This is heavy music--there's a lot going on here, and I don't think this is a jazz album to drop in the middle of a broader range of styles and say, "Here, this one is one of the best." It may be, but it's for hardcore jazzheads. I think "Mingus Ah Um" or "Mingus Plays Piano" is better for the general listener to get familiar with Mingus. This would be better suited for "1001 Jazz Albums To Hear Before You Die." Great album? Probably. Over my head? Definitely. 3/5, just because our esteemed editors haven't read the room. Including this album is just pretentious or lazy; not sure which.

He told me Let the children lose it Let the children use it Let all the children boogie I miss you, Starman.

I didn't listen to this shit when it came out, and I'm not listening to this shit now. Metal sucks.

I love Kraftwerk, but I like them for their role in music more than I do for individual songs (although many of them are very good). To think that this album is 50 years old and sounds so "ordinary" to modern ears (a complaint I have read here) shows just how groundbreaking and influential this album has been (and the entire body of work by Kraftwerk). They've influenced art rock, electronic music, EDM, and hip-hop and probably many other genres. Many imitators, but this is the source. Kraftwerk has always been ahead of their time, and this earlier work stands as a testament to that. Standouts of this album are the title track (an ambitious 22:47, an entire side of an LP when it was released), and "Mitternacht."

Can't get enough of Morrisey's whining? Want something a little faster? Try Suede.

Really wasnt in the mood for it. I know Wu-Tang Clan is widely respected, but I liked the Wu-Tang vs. Beatles mashup more. Hip Hop lacks melody in general, and I'm too much attached to melodies and riffs.

Really consistent. Metallica lives up to its name, no fluff here. Not my favorite genre, but I respect their commitment to the sound.

I can understand how this album became so popular. She has a great voice, and it's presented really well throughout the album. Her richly textured voice has a good crack/yodel in it, and it sounds natural and she doesn't overuse it. Reminds me of Amy Winehouse and Joss Whedon. Her cover of The Cure's \"Lovesong\" is plaintive and authentic. As with many artists, I enjoy Adele when I hear her, but I don't feel the need to seek out her stuff, as it is so easy to hear in the zeitgeist. Least favorite track: \"Rumour Has It\" for its repetitive chorus. \"Rolling in the Deep\" is a banger.

Early rock 'n' roll is tediously repetitive. Elvis appropriated country and blues (to put it politely) and I find his posturing and peculiar, affected pronunciation and singing style more annoying than the monotonous music. He sounds like a parody of himself.

Super-chill, easy background music. No standout tracks, but no clinkers either. The album plays like a continuous song.

Oh hell yes. Every song could be a single and the entire album rocks as a whole. Masterpiece!

Having heard most of these songs on the radio for as long as I can remember, it's hard to dislike this album, but just the same, once I heard it all straight through (for the first time in my life!) at 55, I must say that I can hear further evidence that 1971-1972 was a peak period for pop music, and by 1973 the tarnish was beginning to show. Pop got a little too overdone, and I hear moments of this in Macca's compositions (see also "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" by Elton John). I think it's great that pop outgrew its 3-minute 3-chord adolescence (and my favorite records in my collection will reflect it), but these over-orchestrated and over-produced records in the early 1970s drip with syrup and it doesn't age well. Served better warm than 50 years cold.

I remember when this album emerged into the zeitgeist of my high school around 1984. We felt so naughty singing along to "Add It Up" and "Blister In The Sun" out of our parents' earshot. I always have appreciated the raw angst of the album, but Gordon Gano's voice was too much to endure for an entire album. Now so many years later, I don't find it as abrasive as I once did, and I hear some Gun Club hellbilly noise and junky looseness and even some Jonathan Richman outsider individuality that eluded me the first time around. (TBH, part of my resistance to them was their popularity with peers.) Refreshing to rehear the Femmes' debut anew. I suppose they were the prophets of punk and underground my young ears actually needed. The Femmes will unlikely be my new old favorite band, but now I can appreciate them more than I have for the last 35 years.

Another example of 1973 showing that pop-rock had experienced a peak in 1971-2, and now things were too overdone, over-produced, and overly serious. This album drips with strings, orchestral introductions and accompaniments. Arpeggios as though this were a soundtrack to some space opera. Elton John is undeniably a very talented songwriter, but this is too much. When his rocker side comes out (Benny and the Jets, Saturday Night's Alright), he's fun and his product fits on one side of a 45. The 11 minute intro (Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding) whacks the listener over the head to Sit Down And Listen To Something Serious. Elton John is an entertainer, and he forgets this at several points on this album and instead asks the consumer to listen to drippy sentimentality (Track 1, Candle In The Wind, title track, etc) or shitty noodling (All The Girls Love Alice).

Yes, I take Keith Richard's rather dim view of much hip-hop. Get off my lawn. With that in mind, this is the hip-hop style I like: midtempo beats, chorus vocals, and most of all, jazzy hooks and samples. No shortage of melody in these tracks.

This record's (over)production and Elvis' stylistic evolution in the 10 years or so since the debut has softened all the stuff that annoys me about Elvis. Which is not to say I love this record, but at least I can listen to it without wanting to claw my ears off. I love "Suspicious Minds" and always have, and it's in spite of his performance. His cover of Jerry Butler's "Only The Strong Survive" adds nothing and in fact is a lesser version (Butler has a far better voice). As I know "Dusty [Springfield] In Memphis" better than this record, I can't help but compare them--same sound, same year of release. The wide open soundstage, the richer orchestration, and the backing vocals is the reason artists came to Memphis and not LA, NY, or Nashville to record, just as other artists went a bit further south to Muscle Shoals to get its signature sound. All in all, this is Elvis handled well while he Elvises his way through other peoples' songs.

This is a no-rules recording, and the band throws everything into it, and somehow it all works. Listeners who only know the later version of the band and Bryan Ferry's torch-singer persona will be absolutely shocked by what a rollicking ride this album provides.

