Jim's Top 20 Albums of All Time (numbers 10 - 1)

#10

10,000 Maniacs – In My Tribe (1987)

Oh dearest Natalie, whatever happened to you?? 10,000 Maniacs made In My Tribe - one of the best albums of the 1980s - and then entered a death spiral that led to a “Pink Floyd style" break-up where neither the lead singer nor her original band is nearly as good as the group as a whole. I remember that my friend James and I had high hopes for Natalie Merchant – she was kind of pretty and a very poetic songwriter that actually had something to say. But then she wouldn’t shut up. I hate politics in my music – especially the “limousine liberal” kind – and after a while it seemed like Natalie would jump on every bandwagon that came along. Too bad she didn’t just shut up and sing – In My Tribe is a brilliant album. Back then, Natalie Merchant had a beautiful voice and lyrical pen, and the rest of the Maniacs formed a tight core that churned out one solid pop song after another. Whether ranting about child abuse (“What’s The Matter Here?”), illiteracy (“Cherry Tree”), greed (“A Campfire Song”) or just having fun (“Like the Weather”, “My Sister Rose”), Natalie sounds like an angel on open mike night. Even after almost 15 years, I still pop this disc into my player and just listen to her voice and let her words coat me in honey.  

#9

Sex Pistols – Never Mind The Bullocks (1977)

The Sex Pistols were every bit as “manufactured” as The Monkees, New Kids on the Block or the Backstreet Boys. They didn’t even “invent” punk rock – a distinction better left to The Ramones or perhaps Iggy and the Stooges. But nevertheless, an awesome wave of publicity was generated by the Sex Pistol’s manager (and brain power) Malcolm McClaren, and it turned an otherwise mediocre album into a rock and roll spectacle of the first order. Technically, this is an awful album. It sounds like it was recorded in someone’s bathroom. Sid Vicious only played bass on one of the tracks (“Holidays In the Sun”), but even then it was mixed in with Steve Jones’ “backup” tracks. The lyrics are certainly dumb. The production is painful. But sometimes an album is greater than the sum of its parts, and this is a fine example. The sheer anger on this album is what makes it – the voice of British youth that felt that not only had their parents and society forsaken them, so had their music idols. Because superstars like Pink Floyd and David Bowie were seen as “distant” - either living in America or in a mansion behind more security than the Queen - the average angry British kid felt that they couldn’t relate to them. And thus a legend was born. “God Save the Queen” remains the best rock and roll song of all time. And “Anarchy in the UK” is a friggin' classic, inspiring other punk bands and even some metal ones too. The rest of the album is awesome as well. I owned the vinyl, the cassette, the CD, the T-shirt, the video… 

#8

The Glove – Blue Sunshine (1983)

This was a one-off album featuring Steve Severin of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Robert Smith of The Cure and the forgotten Jeannette Landray on lead vocals. The idea of The Glove was born as a weekend project between Severin and Smith. Intending to record a couple of singles, they instead came out with an entire album in just three days. Definitely “night music”, this disc is poppy, spacey and trippy. Smith said that he wanted to make an modern electronic album for the “Blue Meanies” from The Beatle’s Yellow Submarine. I don’t know about all that, but I just love the lyrics: “First I was a murderer\Then I was a saint\Now I live on stolen time\Twist and run like paint” (from the albums only single “Like An Animal”). Then there's this jewel: “One more cigarette and the car burns slow\Burning like the body waiting at home\Throw out your teeth and call all your friends\Someone coughing took away my breath\Inches of glass all shiny and new screaming laughing\Fucks me to death” (“sex-eye-makeup”) and one of my favorite verses of all time: "Your morning smile of torture holds me in its grip\You trace the taste of yesterday the bruise upon my lip\You touch my eyes and hypnotize and slip inside my heart\I wait for this forever but we always fall apart." (“Punish Me With Kisses”). This album used to be impossible to find in the US, selling for upwards of $50. But it was re-released on CD back in 1991 and should still be around if you want to check it out.  

#7

R.E.M. – Fables of the Reconstruction (1985)

Whenever a fan of later R.E.M. asks me why I don’t like their new material, I simply ask if they’ve heard this album. Recorded back when the band’s members were still “musicians” and not yet “artists”, Fables takes Southern Gothic head-on and creates a love song to the American South that would make Flannery O’Connor proud. There’s simply not a bad song on this album, whether it’s the jarring opening of “Feeling Gravity’s Pull”, the slow beauty of “Maps and Legends”, the moving lyrics of “Driver 8”, the witty “Life and How to Live it”, the bizarre “Old Man Kinsey” or any of the other wonderful songs on the album. It almost makes me sad to hear “new” R.E.M. after listening to this again. In my opinion, this is the best Southern rock album ever released. Unlike the Allman Brothers or .38 Special, it’s not “rednecky” in any way, plus it’s still fun even now to explain the whole “power lines have floaters so the airplanes won’t get snagged” thing to the Yankees. Every band must move on, and R.E.M. did. Life’s Rich Pageant was a very good album, but the cracks really started appearing in Document, especially with the “dance remix” of “Finest Worksong”. Bleh. Too bad they had to end up the way they did.  

