Year End Stuff/Progress Report

Salon has up the 20 best downloads of the year according to their critic, Thomas Bartlett. Worth checking out. Lots of good stuff, some of which I've posted already. Do listen to Toms, The Books, and especially Xiu Xiu Larsen.

One song on Salon's list reminds me of one of my earliest posts on bdrib was about how there must be something good going on if I hate a band or song intensely, so Spoon's "I Turn My Camera On" must be doing something, cause it is without competition my least favorite song of 2005. Lots of people love it.

Also, (and I promise this will be the last mention of KEXP until the next one), KEXP ran its annual listener poll of top bands of the year, which they count down on the 30th or 31st of each year. Here are the top ten:

10. Bright Eyes
9. Wolf Parade
8. Spoon
7. My Morning Jacket
6. Beck
5. Decembrists
4. Death Cab for Cutie
3. Bloc Party
2. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
1. Sufjan Stevens.

(And to illustrate the influence of JITM per my last post, here's his personal top seven: 1. Sufjan 2. CYHSY 3. Bloc Party 4. Elbow 5. Death Cab for Cutie 6. KEXP live CD 7. My Morning Jacket - note any similarities?)

As for my continuing education, thanks to everyone who has sent in suggestions. I am gaining the ear. On my windows media player for repeated listening right now is Berio's "Sinfonia," Riley's "In C," Lutoslawski's 3rd, Beth Anderson's "Swales and Angels," George Crumbs "Black Angels," Stockhausen's "Stimmung," and other stuff I can't recall right this moment. In the home and car cd players I'm listening to Bridge and Britten, some string quartets of Maxwell Davies, and all the Shostakovich I own (including String Quartet 8, on the recommendation of a friend of mine). I was given a big 10 cd box of John Adams' work for festivus, and will indulge myself mightily.

I look forward to the upcoming year and all the new music, of all sorts, to hear. Please continue to suggest to me pieces and composers that excite you, and more importantly, please have a safe, healthy, happy New Year.