Top 10 Albums of 2008 - #10 All Sides by O.A.R.

[stock inspirational words about 2008 here]

What a crazy year, it's gone by so fast... let's cut to the chase: for the last 10 days of the year we're going to present Katie and Kyle's top 10 Album's of 2008 beginning with...

#10 - All Sides - O.A.R.

O.A.R. (Of a Revolution) has been around for over a decade (they formed in '96 in Rockville, Maryland) and released 6 studio and 3 live albums during that time. They started off playing on campus at Ohio State University where they attended school, and grew hugely popular with the college crowd. There sound is probably best described as jam rock, a la Dave Matthews Band (they also regularly have a saxophone part). Their previous album Stories of a Stranger put O.A.R. in the mainstream and on radio stations with "Love and Memories" and "Heard the World", though some purists say this album is the least representative of the band (I don't).

Their latest album All Sides came out on July 15, 2008 when my wife and I were on a road trip to San Francisco and we listened to it while driving through San Jose and Santa Cruz - it's great summer, road trip music and the song "This Town" seemed to embody Santa Cruz perfectly. It's the kind of music that makes the sun seem just a little brighter and the oceanic wind a little breezier. All Sides has all the fun, energetic melodies and grooves you'd expect from an O.A.R. album and it makes a good entry point for new fans. The single "Shattered (Turn the Car Around)" is enjoyable enough, but if you really want to hear the melodies and impromptu-sounding jams that make O.A.R. adored, check out "Something Coming Over" and "What is Mine". All Sides isn't groundbreaking for O.A.R., but next to nearly every other mainstream band, O.A.R. is unique, upbeat and void of the angst-ridden grunge that is so overdone in other "alternative rock".