MY HOT 100 ALBUMS OF ALL TIME
(Is YOUR favourite on the list?)
Rumours of the album’s death have been greatly exaggerated. It may not be as big as it once was, but then the same can be said of the cinema or television. As an artefact, the album is in rude health. Reviewing for the Mail on Sunday, I see how often a really good one comes along: on average, about once a month. When the Brits are handed out on February 21, Album Of The Year may well be a duel between two acts, George Ezra and Florence + The Machine, that would both be worthy winners.
Albums are popular music’s version of the book or the play – the format that means most to artists and aficionados alike. When you read that a favourite singer has an album on the way, it’s like hearing that a friend is pregnant.
Most singers and bands have one LP that defines them, whether it’s Fleetwood Mac with Rumours or Adele with 21. If a much-loved album is performed in full, it’s often more of an event than a regular gig.
IT’S THE FORMAT THAT MEANS MOST TO ARTISTS AND AFICIONADOS
The singles chart, these days, is a youth club. The album chart is more like a bookshop, going big on the latest thing, but always stocking the classics – and welcoming everyone. Even vinyl LPs are flourishing now, with turntables turning the tables on the unloved CD player.
This list comes with only one rule: no compilations (they’re in a box, page 39). And one disclaimer: it’s not pretending to be definitive. By cataloguing our enthusiasms, we advertise our limitations.
Anybody’s list will bear the stamp of their times, and their teens, because that’s when the music goes deep into our bones. Trees can be dated by their rings, humans by their record collection.
When push comes to shove, this is a list of albums I hope you’ll love. If one of your favourites is not here, I can only apologise, and add that plenty of mine are missing too. So here they are: 100 albums that have stood the test of Tim.
100. DIFFERENT CLASS PULP
On his way to being an indie icon, Jarvis Cocker took a curious route. Three albums that sank without trace, one that did OK, and then this humdinger, the music all glam-rock simplicity, the words bristling with sinister wit. Track to download Common People. Rivals Oasis’s Don’t Look Back In Anger as Britpop’s greatest hit.
99. DIAMOND LIFE SADE
‘For years,’ Beyoncé wrote in 2012, ‘I’ve turned to Sade for inspiration.’ Some singers, including Beyoncé, are chameleons; others are leopards, never changing their spots. Sade is serenely consistent, always herself, a singer’s singer and a listener’s friend. Track to download Hang On To Your Love. A bassline for the ages.
98. 69 LOVE SONGS THE MAGNETIC FIELDS
The second-funniest living person in pop, behind Randy Newman, may well be Stephin Merritt of the Magnetic Fields. Laced with dry wit, his love songs are not so much sung as declaimed in a stentorian voice. Track to download Nothing Matters When We’re Dancing. Joking aside, he can be
romantic too. 97. CROWN AND TREATY SWEET BILLY PILGRIM
Music doesn’t just belong to the big names. Tim Elsenburg of Sweet Billy Pilgrim was working as a handyman when he wrote these tremulous folk-rock songs. Now, quite rightly, he teaches songwriting. Track to download Arrived At Upside Down. The most exquisite melody ever dreamed up by a man with a van.
96. HARVEST NEIL YOUNG
Young’s genius is scattered over so many albums that it’s hard to know where to begin. For me, his heavy rock is best admired from a distance. It’s his folk songs you want in the kitchen: crystalline ballads, glowing with humanity. Track to download Heart Of Gold. ‘And I’m getting old,’ sang Young, then 26. He’s still singing it now in his 70s.
95. LATE REGISTRATION KANYE WEST
Kanye West’s knowing brand of hip-hop used to be so sharp, so entertaining. Thirteen years later, he’s more famous and not half as good. Track to download Touch The Sky. The acceptable face of self-absorption.
94. VOL 1 TRAVELING WILBURYS
Supergroups can be a terrible idea – all mouth and no troupers. But Roy Orbison was a modest man, Tom Petty could get on with anyone, Jeff Lynne had spent years as a producer, George Harrison was used to playing third fiddle, and, in their company, even Bob Dylan mellowed. Together, they made lovely, lived-in folk-pop. Track to download Handle With Care. A song that’s like a hug from your dad.
