To say that Jason A Parkes' list of his thirty favourite albums of 2009 is exhaustive would be, well, correct. So exhaustive in fact, that all you're getting today are albums 30-16..

30 Flight of the Conchords - I Told You I Was Freaky

Ideally theses songs should be viewed within the context of the highly amusing second and perhaps final series of Flight of the Conchords - examples being the hilarious 'Too Many Dicks (On the Dance Floor)', or 'Roxanne'-alluding 'You Don't Have to Be a Prostitute.'

But some of the songs transcend the TV series and suggested the Conchords had severe songwriting chops - the title track seemed to be everything I mostly didn't get from the MGMT album last year (especially the lines “At eight P.M. I sell my underpants on E-bay/At half-past nine I hold a séance in your hallway/At ten o'clock I ask some ghosts for a three-way/Yes it's creepy - I told you I was freaky!”) while 'Carol Brown' is as moving as early classics such as 'A Kiss is Not a Contract' and 'Leggy Blonde.'

The highlight remains their spin on Kelis' 'Milkshake' that is 'Sugalumps', which was probably the best R&B record this year and featured a cameo from the Prince of Parties. The hook at the end of 'Sugalumps' is the best I've heard since The Love Below and really should have been fleshed out into a killer single. Sadly there is no more TV series, but a UK tour in 2010 sounds like a must have ticket.

29 Engineers - Three Fact Fader

Feted around their debut e.p. and eponymous debut in 2004/2005, Engineers have become a bit of a lost band - record company woes, a protracted release of their sophomore album, the band effectively splitting, and having to support Porcupine Tree are some of the afflictions that preceded a recent ominous silence.
A shame as Three Fact Fader is a pretty impressive record that indicates a band delivering on that early promise with aplomb. The Harmonia-sampling opener 'Clear Coloured Wine' is one of the most impressive things I've heard all year and sounded like the reviews of The Horrors' Primary Colours read.

Three Fact Fader was a reminder of the promising act of a few years ago and a very pleasant surprise. Here's hoping they come back again and play a few dates - though next time around, could they leave Porcupine Tree at home?

28 Super Furry Animals - Dark Days/Light Years

Gruff Rhys and co remain a rather prolific bunch, delivering a Furries album every few years between solo projects such as the celebrated Neon Neon. Dark Days/Light Years is quite a departure from the previous LP Hey Venus! which sounded exactly how one might expect a SFA LP to sound. Gruff shared vocal duties more with Bunf and Cian and the album seemed to centre on Kosmische-inspired beats and the stoner inflected riffage of Dead Meadow and Harvey Milk.

'Inaugural Trams' felt like a leftover from the Neon Neon record (& the best record of its kind since Black Box Recorder's 'The English Motorway System'), while 'The Very Best of Neil Diamond' nailed the Furries' classic pop song style to the psyched-world vibe of Grails and Om.

Plus any album that includes a song with the lyric “There was the mountain/It was a big fucking mountain” should be applauded - though I am convinced the music is somewhere between a tribute /a pisstake of Kasabian circa-Empire.

Dark Days/Light Years contained about two songs that would have sat on their last Furries album - the rest found the band veering off into fresh territory, which was surprising almost two decades into their career. Fingers crossed album # 10 will embrace the riff a lot more..

27 Sonic Youth - The Eternal

As made evident by tracing up and down this list, 2009 found a lot of perennial oldie band acts delivering rather fine records - though the cliché of the 'return to form', 'Best album since [ ]' etc is always unnecessary and pretty lazy reviewing.

Check out the Sonic Youth back-catalogue and reveal to y'self that they haven't really dropped a dud in that vast career - The Eternal was their 16th or 116th album and their first proper LP on an indie since Daydream Nation (excepting the experimental SYR-stuff released between Geffen works).

