1001(+) Albums I Had to Hear Before I Die, Apparently (#101-#150)

#101: Elastica - Elastica (1995)

February 21st, 2025: as far as I can tell, this band is sort of like a Britpop sidequest, founded by Justine Frischmann and Justin Welch a couple years after they left Suede, a band I've heard of, but I can't say if I ever heard any of their work. (out of Britpop's unofficial "big 4," the States latched onto Blur and Oasis; Pulp and Suede didn't capture nearly as much attention here.)

imagine if Hole wrote songs with Wire-esque riffs and song structures, and you sort of have an idea of what Elastica's debut album sounds like (to me, at least). some of the best songs here, much like on Wire's Pink Flag, are only around 90-150 seconds long! as far as 90s indie rock goes, I have a much higher proclivity for the American bands than the British ones, but Elastica has a sound that brings the best from both sides of the pond to the forefront. it's a mixture of grungy, American alt and indie rock textures with the wit and songwriting tropes of British post-punk. I guess I'm saying they're the Strokes before the Strokes. 7/10

#102: Beck - Odelay (1996)

February 22nd, 2025: this is much more in line with what I expect from Beck, in comparison with Sea Change and even Guero. to me, his signature sound is an even blend of hip hop production with psychedelically tinged alt-rock sonics. with the Dust Brothers on co-production duty for nearly all of this material, the resulting album has an unmistakable aural fingerprint. my major hangup is that Beck's not my kind of rapper; I think he's far more compelling as a singer-songwriter, as Sea Change so eloquently demonstrated. 7/10

#103: Marvin Gaye - Let's Get It On (1973)

February 23rd, 2025: this is the legendary follow-up to What's Going On, an album that's just as relevant today as it was in 1971. it's a magical combination of timeless music with a political angle that only grows stronger and more prescient over the decades. Let's Get It On is, obviously, not nearly as concerned with the issues of the day, but in a way, it's just as timeless and relevant as its predecessor. few topics, especially in American culture, are more widely debated about than sex! Marvin Gaye's liner notes give me the impression that this was an album he made to heal from his sexual trauma and repression; you can hear the weight falling off his shoulders as he careens over these tracks.

What's Going On might be notable for its songwriting prowess, but Let's Get It On captures Gaye in the raw. the songs are much simpler, but that simplicity serves the sexual theme, giving him plenty of room to feel out each lyric and phrase. everything is super groovy, and deeply intimate. this is definitely a step in a new direction from what Motown had become known for, and I'm glad they gave Gaye the creative liberty to make it happen! we have a whole host of funky, loose, jam-session-like soul and R&B albums to thank him for. 8/10

#104: Belle and Sebastian - If You're Feeling Sinister (1996)

February 24th, 2025: even though this is (as of now) the only Belle and Sebastian album I'm even remotely familiar with, I'm comfortable saying that Stuart Murdoch is one of the best songwriters of his time and place. this band strikes such a great balance between familiarity and ingenuity. you'll be humming along to a bouncy melody, and then they'll open a door to a totally different room, leaving you to bask in some sort of lush harmonic bed, and then they go right back to bouncy again. effortlessly catchy, intimately engineered and mixed, and the strings! music that makes you feel good, but also a little wistful. 9/10

#105: Pixies - Doolittle (1989)

February 25th, 2025: in some ways, this is the rock album, as far as the genre's evolution from 1990 to the present day. the DNA for the modern alternative rock sound, in all the many shapes and sizes we can find it in today, is present in every song on Doolittle. the Pixies can go fast or slow, catchy or chaotic, loud or soft, and often do all of that in just two or three minutes, like on "Mr. Grieves." songs like "I Bleed" or "Debaser" are purpose-built for singing along. "Monkey Gone to Heaven" and "Hey" are tender moments perfectly placed. Kim Deal's basslines and backing vocals are everything. it's all so much fun! if this album has no fans, it means I'm dead, along with millions of others. 10/10

#106: Justice - † [Cross] (2007)

February 28th, 2025: can you believe they made this shit in GarageBand?

compared to the only other French house duo I know anything about, Justice leans far more aggressive. as it was explained to me, the French label Ed Banger was home to some of the country's most noisy, in-your-face electro acts in the mid-2000s. Justice's version of this sound is hyperactive, owing to the use of what the group calls "microsampling." it's a little bit like traditional sample chopping, except the fragments you use are much smaller. this leads to a kaleidoscopic, chaotic mix where the timbres being used are constantly in flux, but they're always relentless. mixes that are this crowded usually give me ear fatigue, but you can tell there was a lot of work done to make these songs feel coherent at the same time. I definitely felt weird listening to this while sitting in a chair! 8/10

#107: Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath (1970)

March 2nd, 2025: you can't go wrong with any of the first six Sabbath albums. their 1970 debut is arguably the first metal album in history so, once again, we're seeing history play out in the listening process! the late '60s were a bit of a mad dash to see how loud and heavy blues rock bands could play before the music they made took on a new identity. while Black Sabbath is, for the most part, a blues album, Tony Iommi's particular use of distortion sends the whole band into a different echelon. (his guitar tone is incredible, by the way.) while Cream had pushed the boundaries of this heavy blues sound just a couple years prior, Sabbath played much harder and even louder.

the most obviously metallic song in the bunch is the title track, with its famous tritone riff and slow, ominous tempo. beyond that and the brilliant "N.I.B." (which also has some of the best metal riffs of all time), I think you're better off approaching this as a blues album. that's not to say this isn't metal; since the tropes of the genre were still being established, it just doesn't sound like metal as we think of it today. Paranoid, released just 7 months after Black Sabbath, is a brilliant evolution in approach that I think more truly signals the beginning of heavy metal proper. that being said, one never would've happened without the other, and this debut (their live set at the time, recorded in a single 12-hour session with minimal overdubbing) is an excellent showcase of Black Sabbath's raw talent. 9/10

#108: U2 - War (1983)

March 3rd, 2025: it's always in one ear and out the other with me and U2. "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "New Year's Day" are fine enough, but nothing else on War comes anywhere close to those two songs in terms of memorability or intrigue. it feels like a heavily sanitized version of post-punk, always hinting at the things which make that style so interesting, but never embracing them. it's far from being as insufferable as a lot of their (even more sanitized) later work is, but there's still nothing for me to write home about. 5/10

