Last month Dan had this fun idea for each of us to do our own “Top 10 albums of 2009″ list. Everybody does it. Laying aside for the moment the possibly fading relevancy of the album as a format; I’m not totally buying into it yet, and anyway we like albums. Well, we’ve been stalling on posting them because Will hasn’t got his in. Three weeks into the new year I think it’s time to let him off the hook.

Dan’s (in order):

1. Weinland “Breaks In The Sun”
2. The Black Heart Procession “Six”
3. Morrissey “Years Of Refusal”
4. Polvo “In Prism”
5. Sonic Youth “the Eternal”
6. Dinosaur Jr. “Farm”
7. Do Make Say Think “Other Truths”
8. Jason Lytle “Yours Truly, the Commuter”
9. Katatonia “Night Is The New Day”
10. Isis “Wavering Radiant”

Chuck’s (in no order):

• Sonic Youth “The Eternal”
• Dinosaur Jr “Farm”
• Kowloon Walled City “Gambling On The Richter Scale”
• Black Pyramid “Black Pyramid”
• Magnolia Electric Co. “Josephine”
• Morissey “Years Of Refusal”
• Zoroaster “Voice Of Saturn”
• The Disciplines “Smoking Kills”
• Boston Spaceships “The Planets Are Blasted”
• Mastodon “Crack The Skye”

Honorable mentions:

• Neko Case “Middle Cyclone”
• Wilco “The Album”
• Pelican “What We All Come To Need”
• Built To Spill “There Is No Enemy”
• Baroness “The Blue Album”
• Om “God Is Good”
• The Sundance Kids “The Excellent Sundance Kids”

Making a list like this is kind of funny because there are so many releases you’re aware of but never really got around to getting or listening to very much that you suspect might make the list, but it feels wrong to put on albums that you suspect you might like a lot, but don’t really know very well. I really don’t know how music critics do it, because they also have to think of a bunch of interesting stuff to say about each album. Even with the amount of music that Dan and I are able to listen to (we both tend to have jobs where we can pretty much listen to music all day while we work) it’s hard to get to everything that strikes you as interesting. Especially when you suffer lengthy bouts of unemployment that hamper your ability to buy tunes.

Hopefully you are working your way out of hibernation from this weather. We’ve got a hell of a show coming up on January 29 at Vaudeville Mews with North Of Grand and a really cool Minneapolis band called Story Of The Sea. Hope to see you.

Why Make Clocks is back at it. Saturday we went up to Omaha to play at O’Leaver’s. Bazooka Shootout sounded great, we went on second, then Nick from Little Black Stereo pulled double duty after that, playing piano in the Matt Cox Band before Little Black Stereo capped off the night. One thing is for sure, Nick can play the fuck out of a piano. It was a great show. The band selection was appreciably eclectic and all of them good, and a good turnout and fun all around.

Ian (of Thunder Power) offered us his place to crash at, but we experienced car trouble on the way to his place from O’Leavers. The “brake” warning light was on and the steering was really stiff and something smelled funny. So we didn’t know if we were going to end up stranded or what. In the morning Ian recommended the garage at the BP shop a few blocks away which besides having been good to him in the past had the distinction of being open on a Sunday. Turned out the idler pulley had gone out resulting in loss of the serpentine belt. On the drive back to Ian’s, he and Dan had the fortune of finding the belt itself in the street, and took it back over to the garage. So for not much more than a hundred bucks we were back in business and headed home by noon. Huge thanks are due to Ian and that garage. You guys are lifesavers.

Weekend after next we’ll be on the hometown scene with a show at the Mews on the 29th with North Of Grand and Story Of The Sea. Also plan on us at The Maintenance Shop in Ames with Bowerbirds in March.