411 Top 100 Albums: 90 to 81
Posted by on 07.23.2007
I should tease this column by revealing some of the artists featuring in it………but spoilers suck, so I won’t. Numbers 90 to 81, One Click Away.
Welcome back to ye of exceptional taste. After last Monday's opening ten entries in the elite one hundred, the only way is up (or down) from here. Today we present numbers 90 to 81.
Eighteen 411 writers have contributed lists of their personal top 100 albums of all-time, and we now have a final 100 from those lists. The opening ten are in the history books........
Column Two shall begin in 3…..2…..1…….
PART TWO
Pantera - Vulgar Display Of Power
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #44
Rutherford: This album was a statement. From the album cover that showed one being punched the fuck out, it was the ultimate warning as what was contained within. Heavy, angry and volatile, it was the type of music those not impressed with grunge were waiting for and a legion of metal fans hoped would show the new way for their music. And indeed, almost every heavy metal band afterwards used this album as the template.
Melchor: Few albums have been as aptly titled as this one. Certainly vulgar, this was nothing but a display of power from what would become one of the finest heavy metal bands to grace this planet. Slinky grooves, a thundering rhythm section, and a singer that decided to hell with sounding like the 80's and putting his balls on the line added up to a classic.
Marsicano: After their breakthrough Cowboys From Hell, Pantera revolutionized their sound and became more angry and pissed off. Phil Anselmo ditched his high wail vocals and used a more hardcore barking voice that made the already angry sounding music just get pushed to the edge. It doesn't hurt that the album also has some classic tunes, including "Walk" and "Fucking Hostile".
The Doors - The Doors
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Pop: #2
Singles:
"Light My Fire" Pop: #1
Rutherford: While I find the hype around this band to be more than a little overbearing, you can't deny that when they get it right they REALLY get it right. Not afraid to skip genres and clash styles, they created a unique sound from the rock blast of "Break On Through", the jazzy "Light My Fire" and the slow burn epic "The End". While there is much about this album you can skip, the high points really make it worthwhile.
Melchor: It's damn-near inconceivable to look at this today - with classics such as "Break On Through", "The Crystal Ship", "Alabama Song", "Light My Fire", and "The End" - and realize that this was their debut. Almost no one gets it completely right the first time, but The Doors had it out of the gate. It's enough to make most aspiring musicians sick at the thought, but they're probably too busy aping Morrison's presence and taking inspiration themselves to notice that much.
Mitch Michaels: I don't know if you can really call The Doors extremely psychedelic, but their self-titled debut is most definitely one of the spookiest, trippiest records I've ever heard. Jim Morrison proves that he was the epitome of "rock frontman" straight out of the box on this album, crooning, writhing and screaming his way into the erotic dreams of rocker chicks for decades to come. If you only know "Light My Fire" or "Break On Through", then you should start your Doors odyssey with this masterpiece and work your way forward. You won't be disappointed.
The Cure - Disintegration
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #12
Singles:
"Fascination Street" Billboard Hot 100: #46 Modern Rock: #1 Mainstream Rock: #24 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #7 Hot Dance Music: #13
"Pictures Of You" Billboard Hot 100: #71 Modern Rock: #19 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #33
"Lullaby" Billboard Hot 100: #74 Modern Rock: #23 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #31
"Love Song" Modern Rock: #2 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #8
Rutherford: Goth rock icons to say the least, they appealed to every black wearing, disenfranchised youth in the world, thus leading a legion of depressed people wearing badly applied make-up and wild unruly hair. What always gets overlooked was the great songwriting skill that Robert Smith possessed and this album is the darkest statement of his career. That, if anything, makes this an album you need to check out.
Melchor: Opening with one of the best bass grooves ever, Disintegration was The Cure's coming out party. Coming with a minimalist yet towering sound that paved the way for Goth's mainstream acceptance, Robert Smith and company also knew how to put together one hell of a pop song, helping to redefine pop music as we see it today.
