Your 'TOP 5' albums of all time. - Page 2

On a desert island I'd just shoot myself and be done with it  .

 

"Indeed... the greatest of song of all time was on that album (Red Octopus)." 
 

I'm not sure it was the greatest but I wouldn't spend two seconds arguing with you about it  . That album came out right when I was trying to ween myself off AM radio. KSAN FM was huge out here but Miracles kept pulling me back to AM. I just had to hear it one more time  . But what a great song, sung by the only person who could sing it.

 

"One of my criteria was albums that have no bad cuts."

 

Well that narrows it down to about what, 100-150 albums?   (not including compilations, of course).

 

"And the Beach Boys, can't believe I forgot the Beach Boys."

 

I didn't forget them, but with only five to choose from what's a guy to do  .

 

"3. The Who - Who's Next "

 

Again...

 

"Marillion - Misplaced Childhood (close call between this and Clutching At Straws)"

 

There's a name I haven't heard in a while ! I'll have to look into them again.

 

"ELO: Out Of The Blue

 

It warms my heart to see so many pick this gem. ELO never made profound music, but in the mid-70s they put out four straight albums (Eldorado, Face The Music, A New World Record, and OotB) chock full of the most delectible ear candy you'd ever want to hear. I wouldn't be without any of 'em. And let's not forgot their unsung early-80s masterpiece Time, which was of equal quality to the 4 above."

 

Perfect mid-70's pop/rock albums. They've held up very well. And the Zoom live concert dvd is outstanding!

 

"Agreed on both. I must add that Al continues to make great music decades after his last chart success. He still writes tuneful, literate songs (often based on historical events and fugures) and wraps them in tasteful, understated arrangements. I chose to highlight one of his more recent release in my list above. It's as good as Year Of The Cat and Time Passages."

 

The Year Of The Cat and Time Passages both spend a lot of time in my players. I need to explore more of his work (and so much else mentioned here). The opening sequence of TYOTC is one of my all time favorites. How do these people come up with this stuff? I know, talent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Somewhere along the line, Al Stewart ended up with the most albums by a single artist that I own.  I guess it's his fault for being prolific, because I have all of Zep, all of Floyd, etc., but he still tops the list.  24 Carrots would be a great next step, and Between the Wars is a wonderful album (kind of hard to find, last I checked).

 

Craig, I do have Beach Full of Shells, but I haven't really gotten around to listening to it much yet.  That and Sparks of Ancient Light kind of snuck up on me.  The last one I had purchased was Down in the Cellar, and I somehow didn't hear about his followups until a musician I mentioned (Brian Burns) recommended Sparks on his website.

If I shift my filter from the "great", "important", "influential", "stuff that really means something to me emotionally" side of the equation to "stuff that just tends to get played a lot when I fire up my audio system"* I'd have to add:

 

Basia - Time and Tide

 

Joni Mitchell - Blue

 

Elton John - Madman Across the Water

 

The Beaver Brown Band - Eddie and the Cruisers (Soundtrack)

 

Al Green - Al Green Gets Next to You

 

James Taylor - FIre and Rain, Gorilla

 

* Similarly if you asked what my favorite TV shows were, or what I thought were the best series of all time, I'd list things like Babylon 5, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Star Trek TOS, M*A*S*H, The Twilight Zone or NYPD Blue.  But if you asked me which series I've actually watched the most, from pilot to latest episode in my collection it would be the original CSI, hands down.  I just find the show compulsively watchable in a way that other shows aren't.  More serialzed shows induce fatigue after awhile, you can only watch so much comedy at a stretch and pure anthologies can vary too much in tone and quality.  But CSI has just enough humor, character development and continuing threads to make it a more complete experience than a purely episodid procedural, without the arc burn-out that can set in after 8 to 10 episodes of Lost or B5. 

 

I suspect there is something similar at work with music.  There are artists whose individual songs I like a lot, but who tend to be too much the same from track to track and even album to album, and therefore aren't as much "fun" to listen to in big chunks.  Also there are artists whose lyrics or music (or both) are so complex that they really demand you full attention. So they're not good choices to play in the background when doing other things.  I have certain favorite discs that I can "loop" in the background while I'm working, then "dip into" from time to time when I want to pause and really listen to a given song.  (Or when I need a break from what I'm doing.)  With the albums I've listed I generally know that I'm going to be listening to something really good regardless of where I stop, even though there are other discs in my collection the might contain better indivdual songs. 

