This was really hard for me this year. Spending more time with this project (i.e., the blog), intentionally listening to more music, and talking to more people about music, exposed me to more music in the past twelve months than I think I have ever heard in that same period of time in my entire life which, for better or worse, is long enough to mean something. (Did I mention it was more?)

I heard all kinds of great sounds from all kinds of bands – some on record, some on MP3, some on CD and some only on stage. As I spent the last few weeks thinking about this list, it kept getting longer and longer. Finally, I realized (or simply resigned myself to the fact) that a year-end best of list is really supposed to be just that – only the best. I had to make a cut.

Of course, just like last year, the only criteria we really have for determining what is a “best record” is to think about how many times we listened to it. We returned to all of these albums repeatedly and excitedly throughout the year. What’s more, they were albums we listened to thoroughly. Which is to say we think there’s a lot more than just one good song on them. We hope to put out a short list of best songs of the year to recognize some of those artists who captured our imagination with a tune or two, or maybe make a record that just missed this list, but that’s next – not now.

Right now, I’m going to start the list by borrowing three from Alex’s List – Wilco (the album); David Bazan, Curse Your Branches; and Phoenix, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix – and tell you that had he not listed them already I would have. (Yeah you can call it cheatin’, but once again I am the one footing the bill for the economy server package around here.)

Thanks to Alex’s head start, I came up with 11 more albums that we think you might want to hear this year.

11. Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band – Outer South

Mr. Oberst’s best work of the year.

10. John Doe & the Sadies – Country Club

Having been on the front edge of the American punk scene, John Doe seems no longer interested in doing something new. What he did here was take some old songs and remind us how much we love that classic country sound – especially the Bakersfield sound. We actually got around to reviewing this one. Read about it here.

9. Those Darlins’

We wrote a little bit about this record when they were headed to town this fall, that’s here. We love it. They’re coming right back, January 15 at the EARL.

MP3: Those Darlins – DUI or Die

8. Sea Wolf – White Water, White Bloom

Alex Brown Church does this sound as well as, if not better than, anybody else out there.

7. The Winter Sounds – Church of the Haunted South

I spent half the year meaning to write about this record. I think I listened to it almost every day in August. I even chatted with band member Clayton about the grand ideas behind the record, and still intend to capture that conversation in advance of their next visit to Atlanta (hopefully early next year), but for now let me just say I think it was an easy choice for this list.

MP3: The Winter Sounds – Trophy Wife

6. Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit

This record grew on us over the course of the year eventually climbing into the rarified air (?) of this list. Really, it’s a great record.

5. Band of Skulls – Baby Darling Doll Face Honey

Made this list like a bullet. I can’t stop listening to this disc.

4. Manchester Orchestra – Mean Everything to Nothing

These local boys crushed the sophomore slump with this record. Powerful (in every meaning of that word) from front to back.

3. Metric – Fantasies

One of our first record reviews! Read it here. Still love it.

MP3: Metric – Gimme Sympathy

2. Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca

I wrote about this record in my answer to Alex’s Short & Skinny column. It’s called Abbreviated Attention (Span). Check it out here.

1. The Decemberists – Hazards of Love

This was the easiest pick of all for us. We loved the record, loved the performance at the Tabernacle, loved the new video on iTunes. Great stuff.

Change of Plans – Bologna, not Turkey

We just made a quick decision – that happens occasionally around here (though some might suggest not often enough).  We’re brining back the “Week of” post.  We don’t know how long it will last or if you can really count on it happening every week, but we sort of miss sitting here cranking out something that doesn’t mean much of anything at least once a week.

Another motivator was to revive the email list.  We were surprised to find out that more than one of the original email A-Listers missed that little intrusion into their inbox.  We were even more surprised when those A-Listers admitted they really don’t make it to the blog that often (and one didn’t even know we moved!)  Wow are we out of touch.

Ketch(ing)up, not Gravy

Well just to keep you up to date, while we were away we managed to post to that new url almost every day – from book clubs to record reviews.  We seem to be getting visitors from all over but most of them are local.  We’ve had some cool opportunities to speak to all kinds of great artists and authors like David Bazan, Carrie Rodriguez, The Winter Sounds, and Susan Rebecca White, some of whom we have had a chance to write about, some of whom we still hope to.  We’ve given away some tickets (like Pains of Bring Pure at Heart), and have some more to give away right now (for The Whigs, Dec. 4 at the Variety).

Also, in December, we will proudly host an in-store performance at Decatur CD by one of our favorite new discoveries, The Dutchess and The Duke – lots more to come about that.  We also hope to make another exciting announcement before the end of the year, but we’re gonna make you wait for that.  Anyway, that’s what we’ve been up to and we are really thankful for all of it.  We can’t believe how far this project has come along in the last 12 months.  We look forward to cranking out the next twelve.  Now that you’re sort of caught up, let’s talk about the show we can’t wait to see this week.

White Bread, not Rolls

There is something sort of Snow White-like about Emily Haines and we certainly understand how easy it can be to like everything she does.  We know her best as the face at the front of  Metric.  We may be a little late to the parade, because unlike some A-Listers we didn’t discover these Canadian rockers until the release of this year’s full-length, Fantasies. That being said, we were hooked quite quickly.  The CD received several hundred spins, an unheard of duration in the A-List home, and it inspired one of our first reviews.  We stand by every word.

We are thrilled that Emily and Metric will be at Center Stage on Saturday night.  We got even more excited when we found out that Band of Skulls will open the evening for them.  We just stumbled across these hard rockers, but our first couple of trips through their latest LP, baby darling doll face honey, was quite satisfying road trip music.

That’s another Atlanta’s A-List and you can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant.