How to use end of year lists
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Artist:
It's that time of year again. In the next few weeks, nearly every major music publication in print and online will issue their lists of ten or twenty or fifty albums their staffs selected as favorites for 2006. And, like every previous year since this tradition started, people will roll their eyes, piss and moan, and complain about how wrong and sucky they are. Or nitpick over the rankings. There were over 20,000 albums released in 2006. Who cares if your favorite was ten slots lower than you thought it should be? Or simply gripe that the lists are stupid and meaningless. I'd like to try to preempt some of that wasted energy this year.I'll use the Uncut list as an example, since they are the first publication to issue their list early in November. Personally I think lists shouldn't come out before New Year's Day, because the holidays should be spent catching up on albums one might have missed, and reconsidering others. But perhaps I take it more seriously than some, and consumer publications like Uncut, Spin and Rolling Stone prefer to exert some influence as buyer's guides as gift purchases for the holidays. So be it, they can be useful. While the latter two rags' top 20 and 10 lists rarely offer any surprises of stuff I haven't heard, Uncut isn't too bad. Granted, it's not great either. I could waste my time complaining about the absence of the Yeah Yeah Yeah's and The Roots, and the relatively low ranking of my favorite, TV On The Radio. But seriously, why be a whiney beeotch just because their tastes don't exactly match mine? The real value of EOY lists are that there are often interesting albums that I had previously overlooked, or haven't even heard of. Most are at least worth hearing, and a few might even make my own top 50.Currently, I'm really digging Hot Chip (great British electro-pop), Burial (moody, Tricky-like atmospherics), and Espers (beguiling folk with some Velvet Underground-like drones). I was pleasantly surprised to see Comets On Fire at number three. They're a cool band that I like, but sort of forgot about Avatar when it got buried under all the other new releases. I re-listened to it and inched it up in my list. I finally got around to listening to Neil Young's Living With War. I really wanted to like it, as I respect his gutsy, direct protest lyrics. But I can't stand the choir, and the lack of good tunes makes it virtually unlistenable for me. Oh well. There's many more finds I"ll like. I was reminded to listen to the new Bonnie "Prince" Billy and Ali Farka Toure's (RIP) final album. Oldham's The Letting Go is intruiging and will take more time to sink in, while Toure's Savane is beautiful, and hit me immediately. Joan As Police Woman is an interesting discovery. Joan Wasser has been around the New York music scene for a long time. While a member of the Dambuilders she dated Jeff Buckley, and has worked with Lou Reed, Rufus Wainwright, Sparklehorse, Antony & the Johnsons and many more. I like it on first listen, but am still absorbing. Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis has an appealing voice, but her solo debut's take on country is a little dull and pedestrian for me. Still in my queue are Brightback Morning Light, Howlin' Rain and Oakley Hall. I'll include the list in the comments, courtesy of my friend Julian White and his Rock List site. I doubt that very few people here have heard more than half of it. Dismiss these EOY lists, and you might be missing out on a new favorite or six.
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