Say something bad about your top 20 artists? I'll do you one better and make fun of every physical deformity I can find in my top 38 (yes, 38) artists.
1
Okkervil River – Really? You wanna do how many concept albums in a row? Plus, I can never show you off to my Beach Boys-loving friends because of that last song. Also, the early singing is...terrible.
2
Bonnie Prince Billy – Why don't you make a single song with a consistent melody? Why don't you sing (since you can, and well) instead of whispering? Why can you not keep the same name for more than a couple albums?
3
Stars of the Lid – What do you get when nothing happens for an hour and ten minutes? Half a SotL album.
4
Boards of Canada – Aside from being the most obvious IDM artist ever, and making almost all of their album covers green, and having early demos that are well hyped but actually suck worse than the new DJ Shadow album, I have nothing bad to say.
5
Andrew Bird – You're like the nerdy intelligent songwriter version of those kids who think ninjas and pirates are automatically funny. Lyrics like “there will be snacks” and “your own personal Waterloo” make you sound like a smart-people cliché combined with the computer from Portal.
6
Radiohead – Oh, hands off the Radiohead. You know what you guys did? I like everything you've ever done since Pablo Honey. Really I do. But you ruined Last.fm by releasing a new album. I know you had to be the Beatles, but serious, retire your songs from the Top Tracks list already. We know you're popular.
7
Feist – A friend once told me your voice sounded...broken. I know you had some kind of voice surgery but...whatever. Also, your fanbase includes idiots who say things like the following: “I won't listen to The Reminder despite the great critical reviews because there's no way it could be better than Let It Die, and I don't want that album to be ruined for me.”
8
Wilco – No, a 10-minute
krautrock song is not OK. No, a 10-minute song of ambient noise is not OK. You are not Brian Eno.
9
The Arcade Fire – I told people the lead woman had
Down's Syndrome. No one believed me. I showed them a picture of her. They all believed me.
10 I bought another
Sonic Youth album today! It's just
noise!
11
Helios – So ambient,
you soil yourself and don't even notice. So ambient, it's in elevators and dentist offices and mutual fund commercials. But it's not popular enough for any of that, so our street cred is safe.
12
Menomena – The song I listen to most by this band is
Monkey's Back. I try to show it to other people but they laugh it away before the guitar part because the lyrics are about a fucking MONKEY and spitting SEEDS onto him.
13
Brian Eno – King of the Komatose. I think My Life in the Bush of Ghosts is just one song, played a dozen times. Why is the best work you've done titled 'Music for Airports.' No one wants to listen to Muzak that labels itself Muzak.
14
Lupe Fiasco – Only this high on the list because I was stuck in France for a week and had nothing else to listen to. Also, if
Nas is you favorite rapper, why choose to base your career on It Was Written and not
Illmatic.
15
Wire – Have you heard of this band Wire? Post-punk? Late 70's Early 80's and onward? No? Wanna hear a cool song by them? No? Do you want to watch The Wire? No? It's the best show on television!
16
Destroyer – (La)^15
17
Aesop Rock is a fine rapper because he does not talk about violence and supermanning and
spidermanning. In fact, he talks about nothing at all.
18
Subtle – Lupe, AesRoc, and now these dudes. It's a trifecta of indie-acceptable rap. Plus, this band based their entire careers around telling the story of a white rapper named Hour Hero Yes. Neal Stephenson called, and he's sending Hiro Protagonist over to kick your character's ass.
19
Bob Dylan – Name the five best folk singers of all time: Dylon Dylon Dylon Dylon and Dylon. His voice hasn't aged well, his new stuff is corny but still gets all the critics hot&bothered. You know what? I like Desire because of Hurricane. I like Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. That was about 30 years ago. Plus, you make my mom talk about 'corkscrews to my heart.'
20
The Fiery Furnaces – Each album you got worse, and critics liked it more. Then you finally get good on Widow City and no one cares. Your exposure peaked too early, like River Phoenix. Sorry your grandma is dead though.
21
Iron & Wine – There is no way I'm letting this guy crack my top 20, or else he might get into a beard fight with Bonnie Prince Billy. Plus, how can I be an individual if I listen to the same exact artists as every prudish girl I've ever tried to date?
22
Dinosaur Jr. - This is a puzzler. I don't know why this isn't higher on the list. If it was, I'd have more bad things to say.
23
Talking Heads – Patrick Bateman's favorite band. Yes it is!!!!!!!!
24
Guided by Voices – the lo-fi indie music personification of
premature ejaculation. Yes you released about 1,000 songs in a decade, beating everyone except Bob Dylan for career total number of songs. You also won the 'Most Undeveloped Ideas Award' and the 'This Whole Album is Jag-Off Award'
25
Grizzly Bear – Knife is the most coverable song in years. My band did a cover of it. We all play on Guitar Hero guitars.
26
Eluvium – somehow managed to get the greatest critical praise for their worst release yet. The early stuff (
Lambent Material) was wonderful, but then things got big and bombastic with Airships and such. Leave that shit for Final Fantasy XLI
27
of Montreal – Friend of mine, upon hearing this band at my insistence: “Do you wanna tell me something?” “About what?” “About you being gay.”
28
Pavement – The first line of their first album is quite good lyrically. I find it funny. Why is the whole rest of the album and the entire next one totally incoherent?
29
Yo La Tengo – Your best ambient work was in the movie Old Joy, but you refuse to release a soundtrack. This is music to sleep to, sung by people without singing ability. No wonder all of ICHTHBAO is whispering.
30
The National – Again, getting praised for the album AFTER your good one. What's with that line: “I'm a birthday candle in a circle of black girls...god is on my side...'cause I am the child bride.” Dude, are you...racist?
31
Four Tet has quit his job as a maker of interesting folksy IDM and now stays in his basement, recording tracks of improvisational drumming from his five-year-old son.
32
The New Pornographers – Just let Dan Bejar write all the songs, please. Some of your stuff is so sickly sweet that I need to take salt pills after to keep up my complexion.
33 GHOST! FACE! KILLAH! - I know it was on a Wu-Tang album, but you recorded (and thought acceptable) the line 'wanna have a ball / might as well pick a testicle'
34
Super Furry Animals – I only listen for your Welsh accents. Really. That's it.
35
...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead get off easy because no once bothers to critique anything beyond the band's name. Did you think you could get away with covering Guided By Voices? They're on this list too, you know.
36
Sage Francis – Too easy.
37
Joy Division – I watched Control, wishing that Ian could have been a bit more like
David Bowie. Now if only they'd lasted to put together a third album it would have earned them the accolades that they currently get.
38
Sigur Ros - “Hey guys, this album has no name, no song titles and the lyrics are just three syllables repeated over and over!”
In reality, I truly do like each of these guys. Except Iron & Wine. I wish I could delete that in a non-labor intensive way.
ZenosVeda