Some bands have a very obvious choice to recommend to anyone getting their feet wet. Enter Uriah Heep's Demons and Wizards. Basically if you make this a band to take an interest in and this album doesn't do it for ya, quit while you're ahead. Two very solid records already behind them, (plus one very ambitious one in Salisbury), Wizards was the first one to boast what would become a stable line-up for several years. But it's star attraction as always was Ken Hensley at the peak of his songwriting prowess. "The Wizard", "Circle of Hands", and the medley "Paradise"/"The Spell" are Hensley compositions one and all and make a fitting cause for Heep being one of the more underrated 70s rock bands.
No, the OTHER Wish You Were Here. This doubles as arguably Badfinger's greatest achievement and yet one more terrible piece to their tragic story. Wish was thrust upon them to record so that their manager Stan Polly could continue to rob them blind and secure and keep 100% of their advance from Warner Brothers. Then the label pulled it from the shelves after seven weeks due to pending lawsuits, resulting in enough legal and financial troubles to force Pete Ham into taking his own life. It's heartbreaking that a group so good with such an incredible songwriter and voice in Ham would succumb to such a fate, but Wish is a testament to their greatness. Nothing is short of outstanding, from Chris Thomas' production to their desperate performances and highly consistent batch of songs.
Three out of four Velvet Underground records are the masterpieces everyone says they are, (approach White Light/White Heat with caution), and all of them are remarkably different, the self-titled third basically acting as their folk album; all softer selections with the band themselves producing and Doug Yule replacing John Cale. "Pale Blue Eyes" and "Jesus" are two of Lou Reed's most stunning ballads and set the template here. But the final two, wildly different moments "The Murder Mystery", (clocking in at nearly nine-minutes with it's auctioneer-paced overlapping spoken and sung vocals by the whole band), and sweet, brief, and boppy Mo Tucker sung closer "After Hours" alone offer oh so much for countless future indie bands to aspire to.
The Police's third killer record in a row with a goofy title Zenyatta' Mondatta is almost their best. Not that any of the band members agree. Recorded in four weeks and wrapped up literally the day they began a world tour, they all feel Mondatta sounds rushed. Also Sting hated Andy Summer's first solo-written piece "Behind My Camel" to the point where he refused to play on it. You'd never be able to tell things were tense though from the results. Reaching number one in the U.K., it boasts two hits in "Don't Stand So Close to Me" and "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da". "Man In a Suitcase" remains their very finest album cut, while overall Sting was growing ever more confident as a songwriter. The production is their finest to date as well, achieving that perfect, Stewart Copeland snare crack.
When Sixpence None the Richer's "Kiss Me" became a hit, I wrote it off as more fluffy VH1 crap. I do like most of that late 90s, fully VH1 crap now mind you, but "Kiss Me" is still easily this band's lamest song. Forgetting about that, everything on their fourth and second non-Christian album Divine Discontent is remarkably good. There's hardly a thing revolutionary going on here, it's just an incredibly solid, adult contemporary, ballad-heavy full length with lush production and Leigh Nash's tender and fabulous voice floating over it. The Crowded House cover "Don't Dream It's Over" is recognizable and the last three songs here "Dizzy", "Tension Is a Passing Note", and "A Million Parachutes" are just gorgeous.
It's easy now to listen to R.E.M's debut Murmur and hear familiar sounds. Not just meaning that we all know "Radio Free Europe", but even at this stage, the band's songcraft, Mike Millis' melodic bass playing, and Michael Stipe's very unique voice still sound like R.E.M.. But at the time, it's hard to suss these guys out. Generally band's that can't be categorized is a positive trait, so perhaps it's not too surprising that R.E.M. stuck around and made many a memorable recording. It's all been said about Peter Buck's atmospheric guitar tone and Stipe's "da fuck he just say?", marble-mouthed vocal delivery, (which in time he would abandon), but Murmur endures as I'd say the best R.E.M. album because all of the songs make it so. They were never this very consistent as well as quite so unique again.
