Best of 2004 (Like You Care)

Here are my ten favorite albums of 2004 (in no particular order):

Guided By Voices - Half Smiles of the Decomposed: A fitting swan song for the "kings of lo-fi." Whatever that means?

The Fiery Furnaces - Blueberry Boat: Thirteen tracks spanning 74 minutes results in some interesting music that sounds nothing like anything I've heard before.

McLusky - The Difference Between Me And You Is That I'm Not On Fire: The title of this album is lovely. On some tracks the music is a bit more rockin' than I'm used to, but it is among my faves.

The Secret Machines - Now Here is Nowhere: Psych-rock at it's best. This three piece can make some noise.

The Walkmen - Bows and Arrows: Two tracks on this album almost made my year in music all by themselves.

The Arcade Fire - Funeral: As good as this album is, their live show is even better.

Air - Talkie Walkie: These frenchy guys know how to make a record.

The Go! Team - Thunder Lightning Strike: Happy music makes me happy.

Menomena - I am the Fun Blame Monster: Ok, so this album originally came out in September of '03, but it's proper label release was September of '04. Fantastic!

The Ponys - Laced With Romance: I hate labels such as "garage rock," so I'll just say this band's debut rocked.

Worth mentioning (or, not-so honorable mentions): Baby Dayliner- High Hearts & Low Estates; Franz Ferdinand - s/t; The Faint - Wet From Birth; The Futureheads - s/t; The Joggers - Solid Guild; On!Air!Library! - s/t; Interpol - Antics; Luna - Rendezvous; Death From Above 1979 - You're A Woman, I'm A Machine; Ratatat - s/t

Some '05 releases I'm looking forward to: Spoon, Mercury Rev, Stereo Total, Built to Spill, Menomena (maybe?), Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, Fiery Furnaces, The Unicorns, and many more...