My Top Ten albums of 2006...

...and don't even ask me to try and put them in any sort of order, I had enough trouble getting it down to 10!

Amy Winehouse - Back to Black
No-one else released anything remotely like this in 2006. Channelling the golden age of soul with a girl-pop spin, filthy jokes and magnificent wordplay covered up some very dark material about living at rock-bottom. Amy's voice is like nothing else, and some spectacularly fine production from Mark Ronson was the icing on the cake.

Bodies Without Organs - Halcyon Days
The purest and cheesiest pop this year came from Sweden, as it so often does. It's a measure of how very attuned to the world of the soaring synth-string chorus and the well-judged key change the Swedes are, that Bodies Without Organs have twice now tried and failed to represent their country at Eurovision. Camp, self-referential, and it's never let me down whether I've felt like partying for joy or dancing through my tears.

Grandaddy - Just Like the Fambly Cat
The perfect swansong from my favourite rock band. I said quite a lot about it here.

Gnarls barkley - St. Elsewhere
I've picked up on a bit of a Barkley backlash recently - have people become snobbish about this album because the lead single Crazy was number one for so long? Listen again, this music is fucking fantastic. Innovative production, incredibly soulful vocals, and songs about mental illness and contemplating suicide make this a firm favourite for me.

Guillemots - Through the Windowpane
These guys have made indie-pop respectable again. Inventive use of instruments and orchestration and terrific poetic lyrics. 'Trains to Brazil' is two joyful fingers in the face of terrorism, 'Redwings' a painfully sad colliery brass ballad, and 'Sao Paulo' an epic of styles and moods that's both life-affirming and deeply upsetting.

Hot Chip - The Warning
And this lot made synth-pop respectable again! Sexy, geeky, emotive and truly original, I wrote when they were nominated for the Mercury. One spectacular live show later and I'm even more impressed. 'And I Was a Boy from School' is an anthem for chances lost, and 'Over and Over' had indie kids everywhere dancing like bitches.

The Knife - Silent Shout
More Swedish wizardry, this time on the experimental electronic front. Unsettling noises, keen melodies and beautiful surrealist lyrics have kept me spellbound with this one.

Muse - Black Holes and Revelations
Muse aren't doing anything different here to what they've been doing on their previous albums. But they do it so well, and what I really like about them is that in a world of prog-rock embellished with chugging synths, classical flourishes and post-apocalyptic lyrics, they could easily come across po-faced - but they still sound like they're having fun.

Pet Shop Boys - Fundamental
It's a genius masterclass in how to create intelligent, moving pop that makes you want to dance as much as it makes you want to sit down and analyse the beautiful production and the subversive lyrics.

Squarepusher - Hello Everything
For an artist renowned for being inaccessible, all the reviews of this have focussed on how bright and welcoming it is. But they still won't let me play it at work. Elements of drum and bass collide with experimental electronica, and warm washes of sound fill the room. Then there's the truly unsettling squeal of the Vacuum Garden...