93. THE RAW & THE COOKED FINE YOUNG CANNIBALS 92. YOUNG AMERICANS DAVID BOWIE 91. A FAMILY ALBUM HOLLY PALMER 90. DIVA ANNIE LENNOX
You can now go years without ever hearing them, but what a band the Fine Young Cannibals were – two gifted chefs in David Steele and Andy Cox from The Beat, one charismatic frontman in Roland Gift, and songs to light up a room. Track to download She Drives Me Crazy. Electro-pop with soul. His new guitarist, Carlos Alomar, called him ‘the whitest man I’ve ever seen – translucent white’. But on this album Bowie threw himself into black music, in the form of Philly soul, while still being unmistakably himself on songs like Fame, co-written with Alomar and John Lennon. Track to download Fame. Bowie addresses the future, again. Any list of great albums should contain one you don’t know and one that’s new. This may well be both. And it’s about motherhood. A blue-eyed-soul singer who toured with David Bowie, Palmer captures life with her son, who is nine, has cerebral palsy and loves music.
Track to download Joy’s Along. Handclap heaven. Alongside Dave Stewart in Eurythmics, Lennox had established herself as an exceptional singer with a sideline in sharp (and cross) dressing. Solo, she kept the costumes and added a riveting candour. Track to download Why. A ballad that uses long lines to get at the truth.
89. SILK DEGREES BOZ SCAGGS
Every so often the gods of pop decide to give a class act a day in the sun. For Boz Scaggs, it came in the form of disco, which gave him a hit with Lowdown, and showed millions how good he was. Track to download We’re All Alone.
88. PRETENDERS PRETENDERS
One minute she was just an American in London, writing for the NME, the next she was a rock star. Chrissie Hynde was a natural, singing, playing guitar, writing music and oozing nonchalant authority. Track to download Brass In Pocket. Not so much a song, more of a spell.
87. MUSIC OF QUALITY AND DISTINCTION VOLUME ONE BEF
Everything Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh did after leaving The Human League was intriguing. They started Heaven 17, rescued Tina Turner from oblivion and stage-managed these sparkling covers of half-forgotten hits, with singers ranging from Sandie Shaw to Paula Yates. Track to download It’s Over. Postpunk’s finest singer, the late Billy
MacKenzie from the Associates, matches up to Roy Orbison.
86. SWORDFISHTROMBONES TOM WAITS
Let’s hear it for the great bad voices. Gruff, adenoidal, gravelly, Waits sings like an old man shouting at his dog. But it makes his junkyard blues all the more touching. Track to download In The Neighborhood. Stately as a hymn.
85. HIGH LAND, HARD RAIN AZTEC CAMERA
Every album Roddy Frame has made is lovable, but this is astonishing: an 18year-old, writing alone in his bedroom in East Kilbride, coming up with chords, and words, of effortless elegance.
Track to download Oblivious. ‘I hope it haunts me till I’m hopeless.’
84. THE FUTURE LEONARD COHEN
An intensely personal voice (Anthem,
Waiting For The Miracle) turns political. Democracy, prompted by the fall of the Berlin Wall, ends up portraying the USA: ‘It’s coming to America first,’ Cohen intones, ‘the cradle of the best and of the worst.’ Track to download Democracy. Both sobering and stirring.
83. VAN MORRISON MOONDANCE
I’ve tried and failed to love Astral Weeks. With its successor, you don’t have to try: songs like Into
The Mystic and Crazy Love go straight to the heart.
Track to download Brand New Day. ‘I was lost, double-crossed,’ Van confesses, writing as crisply as he sings.
82. MANIFESTO ROXY MUSIC
Their most underrated album. Back from three years off, which allowed them to watch the blaze of punk from a safe distance, Ferry, Manzanera and Mackay made a shrewd decision: to dance away the heartache.
