The 25 Best Live Performances of 2010

1. Wake Up – John Legend and the Roots (Unstaged)



2. King of Anything – Sara Bareilles and the Backbeats (The Sing-Off)



3. Runaway - Kanye West and Pusha T (MTV Video Music Awards)



4. Breathless - Taylor Swift (Hope for Haiti Now)

5. You and Me – Dave Matthews Band (2010 Grammy Awards)

6. Need You Now – Adele and Darius Rucker (CMT Artists of the Year)

7. Hard Times Come Again No More – Mary J. Blige featuring The Roots (Hope for Haiti Now)

8. Blame It – Jamie Foxx, T-Pain, Doug E. Fresh and Slash (Grammy Awards)

9. Dog Days Are Over – Florence and the Machine (MTV Video Music Awards)

10. Shutterbug – Big Boi and the Roots (Late Night with Jimmy Fallon)

11. Lean on Me – Sheryl Crow, Kid Rock, and Keith Urban (Hope for Haiti Now)

12. Down on the Corner – Streetcorner Symphony (The Sing-Off)

13. Peace / Crazy / Love Train – Yusef Islam, Ozzy Osborne and The O’Jays (Rally to Restore Sanity and / or Fear)

14. Alone and Forsaken – Neil Young and Dave Matthews (Hope for Haiti Now)

15. Earth Song - Michael Jackson, Carrie Underwood, Smokey Robinson, Celine Dion, Jennifer Hudson, and Usher (2010 Grammy Awards)

16. Breakeven – The Back Beats (The Sing-Off)

17. Chasing Pirates – Norah Jones and the Roots (Late Night with Jimmy Fallon)

18. Yesterday – Neil Diamond and Herbie Hancock (Stand Up 2 Cancer)

19. The House of the Rising Sun – Jerry Lawson and Talk of the Town (The Sing -Off)

20. Mine – Maroon 5 (CMT Artists of the Year)

21. We Shall Overcome – Bruce Springsteen (Hope for Haiti Now)

22. Won’t Back Down – Eminem and the Roots (Late Night with Jimmy Fallon)

23. Straight Outta Compton – Ice Cube and the Roots (Late Night with Jimmy Fallon)

24. Send Me and Angel – Alicia Keys (Hope for Haiti Now)

25. Gone – Ben Folds and Streetcorner Symphony (The Sing-Off)

The 25 Best Albums of 2010

If you interested in buying any of the albums below, click on the album title to go to Amazon and the artist name to download it in iTunes. Also check out my orginal album reviews in the link under the album where for those I reviewed.

1. Brothers - The Black Keys

2. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy - Kanye West
Is Hip-Hop Just a Euphemism for a New Religion?

3. Sigh No More - Mumford & Sons

4. The Lady Killer - Cee Lo Green
I Guess He's an X-Box and I'm More Atari

5. Contra - Vampire Weekend
Here Comes that Feeling You Thought You'd Forgotten

6. Catching a Tiger - Lissie

7. Kaleidoscope Heart - Sara Bareilles
I'm Going Down, Follow if You Wanna

8. Speak Now - Taylor Swift
All Those Other Girls, Well They're Beautiful, but Would They Writea Song for You?

9. Wake Up! - John Legend and The Roots

10. Love Letter - R. Kelly
I Want to Bring Love Songs Back to the Radio

11. American VI: Ain't No Grave - Johnny Cash
Until We Meet Again

12. Eric Clapton - Eric Clapton

13. To the Sea - Jack Johnson

14. Infinite Arms - Band of Horses

15. How I Got Over - The Roots
Look How They Got Me on the Def Jam Payment Plan

16. The Velveteen Age - Diane Birch with The Phenomenal Handclap Band

17. Transference - Transference - Spoon
Got Nothing to lose but Loneliness and Patterns

18. The ArchAndroid - Janelle Monáe

19. God Willin' and the Creek Don't Rise - Ray LaMontagne and the Pariah Dogs
Can I Come Home for the Summer, I Could Slow Down a Little While

20. Court Yard Hounds - Court Yard Hounds
I Was Raising Can, Now I'm Raising Babies

21. Record Collection - Mark Ronson & The Business Intl.
I Only Want to Be in Yoyr Record Collection

22. The High Road - Broken Bells
The Dawn to End All Nights; That's All We Hoped it Was

23. Release Me - The Like

24. My Best Friend Is You - My Best Friend Is You - Kate Nash
I Don't Careif We're Just Friends, I CanHang out with Myself

25. Plastic Beach - Gorillaz

Breaking Down the 100 Greatest Albums of the 00’s

Some say we will look back at the 00’s as the decade when the full length album died, and for the most part they will be right. Sure albums will never go away as long as there are people stupid enough to plop down ten dollars for an album with only a good song or two. But the album as an event has long passed. In this instant gratification day and age, we just want to get to the three minutes of musical joy instead of having to spend a whole album digesting an album. I cannot remember one album I sat around with a bunch of friends last decade dissecting it with friends like I did back in the ninties (granted this may be an age thing).

So my list of the 100 Greatest Albums of the 00’s is less about a cohesive album (which there were very few of in the 00’s) than just a collection of twelve good to great songs. I’m sure there can be griping of albums I left out, but when compiling a list of albums for consideration, I only included albums I actual spent money on (or had someone else buy for me, with the obvious exception of two albums on the list), and when it comes down to it, if I didn’t even bother to drop ten dollars (or even less at discount prices), it is not something worthy of my list anyway. Here is how my list broke down by the numbers.

