Best album of every year since....

So whenever was rap relevant for me when I decide whether a year was the worst ever?

1988 was the worst ever year for albums (well, since 1963-64 anyway) because it was bad for new romantics, bad for synthpop (truly analog synths were hardly in use at all, outside the Chicago house underground, otherwise it was all sampling and DX7), bad for prog (I mean, even neoproggers like Marillion, IQ and Pendragon went briefly AOR at that point), bad for sophisiticated melodic pop (Deacon Blues, Danny Wilson or Black were hardly 10cc) and bad for indie (late 80s indie sounded even more low budget than it was and the vocals were mixed so low in the production you could hardly hear the melody below all the exaggerated reverb). In other words: Bad for ALL the musical styles that I love.

Excellent news!

From 1988 I luv:

Spirit of Eden
Miss America
Daydream Nation
Isn't Anything
It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back
69
The Walking (or is this from 1987)
Strictly Business
The House of Love

Admittedly I'm having trouble coming up with non-canonical choices for that year - I think all of the above bar The Walking have been listed upthread (and anyone who loves Miss America should get on The Walking).

More from '88:

I'm Your Man
Tender Prey
Surfer Rosa

Oh yeah I cosign all three of those actually!

tim your taste in old music shocks me.

I LOVE Lex Pretend's list assuming it's not a joke.

why would it be a joke?!

1988 is the only year you need. spirit of eden was released, and then everything else just became.......average.

Lex's and Tim F's lists are both pretty great

tim your taste in old music shocks me.

Why, because he's actually heard Talking Heads?

Lex, I guess the issue here is that it's hard not to be canonical and a bit boring about old music unless you know the era (or at least a specific genre of it) really well. Probably there were albums released in those decades that I'd like a lot more than the ones I listed if I was aware of them - the flipside of this is that throughout the nineties and this decade there were quite canonical/typical-rock-crit albums I loved that just didn't make my number one spot - e.g. my second favourite album of last year was Panda Bear (sorry!).

Having said that, I listen to Miles Davis/Herbie Hancock/Alice Coltrane/Can in a manner rather similar to how I listen to minimal/techno/etc. I reckon of those albums you'd actually really like In A Silent Way, Journey In Satchidananda and any Can from Tago Mago through Landed. They're all profoundly androgynous and fluid in feel - like, if you like Henrik Schwarz and Achso and Where You Go I Go To I reckon you'd like these albums for some of the same reasons.

Probably my most offensive selection: Blood on the Tracks I've only really gotten into in the past twelve months. I wouldn't call myself a Dylan fan really, although I might become one in the future. From 1975 I like The Hissing of Summer Lawns equally as much but didn't want to list Joni twice. Next choices would be Another Green World and RadioActivity, I think. I'd like to hear the Robert Wyatt and Steely Dan albums that came out in those years, too.

If it makes you feel better, my second choice for 1977 is Donna Summer's Once Upon A Time and my equal second choice for 1978 is C'est Chic, and Michael Jackson's Off The Wall is probably my second choice for 1979.

