Here are my top ten favorite albums of the year in no particular order.

1. Animal Collective: Merriweather Post Pavilion

I’ve already said enough about this album.  It’s awesome. Go buy it if you haven’t already.

2. Megafaun: Gather, Form & Fly

I still don’t know a lot about this band, but I really love this album.  It sort of has a Fleet Foxes feel (and by that I mean it’s kinda folksy and there are lots of male vocal harmonies) but also has pretty weird production work.  It sort of sounds in parts like they’ve been listening to a bunch of John Cage.

3. Neko Case: Middle Cyclone

Neko Case’s albums keep getting better and better.  She’s becoming less country all the time.  Plus, she does a Sparks cover!

4. Grizzly Bear: Veckatimest

It took me a really long time to be able to appreciate Grizzly Bear.  In fact, I had to learn to like Department of Eagle before I could learn to like Grizzly Bear.  Everyone I know seems to think that “Cheerleader” is the best song on the album.  But they’re wrong, it’s “Two Weeks.”  Even better is Grizzly Bear’s cover of The Crystals “He Hit Me,” but that one didn’t even make it on the album.

5. St. Vincent: Actor

I didn’t like St. Vincents first album at all, and if it wasn’t for the fact that his album got stuck in my head longer than probably any other album this past year (although not as much as the new Vampire Weekend is stuck in my head now) I probably wouldn’t have given this one a chance.  I don’t think I really liked this one at first either, but it really grew on me.  The production work is pretty awesome and I seem to be constantly discovering something new every time I listen to it.

6. Bat for Lashes: Two Suns

Bat for Lashes (whose real name is Natasha Kahn) is a weird girl.  While preparing to record this album she apparently ran around New York as some sort of alter ego, which is pretty cool.  This album sounds like both the future and the 80’s at the same time but without ever feeling retro.  People keep comparing her to Kate Bush, but I don’t really get that at all.  Her videos also tend to be pretty awesome…the the one for “Daniel” where she pretends to be Elisabeth Shue’s character in The Karate Kid and gives Daniel a big hug.

7. Dirty Projectors: Bitte Orca

Still one of my favorite bands, now with even more insane vocal hocketing than on their last record.  Everyone loves “Stillness is the Move” which is a great song but still might be the least interesting track on the album.

8. Phoenix: Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

I think this is one of the worst album titles I’ve ever heard, so I really didn’t want to like this album.  I tried to ignore it completely, but those songs kept getting so much damn airplay.  Then they started popping up in commercials.  At some point it became impossible to ignore this album.

9. The Flaming Lips: Embryonic

This album seems weird even for the Flaming Lips.  It’s pretty dark, and full of strange keyboard sounds and it seems like all the songs are more or less build on one chord (lots of drones with a beat).  This album is a million times better than their last album (At War With the Mystics).

10. Volcano Choir: Unmap

Volcano Choir is made of of Justin Vernon (Bon Iver) and Collections of Colonies of Bees, and that exactly what it sounds like.  Apparently this album was started years ago, but then Bon Iver got famous and so it took several more years to complete it. The best track on the album, “Still,” is really the Bon Iver track “Woods” only with a bunch of additional instrumentation.