It makes sense on paper that an album with both George Harrison and Todd Rundgren listed as producers should be good. In actuality, Badfinger attempted their follow-up to No Dice three times, first with Beatles engineer Geoff Emerick, but these recordings, (including numerous "Name of the Game" re-mixes and overdubs), were constantly rejected by A&R guys at Apple Records. Harrison then came in to work with the band, but abandoned the project to make A Concert for Bangladesh, for which Badfinger also performed. Then Rundgren was assigned the job, the final version of Straight Up at last being released. The Harrison helmed "Name of the Game" doubles as Badfinger's best song and as always, Pete Ham's other numbers "Take It All", "Baby Blue", and "Day After Day" reign supreme.
I could consider this the best double album in all of hip-hop, but I would rather not take anything away from 2 Pac and instead call it what it really is; two "solo" albums released together under the Outkast banner, and then just admit that I am cheating in including them together. I really do only listen to them back to back, so I am sticking with their two-for-one placement. If there was any doubt, (hint, there was not), that Big Boi was one of the finest MCs in any century, Speakerboxxx obliterates them with "Bowtie" alone. Then astonishingly, Andre 3000 perhaps trumps his bandmate with The Love Below. By saying to hell with rapping for the most part, he instead tires to be Prince for seventy-nine minutes and succeeds wonderfully with "Dracula's Wedding", "Vibrate", "Happy Valentine's Day" and "Spread".
Opeth hit their peak and how on Watershed, their to-date final observation to feature any extreme metal. At the time, this was just the debut of new drummer Martin Axenrot and shredder Fredrik Åkesson, but after this, mainman Mikael Åkerfeldt felt he could no longer write in his trusty and proven vein, as he had said everything he needed to say while screaming and singing together like cats and dogs, mass hysteria style. You could almost stop after the first four songs here and be satisfied in the fact that Opeth had made their masterpiece. "Burden" is probably their most perfect song with zero traces of metal, (and the single best dual lead guitar work so far this century), "Coil" is another gorgeous and against-type opener, "Heir Apparent" is balls-ass heavy, and "The Lotus Eater" is all the prog there can be.
I was already a Dixie Chicks fan since realizing that Martie Maguire was really pretty, but when their follow-up to Fly was a roots-based bluegrass record, I yee-hawed accordingly. Still using a crop of songwriters for material, (including making the seven-hundred and twenty-fourth cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Landslide"), Home's retro-sound is as admirable as the songs themselves. The instrumental "Lil' Jack Slade" and "White Trash Wedding" bust out the hoedown-ness, but the final two ballads "Godspeed (Sweet Dreams)" and "Top of the World" are my two favorite things that I have ever heard on a country record. The latter was written by Patty Griffin who also penned "A Home" here, (as well as the best song on the Dixie's previous album, "Let Him Fly"). Which reminds me that I really should get around to getting some of her own albums.
After Rammstein broke with "Du hast" and Sehnsucht in 1997, four years went by before they continued on, and the resulting Mutter was a different beast if you were to pay attention. The band's trademark arrangement of riff/bass and verse/same riff and chorus, was still apparent, but the riffs themselves were more chunky and rhythmic. This along with Flake Lorenz' more orchestral keyboards gave their music a more organic, grand, and ultimately heavy vibe than the almost techno-metal jams on the first two albums. This is made apparent on "Mein Herz brennt", "Ich will", and "Sonne", (all of which have brilliant music videos to boot), to name just three. Rammstein would emphasize this new direction even further on their future releases, but Mutter is the perfect middle ground to their original and later sounds.
My list, my rules, so on that platform, Heathen Chemistry is the best Oasis album. Believe you me, I was as surprised as anyone when the band's sixth outing that barely made a dent on anyone's radar and received "meh" reviews at best from critics slowly became my pick of the litter. Part of the surprise is that Liam "Why am I even in this band?" Gallagher at long last stepped up to the plate with some material that matched his brother Noel "Why am I not the only person in this band?" Gallagher's. "Songbird" is fantastic, as is "Born On a Different Cloud" and he and his brother's co-write "Better Man". Never to be outdone though, Noel effortlessly delivers with his own sung "She Is Love" and the last outstanding of the band's singles "Little by Little", possibly my favorite Oasis song period.