#109: Spiritualized - Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space (1997)

March 4th, 2025: soothing, anthemic, and otherworldly. this is rock music performed by truly orchestral forces of instruments; you're not going to find timbres and textures like these on many other rock records. clearly, the sound Spiritualized are aiming for here is heavily informed by the more experimental bands in 60s and 70s British prog and psych. it's nice to see that sound combined with the directness of 90s alt-rock, a combination which leads to songs that are just as engaging to sing along to as they are to stand in awe of.

the closer is one of the finest 10+ minute songs in the history of rock music. not a second wasted. and Dr. John's on it? 8/10

#110: Carole King - Tapestry (1971)

March 5th, 2025: I was born early enough for this album to be in my parents' music collection, but not early enough to have heard it overplayed to death. I was much more familiar with James Taylor's recording of "You've Got a Friend" than Carole King's original. that tends to be the case with King; her legacy as a songwriter has arguably outlasted her work as a solo artist, given just how many other artists have recorded iconic versions of her songs. for some reason, it feels like Tapestry is usually discussed as something that came and went. the name Carole King is often a shorthand to evoke the past.

but let's not forget that people bought Tapestry like it was going out of style! it's one of the ten best-selling albums by a female solo artist in the US, where it's gone 14x Platinum. it charted on the Billboard 200 for 300 weeks straight. it won four Grammys, with Taylor's cover of "You've Got a Friend" winning a fifth. these are impressive accomplishments for any artist, woman or not, and they come with a host of really compelling songs to boot.

if you're not into soft rock, this probably won't convert you, but there's not many better examples to be found. King and her session band play these songs with a quiet fire, a refreshing sense of clarity, that makes the music very approachable. unlike other soft-on-the-ears albums I've listened to for this challenge, I get a lot out of the compositions themselves. there's just a hint of jazz or something show tune-y in there, something that keeps each song feeling just a little unpredictable.

wish I could pet that cat. 8/10

#111: Marilyn Manson - Antichrist Superstar (1996)

March 6th, 2025: we're definitely getting some proto-Reddit-atheism energy here. but it's alright, because Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails is behind the boards! oh, wait.

I kid. I love NIN and I think Antichrist Superstar is pretty decent. as far as a more mainstream take on an abrasive industrial metal sound, it could've been a lot worse. the first two tracks are by far the most standout: the rough-and-rowdy "Irresponsible Hate Anthem" into the tight, calculated, mechanical stomp of "The Beautiful People." as far as the rest is concerned, I kind of tune in and out. given Reznor's presence, I often find that the material veers too far into sounding like a dollar-store version of NIN or Fear Factory or what have you. that being said, I could easily see Antichrist being a gateway into more underground, radical heavy music. 8/10

#112: Gene Clark - White Light (1971)

March 7th, 2025: so now I know who MJ Lenderman copped his vibe from. interesting!

Gene Clark was a member of The Byrds, a band I'll probably get around to hearing for this challenge soon, and one which was responsible for boosting the careers of, among others, David Crosby and members of The Flying Burrito Bros. Clark's bag on White Light is a country-tinged folk rock sound that reminds me of Bob Dylan; Clark's voice often dips into Dylanisms, and there's even a Dylan cover on side B. I don't know if much stands out to me, but it's consistently a pleasant listening experience. I just wish it rocked a little harder or felt a bit more unpredictable. 6/10

#113: Bob Marley & The Wailers - Exodus (1977)

March 8th, 2025: the last reggae album I listened to for this challenge was Signing Off by UB40. I remember remarking that I wasn't sure if I disliked the genre, or if I just hadn't spent enough time with the right reggae artists and albums. egg on my face: it's the latter.

whereas Sounding Off felt interminable—it's an LP plus an EP running over an hour, and every song is roughly the same tempo—Exodus is a well-balanced package that never wears out its welcome. for the most part, it's an easy, breezy experience, especially the B-side which is mostly about making love and having fun. are you so heartless that you're not moved by the chorus of "Three Little Birds"? the A-side turns towards religion and politics, and the music feels much more serious as a result; knowing this album was conceptualized in the wake of Bob Marley fleeing Jamaica after an attempt on his life definitely raises the stakes of the title track, with its repeated shouts of "move!" but, no matter the tone, everything always feels funky and relaxed.

great instrumental and vocal backing from the Wailers + free-wheeling performances from Marley = a great time. 8/10

#114: The Cure - Disintegration (1989)

March 9th, 2025: I've tried to get into the Cure on a couple different occasions, but my aversion to the plasticity of 80s rock production always held me back a bit. this time, I think I'm much closer to a full appreciation.

the atmosphere of Disintegration runs deep. like, cavernously so. the layers of guitars (especially the prominent Bass VI), synths and melodramatic vocals all add up to something really ornate and extravagant. the best songs take their sweet time, with most being around five minutes and others stretching out for as long as eight or nine. the band conjures a grandiosity that sometimes reminds me of later developments in post-rock. if I have any major complaint, it would be in regards to the 72-minute runtime of the CD issue. I'm into this album, but not the Seventy Two Minutes kind of into it. 8/10

#115: Django Django - Django Django (2012)

March 10th, 2025: there's an interesting trend of early 2010s albums from smaller artists which appear in 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: critically acclaimed, but with not much staying power in the long run with audiences. (I had never heard of Django Django before this.) do we blame Pitchfork, who had a far more outsized influence on music discussions at the time, even if you hated them? are people just being contrarian for the sake of it?

well, I wouldn't say this blew me away or anything, but I still found it intriguing. Django Django's take on this blog era indie sound embraces electronics in a really cool way. sometimes this album feels like a synth piece, other times like a rocker, and sometimes both. this leads to a few pretty infectious cuts. the grab-bag mixture of influences from psych, disco, EDM, surf rock, folk, and plenty more means that the music rarely stays in one place for too long. some tracks are more memorable than others, but choice cuts like "Default," "Hand of Man" and "WOR" make it worthwhile. 7/10

#116: Brian Eno & David Byrne - My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (1981)

