My Top 20 of 2008

List time!  There are a lot of year end top album lists out there.  This one is mine.

Honorable mention:

Leona Naess Thirteens
Airbourne Runnin’ Wild
Rachael Yamagata Elephants…Teeth Sinking Into Heart (if it was just the Teeth Sinking Into Heart portion it would have been top ten easy…maybe top five)
R.E.M. Accelerate
Katy Perry One of the Boys
Motley Crue Saints of Los Angeles
MC Chris MC Chris is Dead
Coldplay Viva La Vida or…
Flogging Molly Float
Electric Six Flashy

Now, the main list:

20. Metallica Death Magnetic
Am I still smarting over St. Anger?  Is it the muddy mix?  I was happy to have Metallica back to form in 2008, but the album leans too much towards …and Justice for All for my taste.  I should just be grateful they ditched Bob Rock.

19.  The B-52s Funplex
Here we have a band that’s gone without a new album since the early 90s, non-Guns n’ Roses division.  They sound just like they did when “Love Shack” was ruling the airwaves, which is both a good thing and a little disappointing.  I might give this one the award for “pleasant surprise of 2008″.

18.  Charlotte Sometimes Waves and the Both of Us
I’d almost forgotten about this one, but over the last few weeks I’ve rediscovered it.  Think Katy Perry with less in-your-face lyrics and a sly sense of humor, especially on the track “How I Can Just Kill a Man”.

17. Be Your Own Pet Get Awkward
This one is a bittersweet entry, and I’m not talking about the fierce guitar work and voice that rocks hard and draws me in.  I’m talking about the fact BYOP broke up a few months after the release of this album.

16. Dragonforce Ultra Beatdown
This is the kind of album I thought had no chance of being released in this day an age on a decent-sized label, much less debuting fairly high on the charts.  Unapologeticly fast, lyrically stuck in the early 1980s D&D Metal genre, and a sound that is both anthemic and anachronistic.  If you yearn for speed metal without the cookie-monster vocals, Dragonforce is your best bet.

15. MGMT Oracular Spectacular
I’m not sure what you’d even call this duo.  A sound like MGMTs could only exist in this era of music, because it really is a smooth blend of the last four decades (60s hippie, 70s dance, 80s feel, 90s synths, 00s a bit of everything).  “Electric Feel” might be the danciest alternative hit in recent memory.

14. The Hold Steady Stay Positive
This band could travel back in time to the 1970s we’d be hearing this album on every classic rock station in America.  The lead singer sounds drunk on life (and some booze) and the music just makes you feel something, be it good, bad, or sympathy for the album’s many characters.

13. LL Cool J Exit 13
I didn’t plan on putting this album at 13, it just worked out that way. LL Cool J sounds like someone who’s been casually in the game for a long time, who suddenly realized what we all have: that he’s put his music at too low a priority.  Exit 13 is LL Cool J hungry again, and that’s something hip hop needed.  So few artists have the longevity that LL has, and to see he isn’t resting on his laurels is a great thing.

12. Guns n’ Roses Chinese Democracy
We’ve waited seventeen years for a number 12 album?  It might be one of the best albums that follows from song to song, but so few people listen to albums like that anymore.  Axl Rose goes into wall of sound mode to remind everyone of the power Guns n’ Roses had, but more songs like “Shackler’s Revenge” and “Chinese Democracy” could have done that.

11. Ani DiFranco Red Letter Year
It turns out motherhood was very good to Ani.  Most of her fans that were concerned about her losing her edge were lost a long time ago.  This album might be one of her more upbeat records, and that might take a little getting used to.

10. AC/DC Black Ice
Since Brian Johnson is now sixty-one years young (and still smoking a ton), this is more than likely the last album AC/DC has in them.  While the record is stronger than their last album, it still sounds oddly safe, especially from a band that is anything but safe in concert.  It might be their best since The Razor’s Edge, but it wouldn’t stand out if it was part of their post Mutt Lange 80s output.