I felt l like I should be wearing a lampshade and spilling a martini all over the rug when I heard this.

Solid product, but Depeche Mode has never really been my favorite band. I don't hate it, but nothing really stands out, either, other than the sometimes over-dramatic tone in Dave Gahan's voice and the over-the-top \"Pimpf\".

Are you kidding?? One of the greatest musical recordings ever. Still, not my favorite Steely Dan album, it's undeniably an incredible recording (from a technical standpoint) with some top-rate musicians. "Home At Last" is probably my favorite track from the album, if I had to pick one.

I love Kraftwerk, but I like them for their role in music more than I do for individual songs (although many of them are very good). To think that this album is 50 years old and sounds so "ordinary" to modern ears (a complaint I have read here) shows just how groundbreaking and influential this album has been (and the entire body of work by Kraftwerk). They've influenced art rock, electronic music, EDM, and hip-hop and probably many other genres. Many imitators, but this is the source. Kraftwerk has always been ahead of their time, and this earlier work stands as a testament to that. Standouts of this album are the title track (an ambitious 22:47, an entire side of an LP when it was released), and "Mitternacht."

In my limited exposure to TV On The Radio, I have always liked Adebimpe's voice in its higher registers, but when he sings a little lower, he sounds like that guy from The National, who gets on my nerves in the first 2 bars. Interesting that both bands are on 4AD. Anyway, for the most part I like TVOTR, but nothing really stands out about this album: just indie rock from the first decade of the 21st Century. I can tell they're trying for something new and still accessible, but nothing really sticks.

If you're going to own one Sinatra Album, you probably would be satisfied with this one--all the songs he's famous for, with that swingin' Big Band sound. He's never really been one of my favorite artists, mostly because he was old and the subject of parodies and jokes by the time I came around.

I wasn't much a fan of this album when it was released--generally not a great fan of the Big Beat sound (Chemical Brothers et al). A little goes a long way. On the other hand, Prodigy isn't going to take a left turn halfway through the album and throw a slow song in. If you need a good workout album, this would probably suit your needs.

Gen-X alt-rock/alt-country rage. I bought this album in my freshman year of college, and it reflected my youthful angst about Reaganomics, neo-McCarthyism, and other forms of inhuman division. Scott Litt brought REM into a larger audience with this album, particularly "The One I Love" and "The End of The World," both good songs played. to. death. This was, in my opinion, a great work and also the beginning of the end for REM. Litt's production made a lot of hits for them, but they lost their way with Green and particularly their 1990's releases Out of Time and Automatic For The People. For for a short shining moment, this was REM bringing themselves to a larger audience, on their terms. A great, angry album.

It's hard to dislike Funkadelic--they are a genre defining band, and beyond that, they're just great fun to listen to. One Nation Under A Groove sounds a little more disco than their earlier albums, and I prefer the more pyschedelic side of the band. Of course, this album does include the incredible "Promentalshitbackwashpsychosis", "Who Says A Funk Band Can't Rock?!" and the title track--all are sick bangers. If you like this album, look back in their catalog as well as more recent stuff and see what you like. There's a rich body of work to discover.

I've only known "Paper Planes" before listening to this album. The rest of the album is consistent with the eclectic samples and sounds from that hit, so M.I.A. has delivered a very consistent album. I particularly like the Eastern tones of some of the riffs in each song--it sounds like a 21st Century soundtrack to a Sri Lankan open market. Besides "Paper Planes" I really like "20 Dollar" (and the Pixies' "Where Is My Mind" reference).

As canonical this album is for any contemporary record collector, in all, it kind of disappointed me. It's not bad, but it didn't knock my socks off, either. I think "Closer" is a better Joy Division album.

I can't stand Jon Anderson's voice. The music is overwrought.

Bittersweet and melancholy, this is a great album for a rainy day. I'm not a heavy Dylan devotee, but I've grown to better appreciate his work. This and Blonde On Blonde are good albums to own if you have any appreciation for Dylan at all.

I'm familiar with a lot of Kate Bush's work; I was a big fan of her throughout her catalog up to and including Hounds Of Love and for whatever reason, she fell off my radar. This album rivals HOL and The Dreaming for what she's known for best: excellent songwriting, top-tier musicianship and arrangements, and state-of-the-art production quality. Fabulous album. Mick Karn's bass on Deeper Understanding is a real standout treat.

Fun and loud. Best Seattle grunge. All the others were too serious.

I didn't listen to this shit when it came out, and I'm not listening to this shit now. Metal sucks.

Queen playing prog is not the Queen most people think of. I found this pretty boring and dated.

It's a rocker, with a lot of recognizable songs. Hard to criticize it, but I definitely need to be in the mood for any classic rock--I heard far too much of it when I was growing up.

If you like to choose between varieties of tea and you smoke weed, you'll love this album. I could only make it through about half and had to switch over to something more modern-sounding.

Lana Del Rey is definitely refining her sound with Chemtrails Over The Country Club, and her voice has never been prettier to hear. But this album sort of goes on and on with the wistful and blank-verse lyrics, California ennui, and sparse arrangements. (Pro tip to Lana: "business conference" doesn't make a good lyric [White Dress]). Nothing really stood out for me, and after half of the album, I felt like I got what there was to take from it. Nice to see some collaborations on this album with Weyes Blood and Nikki Lane.

Quirky, upbeat, and altogether Kinks. While the Stones were playing blues and The Beatles were entering their psychedelic phase, The Kinks were making oddball pop songs (and later inventing the fuzzed out sound that Hendrix and Black Sabbath adopted). The Kinks are underappreciated, IMO, and this album shows their unique approach to songwriting. Recommended.

Disco-era depression. Terrible melodramatic schlock.

