It’s hard to believe that all of our favorite albums from 2001 will be turning 25 this year. 2001 started off strong enough. In the spring, Alkaline Trio unleashed a blast of gothic punk with From Here to Infirmary, and Weezer’s Green Album turned back to the sunny power pop of their debut. In the summer, the Strokes’ Is This It took over the rock landscape, playing out of every corner in NYC and helping to jumpstart a new era. By the time the colder months hit, Converge, Death Cab for Cutie, and No Doubt were on constant rotation. With this in mind, we got nostalgic and asked our readers to tell us the best 2001 albums. They fired back with some classics, and you can find the top fan picks ranked below.
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5. Sum 41 – All Killer No Filler
By the time Sum 41 arrived on the scene, blink-182, Green Day, and the Offspring had already set the blueprint with their juvenile pop punk. Though equally snotty, Sum 41’s All Killer No Filler tapped into a different vein that made them blow up just as big. Alongside their three-chord punk, they explored metal, rap-rock, and hints of ska, showing off the sprawling tastes that soundtracked their Canadian suburbia. The result was a ripping, generation-defining album, leading to a summer on Warped Tour, making the Billboard charts, and playing more than 300 shows to further hone their sound.
4. System of a Down – Toxicity
System of a Down’s Toxicity took them out of the metal underground and turned them into bona-fide stars. Released days before 9/11, the album seemed prophetic in its heart attack breakdowns and political commentary, with a trio of singles that connected to a paranoid generation. After all these years, it seems strange that one of those was nearly left on the cutting-room floor. “We didn’t work on it,” bassist Shavo Odadjian said of the title track. “I felt so good about it, and it wasn’t taken well. Towards the end of writing material, Daron goes, ‘Remember that song, ‘Version 7.0’? I kinda did my thing to it, and here it is.’ And the dude played ‘Toxicity…’ All of the sudden, [it] was really born. The last song that got submitted was the title track.”
3. Jimmy Eat World – Bleed American
From the first song, it was clear that Jimmy Eat World’s Bleed American was going to be a moment. Leveling up their sophisticated, heartfelt storytelling through gigantic hooks and polished production, Bleed American has it all. There’s era-defining anthems (“The Middle,” “Sweetness”), Davey von Bohlen collabs (“A Praise Chorus”), and devastating tracks about loss that still hit the gut (“Hear You Me”). What made the success of Bleed American even greater was that they were dropped by their label before its release, but sold over a million copies anyway. Twenty-five years later, it’s not only one of the best albums of 2001 — it’s the best Jimmy Eat World album, period.
2. blink-182 – Take Off Your Pants and Jacket
blink-182’s Enema of the State made them pop-punk megastars, leading to a massive tour in 2000 (commemorated on the live album The Mark, Tom, and Travis Show). When they released the follow-up, Take Off Your Pants and Jacket, in the summer of 2001, it doubled down on its strengths and then some: the ideal balance between youthful angst and incredibly good songwriting. As Mark Hoppus wrote in the liner notes of the 2013 reissue, it was “pop punk meets post-hardcore meets hip-hop meets heavy metal. For the first time, the three of us worked in opposition to one another. We weren’t starting from the same point or working toward the same goal. Sometimes the differences became contentious.” Still, the songs speak for themselves.
1. Thursday – Full Collapse
From their early days throwing New Brunswick house shows to their major-label breakthrough, Thursday’s been shaping countless bands since their inception in the late ’90s. Our readers pointed to Full Collapse as the greatest album of 2001, though, which introduced guitarist Steve Pedulla to their lineup and built upon 1999’s Waiting. Emo was exploding in the 2000s, and Thursday bent that influence to their will, using its wounded confessionalism to balance out their furious post-hardcore. That’s deeply felt across Full Collapse, which Thursday will be playing on tour throughout April.
