chris's albums of the aughts

I am a big fan of lists, music, and periods of time, the confluence of which is my top 10 albums of the aughts list.

10 Sufjan Stevens - Illinois. He didn't make much progress on the 50 state/album effort, but it was good while it lasted.

9 Radiohead - Kid A. The oldest album on the list. It opened me up to music I would have never before considered.

8 Eddie Vedder - Into the Wild. Huge bias with anything Pearl Jam-related, but there is nothing better coming through your headphones on the subway trip home from work Friday night.

7 Radiohead - In Rainbows. No five star songs, but everything might be four stars.

6 Wilco - A Ghost Is Born. Tough to beat an album with the title track, Spiders, Handshake Drugs, Theologians, and the Late Greats.

5 Arcade Fire - Funeral. Few other albums have four songs as good as Neighborhood #1, Neighborhood #3, Wake Up, and Rebellion.

4 Spoon - Gimme Fiction. The album that got me into Spoon, who may have released more quality albums in the decade than anyone else.

3 White Stripes - Elephant. Jack White might be the genius of his time, and I like watching Meg play drums. This and the next two on the list are the only three albums in which everything on it is great.

2 The Strokes - Is This It. The album is like a nice compact package. It changed my outlook on a lot of things and they were the first band Lelaine and I saw together. I prefer the UK version, which includes New York City Cops and is much less polished, in a very good way.

1 Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. "Buy this brilliant fucking record." That is the description of the album an employee named Werner wrote in the staff recommendations section of the now defunct Olsen's in Dupont. It has been nearly eight years, but I couldn't agree more with a store employee I never met. Along with both Radiohead records on the list, you can tell how much time went into composing the album. And the story behind its release exemplifies the problems in the record industry.

Honorable mention, in no particular order, goes to The Whigs - Mission Control, Beck - Guero, Kings of Leon - Youth and Young Manhood, Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion, Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand, Black Keys - thickfreakness, Interpol - Turn on the Bright Lights, The Killers - Hot Fuss, The National - Boxer, Okkervil River - Stage Names, Snow Patrol - Final Straw, Block Party - Silent Alarm, and Pearl Jam - Backspacer.