Dane101's contributors and readers continue to roll out our lists for 2007. This entry is from Joshua James, to read them all click on "2007 Reflections" above.

10) A Catapult Western - S/T

I’m not going to give a long and drawn out explanation as to why I love this record because I am currently in the midst of reviewing it. What I will say is that I listen to anywhere between 300 to 500 records a year and after only two weeks with this album I can firmly say it deserves a place in the top ten. If all of Madison had as much talent as A Catapult Western well I don’t know what I would do but it would be something.

9) Bottomless Pit - Hammer of the Gods

When you combine the members of Silkworm, Seam, and .22 you can’t fail. I hadn’t heard Hammer of the Gods until I saw them perform with Dianogah at the Corral Room this past October. With that show I was sold. I bought the album, walked home, and immediately immersed myself in it. Bottomless Pit plays indie-rock for those of us who long for the days when indie-rock still meant something.

8) Broken Social Scene Presents: Kevin Drew - Spirit
If

Kevin Drew the mastermind behind Broken Social Scene gives us a solid album of what we have come to expect. There aren’t many surprises with this record and I am alright with that.

7) The National - Boxer

From the start with “Fake Empire” you know this album is going to be good and by the time you listen to it a second time you are convinced it is great. Matt Berninger’s baritone swoon will either make you fall in love or move on to something else but at least your attention was captured even if only for a moment. And the ladies, oy, I had to listen to my wife gush about how Berninger brushed up against her while we stood at the bar when we saw them at the High Noon. If every straight girl goes on as much as she did about something so benign I am surprised that the stage was littered with undergarments when they ended their set.

6) El-P - I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead

If I could be a hip-hop artist I would want to be El-P. Though he doesn’t release a great deal of output (his last album was put out in 2002) he has a great mind for how things should sound. What else would you expect as the chief head of Definitive Juxtaposition records? With a roster that includes Aesop Rock, Cage, Rob Sonic and Busdriver you know he is doing something right. El-P sets the story that makes up I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead in a post-apocalyptic world where nothing is pretty and all you can do is try to live within the confines of it.

5) The New Pornographers - Challengers

I love Carl “AC” Newman and many could do without his fingerprints all over The New Pornographers latest release. I can understand that people may prefer Neko Case and Dan Bejar over him but I’ll be damned if he doesn’t know how to put a great album together. With the exception of “Electric Version,” The New Pornographers have been a steady group who I know will not let me down; I’m looking at you Bjork and Interpol. I found myself for the first four or five listens of “Challengers,” unable to get passed the first four tracks as they were so strong that I feared that the remainder would be a let down. Nope.

4) Spoon - Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

Like I mentioned above in relation to The New Pornographers; Spoon is a consistent band that has only let me down on one occasion “Gimme Fiction.” I didn’t read any reviews going into “Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga,” I decided that I was going to either continue my love for Spoon or give up on my own terms, well they made it to number three so you know how that went. With “Gimme Fiction,” I felt that the band was trying to break into the mainstream, which they had attempted once before with horrible results, and with their most recent release figured out that isn’t them. Spoon pick up where they left off with “Kill the Moonlight,” and the world is right once again.

3) Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

There is such a catharsis that I feel behind this album that I don’t know what Justin Vernon can do next. I read about Bon Iver a couple months before the juggernaut of music blogs “discovered” him and for that I would like to thank Ryan over at MuzzleofBees.com. Upon reading what Ryan had written about “For Emma, Forever Age,” I knew I had to hear this and I didn’t turn back. It was a rainy autumn Saturday night and I was sitting around with Rebecca (the wife) reading me the news, she some book on pathology, when “Skinny Lover,” came on and I made her listen along with me. I don’t know why this album is so affecting for me and I may never know. I later
found out that Justin was supposed to play at a friend on mine’s wedding in the Spring around the time of release but was out of town. He later called the bride thinking it was the weekend after it had happened . Though the jug-band she got to play was kind of fun, you can’t fail with a banjo version of “The Final Countdown” as your wedding march, witnessing Bon Iver for such a beautiful moment would have slain me.

2) Arcade Fire - Neon Bible

Wow. Could have done without “My Body is a Cage,” but wow. I don’t have anything new to say about this album that hasn’t already been said.

1) Les Savy Fav - Let’s Stay Friends

Thank you Les Savy Fav for saving me from a year that included releases from Beirut and Jens Lekman. I can see the appeal but it doesn’t do anything for me but play in the background of conversations I care a great deal more about than the music, Les Savy Fav demand your undivided attention from the start. “The Equestrian,” grabs you by the scruff and wails on you like an abusive father only to lull you back into a feeling of trust with “Pots and Pans,” and then remembers why he was angry in the first place to assault you with “The Year Before the Year 2000.” My wife jokes that with my constant playing of this album and our drifting in musical interest indicates the beginning of the end of our relationship, but if I had to hear Scout Niblett one more time this year I may have gone out for a pack of cigarettes and never returned.