White Stripes top ‘best album’ of last 20 years poll

Elephant by the White Stripes has beaten releases by acts such as Oasis and Radiohead to be named the greatest album of the past two decades.

The 2003 chart-topper by the now-defunct duo — which included the single ‘Seven Nation Army’ — topped a reader poll to mark the 20th anniversary of music magazine Mojo.

Runner-up in the list was Funeral, the debut by Arcade Fire, while veteran star Bob Dylan was in third spot with Time Out Of Mind in the magazine’s list of 20 Albums That Shook The Last 20 Years.

Despite the poll reaching back to the heyday of Britpop, Radiohead are the highest ranked British act and the only artist to have two entries in the list of 20 — at number four with OK Computer and at number 14 with In Rainbows.

DJ Shadow’s Endtroducing is the only dance music album to make the list.

Of the eight UK albums in the list, half are past winners of the Mercury Prize — Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not by Arctic Monkeys, Let England Shake by PJ Harvey, Different Class by Pulp and Dummy by Portishead. Elephant, the fourth album by guitarist Jack White and his former wife Meg, was their biggest seller. Jack White went on to release albums with The Dead Weather, The Raconteurs, and in his own right.

Phil Alexander, editor-in-chief of Mojo, said: “A decade on from its release, Elephant has lost none of its charm or power. Building on the band’s three previous LPs, it delivered accessible and complex material in equal measure.

“The album helped spawn a raft of two-piece imitators, yet continues to stand alone.”

The 20th anniversary edition of the magazine, which is on sale today, also features a cover designed for the occasion by singer Kate Bush.

20 best of last 20 years

* 1: The White Stripes – Elephant

* 2: Arcade Fire – Funeral

* 3: Bob Dylan -Time Out Of Mind

* 4: Radiohead – OK Computer

* 5: The Strokes – Is This It

* 6: Flaming Lips – The Soft Bulletin

* 7: Fleet Foxes – Fleet Foxes

* 8: Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

* 9: DJ Shadow – End-troducing

* 10: Arctic Monkeys – Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not

* 11: Beck – Odelay

* 12: Jeff Buckley – Grace

* 13: Mercury Rev – Deserter’s Songs

* 14: Radiohead – In Rainbows

* 15: PJ Harvey – Let England Shake

* 16: Oasis – (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?

* 17: Portishead – Dummy

* 18: Pulp – Different Class

* 19: Nirvana – In Utero

* 20: The Libertines – Up The Bracket