Rolling Stone's 30 Best Albums of 2010

29.

June 22, 2010
Critic Score
81
23 reviews
When they come back to Roy Ayers-style funk ("Radio Daze"), they prove nobody does it better. Let's hear it for steady employment.

28.

November 22, 2010
Critic Score
69
25 reviews

Somewhere between the metal- messiah riffs of ” Destroya” and the Red Bull-fueled stomp of “Bulletproof Heart,” Danger Days offers a total rejection of bloated celebrity rock.

27.

Peter Wolf - Midnight Souvenirs
April 6, 2010
Critic Score
74
6 reviews

26.

February 9, 2010
Critic Score
78
37 reviews
The result is simultaneously stranger and poppier, more celebratory and more serious.

25.

September 14, 2010
Critic Score
79
22 reviews

24.

Maximum Balloon - Maximum Balloon
September 21, 2010
Critic Score
76
13 reviews

22.

January 19, 2010
Critic Score
77
30 reviews

20.

September 28, 2010
Critic Score
74
28 reviews

Le Noise is also the most intimate and natural-sounding album Young has made in a long time: just a songwriter making his way through a vividly rendered chaos of memoir, affection and fear.

17.

January 26, 2010
Critic Score
83
36 reviews

They're more radiant than ever on their third disc, particularly on songs like "Zebra," with background chorales swooping over stately guitar plucking.

16.

Kid Rock - Born Free
November 16, 2010
Critic Score
54
9 reviews
With his eighth album, Kid Rock has done something he's threatened to do for years: slipped fully into classic-rock mode.

15.

May 10, 2010
Critic Score
84
37 reviews

Singer Matt Berninger's gorgeous baritone is still the band's main selling point ... Yet the tension comes mainly from composers Aaron and Bryce Dessner: The music is some of their lushest and darkest.

14.

November 22, 2010
Critic Score
83
20 reviews

13.

October 25, 2010
Critic Score
72
17 reviews

Swift’s third album, Speak Now, is roughly twice as good as 2008’s Fearless, which was roughly twice as good as her 2006 debut.

12.

August 17, 2010
Critic Score
76
12 reviews

No Better Than This isn't a perfectly honed set. But Mellencamp has never sounded looser or easier on a record.

10.

May 18, 2010
Critic Score
83
38 reviews

On This Is Happening, Murphy, now 40, remains a hipster, often expressing his emotions through quips, asides and allusions ... But Happening also includes Murphy's most earnest, lovelorn songs.

9.

June 18, 2010
Critic Score
67
27 reviews
Em is just a few years shy of 40, and if he’s seeming more and more like a grumpy middle-aged man, at least he’s owning it — he sounds content to be rap’s wittiest head case.

8.

September 14, 2010
Critic Score
81
22 reviews

7.

June 15, 2010
Critic Score
71
24 reviews
Drake is in total command of a style that would have been hard to imagine dominating hip-hop a few years ago: He's subtle and rueful rather than loud and lively; emotionally transparent rather than thuggy.

6.

January 11, 2010
Critic Score
79
37 reviews

5.

September 14, 2010
Critic Score
91
6 reviews

That Lonesome Song, established him as an heir to "outlaws" like Waylon Jennings and Merle Haggard. The Guitar Song aims even higher, with 25 tracks that take the pulse of a country hitting the skids and a country singer hitting the big time.

4.

August 3, 2010
Critic Score
88
43 reviews
The strange thing about Arcade Fire is how they instinctively scale their most intimate confessions to arena-rock levels, rolling out big drums and glossy keyboards.

3.

Elton John & Leon Russell - The Union
October 19, 2010
Critic Score
77
18 reviews

On The Union, produced by T Bone Burnett, John and Russell share the resurrection. Each goes back to what he first did best. Then they do it together.

2.

May 18, 2010
Critic Score
79
33 reviews

1.

November 22, 2010
Critic Score
91
45 reviews

It’s his best album, but it’s more than that — it’s also a rock-star manifesto for a downsizing world.

Comments
Sign in to comment
No one has said anything yet.
Connect with AOTY
Like Us
Follow Us

February Playlist