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

54. Bruce Springsteen - Born in the U.S.A. [1984] (118 points, 14 votes)

http://mystilllife.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/bruce-springsteen-born-in-the-u-s-a-1984-ape.jpg

Title track is one riff played over and over (when it devolves into gasps and yells it might as well be Suicide) paired with nightmarish lyrics about unemployment and vietnam. That Reagan tried to use it as his campaign theme song makes it even more amazing. I like a lot of these tracks but that song totally blows me away.

― da croupier, 6. joulukuuta 2007 17:27

This album is like the first five songs of Check Your Head that my college roommate played over-and-over. I've heard all the hits, even the sub-top 20 songs like "I'm Going Down" and "Cover Me", so many times on the radio that I just can't listen to them anymore.

Hopefully by the year 2014, I'll be able to sit down and listen to this album again without thinking I've got Magic 105's all-Bruuuuuuuuce Weekend going on in my ears.

And I've always hated "Born in the USA", cool lyrics notwithstanding.

― Pleasant Plains, 6. joulukuuta 2007 18:03

I heard "Born in the U.S.A." in the grocery store the other night, started listening to the lyrics, and, man, what a bring-down. I was thinking about the beat-too-much narrator and his all-gone buddy the rest of the evening. It's hard to believe such a bleak song was a hit. And it works in spite of (because of?) skeletal melody and song form. So: the Boss.

― Brad C., 20. lokakuuta 2008 22:47

I like his synth-pop. "Born In The U.S.A.," "I'm On Fire," "Dancing In The Dark," "Brilliant Disguise," "Streets Of Philadelphia" stuff like that. He tends to lay off the anus-clenched fifteen-syllables-in-room-for-ten horrid "rock poetry" on those numbers. That said, the lyrics on "The Rising" are categorically his worst ever. His fame peaked with Born In The U.S.A because that's his best album.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), 20. marraskuuta 2002

anus-clenched?

I like thinking of 'I'm On Fire' as synth pop. If you mentally add in a load of echoey effects, it even actually sounds a bit like Suicide.

So glad that Dino Jr album made it, that was my #31 choice...

I'm adding Arvo Part and Mekons to my 'to hear' list.

Springsteen fans have a complicated relationship with this record. It gets overlooked because of its mass appeal and popularity. And the production is certainly a bit dated. But on the other hand, the songs are world class. When something as catchy as I'm Going Down gets buried in the middle of side 2, you know you've got the hot hand.

In regards to The Mekons, look for Mekons Rock n Roll, too. Odds are that one will show up here in about ten albums or so.

53. Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska [1982] (120 points, 14 votes)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/43/Nebraska1982.JPG/600px-Nebraska1982.JPG

"Atlantic City"

So there's this guy, and he's spent all his money on God knows what. Maybe just groceries and repairing his car, although he probably goes out and raises hell now and then. Problem is, now that his money's all gone he doesn't know how to impress his lady anymore. He sort of needs to, because she doesn't really love him anymore, and he's basically forgotten how. So this opportunity comes up to kill two birds with one stone, he can take her on vacation to a crumby, cut-rate, shit-ass resort town with a beach covered in used condoms, but it's a day out, right? And she might remember why she loved him, although that probably won't happen, and even so, he's got other things on his mind. Like, the only reason he got to go on this trip in the first place is because he figures if he hangs around with some criminals, problem solved. Now, these criminals don't fuck around. They kill people and blow their houses up, all that good stuff. He knows what they're into, although you get this feeling that he'll crap out when it gets down to the shit. So what he's doing is putting himself into a potentially lethal situation and sort of strongly hinting that the bitch doesn't give him shit about it because she's getting something out of it too, and deep down, he wants something out of it he knows he probably won't get, and in the end he'll probably be dead and the bitch probably doesn't give a shit.

But does he LOVE her?

I dunno, but I LOVE this fucking song. This album just gets better and better the more I listen to it.

― dave q, 3. joulukuuta 2001 3:00

this is the springsteen album for people who don't like springsteen!

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), 29. joulukuuta 2005

It's pretty obviously of a diferent genre than most Springsteen records, that genre being oh-so-dark authentic Folkie stuff. This being a genre which spawned the likes of Gillian Welch, I want no part of it, even though Nebraska's ok. I wonder what these folks you talk of think of the similar, but superior The Ghost Of Tom Joad, though...

