Now this is how it started: THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL RESULTS!!

scary monsters was my #1

Tunnel of Love photo seems to be showing again. Thanks again for doing this, Tuomas. I'm sorry I missed the ballot

in re: pretty hate machine, i first heard it i guess around when it came out, when my girlfriend's roommate pulled out a cassette of it and said, "this guy my mom used to babysit has an album out." we listened to it and we all thought it was overwrought and kind of hilariously abrasive, but we liked "head like a hole." we were all sort of surprised when he became a Big Star.

I got "Pretty Hate Machine" on cassette about a year after it came out. One week later, the tape disappeared and I have never found found out what happened to it. I haven't heard the album since (barring the singles, obv.). I wonder if my Mom threw it out because she thought it was evil or something (this was not typical behavior of my mother, but who knows).

btw Tuomas you shouldn't feel the need to hunt down unambiguously positive comments! just ones that look intersting.

When Pretty Hate Machine came out, my friends and I thought it was fairly tepid in the company of Skinny Puppy, Front 242, and Nitzer Ebb, but I thought the sampling was worthwhile: Reznor supposedly spent a full month listening to Ocora-type recordings to get the tribal chants and background percussion that litter it (as in the "Head like a Hole" intro). With the Adrian Sherwood involvement, Reznor was looking like an American Mark Stewart, and that was promising.

There was universal agreement (among my friends, fellow college DJs who cared about EBM), however, that we hated the teen self-pity angle of the lyrics. Pre-NIN industrial lyrics weren't poetry, but they at least were trying to describe a distopian version of our world some of us felt was immanent. I still like his instrumental work, and Nothing has supported or rereleased artists I adore (Autechre, Coil).

80. Various - The Indestructible Beat of Soweto [1985] (93 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b351/MrClivver/vinyl%20pics/SH105813m.jpg

one of my favorite records evah, but i was once mocked in an IM chat for it, so i don't talk about it in public anymore

― jess (dubplatestyle), 15. kesäkuuta 2003 18:09

That's one of those records that was feted as a classic so often for so long and played so often in various social settings, record stores, etc., that I got a little sick of it and haven't listened to it in years. I'm not even sure I still own a copy. If I want to hear something from that time/place, that's not where I would go anyway (search Boyoyo Boys, Malathini, or Malombo). Nonetheless, I remember it being a lot of fun way back when. I never bothered with the additional volumes; anyone else?

― Lee G (Lee G), 16. kesäkuuta 2003 22:10

the cassette that turned P.S. on is Gumboots: Sax Jive Hits no. 2. I.B. is still no. 1 for me because having listened to a lot of the stuff myself I've never heard anything better, which is not to say "as good"--I play Kings & Queens of Township Jive: Modern Roots of the Indestructible Beat of Soweto just as much. it's all early '70s stuff, faster and more R&B than the first Indestructible Beat, and way more giddy. as Jess sez, the sweet/sourness of TIBOS makes it a bit richer.

― M Matos (M Matos), 16. kesäkuuta 2003 22:28

Nothing I voted for has appeared yet! Not sure whether this means my tastes are so canonical that all my votes will be in the upper half, or so weird that they're mostly out of the running.

Certainly would have voted for Speaking in Tongues in an ideal world but I rate both live records higher (maybe higher than any of their studio albums) and they squeezed it out.

"I Just Can't Stop It" is so perfect.

Nothing I voted for has appeared yet!

Same here, but we're only a fifth of the way in

A friend of Finnish descent with a particularly fine booty had other friends calling it "The Pride of Finland." While I'm sure it's still fine, it's had a good 12 year run, and she would not mind passing on the title to someone else. I nominate Tuomas to be the new Pride of Finland!

If 2 Foetus albums can make the cut, I suspect there's hope for the rest of my selections: the proto-goth/4AD love is strong in these parts.

79. The The - Soul Mining [1983] (93 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/sm1.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/sm2.jpg

Let me just start by saying this album held monolithic status upon it's release back in 1983. It's likely I learned about it from a cable TV program in my hometown of Calgary, Alberta called FM Moving Pictures, which featured a local rock critic and the manager of a record store talking about music, sometimes playing the odd video, more often than not playing a song while a camera zeroed in on the record cover that featured the song that was playing.

Anyhow, I find it odd that from the age of 11 to 13, that this album resonated so strongly with me. During this period, I was also heavily into The Cure and The Smiths, while still dabbling in the top 40, wisely steering clear of the likes of Mister Mister and Opus ("Live Is Life" still makes me want to punch puppies.)

Matt Johnson's self analytical lyrics aside, I think there's incredibly brilliant pop moments throughout Soul Mining. From "This Is The Day" to "Uncertain Smile" (oh that glorious sun streaming through the window in May piano solo courtesy of Jools Holland). And it's likely that my Peter Gabriel fetishism was piqued by Zeke Manyika's African polyrhythms on "Giant".

But 23 years later, I can still put this album on, and I'm floored by the musical invention, the sense of melody, and Johnson's very unique lyrical approach.

What says you?

― Brooker Buckingham (Brooker B), 12. tammikuuta 2006 7:00

astonishingly the original vinyl lp ended at GIANT and not PERFECT the way every cd issue since does.

this may have been the first album i ever heard that showed me there was a world outside of what you heard on daytime radio 1 or read about in SMASH HITS. i was going out with my first ever girlfriend and she had this brother. he had SURFER ROSA. i preferred this.
still do.

matt j went all worthy and shouty on us in later years and
despite me liking them a lot at the time, the subsequent albums don't match up to either their critical appraisal or their status among
the gloomy would-be hip indie types circa 85-89.

i notice GIANT has crept up in balearic circles as a reference point, sort of like a uk BORN UNDER PUNCHES.

why is there no "..seven..." in the countdown at the start?

― piscesboy, 12. tammikuuta 2006 18:17

i am so delighted to see such fond recollections of SM. i worked thruout the peiod of SM and Infected for some bizarre (the company which managed matt at the time). i particularly remember with fondness arranging a kids tv interview which matt and stevo insisted shouls take place at the war room in whitehall; much to everyone's consternation. there was a real sense this album kicked against the prevailing wisdom and i guess this holds true today. i saw matt v recently and he is still writing (unfortunately) without a deal, but he appreciates the love which people have for this period of his work. the only source of bitterness being the availablitiy of the material which is under licence to sony. stevo (the honcho of some bizarre) and matt are real heroes of independent music!!

― alan kaier, 13. tammikuuta 2006 4:07

I was dismissive of Pretty Hate Machine at the time because I felt it ripped off The The. NIN did put on some good live shows, but I still prefer The The.

in grad school a couple years ago, a prof referenced The The and I think he was hoping to seem cool and edgy and whatnot, but all the students just stared back at him with glazed looks, most of them seemingly thinking "what are you going on about, old man?"

^ all our futures

Is the woman on the Soul Mining cover supposed to be Nina Simone?

http://houseofmirthandmovies.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/nina-simone.jpg

there goes my second album (of 30) selected (the first one was meat puppets ii). soul mining should have charted higher. what a glorious album. i am very curious about how many of my choices will make the top 100. 10, 15, 20? i suppose more like 20 as i more or less picked canonical stuff.

thats three albums on which Jim Thirlwell has featured (Frank Want = Jim)
at this rate he will be the ILM 80s icon.

I discovered 'Soul Mining' recently. It's amazing. 'This Is The Day' especially. Not as good as 'Infected' (which wasn't nominated! WTF!) or the recent 'NakedSelf' but probably on a par with 'Dusk'.

I've already posted today about how JGT's cover of ShrunkenMan is epic. He OUGHT to be some sort of icon; he's a genius.