1964 – the Beatles ~ Beatles for Sale
1965 – the Rolling Stones ~ Out of Our Heads
1966 – the Beatles ~ Revolver
1967 – the Jimi Hendrix Experience ~ Are You Experienced?
1968 – the Velvet Underground ~ White Light/White Heat
1969 – the Rolling Stones ~ Let It Bleed
1970 – Led Zeppelin ~ Led Zeppelin III
1971 – Yes ~ The Yes Album
1972 – the Rolling Stones ~ Exile On Main Street
1973 – Pink Floyd ~ The Dark Side of the Moon
1974 – James Brown ~ The Payback
1975 – Queen ~ A Night at the Opera
1976 – the Modern Lovers ~ The Modern lovers
1977 – Sex Pistols ~ Never Mind the Bollocks…
1978 – Captain Beefheart ~ Shiny Beast
1979 – the Specials ~ The Specials
1980 – Talking Heads ~ Remain In Light
1981 – the Psychedelic Furs ~ Talk Talk Talk
1982 – PRINCE ~ 1999
1983 – Violent Femmes ~ Violent Femmes
1984 – the CURE ~ The Head On The Door
1985 – Fine Young Cannibals ~ Fine Young Cannibals
1986 – PRINCE ~ Parade
1987 – Sonic Youth ~ Sister
1988 – Pixies ~ Surfer Rosa
1989 – De La Soul ~ 3 Feet High and Rising
1990 – Public Enemy ~ Fear of a Black Planet
1991 – Mercury Rev ~ Yourself Is Steam
1992 – Pavement ~ Slanted & Enchanted
1993 – PJ Harvey ~ Rid of Me
1994 – Built To Spill ~ There’s Nothing Wrong With Love
1995 – the Flaming Lips ~ Clouds Taste Metallic
1996 – DJ Shadow ~ Endtroducing
1997 – Modest Mouse ~ The Lonesome Crowded West
1998 – Black Star ~ Mos Def & Talib Kweli are Black Star
1999 – the White Stripes ~ The White Stripes
2000 – the Avalanches ~ Since I Left You
2001 – the White Stripes ~ White Blood Cells
2002 – Ugly Casanova ~ Sharpen Your Teeth
2003 – Cat Power ~ You Are Free

takes a nation of millions to be white

i can do since...1999.
99 - Boredoms - Vision Creation Newsun
00 - Radiohead - Kid A
01 - Daft Punk - Discovery
02 - Broken Social Scene - You Forgot it in People
03 - Lightning Bolt - Wonderful Rainbow
04 - Liars - They Were Wrong, So We Drowned
05 - Lightning Bolt - Hypermagic Mountain
06 - Liars - Drum's Not Dead
07 - Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam
08 - Black Pus - Black Pus 4: All Aboard The Magic Pus

takes a nation of millions to be white

list away, pappa

"I'm Your Man" is the only one of those mentioned 1988 ones that is any good at all (and possibly House Of Love - I haven't heard anything by them other than "Shine On" - which was nice and catchy)

it's hard not to be canonical and a bit boring about old music unless you know the era (or at least a specific genre of it) really well. Probably there were albums released in those decades that I'd like a lot more than the ones I listed if I was aware of them

this is exactly why i don't know (or really care tbh) about old music, i already know i can never know the era like i know mine, and i also know that my appreciation of my favourite music is almost always heightened by knowing my era, so...getting into the past always seems like an unnecessarily sisyphean task. also, my reaction to anything canonical is to avoid it for as long as possible, the entire process of canonisation appalls me.

i do like miles davis, alice coltrane &c...i think i've had like 2, maybe 3 can albums on my computer for over 2 years now and still haven't got round to listening to them.

Canonisation is good and important. The classical canon exists for a reason and it's the same with the rock canon. Plus all musical genres should be judged from a criteria not too unlike classical music.

clash of the tits

judged from a criteria not too unlike classical music

Lol, by these criteria every album on your list is shite. Oh hang on, what am I doing?

"This is exactly why i don't know (or really care tbh) about old music, i already know i can never know the era like i know mine, and i also know that my appreciation of my favourite music is almost always heightened by knowing my era, so...getting into the past always seems like an unnecessarily sisyphean task."

I pretty much agree with this. Most of the time when I get into old music it's more because the specific artifact represents some idea or style that seems really crucial to me in an atemporal sense. Like, with Can, I don't really care about the position in 1970s music, their influence on post-punk etc. It's really much more about what they were doing with rhythms and grooves, which strikes me as existing on this horizon of, um, jagged funkiness (stay with me here) that a lot of my favourite music gets to but has difficulty getting past (perhaps in the same sense that you can't get past a horizon. So the reference points for Can for me are not so much Faust or P.I.L. and more other stuff from a whole host of styles which I feel exists on that same horizon. I made a comp the other day with Can's "Spoon" and Talking Heads' "The Great Curve" but also 2-step, A Guy Called Gerald jungle, Matias Aguayo, dancehall, Bubba Sparxx, 'O'Rang... It makes more sense to me to think of Can in a constellation like that, one that, I guess, effaces the canonical hierarchy between all these things but without extinguishing the point of difference that is uniquely Can's. I think Can are important, but I don't think you (or, perhaps, rather, I) can grasp that importance terribly well by approaching them with some more typical canonical framework such as "krautrock".

