100 Best Albums of the 60's

This site has compiled over 2,100 Best-Of lists in an attempt to create a master list of the greatest albums of all time (including rock, pop, jazz, vocalists, etc).  Interesting, and pretty much right on.  Nice mix of the 'unquestionables' and critical darling cult bands, a few even I'm not familiar with.

Here's their Master list of 100 best albums of the 1960's.

1. The Beatles, Revolver
2. The Beatles, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
3. The Beatles, Abbey Road
4. The Beatles, The Beatles (aka The White Album) 
5. The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground and Nico
6. The Beach Boys, Pet Sounds
7. Bob Dylan, Highway 61 Revisited
8. The Beatles, Rubber Soul
9. Bob Dylan, Blonde on Blonde
10. The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Are You Experienced?
11. The Doors, The Doors
12. Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin II
13. The Rolling Stones, Let It Bleed
14. Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin
15. Van Morrison, Astral Weeks
16. The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Electric Ladyland
17. Bob Dylan, Bringing It All Back Home
18. Love, Forever Changes
19. The Beatles, Magical Mystery Tour
20. King Crimson, In the Court of the Crimson King
21. John Coltrane, A Love Supreme
22. The Rolling Stones, Beggars Banquet
23. The Zombies, Odessey and Oracle
24. The Who, Tommy
25. The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground
26. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band, Trout Mask Replica
27. Cream, Disraeli Gears
28. The Kinks, Village Green Preservation Society
29. The Velvet Underground, White Light/White Heat
30. The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Axis: Bold As Love
31. Johnny Cash, At Folsom Prison
32. The Band, The Band
33. Bob Dylan, The Freewheeling Bob Dylan
34. Pink Floyd, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
35. The Band, Music From Big Pink
36. Leonard Cohen, Songs of Leonard Cohen
37. Charles Mingus, The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady
38. The Beatles, Help!
39. The Beatles, A Hard Day's Night
40. The Who, The Who Sell Out
41. Nick Drake, Five Leaves Left
42. Jefferson Airplane, Surrealistic Pillow
43. Neil Young, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
44. Frank Zappa, Hot Rats
45. The Kinks, Arthur, or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire
46. Otis Redding, Otis Blue
47. The Kinks, Something Else
48. The Beatles, Please Please Me
49. Robert Johnson, King of the Delta Blues Singers
50. Aretha Franklin, I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You
51. The Rolling Stones, Aftermath
52. The Doors, Strange Days
53. James Brown, Live at the Apollo
54. The Stooges, The Stooges
55. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band, Safe As Milk
56. Miles Davis, In a Silent Way
57. The Moody Blues, Days of Future Passed
58. Crosby Stills & Nash, Crosby Stills & Nash
59. Blind Faith, Blind Faith
60. The Mothers of Invention, We're Only In It For The Money
61. Nico, Chelsea Girl
62. Simon and Garfunkel, Bookends
63. Dusty Springfield, Dusty in Memphis
64. The Mothers of Invention, Freak Out
65. Creedence Clearwater Revival, Green River
66. John Coltrane, Ascension
67. The Who, My Generation
68. Miles Davis, Sketches of Spain
69. The Monks, Black Monk Time
70. The Red Crayola, Parable of Arable Land
71. The Doors, Waiting for the Sun
72. Bob Dylan, The Times They Are a'Changing
73. The Beatles, Beatles for Sale
74. Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto, Getz/Gilberto
75. David Bowie, Space Oddity
76. Eric Dolphy, Out To Lunch
77. Albert Ayler, Spiritual Unity
78. Simon and Garfunkel, Sounds of Silence
79. Bob Dylan, Nashville Skyline
80. Grateful Dead, Live/Dead
81. Sly and the Family Stone, Stand!
82. Simon and Garfunkel, Parsley Sage Rosemary and Thyme
83. MC5, Kick Out the Jams
84. Pink Floyd, A Saucerful of Secrets
85. Elvis Presley, From Elvis in Memphis
86. Fleetwood Mac, Fleetwood Mac (1968)
87. Tim Buckley, Goodbye and Hello
88. The United States of America, The United States of America
89. Creedence Clearwater Revival, Bayou Country
90. Johnny Cash, At San Quentin
91. The Mamas and the Papas, If You Can Believe Your Eyes And Ears
92. The Byrds, The Notorious Byrd Brothers
93. Bob Dylan, Another Side of Bob Dylan
94. Bob Dylan, John Wesley Harding
95. The 13th Floor Elevators, The Psychedelic Sounds of the 13th Floor Elevators
96. Cecil Taylor, Unit Structures
97. The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Gilded Palace of Sin
98. Aretha Franklin, Lady Soul
99. The Byrds, Sweetheart of the Rodeo
100. The Pretty Things, S.F. Sorrow

More Cassette Continuity

More Cassette continuity issues, following up on an earlier post. If you know of others, let me know and I'll add them to the list.