"soul mining" is by far the best album of the the. "uncertain smile" alone is worth more than all other the the albums combined except "blue burning soul" (was that nominated?) but that was originally a matt johnson solo album anyway.

"uncertain smile" is great but i think jools holland wibbles on for just a tiny bit too long

and come on, 'infected'. oh man.

I suppose a few more are coming today, but here's the story so far:

100. Robyn Hitchcock: I Often Dream of Trains [1984] (75 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Hole [1984] (76 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Spacemen 3 - The Perfect Prescription [1987] (76 points, 5 votes
97. Big Black - Atomizer [1986] (77 points, 8 votes)
96. Associates - Sulk [1982] (79 points, 6 votes)
95. Jane's Addiction - Nothing's Shocking [1988] (79 points, 7 votes)
94. Def Leppard - Pyromania [1983] (80 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
93. Thomas Dolby - The Golden Age of Wireless [1982] (80 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
92. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - Dazzle Ships [1983] (80 points, 9 votes)
91. Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell [1986] (80 points, 10 votes)
90. Meat Puppets - Meat Puppets II [1984] (81 points, 9 votes)
89. Prince and the Revolution - Parade [1986] (83 points, 10 votes)
88. Bruce Springsteen - Tunnel of Love [1987] (86 points, 7 votes)
87. Pet Shop Boys - Actually [1987] (86 points, 8 votes)
86. Pet Shop Boys - Please [1986] (87 points, 8 votes)
84. (tie) Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine [1989] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
84. (tie) Talking Heads - Speaking in Tongues [1983] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
83. David Bowie - Scary Monsters [1980] (89 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
82. Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Nail [1985] (91 points, 5 votes, 1 first place vote)
81. The Beat (aka The English Beat) - I Just Can't Stop It [1980] (91 points, 13 votes)
80. Various - The Indestructible Beat of Soweto [1985] (93 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
79. The The - Soul Mining [1983] (93 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)

and here's a spotify playlist with all the ones on there on it

http://open.spotify.com/user/thomp1985/playlist/7vewFkAlw3bKDbMNziktOF

sadly, no foetus

78. The Pogues - Rum, Sodomy & the Lash [1985] (93 points, 16 votes)

http://www.ifsociety.com/img_upload/records/1661r.jpg

xp I've got a soft spot for the singles ("Pair of Brown Eyes" and "Sally MacLeanne" at the time, right?), but yeah, I'm going for the fast crazy drunken sick-bed opener too. Closest thing on here to Red Roses For Me, which I actually like even more. (This is still a great album, though. 'Twas downhill from here, though the next one was pretty good, too.)

― xhuxk, 26. tammikuuta 2009 22:01

cool, i was going to start a pogues thread because i've been listening to Rum Sodomy & The Lash non-stop all week. classic for its creation of water-tight, perfect aesthetic world, complete on its own terms - ie, for 43 minutes you live in the Pogues version of reality and there isn't a chink of light, no gaps in their vision.

POO is impossible but i'll say 'A Pair Of Brown Eyes' because my girlfriend's in the video! (and it's a classic video too)

― pete b. (pete b.), 13. kesäkuuta 2003 14:59

I adore Red Roses for Me and Rum, Sodomy & the Lash in their entirety and bits and pieces after that, notably "Gridlock" and "Young Ned of the Hill" (both off Peace & Love). Completely lost interest after that. "Church of the Holy Spook" on Shane first solo album is a great, rolicking single, though.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), 14. kesäkuuta 2003 13:08

Re: The Indestructible Beat of Soweto, there's no question that is basks in the reflected glow of Graceland. I think its unfortunate that when Island Records chose a an African musician to promote after Bob Marley's death, they chose King 'Sunny' Ade, who is nice but akin to ambient music, with similar commercial prospects. Had a similar promotional push been made for Thomas Mapfumo, the story of 80s African pop music would be one of Zimbabwe rather than South Africa. Corruption and Nadangariro are fantastic albums that will never see the light of day on one of these lists, and I listen to them far more often than The Indestructable Beat of Soweto.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1EVrKDkyk4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-45xNr-udU

There's a different thread for Youtubes so this one don't get too heavy:

THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL CLIPS!!

