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Now is the time of year when everyone traditionally posts their "Best of" lists. Partially in that spirit, but more in an effort to chronicle for myself what I enjoyed in 2003, I present some lists of my own. Some of this stuff was just new to me in 2003, having been released in 2002. I also think the "Best of" tag implies some nonexistent objective authority in "judging" the merits of art. In light of these points, I'll call these lists "My Favorites of 2003 Or So" and leave it at that. I'll start with music. Since these lists are meant to be topical, I'm leaving off a lot of older recordings and films I discovered this year and by all rights should be here (Some stuff by Lee Morgan, Larry Young, Daniel Johnston and Cibo Matto come to mind). Assuming I find the time, I'll also have a list of favorite movies and reading of the past year in the near future. I know you will all be holding your collective breath. Let us begin:

White Stripes: Elephant

I was late on the White Stripes bandwagon for no good reason and to my own detriment. Seeing their week in residence on Conan O'Brian in April got me all aboard. This album is all over my most-played lists in iTunes, so I can't really single out a favorite song, but if pressed I'd have to point to "In The Cold Cold Night" and "Hypnotise" but only by a hair. In retrospect, the White Stripes sub-conciously opened up a world of music I never would have bothered with before, including several items on this list. I've since bought all their albums, but this one is still my favorite.

The Mountain Goats: Tallahassee

I wouldn't even have know about The Mountain Goats (aka John Darnielle and friends) if not for one of my then houseguests mentioning that they'd be playing a show in Denver and we should check it out. The show, at Larimer Lounge, was great (and actually contributed another entry on this list) and the CD better. Intense acoustic lo-fi folk rock with a story line. Strictly speaking, this was a 2002 release, but it was new to me and kind of entwined with the next entry, which was a 2003 release

Baptist Generals: No Silver/No Gold

More lo-fi rock from the aforementioned Larimer Lounge show. This album flirts with ear-grating rawness (mostly thanks to the vocals of Chris Flemmons), but somehow comes across as a very intimate and compelling personal effort. Not for everyone, but it's definately worth a listen to find out if it's for you.

Juana Molina: Segundo

Strange but beautiful, minimalist blip-blooping elecronica/acoustic music from a former Argentinean sitcom star. One listen was all it took to confirm its place on this list.

Anti-Pop Consortium: Anti-Pop Consortium vs. Matthew Shipp

This album is the greatest mix of hip-hop electronica and jazz that I've yet heard. It's part of the Matthew Shipp curated "Blue Series" on Thirsty Ear Recordings. There are many recordings on this label that deserve a place on this list (The Blue Series Continuum sessions and Spring Heel Jack Live spring to mind) but in the interest of space and diversity, I will let this be the placeholder. Shipp is mining the future of creative music in this series, and you should give every release in the catalog a listen.

The Bad Plus: These are the Vistas

Rock, Jazz, Both? The Bad Plus caught my ear because of some really good reviews of their live shows on several mailing lists I am on. Since there didn't seem to be many live shows circulating (a situation that still needs to be remedied) I decided to give their first major studio release a try and was quite pleased with the results. They often get written off as a novelty response from the labels to the jazz-rock scene, but that point of view ignores the fact that these guys are amazing musicians who make some great, straight-ahead music. Drummer David King is right up there with the best jazz drummers playing today.

Outkast: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

I'm not sure I can say anything about this that hasn't been said a few thousand times before. I'd say this album is everything good about hip-hop, except that it's so much more. Hey Ya might just be the catchiest pop song ever.

Junior Senior: D-D-Don't Don't Stop the Beat

Nothing really groundbreaking with this album, but this Danish duo makes really fun catchy music. Don't miss my favorite video of the year!

Miles Davis: The Jack Johnson Sessions

I owe Rob for setting me straight on Miles Davis. My past experiences with Mile Davis were characterized by the execrable "Doo Bop" and "Tutu". After hearing those album, I unfairly wrote off most all of his work. In hindsight (in any sight really) of course, this was absolute obstinate retardedness for which I have no excuse other than youthful musical stupidity. In any case, many thanks to Rob for setting me straight. This album is probably my favorite of the year and a must for any jazz (or rock or funk) fan.

There are a few items that, given more time, would probably end up on this list. Most of them I just picked up in the last few weeks, but I thought it important to mention them because of their potential for becoming a favorite: Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey: Slow Breath, Silent Mind, The Shins: Chutes Too Narrow and Kaki King: Everybody Loves You.

The Denver Post has its yearly critics roundup of Best Of's. I particularly enjoyed the local music insights of Ricardo Baca and Bret Saunders and thought you might also. Local bands I've been meaning to check out: Mr Pacman, Devotchka, Dressy Bessy and George&Caplin.

You know you want it. December 16th

They told us it was coming, but we were a little skeptical. If it isn't announced by, like, mid-November, it generally isn't going to happen until next year. December, the holy month of accounts receivable, is usually a dead-spot on both indie and major-label release schedules-- not coincidentally the time of year when print ad rates are through the roof and new music must compete with the likes of "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" and Dan Fogelberg. So we were more than a little shocked to find that Geffen/Interscope have slipped a last-minute goodie under the tree: a Dolby 5.1 surround-sound mix of Beck's Sea Change, complete with six videos (five of which are previously unreleased) and an "art gallery" that displays while you're crying your little eyes out to "Guess I'm Doing Fine."

