Quintessential Listening

YorkeDaddy · 06-19-2015, 06:17 PM

@ TH wonder what you think of adding a Bowie album at least, I also think some soul/R&B/hiphop representation would really add some ubiquity to your list. In other words, a combination of our lists with Moss's would be a really great list!

Trollheart · 06-19-2015, 06:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by YorkeDaddy

@ TH wonder what you think of adding a Bowie album at least, I also think some soul/R&B/hiphop representation would really add some ubiquity to your list. In other words, a combination of our lists with Moss's would be a really great list!

Oh yeah, there are tons I left out. Ziggy Stardust maybe, or Diamond Dogs. Or Low. Probably Low actually.

In fairness to Frown, that Eric Dolphy is essential for anyone (like me) who can't get into jazz. I should add that too.

Would it be an idea to build a collaborative list between us all, something like how the 1001 albums was created?

**Frownland** · 06-19-2015, 06:57 PM

Just a thread where people post whatever they think are albums people should definitely check out.

mythsofmetal · 06-19-2015, 07:58 PM

With these albums I've made sure I feel that they're each very important in their respective genre fields, and I'm going to interpret the premise of the thread as about posting personally deeply valued albums. Ones which upon coming across the idea of there being a chance I could have possibly never heard them, would induce an awfully dreadful feeling about what I could've missed in me.

I'm gonna make a brief description of what each one's about, and why I'm adding it to the list in spoilers below the band/album in question.

Gire - Gire

Spoiler for Gire - Gire:

Sigh - Imaginary Sonicscape

Spoiler for Sigh - Imaginary Sonicscape:

Windir - Arntor

Spoiler for Windir - Arntor:

Sigh - In Somniphobia

Spoiler for Sigh - In Somniphobia:

Absu - Abzu

Spoiler for Absu - Abzu:

Sigh - Graveward

Spoiler for Sigh - Graveward:

Okay, so that's not everything I would consider so deeply special to me, however I think I'll leave it at this for now. I really hope a good amount of others will see these albums as I do. Though of course I will understand if others felt differently, I really hope these will click with new listeners as they did with me, and that people who know these albums have seen what I've seen in them.

Pet_Sounds · 06-19-2015, 09:57 PM

Am I honestly the first to mention Bob Dylan? Blood on the Tracks and Highway 61 Revisited are quintessential listening.

T.Rex's Electric Warrior is the quintessential glam rock album IMO, even moreso than Ziggy Stardust.

@Frown Nice job mentioning The Concert in Central Park. That's right up there with Live at the Apollo for quintssential live listening.

grindy · 06-19-2015, 11:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trollheart

Oh yeah, there are tons I left out. Ziggy Stardust maybe, or Diamond Dogs. Or Low. Probably Low actually.

In fairness to Frown, that Eric Dolphy is essential for anyone (like me) who can't get into jazz. I should add that too.

Would it be an idea to build a collaborative list between us all, something like how the 1001 albums was created?

It would be interesting to let this thread go on for some time and then make a meta-list of albums that have been mentioned twice or more.
That way all those terrible, unimportant albums will be filtered out and we'd be more in the realm of objectivity.

Neapolitan · 06-20-2015, 02:09 AM

Since Rock is my main interest (and most of its sub-genres belonging to it) I always thought I should have a broad over-view of it, or at least wanted to. There is so much out there it is impossible to name everything. This seems an impossible task, at least for me cause once I write out at list it looks awkward like it is missing something, or add too many things. Anyway here the ones I could think off hand. If I didn't mention an album, then check out a greatest hits.

Country Blues
Mississippi John Hurt - Complete 1928 Okeh Recordings
Elizabeth Cotten - Freight Train and Other North Carolina Folk Songs and Tunes. Smithsonian Folkways
Blind Willie McTell - Atlanta Twelve String

Early Rock and Roll/Rockabilly
Fats Domino
Big Joe Turner
Chuck Berry
Bo Diddley
Elvis Presley
Gene Vincent
Eddie Cochran
Ritchie Valens
Jack Scott
Ronnie Hawkins
Johnny Burnette
Johnny Cash
Jerry Lee Lewis