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), 18. joulukuuta 2002 3:42

interesting question. i quite enjoy nebraska, too, and i don't have much love for the rest of his production (with the odd exception, of course).
just as johnny cash's first rick rubin record, nebraska is cut down to the basic elements of vocal and guitar. no saxophones, cheesy keyboards or little steven. that sort of gives a chance to listeners who are repelled by springsteen's usually more dramatic 'knives-flashing-in-the-torchlight-kills-high-school-prom-king-turned-alcoholic-in-front-of-the-ol'-diner-in-the-smalltown'-kind of aesthetic.
i basically consider nebraska a folk record, not a usual bruce springsteen rock record, and that's why i like it, i guess.

― Jay K (Jay K), 18. joulukuuta 2002 12:00

Gavin in Leeds, I reckon that 'Fear And Whiskey' is one of the best records to ever come out of Leeds.

I like thinking of 'I'm On Fire' as synth pop

Chromatics do a cover which is pretty much this

Gavin in Leeds, I reckon that 'Fear And Whiskey' is one of the best records to ever come out of Leeds.

Cool! I only know 'Where Are You', I'm going to search F&W out.

Speaking of the references above, Nebraska includes the song "State Trooper", which was directly inspired by Suicide. To the clips thread.

52. Brian Eno / David Byrne - My Life in the Bush of Ghosts [1981] (120 points, 17 votes)

http://www.zoilus.com/documents/bushofghosts.jpg

Yesyesyes, it's still a great album. I keep hearing from people that it sounds really dated, but I don't get that. So, a classic; both very good and veeery influential, and one of those very few albums with Bill Laswell on it that doesn't suck. Re: samples from that album, lots of 'em. Can't be arsed to check exactly which, but one Stereo MCs single was based on a groove from it, Goldie sampled "Mountain of Needles" (I think) etc.

― Janne Vanhanen, 8. kesäkuuta 2001 3:00

So what do we think? Obv., the cultural imperialism arguments that greeted it at the time have gotten significantly more, uh, complicated in the intervening years. We can leave that to Simon Frith and Nelson George to hash out. Plus, few records have foretold as much utter garbage as this one (Talvin Singh, I'm talkin' to you!).

BUT...purely on a musical level, while I find the production kind of chattery, it's not without some real charms — largely those in the electronic vein. And those rhythm guitars, even. I also kind of enjoy how the first side is the neo-rap side, with all the radio hosts/evangelists/etc., and the second is the more song-oriented side, with the mountain singers and what not — that one also has some remarkable electro-textures.

And though the techniques and so forth are definitely similar to those of Czukay's Movies, it's seems to me that the results were pretty far apart — Holger was really going for something else, I think. Oh, and my girlfriend really dug "Regiment" this morning.

Anybody got Tom's Papercuts piece on it?

― Naive Teen Idol (Naive Teen Idol), 10. elokuuta 2004 20:36

I second the anemic production values, but that's a hallmark of all of Eno's production work. Let's face it, his recordings SUCK sonically: thin, effete, trebly, no power or depth to them. I'm always amazed that he's never really called on this.

"Bush of Ghosts" always struck me as the worst sort of colonialist appropriation: two privileged Westerners gleefully tearing music of the "other" from its social context and just diddling with it (because they're privileged; because they can), reducing the cinders to nothing more than funny sounds and trippy noises. Now they may claim this to be a stroke of postmodern genius, but, truly, what meaning is there in any of the tracks? What do they ultimately communicate? If anything, each piece on the record only trivializes the source material, as in "see how impenetrably exotic and weird this stuff is?! – Funny third world chanting! Bizarro radio preachers! The umba-mumba religious songs of the savages!"

