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VH1.com's Best Of The Year
It was the year that music lost its head. Big stars delivered flops and retreated into rehab. Record companies responded to financial freeze by letting the fringe acts do a free fall. No one knew where the new mega-stars might come from, but thank you Alicia Keys, Staind, Ryan Adams and Linkin Park for showing up anyway. So what albums rocked VH1.com’s world? We asked our staff. They answered. You read. |
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> Buy It! |
Bob Dylan Love And Theft (Columbia)
For this grizzled hero, vitality is tied to wit, and wit is tied to wordplay. This is his most animated disc in ages. So as the music spills forward, there are great rhymes in the poesy driving these diary entries, campfire stories, and morality plays. |
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> Buy It! |
Missy Elliott Miss E … So Addictive (The Gold Mind, Inc./Elektra)
If only one album could represent this year’s hurly burly, it would have to be Miss E: Sex, drugs, cutting edge electronic bleeps, and in the middle of it all, a fierce MC, flying her freak flag. |
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> Buy It! |
Alicia Keys Songs in A Minor (J-records)
Time will tell where Keys' imagination will take her, especially since she has the power to make her soul sound like Yes. But on her debut, Keys wrapped up her tender lifetime in tunes both wise and classy.
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> Buy It! |
Nick Lowe The Convincer (Yep Roc)
Some things never go out of style. Then again, some things never were in style. Fortunately, once and future pub rocker Nick Lowe carries on. This low-key collection, which contains some of the driest country songs ever recorded, finds him wielding his wit as deftly as Errol Flynn. |
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> Buy It! |
N*E*R*D In Search Of (Virgin Import)
The familiar Neptunes bounce heard on tracks by Britney Spears ("I’m a Slave 4 U") and Jay-Z ("I Just Wanna Love U") is by now inescapable, but never sounded better or more pertinent on their own debut. |
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> Buy It! |
Radiohead Amnesiac (Capitol)
In all the hubbub about Radiohead’s metamorphosis into mad scientists, everyone overlooked that they still write a smashing tune. Part two of their "We Hate Us" diptych cuts contempt with genuine humanity. |
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> Buy It! |
Sigur Ros Ágætis Byrjun (PIAS America)
Ros arrived with a placard boasting the phrase "Iceland’s biggest band." Their American debut was so epic no one cared that their shtick of playing guitars with violin bows might be heralded as the new prog. |
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> Buy It! |
The Strokes Is This It (RCA)
What was worse? Hearing how great the Strokes were supposed to be, or realizing it was true after spinning their perpetually buzzed-about debut? When the hype clears, Is This It will sound then as it does now - cool below zero. |
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> Buy It! |
Travis The Invisible Band (Epic/Indepentente)
For their second assault on American radio, Travis once again cast themselves as James Taylor in short pants - the band's about sweetly sung acoustic tunes you can whistle. Indeed, The Invisible Band was bursting with such ditties. |
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> Buy It! |
Rufus Wainwright Poses (DreamWorks)
Folk scion Rufus sneaked a grand piano past the Chelsea Hotel’s doorman to hone the seedy show tunes that make his sophomore effort so compelling. Turn to "Grey Gardens" for ruined majesty and "California" for bitchy satire. |
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> Back to The Year In Music |
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