1. Fuck Buttons, Street Horrrsing (ATP)
Unapologetically noisy, unabashedly melodic, Andrew Hung and Benjamin John Power are the new Bristol sound. Not on another record this year were leather and lace worn so well together.

2. Baby Dee, Safe Inside The Day (Drag City)
Nomi Ruiz’s sheen, Antony’s warble, Edie Sedgwick’s tributes, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge’s laments, hell, even Jeffree Star’s suspect electro: 2008 was a banner year for tranny music. None of the above, though, stayed in my stereo longer than Baby.

3. Free Kitten, Inherit (Ecstatic Peace)
Without Mark Ibold, Free Kitten is just Kim Gordon, Yoshimi P-We and Julie Cafritz. Yeah, I know, right? Just Kim Gordon, Yoshimi P-We and Julie Cafritz.

4. Lou Reed, Berlin: Live At St. Ann’s Warehouse (Matador)
Lou Reed back again. Check it top, wreck it - let’s begin. Party people, let me hear some noise. LR’s in the house. Jump, jump and rejoice. There’s a party over here,
a party over there. Wave your hands in the air; shake the derriere. These three words mean you’re getting busy: whoomp there it is…yet again.

5. MGMT, Oracular Spectacular (Sony/Columbia)
If there was a more infectious major label release this year, I simply didn’t hear it.

6. Carlos Giffoni, Adult Life (No Fun Productions)
The Venezuelan No Fun curator oversees his own growth here from disparate, disjointed noise-for-the-hell-of-it to a narrative of developing noise-as-a-result-of-it. (Extra credit awarded for being too much even for The Wire.)

7. Xiu Xiu, Women As Lovers (Kill Rock Stars)
I’m not even gonna front that I’ve heard of Martin Chalmers translation of Elfriede Jelinek’s 1975 novel Die Liebhaberinnen. I have heard this album that shares its name since early February, and just like taking women as lovers, it’s been both incredibly awesome and frustrating to no end.

8. The Matthew Herbert Big Band, There’s Me And There’s You (!K7)
This year, with Matmos tinkering around with vintage synths and a new aesthetic, I was worried about where I would get my annual musique concrète fix. And while it’s certainly strong enough to do the trick, the best high is still a familiar high.

9. Be Your Own Pet, Get Awkward (XL/Ecstatic Peace)
In all my years of doing this, I can’t recall ever knowingly naming a defunct band to my Top 10. (Honestly though, Jemina and the boys could’ve released this late last year, and I’d still find a way to give it a proper 2008 shout-out.)

10. T.I., Paper Trail (Grand Hustle/Atlantic)
I’m absolutely positive, however, that I’ve never put a mainstream rap album in my Top 10. And that’s really all you need to know about Mr. Clifford Joseph Harris, Jr. and that nebulous term of urban endearment known simply as “flow.”