Post by DJ Tim:E on Aug 11, 2012 19:59:34 GMT 1
In between doing 'work' I thought I'd create a chart of what I consider my Top 20 albums ever, with commentary.
1. ABBA The Album (1977)
This is one of the few LPs I wore out from my mother's collection when I was a child, when LPs were commonplace...how I miss them. But, through the years, ABBA have always been one of my top 10 groups at any given time. Today, I'd consider them my favourite group ever, overall. This album, released at the peak of their commercial success, features their biggest-selling U.S. single "Take a Chance on Me", plus the global hits, "The Name of the Game", "Eagle" and "Thank You For the Music". Although not the critics' choice, particularly at the time it was released, the album's mix of songs which take me back to childhood, tracks which meant more when I'd grown up and, tracks which work when I'm DJing...put this album at the top of my chart! "The Album" is the 1st of 3 entries from ABBA in this chart.
SINGLES: The Name of the Game/Take a Chance on Me/Eagle/Thank You For The Music
2. Meat Loaf Bat Out of Hell (1977)
I had considered this my favourite album ever, maybe, partially to show certain stuck-up plonkers that I'm not the stereotypical, brainwashed pop b**** I'm made out to be by them. However, upon reevaluating my favourite albums, I still consider "Bat Out of Hell" one of the greatest. It conjures up memories of listening to it whilst darting down the M5 from Birmingham to Dawlish on our holidays. The whole album is amazing and the track I rated the least when I was younger, "For Crying Out Loud", is arguably now my favourite on the whole collection.
SINGLES: Bat Out of Hell/Hot Summer Night/Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad
3. ELO Time (1981)
ELO's 2nd chart-topper in the UK, "Time" is a concept album about a man who travels to the year 2095 and experiences soulless girlfriends, moon travel and meteor showers are commonplace. As much as the protagonist thinks he can continue to embrace the future world, ultimately he realises he should have stayed in the '80s.
SINGLES: Here Is The News/Twilight/Hold On Tight/Ticket to the Moon
4. Fleetwood Mac Rumours (1977)
1977 definitely seems to be the ultimate year for releasing a quality album... I want to get married just so I can get divorced and write a hit record from my experiences.
5. Britney Spears Femme Fatale (2011)
The only album in the chart from the current decade, Britney Spears is my most played artist according to my last.fm profile (misterPopsical) and it has certainly been helped by the prescence of her latest collection. More of Sweden's finest producers are showing up in my chart thanks the executive production duty of Max Martin. "Femme Fatale" is an example of an album which is overlooked by many because of the elements the general public and rubbish media publications that focus on the negative stuff, ignoring the fact that the instrumental AND VOCAL production is sublime throughout and every song could have been a single.
SINGLES: Hold It Against Me/Till The World Ends/I Wanna Go/Criminal
6. ABBA Arrival (1976)
ABBA's biggest-selling studio album features their biggest-selling global hit "Dancing Queen". But, it is the album as a whole which makes me rank this as my 6th favourite ever. "Dancing Queen" is by no means my favourite single of their's, not least helped by the overexposure it always receives. Album tracks "That's Me" and "Arrival" are highlights along with the other singles from this collection: "Knowing Me, Knowing You" and "Money, Money, Money".
SINGLES: Dancing Queen/Knowing Me, Knowing You/Money, Money, Money
7. Madonna Confessions on a Dancefloor (2005)
OK, so her output has become a little careless of late but, this disco throwback megamix of classics produced by Stuart Price helped make 2005 one of the best for pop album releases. The obvious highlight is "Hung Up"...
SINGLES: Hung Up/Sorry/Get Together/Jump
8. ELO A New World Record (1976)
This is the album which gave them their UK breakthrough, though ELO had already become a household name in the USA. Highlights include the whole "A" side of the album!