yeah, you can still read old music internally without having a surplus of circumstantial knowledge (knowing what mingus phrases quote monk phrases etc). linking it with whatever you have heard and making those kind of connections is what makes listening to old music out of context so exciting imo.

absolutely, i can relate with the lyrics of say, byrne, bowie, wilson and richman, probably more than yer average r'n'b or hiphop lyrics. totally white aesthetic i apppreciate, but if a white middle-englander can escape into the world of gangsta rap then i don't see why he or she can't transport themselves into 60s california. are you saying, lex, that you don't see the point of listening to music unless you can relate it directly to your era?

Personally, I listen to a lot of old music exactly because it's so different from today's music. I don't know any current artists who'd give me the same vibe as Fela Kuti or Curtis Mayfield or Alice Coltrane. And I love finding about all the musical as well as other connections between the musicians and tunes of the past, it simply gives one's appreciation of the music and the era more depth, kinda like doing historical research. But I guess there's a difference between the type of music fan who wants to keep up with the music of today and only selectively listens to old music, often based on its connections to current music (I used to be like this when I was younger), and the type of fan who's lost track of current directions in music and only selectively listens to new music, but finds older music a more exciting and more easily manageable whole to dig into (I'm like this now). I'm not saying either approach is better than the other, but for a person like me, whos simply doesn't have the time and the energy to keep up with all the current developments and trends even in genres I like (let alone recorded music as a whole), the latter approach seems more comfortable and intriguing.

(x-post)

I think Lex's point is that there's a social aspect to enjoyment of Lil Wayne that is missing for David Bowie by and large.

i guess? i think what i like is the sense that the aesthetic i'm listening to is a living, breathing one. it's not that i can't transport myself into whatever aesthetic, i don't find i'm missing anything when i listen to the supremes or joni or whoever, it's perhaps that i just don't see the point of making the effort to get into an aesthetic which was the zeitgeist of people 40 years older than me.

when i first went to university i made a real effort for maybe 5 months to get into the old music i thought/was told i "should" like and i'm not joking, it almost all sucked...dylan, stones, beatles, bowie. dreadful! so many hours wasted trying to get into them. those 5 months may have put me off delving into the past 4 life.

xpps yeah the social aspect is impt, but it's also the sense that this artist or this scene could go anywhere or do anything and i ~don't know what it is~. watching a tennis match on replay when you already know the result vs watching a tennis match live. the former, you can appreciate the skillz etc but there's no thrill, it's done and dusted, we have the result and we're into the next round already, keep up.

I think Lex's point is that there's a social aspect to enjoyment of Lil Wayne that is missing for David Bowie by and large.

I can see the point, yes, but I don't think it's wholly valid. If you are a person who's interested in old music and know about the musical and social history of the era, then you can put it into context, even if the context is unavoidably partial (but then again, so is today's context - no one can ever see the whole context to anything). If this weren't true, you couldn't really appreciate old books or movies either, right?

It's like anything (but specifically it might be like Eng Lit at school) - the past is much more fun when you find out things for yourself and make/invent your own connections. Helpful too if you're an old geezer like me who's lived through multiple nows and can still gain random or not-so-random pleasure from any of them.

Unhelpful is the schoolmaster/cod liver oil swallow it/it's good for you approach that too many people in power still take. For example I was put off listening to "classic soul music" - i.e. JB, Aretha, Stax etc. - for the best part of the eighties because of didactic twats in the NME, The Face etc. telling me the eighties music I liked was crap and fake and plastic and that I should listen to half an hour of Aretha every morning to learn about dignity. This at a time when hip hop, House, Jam & Lewis etc. were rewriting the rulebook practically every day - so if nothing else there wasn't any TIME to listen to "old" music, there was more than enough exciting new stuff to keep up with and find and yet there were all these palsied old twats in the NME and the fanzines moaning about ten years after punk it's all gone down the bog Buzzcocks and I'm YELLING fuck aren't you listening to Husker or Swans or Sonic Y or Big Black get out of your fucking provincial indie ghetto.

