Bad music. I hate anyone who likes this.

The magic that is the year 1971. I wonder if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point--I just expect 1971 albums to be amazing so I make them so in my mind? Nope. Can't be that. I was slain from the opening track, with that psychedelic, apocalyptic guitar. I've rarely heard anything so soothing and hypnotic. Eddie Hazel, where did you learn to play like that? The rest of the album is pretty great, the other high point being "Super Stupid", but nothing compares to the epic opening track. It's like it opened a door to another realm. Dude's playing his guitar as if his mother had just died, just as instructed.

“Shine On You Crazy Diamond” reminds me of two things. The first is in its entirety, for as it is a song broken into two parts and separated, it reminds me of Rush’s “Cygnus” suite. It’s multi-sectional, sprawling, beautiful, mysterious, gripping. The other song it reminds me of is Ray Charles’ “What’d I Say?” It’s all in the build up, teasing you at where he is going to finally, at last, come in and cry, “Hey, Mama, don’t you treat me wrong...” Same goes with “Diamond”. Such a build up, teasing you, tricking you into singing a stanza before Waters croons, “Remember when you were young.” I love the simplicity of “Wish You Were Here,” one of the first songs I, like so many others, learned to play on guitar. Basic yet beautiful.

Schlockingly bad.

I dig this so much...in spots. No one swallows his histrionics the way Ric Ocasek does. To me, this music is all the updated swing and swagger of 50s rock for the contemporary new wave crowd. This must be one of the earliest examples of power pop, and it's all just so pure. Yep. "Moving in Stereo" would be the perfect song to strip to.

The magic that is the year 1971. I wonder if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point--I just expect 1971 albums to be amazing so I make them so in my mind? Nope. Can't be that. I was slain from the opening track, with that psychedelic, apocalyptic guitar. I've rarely heard anything so soothing and hypnotic. Eddie Hazel, where did you learn to play like that? The rest of the album is pretty great, the other high point being "Super Stupid", but nothing compares to the epic opening track. It's like it opened a door to another realm. Dude's playing his guitar as if his mother had just died, just as instructed.

It's not that this is bad. The musicality and whatnot are all on point. I guess for me this has more to do with Bob Dylan. My love of Dylan is directly proportional to my dislike for The Byrds. You don't need to dress up Dylan's songs this way--or any way.

I like Queen. They’ve got a fun, clean feel. Their close harmonies are always a delight, even though they may sound a bit passe today. I prefer the glam to the hard, but that’s just my sexual preference. And the iconic album art is a perfect level of retro-cheese.

Holy shit. This is worse than I imagined. Is this some kind of parody? I can't imagine anyone involved in the production of this turd went in with a straight face. I guess they laughed all the way to the bank. I mean, white trash money is still legal tender, right? The only people who listen to this album are people who literally have nothing better to do. Oh fuck, that's me.

I dig this so much...in spots. No one swallows his histrionics the way Ric Ocasek does. To me, this music is all the updated swing and swagger of 50s rock for the contemporary new wave crowd. This must be one of the earliest examples of power pop, and it's all just so pure. Yep. "Moving in Stereo" would be the perfect song to strip to.

I'm not supposed to be bored by Springsteen. I am. I'm supposed to like this guy. I don't. Generic rock that I can't remember two minutes after it's over. The title track, "Born to Run", sounds like theme song to an 80s TV show reboot of "Grease". Truly terrible stuff. Whenever I'm constipated, I do my best Springsteen imitation, and it clears my bowels right away.

I'd love to vibe to this with all the guy's vocals cut out. The musicality of it all is pretty nice.

Boring music for boring people.

I don't care a bit for her, and I'll never understand her appeal. The perfect example of the kind of music that just passes me by. I'm sure it's very good for the right kind of listener.

A great example of one of those albums that, at my age, I shrug and turn off halfway through. It's decent, but it ain't for me.

What a pleasant little album I couldn't give two squirts of piss about! Clunky melodies sung in a way that I'm convinced the singer is thinking, "Damn... almost, but not quite" and cringing.

All Zep had to do was fucking give credit where credit was fucking due! Some folk singer named Anne Bredon whom no one has ever heard of getting partial songwriting credit for the second track wouldn't have detracted from Page's arrangement, his playing, or Plant's wailing. Must've been an ego thing, which doesn't make sense, considering how excellent the band is. Adaptation is its own form of artistry, ya cunts!

Kill me. Why the hell is this album on the "1001 Albums to Hear Before You Die" list when everyone's already heard it piecemeal 1001 times in every damn movie, mall, and TV commercial known to man? Fuck you, whoever compiled this list.

Two excellent ballads cannot save a mediocre album of worse ballads and questionable choices in blues-rock flirtation. Besides, you can't handle the truth, John.

A garage-rock cover band of their future selves, with Dickinson trying to sound like Rob Halford.

Such a perfect, beautiful, creative, and progressive album that you’ll feel like you’re tripping even when you aren’t. This album turns your mind inside out. The first track, “Close to the Edge”, in its four part composition, might just be the greatest prog rock composition ever penned.

This is much better than I thought it would be. Catchy, short, fun songs with a lot of attitude. It's not for me, but I'll nod in understanding if someone else wants to nosebleed over this album.

I’m not sure how highly I should praise this album. It’s obviously a groundbreaking, legendary album that helped guide the course of rock history, but my style of listening to and enjoying music is to come to the albums in my collection with as much of a clear mind as I can. That is, I try not to bring meta considerations to my appreciation. I really can’t stand the “oh this is an important album” mindset. I don’t care if an album is important. I only care if I enjoy it. There are tons of “important” albums I either don’t care for or flat-out despise. So what about this gem? For it is a gem in my collection, no matter its place in rock history. It has such a strong beginning, of course, one that always leaves me stunned at how brutal it is, but for me, the closer is even stronger. “Desolation Row” is one of my favorite Dylan songs. Everything about it is beautifully ugly, and I find that paradox fascinating. And I love the little poetic flourishes that anchor the song as an image in my mind, like when Dylan sings, "Cinderella, she seems so easy, 'It takes one to know one,' she smiles, and puts her hands in her back pockets Bette Davis style." I also have a soft spot for sprawling, epic songs.

Falsetto and fiddles, swaggering saxophones blasting in time to my heartbeat gait, oh my! So this is where that "Come on Eileen" song comes from. Huh.

If you've not yet heard William Shatner's version of "Common People", do yourself a favor.

Look, I like violins as much as the next person--maybe even more--but damn these overdubs (like they're trying to make every song sound like "Eleanor Motherfucking Rigby"). They're so tacked on, not matching Nico's voice at all, which sounds like she's pulling her jaw back into her throat. And then just listen to "Winter Song": the power is right there in the (rather frightening) lyrics. We don't need a flute to tell us "this is a pastoral song, in case you couldn't figure it out". RYM ranks "It Was a Pleasure Then" as the worst track on the album, but I think it's the best because it's not got those damn overdubs. Everything is more real--the music, the vocals. It's pretty VU at its heart, too, what with the short bursts of howling feedback and the minimalist experimental vibe threatening to explode into a welcome cacophony that never comes. Nope. Bring the flautist and string quartet back in. Break's over!

Pretty underwhelming. I still don't get the appeal of The Boss. No, I'm not asking for help. I'm fine forgetting about this forgettable music.

The finest day I ever had was when I realized I don't have to like Talking Heads.

A reference to "Innervisions" always makes me happy.

Sting would punch this dude in the throat.

I'm sure this is fine, but it's pretty bog-standard blues rock.

This album reminds me of my dad. He was (is?) super into this band. He also had a massive beard.

Does this bloke think he's Marc Bolan? Meh. I'll just go listen to T. Rex. Why the fuck should I listen to this bland shit before I die? Is this list... a joke?

I don't care. This music is all kinda hollow. Nothing here to hold my interest.

I've got an entire room just for trying on clothes!

An overrated album by an overrated band. People who put this poster up in their rooms need to be punched in the nose.

Right. The dude who compiled this 1001 list thing is an idiot. Out of all the albums that exist, he chose to include this one? (Eh, this album isn't terrible; it's just a mediocre album that's come along at a time in my torturous journey through a list of music compiled by a guy who clearly has no experience or taste and has only serendipitously hit upon actually good albums.)

Pretty cheesy, actually, but I like how his glasses are the only straight thing.

Man, these vocals suck.

a massive meh from me, dawg

Whatever I say about this album is going to be nothing more than a vain scribbling of words. What do you say in response to the distant thunder and the clarion call from a landscape beyond? When you stand naked on a dark plain amidst the warring music above and around you? I’ve already said too much. Go get lost in this album that is a world unto itself. Give yourself to its mystery and wonder.

GreatValu Beatles. Nurse Robert. Sweetheart of My Bunghole.

meh

Like Talking Heads, these guys just miss the mark with me.

I prefer the poppier sound of "Breakfast in America", but this isn’t bad. This is one of those albums that squeaks by into my collection.

git up git up git up n git down

Amazing how Cohen can tread a dual path that leads in opposite directions, yet he follows them both simultaneously: one leading to nothing but a scrapbook of women, the other to a place where love calls him by his name. I can't imagine he didn't understand the full meaning of love calling someone by his name. This is dangerous music because if you're alone and have access to alcohol, this could be...unhealthy. The music is so close, so corporeal, and the lyrics are so detailed they're confessional. No one succeeds at failing at love the way Cohen does. And he's got a huge crush on Joan of Arc. But why? Because of her bravery, her conviction, her virginity? No, because her heart is a fiery brand. He longs (lusts) for that fire, but he fears getting burned. Unlike the saint, though, he is not fearless.

George Michael was born under the right alignment of stars, for he looks as good as he sings, and he sings as good as he looks.

Just made me wanna go listen to Hank, who has more pathos and more spice than this technically-proficient yet bland music.

I'm trying to re-imagine a sci-fi / aquatic setting wherein the queen has a thing for her stepson, and when he rejects her, she tells the king his son tried to rape her. The king believes his wife and banishes his son, who soon gets trampled by (sea)horses and dies. If you're sober, you need to bring something of your own to this album to give it claws. Just lie back on the sofa and close your eyes. Listen in complete silence, and it'll be like an underwater journey with lights flashing in the deep.

