I've got a lot of time to kill...
So here we go, my personal year in review. If you ask me, 2005 was fucking doomed from the start, what with Bush getting inagurated into his second term and all. Sad to say, this was a fucking terrible year by all accounts. However, there was some good things to it.
Top Ten Albums of the Year... IMHO and from what I've been able to hear
10. The Most Serene Rebuplic- Underwater Cinemaoagrapher
-It's fun. It's schitzophrenic. It's the Postal Service, except a lot more precise, and in many ways, better.
Best song: "Where Cedar Nouns and Adverbs Walk"
9. Minus the Bear- Menos el Oso
-Math-dance rock? Heck yes.
Best song: "Hooray!"
8. Copeland- In Motion
-So much bigger than Beneath Medicine Tree could have ever been. Copeland's perfected their indie-pop formula on creates a record that outshines it's predecessors in every imaginable way.
Best song: "Choose the One Who Loves You More" or "Love Is a Fast Song"
7. Head of Femur- Hysterical Stars
-Post-ska at its best. The chemistry of the band and the blending of the sounds is perfect.
Best song: "Ringdom or Proctor"
6. Broken Social Scene- s/t
-A most wonderful follow up to You Forgot It in People (Beehives doesn't count). BSS makes sure that every beat of every song is used to its potential. Meant to be listened through headphones, else you lose a lot of the subtleties in the music.
Best song: "7/4 (Shoreline)"
5. Sufjan Stevens- Illinois
-The perfect pop album. Over the top showtunes laced in with heartpouring personal testimonal all based on the state of Illinois? and he plans on doing this for all fifty states? So long as the remaining forty-eight (He already did Michigan for those not in the know) are as wonderful as this.
Best song: "Come on! Feel the Illinoise!" or "Chicago"
4. Danger Doom- The Mouse and the Mask
-It's everything that mainstream rap isn't AND I LOVE IT. MF Doom is really one of the true wordsmiths in the game and creates a great comedic CD that has more depth that 75% of the crap out there right now.
Best song: "Sofa King" or "Old School"
3. Satellite Lot- Second Summer
-Bruce Springsteen inspired lite-psych rock. Catchy, accessable, but quirky enough to keep its cred.
Best song: "Keeping You" or "That Wasn't Me"
2. Daphne Loves Derby- On the Strength of All Convinced
-Ok... this was more of a personal preference. DLD does the easy listening acoustic-y indie pop so well. In comparison to the collection of songs released in 2003 and their previous EP, this is a huge step forward for them. Truly stunning guitar work on a lot of the tracks. Nothing ground-breaking, but an amazing CD nonetheless.
Best song: "Debussie" or "Pollen and Salt"
1. Sigur Ros- Takk...
-I bought this CD two days ago. TWO DAYS AGO. I CANNOT GET ENOUGH OF IT. It's weird, it's in a language I could never hope to understand, it's pretentious as all hell... BUT IT'S SO FUCKING GOOD!! It's haunting, and in the right mind set will absolutely hypnotize you. It's anthemic... almost taking a page out of Mogwai and the other shoegazers. It is easily the best Cd of the year. It creates feelings deep inside you never even knew existed. Even with an average song length of around six minutes, this CD grabs your attention and refuses to let go until you submit to the most beautifully crafted CD of the year.
Best song: No... You've gotta listen to the album as a whole.
Honorable mentions:
Blackalicious- The Craft
The New Pornographers- Twin Cinema
Mae- The Everglow
Umbrellas- s/t
Shout Out Loud- Howl Howl Gaff Gaff
Death Cab for Cutie- Plans
Biggest CD Disappointments of 2005
(In no order)
Cursive-The Differences Between Houses and Homes
-Tim Kasher just isn't the Tim Kasher we all know and love unless he's been through a painful, emotionally crippling divorce. Sorry Timmy.
Daft Punk- Human After All
-Oh man. Maybe I just had my hopes too high since Discovery is easily one of the best CDs this millenium, but aside from "Technologic" this CD made me cry a little on the inside. They reuse the same sample through out the CD... and the sample sounds like synth-mouth farts.
Coheed and Cambria- Good... fuck this- I'm not writing out that entire CD name.
-In no accounts is this a bad CD. In fact, it was very good considering what the expectations were, but there's nothing extremely rememberable about this CD. IKSOSE3 had the Camper Velorium, 21:13 and A Favor House Atlantic... and SSTB was easily CoCa's masterpiece. GAIBS4VOFFTTEOM is... boring compared to what it could have been.
The WTF of 2005
M.I.A.
-Seriously. I mean... why is this critically acclaimed?? It's terrible! Her voice makes me want to claw my eyes out. The beats are tired and really unextraordinary. Sure- there's (supposedly) a deep political meaning behind it, but how am I supposed to hear it if the music is terrible to begin with???
There ya go. Just my opinions. I was gonna do movies and douche bags of the year and what not... but this is tiring. I'll just say this: Kong- worst movie of 2005. Bush? Douche bag of year.... millenium. The Aristocrats? Best movie of 2005. Ok, I'm done.
