Saturday, April 27, 2013

10 Of The Most Important Albums Ever Made




David Bowie
The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars
RCA Records
(1972)

Combining glam rock & roll with the flamboyancy of theatre, David Bowie utilised his major strengths to unfurl the story of his androgynous sci-fi rock star alter ego Ziggy Stardust. The radical orchestration of heavy guitar, buoyant string section and keyboard arrangements when coupled with his profound, and sometimes obscure lyrical sketching, was a stunning production of sheer genius and intensity that far outstretched the dimensions of anything else being offered up at the time. His see-saw juggling of genres is an effective concept clearly visible when the space aged rock thrum of “Moonage Daydream”, complete with spectacular Mick Ronson guitar solo is positioned alongside the whimsically endearing balladry of “Starman”, the perfect pop song with simplicity at its catchiest on the “la la la la” chorusing. Bowie’s greatest rock contribution “Suffragette City” the ballsy, sleaze drenched guitar classic is an immaculate anthem, as is the not so ferocious ( but just as magnetic) title track. An album of scorching rebellion with so many complexities it could easily have ended a fragmented disaster but, instead, turned out to be a classic work of art.

The Pogues
Red Roses For Me
WEA
(1984)

The infectious hybrid of traditional Irish music fused with a punk rock influence was an unknown combination in life before The Pogues. This was their debut album masterpiece, a raw, energetic and unconventional compendium of full bloodied songs that forced new pathways through the middle of post-punk’s garden-variety pastures. Shane McGowan’s lyrics, championing drunkenness and debauchery, are astonishingly brilliant. The band employ an assemblage of instruments including guitar, pipes, banjo, accordion, drums and penny whistles, injecting the songs with authentic Irish nostalgia. This is a drinkers album, little doubt about it. Never has binge drinking and indignant social wastelands seemed so appealing than they do on this record. McGowan’s fractured vocal delivery is tailor-made to narrate the stories - from the guttural offensive launched in the direction of a landlord “and he was a miserable bollocks and a bitch’s bastard’s whore” on “Boys From The County Hell”, the drink sodden pub crawl call to arms of “Transmetropolitan” which promises they’ll “sit and have a drink, of VP wine and cider till’ we can hardly think” or the sewer mouthed ship captain’s “I could fuck all the whores in damnation me boys” claim on “Sea Shanty”. Indeed Shane McGowan is the “bold, shithouse poet” and creature of instinct. With a mixture of original compositions and traditional covers, this is The Pogues at their freshest and most stirring - a sound they never quite managed to ever truly capture again.

The Sex Pistols
Never Mind The Bollocks
Virgin Records
(1977)

Their only studio album from a career that never had the legs to carry them as far as their third birthday yet still cockily self assured enough to procreate a body of work that inspired a whole new movement to grow up around it  (copycat wankers, according to John Lydon) and remains a solid, hugely populated genre 32 years on. There’s no doubting the real genius behind The Sex Pistols was Malcolm McLaren whose clever marketing and carefully positioned episodes of band mayhem challenged the upper classes natural instincts of decency and god fearing so perfectly it brought instant celebrity and notoriety via the backlash of an up in arms society. But, through the contents of this album, the Pistols showed they were more than the puppets of anarchy many dismissed them as being. Lyrically intuitive and deep thinking with an unflinching mean spirit and obvious ability, as musicians, to create catchy, uncomplicated, instantly addictive 3½ minute anthems of expressive brilliance ( Pretty Vacant, EMI, God Save The Queen and No Feelings, for starters) The Sex Pistols changed so many rules in such a short time they ensured this record will always be an important reference point in musical history.

Nirvana
Nevermind
Geffen
(1991)

The ground breaking album that dominated the world and changed the landscapes of rock and roll bringing Nirvana global superstardom and historical relevance. It opened the doors for alternative music within the territories commercial music frequented and attracted new followers who brought and secured a stronger position for the genre which was now flourishing in places never before considered as a hundred new bands were brought to life under its influence. Geffen Records pre-release forecast sales of 200,000 maximum became the most underestimated figure in music as “Nevermind” began selling over 300,000 - per month! It was the pre-album single “Smells Like Teen Spirit” which catapulted everything else forwards thanks mainly to MTV’s worshipping of it - which, ironically, reduced it to college wank proportions until every mummy’s boy seized upon it and elected Kurt Cobain the voice of their generation. But, putting such superficialities aside, this really IS a great album and shows Kurt’s naturally gifted knack for writing stunning melodies and catchy music with often the most minimal chord structures employed. Forget the video-jock friendly single and check the brilliant punk rock aesthetics of “Territorial Pissings” or bittersweet composition “Lithium” and it’s tender/brutal guitar work. This was an album which relied on the music rather than the lyrics, something not many of today’s bands are good enough to carry out so brilliantly. It may not remain as formidable a statement as it did when first released but it will always be a work of genuine honesty.

