1691 replies to this topic

[Agrimorfee]

#33.
Tom Waits (1219 Points, 20 Votes) [/size]

The first time I ever heard him ("Pasties & a G-String", on Dr. Demento! ), I thought he was black veteran blues-jazz singer. Still not a favorite of mine (I made the statement here "A little Tom Waits goes a long way" a few years ago) but he is still an amazing dude.

[Agrimorfee]

SOMB Says: The Cure wrote a pretty good album called Disintegreation. The lead singer wears makeup and cries. – madrox

and some people consider this guy a quality poster... if you offer to write a fucking blurb, write one.

Didn't he say he would leave?

[54cermak]

can't believe how high spoon is, but they're probably my favorite band of the past decade (and apparently a lot of other people's as well), so go figure.

I thinK Spoon was the only post early 90s band I listed.

Huh? I may be wrong, but wasn't Wilco your number 1?

You're correct, I guess I consider them part of the Uncle Tupelo continuum, so I lump Spoon in with a later era.

[Nick]

Paul - Is there a particular reason you didn't ask me to write The Afghan Whigs' blurb?

[Undercooked Sausage]

yeah i was wondering about this.

[Nick]

I know I had a bit of a heated exchange w/ him last year about EOY lists & what should qualify but the more I think about this the angrier I get. I mean, it is a fucking message board & no one really gives a shit but I've established The Afghan Whigs are my favorite band & to slight me like this is a dick move.

[Mitchell]

From the Acclaimed Music Forum, top 100

[spoiler]100. LCD Soundsystem
99. Wu-Tang Clan
98. Pearl Jam
97. Portishead
96. Queen
95. Frank Sinatra
94. The Strokes
93. The Stooges
92. Television
91. James Brown
90. Cocteau Twins
89. Love
88. The Zombies
87. Kraftwerk
86. Buddy Holly
85. Public Enemy
84. Lou Reed
83. Coldplay
82. Neutral Milk Hotel
81. John Lennon
80. Pulp
79. Guided by Voices
78. New Order
77. Beastie Boys
76. OutKast
75. Ramones
74. Chuck Berry
73. Super Furry Animals
72. Otis Redding
71. Nick Cave
70. Creedence Clearwater Revival
69. The Doors
68. Sufjan Stevens
67. Roxy Music
66. Brian Eno
65. Big Star
64. Sly and the Family Stone
63. Depeche Mode
62. Frank Zappa
61. Hüsker Dü
60. The Band
59. John Coltrane
58. The Replacements
57. Michael Jackson
56. Hank Williams
55. Van Morrison
54. Pavement
53. Leonard Cohen
52. The Byrds
51. Bob Marley & The Wailers
50. Sonic Youth
49. The Flaming Lips
48. Scott Walker
47. Elvis Presley
46. Marvin Gaye
45. Massive Attack
44. Joy Division
43. Oasis
42. Joni Mitchell
41. The White Stripes
40. PJ Harvey
39. Simon & Garfunkel
38. Steely Dan
37. The Smashing Pumpkins
36. Elliott Smith
35. Wilco
34. Johnny Cash
33. Arcade Fire
32. Jimi Hendrix
31. Belle and Sebastian
30. Björk
29. The Cure
28. Nick Drake
27. Miles Davis
26. Led Zeppelin
25. Tom Waits
24. Blur
23. Beck
22. Nirvana
21. Talking Heads
20. Pink Floyd
19. Elvis Costello
18. The Kinks
17. The Smiths
16. Pixies
15. The Clash
14. Stevie Wonder
13. U2
12. Bruce Springsteen
11. The Who
10. Prince
09. The Beach Boys
08. The Velvet Underground
07. Neil Young
06. David Bowie
05. R.E.M.
04. The Rolling Stones
03. Radiohead
02. Bob Dylan
01. The Beatles

[theremin]

Bjork - Top 300 Artists Mix
http://www.divshare....oad/5406411-c20

Why are there no songs from my favorite bjork cd, Medulla?

[theremin]

Bjork - Where Is The Line

[velocity]

Christ, Paul! Why haven't you spent your time here memorizing Nick's musical proclivities. This slight will be remembered and severely punished.

[Paul]

Paul - Is there a particular reason you didn't ask me to write The Afghan Whigs' blurb?

I'm pretty sure I did...

[Paul]

Oh Me Oh My, I Think It's Been An Eternity
You'd Be Surprised At My Degree Of Uncertainty

#30.




Brian Eno (1330 Points, 25 Votes)

Years Active: 1970-present

SOMB Says: I'm guessing if you're here on this thread and posting on an indie rock message board, you probably know who this guy is, but just in case, I'll give a quick summary mostly ripped from AMG & Mark Prindle reviews:

To start, Brian Eno was involved in a whole shit ton of stuff. He started out in glam band extraordinaire Roxy Music and made two pretty great records after which he moved on to begin his very own solo career as ENO (later on known as Electric Night Orchestra). And it is this ENO that I will be talking about. An ambient pioneer, a guitar riffing glam rocker, a hit producer, an avant-garde innovator, and much much more (including being just an all around weird dude who drank his own pee and wore lipstick & nipple clamps on stage), Brian Eno was a man who understood music and how to write great songs. He understood craft, but beyond even that he understood texture. He knew the ins and outs of classic Beatles style pop songs as well as the ability to craft tone overlapping tones of blissful beauty. An ARTIST if you will. He also produced a shit ton of records including Pitchfork favorites like David Bowie's Low (as well as the rest of the Berlin trilogy), Cluster, DEVO, No New York, Talking Heads, and hell even U2 and James (I think?). And then of course there was his own career. Which I'm going to try and cover bits and parts of.

