1,000 Albums to Hear Before You Die
March 13, 2008 9:25 AM   Subscribe

1,000 Albums to hear before you die compiled from The Guardian's assorted music reviewers (assisted by readers who then told them which ones they missed). You won't want to be planning to expire any time too soon with these to get through.
posted by rongorongo (112 comments total) 24 users marked this as a favorite
 
Your list of 1,000 whatever sux
posted by BozoBurgerBonanza at 9:36 AM on March 13, 2008


I'm just waiting for the List Of Lists Of Things To Do Before You Die That You Must Read Before You Die. Otherwise I'm not gonna waste my time with what might very well be an empty pursuit, y'know?
posted by Spatch at 9:39 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


No <MyFavoriteBand>? WTF?
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:42 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


Wow, what strange choices

Bowie's Low over both Hunky Dory and Ziggy???

Big Star's Radio City over Sister Lovers?

Big Black's Songs about Fucking over Atomizer? Even Steve Albini said on the
album's cover 'not as good as Atomizer, so don't get your hopes up, cheese'

At least they got the Belle and Sebastian right.

On to the rest of the alphabet ...
posted by farmdoggie at 9:44 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


WWjmcD?
posted by yhbc at 9:45 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


Stop assigning me all this homework, Internets.
posted by fleetmouse at 9:48 AM on March 13, 2008 [3 favorites]


Swordfishtrombone, but no Rain Dogs? Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel over Tilt?

I don't understand.
posted by sonic meat machine at 9:49 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


I've gotten as far as B. And I want to assure you all that you can go your whole lives without ever once hearing Bon Jovi's Slippery When Wet and be just fine.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:54 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


No Rick Astley.
pshaw.
posted by seanyboy at 9:55 AM on March 13, 2008


And here I was thinking that with 1,000 of 'em, there'd be less opportunity for WHUT NO X?

(The Various Artists choices here are interesting...)
posted by nebulawindphone at 9:56 AM on March 13, 2008


Oh, by the way, your favorite list has some navigation that sucks. It's annoying enough that they don't seem to have a master list; it's more annoying that you have to work just to get to the next damn page.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:58 AM on March 13, 2008


What item and BlazecockPileon said. Some diamonds in there, but plenty of rough, too.
posted by HighTechUnderpants at 9:58 AM on March 13, 2008


They're not the "best" albums...they're albums you should hear before you die. In other words, they're the albums the non-fan or casual fan probably hasn't heard yet...but should. I'm not saying I agree with all their choices, but please stop with the "Album X over album Y? WTF?" because that's not what the list was meant to be.
posted by rocket88 at 10:00 AM on March 13, 2008


It's going to be hard to print and carry this with all their comments in there. What if I'm at the bus stop and someone's listening to Dino Valente? Am I supposed to just remember that?
posted by Nabubrush at 10:00 AM on March 13, 2008


I want to assure you all that you can go your whole lives without ever once hearing Bon Jovi's Slippery When Wet and be just fine.

Indeed a more interesting question might be what you need to do with the rest of your life to atone for listening to Slippery When Wet 500 times in 1987 alone when you were 14 and living in northern Alberta and just didn't know any better. I'm . . . I'm asking for a friend . . .

I've told this, uh, friend, to start with 80dbs of Springsteen's Nebraska to clean out the residue left by "Livin' on a Prayer," but I'm at a loss for the cure to once knowing not just every word but every intonation of "I'd Die For You" . . .
posted by gompa at 10:01 AM on March 13, 2008 [4 favorites]


I'm going to die tomorrow. Will this be a problem?
posted by Bromius at 10:01 AM on March 13, 2008


No Jethro Tull- (Neither under J nor T). Aqualung? This Was? Minstrel in the Gallery? Thick as a Brick? At one point Tull was the top selling concert, The first band to do a live intercontinental concert broadcast. Puleeze! Or perhaps this list is excluding bands/ albums that they assume everybody already has listened to...
posted by Gungho at 10:05 AM on March 13, 2008


Whaaa! I'm too busy getting through their 1000 films list...
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 10:06 AM on March 13, 2008


At least they got the Belle and Sebastian right.

