Moving on to the albums of the year. It’s been a damn good music year once again. I first made a top 75 for myself and I can honestly say that I really enjoyed each and everyone of those album. Therefore it was a real struggle to cut it down to top 30, but I’m finally done. Again this list is entirely personal. The records that I loved the most. The records that meant the most to me. The records that I listened to the most. It’s not objective at all. And of course there’s tons of beautiful albums that I haven’t heard or I’m not even aware of. If you are wondering where is Kalispell’s Printer’s Son, I didn’t include it on this because it will get an official release in 2016. Otherwise it definitely would have been on this list. I also dediced not to included my latest purchases. The new albums by Craig Finn and Willy Tea Taylor that both seem to be rather awesome, but I just haven’t listened to them enough at this point. I’ll do this in three parts during this week.

Part two
Part three

Top 30 Albums of the Year – The International Edition.

30. Lilly Hiatt – Royal Blue

Kicking off the list with Lilly Hiatt’s excellent album Royal Blue. I often listen to this at work, because it keeps me going if I need some energy boost. I really love the first half of the album. Easily accessible and energetic, but still holding a lot of value and depth inside. I would listen to the radio a lot more, if songs like this were in there.

29. Marine Dreams – Producer’s Wonderland

Corner Of The Eye remains my favourite Marine Dreams album, but Ian Kehoe keeps the quality high all the time. Producer’s Wonderland is another great album from this unheralded pop genius. Definitely a bit of a challenge soundwise for such a narrow-minded prick like yours truly, but I still can’t resist him.

28. The Deslondes – The Deslondes

The Deslondes from New Orleans slowly won my heart over with their mix of country and southern Rhythm & Blues. I still don’t like the lead single The Real Deal that much, but most of this is absolutely magnificent. Heavenly Home, Low Down Soul, Louise and Still Someone were all candidates for the song of the year list as well.

27. Moonsocket – Eurydice

I have no words. This is something that everyone should hear. Listening to it will be devastating, but when the last chord of the last song Shaped By Your Love fades away, you will notice that the sheer warm humanity of it is what will remain in your heart.

26. Kent Goolsby & The Gold Standard – No Substitute For Handsome

Kent Goolsby is another long time favourite and he delivered a couple of great releases this year. Minor Wear EP came out recently and earlier in the summer he charmed us with this album called No Substitute For Handsome that was full of great old-fashioned songs.

25. The Weather Station – Loyalty

The Weather Station released an absolute beauty of an album called Loyalty. Maybe not something I listen to on daily basis, because I get lost in these songs and can’t concentrate on anything else while listening. That’s not a bad thing. Not at all. Another highlight of the year was her Pickathon performance. I wasn’t there, but there was a live stream of that concert and I loved every second of it.

24. Dawes – All Your Favorite Bands

My love for the new Dawes album has maybe faded a little bit since the early crush, but I still rate it very highly and it was great to see Dawes back in great form after the not-that-great Stories Don’t End. Somewhere Along The Way, All Your Favorite Bands and To Be Completely Honest are very special. And so is Taylor Goldsmith.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I74C2hClAsA]

23. Great Peacock – Making Ghosts

Harmony-filled southern folk music with sweet pop melodies. Count me in. Great Peacock is almost like a melting pot of all things I like about music. I’m first of all a fan of harmony-heavy pop music and during the past ten years I have drifted more and more towards folk and country music. So this is like in the crossroad of all that. This sort of defines my heart.

22. Joan Shelley – Over And Even

I’ve seen people with great taste recommending Joan Shelley during the past couple of years. This fall, I finally listened to them and introduced my heart to her songs. It was a perfect match and her new album Over and Even became a loyal companion that brought all the colors into the dark fall nights.

21. Ariel Sharratt & Mathias Kom – Don’t Believe The Hyperreal

Fuck The Government, I Love You by Ariel Sharratt & Mathias Kom is by far the best song of the year. The rest of the album is not that good, but well.. probably nothing during this current decade has been that good. So we are not gonna hold that against them. Don’t Believe The Hyperreal is also a magnificent little album and there are many songs that I adore. This is the opener What You Want.

List continues later this week. Might go until Saturday, but hopefully little sooner.

