Best of 2008

So everybody is coming up with lists around this time of year, best books, best albums, or just the best of the year in general. So I've decided to come up with a list of the top 50 of my favorite things of 2008. By the way, the idea was taken from another blogger, so kudos to the electic penguin guy, a superior blogger to me.

(In no particular order)

1. Election night 2008-"I don't have any gwape nuhds and I didn't put stickuhs on Weid's Caw!"
2. Change-everybody wanted it, and now we have it and we never have to hear of John McCain and Sarah Palin ever again.
3. Sarah Palin-She inspired one of the best SNL satirization of any political figure...EVER!
4. Magazines-I got to see Barack Obama's face of half the magazine covers in 7-Eleven while I was buying beer, it was like "Hey man, buying some beer? Vote for me!"
5. Beer- It was a good year for beer. I drank it in 6 different countries, 3 US states, 5 National Capitols, Oktoberfest, 30,000 feet above the Atlantic Ocean and while staring up at Ryan Adams' jeans smoking a cigarette with him 4 feet away.
mmmmm beer
6. Vampire Weekend- "Blakes's got a new face!!"
7. The Lord of the Rings
8. Amazon.com-the national yard sale. Where else can you buy books and CD's for a penny and pay 3.99 shipping. Where else would someone pay 5 dollars for a book that you bought at Goodwill for a dollar because the guy behind the counter was too old to see that it was a hardback and hardbacks cost 2.00.
9. Goodwill-Cosby sweaters, cheap pants, picture frames, books and records (I bought an Alvin and the Chipmunks Christmas album and it had Bob Marley and the Wailers "LIVE!" in it. Niccccee.
10. South Park- From Imaginationland up to the Election episode, they have been pretty much spot on reminding us of how fucking rediculous we all are for being Americans and getting caught up in anything Fox News tells us. The election episode was particularly poignant. It depicted Obama supporters partying their asses off after he won and screaming "WE DID IT!!" and "CHANGE HAS COME!!" and puking everywhere and when they woke up, they realized the only thing that had changed was that the were hungover as shit. Yeah...I did all that, so...yeah...change.
11. emusic.com
12. It's Always Sunny in Philedelphia-for obvious reasons
13. Netflix.com-how can anything so amazing actually exist.
14. The end of the writer's strike. I was in Germany the whole time, so I really didn't even notice it until the site that I streamed the Office from stopped posting episodes for Season 4. wtg?
15. The death of Jerry Falwell-I know it happened last year, but I wanted to remind everyone that the fat-ass Jesus freak died and his soul...never existed. (But you can buy a piece of it sown inside of a Bible on www.liberty.edu/store
16. Gas-holy shit, $4.00 a gallon? I think most people just sat in their houses and sweated watching netflix and ordering delivery food for the month of July. Now, Roanoke has the third cheapest gas in the country $1.25 per gallon (about 2.5 litres).
17. Walking-it's fucking awesome!
18. Records-embracing the next cultural revolution: the death of the CD and re-emergence of vinyl as the preferred medium of music. I mean, the record is cheaper than the CD AND you get a free digital download or even the copy of the CD itself. Now I can sell all my CDs on Amazon and use the money to by records Woo-Hoo!!
19. Going Green-Roanoke City can afford to have 2 trolleys running between the hospital and the market but can't figure out how to recycle green and brown glass!! Fuck you for making me feel guilty about drinking beer that doesn't come in a can!!
20. Roanoke City mayor David Bowers claiming that having rats in the Market building was like 9/11.
21. Ratface
22. Being gay-it seemed like everyone was gay this year.
23. Nintendo Wii-have you seen Wii Music? it looks fucking awesome. While everyone else is playing ass-hole Guitar Hero/Rock Band, we could be composing banjo concertos!
24. The English language-the fall of Bush and the rise of the ever-eloquent Barack Obama has dropped the English language back to its number 5 spot on the worst languages to listen to:
1. Dutch
2. Flemmish
3. German
4. French Canadian
5. American English
*(list compiled by the National Association for the Advancement of Texas People).
25. Cooking-it's back!

So that's some of it, I didn't really think it through, but that's enough for now. Of course, this wasn't my best of music list, that will come later. Songs from last year or this year that meant the most to me throughout this crazy fucking year of my life.

headphones and headlines

Luke will be in America in 12 days. Christmas will be here in 15 days. 2009 will be here in 21 days. Barack Obama will be sworn in to the presidency in 41 days and in 88 days I will be 25 years old. Numbers. Days. Time pass by, marking the cadence of life with ticks and tocks reminding us constantly of the passage of time. And yet, there's something comforting falling asleep to the sound of a ticking clock.

