The Loop : 10 Years of Unapologetic Albums

I think most people in their mid-twenties eventually run into their "quarter life crisis". You spend your first 20 years reaching milestone after milestone only to fall into the post-college slump of agelessness and the realization of just how long life is. This is not always a bad thing, of course, but as you get older and look retrospectively, there are so many of years of experience and things yet to experience that it gets overwhelming.

As I was getting ready this morning, I started to think about reaching the end of this first decade of the new millenium. I remember what New Years 2000 was like, drinking soda until WAYYY too late with my two best friends, then running outside to the back yard screaming "Happy New Year!" to blanket suburban Arizona. While imagining how we were ever so young, it occured to me that 2000 was when I started high school and more or less crossed over into shaping my adulthood. In thinking of the vastness of life, ten years of time from then until now is a lot when you've only lived 23 1/2.

By all intents and purposes, these may have been the most defining 10 years of my life. I went from awkward . . . to more awkward. I completed my schooling and (apparently) became a grown up. There were a lot of milestones in a short period of time, many of which had a soundtrack. So much has changed not only in my life, but in music the last 10 years, and it's amazing to think of how much music I've consumed in a decade, and how much consuming music has changed in that same period of time.

So where is this going? Everyone loves a good retrospective. I'm sure music mags are already compiling their lists, and blogs are digging through Wikipedia pages to find the early 00's b-side collection that is their top album. For me, it's a desire to revisit some of the records that placed a musical timestamp on these years. Music means a lot to me now, but I want to get that gut feeling I got when I put on a CD that I had to sneak in and steal from my brothers room. To feel the rush of picking out a mix of albums and one by one recording them to a mixtape. In an age where music is so accessible and sometimes saturated, I want to work for my memories again.

That's where "The Loop" comes from. There are certain things that remind me of when I first started investing into music. Cigarette smoke, sweat, feedback and handstamps. And in those things, I tend to circle back frequently to The Nile Theatre in Mesa, AZ. While it has been closed since 2004(ish), this venue still sparks some serious geeking out amoungst my AZ friends when mentioned. I already named my old radio show on The Blaze 1260 AM "The Basement" for The Nile's smaller room that often featured local bands. I still feel though that The Nile needs to be a part of this, so I've named this series, "The Loop" because of the Loop 202. My brother (or whoever was driving me) would take the Loop 202 East to get to Mesa from Scottsdale. Everytime we'd merge and we'd go from heading South and curve into East, my heart would explode in excitement. I could see the city and feel the rush of how close I was to seeing one of my favorite bands. No matter where I had been, everything circled back to not just that building, but what it represented in music, culture and forming my identity. It's a crossroads, it's a direction, it's whatever you want it to be.

So there you go. Over the next three months I'm going to take a section of this decade, then circle back and talk about albums that meant a lot to me during that bracket of time. Here's how it will work:

October : Albums from 2000-2004

November: Albums from 2004-2007

December: Albums from 2007-2010 and eventually my top 10 of 2009.

It won't be chronological ( I don't have THAT much time on my hands) , but it will fall between those time periods. After failing miserably at my "Sounds from The Basement" series, I hope that "The Loop" series keepts momentum. I feel like it will. These won't always be albums that are critically acclaimed, and some I'm usually too embarassed to admit to, but this music meant a lot to me in the time it did and much of it still does today. I have no apologies. That's what music is about, after all.

Cheers to 10 great years. Ready, set, go.

-Smashley