’s Calling Me’, the slow-burning ‘Dance Yrself Clean’ and ‘I Can Change’ to the tottering ‘Drunk Girls’, it was full to the brim with career highlights. An epic farewell show at Madison Square Garden followed roughly a year after its release, and it was all over. Very nearly, but not quite, as perfect as 2007’s Sound Of Silver – but then again, very few things are. It was a fitting epitaph to one of the greatest bands of the last 25 years – or so we thought… (LISTEN)

048. Angel Olsen – My Woman (Jagjaguwar) (2016)

With the release of her third album My Woman, Angel Olsen shook off the ‘sad girl’ title for good and released an album so delightful that it surprised and pleased both the mainstream and her die-hard fans. Being one of the most brilliant women of the indie-folk scene already with such gems like Burn Your Fire For No Witness, it was only a matter of time before Olsen pulled a 180 and release something unexpected and ‘pop’. Employing a full band set-up, My Woman presented a new iteration of Olsen as a songwriter – same intricacy and attention to the word, sharp and purposeful, but with an added layer of world building of this character navigating the nuance of love within technicolour haze, totally immersive and singular. Olsen’s voice seemed to state its truth with even more confidence than before, a presence of timelessness, with an even heavier sense of yearning and reconciliation with heartbreak. (AS) (LISTEN)

047. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Push The Sky Away (Bad Seed Ltd.) (2013)

Push The Sky Away represented a pretty significant shift in Nick Cave’s career – it was the first album he had made without Mick Harvey, his longest and closest collaborator going all the way back to the formation of The Boys Next Door in the mid-‘70s. But what’s so astonishing about it is The Bad Seeds’ consistent ability to create drama from such a limited range. Rather than see Harvey’s departure as a loss, they fearlessly explore the possibility of life without him. Welcoming back Barry Adamson to the line-up for the first time since 1986, it’s easily the sparsest and most restrained album in their catalogue, even taking into account No More Shall We Part and The Boatman’s Call, but despite the stripped-down, spectral nature the band still packs a hefty emotional punch to go with Cave’s brooding, ruminative lyrics. Check out the menacing, skeletal bass on ‘Water’s Edge’, or the spidery instrumentation on ‘We No Who U R’ or the faintest vibrating of organs on the sepulchral title track which closes the album. Nobody could possibly argue against the sheer beauty, majesty, and downright dignity of it. (LISTEN)

046. Two Door Cinema Club – Tourist History (Kitsuné) (2010)

There’s been barely anything as life-affirmingly, air-punchingly fun as Tourist History released in the decade since its release. Clocking in at just over half an hour, Two Door Cinema Club announced their arrival with one of the sharpest, catchiest collections that indie music has ever known, demonstrating that commercial appeal doesn’t necessitate a lapse in ethics. They mixed the angularity and intelligence of prime Bloc Party with a simple pop sensibility and bold, shiny production. This gave the likes of ‘Undercover Martyn’ and ‘What You Know’ an almost hypnotic quality, ruthless pop missiles aimed directly at the dancefloor. Alex Trimble’s shy, almost twee attitude behind the mic and crystal-clear singing voice on the likes of ‘Do You Want It All?’ was a refreshing change from swaggering laddism that was defining most of the lumpen British indie at the time, and it instantly won over the hearts and minds of every indie kid in the land. Tourist History made them massive, remaining in the public consciousness for years (it achieved its UK chart peak position of #24 sixty-two weeks after its release), and they maintained their impressive form with follow-up Beacon in 2012. (LISTEN)

045. Kendrick Lamar – DAMN. (Top Dawg / Aftermath / Interscope) (2017)

After the introspective and thoughtful good kid, m.A.A.d. city in 2012 and then 2015’s jazz and funk-influenced To Pimp A Butterfly, an ambitious and ferocious masterpiece of provocation, the kind of expectations projected onto Kendrick Lamar’s fourth album made for the kind of pressure that very few artists ever experience. DAMN. was created against a backdrop of escalating police violence and the prospect of the Trump White House. More direct and righteous than anything he had created before, Kendrick met commercial rap radio head-on while inhabiting his new persona of Kung Fu Kenny. Assembling a stellar cast of producers, visual artists and musical collaborators – ranging from Rihanna on the extremely accessible ‘LOYALTY.’ to U2 on ‘XXX.’, the tracks were fizzing with invention and passion but felt more concentrated than the artful abstractions of its predecessor. (LISTEN)