Then I discovered all that classic soul stuff for myself, spontaneously, and I realised how fucking great it really was, but I wouldn't have gone near it with all that capitalised Red Wedge Soul Passion & Honesty jaded music-crit baggage loaded onto it.

What's amusing now is to see people like Reynolds, who back then was in the vanguard of reaction against all of this, now moaning on about things they don't understand and haven't experienced properly (viz. Funky House, but that's just one example) and how we should all fall in obeisance to the Wire/Dissensus doctrine and so Pip Pyle RIP >>>>>> all modern music and that's just stupid, he's just turned into everything he used to hate. Or whinge whinge whingers oh the Verve album's a pile of shit and I felt guilty about buying it but I bought it FOR FUCK'S SAKE rap + R&B + grime + dancehall's going through a CLASSIC phase RIGHT NOW get out of the fucking graveyard and learn about living again, stop swallowing the corporate Guardian Music/Radio 2/Q line, pop music's in a BLOODY GREAT STATE at the moment and it's all there to be investigated and heard and loved. Right now I do feel that it's one of these times when again I don't really have the urge to delve back into the past (apart from the albums blog but that's a different past which nobody goes into much and not one affiliated to Rock's Rich Tapestry, thank fuck); I'm hearing amazing new tracks every bloody day at the moment and if I can still get a kick from now at my age then there's no excuse for anyone else.

I meant that, like, you hear Lil Wayne on the radio and in clubs and the like far more easily than David Bowie. You'd have to have an incredibly selective social network with kind of idiosyncratic social practices to surround yourself with seventies glam in public to the extent that you can with chart rap. But it turns out this isn't what Lex meant really anyway!

Anyway I don't disagree with your general point Tuomas. I wasn't trying to say that a work's historical context isn't important to me, but that the stuff I like also has to be able to transport itself out of that context as well. The experience can't be entirely curatorial. The, as you say, unavoidability of partiality-of-context makes overly canonical presentations of taste seem a bit fictional and even dishonest to me, and I always think that something is being repressed when i read people talk about the music in those terms. For me there's got to be a relationship of mutually creative articulation between actual history and the listener's, more, erm, astrological take on the music they like.

x-post - what Marcello said! Specifically the first three paragraphs but I agree with the rest too pretty much.

In reynolds' defence, at least he appears to like donk-bounce...

But it turns out this isn't what Lex meant really anyway!

it's what i meant as well! talked about that more on the past vs future music thread the other week, but i totally agree re the social factor - it's kind of the tangible manifestation of my nebulous "living, breathing aesthetic" thing.

really relate to marcello's 2nd para, it's no coincidence that all the music i love i got into either accidentally or before i was aware of music criticism generally. there's so much "you must listen to this album in this way" baggage with old music and, as with marcello in the 80s...new music takes up all my time now! those can albums i have, on every occasion i've nearly listened to them i've ended up being distracted by "ooh another young jeezy leak" or "ahh must go on beatport spree today actually" or "whoop whoop new ciara video on youtube".

the music of the past i most want to get into is 80s freestyle but i have no idea where to begin (debbie deb greatest hits is as far as i've got).

"xpps yeah the social aspect is impt, but it's also the sense that this artist or this scene could go anywhere or do anything and i ~don't know what it is~. watching a tennis match on replay when you already know the result vs watching a tennis match live. the former, you can appreciate the skillz etc but there's no thrill, it's done and dusted, we have the result and we're into the next round already, keep up."

