End of a decade – it’s perhaps going to get overlooked somewhat, but this is the last year of the 2000s (“noughties”?). And it’s been quite a decade in all sorts of ways. Personally, I had my 18th birthday in 2000, so it’s been a decade in which much has changed. Musically, while styles have come and gone, the way in which music is distributed, publicised and listened to has been – and for once I think this term is not hyperbolic – revolutionised.
So, at the end of this year, I’m going to compile a Top 100 albums of the decade. Not “the” Top 100, just “a” Top 100. My Top 100. The exercise has its limits, of course: I’m sure there will be 100 albums I would have liked even more had I heard them; and I’m sure there will be 100 albums any reader will consider more worthy of inclusion. But for what little it’s worth I’m going to try to balance my taste with a dash of objectivity and produce a list that might hopefully have a bit of credibility to it.
I mention this now to invite others to think about doing the same: it needs thought, and I’ve already started an Excel spreadsheet. But it would be nice to read others’ reflections, not least as I’m an abiding fan of albums as a way of presenting music, and by 2019 we may not have them at all.
Some rules I’ll be sticking to, but others needn’t: only one album per artist unless there’s a really really good case for including a second (if that artist has really produced two completely different, incomparable albums in totally different genres, fair enough – but otherwise, grow a pair and make a choice); no cheating by including albums release in one territory in 1999 and then elsewhere in 2000; er… that’s it, probably. Of course, it must be an album, released as an album (even if only self-released by the artist) and merit inclusion because it works as an album, not because it just has a few brilliant tracks on it or is by an important or favourite artist. I’ve whittled the list down considerably by that logic alone.
So, music geeks – you’ve got six months. Off you go!
