A Quick and Dirty Listen Back at 2011

We're approaching the very end of 2011, and there's no better time than now to examine what has survived as the soundtrack of our lives via checking what's still playing in our cars. This is as pertinent as any question posed to an Angeleno this time of year, and as we approach the end of 2011, my six-disc changer is still rotating between the following:

1. Ryan Adams' Heartbreaker

     2. Darius Rucker’s Learn to Live

  

3. Nellie McKay’s Normal as Blueberry Pie

4. Fiona Apple's When the Pawn... 

5. Pistol Annies' Hell on Heels

    6. The Secret Sisters (Self-titled)

      That’s at least 50% country, kiddies! (Ryan Adams’ penchant for collaborating with country queens like Emmylou Harris and Gillian Welch counts as the “at least” in that one).  Not too shabby for my first year as a country snob if I do say so myself! Country snob--now there's an oxymoron if I've ever written one. 
 
Anyway, what music did y'all play the hell out of this year?  And more importantly, what are we going to play the hell out of next year?  After all, as the Italian-Phrase-a-Day calendar Santa so kindly left in my stocking this year says for January 1st, "Anno nuovo, vita nuova!"  For the country bumpkins out there who don't happen to be as cosmopolitan and worldly as yours truly, that translates to “New year, new life!"