No, I checked: there's a Belle and Sebastian album on the list.
posted by kittyprecious at 10:08 AM on March 13, 2008 [13 favorites]


No Rage Against the Machine? I think we're done here.
posted by quin at 10:08 AM on March 13, 2008


Indeed a more interesting question might be what you need to do with the rest of your life to atone for listening to Slippery When Wet 500 times in 1987 alone when you were 14 and living in northern Alberta and just didn't know any better. I'm . . . I'm asking for a friend . . .


I'm with you, gompa. I understand. I've been there - not northern Alberta, but the Slippery When Wet place.

Come with me. We can find the light...together. Forever. We two.
posted by never used baby shoes at 10:10 AM on March 13, 2008


I'm going to die tomorrow. Will this be a problem?

Fortunately, they said "hear" and not "appreciate," so you just need 1,000 stereos playing simultaneously.

(Also, post your address, and leave the door unlocked and the volume up when you croak, because I wanna hear what that shit sounds like.)
posted by nebulawindphone at 10:10 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


I find it hard to believe that a casual rock fan is going to go the distance on Sleep's Jerusalem, a 52 minute song, at least 25 minutes of which is a single riff played in repetition, that even many long time heavy music fans require near-death inducing quantities of chemical sedation to sit through. They could have gone with one of the more accessible Melvins albums or maybe something hook-laden like Kyuss for the obligatory stoner metal nod.

Having said that, NO JESUS LIZARD GOAT WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!?2/2/222@@@
posted by The Straightener at 10:12 AM on March 13, 2008


Big Star's Radio City over Sister Lovers?

Either of those over #1 Record?

I have to assume, though, that they decided to include only one album per artist, because (for example) Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot makes no sense without Being There.

In any case, the overweening Englishness of it all is quite fun. Not only, fer instance, does Blur's Parklife get the longest write-up I've yet found, but it opens thusly:

The Noel Gallagher view of history has long damned Parklife as a lightweight postmodern knees-up, all affected estuary vowels and ­contrived "character" songs.

Which is to say: Bally Jerry, pranged his kite right in the how's-your-father; hairy blighter, dicky-birded, feathered back on his sammy, took a waspy, flipped over on his Betty Harpers and caught his can in the Bertie.

Betcha Bally Jarry was all estuary vowels in his postmodern knees-up, too.
posted by gompa at 10:12 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


Calling out just one strange choice among many... I have had many issues with R.E.M.'s oeuvre in the last few years, after being a huge fan of their early career. So while I was glad to see an an early release included here, Fables of the Reconstruction is rarely held up as the best or even representative of those first 5-6 albums. Strange indeed.
posted by tdstone at 10:13 AM on March 13, 2008


I believe that whatever music inspires, intrigues, captivates, or moves a person is subjective enough to make a list such as this totally pointless. I imagine most most people outside of the Guardians regular readership (and maybe a few inside) won't view the whole list. They'll just do what I did, and search for their favorite albums, and, not finding them, give it a resounding "meh."
posted by boymilo at 10:15 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


Oh, by the way, your favorite list has some navigation that sucks. It's annoying enough that they don't seem to have a master list; it's more annoying that you have to work just to get to the next damn page.

You think that's bad? Try going back a page!
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:15 AM on March 13, 2008


1,000 albums to hear before you die unless you don't like them and would rather listen to other ones or don't really give a shit about music which is also fine.
posted by Wolfdog at 10:17 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


Looks like I won't be dieing then.
posted by StickyCarpet at 10:17 AM on March 13, 2008


Isn't Anything over Loveless? Songs About Fucking over Atomizer? Rated R over Songs for the Deaf? It's like they chose the "interesting" albums over the awesome ones.
posted by nicolas léonard sadi carnot at 10:19 AM on March 13, 2008


The raw list is here, albeit with a disclaimer reading "Alphabetical order. This does not necessarily follow the original list. One album per artist. Though this rule is relaxed if the artist is listed as working with someone else [ie Brian Eno is also allowed the Brian Eno & David Byrne album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts]."
posted by Nabubrush at 10:29 AM on March 13, 2008


It seems to be strictly one album per artist, right?

So it's actually 1,000 artists to listen to before you die.

