Over the last month, we have dissected the last ten years in nearly every aspect — from the best albums and songs to the best band and music festival. Today is the day when we recap, so those who missed it can catch up and those who bitched can get in one last jab.

Ladies and gentlemen, here were the 2000s, in all their musical glory…

• Top 100 Albums of the Decade

• Top 50 Songs of the Decade

• The Artist of the Decade

• The Band of the Decade

• The Live Act of the Decade

• The Music Festival of the Decade

When you experience it for the first time, it feels something like an exodus. But, at the moment, these people are evading nothing. The only thing they are escaping is the outside world. A world where none of this makes any sense. A world where a sight like this could only be found during the 1930′s Dustbowl in a Hooverville. But, this is a different universe entirely. In this world this mass movement of people from tents to muddy pastures only means one thing. They’re ready to start the day. These people are about to enter Centeroo at Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, TN. And though the image may seem grim or post-apocalyptic, this isn’t The Road. No, this is something else entirely. This is, Bonnaroo, hands down, the best damn musical festival to emerge this decade.

Bonnaroo is not just a music festival. It is a community of people who share a deep understanding with one another. Since 2002, people have been coming to this secluded farm in Manchester, TN for the sheer appreciation of live music. Sure, there are those who make the trek because of another type of appreciation (I’m talking about drugs, people), but for the most part, this is a group of people so obsessed with music that they’ll endure the heat, the tired nights, and the stench of dirty bodies to see as many bands as they can in a few days. For four days every June, a large field in the middle of Tennessee becomes a sort of music haven that we thought was long forgotten. In many ways it is a modern day Woodstock. It’s a well-organized, relatively safe replica of free-love era music festivals. Though, I’d still recommend avoiding the brown acid.

But Bonnaroo isn’t just for the hippies. That’s what makes it so great. Though it is rooted in the Jam Band scene, over time the lineup has grown progressively diverse, thus yielding an equally diverse crowd. At this point, any music enthusiast can find dozens of bands to see at each Bonnaroo. This being said, Bonnaroo makes most other festivals look officially segregated. Festivals like Coachella and Pitchfork are mostly just hipster-lovechild breeding grounds, without a Birkenstock in sight. And Rothbury and High Sierra mainly attract people who love the color green. Bonnaroo, however, is melting pot of music scenes. It’s a place where we can all just get along. At Bonnaroo you’ll get no stares. Everyone belongs to the Bonnaroo community. At Bonnaroo, you can find a Deadhead with Raybans passing a joint to a skinnyjeaned dude with a set of dreadlocks and a PBR in hand. Somehow, people at Bonnaroo just seem to get a long well. Everybody is in good spirits and accepting of each other’s tastes, no matter how bad those tastes may be. You’ll find a diverse group of music fans at Bonnaroo, people you can talk to for hours about what they have seen so far and what they plan to see while you wait for the next set to start. And the continually all-encompassing lineups make such diversity so prevalent.

Bonnaroo seems to one-up itself every year as far as the lineup goes. In 2006, they nabbed Radiohead to headline. But even when some of the headliners may be a little bit more commercial (recent years saw Metallica and Bruce Springsteen), Bonnaroo manages to balance itself out. Say the headliners are too mainstream for more alternative music fans, then they load up on high quality lower tier acts. 2009 saw Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors, Bon Iver, and Okkervil River beside headliners like Phish and Springsteen, for example. You simply can’t go wrong with a Bonnaroo lineup. Superfly Productions always goes all out with the talent.

Not only are the lineups well balanced and stacked, but the scheduling is equally superb. Stages are organized by the types of fans the bands attract, so that people can see as many bands as they want with minimal overlaps or sacrifices. Most of the time you can camp out at one tent or stage and stay there all day without missing any bands you want to see. This isn’t always the case, but due to great scheduling, it happens quite a bit. And that’s a testament to great organization. Then there are the legendary late night performances. Want to see My Morning Jacket play for four hours straight from midnight to four o’clock in the morning? You got it. Go from an E Street Band show to a 1 a.m. Nine Inch Nails performance? Yup. A Police reunion show followed up by a midnight Flaming Lips mindfuck? Okay. Bonnaroo late night shows are the cream of the crop. The music almost never stops and it comes at all the right times.

And if, for some unfathomable reason, you come to Bonnaroo but don’t much care for the tunes, there’s plenty more to be done in the sun (or out of it). Recently a comedy tent has been thrown into the mix.  And the comedy lineup alone is impressive. Aziz Ansari, Michael Ian Black, Michael Showalter, and Demitri Martin have all graced the Bonnaroo comedy tent stage. It’s air conditioned, and a good place to cool off. There’s an equally cool (air conditioned and awesome) cinema tent that plays movies and playoff basketball and hockey games. There are video games to be played, Silent Discos to be danced at, and pretty much anything else you can dream up. Additionally, all sorts of shops and boutiques populate Centeroo. And then there’s the food. Oh, the food. Fried alligator? Why not? Clam strips? Sure. Fried candy bars, milkshakes, frozen lemonade, smoothies, burgers, pizza, burritos, Greek, Cajun, Bonnaroo has it all. Sound like there’s anything missing? Didn’t think so.

