411 Music Ten Deep 10.30.09: Top Ten Albums from 2002

Posted by Andrew Moll on 10.30.2009

Take a trip back to 2002 and the year's best albums. Everything from Bruce Springsteen's The Rising to Queens of the Stone Age's Songs for the Deaf to Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot are on the list in this week's edition of 411 Music Ten Deep!


(Disclaimer: All opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of 411 Music and its staff.)


Welcome everybody to 411 Music Ten Deep and the fifteenth edition of the column. We have a lot to get to so I'll make this quick, but I have to say that this the best week of the year since the NBA season is finally upon us, and I couldn't be more excited. I may be one of the few real NBA fans left on the planet, but I still love my sport, dammit. Alright, with that out of the way, let's take a look at the feedback from last week's list of the Top Ten Albums from 2001.





Pretty decent list. Surely everything on there is at least worth listening to. Other notably good albums (in no particular order):

Tool - Lateralus
Saul Williams - Amethyst Rock Star
Opeth - Blackwater Park
Sevendust - Animosity
Björk - Vespertine
Posted By: AsoTamaki (Guest) on October 22, 2009 at 11:28 PM

NO LATERALUS?? that record is too amazing to not be in the top, let alone not even mentioned. But i think toxicity should be higher, its such a good album.
Posted By: Jcon (Guest) on October 23, 2009 at 12:10 AM

With the exception of Daft Punk and Radiohead, this list is nothing but a bunch of indie elitist shit. And to list Jay-Z as the #1 is fucking insulting. Tool had THE BEST album of 2001 with Lateralus. FACT!
Posted By: BLACK (Guest) on October 23, 2009 at 07:49 AM

I find it very hard to believe that you could leave Lateralis out of the top ten.

Your opinion is officially worthless...
Posted By: ERX (Guest) on October 23, 2009 at 12:09 PM

Alright, so I may have messed up on the exclusion of Lateralus. But looking at my Top Ten, I'm not sure what to take off so I can put it on. I certainly don't think it was number one, but I know it deserved an honorable mention at the very, very least. So my bad on that one.

Is it only me, or isn't the other Top 5 column doing this, too? MAJOR big mondo-fucking yawn fest. As if one weekly column weren't enough solely on '00 shit.
Posted By: Gitmo (Guest) on October 24, 2009 at 04:59 AM

That they are, but the two columns are done independently. Well, kind of. I could contribute to that one if I wasn't so lazy. And obviously it would have made sense to have the two coincide and do the same years each week, but as many of you know, I'm kind of an idiot, so yeah. The good news is if you don't like, I'll be done with all this around Christmas time and we'll move onto other lists.



Top Ten Albums from 2002



2002 was an odd year musically, as we began the musical hodgepodge that continues to this day, where no one artist or genre really dominates the music scene. Instead we end up with a number of different artists with different sounds on our iPods. That idea is pretty well represented on this list, as we have a returning rock legend, some British hip-hop, some indie rock and much, much more. Before that, however, we'll take a look at the quality albums that just missed the cut.


Some Honorable Mentions: The Black Keys - The Big Come Up; The Books - Thought for Food; The Decemberists - Castaways and Cutouts; Minus the Bear - Highly Refined Pirates; The Mountain Goats - Tallahassee; Sparta - Wiretap Scars




10. Sigur Rós - ( )


You can probably figure out if you'll like Sigur Rós right from the beginning; a post-rock band from Iceland that sings in a made-up language called Hopelandic, doesn't title their songs and names their album with just two parentheses. But if any of that turns you off from the band then you're missing out on the beautiful music that the band creates. Put all the supposed pretensions to the side and just appreciate the sounds and feelings that the album turns into majestic moments. It's an album that takes its time and revels in somber droning, allowing each track and each note to be front and center in your mind.





While not much of a departure from their 1999 breakthrough Ágætis byrjun, the album is still an original work that no band could even attempt to duplicate. Other post-rock bands can excel just as well in the types of theatrics the genre allows but none of them can provide Sigur Rós' lush arrangements and orchestrations. Admittedly, ( ) isn't the easiest album to wade through with its emotional density and seventy-one minute length, but that doesn't take away from the impact the record can have. Shifting from a lighter first half to a darker second half, the album covers a number of bases in a manner most bands wouldn't be able to try covering. Even if you think of the band and their approach as just a gimmick, there's no denying that they and ( ) prove the band to be more than just an arty pretension.