An album I listened to a million times at university (back when it came out), and don't really need to listen to any more. Definitely the kind of music one outgrows if one is serious about music appreciation and exploration.

80s af, and that's not a good thing.

annoying af

This album is a walk—no, a romp, a wallow—through a moonlit garden at night, except that the garden is on a planet of lush, thick magic, and the moons are red and blue, mingling to purple, making the petals of alien flowers glow.

Just... give me the music and cut out ALL the vocals.

The Doors aren't bad, but they're certainly overrated. They've got some good singles, but who the hell wants to sit through their full albums?

Some of the best singles of the 80s herein. As a full album, however, it just misses the mark for permanent inclusion in my rotation.

even "girls who are boys who like boys to be girls who do boys like they're girls who do girls like they're boys" can't save this massively meh album

There aren't many jazz albums I sing along with--because they're instrumentals!--but this is one. I just find my voice singing whatever. I'm not sure why. It's only with this jazz album. Maybe it's because the music is just so damn smooth and melodic. Maybe it's because I've listened to and loved this album so much. Whatever the case, I drink this music. If music was a slushy alcoholic drink on a hot summer's day, the liquid would be blue, and the bottle from which the concoction came would have this album cover as a label.

Like almost everything mainstream in the 80s, this is lame, boring, and dated.

What up, niggas and niggettes! LMAO G-Funk music like this makes me ALMOST like hip hop.

Idiots in my high school liked this album when it came out. Just listen to Mr. Bungle, which is far more interesting.

Is this the most technically proficient album ever made? The most beautiful? Is it even that good musically? No, not really. But that doesn’t matter. I love this album for its unique NY charm and sense of detached cool, carried a lot by the awkward vocals. “Perfect Day” is the song that, for most people, rises above the rest of the tracks, but for me, it’s just part of the suite. Reed certainly had a knack for writing a melody, especially when it came to the chorus. If you haven’t yet, babe, take a walk on the wild side.

It's tempting to label Pet Shop Boys as a singles band, and if you want to listen to them that way, it's fine, of course. "What Have I Done to Deserve This?", "Rent", and "It's a Sin" are among the best songs of the decade, but you'd be missing something of what the band offers if you stick just to the hits. They have an excellent knack for building a nocturnal, urban atmosphere across an album. Just gotta add: Dusty Springfield steals my heart every time.

*shrugs*

Today I learned that "Chipmunk Soul" is a genre.

I'm confused. Is he fat or slim?

This is all right, but it ain't gettin' in the way of my Elton John!

A helluva debut album that set the course of college radio everywhere. Strange considering I hear songs about speaking in tongues, martyrdom, and a meditation on the challenges in carrying one’s Cross. Sure, let’s talk about the Passion, but let’s live it, too, in our own little ways! After all, we’re not required to carry the weight of the world, just what’s been given to us to bear.

Though this album isn't as good overall as the ones preceding and succeeding it, the first track is one of the most low-down gut punches you'll ever hear opening an album. I wish I'd not read some random review calling attention to the fact that the mouth harp is used on every track, because now I can't unhear it. I guess it was always just something in the atmosphere of the music for me, but now it's center stage. Like all Cohen's records, this one is delicate, intimate, and oh-so confessional. A kind of gentle yet earnest wrestling.

Yet another album that solidifies in my mind that 1971 would be the one year to pick if I had to choose only one year of music. Halleluwah! And throw a little Japanese in there for good measure. For all its intimations of spinning in circles until you're dizzy, I find myself rather inclined to recline and just mong out with this album. Listening to "Aumgn" is like being digested through the guts of the universe and shat out the butthole of space.

This is no different from all the other shoegaze out there: a massive, undifferentiated waste of time.

I never feel up to the task writing down my thoughts about giant albums like this. What can I say that’s not already been said? In cases like this, I just stay away from all reviews and scribble down my disjointed thoughts as I listen. This album is a music painting. I can hear the colors. The sounds are stroke patterns and wet paint, layer by layer, from the undefined center to the consummate edges.

Look, I know you're cool and everything, Mr. Jack Black, but recommending this album in a feature film was a moment of real cringe.

Bland and boring and sounds like everything else bland and boring, or at least it spawned its own brand of bland and boring (which they do very well, mind you). In either case, no thanks.

"Skin on skin, let the love begin... women!" Wow, this album is worse than I remembered. Aged like milk.

Meditations on love can sometimes--though by no means is it common!--lead to ecstasy, and in that ecstasy the still, small voice of that supreme Love becomes a whirlwind of fire. Do not awaken love until it so desires.

First of all, the name of the band: quite a juxtaposition from the sound, though perhaps not the lyrics, of their music. One thing I love about this album is how their lead singles are the first and last songs, arguably their most famous track being last, which means you have to sit through the whole album to get to it. I'm going to assume this was intentional, the band saying in 1968 that they weren't just making an album with a couple of singles and a bunch of filler tracks. There is no filler here. Every song is brilliant and fits in the overall whole of the album, a document dominated by the dual perennial themes of vivacious love and inevitable death. Leaves fall, and the summer crown of your roses wither. Also, opening your album with a seemingly innocent love song about “baby you’re coming home” type feelings but actually having it be a letter sent to a jailbird who’s about to get release from prison is a wonderful twist on the romantic song trope. Scratch the surface and you will reveal a darker message here: we’ll kiss and make up… wait. Why is the person in jail?

King Volcano this guy

“Shine On You Crazy Diamond” reminds me of two things. The first is in its entirety, for as it is a song broken into two parts and separated, it reminds me of Rush’s “Cygnus” suite. It’s multi-sectional, sprawling, beautiful, mysterious, gripping. The other song it reminds me of is Ray Charles’ “What’d I Say?” It’s all in the build up, teasing you at where he is going to finally, at last, come in and cry, “Hey, Mama, don’t you treat me wrong...” Same goes with “Diamond”. Such a build up, teasing you, tricking you into singing a stanza before Waters croons, “Remember when you were young.” I love the simplicity of “Wish You Were Here,” one of the first songs I, like so many others, learned to play on guitar. Basic yet beautiful.

Slave of Poop World.

Good for driving, I guess.

If someone said "Fast Car" is the greatest single of the 1980s, I'd not disagree.

Well, I know what song I'm singing next time I play "this little piggy" with my kid's toes!

Good music, but too anti-religious for my taste.

Please like this shit?

I hate Kanye. I hate everything about him, everything he has ever done, and that feeling will never change. He is a garbage human being and a terrible musician. The world is a worse place for his existence. "It's a Wonderful Life" but in reverse.

Boring shit that sounds like all other boring shit.

A banger of an opening track with a robustness that supports its runtime! I've heard it a million times in films. So this is where it's from... huh.

Damn, girl, it looks like he found you. Time to put another ocean between you and him, and let's hope he drowns this time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkfLKiYIfL4

Musical syncretism. I'm sure a lot of people will rightfully find something compelling herein.

The most tedious album opener I've ever had the misfortune to hear. These skits age like milk.

A truly awful mess of an album. Pick a lane!

What y'all need is some of dem easy-listening classics!

Dude, that kid is going to fall into the ocean while you're standing there looking cool!

Depeche Mode was an MTV staple back in its heyday, and since I was basically raised on MTV, the band figures prominently in my memory, especially the singles, "Personal Jesus", "Enjoy the Silence", and "Policy of Truth". I'm not actually a big fan of synthpop as a genre, but this album is just brilliant. It's not "dark synthpop", but the atmosphere evoked by the music--and even more by the vocals--is dark, not in the macabre sense but in the sense of it being urban and night.

Just play the music, and stop telling us about it! Dammit, 1001-guy, you couldn't have chosen "Music of India: Three Classical Rāgas" for your stupid list? What's wrong with you?

I'm kinda hating the project now. I'm 121 albums in, and the idiot who made this list is right only serendipitously.

There are moments when the stars align and the muses themselves come down to touch the lips and fingertips of artists they favor. This is one such album—or rather, the way “Willie the Pimp” and “The Gumbo Variations” go together. Willie is the only actual voice on this whole album, but “Gumbo” is him speaking in a different way—speaking with his feet as he walks his neighborhood, speaking with the back of his hand when he has to put his hos in line. I wish I hadn’t given my pimp costume to my friend. I had this amazing pimp costume I wore at Halloween. It was made of (fake) crushed velvet, lined with zebra-striped felt—and platform shoes to match. The ridiculous, wide-brimmed hat was lined in glittery gold ribbon. I’d wear it right now while listening to this album, the way Buscemi puts on lipstick and listens to “Telephone Line”.

This isn't interesting for the same reason Seinfeld isn't funny. To be honest, this album is to music lovers what the Gospels are to atheists: something we've never heard but are already weary of.

Wait. People have actually given this clown money?

Though more highly rated by many, this isn't even in my top 3 favorite Beck albums. But it's damn good. I'm trying to figure out why it's not one of my favorites, and it might be because I've never had a world-weary heartbreaking depression. But though I've not shared his experience, even I am moved by the brutal resignation of the album's centerpiece, "Lost Cause". It's a devastating meditation on what's left behind when the love of your life has rejected you. I cannot imagine how subhuman one would feel in that situation.

I've got a few Neil Young albums in my collection mostly because (a) I like his music well enough, and (b) he is highly regarded. There are a lot of serious music lovers out there who adore this man's music, even going so far as to say he is the voice of a generation and that his albums are the best of their time. I wouldn't go that far, but I do sense there is more to Mr. Young than I've yet discovered. Every once in a while one of his songs really grabs me. The eponymous track on this album does. "I need a crowd of people, but I can't face them day to day." Although this isn't a state of mind I can personally identify with, I know a lot of people who feel this way, so I try to sympathize. As for me, I learned long ago that people just ain't no good. I avoid them whenever possible.

There's something about his voice that I just can't put into the proper words--a mysterious smoothness, a complete lack of vibrato without sacrificing melody, singing from the back of his throat but not from the lungs, so that the vocals are immediate and profound without being overbearing. For a depressed man, Drake didn't make depressing music. Soft, nuanced, beautiful yes, but not depressing. It is quite introspective, though, like a man looking at things and saying everything by saying as little as possible. This definitely is less-is-more music.

