Best Album Artwork of 2009

It’s the time of year for people to compile their ‘best-of’ lists. Here’s mine for best album artwork of 2009. I limited myself to only albums I own so if you have a recommendation, I’d love to hear from you too. This may be an interesting way to introduce graphics to students and look kind of hip ; ). I simply used Screenflow and recorded my iTunes folder for the video. (Feel free to use the resource via Slideshare here as well.)

Best Album Artwork 2009 from FNC videos on Vimeo.

List: Artist/Album (Amazon.com link)

1. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavilion
2. The Antlers – Hospice
3. Antony And The Johnsons – The Crying Light
4. Baroness – Blue Record
5. Beck – Andy Warhol & Songs of Leonard Cohen (Record Club series – Beck & Guests covering classic albums)
6. Bibio – Ambivalence Avenue
7. The Big Pink – A Brief History Of Love
8. Camera Obscura – My Maudlin Career
9. Dinosaur Jr. – Farm
10. Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca
11. Fever Ray – Fever Ray (Great videos too)
12. Fruit Bats – The Ruminant Band
13. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest
14. Isis – Wavering Radiant
15. Jesu – Opiate Sun EP
16. Lindstrøm & Prins Thomas – II
17. The Longcut – Open Hearts
18. Major Lazer – Guns Don’t Kill people…Lazers Do
19. Manic Street Preachers – Journal For Plague Lovers (Now this is a great painted portrait)
20. Massive Attack – Splitting the Atom EP
21. Matt & Kim – Grand
22. Monsters of Folk – Monsters of Folk
23. Nadja – When I See The Sun Always Shines On TV
24. Neon Indian – Psychic Chasms EP (Don’t know why but I love this collage)
25. The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart – The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart (LP) & Higher Than The Stars (EP) – Great for printing & comic inking
26. Peter Doherty – Grace
27. Prefuse 73 – Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian
28. Rain Machine – Rain Machine (So cheap it’s cool)
29. Squarepusher – Just a Souvenir
30. Them Crooked Vultures – Them Crooked Vultures
31. Wild Beasts – Two Dancers (Beautiful in it’s simplicity)
32. YACHT – See Mystery Lights
33. Various Artists – War Child: Heroes (Lovely pattern and repetition with a message)
34. Various Artists – 5 : 5 years of Hyperdub
35. Various Artists – Warp20 (Unheard) (Warp album covers evoke the entire label’s output. Their covers will be remembered as Blue Note records have been)

Related: Pitchfork’s Worst Album Covers of 2009