In my heart of hearts, I may just be a Decade Truther™—someone who thinks (ok, knows) that the current decade doesn’t end until the end of this year. But everyone else is doing this now, and I hate to miss out, y’know. So here are my top albums of, erm, the past 10 years.
10. Third Coast Percussion, Steve Reich (2016) – As you’ll see, every entry on this list is a folk-y or roots-y or Americana album of some sort. Every album but one, that is. That must mean something, right? If a singer-songwriter-wannabe like me falls so completely for an album of avant-garde percussion music, it must be something, eh? It really is. TCP starts things off with its warm recording of Reich’s absorbing Mallet Quartet. But the good stuff just keeps coming.
9. J.S. Ondara, Tales of America (2019) – Just a few days ago, y’know, I rhapsodized about Tales, and particularly its first three songs. It’s hard to imagine an album getting off to a stronger start. But from beginning to end, Tales asks all the right questions about love and life. I’ll still be listening in 10 years, I’m sure.
8. Jeremy Dutcher, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa (2018) – Dutcher, a Wolastoqiyik member of New Brunswick’s Tobique First Nation, rightfully earned the Polaris Prize for Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa. A classically trained tenor, Dutcher sampled Wolastoq songs from a 110-year-old wax cylinder, composing haunting arias around them. The resulting album is important, but it’s also just downright enjoyable.
7. Amanda Shires, To the Sunset (2018) – I’m not entirely sure what convinced Shires to pair her idiosyncratic, folk-y/Americana vocals with a synth-y, almost poppy vibe, but I’m so glad she did. It worked. And the songwriting sparkles, too. To the Sunset opens with “Parking Lot Pirouette,” a song about the sudden realization that, dang it, you’re in love. It was my favorite song of 2018. And the album ends, poignantly, with “Wasn’t I Paying Attention,” a song that asks if a lost friend could’ve been saved. Those two poles frame a helluva record.
6. John Moreland, High on Tulsa Heat (2015) – There are so many references on Tulsa Heat for an Okie like me to catch. Cleveland County. The endless Indian Nation sky. The “spinning devastation” of a tornado lullaby. But you don’t have to be from Muskogee or Del City to understand raw heartache and loneliness. And you sure don’t have to be a local to appreciate how Moreland’s raspy, unadorned vocals suit his confessional lyrics.
5. Lydia Loveless, Indestructible Machine (2011) – This was the first album of the, erm, decade that really caused me to sit down and pay attention. Barely 21 at the time, Loveless somehow managed to make an album that evoked both Loretta Lynn (or Tanya Tucker, if you prefer) and punk. I’m still marveling at the album’s brilliant three-song stretch (“How Many Women,” “Jesus Was a Wino,” “Steve Earle”) about womanizers, booze, and men who refuse to take the hint. Those are the themes, y’know? If I had a criticism, it’d be that Indestructible Machine is a song or two too short. But that’s just another way of saying it’s a near-masterpiece. It really is. P.S. One of the highlights of my 2010s: sitting at an empty bar in Philly’s Northern Liberties while Loveless and her band talked after (or was it before?) a set. So much fun!
4. Robert Ellis, Lights from the Chemical Plant (2014) – “Chemical Plant,” which has young lovers in a small town seeing Something Important™—all too briefly—in the lights from the town’s chemical plant, really gets to me. I know that small town; I know those lights. It’s absolutely one of the best songs of the 2010s. But the entire album is special. The songs, built on stories of longing and loneliness, are smart and evocative. And Ellis’s gentle, almost brittle delivery really suits the subject matter.
3. Justin Townes Earle, Harlem River Blues (2010) – Harlem River Blues is a 21st-century Jimmie Rodgers or Hank Williams album. Seriously, if either of them lived in Brooklyn in the 2010s, the train engineers in his songs would be working on the subway. And the dark, metaphysical stuff would take place in the Harlem River. Right? A decade later, those particular songs (“Workin’ for the MTA,” the title track) are etched in my mind. As is “Christchurch Woman,” a super-catchy love song. I love Harlem River Blues from start to finish.
2. Jason Isbell, Southeastern (2013) – When I first started writing about Isbell, it felt like I needed to let folks in on something good. Now everybody knows. He’s (pretty darn) arguably the artist of the decade. Four(!) of his albums made my Top 10 lists in the Teens. And the best of those albums is Southeastern, an album that emphasizes Isbell’s agreeable voice and his strong, strong songwriting (especially “Cover Me Up,” “Elephant,” and “Stockholm”). We’re all Jason Isbell fans now, and that’s as it should be.
1. Iris Dement, Sing the Delta (2012) – Dement, a national treasure, recorded three near-perfect albums in the 1990s. And then there was almost nothing new, just a 2008 album of gospel standards, for over 15 years. I can’t say the wait was worth it—the wait was too damn long, Iris Dement!—but she somehow returned with yet another exquisite album. In naming it my favorite album of 2012, I called out the brilliant songwriting (“The Night I Learned How Not to Pray,” “Livin’ on the Inside,” and the title track, among others) as well as the “beautiful, ethereal vocals.” I wasn’t wrong on either score. Sing the Delta may not be easy to find today—among other things, it’s not available on Spotify—but you should absolutely make the effort. It’s the album of the decade (or, at least, the 2010s).
Runners-up: Arcade Fire, The Suburbs (2010); Aziza Brahim, Soutak (2014); Drive-By Truckers, American Band (2016); Darren Hayman, Chants for Socialists (2015); Iron & Wine, Beast Epic (2017); Vikingur Ólafsson, Philip Glass: Piano Works (2017); T’Monde, Making Believe (2012); Tanya Tagaq, Animism (2014).
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