But, as easy and logical as the Bonnaroo organizers try to make things for attendees, they also have a sense of humor about the place. They are aware of the stigmas associated with these types of summer festivals, the level of drug and alcohol consumption facilitated by these things. So, just to screw with high and drunk folk, the stages are labeled in the most hilariously infuriating manner imaginable. They might as well not even have names. If you plan on meeting somebody at a stage or tent, you may want to make sure you’ve got the site map in hand. There are the tents: This Tent, That Tent, and The Other Tent. Then there are the stages: The What Stage (The main stage) and the Which Stage. That’s a good way to confuse the cracked out hippies. But, it’s also a good indicator as to the kind of vibe Bonnaroo gives off. You’re supposed to have a good time here. You’re supposed to relax with your friends while watching the best music around. And, with all that Bonnaroo has to offer, it’s almost impossible not to. Perhaps this is part of why you’ll never run into someone with a negative attitude at Bonnaroo and why mean people do not exist there. Quite frankly, it’s paradise.

When it’s all over, the real world feels like a prison. If there’s a downside to Bonnaroo, it’s that it sucks the joy out of everything else for a while. It’s that good. You can even go through Bonnaroo withdrawal after a while, but luckily it’s an annual event. If you go, you won’t forget it. And if you go, you won’t regret it.  As a personal four-year Bonnaroo patron, I can attest to its power. Once you put the tent up, march through the gates, and drink it all in, there’s no going back. You’ll be sure to join in the migration next time around, and move south for the start of the summer. Bonnaroo takes you in and makes you feel at home. When you step onto the farm, something just clicks. A rough French translation of the word Bonnaroo results in “the best on the streets.” The name says it all. This is what every festival should aspire to be like. The others are working on it, but until then Bonnaroo reigns supreme. All hail to the ‘Roo.

CoS Select Picks:

Radiohead (Live @ Bonnaroo 2006)

The White Stripes (Live @ Bonnaroo 2007)

The Police (Live @ Bonnaroo 2007)

Andrew Bird (Live @ Bonnaroo 2009)

Girl Talk (Live @ Bonnaroo 2009)

Now any fan, hater, or blog troll of CoS knows that this isn’t the first time we’ve gushed about The Boss. But simply put, the guy hasn’t missed a mark with his past four albums. Sure, there’s been the occasional goofy or overly sentimental track here and there (“Worlds Apart”, “I’ll Work For Your Love”, and “Kingdom Of Days” rank among his lowest songs), but each album has succeeded in wildly different ways, which made each of his tours all the more interesting in daring.

The release of 2000′s Live In New York City and 2002′s The Rising and their subsequent tours proved to be a cathartic, celebratory live experience for Springsteen fans in America, not only because of the sheer joy of seeing The E Street Band together after a decade plus separation, but also because of the therapeutic healing over the September 11th attacks. As hokey as that sounds, The Rising was truly the perfect album for 9/11, a meditation on the alienating catastrophe with music and lyrics that miracuously addressed sorrows both global and personal. Having audiences sing and hear the music out loud was a communal experience equal parts southern choir and rock show.

The tours behind Devils & Dust and We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions were a bit more jarring for E Street fans, simply because of the more rustic sound of each album. The haunting acoustic folk of the former and rabble rousing dixieland brass of the latter were a departure from the wall of sound assault of The Boss’ crack band, delving into more experimental territory than audiences had ever seen from Springsteen, particularly with his usage of oddball instruments like the stomp board on the Devils & Dust tour. But in retrospect, these tours added a splash of diversity to Springsteen’s live pallet, incorporating eerie intimacy and hambone politics to his live repertoire, proving that 2000-2009 was a decade that offered fans flesh and blood offerings of every one of his sounds, from the grandiose to the sparse.

The Magic and Working On A Dream tours closed out the decade with the biggest shows of Springsteen’s career. At three hour plus marathons with the E Street Band, The Boss treated each concert as a summary of his entire discography and influences, throwing in the best cuts from each album (even his much lamented efforts of the 90s) with random covers suggested by the audience, and most surprisingly, a series of shows each dedicated to a full disc. Fans flocked to milestone concerts in 2009 to hear Greetings From Asbury Park, The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle, Born To Run, Darkness On The Edge Of Town, The River, and Born In The U.S.A. played in their entirety. And of course, no one can forget his awe inspiring political stints with the Vote For Change Tours and various events surrounding the election of Barack Obama. Hell, the guy even played with the Arcade Fire and headlined Bonnaroo.

But more importantly than the setlists were the shows themselves. Regardless of the song, Springsteen and company attacked each one with speed, passion, and ferocity; traits that are staple to the band during any year, sure, but the end of the decade showed how gracefully they had truly aged. Each performer has grown into themselves, showing a firmer stage presence and stance that allowed them to broadcast their explosive gospel with more precision and grit than ever before. And while The Boss himself is nowhere near as unhinged as his freewheeling seventies performance, he used this to his advantage, never laying all his cards on the table and saving his best antics for the encores. Simply put, no other live band without gimmicks can beat them. Period.

