A Good Place to Start.

Here it is: Daytona Splendor's Alphabetized List of The 26 Most Essential CD's He Can Think Of On This Particular Evening.

A - Achtung Baby / All That You Can't Leave Behind - U2 - "Two albums with nothing but money on both. This one's a tie."

B - Bringing Down the Horse - The Wallflowers - "My favorite album from Jakob and Co."

C - Chutes Too Narrow - The Shins - "In Jonathan Franzen’s overrated best-seller The Corrections, there exists a sophisticated computer program that can identify patterns in someone’s favorite music and synthesize the data into new music that is guaranteed to satisfy. Only fiction? It seems that The Shins have gained access to this magical machine, and they keep pushing my buttons, over and over and over again."

D - Deja Entendu - Brand New - "The title means Already Heard but this album is nothing but good news to my virgin ears."

E - Eye in the Sky - The Alan Parsons Project - "Mostly I put this on because of the title track. The Bulls ruled the 90's."

F - Funeral - The Arcade Fire / Futures - Jimmy Eat World - "Funeral is an album that shines as it emotes a moving artistic rendering of love and redemption and Futures, while it may come off as a tad mundane in comparison, is an essential album for those snowswept days between climbing mountains."

G - God Shuffled His Feet - Crash Test Dummies / Give Up - The Postal Service - "Too often people get caught up and lost in the silliness of Shuffled and they miss what a great record it really is. I'd like to have a Q & A sesh with God sometime. / Ben Gibbard frickin' rules."

H - Hot Fuss - The Killers - "Big, bold, confident music that makes me love. Them."

I - I Am Sam - Various / I'm Wide Awake It's Morning - Bright Eyes - "Oh man, Eddie Vedder's rendition of You've Got to Hide Your Love Away kills me every time. What a great album. / And I really can't stress the importance of owning Bright Eyes' latest. Oberst's straight-from-the-most-personal-of-diaries lyrical genius shines through again, delivered with a passion unrivaled in music today."

J - Joshua Tree - U2 - "This album is the pinnacle of the sweeping, all-encompassing, cinematic and genius anthemic rock that U2 created. U2's focus, intensity and personal revelations within this album make it my favorite and establish it, in my mind, as the definition of 'rock with a conscience'."

K - Kid A - Radiohead - "I stole this quote because it's the only thing that was able to capture this album's glory: 'Comparing this to other albums is like comparing an aquarium to blue construction paper.' Fantastic."

L - Love Is Hell Pts. 1 & 2 - Ryan Adams / Let Go - Nada Surf - "Adams' two EP's constitute his best work and prove that he is the stalwart singer songwriter people claim. / Nada Surf decided to stop trying to sound like The Sonic Youth and made their own sprawling, worthy record."

M - Moulin Rouge Soundtrack - Various / Mermaid Avenue Volume I - Billy Bragg and Wilco - "Call me affeminate, but I like the Moulin Rouge soundtrack a lot. No, wait, don't call me affeminate. / Wilco and Billy Bragg collaborate on an incredible album of new music to Woody Guthrie's lyrics, bringing Guthrie to life more than ever before.

N - Nothing But A Burning Light - Bruce Cockburn - "Full of quiet introspection and a little bit of everything musically, this album contains some of Cockburn's most open Christian expressions, and is delivered in a calming and thought-provoking style."

O - Our Endless Numbered Days - Iron & Wine - "Picture Sam Beam crumpled into your bean-bag chair next to a whispering white-gold fire gently caressing the neck of an old acoustic guitar, poetry tumbling out in his low-key and dulcet tones and you've got a feel for this album. A simply beautiful display of musical genius."

P - Plans - Death Cab For Cutie / Picaresque - The Decemberists - "Both released this year and both masterfully produced by Chris Walla, these two albums deliver two very unique sounds. Plans is yet another example of Gibbard's ability to turn a beautiful phrase and the bands ability to turn out beautiful records. Driven by acoustic and piano-driven melodies that at once elicit joy and sorrow, this disc is a fitting follow-up to Transatlanticism. / Picaresque is an album entrenched with anger and passion and it comes through in the well-engineered stories that make up the tracklisting. Booyes."

Q - Queen: Greatest Hits I & II - Queen - "Love them or loathe them, you can't ignore these guys."

R - Reconstruction Site - The Weakerthans / Room For Squares - John Mayer - "Reconstruction is a smart record with great musical textures and superb literary lyrics. / Squares shows off not only the guitar talents of Mayer, but his brilliant lyrical capabilities to boot. (Especially 'Your Body is a Wonderland'.)"

S - Set Yourself on Fire - Stars / Something About Airplanes - Death Cab For Cutie / So Jealous - Tegan and Sara - "Stars are so good. Break ups, break downs and everything in between; a true catharsis of an album. / Airplanes is fantastic. A little Beatles, a little ragged, lyrically complex but accessible; Death Cab is downright cool. / I never thought I would say this but here it is: So Jealous? Soooo good."

T - Transatlanticism - Death Cab For Cutie / Together We're Heavy - The Polyphonic Spree - "YOU MUST BUY TRANSATLANTICISM. / The Spree are a delight. Choral, choreographed, and not a cult."

U - Unforgettable Fire - U2 - "Solid. More songs about Jesus and peace. Well-executed."

V - Veni Vidi Vicious - The Hives - "Explosive post-punk-rock. And they're Swedish too."

W - We Have the Facts and We're Voting Yes - Death Cab For Cutie / Weezer (Blue Album) - Weezer - "Another good Death Cab album? Not surprising. At once a pop and a not-pop record. Mesmerizing. / The Blue Album is really good. Really, really good."

X - X & Y - Coldplay - "Sure, it's a little cocky. But it's pretty good and it was either this or ZZ Top."

Y - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot - Wilco - "Sad, celestial and lovely. Siggghhhh."

Z - Zooropa - U2 - "People always make fun of this album. I love it."

Phewf! I didn't realize what an undertaking that would be. Well, there you have it. Sure, it's thrown together and is probably missing several key albums, but it's a start. Maybe I'll fix it another day. And for those of you who were counting, yes, I know that I put 38 albums instead of only 26. It's just so hard. Congrats, by the way, if you made it all the way down here. Commendable.

Alright. I'm tired.