Callahan bill

Fleet Foxes, Paul Simon and Josh T Pearson are also named on the shortlist

Many thanks to all of you who stopped by and registered your votes for this Albums Of 2011 Thus Far poll. I've finally done the requisite dark mathematics and come up with this Top 20. A big gap between the top three and the rest of the field and, perhaps, an unexpected winner…

Given we’re coming up to the end of June, I figured it should be time for this annual bit of anal-retentive album-crunching. A lot of fine records here , though not necessarily the 30 I might have envisaged at the start of 2011; as I’ve alluded to before, I feel like there have been a lot of eagerly-anticipated letdowns this year.

An extra-long list this week, since we seem to have worked our way through more stuff than usual. A lot of good stuff, too, I’d say, with one or two exceptions, and a tremendous new mystery record that’s coming out in the summer and which hasn’t, I think, been announced as yet – hence the necessary evasiveness.

Putney prodigy remodels the jazz-soul veteran’s 2010 album. Result? A raw, stripped-down triumph...

Last blog of the year, I suspect, so I thought it’d be useful to post my whole hundred in one place: apologies for the half-arsed obligation to get extra traffic which compelled me to post it in chunks, at least initially.

Previously: 100-76, 75-51.

A bit of anal-retentive listmaking today: my favourite 30 albums of the year so far (though I imagine I’ve forgotten one or two, and there’ll be a bunch more good ones that I haven’t heard as yet).

Something slightly uncomfortable about wondering how much music remains unreleased in the Jack Rose archives, following his passing at the end of last year. It’s scant consolation for his loved ones, I’m sure, that the rest of us are keen on getting unheard music from him for a while longer.

Apologies for the spotty service here recently: deadlines, deaths and a mildly debilitating virus have meant there hasn’t been much time to look after the blog in the past week or so.