The records that have influenced me
In the UK we have a very long running radio programme Desert Island Disks where famous people pick the 8 records that they would take with them if they were marooned on an island alone. I am suggesting that we have a variation of this here
My proposed format is that we each list the ten to twelve records that have defined us musically, with two or three sentences for each saying why they are important to us. Then we could just list five or so near misses. Finally there could be an overall reflective paragraph summing it all up
A couple of basic ground rules. Try to avoid compilations, greatest hits, and live albums that are basically best ofs etc. Also only one album per artist/composer/band, but where a band member has gone solo or into another band that is OK. Also, for classical music I see no reason why an orchestra can't be repeated if the music is by different composers.
When I was a new member this would have helped me get a feel for the people here. Therefore, administrators, could it be made a sticky thread?
Edit - I have changed the thread title to one that better reflects the purpose of the thread
My proposed format is that we each list the ten to twelve records that have defined us musically, with two or three sentences for each saying why they are important to us. Then we could just list five or so near misses. Finally there could be an overall reflective paragraph summing it all up
A couple of basic ground rules. Try to avoid compilations, greatest hits, and live albums that are basically best ofs etc. Also only one album per artist/composer/band, but where a band member has gone solo or into another band that is OK. Also, for classical music I see no reason why an orchestra can't be repeated if the music is by different composers.
When I was a new member this would have helped me get a feel for the people here. Therefore, administrators, could it be made a sticky thread?
Edit - I have changed the thread title to one that better reflects the purpose of the thread
Comments
The Beatles inevitably had a major influence upon me musically being a teenager in their early days. For me this is a turning point album moving from the early fairly straight forward recordings that could be replicated on stage to the later more studio albums like Sgt Pepper. To some extent it reflects me growing up as a person alongside the Beatles 'growing up'
I never took sides in the UK Beatles versus Stones debate. I liked both. They moved me on musically towards a more blues based musical style
The late 1960s was a period in the UK when the blues, an American format, became popular in the UK, especially live. One of the key musical influences for me has been Eric Clapton, and this is where it started.
This just means college to me! One of the tracks was the story of my life as I went through my late teens into early twenties. I was developing musically, and to some extent Neil Young was the key artist in this progression, leading me to a number of west coast bands
Another college record. Never a hit in the UK, but always a student favourite. It summed up the aspirational California lifestyle for us.
I bought this for the third time a month or so ago, with the remastered edition, so it must be one of my key records. To me this is the best of the solo Beatles albums. I can play it again and again and never tire of it.
Such a variation of styles of music. I love Sir Duke - one of my top ten all-time tracks, so I couldn't miss this out. My father played in swing bands and this track gets nearest to that in this list
There was a lot of hype about Bruce Springsteen when he first came to the UK. As soon as I heard the first few notes of Born to Run I knew why. I have never ever heard anyone perform live that surpasses the Boss for me. Still the CD that I turn to when I want to hear some rock. One of the key three albums on this list.
I could listen to the title track daily and never tire of it. This CD introduced me to West African music. When listening to Malinka and Woloff speaking artists from Senegal, Mali and The Gambia you begin to realise the influence that their music has had upon western music through the slave trade taking people to the southern USA.
I did not discover this until its 50th anniversary - how did I miss it? I read a review on its re-issue in the Guardian and went out to buy it to discover what it was all about. I was enchanted by it - a beginning of an interest in a new genre
As I explored West African music more I began to really like the Kora as an instrument. Here the guitar and kora come together with two of the leading players. Sadly this was Ali Farka Toure's last recording.
Such a good voice. This really combines Western and West African music together really well. An impressive range of languages from Angelique Kidjo. Why isn't she a bigger star in the West?
Near misses - too many! Some of these I don't listen to as much now as when they were released, hence being on this list rather than the first list, but at the time they were key recordings for me
Layla and Other Love Songs - Eric Clapton
Moondance - Van Morrison
Led Zeppelin 2
The Nightfly - Donald Fagen
Thriller - Michael Jackson
But Seriously - Phil Collins
Deja Vue - Crosby, Stills and Nash
Bookends - Simon and Garfunkel
Tapestry - Carol King
Chicago Transit Authority - If I had 13 picks above this would have made the list!
Inevitably many of my choices come from an era when I was developing musically. So being based in the UK and born in 1950 the Beatles became the early influence. Since then the key artist has to be Bruce Springsteen for me. Altough I have developed interests into other genre over the years, Bruce is always the artist I come back to when I want something comfortable that I know well. I think I have chosen something from each decade of my life in my dozen, except the 1980s - what does that say about that period for me?
1. Roxy Music--Avalon: made me love, feel, seem romantic, self-important, love the British (that faded), but it was also a gateway--Eno, Crismo, art rock, earlier Roxy, etc.
2. The Police--Zenyatta Mondatta: it was a how-to for my first band--poppy with odd sounds and ideas, three people making a rather energetic and compact racket
3. Joy Division--Closer: bought it when it was still an import record; wonderful dark themes and lyrics; Twenty-four Hours is one of the greatest bass themes ever
4. Philip Glass--Akhnaten: I always like to listen to Classical music on the radio, but buying this was my first attempt to strike out on my own
5. Minutemen--Double Nickels on the DIme: for me, bands like Fishbone,X, Jane's Addiction, even Guns 'n' Roses were local--I had occasion to brush soldiers (ETA: I'm sure I meant shoulders--that's what fatigue will do) with some before they made it; I scoffed at more than a few when they became successful (most notably Poison and LA Guns); I never met anyone in The Minutement/Firehose until I was well older, but they were part of the LA scene, played sometimes appearing on UHF video shows and late-late night radio, becoming ingrained in my consciousness
6. Eno--Discreet Music (words aren't necessary)
7. My Bloody Valentine--Loveless: when it came out, it sounded like the future to me, combining so many things I listened to, played and loved; I thought it was a model of music; I was deeply disappointed when the shoegazer scene fell through, and more disappointed when bands piggy-backed on its success seemingly without acknowledging it
8. West Side Story--film soundtrack: soundtrack to my courtship
9. Mzwhake Mbuli, Resistance is Defense--perhaps not the best of South African music, but so political that it put a lot of popular music from Africa--and from around the world--in context
10. La Bottine Souriante--Travers
I was entertaining getting a new computer of some sort anyway. It might be today. My needs are pretty low, though I'm thinking of some minor upgrades to allow some meager home recording. I might also get an inexpensive netbook as well. For the moment, I'm on an old laptop (the one mentioned above), which I normally use when I'm out in public and don't normally connect to the internet with it.
ETA: To add insult to injury, I can't listen to music on my computer because I need new headphones (my son decided to practice clipping nails on some cords a few nights ago).
are made and will basically cripple me for life. I am going to have to go for the most bang and the most influential
period in my life:
s/t (White Album)-The Beatles; Revolver is my favorite, but I couldnt take Yellow Submarine
every time side 1 came up in the rotation. The White Album captures all the sounds of pop genius
falling apartthe good and the bad. I suspect this effectively captures the full range of emotions one would
wrestle if stranded on a desert island. I was 11 when it was released and learned to play guitar to most of the songs.
(was damn proud when I mastered Blackbird)
Exile On Main St.-The Rolling Stones; stranded on a desert island or not, this would be my choice if I had
to pick one Stones album. The sound of a band finally set free to swing, sway and swagger like they were
born to do.
Quadrophenia- The Who; I was 16 when this was released and it played like a handbook.
Village Green Preservation Society- The Kinks; tough choice, but there is nothing like Kinks on a
Sunday afternoon.
Electric Ladyland- Jimi Hendrix Experience; this covers the past and predicts what the future could have been;
and dammit all sideways, I still get chills when I hear All Along The Watchtower.
Bitches Brew- Miles Davis; this got me interested in Miles and sent me down many wonderful paths
Bayou Country- Creedence Clearwater; Im guessing there will be dancing on this island?
Uncle Meat- Mothers Of Invention; Saturday nights with the Mothers was an early tradition for me;
this one stands the test of time and jams like a mofo
Trout Mask Replica- Captain Beefheart; I suspect there will be times on the island when I will be both
hungry and weird; I will therefore need a soundtrack.
Younger Than Yesterday- The Byrds; probably the first American band to kick my butt; I was 9 and this
was the one that did it.
Sunshine Superman- Donovan; couldnt survive without Sunshine Superman and Season Of The Witch .
will have to monitor island wildlife for recreational plant use.
Highway 61 Revisited- Bob Dylan; followed his songs done by others back to this album a few years
after release. No mention was made of books being allowed; therefore, this will be essential.
Three from the 60's
Beatles - Revolver
Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde
The Doors - (First album)
Three Jazz:
John Coltrane - A Love Supreme
Miles Davis - Birth of the Cool
Dave Brubeck - Time Out
Three Classical
Bach - Brandenburg Concerto
Beethoven - Ninth Symphony, although I'd like to have all 9 in a collection
Mozart - just about anything, but Symphonies 34-41 are a nice collection on two or three discs usually.
Three Pop
U2 - Joshua Tree (takes me to a nice time and place in my memory)
Jackson Browne - Late for the Sky (almost entirely for "For a Dancer")
Creedence Clearwater - Cosmo Factory / 1970 (I had a cassette in HS with both, can I take that?
I thought about taking some Linda Linda Ronstadt or Carly Simon, but no one said anything about bringing the album covers too.
1) Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream: Vital album in my musical development and one I still go back to for the memories.
2) Nirvana - Unplugged in New York: There is so much depth to this album. Recently read an article on the Onion A/V Club discussing how you can almost hear Cobain committing suicide through the choice of songs. It's actually true.
3) The Replacements - Let it Be: I love all of their stuff, but this album is their apex. "Unsatisfied" is simply one of the greatest songs ever written.
4) Atmosphere - When Life Gives You Lemons, Paint That Shit Gold: Perfect meaningful hip hop.
5) James Brown- Sex Machine: Gotta party sometimes!
6) A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory: More party time.
7) Frank Sinatra w/Count Basie and His Orchestra - Sinatra at the Sands: I just need to swing from time-to-time.
8) Soul Coughing - Ruby Vroom: I just never tire of this album.
9) Miles Davis - Birth of the Cool: For nights watching the stars cross the sky.
10) Van Morrison - Astral Weeks: Ditto.
11) Radiohead - Kid A: It's just too good to leave off the list.
12) Linton Kwesi Johnson - Dread Beat and Blood: I'm on a desert island. I need some riddim!
Half these albums would probably change if I made this list tomorrow, but the list is pretty representative at the very least.
