Top Albums of 2005 - Introduction

So here we go…my favorite albums of 2005. This is my 5th annual best albums list, and I’ve got to say, this is without a doubt my best and most complete list. Today I’m just going to talk about some of the details concerning how I create my list. Tomorrow I will give my honorable mentions that couldn’t quite crack my top 10, and then Wednesday the list will begin with #10 and will continue daily until culminating next Friday with my album of the year.

Here are the ground rules concerning my list: First of all, the only albums that can be included are albums that I own. That means there are certainly albums out there that would probably make my top 10, but I never got around to acquiring them. However, for this year I acquired 29 albums that were released in 2005, which is the most I have ever had to choose from for one of my lists. So in that way, I think this list doesn’t have many holes in it and I consider it to be complete. The other requirement for my list is that it must be a full-length release. That means I am not including any EPs in my list even though 2 of my favorite purchases this year were the 2 EPs from Iron & Wine. I have to say that those two releases have some of the best music of the year on them, but I can’t consider them for my list because they aren’t full-length albums.

Now on to how I review each album: Throughout the year I kept up with all the 2005 releases that I have in my music library. I had rankings that I would update every now and then, just to give me an idea of where I was leaning for my favorite albums. Then at the end of the year (over Christmas break) I wiped the slate clean, and listened to every album eligible and rated each of them according to my 10-point scale. Last year I decided to go with a 10-point scale because I didn’t like just arbitrarily ranking my albums at the end of the year. I wanted to see what each albums strengths and weaknesses were. Each album is split into 4 categories: Music, Originality, Lyrics and Production. I rate each album from 1-10 in each category with a 5 being considered an average score. Now I consider some parts of an album more important to others, so each category is weighted with a percentage relative to that importance. The percentage weights are as follows: Music-40%, Originality 25%, Lyrics 20%, Production 15%.
The music category is just what it sounds like it would be. How good is the music? That means vocally, instrumental wise, complexity, and just whether or not I think its good music…completely my preference. Originality deals with whether or not the album is breaking any new ground. Is it just another status quo release or does it show some sort of innovation? This can be compared to previous releases from the band, or to what other music is out there. Lyrics is rated on how thought provoking or how well done the lyrics are in the album. This is a pretty self-explanatory category. Production is how well the album is put together. This can be how the tracks are laid out, or just how the music sounds coming out of my speakers. So many times an album that could be great is “overproduced” which kills the emotion that the band may be trying to get across. I also use the Production category as a way to “tip the scales.” If I can’t quite put my finger on why I love an album so much, I usually give it pretty high production rating, just to raise its score. Now with all that said, I am actually not going to release any of the numbers I came up with for each album in rating them. You’ll have to figure out where an album gained or lost points by reading my reviews.

Well, that’s just the introduction to my list. As I said I will start tomorrow with my honorable mentions, so check back then!