1001 Albums Summary

1994 - 4th album - 59:37 - well-received - Hip-hop/punk/rock/jazz/funk, listened to Miles Davis; hip hop + hardcore; Mike D, Ad-rock, MCA. Sure Shot (jazz flute solo sample; "Come correct"), Sabotage, Root Down (funk), Get It Together, Flute Loop (lol). this felt really long and meandery. lost focus after Flute Loop.

1977 - birth of punk; hard rock; debut; Johnny Rotten (vocal), Sid Vicious (bass); received as "half-singing" and "bullocks" was offensive (beasties later took it to straight up talking/rapping); clearly the basis of St Jimmy in American Idiot; stooges (60s) sex pistols (70s) black flag (80s) beasties (90s). Not my favorite thing to listen to.

2001 - 4th studio album - art pop / glitch pop / electronica / folktronica / ambient - opened to positive acclaim; "thin-sounding instruments = harp, celesta, clavichord, strings, custom music boxes. 'microbeats' from shuffling cards and ice being cracked." "stark melodies, minimalist production. suggesting magic through more powerful sources." "panoramic textures in the background." Singles Cocoon, Pagan Poetry, Hidden Place. After this I went and listened to Homogenic (3rd) and Post (2nd), and honestly I liked Post the most. Probably biased because of my 25-year love affair with Hyperballad. But it did feel more coalesced, more directed. Ambient floaty music isn't usually my style. Though - I love Sigur Ros. Maybe I need to come back to her work with those glasses on. I liked Vespertine more than Homogenic; the soundscape is really something to get lost in, and her vocal isn't as confrontational as it can be on other albums. The cover is SO stunning. Glad I did them all together.

1977 - punk, new wave and British pub rock to elements of 1950s rock and roll, R&B and rockabilly - debut album - he was working a day job as a data entry clerk and recorded this in six sessions; changed his name and look to match Elvis; 3 singles failed to chart in the UK but in US opened to acclaim, "one of the best debuts in music history" Loved this, especially "Welcome to the Working Week," "Waiting for the End of the World" (original 1st and last tracks), and then the 4th single added "Watching the Detectives." This sound has become so ubiquitous, it's great to hear the early DNA.

2012 - solo debut - blues rock / folk / country soul - received favorably; white stripes broke up in 2011; Raconteurs was '08; Dead Weather '09; not sure if it was me or the album but this took me 4 separate listens to get through the whole thing. I loved "Weep Themselves to Sleep" and "Hypocritical Kiss," and just insanely compelling riffs throughout. Happy I experienced it, definitely will listen again.

1985 - 5th & best selling studio album - art pop / progressive pop / new wave / art rock / progressive rock / sophisti-pop; received to critical acclaim and considered her magnum opus; Runnin' Up That Hill went to #3, then #1 in 2022 after ST4; "come on baby, come on darlin" makes chills roll through my whole body; "The second side, subtitled The Ninth Wave, forms a conceptual suite about a woman drifting alone in the sea at night;" "album has been described as post-progressive because Bush voices themes of love and womanly passion rather than the usual male viewpoints associated with progressive rock;" "dramatic, moving and wildly, unashamedly, beautifully romantic;" INCREDIBLE, loved it from the very beginning. Incredible work. Weird, haunting, eerie, emotional. My favorite.

1959 - 7th studio release - swingin pop / traditional pop / rhythm & blues - known to be poorly recorded/engineered & definitely plays that way; "hopelessly banal and inadequate, saved only" by the piano playing of Charles, who "comes through beautifully" - "Am I Blue?" the album's highlight and "almost unbearably poignant..." - "introduces the musical approach he would follow for much of the '70s"; very big band-y, Dean Martin and Sinatra et al; it was okay, not my favorite thing to listen to but his voice is lovely.

