2016's best albums - according to Mojo magazine

From this list? Probably Bon Iver. Latter half knockout, as far as I'm concerned. Blackstar is pretty high up there as well. Outside of the list there's a few others I'd consider.

But we still have a month+ left. You never know what else might sneak in.

 

If I had to pick one from this list, it would be Bon Iver - 22, A Million - really a unique sounding and challenging album.

 

From that list, I went with Blackstar. Bowie's last two albums were pretty amazing.

But honourable mentions go to both Radiohead and PJ Harvey.

 

Monthly UK magazines always reveal their top albums about this time of year which means A Tribe Called Quest was too late to be considered. If you go to the Mojo website, it's Album Of The Week and will be reviewed properly in next month's magazine. A bit rubbish, I agree, but that's the way it goes. Mojo actually gave Bruce Springsteen's 'The Ties That Bind' reissue of the year (presumably for the same reason) even though it came out last year (in December)!

By the way, Chance The Rapper came in at 40 and Kendrick Lamar at 45.

 

It's amazing that Syd Arthur is in there. The orange vinyl of "Apricity" is disappearing quickly so whoever is interested may check it out rather sooner than later

 

Love Bob, but that placing for the covers album is surely honorary; typical Mojo.

 

Bowie

 

That's the best that 2016 was able to produce? Terrible.

 

Wow, what a terrible (albeit kind of predictable) list! I chose Iggy Pop's Post Pop Depression, but Bowie's Blackstar is the only other album on this list that I like. Apart from those, my own list for 2016's best albums would look vastly different!

 

Maybe the Charles Bradley, but I never really took the time to check it out.

 

So what album would you nominate not on that list?

 

I'm a little surprised the new Lady Gaga isn't on there. Maybe not exactly the magazine's demographic, but they do have Beyoncé on the list.

 

okay, here is my complaint about one that is missing from the list: Sarah Jarosz - Undercurrent.

 

Easy...Blackstar...nothing else on that list is competition.

 

Drive-By Truckers - American Band

 

From this list, I picked Leonard Cohen. But this list is not representative at all of the music I listened to and loved in 2016--and I listened to over 40 new albums this year. I guess I'm not familiar with Mojo's specific demographics. My top picks (Norah Jones, John Paul White, Sia, Bob Weir, Drive-By Truckers, Lori McKenna) are all MIA from the list.

Funny how a year of music can be experienced completely differently by two different people or outlets. So much new stuff comes out that I could theoretically rank my 50 favorites and not intersect at all with someone else's 50 favorites.

 

I'm floored Savages' Adore Life isn't on this list. I'd rank that album easily top 5 of 2016.

 

Mojo makes me feel like the UK music scene is so removed from the US, I have no clue about some of these artists. Maybe I'm just out of touch?

 

Why? It was a critical and commercial failure.

 

It always seems odd when these lists are published prior to the year ending... I mean, who knows what may be released in the next few weeks?

 

Lot of good records on the list, I'd probably go with PJ Harvey, loved it from the start but those songs really come alive in concert, I was completely mesmerized watching the Glastonbury show (great sound too).

But these big magazine lists are inevitably skewed toward the well known major releases (doesn't this list look almost like the Uncut list, I'll have to compare), so get kind of predictable, no problem with that, it's the demographic, but it's not what I listen to most often, so my top 5 would likely be a bit more like below, most of them have gotten a lot of spilled words in the big best album of 2016 thread, and a lot of listens even though the one on top is only a couple weeks old now, and just realized they are all kind of psych leaning too ...

Virginia Wing - Forward Constant Motion
Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked For Death
Lola Colt - Twist Through The Fire
Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation - Mirage
Early Years - II

 

Have you actually listened to all of these albums?

 

I picked Iggy - still my favorite album of the year. Surprised to see The Cult in this list. Hidden City is a great album.

 

It actually looks very Americanized to me, with maybe the Michael Kiwanuka record being the main exception (I think he is very popular in UK now, probably not so much in US, but has still gotten a lot of love on this board). In any case, there don't seem to be many surprises, so you may be just a tiny bit out of touch

 

The full list contains 50 albums. You can only have 25 options in one poll.