Drowned in Sound's Albums of The Year 2011

Drowned in Sound's Albums of The Year 2011

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49.

May 23, 2011
Critic Score
70
28 reviews

Born This Way essentially finds Gaga doing more of the same but with a few new production tricks.

48.

May 10, 2011
Critic Score
81
28 reviews

It’s challenging yet fairly catchy beneath all the layering. It’s abstract vocally yet painfully direct musically.

46.

David Lynch - Crazy Clown Time
November 8, 2011
Critic Score
67
31 reviews

45.

New Look - New Look
October 18, 2011
Critic Score
78
5 reviews
Fascinatingly and thankfully, they’ve grasped that the elegant sound we all need to hear right now, is one that gives us space to punctuate our thoughts and the result is pure bliss. Easily one of 2011’s finest releases.

44.

April 12, 2011
Critic Score
76
32 reviews

Here these 11 much shorter songs don’t so much buckle under Panda’s voice as become absorbed into it.

43.

June 14, 2011
Critic Score
76
17 reviews

Marissa Nadler is a good record with a couple of standout moments within it.

42.

August 8, 2011
Critic Score
75
35 reviews

To be disappointed with Watch the Throne is to be disappointed with the rap game in 2011.

41.

October 25, 2011
Critic Score
74
6 reviews
There’s a lot to admire about James Ferraro, and for better or worse there’s no-one really like him in modern underground music, but you need to be cool with the possibility that you’re getting pranked.

40.

September 27, 2011
Critic Score
81
29 reviews

The Hunter is a pitch for the mainstream - but it doesn’t compromise on Mastodon’s core ambition.

39.

September 27, 2011
Critic Score
75
11 reviews

38.

April 5, 2011
Critic Score
77
28 reviews

Essentially, the only tracks that aren’t commercial radio hits-in-waiting are the ones which already achieved that status.

37.

...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - Tao of the Dead
February 8, 2011
Critic Score
72
25 reviews

Tao Of The Dead is Trail Of Dead taking the strengths and hallmarks of their 17 year career into one beautifully orchestrated concept and returning back to form.

36.

March 8, 2011
Critic Score
78
27 reviews

It's fair to say Smoke Ring...'s reliance on gloom and loneliness rarely lets up. But he's trying to find beauty in it, which I guess is the point.

35.

February 25, 2011
Critic Score
80
34 reviews

The mild disappointment of this record can be firmly classed as a first world problem in itself.

33.

April 19, 2011
Critic Score
85
33 reviews

With whokill, Merrill Garbus has somehow managed to encompass more ideas into just over 40 minutes than most artists manage in a lifetime.

32.

February 18, 2011
Critic Score
75
41 reviews

The King of Limbs definitely represents new ground for Radiohead in its cohesiveness and its unnerving, stifling mood. For these reasons alone, it is a good album.

31.

February 16, 2011
Critic Score
74
6 reviews

30.

October 11, 2011
Critic Score
80
38 reviews

Biophilia carves out brave new territory for an artist who’s been colonising the fringes of music all her career

29.

March 29, 2011
Critic Score
82
23 reviews

It is unflinchingly honest, sharp and unfiltered.

28.

July 26, 2011
Critic Score
81
33 reviews

Skying leaves me perhaps more interested in where they'll go next, than where they are now.

27.

March 21, 2011
Critic Score
79
18 reviews

For what The Weeknd have produced, regardless of what genre it is or isn’t, is a very good record.

26.

June 7, 2011
Critic Score
82
31 reviews

Musically speaking, it's a perfectly logical progression from Fucked Up's second album, 2008's The Chemistry Of Common Life, which itself strode recognisably onwards from their 2006 studio debut Hidden World.

25.

August 16, 2011
Critic Score
78
31 reviews

Given time and attention, the detail behind that wave of fuzz soaks through and seduces.

24.

May 13, 2011
Critic Score
74
25 reviews

23.

August 23, 2011
Critic Score
71
18 reviews

22.

February 14, 2011
Critic Score
76
27 reviews

Mogwai have released another jumper, but not quite like we know it.

20.

January 25, 2011
Critic Score
85
30 reviews

He approaches near perfection by combining complex song structures with simple pop melodies.

19.

October 11, 2011
Critic Score
78
27 reviews

This is Willner’s finest record yet, a composition of effortlessly gorgeous, technically fantastic, genuinely awe-inspiring music.

17.

May 9, 2011
Critic Score
81
33 reviews

It’d be reductive to try and describe a timeless album like Smother as a step up from its two predecessors.

15.

May 10, 2011
Critic Score
80
29 reviews

Not easy, but often fascinating, wholly rewarding and genuinely cathartic.

14.

April 12, 2011
Critic Score
81
31 reviews

C’mon is an intriguing, essential addition to their discography, one which might even propel the Minnesotans towards much wider renown.

13.

October 25, 2011
Critic Score
87
42 reviews

Bad As Me sees the performer reaching back into his bag of tricks to pull out a few favourites in a characteristically exhilarating, terrifying, heartbreaking, tear jerking, bone-rattling style.

12.

June 21, 2011
Critic Score
85
41 reviews

Justin Vernon and his crew have changed things up here for sure, but the results are every bit as beautiful as you might expect.

11.

September 12, 2011
Critic Score
86
37 reviews

This is an album that rockets toward you, ricochets through your emotions and finally decides to lay you down on the floor, headphones on, tumbling around like a blissed-out cat in the sun.

9.

August 30, 2011
Critic Score
75
28 reviews

The Rip Tide is neither a sandblasted version of Beirut, nor the band at their most idiosyncratic.

8.

February 15, 2011
Critic Score
68
37 reviews

A collection of fleet, shimmering pop songs; a master-class in sonic splendour; a bold, beautiful and brilliant reinvention that should surprise as many as it will enthrall.

7.

October 11, 2011
Critic Score
85
7 reviews
Nils Frahm is clearly a prestigious talent and this is a remarkable tumble through the sounds and shapes of his imagination.

6.

June 21, 2011
Critic Score
78
7 reviews

Konkylie is an impressive, accomplished collection of songs from a band coming into their own.

5.

November 21, 2011
Critic Score
86
38 reviews

And jolly spectacular it is too, which is never a guarantee

4.

June 28, 2011
Critic Score
77
26 reviews

SERIOUSLY, this record is fucking good, flawless, almost, and hard to stop listening to.

3.

February 14, 2011
Critic Score
89
44 reviews

Let England Shake is neither damning, patriotic, nor angry and its gristly lyrics do not dictate the mood.

2.

February 14, 2011
Critic Score
84
19 reviews

It draws upon the grandeur of the past but refuses to crumble its bones into sonic dust.

1.

May 10, 2011
Critic Score
80
29 reviews

Burst Apart deserves all the plaudits that can be thrown at it; albums are rarely as unashamedly, gut-wrenchingly, genuinely emotional as this.

Original Source: http://drownedinsound.com/in_depth/4144253-drowned-in-sounds-albums-of-the-year--5-1
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