A Round of Sound

To start off this year, I wanted to take a quick moment to talk about exactly what this list is. You’ll notice I call this, and always have, my “Top Albums” of the year, not my “favorite” or “best” albums. This is done intentionally, as I find it a very important distinction. Calling something “the best” is very hard to do, especially when it comes to something as subjective as music, and even moreso when there’s so much of it out there. However, I do think there are characteristics that can place a song or album ahead of others in an objective manner, such as songwriting, musicianship and innovation.  On the flip side, calling something “favorite” is pretty much subjective, and comes across as more of an enjoyment factor while perhaps ignoring aspects of an album that make it a more artistic achievement. So my list has always been a hybrid of the two, and calling it “Top Albums” is the best I could come up with. I’m not necessarily telling you the albums I enjoyed the most in 2013, just as I’m not telling you the albums that were critically thought of as the best releases of the year. Rather, this is a look at the albums I came across in 2013, that I enjoyed immensely which also have value in ways that should set them above others as a fantastic works of art. I suppose that’s my intro for this year’s list, so let’s get to it.

This past year I purchased, in some form, 84 albums…all of which are eligible. I do not include EPs, Reissues, Soundtracks, Live Albums, Holiday Albums, or B-Side/Rarity type releases as albums eligible for my list, but this year I don’t have any of those. As always, there’s plenty of albums that I never got around to procuring, so yes, there’s going to be very worthy albums that don’t make my list. So if you have a question as to why your favorite album isn’t on my list, well it’s because I either didn’t get it, or just plain didn’t care for it as much as you…simple as that. After the jump, you can see the list of all albums I purchased, in order of release date. Also, over to the right, you can see the schedule over the next few days as I continue the countdown.

Yo La Tengo – Fade

Free Energy – Love Sign

Christopher Owens – Lysandre

Parquet Courts – Light Up Gold

Foxygen – We Are The 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace and Magic

Tegan and Sara – Heartthrob

Local Natives – Hummingbird

Frightened Rabbit – Pedestrian Verse

My Bloody Valentine – mbv

Jim James – Region of Light and Sound of God

Autre Ne Veut – Anxiety

The Men – New Moon

Youth Lagoon – Wondrous Bughouse

Waxahatchee – Cerulean Salt

Rhye – Woman

Phosphorescent – Muchacho

Justin Timberlake – The 20/20 Experience (Part 1)

The Strokes – Comedown Machine

The Besnard Lakes – Until in Excess, Imperceptible UFO

Brown Bird – Fits of Reason

Kurt Vile – Wakin On A Pretty Daze

James Blake – Overgrown

The Knife – Shaking the Habitual

The Flaming Lips – The Terror

Iron & Wine – Ghost on Ghost

Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Mosquito

The Thermals – Desperate Ground

The Appleseed Cast – Illumination Ritual

Junip – Junip

Phoenix – Bankrupt!

Akron/Family – Sub Verses

Savages – Silence Yourself

Deerhunter – Monomania

She & Him – Volume 3

Vampire Weekend – Modern Vampires of the City

The National – Trouble Will Find Me

Daft Punk – Random Access Memories

Deafheaven – Sunbather

Laura Marling – Once I Was An Eagle

Queens of the Stone Age – …Like Clockwork

Camera Obscura – Desire Lines

Disclosure – Settle

Surfer Blood – Pythons

Boards of Canada – Tomorrow’s Harvest

These New Puritans – Fields of Reeds

Sigur Rós – Kveikur

Kanye West – Yeezus

The World is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die – Whenever, If Ever

Lightning Dust – Fantasy

Smith Westerns – Soft Will

The Love Language – Ruby Red

Earl Sweatshirt – Doris

Washed Out – Paracosm

Travis – Where You Stand

Laura Veirs – Warp and Weft

Diarrhea Planet- I’m Rich Beyond Your Wildest Dreams

The Dodos – Carrier

Volcano Choir – Repave

Neko Case – The Worse Things Get, The Harder I Fight, The Harder I Fight, The More I Love You

Califone – Stitches

Okkervil River – The Silver Gymnasium

Nine Inch Nails – Hesitation Marks

Joanna Gruesome – Weird Sister

Chvrches – The Bones of What You Believe

Drake – Nothing Was The Same

Touché Amoré – Is Survived By

Into It. Over It. – Intersections

Crash of Rhinos – Knots

Au Revoir Simone – Move in Spectrums

Lorde – Pure Heroine

Haim – Days Are Gone

The Field – Cupid’s Head

Justin Timberlake – The 20/20 Experience (Part 2)

Yuck – Glow and Behold

Of Montreal – Lousy With Sylvianbriar

Sleigh Bells – Bitter Rivals

Cults – Static

The Avett Brothers – Magpie and the Dandelion

Arcade Fire – Reflektor

Islands – Ski Mask

Los Campesinos! – No Blues

Maria Taylor – Something About Knowing

Cut Copy – Free Your Mind

Blood Orange – Cupid Deluxe

This entry was posted on Monday, January 13th, 2014 at 1:20 pm and is filed under All, Music, Top Albums of 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.