The Youth, who as many like to point out, are advanced into middle age, even worked touring bassist Mark Ibold of Pavement into the mix and expanding their sound in the same way that Jim O'Rourke did in the same role. Some may have been shocked by the first example of the Youth harmonising or the catchy blend of early Cure with the 70's rock O'Rourke produced on Insignificance and Loose Fur, but this was very much the Youth. Best of all was the triple-guitar attack of 'Anti-Orgasm' which tore up a SY-hailstorm around Kim & Thurston's vocals. Just a shame the Youth don't do a proper UK tour and stick to the odd ATP-date.

The Eternal is probably a peak like Murray Street or Washing Machine or Sister..it's proof that in an age where everything seems to be have been done, there's always a fresh way to refine.

26 Espers - III

Espers' III was in fact the band's fourth album if factoring in the covers set The Weed Tree - it felt very much an advance on their acclaimed second album (unsurprisingly called II).
III found the American/Swedish sextet refining their psych-folk sound that fits somewhere between John Cale and Pentangle. There was the odd sniffy review comparing the record to its predecessors, but what were the Espers meant to do, pursue a grime direction or something? Personally, I find it odd that some have griped about this record – if you liked the previous albums, this feels like a very natural successor. There is a song-emphasis and Baird feels like the star - especially on the lush 'Caroline' which has the same enchanting quality as records by the British folk influences often cited in relation to Espers.

Baird, sometimes in harmony with Weeks on songs like 'The Pearl' and 'The Road of Golden Dust' sounds alluring, while the band blends their psych-folk sound with a slice of avant-classical approaches, not unlike the Unthanks. Even stranger is 'That Which Darkly Thrives' which sounds like Radiohead, or at least Radiohead if they had pursued the directions suggested in their uncelebrated slice of genius that was 'Go To Sleep.' Ultimately III was just another fine record by Espers; when wasn't that enough?

25 Marianne Faithful - Easy Come, Easy Go

Following up a fine triptych of albums (Vagabond Ways, Kissin' Time, Before the Poison) which had found her collaborating with many, Marianne went one further with this double album which featured a stellar cast including Antony minus his Johnstons, Nick Cave, Keef, former Tom Waits guitarist Marc Ribot, and the inescapable Rufus Wainwright.

Easy Come, Easy Go was a reminder of a vast talent that is often obscured by associations with the Rolling Stones/Mars Bars and centred more on her famous 60's hit or the celebrated Broken English. Marianne has made many fine albums and really should be accorded the same kind of reverence Cohen and Dylan get - on this epic album she generally delivered some fine cover versions transcending the originals. 'Hold On, Hold On' sounded like Nico fronting the Screaming Trees, while the duet with Nick Cave (the Decemberists' 'The Crane Wife 3' was an undoubted highlight of 2009. Here's hoping the next record taps further into the contemporary American back-catalogue, I'm thinking American Music Club, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Fiery Furnaces, the Jonestown, Mark Lanegan, Smog, Swans..

24 This Immortal Coil - The Dark Age of Love

The best video of 2008 was the promo for Coil's 'Ostia (The Death of Pasolini)' by Peter 'Sleazy' Christopherson; one-half of the duo that were at the centre of the band called Coil. There were various incarnations - the homosexual/sex magic/industrial/OTO/pagan-version won out and like the early work of Psychic TV (which Jhonn Balance and Sleazy were a part of) and Kate Bush's The Dreaming remind you how crap that recent pagan-pop piece was in The Guardian a few months ago.

The Dark Age of Love was both a covers and tribute album to Coil and the late Balance. Like the excellent Around Robert Wyatt this is a wonderful tribute album of cover versions from France - assembled by Stephane Gregoire over the last four years, the recordings appear to have taken place across Europe and the States and features a cast including Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Matt Elliott, Christine Ott, and Yann Tiersen of Amelie fame.