March 22nd, 2025: Eno and Byrne mostly made this one in between the sessions for Talking Heads' Fear of Music and Remain in Light. it's a three-album run the likes of which are seldom seen. the Talking Heads albums, two of the best in rock music history, are obviously noteworthy for their iconic songs and forward-thinking production. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts isn't quite as straightforwardly appealing but, as with most things Eno, you'd be hard-pressed to imagine the world of contemporary music without it.

if I had to guess, side A was driven mainly by Byrne, and side B by Eno. all 5 songs on the A-side feel downstream from funk and disco, and they're the most immediately gratifying material as a result. the B-side gives way to a similar rhythmic propensity, but one which is much more open-ended and surreal. grooves, when they appear, feel less grounded. the thing tying it all together is the extremely innovative use of sampling, where found voice objects in recordings from around the world become, essentially, a lead vocalist for the instrumentals Eno and Byrne create. this innovation alone would create a ripple effect that can still be felt in electronic music (and even hip hop) to this day. like with Remain in Light, I'm amazed at how ahead of the curve this music is. 1981! 8/10

#117: Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers - Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers (1976)

March 23rd, 2025: singles "Breakdown" and "American Girl" still hold up, but the rest is pretty unremarkable. I don't understand how 1001 Albums keeps getting it wrong whenever they choose to only include one album from certain artists. why this, a scant 30-minute LP with tremendous growing pains, over later, more mature works like Damn the Torpedoes or Full Moon Fever or Wildflowers?

the Heartbreakers are a skilled unit that play very well together, but it's clear that Petty had a lot of evolution still left to undergo as a writer and a frontman. I've never been the biggest fan of his singing, but I have to admit it got much better over the years. the aforementioned singles prove that he had a lot of great things in his future. I just wish this book showcased his abilities a little better! 5/10

#118: Neil Young with Crazy Horse - Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (1969)

March 24th, 2025: only two albums deep into my experience with Neil Young (the other being Rust Never Sleeps), the thing I've come to appreciate the most about his work is that it doesn't waste your time. it's raw, no-frills rock 'n' roll played hard. the one-note guitar solo has rarely been pulled off with this much aplomb.

Young's voice has been a bit of an acquired taste, but I've come to really appreciate the way his vocals seem to haunt his songs. there's a despondence in his singing that gives his lyrical narratives a more three-dimensional character and emotion. but man, this band. especially Danny Whitten. 8/10

#119: LCD Soundsystem - American Dream (2017)

March 25th, 2025: I mean, it's good and all, but it hardly feels necessary. LCD Soundsystem's reunion has always rubbed me the wrong way. James Murphy made such a definitive final statement for the band with This Is Happening and a live film/album ironically titled The Long Goodbye. that "Long Goodbye" lasted all of four years.

while there's definitely a few pretty great songs here, a lot of the material just feels like the band spinning their wheels. the synth work is still pretty fresh, and I enjoy that they feel more like an actual live band, but it can't make up for the fact that a bunch of these songs just feel like rehashes of the best moments from their first three LPs. "emotional haircut" feels like a lesser "Drunk Girls," "call the police" feels like a lesser "All My Friends," and on and on. that's not even mentioning the lyricism, which can get downright mean-spirited at times. Murphy used to have a little more self-awareness, but "tonite" is basically just a boomer ramble about how pop music sucks now. never heard that one before.

overall, it could've been worse, but it also could've been much better. or, preferably, it could never have existed, and LCD Soundsystem's discography wouldn't have this odd blemish on it. 6/10

#120: Shack - H.M.S. Fable (1999)

March 26th, 2025: Britpop with strings. bored me to tears. couldn't get through it. DNF

#121: Gil Scott-Heron/Brian Jackson - Winter in America (1974)

March 27th, 2025: it's pretty hard to deny the impact that Gil Scott-Heron had on Black American music of all stripes. his spoken-word poetry is widely viewed as an early ancestor of what we now call rapping, and it's rife with social commentary that's possibly even more relevant now than it was at the time. his influence on hip hop can also be felt deeply through the albums he made with Brian Jackson, including Winter in America.

admittedly, it's not my favorite of Scott-Heron's works. I find it a little bit samey; his preference for singing over spoken word for most of the material (save for the electrifying "H2Ogate Blues") leaves me a little underwhelmed. that being said, I can't deny that the music is extremely forward-thinking. Winter in America's legacy is well-preserved through its frequent use as a source for samples in hip hop production, a testament to its evergreen sound, typified by spacey electric pianos and flutes. 7/10

#122: Joni Mitchell - Blue (1971)

March 28th, 2025: I'm a bit more interested in Joni's jazz years, but I mean, come on. it's Blue! talk about an album that will cradle you like a baby when you're feeling low. Mitchell's unique guitar tunings create so much dissonance and heartache, and the way her soprano voice floats over them is so tender and perfect. this is one of the greatest heartbreak albums ever created. it's soul-bearing, deeply confessional and incredibly honest. I can't listen to "A Case of You" without shedding at least one tear. 9/10

#123: Joan Baez - Joan Baez (1960)

March 29th, 2025: a foundational pillar of modern folk music, the 1960 self-titled album by Joan Baez made its mark among aficionados in Greenwich Village and, eventually, the wider folk world. it's a collection of 13 traditional folk songs arranged by Baez for acoustic guitar and voice that sounds strikingly contemporary, despite being over 60 years old by now. to this day, folk guitarists are cribbing her style. it's an impressive thing for Baez to have achieved at the age of 19!

my major complaint is just that 13 songs feels like too many. this album runs 45 minutes, but I felt like I had my fill after around 30. 6/10

#124: Hüsker Dü - Warehouse: Songs and Stories (1987)

March 30th, 2025: why is this the only album by Hüsker Dü in the book? I'm baffled that the team behind 1001 Albums would go for this overly long, samey power pop/college rock experience rather than Zen Arcade or New Day Rising, two albums which were indisputably more groundbreaking and have a hell of a lot more vitality behind them. I can appreciate that the band wanted to do another double LP, but they didn't have nearly as many fresh ideas here as they did on previous records, so it just feels like a slog to get from tip to tail. I'm not sure why I would listen to this over any R.E.M. album from the same time period. 5/10

#125: Prince - 1999 (1982)

March 31st, 2025: sensational.

