Maximo Mark End of Year 2010! *complete*

[Maximo Mark]

10 Codeine Velvet Club 'Codeine Velvet Club'



As soon as I heard something from these they reminded me of the Last Shadow Puppets. Fratellis frontman Jon Fratelli creates a new, retro inspired band with solo artist Lou Hickey. I would quite happily have never heard anything involving Jon Fratelli again after the massive disappointment of 2008's 'Here We Stand', but this came as a very pleasant surprise. It's extremely pleasant and very easy to listen to, with changing tempos making the album interesting and it has some sing a long anthems on. In 'Hollywood' it has one of the years best singles and even their cover of 'I am the Resurrection' is far from being a disgrace.

'Little Sister'


'The Black Roses'

[Maximo Mark]

09 Vampire Weekend 'Contra'


It's never going to be easy following up one of the greatest debut albums in recent years, and a disappointment could always have been a decent possibility. But whilst this isn't as strong as their self titled debut, it's still a very good and consistant album. They developed their sound enough to make it sound fresh, but it's still the same distinctive sound that made 'Vampire Weekend' so good.

'California English'


'Horchata'

[Maximo Mark]

08 LCD Soundsystem 'This is Happening'


This album may not be as incredible as I thought it was when I first got it, or a patch on his previous 'Sound of Silver' but that doesn't detract from this still being a great album. Lead single 'Drunk Girls' didn't exactly raise hopes for the album but luckilly it's by far the worst song on here and the only song you could possibly ever describe as being poor. On 'You Wanted a Hit" he opens with "You wanted a hit, but maybe we don't so hits" and being over two minutes shorter 'Drunk Girls' shows that. The rest of the album however, is what he does best, long and epic, nothing moreso than 'Dance Yrself Clean' which is possibly the greatest thing I've heard all year.

'Dance Yrself Clean'


'All I Want'

[Maximo Mark]

07 Plan B 'The Defamation of Strickland Banks'


Unlike many, I knew and quite liked Plan B when his debut came out in 2006. For a rapper he was very refreshing, so it came as a bit if a surprise the direction he's taken with the follow up album. It's much more soulful and tells a story of a man being sent to prison, which is shown in the videos for the singles he's released so far too. 'Love Goes Down' is a beautiful love song, 'She Said' one of the best mainstream singles and desvering success stories of the year and 'The Writings on the Wall' show off his incredible soulful singing voice. I'd always quite liked this but this has been pretty much the soundtrack to my uni life in the past three months, and it's made me appreciate it so much more.

'The Writing's On The Wall'


'Welcome to Hell'

[Maximo Mark]

06 The Golden Filter 'Voluspa'


I heard the single 'Solid Gold' early last year and then it all seemed to go a bit quiet as I never heard anything about these until the album was then released at the end of April. 'Solid Gold' was good enough but nothing particularly special, so this album was a very good surprise. It's impressive throughout, and very varied for an electronic album.

'Dance Around the Fire'


'Stardust'

[Maximo Mark]

05 Foals 'Total Life Forever'


Foals seemed to have a lot of momentum in late 2007 / early 2008, then they released their debut album and it was a decent album, if slightly disappointingand featured neither of their two best songs. This, their second album, is so much better. I never thought they'd ever make songs as beautiful as 'Spanish Sahara'. 'Blue Blood' is an amazing opener and you can tell from that track it's going to be a fantastic album, 'Black Gold' and the title track are pretty special too. It reminds me in a way of The Horros album 'Primary Colours' from last year, it doesn't sound dis-similar and it's a much better album than I ever thought they could produce.

'Black Gold'


'Total Life Forever'

[Maximo Mark]

04 Robyn 'Body Talk'


This almost pains me that I only put this at four. I was convinced after 'Part 2' that this would end up as my favourite album of the year, but I really don't think the new songs for the final part are as good as the ones on their predecessors. There's also not the greatest amount of variation and I think that's shown in the singles. Individually I think they're all great but really 'Hang With Me' is a less good version of 'Dancing on My Own' and 'Indestructible' the same, although the two acoustic versions are gorgeous. Having said that this album does include some of the greatest pop songs of recent times, 'U Should Know Better' (with Snoop), 'Fembot', 'Call Your Girlfriend' and especially 'In My Eyes'.

'In My Eyes'


'U Should Know Better'

[Maximo Mark]

03 The National 'High Violet'


Again, this is possibly a surprise that it's "only" number three, but it has been beaten by two phenomenal albums. I first found love for the National a couple of years ago when I first heard 'Mistaken for Strangers', and its parent album was also fantastic. But I think this one is better, it's not really particularly different from what they've produced before but it's still very strong. The majority of the album is stunning but nothing is quite as good as 'Conversation 16', a fantastically powerful song capable of bringing out a lot of emotion.

'England'


'Afraid of Everyone'

[Maximo Mark]

02 Bombay Bicycle Club 'Flaws'


The London four piece released their debut album last year, and released this, their second album, pretty much exactly one year later. It's a complete contrast in style, their debut was a strong (but hardly brilliant) punchy indie album. For 'Flaws' however, they've said goodbye to that sound and it's entirely acoustic, creating a fantastic mix of country, blues and folk. It's a collection of new songs, old reworked songs and a couple of covers, John Martyn's 'Fairytale Lullaby' and Joanna Newsom's 'Swansea'. Their transformation is shown fully in that a year ago 'Dust on the Ground' was a fairly average run of the mill indie song. Now it's a beautiful folk song which gives out a lot more meaning. The two covers are both excellent reworkings, and although the two singles ('Rinse Me Down' and 'Ivy & Gold') may feel a bit out of place occasionally as they have a bit more going on in them, they're still brilliant and better than the singles off their debut. The album's highlight, however, is the wonderful 'Leaving Blues', a haunting tale of saying goodbye.

