Year In Retrospective Part Two: Ten Other Awesome Things

For someone like myself, who prides himself on his voracious consumption of pop culture, I had a bit of an off-year. I didn't see too many movies, I'm not really big into the whole "buying CDs thing," and I didn't watch a whole lot of television, really. So, what I'm going to do for my second Year In Retrospective post is to talk about 10 random pop-culture things that fascinated me this calendar year. Some TV, some movies, some odds and ends. It's kind of a potpourri post.

1. Season Three of "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia." This was the year I discovered the funniest show on television. The cast of Charlie Day, Rob McElhenny, Glenn Howerton, Kaitlin Olson, and Danny DeVito may be the best comedic ensemble right now. Most of my highlights from this season involve the aforementioned Mr. Day as "Charlie," whose antics included (but were not limited to) dressing up as Serpico while taping a huge recording device to his chest, huffing spray paint while writing homoerotic glam-rock songs, and becoming a fake-lawyer utilizing a clip-on tie and jargon lifted directly from marathons of "Law and Order." Trust me, it's awesome. My favorite television of the year.

2. Judd Apatow. "Knocked Up" and "Superbad" were both hilariously funny movies. It's hard to believe that, just a few years ago, Apatow was known largely for writing and producing wonderful television that nobody watched ("Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared"). Now, he's the acknowledged god of comedy as both director and producer - and, more importantly, his movies are pretty awesome.

3. The Perez Hilton backlash. Last year's guilty pleasure - perezhilton.com - has become this year's whipping boy, thanks largely to the aforementioned Mr. Hilton, who went from being a snarky underground blogger to an overexposed multimedia annoyance. This time next year, he'll be lucky to be on Celebrity Fit Club. This year, he's the answer to the question "What if Bruce Vilanch was a worse dresser and actually less funnier?"

4. The Onion AV Club - the best regularly-updated pop-culture site out there right now (avclub.com). Unlike most media outlets, the Onion serves up large, intellectual interviews and features in this section of their site, and maintains a certain wit and flair while doing so.

5. The "I'm Not There" Soundtrack, which is the perfect tribute album to Bob Dylan, authored in the name of soundtracking a movie about Bob Dylan which never once mentions the name Bob Dylan.

6. Independent radio. 90.7 FM in New York City. 97.7 in Amsterdam. 102.7 in Vermont. It's a beautiful world when you have the ability to listen to Belle and Sebastian and the Clash on your way into work. In an era of increasing media consolidation, these bastions of independent thought are absolutely to be cherished and patronized.

7. The cast of "Arrested Development" are, in lieu of continuing to create the most excellent show on television, making magic at the movies. Jason Bateman and Michael Cera reteam in the critically-acclaimed "Juno," Will Arnett made the funny in "Blades of Glory," and Cera struck comedy gold in "Superbad." Even the atrocious "Alvin and the Chipmunks" movie was redeemed (somewhat) by David Cross, who chose to chew up scenery as a hilariously slimy music mogul. (and yes, I saw it. God have mercy on my soul.)

8. "Werewolf Bar Mitzvah," by the "30 Rock" character Tracy Jordan. "Boys becoming men, men becoming wolves." Actually, pretty much anything on "30 Rock" this year was awesome. Except for the shameless "Bee Movie" pandering of Jerry Seinfeld.

9. The continued emergence of Steve Carell, who, if he continues to make the right choices, will be the next Tom Hanks. Mark ye my words.

10. Finally, as someone who abhors pre-packaged pop music, watching the freefall into chemical oblivion of stars like Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, and others has been nothing short of schadenfreude for me. On one hand, I know that they're just people with problems, which is sad. On the other hand, it's very, very awesome.

Year In Retrospective Part One: My Favorite Songs of 2007

I've decided that I can be reasonably sure that I'm not going to hear many more new songs this calendar year; therefore, it's time for me to rank my 10 favorite songs for the calendar year. To be eligible for this list, the song had to have been released (officially) between January 1 and now of this year. And I will have had to have heard it between now and then. I can obviously not rank songs that I haven't heard. [Feel free to fire back in the comments section.]

1. Radiohead, "All I Need"
There's been a lot of hype about the latest album from Radiohead, and with good reason - the band's decision to forego traditional distribution routes and release the album onto the internet may have been the most revolutionary act in the history of the recording industry. Lost in that hype, however, was the fact that with this album, "In Rainbows," Radiohead has finally released the true followup to 1997's amazing "OK Computer" - an album that retains the highly electronic sound the band has chased for the bulk of this decade, while revisiting the songcraft that built the band's reputation. "All I Need" is the centerpiece of this album - and an amazing song. If you don't get goosebumps when the drums kick in, you're not human.

2. Wilco, "What Light"
Life affirming to the point of near-hippiedom, this track reminds each set of ears that it reaches that there's always reason to be optimistic. I can dig it.

3. Rivers Cuomo, "Longtime Sunshine"
I'm so glad this song has been officially released - it's an epic ballad of longing and sadness, and one of Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo's finest moments. While we may never hear a formal, full-band version of this, this demo will more than suffice for the time being.

4. Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova, "Falling Slowly"
I'm a sucker for harmony, which this tune has in spades. It's from a movie called "Once," which I haven't seen yet, and a worthy candidate for the best original song Oscar in the upcoming awards.

5. Mark Ronson, "Valerie"
While a great portion of the music-writing world continues to fall at the feet of Amy Winehouse, let us take the time to praise her producer, former club-kid Ronson, whose singlehanded revival of soul-music production made Winehouse's album infinitely better. This track features Winehouse on a genius revisitation of a Zutons album track from a few years ago.

6. Kings Of Leon, "Knocked Up"
Clocking in at over 7 minutes, this blues ramble may actually be longer than an actual Kings of Leon show I caught in 2005. The song's consistent, rumbling rhythm and lead singer Caleb Followill's soulful lead vocal make this track a career highlight for the Kings as well as one of the best tunes of the year.

7. Stars, "Midnight Coward"
The dueling lead vocal between the male and female singers of Stars - never really harmonic, but instead more of a call-and-response vocal - make this song (about the doubts that come and go in the beginning stretches of an intimate relationship) completely noteworthy.

8. Eddie Vedder, "Hard Sun"
9. Loudon Wainwright III, "Daughter"
Both Vedder and Wainwright put together preeminent soundtracks this year; both of these tracks are from soundtracks (Vedder's earthy accompaniment to "Into The Wild," and Wainwright's straightforward, folky counterpoint to "Knocked Up"), and both are covers. Both are, to say the least, essential.

10. Josh Ritter, "Right Moves"
After last year's stunning "Girl In The War," Ritter's taken a slightly more lighthearted path with this track. When he starts spitting words at a remarkably rapid clip, watch out - it's got the effect of being simultaneously hilarious and kind of odd.