Okay, the diskant top ten albums and films of the year articles are finally online. Every year I start things off earlier and every year we still manage not to get things online til mid-January when everyone is sick of end of year roundups. This year has been the most difficult yet – I almost ditched the albums poll at one point when there was so little agreement in the voting that we couldn’t even come up with ten that had 2 or more votes, not to mention the fact that zero of my picks had ended up in the top ten. Thankfully some late votes fixed this and the resulting articles are full of the usual enthusiasm and disdain from the diskant team. I hope you enjoy reading them and discover some new records to seek out. I’m certainly itching to hear more of them. Feel free to comment below.

As an extra bonus this year, you get to see exactly who voted for what as I’ve published everyone’s individual top tens.

If I get a chance I’ll post up some thoughts on why everyone else is wrong and my picks were actually the best ten records of the year but we’ll see. It’s probably more pressing that I dig into that pile of review CDs by my stereo.

You know I’ve been waiting all year to do this again.

ALASDAIR – for patiently re-introducing me to Fun, amongst other things
BUNNIES – I have spent way too much of 2005 stalking bunny rabbits
CHANNEL 4 – Damn you, I wasn’t supposed to get addicted to TV again
DATA PANIK – my favourite new band of 2005
ELEPHANTS – providing the main entertainment of being a corporate designer
FLICKR – my year in photos
GREEN TEA – begone, caffeine
HIS DARK MATERIALS – The stage show was one of the greatest things I have ever seen
IPOD – completely changed my listening habits, probably for the worse
JAPAN – I’M GOING TO JAPAN (my catchphrase for 2005, my most anticipated thing for 2006)
KNITTING – and sewing, as part of www.misofunky.com
LAST FM – See, Crazy Boys IS my song of the year
MONO – home from home this year with the fantastic Plan B and Beard events, our gig with Wolf Eyes and many happy hours just hanging out with friends.
NOODLES – Do I eat out anywhere else than Ichiban and Wagamama? Probably not.
OWW – Brain melting noise at Instal and Glasgow Implodes
PROPERTY OWNERSHIP – In progress. Keep your fingers crossed!
QUIET – Living in a tiny house in a garden, down a lane
RSI – pros: less time on computers, more going out. cons: PAIN, losing touch with online friends
SNOW – on December 29th. Just in time!
THIRTY – My turnaround year, and how
UTER – Still fun, mainly due to good gigs with so many lovely and fantastic bands
WALKING – also rediscovered thanks to living next to the River Kelvin walkway
XENOMANIA/RICHARD X – responsible for most of my pop thrills this year
YOU – for continuing to read diskant. Thank you!
ZINES – I’m not going to get my zine done by the end of the year am I?

Hello, I’ve been away. I would just like to amend the comments in the article “diskant’s favourite films of 2004“. Sherry Ostapovitch returned my DVD of ‘Before Sunrise’ back in January, but I have not had an opportunity until now to clarify the situation. The defamatory claims made about her in my contribution to the article were written back in December 2004, but Ms Ostapovitch – otherwise known as “MusicForOne” – ensured that the DVD had returned to my library before diskant published said article. Sorry Sherry.

Please also note that the DVD is once again available for loan to anyone who asked to borrow it last August.

One year we might manage to get our end of year polls online before the end of January but it is not this year. Getting votes and comments out of our contributors is one of the more difficult tasks of the year but now it is finally done and you can enjoy it. As always there was little agreement amongst us as to the actual best records and films of the year and much complex maths was required to get fair and true top tens. This also means there is lots of disagreement in the comments which makes a nice change from most overly upbeat end of year lists.

So go read about our favourite albums and favourite films and please post your comments here and let us know what you think.

Dave Stockwell has also done us a seperate column about his favourite records of 2004 which overlap with our main choices more than he expected. Not so obscurist now eh Dave?

And to finish off JGram has been chatting to his favourite new band of the year, The Go! Team from Brighton.

One year we might manage to get our end of year polls online before the end of January but it is not this year. Getting votes and comments out of our contributors is one of the more difficult tasks of the year but now it is finally done and you can enjoy it. As always there was little agreement amongst us as to the actual best records and films of the year and much complex maths was required to get fair and true top tens. This also means there is lots of disagreement in the comments which makes a nice change from most overly upbeat end of year lists.

So go read about our favourite albums and favourite films and please post your comments here and let us know what you think.

Dave Stockwell has also done us a seperate column about his favourite records of 2004 which overlap with our main choices more than he expected. Not so obscurist now eh Dave?

And to finish off JGram has been chatting to his favourite new band of the year, The Go! Team from Brighton.

(Sorry for dragging this out for so long. It was not my intention but things have been busier, and windier, than expected). But, finally….

