what was the last 'classic album' you got and were knocked out by?

A lot more so than most of the albums in this thread.

If you like the White Noise I found the United States of America lp sounded pretty similar. To the extent that I thought tracks from one were the other when they came on my Walkman.

The vocals are a lot better on the United States of American album, the weedy male vocals on the White Noise LP are easily the worst thing about it.

Weedy and very English.

Until I got one (at the Quayside market on the Tyne) about 20 years ago or so, I'd not heard anything about it.

Then I played it, and recognised various bits from Kenny Everett's radio show, and John Craven's News Round. (oh, and I also have/had that "Johnny One-Note" from the Phase-4 album that was JCNR's intro)

I think it must have sold well though because I've seen it in a lot of bargain bins over the years - back when I used to look in bargain bins.

was always a fixture on those island inner sleeves alongside john cale, fairport, war ina babylon etc

Another one of those "never been out-of-print' records, check the label variations/versions on Discogs.

huh I just kinda assumed it would be expensive and never tried to buy a copy, but now you mention it there's copies in OK condition starting around £13

tbh I also think the USA LP does similar thing better, but they are both good

THere's a 2nd White Noise lp from 1975 that's more electronic and less folky and weird. It's up on Spotify.
Sounds like it's more serious in intent.

There was a good remaster of the 1st lp on cd about 10 years ago I think it was an improvement on the previous version I had anyway.

Jefferson Airplane, After Bathing At Baxter’s .

Never dug into their work before, and I’ve listened to this thing 20 times in the last few days. Crown and Volunteers are no slouches, either.

Jaki Byard's Out Front

xp There's some great live JA stuff from late 67 and throughout 68 that's worth looking out for too.
I think all the Spencer Dryden stuff is worthwhile but especially the 2nd 3 lps.
& the solo stuff on Grunt is worth hearing too.

I mean, check out the rest of the “main” albums first. The debut is an underappreciated classic!

I mean, check out the rest of the “main” albums first. The debut is an underappreciated classic!

It's not just you.

xp Yeah, “Takes Off”... it’s my favorite, next to “Volunteers.”

jefferson airplane are a ridiculously underrated live band as far as i'm concerned.

Jack fucking Casady

I think they got a lot better when they started improvising which seems to be some time in early 67 from what I can remember from the loves You box set notes. & that seems to be the big thing with the sound on Baxters, not really hearing it on Pillow. THough Garcia is music director so would have thought he'd bring it with him

Grace Slick's previous band the Great Society were pretty great with improvising too. I love Darby Slick her Brother-in Law on their material, a deeply undersung, under-recorded raga influenced guitarist who took off for India to study the music further when grace decamped to JA.

& the comparison of early fairport Convention to them is nothing new. I think FA were referred to as the English JA quite a bit. Wish there was more live material around by them from their early years when the 2 female singers were onboard . Would like to hear how far Richard Thompson stretched out live, you get to hear some of it on the Bouton Rouge appearance from French TV when Judy Dyble was in the band, but I remember reading about him improvising a lot more.
They were doing a lot of US singer/songwriter material before Ashley Hutchings discovered the Cecil Sharpe archives and they became the more traditional orientated band they've remained ever since.

Coincidentally I've been listening to Jefferson Airplane quite a bit lately, I had a Best Of for years but only really knew Surrealistic Pillow outside that. Takes Off is really good, yeah. Baxters is pretty good too.

I also like their cover of High Flyin' Bird a lot, I downloaded what I thought was the original by Billy Edd Wheeler but it looks like he actually recorded that after the JA version (he wrote the song but wiki says Judy Henske did the first recording of it in 1963)

Judy Henske was a pretty strident folk singer who went onto recording Farewell Alderbaraan with then husband Jerry Yester in 1969.
I think that's a must hear lp, glad it finally got an official cd version a couple of years ago

Jefferson Airplane is a major blind spot of mine, as I think I've mentioned at length before on ILM.

Amon Duul II tap into some of the same feeling though the sound is a bit more avant and teutonic.
Their first 5 or 6 lps are well worth checking out too.

