TURN THIS MUTHA OUT! It's the Alternate 1970s Albums Poll on ILX — Results Thread

So far seven of mine have placed - Tres Hombres, Van Halen, New Boots and Panties, Space Ritual, Jailbreak, Lodger and Master of Reality. I figure another five or six have a good shot, though I'd love to see more (like my top two, for example).

Master of Reality on the whole is an explictly Christian album, I am actually writing every single day about exactly that aspect of it!

― J0hn D., Wednesday, June 6, 2007 4:51 PM (2 years ago)

^ I still need to buy this book.

― Johnny Fever

You really do. Incredibly moving book.

That's the spirit! The more we revel in the vastness of awesome 70s music, the less cranky I get. I just had a flashback to a class my freshman year in high school in 1983 when we were having some sort of discussion about music and culture. I was ejected from the class because a girl said the 70s was a total wasteland, and I called her a "silly twat." Oops!

I was ejected from the class because a girl said the 70s was a total wasteland

That's how I feel about the 90s now, but I'm sure I liked it at the time. One day, I might get there again.

Only three I voted for i think, but I stuck to my pig headed 'one album one artist' rule in order to get the list down, so a few of my alternate choices have come in - for example I only listed 'The Modern Dance', but could have voted for all three Ubus, I went for St. Dominic's Preview, but Veedon Fleece was a close second there, I went for Al green Explores your Mind......

Eight off my list are in. Glad to see my #1 (Veedon Fleece)and #2 (The Wild, the etc) make it. I thought I knew my 70s music pretty well but damn if there aren't a number of discs from bands I'd never knew existed. ILX in long tail shocker.

i thought my ballot was pretty conventional almost-canon stuff but only 4 of 40 have shown up so far...

88. Tom Waits - Closing Time (#27)
83. Thin Lizzy - Jailbreak (#12)
80. Van Morrison - Veedon Fleece (#18)
62. Steely Dan - Katy Lied (#15)

hope a couple of my prog picks get in, as obvious and canonical as they are

Only 2 from my list so far (Comus and Sabbath Vol 4), hoping for another 10 or so but I get the feeling Blue Oyster Cult won't make it...

All forty of mine have now appeared.

Not really - the actual total is seven, of which three are from my top ten. I'm middle of the road.

My votes so far appearing: Neu! 2, Space Ritual, Comus and Cluster.

No idea how many more of mine will appear, almost certainly a few, but this list is already completely different from how I expected it to turn out, so who knows?

i only did a ballot for 35 (36-40 only get a point if you do ordered, didnt feel like sifting through dozens of albums to get a point). so far, just 2 from mine (ccr #4, chic #8)

I'm glad to see Sextant made it, I was beginning to fear it wouldn't. It was my #5 vote (and only one of my votes to appear yet), but it could've easily been my #1, as my top 5 could've basically been in any order. It seems a consensus has formed on ILX that it's Herbie's best album, which indeed it is. Sextant features everything that was great about electric jazz in the late 60s/early 70s, before fusion froze into a set of cliches: the restless electronic experimentation, the abstract but undeniably funky rhythms, the freedom-within-a-groove horn blowouts. It's kinda sad that this was pretty much the swan song of the Mwandishi band (there are those two Eddie Henderson albums where most of the band appears, but as nice as they are, they feel less inspired than the albums released under Herbie's name). The Headhunters were a fine band too, and they released some awesome funk records, but there's just so much potentiality on those three Mwandishi albums (especially Sextant), so many exciting directions the music might've taken if the band could have continued playing.

Anway, I'm beginning to fear that only two or three of my top 40 might actually appear in the top 100. I'm still certain Curtis Mayfield's debut will make it, but I'm not so sure about anything else. If you look at top 60-100, 33 of the 40 albums appear to be more or less in the rock mold (I'm a bit uncertain about a couple of those), which feels way too much fo me. In my opinion the 70s were most likely the best decade ever for "black" music (African-American, Afro-Cuban, Caribbean, Nigerian, Jamaican, Brazilian, etc), but I don't see this being reflected in the poll (yet). I guess I gotta just face the facts, that rock will always be the consensus choice.

my choices are so obvious I'm starting to feel bad for not voting for the more obscure and thus throwing the list into boring territory (though I have to admit that I've found it anything but so far).

That is how I feel too, on both counts, but given how I wouldn't have predicted the results so far it is also entirely possible that actually most of my obvious picks will not turn up at all

still feeling bad for turning in a very rockist (or at least very white) list - sheer musical ignorance I'm afraid, will attempt to school myself at some point, let's hope the results of this poll will allow for some of that as well as a few more of my choices popping up

my list is pretty white too, but out of racism more than anything

Ha!

(well played sir, was rather a stupid non-confession of mine there, but still, this thread has underlined the need to broaden my horizons)

Really beginning to fear for my babies now and wishing I'd ordered my list - there's three records in particular I'd love to see here, but as we go higher the likelihood of that recedes.

Sabotage or bust!

I'm shut out so far!