I love the conflation in music of sex and religious experience. That album opener is like standing in a violin downpour at night. The instrumentation on track 2 is actually quite experimental, demanding the listener's ear. Then a walk in the wet garden after the downpour. If this music doesn't speak to you, it's because it doesn't speak to your heart. Because that's the only thing this album can speak to. The heart. I think this is the perfect album when you're returning home after staying out all night. I love how the harpsichord goes hard then silent then hard again. If music were an embroidered object, it would be some of these songs. This album is about turning points--when the rain gives way to clear skies, when the night gives way to the dawn--standing on the cusp of love. "Madame George" is spellbinding, the last song you listen to as the dawn comes, when you've been out all night and are dead tired but still enchanted by the memory of the stars. This is falling in love, not with a person but with an experience and a forgotten but remembered snatch of some whispered line. Here's that violin downpour again. Feel it on your face as you turn your collar up, as you turn your face toward home. This is an album detailing the life portals we must all step through, the last being death. I love that final moment of experimental dissonance. The music--like life--is over. The music is disrupted.

This has at least three iconic folk rock songs direct from the popular hippie free-love consciousness of the end of the 60s. Pretty good stuff overall and a fine album to mellow out to. The trio really benefited from collaborating with Young, and vice versa, since based on the popularity of this album all their solo stuff sold better.

An exquisite album... that's not for me. But I bet it's for you, so check it out.

The band's final and best album, Synchronicity blueprints all the cynicism of the 80s in one artistic statement, focusing on the uniformity driven into us by the tendencies of societal conformity, and how though we may all look alike, we are alienated and dissociated from one another, in some dystopian world where God isn't dead--He's sadistic. And where you have to yell over your Rice Krispies if you expect anyone to pay attention to your bogus suicide attempts.

Look, Mr. Gaye, I understand that “push” rhymes with “bush”, but no matter how iconic and sexy your title track is, it still strikes me as thirsty. When his father shot and killed him before his time, I wonder if Marvin had his “If I Should Die Tonight” running through his mind. And if so, I sure hope the “you” in that song was a real person.

To me, this seems to be where all the 21st-century artsy indie suburban teenage angst started. You know what, Will? Wherever you go, there you are. And that’s all I really have to say about this one. Good tunes, though.

Bad music. I hate anyone who likes this.

"Diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks." This is where it all started. There's just so much affirmation and positivity all over this album, and even the female vocals chanting on the all-too-short "Everyday People" sound like something they'd sing while skipping rope on the pavement. The dark side of this is that this album stands in the shadow of Sly's massive cocaine addiction. One thing this album does well is evoke the feeling of the emotions it's trying to communicate, like how the raunchy electric guitar is the exact sound a sex machine might make, complete with the increased rhythm of the pounding percussion that leads to inevitable orgasm. In the end, this album is bookended with songs meant to uplift the listener. Stand up and try! You can make it.

Syd is just so damn beautiful! I’m intrigued by the title of this album. The madcap laughs. “Madcap” is often used an adjective, so is he describing the silly laughs of someone? Or is he using “madcap” in the noun place, as in “a clown”? The clown laughs? The clown is laughing? This album’s got an overall fragmented feel (which isn’t a criticism), but that’s to be expected what with the three different recording sessions as well as five different producers. Barrett was known for his unpredictable, erratic antics with the Floyd, so perhaps that’s the origin of the use of “madcap”. And what to do with a madcap person? Why, nothing but take him by the hand and lead him into the studio. Because he’s not going to go himself. He’d probably rather be gardening.

Leaving the politics of this album aside, probably because they’ve been analyzed and referenced to death, I’d like to focus on a deeper truth explored in this document: the quest for discovery as a race against time. Indeed, this album is aptly named, for the harvest is plentiful, and the workers are few. Whether it’s the junkie or the philosopher, we’re all searching for meaning, and we have a limited time in which to discover it.

This is some kind of weird unidentified weapon album, the warm and magical musical hinting at the development (discovery?) of the Softest Bullet, the strange "prize" everyone had been racing for, its element so heavy that a spoonful weighs a ton. This whole album glows with radioactivity, some of it being from the laboratory, some from comic book spiders, and a lot more of it from outer space, where our supermen come from. How long have our heads been bleeding and we've not realized it? How is it that we are all glowing with this...substance? This wonderful album explores the intersection of the material and the immaterial, the chemical and the emotional, helping us understand that we are ineffable, hybrid beings, a mix of the physical and the spiritual. And it's okay to be so.

I had kind of a shower thought while listening to this album, specifically during the second track in which Stevie ponders why people think of him as a lesser man because he’s black. This made me think of a lot of other Stevie songs that deal with discrimination and race relations. Here’s a blind man who deals with issues of people judging people based on skin color. Color. Something he’s never seen. Being blind, Stevie simply cannot judge people on what they look like, including skin color. But here he is singing about being black. That’s just so fucked up...that prejudice is so strong a blind man knows what it means to be black.

When love affairs go wrong, they go spectacularly wrong, and when it’s an artist who has fucked up and/or gotten his heart broken, it’s the fans who reap the benefits. So what’s going on here in this at once disjointed and unified narrative? Well, it all started when he got nervous as she bent down to tie his shoes, and then he realized she was his twin...he swears he can change...people don’t know how to act around him...he’s only known careless love...he’s hoping that the cliché is true, that the darkest hour is right before the dawn...but he’s face down, just like the Jack of Hearts...he gets a chill whenever he thinks about how she left that night...he remembers how she gave him shelter from the storm...he’s seen people disappear like smoke. He’s saying goodbye to more than just her, and the regret stabs through almost every song. If you've not heard the New York Sessions bootleg, do yourself a favor!

In my mind, nothing defines grunge like "Nevermind", and nothing Nirvana did touches that masterpiece. However, this album is better, more melodic—despite having a dirtier sound—than I remembered. It’s got some really catchy tunes. The back and forth between acoustic and electric bits highlights how effortlessly the band can switch from delicacy to harshness in quick changes.

This is that classic folk rock album that everyone knows the two singles to: “Father and Son” and “Wild World”. Two songs that jerk tears from sentimentalists everywhere, despite how trite the lyrics can be in spots. Ah fuck it. Just sing along! La la la la la la laaa la.

Something about this album makes me so happy. I loved it the moment I first heard it, and every re-listening experience delights me. Everything feels right about this recording--every groove, every moment of passion, from "Modern Man" to the illimitable and unassailable "Sprawl II". Is the album over-dramatic? Yes, of course, in spots, but for me that's part of its charm. Searching for a place in the modern world, a world dominated by the lifelessness, the creative barrenness, of the suburbs. It's weird... this is kind of a coming-of-age album, but only kinda, as if it's being sung in retrospective, for the point of view is very much an adult one considering the futility of continued human generation. Ambition has rarely been more captivating than the magic caught on this album.

It's good, sure, but who wants to listen to this over and over again?

annoying MTV vocals

“Radio Cure” is so fucking sad, and the fact that the song is trying to cheer someone up makes it even sadder because of its utter failure to do so. For some reason, this song reminds me of something Radiohead would do. It also reminds me, ironically, of a line of Shakespearean poetry: “My love is as a fever, longing still For that which longer nurseth the disease, Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill.” Basically, listening to music like this to help yourself feel better is a vicious circle. Don’t worry. The ambient outro will help you decompress (co-depress?). I feel like this album is a very good example of manic depression, because some of the songs are really sad and other songs have this rollicking alt-country vibe that's faking like everything's okay.

As everyone already knows, this album it is based on time signatures unusual for jazz, lending a double meaning to the title. The music is cool, so you can take some time out of your day while you appreciate the weird timing of the jazz, a taste of rare meters not seen in Western music of the time. An interesting moment of experimentation.

I feel like the music is building a shell around me to protect me from a fake, broken world and all its fake, broken people. Except that I’m inside the shell, and I am also of the world, crippled and searching in vain for Neverland.

Innocence and faerie tales vs. reality and disillusion. This whole album is the diary of a young man’s coming of age, with all its attendant rebellion against the systems under which he was reared. This is all about the internal changes that come with the cold confrontations a young person must reckon with when becoming an adult. “FX” feels like some kind of calibration, a preparation for the quest that subsequently unfolds, a search to recapture the magic of youth. Serenity follows madness.

For me, this is the glam rock album par excellence. Bowie, who started off as a folk singer, made the switch to rock and decided to create alter egos he could explore on stage. In later interviews, he said it was because he didn't know himself and was searching--fair enough! We all reap the benefit of his quest for self discovery. On stage, in the 1970s, Bowie was a very different person than he was off. He became a new person as he adopted each disguise. And Ziggy is perhaps his most famous disguise: a rock-star alien doomed in his quest to save the Earth, an alien complete with orange hair, fantastic makeup, and futuristic costumes. Ziggy Stardust is musical role-playing at its finest without being musical theater. The lyrics of the album create vivid images in the mind of the listener as the vocals shift from person to person within a song. The music is more subtle, though it is full of vocal and instrumental hooks that make every song memorable. Ziggy is mysterious but demands attention, he is simultaneously accessible and ambiguous, and in this creation, Bowie raises role-playing to an art form.

These guys just have it. They’ve got what it takes to make catchy, quirky, fun art pop songs that are refreshing in their sarcasm and complexity.

I wonder if our alien progenitors will have mercy on ungraceful people like me when they return to check up on their colony, to see if we've learned the lessons of Funk, to observe the glides in our strides and the dips in our hips. I am sorely lacking in this department, but perhaps the funk-aliens will beam me up and teach me something of which this music is but a prelude.

I love when folk has this weird, carnival feeling to it. There's something about the freakiness of a carnival that fascinates me, like this place where all the misfits congregate. It's a place for outsiders, but it's not a haven. It's just another place, like Pleasant Street. The psychedelic instrumentation is beautiful and mysterious, perfectly demonstrating what Buckley is singing, like how his lover just vanishes, as if the music itself has blown or carried her away. Almost every song is filled with feelings of trepidation and uncertainty about his romantic relationships. If I didn't know better, Buckley could've convinced me that love is lonely and fake.