This album holds up! Every song rocks, and there's a variety in tempos. I must acknowledge how good the entire band sounds, but Chris Cornell is really the star of the record. I particularly like "Fell on Black Days" and of course, "Black Hole Sun".

Enough harmonies to give The Beach Boys a little competition and one of the legendary supergroups from the 1960s. As an album, it plays a little unevenly--the tone of the opening track (Suite Judy Blue eyes, an ode to Judy Collins) and the second track, Marrekesh Express, give this a easy hippie vibe, but not all songs keep that vibe going. CSN packed a lot of moods into this album, and the flow from song to song isn't always smooth. Undeniably ambitious and living up to the supergroup reputation, this album can be admired for a lot of different reasons.

Honestly, I loved it. I've grown to appreciate some of these old-guard country artists as I get a little older. The music may be a little simple, the lyrical themes are direct, but I love these artists, albums, and songs for their clarity (sonic as well as thematic). Merle Haggard has a great voice, particularly in his younger years, and he delivers sincerely throughout this album. The final song, "Mixed Up Mess of A Heart" sounds like it was lifted right off a Buck Owens record. (This should be only a small surprise, as Buck Owens' wife Bonnie--later Haggard's wife--sings harmony on this record.) If you have any appreciation for that old-school AM Country sound, this album will satisfy.

Ugh.

The thing about Tom Petty is that he started in a pretty good spot. It's hard to hate on him or his music. He didn't have to 'evolve as an artist' or grow into his audience. He just kept cranking out pretty much the same album over and over for 30-some years and died as a pretty well-regarded entertainer. This is a pretty good album from early in his career, and you're not going to shock your ears if you play his last album right after this one.

It's hard to listen to Kanye without having an opinion about the hype--to just hear his recordings and judge them on their own merits, without his reality-distortion field around them. Is this the work of a genius? I won't weigh in on Kanye. But this is a pretty good hip-hop album with some well-selected samples that make this album stand out in the auditory landscape. I particularly liked "Jesus Walks." Overall, the album is too long. I felt like I got the message about halfway through.

Difficult start. Standouts are the duets with PJ Harvey and Kylie Minogue (\"Henry Lee\" and \"Where the Wild Roses Grow\" respectively) and \"Lovely Creature\" in the first half.

Interesting as a relic of early heavy metal, but otherwise nothing to get too excited about. Basic schlocky blues-based rock. I guess the musicians were pretty good, but the album as a whole? Meh.

Absolutely brilliant. Immensely talented musicians playing a pastiche of Americana--deeply familiar and new at the same time. I never tire of this album.

I don't like Eric Clapton. I heard way too much dad rock growing up, and I'm pretty sick of it. However, I can't deny that Delaney and Bonnie were a great group, and I can't hate this album, but I have to draw the line at these wanky long jams that the classic rock years are known for. Nine-and-a-half minutes of "Key To The Highway"?! Three or four minutes makes the point. Get over yourselves.

Getting really sick of these endless "remasters" that throw in so many alternate takes and fluff that didn't make the original cut. Adam Ant was always good cheeky fun, but a little goes a long way. Love the thundering drum sound, but not for 90 minutes straight. The original was good, but more is not better.

Very hippie-60s album, with some psychedelic attempts at bent notes in the voice and a sitar-like guitar sound. Ambitious, but didn't age well. My Back Pages, Why, So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star are probably the best tracks.

Gorgeous album showcasing Dusty's great voice and an album I've owned for years. While this has the distinctive "Memphis sound", her gorgeous voice doesn't get lost in the production. As with "Elvis In Memphis" (released the same year), the soundstage is fantastic and the songs are strong. My favorite tracks here are Just A Little Lovin', Breakfast In Bed, and of course the blockbuster Son of a Preacher Man. Really, not a single clinker on the whole album. The mono release lacks a track, Willie & Laura Mae Jones, also worth seeking out. Reggie Young's guitar on Don't Forget About Me is a great example of the awesome musicianship on this entire record.

I've only been familiar with a few things by Joan Armatrading, but this album makes me want to actively seek out more of her work. The mid 1970s were the heyday of singer-songwriters, but her work, notably on this album, stands out for its varied tempos and themes. I hear some Springsteen storytelling and some British singer-songwriter, a la Richard Thompson, on this, but moreso uniquely Joan Armatrading. Definitely worth a close listen.

This is a groundbreaking album, but its flow is not as predictable as you might expect. Eno starts you with Sky Saw, with a riff intro and a jazzy bassline, but by track 2 (Over Fire Island), he's already leading the listener into a new wilderness of ambient, unstructured tracks. Once in a while you hear something more like a song (I'll Come Running and Golden Hours), but you get lost in some beautiful jungle of sounds and a dream-like atmosphere along the path of the album. What's most remarkable about this album is how this is only the beginning of Eno's genre-defining and category-defying role as a musician throughout his career. Absolutely essential listening for adventurous ears.

I really don't get the whole tortured vampire schtick of Nick Cave. Not my thing. Kurt Weil meets Anne Rice.

I was so excited to get a vinyl reissue as a birthday gift a few years ago. What wasn't there to be excited about? Well, once I unwrapped it and queued it up and started admiring the box and booklet, I realized that George's Eastern philosophy missed on this one. So much excess, so much ego, so much...everything. Pare this back to 60 minutes or less and it might have been a clear message of the monastic Beatle's real and individual voice. Instead, it's just "all too much."

After about, oh, I don't know, 59 seconds, I feel like I've heard everything Fats Domino has ever recorded. Why would I endure an entire album?

I know I know, Jeff Beck is a guitar god, but for fuck's sake stop feeding me dad-rock blues. IT'S BORING.

What a knockout. This is Queen hitting their stride. Pretty much only The Prophet's Song recalls their earlier proggy work as found on Queen II and their debut. The rest of the work absolutely wrecks what their peers in prog, Very Serious Musicians, were doing (I'm looking at you, King Crimson and ELP, to name just two). Queen leapt onto the stage disguised as jesters (Bohemian Rhapsody, an absolute runaway hit when it was released) and revealed themselves to be kings with this album. This album sounds best when it's played LOUD.