Craig
Teens
Fugazi Repeater + 3 Songs (The sound and fury of my misspent youth)
John Coltrane Ole Coltrane (The single most important album I have ever heard as it forever changed what music means to me and how I hear it)
Yes Tales from Topographic Oceans (Yes showed me what Rock could be)
20's
DJ Shadow Entroducing (The second most important album as it laid out just how music could be created, sure sampling had been around for a long while but this elevated it to heights of genius)
The Future Sound of London Lifeforms (I discovered them at the same time as DJ Shadow and their work altered how I connect with music)
Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax, Isaac Stern Shostakovich: Trio, Op.67/Sonata, Op.40 (Shostakovich was the first composer that resonated with me and this remains my favorite work of his and my favorite performance of it)
30's
Duke Ellington Latin American Suite (Long time fan of Ellington's it really wasn't until encountering his suites that I fully understood and appreciated his genius)
Steve Reich - Music for 18 Musicians (I listened to it every night for the first year of my daughter's life holding her and feeding her so there is a deep emotional attachment to it. It is also a work that helped me bridge the gulf between Future Sound of London and Shostakovich and appreciate the interconnectedness of music)
Yumi Arai - Cobalt Hour (Yumi Arai's work has a deep emotional attachment as it is the first artist that my daughter and I really explored together and shared with each other what our favorite songs are and why, which is all the more awesome since she's four)
1. Pink Floyd - "The Wall"
-Me as a teenager found an album themed around disenfranchisement and seclusion pretty easy to attach my heart to. And, awesome guitar, dude!
2. Prince - "Purple Rain"
3. Tears for Fears - "Songs from the Big Chair"
-Numbers two and three, aside from being fun albums that I could listen to repeatedly, are associated with a brief happy period in my life one summer, I think I was twelve or thirteen, when everything just kinda felt, I dunno, safe, I guess, for lack of a better word. Strong associations with these albums. Still listen to both. In fact, I picked up the Songs from the Big Chair Deluxe Edition with a BMG sale years ago.
4. Spiritualized - "Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space"
-Coincided with a hard yet beautiful period in my mid-late twenties. The bitter guitar, the soaring violins, the heavy distortion, and the themes of heartbreak, addiction, loss, and hope all resonated with me powerfully then, and, I guess, always have, before and after the first time I heard that album.
5. Various Artists - "Meditations on Mingus"
-My first introduction to Bill Frisell, who plays in a couple of the ensembles on the album, but also an intro to a lot of great musicians, jazz and beyond, that I had either never heard of before or was only casually familiar with. Opened my ears to the possibilities of music and how much out there that existed beyond what I heard on the radio.
6. Thelonious Monk - Probably one of his Blue Note albums Vol 1-3.
-Sitting in a coffee shop reading and an hour or so later I realized how much I was enjoying the jazz they were playing. I was familiar enough with it to know that Monk was on (and in my memory, it sounds like something from his Blue Note catalog). Anyways, it occurred to me how little jazz I had on my shelf at home and how much I enjoyed just sitting around listening to it and reading (which I did a lot of back then). So I immediately left the shop and headed down the street to the record store and bought a bunch of cassettes. Monk on Blue Note (Vol 2, I think) was one that I grabbed. And it's been almost exclusively jazz purchases since then.
7. Police - "Ghost in the Machine"
-I believe this was the first album I purchased on my own, and well, it's still a favorite album of mine.
8. Wilco - "Summer Teeth"
9. Son Volt - "Wide Swing Tremelo"
-Numbers eight and nine both got me addicted to the alt-country sound (I'm one of the few fans of that genre who avidly thanks Uncle Tupelo for breaking up). Plus, both those albums, usually played back to back, were with me through a hard stretch of life, one which I was metaphorically on a dessert island, so I value their companionship.
10. Bill Frisell - "Quartet"
-My favorite jazz album (usually), the odd instrumentation, the plaintive cry of Ron Miles trumpet, the odd self-call-and-reply of Frisell's bending notes, slides, and loops, Eyvind Kang's lion's roar and seagull caw of tuba and violin, and the delicate audio right crosses of Curtis Fowlke's trombone, just a beautiful album. In addition, I saw them perform at the Boulder Theater in support of the "Quartet" album, and it was one of the finest shows I've ever seen, and it happened on one of those days, a Friday, when, well it's probably not just me that this happens to, but you'd think at the end of the work week, everything would be peachy but sometimes it's like I steel myself against everything the week throws at me and when it's finally over at five o'clock Friday, it's like I just fall apart from the exhaustion and can't do anything for myself and become kinda fussy. Well, the night of that show, that's how I was, and the best friend I ever had helped get me back up on my feet, which allowed me to go to that show and have an oddly peaceful and productively introspective evening that kind've acted as the springboard to my development as a person. So, lots of connections to this album. Plus, I just love it still.
11. Leo Kottke - "My Father's Face"
-The first time I heard Kottke was when he played live on some live from Nashville show, can't remember what it was called, but it was pretty big back in the day. I thought, man, I gotta get some of his music. First album I picked up was My Father's Face, which remains my favorite Kottke and one of my favorite albums ever. Also, I saw him support that album live at the Ogden Theater (Denver). I lived in the same neighborhood, so I walked over to the show. One of the most amazing shows I've seen, just beautiful. Plus, he was pretty funny. Also, I met a girl at the show. When we left, it was snowing in that cinematic way that I've only ever seen in Colorado high-country. We went to a party and hung out. A night when I really felt like I'd established some roots in Denver, a home for myself, and that anything was possible.
12. Chris Whitley - "Living with the Law"
-I picked up his album on the way out of town, the morning my car was packed and I was moving out to Colorado. Hearing the title track as I left Kansas and interstate behind me and was taking a small highway up into the mountains, the iron rich roads red against the deep blue mountain range, snowcapped white and grey and black, well, that's not likely something I'll ever forget. I was lucky to see Chris play at the Bluebird Theater and the Lion's Lair (Denver, both).
