Someone recently asked me if I have a favorite album, a question I found difficult to answer. Record collectors like debating these things in objective terms—what’s the best?—but a favorite is subjective and really more meaningful. (“Best” mostly stands in for “most popular,” as determined by either historical metrics or the consensus verdict of an in-crowd.) The question is how you choose a favorite. You can decide that a particular artwork best represents who you are (or, more cynically, the image of yourself you wish to present to others) but that’s an overly calculated decision. An honest answer is arrived by either a materialist method or a free associative one. Namely:
Which album have I listened to most?
Which album comes to mind first?
Neither is a perfect measure: sometimes a song gets stuck in your head precisely because you hate it, and sometimes a single listen to something that really resonates is more powerful than repeated listens to something you reliably but idly enjoy. There’s also a complicating factor that is more deliberate: which of the possibilities arrived at by the above heuristics do I most want to hear again?
For me, the other difficulty in choosing a single album is that I listen to a lot of different kinds of music, which serve different purposes in terms of emotional response and sense experience. We tend to think of recorded sound as the medium and various musical practices as genres, but I would argue that distinct forms of music can amount to being different media altogether. We don’t consider all visual arts the same medium (even though we encounter most of them through one, the photograph), so why should this elision obtain with sound?
A DJ mix is not the same thing as a record (in fact, the former may use the latter in its production), and neither is the same as a symphony. A rock opera produced by means of extensive overdubbing and multitracking is not equivalent to a real-time jam session document. That’s why it it drives me nuts when Rolling Stone-type “best albums ever” lists are 98 rock albums and then Kind of Blue and A Love Supreme. You’re telling me there are only two jazz albums as good as Led Zeppelin XVII and whatever Taylor Swift put out the year that list was published? I’d rather they left jazz off those lists entirely. There’s no need to make a “best paintings” list that throws in a couple sculptures.
Anyway, I thought about the question and made a few recommendations, but the train of thought kept on hurtling down the tracks. I couldn’t pick just one album, but I could narrow it down to a set of equally valid answers. A subjective selection has to be built from memory, which makes it inherently unreliable, but what I eventually arrived at did start to look authentic. I could see phases I’ve gone through, and it added up to a statement of what matters to me aesthetically and personally. It’s true that all this is primarily of interest only to me, but I haven’t posted in this newsletter for a while and I didn’t have anything else going on.
I limited myself at the outset to 100 entries, which is why there are 101. It was more interesting to make it one album per artist, but the truth is there are some artists who made more than one record that qualifies. In cases where an artist has other albums I listen to just as often or like just as much, I’ve listed them as well. These are not authoritative assessments of those discographies, and some are woefully incomplete even by my own standards (e.g. Miles Davis—how do you pick between Cookin’, Relaxin’, Workin’, and Steamin’?). I’ve lumped together twofers, collaborations, and pseudonymous releases, because that’s how I sort my collection.
Despite my complaint about tokenism above, I’m allowed to mix genres as much as I want, since this is personal and makes no objective value judgments. Because of that, there’s no point in ranking, so this is just alphabetical (by first name—wasn’t about to do this manually). The idea is, depending on the mood I’m in, I could name any of these as my favorite album and not feel like it was the wrong answer.
If you’re considering writing to me disputing my selections, can I suggest…not doing that? I know some of you fellas out there love to raise a fuss about anything numerical. But there’s no argument to be had about favorites. These aren’t supposed to be “the best” albums, as I’ve established at such length that most of you have probably stopped reading. Nor are they the only ones I like. They’re simply the ones I’ve listened to most and will continue to listen to. I do happen to be the world’s foremost authority on that subject. The only valid reason to dispute these selections would be if I once told you an album was my favorite and I forgot about it, or if you personally observed me listening to an album a hundred times and I left it out. That said, if you have a suggestion for me that might become a new favorite, I’m all ears.