Track to download Manifesto. A personal statement, teed up by a twominute intro that pulsates with suspense.
81. THE MISEDUCATION OF LAURYN HILL LAURYN HILL
After making her name with the Fugees, Hill released this sparky, outspoken solo album in 1998. The follow-up is running a little late, to say the least. Track to download Doo Wop (That Thing). Hip-hop meets its grandparents.
80. THE CONVINCER NICK LOWE
‘That untouched takeaway/I brought home the other day/ Has quite a lot to say.’ You don’t get that from lyricists who like to brag. Lowe turns a steely eye on himself in a set of deliciously
underdone country songs.
Track to download I’m A Mess. A bittersweet ballad, crying out for a superstar to cover it.
79. CALL ME AL GREEN
At a time when soul music was overflowing with great singers, Green still managed, with the help of his masterly producer Willie Mitchell, to craft a singular sound. It’s so silky, you don’t always notice its bite. Track to download Funny How Time Slips Away. Willie Nelson’s classic, taken sip by sip.
78. DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
In Springsteen On Broadway, the Boss confessed that he had never set foot on a shop floor. It hadn’t stopped him writing Factory, about his father’s job. Nor had failing his first driving test got in the way of the epic ballad Racing In The Street. Track to download Factory. Piercing.
77. SO PETER GABRIEL
All Gabriel’s albums are rewarding and So is the most popular. It juxtaposes the barnstorming funk pastiche Sledgehammer with the heartrending dole-queue lament Don’t Give Up. Track to download Don’t Give Up. A duet with Kate Bush, who stepped in when Dolly Parton said no.
76. DREAMS NEIL DIAMOND
From a fine songwriter, an outstanding covers album. Diamond puts his own stamp on Gilbert O’Sullivan’s Alone Again (Naturally), Gladys Knight’s Midnight Train To Georgia and Randy Newman’s Feels Like Home and Losing You. It’s the kind of album that becomes a friend. Track to download Feels Like Home. So tender, it’s almost painful.
75. NOTHING IS WRONG DAWES
For millennials, hardly anything is simple. Taylor Goldsmith’s folk-rock songs reflect that, while still showing all the flair that music demands. Track to download A Little Bit Of Everything. Top-class storytelling.
74. DUSTY IN MEMPHIS DUSTY SPRINGFIELD
Not content with being pop’s leading mezzo-soprano, Dusty went to Memphis, worked with Jerry Wexler, tackled Son Of
A Preacher Man, and proved herself a proper soul singer.
Track to download Just One Smile. Written by Randy Newman, made famous by Gene Pitney, nailed by Dusty.
73. NEW BOOTS AND PANTIES!! IAN DURY
Witty, gritty, sweary and warm-hearted. Dury And The Blockheads found a thread in British pub rock that went right back to the music hall.
Track to download My Old Man. Poetry in the definite article: ‘Did the crossword in the Standard/At the airport in the rain.’
72. DEMON DAYS GORILLAZ
Damon Albarn has been the most creative figure in British music this century. He makes thoughtful albums with Blur, with The Good, The Bad And The Queen, and solo; he writes rock operas; and he uses his virtual band, Gorillaz, to make high-class funk and hip-hop with a dream team of guest singers. Track to download Dare. Shaun Ryder from the Happy Mondays having a ball.
71. BROTHERS IN ARMS DIRE STRAITS Yes, I know. When the Eighties fell out of fashion, this mega-seller carried the can. But dig it out now and you find one gem after another, from the breezy satire of Money For Nothing to the warm embrace of Why Worry. Track to download Money For Nothing. Mark Knopfler sends for Sting: two Geordies for the price of one. 70. LISTEN WITHOUT PREJUDICE VOL 1 GEORGE MICHAEL
Faith has more fizz, but this is George at his mature best, slowing down, thinking hard, writing mini-memoirs and tapping into pop history, with a cover of Stevie Wonder and a gloss on the Stones. Track to download Freedom! 90. An infectious manifesto. 69. BLOOD ON THE TRACKS BOB DYLAN
Senior singer-songwriters are forever hearing the words ‘his best since’. With Dylan, it’s usually his best since Blood On The
Tracks, a set of searing songs about love that are either fearless confessions or clever short stories. Track to download Simple Twist Of Fate. A beguiling fable.