And if you think this doesn’t entail serious implications, just why do you think "Qu'ran" was hastily withdrawn from the LP? Some people were definitely bothered by (and vehemently objected to) the duo's appalling disregard for the meaning/depth of their sources. I remember Eno's response to this was along the lines of: 1) he didn't know that what he had done with this material would possibly be a source of major contention to someone, and, well, 2) isn’t that a telling statement? The great western boffin and dilettante didn’t do his homework (who cares what the “other’ thinks; “you mean their weird chanting actually means something to them?”), demonstrating that the material never ,meant anything more to him than an exotic texture of weird sounds to be used and altered. So Eno grumbled and caved into public pressure (or simply was forced to go along with what the record company had already decided to do). The rub is this: did he ever once think about the fact that perhaps the performers he hijacked would grumble about being on his record. Did he ask them? Was it ever in his mind that these people might possibly have opinions, or were even capable of them? And, if so, would they even count? Apparently not.

Byrne and Eno – whatever their intentions may have been – and I don’t believe they are/were consciously imperialist or trying to offend anyone, but, hey!, it's results that count, and ignorance is no excuse – can only but reduce their sources. "Bush of Ghosts" comes off as a tedious (and, let's face it – unintentionally offensive) exercise in how hip Byrne and Eno think they are – nothing more, nothing less. It’s as shallow as – and, really, not too different philosophically and aesthetically from 1950s “exotica” records by Les Baxter or Martin Denny (although those two composers made better records than Byrne and Eno, who replace the winsome naiveté of Baxter and Denny with a grating, cynical hipper-than-thou schtick). The individual tracks on the LP state nothing beyond the "exotic" textures weaved by two self-appointed hipsters: far out sounds from far out alien cultures set to (then) trendy funky beats and blasts of noise.

Holger Czukay, I think, achieved quite the opposite. If Byrne and Eno rendered everything they touched into pure nothingness (with disturbing imperialist implications), Czukay seemed first and foremost obsessed with depth, content, context, and – above all – great respect for his source material: 180 degrees away from Byrne and Eno's hipster sonic wallpaper jive. "Movies" revels in difference and the creation of new meanings: it’s a veritable wonderland of multiplicity and possibilities, pointing out oppositions, juxtapositions, tensions, and - yes – harmony. “Persian Love”, the piece from “Movies”that (superficially) most resembles anything from “Bush of Ghosts” achieves a hauntingly beautiful harmony between the diametrically opposite Iranian singing and the sugarplum Teutonic fairytale Muzik Czukay merged it with. What’s important here, I think, is this: the “western” music in this piece is not privileged, nor is the Persian singing “reduced” or trivialized. Ergo, many questions come to the fore as it plays: difference, boundaries – “boundary” in the utmost Deleuzian sense: the AND that is always between the two, the only place at which true multiplicity is found. Unfortunately, you will find none of this happening on any of the “Bush of Ghosts” pieces, which seem (consciously or not) designed to communicate absolutely nothing. All possibility is squashed, all context and content is bled,; everything is subordinate to Byrne and Eno’s shallow textures and damn the meaning (and consequence).

I recall a contemporary review of “My Life in the Bush of Ghosts” that took the duo to task over this issue (was it in Trouser Press perhaps?), expressing mild outrage at their nerve and irresponsibility; asking the pertinent question of how Byrne and Eno might feel about the prospect of any of the performers they appropriated (and, incidentally, didn't pay) taking Eno and Talking Heads records and diddling about with those (and not pay them either). More to the point, Byrne and Eno sat happily atop the cultural hierarchy and thus felt entitled (and were enabled) to appropriate. Can’t say the same for those who were appropriated into “My Life in the Bush of Ghosts”. Not a two way street, is it?

― CJM, 11. elokuuta 2004 1:24

This album is completely and totally amazing. I never really thought I'd like it for some reason, just heard scraps of it here and there. What a revelation!

― Bimble, 30. kesäkuuta 2007 23:08

Nebraska way too low. Should've been top five.

Feels like we're way deep in some of the really big records already. Guess there's not going to be too many weird surprises to come from now on?

damn, guess that's it for springsteen

Yeah, I can't see The River showing higher than Nebraska (though it is great too.)

51. Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man [1988] (121 points, 11 votes)

http://i41.tinypic.com/iqbojm.jpg

Songs of Love and Hate is one of the most perfect albums I've ever heard. His later synth stuff easily matches the early folk mumblings, esp. 'I'm your man'. Baffled by the hate for him. I tried one of his books though, it was unreadable.