First off, Ambient records have never really been my thing. I like a few, but I'd never rank them anywhere near a good old pop & rock album. And for that reason, I'm just not really going to go into Eno's ambient stuff (as great as it all can be). So for all you ambient boarders, I'd suggest talking to avec or st park or someone for a good place to start. As to me? I'm going to talk about his POP albums. The one's full of hooks and noises and lots and lots of warm humming synthesizers. Like his first three: Here Come The Warm Jets, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) & Another Green World. To sum these albums up real quickly (well more the first two at least), these are albums that are full of dark, experimental, sinister, and incredibly catchy pop songs. Sure there's a lot of weird shit about trying to tie his shoe and Regina's vagina as well as some heavy metal riffs (Third Uncle!!), typewriter percussion (China My China) and lots and lots of warm British jets of piss passing over and over again (Here Come The Warm Jets), but the truth of the matter is that Brian Eno wrote pop songs. Songs that more than likely made the likes of Brian Wilson & Paul McCartney just a little jealous. Like, "Backwater" and "Baby's On Fire", and man oh man, "St. Elmo's Fire" (!!!) I mean hyperbole aside, "St. Elmo's Fire", now there's a song. Honestly a top ten song of all time for me. Sublime in the best sorts of ways. Sound systems have been crafted from this song as well as iconic cinematic masterpieces. For example, I was watching 2001: A Space Odyssey last night, and "St. Elmo's Fire" could have sound tracked the whole thing. Just slow enveloping layer after layer of pop bliss washing over and throughout your entire body. I don't know what to say, it's just got this cool & crisp otherworldly dreamscape quality to it. Maybe it was the drugs or just the cultural landscape of the time, but the 70s more than any other decade seems to have been able to pull this feeling off. Most likely though it was just that Brian Eno is some sort of genius sound wizard (which of course he is). That makes the most sense to me at least.

But back to the albums. I'm a big fan of any of his first three (as well as Before And After Science), but I think I'm going to end up singling out Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) as my favorite. It's just got the most pound for pound pop rock jams of any of his albums. It starts with the fantastic 1-2 glam rock punch of "Burning Airlines" & "Back in Judy's Jungle" and moves right into the dark & haunting riffs of "The Fat Lady of Limbourg" (and when that horn comes in at 2:13, oh man!). Then of course there's the great proto-industrial "The Great Pretender" as well as the heavy metal riffing and just all around awesome "Third Uncle" not to mention the weird lullaby "Put a Straw Under Baby" the pop classics "The True Wheel" & "China My China" and the lush flooding sounds of "Taking Tiger Mountain". All in all a fantastic album with layers upon layers of pop songcraft.

But really, the same could be said of the dark pop masterpiece Here Comes The Warm Jets as well as the swirling song textures of the fantastic Another Green World. These are the things Brian Eno albums are made of (or at least his early ones). Lots and lots of dark monsterish hooks enveloped within rolling waves of warmth and melodies. Anyways, I don't really have much else to write. I think he's great and he made #20 on my list and you should probably give all these songs a listen or two because they're all incredible and worthy of any quality boarder's time. Oh and also, while his music is fine at any volume, like most any music is, and his ambient stuff is probably good for falling asleep to, when it comes to the stuff I've been talking about, you really should listen to it at a loud volume. Like on headphones or with your head between two large speakers. Cause as I mentioned above his music is full of TEXTURE, and lot's of it. So do yourself a favor and welcome it in. – stphone

Album Pick: Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)

Track Picks: "St. Elmo's Fire"
"Baby's On Fire"
"Third Uncle"

Ranked Highest By: Magnus Malcolm (#3)

Also Ranked By: Nick, vurt, pink (#5)

[Freddie Freelance]

Definitely funnier in context. Paul, consider replacing The Cure's blurb with the above.

Sausage/Avec, I apologize for confusing your posts in my memory.

[undo]

I own 3 Brian Eno albums and I've heard at least 3 others, really gone out of my way to give this guy a chance because he seems like an artist I should probably love, but so far it just hasn't happened yet.

[Paul]

I Am Human And I Need To Be Loved
Just Like Everybody Else Does


#29.




The Smiths (1455 Points, 26 Votes)

Years Active: 1982-1987

SOMB Says: Though I may listen to other artists more often these days, there are few bands as deeply ingrained in my psyche as the Smiths. Like millions of lonely, disaffected teenagers of the last 25 years, the music of Morrissey and Marr were the soundtrack of those years. When it seemed like everyone in the world just didn’t understand, there was always the Smiths. Morrissey showed a way to cope with the cruel world: sneering disdain and cool detachment.