The Dark Age of Love feels like a brilliant album and more than just a bunch of cover versions, the influence of the band's name from This Mortal Coil will give you an idea of how great the cover versions are. This is a collection of cover versions that remind you how great Coil were and will make you want to invest in the band's fine back-catalogue. Every track feels fantastic, though right now I'm rather obsessed with the epic take on 'Red Queen' (which recalls Tuxedomoon) and Will Oldham's version of 'Ostia', which to my ears still sounds like the best song of the last 30-something years. The lyrics to 'Ostia (The Death of Pasolini)' remain poetry that deserves to be repeated here:

"There's honey in the hollows
and the contours of the body
A sluggish golden river
A sickly golden trickle
A golden sticky trickle
You can hear his bones humming
You can hear the bones humming
And the car reverses over the body in the basin
In the shallow sea-plain basin
And the car reverses over
And his body rolls over
Crushed from the shoulder
You can hear the bones humming
Singing like a puncture
Singing like a puncture
Killed to keep the world turning
Killed to keep the world turning
Killed to keep the world turning
Throw his bones over the White Cliffs of Dover
And into the sea, the sea of Rome
And the bloodstained coast of Ostia
Leon like a lion sleeping in the sunshine
Lion lies down
“Out of the strong came forth sweetness”
Throw his bones over the White Cliffs of Dover
And murder me in Ostia
The sea of Rome
You can hear his bones humming
Throw his bones over the White Cliffs of Dover
And into the sea, the sea of Rome
Then murder me in Ostia"

The Dark Age of Love was another highlight of 2009, as well as another great covers album - it also acts as a reminder of the mighty Coil whose back-catalogue is increasingly hard to find and at quite silly prices. Here's to a career compilation, a thorough reissue programme, or an over-priced boxed-set.

23 Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion

Hmmm, I was fairly sniffy regarding this album, possibly as it elicited the same response that the Animal Collective and Panda Bear albums I'd purchased in the past. To be fair, AC had their work set out for them with ridiculous gushing hyperbole fucking everywhere before the record came out - I was tempted to seal it in a vault and listen to in a decade to have a clear mind.
Not that I want a record to be bad, or to have my snobbery confirmed..but this sounded less like the peak Brian Wilson on E-comparisons, but more like The Shins meets The Paris Angels. I was very un-bowled over and pointed out to some the weird way it sounded on an MP3 player or how acts like Psychic TV, 'Big City'-Spacemen 3, or the pre-sell-out work of The Shamen had fused the X-inflections with electronics and psychedelics - while AC's performance at The Green Man was a shocker (the much lower down on the bill Nick Nicely demonstrated how it should have been done!).

Then again, the odd summery walk amid fields set to this record and the way one track played between something else on Radio 6 made me think I should give the LP another chance. A lot of this record is sounding pretty fantastic, especially 'My Girls' and 'Summertime Clothes' while the recent e.p. Fall Be Kind, like their Vashti Bunyan-collaboration, indicates that they work well within that format.

Best of all was the closing 'Brother Sport', which really did blend Smile-era Wilson/Van Dyke Parks with blissed out techno - the song drifts into a repetitive orgasm of sound at the end, but the earlier climax where they sing “You got to weigh what he said/To help you shape the way you play/You gotta get rid of the mourning/Sort out the habits of your mind” is the best thing I've heard all year and has the same effect as 'Surf's Up' or 'Astral Weeks.' There were better albums than Merriweather Post Pavilion, but it's undeniable - despite the irritating hype and excitable narrative conventional points of music criticism applied.

22 Nadja - When I See The Sun Always Shines on TV

Nadja have been celebrated by the Arch Drude Julian Cope on his seminal Head Heritage site and have managed an alluring collision of doom/drone and shoegazing for several albums now. Like the equally fine Wolves in the Throne Room they operate in a strange realm of doom and dream rock.

When I See.. is an album of cover versions delivered in this style that cross-fertilises Slowdive with Sunn O))). It possibly helps if you know the originals, surprisingly Nadja take a late-period Swans-song and give it a treatment closed to the earlier period-Swans.

