The N&G Top 500 Albums of All Time!!!

Going back to 5 at a time; 10 feels excessive.
30. Deerhoof - La Isla Bonita
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29. Men at Work - Business as Usual
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28. St Vincent -Strange Mercy
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27. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
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26. Tenniscoats - Temporacha
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Gavaxeman said:
A bit different time ..this should get your started


Guess the album from a lyric - my albums 50-48.

50-“All relationships are emptying and temporary”

49-“Oh, I never was good with romantic words
So the next few lines come really hard
Don't have much but what I've got is yours..”

48-“ I was born under a bad sign,
Left out in the cold..”
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Well this post went down nearly as bad as my Keane pif .....

I’ll post the albums properly ...
 
No 50 then ....

Mansun “Six” 1998

Brit Pops True Prog masterpiece, the second album from Chester’s finest , in its U.K. version is a sprawling epic , one long linked series of songs that segue and flow into each other, multiple time signatures within single tracks , it’s bonkers and brilliant . The album artwork is great, references to the lyrics abound, and it creates its own world, a proper album to sit and ingest in one long flow, with each listen revealing something you’ve not noticed before .

Factoid- The cover art also depicts a number of (perhaps non-existent) books, including:


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I have all but one of these five on vinyl. The missing one here is rare, and by an artist that is definitely on peoples' list, but I'm guessing nobody else chooses this one.

Radiohead - OK Computer
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
The Cars - S/T
Jane's Addiction - S/T
Wilco - A Ghost is Born
 
40. Sturgill Simpson - Sound & Fury

3CB0FE25-6B3E-43F3-BA1A-7BCA30F56172.jpeg

39. Stevie Wonder - Songs In The Key Of Life

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38. Pink Floyd - Animals

27B54504-3AE4-4021-9807-2670C7B74D0F.jpeg

37. Black Sabbath - Paranoid

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36. Open Mike Eagle - Brick Body Kids Still Daydream

1DFC05B1-5BEB-43E9-A40F-E8A870E7F6DA.jpeg

I'm not limiting my list to one album per artist or anything like that, primarily because I want this list to be the truest representation of my favorite albums of all time. So, y'all can expect to see two more Stevie Wonder albums on my list above Songs In The Key Of Life, because the man has 3 perfect albums and countless more near-perfect ones.
 
Now that my stress levels from the past few days have been eased, time to rattle off the next 5!

40) Justin Timberlake - Futuresex/Lovesounds [contemporary R&B, pop, trap]
Justin Timberlake - Futuresex/Lovesounds (2006, CD) | Discogs

Across the 12 tracks here, the variation is immense for a pop/R&B album. The production sounds incredibly fresh and ahead of its time here...many tropes seen on pop and R&B albums even to this day have to owe it to this record. "What Goes Around...Comes Around" uses Turkish bağlamas, an unheard of instrument choice for modern pop music...it's hypnotic enough to be the closest thing to trip hop on a top 40 album. "Chop Me Up" is an accessible early undertaking in trap pop/rap. Justin hit his artistic apex here and hasn't come even close to redefining himself in the years since.

39) Between the Buried and Me - Colors [progressive death metal, metalcore]
Between The Buried & Me - Colors [2 LP] - Amazon.com Music

Epic, grandiose, and sprawling in nature. The album that got me into death metal. It sounds great in its original metal composition. It sounds powerful as an orchestral arrangement. The music navigates and shifts through breathtaking peaks and valleys, with copious frenetic guitar solos. It even has a brief segment of bluegrass!

38) Nujabes - Modal Soul [jazzy hip hop, instrumental hip hop]
Nujabes - Modal Soul (2005, CD) | Discogs

A project where every song is its own journey, with many told without words. It is as the album title implies: tonal changes within a pulse/heartbeat. A truly remarkable achievement from a talent gone far too soon.

37) Ween - Quebec [experimental rock, art rock]
Quebec (album) - Wikipedia

A neat, fun collection of songs from a band where you never know what you're going to get next from song to song! Classic rock, psychedelics, children's songs, and some eerily creepy cuts across the works on Quebec among a slew of other genres adorn the tracklist. The band's musicianship is vastly underrated.

