Funeral to Finish

  Did you see the other day that Paul almost got flattened while crossing Abbey Road ?  Like, this just happened a couple of day ago!  I mean, I'm glad the guy's OK, but wouldn't that be like the most poetic ending possible, especially since the album's cover was integral to the whole " Paul is dead " theory that was a thing in the late 60s because people didn't have the bandwidth for "The CIA is overthrowing Central American countries for the United Fruit Company" or the horrible real conspiracies that were happening. I've thought about it a lot and this might be the album I've listened to more than any other.  That is due, in no small measure, to my studio art teacher in high school, who used to regularly play this album while I was in the studio working on my terrible paintings and whatever.  I had it cassette and CD.  So yeah, I've heard it a ton, but not a lot recently. I used to think of this as One of My Favorite Albums and I g...

  There are very few songs where I can remember exactly where I was the first time I heard it and one of those songs is "Smells Like Teen Spirit," the opening track of this album, and I was driving on the lower deck of the Bay Bridge approaching San Francisco when it came on Live 105, which used to be the "alternative rock" radio station in SF .  I distinctly remember being immediately floored .  Then I remember wanting to hear it again, immediately.  I didn't buy the album right away because I had no way to play albums at the time. It's hard to conceptualize now how much this album changed popular music at the time it was released, but one of my favorite facts is that it displaced Michael Jackson's Dangerous from the number 1 spot on Billboard, and if that isn't symbolic enough I don't know.  In an instant, the hair-metal bands that had strode the landscape like dinosaurs met their asteroid in the form of a kid with a shitty attitude from Aberd...

  When I hear the songs on Rumours , the sun is always shining; the memories are washed-out and shaky, like they were shot on an 8 mm home movie camera; and there is infinite promise stretched out in front of me.  Recorded in turmoil, it's paradoxically one of the brightest-sounding records ever made. The story behind the record's production - largely in the windowless rooms of the Record Plant in Sausalito - are now legendary.  The band would convene around 7 pm, and then after a feast of food and wine and endless supplies of cocaine, they would begin recording and go all night.  The last song, "Gold Dust Woman," directly references the damaging power of the drug ("Rock on, gold dust woman/Take your silver spoon, dig your grave"), but no one was complaining at the time. The resulting record - at over 40 million copies, one of the best-selling albums of all time - somewhow combines existential turmoil with some of the most beautiful and beautifully-construct...

  Not to disrespect Prince in any way, since he was clearly one of the greatest musical talents of our time and deserves any possible accolade you can give him, but I'm puzzled overall by the rankings of his albums on this list.  This is certainly a fine album but, to my mind, pales in comparison to 1999 .  And it's not just me; lists of Prince albums ranked usually have Sign O' the Times at the top, and even though my personal preference is with 1999 , I certainly can't argue with that.  But this being the highest ranked Prince album?  I'm mystified. Let us first take account of the absolute audaciousness of a 26-year-old deciding that what he really needs is a biopic.  That's right, at the time this album was released, along with the film of the same name, Prince was a mere 26 years old and was already a rising star, largely due to Controversy and  1999 , the albums that preceded it.  (I should note at this juncture that I've never seen the mov...

  There are two things that will make Boomers extremely mad.  One of them is taking away the Early Bird special at Applebees and the other is saying that this album is overrated.  Guess what motherfuckers, there are only nine albums left and if I go down I'm taking Bob with me. We've already established that my favorite Bob Dylan album, and in fact the best Bob Dylan album, is Highway 61 Revisited .  But I know that this album is a lot of people's favorite, including commenter Stephen.  As best as I can tell, that unvarnished love is mostly about the lyrics, which is good because apart from a few exceptions we'll get to, the music isn't that great. So let's start with the music.  Originally recorded in New York City with the bluegrass band Deliverance as backup, Dylan scrapped that plan pretty quickly and then recruited new musicians for the sessions.  When his brother heard the test pressing and complained that it sounded too much like old Dylan, Bob ...

  I like, but don't love, this album, which has peaks that can rival any album on this list but some patches that can drag.  I certainly understand why it's up here, but I think it's a top 20, not top 10, album.  God I'm such a fucking downer! Let's talk about it. The peaks are really, really high.  Before we get to the hits, I want to spend some time with "To Zion," a song about motherhood and the kind of love you feel for a child that's unlike any other love.  Sorry for the naked sincerity but it's true!  God, it is such a beautiful song.  Hill's voice dances through the melody, and Carlos Santana's guitar provides just the right counterpoint.  The lyrics are a frank look at the tension between career and parenthood that so many feel: Unsure of what the balance held I touched my belly overwhelmed By what I had been chosen to perform But then an angel came one day Told me to kneel down and pray For unto me a man-child would be born Woe thi...

  It's 1966 and the biggest band in the world is in flux.  Three-quarters of the band have tried LSD and embraced it; only Paul McCartney has held out.  They go into EMI Studios in London in April 1966 and over the course of a few weeks essentually rewrite pop music.  For the first time, you don't have to be constrained by what you can reliably play live; now you are free to use the studio to create your sound and not worry about how it could sound on stage.  Indeed, the first track recorded for this album was the last song on the record, "Tomorrow Never Knows," a feast of backwards-tracking, sitar drone, tape loops, and John Lennon's vocal recorded partly through a rotating Leslie speaker cabinet.  It doesn't have any chord progression or rhyming vocals and it sounds like the dawn of something new and wild and slightly scary.  There's a reason why Mad Men paid $250,000 to license this single song, for a scene in which Don Draper realizes the world is ...