Yes this is so true. Something similar I wrote w/r/t funky house:

"Later on, we'll be able to look back and discern a narrative, to signpost almost precisely the moments when the goalposts were shifted and the paradigm transformed. But right now all such narrative flourishes are up for grabs, and the resulting sense of uncertainty is as satisfying as it is disarming for a critic like me. Critics like to look into the rearview mirror and think they see the future; what distinguishes UK funky house from any other style currently going is not merely that this story hasn't been written, but that it's moving so fast and so multi-directionally that such attempts at prophecy seem feeble even before they hit the page. To be able to accurately predict the future is fun, but to be in the thick of it, to hear the future emerging so unexpectedly that it confounds your predictions... there's quite seriously nothing better."

*goes off and checks Blissblog update for donk content*

OK, I'll let him off on that front...

This list will probably be different in a day or two's time, but for now...

1965 Dylan - Highway 61 Revisited
1966 Beatles Band - Revolver
1967 Sgt Pepper
1968 Everly Brothers - Roots
1969 Dusty in Memphis
1970 Curtis Mayfield - Curtis
1971 Rod Stewart - Every Picture Tells a Story
1972 David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust...
1973 John Cale - Paris 1919
1974 Sparks - Kimono My House
1975 Keith Jarrett - Koln Concert
1976 ELO - A New World Record
1977 Eno - Before and After Science
1978 Eno - Music for Airports
1979 Sister Sledge - We Are Family
1980 David Bowie - Scary Monsters
1981 Kraftwerk - Computer World
1982 Associates - Sulk
1983 Tom Waits - Swordfishtrombones
1984 Lloyd Cole - Rattlesnakes
1985 Kate Bush - Hounds of Love
1986 REM - Lifes Rich Pageant
1987 Bruce Springsteen - Tunnel of Love
1988 Todd Terry - To the Batmobile...
1989 Blue Nile - Hats
1990 KLF - Chill Out
1991 KLF - The White Room
1992 kd Lang - Ingenue
1993 Saint Etienne - So Tough
1994 Morrissey - Vauxhall and I
1995 Teenage Fanclub - Grand Prix
1996 DJ Shadow - Endtroducing
1997 Simon Warner - Waiting Rooms
1998 Air - Moon Safari
1999 Underworld - Beaucoup Fish
2000 Various - Sound of the Pirates mixed by Zed Bias
2001 Paul McCartney - Driving Rain
2002 Beth Gibbons and Rustin Man - Out of Season
2003 The Cardigans - Long Gone Before Daylight
2004 LMP - A Century of Song
2005 Saint Etienne - Tales from Turnpike House
2006 James Yorkston - The Year of the Leopard
2007 Soulsavers - It's not how far you fall...
2008 The Caretaker - Persistent Repetition of Phrases

Interesting how your list gets progressively less "canonical" the nearer it gets to now.

(nice to know I'm not alone in remembering Simon Warner though; he deserved better than permanent residency in the MVE bargain basement...)

it surprises me how many people pick compilations for one year

xpost
Yeah, I think what gets overlooked in the canonical debate is that there were just fewer albums released back in the 60s/70s, well, at least relative to the previous few years.

Other thing on a personal level is that I've pretty much gave up on reading the music press now, though still get Mojo through my letterbox, so I'm not 100% sure what the 'canonical' releases of the past few years have been, other than say Arcade Fire/Radiohead. Nowadays I'm not particularly interested in where something ranks in the wider world of current critique or pop culture history, I'm really just interested in where and how it fits into my world.

For me the past few years have very definitely been a case of, not so much how new music will fit into my world, but how it might change or even enlarge my world. And, one way or another, sooner or later, the best new music still somehow manages to reach me without recourse to the dying dinosaur that is the music press. Which has to be a good thing.

i don't understand the "my world" vs "wider world" distinction in the slightest.

what do you mean? you don't understand why people care about the wider world part?

Unhelpful is the schoolmaster/cod liver oil swallow it/it's good for you approach that too many people in power still take. For example I was put off listening to "classic soul music" - i.e. JB, Aretha, Stax etc. - for the best part of the eighties because of didactic twats in the NME, The Face etc. telling me the eighties music I liked was crap and fake and plastic and that I should listen to half an hour of Aretha every morning to learn about dignity.

