10. Feist Let It Die (Arts & Crafts/Polydor) 2004
One of only two artists with two releases in Toronto's Top 20, Leslie Feist started her career with Toronto's famous collective, Broken Social Scene. She broke away from BSS to cultivate her own sound on Let It Die in early 2004, which has captured the attention of both younger and more mature audiences alike. Let It Die's release, with its boudoir-worthy songs, such as "One Evening," "Lonely, Lonely" and "Secret Heart," had girls sighing, imagining new romances and tender nights with their lovers. It was "Mushaboom," however, that stood out as a strong radio single, proving Feist's burgeoning commercial appeal. Casting her lot as a soulful chanteuse, it was Feist who started a revolution that would later see female Toronto contemporaries such as Emily Haines and Amy Millan join up in arms, creating strong solo albums in their own right. With Let It Die, Feist launched her now internationally renowned solo career — a credit to the Toronto music scene.

 

		9. Holy Fuck Holy Fuck (Dependent) 2005
Holy Fuck take the lo-fi concept to new heights. Started in 2004 as a sort of "evil supergroup", to quote Eye Magazine (the band contains members from such other Toronto acts as King Cobb Steelie, By Divine Right and Blue Rodeo), they set out to reimagine contemporary electro music without all the fancy fixin's, eschewing the concept of rehearsal along with most other musical conventions and ending up instead with a free-flowing, grinded-up form of glitchy dance music. Well Holy Fuck! — this was just what Toronto needed. Primarily reliant on Casio keyboards, 35 mm film synchronizers, and whatever else can be found to make a pretty noise, Holy Fuck, along with other locals like MSTRKRFT, re-installed the beat in Toronto's indie music and party scene, and their 2007 self-titled EP is a prime example of how it's done.

 

		8. Hayden Skyscraper National Park (Hardwood/Universal) 2001
Sure, we all loved Hayden long before Skyscraper National Park thanks to the depressing indie-folk of Everything I Long For and The Closer I Get. His tender lyrics, raw acoustic sound and occasional desperate growl on his first two full-lengths had already made him one of Toronto's most beloved singer-songwriters. But it was with this, his third, that Hayden surprised us all with his most ambitious and polished effort to date — not to mention his happiest. And though that might not be saying much, his decision to swap songs about murder-suicides and breaking-up in favour of songs about just-plain-murders and maybe breaking-up turned out to be a good one — after all, Skyscraper National Park is Toronto's #8 album of all-time.

 

		7. Final Fantasy He Poos Clouds (Blocks/Tomblab) 2006
The second of the only two artists to have a pair of records in Toronto's Top 20 is Owen Pallett. A huge supporter of the local scene (not only did he help found T.O. co-op label the Blocks Recording Club, but after being awarded last year's inaugural Polaris Music Prize, he donated much of the $20,000 in winnings to support local indie artists), he has quickly become of the shining lights in our city's indie scene. And listening to He Poos Clouds, it's easy to see why. Final Fantasy is one of the few acts around who don't just claim to be original, but actually are original. Having cut his teeth by scoring videos games and films, as well as composing operas (not to mention co-arranging the strings on Arcade Fire albums), Pallett's second full-length is a swirling mass of inspired orchestration, with plenty of memorable lyrics and local references to boot. It was good enough to net him the Polaris Prize — and it's good enough to land him at #7.

 

		6. Metric Live It Out (Last Gang) 2005
Metric's second release Live It Out injected some much needed traditional and conventional indie-pop sounds into Toronto's local music scene. Haines and her troops captured a new-wave style of buzzing guitar hooks laced with indie-pop beats based around sultry and angry vocals. A more balanced (and thus better) album then their previous record, Metric's hard, fast and poppy sound on this release appealed to fans on a number of levels. Songs like " Monster Hospital", " Handshakes" and " Poster of a girl" are just a few of the gems gives it a strong presence with no weak tracks. It's Live It Out that firmly established Metric as one of the strongest bands in an already strong Toronto indie scene.