― Affectian (Affectian), 29. toukokuuta 2003 18:08

Really, BBT? Had you heard the record before? "Tower of Song" and "I'm Your Man" are the best songs, I think. "Tower of Song" is really beautiful. "First We Take Manhattan" is pretty great as a kind of gesture of overblown grandeur. And you gotta admit it's pretty funny. Maybe you just don't like the synth textures?

― Broheems (diamond), 9. tammikuuta 2004 23:53

I've been wanting to do an "In Praise Of" type thread about I'm Your Man but it seems like it would be tough to do without getting deep into the lyrics, which would be a major undertaking in itself. But just in terms of the sound, it's sort of an unlikely combination that somehow succeeded much better than it should have. I think the spare acoustic backing of Cohen's early stuff tended to reinforce his weaknesses and made him sound more mopy, humorless, and po-faced than he really is. I'm not sure who is responsible for the arrangements on I'm Your Man but they are really quite breathtaking in their understated subtlety and fullness. The 80s-funky drum machine beats and the lovely syrupy female backup singers are a perfect foil to Cohen's somewhat flat, subterranean baritone - he sounds more keyed into the rhythm than on any other album of his that I've heard and he sounds like he's having more fun. He seems the most self-aware of how his voice comes across and he's able to laugh at himself. Considering the minimal nature of the arrangements, it's also amazing how much stylistic ground they cover: from the faux-Pet Shop Boys disco of "First We Take Manhattan" to the loping faux-country of "I Can't Forget" to the odd choice of classical guitar to accompany "Everybody Knows" to the faux-waltz of "Take This Waltz" - it all works much better than you'd expect it to. On later albums I've heard such as Ten New Songs which have similar instrumentation, somehow the spark is missing. They aren't as funky and fun. Even if it was only a one-album peak, what a peak it is.

― o. nate (onate), 9. kesäkuuta 2005 20:19

Another from my top five.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_2fuk3iGxQxM/SmbWdQ4cvYI/AAAAAAAAClg/ByLrqamiuDg/s400/FF8.jpg

Thanks Tuomas!

I saw him live about a month ago and the "I'm Your Man" songs worked perfectly on stage--better than the 60s stuff for which he no longer quite has the voice.

I meant Leonard not Tuomas.

Good work!

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)
78. The Pogues - Rum, Sodomy & the Lash [1985] (93 points, 16 votes)
77. Meat Puppets - Up on the Sun [1985] (94 points, 8 votes)
76. U2 - The Joshua Tree [1987] (95 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
75. Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual [1983] (95 points, 9 votes)
74. Galaxie 500 - On Fire [1989] (96 points, 10 votes)
73. X - Wild Gift [1981] (97 points, 9 votes)
72. The Chills - Kaleidoscope World [1986] (98 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
71. Roxy Music - Avalon [1982] (99 points, 10 votes)
70. Laurie Anderson - Big Science [1982] (99 points, 11 votes)
69. Scritti Politti - Cupid & Psyche 85 [1985] (100 points, 7 votes)
68. New Order - Power, Corruption & Lies [1983] (100 points, 16 votes)
67. Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes [1983] (101 points, 12 votes)
66. Prefab Sprout - Steve McQueen [1985] (104 points, 10 votes, 1 first place vote)
65. Donald Fagen - The Nightfly [1982] (105 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
63. (tie) Tom Waits - Rain Dogs [1985] (106 points, 12 votes)
63. (tie) Cocteau Twins - Treasure [1984] (106 points, 12 votes)
62. Grace Jones - Nightclubbing [1981] (106 points, 12 votes, 1 first place vote)
61. Arthur Russell - World of Echo [1986] (108 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)
60. Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full [1987] (111 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
59. Mekons - Fear and Whiskey [1985] (111 points, 8 votes, 2 first place votes)
58. The Cure - Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me [1987] (112 points, 7 votes, 2 first place votes)
57. Arvo Pärt - Tabula Rasa [1984] (112 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)
56. R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant [1986] (112 points, 12 votes)
55. Dinosaur Jr. - You're Living All Over Me [1987] (115 points, 13 votes)
54. Bruce Springsteen - Born in the U.S.A. [1984] (118 points, 14 votes)
53. Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska [1982] (120 points, 14 votes)
52. Brian Eno / David Byrne - My Life in the Bush of Ghosts [1981] (120 points, 17 votes)
51. Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man [1988] (121 points, 11 votes)

http://earbuds.popdose.com/jon/Sharon%20Robinson%202.jpg

Sharon Robinson has been Leonard Cohen's songwriting collaborator since the "I'm Your Man" time and probably has a lot to do with the transformation of his sound.

