Monday, January 30, 2006

My Nintendo DS makes me long for the days of the Super Nintendo. It's good to know that I now have a place to relive the glory days. I've been playing Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, which makes me wish companies hadn't abandoned the turn based stategy games. I've also been playing Castevania: Dawn of Sorrow, which reminds me of just how amazingly great the last Playstation Castlevania was. And then there's Metroid Fusion, which makes me yearn for the days of Super Metroid, another of the best videogames ever made. Not to say that 3-d games aren't great. Sure they are. But I would kill to see a new, beautifully rendered 2-d Castlevania game on a next generation system.

I have been doing a lot of thinking recently. I haven't been able to put these thoughts to words. I haven't updated this in a long time because of this. Well, that and the fact that I'm never home. I think that depending on what happens when the lease is up here, I might move somewhere else. The leading candidates for change are the Pacific Northwest (Seattle), or back on the east coast (North Carolina or thereabouts). I just don't think my future is here in Colorado. It's funny because a couple months ago I wanted to live in Fort Collins for a long time. I love it here. But my skin is going to walk out on me if I don't move somewhere with humidity.

This entails making new friends, finding new roommates and a new job. I'm not sure how I feel about being completely alone. It could be terrifying and it could be completely refreshing, starting over. I just feel dead ended right now. I know I don't want to be in sales, and this Hertz job is a sales job. I feel dirty when I'm mentioned in conjunction with sales. But I looked at jobs online and I find nothing that interests me. Everyone I know seems to have some kind of direction in life. I have nothing. This is very depressing sometimes.

Is leaving everything behind and starting over the solution to this rutted feeling? Hell if I know. But at least it's something different. I've finished school. I've done everything I've had to do up to this point very well. This is the real world now... I'm not impressed.

Sorry, maybe I'll have something entertaining to say next time.

Sunday, January 01, 2006

Well, this is the annual top 10 albums of the year list. 2005 was in some ways good and some ways bad for music. The quality of the good albums was excellent. The amount of good albums was not. I am having trouble coming up with 10 albums to put on the list, but the ones I have for sure are solid. So anyway, these are the albums that I found myself listening to a ton all year, and if they sound good to you, I wholeheartedly recommend checking them out. Search them out in record stores or order them online, because most likely Best Buy's not going to have them all.

10. Alkaline Trio - Crimson: It's an evolution of the sound they put out on their last album, and therefore it's not the return to form that a lot of people are wishing for. That said, this is the Trio's most mature album musically, and finds them experimenting with piano and electronic noises in some songs. It's catchy as hell, and even though I find the whole dark image of the band these days stupid, this album's choruses were stuck in my head for a good month during my landscaping days earlier this year.

9. Atmosphere - You Can't Imagine How Much Fun We're Having: This is an interesting beast. The first half of the album is worse than Seven's Travels, but the second half of the album is probably the best rap album I've ever heard. The title of the album is very appropriate, as it really sounds like Slug is having fun rapping. It's not as socially or politically conscious as other Atmosphere albums, but it's a lot more fun. The B-side of this album gets it onto the list.

8. The Glow - The Ghosts are Out: Half raucous rock and roll, half slower bluesy stuff, this organ driven rock band is one to watch for. While it's impossible to understand what the hell the singer is saying for the most part, this is good old rock music. It sounds like oldies punked up for the new generation, and it's one of the best surprises of the year for me.

7. Colonel Rhodes - This is Public: This is a five song alt-country EP. The band put this out and broke up, and it's the only thing they ever released. That said, it's fantastic. Every song is great, with the excellent classically trained female vocals pairing nicely with the solid male vocals (though really, they could lose the guy and put the girl up front and probably come out for the better). If you're at all interested to see what southern rock is sounding like these days, this is one of the best examples I've heard.

6. Lucero - Nobody's Darlings: Lucero's latest really got treated poorly by reviewers. It's a southern rock album through and through. The country is more or less missing, and that slight change in sound put a lot of people off. It's not Lucero's best album, that crown still goes to Tennessee, but this does have its fair share of wonderful songs. The War is a great song that's an absolute pleasure to see performed live. If you like rock and roll music and you haven't listened to Lucero, you're missing out on one of the best bands of our time.

5. Lagwagon - Resolve: This whole album was written about and dedicated to their good friend and former drummer Derrick Plourde, who killed himself earlier this year. The album was written and produced quickly, but only serves as a testament to the songwriting power of Joey Cape. It's Lagwagon's most powerful album emotionally, and reading the lyrics really caused me to get a little teary eyed. Some songs are better than others (one of those songs is Resolve, a beautiful punk song, probably one of the best songs Lagwagon has ever written), and it's not Lagwagon's best album (that title will forever belong to Let's Talk About Feelings), but it's right up there, and it's lightyears better than the slightly disappointing Blaze. This is the band that got me into punk rock, and all these years later, it's great to see them put out such an amazing, truly powerful album, even though the circumstances surrounding the album are so tragic.

