Billboard's Top 10 Albums of 2002

[Guest hardyz1]

1. Coldplay, "A Rush of Blood to the Head" (Capitol)

2. Queens of the Stone Age, "Songs for the Deaf" (Interscope)

3. Wilco, "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" (Nonesuch)

4. Norah Jones, "Come Away With Me" (Blue Note)

5. Bruce Springsteen, "The Rising" (Columbia)

6. Steve Earle, "Jerusalem" (E-Squared/Artemis)

7. Beck, "Sea Change" (Geffen)

8. Solomon Burke, "Don't Give Up on Me" (Fat Possum/ Epitaph)

9. Doves, "The Last Broadcast" (Capitol)

10. The Dixie Chicks, "Home" (Open Wide/Monument)

 

I was pleasantly surprised to see Songs for the Deaf at #2, as it was my favorite.

 

Disagreement in 3...2...1...

[Guest The Hamburglar]

Jeez, I'm a fellow countryman of theirs, but Coldplay and Doves are both a bit crap. They bore the absolute living hell out of me. NME gave Coldplay album of the year, the daft shites. They redeemed themselves with the Streets at number 3 and the Coral at number 4, but the inclusion of Oasis' Heathen Chemistry even in the top 50 shot the list's credibility to hell for me. People need to cease placating Oasis when they release shitty albums. Oh dear, I've realised I just side-tracked the thread. I was talking about the NME top fifty for 2002, not the Billboard top 10. Apologies.

[Guest Kinetic]

Well, #3 should be #1 and the rest should be carefully reconsidered, if not discarded altogether.

[Guest Dace59]

Coldplay is a disgrace to British music.

[LaParkaYourCar 0]

My God........Coldplay is so freakin boring! Why are they the #1 Album? Is this based on sales?

[Guest Dace59]

Nothing wrong with slow melo music, but Coldplay has no skill to it at all.

[Guest Respect The 'Taker]

^What he said

[Guest Kinetic]

I'd say it's pretty obviously not based on sales.

[Guest TheyCallMeMark]

Eyes Adrift should be number one or two, give or take Wilco.

[Metal Ed 0]

Where's South of Heaven?

[Guest Incandenza]

I fail to understand the love that Coldplay gets. They're like a wussier Travis.

[Guest kingkamala]

Hey whatever found on to Travis anyway? They were one of the bands MTV 2 said would be the next big thing back in 2000 same thing with At The Drive In....speaking of where are they now....

[Guest Incandenza]

Travis is still chugging along. At the Drive In broke up last year.

[Guest redbaron51]

Well, #3 should be #1 and the rest should be carefully reconsidered, if not discarded altogether.

you don't think Beck's new album is any good???

 

I'm surprised

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Ed, Although South of Heaven is better than every album on that list put together, it's a bit of a stretch calling it the album of the year since it came out quite a bit ago. I suppose we could bend the rules a bit and stick God Hates Us All in there, but that would still be stretching it when it comes to time constraints and such.

[Metal Ed 0]

Man, South of Heaven defies the laws of time and space. It should top every year's list and its skull-crackin, bone-crunchin metal masterpieces should occupy every CD ever pressed, past or future. Except for other hard rockin shit, anyway. That's the way I see it. I guess that's probly why I don't write for Billboard. Well...that and my seven felony convictions.

[Guest kingkamala]

Where is Poison's Hollyweird?!?!?! This is an outrage same thing with the Bret Michaels solo album he released this year. Did Journey release an album this year? If so that's an automatic #1, Steve Perry or some other guy that looks like Steve Perry its an album of the year.

 

 

 

I bet Kotzenjunge goes to Billboard's office on Monday with a baseball bat and demands Kylie Minougue's latest release gets the #1 spot.

[Metal Ed 0]

You best not be mockin me with that shit, Kamala. I got a poem for you in General Chat.

[Guest kingkamala]

Travis is still chugging along. At the Drive In broke up last year.

Aw man I kind of dug At the Drive In....I mean they weren't anything great and sure they were a rather blatent Rage against The Machine ripoff but they were better then 50% of the other stuff they were playing on MTV right now. I remember those guys being wayyyyy overhyped, everyone said they were like a "punk" Rage against the Machine.

[Guest KingOfOldSchool]

If it means anything to you, three members of ATDI are now in Sparta, who released "Wiretrap Scars" earlier this year.

[Guest Incandenza]

Gah, At the Drive-In was waaaaaaaaay better than Rage Against the Machine. RATM lacked the melody and focus that Drive-In had in spades.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Are you nuts? Rage's s/t album alone kills ATDI's entire body of work.

 

Who needs melody and focus anyway?

[Guest Incandenza]

RATM's overrated. I could never get past Zack de la Rocha's mediocre rap skillz, yo, and Tom Morello's guitar playing was technically fine, but empty and dull. The rhythm was tight, but a nice bass-and-drum combo does not a good band make. Blah all around, in my massive ego's opinion.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

Oo, Incandenza, I can definitely agree with those statements about Rage's later output, but I adore the s/t oh so much.

 

Granted, all the "fuck you I won't do what you tell me!" anti-authority stuff feels a bit pedestrian, but I've always found that album rips and tears the eardrums in all the right ways, despite the somewhat silly rhetoric contained within.

 

I also have a fond spot for ATDI's Vaya, and a lot of the stuff on Relationship Of Command, too. I saw Sparta opening up for Weezer this summer, and they seemed to have the ATDI instrumentation rip-off down, but without the same passion. They all work better together than apart, I reckon.

[Guest Incandenza]

Sparta's lame. It's ATDI-lite, all the way.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

I agree about Morello's riffs not having much emotion behind them, and the rhythm section always being tight, but Zack's vocals fit the band perfectly, even if the political nonsense was over the top.

 

They're by no means a really great band, but they put out a great album, which is more than I can say for their scores of imitators.

[Guest Incandenza]

In the past, I've ranted about the large portion of clueless dipshits that make up the RATM fanbase, haven't I? The ones who could give a flying fuck about the Zapatista rebels in Mexico, instead, choosing to take the line "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me!" as a rallying cry for their own pathetic excuse of rebellion? Oh, how I hate them.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Totally agreed on that point, but it doesn't mean the music's any worse because of it.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

I hate them too, but I think I actually hate them a little less than the people who actually do base their entire political worldview around RATM lyrics. I'm pretty sure Scott Keith's Biggest Fan was one of these characters back when he was around.

 

It's one thing to be dumb; it's another to be dumb with a cause.

[Guest Incandenza]

Totally agreed on that point, but it doesn't mean the music's any worse because of it.

No, it isn't. But whenever I think of RATM, I automatically think of those kids I knew in high school who were just like that. I don't blame that band for it.