9. Flight of the Conchords Flight of the Conchords
We had a taste of this band last year, and it made me quite hungry for the main course.  While fulfilling, the full length album almost plays it safe on some tracks, and overall has a more electronic vibe than I’d expect from New Zealand’s fourth most popular folk-comedy duo, or however they bill themselves.

8. Spooncat Higher Than the State
Even the band would probably not put their album at number one, mainly because they strike me as quite humble, and they would probably admit this collection of songs left over from previous album writing sessions isn’t their strongest work.  It is a very fun work, with longtime concert staples like “Tiger”, “Person 3″, “Move”, “I’m Gonna Make It”, and “Magic (Seven Trillion Bunnies)” and some of their weirder stuff like “Pump Zooey”, “Prom”, and “Now I Have to Frost This Cake Now”.  I almost put it at number one, because after talking to the band last  year it sounded like this might be the last one.  I resisted the urge in hopes that prediction doesn’t come to fruition.

7. Girl Talk Feed the Animals
This CD isn’t so much an album as it is a bunch of albums, all fused together as some kind of crazy gestalt entity.  If the Transformers that combined to form a larger robot had a sound, it would be Girl Talk.  Granted, that robot would have one from each combining subgroup, but I digress.  What blows me away about Girl Talk is how the songs selected to be mashed together always sound like they were meant to go together, even when they obviously aren’t.

6. Conor Oberst Conor Oberst
I didn’t know if Conor would sound any different without using the Bright Eyes moniker, but while he didn’t sound like a different artist, he did sound like a different Conor Oberst.  This album gets major points for having a song like “I Don’t Want to Die (in the Hospital)” which should in no way be as fun and energetic as it is.  This album is less focused than Bright Eyes, and that turned out to be a welcome change.

5. Tom Gabel Heart Burns
This might only be a seven song EP, but every song jumps out like the best tracks on the last Against Me CD.  “Anna is a Stool Pigeon” actually made me feel bad for a guy who wanted to blow up a dam, which is something I never thought I’d say.

4. Butch Walker Sycamore Meadows
After losing everything in the California wildfires (including all the masters for every song he’s ever recorded), Butch shrugs it off and starts over with a clean slate, and a dynamite new album.  Butch pours out his soul, warts and all, and comes off as the quintessential pessimistic optimist.  I wonder when he’ll finally get some mainstream love for something besides his top-notch production skills.

3. Various Artists Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along-blog Soundtrack
A thirty minute soundtrack to a sixty minute online movie, and the songs are mostly sung by Neal Patrick Harris?  No way dude, no WAY should this be here.  Yet, every damn song is so sing-alongable it is simply ridiculous.  “Bad Horse Chorus” was stuck in my head so bad before I bought this I listened to it on iTunes for free about ten times (30 second preview for a 30 second song yo!), and “Everyone’s a Hero” and “A Man’s Gotta Do” beg to be sung in the shower.  Does this mean I’m Joss Whedon’s bitch now?

2. Ludacris Theater of the Mind
Now that Luda has his introspective and serious album Release Therapy out of his system, he’s back to doing what he does best, and he does it here better than ever.  With all the Kanye and Lil’ Wayne hype, this album seems to have been lost in the shuffle, which is just a damn shame.  I tried to listen to this album at work while recording commercials, and I had to shut it off because I couldn’t focus on the commercials (that and I couldn’t stop laughing).  If you own any Ludacris, you need to own this one.  Track for track it is his best work to date.

1. Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend
Some people were turned off by the hype, or by the band’s look, or by the odd sounding mix of sounds on their first album.  Before I heard about any of that, I had heard a few tracks.  The unique blend of afro-pop, indie rock, and genuine talent made me a believer before I even factored all that other stuff into the mix.  As good as some of the albums I heard this year were, this was my choice from the first listen.  I just didn’t realize it until tonight.  Here’s to Vampire Weekend and many more albums worth of their one of a kind music.