I will have to check with the authorities to officially confirm this, but I am confident that it is against most laws to make a greatest album list without Nevermind on it. If you had to name but one record that caused more of a ruckus in the 1990s, this would be it. Besides single-handedly making grunge the biggest form of music in the world, putting Seattle on the rock map, and turning Nirvana into poster boys for all of it, Nevermind remains not the least bit overrated for having just great goddamn songs. Even played out jams such as "Come As You Are", "In Bloom", "Lithium", "Polly", and "Smells Like Teen Spirit" only get better with each listen. Though Kurt Cobain allegedly disapproved of Butch Vig's production job after the fact, this album sounds fantastic and as heavy as pop music ever got.
I will say nothing bad about Is This It because there is nothing bad to say about it, but I still consider the follow-up Room on Fire to be superior. Julian Casablancas's vocals are still run through a light distortion pedal for each and every utterance that he makes, he is still singing about hanging out with people and being awkward, and the band still goes for a different drum sound depending on the song, but Room on Fire still has a more unified feel. Less immediate than its predecessor, "Automatic Stop" per example seems at once conflicting, each band member playing a hook to top the other and creating almost a clashing cacophony of them that takes multiple listens to decipher. "Under Control" is my favorite Strokes song, and "I Can't Win" would be the only one here that sounds like a Is This It leftover, be it a top notch one.
Including some of the most cryptic liner notes of the LP era, Neil Young's Tonight's the Night is also one of the most anguished records that has ever been made. Young recorded it months after Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten and roadie chum Bruce Berry had each suffered fatal drug overdoses, the songwriter pouring out his pain here. "Come on Baby Let's Go Downtown" is a live recording featuring Whitten on his own song, but every other moment is Young letting it fly. He lazily admits that he stole from the Stones in "Borrowed Tune", does a terrible job staying in key and hitting the notes in "Mellow My Mind", and opens and closes the album with the same song not for the last time, but here just to slam home his point. Young sounds like he is barely keeping it together throughout and that is because he indeed was not, making this his most honest, stark, and excellent work.
For years it seemed that me, my cousin, and my brother were the only three people I would ever meet who knew who the fuck Captain Beyond was. Yet as time goes by, it is delightful to hear them referenced in Clutch songs and to have random musicians and old vinyl buying rock fans who I meet equally singing their praises. This could be the best supergroup ever assembled, and not because they are made up of A-listers since they are not, but because two guys from Iron Butterfly, Deep Purple's original vocalist, and Johnny Winter's drummer easily made the best debut that any supergroup could possibly deliver. Structured as one thirty-two minute song broken up on two sides and with individual track names, Captain Beyond is a heavy for its time/spaced-out lyrics/odd-timing/classic rock riff fest.
With nearly every record that he made throughout the 1960s, Bob Dylan inspired everyone and consistently blew craniums, not taking a break until after Blonde on Blonde. Because really, you kind of have to sit back and let things simmer a bit after this one. His third full-band rock album in a row and the first to be a double LP, Blonde was the money-shot of all that he had been leading up to at this point. Dylan's abstract lyrics, (whether deliberately meant to toy with people's heads or not), reached their zenith here, and Blonde represents the most colorful words that he had yet put to sound. Even something as seemingly straight forward as "I Want You" becomes an object of debate when you dig deeper. Yet despite the fun lyrical nitpicking, Blonde's music is equally stellar. "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands" and "Visions of Johanna" could not be better if they tried.
Technically three acts spread out over two LP's that were released two months apart from one another, Joe's Garage is my favorite Frank Zappa album for a number of reasons. Both me and my six year old daughter's favorite silly song is on here in the form of "Stick It Out", (I cough really loud during the profanity when we listen to it, just to PC it up as I am sure Zappa would be proud), and sometimes an artist is so good that a double album from them just hits the spot that much more. By the time that Garage gets to "A Little Green Rosetta" and Frank ditches the Central Scrutinizer voice and proclaims how the band is way off the click track but that they are "really good musicians", you just have to applaud. Zappa naturally would be the guy to take his own concept album the least bit seriously and also make it brilliant as all get-out in the process.
Though original and once again current bass player/Phil Lynott dead ringer Frankie Poullain bowed out during the making of The Darkness' sophomore effort One Way Ticket to Hell...and Back, (and Justin Hawkins was chin-deep in enough cocaine to kill a sperm whale), this nevertheless remains the brightest Darkness there is. Working with Queen's legendary producer Roy Thomas Baker because of course they did, topping Permission to Land seemed like it would not possible, (and even the band when I saw them live played but one song off of this, boo-the-fuck-urns to that), yet everything is bigger and better for the second go around. Mostly referring to the choruses, and good Satan are they outstanding. "Knockers", "Hazel Eyes", "Girlfriend", and "Bald" only offer a sweet, glorious taste. Self-aware cock-rock never succeeded more.
