ouch. i feel ya. got mine stolen once (i think i've posted about that before). The good news i guess is that you're one of the smarter/more fortunate ones that ACTUALLY have a back up plan, its just unfortunate that you lost the new stuff that hadn't had a chance to get on the ol' time machine. at the store, we have a saying...its not IF your hard drive will fail, its WHEN. that's weak that it failed in less than a year, however. BUT since its less than a year old, you're at least getting a new one for free. and i'd get applecare if you don't yet. for real.
all of my big technical problems have happened POST the thieving of my computer, so I've had several back up plans since then. However, before the invention of time machine, I was out on the road and my logic board was going out. I spent about 3 hours at a Genius Bar with my computer hooked up to my drummer's trying to save files for a while until my computer would freeze up, restart (trying not to move or bump my computer in any way), and move some more files.
The other was terrifying though...we MTF boys did half our album out in California, and half 2 years later in Arizona. We put all the files on two external Lacie hard drives. Well, we had some BGV's to do and so i plugged on of them in to my rig and it just clicked constantly. Who knows what happened to it, but we sure treated that 2nd backup hard drive like it was a newborn baby! No one was allowed to plug it in or turn it on, or even pick the thing up until we made another backup. we literally almost lost an entire album's worth of work. moral of that story is...next time i'm making THREE backups immediately. which is probably over kill.
"Some men can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn."