Jeff's 2021 list becomes a candid map of taste, habits, and guitar-centered listening.
The Great Albums returns with Jeff's top 10 albums of 2021, but the ranking works best as a snapshot of taste shaped by a year when he let music find him.

Album talk with memory, jokes, and receipts.
The Great Albums treats rock and pop records as living objects, not museum pieces. Its conversations move from hooks, artwork, and guitar parts into personal listening history, scene context, and why a record still earns replay time.
PRESS PLAY
The Great Albums is a music commentary show with a stubborn affection for the album as a format. It talks like fans talk, but with better recall. The episodes often begin loosely, with banter, updates, or a small joke, then settle into a record, a list, or a special theme. From there, the conversation can move quickly. A point about a soft-rock lane becomes a note about guitar complexity. A pop-rock pick leads into comparisons with power pop, early textures, hooks, and review culture. A delayed favorite can become a way to talk about changing opinions, delayed appreciation, and the awkward business of correcting an old list. The show is not allergic to enthusiasm, but it rarely sounds like hype. Its best stretches have the feel of two record obsessives testing their own memories against the music in front of them. That makes the criticism approachable. It also keeps it honest. Bill and Brian will admit when a list is shaped by what they actually heard, when an episode is lighter on homework, or when a long album needs a more selective path through the tracks. The formats give the archive range. Standard album episodes lean into song-by-song discussion, while year-end lists capture what stuck from a particular listening year. Six-pack episodes make room for bands when one single album cannot hold the whole case. High Fives episodes shift the lens toward side doors, including strong records saddled with weak cover art. Those side doors matter because the show treats music culture as more than sound alone. Artwork, radio ubiquity, personal playing history, guest reactions, and old fan arguments all become part of the record's afterlife. The result is warmly nerdy and lightly dry, with enough specificity to satisfy album people and enough looseness to avoid feeling like homework. It suits listeners who enjoy hearing taste develop in real time. It also rewards anyone who likes criticism that can say a song is great, explain why, and still leave room for a joke about the cover.
Made for: For music fans who care about albums, deep cuts, year-end lists, cover art, and the way records change shape over time. It especially suits listeners who like criticism that sounds conversational rather than formal.
What sets it apart: The show stands out by mixing detailed album discussion with candid listening history and relaxed side routes. It can handle track-level analysis, artwork complaints, list debates, and personal musician memories without turning stiff.
Two indie rock musicians, Bill Lambusta and Brian Erickson, dive into great rock and pop music through the lens of the medium they care for most - the album. Every episode features a track-by-track review, discussions about the sounds they love, and their own stories. Guests include musicians, podcasters, and journalists who are fellow deep-dive music nerds.
Based on 4 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Bill Lambusta and Brian Erickson turn album criticism into a detailed, conversational account of how songs sound, work and endure.
The Great Albums treats each record as a conversation to be worked through, often song by song. Bill Lambusta and Brian Erickson move easily between composition, production and judgment, listening for guitar choices, drum patterns, hooks and the moments when an artist's…
Bill and Brian turn a track list into the record-store argument you hoped would keep going.
Press play if you want
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Jeff's 2021 list becomes a candid map of taste, habits, and guitar-centered listening.
The Great Albums returns with Jeff's top 10 albums of 2021, but the ranking works best as a snapshot of taste shaped by a year when he let music find him.
A relaxed 2020 album list finds its clearest spark in Beach Bunny's surprise appeal.
Bill and Brian return to their music-appreciation format with a Top 10 Albums of 2020 discussion that feels more rooted in personal discovery than consensus.
A relaxed summer detour through liked albums, disliked covers, and the arguments those mismatches invite.
The Great Albums uses its High Fives format for a summer special about albums the hosts like despite covers they do not, and the shift gives the episode an easy, low-homework feel. Bill and Brian skip the usual track-by-track structure and move through familiar records instead.
A longtime favorite Ryan Adams album gets a warm, fan-level airing, sharpened by guitar memories and lived-in affection.
The Great Albums episode on Ryan Adams' Love Is Hell comes across as a familiar, fan-level conversation about a record Bill and Brian clearly know well.

Chicago critics DeRogatis and Kot pair new-album reviews with deep dives into records like Rumours.

Annual Songlines Music Awards ceremonies spotlighting global artists, from Afrobeat to sevda.

A high schooler's music diary — Grammys press pass stories to family concert interviews.

Stephen Hyden and Ian Cohen argue about indie rock, one Metacritic score at a time.


Bill and Brian of The Great Albums Podcast dive into Ryan Adams' 2003/2004 album 'Love Is Hell.' They explain how the label rejected it for being too alternative, leading Adams to record 'Rock and Roll' as a compromise.
The hosts introduce a special liner notes episode where they discuss their month off and make an announcement.
Bill and Brian host a 'High Fives' episode discussing five albums they enjoy musically but criticize for having poor cover art.
Bill and Jeff Fiedler co-host a top-10-albums-of-2021 episode of The Great Albums Podcast, with regular third host Brian absent due to technical issues and his own admission of not discovering enough new music this year.
["Bill opens The Great Albums' top 10 albums of 2020 episode by noting the show's July or August semi-hiatus and Brian's return to the mic.", "Brian says he still balances \"personal favorite\" records against albums that feel \"capital I important,\" then names Pitchfork, Stereogum, Billboard, Spotify, and local musicians as his discovery sources.", "The countdown runs from Draco the Ruler's jail-recorded Thank You for Using GTL and GOT's Mama You Can Bet to Beach Bunny's Honeymoon and Haim's Women in Music Part Three.", "Brian closes this section with Jessie Ware's What's Your Pleasure, linking Chic, Donna Summer, Giorgio Moroder, and New Order's \"Blue Monday\" to the dance-pop sound he was chasing."]
Bill of The Great Albums reviews his 2019 listening habits, separating podcast homework from music he chose for Fake Pockets’ recording sessions.
The Great Albums episode presents Jeff Fiedler’s favorite 2019 albums, ranked by which records he reached for most often rather than by an objective definition of the year’s best.
Bill and Brian introduce Brian’s subjective ranking of 10 albums released in 2019, using popular impact, critical appraisal, personal taste, and possible long-term influence rather than a fixed metric.
Bill and Brian discuss their top 10 albums of 2018, including a debate about Father John Misty's Pure Comedy.
Bill and Brian discuss Harvey Danger by picking six favorite songs from their three albums for a track-by-track review.
The hosts discuss albums they enjoy but with cover art they dislike, in a relaxed summer special episode.