Instrumentals

Les Paul
Chet Atkins
Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass

Jazz
Johnny Smith Quintet - Moonlight in Vermont (1952)
Rufus Harley - Bagpipe Blues
Rufus Harley - Scotch & Soul
Dave Brubeck Quartet - Time Out

Instrumental Rock
Link Wray
The Shadows
The Ventures
Duane Eddy
Johnny and the Hurricanes

(pre-EDM/IDM) Electronic
W. Carlos - Switched-On Bach (originally release under Walter Carlos, now Wendy Carlos)
Jean Jacques Perrey - The Amazing New Electronic Pop Sound
Jean Michel Jarre - Equinoxe
John Chowning - Turenas · Stria · Phoné · Sabelithe

Rock
The British Invasion
The Rolling Stones
I listened to every album from England's Newest Hit Makers to Tattoo You, & Jamming With Edward!
The Beatles
I listen to every Beatle album, and have two dozen cover-song albums which are either from a band compilations or done by a single artist.
Meeks - Beatless (as far as Beatle cover albums go is a "Quintessential Listening")

Progressive Rock/Jam bands
Allman Brothers - At Fillmore East
Emerson, Lake & Palmer - Trilogy (the first 31 minutes are brilliant, the last two songs are ok, but I skip them.)
Egg - Egg
Traffic - Mr Fantasy
Traffic - Traffic
Traffic - The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys
Shingetsu - Shingetsu
Saga - Worlds Apart
I own mostly every Genesis and Yes albums and a few solo albums to boot... and some live bootlegs. It's difficult to make a decision which one to mention as essential.

Chula Vista · 06-20-2015, 09:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neapolitan

I own mostly every Genesis and Yes albums and a few solo albums to boot... and some live bootlegs. It's difficult to make a decision which one to mention as essential.

I'd start with Close to the Edge and Selling England by the Pound.

Trollheart · 06-20-2015, 10:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chula Vista

I'd start with Close to the Edge and Selling England by the Pound.

I've never been a SEbtP man; much more into Wind and Wuthering, Trespass, Nursery Cryme, that kind of thing. And the Lamb of course.

Another suggestion: vote on best albums, the ones that get the highest votes go on the list? Or do a Survivor kind of thing, even a separate thread, and link it here?

**Frownland** · 06-20-2015, 10:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trollheart

I've never been a SEbtP man; much more into Wind and Wuthering, Trespass, Nursery Cryme, that kind of thing. And the Lamb of course.

Another suggestion: vote on best albums, the ones that get the highest votes go on the list? Or do a Survivor kind of thing, even a separate thread, and link it here?

I kind of wanted to make this a general thread instead of a competitive one. If someone wants to make a separate survivor type thread I'll link it in the OP.

06-19-2015, 06:57 PM	#73 (permalink)
Frownland SOPHIE FOREVER Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: East of the Southern North American West Posts: 35,541	Just a thread where people post whatever they think are albums people should definitely check out. __________________ Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth. d e a f b o x

