Best of All Songs Considered

Earlier this month the NPR podcast All Songs Considered released their annual year in review episode, which made me realize I have been listening to the show for 2 years now. I remember finding their 2005 year in review episode and getting caught up in their opening track: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s “The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth”. I’ve been listening ever since and its been a great treat to look forward to on Thursday evenings. All Songs Considered does a pretty good job of sampling the latest in contemporary music and had helped me shape and refine my musical tastes. So in honor of two years of good podcasts and great music, here are some of the artists and albums I discovered through the show.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Picaresque
Picaresque
The Decemberists
Z
Z
My Morning Jacket
Illinois
Illinois
Sufjan Stevens
St. Elsewhere
St. Elsewhere
Gnarls Barkley
The Crane Wife
The Crane Wife
The Decemberists
Return to Cookie Mountain
Return to Cookie Mountain
TV on the Radio
Boys and Girls in America
Boys and Girls in America
The Hold Steady
Boxer
Boxer
The National
Memory Almost Full
Memory Almost Full
Paul McCartney
The Stage Names
The Stage Names
Okkervil River
Challengers
Challengers
The New Pornographers

I could have listed many more, but I tried to limit myself to artists or albums I heard for the first time on the show. The exception to that is The Decemberists’ The Crane Wife because I probably would not have bought the album if I hadn’t heard it on All Songs. It’s also worth noting that I downloaded more than half of these albums from eMusic, a DRM-free music download service that’s great for discovering independent artists. I look forward to hearing All Songs’ listetener’s picks for best albums of 2007 this week.

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