ALBUMS (descending points)
1. Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
2. Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
3. Lily Allen - Alright, Still
4. The Fratellis - Costello Music
5. Kanye West - Graduation
6. Nick Lowe - At My Age
7. The Good, The Bad and The Queen - The Good, The Bad and The Queen
8. Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
9. Kaiser Chiefs - Yours Truly, Angry Mob
10. Rilo Kiley - Under the Blacklight

TRACKS
1. The White Stripes - You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You're Told)
2. M.I.A. - Paper Planes
3. LCD Soundsystem - All My Friends
4. Taylor Swift - Our Song
5. Jay-Z - Roc Boys
6. Grinderman - No Pussy Blues
7. Eve - Tambourine
8. Justice - D.A.N.C.E.
9. Feist - Brandy Alexander
10. Nickelback - Rockstar

REISSUES
1. Sly And The Family Stone - There's A Riot Goin' On (Expanded Edition)
2. Frankie Valli & The 4 Seasons - Jersey Beat: Music of Frankie Valli & The 4 Seasons
3. The Damned - Damned Damned Damned (Triple-Disc Expanded Edition)
4. Warren Zevon - Stand in the Fire
5. The Traveling Wilburys - The Traveling Wilburys Collection

ARTISTS
1. Amy Winehouse
2. Kanye West
3. The 33 1/3 series
4. Taylor Swift
5. Auto-Tune

COMMENTS
Like Gordon Gano, I love American music. But reviewing my alarmingly Anglocentric top albums, with a mere three States-based acts, 2007 was clearly an underwhelming year for music made in America, by Americans. Stalwarts from The Shins to Springsteen to Fountains of Wayne released disappointing albums, incomprehensibly adored acts like Wilco and Bright Eyes grew even more grating, and torch-carriers the press anointed, be they Band of Horses or Lil' Wayne, were more hype than substance. The music from across the Atlantic (or even up north in the land of socialized medicine) was incontrovertibly more exciting. With such dismay regarding my country's music (the John Mellencamp quote is unintentional), solace was found in a crisp, sterling reissue of one of the greatest American albums of all-time: "There's A Riot Goin' On." The restored flag cover alone is worth the upgrade; the dramatically improved sound and unearthed bonus jams are simply icing. Thirty-seven years later, "Riot" remains among the most sonically and lyrically subversive albums ever to top the Billboard 200 (and given the tweens-and-geriatrics nature of recent best sellers, it seems destined to stay that way). Not even Kanye would have the guts to release anything like it. "Riot" is the murky, unhinged sound of a man, a family, a belief system and a country simultaneously imploding: sounds closer to the current American zeitgeist than any 2007 music I encountered.