Your Personal Ten Most Influential Albums

These are some of the albums that impacted as a young kid in the 70's

Alice Cooper Billion Dollar Babies
Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers
Lynyrd Skynyrd pronounced
Elton John Don't Shoot Me...
Elton John Honky Chateau
Pink Floyd Dark Side Of The Moon
Rod Stewart Sing It Again Rod
Aerosmith Get Your Wings
ZZ Top Fandango
Beach Boys Endless Summer

 

Pet Sounds
Revolver
Sticky Fingers
London Calling
Outlandos d'Amour
Time Out
Achtung Baby
Paul's Boutique
Murmur
No Depression

 

As with others, 10 that knocked me back or changed me off the top of my head:

Yesterday...and Today- The Beatles
Ramones- Road to Ruin
Dwight Twilley Band- Sincerely
The Clash- Give 'Em Enough Rope
The Jam- Setting Sons
Crosby, Stills and Nash- s/t
The Byrds- Sweetheart of the Rodeo
The Beat-s/t
Mott the Hoople- Greatest Hits
Mike Viola- Lurch

 

thanks...my bad..I missed that.
My list changes dramatically !!!

 

I'm going to go with the following 10. May be cheating a bit since it's mostly compilations but taken as a whole they're good examples of how I've collected music over the years and not just stuck with studio albums...

-Genesis - Live (1973 LP)
Hard to pick any one Genesis album as the most influential but this one gets the nod for showcasing just how great the Peter Gabriel era was live. Apparently the tracks were originally recorded for the King Biscuit Flower Hour which had a HUGE influence on my youth. It's also proof that it pays to explore an artists entire catalog...

-Pete Townshend - Scoop (1983 2xLP) / Another Scoop (1987 2xLP)
Getting to hear Pete Townshend's demo versions of classic Who songs was a real eye opener into how music is actually made. On the whole I think Another Scoop is the better compilation but since I bought them at the same time I'm lumping them together.

-Bruce Springsteen Live 1975-85 (1986 5xLP)
A nice overview of why Springsteen is so great live. Plenty of bands have released albums of specific tours or concerts but I can't think of (m)any that released career spanning live box sets like this one.

-Little Richard - The Specialty Sessions (1989 3xCD)
You'd think that multiple takes and fragments of songs with Studio Chatter could get annoying after awhile but this actually had the opposite effect. Fascinating look into the recording process of the birth of Rock and Roll.

-The Grateful Dead - One From The Vault (1991 2xCD)
There are a lot of influential Dead albums that could be mentioned here but this one gets the nod for being the first complete concert released by the band, predating the highly successful Dick's Picks series by about 2 years. Growing up "The Grateful Dead Hour with David Gans" was a Sunday Night staple for over a decade.

-Bob Dylan - Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3 (1991 3xCD)
Could probably pick any number of bootlegs / official albums but the first "official bootleg" proved some of Dylan's outtakes were just as good as some of his hits.

-Jimi Hendrix - Lifelines: The Jimi Hendrix Story (1991 4xCD)
Yes it's a glorified radio special with song fragments and people talking over the music but the rarities included made repeat listens enjoyable. Radio shows like "Off the Record" / "In The Studio" & "Rockline" were like a R&R boot camp before streaming made everything so accessible.

-U2 - The New U2 [BOOT] (1992 2xCAS)
I remember going to a record show soon after Achtung Baby was released and couldn't believe that bootleggers were selling copies of its rehearsal sessions. Apparently the original tapes had been stolen / leaked much to the chagrin of Bono & Co. It's not often you get to hear the sound of a band reinventing itself in the studio which is why this "album" was so important.

-ONXRT - Live from the Archives Vol. 1 [WXRT] (1993 CD)
Probably not well known outside Chicagoland, this was my introduction to the regional limited edition live CD fad that radio stations starting putting out in the early 90's. Tracks like these had previously been relegated to bootlegs / b-sides / fan club compilations if you weren't lucky enough to catch them live on the radio.

-Pearl Jam - Official Live Bootlegs (2000 25xCD)
When Pearl Jam decided to release their entire 2000 European tour on CD, it changed the way I collected an artists output. It suddenly became cost prohibitive to buy everything so you kinda had to pick an album based on the set list and hope for the best. Some would say what Pearl Jam did was extravagant / lazy but there was an exhilaration hunting for good shows and completing the set.