Al Green - Call Me
I’m Still in Love With You, The Belle Album
Alvin Lucier - I Am Sitting in a Room
Antonio Carlos Jobim - Wave
Stone Flower, Elis & Tom
Aretha Franklin - I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You
Ashra - Blackouts
New Age of Earth, E2-E4
Augustus Pablo - King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown
East of the River Nile
The Beach Boys - Love You
Pet Sounds, Surf’s Up
Big Joe Turner - The Boss of the Blues
Big Star - #1 Record/Radio City
Third/Sister Lovers
Bill Evans - The Tony Bennett/Bill Evans Album
Everybody Digs Bill Evans, Portrait in Jazz, Sunday at the Village Vanguard, Undercurrent
Bill Frisell - Bill Frisell, Ron Carter, Paul Motian
Have a Little Faith, Disfarmer
The Blasters - The Blasters
Non Fiction, Hard Line
Brian Eno - Another Green World
Here Come the Warm Jets, Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks
Can - Future Days
Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi
Carl Craig - More Songs About Food and Revolutionary Art
The Secret Tapes of Dr. Eich, Landcruising
Charles Mingus - Mingus Ah Um
Blues & Roots, Oh Yeah, The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady
Chuck Berry - After School Session
Chuck Berry Is On Top, St. Louis to Liverpool
D'Angelo - Black Messiah
Voodoo
Dusty Springfield - Dusty in Memphis
Dwight Yoakam - This Time
Buenas Noches From A Lonely Room, If There Was A Way
Elvis Costello - Armed Forces
My Aim is True, This Year’s Model, Get Happy, Trust, King of America
Faces - Ooh La La
Long Player, A Nod Is As Good As a Wink to a Blind Horse
Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine
Frank Sinatra - In the Wee Small Hours
Songs for Swingin’ Lovers, Where Are You, No One Cares, Only the Lonely, September of My Years
Funkadelic - Hardcore Jollies
Maggot Brain, Let’s Take it to the Stage, One Nation Under a Groove
The Flying Burrito Brothers - The Gilded Palace of Sin
Gang of Four - Solid Gold
Entertainment!
George Jones - The Grand Tour
I Am What I Am
George Michael - Faith
Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1
George Strait - Strait From the Heart
Strait Country, Does Fort Worth Ever Cross Your Mind, Beyond the Blue Neon
Gram Parsons - G.P./Grievous Angel
Grant Green - Idle Moments
GZA - Liquid Swords
Hank Mobley - Soul Station
Helen Merrill - Helen Merrill
Herb Ellis - Nothing But the Blues
Herbie Hancock - Maiden Voyage
Empyrean Isles, Head Hunters
Howlin’ Wolf - Moanin’ in the Moonlight/Howlin’ Wolf
Hüsker Dü - New Day Rising
Iasos - Inter-Dimensional Music
J Dilla - Donuts
James Carr - You've Got My Mind Messed Up
Jerry Jeff Walker - Ridin’ High
Jerry Lee Lewis - Live at the Star Club, Hamburg
She Still Comes Around (To Love What's Left of Me), Another Place Another Time, She Even Woke Me Up to Say Goodbye
John Coltrane - A Love Supreme
Giant Steps, Coltrane Plays the Blues, Ballads
John Fahey - Death Chants, Breakdowns & Military Waltzes
Blind Joe Death, Days Have Gone By, The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death
Joni Mitchell - Court & Spark
Blue, Hejira
Julie London - Julie Is Her Name, Vol. 1
Kenny Burrell - Midnight Blue
The Kinks - Village Green Preservation Society
Something Else, Arthur, Muswell Hillbillies
The KLF - Chill Out
Laura Nyro - Eli and the Thirteenth Confession
Liz Phair - Exile in Guyville
Lucinda Williams - Car Wheels On a Gravel Road
Lucinda Williams
Marshall Crenshaw - Marshall Crenshaw
Field Day, Downtown
Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear
Mekons - Fear and Whiskey
Rock 'N' Roll, The Curse of the Mekons
Merle Haggard - Swinging Doors and the Bottle Let Me Down
Mama Tried, Pride In What I Am, Back to the Barrooms, Serving 190 Proof, Big City, Going Where the Lonely Go
Miles Davis - In a Silent Way
’Round About Midnight, Kind of Blue, Someday My Prince Will Come, E.S.P., Nefertiti, A Tribute to Jack Johnson
Millie Jackson - Caught Up
Model 500 - Deep Space
Moodymann - Silentintroduction
Forevernomore
The Mothers of Invention - We’re Only in It for the Money
Mr. Fingers - Amnesia
Nas - Illmatic
The New York Dolls - The New York Dolls
Too Much Too Soon
Neil Young - Tonight's the Night
After the Gold Rush, On the Beach, Rust Never Sleeps
Neu - Neu!
