Right you are, I think I've worked out my ten albums of the year. The process has been a fairly tortuous one, I started out with all the CDs I've aquired over the year; anything not released in 2002 was discounted, as we're some fairly obvious reissues and compilations (Sonic Youth's Dirty special edition and the Bad Brains compilation were particularly painful to discard), which left me with about 40 CDs. From these I've chosen the ones I consider to be the most complete works, all killer and no filler! So, without further delay, here they are (in no particular order):



Broken Social Scene

You Forgot it in People

This one came out of nowhere, a Canadian collective releases possibly one of the strongest indie pop albums ever. Stars and Sons has one of the greatest bass lines I've ever heard and the way it kind of restarts about half way through can only be described as joyous; Cause = Time could be a lost Dinosaur Jr classic. The other songs aren't too shabby either!



The Bug

Pressure

I was nervous about this one, Kevin Martin - one half of the mighty Techno Animal - doing a ragga album? Not the sort of music I'm familiar with really. Thankfully he pulled it off, injecting just the right amount of fear and dread without losing the 'riddim', aided and abetted by some heavy weight vocal courtesy of the likes of Toastie Taylor and Daddy Freddy.



Kid606

Kill Sound Before Sound Kills You

Fuck it! I'm a fan. Admittedly it's not perfect, but I think it's as close as you can get to compiling all of his diverse styles onto one disc. Full on dance floor fillers, ruff'n'ready digital ragga, chilled out reflective moments, and some good old fashioned noise. There's more musical ideas on this one disc than most artists come up with over there whole careers.



Four Tet

Rounds

At the time, I believe this was descibed as folktronica. Crap descriptions aside, this was one of the most complete albums I've heard this year working better as a whole rather than it's individual parts.



Hymie's Basement

Hymie's Basement

Another surprise. Andrew Broder otherwise known as Fog, and Jonathan Wolf otherwise known as Why?, both from the Anticon collective, each released mighty fine solo albums this year - but I thought this collaboration between the pair of them was slightly better than each solo effort. Difficult to descibe, it seems to have been recorded really quickly - everything sounds like it's been barely rehearsed, lyrics made up on the spot... it's released on Warp's hip hop label, but it isn't hip-hop - it's basically a really good pop album.



Prefuse 73

Extinguished: Outtakes

In theory this should not be better than the album which provides all the material, but some how it is. Prefuse 73 normally makes music by cutting up other peoples music, here he cut's his own up to create an amazingly intricate musical collage. It's helped by it's brevity, I just really liked it - everything about it sounds and feels right.



Black Eyes

Black Eyes

Re-inventing Washington D.C. hardcore sound by using two drummers, two vocalists and two bass players. Rythmn and space are the main draws, helped by some amazing guitar playing - I loved the way that the guitarist uses his screaming as almost an extra element to the noise coming out of his guitar, sometimes it's hard to tell where the screaming ends and the wailing on his axe begins (sorry about that, that was almost a terrible pun - but somehow worse)



The Twilight Singers

Blackberry Belle

Like on old pair of shoes, this just fit's so well. Greg Dulli returns with what sounds like a lost Afghan Whigs album in places, more soul than most groups have in there collective little fingers. Top stuff, extra marks for the collaboration with Mark Lanegan, which is one of the finest country influenced blues jam you'll ever here.



Themselves

Live

This year has been the one where I discovered the Anticon crew, they seem to produce Hip-Hop so left of centre half of the time it's not even hip-hop. This is almost traditional, in that there are beats, and there is rapping but not like you've ever heard. Apparently the beats are programmed live (god knows how!), and some of Dose-Ones' vocal gymnastics defy belief. Even though most of the songs have already appeared on last year's The No-Music there's a sufficient twist to get this release into my list.



Mogwai

Happy Songs for Happy People

Seeing Mogwai live at Glastonbury was one of my defining musical moments. I'll alway's remember standing in a field as the sunshine came out to dry us all off from the morning rain watching stunned as they gave the crowd absolutely no mercy and plowed through there 'difficult' tribute to a jewish prayer, My Father, My King. I think this album is the finest they've recorded, consistantly appealing, downright beautiful in places.



...anyway there you go, it will be interesting to see how many of these appear in other websites albums of the year. I'll be paying particular attention to tomorrows list on Pitchfork.