1. The Indelicates – David Koresh Superstar
2. Destroyer – Kaputt
3. Radiohead – The King of Limbs
4. Elbow – Build a Rocket Boys!
5. PJ Harvey – Let England Shake
6. Marissa Nadler – Marissa Nadler
7. The Twilight Singers – Dynamite Steps
8. British Sea Power – Valhalla Dancehall
9. Luke Haines – 9 1/2 Psychedelic Meditations On British Wrestling Of The 1970s and Early 80s
10. 8in8 – Nighty Night
11. Frank Turner – England Keep My Bones
12. Craft Spells – Idle Labor
13. Veronica Falls – Veronica Falls
14. Widowspeak – Widowspeak
15. EMA – Past Life Martyred Saints
16. Wilco – The Whole Love
17. Toro Y Moi – Underneath The Pine
18. Anna Calvi – Anna Calvi
19. Amanda Palmer – Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under
20. Akron/Family – S/T II: The Cosmic Birth and Journey of Shinju TNT
21. Timber Timbre – Creep On Creepin’ On
22. The Horrible Crowes – Elsie
23. Dum Dum Girls – Always in Dreams
24. Grails – Deep Politics
25. Mogwai – Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will
26. The Horrors – Skying
27. Tori Amos – Night Of Hunters
28. Soft Metals – Soft Metals
29. Los Campesinos! – Hello Sadness
30. The Decemberists – The King Is Dead

The Dresden Dolls live album A is for Accident (Collected live recordings 2001-2003) is available to download on a pay-what-you-want model from here. In this case “what you want” can also mean free, so you really have no excuse if you like their music.

You can also download their eponymous debut album under the same model from here. This one is definitely worth paying something for.

I’m also quite intrigued with how the Kaiser Chiefs are releasing their new record, and have already bought my version of it.

My album of the year has never been released in January before. Maybe this year it will be.

1. The Indelicates – Songs for Swinging Lovers – A lot of people don’t seem to have heard of this band, which is a great shame. This record is witty, literate and seeped in irony and sarcasm. It’s also the best thing I’ve heard this year in any genre, and is still available for free (or as much as you want to pay) from the Corporate Records website.
2. The National – High Violet – In any other year this would be my album of the year. It managed to do well critically and commercially, and is yet another big step up from their previous work. I would imagine this would appeal to pretty much anyone who likes music with vocals and guitars, and as such I’d recommend it to most people reading this.
3. Shearwater – The Golden Archipelago – Every year there is an album that I’m underwhelmed by when it comes out, but that by the end of the year I can’t live without. This year it’s by Shearwater, who I’d not even heard of a year ago. Each song is a sweeping majestic masterpiece, and the album as a whole makes early mornings make sense in a way nothing else can.
4. The Love Language – Libraries – Imagine Brian Wilson and Phil Spector locked inside one man’s head for 25 years. If you like how that might sound then you’ll love this record. It could have been made in any year since 1965, but has some of the most perfect songwriting and production I’ve heard this year.
5. The Pernice Brothers – Goodbye Killer – I like everything Joe Pernice has ever released, and this album acts as a good start to what is already a huge back catalogue. Some of this is out and out classic pop music, and it’s a brighter and catchier album than I think many people were expecting.
6. Tindersticks – Falling Down A Mountain – I loved this band 15 years ago, and had no idea they still had this sort of record in them. It’s worth playing it after “High Violet” by the National, because parts of them are tapping the same smoky late night baritone vibe.
7. Tame Impala – Innerspeaker – This was sold to me as an Australian band who sound like Led Zeppelin for 2010. And I can totally live with that. Another record that could have been made in the late 60′s, but one that I have grown to love this year to the point where I’ve since bought everything else they have ever made.
8. Vampire Weekend – Contra  – I still think they sound like a cross between Talking Heads and Paul Simon. This is the album where that stops being a problem and starts being something I find oddly enthralling. It will be interesting to see where they go next though.
9. Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan – Hawk – In some ways more of the same, but this time around they have stretched the musical palate slightly, as well as producing “Lately” which is a song of pure beauty and perfection.
10. The Hold Steady – Heaven Is Whenever – In some ways a disappointment, because it doesn’t live up to the potential I was expecting after “Stay Positive!”. However, if you simply take it on face value then it’s a perfectly good example of a bar-rock record that is trying to move from the bar to the stadium. Very much a grower, which is not what I was expecting.