Please Please Me is the closest studio album to capturing an entire live performance by the Beatles. A month before it was released, (crazy how quickly these LP's were able to get pumped out back in the day), the group entered EMI Studios with George Martin and ran through their live repertoire song by song, tagging some singles on for release. Two of the covers "Baby It's You" and of course "Twist and Shout", (the later done in one take with John Lennon's voice all but gone), trump their original versions, but it's Lennon and McCartney's already fully-formed songwriting that's most impressive. "I Saw Her Standing There", "Misery", the title track, "Do You Want to Know a Secret?", and the mushy "Love Me Do" and "P.S. I Love You" all represent the best pop music anyone had yet done.
Though "Creep" inexplicably remains the most covered Radiohead song on planet earth, it really wasn't until they dropped the album after the one that song is on that these guys became a group to take notice of. They still seemed to be figuring out what kind of a band they were on Pablo Honey, (in actuality they were in part a covers band when they formed in college in Oxfordshire and were later compared to a British Nirvana), but on The Bends, everything is fully formed and the songwriting is mountains better. Certainly not limited to one, Bends boasted five singles that charted and one of 'em "Fake Plastic Trees" remains their finest song. "High and Dry", "Street Spirit (Fade Out)", "My Iron Lung", and "Planet Telex" all boast an air of confidence that of course would only intensify on future releases.
It was more or less written on the wall that Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel's partnership was to be ending by the time they made their last album together Bridge Over Troubled Water. Art was off beginning his acting career in Catch-22 while Simon worked on the songs and when they finally joined forces in the studio, the strain was apparent though the material certainly didn't suffer. "Cecilia", "The Boxer", and "The Only Living Boy In New York" are some of the best folk songs of any era, made more so by the ambitious arrangements. Art's lead in the title track could be the finest vocal performance ever laid down, so thankfully he and Simon kept it going long enough for this version to exist as the latter always planned on singing it himself.
Oddly it's a cover of "Crossroads" that's the only dud on an album with ten John Mayer originals. This is not to knock Mayer, just that all logic dictates that having a Robert Johnson song on his record would only improve it. Steve Jordan was still producing and drumming, (for the last time so far, sadly), and Mayer's writing was ever improving. "Edge of Desire" stands as his finest example; a pristine ballad where performance, melody, and lyrics are all flawless. "Assassin" and "Heartbreak Warfare" are also incredible and a lot of Battle Studies has Mayer easing back into some of the pop territory of Room for Squares, be it wonderfully so. The Taylor Swift duet "Half of My Heart", "Who Says", and "Perfectly Lonely" still have nods and winks to his celebrity, but all step back from being off-putting.
Brian Eno truly began to show where his music was heading on Another Green World. Only five songs have vocals, the other nine being instrumentals that basically give birth to ambient music. Eno would officially invent this genre on later releases, (his next Discrete Music delved head-on), but World was his first step away from the quirky art-rock songs which made up his first two albums. Still working with some of his favorite musicians such as Phil Collins and Robert Fripp, (both best showcased on "St. Elmo's Fire" and "Sky Saw") and once again using his Oblique Strategies cards for direction and ideas, "The Big Ship" and "Becalmed" are the best movements here; simple chord progression explorations that build and simmer beautifully.
The album that pissed-off the protest folkies somethin' fierce, Bob Dylan's Bringing It All Back Home was his first to embrace electric guitar and a full band line-up in record form. He very slyly only went halfway in the pool, dedicating the second side still to acoustic numbers. But those numbers continued what he'd done on Another Side of Bob Dylan, with more abstract lyrics ("Gates of Eden" and "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue"), and in what could be a protest song "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)", a more personal, vague target of his pessimism. "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream" sums everything up with an acoustic false start, Dylan laughing his ass off, then the full band coming in for another one of his sleepy time surreal tales.
The Beatles second full-length was the one that dethroned Please Please Me at the number one spot on the U.K. charts, meaning that for fifty-one straight weeks, they occupied said spot. With was recorded over three months, taking far more time after their historic, one-day recording session for Please. George Harrison's first composition was recorded by the group here with "Don't Bother Me", Ringo got the one they first gave to the Rolling Stones "I Wanna Be Your Man", and the other Lennon-McCartney originals "It Won't Be Long", "All My Loving", and "Little Child" are all typically excellent. The covers are all better still than on Please, with "You Really Got a Hold on Me" and "Please Mister Postman" maybe the best results of other peoples songs they ever tackled.
