Not a Typo: My Favorite Albums of 2015

Or, the new and laughable frontiers of deadline-free self-publishing

Twenty favorite albums, presented in alphabetical, unranked order. To my credit, I did write 90% of this last year.

top 10 — maybe the first in a series

This one started during an Aug. 20 conversation in New York with a fellow Wallflowers fan. What are your top 10 Wallflowers songs? What are your 10 least favorites?

30 Very Good Reasons to Not Update Your Music Blog for More Than a Year

1. No one reads it.
2. Your friends might read it and silently judge your preferences in music.
3. Your mom might read it and worry about you.

correcting a delinquency

“Hey!” you’ve been saying. “You never finished your top 10 of 2010 list! I’ve been in suspense!”

(Alternatively, you just said, “Huh? You were posting something with favorite albums or something? Oh, right. I didn’t really notice.”)

the spotify experience

After the initial bewilderment and aimless searching, I realized that getting the most out of Spotify would require a little help from other websites — namely, places that could recommend new music for me to explore (unless there’s some sort of internal public playlist feature on there…

all together

Twitter has a knack for creating an odd sense of intimacy with — and among — famous people we’ve never met. I’ve followed several musicians on there since joining the site in early 2009 and have developed a new sense of “knowing” them that could never have been gained from standing on the other side of…

Top 12 Albums of 2014: The War on Drugs — Lost in the Dream

This was the year of artists who had very good albums in 2011 and then came roaring back with even better ones this year, with maybe a single or EP in between. (See also: Real Estate, The Antlers). Maybe the three-year cycle is…

Top 12 Albums of 2014: Sondre Lerche — Please

Seeing old favorites reappear on these lists is satisfying. I’ve been a Sondre Lerche fan since 2003 and, naturally, have liked some albums more than others. This one required quite a few listens to acclimate to — let alone like — but eventually I…

collected and collaged

Et voilà, the 2011 albums that I bought or repeatedly Spotify’d this year (either because I really liked them or was determined to give them a fair chance).

Twenty-three altogether — six fewer than last year. It’s a pretty… Paste-y collection, for lack of a…