Yesterday, we revealed the first installment (picks 50-11) of our fourth annual Critics Poll. Today, it’s the Top 10. (OK, so it’s technically a Top 11, but unlike Trishna and Krishna, Kid Sam and Philadelphia Grand Jury just couldn’t be split). So without further ado…

T10. Kid Sam
Kid Sam (Two Bright Lakes)

What we said: “Kid Sam have created a uniquely colloquial but still universal aesthetic with this work…”.

With an unswerving lyrical and musical commitment to themes of death, loss and decay, it’s something of a wonder that Kid Sam’s startling debut manages to make you feel so great. There is a hole at the heart of each and every song – its characters, moods and landscapes are simply different light-angles on Yorick’s skull. And yet rather than return us to the dirt, Kid Sam lift us above our station – and not just because they fucking rock. Kieran Ryan can’t help but turn the same things that drown us into symbols of rebirth: “We’re mostly made of water/Let’s jump into the river/And we will never die.” It might only be the elements that live on – or our ghosts – but the kind of document these two cousins have made is the most permanent thing of all. – Lawson Fletcher

T10. Philadelphia Grand Jury
Hope is For Hopers (Boomtown Records/Shock)

What we said: “These are brilliantly crafted pop songs from a fiercely talented rock band…”

When the dust settles on ’09, Philadelphia Grand Jury may well emerge as its most unlikely heroes. In a market saturated by preened pop stars and Wayfarer-sporting hipsters, the Philly Jays – a dorky studio engineer with a high-speaking voice, his bearded childhood friend and a 54-year-old drummer named Calvin – succeeded by turning an anti-image into, well, an image. But that’s not to say they didn’t pull out all stops to get there. The band played on the back of a flatbed truck across Sydney, shed two drummers and smashed pianos on their way to an AIR Award, the most talked about showcase at this year’s Big Sound and an ARIA Top 50 placing. Recorded after-hours at BJB Studios in Sydney, where singer Berkfinger works as an engineer, their debut album Hope Is For Hopers somehow managed to bottle the combustible energy the band so consistently expend live. The result is the most unashamed party rock record of the year. – Darren Levin

9. St Helens
Heavy Profession (Dot Dash)

What we said: “In a world of bloated credit and diminished confidence, St Helens are completely vital; so far from sub-prime…”

Having honed his darkly sardonic take on the human condition in the vastly underrated rock trio The New Season, Melbourne songwriter Jarrod Quarrell branched out into a world of twisted pop sounds with his new band St Helens. Roping in second vocalist Hannah Brooks and a veritable who's who of Melbourne's indie-rock instrumentalists, Quarrell broadened his vision to embrace complex arrangements, intricate melodies and subtle influences ranging from Krautrock to reggae in order to create a classic debut album. From the druggy haze of ‘St Luke’ to the mutant psychedelia of ‘Positivity’ and acid-fried country touches in ‘Summer Is Forever’, Heavy Profession delivered intelligent, mature rock without compromising its underground credibility. – René Schaefer

8. Dappled Cities
Zounds (Speak N Spell)

What we said: “Zounds feels like a new era for Dappled Cities – and it couldn’t be more exciting…”

Dappled Cities were often in the public eye in 2009. They soundtracked the alphabet for the lucrative toddler market, had their national tour presented by Video Hits and played their encores literally dressed like an Electric Light Orchestra. These were amusing reminders that indie culture doesn’t need to be so self-aware and anxious, but it also indicated a desire to break through barriers that was equally apparent on Zounds. The five-piece’s third album banished the ingratiating alternative pop of 2006’s Granddance with the opening ‘Hold Your Back’, all turbulent electronic frequencies, and while the album did pull back from there, the conventional could never get a solid foothold. The band did soaring choruses (‘The Price’), sunrise pop (‘Kid’), and tremulous soundscapes (‘Middle People’), alternating between the obtuse and the direct with the kind of casual effort that suggested they were coming into their own. – Craig Mathieson

7. Love of Diagrams
Nowhere Forever (Unstable Ape/Remote Control)

What we said: “What unfolds here is a casually brilliant collection of texturally moving rock songs with no pretence to save the world, or even change it slightly…”

From its conception, Love of Diagrams’ sound has been built on the interplay between Luke Horton’s guitar, Antonia Sellbach’s bass, the pair’s call-and-response vocals and Monika Fikerle’s drums. On their 2007 album Mosaic, Love of Diagrams celebrated that interplay with mathematical precision. In contrast, Nowhere Forever layered the musical dialectic with colour and texture. In visual art terms, Nowhere Forever is Monet to Mosaic’s Matisse.