Time for the dreaded end of the year lists. I’m gonna kick off with my favourite songs of the year. First the international edition and the Finnish one a few days later. Remember that the lists aren’t in any way objective. These are just the songs I fell in love with during the year. If I fell in love with a simple little tune that lasted two minutes, for me it’s one of the songs of the year. The first 3-5 were very obvious and the songs that meant the most to me. After that the order could be very different on another day. They are all very dear to me. They are the glue that holds me together. These songs are my friends from now on and ranking one’s friends is pretty fucked up business, if I may say so. It was a really good music year. I made this a top 20 instead of 10, because there was so much great ones. I should have stuck with 10 I guess, because I still couldn’t fit in even half of the ones I wanted to. I need to make that album list a top 50, if I want to avoid heartbreak. Nobody wants to read that, so perhaps I’ll do my best and cut it down a bit. Anyway, time to begin.

Top 20 Songs of the Year 2015 (International Edition)

20. Daniel Martin Moore – Sign Of Life

Kicking of the list with my latest favourite Sign of Life by Daniel Martin Moore. Simple words, but when they are wrapped into that beautiful melody they go directly into my heart. Such a beautiful song.

19. Joey Kneiser – To My Younger Self

More fairly new stuff. My favourite song from the new Joey Kneiser album The Wildness might still be changing on a daily basis (this is why one shouldn’t make these list before February), but right now it’s this one where Joey tells life lessons to his younger self.

18. Joan Shelley – Jenny Come In

Joan Shelley’s album Over and Even is full of beautiful folk songs. This is my biggest favourite Jenny Come In. Mr. Will Oldham in harmony vocals. This is a live version of the song.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1sVwsB8qS4]

17. Michael Feuerstack – I Wanted More

The latest Michael Feuerstack album has been a big favourite throughout the year and is filled with wonderful songs. This one called I Wanted More is instantly catchy and rather simple, but still moves me deeply.

16. Jason Isbell – Speed Trap Town

Something More Than Free is no Southeastern, but let’s not get stuck into that. If you win the MLB one year and next year you end up on the losing side of the world series, the latter result is still pretty damn good. Something More Than Free contains some amazing songs like Children Of Children and Speed Trap Town for example.

15. Daniel Romano – Old Fires Die

Daniel Romano delivered another great album with bunch of gorgeous songs like Old Fires Die and The One That Got Away (came back today). I’ll go with Old Fires Die, because it’s a song that I fell in love with during Daniel’s Finland tour that was a big highlight of the year for me. Actually it’s was a damn great year for Finnish country/folk fan, because we got to see Daniel Romano, Austin Lucas, Ryan Boldt, Shuyler Jansen, Michael Feuerstack and Small Houses live in Finland.

14. The Decemberists – Cavalry Captain

What A Terrible World, What A Beautiful World by The Decemberists is maybe a little too long and cutting a song or two would make it better. Not a big deal, because it’s a really good record as it is and also has a couple of songs that are among the very best of the year. These songs are Cavalry Captain and Make You Better. I love them both wholeheartedly. I flipped a coin and chose Cavalry Captain to this list.

13. Small Houses – Seventeen In Roselore

A long time favourite Small Houses dropped a new album early in the year and also visited Finland twice during the year. Still Talk; Second City is a magnificent album and contains plenty of songs that could make this little list. In the end it was a choice between the catchier single Staggers and Rise and this beautiful song called Seventeen In Roselore that also features the great Samantha Crain.

12. Andy Shauf – Wendell Walker

Sad song beautifully told. I fell in love with this one a couple of years ago, but Andy Shauf’s Bearer of Bad News album got a re-release this year and therefore it’s probably still ok to list it. And well it’s my blog so I can make the rules. This is a live version of Wendell Walker by Andy Shauf.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dThrMKG4r4]

11. Darren Hanlon – Letter From an Australian Mining Town

Where Did You Come From? probably isn’t my favourite album by Australian pop troubadour Darren Hanlon as a whole (still great of course), but this song. Everything about this song. Classic Darren Hanlon storytelling.