68. AM ARCTIC MONKEYS
If you’re bemused by Tranquility Base
Hotel And Casino, do what other recordbuyers are doing: buy its predecessor instead. It’s the rock album of the decade, with the riffs to match Alex Turner’s
restless intelligence. Track to download Do I
Wanna Know? Men, summed up: all swaggering insecurity.
67. HARPS AND ANGELS RANDY NEWMAN
When not writing songs for pixellated toys, Newman makes great music for grown-ups, mixing caustic satire with sudden gentleness. The two love songs here, Feels Like
Home and Losing You, go straight to the heart. Track to download Feels Like Home. Neil Diamond liked this and Losing You so much, he recorded both on Dreams (see no 78).
66. PJ HARVEY LET ENGLAND SHAKE
Some artists have the ability to take the same old instruments and forge a new sound. A select few do this with one hand while capturing the state of the nation with the other. Polly Harvey’s masterpiece is halfway from skiffle to poetry. Track to download The Last Living Rose. A whiff of Brexit, five years early.
65. AUTOMATIC FOR THE PEOPLE REM
One test of a great song is: could you sing it round a campfire, strumming a guitar? Eight albums into their career, REM sat that exam and came top. These songs are simple on the surface, yet shot through with mortality. Track to download Everybody Hurts. Ballad of the Nineties.
64. GANG SIGNS & PRAYER STORMZY
As radio stations target niches, it falls to festivals to broaden our minds. Stormzy headlines Glastonbury this summer after releasing only one album. Listen to it, and you see why: his brand of grime, blending fury with elegance, is built for the big occasion. Track to download Blinded By Your Grace (Pt 1). If Stevie Wonder was from South London...
63. PARALLEL LINES BLONDIE
When the new wave of 1976-77 swept a generation of teenagers into power, a few veterans flourished too. At 33, Debbie Harry made her masterpiece, an album so punchy that it was like an instant Greatest Hits.
Track to download Heart Of Glass. When punk met disco.
62. FUNERAL ARCADE FIRE
David Bowie and Bruce Springsteen had hardly anything in common – until eight earnest young people in Montreal worked out how to combine Bowie’s sense of drama with Springsteen’s heart. They ended up performing with Bowie at his second-last live appearance. Track to download Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels). Urgency incarnate.
61. THE LEXICON OF LOVE ABC
Some pop stars want to be all things to all people. Martin Fry of ABC only wanted to be one thing: debonair. He managed it, and touched quite a lot of people, with the glossy orchestral pop of this glittering debut. Track to download Poison Arrow. So good they recorded it twice, fast and slow.
60. ELEPHANT THE WHITE STRIPES
The fewer the band members, the bigger the noise. Meg White, on drums, was a onewoman powerhouse; Jack White, with his howl and his riffs, was Plant and Page rolled into one. Track to download Seven Nation Army. The song of the 21st century.
59. THESE FOOLISH THINGS BRYAN FERRY
After introducing rock to postmodernism with Roxy Music’s debut, Ferry coolly reinvented the covers album. Mixing The Beatles, the Stones, Dylan and Motown with old show tunes, he tackled them all with artful irreverence. Track to download A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall. Armageddon goes glam.
58. DARE THE HUMAN LEAGUE
Electro-pop doesn’t tend to age well, but these are just sizzling pop songs that happen to be played on synthesisers. Track to download Don’t You Want Me. Only the third single off the album, it soon became a classic.
57. THE BEATLES [THE WHITE ALBUM] THE BEATLES
John, Paul and George try everything and most of it works. Ringo walks out, in protest at the others’ bickering, but soon returns. Track to download While My Guitar Gently Weeps. George’s first great ballad, featuring Eric Clapton.
56. NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS, HERE’S THE SEX PISTOLS THE SEX PISTOLS
Rock music in 1977, all pomp and prog, was boring beyond belief. The balloon needed pricking, and that task fell to Johnny Rotten, who could shoot down a zeppelin with his snarl. Track to download Pretty Vacant. Beneath the spikes, a stirring pop song.
55. GOODBYE YELLOW BRICK ROAD ELTON JOHN
Elton’s genius lies mainly in singles, and there are several here. But this is also his most rounded album – 80 minutes of light and shade. Four decades later, six of the songs are ringing out on his farewell tour. Track to download Candle In The Wind. Soulful enough to get away with calling its subject ‘MariLYN MONroe’.
54. SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER
How on earth did the Bee Gees, three Anglo-Australian brothers whose career had stalled after a few lachrymose hits, turn into the kings of global disco? By writing irresistible songs like Stayin’ Alive. Track to download Stayin’ Alive. Now used, magnificently, to train medics in emergency resuscitation.
53. BUDDY HOLLY BUDDY HOLLY
Today, he’d be a geek. Sixty years ago, Buddy Holly was just a guy in glasses who wrote his own songs, and brought a delicious tenderness to early rock’n’roll. His death in an air crash at 22 may have robbed us of more great music than any of rock’s other tragedies. Track to download Rave On! Pop perfection, all over in 110 seconds.
52. THRILLER MICHAEL JACKSON
The biggest album of the Eighties, and perhaps the best-selling studio album of all time. So how does it stand up today? The ballads drag, but the uptempo tracks have lost none of their lustre. Track to download Billie Jean. A groove, a pulse, a yelp, a gem.
51. ALL THINGS MUST PASS GEORGE HARRISON
As the third-best songwriter in the Beatles, George tended to be allotted six minutes per album. Here he has 106 minutes, which could have gone horribly wrong, but he makes you feel his exhilaration as well as his meditative calm. Track to download What Is Life. A riff like a ride on a toboggan.
50. LONDON CALLING THE CLASH
Joe Strummer had all the attributes of a pop star (the pipes, the quiff, the sneer), plus an open mind and three gifted bandmates. This double LP captures their range, from rock to ska, and their dynamism.
Track to download The title track. Obvious, but immense.
49. FOR YOUR PLEASURE ROXY MUSIC
Their debut was more audacious, but this follow-up has more fun and focus. And it’s still fearless enough to feature In Every
Dream Home A Heartache, a hymn to an inflatable doll. Track to download Do The Strand. At every gig Bryan Ferry plays, it raises the roof.
48. BLONDE ON BLONDE BOB DYLAN
Dylan goes to Nashville, and to heaven. He delivers exuberance on
Rainy Day Women, ardour on I Want You, sorrow on Visions Of Johanna,
and searing ambivalence on Just Like A Woman. Track to download I Want You. Fifty years later, a highlight of the musical Girl From The North Country.
47. THE SELDOM SEEN KID ELBOW
There are bigger names in Manchester’s musical history, but has any of them made a more satisfying album? After 18 years together, Guy Garvey and friends found the oomph to go with the intricate warmth of their soulful folk-rock. Track to download One Day Like This. The best wedding anthem since Wagner.
46. LET IT BLEED ROLLING STONES
A singles band at first, a force on stage forever, the Stones were an albums band for a few years (c 196872). Exile On Main St is more famous but Let It Bleed has Gimme Shelter, You Can’t Always Get What You Want, and a cake baked by Delia Smith for the cover. Track to download Gimme Shelter. The zeitgeist captured in a blazing duet by Mick Jagger and Merry Clayton.
45. UNTITLED (LED ZEPPELIN IV) LED ZEPPELIN
Rock has been around so long now that it has its own Mount Rushmore. Among the figures carved in granite are Robert Plant, for his howl, and Jimmy Page, for his riffs. Track to download Stairway To Heaven. The greatest No 1 that never was.
44. LEMONADE BEYONCÉ
She could have kicked him out, or suffered in silence. Instead Beyoncé responded to her husband’s infidelity with a concept album about black history, which also covers half of popular music, from country to hiphop. Track to download Formation. Personal pain turned into a political anthem.
43. THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON PINK FLOYD
The title is a headline. The sleeve is an icon. The band haven’t played together since 2005, but their masterpiece, still selling after 46 years, just won’t go away. Track to download Us And Them. Beautifully written by Roger Waters and Rick Wright, beatifically sung by
David Gilmour.
42. TRANSFORMER LOU REED
David Bowie didn’t just make great records, he could produce them too. Reed, who could be so uncompromising as to be unlistenable, showed his softer side on Perfect Day and Satellite Of Love. Track to download Walk On The Wild Side. Genderbending with nonchalance.
41. BAD LOVE RANDY NEWMAN
Pop’s greatest wit on top form. Newman harpoons everyone from 16th-century imperialists, on The
Great Nations Of Europe, to today’s ageing rock stars on I’m Dead (But I Don’t Know It). And then he slips in this...
Track to download I Miss You. A sublime ode to Newman’s first wife, written while married to his second.
40. LOW DAVID BOWIE
His chilliest album, yet one of his best. Living in Berlin, shaking off a cocaine habit, working with Tony Visconti and Brian Eno, Bowie hit on a sound that mixed icy synths with a warm rhythm section. It was both alien and intensely human. Track to download Sound And Vision. One of the great long intros.
39. ARMED FORCES ELVIS COSTELLO AND THE ATTRACTIONS
It begins ‘Oh I just don’t know where to begin,’ and never looks back. All Costello’s bark and bite, plus a sudden plushness, inspired by Abba. Track to download Oliver’s Army. Post-punk’s answer to Our Island Story.
38. WHO’S NEXT THE WHO
Anger meets artistry. Pete Townshend poured both into his songwriting, and had all the kit to express them: his scorching guitar, Keith Moon’s do-or-die drumming and Roger Daltrey’s soaring voice. Track to download Won’t Get Fooled Again. 1971 in a nutshell and still apt now.
37. 21 ADELE
Just when albums were being widely written off, along came one that sold like Sgt Pepper. Bruised voice, broken heart, potty mouth, dirty laugh: Adele is relatable and adorable. And she always gives her all. Track to download Someone Like You. She sings the words as if they’ve just popped into her head.
36. PET SOUNDS THE BEACH BOYS
Rated the greatest of all time rather too often for its own good, Brian Wilson’s magnum opus still manages to dazzle. The instruments are riveting, and the chords go from bottling sunshine to capturing the clouds in a man’s mind. Track to download God Only Knows. Magical.
35. OFF THE WALL MICHAEL JACKSON
Pop, unlike classical music, produces few prodigies, and they tend to fade away. Jacko made sure he didn’t by hiring Quincy Jones as producer and
Rod Temperton as writer, and devising a sound as slinky as his dancing. Track to download Don’t Stop ’Til You Get Enough. That swing.
34. JOHN LENNON/PLASTIC ONO BAND
This solo debut had the rawest of raw materials: primal therapy. Songs like Mother and God were as stark as their titles, as Lennon bared his soul and honed his voice. Track to download Working Class Hero. Look back in anger.
33. THE VISITORS ABBA
The problem with office romances is what happens afterwards. Not for Agnetha, Bjorn, Benny and Anni-Frid. They turned their pain into a set of break-up songs so piercing that, nearly 40 years later, we’re still wincing along. Track to download One Of Us. Abba’s first single after the second divorce, so deliciously sad that it became their last No 1.
32. THE FREEWHEELIN’ BOB DYLAN BOB DYLAN
It was on this scintillating second album that Dylan, just turning 22, became the Dylan we know, writing his own words and engraving them on his time. Track to download Blowin’ In The Wind. How to make a fool of a racist with a few simple questions.
31. OK COMPUTER RADIOHEAD
The same line-up for 32 years, the same producer for 25: Radiohead, for all their sidelines, know exactly who they are. On this, their third album, Thom Yorke and his mates found a wintry beauty. Track to download Karma Police. Started off as an in-joke, ended up as a classic.
30. THE JOSHUA TREE
U2 Interviewing U2 in 1982, just before New
Year’s Day became their first hit, I found them asking me questions, which is not standard rock-star behaviour. Within five years, their open minds had led them to the very top. Track to download I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For. Gospel according to St Bono.
29. ABBEY ROAD THE BEATLES
Let It Be emerged later, but this was The Beatles’ real farewell. It showed their true colours: playful soulful cheerful (Here childlike intense and effortlessly eclectic The album sleeve wasn’t bad either. Track to download Something. Frank Sinatra called it Lennon and McCartney’s greatest song. It was by George Harrison. (Come Together), (Something), Comes The Sun), (Maxwell’s Silver Hammer, Octopus’s Garden), (I Want You) (Medley).
28. REMAIN IN LIGHT TALKING HEADS
In Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, Talking Heads had a rhythm section so tight, they were married to each other. On this album, steered by Brian Eno, those rhythms took charge, to mind-blowing effect. Track to download Once In A Lifetime. Definitive.
27. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND AND NICO
A year before Sgt Pepper, Lou Reed and John Cale dreamed up art-rock with brooding classics like Femme Fatale and All
Tomorrow’s Parties. ‘Only a thousand people bought that album,’ said Brian Eno, ‘but they all started a band of their own.’ Track to download Sunday Morning. A gossamer ballad, one of Eno’s Desert Island Discs.
26. HIGHWAY 61 REVISITED BOB DYLAN
The fan who yelled ‘Judas!’ couldn’t have been more wrong. When Dylan went electric, he got even better. That wild mercury sound was a match for his marauding intelligence. Track to download Ballad Of A Thin Man. ‘You don’t know what’s happening, do you, Mr Jones?’
25. MISS AMERICA MARY MARGARET O’HARA
She came from nowhere and couldn’t wait to get back, but Mary Margaret O’Hara delivered one classic album, pulsating with soul. And she wrote it all herself. Track to download Dear Darling. Hear it once and you feel as if you’ve known it all your life.
24. AMERICAN IV: THE MAN COMES AROUND JOHNNY CASH
Take one sleeping giant. Add great songs, mixing old chestnuts with surprises. Keep the sound minimal, to let the giant’s voice ring out like the crack of doom. Rick Rubin’s recipe turned into a feast. Track to download Hurt. Pop-video perfection.
23. ELVIS PRESLEY ELVIS PRESLEY
Elvis albums – 239 of them, at the last count – are easily confused. This is the one whose sleeve design appealed to The Clash so much they borrowed it for London
Calling. More importantly, it’s the one that started it all: a slice of pure dynamite. Track to download Blue Suede Shoes. For Scotty Moore’s guitar as much as Elvis’s charisma. 22. GRACELAND PAUL SIMON With his seventh solo album, Simon finally reached the audience he deserved. By crossing his poetic pop with South African township jive, he discovered a thrilling exuberance. Track to download The Boy In The Bubble. If you don’t play this to your kids in the car, they may have to be taken into care.
21. WHAT’S GOING ON MARVIN GAYE
Divorced, depressed, mourning his musical partner Tammi Terrell and anxious about his brother in Vietnam, Gaye found himself by using his silky soul to ask the big questions. Track to download Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology). Visionary stuff in 1971.
20. BLACKSTAR DAVID BOWIE
When he died, in 2016, Bowie had no funeral or memorial service. He didn’t need one, because this was it: the master of theatrical music staging his own finale.
Track to download The title track. Bowie takes a favourite image and paints it black.
19. PURPLE RAIN PRINCE AND THE REVOLUTION
Sign O’ The Times had more to say, but it was Purple Rain that made Prince a superstar. He was four musicians in one: a great frontman, songwriter, bandleader and guitarist. Track to download When Doves Cry. The ace of no bass.
