minneapolisidiot said:

cosign.

No Stevie Wonder in the entire list!?

BT11 said:

Rightfully so. Stevie's best work was pre-1985.

sextonseven said:

So you don't like U2 that much. But the first side of the album runs like a Greatest Hits album and the second side runs like a great U2 album.

Maybe Achtung Baby is better, but I think Joshua Tree could have at least made it on the list. It's like saying Revolver is the best album ever and Sgt Pepper doesn't make the list because it's just too obvious. They probably meant to make it #1 but forgot.

andyman91 said:

I think the opposite would be a better comparison. 'Sgt Pepper' to me was more adventurous like 'Achtung Baby'.

sextonseven said:

What I'm really saying is Achtung Baby is a hipper choice just like Revolver. Just like Sign 'o' the Times vs. Purple Rain and Innervisions vs. Songs in the Key of Life.

Jarret said:

My, my aren't we sensitive?

I actually agree with you about the complaints sometimes being worse than the lists themselves.

namepeace said:

I hear you both...but wouldn't this be a REAL boring thread if we all just piped in and said: "Huh. Interesting List." ??

endorphin74 said:

It is an interesting list. Nation of Millions is, IMHO, a deserving no. 2, tho IMH-but biased-O, I'd put Sign O' The Times at the top of the list. Save for Missy Elliott, the list gets the hip-hop picks right. I'd have put in a good word for Madvillainy.

On the flip side, the list is an indirect indictment of soul music over the last 20 years. Deservedly so? It's arguable.

namepeace said:

I agree with that statement. If the list was the best 100 albums from 1965-85 then there should be tons of soul on it. But 1985-2005? Not as impressive.

sextonseven said:

I agree with that overall. But you could make the argument that in the last 10 years, Jill Scott, Erykah Badu, D'Angelo, and Maxwell released albums that were every bit as good as many of the rock albums mentioned on here. But Spin has never paid much attention to soul music, however good or bad it is. They give rock the benefit of the doubt over soul. To their credit, hip-hop gets a lot of respect. But a Mama's Gun or Voodoo can stand up to at least half of the albums on that list.

namepeace said:

That's why I hate lists like these and take them with a grain of salt because no one can say what the best album of the last 20 years is, its all a matter of taste. Furthermore, the lists will always have a bias moreso toward the rock genre. I have Ok Computer and its a good album, but its far from what I would consider the best album of the last 20 years.
[Edited 6/24/05 11:45am]

Yep. List looked good at first, but now it is glaring how well-rounded it is NOT.

namepeace said:

That's why 'Voodoo' is on the list.

sextonseven said:

D'OH!!!!

I think its important, and refreshing to see that Voodoo is on that list.. That is a true soul disk for me.. its real.. its everything it should be.

I just got done actually reading this Spin and I am quite impressed. It's been a LONG time since I actually enjoyed an issue of Spin, so I'm a bit shocked by how well they did with this list.

Of course I have a handful of albums that I can't believe didn't make the list, but the one complaint of mine which I think is most valid is the omission of Sinead's 'Lion and the Cobra.' That album just blew in with such rage and beauty from the bald n crazy sinead that no one knew what hit them, just that it was good.

She may have gone quite loony over the years, but still that album paved the way for many, many angry rockgrrrls and I think they missed the boat on not including it on the list.



...need coffee edit...
[Edited 6/25/05 9:24am]

I would have liked to see Lauryn Hill rank higher & Missy Elliot rank lower... or not rank at all

top 20 greatest rock and pop albums of all time music critics choice:
...
...





1 The Beach Boys
Pet Sounds
1966


2 The Beatles
Revolver
1966


3 Nirvana
Nevermind
1991


4 The Velvet Underground & Nico
The Velvet Underground & Nico
1967


5 The Beatles
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
1967


6 The Rolling Stones
Exile on Main St
1972


7 Bob Dylan
Blonde on Blonde
1966


8 Marvin Gaye
What's Going On
1971


9 Sex Pistols
Never Mind the Bollocks - Here's the Sex Pistols
1977


10 The Clash
London Calling
1979


11 Van Morrison
Astral Weeks
1968


12 Bob Dylan
Highway 61 Revisited
1965


13 The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Are You Experienced?
1967


14 The Beatles
The Beatles ("The White Album")
1968


15 Radiohead
OK Computer
1997


16 David Bowie
The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
1972


17 Bruce Springsteen
Born to Run
1975


18 Public Enemy
It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
1988


19 Prince
Sign 'O' the Times
1987


20 The Jimi Hendrix Experience
Electric Ladyland
...
http://www.acclaimedmusic.net/

I honestly believe all those Beatle albums should be in there that they have named...
its important to include them. very important

namepeace said:

Oh yeah? What's THAT supposed to mean?????