All bangers, great flow. In 1978, when The Cars broke into the scene, the Loop, the top hard-rock AOR station in Chicago, promoted this band and album heavily. Guitars, yes, but synths?! It sounded so futuristic to me, and quite uncharacteristic for a station that held Zeppelin and the Stones up as gods. It's undeniably good New Wave music, bridging a lot of stuff on the scene in 1978--post-disco, post-punk, power pop, AOR and Top 40. There's something for any fan of rock music here. Excellent mix and production all around.

Yacht rock spun in a blender with modern soul, hip-hop, and jazz. Thundercat is immensely talented but too stoned to take himself too seriously. Obviously polarizing, based on the scores other listeners have given it. Much like Steely Dan. IYKYK.

Considering this album came out in 1962--when the Motown label was only 3 years old and albums were nothing more than collections of singles--Booker T & co. made a good set of singles to put on the hi-fi and dance around the living room. Is this on par with What's Going On? No, of course not. But considering the evolution that R&B and pop music went through in 8-10 years and the expectations listeners put on an album, this is a collection of some early R&B better than most from 1962. Besides Booker T.'s relentlessly soulful organ, guitarist Steve Cropper--as described by Keith Richards--is "Perfect, man." I love Cropper for all that he doesn't do. He's never there to show off, just to support the groove.

Undeniably great funk/soul/pop/rock album. A milestone, but better than that, it's just great music that has something for everyone.

God damn it. STOP FEEDING ME DAD ROCK.

The music was good psychedelia, but man, that narrator was annoying.

Like De La Soul, Digable Planets, and even Digital Underground, the Jungle Brothers delivered some funky, jazzy beats with insightful and fun lyrics. This is a good example of the late 1980's alternative hip-hop. Recommended.

BB King is absolutely a major figure in the Blues, but in a way, he stands so high in the genre, he's apart from it. This is a solid performance with an enthusiastic crowd. I have been lucky enough to see BB King twice before he died, and I don't consider myself a big fan of the Blues. BB King, however, is a consummate entertainer, a brilliant guitarist, and an empassioned vocalist. The band is right there along side him, right in the pocket. Great live album, and I don't like live albums.

I'm not a big fan of the first 2 albums, I like some of their other stuff, but overall don't understand the hype they get. Amnesiac appealed to me when it was released because it's the most triphop of all their albums, and I was in a big triphop mode in 2001.

Short and sweet. Easy listening for eating, socializing, and putting the moves on the SO. Good gateway into Brazilian-tinged jazz.

I'm pretty new to Shuggie Otis, but this album makes me want to explore more of his work. I definitely hear new turns of the soul/R&B phrases here like Sly Stone, Marvin Gaye, and Stevie Wonder were also creating new forms of R&B around the same time. The analog synths on this album are of particular note--probably only Stevie Wonder was doing more with electronics in the R&B field at this time. Great rhythms and basslines, interesting arrangements, all around a great soul album.

Funky beats and a great flow. A classic.

If this were an instrumental album, I'd like it a lot more. Van Morrison has a voice like a cheap door alarm.

I'm not a big fan of Dylan--I don't like his voice. However, I recognize that he has cast a long shadow across popular music. Hearing him at this turning point, I'm sure glad he picked up an electric guitar, because just imagine how insufferable the rest of the 60s and most of the 1970s would be if he had stayed entirely in the all-acoustic "pure folk" camp. Ugh. Anyway, I definitely prefer the electric stuff on this album, mostly because The Band (aka The Hawks) could play the ever-loving shit out of their instruments and worked so well as a unit. I still can take only so much of his voice. This is a good album if you can get past that.

Incredibly ambitions, fairly avant-garde in parts. Listenable, but not my favorite by her.

Beautiful, melancholy Britfolk. I have a limited appetite for Britfolk, but this suits me well. I can't decide if this is better played in the morning or as the night's closer, but it's deep, introspective, and definitely worth a listen.

It's good to see something from outside the US and UK, but this was kinda boring after the first couple of tracks.

I remember liking this album back in the day. What was I thinking? So middling throughout.

I have a fondness for this era of Stones albums--they're nasty, dirty, and finally living up to their reputations. This isn't Beggar's Banquet or Goat's Head Soup or even Sticky Fingers, but still a damn good album. "Midnight Rambler" is probably my favorite, but there's really not a bad song on the set.

A monumental album, but I don't recommend this one as your entry into jazz. Try "Kind of Blue" or even better, Brubeck's "Time Out." Maybe some Thelonius Monk ("Brilliant Corners") or Charles Mingus ("Mingus Ah Um"). This one is a tough listen for the uninitiated. This is modal jazz, bordering on free jazz, and not background music. It can't be broken down into tracks, it's a single work, and it is a triumph, but if you're expecting "The Girl From Ipanema," you're going to have a hard time.

Bluegrass and country are genres I've only recently come to appreciate. It's interesting, then, to consider that this album's credit is first given to the "second wave" of artists, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, collaborating with the "first wave" of Bluegrass/Country/Americana artists. I loved listening to this, in spite of the banter between songs, which would surely get on my nerves in future listens.

It's not my jam, but it's not awful. Kinda reminds me of Gwar for its campiness, but just a different, electroclash sort of sound.

I hear a lot of Beatles in this, especially Paul's influence. I find the most popular tracks on this (Coconut Song, Into The Fire, and Without You) the most annoying. He really started out well with the first two track though.

I've never listened to this entire album straight through, and while there are no big suprises, there are also no needle-scratching disappointments, either. This is a solid album, even if Billy Corgan insisted on singing on all of them.

Can't get enough of Morrisey's whining? Want something a little faster? Try Suede.