06-19-2015, 07:58 PM	#74 (permalink)
mythsofmetal Music Addict Join Date: Nov 2012 Posts: 207	With these albums I've made sure I feel that they're each very important in their respective genre fields, and I'm going to interpret the premise of the thread as about posting personally deeply valued albums. Ones which upon coming across the idea of there being a chance I could have possibly never heard them, would induce an awfully dreadful feeling about what I could've missed in me. I'm gonna make a brief description of what each one's about, and why I'm adding it to the list in spoilers below the band/album in question. Gire - Gire Spoiler for Gire - Gire: (This is an experimental metal album which had excellent results. This Hungarian band masterfully blended Death Metal, Electronic music, and Folk music so well, and came out with such a unique, cohesive, polished, masterpiece of a result that it just blows my mind how they really got so much to come together for their one and only LP release. There's the intensity of Death Metal, the calm, beautiful consonance of some Folk, the majestic, whirling atmosphere of Electronic music, and interesting blending of it all in a new style that makes a lot of sense yet hasn't seemed to be realized by many, if any others.) Sigh - Imaginary Sonicscape Spoiler for Sigh - Imaginary Sonicscape: (This is another album of great experimental metal, like a lot of what I would consider quintessential to me. Here Sigh mixes the style they started out as, which is Black Metal, with Heavy Metal, Psychedelic Rock, and various other genres. All the songs are very solid while having their own unique personalities of sorts, and also come together into something which makes sense as a whole album and doesn't feel disjointed either. Pretty much all of the songs have highlights, or are just plain great in themselves, though that guitar solo on Dreamsphere (Return to the Chaos) is something which's particularly held resonance with me.) Windir - Arntor Spoiler for Windir - Arntor: (It's super consistent, with an excellent atmosphere, great interwoven, massive guitar melodies, and certainly an overall production, tone, and composition which left a great impression on me. This is some Atmospheric Melodic Black Metal with Folk aspects at its best, and has become a classic I must listen to in full annually, typically around the winter season. All of the songs are easily recognizable and have pretty much become iconic to me in presenting just how great an achievement this album was as there truly is no filler, with each song of course being unique while also equally special and flowing together so well, which is something quite praiseworthy to be honest.) Sigh - In Somniphobia Spoiler for Sigh - In Somniphobia: (Another great experimental effort from Sigh which is also very cohesive, however very unique of course. This album turns up the Prog Rock and Jazz influences quite a bit, and also uses some good noise techniques to convey the sense of being in a dream quite well, and of course there's loads of other fairly unexpected stuff thrown logically into the mix. Now I'm feeling I'm being a bit redundant with saying this, but this album goes together so well, while the songs are also fairly different yet similarly great. That really is something I've liked about Sigh quite a lot, in how they manage to have a theme for an album which all the songs more-or-less fit into, and the theme being different from any album they've done prior, while of course having similarities yet staying unique in a new exciting way, and letting the different songs be unique within the theme and typically all being of high quality is something I've really come to love about them.) Absu - Abzu Spoiler for Absu - Abzu: (Yes I'm serious with this, and am picking this over a probably more popular Tara pick because I personally truly feel this album is much more special than any releases they did prior. The production is excellent, creating a great murky scene for their extreme Thrashing Black Metal to flow through. The guitars are absolutely amazing, and there are many layers to them, great melodies, and good use of interesting chords and other techniques to get really intense sounds out of them. The drums are amazing too of course and are about just as big a draw as anything else about the album is. All of the songs are really great, and having the proceeding songs to the 14 minute mythological epic ending song, being fairly short, somewhat to the point yet complex with their own uniqueness, is really great. The closing song "A Song for EA" really delves into the dark psychedelic murky atmosphere they were going for, and is a truly great ending, deserving of as much praise as it can get and probably more, and the prior songs likewise hold their place on this album too. This album is just so consistent, and constantly great, with there also being nothing else really like it that I've heard which cements its place as being something really quintessential for me) Sigh - Graveward Spoiler for Sigh - Graveward: (Of course there's a pattern here, and it ends here, because I really felt like I should try to narrow things down at least a bit, no matter how much I wanted to list more than half their discography. :P This album is probably most similar to their earlier Hail Horror Hail album in that it's really a great avant-garde take on cinematic horror inspired metal. Some differences are the great technical lead guitar work, interesting production with high quality synths/orchestra sounds, and just generally a good variety of other great new stuff added into the mix, yet it all comes out cohesive and not jumbled, which is quite a hard thing to do I would assume. There's also some hearkenings to other previous albums of theirs, but don't be confused, this album certainly has its own style. This album is just really consistent and unique, though I feel there's some songs which stand a bit above the rest, that's because they're essentially 11/10's while the rest is perfect... If that makes any sense...) Okay, so that's not everything I would consider so deeply special to me, however I think I'll leave it at this for now. I really hope a good amount of others will see these albums as I do. Though of course I will understand if others felt differently, I really hope these will click with new listeners as they did with me, and that people who know these albums have seen what I've seen in them. Last edited by mythsofmetal; 06-19-2015 at 08:06 PM.

06-19-2015, 09:57 PM	#75 (permalink)
Pet_Sounds Remember the underscore Join Date: Feb 2014 Location: The other side Posts: 2,488	Am I honestly the first to mention Bob Dylan? Blood on the Tracks and Highway 61 Revisited are quintessential listening. T.Rex's Electric Warrior is the quintessential glam rock album IMO, even moreso than Ziggy Stardust. @Frown Nice job mentioning The Concert in Central Park. That's right up there with Live at the Apollo for quintssential live listening. __________________ Everybody's dying just to get the disease