Learn something new every day!

All is not lost though:

“The number 8 is considered to be the luckiest number of all in Chinese culture and prices in Chinese supermarkets can often be found containing many 8′s”

(from Wikipedia for 88, number, which also confirms Dubdance’s point.)

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I get this. I think you’ll read much more about “Untrue” next year, when critics and fans release their Best of the Decade lists.

Thankfully it was No. 89 and not 88, because 88 is known as code for a certain Austrian guy who caused a lot of trouble for most of the world around the middle of the last century amongst his fans. Can we have a best of any other number than 88 next year please?

http://www.emusic.com/album/Wintersleep-Welcome-To-The-Night-Sky-MP3-Download/11290870.html

Hoping to see at least one of my pics on the list. I stand by my belief that Sex Death Cassette should be the album of the year hands down.

I thought I remembered that All Hour Cymbals was actually really popular last year, so I looked it up — it was emu’s 28th best-selling disk of ’07. That’s remarkable since it didn’t come out until October 23. The bestseller list ran through 12/31, but still.

On one hand, that’s evidence that any votes for it as the best of 08 should be discarded. Sorry folks, no matter how many votes we get, Old Yeller is not eligible for Best Adapted Screenplay for 2008. Those votes get tossed to make room for something that IS eligible.

On the other hand, there’s no freaking date on the All Hour Cymbals page. As much as anything else, this is something I’d love to see fixed at emu. (Maybe license CDDB or similar?) It used to be that I could assume that no date meant “this year,” which obviously other people did this time…but now there are just too many missing dates to be useful even for guessing purposes.

All of this reminds me of my tippy-toppest, most number one-est request: make lists like this findable again. Both you and we work too hard on them for them to disappear.

It happened that the list of ’07 bestsellers was linked from the All Hour Cymbals page.

(Hmm, maybe I should be heartless and ask for a recount after all. You could have tossed those votes and noted in one of these 17 Dots entries that “All Hour Cymbals is already starting to stand the test of time – well, 14 months anyway” or something even cleverer- while also making room for another actual 2008 release in the top 100. Or at least the bottom 20 of the top 100.)

But I was still curious to see if it made the user Best of 07 list. You know what I had to go through to get THERE? I had to remember that something by Spoon made the list….which I only remember because of how much I DON’T like Spoon. From the Spoon record with the red and white cover (I refuse to learn its name), I got to the 07 list – nope, no Yeasayer.

BTW, thank JEEBUS that 2007 was the last year of the Best Of “Dozens” that were only TEN. I’m glad you took my advice and avoided the linguistic (nay, epistemological) trap of Dozens that are only 10 by freeing yourself of the tyranny of tens altogether.

I suggested a top 108, but you much more cleverly paid tribute to the very first rock and roll record, “Rocket 88″ by Jackie Brenston with Ike Turner. (Even though it was recorded on Sun, the earliest among emu’s 24 versions of the track is Bill Haley’s 1951 cover.

The other cool thing about 88 is that it’s actually the roundest number you can possibly have, isn’t it? Even 00 is only half as round. You guys freakin’ RAWK!!!

Except for Joe, who, of my suggestion for a top 36 rather than a top 30 said, “but ‘Top 36 of 2007′ just sounded… bizarre.” (He really said that. Look it up.) Unless he’s one of the ones who held out for 88 this time…in which case Joe RAWKS!!! But only if.

Since I found the best of 07 list, I thought I’d poke around a little more. It’s credited to eMusic Users, and if you follow the link to that profile, you find links to the best ofs for 05-07, but clicking on them only shows “Your request returns no data.”

Coolly enough, I COULD see eMusic User’s Neighbors, who, it turns out, only like jazz! Must be all that Black Saint/Soul Note crack card goodness.

Shaking off the distractions, I return to my quest. Maybe All Hour Cymbals was on the UK user lists – can’t find ‘em. Maybe on the editor’s list. Can’t find those either. What about the Eternal Flame 100 Best Best BEST lists? All 4 of ‘em. Maybe it’s on one of those. Oops, can’t find them either.

Quest thwarted. Long ridiculous blog comment begins.

So anyway, here’s my suggestion. You’ve already got these nice, neat URLs, like such:
http://www.emusic.com/features/hub/best08users/index.html

Nice! Now howzabout a page like http://www.emusic.com/features/hub/index.html — you know, an INDEX page for a HUB.

I’m pretty sure there’s an actual hub, right? Just not an index page that I can guess my way too…like, say, emusic.com/features/hub/index.html.

Once you have such a page, the “home” link, as in “Home » Your 100 Favorite Albums of 2008″ — would point back to the HUB, that is, the home of the lists. I can get back to the front page of the site by clicking on them 17 dots in the upper left corner of the page. Or hit the Back button.

Yap yap yap. You get the idea. It’s great work. We shouldn’t have to work so hard to find it.

Of course, if you have a hub page and I missed it, then…Well done, eMu! A hub is a wonderful idea! You guys RAWK!!!

It’s still too hard to find.