4. Propagandhi - Potemkin City Limits: Holy crap, this album blew me away. I've been a Propagandhi fan for a while now, and I was expecting pretty big things out of this album, but I wasn't expecting this rock monster. They've slowed down the thrash and turned up the melody, and it worked brilliantly. Politics aside, this is an extremely well constructed album through and through, with no throwaway songs. Their last album had some excellent stuff and some filler, most notably from the gravelly voiced singer. His songs on this album are right up there. Melodic, hard punk rock, this is not one for everyone, but for anyone looking for a smart, politically conscious album that's easy to listen to, this is it. Fantastic album.


3. The Mountain Goats - The Sunshine Tree: Absolutely astounding, beautiful, touching, personal. Great. John Darnielle turned his camera inwards and wrote an album about his childhood growing up with an abusive stepfather, and it's far and away the Mountain Goats' best album. After experimenting with the sound of multiple instruments on We Shall All Be Healed, he finally wrote songs that really incorporated various sounds. He doesn't ask for pity, there's no "why me" songs. It's an optimistic album, showing that there's a light at the end of the tunnel. Acoustically driven but incorporating piano, cello, and other instruments, this was for most of the year my choice for number one on this list. Still, months after it came out, I'm in awe of just how wonderful this album is. Get it.

2. Sufjan Stevens - Illinois: This album took me a few listens to get into. From the one song I'd heard off it, I wasn't expecting the lush banjo folk that I got, but once I understood what I was listening to, it became apparent that I was listening to one of the best albums I'd ever heard. The compositions here are so incredibly dense and complicated, I can't even understand how one man could write them. Some of the songs are just strange, but some of the songs (Casimir Pulaski Day, Chicago, John Wayne Gacy Jr., Decatur) are simply jaw droppingly beautiful. Sufjan himself plays dozens of instruments on this album, and he's backed by a full choir, a full orchestra, and an arsenal of over 20 instruments. I've honestly never heard anything quite like this before. At 22 tracks and 74ish minutes, this should be overwhelming, but the album flies by. "Sufjan Stevens invites you to Come on feel the Illinoise," as it says on the cover, and you'd be an absolute fool to turn him down. This shit is genius.

1. Against Me! - Searching for a Former Clarity: Putting aside my mixed feelings about the band's growing popularity, I can honestly say that this is, for me, the best album I've heard all year. This is a complete album, less rocking than previous entries, but more fully realized. While I wouldn't mind seeing How Low left off and replaced by one of the other demo songs that were leaked, this album totally does it for me. I'm biased, yes, because of how much I love everything these guys do, but I really think this album transcends genres, and anyone willing to give it a chance should find something to like. It's diverse, it's long, and it's just amazing. Not only number one on this list for the year, but it also fully deserves a place on my top 10 albums of all time list. This is the best album yet from the most important current band in punk rock. They've got a shot at the big time now, having recently signed to a major label, and while I'm wary of what their next album could be, I still place all my faith in Tom Gabel and the boys to continue blowing me away with their perfect blend of folk, rock, country, and punk for years to come. Absolutely an essential album.

That all said, I'd like to give two other awards. Though I couldn't justify placing it on the top 10 list because it's mostly recycled material, The Lawrence Arms' "Cocktails and Dreams" this year was one that I listened to way more than I should have, considering I'd heard 90% of it a hundred times before. The new song and the reworked version of Turnstiles is worth the price of admission.

And finally, once again, my disappointment of the year goes to Weezer and their album Make Believe. While it showed glimpses of the band of yesteryear, who put out two of the best albums of all time (Blue and Pinkerton), I listened to it maybe five times because it's just such mediocre garbage for the most part. We are all on Drugs and Beverly Hills are so bad it's almost painful to listen to, especially considering the high hopes I still have for these guys. But songs like Perfect Situation make me want to believe that they still have another great album left in them somewhere. They just aren't doing it. The worst album yet from Weezer.

Okay, and a couple more things. American Idiot by Green Day was solid, but Jesus Christ people, it wasn't that good. All because it was so much better than that rancid festering turd Warning doesn't mean it's the savior of rock music. Dookie and Insomniac were way better. And Dave Grohl, quit acting like all because you put out a double album it's all good. It was a solid effort, but saying that this is the Foo Fighters album you want people to remember is just silly. We all know that The Colour and the Shape is the best album you'll ever make. Also, I'm really sick of all this dance rock music that's being made. That's it for the musical year of 2005. Happy New Year, everyone. Let's make it a good one.