Welcome to the fifth consecutive Best Albums of the Year here at Hidden Track. Hopefully, you know by now that we pride ourselves on covering music that spans any genre, any age, any geography and any instrumental makeup. To us, good music is good music. Period.

So, you can rest assured of the one thing that will always make our list a cut above the rest: we consider everything. Our submissions include all styles of music from bluegrass to jazz, jam to indie, electronica to rap, as well as everything in between. At the end of the day, we’re a diverse open-minded music blog. Our writers work here because they have great taste in music, and thus they are encouraged simply to write about what catches their interest. We have no motives, no editorial biases and no strings attached. We hope that comes across in our picks.

So, let’s kick off our week-long celebration of the HT staff’s favorite albums of 2012 with numbers 25 through 21…

25) Old Crow Medicine Show – Carry Me Back

Sounds Like: The modern torchbearers of Bill Monore’s high and lonesome sound

Key Tracks: Carry Me Back, Levi, Bootlegger’s Boy

The Skinny: Long before it was cool to play acoustic foot-stomping Americana music, there was the Old Crow Medicine Show. The Nashville-based band, who have been around since 1998, could arguably be credited with planting the seeds the genre’s current boom – thanks in part to the popularity of their “breakout hit” Wagon Wheel. For their first album since 2008, the band welcomed back founding member Critter Fuqua, and delivered a modern Americana classic steeped in bourbon-soaked bluegrass, dusty country and traditional Appalachian folk sounds. While there has been a question about the authenticity of the newer generation of roots acts, OCMS are undoubtedly the real McCoy.

- Jeffrey Greenblatt

• Spotify Playlist: Hidden Track’s Top 25 Albums Of 2012
  
• Previously On HT: Top 25 Albums Of 2011

24) First Aid Kit – The Lion’s Roar

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It being Friday, and just shy of half-way through the ninth month of the year, this morning I (@andykahn) decided on a whim to tweet out my Top 9 Albums of 2012 (so far). Along with the nine I chose, I also added a handful of, “Honorable Mentions,” that didn’t quite make the cut. With a quarter of the year left, 2012 has thus far proven to be another impressive year of album releases.

#9 album of 2012 (so far) @mapsnatlases “Beware and Be Grateful” http://t.co/5HDX8ZdH

Friday, September 14, 2012 12:31 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@andykahn

andykahn

#8 album of 2012 (so far) @liannelahavas “Is Your Love Big Enough?” http://t.co/Ktz2BZqr

Friday, September 14, 2012 1:16 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@andykahn

andykahn

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Back in 2008, the Swedish sister duo of Johanna and Klara Söderberg, who perform and record as the First Aid Kit, became indie-rock viral video sensations when they posted a clip of themselves in a forest, decked out in flannel, performing an enchanting acoustic version of the Fleet Foxes’ Tiger Mountain Peasant Song. The video has since been viewed a staggering 2.6 million times. As a result of the YouTube clip, the sisters, who had released an EP on a Swedish label in April of that year, were signed to the London-based Wichita Records, who re-released their EP Drunken Trees to include their Fleet Foxes cover, and put out their full-length debut Big Black & the Blue in 2010. The duo, who hail from the pastoral, woodsy looking Stockholm suburb of Enskede, fittingly play a dreamy brand of country-infused, psych-folk that draws influence from the likes of Mazzy Star, Joanna Newsom and even Neko Case.

On January 24, First Aid Kit will release their Mike Mogis (Bright Eyes, Monsters Of Folk) produced full-length, sophomore effort The Lion’s Roar. The ten-track album, which was recorded in Omaha, is the duo’s first with a full backing band, which featured their dad, Benkt, on bass, as well as assistance from Mogis and Nate Walcott (Bright Eyes). The Söderberg sisters also got some high profile help on the album’s closing track, King Of The World, from the The Felice Brothers, who added their ramshackle instrumentation, and Conor Oberst, who sang that song’s closing verse. Last week the First Aid Kit released this video for the pedal steel-drenched track Emmylou, which is a direct nod to Ms. Harris, and also name checks Gram Parsons and June and Johnny Cash. Let’s check it out…

The First Aid Kit will head out for a 12-date North American spring tour, that kicks offs with a high profile show at New York’s Webster Hall on March 28, and wraps roughly three weeks later with a tour closing gig at Slim’s in San Francisco on April 18.