Top 10 Albums of 2014

1. "1989," Taylor Swift

She’s no longer the girl next door—Taylor Swift’s glossy, Max Martin-produced “1989” finally departs from country for a mainstream pop aesthetic. Gone are the lengthier anthems “Speak Now” and “Fearless,” as Swift tightly packs hook after hook in an album of radio-friendly melodies. Although Swift’s individual style has trouble standing out—“New Romantics” sounds like Passion Pit, “Wildest Dreams” channels Lana Del Rey, and the tongue-in-cheek single “Blank Space” is every mid-2000s R&B song given the Lorde treatment—her songwriting prowess remains undeniable. Through combined strength of brand image and genuine talent, Swift demonstrates exactly why “1989” has managed to sell over a million physical copies in the age of streaming. —Alan R. Xie

2. "x," Ed Sheeran

In an age of synthesizers and overproduced, bass-heavy radio singles, English singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran brings back the acoustic ballad in his sophomore album “x.” Standout tracks like “I’m a Mess,” “Bloodstream,” and “Afire Love” showcase the unabashed sentimentality and idiosyncrasy of Sheeran’s songwriting, along with his ability to build a quiet acoustic track towards a grand climax with an innovative and skillful use of the loop pedal. Meanwhile, the album’s overt funk influences—noticeable in singles “Sing” and “Don’t”—demonstrate Sheeran’s musical range as he balances catchy hooks with fast and clever rhymes. —Alan R. Xie

3. “In The Lonely Hour,” Sam Smith

While critics panned the safe orchestration and cliché lyrics of Sam Smith’s debut “In The Lonely Hour,” Smith’s deft voice overshadows any deficiencies. The British singer displays a versatile register, effortlessly sculpting his voice to match each song’s theme. “Lay Me Down,” a track about yearning for a futile love, reflects this: while Smith begins in crooning speak-sing that muted piano chords sporadically echo, he soon bursts into roaring proclamations—a testament to his voice’s power as an instrument. And while Smith’s melancholic subject matter is an interesting study in and of itself, it is his vocal prowess that ultimately smooths out the album. —Ha D. H. Le

4. “Ultraviolence,” Lana del Rey

Lana del Rey is the incarnation of the Great American Pop Star, and hating her is tantamount to hating Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, and Judy Garland all at the same time. Your feelings about her depend entirely on this. Her second album, “Ultraviolence,” presents a more coherent sound than that of her 2012 breakout, “Born to Die,” winning over many critics who received “Born to Die” coolly. This increased coherence and standout songs—including “Shades of Cool” and the almost sentimentally tender “Old Money”—make “Ultraviolence” one of the most compelling pop albums this year. Lana is still the pop girl to watch over the next few years. —Jude D. Russo

5. "This Is All Yours," alt-J

Bands that become wildly successful right away often struggle to live up to expectations with their later efforts; alt-J’s sophomore album, “This Is All Yours,” avoids that problem by building on the aesthetic of 2012’s “An Awesome Wave.” From the first Whac-A-Mole-reminiscent chords of the opening track (appropriately entitled “Intro”), it’s clear that the Leeds-based band does not intend to fix anything that ain’t broke. The album wanders through a progression of melancholy synths and echoing vocals; the end result comes out as something you might play to a sleepy person on mescaline. Standout tracks include “Nara,” “Garden of England,” and “Choice Kingdom.” —Lien E. Le

5. "Turn Blue," The Black Keys

The Black Keys, Grammy-winning purveyors of radio-friendly stadium rock, return with a record that lightens up on the crowd-pleasing and pushes the envelope more than the Akron, Ohio duo have done in years. Opener "Weight of Love" is a seven-minute exercise in ambience and bass guitar that feels like the Keys' most genuine effort so far at sonic originality, and closer “Gotta Get Away” leaves something for fans of classic Keys as the album’s sole unabashed foot-stomper. The unending deluge of blues guitar-over-synth can, at times, overwhelm, but the prospect of The Black Keys daring for once to explore their own boundaries redeems an album with just enough atmospheric, funk-infused experimentation to set it apart from the genre as a whole. —Victoria Lin

7. "G I R L," Pharrell Williams

While the ebullient and light "Happy" may be the foundational song on Pharrell Williams's comeback album "G I R L," the artist crafted the concept LP as a serious rebuff to those who criticized his musical treatment of women after his participation in Robin Thicke's controversial "Blurred Lines." The exhilarating pastiche of soul, funk, and R&B presents females as equal participants in love—Miley Cyrus's gruff background vocals save even "Come Get It Bae," the most sexually aggressive track on "G I R L," from the machismo of the Thicke-verse. In "Marilyn Monroe," Pharrell sings of a tender relationship that eschews ego and braggadocio. The song also has an extended Hans Zimmer-composed string intro, just one of many triumphant production and thematic risks from the resurgent star. —David J. Kurlander

8. "St. Vincent," St. Vincent

Let it be known that in 2014, Annie Clark officially became a rock goddess (she shared the stage with Nirvana twice, for crying out loud). Gone are the twee trappings and Sufjan Stevens influences of old; in their place are a wild mane of silver hair and a dense mix of glitched-out dance jams and roaring guitar solos. “St. Vincent” is Clark at her most eclectic—and also her most fun—and if the album paints her in a colder light than records past, Clark remains vulnerable enough behind the space-odyssey synths and robotic beats to remind you why you fell in love with St. Vincent in the first place. —Tree A. Palmedo

9. "LP1," FKA twigs

She had us at “I can fuck you better than her.” FKA twigs shook the walls and came on strong with first single “Two Weeks,” sweetly warning us that she “could rip it open.” And then that’s what she did with “LP1,” an iconoclastic debut album that takes a baseball bat to the lavish electronics of contemporary R&B and then has makeup sex in the rubble. Through its 10 tracks, she shatters expectations about what a female artist can sound like and sing about, and the awe-inspiring music videos and live performances that have followed suggest that she’s just getting started with us. —Matthew J. Watson

10. “Morning Phase,” Beck

Beck, loser-hero of the late ’90s and early ’00s, has gotten old, and his sound has gotten more mature too. Ethereal arrangements make for cogent, unaccustomedly cheerful content on his latest album, “Morning Phase.” Beck has billed this as the “companion piece” to “Sea Change,” emphasizing the album’s day-and-night contrast with the gloomy 2002 masterpiece. Beck’s usual acoustic bias is transformed into a lush, hypnotic orchestral landscape, with rhythmic tracks like “Morning,” “Blackbird Chain,” and “Waking Light.” —Jude D. Russo

10. "Salad Days," Mac DeMarco

“Salad Days” is an album of contradictions. Put together after a series of concerts (which DeMarco calls “raunchfests”), the tracks were recorded in the intimacy of his bedroom apartment. Despite its title, the album was born out of feelings of exhaustion and old age. And the ever-unfazed DeMarco, in all of his gap-toothed glory, appears more genuine than he’s ever been over the course of his two-moniker, three-album career. It’s a little disorienting to see one of indie rock’s most outlandish figures release an album that’s so simple in its yearning, so bare in its delivery. “Salad Days” features an astonishingly direct DeMarco, who transforms his trademark abandon into sincere vulnerability. —Brian B. Kim