Best Music of 2008
10. Beck - "Modern Guilt"
The point where Beck's melancholy meets perfectly with his pop sensibilities in no small part to Danger Mouse's stellar production.
Stand out tracks: "Orphans", "Chemtrails", "Walls", "Soul of a Man"
Beck (feat. Cat Power) – “Orphans
9. Thrice - "The Alchemy Index Volumes III & IV
Modern Prog-Country-Emo-Whathaveyou done right by a band that continues to evolve by leaps and bounds.
Stand out tracks: "Broken Lungs", "Moving Mountains", "Come All You Weary"
Thrice – Broken Lungs
8. Gaslight Anthem – “The ’59 Sound”
An almost too good meshing of Springsteen and The Pogues. While at some points the album is almost too earnest for its own good, it still rocks just as hard as anything else out this year. Also, despite my ardent hatred for Dickie Barret, I can even forgive his cameo here. This was the album The Killers always wanted to secretly make but are too full of themselves to do so.
Stand out tracks: “Great Expectations”, “Old White Lincoln”, “Meet Me By the River’s Edge”
Gaslight Anthem – “Old White Lincoln”
7. Los Campesinos - "We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed"
The better of two stellar albums from a band I admittedly tried hard not to like at first.
Stand out tracks: "Ways to Make it Through the Wall", "We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed", "You'll Need Those Fingers for Crossing", "Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown #1"
Los Campesinos – “You’ll Need Those Fingers for Crossing”
6. Fall Out Boy - "Folie a Deux"
If you hate them, far be it from me to try and convert you, but this is the best mainstream release of any genre this year, and is often at its best at when the songs are weirdest.
Stand out Tracks: "What a Catch, Donnie", "Disloyal Order of Water Buffalos", "w.a.m.s.", "West Coast Smoker"
Fall Out Boy (feat. Pharell) – “w.a.m.s”
5. Fucked Up - "The Chemistry of Common Life"
This isn't just good hardcore. This is good music in general. Brutal and beautiful all at the same time.
Stand out tracks: "Son the Father", "Royal Swan", "Twice Born", "Black Albino Bones", "Crooked Head"
Fucked Up - “Royal Swan”
4. Girl Talk - "Feed the Animals"
This is all around the best achievement this year by a single artist. The ultimate party in a box is also one of the most cohesive and well thought out albums of the year. Also, the best hip-hop album in a weak year for the genre (sorry Jeezy, I just can’t put you on this list).
Stand out tracks: Well, it's just like on really big track if you think about it...
Girl Talk – “Shut the Club Down”
3. Sigur Ros - Med Sud I Eyrum Spilum Endalaust
Sometimes accessibility can be a good thing. While not their best, these guys have finally created an album even the most casual listeners can get into easily.
Stand out tracks: "Gobbledigook", "Inni mer syngur vitleysingur", "Straumnes", "All Alright"
Sigur Ros – “All Alright”
2. MGMT - Oracular Spectactular
Much like Los Campesinos (and to a much lesser extent Vampire Weekend) I tried so hard to hate these guys, but I have a deep appreciation for bands that like to blur the lines between what a joke and what is sincere. These guys are clearly in on it. By turns fun and touching, this could be the one album on this list that stands the test of time better than the rest.
Stand out tracks: "Weekend Wars", "Kids", "The Youth", "The Handshake", "Pieces of What"
MGMT – “Weekend Wars”
1. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
Overly sensitive indie acoustic loving assholes (like myself) find themselves a new Iron & Wine with this absolutely gorgeous collection of songs. It might only be 9 songs long, but they are all the perfect soundtrack to a lonely night of nothing in particular.