No, the OTHER Let It Be. Breaking from the "play everything more intense" approach of their early, noise-punk outings, Paul Westerberg and the Replacements were bored by the rules laid out for a hardcore band to follow and for their third album, got to penning "real" songs. The noise and abrasive playing is still there along with somewhat juvenile songs such as "Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out" and "Gary's Got a Boner", but these elements just enhance the different songwriting on display. The jangley "I Will Dare", lounge-piano ballad "Androgynous", and roaring vocal on "Unsatisfied" make the Replacements sound like a singer-songwriter's version of a garage band. And it says something for a Kiss freak such as I that their cover of "Black Diamond" is actually the weakest song here.
Out of the four post-Déjà Vu solo albums put out by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young, the latter's After the Gold Rush has gone down as the most enduring. Originally based around an ultimately unused film script of the same name, Neil Young used a combination of CSNY session guys and this new band Crazy Horse for the tracks here. Along with the first two outings from the Band, Gold Rush is the best roots-rock album there probably is. The simple arrangements keep everything grounded and it all seems dusty and pioneery. The piano jangles, ("Till the Morning Comes"), folk, ("Tell Me Why"), rock, ("Southern Man", "When You Dance I Can Really Love"), and ballads, ("Birds", the title track), have Young at his most consistent and inviting in full-album form.
Twenty-six at the time of release, Stevie Wonder had contemplated retiring from music all together to focus on charity work. He was then granted a new contract with Motown and more money and artistic control offered to a solo artist at that time, at which point the process for the always planned double LP Songs in the Key of Life began. It was not uncommon for Wonder to spend days on end in the studio, hardly if at all eating or sleeping and just hammering out song after song. The ambitious, socially conscious, eighty-five minute album boasts his catchiest song "Sir Duke", "Pastime Paradise", the fusion instrumental "Contusion", "I Wish", and four songs over seven minutes, "As" and "Another Star" the best of 'em.
The quiet Beatle had amassed such an overflowing heap of material that he easily could've stretched it out probably for the duration of the decade on future releases. But having grown increasingly frustrated in the lion's share of tracks per album always going to his two former hit-penning bandmates, George Harrison had much to prove and let it explode out of him all at once. I've admittingly only listened to All Things Must Pass in it's tri-album form once or twice as it's last two sides of instrumental jams do zilch for me. But that's easy to ignore when ranking Harrison's all time best song in the title track, "Apple Scruffs", "Beware of Darkness", and the Dylan co-write "I'd Have You Anytime".
The first Simply Red album to exclusively feature Mick Hucknall originals left no doubt that the outstanding vocalist pretty much was the band. Original drummer Chris Joyce was unceremoniously replaced by Gota Yashiki as Hucknall wanted to feature more programmed drums and Yashiki could do that AND play a kit, ergo becoming the band's new skinsman. But the most important change on Stars came in the songs themselves. This is the only flawless Simply Red album. It was the U.K.'s biggest selling record two years straight, with the dance jam "Something Got Me Started", the title track, ballad about parenting "For Your Babies", and Thatcherism critique "Your Mirror" all showing a pop craftsmanship that Hucknall had only dabbled in before.
Tracked live in two days with zero overdubs at Jackson Browne's LA studio, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble were hot off their performance at the 1982 Montreux Jazz Festival when Browne was blown away enough by them to offer a few days of free studio time. This is my favorite blues record and as you could guess, it has much to do with Ray Vaughan's axe slinging abilities. He's easily the best blues guitarist that was ever born; shredder worthy chops with enough Albert King licks perfected to make every note in the pentatonic scale his willing bitch. The instrumental originals "Lenny" and "Rude Mood" are his two best songs, but the Larry Davis cover title track comes awfully close.
