Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Lists based on votes from readers, listeners, viewers, etc.
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Donchano
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Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Donchano »

https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-an ... al_twitter

It's readers list but I found it interesting.

01. Radiohead - Kid A
02. Radiohead - OK Computer
03. Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
04. Radiohead - In Rainbows
05. Kendrick Lamar - To Pimp A Butterfly
06. Frank Ocean - Blonde
07. Arcade Fire - Funeral
08. The Strokes - Is This It
09. Kendrick Lamar - good kid, m.A.A.d city
10. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
11. Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
12. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
13. Kanye West - Yeezus
14. Frank Ocean - Channel Orange
15. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
16. Madvillain - Madvillainy
17. Lana Del Rey - Norman Fucking Rockwell
18. Sufjan Stevens - Carrie & Lowell
19. Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion
20. Lorde - Melodrama
21. Vampire Weekend - Modern Vampires of the City
22. Interpol - Turn On the Bright Lights
23. Arcade Fire - The Suburbs
24. Fiona Apple - Fetch The Bolt Cutters
25. Tame Impala - Currents
26. Bjork - Homogenic
27. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
28. David Bowie - Blackstar
29. Daft Punk - Discovery
30. Phoebe Bridgers - Punisher
31. Beach House - Teen Dream
32. The Avalanches - Since I Left You
33. Bon Iver - Bon Iver
34. The National - Boxer
35. The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulleting
36. Beyonce - Lemonade
37. LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening
38. Outkast - Aquemini
39. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes
40. Elliot Smith - Either/Or
41. Bjork - Vespertine
42. Kendrick Lamar - DAMN.
43. Beach House - Bloom
44. Joanna Newsom - Ys
45. Outkast - Stankonia
46. Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
47. Burial - Untrue
48. Kanye West - Late Registration
49. Fiona Apple - The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do
50. Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill
51. Kanye West - The College Dropout
52. Tyler, The Creator - IGOR
53. Belle and Sebastian - If You're Feeling Sinister
54. The War on Drugs - Lost in the Dream
55. Sigur Ros - Ágætis byrjun
56. Carly Rae Jepsen - E.MO.TION
57. The National - High Violet
58. Deerhunter - Halcyon Digest
59. Godspeed You! Black Empire - Lift Your Skinny Fists like Antennas to Heaven
60. Tame Impala - Lonerism
61. Modest House - The Lonesome Crowded West
62. Kacey Musgraves - Golden Hour
63. Modest House - The Moon & Antarctica
64. DJ Shadow - Entroducing...
65. Daft Punk - Random Access Memories
66. Bon Iver - 22, A Million
67. Boards of Canada - Music Has the Right to Children
68. Taylor Swift - folklore
69. Weyes Blood - Titanic Rising
70. Massive Attack - Mezannine
71. Solange - A Seat At Table
72. Vampire Weekend - vampire Weekend
73. SZA - CTRL
74. Weezer - Pinkerton
75. Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues
76. Kanye West - The Life of Pablo
77. FKA Twigs - Magdalene
78. The xx - xx
79. Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
80. Destroyer - Kaputt
81. Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool
82. J Dilla - Donut
83. The White Stripes - Elephant
84. Joanna Newsom - Have One on Me
85. Grimes - Art Angels
86. D'Angelo - Voodoo
87. SOPHIE - OIL OF EVERY PEARL's UN-INSIDES
88. Broke Social Scene - You Forgot It in People
89. Panda Bear - Person Pitch
90. Father John Misty - I Love You, Honeybear
91. Portishead - Third
92. Jamie XX - In Color
93. Robyn - Body Talks
94. Death Grips - The Money Store
95. Radiohead - Amnesiac
96. The Microphones - The Glow, Pt. 2
97. Queen of the Stone Age - Songs for the Dead
98. Tyler, The Creator - Flower Boy
99. Fiona Apple - When The Pawn
100. The Knife - Silent Shout
101. Beyonce - Beyonce
102. Yo La Tengo - I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One
103. The White Stripes - White Blood Cells
104. Jay-Z - The Blueprint
105. Taylor Swift - 1989
106. Charli XCX - Pop 2
107. Gorillaz - Demon Days
108. The Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs
109. Beck - Odelay
110. Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels 2
111. PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea
112. Car Seat Headrest - Twin Fantasy
113. Lorde - Pure Heroine
114. The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots
115. M.I.A. - Kala
116. D'Angelo/The Vanguard - Black Messiah
117. Gorillaz - Plastic Beach
118. Silver Jews - American Waters
119. Taylor Swift - Red
120. A War on Drugs - A Deeper Understand
121. Lana Del Rey - Born To Die
122. Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest
123. PJ Harvey - Let England Shake
124. The Postal Service - Give Up
125. Danny Brown - Atrocity Exhibiton
126. Deafheaven - Sunbather
127. Kanye West - Graduation
128. Grimes - Visions
129. My Bloody Valentine - mbv
130. Kanye West - 808s and Heartbreak
131. Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
132. M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
133. Mitski - Be The Cowboy
134. Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Fever To Tell
135. The National - Trouble Will Find Me
136. Courtney Barnett - Sometimes I Sit and Think, Sometimes I Just Sit
137. Rihanna - ANTi
138. Arctic Monkeys - AM
139. Bloc Party - Silent Alarm
140. Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning / Digital Ash in a Digital Urn
141. Car Seat Headrest - Teens of Denial
142. Built To Spill - Perfect From Now On
143. The Strokes - Room on Fire
144. St. Vincent - Strange Mercy
145. Wilco - Summerteeth
146. Eminem - The Marshall Mathers LP
147. Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
148. Mitski - Puberty 2
149. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary
150. A Tribe Called Quest - We got it from Here... Thank You 4 Your service
151. FKA Twigs - LP1
152. Built To Spill - Keep it Like a Secret
153. Lana Del Rey - Ultraviolence
154. Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz
155. Vampire Weekend - Contra
156. Angel Olsen - My Woman
157. Death Cab For Cutie - Transatlanticism
158. Beck - Sea Change
159. Swans - To Be Kind
160. Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
161. Drake - Take Care
162. Titus Andronicus - The Monitor
163. Big Thief - U.F.O.F.
164. The Dismemberment Plan - Emergency & I
165. Yo La Tengo - And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out
166. Animal Collective - Feels
167. Madonna - Ray of Light
168. Aphex Twin - The Richard D. James Album
169. Elliott Smith - XO
170. Sleater-Kinney - The Woods
171. Jessie Ware - What's Your Pleasure?
172. Waxahatchee - Saint Cloud
173. Deftones - White Pony
174. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Skeleton Tree
175. Beach House - Depression Cherry
176. Radiohead - Hail to the Thief
177. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
178. Lady Gaga - The Fame Monster
179. The National - Alligator
180. Outkast - Speakerboxx/The Love Below
181. Japandroids - Celebration Rock
182. Slowdive - Slowdive
183. HAIM - Women in Music Pt. III
184. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Push The Sky Away
185. Godspeed You! Black Emperor - F♯ A♯ ∞
186. Bob Dylan - Time Out of Mind
187. Earl Sweatshirt - Some Rap Songs
188. Janell Monae - The ArchAndroid
189. TV on The Radio - Return To Cookie Mountain
190. MF Doom - Mm...Food?
191. Purple Mountains - Purple Mountains
192. Deerhunter - Microcastle/Weird Era Cont.
193. Air - Moon Safari
194. Arcade Fire - Reflektor
195. Bonnie "Prince" Billy - I See a Darkenss
196. Blur - 13
197. James Blake - James Blake
198. Flying Lotus - Cosmogramma
199. Dirty Projects - Bitte Orca
200. Erykah Badu - Mama's Gun
Last edited by Donchano on Sat Oct 16, 2021 1:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by panam »