044. Flying Lotus – You’re Dead! (Warp) (2014)

A couple of minutes in, you just got the feeling Steven Ellison had been building up to this his whole life. As brilliant as Cosmogramma was, it didn’t quite have the all-encompassing theme of this one. I mean, you can’t get more serious than death itself, right? But as well as being surprisingly playful, You’re Dead! (note the exclamation point) seemed to break out of the language of pop music altogether, and into the territory of free jazz. Licks of fusion guitar, blindingly fast jazz breaks, scattershot rapping, the extraordinary guest spots… …there’s absolutely no point in trying to communicate every joyous instant on this album. What’s so extraordinary is that, by cleverly assembling the hundreds of micro-samples and audio snippets into such a bewildering kaleidoscope of an album, Ellison manages to communicate so much to us about ourselves, about the nature and meaning of life, death and beyond, without actually saying much at all. Out of the chaos looms a singular message – the end of life is nothing to be afraid of. You’re Dead! is the sort of career-defining moment artists usually dine out on forever. (LISTEN)

043. HAIM – Days Are Gone (Polydor) (2013)

Days Are Gone was American sister trio HAIM’s debut record, arriving after the kind of hype that destroys many a young band. Fronted by quality singles such as ‘Don’t Save Me’, ‘The Wire’ and ‘Forever’, the album is a blend of ‘70s and ‘80s soft rock with a twist of ‘90s R&B, showing that accessibility needn’t be exclusive from critical acceptance. Produced by the ultra-hip duo of James Ford and Ariel Rechtshaid, Days Are Gone had a classic contemporary pop-rock feel that felt so effortless that you wonder why others struggle so much. The most obvious style references are Stevie Nicks-era Fleetwood Mac with elaborate ‘80s influenced drum patterns and layered vocals. Many unsure music journalists called HAIM a cross between Fleetwood Mac, Phil Collins and Shania Twain – in fairness, the comparison was about right! Following the album’s release the trio thrived off a busy festival period in 2014 and featured on Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage. They may be at their best in a live environment in which they take a heavier guitar approach, but this was sacrificed for a lightness of touch on the record that made it the accessible unit shifter that it was. (LISTEN)

042. Kaytranada – 99.9% (XL / HW&W) (2016)

While it took him an aeon to complete – his perfectionism is referenced in the very title 99.9% – Canadian producer Louis Kevin Celestin delivered a genre-defying stew of funk, soul, R&B and dance music for his first full-length statement. Roping in collaborators as diverse as Little Dragon, Anderson .Paak, BadBadNotGood and even revived British R&B megastar Craig David, the resulting record could have sounded completely disjointed, but it’s down to Celestin’s background as a DJ that all 15 tracks sound of a piece. Nothing sounds like it’s been shoved arbitrarily together, and all the progressions, such as between the likes of ‘Despite The Weather’, a dreamy instrumental, and ‘Glowed Up’, one of the album’s many headlining-grabbing guest hook-ups, sound totally natural. The world eagerly awaits Kaytranada’s next step, but 99.9% has indelibly left its mark on a generation who are hungry for sonic diversity. (LISTEN)

041. Courtney Barnett – Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit (Marathon / Milk! / Mom + Pop) (2015)

Before Courtney Barnett’s musical friendship with Kurt Vile took public form with all its bluesy bro-isms and allowed her to access a new audience, there was her debut album Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit. Feverous yet laid back, rough but simply brilliant, it had none of the pretension of the rock canon and all the chill one would expect from a modern Australian guitar record. With Barnett’s circuitous and narrative lyrics going off about peculiar stories of the everyday (including asthma, a 20-something sacking off work to hang out on the roof, moving in with your girlfriend into a cul-de-sac whilst owning a percolator to save money on take out lattes) the songs are at times confusing, most times humorous and always endearing. Barnett sounds confident, her deadpan delivery perfectly fitting, most of the tracks housing a certain sauntering quality. Gone are the typical topics of most guitar records of today – there’s no over-the-top teenage angst leftover from an infinite adolescence (though thematically it can be found, it just doesn’t come off as passé)  or meek attempts to be political just for the sake of it. It’s an engrossing and entertaining listen, a gift of indie-rock that’s far away from being a drag. (AS) (LISTEN)