Rachael with an a's Top 8 of '08

Somehow Ive never learned how to stay in the lines and thus I decided 8 is gooder than 10 just cuz I was feeling distraught and overwhelmed by amazing music.

SO..........

#8 and a half- Coldplay- Viva la Vida- I’m almost embarassed to have this on my list but a friend gave it to me over summer and I swear this album saved my life!!!It’s crazy poppy but there are a few songs I listened to over and over again while living in some version of hell. I’ve been mad defending this album to Chris Martin-haters for the last six months. And really, my only argument goes, "Seriously, dude, Just because I’m losing, doesn’t mean I’m lost.”

#8- Ryan Adams and the Cardinals- Cardinology- This was a conflicting decision because Ryan Adams is my go-to-man of misery and intensity, but this is such a chill, subtle album. However, I realized that I dig it for what it is, not what I expected it to be. I told my friend Bach its sort of a ‘love yourself’ album, and he replied, “Good, I was really worried about him,” which raises the philosophical question, "Is Ryan Adams a real person?"

#7-Fleet Foxes- Fleet Foxes- weird and beautiful. so frickin beautiful..... and weird.

#6-She & Him- Volume One- - I keep losing this album and finding it and remembering how stylistically versatile and amazing it is!! Zooey’s voice is intense and unique (reminiscent especially in Sentimental Heart, of Joanna Newsom) which combined with M. Ward is all kinds of brilliant.

#5-Cut Copy- Ghost Colour- I demand a Cut Copy Mad Planet Dance Party!!! The songs run into each other seamlessly and its impossible not to groove to this record. I’m a sucker for any band that rocks out like its 1986!!!

#4- Santogold- Santogold- SEXY mc SEXY and SASSY and SMART- This album reminds me of a less dirty version of Peaches. ‘Im a Lady’ is definitely on my personal walking into a bar and feeling feisty soundtrack.














#3- Los Campesinos!- We are Beautiful, We are Doomed- This is my first LC album, but
their lyrical brilliance (You worry a million raindrops'll die with their last memory of you and I in a soft porn version of the end of the world), strange giddiness and clash of lyrics and melody blew me away.















#2- Spiritualized- Songs in A & E- Most Amazing Album to Paint To In the Whole World- these 18 tracks are composed beautifully and dance among each other like a walk between the brinks of existence and danse macabre. I'm also going to give this album 'Album I most want to listen to while making the hot loving!' Project for 2009!?

AND.......








#1- Bon Iver- To Emma, Forever Ago- Upon its inception in my head, this album destroyed me, broke me, and being the masochist that I am…… I couldn’t stop listening!!!! I love this album for its intensity and intimacy. The falsetto in Skinny Love and The Wolves (Act I and II) still haunts me and I drown in it everytime. Apparently every once in awhile, some amazing amount of goodness comes from locking yourself in a Sconny cabin.









Best 'Goodbye My Nomadic Lover' Song- Ingrid Michaelson- The Chain- I wasn't quite ballsy enough to put her on my list but a couple of her songs blow my mind, and this one kills it when it comes to the end of things.

Best Song About the glory of Mathematics- Death Cab for Cutie- Long Division

Best Album for your Mother- ELGAR E. (Violin Concerto in B minor) by Gil Shaham