My dad in 1997: why do you have my fender and a monkey wrench in your room Mason stop messing with my stuff! Me: *all of 11 years old and doing tom morello shit to the fender with the wrench* FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME

Flatly insane to include this album on this list. It would only meet the criteria if there were more than a thousand Beck albums and then you could be like wow what a step outside of the box for Beck. Honestly beck has certainly earned the right to make this album, but it is not what I want when I go to the “Beck” section of the music store. Get it outta here

I enjoyed most of this. It felt somewhere in between the classic rock Zach braff would put on a soundtrack and the indie rock Zach braff would put on a soundtrack.

Live albums are rarely good, and this is not an exception though for different reasons than usual! this actually sounds really good for a live album from a production and recording standpoint, and then it’s just a terrible performance. Why is he like that live? Why were the horns so bad? Why was he yelling instead of singing? If I’d gone to that concert it would be to hear him singing! Reluctant extra star because it really is an impressive live recording

i think i judge single instrument noodley virtuosos on a 2 axis matrix. they're all really good at their thing by definition, so from there it's: are they cool, and are they just technically skilled and making masturbatory music or is there artistry involved so for instance: yngwie malmsteen... one of the least cool people you've ever seen in your life (and also a dickhead), and he's just up there noodling for noodling's sake to prove that he can. your enjoyment and even your presence is irrelevant to him. jimi hendrix, one of the coolest people you've ever seen in your life, and he's pouring himself into it. 0 stars for yngwie malmsteen on principle if he ever pops up on this list, 3 stars for this particular jimi album

Includes two of the all-timers in the "long ass songs" category. A great album for driving, cleaning, cooking, background noise at a small gathering.

I'll take others' word for it that it's seminal and influential for a lot of things I've enjoyed since it was released, but no thank you never again

AC/DC songs are just a vehicle for Angus to play a guitar solo. They really are best consumed as a closing pitcher's entrance music instead of by the album.

You can draw a straight line from this album to The Decemberists and I think that's neat. I stole this CD from my Dad when I was 11 and have loved it ever since.

The whole album sounds like one song. Which is different from saying the songs all sound the same. It sounds like one hour-long song.

Live albums are rarely good and this one is not an exception

Quintessential 60s classic rock sound

A nonsense 13 minute long opening track is exactly why nobody likes prog rock

Almost entirely bangers.

Bands that got massive radio play in the 90s are weird because some of them (Pearl Jam included) are precious to me, and some of them were so overplayed that I cannot stand them now (Creed). Start to finish fantastic rock. Unique, bordering on weird in a way that was important to me as a kid. Of Alice In Chains' Layne Staley, Nirvana's Kurt Cobain, Soundgarden's Chris Cornell, and Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, it seems cruel that the one who got his shit together and became a vegan and insufferable and might now be immortal is the latter.

It played on repeat like 2 and a half times before I realized? It was fine, with some moments.

The intersection of easy listening classic rock, southern classic rock, and radio classic rock.

FULL ADMISSION: I made a big mistake. I read the "about" blurb on spotify before listening to this. The "about" blurb on spotify for The War On Drugs appears to have been written by the band (and given that all the photos are of the lead singer, one presumes by him specifically). It is nonsense from start to finish, and negatively colored my impressions of the record thoroughly, so I recommend not doing that. Perhaps their other albums show off their skill as "this century's great rock synthesists," but the start of this record is nondescript middle of the road indie rock. Then suddenly, the warning signs: an extended Dire Straits impression on "An Ocean In Between The Waves." The almost-unique vocals now sound like they're trying to be something specific. And then inexplicably it turns into Bob Dylan tribute music on "Eyes To The Wind." If you inexplicably turn into (bad, I might add) Bob Dylan tribute music in the middle of your record I will give you 1 star every time. If you then, after an unearned instrumental interlude, turn into Bruce Springsteen tribute music on the very next track, I'll wish I could take that 1 star away. This album infuriated me in a fun way. 5 stars for the experience, 1 star for the album

Foundational and iconic and all that, but it's not really listenable as an album.

Not my thing. I'm giving it an extra star because it absolutely succeeds at the band's goal of creating an "anti rock" sound.

It's endlessly odd to me while listening to the album straight through that Simon & Garfunkel put stuff like 'bridge over troubled water' and 'so long frank lloyd wright' on the same album as stuff like 'cecilia' and 'keep the customer satisfied,' and then i remember they broke up acrimoniously. the boxer is a perfect song. the lyrics are almost conversational but flow with the music perfectly like a gentle downhill stream in a way i don't think anyone else has ever come close to matching. most of it is listenable, a lot of it is good, and bridge over troubled water is one of the most annoying songs ever recorded.

It was fine. Mostly charming. I'd go to a tavern to see it live. Another case of "I'm sure several artists I enjoy cite them as an influence."

Easy listening, no complaints

Weird album for me. I think it's important as a bridge between a time when alt rock had become very samey and when actually-alternative alt rock became widely commercial and popular. Some of the guitar work is very foundational for the alt rock of the 2010s. The AltNation SiriusXM station and many of the bands they play regularly owe a lot to Kings of Leon. Unfortunately, Caleb Followill's voice is unfuckingbearable.

If you can set aside the cartoon character that is Moby, I believe there is a 4 or 4.5 star album here, but there's so much useless underground electronic DJ set filler squeezed into the cracks that drags it down.

