While a lot of my favorite stuff in 2007 was on the lighter side (Maximo Park, St. Vincent, Iron and Wine, etc), 2008 was dominated for me by satisfyingly solid releases from some of my favorite metal bands.

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MY TOP 10!

1. Opeth – “Watershed” This may seem like a strange statement, but I think this album is basically perfect… and yet I don’t like it as much as their previous LP. I think Ghost Reveries was an all-around more amazing album, but this one is really close and I love the direction they’re taking with even more clean and quiet stuff mixed in. The first track, with all its wonderfully jangly 12-string acoustic guitar, is absolutely beautiful. And ‘The Lotus Eater’ is vintage mind-blowing Opeth progressiveness. I am particularly enamored by the keyboard parts in it. My expectations for this record were the kind of massive that usually results in a letdown, but Opeth came through for me.

2. Amon Amarth – “Twilight of the Thunder God” This band has been awesome for years and keeps getting better. As always, I still firmly believe they are Odin’s favorite band and they truly satisfy my lust for viking music. The title track on this record is stellar (super catchy chorus about Thor and a face-ripping guitar solo) and “Where is Your God?” is another favorite.

3. R.E.M. – “Accelerate” This was an unexpected addition to my top records for the year. I’ve always been a casual to moderate REM fan, but I wasn’t really into their records since Automatic for the People. I think this one is almost as good, but in a totally different way. Automatic was much moodier and prettier, and Accelerate is fast and fun.

4. The Dodos – “Visiter” There a 2 or 3 songs on this record that I don’t like at all, but overall the album is a fabulous example of how to make oustanding, lively music with a small suite of acoustic instruments. Everyone should check it out.

5. Scream! Hello – “Everything Always Keeps Happening” Also completely unexpected. The Procedure regularly played with this band for years, and they were almost hard to watch sometimes. But they stuck together and got really goddamn good. This was a very pleasant surprise when they sent it to me for mastering, and Maggie and I have listened to it many dozens of times since then. It’s wonderfully catchy and I suggest you support them and Red Leader records and pick up a copy!

6. Plants and Animals – “Parc Avenue” This album kind of sounds to me like it should have been released 35 years ago. It’s a very diverse record with an awesome classic-rocky sound and great vocals.

7. The Mountain Goats – “Heretic Pride” I just got into The Mountain Goats this spring, so I dove into three of his albums one-at-a-time. I started with Talahassee, then The Sunset Tree, and finally made it to Heretic Pride. In terms of the musical arrangements, this is definitely my favorite of the three – though I find it the least interesting lyrically of the three I’ve heard. I like that his albums are getting progressively more diverse (which I obviously love, if you listened to my record) and this one has so much more to offer musically. I adore the way he arranges string parts in his songs – it’s not at all the way strings are usually used in indie songs.

8. Metallica – “Death Magnetic” Let me first make something clear about this record – I only really like the version that I remastered from the GH3 mixes. The official release is a sonic disaster and the engineers involved should never work again. But, for the most part, I really enjoy the songwriting on this record – which was a huge shock. It really reminds me a lot of Master of Puppets era stuff. My only real complaint is that the album is way too long. The instrumental track is particularly boring and could be cut in half easily, and “Cyanide” and “Unforgiven III” aren’t great songs and one of those could stand to easily be left off the record entirely. But I love the first 5 tracks and I am happy that they showed me they didn’t completely forget how to be talented.

9. Meshuggah – “Obzen” Everything Meshuggah has done lately has been mind-bending in terms of the rhythms and songwriting. This is no exception, though I have to say it’s maybe only my 3rd or 4th favorite release by them at this point. Highlight of the album for me is the next to last track called ‘Pravus’.

10. The Bronx – “The Bronx III” Great catchy rock, but I miss the stylistic experimentation of their last LP. This is one that let me down at first because my expectations were so high, but it may grow on me.

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Honorable Mention:

Annelids – “Binomial Nomenclature” I feel weird even listing my own album in the honorable mention section, but if I’m being honest, my record is one of my favorite albums of the year and I really listen to it a lot. I’m super happy with how it came out and really proud of it.