Rumors are abound of Springsteen dissolving The E Street Band once more, and with no shows on the horizon, anyone who saw The Boss during the past ten years should consider themselves very lucky. But for the optimists in the crowd (and Springsteen would want it that way), let’s hope 2010-2020 is another decade of incredible music and incredible live shows. Bruce Springsteen, may the hair on your head never grow gray (even if it already has).

CoS Select Picks:

Green Day hardly met any challenges ’til the 00s. From the get-go, Billie Joe Armstrong and Mike Dirnt witnessed success. In 1988, after only a year on the circuit, Larry Livermore of Lookout! Records signed their band, then called Sweet Children, to record a handful of EPs, which would more or less become the basis for their initial 1990 debut, 39/Smooth. Things hardly slowed down, either. They wrote, they toured, they snagged drummer Tré Cool, and they picked up fans along the way. Four years later, the trio held every teenager alive by the neck with their mainstream breakthrough record, Dookie, which served as the renegade “phoenix” for fans recently abandoned by one Kurt Cobain.

From Woodstock to any slacker-ridden film’s soundtrack, the three pranksters from Oakland graced each and every medium with spit, snot, and mud. They made punk not only hip, but accessible, sort of the same way Cobain had made guitar playing as easy as changing the TV channel. It wasn’t until 1997, with the release of Nimrod, that the band started to see what the industry refers to as, “a slump.” Despite critical acclaim and adoration (How many girls do you know that pined for “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” as their graduation song?), Nimrod‘s album sales were hardly as voluminous as Dookie, or even 1995′s heavy handed follow up, Insomniac. Alas, things started to turn, but not until the new millennium.

2000′s Warning may be the most underrated album of the decade. For one, everybody remembers it, but not until you remind them. It was swept under. The band opted for acoustics, the fan base opted out. But at its heart, it’s the band’s most decisive record in their discography, as it’s the first time they truly carved something different. Warning hardly screamed, but when it did, it wasn’t an angsty wail, it felt… mature. The mud-chucking Armstrong sounded more like John Lennon than Jesse Michaels (or Paul Westerberg) and both Dirnt and Cool spent the extra time to bring in some extra fills and key changes. Songs like “Warning”, “Waiting”, and the magnum opus “Minority” spoke different tongues, and while some fans “got it”, the album plummeted in sales, despite the broad critical support. This led to the release of a greatest hits compilation, which is just a sign that the label needs more money, the awkward Pop Disaster Tour, where the three opened for Blink-182, and even discussions about splitting up the band.

But here’s where things get interesting. Armstrong, Dirnt, and Cool pushed forward, recording the long delayed follow up, Cigarettes and Valentines. Call it fate, call it a draw of luck, or call it a brilliant restart, but the tapes were stolen, and the album was eventually canceled. Shoot to 2004, the music industry receives its most iconic concept album since Radiohead’s OK Computer. It’s called American Idiot, and while it doesn’t take off immediately, it goes on to be the band’s most successful album since 1994′s Dookie. The band’s back. Radio stations of every genre play “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” ad infinitum, the American Idiot tour sells out everywhere, and by 2005, the album snags a Grammy for Best Rock Album (not counting the four other nominations, which includes Best Album). The biggest surprise? Armstrong’s a house hold name, a modern rock hero to new generations.

You don’t have to look (or think) hard about how influential American Idiot became. With a marketing scheme that channeled former war propaganda, lyrics that provided a perfect escape for those bewildered by President Bush, and poppy sensibilities that could rival any Top 40 act, it wasn’t hard for the band to win over America’s youth. If anything, it’s the older fans that crossed their arms and shook their heads… as they took their kids to the shows.

Things haven’t changed, either. While the Green Day moniker vanished for a good three years, the trio popped up just enough to stay in everyone’s minds. From a duet with U2 (“The Saints are Coming”) to a rollicking side project (last year’s Foxboro Hot Tubs), Armstrong & Co. managed to deliver to its demanding fan base, leading all the way up to this year’s eagerly anticipated follow up, 21st Century Breakdown. Some could argue the idea of following up a concept album with another concept is not only a bloated one but a trite one, too, but it worked for Pink Floyd. Guess what? It worked for Green Day, too. Packed with windmill guitar work, anthemic lyrics, and overall musicianship that bears little similarities with anything they put out pre-2000, it’s safe to say the sister concept solidified Green Day as more than just a “hit punk band from the Bay Area,” as they were pegged for years and years.

No, if the band’s taught us anything this year, it’s that they’re just a straight up, honest-to-god rock band with little to no pretensions. What else do they have to be? Not punk rockers. After all, they told the punk genre to fuck off back when “Basket Case” hit MTV in the summer of 1994, and by the time they squeezed out “Nice Guys Finish Last”, anyone still snubbing them were yesterday’s news. They are what they’ve always been: three guys with a sense of melody. It’s that same mentality that put The Beatles on the proverbial rock ‘n’ roll pedestal, it’s that sort of attitude that draws crowds of every age, demographic, and nationality. What’s more, they love their fans. Since the early ’00s, their shows attempt to incorporate older and younger audiences in any way or form possible; either through singing along, pulling tykes on-stage for support, or passing out guitars to prospective rock ‘n’ roll heroes to come. That’s why the idea of Harmonix working with the guys for an incarnation of Rock Band isn’t surprising in the slightest. In fact, it was probably just another way they wanted to reach out to kids — because really, it’s doubtful they’re in it for the money (if they ever were in the first place).