Why only the first 120..?
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Harold »

panam wrote: Fri Oct 15, 2021 6:05 pm Why only the first 120..?
Presumably they didn't have time at the moment to transcribe the whole thing but wanted to post what they had, and will update with the rest later.

Or maybe their reaction to #121 (it's LDR's Born to Die, for the record) was "Welp, I'm out!"
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Donchano »

panam wrote: Fri Oct 15, 2021 6:05 pm Why only the first 120..?
Too tired, too sleepy
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Nassim »

The highest ranked album from their top of the 2010s to not make the list if their #20, DJ Rashad's Double Cup, but their #3, Beyonce's self titled didn't make the top 100.

This list is a bit strange, it seems more in line with the Pitchfork from 10 years ago than the recent one (with some caveats, not sure 10 year ago Pitchfork would have voted for ANTI- at all or for 3 Taylor Swift albums) so it kinda seems like us old Pitchfork readers that will stick with them but keep on complaining about their changes might be the majority.

Anyway, glad to see Modest Mouse, Built to Spill and Car Seat Headrest both have 2 albums ranked (and pretty high in Modest Mouse's case) despite not appearing in their top 200 artists list.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by panam »

I was checking the People's List from 10 years ago and there are some changes. The Shins, Spiritualized and Franz Ferdinand no more.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Pauler »

Breathing a sigh of relief that BTS fans didn't flood this poll. Also, Self-titled is the superior album to LEMONADE
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by panam »

If you wanna compare..

Pitchfork's "The People's List - Top Albums 1996-2011"