 

This really is an interesting topic.  It's made me stop and really think about some of my musical tastes, instead of just indulging them.  

1) Genesis - Foxtrot

2) Metallica - Master Of Puppets

3) Cheap Trick - Heaven Tonight

4) The Beatles - Revolver

5) Marillion - Clutching At Straws

I have never done this before, but what would be exceedingly challenging for me to do would be to list my top five favorite albums of all time regardless of genre, style, or historical period.  I don't think I could do it, any more than I could list my top five favorite films of all time.

 

I do think that this is a fun topic.  With every piece of music I listen to (regardless of genre, style, or historical period), I spend several hours initially (and in some cases, repeatedly over many years) examining the elements of the music I am hearing from many different vantage points, as it's what I have been trained to do.  This is always the primary criteria I use when judging any work of music (with score in hand whenever possible), and this is what usually compels me to compile such lists.  (A secondary criteria for me is textual considerations.)  I am a bit less stringent when it comes to books, films, and television shows; this is most likely due to my being less qualified to judge other disciplines as quantifiably and concretely as I do the discipline of music.

 

BTW, I have played the desert island game before.  I usually list my favorite books, music, and television shows.  That might be an interesting thread to start one day as well. :)

Some of the best collections:

Kind of Blue - 1959

Like a prayer - madonna

Sunrise - Elvis Presley

This is hard because my top fives changes from time to time.

 

1. Rubber Soul ------- Beatles

2. Secret Garden -------- Secret Garden

3. Double Fantasy ------- John Lennon ( I enjoy only his songs)

4. Moody Blues .......Days of Future Past

5. TSO ------- Beethoven Last Night

"I'd say my top 5 list will remain unaltered for about 5 or 10 more years."

 

This is very similar to my sentiments, except that I would say (at least in the pop/rock genre) that my list will remain unaltered for as long as I live.

 

"I didn't have a hard time at all picking my favorites, and I will stand by them for years to come."

 

Yes, I feel almost the same way.  Well said. :)

Double Fantasy is an interesting pick.. Lennon is fantastic on it, with "Watching the Wheels" and "Woman" as sensational; but Yoko just destroys that album for me.. if it was all John, it'd be a Top-10 consideration for me, but it can't break my top.. I don't know, 50 or 100 because if I had to listen to the rest of that caterwauling I'd go nuts.
 

 

My top 5, not including compilations or boxsets (rats!), and in no order, I love them all equally.

 

Ween - The Pod

 

Beach Boys - Pet Sounds

 

Nine Inch Nails - Downward Spiral

 

Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin

 

The Who - Live At Leeds (deluxe edition of the complete concert, that's my cheat) ;)

 

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The other 5:

 

Neil Young - Tonights The Night

 

Liz Phair - Exile In Guyville

 

White Stripes - Elephant

 

Rolling Stones - Exile On Main Street

 

Tom Waits - Bone Machine

 

Many of these I'm just sold on the artists and could listen to any of the albums at any time. The Beach Boys excepted, they lose me after Smiley Smile/Wild Honey ha ha.

 

And while not appearing in my top ten, I'd gladly take a Beatle album if I had too. I've listened to them so much I've kind of taken them for granted!

 

 

 

I disagree that Five is too difficult.  20 would have me tearing my hair out, but five I can do fairly easily, surprisingly.

 

Genesis - "Wind and Wuthering"

Probably my favorite band of all time.  W&W gets just a slight nod over "Trick of the Tail", "Selling England by the Pound" and believe it or not, "Duke".

 

Elton John - "Tumbleweed Connection"

Again, a slight nod over "Madman Across the Water".  Those two could have been a double album.

 

Peter Gabriel - "IV" (aka, "Security")

For a lot of people. Floyd's DSotM is maybe the most revolutionary rock album of all time (yeah, or "Brain Salad Surgery" or "In the Court of the Crimson King" or "Close to the Edge", etc) for me it is "Security".  Genesis was better without him, but both Genesis and PG reign supreme.

 

Pink Floyd - "The Final Cut"

Seriously, listen to it.  Read the lyrics.  To me, this is probably the greatest concept album of all time.  Yep, better than Quadrophenia, DSotM, and so on.

