In the 21st century, music became more universal, immediate, and accessible than ever before. On Jan. A change in cultural consumption that sweeping is bound to be an enormous mixed bag.
Early in this century, the album was alleged to be dying at the hands of single-track downloading. The biggest artists have often been the most radical innovators. Those are just a few of the biggest big-name examples.
In compiling our top albums of the quarter-century, we wanted to show as much of the scope of this story as possible. So when given the choice between including multiple albums by an artist and finding room for a record that added something important or interesting to the list, we almost always took the second option.
Still, this is a list of albums, not artists, and certain heavy hitters just put out too many amazing LPs to deny. There might not be too much to be optimistic about in , but the mountain of good records will always keep growing. In hindsight, Survivor is singular in that it captured both the apex of the TRL girl groups and the moment before they became obsolete.
Over time, the world Kanye West constructed on Yeezus β full of guttural and chaotic emotion, combined with so much noise β started to feel and sound like the world around us. The collaborators on the album, from indie electronic musicians like Arca and Hudson Mohawke to icons like Daft Punk and Rick Rubin, helped West construct a blueprint for where popular music was heading, and as time would tell, they were spot-on.