I'm a bit surprised to see the Pet Shop Boys placing so low. I thought they were big ILM faves. Same goes for Bowie too. It makes me curious to see what's coming in higher.

well personally i used all my socks to vote for tin machine

77. Meat Puppets - Up on the Sun [1985] (94 points, 8 votes)

http://rmangum2001.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/meatpuppets_-_uponthesun.jpg

HEY PETE THIS ALBUM IS SO MUCH BETTER THAN MEAT PUPPETS II

― Mr. Que, 14. toukokuuta 2009 0:14

There's a lot to recommend on this album. It was the first Meat Puppets I heard. Bought it randomly out of the SST catalog insert from a Black Flag cassette.

I'd go with Up On the Sun (the title track, obvs). It was always my favorite, but I saw them play it live twice during their too-brief period of stadiums and basketball arenas in the mid-90s and it was just so huge sounding.

― kingkongvsgodzilla, 14. toukokuuta 2009 15:47

I remember buying "Up On the Sun" years ago - I had no idea what it sounded like or what the Meat Puppets sounded like, it was just cheap and I had money to burn. Suffice to say, that it's one of my favourite albums - and, this is fairly important - every person I ever played it to eventually went out and bought a copy too! Alas, I've never really heard anything by the Meat Puppets that is anywhere near as good - II has some good things on it but it's not in the same league.

― Dadaismus, 24. maaliskuuta 2003 17:58

maaliskuuta, toukokuuta, kesäkuuta

haha so cool so see that higher than II!

January tammikuu
February helmikuu
March maaliskuu
April huhtikuu
May toukokuu
June kesäkuu
July heinäkuu
August elokuu
September syyskuu
October lokakuu
November marraskuu
December joulukuu

I wish people would comment on the albums instead of month names.

That was in my top ten. Couldn't really understand where it was coming from when I first heard it. It didn't sound like a lot anything else SST, and tbh I still haven't heard all that much like it since. Three fried minds getting gloriously baked in the sun.

76. U2 - The Joshua Tree [1987] (95 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://snuffleupagush.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/the-joshua-tree1.jpg

The first half of that album is extremely classic. The second half of the album is a turgid, uninvolving mess.

― Dan Perry, 25. kesäkuuta 2002 3:00

To those who dis the B-side of Joshua Tree, just remember that Eno produced it. Remember Bowie's 'Berlin Trilogy' how the A-sides were all semi-accessible singles and the B-sides were arcane ambient mood music. Joshua Tree is the same way. Straightforward Anthems of the A-side; moody, experimental stuff on the B-side. (Kind of reminds me of a prog-rock Midnight Oil, on qualuudes, especially "Red Hill Mining Town" and "One Tree Hill")
Wow, I didn't anticipate anyone would complain about "Trip Through Your Wires"; People usually get worked up about "Bullet the Blue Sky."

― Lord Custos III, 25. kesäkuuta 2002 3:00

Strange how "Red Hill Mining Town" was one of my absolute favourite song when I was 10 years old. I havent heard it in ages, like the rest of the record. It's classic, without a doubt, although the fact that I now despise U2 and have despised them for a decade now kinda prevents me from really saying anything nicer about the record or the band. That's a strange phenomenon. The Rolling Stones, for instance, released far many more bad records than U2, and made real fucking bad moves etc., but this does not change my undying love for them. On the other hand, my dislike of U2 now has a strange retroactive effect. Does this happen to you sometimes?

― Simon, 25. kesäkuuta 2002 3:00

Organic. Layered. Strained. Quiet. Windy. Dusty. Gone. Heroic. Light. Dark. Classic.

― the pinefox, 15. lokakuuta 2002 23:04

Hate me now, ILM! That right there was my #1 vote.

well at least it's outside the top 75.

the only u2 album i would've even considered -- boy -- wasn't even nominated.