10. Kacy & Clayton – If You Ask How I’m Keeping

New Kacy & Clayton album is only out in Canada at the moment, so we shall continue praising Kacy & Clayton when the album hits US/Europe during 2016. I’ll make a bit of a head start, because I’ve been watching the youtube video of this song If You Ask Me How I’m Keeping so many times that I can’t even count that far.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OR65DuZ48Co]

9. Two Cow Garage – Let The Boys Be Girls

Old favourite band Two Cow Garage was in top form and kickstarted the year in perfect fashion, with this glorious anthem Let The Boys Be Girls. I was slightly disappointed with the previous full-length, but this is just fantastic.

8. Barna Howard – Then and There

We are not good at holding secrets here at onechord.net headquarters, so I can already say that Quite a Feelin’ by Barna Howard will win the album of the year award later in December. It’s pretty hard to pick a favourite song for this list, because they are all so dear and that’s why nothing really stands above the rest. In the end, I thought I go with There and Then on this list. It might be a bit weird favourite, but there are lines there that I really love.

7. John Moreland – You Don’t Care For Me Enough To Cry

John Moreland is a huge favourite of mine and his new album High On Tulsa Heat was full of amazing songs. The album will rank in my top 3, when it’s time to make that album list. I love the whole thing and could pick any song from it to this list, but I go with this sad song called You Don’t Care For Me Enough To Cry. I’m very excited to see John Moreland perform in Stockholm, Sweden in early January 2016.

6. Hezekiah Jones – Borrowed Heart

It might be questionable to select this as one of the songs of the year 2015, if I have been in love with it since 2011. But it’s now out and available on the brand new and brilliant Hezekiah Jones album. Raph and co created a stunning album that you will find from my top 10 albums later and you could pretty much drop any song from it on this list and it wouldn’t feel out of place.

5. Andrew Bryant – My Own Saving Grace

Andrew Bryant might be better known as a member of Water Liars, but he also releases stunning solo albums. His album This is The Life has been a real grower for me during the year. I didn’t even have it on my top 10 on my mid-year list and now it looks like it will end up on my top 3 on the album list. There’s several songs that I really adore (well basicly everything), but my biggest favourite has been My Own Saving Grace. I think it works even better in the context of the album, because for me My Own Saving Grace and Do Your Work wrap the album together beautifully. Still it works wonderfully on it’s own as well. That last minute of the song is a bliss. A hopeful bliss.

4. Steven Lambke – Memory Forever

This might be a bit weird choice. Just two and half minutes and on that exact moment when I fell in love with the song, it starts to drift away. At first I found that a little annoying, but now I think it’s just perfect as it is. The moment is when Tamara joins Steven and they sing the words “strong enough to love / strong enough to be loved / to listen close to love / and hear love” together.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_srn_wgkGDQ]

3. Simon Joyner – Nostalgia Blues

Simon Joyner’s Grass, Branch & Bone contains some of the greatest songwriting of the year and several songs worthy of a song of the year title. Two sneaked ahead of him mostly because I just haven’t listened to Simon 7-minute long songs as many times. These days I probably love a few other songs of this amazing album just as much as Nostalgia Blues, but I still have to select this, because It’s the one that I first fell in love with. One of the best songs of the year from one of the best albums of the year.

2. Christopher Paul Stelling – Dear Beast

C.P. Stelling might have to settle for a spot just outside the top 10 on the album list, because I don’t love those energetic songs as much as these beautiful ones. Those are really good as well, but Scarecrow, Burial Shroud, Too Far North and Dear Beast. These are the key songs of the album for me and there’s no limit to my love for these songs. Especially this song Dear Beast is out of this world.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NGw6RhuGoo]

1. Ariel Sharratt & Mathias Kom – Fuck the Government, I Love You

And the Song Of The Year Award goes to Fuck the Government, I Love You by Ariel Sharratt & Mathias Kom. There was never any doubt after I heard this for the first time. This is by far the song I loved the most during the year. It’s a lovely story of a couple meeting at a new year’s party and it has the finest singalong chorus I can think of. I just love every second of that song. Perhaps I prefer The Burning Hell version, but if my addiction doesn’t fade away I can make a cunning plan and select that as the best song of 2016.

And here’s the Burning Hell version aka Song of the Year 2016.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIRph805nJE]