Category: Opinions and Rants

Favorite edition decade: 2000-2009, Nos. 10-1

As I said before, it was easier to pin down the ranking of the first half of this list than the last half. The placements on this upper tier are fairly solid, and given the cop out of making a "favorite" list instead of a "best" list, I don’t have to make subject judgments about merit. I like these albums in this order because, well, I like these album in this order.

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Favorite edition decade: 2000-2009, Nos. 40-31

Like the previous set, the albums ranked 40-31 in this decade overview are bit unstable. Even after I started writing these entries, I was still shuffling albums around. The list gets more stable with the next set.

By the way, I’m linking to each previous and next entry, regardless of their publication status. If I don’t include the links now, I won’t remember to add them later.

UPDATE, 12/15/2009, 10:03 a.m.: I realized Onitsuka Chihiro’s Insomnia didn’t make it on this list, and NUMBER GIRL’s NUM-HEAVYMETALLIC had a pretty precarious spot on it anyway. So I bumped NUMBER GIRL off to make way for Onitsuka. Sorry, Mukai.

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Favorite edition decade: 2000-2009, Nos. 50-41

Music writers geeks love their lists, as the characters of Nick Hornby’s High Fidelity would have you believe.

All the fashionable online pundits are throwing together decade retrospectives, and there’s no reason my little dog and pony show shouldn’t get in on some of that action.

I’ll count backward, instead of using the traditional Desert Island Disc format (which reminds me …), and I’m splitting this list of 50 up by tens. That should really pad my Holidailies output.

This first set is probably the most unstable. I have to admit I was padding these lower ranks, and 10 years from now, I may change my mind about these albums. I’m far more certain about the first 20, maybe the first 25.

For now, here’s what you get.

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Favorite edition 2009: Quarter final

I’m hesitant to call the Favorite Edition 2009 list because I haven’t really listened to very many new releases, and the numbers bear that out. According to the Music Collector database I use to keep track of my music purchases, 2009 saw a huge drop in new release consumption.

The number of titles I consumed from 2008, spanning three formats (CDs, downloads and paid streams), was 76. In 2009, that number is 46, a 30 percent drop.

Those numbers are bit deceptive, because three of those 2008 titles weren’t discovered till 2009. Still, 46 titles is paltry next to 76 in 2008, 86 in 2007, 71 in 2006 and 67 in 2005. Also, some of the stream and CD titles are duplicates — when I like a stream well enough, I’ll buy the CD.

Most of that shift in purchasing habits can be attributed to saving for my Japan trip, but my changing preference for catalog titles didn’t help either.

So 2009 is getting the short shrift. Perhaps later I can revise history, should the new releases of this year become catalog discoveries of coming years. I doubt it.

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Favorite edition 2009: Quarter second

When I look at the titles occupying my various listening playlists, I notice a lot of catalog titles. That doesn’t bode well for 2009 releases. How can I make a Favorite Edition list when I’m not paying attention to what’s being released? As a result, only nine slots on this list of 10 are filled. I haven’t done much research to see if Q3 promises anything to fill that last spot, and if it did, what are the chances some old album by the Dukes of the Stratosphear won’t distract me?

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Access for the precocious, a follow-up

A while back, I mentioned a site called Sheet Music Plus. At the time, the site didn’t have a wish list functionality similar to Amazon. Well, it does now, and I even created a list for myself.

I broke my embargo on using my credit card recently in order to take advantage of a sale on small ensemble sheet music which ends, well, tomorrow. (Yeah, I should have probably given more of a heads up. I’m not too sure how many of my 10 readers would find that information useful, though.)

The sale was just the thing to spur me to grab a whole bunch of scores I’ve been meaning to get. I’m using these scores as research for the next time I try my hand at writing a string quartet. I would like the one string quartet I wrote back in 1990 — before I took even a single music theory class — not to stand on its own. But I have to do my homework first.

UPDATE, 05/20/2009, 09:51: Sheet Music Plus recently redesigned its website, and on the whole I really like it. But in doing so, they broke the list functionality, which won’t be available again till June 2009.

Favorite edition 2009: Quarter first

As usual, the first quarter of the year isn’t very active in terms of releases, and while I was hoping the anomalous activity of 2008 would repeat itself, it was not to be.

I really ought to wait till April to publish this list, but about the only thing I want to check out next Tuesday is the new Pansy Division album, more for curiosity than any real desire to write about it.

So I may as well compile the preliminary favorite list for the first quarter. The pickings are slim, and so is the list, arranged by rank but not numbered as such.

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Favorite edition 2008: Quarter final

November is done, and December isn’t big on releases. So I’m calling it — my Favorite Edition list for 2008.

A number of titles got bumped around — or bumped off — the list for this final draft, but I have to say 2008 has been a near embarrassment of riches. Competition for this list was really stiff, with a lot of albums getting heavy play time on my media player. I even like the ones I didn’t absolutely love.

If there was an overall theme to this year, it was the number of releases by gay artists I actually liked. Most of the time I run across someone name-dropped in the Advocate or Out, they tend to fall into two genres: wispy folk music or club music. This year, I’ve run across musicians either pushing the boundaries of those constraints or working outside them altogether.

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