A different look at 2008 in music

(Been looking through the 'Draft' pile on my blog for stuff that I abandoned. This one's a little overdue, but, as always, I'm looking to get all of you out of your staid 'whatever's-on-the-radio-that's-what-I'll-listen-to'. Remember, the people want what the people get. That's not good - that's not how greatness is revealed to us.

Damnit.)

I've decided that I'm not going to do a traditional "Best of 2008" in music for a simple reason - I didn't buy Dear Science by TV on the Radio and therefore won't have a number one pick.

What I am going to do instead is do a "Top Albums, Acts or Styles" that I became aware of this year, regardless of date of issue. Also, I'm going to do a "Top Albums, Acts or Styles" that I re-acquainted myself with this year.

Things I discovered a love for the first time this year

• Bishop Allen
• African music
• Le mystere des voix bulgares
• Ornette Coleman
• Sonny Rollins
• Off the Coast of Me and Fresh Fruit in Foreign Places- Kid Creole and the Coconuts
• The Style Council
• Mario Biondi and the High Five Quintet
• Forever Breathes the Lonely Word - Felt
• Tommy: The Wedding Present 1985-1987 - The Wedding Present

Things I rediscovered a love for this year

• Off the Wall - Michael Jackson - kicks Thriller's ass any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
  
• The Rolling Stones' 1980s studio work - OK, forget "Start Me Up" (wait, we can't - it's encoded on our DNA) - but the rest of these 4 albums make a case for working waaay past what society might think are your "valid" years.
  
• Radio KAOS - Roger Waters - Waters got the conceptual stuff in the Pink Floyd divorce of the 1980s and Gilmour got the musicality. But this one has a good deal of interesting melodies to go along with the story. If you jumped off (a building) after hearing The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking, dust it off and try this overlooked album from 1987, the year closest to the awesomeness that is 1984.
  
• Gold, Volume One - The Bee Gees - my very first vinyl album. Dad got it for me. Dad would go on every year to Jimmy's Music World, then The Wiz and finally Tower Records (4th and Broadway - we miss you, stah!) to bravely ask for the increasingly outlandish shit I would ask for. I owe him huge for 1983, when he had to get me The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway and Abacab. Hope 2 grandkids are enough.
  
• Mid-period Genesis (as well as Phil Collins' output from that time) - 1976-1982 for the band (stop before 1983's Genesis, please) and the first three solo Phil joints.
  
• Brighten the Corners - Pavement. Along with Yo La Tengo's I Can Feel the Heart Beating as One, the album that brought me back to music with a vengeance in 1997. I will personally guarantee your money on these two.