What is the best art-pop album of all time?

Art-pop brings together pop's commercial accessibility and avant-garde ambition, challenging conventional ideas of what a pop record can be. Vote for the most visionary art-pop album of all time.

1

Hounds of Love

Kate Bush's 1985 magnum opus split between dazzling pop songs and an ambitious avant-garde song cycle called 'The Ninth Wave'.

2

Homogenic

Björk's 1997 album fused orchestral strings with electronic beats into a singular emotional landscape unlike anything before it.

3

Heroes

David Bowie's 1977 Berlin trilogy centrepiece, a stunning marriage of avant-garde experimentation and irresistible pop melody.

4

Remain in Light

Talking Heads' 1980 album merged African polyrhythms with new-wave art-pop in a revolutionary sonic document.

5

Post

Björk's 1995 album pushed the boundaries of pop into jazz, big band, and electronic territory with unbridled creativity.

6

Little Earthquakes

Tori Amos' 1992 debut introduced an emotionally devastating and musically adventurous voice to art-pop.

7

LP1

FKA Twigs' 2014 debut fused R&B, art-pop, and avant-garde production into one of the most distinctive albums of the decade.

8

Melodrama

Lorde's 2017 album applied art-pop sensibility to teenage heartbreak with extraordinary craft and emotional precision.

9

Art Angels

Grimes' 2015 album navigated pop, classical, and electronic music through a kaleidoscopic artistic vision.

10

Lungs

Florence and the Machine's 2009 debut combined baroque pop, indie rock, and art-pop ambition to immediate critical acclaim.

11

The ArchAndroid

Janelle Monáe's 2010 sprawling sci-fi concept album drew on funk, classical, and pop across 18 tracks of dizzying ambition.

12

Kala

M.I.A.'s 2007 globally-sourced art-pop album integrated grime, bhangra, and dancehall into an urgent and adventurous statement.

13

Vespertine

Björk's 2001 album created a quiet, intimate world of microsounds and orchestral swells that remains uniquely beautiful.