Don't you know there's a war on?

[vovat]

Since the year is quickly drawing to a close, I might as well create my annual Best Media of the Year lists. I've already written about most of these things, so my comments on this page are going to be brief, if not non-existent. The rankings are approximate; it can be difficult to compare two things that aren't all that similar, and I don't remember some of these thing all that well.


Albums:

1. The New Pornographers - Twin Cinema--A great, catchy record. An improvement over their last one, The Electric Version, and that was hardly bad either.
2. Frank Black - Honeycomb--A little on the mellow side for Frank, but still cool.
3. The Decemberists - Picaresque--Probably the band's best album so far.
4. Laura Cantrell - Humming by the Flowered Vine--Still not as good as Not the Tremblin' Kind, but pretty much all of her songs are really good.
5. Carolyn Mark - Just Married: An Album of Duets--Each song is a duet with a different person. They vary in quality, but the album is great overall.
6. Tori Amos - The Beekeeper--She and Frank both put out mellow albums with bee-related titles this year. Coincidence? Well, probably, but it's still weird.
7. Rasputina - A Radical Recital--A live album, with a lot of amusing banter.
8. Hypnotic Clambake - Mayonnaise--I didn't like this so much at first, because it didn't come across as being quite as fun as the band's other albums. It's grown on me, though.
9. They Might Be Giants - Here Come the ABCs--A CD and DVD put out to teach kids about the alphabet. Definitely geared toward younger audiences than No!, but there's still a lot for TMBG fans to like. The band's Venue Songs CD and DVD also came out this year.
10. Ben Folds - Songs for Silverman--A little disappointing, considering how good Rockin' the Suburbs was.
11. The Posies - Every Kind of Light--The Posies' first new studio album in years is also somewhat disappointing, although there are a few good songs.
12. Johnny Hickman - Palmhenge--This side project by the less prolific member of Cracker isn't that great, but it isn't bad either. It's worth an occasional listen.
13. Erin McKeown - We Will Become Like Birds--I've only listened to this once, and I wasn't very impressed. Nowhere close to the quality of Grand.


Albums from earlier years that I first heard in 2005:

1. The Ditty Bops - self-titled--bethje and I saw them open for Tori, and found them really fun. Their album has a lot of amazing songs, which stand up quite well to repeat listening.

2. The Dresden Dolls - self-titled--Another band with a unique and interesting sound.

3. Fastbacks - A few albums--I got most of their catalog in late 2004 and early 2005, and I don't really feel like looking up which ones I got in which year.

4. Sgt. Major - Rich, Creamery Butter--The new band of Kurt Bloch, from the Fastbacks and the Young Fresh Fellows.

5. The Breeders - Last Splash--Some good songs, and some forgettable ones.


Albums that might be coming out in 2006:

Belle and Sebastian - The Life Pursuit--Scheduled to be released on 7 February.

Frank Black--There's a follow-up to Honeycomb planned for release early next year (possibly in April). As far as I know, the title hasn't been chosen, but we can be pretty sure it ISN'T going to bear its working title, The Sicilian. There was some talk of its being a double album, but this is starting to look doubtful.

Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood--I think she originally planned to put this out this year, but it didn't work out. According to this, the projected release date is 7 March.

Cracker--There have been rumblings of a new album for some time. I have no idea if they'll come to pass in 2006, but it would be cool if they did.

The Minus 5 - The Gun Album--Another 7 February release. Hopefully I'll be able to find a store that sells both this and the B&S album.

Andy Partridge - Fuzzy Warbles Volumes 7 and 8--Since these didn't come out this year, maybe they'll come out next year. Unless Andy has decided to just stop with six volumes, that is.

Pixies--Every so often, news of a possible new Pixies album surfaces, but no concrete plans seem to have been made as of yet. I know some people are concerned that a new album would tarnish their legacy or whatever, but I say to bring it on.

TMBG--Given their track record, they'll probably release SOMETHING in 2006, even if it isn't an album per se.