SINGLES: Telephone Line/Do Ya/Livin' Thing
9. ABBA The Visitors (1981)
ABBA's lowest-selling #1 album, the star was dwindling commercially and I was never fussed over this LP until I rediscovered the album in 2002 when I bought a turntable and starting playing my parents' old vinyl. "Soldiers" became one of my favourite ABBA songs and remains so. Just such a mature, solid collection of tracks. A fitting ending for the group, though having heard subsequent recordings like You Owe Me One and Just Like That, I wonder whether they could have returned with a more fun, poppy album in 1983?
SINGLES: One Of Us/When All Is Said and Done/Head Over Heels
10. Britney Spears In The Zone (2003)
This was my most played album of 2004 by a country mile. The Onyx Hotel tour was AMAZING and showed how much of a woman Britney really had become...
SINGLES: Me Against the Music/Toxic/Everytime/Outrageous
11. Spice Girls Spiceworld (1997)
Although not the album which broke them into the mainstream, Spiceworld is much more fun than their bestselling debut overall. This CD was played to death on my little Boots CD tower system in 1998 and only got removed when All Saints' debut ended up on my lap via my sister, who, foolishly passed it to me! She saw the error of her ways and bought the revised edition late in 1998.
SINGLES: Spice Up Your Life/Too Much/Stop/Viva Forever
12. The Darkness Permission to Land (2003)
When I worked on hospital radio, the main presenter of our show claimed that I would hate what I was about to hear when he dug out "I Believe in a Thing Called Love." How wrong he was. The next day I got the train to Nottingham and purchased "Permission to Land" on vinyl. Because of the thin, cheap vinyl it was produced on, I later had the CD, as did my mom and my sister then I bought it again as I scratched my disc through overuse! This is proof of a mega album surely! Later, in 2004, I broadcast a review on the album via the hospital radio to a rock station in the Netherlands. I discussed how the album seemed to fuse together elements of 2 of my favourite groups: ABBA and Queen. Just listen to "Love is Only a Feeling" and see if you can hear the resemblence to "Chiquitita"? SINGLES: Get Your Hands Off My Woman/Growing on Me/I Believe in a Thing Called Love/Love Is Only a Feeling
13. Girls Aloud Tangled Up (2007) SINGLES: Sexy!... No No No/Call The Shots/Can't Speak French
"Chemistry" turned Girls Aloud from a girlgroup I loved into a girlgroup I worshipped! The first half of the album is as good as it could ever get. However, it didn't make my top 20 because of the way it tails off during the 2nd half. I must be one of the minority who doesn't rate "Swinging London Town" but loves "Long Hot Summer"...Anyway, then came "Something Kinda Ooooh" which became my favourite single of the 2000s, a couple of covers which kept them in the spotlight and then...."Sexy...No No No" got its first play on Chris Moyles' Breakfast Show in July 2007. Blown away as soon as I heard Cheryl's autotuned intro, I almost came(!) Then "Call the Shots" became mine and my ex's 'song' (well, that's how I remember it). I could happily play Tangled Up from start to finish without skipping a track, which would become the practice when the next album came along.
14. Queen II (1974)
This is another album I remember from my childhood and I dug it out when I bought my own turntable in 2002 (for some reason I wanted to buy all my records on vinyl for no particular reason). I didn't appreciate the prog on the "White" side until 2 or 3 years ago when I had the CD by this point but now I think it's a brilliant indication of where Queen would go over the next couple of albums. But, it's Freddie's "Black" side which I am most fond of...a suite, if you will, of tracks celebrating the Black Queen and the mythical characters Freddie conjured up. You can hear in "March of the Black Queen" that a "Bohemian Rhapsody" was round the corner... SINGLES: Seven Seas of Rhye/White Queen (As It Began)
15. The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour (1967) Soundtrack to the TV movie which bombed upon its initial black and white BBC airing. Originally this album was only released in the US as it is a collection of the UK releases: "Magical Mystery Tour EP" plus the A and B sides to the singles released around this time.
