Now that the Golden Globe Awards of Indie Rock Lists are done (Stereogum’s 2008 Gummies - brought to you by BECK. The beer, not the aging folkie. Lame much?), we can all turn our attention to the Oscars. Despite the avalanche of year end lists from everyone with a keyboard and too much time on their hands (myself included - next week!), all eyes will be on the most widely read and oft-criticized one of ‘em all - Pitchfork’s Top 50 Albums of the Year. While under normal circumstances I don’t agree with their overall #1’s (The Rapture, anyone?), last year they totally copied mine.
Whatever though, I forgive them. I'm not gonna go all Joe Satriani on them over it. About a week or so before they posted that list last year, I had some fun predicting what their top 10 might look like, and wouldn’t you know it - I was right on 6 out of 10 counts! This year I’m hoping to get a passing grade - we’ll see if I can top 6:
My Predictions for P’fork’s Top 10 (in no particular order):
Deerhunter - Microcastle (#1, I bet)
No Age - Nouns
TV On The Radio - Dear Science,
Portishead - Third (could sneak in there as #1 if they would rather pull one over on us)
The Walkmen - You & Me
Fleet Foxes - s/t
Fucked Up - The Chemistry of Common Life
Gang Gang Dance - Saint Dymphna
M83 - Saturdays = Youth
Lil’ Wayne - Tha Carter III
Some of these are obviously safe choices in a year that wasn't as deep as last. Deerhunter, No Age, and TV On The Radio all received scores of 9.2 (yeah, I’m a loser, I just looked that up), so they’ll likely battle for the top spot. I don't remember any new releases being scored higher, and they tend to stand by their scores, for the most part, regardless of backlash. I do think though that Microcastle is going to walk away with their top spot, and my long shot for #1 would be Portishead - it’s very deserving and a real grower, plus they have a ton of goodwill left over from the 90’s.
As far as the other spots go - Fleet Foxes figures to place high despite the mild backlash sentiment I’m starting to feel around the net. You & Me has been an overwhelming favorite among bloggers and web lurkers and could find itself riding a lot of good will into the Top 10 - it’s a really great record and very deserving of a spot. The Chemistry Of Common Life was released fairly recently and the songs I’ve heard haven’t done much for me. But it seems that the people who like it really really like it.
Beyond those, things get a bit more sketchy for me. I didn’t find myself loving as many off-genre (read: non-indie rock) records as I did last year (hello Untrue & From Here We Go Sublime). But I have been loving the Gang Gang Dance album for a few weeks now, so I’m going with their Saint Dymphna, M83's Saturdays = Youth (or should I go with Cut Copy?), and Lil’ Wayne's Tha Carter III (though I know next to nothing about it other than it's hip-hop and it's everywhere) to round out the 10. You may notice the absence of a certain Vampire album - hopefully that one will stay where it belongs - low on the list. All for fun - we’ll see next week….
No comments:
Post a Comment