Thursday, December 03, 2015

Best Albums of 2015 (and lots of rabbit hole links)

It's time for "best of" lists. Here's my best albums list for 2015, with a bit of commentary.

1. El Vy--Return to the Moon (The National won't have an album until 2017, this will hold me over)
2. Calexico--Edge of the Sun (important in our refugee and immigration conversation, here's a guide to every song on the album)
3. Kamasi Washington--The Epic (a best-selling three CD jazz album)
4. Kidz Bop--30 (the family favorite)
5. Jamie xx (I can't get enough of the beats)




6. Palehound--Dry Food
7. Courtney Barnett--Sometimes I Sit and Think and Sometimes I Just Sit (Courtney and Palehand are my favorite car albums)
8. Wilco--Star Wars (coolest release ever, releasing for free, similar to Miley Cyrus, whose album was also free and wild)
9. Sufjan Stevens--Carrie and Lowell (I bought it on tape!)
10. Sleater-Kinney--No Cities to Love (these are the queens of rock)
11. Wavves/Cloud Nothings--No Life for Me (Cloud Nothings play an important role in a work of theology this year, Catherine Kellers Cloud of the Impossible).




12. Kathryn Stott and Yo-Yo Ma--Songs from the Arc of Life
13. Mark Ronson--Uptown Special (my favorite novelist, Michael Chabon, wrote the lyrics)




14. Jack Ü (Skrillex and Diplo get together)
15. Mbongwana Stars--From Kinshasa
16. D'Angelo--Black Messiah (December 20
14, but amazing)
17. Chris Potter--Imaginary Cities



18. Vijay Iyer--Break Stuff
19. Bad Plus and Joshua Redman
20. Jack DeJohnette--Made in Chicago
21. Wild Card--Organic Riot
22. Alexander von Schlippenbach Trio--Features
23. Fred Hersch--Solo
24. Godspeed You! Black Emperor--Asunder, Sweet, and Other Disasters
25. Shovels and Rope--Busted Jukebox #1


And the album I haven't heard yet but am hoping for for Christmas is Joanna Newsom's Divers.

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