[Note: This is the first in a series of articles that constitute Village Voice Media's year-end music package. The others - pop, indie-rock, dance mixes, Latin, country, alt-country/Americana, metal, rap/hip-hop and special graphics breaking down the year in charts and 2008's worst lyrics - will be posted on Rocks Off throughout the rest of the holiday season.]
It's time to rank the best of what went around and came around again.
BILLY JOEL
The Stranger
(Columbia/Legacy)
As punk and disco e
For the second (third?) year in a row, LOM didn't vote in either the Nashville Scene's best of country music poll or the Village Voice's Pazz & Jop best of American music poll. I'm just not a good list-maker. Detest that stuff. Just trying to compile a list of possibles makes my brain hate me.
Anyway, I rarely get serviced by the major labels, and I don't listen to the radio stations that kowtow to the major labels, so I don't feel I have much context in which to wrestle with the important
One of Lonesome Onry and Mean's favorite L.A. chanteuses, Sam Phillips, announced a free download of a new song today. The catch is you have to click on the link above and join her mailing list.
I've already signed up, but after 30 minutes I still haven't received the email link to the tune. But given how much I liked her most recent effort, the brutally frank and murky Don't Do Anything, I reckon I'll just sit here and twiddle my thumbs until the link shows up in my inbox.
Led Zeppelin shouter Robert Plant and country/pop vocalist Alison Krauss seem like a highly unlikely duo. When I heard they'd made an album together called Raising Sand, the pairing seemed so odd I didn't really even want to hear it. I thought their two voices would clash like Lucinda Williams and Robbie Fulks.
But the woman in my life, a pretty fair vocalist in her own right, kept telling me I had to listen to it. Now she and I don't exactly listen in lockstep; she likes Rufus Wainright and Jul
Photos by Jay Lee
It took Aftermath most of Friday to figure out why we were in such an awful blue funk after Thursday's Pogues show, especially after the band delivered a more brilliant set than even this 20-year fan thought they were capable of. But after leaving work early and relaxing for a while at home in the fetal position, we knew.
Some shows - particularly ones we've waited more than half a lifetime to see - we'd rather just be a face in the crowd, soaking up the music and the booze
