What's your 3 favorite J. Geils Band albums?

After the unfortunate passing of J. Geils I've been on a big J. Geils Band kick. I have all their Atlantic CDs and still need to repurchase Sanctuary, Love Stinks and Freeze Frame (I had them on vinyl back in the day). The consistent quality of their releases is impressive and be it live, or studio, these guys delivered the goods over and over again.

If you are a J. Geils neophyte, The Original Album Series offers their Atlantic CDs for small money (get volume #1 from Amazon.uk for a good price, Vol.2 is available cheap on regular Amazon).

I may change my votes in the future based on additional listening, but for now I count Full House, Monkey Island and Nightmares.... as my favorite 3. Full House for the sheer live power presentation of their early songs and covers. An amazing party album we played to death in the 70s. Monkey Island has diversity (Soul, Funk, Blues and Pop), strong songs and amazing production. It will always be my favorite. Nightmares is just a strong studio release, but to be honest, several albums give this third spot a strong challenge and I may change this one after additional catalog listening.

Please share what you enjoy most about your top three choices.

 

Bloodshot was pretty undeuiably their best studio album. The followup Ladies Invited is really underrated, their first stab at getting a tad more progressive. No hits at all but "Did You No Wrong" shoulda been one.

 

I listened to Ladies invited for the first time in many years last night. It's seems like it may be a grower.

 

I've never been able to choose 1 of the 1st 3. The 2 studio LPs are great. They were ready to rock by the time of the 1st LP. But Full House has so much energy that it's hard to believe that they'd only been together for about 4 years. If you're new to the Geils band I'd start there and work backwards.

 

Monkey Island could well be one of the most underrated albums ever.....

 

I agree. It seemed that a lot of fans had moved on by '77, and the new younger fans didn't jump on board till the following album (Sanctuary).

 

Full House, Full House and Full House.

 

But do you also like Full House?

 

His name was John, not Jerome.

 

Blow Your Face Out needs some love.

 

Yeah, but Full House is the better album.

 

I agree, but Blow Your Face Out is still a great live album.

 

You're Getting Even While I'm Getting Old

Interesting how one letter can completely change the whole meaning!

 

S/T, Full House and Hotline (my favorite!)

 

S/T, The Morning After and Hot Line among the studio albums with Nightmares And Other Tales From The Vinyl Jungle close behind but Live Full House and Blow Your Face Out are arguably better than any of the studio albums.

 

Hotline has got such great songs like Orange Driver and Love-itis. It's their best album (imo).

 

Yes...also Mean Love and Easy Way Out. Great album.

 

Those two live albums make a great introduction to the band.

 

This.

 

Yeah - Peter Wolf does that scream in Mean Love ("YEEEEAAAHHHH - NASTY!!!") makes Roger Daltry's sound like a whimper.

 

Nice! Too late to fix it now...

 

Nightmares, Blow Your Face Out, and Full House!

 

Artwork spotlight bump:

 

I guess I'm in the distinct minority of folks who like every album they ever did. FULL HOUSE would clearly get a vote, but it's too hard to choose only two of the others.

 

I voted S/T, "Monkey Island" and "Freeze Frame" - "MI" would have been first if we ranked them in order of excellence