Unleashed – “Hammer Battalion” For me, this record falls a bit short of their last 2 LPs, but it’s still a very solid release. Another one that I recommend if you love vikings and hate Jesus.

De La Hoya – “The Sound of Our Own Decay” Only a few new songs on this, but I really like them!

Bad Religion – “New Maps of Hell Deluxe Edition” (the new Acoustic Tracks) A couple new tracks, a few old songs, all acoustic versions. It’s Bad Religion, so it’s good.

Scream Hello – “Smart & Stupid EP” Both of their releases this year were really good, but I’m only putting the LP in my top 10.

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Other records I enjoyed:

Max Richter – “24 Postcards in Full Colour” Also need to familiarize myself with this more, but I’ve really enjoyed it in the short time I spent listening.

In Flames – “A Sense of Purpose” I can’t tell if this is better than the last few In Flames records, or if I’ve finally just resigned myself to believe they’re a different band than they used to be and that now lets me enjoy them again. But I like a lot of this CD.

Helcaraxë – “No God To Save You” We recorded these songs in 2006 and the album was supposed to have been pressed by November 2007. But alas, it didn’t come out until a couple months ago. I like how these songs came out though, and I’m psyched to be working on more new material for other records that won’t come out for years after they’re done. Warbringer – “War Without End” Decent, if generic thrash record. I believe the kids in this band are really young, so they have a ton of potential.

Johann Johannson – “Fordlandia” Haven’t listened enough to fully form an opinion yet, but it seems like very cool and moody background music.

Matthew Sweet – “Sunshine Lies” Only listened once so far, and it took me a few tracks to get used to the fact that he’s getting a thin old man voice, but there are some decent tracks tracks on here and I will eventually spend more time getting into them.

White Denim – 11 Songs Insanely uneven and strange album, but a lot of tracks have a ton of charm and I need to spend more time getting my head around it.

X ONE WAY X – “Start Whenever” This record is obviously complete garbage, but it goes in the “records I enjoyed” section because I laughed so much and had a great time recording it.

Shearwater – “Rook” This was decent, but I need to come back to it and check it out in more depth.

Torche – “Meanderthal” I listened to this a few times and enjoyed it, but didn’t love it enough to keep listening to it at the time. I’ll probably come back to it in a while though and check it out some more, because there were some neat songs on there.
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Disappointments:

Kaki King – “Dreaming of Revenge” I had previously only been familiar with her excellent all-instrumental “Legs to Make us Longer”. On the bright side, this album is still mostly instrumental, and those songs are enjoyable. But I feel that even those tracks got less adventurous as she’s tried to accomodate having a backup band. On the other songs, I find the addition of vocals to be detrimental because her voice isn’t very strong and singing seems to prevent her from playing more interesting guitar lines.

Thrice – “Alchemy Index Vol III & IV” Thrice makes my disappointment list for the second straight year. Good job, jerks. I am not into the Earth disc at all. My least favorite of the 4 parts by far. I wish this band would stop changing their songwriting to fit a cliched “elements” concept and get back to just writing awesome songs. If they want to do a concept album, just make the lyrics conceptual.

Metallica – “Death Magnetic” (verion they released on CD) AGHHHHH A DISTORTED INSANELY LOUD MESS DISASTER RUINATION OF GOOD SONGS.

Death Cab for Cutie – Narrow Stairs I wasn’t really looking forward to this, but expected to enjoy it the way I usually casually enjoy Death Cab. Instead, I only enjoyed about 4 songs and the rest was boring and repetitive.

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Other stuff I checked out and was not into:
Bon Iver – “For Emma, Forever Ago”
Boris – “Smile”
Colin Meloy – “Colin Meloy Sings!”
Devotchka – “A Mad & Faithful Telling”
Gaslight Anthem – “The ‘59 Sound”
Helios – “Caesura”
Jacaszek – Treny
Marnie Stern – “This Is It and I Am It and You Are It and So Is That and the Vocals Sound Like Whining Toddler Shouts and it Ruined this Record and That Is That”
Pennywise – “Reason to Believe”
Polar Bear Club – “Sometimes Things Just Disappear”
Punch Brothers – Punch
sBach – “sBach”
Sun Kil Moon – “April”