It's That Time of Year Again, WXPN's Top Fifty Albums of 2004

Being it's now less than two weeks till Thanksgiving, I guess we can give xpn some slack in starting their drive for listeners to submit top ten lists for 2004 so early. As a year with some great new music, this will be both easy and hard; easy in that my one, two and three are locked in, hard in that there are easily thirty-nine great records all seemingly worthy of one of the seven remaining spots on the list. Even narrowing it down, there are still about fifteen that are strongly resisting elimination - I may have to give them all another spin or two. To get in the spirit, and partially because it was finally just posted this week to the Rambles website, here is my review again of the Julia Fordham CD, That's Life, which has a lock as my number one. http://www.rambles.net/fordham_life04.html

Here's my Rambles review (pre-blog) of Nellie McKay's Get Away From Me which is residing happily in my number two slot. http://www.rambles.net/mckay_getaway04.html

Anyone who's read the previous entries here for the past few months will find no surprise in my number three selection, k.d. lang's excellent Hymns of the 49th Parallel.

After that it gets bloody, with the following CDs from 2004 all seeming worthy of top ten designation, each in and of itself. I will find a way to whittle it down between now and xpn's deadline for submission. Here now is the rest of my best of, in alphabetical order.

  • Johnny A - Get Inside
  • Gabriela Anders - Eclectica
  • The Blue Nile - High
  • Jonatha Brooke - Back in the Circus
  • J.J. Cale - To Tulsa and Back
  • Cardigans - Long Gone Before Daylight
  • Mary Chapin Carpenter - Between Here & Gone
  • Kasey Chambers - Wayward Angel
  • Ray Charles - Genius Loves Company
  • Elvis Costell0 - The Delivery Man
  • Cowboy Junkies - One Soul Now
  • David Crosby & Graham Nash - Crosby-Nash
  • Damnwells - Bastards of the Beat
  • Tina Dico - Far
  • Five for Fighting - The Battle for Everything
  • John Fogerty - Dejuvu All Over Again
  • Gov't Mule - Deja Voodoo
  • Daryl Hall - Can't Stop Dreaming
  • Daryl Hall & John Oates - Our Kind of Soul
  • Juliana Hatfield - In Exile Deo
  • Ron Isley & Burt Bacharach - Isley Meets Bacharach
  • Jem - Finally Woken
  • Norah Jones - Feels Like Home
  • Keane - Hopes and Fears
  • Mark Knopfler - Shangri-La
  • Leo Kottke - Try and Stop Me
  • Queen Latifah - The Dana Owens Album
  • Eleni Mandell - Afternoon
  • Rebecca Martin - People Behave Like Ballads
  • Allison Moorer - The Duel
  • Holly Palmer - I Confess
  • Alex Parks - Introduction (Import)
  • Sarah Randle - The Sparrow (Import)
  • Chris Rea - The Blue Jukebox (Import)
  • Sia - Colour the Small One (Import)
  • Garrison Starr - Airstreams & Satellites
  • Martina Topley-Bird - Quixotic (Import)/Anything (Domestic)
  • Trashcan Sinatras - Weightlifting
  • Zero 7 - When It Falls

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