As my list came together, I grew quite anxious. Debating between personal favorites making the list over critical classics. Too many of the latter and my list becomes a carbon copy of any list you can dig up from Rolling Stone or Spin; too many of the former and on one will buy that your opinion is well informed. Nice. by Puffy is an album I like an awful lot. Pop doesn’t come more solid than that, but in the grand scheme of things, there are certainly twenty albums I like better. Ok Computer is an amazing record, everyone loves Ok Computer. Certainly I do. But really, I am lucky if I feel like listening to it a half dozen times in a year. As much as I dig it, it doesn’t have as big of a pull on me as an album. (When I ordered past

Is there a more tragic album in rock and roll history than that of Weezer’s 1996 sophomore effort Pinkerton? An album created after the collapse of an even more ambitious record attempt. An album created after the social ostracization of front-man Rivers Cuomo brought on by serious leg surgery during the band’s meteoric rise, as well as his entrance into Harvard. An album dubbed the second worst album of 1996 by Rolling Stone. An album that only gained notoriety during a long hiatus for the band. An album that since, Cuomo has either desperately tried to recreate or settle on posthumously cashing in on. An album that now has garnered so much praise that today it’s almost considered passé to mention in a “best album” discussion. At the risk of being trite, such woe is the subject of my #14 album...

As we progress in the dissection of my list, the relationship between be and the remaining thirteen is going to invariably become more personal. Frankly, it will likely become about me growing up, but I’ll try my best to keep this from becoming an extended pat on the back. The next two albums up for discussion provide the appropriate view on the dichotomy that reflects the mercurial, icky, feeling of growing up.

Not every album clicks at once. Amongst overwhelming critical and popular acclaim, you are some times left wondering what is wrong with you. What am I not hearing? Why don’t I get it? Sometimes you have to make a concentrated effort in the hopes of earning some sort of reward. Arcade Fire came during a time when I found the music scene confusing and blurry. Burned by the 2001 “rock revival” band’s lackluster follow-ups (for whatever reason, I skipped Elephant. I don’t know. I didn’t believe the press,) I grew weary of bands that came out of nowhere with a hurricane of hype.

After 1999, the one sure fire way for me to keep up with new music was to just wait for the end of year, “best of,” lists. In 2002, I had fallen woefully behind on the scene. To my surprise, every end of year list I could find, Amazon, metacritic, allmusic, had a stunning consensus opinion on what I should have been listening to: Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

It wasn’t even two years since that night I bought First Band on the Moon, but my musical sphere had grown exponentially since. Less and less of the music videos shown during the normal hours were appealing to me, and MTV was gradually ceding to the TRL generation -- which offered nothing to me. Sometime in late summer ‘98 I had discovered MTV’s 120 Minutes, a block at midnight Sunday (turning Monday) where they evidently hid all the good music. I would religiously stay up to watch; even if I was lucky to catch more than four videos before succumbing to sleep. One thing was clear, my musical ear was skewing further from Top 40 and more alternative and underground. It must have been the first Sunday of 1999 where 120 Minutes held one of the most memorable episodes ever. They were doing a recap of the best “120 Minutes” videos of 1998. I’ll never forget the first three videos they played, all which still hold a special place in my heart. The first video floored me, “All You Good, Good People” by Embrace, I was already proclaiming it my favorite song ever after one play. Soon after they played “Get Myself Arrested” by Gomez, another awesome song I was excited about! The song they played in between the two I thought was pretty okay too. It was a nice song called “Stolen Car” by some lady named Beth Orton.

Maybe it’s a dubious distinction. Maybe it’s just a coincidence. Maybe it is something that looks good on a resume and I enjoy repeating. Maybe it was largely lost on me at the time, or, maybe it is the defining cornerstone to my entire musical world. At the green age of 7, my first music CD was purchased for me at my request. As a devout child of the 90’s, it is only right that my first album was Nirvana’s monolithic Nevermind.

In the airy quiet that follows the opening clatter in my number 6 favorite album, you already know Karuki Zamen Kuri no Hana is going to be an interesting listen. It takes all of 36 seconds for the heavy drums and fuzzed bass to crash through the orchestration of the album opener “Shuukyou” before you just might sit up in your chair. And at the 1 minute mark, when the orchestra overwhelms the track once more, you can’t but wonder where else Shiina Ringo’s third album can go; how an artist can stuff this mammoth at the front of an album.

In 1994, a subtle move caused a seismic shift in the trend of popular music. The headline act for the ’94 Lollapalooza festival was set to be Nirvana – easily the biggest and most revered band on the scene. However, due to personnel issues that spring, Nirvana had to back out. The organizers had to promote another act as the headliner, but this decision proved to be more symbolic than it seemed at the time. This wasn’t just about Lollapalooza – this was Nirvana, the band whose album knocked off Michael Jackson on Billboard, the band that subverted rock and killed the hair band, the band that defied commercial expectations even at the great expense that it proved to be. Nirvana had abdicated it’s thrown, and now Lollapalooza was unwittingly dubbing an heir. They turned to the next act on the bill, and one of the hottest acts at the time, the Smashing Pumpkins.

By late 2009, I was a long way from the comfortable rut I had for much the first decade of the new century. I was out of school, I had met my future fiancé (as of the time of this writing), and became adept at cooking my own meals (as in, not using a microwave.) With all these extra duties there was little opportunity for music listening. My musical sphere was as small as it had been in those ten years. Most of the bands I was into, 90’s holdovers, were putting out music that was decidedly “passed their prime.” I was no longer DJ-ing on the radio, and by that time the mainstream long since left me on the banks. About the only time I could “get my freak on” was in 3-5 song bursts in the car. (Is “get your freak on” still a thing?) I was ready for something new – and I had a fail proof plan. My hallowed tomes, the December “best of year” lists were trickling out, and it was only a matter of time for me to strike gold. One December night, I sat down to crawl through the lists, determined to find something to listen to, something new.