This year I spent a lot more time downloading and listening to instrumental and sludgy metal bands. I still have little interest in dance music and popular hip hop so I'm sure this list will look a lot different than the pfork list.

As it stands - my personal favorites of 2006:

Rank - Artist - Album
1 - Mastodon - Blood Mountain
2 - Guillemots - Through The Window Pane
3 - The Elected - Sun, Sun, Sun
4 - The Futureheads - News And Tributes
5 - The Hold Steady - Boys And Girls In America
6 - Pearl Jam - Pearl Jam
7 - The Draft - In A Million Pieces
8 - Red Sparowes - Every Red Heart Shines Toward the Red Sun
9 - Converge - No Heroes
10 - Califone - Roots & Crowns
11 - Jesu - Silver EP
12 - Mr. Lif - Mo' Mega
13 - Paper Chase - Now You Are One Of Us
14 - Mogwai - Mr Beast
15 - Tapes n Tapes - The Loon
16 - The Nice Boys - The Nice Boys
17 - Keane - Under The Iron Sea
18 - I Love You But I've Chosen Dar - Fear Is On Our Side
19 - Isis - In The Absence Of Truth
20 - The Figurines - Skeleton
21 - Eric Bachmann - To The Races
22 - Deftones - Saturday Night Wrist
23 - Band of Horses - Everything All The Time
24 - Boris - Pink
25 - Ghostface Killah - Fishscale
26 - Appleseed Cast - Peregrine
27 - Radio Dept. - Pet Grief
28 - The Roots - Game Theory
29 - Planes Mistaken For Stars - Mercy
30 - Centro-matic - Fort Recovery
31 - Josh Rouse - Subtitulo
32 - The Decemberists - The Crane Wife
33 - The Sword - Age Of Winters
34 - Liars - Drum's Not Dead
35 - The Bronx - The Bronx
36 - Killswitch Engage - As Daylight Dies
37 - Pernice Brothers - Live a Little
38 - Russian Circles - Enter
39 - Strokes - First Impressions Of Earth
40 - Junius - Blood is Bright
41 - Mono - You Are There
42 - Mos Def - Tru3 Magic
43 - NAS - Hip Hop Is Dead
44 - Envy - Insomniac Daze
45 - Tool - 10,000 Days
46 - Youth Group - Casino Twilight Dogs
47 - Morrissey - Ringleader Of The Tormentors
48 - The Legends - Facts And Figures
49 - White Whale - WWI
50 - Built To Spill - You In Reverse

Stuff that belongs in my top 50 but I forgot about until after I already compiled it:

Mouth of the Architect - The Ties that Blind
Cut Chemist - The Audiences Listening
Girl talk - Night Ripper
The Melvins - Senile Animal
Pink Spiders - Teenage Graffiti

Biggest disappointment of the year:

Flaming Lips - At War With the Mystics
Trail of Dead - New album (not as surprising of a letdown as the Lips)

Possible top 10 contenders for 2007:

Jesu - Conqueror
Explosions in the Sky - All of a Sudden Everyone I Miss Everyone