2006: The year of living dangerously (3rd anniversary).

What did I like this year? Looking back, I didn't do a lot other than work. I sent 3006 emails from my work email account this past year. That alone probably accounts for how little I did for entertainment in 2006.

LaLa, the online used CD trading site, was a big hit for me. I unloaded around 100 CDs I rarely listened to for "new" used discs at a $1.75 per disc I received. Filled a lot of gaps in my collection, picked up a lot of "oh, I should give those guys a listen someday" things and tried some new stuff.

The other thing LaLa has going for it is its record store for buying new CDs. They work through Newberry Comics, a great online CD store, and LaLa is basically selling members selected things on their "Want" list at cost. Not all discs are available through this service -- of the 125 discs on my Want List only about 40 show up in my "store" -- but we're talking CDs for $7-12 dollars, most being in the $8-10 range. Very nice.

Due to getting regular trades from LaLa which were mostly older things, I don't feel like I listened to too much music that was actually made or released this year. Funkadelic, Parliament and the various constituents of that world - George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, O.G. Funk, Axiom Funk, Praxis, P-Funk, Bernie Worrell -- have pretty heavily occupied my listening time since summer. Always a favorite band, I've ended up getting all the stuff I just never picked up for some reason or another, which provides the sensation of getting tons of "new" material from a beloved band. I also listened to a lot of Sly Stone, revisited the early 1990s catalog of Public Enemy featuring the amazing Hank Shocklee's sonic collages, continued to mine the Krautrock mother-load, and rediscovered Jim Thirlwell's dark and funny musical world.

Released this year:

• The Flaming Lips' At War With The Mystics has rarely been far from my speakers since it came out - for my money it's probably the best thing that came out this year. Nobody does catchy tunes cloaked in downright strange arrangements like they do.
  
  
• Neal Morse, Mike Portnoy and Randy George released Cover To Cover, a terrific disc of cover versions (Cat Stevens, The Monkees, Moody Blues, The Who, U2, Chicago, George Harrison, Joe Jackson, and on...), all given fairly straight ahead, but inspired, treatments by the progressive rock trio. Several of the songs sent me back to find the originals and in most cases, I decided I liked the cover version better. How often does that happen?
  
  
• Tony Levin released Resonator which for some reason I put off buying for six months. This proved to be a foolish choice and a loss for me in terms of the time I could have been enjoying it. It's more of a vocal album than might be expected from such a strong instrumentalist, but Levin's voice is good and any concerns about devaluing the playing are quickly alleviated. The band is top notch -- as per Levin's last couple of releases it contains the three key members of Peter Gabriel's core band from 1976-1986 -- so there is an effortlessness about the playing that belies the complexity of the songs.
  
  
• I still haven't bought the Mars Volta's Amputecture and I will probably regret that when I get around to picking it up.
  
  
• The great Barry Adamson stealthily shipped Stranger On The Sofa, his strongest release in ten years, which is saying a lot. There's really no way to describe what he does and not sound like a record shill's hyperbole-filled press release, though I've attempted to do that here.
  
  
• Mission of Burma's The Obliterati is likewise a terrific release, one that I know I haven't listened to enough to fully mine its depths. Burma rose from the ashes three years ago and in a rare instance of a reformed band not sucking, they have fulfilled the promise of their 1980s work and are now pushing forward.
  
  
• Paul Gilbert didn't disappoint in the least with his first all-instrumental recording, Get Out Of My Yard. Stunning guitar playing, like a brick to the head; guitars (and guitar players) all over the world are hiding in shame.
  
  
• The reissue/re-master of Brian Eno and David Byrne's My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts was a welcome surprise. It reminded me why I do what I do and, to a certain degree, why I do it that way. Although it is probably among the "most listened to albums that Joe owns" , the simultaneous release of the multitrack files of two songs for download and remixing provided to be the most unexpected education I got this year. The tracks reveal a largely hidden labyrinth of process and structure that the album cloaks from view (or hearing). I have a new admiration for this release and 25 years out it is inspiring and teaching me all over again.
  
  
• There was an expanded issue of one of last year's best releases Ghost Reverie by Opeth. This release has the regular album plus a bonus track and a second disc with a fabulous 5.1 mix of the album and a 40 minute documentary shot during the recording of the disc.
  
  
• If anyone wonders, I haven't yet picked up Love by George Martin - not from lack of desire but from lack of wanting to pay $17 for it. Give me a break. It's coming in the mail and maybe it will show up before the 31st.

In other media, I have really taken to The Venture Brothers Season One. Since I don't have cable this show was completely off my radar. I bought the latest Foetus album Love and it includes a DVD with trailers of the show (Foetus main-man Jim Thirlwell provides the music for the cartoon.) A snotty nod to Jonny Quest, Scooby Doo, James Bond, 1970's mainstream comics, classic rock and violent action films, it makes me laugh a lot. Sly (and often completely obscure) references to Rear Window, Depeche Mode, David Bowie, Sin City, Streetcar Named Desire, The Six Million Dollar Man are just the tip of the iceberg. And the theme songs rocks -- you can download it here.

Other DVDs that came out this year that I enjoyed were Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story, Porcupine Tree: Arriving Somewhere,and MirrorMask.

The Oldboy box set proves that there just can't be enough of a good thing (350 minutes of film, deleted scenes, making of documentaries -- that's about 7 hours for those of you that aren't so good at doing math in your head), even when it is one of the most harrowing and disturbing films ever made .

I'm told that there is finally an official DVD of Tetsuo: The Iron Man but I have yet to actually see it anywhere. It's available online so I guess I'll just order it. It doesn't appear to have any extras, so it will just be the convenience of having it on DVD instead of VHS. But since I haven't actually bought it I'm not sure why I even mention it.

In print, I'm just staring to set myself at Against the Day, the Thomas Pynchon tome that came out last week. The Particle Tarot: Minor Archana by Dave McKean was more disturbing than I expected, not that his work doesn't have an disquieting edge anyway. Making Comics, the third book in Scott McCloud's exploration of graphic storytelling, is wholly entertaining and insightful. The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde looks to be a promising addition to his growing cannon of smarty-pants meta-fiction. I just bought it so I don't know that I'll actually get it read this year - but I did buy it this year.

Disappointments? Promised for at least five years, the TWIN PEAKS SEASON TWO DVD collection was again delayed. It is promised now for 2007 with no Lynch commentaries. ERASERHEAD finally saw an official DVD release this year, as did a collection of early short films by Mr. Lynch and both of these have Lynch commentary (sort of). I'll take what I can get.

I need to find more time for this part of my life.