2NE1 & SNSD rank on SPIN Magazine’s ’20 Best Pop Albums of 2011′

American music magazine ‘SPIN‘ have released their annual ranking of the best pop albums of 2011.

Adroitly titled, ‘SPIN’s 20 Best Pop Albums of 2011‘, the magazine considers pop albums from all over the world for spots in their top. This year, 2NE1‘s 2nd mini album and SNSD‘s ‘Girls’ Generation’ album have placed 6th and 18th, respectively.

This is what the writers of SPIN had to say:

18. Girls’ Generation

‘Girls’ Generation‘

This nine-member, all-girl K-Pop drill team fully exploits South Korea’s 800-pound neighboring market with a Japanese-language album (plus English choruses!). And though it may be a translation trainwreck, these chipper, reality-show vets behave with real zeal — eagerly beaming, winking, chattering, emoting when it’s called for — over terrifyingly sophisticated dance tracks (echoes of Latin Freestyle, Italo disco, every Backstreet/Britney scrap from 1999), plus a dutifully aching ballad or two. The peak is “Run Devil Run,” a white swan/black swan kiss-off with a chorus so confidently sassy it could stop a North Korean missile in mid-air. (CHARLES AARON)

6. 2NE1

2nd Mini Album The TLC of K-Pop dropped this stopgap, six-song EP compilation in July, and for pure (purely impure?) sonics, it might be the year’s most boldly thrilling recorded statement. A collision of electro-house, hip-hop, and pop-rock guitar, with yet another undeniable hook cropping up every 15 seconds, it is the primary work of producers Teddy Park (formerly of Korean-American rap group 1TYM) and Kush. But this all-female foursome clearly own their persona more than most K-Poppers, particularly on the spicy, playalistic “I Am the Best” and the body-image throwdown, “Ugly.” There’s even a solo turn by the group’s vocal powerhouse Park Bom, who considers the cosmos over a springy sprint to a piano-plinking chorus. (C.A.)

Congratulations to 2NE1 and SNSD!