My Top Ten Albums of 2006

I've had this post in draft format for a month and a half now, since December 7th. Its obviously was a busy holiday season for me, and has been a busy start to 2007 with my work helping to spin up UFCjunkie.com and a few other interesting projects as well. But a phone call from The BlogFather chiding me for my lack of posts lately has kicked me in to gear enough to get this up ASAP. I’ll be back at least twice more this week – once with my usual writeup and picks for the next UFC event (which is this Thursday, already) and with an update on a couple different personal topics.

So, while I don't have the extensive writeups on each of these that I would like, I'm still going to get this out there, before I have to fend off yet another email asking when my annual top ten list will come out.

In alphabetical order by artist, NOT in order of ranking. Note that most of these are available from Amazon for $10 or less, so if you're interested and happened to have missed some of these, I'd definitely recommend giving them a shot. You can just hover over the image for a cool preview of the current price via Amazon.com

	...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead - So Divided This Austin-based band has been in my regular rotation with both of their last two major albums, 2002’s Source Tags and Codes and last year’s Worlds Apart which somehow barely missed my Top Ten of 2005 list. I'd label them as "Progressive Indie Rock" if you forced me to cram them in to a genre title. Trail of Dead is also taping friendly and freely allows sharing of their live music through The Internet Archive.
	The Decemberists - The Crane Wife This is an absolutely brilliant album that has received a lot of critical praise this year, including an 85 rating at Metacritc, eclipsing last year's 80 rating for universally-praised Picaresque. The Decemberists are perhaps the epitome of hipster bands, but I loved Picaresque and I also love The Crane Wife. Most know, I'm a sucker for progressive sounds that actually move a genre forward, and for concept albums that push the conceptual boundaries of music – if not the boundaries of pretentiousness itself. Hipster concept album based on a Japanese fable, crossed with thematic elements of Shakespeare's The Tempest? Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a top ten finisher. The Decemberists are also the only band to receive back-to-back honors on my Top Ten for last year and this year, although Beck came close.
	Ghostface Killah - Fishscale Ghostface Killah aka Tony Starks aka perhaps the most successful rapper to emerge from the rap collective of the Wu Tang Clan released two albums in 2006, the very well regarded Fishscale and a follow-up at the end of the year called simply "More Fish". As usual in this world of digital music I most frequently just pull my favorites from both albums in to my iPod, but Fishscale is definitely the more polished release and clearly earned its spot on my Top Ten. Fishscale featured several tracks produced by MF Doom, and the two are rumored to be working on a full collaborative project for release in 2007.
	Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere I went "Crazy" over Gnarls Barkley like everyone else in America *groan*, but this musical collaboration between DJ and super-producer Danger Mouse (aka Brian Burton) and rapper/singer Cee-Lo Green – who mentored Outkast's Andre 3000, and you can definitely see the influence there - delivered much more than that first smash single. The whole album is an absolute favorite, and hasn't left my regular rotation since its release. The title track "St. Elsewhere" is definitely my favorite, but the whole album has fantastic listenability start to finish.. I've won over several fans to the work, even those who weren't typically fans of this type of music .
	The Killers - Sam's Town Burdened by heavy expectations and the fear of the dreaded sophomore slump, this album was highly anticipated and generally met with a universal "meh" from most of the critical music press. I for one really liked the album. Its definitely not "Hot Fuss", but it’s a great evolution of the previous work, and in some ways – at least on some songs – I think it’s even superior, a great step forward. While a couple tracks on the album trend more towards the forgettable, I think "Read My Mind" is the Killer's finest work yet, and tracks like "Bones", "When You Were Young", and "For Reasons Unknown" are every bit as good as my favorites from Hot Fuss.
	POS - Audition Stefon Alexander, aka P.O.S., started life as a punk musician and evolved in to a unique sound in hip-hop. Audition" features the work of two simultaneous DJs which gives it much more depth than his earlier work, Ipecac Neat (2004). Plus, you've got to like anyone who pays enough homage to Takashi Miike's to name an album after one of his masterpiece movies - and do all the cover art from said album in Miike theme as well. For those interested in more, I wrote a pretty extensive review of POS including this album in a post on 2+2's OOT forum (Other Other Topics) which of course turned in to a trainwreck of people arguing about the best in underground hip-hop, but hey that's the interweb for you.
	Raconteurs - Broken Boy Soldiers I've seen this labeled as "only the fourth best White Stripes album", but for me Broken Boy Soldiers warrants clear inclusion in my Best Of list for the year. Its worth it alone just to hear Jack White backed by a drummer with even moderate talent – sorry Meg. Intimate Secretary, Store Bought Bones, Level, and Steady As She Goes carry the album for sure, but its definitely one that I can listen to front to back.
	Snow Patrol - Eyes Open Northern Ireland's Snow Patrol opened for U2 during 2004, and the effect of being so close to their kinsmen for a year definitely shows on this more mature sophomore release. Snow Patrol crosses a bit of U2, a bit of Coldplay, a bit of The Shins, and puts their own unique voice forward along with what I'd consider some very strong lyrics. I also did an extended review of this album previously on my blog and in another 2+2 post
	Thom Yorke - The Eraser Radiohead frontman Yorke could put out an album of Danish Deathmetal-infused-Polka and it would probably be a strong candidate for my top ten list. I think the Eraser is good but not great, but still ranks among the top ten, although I’d probably rank it towards the bottom rather than the top if I were doing these in numeric order - which I’m not. I think the album has a noticeable peak in the middle with The Clock, Black Swan, and Skip Divided (#3, #4, #5). Those three songs are the only ones with a permanent spot on my iPod, but the fact that those three might as well be hardwired in, means this album succeeds where so many others failed to impress.
	Tool - 10,000 Days Without question my album of the year. I know a lot of old school Tool fans point to Aenima as their favorite, and some smaller group will point to Lateralus as the pinnacle of their fanaticism. However, I strongly feel that 10,000 Days continues one of my favorite trends about this band: Tool gets better and better with each album in my opinion, as the band continues to lead progressive rock in new and exciting directions. I’ve been a big fan since Undertow, their first major studio album, but I really think every album is better than the last, and 10,000 Days stands alone not only at the top of Tool’s catalog, but at the pinnacle of everything released this year. Every song on this album is fantastic. I can’t say enough good things about it.

