5 of the mostly now

I've been a bit lax in posting any 5 of the now music recently, so some of these tracks are finely aged at this point. All still good though. A nice mix of some mainstream, and some really fine remixes.

1. Cage the Elephant - Ain't No Rest For The Wicked - Ain't No Rest For The Wicked
Good, solid rock. I thought for sure this was a hair metal track that I somehow missed, only to learn it was brand new. I've only heard this on KRNA on rare terrestrial radio listening occasions, so I don't know if it has gotten much airplay or not. I dig it.

2. Lateef & Z-Trip - Ahead of the Curve - Time (Freestyle)
Z-Trip is hands-down one of my favorite DJ's, and I've been a fan of Lateef's since his work with Lyrics Born. This track is the current favorite off of what is a great mixtape.

3. Rhianna - Umbrella (Travis Barker Remix)
Since becoming more interesting in drums, I've been even more amazed with what Travis can do. His work with DJ AM was incredible. This track is very much along those lines.

4. DJ Earworm - Heartless (In a Bottle). I first came across DJ Earworm after his "United State of Pop 2008 (Viva La Pop)" mashup of the top 25 pop songs of 2008. He has a number of other very smooth mashups, with this one being one of my favorites. The Fray doing Kanye + The Police + Black-Eyed Peas + others. Fabulous.

5. Toby Keith - American Ride - American Ride
Toby Keith is often hit or miss for me. This one nails it though.

Albums of 2009

For the past few years (initially started by Ryan, I believe) at the end of the year I have assembled a list of my favorite albums that I purchased during the year. These are not individual songs, instead they are whole albums that ended up getting lots of play during the year.

This year proved to be particularly challenging. First, in something that should be a sign to the ignorant record companies, I did not buy a single, silver, shiny disc this year. Not one. I didn't do this to purposely not buy CD's any longer. Instead, I have just found that price, convenience, and ease of use by me all lead to me buying nearly all of my music as Amazon MP3 downloads. Second, I also greatly loaded up on the amount of free music I was finding, and a healthy dose of Pandora. All of this lead to a rather small list of possible albums. However, out of that list, I was able to find 4 albums that had significantly more listening mileage than others.

These are in no particular order. They are simply 4 albums that I purchased this year and found to be the most interesting of 2009:

1. Kid Cudi - Man On The Moon: The End Of Day [Explicit]
I was first pulled in by "Day and Night", and the "Make Her Say" remix was far better than the original. Good stuff overall.

2. LMFAO - Party Rock (Amazon MP3 Exclusive Version) [Explicit]
Raw fun. That's really all you need to know. This stuff never gets old, it just perks up your day when you hear it. "I am not a whore" remains my favorite.

3. Shinedown - The Sound Of Madness
Yes, this album got a significant amount of standard radio airplay. Despite that, this is the real deal. These guys are how I want my rock to sound. The title track still kicks me in the rear when I need it.

4. Steinski - What Does It All Mean? - 1983-2006 Retrospective
If you dig people such as Girl Talk, DJ Shadow, etc., you need to give Steinski a listen. In my mind, he's the Grand Wizard Theodore of the mashup/sampling movement. He's the originator who almost nobody knows - he doesn't have the mainstream name. However, this stuff is top-notch. More info on Steinski is here.