Live4ever’s Essential Albums rundown continues today with Part 3, which features acts including Manic Street Preachers, Smoke Fairies and Band Of Horses.
Once you’ve been through this part of our list, why not do us a favour and recommend your own stand-outs from 2010. Leave us a comment below telling us what has rocked your 2010 to be in with a chance of winning a selection of prizes from acts featured on our own rundown.
30: Interpol – Interpol
Their final album with enigmatic bassist Carlos Dengler, the now trademark brooding tones are present on a record which has again just fallen short of delivering the level of success they deserve.
29: Manic Street Preachers – Postcards From a Young Man
‘One last shot at mass communication’ is how the Manics described their latest release, and there’s certainly a more mainstream feel which has produced some of their biggest radio hits to date.
28: Smoke Fairies – Through Low Light and Trees
The British duo of Katherine Blamire and Jessica Davies deliver a haunting, other-wordly debut release which sets the bar high early on with ‘Summer Fades’ and never lets it drop.
27: The Magnetic Fields – Realism
One of Stephin Merritt’s most accessible albums, tracks such as ‘You Must Be Out Of Your Mind’ and ‘We Are Having a Hootenany’ stand out as some of the most unashamedly merry pop songs of 2010.
26: The Drums – The Drums
The subject of so much industry hype at the start of the year, the New York band managed that rare feat of backing up the fuss by delivering a consistent debut album.
25: Bombay Bicycle Club – Flaws
A bold return from the London band who emerged from the shadows of middle-of-the-road indie to deliver an impressive, poignant acoustic-led record.
24: Tame Impala – Innerspeaker
Oozing with psychedelia, an album honed in one of the most isolated cities in the world deals understandably with introspection on of the talked about albums of the 2010.
23: Band Of Horses – Infinite Arms
Their previous releases had threatened an ‘Infinite Arms’, and it arrived this year as a hook-laden collection of potential singles which the US band had promised for so long.
22: Field Music – Field Music (Measure)
Quality is slightly hampered by being expanded to a double album, however ‘Measure’ is a master of British songwriting led by the excellent single ‘Them That Do Nothing’.
21: Best Coast – Crazy For You
The California-based indie band dispatch half an hour of dreamy, lo-fi surf pop on their debut album conveniently released last summer through Mexican Summer records.
Live4ever’s Essential Listening 2010 – The Albums: 40-31
Live4ever’s Essential Listening 2010 – The Albums: 50-41
