Review: Of Montreal - The Gay Parade

Of Montreal - The Gay Parade: Not as acessible, and by extension, not as enjoyable as The Sunlandic Twins.

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Download Nickee Coco and the Invisible Tree

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Review: New Radiant Storm King - The Steady Hand

New Radiant Storm King - The Steady Hand: Bradley may have jumped the gun on album of the year, but it is really, really solid pop/rock bordering on shoegaze.

Download The Winding Staircase

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Review: Omar Rodriguez - Omar Rodriguez

Omar Rodriguez - Omar Rodriguez: On his latest solo album, Omar tries to make freak-jazz a viability. The problem arises when your realize that highs aren't so high and the lows are boring and don't, like Frances the Mute did, make you anticipate the highs. I still applaud him for making music and challenging creative norms.

No streams or downloads available at this time

Import-only price is going to put you close to $20, so I'd rather not link until it gets a proper release

Review: Good Clean Fun - Between Christian Rock and a Hard Place

Good Clean Fun - Between Christian Rock and a Hard Place: I think the cheeks of the members of Good Clean Fun have holes in them from all the tongue jabs they get. Another solid batch of satire for the hardcore/emo/whateverelseitscalled crowd. The MySpace Song in particular, is amazing.

Stream The MySpace Song and Positive Hardcore

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Review: John Fahey - The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death

John Fahey - The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death: Interesting instrumental acoustic album from a guy who inspired a lot of people after him. Not something you'll play all the time, but something that should make mix tapes.

Stream clips from the entire album

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Review: The Elected - Sun, Sun, Sun

The Elected - Sun, Sun, Sun: Leaps and bounds better than their debut. I wonder if I could play this on top of Rabbit Fur Coat and get a new Rilo Kiley album...

Stream Firelies in the Steel Mill and Not Going Home (Music)

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Review: Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not

Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not: Perhaps it's selfish of me, wanting thirteen new songs for their debut album and only getting a few, but that's my right. The songs they did re-record seem to lack some of the intensity that their demo brethren posessed. Ultimately, however, it's hard to deny that this is one hell of an album.

Stream the video for When The Sun Goes Down

Stream versions of I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor, Fake Tales of San Francisco and Mardy Bum

Download live and demo versions of a bunch of songs

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Review: Pearls Before Swine - Balaklava

Pearls Before Swine - Balaklava: Building upon the concepts created for One Nation Underground, Balaklava feels more like a complete album. It's an excellent album at that.

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Review: Pearls Before Swine - One Nation Underground

Pearls Before Swine - One Nation Underground: Quirky without seeming contrived, this pyschadelic '60s album (though not pop) is certainly decent, just not amazing.

Stream clips from the entire album

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Review: Felt - Forever Breathes The Lonely Word

Felt - Forever Breathes The Lonely Word: Despite being '80s almost to a fault, this album could be the next 'next old [album] that's cool to like now'.

Stream clips from the entire album

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Review: Cat Power - The Greatest

Cat Power - The Greatest: As if it were some fortune-telling device, this album turns out to be Chan Marshall's greatest to date. It's very accessible, without straying too much from her trademarks. It's entertaining and enjoyable, something previous albums weren't.

Stream The Greatest

Download The Greatest

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Review: The Society of Rockets - Where The Grass Grows Black

The Society of Rockets - Where The Grass Grows Black: Good old fashioned rock and roll that's fun to listen to without being cheesy.

Visit their homepage

Their record label (one of the two should have mp3s and ability to purchase soon)

Review: Robert Pollard - From A Compound Eye

Robert Pollard - From A Compound Eye: I was never really into Guided By Voices to begin with, so it's not surprising I'm not really into Pollard's solo album. That's not to say it's bad, it's just not for me.

Download Love Is Stronger Than Witchcraft (via My Old Kentucky Blog)

Purchase for $11.19 (out 1/24)

Review: East River Pipe - What Are You On?

East River Pipe - What Are You On?: Really solid rock/pop if tryingly simple.

Download What Does T.S. Eliot Know About You?

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Review: Two Gallants - What The Toll Tells

Two Gallants - What The Toll Tells: Like some magnificent marriage of Bright Eyes and Against Me!.

