Over the next couple of weeks, Backbeat will feature some Top Ten lists from around the Village Voice Media chain. Click here for previous year-in-review coverage from Backbeat and VVM.
Picking the best folk and Americana records of the year isn't nearly as hard as discarding those great records that just didn't feel right stuck in the category. Releases by Calexico and DeVotchKa felt far too worldly to pigeonhole as folk or country, for instance, while Blitzen Trapper's fantastic Furr smells
As music critics, the most common question we get asked (and ask each other, for that matter) is, "What are you listening to?" The pervasiveness of this query is precisely what inspired Heavy Rotation, our latest feature. For the benefit of those who happen to be curious, we've compiled a list of all the things we're listening to this week. Feel free to chime in with your own picks after the jump.
​Radio 1190's The Local Shakedown, Vol. 3, a two-CD collection of 41 Colorado bands released last week, topped the charts at Wax Trax, for the week ending October 18. Coming in second was Run Rabbit Run, in which New York-based string quartet Osso reinterprets Sufan Stevens' 2001 album Enjoy Your Rabbit. The Flaming Lips grabbed the third spot with Embryronic, Nick Cave & Warren Ellis' White Lunar, a collection of the duo's film music, came in fourth, while Karen O's soundtrack to the Wher