Codeine's 'Pea' is the closest to the original - while MBV's 'Only Shallow' is slowed down more but still mind-blowing stuff and a reminder of what a killer songwriter Kevin Shields was (as well as a sonic architect of genius proportions). I'm not sold on the A-ha cover - you shouldn't mess with the classics - but Nadja are nothing less than divination-inducing on covers of The Cure's 'Faith', Slayer's 'Dead Skin Mask' and Elliot Smith's 'Needle in the Hay.' The latter is the undoubted highlight and the one to download, seeming to take the suicide of Smith and the fictional suicide-attempt in The Royal Tennenbaums set to the original and centre within a sad, epic riff of a minimal nature. Almost as great is the cover of song from the Kids in the Hall-movie I've still not seen - 'Long Dark Twenties'. As with 'Needle in the Hay', 'Long Dark Twenties' is one of those songs I've listened to most in 2009, the wasted nights and wasted year- the whole record seeming to tap into the hinterland that was the U.S. 80's-90's.

When I See.. like Low's Christmas or Cat Power's first covers record is one of those examples of a great covers album - brilliant covers from an already great band. Their recent Numbness-compilation and upcoming/recent releases should be tracked down, as well as one of their earlier classics like Radiance of Shadows. Like Wolves in the Throne Room, Nadja probably should garner as much acclaim as Sunn O))) - though hearing their other Cure-cover ('One Hundred Years'), I'm hoping they might record a sequel to this album in the future.

21 Oneida - Rated O

Rated O was a suitably epic triple album from Oneida, confusingly the bands 10th album and the second part of a trilogy entitled Thank Your Parents. Jagjaguwar label mates of Black Mountain, Dinosaur Jr et al, Oneida are similarly pushing the bounds, and there might be an argument that like most double/triple albums, there's a classic single LP lurking here. Then again, I like the epic scope, and this feels a bit like the original Metal Box where a bunch of 12”'s scraped up against each other - there were less exciting tracks on that celebrated album too ('The Suit' anyone?) and that's much the case here.

Still any record that sounds like a collision of Fela Kuti, Lightning Bolt, Lee Perry, On-U-Sound, Neu! and Suicide must be condoned. Disc A/Sides A & B stood out for me, especially the psyched out 'What's Up, Jackal?' and the rhythmic maelstrom that is the 'Story of O.' I can't say I've got the concept of Thank Your Parents , but am looking forward to the follow-up, as well as kicking myself for not checking their material before. Another fine back catalogue to mess my collection up again..

20 Boston Spaceships - The Planets are Blasted/Zero to 99

I've been rather partial to the back-catalogue of Guided By Voices, as well as the band biography and the 33 1/3 book on Bee Thousand I picked up. Looking back is very nice and utterly necessary for such a key alternative band, but Robert Pollard's current work is just as necessary.

Pollard was always immensely prolific during the GBV years, releasing a mass of solo recordings in parallel to the band - he's also working in Circus Devils, Cosmos, and The Takeovers, but right now Boston Spaceships are currently the primary vehicle. With former GBV-member Chris Slusarenko and the Decemberists' John Moen, the band released their second and third albums in 2009 rapidly following last year's debut Brown Submarine.

I found it too hard to pick one so have opted to pick both Boston Spaceships' albums of 2009 - The Planets Are Blasted and the more recent Zero to 99. While I'd argue that any GBV is good GBV, having become enamoured with early tracks like 'Drinker's Peace' and 'Echos Myron' and the albums from 1992's Propeller to 1995's Alien Lanes I tend to adore their lo-fi take on Quick One/Who Sell Out -era Who (as well as early REM, Husker Du, and Mission of Burma). That's not to say records like Mag Earwig! or Universal Truths and Cycles are bad - far from it - but there was a certain kind of Pollard-fronted alt-rock I liked and these albums sound very much like it.

