WAKEUPANDSMELLTHEMUSIC.COM: 25 Essential Albums Of The Decade: Part 2

Wake Up And Smell The Music

Brewing A Fresh Blend Of Indie Music

WAKEUPANDSMELLTHEMUSIC.COM: 25 Essential Albums Of The Decade: Part 2

25 Essential Albums Of The Decade: Part 2

What if you were stranded on a deserted island with your iPod only capable of holding 25 albums of your choice from the last decade? Assuming, of course, you have unlimited battery power (and enough food and water), what albums would you pick to listen to over and over? Well, probably the ones that you go back to just for pure listening enjoyment. It wouldn't be same as the so-called "experts" best of list, because many of those were chosen for artistic expression or musical experimentation. No, what you want are strong track-for-track albums with no filler, since you're limited to just 25 albums. What you want are interesting, engaging, and accessible works that you don't ever seem to tire of. It's those essential albums you want on your hypothetical deserted island to keep you company and maintain your spirits until someone comes along to find you.

Here's 25 essential albums of the decade we wouldn't want to be without. To diversify our list we choose only one album per artist, which gave us a few tough choices. We broke this into 2 parts with the first 13 yesterday and the rest today. We have a link to listen to each album on lala below. Check our list and then try making your own. Maybe, your choices, like ours, might just surprise you a little.

25 ESSENTIAL ALBUMS OF THE DECADE

PART 2

Snow Patrol

Final Straw

Release Date: March 30, 2004

Label: A&M

Stylus Magazine: "The drama, the shitty relationship, the compromises, the cross-purpose communication and utter helplessness one feels in the twilight moments of love’s demise are all represented here. The fact that the music, vocals and melodies are stunning is just icing on the cake."
Play the album on Lala here.

Modest Mouse

Good News For People Who Love Bad News

Release Date: April 6, 2004

Label: Epic

Allmusic: "The occasionally indulgent feel of The Moon & Antarctica allowed Modest Mouse the room to make epic statements about life, death, and the afterlife; while Good News...has a more active, immediate feel that makes its comments on these subjects that much more pointed."
Play the album on Lala here.

Kings of Leon

Aha Shake Heartbreak

Release Date: February 22, 2005

Label: RCA

The Guardian: "The whole album drips with confidence...But the music on Aha Shake Heartbreak suggests something else entirely, a sophistication that belies their hick image and outstrips their contemporaries."
Play the album on Lala here.

Beck

Guero

Release Date: March 25, 2005

Label: Geffen

Stylus Magazine: "With this, his eighth proper album, Beck has shed himself of Sea Change’s need to shelter himself in his songs. We have our urban craftsman back, to stir the dust in sampled record grooves and unearth for us, again and again, the new in the old and vice versa."
Play the album on Lala here.

Sufjan Stevens

Illinois

Release Date: July 5, 2005

Label: Asthmatic Kitty

Dot Music: "Once you've taken in how wonderful it sounds, it'll be time to thrill at how much of it there is, then how dense it all is. Not simply wonderful music, Illinois is a collection of short stories set to song."
Play the album on Lala here.

My Morning Jacket

Release Date: October 4, 2005

Label: ATO Records

The A.V. Club: "This hasn't been an era for disciplined, focused LPs, which makes listening to My Morning Jacket's Z—with its 10 fantastic tracks packed tightly into 47 minutes—so bracing that it's hard to trust...If it takes some time to adjust to, it's only because it's hard to recognize a classic right away."
Play the album on Lala here.

TV On The Radio

Return To Cookie Mountain

Release Date: September 12, 2006

Label: Interscope

Allmusic: "Yes, it's that good, good enough to reach classic status, and if ten years down the line, this isn't mentioned in the same way we think about Loveless or Slanted And Enchanted or at least In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, I'll be very surprised."
Play the album on Lala here.

Cold War Kids

Robbers & Cowards

Release Date: October 10, 2006

Label: Downtown Records

Sputnik Music: "...the Cold War Kids are probably one of the more individual acts in the indie scene at this moment. Fusing blues, rock and roll, and soul, the Kids engineered one of the more unique albums of 2006 with Robbers & Cowards, their debut LP."
Play the album on Lala here.

Peter Bjorn and John

Writer's Block

Release Date: February 6, 2007

Label: Almost Gold

Allmusic: "It's a major work of post-everything indie rock that has enough hooks, production genius, and emotional strength to make other rock acts (indie or otherwise) sound like they are just wasting everyone's time."

Play the album on Lala here.

The National

Boxer

Release Date: May 22, 2007

Label: Beggar's Banquet

Delusions of Adequacy: "Not only did The National create a startling, astonishing work of genius but they also crafted an album that is one beautiful piece of art — one that I certainly wouldn’t want to think about parting with it."

Play the album on Lala here.

Vampire Weekend

Vampire Weekend

Release Date: January 29, 2008

Label: XL

Allmusic: "Fully realized debut albums like Vampire Weekend come along once in a great while, and these songs show that this band is smart, but not too smart for their own good."

Play the album on Lala here.

The Asteroids Galaxy Tour

Fruit

Release Date: October 27, 2009

Label: Small Giants

URB: "Fruit is able to strike that hardly graspable balance of being happy or uplifting...these two have established a sound for themselves that isn’t re-inventing the wheel: it’s pushing the wheel forwards."

Play the album on Lala here.

Enjoy, GB