1969 - 3rd studio album - british folk rock - well-received; “English folk songs, several Bob Dylan songs, Sandy Denny's signature song "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?", “only traditional song on the album, ‘A Sailor's Life’, is seen as pivotal in the development of English folk rock music.” Influences/contemporaries - the byrds, mamas&the papas, dylan, joni mitchell. Sandy sounds SO much like joan baez. Not a great first track initially, and i was worried. I proceeded to be completely engrossed by this album and its story. “A Sailor’s Life” was the linchpin for me. I loved it. It might not be something I beat to death, but this is a five-star album.

1972 - 6th studio album - British hard rock/heavy metal - contemporaries zep, floyd, and sabbath - most commercially successful album and charted for over 2 yrs; band felt their studio albums didn't sound as good as their live performances & wanted to record on a stage. I did NOT want to listen to this, ugh. "Smoke on the Water," I get it, I don't need any more Deep Purple. One song is enough. But "Highway Star" was SO good? Like, SO good? And then I was just on my little journey. I get it. Ritchie Blackmore is insane, the riffs are so captivating. And the buzzy, distorted tone of the guitar is singular. Drumming also caught my ear, Ian Paice is DOING THINGS. There wasn't a track I didn't actively enjoy. I cannot believe I can easily rate this a 5.

1967 - 9th studio album (only 28 min long) - country - recorded in mount juliet TN; she was ~35 yo; well-received, first album by a female country singer to be certified Gold by the RIAA; country standards as well as her own -- "besides the title song, Loretta offers such well known country tunes as 'There Goes My Everything', 'The Shoe Goes on the Other Foot Tonight', and 'I'm Living in Two Worlds.'" To note, she had been FIFTEEN WHEN SHE GOT MARRIED IN 1948, FUCK. This is my grandma's music. She loved a warble. I listened to this and Coal Miner's Daughter. I think my favorite was I'm Living in Two Worlds. This woman had a tough life and certainly made the best of it.

2008 - 4th studio album - groove metal / nu metal - hgrrrr vocal - well-receiver; original band disbanded in ~2010?; 1:12:00?!; too long; corey taylor liked it, rest of the band hated it. There is nothing wrong with the record but I am choosing to rate subjectively. This is the only kind of music I’ve found that I can’t derive any enjoyment or satisfaction out of. I only made it through half of this and the only one I could almost tolerate was Psychosocial. No man. I don’t need to listen to anything that makes me relieved for silence again.

1973 -- 3rd studio album -- Southern rock / blues rock / boogie rock / Texas blues -- lead single La Grange; "We could tell that we had something special. The record became quite the turning point for us. The success was handwriting on the wall, because from that point we became honorary citizens of Memphis;" "... full of characters and doings so steeped in caricature – yet presented straight-faced – as to invite skepticism. The album is stuffed with color and flavor, much like its famous gate-fold photo on the inside: a gut-busting couple of plates of food from the much-beloved but now-closed Leo's Mexican Restaurant on South Shepherd near Westheimer." I listened but don't feel anything about ZZ Top. I'm good.