Then they toss a coin to decide whether to use the generally reputed best album, or something left of centre; just to keep the list a bit unpredictable & controversial.
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:30 AM on March 13, 2008


Damn. Should preview.
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:31 AM on March 13, 2008


I think I'll wait 'till the Now That's What I Call Music! condensed version comes out.
posted by designbot at 10:31 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


I imagine most most people outside of the Guardians regular readership (and maybe a few inside) won't view the whole list. They'll just do what I did, and search for their favorite albums, and, not finding them, give it a resounding "meh."

Maybe. But it depends if you want to use a list like this as a means of confirmation or one of discovery. One reason why I posted this is because I have spent a couple of hours reading through some of the sections and then plugging the details of stuff that sounded interesting into LastFM where I can sample most of what they mention.

I also like the way that they include a refreshing number of thoroughly uncool artists (Status Quo and Cilla Black to name two) amongst the standard cult suspects.
posted by rongorongo at 10:32 AM on March 13, 2008


They forgot the Eels. I demand an explanation.
posted by owtytrof at 10:34 AM on March 13, 2008


MetaFilter: Your Daily Dose Of Guardian Top-Something Lists
posted by matteo at 10:37 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


I should note that the list I posted begins with their 100 best albums and 100 other best albums (which appears to have 102 albums on it) which gives everyone a couple other things to fight/bitch about.
posted by Nabubrush at 10:39 AM on March 13, 2008


"They're not the "best" albums...they're albums you should hear before you die. In other words, they're the albums the non-fan or casual fan probably hasn't heard yet...but should."

Well, no. If it's going to be the one album you hear from a band, it should damn well be the best album.

Aside from that, this has all the faults of lists compiled by committees, and my personal taxonomy does not count best-ofs as proper albums, which they seem to.

That and, c'mon, no, you really should hear Slippery When Wet at least once in your life. I don't want to be the Chuck Eddy of the thread, but that's a lot more worthy than some of the thin Brit bullshit. There's also the pervasive over-rating of recent albums; Lilly Allen's nice, but not a MUST HEAR.
posted by klangklangston at 10:41 AM on March 13, 2008


Then they toss a coin to decide whether to use the generally reputed best album, or something left of centre; just to keep the list a bit unpredictable & controversial.

There seems to be a LOT of "eccentric" album choices here -- bands you'd expect to see, but matched with non-representative records -- presumably so that the list can show you how much cooler than you it is.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 10:45 AM on March 13, 2008


And man, their jazz stays on canon side, except when they're undercutting better albums (like the Art Ensemble entry) for more trad shit.
posted by klangklangston at 10:47 AM on March 13, 2008


"There seems to be a LOT of "eccentric" album choices here -- bands you'd expect to see, but matched with non-representative records -- presumably so that the list can show you how much cooler than you it is."

Yeah, but they still tend toward the safe choices. Like, Odessa by the Beegees is a "psych" overlooked "classic" with, like, one good song and a buncha soft mush. It's sub-Zombies crap. But they didn't want to go with the superior soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever, because it's what everyone knows from them, despite it being the best thing they did.

Like I mentioned before with the committees, it's pretty clear on which entries the rockists won and which entries were consolations to the popists.
posted by klangklangston at 10:52 AM on March 13, 2008


What farmdoggie said about David Bowie, and what fleetmouse said, and that kittens for breakfast guy is also correct. I don't know about the song The Straightener was referring to, but I'm going to take his word for it. And yeah Blazecock, he's got a good point, which preempts the comment I was going to make about the lack of Jeff Beck on the list. But they do have the Yardbirds' Roger the Engineer on there.

So, there's really nothing to say that ain't already been said, therefore, no need for my comment.
posted by marxchivist at 10:57 AM on March 13, 2008


c'mon, no, you really should hear Slippery When Wet at least once in your life.

I might agree, if I could somehow disassociate the music on that album from the maddening experience of having a hard-on in sixth-period math. For no apparent reason. And not really understanding why. But knowing still, dammit, that it'd be a loooong time before I'd be able to really do anything serious with it. Maybe if they'd called the album Inexplicable Boners, I could forgive it, but as it stand that album's like failure's hymnal.