 

So I assumed, yeah, I know what happens when we assume,
that the list was albums that were musically influential and not personally so.
I am requesting a redo with sincere apologies for being Lord of the Idiots.
1/Beatles..With The Beatles
My first Beatles album in 1964..in Canada called Beatlemania on Capitol.
I was 11 years old. I have been an obsessive fan ever since.
2/ James Brown Live At The Apollo
My neighbour, who was a couple years older than me, invited me over to hear this album.
It blew me away. Then went to the theatre to see The TAMI Show...Holy crap..what a performance.
3/The Mothers Of Invention Freak Out...opened my ears up a lot wider !!!
4/Bob Dylan Freewheelin’...My best friend had two older brothers in university in the early sixties,
both played guitar. While we were freaking out over the British Invasion stuff, they turned us on to folk music.
5/ Jefferson Airplane Surrealistic Pillow..turned me in to the San Francisco scene.
6/Van Morrison Astral Weeks..another album that opened my ears to new sounds, new styles.
7/John Hartford Steam Powered Aeroplane... turned me on to banjos and dobros.I bought a banjo and changed my life.
8/ Bela Fleck Crossing The Tracks.. Bela’s first album. He became my musical hero and huge inspiration.
This album also introduced me to the thought of listening to jazz with his version of Spain.
9/ Miles Davis Kind Of Blue...I asked a jazz fan what is the first jazz album
I should listen to if .i wanted to explore the genre..Kind Of Blue was it.
10/ Jerry Garcia’s Acoustic Band..I liked the Grateful Dead but wasn’t a huge fan. I bought this record and became obsessed with Jerry Garcia, his solo stuff and The Dead..

 

Off the top of my head, these records I can pinpoint as having the most effect on me as a listener or a player.

Rolling Stones Now! - Rolling Stones
East West - Paul Butterfield Band
Time Out - Dave Brubeck
Live Dead - Grateful Dead
Astral Weeks - Van Morrison
Highway 61 Revisited - Bob Dylan
Burnin' - The Wailers
Murmur - R.E.M.
The Queen Is Dead - The Smiths
Born To Run - Bruce Springsteen

 

Beatles - Meet the Beatles
Pink Floyd - Meddle
Deep Purple -Machine Head/Made in Japan
James Gang - Rides Again & Thirds
Black Sabbath - 1, 2, & 3
Zep - 1, 3, & 4
Jimi Hendrix - 1, 2, & Band of Gypsies
CSN&Y: Deja Vu
Dylan -Blood on the Tracks
R. Stones: Exile on Main Street, Sticky Fingers.
Alice Cooper - Killer
Ron Wood - Gimme Some Neck , '1, 2, 3, 4' (name of the album)
Azymuth - Telecommunications, Light as a Feather, Outburo... then also Cascades.
Donald Fagan - The Nightfly
& ELP & Bowie

* Story of my life. *

Doesn't include the 50s-60s Jazz (& Blues) which I really got into in 1971.

 

10 of the ones that have had the most impact on my musical journey and life i guess

John Coltrane - Love Supreme
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
Hugh Masekela - Hope
Michael Jackson - Off The Wall
Sade - Love Deluxe
Sonny Rollins - Saxophone Colossus
John Lee Hooker - The Healer
Pete Rock & CL Smooth - Mecca & The Soul Brother
A Tribe Called Quest - The Low End Theory
Manu Dibango - O Boso

 

In the spirit of the OP, I'd taken the route of brevity, but it is a fair point you make @fenderesq. So here is my re-done list from post 38 and changing it out for influential albums that helped to shape my music tastes rather than favourites. Only three remain (Dirt, Dummy, Rising).







1. Chemical Brothers - as a youngster, there was no music particularly in my life. Sure, my parents listened to it - recollections of dad playing Billy Idol and mum Erasure particularly - but I wasn't indoctrinated in music history as a child. I started paying attention around age 14, the year this album was released. Britpop had come and largely gone, electronica was on the rise. As we approached the millennium I was really into trance most of all. Not the clubbing - still too young and never my scene thereafter - but lots of late night radio stations that were hammering all sorts of varieties of electronic music. I wasn't really an album listener at this point, but if there is one that encapsulated this time it would be 'Dig Your Own Hole'. Nowadays, it would be Massive Attack or The Prodigy.

2. Evanescence - I never expected to be name-checking Evanescence on this forum, but hear me out. This dropped around the end of my second year of Uni. Still into trance, bought it on a whim in London Heathrow as I flew out to Oklahoma for 3 weeks as part of my degree course requirements. Guitars, a little dark, a siren for a vocalist. Slightly surreal to think that my entry point into rock, metal - and all the other goodies since - was 'Fallen'.

