Favorite Music of 2016

20 Favorite Albums of ‘16

In all my years of music obsession I don’t think I’ve ever immersed myself in music so much as I did in 2016. I’ve never listened to so many different albums and so many different artists. The year was dominated with soundtracks for me, but thanks to some new Spotify features, I was introduced to many more bands than I had ever been before.

My year end music lists are usually dominated by early year releases. For some reason the first half of most years just seem to be filled with albums that hit me harder than the albums released later. I also tend to get much more listening time for the year’s early releases than I do for the late year ones. But this year was different. After Sturgill Simpson’s amazing not-really-country ode to his son “A Sailor’s Guide To Earth”, I figured nothing could surpass it in my mind. Then a few months later Car Seat Headrest hit me despite their questionable name. That one held my top spot for quite some time; then the new Leonard Cohen blew me off my feet, released like Bowie’s early year masterpiece, just before his death. Then A Tribe Called Quest’s triumphant return floored me, and then no one expected Run the Jewels to jump their 2017 release date the day before Christmas. The hits just kept on coming until the very end.

Anyway, the best I could whittle the list down to was 20, and there were still so many great albums I had to leave off the list. Here they are:

16 Favorite Movies of 2016

OK. I had all but given up on my favorites lists for 2016. I had tried compiling my list of favorite movies in the same manner I had in past years, where I do a little write up on each movie explaining its presence and positioning on the list; but since I hadn’t written reviews on most of these movies, I found myself writing far too much about each one. It was taking me far too long. I had put off my favorite music so I could concentrate on my movies. I had pretty much decided I just wasn’t going to do it this year when it occurred to me, I had the lists. Why don’t I just present the films the same way as I present the music each year, just list them and let them speak for themselves? Well, duh.

So, it may be a little late, but here are my 16 Favorite Movies of 2016. As usual concerning omissions, there are a great many films I missed that would surely have replaced some of these films on the list, but to be sure, these are all great films in a year that was filled with them. It was a pretty mediocre year for big mainstream films, but the independents were in rare form.

These films run the gamut, from Oscar contenders to surprise horror entries, from a nearly 8-hour documentary of an American sports legend whose life turned toward infamy to a costumed comedy of manners made by a master of the genre, from a classic 70s-style crime drama, to one of the most original premises for a movie I’ve ever seen, from a sci-fi thriller about linguistics, to the greatest performance of Sam Neill’s rather odd career. It was a great year for film, and I’m glad I didn’t pass up this opportunity to share my favorites.