9. The Streets - Original Pirate Material


Mike Skinner (aka The Streets) took the UK's grime and dubstep scene to the suburbs and made an album that encapsulated everyday life and made club music cheap and uncool. Original Pirate Material tells of a working class guy who's only worried about getting high and playing PlayStations while avoiding "geezers" as much as possible. It's far from a revolutionary album or a sonic statement of any kind, but that's exactly the point. This is homemade, simple British hip-hop made by a guy that, while not quite being the best rapper in the world, understands than an album needs actual songs to be effective; tracks that seek to replicate a night out or just feature rapid-fire rhymes don't have the same impact or quality of a full album of great songs, which Original Pirate Material is.





It was certainly easy at the time to compare any white rapper to Eminem but the comparison between he and the Streets pretty much ends there. Besides not sharing Eminem's verbal skills, Skinner is also not as confrontational and not really speaking for anybody but himself. That's not to say, though that Skinner isn't capable of coming up with great lyrics himself, from his declaration of "Seems the only difference between mid week shit and weekend is how loud I speak," in "Same Old Thing" to the brilliant back and forth between drunkard Terry and pothead Tim in "The Irony of It All." Maybe Original Pirate Material isn't a commentary of British life, but it is a commentary on a certain life, one full of pubs and pot smoke that's backed by homemade yet perfectly imperfect beats.





8. Bright Eyes - Lifted or The Story is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground


Lifted is pretty much the apex of Conor Oberst's excess as a songwriter, from the elongated title to the eight minute opening track to the ten minute closing track to the all-over-the-map songs that allow his voice to strain as much as possible. For a man that was then twenty-two years old to create an album of such skill and varying sounds is amazing, but remember that Oberst had been writing and recording since he was ten. In some ways this album is the middle point of the young songwriter already being called the next Bob Dylan and the more mature writer Oberst has become in recent years. Lifted is a chore of an album that goes from sound to sound, mood to mood and from youthful exuberance to childish self-pity. Oberst is able to expertly make each of it work, with songs that are instantly relatable. He has quite the knack for declarative statements that people latch onto immediately and that, along with his impassioned vocal delivery, turned him into the indie rock troubadour of choice early in the decade.





But it's with great songs like "Method Acting," "Bowl of Oranges" and "Lover I Don't Have to Love" that Oberst earned his reputation, and with good reason. That's not to say the album is without its flaws, as Oberst's self-pity can be a bit much at times and every song seemingly amps up the drama to eleven, but those slight problems are easily forgivable since Oberst is such a likeable figure. You're immediately drawn to him and his songs, ones that mix rock, folk and country for an expansive sound that are enhanced by his strained and cracking voice. The song "Laura Laurent" ahs what may well have been his mission statement, as he sings, ""But you should never be embarrassed by your trouble with living/Because it's the ones with the sorest throats, Laura/Who have done the most singing." Those kinds of sentiments are why Oberst is beloved and why Lifted is such a great album.





7. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot


The story behind Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is pretty well known at this point, a piece of indie rock lore that signifies to many just how out of touch some people are with the audience. Wilco recorded the album in 2000-2001 and were looking for a release later that year, but their label refused to release the album, citing the presence of no radio singles. Eventually the band was released from their contract, maintained the rights to the album and began streaming it on their website in September 2001. The songs quickly created a buzz around the band that led to a bidding war for the album. Come April 2002, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was released and became a commercial and critical success, selling more than 500,000 copies. All the hoopla surrounding the release garnered the band a bit of attention and no doubt helped the album's success; but none of it would really mean anything if the music itself wasn't as great as it is, an album full of alt-country experimentation combined with classic pop sensibilities.





Beginning with the epic opener "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart," and extending through other great songs like "Jesus, Etc." and "I'm the Man Who Loves You" Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is a thrilling and emotional album that brings up emotions that are simply inadvertent. Much like with The Rising, songs that were written well before September 11th took on a whole new meeting in the wake of the attacks, especially ones like "War on War" and "Ashes of American Flags." Not everything is so down, though as the album features lighter fare like "Kamera" and "Heavy Metal Drummer." Ultimately, the album is a testament to the talent of Jeff Tweedy, the band's great songwriter whose voice is earnest enough to turn lines like "Take off your band-aid 'cause I don't believe in touchdowns" into meaningful statements. While their record label didn't hear the genius in Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, everyone else did as we luckily heard a modern classic.