At the end of the day, they just know what it’s like to be a band. God, do we even remember what a band is anymore? One downside of this decade has been everyone’s incessant need to find some obscure act we have no idea about (and the internet’s made that easy for everyone to do, of course). Well, Green Day has always been the opposite. They want to be a band for everybody. This past July, we wrote about their time in Chicago, concluding, “Risky or not, Green Day continues to tear the house walls down, pillar by pillar and generation after generation.” This statement says it all. They’re a party that will never slow down, that will take each hurdle with the smartest consideration, and they will never tire. But don’t worry, you can always join in on the fun. They sort of pride themselves on having an open-door policy.

CoS Select Picks:

“Who Wrote Holden Caulfield?” (Live in Miami 1993)

“Paper Lanterns” and the Woodstock Mud Fight (Live 1994)

“Geek Stink Breath”

“Minority”

“American Idiot” at Live 8 (Live in Berlin 2005)

“Know Your Enemy” (Live in Oakland 2009)

On an entirely superficial level, White is the kind of rock star critics and fans of the new millennium need. There’s an air of mystery to him (the White Stripes’ tri-force color palette, early questions regarding his and Meg’s relationship, and rumors he changed his name to Three Quid). But at the same time, there’s a complete openness and a level of confrontation he effortlessly puts out. He’s always made it crystal clear that for him, nothing matters but the music.

“It’s the same thing as asking Michelangelo, ‘What kind of shoes do you wear?’…In the end, it doesn’t really matter … the only thing that’s going to be left is our records and photos,” White said in an April 2006 interview.

Of course, he’s also allowed himself to grow creatively. From our first widespread glimpse of him on the White Stripes’ 2000 sophomore album, De Stijl, to jamming with other rock gods on this year’s It Might Get Loud (even playing Elvis Presley in 2007′s Walk Hard), White has transformed himself into an increasingly growing presence without ever losing his core beliefs and manners. Each year has only seen his public aura brighten, but he’s never lost step with himself. White has always considered himself a bluesman, and no matter how loud and distorted or bright and poppy the result, he bends that genre born of sorrow, always creating a palpable end that we can follow him toward eternally. And that dedication is a cornerstone of our relationship with White and his art and mystique.

The White Stripes self-titled album came out in 1999, a time when rap-rock ruled the charts and radio. White’s said countless times he still finds it to be the most raw album he’s ever made, and while it wasn’t as groundbreaking as 2001′s White Blood Cells, it was an introduction to the stripped down rock White would slam against music lovers worldwide for years to come. It was a shot in the arm to a great many people, a reminder of the real power that rock and roll music can have before it was watered down and diluted by outside influences that bore away at its speed, its stylish stealth, and its evocative powers. White sought to give those qualities power again. What’s intriguing, however, is that White has never been anti- anything. Call him eccentric or blame the Detroit/Midwest nose to the grindstone living, but his music has always been about doing his own thing and doing it well.

But at the same time, others have seen what he has done and honed in, too. Whether it’s another power rock duo like The Black Keys or instilling his own spin on Loretta Lynn’s Van Lear Rose, White has left his mark on other musicians. You might even give him some glass ceiling breaking credit in regards to the rise of bands like Band of Horses and beyond. Of course, White has never hidden his love and influence from acts like Robert Johnson to MC5. For White, music is communal and everything is one big song to sing.

No other artist of this decade, and few others in any other time for that matter, has been as musically involved as Jack White. But more than just being in three bands (which is a fest in and of itself), the miraculous part is how each band is sonically similar and completely different at the same time, with White acting as the common thread each time. The White Stripes are the garage band of the White trinity. Their rock-blues-punk fusion is the most simplistic sound, one that is generated by White’s fury and prowess and Meg’s child-like drum banging. On the other hand, The Raconteurs is the all-boy blues/arena rock band. While the White Stripes made White famous, The Raconteurs were his chance to create bigger and more complex, often bombastic, rock anthems, all of which were fueled by an old-school level of musicianship and testosterone.

And that big rock bug bit White hard, as his next musical project took the music nerd experimentation of the White Stripes and that grandiose sound of The Raconteurs and brought to us the Dead Weather. While White was left in the back as the drummer and Alison Mosshart took over lead vocals, the band’s dense, dark and sexual sound that sounded like it was blues played by the devil in heat was clearly the brain child of White. Musical growth has the often negative inference of leaving behind your roots. But White’s proven to be a musical hoarder, pulling and closely guarding every bit of influence he’s gathered in his life. Each new project is fresh and lively only because it’s made of the brightest and most shiny parts of his life and career.

