Just call it “Progressive Music List Bloat:” my first Best Of list, covering the 1960’s, contained all of ten albums. The 70’s list was 20 items long. By the time the 80’s rolled around, I had expanded to 25 titles. Wellsir, for the 1990’s, we’ve blown it all the way out to thirty five.

It’s the curse of familiarity. After all, I wasn’t alive in the 60’s; I was a preteen in the 70’s; and I went to high school in the 80’s. By the dawn of the 90’s, I was Officially An Adult, a college student with a job and disposable income to spend…which I did, on music, music, and more music (a debilitating habit that continues to the present day.)

More music means more trouble narrowing down. Throw in the 90’s alt-rock explosion, which irrevocably split popular music into zillions of new genres, sub-genres, sub-sub-genres, and micro-genres, and winnowing the damn thing down becomes well nigh impossible.

Yadda, yadda, yadda. Here’s the list. As always, positioning is in no way indicative of rank.

Nirvana – In Utero
The Beastie Boys – Check Your Head
Radiohead – OK Computer
Kyuss – Welcome to Sky Valley
Dr. Dre – The Chronic
The Beta Band – The 3 EP’s
Soundgarden – Badmotorfinger
Uncle Tupelo – Anodyne
Fishbone – The Reality of My Surroundings
Slayer – Seasons in the Abyss
Neil Young and Crazy Horse – Ragged Glory
The Roots – Things Fall Apart
Sugar – Copper Blue
Alice In Chains – Dirt
The Black Crowes – The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion
Dr. Octagon – Dr. Octagonecologyst
Radiohead – The Bends
Sigur Rós – Ágætis Byrjun
PJ Harvey – Rid of Me
Pearl Jam – Vitalogy
A Tribe Called Quest – The Low End Theory
Opeth – Still Life
Masters of Reality – Sunrise on the Sufferbus
Grant Lee Buffalo – Mighty Joe Moon
Johnny Cash – Unchained
Tool – Undertow
Faith No More – Angel Dust
The Melvins – Stoner Witch
Wilco – Being There
Beck – Mellow Gold
Portishead – Dummy
Rage Against The Machine – S/T
Sleater-Kinney – Dig Me Out
Ol’ Dirty Bastard – N***a Please
Lo-Fidelity Allstars – How to Operate With a Blown Mind

UPDATE: I have no idea why this post published with comments closed. Consider it fixed.

Ok, so here’s where I expect things will get testy. I’m guessing that most of the readership of this blog hadn’t been born yet in the 60’s, so it was hard to get too worked up about that list. And while many (or most) of us may have been alive during the 70’s, we hadn’t yet reached that age when obsessive music listening grips one.

But most of us passed through our formative rock and roll years in the 80’s (or possibly 90’s.) Those choices stay with one longer and often shape the rest of one’s music-listening life. It’s harder to be neutral and objective about those years.

Take me, for instance. I hated most of the popular music during the 1980’s, the decade in which I spent my teens. With the notable exceptions of REM, The Police, and U2, none of the acts listed below were multi-platinum. (Several bands on the list did go on to huge sales during the following decade, but during the 80’s, they were cult favorites at best.)

You will also note the total absence of any music from Prince. Since absolutely everyone I know worships and adores Prince and thinks the sun shines out of his ass, I expect this will elicit some anger. Look, people, I get it: he’s a genius. He must be, because everybody says so, and everybody is never, ever wrong. His shit just never clicked for me, ok? It’s not a crime, you know.

There is, however, another Neil Young album, just like there were Neil Young albums in the 60’s and 70’s lists, and just like there will be at least one in the 90’s list. Why? Because Neil Young has been around for a very, very long time, and he’s fucking awesome. That’s why.

Anyhooo….

Jane’s Addiction – Nothing’s Shocking
Husker Du – Zen Arcade
Public Enemy – It Takes a Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back
Metallica – Master of Puppets
The Police – Synchronicity
Celtic Frost – Into the Pandemonium
U2 – War
Guns N’ Roses – Appetite For Destruction
REM – Document
The Pixies – Doolittle
Motorhead – Ace of Spades
The Pretenders – Learning to Crawl
Run-D.M.C. – Raising Hell
Slayer – Reign in Blood
The Replacements – Let it Be
Neil Young – Freedom
Faith No More – The Real Thing
Ministry – The Land of Rape and Honey
Living Colour – Vivid
The Beastie Boys – Paul’s Boutique
Camper Van Beethoven – Key Lime Pie
The Dead Milkmen – Beelzebubba
AC/DC – Back in Black
Ultramagnetic MC’s – Critical Beatdown
Nine Inch Nails – Pretty Hate Machine

If there’s one thing I’ve noticed in the nearly five years I’ve ranted here on the ol’ bloggy blog, it’s that hardly any topic generates less interest and commentary than “Aaron Plays Amateur Music Critic.” A smarter man would, perhaps, take this as a sign that nobody gives a crap about his benighted take on what constitutes quality music. Luckily for me, I’m either too dumb or arrogant to notice.

