Monday, July 14, 2008

My Official Yearly Record(s)

All the cool bloggers are doing it...so why not me? An album from each year of my existence on this planet. Other folks may have their own criteria...mine was simple. First, I had to own it...and I did find, to my kinda surprise, that I actually do own albums from every year since my birth...and I had to like it a lot. I went back and perused critics' favorites lists from 1961-on and picked the highest-ranked album that I listened to the most. Simple as that. Be forewarned...I won't be fronting about how much I love hip-hop or pimping the indie flavor of that year. In fact, I'm pretty sure you'll find my tastes to be almost aggressively middlebrow. So...with all that in mind...here we go:

1961 - Sinatra's Swingin' Session (Frank Sinatra)
1962 - Sinatra and Strings (Frank Sinatra)
1963 - The Concert Sinatra (Frank Sinatra)
1964 - A Hard Day's Night (The Beatles)
1965 - Rubber Soul (The Beatles)
1966 - Pet Sounds (The Beach Boys)
1967 - The Velvet Underground and Nico (Velvet Underground)
1968 - The Beatles [aka The White Album] (The Beatles)
1969 - Tommy (The Who)
1970 - Deja Vu (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young)
1971 - Who's Next (The Who)
1972 - Harvest (Neil Young)
1973 - The Dark Side of the Moon (Pink Floyd)
1974 - Walls and Bridges (John Lennon)
1975 - Born To Run (Bruce Springsteen)
1976 - Ramones (The Ramones)
1977 - Rocket To Russia (The Ramones)
1978 - Darkness on the Edge of Town (Bruce Springsteen)
1979 - The Wall (Pink Floyd)
1980 - The River (Bruce Springsteen)
1981 - Beauty and the Beat (The Go-Go's)
1982 - Under the Big Black Sun (X)
1983 - Murmur (REM)
1984 - Purple Rain (Prince and The Revolution)
1985 - Tales of the New West (The Beat Farmers)
1986 - Life's Rich Pageant (REM)
1987 - The Joshua Tree (U2)
1988 - ...And Justice For All (Metallica)
1989 - New York (Lou Reed)
1990 - Ragged Glory (Neil Young)
1991 - Metallica (Metallica)
1992 - Automatic for the People (REM)
1993 - Siamese Dream (Smashing Pumpkins)
1994 - Definitely Maybe (Oasis)
1995 - And Out Come the Wolves (Rancid)
1996 - Fountains of Wayne (Fountains of Wayne)
1997 - OK Computer (Radiohead)
1998 - Hey! Album (Marvelous 3)
1999 - From Here To Eternity Live (The Clash)
2000 - In The Flesh (Roger Waters)
2001 - Is This It (The Strokes)
2002 - The Rising (Bruce Springsteen)
2003 - St. Anger (Metallica)
2004 - Smile (Brian Wilson)
2005 - Devils and Dust (Bruce Springsteen)
2006 - We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions (Bruce Springsteen)
2007 - Magic (Bruce Springsteen)
2008 (so far) - Flight of the Conchords (Flight of the Conchords)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Some pretty good choices there. I think we were born at the right time for music.

Anonymous said...

You gotta be kidding about St. Anger... You know I'm down with Metallica but I hated that album with a fucking passion... Listened to it once and shelved it. But I got high hopes for Death Magnetic. The title alone makes it rock harder.
Jamie

Mike-El said...

Jamer, I was going to totally eviscerate you with some acidic one-line pwnage...but I've actually got a take on this subject. Watch this space in the next day or so...