So, my friend Kylie updated her blog today with her five favorite albums, and she invited her readers to list their five favorites.

Then my brain shut down.

This is the flow chart of my brain for this process:

Are you going to make this list?
NO—-> DONE—-> COMPLAIN ABOUT ROOMMATES SOME MORE
YES—-> START CATEGORIZING AND ORDERING FAVORITE ALBUMS—-> BRAIN SHORT-CIRCUITS —-> COMPLAIN ABOUT ROOMMATES SOME MORE

Part of it has to do with my thinking I’ll get my list wrong. My purely subjective, preferential list that I’m sure people will judge me by. Hee, I need to rethink this. So much good music is in the world, and maybe I can choose my top five for now, because something different always rotates through various phases of my life.

Still, my little paranoid heart thinks I’m getting graded for this.

I mean, there are nostalgia favorites:
August and Everything After, Counting Crows
Little Earthquakes, Tori Amos
Pablo Honey and/or The Bends, Radiohead
Fumbling Toward Ecstasy, Sarah McLachlan
Wide Open Spaces, Dixie Chicks
Automatic for the People, R.E.M.
Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Smashing Pumpkins
Our Time in Eden, 10,000 Maniacs

There are my standards:
Retrospective, Indigo Girls
OK Computer and/or Kid A, Radiohead
Little Earthquakes, Tori Amos
1,000 Kisses and/or Living with Ghosts, Patty Griffin

There are soundtrack favorites:
The Mission
Magnolia (featuring Aimee Mann)
Lord of the Rings
The Red Violin
The Village
O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Then there are newish favorites:
Re-arrange Us, Mates of State
Fleet Foxes, Fleet Foxes
For Emma, Forever Ago and/or Bon Iver, Bon Iver
Armchair Apocrypha, Andrew Bird
Weathervanes, Freelance Whales
Mortal City, Dar Williams

And, there are are classical favorites:
I don’t even know where to begin.
Composers?
Eras/Movements?
Countries?
Performers/Orchestras?
Conductors?
I CAN’T I CAN’T DO THIS OH DEAR THERE GOES MY BRAIN MELTING INTO A FATTY GELATINOUS PUDDLE AAAAAAAH A;LJ5ADJFKTIAFKAJLFK58A;LJF%#!*(&)AJFLFJK(&*taQL4JKAF098FDKJF00001000100010001001000100000000 ZERO ONE.

Hmm. For now, let’s try:
Little Earthquakes, Tori Amos
1,000 Kisses, Patty Griffin
Retrospective, Indigo Girls
OK Computer, Radiohead
The Mission soundtrack

Do you have five favorite albums?