Download “2008 Music, Summarized”

I think it’s safe to say that the “Season of the Year End Lists” has finally come to a close. There was a lot of meta-talk about the listmaking this year, and there were a few little surprises (e.g. Paste’s pick of She & Him for #1). But for the most part, as one would expect, there were a lot of commonalities across all the lists.

With that in mind, here’s a nice, concise “Consensus Best” Mix for you to download, put together through extensive mathematical calculation and data analysis of Pitchfork, Stereogum, Amazon, Metacritic, and myriad blogs. This encapsulated playlist should be all you need to get yourself a straight-up summary of 2008, as dictated by the online “indie tastemakers.”

Download: “2008 Music, Summarized” Mix (12 MP3s, 72MB zip)

1. Fleet Foxes – “White Winter Hymnal”
2. Portishead – “Machine Gun”
3. Bon Iver – “Skinny Love”
4. Vampire Weekend – “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa”
5. Deerhunter – “Nothing Ever Happened”
6. Of Montreal – “Id Engager”
7. The Walkmen – “In The New Year”
8. Cut Copy – “So Haunted”
9. M83 – “Kim and Jessie”
10. Nick Cave – “Dig, Lazarus, Dig!”
11. Santogold – “LES Artistes”

Good year? Bad year? Don’t ask me! Can’t you see I’m trying to be impartial and objective here? Download the mix and decide for yourself.

- Ryan Catbird