Close ups. Big lipstick lips. Glitter. Come hither looks. Baby baby baby fa la la la la. As sexy rocking as crooning. Not much more to say about the boyish charm of this sexy album.

Yeah, progressing right along the autobahns of the world of Tron, where all the cars run on solar energy and drive themselves. But I’m actually more interested in what’s going on off the road, beyond the ditches and in the vast, dark forests of metal leaves that cut like razors.

I’m sorry. I just can’t find it in my heart to give Zep any of the shit they often receive from the haters. I love their albums, and I love what they did with their “borrowed” material. I guess I just let the music be my master. The band has so much raw sexual energy that as a man I just can’t resist them. The opening of “Kashmir” gets me every time, like something big is coming and I better get ready!

This is vile, so of course many of you degenerates will laud this.

Al Green’s pure vision of love always inspires me. He’s just so damn wholesome, never running around playing, but seeking the natural end of love: to give himself completely to one woman for life. I love the touches of his sweet, sexy falsetto. Also this album has one of the best covers of any song ever: Green’s rendition of the Gibb brothers’ “How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?” I believe him when he sings.

I could write an essay about each and every Elliott Smith song. There’s just so much to unpack, so many metaphors, so many sad yet clever turns of phrase, so many poignant observations. So what about this album? Well, this one has two particular holds on my affection: “Pictures of Me” is the first Elliott Smith song I ever heard, and “Say Yes” might just be the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard. He’s damaged bad at best.

This one feels like a clear, definite journey. Quite forward moving, at different rates of acceleration. The craft you’re in dives from the clear sky and plunges into the sea, where you turn on the floodlights and lay bare the mysteries of the deep. The ascent from the sea is not merely a return to the atmosphere but beyond into naked space.

Again, I’m not an expert in jazz, and especially not in anything outside the fusion subgenre, but Monk is always a pleasant listen. Smooth and cool without being smooth or cool jazz. Rollins, Chambers, and Roach feature here, and they’re exquisite, just the kind of guys a weird and demanding band leader like Monk needs to play his challenging compositions.

"Skin on skin, let the love begin... women!" Wow, this album is worse than I remembered. Aged like milk.

This is my favorite Pogues album, but that’s a safe bet anyway. I mean come on! This album has everything The Pogues are: drinking, death, a proclivity to engage in fisticuffs, swearing, and drinking. Oh did I say “drinking” twice? Well, that sounds about right. By the way, this might just be the best named album of all time. The only gripe I have about this album is that I greatly prefer Woody Guthrie’s “Jesus Christ” to The Pogues’ “Jesse James”. The final track is gutting, and since you've already had your whiskey by the time you get to the end of the album, your ears are just about ready to hear the tragic tale of "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda". Your heart's just about ready for the lazy horns expressing the dull pain of a mangled soldier.

A masterpiece on so many levels I cannot really enumerate all the ways. Sometimes an artist will make an album that is special, in a class of its own, and head and shoulders above anything else their peers were doing. This is such an album. The fires of inspiration really cooked Stevie in the brewing of this critical and fan darling of a gem. There’s a lot more going on here than just bright, fun singalong songs. He deals with some pretty dark themes, exploring despair with the same energy he extols hope, and there’s quite a spicy mix of funk thrown into the soul.

The lyrics are all over the place, exemplified by the first (and probably most famous) track on this album. It's kind of a jumbled mess, but in a charming way--but not the powerful snapshots of Dylan's genius brain like on "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall". For me, the most powerful statement on this album isn't the call to follow the Tambourine Man but rather Dylan's scathing criticism of the materialistic, war-mongering, hypocritical society he saw all around him expressed on "It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)". This is where his lyricism shines, the intense, monotone vocal delivery matching the grim imagery. Is anything sacred anymore? Nothing was back then. What about now?

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/villains/images/7/7b/Eric_Gordon.jpg

The entry fee to this album is your promise. Your promise to both give and surrender to the funk, the whole funk, and nothing but the funk. And that promise leads to unity, and unity leads to your mind being freed. And most likely your ass, too, of course, but we already knew that. We are, after all, in Funkadelic Nation. So reprint the fiat currency. As good as this album is, whenever I hear those raunchy guitar solos, I feel Eddie Hazel's absence. I'm not really criticizing the album for that... it's just. Yeah. Hazel is such a presence that he is missed in the music when he's not part of it. That's just me, though. The strength of Funkadelic is in its numbers, and Mike Hampton does a fine job here. How you respond to the fact that fried ice cream is a reality is probably a good indicator of how you respond to life on a daily basis. It's either wonderful or a horror show. By the way, this is the album that has the live version of "Maggot Brain", so do yourself a favor if you've never heard this track. Pour yourself a drink, sit back, turn off your phone and your lights, and be transported.

This album is bookended by two giant teenage anthems, and the listener is stuck between a wasteland and a system that doesn't change no matter how many revolutions you have. Live fast, die young, and don't trust anyone over the age of 30. Oh, and the portable synthesizer debuted in 1971. Don't this cutting-edge technology just sound great?

Hey, 1001 albums guy, kys.

Sweet love make you righteous, make you whole. And that’s the kind of love people call “crazy”. Returning to this album is like slipping into the world’s most comfortable chair, just a welcoming, warm, relaxing album. I know this gets mentioned a lot about this album, but it’s really lopsided. Side A is so good I just want to punch someone in the face. Side B isn’t bad, but compared to Side A…well, what five songs in a row on an album can compare with that? Very few, I reckon.

A heartbreaking album, this. There aren't many albums like this for me, ones that I both love and fear. This is one of those albums I listen to and am grateful for my Lady's mantle to hide in while listening. This album is basically the chronicle of a couple falling in love over drugs and falling apart through the abuse of said drugs, the abuse of each other, prostitution, the disintegration of their family, and eventually suicide by one partner, while the surviving partner, though sad, sees the suicide as a necessary escape and relief. oh oh oh oh oh oh oh what a feeling!

I enjoy the lo-fi psychedelic feel of this more than I thought I would. This kind of thing can get boring pretty quick for me, but this album holds my interest. It’s got a strong introspective atmosphere communicated mainly through the sparse instrumentation. This kind of sounds like Syd Barrett if he wasn’t English and he brought a country vibe to his music.

This is an old favorite. Such a fun, bright album. Mbaqanga, Mbube, Zydeco, and Soukous are the four African-based musical traditions featured here, two of them finding their origins in South Africa, whereas the other two developed more in the Americas as African immigrants and slaves brought their music with them. I’m not going to get political here, but I can’t help but wonder how much this album helped Western (white) ears tune into sounds beyond their borders. Clearly music aficionados are always listening outside their cultural experience, but this album seemed to bring African music to the forefront in the popular American consciousness. It was a big thing to do in the 80s.

I'll never forget that random YouTube comment I once read about the man whose wife was dying in hospital. Her name was Marianne, and he would sit by her bedside every day and hold her hand. One day he was just too tired to stay awake, so he closed his eyes for a nap, and during that time, Marianne slipped away. Fiction or no, that's a beautiful, heartbreaking story. The rest of the album is pedestrian get-down rock-out af. Looks like they accidentally criticalled on their songwriting check with the first track. I went and took a dump in the middle of the last song. Not sure if it was just coincidence or if the song filled me with the urge to defecate.

This is one of my favorite albums, mostly because of the centerpiece, “Indian Sunset”, and the deep cuts. “Madman” and “Tiny Dancer” are great songs, but “Indian Sunset” rises above the rest of this already perfect album. It’s not really what you think of when you think of an Elton song. It’s expansive, serious, and bittersweet, kind of like a grander “Skyline Pigeon” or “Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters”. The delicate piano parts giving way to the orchestral finale perfectly evokes not only the sadness and solitude of the Native American warrior but his inevitable and glorious demise. Side B has the deep cuts worth every moment of your time, from “Holiday Inn” through the appropriately-titled final track, “Goodbye”. I just wrap up in this album like it’s a warm blanket.

I've had a lot of disheartening moments in my music journey, but Norah Jones singing "Cold Cold Heart" might be the nadir.

This album kicks off with some fun piano work, setting a not-too-serious prog mood. It’s like they’re telling the listener, “We’re here to play, not show off.” Not to say that showing off is bad. I know some people hate it, but I don’t mind it. Anyway, the reason I mention this is because so much prog shows off, so it’s nice to hear something a bit more straightforward for a change. “Freedom Rider” is the centerpiece here, but being a folkhead, I prefer “John Barleycorn”.

Is he eating a banana? wtf

The footing of the world is often treacherous, so on your stroll through life, it’d be best if you were able to take someone else’s arm. Anything to protect against the cold winds blowing. Well, the world didn’t end in 1963, but it will someday, so the lyrics will punch as hard then as they do now. Besides, the world is made and unmade every day thousands of times, so just hold on to someone until your world disintegrates around you and your own personal apocalypse envelops you.

Even "Don't Go Chasing Waterfalls" isn't that good.

How many beer cans do you have to crush on your head before you're dumb enough to like this album? This is the kind of album listened to by dudes who go to the gym to get noticed by women but are baffled as to why only other dudes comment on their muscles.

Glorious glam solos and echoing glam vocals. Multi-sectional, opera-like, theatrical rock. So beautiful, sometimes soaring, sometimes playful. The common metaphor employed is that we're in the hands of God (the gods), but not with Queen. It's the lap, not the hands.

For a couple years, this album was my go-to soother after a long day of work. Amy healed me, her voice like a good massage. She's still got that touch, and every sporadic return to this album is stepping back into my favorite R&B lounge to spend another night smoking and grooving.

Björk is the little spoon in a bed set outside amid an ice garden filled with night-blossoming flowers, and there she sleeps and dreams and sighs beneath the wispy green undulating arms of the Aurora.