Difficult listening from an artist who maybe is less concerned with the audience's feelings than his expression, who was experiencing a real crisis in his life. Mad respect for this output, but it's not a "fun" record. It does take concentration and patience.

No.

Johnny Cash is regarded as some great master now that he's dead. He sure had an interesting life and a rocky career, but he missed at least as often as he hit ("Everybody Loves a Nut"?!--drugs are bad, m'kay?). On the other hand, these prison albums are great. This one, featuring other performers, is a bigger, broader show than Fulsom. Both are great albums, capturing great performances.

I want to hate this album. I hated Duran Duran from 1983 until whatever year it was that they covered "Ball of Confusion," and then only begrudgingly gave them cred because "Ball of Confusion" would be a banger even if Judy Collins and Gordon Lightfoot had turned it into a slow duet. What I'm saying is that the cool kids at my high school didn't like Duran Duran, only the posers and jocks and cheerleaders liked them. But now that I'm older and wiser and know it's all about the funk, punk, I have to give credit. This is an excellent pop album. John Taylor obviously worships at the altar of Bernard Edwards (Chic), and if you don't believe me, go look up the isolated bass track from "Rio" on YouTube. So tease up whatever hair you have left and dance around the room singing into your hairbrush and have fun with this album.

Is this the same sort of 5-star album like "Thriller"? Absolutely not. This is more a cultural change put to tape. I don't put this on so I can dance around the room ("Thriller") or rock out ("Marquee Moon"), but instead to peer into a moment in time when music somehow changed--I listen to it to seek that one thing where it all pivots. I haven't found it yet in this album, but I know it's here. Punk was born in this album, but maybe it just sounds like so much 1970s singer-songwriter stuff that came out around 1975 to some people (maybe even worse). But Patti Smith's authenticity and earnestness as a poet combines with New York musical grit on this debut. This is an OG punk and her band shoving off from shore and trying anything, as long as it's real.

Much better than I expected it to be. I like this nitty-gritty American music, but I also can take only so much most of the time. Besides the excellent musicianship (and sparse arrangement), what really grabbed me was the sincerity of the lyrics and Welch's delivery. I listened to this one twice, back-to-back, and I'll return to it.

Fun, funny, bangin', psychedelic, all around great. Absolutely essential listening.

Better than I remember, but still not a huge fan of his voice. Booker T lends a lot of soul to this.

A good ambient electronic album, but essential? Not sure how some kid twiddling around with synths in his bedroom can be a pioneer of electronic music if he didn't release it right away. It's good, and I'd listen to it again, but I don't see how this particular album is a great example of pioneering ambient music. How about Cluster? They were making and releasing ambient electronic music 15-20 years earlier than this.

Tim Buckley sounds like a sex tourist just back from a Mississippi bordello on this album. I sure hope this album got him laid, because I can't see anyone else gettin' it on to this skin-crawling performance. 1972 was a much better year for music than this album attests (Ziggy Stardust, Exile On Main St, Transformer, Talking Book, Music of My Mind, Big Star's #1 Record, Harvest, and so many more). Skip it.

If Jonsi (Sigur Ros) sat in for vocalist Dave Bayley on a Glass Animals album, it would sound like this: better than Sigur Ros, but ruined by that damned falsetto. I struggle to understand what's so exceptional about this album besides its utter banality.

Great album for jumping around in a frenzy, partying and raising hell with your friends, working out, or even cleaning the house. Not a great album for dinner music, working at your desk, or being stuck in traffic.

Fun country/rock, opens with some Texas swing styling. I don't know enough about country to say that this is absolutely better than other albums by artists of similar status and era, but I will say it's a damn sight better than the "country" crap that seems to be prevalent right now.

Two massive hits, and you think you've heard all that you need from this album. You'd be missing out on Roland Orzabal's genius as a composer. As with "The Hurting," Orzabal seems equally comfortable creating a memorable pop song as much as an orchestral mood piece. A pinnacle of 1980s pop music.

Sometimes, I miss drugs. Other times, I'm reminded of how annoying people on drugs really are.

It's taken me a long time to get my head around Joni Mitchell. I'm only now in my 50s beginning to "get" her. Court and Spark is a great example of her high standards for everything that goes into her recordings. Highlights are "Help Me", "Raised On Robbery", and "Free Man in Paris".

This is heavy music--there's a lot going on here, and I don't think this is a jazz album to drop in the middle of a broader range of styles and say, "Here, this one is one of the best." It may be, but it's for hardcore jazzheads. I think "Mingus Ah Um" or "Mingus Plays Piano" is better for the general listener to get familiar with Mingus. This would be better suited for "1001 Jazz Albums To Hear Before You Die." Great album? Probably. Over my head? Definitely. 3/5, just because our esteemed editors haven't read the room. Including this album is just pretentious or lazy; not sure which.

New York Dolls (and their producer The Runt) delivered proto-punk in the early 1970s rivaled only by The Stooges. Raunchier than the Stones, looser than the Ramones, and louder than just about everyone. Absolutely required listening for any fan of garage, punk, or post-punk.

Hip-hop isn't really my thing, but this had a nice groove. I'd listen again.

Boooooorrrrrrring.

As classic rock goes, this is a pretty good album. However, I'm pretty tired of all the music on it, and I can't say I can think of any later generation of musician who cites Pete Townshend, The Who, or this album in particular as an inspiration. It's...okay. Instead of dying before they got old, maybe The Who just slid into insignificance.

Amy Winehouse was a fine singer, and sure could reach listeners of different generations and tastes. This isn't her greatest work, and it sure isn't essential listening. Her voice is a lot better on Back To Black.

Fantastic soul/psychedelic/funk, made by the Prince of the 1960s and his amazing band. Not quite a perfect album--track 2 isn't that interesting from a 21st century perspective--but damn close. If this album grabbed you in any way, check out Sly and the Family Stone's performances at Woodstock and in the Questlove film, "Summer of Soul."