Awesome! Arvo Part made it! Was one of my nominees and one of my top picks as well. Was losing hope on seeing it anywhere on this list. Crossing my fingers for The Cramps, King Sunny Ade, Manuel Gottsching and Glenn Branca showing up next.

Chromatics do a cover which is pretty much this

so do Telefon Tel Aviv

I started lurking here years ago in part because of past polls, which (seemed to) place a hazy focus on strands of music emerging out of the common hinterlands of (mostly european) pop and experiment in the 80s, but welcomed genius arriving from other corners. Thats more or less my trajectory, too. Those who see the best of modern music as a continual divergence of musics of the African diaspora, and there's a lot of merit to the idea, generally found other forums.

― Biodegradable (Derelict), Thursday, November 26, 2009 8:01 AM Bookmark

Fwiw, the other decade polls have seen a good deal more representation of black artists then this one.

Halftime stats, just for fun - albums by year:

1980 = 2
1981 = 3
1982 = 6
1983 = 7
1984 = 6
1985 = 8
1986 = 7
1987 = 7
1988 = 2
1989 = 2

I was going to attempt to work out nationalities etc, but I can't actually be arsed. Maybe at full-time.

When it's all done, 1984 should win that by a comfortable margin.

nice pseudo-bell curve going on there

I started lurking here years ago in part because of past polls, which (seemed to) place a hazy focus on strands of music emerging out of the common hinterlands of (mostly european) pop and experiment in the 80s, but welcomed genius arriving from other corners. Thats more or less my trajectory, too. Those who see the best of modern music as a continual divergence of musics of the African diaspora, and there's a lot of merit to the idea, generally found other forums.

― Biodegradable (Derelict), Thursday, November 26, 2009 8:01 AM Bookmark

Fwiw, the other decade polls have seen a good deal more representation of black artists then this one.

― BIG HOOS was the drummer for the rock band Gay Mom (The Reverend)

These sort of commments make me want to stab my own face.

the battle is over and geir won.

"white, black, puerto rican
everybody just a-freakin'
good times were rolling"

-PRINCE (1980)

Re: samples from [Bush Of Ghosts], lots of 'em. Can't be arsed to check exactly which, but one Stereo MCs single was based on a groove from it, Goldie sampled "Mountain of Needles" (I think) etc.

Indeed:

http://www.whosampled.com/sample/view/9054/Goldie-Sea%20of%20Tears_Brian%20Eno%20and%20David%20Byrne-Mountain%20of%20Needles/

and

http://www.whosampled.com/sample/view/14438/Stereo%20MC%27s-What%20Is%20Soul%3F_David%20Byrne%20and%20Brian%20Eno-Regiment/

50. The Feelies - Crazy Rhythms [1980] (123 points, 13 votes)

http://www.chicagoreader.com/images/blogimages/2009/09/28/1254174904-41wy3az6w-l._ss500_.jpg

Very few albums top this one for me. The gestalt, the era, the Stiff Records connection, the drums (the rhythms are crazy!!), the way the most basic sus2s and repeating patterns are made to sound tricky and impressive when layered and played fast, the way Feelies-"fast" is just agitated midtempo, the Richmanesque snotty/blase vox, the quiet build-ups, "Paint It, Black" and "Everybody's Got Something to Hide" (pedestrian choices but I don't mind, do you?), and though it'd be really easy to look back in 2003 and describe this as quintessential North/Central Jersey sarcastic bootgazer pubtwang, I can't think of a pre-1980 Jersey record that sounds anything like it.