Classic, mostly great outside of extended noodling sessions

It was great

enjoyed it from start to finish. type o negative vibes

irredeemable garbage from start to finish

Solid, but not nearly as good as 2005 Mason thought it was

Another in the "i understand that it's foundational and influential but i'll stick to the things that built upon its foundation and were inspired by it thank you"

I have no particular attachment to either artist, but at least once or twice I thought "Man Adele really stole her whole vocal sound didn't she" Me and Mr. Jones gets the album an extra star all by itself. "What kind of fuckery is this" is a wonderful line

yep, that's a beastie boys album

love an english punk band where you can hear their accents (meegraine)

I want to rate this higher. I didn't dislike it, it shines in a couple spots. But it can't escape sounding like the solo effort of a guy who does his best work collaborating with other artists (which it is)

*shrug* if you say so

fun all the way through

prog rock is a tool of the devil. jazzy prog rock is a WMD.

one of the best grime albums ever. bonus points for putting a recording of a cod lobby on a track

no skips

did not realize christina aguilera was making christiany pop albums a couple of these songs felt kinda.... pandery? weird vibe. i like the risk taking with the sound though, it's not exactly what you expect from christina a song full of voice mails from fans is a CHOICE.

bland and offputting in a way i'm not sure how to explain

one of the ones where you just go "yeah of course this is one the list"

I was excited to sit down and listen to this as an adult. I know there are some bangers on here, but as a young'n Radiohead was the annoying boring stuff that interrupted the loud grunge on the radio and the music video for paranoid android was highly unsettling to me. It really drags at the end, but there's a lot of great stuff here. It has an emblematic 90s non-music interlude track which I appreciate on principle. It hearkens to a time when people made albums instead of singles

i have a generally positive opinion of the kinks from the singles i'm familiar with and their appearances on wes anderson soundtracks, but i hated this

the beatles fall into a category of foundational, influential inspirational media where i consumed everything it inspired before i consumed the media. boring, but i don't hate it.

when talking heads works it works really well. when talking heads doesn't work it is the most annoying music on the planet. this is an entire album where it doesn't work.

The bangers are banging, the bops are bopping I've never listened to this album all the way through, so I did not expect a Chuck Mangione joint on track 4

The spotify version doesn't have oh bondage up yours on it, so what's the point?

I know that this genre of music simply isn't for me, and also I shouldn't be listening to it while I do my fake email job at 1pm on a Thursday, but even so I cannot fathom why this album is held in such high esteem by those who are into it. There's a 7 minute 33 second song of the same 8 count of noise repeated over and over with nothing but various effects and additional percussion layered onto it. Most of the album just isn't compelling if I'm not at an EDM show and on drugs. Extra star for Da Funk and Around the World tho

I went through a middle school kid who got super into the rat pack phase and nothing from this album was ever of interest to me. also it's really sleepy

Absolutely love the vibe of a dude named fred releasing an album called fred with a song that includes "(fred's tune)" in its title. It was fine.

I was aware of Bono and The Edge as kind of insufferable before I was aware of U2's good music, and it definitely colors my impression of them. This is a pretty good album though.

Yep. That's a new wave album.

The platonic ideal of the kinds of albums I let ruin my mood throughout the 00's. No thanks!

an all timer, one of the kings of sad as fuck country still being a good time

yep, that's a led zeppelin album

Enjoyable throughout

I would never choose to listen to this again, it simply doesn't interest me, but it's not bad.

pretty hard to mess up blues

I like a lot of the guitar work, but this album feels like when a good character in a show disappears and comes back but now they're dark and brooding cause they've been through some shit. Shouldn't have broken up the pixies, francis

This is one of the most precious albums to me of all time. There is so much there beyond the singles. The sludge of 4th of July, the creeping opti-pessimism of The Day I Tried To Live, the groove of Let Me Drown... No skips. All timer. 6 stars.

First couple tracks were great, but Nina Simone's vibrato is not for me for extended periods of time

mostly fine, sometimes irritating

I am convinced that the vast majority of the punk included in this list was done so as an afterthought to avoid the author getting yelled at about it

How can there be so much Bob Dylan yet only Tangled Up In Blue is good

I know that arctic monkeys know how to use distortion on their guitars because they do it on this album and yet they spend so much time opting instead for the most annoying guitar tone ever recorded

There are a lot of albums we've heard so far where I could see why it would be enjoyable to someone, but this is the first one that just fucking sucks and I cannot fathom enjoying it. ZERO stars I never want to hear any of these songs again.

all of the rough edges of a live performance with none of the energy, but mostly fun to listen to

Better than the last one but still some real questionable stuff in here

one of the best albums of the 00s. And I love an album with some acoustic versions at the end

Live albums are rarely good and this is not an exception. That being said, extra star for space truckin. Space truckin is never not good

A completely fine and inoffensive Christmas album punctuated by a weird spoken word greeting from a convicted murderer

mostly agreeable listen

I didn't mind most of this, though I don't particularly enjoy when an otherwise good if not weird song descends into noise making for no good reason in the middle. I am ten thousand percent positive that wayne coyne lyrics and vocals would make every single track a certified banger. i think i expected the flaming lips to show up on every single track.

I love the guitar work throughout most of Bowie's career, I just don't like when he sings over it throughout most of his career also.

There was nothing wrong with anything on this album I just wouldn’t ever choose to listen to it again and “would listen again” is my bar for 3 stars so…

I hold these men personally responsible as the progenitors of most prog rock

Every single Tom waits song is simply wait(s)ing for the right scene in a movie or tv show of which to be a theme song. It all feels like it’s missing context when you’re just listening to the album.

I’ll take the layne Staley Tom morello version of another brick from 1999’s criminally underrated The Faculty, but an extra star for producing the original so it could be used in a movie about alien teachers attacking students instead of protest

Probably the third best Priest album. I remain shocked this was picked as their appearance over others. If I ever run into Rob Halford in San Diego again I will ask him about it.

There's not really much that moved me outside of the singles (BUT THE SINGLES ARE ALL TIMERS)

Pretty listenable, but a lot of making weird noise for weird noise’s sake

pretty fun the whole way through, and a perfect album to listen to while doing house work

Just not for me in album form

I’ve never listened to this in its entirety and I probably haven’t heard anything but a snippet of hotel California on the radio in a store or something in years. I think it’s one of those songs that younger people just sort of take on faith as being an all timer but it is exactly as good as your dad says it is. The rest of it is decent 70s rock ranging from listenable to pretty good. Also it’s weirdly fun to listen to good music when you know the people making it utterly despise one another. But then less so when you know what a bunch of assholes they are.