It was somewhere in my top 10 too Johnny. Partly for its cultural impact - it's rare that a record makes a band the biggest thing in the world, and I want to celebrate the ones that do - and partly because that Pogues quote about the album creating its own world applies equally to this, and this world is far stranger.

75. Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual [1983] (95 points, 9 votes)

http://robsrecordscdsdvds.com/Cyndi%20Lauper%20Shes%20So%20Unusual.jpg

the big critical thing at the time was, 'madonna will go nowhere because she can't sing, cyndi lauper will have the long term career' because they were very much seen as doppelgangers when they appeared, with madonna being the 'fake' cyndi. it was in Time magazine. i prefer 'she's so unusual' and 'time after time' to anything madonna's done, but at the same time, in a certain sense, i think madonna had better taste. but i HATE taste, i absolutely despise it, and i love the terrible orchestration and use of synthesizers on side two of 'she's so unusual' so that you have to listen THROUGH the songs, you have to put in an effort, to really cry over 'witness' and so on. some of madonna's early stuff is a bit like that, but basically it's so bland you can become attached to it with an act of will, but not a very difficult one. and as for madonna's later stuff, like kylie's new stuff, it's so french, in such good taste. and of course you like it.

― maryann, 25. heinäkuuta 2002 3:00

I've only heard She's So Unusual, but based on that I'd say classic all the way. If only she'd been Madonna instead of Madonna.
-- Justyn Dillingham

EXACTLY what I was gonna say! Ya just KNOW that in an alternate universe, it's not Madonna but Cyndi who...etc.

Well, the videos are all excruciating, but at least Cyndi had Lou Albano in hers.

-- Ned Raggett

Sorry Ned, couldn't disagree more. I hated "Girls..." and Cyndi herself when I first heard her, mostly because she didn't sound like Black Sabbath. But the video for "Time After Time" was quite moving, and won me over. Utterly Charming & Disarming: The bit right at the start when she awakens her boyfriend by allowing a ceramic dog (modeled after RCA Victor's "Nipper", I think) to "lick" his cheek. And later, in the "She Bop" video, she endeared herself to me all over again with her fairly clumsy (and so what!) top-hat-and-cane soft shoe number. And there was even a little animated bit accompanying the synth-break! I was always fairly indifferent to video - most of 'em were forgettable, which means that I've forgotten them! Cyndi Lauper's videos I never forgot.

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), 12. toukokuuta 2005 12:20

i'll fuck with "time after time" til the end of days

― prostitutes all over the place (k3vin k.), 5. huhtikuuta 2009 8:55

At the wedding reception, Madonna can make your gay friends dance, but Lauper can make your 30-something aunts get on the dancefloor. I vote Madonna.

That's one of my favorite album covers ever, btw.

30-something aunts, eh?
xp

Anybody else still waiting for something they voted for to show up?

Cover shot here?

"Also in 1981, Mark played with Ian Lloyd, (Louie, Louie) highlighted by the Halloween Rock Jam two shows at the Roberto Clemente Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico 10/31/81. (Blue Angel featuring Cyndi Lauper, was the opening act for those shows.)"

As for U2, we all lost by not getting the Martin Hannett produced album that would have made the Comsats and Chameleons hide in their bedrooms. Our post-1987 feelings are inextricably tied to how we feel about Bono's public persona - Eno and the band are always quietly competent, but "all bad poetry is earnest".

xp: kornrulez, I'm still waiting. Lots of stuff I'm like "how did I not vote for this?" until I look at what I actually voted for. Cyndi Lauper a good example. Non-vote because: as much as I love the singles, I never owned or listened to the album; I excluded all such records as a means of getting my list down to 30.

I've only had one show up - The Beat - and if we're up to the point of albums getting around nine votes I don't hold much hope of seeing too many of my other choices, the obvious big hitters aside.