At the midpoint

Now that the year is half over, here are my favorite albums of the year:

10. Hercules & Love Affair - Hercules & Love Affair: As far as New York hipster dance music goes, this is the a great album if you've worn out your copy of LCD Soundsystem's albums. (Listen to "Raise Me Up")

9. Mudcrutch - Mudcrutch: Better late than never for Tom Petty and his laid back country Florida buddies. (Listen to "Scare Easy")

8. REM - Accelerate: After a long artistic absence, a nice return to garage/pop/punk mode. (Listen to "Horse To Water")

7. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes: These Seattle folk Brian Wilson-worshipers made one blissful record; I hope they don't wait long to make another one. (Listen to "He Doesn't Know Why")

6. Alejandro Escovedo - Real Animal: A lot edgier and less restrained this time - it's not often you hear this much Sex Pistols influence in a country record. (Listen to "Chelsea Hotel '78")

5. Lil Wayne - The Carter III: It's not often a rap record lives up to its sales and hype like this - he might give Kanye some competition if he can just go crazy at a few awards shows. (Listen to "Tie My Hands")

4. Portishead - Third: After eleven years away, they sound like they didn't miss a beat. Even if you are a fan, there are some stunning surprises hidden in this album. (Listen to "Magic Doors" and "Machine Gun")

3. Coldplay - Viva La Vida: Brian Eno was a good fit for them - they leave the comfort zone and live up to the "Biggest Band in the World" title. (Listen to "Viva La Vida", "Lost!", "Reign Of Love")

2. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Dig! Lazarus, Dig!: Age only makes him crazier. With his band sounding simultaneously like The Stooges and The Band, Nick rants about the end of the world like a crazed pastor. (Listen to "Today's Lesson", "More News From Nowhere", "Moonland")

1. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago - The most stunning folk album since Nick Drake was alive is nine tracks of stunning heartbroken imagery. It makes you want to go hide out in a Wisconsin cabin for four months the way he did. At first, it was sleepy background music for me; now it's one of the best records of the decade. (Listen to "Skinny Love", "Flume", "The Wolves"... and then for God's sake go buy this album)