#1 – THE MORNING NEWS

Probably not a surprise to anyone as I have never stopped going on about how great The Morning News is since I discovered it years ago. It is surprising though that they have managed to continue being fantastic when most of my other favourite websites have disappeared, gone rubbish or turned into ad-filled nightmares. Basically you’ve got a group of extremely witty and intelligent writers with some link to New York with the freedom to write about pretty much anything they choose. It’s updated daily with links to the day’s most interesting stories and wonders to be found on the web and an article or two ranging from in depth interviews and round table discussions to How To guides and illustration galleries. Over the years I have learned an enormous amount about smart dress for men and wedding etiquette and when I do eventually visit New York I’ll probably find I already have an in built city guide buried in my brain. My only gripe is with the current redesign process which has been going on for about 6 months now with no results but from what I hear there are exciting plans afoot and I guess they’ll be worth waiting for. In the meantime go and have a dig about or just go look at my favourite article of 2004, The Bear.

I’m also donating $20 to The Morning News as a prize of sorts. Long may they continue.

www.themorningnews.org

From the temping job that has been slowly destroying my life since June:

Number 5. From someone who wrote a five-page letter about the brown spot on their ceiling:

“…please note no one in the house who smokes as this is a CHRISTIAN home.”

Number 4. From a man who wants his local housing association to reimburse him for the uninsured stuff he got stolen from his house after he forgot to lock the front door:

“I don’t believe I should pay because I am a victim”

Number 3. Explains itself nicely:

“I have absolutely no intention of returning to shop in ********* ever again, until all of the parking meters produce tickets with sticky labels to enable me to fix the ticket properly to my screen, as is the style in Derby. My daughter, who is 6′ 5″ has the greatest difficulty finding clothes to fit. Derby cannot help her and ********* was one place that could help. She has, since the above incident, found one or two good shops in Leicester.”

Number 2. An email, apparently drafted on a mobile phone:

“our tax 4 136 leybourne dr is up to date acc no ********,wepay monthly over the fone so why r u taking us to court 11-11-40 we dont owe you.

yourskevin and sonia wright”

Number 1. Some constructive criticism in the wake of the very publicised murder of a teenage girl:

“You people are to blame, your city is the most violent city in the UK.You are all accountable and have presided over this continuing decline in the quality of this city.

1. Bring back the death penalty

2. Sack the entire ********* council and the staff

3. Wipe ********* off the face of the map”

#2 – FREAKY TRIGGER

Changing from an irregularly updated webzine to a frequently updated weblog is becoming a bit of a cliche these days but FT has reinvented itself as possibly the best group blog around. They always had a good group of writers including a fair chunk of freelance music writers but they’ve enlisted lots more people with all kinds of interests and got them writing informally on a range of topics over 7 themed blogs covering music, film and TV, books and art, food and drink, sport, science etc. meaning when one blog gets a bit quiet another will be full of new posts. They also cleverly organise a few long running series of posts to keep things ticking over and prevent the usual posting droughts of other blogs. The recent Top 100 Films voted using drunken pub science was great and they’re now doing the same with pop songs. Also a special mention for linked sub-blog Popular which is one man’s task of writing about every UK number 1 record in order from the beginning.

www.freakytrigger.co.uk

#3 – JGRAM WORLD

So good it got him sacked so maybe it should have been #1. Or maybe JGram World will be all the better for learning those important rules about Google proofing, pseudonyms and not talking about your workmates and boss on your blog (Hi everyone at my work!). V1 is now no longer online as was but instead you can jump straight into the aftermath on V 2.0. What puts this above most peoples’ blogs is Jason’s prolificness and seeming complete lack of shame. Most bloggers post once every two weeks with an edited take on what they’ve been up to, kinda. Jason, on the other hand, posts lengthy daily posts in great detail without worrying about making himself look good. So you can really get into JGram’s World for what it is which is often riveting and hilarious. The changes in tone from the work entries to the days of unemployment have been particularly poignant. If you know Jason it’s twice as fun and if he knows you then beware! You will be mentioned and you may not look cool either. Read it now before he gets a book deal and why not see if you can be the first person to get sacked for reading blogs at work instead of working.

jgram2.blogspot.com

#4 – STYLUS MAGAZINE

This is about the only music website I read regularly. It’s sometimes mentioned as a mini-Pitchfork but I find it much more interesting and fun and so much less horribly indie rock than Pitchfork. There are daily reviews of a wide range of albums from your dull indie rock to your shiny pop and scary noise but these are just the basic content which is overshadowed somewhat, for me, by the other daily and weekly features where their writers use a selection of repeated concepts to great effect from top tens, J-Pop reviews, ‘playing God’ with classic album tracklistings and the hilariously brilliant UK chart commentary. Add round table discussions, in depth interviews and film reviews and there’s not really much else you could ask for to while away a boring lunch break.

www.stylusmagazine.com