One in the same beast with the following, (and generally considered superior, sans me) Rain Dogs, Swordfishtrombones was at least the more shocking of the two, with a soundtrack album and then Heartattack and Vine coming before this, leaving everyone unprepared for what was to transpired next. Waits embraced a more surreal voice here, with songs about the seedy underbelly of the downtrodden and instrumentation that was anything but conventional. This does not even take into account his howling voice which increasingly seemed to be daring you to turn your record player off. It was bold and exciting shit to be emerging in during an era where keyboardy sounding keyboards were trying to make everyone dance. Waits was not on another planet so much as he was living in the sewers, making music about and with whatever he found down there.
If you lifted up a rock and actually found someone living under it, this would be the David Bowie album that you would play them as their introduction to the man. Taking his alien/would-be-transsexual alter ego Ziggy Stardust that he developed on tour for Honky Dory into the recording studio, Bowie brought over some older songs and b-sides, re-worked some, and cranking out some new ones to fit his concept. Not that there is a narrative through line here, but utilizing the same band as Dory sans Rick Wakeman, (who did provide harpsichord on "It Ain't Easy" nevertheless), The Rise and Fall is still a triumph. "Lady Stardust", "Five Years", "Hang On to Yourself", "Rock and Roll Suicide", "Moonage Daydream", and the title track all represent the best glam rock on earth, or any other planet for that matter.
Four solo Lou Reeds and two from the Velvets, it should surprise no one that the debut from the latter would be showing up here and at the highest spot. The Velvet Underground & Nico essentially invented alternative music. Songs about hookers, being strung out, sadomasochism, and Andy Warhol's circle of freaks were certainly the alternative to what everyone else was and had been doing by 1967. This album even predates the summer of love by a few months, and makes it seem like such a tied-eyed flavored time of year was simply going to pass New York by entirely. Most of & Nico was recorded in a building that was falling apart by engineers who hated what they were hearing, (and Andy Warhol probably playing with grapes and nude boys somewhere instead of producing), but the songs that it wielded are all iconic.
This time teaming up with U2 producer Steve Lillywhite, Morrissey topped his American breakthrough Your Arsenal two years later with the best thing that he has yet to do outside of The Smiths. Named in part after a district in London that sports a handful of gay clubs, (always a fan of sending mixed singles that Morrissey fellow), Vauxhall and I features a new rhythm section, but the singer was still working with the same two guitar players Alain Whyte and Boz Boorer, both of whom have stuck around for some time. Perhaps it was the desire to keep the momentum going from Your Arsenal and prove that it was not a fluke, but the material here just surpasses all of Morrissey's other solo work. "Now My Heart Is Full", "Used to Be a Sweet Boy", "Speedway", and the exquisitely catchy "The More You Ignore Me, the Closer I Get" are as good as this perpetually miserable devil gets.
Everyone has heard this guy's voice from either the Toy Story trilogy or the beginning of Major League, and his songs were making the rounds everywhere by the time that Sail Away came out. In fact several here were already done by other artists, most notably Harry Nilsson who dedicated an entire album Nilsson Sings Newman to his favorite songwriter. Yet Newman's own brand of Jewish blues, (good ole critics making up genres that do not exist), fits his voice and arrangements best of all. Sail Away is one of the funniest singer-songwriter albums and it is not even Newman's personal funniest, (that title would probably belong to Good Old Boys). Look no further than his ode to slavery in the title track and the "god is an asshole" jab with "God's Song (That's Why I Love Mankind)", both simply oozing with sarcasm. Though the sweet and brief "Memo to My Son" is probably my favorite here.
After fulfilling their contract with Atlantic Records with the no-brainer "get out of a record deal early card" greatest hits album, Collective Soul took a long break as both the Roland brothers Ed and Dean went through divorces. They then had a double LP of understandably depressing songs ready to go when they instead decided to be optimistic and start anew with what became Youth. Though I would still love to hear that abandoned break-up album someday, I cannot say that they made the wrong move here, as Youth is without question their best record. Collective Soul is one of those bands where I love every single that they put out so I get all of their albums regardless, but the perfect and giddy pop craftsmanship that hit me when I played this after such a long wait was better than I or anyone could have expected.
