Kendrick Lamar’s sparse and hard-hitting rap treatise, Damn, is music critics’ favourite record of 2017.
The album, which explores the conflicts in Lamar’s personal life, his faith and American society, has topped a “poll of polls” compiled by BBC News.
Second place went to SZA’s sensual, intimate and partially-improvised R&B album, CTRL.
Pop star Lorde came third with Melodrama, an exhilarating song cycle about the angst and ecstasy of youth.
Melodrama was co-written and produced by Jack Antonoff, who worked on two other albums in the critics’ top 20 – St Vincent’s Masseduction and Taylor Swift’s multi-million-selling Reputation.
The full top 20 looked like this:
| Best albums of 2017 – poll of polls | ||
|---|---|---|
| Artist | Album | Points (max: 600) |
| 1) Kendrick Lamar | Damn | 506 |
| 2) SZA | CTRL | 394 |
| 3) Lorde | Melodrama | 384 |
| 4) St Vincent | Masseduction | 277 |
| 5) LCD Soundsystem | American Dream | 186 |
| 6) The War On Drugs | A Deeper Understanding | 149 |
| 7) Jay-Z | 4:44 | 134 |
| 8) Perfume Genius | No Shape | 119 |
| 9) Sampha | Process | 116 |
| 10) Kelela | Take Me Apart | 115 |
| 11) Kesha | Rainbow | 111 |
| 12) Vince Staples | Big Fish Theory | 108 |
| 13) Father John Misty | Pure Comedy | 102 |
| 14) Tyler, The Creator | Flower Boy | 98 |
| 15) The National | Sleep Well Beast | 86 |
| 16) Taylor Swift | Reputation | 83 |
| =17) Khalid | American Teen | 82 |
| =17) King Krule | The Ooz | 82 |
| 19) J Hus | Common Sense | 69 |
| 20) Wolf Alice | Visions of a Life | 66 |