Honorable mention (close but not quite):

	Joseph Arthur - Nuclear Daydream Ohio singer-songwriter Arthur has release six studio albums and seven EPs in a career spanning back to 1996. I’ve seen Arthur on tour twice, once a few years back when he was a one-man-band, and then on the tour supporting Nuclear Daydream where he’s added a full band "The Lonely Astronauts" to complement his unique live sounds. While this album features some standout tracks, overall there are few good tracks mixed among only "OK" songs to crack the top ten, but it was really close. "Black Lexus" would easily be in my top five singles of the year, however – its haunting lyrics and melodies make it one song I can't skip over anytime it comes up when I'm shuffling songs. If you're interested, you can stream the entire album from JosephArthur.com (bottom right of the page).
	Beck - The Information I had high hopes for The Information, mostly due to the presence of longtime Beck-collaborator Nigel Godrich, who also happens to be known as the sixth member of Radiohead due to his longtime collaboration with the Oxford band. Reportedly this album took a difficult three years for Beck to finish, and most of it was actually recorded prior to the Dust Brothers produced "Guerro". I think it shows – the finished product is definitely good and shows signs of the usual Beck brilliance, but its no Guerro, and its no Top Ten.
	Deftones – Saturday Night Wrist I'm a longstanding fan of the Deftones and of Deftones frontman Chino Moreno's unique vocal and lyrical stylings. However, there are two clear classes of Deftones albums: Adrenaline, White Pony, and Around the Fur, all amazing albums still in strong rotation for me to this day, and 2003's self-titled Deftones and now 2006's Saturday Night Wrist which are listenable and good, but definitely not great. In my opinion, "Beware" and "Kimdracula" are the only tracks on the album that make me think the Deftones are still capable of delivering the type of brilliance last consistently demonstrated on 2000's White Pony.
	AFI - Decemberunderground AFI's seventh album is not their best, nor is it their worst. A couple tracks clearly stand out, but the album is a little too "poppy", a little too glam, a little too emo to crack the top ten. However, its definitely a standout album and well worthy of mention as an album just outside my Top Ten.

Biggest surprise:

Between the Buried and Me – The Anatomy Of Between the Buried and Me, from Raleigh, North Carolina, are one of the more technical bands out there, crossing numerous genres in their music from classical to metalcore to alt-rock to electronica, sometimes all in one song. While I'm not always the biggest fans of their albums, I usually enjoy a couple tracks very much (such as "Selkies: The Endless Obsession" from their 2005 release Alaska) I can always appreciate their highly technical songs and their progressive sounds which push the genre. When I heard they were releasing an album of cover songs I was intrigued, and The Anatomy Of did not disappoint in the slightest. The concept was that the band would cover songs from some of their strongest influences, which ranged from metal standards Metallica, Pantera, even Motley Crue, to alt-rockers Soundgarden, Faith No More, Depeche Mode, and Smashing Pumpkins, to more esoteric influences such as underappreciated hardcore band Earth Crisis, progressive rock pioneers King Crimson (a major Tool influence), even one of the godfathers of progressive rock in Queen. And then they cross to cover two great songs outside what many would see as their normal genre, but to a true fan the line of influence is clear: the fantastic song "Change" by Blind Mellon, and "Colorblind" from the Counting Crows. I very much enjoyed this album and its covers continue to delight anytime they spring up in a random shuffle. I'd very much recommend this album to anyone who is a fan of any of the covered bands.

Biggest disappointment: (tie)

Jaz-Z - Kingdom Come Universally panned by critics and bloggers alike, I can't really say much good about Kingdom Come. After the great commercial and critical success of The Black Album, I was looking forward to the fruits of Jay-Z's decision to step out of retirement for Kingdom Come, at least until I got my hands on the album. Unfortunately, it is nowhere near as good as the Black Album, and really needed help from a stronger production team. With collaborations from a couple standout names, I at least expected greatness from the track with Pharrell, and that turned out to be one of the worst on the CD. A big disappointment…

Pharrell – In My Mind Pharrell's new album was actually one of my top anticipated albums of 2006. I am a big fan of Pharrell's work as a "super producer", especially his work with Chad Hugo under the name "The Neptunes" and work fronting the funk-rock band N*E*R*D with Hugo and Shay Haley. However, his first solo album really didn't deliver what I was looking for at all. While the album certainly isn't terrible, its definitely a huge disappointment. Pharrell couldn't seemingly bring his own signature sounds as a producer – or the infamous "Neptunes Sound" – to his own album for whatever reason.

Best Album I Overlooked from 2005:

Andrew Bird - Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs This album appeared on last year's Top Ten list of a friend who generally exposes me to a lot of music, with whom I generally overlap quite a bit in taste but not always. I picked up a copy of this album on his recommendation, but never really seemed to get in to it last year enough to bubble it up to my own Top Ten. However, fastforward to the start of 2007, and "the Mysterious Production of Eggs" is in heavy rotation on my iPod, and is one of the few albums I never consider removing when I sync up with my iTunes library to pull in some different music. If you like Sufjan Stevens, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, or even Elliott Smith, I'd strongly recommend checking out this album, and I'm sad to say I overlooked it previously.

If you're interested, you can find my previous two lists still online: 2005 | 2004.