Marvellous G's Top Fifty Albums - FINISHED

[TheVoxyn]

Damien Rice   

[ReaperKK]

Just got into Shpongle a few months ago but they are awesome! I've only listened to Nothing Is Lost. . . . tho

[Marvellous G]

Just got into Shpongle a few months ago but they are awesome! I've only listened to Nothing Is Lost. . . . tho

I think their newest album, Ineffable Mysteries from Shpongleland, is possibly held in a little higher regard by fans, although I don't personally love it quite as much, so I'd try that next!

[kári]

O is definitely better than 9. I love Damien Rice.

[TheVoxyn]

Damien Rice is pretty much all I have been listening to the past weeks, fits my current mood perfectly.

[Marvellous G]

He's definitely a really good wintry/introspective artist.

[Ravenheart]

Good stuff, Tom. Also, nice work on moving this along. Moar plz.

[Fluffy Lothario]

I seem to be the only person in the world who finds 9 a LOT better than 0. About half of 0 is really good, but as an overall album, it's fairly monotonous, some tracks feel amateurish, and some are too dreary just for the sake of being dreary.  Not only are there no weak tracks on 9, but there's far more variety - there are loud tracks and quiet ones, there's more full band stuff and some moments with full orchestra, there are sad songs and angry songs and hey, even some more upbeat, hopeful songs, and it all works, so it's far more interesting.

Also, for some great live material, I recommend: https://www.archive.org/details/damo2006-11-13.el-rey-theatre-los-angeles-ca , which you can download for free. Awesome non-album tracks Childish, The Professor/La Fille Danse, and Toffee Pop, the recording quality's brilliant (except on the tracks with distortion, I Remember, Then Go, and Elephant, where admittedly, it craps out almost completely), and there'd be a fair few versions on here I prefer to in the studio (in particular, Delicate, Eskimo, and The Blower's Daughter with the Toffee Pop intro all slay the album versions).

[kári]

I seem to be the only person in the world who finds 9 a LOT better than 0. About half of 0 is really good, but as an overall album, it's fairly monotonous, some tracks feel amateurish, and some are too dreary just for the sake of being dreary.  Not only are there no weak tracks on 9, but there's far more variety - there are loud tracks and quiet ones, there's more full band stuff and some moments with full orchestra, there are sad songs and angry songs and hey, even some more upbeat, hopeful songs, and it all works, so it's far more interesting.

Come on! The Blower's Daughter, Cannonball, Amie, Cold Water, and to top it off I Remember, by far my favourite Damien Rice song.

[ClairvoyantCat]

I seem to be the only person in the world who finds 9 a LOT better than 0.

I might agree with you.  For me it's one of those things where I find 0 easier to listen to, but 9 more rewarding. Both great albums, though, love me some Rice. 

Also, hooray for Shpongle.  Awesome list so far!

[Fluffy Lothario]

I seem to be the only person in the world who finds 9 a LOT better than 0. About half of 0 is really good, but as an overall album, it's fairly monotonous, some tracks feel amateurish, and some are too dreary just for the sake of being dreary.  Not only are there no weak tracks on 9, but there's far more variety - there are loud tracks and quiet ones, there's more full band stuff and some moments with full orchestra, there are sad songs and angry songs and hey, even some more upbeat, hopeful songs, and it all works, so it's far more interesting.

Come on! The Blower's Daughter, Cannonball, Amie, Cold Water, and to top it off I Remember, by far my favourite Damien Rice song.

Cannonball is possibly my least favourite Rice song, and just what I mean by amateurish. And Cold Water is exactly what I mean by too dreary for the sake of being dreary.

Blower's Daughter and Amie are both great though, and I'd say I Remember is almost certainly my favourite song of his too. But that song perfectly illustrates the problem with 0. It's brilliant, and it's a complete outlier on that album, he's so focussed on melancholy folk, he doesn't try anything else of that ilk at all... until 9.

