In alphabetical order, because that’s how I roll.

Austra
Feel It Break
If 2011 was the year that goth-damaged female artists emerged from the shadows (hello, Chelsea Wolfe and Zola Jesus), then Austra’s Katie Stelmanis is surely their reluctant queen. Her pitch-perfect, operatically trained voice adds serious warmth to Austra’s chilly electro dirges.

Fleet Foxes
Helplessness Blues
The band that launched a thousand beards delivered a superb suite of impeccably crafted folk-rock tunes about growing up and wondering what the hell it all means.

Girls
Father, Son, Holy Ghost
Unapologetic hard-drug addict and all-around fuck-up Christopher Owens would probably be lying facedown in a ditch somewhere if he weren’t one of the most gifted songwriters currently working in indie pop. Here’s hoping he lives long enough to make another album as good as this one.

Guitaro
JJ’s Crystal Palace
Vancouver’s own Guitaro continues to fly, undeservedly, under just about everyone’s radar, but this perfect synthesis of shoegazing rock and ambient electronica is every bit as buzz-worthy as anything Anthony Gonzalez released this year.

Iceage
New Brigade
Elias Bender Rønnenfelt is the worst interview subject ever! Just had to get that off my chest. Fortunately, his band’s raucous, youthful collision of hardcore and postpunk speaks volumes, which almost makes up for the singer’s reticence.

M83
Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming
Once you’ve heard the sublime “Midnight City” you’ll never think of saxophone solos the same way again.

Real Estate
Days
The intertwining guitar jangle of Martin Courtney and Matt Mondanile brings to mind Johnny Marr jamming with Peter Buck circa 1985, and their summer-haze vocal harmonies are likely to cause ecstatic syncope in those susceptible to that sort of thing.

Ringo Deathstarr
Colour Trip
It’s got to be hard to cross bubblegum-pop melodies with tortured guitar violence and not sound like you’re ripping pages from the My Bloody Valentine songbook. Ringo Deathstarr sees your MBV and raises you one JAMC, and it’s a winning hand for everyone.

Washed Out
Within and Without
Oh, Ernest Greene. Your swooning dreamtronic pop made wistful sighing seem like a perfectly good way to pass a rainy afternoon.

Yuck
Yuck
I read somewhere that the ’90s are, like, totally hot right now. Yuck apparently got the same memo, affixed to a dust-coated VHS tape with the December 27, 1992, episode of 120 Minutes on it—you know, the one with Thurston Moore as the guest host.