But the pages of rock history are littered with lesser bands who covered similar territory, so why were the Smiths so different? What made them icons, while the Housemartins, for example, were a cult favorite at best?

Certainly Johnny Marr, who represented a different kind of guitar hero – one whose genius was rooted in melodicism and songcraft rather than solos and preening, played a part in that. Johnny Marr was the coolkid that every loner envisions himself to be inside. A rocker who took the slings and arrows of lesser minds and used them to fuel his outsized talent. Marr represented the hope in straight Smiths fans everywhere that not only could the shy kid get the girl someday, but that he’d get all the girls. Marr was the modern embodiment of Morrissey’s James Dean fixation.

Marr’s role is really secondary when speaking of the Smiths-as-legend though, because the iconic figure in the group was of course, Morrissey. On paper, Morrissey’s influences are about as incongruous as one could think of – glam rock, British soap operas, James Dean, girl groups, punk, Elvis – but somehow, in his hands, this amalgamation not only made perfect sense, but inspired legions of loyal followers. When Morrissey croons about comatose girlfriends, impending bus crashes, lousy DJs, child abuse, etc. the effect is at once hilarious, but also deeply personal. It didn’t matter if you were a lonely suburban kid who stayed in on Saturday night, or a Mexican gang member, Morrissey was speaking to you.

This incongruity means that The Smiths legacy is one that is just as conflicting as their music was. On the one hand the most obvious antecedents come in the twee-pop of groups like Belle & Sebastian, but their shadow also looms large over hardcore as well – not to mention the fact that emo would probably not exist without the Smiths. So, a mixed blessing, shall we say?

What will be interesting is to see how the Smiths influence continues to be interpreted by succeeding generations of fans, because as long as there are outcasts, there will be Smiths fans. – 54cermak

Album Pick: The Queen is Dead, I'd also recommend getting Louder Than Bombs or one of the other compilations as the Smiths released many classic tracks as b-sides and non-album singles.

Track Picks: “Ask”
“There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”
“The Boy With The Thorn In His Side”

Ranked Highest By: falling and laughing (#2)

Also Ranked By: mike2511, Mitchell (#3), suckeredyou (#4), Huckle, Diesel (#5)

[Duff.]

I own 3 Brian Eno albums and I've heard at least 3 others, really gone out of my way to give this guy a chance because he seems like an artist I should probably love, but so far it just hasn't happened yet.

Right there with you. Maybe I'm not putting in as much effort, but still.

[Paul]

Hey Ho
Let's Go

#28.




Ramones (1469 Points, 30 Votes, 1 #1 Vote)

Years Active: 1974-1996

SOMB Says: They were wrong, completely wrong, about everything really, and they kinda sucked, and were ugly, and no one really liked them, not here anyway, never even heard of em, only the weirdoes, because every song–every song—sounded exactly the same, just a different order of the three or four chords they could be bothered to learn, and Joey couldn't sing, could barely speak, sounded as goofy as he looked, at eight feet tall, 67 pounds, and god that mug, and the leather jacket and the jeans, just like his brothers, and they weren't even brothers for fucksakes, and their guitarist was a fucking Republican, Johnny, god rest his soul, and they couldn't even live to old age, Joey Johnny Deedee, gone before nearly every goddamn Rolling Stone, though maybe that helps, but it's just another thing, and they trotted this out, actually in front of people, called it rocknroll, actually didn't bother calling it anything, didn't give a fuck what anyone called it, what they said, just went out there, at a country western bar, or was it a homeless shelter, but they kicked out the jams, barely taking a second to breath between songs, arguing onstage, no set list, just a bunch of simple pop tunes, sped the fuck up, Tommy or Marky or whoever pounding the drums, who could keep up, really, and Johnny and Deedee attacking their instruments, Joey bleeting about huffing, and horror movies, and beating up children, like a smartass, and it came together, but it was chaos, and it was mayhem, and it was rocknroll, because it lived, it burned, it couldn't be stopped, and no one listened, only the weirdoes, but they got it, were right, were right all along. – Duff

Album Pick: Rocket To Russia

Track Picks: “Cretin Hop”
“Judy Is A Punk”
“Beat On The Brat”

Ranked Highest By: nobodies (#1)

Also Ranked By: Freddie Freelance (#2), One Word Extinguisher (#5)

[RoBKoZ]

I own 3 Brian Eno albums and I've heard at least 3 others, really gone out of my way to give this guy a chance because he seems like an artist I should probably love, but so far it just hasn't happened yet.

Right there with you. Maybe I'm not putting in as much effort, but still.

i got into all his stuff about a year ago for the same reasons. in my opinion, all you need is Here Come the Warm Jets, which is the only one i still listen to

[Undercooked Sausage]

duff that blurb nearly brought a tear to my eye.

[elcorazon]

yeah, duff, that's a great blurb. makes me wish I hadn't volunteered to write the shitty blurb I wrote. oh well.