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), 13. tammikuuta 2003 19:29

Like many teenagers in the eighties, I craved a particular kind of music that I had not yet heard. Before I got to college my access to music was limited, but I'd heard the typical high school music of the Smiths, Cure and Violent Femmes, which had significant angst but was sometimes too fluffy. Anger is indeed an energy and punk fueled it. However, not all teenagers are necessarily political enough at that age to be filled with anarchic rage, or had been savagely dumped yet, let alone kissed. There's other pent up energies, of course. Like nervousness. Fear and frustration that you'll never "grow into" your awkward body, that you'll find anyone who wants to touch it, let alone slather their tongue over it. That you won't become "Somebody." Frantic friction, fear of embarrassment, tension and release but no satisfaction. Teenagers push their bodies in various ways beyond pain thresholds and exhaustion, yet the relief from the nervous energy is always temporary. Talking Heads occasionally touched on that on their first couple albums, as did XTC. There's a reason those bands appeared as dorks on their album art. They understood a different kind of tension, that the dominant few didn't. The Type-A's seemed to be able to drink and screw and bash heads to oblivion enough that they really didn't suffer from that type of pent-up nervousness.

The Feelies were just the band to fill that void. Their nerdy portraits in glasses and preppy pastel outfits emblazoned on a sky blue background, they looked like their audience. They were named after the high-tech virtual reality movies (and perhaps porn) that people were addicted to in Aldous Huxley's paranoid classic, Brave New World. The first song on their 1980 album was called, appropriately, "The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness." The song started with silence, followed by faint percussion. Blocks, toms, and then bass gradually entered the picture, growing increasingly faster. Once the dry, brittle, furiously strummed dual guitars started (three times the speed as a Lou Reed), The Feelies were a rogue train veering off its wheels with no brakes. It sounded exactly how a I felt. Running with nowhere to go, crescendos without climax, wildly repetitive action without end. Their sound distilled a perfect aesthetic sensibility, and sounded like no one else.

There's certainly influences, the greatest being The Velvet Underground. The band formed in 1976 in Hoboken, New Jersey. Glenn Mercer and Dave Weckerman played in a band since 1973 called The Outkids. Bill Million joined in 1975 and with a couple other members they evolved into The Feelies. As the band moved up from playing at Phase Five in Elmwood Park to Max's Kansas City and CBGB's they opened for Patti Smith, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, and ravenously drank in every performance by Television. When Anton Fier came from Cleveland to contribute drums and percussion, he helped solidify their sound by cutting back on cymbals to give room to the twin guitars, filling out their unique percussive style with tom toms and other percussive instruments like tambourines and maracas. The band did not like to play live often, but when they did, the shows became the stuff of legend. They were also the ultimate cover band with the ability to strip down another artist's song down to its purest, Feelies-like essence. These included Iggy Pop's "Funtime," The Stooges' "Real Cool Time," MC5's "Looking At You," The Stones' "Paint It Black," Love's "Little Red Book," Brian Eno's "Third Uncle" and "King's Lead Hat," The Beatles' "Everybody's Got Something To Hide" and "She Said She Said," Neil Young's "Sedan Delivery," "Barstool Blues" and "Powderfinger," Wire's "Mannequin" and "Outdoor Miner," The Modern Lovers' "Roadrunner," Patti Smith's "Dancing Barefoot," Television's "See No Evil," and over a dozen Velvets covers.

Like Television, it took The Feelies a few years before they were able to secure a record deal and get into the studio. They stubbornly would not agree to allow any producer to influence their sound. Once signed to England's Stiff Records, it took them weeks to get the guitar sound they needed, which involved plugging the guitars direct into the recorder without amps. The resulting Crazy Rhythms had a much different sound than their live shows, the intense, angsty songs like "Loveless Love," "Moscow Nights" and "Raised Eyebrows" augmented by subtle studio experimentation. It was a drop-dead classic, surpassing everything in 1980 save for Talking Heads' Remain In Light.

- Fastnbulbous (http://www.fastnbulbous.com/feelies_crazy.htm)

It took weeks to do that?! There can't be an easier way to get a sound. I was surprised to find that McCartney did just the same for 'A Day In The Life' - I'd always imagined everything was calibrated just so

does that mean that "the good earth" did not make the top 100? i have always preferred its pastoral serenity to the quirky nervousness of "crazy rhythms".

