Over 270 people voted for their favorite albums of the decade. Your choices were varied and some of you really broke it down. A few even wrote a short essay for each choice and why it claimed album of the year for them. This was awesome to gain some insight into what albums ya’ll enjoyed over the last 10 years. It’s also spurred on many to dust off their collections and listen to some older albums.
The winners after all the submissions were tallied up:
2000: MG! the Visionary – Transparemcee (Uprok Records)
This album was a runaway favorite with 86 votes overall. No other album was within 50 votes.
2001: (tie) Mars ILL – Raw Material (Uprok Records)
2001: (tie) Tunnel Rats – Tunnel Vision (Uprok Records)
What a great year 2001 was. It offered up a new Tunnel Rats album, Mars ILL’s debut, label debut for Deepspace5 and numerous other fresh albums. These two tied at 72 votes a piece.
2002: (tie) New Breed – Stop the Music (Uprok Records)
2002: (tie) L.A. Symphony – Baloney EP (Indie)
This was the year where albums released that fans had been clammoring for. Unfortunately the L.A. Symphony “Call It What You Want” album has never seen a proper release. If it had, I bet it would have garnered more votes than any album on this list. Another tie here with 45 votes a piece.
2003: (tie) Soup The Chemist – Eargasmic Arrangements (Indie)
2003: (tie) Sintax the Terrific – Simple Moves (Illect Recordings)
What gives with all the ties? Both albums were meaningful in their own right. Soup made his last and Sintax his first. I have a feeling in another decade or so we’ll look back quite fondly on Sintax the Terrific’s full body of work. Each secured 62 votes a piece.
2004: (tie) Listener – Whispermoon (Mush Records)
2004: (tie) Flynn – In Like Flynn (Illect Recordings)
Two diverse releases that couldn’t be more stylistically different. The Whispermoon album had one of the best singles of the decade in “Train Song” while the In Like Flynn album had 4 top singles at radio in addition to being used as background music in a Nike promotion. Each received 39 votes a piece.
2005: Ohmega Watts – The Find (Ubiquity Recordings)
The Find was one of the better debut releases in some time. It sold extremely well at the Sphere of Hip-Hop Store and you guys voted it the clear winner for 2005 with 94 votes.
2006: Mars ILL – Pro Pain (Gotee Records)
It finally released! This album could have contended in prior years had it released on its intended release date(s). The album received 67 votes overall.
2007: Theory Hazit – Extra Credit (HHIM)
The latter part of the decade brought us a plentiful listing of album releases. This particular year saw the most different albums nominated but Extra Credit was the clear choice with 55 votes.
2008: Scribbling Idiots – The Have Nots (Illect Recordings)
This year saw a few strong releases, two of which received piles of votes. Beat Rabbi & Deepspace5’s “DeepSpaceSoul” and Dert’s “The Short List” were strong contenders but the Scribbling Idiots ran away with this one winning by more than 20 votes at 77 total.
2009: (tie) Cas Metah – Guest Room (Illect Recordings)
2009: (tie) Braille & Symbolic One – Cloud Nineteen (Indie)
Last year was another fresh year. There were about 10 releases we thought might win for 2009. In the end we had yet another tie but this one was mighty close as two other releases were within a few votes of being in the lead. Each album secured 41 votes.
A 2010 release received numerous votes for 2009/2010. Theory Hazit & Toni Shift’s “Modern Marvels” album received 88 votes even though it wasn’t eligible for 2009 (we used official release dates to nail down the year of release). That bodes well for it possibly running away with Album of the Year for 2010. We’ll see about this time next year.
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[…] episode featuring fans choice for best albums of the past decade (2000-2009). We tallied hundreds of votes covering the decade and here are the top choices of the fans. Visit […]
Very cool. The results were very interesting, especially seeing things like Whispermoon and In Like Flynn in a tie. Thanks for doing this Plastic and Sphere of Hip-Hop!
I was surprised too with many. The variety of albums getting votes for each year was pretty crazy. Next time I’ll do up a nice poll on the site with a bunch of choice. A lot of people couldn’t remember when everything came out. Sorting the votes out was a pain… spent a few hours on it. Yuck!
I agree with most of this list I’m surprised Lightheaded’s Pure Thoughts wasn’t on here though!
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