Remember that guy you bought weed from a few times in college? He was a political science major, or philosophy or some shit, and when you bought your bag from him, he'd expect you to break off the first nug and smoke it with him, and once he'd had a couple long draws off the pipe and pass it to you, he'd start in on some shit he saw as a great indignity visited upon The People and he'd go on and on and you'd take a hit off the pipe and buckle up to be preached at for what seemed like hours and you'd nod politely and add a point here or there, but he wasn't listening to anyone but himself and you'd slowly become aware that music had been playing all along and it's another whining twat who also never seemed to shut up. That's Billy Bragg.

I kind of want to describe this as Fleetwood Mac's White Album, but that analogy doesn't quite fit. The two albums are similar in their sprawl and their individual songs that sound like bunch of solo songs played by a group. Lindsey Buckingham's hand is pretty heavy on this, but that's a good thing. His immaculate production ear really helps the sluggish and boring tracks ("Beautiful Child" is one such song). Overall, this album would have been better if it'd been shorter.

He told me Let the children lose it Let the children use it Let all the children boogie I miss you, Starman.

Stevie Wonder's output could do no wrong in the first half of the 1970s. His incredible run from Talking Book, Music of My Mind, Innervisions, Fulfillingness' First Finale, and Songs In The Key Of Life is so stratospherically great as a subset of an artist's work, I struggle to think of many other 3-4 album runs of any artist that was comparably strong. The Bowie Trilogy comes to mind; Beatles from Rubber Soul to Abbey Road, maybe (obviously a lot of flaws in that period). Paul Simon famously thanked Stevie Wonder at the Grammys in 1976 for NOT releasing an album so that he might win. To call Stevie Wonder a musical genius is not hyperbole. No brags, just facts. So when I get to pick out my favorites among these spectacular albums, it seems ridiculous to say I love this one the least of this group of Stevie Wonder's output. Comparatively, it's a little slow in spots. I guess I prefer Stevie Wonder up front and making my heart beat a little faster. It's really something that an (amateur) critic like myself can make any disparaging remarks at all. Stevie's a genius, and this is a great album. It's just not his GREATEST album.

I'm not very familiar with Japan, but as a fan of a lot of New Wave and post-punk music, I quite like them. This may have been a pivotal album in their catalog, but I think the subsequent album, Gentlemen Take Polaroids (1980) is a measure better. What I like about this late 70s-early 80s era of Japan is that they are bringing the compositional experimentation of prog forward with the cutting edge of synths and electronic drums. As another review said, some of this is utterly forgettable, but the parts that really click /really/ click. This is an excellent example of the moment--synth pop before the cocaine frenzy that folded into the genre in just a few short years.

When the party is almost completely wound down and you're knitted to the sofa, all the wine is gone and the last joint is going around and it's what? two in the morning? and you're all just enjoying the end of the night spent with friends very quietly, this is the album to put on to close out the night. Absolutely perfect.

I found a copy of this album on vinyl at a Salvation Army about a month ago, and it was in pretty good condition, so I bought it. What the hell, for $3, right? Now, I was in high school when this album burst onto the scene, and I thought I knew it because of all the hits that erupted from it, but upon listening to it end-to-end, I gained a much greater respect for it and for Cyndi Lauper. Here delivery at times reminds me of David Johansen (New York Dolls, Buster Poindexter), but a few octaves higher. At other times, her Betty Boop inflection was on-point and intentional. What really struck me is how strong an album, as a single artistic work, this is. It's not High Art, but it's a damn good product and example of 80's synth-pop. I'm surprised I didn't have a taped copy for my Walkman back in the day.

Caveat: I'm reviewing this as a listener who's been familiar with this album for a long time, but I don't consider myself a big fan of hip-hop. PE announced a sea change to hip-hop with their first three albums: "Yo Bum Rush The Show", "Fear of A Black Planet", and this album. They absolutely dominated in the day, bringing social awareness and politics to hip-hop. Respect, even if I don't consider myself a fan.

I love me some First Wave post-punk, and E&TB are definitely of that sound, but I don't see what's so particularly monumental about this album. It's darn good, but did it launch a dozen copycat bands? Introduce a new sound to an instrument that everyone scurried to copy? No. But it's a pretty typical slice of early 80's indie pop. Not bad.

Someone had to do it--a rap opera. That doesn't mean I'm going to listen to it.

The Americana/country rock music that emerged in the early 1970s sounded equally new and old (Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, The Band, the Laurel Canyon artists, etc), and Neil Young fit right in. I get it, his voice can be a deal breaker, but if you like Neil at all, this is probably right in your wheelhouse. I happen to like the music enough to get past his voice. This is probably the best example of Neil Young from this era.

If you like Nick Drake and his low-key delivery, you'll love this album. It's all so low-key that it's hard to parse out the individual songs without giving it a lot of earnest concentration. All this sounds like criticism, but I don't mean it that way. Nick Drake is like still water--it runs deep for those who want to make the deep dive into his lyrics (as the arrangements are bare-bones simple).

Good, consistent product. If you know any Simply Red and you're inclined to listen to more, you'll love this record. I, for one, cannot forgive them for the abuse they unleashed on Talking Heads' "Heaven". For that and Mick Hucknall's MTV-primed pouting and posing, they get my lifelong derision.

If you're going to listen to stoned idiots bang on instruments like toddlers, put some punk on. At least they're done sooner.

Another great album by Pixies. Another great album to listen at maximum volume. Another great album to remember the first time I heard it. A few days later I played "Rock Music" for my roommate who was in a band and loved hard rock and heavy metal, and his face absolutely melted. His respect for my twee indie tastes grew three sizes that day. Another memory of getting this on a vinyl repress after my divorce and absolutely rattling the plaster off the walls with it. And to think this is commonly regarded as only the third best Pixies album.