So, there's my twelve.
If I simply just had to pick twelve albums I'd want to have with me stranded on a desert island, it would be:
1. Thelonious Monk - "Straight, No Chaser" (Soundtrack to the movie)
2. John Coltrane - "A Love Supreme"
3. Bill Frisell - "Intercontinentals"
4. The Kinks - "Village Green Preservation Society"
5. Leo Kottke - "My Father's Face"
6. Mercury Rev - "Boces"
7. Todd Sickafoose - "Tiny Resistors"
8. Calexico - "Feast of Wire"
9. Disinterested - "Behind Us"
10. Faith No More - "King for a Day/Fool for a Lifetime"
11. Slipstream - Self-titled,white album cover (released on Carrot Top)
12. Radiohead - "Amnesiac"
12. McCoy Tyner - "The Real McCoy"
2. I'd want to take lots of Dylan along, but since Greg in his cruelty won't let me do that, and rules out compilations like Biograph and live albums like the "Royal Albert Hall" concert, I might as well go with one that's as good as or better than any and twice as long.
2. The same problem with the Beatles, but for variety I'll take one that hasn't been chosen yet. Not only for that reason, though. I enjoy it as much as or more than I do some later ones.
3. Bruce too, but instead of going with The River on the double length strategy I'll pick my first love, because sometimes those remain sweetest.
4. Ditto for Van the Man:
5. Sometimes you need a groove. The picture isn't as self-explanatory here, maybe; it's Watina by by Andy Palacio and the Garifuna Collective.
6. Maybe Greg will let me break the rules once for an artist whose single releases don't convey his greatness, AFAIK.
7. Someone else whose technique is as amazing and as endlessly fascinating as Tatum's, but in another genre.
8. One of my very first purchases back when it was released in 1962, this contributed to my love of classical. I guess this precise release has never been on CD; Amazon only has it on vinyl.Lenny conducts from the piano.
9. Rock & roll lives. I haven't heard this in ages, having lost it somewhere along the way, but I think I'd still take it with me if I could.
10. Here's where I'll earn some scorn, at least from brittleblood. If I were taking a phonograph, not a CD player (I guess I'd need a phonograph for the Gershwin/Bernstein anyway), I'd take these two records, slice them horizontally from edge to edge, discard both Side 2's, and glue the Side 1's together to make one record. I looked on that bbcode site for a way to put the images next to each other, but didn't find one.
1. Yesterday And Today by The Beatles - my very first LP, and forty-something years later these guys are still a regular part of my music listening.
2.Buffalo Springfield by Buffalo Springfield. A kid in my class played me this record at his house and I remember thinking how cool it was, like an American Beatles, and it led to C,S&N, C,S,N&Y, NY, The Byrds and much else.
3.Cosmo's Factory by Creedence Clearwater Revival - played the hell out of this record, and I'd say it was a gateway to a whole lot of American roots music and rock'n'roll.
4.Led Zeppelin II by Led Zeppelin 5. Let It Bleed by The Rolling Stones 6. Goodbye Cream by Cream - I list these together because I listened to them at about the same time and they were my introduction to what I'd call Rock, and these bands were my gateway to a lifelong preoccupation with the blues, which is my primary objection to the dismissal of Englishmen corrupting an American musical genre - they loved it, in my book they honored it, and they brought it back home for a lot of Americans when the country wasn't paying it the respect it should have.
7. Are You Experienced by The Jimi Hendrix Experience - what can I say, it blew my mind. Jimi was the one who made me want to play guitar. Electric Ladyland would be the desert island disc if I could only have one, but this is very close, and was the eye opener.
8. John Mayall and The Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton - was my first blues album. The tone and the ferocity of the playing blew me away, things which unfortunately EC lost later on for me.
9. Freddie King Is A Blues Master by Freddie King - my first "real" blues album purchased shortly after the John Mayall. Not the best Freddie King album, not my favorite phase of his career - that would be the Freddy King phase - but it set the hook in me, bad.
10. Djangology by Django Reinhardt - I had a friend in high school who loved Django and he told me the story about the maimed hand and playing the leads with just two fingers, and when I got a hold of this album I was amazed, and I'm still amazed. Django has his own shelf on my CD bookcase, only Jimi and the Beatles have more.
11. Procol Harum by Procol Harum - this record amazed me because it combined elements of classical training and playing with out there poetic lyrics and psychedelic pop, not to mention bad ass guitar by Robin Trower. I'm still appalled at people who dismiss him because whatever you think of his solo material his work with Procol Harum was stunning and pretty amazing for a guy who was basically an R&B player thrown in with seriously trained musicians. This band was unlike anything else and is still one of my favorites.
12. Lost In The Ozone by Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen - hmm, freaky cartoon cover, wild ass country&western honky tonk rock'n'roll, and turn it over and look at the bands picture - holy crap, they're freaks! This opened a whole world of possibilities, and showed that country could be cool.
13. Kind of Blue by Miles Davis - my gateway jazz album that proved jazz wasn't just that weird formless noise I'd once heard on the radio that made me think I didn't like jazz when I was younger. Hallelujah!
Oops, and I forgot a movie - The Long Riders , soundtrack by Ry Cooder. When I saw this I had the revelation how much country music owed to Irish/Celtic music and it started another preoccupation that has never ended.