Prince is well-known today for his virtuosity as a singer, songwriter, engineer, producer, multi-instrumentalist and conceptualist. 1999, his fifth album, displays this myriad set of abilities better than any of the previous four. the singles are well-known for good reason, but the deep cuts are just as stimulating. you're not likely to find many records funkier than this that also have such a strange, off-kilter feeling. it reminds me a little bit of There's a Riot Goin' On, which captures a similar feeling of unease which was also very much influenced by global politics! the second of the two LPs that make up 1999 gets especially weird, but if that's your thing (and it's definitely mine) then you'll get more than your fill. 8/10

#126: The Sonics - Here Are The Sonics!!! (1965)

April 17th, 2025: is this the beginning of punk rock? it's hard to know for sure if the Sonics were even fully aware of what they created here. this crudely recorded set of covers (and a few original songs), fronted by the unrestrained hollers of Gerry Roslie, feels like a true evolution in the art of raucous rock 'n' roll. as RateYourMusic user Nurah's review puts it, the Sonics are the missing link between Little Richard and The Stooges. Kurt Cobain was also a massive fan of this album in particular, especially its drum sound (an entire kit, recorded with a single microphone, played super hard). the exclamation points all over the top of the album artwork are a clear indicator of just how vivacious and over-the-top this music is, especially for 1965.

all that being said, once again, I find myself in a situation with a 1001 album where I think the wider impact that this music had is just a bit more interesting than the music itself. thankfully, these 12 tracks fly by in under half an hour, so it's hard to feel like I wasted any time. 7/10

#127: David Bowie - "Heroes" (1977)

April 18th, 2025: my review for Low (album #7 in this list) outlines a lot of the reasons why that album is my favorite of Bowie's 20th-century output, and many of those same positives also apply to "Heroes", the follow-up. it's no shock that the two have so many similarities. both were released in the same year; both feature many of the same performers and songwriters, particularly the synth treatments of Brian Eno; and both were produced by Tony Visconti, continuing Bowie and Visconti's long streak of collaborations (although it wouldn't get much longer after this).

I don't want my adoration of Low to bias my adoration of "Heroes" but, of course, comparisons between the two are inevitable. they form the first two-thirds of what's now called the "Berlin" trilogy of albums along with Lodger, an era which many people would argue represents Bowie's artistic peak. much like Low, "Heroes" is divided into a more rockin' A-side and a more bleepy-bloopy B-side, although the divide isn't as strong here as it was on Low.

if you were frustrated by how short the rock songs on Low were, you'll feel much more at home with this one, where there's not a single track under three minutes long. plus, in comparison with how emotionally detached Low can sometimes feel given the brevity of its material, "Heroes" brings back a lot of the funk and soul grooviness of the previous year's Station to Station, but with a newfound precision, thanks to Bowie's recent sobriety. opener "Beauty and the Beast" sets things off with a ton of energy that doesn't relent for the entire A-side, which also includes album highlights "Sons of the Silent Age" and "Blackout."

I would argue that the title track is one of the best things ever created by humans, let along just songs. it's one of the most satisfying slow builds you'll ever hear, with a vocal performance from Bowie that may be the best he ever recorded. it never fails to make me stop dead in my tracks and well up with emotion.

the electronic tracks are, just as with Low, drop-dead gorgeous. whereas Low used ambient music to create an often oppressive atmosphere, the vibe on "Heroes" is much lighter and more ethereal. just existing inside of tracks like "Moss Garden" and "Neuköln" is one of the simple joys in life. plus, the first four tracks of the B-side all crossfade into each other for a seamless 16-minute ride. Bowie's saxophone trailing off at the end of "Neuköln" feels like a really satisfying conclusion, with "The Secret Life of Arabia" acting as a nice bonus. presumably it's at the end so as not to hang the rock 'n' roll people completely out to dry, but I always thought it would fit better somewhere else in the tracklist. it's the one major gripe I have with "Heroes" despite the fact that, at the end of the day, it's still one of my top five Bowie albums. 9/10

#128: The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground (1969)

April 19th, 2025: out with the Cale, in with the Yule. the effect this simple lineup change had on TVU is pretty hard to overstate. save for the 9-minute psych-tinged surrealism of "The Murder Mystery" (by far the most interesting song here), any trace of the avant-garde elements which colored their debut and defined their sophomore effort are essentially gone here on LP3, which is either their first or second self-titled album, depending on how you want to count it.

on the one hand, the band's pivot to a straightforward rock sound automatically makes this album just a little less interesting to me compared to the first two. on the other, that's just me wanting this to be something other than what it is.

with Reed as the sole songwriter, it's no surprise that both the compositions and their orchestrations are heavily stripped back; after all, this is the guy who famously said that "Two chords is pushing it." a lot of the time, you're left rocking between the 1 chord and the 4. you're sort of forced into this hypnosis in a similar way to the minimal music being written in New York City at the same time as TVU was active. the lyrics are, similarly, a lot less taboo than the band had become known for.

if anything, I feel like there might have even been a little too much edge sanded off in comparison with their previous work. despite that, I really appreciate how this album shows off the band's ability to thrive in many different musical contexts. there's still some interesting instrumentation quirks to be found; it's hard to think of this as being a "sell-out" record, since the band's identity is still pretty well intact. that definitely didn't stay true for much longer after this album, though! 8/10

#129: The Black Crowes - Shake Your Money Maker (1990)

April 20th, 2025: were people really clamoring for this sound in 1990?

1990 was a bit of a liminal space in comparison to the decade that followed; the sound of "the nineties" was yet to be solidified, so a beguiling array of genres were competing for dominance, many of them holdovers from the eighties. the Black Crowes, meanwhile, are a holdover from... the seventies? yes, they formed in 1984 in Atlanta, and they play a pretty authentic southern blues rock sound.

by the time the band finally released this, their debut studio album, they were six years in, and their musical path had been pretty well-trodden by bands as far back as the sixties. it makes it hard for me to get all that excited about the material on offer since, while the Black Crowes are a capable performing unit, they hardly bring anything new to the southern hard rock formula other than, perhaps, a slight bit of alternative flair on their ballads. they sound like a very talented bar band.