Initial observations of the record focused on the thick guitar wash reminiscent of late 1980s English bands such as Ride and Swervedriver. Closer inspection, however, revealed a pristine pop sensibility in tracks such as ‘Forever’, while ‘Mountain’ and ‘All You Know’ could be located within a punk context that stretches from Dinosaur Jr through to Heavens to Betsy and Lizard Train. Such reference points, however, are specious and offensive. Nowhere Forever is a unique work from a band content to explore its art unbridled by expectation and convention. Moreover, it proves that when Matador Records made the ruthless commercial decision to cast the band adrift prior to the album’s recording, it wasn’t their finest hour. – Patrick Emery

6. Songs
Songs (Popfrenzy)

What we said: “Songs fit well within the current ’90s revivalist movement, but this band is much more than a fickle throwback…”

There’s a pile of expensive-looking cheese on the front cover of Songs’ debut LP, but that’s where the fanciness ends. Call this meat-and-potato indie rock (with cheese). There’s the usual ransacked Flying Nun heritage, with garnish from a slew of veteran American indie groups who should immediately break up, as well as a dash of spice from veteran English indie groups who will inevitably reform soon (nothing will stop this onslaught of the hookless walking dead).

Thing about Songs is, the band name says it all: as sprawling and eagerly referential as this debut is, your first listen is like striking gold in an otherwise dry and eroded MOR guitar rock landscape. It’s by no means a perfect debut – it’s unwieldy and fat around the edges - but three-quarts of this is indie guitar heaven: boy-girl harmonies, vague come-ons and swirling feedback echo chambers. Some cheese is meant to be served stale anyway. This is like a serving of good quality blue cheese for people who like to consume old things. – Shaun Prescott

5. UV Race
UV Race (Aarght!)

What we said: “The UV Race have matured into a band that can withstand scrutiny, but they are still best dealt with in the here and now, like a flaming Sambuca shot spilt on your arm…”

Easily the most awesome guitar pop album to be released all year. It’s a new barometer to test whether you should be friends with someone or not: play this album and gauge their reaction. If they don’t like it - slap them. Not many albums inspire such belligerent passion, but for me UV Race’s debut is one of them.

UV Race are a pack of weird-ass kids from some shithouse rural Victorian town who have come to tell us their utterly inconsequential but nonetheless fascinating anecdotes. Like their Brisbane counterparts Kitchen’s Floor, this is the sound of boredom turned ecstatic: slow hours spent playing in a band because there’s nothing much else to do and happening to be actually quite good at it. Who else is sick of listening to well-connected inner-city moustachioed pretty boys sing between sips of a soy latte? UV Race wins all trophies because they’re an antidote to everything that is pedestrian and frustrating about rock music in 2009. It’s down-to-earth, infectious and smart - but also dumb and blissfully cathartic. – Shaun Prescott

4. Crayon Fields
All The Pleasures of the World (Chapter Music)

What we said: “All The Pleasures of the World gorges on the ecstatic risks that come with finally laying yourself naked and afraid at the feet of a significant other…”

Animal Bells was certainly buoyant with charisma, but this is the record where Crayon Fields got to be a band, not just bedroom Peter Pans. Cue the slinking bass lines, Television-esque guitar, malleable drums and Geoff O’Connor’s blanketing sigh, all steeped in embellishment no longer indebted to Pet Sounds. It’s even – brace yourselves – a bit sexy, though the couples depicted are as likely to argue in a doorway as pash. Between this band, his solo work, and his entry on Angie Hart’s latest album, Geoff O’Connor has emerged as perhaps our most reliable young songwriter. His meekness may distract or turn off some, but beneath it is an assured eye for miniature, everyday detail that never leads him astray. On an album with songs titled ‘Timeless’ and ‘Graceless’, it’s easy to see which applies to O’Connor and his Crayon Fields. – Doug Wallen

3. Aleks & The Ramps
Midnight Believer (Stomp)

What we said: “With every song, the album picks up momentum – it seems designed to hurtle toward the final track and first single, 'Antique Limb'…”

“Aleks’ brain is like an udder and we’re four tiny teets squeezing out the juice.” This was guitarist Joe Foley’s typically flippant description of the band’s songwriting process in an interview with M+N back in June. Built around Aleks Bryant’s zany impulses, The Ramps – siblings Joe and Janita Foley, Jon Tjhia and Simon Connolly – are a gang in much the same way as The Birthday Party were. Except instead of heroin chic, they share a similar sense of humour and a penchant for glittery stage costumes, kitties and synchronised dance moves.

