The 50 Best Albums of the 2000s: Numbers 50

The 50 Best Albums of the 2000s: Numbers 50 – 49

December 1st, 2009 MUSIC Cory Maidens

The double oughts are about to be over. Featured author and music obssessive Cory Maidens takes a look back at the first decade of the 21st Century in music, and lists his picks for the 50 best records to be released during its ten years

50. Baroness – Blue Record (2009)
Savannah, Georgia’s Baroness get saddled with descriptors and classifications that never quite seem to accurately encapsulate their decreasingly metallic style of “southern” rock. Blue Record sounds akin to a cross-dimensional jam between Motörhead and the Allman Brothers. The attitude and volume are 100% metal but the song structures, vocal harmonies and guitar lines feel inspired by classic psychedelic and alternative rock. The traditional rock guitar style adds both a new dimension to the group’s unbelievably heavy sound and a new tool to their musical arsenal. Like fellow Georgians Mastodon, Baroness has expanded the metal landscape by reminding a broad range of listeners that thunderous rock didn’t die with Kiss’ coolness and no genre limitations can defy great music.

49. Justice – † (2007)
French electro duo Justice were propelled to fame by “D.A.N.C.E.,” the lead single from their debut full length album. The track’s disco funk and schoolyard chant vocals have “novelty hit” written all over them but Justice delivers another eleven tracks of thoughtful, progressive dance music. Justice have an obvious flair for the dramatic and more often than not, the group’s music attains the cinematic heights on which they’ve set their sights. The album opens with forty seconds of ominous tympani and brass before finally revealing its playful true nature. Album centerpieces “Phantom” and “Phantom Pt. II” lift their main musical motif from Italian prog band Goblin’s score for the Dario Argento thriller Tenebre. In the hands of Justice, Daft Punk’s robotic techno gets run through a glitchy meat grinder and sprayed down with a liberal dose of hipster sweat wrung from American Apparel deep V t-shirts, and the results never fail to move bodies on a dance floor.

Take us through your picks for Best of the Decade in the comments!

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Cory Maidens

Cory Maidens is a proud son of the American Midwest, a man of letters and an incorrigible bastard. Since acquiring his BA in English Literature, he has proudly avoided non-comic books as an apathetic eye-roll at intellectual elitism. He thinks that arguing is highly underrated as sport and engages in it more often than might be advisable to compensate for that perceived deficiency. He believes in gay marriage, The Daily Show and Bruce Springsteen. He enjoys hearing Southern voices read Civil War-era correspondence aloud.

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