Top 40 Albums of 2012 (40-21)

It’s that time again – time to look back on all the great albums released this past year. 2012 has been filled with fantastic albums, and as a result, I’ve come up with a doozy of a list.  You’ll find a variety of genres here ranging from rap to folk to metal to punk.  No matter what type of music you enjoy (minus country) you’ll find something on here that you’ve either already been enjoying or music you should be enjoying. Whatever the case, enjoy!

Honorable Mention:

The Amazing “Gentle Stream”

Bison B.C. “Lovelessness”

Crystal Castles “(III)”

The Evens “The Odds”

Lambchop “Mr. M”

Metz “S/T”

Mind Spiders “Meltdown”

Pilgrim “Misery Wizard”

Lee Renaldo “Between the Times & the Tides”

Twin Shadow “Confess”

Top Albums of 2012 (So Far…)

This year in music reminds me of the 2011 NBA Draft.  There hasn’t been any stand out stars in the releases thus far, but there are a lot of quality albums on the cusp of greatness. Last year, I had no doubt about what albums would make my top five for the mid-year list, but this time around, I moved albums up and down the list indecisively for days, finally settling on the order below.  My point: there could be a lot of shuffling when the real list comes out in December.  Before getting into 20 albums that you shouldn’t miss out on, here are six honorable mentions that could easily end up being this year’s Jeremy Lin.

Cloud Nothings “Attack On Memory”

Cloud Nothings

“Attack On Memory”

[Carpark; 2012]

Rating: 8

Steve Albini is the Greg Popovich of music (or vice versa).  This comparison goes beyond the obvious fact that they are both curmudgeons whose impenitent honesty has been known to ruffle feathers over the years.  While both have been hugely successful, they both enjoy downplaying their impact.   Albini has been known to insult the bands involved with some of his best work as a producer. He said the only reason he worked with Nirvana on “In Utero” was for the money, and he once called his work on “Surfer Rosa” with The Pixies ”a patchwork pinch loaf from a band who at their top dollar best are blandly entertaining college rock”).  Popovich isn’t one to mince words either, victimizing the people who have helped seal his place in basketball history: the media, the league, and his players (he’s quoted as once saying of his best player “Tim Duncan doesn’t have to say much. I haven’t liked him for a long time”).

But what truly ties these men together is not their venomous assault on anything and everything – it’s their ability to take the one-dimensional and make it multi-faceted.  Popovich has been successful at this for years, making defensive players offensive threats (Bruce Bowen), picking players late in the draft that others have ignored and helping them become all-stars (Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker), or culling players from the depths of the D-League/CBA and making them productive cogs within his basketball machine (Jaren Jackson, Gary Neal).  Albini has  worked much in the same manner, helping bands refine their sound and then blow it up with distortion.  Despite both entering the second half of their life, they continue dominating their field. Popovich’s Spurs are currently 3^rd in the Western Conference with an aging Tim Duncan and a sidelined Manu Ginobili, and Steve Albini’s fingerprints are deeply pressed into every nook and cranny on his latest work with Cloud Nothings.