The Soapbox Album of the Decade (2000-2009) - A New Poll

Ok I'll give this a go. I noticed a few on my list from back in the day that I've not listened to for quite some time so it should be a bit different. Will still be mostly full of white male guitar music though as that is what I was listening to at the time. Would have liked some time to revisit everything but I've about 20 new records I've not even had a chance to listen to yet so by memory will have to do.

01: LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver (2007)
02: The Streets - Original Pirate Material (2002)
03: PRMLSCRM - XTRMNTR (2000)
04: Super Furry Animals - Rings Around the World (2001)
05: The Strokes - Is This It (2001)
06: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus (2004)
07: The Coral - The Coral (2002)
08: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - No More Shall We Part (2001)
09: Doves - Lost Souls (2000)
10: British Sea Power - The Decline of British Sea Power (2003)

11: Eels - Blinking Lights and Other Revelations (2005)
12: Evan Dando - Baby I'm Bored (2003)
13: The Go! Team - Thunder, Lightning, Strike (2004)
14: LCD Soundsystem - LCD Soundsystem (2005)
15: PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea (2000)
16: Neon Neon - Stainless Style (2008)
17: Antony and the Johnsons - I Am a Bird Now (2005)
18: Jurassic 5 - Quality Control (2000)
19: Art Brut - Bang Bang Rock & Roll (2005)
20: Dustin's Bar Mitzvah - Dial M for Mitzvah (2005)

21: The Raveonettes - Chain Gang of Love (2003)
22: Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Fever to Tell (2003)
23: Morrissey - You Are the Quarry (2004)
24: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Howl (2005)
25: Ryan Adams - Heartbreaker (2000)
26: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - B.R.M.C. (2001)
27: Black Lips - Good Bad Not Evil (2007)
28: Jay Reatard - Blood Visions (2006)
29: Eels - Shootenanny! (2003)
30: Ryan Adams - Heartbreaker (2000)

31: Ryan Adams - Gold (2001)
32: Shack - ...Here's Tom With the Weather (2003)
33: The Rifles - Great Escape (2009)
34: The Strokes - Room on Fire (2003)
35: The Libertines - Up the Bracket (2002)
36: The Go! Team - Proof of Youth (2007)
37: The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - The Pains of Being Pure at Heart (2009)
38: Dave Rawlings Machine - A Friend of a Friend (2009)
39: Richard Hawley - Truelove's Gutter (2009)
40: Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz! (2009)

41: Spiritualized® - Let It Come Down (2001)
42: Eels - Hombre Lobo: 12 Songs of Desire (2009)
43: The White Stripes - White Blood Cells (2001)
44: I Am Kloot - Natural History (2001)
45: Grandaddy - The Sophtware Slump (2000)
46: The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002)
47: Brakes - Give Blood (2005)
48: Gruff Rhys - Candylion (2007)
49: Tom Waits - Blood Money (2002)
50: The Raveonettes - Whip It On (2002) (technically an EP but I don't care)

51: Eels - Daisies of the Galaxy (2000)
52: Burial - Untrue (2007)
53: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! (2008)
54: The Lemonheads - The Lemonheads (2006)
55: Doves - Some Cities (2005)
56: The Exploding Hearts - Guitar Romantic (2003)
57: The Electric Soft Parade - Holes in the Wall (2002)
58: Soulwax - Nite Versions (2005)
59: Grandaddy - Sumday (2003)
60: Tom Vek - We Have Sound (2005)

61: The Legends - Up Against the Legends (2003)
62: Super Furry Animals - Mwng (2000)
63: Radiohead - Kid A (2000)
64: Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Show Your Bones (2006)
65: Gruff Rhys - Yr Atal Genhedlaeth (2005)
66: Paul Weller - 22 Dreams (2008
67: Envelopes - Demon (2005)
68: The Horrors - Primary Colours (2009)
69: Supergrass - Road to Rouen (2005)
70: Edan - Beauty and the Beat (2005)

