Best of 2009: solo albums

With just over a month to go it's time to begin our look back on the year that was in music.

When I began going through the happenings of 2009 I was struck by an interesting phenomenon.  It seemed to me that there were a whole lot of solo albums that came out this year.

So I figure what better place to start than examining the good, the bad, and the rest of solo works of 2009.

The Good
There were actually quite a few albums that fall under this category.  Standout solo albums include:

• Interpol's Paul Banks had a great run as Julian Plenti (review)
• I'm going to include Karen O and her effort on the Where The Wild Things Are soundtrack here (review)
• The Black Keys' singer/guitarist Dan Auerbach may have had the best solo record (review)
• David Bazan dropped the Pedro The Lion moniker to give us an album under his own name (review)
• Franz Nicolay of The Hold Steady did his part to entertain us (interview)

The Bad

• Failing to live up to the standard set by a trio of his Strokes bandmates, Julian Casablancas gave us an album that is, to put it bluntly, complete garbage (review)
• TV On the Radio's Kyp Malone disappointed with a bland Rain Machine (review)
• Gordon Gano proved he needs Brian Ritchie to be successful (review)
• The Mars Volta's Omar Rodriguez Lopez shows he's no better on his own (review)
• G N' R refugee Duff McKagan released an album that wasn't as bad as one would expect (review)

The Rest

• Against Me! singer Tom Gabel dropped a promising EP
• Alec Ounsworth of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! came up with an album that sounds remarkably like Clap You Hands Say Yeah!
• Former Be Your Own Pet singer Jemina Pearl hit us with a so-so affair (review)
• Pavement's Spiral Stairs gave us an album that wasn't great, but stands head-and-shoulders above recent Stephen Malkmus output (review)
• Drive-By Truckers' singer Patterson Hood gave us what could easily have been a DBT record (review)
• Tommy T, bassist for Gogol Bordello, gave us a World Music-spired effort (review)

Keep coming back in December as we'll bring you lots of lists like best song, best albums, best concerts, genre-specific list, and of course, most disappointing albums of 2009.