Neu! ’75
Nick Lowe - Labour of Lust
Jesus of Cool, The Impossible Bird
Notorious B.I.G. - Ready to Die
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan - Shahbaaz
The Old 97’s - Too Far to Care
Original Broadway Cast - Company
Ornette Coleman - The Shape of Jazz to Come
Science Fiction, Of Human Feelings
Parliament - Funkentelechy vs. the Placebo Syndrome
Mothership Connection, The Clones of Dr. Funkenstein, Motor Booty Affair
The Pet Shop Boys - Actually
Please, Introspective, Behaviour, Very
Prince - Parade
Dirty Mind, 1999, Purple Rain, Sign ‘O’ the Times
Randy Newman - 12 Songs
Sail Away, Good Old Boys, Trouble in Paradise
Randy Travis - Always & Forever
Storms of Life, Old 8×10
Rodney Crowell - The Houston Kid
Ain’t Living Long Like This, Diamonds & Dirt
Robert Hood - Minimal Nation
Internal Empire, Nighttime World Vol. 1
Rod Stewart - Never a Dull Moment
Gasoline Alley, Every Picture Tells a Story
The Rolling Stones - Exile On Main Street
Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers, Some Girls, Brussels Affair
Sly and the Family Stone - There's a Riot Goin' On
Stand, Fresh
Sonny Clark - Cool Struttin’
Sonny Rollins - The Bridge
Saxophone Colossus
Squeeze - Argybargy
East Side Story
Steely Dan - Gaucho
Can’t Buy a Thrill, Countdown to Ecstasy, Pretzel Logic, Katy Lied, Aja
Stevie Wonder - Fulfillingness’ First Finale
Music of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions
Television - Marquee Moon
Thelonious Monk - Solo Monk
Monk’s Music, Monk’s Dream
Theo Parrish - First Floor
Tricky - Maxinquaye
2Pac - Me Against the World
The Upsetters - Super Ape
Utah Phillips - We Have Fed You All a Thousand Years
Waylon Jennings - Honky Tonk Heroes
Dreaming My Dreams
Wayne Shorter - Speak No Evil
Night Dreamer, Juju, Adam’s Apple
Weather Report - Weather Report
Heavy Weather
Wes Montgomery - Smokin’ at the Half Note
Incredible Jazz Guitar
Willie Nelson - Phases and Stages
Shotgun Willie, To Lefty From Willie, Somewhere Over the Rainbow
A note on omissions: I’ve excluded compilations, which are too variable. I love a lot of music that isn’t oriented around the format of the LP—not just styles that preceded it, like early jazz, blues, and country, but also those that don’t primarily use it, like house and techno. That limitation is why I haven’t included discs like The Best of Muddy Waters—those that are historically relevant and more canonical than the LPs their contents were sourced from—not to mention any Louis Armstrong or Hank Williams or Count Basie or Duke Ellington or Billie Holiday or Charlie Parker and so on, all of whom I’ve spent countless hours listening to. The dance records here, cobbled together from 12-inch singles, are probably cheating, and they’re only a fleeting glimpse of the genre in the first place, but it’s too important to me to skip. Early Motown was also too much a singles operation for inclusion, forcing me to leave out Smokey Robinson.
I’ve only recently started learning about Latin music, and classical music doesn’t fit the prompt (not an “albums” medium, and not something I know much about anyway). There isn’t really any metal here because I rarely listen to it, though I do enjoy it (I considered including Black Sabbath’s Master of Reality, Obituary’s Cause of Death, Entombed’s Wolverine Blues, and Carcass’s Heartwork, but I’m not as familiar with any of them as I am all of the above). Punk was never a defining principle for me, though there is plenty here from its periphery. On the opposing pole, progressive rock usually leaves me cold, though I do love King Crimson’s Red. There’s less indie rock than there could have been; based on prior listening habits I considered Silver Jews and Stereolab, but I’m no longer sure which records were my favorites, and checking on it would have defeated the purpose of the exercise. Some stuff I got really into in younger phases of my life, like The Velvet Underground or The Replacements, now seems inextricable from those times. I’m forever meaning to get a better grip on contemporary rap. I went through a phase not long ago where I listened to nothing but dub reggae and one album stood out as my new favorite, but now I can’t for the life of me remember which one it was (and I don’t even smoke pot).
As for “classic rock,” I’m not a fan of Led Zeppelin and it’s not a priority for me to listen to The Beatles or Bob Dylan again during my remaining time on earth. There are some consensus “classics” I’ve listened to many, many times—Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland, Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, Bruce Springsteen’s Darkness at the Edge of Town—but I’m not sure how I’d feel about them today without reminding myself by listening again. Part of the fun of being a collector is rediscovery, so I’m sure my choices would fluctuate if I did this again next year, but this is how it looks to me now.
Music 101 (subjective)
Valuable list!
Agreed that a personal list of favourites is more meaningful than a list of "the best." Also, generally far more interesting, I'd say. I see some overlaps here with my own list (which is mostly in my head). I'm listening to Blackouts now (still mostly new to krautrock) and have bookmarked this list with plans to refer to it in the future. Thanks for sharing!