1 Radiohead OK Computer
2 Radiohead Kid A
3 Arcade Fire Funeral
4 Neutral Milk Hotel In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
5 The Strokes Is This It
6 Radiohead In Rainbows
7 Wilco Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
8 Animal Collective Merriweather Post Pavilion
9 Kanye West My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
10 Sufjan Stevens Illinois
11 LCD Soundsystem Sound of Silver
12 Interpol Turn On the Bright Lights
13 Bon Iver For Emma, Forever Ago
14 The Flaming Lips The Soft Bulletin
15 The xx The xx
16 Arcade Fire The Suburbs
17 Modest Mouse The Moon & Antarctica
18 Fleet Foxes Fleet Foxes
19 The Flaming Lips Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots
20 Radiohead Amnesiac
21 The White Stripes Elephant
22 The White Stripes White Blood Cells
23 Grizzly Bear Veckatimest
24 The National Boxer
25 Broken Social Scene You Forgot It in People
26 Daft Punk Discovery
27 Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend
28 Bon Iver Bon Iver
29 DJ Shadow ...Endtroducing
30 Beck Odelay
31 Belle And Sebastian If You're Feeling Sinister
32 Beach House Teen Dream
33 Modest Mouse The Lonesome Crowded West
34 LCD Soundsystem This Is Happening
35 OutKast Stankonia
36 Phoenix Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
37 Elliott Smith Either/Or
38 Arcade Fire Neon Bible
39 Kanye West The College Dropout
40 Radiohead Hail to the Thief
41 Panda Bear Person Pitch
42 Madvillain Madvillainy
43 The Postal Service Give Up
44 Animal Collective Strawberry Jam
45 Sigur Rós Ágætis Byrjun
46 The Avalanches Since I Left You
47 The Shins Chutes Too Narrow
48 Dirty Projectors Bitte Orca
49 Spiritualized Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space
50 Beck Sea Change
51 Björk Homogenic
52 The Magnetic Fields 69 Love Songs
53 Modest Mouse Good News for People Who Love Bad News
54 The National High Violet
55 The Shins Oh, Inverted World
56 Arctic Monkeys Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
57 Yo La Tengo I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One
58 Kanye West Late Registration
59 Massive Attack Mezzanine
60 Burial Untrue
61 Yeah Yeah Yeahs Fever to Tell
62 Boards of Canada Music Has the Right to Children
63 Deerhunter Halcyon Digest
64 Bloc Party Silent Alarm
65 M83 Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
66 Jay-Z The Blueprint
67 Animal Collective Feels
68 Queens of the Stone Age Songs for the Deaf
69 Sigur Rós ( )
70 Franz Ferdinand Franz Ferdinand
71 James Blake James Blake
72 Daft Punk Homework
73 Portishead Third
74 The National Alligator
75 Animal Collective Sung Tongs
76 The Strokes Room on Fire
77 Wilco Summerteeth
78 Elliott Smith XO
79 Justice †
80 Deerhunter Microcastle/Weird Era Cont.
81 TV on the Radio Dear Science
82 Fleet Foxes Helplessness Blues
83 The Knife Silent Shout
84 Outkast Aquemini
85 TV on the Radio Return to Cookie Mountain
86 Built to Spill Keep it Like a Secret
87 Air Moon Safari
88 Vampire Weekend Contra
89 OutKast Speakerboxxx/The Love Below
90 Kanye West Graduation
91 Wolf Parade Apologies to the Queen Mary
92 LCD Soundsystem LCD Soundsystem
93 The Antlers Hospice
94 Jay-Z The Black Album
95 Of Montreal Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
96 Spoon Kill the Moonlight
97 Spoon Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
98 M.I.A. Kala
99 Girls Album
100 The Microphones The Glow, Pt. 2
101 Joanna Newsom Ys
102 Aphex Twin The Richard D. James Album
103 The Dismemberment Plan Emergency and I
104 Built to Spill Perfect from Now On
105 Grizzly Bear Yellow House
106 Interpol Antics
107 M83 Saturdays=Youth
108 The Weeknd House of Balloons
109 Bonnie "Prince" Billy I See a Darkness
110 Blur 13
111 Sufjan Stevens Greetings from Michigan: The Great Lakes State
112 J Dilla Donuts
113 St. Vincent Strange Mercy
114 Justin Timberlake FutureSex/LoveSounds
115 Destroyer Kaputt
116 Feist The Reminder