SINGLES: Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane/All You Need Is Love/Hello, Goodbye
16. Lady Gaga The Fame (2008/9) Admittedly, it's "The Fame Monster" addition that made me want this album. The original collection is a bit hit and miss, though "Poker Face" stands as one of my favourite singles of all time. "The Fame Monster" disc is flawless, though, especially "Telephone" and the ABBA-esque "Alejandro."
SINGLES: Just Dance/Eh, Eh/Poker Face/Paparazzi/LoveGame/Bad Romance/Alejandro/Telephone
17. Queen A Day at the Races (1976) Seen as the album to compliment their breakthrough album "A Night at the Opera", that comparison goes as far as the title to be honest. Queen left behind the progressive sounds in favour of more grit, particularly on tracks like "Tie Your Mother Down" and "White Man".
SINGLES: Somebody to Love/Tie Your Mother Down/Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
18. Rachel Stevens Come and Get It (2005) A sales disaster, both singles and album-wise, this album luckily got picked up by many pop geeks like myself and is seen as a masterpiece. Popjustice want that follow-up and so do I!
SINGLES: Some Girls/Negotiate With Love/So Good/I Said Never Again
19. Ke$ha Animal (2009/10)
I have been a sucker for Autotune ever since Cher came out with "Believe". To have a whole album with autotuned vocals AND brilliantly produced tunes courtesy of Dr. Luke was going to create a surefire hit as far as I was concerned! Haters gon' hate. Just because Ke$ha can sing doesn't mean she has to if she's making music this amazing! A natural vocal wouldn't suit the style so there!
SINGLES: Tik Tok/Blah, Blah, Blah/Your Love Is My Drug/Take It Off/We R Who We R/Blow
20. The Corrs Forgiven Not Forgotten (1995)
I bought this in Woolworths, Exeter in March 1999. I remember that as I was on holiday thinking £4.99 was a great price for an album on tape! I was 13... The album is by far, The Corrs' greatest album. I never did take to Talk on Corners, maybe it was because I bought the original and not the remixed edition. Nonetheless, I found their global smash boring in comparison to their lesser-selling collections and quite like "Home" as well.
Well, that used up a few hours in between calls at work. Thanks for reading! Please comment :-)
1. ABBA The Album (1977)
This is one of the few LPs I wore out from my mother's collection when I was a child, when LPs were commonplace...how I miss them. But, through the years, ABBA have always been one of my top 10 groups at any given time. Today, I'd consider them my favourite group ever, overall. This album, released at the peak of their commercial success, features their biggest-selling U.S. single "Take a Chance on Me", plus the global hits, "The Name of the Game", "Eagle" and "Thank You For the Music". Although not the critics' choice, particularly at the time it was released, the album's mix of songs which take me back to childhood, tracks which meant more when I'd grown up and, tracks which work when I'm DJing...put this album at the top of my chart! "The Album" is the 1st of 3 entries from ABBA in this chart.
SINGLES: The Name of the Game/Take a Chance on Me/Eagle/Thank You For The Music
2. Meat Loaf Bat Out of Hell (1977)
I had considered this my favourite album ever, maybe, partially to show certain stuck-up plonkers that I'm not the stereotypical, brainwashed pop b**** I'm made out to be by them. However, upon reevaluating my favourite albums, I still consider "Bat Out of Hell" one of the greatest. It conjures up memories of listening to it whilst darting down the M5 from Birmingham to Dawlish on our holidays. The whole album is amazing and the track I rated the least when I was younger, "For Crying Out Loud", is arguably now my favourite on the whole collection.
SINGLES: Bat Out of Hell/Hot Summer Night/Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad
3. ELO Time (1981)
ELO's 2nd chart-topper in the UK, "Time" is a concept album about a man who travels to the year 2095 and experiences soulless girlfriends, moon travel and meteor showers are commonplace. As much as the protagonist thinks he can continue to embrace the future world, ultimately he realises he should have stayed in the '80s.
SINGLES: Here Is The News/Twilight/Hold On Tight/Ticket to the Moon
4. Fleetwood Mac Rumours (1977)
1977 definitely seems to be the ultimate year for releasing a quality album... I want to get married just so I can get divorced and write a hit record from my experiences.
