I go into this journal entry with little purpose other than to catch up, since my last entry was almost two months ago. Much of the reason for that is that lately I lead a boring life. Travails are at a minimum (and my friends thank me for that, as it keeps the whining at bay), and most of my time has been spent at work, or preparing for an upcoming move.

Yup, that's right: the move I documented near the beginning of this journal is long over, and a year later, it's time to find a new place to live. The reason is mostly practical for my partner Rich: he has been commuting back and forth to Baltimore every day--about 70 miles. While I am not happy with the choice of median areas, I suppose it could be worse. We'll be living in Columbia, Maryland, which is closer to Baltimore than to DC, so the long commute will be mine: 51 miles of ass-to-front traffic. Rich drives against traffic, but I will be moving with it, which means my drive will be around 90 minutes each way, every day. If you have any No-Doz or books on tape, send them my way, because I will need to be awake and occupied. In the long run, it will be cheaper living, since my car gets far better mileage than his Explorer, and the rent is (marginally) less expensive than here in Fairfax, VA. It's also important for his kids: the boys are getting older, and with Gregory at the impressionable age of 14 now, he needs to keep close tabs on them--something he can't do when they are with their mom in Baltimore. It's easier for everyone. Well, except for me. The sacrifice is small though, when you consider the sacrifice he made for me.

Aside from that, I am celebrating the receipt of a care package from mom, which contained--a foot massager. Yes indeed, at this very moment, my feet are swimming in bubbly, heated water, and it is actually calming my nerves and making the cares disappear. My only fear is that the computer tower is relatively near my feet, so I need to turn the thing off, but it's relaxing for now, so I'll just have to be careful. After all, I don't want to relive the hair dryer incident (I had hair at one time) of 1988, when I almost eleotrocuted myself when plugging in the appliance when wet. The doctors say it has nothing to do with the occasional tww-itching and stt-uttering, but I'm not so sure, myself. It also reminds me of the true story of the dude who thought water cooling meant filling his computer case with H20, but that's a tale for another day.

In gaming land, I am playing Fable on the Xbox at last in preparation for The Lost Chapters, finished Dungeon Siege 2 not too long ago, and am spending some time with the Auto Assault early beta test. Fable seemed so ordinary when I first began, but it developed into something much greater as I progressed, and I find myself trying to take every quest and explore every nook and crannie. I took a husband, although I grimace when the game calls him my "wife." I also have a handsome assortment of tattoos, and the halo and translucent butterflies make me practically angelic, even when I am fully decked out in chainmail. My title, "Liberator," is growing tiresome though, so I need to take another. Chicken Chaser looks tempting, but won't fit my character, who has yet to chase chickens down at the beach.

Aside from that, I am enamored with Aimee Mann, the former 'Til Tuesday vocalist that has made quite a name for herself as a singer-songwriter, and wrote the gorgeous ballad "I've Had It," easily one of the greatest songs of all time. If you don't know Aimee's music, you owe yourself to grab an album; the Magnolia soundtrack is a good choice. Another song, "Stupid Thing," has also made its way into my psyche, and I mentally sing it even in my dreams. One of my rotating sigs is a tribute to Aimee, so keep your eyes open for it.

Well, friends, until later, I leave you with this line, from the pen of Ms. Mann herself:

Experience is cheap

if that's the company you keep

but I'll never get that disease

'cause I've had it

November 21, 2005, 5PM: I leave work an hour early. Word is that the Best Buy in Sterling, VA is one of a handful of Best Buys across the country opening at midnight to sell the Xbox 360. I called the store, where customer service informed me that they will not be handing out tickets or allowing a line before 6PM. I remain cautiously optimistic.

5:33 PM: I arrive at Best Buy to discover hundreds of hopefuls already camped out under tents. According to those in front, there are at least 100 more people in line than 360s that will be sold, apparently praying for a weird natural disaster to wipe out just those in front. Best Buy started handing out tickets that morning, contrary to the information given me by the clerk.

5:38 PM: I drive to the Wal-Mart across the street. I assume I will find a similar circumstance there, as well as at the nearby Target. To my surprise, there is a tent out front, with all of three people under it. I ask if they were they were the official line. They are. I run into the store real fast to call Rich on the pay phone and let him know I'll be camping. Those in line tell me the store has 14 units to sell when they open at 6AM: 4 premium and 10 core. By the time I am an official line member, I am 10th, which means a core system for me. Disappointing and expensive, since I will now have to buy separate peripherals.

6:30 PM: We're getting to know each other under this tent, and one of the women seems to be the unofficial leader. She's there getting a 360 for her daughter as a Christmas present. She decides to give us all numbers, and rips off pieces of paper with the numbers 1 through fourteen on them. A store manager has yet to come out and acknowledge us, so for now, we are telling people the system is sold out and making arrangements for food and bathroom breaks.

6:46 PM: The store manager finally emerges and introduces himself. He admires our dedication, and tells us we need to police ourselves and let everyone know there are none to be sold. He returns to the store, and I suddenly realize I am hungry, freezing, and my bladder is going to burst. I am growing to like these people in line with me, but I am still too untrustworthy to let the fact that I have to pee ruin my chances. If I have to starve, get frostbite, and piss my pants, I'm gonna get a 360, goddammit.

7:25: Four of the folks in line is a parent, two of whom have brought their child for the fun. One of the parents is a type-A personality blond with a bad chain smoking habit. While most of use are good natured, knowing what we have gotten ourselves into, this witch is complaining about the pouring rain and the 40-degree temperature. She's sick, apparently, and she needs to go to work at 7 the following morning. For the next hour, we endure her complaints until she decided to go home and take a shower. One of the other dude's girlfriends takes her place, and she thankfully zooms off, leaving all of us to chat without the whining.

8:37: Blond bimbo is back, now whining that someone moved her folding chair and it's now all wet. Honestly, I don't care at this point: I'm cold and wet myself, so I don't give a rat's ass about her sad problem. The other supermoms, however, are nurturing the entire crowd, and the leader runs home to get a large kerosene heater. The only dad in the group, this nice (but not very bright) burly guy, runs into Wal-Mart to see if there is something he can get to keep those of us on the other side of the tent warm. Eventually he returns with a bunsen burner and some of those packets of portable heat. I have no gloves or hat, so as soon as he comes back, I go in to the store to pee, and grab a hat, a pair of gloves, and a hot pink folding chair, so I can sit in style.

9:59: One of the dudes is a graduate student studying for an exam. He's brain dead, so he offers to run to 7-11 to get us all hot coffee or cocoa. I give him a few bucks for cocoa, since I hate coffee. The rain is pooling on the edges of our tent, so we occasionally have to bounce it out, lest it start dripping on us more than it already is. The manager comes out; he isn't happy with the kerosene heater, and tells us we need to shut it off. He also cautions us that when the store closes at midnight, we could set off the alarm if we get too close to the windows. He goes back inside, but we never do shut off the heater or the bunsen burner, and no one ever does return to tell us otherwise. Not as if it's doing much good, since my feet are soaked, and the chill is traveling through every bone in my body.

10:32: The dude with the cocoas returns, and I run inside to get McDonald's food from the kiosk in Wal-Mart. A Big Mac has never tasted so good. When I am finished, I try to play some Lumines, but my fingers are too cold to make it much fun, and since I don't have earphones, the hypnotic nature of the experience is drowned by the rain and the weird looks from passersby. I get into a conversation with the other mother, who is a guidance counselor in a high school. She's perfectly lovely, and her son seems quite nice too. Another young guy joins the conversation, and it turns out, he is buying a 360 so that he can sell it on Ebay. It seems kind of unfair, but hey--this is is a free country. If he can get money for it, all the power to him, I guess.

1AM. It could be 1AM. Who knows. All I know is that bunches of morons who stayed in line for a 360 when they knew they weren't getting one are now trying to infringe on our line, and we don't like it. We wave everyone off with our scrap vouchers. One dude doesn't seem too happy, so he returns to his car and sits. We watch him converse on his cell phone. He'll be trouble.

2:44. I am freezing cold, so I take one of the hand warmers and stick it in my shoe. Turns out, they don't do such a good job when they get wet, so my search for warmth is in vain. I try to lower my head and sleep, but that doesn't go well, either. Half of the group is playing poker with chips and cards they bought before the store closed, but I don't feel like moving from the hot pink deck chair. One guy I've made friends is comparing the Dreamcast launch with this one, but much of it is nonsense, so I just let the words flow through one ear and out the other. I hold my hands over the bunsen burner, and briefly wonder if I should have brought any test tubes or petri dishes.

