1. AMPLIFIER - Amplifier

Not really a surprise here.  Let’s just say that I didn’t think for a second about what would be #1.  This album is so far ahead of anything else on this list it is a bit embarrassing for the competition (however much I adore the Therapy? album).  This beats last year’s winner by Mars Volta.  Christ, we are talking In Utero/Holy Bible period before I find something I like this much.  My Dad deserves all the credit – seven albums on my list are due to his rediscovered enthusiasm for music, and this is his best find by far.

Nobody cares about Amplifier.  There are a few of us who are on the website all the time, but none of the others are from the UK (unlike myself, and, er, the band…).  Amplifier have cracked Germany and Finland.  Most people I play them to either come back with ‘it’s ok’ or ‘it’s shit’.  So maybe I’m just crazy.  But I have been blown away.  This album has been played at least 3 times a week since I got it.  Perhaps more.  For eight months!   It has everything, the inventiveness, the riffs, the passion, the vocals, lyrics (ok, ok, the album cover is a bit bland).  I know and love every note.  For me (though I assume for very few other people, if anyone) this is one of the best albums ever made.  Music never normally gets this good. 

[Note, 2014: this remains my favourite album ever made, by any artist, ever, a decade on, by an overwhelming distance – it is, quite simply, an (entirely non-hyperbolic) masterpiece].