Let’s face it.
A lot of shit went down in the past decade, and, if you’re anything like me, you needed a soundtrack to get through the toughest times.
What follows is a list of 30 albums that resonated more deeply than everything else I’ve heard since the ball dropped on 2010. I considered writing a capsule review for each selection, but the best way to absorb the impact of these works is to just listen for yourself.
The Black Keys – “Brothers” (2010)
Arcade Fire – “The Suburbs” (2010)
Son of the Sun – “The Happy Loss” (2010)
The Civil Wars – “Barton Hollow” (2011)
Beastie Boys – “Hot Sauce Committee Part Two” (2011)
Shilpa Ray and Her Happy Hookers – “Teenage and Torture” (2011)
Foo Fighters – “Wasting Light” (2011)
Rush – “Clockwork Angels” (2012)
Bob Dylan – “Tempest” (2012)
Neil Young and Crazy Horse – “Psychedelic Pill” (2012)
Steven Wilson – “The Raven That Refused to Sing (And Other Stories)” (2013)
Savages – “Silence Yourself” (2013)
Queens of the Stone Age – “…Like Clockwork” (2013)
David Bowie – “The Next Day” (2013)
The War on Drugs – “Lost in the Dream” (2014)
Lana Del Rey – “Ultraviolence” (2014)
You + Me – “Rose Ave.” (2014)
Jackson Browne – “Standing in the Breach” (2014)
The Black Keys – “Turn Blue” (2014)
Kendrick Lamar – “To Pimp a Butterfly” (2015)
Iron Maiden – “The Book of Souls” (2015)
Sleater Kinney – “No Cities to Love” (2015)
Radiohead – “A Moon Shaped Pool” (2016)
David Bowie – “Blackstar” (2016)
Kendrick Lamar – “Damn.” (2017)
Spoon – “Hot Thoughts” (2017)
Beck – “Colors” (2017)
Judas Priest – “Firepower” (2018)
3.2 – “The Rules Have Changed” (2018)
Tool – “Fear Inoculum” (2019)