my life in favorite albums

Once again stealing a post idea from an ongoing thread in the Sk8J forum... This time the idea is, for each year of your life, name your favorite album released that year. The person who started the thread did not insist on one and only one per year, so I have some ties in the list. She also included "honorable mentions" for some years; when I made my list, I decided to use "honorable mention" status only for compilations or soundtracks. However, I did give the favorite album status to one compilation, Now That's What I Call Quite Good, partly because I've always felt it works fine as an album in itself and partly because it was simply my favorite for that year.

1969: Blood, Sweat & Tears, Blood, Sweat & Tears

1970: Time and a Word, Yes
1971: tie - Who's Next, The Who; The Yes Album, Yes
1972: Fragile, Yes
1973: The Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd
1974: Pretzel Logic, Steely Dan
1975: Wish You Were Here, Pink Floyd
1976: Dreamboat Annie, Heart
1977: tie - Little Queen, Heart; Aja, Steely Dan
1978: Dog & Butterfly, Heart
1979: Look Sharp!, Joe Jackson

1980: Duke, Genesis
1981: Ghost in the Machine, The Police
1982: Night and Day, Joe Jackson
1983: The Politics of Dancing, Re-Flex
1984: Three of a Perfect Pair, King Crimson
1985: Songs from the Big Chair, Tears for Fears
1986: Big World, Joe Jackson
1987: Louder Than Bombs, The Smiths
1988: Now That's What I Call Quite Good, The Housemartins - honorable mention to Live 1980/86, Joe Jackson
1989: Deep, Peter Murphy

1990: Reading, Writing and Arithmetic, The Sundays
1991: The Real Ramona, Throwing Muses
1992: Imperial f.f.r.r., Unrest
1993: tie - Deep End, Tsunami; Perfect Teeth, Unrest - honorable mention to Message in a Box: The Complete Recordings, The Police
1994: tie - Encendedor, Dambuilders; Destroy All Astromen!, Man or Astro-man?
1995: tie - Ruby Red, Dambuilders; Silt, Mistle Thrush
1996: The Sonora Pine, The Sonora Pine
1997: Downward Is Heavenward, Hum - honorable mention to Then: The Earlier Years, They Might Be Giants
1998: Decksanddrumsandrockandroll, The Propellerheads - honorable mention to Everything!, Tones on Tail
1999: Haley, Reflecting Skin - honorable mention to Retrospective, Red House Painters

2000: Peregrine, Tara Jane O'Neil - honorable mention to Stars & Topsoil: A Collection (1982-1990), Cocteau Twins
2001: Long Distance, Ivy - honorable mention to The Matrix Revisited soundtrack (never released as such, but all the music was available as a hidden feature on the DVD)
2002: Turn on the Bright Lights, Interpol
2003: tie - Airs Above Your Station, Kinski; The Happiest Days of Our Lives: The Complete Joan of Arc Tapes, My Favorite
2004: Sun Q, IQU - honorable mentions to The Incredibles soundtrack and to Left of the Dial: Dispatches from the '80s Underground
2005: Witching Hour, Ladytron
2006: Be He Me, Annuals
2007: so far, Mirrored, Battles

In my original list, three more of the years were ties: 1979 had a tie with Regatta de Blanc, 1980 with Zenyatta Mondatta, and 1983 with Synchronicity, all by The Police. However, I've since decided that because I have their Message in a Box compilation in the list as an honorable mention, I would just give those years to the other album in consideration.

The hardest years to decide were 1979, 2000, 2002, and 2003. But even in years like 1997 and 1998 where there was an immediately obvious answer, I usually still had other good contenders. The years 1970 to 1978 were a problem for a different reason: although I know plenty of songs from that time period, there were very few whole albums I knew, so there wasn't much choice.

I generally avoid participating in or promoting blog memes, but I'll just say that if some of you happened to post your own lists, I'd certainly be interested in seeing them... You might consult Wikipedia's Table of years in music to help craft your lists, although their years in music articles aren't all-inclusive: they have an article on Re-Flex's The Politics of Dancing from 1983, but it wasn't listed in the 1983 in Music article (it's listed now...).