Berry: The album that made Britain's best known gloom rockers a household name in America is also one of their finest works. If pressed to find one word describing 1989's Disintegration it would have to be "epic". The songs are much more expansive than on the hit or miss 1987 double-album, Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me. Here we find Robert Smith and company making a more sensual, albeit gloomy, group of tracks that flow together better than anything they had created or would ever create again. Highlights include the wall of sound on "Plainsong", the mix-tape staple "Pictures of You", the creepy rocker "Fascination Street", and the organ aided shoegaze classic "Love Song".
Alice In Chains - Dirt
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #6
Singles:
"Rooster" Mainstream Rock: #7
"Down In A Hole" Mainstream Rock: #10
"Would?" Mainstream Rock: #19
"Them Bones" Mainstream Rock: #24 Modern Rock: #30
"Hate To Feel" Mainstream Rock: #34 Modern Rock: #27
Rutherford: Sometimes a band shows great promise on their first album but never follow through and delivers. Alice In Chains, however, not only fulfilled the promise they showed on Facelift, they managed blow it out the door and create a work so dark and twisted you wonder just how much was imagined and real. Sadly, after the death of Layne Staley we realised that the reality of this album was all too real and songs like "Would?", "Them Bones", 'Angry Chair" and "Rooster" weren't just a pose.
Melchor: Let's not even bring up the "g" word, because it isn't necessary. This is pure hard rock at its seediest, drenched in despair and brought to us by a vastly underrated guitarist and a voice that howled from the grave long before Staley went there himself. Nirvana had the angst and Pearl Jam had the lamentations, but Dirt had everything else down pat.
Marsicano: When I first heard this album, the main thought that came to my mind is, "damn, this singer is really depressed!" One of the most depressing albums ever made, Dirt signified what the grunge movement was all about. However, this album stood out because of Layne Stanley's vocals and Jerry Cantrell's metal-influenced guitar playing. Both of these members worked off each other to create beautifully dark melodies that are still remembered some 15 years later.
Beck - Odelay
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #16
Singles:
"Where It's At" Billboard Hot 100: #61 Modern Rock: #5
"Jack-Ass" Billboard Hot 100: #73 Modern Rock: #15
"The New Pollution" Billboard Hot 100: #78 Modern Rock: #9
"Devils Haircut" Billboard Hot 100: #94 Modern Rock: #23
Rutherford: What the fuck! That was the most common reaction when most people found out that the slacker that gave us the anthem "Loser" created a fresh new sound and ultimately gave himself a career. As with Frank Zappa, Beck separates his different experimentations one album at a time and this would be Beck's "dance/rock, cut and paste collages" project. Seriously funky, seriously fun and seriously out there.
Helm: While the term has been bandied about for many years, I believe that Odelay stands as the first mainstream "alternative" album. While Beck originally seemed to be doomed to a fate as a one-hit wonder with his white-boy rap anthem "Loser" a few years prior, he and the Dust Brothers orchestrated a massive, Grammy-winning comeback with Odelay. Featuring Beck's quirky sensibilities throughout the album, Odelay crosses many genres without being firmly planted in any – hence "alternative" – and each song is different than the next without undermining the album as a whole. Add to that the Dust Brothers' use of samples from a myriad of sources – the album would probably never be made today due to rights issues – and Odelay proves its greatness as a rare and listenable work of art.
Mitch Michaels: With the massive success of "Loser", Beck could have easily coasted on the slacker image and faded quietly into oblivion like so many other 90's alt rockers. Instead, he followed it up with Odelay, possibly the single most eclectic album of all time. The record finds Beck rocking everything from blues to country to rap to indie rock, and it all flows together into a massive collage of sweet, sweet noise.
The Roots - Things Fall Apart
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #4 R&B/Hip-Hop: #2
Canadian: #7
Singles:
"You Got Me" Billboard Hot 100: #39 Rap: #19 R&B/Hip-Hop: #11 Rhythmic Top 40: #35
"Adrenaline!" Rap: #29 R&B/Hip-Hop: #73
Phil Watts, Jr.: Not only were The Roots at their creative peak with this album, this was also their most successful, going gold and getting more exposure than I thought they would. It felt great to see them on top, especially with an album as great as this.
