When Push Comes to Shove: My Favorite Albums (2001 edition)
- 1.U2/Achtung Baby
- 2.The Byrds/Younger Than Yesterday
- 3.Lucinda Williams/Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
- 4.The Rolling Stones/Sticky Fingers
- 5.Bob Dylan/Highway 61 Revisited
- 6.Rod Stewart/Every Picture Tells a Story
- 7.The Byrds/The Notorious Byrd Brothers
- 8.Bob Dylan/Bringing It All Back Home
- 9.The Clash/London Calling
- 10.Adam Again/Dig
- 11.The Rolling Stones/Exile on Main Street
- 12.Presage/Outer Perimeter
- 13.New York Dolls/Too Much Too Soon
- 14.Mike Knott/Rocket and a Bomb
- 15.Pavement/Slanted and Enchanted
This list was even more painful then the corresponding film one! Fifteen is just not a large enough number for my favorite lists, so let me add a few that are "bubbling under": Nirvana/Nevermind and Unplugged, U2/War, David Bowie/Low and Ziggy Stardust, The Doors/The Doors, Beck/Odelay, Frank Zappa/Freak Out!, Shelby Lynne/I Am Shelby Lynne, and Johnny Thunders/So Alone. Whew, that felt a little better...
I came across a couple of surprises in making this list. The biggest one was that, although I have long felt Bringing It All Back Home to be Dylan's best/my favorite (synonomous, right? ;), when I sat down to think things out, Highway 61 Revisted had taken a slight edge in my affections. So this is an epistomological list, huh: Writing as a way of knowing myself (how philosophe)...
Wow, two of these in one day. I'm impressed.
Another interesting list. I still haven't gotten into Presage's music yet, but this may be as much my fault as their's, as I haven't exactly bought the disc and spun it several times in a row yet.
You know I'm not quite the New York Dolls fan as you are, but I'm certainly in the minority on this one.
Great list. Acthung Baby is a very admirable album to top such a list. I especially can listen to your top 11 repeatedly with joy, and the Mike Knott and Pavement discs are also quite yummy. Do you dig Pavement's Crooked Rain Crooked Rain? I'm enchanted, though I certainly still favor Slanted & Enchanted...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
Re-reading your list, I am a bit surprised to see a lack of Elvis Presley in your top picks. For the purposes of this list, do you consider The Sun Sessions to be an album? Were his From Elvis In Memphis or The Million Dollar Quartet be contenders here?
Only surprised and curious...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
Thanks for the comments, les. I guess I did hold to an even stricter definition of album than I usually do; otherwise The Sun Sessions "coulda been a contender." The Million Dollar Quartet I can't count because it wasn't even recorded to be released; great, but I didn't feel I could include it. Now, From Elvis in Memphis is a great album, but I don't play it nearly as much as I do the other inclusions here. Sigh. This could be a list where the top fifty were all tied for number one...
Johnny Waco
I love Achtung Baby. That is by far the best U2 album. When it comes to The Rolling Stones I guess I favor Let It Bleed. Also, there is the abscence of The Beatles? Do they grab you or not?
I certainly respect the Beatles and fully acknowledge them as one of the best and most influential groups in rock history, yet, you guessed it: they've just never grabbed me. Growing up listening to "oldies" I prefered the grittier sounds of the Stones and the soul of Motown and Stax/Volt. As I've gotten older, I've moved closer to liking sounds close to the Beatles, as The Byrds are definitely one of my favorites, and groups like Big Star, Badfinger, and The Soft Boys get a lot of play on my stereo. All this leads me to think that one day I will come to like them more, but at this time I'm not too much into them...
Johnny Waco