Presence was the seventh studio Zeppelin joint in so many years and it was recorded at the peak of rumors that they were cursed. A "cursed" band that was the most popular in the entire decade. But anyway, Robert Plant had suffered a car accident that rendered him wheelchair bound for many months, forcing Zeppelin to cancel what would've been their biggest tour yet. Plant recorded his vocals still in the sitting position and the entire record was wrapped up and mixed in eighteen days, (since the Rolling Stones were booked to make Black and Blue immediately afterwards). This is a more laid back Zeppelin. "Achilles Last Stand" is the only truly ambitious piece here, (and beyond excellently so), but elsewhere they find a comfortable groove with"For Your Life" and the blues work-out "Tea for One".
Fresh from their stint backing Bob Dylan in '66, the Band embarked on a massive collaboration with the songwriter, recording in Big Pink in Upstate New York in what was eventually released years later as The Basement Tapes. For their own debut, they also used Dylan's artwork for the cover and his services writing or co-writing three songs. Robbie Robertson wasn't yet supplying all the Band's material as he only has four songs on here, but his "The Weight" is one of the many moments that would prove instantly influential at the time. In '68, the Beatles' "studio as an instrument" influence was still heavily apparent nearly everywhere, but the Band were rooting their music inward; rustic and timeless but hitting a chord with the end of the decade as much if not more than anyone.
The solo career of Robert Plant is rather confusing. His five albums before Fate of Nations and much of what he's done since fall into two categories; entirely forgettable or so-so at best. Much of it seems determined to be as hookless as possible, certainly including he and Jimmy Page's Walking into Clarksdale which is the least catchy album ever made besides Pearl Jam's Vitalogy. But randomly with Fate, Plant decided to make a full-fledged masterpiece. Not limited to the more personal and environmentally conscious lyrics, the opener "Calling to You" is quite heavy, but it's really the Mid-Eastern themed mellower moments that work most. "Come into My Life", "I Believe", "29 Palms", "The Greatest Gift", and "Great Spirit" > everything Plant's ever done without John Bonham.
Prince recorded his third album Dirty Mind in his home studio, did 98% of everything on his own, and it stands as his first truly essential album; just over thirty-minutes of horny, androgynous, incest favoring, anti-war, get-up-and-dance pop goodness. Many of the tracks were done in a single day and Prince deliberately leaves the production relatively bare. It truly sounds like a basement-recording of a genius who's ever so anxious to bust his music all over your face. "When You Were Mine" proudly belongs in any top ten Prince songs list you could make. The one ballad "Gotta Broken Heart Again" is leaps and bounds better than such moments on his previous self-titled effort, "Sister" and "Head" are as filthy and funky as he'd ever be, and "Partyup" should probably be twice as long.
Johnny Marr quitting the Smiths put Morrissey in a position he wasn't planning on as he had no previous aspirations to be a solo artist. Recorded six months after that band's final album, Viva Hate was the first full-length from the Mozz where the singer started his next phase off with a casual shrug, grabbing the Durutti Column guitarist Vini Reilly to collaborate with. Morrissey's solo output is mostly great, with just a few stumbles tossed in there every now and again, but the fact that he nailed it right away is most fortunate. "Suedehead", "Everyday Is Like Sunday", "Bengali in Platforms", "Late Night, Maudlin Street", and my personal favorite "Break Up the Family" are excellent pop tunes in spite of Marr's wizardly six-string not being present and Morrissey hasn't looked back since.
The Beatles first signs that Beatlemania was getting to them showed up in their fourth album in less than two years, (not counting all the chart-topping singles and almost literal non-stop touring in between). They look all but exhausted on the cover to for Sale, probably something they couldn't have helped. After the entirely Lennon-McCartney filled A Hard Days Night, this goes back to utilizing covers to fill up space with six of them total. "Kansas City/Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey" would be the strongest and though most people seem not to care for Lennon's take on 'Mr. Moonlight", I like it just fine. Two of Lennon's first and best Dylan-inspired numbers open the record with "No Reply" and "I'm a Loser" and McCartney's brief "I'll Follow the Sun" is likewise an early example of his acoustic tastes.