Def Leppard's twin-pack of slick hair-metal genius - Pyromania and Hysteria - which was in heavy rotation that same endless year, doesn't bear the same stain, for some reason I can't quite pinpoint. Unless it's that the guys in Bon Jovi had the same perms as the girls I wanted to fuck.
posted by gompa at 10:59 AM on March 13, 2008 [3 favorites]


I almost forgot: You kids out there? There is nothing cute about '80s nostalgia. It is a nuclear bomb crater of a decade, and it will be midcentury at least before anything pure can grow there.
posted by gompa at 11:03 AM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


Unless it's that the guys in Bon Jovi had the same perms as the girls I wanted to fuck.

Wanting to fuck Jon Bon Jovi (or, by proxy, girls who looked like JBJ) is something you have in common with likely 90% of people who grew up in Jersey.

On the other hand, I never listened to that stuff when it was new, so I missed a lot of those weird memories. For me, middle school mixtapes had a lot more grunge and art metal (I remember me and Danny Carroll being all thrilled when a new Therapy? album came out).
posted by klangklangston at 11:06 AM on March 13, 2008


I'm going to start a website called heywhatdoyouthinkofthislist.com where people just post lists of the top x y's and other people go "No way should z be on the list" and "Hey they forgot to put my favorite y! Bogus!" and I am going to call it Metafilter.
posted by ND¢ at 11:10 AM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


Inexplicable Boners, that's all, just wanted that repeated again, carry on.
posted by Divine_Wino at 11:13 AM on March 13, 2008


No Captain and Tenille? WTF?
posted by ericb at 11:14 AM on March 13, 2008


Songs about Fucking beats the hell out of Atomizer. I commend their choice.

But: 13 Songs over In on the Kill Taker? Nonsense!
posted by equalpants at 11:19 AM on March 13, 2008


“Though this rule is relaxed if the artist is listed as working with someone else [ie Brian Eno is also allowed the Brian Eno & David Byrne album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts]”

Eno was also in 801 and Roxy Music, and he produced and performed on the Talking Heads’ Fear of Music, and he collaborated with Bowie on Low, so he’s featured on at least 6 albums.
posted by breaks the guidelines? at 11:22 AM on March 13, 2008


Wow, that's amazing. All of the wheat and no chaff! Just like their Sunday magazine's most powerful blogs list! And can you believe that it came out to such a nice, round number?
posted by Navelgazer at 11:23 AM on March 13, 2008


Where is the Uriah Heep? HOW WILL PEOPLE KNOW?!
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 11:25 AM on March 13, 2008


They missed so much off that list, and got so much wrong it's kind of painful to look at.

I'd pick 13 Songs though. Never really gotten into the others the same way as that one, which is seminal as far as I'm concerned.
posted by opsin at 11:27 AM on March 13, 2008


Thanks for the raw list, Nabubrush—no way I was going to navigate their letter-at-a-time system. Like klang, I noted the pro forma nature of their jazz selections, but this leaped out at me (like Lester leaping in):

Count Basie - Complete American Decca Recordings


So that's what you consider an "album"? Then why confine yourself to

Ella Fitzgerald - Sings the Cole Porter Song Book


when you could list the Complete Songbooks?

Oh, and their favorite list of favorites sucks.
posted by languagehat at 11:28 AM on March 13, 2008


Amazing. The group 'Various' has 44 of the Top 1000 Albums of All Time. And I have never heard of them!
posted by mathis23 at 11:41 AM on March 13, 2008


Will someone please tell me what I should be listening to?
posted by joecacti at 11:51 AM on March 13, 2008


Will someone please tell me what I should be listening to?

Your mother!
posted by ericb at 12:04 PM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


Is the Guardian just all lists now?
posted by Sys Rq at 12:04 PM on March 13, 2008


(I stopped reading when I hit ABC. No one anywhere ever needs to listen to ABC.)
posted by Sys Rq at 12:06 PM on March 13, 2008


So that's what you consider an "album"?

Yeah, I know that the definition of "album" is sort of up for grabs, but on a list like this, I feel like singles collections really undermine the point. Example:

XTC
The Compact XTC: The Singles 1978-1985 (2003)
There are perfect albums in the XTC catalogue...


