Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 by RockyRaccoon

For more, check out my 2015 Honorable Mentions chart here: http://www.besteveralbums.com/thechart.php?c=25272

Chart updated: 09/20/2022 20:15
(Created: 01/06/2015 23:31).
Chart size: 100 albums.

There are 26 comments for this chart from BestEverAlbums.com members and Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 has an average rating of 92 out of 100 (from 37 votes). Please log in or register to leave a comment or assign a rating.

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1. (=)

Ten Love Songs

Susanne Sundfør

This album. Wow. It's hard for me to accurately articulate the experience that I had with this album. This album took me through a range of emotions, it showed me the entire life experience of a human being. People talk about albums being life-affirming, this is it. Susanne Sundfør just kills it. Perhaps the most accurate genre to classify it as is synthpop, though it's so much more than that. The thing that sticks out the most are the vocals. Vocally, this album is arranged so incredibly well it's mind blowing. Sundfør's voice is fantastic and everything she does with her voice, all the harmonies, the layers, all of it, is just awesome. This album is perfect, I mean I genuinely cannot find a flaw in it. The songwriting, the arrangements, all of it, it's perfect. This album is so many things, it unrequited love, it's heartbreaking abandonment, it's loneliness, it's redemption, it's everything. If "Memorial" (a song that, instrumentally, sounds like the soundtrack to a sunset) doesn't make you feel a wealth of emotions just in and of itself, then you need to re-examine yourself. This album is magical, there's no other way to describe the experience I had with it, this is one of those rare albums that inserts itself into your life, that burns itself into your very being that it feels like it knows you personally, like it's something you've been waiting for for so long. I don't even know if any of this makes sense, but all I can say is, listen to this album because you will not, for even a second, regret it. [First added to this chart: 03/01/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

184 charts

Rank Score:

1,273

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

211

Overall Rank:

1,371

Average Rating:

78 (226 votes)

Comments:

2. (=)

Carrie & Lowell

Sufjan Stevens

This is, perhaps, one of the most emotionally raw albums that I have ever heard. The story behind it is what really makes it. Carrie and Lowell are Sufjan Stevens' mother and step-father. His mother was a bipolar drug addict who abandoned the family when he was young, she also died a few years back. This album is Stevens dealing with that death, dealing with his mother and how he feels about her, which is not only a difficult thing, but a complex one. He doesn't outright hate her, though I'm sure plenty of children would. He seems to still love her, she is his mother after all, but he's conflicted about it, he's struggling with it. Once you hear "Fourth Of July" though, you'll know he loves her, he consistently refers to her lovingly. But this album isn't entirely about his mother (though it's close), it's about him too, it's about the struggles that he has. Struggles with his faith (all you need to hear is "No Shade In The Shadow Of The Cross" to recognize that), with depression, suicidal thoughts, drinking, everything. All of this is laid out in some of the most sparse instrumentation from a Sufjan Stevens album since Seven Swans. I mean, when I think Sufjan Stevens, I think of the orchestration and instrumentation of Illinois, but this album is just guitar and/or piano and Stevens and that's about it, and that's all you need. This is Stevens completely and totally showing you everything, everything he has, everything he feels, he's letting you into his life in a way he never has before. These are the secrets under the floorboards he sang about in "John Wayne Gacy Jr.", this is what makes him "just like" a serial killer in his mind. This is Stevens' life laid out for you to see and it's truly a remarkable experience.