Try as I might to give this an unbiased listen The Beach Boys are simply “my dads music” from a time when I was starting to choose “my music.” Didn’t really enjoy my time here, but didn’t dislike it as much as I thought I would

I enjoyed this quite a bit

I did not expect to enjoy this but it was quite lovely to make soup to

Don’t think consuming the pogues in album form is for me, but I really enjoyed quite a few songs

In the ghetto is one of the most insane songs ever penned. Just totally wild that was a hit even accounting for “it was a different time” It always makes me laugh to hear Elvis plead with the recipient of a song to believe him or cry about his partner being suspicious of him, ELVIS PRESLEY. Only a couple songs on here that really drag. Great overall

Was having a much better time with this talking heads album until warning sign. And the song after that. And the one after that. And then I was like ah fuck yep this is a talking heads joint. Then it recovered a bit! I would listen to some of these songs again, but never in album form.

There was some really fun stuff here but the rest of the album sounded like the fun stuff but not as fun.

I’ve always been vaguely sure I don’t like Springsteen now I know for sure. It all sounds the same and it’s not great. A lot of it is quite bad. Why does the melody in jungleland sound directly ripped from tiny dancer? Why is the title track held in such high regard? And why is one of the e street band members a main character in The Sopranos?

Some real standouts amid a lot of dullness

Really didn’t enjoy any of this

My room mate played this album a lot in college. It's very enjoyable.

A personal top 5 album of all time. As a kid learning to play guitar but not being very good or fast and only having metal and grunge in my musical tastes, Mick Ronson was revelatory. I would say the ziggy era is the only Bowie I really like, but even Aladdin Sane abandons so much of what makes me love this album. Five years is one of the best songs ever recorded.

This album and band have an outsized reputation that neither really meets. What’s good is pretty good, and what’s bad (when they go full talking heads, my disdain for which is already stated in these records) is pretty bad. The rest of it is fine, but nothing revolutionary or legendary like I’d been led to believe

Chris isaak I wanna fall in love the album

Too long, but almost entirely enjoyable. Can I kick it is an all timer

Live albums are rarely good and this is not an exception. Love Johnny tho

didn't mind any of this, very much enjoyed the vocals and the instrumentation

might be my favorite album of the 00s

the late 90s/early 00s is an era of hip hop that doesn't really interest me, but hov interests me more than the rest. You can only hear Jay-Z talking about beating the charges so many times before you get tired of it, but I will readily admit he is the best at it.

Too much jam bandy noodley guitar work on too-long songs, but I liked some of it. Wouldn’t reach for it again

This is one where I want to find a copy of the book and find out what about it makes it an album you should hear before you die. In a genre that I would describe as "fancy hotel lobby music" or "tv/movie incidental music," is this particularly exemplary? was there special drama in its recording? I enjoyed it, but it's not immediately clear to me why I needed to hear it before I die.

absolutely not. the whole idea bothers me in principle.

It went on a little too long, but it's good overall and there's some real bangers

i found it very hard to take this album seriously. i recognize logically that def leppard is probably the target sound for every tv commercial or show that wants 80s rock-sounding incidental music, but the whole album sounded like that.

Easily the biggest delta so far between the reverence most folks have for the album and the depths of my distaste for it. Roger Daltrey is unbearable both as a singer and a human being. The story is boring. The music is fine. I never want to hear it again.

It was a fun listen, but not something I'd ever reach for

Definitely bottom 5 so far. Just a terrible experience sonically.

Not my favorite Common. Doesn’t help that it’s full of problematic language. He has thankfully publicly realized that was a problem and resolved not to use homophobic slurs anymore. A couple great ones here though

My dad in 1997: why do you have my fender and a monkey wrench in your room Mason stop messing with my stuff! Me: *all of 11 years old and doing tom morello shit to the fender with the wrench* FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME

Mostly had a bad time, from some of the stuff I was reading it sounds like they had a bad time making it too. I do enjoy some of their other work though (which would be perhaps much to Mark Hollis' chagrin)

I was surprised by how regularly bothered I was listening to this. I really love Kate Pierson's voice, but she spends so much time using it to make annoying noises in addition to her singing. Hero Worship is a great song! Rock Lobster is a gimmick that simply does not need to be almost 7 minutes long!

The instrumentation is wonderful (because it’s largely Mick Ronson of David Bowie fame), but that’s about all I enjoyed

Pretty forgettable but not disagreeable. Because I listened to this the other day and then got 3 songs into it before realizing I’d already listened to it

New pet peeve unlocked it’s a guy talking while a girl sings the same words

Spanish Harlem was incredibly unsettling to me as a child and I never really clocked why and yep as an adult it’s still a kinda creepy song. Everything else is great except The In Crowd

Neil Tennant is simply a non starter for me

this is like the platonic ideal of 60s rock. right down the middle. and i do not enjoy it.

an all timer

Going into this I thought “surely Brian Eno won’t let David Byrne ruin an entire Brian Eno record” and I was right, but multiple songs sound like 5 minute long intros to a Talking Heads song and that’s just such a waste of the time these two had together I expected better

I am 100% confident if you gave Elliot smith the drummer from That Thing You Do! and he made him play everything faster his music would be really really great instead of just good, mood depending

Loved it!

Most of this isn’t actually that great but the quarter of it that is good s EXTREMELY fucken good

I enjoyed almost all of it

My vote for the widest gap between the good and the bad so far. The iconic songs are iconic, the ones that aren’t are nigh unlistenable

This album is so full of judgy weird like internalized misoginy I had no idea

Perfectly fine classic rock

Proud Mary keep on boinin is one thing, but thirty people toined to stone is too far. There wasn’t much especially disagreeable but I’d never reach for it and you gotta be replayable if you want 3 stars from me

A fun listen once

This made me feel like my atoms were out of position

I know it’s sacrilege and everything I like stands on the fossilized bones of The Beatles, but I just really can’t stand these guys. And even the remaster sounds like it was mixed to evoke the record being played on Walkman headphones with the volume all the way up but lying on the counter of a bathroom instead of on your ears. The lyrics of Glass Onion seem to indicate that the Beatles were openly contemptuous of their stardom and fans, and then Wild Pie Honey, Piggies, and Happiness Is A Warm Gun removes all doubt. A reluctant extra star for Rocky Raccoon, I’m So Tired, and Helter Skelter

What a snooze fest

truly unbelievable lows after such highs in their career

did they just not make any good music in 1970 why is this momentous in any way

cain't so no to any waylon, tbh. this is one of his more listenable albums from start to finish

Give the people what they want when they want and they wants it all the time

2000 is about when we got the internet at home and i was finally able to begin discovering and choosing my own music and drifting away from what the alternative rock radio station was playing. violently rejecting linkin park is like one of my first conscious musical choices and i'm committing to the bit. i do not like this.

