Saturday, December 08, 2007

Best CDs of 2007 ... It's That Time of Year Again

I've never really been into creating lists of the top 10 (or whatever) CDs of a given year, because any number you choose is going to be totally arbitrary. And with some years having an abundance of riches and others being pretty thin, the quality can vary widely from year to year.

So while I won't be picking a certain number of best CDs, I do offer my votes to a variety of online lists, so that the CDs I like best can be tallied in the totals. One of my favorite radio stations, New York City's WFUV (90.7 FM), lets you choose five CDs and three songs. So here's what I put down on my WFUV list, along with other favorites... keeping in mind that that the 10th CD I put on the list may be as good in my eyes as the number 5 CDs.

WFUV makes the task easier by providing a list of the CDs that game out in 2007, fallling into the station's broad category of Americana/folk/singer-songwriter category. And I have to note that although I'm a big music fan, there are many acclaimed CDs that come out each year that I just haven't heard enough of to consider them for a best-of list (or a worst-of list, for that matter).

Here's a list of some of my favorite CDs of 2007:
Arcade Fire, Neon Bible
Brandi Carlile, The Story
Bruce Springsteen, Magic
Feist, The Reminder
Jonatha Brooke, Careful What You Wish For
Kelly Willis, Translated from Love
Kim Richey, Chinese Boxes
KT Tunstall, Drastic Fantastic
New Pornographers, Challengers
Suzanne Vega, Beauty and Crime
The Donnas, Bitchin'

I'm sure I'll be adding to this list in the days to come as more CDs come to mind. What are your favorites?

And of course, I would be remiss if I didn't mention that in 2007, as in the previous two years, many of my musical discoveries were made through podcasts, from the CBC Radio 3 podcast to Morning Becomes Eclectic to the live concert downloads offered by All Songs Considered.

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