Speaking of albums that could not be any more pleasant to the ears, it is the indie/husband-wife duo Mates of State's fifth Re-Arrange Us. I heard this by accident. My brother had been groaning on and on about how this was the greatest band since sliced bread, and one night while I drove his toasted ass home in his car, "The Re-Arranger" came on his iPod and I pulled a "What's all this then?". I have heard much from this outfit since and yeah, Re-Arrange Us easily reigns supreme. Broadening out their sound with more instrumentation and better, punchier production, these songs could probably sound like Venom's Welcome to Hell and they would still be amazing. It is impossible to listen to it without smiling throughout its entirety as Mates of State are all about the hooks, as well as packing as many of them into three-ish minute pop songs as possible here.
There is so much to praise about the biggest selling classic rock album in history that everybody on earth already owns. For starters, this was the best sounding record yet made at the time. Listening to it now, modern production techniques still have nothing on it. If every song on Dark Side of the Moon was about Nazis eating babies, it would still hit the spot. Roger Waters conceived the lyrics to Moon on his own,and this marks the first yet obviously not the last time that he took a more controlling role. The band were still compiling their music together though, and spending over six months at Abbey Road Studios to make this happen clearly paid off. Every note of Dark Side has been etched into our brains, so there is no point in naming highlights. You listen to this from beginning to end or you are lying.
You could label these chaps an Irish Coldplay, (Coldplay themselves always trying to be a British U2, just to bring this full circle), but this is pigeonholing Snow Patrol unfairly. Their fourth record Eyes Open defines their own brand of power pop and gloriously so. They had and have continued to feature killer songs on all their albums, but Eyes Open is so far their only one to have eleven of them. "Chasing Cars" once again owes a debt to Grey's Anatomy for it breaking through in the States, but "You Could Be Happy", "You're All I Have", "It's Beginning to Get to Me", and "Make This Go on Forever" easily beat them and all feature even more outstanding vocal melodies from Gordon Lightbody. The penultimate "Open Your Eyes" though, (with its one chord progression and slowly building arrangement), is just everything that I like about music.
Rivers Cuomo abandoned the spotlight for a bit after Weezer's blue self-titled came out and made him a millionaire. He finished up his degree at Harvard University, got one of his legs that was shorter than the other since birth operated on, and ditched a rock opera called Songs from the Black Hole to instead write what would come out as Pinkerton. Critics had their heads up their asses and panned the album and it wielded no hits when released, depressing Cuomo to the point where even today he is reluctant to play much of anything from it, even though everyone has been bending over backwards to apologize for not liking it the first time. This was the last and best go that the band had at delivering songs that were not about Hollywood or embracing their shinny, ironic, nerdiness, where Cuomo was digging deep and hitting darker gold, with noisy, heavy, and triumphant production to boot.
If you do not live around the greater Chicagoland area, then I have to pity you. Maggot Twat have operated around these here parts for about sixteen years and they make going to see a local metal show in a shithole bar one of the most enjoyable experiences you could have. Formed by two brothers who dubbed themselves Spam and Pizzer Manwhat, and utilized the services of puppet drummer extraordinaire Dick Pancakes, the Twat have cut only three albums in their near twenty years as a band, and the middle one 8-Bit Apocalypse is their ultimate experience. "Kill the Bitch", "A Vampire Bit My Balls", "I Wanna Get Laid", "Sexy Plants", and the interludes "Fuck My Underwear" and "Hot Dogs, Present Bush" should give you a clear idea, but what these guys are oozing with in brilliant and immature humor, they equally match with wammy-bar abusing riffs and heavy as balls production.
Sir Elton John's second album scored the now standard "Your Song", and being self-titled and the first one to see release in the States, most people over here logically assumed that it was his debut. This early in the game, he and Bernie Taupin had not landed their stable band line-up yet, but the material they had already was without rival. Elton John carries a lot of nostalgia for me as this was my Ma's favorite of his records, and she played the shit out of it to me and my brother since infancy. Yet I stand by it as one of the best soft rock albums by Elton or anyone. There is a strong emphasis on harp and an almost medieval vibe throughout, in gorgeous songs like "I Need You to Turn to", "The Greatest Discovery", "The King Must Die", "First Episode at Hienton", and "Sixty Years On", with still plenty of rock left over for "Take Me to the Pilot" and "The Cage".
Ian Anderson channeled his personal thoughts on organized religion through a folk-prog filter on Jethro Tull's defining work Aqualung. There are both proggier and folkier albums by the Tull, but as far as many people including me are concerned, this is an open and shut case as to the album that best represents the band's abilities. The title track, "Locomotive Breath", "Hymn 43", and "Cross-Eyed Marry" are as classic as classic rock gets, but the closing number "Wind-Up" sums up the album's god vs. religion theme to a tee and is the single best song that Ian Anderson ever wrote. The excellent Clive Bunker sadly bowed out of the band after this album, but at least John Evan made his debut on the keys. As far as musicianship goes though, Martin Barre hogs the spotlight on the title-track's guitar solo, easily in the running for one of the best non-Jimmy Page ones of the early 70s.