4:22. Line-breaker dude is back, and he brought buddies. He's demanding to see our vouchers. We show him the scrap paper, and he looks incredulous, so he starts arguing with graduate student guy. I am thankful that blond witch is on our side: she cusses him out and he returns to his car. We vow allegiance to each other and begin to form an actual line.

5:00. The morning manager has come in. We ask him what guarantee we have that these morons won't be breaking into our line. He offers nothing and enters the store. Fortunately, he comes back a short while later and opens the outer doors, lallowing us to come into the warmth. Weirdly, I get a case of the shivers, and I spend the next 10 minutes shaking, although I am warmer than before. Super-guidance-counselor-mom asks if she can sit in my folding chair. I tell her to go ahead, but only if she wished to make a strong fashion statement.

5:33. Moron and his friends push open the outer doors and crash our line. We know the crap they are trying to pull, and know we won't allow it. And it works: when the morning manager returns to us with the real vouchers, he simply exchanges them for our handwritten vouchers. Dejected, the asswipes leave, and the manager opens the inner doors for us so we can go pee. Almost all of us go at the same time, making me wonder if our pee had actually frozen in our bodies and now needs escape after thawing.

6:00. Surpringly calm, we walk to the electronics department and redeem our vouchers. By the time I have the 360 in my hands, I am so thankful I want to hold it like a long-lost lover. Instead, I am worried that the moron may be waiting to lynch me outside, so as soon as the box is paid for, I rush out to my car and leave. I head for the Wal-Mart at Fair Oaks to get my accessories, knowing my system is safe and sound in my trunk.

With all the excitement over Game of the Year awards at GameSpot and elsewhere, it’s unlikely that many will take a moment to notice my own meager comments here, yet I can’t help but express my love for many of the games that landed on my plate this year. 2005 was a great year for those that believe in games as art—and even better for those that just want to have fun. With that said, I’d like to present you with the most important Game of the Year awards yet to hit the internet: the Cubbies. 

Shooter of the Year 

Project: Snowblind 

As you can tell by the first winner, this isn’t your run-of-the-mill awards banquet. Yes, I played lots of Battlefield 2, and I let F.E.A.R. scare the willies out of me. Yet it was this game I returned to over and over again on the Xbox, thanks to its dreamy visuals, successful everything-but-the-kitchen-sink mentality, and a wealth of small details most players apparently overlooked. I have a weakness for contrasting elements, which is one reason I enjoyed Otogi 2 so much last year. The extreme violence and technical gadgetry is offset by an off-kilter soundtrack, a myriad of cultural references in its dialogue, and plentiful but not over-the-top light bloom that makes the action otherworldly. The fact that I am a pc gamer, yet enjoyed this game on console more than the pc speaks volumes about this excellent and underrated gem.  

Runner Up: Perfect Dark Zero 

And yet another console shooter makes my list. Will wonders never sneeze? No, PD0 was not without its faults, but its single-player game was compelling, thanks to some excellent level design. I never imagined that a shooter in which you cannot jump would be one of my favorite games of the year, but there you have it. The endlessly exciting multiplayer that runs circles around Halo 2 is just icing on the cake.  

Time Sink of the Year 

Guild Wars 

The .sig I used most of this year in my GS profile said “Why Choose?” The attractive women featured in it were from Guild Wars and World of Warcraft, and while I had some queries as to whether that meant I encouraged three-ways, I actually meant to imply that we should avoid putting these games head to head and enjoy them both. And boy oh boy, is Guild Wars a lot of fun, and thanks to the endless skills that can only be equipped eight at a time, it never plays the same way twice. I am not here to join the endless whining that it is not an MMO (and I was tempted to ban the insistent jerks who incessantly trolled anyone saying that it was), nor can I deny its limitations. But for those that just want slick RPG combat and awesome PvP, it doesn’t get better.  

Runner Up: Battlefield 2 

Considering it wasn’t one of my top shooters, I still spent a lot of time with BF2, thanks to its leveling system and some really awesome moments. My biggest problem with it was only that it was a bunch of phenomenal moments, some of the best in all of gaming—with less-than-spectacular moments filling in the gaps. I also secretly wished it featured vehicular controls more similar to Joint Operations, but maybe that’s because the rest of the game is so easy to pick up and play, in spite of the potential complexity of its teamwork. Still, I went back over and over, and there’s something to be said for the games that keep you coming back for more—even if it’s more punishment.

 Worst Game I Wanted to Love 

Age of Empires III 

I still don’t understand the solid scores this game received from most critics: AOE3 had some great things going for it that were completely squandered by an irritating developer that didn’t notice that it’s been four years since their last game. Terrible interface, terrible implementation of camera control, no formations, complete lack of standard RTS commands like patrol and guard—pretty graphics just don’t make up for this, guys. Yes, the story was grand, and some of the mechanics worked the way they do in other strategy games, but what of these things? There are a multitude of RTS’s in bargain bins that are more worth playing than this heap. Just because it works, and just because it has a cool but limited card system, doesn’t mean it deserves praise. The whole “amass a bigger army by better control of my resources and then blowing everything up without a smidgen of actual strategy” thing is passé. Note to Ensemble Studios: get with the millennium.  

Runner Up: The Matrix Online

It’s crap. Enough said. 

Best Argument for Games as Art 

Shadow of the Colossus 

The controls keep this wonderful experience from being a great platformer, but as an eloquent allegory about the power of love, and with a nod to the Biblical story of David and Goliath, Colossus succeeds at being one of the most powerful encounters this year. Even the gargantuan colossi diminish under the stranglehold of devotion, and yet the mysterious love that drives you towards the evocative conclusion just gives more weight to these hulking monoliths.  

Best Argument for Games as Fun 

God of War 

What a goddamn trip this thing is; how violent and depraved, appealing to the basest of human passion. Kratos personifies the twisted chunks of our brains, the ones we keep hidden lest we become serial killers or tax attorneys. By ramping up the difficulty and tossing an incredible number of awesome abilities at the player, God of War was a solid rush of vile and satisfying decadence that, for the first time in years, made the appearance of bare breasts perfectly appropriate.  

Runner Up: Lumines 

Word to the wise: never accuse puzzle games of being simple. Yes, all you have to do is match up blocks of colors to be whisked away by the timeline. But you do it as your temples pulse and your mind races, only to be subdued by the pulsing visuals and sonic delights that do more than accompany the play: they direct it, steering you towards combos you may have missed, daring you to take chances for the hope of a greater payoff. It’s food for the left brain: thoughtful, persistent, orderly, and utterly masterful.  

Game of the Year: Runner Up 

Psychonauts 

How I adore this game, how wonderful and vibrant it is. Few games make you feel more alive than this, few can make you float on air the way Raz’s journey through the psyche does. Absurd, laugh-out-loud wit is uncommon in our precious mode of entertainment, and somehow Psychonauts delivers in spades with colorful characters, astounding level design, and cool game mechanics. Here is the world you will want to revisit as the years dwindle by. As the decades pass and you look fondly back at the virtual worlds you got to inhabit, very few of them will stand out: The Longest Journey, Grim Fandango, Half-Life 2, Syberia—these are the games that draw you into their world and remain part of your being, for better or for worse. And now we can add Psychonauts, and for that, I say Thank God. 

Game of the Year: Winner 

Black & White 2 

I’m convinced that the critics that lambasted this brilliant tour de force are trying to make up their perceived overrating of Black and White a few years ago. Has there ever been a song, or a painting, or a book, or a film, or something else that you know is life-changing, something incredibly important and beautiful to you, and no one else understands? This is that game, exceptional in scope and magnificent in its execution. B&W2 reminds me of the delights that only a pc gamer can understand; the enormity of creature battles, the tribal dances of your worshipers, the swarms of ants covering the ground, the slow, sweet push-and-pull of land domination—these things and hundreds of others place Molyneux’s all-time masterwork at the top of 2005’s overflowing heap. Not a day goes by during which I don't shake my head in wonderment that others don’t see the beauty of Black & White 2, yet while my company may be few, my solitude is worth the confidence I have in knowing that it was the best game released in 2005. Thank you, Lionhead, for reminding me why I love games so much in the first place, and thank you for never once failing to delight me during the dozens and dozens of hours I spent—and will continue to spend—with this awesome work of art.