This pretty much echoes my experience. There's probably a whole bunch of people who didn't get into soul music for years because NME, Face etc just made it seem really boring and un-fun. Pretty sad to contemplate this, in retrospect.

i just thought ignoring everything from before you were born until you were in your mid 20s was the norm

I like this discussion, one of several good ones round these parts lately on what I've come to think of as pastism, an adherence to the past at the expense of the present. I've become almost totally wedded to past musics, and the talk around here lately has jarred me to try to figure out why and what that implies. This classical music teacher John Rohnsheim gives a nice critiqueof pastism among both composers and audience:

Q: Do you think you should totally . . . you should know tonality, before you go off, before you create what's inside you?

Well, see . . . I . . . this might reflect my own opinion of today's music, in some form, OK? See, I'm against neo-clacissism. . . I'm not against it, it's just worthless. You can't repeat the past. People who try to repeat the past, there's something gone wrong - no, it's an end of something. Obviously we're in a decadent period of the arts. Everybody's making things over again. That's a sure sign that no one has anything to say. And that goes on all the time, including rock music now. The Rolling Stones traveling, 59,000 people go to Cincinnati Stadium to see the Rolling Stones last weekend? 59,000 people? They made millions of dollars? What in the hell are the Rolling Stones saying that's so vital for young people? My god, they existed when things were . . different! Are they doing anything really different? What's going on? Films being made over, ah, going back to tonality and doing things with tonality . . .

Q: So you think its like beating your head against the wall.

A: (shouts) NO!!! Just people who don't know what to do, they have no imagination. AND, you are a servant of now. You can't . . be . . from a different era. . . you can't pretend that you're living one thousand years ago, or one thousand years from now. You are a NOW person, you have to confront what NOW is, and somehow transcend it! Don't let it control you, but you control it. So we are, so . . . Tonality is Dead! Done! Finished! Boring! Dull! Boom! And all the people that compose, who make fashion now? Boring as hell! Terribly boring. They have no vitality. No conflict. Dullards. My opinion, and I know people who actually play in . . I can name two people, I know people who play in these groups, these musicians, I know these musicians, I've worked with them. I've told them, they agree with me, but they still do it.

Lol, by these criteria every album on your list is shite.

Not using the criteria that was used in the 18th and 19th century to judge the music that has actually become classic. Particularly prog holds up fine using 19th century criteria.

65- Johnny Cash- Sings Ballads of the True West
66- Merle Haggard- Swingin' Doors & The Bottle Let Me Down
67- Loretta Lynn- Don't Come Home a Drinkin' (With Lovin' On Your Mind)
68- Johnny Cash- At Folsom Prison
69- Merle Haggard- Same Train, Different Time
70- Kris Kristofferson- Kristofferson
71- Dolly Parton- Coat of Many Colors
72- Nitty Gritty Dirt Band- Will The Circle Be Unbroken?
73- Waylon Jennings- Honky Tonk Heroes
74- Tanya Tucker- Would You Lay With Me (In a Field of Stone)?
75- Guy Clark- Old No. 1
76- Waylon Jennings- Waylon Live
77- Emmylou Harris- Luxury Liner
78- Willie Nelson- Stardust
79- Hank Williams Jr.- Whiskey Bent & Hellbound
80- George Jones- I Am What I Am
81- John Anderson- 2
82- George Strait- Strait From the Heart
83- The Judds- Wynonna & Naomi
84- George Strait- Does Fort Worth Ever Cross Your Mind?
85- Mekons- Fear & Whiskey
86- Steve Earle- Guitar Town
87- Randy Travis- Always & Forever
88- Rodney Crowell- Diamonds & Dirt
89- Keith Whitley- I Wonder Do You Ever Think Of Me
90- Dwight Yoakam- If There Was a Way
91- Garth Brooks- Ropin’ the Wind
92- Alan Jackson- A Lot About Livin’ & a Little ‘Bout Love
93- Jimmie Dale Gilmore- Spinning Around the Sun
94- The Mavericks- What a Crying Shame
95- Emmylou Harris- Wrecking Ball
96- Lyle Lovett- The Road to Ensenada
97- Shania Twain- Come On Over
98- Vince Gill- The Key
99- Lucinda Williams- Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
00- Terri Clark- Fearless
01- Alejandro Escovedo- A Man Under the Influence
02- Dixie Chicks- Home
03- Brooks & Dunn- Red Dirt Road
04- Big’n’Rich- Horse of a Different Color
05- Gary Allan- Tough All Over
06- Alan Jackson- Like Red on a Rose
07- Josh Turner- Everything Is Fine
08- Jamey Johnson- That Lonesome Song

