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

Make sure you get Lo's solo album with the sneakers on the cover too.

YESSSS

I've been listening to some albums I did not know, these are some that I have come to know over the past few weeks.

Allman Brothers - Win, Lose or Draw, Wipe the Windows (live) & Enlightened Rogues

The band themselves don't think much of these records, the first two from 75/76 when the Chuck Levell version of the Brothers broke up. Enlightened Rogues is their first reunion record that was produced by Tom Dowd.

Both the studio albums are a bit more tame than the early records, but there is still some good tracks and it's all solid blues based music. Enlightened Rogues is really well recorded, but not slick. The instrumentals "High Falls" and "Pegasus" are both good prog blues in the style of previous Allman brothers musical epics. Their take on Muddy Waters "You cant lose what you never had" is excellent.

The live album is pretty good, although the sound quality is closer to a Dead board tape than 'At Fillmore East' mix wise. The two keyboard lineup gives them a bit more space in their sound. Worth hearing is the "Elizabeth Reed" with this lineup, with Chuck Leavell on electric piano and the lack of a second guitarist, the group sound is not unlike some modal electric jazz.

I guess similar to many other bands, if it was from the 70s, it's worth hearing.

Shopped at a record store today for the first time in six months (Record High in Tempe, AZ) and picked up two stone-cold classics that are fairly new to me: James Gang Rides Again and Ahmad Jamal Trio at The Pershing. Jamal was a safe bet as I love everything I’ve heard but James Gang was a real revelation which I learned about from hearing guitarist Nicole Lawrence rave about it on The Best Show. I’d otherwise only known Joe Walsh as an Eagle and was not interested.

i need to hear more brazilian albums.

Peter Gabriel - So (obv already familiar w/ most of it already, but the sequencing and arty-to-poppy range of it is really grabbing me as a full listen)

The first Aztec Camera album. No idea how I had skipped it until 2020.

Also just heard that album for the first time this year. "Lost Outside the Tunnel" is such a gorgeous song!

As for me, I don't know why it took me so many years to listen to the Fall, but I'm blown away by Nation's Saving Grace and giddy to explore their other billion albums

high land hard lane completely rules, love love love it

Tigermilk

my thing went off because someone mentioned aztec camera. i'm weird and prefer the second album. but yes: totally classic, all the way.

I've never been a big Dead person outside of the standard "everybody likes them" American Beauty/Workingman's Dead albums, but I got deep into From The Mars Hotel last month and probably listened to it 15 times. It's quite good.

XP does that mean Knife is even more totally classic? I'm kinda fascinated by that opinion because I purged that one out of my collection after unsuccessfully trying to get into it for a while. High Land, Hard Rain is rock solid though.

xp It is! Check out Wake of the Flood and Blues for Allah next (if you haven't).

Those three are really their best studio albums.

First lp has its own fand0m, or crossover from garage etc. Its reflective of another drug being used since it was partially written on acid and recoreded on speed anda meat only diet. Aoxomoxoa is pretty good too for the most part.

Solo lps are pretty good too at least the solo Garcia and Ace by BOb Weir and i think Rolling tHunder by Mickey Hart.
worth ehearing as well not as timeless possibly as the early mid 70s run.

They were renowned as a live band for good reason when they did take off properly and could be a let down when they didn't.

enoch: no, i'm fairly certain that i'm the only person in existence -now or ever- that prefers knife over high land.

Zücker by Fastbacks has been kicking my ass for the last two weeks or so

Hell yeah!

I didn't acquire it, but I just listened to Nat King Cole's "After Midnight" for the first time, and definitely will be coming back to it.

Is Tigermilk 25 years old yet? Must be getting close. (1996 it says)

Pandemic lockdown was a good time for catching up gems that slipped me by. I discovered Prince Paul's A Prince Among Thieves and Handsome Boy Modeling School's So... How's Your Girl?. I was already a huge fan of De La Soul's first three albums, but I was completely aware of those two works until I started searching for more Prince Paul and came across Robert Christgau's enthusiastic reviews for both.