By the way, if you haven't heard this version of I Remember, get ready to love it even more. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J74gTgea5-I

[Marvellous G]

By the way, if you haven't heard this version of I Remember, get ready to love it even more. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J74gTgea5-I

Jesus Christ.  That was astonishing, thanks very much for the find! I'll check out that El Rey Theatre concert, too.

[kári]

I seem to be the only person in the world who finds 9 a LOT better than 0. About half of 0 is really good, but as an overall album, it's fairly monotonous, some tracks feel amateurish, and some are too dreary just for the sake of being dreary.  Not only are there no weak tracks on 9, but there's far more variety - there are loud tracks and quiet ones, there's more full band stuff and some moments with full orchestra, there are sad songs and angry songs and hey, even some more upbeat, hopeful songs, and it all works, so it's far more interesting.

Come on! The Blower's Daughter, Cannonball, Amie, Cold Water, and to top it off I Remember, by far my favourite Damien Rice song.

Cannonball is possibly my least favourite Rice song, and just what I mean by amateurish. And Cold Water is exactly what I mean by too dreary for the sake of being dreary.

Blower's Daughter and Amie are both great though, and I'd say I Remember is almost certainly my favourite song of his too. But that song perfectly illustrates the problem with 0. It's brilliant, and it's a complete outlier on that album, he's so focussed on melancholy folk, he doesn't try anything else of that ilk at all... until 9.

By the way, if you haven't heard this version of I Remember, get ready to love it even more. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J74gTgea5-I

Why the Cannonball hate? I can relate so much to that song... It kind of describes how I always feel in a relationship. And Cold Water nearly bring me to tears every time I hear it, so beautiful... Ah well. To be honest I'm not that familiar with 9. I've listened to it a few times but I never felt connected to any of the songs. I'll give it a second chance though.

[Marvellous G]

29.   Ulver – Perdition City (2000)



– What a surprise, yet another noiry album. This is the daddy of all Ulver albums for me, regardless of how good Blood Inside and Shadows of The Sun were. From literally the first two seconds of Lost In Moments to the death throes Nowhere/Catastrophe, Perdition City offers up a world that really does fulfil the promise of the pretentious sounding ‘soundtrack to an interior film’ claim that the band themselves offer. When my parents finally stop being insane and overprotective and I’m allowed to go walking around our town at night, this album might well be the only one I listen to when doing so for a very long time.

28.   Arctic Monkey - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not (2006)



- This debut album from the internet-indebted Sheffield locals has gotten its fair share of 'overrated!' shouts since its release half a decade ago. Admittedly, the Monkeys' sound evolved on their next 3 albums, becoming a bit denser musically and a lot more abstract lyrically, which was great. But this is what they're really all about. The arrangements are tight and intense, and the band don't let the fact that they'd only been playing their instruments for two years at the time of the album's release hinder them in any way. Every song has incredible lyrics, almost every song has a gasp-worthy riff, breakdown or drum part, and the album ends on A Certain Romance. It might be pretty simple compared to their successive three releases, but WPSIATWIN sees the Arctic Monkeys at the (unfortunately premature) peak of their genius.

27.   Thrice – The Alchemy Index (2007/2008)



– It might be cheating to include both albums in one slot, but they really are best when taken as a whole. I’m still not quite sure that Thrice deserve the enormous amount of praise that they receive in hardcore circles, but with these two releases they really showed that they could retain their post-hardcore roots whilst mixing up their sound with some great genre experiments. The Water EP here is my personal favourite, and it really does live up to the atmosphere that its name brings to mind, sounding just like a tranquil, deep sea dive should. There’s a lot of other great material here to admire, though, and whilst a few tracks are admittedly a bit dull, there are so many of them that you can forgive the occasional misfire.

[Zantera]

Ulver and Thrice!
I quite dig some Arctic Monkeys as well, though they have a tendency to sound a bit samey after a while for me.

[Gorille85]

ULVER AND THRICE 

[Jirpo]

Water is probably my fave too! Nice pick.