A bit expanded and revised since last time...

1967: Love - Forever Changes
1968: Silver Apples - Silver Apples
1969: Scott Walker - Scott 4
1970: The Velvet Underground - Loaded
1971: Can - Tago Mago
1972: Neu! - Neu!
1973: Fripp and Eno - (No Pussyfooting)
1974: Cluster - Zuckerzeit
1975: Kraftwerk - Radio-Activity
1976: David Bowie - Station to Station
1977: Brian Eno - Before and After Science
1978: Magazine - Real Life
1979: Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures
1980: Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth
1981: Echo and the Bunnymen - Heaven Up Here
1982: The Cure - Pornography
1983: The Chameleons - Script of the Bridge
1984: Talk Talk - It's My Life
1985: The Jesus and Mary Chain - Psychocandy
1986: Depeche Mode - Black Celebration
1987: Prince - Sign 'o' the Times
1988: Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation
1989: Spacemen 3 - Playing with Fire
1990: Cocteau Twins - Heaven or Las Vegas
1991: My Bloody Valentine - Loveless
1992: Tom Waits - Bone Machine
1993: The Afghan Whigs - Gentlemen
1994: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Let Love In
1995: Slowdive - Pygmalion
1996: Swans - Soundtracks for the Blind
1997: Mogwai - Young Team
1998: Spiritualized - Royal Albert Hall October 10 1997
1999: Low - Secret Name
2000: Radiohead - Kid A
2001: Jay-Z - The Blueprint
2002: Boards of Canada - Geogaddi
2003: Four Tet - Rounds
2004: Madvillain - Madvillainy
2005: Daft Punk - Human After All
2006: Junior Boys - So This Is Goodbye
2007: PJ Harvey - White Chalk
2008: Portishead - Third

50 YEARS OF MUSIC ACCORDING TO ME (Yes, I am bored, why do you ask?)

1966 - The Horace Silver Quintet - The Cape Verdean Blues
1967 - Bob Dylan - John Wesley Harding
1968 - The Beatles - The Beatles
1969 - The Flying Burrito Bros - The Gilded Palace of Sin
1970 - Grateful Dead - Workingman's Dead
1971 - Judee Sill - Judee Sill
1972 - Wishbone Ash - Argus
1973 - Can - Future Days
1974 - Steely Dan - Pretzel Logic
1975 - Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks
1976 - Ramones - Ramones
1977 - Electric Light Orchestra - Out of the Blue
1978 - The Cars - The Cars
1979 - Van Morrison - Into the Music
1980 - The 2nd Chapter of Acts - The Roar of Love
1981 - X - Wild Gift
1982 - Donald Fagen - The Nightfly
1983 - Dolly Mixture - Demonstration Tapes
1984 - R.E.M. - Reckoning
1985 - The Pogues - Rum Sodomy & the Lash
1986 - Prince and The Revolution - Parade
1987 - Death - Scream Bloody Gore
1988 - Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man
1989 - Boredoms - Soul Discharge
1990 - Sonic Youth - Goo
1991 - Autopsy - Mental Funeral
1992 - The Pharcyde - Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde
1993 - A Tribe Called Quest - Midnight Marauders
1994 - Nas - Illmatic
1995 - Rancid - ...And Out Come the Wolves
1996 - UGK - Ridin' Dirty
1997 - Pavement - Brighten the Corners
1998 - Tom Varner - The Window Up Above: American Songs 1770-1998
1999 - Sleater-Kinney - The Hot Rock
2000 - Hypnosia - Extreme Hatred
2001 - Ellen Allien - Flieg mit Ellen Allien
2002 - F.M. Knives - Useless & Modern
2003 - Sun Kil Moon - Ghosts of the Great Highway
2004 - Mihály Dresch Quartet - Egyenes Zene
2005 - Richard Hawley - Coles Corner
2006 - Bob Dylan - Modern Times
2007 - Ulver - Shadows of the Sun
2008 - William Parker - Double Sunrise Over Neptune
2009 - Bat for Lashes - Two Suns
2010 - Ghost - Opus Eponymous
2011 - Destroyer - Kaputt
2012 - Grimes - Visions
2013 - Haim - Days Are Gone
2014 - Hail Spirit Noir - Oi Magoi
2015 - Julia Holter - Have You in My Wilderness