Anyhoo, a couple of weeks ago I posted my favorite albums of the 1960’s. The self-imposed limit of 10 albums, however, caused much wailing and gnashing of teeth, especially when I immediately thought of at least that many good or better albums approximately three seconds after I clicked “Publish.” Accordingly, for the 1970’s installment, I’ve expanded the list to 20. This way I feel free to include more than one release by an artist. Because let’s face facts, folks: Zep and Floyd were the most important white people of the 70’s, and Stevie and George were the most important black people. They all deserve to be represented more than once.

You’ll further notice that nary an appearance is made by such 70’s staples as Fleetwood Mac, Peter Frampton, Meatloaf, or anyone remotely connected to the Saturday Night Fever or Grease soundtracks. Fuck them. And as for the Eagles…well, why don’t we just let The Dude tackle that one.

So, yeah, here’s the list. As before, placement in no way indicates rank. Numbers are square, baby.

Led Zeppelin – IV
Iggy & The Stooges – Raw Power
Pink Floyd – The Dark Side of the Moon
Funkadelic – One Nation Under a Groove
The Clash – London Calling
Black Sabbath – Paranoid
Stevie Wonder – Talking Book
Bob Marley and the Wailers – Live!
John Lennon- Plastic Ono Band
David Bowie – The Rise & Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
Led Zeppelin – Physical Graffiti
Curtis Mayfield – Superfly
The Who – Who’s Next
Funkadelic – Maggot Brain
The Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols
Pink Floyd – Animals
Janis Joplin – Pearl
Stevie Wonder – Innervisions
AC/DC - Highway To Hell
Neil Young and Crazy Horse – Rust Never Sleeps

Being an inveterate music list maker, I’d already started putting together my “Favorite Albums of the Oughts” list. I was all set to publish it, but decided that doing so would be premature, given that this decade obviously isn’t over yet. So instead, why not satisfy my jones by making lists for all the rock n’ roll decades which are over?

We’ll start with the 60’s. Yes, rock and roll technically started in the mid 50’s, but “albums” as we currently think of them didn’t exist in the 50’s (they were just collections of previously released singles.) Also, much like Chuck D, I don’t give two shits about Elvis.

So, the 60’s it is. Granted, I wasn’t alive during the decade, but why should that stop me? Feel free to tell me how wrong my picks are, and/or offer alternate titles. I probably won’t agree, but what are Teh Interwebs for, if not a good argument?

Here’s the Top 10. The order of the list should in no way be construed as conferring rank. In true hippie fashion, everybody’s equal. Now, let’s all join hands and sing “Kumbaya…”

The Rolling Stones – Let it Bleed
The Velvet Underground – White Light/White Heat
Jimi Hendrix – Electric Ladyland
Neil Young and Crazy Horse – Everybody Knows This is Nowhere
The Beatles – S/T (ie, “The White Album”)
Van Morrison – Astral Weeks
The Band – S/T
Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band – Trout Mask Replica
Led Zeppelin – S/T
Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited

For the past several years, a favorite annual ritual of mine has been to read and dissect the ranking and relative (de)merits of those individuals in The Buffalo Beast’s 50 Most Loathsome Americans list. Every installment is a treasure chest of hilarious, spiteful mockery, directed at those sewer-swimming politicians, celebrities, pundits, and assorted cultural vampires who so richly deserve it. To paraphrase the late, great Bill Hicks: they are demons from Hell, sent here to Earth to lower the standards. The Beast calls them on it.

However, I have a major problem with 2007’s list: the curious absence of 2006’s winner, John McCain. Not only did he not repeat as Most Loathsome, he missed the Top 50 entirely! If his behavior in 2006 was so unspeakably loathsome (and it was), his actions last year were even more so, from defending the disastrous war authored by his one-time hated rival George W. Bush to his ludicrous assertion that Baghdad streets are “safe for Americans” to walk on and his subsequent April Fool’s Day stroll through the marketplace:

On the heels of those narrow-scope photos came reports of what McCain’s entourage was actually comprised of. That “safe” Baghdad market had been flooded with more than one hundred battle-ready troops and armored Humvees. Three Blackhawk helicopters and two Apache attack helicopters roared overhead, and sharpshooters were posted on the surrounding rooftops. Simply put, McCain’s “safe” street was one overly loud mouse-fart away from being paved with flaming lead during every step of that little walk.