5. Britney Spears Femme Fatale (2011)
The only album in the chart from the current decade, Britney Spears is my most played artist according to my last.fm profile (misterPopsical) and it has certainly been helped by the prescence of her latest collection. More of Sweden's finest producers are showing up in my chart thanks the executive production duty of Max Martin. "Femme Fatale" is an example of an album which is overlooked by many because of the elements the general public and rubbish media publications that focus on the negative stuff, ignoring the fact that the instrumental AND VOCAL production is sublime throughout and every song could have been a single.
SINGLES: Hold It Against Me/Till The World Ends/I Wanna Go/Criminal
6. ABBA Arrival (1976)
ABBA's biggest-selling studio album features their biggest-selling global hit "Dancing Queen". But, it is the album as a whole which makes me rank this as my 6th favourite ever. "Dancing Queen" is by no means my favourite single of their's, not least helped by the overexposure it always receives. Album tracks "That's Me" and "Arrival" are highlights along with the other singles from this collection: "Knowing Me, Knowing You" and "Money, Money, Money".
SINGLES: Dancing Queen/Knowing Me, Knowing You/Money, Money, Money
7. Madonna Confessions on a Dancefloor (2005)
OK, so her output has become a little careless of late but, this disco throwback megamix of classics produced by Stuart Price helped make 2005 one of the best for pop album releases. The obvious highlight is "Hung Up"...
SINGLES: Hung Up/Sorry/Get Together/Jump
8. ELO A New World Record (1976)
This is the album which gave them their UK breakthrough, though ELO had already become a household name in the USA. Highlights include the whole "A" side of the album!
SINGLES: Telephone Line/Do Ya/Livin' Thing
9. ABBA The Visitors (1981)
ABBA's lowest-selling #1 album, the star was dwindling commercially and I was never fussed over this LP until I rediscovered the album in 2002 when I bought a turntable and starting playing my parents' old vinyl. "Soldiers" became one of my favourite ABBA songs and remains so. Just such a mature, solid collection of tracks. A fitting ending for the group, though having heard subsequent recordings like You Owe Me One and Just Like That, I wonder whether they could have returned with a more fun, poppy album in 1983?
SINGLES: One Of Us/When All Is Said and Done/Head Over Heels
10. Britney Spears In The Zone (2003)
This was my most played album of 2004 by a country mile. The Onyx Hotel tour was AMAZING and showed how much of a woman Britney really had become...
SINGLES: Me Against the Music/Toxic/Everytime/Outrageous
11. Spice Girls Spiceworld (1997)
Although not the album which broke them into the mainstream, Spiceworld is much more fun than their bestselling debut overall. This CD was played to death on my little Boots CD tower system in 1998 and only got removed when All Saints' debut ended up on my lap via my sister, who, foolishly passed it to me! She saw the error of her ways and bought the revised edition late in 1998.
SINGLES: Spice Up Your Life/Too Much/Stop/Viva Forever
12. The Darkness Permission to Land (2003)
When I worked on hospital radio, the main presenter of our show claimed that I would hate what I was about to hear when he dug out "I Believe in a Thing Called Love." How wrong he was. The next day I got the train to Nottingham and purchased "Permission to Land" on vinyl. Because of the thin, cheap vinyl it was produced on, I later had the CD, as did my mom and my sister then I bought it again as I scratched my disc through overuse! This is proof of a mega album surely! Later, in 2004, I broadcast a review on the album via the hospital radio to a rock station in the Netherlands. I discussed how the album seemed to fuse together elements of 2 of my favourite groups: ABBA and Queen. Just listen to "Love is Only a Feeling" and see if you can hear the resemblence to "Chiquitita"? SINGLES: Get Your Hands Off My Woman/Growing on Me/I Believe in a Thing Called Love/Love Is Only a Feeling
13. Girls Aloud Tangled Up (2007) SINGLES: Sexy!... No No No/Call The Shots/Can't Speak French
"Chemistry" turned Girls Aloud from a girlgroup I loved into a girlgroup I worshipped! The first half of the album is as good as it could ever get. However, it didn't make my top 20 because of the way it tails off during the 2nd half. I must be one of the minority who doesn't rate "Swinging London Town" but loves "Long Hot Summer"...Anyway, then came "Something Kinda Ooooh" which became my favourite single of the 2000s, a couple of covers which kept them in the spotlight and then...."Sexy...No No No" got its first play on Chris Moyles' Breakfast Show in July 2007. Blown away as soon as I heard Cheryl's autotuned intro, I almost came(!) Then "Call the Shots" became mine and my ex's 'song' (well, that's how I remember it). I could happily play Tangled Up from start to finish without skipping a track, which would become the practice when the next album came along.