The Who - Tommy
I swear growing up my dad had a single-cassette release of Tommy that faded out "Sparks" early and skipped a couple other tracks ("Eyesight to the Blind" was one, I think), but I can't find any corroborating evidence on Google.

Moody Blues - On The Threshold of a Dream
"Never Comes The Day", which opens side B on the LP version, is moved to the end of cassette side A, creating a lengthy gap at the end of side B.

Led Zeppelin II
All screwed up. Side A closer "Thank You" and Side B opener "Heartbreaker" are swapped on cassette, as are "Moby Dick" and "What Is And What Should Never Be." The natural link between Heartbreaker and "Livin' Lovin' Maid" which motivated FM dj's consistently to play the two songs together is lost.

Cream - Wheels of Fire
The side-closing tracks, "As You Said" on vinyl side A and "Deserted Cities of the Heart" on side B, are swapped on the original cassette release.

Beatles - Abbey Road
One of the less egregious track re-orderings in the Beatles' cassette catalog (subject of a forthcoming blogpost), but still odd. The opening tracks on either side, "Come Together" and "Here Comes The Sun", are swapped on cassette. This means that cassette listeners get both Harrison songs over and done with at the start.

U2 - Boy, October & War
I had these three albums on cassette in the 80's, and it's worthy to note that in all three releases, each side contains the entire album. Although it used twice as much cassette tape (how EMI's accountants would've blanched at such a notion!), it completely solved the track re-ordering dilemma.

Pink Floyd - Ummagumma
The concept of "One album live, one album studio" goes to pot on the cassette release, with the songs scrambled out of any semblance of order. It's an EMI release; go figure.

Monty Python - Contractual Obligation Album
They left the running order unchanged, but since side A was six minutes shorter than side B, Michael Palin bookends the six silent minutes at the end of side A with opening and closing narration. (The intervening silence is about as funny as most of the rest of the album, particularly "Finland" and "I Like Traffic Lights.")

Cassette Continuity

Back in 'the day,' it was common for albums to be released on cassette with the tracks in a different order than the LP. I presume the main reason was for continuity; in the minds of the people in charge of these things, it was better for side A to be longer than side B, so listeners wouldn't have to fast-forward to the end before flipping over to side B.

Usually this would result in the first track of side B being moved to the end of side A, but occasionally song order would be altered. The most dramatic example was the 80's cassette release of the Beatles catalog, with the order completely scrambled. Purists were justifiably appalled.

In some cases, Side A and Side B are swapped. Two examples I can think of are Led Zeppelin I and Jethro Tull's This Was. Led Zep opens with "Your Time Is Gonna Come" instead of "Good Times Bad Times", and This Was opens with "Dharma For One" instead of "My Sunday Feeling".

I bring up these particular examples because the cassette releases were my first introduction to these albums, and I've grown to prefer them to the original running order. The albums make more sense to me with the sides reversed. To these ears, "Dazed And Confused" makes a more epic album closer than "How Many More Times." "Dharma For One" makes for a dynamic opening track with Clive Bunker's hyperactive drum solo, and the comparatively uptempo side B now precedes the contemplative side A. I even changed track numbers on iTunes so that they play in the cassette release order, thus:

Led Zeppelin I

1. Your Time Is Gonna Come
2. Black Mountain Side
3. Communication Breakdown
4. I Can't Quit You Babe
5. How Many More Times
6. Good Times Bad Times
7. Babe I'm Gonna Leave You
8. You Shook Me
9. Dazed And Confused

Jethro Tull - This Was

1. Dharma For One
2. It's Breaking Me Up
3. Cat's Squirrel
4. Song For Jeffrey
5. Round
6. My Sunday Feeling
7. Someday The Sun Won't Shine For You
8. Beggars' Farm
9. Move On Alone
10. Serenade to a Cuckoo

I'm sure there are more albums that have their running order uprooted for cassette release, but these stick out.