71: The Black Keys - Thickfreakness (2003)
72: British Sea Power - Do You Like Rock Music? (2008)
73: Camera Obscura - Let's Get Out of This Country (2006)
74: Doves - The Last Broadcast (2002)
75: Primal Scream - Evil Heat (2002)
76: Spank Rock - YoYoYoYoYo (2006)
77: Ryan adams - Love Is Hell (2004) (Though I only ever listen to it as the two mini EPs)
78: The Brian Jonestown Massacre - Bravery, Repetition and Noise (2001)
79: The Cribs - The New Fellas (2005)
80: Blur - Think Tank (2003)

81: Tramp Attack - Attack! Attack! Attack! (2004)
82: Sonic Youth - The Eternal (2009)
83: Absentee - Schmotime (2006)
84: Madvillain - Madvillainy (2004)
85: Grinderman - Grinderman (2007)
86: The Sleepy Jackson - Lovers (2003)
87: The White Stripes - Elephant (2003)
88: Weezer - Weezer [Green Album] (2001)
89: Paul Weller - Heliocentric (2000)
90: Rilo Kiley - More Adventurous (2004)

91: I Am Kloot - I Am Kloot (2003)
92: The Coral - Magic and Medicine (2003)
93: The Bees - Free the Bees (2004)
94: Roots Manuva - Run Come Save Me (2001)
95: The Rifles - No Love Lost (2006)
96: Richard Hawley - Lady's Bridge (2007)
97: Amy Winehouse - Back to Black (2006)
98: Jenny Lewis - Rabbit Fur Coat (2006)
99: The Cribs - Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever (2007)
100: Wild Billy Childish & the Musicians of the British Empire - Punk Rock at the British Legion Hall (2007)

101: The Futureheads - The Futureheads (2004)
102: Super Furry Animals - Love Kraft (2005)
103: Beck - Guero (2005)
104: The Raveonettes - In and Out of Control (2009)
105: Oasis - Standing on the Shoulder of Giants (2000)
106: Guided by Voices - Isolation Drills (2001)
107: Howling Bells - Howling Bells (2006)
108: The Charlatans - You Cross My Path (2008)
109: Sonic Youth - Rather Ripped (2006)
110: Super Furry Animals - Phantom Power (2003)

111: Brendan Benson - Lapalco (2002)(jesus I've not heard this for years)
112: Hercules and Love Affair - Hercules and Love Affair (2008)
113: Tim Burgess - I Believe (2003)
114: Wild Billy Childish & The Buff Medways - Steady the Buffs (2002)
115: Jenny Lewis - Acid Tongue (2008)
116: Kings of Leon - Aha Shake Heartbreak (2004)
117: Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand (2004)
118: Sonic Youth - Sonic Nurse (2004)
119: The Libertines - The Libertines (2004)
120: British Sea Power - Open Season (2005)

121: Brakes - Touchdown (2009)
122: Gnarls Barkley - The Odd Couple (2008)
123: Joanna Newsom - Ys (2006)
124: Jesse Malin - The Fine Art of Self Destruction (2002)
125: Tim Ten Yen - Everything Beautiful Reminds Me of You (2008)
126: Camera Obscura - My Maudlin Career (2009)
127: Bill Callahan - Woke on a Whaleheart (2007)
128: The Black Angels - Passover (2006)
129: The Duckworth Lewis Method - The Duckworth Lewis Method (2009)
130: Super Furry Animals - Hey Venus! (2007)

131: Graham Coxon - The Spinning Top (2009)
132: Antony and the Johnsons - Antony and the Johnsons (2000)
133: Kevin Burgess - Butterflies At The Axis (2009)
134: Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning (2005)
135: Grandaddy - Just Like the Fambly Cat (2006)
136: Supergrass - Life on Other Planets (2002)
137: The Pipettes - We Are The Pipettes (2006)
138: The Lemonheads - Varshons (2009)
139: The Cooper Temple Clause - See This Through and Leave (2002)
140: Nine Black Alps - Everything Is (2005)

141: Morrissey - Years of Refusal (2009)
142: The Divine Comedy - Regeneration (2001)
143: Doves - Kingdom of Rust (2009)
144: The Twilight Sad - Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters (2007)
145: The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America (2006)
146: Jurassic 5 - Power in Numbers (2002)
147: Tom Waits - Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards (2006)
148: Black Rebel Motorcycle Club - Take Them On, On Your Own (2003)
149: Super Furry Animals - Dark Days / Light Years (2009)
150: The Flaming Lips - Embryonic (2009)

Solid effort Karl. It would take me at least a month to come up with something like that! Have you gone off Wonderland or did you just forget it?

