Past Masters and the First Third Challenge

Weekly Challenge : Past Masters and the First Third

The Musical Chairs challenge is still open although it will be closed by the next time I have a day off of work (just two more out of the nine I've had to work left to go).

But here is your new challenge; something much easier and also music related. Everyone can participate with little craft-work, so everyone is encouraged to. The new challenge is called "Past Masters and the First Third."

Part One

Every year we do this thing called the Lost Sock Collections which is an exchanging of mix-cd's featuring each participant's top ten albums of the year. What I find is that a few months later, due in part to the LSC and in part to ambling through record stores, my list would have looked quite different. However, the calendar-year-centered environment we create with "Top Ten of **" lists prevents late-comers from being garnished with attention. The artists still make money off old albums, and the listeners can still enjoy the albums though, so maybe we should give a little more praise to what we missed.

Thus, the first part of this challenge is to name a double-plus good 2003 album(s) that you first heard in 2004.

Part Two

Albums from the early months of any calendar year generally lose ground in annual top-lists due to the added competition, the freshness of that competition and the flaws of human memory. Arguably, a truly great album should be remembered over the course of a year, but is it fair that late-comers don't have to stand up to the same test?

In order to give the underdogs their own place, TMSO issues this simple challenge. Name your favorite 2004 release(s) thus far.

Fulfill your challenge as a comment below or as a separate e-mail and all entries will be put together for a future post.