117 Ryan Adams Heartbreaker
118 Weezer Pinkerton
119 Iron & Wine Our Endless Numbered Days
120 Real Estate Days
121 Eminem The Marshall Mathers LP
122 Girls Father, Son, Holy Ghost
123 Flying Lotus Cosmogramma
124 Elliott Smith Figure 8
125 PJ Harvey Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea
126 Clap Your Hands Say Yeah Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
127 Jay-Z / Kanye West Watch the Throne
128 Sufjan Stevens The Age of Adz
129 Crystal Castles Crystal Castles
130 Band of Horses Everything All the Time
131 Sleigh Bells Treats
132 Japandroids Post-Nothing
133 Yo La Tengo And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out
134 Battles Mirrored
135 My Morning Jacket Z
136 Björk Vespertine
137 Titus Andronicus The Monitor
138 Gorillaz Plastic Beach
139 Sufjan Stevens Seven Swans
140 PJ Harvey Let England Shake
141 St. Vincent Actor
142 tUnE-yArDs w h o k i l l
143 Joanna Newsom The Milk-Eyed Mender
144 The Unicorns Who Will Cut Our Hair When We're Gone?
145 Caribou Swim
146 Passion Pit Manners
147 The Hold Steady Boys and Girls in America
148 Tame Impala Innerspeaker
149 Cat Power You Are Free
150 The Walkmen Bows and Arrows
151 Spoon Gimme Fiction
152 Beck Midnite Vultures
153 Beach House Devotion
154 Yeah Yeah Yeahs It's Blitz
155 Wilco Being There
156 Silver Jews American Water
157 Fugazi The Argument
158 The New Pornographers Twin Cinema
159 Fever Ray Fever Ray
160 Grandaddy The Sophtware Slump
161 D'Angelo VooDoo
162 Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti Before Today
163 Beirut The Flying Club Cup
164 The Streets Original Pirate Material
165 Mogwai Young Team
166 ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead Source Tags & Codes
167 M.I.A. Arular
168 Tom Waits Mule Variations
169 Joanna Newsom Have One on Me
170 The Decemberists The Crane Wife
171 Boards of Canada Geogaddi
172 Frank Ocean Nostalgia, Ultra.
173 Ghostface Killah Supreme Clientele
174 The Libertines Up the Bracket
175 The Tallest Man on Earth The Wild Hunt
176 Robyn Body Talk
177 Janelle Monáe The ArchAndroid
178 Kurt Vile Smoke Ring For My Halo
179 The Rapture Echoes
180 Andrew Bird Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs
181 Kanye West 808s and Heartbreak
182 Clipse Hell Hath No Fury
183 Big Boi Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty
184 TV on the Radio Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes
185 Stereolab Emperor Tomato Ketchup
186 The Wrens The Meadowlands
187 My Morning Jacket It Still Moves
188 The New Pornographers Mass Romantic
189 Godspeed You! Black Emperor Lift Your Skinny Fists like Antennas to Heaven
190 Deerhunter Cryptograms
191 Spoon Girls Can Tell
192 M83 Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts
193 Bright Eyes Fevers and Mirrors
194 Girl Talk Feed the Animals
195 Santogold Santogold
196 Belle And Sebastian The Life Pursuit
197 Cut Copy In Ghost Colours
198 The Pains of Being Pure at Heart The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
199 Drake Take Care
200 Jens Lekman Night Falls Over Kortedala
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Donchano »

I expect we will get the editor list by this week
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Harold »

Donchano wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 3:46 am I expect we will get the editor list by this week
I don't think there is one (unless they've said there will be). They didn't do an editors' list to follow up the last "People's List" 10 years ago and I'm not expecting one now.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by hero »

Am I the only one in the world with a quite normal opinion or approach towards Radiohead. It feels like a lot of music interested people put them down as the greatest band in history, without competition. Here they have six albums in the top 200. Five of those in the top 100, 3 in the top 4.