Jefferson Airplane was one of the bands that directed the American musical spotlight to San Francisco, what with their uninhibited, extroverted stage personality. Of course this album contains their smash hit "Somebody to Love", featuring Grace Slick's glorious vocals, but the short, powerful "White Rabbit" is the track that most directly connects the listener to the drug experiences of the late 60s. This is an overt reference to Alice in Wonderland, a kind of weird, psychedelic roadmap detailing a world of strange experiences. (I recommend reading the book aloud if you haven't before.) The lyrics of this song contain only part of the importance, though, since the music itself was inspired by an LSD experience while listening to jazz. The gradual crescendo makes the final line sound like a call to action, exhorting everyone to drop acid at least once.

Nirvana playing fan favorites and tracks off their next album, with some fun covers, all done on a sliding spectrum of "unplugged".

I adore “Venus as a Boy”, such a charming, wonderful, slightly freaky tune with lush strings to make it all better. This album indulges as much in the pounding club beats as it explores the more delicate side of Björk, liquid harp and all. I just can’t enough of Björk’s quirky, breathy, sometimes husky and cracked vocals. I might be overthinking this, but I feel like this album is a struggle between the ephemeral and the eternal, the pleasure-seeking of the nightlife and the object of its search: a lasting love.

Aged like milk.

“Violence, violence.” Sung in the least violent way possible, with music you might hear at a genteel high tea. I’d like to try eating a scone with non-smudge lipstick.

Remember, kids: when you're listening to silence, you're listening to not-Zappa. Also, the wisdom of Zappa is still appropriate today: steer clear of San Francisco. Loving the police while they kick the shit out of you is an activity that has aged like wine. And if you don't have an Indian in your group, get one! What is wrong with you? Welcome the Dance Hall of Chopped-Up-Cabbage Music... doo wop doo wop. You need a makeover! The palimpsest of sound that is called an album speaks one eternal truth to me: hippies suck in every galaxy.

Of course you had a bad trip. What were you thinking giving a boat a man's name?

Although Elton and Bernie’s collaboration produced many great albums and many excellent songs across many albums, it is this album where all their production and songwriting strength is brought to bear. For me, this is the Deep Cuts album par excellence. Of course this album has unassailable hits like the title track and “Candle in the Wind”, a song that—like “Yesterday”—is ingrained in pop culture consciousness, but the glue that holds it all together is surprising high quality of the deep cuts. Just listen to “This Song Has No Title”, a throwaway track if there ever was one—but it is? One doesn’t waste such poetic lines as “born on the breeze and die on the wind” on throwaway songs. Or what about the reversed weeping guitar solo on “I’ve Seen That Movie Too”? Brilliant stuff that really sweeps you away. Even the vibraphone and violin on “Sweet Painted Lady” perfectly paints the charming atmosphere of some seaside debauchery. This is without a doubt one of the greatest double albums of all time. So kick back and enjoy Elton at his most beautiful and symphonic and melodious and harmonious, but also enjoy the grit and vinegar sprinkled throughout!

People listen to this?

Tranquilize yourself with music and escape the ennui of your safe, boring life. Lace up your boxing gloves and go three rounds in the perennial Battle of the Sexes. And when you’re weary of all that, indulge in a meandering, digressive meditation on what you’ve got and almost lost, and how desperately you want to go back home—a blues theme as old as the hills. As old as your desire. “Flight 505” is the groovy, wonderful fruition of that long pent-up need.

It's always refreshing when a young band has gained the confidence and experience to no longer cover songs on their studio albums. Happened with the Beatles etc, and this is Yes' moment, three albums into their career. This album benefits from the extended collaboration of the band members, especially with the breath of fresh air from Howe, eclectic in his playing style, such as when he wields the Portuguese guitar.

Already? But we just did it!

It's funny how robots used to be thought of as these physical creations with dead-giveaway mechanical voices, when in reality robots are "bots", unseen software that often fools people into thinking they are fellow humans. The robots are smarter than we gave them credit for, their takeover more insidious and complete. Robots have evolved beyond our anthropomorphic conceit. That's okay, though, because we still think of space as this super-interesting place where cosmic winds of music push our ships along, where our spacemen can float.

Setting aside all the profound sociopolitical circumstances out of which this album arose, this music is deep funk, so deep Sly can yodel and make it work, make it as black as the space that cowboy is floating in, so deep you can just fall into it and never stop falling. Amazing stuff.

Four of the nine tracks on this album are Traditionals, and I’d not be surprised to learn they’re Child Ballads. It’s what was all the rage for folk singers in the 60s and 70s. The female vocals are just magical. There’s mystery here, too, with the religious invocations. Overall this album is one of pastoral narratives of delicate beauty despite the dark themes woven throughout. And the whole idea of a “true love” seems to have always been immortalized in song, hasn’t it?

There are many things Dolly does in her music that I’d not forgive in others, because others aren’t Dolly. Her wide-eyed optimism and her super-sweet music suits her wholesome nature, but this album isn’t all tiptoeing through the tulips: she brings some of that sassy country storytelling, too, especially when she complains about her mother stealing her boyfriend!

This short album dripping with depression is a metaphor for Drake’s short life, not even living long enough to reach the 27 Club. Other people see the sun shining, but he sees only the moon. I guess that sentiment can be taken as evidence of his depression, but perhaps he’s singing of hope in the face of such looming darkness. I think he evokes cathartic feelings within his listeners without himself being depressed in the moment of recording the music. After all, he follows themes of flight and finding the right road, both common themes of hope.

Ms. Joplin just couldn’t live long enough to see her second album released. Talk about a rise and crash! Well, what about this one? A lot of convincing covers and a couple originals, including the silly a cappella ditty, “Mercedes Benz”. I actually think she’s got the best “Me and Bobby McGee” out there, too. What haunts me about this album is that one of the tracks is an instrumental because Janis died before she could record the vocals. So they just kept it as-is, a testament to her untimely death.

Instant hate. What the fuck is wrong with you, 1001 guy?

pretty good in spots

This album is a beacon and a buoy, and you, in the dark yet glimmering waters, are invited to swim around it, explore it, enjoy it, and immerse yourself in its ocean. This album is the elf who stares back at you through your own eyes when you look in the mirror late at night, when you need sleep but cannot find it. This album is an airstrike on the finest day you've ever seen.

An exploration of the profound loneliness one can feel whilst being surrounded by a sea of people. Alone in the crowd with only an equally-lonely alto sax to keep you company. I wonder if his musings on what he could have been is him head-hopping into all the strangers around him. "Fly" is the clear frontrunner here, expanding on his search for identity, be it in faces or names. And only in understanding identity can we make real connections with others. Like many great albums, there's an existential crisis at the core.

Schlockingly bad.

It's a time-honored country tradition to sing about Jesus while drunk, but Prine does it differently. He calls Our Blessed Lord as witness to all the meaningless deaths soldiers are sent to by bloodsucking politicians in rich suits. There are five songs that are either direct criticisms of the Korean War or explorations of the isolating psychological aftermath on a soldier's mind, as that soldier navigates the wreckage of his life, futilely searching for any meaningful human contact, a search that ultimately leads to suicide. Time passes into loneliness as you're locked inside your own meaningless existence, numbed by alcoholism and drug abuse. You have time to sit and do nothing and wallow in your survivor's guilt and mourn the loss of that world of your childhood when everything was still beautiful.

I love the dramatic way in which the MC introduces not only James Brown but the whole damn set list. When live albums go right, they go oh-so right. And this recording is a shining example of the live magic a master like James Brown can summon up. I feel like I'm right there, screaming along with the ladies, body swaying with the crowd. Those interludes, though... it's like I'm in church!

The spirit of the typical, modern teenager is demonstrated by his indulgence in meaningless entertainment and violence, further revealing a world where nothing has any value, where there is no memory, and identity becomes nothing more than chasing after trends. And thus the teenager cares about nothing, yet neither does he mind what happens to him or around him, no matter how vile.

This album shines in my mind like a prism hit by a million rays of white light, breaking into new spectra that can only be felt and not seen. So much wonder in the exploration and joy in the revelation as circuits duplicating emotions attempt to comfort you. AI gains the ability to feel. This is a whimsical journey through the mind of a machine, a mind trying to understand a new heart, to analyze its frequencies. My world flutters and pulses, just like the robot’s new beating heart, just like the bugs and butterflies of summertime. Join the confused robot as it sings its soliloquy to an empty sky. "What is love, and what is hate?" asks the solemn simulacrum.

This is my favorite Stones album. I’m not a super fan of the band’s career in general, but I can’t deny how amazing of a blues rock album this is. I mean, it’s the kind of work where, at the end of every song, you just shake your head in disbelief and wonder if it can get any better. And then it does. It accomplishes perfectly what it sets out to do: make a cool, swaggering record of tavern blues songs. The testosterone-driven hedonism is strong on this one.

Lazy, sexy jazz that blows hot and cold, like a love affair. Just when you’re certain, the rug is pulled from under your feet, upending you and calling into question everything you thought you knew.

This album is a wonderful kind of bait and switch, starting off with something quite philosophical but then veering into blues songs about traveling and heartbreak. The slide guitar swirls around the vocals like a dance, enough to distract anyone from his jigsaw puzzle. And don’t worry about being so far from home—it ain’t no crime. Just make sure you don’t let your mama know what you’ve learned how to do. For all the swagger of these songs, however, there’s an underlying theme of a desire to return home, a longing for peace and quiet.

It's clear from the beginning how central Sufjan's faith is to him, what with the way he equates a UFO sighting with the Incarnation and its attendant signs in the heavens. How effortlessly Sufjan calms the celebration and, without taking away any of the joy, brings us into such a beautiful turn of musical phrase that leads us all into a singalong ballad! Float away on lazy horn clouds, or leap above them on the strings of violins. And you know what? It's okay to cry yourself to sleep sometimes. Not all tears are sad. For the record, I've never heard a more uplifting, beautiful song about a serial killer. Not sure what Sufjan is trying to do here, but I just close my eyes and shake my head at the loveliness/ugliness and the conflicted feelings with me. If you want to know just how full this album is, take a look at just what Sufjan is doing: vocals, acoustic guitar, piano, Wurlitzer, electric bass, drum kit, electric guitar, oboe, alto saxophone, flute, banjo, glockenspiel, accordion, vibraphone, tenor recorder, soprano recorder, sopranino recorder, alto recorder, sleigh bells, shakers, tambourine, triangle, and church organ. The only instrument featured on the album he didn't touch is the trumpet. Thematically, the album is at once inaccessibly specific about historical facts that really don't have anything to do with anyone, as well as being broad in his allusions to our common human condition, to say nothing of the all-pervasive Christian framework. Why do we need our faith? Well, for one...bone cancer. So celebrate life while you can, and understand just how much you have to give.

