It's pretty easy to get behind on indie music these days.  While pop music gets fed to us in our cars, at malls, and at movies, indie music isn't quite so accessible.  You have to work to find out what genres you like, albums can be hard to find (though not as difficult as before the internet), and you have to really follow the touring schedules of your favorite bands in order to catch them in concert.

It's pretty much a full-time job to keep current.  Granted many of us enjoy keeping up-to-date through downloading, reading articles, and seeing new bands, but many don't have the time or inclination to keep up so aggressively.

Fortunately, there are a lot of shortcuts out there, none better than the Pitchfork Media Staff Guides to the year in music.  The staff of Chicago-based Pitchfork Media compile the 50 best albums of the year, as well as the best 100 songs.  While Pitchfork's tastes are diverse enough that you will surely find some stuff you hate, the good news is that the diversity also means that there will be stuff you like, regardless of genre.

You can obtain all their picks at either indie record stores or on iTunes, but my favorite method is by scrolling the torrent sites for large folders containing all the albums from a given year (search for Pitchfork 2009 on the torrent site and you should get torrents that have all 50 albums in one download).  I listen for a week or two, delete it all, then buy the music I like.  Fortunately, you only have to do this once per year, and if you're hip to Pitchfork's 2009 picks, then trust me, you're way ahead of the curve for 2010.  (Otherwise, just get on YouTube and start browsing.  YouTube serves pretty well as an on-demand music jukebox these days)

I don't want to get preachy here, but if you download the works of these bands illegally, find a way to throw some money their way.  These artists aren't Jay-Z, Shakira, or The Eagles.  Many of these bands are living hand-to-mouth and producing their own albums, so a sale or two can make a difference.

For no particular reason, here are 13 releases (and bands) from the past couple years that are approved by a pretty big music snob (me).  They're all pretty poppy with nothing too weird or heavy:

• Black Keys - Brothers
• Blitzen Trapper - Wild Mountain Nation
• LCD Soundsystem
• Los Campesinos! - Romance Is Boring
• Hot Chip - One Life Stand
• Gaslight Anthem - American Slang
• The xx - xx
• Throw Me the Statue - Creaturesque
• Bishop Allen - Grrr...
• The National - High Violet
• B.o.B. - The Adventures of Bobby Ray
• The Henry Clay People - Living in Debt
• Lucero - 1372 Overton Park

Enjoy.  Find your bands, go see them in concert, and pretend you're cooler than you actually are.