Yes, I prefer Amon Duul II and Fairport to JA.

a couple things that strike me about JA:

* it wasn't just the core band, they had some really talented people in their periphery - there's this rolling band going out playing JA songs now and I believe both Darby Slick and Peter Kaukonen are involved, and I feel like, man, they're both great and should be recognized for more than just hanging out with the Airplane

* there are basically a ton of bands who copied the Jefferson Airplane male/female vocal/electric folk model, most of whom are now forgotten - you know, bands like HP Lovecraft. definitely a really influential band back in the day

* when it comes to them as a live outfit, they might pale next to people from europe, but, i will be controversial here - i think as a live band they were the best san francisco psychedelia had to offer. except for the dead, that scene is a little bit out of vogue right now because rolling stone pushes it so hard, but i gotta say, in '69 i truly believe that the airplane were a better live band than the dead (see: "sweeping up the spotlight")

Link Wray's S/T 1971, mentioned up thread and covered extensively in Oxford American. Like Exile on Main St, and unlike a lot of other early 70s soul-rock, it brings the riffs, not just the depleted gaze and world-weary hooks.

Kleenex/LILIPUT, First Songs

some shit talk about this album itt but sweetheart of the rodeo by the byrds has been my album for about the last 6 months. play it about once a week.

Whoever shit talks my sweetheart has a mouth that smells like shit
- psalms 82

The Wipers, especially Youth Of America. no idea how I managed to avoid them until now, but I'm head over heels in love.

yesss that's the best one

i think that overall YOA is the best, but once you're ready to explore them so more there are some reaaaaally good songs on their surrounding releases. i just mention it because i also missed out on the wipers for a really long time, and even when i finally got into YOA, i kept missing out on other great stuff.

in particular, the first three tracks from Over the Edge are just UNSTOPPABLE - Over the Edge, Doom Town, So Young. the rest of the album flags a bit imo (which is why YOA is still the consensus best wipers album as a whole)

the title track of Over the Edge has one of the top 5 wordless choruses in guitar music of all time (i just made that list up and don't know what else is on it except for MBV's What You Want). i guess this advice goes for most wipers songs but it sounds particularly good when played at maximum volume

yeah that's some starting run. i never really listened to the wipers until i moved to vancouver, and then in the circles I'm around tire extremely popular and i feel like I've heard the title track to over the edge a hundred times since moving here and it's still awesome

can this be and pushing the extreme are so fucking great

right now the answer to this is Van Morrison's "Poetic Champions Compose" - much more loose and spacey than I expected

Youth of America has always been my fave Wipers album. The quintessential Wipers song is When It's Over which is about the most transcendental piece of music I have ever listened to in my life. I wrote about it in my blog a while ago.

Link Wray's S/T 1971, mentioned up thread and covered extensively in Oxford American. Like Exile on Main St, and unlike a lot of other early 70s soul-rock, it brings the riffs, not just the depleted gaze and world-weary hooks.

I was knocked out by this one too when I first heard it almost 10 years ago. I had no idea Wray had made music that sounded like that.

Coming out of a five year relationship, discovering Hats by the Blue Nile makes a lot of sense.

https://www.discogs.com/Natural-Essence-In-Search-Of-Happiness/master/233493"">guys

fuck.

album's an absolute spewing volcano of pure heat tho

Another for Kleenex/LiLiPUT. Only had "Madness" on a mix tape, and finally just listened to
a bunch of others. Blows me away how good they were for early 80s.

Drexciya and side projects, Der Zyklus II in particular

rajie - espresso

another mid-'80s record along the lines of akina nakamori's "fushigi", who knew there was more than one great cocteau twins-influenced j-pop record from the mid-80s?

sry, this is the album i was trying to link before i opened up a wormhole: https://www.discogs.com/Natural-Essence-In-Search-Of-Happiness/master/233493

it's a david axelrod / cannonball Adderley affiliated jazz / soul album

Kleenex First Songs 2LP on Mississippi/Kill Rock Stars sounds fantastic, for some reason much bigger than the 2CD version represented on Spotify. Definitely a favorite discovery of recent years.

The Residents Fingerprince.
Probably about tiime i was familiar with all that early run though.
NIce weird stuff like I've been looking for for years. I have meet The , & Not Available not sure why I never really got into the band massively. Also used to have Third Reich & Roll and Commercial lp but not sure what I listened to heavily. I think bits of Commercial stuck in my head for years though.

i liked "leapmus" on the fingerprince preserved edition, overall the bonus tracks have been hit and miss but man i've never heard a version of "diskomo" i didn't like

the 180 gs just did a cover of the commercial album, i think overall the commercial album doesn't quite work as a conceit for me, particularly since "ups and downs" is way better as a proper _song_, but i'm still a little curious