| 4.5 superb |
| A Wilhelm Scream Career Suicide |
| Air Moon Safari |
| Alvvays Alvvays |
| Arcade Fire The Suburbs |
| At the Drive-In In/Casino/Out |
| Autechre Incunabula |
| Bat For Lashes Two Suns |
| Beastie Boys Paul's Boutique |
| Big Boi Sir Lucious Left Foot |
| Bjork Vespertine |
| Blue Sky Black Death Late Night Cinema |
| Boards of Canada Geogaddi |
| Boards of Canada Hi Scores |
| Boards of Canada Tomorrow's Harvest |
| Bon Iver For Emma, Forever Ago |
| Bruce Springsteen Born to Run |
| Burial Untrue |
| Burst Lazarus Bird |
| Given the stagnancy of most metal scenes these days, it isn't all that often that I'll scour blogs for lesser known bands. Too much of the material is either a second or third rate clone of already established artists, and searching for unique or interesting artists is just too tedious. This is, in part, what makes an album like Lazarus Bird so endearing. Though Burst's fifth studio album does take a page from the likes of Mastodon and Neurosis, it's a refreshing record none the less. Songs like "I Hold Vertigo" and "Cripple God" convey Burst's song writing prowess exceedingly well, as they effortlessly morph from heavy, riff-based sound to a tranquil, yet still lively endeavour. The nine minute long "City Cloaked" not only does an especially exceptional job in bridging together Burst's multifaceted sound, but also earns the distinction of being on of the year's best songs. |
| Converge Jane Doe |
| Death The Sound of Perseverance |
| Death Symbolic |
| Delerium Karma |
| Dinosaur Jr. You're Living All Over Me |
| DJ Shadow Endtroducing..... |
| dredg Leitmotif |
| Elliott Smith Either/Or |
| Eluvium Copia |
| Entertainment for the Braindead Seven (+1) |
| Entertainment for the Braindead Roadkill |
| Entertainment for the Braindead Postcard #5: Songs for the Sleepless |
| Experimental Aircraft Third Transmission |
| It's been seven years since Experimental Aircraft released their sophomore album, but the Texan quartet has hardly missed a beat. The brand of shoegaze featured on the band's third LP, Third Transmission: Meet Me on Echo Echo Terrace is hardly a groundbreaking endeavour, but the record is a superb effort all the same. The album's backbone is a constant buzz of distortion that creates a hazy, yet endearing atmosphere; accented by the ethereal talents of vocalist Rachel Staggs, and the sparse, yet effective passages of clean guitar, Third Transmission simply makes for a beautiful listen. Guitarist T.J. O'Leary adds his own voice to some of the more straightforward rock tracks which gives the album some diversity, but the real story behind Third Transmission lies in the dreamy atmospheres created in the likes of "Paintings in the Attic", "Stellar", and "Remembrance". Third Transmission: Meet Me on Echo Echo Terrace is only Experimental Aircraft's third release in eleven years, but it is the band's most engaging thus far, and easily one of the year's strongest records. |
| Experimental Aircraft Love For the Last Time |
| Explosions in the Sky The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place |
| Fair to Midland Inter.Funda.Stifle |
| Flying Lotus Cosmogramma |
| Fugazi 13 Songs |
| Gamma Ray No World Order |
| Genghis Tron Board Up the House |
| Grouper A I A |
| Grouper Ruins |
| Helloween Keeper of the Seven Keys Part I |
| Interpol Turn on the Bright Lights |
| Iron Maiden Live After Death |
| ISIS Oceanic |
| ISIS Panopticon |
| James Blake Overgrown |
| Joanna Newsom Have One on Me |
| Judas Priest Painkiller |
| Kenji Yamamoto Super Metroid |
| Koji Kondo The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time OST |
| Leonard Cohen Songs of Love and Hate |
| Madvillain Madvillainy |
| Massive Attack Mezzanine |
| Matthew Good Avalanche |
| Matthew Good Vancouver |
| Matthew Good Band Beautiful Midnight |
| Metric Fantasies |
| Mew No More Stories |
| Nas Illmatic |
| Nirvana Nevermind |
| Nobuo Uematsu Final Fantasy VII: Original Soundtrack |
| Nujabes Metaphorical Music |
| Oasis (What's the Story) Morning Glory? |
| Opeth Damnation |
| Our Lady Peace Spiritual Machines |
| Parades Foreign Tapes |
| pg.lost It's Not Me, It's You! |
| Pink Floyd Animals |
| Pink Floyd Wish You Were Here |
| Pixies Surfer Rosa |
| Portishead Dummy |
| Public Enemy It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back |
| Radiohead Hail to the Thief |
| Raine Maida Love Hope Hero |
| Raine Maida The Hunters Lullaby |
| Regina Spektor Far |
| Regina Spektor Live in London |
| Rise Against The Sufferer and the Witness |
| Shpongle Tales of the Inexpressible |
| Sigur Ros Takk... |
| Soap and Skin Lovetune for Vacuum |
| Soundtrack (Video Game) Metroid Prime and Fusion |
| St. Vincent St. Vincent |
| Swarms Old Raves End |
| The Cranberries Wake Up and Smell the Coffee |
| The Flashbulb Arboreal |
| The Jezabels Prisoner |
| The Smashing Pumpkins Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness |
| Thrice The Illusion of Safety |
| Thrice The Alchemy Index Vols. I & II |
| Tim Hecker Harmony in Ultraviolet |
| Tim Hecker An Imaginary Country |
| Since his 2001 debut, Haunt Me, Haunt Me Do It Again, Tim Hecker has been one of Canada's most prolific electronica musicians. The Montreal based Hecker's sound has taken on a variety of different forms, from the subtle drone of his aforementioned debut, to the dark dissonance of Mirages, to the more engaging characteristics of Harmony in Ultraviolet. An Imaginary Country takes Hecker's droning electronica in a new direction, introducing elements of noisy shoegaze in tracks like "100 Years Ago", subdued minimalism in "Utropics", and an overlying sense of naturalism to the album as a whole. That An Imaginary Country is Hecker's most accessible release can be attributed to its free-flowing, natural ambience, which is as effective as it 's been on previous releases, if not more. |
| Tycho Past is Prologue |
| Tycho Dive |
| Yo La Tengo I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One |
| Yuck Yuck |
