Best Albums Of The Decade
As we ring in the new year we don’t just say goodbye to 2019, we also say goodbye to the 2010’s. The past decade saw the release of thousands of notable albums and we thought it would be fun to take a look back at some of our favourites. Time moves fast and our rabid appetite for the latest and greatest new thing means that sometimes we can forget about releases or acts that meant a lot to us in the past. It is with this sentiment in mind that we hope you’ll look through this list of 25 albums and revisit some of these favourites.
As the Cups N Cakes team came together to start carving out this list, we had a lot of albums we agreed should be present but we also realized that there were a lot of albums that we loved deeply that never got the attention they deserved. Most team member’s fondest memories are with some albums that you readers might not expect to see on such a list… Maybe you’ve never heard them at all. It is for this reason that we decided to split our “Best Albums Of The Decade” into two categories: The Expected and The Unexpected.
Please enjoy!
THE EXPECTED - Honourable Mention
Mac DeMarco
2 // Captured Tracks
We may never get to cover Mac DeMarco again. After the enormous success of this album he moved to Brooklyn, New York and has written and recorded every subsequent album as a US resident. Perhaps the best album he’ll ever write, 2 made slacker-pop an international sensation and inspired hundreds, maybe thousands, to start mimicking DeMarco’s jangly guitars and laissez-faire attitude.
- Jeff MacCallum
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! // Constellation
This past decade gave us the return of Godpeed You! Black Emperor. The release of 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! ended a ten year hiatus and effectively reminded the world that Canada was (and still is) a powerhouse in the post-rock universe.
- Jeff MacCallum
U.S. Girls
In a Poem Unlimited // 4AD
Meghan Remy perfected her sound on In a Poem Unlimited. The record is essentially pop music but the song craft is so exquisite and unique that it’s hard to imagine these songs getting eaten up by the masses. Remy somehow managed to tap into all the best elements of pop music and toss aside the calculated garbage that rules the charts. This album is like Talking Heads meets Madonna.
- Jeff MacCallum
THE TOP 10 EXPECTED
#10 - Timber Timbre
Creep On Creepin’ On // Arts & Crafts
Nobody, and I cannot stress this enough, nobody sets an atmospheric mood like psych-blues-folk pioneers Timber Timbre. Released in 2010 and short-listed for the Polaris Prize, their fourth album, Creep on Creepin’ On, is still on the Cups N Cakes team’s collective minds one decade later. Spacious, rich, crooning, shadowy and strange. Timber Timbre have this ingenious ability to blend futuristic, innovative sounds with retro, 50s progression-esque elements and the end result is always distinctively their own style. Freak-folk at it’s finest. Highly recommended for a late-night highway drive.
- Nicola Gunter
#9 - Colter Wall
Songs Of The Plains // Young Mary Record Co.
Colter Wall's sophomore full length is both an homage to Western music and a tribute to where he comes from. When you completely understand your origin as well as its place in forming an art form, only then can you create a tribute to it. Wall neither glorifies nor candy coats his themes of beauty, isolation and loneliness. Even the artwork harkens back to mid century design form. This was not an accident, nor was Wall's approach to recording the album. It was his second foray into the studio with lauded producer Dave Cobb. All songs were written, selected, and rehearsed prior to recording. Wall assumed more of a co-producing role while Cobb lent his signature atmospheric effects and sparse production to the recordings.
Much has been written about Wall's sensitive baritone. However, one must simply hear it to believe it. He has worked steadily at improving his delivery and range and without it, there would be no Songs of the Plains.
Wall has remarked that this collection of songs serves as both an re-introduction to Western music as well as an introduction to the geography and culture of his origins. The Western provinces are indeed sparsely populated in comparison to that of the United States. And in turn, he reminds the listener that the cowboy boots and hats of Country and Western do not originate from the South. That is the Western influence.
Colter Wall's Songs of the Plains is as authentic as they come. Themes of expansive beauty, isolation, and loneliness are candy-coated for no one, it’s Western music done right.