This was Kiss' sixteenth record and third with Bob Ezrin, whose previous two I have conflicting opinions on from the general public and critics alike, (Music from "The Elder" is great, Destroyer blows). The 1980s and Maude wardrobe done and packed away with, Kiss channeled the mainstream heavy rock sound of Metallica's "Black Album" in parts for Revenge, delivering their finest work as a band. Eric Carr had recently passed, (though his background vocals are still there on "God Gave Rock 'N' Roll to You II" and he gets the swansong tribute "Carr Jam '81"), but new guy Eric Singer makes a slamming debut in his place. Gene was back delivering with "Unholy", "Domino", and "Paralyzed", Paul was with "Take It Off", "I Just Wanna", and the super-ballad "Every Time I Look At You", and both were on "Spit" and "God Gave".
While still in The Commodores, Lionel Richie cut his eponymous debut and because only seventy-two albums are better than this says me, he understandably quit soon afterwards to go and remain solo. Featuring Richard Marx and Kenny Rodgers on background vocals, as well as Joe Walsh of all blokes on lead guitar for "Wandering Stranger", Lionel Richie had enough going for it to prove that the singer was stepping out of the pure funk and R&B of his current band, having grander pop ambitious in the process. Richie's crossover success would be official on the following year's monster Can't Slow Down and for sure by the 1985's "We Are the World" event, but his first go alone bounces back and forth between up-tempo gems like "Serves You Right" and the best thing he has in "You Are" against his always superb ballads like "My Love", "You Mean More to Me", and "Truly".
Greece's Rotting Christ had evolved from an almost romantic and primitive black metal outfit, then gone through a goth phase, and by their ninth album Sanctus Diavolos, they had arrived at an otherworldly place altogether. Few extreme metal records sound like this one. Christ adds a Latin choir straight out of The Omen and/or Indian Jones and the Temple of Doom and an almost overbearingly atmospheric production to Diavolos. This gives it a sweeping, conceptual feel that is downright scary at parts. On top of it all though, each track is a stand-out. "Visions of a Blind Order" has an incredible guitar solo, "Tyrannical" is a chunk-fest, "Sanctimonius" is a haunting interlude, "Athanati Este" is their best song period, and the title track is everything dark, beautiful, and grandiose that this album is condensed to in six minutes and forty-one seconds.
Recorded without a label and with the first gathering of what would later be known as the Spiders, (plus Rick Wakeman, score!), David Bowie tracked eleven of his most wildly different songs all for inclusion on one album, his forth Hunky Dory. After his folk-inspired early records and the more electric Man Who Sold the World, Bowie was throwing everything in this time, with influences being direct both in the lyrics and music. "Song for Dylan" and "Andy Warhol" are two self-explanatory examples, "Kooks" was written about his newborn son, "Oh! You Pretty Things" drops a Nietzsche reference, and The Velvet Underground make their first but not last impression on Bowie with "Queen Bitch". "Life on Mars?" is the track to single out if you had to though, an avant-Broadway orchestral gem that sums up this gentleman's brilliance.
Though it was recorded in the U.K., Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea was written in both New York City as well as Paris, acting as PJ Harvey's love letter to the Big Apple. It was also a reactionary record to her previous work which went for more of a dank and dark vibe. Stories is PJ Harvey's deliberate "pop" album, full of lush melodies, clean production, and positive lyrics, at least comparatively. "Good Fortune", "We Float", "A Place Called Home", and "You Said Something" are the prettiest moments that Harvey has had on record, but there is some melancholy still to be found in the Thom Yorke duet "This Miss We're In" and "The Whores Hustle and the Hustlers Whore". Then "This Is Love" is just a straight-up song about doing it in the bathroom, because you gotta have one of those.
As I have previously stated, Elvis Costello's sound and rhythm section improved immediately following his debut My Aim Is True. Yet as far as a collection of songs goes, he peaked straight-away. "(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes", "Alison", "Pay It Back", and "Miracle Man" are jangly pub-pop tunes that bite with the punk attitude of the day, and in some ways, the less than polished production helps My Aim achieve its goal. It was recorded in a studio owned by former Crazy World of Arthur Brown associates Peter Ker and Mike Finesilver, with Nick Lowe producing quickly, cheaply, and exclusively during night sessions while Declan MacManus/Elvis was still working his day job. Yet after the success of the "Less Than Zero" and "Alison" singles, the now Mr. Costello had proven himself as arguably the finest songwriter of the new wave.