There are plenty of other games I enjoyed this year, and deserve a mention, even if they didn’t win a Cubbie. Let’s call these the Minicubbies. 

Best Game Featuring Characters with Attitude: Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath 

Worst Game Featuring a Main Character with Attitude: Prince of Persia: Revelations 

Best Game Not Winning a Cubby that Deserved One: Resident Evil 4 

Best Game Featuring a Chaise Lounge: We Love Katamari 

Best Argument That PC Games are Buggy Messes: X3: Reunion 

Best Argument That Budget Games Are Crap: Crime Life: Gang Wars 

The Game I Embarrassingly and Secretly Adored: The Chronicles of Narnia 

Most Awesome Visit from Old Friends: Animal Crossing: Wild World 

Best Particle Effects Ever: F.E.A.R. 

Best Use of Giant Apes and Dinosaurs: King Kong 

Best game I am Sure is Awesome and I Can’t Wait to Play but Haven’t for Some Reason: Indigo Prophecy

By now, you've all heard about the blockbuster exclusivity deal between EA and the NFL, effectively punking out the competition by way of exclusion. I'd heard rumblings about such deals earlier in the year, but hadn't quite resolved myself to the notion that maybe, just maybe, this might actually happen. Which is probably why I was knocked back on my coal-mining keister when I read the news.

Fundamentally, I completely understand EA's point of view on this. They're number one in sales, and want to stay that way. They have the scratch and the influence to make a deal like this happen, whereas a company like Sega/Visual Concepts probably doesn't, at least not anywhere NEAR to the level that EA does. Still, I can't help but be deeply bothered by the whole thing. Ever since the announcement, all I've had playing in my head is that speech Michael Douglas gives in the movie Wall Street.

"The point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of it's forms - greed for life, for money, knowledge - has marked the upward surge of mankind and greed - you mark my words - will not only save Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you."

Somehow, I just envision a faceless EA executive giving this exact speech, only replacing Teldar Paper with Electronic Arts.

Now look, I'm not here to demonize anybody. This is a caplitalist society, and business deals like this go down every day in a myriad of industries. This is just the first time in a long while when one of these deals has directly affected me, and my personal interests. I loved the ESPN games. I still do, in fact. I just worry that now, they'll be relegated to making some sort of Winning Eleven-esque generic version of football, and frankly, I just don't want to deal with that. The gameplay will certainly be there, but the ESPN games have also been about wholly authentic presentation. The way they capture the essence of an NFL broadcast, and the use of all the ESPN personalities. Hearing Chris Berman prattle on about Arena Football, or some fake brand of football made up for the game just does nothing for me, personally.

Then again, maybe it won't be all doom and gloom in the end. Right now, I envision a legal library full of panicked Sega lawyers, frantically pawing their way through every law book they can find, trying to find some obscure legal loophole that will allow them to sue to stop this. Even if they don't find the way, somehow, I don't think this is the end of anything--at least not in the short term. Ultimately, I think this is the beginning of a new chapter in what has been a long-running, very bitter, and intensely fascinating story. Even if the ending sucks, at least it'll be a wild ride.

Ohboyohboyohboyohboy!

Greetings everyone. As I said before, come hell or high water I'm going to do this list. But before I jump into the big list of ridiculously awesome albums, I'm going to hand out a few special achievement awards, just because I'm stalling for time while I actually finish the list.

And without further ado...

The Top 3 EPs of 2005

3. Jimmy Eat World - Stay on My Side Tonight

Let's face it. I'm just a sucker for whatever Jimmy Eat World puts out. This five song EP contains a bunch of the kinds of stuff you'd pretty much expect from the band, with a couple of rocky numbers, a couple of more meloncholy tracks (with the requisite song longer than 7 minutes) and kind of a cool remix of Drugs or Me from the last album. None of the tracks sound like crappy leftovers from Futures, and all the songs are good. What more could you ask for?

Key Tracks: Disintigration; Closer; Drugs or Me (Styrofoam Remix)

2. Hey Willpower - Dance EP

It wouldn't be too far off to describe the lead singer of Hey Willpower as the white Prince. Or at least a vague approximation of the white Prince. Whatever. Hey Willpower is the shirtless guy on the cover on vocals, a shy looking asian man on the beats, and a couple of back-up dancers that pull off these incredibly detached dance routines that are so beautifully simple, that it makes you wonder why most pop stars insist on all that gyrating and foot stomping. Obviously this four song EP is devoid of the dancing, but it's not devoid of the grooves. This record proves that Hey Willpower's music isn't just second banana to the stage show, and it's exactly the kind of stuff everybody should be playing at their next dance party--or at least the next time they feel the need to move their asses for one reason or another.

Key Tracks: Hundredaire; Double Fantasy II; Uh-Uh-Uh

1. Von Iva - Von Iva

There's a sort of purity to the brand of heart-pumping, body shaking, in-your-goddamn-face combination of soul and rock and roll that Von Iva makes. Comprised of four female musicians that any man would be equally beguiled and intimidated by, Von Iva is devoid of pretention. They want to rock, and they want you to rock with them. Simple as that. The songs on this six-track EP are some of the best the band has to offer. Though the production is a little more low key than you might expect, the fierceness of the music, as well as lead singer Jillian Iva's incredibly soulful voice shine through. When she exclaims at the beginning of Feel It!, "Ladies and Gentlemen, we're here to tell you what the world ain't got enough of," you stop and listen, because she commands your full attention (incidentally, it's "love" that the world ain't got enough of). It's a hell of a debut release, and hopefully a good indication of things to come from them.

Key Tracks: Feel It!; Not Hot to Trot; Soulshaker

The Top 3 Remix/Mashup/B-Sides Collection Albums of 2005

3. Death From Above 1979 - Romance Bloody Romance

Last year's You're a Woman, I'm a Machine was a heck of a good album, deftly mixing soulful singing with thrashy instrumentations. Romance Bloody Romance is a collection of remixes of tracks from that album, and though there's a fair amount of repetition in regards to song selection, the variety of the remixes themselves is simply excellent. Black History Month goes from a dancy discotheque groover to a moody, mellow rock piece, to a noisy, glitchy electro track, depending on who's remixing it (with one of the aforementioned remixes coming from Queens of the Stone Age frontman Josh Homme). In between all the remixes, there's also a cover of Le Peste's Better off Dead, but mostly this is a neat collection of reenvisionings for people who loved the original album--and that's just fine by me.

Key Tracks: Better off Dead; Black History Month (Alan Braxe & Fred Falke remix); Sexy Results (MSTRKRFT Edition)

2. Q-Unit - Greatest Hits

Mashing up Queen music with hip-hop isn't a completely original idea (The Kleptones did it with A Night at the Hip-Hopera), but originality or not, nobody's done it quite like this record. Taking a smattering of 50 Cent-heavy tracks, and cross-breeding them with some of Queen's biggest hits, Q-Unit is as unholy as it is awesome. This is basically this year's Grey Album, though somehow completely devoid of the publicity that album recieved. The opening track, This is How We Bite the Dust, is a good indication of what's to come. The Game's How We Do (which might as well be a 50 Cent solo song) mixes almost frighteningly well into Another One Bites The Dust, with an original beat put over that infectious bass line, and Freddy Mercury's vocals provide the glue that keeps the whole thing together as 50 and Game spit over this ludicrous amalgamation. Most of the rest of the record is 50 solo tracks, and depending on your opinion of the larger than life rapper, you may not be able to get into this. I'll say this much, though: I hate 50 cent, yet I love this album. Go figure.

Key Tracks: This is How We Bite the Dust; Crazy Little Pimp Called Love; Just It All

1. Deftones - B-Sides and Rarities

I make no bones about my stupid Deftones fanboydom. I love this band, and generally pretty much anything it does. The collection of covers, remixes and acoustic tracks on this CD is basically any Deftones fan's wet dream. Chino and the boys tackle tracks from everyone from Duran Duran to Jawbox, from Sade to Helmet, and manage to do it all without sounding like a completely different band every single time. The acoustic tracks are really the best thing this disc has going for it, though. The stripped down versions of Change (in the House of Flies) and Digital Bath both give the songs entirely new, prettier qualities, but the acoustic version of Be Quiet and Drive (Far Away) in particular is simply beautiful on every level. There are a couple of notable absences on this disc that more industrious Deftones may have found previously and might be bummed isn't on this nicely mastered CD, as opposed to the lousy tape copy they currently have. But there's more than enough here to keep the Deftones loyalists busy for as long as it takes for the next album to come around.