I plan to do it, but yeah, will need time.

So I thought I’d forgot it then I checked my Rateyourmusic and last time I listened to it I only have it a 7. I need a revisit, love the record tho there’s a few duds on the second half

Lists like these are quick when you’ve been using RYM for years

yeah rym helps massively.

i want to spend a bit more time considering mine before posting but after an initial look i don't think mine will vary too much from my original post at the end of the last decade.

like kev said i think this decade and to a certain extent the 90s are linked more with coming of age and nostalgia for us so those albums remain. also i guess this was the first decade i was listening to loads of stuff as and when it came out and with the rise of the internet and downloading had the ability to consume so much more stuff. therefore there's not as many albums i missed out on first time around like there is with previous decades.

OK Eddie

We await your contribution with baited breath

Thank you for pointing that out murphs Kevin remove the second heartbreaker and budge the rest up.

Number 150, the charlatans - wonderland!

Eddies list

1. Jj72 - WHHHHY WONT IT SNOW
2. Velvet revolver - we miss axl
3. The best of steely dan (2001)
4. Bon jovi live at Hyde park

amazing list mahoney....i don't think I've listened to that many albums ever let alone that many new albums in any decade...i was a massive streets fan back in the day so I'm surprised you've got opm at 2 but agdcff doesn't make the top 150....i don't think there's much, if any, dip in quality, certainly not that if you enjoyed the first that much the second would go off radar?

Ah see for me the second record was half great and the rest was just ok but not as good as anything on OPM. though tbh I’ve not listened to it for years as it’s always the debut I stick on.

Will give it a go sometime this week see how I feel about it now.

Yeah I completely agree, I've revisited both a fair bit recently. AGDCFF is a good album, but it peaks and troughs, it has some absolute bangers on it, but has some fluff as well, nothing terrible, but it's a bit uneven. OPM has grown in stature, it's got even better with time, it's such a seminal record, there's an aura too it that lends weight beyond the sum of it's songs.

wierd that, after scanning your list this morning I went and put the stands on....good little album...and fuck me it's not even on the list! I think that's called the Mandela effect

contraband from velvet revolver was pretty good tbh.



sucker train blues.

I was obsessed with the Stands around the time, saw them 20+ times but they were never as impressive on record as they were live. Loved the record at the time, still enjoy it today but minus a few numbers it isn't something that I can get too excited about anymore.

Listening to a grand Don't Come For Free now, I just can't see it myself, huge step down from the debut. Blinded by the Lights would have been worthy of OPM & there's some good stuff scattered throughout but stuff like Wouldn't Have It Any Other Way & Could Well Be In are bloody terrible. Lyrically he just seems a bit too obvious, I guess he used up all his best one liners first time around.

yeah I remember you mentioning them a bit so I mustve just presumed they were they were..trust Noel to play the boring bit of guitar on the song!

also no arctic monkeys?

I’ve lost total interest in them tbh. I do like those early records though I can’t remmeber the last time I felt like hearing any of them.

That's still an Eels compilation on the home straight and a complete blanking of Elliott Smith. I think that I've fallen out of love with mahoneychops (Ryan Adams, Dear Chicago, Demolition, 2002).

I still love you really, Karl (Karl Kennedy's wife, backing vox, live @ the Gabba circa 2008)

I reckon The Stands debut is better than The Coral's. I've seen the latter a few times but they've never done much for me minus a few big tunes. My list would be a 100m sprint but I'd arguably have It's A Wonderful Life by Sparklehorse at no.1. Fucking yes, Mark Linkous was/is a godsend. Sunshine from Good Morning Spider is currently my favourite song by anyone.