Artists with Multiple Albums
Dave Matthews (Band) – 5
Jack Johnson – 4
John Mayer (Trio) – 4
Ryan Adams (and the Cardinals) - 4
Alicia Keys – 3
Coldplay – 3
Danger Mouse (Gnarls Barkley) – 3
Kanye West – 3
Michelle Branch (The Wreckers) – 3
The Roots – 3
U2 - 3

Albums by Year
2000 – 6
2001 – 12
2002 – 11
2003 – 8
2004 – 9
2005 – 12
2006 – 8
2007 – 10
2008 – 14
2009 – 10

Albums by Genre
Rock - 19
Rap - 15
Alternative – 14
Pop - 13
Adult Contemporary – 11
RnB - 9
Folk - 8
Country - 5
Blues - 3
Hard Rock - 3

The Ten Most Anticipated Albums of Fall 2010

We are coming upon the fourth quarter which means record companies will actually start releasing albums in hopes that you will buy some to giveaway at Christmas. Please note that release dates are subject to change. Click the album name (or album artwork) to pre-order it on Amazon. Click the artist’s name for their iTunes page.

1. Dark Twisted Fantasy (working title) – Kanye West (11/16): He really shouldn’t be this high considering his last album was one of the worst of last decade. But this will be a return to rap, and it is hard not to get excited when the album will be headlined by two stellar tracks, Power and Runaway. I suspect there will be plenty of toasting to this douchebag this fall.

2. Speak Now - Taylor Swift (10/25): And how can you mention Kanye West without Taylor Swift? She gave us a definitive answer at the Video Music Awards to the question of if she would be addressing the Kanye incident from last year on the new album. Between Innocent and Mine, it sounds like Taylor is growing up quickly and moving further away from her country roots.

3. Wake Up! – John Legend & The Roots (Today): Fall 2010 looks like the season of collaborations with Ben Folds teaming with writer Nick Hornsby, Elthon John recording with his idol Leon Russell, and Mark Ronson hooking up with, well, everyone. But the union I am most interested in is this one from The Roots and John Legend covering mostly obscure soul records.

4. Record Collection – Mark Ronson & The Business Intl. (9/28): After bringing retro back in style with Amy Winehouse, Lily Allen, and his second album, Ronson has been working with Duran Duran and that comes though in a big way on this album which sounds very synth heavy. Look for appearances by Q-Tip, Ghostface Killer, Boy George, D’Angelo, and Simon LeBon himself.

5. Come Around Sundown – Kings of Leon (10/19): After their breakout with Only by the Night it is interesting how the Followell boys will follow up the success. From the sound of first single Radioactive, it will be more of the same.

6. Hands all Over – Maroon 5 (Today): After a pretty good debut album, every successive Maroon 5 album has gotten blander than the previous one. First single Misery doesn’t give me too much hope that Hands all Over will turn that around, but the album was produced by hair-band uber-producer Mutt Lange, so maybe it will be worth a listen.

7. Second Chance - El DeBarge (9/28): C’mon, who isn’t down with an El Debarge comeback? One can only be disappointed in that he didn’t bring the whole family with him.

8. Lonely Avenue – Ben Folds and Nick Hornby (9/28): Here was an album I had to do a double take when I first saw it announced. Quirky pop master Ben Folds and novelist Nick Hornby. For illiterates like me that are unaware of Hornby, his books that have been turned into movies include High Fidelity (which was number 10 on my list of The 100 Greatest Movies of the 00’s), About a Boy, and Fever Pitch (but do not blame him about the horrible adaptation because his book was actually about soccer). Hornby contributed the lyrics with Folds coming up with the music including a song about Alaska’s least favorite son Levi Johnston.

9. The Lady Killer - Cee Lo Green (12/7): I really was not interested in a Cee-Lo album that didn’t involve Danger Mouse, but after hearing the ultra-catchy (Explative Deleted) You, color me intrigued. But seriously, after this, lets get another Gnarls Barkley album out please.

10. Hot Sauce Committee part 1 - Beastie Boys (TBA): Putting this on the list may be a bit of wishful thinking because there is no release date announced yet, but with Adam Yauch doing better these days, he’s hoping he is well enough to do the rigors that surround promoting a new album.




Other albums of note:

Today
The Sound of Sunshine – Michael Franti and Spearhead
Guitar Heaven: The Greatest Guitar Classics of All Time – Santana
You Get What You Give – Zac Brown Band
A Year Without Rain – Selena Gomez and the Scene

September 28
Clapton – Eric Clapton
Invented – Jimmy Eat World
Pete Yorn – Pete Yorn
Le Noise – Neil Young
6: Commitment - Seal
The Dissent of Man – Bad Religion
Going Back – Phil Collins

October 5
Tiger Suit – KT Tunstall
Glow – Donavon Frankenreiter

October 12
Charleston, SC 1966 – Darius Rucker
The Rock and the Tide – Joshua Radin
The Age of Adz – Sufjan Stevens

October 19
Sale el Sol - Shakira
The Union – Elton John and Leon Russell
Libra Scale – Ne-Yo
Fly Me to the Moon... The Great American Songbook Volume V - Rod Stewart

October 26
Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager - Kid Cudi

November 2
...Featuring Norah Jones – Norah Jones
National Ransom – Elvis Costello
Dreams – Neil Diamond
Sidewalks – Matt and Kim

November 16
Born Free – Kid Rock
Loud – Rihanna

November 23
Hard Times and Nursery Rhymes – Social Distortion

Unknown Dates
Songs of Ascent – U2
The Believer – Common
Walk with Me Now and Fly with Me Later – DMX
Give Till it’s Gone – Ben Harper and Relentless7
Nothing – N.E.R.D.

And what would a music preview be without an obligatory this may actually be the season that Dr. Dre releases Detox mention.