- Drew Cox
#8 - Metz
Metz // Sub Pop
In 2012, Metz ushered in a new era of punk music in Canada. While they had already put out a series of singles, it was with their debut full length that broke-through and established them as one of Canada’s premier heavy acts. Fittingly released by legendary label Sub Pop, the album is a blistering collection of dissonant noise-punk. Fucking relentless from start to stop, Metz develop a formula of screeching guitars, driving bass lines, and the most pummelling drums throughout the album. A formula that would go on to influence a large number of Canadian punk groups to try and recreate something so brutal, but often missing the mark. While other Metz releases hold their ground, their self-titled came the same year as many, many, excellent Canadian releases of a similar vein (Suuns, Preoccupations) and broke through on the international scene. While those bands released fantastic albums that year, it was Metz’ debut album that the Canadian music scene needed most. It provided a fresh brand of heavy music that helped push Canadian punk, post-punk and even psych, to international audiences. It was a signal to the world that the Canadian music scene is worth giving a shit about. Eight years later, Metz is still fresh as ever proving to be a timeless classic, a record that demands to be busted through the eardrums of punks for years to come.
- Kennedy Pawluk
#7 - Feist
Metals // Arts & Crafts
Upon its release, Metals seemed to be a purposeful step away from the commercial pop sensibilities that made Feist’s 2007 breakthrough album, The Reminder, so appealing. But instead of reinventing the wheel, Feist leaned more into the subtleties that she was exploring on prior releases and by doing so, crafted one of the most rewarding and cohesive albums of the 2010’s. On Metals, Feist’s word play and unique vocal delivery mixed with jaw droppingly thoughtful production allow for new gems to be discovered with each listen. Maybe this time, you notice yourself stand taller to match the discrete crescendo (2:30-3:25) leading into the triumphant ending of “Graveyard” or perhaps the vibrating string nestled below the looooong held note (2:15-2:23) of “Caught a Long Wind” catches your ear.
- Greg Torwalt
#6 - BADBADNOTGOOD
IV // Arts & Crafts
BADBADNOTGOOD’s fourth record (aptly titled IV), established them as pioneers at the forefront of modern jazz. Featuring high profile collaborators from across the Canadian jazz scene, this album was destined to be big from the get-go. IV is their first record with multi-instrumentalist Leland Whitty as a permanent member of the group, and Cups N Cakes favourites Kaytranada and Colin Stetson (among others) are featured on tracks.
The group has a knack for stylish arrangements that are showcases for their jazz training, but are also indebted to electronica, soul, and pop from the last century of recorded music. Their seemingly effortless remixing of such a wide swath of musical culture is what makes these eleven tracks so alluring; each one is a sophisticated blend of old musical traditions dissected and reassembled into something completely new.
- Sean Newton
#5 - Women
Public Strain // Flemish Eye
Writing about Women’s Public Strain is difficult for me as I often mourn the dissolution of this Calgary quartet and the passing of their guitarist Chris Reimer in 2012. Additionally, I never got to see them perform live during their short-lived life as a band. As a result, I can’t help but daydream about an alternate reality where Women were still producing music. How would it have changed the musical landscape in Alberta? What would their third album sound like? Once I snap out of this world of “what ifs”, I’ve realized that for me personally, Public Strain has taken on a life of its own and has dictated my taste in post-punk and music in general ever since it became part of my life. It has led me to scour the internet for bootleg recordings of their live shows, “meet” fellow obsessives on social media platforms such as last.fm and music message boards in an effort to find other Women-esque bands. Over the years, the term Flegel-core has been informally coined as a way to describe any bands making that lo-fi brand of angular post-punk music that Women mastered on Public Strain. The influence of Women and Public Strain is further reflected in the fact that bands from UK, USA and the rest of the world continue to cite them as a major influence almost ten years after the band abruptly called it quits. The fact that there exists a list titled “The Calgary Sound” which, (when I checked last), contains 65 bands and their corresponding Bandcamp pages from around the world in an effort to spread “the women sound” among fans is nothing short of amazing. Not bad for an album recorded in a cold, dreary basement during the bleak Calgary winter.