Ultravox - Vienna. A lot of their catalogue turns out not to have been as great as I thought as a teen; but I played this to death. As a mid-teen I would visit a friend who had a better stereo (not difficult) and different tastes, and we would take turns to choose an LP; that's where I heard AC/DC and Iron Maiden and similar - and he was subjected to an awful lot of Ultravox. It as much as any album started a leaning to electronic music that has lasted since. (Near misses on the same score: Architecture and Morality by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Songs from the Big Chair by Tears for Fears and Tin Drum by Japan)
Oxygene - Jean-Michel Jarre. I bought this with hard-earned summer cash when I was 16 in a gatefold double LP edition with Equinoxe (does that allow me to take both to the desert island? Pretty please?) and was captivated - I still think it's well above anything else he or a lot of people after him did later in this direction. Opened up vistas where electronic music did not also have to be a pop song, and timbre mattered as much as rhythm, paving the way for other genres later.
Gretchen Goes to Nebraska - King's X. There's only so much tranquil music one can take before needing loud rhythmic noise. In our early 20s we got to know another young guy who had just experienced some fairly major personal crises. He needed a place to get his head together, and ended up living with us for a couple of months. He played this a lot, and it was not a genre we were used to at all. It opened my mind to the more creative possibilities of metal and got me into their other albums. (Near miss: When Pus Comes to Shove by Platypus - same guitarist, and an album I love perhaps more; just has a less specific biographical niche.)
Big Circumstance - Bruce Cockburn. I have been a Cockburn completist - and that's a decent catalogue; which album to list here is almost arbitrary among, say, the ten best. He has meant different things at different times - painfully collected a bunch of his stuff while a poverty-stricken grad student in Toronto, heard him live a few times, love his take on life in most of his lyrics and have had particular songs speak to me meaningfully. I remember finding Big Circumstance in a used CD store in Wales, and being very excited, and being in raptures at the guitar work in Radium Rain. Also, when I found myself Christian but disliking most Christian music, his lyrical, slanted way of expressing his faith in his music helped keep both ends of that bridge attached. That's actually a relevant feature of at least five other entries on this list.
Good Dog Bad Dog: The Home Recordings - Over the Rhine. Not the 2000 Virgin/Back Porch reissue with two quirky but excellent tracks removed - the original 1996 self-release with the above cover art. This was a slow grower at first but became the start of a complete collection of their work, and they are now by far the band I have seen most times live - I guess at least half a dozen - and I had a chance to talk to them once. This album resonates both musically and lyrically, and won me over despite being in a genre I didn't think I liked. A band both my wife and I like going to hear, and that's a shortish list.
Bridge Across Forever - Transatlantic. Found it kind of by accident, it opened the window to sprawling progressive-rock epics, connecting me with other things in that genre, launching exploration of e.g. Spock's Beard, Porcupine Tree, Riverside, O.S.I., Dream Theater, etc. Still get it out every now and then. A candidate for best use of four download credits back in the good old days at eMu.
Songs to Burn your Bridges By - Project 86. More metal therapy; this one represents the stage a few years ago when my teenage son started listening to screamo, hardcore, math metal, etc; I sometimes think that maybe with the variety of musical genres in the parental repertoire he had to reach to the extremes to find something that was different. I decided I would not criticize any of his music until I understood it, and so this album among a few others has memories of hanging out in his bedroom listening together, learning the contours of new noises, going to shows I would never have visited - including Project 86 several times, accidentally getting stuck in mosh pits, and learning to love the best examples of genres I didn't think I could appreciate very easily. He turns 20 in a few days, a fine young man, and we are friends, for which I am very thankful.
Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas Toward Heaven - godspeed you! black emperor. I still think this is their best; it, together with near-miss The Earth is Not a Cold, Dead Place by Explosions in the Sky, set me off on a post-rock binge - I am still just recovering from the hangover and starting to go back to some of it. This, more than EITS, opened me up to slowly unfolding, long-form, experimental, collage-ish, textured tracks and in that way helped me into certain kinds prog and ambient also. Another candidate for best use of four eMu credits.
Field Recordings from the Cook County Water Table - Brokeback. I find this a near-perfect album, such simple composition, resonant sound, patience, mellow tone, a warm and timeless feel. It is in a small group of CDs (the P
1. Madness - "Complete Madness". A 12th birthday present, first proper album I owned. Still brilliant. Yes, I know we're not allowed compilations but Greg you didn't say so at the time.
2. The Stranglers - "Themeninblack". The crackpot theories of Erich von Daniken rendered into a meticulously engineered concept album of sometimes nursery-rhyme simplicity by 4 people taking an awful lot of drugs. What's not to love?
3. Philip Glass - "Glassworks". When not thrilling, gorgeous.
4. Stephen Sondheim - "Sweeney Todd - original cast". This was in my head for at least an entire term of college. Completely failed to instill in me a love of musical theatre though (other Sondheim productions excepted).
5. A House - "I Am The Greatest". Ah, that glorious feeling when a band you already love release a third album and it's their best yet. It was all downhill from there. For all of us.
6. Gustav Mahler - Symphony no.6 (Cleveland/George Szell). Yes, this is the dark and gloomy section of the list. Unfortunately this captured my mood perfectly at the time. Still my favourite piece of music though!
7. Franz Schubert - Winterreise (Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau & Gerald Moore). Another album of misery.
8. Frank Zappa - "Broadway the Hard Way". Things start to look up. Listened to quite a bit of FZ back in the mid to late 90s, but not all of it stayed with me. This one captures my favourite side of him.
9. John Fahey - "The Dance of Death & Other Plantation Favorites". And then one day I joined this piece-of-shit music service called eMusic. Which led me into some hitherto undreamt-of realms of music.
10. Richard Buckner - "The Hill". A beautiful, sometimes heart-stopping, song cycle. Makes the list on its own merits but also is here to represent all those albums that appeared out of the blue and became favourites. This one I happened to come across on a listening post in Tower Records.
11. Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphony no.9 (Minnesota Orchestra/Osmo Vanska). Well, obviously I've got to have Beethoven's 9th on my desert island. This should go without saying. Actually on the radio show the participants are by default allowed to bring the complete works of Shakespeare and the Bible. Beethoven's 9th would replace both for me.
12. The album that I'm going to remember tomorrow and think, "how the hell could I have left that out?"
Germanprof, I'm glad to see there's another Over the Rhine fan in the group besides me and qwynwyn, I think.
All this diversity, as with our 2010 lists, just shows how much great music there is.
Kiss (1974): From an historical perspective, it's impossible not to list this album first, if only because it was the first album. And because it was first, it has a firstness about it that is undeniable, a recording of a band that practically leaps off the record player and shouts "I am first!" before falling to the floor in a heap of twisted wreckage and unpleasant-looking bodily fluids.
Destroyer (1976): In retrospect, this was the best Kiss album, and not just because of smash hits like "Detroit Rock City" and the haunting ballad "Beth," or even because of Bob Ezrin's big production sound that gave the band a kind of sheer bigness it had never had before. No, this album was the best because showed the world that Kiss were serious. Sure, they dressed like clowns, had no appreciable musical talent, and smelled terrible - but before Destroyer, people might have thought they actually had a sense of humor.
Alive! (1975): It's easy to dismiss this album as an exercise in mass deception; after all, the album wasn't alive at all, but rather a slab of cheap vinyl showing no signs of biological or chemical activity whatsoever. But look past the thinness and roundness of the artifact and you'll see whatever happens to be behind it.
Rock 'n' Roll Over (1976): "Calling Dr. Love" is probably my all-time favorite Kiss song, which is to say it's the song of theirs that causes me the least amount of gastric distress. Other tracks show Kiss' awareness of troubling social issues - for example, "Baby Driver" draws attention to the problem of speeding automobiles being driven by unlicensed infants, and "Ladies Room" tells of the horror of not being allowed into bathroom facilities designed for your "real" gender merely because you happen to be wearing a black-leather kabuki-suit and several pounds of pancake makeup.
Creatures of the Night (1982): The last of the "early period" Kiss albums, Creatures of the Night shows Kiss at their most perspicacious, even though none of the band members knew what the word meant at the time.
Wham - Make It Big (1984): Despite being released several years after Kiss' best work, this album vaulted Andrew Ridgeley to the top of the pop-star pantheon, finally making it completely safe for men to dress in black-leather catsuits with giant codpieces.
Dressed to Kill (1975): With this album's closer, "Rock and Roll All Nite," Kiss made their generation's definitive statement regarding the ideal frequency of lavatory usage - "I want to Rock and Roll all night and potty every day" made it clear that one's need to urinate and defecate on a daily basis should never get in the way of having a good time. A similar sentiment was echoed just two years later in Eddie Murphy's smash-hit single, "My Baby Wants to Potty All The Time."
Hotter Than Hell (1974): Perhaps the most enigmatic and paradoxical of the early Kiss albums, Hotter Than Hell was badly misunderstood by critics when it was first released, as many of them mistook it for a Japanese inflatable sex-toy. Many copies of the album were irreparably ruined by attempts to blow it up before a handful of enterprising writers decided to try actually playing it. Many more copies of the album were then burned, smashed, gouged, or even immersed in acid before efforts were made to try to recycle the vinyl for use in copies of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, released just four years later.
Alive II (1977): Since Alive! was, for all intense and purposes, impossible for Kiss to improve upon, they hired actual musicians and singers to record this concert album. Quality-wise, it shows: You can almost hear a form of primitive musicality in a few tracks. Though grotesquely underappreciated by fans, the album maintains a staunch following amongst members of the Lawrence, KS Ladies' Auxiliary and the DeKalb, IL Kiwanis Club.
Love Gun (1977): The cover art alone makes this album worth having on a desert island, as it can be used to frighten snakes.
Ace Frehley (1978): Tired of the endless touring grind and internal turmoil, not to mention the skin problems caused by massive overdoses of hideous greasepaint, the band's management decided to have the four members produce their own solo albums, with all four to be released on the same day: September 18, 1978. Little did they know that just one day prior to their well-planned simultaneous release date, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian Premier Anwar Sadat would sign the Camp David Peace Accords, ending years of violence and tension between their two countries. The effect on sales of the Kiss solo albums was devastating, and instead of the financial windfall they had expected, each band member received only $10.00 for their efforts. Only Ace Frehley, easily the most forward-thinking of the band, had the vision to invest $10.00 in shares of a new company called "Microsoft," and thirty years later, his shares were worth an astonishing $3,750.00 - nearly enough to pay for the surgery he needed to lower his right eye down far enough to be horizontally aligned with his left eye.
i have not thought about his music in quite some time, I really enjoyed his adventurous lyrical style and his
dexterous guitar playing.
edit - just downloading a couple now - You've Never Seen Everything and Speechless. Interestingly his early career releases are available in the UK and some od the later ones, but nothing from mid career. He must have been on a major lable then!
@selfrisinmojo - the recent albums have gone from strength to strength - there's some stuff worth catching up on.