Times are tough for Americans. When Americans can't charge as much as they want whenever they want, they get a little upset. And now the wasteful spending of the rich and the poor alike is hurting everyone's pocket. Which leads Americans to the "simple life." What does that mean? It means not going out to eat 20 times a week and throwing away the leftovers the next day. It means not taking the Expedition out for a spin in the mountains for a weeked of fishing. It means learning how to cook meals and shop within a budget. All of these cut backs are the change that's needed to happen to middle to upper-class Americans, to remind us of how lucky we are to have had what we've had for so long. There are poor people in America, homeless people, destitute people, yes. But they still get to eat. We're not living in Haiti or Ethiopia where, even if you have money, there's not much food to buy and we throw away more food in a day than they eat as a country in a year. Sad stuff, right?

Even Kanye West is feeling a bit down. For an artist whose previous hits had titles such as "Stronger," "The Glory," "Champion," "Touch the Sky," and "Jesus Walks" has released an album suffused with sadness, heartbreak and general angst. The thing that I love about hip hop and the reason I've been listening to it so much this past month is the contrast and drama that rock sometimes lacks, especially indie rock. There's something about rap that's eye-opening. The contrast becones apparent when I put on Chronic 2001 or Lil Wayne as I drive through little ole South Roanoke. Dre rapping about gang violence and murder, drugs and street life. Wayne rapping about "bodies still floating," in New Orleans and "you wonder why black people still voting" when your "president's still choking." It's like watching footage from some war for the first time, like those images in the Time magazine of all of those Vietnamese people with their eyes bulging from their skulls, covered in flies with Americans standing around smoking cigarettes posing for the picture. It's a slap in the face. It's truth without metaphor, anger, irony, hatred, love. But it can also be very funny, which I also like. (see Eminem).

Then there's the cross-refrencing. Lil Wayne quotes Kanye, Kanye praises Lil Wayne. And of course there's the infinite references to 2 Pac and Notorious BIG who are referred to as martyrs to the rap game. They make it sound like it was inevitable that they would have to be sacrificed in order to end the fueding between rappers. This drama spans two decades and countless rappers.

So if 2 pac and BIG died for the sake of peace, what has rock offered up to the music gods? Rock's drama exists within the artists tortured head. Several tortured artists have taken their own lives either intentionally or otherwise (drugs). Kurt Cobain was the big one, Bradley Nowell's music was not exactly tortured emotionally charged music, but he gave up his life to his heroin addiction. Rock hasn't lost any big stars since then. Hunter S. Thompson would be on the list of martyrs, another tortured soul, tormented by the personas created for him that he was forced to act out (Duke). The only martyr that comes to mind that was murdered was John Lennon. Ironically, his war was against peace and his life was prematurely ended by an instrument of hate.

Insecurity is the voice that must be silenced for rock stars, not the voices of haters or rival gangsters. The violence that rock stars deal with the pain inflicted upon them by the world. Pain and drama and violence exists in both genres of music, rock singers channel all of this through their guitars or in their strained voices, shrouded in vague lyrics about the universal girl that broke his heart, the pain of his past life, his insecurities, his anger, all expressed through a combination of instruments voice. The rapper has his words. Yes, metaphors exist, but names are used, specific events, public or private, or discussed openly.

Kanye has a song about how his grandmother was sick in the hospital and the pain he felt, the helplessness, the feeling that poor people get cheated by the system and "if my grandmother were in the NBA, right now everything would be okay?" They invite people into their lives where rock musicians attempt to alienate themselves farther by their vaguness and mystique. Conor Oberst wrote songs about his personal life and it tore him apart. He felt to insecure and hated the feeling of people watching him, whereas Lil Wayne claims that he's "the greatest rapper alive" on his album and never shys away from a photo shoot. Hip hop is refreshing because it welcomes the listener into a full serial drama that exists both within the headphones and in the headlines and for that, I owe a debt of graditude to Mr. Shakur, Mr. Wallace, Mr. Young, Mr. West, and Mr. Carter. Not to mention all of those before, after or unheard of that will one day inspire me.

Lil Wayne

Have you heard Lil Wayne? He's the best rapper in the world and becoming one of the most successful. There's a list of the top 77 songs he released (or was featured on) of 2007. While everyone was freaking of Graduation, Weezy was sneaking his way into the best of list-topper of 2008. He's played on the radio to the point of nausea. My first listen was when I once again caved and bought an album on iTunes at 1 in the morning. I was curious.

So it's definitely like nothing I've ever heard before. Not since Dylan has such a fucked-up sounding voice been so popular and sought after. At times, he sounds like an old man on his death bed croaking out random phrases that just happen to rhyme and make sense. Other times, he sounds like a cartoon character, then switching to the square white guy voice then into some high pitched Louis Armstrong impersonation. And most of the time, it sounds like he's rapping while exhaling a big cloud of smoke.

I went to my dad's house today and picked up an issue of Oxford American magazine, published at the University of Arkansas and covers all things Southern, from music to books. I opened it to whatever page and started reading. A man had written a journal-style essay explaining how he survived his first year teaching in New Orleans (where Lil Wayne is from). He talked about how much the kids idolized him and celebrated his complete collection of mix tapes, and albums. Essays written about him, and how he used his music to relate to the kids. He listened to basically nothing but Lil Wayne for an entire year. To say the least, I'm interested in this guy.