 

Electric Light Orchestra - "Out of the Blue"

In the end, I will probably take this to the grave as my #1 of all time.  ELO is kind of like Tchaikovsky.  I loved it as a teen.  Outgrew it as a young adult.  Now I love it again, probably more than ever.  It's easy to pass ELO off as "Pop", which it is, but it is also some of the most creative and involving music ever written, and it is just stinking FUN.  I recently acquired remasters of the entire ELO studio catalog and "Out of the Blue" is particularly stunning, plus no album brings a smile to my face like this one.

Edited by JohnRice - 6/2/11 at 10:44pm

I should probably listen to some ELO. Which versions to get? There seems to be disagreement on different remasters. . .

 

I think the 2007 remaster of Out of the Blue sounds incredible.  Otherwise, I have all the current remasters.  I'm not positive, but I think the versions of I and II are the current British ones, Eldorado is the newest US and I also got the Original Album Classics set from the UK.  I even finally got Secret Messages and Balance of Power (which I still haven't listened to yet).  I know there have been complaints, particularly about I and II, but they sound good to me.

I like many more ...

 

Ramones: Rocket To Russia
Alan Parsons: I Robot
The Police: Synchronicity
U2:  The Joshua Tree
Rolling Stones - Some Girls

 

Greetings

Permanent Waves - Rush
Physical Grafitti - Led Zeppelin
Circa - Mary's Danish
Black Sheets of Rain - Bob Mould
Honey I'm Homely - Dance Hall Crashers

Walk Among Us - The Misfits (tough to choose this or Static Age)
Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell - Social Distortion
Bad Brains - Bad Brains
Cause for Alarm - Agnostic Front
Raw Power - The Stooges

John, your list is interesting.

 

I find myself listening to The Final Cut more these days, but it's always seemed to me a personal statement by Roger Waters.  If anything, it feels like Waters' first solo album, albeit being played by his backup band, Pink Floyd, minus Richard Wright.  The longer version of the album is more interesting - but I've come to understand that much of the album is made up of pieces that were considered for The Wall.

 

I agree with you on Out of the Blue, obviously.  It starts with a heck of a first side of four, and the third side "Concerto for a Rainy Day" is really great stuff.  I still remember spinning this one as two records where you stack the two LPs with sides 1/4 and 2/3, and then flip 'em over when they're played through.

 

Peter Gabriel is a perennial for me, even in his current orchestral phase.  I picked So, but just as easily could have picked Security or "Melting Face".  Us initially didn't click with me until a year after its release when it fell into place.  Up was just a welcome addition when it finally arrived.   Ovo and Big Blue Ball have been great examples of his collaborations, with some really intersting results.

Kevin,

A friend brought "The Final Cut" over for a listen the day it was released. I guess I was maybe 18 and didn't really grasp it, but about 20 years later it really started making a lot of sense. I guess it's not the greatest sign that I have grown to relate to Waters' attitude toward so many things. It really is his first solo album and The Wall certainly touched on a lot of the same topics somewhere in the middle. Still, with all the darkness in The Wall, it is softball compared to The Final Cut.

Yep, I used to listen to Out of the Blue on LP the same way. It sucked having that interruption.

Back in the day I used to refer to The Final Cut as "The Roger Waters Feel-Bad Band."

OK, maybe I caught this late. I've more or less stayed with these for a few years (well, since Zep's newest live one came out)

1. Frank Sinatra/Count Basie "Live at the Sands"
2. Grand Funk Railroad Live (the first one)
3. Sarah McLachlan "Mirrorball, The Complete Concert"
4. Rubber Soul
5. Led Zeppelin "How the West Was Won"

Here's my shot at it.

1. Faith No More - Angel Dust


2. Talking Heads - Remain in Light


3. Tool - Aenema


4. Slayer - Seasons in the Abyss


5. Clutch - Clutch


It was very hard to trim the following:
Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
Beastie Boys - Paul's Botique
Fantomas - Amenaza El Mundo
Peter Gabriel - III
Radiohead - The Bends
Primus - Sailing the Seas of Cheese

Darkness on the Edge of Town
Born To Run
The River
Sinatra At The Sands
Exile on Main Street

Pink Floyd-Animals
Led Zeppelin-IV
Jethro Tull-Thick As A Brick
Neil Young-After The Goldrush
The Clash-London Calling