49. The Go-Betweens - 16 Lovers Lane [1988] (125 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://jukeboxparables.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/16-lovers-lane.jpg

Effortless, graceful, radiant, fragile, gorgeous. As much as I like much of their earlier work, this one just blows me away. "Love Goes On," "Clouds," "Was There Anything I Could Do?"... Is there anything wrong with this record?

― Clarke, 5. helmikuuta 2008 22:08

This is a magnificent record, though I admit it did sound a bit too slick when I first heard it. But I've actually grown to love that slickness. The whole record just shimmers. I have to say, however, "Was There Anything I Could Do?" is my least favorite -- I was always baffled by that one kicking off one of their "greatest hits" comps. But I could listen to everything else here on repeat forever ...

― tylerw, 5. helmikuuta 2008 22:53

in the right mood, this record is like the most beautiful,special thing ever recorded.

― Zeno, 24. huhtikuuta 2009 1:40

a whole load of albums that just missed out on my 30 are here, which is great! criminal that Before Hollywood wasn't nommed by anyone (including me).

9 votes seems surprisingly low. probably doesn't bode well for the rest of their stuff.

48. XTC - Skylarking (127 points, 16 votes)

http://www.musthear.com/music/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/skylarking.jpg

Really, XTC are so much better as a powerpop band than they were as a new wave/postpunk band. That's not to say that "Black Sea" or "Drums And Wires" are bad albums in any way, but everything they have done since "Skylarking" is downright fantastic.

― Geir Hongro, 8. huhtikuuta 2008 13:35

The thing that confuses me is the fact that Rundgren was somehow responsible for Skylarking's sequencing concept: the original order reads pretty plainly to me as a life cycle, and of course it doesn't seem likely that Patridge was like "here are a bunch of songs that just so happen to correlate to stages in a person's life" and then Rundgren said "OMG I have an idea, let's put them in order!" So it seems like some kind of cue that a lot of the writing (of lyrics, at least) was done in-studio, or during the process, which ... well, Partridge lyrics certainly aren't lazy, even when they don't entirely work, so that's fairly impressive to me.

― nabisco, 9. maaliskuuta 2007 23:22

I forget which Partridge interview, but I remember it being something like Andy & Dave handing over about 40-50 demos of songs to Rundgren, who came back a week later saying 'ok we will record _these_ songs in _this_ order -- thereby forming a concept album''. perhaps some lyric writing was adjusted after the fact once that concept was agreed upon, but either way that's a profoundly assertive thing for a producer to do and it's no wonder that some feathers were ruffled when starting the show like that

― Milton Parker, 9. maaliskuuta 2007 23:30

wow...i don't think i've heard this record in at least 15 years. but when i did listen to it, it was every single day (sometimes twice a day) for about six months straight. so i remember it well. i can't decide between "earn enough for us" (the song that initially drew me to the album, with the most perfect snare sound ever) or "the meeting place" (which for me best captures the overall essence of the record).

― Lawrence the Looter, 26. heinäkuuta 2007 4:58

48. XTC - Skylarking [1986](127 points, 16 votes)

the year was missing. :)

Yes, sorry.

a whole load of albums that just missed out on my 30 are here, which is great! criminal that Before Hollywood wasn't nommed by anyone (including me).

Before Hollywood was nominated, and it was on the list of albums you cold vote for.

I never understood why my first-year college roommate, who a staunch Lee Atwater Republican who listened to a diet of Beatles, Clapton, and delta blues (and nothing else), refused to acknowledge that XTC was the contemporary band working in the Beatles tradition. I hear the same dynamic (with less Yoko fluxus stuff) at work in every mid-period XTC album as in the studio-bound fab-four.

^ (best/most prominent/most successful) band working in the Beatle pop tradition.

Before Hollywood was nominated, and it was on the list of albums you cold vote for.

Gah! Don't know how I missed that.

eh what band wasn't working in the beatles tradition? I like XTC but their music is a lot less accessible and a lot more nerdy. 'you liked the beatles, surely you'll like XTC' doesn't compute for me.

I just noticed I voted for Liberty Belle & the Black Diamond Express but it wasn't on the short list. I think I just had seen their name on the list a few times and assumed that one would have been nominated. I'm really shocked the first album was on their above Liberty Belle and Spring Hill Fair which are my two favourites.

yeahhh I woulda voted liberty bell top 5 had it been nominated