Every time I think my favorite Coldplay joint may change when I listen to their first four albums, I am now no longer surprised that their second A Rush of Blood to the Head stays in the lead. I was a fan of these blokes from Parachutes and picking up A Rush as soon as it was made available convinced me that they were even mo betta than I had believed. I'm usually not overly impressed by their biggest singles for whatever reason and "Clocks" is still the only song I skip here. "Politik" ends more gorgeously than anything they have besides "Fix You" and that and my immediate favorite Coldplay song "The Scientist" could be the only two things on here and I wouldn't complain.
Sons of Northern Darkness was Immortal's last record before splitting up for several years, (and at this writing things seem even more dysfunctional with lawsuits and the like), but there is no one on earth who shall ever convince me that this isn't the pinnacle of their greatness. Both Horgh's Incredible Hulk powerful drumming, Abbath's unfathomably good riffs, and Hypocrisy mainman Peter Tägtgren's speaker exploding production help make the title track, "Tyrants", and especially "One By One" easily some of the heaviest music ever made. Though more German thrash inspired than anything, Sons is quite easily the greatest achievement by any Norwegian black metal band.
Yeah, yeah this is too low, wah wah. But no argument from me as to Astral Weeks being one of the most unique albums in recorded music history. Morrison entered Century Sound Studios in New York and over the course of three sessions, made Weeks with several jazz musicians, only one of which he had ever performed with before. More astounding, none of them had heard any of Morrison's new material before the tapes started rolling, his only instructions being to "play what you feel". You can single out individual songs here such as "Sweet Thing" and "Madame George" if you needed to make a Morrison compilation and your choices were limited, but listening to Astral Weeks from front-to-back is really the only way to go. It's spellbinding music, pure and simple.
If you bumped The Real Thing and then Album of the Year side by side with no information at your disposal, you'd hardly be able to recognize that they're the same band. Four albums in just under ten years before their long hiatus, the final moment for quite awhile was Album and for quite some time I considered this their tastiest treat. Guitarist Jon Hudson, (who came back for the reunion), made his debut here; their seamless continuation of their sound with metal in the form of "Naked in Front of the Computer", circus keyboards in "Mouth to Mouth", blue-eyed soul in "She Loves Me Not", punk in "Got That Feeling", the almost Depeche Modey "Stripsearch", and "Ashes to Ashes" being probably the best ever FNM single.
Studio interference, well, interfered for the first and only time in Dream Theater's career on Falling into Infinity. The band caved and made a begrudged attempt at making a commercial album, but it failed to expand their audience and left them pissed-off, pretty much demanding that record executives forever more leave them to do their thang. But all that said, Dream Theater were still at the peak of their powers as songwriters and Falling showcases this above all else, virtuosity included. "Hollow Years", "Take Away My Pain", and the Elton John-esque "Anna Lee" are three of the best DT ballads and the longer moments "Trial of Tears" and "New Millennium" are still loaded with brilliant arrangements and melodies.
By simply ignoring Steve Wilson's often embarrassing lyrics, one can easily recognize that Porcupine Tree is about as good as progressive rock has ever been. Though they're more focused on tight, memorable songs than virtuoso acrobatics, In Absentia nevertheless showcases the jaw-dropping skills of drummer Gavin Harrison, who's tasteful chops and grooves hit you immediately in "Blackest Eyes", "The Creator Has a Masterpiece", and "The Sound of Muzak" and the whole band let's loose in the very heavy instrumental "Wedding Nails". ".3" and "Strip the Soul" are equally spooky and borderline funky and I'd say the closing piano-based "Collapse the Light Into Earth" is the single high point for this band. Ballads seem to do that for me in case you haven't noticed.
The Pixies essentially enhanced their shtick on Surfer Rosa from their debut EP Come On Pilgrim and mash of demos The Purple Tapes. Black Francis was still singing occasionally in Spanish and occasionally about the ridiculous, but working with Steve Albini resulted in one of the best drum sounds any rock record has ever had, instantaneously making the band seem far heavier than they were. Whereas the follow-up Doolittle has no shortage more polished and still great songs, Surfer just sounds bombastic. Five of the tracks are under two-minutes, (the most silly "Tony's Theme" being the best), and many of them achieve the most difficult task of being totally abrasive yet hooky all at once. Plus Kim Deal's co-write and vocal on "Gigantic" will always make my everything happy.
