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Zach's Favorite Music of the Year (So Far)

At this time last year I felt overwhelmed making this list. This year not so much. These five albums are easily my favorite so far. I feel like a you can judge an album by how many times you can listen to it without getting tired of it. All of these are still on repeat.


  1. Conor Oberst: Upside Down Mountain - This is an easy pick for my number one record. Sure I'm biased, but Conor's at the top of his game with this one. He's back to personal song writing which is where he's at his best. 
  2. Beck: Morning Phase - I'm not going to pretend that I'm a huge Beck fan. Until Morning Phase I hadn't listened to a full Beck album all the way through since Odelay. I hadn't listened to MP's older sibling Sea Change or anything else. Please don't judge me. All I have to say is that this album is damn good. It reminds me so much of Pink Floyd that I tried to turn down the volume on my TV so the album could accompany The Wizard of Oz. 
  3. Angel Olsen: Burn Your Fire For No Witness - Angel Olsen has the best female voice in indie rock, you can quote me on that. This is lyrically my favorite album of the year. Adding a full band was a surprise and an upgrade from her last album.
  4. Jack White: Lazaretto - The dark lord is back with his second solo album, Lazaretto. I really liked Blunderbuss, but I felt that it lacked cohesiveness. It seemed all over the place. Lazaretto on the other hand flows from song to song without question of the songs place within the album. The title track rocks like no other song this year and "Would You Fight For My Love" makes me feel like I'm in a Clint Eastwood spaghetti western ready for a shootout. Jack White has taken the crown for America's best rock n' roller. 
  5. Parquet Court: Sunbathing Animal - Brooklyn transplants Parquet Courts channeled their inner Lou Reed for Sunbathing Animal. The only comparison I could think of for this album is Transformer. It's that good. It also produced two of my favorite songs of the year, "Raw Milk" & "Dear Ramona".

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Easy Street Records

This past weekend my favorite record store closed, Easy Street Records in Queen Ann. Fortunately, they still have their flagship store in West Seattle but who wants to go all the way out there??
Anyway, Ryan posted about this earlier but I just wanted to do a follow up post.
I went there twice last week. Once on Wednesday for one last purchase. While I was there, I actually got a little emotional. Well, I almost did. There were people around. I'm really happy about my last purchase there, though. I bought the Black Belles record. They're one of those cool, hot chick rock bands that I love so much. Not to mention, they record with Third Man Records (AKA Jack White's record label). Here's a cool video of them.



Moving on. My second and last visit to the Queen Anne Easy Street Records was Friday night. Their last show. Yo La Tengo played, which I missed because I have this really dumb thing called a job. I had a few friends go for the show portion of the evening and they said it was PACKED. One of my friends had to wait in line for 45 minutes just to get in. I also missed this really epic moment brought to you by KEXP DJ and The Young Evils band member, Troy Nelson: The rest of the evening was consumed with great music and dancing. They also had Empire Records playing in the back ground. Which was incredibly appropriate.
The night was the perfect send off for the greatest record store in Seattle. I remember the first time I went there. I was in high school and my brother and I had some time to kill during Bumbershoot weekend so we went to check out this record store we'd heard about. We both immediately fell in love. All through high school and whenever I was home from college, I would drive all the way to this store from North Bend (about a 45 minute drive) just to go there. I went there for all my music needs. Anytime someone would come visit me, I would always take them there and they would also fall in love. I even applied for a job there once. It would have been a dream to work there. It was such a great store and will be severely missed. So, goodbye Easy Street Records (in Queen Anne). You will always have a special place in my heart.

Posted by Tori

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Overlooked in 2012



Every year there are always a few albums I overlook. This year I tried to keep track of everything, but there were still a few albums that I either forgot about that I listened to earlier in the year or that I didn't listen to until this month.
One album I forgot about was The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy by Nada Surf. I bought this album the day it came out last January and loved every song, but for some reason I never listened to it after January. Last week on the All Songs Considered blog I saw that one of the editors, Stephen Thompson, put it in his top ten albums of the year. I went back and listened to it and fell in love with it all over again. It's a really great album. I think I can consider Nada Surf one of my favorite bands. They get better with every new release. 
The other two bands that didn't make my list are Japandroids and Jack White. Both of these albums (Celebration Rock & Blunderbuss) are incredible. I bought them both in December. I had heard them on Spotify but its really hard for me to get into an album unless I can listen to it in the car or at work. Both albums would have made my top albums list. 
If you haven't listened to any of these albums I highly recommend them. Here are my favorite songs from all three albums. Enjoy. 


               Japandroids pictured below 

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