So 2005 is at an end and everyone is making their best of lists. Here I am looking through the lists to see if anything that I am listening to made the cut, and a lot of it did…so that’s good. But as I look over the lists I am realizing that most of the stuff that came out this year, the stuff that I am supposed to love (young indy hipster that I am) I only have lukewarm feelings about.
For example, The Wolf Parade and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. I like both these bands, have played their albums both numerous times, but neither of them goes beyond the point of me just liking them. They are good bands, but ultimately nothing too special, and I am being told that this is the best we got this year? One of my favorite bands The Fiery Furnaces released two albums this year, and both fell short of the magnificence of their first efforts. Same with The New Pornographers, Sleeter Kenny and Bonnie Prince Billy. The only established bands (artists) that released something truly extraordinary in relation to their previous work were The Decemberists and Sufjan Stevens. And all that being said, there isn’t a single album that was released this year that felt fresh or new or different, and not one that gives me chills the way **The Arcade Fire ** did when Funeral came out last year.
What happened? We had been riding a wave where music was getting better and better with every year, new ideas and sounds were everywhere, and this year it all seems to have slid back a step. Everything I have heard sounds like something else, or a retread of something the band has already done.
So while I am not going to say that 2005 was a bad year for music (that would be a lie) I am going to say that it didn’t even come close to living up to its potential.
And to top it all off, the new album Built to Spill promised this fall didn’t get released. 
Anyway, that’s my take on 2005, anyone else have thoughts?