Posts Tagged ‘Pearl Jam’
Ryan’s All-Time Favourite Albums
Choosing my top 5 albums of all time was really difficult. Even after finishing it I’m still sweating thinking that I may have missed something! I pre-apologize to the albums that I may have forgotten. These are in no particular order…
Pearl Jam – Ten
Ten was released when I had just become old enough to develop to my own musical taste. It sounded unlike any other record I’d ever heard, with an attitude and an ideology that perfectly aligned with growing out of my childhood. It was honest and real, and that seemed to make sense to me at the time. I don’t know that I ever bought into the anthemic moniker that was given to many of the songs on the album, but it did speak and the rest didn’t matter. No other album shaped me to the same extent.
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Blood Sugar Sex Magik
Once again, at such an impressionable age, this album was so beyond hip no choice but to love it. Great songs and a unabashed attitude made this album incredible. I never wanted to follow in RHCP’s footsteps but I respected how unique they were. Blood Sugar Sex Magik was also my first exposure to funk which lead to my love of old soul and R&B. That alone puts Blood Sugar Sex Magik on this list.
U2 – Achtung Baby
The songs and the production make this album are an anomaly that could never be recreated. Besides the incredible songwriting, there’s an atmosphere to this record that is unrivaled, and to this day the album doesn’t sound dated. This album is art.
Michael Jackson – Thriller
This doesn’t even require an explanation.
Stone Temple Pilots – Purple
I have always loved Stone Temple Pilots’ attitude which perfectly balanced swagger with hard rock. I remember this albums being so anticipated, especially after Big Empty was released on The Crow soundtrack prior to the actual album release. And just when you thought that you were prepared for the album, it came out of left field as the band showed us all how much they had evolved. STP seemed to balance the dark seriousness of the time, with a tongue-and-cheek playfulness that very few bands can pull off.
… I also had to include my honourable mentions…
Depeche Mode – 101 / Violator / Music For The Masses
The Beatles – Sgt. Pepper’s… / Help!
Alice In Chains – Dirt
Johnny Cash – At Folsom Prison
Massive Attack – Mezzanine
Bob Marley – Exodus
Peter Gabriel – So
Marvin Gaye – What’s Going On
Tom Petty – Damn The Torpedoes
INXS – Kick
The Verve – Urban Hymns
Greg’s All-Time Favourite Albums
In no particular order…
Pearl Jam – Ten
I know it’s a cop out for most rock musicians of our generation to choose this. But hearing about it, buying it, and listening to for the first
time, is so vivid in my mind to this day. I wore out 3 cassette tapes and have bought it on CD the same number of times.
John Lennon – Plastic Ono Band
It’s raw, it’s angry, it’s tender, it’s John free from Paul. ‘Mother’ is quite possibly one of the greatest songs ever written. I love it.
Band of Gypsys – Live at the Fillmore
This time it’s Hendrix free from ‘the Experience’. Psychedelic Blues, in your face, groundbreaking musicianship, ‘Machine Gun’, ‘Power of Soul’. No wonder Miles Davis was into jamming with him.
John Frusciante – Shadows Collide with People
I never get tired of this record. I must have listened to it a thousand times. I’ve listened to it on 3 continents. This is my desert island record.
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band – Hammersmith Odeon, London ’75
I know, I know, 2 live albums in my top 5 but the show with a solo performance of ‘Thunder Road’ which is EPIC. I couldn’t pick a single Bruce studio album, partly because I love them all, but partly because I feel like when you can hear the band let loose, then you can
really get what the whole thing is about. This is guys with their asses on the line stepping up. This was the beginning.