#6

Saint Etienne – Tiger Bay (1994)

Sarah Cracknell’s voice is a drug to me. I would buy a CD of her reading her grocery list or the phonebook just to hear her lovely voice. Saint Etienne has been around for years and actually invented the “60s Retro” sound that bands like The Cardigans would exploit later on in the 90s. Of all of Saint Etienne’s albums, this one is easily the most polished, well thought out and easiest to listen to. At this point in their careers, the band had lost most (but not all) of their 60s sound, having moved on to pop electronica. The British version of the album (shown left) features the hits “Like a Motorway” and “He’s On The Phone”, both of which were turned into smashingly popular remixes in London’s nightclubs. Because the other members of the band do a lot of production and mixing work on other bands’ albums, Saint Etienne has always been well-received by the DJ set and are consistently popular with the “in” crowd in the British music scene. But it’s not all drum machines. Saint Etienne can go mellow with the best of them, as “I Buy American Records” and “Grovley Road” can attest. Their music – while always showing a common thread – never sounds exactly the same, and few bands anywhere have as wide a reach as Saint Etienne. One reviewer said that the band "puts all the world's music in a food processor and creates something new" - get this album and find out why!

#5

Paul Oakenfold – Tranceport (1998)

If aliens landed on the Earth and for some reason had a burning desire to know what trance music is, this would be their primer. In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past several years, Paul Oakenfold is a London-based DJ that rode the wave of the trance movement and rave culture to become the top DJ in the world. He's “jumped the shark” as far as his career goes, doing cheesy soundtracks (Swordfish), losing his edge and in general, getting full of himself. But back in ’98 he was at the top of his form. This disc is an awesome introduction to the world of trance, your very own copy of the “Trance 101” textbook. Featuring tracks from Energy 52, Binary Finary, Paul Van Dyk, Lost Tribe and others, Oakie mixes them all up as smooth as buttah. It’s 70+ minutes not of separate songs, but rather a single living thing. Transitions have always been Oakenfold’s strong point, and you’ll be amazed by them here. The man could mix Slayer and Beethoven and make the transition between them so smooth and seamless that you’d hardly notice the change. Most of the tracks on this disc are so worn out with the dance crowd that they’ve become passé, much like “Stairway to Heaven” and “Another Brick In The Wall” are with the Dinosaur Rock crowd. But that doesn’t take anything away from this CD over time. This is the Sergeant Pepper’s for the trance set.     

#4

Cocteau Twins – Victorialand (1986)

In the crowd of people I kicked around with in high school, the Cocteau Twins’ Victorialand was our “default” album. Everyone liked it to a degree. It helped take the edge off bad acid trips and enhanced the good ones. This album was our sleeping, rainy day, make-out, “bad day at work”, post-party drive home and “oh wow – the sun’s coming up” music. Wonderful as background noise, the Cocteau Twins could take you to that extra level when you listen to them in “enhanced mode”. Or just through headphones. It's just plain beautiful music from another world. Elizabeth Frazier always used her voice as an instrument and the literal meaning of Cocteau Twins lyrics are unimportant; the words and how they sound count. For this album, Robin Guthrie decided on an all-acoustic set. The music shimmers and sparkles like a Tiffany diamond in the South Pacific moonlight. Although I very much like Treasure also, this album fits together as a whole much better than that one.  

#3

This Mortal Coil – It’ll End In Tears (1986)

Possibly the most depressing album ever, It’ll End In Tears is also one of the most beautiful. This Mortal Coil was the lovechild of British record label 4A.D.’s founder Ivo Watts-Russell. Members of 4 A.D.’s most popular bands of the time – Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, Clan of Xymox, Xmal Deutschland, Colourbox and Modern English – were randomly thrown together with guests like Gordon Sharp of cindytalk to cover some of the 1970’s and early 1980’s best “art rock” songs (some of the tracks – mainly the Lisa Gerrard stuff – are originals). While every track on this album is a jewel, some certainly stand out more than others. The most popular song off the disc – the Tim Buckley tune “Song to the Siren” - is given a complete make-over by the Cocteau Twins’ Elizabeth Frazier and Robin Guthrie. It’s achingly beautiful, even today. Even the worst teen heartbreak angst could be soothed by this. This was the album you could lay it all bare to. When the time came to put It’ll End In Tears into the CD player, things were very, very bad. And when you didn’t want to be cheered up, when you wanted to wallow in your tears, this was it. The other two This Mortal Coil albums, Filigree and Shadow and Blood were good, but neither of them could top this.    

#2 

Duran Duran – Duran Duran (1981)

If you ever wondered where my fascination with “space music”  – atmospheric synths with a dance beat and futuristic lyrics and style – came from look no further. The Fab Five’s debut album was the embodiment of the British “New Romantic” movement of the early 1980’s: over-the-top fashions mixed with slow, airy synthesizers, a danceable beat and a slightly dysopian outlook. This album holds the distinction of being the most prolific in my collection – I own at least 4 copies on vinyl, went through 6 or 7 copies of the cassette, and still have 2 versions of the CD. In America, this album was originally released by Harvest Records with the same cover and titles as the UK version. In 1983, it was re-released in the US with a new cover, slightly different song titles, and a different track listing. Capitol decided to drop the airy “To The Shore” for the chart-topping “Is There Something I Should Know?”. This ruined the ambiance of the original; “Is There…” just didn’t fit in with the original tracks like “Planet Earth” (still one of my favorite songs ever), “Careless Memories”, “Nightboat”, “Sound of Thunder”, “Girls on Film” and more. Although I rarely listen to this album these days, I cannot deny its importance to my music development. It was my first favorite album and it opened up a world of New Wave music that defined me as a teenager. Even today, my love for trance music can still be traced back to this. And to think I pulled it out of the bargain bin at the Record Bar at Northlake Mall all the way back in December 1981!

#1

Madonna – Ray of Light (1998)

Jim's Top 20 Albums: 20 - 11  |  10 - 1  |  Honorable Mention