@denver Saw Over the Rhine again just a few weeks ago. Excellent as ever, and some new songs. The new album was just released a few days ago I think.
al green -- the belle album
this is the loosest, more rock-oriented disc of those released during green's prime. his voice -- so full of grit and conviction -- is what makes this the best example of southern soul i've heard.
belle
gavin bryars, alter ego, philip jeck -- the sinking of the titanic
probably not the best choice if i was stranded on a desert-island, hoping for a safe rescue from a passing boat. this adaptation of bryars' mid twentieth century longform piece is ostensibly about the titanic disaster, but really -- with the ominous vibe from the loop of the song played as the ship went down, and the just-imperceptible voices of the survivors, and the sound of crowds rushing (or being thrown) back-and-forth across the deck, and the crack and pop of the deteriorating tapes this seemingly was drawn from -- its about the sadness of aging, the deterioration of the mind and body over time, and distant memories. really stunning.
not sure if this is the alter ego/philip jeck version, but it still gives you a nice idea about the piece
the smiths -- the queen is dead
the first of my two essential underground discs of the 80s, both of which seemed like the floated in from another planet. to be fair, and despite being one of the most forward-thinking rock bands ever, the smiths had a distinctive backward-looking streak lyrically, with morrissey longing for a quaint england that had long since passed away. still, there's nothing especially nostalgic about the fury and snarl of the title track, which has a pounding-drum intro you can play when you're marching into battle -- or maybe rounding up a revolutionary party.
the queen is dead
r.e.m. -- chronic town
my other essential 80s disc. more than any of their full-lengths, this one was a perfect example of their nu-jangle aesthetic, their southern gothic vibe, and that beat, which defined r.e.m. in the early part of the 80s. utterly essential.
chronic town (box cars)
burial -- untrue
my favorite disc of the 00s. took the underground uk dance genres of the 90s (2step, uk garage) and hulled-them out, leaving an echoey empty chamber, with ghostly diva voices rattling around inside.
archangel (fan video; you ain't finding no live versions of the song)
burning spear -- marcus garvey
maybe the best non-compilation, non-soundtrack reggae disc ever? like watching smoke from a distant revolutionary fire.
slavery days
the clientele -- suburban light
not sure if this meets the qualifications, since it's a collection of singles. and it's devoid of anything resembling rhythm. but as a hazy, melodic anglophile rock-record, it's near-perfect.
6AM morningside
fleetwood mac -- tusk
c'mon now. obviously.
brown eyes
tusk
miles davis -- jack johnson
the sound of the best jazz musician in the world proving he can, on his whim, be the best rock musician in the world.
(haven't yet found a suitable live clip -- workin' on it)
miles davis -- in a silent way
the sound of the best jazz musician in the world leaving everyone else behind.
in a silent way
teenage fanclub -- bandwagonesque
three chords, a guitar, and the truth. loaded, top-to-bottom, with perfect pop songs. imo, spin was right to rate it no. 1 in 1991 (over two other discs you may have heard of).
what you do to me
the concept
the bug -- london zoo
the sound of revolution on the streets of uk at the end of the decade. brilliant.
skeng (no good live clips i've found so far, so this is the studio version (actually a remix))
I grew up in a strictly Christian music only house, and for my parents even "Christian rock" was a somewhat borderline thing. Exposure to things like this; sort of on the edge of what was allowed; was what began to whet my appetite for experimentation in listening. Honestly how many people can say that Michael W. Smith was the beginning of an interest in experimenting with listening? Dion DiMucci's '80's albums were another touch point in this vein.
Continuing down the road of pushing my parents' buttons. They really didn't like the idea of this at all; "Christian Metal" seemed a complete oxy-moron to them, except that I could play the ballads for them, and they'd like those. But laughable as it may now be, this started to develop my taste for the heavier side of the musical world.
Early in high school, most of my friends had jean jackets with giant patches on the back of either Metallica or Megadeth album covers. This was a revelation to me. My dubbed cassette copy got worn to a nub.
From metal it was an easy transition to skate-thrash, and from there into the worlds of hardcore and punk. Finally hearing the Sex Pistols a couple of years later would forever cement my punk love, but this came first, and over the years did more damage to my ears, so this gets the nod over "Never Mind the Bollocks." Plus there a were a lot of interesting quieter things going on here too. Honorable mentions in the "high school music" category go to Red Hot Chilli Peppers' "Mothers Milk" and Ministry's "Land of Rape and Honey."
This and the skate-tape are where I started to get into what we were calling "alternative" at the time. (And yes I'm using compilations; deal with it.) My friend that I dubbed this from, the same one as had the skate-tape, knew I was into metal, and told me "you won't like this"; this phrase has always sort of been the magic words that get me to truly love things. Important to note that this is the cassette version "Standing on a Beach" not the CD or vinyl version. Important because the tape had all the b-sides on it too. Tapes get short shrift in history in my opinion; as I remember the 80's, no one was listening to vinyl anymore, and CD's weren't big yet; everybody was listening to tapes. From here most other "alternative" gets reduced to also rans; many things I loved, but none of them really influenced or changed my habits like this first one; including: Nirvana, Nevermind, then back tracking to Bleach, Teenage Fanclub, Pixies' Trompe Le Monde, Red House Painters, Smashing Pumpkins, "Gish" and on and on in that 1991-92 vein.
Although they didn't really listen to them very often, my parents still kept a lot of their old records, and I spent a lot of time listening to this and other Simon & Garfunkel in high school, and it helped me to realize that although heavy was good, there was more to life. This definitely shaped my listening habits in the years to come. This is as good a place as any to give a nod to my parents campfire singing habits. We always went camping in the summers, and there were always campfire songs, heavy on '60's folk rock lite like Peter, Paul and Mary. The thing about that stuff is that it can't help but lead you to other folkies like Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan.
