2014 Best Albums Of The Year Extravaganza

Welcome to yet another addition of my Year-ending Album extravaganza, just in time for you to switch from complaining about how terrible 2014 was into how awful you know 2015 will end up!

Let’s take a moment to recognize the Hall-of-fame, our past extravaganza winners. 2009 – The Decemberist’s Hazards of Love. 2010 – Arcade Fire’s The Suburbs. 2011 – The Felice Brother’s Celebration Florida. 2012 – Dr. Dog’s “Be The Void”/Father John Misty’s “Fear Fun”, 2013 – The National’s “Trouble Will Find Me”.

I looked over my list prior to writing this and realized that 2013 > 2014 overall. My #1 this year would probably be #4 last year, but there’s still plenty of good discoveries out there. Want to discuss it, you can find me on the website known as twitter.

Unfortunately I was diagnosed with the flu earlier this week. Why do you care? You most likely don’t however this post was almost ready to go but is at my office. Hence I’ve had to recreate everything and leaving out the sentence blurb about each album. Basically, my main genre is indie rock, folk singer-songwriters, some electronica that isn’t too weird, garage rock and older sounding country music. With each passing year I’m getting into more female indie artists as well.

I’ll write some thoughts about the final list at the end. Here are my top 42 albums of 2014. Remember, 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything.

42.   The Black Keys – “Turn Blue”

41.   Foo Fighters – “Sonic Highways”

40.   Willie Nelson – “Band of Brothers”

39.   Cloud Nothings – “Here and Nowhere Else”

38.   Shovels & Rope – “Swimmin Time”

37.   The Hold Steady – “Teeth Dreams”

36.   Fanfarlo - “Let’s Go Extinct”

35.   Ryan Adams – “Ryan Adams”

34.   Lake Street Dive – “Bad Self Potraits”

33.   Real Estate – “Atlas”

32.   Wye Oak - “Shriek”

31.   Justin Townes Earle – ’Single Mothers”

30.   Future Islands – “Singles”

29.   The Antlers – “Familiars”

28.   Phantogram – “Voices”

27.   Sharon Jones & the   Dap Kings-“Give People What They Want”

26.   Alt- J – “This Is All Yours”

25.   Sturgill Simpson – “Metamodern Sounds in Country Music”

24.   Jenny Lewis – “The Voyager”

23.   Jamestown Revival – “Utah”

22.   Ty Segall – “Manipulator”

21.   Weezer - “Everything Will Be Allright in the End”

20.   Rodrigo y Gabriela – “9 dead alive”

19.   Drive By Truckers – “English Ocean”

18.   Broken Bells – “After the Disco”

17.   Shakey Graves - “And The War Came”

16.   Greensky Bluegrass – “If Sorrows Swim”

15.   Spoon – “They Want My Soul”

14.   Angel Olsen – “Burn Your Fire For No Witness”

13.   St. Paul and the Broken   Bones – “Half the City”

12.   Sharon Van Etten – “Are We There”

11.   The War on Drugs – “Lost in the Dream”

10.   The New Pornographers – “Brill Bruisers”

9.       Felice Brothers – “Favorite   Waitress”

8.       First Aid Kit – “Stay Gold”

7.       Strand of Oaks – “Heal”

6.       Sun Kil Moon – “Benji”

5.       Beck – “Morning Phase”

4.       Jack White – “Lazaretto”

3.       The Men – “Tomorrow’s   Hits”

2.       Conor Oberst – “Upside Down   Mountain”

1.       St. Vincent – “St. Vincent”

Congratulations to St. Vincent for making the best album of the year. I’ve always been a fan but this record changed my perception of Ms. Clark. I’ve listened to it all year.

I’ve always been an unabashed Conor Oberst fan-boy, but his last few albums have lacked something starting with his second solo release. This effort is a perfect mix of a style he feels comfortable combined with his patented lyrics.

Much like The Hazean himself, I was blown away by The Men this year. Jack White and Beck round out the top 5, with Jack White improving upon his first solo album and Beck making me a fan again.

The rest is an eclectic (if you disregard no rap, metal or pop music) blend of other genres. Thanks for reading.