'Leaving Blues'


'Fairytale Lullaby'

[Maximo Mark]

01 Beach House 'Teen Dream'


Whereas most people on forums I post on will rate 'Teenage Dream' as their album of the year, I plump for the similarly titled 'Teen Dream'. If it has one thing in common it's that it's sang by a female (although we'll gloss over me thinking it was a man for about a month of listening to 'Norway', rather Jonsi-esque). Before this year I'd heard of Beach House, but never heard anything by them, if I had don't it had made no impression on me.

Released at the end of January, this was one of the first albums of the year to be hyped up a bit so it was an obvious choice to check out (it worked with 'Merriweather' last year so why not?.) It didn't disappoint but what it has done is continue to grow on me throughout the year. It's a dreamy place to get lost in which sounded great on warm summer nights. It now sounds just as good in minus temperatures. The singles are the obvious highlights although the whole album is pretty stunning, it was the release of 'Lover of Mine' (my album highlight) that made me really take notice of the album, pushing it from a "top 10 possibility" to a contender for album of the year, it's the poppiest thing on here and is one of the years best few pop songs. It's possibly slightly unusual that an album I'd rank album of the year doesn't have the stunning 10/10 songs throughout (infact I'd say LOM is the only one) but it's just so incredibly consistant throughout and everything seems to work better as an album, 'Zebra' being the prime example as it's stunning 30 second guitar intro before some 'ahh's set the album up perfectly....

'Zebra'
'Silver Soul'
'Norway'



'Used to Be'



'Better Times'
'10 Mile Stereo'
'Real Love'
'Take Care'

[Maximo Mark]

10 Codeine Velvet Club 'Codeine Velvet Club'
09 Vampire Weekend 'Contra'
08 LCD Soundsystem 'This is Happening'
07 Plan B 'The Defamation of Strickland Banks'
06 The Golden Filter 'Voluspa'
05 Foals 'Tota Life Forever'
04 Robyn 'Body Talk'
03 The National 'High Violet'
02 Bombay Bicycle Club 'Flaws'
01 Beach House 'Teen Dream'

[TheThorne]

4 more that would be in my top 10

[Jordan]

Plan B and Robyn are the two from that last that I would rank highest. 7/10 of those will be somewhere in mine

[raliverpool]

Dec 22, 2010 17:35:36 GMT 1 Maximo Mark said:

Dec 21, 2010 20:57:30 GMT 1 Jordan said:

Magnetic Man is my favourite one so far, looks like it only just made it in

I do have 69 albums from 2010 so it's far from being a poor album...

Mark,

A great read as ever.

I own 4 of your Year-End Top 10 albums; just out of curiosity (even if you have not ranked them #41-#69) what are the other 29 albums you've bought from 2010?

I can't help thinking I might be better off not revealing the worst album I bought of 2010 on my Y/E countdown, and just doing a Top 40 albums from the 54 studio albums I own, like you've done. ;D

[Maximo Mark]

Thanks Rich,

The other 29 albums I've gott are:

Band of Horses 'Infinite Arms'
Baths 'Cerulean'
Broken Bells 'Broken Bells'
Cee-Lo Green 'Lady Killer'
Chew Lips 'Unicorn'
Danger Mouse & Sparklehorse 'Dark Night of the Soul'
Deerhunter 'Halcyon Digest'
Diamond Rings 'Special Affections'
Example 'Won't Go Quietly'
Fang Island 'Fang Island'
Fyfe Dangerfield 'Fly Yellow Moon'
I Am Kloot 'The Sky At Night'
Interpol 'Interpol'
Janelle Monae 'The ArchAndroid'
JJ 'no.3'
Jonsi 'Go'
Local Natives 'Gorilla Manor'
Los Campesinos! 'Romance is Boring'
M.I.A. '/\/\ /\ Y /\'
Magic Kids 'Memphis'
MGMT 'Congratulations'
No Age 'Everything In Between'
Owen Pallett 'Heartland'
Pantha Du Prince 'Black Noise'
Royksopp 'Senior'
RPA & The United Nations of Sound 'RPA & The United Nations of Sound'
Shout Out Louds 'Work'
These New Puritans 'Hidden'
Tokyo Police Club 'Champion'

About half of those I've not really listened to enough to properly consider. The only poor ones I'd say are Tokyo Police Club, Interpol () and JJ, all of which are massive disappointments after their previous albums.

[Ramz]

Bombay Bicycle Club

[borneoman]

I don't know your #1 but I really like Bombay Bicycle Club and The National. I don't super love them but they're ok. Funny my #1 by miles this year would be Jonsi, which failed to crack your top 40

[Maximo Mark]

Dec 22, 2010 18:13:53 GMT 1 TheThorne said:

4 more that would be in my top 10

That's great, just one of your top 10 not in my top 40.

[Maximo Mark]

Dec 22, 2010 19:50:15 GMT 1 Jordan said:

Plan B and Robyn are the two from that last that I would rank highest. 7/10 of those will be somewhere in mine

7 of 10 isn't too bad!

[Maximo Mark]

Dec 22, 2010 21:25:04 GMT 1 Ramz said:

Bombay Bicycle Club #wub#

They are wonderful, 'Flaws' has made me appreciate their previous album more as well, although I did always like it.