CD's I bought this year

Time was, (the 90's) I bought at least a CD a week and back before that in the 80's I was buying cassette tapes all the time. I am sure I spent more money on music than I ever did on clothes or anything else. But now my hundreds of cassette's are filling up a trunk in Montana, and even the CD's which have a mediocre trade in value are mostly gone. I used to have a competition with a friend for who had more, we were getting into the 1,000 plus range when his collection got stolen. Years later, everythings on the computer (with all kinds of crazy backups) and since becoming married, a parent, and much more into book collecting the CD collection fell bythe wayside. I have to be pretty motivated to buy an album, so here's what I bought this year.

1. Morrissey: Years of Refusal

I'm a big fan, daresay I think of him as the premier poet of our day. Because I'm such a fan, I got this within a week or two of release and at first only two songs really caught me. Thats a little poor for me with a Morrissey album but in the last couple weeks I find other tracks are getting stuck in my head in a good way. Best track: 'All You Need is Me'

2. Brule: We the People

My wife and I watched them perform on the UEN channel, (thats a weird station, who knows whatever is gonna turn up on it) In any case they put on a real good show at Mount Rushmore and I remembered the songs titles that I liked. They have a Native American/ Symphonic Rock sound that I dig. Nothing much in the way of lyrics, mostly chanting but it's easy on the ears and I look for stuff thats good to listen to when I write. It took awhile to actually find one of their albums none of the local stores had it. I went to an Native American shop in the local mall and they had this one, their first album so I bought it. Not quite as good as what I watched on UEN but still good and I gotta account that it was their first. Best track: 'Red Path' or 'Fire Dancer'

3. Lacuna Coil: Shallow Life

I did buy this on date of release. I first heard of these guys in a joint add with one of my other favorites Nightwish. Both are heavier rock fronted by women, yet they retain a strong melodic sound that so many other groups miss. I listened to their previous album Karmacode a lot writing first drafts of what became 'Heroes of the Fallen' and 'Blood of Our Fathers'. So I was very excited this album was finally getting released, its been 3 years. I don't know if I like this one as much as Karmacode but it still grips me. They have got to be the best Italian band period.Best tracks: 'I Won't Tell You' or 'Spellbound'

4. Lady GaGa: The Fame

Its funny I just got done telling my wife that I didn't care about stuff that was popular in fact I usually disdain it. And she brought this up. In my defense yeah I heard 'Just Dance' a bunch of times and thought it was alright, but what really got me was when I was eating lunch in my car fiddling through the radio stations and heard 'Pokerface' I didn't even know who sang it, I missed that but it stuck with me. Days later, I was looking through a CD rack, saw Lady GaGa and thought that kinda sounded like her, and it was, so I bought it. Best track: 'Pokerface'