Feel like there was a better way to tell the story of mongoloid without the word mongoloid even in 1978. Devo is very much like talking heads where when they do it good it’s great and when they do it too much it’s unlistenable. Thankfully they do it much more infrequently!

So very many crimes were committed in the mixing of albums in the 1970s. This is fun though.

absolutely as good as the beatles get in my ears

This my dads music. I can’t stand the instrumentation for large portions of this album, but I do enjoy all of the vocals

way better than the last elvis

Bonus star (up from zero) because I got to make my gf experience this for the first time. This is legitimately one of my least favorite albums (and bands) ever recorded

this album is connected to so many wonderful memories. but nostalgia is a toxic impulse (you can never go back). shirley manson was one of my first celebrity crushes.

fernando valenzuela used to enter baseball games to fernando, 3 stars for that song alone

It’s pretty enjoyable for the parts where you can zone out and not hear all the NGE/nation of Islam hate group stuff

Fun instrumentation but sorry Damon your voice doesn’t do it for me if it’s not a blur song

i am 38, this can only be chore music for me now

a pretty good album, but vastly overrated on the strength of two songs. i've never been a huge maiden fan, they are fischer price baby's first metal to me. some of the best song writers ever in the genre, i just don't like their sound.

pretty much has everything you expect from a p funk album, a true album experience from start to finish

Cajun Tom waits is a no for me

This is a tough listen with hindsight. Underproduced too. Just feels too light since we know what can be with Black

On the Wikipedia entry for Wings one of their ever rotating guitarists claims Wings sounds like a band and not a solo McCartney project and that is only true on the songs that sound like Beatles songs. Mostly boring!

Somewhat slow start and then 7 straight classics. One of the best albums of the 90s

this is kind of exhausting to listen to now because of the time it represents, but it is a formative experience

fun and engaging throughout. perfect blend of musicianship and showmanship to keep it entertaining the entire time. shouts out to all middle schoolers currently going through a weird rat pack/lounge phase you're doing great

this is unarguably the worst white stripes album why have the authors of this book done this to us? it's fine. it's got a couple singles that were fine to hear in a 00s alt rock shuffled playlist, but they are scattered throughout a desert of jack white being unproductively weird. a horrendous full-album listening experience.

u gotta be kidding me

i don't live a lifestyle conducive to sitting around listening to an hour of post rock songs anymore unfortunately, but i fondly recall when i did

more musicianship than you expect from punk of the era, it's really great throughout

Dreadfully boring almost the entire time. We’re getting RNG’d here but this is a lot of “why on earth would you pick this album from this artist” entries recently

An entire album of the same rhythm is not fun to listen to

Almost nothing of note besides the singles. A very puzzling entry to the list.

some of this is still pretty damn infectious, but it all sort of generally sounds like a lot more like shit than i remembered. just wildly under and/or poorly produced.

this was fine. after the opening track, which i enjoyed in substance if not length, i was not exactly expecting an easy listening album having seen it described as jazz. i wish all jazz was like this.

this wasn't as bad as i was expecting, but then again the basic ingredients of reggae are like nails on a chalk board to me

it's all a little samey, but in the comfortable way that it sounds like a complete album to listen to rather than "the songs all sound the same" if that makes sense. the music is exactly as shoegazey as i want my rock before it goes overboard and i just want it to be post rock instrumentals. it perfectly blends a lot of different ideas and ends up unique. it's very good.

It’s weird how we got the weird jam band album first and then we got this one and this one is bad because it also sounds like a jam band (and because Neil Young is singing). Some nice instrumentation though

this sounds like white stripes b sides, which perhaps provides some clarity for why this list includes the lesser white stripes albums. i think that jack white is supremely talented, but it feels like he got famous for being a weird lil guy at a time when we didn't have enough weird lil guys and i can't help but wonder if he's chained to his schtick or if this is just really what he's after when he records for himself.

Some of this was VERY fun, but dissonance and noise rock has always been widely available to me and so i don't think it has the same uniqueness it probably did when people discovered it in its time.

the phrase "heavy lifting" doesn't come nearly close enough to describe what the eminem singles do for the rest of his backlog

Sufficiently different from the other beastie boys albums on the list to be interesting, but idk that it holds a candle to either of them

i hated all of my time with this album.

I keep wondering if the 60s had anything interesting to offer and 60s bands keep saying “nope”

B.O.B is undefeated, and the rest of it is good too

Fundamental guitar work for a lot of what else came in the 90s. Enjoyable throughout

I can’t think of a way to describe this album besides “mostly interludes.” It felt like I was constantly waiting for an actual song to start and it only did a couple times.

I enjoyed this a lot. I can imagine putting this on the record player while you're having friends over and it being the perfect compliment to a nice little party.

It requires setting aside some notions about Aerosmith and Steven Tyler from the intervening years, but this is a pretty good classic rock album. It relies on superior guitar work and a unique vocalist without forgetting the rest of the band entirely. It's got grooves and riffs and it feels emblematic of the time.

each song had a good half that went off the rails, but I mostly was fine with this. it came very close to scratching the itch that I normally get from shoegazey post rock instrumental bands these days. proto-post-rock is a funny concept.

astoundingly inoffensive for a live album. doesn't go too overboard with jam banding. produced and mixed well. no excessive faffing about between songs.

