Ok, so this one went around Facebook some time ago, but I didn’t get to it now.
First, this is NOT a list of my 25 best albums. This is a list of the albums and artists that have had the biggest influence on me. Actually, it’s really a mix of that and my top artists and their most important albums (for me.) Here’s my list – in alphabetical order:
Tori Amos – Boys For Pele
I’ve liked Tori Amos since Little Earthquakes but this is the album that I couldn’t stop listening to for years. To me, Tori falls into the category of artists that truly brought something new to music. When people speak of musical genius this is the kind of artist I think of. I would also put Beck and Björk in this category, but neither of them had one single album that was strong enough to make the list.
Johnny Cash – At Folsom Prison
What can I say that hasn’t been said before? It’s a classic that holds up incredibly well 40 years later. And, I generally don’t like country music. His American III, IV and V are a bit uneven, but contain a number of incredible covers: U2’s One, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s I See A Darkness, Nick Cave’s The Mercy Seat, and of course Nine Inch Nail’s Hurt.
The Clash –
Almost universally lauded as the best album of the 80s, even though it was released in late 1979. Just incredible all the way through.
Elvis Costello – Spike
Ok – here I have to admit that I (sort of) cheated. Spike is a very good album, but not necessarily an outstanding album. Heck, it’s probably not even Elvis’ best album. But, I had to put him on the list because I’m a huge fan of his career, and this is the album that made me discover his talent. (Bought it in high school.)
The Cure – Disintegration
I was pretty late to appreciate The Cure. Through high school I never gave them a chance because of the goth image, but once I listened to Disintegration I was sold. Great, incredibly tight album, and it is just as good now as it was 20 years ago.
Depeche Mode – Black Celebration / Music for the Masses
Ok, I’m cheating again. This time by picking two albums. Black Celebration may be the better album, but I listened sooo much to Music for the Masses when it came out I can’t leave it out. Their follow-up studio album, Violator, is their most commercially successful album, and it contains some great tracks, and I often return to it now, but at the time I felt that they had sold out and I couldn’t get behind it.
Ani DiFranco – Not A Pretty Girl
It’s difficult to pick a favorite Ani-album. I’m picking this one because it was my first one. Strangely enough, I bought it at HMV in
In my opinion, Ani is one of the greatest lyrical talents of our time, and her songs simply kick ass. I caught two of her shows last year (LA and
Dire Straits – Brothers In Arms
Not much to say about this one – just a classic album.
Nick Drake – Fruit Tree Box Set (1986 release version)
Yeah, I’m cheating yet again by picking a whole box set. But, first, I need to thank my great friend Lisa for finding Nick Drake for me. Nick Drake only released three albums before he died from an overdose of antidepressants in 1974, at the age of twenty-six.
He never achieved fame during his lifetime, but over the years his music has increasingly been given critical acclaim, he is often cited as an influence to other artists, his songs have been covered and used in movies and commercials (most notably Pink Moon in the
Fruit Tree is a 4-disc box set containing all three of his albums and additional unreleased material compiled on the fourth disc. The reason I’m including the entire box set on my list is because that’s how I bought it – sometime in the mid-90s – and I can’t separate the albums from each other.
Guns N’ Roses – Appetite for Destruction
Not really my kind of music then and not really my kind of music now, but how can you argue with Welcome to the Jungle,
I saw them live in 1993 at the
Can’t say that I listen to this much now, but looking back over the years this certainly earned its place on this list.
Jane’s Addiction – Ritual de lo Habitual
I was a huge Jane’s Addiction fan for about five years (late high school / early college years.) I don’t listen to them very often anymore, but whenever I do it takes my right back. My favorite song – Jane Says – isn’t on here, but this album is the strongest overall.
Massive Attack – Blue Lines
I got this album right when it came out because I liked the song Daydreaming. For some reason, I didn’t listen too much to the rest of the album at the time. It wasn’t until I started getting into Tricky in the mid-90s (after seeing him live at the Hultsfred Festival in Sweden in ’95) that I went back and really gave this a serious listen, and I’ve been addicted ever since. It’s one of the few albums that I’ve had in heavy rotation for well over a decade and I’m not the least bit tired of it.