O'Sullivan: For any urban disc to make this top 100 is a huge deal. It signifies greatness, and greatness is exactly what The Roots deliver. The Roots epitomise everything that's superb about pure hip hop music, and this album was just about their peak. Illadelph Halflife and Phrenology were great sets, but nothing flowed quite as effortlessly as Things Fall Apart. From the grace of "You Got Me" to the brilliant energy of "You Don't See Us", this is hip hop gold from start to finish.
Shoemaker: What's not to like about The Roots? Great songs. They play their own instruments. Incredibly tight rhymes. This album is no exception. Every song is a finely tuned work of art.
Rolling Stones - Let It Bleed
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Pop: #3 Black: #19
Top Internet Albums: #15
Singles:
"You Can't Always Get What You Want" Billboard Hot 100: #42
Rutherford: A huge moment in time for rock music. The Stones had been creating mass hysteria and redefining blues for the new generation for a few years at this point, but this album was the sign that they were something special. While Let It Bleed is the last to feature Brian Jones, it was the big step in songwriting, giving us two classics in the form of "Gimme Shelter" and "You Can't Always Get What You Want" and one last glance at the blues in the form of "Love In Vain", which was probably the best cover of a Robert Johnson song...ever!
Berry:My personal favorite Rolling Stones record! 1969's Let It Bleed continues with the rock & blues swagger of their previous records while bringing to the table some of their most memorable cuts. Never has a band sounded in such peril as on the desperation themed "Gimme Shelter". "Country Honk" reworks the classic "Honky Tonk Women" into a more traditional sounding country-western jukebox number (you'll swear these dudes grew up in Nashville after hearing this version). "You Can't Always Get What You Want" provides realistic optimism through one of the Stones' prettiest tunes, while "Love In Vain" and "You Got the Silver" are straight-up Southern blues tracks that rank up with the masters. The moderately perverse/amusing title track is icing on the cake for this gem, which set the stage for the classic early 70's albums Sticky Fingers and Exile On Main St..
Nagle: Arguably the Stones' finest moment. It captures them at a moment of uncertainty; directly after the tragedy at Altamont and the death of Brian Jones. Their drug use was at its peak, but you can tell it hasn't truly gotten to them yet. The record lacks the weariness of Sticky Fingers and Exile on Main St., which is probably why it holds up so well.
Michael Jackson - Off The Wall
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Pop: #3
Black: #1
Singles:
"Don't Stop ‘Til You Get Enough" Pop: #1 Black: #1 Club Play: #2 European Hot 100: #3
"Off The Wall" Pop: #10 Black: #5
"Rock With You" Pop: #1 Black: #1 Club Play: #2 European Hot 100: #7
"She's Out Of My Life" Pop: #10 Black: #43 Adult Contemporary: #4
Rutherford: For all that he became, there once was a time when Michael Jackson was the coolest brother on the planet. This was his first solo album as an adult. He brought uber-producer Quincy Jones onboard and they created one of the most fun and funky records ever, for better or worse creating the myth of Michael Jackson.
O'Sullivan: It would have taken something pretty special to push D'Angelo's, Voodoo to number two in my personal one hundred, but this is the album that did just that. The order of my top five was something that bugged me for ages, but even if my rankings would be different today, something made me pick Off the Wall as my number one album of all-time. Whereas everyone else waxes lyrical over Thriller and Bad, I always favoured MJ's inaugural solo disc. This was the start of his rise to solo superstardom, and in this form you couldn't argue with the status he was soon to acquire. Most of the set is full of finger-clicking funk-soul, with only the beautiful, "She's out of my life" softening the mood. I would reel off the album's highlights, but I would end up noting down the entire tracklist. Every time I listen to this it annoys me how the mighty has fallen.
