20. Sufjan Stevens -- Illinois (2005)

Sufjan’s Prairie State

I wish he did all fifty

(Yes, I fell for it)

19. Jeffrey Lewis -- It’s the Ones Who’ve Cracked That The Light Shines Through (2003)

Anti-folk hero

Serves comic stripped down delight

Raw, honest and fun

18. PJ Harvey -- Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea (2000)

Poptastic Polly

Her most commercial album

That never sells out

17. Pulp -- We Love Life (2001)

Leafy perfection

From kitchen sink troubadours

Sad, Sheffield swansong

16. TV on the Radio -- Dear Science (2008)

Arse-shaking anger

As Sitek and crew unleash

Brooklyn funky stuff

15. Bruce Springsteen -- Working on a Dream (2009)

My favourite Boss

Is reconciled with E Street

Glory Days again!

14. Midlake -- The Trials of Van Occupanther (2006)

Lush, pastoral grooves

Et in arcadia they go

I think I’ll head home!

13. The Strokes -- Is This It (2001)

New York storybook

A soundtrack of the decade

This, it seems, is it

12. Johnny Cash -- American III: Solitary Man (2000)

Departed legend

Au revoir, L’homme en noir

No one sounds like you

11. Brian Wilson -- Smile (2004)

Infamous Beached Boy

Went back to sea triumphant

And served up Surf’s Up

10. Grinderman -- Grinderman (2007)

Black Crow Kingdom reigns

As Bad Seeds bear twisted fruit

(See what I did there?)

9. The White Stripes -- White Blood Cells (2001)

Third from Jack and Meg

With incandescent gee-tars

And Awesome Welles riff

7. Lift to Experience -- The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads (2001)

A Lone Star Statement

They burnt fast but -- by God! -- burnt bright

“Don’t mess with Texas”

8. Wilco -- Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)

Tupelo’s Tweedy

Overcame Warner Bother

To create this gem

6. The National -- Alligator (2005)

Late night, low-rent wit

Don’t compare to Tindersticks

They’re better than that

5. Arcade Fire -- Funeral (2005)

Mournful joie de vivre

Joyous momento mori

(Inadequate praise)

4. Tom Waits -- Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers and Bastards (2006)

Gravel voiced Bardfly

Serves up three courses of treats

We hunger for more!

3. Warren Zevon -- Life’ll Kill Ya (2000)

Sardonic singer

Enjoyed every sandwich

Then left us a feast

2. Lambchop -- Nixon (2000)

Funky slide guitars

Where country and Curtis meet

Mayfield, not Stigers!

1. The Flaming Lips -- Yoshima Battles The Pink Robots (2002)

Fearless freaks, rejoice!

Perfect bubblepop classic

Don’t you realize??

I went to see The Pogues the other week. Really, I did.

I suppose I should write a review or something, but it all seems a bit redundant. A Pogues gig is everything you’d expect a Pogues gig to be, only moreso. It was boozy, bawdy, boisterous and – by bloody bejaysus – it was a whole lot of fun.

This wasn’t the first time I’d seen them live, and it won’t be the last. At least, I pray God it won’t be the last. Shane turned 50 on Christmas day and has spent most of those years living on a diet that would make Dr Gillian McKeith question her faith. He and the lads [sadly minus the great Philip Chevron, recently diagnosed with throat cancer] belted out their Anglo-Irish splicing of Irish folk and punk rock like they’ve always done: with demented passion and shambolic gusto.

They’d mixed things up a bit since the last time I saw them. This time around there was less reliance on their excellent mid-80s masterpieces Rum, Sodomy & The Lash and If I Should Fall From Grace With God. Amongst other things, the capacity crowd were treated to blistering renditions of ‘Boys From The County Hell’ and ‘Streams of Whiskey’ from Red Roses For Me, ‘Summer in Siam’ and ‘Sayonara’ from Hell’s Ditch and ‘Rainy Night in Soho’ from 1986’s Poguetry in Motion EP. There were others, I’m sure, but I’m relying on memory here. This was, after all, a Pogues gig. You don’t take notes at a Pogues gig, let alone remember much.

But while there was a welcome extension to the catchment area of their setlist, in all other respects it was business as usual. They’re not the kind of band who do radical reimaginings of their classics. You won’t hear ‘Fiesta’ delivered a capella or a 180bpm drum’n'bass ‘Dirty Old Town’. No, The Pogues give their audience exactly what they want – and why shouldn’t they? This was, after all, a nostalgia gig. And don’t be getting sniffy about that: if a man can’t wallow in unbridled nostalgia at this time of year – with the band who were responsible for The Greatest Goddamn Christmas Song Ever – than when can he?

The atmosphere, of course, was wild and incandescent. It always is when The Pogues play, but this time it felt even more intense. At times it seemed more like a football match than a gig, although that might have something to do with the recurring chants of “One Shane MacGowan, there’s only one Shane Mac-Gow-an” to the tune of the Macarena. You get a lot of that at Pogues gigs.

You also get a lot of drinking. Not that I’m being judgmental: I did a lot of drinking, too. It wasn’t really an evening for the cappuccino crowd. But as I found myself caught up in the booze-fuelled, slam-and-embrace-the-bystander carnage, I couldn’t help but feel a sudden twinge of irony. Was I turning into a caricature of myself? Were we all turning into characters from a Pogues’ song?

Maybe, maybe not. Who cares? I was having fun. Everyone else was having fun. As soul searches go it wasn’t exactly thorough. In fact, you couldn’t call it cursory.

Brother Younger and I took our dear oul’ mum to the gig. Now, I wouldn’t normally be so irresponsible as to encourage a senior citizen (however feisty she may be) to go to a spit-and-sawdust, Rock-and-Roll venue like the Birmingham Academy. But The Pogues mean a lot to the Lennon family. Long ago and far away I got my Dad into the Pogues and my Dad got me into Johnny Cash. I like to think of that as a perfect, mutually beneficial cultural exchange programme. Dad passed away twelve years’ ago but Mum, Brother Younger and I still have vivid memories of family holidays in the Lake District with a soundtrack made up of ‘Sick Bed of Cuchulainn’, ‘Drunken Ira Hayes’ and ‘Sally MacLennane’. Like I said, The Pogues mean a lot to us.

The Academy is a standing-only venue and Mum has a slightly dicky knee, so she got herself a seat in a zoned-off disabled section with a perfect view. Mum’s very resourceful like that. While she was there she got talking to a middle-aged couple, a lady on a wheelchair and her able-bodied boyfriend/husband/significant other. Mum’s very good at introducing herself to strangers, too.

Anyhow, as the night progressed the man got more and more wasted. After a minor altercation with a bouncer, eventually and inevitably he chucked his guts up all over the feet of his wheelchair-bound significant other. She had to clear it up after him.

If that isn’t a scene straight out of a Pogues song I don’t know what is.

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