Liam Howlett's answer to the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act that was passed in Great Brittan to shut-down raves partially inspired the second and best Prodigy album Music for the Jilted Generation. At least "Their Law" leaves us to believe so. Being an electronica album, lyrics are hardly a-plenty on here. What is though is the best big beat music on earth. Each listen reveals more strengths and at seventy-eight minutes long, it is still too short. Howlett's knack for layering countless hooks on top of heavy as fuck rave beats is probably unparalleled, and the music does nearly all of the talking. "Voodoo People", "No Good (Start the Dance)", "Poison", and all three parts to the closing "Narcotic Suite" could play on an endless loop and it would never grate on me. Even if I am just sitting peacefully at home, miles away from a rave while playing them.
I have defended my ranking of Paul Stanley's first solo album to be the best Kiss album elsewhere on this blog, so no surprises, (or apologies), to the Kiss fans reading this now. To reiterate, it makes logical sense that an album with nobody else's songs or voices invited to the party except the Starchild's would be a best case scenario. Paul was and has always been both the band's strongest writer and vocalist, and for nine songs straight, he proves that he could have went solo any time that he wished and still would have made killer Kiss music. "Wouldn't You Like to Know Me" and "It's Alright" are the best things here, but you cannot leave out "Tonight You Belong to Me" or "Take Me Away (Together As One)" either, or "Love In Chains", "Goodbye", or the sap-fest "Hold Me, Touch Me (Think of Me When We're Apart)". Which you might notice is practically every song. Paul Stanley for President!
This stands as the only album with three entries on it that I put in my own 100 favorite songs list for this blog. Those being the Leonard Cohen "Hallelujah" cover, the musical standard "Lilac Wine", and Buckley's own "Lover, You Should've Come Over", the later my single favorite song ever written. "Hallelujah" remains Jeff Buckley's most celebrated and easily one of the most successful moments of another artist making someone else's song their own. "Lover", "Last Goodbye", and the title track all prove that Buckley had more than just a god-like voice, a voice that ius showcased glowingly on all of Grace. Produced by the busy Andy Wallace and featuring an excellent band to boot, this is the only complete vision which Buckley got to release in his lifetime, and we can only wonder if he ever could have topped it.
It makes some sense that the ultimate break-up album would be made by not one but multiple bandmembers ending their respective relationships with each other all at once. During the making of Rumors, Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks were on the outs, (in part or not since she was fooling around with drummer Mick Fleetwood at the time), and the married John McVie and Christine McVie were also to be no more. All of this on top of the usual rockstar shenanigans of drugs and drink flowing freely made the making of the band's masterpiece a soap opera. Yet in spite of and because of the inner turmoil, this record connected with nearly every record buyer on earth. Even the songs that were not hits were hits, the best of them being Buckingham's opener "Second Hand News" and McVie's lovely "Songbird".
After Love It to Death brought them into the public eye but before they became the arena filling shock-rock act to rival all others, the Alice Cooper band dropped their forth album Killer which I have always considered their peak. It is a continuation of the proceeding Love It, with Bob Ezrin still collaborating with the band and some increasingly ambitious pieces coming out of it. "Dead Babies" and the title track provide a spooky closing medley, but the best Alice Cooper song ever is the garage prog epic "Halo of Flies", which boasts a fascinating linear arrangement that never lets up. The presumably-about-Jim-Morrison "Desperado" was one of their few successful ballads, and "You Drive Me Nervous", "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah", and "Under My Wheels" still proved they were in the hard rock camp and better than most at it.
Switching vocalists for the third time, you would think the odds unlikely that a band would not only stay relevant, deliver a masterpiece, and get TWO new outstanding singers for the price of one, but that is just what Deep Purple did in debuting their mark III line-up on Burn. Nearly topping Machine Head as the band's most pristine recording, Burn features one pointless instrumental at the end, but also seven ridiculously excellent songs before it. You could paddle endlessly on about how good the title track and definite David Coverdale vocal in "Mistreated" is, but "Might Just Take Your Life", "Sail Away", "Lay Down, Stay Down", and "What's Goin' On Here" are also performed flawlessly. They all have mighty riffs, killer Ritchie Blackmore and Jon Lord solos, plus Coverdale and new bassist Glenn Hughes harmonizing and trading some of the best rock vocals that you have ever heard.
