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| The Last truly Great rock band if not the greatest. Nirvana wish. |
Fuck me Rolling Stone have put out a Best 500 albums magazine and geez I'm gonna boil over & end up in the Loony Bin. I've just skimmed through it in a hurry and it's the sane old jive. I thought 'wait I'm gonna spend $10 on something I'm gonna hate, no I will not'. Now thinking that would have been worth it just to write about. God I think I've still got 6 records to go in my Glaring Omissions (on Australian Rock) series at least. So The fucking Clash make top 10 but where are The Smiths, somewhere way down the back. Nevermind is better than Doolittle yeah sure. I even believe they had The Bends and OK Computer above Loveless??? That's pretty funny! The Clash over the Sex Pistols, I didn't realise Americans were so hilarious. Hotel California over The greatest LP of all time Love's Forever Changes. A Moby Grape LP over The Byrds at their absolute peak on Younger Than Yesterday. Highway 61 Revisited I like but you know what Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation is way fuckin better than that. Pavement's Fall tribute LP Slanted & Enchanted but no Fall albums. Nine Inch Nails but no Skinny Puppy haha... These yanks need to loosen up. Sly's There's a Riot goin on at 99, what about at 9.
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| Like RadioFuckhead are anywhere near as good as this! |
It is quite a skewed list when you get further down. The Velvet Underground's Loaded LP comes in way higher than the two more superior records White Light/White Heat and The Velvet Underground (or 3rd). Who knew Eric Clapton had so many projects and that Americans (well RS writers anyway) loved every single one of them. Tracey Chapman's there, but seriously who's listened to that LP in like 20 years. I am coming from an Australian perspective so maybe there's some cultural thing I'm missing. Anyway who really likes Van Morrison or Randy Newman? Oasis made it in somehow but other great British 80s into 90s bands missed out. No Happy Mondays, Pulp, Spiritualised or Stereolab here. Then there were the fab America 90s psych/pop bands like Mercury Rev and the Flaming Lips who don't appear. The 2 strangest entries are The Zombies who come in very high with Odyssey and Oracle who I really like and Peter Wolf with his record Sleepless (who outside The US even knows what this is? Was he the dude from J Geils band?). Things like Alexander Skip Spence's OAR or The Monks: Black Monk Time don't turn up let alone other great stuff like Karen Dalton, Silver Apples or The United States of America. Electronic music forget about it, There is one Kraftwerk LP as a token.
I remember a list like this in the magazine, maybe from 1988 and the first 50 have not changed bar about 3.It's like it's been set in stone and they have to have a Vatican council meeting for the slightest change to be made It's weird, old, way too rigid and no fun. U2's Joshua Tree comes in ahead of The Doors first LP. The anomalies just keep coming. Weezer's debut ahead of the Pixies Surfer Rosa. Here's a ripper Guns and Roses Appetite For Destruction comes in ahead of these 3: Led Zeppelin II, ACDC's Back in Black and Zep's Physical Graffiti. Then there's 3 inferior later Roxy Music LPs that come way ahead of their all time classic For You Pleasure. Joy Division's Closer makes it but where's Unknown Pleasures. Green Day come in ahead of Lou Reed's Transformer with Dookie. They've got token country, jazz Reggae & even trip hop. The most recent LP I think is The strokes debut. It's not like it's all shit music quite the contrary. Maybe they shouldn't number them, you know it's not sport, just put 'em in alphabetical order or chronologically. Oh but then they have to have a secret ballot and get the pope to smoke his pipe through a hole and then a cardinal will have to interpret the smoke for the decision to be made.
Some bands that missed out that perhaps should have been considered - The Residents, The Ventures, OS Mutantes, The Insect Trust, Comus, The Incredible String Band, The Seeds, America, Goblin, Pere Ubu, The Gun Club, The Saints, X-Ray Spex, The Feelies, The Wipers, Can (but they're not American or British uh oh), Cluster, ESG, The Meat Puppets, Burzum, The Dream Syndicate, Vanity 6, Throbbing Gristle, Chrome, Cabaret Voltaire, The Birthday Party, Cocteau Twins, Scott Walker, Donna Summer, Gong, The Groundhogs, Jimmy Castor Bunch, Booty's Rubber Band, Chic, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Flipper, Talk Talk, Dinosaur Jr, Boredoms, Slint, Royal Trux, Aphex Twin, Marc Acardipane, Boards Of Canada, Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Burial..........I could go on forever.
I've made up a different top 10 from the top 500 just off the top of my head and in no particular order.
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| ZZ Top's lunch. That cheese is gonna be a problem |
- Tres Hombres - ZZ Top
- Dirty Mind - Prince
- Marquee Moon - Television
- Suicide - Suicide
- Double Nickels On The Dime - Minutemen
- Stand - Sly & the Family Stone
- Paranoid - Black Sabbath
- The Queen is Dead - The Smiths
- Look-Ka Py Py - The Meters
- Let's Get It On - Marvin Gaye
Is there a need for this list now in this day and age of access all areas and Internet flux? No and we're not buyin it. We make our own top 500s now It's 2012 the times belong to the Ariels, Gang Gangs, Ferraros, southern hip hop etc. Then there's 70s Afro psych/beat/funk, Indonesian 70s rock, Chica/Cumbia from Peru, 70's Hungarian Funk, Swedish psych from the 60/70s, Thai genres like Luk Thung & Molam, 60/70s Anadolu pop from Turkey etc. to listen to so why the fuck would I want to listen to Radiohead, Green Day, Pearl Jam, Eurythmics, No Doubt or Coldfuckinplay! It's kinda a little bit sad that the old farts (nothing too modern here please, like from the last decade or anything unless it sounds like something from a previous decade and keep it American or British, nothing too exotic please. Where did I leave my walking stick? Christgau have you seen it anywhere?) at RS are hangin onto their James Taylor's, Janis fuckin Joplins, Linda Ronstadts & Vans. Who cares?
In a word redundant!
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