Game over

While I've been posting some of my favourite tracks of 2011 elsewhere by way of building up to the annual album countdown on here, the Guardian have revealed their critics' list. It says a lot about my listening habits these days that I'd never even heard their top pick, Lana Del Rey's 'Video Games', and neither it nor Alexis Petridis' gushing justification managed to convince me that it's better than (for instance) anything on the Cat's Eyes or Lykke Li records. (Perhaps I've been spoiled by listening to a bit of Marissa Nadler recently, too.)

Far superior is Azealia Banks' '212', which I've also just listened to for the first time - smart and smutty. Don't think much of her cover of Interpol's 'Slow Hands', mind.

The paper has also printed the same critics' run-down of the year's best albums. No prizes for guessing what ended up in the top spot - but here's Kitty Empire's spot-on assessment of an astounding record.