This right here is probably the most essential singer-songwriter album available. Mostly written during a vacation in Europe after her and Graham Nash had parted their romantic ways and she then had a super fling with James Taylor, Joni Mitchell had three albums behind her at this point, but nothing touches Blue. This was the kind of honest-exploration-of-one's-own-relationships record that has her being an open book emotionally, crafting moments that resonate with any and all of us. Yet if this were an album with just great poetry readings and crap music, than we would not still be talking about it. Mitchell's voice is astounding in its range, and her alternate odd tunings and use of an Appalachian dulcimer on many of the songs, (the three best being the title track, "River", and "A Case of You"), gives the whole of Blue a sound unlike anything else.
After Cowboys from Hell did enough chart damage to prove that Pantera had made the right stylistic change on it, Phil Anselmo dropped the King Diamond vocal act completely and the entire band crafted an album that could not be any more crushingly satisfying. Vulgar Display of Power is not only the band's best, but it is easily the defining groove metal record. Moments of thrash are still to be found as "Fucking Hostile" clearly demonstrates, but the breakdowns are what is most overpowering here, plus Anselmo's southern screaming-in-key wail was never better. Dimebag is ripping the best riffs of all time since Tony Iommi's heyday in "Mouth for War", "By Demons Be Driven", "This Love", "A New Level", and "Regular People (Conceit)" and his brother Vinnie was nearly as impressive behind the kit as he was on the boards with what belongs in the conversation of best production jobs in metal history. Rex Brown tears it up on the bass too, not to leave him out.
West Coast G-funk was unarguably the most successful form of hip-hop in the early 90s, (made so by Dr. Dre's The Chronic), but Snoop's debut a year later is its champion. Being the MC that got the most attention on Dre's Chronic, it makes sense that Snoop's own debut would chart as well as it did, entering at number one in fact. Still dipping into much George Clinton goodness, Dre does wonders on "Gz and Hustlas", "Doggy Dogg World", and "Tha Shiznit", plus Snoop's ridiculously killer flow on "Lodi Dodi", "Gin and Juice", "Murder Was the Case", and "Who Am I? (What's My Name?)" would make him the finest MC of all time if his post-Doggystyle output ever came close to matching what is here. "Ain't No Fun" could in fact be the greatest hip-hop song, Nate Dogg as always appearing on, (and making), an album's highlight as he was wont to do.
To think that Queen II was as complex a record as it is, AND that it was recorded in only a month, AND that it was only their second outing is all remarkable. It proves how ingenious this band very often was, even while still finding their wings and cranking out hits. Queen had the foresight to save the older songs "Ogre Battle" and "Father to Son" until they had more flexible studio time booked, but everything else here was written quickly after their debut was wrapped up. Brian May and Freddie Mercury split up half pf the album, (with Roger Taylor throwing "The Loser In the End" on May's White Side), and each act as a medley. The instrumental "Procession" and "Someday One Day" show off May's guitar overdubbing and vocals respectfully, but it is Mercury's Black Side that really pulls out the stops. "The March of the Black Queen" is damn near the band's greatest studio achievement, and is as proggy as they ever got.
His first marriage to actress Julianne Phillips now done and in the can, Bruce Springsteen took a break from the E Street band as well, though he still utilized all of them on several tracks for his eighth full length Tunnel of Love. This is mostly Springsteen on his own, as he handles almost all the instrumentation and gets away with using a drum machine because the 80s. As a follow-up to his biggest selling Born In the U.S.A., Tunnel is probably the most personal record that the Boss ever cut as it deals directly with his failed marriage, but not in a mopey way. Springsteen is owning his faults and growing out of his romanticism here and thankfully for us, every song that he has crafted around such lyrics is great. "One Step Up", the title track, the hit "Brilliant Disguise", and "Walk Like A Man" all work fantastically in this pristine yet low-key setting.
By his own admittance, John Lennon was a mess of a human being. Suffering insane jealously, addiction problems, a violent temper, abandonment issues, and emotional stress across the board, when he hit the age of thirty, The Beatles were no more, he and Yoko Ono were a few years deep into being inseparable, and he took the chance to make the most personal musical statement that he could with his solo debut Plastic Ono Band. Using just Ringo, old friend/artist Klaus Voorman on bass, and Billy Preston's keys on one track, Lennon gave producer Phil Spector specific instructions to keep the record as bare as possible, with zero of his "Wall of Sound" shenanigans. Which begs the question why hire Spector in the first place? Everything here was Lennon at his most vulnerable and bitter, yet beautifully so. "Mother", "Working Class Hero", "God", and "Love" spell everything out in painful detail.
