Slant Magazine

Glad to see Kaputt on the list. Fantastic album.

interesting top 3. I like them all, but each contains a few clunkers IMO, especially "Let England Shake." My number 1 is tune-yards.

also, too bad for pistol annies, but maybe they're too slight to be memorable.

I was certain that #1 and #3 would be in reverse order. Dang it. The noses of the editors at Slant mag aren't as far up Gaga's ass as I had originally thought.

I'll save everyone the trouble and say it myself: "Mike, you don't have to agree with them". Or better yet, "If you don't agree with their opinion, then don't read it." Still, though. I had a lot of respect for Sal and Eric... that is, until they churned out this piling sack of dog crap.

If no one else can see that the bank account of the editors here are being fattened by Gaga's publicist, then slap my ass and call me Sally. Heck, they even used Gaga's picture as the thumbnail for both this and the singles list.

Mike, get over it—just because you don't like Gaga because you can't get past the fact that she's such a popular, mainstream artist who sells pop records doesn't mean her music isn't actually very good.

Thanks, Matthew, for putting his ass in place.

While Kate Bush's "50 Words For Snow" is my favorite of the year, I'm okay with PJ Harvey taking the number one spot here. Both are flawless concept albums and I'd venture to say a masterpiece for both artists.

haha. I'm pretty sure Gaga's team could afford a number 1 spot anyway

Really well deserved on Gaga . Her new album is so massive . Nothing quite like it in years . I mean the sounds are so big . Such variety . She is an artistic genius . Well deserved . Mike hating on Gaga for being pop is so 2008 , get over it

Why isn't 'The SMiLE sessions' on here? Didn't you find it eligible?

Again, whilst I like 'Born This Way' - (Bad Kids/Government Hooker/Judas/Scheiße/Black Jesus) - for me, NO.3 is too high...

Great to see Watch The Throne - although its patchy it's the strongest mainstream Hip Hop LP of 2011 - that Drake LP isn't Hip Hop - I don't care and was rated way too high.

Unless your f**king someone or high - The Weeknd is mostly unlistenable and is again placed too high -

GREAT to see Katy B in the Top Ten - even tho the LP was OK only. I like Lykke Li especially 'Love Out Of Lust'

Canadian group NEW LOOK should have been in there!

lady gaga doesn't have to pay people to like her — unfortunately. she's already done a pretty brilliant job convincing queer folks that what we really need right now is another obnoxious rich white lady to "speak for" us. she's not buying us, we're buying her — because she's managed to tap into the neoliberal assimilationist bullshit rhetoric which has finally trickled down from the upper echelons of the white gay male elite into the political mainstream. you go girl!

p.s. i would have expected the slant contributors, who are usually pretty sensitive to issues of language, to avoid using "tranny," a word with a pretty violent connotation both historically and in the present.

i'm sorry but I'm so incredibly EXHAUSTED by this anti-Gaga rhetoric. What is it about this woman (and others like her, like Madonna) that inspires such vitriol from, notably, MEN. Reading these reader comments - not just here, but on sites across the internet - over the last year or two has gone from amusing to bewildering to downright disturbing. Why is it such a shock that gay men like a strong woman who writes catchy dance songs and stands up for equal rights for minorities? More importantly, what's so dangerous about that? I know those of you who fancy yourselves part of the gay/indie intelligensia like to think there's some kind of brainwashing of the gay community going on, but the fact is that even if there were notable gay men who were selling millions of records and standing up for trannies - yes, trannies, and I know plenty of people who use that term affectionately without their P.C. alarms buzzing (and since when has Slant been sensitive to language - they throw words like "fag" and "bitch" around plenty) - the gays would still love their strong, pop divas. And the fact that there are a handful of critics out there who are brave enough to acknowledge that BTW is a damn good pop album is refreshing. The fact that 90% of the discussion here is about 4% of this list says more about YOU than the writers on this site. Or maybe it's just confirmation why this woman is on the list in the first place. Because she's making people think!!

HerMadgesty...I couldn't have said it better. Really. Bravo.

Pistol Annies missing the aggregate list? Hmmm...well, there's On A Mission, whokill, Born This Way and Wounded Rhymes on top, so it's still female power all the way. And though Frank Ocean's Nostalgia/Ultra is a "mixtape", it neatly trumps House of Balloons in terms of durability. It's the best R&B release in years.

Also love Das Racist and St. Vincent.

Hello, guys. It would be wonderful if you could post the list from each of the editors that voted just as you did with the movies top-25. With such a diverse final list it'd be interesting to discover which albums were pick by the staff individually.

"Every year seems like the year of the woman around here."

Really?

Then where are the women who work for Slant?

Before I get jumped, I appreciate that you seem to have fairly lefty politics, a queer critical perspective, etc. And often the blog has a feminist perspective. But I still wish there were more women writing for you.

"i'm sorry but I'm so incredibly EXHAUSTED by this anti-Gaga rhetoric."

So we should all either shut up or jump on the bandwagon? Maybe you should grow a pair (if I may use a male-centric phrase) and deal with the fact there are a lot of people out there who just don't like her or her music. As a 30+ year pop music fan, I find her songs derivative and inconsequential, spectacle posing as art. Generations of female pop singers have done much more with less fuss.

Stefani Gaga's album isn't faring all that great overall on year-end critics' lists (it's outside the top 50 at Acclaimed Music, which compiles multi-critic lists from around the world). PJ Harvey's album, on the other hand, is slaying the year-end lists.

@mietzelfeld - You might be correct, except Gaga herself is bisexual. I remember before "The Fame" was even out, and therefore way before "Just Dance" became her first pop hit, she was making that known in interviews. So, even if you see her as an "obnoxious rich white lady," she is also bisexual, and is therefore part of "us" (LGBTQ community) in that regard. When she sings "no matter gay straight or bi lesbian transgendered life" in "Born This Way," she is part of that group she is speaking of. That is why so many of us respond to her; it's not because we feel we need another rich white lady to "guide" us, but because this rich white lady is one of us, and makes damn good music to boot.