The Specials
The Specials
2Tone
(1979)

Eponymous debut album which revived ska music in Britain with what was essentially a recycled and reinvented model of the 1960’s Jamaican original. Labelled the “defining moment” in that genre’s far reaching appeal The Specials spearheaded its reintroduction with a more accessible formula by injecting the infectiousness of Ska with punk music’s street appeal and the lyrical politics of pub culture, an instant vehicle upon which the frustrations of youth could rely upon to be the soundtrack of their dissatisfaction. Relying on a mixture of cover versions and original songs (as well as the clued-up street level intellect of Elvis Costello as producer) this album captured a generation so fucking perfectly it became the most important musical possession of British youth in 1979 and remains a vital landmark of that time - 31 years since being released. Opening with the most recognised cover ever of Dandy Livingstone’s “A Message To You, Rudy” this album is a masterpiece, a musical interpretation of the community spirit it went on to evoke through songs which typified, accurately, the real Britain that politicians are always so out of touch with to appreciate even exists but is documented on here with brutal honesty and informed wisdom - “all the girls are slags and the beer tastes just like piss” from “Niteklub” or echoing the thoughts we’ve all felt at some point as the realisation of avoiding a definite kicking sinks in with the “glad I got my mates with me” moment in “Concrete Jungle”. Never has the working class been so tunefully encapsulated.

Ian Dury
New Boots And Panties
Stiff Records
(1977)

The rough edged cockney geezer with an earthy sense of fun, cheek of the devil and the soul of a poet painting his suburbia in shades of lyrical witticisms with the brush of his keen eyed observation, and sharing it all with us in the vivid snapshots of “New Boots And Panties” Steeped in true Britishness and with a council estate eloquence and working class honesty, Ian Dury became the greatest champion of normal people, lyrically, since Ray Davies. With a touching nod toward the less glamorous segments of society (and in a language more profane than his predecessors) this was an album of originality and depth from a naturally gifted human being. The wry humour and down to earth honesty came to life under the versatility and magic of backing band The Blockheads. Their incredible grasp as musicians journeyed the songs through stabs of art-rock, elements of jazz and occasional blues, spit and sawdust pub ambience, soulful yearnings and even a bit of disco chucked in for luck. Dury’s songs simply grew wings under such majesty. His lyrical ruggedness was as endearing as it was overwhelming. Never before, or since, has a song opened with the line “Arseholes, bastards, fucking cunts and pricks” (Plaistow Patricia) and be made to sound as non-threatening as Dury did it. But he had a proper tenderness within him, the tribute to his late father, “My Old Man” is astonishingly perfect, and when he sings the line “all the best mate, from your son”, you could weep for his sorrow. It’s a perfect introduction to Ian Dury and one that’s never overlooked by the media or the public. His greatest moment though, and the one that sums the man up, is his humorous composition “Blockheads” - with his east-end brogue at its most jagged and imagination at its most vivid, “they’ve got womanly breasts under pale mauve vests, shoes like dead pigs noses. Cornflake packet jacket, catalogue trousers and a mouth wot neva closes”. How we miss him.

The Smiths
The Queen Is Dead
Rough Trade
(1986)

