pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

The first one seems to be the most canonized, perhaps because it is so weird and distinctive and removed from all the albums before and after it?

I guess so... the first three are such classics in their own right, though (and hold together better, IMO)

(And Stop Making Sense, as you said, isn't as "impactful" [sorry!] as an album than a film)

No argument from me. I think Bush of Ghosts is much more overrated, to be honest, despite being huge fans of everyone involved and recognizing its importance.

xpost

I remember hating the song "Bad" instantly.

haha yeah this was almost comical, an "is this really happening" moment

the first Boredoms album got yanked :(

can't be having anything too noisy, or any punk except fucking Sandinista

or Minor Threat, who are as everyone knows well crap

morrisp, they couldn't put the first 3 TH albums on this list

haha, oops!

I fro-got the whole premise

xxp Black Flag's on there, too (fwiw)

Black Flag - another dull Yank-punk outfit. PENI FOREVER

the best songs on Thriller are "Wanna Be Starting Something" and "Human Nature", in my opinion

I agree there's something weird about listening to it now, an album that's so well-known and canonized and really doesn't reveal much beyond the songs you already know (unlike say, the classic Beatles albums). It sounds like a compilation to me, almost like Sports by Huey Lewis & the News or something.

one fun hypothetical is "what if 'Behind the Mask' made the album?". as you may or may not know MJ toyed around with including a rearranged cover of the YMO song, recording a few demos but never actually officially releasing it. I thought his version was good, and probably could've helped make Thriller a more "perfect" album. Plus I wonder what it would've done to YMO. Who, by the way, should've placed at least 2 albums on this list :/

(I'll listen to BF properly soon lol I promise)

speaking of non-Yank bands -- I noted that the 2002 list (100 albums) included three (3) albums by The Fall; whereas this new, expanded list only has one...

(also, the two they dropped are *THE* two Fall albums, IMHO)

obviously

well, THE two 80s Fall albums

ya

Black Flag - another dull Yank-punk outfit. PENI FOREVER

― imago, Monday, September 10, 2018 3:21 PM (twenty-two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you are sentenced to life in THE SHED

I think in general the list has become more US-centric?

There is a third jazz-album, btw, Alice Coltrane is on there with Turiya Sings. But perhaps that's not jazz enough? Would love to see a bit more, but I'm not sure there really are that many consensus 80's jazz records? What else should be on there? I'm not sure I buy Tutu and Wynton Marsalis.

Also, seeing as there's a lot more classical than before, it's pretty surprising that Tabula Rasa has fallen off the list. And wrong, btw, that record is as great as they say. I could also someday see John Adams get on there, either with Nixon in China, or if we're being more quirky, The Chairman Dances (that whole album is weirdly consistent).

That Alice Coltrane album isn't jazz at all - it's a cassette of devotional/spiritual music she sold to her followers. It got rehabbed in the last year or two when Luaka Bop put out a compilation of her spiritual stuff (which is good, mind you, but it's not jazz in any sense and she'd have told you so herself).

I think in general the list has become more US-centric?

For sure. But then the US seems to have gotten more US-centric, so it's not a big surprise.

Would love to see a bit more, but I'm not sure there really are that many consensus 80's jazz records? What else should be on there?

maybe something like ‘as wichita falls’?

Err ‘as falls wichita’ obv

Song X by Pat Metheny/Ornette Coleman?

^^^ I almost expected to see it

Or maybe some Last Exit?

Power Tools - Strange Meeting is a good one.

If I were to pick an 80s Metheny album, it would probably be Offramp

Anthony Braxton put out tons of stuff in the 80s, don't know if there's a particular consensus pick in there.

Imagine hearing this and thinking Straight Outta Compton is better than Nation of Millions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_04TzJsVpc

That album's jump from 35 to 3 is definitely notable

Man, that album at number 3 ...

Oh, here's one that I could see get reevaluated at some point, not sure if it would be good or bad: Herbie Hancock - Future Shock?

all three of the electronic hancock records are great

Good call Frederik, and yeah re-evaluation will favor it imo.

whiney otm

is it a challops or conventional wisdom to note that Straight Outta Compton drops off *hard* after the first three songs, with the other real bright spots being old (8-Ball and Dopeman) and the rest being mostly useless...?

Nation of Millions has easily identifiable filler too but is p relentless by comparison

also extra-lol at "Control" placing so high, that album sucks

No One Can Do It Better >>>> SOC

so many aimless tracks where you can tell Janet doesn't have a clue what to do. The hits were hits for a reason, the rest is Jam & Lewis not quite hitting their stride.

No One Can Do It Better >>>> SOC

^^^real heads know what's up

also extra-lol at "Control" placing so high, that album sucks

― Οὖτις, Monday, September 10, 2018

I've waited years for people to realize how good Jackson-Jam-Lewis were on this thing: every single is cold steel. And seven of nine tracks were singles, like on Thriller.

This is even better!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control:_The_Remixes

Shakey, on what universe does Control suck? I was young but remember the shock in hearing tracks as hard as "Nasty" and "Control" on the radio.

If you wanna say Hearsay is better, I accept it.

Control is great. When I saw her play last year those songs (along with the Rhythm Nation songs) just exploded.

But per Shakey and his (and my) dislike of Thriller, at least as an album, Control has a vision.

the universe where I listened to it for the first time in 30(?) years recently on a roadtrip and wanted to skip 75% of it

xp

Control has a more unified sound than Thriller does, that's true

It's inconceivable that somebody might think "When I Think of You," "What Have You Done For Me Lately," and "The Pleasure Principle" are annoyances.