This is the soundtrack to someone trying to sell you something. Commercial, corporate slop with no redeeming qualities other than its brevity.

credit to the Stones, if i built my career around playing these songs over and over again for 60 years i would fucking kill myself

what if every bad rock cliche was stretched out into an 8 minute song. fuck this

I will give them credit, there were times were it sounded like they were at least trying to do something unique. The organ was a nice touch, but overall this is just so lazy. Smoke on the Water one of the most overrated songs of all time.

The clearest example so far this list has given me of white people lazily copying black music to make a quick prophet. Zero effort put into the performances - the guitarwork is by Clapton so it is of course lackluster, the vocalist sounds like a muppet, and there is zero effort being put into anything else.

Completely fine, but also completely unremarkable. More interesting as a study of Jacques Brel the celebrity than Jacques Brel the musician. I have no strong feelings other than I'm reasonably convinced that I can find better recordings of Brel playing these songs on other albums. Why is this on the list?

steely dan are not yet at the height of their powers but still a good if somewhat unfocused album.

One of the most important and influential albums in American music over the past quarter-century. I don't listen to it often but Nas' lyricism and general intensity have solidified this into a stone-cold classic. "New York State of Mind" and "Life's a Bitch" is still one of the best one-two punches in rap history. I think the second half is generally weaker but still consistently good, with some of the beats sounding a bit dated by today's standard. Still excellent.

Not as unpleasant as I was initially anticipating - I even like the song "I've Seen All Good People" and I think the bass playing is pretty fun. The rest of it is pretty standard prog rock wankery that I find pretty distasteful, but that is not new news to me.

Some solid vocal performances but ultimately the tepid instrumentals drag this thing down. Strange songwriting decisions too - One More Dance is a complete misstep. Ultimately this album was made to highlight Makeba’s awesome voice, but it doesn’t have the foundational elements necessary to truly do that.

A solid pop album with some good hooks. Lorde's vocal performances are consistently great and it makes for a nice evolution from her debut. I don't think this is anything particularly special (although Liability is a nice, heartfelt ballad) but it was pretty popular when it came out and it's the first major work that Jack Antonoff produced, kickstarting his career as one of the major forces behind pop music in the past decade or so.

Listening to this made me very sad in a way music has not in a very long time. A uniquely joyless experience.

Not a high batting average for a 20 track album. Never particularly offensive though, just kind of drags along for 75 minutes. Some highlights, some lowlights, could have easily been shortened to a single LP.

Crisp and warm, the performances here are wonderful across the board. A great piece of 50's jazz. It's never particularly flashy playing but they sound and are confident enough in their chops to make such demonstrations unnecessary.

This is the soundtrack to someone trying to sell you something. Commercial, corporate slop with no redeeming qualities other than its brevity.

Not really moving the needle one or another for me on this one. Perfectly acceptably fine performances but not really adventurous enough for me to pay any close attention to it.

solidly scuzzy psych rock, with lots of energy behind it. very fun vocal performances as well!

Great album, finally an old guitar album on this list that actually feels like it deserves to be here. Great performances, interesting and catchy songwriting, and incredibly influential on virtually every post-punk band to follow.

What if the shittiest lamest rock star ever had a full marching band behind him. Fuck off.

Tepid, empty songwriting with a decidedly Christian bent to it. Cheesy crooning that doesn't earn any kind of emotional response. Really only noteworthy because Phil Spector did the production, and he's not exactly at his best here anyway. Another bizarre pick for an essential albums list.

Largely unremarkable pop music that, because they wanted to fill an entire CD, lasts 80 minutes.

An incredibly influential album on a number of different bands and musicians that I really like, but it doesn't do a whole lot for me here. Some of the songs are pretty fun though!

Serviceable and efficient pop music. It's from '81 so it's from pretty early on in new wave's life cycle, which is probably why it's here. It's fine! None of it really stuck with me which is a pretty big problem with music like this. If it's not catchy, then what is it?

I imagine that future generations will treat bands like Brockhampton or whatever in the same way that this generation treats The Doors: a polite smile, a "that's nice", and then ignoring my nostalgia/dementia-induced mutterings of "Ah, you had to be there" and other such statements. (the vocals on Ship of Fools and Land Ho!, though, yikes. don't let the alcohol win, kids.)

Pretty great. Some of these songs are obviously classics of the genre, and even the weakest ones are still pretty good. It's definitely for the best that Fagen would take the reins on vocals in the future though, sometimes those other performances get a bit awkward.

