No year is complete without the obligatory list of my favorite records of the year. This year’s selection includes some obvious choices, but also some picks that really surprised me. There were actually a lot of great records released this year, and it was hard to choose 10, but here we are. On with the show!

10) Converge - Axe to Fall

This was a real shocker for me. My intake of heavy music has dwindled over the last few years, and while I’ve always admired Converge, I hadn’t been mesmerized by anything they’d done since Jane Doe. However, as soon as I heard the chugging bass and pummeling drums that open “Dark Horse,” the first track on Axe to Fall, I found myself in 2001 all over again rediscovering what heavy music means. Axe to Fall is some of Converge’s most brutal and most melodic music to date. At the very least it’s inspiring to see a band putting out some of their best material nearly two decades after their inception.

9) Zoot Woman - Things Are What They Used to Be

Ah Zoot Woman! This band has always existed with a relative inconsistency and usually played second fiddle to the notoriety of front man Stuart Price’s production work for bands like The Killers and Keane. With Things Are What They Used to Be, Zoot Woman has finally delivered a collection of front-to-back moody, 80s inspired dance pop. Here the band borrows extensively from the musical foundation laid by groups like Depeche Mode and the Pet Shop Boys, but coupled with Price’s production, the record almost has more in common with Madonna’s “Confessions on a Dance Floor” (also produced by Price). Additionally, the album’s opener, “We Won’t Break,” might be one of the best club songs of 2009.

8) Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It’s Blitz!

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs were always a band that never quite did it for me. I was able to get down on tracks here and there, but I was never fully obsessed with or enveloped by any of them. However, It’s Blitz delivers some of the best electro-dance-pop of the year along with tracks like “Zero” and “Heads Will Roll.” But it doesn’t stop there as tracks like “Little Shadow” and “Hysteric” deliver some lush, moody, and contemplative standout moments. The signature guitar and drum work of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, coupled with an overwhelming use of keyboards recalls all the best moments of Blondie and my favorite tracks from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs catalog. The record has a sort of full circle quality about it; a beginning, a middle, and an end. As Karen O. sings on “Hysteric,” “You suddenly complete me.”

7) The XX - XX

The first time I heard The XX, I was sitting on my bed in my apartment on a Sunday afternoon. It was warm out and the sunlight was beaming in through the window, catching anything it could; little specs of dust, the screen of my laptop, my girlfriend’s hair as she napped next to me. It was a perfect lazy, fall afternoon and as the lilting melodies, stripped down simplicity, and relaxed sentiments of The XX filled the room I was struck by how perfectly the music matched the mood. That feeling has stayed with me ever since and now whenever I hear this record, I am transported to that moment in September when I was enjoying a perfect, carefree moment in my life. What an incredibly special thing.

6) Mew - No More Stories Are Told Today, I’m Sorry They Washed Away

For inexplicable reasons, I thought Mew was going to make a more commercial record since they were coming off the relatively surprising success of “And the Glass Handed Kites.” However, the release of No More Stories reaffirmed Mew’s conviction to making brooding, prog-inspired indie rock. With four years between albums, the bar was set high for Mew, and here they deliver some of their best work to date with tracks like “Beach” and “Repeater Beater,” where stomping drums, twinkling guitars, and complex vocal melodies blend together into a dizzying array of aural audacity. How refreshing!

5) Delorean - Ayrton Senna EP

Here we are, finally, with one of my “New Music Monday” picks. Glorious, sunny, electro-pop by a group of dudes from Spain, Delorean almost sounds more like a DJ than a full band. Ayrton Senna is full of looping, ethereal melodies, repetitive lyrics, and always a bouncing, groove-oriented rhythm section. This record oozes gorgeous subtlety and nuance so much so that it almost seems like an exercise in how to make me feel totally happy and inspired all the time. Their promised 2010 full length is one of my most anticipated records of next year.

4) Manchester Orchestra - Mean Everything to Nothing

Admittedly, I am a latecomer to the Manchester Orchestra fan club. The group’s previous work didn’t really strike a chord with me, but Mean Everything To Nothing changed all that with its infectious hooks, organic construction, and surprising simplicity. Singer Andy Hull spits some fantastic prose and flawlessly switches from charming sincerity to disturbing anguish at the drop of a hat, but it never feels overly dramatic or anything less than honest. Occasional Replacements-esque moments keep Mean Everything to Nothing rocking hard, but the real stars are the album’s quieter moments. The under two minute “One Hundred Dollars,” feels like an awkward conversation before it explodes into frightening desperation, while “I Can Feel a Hot One” is one of the saddest, most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard.

3) Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More

This was the biggest surprise of the year for me, coming completely out of left field to be one of my favorite records of 2009, and then some. Incredibly cinematic, Mumford and Sons’ rootsy, harmony oriented, indie folk conjures images of not only old London, but also Appalachia and golden eras of American history. Every song is a story told through rollicking drums, dancing banjos, multi-part harmonies, and tasteful brass. Sigh No More is epic, dark, romantic, and utterly captivating.

2) Passion Pit - Manners

Perhaps the biggest breakout band of the year, Passion Pit graduated from bedroom project to major touring circuit seemingly overnight. Full of the fattest synths, the highest vocals, and the most unabashed intentions, Manners is not only a party and a half, but it is so without making you feel bad about it. Every track is ripe with hooks and dripping with sugary sweetness, but it retains just enough hipster cool and nuance to keep itself from falling into radio pop nonsense. It doesn’t hurt that no matter how many times I listen to “Little Secrets,” it still makes me want to party all night long.

1) Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

All I can say is “Bravo.” It’s about time Phoenix got the recognition they’ve deserve in America. Phoenix’s fourth studio album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, manages to walk the line between highly stylized, intelligent indie rock, and Top 40 radio perfection. Combining the best elements of the group’s earlier electronic work and their later, more rock oriented sound, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is carefree and fun, rocking hard (by Phoenix’s standards anyway) but still incorporating the suave, intimate, soft rock sounds that the band is known for. This year was a real victory for the band; performing on Saturday Night Live, headlining Central Park, mainstream radio airplay, and a Cadillac commercial. Well deserved success is always inspiring to see. Again, bravo!