Hooray for more albums I'm ranking too low! The Beach Boys Pet Sounds could be the most praised and influential studio LP not done by the Beatles, (and in fact even the Beatles themselves were inspired by it for Sgt. Pepper's), and it's innovation does carry considerable weight. In the mid-60's, Brian Wilson got it in his head that he had to beat the Beatles at their own "game", giving himself a nervous breakdown in time by trying. So he brought in lyricist Tony Asher and with the rest of the Beach Boys plus an army's worth of studio musicians, this baroque pop masterpiece was made. "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times", "God Only Knows", and "Wouldn't It Be Nice" made me a believer when I had previously written off their fun-in-the-sun, surfer anthems as fun-in-the-sun surfer anthems.
Things were still moving into grander, more epic territory for Metallica and Master of Puppets. Kill 'Em All was a straight-ahead statement of intent, Ride the Lightning brought in the melody and bigger axe-harmonies, and Master simply goes for the all. Lyrically James Hetfield was getting better by the album with anti-war themes present in "Disposable Heroes" and addiction addressed in the title track. Lars still can't play the drums aye, but he and Hetfield's arrangements remain the star attraction here as there really hasn't been a metal band before or since that was better in this area. "Battery" and "Damage Inc." remain the best thrash songs Metallica have, "Orion" nearly trumps their handful of other instrumentals, and everyone and their uncle has sung the praises of the title track.
If you made a write-up of the most essential classic rock albums ever, the Who's Who's Next would obviously have to be there. Pete Townshend had yet another rock opera in mind after the success of Tommy proved he was onto something, but the would-be project Lifehouse eventually imploded and a normal studio album began anew. Several songs from Lifehouse stuck around in some form or another and the synthesizer was gloriously introduced into the Who's sound right away with "Baba O'Riley". There isn't a song on this album that hasn't been played on the radio countless times and "Won't Get Fooled Again" has taken on a life of its own. It also has the single finest scream in rock music if anyone noticed.
Elvis Costello's band and production gloriously improved on his second LP This Years Model. My Aim Is True had competent enough performances from future members of Huey Lewis and the News, but the Attractions just light a fire underneath Costello's jams. The rhythm section of Bruce and Pete Thomas are flashy and tight, most obviously on "(I Don't Want to Go to) Chelsea", "No Action", and "Pump It Up", all of which double as the album's best tracks. This offers a pleasant perk to just a new wave album with great songs as any musician can appreciate the skill on display here just for musicianship sake. Model could be a punk album for all the energy displayed, but as nasty and fast as the performances are, these are fiendishly clever pop songs first and foremost.
The 60's did produce better sounding rock albums than Cream's second Disraeli Gears. Any listen to this band's live assault is a clear testament to how truly heavy they could and usually were. But such things were often hard to duplicate in a studio setting anyway at the time, so can't knock producer/Mountain bassist Felix Pappalardi for giving it his all. Tracked in three-ish days, Disraeli brought Cream much bigger success the world over and it plays better than any to the band's strengths. There's a goofy lullaby with "Mother's Lament", a protest song "Take it Back", a break-up song "We're Going Wrong", psychedelic rock standards "Tales of Brave Ulysses" and "SWLABR", and blues with "Strange Brew" and "Outside Woman Blues". And then there's also "Sunshine of Your Love".
With Sea Change out of his system and really an album-to-album process of change since Mellow Gold, Beck kinda threw most of what he had previous success with all together for Guero. So it's a return of sorts, with the Dust Brothers back collaborating on almost the entire album for one thing and Beck's junkyard rhyming and indie folk shtick as present as ever. I may not share the average critics opinion that this is his best album, but what seals the deal is that every Guero jam is chock full of enough hooks to make a Michael Jackson record sound like a Michael Jackson record. I recall seeing the video for "E-Pro" when it debuted and thinking two things; one, it sounded nothing like anything on Sea Change and two, it was catchy as all get-out. And so it goes, song to song here.
