A short time ago, the good fellas over at the All Songs Considered Blog asked the question of what was the best music of the year so far?   I agree with them that this has been a great year for music, much better than 2008, and I’d like to share some of my favorite albums of the year with you.

I’d like to do this a little differently than some other blogs, so instead of giving you a "Top Five" or something artificial like that, I’m going to do this as a series of posts and I’m going to give you a short burst about every 2009 album I’ve listened to.  This way, these posts can grow organically over time as new music is released.  My hope is that you’ll get turned on to some new music.  I hope that’s agreeable to you…

A.C. Newman, Get Guilty–So we’ll kick this thang off alphabetically with A.C. Newman’s 2009 release Get Guilty.  This is an easy one because I’ve already blogged about it on this site, needless to say I love this album.  It’s not the best album of the year mind you, but it’s a solid powerpop effort.  I could listen to it many times before tiring.

Andrew Bird, Noble Beast–I’ve got to admit, I’d never listened to Andrew Bird before this album.  This despite his membership in the Squirrel Nut Zippers and a brief stint on Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe records.  But I must say that I’m glad I found Mr. Bird, for he turned in one of the most literate and intelligent albums of the year.  This is another album that is very finely crafted, but in a different way than Newman’s work.  The quality in Noble Beast is in the songwriting and the musicianship, not necessarily the production.  But if you like your rock music with an element of composition and orchestration, this one’s for you.

Animal Collective, Merriweather Post Pavillion–I’ll likely get skewered over this but I’m really not feeling AC’s latest this year.  I can appreciate what the boys did on 2007’s Strawberry Jam and I liked Panda Bear’s solo release, but I can’t say that I’m overly impressed with (beware blog shorthand) MPP.  Truth be told, I can’t make it through an entire listen of the thing.  Plenty of folks on Stereogum and Pitchfork think this is the best album of the year, so evidently there’s something here I’m missing.  I can’t for the life of me see what it is though.

Share on Facebook