My Musical Recap of 2007, Pt. 1: Favorite Albums

I've been putting off this post for a while now, not because I didn't find a lot of music that I enjoyed this past year. More because I knew there would be a lot to write and that was kind of imposing. In the end I decided to break it up into sections, for my benefit and yours.

One nice thing that I saw on a lot of musical "Best ofs" for 2007 was that the music was there available for your listening in the article. So I did my best to go out to YouTube and find most of the songs that I wanted to mention in this list. I couldn't quite find all of them, but it was surprising how many of them I could find. And it was also surprising to realize how long its been since I watched a music video. As far as I can tell the M in MTV stands for "next top Model" since that is all that is ever on that channel when I surf past it in search of something to watch. It was also interesting to find that some of the songs were made available by someone other than the artist or record label, and basically as audio-only videos. Just the song playing with a picture of the album cover showing. Its an interesting time that we live in.

Anyway, I wanted to start out by first mentioning a couple albums that I enjoyed a lot this past year, and then move on to individual songs. And as before, these albums and songs may or may not have been released in 2007, but thats when they came to my attention. So if you are upset that I include something thats a little bit old, I can't really go back in time and "discover" that song back then, so I might as well enjoy it now, right? Without further ado and in no particular order...

Top Albums of 2007

1. Minutes to Midnight - Linkin Park

If you read this blog, you'll know that I'm a big fan of Fort Minor, side project of LP member Mike Shinoda. This is the first LP album since Mike got Fort Minor up and running and there are a couple tracks on this album that are very Fort Minor-ish. At the same time, this album also has some songs that feel like traditional LP, and some that are harder than their other stuff, and some that are very much adult contemporary in sound. So while there's not a real consistent feel to the album, I thought there were a lot of good songs and I really enjoyed the album.

2. Paper Walls - Yellowcard

In addition to being a big Linkin Park fan, Yellowcard is another favorite band of mine. Their previous album, Lights and Sounds, I didn't enjoy as well as their break-out album Ocean Avenue, and while I didn't enjoy Paper Walls quite as much as Ocean Avenue, I thought it was definitely a step up from Lights and Sounds. If you liked Ocean Avenue, its definitely worth checking out.

3. Commitment - Lucky Boys Confusion

This album came out a few years ago, but if you're like me, you may have never heard of this band. They play what amounts to rock music, but this album doesn't quite fit nicely into that genre for me. Its hard for me to say exactly what I like about them, but I'll put a couple songs from them in the songs section and you can check them out.

4. As Cruel As School Children - Gym Class Heroes

If you've heard of these guys, it was likely their song "Cupid's Chokehold" that featured a chorus from "Breakfast in America" by Supertramp ("Take a look at my girlfriend. She the only one I got. Not much of a girlfriend. Never seem to get a lot.") Or you may be familiar with the songs "Clothes Off!". Anyway, basically their lead singer raps over live instruments and I thought this was a fun album. Kind of chill hip-hop that's not exactly dance music, but good for listening to in the car.

5. Infinity on High - Fall Out Boy

F.O.B. once again put out an album that is growing on me and producing lots of hit singles. They do a good job of standing out from the large (and always getting larger) crowd of emo bands. And they make good songs to back up their quirky song titles. My hat's off to them.

This ends part one of my 2007 musical favorites. Still lots more to come. Stay tuned.