- Piyush Patel
#4 - Caribou
Our Love // Merge
The use of a cliched phrase “the only constant is change” would probably draw a chuckle or a groan from Caribou aka Dan Snaith himself as he possesses a PhD in mathematics, but his own discography is a prime (pun intended) example of his ever-changing soundscapes. Somewhere in the midst of “Niobe”, the last track on 2008’s Polaris Prize winning album Andorra, Caribou planted the seed of his vision of creating electronic music that was fluid in nature with its own ebbs and flows. The same track would also mark Caribou’s musical shift from the psychedelic kraut-pop of Andorra (and his other albums under the Manitoba moniker), to fully embracing electronic sounds on Swim (2010) and Our Love (2014). It would also lead to the creation of his strictly dancefloor ready project “Daphni” in 2012. If we time travel further back to the beginning when Caribou started releasing music in 2001 with his debut album Start Breaking My Heart, it was full of glitchy IDM inspired beats paired with pastoral electronica textures.
Caribou truly is a shape-shifter when it comes to music, and although the genres might have changed over the years, some characteristics remain very Caribou-esque. One such quality is that even at his most electronic, Caribou’s music continues to feel very human and this is evident throughout Our Love. Whether it’s hiding in the bright sunny psychedelic haze of Andorra or bubbling underneath the liquidy baselines of songs featured on Our Love, through his music, Caribou has always been dealing with broken relationships or relationships that never quite blossomed in the first place. If you peel back the pop and dance layers, you will find lyrics full of melancholia. The only factor that has changed over the years is the soundscapes through which he is articulating those feelings of love, heartbreak and everything in between. Our Love is Caribou at his most minimal lyrically and musically but it still manages to pack an immense emotional punch. I celebrate Caribou’s entire discography and I don’t think Dan Snaith is capable of making mediocre music
- Piyush Patel
#3 - Destroyer
Kaputt // Merge
I strongly believe that Destroyer’s Dan Bejar is one of the greatest songwriters of our times. Known for his unconventional singing style and stream of consciousness poetry, I often think of him as a Canadian Nick Cave. Kaputt, Destroyer’s ninth and arguably his best album is a metamorphosis of sorts in terms of the sound palette that Dan Bejar would go on to embrace with subsequent albums. It has this undeniable 80’s sheen, as the songs are polished with a lustrous glaze of shimmering synthesizers, trumpets and flute melodies, all encased in crystal clear production. The use of brass instruments basks the songs in a warm candle-like glow, especially on the eight minute plus epic, (and personal favourite), “Suicide Demo For Kara Walker” with its glorious swelling saxophone outro (which in itself should ideally continue for another eight minutes for full satisfaction). Elsewhere on the album, Bejar croons about maladies of being in and out of love in a way that only he can. Perhaps the greatest bit of sage-like wisdom that Bejar imparts on to the world arrives halfway through the track “Blue Eyes” with the lines “Don’t be ashamed or disgusted with yourselves”, a poignant reminder for all of us as we venture into the next decade.
- Piyush Patel
#2 - Sandro Perri
Impossible Spaces // Constellation
Sandro Perri had been around for a long time before releasing Impossible Spaces, but this 2011 release was the one that put his records in headphones around the world. Pitchfork named it one of the top 50 albums of 2011, and it became Perri’s second to be longlisted for the Polaris Prize. For good reason: the scope of each track, let alone the whole album is incredible. A track like “Wolfman”, for example, slips back and forth between Perri’s playful lyricism and technicolor instrumental moments, ripe with chromaticism and analog synthesizer. Each section seems to grow and change into the next, making for a listen that eschews conventional ideas about form and deals in slow reveals as opposed to climatic choruses. This quality makes for a record that you can’t possibly listen to enough; it’s hard enough to pinpoint exactly how these songs snowball into their best moments. Every time you listen to them, they seem to be telling you something different. Impossible Spaces is Perri at his best, and is an excellent place to start digging into one of Canada’s most intriguing songsmiths.
- Sean Newton
#1 - Jeremy Dutcher
Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa // Independent
As Canadian’s have been learning and trying to understand the systematic atrocities that befell this country’s original peoples. Important pieces of artwork have been getting created to further emphasis the dark historical past with which Canada is coming to terms. Many amazing indigenous artists are telling their ancestors, families, and personal stories through art, but none have managed to impact our lives as heavily as Jeremy Dutcher’s Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa. Dutcher spent five years studying his ancestors traditional songs at the Canadian Museum of History. His project began as a suggestion by a Wolastoqiyik elder from his community named Maggie Paul.
A Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet) member of the Tobique First Nation in North-West New Brunswick, Dutcher studied music and anthropology at Dalhousie University then trained as an operatic tenor in the Western classical tradition. After multiple generations of forced assimilation, the Wolastoqiyik peoples language and traditions were on the brink of extinction. Dutcher took it upon himself to transcribe a collection of wax cylinder recordings of Wolastoqiyik people singing their traditional songs and incorporate them into classical opera music. The outcome of this monumental undertaking was Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, an exquisitely beautiful album that showcases the Wolastoqiyik ancestry but also serves as a reminder that many indigenous communities nearly, or completely, lost their history under this country’s brutal past. When looking back at this decade way down the road, I have no doubt that Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa will be considered one of the most important Canadian albums of all time.
- Jeff MacCallum
THE UNEXPECTED - Honourable Mention
Cadence Weapon
Hope In Dirt City // Upper Class Recordings
On Hope In Dirt City, Cadence Weapon gave Edmonton one last record filled to the brim with love for his old prairie home. Not only did he show the rest of Canada that hip-hop lives in the prairies, he did so without changing his signature laid back delivery over odd-ball beats.
- Jeff MacCallum
FRIGS
Basic Behaviour // Arts & Crafts
Haunting, beautiful, and captivating, Basic Behaviour, showcases the chilling, yet admirable, energy of FRIGS. Eerie and tensing guitars blend with shockingly raw vocals to create a swell of intensity. A coarse and passionate build of screams and guitar, are followed by longing resolutions. Designing a fierce energy, each beat and chorus keeps you on your toes. FRIGS paint a portrait of growing and self-discovery by bringing a new light to dark themes. Like emerging from a dream, Basic Behaviour, immerses listeners in a hazy and hectic world full of restlessness and yearning.
- Jackie Klapak
THE TOP 10 UNEXPECTED
#10 - Napalmpom
The Core Competencies Of Napalmpom // Teenage Rampage
The Core Competencies Of Napalmpom is rebirth in the form of rock and roll. Anthems of love and heartbreak, good times and bad times, are illustrated through the healing power of celebratory rock. Thick and firm bass lines hold down the groove making it irresistible to not get up and dance while all-powerful guitars shred overtop. Honest and compelling lyrics are belted over these energetic instrumentals. The sounds are reminiscent of rock n’ roll’s roots.
Paying homage to the those who rocked before, Napalmpom, gives the genre a fresh feeling of release and euphoria- signature to them. The affable energy of The Core Competencies Of Napalmpom is unforgettable and will find a spot in the softest places of your heart.
- Jackie Klapak
#9 - Suuns
Images du Futur // Secretly Canadian
With Images du Futur, Suuns broke-out onto the Canadian scene with an entirely unique brand of noise-rock. Experimental in its essence, Suuns glide track to track with an undeniable groove. The Montreal four piece expanded from their previous release by developing a darker tone throughout the album. While their approach to noise-rock is marred by subtlety and space, there’s a held back aggression within Ben Shemie’s light and airy vocals that give the record an intensity unlike that of most noise-rock. Suuns kraut influences guide much of the instrumentation with minimalism that gives each individual part purpose and emphasis. Images du Futur listens like a dance record. It listens like a krautrock record. It listens like an experimental record. It’s widely diverse while never stemming too far from its core elements that make it the masterpiece it is, and for that it is one of the best records to be released by a Canadian artist throughout the 2010s.
- Kennedy Pawluk
#8 - Mulligrub
Soft Grudge // Independent
The world moves too quick these days. It’s easy to forget just how important Soft Grudge was when Mulligrub sprang this piece of pop-rock perfection on us. This Winnipeg trio had built a solid following in their hometown for a few years before delivering their debut album in 2016. This album quickly grew the band beyond the confines of their city and into the hearts of Canadians from coast to coast.
Best described as melancholic guitar-pop, Soft Grudge deals with heartbreak and depression while using Canadian geography to add familiarity. Singer Kelly Campbell’s voice soars over guitar, bass, and drums that shimmer with indie-rock perfection reminiscent of the late 90’s and early 2000’s. Campbell’s voice is a powerful force and is used to stamp exclamation marks at the end of every line. The delivery is sincere, as a listener, you can actually hear that Campbell’s words are not simply being sung… they are also being felt.