3. Alice In Chains - remember when you first gained access to the Internet (who can forget the dial-up modem)? Well for me it was late in secondary school and then at home. Early years, I was using LimeWire to access music. Alice In Chains were one of the first bands I really got into through this medium and 'Dirt' clicked immediately. We each have that 'one' band, right? That's Alice In Chains. They haven't been dethroned in the 20 years since. There is nothing that can punch me in the ribs like a Cantrell riff and Staley vocal.

4. System Of A Down - similar to the above, one of the earlier bands that really struck a chord with me and 'Toxicity' was an introductory point into the likes of Metallica, Judas Priest and so on - bearing in mind as a child of '83 I'm working backwards from around 1997. The Gathering's 'Mandylion' album was another contender here.

5. Mother Love Bone - I've already name-checked one 'grunge' band and I was tempted not to do another in that genre. However, Mother Love Bone are the band that most strongly remind me of a time and place: 2006 and a year spent in Australia. Cruising from city to city on Greyhound buses with this as a soundtrack. A backpacker that was meant to be travelling light, I actually carted around an ever-expanding CD collection as I hoovered up numerous albums in the cheap seconds stores around Bondi whilst staying in Sydney for 3 months. 'Apple' vividly reminds me of this year on the road, with a secondary nod to Stone Temple Pilots' 'Core'. I can't say it shaped my musical tastes, but it did emphatically stamp time, places, people and experiences in a way that nothing else could since.

6. Guns 'N' Roses - G'N'R get a mention here as 'Appetite For Destruction' was one of the first proper hard-rock albums that existed in my collection. In fact, chronologically they should probably come before the previous entry, but they are another band that strongly remind me of that particular period of time in my life (albeit it was the 'Use Your Illusion' albums). G'N'R have come to embody a certain core ethos that underpins my collection, despite the fact I enjoy them far less than other similar bands (e.g. Scorpions).

7. Portishead - no time and place attached to this one, I simply remember being mesmerised by Beth Gibbons' voice on Glory Box and then understanding the entire album was to be reckoned with. Earlier, I was more a singles than album person and 'Dummy' was one of those which helped to change that perception.

8. N.W.A - 'Straight Outta Compton' earns a mention as it did more than most to bring old school hip hop into the equation. A secondary influence for sure, but it is something I enjoy in moderation and this is a very influential album in its own right.

9. Bjork - I've had a circuitous relationship with Bjork. In my youth she was just a bit of an oddball that appeared on shows such as 'Top Of The Pops' (one for UK-based members there). I didn't understand her, the music, her fashion - any of it. It took a long time to come out of that mindset - as I've posted on other threads. Now I see her for exactly what she is: an extraordinarily gifted vocalist, arranger, personality and someone who exists in a small sphere of creative geniuses that bow to no trend or expectation. 'Debut' was my entry point into her work, and whilst I prefer follow-up works, it is why this album makes the cut. I also have a particular fondness for manic, deep and dark female vocalists and Bjork just ticks every box. My favourite female vocalist period.

10. Rainbow - in the same way as Alice In Chains are that one band, 'Rising' was 'that' album. This one opened so many doors. I'd dove into the depths of time previously of course but when I hear a masterpiece like this album - and that is what it is - it really acts as a springboard and motivation to push the boundaries and discover a litany of bands and artists that existed well before my time. Every so often I'll hit that one treasure trove, and 'Rising' was such a trove.

11. Rush - Rush have become one of my favourite bands over recent times. I'd owned their self-titled debut album for a while, but it was '2112' that ignited the fire. I could easily have mentioned The Scorpions here, but I've already got that covered elsewhere, whereas Rush are one of those chameleon bands that by their very existence drag you across various spheres of influence and challenge perceptions. A cornerstone.

12. CCR - I'll give my last nod to CCR's 'Bayou Country'. The 60s and very early 70s was an era relatively lacking in coverage across my collection until quite recently and CCR have done more than any other to begin to fill the void and act as a reference point. Long familiar with bands such as Lynyrd Skynyrd, CCR have essentially elevated my perception of blues-rock and therefore deserve credit here.

 

Meet the Beatles
JHE - Are You Experienced
Little Feat - Feets Dont Fail Me Now
Stones - Sticky Fingers
Cream - Disraeli
DP - Machine Head
Fab T-Birds - Girls Go Wild

 

And if I may be presumptuous; I'll pose this as a question... was the experience of detailing your inclusions an interesting exercise for you? I hope so... it was good for me. In addition to your explanations, noting your change-outs made your post really very very interesting. Right on Flaevius!

 

Absolutely, I had more time tonight to review and verbalise it. Some memories fade and it takes time to really look through what I own to re-familiarise. I'll be honest, I probably haven't listened to those first two albums in the past 15 years (although I did take a trip down memory lane and play all of 'Fallen' whilst typing my post!).

