2011 Top 10 List

andrew chalk - violins by night
wild flag - wild flag
andy stott - passed me by/we stay together
kyle bobby dunn - ways of meaning
ty segal - goodbye bread
grouper - dream loss/alien observer
meg baird - seasons on earth
big troubles - romantic comedy
nicholas szczepanik - please stop loving me
cave - neverendless
raspberry bulbs - nature tries again
idea fire company - music from the impossible salon
shabazz palaces - black up
barn owl - lost in the glare/shadowland
black eagle child - lobelia
kwjaz - kwjaz
cindytalk - hold everything dear
metal mountains - golden trees
richard youngs - amplifying host
steve hauschildt - tragedy and geometry
yob - atma
charalambides - exile
the renderers - a rocket into nothing
v/a - its not the spaces you know but between them

While it is useless to predict what the music critics of the future will decide what was important in 2011, here are some records I really liked and think more people should listen to. They aren't what I thought were the most zeitgesity (although a few certainly are), but what I personally thought was great. Each one of these albums brought me immense joy over the past year, and I hope you, dear reader, find something new and wonderful. Unnumbered, in random order.