I'm not sure why we even do music rankings.
I know why >I< do them, though. And I've also got an alternative up my sleeve.
It seems like music outlets never tire of releasing rankings lists with familiar titles like like The Best Albums of 1981 , The Best Albums of 1990, The 35 Best Album Reissues of 2021, Ranking Every AC/DC Album From Worst to Best, Ranking Every Deftones Album from Worst to Best, The Best Country Songs by The Eagles, etc.
I should point out:
I CONTRIBUTED ENTRIES FOR ALL OF THE LISTS I JUST MENTIONED.
In fact, even though I hate the idea of ranking music and hate categorically saying that something is the “best,” I always jump at the chance every time an editor asks if I want to take part in a ranking.
Why? Because it’s an excuse to write about specific albums, which I love doing.
If I can say something about a given title from a more general perspective, my description can stand on its own irrespective of the ranking — and vice-versa. If you’re someone who’s invested in how the music is ranked, then my write-ups can serve that too. Everyone’s happy.
At the end of 2021, I wrote a list on my own titled The 20 Best Reissues and Box Sets of 2021, which I consider to be one of my proudest achievements. In that case, I felt like there actually was some utility in “ranking” these reissue/box set packages based on a number of factors. I also felt a real sense of joy in being able to tell the one publicist that the box set they were repping made the top of my list. But was it worth arguing about, or saying definitively that there was one “best” box set of the year? Of course not. By the same token, I did labor quite a bit over the ranking position for each item.
For the most part, though, I think ranking works of art is an utterly preposterous — even irrational — thing to do. Arguing over rankings is even worse, and I can’t for the life of me understand what people think they’re accomplishing when they insist that their confusion of subjective opinion with concrete truth is more valid than someone else’s confusion of subjective opinion with concrete truth.
Moreover, I really wish we’d expunge the word “best” from our discussions of art. I mean, are we really going to persist in the delusion that certain works of art can be crowned as the “best” in a way that’s collectively decided-on? Is that what we’re saying when we make these assertions — that “no reasonable person would argue with this”? Because that’s just not true, except in maybe the rarest of cases.
Not to mention that my idea of an artist’s quote-unquote best work doesn’t always match up with my favorite work by that artist. There’s a lot of stuff I positively love that I don’t think is “good” and vice-versa. So my favorite stuff isn’t necessarily the stuff that I consider to be the most well-executed… And in any case, ALL of this is one-hundred percent subjective.
I always try to convince editors that I’d prefer not to use the word “best,” but usually to no avail. It’s a matter of choosing my battles — all of the editors I worked with on the above linked pieces are an absolute joy to work with, and writing for outlets like Paste, PopMatters, Consequence, etc is an honor. (Both Paste and PopMatters, along with my all-time favorite music critic Greg Kot’s show Sound Opinions, have just recently posted items titled “The Best Albums of 2022 So Far” — here, here and here.)
At the end of the day, unless we’re talking about something like Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, most of these lists can simply be read as “Here’s a Bunch of Stuff You Might Wanna Check Out,” or as fun fodder for barroom banter that no one takes very seriously.
I can live that, and I’ll keep saying yes whenever an editor asks if I want to have a hand in another list.
But for you, dear reader, I’ve got something else in mind…
Stay tuned!
For now, though, enjoy this awesome video:
<3 SRK