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It's a mix-and-match age, with both musicians and music fans mashing together genres like never before. Just about any style of music that's ever been played seems like fair game these days for reinvention.

The hottest rock bands of the last few years haven't strayed too far from their '70s and '80s punk and new wave influences, beyond the occasional '60s garage-rock homage. But other musicians dug deeper into musical history and came up with incredible soul and funk (Sharon Jones and Bettye Lavette), country (Robbie Fulks), power pop (Devin Davis) and folk-rock, blues and the Great American Songbook (all rolled into one, in the form of genius songwriter M. Ward).

Despite their sometimes obvious historical influences, the best albums this year didn't really sound like anything we've heard before. Orchestral pop music has been done many times, but never quite like Sufjan Stevens on his majestic "Illinois" or one-man symphony Andrew Bird on his "Mysterious Production of Eggs."

No one epitomized the idea of the musical blender better than The Go! Team, creating a crazy quilt of styles that was both artful and incredibly fun. Mali's Amadou & Mariam, with help from producer Manu Chao, also achieved a colorful fusion of styles and sounds.

Sons and Daughters and another band from the U.K., Brakes, are the latest generation in the punk family tree, but they rose above their influences with an eccentric sense of timing — and, especially in the case of Brakes, a keen sense of humor.

Sleater-Kinney also transcended its punk roots and dared to sound bigger and more dramatic —  almost like a classic-rock band in the vein of Led Zeppelin. The result was "The Woods," an album of reckless and intense power. It's what rock 'n' roll is all about.

— Robert Loerzel

Read my commentary on the albums in my story for Pioneer Press.

THE REST OF MY
TOP 20

11. Thelonious Monk Quartet With John Coltrane — At Carnegie Hall

12. Black Mountain — Black Mountain

13. Robbie Fulks — Georgia Hard

14. The New Pornographers — Twin Cinema

15. Gorillaz — Demon Days

16. Brazilian Girls — Brazilian Girls

17. Bettye Lavette — I've Got My Own Hell to Raise

18. LCD Soundsystem — LCD Soundsystem

19. Low — The Great Destroyer

20. Marianne Faithfull — Before the Poison

AND HERE'S THE REST OF MY
TOP 100
 in alphabetical order... but subject to change any second. There are so many other albums from 2005 I needed to spend more time with. My oversights vastly outnumber this list.
 

Acid Mothers Temple & the Cosmic Inferno — Iao Chant from the Cosmic Inferno

Alice Texas — Sad Days
American Analog Set — Set Free

Antibalas — Government Magic

Fiona Apple — Extraordinary Machine

Nic Armstrong & the Thieves — The Greatest White Liar

Art Brut — Bang Bang Rock 'n' Roll

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club — Howl

Blind Boys of Alabama — Atom Bomb

Blue Rodeo — Are You Ready

Bright Eyes — I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning

Broadcast — Tender Buttons

Kate Bush — Aerial

The Caesars — Paper Tigers

Laura Cantrell — Humming by the Flowered Vine

Caribou — The Milk of Human Kindness

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah — Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

The Clientele — Strange Geometry

John Coltrane — One Up, One Down: Live at the Half Note

Constantines — Tournament of Hearts

Ry Cooder — Chαvez Ravine

Danger Doom — The Mouse and the Mask

The Detroit Cobras — Baby

Dogs — Turn Against This Land

Dr. Dog — Easy Beat

Bob Dylan — No Direction Home: The Soundtrack


The Fleshtones — Beachhead

Flotation Toy Warning — Bluffer's Guide to the Flightdeck

Four Tet — Everything

Edith Frost — It's a Game

Great Lake Swimmers — Bodies and Minds
Great Lake Swimmers — Great Lake Swimmers

Ed Harcourt — Strangers

Richard Hawley — Coles Corner

The Hold Steady — Separation Sunday

I Am Kloot — Gods and Monsters

Ida — Heart Like a River

Seu Jorge — Cru

Damien Jurado  — On My Way to Absence

The Kingsbury Manx — The Fast Rise and Fall of the South

Konono No. 1 — Congotronics

Kronos Quartet with Asha Bhosle — You've Stolen My Heart

Louis XIV — The Best Little Secrets Are Kept

Magnolia Electric Co. — Trials and Errors
Magnolia Electric Co.  — What Comes After the Blues

Matt Mays and El Torpedo — Matt Mays and El Torpedo

Mercury Rev — The Secret Migration

MIA — Arular

Chris Mills — The Wall to Wall Sessions

The Moaners — Dark Snack

Moonbabies — War on Sound

Bob Mould — Body of Song

My Morning Jacket — Z

Okkervil River — Black Sheep Boy

Oneida — The Wedding

Graham Parker — Songs of No Consequence

The Ponys — Celebration Castle

Portastatic — Bright Ideas

The Reigning Sound — Home for Orphans

The Ike Reilly Assassination — Junkie Faithful

Amy Rigby — Little Fugitive

Rouge Wave — Descended Like Vultures

Anoushka Shankar — Rise

The Sights — The Sights

Son Volt — Okemah and the Melody of Riot

South San Gabriel — The Carlton Chronicles: Not Until the Operation's Through

Spoon — Gimme Fiction

Bruce Springsteen — Devils & Dust

Stars — Set Yourself on Fire

Teenage Fanclub — Man-Made

Boubacar Traorι — Kongo Magni

Chad Vangaalen — Infiniheart

Various Artists — World Psychedelic Classics 3: Love's a Real Thing: The Funky Fuzzy Sounds of West Africa

Laura Veirs — Year of Meteors

Waco Brothers — Freedom and Weep

Warsaw Village Band — Uprooting

Paul Weller — As Is Now

Wilco — Kicking Television: Live in Chicago

Wolf Parade — Apologies to the Queen Mary

Youth Group — Skeleton Jar


© 2005 BY THE UNDERGROUND BEE AND ROBERT LOERZEL.