The 2000s was arguably just the beginning for Jack White. Whether 2010 and beyond means more new bands, production work, new acting gigs, or anything else White earns for himself, there’s one thing that will always remain with him no matter how big he gets: a level of simplicity. As a young man, he was an upholsterer. He’s taken the same level of pride in weaving the various fabrics and materials as he has the threads of the past, present, and future, in addition to the true materials and makings of rock music, into everything he does. As we stand at the top of the decade, Jack White, we salute you.

CoS Select Picks:

“Fell In Love With A Girl”

“Seven Nation Army” (Live at 2004 Grammys)

“Ball and Biscuit” (Under Blackpool Lights)

“Broken Boy Solider”

“Top Yourself” (Live at Coachella 2008)

“Treat Me Like Your Mother”

“So Far From Your Weapon” (Live on Jimmy Kimmel Live)

Anything truly great, however, has to go out with elegance, poise, and style. Sometimes a final word can mean everything. How something ends can influence the perspective with which you look back at everything that preceded it. In a way, music released this year works as a sort of frame of reference for looking back at the decade’s musical merit. Bands that didn’t even exist at the beginning of the decade (Phoenix, Passion Pit, The Rural Alberta Advantage, Antlers) released great albums, which drew influence from the various records that we have come to cherish over the course of these ten years. Bands that had just budded at the beginning of the decade released what some would consider career-defining records (Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors); great retrospective tools for looking at their respective discographies analytically. In the same way that a great album ends with a beautiful, conclusive summation of itself, I see 2009 as a great decade-closer in it’s own right.

But, of the great albums released during the first decade of the 21st century, certain albums (and bands, as you’ll see) got the album closer down better than others. The following list is a collection of songs that seem to perfectly sum up the albums that they conclude. Some do this sonically, by tying all of the auditory motifs from within the album into one culminating idea, or even by stepping away from them. Others do it lyrically, by attempting to summarize the thoughts and ideas found throughout the album verbally. And the best do both simultaneously. These songs work as a sort of breaking system, a way of slowing down and easing out of the potentially high-energy songs at the core of the records, so that we can open the doors and get out safely. They make us understand just how deliberate the sequencing of a record is, how well balanced the songs on a great album really are. And, some make us want to simply replay the record immediately. These songs end things on a note that simply seems perfect in context with the rest of the music.

So here it is, the Top 10 Best Album Closers of the decade:

10. LCD Soundsystem – “New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down”

After eight tracks of danceable, funky, electronic-infused rock, James Murphy slows things down to end Sound of Silver. With this slow-building piano ballad about his city, Murphy looks back to the noisier, more cluttered moments of his record, and for that matter his life. Like most of the song, the track blossoms into grandiosity from a mere few layers, but not in the same manner as the prior tracks. Where programmed blips and drum machines opened all of the previous songs, a shockingly quiet acoustic piano leads us in, until crashing drums and electric strums catch us off guard. Here, Murphy proves, both sonically and lyrically, that sometimes you need to take a step back from all of the chaos of life and admit your deepest feelings to understand them. Murphy steps away from the computers and programming in order end an album bursting with technological and philosophical quandaries.

9. My Morning Jacket – “Strangulation”

At Dawn is a long record. To be specific, it’s 70 minutes of spacious, progressive southern rock. But At Dawn’s final song, especially in combination with its antecedent track, “Phone Went West”, is certainly worth the wait. In fact, it may just be the best the band has ever sounded. If nothing else, it is a perfect go-to for describing the range of sounds the band so seemingly effortlessly combines into one. The song can best be described as some strangely perfect amalgamation of Noise-prog-folk-psychedelia. Following the beautiful, angst-ridden reggae of “Phone Went West,” a flurry of distortion and hard-hitting chaos enters in. Faint, distanced screams are engulfed in noise before a sole acoustic guitar paves way for Jim James’ country-tinged swoon. That recorded-in-a-wheat-silo reverb that James has become so synonymous with sings depressingly about the desire for numbness. Lush pedal-steel and drums enter as the lyrics grow darker and darker, and progressively suicidal: “I don’t want to feel a thing.” But just before the song’s dark instrumental climax, James presents a sense of twisted hope amidst the misery: “But I know there’s someone that loves up above/And wants to fix you a dream./He wants to sit down and think./He wants to pour you a drink./And you wont feel a thing./You wont feel a thing.” Then waves of distortion and screams smother all else, and you don’t feel a thing but sheer joy in witnessing it all go down.

8. The Streets – “Empty Cans”

Mike Skinner is a very underrated songwriter, and just an underrated storyteller for that matter. A Grand Don’t Come For Free is one of the most compelling stories to be turned into music in quite some time. In brief, the story goes like this: Guy loses a thousand pounds (British currency, not weight), guy falls in love with girl, guy makes some (often consumption-related) poor decisions, guy sulks, guy gets dumped by girl, guy sulks again, guy comes to terms with his situation and looks on the bright side, guy finds the thousand pounds he lost in the beginning. But it’s really how the story ends that’s most brilliant. In a two-part track entitled “Empty Cans”, two sections begin with the exact same line: “If I want to sit in and drink super tennants in the day I will/No-ones going to fucking tell me jack/But can you rely on anyone in this world? /No you can’t/Its not my fault there’s wall to wall empty cans.”