6. Broken Social Scene - You Forgot It in People


Broken Social Scene is less a band, per se, but rather a large collective of musicians that came together to make a sprawling indie classic with You Forgot It In People, an album featuring no fewer than fourteen musicians. Somehow, someway, these Toronto scenesters came together to make an album of hummable art rock that never stays in one sound for too long. Because of the trip from one idea to the next this is an album that is difficult to summarize; but it's also the type of album that is pointless to sit around and talk about but instead should be heard and experienced. Sit back and let yourself be swept away by the post-rock energy of "KC Accidental", the anthem "Cause =Time", the beautiful "Lover's Spit" or Metric's Emily Haines' great guest work on "Almost Crimes" and "Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl." Whatever your preferred style of rock and roll, you're bound to find something on the album that speaks to you.





One might say that the album is unfocused and sure, without a consistent group of musicians it might be easy for an album to fly off the tracks and veer into a number of different directions. That's actually not necessarily untrue when it comes to You Forgot It In People but it also implies the album is an incoherent mess, which is certainly not true. Not long after the album's release, band leader Kevin Drew said ""I was scared to see if people were going to embrace the idea of a whole shitload of sounds on one album." I think it's safe to say that people did embrace it as the album was a huge critical hit and the band became one of indie rock's most popular band du jour. The collective's members have gone on to do much more with their respective bands (Metric, Do Make Say Think) or as a solo artist (Feist), but their best work has been done together and on this album.





5. Spoon - Kill the Moonlight


Writing about Spoon for the second column, I realize that they're not a particularly easy to band to find a hook to talk about. They don't represent a scene or genre or some greater ideal. Other than their getting screwed by a major label and career transformation starting with Girls Can Tell, there's no a juicy story about Spoon that everybody knows and can be applied to their music. But there's something to be said about a band that consistently produces great rock music, with Kill the Moonlight another in a line of pitch-perfect pop rock. "Jonathan Fisk" surges forward with great urgency while "All the Pretty Girls Go to the City" shuffles ahead with a killer groove, like a leaner version of Girls Can Tell's "Everything Hits at Once." All the songs on the album are aided by lead singer and songwriter Britt Daniel's vocal delivery that manages to infuse attitude and sexuality into each word.





Of course, a big part of why Kill the Moonlight is so good is because it features what is still the best song Spoon has written, "The Way We Get By." With its great piano line and tight pop production, it's the type of infectious song that immediately brings people in to the band. Fortunately, it's the not the only such song on the album as tracks like "Jonathan Fisk," "Don't Let it Get You Down" and the beat-box featured "Stay Don't Go" all have great pop melodies. Spoon may not have the most exciting back story in rock but something like isn't necessary when you have the quality songs that they do, with Kill the Moonlight being arguably their best collection.





4. Bruce Springsteen - The Rising


Musically, is The Rising one of the top ten albums of 2002? Maybe, maybe not. But what makes it such an important album isn't the music itself, but what Bruce Springsteen represents to so many people. There's a story that says that recently after 9/11, a driver pulled up next to Springsteen and shouted to him, "We need you now!" Whether that story is true or not is irrelevant, as it too proves what Springsteen means to so many people. Some of the songs themselves were written before 9/11, but that doesn't stop them from taking on a completely different meaning. "My City of Ruins" may have been written about Asbury Park, NJ but from September 12th on, it was about New York City. One of the best things about Springsteen's music over the years has been that despite the sadness in some of the songs he writes, there's also a sense of joy and optimism to what he does, and it's a quality that people have gripped onto for more than thirty years.





It should also be noted that this was his first album with the E Street Band in eighteen years and that alone gives Springsteen more vigor than he had had in some time. The theme in writing and recording The Rising was surely a number of things, not the least of which was September 11th, but the theme when listening to the album is that of an audience looking to not just any musician, but this musician to help up us come to terms with what had happened. There aren't really any answers to be found on The Rising, but no one should have expected any. Instead, we expected exactly what we got, which was one of the great rock and roll songwriters of all-time providing a soundtrack to a general sentiment better than anyone else could have, while also providing a little hope and inspiration along the way.





3. Interpol - Turn On the Bright Lights


The name Joy Division usually comes up pretty up quickly when discussing Interpol. Hell, it was the very first thing I wrote when I discussed this album awhile back. Those comparisons are mostly based on the fact that lead singer Paul Banks has a similar baritone to that of late Joy Division singer Ian Curtis, and also the band's post-punk revival sound. All those things though undercut the fact that with their debut, the New York City band created a stunning debut that quickly distinguished themselves from not only their inspirations, but also the previous year's NYC buzz band. But while the Strokes excelled in barely caring, dirty rock and roll, Interpol was a tightly coiled unit in well-tailored suits that took things pretty seriously. Turn on the Bright Lights is an album of urgent rock and tension that is practically begging to be resolved, and it's those qualities that gave Interpol's songs such energy.