Janis is the draw here for me. Without her, they'd be a competent blues band but nothing to catch my interest. But you know...it's Janis. Her voice, and that definitive live version of "Piece of My Heart"--classic vocal blues. At 37 minutes, this album is not a minute too short.

This is an interesting album, especially since it’s the only one the band released, and yet it’s highly regarded. Harsh in some parts and playful in others, this album maintains a strong psychedelic feel throughout. The weird spoken samples that break down the end of the album are a collage of sound that was envelope-pushing in the late 60s.

Some smooth, mellow blues rock tunes and covers. Nothing especially exciting here (not sure why the guitarist was compared to divinity) but these chords can strike the right note in your soul under certain circumstances. Roll on.

I find it hard to think of anything to write about this album because it's been a part of the fabric of my soundscape for so many years. This is a beloved favorite because of the cerebral lyricism married so effortlessly to fun singalong rock songs. "They tried to give me advice down at the record shop. I said, 'Sit down, boys. This may come as a shock: the only thing I listen to is freedom rock'." I love this sense of awareness Black has in calling out music snobbery. Clocking in at 22 tracks, this album has plenty of room for the harder, faster rock songs and more ballad-y or bouncy pop tunes.

When you're so far gone in the liquor you think even the rain is a beverage. Anyway, it doesn't take much imagination to understand the implications of the album title, an obvious reference to Hollywood and Vine in Los Angeles, the very heart of the rise of cinema and all its attendant lures into the corruption of innocence. This album is certainly more blues guitar-driven that his six previous recordings, bringing with it even sexier grit (that seems to be obsessed with prostitutes). Like pretty much all his other music, these songs are snapshots into the lives of seedy people who live in the quiet, dark, lonely hours between the closing of the bar and the opening of the circus. This is the final Asylum record, and Waits was contractually-obligated to write it since he owed the label seven albums. You might know Springsteen's cover of Waits' "Jersey Girl"... and I can't help but wonder if the "sha la la la la la las" are indicative of Waits' fatigue with his label.

oh thank fuck I'd already heard this so I don't have to listen to it now for this dumb challenge

Sexy spoken-word music to objectify / seduce underage girls with. It's a French tradition!

Turns out you can't really dance to the sound trains make, so we need Kerls like this to tweak it a bit. Just fill the cars with mannequins and send the whole thing on its beeping, synthy way.

trash

I had a friend who was attracted to crazy girls, and I never understood that. Why would a man want to borrow that kind of trouble? Was there such a lack of interest in his own life that he had to manufacture it? Maybe he just wanted to look in the crazy mirror. Like Cohen, he failed at relationships again and again. Was it all an unconscious self-sabotage? Knowing it wouldn’t work out, and being able to blame it on the craziness of the girl?

Apparently this album was played a lot at college parties. Since I missed that whole scene, I am able to enjoy this album. This is, however, one of the most front-loaded albums I've ever heard. As a bonus, I love how they got Joanna Newsom to play the mom in the video of "Kids". That song is such an earworm that everything after it on the album, though good, suffers by comparison.

I just want to put on a flannel shirt and sit on the front porch of a cabin in the wooded foothills of some frosty morning. This album is just so effortlessly beautiful, like the mountains.

I try not to let meta biographical considerations influence my judgment of music, but every time I hear this, I just shake my head in awe: the dude was hungry, sleep-deprived, and playing on a out-of-tune practice piano with badly-working pedals. And it was almost midnight when the concert got started. The way Jarrett is able to take all that and just go with it and manipulate the piano in the middle register is just amazing. And those little moans and wails throughout, adding just the right touch of soul to it all. It all melts away into such a sublime beauty that could be the soundtrack to monarch butterflies migrating. Look up! Look around you!

I hate this band.

Another unassailable classic by the soul genius. Topical themes of racism and injustice, yet still ringing true today, right along with themes of goodness, love, and beauty. I love how well-rounded Stevie is as a songwriter, not afraid to explore themes that might be unpopular on all sides of the fence. Effortlessly smooth.

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Wildly inappropriate cover art.

God save this and that, whatever rhymes. So begins the tongue-in-cheek themes surrounding the village green, tying together a very loose concept of sketching out characters from Anywhere, UK, including the more unsavory village types, like the hoodlum and the prozzie. It’s all a kind of false walk down Memory Lane. You know, the place where Walter used to stroll? Anyway, a fine place to escape to when things get rough or hectic.

You know that certain kind of crazy person who convinces you he's not crazy (despite his former erratic behavior), you believe him because he seems so convincing, but then he ends up being crazy anyway? Well, that's this album. It's schizophrenic at its core, not knowing what it is--or rather, intensely knowing what it is in a precise moment, but then forgetting when it moves into a new moment, thus knowing itself once again anew. So many fractured pieces coming together, coalescing in a unified musical statement at the end of Side A, convincing the listener, in the quiet moments of flipping over the vinyl, that all is well. This deception continues in the calm, pastoral phrasings of the beginning of Side B, only to shock you out of your complacency with a punch of the piano keys, howling at the moon, and growling in gibberish. This insanity returns with a full-on mad carousel ride.

Trash.

As far as I know, abortion was legal in 2001. This album therefore didn't have to exist.

The Dark Horse emerges at last on this album with “Something”, the first ever non-Lennon/McCartney Beatles’ single. When it went #1 in America, Lennon’s estimation of it being the best song on the album was clearly justified. After all, it was Lennon’s idea to finally give Harrison a single release, to help give his bandmate courage and confidence in songwriting. The greatness of Harrison thus further emerges with this song and with “Here Comes the Sun”. As everyone knows, this is the Beatles’ final album, as it was released before but recorded after Let It Be and the imminent breakup of the band is painted all over the music. The Fab Four didn’t enjoy working together anymore, and their ability to make music together suffered. They knew they were breaking up, and they wanted to leave as the greatest band in history. Are they? In America, Abbey Road is their biggest selling album, but is it their best? Twelve of the 17 tracks first surfaced during the “Get Back” sessions, and thus some songs got days of attention, whereas others received very little focus. Some songs are just fragments, highlighting two things: the band’s fatigue and Lennon’s divided attention (Yoko and heroin). What happens in the end, therefore, is the throwing of all these fragments into a medley, one last, great run before the band breaks up, one final “hurrah!”

Does anyone else feel that the vocals sometimes resemble a rockabilly style? Or is it just my broken ears? Anyway, if I were king of the world, my first law would be the banning of all personal motorized vehicles.

one of the worst albums of all time

This is, of course, one of those albums where you wonder if spilling any more ink is even worth the time it takes to do so. Whatever. Might as well add my thoughts. Clearly this is an album of extreme mood swings, and the sound of the music demonstrates that, swinging from unbridled rock energy ("Rock and Roll") to acoustic delicacy ("The Battle of Evermore"), from idealism to destruction. "Stairway" reconciles the two as the album's centerpiece. But I love the fragility of the last two songs: yes, fragility. Obviously "Going to California" sounds fragile, and it is, but "When the Levee Breaks", though it doesn't sound at all fragile, is about...the levee breaking. We hear the roaring wind, the driving rain, and the crashing waves, but at the heart of it all is the levee breaking and the destruction that brings. Better flee to California. I hear there's a girl out there who's never been born. Run away towards something that doesn't exist.

The first three tracks get me drunk without alcohol ever passing my lips. After the mad dance, I have to sit down to catch my breath, and a beautiful, heartbroken fairytale is waiting for me, telling me about life's hopes destroyed by alcoholism. OK. I've caught my breath. Back on my feet! Not much inspires me to dance-oh.

When you’re coming down, in the middle of the night, when all is quiet and the candles have burned low, turn this record on, step out on your balcony, smoke a cigarette, look at the stars, and know that life is beautiful and everything will be all right. Glowing, magical anchor’s away!

This epic album is a long mumbling fumbling trip. It's weird, though, hearing a Japanese lead singer of a German band singing in English. Take a long walk, drive, or bike ride of exploration with this one, and do it at the changing of something--like a sunrise or a sunset. Or the first day of spring, or the last day of summer. Find out what your future days are going to be like. You won't be disappointed.

If this is a concept album, it’s pretty loose. Or at least it seems that way to me. That’s not a detraction, by the way. It’s just the style of the album...there are moments where the psychedelic overtone of the music pulls the art out of its narrative and just does its own thing. It’s like a writer using fancy speech tags instead of just using “said”. A stylistic choice.

This is one of those albums that is so good it stuns me into silence, and it's a struggle to think of anything to write. How can I do it justice with my commentary? Well, here goes. Mass destruction, mass death, and mass brainwashing are the order of the day. Mix mechanized slavery and the Bomb into this, and you have a recipe for mass drug use to numb ourselves from the bleak reality of this dystopia we're all living in. I mean, what's worth living for anymore? That's the societal commentary here. But you know what? That music! So beautiful and calming. Let it sweep your paranoia and sadness away. "Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only the question: When will I be blown up?" --William Faulkner, 1950

After you invade uncharted lands and slaughter nearly everyone, after the songs of praise to Valhalla, after you drink to the deaths of your friends in battle--then you need to start working on your politics. If you're ever going to rule the natives, you need to treat them as your friends. I mean, they're pretty "blue" because your murdered all their friends and families. The least you can do is trade a smile with them. Once things settle down, you can all have a song and dance as you celebrate the new way of things in the promised land. Aaand then the album goes off the rails, taking an equally enjoyable track. Things suddenly turn sexual, even though they're not supposed to be. Oh yeah, sing it! You know how hot I get about you working overtime. You know how turned on I get watching you hang people.

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Finally! The 1001 guy chose an album I'd not heard that's actually good.