Even if they are a great band, when you talk to people not that interested in music, they only kind of know Creep and that they made that record OK Computer that's quite good.

I never even heard of anyone with a quite normal approach like my own. Yes, they are a great band, they have made some good records. I listen to them quite often but compare to one kind of music critcs and pitchfork readers I think they must be one of the most overrated bands in history. Which is quite weird when they are so underrated by the general public. Well well, am I the only one with a sober view :)
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Henrik »

hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am Am I the only one in the world with a quite normal opinion or approach towards Radiohead. It feels like a lot of music interested people put them down as the greatest band in history, without competition. Here they have six albums in the top 200. Five of those in the top 100, 3 in the top 4.

Even if they are a great band, when you talk to people not that interested in music, they only kind of know Creep and that they made that record OK Computer that's quite good.

I never even heard of anyone with a quite normal approach like my own. Yes, they are a great band, they have made some good records. I listen to them quite often but compare to one kind of music critcs and pitchfork readers I think they must be one of the most overrated bands in history. Which is quite weird when they are so underrated by the general public. Well well, am I the only one with a sober view :)
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Nassim »

hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am Am I the only one in the world with a quite normal opinion or approach towards Radiohead. It feels like a lot of music interested people put them down as the greatest band in history, without competition. Here they have six albums in the top 200. Five of those in the top 100, 3 in the top 4.

Even if they are a great band, when you talk to people not that interested in music, they only kind of know Creep and that they made that record OK Computer that's quite good.

I never even heard of anyone with a quite normal approach like my own. Yes, they are a great band, they have made some good records. I listen to them quite often but compare to one kind of music critcs and pitchfork readers I think they must be one of the most overrated bands in history. Which is quite weird when they are so underrated by the general public. Well well, am I the only one with a sober view :)
I'm OK with 6 albums in the top 200, though I don't think Hail to the Thief should be there.
I'm also pretty ok with OK Computer and Kid A both being in the top 10, and honestly even if it's a bit of an overkill, the first 2 places seem OK. Really if you look at their data in any country, for any gender of any age, you get those 2 in the top 10.
TPaB, Funeral, Blonde and MBDTF could stop them from hoarding the first 2 spots but that's it, and looking at the votes I think only MBDTF came close.

I loooooove In Rainbows but yeah, #4 is too high, it'd be fine somewhere around the #20 spot. I wouldn't put A Moon Shaped Pool and Amnesiac in the top 100, but I don't find their rankings utterly ridiculous either.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by panam »

hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am Am I the only one in the world with a quite normal opinion or approach towards Radiohead. It feels like a lot of music interested people put them down as the greatest band in history, without competition. Here they have six albums in the top 200. Five of those in the top 100, 3 in the top 4.

Even if they are a great band, when you talk to people not that interested in music, they only kind of know Creep and that they made that record OK Computer that's quite good.

I never even heard of anyone with a quite normal approach like my own. Yes, they are a great band, they have made some good records. I listen to them quite often but compare to one kind of music critcs and pitchfork readers I think they must be one of the most overrated bands in history. Which is quite weird when they are so underrated by the general public. Well well, am I the only one with a sober view :)
It is something that I have also thought about, but it has to do with the ways that music reached people in the 90s. You talk about Radiohead as an obscure band that the masses only know two references and it is true, but if you realize within the 200 albums of that list it is the only band that all their albums were in the Top 10 of Billboard. Then the problem is its overrate responds to the fact that they are in a representative box with bands that never had the same reach to the masses (radio, tv, millionaire promotion). And it is true that 2010's with Kendrick Lamar, Beyonce and Frank Ocean seems to change the landscape, but they are still reluctant artists for an indie audience that rejects the mainstream (everyday less, but still).
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Chris K. »

hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am Am I the only one in the world with a quite normal opinion or approach towards Radiohead. It feels like a lot of music interested people put them down as the greatest band in history, without competition. Here they have six albums in the top 200. Five of those in the top 100, 3 in the top 4.

Even if they are a great band, when you talk to people not that interested in music, they only kind of know Creep and that they made that record OK Computer that's quite good.