[Fluffy Lothario]

I like what I've heard of Thrice and Ulver, Thrice more than Ulver, but they're both fairly low on my to-check-out list, so I can't see myself getting to them anytime soon.

[Ħ]

yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ulver

[Marvellous G]

To be honest I think they're both pretty overrated on here in terms of their whole discography, but I do really love those albums - and Thrice's new one could well end up making the list in time. Updates, let's keep this going...

26.   She & Him – Volume One (2008)



– I’m a real sucker for the warm, harmonious pop of the 60s, and I’m also a real sucker for anything even remotely involving Zooey Deschanel. So it seemed like a match made in heaven when I heard about her joint project with M. Ward, She & Him, which married those two obsessions of mine in a hopefully-awesome matrimony. But hot actresses have made terrible albums before (hi, Scarlett Johansson) so I wasn’t convinced. Luckily, She & Him are great. Nothing revolutionary at all, but great. Volume One sees Deschanel’s surprisingly lovely voice and lyrics complemented by M Ward’s restrained but excellent instrumentation, and the whole album really feels like a labour of love. It might do literally nothing new, but it’s such a triumph of style, with enough real lyrical and musical substance to carry it, that I can’t help but love it.

25.   Steve Reich – Music For 18 Musicians (1978)



– Here’s an odd one. Steve Reich is the famous musical innovator, whose experiments in rhythm, sound effects and texture have led to him being revered by many a music fan, myself included. In Music For 18 Musicians, the premise is, essentially, 18 musicians play a note repeatedly, and independently of each other, for the duration of each track. The timings offset each other, and the combination of all of these notes being played at once makes a sound that intrigued Reich. And with good reason; this is one of the most original, hypnotic albums I’ve ever heard. It really sounds like how driving down a motorway at night feels, and it’s the perfect album for travelling while looking out of the window or, and I mean this in a good way, getting to sleep. Sadly, the album is a bit too repetitive to stomach all in one go, but it’s excellent when I just want to zone out to something. The ideas in this album were picked up by another modern artist who will be making an appearance at some point later on this list…

24.   My Chemical Romance – The Black Parade (2006)



– This might be a pretty controversial pick. And I can see why; other than this album, I hate MCR. Helena, I’m Not Okay and all of their other hits sound horrendous to my ears, and Gerard Way’s vocals on every other album of theirs I’ve heard are just whiny, generic and annoying, and the music is typical pop-punk. But on this album, they did something very, very right. Switching out pop punk for classic rock, they released a concept album of startling lyrical and musical maturity which I was just as surprised by as I was impressed. Songs like the title track, Disenchanted and Famous Last Words are genuine classics of our generation, mixing the typical anthemic choruses with intricate music, great solos and some surprisingly wonderful vocal moments. I’ll confess that I’m almost a little ashamed on having such a band on my list at all, let alone moderately high up, but this, along with one other album of a similar ilk which is yet to come, is one of the few albums that I listened to relentlessly when I was first getting into music, and which I still enjoy now.

Things start to get a little more eclectic from here on in, so I expect the flaming to begin, with this post probably. 

[Ravenheart]

If you're going down, I'm going down with you. I actually quite like The Black Parade myself. In no way would I lump that specific album in with all of the other generic pop-punk clones out there.

[Marvellous G]

If you're going down, I'm going down with you. I actually quite like The Black Parade myself. In no way would I lump that specific album in with all of the other generic pop-punk clones out there.

\o It's so underrated, mainly because of where it's coming from, and it's not fair because it's AWESOME. Seeing some of the best songs from it played at Reading this year was brilliant!

[Ravenheart]

o/*  I definitely agree. All of the songs on there are just genuinely catchy, melodic, epic, and well-written.

And, honestly, I'm sure I'll get lots of flaming for some of the albums on my list. 

[Marvellous G]

I actually can't wait for yours! I'll probably support you in most of your flamable (flammable?) picks as well, assuming a lot of them are 80s. 

But yeah, I'll try and keep this going pretty quickly so people further down the list actually ever get to go, such as yourself!

