Four Island

Has everyone had a happy (and uneventful) end of the world? Well you're not quite safe yet: if I'm posting, it MUST be the end of the world. Actually, for a while I've been listening to music, yah know, and there's so much music out there that I enjoy. Last year I attempted to write a "Favorite Albums of 2011" post and... got a little sidetracked. Or lazy. Or busy applying to colleges. Who knows. Well, this year has been a very good year in music and I want to share the albums that I enjoyed the most. I just want to note, however, that this is not a list of the best albums of 2012, it is a list of the top albums that I experienced this year. Most of the albums on this list did in fact come out in 2012, but a few did not, so keep your eyes peeled.

We're going to start out with a shocker. I first got into Emilie Autumn way back in March of 2010 when my good friend Amelia taught me the ways of being an Opheliac (really, Mad Girl was the first song I heard, but I digress). I listened the heck out of that album, and I still do, as it's quite a fantastic album and one of my favorites of all time. However, after a few months, I thirsted for more Emilie. Where would I get my fix? Clearly I was too stupid to listen to her first album, Enchant, or listen to any of the scads and scads of extra material and oddities she had released. Oh no, I had to wait. But what was I waiting for?

I was waiting to be able to Fight Like A Girl. I had long known that Emilie's third album would be called FLAG, but through 2011, I was forgetting her. With nothing happening, she simply slipped my mind. My first shock came on April 11th when out of nowhere, the songs Fight Like A Girl and Time For Tea were released as a double A-side single and I gobbled them up like warm oatmeal. My second shock came on July 24th when also out of nowhere, Fight Like A Girl, the album itself, was released! It was a joyous day, and I purchased it almost immediately, and what was in fact quite nice about this transaction was that fact that not only did I get a digital copy of the album, but later I received a physical copy in the mail. How nice.

This album is a real doozy. You could compare it to Opheliac, but it's both lighter and harder at the same time. Beautiful songs like Gaslight wrap you up in a cozy blanket of fear, and, well, let's just say that I was very scared the first time I heard the song Time For Tea. This album is difficult to explain on its own. It's a concept album, telling the story of Emilie's stay in a psych ward after her suicide attempt, only the story is dramatized as if it occurred in the Victorian era.

Standout songs include Fight Like A Girl, If I Burn, Gaslight and Goodnight Sweet Ladies. The latter is especially interesting because it quotes both If I Burn and The Art of Suicide (from Opheliac), the latter of which is perhaps my favorite Emilie song. Regardless, this is a very good, very crazy, and very mixed album. I must say that I did not enjoy it as much as I enjoyed Opheliac, but nonetheless, it satisfied my craving for the very talented Miss Emilie Autumn. For a while. You'll see.