I never even heard of anyone with a quite normal approach like my own. Yes, they are a great band, they have made some good records. I listen to them quite often but compare to one kind of music critcs and pitchfork readers I think they must be one of the most overrated bands in history. Which is quite weird when they are so underrated by the general public. Well well, am I the only one with a sober view :)
I suppose an obsessive like me (who put OKC and Kid A as my #1 and 2 and In Rainbows at #5) probably doesn't have a sober view haha. If they had given us room for more than a top 25, I undoubtedly would have have included the other three albums that made the list.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by GabeBr »

the top 15 made up of men only, more female records deserved to be in the top 10, I love Lana's album but Fiona or Björk deserved to take the place of best female record of the last 25 years
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by CarpyDylan »

I voted in this Pitchfork poll and all the top 5 were in my 25 I chose.
I’ve always been a keen reader of Pitchfork ever since I got into Arcade Fires’s ‘Funeral’ when it was voted as their album of year so I guess my selection is always gonna be close.
As for Radiohead, I’m a huge fan a believe they definitely deserve the high rankings for those three landmark albums.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by hero »

panam wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 5:20 pm
hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am
It is something that I have also thought about, but it has to do with the ways that music reached people in the 90s. You talk about Radiohead as an obscure band that the masses only know two references and it is true, but if you realize within the 200 albums of that list it is the only band that all their albums were in the Top 10 of Billboard. Then the problem is its overrate responds to the fact that they are in a representative box with bands that never had the same reach to the masses (radio, tv, millionaire promotion). And it is true that 2010's with Kendrick Lamar, Beyonce and Frank Ocean seems to change the landscape, but they are still reluctant artists for an indie audience that rejects the mainstream (everyday less, but still).
I agree to some degree but making it to the top 10 of Billboard doesn't say that much though about the quality of an album. Radiohead, like some other bands have a large and loyal fanbase. They will buy/stream the album whatever the quality. A little bit like Oasis in the 00's in the UK. Didn't matter how bad the reviews where, it always made UK #1 spot on the album lists.

Of course you are gonna have fans voting for their favorites, especially in readers poll, so for a readers list like this. I have no problem at all Radiohead claiming the top 6 positions. Just state the facts that Radiohead fans are also readers of that specific paper. What makes my head scratch a bit when it comes to Radiohead, is that it feels like so many critics act like fans and not journalists or critics, placing them as the greatest band of all time, which in my opinion, objectively they're clearly not. It's like when Laura Snapes of NME voted for four The National albums in her top 5 in their 500 greatest album lists. That's a vote on her favorite band, not the five greatest albums in the world.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Chris K. »

hero wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 12:44 pm
panam wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 5:20 pm
hero wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 8:05 am
What makes my head scratch a bit when it comes to Radiohead, is that it feels like so many critics act like fans and not journalists or critics, placing them as the greatest band of all time, which in my opinion, objectively they're clearly not. It's like when Laura Snapes of NME voted for four The National albums in her top 5 in their 500 greatest album lists. That's a vote on her favorite band, not the five greatest albums in the world.
I would say that objectively they are *one* of the greatest bands of all time (my personal favorite). But that's just my opinion as well. Perhaps there's no way to say they are or they aren't objectively. That said, I don't expect critics to vote for anything other than their favorite albums. Otherwise they become subject to the fashionable opinions of the moment (something that I have had a problem with PF for since the dawn of their existence).
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Rob »

Nassim wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 1:06 pm This list is a bit strange, it seems more in line with the Pitchfork from 10 years ago than the recent one (with some caveats, not sure 10 year ago Pitchfork would have voted for ANTI- at all or for 3 Taylor Swift albums) so it kinda seems like us old Pitchfork readers that will stick with them but keep on complaining about their changes might be the majority.
I don't think it is all that strange. One thing I wondered when Pitchfork and many other critical outfits suddenly 'abandoned' indie and alternative and indie for mainstream and poptimism was whether their regular readers agreed with that extreme whiplash. It seemed unlikely and this list more or less confirms this.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Sweepstakes Ron »

I wonder if they're feeling real stupid now about downrating Turn on the Bright Lights recently.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by hero »

