Hot Bands Worldwide?

Last week, Information Leafblower listed the results of the "Top 40 Bands in America" designated by a cadre of mainly indie-rock bloggers. Here's the top ten:

1. Sufjan Stevens
2. The National
3. Kanye West
4. LCD Soundsytem
5. Sleater-Kinney
6. The Hold Steady
7. Green Day
8. The Fiery Furnices
9. The Decemberists
10. Spoon

After reviewing this list, I realize that I actually do not like much American music. Of the so-called "top" bands, I only like LCD Soundsystem, We are Scientists, and Out Hud. With the exception of a couple of mainstream pop acts, most of the bands on the list were American indie, which kinda gets into emo and folksy types of stuff. Not my bag. (Lists like these are, of course, difficult to put together and difficult to please everyone. I'm not sure I would have called it the "Top 40 Bands in America Today" though - more like the acts bloggers like the most.)

Of course, there are a fair amount of American bands that I like that weren't listed (Interpol, The Rapture, Madison Strays) so I wouldn't go as far as saying I dislike American music completely.

So after reading the "Top 40 Bands in America" list, I thought, I need to see a Top Bands in the UK list, since my musical allegience lies across the pond. And Take Your Medicine came through for me. He compiled a list of 47 after consulting with UK blogs. Now here's something I can get into.

The "UK-centric Bloggers and Podcasters: Top 40 Artist's of 2005":

1. Girls Aloud
2. The Go! Team
3. Radiohead
4. Bloc Party
5. Test Icicles
6. Patrick Wolf
7. Art Brut
8. HAL
9. Basement Jaxx
10. Rachel Stevens
11. Boards of Canada
12. Super Furry Animals
13. Kaiser Chiefs
14. Arctic Monkeys:
15. MIA
16. ¡Forward, Russia!
17. Mystery Jets
18. Muse
19. Tom Vek
20. Ladytron
21. Maximo Park
22. Jeremy Warmsley
23. The Futureheads
24. McFly
25. Franz Ferdinand
26. The Priscillas
27. Mojave 3
28. Oasis
29. Twisted Charm
30. The Streets
31. The Bridge Gang
32. Emmy The Great
33. The Boy Least Likely To
34. The Pipettes
35. Thirteen senses
36. Paul Weller
37. Mu
38. Comanechi
39. The Cribs
40. Clor
41. 22-20s
42. Uncle John & Whitelock
43. Larrikin Love
44. Belle & Sebastian
45. Sugarbabes
46. The Emperor Machine / Chicken Lips
47. Guillemots

That's more like it. I like many more of these than the bands on the American list. Luckily, a lot of these acts come to New York, thus allowing me to quench my thirst. I think I would have added Editors, Hard-Fi, The Departure, and Stuart Price to this list.

Oh, and Canada got involved too.