The best album of their impressive career and the one that earned them a whole new generation of admirers deeply stirred by the almost majestic assemblage representing the craft of a band currently at their most inspirational and influential It’s the consolidation of the foursome, synchronized in natural bonding and shared commitment that urged the perfect flow this record travels at. For those who slated the first two albums and wondered out loud why Johnny Marr “allowed his genius to suffer Morrissey’s absurdities” had their mouths firmly zipped shut and crammed with enough humble pie to feed a nation of starving doubters. It only takes the pounding Mike Joyce drumbeat on opener “The Queen Is Dead” for you to realise that something special has been created. Morrissey’s lyrics are, in the main, light hearted, deliberately cheesy and stuffed with pier-end humour, as he regales us with such nonentities as - “she said hey I know you and you cannot sing, I said that’s nothing you should hear me play piano” as well as his blatantly obvious disregard of the more serious issues in the world “the rain that flattens my hair, these are the things that kill me”. The skills of Johnny Marr as a guitarist are everywhere you turn, from the feathered indie bounce of “Cemetery Gates”, his greatest ever riff on “Bigmouth Strikes Again” clever marching chord structures of “Frankly Mr Shankly” or his finest hour “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out “a stunning anthem of sheer adoration and love which sees Morrissey drop the jokes for poignant reflection “and if a 10 ton truck kills the both of us, to die by your side, well the pleasure and the privilege is mine”. A powerful album with not one visible weakness in earshot, proof that The Smiths were one of the greatest bands of the modern era.

The Beatles
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Parlophone
(1967)

The greatest contribution of their 8 year existence and most opulent pop album to ever emerge from the liberating sixties Packed with complex song structures, multi-tracking, overdubs and astonishing creative stamina The Beatles finally ditched the matching suits, appealing haircuts and boy meets girl love ditties in the most sensational transformation ever witnessed. The entireness of this record at the time of it’s release would possibly be too breathtaking to fully appreciate - yet it’s simply the best of everything their collective minds ever produced. John Lennon’s prolific editorial magnum opus “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds”, Paul McCartney’s ornate “Fixing A Hole” , the double layered intelligence of “A Day In The Life”, or just the simple, music hall skew of “When I’m 64” , every note of every song as iconic sounding as the next. It’s studio technology at its most imaginative which brings life to this pseudo-concept album’s curiosity cabinet of unorthodox sound effects (brass instruments, reverse cymbals and sitars included) and sonic experimentation. Nothing is hidden, it’s as honest an effort as you’ll ever hear from them and the over sensitive drama queens of the BBC who banned the playing of 3 of its songs because they suspected a reference to drugs may be contained within the lyrics just make it all the more glorious.

The White Stripes
Elephant Warner
(2003)

For the genius that is Jack White and nothing else! Never has minimalism sounded so powerful. The bluesy/punk/garage sounds of “Elephant” is incendiary guitar rock stripped back to it’s most primitive, low toned state for the greatest example of stunning musicianship in years. Charging through the genres with screaming feedback distortion and Meg’s simplistic, almost petulant thump-thump drumming it’s nearly impossible to believe only two people can create such a searing wall of sound. It’s a far more immediate album than their previous three and certainly more produced which enhances the sharp corners that peppered the music brilliantly. The booming bass sound (it’s an octave pedal not a bass guitar) which opens “Seven Nation Army” is the greatest heaviness to be measured so precisely. Churning blues hybrid “ Ball And Biscuit” is the albums most mesmerising moment and Jack White’s statement of significance delivered soundly with wailing, unrestrained enthusiasm, muscle and brains and heart. Their fuzzy lo-fi cover of Burt Bacharach’s “I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself” is as far away from anybody else’s song as you could possibly go, with its skewed structuring and cymbal tapping before exploding into a thunderous, unsymmetrical, haunting symphony. This was an album of proud disturbance. Jack White is Marc Bolan reincarnated. 

Patti Smith
Horses
Arista
(1975)

Though “Horses” was never a masterpiece, and Patti Smith really doesn’t have the greatest singing voice, it made a significant enough impact to re-adjust people’s perception of music. She was the rock critic/punk poet operating from within a post-beat landscape merging her esoteric verse with a garage/punk aesthetic on New York’s bohemian gig circuit before this, her debut album (produced by John Cale) was released. Clearly unwilling to ever compromise the poet she was born to be allows the words to run unharnessed with the liberation of their own originality rather than chastising them in a dumbed-down interpretation of themselves. It’s the way they criss-cross between multitudes of spiritual meaning, parallel universe and apocalyptic dreamscape which can become a bit cloudy and harder to follow. The music was loosely structured and only there in most instances to complement her poetry and talk/sing style. Her 9½ minute of free form rock and roll epic “Land” with its sprawling narrative moved between scratchy guitar, atmospheric piano and solid riffs, “Elegie” with its in and out guitar wails, the reggae tinged “Redondo Beach” and signature track “Gloria” are the reasons “Horses” continues to be such a core favourite among the collators of influential music.

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