Chris K. wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 3:59 pm
hero wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 12:44 pm
panam wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 5:20 pm
I would say that objectively they are *one* of the greatest bands of all time (my personal favorite). But that's just my opinion as well. Perhaps there's no way to say they are or they aren't objectively. That said, I don't expect critics to vote for anything other than their favorite albums. Otherwise they become subject to the fashionable opinions of the moment (something that I have had a problem with PF for since the dawn of their existence).
Both yes and no! Tastes are personal so in one way it's absolutely impossible to say that something is good or that it is bad. But critics are to see it as objective as they can. If A Moon Shaped Pool would have sounded exactly the same, but it was Hoobastank that released it, would it still have been on the end of year lists? I'd say no. Because I think the in many cases is more about who releases it, then what they release.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by BleuPanda »

hero wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 3:03 pm
Chris K. wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 3:59 pm
hero wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 12:44 pm

I would say that objectively they are *one* of the greatest bands of all time (my personal favorite). But that's just my opinion as well. Perhaps there's no way to say they are or they aren't objectively. That said, I don't expect critics to vote for anything other than their favorite albums. Otherwise they become subject to the fashionable opinions of the moment (something that I have had a problem with PF for since the dawn of their existence).
Both yes and no! Tastes are personal so in one way it's absolutely impossible to say that something is good or that it is bad. But critics are to see it as objective as they can. If A Moon Shaped Pool would have sounded exactly the same, but it was Hoobastank that released it, would it still have been on the end of year lists? I'd say no. Because I think the in many cases is more about who releases it, then what they release.
This is a nonsense point. People like Radiohead because they consistently make outstanding albums - and if people like Radiohead albums just because they are Radiohead albums, than why is The King of Limbs so easily tossed aside by those same people?

It's clear a lot of people love A Moon Shaped Pool, and you're coming off as a condescending, self-important jerk by trying to imply other people only like music for brand recognition.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Schüttelbirne »

Loose thoughts again. Writing a coherent text would be far more exhausting, so I will leave you with this.

1. The persona of a well-known band will always be behind its releases which makes them appear far more important than the records of no-name bands. There actually aren't a lot of ways to even encounter a new release:
a) Name recognition
b) Recommendation
c) Random encounter
The reason Radiohead's albums are listened to by so many people is clearly a), that's undeniable.

2. The concept of the author goes so far as to shape the way we listen to a certain artist. Everybody knows we have biases and biases against certain artists are certainly included. I think a lot of people here have had the experience of listening to an album by an artist they didn't like and thinking it's not as bad as previously thought.

3. Most artists don't have bad name recognition (like Limp Bizkit around here), they don't have name recognition at all. Very few people listen to their music.

4. Journalists and critics are gate-keepers. They are able to elevate a band with no name recognition to a band with name recognition (good or bad). If a lot of critics give bad reviews, the band will have bad name recognition, if the reviews are good, the name recognition will be good. In any case, it will influence the opinion of people. (We're firmly in the territory of recommendation here, btw, so we see that recommendations (b) influence name recognition (a) directly.)

5. That means that critics and journalists are responsible for a lot of encounters with new music, because they recommend it. This pushes their name recognition which makes people listen to their records without additional promotion because they recognize the name.

6. Ultimately, hero's example isn't a good one, because (as far as I know) Hoobastank is more in the territory of "bad name recognition" which will already disqualify them from being on a critics' list, unless there's a constructed "comeback" or "finally, a good one" narrative.

7. That means, if "A Moon Shaped Pool" was made by by Radiohead, but released under a different name, with no additional promotion, it wouldn't have been as high on critics' lists because of the lack of name recognition.

8. At least, that's a theory, but name recognition goes further than that. We do not only recognize the name of a band by seeing it spellt out, but rather by the sound we've become accustomed to. Clearly somebody will pick up that it's a Radiohead album, or at least an album that sounds like Radiohead and will construct a narrative like "the new Radiohead" or "cheap Radiohead copy" around it.

9. This is all just a thought experiment, but I do think the influence of a band's persona on the perception of its music is very big.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by BleuPanda »

The problem is almost every artist getting on EOY lists has brand recognition, not just Radiohead. And there are still new artists popping up and doing well.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by hero »

Schüttelbirne wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 5:21 pm Loose thoughts again. Writing a coherent text would be far more exhausting, so I will leave you with this.

1. The persona of a well-known band will always be behind its releases which makes them appear far more important than the records of no-name bands. There actually aren't a lot of ways to even encounter a new release:
a) Name recognition
b) Recommendation
c) Random encounter
The reason Radiohead's albums are listened to by so many people is clearly a), that's undeniable.

