70. Kanye West - The College Dropout
As much as I dislike Kanye West these days, there is no denying the incredible power of this first album. Even though there are just as many bad tracks as there are great ones, the fact that it has 21 makes this okay. Despite the terrible skits and poor pacing of the tracks, the amazing beats and Kanye's excellent rapping make several of the tracks just monumental. And unlike many other rappers, I don't get angry when I listen to Kanye. Rapping about issues like his own self-consciousness makes this a rap album that I enjoy in more than one way.

69. Pixies - Surfer Rosa
Steve Albini might just have made this album as good as it is. With trademark focus on instrumentation with vocals something of a background sound, the whole album just sounds really bare. The screaming vocals of Black Francis are a perfect fit with Joey Santiago's screeching guitars and Kim Deal's distinctive bass that holds everything together. The best thing about this album is that it sounds so fun, so human. Any album with both "Where Is My Mind?" and "Gigantic" has to be amazing anyway.

68. The Velvet Underground & Nico
Wow, this album has to be one of, if not the most influential album of all time. Almost every genre of music these days owes a lot to The Velvet Underground's famous collaboration with Nico and it has to be good if Andy Warhol is producing the thing! Pretty much every track is amazing and what is great about them is that they can cover so many different styles of music while still being distinctive. But the best thing about the album is that even though it was made almost 40 years ago, it hasn't lost anything over the years - a sign of a classic.

67. Explosions In The Sky - The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place
Everyone's favorite post-rock band's most popular album. In such an alienating genre, it is amazing how Explosions in the Sky can still garner a wide following, even from people whose favorites include not Mogwai, Do Make Say Think, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, but rather Death Cab For Cutie, Sufjan Stevens and Rilo Kiley. Granted, Explosions in the Sky can be nothing like other bands in the post-rock genre, but their appeal could be mainly due to the sheer beauty and brilliance of their music. Songs like "Your Hand In Mine" and "First Breath After Coma" show off their distinctive tremolo style (that is now hugely imitated by many lame post-rock bands) that is so evocative and inspiring it brings me close to tears. Screw fight songs and rap music, this is what gets me pumped up for sports.

66. Built To Spill - There's Nothing Wrong With Love
I don't always like indie rock, it can all sound the same, but Built To Spill has created the perfect indie rock album right here. It doesn't really defy conventions or anything, but each song is more or less perfectly crafted and they each sound pretty amazing. So many classics like "Big Dipper", "Car", and "Dystopian Dream Girl" are perfect for putting on mix tapes and stuff just because they have great lyrics, melodies and Doug Marsch's amazing guitar skills don't hurt either.

65. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
Remember when Pitchfork gave this a 10.0? It doesn't quite deserve that but it comes close, and in a sense, it is "perfect". This actually was one of the first "alternative" albums that I actually listened to, after Weezer's discography and the Fountains of Wayne self-titled. This album really covers all of the bases from weird and seemingly nonsensical "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" (I probably just have no idea what "I am an American aquarium drinker/I assassin down the avenue" means), to sad and depressing "Jesus Etc." (strangely relevant to it's 9/11/01 release date - "Tall buildings shake/Voices escape singing sad sad songs"), and even upbeat and infectiously poppy "Heavy Metal Drummer". There's a good reason that this album turned me on to indie/alternative music. It's because it's great and is seemingly flawless, to my ears at least.

64. The Olivia Tremor Control - Black Foliage Vol 1
My brain seriously was turned inside out by this album. Maybe I need to listen to it on shrooms or acid or something, but I get so freaked out and amazed whenever I listen to this CD. In one sense, it is just as poppy and catchy as the also-great "Dusk At Cubist Castle", but it is a serious departure from the light-hearted tone of that album. This album seems almost dark and mysterious in comparison. It is very very hard to describe but it is so psychedelic and just makes me think that it would make much more sense if I take some kind of drug while I'm listening to it. However the craziness that it immerses you in is really an experience to be had. I don't know if what Will Cullen Hart said about it making sense after listening to it 50 times because every song is involved with each other is true, but if it is, man, this has to be the most brilliant thing in the world.

63. Roxy Music - For Your Pleasure
I am a big Roxy Music fan. Bryan Ferry's amazing voice definitely lends itself well to the music, and with this being Eno's last work with Roxy Music, it has to be amazing. The album excels in both the slower tracks and the faster, more energetic ones, but I really have to give the edge to the tracks where Roxy Music really shows off its energy. "Do The Strand" is such a great track, and "Editions of You" has to be one of the best pop songs of all time. It might not be really obvious, but there is definitely influence from Roxy Music on the U.K. rock bands of today, especially from tracks like these. I mean bands like Franz Ferdinand, Art Brut and Maxïmo Park. Of course none of them, except perhaps Art Brut, can say they are as good as Roxy Music were.

62. Black Dice - Beaches & Canyons
THANK YOU JONNO FOR THIS ALBUM. IT IS AMAZING. Christmas 2005 was the best in terms of music for me, just because I got this. Black Dice has changed everything that I used to think about music. I could go on an on about how amazing they are and how they can virtually create entire environments from their music. Each album is totally different, and this one is perfectly indicated by its title. This album DOES sound like beaches and canyons, I don't understand how they do this, but Black Dice, with their 3 or 4 members, recreate the experience of traveling through a canyon and then landing on the beach to experience the beautiful sound of the waves and the ocean's roar. This could be a lyric-less concept album. Like a bird flying over the ocean, the beaches, and the canyons and back again.

61. The Microphones - The Glow, Pt. 2
There isn't much to this album besides guitar, vocals and the occasional drums. It is really great though, I love Phil's great whisper of a voice and the lo-fi buzz of the entire experience. Each song is sung as if it was a real personal experience for Phil, in the first person. The album feels less like a musical collection of individual tracks as songs, and more like a journal, recounting the experiences of a single man that is written as he goes along and is unearthed many many years later, in a lower quality, but the stories and recollections are all still there, all just as real and just as breathtaking. I'm tired. I need to lie down.