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30 FOR 30

MAGNET’s Noah Bonaparte Pais Picks His 30 Favorite LPs Of The Past 30 Years

To celebrate our 30th anniversary and all the great music that made the past three decades special, MAGNET contributors past and present chose their 30 favorite albums released between 1993 and 2022. The only rules were that each record has to be a full-length and that no artist could be represented more than once in the same incarnation. We’re posting these lists throughout the rest of the year.

Noah Bonaparte Pais, contributing writer
1) Radiohead
OK Computer (Capitol), 1997
2) Neutral Milk Hotel In The Aeroplane Over The Sea (Merge), 1998
3) Solange A Seat At The Table (Saint/Columbia), 2016 
4) Joanna Newsom Have One On Me (Drag City), 2010
5) OutKast Aquemini (LaFace), 1998
6) Built To Spill Perfect From Now On (Warner Bros.), 1997
7) Sufjan Stevens Illinois (Asthmatic Kitty), 2005
8) Songs: Ohia The Magnolia Electric Co. (Secretly Canadian), 2003
9) Nas Illmatic (Columbia), 1994
10) Weezer Weezer (Blue Album) (Geffen), 1994
11) Beck Odelay (Bong Load/DGC), 1996
12) Neko Case Fox Confessor Brings The Flood (Anti-), 2006
13) Yo La Tengo I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One (Matador), 1997
14) Elliott Smith Either/Or (Kill Rock Stars), 1997
15) Lauryn Hill The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill (Ruffhouse/Columbia), 1998
16) Spoon Kill The Moonlight (Merge), 2002
17) Guided By Voices Bee Thousand (Scat), 1994
18) Black Star Mos Def & Talib Kweli Are Black Star (Rawkus), 1998
19) The Shins Chutes Too Narrow (Sub Pop), 2003
20) Cat Power You Are Free (Matador), 2003
21) Pavement Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (Matador), 1994
22) Interpol Turn On The Bright Lights (Matador), 2002
23) Modest Mouse The Lonesome Crowded West (Up), 1997
24) Wilco Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (Nonesuch), 2002
25) Broken Social Scene You Forgot It In People (Arts & Crafts), 2002
26) The Flaming Lips The Soft Bulletin (Warner Bros.), 1999
27) Wolf Parade Apologies To The Queen Mary (Sub Pop), 2005
28) Phoenix It’s Never Been Like That (Astralwerks), 2006
29) The Strokes Is This It (RCA), 2001
30) Arcade Fire Funeral (Merge), 2004