2. The concept of the author goes so far as to shape the way we listen to a certain artist. Everybody knows we have biases and biases against certain artists are certainly included. I think a lot of people here have had the experience of listening to an album by an artist they didn't like and thinking it's not as bad as previously thought.

3. Most artists don't have bad name recognition (like Limp Bizkit around here), they don't have name recognition at all. Very few people listen to their music.

4. Journalists and critics are gate-keepers. They are able to elevate a band with no name recognition to a band with name recognition (good or bad). If a lot of critics give bad reviews, the band will have bad name recognition, if the reviews are good, the name recognition will be good. In any case, it will influence the opinion of people. (We're firmly in the territory of recommendation here, btw, so we see that recommendations (b) influence name recognition (a) directly.)

5. That means that critics and journalists are responsible for a lot of encounters with new music, because they recommend it. This pushes their name recognition which makes people listen to their records without additional promotion because they recognize the name.

6. Ultimately, hero's example isn't a good one, because (as far as I know) Hoobastank is more in the territory of "bad name recognition" which will already disqualify them from being on a critics' list, unless there's a constructed "comeback" or "finally, a good one" narrative.

7. That means, if "A Moon Shaped Pool" was made by by Radiohead, but released under a different name, with no additional promotion, it wouldn't have been as high on critics' lists because of the lack of name recognition.

8. At least, that's a theory, but name recognition goes further than that. We do not only recognize the name of a band by seeing it spellt out, but rather by the sound we've become accustomed to. Clearly somebody will pick up that it's a Radiohead album, or at least an album that sounds like Radiohead and will construct a narrative like "the new Radiohead" or "cheap Radiohead copy" around it.

9. This is all just a thought experiment, but I do think the influence of a band's persona on the perception of its music is very big.
Spot on, I agree with pretty much everything you write here. Just to clarify, I just wanted to point out that Hoobastank as an example, because of the fact that they have a bad name recognition, which normally means that they're not gonna end up on the EOY lists, even though the would have made a record just as good as Radioheads AMSP. And let me say that I like A Moon Shape Pool and not a single album from Hoobastank.

And I think you forget one aspect. Critics definitely influence what people listen to and in the end that kind of recognition they'll get. But I think they influence each other just as much. "Ohh everyone acclaimes that album" we need to put out a positive review or the other way around. I know for a fact that in one of the Swedish biggest daily papers a critic gave Oasis Dig Out Your Soul a 5/5 review, but before publishing it, he was told that there's no way we can give Oasis a 5 star review. "It's not the 90's" and it ended up a 3-star review but with the same text.
Last edited by hero on Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:56 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by hero »

BleuPanda wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 4:53 pm
hero wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 3:03 pm
Chris K. wrote: Tue Oct 19, 2021 3:59 pm
This is a nonsense point. People like Radiohead because they consistently make outstanding albums - and if people like Radiohead albums just because they are Radiohead albums, than why is The King of Limbs so easily tossed aside by those same people?

It's clear a lot of people love A Moon Shaped Pool, and you're coming off as a condescending, self-important jerk by trying to imply other people only like music for brand recognition.
I thought an acclaimed music forum is exactly where you could discuss these kind of things, disagreeing is of course fine, but without calling each other jerks.

For me The King of the Limbs are a good example. As I written multiple times in this thread earlier, I think Radiohead is a great band. I have three Radiohead albums in my top 250 albums of all time. But I think King of the Limbs was an album to toss aside as you put it. Still, it ended up pretty much on all EOY-lists, e.g. Rolling Stone put it in 5th. I don't think that would have happened if their bands name wouldn't have been Radiohead. That's my belief at least, you can agree or disagree.
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Re: Pitchfork (Readers) - Top 200 Albums of the Last 25 Years

Post by Edre Depeche Head »

hero wrote: Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:44 pm For me The King of the Limbs are a good example. As I written multiple times in this thread earlier, I think Radiohead is a great band. I have three Radiohead albums in my top 250 albums of all time. But I think King of the Limbs was an album to toss aside as you put it. Still, it ended up pretty much on all EOY-lists, e.g. Rolling Stone put it in 5th. I don't think that would have happened if their bands name wouldn't have been Radiohead. That's my belief at least, you can agree or disagree.
For me I disagree but understand your sentiment. Their name without a doubt helped TKOL but I personally enjoy the album and believe that even them making a weird detour is better than a lot of other albums out there.
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