Key Tracks: Savory; No Ordinary Love; Be Quiet and Drive (Far Away) (Acoustic)

Best Soundtrack of 2005 (Game or Movie)

Stubbs The Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse

This is not me being a rebel, going against the official winner of GameSpot's best licensed soundtrack of the year. I'd certainly argue that as a whole, PGR 3's soundtrack was probably better. But speaking purely from the position of what I'd like to be listening to on my own time, this soundtrack is hands down the most inventive and most listenable one out there this year. Collecting a smattering of indie and alternative bands to cover the hottest jams of the 1950's, Stubbs' soundtrack goes way beyond the usual lazy licensing practices of game publishers. Most everything on here is an absolute gem, too. Cake's rendition of Strangers in the Night is frighteningly natural, like it would have come from one of their albums previously. The Flaming Lips' If Only I Had a Brain is entirely goofy, but no goofier than the original song. Death Cab For Cutie is the perfect band to bring Earth Angel into the 21st century, and the one original track on the disc, Phantom Planet's The Living Dead rocks seriously hard. It's totally bizarre, out of left field and utterly hysterical--sort of like the game itself, no?

Key Tracks: Earth Angel; Strangers in the Night; Everyday

Worst Album By a Band I Generally Like

Dave Matthews Band - Stand Up

I suppose I shouldn't have been altogether surprised by this one. Dave Matthews Band hasn't made a great album since Before These Crowded Streets, but even the last two efforts were still pretty good, and not this flacid nonsense. It's not that I hate this album, exactly, but it's just so...boring. It's as if Dave has simply run out of things to sing about, yet couldn't be convinced that in absence of legitimate, heartfelt songwriting, that shirking the unique, jam-filled song structuring thing probably wasn't such a hot idea. Everything on here just comes across as sort of half-finished and lazy, and while there's a few catchy tracks here and there, it just doesn't have much to offer fans or newcomers alike. Guess I'll just be listening to Crash for a while longer.

The 2005 Album That Has No Business Being as Good as it is

John Cena - You Can't See Me

Wait, don't give up on me yet. I'm not going out on a limb here and saying this is a truly great hip-hop album, or anything so completely ludicrous. What I am saying is that anytime you typically mix professional wrestling with a CD, you get the kind of ironically hysterical nonsense that involves Macho Man Randy Savage rapping for serious or Hulk Hogan rapping about his 24 inch pythons. Yeesh. With this album though, John Cena proves that not only is he above such crap, but also that he's not a half-bad MC. Sure, his delivery's a little on the simple side, and his sidekick, Tha Trademarc isn't much more talented, but the rhymes have a certain quality to them, the beats (while somewhat archaic) hearken back to a simpler time for hip hop, when groups like 3rd Bass were running the whiteboy hip-hop show, and the few guest spots by guys like Bumpy Knuckles and Esoteric add some cred to the whole thing. Again, not a great album, but a listenable one, and considering the source material, that's practically a revelation in and of itself.

Key Tracks: Make it Loud; Just Another Day; Bad, Bad Man

2005's Most Awesomely Bad Rock Album
or
The Album Most Likely to Appear in its Entirety in
Guitar Hero 2

Turbonegro - Party Animals

Oh Turbonegro, how I love you. As Norwegian hard rock bands go, they don't get an awful lot better. Party Animals is basically everything the band has stood for over the years: Silly guitar riffs, obtuse lyrics, and just in general, the sort of music that kids with mullets and leather pants would have eaten up in 1986. City of Satan starts out with a sort of clap-along drumbeat that sounds like Motley Crue doing Queen, and then delves into an almost cautionary tale of society's excesses. Though, then again, excess and hubris are really what this record, and this band for that matter, are all about. Sometimes it's a bit much, especially in the lyrical department. But if you can get yourself in the mindset that this is purely a rock album for people who are looking to lose a few braincells while listening, then you'll certainly have to appreciate it for what it is.

Key Tracks: Blow Me (Like the Wind); City of Satan; Babylon Forever

OK. That's all the special stuff. I'll get that actual top 40 list going here in the next day or two. In the meantime, chew on all this.

Alright, let's get the magic in motion, shall we?

40. Metric - Live it Out

On no level is Metric's latest album anywhere near as good as the band's 2003 synth-pop-rock masterpiece Old World Underground, Where Are You Now? But outside of pure comparisons to that near-brilliant album, Live it Out is an interesting, engaging and largely loveable record. The synth sounds are still apparent on many of this album's tracks, but as a whole, Live it Out plays more like if Blondie and The Cars hooked up and had a hot Canadian daughter. It's catchy stuff, regardless of what you might have thought of the band's old style, and may think of its new direction.

Key Tracks: Empty; Poster of a Girl; Patriarch on a Vespa

39. Askeleton - (Happy) Album

Minnesota's Askeleton is mainly the brainchild of vocalist/guitarist/percussionist Knol Tate, and includes a wide variety of revolving door musicians. But with (Happy) Album, the band seems to get away from the whole one man show mentality, displaying more of a unified front, both in the songwriting and instrumentation. There's a greater consistency amid the album's dozen tracks than there has been in previous releases. For the brand of minimalist pop rock that the band is geared toward, this newfound solidarity creates much catchier, and generally memorable songs. Tracks like Cities, Not the People in Them, and its apparent antithesis, People, Not the Cities They Live in display the band's ability to rock, and still keep it cool and breezy all the same. There's not much posturing or serious intellectualism or artistry going on here; this is just a great pop record from a cool band. Pure and simple.

Key Tracks: Cities, Not the People in Them; People, Not the Cities They Live in; You and Your New Me

38. Fall of Troy - Doppelganger

The mainstream and underground music scenes combined are usually only good for about one, maybe two truly listenable screaming hardcore albums per year. This year I ran into about five or six I really liked. However, Fall of Troy's Doppelganger stood out to me above the rest. While bands like Thrice and Funeral For a Friend seemed content to just stick to the more marketable forms of hardcore, and other bands preferred to steer more into the purely esoteric direction, this record is really a striking balance between the two. The song structures are appropriately scattershot, veering wildly between off-tuned solos and odd time signatures, but it's all super tight. And while loads of bands do the whole mixing screaming vocals with melodic vocals thing, often times it just comes across as forced in one way or another. Not such the case, here. It's an album that both purists and fairweather genre fans can appreciate on some level, and it's a lot of fun to boot.

Key Tracks: Ace One, Scene One; F.C.R.P.E.M.I.X.; We Better Learn to Hotwire a Uterus

37. Sun Kil Moon - Tiny Cities

No sense in beating around the bush, Sun Kil Moon's Tiny Cities is the guy from the Red House Painters (a band I out and out loathed, for the most part) and a couple of backing musicians doing nothing but Modest Mouse covers, and it's completely bananas how good it is. Mark Kozelek (the band's creative force, and the aforementioned former RHP singer) has done something like this previously, covering ACDC songs and turning them into his own brand of meloncholy singer-songwriter-esque songs. But on this record, he straight up takes these songs and makes them his own. Compare and contrast: The Modest Mouse version of Tiny Cities Made of Ashes is an erratic and dancy piece of noise rock, with singer Issac Brock shrieking through most of it. On Tiny Cities, the song is transformed into an almost painfully pretty piece of folky acoustic rock. Every single song on this album is given the same sort of loving treatment, carefully crafted with similarly sparse production, beautiful vocals and unique style. It's a completely bizarre record, but one that can be easily taken in, all the same.

