The fourth week of the Best Album of 2001 is over, and as is usual with the first round, no surprises — all the higher seeds won their matches. I will note that we did have our closest match so far, as #61 WE LOVE LIFE scraped a win by 6 votes over #68 GO FORTH. That match was neck and neck for several hours (and GO FORTH actually took the lead for a bit) before settling into a ~10 vote difference in favor of WE LOVE LIFE. GO FORTH seemed to be mounting a comeback at the end, but if you’re on Bluesky, this was the day that platform shit the bed and posting was close to impossible. (I’m not sure if anyone reads the “fine print” on the match newsletters, but if you want to vote without using the Google Form, you can by emailing me, and I got my first email vote that match, all because of the Bluesky fiasco.) Could this match have had a different result if a certain social media app didn’t drive into a ditch? We’ll never know.

Finally, just want to note that #40 DRUKQS defeated #89 ORIGIN OF SYMMETRY by 28 votes, a solid win generally but kind of weak for a fortysomething/eightysomething match. Feels like we’ve seen a number of those from that particular seed pairing this tournament.

LAST WEEK’S RESULTS

On Monday, #41 Sparklehorse, IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE defeated #88 Pernice Brothers, THE WORLD WON’T END, 99-63-3. (165 total votes, +36)

On Tuesday, #40 Aphex Twin, DRUKQS defeated #89 Muse, ORIGIN OF SYMMETRY, 114-86-5. (205 total votes, +28)

On Wednesday, #61 Pulp, WE LOVE LIFE defeated #68 Les Savy Fav, GO FORTH, 111-105. (216 total votes, +6)

On Thursday, #29 Built to Spill, ANCIENT MELODIES OF THE FUTURE defeated #100 Mercury Rev, ALL IS DREAM, 125-66-2. (193 votes, +59)

On Friday, #36 The Microphones, THE GLOW PT. 2 defeated #93 Elbow, ASLEEP IN THE BACK, 99-65-6. (170 total votes, +34)

NEXT WEEK’S MATCHES

Monday, April 20th: #13 Rilo Kiley, TAKE OFFS AND LANDINGS vs. #116 Blink-182, TAKE OFF YOUR PANTS AND JACKET.

Tuesday, April 21st: #52 Old 97s, SATELLITE RIDES vs. #77 The Knife, THE KNIFE.

Wednesday, April 22nd: #20 Bob Dylan, "LOVE AND THEFT” vs. #109 Wu-Tang Clan, IRON FLAG.

Thursday, April 23rd: #45 Basement Jaxx, ROOTY vs. #84 Sophie Ellis-Bextor, READ MY LIPS.

Friday, April 24th: #5 Björk, VESPERTINE vs. #124 Nas, STILLMATIC.

We currently have Designated Cheerleaders for SATELLITE RIDES, "LOVE AND THEFT,” and STILLMATIC, but as of this writing, that’s it. If you’d like to write a DC for any of the other albums (or any album that already has one!), please send it to me at kentmbeeson@hey.com. Thanks!

I’m in the process of preparing the spreadsheet that has all the voting date for the 2001 tournament, so look for that this weekend as well. Also, if you hadn’t heard, the next tournament will be for 1988, and the 1988 Master(ish) List of albums will be up for viewing very soon, for your prepping pleasure.

Hope you had a great week,

Kent