Favorite Albums of 2008

The year in music 2008 began in a crawl. Like a bear slow to leave the confines of its cave, music was biding its time until the frigid winter air stopped its biting. Maybe it was just my personal winter hangover from the end of 2007 – as musically rich a time as I ever experienced. Maybe I was just content with what I had. Maybe there simply wasn't just a ton of good music released the first couple months.

The moral of the story, then, is to wait. The rest of 2008 was a seemingly endless procession of exceptional albums, culminating with an early 2009 release by Animal Collective (a 9.6 by Pitchfork?!!!) that has the critics drooling and comparing it to to Pet Sounds and OK Computer.

These are my favorite albums. Meaning albums I bought and listened to. This isn't a comprehensive list of albums released in 2008 - no single man has the time or money for such an endeavor. Just my favorite. That's all.

Bon Iver takes the top spot simply because I listened to For Emma, Forever Ago more than any other album - and the fact that it's ceaslessly gorgeous, brief (only eight actual songs), and doesn't lose its momentum even a full year after its initial release. And it makes me cry. All the time.

So, without further ado, my favorite albums of 2008:

1. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago
2. Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
3. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend
4. Grand Archives, The Grand Archives
5. TV on the Radio, Dear Science
6. Sigur Ros, Með Suð Í Eyrum Við Spilum Endalaust
7. Coldplay, Viva La Vida
8. Jon Foreman, Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer EPs
9. MGMT, Oracular Spectacular
10. Gaslight Anthem, The '59 Sound
11. Glasvegas, Glasvegas
12. Hot Chip, Made in the Dark
13. Headlights, Some Racing, Some Stopping
14. Ra Ra Riot, The Rhumb Line
15.The Helio Sequence, Keep Your Eyes Ahead
16. The Killers, Day & Age
17. Frightened Rabbit, The Midnight Organ Fight
18. Electric President, Sleep Well
19. The Dodos, Visiter
20. Low vs Diamond, Low vs Diamond
*(21. Avett Brothers, The Second Gleam)

This is an EP, so it gets the asterisk and parentheses treatment.