Carlos Santana is so widely regarded as a guitar god, but then so it Clapton and he sucks, so I've always thought of Santana as overhyped. You see him in music documentaries and he's always, and I mean ALWAYS dropping names, jazz names like John Coltrane, and I think, man, you never played with him, stop that. Then you run across something he did with Alice Coltrane, but then he shows up at those big wanky all-star shows a little too much and I think he's really trading hard on his rep. But you know what? That cat can PLAY.

Nope. I can't bear an entire album of all-acoustic Dylan. Blonde on Blonde and the Basement Tapes are hard enough, but just him with his guitar and a harmonica going on and on like some lunatic busker? I just can't.

There were a few moments in the whole 90s Britpop thing that made it across the pond and even fewer of those songs that I actually like, but overall I consider The Verve, Pulp, Oasis, and all those other sentient haircuts to be churning out the same dreck that was emblematic of the Volume Wars of the 1990s. As though anyone really gives a shit what a white guy in 200-quid sunglasses has to complain about. Shut up already.

The Fall, a little past its prime, but still a pretty good listen. Essential? Hmm...probably not, but knowing a little of The Fall isn't going to do anyone interested in post-punk any harm. Bend Sinister might be a better choice.

Reggae to a white audience ranges from quasi-blackface idiots saying "ya mon smoke some ganja" to elevating Bob Marley to the status of prophet to rejecting Marley as too mainstream, and then finally to recognizing Marley as a great figurehead in the genre. I'd like to think I have achieved the final status as a white audience member, and so I come to Exodus. Words cannot express how damned sick of "Three Little Birds" and "People Get Ready" I am. However, most of this album is a genius politically aware makeout album--no mean feat. Personally I prefer the melancholy Kaya and the angry boogie of Uprising, but this is pretty great album once you get past the greatest hits found on "Legend."

A stupid idea like this smells like flop sweat and desperation.

Half and half electric and acoustic Dylan. I'm not a fan of acoustic Dylan, but the electric tracks on this album are pretty good.

Not sure I'd listen again, but I sure didn't hate it.

Perhaps it's my Reminiscence Bump (wikipedia.org/wiki/Reminiscence_bump) in play, but the postpunk movement is probably the most interesting to me, because I, a few years younger than the bands in the scene, looked up to them and saw the unrealized potential of the punk movement actually being manifested. Art, literature, social justice and activism appeared in the songs and in the zines. Pere Ubu and bands like them brought art to the rock stage in a way that really resonated with me. Several other reviewers have praised "Rip It Up and Start Again" by Simon Reynolds, and I bought it right away. If this album resonates with you, perhaps you'll want to read this book, too. The album kicks off with a fair warning of a tinnitus-inducing alarm to tell us that something very new and different is in play. This isn't your father's rebellious rock--this is a total revolution, so get lost with your 3-chord rock and harmony. Is it "fun?" No, but it's stimulating.

Another brilliant record by the most British band of the British Invasion. The Stones and The Beatles made their bones reinterpreting American R&B, but The Kinks drew their water from a much different well, and their records, and Arthur emblematically, delight and charm like no Beatles or Stones record.

I associated Zeppelin with drug-addled burnouts of my highschool days until I was nearly out of college, and "got" Zeppelin in a new way. At that point John Bonham had been dead ten years or more and I was able to sort through the discography at my will. I came to discover I the heavy blues of the first two albums kind of bore me. I prefer III, Houses of The Holy, Physical Graffiti, and Presence. Three comes at you with more interesting and varied rhythms, and the entire band performs so well, and so well together. I particularly like "Out On The Tiles" - "Gallows Pole" - Tangerine." That's a great run.

Y'know, for the best selling album of all time, it's pretty good, but any time a big blockbuster album of the 1980s drags in an artist from another generation for a cameo, the capitalism of the endeavor really shines through and I feel like I've been taken for a ride.

The first album of introspection and melancholy from Nick Drake. Possibly his best one, but seriously, you can't go wrong with any of them. Good album for nursing a heartbreak. I especially love "River Man" and "Saturday Sun."

My general distaste for soundtracks is displaced by my love for good Chicago soul, and there's little better than Curtis Mayfield and this soundtrack for Super Fly. Short and sweet and oh so funky.

Marianne Faithful has many admirers and imitators, but she's as OG as Patti Smith. This album, which she herself calls her masterpiece, howls with the same passion as Smith's "Horses" or--to avoid limiting this to women in rock--any other great album of loss and redemption.

It definitely has that late-80's (early days of CDs) hard-rock sound. Still a better album than anything recorded by Ratt or Motley Crue in the same timeframe. I saw Living Color at the first Lollapalooza and loved their energy. I think too many people made a big deal that they were a hard-rock band of black musicians. These guys just rock. It's not my preferred style, but I'll give them credit where due.

Any fan of early soul and vocal R&B (Percy Sledge, Otis Redding, The Impressions, Wilson Pickett, Etta James, etc.) probably already knows Solomon Burke's music, and if you don't, you should. Ten times more interesting than Fats Domino and 100 times more authentic than Elvis just on the sheer range and expression of his voice.

Oh, please. These are supposed to be 1,001 albums I need to hear before I die. What is this shit?

If all rap-metal was this sincerely angry and on-point, I wouldn't hate Red Hot Chili Peppers so much.

A milestone in production with a genius of the 3-minute composition. While the rest of the Beach Boys were touring, Brian Wilson took some ideas to the Wrecking Crew and began a process like nothing undertaken before, building layer upon layer of sound. When the rest of the Boys returned, they laid down their inimitable harmonies and Pet Sounds was created--a landmark in pop music. Favorite tracks: Wouldn't It Be Nice, Caroline No, Sloop John B, God Only Knows.

Hard funk with some hard truth.

While Radiohead's peers (Oasis, Pulp, etc) were as much part of celebrity gossip as they were in music talk, Radiohead put their effort solely into the music. That work is really paying off by Kid A. They laid down a whole soundscape of alienation and existential dread.