I'm starting to realize that this is going to rum over the limit when done this biographical way. Oh well.
Off to college, and starting to meet other people who listened to "alternative" music. In spite of Nevermind, alternative still hadn't really broken big and taken over the way that indie and the indie sound has now, so there really still weren't a lot of us at our small college in 1992. Some upper-classmen friends that I made turned me onto this, and if it was on tape or vinyl I would have worn it out my freshman year. This was one of my earliest experiences with how weird music could be, and how weird could be more shocking than heavy or hard. This lead me down many weird roads in the years to come. Funny thing too is that His Name is Alive have still been relevant to me in recent years; Their excellent 2005 Marion Brown tribute album turned me on to Brown himself, and introduced me to a lot of interesting jazz.
Next is the E single. In college I discovered going out to clubs and dancing, and I have to say that Next is the E was my favorite thing to hear. This also has the song "1,000" which is basically just a 1,000 bpm drum crash, and which is also awesome. This was more or less the start of a lifelong love of electronic music, the great majority of which has not been danceable. (If nothing else I'm forever grateful to Moby for leading me to Aphex Twin.) When Moby was signing records in a local record store around the time of "Play", I was the only one in line with a copy of Next is the E. Honorable club mentions go to Apotheosis' "O Fortuna" (shut up), Prodigy's "Charly Says", Ministry's "Psalm 69" and N.I.N. in general.
After seeing Neil Young kick the ass of the Pearl Jam guys half his age on the 1993 video music awards, I had to find out more about this guy. This album was the first step of many in my love of Neil Young. In the interest of keeping within my limits, I'm going to let this edge out this:
with which I had similar relationship. I'd heard, and loved Bone Machine, but hearing "The Piano has been Drinking" a few years later on the radio while sitting at my mindless factory job was what really plunged me into the world of Tom Waits.
Around about 1993 is when I first discovered the White Album. I'd been aware of and listened to the Beatles before then of course, but nothing hit me like this. Those few seconds when Back in the USSR closes out and the opening notes of Dear Prudence kick in just get me every time. If I had to pick just one album for a real desert Island this would be it. And the funny thing is I don't really even listen to it that often. It's just built-in by now.
This a late college/early post college thing, that narrowly edges out Beck and basically makes it in for one reason: the Lee "Scratch" Perry song at the end, that led me into the world of Lee, and from there into reggae in general. I bought my first Perry comp based on this, and that led me to Perry's solo/Upsetters albums, the Congos, Augustus Pablo and the early trojan Bob Marley stuff, and so on and so on.
As others have said, this was my jazz gateway. I'd tried jazz before, but nothing successfully got to me the way this did. I also have to drop a mention here for the Ken Burns "Jazz" series, which really helped me find my way in to jazz. As much as I dislike the revisionism and the wholesale ignoring of free and electric jazz, there is still an incredible amount of good music, good stories and good pictures in that series, and I feel indebted to it for my own jazz wanderings.
Hearing the version of "Preachin' the Blues" that's on this album is what pushed me in the direction of the blues. Hadn't heard anything like that before. Haven't really heard anything like that since.
My hip-hop gateway, and no, the Beasties don't count. It took a long time for me to like this, and honestly I don't always even like it now - I feel the album drags a bit toward the end, but there are parts I love, and it's led me to a lot of other things. And sometimes I honestly feel like I get more out of trying to like something and trying figure something out - basically just trying to stretch myself - than out of listening to something that I easily like.
This to me is a good closing, because in a lot of ways there hasn't been anything since then that meant quite as much. My avenues of discovery expanded rapidly from this point on, but that also meant less time for any particular thing. This is also the last thing that I feel like doesn't really have a line back to something earlier. I read about it (thank you Spin), it sounded great, I bought it, I loved it. From then on I feel like I'm always building on something, even though I'm still discovering. This is a good place to mention Radiohead's Kid A too, which was around the same time for me, and which meant the world to me, but that was an easy hit from my earlier alt. wanderings, and it didn't really lead me anywhere.
So that's the list, but one other thing: this process actually affected my buying/listening habits, so I have to mention it. You'll notice there's no classical on my list, but when I was thinking about being stuck on a desert island, I thought that I'd really want some Bach with me, and particularly the Goldberg Variations popped into my head, and looking around I thought, I should get that Glenn Gould version that I've heard about. So I almost put that on a list of things that I wanted to have on a desert Island, but I'd never actually heard it. And I thought that was kind of fucked up. So this weekend I went and bought this:
and so far I love it. Then I saw someone listed Thriller, and I'd never actually heard Thriller the whole way through. And I always meant to, and I thought it would be weird to be on a desert island for the rest of my life without ever having heard Thriller, so I also picked this up:
And it's pretty great too.
So finally, here are some things that I guess are the also rans, that aren't necessarily signposts in my musical world, but that seem like at this point some things I'd actually want with me on a desert island:
The End.
Craig
Craig
it's currently on sale for $5 at amazon. Does anyone else have albums that when you see it on sale or at a used cd store, you feel oddly tempted to buy it even though you already have it because you remember how excited you were when you first got it? This is totally one of those for me, although maybe you have to have spent a few years intensively and almost exclusively buying used stuff to have that feeling - like I want that and would have paid full price and now I'm getting it for $5. emusic used to create that feeling too, but it wasn't the price raises that killed the feeling so much as just being overwhelmed with stuff to the point where nothing new was really quite so exciting anymore. [/slightlyfeverishrambling]
edit: on second thought it totally is the price changes. $5.99 and up for an mp3 is absolutely nothing to write home about. [/doneforrealnow]