John's Time Capsule Playlist

Last time I was home I came across a wonderful relic of my undergrad years: On an early spring morning, I set up my battered boombox (remember those?) in the record storage room next to the studio, and recorded of one of my radio shows onto a pair of 90-minute TDK cassette tapes. I was a DJ on our college radio station, WMEB 91.9 FM, "Radio Free Orono." It was the spring semester of my Sophomore year, and I had what would never be described as the ideal timeslot: Saturday morning, 6-9am.

Despite having to wake up at an ungodly hour, the advantage of that timeslot was the knowledge that virtually nobody was listening (except for Paul, the zany Quebecois who had the 9am show), which freed me up enormously. Although I had to play my required selections from the rotation bin (3 from heavy rotation, 2 from medium, and one from light) plus various promos, PSA's and station ID's, I could play anything I wanted, and could crank up the studio volume as loud as I could. I brought a hotpot and Earl Gray tea, a milk crate full of records (plus dozens that I'd pulled from the racks into my own stash on a particular shelf), and had a blast. My format was free-form, a rather unwieldy clash of progressive, punk and oldies in addition to the rotation items.

I was one of those dorks with a dog-eared copy of the Rolling Stone Record Guide, so my radio days gave me the opportunity to explore bands and artists that were highly rated in the book but were never played on my Classic Rock radio station back home. This was long before iTunes made virtually any song instantly accessible. Thus it was here that I discovered The Move, The Nice, Phil Ochs, Moby Grape, The Jam, The Fugs, Family, My Bloody Valentine, and a whole lotta college rock I liked that never broke beyond a small cult following: Monsterland (the first time I played them I got a call from an ecstatic co-ed whose brother was in the band), The Loud Family, Lyda Husik, etc.

The tapes are a very cool relic of a bygone era. 1991 was the point just before Nirvana came around and made alternative and grunge explode. I can claim that this was pretty much the zenith of College Rock Radio, when Alternative was a truly under-the-radar genre instead of a marketing tool. This was when we were pissed at REM for going mainstream, when it seemed U2's best days were behind them, when the vast majority of the playlist was on vinyl 7", when the transmitter sent our feeble signal about 10 miles, before streaming internet, before podcasts, before Napster. Contrast with the show I did in grad school in the mid-00's, where I IM'ed with a listener in Reykjavik.

I'm gonna ask my friend Dave if he can digitize this show and stream it, so you can experience it all in its entirety: the scratches and skips, the low quality signal, the Velvet Underground fixation, and me as a fresh-faced 19-yr old, nasal unsupported voice, incoherent rambling and all.

If I recall correctly, my favorite Station ID, featuring Monty Pythonian Graham Chapman shortly before he died, was pulled and deleted some time before this show. I was quite upset; I loved it and played it regularly, and since it's not on the tape it's lost forever. It went something like this:

"Hello, this is Graham Chapman, and whenever I'm in Orono I listen to WMEB, 91.9-FM, Radio Free Orono. Well, sometimes when I'm in Orono. I certainly listened to it once... um, look, quite frankly I've never listened to it, but I'm told that it's awfully good, so do give it a listen if you've got a moment."

The Playlist: April 20, 1991
(FCC-mandated opening when going on the air to start the broadcast day)
The I Love You Song - Blackgirls ... (iTunes)
Flying the Flannel - fIREHOSE ... (iTunes)
I Guess I'm Falling In Love (instrumental version) - Velvet Underground
Senses Working Overtime - XTC
(Station ID - Fred Schneider of the B-52's)
Outside of a Small Circle of Friends - Phil Ochs ... (Lala)
(Promo - Jazz show)
(Me, announcing a Billy Bragg concert over at Bowdoin College, and bemoaning missing two recent opportunites to see Neil Young)
Like A Hurricane - Neil Young
(Station ID - Bruce Watson, guitarist of Big Country)
Decide - The Feelies
The Last Days of Pompei - Nova Mob (featuring Grant Hart of Hüsker Dü)
Drive That Fast - Kitchens of Distinction
Lament (live) - King Crimson
(Station ID - How To Disco)
(Me displaying my ignorance at not knowing who Grant Hart was at the time)
The Trouble With Classicists - Lou Reed & John Cale
Chase - Moe Tucker ... (iTunes)
(Station ID - Not Quite Barbershop)
Love in a Burning Universe - The Darkside ... (iTunes)
Vote Elvis - Popinjays ... (iTunes)
Big Ass On Fire - Happy Family ... (Lala)
Strawman - Lou Reed
(promo, metal show)
(me, pushing a production of Lysistrata that my classmates were in)
Fishy Swa Ska - Fishbone
Farewell to John Denver - Monty Python
My Wife and My Dead Wife - Robyn Hitchcock & the Egyptians
The Gift - Velvet Underground
The Bottom Line - Big Audio Dynamite
(promo, classical music show)
(me, reading hockey scores and mentioning the new REM album I picked up, Out Of Time)
Public Image - Public Image Ltd.
(Station ID - Michael Hedges)
Pictures of Matchstick Men - Camper Van Beethoven
Hey Grandma - The Move
(Station ID - 2001)
Writing Wrongs - The Monkees
(Station ID - Mojo Nixon)
Radio Free Europe - R.E.M.
I've Changed My Address - The Jam
Lonesome Bulldog - Butthole Surfers
Unknown artist - the tape ran out before it finished, I think I went on the air here to do a backsell but it must have happened before I flipped the tape over. Thus I have no idea who this is.
Rock N Roll (live) - Lou Reed
(PSA - Marsha Warfield on getting tested for HIV)
Revolution Come and Gone - Beat Happening
(Station ID - Michael Hedges... again)
Hammerhead - Laughing Academy
(Promo - Radio Mental Health)
(me, rambling)
Sunless Saturday - Fishbone
Starless - King Crimson
Würm (from "Starship Trooper") - Yes (My closing credits)
(Station ID - 2001, then a few extra songs until Paul arrived)
Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds - William Shatner
Hey Mersh - Moe Tucker

