106. Manitoba - Up in Flames (2003)

In electronic, sample-based music it's usually electronic elements that are sampled and placed in new contexts; what this album tried to do was take acoustic music and mess with it electronically so that the two types of music (electronic and acoustic) would be bonded on a molecular level. This sounds like psychedelia more often than not, and a lot of this sounds like a more lush but less melodic version of Love's Forever Changes. Vocals are chopped up and abused in the same fashion, but the effect is pleasantly relaxing (this is not intense music). The whole album is basically just a huge, candy-colored collection of psychedelia; there's not much to say about it as it changes little throughout its duration (honestly the whole album sounds like individual parts of a single longish track) but on the whole this stuff feels a lot more honest and creative to me than repetitive "psychedelic nostalgia" bands like the Brian Jonestown Massacre and the Dandy Warhols. Just let it relax and carry you away, etc...

MY RATING: 8.3

Manitoba - "Kid You'll Move Mountains"

142. Primal Scream - XTRMNTR (2000)

This is certainly the most aggressive record on this entire top 200 list--I mean, look at the titles: "Kill All Hippies". "Accelerator". "Exterminator". "Swastika Eyes". "Blood Money". "If They Move, Kill 'Em". The entire album is soaked in this violent, militaristic rage that in this age sounds even more prescient than it must have in 2000. If ever an album's sound was perfectly evoked by its album cover, it's this one--"Accelerator" is a garage rock song so loud and distorted it sounds like a jet taking off and the rest of the tracks are nothing more than celebrations of aggression and violence, and at points I was reminded of vintage Stooges, except with a more electronic flavor. This album is a near-masterpiece: every track feeds into the central theme of violence perfectly and each track does something different while never seeming extraneous--variations on a theme. It's a concept record of a sort--the opening sample is a woman saying "It's not sexual, it's just aggression," and then you've got the insane militaristic funk of "Kill All Hippies", stuff like "Insect Royalty" that sounds like a drinking song for robots, and "Blood Money", which sounds like Miles Davis being force-fed amphetamines in Hell. The second remix of "Swastika Eyes" is totally unnecessary, but everything else is so perfectly written, performed and produced that it boggles the mind. Bands should not be releasing albums this good fifteen years into their career. Play it loud and have your brains knocked out.

MY RATING: 9.4

Primal Scream - "Shoot Speed/Kill Light"

197. Yeasayer - All Hour Cymbals (2007)

I first heard this album the same day I first viewed Terrence Malick's classic film Days of Heaven, so there will probably always be a connection in my mind between the alternately bucolic and apocalyptic vision of the film and the gorgeous, psychedelic sound of this album's best tracks. The album's marriage between pop and psychedelia brings to mind most readily stuff on Nuggets II, but since this is an indie album made by New Yorkers in the 2000s, there's a strong dance element. It sounds like a new-century update of the Eastern-style stuff everyone was doing in the 60s, mixed with elements of the kind of campfire-singalong thing that Animal Collective was trying to do on Sung Tongs, except more successful (not that Animal Collective didn't immediately redeem themselves with their next record). The first four tracks set a standard that the rest of the album can't reach, however, and there's a noticeable drop-off in quality after the creepy lyrics and wheezy accordion of "Germs". The second half is basically the same as the first half minus the good melodies, so at least you've got an interesting enough atmosphere to groove on, if nothing else. Still, the first four tracks are glorious, almost revelatory, and about as good as pop music got this decade. Definitely worth hearing, and it's nice to see this band get some commercial success with their follow-up.

MY RATING: 8.0

Yeasayer - "Sunrise"