Both albums feature sterling guest spots from Peter Buck and Sam Coomes (Quasi/Elliot Smith). 'Canned Food Demons' sounded like Buck's main band circa Reckoning - it would be nice if Buck could take this vibe back to Mills and Stipe and come up with that decent REM album I've been waiting for a long time. There are plenty of other fine tracks - 'Question Girl All Right' sounds like a lo-fi Husker Du and could easily have found a place on the mythic Bee Thousand while 'How Wrong You Are' taps into the Who Sell Out/Quick One-side of Pollard's vast back-catalogue - but unlike a lot of Pete Townshend and co, doesn't take an eon to finish the song.

Both albums are a little pricey on import and really should be picked up by Domino or someone - albums #354 & #355 of Pollard's career find him in fine form. Having missed GBV play live, I really hope the Spaceships come to these shores next year..and I'll try not to get hung up on the fact Julian Casablancas' solo career got a mass of attention while these records were hardly mentioned in the British press, or at least that's how it felt..Boston Spaceships' albums of 2009 might very well provide the best introduction to the infinite career of Bob Pollard as well as being amongst the best albums of 2009.

19 Bill Callahan - Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle

Similar narratives recur when albums are reviewed and tend to stick in my craw. One of them is the Blood on the Tracks-allusion, i.e. everytime a singer-songwriter splits up with their partner the album centring on their separation is made and it's genius (I was amused that Dylan claimed his famous LP was inspired by some Chekhov short stories). It irritates me that validity is found for a record due to the artist experiencing equally valid pain - possibly as that notion would mean every album by Ryan Adams is a classic rather than the 2 ½ actually decent records he's produced. But more so as Callahan in his current solo mode or his prior guise as Smog has consistently produced fine albums - strangely in the UK it seemed that everyone liked 1999's Knock Knock and felt less excited about the following four albums.

Even more vexing is that Callahan's 2007 solo debut Woke on a Whaleheart, recorded with Neil Hagerty (Royal Trux/Howling Hex/Pussy Galore), was as brilliant as this album. But Joanna Newsom hadn't parted company with Mr C then - oh well. The other problem I had with this LP is that it somehow vanished from my computer before I'd put it on the MP3 player - clearly I've not played it enough or it would be higher. References against religion and the so-called 'Culture Wars' and to James M Cain make me feel happier about this album while songs like 'The Wind and the Dove' and 'My Friend' are a reminder that along with peer Will Oldham, Callahan is one of the most consistently fascinating songwriters around.

Callahan knowingly alluded to his own career/recent events with the oft-quoted line about being dark/getting light/dark again that I won't repeat here on opener 'Jim Cain', though another contender for song of the year was 'Eid Ma Clack Shaw' which sounds like Kevin Ayers fronting something like Van Dyke Parks' scoring The White Album with a working knowledge of jazz/hardcore drumming and the rhythms of early Talking Heads. Yeah..song of the year..

18 Broadcast and the Focus Group Investigate Witch Cults of the Radio Age

Broadcast were once known as a Stereolab-lite band (possibly due to the fact they were signed to the Lab's label Duophonic) and for the pastiche 'The Book Lovers' that featured in Austin Powers. As they have shed band members and moved to Warp, they have transcended those influences - something clear on some tracks on The Future Crayon compilation and last album proper Tender Buttons. Now a duo relocated to Hungerford from Kings Heath, they have teamed up with The Focus Group from the mighty Ghost Box label (if you haven't already, download their brilliant sampler and be blown away!) and released this 23-song mini-album.

It was heartening that some very positive reviews featured in the kind of mags you get in Tescos - I'm guessing as this record sounded out of this and several other worlds? There is much invention here, and enough sounds to keep peak rappers in samples for decades to come - the reference points are much, much wilder than Joy Division, 80's electronic pop or fucking Krautrock so obviously referenced by the mainstream turd burglars probably topping the NME end of year list. Anyway, here the Broadcast referenced things like an Occult-themed episode of Dr Who, obscure Hammer Horror-soundtracks, Delia Derbyshire, acts like The Vampires of Dartmoore and The White Noise, the deleted Fading Yellow-compilations..all hopped up on something like ingesting LSD on the set of Plague of the Zombies or Quatermass. Broadcast and the Focus Group Investigate.. reminded me of weird psychedelic infused albums of the early to mid 80's like Dreams Less Sweet and Sulk which seemed so dense with sound. I still can't get over the part around 2 minutes, 40 seconds where “all circles” is intoned - it definitely makes one want to don a robe and proceed with an occult rite in a place of natural beauty..