Key Tracks: Tiny Cities Made of Ashes; Space Travel is Boring; Trucker's Atlas

36. M.I.A. - Arular

Critics and obnoxious music snobs alike have basically been shoving Maya Arulpragasam's M.I.A. project as the next big thing in...well, everything. Is it dance hall? Is it electro? Is it UK hip-hop? Oh who gives a flying ass. Really it's just a weird mixture of all three, and it translates into a great party record. For all the critical acclaim, it's bizarre that all the hoopla comes to rest at such a generally un-snobbish result, but whatever. Arular is just a good goddamn bit of fun music. Its mixture of genres works better than it sounds like on paper, and it easily transcends most of the pedestrian dance hall acts the UK keeps shipping out. Lyrically, most of this record is fairly inpenetrable to those who aren't hip to the scene's opaque brand of slang. Supposedly there's a fair bit of political commentary contained within, but us Americans seem destined to just nod our heads to the rhythm with generally clueless looks. But hey, with beats this hot and the vocal energy to back it up, that's more than sufficient.

Key Tracks: Bingo; Hombre; Galang

35. Boards of Canada - The Campfire Headphase

Glasgow's Boards of Canada has been making decidedly mellowish electronica for years now, and The Campfire Headphase doesn't really futz with the group's formula too much. If anything, this album benefits from the best production quality a Boards of Canada release has ever seen. It maintains that sort of scratchy, senescent sound that the music has always had, but the beats are arguably the best they've ever been. There's also a melodic quality that wasn't so much missing from past records, but seems more at the forefront here. The end result is one of the best cool-out records of recent years, and the perfect soundtrack for your next moment of relaxation.

Key Tracks: Chromakey Dreamcoat; Dayvan Cowboy; Oscar See Through Red Eye

34. Gorillaz - Demon Days

Creating a follow-up to 2001's self-titled debut must've been a heady task for Damon Albarn, the driving force behind the band of cartoon heroes that makes up the Gorillaz. For as ludicrous a labor of love as that first album was, it was a fairly resounding success, almost in spite of itself. Demon Days does suffer from a bit of a sophomore slump, but obviously not too huge of one. Feel Good Inc. was one of the biggest hits of the year, and with good reason, considering it's easily the best song the record has to offer. But there is more beneath the surface level of the album's main single. Songs like Kids With Guns and Every Planet We Reach is Dead evoke the same sorts of desolate emotions that were in abundance on the previous record, and the MF Doom collaboration on November Has Come ALMOST makes up for the total lack of Del Tha Funkee Homosapien this time around. You can't quite call it more of the same, but you can't really call it a departure either. It's simply another weirdly listenable album from Albarn and his collaborators that's damn near impossible not to get attached to.

Key Tracks: Dirty Harry; Feel Good Inc.; Every Planet We Visit is Dead

33. Sigur Ros - Takk...

Sigur Ros has made its mint creating trancendentally minimalist music that primarily consists of vocalist Jon Thor Birgisson indecipherably chirping in Icelandic over etherial guitars and keys, and deconstructed percussion for around eight or nine minutes at a time. On Takk, none of the above has really changed radically, but there is certainly a bit more in the way of oomph to the music. The songs are unmistakable in style, but the crescendos come sooner and harder, and the rhythmic base goes more rock than ever before. Takk certainly has its moments of tranquility, but they're broken up more frequently by distorted guitars and crashy cymbal hits than ever before. It's almost as though the boys from Iceland sat down one day and came to the conclusion that they just wanted to rock--as much as they were capable of rocking, anyway. The newfound chutzpah gives the band a dynamic that it wasn't necessarily lacking previously, but is more than welcome all the same.

Key Tracks: Glosoli; Saeglopur; Milano

32. Weerd Science - Friends and Nervous Breakdowns

In between Coheed and Cambria records, drummer Josh Eppard apparently went and made a hip-hop album; and lo and behold, it's pretty goddamn great. Eppard's delivery is faster and more furious than your average white boy rapper, though also manages to avoid the trapping of just sounding like another angry Eminem wannabe. The subject matter often centers around the usual kinds of material found on a rap album--an underprivledged youth, aggressive posturing towards those who might have smack to talk, and whatnot. But all of it is brought to the table with believable skills and some serious heart. Certainly, Friends and Nervous Breakdowns has its moments of outlandishness. In Girl, Your Baby's Worm Food, he speaks at length about forceably aborting the fetus of an overly promiscuous ex-girlfriend, and in Blueprint, he instructs a female friend on how to put his broken body back together, piece by piece. As potentially offensive and off-kilter as such material can be, Eppard handles it well, and the tonal shifts between the quirky and the hip-hop standards, mixed with shockingly excellent beats make for an eclectic and surprisingly adept rap record.

Key Tracks: Conspiracy Theories Without Mel Gibson; Blueprint; In a City With No Name

31. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary

Don't adjust your stereos. Apologies to the Queen Mary is not a lost Modest Mouse album from the late 90's brought to light--it just sounds like one. Maybe that's because MM singer Issac Brock produced the record, or maybe it's just because the members of Wolf Parade seem so head over heels in love with the sorts of wobbily indie song structurings and high-pitched vocals that Modest Mouse practically coined back in the day. But this isn't just some bad soundalike. Wolf Parade is a talented group of musicians, and the songs do have their own unique qualities. Interjections of synth and piano lines along with periodic moments of heavy rocking counterbalance the more frequently oddball melodies and loosely woven deconstructionist indie pop sensibilities that make up much of the album. It's more than a little esoteric, but musically sound, and at times, near brilliant.

Key Tracks: You Are a Runner and I Am My Father's Son; Grounds For Divorce; Fancy Claps

That's all I can fit into one journal entry. Look for another installment soon.

Let the path to righteousness continue.

30. Doves - Some Cities

I won't confess to being much of a propponent of Doves' last album, The Last Broadcast. It had some fleeting moments of brilliance, but for the most part it read to me like a peppier, less engaging version of The Verve. Some Cities pretty much spun my opinion of the band around completely. It's not that the pep isn't still there, but lyrically and musically, it feels like it's actually backed up by something other than pure catchiness. The single, Black and White Town, is a perfect example of this. It's got an upbeat tempo and catchy guitar riffs, but the music itself has a richer, deeper texture to it. That same sentiment holds true from the opening title track, to the concluding lullaby, Ambition. Finally, a Doves album that actually warrants its given attention.

Key Tracks: Black and White Town; Snowden; The Storm

29. Franz Ferdinand - You Could Have it So Much Better

Franz Ferdinand's sophomore effort has, hands down, THE best one-two punch of opening tracks of any album this year. The Fallen's opening riff kicks the record into gear with absolute fury. So much so, that you might actually think that the band just went and made a straight ahead rock album. But then when the infectious dance groove of Do You Want To hits its stride, it becomes abundantly clear that what made the band so successful to begin with is front and center here. Admittedly, the album does trail off a bit from here. It's not that the remaining collection of tunes isn't completely solid and enjoyable, but nothing ever quite matches the energy and snappiness of those opening tracks. Still, songs like Eleanor, Put Your Boots On and Fade Together provide pretty, mellow counterbalances to the band's archetypal dance rock numbers, and taken as a whole, the album's just a lot of fun to listen to.

Key Tracks: The Fallen; Do You Want To; Eleanor, Put Your Boots On

28. Goldie Lookin' Chain - Straight Outta Newport

Between HP Sauce, Boddington's Ale, and Goldie Lookin' Chain, I'm now convinced that Justin Calvert actually knows what he's talking about (the whole soccer thing had me doubting him for a while there). A bunch of thickly accented British nutballs get together and make borderline unintelligible rap music. Film at 11. It'd be easy to just write off the concept altogether, but the thing of it is, these guys have personality, and it's a damn funny one. They're not quite up to the level of Licensed to Ill-era Beastie Boys or anything, but their bizarre characterizations, completely obscure slang and name-droppings, bargain-basement samples with ridiculously catchy hooks, and constant use of the f-word as a labored crutch when they're short a few syllables are all just too funny not to love. Purely for those who don't take their rap music too seriously, but highly enjoyable all the same.

Key Tracks: Guns Don't Kill People, Rappers Do; Half-Man Half-Machine; Your Mother's Got a Penis

27. The National - Alligator

It's tough to nail down the exact quality that make's The National's sound more intriguing than the average NYC wannabe garage band. There's a little bit of of Interpol's meloncholy rock mentality, a little bit of the Walkmen's penchant for writing harsh sounding ballads, and a little bit of late 80's U2. In no way is the band directly comparable to any single one of these aforementioned things, but again, its sound and style doesn't exactly fit into a neat and tidy comparison. All you need to know is that the lyrics are sharp, the music is pretty without degenerating into lackluster wailings, and every part of this band's package is tight and refined. Easily one of the most surprising albums of 2005.

