It's the season of superlatives and Bronx cheers, time to take stock of the best and worst in pop this year. This list of top 10 albums is based on a complicated formula: time spent listening to a CD, multiplied by pi. The bigger the number, the better.
Here we go.
1) The White Stripes, "Elephant"
A roaring beast with a heart of gold, the White Stripes' fourth album has a thick, menacing exterior and a hopelessly tender soul. Jack White, the guitarist and songwriting half of this Detroit duo, drew heavily on Led Zeppelin and vintage bluesmen for these garage-rock valentines, which tacked from the sentimental ("I Want to Be the Boy to Warm Your Mother's Heart") to the leering ("Ball and Biscuit"), from up-tempo seductions ("Hypnotize") to slow-motion farewells (a cover of Burt Bacharach's "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself"). Recorded in a studio with pre-digital, early '60s equipment, "Elephant" sounds timeless. It's also playful: Somehow White works the word "acetaminophen" into a rhyme, and the album ends with a lass named Holly Golightly inviting the Whites to a cup of tea. Why isn't there a herd of "Elephants" every year? It must be harder than it looks, pairing monsoon riffs with words that amuse and touch. But the Whites make it look awfully easy.
2) OutKast, "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below"
Unwilling to limit themselves to just one disc, Andre 3000 (Andre Benjamin) and Big Boi (Antwan Patton), the dueling egos of OutKast, rolled out a gargantuan double CD with 135 minutes of music, spoken interludes and skits. Insanely self-indulgent? No question. But "S/TLB" more than rewards the time. Big Boi's "Speakerboxxx" tackles politics and the stress of life as a single dad, while Andre 3000's "The Love Below" is the uncensored diary of a tireless Romeo in search of a classy Juliet. Both albums jumble up decades of rap, soul, R&B, jazz, electronica, rock and funk, both have raunch and occasional moments of class. (Norah Jones stops by for a cameo.) This franchise might not last -- Big Boi and Andre didn't collaborate much on their respective discs, and in interviews it's clear that on a personal level, they're drifting. But if "S/TLB" is the end of OutKast, then OutKast has gone out in magnificent style.
3) Yeah Yeah Yeahs, "Fever to Tell"
The debut LP of this Brooklyn trio re-scorches some trails blazed by '80s punk bands, then threshes a few acres all its own. Singer Karen O. is the centerpiece, her voice lurid and sadistic one minute and girlishly vulnerable the next. ("They don't love you like I love you," the chorus of a song called "Maps," is the heartbreakingest moment in rock this year.) Drummer Brian Chase avoids every rhythm cliche in the canon, and Nick Zinner's guitar has the wailing density of a whole motorcade of sirens. Noisy, naughty and affecting, "Fever" gave everyone a fabulous case of the chills.
4) Missy Elliott, "This Is Not a Test!"
The X-rated ringmistress of rap grabs the mike to once again rhyme about peace, lust and her ample thighs. Party ensues. Longtime producer Timbaland provides most of the beats, many of them as stripped-down as Morse code -- but with the double-time rhythm of rope-jumpers, and bass that resonates like a foghorn. Elliott is joined by enough celebs for a season's worth of "MTV Cribs" -- Jay-Z, Monica, Fabolous, Mary J. Blige, R. Kelly -- though most seem like a distraction from the main show, which is Miss E. and her sex drive, Miss E. and her conquests, Miss E. and her tirades against violence.
5) The Kills, "Keep on Your Mean Side"
Another male-female garage-rock duo, but one that travels even lighter than the White Stripes, unless you count silly pseudonyms as baggage. The Kills are singer VV (born Alison Mosshart), guitarist and co-vocalist Hotel (Jamie Hince) and a drum machine. "Mean Side" is bare-bones and weirdly seductive, filled with dour ruminations about sex and dead ends, all narrated by Hotel's jagged guitar-playing and the mournful harmonies he makes with VV. These crazy kids made doom seem cool.