And the rest…

• The New Pornographers – Together
• Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
• Midlake – The Courage Of Others
• The Divine Comedy – Bang Goes The Knighthood
• School of Seven Bells – Disconnect From Desire
• Wild Nothing – Gemini
• Richard Youngs – Beyond The Valley Of Ultrahits
• Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti – Before Today
• Ted Leo & the Pharmacists – The Brutalist Bricks
• Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra – Kollaps Tradixionales
• Neil Young – Le Noise
• Field Music – Field Music
• Sufjan Stevens – The Age of Adz
• Swans – My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky
• Kele – The Boxer
• Solex vs Cristina Martinez + Jon Spencer – Amsterdam Throwdown King Street Showdown!
• Uniform Motion – Life
• The Besnard Lakes – The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night
• Allo Darlin’ – Allo Darlin’
• Paul Smith – Margins
• John Zorn – Ipsissimus
• Ryan Adams & The Cardinals – III/IV
• The Knife – Tomorrow, in a Year
• LCD Soundsystem – This is Happening
• Les Savy Fav – Root for Ruin
• M.I.A. – /\/\ /\ Y /\
• These New Puritans – Hidden
• Janelle Monáe – The ArchAndroid
• Kanye West – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
• Emeralds – Does it Look Like I’m Here?

Yes, that’s a lot of music. I dread to think how many hours of my life I’ve spent listening to these 40 records this year.

What I’ve tried to do is to look at songs that don’t appear on albums, or that act as an edited preview for an album. These are in no order, and are clustered by artist. The hyperlinked song titles point to when you can get the song (not always for free I’m afraid), and there is a youtube link as well if I could find one.

The Veronica Falls – Found Love in a Graveyard  (youtube) and Beachy Head (youtube). The Veronica Falls sound like they recorded all their records in 1986, despite probably not having been born in 1986. Think jangling guitars, and a weird cross between Morrisey and Siouxsie that works in a way it probably shouldn’t. Neither song reaches the three minute mark, and both are better for it.

Amanda Palmer – Do You Swear To Tell The Truth The Whole Truth And Nothing But The Truth  (youtube) and Map of Tasmania  (youtube). I lke Amanda Palmer a lot, but both of these took me a couple of listens before they started to worm their way under my skin. I think they’re both still available for free as well.

British Sea Power – Zeus (youtube) and Living is so Easy (youtube). Both of these were released for a very limited time for free, and are edited previews for the Zeus E.P. and the Valhalla Dancehall album (due out in January). I’ve been a fan for years, but these two songs would probably be on this list even if I wasn’t.

The Japandroids – Art Czars  (youtube) and Younger Us  (youtube). A band I discovered last year, and who make loud guitar music of the sort I play a lot when I need to wind down after a hard day. This year they have released a few things, but these two are probably the most representative.

Ash also released a lot of new singles as part of their A-Z project. I’ve at least heard most of them, but am not quite sure which ones I’d recommend. In fact I’d probably recommend picking up the two CDs that compile all 26 singles (and a bit more), because I’ve got at least 10 of their singles on heavy rotation, and they are all good.

So here goes…

1. Lloyd Cole and the Commotions – Mainstream
2. Sonic Youth – Daydream Nation
3. The Cure – Disintegration
4. Pixies – Surfer Rosa
5. Pixies – Doolittle
6. Joy Division – Closer
7. The Stone Roses – The Stone Roses
8. Rage Against the Machine – Rage Against the Machine
9. R.E.M – Automatic for the People
10. Manic Street Preachers – Gold Against the Soul
11. Manic Street Preachers – The Holy Bible
12. Jim O’Rourke – Bad Timing
13. The Beta Band – The Three EPs
14. Radiohead – Kid A
15. The Arcade Fire – Funeral

I could easily name another 15, and may very well change my mind on a lot of these by tomorrow.

These days, thanks to the wonders of the internet, it’s possible to listen to new music every day without spending a penny, although thankfully I’m now in a position where I can justify a 50 song a month emusic subscription and can buy a few other bits and pieces of music each month without it really impacting on my standard of living.

I’m not sure if this makes me feel more connected, but it certainly makes me happier.

This week I’m listening to a lot of music released on the Captured Tracks label. They don’t release music on CDs, only on vinyl, cassette and digitally, and they remind me a lot of how Creation and Cherry Red were in the 80′s. They also are home to Wild Nothing and Veronica Falls, who are two of the groups I’m listening to a lot at present.

I’ve also recently discovered The Love Language, and am also very much enjoying the new albums by The Arcade Fire and Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan. I am also not yet anywhere near bored of the Indelicates album, and there is another one on the way soon as well.

2010 has been a good year for music, and promises a few more interesting releases in the autumn.

Who are you and what do you do?

I’m Andy, and I work for IT Services at the University of Birmingham in a Service Desk management/development role. In my spare time I listen to and write about music, dabble in free and open source software (mainly Ubuntu), and am sporadically involved in the Isles of Darkness live action roleplay society.