And a singles collection that doesn't even draw from their most critically acclaimed album is somehow more perfect than all of them? That's amazing!

Yes yes, I know, this "isn't" a "best" albums list. But really, it is.
posted by SpiffyRob at 12:10 PM on March 13, 2008


Eno was also in 801 and Roxy Music, and he produced and performed on the Talking Heads’ Fear of Music, and he collaborated with Bowie on Low, so he’s featured on at least 6 albums.

7.
Add DEVO's Eno-produced "Q: Are we not men..." to the list.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:10 PM on March 13, 2008


I think I've pretty much had it up to here with lists from the Guardian.
posted by Dave Faris at 12:12 PM on March 13, 2008


Thanks for the raw list, Nabubrush
posted by languagehat at 11:28 AM on March 13


Oh sure, you couldn't be bothered to favorite it??

Sorry, I'm a little giddy that someone so well-respected around here thanked me. Well, that and I'm angry that 801 and 808 State made the list but not 800 Octane (PDX represent).
posted by Nabubrush at 12:22 PM on March 13, 2008


One good radio station would be better. But they don't have them anymore, do they?
posted by pracowity at 12:24 PM on March 13, 2008


They got The Story of Bo Diddley (2006) on there twice.
Which is appropriate.
Carry on.
posted by Lord Kinbote at 12:26 PM on March 13, 2008


"(I stopped reading when I hit ABC. No one anywhere ever needs to listen to ABC.)"

RONG. Lexicon of Love is a fantastic album, and includes the amazing pop confection "Poison Arrow."
posted by klangklangston at 12:30 PM on March 13, 2008


1,000 albums?? That's impossible. Dream Theater only has 9!

unless I'm supposed to listen to each of them 111.11 times -- which... I probably have...
posted by LordSludge at 12:37 PM on March 13, 2008


All y'all are missing the point.

When you've all thousand of these records, you will die.

Instantly.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 12:37 PM on March 13, 2008


They're not the "best" albums...they're albums you should hear before you die. In other words, they're the albums the non-fan or casual fan probably hasn't heard yet...but should.

Yeah. Like The Bends.
posted by jokeefe at 12:37 PM on March 13, 2008


or when you've *heard* them, dammit. when you *have* them all, OTOH, that's just sad.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 12:38 PM on March 13, 2008


There's only 999 albums on the list, and since Bo Diddley is taking two spaces (under "Bo" and "Diddley"), there's room for two more! Plus, Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue, and The Spice Girls don't count as "music", so there's actually five spots open!
posted by Lord Kinbote at 12:39 PM on March 13, 2008


tl;dl
posted by crunch buttsteak at 12:50 PM on March 13, 2008


[michael bluth]
You open your list of must hear albums with A Certain Ratio? Them?
[/michael bluth]
posted by bunnytricks at 1:00 PM on March 13, 2008


Good thing I'm already dead inside so I don't have to bother with this or any other death-list.
posted by slimepuppy at 1:01 PM on March 13, 2008


I think this list is perfect and if there are any changes that you would make than you have a disease of the brain, and also you are dumb and wrong and dumb.
posted by Kwine at 1:09 PM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


Man, not to mention...

Blackstreet - Blackstreet
Black Star - Black Star

FTFY.
posted by SpiffyRob at 1:09 PM on March 13, 2008


I hate to do this.

What about Ani DiFranco?
posted by lunit at 1:50 PM on March 13, 2008


No Pearl Jam? I can't imagine the metric that led to about 100 of those over Pearl Jam (including some that I actually prefer personally). It's nonsensical.
posted by Nabubrush at 2:07 PM on March 13, 2008


Just about the shittiest Cabaret Voltaire album and nothing for The Hafler Trio. I pronounce this list a fuck bucket sandwich.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 2:42 PM on March 13, 2008 [2 favorites]


Pulp Fiction
OST (1994)
Has anyone made films with better soundtracks than Tarantino?


I have never been a big fan of that "FAIL" meme but Jesus Fucking christ you know nothing about music

FAIL
FAIL
FAIL
FAIL
FAIL
FAIL
posted by drjimmy11 at 3:08 PM on March 13, 2008


ericb writes "No Captain and Tenille? WTF?"