At this point, Mike Skinner has drunk himself into oblivion, and thus spends half of the track talking about his unfortunate situation in an undeniably spiteful manner. “No one gives a crap about mike/That’s why I’m acting nasty,” skinner speak-raps. But half-way through, the track stops and the sound of speedy rewinding takes us back to the very opening line. The same hard-hitting beat comes in again, but this time with bright, solemn piano to accompany it. As the track continues, Skinner accepts his faults, accepts his flaws, and finally realizes that things don’t always work out. Just as he comes to this realization, Skinner finds the very source of most of his woes, the money he lost all the way back on track one. It’s a bittersweet ending to the story of one common guy just trying to get by.

7. Arcade Fire – “My Body is a Cage”

Win Butler and the rest of Arcade Fire really went all out with ending their sophomore masterpiece, Neon Bible. To conclude an album filled with spiteful church motifs, an ominous organ accompanies Butler as he philosophizes body vs. mind in “an age that calls darkness light.” The song slowly grows, introducing haunting choirs and strings, until it reaches its startling climax, a militant blast of drums, strings, and the like. The whole way through, the song describes a sort of paralyzing pressure. The narrator begs for freedom from a body that inhibits his ability to do what his mind desires. With such vague, yet stirring imagery, the song sets itself up for a wide array of interpretations, ending the thought-provoking album with a prompt for even more speculation. It’s hard to tell just what Butler’s getting at, but the grandiose intensity of the track says a lot about the powerful emotions he’s describing. Neon Bible certainly poses many specific questions throughout its duration, but perhaps its most important one comes at the end, when Butler starts questioning the very basic idea of existence; living inside of a body and having no say in the matter.

6. Radiohead – “Life in a Glasshouse”

Concluding their most inaccessible record to date, the boys of Radiohead semi-rebelliously explore some previously untouched sounds with the Amnesiac closer. The song opens with the same ambient, synthetic, eerie feel of the rest of the tracks. But, in direct contrast with the rest of the record, the tune utilizes predominantly live, old-time instrumentation. Instilling the collaborative effort of traditional jazz trumpeter, Humphrey Lyttelton and his band, “Life in a Glasshouse” is a truly breathtaking exercise in genre defiance. Just when you thought Radiohead had already broken all of the ground that they were standing on, the guys decide to record a song in the style of a New Orleans funereal tune to catch us all off guard. Nevertheless, even with such a seemingly different aesthetic, Radiohead adequately perpetuate the same mood and feelings found on all of Amnesiac’s previous songs, proving that there really are no limits to what this band is capable of. If a group can craft a song that utilizes the New Orleans Jazz aesthetic, yet still fits in with the off-kilter, mostly electronic-based tracks that surround it, then something truly special is going on. The music, in combination with cryptic lines only Thom Yorke could conjure, presents a song that is at once haunting and tantalizing. In other words, a Radiohead song, and one of their best at that.

5. Arcade Fire – “In the Backseat”

I often forget about the first time I heard “In the Backseat”. The first time you hear the song in the context of the album, it’s a bit jarring. I remember thinking, “Where is Win Butler? What’s going on? This song isn’t depressing.” But, after a while, I forgot about this initial reaction. I came to realize that in many ways, “In the Backseat” is the only way that Funeral could end. After all of the emotional intensity found in Win Butler’s howls, what we really need are some bright, lighter sounds. We need Regine Chassagne’s sweet voice to gradually ease us away from all that turmoil. Her words are comforting and reassuring in their blitheness, almost like a breath of fresh air after inhaling smoke for the whole album. As the song builds, it grows so refreshingly lush and harmonious that we can finally forget all of the problems presented before. As she belts out “I’ve been learning how!” howling like a wolf, her voice cuts into you. She comes across as a more accessible, warmer Bjork, passionately wailing alongside the cinematic strings that provide backup. With this song as the finale, Funeral ends on a high note and leaves little to mourn for.

4. The National – “Mr. November”

Whether the song references Reggie Jackson, Derek Jeter, being the President of the United States, or all of the above, the emotions on The National’s glorious Alligator album-closer are so universal, that the specific allusion is almost irrelevant. When Berninger repeats the phrase “I used to be carried in the arms of cheerleaders,” for some reason, we all know exactly what he means. As he unleashes his desperate, feigned reassurance, “I won’t fuck us over, I’m Mr. November!” a feeling of intense hopelessness comes with it. “Mr. Novemeber” is a classic example of how with each of their songs, the National builds a sense of tranquility, caves in on itself, but somehow manages to make it out alive.

3. Radiohead – “Videotape”

Before the release of In Rainbows, there was much speculation as to how the final studio version of “Videotape” would sound. The band had performed several versions of the song live during their “testing” tour and many people were curious as to just what kind of song “Videotape” really was. As a result, some fans were initially disappointed with the finalized studio version; a subdued, minimal electronic laden piano ballad. But, with each listen, the perfection behind “Videotape” becomes clearer and clearer. What results is a song that delicately sums up the record’s principal theme, the ambivalence that comes with loving another human being. With just piano and what sounds like the whirring of film tape, Yorke sets the track up in anticipation for his own imminent death. Almost as if he’s discussing his own will in the form of a video message, he cries out “When I’m at the Pearly Gates/This’ll be on my videotape.” Presumably he is expressing his unconditional love for people he holds dear to his heart (“This is my way of saying goodbye”), but in his own words, he “can’t do it face to face.” Thus, he is leaving this song as a testament to those he loves.