Though recorded in Spain, Björk wrote Homogenic primarily about her home planet Iceland after returning from a tour and needing some writing to commence as a form of self-therapy. Then her stalker killed himself and she pretended to be a Spanish soap opera character to deal with it and get a song out of her head. Just another day in Björkland. Utilizing a slew of producers, (Mark Bell being the most prominent), there's a heavier emphasis on strings than ever before and that with the lyrical themes give the entire album a more steady feel than any of her others ever went for. There's still some funkiness on "Alarm Clock" and the robot techno of "Pluto", but overall a dark mood permeates all of Homogenic with "Unravel" and "Hunter" being particularly soaring.
The last Iron Maiden joint with Adrian Smith for quite a few years and ergo the final opus in their classic line-up and '80s period of ubber glory, Seventh Son of a Seventh Son was the culmination of everything the band was doing this decade simply peaking. Constructed as a loose concept album, (as so many are), about a chosen one because heavy metal, Son has the Crowley-flavored "Moonchild" and "The Clairvoyant", the best Maiden "ballad" in "Infinite Dreams", and two shout-along singles/anthems in "Can I Play with Madness" and "The Evil That Men Do". This is as prog as Maiden had ever been at this point and also their most collaborative, with Bruce Dickinson back co-writing half of it.
Less than seven months after All Eyez on Me was released, 2 Pac was dead. Commonly, (and rightfully), regarded as the best double hip-hop LP there is, at over two-hours in length, nothing here seems wasted or padded on. Pac was recording such a huge amount of material at this point, (almost as if he was setting up his own posthumous career, most "Pac faked his death" conspiracy theorists will tell you), that he had the pick of the litter for the best shit he was effortlessly pumping out for inclusion here. Dr. Dre's "California Love", (though the single version is the superior), "How Do You Want It", and "I Ain't Mad at Cha" were all gargantuan, but Nate Dogg's presence on "All About U" and "Scandalouz" or Snoop's duet on "2 of Amerikaz Most Wanted" very much help the classic status.
The John Mayer Trio's live album Try! set the pins up for Mr. Mayer's next move. Most people, (including me), had no idea Mayer was not only very influenced by fantastic blues guitar players but that he himself WAS one. The Trio being a thing proved it and the following studio album Continuum solidified it. John Mayer has no finer album than this. Trio/long serving Keith Richards solo-collaborator Steve Jordan helped helm as well as perform on this and the change in musical direction offers a flawless number of moments. "Gravity", "I Don't Trust Myself (With Loving You)", and "Slow Dancing In a Burning Room" are only better in their lengthier, guitar shredding live forms and a very noble attempt is made and Hendrix' "Bold As Love" for good measure.
Sad face no longer in my top 100, the Boss' first double album The River was originally intended to be an uptempo single one to follow-up Darkness on the Edge of Town, but at some point, Bruce Springsteen decided he had much more to say and many more "rivers" to cross with his characters and fleshed out what became the final product with more darker and somber moments. Themes such as parenthood and marriage were now being explored as both Springsteen, his audience, and the universe he wrote in were all getting older. "Hungry Heart" was the biggest single he'd yet had but there's nothing better here than then penultimate track "Drive All Night", another of the man's long ballads knocking it clear outta the park.
The first Opeth observation I ever heard was 2001's Blackwater Park. The second of the band's albums in a row to have a consistent line-up, Park was the first of their collaborations with Porcupine Tree's Steve Wilson. They were still sticking with Studio Fredman in Sweden, (which virtually every metal band in said country was almost required to enter at least at one point in their careers), but with Wilson's influence, they achieved their best sound ever on record. The first four songs here almost overwhelm you with how good of a songwriter Mikael Åkerfeldt is. Their sound was wholly defined at this point and the entirely acoustic "Harvest" just compliments Blackwater Park as a whole; the mood between extreme metal and folk music seamlessly and perfectly combined.