Chris Robinson's vocals are as ugly as sin. 3/10

#130: A Tribe Called Quest - People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm (1990)

April 21st, 2025: without question, this is an iconic debut from one of the most iconic groups in the history of hip hop. that being said, one thing that ever-so-slightly holds People's Instinctive Travels back in comparison to a later album like The Low End Theory or Midnight Marauders is how wet Tribe feels behind the ears.

Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad demonstrate a hell of a lot of prowess as producers on nearly every track here (the one-two punch of "Bonita Applebum" into "Can I Kick It?" remains one of the highest points of any Tribe album tracklist), but knowing just how colorful and unique their production would become on future records, in comparison to how stripped back and basic this debut can feel, does leave this feeling like it's missing a little bit of that extra something from their later work.

thankfully, the group's MCs nailed their sounds from the jump! Q-Tip's rasp and Phife Dawg's smoothness each make for some of hip hop's most iconic voices. plus, for a long time, this was the only Tribe album to feature vocals from Jarobi, who makes perhaps his most notable contributions to People's Instinctive Travels as a chatting DJ in the skits that introduce each song.

again, this is a pretty great album all around, but it's hard to observe in a vacuum. their first three records form this tremendous trilogy which it's hard to isolate any one piece from. they'd probably rather I focus on the whole anyway, since ATCQ notably credited all the production and writing to all of their members, somewhat obscuring the lines between who was doing what and making it all about the collective. it's a pretty great formula for free-wheeling group chemistry that they would capitalize on even further in the future. 8/10

#131: Donovan - Sunshine Superman (1966)

April 22nd, 2025: UK psych's stranglehold over 1001 Albums' sixties selections reigns supreme. at least this time we've got a Scottish take on the sound, and one that's actually pretty singular. Donovan's particular brand of surrealist poetry, paired with some exceedingly strange songs (with even stranger arrangements and orchestration), makes for an album that's pretty hard to mistake for any of his many psych contemporaries at the time.

the bluesy title track was apparently a #1 hit here in the US, but I can't recall if I had ever heard it before. it's one of the more obvious highlights, with its sticky, chromatically descending melodic phrases and its variation on the three-chord blues form. it's hard not to think of the psych era of the Beatles in the face of some of this material, but remember that Sunshine Superman hit store shelves a full 9 months before Sgt. Pepper's! it's easy to forget that this was a collective of artists all trying to achieve a similar aesthetic.

there's also "Season of the Witch" which feels like a more polite version of what bands like Led Zeppelin would go on to do just a few years later. (incidentally, a pre-LZ John Paul Jones plays bass on the title track.) beyond that, the rest of the material can be a little bit hit-or-miss, but I really enjoy a lot of the sounds this album presents despite that. 7/10

#132: Otis Redding - Otis Blue/Otis Redding Sings Soul (1965)

April 23rd, 2025: Booker T. & The M.G.'s definitely sound better with a frontman and horns.

Otis Redding possessed one of the most emotive, multifaceted singing voices recorded music has ever seen. on Otis Blue, he digs in hard on just about every cut, squeezing every ounce of meaning from each lyric with a kind of controlled chaos. most of the material is cover songs, with a particular focus on the music of the then-recently-deceased Sam Cooke; Redding's versions of "A Change Is Gonna Come" and "Wonderful World" are particularly strong, every bit as worthwhile as Cooke's.

there's also "Respect," a Redding composition which Aretha Franklin would later modify and record herself, with her version becoming her signature song, and a major feminist anthem to boot. I enjoy the novelty of hearing such a different arrangement in Redding's master version, but there's no question that Franklin's version, with the addition of the "R-E-S-P-E-C-T" break and a whole lot more, is much more definitive. that being said, I might like Redding's version of "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" more than The Rolling Stones' original. a bit hard to say this soon. the overall highlight of the album is another Redding original, the magnificent slow burner "I've Been Loving You Too Long." 8/10

#133: Dinosaur Jr. - Bug (1988)

April 24th, 2025: for as much noise as Dinosaur Jr. can create, they have a really keen sense of structure, dynamics and timbre manipulation. plus, they write really catchy stuff! frontman J Mascis is apparently compared to Neil Young no less than all the time, so I hate to relitigate this finished business, but there's an uncanny resemblance between the two and a clear path that leads from one to the other through musical time. Young's raw, unbridled rock 'n' roll spirit is very much alive on songs like "Freak Scene" and "They Always Come," as well as songs like the confrontational "Don't" which offer a lens into this trio's interpersonal struggles.

the transition from one decade into another can often be rocky, as the old one bows out while the new one is still trying to find itself. a band like The Black Crowes, whose 1990 debut LP I listened to and reviewed just a few days ago, was looking pretty solidly to recreate the past in their work. Dinosaur Jr. did the same, but also had a keen sense of how they might push things forward.

in some ways, their work is as important to the development of alternative rock (perhaps the last major advancement in rock's mainstream) as that of the Pixies from around the same time. in fact, Dinosaur Jr. was even there slightly earlier! their eighties presence on the SST label (alongside similarly forward-thinking punk and proto-alt stalwarts like Black Flag, the Minutemen, Hüsker Dü and Sonic Youth) hardly seems like a coincidence. 8/10

#134: U2 - Achtung Baby (1991)

April 25th, 2025: there's a vast emptiness at the center of this music that I can't seem to shake. given that Daniel Lanois, Brian Eno and Steve Lillywhite (among others) are handling production duties, this should be an easy shoe-in for me. and yet, it's U2 themselves that hold me back from a fuller enjoyment and, in fact, actively grind my gears.

granted, there weren't many rock albums that sounded like this in 1991. it's a grandiose experimental sound involving a lot of electronics, strings, and other "recording studio as an instrument" layers. at times, I almost found myself captured by Achtung Baby just off of the pure textural thrill that sometimes comes through on songs like "Until the End of the World" or "Zoo Station," but then I started paying attention to the actual songwriting again.

that's where it all came crumbling down.

