The Year in Music
Many radio stations will take the last week of the year and play a "best of" selection of all the music the program director was paid to play. I’m sure the music video channels do this too, but I haven’t watched them in over a decade. We’ll assume that they do.
I wanted to do something similar, so I’ve picked out 19 songs that I first heard in 2005. Not all of them were released this year - the track from Hednoize dates back to 2000. I don’t care. This list to me is a list of songs I discovered in 2005, and which I think are good enough to tell people about.
If you know me at all (and you probably don’t), some of these tracks will not be surprising. I can just hear you saying "Ooo! U2, Depeche Mode and Tears For Fears! Could you drag your pasty white ass out of the 80s?!?" Bite me. I like what I like.
I owe my discovery of several tracks here to Music For Robots, probably the best music blog I’ve found. They post new tracks at least once a day, often more. Highly recommended. Where I can I’ve included links to the source album so you can go buy a copy and support the artist.
Andi Teichmann - They Don’t Care It’s so nice to find computer-based music with a soul, not to mention with nice melody and guitar work. From his album Fades.
Apparat Organ Quartet - Romantica Hard to describe. There are at least four organs playing here, but it’s not what you think. You’ll have to get this as an import. The band has a full length album out but I haven’t been able to find it.
bad loop - eri valeire I seem to be a sucker for music from the North. bad loop is from Finland, and the music is definitely sparse, but I like it. From his album Luo.
beight - Parallels What is it about music from Minneapolis? Bob Mould, The Ocean Blue, to list just a couple. Peter Anderson from The Ocean Blue plays drums for beight, who is Brad Senne. Check out the album: File in Rhythm.
Depeche Mode - John The Revelator My favorite track from Playing The Angel, released in October. "Seven lies, multiplied by seven, multiplied by seven again…"
Garbage - Why Do You Love Me? Another band I had lost track of. I had no idea they were on their fourth album, and they haven’t lost their edge. From the album Bleed Like Me.
Happy Bullets - The Vice and Virtue Ministry Okay, listen to this track first. Done? Now are you shocked to hear this band is from TEXAS? I was. To me this is a pure slice of northern English pop. You can get the whole album here.
Harvey Danger - Moral Centralia Harver Danger - Wine, Women and Song Did you ever wonder what happened to good pop music? Little By Little has to be my favorite album of the year, and not just because they released it via BitTorrent. Buy your copy at the band’s website.
Hednoize - Devil’s Train I have no idea how I missed this one, since it’s half of Psykosonik, one of my all-time favorites. They only released the one album, but you should run out and get it from TVT Records.
Jerry Cantrell - Anger Rising Layne Staley is dead. But the real songwriter for Alice in Chains was Jerry Cantrell. This is from his second album, Degradation Trip, released in 2002. A new album is supposed to be out soon!
LCD Soundsystem - Tribulations (Tiga Mix) I don’t know much about this band, but I really really like this remixed track. Get their stuff here.
Neil Finn - Driving Me Mad One of my favorite songwriters of all time. Split Enz and Crowded House never had a bad song as far as I’m concerned. From One All, released in 2002. Neil is also working on new music for 2006.
Portastatic - I Wanna Know Girls From the 2005 release Bright Ideas, this is Mac McCaughan of Superchunk. If you know or like Superchunk you’ll love this. If you don’t, what on earth is wrong with you?
Sarah McLachlan - Stupid For some reason I put off getting this album for a couple of years. I don’t know why, because I love all her previous outings. You can get the album here. WARNING: Her recent remix album, Bloom, was released by Sony/BMG and is infected with pernicious DRM rootkit spyware. Buy it from iTunes instead!
Tears For Fears - Call Me Mellow I cannot get get this song out of my head. It has to be one of the catchiest pop tunes written in years. Listen to the chorus and tell me you can’t see this being used as the theme for a 1-hour comedy/drama on Fox featuring some plucky female struggling against all odds. You can listen to the whole album through a Flash interface at the TFF website, or buy it here.
Todd Snider - Doublewide Blues I heard this song on a local radio station, and nearly drove off the road laughing. Turns out it’s from 1997, and he’s put out several albums since then. Find him and buy his albums at toddsnider.net.
U2 - Love And Peace Or Else I’m so happy that Bono stopped singing in falsetto, and U2 has got back to writing rock music with a message. How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb is definitely their best release since Achtung Baby.
VNV Nation - Beloved This has to be the best electronic love song since Alphaville’s "Forever Young". No slow-dancing to this one! From their 2002 release, Futureperfect. Their 2005 album, Matter+Form is also definitely worth a listen.
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