That was probably meant as a joke, but I gotta admit, their hit "Love Will Keep Us Together" surprised me when hearing it recently. It's not brilliant or anything, but it was far better than I remembered, although it probably doesn't sound as corny in retrospect as it did at the time. The keyboard bass is pretty funky ... Sorta reminded me of ABBA, in the sense that it's pure pop with nothing but hooks, and it's very, very shiny. There are times when I find myself playing the mp3 over again, just to make sure the effect hasn't gone ...
posted by krinklyfig at 3:16 PM on March 13, 2008


Sys Rq writes "Is the Guardian just all lists now?"

I think the people who bought Cracked also bought them out ...
posted by krinklyfig at 3:18 PM on March 13, 2008


Along with Cluster and 801 and Roxy and Talking Heads and Bowie and DEVO, Eno produced U2's Achtung Baby. (Which appears twice on the list, bringing it down to 998.)
posted by punchdrunkhistory at 3:23 PM on March 13, 2008


I agree more with the 55 Additional Readers’ Choices ‘Missed’ from the Original List from the alphabetical list than the main choices.

I was also stunned to see Linton Kwesi Johnson - Dread Beat an’ Blood, an album I've always felt was my own personal secret.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 3:24 PM on March 13, 2008


Of course there are lot of dumb and weird choices. Who would talk about it otherwise? "Top 1000 -- hmmm, yep, that's it. They nailed it. What else is going on?"
posted by msalt at 3:39 PM on March 13, 2008


Various Artists — Guilty Pleasures apparently has a Captain and Tenille song. So they make up a fraction of a tenth of a percent of the list, which is still more then they deserve.
posted by nebulawindphone at 4:03 PM on March 13, 2008


They want me to listen to Rick Wakeman's The Myths and Legends of King Arthur and the Round Table because they think it's ridiculously bad?
posted by Flunkie at 4:21 PM on March 13, 2008


No Fall, no Joy Division, no Miles Davis........................IMHO!
posted by kenchie at 5:06 PM on March 13, 2008


Didn't rtwfa admittedly....too long.
posted by kenchie at 5:09 PM on March 13, 2008


Fall - Perverted By Language
Joy Division - Closer
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue

Somebody wasn't paying attention...
posted by languagehat at 5:09 PM on March 13, 2008


OK now I'm doubly pissed that there's no Jethro Tull since tonight's Simpsons episode featured Martin Prince playing the flute and singing Thick As A brick.
posted by Gungho at 6:06 PM on March 13, 2008


There is also a Guilty Pleasures by Lazlo Bane. Features 10cc, , Nick Lowe, Captain and toenail, etc.
posted by Gungho at 6:11 PM on March 13, 2008


Fall - Perverted By Language This Nation's Saving Grace

(to lhatment: yarbles!)
posted by UbuRoivas at 6:19 PM on March 13, 2008


klangklangston writes: But they didn't want to go with the superior soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever,

But they did. Look under S for, um, soundtrack I guess.
posted by George_Spiggott at 6:43 PM on March 13, 2008


This list is a superset of Albums You Hope You'll Stop Hearing in Your Head Sometime Before You Die. It includes every album of the sort that Mike Myers described as "if you were a teenager in the seventies, you were issued it."
posted by George_Spiggott at 6:48 PM on March 13, 2008


My lovely wife got me the 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die book for my birthday that appears to have little in common with this list, and has been wonderful to pick up and open at random and see something I'd not listened to in ages (and all the great cover art). I also find my disagreements with it veer more toward omissions than with the inclusions. Yes these lists are all faintly (or strongly) ridiculous, but I find them fun for some reason.
posted by jalexei at 6:54 PM on March 13, 2008


I listen to 1000 albums before breakfast, fuckos!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 7:16 PM on March 13, 2008


I know that I'm being baited into the "your favorite band is not one this list stuff," but no Amon Tobin?

OK, that's all I'm gonna say.
posted by spiderwire at 8:07 PM on March 13, 2008


OK, the list is called "1,000 Albums to Hear Before You Die"...and it's got more than just pop trash, more than just pop and rock, it's got some 'Difficult Listening' indie stuff, it's even got some jazz...ok, it encompasses several genres of music...it goes back several decades, even....I get it so far....