Key Tracks: Karen; Val Jester; Mr. November

26. The Soviettes - LP III

The Soviettes are what would happen if Joan Jett's irrepressable tough chick persona got tossed in a rock tumbler with Sex Pistols or Hives (depending on which is more relevant to you and your particular generation) styled high-energy punk rock. It's female fronted punk that doesn't sound like another lousy Tilt or Distillers rip. There's plenty of three-chord rippers on this album, many of which often don't eclipse the two-minute mark, but shockingly enough, there's also quite a bit of melody and solid lyrical content on top of everything else. And in the rare moments when male vocals do cut in on the largely female-dominated singing, it isn't as jarring or detrimental as it probably ought to be, especially since the dude sounds like he's trying to do his best Johnny Rotten impersonation. The Soviettes transcend base level punk rock by a pretty wide margin, and this album, despite being the band's debut on the notoriously base Fat Wreck label, is entirely indicative of that fact.

Key Tracks: Multiply and Divide; Paranoia Cha-Cha-Cha; Middle of the Night

25. Yourcodenameis: Milo - Ignoto

I'm not sure if this album ever made it out in North America proper, so I'll probably need to do a copious amount of explanation here. Yourcodenameis: Milo is a UK indie band with something of a harder edge. It sounds sort of like a cross between Fugazi's later years, the At The Drive-In albums that came before Relationship of Command, and early Radiohead when they felt like rocking it a bit harder. There's more things you could compare it to, but those are the most obvious, and the most telling. Ignoto is a heck of a debut album, rarely striking a wrong chord tonally, and maintaining a constant sense that these guys are smarter than the average rock band. The whole record rocks, but it rocks in such creative ways that it's impossible to ignore what it accomplishes musically.

Key Tracks: I Am Connecting Flight; 17; The General

24. DJ Muggs vs. GZA - Grandmasters

I'm always wary of any album with the word "versus" in the title. It usually just smacks of bad remixes or lazy production. This album is nothing of the sort. In fact, I don't even get why this is treated as a competitive sort of thing. This is basically just another GZA solo album with Muggs production. It could have just as easily been GZA and Muggs on the cover, dressed as the Wonder Twins, shouting "form of an awesome rap record!" And that's really what this is. There's very little pretense here--well, outside of GZA's notoriously estoeric lyrics and constant references to chess. The beats, however, are almost ancient in design, but not in an archaic or irrelevant way. The loops are intentionally brief, and laid down in an entirely exquisite way. While Wu-Tang member solo albums tend to run hot and cold, and GZA's stuff in particular is pretty all over the map, Muggs' low-key production helps pull together his best album since Liquid Swords, and one that's arguably even better.

Key Tracks: Exploitation of Mistakes; Advance Pawns; Smothered Mate

23. Queens of the Stone Age - Lullabies to Paralyze

Everybody freaked out when Josh Homme kicked bass player and longtime contributor Nick Oliveri out of Queens of the Stone Age. Everyone automatically assumed at their next album would just suck. Yes, there is something about Lullabies to Paralyze that feels missing in comparison to the unfathomably good Songs for the Deaf--but it's not anything related to Oliveri's playing, the songwriting as a whole, or anything even close to it. It's the distinct lack of Dave Grohl's manically tight drumming. Them's the breaks when you maintain a revolving door of musicians, I suppose. Anyhow, despite the utter lack of Grohl-ness, Lullabies is another completely kick ass rock album with some psychadellically artistic undertones--just like pretty much every other QOTSA album. And this is one case where maintaining the status quo is very much a good thing.

Key Tracks: Everybody Knows That You're Insane; Burn The Witch; Skin on Skin

22. Coldplay - X & Y

I don't quite get the level of hate that got leveled at this record. Yeah, OK, it isn't exactly a giant step forward for the band. It sounds an awful lot like the same music they've put out before, and hell, I'll even grant you that the piano line and rhythmic base to Speed of Sound smacks of a rehashing of the piano line and rhythmic base to Clocks on the last record. All of these things said, this is still an incredibly listenable album. It's just a more produced, tighter installment of the sound that everybody was going completely ape%$#& over three years ago. I'm all for musical progression, but I'm not in favor of it JUST for the sake of being different, especially if you're still capable of delivering a familiar sound that's still really enjoyable, and hasn't gotten mundane yet. In the case of Coldplay, it hasn't yet.

Key Tracks: Square One; White Shadows; Talk

21. Broken Social Scene - Broken Social Scene

When I say to you that Broken Social Scene is made up of a collective of random Canadian musicians, your first thought is probably something like, "Oh, great, those jackasses from the Barenaked Ladies, Alanis Morrissette and Bruce Cockburn all formed like Voltron to create a gigantic cyborg's worth of crappy music." Or, at least, that's what I said. As it turns out, 15 different indie musicians from bands like Metric, Stars, Feist, and a bunch of other pretty damn good bands make up this supergroup, and the music is inexplicably good. It doesn't completely play like the sort of noisy, wanky, experimental nonsense such a band would usually make--yes, there are the occasional off moments of pure experimentalism--but largely, the songs here just sound like much more grandiose versions of the kinds of cool indie songs these people would already be making. It's almost orchestral in nature, and surprisingly captivating.

Key Tracks: Ibi Dreams of Pavement (A Better Day); 7/4 (Shoreline); Handjobs For the Holidays

That's all for now. More later.

Excelsior!

20. The Briefs - Steal Yer Heart

The Briefs make the kind of punk rock that makes you want to dance around like a damnedable idiot. In fact, most of the descriptors I used for The Soviettes apply here, too. The Briefs are a more consistent band, though, and on their fourth album, the guys have refined their sound to near punk-perfection. The energy is nearly blinding, and completely relentless as the foursome tears through each new tune. Sure, you'll get the occasional mid-tempo number like Getting Hit On at the Bank, but more often you're treated to manic energy on songs like Genital General and My Girl (Wants to be a Zombie). There's nothing overtly political or exceptionally meaningful about the brand of punk The Briefs play, but that sort of stuff would just get in the way of all the fun these guys are having.

Key Tracks: Genital General; Move Too Slow; Stuck On You

19. A Gun Called Tension - A Gun Called Tension

Everybody talked up the self-titled 13 and God album as the big expermentally weird indie/hip-hop album of 2005, but frankly I think that album was mostly overrated. If you ask me, A Gun Called Tension easily takes the crown as the best avant garde collaboration between seemingly incompatible artists across the indie rock and hip-hop planes. Former Murder City Devils and current Modest Mouse member Dan Gallucci and hip-hop MC Sean Reveron are the collaborators in question here. It's a deeply eclectic mixture of varying musical styles. Hip-hop beats, scratchy guitars and varying forms of rap and singing shoot across the album's horizon line at one time or another. One minute Reveron is flowing straightforwardly across a bouncy beat, and the next he's practically singing on a song that sounds more well suited to Modest Mouse's catalog. Guest spots by the likes of Roots Manuva, former Murder City Devils vocalist Spencer Moody, and Pretty Girls Make Graves' Andrea Zollo add to the scattershot nature of the record, but only in purely positive ways. It's not quite indie rock, and it's not quite hip-hop. The term "indie-hop" makes me kind of want to throw up in my mouth a little bit, so let's just split the difference and call it extremely cool, shall we?

Key Tracks: Gold Fronts; Electric Chair; Document

18. Billy Corgan - The Future Embrace

Apparently Billy Corgan's kind of pissed off these days, or at least just really, really mopey. The Future Embrance, the former Smashing Pumpkins and Zwan frontman's first solo album, is a pretty clear venting of all that sullen emotion and sour grapes. But rather than just scream it out ala his rock days, Corgan retreats back to the sort of gothic electro of Depeche Mode and New Order's heyday. And he does it with the deftness and talent of a seasoned veteran of the genre. The beats take on a decidedly mechanized tone throughout the record, adding the pulse to a stream of neverending synthesizers and heavily distorted guitars that sound straight out of David Gahan's basement studio. Lyrically, the album can either be viewed as beautiful or whiny, depending on your predilection, but while it does clearly wear thin in a few spots, there's so much beauty to the record as a whole that those scant overindulgences are easily forgiven.