1969 -- debut, graham parsons of the byrds and chris hillman (both left the byrds in 1968) -- country rock -- not a commercial success; "modern country music, fusing traditional styles such as folk and country with other forms of popular music including gospel, soul, and psychedelic rock;" "important in the development in 1970s rock;" also harmonizing attempting to pull in things like Everly Bros and Otis Redding (country + soul); "Gram Parsons was passionate about country music's simple poetry. He was equally passionate about rock music. At a time when they were poles apart, he alone thought they belonged together;" "the two R&B standards covered on the album, 'Dark End of the Street' and 'Do Right Woman', are examples of a country-soul fusion that Parsons would often refer to as 'cosmic American music.'" Bob Dylan loved this album. "Picks up where Sweetheart of the Rodeo leaves off." It's reminding me a LOT of ken bethea doing "coahuila" and all of murray hammond's contributions to the old 97's discography. ok yeah the rest of the wiki: "However, its impact on popular music has grown over the years, influencing, for example, the Eagles. During the 1980s, the New Traditionalist movement in mainstream country music was influenced by The Gilded Palace of Sin, with artists such as Travis Tritt, Vince Gill, Alan Jackson, Clint Black and Randy Travis. Today, The Gilded Palace of Sin continues to influence the alternative country movement, often referred to as "alt-country." Bands like Uncle Tupelo, Wilco, Son Volt, Whiskeytown, and the Jayhawks, as well as such musicians as Dwight Yoakam, Lucinda Williams, Emmylou Harris (Parsons' one-time singing partner), and Steve Earle all have recorded music that bears traces of The Gilded Palace of Sin. Non-country artists like Elvis Costello have cited the album as a particular favorite, with Costello covering several cuts during his career; similarly, Dinosaur Jr. covered the song "Hot Burrito #2" on its album Green Mind. In the liner notes for the 1997 reissue, Sid Griffin wrote that while Gilded Palace only sold 50,000 copies, '...like the first album by the Velvet Underground, it would seem everyone of those 50,000 went out and formed a band inspired by what they'd heard.'" this is important to me insofar as it illustrates the DNA from which the old 97's and alternative country music were born. the saloon-style piano is a vibe. I added it to my albums, I enjoy it, I like where the sound traveled in the proceeding musical landscape. I may not throw it on all the time but it is definitely in the world of additional listens for me.

1967 -- 4th studio album -- Rock folk / rock / psychedelic rock / country rock / raga rock -- overlooked at the time but amassed critical acclaim through the years; now considered one of their best albums; had gotten to #1 with covers of Dylan "Mr. Tambourine Man" and Seeger "Turn, Turn, Turn;" David Crosby's home band; at the time of recording their main songwriter and producer had left; Chris Hillman stepped up to write and lead vocal; Crosby and McGuinn also wrote quite a bit. CTA - 102 FUCKED ME UP, what was going on there? "McGuinn and Crosby's songs, written both separately and together, represented an expansion of the jazz influences and psychedelia that had been featured heavily on the band's previous album. The song "C.T.A.-102", named after the CTA-102 quasar and written by McGuinn and his science-fiction-minded friend Bob Hippard, was a whimsical, but ultimately serious song that speculated on the existence of intelligent extraterrestrial life." The edge of psychedelic, is not my bag. I just have a hard time enjoying it. Something about the tones, and often it feels so flat to me. This also had a lot going on with quirky synthesized sound that ultimately didn't add much to the listening experience for me (thinking of "Thoughts and Words" here). It is Beatles-esque without the benefit of being the Beatles. "Mind Gardens" is VERY very very Tim Buckley (active '66-'75) "I Never Asked to Be Your Mountain" from Goodbye and Hello, 1967.

1991 -- 4th studio album -- thrash metal / death metal -- Brazilian heavy metal band formed in 1984 -- widespread acclaim on release; "progressive and technical abilities, and presents the band's first incursions with industrial music, hardcore punk and Latin percussion;" "Arise is widely considered Sepultura's greatest album;" toned-down pace and more groove in drum rhythms than prior albums; love for industrial and hardcore punk. Nah still can't do it. It all sounds technically incredible but wall-of-sound is not and never will be my listening preference. I want to scream.

2024 -- 7th studio album (Strange Mercy was 3rd) -- rock / pop / art rock / indie rock -- opened to universal acclaim -- solo career of Anne Erin Clark of the polyphonic spree, wrote cruel summer w/ tswift -- from Tulsa/Dallas; produced the entire album herself; "Clark compared it to 'taking the long walk into the woods alone' in order to find the messages of your heart"; singles Broken Man and Flea (LOOOOVE); 90s revivalism; "tight and digestible affair"; 7-minute closing track; "her most hopeful record to date" The album won three of its four nominations at the 67th Annual Grammy Awards: Best Alternative Music Album, Best Rock Song for "Broken Man", and Best Alternative Music Performance for "Flea" I loved this album on first listen, which is always such a gift. I would happily listen to this a hundred times to get to know every single dip and valley to it.