To compound the calamity, a report emerged two days later describing the abduction and slaughter of 21 Iraqis who worked in the marketplace McCain’s mini-Normandy force had stormed the previous Sunday, an obvious act of retribution for his visit by a violent Baghdad militia. Already belied by the revealed firepower he brought along, McCain’s “safe” walk in Iraq led directly to yet another horrific Baghdad bloodbath. There is bad, there is awful, and then there is this thing, this quantum singularity of ignominy that bends the very light now shining upon it.

Call it farce, call it folly, condemn it for its drenching hypocrisy and the mortal consequences suffered by 21 innocent people. One must also see this, in the end, as a true American tragedy of historic proportions.

I’m sorry, Buffalo Beast. For this egregious failure to fully take into account John McCain’s complete and utter douchitude, you must be punished… and there’s only one punishment commensurate with your sins. That’s right, you’re about to be on the business end of a

PRAYER ASSAULT!

I’m sorry to have to do that, but you brought it on yourselves. Perhaps you’ll be constructive and use this as a learning experience. After all, McCain has already provided you with plenty of fodder for 2008’s list, dropping his one remaining principled stance by voting to allow the CIA to torture. And with 2007’s winners, George Bush and Dick Cheney (the Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine of American politics) shuffling off to retirement soon, he should have the field all to himself…

Unless Crazy Mike Huckabee somehow snags the Republican nomination, of course.

After all the non-stop paranoid pessimism I’ve thrown at you in this, the fledgling two thousand and eighth Year of Our Lord, I feel it’s my civic duty to dish out some good news.

No doubt you’ve already heard about the Indian car company that just unveiled a $2500, 50 mpg automobile.

That’s pretty awesome and all, but you know what? The very same company is working on a zero-emission car that runs on compressed air and uses no fossil fuel at all.

And just because I’m feeling generous, here are ten more things that might cause you to nurture a sliver of irrational hope that the human race and the world might possibly not be completely and irretrievably fucked.

Yes, I know New Year’s resolutions hardly ever pan out. People follow them for a couple of days or weeks and then give up. If I manage to find one that I can actually stick to, I’ll be way ahead of the game.

So why not try eight? Here goes…

Lose some damn weight.
225 pounds is too heavy, even when you’re 6 foot 3. I don’t even want to guess how high my cholesterol is. Exercise is imperative, and it wouldn’t hurt to make changes to my entirely beer-pasta-and-red-meat-based diet.

Use my kayak.
For months, I yammered on to anyone who would listen about how much I wanted a kayak. My fiendishly clever plan worked, because I finally received one for Christmas. Now it’s time to put my money where my mouth is, and actually make use of the damn thing. My house is mere blocks from the Back Bay here in Portland, so once summer rolls around, I could actually carry the kayak down the street and plop it in the water. (The key word, here, obviously, being “could.”)

Pay off credit cards.
With only one income coming in for the past few months, we’ve been racking up the bills. It’s getting ugly. However, starting next week, we’ll both be employed, and as soon as the paychecks start rolling in, all available cash goes towards paying off the plastic. The last thing I want to do is give those blood-sucking weasels an excuse to jack my interest rate up to 32 percent.

(Re)learn a second language.
I spent seven years from junior high through college taking French, but have since managed to forget practically all of it. Given Maine’s proximity to the French-speaking part of Canada, it couldn’t hurt to be fluent, especially if we decide to flee the country should the unthinkable happen and the Republicans win in 2008.

Play my axe.
The bass and amp have been gathering dust in the attic. I have several friends whose bands need bass players. I’ve barely touched the thing for 10 years. It mocks me.

Plan a real honeymoon.
We got married last Labor Day weekend, but didn’t take a honeymoon at the time. After emptying our bank accounts moving cross-country, we decided it would make sense to wait until we could save up the money to do it right. I bought the Lonely Planet South Pacific/Micronesia guide last month, and I read it and daydream frequently. Sure, we’ll probably never have the cash to reach somewhere truly remote like Niue or Vanuatu, but a boy can dream, can’t he?

Volunteer at local library.
After 10 years in the library and nonprofit worlds, I finally broke down and took a job with a for-profit company. Making a livable wage will be a nice change, but I need to find a way to maintain that sense of Karmic fulfillment that only comes from helping people who don’t want or deserve it. So I’ll volunteer at the library a few nights per week.

