Inside the inner circle, body to body with all my new best friends.

Here’s my personal selections of the music albums not to miss from 2008. I would be wearing them out except that of course they are on an ipod instead of vinyl/tape/cd. I would say it is guaranteed to make you younger to listen to new music instead of the same stuff you’ve listened to since the 80s, but since I have too many friends that are lawyers, I’ll only imply it instead. Here goes:

The Last Shadow Puppets – The Age Of The Understatement
Rue Royale – Rue Royale (cd is out of print already but mp3s are easily found – that’s indie music for you)
Glasvegas – Glasvegas
Darker My Love – 2
The Stills – Oceans Will Rise
Does It Offend You, Yeah? – You Have No Idea What You’re Getting Yourself Into
The Republic Tigers – Keep Color
Elbow – The Seldom Seen Kid
British Sea Power – Do You Like Rock Music?
Sneaky Sound System – 2 (only legally available in Australia)
Nine Inch Nails – The Slip
Coldplay – Viva La Vida or Death And All His Friends
Bloc Party – Intimacy
UNKLE – End Titles… Stories For Film
The Whip – X Marks Destination
Cut Copy – In Ghost Colours
CruelBlackDove – Full Powers (only available through the band’s website)
The Black Angels – Directions To See A Ghost
Oasis – Dig Out Your Soul
DeVotchKa – A Mad & Faithful Telling (try putting this one in a genre)
UNKLE – End Titles… Redux

And for the uninitiated, to listen to any of this, try searching on google for the artist name plus the keyword “myspace”. Every band nowadays has a MySpace page where they have full songs available to listen to through your web browser.

Enjoy!

I’m outside Club Dada in Dallas waiting to get in to see Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, but the fire marshals have closed the doors. They are holding another show at 12:30 so we are waiting around outside. While we waited, Robert played outside on the street for us!  The picture is a bit dark, but its taken with my no-flash iPhone.

Okay – most of the bands that seemed cool with their first release didn’t do so hot on their second album. The Killers vol 2 was awful. Bloc Party vol 2 was not so good. Kaiser Chiefs vol 2 was ok. But Editors on the other hand have improved on their first album that I liked so much. I can’t help but hear echoes of Edge-like guitar anthems ringing through wide open spaces… So if you are down on this new generation of bands, check out this new Editors album for yourself.