iPod album shuffle of the Day: "Asia" (1982)

My iPod is set to album shuffle (and has been for several months; currently on song 6171 out of 7965), and today's album carrying me thru my drizzly morning commute was Asia's 1982 self-titled debut.

During my tweens this was one of my favorite albums, back before I discovered the progressive heavyweight bands that came to dominate my playlist in undergrad and after. Asia was a supergroup consisting of members of three leading prog bands that at the time had gone on hiatus: guitarist Steve Howe and keyboardist Geoff Downes had left Yes (who had broken up in '79 and were about to reform without them), drummer Carl Palmer had left Emerson and Lake (who then promptly re-formed with Cozy Powell... a theme?), and John Wetton was the bassist and vocalist of King Crimson before they evaporated in '74 (and had since, all together now, re-formed without him). Hell, even Roger Dean (who had a virtual monopoly on prog rock album artwork) designed the cover.

As the band's pedigree suggests, Asia is awash in the intricate stylings of the genre, albeit liberally peppered with hooks and pop references (i.e. the Spectoresque "Be My Baby" drumbeat in "Heat of the Moment"), but lyrically... well, nobody put it better than master critic Robert Christgau: "After listening to two lyrics about why they like their girlfriends, three about "surviving," and four about why they don't like their girlfriends, I'm ready for brain salad surgery."

I can't deny that Asia is full of catchy, hooky, guilty pleasures, but acknowledging so doesn't overshadow the sense that they're consciously dumbing down their songs to reach a mass audience. When you consider the artistic heights they had reached in their earlier bands, there's an inescapably condescending air pervading this album, which as an adult prevents me from embracing it the way I did as when I was twelve. It's like if the Beatles tried to write "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" after they'd done Revolver & Sgt Pepper. (also guilty: ELP's "Black Moon," Howe and Steve Hackett's "GTR", and any Yes song with Trevor Rabin in it)

And a side note - putting a year in a song lyric is almost always a bad idea. "And now you find yourself in '82 / The disco hotspots hold no charms for you" confines the album to a specific era, freezing it in time (and makes me feel really really old to think that this album came out twenty-seven years ago. I've dated people younger than this album).

(In the meantime, my shuffle has now landed on Yes's Tales From Topographic Oceans, which is either the peak or nadir of progressive rock. For me it's a bit of both, sometimes over the course of a single song. Still, the contrast between this and Asia is startling, and further confirmation of my above opinions.)

What My iPod's Album-Shuffle Feature Brings Forth Today

Multi-instrumentalist Ian McDonald and drummer Michael Giles recorded an album on the Cotillion label in 1970 shortly after leaving the original lineup of King Crimson. Charmingly twee hippy-dippy folky prog rock, with a guest appearance by Steve Winwood, landing somewhere in between Traffic and T-Rex, but lacking King Crimson's sinister edge. Or really, any edge at all.

That said, here's everything you need to know about this album:

In the first verse of the opening song-suite "Turnham Green," when McDonald sings about his girlfriend's "soft pussy," he's referring, without a trace of innuendo, to her cat.

Gosh.