This isn't a fun album to listen to in any way, but that type of thing should matter only to people who use music to soundtrack parties. For people don't mind a little melancholy to their music, then Turn on the Bright Lights is as good as it gets. It's also yet another album that lives in the specter of post-9/11 New York, fairly or not. Interpol certainly isn't a band to make grand political statements or get overly emotional, but there is something in Banks' voice in "NYC" when he sings that, "New York cares." And for all the people preoccupied with what bands Interpol happens to sound like, they must realize that there isn't much uncharted water for rock and roll and also, not all music has to be revolutionary to be great. One listen to Turn on the Bright Lights should be enough to become aware of that. Songs like "PDA and "Obstacle 2" have an energy all their own that stands up to any scrutiny thrown its way.





2. Queens of the Stone Age - Songs for the Deaf


There will always be a place for kick ass rock and roll at any time in music history, and Queens of the Stone Age stepped up to fill that void with their mind-blowing and ear destroying album Songs for the Deaf. Enlisting Foo Fighter Dave Grohl to play drums and getting help from friend of the band Mark Lanegan, QOTSA constructed on the heaviest and most intense albums of the decade while never sacrificing melody or structure. Spearheaded by the singles "No One Knows" and "Go with the Flow" the album was a punch to the gut for fifty-nine consecutive minutes and it threatens to be a dense and impenetrable listen. Thankfully, repeated listens reveal the melodies and musicianship of the album; you almost miss Grohl's work at first, but eventually you find him and realize he not only does his best work, but some of the best rock drumming ever put to record. Team him up with three accomplished musicians like Lanegan, Josh Homme, and Nick Oliveri and you've got a lineup that can match up with any other in hard rock.





What makes the album good, though, is that it never focuses on just hard rock but instead becomes a prog-grunge-punk-metal-psychedelic-stoner rock hybrid that was pretty much unheard of. And when you play that hybrid as loudly as humanly possible, the result is something special. One of the ideas behind the album was one of driving through the desert and listening to the radio, an idea enhanced by the fake radio DJs that are peppered throughout the album and connecting the songs. You can easily imagine yourself on some isolated road, listening to this album and driving at ungodly speeds, which is really the only appropriate thing to do. The title Songs for the Deaf is also pretty apt, since at times it seems as if the group was trying its hardest to make sure heaving the hearing impaired knew what they were up to; it also wouldn't surprise me at all if they came pretty close to doing just that.





1. Beck - Sea Change


By 2002, Beck had already made a career out of challenging our expectations for him, shifting from loser slacker to sampling hipster to a man challenging our sex laws. Perhaps then we should have been more prepared for his next transformation into broken hearted folk rocker. But then we wouldn't have been as taken aback by the naked beauty and sorrow of Sea Change, an album unlike any we had heard from Beck before and, wisely, one that he hasn't attempted to recreate. With the best breakup album this side of Blood on the Tracks, Beck changed our conceptions of him and what type of musician he was. By incorporating country along with some beautiful strings, some taken right from Serge Gainsbourg's classic Histoire de Melody Nelson, he gives his music a new context and brings to the forefront some ideas that had been there all along on songs like "Jack-Ass." But this time all of that is front and center with Beck, for seemingly the first time, not covering up his feelings with crazy sounds; this is Beck at his saddest and most broken hearted. The result is a classic and undoubtedly his best work.





He manages to capture perfectly that post-breakup feeling numerous times throughout the album, with lines like "It's only lies that I'm living/It's only tears that I'm crying/It's only you that I'm losing/Guess I'm doing fine." Lines like that, along with the beautiful production and songwriting help make a timeless album that could have been released in 1972, not just 2002. Also of note is what I consider the decade's best song, "Lost Cause" another track that encapsulates a broken heart as well as any song conceivably could. I have to say it's a good thing there hasn't been another Beck album remotely like this one, because this album stands out amongst his work as his most personal and beautiful, a majestic record that hits straight at the heart. In a year where a lot of albums were reacting to the tragedy of the year before and looking outwardly, the best album was by a man who finally took the chance to look inwards and came up with something magical.



That'll do it for this week folks, thanks for reading. If you have any questions, comments or concerns feel free to let me know, and make sure to leave your own lists in the comments. I'll see you all next week. And if you're out on your bike tonight, do wear white.