tUnE-yArDs wins Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics poll

Merrill Garbus - a.k.a. tUnE-yArDs - has won the Village Voice music critics poll for her album whokill. In a year without a clear critical consensus - unlike say, last year, when Kanye West's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was the runaway winner - the victory for the noisy, deliberately unkempt tUnE-YaRds album qualifies as a minor upset over Bon Iver's eponymous indie-easy listening mainstream breakthrough.

That album, by the artist also known as Justin Vernon, was named album of the year by online music sites Pitchfork and Paste and also scored nominations in three major Grammy categories, including album of the year. In the Voice poll, which is not the baromater of critical consensus it was back in the 1980s and 1990s when self-proclaimed Dean of rock critics Robert Christgau ruled the roost, the soft-rock Bon Iver came in 9th, and three of the top ten choices were hip-hop records, including Jay-Z and Kanye West's Watch The Throne (3rd), Drake's Take Care (8th) and Shabazz Palaces' Black Up (10th).

Rounding out the top ten: at #2, PJ Harvey's Let England Shake (an overrated effort by a great artist, in my book), #4, Wild Flag's Wild Flag (deserving); #5, Tom Waits' Bad As Me (not quite that good); #6, Adele's 21 (the sales champ but ranked higher than its merits); and #7, Destroyer's Kaputt (a worthy sleeper choice).

For the record, three of the names on my ballot made the Voice Top Ten: whokill, Wild Flag, and Watch The Throne. the full results, including the list of top ten singles led by Adele's "Rolling In The Deep," are here. Below, tUnE-yArDs' "Gangsta."

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