 

Can I apologise from the off. I've sat here for 25 minutes trying to reduce the albums that have shaped my understanding and appreciation of music down to 10, but I just can't. I've managed to get it down to 16, from an initial of 27, and I've kept it to one album per artist.... My list, as someone who can play many instruments badly, and none expertly, personifies my catholic taste in music...

Live Evil - Miles Davis
New Orleans Suite - Duke Ellington
The Awakening - Ahmad Jamal
Ege Bamyası - Can
Tonight's the Night - Neil Young
Sort of Revolution - Fink
Pink Moon - Nick Drake
Wish you Were Here - Pink Floyd
Winter in America - Gill Scott-Heron
Aromanticism - Moses Sumney
Hail to the Thief - Radiohead
Ones and Sixes - Low
There's No Place Like America Today - Curtis Mayfield
What's Going On - Marvin Gaye
Station to Station - David Bowie
Sun Bear Concerts - Keith Jarrett

 

Thanks for your post. If you had to narrow your list to ten, which two would you leave off?

 

REVOLVER (Beatles)
THE KINKS ARE THE VILLAGE GREEN PRESERVATION SOCIETY (The Kinks)
PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN (Pink Floyd)
ODESSEY AND ORACLE (The Zombies)
NUGGETS (Various Artists)
THE MODERN LOVERS (The Modern Lovers)
THE VELVET UNDERGROUND & NICO (The Velvet Underground)
WHO'S NEXT (The Who)
WALK AWAY RENEE/PRETTY BALLERINA (The Left Banke)
FABLES OF THE RECONSTRUCTION (REM)

 

I've always been a proponent of slowing the f*** down and allowing things to percolate and penetrate deep and see what unfolds... and recognize and acknowledge what's being missed, minimized or negated in our ordinary day to day zoom. There's so much all around, everywhere; in the mundane as well as the layered complexities we just pass by. This feeling has always been in my make-up but now as the days march on that understanding has gotten stronger, more conscious and respected and I walk a bit slower and take in all I can; as I can and let it roll around until I go on to the next; the next whatever... easier said then done of course. But rewarding and valuable.

 

I'd struggled with ten, as I felt any omission would be leaving off something pivotal - and even now there are still sizeable holes genre-wise. Push me to remove two though and it's 'Appetite For Destruction' (more a reference point than influential) and 'Bayou Country' (recency bias).

 

Bonus Additions

Van Halen - I
The Who - Meaty, Beaty, Big and Bouncy

 

Kate Bush: The Dreaming
Genesis: Selling England By The Pound
Genesis: Foxtrot
King Crimson: Red
King Crimson: Court
Marillion: Clutching at Straws
Pink Floyd: Dark Side
Tool: Aenima
Tori Amos: Little Earthquakes
The Moody Blues: To Our Children's Children's Children

 

In terms of albums that made me learn new things, change my way of thinking, add new experience to my life, etc.:

Frank Zappa - Overnite Sensation/Just Another Band From LA/One Size Fits All (I heard all 3 in the same night in one session)
Prince - 1999
U2 - Achtung Baby
Metallica - Kill 'Em All
The Ramones - Mania!
AC/DC - 'LIVE', 1992
Phish - Lawn Boy
Grateful Dead - insert live show of your choice
Yes - 90215
The Beatles - '1'

 

Songs In The Key Of Life - S Wonder
Zep II
Yessongs
Fear Of Music - T Heads
Far East Suite - Ellington
Blow by Blow - J Beck
Steve Howe Album
Crime of the Century - Supertramp
Jack Johnson - Miles
Pretenders
Al Green - G Hits

 

1. The Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers
2. Michael Jackson - Thriller
3. Smokey Robinson - A Quiet Storm
4. Marvin Gaye - What's Going On
5. T. Rex - Electric Warrior
6. Diana Ross - Surrender
7. The Beatles - Revolver
8. Kraftwerk - Autobahn
9. The Who - My Generation/Who Sing My Generation
10. John Coltrane - A Love Supreme

...i know a lot of those are well known albums but they all really moved me and are a continued source of inspiration in life and with my musical passion. I don't listen to Thriller as much now due to the image surrounding Michael Jackson

 

Let me try:

Pearl Jam: Vs (very first album I heard!)
R.E.M.: Automatic for the People
Metallica: Metallica
Soundgarden: Superunknown
Alice in Chains: Dirt
Radiohead: OK Computer
Massive Attack: Mezzanine
Iron Maiden: Powerslave
Rush: 2112
Genesis: Foxtrot