Due to its intended message, the song simply couldn’t be as hard-hitting as some of the band’s live renditions would have suggested. The true beauty of videotape is in its subtlety. Everything about the song’s aesthetic is understated. For a piece with such heartbreaking lyrics, this means a great deal. It’s all in the way that the music’s gradual dissonance accentuates the conflicted message of having to say goodbye to the people you love more than anything in the world. “You are my center when I spin away,” Yorke cries as eerily out-of-time programmed drumrolls combine with drummer Phil Selway’s stickwork and Yorke’s spooked-out background croon. It’s as poignant a song as they come, from a band that pretty much got the idea of the album-closer down to a tee.

2. Okkervil River – “Okkervil River Song”

The eponymous track that concludes the debut album from Austin, Texas’ Okkervil River is an acoustic folk-ballad as lush and poignant as they come. The song begins with acoustic guitar strums, accordion, and sandpaper blocks, before beautiful mandolin dances its way in. It’s difficult to find any information on what significance the Russian river holds for Will Sheff and co, but the band’s name is taken from a story of the same name about the river, by Russian author Tatyana Tolstaya. In the song, Sheff paints a picture of a disgusting, polluted river “slow, silent, thick, and black.” By “cigarettes and rusty tires” Sheff describes a romantic, sensual scene where the narrator and his significant other escape to from “ugliness” to “find some refuge here.” At its core, the song describes turning something grotesque into an uncharacteristic paradise; finding beauty amidst chaos.

With his lover, the narrator finds solace on the banks of a dirty river, as it’s one of the few places where the two can be away from everything else. But as the song concludes, the narrator comes to realize that without his lover there, the river is merely the cesspool it appears to be. The song ends on a note of ambivalence as multiple voices cry out in a cappella, “And I woke up one cold morning/Felt an absence at my back/And I searched and stared/But only the river stared back.” Here, Sheff questions what makes a given place significant to any single person. The song’s narrator clearly feels a strong connection with this location, but soon realizes that it’s not the place that he loves, but the memories tied to it. Without the memories, the place loses all of the meaning it once held. For a record that focuses on deteriorating relationships, this gorgeous song does a great deal of justice for the rest of the record, setting Sheff up as one of the most exciting songwriters of the decade.

1. Radiohead – “Motion Picture Soundtrack”

Life is not like the movies and the members of Radiohead know it. And somehow, in a uniquely complex fashion, they have captured the feelings that accompany this realization to near perfection. Put simply, “Motion Picture Soundtrack” is an ironic take on contrasting real world situations and relationships to those portrayed in film—a sort of backhanded joke, played out so beautifully that you might miss it if you aren’t paying attention. The song’s music purposefully imitates the whimsical and peaceful cinematic orchestrations of old 1950s Walt Disney films, most notably the music accompanying “The Dance of the Sugar Plumb Fairy” in 1942’s Fantasia. Though imitating these beautifully elegant sounds, there is quite a bit of sadness in the notes as a downbeat pedal organ plays alongside exploding whirling harp strums, all of which eventually overwhelm the vocals.

Whereas the music imitates that of blissful motion pictures, Yorke’s lyrics seem to completely contradict the happy-ending nature of these films. As he sings, “Stop sending letters/letters always get burned,” there is a sense that all hope for anything is lost, yet the music seems to build here into the most gorgeous sounds on the whole song as harp crescendos return joined by high pitched whirring choir vocals after a brief pause in the music. Though this seems counter intuitive, the song’s beauty is most revealed here, in that this contrast does not immediately jump out, but is still meant to confuse; it is meant to conflict the emotions, playing tricks on the mind. The song toys with the way listeners connect emotions with the music they hear. As Yorke sulks over a failed relationship, he finally comes to terms with everything and lets go: “I will see you in the next life.” A long pause follows before a brief swell of ethereal sound emerges from nothing and drops out back to silence. It plays out as if the gap is some sort of sonic purgatory and the swell, which sounds how a beam of holy light breaking through the dark clouds would sound if it produced noise, is entering heaven. And there you have it, with “Motion Picture Soundtrack”, Radiohead ends Kid A by letting you at least hear what heaven sounds like. And hell, that’s the way it should be.

It all started with the idiot nobody elected: President Bush. Someone somewhere, probably while on mescaline or something otherworldly, thought, “Hey, what better way to start this decade than how we started the last… with another Bush in office!” Well, that thought became a statement which became an idea that rolled into a campaign, and one that somehow made its way into the Oval Office — and for eight years, no less. Nobody knew it at the time, but this started a trend…

Take a look around, everyone’s making a return. It’s a big fad. Bands reunited (e.g. Stone Temple Pilots, Pavement, My Bloody Valentine), actors we thought to be dead returned to surprise us (e.g. Mickey Rourke), and some even tried to return but ended up dead (e.g. Michael Jackson). Hell, turn on the television. Half of the CW programming is a collection of ’90s shows… making a return. 90210? Melrose Place? Ring a bell? In fact, you could argue that The Simpsons tried to return, even if they never really left in the first place. There were some major backfires (e.g. NBC’s Knight Rider, Jerry Seinfeld’s Bee Movie, John Travolta’s fourth comeback), but it all peaked with one giant, hip conglomerate… Apple.