Key Tracks: Mina Loy (M.O.H.); The Cameraeye; DIA

17. Fort Minor - The Rising Tied

If enjoyment of Linkin Park is a guilty pleasure of mine, then my enjoyment of Fort Minor must be that horrible, unutterable secret that you wouldn't confess with a three hundred pound man standing on your sack with a flaming shoe. OK, maybe that's a bit extreme, but I do find my love of this album completely perplexing. It should suck. Mike Shinoda, bless his heart, isn't exactly the most adept MC out there. Yet somehow he absolutely shines through on this largely self-produced, instrumentalized and mixed album. He gets plenty of assistance from the members of Styles of Beyond, as well as some other guests like Common, Black Thought, and LP DJ Mr. Hahn, but largely this is Shinoda's show, and he shows a truly unique production style with his styles of beats and samples. And he even manages to sound like a better rapper than he probably has any right to be. File this one under completely out of left field.

Key Tracks: Remember The Name; Right Now; Back Home

16. Matt Pond PA - Several Arrows Later

There's a sort of sincerity to Matt Pond PA's music that's just cloying when it comes from other bands. But from this band, it comes across as thoroughly charming. Basically a modern interpretation of the sort of music Wes Anderson frequently puts on his film's soundtracks, Several Arrows Later represents the band's most accomplished work; an album of attractive songs that move from one to another with almost effortless flow. The catchy acoustic rhythms are complimented wonderfully by the band's string duo, and Pond's sometimes witty, sometimes mournful and always enjoyable lyrics. It's not the most easily marketable thing in the world, since it's tough to really pick out any big, "single" among the bunch, but as a pure start-to-finish album, Several Arrows Later gets it completely right.

Key Tracks: Halloween; The Trees and the Wild; From Debris

15. Beck - Guero

Beck's last album of purely meloncholy acoustic tunes was exactly the kind of departure that critics tend to fall in love with, and fans get huffy about, since it's not what they came to know and love over the years. Guero is precisely the kind of return to form that critics bemoan as a silly step backward, and fans proclaim to fall in love with, only to suddenly get bored with because it's not "different enough." Whatever. I'll take Beck in either classic or moody form, and Guero works just great for me. He's back doing the sorts of goofy, glitchy, hip-hoppy numbers that made him famous, and I don't think it sounds one bit forced. It just sounds to me like Beck got over the whole ex-girlfriend thing, and felt like making his special brand of music again--getting the Dust Brothers back certainly didn't hurt. Yes please thank you many much excellent.

Key Tracks: E-Pro; Hell Yes; Go it Alone

14. Coheed and Cambria - Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV

Coheed and Cambria is totally the modern musical generation's answer to Rush; and I'm not just saying that because the lead singer sounds a bunch like Geddy Lee. It's because this band can somehow take a mind-boggling esoteric songwriting saga, attempt to spread it across something like four different albums, and yet still make a single album's worth of material with songs that are individually completely listenable. Definitely more prog-metal happy than their last release, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3, Good Apollo rocks your balls off while still maintaining the complex songwriting concepts found previously. It's equal parts Greek tragedy, space opera, and Rush's 2112 album. Everything on this record is epic with a capital E, P, I and C. Pretentious, certainly, but rocking, absolutely.

Key Tracks: Always and Never; Ten Speed (of God's Blood and Burial); Apollo 1: The Writing Writer

13. The Bravery - The Bravery

Yes, OK, fine, the guys in The Bravery probably owe The Killers about half of whatever they made off this album, but I also kind of don't give a crap. For as largely unoriginal, goofy and simplistic as this album is, it's also one of the most purely catchy records released this year. It's like a bunch of kids sat around, listening to as many Cure and Duran Duran albums as they could, and said "OK, let's do that!" And strangely enough, it works. Vocalist Sam Endicott's style emulates that sort of pained English-by-way-of-NYC moan with startling enthusiasm, and the music itself is the stuff of 80's synth pop haters' nightmares. As an unapologetic enthusiast of pop music at large, I can't help but grin every time I listen to this one.

Key Tracks: An Honest Mistake; Tyrant; Unconditional

12. Death Cab For Cutie - Plans

Certainly not my favorite Death Cab For Cutie album of all time, but even a slightly off Death Cab record is usually about a dozen and a half times better than the average crap most bands put out. Plans is interesting in that it doesn't reinvent the wheel that the band has been rolling on lo these many years, but at the same time, feels like a progression of some fashion. It permeates the lyrics, the instrumentations, and even the production--everything is just a bit cleaner, a bit tighter, and a bit more toned down. No, it's not the major label's fault--it's called maturity, and while Death Cab's music has been nothing if not mature throughout its career, Plans plays like a plateauing of that maturity. This feels like as far as Death Cab can go maintaining this same precise brand of emotionally charged indie pop it always has. And while the next record could concievably suffer if the band doesn't try a little something new, Plans is a perfect plateau. It strikes plenty of pretty chords as singer Ben Gibbard laments with his usual poetic charms. This album, taken exclusively for what it is, is excellent. Next time? Well, we'll see.

Key Tracks: Soul Meets Body; Summer Skin; Brothers on a Hotel Bed

11. Kanye West - Late Registration

Apparently I'm decidedly late to the Kanye West party, in that I wasn't really overly familiar with him at all until this album, and the first big single, Diamonds From Sierra Leone, was released. All I knew was that he had something to do with Jay-Z. D'oh. Honestly, there's really very little creativity in mainstream rap these days, and Late Registration is one of the most creative, bizarre and inexplicably listenable rap albums I've caught in years. Kanye's flow isn't exactly original in and of itself, but his writing is thought provoking and clever, and the beats and samples are dope as hell. Plus, the man really knows how to write a good hook ("We want pre-nup!" anyone?). Of course, all that great production is half due to previous Eels and Aimee Mann collaborator Jon Brion, who evidently coproduced much of the album. Kooky pairing, but it gives the set an intensely intriguing dynamic. Whatever you might think of his political stances, there's no denying the man's talent.

Key Tracks: Touch The Sky; Drive Slow; Diamonds From Sierra Leone (Remix, featuring Jay-Z)

Tomorrow...the top 10!

This is it folks, the thing eight of you have been waiting for. My top 10 albums of 2005. Let's do this.

10. The Game - The Documentary

Everyone talked up 50 Cent's Aftermath debut as the big debut rap LP of the last several years. I'd argue that The Game's Documentary is five times as good, and ten times more impactful. The Game is just a pure, unadulterated talent. His flows are matched by few in the mainstream rap world, and the production by a host of producers from Kanye West to Just Blaze give the album a unique and varied sound that doesn't just sound like it's biting off the rest of what's out there. If the album has any specific flaw, it's that it's got just a bit too much of 50 Cent's presence on it--but given the marketing blitz behind the album, billing Game as a member of G-Unit. Guess we won't have to worry about that next time around, will we? Anyhow, this is a fantastic all around debut, and hopefully a great sign of things to come.

Key Tracks: Dreams; Church For Thugs; The Documentary

9. The Mars Volta - Frances The Mute

Frances The Mute may only feature five principal tracks, normally qualifying it for EP status, but considering that it clocks in at around 76 minutes, this is most definitely a full-fledged album. A fitting contrast given the band's nature, that of crafting completely ape%$#& instrumentations that run the gamut from standard progressive indie rock to completely avant garde jazz formulas. Brevity is not a gift the band possesses, but controlled musical fury is. The five songs on this album run so hot and cold, so fast and mellow, that it can be extremely jarring to try and follow the whole thing along. But dammit if you don't want to try. Equal parts Coheed and Cambria and Miles Davis' *****es Brew album, Frances The Mute is just a superb piece of work.

Key Tracks: Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus; Via l'Viaquez; Cassandra Geminni

8. Thunderbirds Are Now! - Justamustache

My love of this album is largely unexplainable. I can't go out on a limb and say it's really special, exactly, since Thunderbirds Are Now! largely play the same sorts of synth-heavy indie rock that roughly half the musical landscape is doing these days. But dammit, this album just has SOMETHING about it that strikes me the right way. Part of it, I'm convinced, is the pure energy of it all. These guys know how to rock it, yet still maintain a danceable aesthetic. Not to mention that every song on the album is super catchy, in ways that beg to get stuck in your head for a very, very long time after your first listen. So, yeah, that's as much explanation as I can cull together. Basically, it just rules.

