So making the local year-end list sort of depressed me a little bit. There were only two good albums released locally in my opinion, and one of them is a band from Duluth. I was thinking about the not-too-distant past when we had classic albums by Lifter Puller, A Whisper in the Noise, 12Rods, Tiki Obmar, Mr Projectile, Kid Dakota, and The Plastic Constellations, just to name a few. Sure some of those have broken up or moved to another city, but the magic isn't gone, it just didn't happen as much this year. Brother Ali has an album in the works. Next year's TPC pwns for the most part. Cepia still hasn't made an full-length. Ryan Olcott has a something going on; I've heard him play a couple tracks and it's ridiculously good. So in spite of the dubious honor of being the home of Fitzgerald and Har Mar, it's still not a bad town for music, even if Tapes n Tapes and Heiruspecs are supposed to be the hot acts (that's just a little embarassing).
On to the geekery! I have made a very scientific list of what the best areas for music for 2005, based on my top 80. I have the areas split in to arbitrary political borders. My formula is basically population per album, weighted for how good the albums are, and set to a curve with the top location getting a score of 1. I limited the list to locations with more than one album on the list. Sorry, Boston! So it turns out Minnesota's not that bad when you factor in population.
Countries
Comments (5)
boston bands don't get signed. there are so many colleges that there is a pretty good scene, but once people graduate they move to New York if they take it seriously.
Dropkick Murphy's Tessie is the best baseball music in awhile.
Posted by zakcq | December 24, 2005 3:31 PM
Posted on December 24, 2005 15:31
Oh c'mon! Boston's given us some of the best bands of the last 20 years! Karate, The Pernice Brothers, Dinosaur Jr, Isis. Soltero's not bad. And let's not forget Aerosmith..... er....
Posted by ryan | December 24, 2005 11:53 PM
Posted on December 24, 2005 23:53
So you didn't like the Pernice Brothers record this year? Or somehow didn't hear it? I really like it; it'll be at or near the top of my list. And I think I'll listen to it right now.
Posted by TL | December 26, 2005 4:22 PM
Posted on December 26, 2005 16:22
yeah there was something about it that felt way off to me. like a different songwriter or a drum machine or something.
Posted by ryan | December 26, 2005 11:40 PM
Posted on December 26, 2005 23:40
Way cool! (Seattle is such a ripoff of the Twin Cities, though.)
--------Posted by LEE | December 31, 2005 1:30 AM
Posted on December 31, 2005 01:30