“Starlings” has to be one of the finest opening tracks on an album that most causal music fans have never heard. Just breathtaking.
Besides 3 Feet High & Rising, this is easily the greatest use of samples ever on an album!
Where to begin? A revolution in sound. It didn't last, but the Alternative nation was an incredible era of music to grow up in.
The beauty of this record never ceases to amaze me. Homemade samples, scratches and Beth Gibbons’ immaculate voice.
“Inner City Life”, along with “Block Rockin’ Beats” by the Chemical Brothers opened my mind to EDM in high school. I’ve loved it ever since!
Bowie doesn’t get enough credit for being a kickass piano player!
Double the fun, double the Max, soluble the brilliance of Lindsey!!!
The sound of the resistance!
1,000 hip hop samples were taken from this bad boy!
The perfect double album, arranged, performed and produced to the nines!
One of the concept albums that never really leave my rotation. A glorious story of betrayal, murder and redemption.
This is just fine. I would prefer Bob Marley or even The Mighty Mighty Bosstones...but this is just fine!
So many great Aerosmith songs throughout their career, but this is the one true classic, 5-star Aerosmith album!
It’s hard to pick a fave, but I think this is mine for the best post-Beatles album by any member!
Biting, devastating, hilarious. All of the feelings with this album.
The king, killing the game that only he could play!
It's easy to forget how good of a pop album band Blondie was. Their singles were brilliant, but their albums were kinda perfect.
A headphone masterpiece, that you better hope involves wireless headphones because you are going to pull your stereo off its shelf dancing around if those headphones are wired in!
Hero worship of David Byrne begins here.
The title song of this album, though not widely known, is one of my go-to sad songs of all time.
Roots rock before that was eve a genre!
All in all, one of the finest stories ever put to vinyl. Pretty sure it got me through high school.
Pollard has written more songs than some people send texts in their lifetime!
Country folk at a level most artists outside of Willie Nelson never reach.
80’s Electronic pop with a sad soul.
The first classic Beatles album to feature all original compositions…and they all Rule!!!
A peak of the hip hop genre that has aged better than almost any album from the period.
The pre- Thriller MTV era in a nutshell…and a great dance pop album!
So perfect. So deeply sad.
The king of New Orleans soul gives us some of his finest sides!
Where Lana starts to become a major album artist.
Breakin' the law, Breakin the law!!!
Harder to listen to now because of the homophobia, but at the time of its release, one of the most important hip hop albums of all time.
Some would say this is better than Thriller. I wouldn't go that far (Thriller is my second favorite MJ album. My first? Bad.), but this is perfection from start to finish!
The versatility on this release. From the baroque folk of “Lady Jane” to the blues jam “I’m coming home”…Incredible stuff!
The most immaculate VU cover ever lived here.
Early Beatles firing on all cylinders.
Such an incredible follow-up to something that probably felt impossible to each or surpass. Perfection.
A hip hop manifesto. Glorious stuff.
A singer/songwriter stretches his wings to give a hint of the path he would take in his experimental 1980s.
Literally save me life, this one.
A sea change at 33 1/3 RPMs
A bright and shining way to start a solo career!
A Sample-forward masterpiece.
The zenith of their power. They were good before and they were great after…but they were perfect here.
Prog Rock moves into the 80’s gracefully with impact to spare!
Raw, powerful and one of the best album covers of the decade
A Last Burst of Pure Genius before the MAGA and the Madness set in.
Basie continues his string of albums that glide him gracefully through his later years!
A dream of a pop album: tough, melodic and sung to perfection.
Beautiful, esoteric and oh so French.
Overshadowed by Plastic Ono Band, this is Lennon and his poppiest, his most optimistic and his nastiest. An incredible statement.
Singer-songwriter Americana at its smoothest.
“The Last Resort” is the fifth greatest song of all time
Beautiful, off-kilter pop .
Early Cure hits so differently and so good!
Never seen the appeal. I understand it is music that moves millions of people, but it is sounds super pedestrian to me.
The finest pop album of the early part of the 10’s!
The birth of metal. Delicious!
Metal perfection…almost Prog metal, but if not it, than it’s forefather!
Every album you discover of Elvis Costello's is such a unique, rewarding experience. Blood and Chocolate is no exception!
The Riff alone is worth 5 stars. The rest of the album is superb as well!
1st major label album, and it set off a run on Warner Brothers that most bands would sell their souls for!
Bob Ezrin finally made this band sound on record like they did at their live shows...Such an incredible record.
Bowie-produced madness. ESSENTIAL.
John Cage-produced bedroom rawk...Essential!
What a journey this album takes you on. Trevor Horn is a production god.
I've heard the sound was not mixed well in the room, but it sounds immaculate on this live recording...Orchestral Metal is a powerful freakin' thing.
Eno, Fripp, Visconti & the Thin White Duke...Making magic in Berlin.
Close your eyes and listen...and you hear Jeff Buckley...It's uncanny!
My fave MJ album, now and forever.
Like their idols The Beatles before them, this is a perfect debut album.
A Pandora's Box into prime singer/songwriter manna, that once opened, can never be closed again. Lives are changed with every song on this one.
Maybe it wasn't trying to be a concept album...but it's the best Prog variety this side of Genesis' Lamb.
Funk metal with a sardonic and biting edge.
Perfect in every way. Never better, never duplicated.
Back when samples ran wild…and the headphones all transmitted masterpieces.
A murderer’s row of talent on a perfect freaking album.
One of those albums that once it enters your conscience, it never leaves your rotation.
This, and Genesis' Trick of the Tail, show that sometimes you can go on without your original lead singer quite successfully!
Post-Punk perfection, from a band whose influence is greatly underappreciated in American.
Sometimes, albums that only got 3 1/2 stars in the Rolling Stone Album Guide are my favorite albums by that artist!
Rage against the dying of the light.
Country clawing it’s way through the 70’s fresh, vital and important.
Power Pop never reached these heights again, until Ocasek produced the first Weezer album!
Metal, as a genre, as a product and as an artform, peaked right here.
How do you put out your first album and shred this hard!??!
Madchester seemed to peak hear...and then came the Gallagher brothers!
The Queeniest Queen this side of Queen!!!
One of the founding fathers of Prog. Still makes you wish things had gone different for Syd.
The most opulent Nick ever got...and god is it gorgeous.
On of the 5 greatest live albums of all time.
Progressive Rock, after many starts and fits, is born with this earth-shattering classic for the ages.
Such perfect pop that even a progger like Mike Oldfield had to cover the title song!