...but:

Of all the music You Should Hear Before You Die... there wasn't room for a single classical album?

Isn't that just a bit odd?
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 9:19 PM on March 13, 2008


> I listen to 1000 albums before breakfast, fuckos!

Feast or famine, ain't it? Abraham Lincoln didn't hear a single one of these albums before he died.
posted by jfuller at 9:26 PM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


God, there's some terrible music there. OutKast. And I canNOT believe they chose Zappa's "The Yellow Shark"! It's not just that it's not a great album (hey, Zappa was dying while he made it) but it's so very unrepresentative - who thinks of Zappa as an orchestral composer primarily?

No Stockhausen! No Steve Reich! No John Cage! No Terry Riley! No Philip Glass! Actually, no "classical" music at all that I can see.

This is SUCH bullshit. I don't listen to that much classical musical but you should fucking well listen to Beethoven's Ninth before you die.

No Butthole Surfers! Hah, Iggy Pop's under P, I wonder if Pink Floyd is under F? ("which one's Pink?")
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 10:50 PM on March 13, 2008 [1 favorite]


No Pantywaist Hit Patrol! No Father Freddy's Holy Bowlers! No Sally Mae Graham! No Wisniewski! No Alligator Sunshine Party!

This list is like the rotten puke of my rotten puke.
posted by Kwine at 5:36 AM on March 14, 2008


lupus_yonderboy: Hah, Iggy Pop's under P, I wonder if Pink Floyd is under F?

Uh... Iggy Pop is an actual, singular dude. His name is Iggy Pop. First name Iggy, last name Pop. Pop starts with a P. File under P. It's not like F for Floyd or T for Tull. It's the guy's name. Unless you want to get all technical and file him under O for Osterberg, what exactly are you on about?
posted by Sys Rq at 9:53 AM on March 14, 2008


Why, that depends on your authority record and taxonomy scheme. Some classification systems treat adopted names and band names differently from given names. And under your system, Alice Cooper records would be alphabetized in two different places.
posted by klangklangston at 10:09 AM on March 14, 2008


I understand that. I merely meant to point out that while Floyd, Pink is right out, there's nothing inherently wrong with Pop, Iggy.
posted by Sys Rq at 10:43 AM on March 14, 2008


I think that if I owned any CDs of Iggy solo albums, I'd probably sort 'em under Pop, since I put Bowie under Bowie. I do, however, sort Alice Cooper albums as a band, even after the man who adopted that name took over.
posted by klangklangston at 11:40 AM on March 14, 2008


Fall - Perverted By Language
Joy Division - Closer
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue

Somebody wasn't paying attention...
posted by languagehat at 5:09 PM on March 13 [+] [!]


Perhaps Kenchie was making a request that the list have no Fall, no Joy Division, and no Miles Davis.
posted by Nabubrush at 11:49 AM on March 14, 2008


I certainly hope that's not the case. I don't care about the Fall or Joy Division, but if the request was for no Miles Davis, I'm gonna have to take Kenchie out.
posted by languagehat at 12:27 PM on March 14, 2008


No Sex Wino? No Greenpoint Avenue Freighthandlers Association? No Fag Cop? No Butt Wolf? No This Tastes Funny? NO Tavis Smiley Project?


WTF?

All of these, as far as I know are band names made up by me or my associates. Fake band names is the lowest form of humor after improv comedy and puns.
posted by Divine_Wino at 12:56 PM on March 14, 2008


I am thrilled that Guided By Voices is on this list, but terribly disappointed that it's a "Best Of."

Isn't this a list of 1000 albums to hear before you die? Not "a random hodgepodge of songs to put into your iTunes"?

It's too late at night for me to wax eloquent about why Bee Thousand is one of the greatest records ever made, but if you want to hear a great album before you die, it's a good place to start.
posted by spacewaitress at 11:21 PM on March 14, 2008


These multi-page top-n lists are unabashed hit-count whoring, and we should stop patronizing them, or at least post the full list along with the link.
posted by troybob at 11:44 AM on March 15, 2008


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