1972 -- 2nd studio album (produced by Bowie) -- glam rock -- received well -- wrote some of these songs while in velvet underground; strong connection to andy warhol (woof) - NY Telephone Convo sounds like a 2 minute impersonation of him; "songs on the album are now among Reed's best-known works, including 'Walk on the Wild Side', 'Perfect Day' and 'Satellite of Love'"; "I don't think it's nearly as good as he's capable of doing. He seems to have the abilities to come up with some really dangerous, powerful music, stuff that people like Jagger and Bowie have only rubbed knees with." I can hear that Bill Callahan (Smog) has listened to a lot of Lou Reed, has emulated his delivery. Ryan Adams - Wagon Wheel. This list is full of brilliant work but this is brilliant to me personally. Repeat listens for sure. I'm interested if there are other albums of his or Velvet's that would hit me at the five-star level. This feels close but not quite there; it's got some weird tracks and I include "Walk on the Wild Side" in that.

1967 -- 2nd studio album -- psychedelic rock / blues rock / hard rock -- released to critical acclaim -- Strange Brew & Sunshine of Your Love -- recorded in 3.5 days in nyc because the band's visa expired that day -- "Disraeli Gears features the group veering away, quite heavily, from their blues roots and indulging in more psychedelic sounds, in particular on tracks such as "Tales of Brave Ulysses", "SWLABR", "World of Pain" and "Dance the Night Away". "Tales of Brave Ulysses" had been inspired by a trip to Ibiza that artist Martin Sharp had recently taken, where the sirens were alleged to have sung to Ulysses."; "Clapton revealed that "World of Pain" was one of his favorite tracks, written about the back tree in the garden of composer Pappalardi, and that "Dance the Night Away", with its 12-string guitars (the only time the instrument was used on a Cream recording), was Bruce's tribute to The Byrds, a band the group admired and were friends with." Chris Jones described the album as "a perfect encapsulation of the point where the blues got psychedelic and in turn got heavy"; Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic describes the album as "a quintessential heavy rock album of the '60s". An album that reminds me how much I love a hard, chunky guitar. Cool to listen to, but where it falls on the edge of psychedelic I probably won't revisit often.

2000 -- 5th album and 2nd commercial success -- alt rock -- vocal reminiscent of Chrissie Hynde; "The album featured a duet with Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke on the track "This Mess We're In", as well as backing vocals and keyboards from Yorke on the songs 'One Line' and 'Beautiful Feeling'; "I wanted everything to sound as beautiful as possible. Having experimented with some dreadful sounds on Is This Desire? and To Bring You My Love—where I was really looking for dark, unsettling, nauseous-making sounds—Stories from the City... was the reaction. I thought, No, I want absolute beauty. I want this album to sing and fly and be full of reverb and lush layers of melody. I want it to be my beautiful, sumptuous, lovely piece of work."; "a magnificent, life-affirming opus" - shrug emoji - maybe with more listens i could get there but the first listen didn't inspire a desire to listen more.

1983 -- 3rd studio album -- post-punk / pop -- highest charting release despite early poor reviews; singles "The Back of Love" and "The Cutter"; hard to write after long bout of touring, "had to drag it out," "recording the album, the mood among the band members was 'horrible'"; first was rejected by label, they had to re-record it; "I think Porcupine was a classic autobiographical album, the most honest thing that I'd ever written or sung."[17] Talking about how the album made him feel, he went on to say: "I found the material from it really heavy to play – like, really oppressive."; Pitchfork called the album "the band's definitive statement" and described "The Back of Love" as "the astonishing highlight of the group's career"

1988 -- solo debut album (after the Smiths) -- alt rock (lol okay?! are we sure?!) -- generally well-received; "Rolling Stone, which had expected the now solo artist to "wallow", called the album "a tight, fairly disciplined affair".[15] In its retrospective review, Pitchfork called the album "one of Morrissey's most interesting records, and certainly his riskiest", and that its "strange mix of pomp and minimal languor makes Viva Hate the only Morrissey LP you'd consider listening to just for its music"" simply cannot. dislike. actively annoying me. don't get it, can't get it.