oh ye of little faith. you expected this list to stall out at seven and here i am to prove you all wrong. blame, work, sickness, holidays and family for the brief interlude.

ELECTRELANE, AXES

oddly enough, every dude that raved about the magik markers apocalyptic noise hated this record. while not as free-form chaotic as the other band, “axes” is a sprawling wreck of an album, each of the band members going off in their own directions and being captured to tape in its most metallic form possible. god, how i wish more women bothered to make music like this. actually, i just wish i could make music like this.

ESPERS, THE WEED TREE

sometimes more interesting than original material is the way existing work is interpreted by others. espers, sometimes by their own fault, wind up pigeonholed as purveyors of music so fragile; all the press they’ve received leads you to believe they wander fishtown with gossamer fairy wings attached to their backs. what makes weed tree so fascinating is that a lot of those preconceived ideas about who they are as a band wind up being smashed to bits here. let the record show that 2005 marks the year espers threw me for a motherfucking loop. sure, there’s the obvious cover choices such as michael hurley but then they cover — what?! — durutti column and blue fucking oyster cult. the band doesnt turn faux-metal on us on the latter, but rather twists the song away from a mere melodic, pretty tribute to a sinister, sprawling psychedelic freakout. if this is what we get on a mere covers album, who knows what damage they’ll cause on their forthcoming release for drag city next year.

SLEATER-KINNEY, THE WOODS

sleater-kinney’s letterman performance earlier this year was, at best, shaky, each component slightly out of time with each other; you could see the slightly terrified look in their eyes as they attempted to get their shit together and fly right in front of a live national audience. while this would qualify as an utterly craptacular and embarrasing show of talent for any band, it might be the first time ive witnessed the group in such a vulnerable state. you know, im still not even sure if i actually like this record, but i think they’ve giving us something different this time around, which at the very least, is commendable.

HAIL SOCIAL, SELF-TITLED

for me, when it comes to music words are often like the wah-wah-wah of adults in charlie brown cartoons, but in 2005 i finally could understand what they were saying. after the cotton had been pulled from my ears, i struggled with lots of records, especially this one. just as sleater-kinney grabbed my attention for their vulnerability, hail social earned my respect by refusing to give easy answers this early in the game.

thanks, jonathan valania! philly, i have you in the palm of my hand. a hand which has very, very long fingers.

in lieu of actual content, i present to you the titles of posts i started writing but then totally gave up on. trust me, the actual posts are awful but its really funny looking at them in this context. what are the titles to some of your drafts? post ‘em:

friday afternoon recap
Post #534
man man mystery
chewing chewing gum
hurrricane maria
nights of awesome, days of suck
my favorite songs
Post #633
new yorks alright if you like saxaphones
the death (and rebirth) of Y100
booking rock shows is the new black
pinback: offcell ep
the liz phair issue
the greatest record store ever
example #983458453 of why philly will never “blow up”
my new business
never mind nirvana
hung up in a warehouse town
“family values” tour proposal
crafty ladies
ive seen lots of bands this week
i am gay for merge
weekend in review
Post #467
justify your existence

FIERY FURNACES, REHEARSING MY CHOIR

i really should have HATED this record. narrative/poetry set to music? grandmothers? christ, kill me now. but this record is exactly what i want out of music — it makes me rethink and rethink and rethink what my criteria for music, both good and bad, compelling and repulsive, should be.

[id like to add that i bear no ill will towards the grandmothers of the world. my own passed away in october of 2004 and there’s not a day that goes by where i miss her dearly.]

THE TEETH, CARRY THE WOOD

anyone who’s a longtime follower of plain parade already knows about our dirty, not-so-secret love affair with the teeth, so dont act all surprised when they wind up on my list. i mean, how could they not? i nearly forgot about this record’s official release this year, mainly because they play so many shows in town, thus making these songs part of philly’s indie subconscious, especially with all the twentysomething drama that goes on. you see that figure on the left, clasping hands over its heart? how much more do i need to explain to you?

KINSKI, ALPINE STATIC

the moment i turned on alpine static, i metamorphed into some kind of monster. my hair was straggly and long, my jeans were ripped — in fact, this record brings me closer to the teenage version of myself, closer than i’ve felt in years. the only downside to this record is its lopsided nature. but that’s kind of what being a teen is like — half-noise, half-quiet.

