ALBUMS (10 each)
1. Of Montreal - Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
2. Wu-Tang Clan - 8 Diagrams
3. Jens Lekman - Night Falls Over Kortedala
4. Kanye West - Graduation
5. Phosphorescent - Pride
6. Joe Ely - Silver City
7. The Fiery Furnaces - Widow City
8. Lucky Soul - The Great Unwanted
9. The Clientele - God Save the Clientele
10. Jason Anderson - Tonight

TRACKS
1. The Caribbean - The Go From Tactical
2. Sleeping States - Rivers
3. The Capstan Shafts - Better Get a Dream Out of This
4. Eluvium - Radio Ballet
5. Prince - The One U Wanna C
6. Paul McCartney - Dance Tonight
7. Namelessnumberheadman - The Beginning
8. Neil Young - Ordinary People
9. Vic Chesnutt - You Are Never Alone
10. Kelly Willis - Success

REISSUE
1. Vashti Bunyan - Some Things Just Stick in Your Mind: Singles and Demos 1964-1967
2. Masta Ace - Take a Look Around
3. v/a - Summer Records Anthology 1974-1988
4. Ray Price - The Essential Ray Price
5. For Against - In the Marshes

ARTISTS
1. Of Montreal
2. RZA
3. The Capstan Shafts
4. Jason Anderson
5. Japancakes

COMMENTS
The amount of new music I manage to listen to increases unbelievably each year, yet I'm more likely than ever not to have heard the song, album or even artist that to other people absolutely defined the year in music. That also means it's harder than ever to write words that summarize an entire year in music without looking like a jackass.

So I'll offer just one personal observation on the year in music: Much of the music that interested me most in 2007 was also the goofiest, be it Of Montreal's theater of pain, Kanye West's stand-up comedy routine or The Fiery Furnaces' absurdist rockpopopera. Even the Wu-Tang Clan's haunted-house "8 Diagrams" (don't call it a comeback, they've been getting better for years) has hilarious moments, musically and lyrically.

And then there's the unintended humor of Rilo Kiley's "Under the Blacklight": one of the most fun albums of the year even though its creators probably don't see it as the awkward mishmash of clichés that it is. (I still couldn't bring myself to rank it; I guess "guilty pleasures" do exist, no matter how much I deny it.)

As unfashionable as it might be to say, writing about music is necessarily subjective, and mostly about taste. For me, description is more important than judgment, and harder. In music criticism, we need more thoughtful consideration and contemplation, fewer pronouncements, absolutism and slap-bets. I want more writing that gets as close to a specific piece of music as possible, without trying to draw broad conclusions about culture and society. (If I ever use the phrase "captures the zeitgeist" to describe a song or album, somebody please slap me.) And I want far fewer reviews that offer nothing but quick-and-easy praise, coupled with a few biographical facts that would be found in any 5-second Google search.

All complaints aside, end-of-the-year list-making is pure pleasure: that moment when people are (slightly) more likely to pay attention to my incessant raving about what music everybody needs to hear. In my album and singles lists I avoided overlap so I could include as many of my favorite musicians from 2007 as possible, and there's many more I didn't mention. Really, though, who needs more than a top 10? I could list my favorite 100 albums of the year, but who after reading it would run out to hear number 73? NO ONE.