Stand Out tracks: "Re: Stacks", "Skinny Love", "Blindsided", "Team", "Lump Sum", "For Emma"
Bon Iver – “Re: Stacks”
Worst Music of 2008
10. Jamie Foxx - "Intuition"/ Terrance Howard - "Sanctuary" (tie)
Fuck, where do I begin when a lot of this list repeats itself. I can’t even figure out which of these two clusterfucks to begin with. I guess we can start with the ever so slightly better Terrance Howard album. This man has come a long way from “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp”, but he has gone in the wrong direction completely and started to think he can now play the troubled troubadour role. With a lead single as ri-god-damn-diculous as the title track, i could not take him seriously as an artist. I thought I was listening to Tenacious D’s Wonderboy. As for “Shine Through It”, well, just listen to it. Check that falsetto he tries... numerous times:
Terrance Howard – “Shine Through It”
So naturally Terrance Howard feels the need to dis Jamie Foxx and his music (on CNN of all places). Jamie comes back and does a pretty spot on imitation of Terrance that nearly made me piss my pants laughing. Unfortunately, Jamie’s album also made me piss my pants laughing at his fake ass neo-soul freak shit that sounds like he just dusted off some shit he found in the trash of Boyz II Men. In the YouTube comments for “Slow” someone had the balls to say that people are “losing their V-Cards to this song”. Fuck, the world is doomed.
Jamie Foxx – “Slow”
9. Weezer - "Red Album"
I don’t think it needs to be said anymore that letting Rivers Cuomo turn song writing duties over to his band mates was a terrible idea, but this album is simply abysmal. It’s only saving grace is the astoundingly flippant lead single that makes you wonder if this whole thing wasn’t a joke to begin with. River’s also redeemed himself with the vastly better solo collection “Alone II”.
8. Oasis - "Dig Out Your Soul"
Are these guys dead yet? Between bouts of getting tackled on stage and baiting Jay-Z, the Gallagher brothers found time to release yet another dreary bombastic album that shows no progression whatsoever from “the greatest band on Earth”. Of course, I have never been a huge fan of Oasis. Now I am just plain sick of hearing about them at all.
7. The Killers - "Day & Age"
The title of the first track, “Losing Touch”, seems quite prophetic. This is a band that seems chronically out of their comfort zone on every album, but it is none more apparent than on this bizarre effort. I don’t think I was more bored listening to another album this year. I didn’t even care to figure out what the hell was exactly wrong with it. I just didn’t care.
6. Metallica - "Death Magnetic"
People need to stop saying “At least it doesn’t sound like ‘St. Anger” as if it were a good thing. It’s like the difference between having a safe dropped on your head from 20 stories up and getting run over by a freight train with steamroller wheels. Everything about this “return to form” is wrong from start to finish. Even the cover looks like a fucked up Wooly Willy.
5. Beyonce - "I am ... Sasha Fierce"
It is a bad sign if you are trying to create a concept album and the singer sounds completely disinterested in everything. If Beyonce wanted to create an altar ego, she should have sat on it longer. From lyrics to production (which is surprisingly sparse for such an occasion) this entire thing feels half baked and lazy.
4. Plain White T's - "Big Bad World"
I can see why Delilah left you. You were outshone by label mate Miley Cyrus. This is what you get when you mix the sound of Radio Disney, a bad Joy Division cover band, and the sound of a check cashing over one another.
3. Scarlett Johanson - "Anywhere I Lay My Head"
Scarlett’s bid to become as overexposed as possible came up short with an album of covers that should never have been allowed to crawl out of the bowels of Hades. There have been threats of yet another album. I say the world starts a fund to make sure that never happens.
2. Pussycat Dolls – “Doll Domination”
Oh, just go fuck yourselves. You guys get number two by default because...
1. Nickleback - "Dark Horse"
...these assholes put out an album. But getting back to both number two and number one, combined both albums manage to bring misogyny to dizzying new levels. Nickleback wins simply because “S.E.X.” (spelled that way for God knows what fucking reason) is quite possibly the most loathsome song of the decade.
Best Films of 2008
10. Cloverfield – Despite the inevitable backlash over the past year, this January release manages to hang on to it’s spot on the list mostly on technical achievement alone. It is fun, suspenseful, and not disappointing in the slightest.