This was much more than just a mini-album and sounds like everything and nothing on earth..as with the Sunn O))) record it was effective when played every couple of weeks - a record that imposes its universe on the listener. There was nothing mini about this album ultimately - the thought of a Broadcast LP proper in 2010 is another enticing thought..

17 The Unthanks - Here's the Tender Coming

The Mercury-nominated The Bairns bought Rachel Unthank & the Winterset into the spotlight and offered a world of regional lyrics set to the kind of avant-classical realm explored by folk like Michael Nyman, Penguin Café Orchestra, and Philip Glass. Their cover of Robert Wyatt's 'Sea Song' was almost as good as the original and the slightly lost Paul Morley celebrated them..which is usually a great sign. Rebranding as The Unthanks and expanding to a 10-piece band that feels as epic as Godspeed You Black Emperor! or Silver Mt Zion. Here's the Tender Coming meanwhile was a typically canny selection of material, from traditional material to fairly obscure cover versions and some original compositions, the 13 tracks contained comprised one of the most enjoyable albums of 2009.

With the change in name it became apparent that Becky Unthank was as significant - her vocal performance on 'At First She Starts' sounds like the missing link between Mellow Candle and This Mortal Coil. Having witnessed the Unthanks live, my only quibble is that they are even better in that format and probably should consider a live album. The highlight has to be recent single 'Lucky Gilchrist', written by band member Adrian McNally; it's pitched between celebration and elegy to a dear departed friend. I found this song even more fantastic with the Unthank sisters' metronomic clog-dancing that has to be witnessed to be believed.

Here's the Tender Coming is huge and warrants another Mercury nod, and indeed the award itself. I'm thinking they should be pretty high up the bill for The Green Man 2010? Let's just hope that no one realises they're probably to blame for Sting's recent regional shocker!

16 Magnolia Electic Co - Josephine

A familiar factor in 2009 was that several albums were produced by Steve Albini - O.K, not all of them were good, as the Jarvis and Manics albums demonstrated. Josephine was another of the great ones along with Mono and Om; it was the long-player companion to the It's Made Me Cry e.p. and like the Mastodon LP was also steeped in tragedy.

The record's theme and driving influence was the sad death of Magnolia-bassist Evan Farrell, giving the album a similar feel to other records that reacted to a passing such as Astral Weeks, Funeral, Magic and Loss, and Tonight's the Night. Though musically I was reminded of the early great work of The Band and the atmosphere of Bonnie 'Prince' Billy's I See a Darkness as well as the ditch-fixated works of Neil Young. Josephine was an elegy and pitched somewhere between a celebration and consolation - strangely, it's also another one of those records that didn't get the fuss it warranted. Perhaps people don't get that excited about fourteenth albums - indeed Magnolia-main man Jason Molina has already released a follow-up album with Will Johnson that should probably be in this Top 30..

I was reading Greil Marcus' fantastic dissection of Dylan's Basement Tapes and related traditional work that is Invisible Republic when I heard this album and it seemed to be part of the same universe. Strangely this collection of songs seemed to tap into that American tradition - gorgeous bruised ballads like the title track and 'Song for Willie', the latter up there with the peaks of Gram Parsons. The highlight has to be 'The Handing Down' which recalls Neil Young & Crazy Horse at their most wired - the band should really aim for an epic Weld-style version of this in the future.

Josephine and its companion e.p., like at least 18 albums by Bob Dylan, is one of those records to live by - between celebration and consolation, death and life. I can see this is one to live by..

Phew..15-1 to follow before the year's out..

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