FolkBlog

Since it seems that everyone else does it, I do it too. The following are the albums that I just keep coming back to this year for my own personal listening enjoyment.

Here they are - the Top 10 albums of 2006 according to the woodsmeister:

1. Bruce Springsteen - The Seeger Sessions: Easily the most important folk album of the new century. Supercharged folk songs rendered in a folk/rock/Dixieland melange by top-flight musicians that transcends easy categorization.
2. Bob Dylan - Modern Times: The best album by Dylan in well over a decade, maybe two.
3. Ashley Maher - Flying Over Bridges: Intriguing mix of folk/singer/songwriter/Afropop/worldbeat/jazz with catchy, difficult syncopation and an incessant groove. Maher’s smooth voice also helps.
4. Brett Dennen - So Much More: The best pure singer/songwriter album I heard all year. It’s no wonder that Dennen is getting all kinds of buzz and his tunes placed on TV shows. It’s all that good.
5. Diana Jones - My Remembrance of You: A little bit country, a little bit folk, a little bit old-timey, a little bit Iris DeMent, a little bit Gillian Welch, but a whole lot of good. Jones’ songs are first-rate, and her voice is arresting.
6. Red Molly - Never Been to Vegas (live): This all-female trio features tight harmonies, instrumental chops (particularly Abbie Gardner), and well-chosen cover tunes, and should appeal to anyone who likes the Dixie Chicks and/or murder and death ballads.
7. Mark Erelli - Hope and Other Casualties: Erelli’s best yet features some of his best songwriting so far. Here’s what I said in April: “It’s no accident that the cover of this album is an homage to Dylan, because this album is very Dylanesque - a little personal, a little political. And while several songs do chronicle Erelli’s disappointment with the way things are going (hence the title) he title of the album, he does offer an album of pragmatic hope in “The Only Way” : ‘So I’m gonna love/And I’m gonna believe/And I’m gonna dream/But I’m gonna roll up my sleeve/And give everything until there’s nothing left to give./That’s the only way I know how to live.’”
8. Hem - Funnel Cloud: Hem keeps expanding their musical pallette, and the result is their best album yet. Sally Ellyson sings with a little more passion on this disk, and the production and arrangements are top notch as always.
9. John Flynn - Two Wolves: Flynn is as much a philospher as a great storyteller, and songs like the title track about the effects of revenge on the one seeking vengeance, and “Trust the Rope” bear this out.
10. Chuck Brodsky - Tulips for Lunch: Another great album of story songs from a master storyteller.

Honorable Mention (in alphabetical order):

• Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer - Seven is the Number
• Bruce Cockburn - Life Short Call Now
• Crooked Still - Shaken by a Low Sound
• The Duhks - Migrations
• Tommy Emmanuel - The Mystery
• Amos Lee - Supply and Demand
• The Queensberry Rules - Black Dog and Other Stories
• Paul Simon - Surprise
• Solas: Reunion
• Brooks Williams - Blues and Ballads

Honorable mention 2006 releases for Christmas:

• Over the Rhine - Snow Angels
• Sarah McLachlan - Wintersong
• Moya Brennan - An Irish Christmas

Disclaimer: The above list is entirely subjective based on the taste and whims of Greg Grant, aka woodsmeister. It is not based on airplay, listener feedback or any other scientific measurement.