Highlights include: "Fourth Of July", "No Shade In The Shadow Of The Cross", "Should Have Known Better" [First added to this chart: 04/06/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

1,200 charts

Rank Score:

18,343

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

86 (1,438 votes)

Comments:

157

3. (=)

If I've Only One Time Askin'

Daniel Romano

One of the greatest qualities that country music can have is pure honesty. Country music often sounds like the "music of the people", it's relatable, you hear a country singer lament about a woman or someone's death or something and it sounds like it's coming straight from the heart. That's what country *can* be at least, within the past 10-15 years or so, country has stagnated a bit, more apt to glamorize the idea of being a "redneck" and blue-collar society than anything else, but Daniel Romano isn't about that. Romano is making an old-time country record with his own feel. He's got a voice about as close to Willie Nelson as I've ever heard, and a gift for melody that's just about as good as Willie ever had. Romano feels authentic, he feels honest. When he sings "What do you get from lovin' me/Why is our marriage in danger/Cause I get more happiness from a bottle/And get more love from a stranger", you feel his pain, you feel the broken marriage, the distanced lovers who once were so close, you feel like you just eavesdropped on a private conversation he was having with his wife. Romano's songwriting ability is absolutely top-notch, he takes his broken heart, his whole soul, and lays it bare for us to see. This album is full of old country sentiments, but it doesn't sound like it's trying to imitate old country note-for-note, rather this is Romano taking the influences he has and making it all his own, and with that, he has made one of the best country albums of the decade.

Highlights include: "Old Fires Die", "I'm Gonna Teach You", and "Let Me Sleep (At The End Of A Dream)" [First added to this chart: 08/05/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

15 charts

Rank Score:

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

Comments:

4. (=)

Dark Bird Is Home

The Tallest Man On Earth

I think I understand it now. In 1965, Bob Dylan caused all kinds of controversy because he “went electric”. He had a band with guitars and drums and all of that, when up to that point, he had been a simple folk musician, with little else than a guitar and his voice. This shocked people, and enraged many of them, culminating in the famous Manchester Free Trade Hall concert in 1966 where the audience heckled him to no end, and one audience member famously called him “Judas”. While Kristian Matsson isn’t exactly at the point Bob Dylan was at, he’s going through a similar transition, and I think I understand how the fans felt when Dylan went electric. You’re used to one thing and then an artist releases something completely different. There’s just one difference between me and the Dylan fans: I love what Matsson is doing. I love seeing an artist evolve and that’s exactly what Matsson is doing, he’s moving forward with his music. This is drastically different from anything he’s released before. He’s progressively added more and more to his music as time has gone on, an electric guitar here, some keys there, but nothing like this. This is a full band, drums, orchestration, everything. Songs like “Sagres” and “Darkness Of Our Dream” sound like they could be Springsteen songs. The closest you’re gonna get to original TMOE is the final song, the title track, but even that has elements that Matsson hasn’t used before. His lyrics and vocals are still like they’ve always been, and the songs are structured just like we’re used to from him, but the instrumentation is so different, and it’s a real breath of fresh air. Lyrically, Matsson bears all, as he’s often done, and a prime example is in “Sagres”, where he deals with the creeping doubt that comes into his life. The man is an excellent lyricist, and that hasn’t changed. “This is not the end, this is fine” Matsson sings in the title track, and anyone who’s upset about this change needs to remember that: this isn’t the end of The Tallest Man On Earth, this is the beginning of Matsson’s new chapter as an artist. Seeing movement in a musician’s career like this is an awesome thing, and I commend him greatly for it. This album is different from what you’re used to, but it’s still a rewarding listen.

Highlights include: “Sagres”, “Fields Of Our Home”, “Darkness Of Our Dream” and “Timothy”. [First added to this chart: 04/14/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

95 charts

Rank Score:

358

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

724

Overall Rank:

4,012

Average Rating:

73 (137 votes)

Comments:

5. (=)

To Pimp A Butterfly

Kendrick Lamar

If you wanted proof that Kendrick Lamar is a whole other level of rapper, this should just about do it. We're three albums into his career and it just keeps getting better and better. After "Good Kid MAAD City", it was hard to imagine him topping himself, as GKMC was a massive album, but here we are with "To Pimp A Butterfly", and I don't think you can really, accurately compare the two albums. Is one better than the other? No, I don't think so, I think they're two separate entities. GKMC was Kendrick telling you who he is and where he comes from, why he is what he is, why he believes what he believes, he was telling you a grand story. TPAB is Kendrick making a statement. He's making a statement about society, about life as a black man, about the implications and struggles of low socioeconomic status, about everything he can think of, and he does it expertly with an intense and beautiful artistry. This is a magnificent album, and really shows that Kendrick is just in another world, at his peak, and it's amazing to see where he's going. [First added to this chart: 03/18/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