these songs are dreadfully boring. the rock instrumentation at play (y'know, the actual band) is utterly sterile. the producers and extra bells/whistles get all the best moments. Bono's voice (specifically his grating falsetto, a defining feature for him on this LP) is among the most punchable I've ever heard. The Edge's guitar tones are among some of the least edgy (and most pillowy) in all of rock music. the only interesting layer of stuff coming from the members of U2 themselves is Larry Mullen Jr.'s drums.

this was very nearly my second DNF for this series. U2's music, especially this album and The Joshua Tree, reek of a kind of pomposity that simply doesn't feel earned. there's this feeling I get like the band thought they were making the hottest shit any rock band had yet thought of, and yet the final results are so tepid, predictable and uninteresting. not to mention how cloying the absolute worst moments are.

fun fact: "One," which has become an anthem for social justice causes in the last few decades, is actually just a song where Bono negs a woman he made up. stop it! get some help! 3/10

#135: Big Black - Atomizer (1986)

April 26th, 2025: Big Black were yet another underground rock band working in the eighties to hazard a guess as to what the guitar music of the future would sound like. their answer was an uncompromisingly abrasive sound with a ton of overdrive and stiff, mechanical drums provided by an E-mu Drumulator. every song here has a slightly different drum pocket and more than a few incredible riffs, which helps to create a good sense of variety from one track to the next. I'm glad this was under 40 minutes; any more and I'd have gotten a splitting headache. Atomizer lasts just long enough to make it possible to enjoy every second, but not too long! 9/10

#136: James Taylor - Sweet Baby James (1970)

April 27th, 2025: the polar opposite of yesterday's Big Black album?

this is among the easiest of easy listening fare you can find. James Taylor is a songwriter in the folk and soft rock vein, and his music is an uncontroversial blend of those sounds with those of Black American styles like R&B and jazz, not to mention a country undertone that never really lets up. it's definitely not "cool" to like this type of stuff (nor does Taylor attempt to make it sound very cool), but I can't help but enjoy it. it's no accident that a generation of jazz musicians in the 70s and 80s were taken by his work! the closer ("Suite for 20 G") is an especially keen demonstration of Taylor's flexible harmonic frameworks and keen sense of melody. 6/10

#137: Prince - Sign "☮︎" the Times (1987)

April 28th, 2025: even by Prince's eclectic standards, Sign "☮︎" the Times is an absolute smorgasbord. there's plenty of the fun, funky heaters that he's now synonymous with, but also way more sonic detours than on any prior Prince album. he really takes full advantage of the flexibility that the double-LP format allows for. it's hard for me to get into as much detail as I typically do, since the act of listening to so many great songs in so many different styles tends to scramble my brain a bit. while this is becoming one of my favorite Prince albums, I think I need a little more time with it compared to Dirty Mind or Purple Rain.

just rest assured that whether Prince is in sex funk mode, romantic balladeer mode, gender-bending mode (with the Camille songs), or what have you, it's gonna be great. it never ceases to amaze me how many different talents this guy had. truly a musician's musician's musician. the fact that some of these larger-than-life tracks were made totally in isolation is insanely cool.

the biggest highlight is easily "I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man," an absolute show-stopper that foreshadows the sound of contemporary creatives like Mk.gee. 9/10

#138: The Young Gods - L'eau rouge (1989)

April 29th, 2025: a bit of a hard sell for me, even if I really enjoy the idea of this band and this music. it's an industrial rock album where all the guitars are played off of a sampling machine. but, more than that, it's also a surreal ambient record. with the throat-sung Swiss-French vocals layered on top of everything, the final result is a truly alien experience; it's not shocking to me that a band named after a Swans song would produce something so difficult to categorize. (seems like David Bowie was listening to this when he made 1.Outside, which totally scans.)

ultimately, I find myself more enthralled by the sound of The Young Gods than the songs they write. but, hey, these guys definitely have a sound, which is more than you can say for most bands! 6/10

#139: Elvis Costello and The Attractions - Armed Forces (1979)

April 30th, 2025: the more Elvis Costello albums this book throws at me, the more I understand why it adores him. he was in the right place at the right time making just the right kind of music to appeal to the critics: a sharp blend of post-punk and new wave with nods to artists of yesteryear (the omnipresent Beatles being most prominent to my ears as an influence) and production work which, by Armed Forces, was beginning to resemble the maximalist sound pioneered by Phil Spector (listen to the layers upon layers of guitar coating "Chemistry Class," for instance).

some of the best pop/rock songs I've ever heard are to be found here. the opener ("Accidents Will Happen") is surely the biggest standout; you just don't hear harmonic ingenuity like that on the charts these days. "Senior Service" is a great jam, too. "Oliver's Army" would've been my #1 pick easily, but Costello says the N-word on it (prefaced by the word "white"). I just don't understand the point he's trying to make there; even taking Costello's ironic character in mind (which I talk about a bit in my review of This Year's Model, album #13), it just feels like pointless edginess. I have to dock the song a little bit as a result.

the songs that point away from Costello's power pop origins and towards his interest in more traditional rock sounds are often the ones that go over the best. otherwise, I think I'd rather just put on This Year's Model again. 7/10

#140: X - Wild Gift (1981)

April 31st, 2025: I was somewhat familiar with X's hooky, witty approach to punk rock (by way of rockabilly and the blues) from their debut album Los Angeles, and Wild Gift, their sophomore effort, is largely in the same vein. both albums were produced by Ray Manzarek, which is an oddly good fit considering how often X will veer just a little bit towards sounding like The Doors. John Doe and Exene Cervenka have such great vocal chemistry, and that's the main thing that keeps me engaged. it also helps that X has a much more keen ear for unique instrumental arrangements and sharp melodies compared to a lot of their competition at this time! 8/10

#141: Cocteau Twins - Heaven or Las Vegas (1990)

March 2nd, 2025: few albums have taken their sweet-ass time to grow on me quite like this one. if you asked me a few years ago, I would've told you I thought the Cocteau Twins, and this album in particular, were some of the most overhyped music in the history of the RYM charts. despite that, there's always something that keeps me coming back to Heaven or Las Vegas in the hopes that "maybe this will be the listen where I well and truly 'get it!'" I think this listen was the closest I've come so far.