6) Vic Thrill, "CE-5"
Don't worry, no one else has heard of him either. Heir to the kingdom abandoned by Devo, Thrill makes highly theatrical pop with a pseudo-scientific bent. Unlike his yellow-jumpsuited forefathers, however, Thrill hasn't found much of an audience (beyond a group of local admirers in his home town of Brooklyn), and "CE-5," his debut album, looks destined to be one of those cult productions adored by a few and ignored by the rest of the planet. Part of the problem was timing: "CE-5" was filed under "electro-clash," a style of gaudy, New Wave-inspired synthesizer rock that was spurned about 10 minutes after it was born. Fame, you fickle ho! There weren't many songs in 2003 as intriguing as the album's opener, "Hummingbird Pneumonia," a field holler sung by what sounds like a chorus of funk-loving robots. And that was just the beginning.
7) Liam Lynch, "Fake Songs"
Satire or tribute? It's hard to tell. Lynch, who hails from Ohio and was trained at Paul McCartney's performing arts school in Liverpool, impersonates his favorites acts on "Fake," writing songs in the style of Talking Heads, the Pixies and Bjork, to name a few, and uncannily mimicking their lyrical style and vocals. His "Fake David Bowie Song" is the belle of this masquerade ball, a sendup that nails the gender-bender timbre of Ziggy Stardust and includes the enshrinable lyric, "Hydroplaning toward infinity / Just some drag queens and . . . me." But the original originals, if you will, are just as entertaining, particularly "United States of Whatever," the best celebration of apathy since Beck wrote "Loser."
8) Panjabi MC, "Beware"
Jay-Z gets credit for discovering England's Panjabi MC, and their collaboration on the title track of this album was one of the best shotgun marriages of the year, wedding rap to bhangra, a British take on traditional Indian music. But Panjabi MC, nee Rajinder Rai, doesn't need an assist from an American mogul, as proven by the 13 Jay-Z-free tracks of "Beware." This baker's dozen is an international mash-up of modern electronica and the sounds of the subcontinent -- "Monsoon Wedding" meets Fatboy Slim.
9) The Shins, "Chutes Too Narrow"
With the success of the Shins' last album, "Oh, Inverted World," you had to worry that lead Shin James Mercer would go Hollywood with a big-budget sequel. Instead, he and his band recorded "Chutes" in his Portland, Ore., basement and kept the production to an intimate minimum. There are fewer Beach Boys harmonies than last time; most of this album feels inspired by folk, old country and western acts and '80s bands, like the Cure and the La's, that Mercer discovered while attending high school in England. Heartbreak is still Mercer's topic of choice, and he captures it, on songs such as "Pink Bullets," with the eloquence of a novelist and melodies to match.
10) The Deadly Snakes, "Ode to Joy"
Leaning on mid-'60s Dylan for inspiration, Toronto's Deadly Snakes let sail a shrill, liquored-up and superb retro-rock album about time-tested themes, like love and repentance. "Oh My Bride" and "There Goes Your Corpse Again" make "Ode" worth the cover charge.
Honorable mentions
The Libertines, "Up the Bracket." My Morning Jacket, "It Still Moves." Dwight Yoakam, "Population Me." Radiohead, "Hail to the Thief." Rufus Wainwright, "Want One."
Song of the year:
OutKast, "Hey Ya!"
With the year's most memorable lyric ("Shake it, shake it, shake it like a Polaroid picture!") and a beat that ignites your feet, "Hey Ya!" might be the best thing to happen to radio since the invention of the knob. Andre 3000, the lovelorn and zanier half of OutKast, whisked this tangy meringue of funk and pop, tossing in equal measures of Parliament Funkadelic and Fab Four. It's a breakup song, strangely enough, but so shamelessly filthy you hardly notice.
Runners-up: "The Songbird" by the High Strung. "Not Gonna Get Us" by T.A.T.U. "The Theme From Fannypack" by Fannypack. "Jogi" by Panjabi MC. "The Air Near My Fingers" by the White Stripes. "Maps" by Yeah Yeah Yeahs. "Mines Not a High Horse" by the Shins. "Dixie" by Bob Dylan, from the soundtrack to "Masked and Anonymous." "I'm Holding Out" by the Reigning Sound.