- Jeff MacCallum
#7 - Biblical
The City That Always Sleeps // New Damage
The City That Always Sleeps is the monstrous 2017 sophomore full-length from Toronto’s Biblical. With eight carefully arranged tracks they take participants on a mind bending, genre defying journey that flows like the passage of time and hits with all the force of mother nature. Every song runs flawlessly into the next, thanks to the bands innate ability to manipulate the dynamics of every situation and throw you into a trance. This album is not just a nod to the stoner-rock gods of our past, it pushes the envelope of modern psych-rock and metal with melodic rhythms of biblical proportions.
- Jeshaiah David
#6 - Motherhood
Dear Bongo, // Forward Music Group
I first discovered Motherhood at Sappyfest Nine in 2014. At the time, Cups N Cakes was nothing more than Carey and I drinking whisky and laughing into a shared microphone. The two of us travelled across the country to see Constantines on their reunion tour; no Western dates had been announced so we hopped a plane for New Brunswick. Sappyfest turned out to be one of the best music festivals I’ve ever attended and as great as the lineup was, both Carey and myself walked away talking about one band, and one band only… Motherhood.
Over the years, I’ve watched Motherhood grow and become a trio that is talked about with a reverence like no other. They are one of the few beacons of hope for rock music, a truly original band that doesn’t veer away from the course they plotted. Always a trio of outsiders, they’re hard to write about because they blend countless influences into one giant, bastardized sound that can only be called “art-rock”. On Dear Bongo, you’ll hear flourishes of country, punk, psych, pop, and even folk. A mash up of sounds like this rarely works but they’ve found a way to fuse together the many elements we now come to expect from them.
Dear Bongo, is the newest album on this list and the only release that’s less than a year old. It made this list because of its originality but also because of its familiarity. The record is like nothing you’ve ever heard before, yet it conjures warm memories of the past. A start to finish record that can be enjoyed by anybody, but it can also be studied and picked apart by the those who want to dive deeper into the minds of Motherhood.
- Jeff MacCallum
#5 - Kacy & Clayton
Strange Country // Big White Cloud
This album was so good that the November 2015 release on the Victoria label, Big White Cloud Records, was not enough to keep up with the demand from our friends South of the border. So Strange Country was released again in May of 2016 on New West Records which is located in Nashville, the capital of folk and country music. The thing that is immediately clear about the album is the musical tradition that has been passed on to a new generation. There isn’t anything strange about this because humans have been doing it forever, but Kacy & Clayton do it with such grace that they can’t (and haven’t) be ignored. The warm tones of Kacy’s voice, backed up by Clayton and his guitar plucking mastery combine to make a formidable duo that is likely to inspire musicians from the Prairies and beyond for a long time to come.
- Jeshaiah David
#4 - Slam Dunk
Welcome To Miami // File Under: Music
2019 saw the return of one of the funnest, wildest, and talented West Coast bands to ever grace the stage. Truth be told, we have Built To Spill to thank for coaxing Slam Dunk out of a long hiatus to be their opener while on tour in Europe and the United States. The return of Slam Dunk yielded the 2019 release In Hell (which made our list of the Best Albums Of 2019), but it’s this Victoria band’s sophomore record, Welcome To Miami, that graces the list of our favourites from the past decade. The album is a frenetic beast; wild guitar flourishes, fist pumping drums, and perfectly placed horn blasts all power the album forward at a break neck speed. It’s too good and it ends too soon… the only prudent thing to do is put it on repeat. Producer Colin Stewart captured the bands insane live show perfectly as they smash together punk, swing, pop, surf, and even cabaret sounds into an album that can only be described with an awful pun… it’s a slam dunk!
- Jeff MacCallum
#3 - Andy Shauf
The Bearer Of Bad News // Shuffling Feet/Arts & Crafts
With his signature vocal inflection and exceptional storytelling, Andy Shauf is at his most poignant with The Bearer of Bad News (released 2015). The warmth of clarinet and piano melodies adorn the desolate mood of the album. Teetering between folk and neo-jazz; and creating a captivatingly beautiful but also haunting mood throughout. “Wendell Walker” still brings me to tears.