9. American Teen- There is a fine line between fiction and reality. For all the claims against this little seen documentary that large parts of it had to be staged (and large chunks of the film definitely suggest that), the film remains an interesting case study if you look at it from the perspective of what happens when you introduce cameras in front of a group of otherwise normal kids. Definitely a movie where you have to suspend your own personal prejudice towards the material.
8. Snow Angels – Before he helmed “Pineapple Express”, auteur David Gordon Green directed this indie downer of a drama. Movies this bleak and this rewarding were hard to come by this year.
7. JCVD – Quite possibly the best foreign film of the year, also one of the most unexpectedly endearing portraits of a larger than life man struggling to just be human in an inhumane world.
6. Son of Rambow – Since I didn’t see “Slumdog Millionaire” yet, this is the requisite feel good crowd pleaser of the bunch. This tale of two kids trying to stage their own version of Rambo is a testament to the magic that even the most mediocre of movies holds.
5. Role Models – By turns equally crude and unexpectedly touching, David Wain’s comedy doesn’t expect laughs to come easy. Every emotion this film creates is earned by an able cast and a tight script.
4. Wall – E – It is hard to get people in this day and age to care about a main character that doesn’t even speak so much as he squeaks and grunts, but Pixar has created undoubtedly their best movie to date and redeemed themselves for “Cars”.
3. The Dark Knight-So many people attack this movie now during its (perhaps unavoidable) backlash by saying that it isn’t what a superhero movie should be. I secretly envision these people going home and watching “The Phantom” every night before jerking off into a sock. It stays true to the source material in tone (if not too much in story) and manages to work as something better than a super hero movie. It is the best crime saga in years.
2. Tropic Thunder – I didn’t expect this from Ben Stiller. Or anyone in the cast for that matter. Still has created the most vitrollic representation of Hollywood in quite some time. Even the gags that don’t work seem to be part of the whole point, and the performances are across the board awesome.
1. I doubt I have seen it yet. Seeing as my budget was pretty tight both over the summer and now, there is a list of films that I sadly have yet to see. I am very lax to call any of these films the best of the year and I ultimately feel guilty naming “Tropic Thunder” as the across the board champion. If I see one of the films on the list to take the title, I will be sure to update this, but for now, I am at a loss.
Worst Films of 2008
10. Jumper – A petulant Hayden Christiansen jumps around moping and bitching while Samuel L. Jackson continues his rapid descent to Shatnerville.
9. Fool's Gold- Easily the most overly plotted movie of the year. I actually saw this piece of shit twice. Don’t ask me why. Both times were voluntary. I am so ashamed.
8. Untraceable – It’s like “The Net” and “Feardotcom” had an unholy demon of a child. Co-starring Colin Hanks!
7. 21-The most implausible blockbuster of the year full of scenery chewing and listless direction to reel any of this in.
6. Chapter 27-Jared Leto gets fat for the sake of getting fat and no one gave a shit. I hope you enjoy the gout you got trying to play Mark David Chapman. Your inept stab in the dark to try for respectability just got you blown off the screen by your co-star Lindsay Lohan, who was actually the only decent thing about this piece of shit.
5. Speed Racer-I couldn’t finish watching this movie. It was pretty terrible based on the half that I did see. I felt drunk, high, and about to die the entire time. It is only number 5 on this list because a movie with this much crazy shit going on has to count for something.
4. Smart People-This is the indiest movie to ever indie itself to indietown. Everyone in this movie is such a cliché and so utterly loathsome that you don’t give a shit about what happens to them from the opening frame. Never before has such a talented cast gone down with their material so hard.
3. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor-Both a guilty pleasure and undeniably horrible at the same time. I could write a book about just how risible this movie is. It is only number 3 because I actually plan on showing it to people as a double bill with “Troll 2” to illustrate just how cathartic a shitty movie can be for the soul.
2. Twilight-It’s the fluorescents. I’m sure of it. It’s science.
1. The Love Guru – Easily the most unfunny movie of this or any year since Carrot Top shat out “Chairman of the Board”.
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