Also during some Pazz & Jop trawls, I checked out Flipper's Album/Generic (#12, 1982) and Kate & Anna McGarrigle (#5, 1976). Never heard of the former, knew of the latter (mainly through Linda Ronstadt's cover of "Heart Like a Wheel," from the only Ronstadt album I really like) but wasn't sure if I'd actually enjoy their music. Both complete knocked me out. Flipper's is all the more impressive when you listen to some of the other albums on the same Pazz & Jop top 40 - you'd swear it actually came out a decade (even decades) later. I remember when Kate McGarrigle passed away - it saddens me to have waited so long to listen to them, missing any chance to see them in concert. Reading a NY Times review of the memorial concert at Town Hall, Anna says one of the saddest introductions I've ever heard to a song - "I sang backup on this for a while...And I wish I weren't here singing the lead on it.” It took several spins, partly to get accustomed to the polish (the demos are arguably better, but the album has more of those harmonies that are so memorable), but I've definitely grown to love this album.

ugh, typos galore

*catching up on gems
*completely unaware
*competely knocked

Have you heard the podcasts Prince Paul did with Open Mike Eagle, looking back at his career? Great stuff, dude's a hell of a raconteur.

^ would second this, that podcast is great fun

on topic: first American Football album, a cult classic
the lyrics can get a bit too emo cringe for me at times, but the guitar tone & playing is absolutely doing it for me
and when the trumpet occasionally comes in it sounds a lot like Hex era Bark Psychosis, which is A Very Good Thing

Thin Lizzy - Nightlife. I don't know what I was expecting exactly, maybe an album full of rockers like "Boys Are Back," and I knew about Lynott's Van Morrison-isms, but I guess I wasn't prepared for how subtle and how folk and soul inspired much of it is. Beautiful record.

Two albums from the 60s that I'd heard pieces of but don't think I'd ever sat down and listened to through with intent:

John Coltrane - Ole Coltrane ~ amazing ensemble, McCoy Tyner's piano, especially
Nina Simone - Pastel Blues ~ played this 3x in a row and was just floored. The marriage of old and new; it is both super traditional, easy listening and also very progressive. Need to dig deeper into her catalog if anyone has any suggestions.

olé is sometimes my favorite coltrane record. maybe it is

Olé fans may already be aware, but "Village of the Pharoahs" by Pharoah Sanders is a similar modal piece that doesn't get talked about much.

Pharaoh Sanders also has an excellent version of "Olé"

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

I think the tune I mentioned might have begun as a variation on the Coltrane.

Olé is monumental. The title track makes me want to run up a mountain with a bull across my shoulders.

Thin Lizzy - Nightlife. I don't know what I was expecting exactly, maybe an album full of rockers like "Boys Are Back," and I knew about Lynott's Van Morrison-isms, but I guess I wasn't prepared for how subtle and how folk and soul inspired much of it is. Beautiful record.

― Three Rings for the Elven Bishop (Dan Peterson), Wednesday, April 7, 2021 7:36 AM

+1
nightlife rules!

also ole` would be the greatest jazz album ever made if he never recorded anything after it.

Olé RULES

i haven't heard the pharoah sanders version before, though, so i've got that cued up

Olé is monumental. The title track makes me want to run up a mountain with a bull across my shoulders.

― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Wednesday, April 7, 2021 5:14 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

i will now be checking out Olé

I’ve been getting really into thrash and technical death metal lately and have totally fallen in love with mighty Death. I’ve been totally “rinsing” their first 5 albums and it’s like... I feel like a teenager again, just loving this music so much. I’m a total Death fanatic now... it’s so hard to pick just one. My gut says human but my heart says scream bloody gore but leprosy is so fucking sweet but the guitar solos on it aren’t as great... also fucking INDIVIDUAL THOUGHT PATTERNS!! Chuck is god, I swear.

I’ll just say Scream Bloody Gore since I had an enormous blast singing along and air drumming to it while driving last week.

nice! yeah i heard leprosy for the first time a few months ago and that thing rips so hard. incredible lyrics too!