Andy Shauf’s approach to music reminds us of the importance of sincere, patient poetry and is for those who appreciate the ghost folk elements shared by other folk innovators such as Phoebe Bridgers and Common Holly. “You’re Out Wasting” has ended up on every playlist I make for a friend because, like this album, it is timeless.
- Nicola Gunter
(Editor’s Note - Andy Shauf is on the “Unexpected“ list because our team almost unanimously picked Bearer Of Bad News and not his break-out album The Party.)
#2 - Frog Eyes
Violent Psalms // Paper Bag
Frog Eyes released four albums in the past decade and any one of them could have made this list, we chose Violent Psalms to feature here. Their final outing as a band was perfection. Together, the final Frog Eyes lineup crafted a beautiful goodbye.
An outlier within the Canadian music scene, Frog Eyes stayed true to their art for 17 years. We listened to them grow musically over the course of nine full length records and two EPs. We felt the pain of love, loss and struggle as Carey Mercer offered up personal details of his life through his cryptic musings. When a band has such a lengthy tenure, each release becomes a time capsule for the members that created it. That sentiment extends beyond the band as each record has the ability to take fans back to significant moments in their own lives. Unbeknownst to Frog Eyes, we shared our own love, loss and struggles with them. The core duo of Carey Mercer and Melanie Campbell wanted to capture the sound of a debut with no expectations of ever being heard. They forced themselves into a creative cave beginning with guitar and drums, meticulously recording each kick, tom and snare to perfection. Terri Upton added bass to the mix while Shyla Seller’s synths were layered in to create luscious texture to the band’s final ten tracks. As we’ve become accustomed to with Frog Eyes, Carey Mercer’s voice is the album’s most vital asset. The word idiosyncratic is synonymous with his style, but I urge everyone to quell the desire to describe his voice in this way. Perhaps the only peculiar thing about Mercer’s voice is his ability to soak each word with emotion and imprint those raw feelings into the listener. His voice makes hair stand upright, goosebumps emerge and the spine tingle. Although the end of Frog Eyes filled many with a deep sorrow, we must consider ourselves lucky that they gave us one last triumph to add to our collections.
- Jeff MacCallum
#1 - Jom Comyn
*In The Dark On 99 (All The Time, All The Time) // Value
*Vinyl Version
In Edmonton, it’s not uncommon to hear people refer to Jom Comyn’s In The Dark On 99 (All The Time, All The Time) as the best album ever released from that city. The album captures the most predominant season that Edmontonian’s experience... winter. As Canada’s most northern major city, roughly one million people experience its long, harsh, and dark prairie winter. Seven hours and thirty minutes of daylight is all you get for sun on Edmonton’s shortest day; you go to work in the dark, you go home in the dark. The album title is a direct reference to this phenomenon, inspired while Jim Cuming (aka Jom Comyn) was living on 99th street. The album opens with soul piercing guitar and Cuming’s soft baritone delivering late night imagery of the season changing from fall to winter. On “Cool Room”, Cuming’s guitar shimmers like hoarfrost falling from bare elm and ash trees as the blistering prairie wind begins to blow. Cuming’s voice is the warmth found while navigating his wintery instrumentation. The album’s introspective lyrics are also a nod to the dark Edmonton winter. It’s cold, people tend to stay in, winter can be an extremely contemplative time as Cuming explores poetically on “O Frozen Sidwalks”:
“Time moves slow, striking blows on that railroad, don’t you know who you even are? Cars are buried under lifetimes of snow, don’t you know in whose footsteps you’ve been walking on”
The record continues with the beautifully arranged “Wish Upon A Storm” that pushes Cuming’s instrumentation to new heights before the most urgent track on the LP, “Couples” blows in like a Calgary chinook and offers much needed warmth… but only for a moment. The album then moves to the calming presence of “Monotone”, a track that builds endlessly, inducing a trance-like feeling. Faith Healer’s Jessica Jalbert brings a truly perfect listening experience to an end, lending her voice to the albums final song.
As revered as this album is in all Edmonton circles, it never blew up across the country like we assumed it would. Perhaps our collective love of In The Dark On 99 (All The Time, All The Time) stems from us Edmontonians “feeling” this album more than other geographic regions could understand. Next time you set out on a wintery night, listen to this record and understand what it “feels” like to be an Edmontonian.
- Jeff MacCallum