Really? Out of ALL the music released in the last century, this makes the list of essential listening? WTF is so special about this? It's just another boring, emo, 21st century navelgazing record. It's fine for what it is, but for God's sake, I expect this list to challenge me, not bore me to sleep. This site should be called 1,001 records you may or may not find interesting.

Iiiiiittttt'ssssss ffffffiiiiiinnnnnne. Essential? Hmph.

I find Leonard Cohen much more interesting in theory than in practice. He was a much more interesting writer than musician.

I know it's a controversial opinion, but I really disliked "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road." "Madman Across The Water" is a measure better, because it precedes "GYBR", but it lays the foundation of the saccharine strings and extended arrangements that went off the rails on the later album. I really do like Bernie Taupin's lyrics, Elton John lays 'em down well, and I love his piano. But those strings, man. They weigh it all down so much.

Unfair to 1) throw this among a bunch of rock albums and call it essential without mentioning the rest of her Great American Songbook entries and 2) select the longest chapter in her Great American Songbook as the representative one. Ella Fitzgerald and Norman Granz put a much larger and more ambitious package together, and in this case there should be a "selections from the Great American Songbook," a sort of greatest hits from these albums that should be considered. Gershwin is easy to listen to, but five disks of it is a long slog. Boil this whole body of work down to maybe 2-2.5 hours of music would be a far fairer assignment. All that said, Ella Fitzgerald was a fantastic singer, but she's not my favorite. She hits notes a little too perfectly; she lacked the soul of Sarah Vaughan or the swagger of Lena Horne, not to mention a whole world of soul singers who followed after her. I just get kinda bored of so much Ella.

Disco haters who think the bass gods are Lemmy K and Geddy Lee need to sit down and listen to Bernard Edwards--on second thought, get up and dance to Bernard and Nile lay down the groove. Sister Sledge brings it in their vocals, and this album is a sophisticated, groovy party. Slick funk.

In my opinion, this is the best Flaming Lips album. Yoshimi et al that followed The Soft Bulletin were extensions of this album. The Soft Bulletin is deeply rooted in the Beatles most psychedelic--most apparent on "Suddenly Everything Has Changed" and "The Gash" but this album is no mere imitation of The Beatles. Like any good psychedelic album, there's an overarching theme: the band and its maturation, the harrowing experience of almost losing a member to a spider bite, and the emergence from the experience improved and strengthened. Now strong enough to fight alongside Yoshimi against the Pink Robots.

I read once on the internet that everyone has a favorite Simon And Garfunkel song and if you really listen to it, it'll break your heart. I'm not sure that's entirely true, but so many of the songs on this album sound sweet for their harmony or tempo or melody, and if you listen carefully you'll hear lonliness, alienation, fear of loss, and so many other emotions that can break your heart. End-to-end, it's a great album, but I found the crowd noise in "Bye Bye Love" jarring and distracting, so I have to take a half-star off for that. Rounding up, it's still a five-star album.

If you're gonna own one Johnny Cash album, this is the one.

If you love Dusty, this is probably where it all started for you. She delivers her blue-eyed soul by the shovelful on this short album. I still prefer Dusty in Memphis on the whole, but this is damn good Dusty.

I had known that Emmylou Harris was very highly regarded in the Americana/country realm when I was younger, but having little interest in that branch of music, I didn't know any of her stuff. I came to Emmylou Harris with her collaboration with Daniel Lanois in 1995 with Wrecking Ball, and her shimmering and expressive voice enraptured me. I've been a fan ever since. Now that I know her earlier stuff (back to the mid-1970's), I consider Wrecking Ball the sea change in her sound, and Red Dirt Girl is more of the same. However, this is notable as an album of her own compositions. Lovely songs, beautiful production, and an adventure for the mind, heart, and ears. Only giving it 4 because I think that Wrecking Ball really was the monumental sonic shift in her catalog.

I like the album in spite of it being by U2. To me it's and Eno/Lanois album; they're playing U2 and the studio, so I like it.

Small observation: I've known many more women who like Tom Waits than men. I don't know what to take from that, but it's an observation I've made. I like Tom Waits' old stuff (Heart Attack And Vine, Nighthawks At the Diner, etc.), but this Beefheart-esque stuff is hard to bear. Not my cup of tea, but I think I get it anyway.

A lovable mess of an album, it's a slice of history--John's new fascination with Yoko and her artsy approach, the growing tensions between John and Paul, George trying to get his songs heard, really only Ringo kept his cool, and IMO delivered some of his best drumming of all their albums. There's a lot to criticize this album for, but I love it anyway. Of special note, the 2018 Stereo mix is a goddamned horror to the ears. Stick to the mono mixes.

What, precisely, am I supposed to see as essential about this album? Corny, commercial music, presented as a smattering of singles without a coherent feel of an album...what am I missing? If Pet Sounds made it onto this list, that's all the Beach Boys you need for this project.

So original! They play bar-band blues-rock! It's so retro, it's new! Not like The Black Crowes and a million other bands haven't done it. Now it's an homage, a pastiche, another fucking boring dad-rock album.

This is the fourth Radiohead album I've gotten so far. That seems a little excessive. Nevertheless, this is a good example of their work. Impeccable performances and songwriting about lonliness and alienation. But they all are, so I'm not sure why we're getting so much Radiohead. Pick a favorite or two and let's spend more time exploring other music than late 20th/early 21st century indie rock.

So. boring.

I've said it before, I'll say it again: The Kinks are the most British band of the British Invasion. The Who, The Beatles, and The Rolling Stones all drew their inspiration from American rhythm and blues, where the Kinks wrote clever pop songs from a more distinctly English perspective. You can almost hear the tea kettle whistle in the background as they play. This is an utterly charming album, and I wouldn't change a thing about it.