Concert of the Year: Cody ChestnuTT at the Birchmere
An eccentric night of Sly soul and Hendrix rock, led by a guy who is equal parts shaman and showman. ChestnuTT and his band vamped during an impromptu poetry slam starring a few audience volunteers, and the whole thing ended with Cody in the middle of the room, surrounded by a dancing crowd as he sang "Look Good in Leather." Unpredictable and exhilArating.
Runners-up: Simon & Garfunkel at MCI Center, Andrew W.K. at the 9:30 club, the Afro-Cuban All Stars at Lisner, Avril Lavigne at Nation.
Worst Concert: Godspeed You! Black
Emperor at the 9:30. What do you expect from a band that once compared rock venues to concentration camps? They're glum, pretentious and hate their audience -- or pretend to, anyway. Long and predictable dirges, minus vocals. Oh, and it went on for hours.
Best Box Set: "No Thanks: The 70s Punk Rebellion"
Punk gets the Rhino treatment on this four-CD set, which skims the curdled cream of the Buzzcocks, the Dead Kennedys, X, the New York Dolls and the Ramones, as well as dozens of others. Neglected greats like Stiff Little Fingers and Johnny Thunders get salutes, and the track-by-track commentary, by Ira Robbins and Dave Schulps, sums up the story and the characters in succinct and colorful detail. Notably absent are the Sex Pistols -- a deal with whoever owns their catalogue never panned out -- but everyone else who matters is present and accounted for, and anyway, as it candidly says in the liner notes, you ought to buy the Pistols' "Never Mind the Bollocks" before you spend more than $60 for this set.
Runner-up: Talking Heads, "Once in a Lifetime"
The songs that Brian Eno produced hold up best, but the lesson you take away from this overview of the protean career of Talking Heads is that leader David Byrne did droll, deadpan humor better than just about anyone else in rock.
Best DVD: "Led Zeppelin"
A double disc of shows, starting with the Royal Albert Hall appearance in 1970 (with Jimmy Page in an argyle sweater) and ending in Knebworth in 1979, the year before drummer John Bonham's death. A TV screen and a set of home speakers can't do justice to the thermonuclear experience of Zep live, but if you never caught them live, this is as close as you'll get to the hammer of these gods. They are still your overlords, only now you can watch them in slow motion.
Runner-up: "The Four Complete Historic Ed Sullivan Shows, Featuring the Beatles"
Four hours of a TV variety show that inspired more rockers than you can count. The band's performances are familiar, but the freak show of vaudeville magicians, singers and slapstick comedians that took the stage before and after the lads is riveting. Pity poor Soupy Sales, who flaps up and down the aisle singing "Do the Mouse" while impatient fans await the Beatles, who perform "Ticket to Ride."
Most baffling critical swoon: Neil Young's "Greendale"
A droning mess of a concept album inexplicably hailed as ingenious. Young says he wrote it during morning drives to the studio, an attempt to re-create the draft-it-on-the-fly work habits of his novelist father. It might have worked for Young the elder, but it failed Young the younger, who ended up with dull, meandering and overwrought songs that tell a dull, meandering and overwrought story. Yes, this emperor of rock has earned a bit of critical slack, but what if he shows up without any clothes?
Runner-up: 50 Cent, "Get Rich or Die Tryin' "
Dude can take a bullet. Doesn't mean dude can rap.
Weirdest reissue: Jack Palance, "Palance"
This country album, recorded in 1969, is the fault of Kris Kristofferson, who was boozing it up in Nashville with actor Jack Palance when he was hit by an insane idea: Palance could be the next Johnny Cash! As it happens, the glowering actor wasn't even the next Kris Kristofferson. The lowlight here is "The Meanest Guy That Ever Lived," which Palance wrote and which he doesn't so much sing as painstakingly enunciate, as if the words have been spelled out for him phonetically. Was there a Jack Palance revival that I missed?