when all the elements fall perfectly into place—the programmed drums, the icy synthesizers, Robin Guthrie's cavernous guitar layering, Simon Raymonde's slinky basslines, and especially Elizabeth Fraser's shimmering voice—the results are tantalizing. my favorite is still the opener ("Cherry-Coloured Funk"), with its incredible use of Fraser's falsetto in the chorus. this was also the first time I appreciated just how crafty the bridge of the title track is, or the post-chorus of "Fotzepolitic," or any number of other moments. whether or not the lyrics of these songs mean anything is anyone's guess, but they just have such a great sound about them.

the main thing that held me back from a fuller enjoyment of this album on previous listens (and believe me, I've been trying for a few years now) was the production and mixing. however, what once sounded like a muddy, overly reverberated blend of gloop to my ears now has a lot more precision and care in it than I previously recognized. it definitely suffers a little bit from that 80s gloopiness, but if anything, the Twins use it to their advantage. I'm not sure what changed with my ears or my brain chemistry, but this listen was easily the most I've ever enjoyed this band! 9/10

#142: Yardbirds - Yardbirds [Roger the Engineer] (1966)

May 3rd, 2025: another case where the legacy of an album is more interesting than the music itself. with Jeff Beck on lead guitar, I think I came into this expecting more fireworks, but for the most part this is a pretty by-the-numbers British 60s blues rock session. Beck does get a few decently entertaining solo turns on tracks such as "Rack My Mind" or the instrumental "Jeff's Boogie," but you also have to sit through some truly tacky cuts too, such as the piano ditty "Farewell" or the overly silly "Hot House of Omargararshid" (complete with "yah-yah-yah" group vocals). I can appreciate that this album had a tremendous impact on the shape of rock music to follow, but its value beyond that is somewhat limited, in my view. 5/10

#143: Liz Phair - Exile in Guyville (1993)

May 4th, 2025: Liz Phair is one of those artists who can never seem to top their debut, let alone match it, in terms of either sales or critical acclaim. it's a statement so confrontational that it seemed to have the unintentional effect of pigeonholing Phair to a place she never had any business being pigeonholed to, culminating in her dismal self-titled album where she was being marketed as an alternative to Avril Lavigne, a far cry from the musical and emotional maturity displayed here on her debut.

most of the ink spilled over Guyville concerns its famously crass and sexual lyricism, which is obviously a big selling point, but the music itself points heavily towards the future of alternative and indie rock, especially of the female-fronted variety. this definitely puts the music of your Mitskis and Lucy Dacuses into a clearer context! I'll definitely be returning to this to really get a fuller picture of just what Phair is talking about on each of these 18(!) songs; it's a lot to sift through, especially on a first listen, but I'd happily listen to this quite a few more times. 8/10

#144: Simon and Garfunkel - Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970)

May 5th, 2025: my cat Béla hates traveling, but he can tolerate the car ride in the cat carrier a little bit better if I throw on some Simon and Garfunkel, so I've become fairly familiar with their five studio albums over the past couple years. Bridge isn't necessarily my favorite, but it's hard to deny that it's one of their finest efforts, especially considering the circumstances surrounding its production (most notably, Art Garfunkel missing sessions to go act in a movie). how can I really deny an album with songs as great as the title track, or "The Boxer," or especially "The Only Living Boy In New York" (which might stand as my favorite S&G song of all time)? you're looking at some of the most immaculate pop songs ever conceived right there!

the vocal layering is fantastic as always, but what really sells this album is all the studio instrumentation. on some previous S&G albums, I always felt like the bells and whistles distracted from the core of what made them so compelling, but on Bridge they all serve to elevate the songs in question, especially the brass and saxophones that show up from time to time. a great note for this iconic duo to go out on. 8/10

#145: Joni Mitchell - Hejira (1976)

December 27th, 2025: Jaco Pastorius's performance on opening track "Coyote" should be enough to convince you that Hejira is a different kind of album. these are songs that wander and meander, much like the pilgrimage invoked by the album's title, and yet there's also such a focus and precision on display at the same time. surprising nobody, Joni Mitchell's explorations with jazz in the mid-seventies resulted in my favorite music of her entire career. her ever-lowering voice was now a smoky alto which transmitted some truly stunning poetry.

the pristine layers of electric guitars from Mitchell and Larry Carlton, plus Victor Feldman's vibraphone, results in a transcendent listening experience on "Amelia". "Furry Sings the Blues" freely moves from one key to the next, but it always comes back to that beautiful A minor chord one way or another (Neil Young on harmonica!). it keeps going in much this same way; every song has at least one or two surprise chords, and Mitchell's melodies remain ever-searching. many of these tracks feature little or no percussion, which really adds to the soul-searching nature of it all. by the end, you really feel like you've wound up somewhere else. one of the most immersive albums ever created. it's great to pay close attention to, or you can just check out and let it wash over you. 10/10

#146: Fairport Convention - Liege & Lief (1969)

December 28th, 2025: I reflexively assumed I wouldn't enjoy this very much, since I tend to prefer (or at least I'm more familiar with) American folk music over that of the British Isles, but Fairport Convention really sold me with their electric approach to this repertoire of traditional songs, and the original compositions inspired by it! there's hints of psychedelia, prog and the blues lurking underneath most of this material (especially the extended jam that makes up the second half of "Matty Groves"), but the band can also do a lot with a more contemplative, pastoral approach.

the biggest highlights for me are Dave Swarbrick's dynamic fiddling and Sandy Denny's delicate, almost mournful vocal performances. Swarbrick in particular really shines on the instrumental medley on side B, which also incorporates a few Irish tunes alongside the British ones; and Denny, who died tragically young less than a decade after recording Liege and Lief, casts a haunting shadow over many of its finest moments as an album. 8/10

#147: Nick Drake - Pink Moon (1972)

December 29th, 2025: yet another helping of British folk music to complement yesterday's album, I guess!

this album is one I am far more familiar with, since I discovered it in high school over a decade ago. it was the first of Nick Drake's three albums I chose to dive into, likely because it's his most popular (owing to it being his only album to release in the US during his short lifetime). Five Leaves Left (which I reviewed for album #85 of this challenge) and especially Bryter Layter are adorned with wonderful chamber arrangements with strings and winds, and what feels more or less like a band behind Drake.