GOLDEN BALL, THE LUXURY OF PAUSE

word assoociation time! this band makes me think of the shiny ball inside a pinball game, what with all their whirring around. on the pp compilation, they managed to convert one of espers dirgey-slow songs into a hyperballad worthy of placement alongside the add-riffic inspired material of fiery furnaces. the same approach can be found in spades on this record. with all their energy, im sure the band finds their downtime, if any, luxurious.

inspired by j. edward keyes, i am going to begin a countdown of my favorite music from 2005, day by day on this here blog. i promise you i wont crap out midway — we all know what happens when i get a crazy idea.

i’ve been wrangling with how i’d present these picks to you for a while. should i separate them? should they be combined into one master list? after much consideration, i decided it was best to keep the lists separate yet posted concurrently. id like to think this is how i listened to music in the past year — one ear on the local, one ear on the rest of the world. there is no larger comment, no ulterior motive — im not trying to ghettoize anyone here. 2005 offered up some incredible music and any reader of this blog can certainly attest to how psyched i was to hear what was happening in my own backyard. these albums are worthy of standing tall, side by side.

10. JENNIFER GENTLE, VALENDE

valende feels like a first visit from a long-lost overseas cousin to the more continental olivia tremor control. despite a shared DNA of homerecorded goodness, sci-fi weirdness, forays into film scoring and pink floyd, its obvious jennifer gentle are from elsewhere — watch how they chew their bubblegum.

10. AUDIBLE, SKY SIGNAL

mike kennedy — one of the busiest men in philly music or covert ADD sufferer? i ask this because the dude has, like, eight billion bands. OK, thats not true. of course there’s audible, the recently-revived lefty’s deceiver [now with 100% more ed hogarty!], fleetwood mike [guess what they do] and the pavement-meets-the-kinks-in-a-non-alcoholic-bar future tips. despite the busy nature of audible’s brainchild, their debut release for polyvinyl records displays the sharpest, most surgical focus, even when jumping in between shoegaze, synth-pop and other influences, creating seamlessly pretty indiepop.

BAHAHAHA. i hope you enjoy this! thanks, stereogum.

i still cant make up my mind about which is more disturbing about friday night — class of 1923 ice rink’s architecture, in its full, brutalist, concrete-poured glory or the discovery that most of penn’s figure skating club roster consists of engineering and Wharton students. perhaps its neither and i should be concerned about my decision to take in PFSC’s holiday show on a friday evening.

its been a long time since i have been inside an ice rink without being on the ice; i froze my ass off. and the gigantic slab of concrete that is C’23 rink isnt any help with making it easier on spectators. the other thing about ice rinks is that i had forgotten is how awful amplified music sounds in those spaces. boomy and tinny at the same time, wheezing its way out of speakers beyond their prime. combined with the fact that 99% of figure skaters have the most awful taste in music (for example, the girl in this show who skated to black eyed peas’ “my humps”), i remembered exactly why i kept my history with figure skating a secret all those years.

skating is best experienced in two ways — as a participatory exercise (ie, get on the ice and d.i.y.) or on television. even the show’s best skaters, tiffany scott and rusty fein (2005 senior pairs eastern champs, which is like A Big Deal), seemed to move across the ice at an unhurried pace. were this television, tiffany and rusty would have appeared lightning quick. of course, when i went out skating on my own saturday, i wondered how fast i appeared to be moving. im fairly positive the less experienced skaters of the PFSC moved like lightning bolts compared to my out-of-shape, havent competed in 13 years self.

overall, the show was not bad. some skaters were technically proficient, and in expected fashion failed to emote on ice, and thus made for less compelling performances. then there were the beginners — i couldnt help but really feel sympathetic for them, especially when they leapt into axels and other jumps, for the obvious fact that figure skating is hard, no matter how much fun you want to poke at it. this is something i think about constantly, on and off the ice: how could i spend 13 years of my life, hurling myself into the air without a single doubt? OK, i did have my doubts and those are the moments i wound up falling the most. there’s a reason why figure skating’s history is left to the barely legal crowd — the older you get, the more you think about the dangers of the sport.

in other news:

» i caught blood on the wall & psychic ills saturday night at vox populi. it was worth the two hour delay in door time. i think nick sylvester is pretty on point with blood on the wall sounding the way we remember indie rock in our heads, rather than the preserved specimens. the same could be said about oxford collapse as well.

» SFTSB gets reviewed in the philadelphia inquirer. dan mcquade and john carroll have good things to say in response. my take? its a nice review, though deluca incorrectly remarks that the spinto band have never done a show with us. spintos have done three shows, going back to the doc watson’s era. update: as of 3:30pm EST we’re newsworthy enough to warrant a spot on philly.com’s front page, ABOVE breaking wingbowl news!!!

» dont forget, i am djing tonight @ silk city! a snowball fight is in the works.

fluxblog’s got a track from the forthcoming delta 5 reissue, which you might recall i did the packaging for.