Cutting this off at 2015, to give the newer stuff more time to sink in, and because 50 years seemed like a good round number.

Nice list o. nate

Some years I’m struggling to pick just one out of, like, five. Other years I’m finding it hard to select any at all (mostly late 70s-mid 80s).

Alright, I'll bite…

Disclaimer #1: classical notwithstanding because it’s just too complicated otherwise.

Disclaimer #2: it’s an extremely boring list for the most part, but it’s accurate relative to my FeELiNgS.

1963 Charles Mingus – The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady
1964 Yusef Lateef – Eastern Sounds
1965 Son House – Father of Folk Blues
1966 The Beatles – Revolver
1967 The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Are You Experienced
1968 Van Morrison – Astral Weeks
1969 Miles Davis – In a Silent Way
1970 Black Sabbath – Paranoid
1971 Alice Coltrane – Journey in Satchidananda
1972 The Rolling Stones – Exile on Main St.
1973 Pink Floyd – Dark Side of the Moon
1974 Edward Vasala – Nan Madol
1975 Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here
1976 Jean-Michel Jarre – Oxygène
1977 Ashra – New Age of Earth
1978 Ralph Towner – Batik
1979 PiL – Metal Box
1980 Joy Division – Closer
1981 The Cure – Faith
1982 David Darling – Cycles
1983 R.E.M. – Murmur
1984 Mercyful Fate – Don’t Break the Oath
1985 Tom Waits – Rain Dogs
1986 Slayer – Reign in Blood
1987 Sonic Youth – Sister
1988 Talk Talk – Spirit of Eden
1989 Pestilence – Consuming Impulse
1990 Depeche Mode – Violator
1991 Talk Talk – Laughing Stock
1992 Aphex Twin – Selected Ambient Works 85-92
1993 Nirvana – In utero
1994 Portishead – Dummy
1995 Dissection – Storm of the Light’s Bane
1996 Underworld – Second Toughest in the Infants
1997 Radiohead – OK Computer
1998 Gorguts – Obscura
1999 Tenhi – Kauan
2000 Boards of Canada – In a Beautiful Place Out in the Country
2001 Robert Rich – Somnium
2002 Agalloch – The Mantle
2003 Darkspace – Dark Space I
2004 Steven R. Smith – Antimony
2005 Murcof – Remembranza
2006 Negură Bunget – OM
2007 Frode Haltli – Passing Images
2008 Grouper – Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill
2009 Sunn O))) – Monoliths & Dimension
2010 Deathspell Omega – Paracletus
2011 Tim Hecker – Dropped Pianos
2012 Dordeduh – Dar de duh
2013 Gris – À l’âme enflammée, l’âme constellée…
2014 D’Angelo & The Vanguard – Black Messiah
2015 2 8 1 4 – 新しい日の誕生
2016 Radiohead – A Moon Shaped Pool
2017 Lingua Ignota – All Bitches Die
2018 Ungfell – Mythen, Mären, Pestilenz
2019 Tomb Mold – Planetary Clairvoyance
2020 Turia – Degen van licht