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"Courtesy" of CBC.ca it's a pretty good list, with links to videos. Enjoy

Illustration by Jillian Tamaki

Our musical tastes are highly subjective. What sound like chaotic bloops, squawks and skronks to one person might constitute brilliant free jazz to another; a metalhead’s awesome blistering riffs might strike a classical music aficionado as horrid unfocused noise. So as a rule, attempting to decide on the year’s finest albums is often akin to trying to herd a bunch of cats.

But somehow, when it came time to determine 2009’s best albums here at CBC News, we were surprised by how many overlaps appeared on our individual lists. (For the record, the listmakers were Arts feature writers Greig Dymond, Lee Ferguson, Andre Mayer and Sarah Liss.) Admittedly, each contributor made sacrifices in the interest of reaching consensus, but by and large, it was relatively easy to agree on a collective Top 10 list. Don't agree with our picks? Let us know in the comments below, or have your say in the Your View section.

10. Arctic Monkeys, Humbug
On a certain level, Humbug is the documentation of a vision quest. For their third full-length album, British quartet Arctic Monkeys made a pilgrimage to the Mojave Desert where, under the tutelage of sludge-rock guru Josh Homme, they learned to expand their minds – and their sound. The result is a surprisingly sophisticated rock ‘n’ roll album, bolstered by psychedelic guitar accents, serpentine melodies and cleverly cryptic lyrics.

9. Timber Timbre, Timber Timbre
Toronto-based Taylor Kirk has a strikingly unique voice. When he sings, it sounds like the words are burbling up from the depths of a swamp and rippling out through tall marsh grasses. On his third album as Timber Timbre, Kirk uses quivering organs and macabre imagery – disinterred corpses, bleached bones, spectral visions – to tell tales of a man haunted by love and mortality in equal parts. Appropriately, these songs haunt listeners long after the last note dies out – but only because they’re so impossibly beautiful.

8. Metric, Fantasies
The members of Metric were determined to stay sunny while making their latest album, and Fantasies proves it paid off. Positive without being Pollyannaish, this collection of songs combines stadium-sized rock anthems with silvery after-hours entreaties. Through it all, frontwoman Emily Haines manages to balance the icy confidence of her performance persona with subtle hints of vulnerability and desperation.

7. Neko Case, Middle Cyclone
Honourary Canadian and sometime New Pornographer Neko Case scored a major breakthrough with Middle Cyclone, which debuted at #3 on the Billboard, charts and received a pair of Grammy noms. The accolades are well deserved. Case infuses her parables about wild beasts (people are included in that category) with a sense of pure reverence for Mother Nature — a quality underscored by the birdsong and chirping frogs that she gently folds into the background. Just as awe-inspiring, however, is the revelatory power contained in Case’s ringing bell of a voice.

6. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, It’s Blitz!
Worlds away from the dreamy inner-child reveries that singer Karen O composed for the Where The Wild Things Are soundtrack, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ third album explodes with the sound of NYC night owls in the post-CBGB’s age. It’s Blitz! is like stumbling upon glitter in the gutter, a mix of gleaming new wave influences and grimy, muscular rock ‘n’ roll.

5. Bat for Lashes, Two Suns
For Two Suns, two-time Mercury Prize nominee Natasha Khan (who leads Bat for Lashes) explored her more wicked fantasies through Pearl, a blond, vixen-like alter ego to the singer-songwriter’s introspective tenderness. Despite this dualistic conceit, the second Bat for Lashes album is a cohesive collection of glorious, layered electronic art-pop, with synths, strings and harpsichord sounds tumbling over Khan’s otherworldly vocals.

4. Charlotte Gainsbourg, IRM
French performer Charlotte Gainsbourg has a track record of collaborating with intriguing musical partners. At age 12, she stirred up controversy by crooning sweetly alongside father Serge on the creepy/sweet tune Lemon Incest; as an adult, she’s worked with Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker, electronic duo Air and Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich. On IRM, Gainsbourg teams up with American pop savant Beck for an album that’s stirring and stunning. It ricochets between brittle, evocative experiments (the title track, which tries to replicate the experience of undergoing an MRI) and heavenly folk-inspired ballads.

3. Phoenix, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
We’re still not entirely sure how to diagnose a case of “Lisztomania,” but the description provided by Phoenix on their hit single of that name – “Like a ride, like a riot, oh!” – serves as a fitting encapsulation of the Gallic rockers’ fourth studio album. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is all giddy exuberance, a fireworks display of galloping guitars, triumphant keyboard licks and effervescent choruses. Vive le Phoenix!

2. Grizzly Bear, Veckatimest
Imagine a Gregorian monk’s choir singing doo-wop tunes against lush, airy soundscapes and you’ll have a rudimentary sense of the breathtaking songs on Veckatimest, the third studio album by Brooklyn’s Grizzly Bear. Intricate string arrangements by new classical wunderkind Nico Muhly helped buoy these magnificent tunes, in which co-lead singers and songwriters Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen described yearning and turmoil in enchantingly oblique terms.

1. St. Vincent, Actor
St. Vincent is 27-year-old Annie Clark, an ethereal pixie whose innocent, lilting voice belies her estimable guitar-shredding skills and technical savvy. On Actor, her sophomore album, Clark marries dizzying riffs and twisted narratives with orchestral fantasias reminiscent of mid-century Disney cartoons. It’s magical and masterful.