By Jay Roberts
(resident classic/melodic rocker)

It’s the end of another year, and that means of course that it’s time for another Top 10 list from your friendly neighborhood CD reviewer Jay Roberts. I’m completing the second season of my Rock Is Life.com reviews and with at least 125 reviews under my belt; I’d say that the music world continues to surprise and amaze me with what it has to offer.

This best of list is not made up solely of the albums I gave the best reviews to. One of my requirements for inclusion on this list is “repeatability.” I can love an album when I listen to it, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that I play it endlessly throughout the year. The CDs that do get repeated plays end up being the albums that mean the most to me.

#10.) JON OLIVA'S PAIN
Meniacle Renderings

It took a while for me to get my hands on the album and it was one of the last reviews I did before the cut off date for consideration for the Best Of list. The first album from JOP was really good, but just missed making last year’s list. This album makes the list because it is just that much better than the first CD ‘Tage Mahal. I’m always fully prepared to like anything Savatage related and I’m always happy when my expectations are met and then surpassed.

#9.) AMBITION
Self-Titled


The self-titled album from Ambition was one of the first albums I reviewed in 2006, and to be honest, I didn’t really listen to it all that much over the course of the year. In preparation for writing my portion of this article, I chose a bunch of the albums to listen to again. Ambition remains as powerful and superb as I first found it when doing the review.

#8.) CIRCLE II CIRCLE
Burden of Truth


As bad as the second Circle II Circle album was, is how fantastic Burden Of Truth turned out to be. The album is simply fantastic and surprising in how great it turned out. The concept tied to the whole Da Vinci Code story is fine, but the songs work well as standalone tracks as they do being a part of the overall storyline.

#7.) DESPERADO
Ace

I’m a comic book fan, so I’m used to long delays in product coming out. However, 15 years does seem like a long time even to me. However, thanks to guitarist Bernie Torme, I was finally able to hear this album I’d been waiting for all this time. This album rocks so well. I think if it had been released when it was originally recorded, things would’ve been quite different for the band.

#6.) DORO
Warrior Soul

My review pretty much says everything about how good this album is. The one note to add would be that Doro released a new version of the album, dubbed “The Winter Edition” on November 17th. You can read more about that here.

#5.) QUEENSRYCHE
Operation: Mindcrime II

I don’t think anyone had much in the way of high hopes when the plans for this album were announced. The band’s recent material has been extremely lackluster. However, the magic that was captured for the first mindcrime album was recaptured and Queensryche delivered their best album since Hear In The Now Frontier.

#4.) SLAVE TO THE SYSTEM
S/T

Scott Rockenfield steps outside of his drumming for Queensryche and comes up with a very worthy side project. It’s much more of a hard rock album than a metal release but it just continually rocks hard. Hey, any album that makes me LIKE the guitar playing from Kelly Gray has to have something going for it.

#3.) GMT
Bitter & Twisted

It’s been quite a successful year for guitarist Bernie Torme. I loved the release of the Desperado CD you see on this list a bit further down and I gave a great review to the Gillan live DVD he was involved with. The saving the best for last (or #3 as things go) would be the release of the debut GMT album. A truly awesome album and the song “Cannonball” goes down as my second favorite song of 2006.

#2.) IRON MAIDEN
A Matter of Life & Death

Up The Irons, indeed! The release of an Iron Maiden album is always something of a national holiday for music fans, or at least it should be. They may be one of the longest running bands these days but they always put out great material, and generally embarrass the younger bands out there today.

#1.) JIM PETERIK
Above the Storm

Yes, a melodic rock album from the former keyboardist of Survivor is my favorite album of year. I’ve been a big fan recently of Jim Peterik from his work with Pride Of Lions. When this album was announced, I wanted to get it, but I wasn’t prepared for how amazing this album turned out. One criticism I heard about the album was that the lyrical content was relentlessly positive. While normally that would be something I would agree with, this just wasn’t the case with Above The Storm. Every song on this album is outstanding and “Stand and Be Counted” became my own personal rallying point I used for coaching youth basketball teams in the winter and summer this year. It ranks as my top song for 2006.

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES:

While the following albums didn’t make the top ten list, they shouldn’t be forgotten as they were also among the best releases of the year.

SURVIVOR
Reach

I really liked the album and gave it a great review. However, subsequent events like the departure of singer Jimi Jamison and his statements that he wasn’t enthused about some of the material on the CD, kind of cooled me off to the album.

HOUSE OF LORDS
World Upside Down

A great start from a reconstituted lineup. This album is the one that I’m really sorry didn’t make the top 10 list. If I was ranking beyond the top 10, this would be #11.

BILLY TALENT
II

The band just missed making my Best of 2005 top ten list. I only had two debut albums even in consideration. The album has a great sound to it, and I’m looking forward to not only playing it more as time goes by, but also for more material. This album proves you can find quality rock music anywhere in the world, you just have to open your eyes to look for it.

SUSAN CAGLE
The Subway Recordings

I seem to have a strong partiality to strong female singer-songwriters and Cagle joins the list after hearing this album.

CHEAP TRICK
Rockford

A new album from one of my all time favorite bands is always a good thing.

RED LOTUS
De Pinche Nada

It’s only a 5 song album, but what the band does in just five songs is purely amazing. Red Lotus is one of the few lesser known names that I promoted to some of my other online friends and it paid off with at least one of them who absolutely raved over the disc. I look forward to hearing more from them.

EXODUS
Shovel Headed Kill MAchine

While this album was actually released in 2005, I didn’t get it until this year. My original review gave it just 3 ½ stars, but as I’ve listened to it multiple times my opinion of the album has risen. If it had been released this year, there’s a possibility it may now have made the top 10.

Well, that’s it for my favorite albums of the year. Let’s hear some feedback from our readers on our picks and what your own best of list would include. As a side note, the three worst albums I had to listen to were Glenn Tipton’s remastered Baptizm of Fire, Millionaire’s Paradisiac and the incredibly atrocious Valentine release The Most Beautiful Pain.

We have another year down, and we are getting ready to start on the 2007 review year. I know that I’ll find lots of new things to listen to from my favorite artists and get my ears wrapped around a bunch of new bands as well. I can’t wait.