This is a brilliant album, Yorke’s answer to the creeping dread within him that rock as a genre was dead. Also, the band was disillusioned by all the copycat bands that came out of the woodwork after the commercial and critical success of *OK Computer*. What I find most impressive about this album is how they got away from a guitar-driven sound and weren’t afraid to experiment with string and brass instruments, electronic, and jazz. “National Anthem”, for example, has a very strong avant-jazz feel in parts. This is a fine, contemplative answer to mega-success.

This is a beautiful album of melancholic musings that are not indicative of defeat but rather reminders that love exists and life can be good. Is this album them selling out and going more mainstream? Who the fuck cares! This is a masterpiece of pop rock. I don’t give a shit about the band’s career arc and whatnot. I like their old stuff, and I like their stuff ten years on, as the band members matured and had different things to say. “Nightswimming” says everything you need to hear sometimes. The stars aligned in the making of this album.

Dear 1001 guy, die in a fire. kthxbye

Poetic in her observations, boring in her delivery. A departure from the catchy melody of Blue. An album of wandering through relationships like landscapes. Her guitar-playing evokes such wide open spaces. There's almost no melody to latch onto. A lot of meandering and returning to the same undulating rambling musical phrasings. Not afraid to underuse the harmonica. Title evokes idea of not only traveling but also one with overtones of "discovery".

The 80s buttfucks Celtic music while Van Morrison and the Beatles hug one another and weep in shame.

The deepest heartbreaks are the most beautiful, and this album—and its theme—is beautiful in its lonesomeness. Lonesome, not lonely. The red-headed stranger meets plenty of women along the way, but none of them can replace the wife of his youth, the one for whom he bought the bay, the one whom he caught in bed with another man and subsequently shot dead. This album is a well-crafted sojourn through the mind of a man wrestling with betrayal, wondering if it's possible to touch the fire once again. Side A is grief, Side B modus vivendi. This album is like an old Western film: the more it leaves unsaid, the more it expresses.

I'm a few hundred albums into this "challenge", and this by far the worst album yet. I'd rather guzzle Satan's diarrhea than listen to this one again. If there was a magic spell that could undo this album to make it never exist and the material component for the spell was my ears, I would willingly sacrifice them to negate the existence of this trash.

The more time that passes between now and that what was once Animal Collective, the more convinced I become that this is drug music. Not that you have to take drugs or that you should to appreciate this, but that the music is like…“hey drugs!” Is this the kind of semi-surreal stuff that flows through the average tripping brain? Anyway, the music is pretty catchy and experimental overall, and though it’s a bit disjointed in spots, overall it holds together.

"Mr. Blue Sky" is one of the best, most infectious pop rock songs ever written. Pure genius. I mean, this whole album, like so many ELO albums, show just how good Lynne was at writing catchy songs (kind of like Elton John). It's all such amazing easy-listening cheese.

I'd rather listen to crust punk.

Is this some kind of joke album? This is one of the worst pieces of trash I've ever heard.

The only dip in quality on this album is the opening of side B, “Passage to Bangkok”. Please, for the love of Buddha’s butthole, stop trying to make songs sound Asian! It’s cringey and stupid. Other than that, this is an excellent concept album. Side A is a masterpiece Rush only equals with “Cygnus” (all parts combined). For anyone who’s been living on Mars and doesn’t know what this album is about, I’ll give an overview: in the future, you’re not allowed to be creative or think for yourself. Such individualism is a crime, punished under the authoritarian control of the priests of Syrinx. There is no music in this dystopian setting (similar to themes expressed in Zappa’s Joe’s Garage). One day a man finds an artifact from another time and place, and he discovers through experimentation that this device can make music. It’s a guitar, something unknown to the people of the future. This device helps the man express himself, his creativity, and his individuality. The priests seize and destroy the guitar and banish the man, and the man, disillusioned and unable to go on without music, kills himself.

I guess what appeals to me most about this album, other than the catchy-as-hell pop punk, is the rock opera feel of the whole thing. This is the story of Jimmy, a suburban kid from Jesusland trying to make his way in a world of rock n roll and politics, trying to live in a divided America where everyone is drawing lines in the sand.

I harbored quite a prejudice for Bowie’s earlier stuff for a long time. 1969 through 1972: Bowie at his best. And so I just listened to albums #2 through #5 for the longest time, but eventually I had to look myself in the mirror and admit how much I loved Bowie. And if I loved Bowie that much, could I be content with just his earlier folk stuff? After much late-night pacing and soul-searching, I was forced to come to the conclusion that I would have to explore more of his discography. It was a painful realization, but like a child taking his medicine, sometimes what’s painful is what’s best for you. This branching out led me to Low and this album, and I just adore everything about them, especially “Wild Is the Wind”.

Worst album cover of all time.

As the lady swooned under the spell of the bard's guitar, she tried to keep her wits about her as she indulged in her guessing game: how many inches, after all, was the incubus her minstrel had summoned? And was it, indeed, after all, "love"?

I can’t think of a better album to commit double suicide to, but at least wait until the end or you’ll miss some delightful, clever, and, at points, experimental music. And then maybe you’ll decide to experiment a while longer with this delightful little thing we call life.

One of the greatest songs of all time is on this album. I'll let you guess what one I'm referring to.

There’s a nice clash of the blues with jazz on this album, in a battle of the songwriters, as it were.

Take every undesirable yet attractive thing you read in a dime-store pulp novel and throw it into a pot stirred by an unshaven vagabond, and you get this bourbon-soaked album. Mad hatters and beat poets doing the polka on this postcard mailed from desolation row.

Music for people who feel like androids, who seek salvation in airbags and rain, who cry themselves to sleep and awake, who are deluded enough to actually believe their existence and consciousness are nothing more than the sum of complex chemical reactions, who resolve again and again to get off their asses and make something of their lives yet never do. Never fear! Radiohead is hear to sing your woes for you, so that you don't have to think of some way to express yourself yourself. I'm just gonna hold myself and let Radiohead tell me how I feel about myself.

A truly terrible, talentless band.

My wife is a huge Stones fan … or, rather, there are, like three Stones albums she loves but she kinda shrugs at the rest. When I played this one for her yesterday, she didn’t make a single comment. I find that telling. My super conservative friend, however, loves the Stones and bangs on constantly about how cool Mick Jagger is. He loves most (all?) Stones albums, and I’ve even heard him talk about this one. He’s in the closet. I find that telling, too.

This is the Beatles' passage to India, popularizing the West's flirtation with the East and all things "exotic". Their spiritual guide in all this? Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who blew their English minds by telling them that “heaven is like electricity—you don’t see it; it is within you”. Such "wisdom" hooked the Fab Four, and they followed the maharishi to northern India, believing that this form of spiritualism offered real answers through meditation, relaxation, and peace after years of fame, fortune, and publicity. Let's just ignore the total irony of this situation--the fact that Lennon was always anti-religious. Could this respite in rural India help the Beatles rise above their worldly concerns and viewpoints? And can this actually be called a respite, since reporters and photographers followed them to the compound? The mere presence of the Beatles in India was enough to popularize Eastern spiritualism in the 1960s West. (Of course, after a few days of nothing happening, the reporters, in boredom, left.) This trip was pretty much inevitable, since it was nothing more than an extension of the drug experience. People were looking for euphoria, looking for god-figures in everything. Harrison actually took it seriously and grew quite devout through meditation. Devoted to what, though? The quiet Beatle wasn't giving away his secrets. Though Lennon, too, tried taking his seclusion seriously, he had trouble concentrating, what with the troubles in his marriage and the fact that Yoko kept sending him letters, with little poems like "I'm a cloud, look for me". Lennon was quickly smitten. McCartney and Starr weren't as keen as their two bandmates on the whole spiritual enlightenment thing, and besides, there was still music to make. Lennon and McCartney learned to fingerpick their acoustic guitars, the former writing "Julia" (a goodbye to his mother and hello to Yoko) and "Dear Prudence", the latter writing "Blackbird". Actually, most of the songs for The White Album and Abbey Road were written during their stay in India. It didn't take long for problems to arise, however. The maharishi started using the Beatles' name to promote himself through spoken-word albums, and he even had the stones to ask the band for 25% of their earnings. Add a bit of sexual predation of the female devotees and the maharishi found himself the subject of an absolute character destruction in the form of "Sexy Sadie". The album itself---hmmm, well the criticism that the double album has too much filler is a valid complaint. Many of the songs are substandard for the band, but I just don't think they cared. They didn't have to prove themselves anymore, and they were working more and more apart all the time. When they were in the studio, Yoko was always there, always interrupting sessions, not happy to just sit in the recording booth, and started giving her opinions as if she was a creative participant in the band. She "helped" Lennon with his songs, and then, as Harrison famously noted, "the rot set in". After India, the Beatles grew ever more insular, wanting to work alone, keeping to themselves, valuing their privacy above any public considerations. Lennon and McCartney continued recording while Harrison & Starr went to America, and Lennon was working on "Revolution 9" alone. McCartney was perfecting "Blackbird" alone. And then Lennon & Harrison completed "Revolution 9" while McCartney was in America. The dynamic of the band was being redefined (falling apart?). "Revolution 9" is the band's most unpopular track ever. McCartney and Starr were straight up pissed off about it, but Lennon's thoughts on it were that this was the music of the future, music without the necessity of instruments. As far as sound experimentation goes, however, this track is definitely the most relevant and enduring. It was influenced by two main sources, the first being social disturbances in England, the second being Yoko herself. Her art show displayed a new type of avant-garde, and Lennon, listening to her spoken word art, wanted to try something new. Naturally, Yoko helped make decisions on which tape loops to use. So what the hell is actually inside "Revolution 9"? About 100 fragments of classical music, opera, Lennon's voice, Yoko's voice, Harrison's voice, applause, gunfire, choir music, football fans, and of course a man saying "number nine". Lennon thought 9 was significant, it being not only in his address but also his birthday. Derp. "Revolution 1" grew out of a jam session of "Revolution 9", wherein all kinds of weird ideas were fielded, like how random sounds can be used to make music, like how fun it would be to sample sound bytes from other previously-recorded sources. "Helter Skelter" was McCartney's response to a criticism saying he was capable of writing only soft ballads, so he tried to create as loud and dirty a sound as he could. I've read critics who maintain this is the first "heavy metal" song. Bollocks! It's an infamous song, though, considering how Charles Manson chose to interpret a song about a carnival ride, a song about the rise and fall of an empire. America's most notorious mass murderer believed "Helter Skelter" contained prophecies about a coming race war between blacks and whites. Other notable tracks (for me) include "Mother Nature’s Son" (inspired by a maharishi lecture), "Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey" (John thought the other Beatles were paranoid about Yoko), "Honey Pie" (an homage to British music-hall style), "Savoy Truffle" (Harrison sniping Clapton for his love of sweets), and "Cry Baby Cry" (where George Martin plays harmonium).

This album strikes me as quite sarcastic, as only a Brit can make it, but the last track, “Waterloo Sunset”, is just so beautiful and a nice turn of attitude. Just escape to the other side of the river, away from the teeming millions, and be in paradise as you watch the sunset with your true love. I’m more in the lovers’ camp than the melancholy observer’s, so I get what he’s only seeing.

This bloke has done it all and played on every other album out there. Not only is his solo discography long and impressive, so is his work with different bands, as well as collaborations. When I was listening to this album, my wife mentioned how it wasn’t doing much for her. I immediately disagreed, pointing out that although the album isn’t robust (that is, it doesn’t work when people are lightly chatting while listening), Wyatt knows exactly what he’s doing. The man is a master. Brian Eno producing, by the way.

Illimitable, iconic vocal harmonies beckoning us back to a time of musical revolution, taking the public ear from 60s blues rock into a new decade of singer/songwriters. By the way, comparing your “m’lady” to Guinevere isn’t a good thing. If she’s also drawing pentagrams on your walls, run. Leave her before she leaves you for a guy who picks oranges just as well as he picks a guitar.

Truly awful.

Truly awful.

This album was released amidst the smoke of a holy war. Lennon famously said in an interview that The Beatles were “more popular than Jesus.” This caused outrage in America, inciting public bonfires sponsored by radio stations. They burned and destroyed Beatles’ albums, and the music was banned from the airwaves in the South. What Lennon meant, of course, was that rock music was replacing God. It was merely an observation that Christianity was losing its influence. And of course so many people hung onto every word Lennon uttered. He was the voice of his generation, a spokesman for his restive peers. He talked openly about drugs and the Vietnam War. He sparked rock journalism: everyone wrote about his Jesus comment. People started listening to the opinions of rock stars, and there was born a quality and truth in rock ‘n roll reporting. This album marked the end of touring for The Beatles. Anti-Beatles’ sentiment was widespread—in Japan, the Philippines, and in America. Besides, touring annoyed the erstwhile Fab Four. They didn’t enjoy touring at all in 1966. There were simply too many distractions, and their songs weren’t suitable to be played live. “Rain” and “Paperback Writer” just didn’t sound good in concert. The Beatles were more than happy to stop touring. In profound relief, Harrison is quoted as saying, “I can stop pretending to be a Beatle.” He and his bandmates could leave behind the limitations of touring—PA systems not being powerful enough for stadium concerts and difficulties in hearing the music over the screaming crowds caused the band’s technical skill to deteriorate. The studio process continued from the experimentation we hear on Rubber Soul, but there are marked differences. The difference between 1965 and 1966 is the difference between the early 60s and the late 60s. Though that looks like an obvious and banal observation, it says a lot as far as The Beatles are concerned, for it is the difference between being live performers and being a studio collective band. The Beatles stopped worrying about appropriate concert music and started considering imaginative sonic and musical ranges. The technology was in the studio, not on the stage. The beauty of “Taxman”, for example, is that it sounds like it could be live, but in fact there’s no way they could have done it justice in front of a crowd at that time. “I’m Only Sleeping” evokes a dreamlike mood with a dual-guitar solo played backwards. “She Said She Said” (a surreal tune about Lennon’s first LSD trip), “For No One” (wherein the clavichord and French horn are dominant), and “Love You To” (sitar as main instrument) were hardly concert-appropriate songs. And how the hell would they ever have been able to play “Tomorrow Never Knows” live? This masterpiece displays a world of new capabilities. It’s our first look into Lennon’s intoxicating, terrifyingly wonderful mind. A one-chord drone throughout the song is outside pop rock sensibilities, and the use of tape-loops and vocal processing technology place the piece firmly in the annals of psychedelia.

Some albums are perfect examples of what they set out to do, and this album is a perfect example of an Album of Two Sides, because these two sides are two sides to the same story, A being the sounds of the surface, the story you tell everyone, the one exposed to those around you, and so the songs are more poppy yet retaining a visionary, experimental edge; then side B delves below the surface, into the realm of haunting synthesizers, darkly lit by the mood of Bowie's recovery from a crippling cocaine addiction.

There is this slow, unassailable, confident energy enveloping this whole album. And it's all a night energy--literally the first four songs directly reference nighttime. This confidence of an idiot who doesn't know any better is just so darned attractive, especially when the person in question is not an idiot. Oh, and I prefer this version of "China Girl". I wonder what it was like to walk the streets of Berlin at night in the 70s. With Bowie at your side. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to hear that his ghost still walks there, moseying along to the warped electronics of "Mass Production". And one last thing: if you're going to get your strings pulled by someone, you could do worse than Bowie.

The idiot who compiled this list sure loves sophisticrap.

I'll send an SOS to the world: this album is criminally underrated. At least underrated by music nerds. Maybe because it has the band’s first two no 1 singles? I don’t know. It seems to be getting more love these days, but that might be because as the years pass and more time is put between this album and us, we’re able to appreciate it apart from the hype. It’s not a perfect album by any means, but it’s got its own charm, especially considering the band had complete artistic control, anemic as it may be in spots. There was no meddling by the label.

Even sad sacks who think The Smiths are great and cannot escape the absurdity and humiliation of their daily existence love this album.

Being just a studio band as a pop music group was unheard of before this album. Beatlemania was at an end, and the Beatles were no longer merely a product to be sold. The band stopped touring, and there was a significant downshift in the marketing side of things, and this put more focus on actually creating music. A lot of people know Rubber Soul as the Beatles' pot album, since Bob Dylan had introduced them to marijuana in 1964. The lads smoked a lot of pot during the recording of Help!, and that marijuana motif spills over into this album, what with the album cover being reminiscent of the leaves as well as the distorted image evoking a sense of altered consciousness. Unlike on Help!, however, the Beatles didn't work high on this album. They took their drug experiences into the studio but not the drugs. Rubber Soul has vision and articulation, a clear-headed and purposeful musical statement. This is also where the Lennon / McCartney rivalry really takes off. The duo were rarely writing together by this point, just answering each other's songs instead, like a game of oneupmanship. One day Lennon would come into the studio with a song, the next day McCartney would show up with something of his own. Harrison was also getting in on the songwriting act. He had only two songs on the first five albums, but now he's got two songs just on this album. This is the real beginning of his songwriting career, and you can hear the maturity as he just gets better and better. On his "Think for Yourself", he's not afraid to try a bit of sound experimentation: the two simultaneous bass guitar lines, one conventional and the other run through a fuzzbox. Overall, the general songwriting style of the Beatles was changing. No more naive, shallow love songs about dating and holding hands. There's a sense of adventure, a sense of questioning, no doubt influenced by the drug use, the sexual experiences, and the dabbling in spirituality, evidenced in the song "The Word", wherein belief in the sufficiency of love is proclaimed. With love, all the world's problems are solved. Despite these new frontiers, the band keeps to the brevity and clarity of the classic pop song. Rubber Soul also has a streak of sarcasm and irony running through it. The Beatles are laughing at and joking about their fame as they comment on stardom and seduction. Everyone fawned over the Beatles, everyone lusted after them. The best example is "Drive My Car", and musically it's an interesting number: the guitar and bass doubling the vocal, the use of the tambourine instead of the cymbal, the drumming rimshots, creating a stronger, sharper sound. Let's go back to that new frontier idea I mentioned earlier. Listen to "Norwegian Wood". This is the first time that the sitar replaces the lead guitar. Look at the social criticism on "Nowhere Man", the opening a capella line and somber tone giving the impression of profundity. This song attacks their parents' generation of conformity.

People listen to this kind of bland music?

When they found Frankie Carbone in the meat truck, it took them three days to thaw him out before they could do an autopsy.

Like everything with this band, this album has a lot of history, and that history is pretty rocky. The band wasn’t looking to make a copy of their wildly famous *Rumours*, and Buckingham had very different ideas for this recording, even going to far as to be a bit on the experimental side. The title track, by the way, is unassailable. Pretty much the best thing the band ever did.

Put on the lipstick and eye shadow. Hold your guitar for me, right out there in front of you.

Just Welch and Rawlings, co-writing and wielding their guitars on a quiet collection of excellent, stripped-down American folk tunes with some deep, intelligent lyrics rich in metaphor. And Welch's voice... just timeless and iconic. It's everything you want American music to sound like. Her woven lyric imagery is superb, detailing the American experience in every moment, from the time of Lincoln through the time of Elvis all the way up to the moment of pondering a broken heart over a whisky and water.

The admonition not to go near the water is sadly even more powerful a damnation today than it was in 1971. Look how much we’ve learned and how little anyone gives a shit! That dude on the album cover is us. Surf’s up, and it’s plastic wrappers and bottles from a sea of garbage.

A damn tedious waste of an hour.

Not sure what I can say other than parrot the buzzwords that flock around this album like persistent birds: genius, smooth, exquisite. That's enough. Every track is brilliant, of course, but my favorites are "Blame It on the Sun" and "I Believe". With this album, I finally got my friends to stop sleeping on Stevie and, at least in part, appreciate his groove, funk, and genius.

Our favorite little swan takes to flight and abandons the dancefloor, much to the dismay of all the clubgoers, but alights at last upon a steeple, and in her sudden and unexpected flight she brings along a chorus of voices, inspired by her own natural instrument and ready to experiment with her. Take your time. Breathe. Concentrate. Or not. It doesn't matter. The song actually sings itself, and you can consciously add to it or let yourself be unconsciously swept along. Why not try both?