On paper there is nothing going on on the B-52's debut that most of us could've possibly made anything out of. Toy keyboards, surf guitar licks, disco beats, Fred Schneider's "gayest man ever" vocal delivery, Kate Pierson and Cindy Wilson's bird-calling squawks, and songs about dancing, lava, more dancing, lobsters, phone-numbers, still more dancing, and the moon. And that's not even taking into account how purposely absurd they looked while making all this ruckus. I'll be the first to admit that the later hit "Love Shack" makes me wanna puke out my puke, but everything on The B-52's just gets better the more I hear it. Henry Rollins' proclamation that Fred Schneider screaming "Let's rock!!!" in "Rock Lobster" could be the single most appropriate moment in all rock music is not too far off.
(What's the Story) Morning Glory? was the next logical step for Oasis after their immediate success with Definitely Maybe. Meaning that now it was time for the band to be even more enormous. Critiqued for contributing greatly to the "loudness wars" in album mastering and the usual "Noel Gallagher stole this riff from this bloke, etc", none of this matters a tit when you're talking about songs this good. Noel was pretty much writing masterpieces by accident at this point and Glory is loaded with em. "Champagne Supernova", "Wonderwall", "Don't Look Back In Anger", "Cast No Shadow", and "Some Might Say" all show an even stronger emphasis on melody and all are superior to anything on Maybe and anywhere else you could possibly look.
There's a number of entries on this list that have one or two horrid duds in their midst. Perhaps the biggest offender of all and the only thing really keeping this out of my top 100 is Andy Summer's atrocious "Mother" on the Police's otherwise superior record Synchronicity. No wonder Sting went solo afterwards, good fucking lord. But everything that Gordon Sumner penned on here is all kinds of outstanding. It's a cliche to say that "Every Breathe You Take" is the best Police song but that's exactly what it is. "Wrapped Around My Finger" plays as the most gorgeous, white-reggae ballad there probably ever was and other hits like "Synchronicity II" and "King of Pain" almost trump "Tea In the Sahara" and probably Stewart Copeland's best drum performance on "Murder By Numbers".
I truly love Prince and everything he tastes like, but yes I have to admit and apologize that his unanimously regarded masterpiece Purple Rain is only at the 103 spot. I have appropriately smacked my self, be not concerned. Though I don't consider this quite the Purple One's magnum opus, I wouldn't really be a Prince fan at all if I didn't very much oo and ah over it. The bookending title track and "Let's Go Crazy", (the latter only proving to be more amazing than we even thought once the 3rdeyegirl, stoner version existed), make this begin and end as strong as it could. But then you have "I Would Die 4 U", "Darling Nikki", the bassless "When Doves Cry", and the most melodious, genuinely moistening screaming ever in "The Beautiful Ones" to make this even more perfect.
Terry Bozzio, Tony Levin, and Steve Stevens' self-titled supergroup could be a fusion band, but at least their second and last experiment Situation Dangerous is far too heavy to really qualify. As all encompassing as fusion by definition is supposed to be, Stevens' axe shredding puts this more in the guitar virtuoso camp. Well it would but then you'd have to likewise put it in the drum virtuoso camp. And the bass one. So yeah, this is just three freakishly qualified musicians hammering out a set of some of the most fantastic music they've ever done. For an instrumental record, every track here is incredibly memorable. I've yet to hear another album of this kind that delivers as good as "Dangerous", "Lost", "Tziganne", or "Crash".
Maybe the most lauded album of the '90s that wasn't by Nirvana, Radiohead's OK Computer forever put them on the list of world's greatest bands. One forgettable and one amazing album proceeded this, but the gloves were gone here. Computer was so good and seemingly impossible for the band to live outside of that they instead chose to, (amazingly), reinvent themselves with their next outing, feeling that the product here could never be topped in the same vein. They were probably correct. I never skip songs here but that being said, "Paranoid Android", "Airbag", "Exit Music (For a Film)", and "Karma Police" are just ingenious pop tunes; all of which are as sonically interesting as they are beautifully sung by Thom Yorke and then again unique from one another.
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