XTC--Do I really think there will be a new XTC album? Probably not. It would be awesome if there WERE one, though, right?

"Weird Al" Yankovic--He already has six originals recorded. When he'll record the parodies is unknown; there can sometimes be significant gaps in between the recordings of the two types of songs.


Concerts:

1. The Decemberists
2. David Lowery and Johnny Hickman
3. The Last Car/Piñataland
4. The New Pornographers
5. Tori Amos (twice)
6. Ben Folds (twice)
7. Pixies
8. TMBG (twice, and I plan to see them twice more before the end of the year)


Movies:

I never watch very many movies in the theater. Let me see if I can remember what I saw this year.

1. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
2. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
3. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
4. The Devil's Rejects
5. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
6. Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
7. The Baxter
8. Batman Begins
9. Red Eye
10. Phantom of the Opera
11. The Ring Two


Books:

1. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, by J.K. Rowling
2. Thud!, by Terry Pratchett
3. A bunch of recent Oz books: Sherwood Smith's Emerald Wand, Philip John Lewin's Witch-Queen, Melody Grandy's Zim Greenleaf, Phyllis Ann Karr's Hollyhock Dolls, Lin Carter's Merry Mountaineer, and Edward Einhorn's Living House
4. Lies My Teacher Told Me, by James W. Loewen--Actually pretty old, but I didn't read it until this year.
5. The Penultimate Peril, by Lemony Snicket
6. Son of a Witch, by Gregory Maguire--I haven't finished this yet, so I can't really rank it properly.



I hope the New York City transit strike won't affect our ability to get to Brooklyn on New Year's Eve. I'm already worried about finding parking.

I had a dream where I was either playing or in (you know how it is with dreams) some kind of combination video and card game. I was staying in a cave with some other people, and I was excited because it was the cave where some hero had stayed centuries ago. I was coming up with stories about how other heroes had also stayed there, but no one else was interested. Then there was some part where we had to pick a deck of cards, which were something along the line of Magic: The Gathering and its numerous rip-offs. (I've never actually played any of those games, by the way.) I got mad because the other people kept discarding every deck without even trying them. Then there was a parade of multi-colored horses. One of them was biting another one, and I suspected that they might have been colored with gelatin. [1] After that, the dream totally changed direction, and I was on a college campus, talking about some play going in a nearby building, and eating watermelon.

Bush is still trying to get the Patriot Act renewed. I know some people (including Michael Moore and Penn and Teller) suspected that the Patriot Act was only passed the first time because no one read it. While that makes some sense, it doesn't explain why, now that everyone knows more about it, the House of Representatives has passed it. I hope it doesn't get through the Senate. I love how Bush said he wants it renewed "for so long as the nation faces the continuing threat of an enemy that wants to kill American citizens." How ambiguous can you get? I guess when there's no more terrorism, and all mankind lives in peace and harmony, THEN they can repeal the Patriot Act. And doesn't it strike anyone else as rather convenient that the same people who decide we're at war are the ones who decide what civil liberties they can take away in order to properly conduct the war? And when the war isn't even against a specific enemy, but rather against a concept, they can apparently get away with just about anything.

[1] The Horse of a Different Color in The Wizard of Oz was colored with gelatin. You can occasionally see him trying to lick it off.

Comments

[onib.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Bush and the amazing infringement of civil rights, you gotta love Bush's response to the whole NSA scandal. It basically amounts to, "I'm the president. I'm allowed to ignore the Bill of Rights whenever I want to. Congress passed a resolution saying I could do anything to fight terrorism, and surely a resolution surpasses the Constitution, right?"

[rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com]

I never watch very many movies in the theater.
And yet you still manage to list ten????

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Eleven, actually. As Beth pointed out, I forgot about The Baxter. This is actually more than usual for me, but I still don't think it's that many.

[rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com]

I saw THREE movies in the theater. THREE. Anyway.

[bethje.livejournal.com]

You're such a creep that you left out The Baxter.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

You're right. I added it in.