Blog more about things that are annoying me.
If there’s one thing that people consistently tell me, is that I’m just too darn cheerful. Practically every post in this blog’s history has been filled with nauseating amounts of sunny optimism. Starting today, I resolve to change this. You’re welcome.

And once again, you come crawling back for your fix. Like addicts, you spend every waking moment in feverish pursuit, that half-forgotten cigarette burning down between your shaking fingers as you scour the Interwebs in search of new music to sate your craving.

And I’m the pusherman, baby. I helped you out with a quick fix last week, but now you want more. And I deliver. I’ve sifted through the crap to discover the high grade shit you need to mainline in order to be considered even remotely cool. These are the albums you must want and own.

You’re welcome.

This year’s list features a lot of repeat offenders from 2005, so the musical pedigree is sound. And while the number of titles is smaller than last year’s jaw-dropping musical bonanza, quality may, in this case, make up for quantity. There are several releases here that I’m quite sure will still be in heavy rotation on my mp3 player years from now.

But I digress. Without further ado, the music:

30) Pelican, City of Echoes
29) Marnie Stern, In Advance of the Broken Arm
28) Dungen, Tio Bitar
27) Sage Francis, Human the Death Dance
26) Tomahawk, Anonymous
25) Modest Mouse, We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank
24) The Aliens, Astronomy for Dogs
23) Jesu, Conqueror
22) Battles, Mirrored
21) Earthless, Rhythms From a Cosmic Sky

20) Band of Horses, Cease To Begin
19) The Fratellis, Costello Music
18) Dropkick Murphys, The Meanest of Times
17) Menomena, Friend and Foe
16) Wilco, Sky Blue Sky
15) Son Volt, The Search
14) Dinosaur Jr, Beyond
13) Oceansize, Frames
12) Porcupine Tree, Fear of a Blank Planet
11) Clutch, From Beale Street to Oblivion

And at last, we come to the Top 10:

This list started as a comment over at Kables’ “Top Singles of 2007” post. Inspired by Kables, I threw together a list of my own favorite songs from this year. Then I added some more. And some more. And still more.

I tried to find “official” videos (or at least live clips) for all the songs, but in some cases, they simply didn’t exist, so I linked to interesting fan-made videos.

I’m still working on my Top Albums of 2007 list, but it’s a pretty safe bet that most of the albums from which these songs spring will feature prominently in said list.

In no particular order:

Queens of the Stone Age – “3’s & 7’s,” “Suture Up My Future”
Gogol Bordello – “Wanderlust King,” “Supertheory of Supereverything”
Dälek – “Paragraphs Relentless”
Grinderman – “No Pussy Blues,” “Electric Alice”
The Aliens – “Robot Man”
Clutch – “Electric Worry”
Wilco – “Shake It Off,” “You Are My Face”
Radiohead – “Bodysnatchers”
The White Stripes – “Icky Thump,” “Prickly Thorn, Sweetly Worn”
Robert Plant & Allison Krauss – “Polly Come Home,” “Sister Rosetta Goes Before Us”
Band of Horses – “Ode To LRC”
Kings of Leon – “Black Thumbnail,” “My Party”
Dropkick Murphys – “State of Massachusetts”
High On Fire – “Rumors of War”
Dinosaur Jr. – “Been There All the Time,” “Back to Your Heart”
Machine Head – “Now I Lay Thee Down,” “Aesthetics of Hate”
Porcupine Tree – “Fear of a Blank Planet”
Oceansize – “Unfamiliar”
The Fratellis - “Chelsea Dagger”
Modest Mouse – “Dashboard”
Sage Francis – “Got Up This Morning”

Honorable Mention: Mastodon – “Sleeping Giant”
The album from which this single issues (The magnificent Blood Mountain) was actually released last year, but this song wasn’t released as a single until this year.

As a librarian, it is of crucial importance that one masters the language, the culture, nay, the zeitgeist of the patrons who frequent one’s library. When the kids come in, with the hopscotch and the jungle music and the maree-wanna, you gotta be able to rap with them. You gotta be hep.

That’s why I, for one, am elated that Merriam-Webster dictionary has finally announced their Top 10 Words of 2007. Memorize these words and use them often in daily conversation, and the kids will automatically respect you. They will instinctively understand that you’re on their wavelength, hip to their jive. No one will ever ask you if you are a narc.

Without further ado:

10. charlatan
9. hypocrite
8. Pecksniffian
7. apathetic
6. sardoodledom
5. blamestorm
4. quixotic
3. conundrum
2. facebook

And the 2007 Word of the Year…

1. w00t!

So, any suggestions for the committee? Any favorite words that they missed?