Apple, for all its charm and dazzling software today, was a dusty relic in the ’90s. To be honest, they were horrible. PowerPC? More like a headache that managed to steal cash from your wallet. And when those iMacs hit public schools everywhere, they might have looked pretty, but nobody wanted to make that shift, save for “those graphic designers.” Then came a cute, little invention in the early ’00s: the iPod. It took a couple of Christmas holidays to catch on, but by Winter of ’05, everyone who was anyone owned one. By ’07, everyone who was anyone wasn’t anyone anymore because they now knew nobody because they were slaves to a plastic device. Regardless of the global sonic slavery, one thing became clear: Apple returned!

Because of this, there’s been a very interesting trend in music for the past decade. Songs have become synonymous with life. Why? Well, for two reasons. One, Zach Braff. Two, Apple. Let’s start with the Scrubs guy first, though. In 2004, Garden State became the first film in probably ten to 15 years where the music preceded the actual film. All sorts of folks flocked to Best Buy or Borders to buy the popular soundtrack. Most people hadn’t even seen the movie. They knew one thing, though: These songs would change their life. This mentality, coinciding with Apple’s insistent demand to keep those buggy lil’ earplugs on your head, made for one “personable” experience. Forget the album, a dead subject to anyone outside of Greenwich Village or a critic’s circle. But also, forget the mixtape.

With the iPod, everyone started what nixed the mixtape: the playlist! People culled songs from band’s career spanning discographies, all with the purpose in soundtracking their everyday mundane life, and with the hopes that it’d make everyday mundane life something else. Something bold! People still do this. In fact, it’s one reason why MP3s continue to be so popular and why I can’t visit Tower Records down the street from me anymore. And c’mon, it’s not rocket science here. You don’t have to do a long, public survey to find out that people live by this mantra: “It’s uneconomical to buy a CD for a song, so why not download it?”

So, what the hell does this all mean? It means songs are important to people. They cherish ‘em because they live with ‘em — and vice versa (I think). Albums are still sacred and what not, but it’s the songs that matter these days. In some respects, this could sort of be considered a return, too. Here’s a fun fact. Long before our time, bands wouldn’t even bother with an album. They would be lucky if they even made it that far. No, studio heads and producers pushed singles, what were then called 45′s and what we now call EP’s. If there’s one thing to be said of the ’00s, it’s that the MP3, for all its intensive purposes, is just the medium to which “songs” made their triumphant return. But still, it’s all because of Apple.

Or, maybe President Bush.

-Michael Roffman
Editor in Chief

p.s. I almost forgot, here are 50 songs we all thought were pretty good.

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Note: We’ve included streams for each of our 50 choices. But, there’s a catch — you’ll have to register at both imeem and Lala. Don’t fret, it only takes 20 seconds. Then, the rest is on us.

But overall, it doesn’t feel like 2010. Instead of flying cars and video games that require you not to use your hands, we’re bogged down with age-old past times, like recessions, health insurance scares, and U2. Nothing seems futuristic, save for a trip to the Apple Store, and while we’re embracing the future with every inch that technology shifts forward, it all just sort of boils down to everyday mundane life.

That doesn’t really apply to music, though. Not at all. Each year, bands both new and old throw out album after album, stuffed to the brim with sounds that take us to yesterday, today, and, most of the time, to tomorrow. It’s here where we understand the true value of time and how far we’ve come. Artists and groups like Animal Collective, Daft Punk, and even Radiohead take us by the hand into regions that suit our wildest dreams, where things happen that will never occur in our lifetime. Then there are those that keep us grounded, that help us understand our inner emotions and thoughts today, bands like Wilco, The Arcade Fire, and The Strokes. It’s like we’re sonically expanding our own dimensions. Pretty deep, huh?

C’mon, it’s 2009! Everyone knows how vital music is nowadays, and even though we’re guilty of its absolute accessibility (e.g. the advent and success of the mp3), the past ten years have brought us new ways to celebrate its sonic brilliance. We all own iPods (or Zunes, for the five of you). We all walk and work and play with them in our ears — after all, we live for this stuff. But it’s more than that. We don’t just live for this stuff, we live with this stuff. You know, everyone has recognized again and again that albums have become just a hub for — or a collection of — songs, but few have noted that songs have become dalliances of everyday life. That’s why it’s important to go back, to look at where these songs come from, and to recognize the true power of that “hub”, or “collection”, or album!

And that we did…
-Michael Roffman, President/Editor-in-Chief

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Note: Don’t believe us? Haven’t heard these albums? That’s why we’ve included streams for each of our 100 choices. But, there’s a catch — you’ll have to register at both imeem and Lala. Don’t fret, it only takes 20 seconds. Then, the rest is on us.