Albums of 2005...

[uw_madtown]

What music albums of 2005 have you given a listen, and how were they?

For my part, I've heard a fair amount of music thus far this year (well, more than I normally would, at least) largely as a result of becoming Arts editor at a student newspaper. While there's a pretty large staff of writers around, I do still feel a bit of an obligation to try to keep up with as much of the movies and music we're covering as possible.

3 Doors Down, "Seventeen Days" -- Absolutely TERRIBLE album. I enjoyed "Kryptonite" but otherwise have no use for the band. As far as radio-friendly pop-rock goes, this is real bad.

50 Cent, "The Massacre" -- Not nearly as good as "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," and I didn't even love that album very much. The production on that was pretty solid though. "Massacre's" production is amazingly bland.

Black Mountain, "Black Mountain" -- Thoroughly enjoyable Canadian indie rock which some tracks that do get a little too long and meandering. Love their two main vocalists. "Modern Music," "Druganaut" and "No Hits" were fave tracks.

Bloc Party, "Silent Alarm" -- Still need to give this another listen, but it didn't make a strong impression one way or another the first time through.

Bright Eyes, "Digital Ash in a Digital Urn" and "I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning" -- Both are good listens. "Digital Ash" is semi-Postal Service sounding (makes sense, I believe they were involved in producing a couple tracks). I really like "Arc of Time (Time Code)" and "I Believe in Symmetry." However, I have fallen in love with the second album, the acoustic "I'm Wide Awake." It's probably my favorite album of the year thus far.

Eisley, "Room Noises" -- Only listened to it once, but I enjoyed it on first listen. Would have to pay closer attention to really give a full endorsement, but it tenatively gets a thumbs up.

Jack Johnson, "In Between Dreams" -- I can't help but enjoy this thing. It makes me feel warm all over. I'm not saying Jack Johnson is a genious musician (or even a particularly good one), but damnit, if you don't at least mildly enjoy this album, you have no soul.

LCD Soundsystem, "LCD Soundsystem" -- Same as with Eisely: haven't listened more than the one time, but I liked what I heard.

Beanie Sigel, "The B.Coming" -- Really mixed feelings. On the one hand, you can tell Sigel's coming off a long break and that "B.Coming's" thematic content was meticulously planned. On the other, you can also tell that the production--the sound--was rushed due to his November incarceration on fed gun charges. It lacks a uniform sound to go with the uniformly bleak themes. Tracks stick out like a sore thumb here and there--it's more mixtape than album. They're good beats and production, they just don't fit in. There's far too many guests that get in Sigel's way (surprisingly, Snoop does the best job of avoiding that pitfall). It's definitely worth a listen, it just could have been a bit better.

Beck, "Guero" -- Again, only one listen. I've heard some negative reviews of this (more disappointed than negative, really) and I didn't get it. I liked it. But haven't dived in too hard yet, so my opinion might change.


There's about 20 or so that I want to get at yet but haven't had time.