1,775 charts

Rank Score:

37,005

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

Comments:

6. (=)

I'm not completely convinced that Kevin Parker lives on the same temporal plane as the rest of us. The man is exceptionally talented with a penchant for writing some of the best psych-rock that's come out in the past 10 years. Tame Impala is one of those bands that has a distinct "sound" but doesn't have a formula to every album. Each album is a new exploration that Parker wanders into, oftentimes these explorations are very lonely (the guy is not a happy person), but they're so interesting you can't help but get entirely enveloped in them. With this album, Parker moves a little more away from the thick, reverbed guitars that he has so heavily relied on in the past, and shows that he's more than just a psych rock songwriter with a heavy guitar, he's an excellent producer and composer, arranging so many different things to happen all at once that it'll make your head spin. I think what takes it over the top, for me at least, is his voice. That John Lennon-y, dreamy falsetto, when he's singing "It's calling my name and it's calling yours tooooooo" it's like he's opening a door and leading you into a dreamworld that probably looks like whatever The Beatles were seeing while writing Sgt Peppers or Magical Mystery Tour. This is just another incredible piece of work from a band that has become one of the most consistent groups in music today.

Highlights include: "Yes I'm Changing", "Eventually", and "The Less I Know The Better" [First added to this chart: 07/22/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

956 charts

Rank Score:

10,535

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

Comments:

7. (=)

Beach House are just so good. They really are. They are the prime example of how amazing dream pop can really be. This perfect balance between lush guitars, ethereal music that completely enraptures you and takes you to a whole other planet. It always makes me think about that Beatles line in "Tomorrow Never Knows", "Turn off your mind, relax and float downstream", that's what you do with Beach House. You turn everything off and you float off with them to another place where everything is beautiful. There's movement to keep the music interesting, but at the same time, there's always that drone underneath everything to fill it all out. It's able to be big and powerful, yet still personal and intimate, and I think part of the intimacy comes from the gentleness of Victoria Legrand's voice, it's just so warm and calming. This is another addition into a discography of a band that is proving to be one of the best and most interesting bands out there right now. [First added to this chart: 09/02/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

394 charts

Rank Score:

2,814

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

634

Average Rating:

78 (566 votes)

Comments:

8. (=)

On Lonely Towers

Barren Earth

This is everything progressive death metal can be, or at least, everything I want it to be. First and foremost, the craftsmanship and execution of this album is downright incredible. The virtuosity of the instrumentalists, the composition, everything, it's jarringly great. Vocally, the album is wonderful too, finding the right vocalist can be key for a metal band and Barren Earth have found the perfect fit. This is a massive piece of work, it's just over an hour long, and every minute of it is glorious, you won't even notice that hour go by. Like, no joke, I was listening to this while doing yard work and it made that yard work so much more awesome, and I hate yard work. This album is full of peaks and valleys, from the loud, Opeth-like riffs to the almost 70s prog-like organ to the quiet acoustic sound, there's everything you could want here and more. It's a beautiful work and easily one of the best metal albums I've heard this year. [First added to this chart: 04/20/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

10 charts

Rank Score:

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

Comments:

9. (=)

The Epic

Kamasi Washington

If I'm gonna make it all the way through a three-hour jazz album, it better be a good album. And guess what? The Epic is that and so much more. Yea, it's almost three hours long (it's called "The Epic" for a reason) but it's hands down one of the best jazz albums I've ever heard. It harkens back to the likes of John Coltrane, Miles Davis, and Ornette Coleman without sounding like someone just going through the motions and trying to make a copy of the jazz greats. It's still uniquely a work of Kamasi Washington's, and as such, it's fantastic. There are some R&B vocals thrown in here, some different, free jazz-type stuff, just a little bit of everything, you can really fit a lot into three hours. The length might seem daunting but it's absolutely worth it and it doesn't feel like it drags, it just feels like a revelation. [First added to this chart: 05/26/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

