We did it! And by we I mean I, though your contribution was no small feat. You read all of these, or not. And you read all the reviews all year. Or not. I don’t really look at the metrics so I’m not completely sure. I’m just going to go ahead and just assume that everyone loved every one of these posts all year and it’s just that the comment button was broken.
For me personally December was a good month finishing up a very good year. I was lucky enough to have a significant chunk of downtime between Christmas and New Year’s day. Going back to work didn’t feel bad. I had lovely times with family and a focus on being cozy that I fulfilled for the most part.
Having everyone home and not doing my normal things like commuting or work road trips made it hard to stay on top of the album of the day and I almost didn’t make it a couple of times when I had to sequester myself somewhere and listen to like a Blink-182 album. “Dad is doing his influencing,” I had to say. But since my kids are teenagers they didn’t hear me because they were listening to Youtubers.
Anyway, this post feels kind of weird because this whole experiment is over and because I don’t know what I’m going to do next. I don’t know what I will do with this Substack, but I’ve decided that at least I will no longer monetize it. From this blog I was able to afford at least one new record every month. I ended up getting a few extra albums beyond the monthly one. Check out this haul:
Anyway I can’t think of any way to put it than this was a success and I thank you all deeply. Also many of you helped me raise money in October for Domestic Violence Awareness month and in my family’s sponsorship of a refugee family from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The music was fun, the records lovely, but the part I won’t forget is all the things we were able to do together in 2023. Hoping there’s more where that came from in ‘24!
Here’s my favorite 5:
Mitski, Be The Cowboy
Last month Mitski’s Laurel Hell made the top five because it was so good and her now-classic 2018 opus Be the Cowboy is also good. I don’t know why I didn’t pick this as the top album, to be honest. I mean I like the one I picked but this was a total oversight. What the heck I’m kind of mad.
Bif Naked, I Bificus
This was the last album I listened to in 2023, and after 374 albums back to back to back I was still able to feel awe. I’m grateful for this. Bif Naked has such a cool sound and I just know I would have been obsessed with her if I’d discovered her in the 90s. I know that because I’m obsessed now. Rock-solid 90s rock with unique vocals. No skips.
Misfits, Walk Among US
This year I’ve listened to a lot of seminal punk albums, many of them debuts. Some of them are like proto-punk stuff. Not punk by any modern standards but it is at least surmised that punk wouldn’t have existed without them. That’s not what we’re dealing with here. This is punk-ass punk. It’s not trying to do anything else and why should it be? Sometimes what you want is Misfits and nobody does Misfits better than Misfits.
Aretha Franklin, Young, Gifted and Black
This is the third album by Franklin I listened to and I’ve loved them all. What’s funny is that right now I’m typing this and “Respect” is playing during a football commercial break. Why is that funny? I’m not sure. Aretha Franklin is super good and I love her.
Cocteau Twins, Heaven or Las Vegas
This is the one I bought and it’s great. It sounds incredible on my home stereo. This is another album, similar to Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love, that I would have absolutely devoured as a teen. Maybe the biggest thing I’ve taken away from this whole experiment is filling in gaps that young me never got around to listening to. Fifteen year old me is still inside 45 year old me and the lucky thing is I get to keep listening to music for another few decades, I hope. So it will all work out.
From the Vault:
This is my last post of the whole thing and I’m not going to overthink it. I’ll go with one of the first records I got last year when I got a record player in the first place. And that’s Jim Croce’s You Don’t Mess Around With Jim. Because for a while we only had a handful of records, I listened to this one a lot last year. But even with a much-grown (again, thanks to you all) collection, this one gets a ton of play. I can’t read a single word about Jim Croce without wanting to cry. Such a talent, what a songwriter, what incredible production.
Croce played around with music without fully committing until his son was born. When he decided to really buckle down and make it a career. He signed with ABC Records and recorded this record in 4 weeks for $18k. It went on to stay 93 weeks on the charts. Many of those, unfortunately, came after his death in a plane crash at the end of his tour. Shortly before, he had written a letter to his wife saying he wanted to stop touring, settle down, and write screenplays.
I wish we’d gotten the screenplays. In just a few years, Croce created so many enduring characters who I think about all the time. The titular Jim, of course. Slim; Bad, Bad Leroy Brown; Tuffy the roller derby queen; Rapid Roy the stock car boy; and terror of the highways Speedball Tucker. It’s a veritable MCU level of epic characters created over just two years and three albums. I want to know who would have won a fight between Slim and Leroy. Would either hold a candle against the ‘fridgerator with a head Spike? Who would win a race between Roy and Tucker?
We’ll never know and dangit that bums me out.
Super stoked that Cocteau Twins made it into the Top 5. Treasure is my fave, but might just be because that's the first album I heard by them. One of those albums where I will never forget where I was when I heard it the first time. Glad you loved it!! What a fun year it was to read all your reviews!
We actually sang Jim Croce's songs in choir when I was in 6th grade in Wyoming. I was a big fan! My best friend and I would roller skate to his music ( stacked 45's on her record player, in her basement, when I was even younger. Definitely a sublime pick! Thank you for this past year!