Pitchfork’s Readers Loved <em>In Rainbows</em> So Much They Probably Even Paid For It

inrainbowssssss.jpgBecause 2007 still has a few weeks/months left to haunt us–Idolator Poll comin’ soon, y’all!–we present (what might be) the last 2007 list in our Year-End Analysis feautre, one we almost forgot in our joy that the clocks had turned over at midnight on Jan. 1, and with that the promise that we might never again have to type the words “Neon Bible” between an italics tag into Movable Type: the Pitchfork readers’ poll! And guess what? We had to type the words “Neon Bible” between an italics tag into Movable Type. As Pitchfork itself notes, their reader’s Top 10 hews close to the site’s own official Top 10, but after that things “diverge.” Why? Because [insert usual former-conflict-of-interest-y caveat here] despite the site’s admirable expansion of coverage over the last five years into areas that readers might not necessarily mutiny over, who else is gonna vote the Shins for “Most Underrated Album” with a straight face, Braff jokes be damned?

THE GOOD: Consensus cynicism be damned, it’s kind of heartening that, after all the first-listen reviews and release date hype hype, people actually do seem to be repeat-listening to and enjoying the Most Important Album Of 2007. (You can decide which one we’re talking about.)
THE BAD: That said, consensus keeps great records from Roisin Murphy, Dude N’ Nem, and the Dirty Projectors, which “most often received first-place votes,” off the singles list in favor of two Arcade Fire joints, two Radiohead songs, and (less irritatingly) two Spoon and LCD Soundsystem tracks each. Democracy!
THE WHAAA?: We’ve only included the Best Albums and Best Singles list after the jump, but interestingly, or perhaps just keeping with this year’s vibe of established artists comfortably trouncing even well-regarded upstarts, only three of the winners in the Best New(ish) Act category make the album and/or singles lists, all down in the lower reaches save the expected Top 10 finish for Justice’s “D.A.N.C.E.”

Albums
1. Radiohead: In Rainbows
2. LCD Soundsystem: Sound of Silver
3. Panda Bear: Person Pitch
4. The National: Boxer
5. Animal Collective: Strawberry Jam
6. Arcade Fire: Neon Bible
7. Spoon: Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
8. Of Montreal: Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
9. M.I.A.: Kala
10. Battles: Mirrored
11. Feist: The Reminder
12. Okkervil River: The Stage Names
13. Jens Lekman: Night Falls Over Kortedala
14. Sunset Rubdown: Random Spirit Lover
15. Wilco: Sky Blue Sky
16. Menomena: Friend and Foe
17. Justice: †
18. Burial: Untrue
19. Deerhunter: Cryptograms
20. Iron & Wine: The Shepherd’s Dog
21. The Field: From Here We Go Sublime
22. Andrew Bird: Armchair Apocrypha
22. Kanye West: Graduation
23. Modest Mouse: We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank
24. The Shins: Wincing the Night Away
25. Band of Horses: Cease to Begin

Singles
1. LCD Soundsystem: “All My Friends”
2. Panda Bear: “Bros”
3. M.I.A.: “Paper Planes”
4. Battles: “Atlas”
5. Animal Collective: “Fireworks”
6. LCD Soundsystem: “Someone Great”
7. The National: “Mistaken for Strangers”
8. Feist: “1 2 3 4″
9. Justice: “D.A.N.C.E.”
10. Arcade Fire: “Keep the Car Running”
11. Radiohead: “Jigsaw Falling Into Place”
12. Radiohead: “Nude”
13. Arcade Fire: “Intervention”
14. Spoon: “You Got Yr Cherry Bomb”
15. Of Montreal: “Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse”
16. Spoon: “The Underdog”
17. Okkervil River: “Our Life Is Not a Movie or Maybe”
18. Animal Collective: “Peacebone”
19. Beirut: “Elephant Gun”
20. UGK [ft. Outkast]: “Int’l Players Anthem (I Choose You)”
21. Rihanna: “Umbrella”
22. Wilco: “Impossible Germany”
23. Jens Lekman: “A Postcard to Nina”
24. Caribou: “Melody Day”
25. Band of Horses: “Is There a Ghost?”

2007 Pitchfork Readers Poll [Pitchfork]

Categories:
top, year-end analysis

5 Responses to “Pitchfork’s Readers Loved <em>In Rainbows</em> So Much They Probably Even Paid For It”

  1. by walkmasterflex at 2:12 am

    Shockingly, the readers of a publication that focuses on indie rock like indie rock releases the best.

  2. by Big Tuna at 4:09 am

    No “Year End Analysis” for the Pazz & Jop poll?? C’mon! That thing is comedy gold! Especially if they don’t learn their lesson from last year and put a picture of Radiohead running over M.I.A. on the cover

  3. by Chris Molanphy at 11:09 am

    I’ll just say it and then duck so people can throw shit at me: the Shins album is a bit underrated.

    I said “bit” — I didn’t put it in my Top 10, and it didn’t Change My Life (snark intended) or anything. But it’d make my Top 15, easy. It has a very coherent sense of mood, moreso than their last record, and “Phantom Limb” is a lovely song (in every damning-with-faint-praise sense of the word “lovely”).

  4. by Dead Air ummm Dead Air at 11:13 am

    I was totally into loving In Rainbows and paying for it before anyone else, but then loving In Rainbows and paying for it got too popular, so now it sucks.

  5. by SuperUnison at 11:28 am

    I was over the vinyl version of “In Rainbows” before any of you had even downloaded it.

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