A Look At The 2000s

A Look At The 2000s

1st January, 2011




Duncan Glenday



As always, this year's 'Best-Of-2010' lists make interesting reading.  I've assembled these lists for many years now, and I always wonder how this year's list stacks up against the list we compiled last year - or any prior years.

We could just compare the consolidated Summarized List Of The Top 50 CDs, From All Of The SoT Staff lists, year-on-year, but that would be misleading for several reasons.

Firstly - if you look at each reviewer's individual lists, they're richly punctuated with gems that aren't universally popular among all of our staff.  These include music in genres ranging from RIO through AOR, from death metal through progressive folk, and from fusion through pomp.  So as deserving as those albums may be they those don't typically make the consolidated list.

Second - not everyone hears every album, every year.  As the years progress most of the staff get to hear most albums, but at the time I distill all 20-or-so lists into one, the staff's partial knowledge of the year's catalog detracts from the completeness of the consolidated list.

Finally, in the nature of the complex music we evaluate, it's common for albums to gain or fall from favor over time.

So - what records would you choose for the past decade - in retrospect?  I for one would like to find out what the SoT staff thinks.  Our writers are from 5 continents and have differing tastes, yet they share a passion for and a knowledge of music that always impresses me.

So - I'm going to ask everyone on our staff to provide a retrospective of the whole decade.  This will be a big exercise and will yield an interesting best-of-decade list, as well as a slew of blog entries, another poll, and probably a few articles and interviews; and it will be spread over the next several months.

I know perfectly well that 'the decade' was over a year ago.  I'm claiming a sort of poetic license with that inconvenient fact - and our survey will include all albums from 2000 through 2010, inclusive.  I'm really looking forward to discovering a few shining gems, and will probably purchase more than I should.

More important, I hope you will also find value in this endeavor, and will be able to add some top quality items to your collection.





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