by contrast, apart from a single piano overdub on the opening title track, Pink Moon is just a man and his guitar. that minimal approach lets you focus way more on just how great of a guitarist he was, and it pulls even further attention to his delicate voice, and the harrowing words he delivers with it. "Place to Be" is a great example of this, with its low, open guitar tuning and Drake's yearning for a time when he was younger, greener and stronger. Drake's death at the age of just 26 casts a long shadow over a lot of his work, but perhaps none more than this, his final statement on record.

one of the most compelling aspects of Pink Moon is how it shifts between despondence and levity, sometimes within the same song. depression can often feel like laughing to keep from crying! my favorite Drake song, "Things Behind the Sun", features some incredible modal interchange that takes us from minor (dark, introverted) to major (bright, sunny) and back again in the most spellbinding way. (that A lydian chord is the stuff of dreams!) there's also "Know", entirely based around a simple, swinging riff; it's another moment of relative calm, but its single stanza of lyrics throws a lot of ambiguity into the picture. "Parasite" is full of vivid images of sailboats, station bars, churches and the like, but Drake feels himself unable to participate in any of it, instead viewing himself as the titular parasite of the town he describes. I even interpret "Free Ride", on the surface the album's most upbeat song, as a desperate plea from a lower-class person that a richer man might take pity on him, should he ever come calling for it. it reads as a plea for success which, unfortunately, he never truly saw in his short lifetime.

that lack of success (due to a combination of poor promotion from his label and the lukewarm critical appraisal he received at the time) inevitably contributed to the mental health issues he wrote about so frequently in his music, and prevented him from completing more than three albums. on the one hand, he deserved so much better from the industry and the music-listening public; on the other, these songs might not have ever existed in this form had his career been more fruitful and profitable (and profitable for whom, exactly?). all we can do now is sit with what Drake was able to give us while he was here, and that's a set of three utterly magical folk records. 10/10

#148: Nirvana - Nevermind (1991)

December 30th, 2025: yet another case of 1001 Albums... throwing a mega-popular record at me and expecting me to have something new to say.

you definitely know all of the singles from Nevermind; they entered radio rotation almost immediately, and have never really left since. the album's first five tracks are a masterclass in no-frills rock songwriting, featuring some of the most iconic riffs and melodies ever penned. you can really hear Kurt Cobain's dueling interests in pop songwriting formulas and raw, noisy imperfection reach a tremendous compromise. elsewhere, "Polly" and "Something in the Way" showcase the band's soft, sensitive side, whereas "Territorial Pissings" and "Stay Away" point to the even noisier, more confrontational direction In Utero would go in.

people endlessly debate whether or not Cobain wanted all the press and popularity he received off the back of Nevermind, let alone the credit for single-handedly transforming rock music in the 90s, and ending the glam era in the process. part of me thinks he must've known what he was doing; you don't write a song as catchy as "Smells Like Teen Spirit" unless you want to turn a lot of heads.

this is my favorite Nirvana album. I have no hot takes here. 9/10

#149: Van Morrison - Moondance (1970)

December 31st, 2025: "I make albums primarily to sell them" -Van Morrison

I can't bring myself to find this more than just okay, borderline superfluous even. it's a perfectly serviceable blend of jazz, R&B, pop and folk music from blue-eyed soul singer and future conspiracy theorist Van Morrison. to me, there's nothing new really being brought to the table here. this move towards extreme accessibility feels like a cowardly retreat from the far more ambitious sound of Astral Weeks. I get that this was the album that launched his career as a mainstream star, but I was pretty bored by it nevertheless.

also, what was with white musicians in the seventies constantly alluding to Romani people as some sort of clumsy, racist metaphor for free-spiritedness and spiritual mumbo-jumbo? the constant cringe of Morrison alluding to "g*psies" in one way or another pulls my rating here down a full number score. 4/10

#150: Santana - Abraxas (1970)

January 1st, 2026: the psych- and blues-tinged Latin rock stylings of Carlos Santana are as good a way as any to ring in a new year! I have a fairly good connection with his eponymous band's debut record, which I had a second-hand vinyl copy of as a kid. (I accidentally played it at 45 speed once. "Waiting" sounded sick.) Abraxas is, generally speaking, much newer territory for me; despite that, there's two tracks on the A-side I'm more than familiar with.

the first is the now-classic medley of Fleetwood Mac's "Black Magic Woman" and Gábor Szabó's "G*psy Queen" (there's that word again, but at least they don't say it) which, of course, was in Guitar Hero III, and its iconic status is obvious even in GH3's cover recording. having become more familiar with the original version presented here, I can obviously say it's much better, and certainly the best song on the album. the elusive opening, Santana's iconic guitar solos, the adrenaline at the switch-up midway through, the dense percussion layering throughout—you know how this one goes.

second is "Oye como va", a Tito Puente classic that I played more than a couple times in undergrad with my university's Latin big band! the electrified version of it here has become another one of Santana's signature songs, and for good reason; if that cha-cha-chá groove doesn't move you, you may want to get your pulse checked.

lots of records from around this era of the 1001 Albums... selections tend to emphasize the hits and/or singles at the expense of everything else, but the deeper cuts on Abraxas hold up really well against its two most iconic ones. the A-side also contains opener "Singing Winds, Crying Beasts", a nice bit of atmospheric, modal jamming that feels almost like an extended prelude for "Black Magic Woman", as well as "Incident at Neshabur", which opens as a fiery D minor jam in 6/8 (with great solo turns from Santana and organist Gregg Rolie) before giving way to a transcendent, borderline ambient back half in C major.

the B-side contains "Se a cabo" and "El nicoya", two more great features for the percussion section; two tightly constructed originals from Rolie ("Mother's Daughter" and "Hope You're Feeling Better") that show the band leading with their blues influences; and "Samba pa ti", the slowest and sultriest of all nine tracks here.

if you like your rock music groovy with a lot of raw power and a live feel, look no further! the singing might not always be the greatest thing you've ever heard, but how can you listen to these guys play instruments together and not instantly get a lift? 8/10