Flatly insane to include this album on this list. It would only meet the criteria if there were more than a thousand Beck albums and then you could be like wow what a step outside of the box for Beck. Honestly beck has certainly earned the right to make this album, but it is not what I want when I go to the “Beck” section of the music store. Get it outta here

Yep that’s an rem album

One of my favorite albums. Her voice, the writing, the way it pulls from country tradition yet also subverts quite a lot. Pieces here have a distinct songwriting character, yet still manage to span a breadth of country song types. It’s an album where I think yeah this definitely should be on the list and should be heard by everyone.

A 3 because it has very high peaks and is the bedrock of a lot of stuff I like, but I don’t particularly enjoy listening to it as a full album

A nearly perfect album. One of the first tapes I bought for myself, a formative “choosing my own music” moment. 50 ft queen is a banger

This is maybe not the thing I’m supposed to take away from an Aretha album but I really liked the harmonies

there were some moments, but i don't think i'd like to hear the vast majority of this again. i'm just not sure how you could pick this as what you need to hear from brian eno given his entire repertoire

giving this two stars because it made me feel like my atoms were out of place, but not as far out of place as i expected it too, and i found myself bopping along a couple times.

there was so much weird stuff (respectfully) in here. not something i probably would have come across outside of this exercise

i feel like i almost liked this multiple times

i think i judge single instrument noodley virtuosos on a 2 axis matrix. they're all really good at their thing by definition, so from there it's: are they cool, and are they just technically skilled and making masturbatory music or is there artistry involved so for instance: yngwie malmsteen... one of the least cool people you've ever seen in your life (and also a dickhead), and he's just up there noodling for noodling's sake to prove that he can. your enjoyment and even your presence is irrelevant to him. jimi hendrix, one of the coolest people you've ever seen in your life, and he's pouring himself into it. 0 stars for yngwie malmsteen on principle if he ever pops up on this list, 3 stars for this particular jimi album

Horrendous. Sounds like it was recorded in an aluminum trash can.

Mario music

It's... fine. Idk, I just like 25 better.

these are all the same song, and it's a good song, but i dunno what punch the album is meant to bring to this activity. i guess i recognize how it could be considered important by idk lana del rey and her whole entire thing

a fun listen that couldn't justify the outsized reputation this album has

I really liked a lot of this and I really hated a lot of it. There's a tight 4 star album in here somewhere.

I enjoyed this a lot more than I expected to because it's a guitar noodler and a vocal noodler together. maybe their noodling cancels out and it's just mostly enjoyable music as a result?

This was mostly fun and interesting but I find it surprising that by 1995 it was still interesting enough to get on this list.

Diablo II town music ass album

The best Jimi Hendrix songs are actually Stevie Ray Vaughan songs

Prog rock is anything but prog

People were STARVING for music in the 60s

It’s the highlight of a weird ass career

I have never heard this but I’ve heard plenty of later LK and I can only describe this as a caricature of what his sound would become. It’s not good but it’s charming. I’m bewildered. I think I like it.

not at all what I expected from the title, even knowing it was RC

a nearly perfect album

Do you know how whiny an album has to be to get an elder emo like me to go “what a sad sack bored this album was” Couple bright spots tho

It strikes me that to this day every time white people try to do an ill-advised rap song about like how to check out books from a library or why Jesus is cool to try and relate to kids they are still entirely influenced by Run. I can’t wait for the day that a municipal water conservation effort tries to bring awareness to itself via rap but instead it’s like dirty south hip hop as an influence instead

this was really fun! the country twist to some of the songs is such a good layer for otherwise great soul music

This is the kinda album I expect to be hidden on this list. There is so much genuinely interesting music here and some very funny and interesting lyrics and also so much of it is entirely off putting in a compelling way. What the hell

very few times have i encountered an album that is mostly good, but the part that is bad is so bad that it ruins the entire thing

this is one of those albums that i know a lot of my friends consider precious and i get why they do, but it's still pretty bad

this is probably a 4 star album but billy corgan is enough of a shit for it to be dragged down to a 3

On the strength of one single

This was dreadfully boring! I knew one song, extra star

There are good talking heads songs but there are no good talking heads albums. This one wasn’t quite as annoying as the others we’ve had and it has one of the ones everyone knows

Oh that’s the band behind that one song that I didn’t know was called connected, neat. There were a couple other fun moments on here at least

not at all what i expected from steve winwood based on what i know about steve winwood, pleasantly surprised

i can't tell why this is distinguishable from other D&B besides it being first or early or something?

sonically annoying in all but the hits

entirely distracted by a song with the word "talkin'" in the title and the word "talking" being sung

Genuinely don’t know how we made it through the 60s to start making actual good music

the least offensive neil young so far

i fully understand why people were anti rock n roll during this period

better than all the others before it

This felt fairly nondescript but had a few interesting moments

I had fun the whole time

Sounds like the music they played at visible changes alongside videos of fashion shows in the 90s

This was never fun

Brimful of Asha is one of my favorite 90s one hit wonders and the rest of this was actually really nice

Makes my atoms feel like they’re in the wrong place

Never reaching for this on my own but it had some yams

Don’t think I’ve really ever heard anything but the chorus of the obvious songs. I hated it throughout!

Fun

whatever cleverness is there in both his lyrics and his songwriting is entirely overwritten by the sardonic moping

What

The classic steely Dan vocal harmonies are usually a non starter for me but it was actually a lot of the instrumentation that bothered me here

really excellent guitar work regularly ruined by the vocals, but a listenable album nonetheless

they were always peripherally available and interesting, but i never got into them. there's some very fun things here, but i think all of it was better done on their second album and in their other bands

Nothing really stood out to me here, in that it played like 1 1/2 times before I noticed. I didn't mind any of it, but it's not my regular fare.

The beeeeeaaaaaaaattts. The beats. Amazing album. It’s really mean though.