Phil Watts, Jr.: And to think...many people thought that Michael Jackson's career was DEAD just because 1) he was past puberty and 2) he left Motown. They didn't think this album was going to even chart, much less sell 20 MILLION COPIES! Morons. Anyway, hot off of his roll as the scarecrow in The Wiz, he hooked up with Quincy Jones and Heatwave's Rod Temperton to create the first in a string of chart-topping, trend-starting, influential albums with this regarded as the best of the bunch...to me anyway.
Depeche Mode - Violator
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Billboard 200: #7
Singles:
"Enjoy The Silence" Billboard Hot 100: #8 Modern Rock: #1 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #6 Hot Dance Music: #2
"Policy Of Truth" Billboard Hot 100: #15 Modern Rock: #1 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #2 Hot Dance Music: #1
"Personal Jesus" Billboard Hot 100: #28 Modern Rock: #3 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #12 Hot Dance Music: #9
"World In My Eyes" Billboard Hot 100: #52 Modern Rock: #17 Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #6 Hot Dance Music: #3
"Halo" Modern Rock: #21
"Enjoy The Silence (Remix)" Hot Dance Music/Club Play: #25
Rutherford: A band that almost has a cringe factor if you claim to like them in this day and age, Depeche Mode was the missing piece between pop and industrial and their music showed the way forward for bands like Nine Inch Nails and Ministry, albeit without the guitar histrionics. Violator was their own link between being a straight synth-pop band and one that introduced guitars and other rock elements to help create the industrial music scene. Search out the "Personal Jesus" from this album and his use of the blues guitar hook thus creating their own blueprint which they rode to massive sales and acclaim.
Melchor: The perfect marriage of gloom-and-doom depression married to solid pop sensibilities. Violator was one long therapy session for many a Gen X teenager, but even more than that, it holds some of the prettiest and heartfelt tunes to come out of the 80's.
John Lennon - Imagine
CHART HISTORY:
Album:
Pop: #1
Singles:
"Imagine" Billboard Hot 100: #3 Mainstream Rock: #20 Adult Contemporary: #7
"Jealous Guy" Billboard Hot 100: #80 Mainstream Rock: #12
Rutherford: Although he had a prolific and successful solo career, this would be the album most looked at as its high watermark. While the Plastic Ono Band was his step away from The Beatles, this was him finding his home as an individual songwriter that didn't need his legacy to hang his hat on. The title track is probably his most enduring song ever, where he realised that "people want their message with a little honey" and with it he became the artist he wanted to be instead of the one everyone else wanted.
Melchor: If Plastic Ono Band was a hint that Lennon was arguably the best songwriter ever, Imagine certainly gave the case much more merit. This was Lennon at his peak, Beatles be damned, creating an album that every other singer-songwriter holds as a blueprint to this day.
Nagle: The morning after the Plastic Ono Band. This record was all about healing, and the title track is John Lennon's gift to the world.
Credits
Creator / Host:Tim O'Sullivan
Sub Editors:Mitch Michaels and Brian Berry
List Counters:Tim O'Sullivan and Brian Berry
Disc Artwork:Scott Rutherford
Design and Production:Mitch Michaels
Writers who contributed lists: Tim O'Sullivan, Brian Berry, Scott Rutherford, Leonard Hayhurst, Tollah, Mitch Michaels, Morgan Marx, Ian Wright, Will Helm, Jared McGuckin, Frank Estrada, Matt Shoemaker, Scott Slimmer, Phil Watts Jnr, Dusty Godwin, Korry Hill, Jamie Buttineau, Marques Furumoto
Writers who contributed blurbs: Tim O'Sullivan, Scott Rutherford, Ian Wright, Will Helm, Mitch Michaels, Michael Melchor, Phil Watts, Jnr., Brian Berry, Matt Shoemaker, Tollah, Frank Estrada, Jason Chamberlain, Jesse Coy, Dan Marsicano, John Nagle