Did Geir vote?

all of my fav '70s R&B albums are stuff that's either so canonical that it made the first list, or not canonical enough to make this list

my list contains precisely one black person although he is one of the funkiest bassists that has ever lived so probably counts for 3 or 4 (the great Barry Adamson, obviously)

i don't feel especially guilty for this. sure soul jazz and r&b deserve lots of placements here, and sure they'll get them. sometimes a dude has to go bat for art-rock, s'all. i've called it based on what are my favourite albums [/geir]

i wish there was an equal desire on the part of the soul/jazz fans to expand their horizons towards progressive rock! [/geir]

god see talking about this makes me sound like geir

i wish there was an equal desire on the part of the soul/jazz fans to expand their horizons towards progressive rock

ahem, back when you were still in short trousers son...

I don't know, all this talk about 'black music' and 'white music', but what about the Asians, guys? Won't somebody think of the Asians?

and no, not last year.
xp

yeah granted pfunkboy

i do need to hear more carnatic music etc. microtonal scales, drones, and other groovy things

Actually, I only have two Asian bands on my list - YMO and FTB. But still.

60. Various Artists - No New York (1978) [101 points, 10 votes]

http://i49.tinypic.com/2vmyfzp.jpg

I hate how "No New York" and "no wave" have become synonyms for "noisy."

― hstencil (hstencil), Friday, July 30, 2004 3:11 PM (5 years ago)

I'm not sure what "lasting impact" *No New York* has had, since no NY bands since have really matched what the Contortions, DNA, Mars, and Teenage Jesus and the Jerks did on it (which isn't to say nobody's made music that *good* -- I mean, I just don't see how they've really influenced anybody in especially interesting ways, and when bands have *tried* to do what they did, they usually fall flat on their faces.)

― chuck, Thursday, June 5, 2003 1:02 PM (6 years ago)

When No New York hit unsuspecting record store shelves, the cache of Eno's involvement may have helped shift a few units, but I certainly don't believe it wasn't designed to suggest a bubbling well-spring of untapped profit-generators so much as take a snapshot of a truly unique, fleeting art movement.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, June 7, 2003 4:09 PM (6 years ago)

Never heard of that one.

I guess I'm a middle-of-the-road voter too, since both of my picks that have placed thus far are ultra-canonical, ie. Bruce and Stevie.

sure soul jazz and r&b deserve lots of placements here, and sure they'll get them. sometimes a dude has to go bat for art-rock, s'all.

i feel u on this, but r&b and soul are no less artful and u should def make a quest to know the most prolific time of funky shit

i will be chasing this stuff down. the 80's poll got me into prince!

if u dig the mega-genius of prince, u should follow the advice of the usa president and listen to that 5-album run by noted-recording artist stevie wonder

I'm still holding out hope that Lawrence of Newark made it. Oh, and Don Cherry's Brown Rice. That's fucking killer too. But I think that my ballot may have been functionally irrelevant…

Disappointed in the low placement of NNY. I think it was in my top 10 in the original poll. I hope Tusk takes this.

I thought NNY was definitely canon enough to make it top 30.

I was kind of surprised how high NNY was -- highly admired, rarely loved. Again, how can anything ranked in the top 100 out of over 1,300 options be considered low, considering there's easily another 1,000 worthy candidates?

I picked up CCR's Green River used to reconsider, and realized I already had most of the tracks on the two comps. At least it was a 40th Anniv remaster (didn't have Cosmo's), and I always prefer to hear the songs in the sequence they intended. I do like their chooglin', it was probably just a mistake to listen to their entire catalog all at once. I don't know that I can stomach ABBA though, I'm still recovering from Mama Mia.

tusk is 1980 tho?

19 oct 1979 according to wikipedia

'79.

Completely forgot to finish my voting ballot. Enjoying what I see and read so far!

Format:

Position, Album title, Artist, Year, Points, Votes.

Picture.

Blog/posts of people dissing the album
One post from someone who likes it
Tuomas post about having never heard of it.

Comfort and familiarity in these troubled times.

59. The Specials - Specials (1979) [102 points, 10 votes, 1 first place vote]

http://i47.tinypic.com/2lasqe0.jpg

First album : the most classic of the classic, of all music.. seriously. "The Specials" was the most important and therapeutic record for me back in the day, when I used to feel like a social fuck-up.

― donut bitch (donut), Friday, December 13, 2002 1:55 PM (7 years ago)

Their first album alone redeems them from any possible later crimes they may have committed.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, December 13, 2002 5:08 PM (7 years ago)

In high school a friend gave me a copy of "Lifes Rich Pageant" that he'd taped over a copy of this Specials album, so that right after the end of "Superman" you'd come in halfway through "Little Bitch," and I was completely captivated by this amazing half-song, which it was two years before I learned what it was and bought the record.

― Guayaquil (eephus!), Tuesday, December 16, 2008 8:39 PM (1 year ago)

Still prefer the first Beat album to this one i think, but both are classic

I didn't notice the Specials were on the nominations list I just assumed it was in the first time round. I would have voted it for if I'd have seen it, the first two albums are total classics.

I love that story from eephus.

Seven of my 40 in so far, got no idea whether most of my others stand a chance of placing. My picks were certainly more varied in terms of genre than my '80s list was. For the last two or three years the '70s has been a constant source of unheard treasures for me really.

Sorry they're so few today, guys. My internet keeps going out for an hour or more at a time.