I went to the record store with my Mom a while ago. didn't find anything I liked but she saw a copy of Cat Stevens' Tea for the Tillerman. I know nothing of Cat and her taste is kind of suspect but I didn't want to leave empty handed so I got it. anyway I finally decided to listen to it now. it's fucking great!!! thanks Mom!!

Sparklehorse, «It’s A Wonderful Life» (ymmv re «classic», of course)

Nevermind, didn’t catch the pre 1990-criteria until after I posted. Carry on.

check out in utero too
(nobody cares about that criterion)

lol

Speaking of Coltrane, I just discovered Blue Train <3

JUst had teh 13th Floor Elevators' Bull Of The Woods reappear in my consciousness after not really listeningto it for a few years.
& finding it pretty magical while still far fro perfect soundwise.
Really muffled in places.
BUt wow shows how good Stacy's guitar is and if it wasn't preceded by 2 lps taht are considered genre classicsit might be much better sung.

Also just had the Misunderstood's london era recordings represented to me in a different way.
Guitars are really something else. Corrosive.
Don't think I've listened to my other versions of this material in a while though do still love it from my early teens.
PLus it has some bits taht haven't really appeared before. Some masterful guitar stuff at teh end of teh version of I'm nOt Talking might have been a structural guide for a number of people if it had been known before now.
Really is some very 'other' stuff and now there's a full disc of this stuff of somewhat similar quality together. previous collections of their work may have had teh Riverside recordings too close to this otherworldly stuff. While the Riverside is still pretty fanbtastic it's not as trepanningly great as this.

Abbey lincoln
Various solo recordings I think most notably Abbey is Blue and People In Me.
Jazz vocalist who may be best known in work with her onetime husband Max Roach. Abbey Is Blue is her in a band with Roach and several other great jazz players who may be better known fro slightly later work.
People in Me is recorded in Japan in 1973 with a pick up band with a Japanese bassist and pianist and 3 members of Miles Davis' band and possibly Miles himself. THey happened to be playing Japan at the same time as the recording.
IT's a little looser than the early recording.

Solomo Burke
now onto the 3rd disc of the recent Atlantic set. Guitar is still pretty strong and vocals are sublime.
Disc 2 has the guitar doing things i think were very innovative at the time and may have been credited to white players as innovations. But are really effective here which is probably more of a source.
3 just has really fluid guitar which probably would have been a great example for rock players of the time

xpost nicely done

Sparklehorse, «It’s A Wonderful Life» (ymmv re «classic», of course)

― Mule, Sunday, April 11, 2021 5:24 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

it's a classic

Thin Lizzy - Nightlife. I don't know what I was expecting exactly, maybe an album full of rockers like "Boys Are Back," and I knew about Lynott's Van Morrison-isms, but I guess I wasn't prepared for how subtle and how folk and soul inspired much of it is. Beautiful record.

― Three Rings for the Elven Bishop (Dan Peterson), Wednesday, April 7, 2021 7:36 AM

I need to revisit this one. I remember it being the only album of the band's classic period that I thought was underwhelming. It also features one of their worst songs ("Frankie Carroll") and a tossed off instrumental. But I'll admit it's been many years since I listened to it and I remember really loving "Showdown" and the last song, so I think I'll pull it out tonight

Nina Simone - Pastel Blues ~ played this 3x in a row and was just floored. The marriage of old and new; it is both super traditional, easy listening and also very progressive. Need to dig deeper into her catalog if anyone has any suggestions.

Her whole mid-60s Philips catalogue is good-to-amazing but if you enjoyed Pastel Blues I'd really recommend In Concert, released a year earlier, and Wild Is the Wind, released a year later.

The compilation Sugar in my Bowl was my introduction to that eraof Simone's work. it used to be around teh local chain record shops in the cheap multibuy offer for ages.
Odd how much white singer songwriter she covered for somebody so heavily involved in the black power movement. Or so it struck me at the time I was listening to it heavily. Has some really good stuff on anyway.

Thanks!

somehow i'd never listened to "the idiot" by iggy pop??!?!? even though i've listened to "lust for life" a million times? anyways, the idiot is amazing while also making me feel seasick