On a related note, for fans of The West Wing, go back and watch the last two episodes of season four for the amazing use of Angel (from Mezzanine) in the scene with Zoey at the night club after her graduation.
Sinéad O’Connor – The Lion And The Cobra
Like many people, I discovered Sinéad O’Connor watching the stunning video of Nothing Compares 2 U; almost entirely consisting of a close-up, ending with two genuine tears streaming down her face. I quickly bought I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got, and shortly thereafter her debut album The Lion And The Cobra.
Both albums are very good, but the debut displays a rare level of honesty and raw emotional intensity. Both the arrangements and her voice are much less polished than the follow-up, but that’s also what makes it so great. While the album is admittedly uneven, the heights of songs such as
Finally, do check out the live recording of
Beth Orton – Central Reservation / Trailer Park
Again, I have to pick two albums because I bought them at the same time. I was a bit late to the game here so I missed her debut album Trailer Park when it came out in 1996 but have been following her closely ever since I picked it up a few years later along with the follow-up Central Reservation.
Orton’s music lives in the strange land between folk and electronica. Early on she collaborated with The Chemical Brothers and William Orbit, but over the years the acoustic singer-songwriter side has become increasingly prominent.
Pearl Jam – Ten
The so-called grunge explosion hit during my senior year in high-school and I was a part of it through my first couple of years in college. While most people herald Nirvana’s Nevermind as the pinnacle of the movement I always enjoyed Ten more. Sure, Smells Like Teen Spirit is a fantastic song that captured the collective consciousness of my generation at that time better than anything else, but Ten is, in my opinion, a stronger album overall.
The great song Alive is commonly misunderstood. The song is partly autobiographical and very dark; about how Eddie Vedder found out as a teenager that the man he thought was his father was actually his step-father and that his biological father was dead, leaving him confused and feeling that being ‘alive’ was a burden. However, most people interpret the howling chorus as inspirational, and in a recent interview Vedder said that performing the song over the years “lifted the curse. The audience changed the meaning for me.”
While there are many other great songs on the album (Once, Even Flow, Why Go…), the other clear standout is Jeremy and its harrowing video with a climax that to this day makes me shiver and shake every time I watch it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gskAeWgEExk. The song is based on a true news story of a 15-year old boy named Jeremy who brought a gun into the classroom and shot himself in front of his classmates.
Pink Floyd – The Wall
Another classic that needs little explanation. Dark Side Of The Moon is obviously also a great album, but growing up my dad had The Wall on vinyl and I would listen to it all the time.
Portishead – Portishead
If I were stranded on a deserted island and could only choose 10 albums to listen to for the rest of my life, two or three of them would be Portishead albums. Over the last dozen years or so, no discs have gotten more Mattias-play than Dummy, Portishead and Roseland NYC [Live], all released in the four year span of 1994-1998.
I’m sure I’ve listened to other artists as much or more over the years, but they have all had huge bodies of work (Ani DiFranco, Elvis Costello, Morrissey/The Smiths, U2, Tom Waits…) but until last year, Portishead only had two studio albums and one live album (with no new songs), and I simply never grow tired of them.
Along with Massive Attack, part of the trip-hop movement of the mid-90s, Portishead came on the scene with one hit song (Sour Times) and a revolutionary new sound: Beth Gibbons’ simultaneously despondent and haunting vocals, floating on top of a hypnotic atmosphere of smoky lounge and film noir, accompanied by hip-hop beats, scratching turntables and retro tape loops.
Somehow, I mostly missed this when Dummy came out, but once I got into the follow-up album Portishead I was hooked for life. At the time I assumed that this was a studio-only band and that they would never go on tour: how could you possibly perform this music live without having all of it pre-recorded? Well, you get the string section from the New York Philharmonic orchestra to join you and you go to town, that’s how! The live-disc Roseland NYC is absolutely amazing; with the exception of Radiohead, I’ve never seen anyone do anything like this live. I don’t have words to describe it, you have to experience it for yourself.
