Final Fantasy - He Poos Clouds
Around last fall, one of my friends told me about this album over instant message, and I was immediately skeptical. "Final Fantasy? WTF is this some lame orchestral video game music?" I was pleasantly surprised.
This is a solo project consisting solely of Owen Pallett (of Arcade Fire and some other stuff). It actually is pretty orchestral, as there are no standard guitar/bass/drums songs on this album. All I can say is that this album is phenomenal. It was one of the best (overlooked) albums of last year IMO.
There are some tracks from the album available
here, but I think it's a pretty big disservice to listen to this album piecemeal (I think that about most good albums FWIW).