LUDIC LOG

Saturdays are usually list days here at the Ludic Log, and today is no exception. However, today's list is a little different. It's more "serious" (not really, but it's also not transparently a joke), it's a lot longer, and it comes with the lengthy explicatory quasi-FAQ you see below. If you want to go straight to it, go nuts. Otherwise, take a gander at the apologia first.

Q. What is this list?

A. It's a list of my top 12 albums for each year since 1988.

Q. Why?

A. I like starting arguments.

Q. "Top" is pretty subjective, isn't it?

A. It sure is.

Q. Why since 1988?

A. That's the first year I really started paying attention to music. Of course, I listened to plenty of music before that, but it wasn't until then -- the year It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, the greatest rap album of all time, came out -- that I really started thinking about music from a critical perspective. Or, to put it another way, that's the first year I was geeky enough to start making lists of records I really liked. Also, it gives you a nice shapely cut-off of 15 years.

Q. Speaking of rap albums, there sure are a lot of them on there. What gives?

A. I like rap. I listen to it more than anything else other than "rock", an equally nebulous term.

Q. I don't see a lot of (insert genre here) on your list. Don't you listen to (insert band here)?

A. I probably do; my musical tastes are ludicrously diverse. However, there are some genres I really know very little about (jazz), some genres I'm not especially fond of (electronica, mainstream modern country), and some genres that I like quite a lot but which are so narrow and which produce so little product, relatively speaking, that it's very hard to rank it in the framework of a broader context (black metal, Japanese noise).

Q. I have never heard of any of the bands on your list. Aren't your tastes pretty obscure?

A. I like what I like. Due to a number of social, temporal, economic and geographical factors, I tend to know about, listen to, and appreciate certain types of music that some people would find obscure. I'm not trying to be hip; that's just the way it turns out.

Q. Everyone I know has heard of all of the bands on your list. Aren't your tastes pretty mainstream?

A. I like what I like. Due to a number of social, temporal, economic and geographical factors, I tend to know about, listen to, and appreciate certain types of music that some people would find obscure. I'm not trying not to be hip; that's just the way it turns out.

Q. Why 12?

A. 10 seems like too few, and 20 like too many. 12 gives me just enough wiggle room.

Q. May I send you CDs of (insert artist here) so you can learn what a fool you were to exclude them?

A. You certainly may.

Q. May I send you angry e-mails telling you how much your taste in music sucks?

A. You certainly may.

And now: The Dirty Dozens.