| Rank | Artist | Album | Label | Buy |
|---|
| 1 | Animal Collective | Merriweather Post Pavilion | Domino |  |
| 2 | Phoenix | Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix | Glassnote | |
| 3 | Grizzly Bear | Veckatimest | Warp | |
| 4 | Neko Case | Middle Cyclone | Anit- | |
| 5 | The xx | xx | Young Turks | |
| 6 | Yeah Yeah Yeahs | It's Blitz! | Interscope | |
| 7 | The Avett Brothers | I and Love and You | American | |
| 8 | Passion Pit | Manners | Columbia | |
| 9 | Wilco | (the album) | Nonesuch | |
| 10 | Andrew Bird | Noble Beast | Fat Possum | |
| 11 | The Decemberists | The Hazards of Love | Capitol | |
| 12 | Built to Spill | There Is No Enemy | Warner Bros | |
| 13 | Bon Iver | Blood Bank | Jagjaguwar | |
| 14 | Dirty Projectors | Bitte Orca | Domino | |
| 15 | Metric | Fantasies | Metric Productions | |
| 16 | Fresh Espresso | Glamour | Out For Stardom | |
| 17 | Miike Snow | Miike Snow | Downtown | |
| 18 | (Various) | Dark Was the Night | 4AD | |
| 19 | We Were Promised Jetpacks | These Four Walls | Fatcat | |
| 20 | Visqueen | Message to Garcia | Local 638 | |
| 21 | The Cave Singers | Welcome Joy | Matador | |
| 22 | Monsters of Folk | Monsters of Folk | Shangri-La | |
| 23 | M. Ward | Hold Time | Merge | |
| 24 | Matt & Kim | Grand | Fader | |
| 25 | Fever Ray | Fever Ray | Mute | |
| 26 | Yo La Tengo | Popular Songs | Matador | |
| 27 | The Maldives | Listen to the Thunder | Mt. Fuji | |
| 28 | The Pains of Being Pure at Heart | The Pains of Being Pure at Heart | Slumberland | |
| 29 | Grand Hallway | Promenade | Self-released | |
| 30 | Dinosaur Jr. | Farm | Jagjaguwar | |
| 31 | Erik Blood | The Way We Live | Self-released | |
| 32 | The Flaming Lips | Embryonic | Warner Bros | |
| 33 | Handsome Furs | Face Control | Sub Pop | |
| 34 | Fanfarlo | Reservoir | Fanfarlo | |
| 35 | Elvis Perkins in Dearland | Elvis Perkins in Dearland | XL | |
| 36 | The Big Pink | A Brief History of Love | 4AD | |
| 37 | Blitzen Trapper | Black River Killer | Sub Pop | |
| 38 | Gossip | Music For Men | Columbia | |
| 39 | St. Vincent | Actor | 4AD | |
| 40 | Mos Def | The Ecstatic | Downtown | |
| 41 | Sonic Youth | The Eternal | Matador | |
| 42 | Silversun Pickups | Swoon | Dangerbird | |
| 43 | The Dutchess & the Duke | Sunset/Sunrise | Hardly Art | |
| 44 | David Bazan | Curse Your Branches | Barsuk | |
| 45 | Thao with The Get Down Stay Down | Know Better Learn Faster | Kill Rock Stars | |
| 46 | Camera Obscura | My Maudlin Career | 4AD | |
| 47 | Dan Auerbach | Keep It Hid | Nonesuch | |
| 48 | Japandroids | Post-Nothing | Unfamiliar | |
| 49 | Bill Callahan | Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle | Drag City | |
| 50 | Beirut // Realpeople | March of the Zapotec // Holland | Ba Da Bing | |
| 51 | The Dead Weather | Horehound | Third Man/Warner Bros | |
| 52 | The Horrors | Primary Colours | XL | |
| 53 | Atlas Sound | Logos | Kranky | |
| 54 | Fruit Bats | The Ruminant Band | Sub Pop | |
| 55 | Bat For Lashes | Two Suns | Astralwerks | |
| 56 | Girls | Album | True Panther | |
| 57 | Betsy Olson | Lonely Woman Blues | Self-released | |
| 58 | Doves | Kingdom of Rust | Astralwerks/Heavenly | |
| 59 | Regina Spektor | Far | Sire | |
| 60 | Slender Means | Adrift in the Cosmos | Self-released | |
| 61 | Deer Tick | Born On Flag Day | Partisan | |
| 62 | A Place to Bury Strangers | Exploding Head | Mute | |
| 63 | The Antlers | Hospice | Frenchkiss | |
| 64 | The Raveonettes | In and Out of Control | Vice | |
| 65 | Royksopp | Junior | Astralwerks | |
| 66 | Mew | No More Stories… | Columbia | |
| 67 | White Rabbits | It's Frightening | tbd | |
| 68 | Iron and Wine | Around the Well | Sub Pop | |
| 69 | Lily Allen | It's Not Me, It's You | Capitol | |
| 70 | The Heavy | The House That Dirt Built | Counter | |
| 71 | Dodos | Time To Die | Frenchkiss | |
| 72 | The Redwood Plan | Movers Shakers Makers EP | Self-released | |
| 73 | Twilight Sad | Forget the Night Ahead | Fatcat | |
| 74 | Au Revoir Simone | Still Night, Still Light | Our Secret Record Company | |
| 75 | Sleepy Eyes of Death | Dark Signals | Mass Mvmnt/ Sleep Capsule | |
| 76 | Eels | Hombre Lobo | Vagrant | |
| 77 | Future of the Left | Travels With Myself and Another | 4AD | |
| 78 | Tegan and Sara | Sainthood | Vapor/Sire | |
| 79 | Throw Me the Statue | Creaturesque | Secretly Canadian | |
| 80 | Gui Boratto | Take My Breath Away | Kompakt | |
| 81 | Antony and the Johnsons | The Crying Light | Secretly Canadian | |
| 82 | Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band | Outer South | Merge | |
| 83 | The Thermals | Now We Can See | Sub Pop | |
| 84 | Arctic Monkeys | Humbug | Domino | |
| 85 | (Various) | Live at KEXP Volume Five | KEXP | |
| 86 | The Ironclads | Space Between the Maps | Self-released | |
| 87 | Devendra Banhart | What Will We Be | Warner Bros | |
| 88 | Junior Boys | Begone Dull Care | Domino | |
| 89 | Julian Plenti | Julian Plenti Is… Skyscraper | Matador | |
| 90 | Florence and the Machine | Lungs | Island | |
| 90.3 | Telekinesis | Telekinesis! | Merge | |