Not the pop perfection they would later reach, but still a solid album with some fun songs on it.

Jeff Buckley's first and only album Grace paved the way for decades of soulful white boys to follow. The first 3 songs are legitimately incredible, and while the album never reaches that high point again, it never becomes unpleasant to listen to. Some interesting harmonies and progressions that kept me on my toes!

I'm sure it was probably pretty cool to have some openly gay musicians in the mainstream in the early 2000s, but the music is pretty terrible. When it's not blatantly ripping off better music (which is not often) it's woefully uninspired and the production is extremely bland, with nowhere near the level of cover or detail the cover suggests.

I'm sure everyone wanted to work with Nigel Godrich after OK Computer, and somehow this mediocre Britpop band got the chance. The songs are pretty mediocre and the singer's near-constant falsetto is definitely grating, but Godrich makes sound as good as he can.

Generic but fun pop music clearly aimed at a teenage audience. Most tracks are fun on their own but suffer when listened to one after the other in an album context.

Every song that isn't something I've already heard a billion times is boring as fuck.

Elvis predicts the snotty vocal delivery of '90s alt rock with startling precision. Other than that, I don't really get much out of this. Silly and fun enough that it wasn't unpleasant, though!

An oddball moment (relatively speaking) in '80s new wave. The vocals and lyrics are definitely atypical and stand out in a good way, and some of the progressions are pretty interesting. Definitely worth a listen even if it's not my favorite thing I've ever heard.

The definition of locking in. Jarrett runs the gamut here, switching effortlessly from classical to jazz to even gospel, and it works brilliantly.

While not the earliest major punk release - Misfits have them beat by a few years - Minor Threat were Ian MacKaye's first band, who would go on to shape punk in his own image. The music itself is pretty great! I tend to think early hardcore is pretty quaint by today's standards, but the riffs here are legit and the drumming is awesome (especially on the first track).

In a remarkable feat, every song is exactly two minutes too long. On paper, this should be the worst idea for a band anyone's ever had, it ends up working as well as it does thanks to the earnest of the execution. Good in short bursts - maybe a song or two - but listening to this all the way through in one go seems a bit redundant.

A 28 minute long album that sounds like it took 28 minutes to make. Sloppy and often strained vocal performances from Elvis with weak backing instrumentation. It put him on the map though, and that’s the entire reason this album exists.

Bland indie british pop from the late 90s. Not worth talking about with any detail. Really glad we get more of this boring shit instead of something that people actually should listen to!

Some solid grooves here along with that classic 90s cheese that's always a bit hit or miss. They really thought they were cooking with those "woaaaaaaooaooaah"s huh.

Pretty ok snotty post-punk. Sounds pretty safe by genre standards. Not exactly accusing them of selling out, just not doing a whole lot

Less good Sparks

Love a rock album with some actual texture. Deadpan vocals mix with the guitars very nicely as well.

Making an album is an incredibly difficult task, highlighted by Stephen here as he very quickly runs out of ideas for songs after track 2. A lot of filler for a 10 track album!

Such a great pop album. Sledgehammer is one of the best songs of the '80s!

Some pleasant but largely unmemorable folky-rock tunes, and also The Murder Mystery, which is insane.

A great slice of gothy post-punk, it's never truly a Masterpiece but it is pretty fun for it's entire runtime. At its best when it leans into the dreamy side of its sound.

Truly an album that deserves its status as an all time great, Simone's vocal performances are unbelievable in how much raw emotion she is able to put into them.

Very dull and unconscionably long. Occasionally there's a nice instrumental flare where the backing band finally decides to do something cool ("Sunken Treasure") but Jeff Tweedy is an insipid, uninspiring vocalist for the album's entire 76 minute runtime.

Your least favorite coworker’s favorite band.

Cute!

british moment

Back to back "not their best but has some good songs and is interesting as a historical document"

Have I not suffered enough

Jert Bansch

70 minutes of essentially the same pretty good rock song / 10

If this was “1001 Songs” this would’ve been great for hurt

I have very little patience for Morrissey.

they call him 0011 0 interesting musical ideas 0 good vocal performances 11 boring songs is neil young a lyrics merchant ⁉️

Great album… for me to poop on.

Remarkable how long this album feels vs how short it is

Don’t really like jazz where the edges have been sandpapered off. Pleasant enough though.

Mediocre rapper flexes unimpressive accomplishments for an hour. Dull as ditchwater