On second LP Midnight Believer, the band cut out the bullshit – for the most part, at least – and emerged with their strongest set of songs to date. ‘Circa 1992 Ideas’ lives up to its name, swerving from sparse lullaby to West Coast AM rocker and back again in just over five minutes; the opening one-two punch of ‘Destroy The Universe With Jazz Hands’ and ‘Walking In The Garden’ are punctuated by epic and unpredictable bursts of noise; and in triple j favourite ‘Antique Limb’, they had one of the best singles of the year. Such is the quality of material here that you could almost excuse them for ‘Weather Patterns’, a ‘Fitter Happier’-style interlude featuring a poetry reading in a computerised voice. Guess some things will never change. – Darren Levin

2. Mum Smokes
Easy/House Music (Sensory Projects)

What we said: “In a world full of excuses to be angry and demonstrative, it’s a feat to pull off one album like Mum Smokes have here – let alone two…”

On paper, Easy/House Music is a devil-may-care double album made by a Melbourne super group comprising members of Kes Band, the Ancients and ZOND. Wrong. It’s actually two albums packaged together, and while it does indeed take the form of unfettered sprawl, there’s nothing bloated or indulgent about it. Easy/House Music – Mum Smokes’ second release in four years – is simply a babbling brook of inspired creative release from four versatile players: Karl Scullin, Jonathan Michell, Julian Patterson and JK Fuller.

In true collaborative spirit, everyone plays everything, writes songs and sings, while the 31 tracks run from pastoral folk to elusive psych to frazzled indie rock. There are also more than a few winding instrumentals and recurring jags of classical piano, making it a perfect companion piece to Kes Band II. But given the way these two discs nestle against each other and blur into one in retrospect, aren’t they already their own companion pieces? – Doug Wallen

1. Rowland S. Howard
Pop Crimes (Liberation Music)

What we said: “Despite the 10-year gap between albums, this collection is not a return to form. He’s never lost it…”

Howard’s first full-length work in a decade marks a stunning comeback for the iconic Melbourne guitar slinger. For an album so accomplished and dense, the approach was surprisingly simple: pull together a talented group of players (Hungry Ghosts’ JP Shilo on bass/violin and old bandmate Mick Harvey on drums), strip the music back and let the songs speak for themselves.

Howard’s affectless, often flat vocals carry more weight than you’d reasonably expect, allowing the complex lyrics and ideas to shine through. The title track oozes a kind of coolly restrained menace (“I guess that I won’t see you tomorrow/On this, our planet of perpetual sorrows”), while a duet with HTRK’s Jonnine Standish, ‘(I Know A) Girl Called Jonny’, is playful and downright saucy. On stage, the material (augmented by The Beasts of Bourbon’s Brian Hooper on bass) comes alive even further, and is played with an almost telepathic sense of connection between singer and band.

In a year when Nick Cave’s self indulgence and irrelevance came under some well-deserved scrutiny, Pop Crimes was welcomed across a wide spectrum, winning Howard a surprisingly young set of new fans (“No longer do I look out from the stage and just see a bunch of ageing ex-junkies,” he quipped in an interview with M+N back in October). Yet there is a sting in the tail, with Howard’s battles with illness forcing the cancellation of a bout of shows including an appearance at Homebake earlier this month. If this album does turn out to be the final chapter of his rich legacy – and let’s hope that it’s not – it’s a damn fine one at that. – Trevor Block

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Compiled from the votes of: Dom Alessio, Trevor Block, Danny Bos, A.H Cayley, Patrick Emery, Lawson Fletcher, Babette Gladney, Dave Graney, J.P Hammond, Lucy Hearn, Kate Hennessy, Darren Levin, Jody MacGregor, Craig Mathieson, Andrew McMillen, Adam D Mills, Shaun Prescott, Andrew Ramadge, Ian Rogers, René Schaefer, Tim Scott, Doug Wallen.

Critics could not vote for records they were associated with.