Download Las Cruces Jail

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UponFurtherConsideration: It's tremendous. The storytelling is great, the delivery is outstanding. It just hits on all the right spots. Competing with Arctic Monkeys for album of the year (yes, I know it's only January).

Download Waves of Grain

Strem the entire album

Review: Tapes 'n' Tapes - The Loon

Tapes 'n' Tapes - The Loon: Great singles, but as an album it fails.

Download Insistor

Download Cowbell

Download Omaha

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Review: The Spinto Band - Nice and Nicely Done

The Spinto Band - Nice and Nicely Done: Nicely done indie-pop.

Download Brown Boxes

Download Oh Mandy

Download Crack The Whip

Purchase for $12.56

Top 35 of 2005

Belated as usual, I bring to you my Top 35 of 2005. I know last year I did more than this (Top 88 of 2004), but I'll tell you why I did not.

This year, I managed to review one album (or EP) a day for an entire year. That's 365 albums that I, by myself, have reviewed. This is a very difficult task to do and one that I do not anticipate continuing.

As much as I like finding new music, I like listening to new music. Accordingly, when I'm forever reviewing a new album, I don't get the chance to go back to listen to ones that I liked, or that I should have liked. I did not spend enough time with anything outside of the Top 5 this year. Whereas last year, when I spent a good deal of time on my Top 20 or so.

In addition to listening to 365 albums this year, I listened to 166 albums that came out this year (more than double that of last year), which, to me, is astounding. Overall though, I found this year to be a weaker collection that last. I'm very excited for next year, as there seems to be a ton of good stuff on the horizon. I did, however, get around to listening to all of the albums that I wanted to listen to this year.

I mentioned earlier that I do not anticipate continuing my pace of an album a day. Surely, you can understand how difficult this is and respect my decision to cut it back but a bit. You should still see 4-5 reviews a week, just not 7. And don't look for reviews when I'm on vacation or on holidays.

That being said, I could continue to update more frequently if I had some help. So I'm asking you, my readership, for help. I'm looking for more 'staff' to help me out. E-mail me and we'll talk about what I'm looking for, what I need and how you can help.

Without further delay, I bring to you my list of year end bests. I'm pretty set on my Top 5, but everything else is up for grabs.

1	Broken Social Scene - Broken Social Scene
2	Mountain Goats, The - The Sunset Tree
3	Bloc Pary - Silent Alarm
4	Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
5	Nada Surf - The Weight is a Gift
6	Bright Eyes - Digital Ash Is A Digital Urn
7	Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
8	Stars - Set Yourself On Fire
9	Imogen Heap - Speak For Yourself
10	Calexico and Iron & Wine - In The Reins
11	Mars Volta - Frances the Mute
12	Fiery Furnaces - EP
13	My Morning Jacket - Z
14	Animal Collective - Feels
15	Sigur Ros - Takk
16	Calla - Collisions
17	National, The - Alligator
18	Clientele, The - Strange Geometry
19	Elbow - Leaders of the Free World
20	Gorillaz - Demon Days
21	Editors, The - The Back Room
22	One.Be.Lo - S.O.N.O.G.R.A.M.
23	Antony and the Johnsons - I Am A Bird Now
24	Apple, Fiona - Extraordinary Machine
25	Bird, Andrew - Andrew Bird and the Mysterious Production of Eggs
26	Coheed and Cambria - Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star4: From Fear Through The Eyes Of Madness, Volume 1
27	Common - Be
28	DangerDoom - The Mouse and the Mask
29	Foo Fighters - In Your Honor
30	Low - The Great Destroyer
31	Bane - The Note
32	Mental - Planet Mental
33	Leaves - The Angela Test
34	Coldplay - X&Y
35	Kaiser Chiefs - Employment

Review: Neutral Milk Hotel - When It All Caved In: Rarities and Final Show

Neutral Milk Hotel - When It All Caved In- Rarities and Final Show: This is the essential bootleg fans of NMH should obtain. At least, until Orange Twin gets their act together (or though it seems it's Jeff dragging his feet).

"Purchase" for a $5 "donation"