An all timer. A really masterful turn by a band trying new and interesting things, and managing to keep their familiarity at the same time (something they would more (St. Anger) or less (Load and Reload) fail at for their next 3 albums. Opened the flood gates for a wider audience to get into heavy music without the gatekeeping or high barrier to entry of most metal. Launched the superstardom of one of the best touring acts in history. Full of hits. Culturally relevant. Also provides (via the making-of documentary) the first glimpses into what a bunch of turds those guys can be.

There's a couple standouts here, but this album is kind of a prototype for the stuff that would end up being formative for me

I enjoyed most of this. It felt somewhere in between the classic rock Zach braff would put on a soundtrack and the indie rock Zach braff would put on a soundtrack.

Live albums are rarely good, and this is not an exception though for different reasons than usual! this actually sounds really good for a live album from a production and recording standpoint, and then it’s just a terrible performance. Why is he like that live? Why were the horns so bad? Why was he yelling instead of singing? If I’d gone to that concert it would be to hear him singing! Reluctant extra star because it really is an impressive live recording

This was compelling and weird and thoroughly ruined every time the guy started talking

The bangers elevate this above all the Neil young before it but I have to believe this album is on the list based on their strength alone. The rest of this is entirely forgettable

happy mondays on bummed bravely asks the question "what if a mancunian smoker did a bob dylan impression while he was already doing a david byrne impression" and the answer is "it would be annoying most of the time"

I don’t have much exposure here and I’m torn between being predisposed by the reputation of the music and the reputation of morrissey, but I enjoyed it

I didn’t know what this was and I still don’t know what it is but I liked it

That’s the good stuff when it comes to Frank. Much more engaging than the previous one we got

The lack of an E street band made this tolerable

For a genre that so often loses me because the music and instrumentation is exactly the same for an entire album, this was pleasantly surprising and varied.

Not as close to no skips as I thought I remembered, but it is a masterpiece.

Are all Björk albums one long song? This one and the other one we've had felt that way, but it isn't a bad thing. It was weird and mostly enjoyable which is about what I'm after from Björk

Weird but mostly good! I can hear it in the basement with a lot of other inspirations of a lot of the music I really cherish

Dreadfully annoying

worst or second worst live album we've had so far, but mercifully short

This was mostly fun! It's not something I'd ever come across or reach for unprompted, but I enjoyed my time with it

What if a kings of Leon knock off was also a jam band

I really hate this on so many levels! It's the platonic ideal of annoying 60s rock and it's the most annoying because it's so organ driven. Jim Morrison and the deification of him has always always grated for me. Especially the ones that subscribe to the theories that he was still alive for a time. He very clearly was desperate to die from doing drugs based on this album, of course he is dead.

I am not with this in principle or in execution

This was mostly inoffensive until it wasn’t. I’ll never be high enough for Frank Zappa I don’t think

The hits are pretty darn good, a lot of the rest of it is weird (respectful) but not earth shattering

this was exactly as weird as you'd ever want it to be! he's a genius of the weird lil guy genre! there's not really any issue i can take with anything here except that if I'd not been in the right space for it i would have not liked how weird it is instead of loving how weird it is

I did not expect to enjoy this as much as I did. It gets too noodley fairly often, but it never really got bad enough for me to even notice it, which is about what I expect from chicago

This feels like a subgenre of 90s alt rock that I can't stand. Acoustic guitar-led sort of cloudy vocals. Toad the wet sprocket. Lemonheads. All them things. They all had a hit, and those are fine, but an entire album of them is distasteful.

There is so much amazing stuff on this album, but the stuff that is bad is so, so, so incredibly bad.

worse than the other 2, glad we're done with this

this was WAY more boring than I remembered it being, and way more boring than its reputation suggests it should be. what a dreadful era of music

sometimes fun, mostly weird

a little much as an album, but very good vibes. had no idea about this going into it, came out enjoying it

So many otherwise good songs ruined by Tom petty singing he was so annoying on his early work lol

It’s kinda all the same

Foundational, a little much as an album, some extremely important standout tracks

doors organ driven light my fire: one of the most annoying songs on earth ananda shankar sitar and moog light my fire: amazing. perfect. beautiful.

Bowie kinda lost his fastball after Ziggy for me, and this one goes back and forth between being very interesting and the garden variety Weird Bowie that makes up most of his backlog

One of the best voices in western music history

This was sooooooo boooooorrrrriiiinnnnggggg but an impressive number of times to write the same song

this was infinitely better than the other police album and still incredibly annoying for most of its run time.

The singles are unfairly maligned, but the whole thing was always more “musical” and less “concept album” and that is grating to me

This was pretty snoozy (respectfully) mostly

I’m told this is the first true psychedelic rock so I guess at least I know who to hold responsible for the rest of it

So much better than I expected it to be. It doesn’t all sound like That One CCR Song like so much of the other album we’ve had did. And nothing boined or toined.

I was over this before it even got to Layla. It's fine for the most part. I can see why it would have been amazing in its time thanks to this exercise.

This sounded like royalty free 80s rock and then it went to absolute hell with a born to be wild cover kill me before subjecting me to that again please

Therapy waiting room music, but some of it is nice

I can hear Colin Meloy telling me how important this album is but that doesn’t make me enjoy it necessarily

There’s nothing here but the single, a baffling choice for the list

Live albums are rarely good but this IS an exception! It well recorded well produced and well performed. The crowd gives it a lot without taking away from it.

Liked every song but every song was too long. They all overstayed their welcome.

I appreciate how timely this is, given the Oasis reunion news. There is one good song on this album and a bunch of unbelievably annoying ones. It is absolutely insane that they were ever placed in a "rivalry" with the Gallagher brothers, who are absolute knobs and wildly overrated in their own right, but Blur never came close.

Hated the entirety of this

This was no skips for me as a kid. Still almost entirely good

The hits are the hits but otherwise pretty snoozy

None of this was interesting enough for me to notice it while doing other things

I know that this IS a Tom waits album but so much of it sounds like a caricature of Tom waits. It’s Tom waits at his most Tom waitsy (this is not a good thing to be)

It's not my bag, but I get why people love it so much. Some standout moments.