[Ravenheart]

Oh yes, a good portion of my choices are from the 80s. The Gothic 80s, of course.

You're keeping the pace on updating your llist good. Updates are daily, the descriptions are detailed, and the grapes are ripe for the pickin'.

[Marvellous G]

Haha thanks, it helps having it mostly done sitting in a Word Doc beforehand. 

[skydivingninja]

Props for Art Blakey, Thrice, and She & Him.  Sorry I haven't been following this too closely   Just missed it for this long.  Gonna have to check out some albums here.

[ReaperKK]

Nice picks but I can't get behing The Black Parade I thought it was the weakest album up to that point. Their first album (name which escapes me at the moment) was my favorite.

[Marvellous G]

Nice picks but I can't get behing The Black Parade I thought it was the weakest album up to that point. Their first album (name which escapes me at the moment) was my favorite.

I guess most actual fans of the band as a whole agree with this, but most people who dislike them in general like The Black Parade, so each to their own I guess. I've actually warmed up to their other stuff a bit after seeing some of it live, but TBP is still my favourite I think. Anyhoo, updates:

23.   Opeth – Watershed (2008)



– Well, Opeth had to make an appearance somewhere. I’ll get flamed a fair bit for this, I guess, but Watershed really is everything I want from Opeth. It has the seriousness and the metal side of their previous albums, but it introduces a sense of *gasp* humour to the band’s sound, which, after hearing the final product, really does seem like it was the missing ingredient that Opeth needed. Because they weren’t taking themselves as seriously as they used to, we got crazy outros of downtuning guitars, creepy processed laughter, funky keyboard sections and a genuine desire to experiment with their tried and tested formula. And, for me at least, it completely paid off. Watershed is by far the most interesting album in the band’s discography, and whilst I can see how some of the experiments might have put people off, they all succeeded resoundingly for me.

22.   John Coltrane – A Love Supreme (1965)



– I know it’s one of the ‘obvious choices’ in terms of jazz, but A Love Supreme has garnered so much praise and acclaim since its release that it’s easy to forget just how good it genuinely is. The three (or more recently, four) part masterpiece shows Coltrane at his best, but also showcases some of his more experimental moments. It’s much freer sounding and flowing than his previous work, but that suits the music and genre incredibly well as the album flows effortlessly by. I remember on my first listen, by the time I’d reached the ubiquitous chanting in the first track, I knew that this album was gonna be riding high in my listening habits for a very long time.

21.   Joanna Newsom – Have One On Me (2010)



– Whilst this is one of the most recent albums on my list, it fully deserves to be this high up. It’s not often that one sees a triple album released in today’s musical climate, and it’s even less often that one sees such an album justify its extended running time. Thankfully, Have One On Me more than does so. It’s such a sprawling release that it took me literally six or seven listens to get my bearings, and then everything started to fall into place. Newsom is on her career best form in terms of lyricism here, with tracks like Good Intentions Paving Company and In California demonstrating an ability for tonguetwistingly brilliant depictions of people and situations that would almost make Joni Mitchell blush. The music is vastly improved and expanded here compared to her previous efforts, too, but Newsom and her harp still remain firmly in the centre of attention. And frankly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[Ravenheart]

Watershed and A Love Supreme are great albums. I wish I could like Joanna Newsom, but I just can't get past her voice. 

[Jirpo]

I love Watershed! Great album. I've listened to A Love Supreme once, I'll have to do so again.

[Sigz]

>Alchemy Index not in Top 5 at least


But no, cool list so far - every album I've heard on it is excellent besides Kanye, which was honestly a massive disappointment after all the hype there was around it.

[orcus116]

Was it not good or can you not listen to without thinking "this was fucking by a fucking douchebag"? I can't bring myself to listen to any of his stuff because of the latter.

[Zantera]

Nice picks!

[Fluffy Lothario]

A Love Supreme is a great album, and it's fairly obvious why it's considered a classic. I prefer both Blue Train and Ascension though.