(insert smiley face or something)



Personally, I like the lists, taken for what they usually are...sort of a snapshot of how the reputation of various albums rises and falls over time.

You take "Sgt. Pepper's". For a good twenty years after its release, it was indisputably the #1 choice in virtually every critics' or fans' poll, up to and including Rolling Stone's 1987 list (100 best albums of 1967-1987). As I recall it, though, that particular list included some strange disclaimers in the "Sgt. Pepper" entry...things like "there were more impressive albums that year, like Pink Floyd's first...these days, Pepper doesn't even sound like the Beatles' best album" -- sort of making excuses for keeping it #1, since it was as much a cultural event as an artistic triumph.

Sure enough, during the 90's, similar lists showed "Pepper" losing a little ground..."Revolver" would almost always be ranked higher, and the Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds" would quite often be #1 overall. So I was surprised to see "Pepper" back on top when RS did their 500 best albums list about two years back...but then again, this one was different: it was voted on by not only critics, but artists, producers, and other industry types -- and LOTS of them, and ALL their names were printed in that issue. I thought it was a much more interesting list, representing a fairly inarguable consensus, at least up at the top.

Of course, right away the usual bullshit started: "Rolling Stone is so out of touch" -- well, they just commissioned and printed the list; do you want to extend that to the hundreds of artists/critics/etc. who voted? Likewise with "If XXX isn't there, this list is invalid." One Beatles-fansite pundit (apparently unhappy with virtually every Beatles album being on the list, one of them even in both its US and UK versions!) decided the whole thing was a farce because "A Hard Day's Night" specifically didn't make the cut. What can you say to that? Sorry...people still love the film, but as an ALBUM, it hasn't really stuck out in everyone's memory enough to make the list. Probably because there were nine or ten other Beatles albums that DID!

So, was there a "Pepper" renaissance? Or was the bounce due to the fact that this list wasn't purely "critical" or "editorial" in its origins? Everyone who owns ALL the Beatles' albums loves "Revolver"...but a lot more people probably just own "Sgt. Pepper". (Or the hits collections, but that's another story.)

I don't know much about how the Spin list was created, but it is what it is. A little too white/college/nerd for my taste, but I'm glad to see SOTT up there where it undoubtedly belongs.

namepeace said:

If you think R&B is underrepresented, count the number of country albums that made the list.

Sdldawn said:

sextonseven said:

You know, if you keep correcting me and making good points I haven't thought of, I'm gonna be mad!



(you're absolutely right. I can't think of many country albums that I'd call "great" over the last 20 years, except maybe the O, Brother soundtrack. any other suggestions?)

namepeace said:

You're asking the wrong person about country music. (Were you asking me?) My country music collection consists of less than 10 CDs and the only one that has music recorded after 1980 is Loretta Lynn's 'Van Lear Rose'.

sextonseven said:

I can think of a handfull of great country albums that would deserve ranking on this list:

Neko Case – Furnace Room Lullabies
Rodney Crowell – Diamonds and Dirt, Keys to the Highway, Houston Kid
Shelby Lynne – I Am Shelby Lynne
Merle Haggard – If Only I Could Fly
Lucinda Williams – Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
Iris Dement – My Life
Uncle Tupelo – Anodyne
Son Volt – Trace
Jimmie Dale Gilmore – After Awhile, Spinning Around the Sun
Lyle Lovett – Pontiac, Joshua Judges Ruth


A few of these stretch the definition of country pretty far, mind you - Uncle Tupelo were as informed by Minneapolis hard-core as they were by country.
[Edited 6/28/05 16:47pm]

damosuzuki said:

Already on the list.

sextonseven said:

right you are - you woulda thought I'd have remembered that given I pointed out how odd it seemed that it was there while Car Wheels was absent when I first posted that list. fuck i'm an idiot.

damosuzuki said:

You know that ain't true.