18. BACK TO BLACK AMY WINEHOUSE
Her first album had been promising, but this was something else: a troubled young woman turning her turmoil into classic soul. Britain’s second-favourite album of the 21st century, behind Adele’s 21. Track to download You Know I’m No Good. The demons have all the best tunes.
17.THE KICK INSIDE KATE BUSH
‘All tracks written by Kate Bush.’ Those words would be unusual for a female singer today, let alone a 19-year-old in 1978. Ten albums later, they’re still proclaiming her fabulous individuality. Track to download Wuthering Heights. The vocals alone are mind-boggling.
16. FEAR OF MUSIC TALKING HEADS
The first album I ever reviewed. Played it twice, didn’t warm to it, said so, sold it to the Record & Tape Exchange for £2, and bought it back for £4 after realising it was a masterpiece. Simultaneously unnerving and uplifting. Track to download Life During Wartime. Vivid, infectious, and all too topical.
15. RUMOURS FLEETWOOD MAC
A masterclass in how to have affairs with band-mates and turn them into gorgeous music. If, like most people in the western world, you already have a copy, try
Rumours’ crazy little sister, Tusk. Track to download The Chain. Pop with real depth.
14. RUBBER SOUL THE BEATLES
December 1965: the moment when the greatest singles band of all became an albums band too. Side one is 18 minutes of bliss, from
Drive My Car to Michelle, by way of Norwegian Wood, Nowhere Man and The Word.
Track to download In My Life. ‘My first real major piece of work’ – John Lennon.
13. TAPESTRY CAROLE KING
At 18, already a wife and mother, she co-wrote a great song with her husband. At 26 she was divorced. At 28 she made a debut album, which flopped. And at 29 she released this classic: her best tunes, boldly underplayed. Track to download Will You Love Me Tomorrow? The one she wrote at 18.
12. HUNKY DORY DAVID BOWIE
In 1971, with his fourth album, Bowie went from a one-hit wonder to a genius. It had the verve of Oh!
You Pretty Things, the grandeur of Life On Mars?, the fearlessness of Changes and the charm of Kooks, addressed to baby Zowie, now better known as the film director Duncan Jones. Track to download Life On Mars? Show-stopping ballad that began as a response to My Way, then easily surpassed it.
11. SONGS IN THE KEY OF LIFE STEVIE WONDER
This was his 18th album at the age of only 36, and it ran to 104 minutes – yet it feels effortless, from the swing of I Wish to the grace of Joy Inside My Tears. Track to download Sir Duke. ‘A language we all understand.’
10. THERE GOES RHYMIN’ SIMON PAUL SIMON
The best of a dozen great solo albums from the most skilled craftsman in pop, equally adept at melody, lyrics and rhythm. Track to download American Tune. Borrowed from Bach, prompted by Nixon, all too applicable to Trump. Played live last summer, its withering beauty sent shivers down spines.
9. LADY SOUL ARETHA FRANKLIN
New York, 1967: guided by Jerry Wexler, accompanied by southernsoul sidemen, and backed by Cissy Houston (mother of Whitney), Aretha sings from the heart, and the church. Track to download (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman. The song that made Obama cry when Aretha sang it for its author, Carole King.
8. REVOLVER THE BEATLES
Eight months after Rubber Soul, the Beatles released another masterpiece of mature pop. It was less consistent, but more transcendent: Eleanor Rigby, Yellow Submarine, Got To Get You Into My Life, and above all... Track to download Here, There And Everywhere. A marvel even among Paul McCartney’s ballads.
7. THE RIVER BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
Rock’n’roll, born to run on youthful energy, has to grow up some time. Springsteen’s only double album is all about just that, tempering fire (Hungry Heart, Cadillac Ranch) with wisdom (the title track, Independence Day). Track to download The Price You Pay. Making maturity sing.
6. AVALON ROXY MUSIC
The most beautiful album in the whole of art-rock. Here, it went to No 1, but is often misread as being merely smooth; in America, it’s a
cult object, with a reputation as an aphrodisiac. Track to download More Than
This. A sinuous melody, covered by everyone from Blondie to Bill Murray.