--Mike--
Top Ten Albums of the Year... IMHO and from what I've been able to hear
10. The Most Serene Rebuplic- Underwater Cinemaoagrapher
-It's fun. It's schitzophrenic. It's the Postal Service, except a lot more precise, and in many ways, better.
Best song: "Where Cedar Nouns and Adverbs Walk"
9. Minus the Bear- Menos el Oso
-Math-dance rock? Heck yes.
Best song: "Hooray!"
8. Copeland- In Motion
-So much bigger than Beneath Medicine Tree could have ever been. Copeland's perfected their indie-pop formula on creates a record that outshines it's predecessors in every imaginable way.
Best song: "Choose the One Who Loves You More" or "Love Is a Fast Song"
7. Head of Femur- Hysterical Stars
-Post-ska at its best. The chemistry of the band and the blending of the sounds is perfect.
Best song: "Ringdom or Proctor"
6. Broken Social Scene- s/t
-A most wonderful follow up to You Forgot It in People (Beehives doesn't count). BSS makes sure that every beat of every song is used to its potential. Meant to be listened through headphones, else you lose a lot of the subtleties in the music.
Best song: "7/4 (Shoreline)"
5. Sufjan Stevens- Illinois
-The perfect pop album. Over the top showtunes laced in with heartpouring personal testimonal all based on the state of Illinois? and he plans on doing this for all fifty states? So long as the remaining forty-eight (He already did Michigan for those not in the know) are as wonderful as this.
Best song: "Come on! Feel the Illinoise!" or "Chicago"
4. Danger Doom- The Mouse and the Mask
-It's everything that mainstream rap isn't AND I LOVE IT. MF Doom is really one of the true wordsmiths in the game and creates a great comedic CD that has more depth that 75% of the crap out there right now.
Best song: "Sofa King" or "Old School"
3. Satellite Lot- Second Summer
-Bruce Springsteen inspired lite-psych rock. Catchy, accessable, but quirky enough to keep its cred.
Best song: "Keeping You" or "That Wasn't Me"
2. Daphne Loves Derby- On the Strength of All Convinced
-Ok... this was more of a personal preference. DLD does the easy listening acoustic-y indie pop so well. In comparison to the collection of songs released in 2003 and their previous EP, this is a huge step forward for them. Truly stunning guitar work on a lot of the tracks. Nothing ground-breaking, but an amazing CD nonetheless.
Best song: "Debussie" or "Pollen and Salt"
1. Sigur Ros- Takk...
-I bought this CD two days ago. TWO DAYS AGO. I CANNOT GET ENOUGH OF IT. It's weird, it's in a language I could never hope to understand, it's pretentious as all hell... BUT IT'S SO FUCKING GOOD!! It's haunting, and in the right mind set will absolutely hypnotize you. It's anthemic... almost taking a page out of Mogwai and the other shoegazers. It is easily the best Cd of the year. It creates feelings deep inside you never even knew existed. Even with an average song length of around six minutes, this CD grabs your attention and refuses to let go until you submit to the most beautifully crafted CD of the year.
Best song: No... You've gotta listen to the album as a whole.
Honorable mentions:
Blackalicious- The Craft
The New Pornographers- Twin Cinema
Mae- The Everglow
Umbrellas- s/t
Shout Out Loud- Howl Howl Gaff Gaff
Death Cab for Cutie- Plans
Biggest CD Disappointments of 2005
(In no order)
Cursive-The Differences Between Houses and Homes
-Tim Kasher just isn't the Tim Kasher we all know and love unless he's been through a painful, emotionally crippling divorce. Sorry Timmy.
Daft Punk- Human After All
-Oh man. Maybe I just had my hopes too high since Discovery is easily one of the best CDs this millenium, but aside from "Technologic" this CD made me cry a little on the inside. They reuse the same sample through out the CD... and the sample sounds like synth-mouth farts.
Coheed and Cambria- Good... fuck this- I'm not writing out that entire CD name.
-In no accounts is this a bad CD. In fact, it was very good considering what the expectations were, but there's nothing extremely rememberable about this CD. IKSOSE3 had the Camper Velorium, 21:13 and A Favor House Atlantic... and SSTB was easily CoCa's masterpiece. GAIBS4VOFFTTEOM is... boring compared to what it could have been.
The WTF of 2005
M.I.A.
-Seriously. I mean... why is this critically acclaimed?? It's terrible! Her voice makes me want to claw my eyes out. The beats are tired and really unextraordinary. Sure- there's (supposedly) a deep political meaning behind it, but how am I supposed to hear it if the music is terrible to begin with???
There ya go. Just my opinions. I was gonna do movies and douche bags of the year and what not... but this is tiring. I'll just say this: Kong- worst movie of 2005. Bush? Douche bag of year.... millenium. The Aristocrats? Best movie of 2005. Ok, I'm done.
--Mike--