Top 25 Albums of 2013 2 - Numbers 20 to 16

Here are the next 5 albums in our countdown of the top 25 albums of 2013.

Rank	Artist	Album	Source
20	Mumford & Sons	Babel	Sales
19	Bruno Mars	Unorthodox Jukebox	Sales
18	Gorguts	Colored Sands	Fans
17	One Direction	Take Me Home	Sales
16	Boards of Canada	Tomorrow's Harvest	Fans

The Mumford & Sons is pleasant enough - it's nice to hear a big selling album that is at least a bit organic and without a totally compressed and cluttered production style.

I didn't have high hopes for Unorthodox Jukebox but was quite pleasantly surprised by the range of stylistic influences. 

I couldn't say the same thing about Take Me Home. It was pretty much what I expected - expertly crafted pop music. Guilty pleasure when it pops up on the radio - but nothing that makes me want to listen to an album of it.

The fan selections in this bracket are pretty interesting - and divergent. Colored Sands is intense death metal - not a genre that I listen to much. I have a particular aversion to Cookie Monster vocals (AKA screamo) - although I can appreciate a certain artistry therein. Notwithstanding, Colored Sands is worth checking out for fans of the genre, or newbies wanting to know what it's about.

Tomorrow's Harvest is one of my personal favourites of 2013. "Downtempo" is the emergent label encompassing many subgenres that have sprung up in the wake of Massive Attack and Portishead. Tomorrow's Harvest is an excellent example - there are elements of trip hop, ambient, IDM (intelligent dance music). I have listened to a lot of new music. The majority only get one or two listens - but I have kept coming back to Tomorrow's Harvest.