36) Kraftwerk - The Man Machine [electronic, synthpop]
The Man-Machine - Wikipedia

Are we sure this is not from 2078 instead of 1978? I couldn't even pontificate what people thought of art like this back then, along with the rest of their works. Mind-bendingly avantgarde electronic wizardry. RIP Florian Schneider, you will be missed.
 
chrb98 said:
I'm not limiting my list to one album per artist or anything like that, primarily because I want this list to be the truest representation of my favorite albums of all time. So, y'all can expect to see two more Stevie Wonder albums on my list above Songs In The Key Of Life, because the man has 3 perfect albums and countless more near-perfect ones.
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Stevie Wonder is a good example of why my list will probably be unimpressive compared to most others on here. Stevie is just one of many acclaimed artists I've never delved into and so they won't be represented on my list 😕
 
gaporter said:
Stevie Wonder is a good example of why my list will probably be unimpressive compared to most others on here. Stevie is just one of many acclaimed artists I've never delved into and so they won't be represented on my list 😕
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No one's list is any more impressive than anyone else's! It's just our favourites! There's no shame in not being familiar with or not liking an artist that a lot of other people like, or vice versa.
 
gaporter said:
Stevie Wonder is a good example of why my list will probably be unimpressive compared to most others on here. Stevie is just one of many acclaimed artists I've never delved into and so they won't be represented on my list 😕
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Dude, there is no shame. You could post a list of 50 emo albums from the early 2000s and you'll still get a passing grade.
 
gaporter said:
Stevie Wonder is a good example of why my list will probably be unimpressive compared to most others on here. Stevie is just one of many acclaimed artists I've never delved into and so they won't be represented on my list 😕
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When you really sit down and think about how many critically acclaimed artists there are in the western music canon, ya quickly realize it'd be almost impossible to fit them all into one list. I don't think there's anything impressive or unimpressive about someone having The Beatles, or Stevie Wonder, or David Bowie, or any artist in their top 50! The personal touch is what makes everyone's lists interesting.

And besides, I'm putting Music Of My Mind above Songs In The Key Of Life, so even within the Stevie Wonder critical consensus, I'm still making the "wrong" choices :p
 
I’m trying my best to be honest with myself about what I actually enjoy and make this a list of albums where I’m both thoroughly enjoying and eagerly anticipating what comes next throughout the whole listen. My struggle is that as soon as I got Spotify 5-6 years ago, my music listening has shifted far more into new (to me) music exploration than revisiting albums I already think I like - and there’s still so much ground to cover! I haven’t listened to so many of my “favorite” albums in years even though they lurk in my mind and haunt me with vague memories of how much I enjoy(ed) them. This allowed a nagging fear to creep in that, when I’d finally listen to them again, they might fall flat and just sound dumb. I got so nervous!! But I’m happy to report that Hoobastank, Stroke 9, and Gavin DeGraw still ROCK. 😎

I’ve also found that it helps to try to diagnose what it is that I actually like about music in general and then use that logic to help when I get stuck trying to rank these albums:
  • Lyrics cannot make a mediocre album great. If you can’t say it with a melody or harmony or rhythm, I’m not listening!
  • Haunting/primal is good.
  • Self-consciously trying to be cool? um...no, thank you.
  • Innovation is one thing but experimentation? Nope. Come back when the experiments are done and you have a finished product.
And to catch up on some discussions I missed:
Joe Mac said:
Equally I expect a chunk of mine to be lower down because the forum is largely American so, a bit like in that Rolling Stone list, some of the British ones, outside the the obvious, may get buried.
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Craig David has more of a global following than you give him credit for, Joe.

Woob_woob said:
The voting winners are 50 lists, closed ballot, and anything goes for what is considered an album
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So there are no guardrails that I can use to keep Pure Moods comps from dominating my list? Oof.

Lee Newman said:
I mean Life in a Northern Town is almost single handedly strong enough to put The Dream Academy on my damn list.
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It's on Pure Moods 2, so that should make things easier for you! Maybe I won’t be the only one!

Joe Mac said:
Oh mean I’d never say he can’t play the guitar like a mofo, that’s clear and people love cream. I just find that, for me, he is a bit like a lot of extremely proficient players in that he’s not a great songwriter. I find a lot of it meandering and one paced and it bores me tbh.
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his songs can cha-ee-ange the world, Joe. He could be the sunlight in your universe.
 
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