What hardware are you using?

At work everything is largely generic. I have a Dell desktop that is coming to the end of its life, but that is still more than capable of dealing with most of my emailing and calendaring needs. It is plugged into a 17″ Sony monitor that has been with me for about 4 years now, and which I keep holding on to as it is one of the few desktop monitors I’ve used that doesn’t give me a headache after hours of staring at it (yes, I know a new monitor and more breaks might be a more sensible plan).

Most of my actual work is done on an (again) fairly generic Fujitsu Siemens laptop, which I started using a couple of years ago, and which allows me to type for hours without my wrists hurting. I wouldn’t recommend this laptop above any other, but it does the job.

At home I have pretty much left desktop computers behind. My main workstation is a Sony Vaio VGN-NS10l (dual core, 4Gb ram), which I bought a couple of years ago and deals with anything I throw at it. I’ve also got a 10″ Dell Inspiron Mini, which goes everywhere with me, and is increasingly becoming the computer I do most of my web browsing, email and writing on. My backup machines are a G4 iBook and a EeePC 701, and we’ve also got another Mac and a Wii plugged into the TV downstairs. My wife has several other computers which I’ll not mention here except to say that we have more computers than there are rooms in our house (by quite a lot). And that’s not counting the ones that are propping open doors or otherwise not really being used for anything productive any longer.

And what software?

Work is a mix of Windows XP (desktop) and Ubuntu 10.04 (laptop). In Windows I largely use Outlook for email and calendaring, office communicator for collaboration, and very little else. In Linux I use Firefox for browsing (with Chrome and Epiphany for testing), Evolution for email, Empathy and Dropbox for collaboration, OpenOffice.org for creating documents and spreadsheets, and (generally) Bluefish for coding. Recently I’ve been using GIMP a lot too, and have also been dabbling with a few command-line image conversion tools. I also maintain several instances of Mediawiki, as well as a full LAMP environment for development, and use google calendar to plan and maintain my work-life balance.

At home both of my laptops are running the latest version of Ubuntu, which I’ve used as my primary OS since 2005. I use largely the same software as I use at work, although I’ve recently reverted to using gedit for writing blog posts and other bits of text, and only venturing into OpenOffice when I want to make something available to other people. Home is also where I spend a lot of time playing with WordPress and Virtualbox, and where I use Rhythmbox to listen to music (and Last.fm to catalogue what I’m listening to). I’ve also recently started using Google Reader, and I now don’t know how I coped without it.

My Macs run a very stripped down version of Leopard, and really only get used for iTunes and other media related things now (although I’d still use my iBook as my main portable computer if it weighed a little less). They also run Dropbox (as does every computer I own), and I’ve been syncing all my important files between all my machines for a couple of years now. I still can’t understand why more people don’t do this, and I’ve lost count of the number of times this one piece of software has got me out of a hole.

What would be your dream setup?

I change my mind about my ideal working environment a lot, but what I basically want is a laptop that is thin, light and stylish, and that can perform at the level where I could use it as my only computer (including storing 100gb of music). The nearest thing I’ve come across is the 13″ Macbook Pro, although I’d be happier with something the size and weight of my 10″ Dell Mini with all the power and stylishness of the Macbook Pro. Being able to run OS X and Ubuntu at the same time would also be great.

Of course, having used an iPad for the first time recently, I’d probably have to add that to my wish list, just because it’s a really stylish and functional piece of kit.

I also wonder if having a desktop computer with two large monitors would make me more productive. I have a feeling that most of what I do can be achieved on a single small screen, but it would be nice to have the opportunity to experiment with these things.

Question format borrowed from The Setup under the Attribution-Share Alike license.

I may also be abusing twitter a lot tonight. Check out #eurovision for live commentary.

Things I’ve downloaded so far include:

• Songs for Swinging Lovers by The Indelicates
• Ghosts in a Burning City by Red State Soundsystem
• Oh No… by Lily Rae

All of these are great in different ways, and are well worth a listen. I’ve also tracked down a few bizarre alternate arrangements of Indelicates songs, and a very strange band called Anal Beard who are amusing if nothing else.

My gut instinct is that no record released this year should make the list. Just because I’ve not had time to assess their importance. But at the same time I don’t think that’s fair to an album like The Hazards of Love, which I reckon I’ll still be listening to in 2019.

So without further ado, a first stab at a list of records from the last 10 years that I think people should own, and that in some way sum up the decade for me.

Radiohead – Kid A (2000) – To me this record redefined what a big selling record could sound like, and did a great job of sounding like everything I was currently listening to at the time (Tortoise, Jim O’Rourke, Miles Davies and a few even more esoteric things). Everything they released this decade would get into my top 100, but this is where they laid down the blueprint for what was to come. I bought this album the day I had my first interview to work at the University, and to me it perfectly sums up 2000.

Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002) – The album that introduced me to Wilco, and that marked them out as something more than just an alternative country band. It was also the first album (I think) that was streamed to listeners before it was released, and marked the first of four consecutive great albums they released between 2002-09. It was hard choosing between this, A Ghost is Born and Wilco (the album), but I think YHF just shades it, and is the one I’d recommend people start with.

The Arcade Fire – Funeral (2004) – They seemed to come out of nowhere, and to be critically acclaimed without ever being fashionable. This album was the one that really introduced me to them, and made me realise that there was something coming out of Canada that wasn’t 24 minute instrumental masterpieces or trite pop songs. I played this album to death in 2004, and still dip into it every now and again, and it is something I would recommend to anyone who likes music.

The Hold Steady – Separation Sunday (2005) – I didn’t discover this band until their 4th album (Stay Positive), but soon fell in love with their second effort from 2005. They are described as a bar band, but I see them as the 21st century version of Jack Kerouac and the best storytelling band ever. The music is loud and simple, the lyrics are narrative and hilarious, and the fact that something made in 2005 topped my listening charts for this year just goes to show it is something special.

Elbow – The Seldom Seen Kid (2008) – Last year’s album of the year by a mile, and something I keep going back to when I want to be reminded of 2008 (which was generally a good year). I’ve been a fan of theirs for a while, but this is the first album where I would recommend every single song.

1. The Decemberists – The Hazards of Love
2. Wilco – Wilco (The Album)
3. The Horrors – Primary Colours
4. Portugal. The Man – The Satanic Satanist
5. Florence and The Machine – Lungs
6. Jarvis Cocker – Further Complications
7. The Big Pink – A Brief History of Love
8. Califone – All My Friends Are Funeral Singers
9. Doves – Kingdom Of Rust
10. Maxïmo Park – Quicken The Heart
11. And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead – The Century of Self
12. Robyn Hitchcock – Goodnight Oslo
13. Editors – In This Light And On This Evening
14. Manic Street Preachers – Journal For Plague Lovers
15. Bear in Heaven – Beast Rest Forth Mouth
16. Julian Casablancas – Phrazes For The Young
17. Fresh Body Shop – The Ugly Army
18. Atlas Sound – Logos
19. David Byrne & Brian Eno – Everything that Happens will Happen Today
20. Monsters of Folk – Monsters of Folk

Oddly enough, three of my most played (and favourite) albums of 2009 were released prior to 2009. They slot into the top 5 as follows:

1. The Hold Steady – Separation Sunday
2. The Decemberists – The Hazards of Love
3. Wilco – Wilco (The Album)
4. British Sea Power – Do You Like Rock Music?
5. The Hold Steady – Stay Positive

Nothing else from before 2009 got anywhere near the top 20 (American Demo by The Indelicates being the closest by some distance).

• Listening to the new albums by The Flaming Lips, Atlas Sound, Charlotte Hatherley and Broadcast (all of which I’m really enjoying)
• Updating my main workstation to Ubuntu 9.10
• Learning about Google Wave
• Trying to juggle various work tasks (and not dropping anything hopefully).

Oh, and I still hate this time of year. Even though we had no annoying begging children this year, there is still the firework-hating dog to deal with.

In other (more relevant) news, I’ve been losing myself in the new Flaming Lips album for days. It’s epic (over an hour and a half if you download the iTunes version), and a very challenging listen, but if you like music that makes you think and that is a little (lot) to the left of the mainstream then I’d very much recommend it. I’m also liking the new Califone album (for those times when I need to be soothed rather than challenged), but have otherwise not bought a great deal of new music recently.

Of course, by “recently” I mean this month.

It’s certainly well worth 11 emusic credits, and probably worth a lot more than that.

I didn’t watch the Mercury Music ceremony in the end (Dollhouse was more pressing this week), but I’m slightly disappointed with the result. I’ve heard bits of the winning album, and I don’t think it offers anything I’ve not heard before. I’d like to have seen Florence winning, but it doesn’t change the fact that “Lungs” is a great album that would appeal to most people who can appreciate music made by someone who gives a damn.

The Butcher’s Ballroom by Diablo Swing Orchestra – Another great name, and an album that I can only describe as a cross between Opera and thrash metal. Except it is a lot better than I’ve made it sound, and is the sort of thing that should be made into a musical.

Before We Stand… We Crawl by Hungry Lucy – Interesting trip hop, with a female singer who can sing, and some killer melodies to go with it.

All are freely available to download.