2YR is a particularly special album for me - making it my number one wasn't a hard decision. Whether it's luck, fate, both or neither, it's been there for my highest highs and lowest lows. It always seems to come up in my playlist at just the right time. It's the album and sound I listen to the least, out of any of the music I keep, only because I don't want to water down the experience. It comes from a very particular time in my life and from a very particular artist that I respect greatly, far beyond their ability as a musician. I've existed in the community that has formed around this person and their online presence since I was almost single-digits old. They never stopped making things, though. The stuff this person made evolved just as I and they grew older and matured. Even the old stuff isn't something I really 'grow out of,' though. The things this person has made are magical, to say no more. The background of this album, in few words, would be either "the first of the Halley labs albums" or "the last of the true Lapfox albums". That won't make sense without context, but the ethos around this particular author and their many aliases deserves a documentary in itself. I cannot attempt to do it justice in this little box. I can only assert that it is deep enough to lose yourself in, and every second of it will be a more intriguing story than you've ever read on paper.

Floating Rooms By June LaLonde, née Casey LaLonde, is another album from that particular period in my life I mentioned in the first album's summary. The pattern I've noticed in the release years and the times i've been exposed to these albums put them squarely in my formative years. This was the music that raised me. The sounds in this album feel like the cover art. I guess if I have to compare it to something, to get my point across, this has a much similar feeling Night in the Woods. It's home. It's the magic of returning after a long time, but things have changed. You're older now, and so is the town. Nothing stays the same forever.

Another album I discovered when I wasn't even old enough to drive. I don't think it would be wrong to say many people thus far consider this album Wolfgun's 'magnum opus.' He's made a significant number of great tracks since then, but this album has everything. All the lyrical motifs he's used over most of his other albums about stars and dancing light come together here. Everything that followed felt like it was a further exploration of those, if not a re-treading of old ground, in an attempt to find that magic again. I've met so many cool people through this album. Found so many cool artists. Explored new topics, seen novel creations by this artist and more. Like the other albums thus far on the list, it was like a sort of connective tissue for my online life, leading me around to new places that may not even exist anymore.

Gaburger is an ugly album. It sounds ugly, the cover is ugly, it covers ugly things and ugly people. But, so is life. It hits home hard. Even with the harshness of the sounds here, you can tell there's heart in it, as with Gezebelle's other albums. Beyond that, like the other albums in this list, it has a story behind it. Gezebelle Gaburgably hails from the "incelcore" community. That's the community MKUltra Support Group came from, with people like NXP/Shooter, Werewolf Hair, Steakfry, etc. It was a very tight-knit group of people, and a very insular community for most of its existence. It mostly existed surrounding those already named, among a few others who shared the same sentiments and feelings, and wanted to make similar music with similar motifs. Most of the artists from it have moved on, or faded into obscurity. Gezebelle and NXP are perhaps the only ones left of the 'old guard,' and the community is basically gone, as with the 'scene' community of years' past, fading into obscurity, living on only in the hearts of the ones who were there. It's saddening to remember what we lost, but I look back fondly at the good times everyone had, and the silly shit we all did. I wasn't as close as I'm making it sound, and I never made it to any of the big meetups, but I remember it as fondly as my time in the Lapfox community. We were there to better ourselves, and have fun doing it.

This album is No longer available on Bandcamp. It seemingly has disappeared from the internet entirely, even YouTube doesn't seem to have a full album rip anywhere. I have no idea what happened to it, or why. I've included a link to the original zip file as it was available from Bandcamp below, next to the original Bandcamp page. Download and listen at your leisure. The Myriad is a budding musician's first album, recorded on an iPod and played live. Despite this, or maybe because of it, it feels warm and inviting. It feels true to heart. It's one of the first albums I really enjoyed from this sort of genre, and it took me down a rabbit hole of other stoner doom albums, the same way Floral Shop took me down a hole of even more obscure vaporwave. Seeing "2017" on my screen, it doesn't seem that long ago, but I have to remember how young I still am. 7 years ago is basically a third of my life. Half, if you only count the length of time my brain actually functioned and I could form coherent memories. It's an interesting and fun exploratory experience. I've had many hours of enjoyment singing along to this album on long trips by myself. Maybe you can too.

This album is why I couldn't have just a top 5 like one might come to expect. Peripheral vision is a wonderful album for a sunset. Wikipedia lists it as "Dream Pop". It wanders into midwest emo territory, but all of these labels don't really mean much and are complicated to people who don't know them anyway, so who cares. It's slow, it's melodic, it's the end of the summer. Its themes are something I think many people would resonate with in this day and age - You can have the best days of your life, experience life, death and heartbreak. You can come back in after a walk in the night midway through summer. But, at the end of the day, stuff sucks. We continue on despite this. We can revel in sadness and learn from our mistakes. Yearn for freedom from responsibilities, so we can be happy once again, and go around another turn.