top ten, of sorts

Posted in Music by Ashley : March 31, 2008

Oh, I know it’s not January and time for top ten lists, but today marks one year since I joined Last.fm so I thought I’d do a “year” end list for that, and take a look at the site and what constitutes the 10,200 song plays that I have enjoyed over the last year. For those who don’t know, Last.fm is a website that tracks the songs in your “recently played” playlist in iTunes (including what you play on your iPod). But since I tend to go on and on, I’m going to post this with a Read More Here…

Last.fm has millions of members (seemingly heavily slanted towards Europe) and the site offers statistics, some streaming radio station features, “friends” and can be a good place to find artists similar to those that you appreciate. Though I do enjoy statistics and trivia, the reason that I actually joined was to get an album cover quilt. I stumbled on one on some blog, and realized that I needed one on my own blog.

Now after a year, I have become interested in the statistics. Now some may say, why? After all, iTunes tracks what songs you play. But what I like about Last.fm, is that you can track Artists, Albums and Songs, either by Overall plays, yearly, 6 month, 3 month, weekly or recently played. As I have only been a member for a year, I generally just stick with the overall charts. And in terms of the charts themselves, I find the specific’s of song tracking to be of little interest (since if one listened to one particular album a lot, then those songs will dominate the top of the charts), the Artist tracking is handy, but I am interested in information that is a bit more middle of the road than those. What I really appreciate are the Album charts. As a lot of bands have a number of different periods to them, seeing which albums you listen to is more informational in that sense. I have been surprised with some artists realizing which albums of their I listen to the most. For instance… AC/DC. I have learned that I listen to substantially more of the Brian Johnson albums than the Bon Scott ones, which I found most surprising. It’s also a bit funny to see that Point of Entry, which was probably the album I spent the most time with in the early 1980’s, still ranks number three on my most listened to list…

All in all, I find it more interesting that most of the “online social networking” sites… Maybe I am more interested in what music I listen to than I am in online social networking? But I still have tried to get people to join, though the only friend who I have talked into joining Last.fm so far has been having troubles getting it to function accurately.

Anyway, here is the list of the top 25 albums (well, 27 actually) that I’ve listened to in the last year…

    01 God and Texas – Criminal Element
    02 The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets – Cthulhu Strikes Back
    03 Judas Priest – Point of Entry
    04 Silverfish – Organ Fan
    05 Dark Funeral – The Secrets of the Black Arts
    05 AC/DC – Powerage
    07 John Clifford White – Romper Stomper
    08 Gary Numan – Replicas
    09 AC/DC – Flick of the Switch
    10 Foetus – Hole
    10 Butthole Surfers – Independent Worm Saloon
    12 God and Texas – History Volume One
    12 Gary Numan – Telekon
    14 Giuseppe Verdi – Rigoletto
    15 AC/DC – Highway to Hell
    16 Melvins – Houdini
    16 Blue Öyster Cult – Blue Öyster Cult
    18 Koldbrann – Moribund
    19 AC/DC – Back in Black
    19 The Ejected – A Touch of Class
    21 The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets – Great Old Ones
    22 AC/DC – Fly on the Wall
    23 Big Black – The Hammer Party
    23 Immortal – Battles in the North
    25 L7 – Slap-Happy
    25 Dark Funeral – Vobiscum Satanas
    25 Big Black – The Rich Man’s Eight Track Tape
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