A surprising choice? Perhaps, but when I was 14 I loved the movie Highlander and listened to the soundtrack A Kind of Magic for a long time. I rarely make the conscious choice of playing this album now, but whenever Princes of the Universe comes on I rock my heart out, and when I hear One Year of Love or Who Wants to Live Forever I well up a little inside.
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Blood Sugar Sex Magik
This is just a great album. I enjoy both the earlier and some of the later RHCP albums too, for different reasons, as their style has evolved over the years. But this is the one that best combined the raw power and energy of the early years with the engaging hooks of the later years.
The Smiths – The Queen Is Dead
Not much to add about this classic that hasn’t been said already. Not a single weak track and it has held up incredibly well over the years. If I had to limit this list to my Top 5, this might make the cut. And, it contains one of my favorite songs of all time: There Is A Light That Never Goes Out.
Sting – Nothing Like The Sun
This is the first CD I ever bought. Growing up I had records and tapes, and in 1988 I spent the money I had made at my first summer job on a CD player and this disc.
The The – Dusk
Don’t have much to say about this one, except that it’s a really solid album from beginning to end. Not as pretentious as some of Matt Johnson’s earlier work (which I enjoy in its own right) but still very ambitious.
Tricky – Pre-Millennium Tension
Tricky began his career by rapping on Massive Attack’s Blue Lines but shortly after left for a solo career. I almost picked his debut album Maxinquaye (named after his late mother Maxine Quaye), but ended up choosing Pre-Millennium Tension instead. Why? They are both about equally good, but PMT gets the edge because it has Tricky Kid on it and “everybody wants to be naked and famous”.
I’ve seen Tricky live twice – the second time was at a club on
U2 – The Unforgettable Fire
I could go on for a long time about U2. They have been my favorite band for most of my life. I’m still a big fan although I don’t think their material after Achtung Baby has been up to the level of their previous albums. Many people consider The Joshua Tree to be their greatest album, and it surely is phenomenal, but I’m picking The Unforgettable Fire. I think it is just as strong and it was the first U2 album I bought.
Here is my embarrassing U2 fact: I bought The Unforgettable Fire by mistake. I was 11 years old and had just heard the song Dancing With Tears In My Eyes and got Ultravox mixed up with U2. Oops.
Tom Waits – Rain Dogs
If you change the desert island question so that you’re allowed to bring the complete works of one artist I would pick Tom Waits. He’s made 20+ albums over the years and I consider him to be perhaps the greatest lyricist and one of the greatest songwriters of the last 40 years.
He started out in the early 70s as a piano-playing singer-songwriter. In 1983 Waits turned a new leaf with the release of Swordfishtrombones where he began experimenting with different instruments: bassoons, bagpipes, waterphones, etc. The album also contains In The Neighborhood, one of the first Tom Waits songs I ever heard, which has a great video of Waits in top hat and cane, leading a freak show parade of musicians through a neighborhood: http://www.myvideo.de/watch/4236007/Tom_Waits_In_The_Neighborhood_1983
His follow-up Rain Dogs contains elements of New Orleans funeral brass, polka, blues, Kurt Weill, country, and so on, and out of all of these pieces Waits has created a unique experience with several of my all-time favorite songs: from the opening track Singapore to Tango Till They’re Sore to Rain Dogs.
In the 90s Waits got more involved with theater, musical and film projects. He made movies with Jim Jarmusch, Robert Altman, Terry Gilliam and Francis Ford Coppola; he worked with William S. Burroughs to set up the theatrical production Black Rider in Hamburg based on a German folk tale; he collaborated with Primus and Gavin Bryars; he wrote and recorded the music for Alice (a play about Lewis Carroll); and he made a couple of regular albums and won two Grammys.
For the past decade, Waits has continued to work across several genres and has been involved in too many collaborations to mention, most recently on the latest N.A.S.A. album where he contributes vocals on Spacious Thoughts. I was fortunate enough to see Tom Waits perform live for the first time last year (at the Orpheum in
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