Wasn't overly familiar with it in the first place and now it kind of feels like a novelty

This was almost entirely amazing, but that is the worst version of i'm so lonesome i could cry i've ever heard. it was so grating for reasons i can't pin down. star deducted for that alone.

Bowie can and did do whatever he wants, but this was upsetting at release and is more so now for different reasons

I loved so much of this. She has such an interesting voice and the instrumentation was varied and surprising at times. Title track and Joy are two of the most annoying songs we’ve encountered

That was.... a lot. If you played almost any of these songs I'd be like "that's pretty good" but I don't know that I'd have a huge appetite for more. As an album, it's a lot of kind of the same thing. Is he recording all of his vocals through a megaphone, or does his voice just sound like that? Extra star because you can tell they said "this is a little light can you put down a couple more tracks" and the result was a song about cold drinks and a song about basketball

This was chill as hell

yeah that's the good stuff. this is what made the white stripes the white stripes and they never fully recaptured it across a full album in followup efforts. almost all of this is really good and no frills in an authentic way instead of feeling like it was a gimmick (a lot of the rest of their catalogue and jack white's solo career)

fun, dancey, anti reagan, what can you complain about

Probably my favorite album from an artist and genre i never would have discovered or listened to on my own. I liked the whole thing. Her voice is remarkable. One star deducted for the song with the child.

there were exactly 3 different rock and roll songs in 1957 and all anyone did was put different words to them, so i dunno how you could possibly need a 12 track record. nothing is particularly objectionable here on it's own, but it is not a good listening experience as an album.

The problem with this and so much post rock is that it’s an entire album that sounds like an intro for a song that never starts

a lot of the content here is really good, but richie edwards voice has always been a non starter for me

A triumph for weird lil guys everywhere. I feel like this is as good as everyone says Dylan is.

every song is a bit too long for listening at home as an album, but no skips

there's nothing particularly bothersome here, but not very much of it was exciting either

Like if one of the replacement ramones who was super into the doors and velvet underground tried to make the most annoying album they could

live albums are rarely good and this was undeniably the worst one we've had. as far as jazz goes, this wasn't as bad as i was expecting, but the whole experience was not good. learning that recording a live album at the village vanguard with light dinner conversation in the background of all your songs is a rite of passage for jazz artists was upsetting.

it was fine

chill as hell

some of the least elvisy elvis ever, surprisingly varied for a 50s rock and roll album.

it's fine, i guess. the hits are the hits, the rest of it is so dreadfully boring compared to every musical genre that came after it

a sometimes good sometimes terrible rolling stones impression (shocking to learn Mick Jagger apparently thought this album was a better Sticky Fingers). doesn't feel cohesive as an album, but still mostly good

this was mostly pretty boring

5 star no skips. the foundation for the vast majority of riff-led metal being made to this day. on a less positive note it is also, along with ride the lightning, the source of even more lead guitarists covering up how much they suck with a wah wah pedal.

i've heard to be young before and i gotta say i thought it was from the 70s. it's pretty good. the rest of it sounds like it's from 2000 but is trying to be from the 70s and was pretty bad.

i read that someone described oliver's army as "a single radio couldn't refuse" and i am guessing that is purely because of the political content because every song on this album sounded the same and it was all a snooze fest.

Dwight Yoakam is the sweet spot of all country for me and this is his most complete album. He’s not Nashville he’s not Bakersfield he’s not honky tonk he’s not rock, but he’s each of those things and more when he feels like it without ever seeming hewn to the rules or expectations of any of them, and without ever seeming like he’s cramming them together without thought. The title track is perhaps the all time masterpiece of the Killin’ Folk What Done Ya Wrong genre of songwriting. He’s a master of sad sack country songwriting. The Pete Anderson guitar work is often imitated and rarely matched by other artists. 1 star deducted for the hymnal.

if you stuck to the hits and a handful of the other songs on here you'd have one of the tightest no skip albums of the 90s instead of a double album full of some of the most forgettable music of the decade

this was mostly enjoyable, but not my bag

i would imagine that my politics align fairly closely with Michael Franti's, but so much of this album just made me laugh because it's so dated?? Like setting aside that I don't even know if it ever gets away from spoken word and into hip hop very often, there is a lot of very (by today's standards) softy lefty ideas here, couched weirdly on the title track within the boomers' near-satanic panic about their grandkids watching too much tv and i don't know how i'm supposed to take it seriously. I know that the line "well, the only soda I that support would be a union C.O.L.A. cost of living allowance" probably hit some people like a ton of bricks in 1992, but it did not land for me in 2024, and around the time he made the "military intelligence is an oxymoron" joke i really lost the will to continue. the instrumentation and sampling was great, though

This is in the running for biggest delta between its reputation and how much it sucked

this was neat, idk really how to explain it any better than that

fun all the way through

yeah sure. i don't reach for this genre often, but i can tell this is standout

formative album for me, engendered a love for concept albums in me that essentially no one else has ever satisfied.

AC/DC makes music for venues to play between bands

High highs and low lows

my tastes made me wary of this album but I liked it a lot. It avoids all the jazz stuff I don’t like and focuses on the stuff I do

I do not get the smiths and I am at peace with that

maybe the most unnecessary double album i've ever encountered? not much deviation from the standard nick cave experience

haunting, interesting, mostly fun

I vibed with this one way more than I did the first one.