Presumably inspired by fellow Boston institution MIT's Open Courseware, the Berklee College of Music, one of the finest jazz and music business schools in the country, has started the Creative Commons licensed Berklee Shares.

Welcome to the Berklee Shares Web site. Here you will find free music lessons that you can download, share and trade with your friends and fellow musicians.

Berklee Shares is:

• Individual self-contained music lessons developed by Berklee faculty and alumni.
• Free and open to the music community around the world.
• A library of MP3 audio, QuickTime movie, and PDF files.
• A glimpse into the educational opportunities provided by Berklee.

This is amazing. It has everything from lessons on music production and business, to improv, to individual instrument lessons. Check it out.

[via unproductivity]

I saw Primus last night at the Fillmore. As always, Les Claypool puts on an entertaining show. Great visuals and the inventive music and sense of humor that makes Claypool and Primus what they are. However, while sitting there watching the show, I realized the last time I saw Primus was 10 years ago, almost to the day - October 29th, 1993 at the Orpheum Theater in Boston.

I'm old.

The only consolation is that my fellow attendees at that Orpheum show are also old.

iTunes for Windows is ready for download! They've added some new features to the store as well. Celebrity playlists, gift certificates and an allowance account to allow parents to let their kids use iTunes without a credit card.

If you're stuck on Windows and have an iPod, you're already downloading it, but even if you don't have an iPod, but do have an mp3 collection you should check it out.

Welcome, Windows users, to the world's best digital music jukebox, with a great music store inside - and it keeps getting better. Welcome to a music store with hundreds of thousands of songs which you can conveniently browse and search, and an inviting way to preview, buy and download music online quickly and easily. And welcome to the best friend an iPod ever had: iTunes.

Incidentally, while browsing the iTunes web site, I noticed this little blurb.

Coming soon for more than 25 million U.S. members of America Online

Sure enough:

Apple(R) and America Online, Inc., the world's leading interactive services company, today announced an alliance to provide instant, one-click registration to the iTunes(R) Music Store for AOL's more than 25 million U.S. members starting later this quarter. America Online will integrate links to iTunes artists, albums and songs throughout its leading music site, AOL Music, which will give members the option to link directly to the specific iTunes Music Store page to preview and buy music as they browse and read music news and reviews.

"Apple and AOL are making it easy for AOL's 25 million U.S. members to legally buy music online," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "With just one click, AOL members will be able to legally preview, purchase and download music from the iTunes Music Store's catalog of more than 400,000 songs."

"Apple's iTunes Music Store is a runaway hit," said Jonathan Miller, chairman and CEO of America Online. "Today, Apple and AOL are uniting the number one music destination site, AOL Music, with the number one music download site, Apple's iTunes Music Store, to bring customers the most complete online digital music experience."

This could be the nail in the coffin for eMusic, Napster MkII, etc.

WWBD?

Had a fine time tonight up in north Denver at the Larimer Lounge. Caught the Mountain Goats, Baptist Generals and Joshua Novak (who seems to have no online information, but struck me as a very talented Beck/Radiohead cross) on Paulette's recommendation and had a fine time. Fine performers all and you should check them out if they are in your area. Thanks to KVCU for the show.

iTunes is about to get huge.

The Mac maker has scheduled an event for next Thursday at San Francisco's Moscone West convention hall. "The year's biggest music story is about to get even bigger," Apple said in an invitation to journalists.

The company is expected to launch the long-awaited Windows version of the iTunes Music Store at the event, according to Wall Street brokerage Needham. Apple earlier said it would release the Windows service sometime before the end of the year.

[via iPodlounge]

It's been a year and a half since their last album, Uninvisible. Bring it on!

john, billy and chris are busy in brooklyn laying down tracks for their ninth studio album, due out this spring. the big news this time around is the addition of producer john king, one of the Dust Brothers, and best known for his innovative work with the Beastie Boys and Beck. we can't wait. neither can you.

[via Ropeadope]

Fred Kaplan has a Slate piece on John Zorn's evolution over the last 10 years and the "life-soundtrack that most compels him" - Masada.

There are, counting the multiple discs, 28 Masada CDs in the bins, not including Zorn's 14-volume Filmworks series, a few of which draw on the Masada songbook. Is this too much Masada? Yes, probably (though, I must confess, I own all of them). There is a compulsion toward "compleatism" in many subcultures, particularly those that have a slightly subversive bent, and the tendency is heightened in jazz because of its improvisational core: At least when the musicians are inventive (and all of Masada's are), no two versions of a tune are alike.

But the appeal of multiple Masadas stems from more than cultish esoterica. Not many compositions—in whatever musical genre—could sustain renderings by jazz quartet, string trio, string sextet, solo guitar, and so forth. Yet these Zorn compositions do. And the different versions reveal different aspects of a tune. Playing a song called "Khebar," for instance, the Masada quartet emphasizes its rhythm. The string sextet brings out the harmonic colors. On the Voices album, the downtown rock musician Kramer treats it, wittily, as electronica. They're subtle heads, these Masada tunes, richer and more complex than they seem at first hearing.

I don't have them all yet, but I'm working on it ;)

In tribute to John Zorn's 50th birthday (i know, I'm a month late) I've made a list of my favorite Masada albums and will feature them over to the left for a bit.