I’ve never really talked about the subject of music very much here on Manic, but I do have a large range of likes of the medium. While there are many lists that come up with the best of certian genres and songs, I decided to take a bit of inspiration from Rolling Stone magazine. If they were able to come up with a list of 500 Great Albums, I figured I can come up with 52 of my personal favorites.
The only thing I considered for this list was that I tried to go with one artist per album because If I didn’t, you’d be seeing nothing but albums by the same six or seven artists.
(I’ll also leave links if you wish to listen to the albums.)
Anyways, onward with the list.
52. Bad Girls – Donna Summer
…Well, It seems I’m starting this off on an intersting note. As I’ve mentioned a while ago in my 54 review, I like Disco music. With Giorgio Moroder being one of the more recognized figures among the genre and the music industry of that time, I’ve been hearing a lot of albums and songs that he produced or wrote and the majority of those were sung by Donna Summer. With that being said, the music has a lot of similarities to ther previous collaborations with a Euro-disco sound that worked well with Donna’s vocals, but this time around the album added in elements od Rock, R&B, Funk, and even little bits of Country thrown in which ended up being some her best stuff and was a bit of an ease into the genre for me.
51. Play – Moby
Techno is something that is usually considered the basics of most electronic music that spawned from the ’80s, it haves often gone through its own evolution with Moby at the front of it when he decided to take a bit of a different step and decided to sample mostly Gospel and Folk vocals that he mixed in with his some breakbeat and pure 90’s electronic sound that he was known for and created something unique and extremely successful for those reasons. Although my favorite tracks were strictly techno like “Machete,” the Gospel sampled tracks are the strongest tracks on the album and they definitely added a breath of fresh air to the usual Disco and Rock tunes.
50. 3 Feet High and Rising – De La Soul
Rap music is another genre that I never thought much of in the past, but has recently gotten my attention through some artists and groups, most of them from the ’90s, and one that I’ve come to like the trio that are considered the “Hippies of Rap.” While I wouldn’t consider them of that nature, I do hear some psychedilic sound in a couple of songs on the album which is a bit strange but worked rather well. Along with the addition of comedic skits thrown in and some upbeat Feel Good (no pun intended) songs, it’s probably one of the best rap albums I’ve heard.
49. London Calling – The Clash
…And Now, it’s time for an album which has a song I’ve heard non-stop ever since I was born.
I’ve heard the song “London Calling” all the time as a child and when I eventually heard the album that it came from, it was basically my gateway to Punk Music (Even though this album is considered to be Post-Punk.) With it mixing in different genre styles with the usual Punk sound as well as themes of drug use, unemployment, and adulthood among others, it ended up being one of the best of the genre that I’ve heard.
48. 10,000 Days – Tool
When I was approaching my Middle School years, I was starting to expand some of my musical horizons by trying out different bands and I basically grabbed whatever I found at my local area for purchasing music and this was the first album I ever purchased…needless to say, it was a bit of an experience to hear for the first time and served as my introduction into Tool and there unique style of Metal.
47. Full Moon Fever – Tom Petty
It’s no secret that I like Tom Petty’s music. I could pretty much put any of his albums up on this list with ease and give off the same reasons why I like it. In the end though, I decided to go with the start of his solo career. While Tom Petty could have easily made a great solo album one his one, one thing that I love about it was that he got a little help from the majority of the Travelling Wilburys on the album, appearing on multiple songs as well as the majority being co-written by Jeff Lynne.
46. 20 All -Time Greatest Hits! – James Brown
Often times when I, or any other person, can’t really pick a personal favorite album by any artist, a compilation album are often chosen. That what is applies for me when I couldn’t pick anything for the Godfather of Soul, James Brown. While I don’t have any other albums by him, I have heard many others and he has plenty of great songs to choose from and it’s pretty easy to put a bunch of them onto a compilation album and this was one that’s an easy buy for anyone. (I mean who doesn’t like James Brown?)