Trent Reznor's masterpiece The Downward Spiral was structured as just that; the downward spiral of a man whose depression was getting the better of him, culminating in the closing moment "Hurt". That song and "Closer" have become iconic ever since, covered and used in movies an equally large amount of times. Yet they are hardly the only good ones to come out of such negativity. Spiral is really THEE industrial album as Reznor and Flood's production is what all other such offerings are to be judged by. Even going by Nine Inch Nails' keyboard heavy debut Pretty Hate Machine or the also excellent EP Broken, this is still the benchmark. The album evokes everything from Brian Eno on "A Warm Place" to metal on "March of the Pigs", with both Jane's Addiction drummer Stephen Perkins and King Crimson's Adrian Belew helping out along the way.
Ignored at first release, the Beastie Boy's sophomore album Paul's Boutique would only continue to grow in reputation. It is now rightfully regarded as one of the finest rap albums in history and the Dust Brothers' production of 100% samples likewise is hailed across the board. I love the Beasties but have never been a fan of License to Ill. "Girls" and "Brass Monkey" will do that to you. Yet with Boutique going a conceptually different route, (something that would become the norm for the group), I have to agree that this is as good as it gets. As energetic and great as the Beasties are at rhyme-trading, this is ultimately the Dust Brothers' showstopper. Everything gets used from Curtis Mayfield, to The Beatles, to James Brown, to Mountain, to the theme from Psycho, to the Beasties themselves, making these beats the crème de la crème of hip-hop sampling.
Switching from Upstate New York to West Hollywood, renting a house with a pool, and setting up recording equipment in the spacious living room, The Band proceeded to make the most perfect Americana record. The Band is one of those albums that is as perfect as it is unique. Though everyone was Canadian except Levon Helm, Robbie Robertson crafted pristine tales of America's past set to music that seems to evoke every era and none of them all at once. Everyone in The Band was a multi-instrumentalist and three of them were beyond gifted vocalists, each stretching their voices and their playing anywhere that it could go. "Up on Cripple Creek" is roots rock funk and a well deserving signature song for them, but "Rockin' Chair" should be this country's national anthem it is so goddamn amazing.
In case you were thinking that I was merely re-ordering every other greatest albums list for my top 100, I now present you with a joint that I have seen on none of them, Shiner's farewell outing The Egg. Kansas City's Shiner were introduced to me by an ole co-worker/fellow musician and starting with this one and then going back and picking up their other three full-lengths, The Egg trumps them mightily. Drummer Jason Gerken debuted on the previous Starless, and his performance here is one for the books. Gerken beats the ass out of his small drum kit and transcends Allen Epley's batch of material from good to stunning. As far as math-post-rock goes, I am hard pressed to think of an album this addictive. It has been one of the most played records in my arsenal, and I only wish that every rock band everywhere sounded like these gentlemen do here.
All the hullabaloo made when Radiohead dropped the sequel to OK Computer I still remember vividly. You could not open a magazine or have a conversation with any musician and NOT talk about this band and their wacky new album, an album which I absolutely loved from the first time that I heard it on release day. Radiohead where clearly going for something special here and were determined not to make an embarrassing "guitar/bass/drums band going electronic" album, so nothing on Kid A was done half-assed. The band's three guitar players put their axes down and picked up synths, drum machines, horns, and basically anything without strings, and the result is amazingly even better than OK Computer. From the robotic "Everything In It's Right Place" to the pedal organ "Motion Picture Soundtrack", this is a flawless forty-nine minutes of adventurous music.
As much as I adore Paul's Boutique, I now have to fess up that three Jewish white boys did not in fact make the greatest hip-hop record of all time. There is not a rap anything that I have addictively bumped more over the last several years than Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). The concept of nine almost entirely unknown MCs coming together from Staten Island New York in the early 90s, sampling a bunch of kung-fu films, and then delivering a record of this quality seems impossible. Yet every verse, beat, and song here lays waste to pick-your-other-hip-hop album. In Method Man, GZA, Ghostface Killah, Chef Raekwon, and Ol' Dirty Bastard, five of the most unique and fantastic MCs were heavily featured, and the three others that crop up here and there would bet their better due on future releases. Also and of course, RZA's sharp, primitive, atmospheric beats proved that he was one of the most innovative hip-hop producers since anyone.
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