Instrumentation 5 stars vocals 1

Vocals 5 stars instrumentation 1

one trick pony but the one trick is pretty darn good

In the right time of life and/or mental headspace this fucking slaps

All timer, no skips, perfect combination of her unbeatable vocals with a buncha guys singing backup like they know what they did wrong

Live albums are rarely good and this one is not an exception, but it's not the worst one we've had so far. In my late thirties I'm thinking "Motorhead opening with Ace of Spaces is wild, why is anyone hanging around past Overkill." One time in my 20s the answer was "Cause Judas Priest is on next" and that concert was maybe the drunkest I've ever gotten. There's much better ways to listen to this band than a live album

the vocals of depeche mode have always been a non starter for me, so the almost entirely acapella sexy breathing song really ruined my night. i also did not care for the songs that sounded like they were from a castlevania soundtrack

Probably my favorite hip hop album of all time. Takes a sledgehammer to the walls of what music can be behind rap. In the hall of fame of rap’s double entendre venereal jokes, “like a Chevy in quicksand” before that beat shorts out and comes to life is inner circle

Hell yeah this is what I was hoping for more of from this list. In a genre that seems to mostly be on rails this album bends them in a very pleasing way. Bossa nova is mostly fine but this was really nice to listen to and stood out in a way very little bossa nova ever has to me

That sure was one of The Rolling Stones albums of all time

I can easily imagine in 1968 that there was so little going on that someone could hear this and it could be so experimental and different and interesting that they’d be like wow this is so experimental and different and find it very entertaining, but i am listening to it in 2024 and it isnt interesting it’s annoying

Was worried I might have to grudgingly admit this slapped until jealous guy started. I am willing to admit that my view of Lennon is colored by current events and because I just finished For All Mankind where they retcon his assassination to fail and I spent a good couple minutes imagining how insufferable he would have continued being. But I am not willing to admit that much of this album was any good

One of the more annoying kinds of albums you come across on this list is “someone with an interesting voice who chooses to use it to make annoying noises instead of singing good.” This is only here for tainted love.

I regret to inform the rolling stones that we do not all need someone we can cream on. It boggles my mind that anyone ever let ugly british guys get away with this kind of cosplay. Extra star for gimme shelter which would be ten thousand times better if Merry Clayton sang the entire song instead of just backing vocals

I don't think I've ever heard any Harry Nilsson besides the obvious one before and I imagine if I listened to this record again in 6 months i would say the same thing

The album is probably not the format in which to listen to the blues, but there's a lot of really good stuff here

That sure is one of the Radiohead albums! I don’t mind anything here but none of it stands out either.

Went into this completely blind, never heard of it and it was genuinely lovely almost the entire time.

This was mostly good but there were a few moments where the vocals were mixed so prominently it sounded like someone was in the room singing karaoke to you

pairing guitar virtuosos with a Front Man™ instead of a journeyman always ends in disaster. I cannot stand Roth's vocals or antics. there's some good stuff here but it's all of a time and the dated sounds don't really hit for me

i don't think i get it

immaculate vibes

Hard to argue with anything here, it's always been a vibe

fuck. listen, it's fine, OR WHATEVER, but give it a rest there's no possible justification for including this many albums that all sound like this from this one dude. it has added nothing notable to my pre-death experience

This sounds like junior varsity police and I hated every dreadful second of it

This felt spiritually shoe gazey if not musically in a way that was compelling

The only redeeming quality of this album is its brevity.

Surprisingly I enjoyed 3 of these tracks. The xylophone solo was a deal breaker and the opening track’s timing fuckery made me feel like my atoms were in the wrong spot

This was good but that doesn't justify how much gd neil young is on this list

No complaints here, score one for mom's music

There's some really good and influential stuff on here. One of my first mentors in my professional life was a grizzled former session musician who was very good friends with everyone in Pantera and often told the story about how in 1999 when the Dallas Stars won the Stanley Cup there was an absolutely nutso party at Vinnie Paul's house and Guy Carboneau tried to toss the Cup into the pool and missed and that's where the visible dent during the parade came from. The Cup was then allegedly wrapped in a bungie cord anchored on either side of the pool and ridden by women like it was a mechanical bull. They're all such complete dickbags that it's kinda gross to listen to though.

The timeline of an album called Live Through This with the deaths that preceded and followed its release is crazy. I don't think I would have succeeded. Almost a no skip album

This had aggressively mediocre side project energy.

There are very few weak tracks here, but there are so many in total that it's a lot as an album listening experience.

Platonic ideal classic rock type stuff. There's nothing to write home about in complaint or compliment.

The call and response of vocals to guitar on dire straits makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside

joyfully noisy without being repetitive like a lot of their peers

This has aged maybe the most poorly of anything we’ve had so far

I gave it my best shot, but no thank you

when i was a child my mom took us to this place called visible changes in the mall to get our hair cut and they always had music like this playing

Very many pleasant memories of this album from my childhood except for I've Had Enough. I've Had Enough inspires Bridge Over Troubled Waters levels of fury inside me. I cannot stand that song.

this was mostly unintrusive. one of the songs sounded like the mario 2 theme for a minute that was nice

The motherfucking Beatles opening an album where they describe taxes with the understanding of a 12 year old who had nothing to read but ayn rand on a transatlantic flight did not do much to dissuade me of my stance that the Beatles suck shit, and neither did the rest of the album

The hits are the hits, but the rest are definitely not hits

this album feels like a beige doctors waiting room

i did not enjoy the vast majority of this, but i did find it funny after learning the back story of it

very yes

All timer for a reason

Nasty business to trick everyone into listening to a junior varsity arctic monkeys album

There is a Neil Young amount of unnecessary Elvis Costello on this list, and this is yet another one that doesn't even have Alison on it. What a snoozefest.

No thank you Neil

This was almost impressively miserable!

Extra star and relisten just for Underwater Rimes

I feel like this got completely blown out of the water by its contemporaries, but it's a perfectly fine brit pop album

it's noisy and loud and brash and loud. i love it, your honor.

I liked a couple more songs than I expected to but I really did not like the other ones. This man’s career is unfathomable.

i'm still very confused as to how this made it on to this list. are there other soundtracks? i am surely missing something culturally here, but parts of it were fun.

Sure why not

this is really boring but i can see it really blowing some minds in 1975

had no previous knowledge of this, liked it enough to listen to more hookworms

This was musically interesting, but we're not far enough removed from the last Elvis Costello album for me to really enjoy a guy that sounds like Elvis Costello.

I was ready to apologize for accusing the Charlatans of being junior varsity Oasis based solely on the album cover but then they turned in the most junior varsity Oasis album they possibly could have. It was fine throughout.