Key Tracks: Eat This City; 198090; Enough About Me, Let's Talk About Me

7. Chemical Brothers - Push The Button

It occurred to me as I began to write this that really, the Chemical Brothers have never made a bad album. In fact, if anything, their consistency is astounding considering the amount of sonic experimentation the twosome has done over the years. Push The Button is yet another triumph in this regard; it showcases the Brothers Chemical's knack for eclecticness, while at the same time creating enough danceable grooves and sickeningly catchy hooks to keep you listening from beginning to end. Collaborations are frequent and enjoyable. Q-Tip climbs up from whatever intellectual hip-hop hole he's been living in to drop vocals on the opening track, Galvanize, while Bloc Party frontman Keke Okereke wails along to the exceedingly bouncy Believe. But as usual, the Brothers are at their absolute best when creating intrumental numbers that transcend the need for vocals, and there's several of them here. Their best album? Probably not, but considering how closely all of them run together, it might as well be.

Key Tracks: Galvanize; Hold Tight London; Marvo Ging

6. Minus The Bear - Menos El Oso

For a time there, Minus The Bear was known better for its oddball song titles (Monkey!! Knife!! Fight!!; Absinthe Party at the Fly Honey Warehouse; Booyah Achieved) than its music. The band's relatively innocuous math rock sounds, while reasonably goofy lyrically, never quite meshed up with the titles. On Menos El Oso, Minus The Bear grows up. The quirky nature of the music finally comes together into a whole album very much worth listening to. Think, if you will, of a combination between Soul Coughing, early Death Cab For Cutie, middle-era Talking Heads, just a pinch of Fugazi for flavor, and what the hell, a little bit of Cake too. It's kind of a dizzying thing to take in all at once, but Menos El Oso has a kind of methodical flow to it that instantly puts you at ease, even when it's rocking its hardest. Vocalist Jake Snider's voice is instantly soothing, and the relatively relaxed instrumentations suck you in even deeper into the breezy mood of the album. It's interesting, alluring and rocking all at once, and shows that there's more to this band than clever song titles.

Key Tracks: The Game Needed Me; El Torrente; Pachuca Sunrise

5. Danger Doom - The Mouse and the Mask

If you asked me before I heard The Mouse and the Mask what I'd think of a collaboration between DJ Danger Mouse, MF Doom and Adult Swim cartoon characters, I'd have probably hit you in the face. As of today, I'd be apologizing and buying you a nice sandwich. This album is simply phenomenal. Danger Mouse, known best for his mash-up of Jay-Z and The Beatles on The Grey Album, delivers his tightest beats yet while underground hip-hop fave MF Doom does his thing just as good as he always have. And that's the insane thing--despite the constant (yet thoroughly unobtrusive) presence of the likes of Master Shake and Brak, the album never takes on the tone of some kind of inspid cartoon tribute album, or a bad work of marketing. Sure, Doom name drops Harvey Birdman here and there, and he does do a whole song about the Aqua Teen Hunger Force, but mostly he's just flowing like he always does (and it's not like his raps haven't taken on a decidedly cartoonish nature in the past). Guest spots by Ghostface and Taleb Kweli just make the whole thing all the more ludicrous. The Adult Swim crew is kept to downright hysterical segues, skits and occasional interjections, leaving the rapping to the people who know what they're doing. The result is one of the most oddly captivating collaborative rap albums of the last decade.

Key Tracks: El Chupa Nibre; The Mask; Benzie Box; A.T.H.F.; No Names (Black Debbi)

4. Alkaline Trio - Crimson

It's not quite punk, it's not quite indie, but it's all the way awesome. Alkaline Trio is known for its brand of emotionally charged indie rock--the brand the Killers stuck a synthesizer over and pretended they made up. Well, they didn't. Granted, the Killers also never opted to take it quite to the extremes that Alkaline Trio does. Every song is a blood and alcohol soaked elegy to lost love, lost life and all around losing. Wait, hold up, put down the black lipstick and ripped Joy Division t-shirt--it's not all that bad. To counterbalance the mournful nature of the music, straight ahead three-chord punk guitars and fast as lightning drums give the music the energy it needs to stay out of any sort of funk. Crimson is, if anything, the poppiest record the band has ever made, although that term is somewhat relative given the downtrodden nature of some of the past efforts. But the sing-along worthy melodies, combustable power chords, and occasional use of legitimately pretty piano lines come together into a fantastic adventure through more angsty metaphors than you can shake a whisky bottle at.

Key Tracks: Time to Waste; Burn; Sadie; Back to Hell; Smoke

3. Team Sleep - Team Sleep

Like I said, I'm a sucker for anything the Deftones put out--even when it isn't actually them. Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno's electronically experimental side project has been years in the making (so many, that I had a bootlegged unmastered version of the album all the way back in 2002--and before anyone complains, YES, I did buy the final product when it came out) but all that time and effort pays serious dividends on Team Sleep's self-titled debut. Think about the occasional off Deftones songs like Teenager and Lucky You, then spread them across an entire album's worth of dreamy beats, debonair vocals and periodic moments of fury. There are times when this album goes straight up Deftones (Blvd. Nights, Your Skull is Red), but even more where it veers into completely uncharted electronic territory. Moreno's vocals rarely go above a wail, even at the album's peak of rockingness. You can tell he's entirely too transfixed by the comeliness of DJ Crook's uniquely layered beats and Todd Wilkinson's decidedly indie-ish guitar playing to screech note one. Even at its weirdest, Team Sleep never flies off the rails. It threatens to on multiple occasions, but Moreno and Wilkinson's direction pulls the reins back in each and every time, creating one of the few side projects that nearly surpasses the original band in practically every respect.

Key Tracks: Ever (Foreign Flag); Blvd. Nights; Ever Since WWI; King Diamond; Live From The Stage

2. Bloc Party - Silent Alarm

For some reason, when Bloc Party's debut album hit earlier this year, I went specifically out of my way to avoid it. I was on some kind of anti-next-big-thing kick, and refused to listen to any band with any amount of music industry buzz surrounding it. I really must learn to stop doing that, because I nearly missed out on one of the most effervescent rock records of recent memory. Bloc Party evokes memories of UK bands past, like U2, The Cure and The Clash. Throughout the record, singler Keke Okereke wails like Robert Smith and Mick Jones' hyperactive love child, and the rest of the band backs up his frantic energy with guitars and drums that nearly surpass even his manic persona. It's not all machine-gun style indie rock, though. Silent Alarm's quieter moments are equally effective, showing the band's gift for creating melodic ballads with just as much charge as the speedier and dancier material. Of course, Bloc Party has its leftist political edge, and more than a few allusions are made toward the war on terror and Bushism. But regardless of where your politics lie, the music transcends any one specific message, and is simply undeniable in its charm.

Key Tracks: Like Eating Glass; Helicopter; Banquet; Luno; Plans

1. ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - Worlds Apart

You're got to either loathe or love and album that begins with a minute long choral opus, complete with banging tympanis, dramatic strings and indecipherable lyrics. There's no middle-of-the-road reaction you can have to something like that. Trail of Dead has never really been much of a middle-of-the-road band, either. Even well before their much acclaimed Source Tags & Codes, the group has given it its all, throwing body and instrument all around the stage in rage-induced stupors, creating some of the most frighteningly entertaining stage shows on the indie rock circuit. Worlds Apart is the band's most impressive work to date. Not that you could exactly call any of the previous material "safe," exactly, but Worlds Apart eschews the more straight ahead nature of previous albums for the sorts of epic progressive structurings that can either make or break a band. Tonally, the album is all over the map. You get everything from musings on post 9/11 politics to the evils of MTV's Cribs. And there's never a dull moment with the music, as it herks and jerks between Mellon Collie-era Smashing Pumpkins brands of rock to interludes of violin waltzes. But through it all, the band remains very much itself. They shriek, they wail, and they bang their instruments as hard as they possibly can, all the way through to the almost post-coital cooldown of the album's final track, City of Refuge. It's easily the most ambitious rock record of the year, and in my humble opinion, simply the best.

Key Tracks: Would You Smile Again?; Worlds Apart; Summer of '91; Caterwaul; Classic Art Showcase

Well, that's the list. Hopefully you've all got some music to listen to now. And if not, then why the hell were you even reading this thing? Get to your nearest iTunes music store and get crackin', kid