14. Queen II (1974)
This is another album I remember from my childhood and I dug it out when I bought my own turntable in 2002 (for some reason I wanted to buy all my records on vinyl for no particular reason). I didn't appreciate the prog on the "White" side until 2 or 3 years ago when I had the CD by this point but now I think it's a brilliant indication of where Queen would go over the next couple of albums. But, it's Freddie's "Black" side which I am most fond of...a suite, if you will, of tracks celebrating the Black Queen and the mythical characters Freddie conjured up. You can hear in "March of the Black Queen" that a "Bohemian Rhapsody" was round the corner... SINGLES: Seven Seas of Rhye/White Queen (As It Began)
15. The Beatles Magical Mystery Tour (1967) Soundtrack to the TV movie which bombed upon its initial black and white BBC airing. Originally this album was only released in the US as it is a collection of the UK releases: "Magical Mystery Tour EP" plus the A and B sides to the singles released around this time.
SINGLES: Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane/All You Need Is Love/Hello, Goodbye
16. Lady Gaga The Fame (2008/9) Admittedly, it's "The Fame Monster" addition that made me want this album. The original collection is a bit hit and miss, though "Poker Face" stands as one of my favourite singles of all time. "The Fame Monster" disc is flawless, though, especially "Telephone" and the ABBA-esque "Alejandro."
SINGLES: Just Dance/Eh, Eh/Poker Face/Paparazzi/LoveGame/Bad Romance/Alejandro/Telephone
17. Queen A Day at the Races (1976) Seen as the album to compliment their breakthrough album "A Night at the Opera", that comparison goes as far as the title to be honest. Queen left behind the progressive sounds in favour of more grit, particularly on tracks like "Tie Your Mother Down" and "White Man".
SINGLES: Somebody to Love/Tie Your Mother Down/Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy
18. Rachel Stevens Come and Get It (2005) A sales disaster, both singles and album-wise, this album luckily got picked up by many pop geeks like myself and is seen as a masterpiece. Popjustice want that follow-up and so do I!
SINGLES: Some Girls/Negotiate With Love/So Good/I Said Never Again
19. Ke$ha Animal (2009/10)
I have been a sucker for Autotune ever since Cher came out with "Believe". To have a whole album with autotuned vocals AND brilliantly produced tunes courtesy of Dr. Luke was going to create a surefire hit as far as I was concerned! Haters gon' hate. Just because Ke$ha can sing doesn't mean she has to if she's making music this amazing! A natural vocal wouldn't suit the style so there!
SINGLES: Tik Tok/Blah, Blah, Blah/Your Love Is My Drug/Take It Off/We R Who We R/Blow
20. The Corrs Forgiven Not Forgotten (1995)
I bought this in Woolworths, Exeter in March 1999. I remember that as I was on holiday thinking £4.99 was a great price for an album on tape! I was 13... The album is by far, The Corrs' greatest album. I never did take to Talk on Corners, maybe it was because I bought the original and not the remixed edition. Nonetheless, I found their global smash boring in comparison to their lesser-selling collections and quite like "Home" as well.
Well, that used up a few hours in between calls at work. Thanks for reading! Please comment :-)