The City Veins

I think that we spend a lot of time looking for the next new thing in music these days. I don’t have a problem with this tendency, in fact I hope to be the next new thing at some point. That said, I think it is good to look back and find things that were overlooked.

For example, I had heard a lot about Dinosaur Jr. for years, but I didn’t really start listening to them until a few months ago, and let me say that “You’re Living All Over Me” is a pretty awesome album. The songs are really good, but more than that, the album just sounds fantastic. It creates a world of its own. I have always wished I could pull that off with a recording.

I was looking over all of these top album lists from 2005. At the time, I agreed with most of the selections, and I still agree with a lot of them, but now I find the omission of Lee Ann Womack’s “There’s More Where That Came From” to be criminal. It has become one of my favorite albums of the decade. It is touching and witty in the ways the country music is supposed to be. It has humor and tragedy, and fantastic songs. It is pretty much a perfect album.

By the way, 2005 was a pretty great year for music. You have Spoon’s “Gimme Fiction,” Hold Steady’s “Separation Sunday,” “Apologies to Queen Mary,” “Illinoise,” John Legend’s “Get Lifted” and Kanye’s “Late Registration.” That is nuts.