434 charts

Rank Score:

3,093

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

574

Average Rating:

82 (479 votes)

Comments:

10. (=)

At The Expense Of Humanity

Judicator

Sometimes pain brings out the best in an artist. Art is so often used as a catharsis for the artist, a way to pour out their emotions into something almost tangible, a way to express pain or anger or love or joy, that when an extreme event that causes an extreme response happens to an artist, the art can be incredible. We've seen it in The Antlers' album Hospice, in Arcade Fire's album Funeral, and in Cursive's album The Ugly Organ, all of those albums featured artists pouring their souls into music and creating something beautiful. At The Expense Of Humanity is another example of just that. This album is inspired by (and in some cases, seems to be a day-by-day retelling of) lead singer John Yelland's brother's battle with and eventual death from cancer. This would be a great power metal album just on its own, even if the lyrics just dealt with the usual "fighting dragons with a flaming sword of justice" subject matter, but Yelland takes on very personal, very introverted subject matter and puts it in a genre that is known for being supremely energetic and extroverted and absolutely nails it. You would think that something so personal would feel out of place in power metal, but this album will prove you wrong. It's not just the lyrics, the guitar-work is excellent, the riffs are solid, melodically-focused but still powerful, and the solos are far from mindless shredding but more focused, melodic additions to the song. Add in Yelland's excellent vocals to the whole mix and you've got one of the best power metal albums this side of Blind Guardian, certain to become a classic. [First added to this chart: 08/12/2015]

Year of Release:

2015

Appears in:

4 charts

Rank Score:

Rank in 2015:

Rank in 2010s:

Overall Rank:

Average Rating:

Comments:

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Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 composition

Artist	Albums	%

Oneohtrix Point Never	1	1%
Kendrick Lamar	1	1%
Kamelot	1	1%
Komara	1	1%
Blind Guardian	1	1%
Cruciamentum	1	1%
Father John Misty	1	1%
Show all

Country	Albums	%

	59	59%
	11	11%
	7	7%
	4	4%
	4	4%
	3	3%
	3	3%
Show all

Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 chart changes

Biggest fallers
Down 1 from 51st to 52nd MCIII by Mikal Cronin
Down 1 from 52nd to 53rd Hand. Cannot. Erase. by Steven Wilson
Down 1 from 53rd to 54th Poison Season by Destroyer

New entries
Traveller by Chris Stapleton

Leavers
Running On Machinery by Megan Slankard

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Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 ratings

Average Rating:

92/100 (from 37 votes)

Showing latest 5 ratings for this chart. | Show all 37 ratings for this chart.

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Rating
Date updated
Member

Rating	Date updated	Member	Chart ratings	Avg. chart rating
90/100	02/01/2023 21:35	Moondance	455	84/100
85/100	02/01/2023 14:35	Johnnyo	2,016	80/100
90/100	02/01/2023 09:23	Tamthebam	554	85/100
100/100	07/17/2020 22:53	Rhyner	1,382	99/100
90/100	07/17/2020 20:17	StefanR10	83	88/100

Rating metrics: Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
(*In practice, some charts can have several thousand ratings)
This chart is rated in the top 1% of all charts on BestEverAlbums.com. This chart has a Bayesian average rating of 91.8/100, a mean average of 92.7/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 93.4/100. The standard deviation for this chart is 7.1.

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Top 100 Music Albums of 2015 comments

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Rating:

90/100

From Moondance 02/01/2023 21:40

Really enjoyed checking out this year chart - the effort you put in to writing up such thoughtful comments puts this chart in a realm of its own. As an observation, I think it is too US-centric. Nice to see 3 Aussie albums make the cut.