45. Panic – Caravan Palace
Whoever came up with the idea of Electro-Swing is an absolute genius. I mean this was absolutely amazing when I heard this for the first time and I just loved it. While a lot of artists have tended to add in elements of dubstep into the genre, there’s just two artists of the genre whom have kept to the original sound that got me hooked into the genre in the first place, Parov Stelar and Caravan Palace. While Parov has plenty of good stuff, Caravan always had the tunes that had a bigger impact on me upon my discovery of them. Combining the traditional Big Band style of Jazz with some Electronic sounds and ocassionally DJing thrown in and it was just and amazing experience for my ears.
44. The Girl Next Door: 1927 – 1932 – Annette Hanshaw
One thing that comes as a bit of a shock to some people is my love of the Jazz Age music, especially considering with some of the artists I like and albums I own. I often enjoy the early jazz music that was mostly just big band music lead by a single musician as well as the solo singers such as Cab Calloway, Al Jolson, and my personal favorite was always Annette Hanshaw. While not much to say on the sound aspect of it, the main thing that I often liked about her was her some what innocent vocal style that was very fitting with most of her songs.
43. Ramones – The Ramones
While the punk music from the United Kingdom was something I heard often, it wasn’t up until a couple of years ago until I fully appreciated a majority of the American Punk acts like the Dead Boys, The Stooges, and, of course, The Ramones. While being Loud, Short, and uptempo with somewhat controversial lyrics throughout, it was everything that I was expecting in it and it was great to hear.
42. Red Headed Stranger – Willie Nelson
Out of all of the music genres out there, the one that’s often at the bottom of the barrel for me is Country. Although I was constantly surrounded by it throughout the course of my youth, I never really fully got into the genre mostly because I thought it was a bit too repetitive and that’s a really odd sentence for me considering I’m a fan of Electronic music. While I’m not a big fan of it, I’ll admit there are some artists that I listen to which mainly consists of the older stuff like Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Marty Robbins, and, as this list shows, Willie Nelson. While the majority the songs are mostly covers, they all still were perfect in telling the tale of a fugitive on the run with the arrangement of (then) older songs and poetic lyrics that were lacking on instruments at times but still worked well and ended up helping me turn my head a little bit more toward Country.
41. Mule Variations – Tom Waits
It was actually easy for me to pick which style of Tom Waits that I prefer. While his work Asylum is good and I’ve liked a bunch of it, I always tend to enjoy the strange and bizarre stuff so his experimental stuff like Bone Machine or Sordfishtrombones so I tended to lean toward the recent works of his career. With the Delta Blues-esque sound and lyric style along with his distinct style of singing, It was a perfect album for me.
40. Off the Deep End – Weird Al Yankovic
If you know me personally, it’s no secret that I love the music of Weird Al Yankovic. He has always been a great source of music and humor over the course of my entire life and he will always be one artists whom I’ll always adore as my life goes on. While I’ve enjoyed and grew up with some of his modern stuff like Straight Outa Lynwood and Bad Hair Day for parodying songs that came out in my Youth, I’ve always had a soft spot for his come back album after his lull in the late ’80s. While heavy on style parodies of artists like The Beach Boys, Tonio K, and Jan & Dean, the tracks I heavily enjoyed were the parodies of songs that spawned during the early ’90s which often spawned many artists and songs that I’ve grown to despise and Weird Al make them all fun for me to hear.
…and with that, Part 1 draws to a close. Part 2 will be on it’s way soon.
Here are Links to the albums if you’re interested:
Bad Girls -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKT6mnvH4Ozjo8xj-OHnSJNYfSAQoQsob
Mule Variations -Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_OkcVLBB9A
Off the Deep End -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBvdvKDIsQZlnuvXlMzWPD6-OxjdsliB4
3 Feet High and Rising -Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFTqs1ZuADQ
Full Moon Fever -https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLoX5VdQlt9OfzN2_5X0my1F9ZoXqtD6uS
Play -Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIr7V7vmwu0
London Calling -Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KonmIMQelwM
10,000 Days -Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ajx-ABtbVM
Rocket to Russia -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdHL2tfhDRp3krgv2kuxZm4Wob_dOrAE0
Red Headed Stranger -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLE515829A383AB7E4
Panic -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7odT97B5pLaLjahegeZTIV4NNt2KjJc1
20 All Time Greatest Hits! -Â https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLoSoYZTkLMZehIAVW1KP-Wyv2OIrhGXU9
