Music geek alert: "All Songs" Best of 2009

I'm a music geek but the four folks behind NPR's "All Songs Considered" are geeks beyond all measurement. I say that with love.

That geekiness is in evidence in "ASC's" best-of 2009 podcast, which includes some fun categories like biggest surprise, best artists not previously featured on "ASC," and more. You'll likely hear lots of great music for the first time. You'll also hear the four hosts fawning over more than a few little-known artists/poets, so much so I wondered whether they were purposely ruling out top nods to anyone who ever had a sniff of commercial radio, let alone a mainstream magazine article.

Overall, I found this year's "ASC" choices soft. Too much mopey soft pop-rock and not enough bite and volume. Co-host Carrie Brownstein, of Sleater-Kinney fame, offered up one of the few songs with an electric guitar, but even she seemed to favor the more acoustic stuff.

More in line with my tastes is the All Songs Considered Listener Picks, which are not so far afield and which have a bit more bite overall.