Essential Studio Albums

[liebzz]

Blind Melon

Lesson learned: never judge a book or album by its cover or even its hit song. Granted, No Rain is a perfectly nice and catchy song, and took the world by storm with the bee girl for a good chunk of time in the 90s. But with that being my exposure to Blind Melon, I thought they seemed fine but nothing to fuss about. Now this comes up on the list, and I was properly floored by this album. Shannon Hoon is a beast of a frontman, and the band is even better, throwing down with the reckless abandon that reminded me of that whole Faces/Stones comparison often laid on the Black Crowes. Soak the Sin, Tones of Home, I Wonder, Paper Scratcher, Deserted, and Drive are badass. And yet the songs with the deepest impact fall in between: Change and Time are wonderful. Absolutely phenomenal album here.

The Essential Track: Change

Up Next: Stone Temple Pilots - Core

To me this is one of the great guitar albums. You get the full impact with headphones. Neither guy plays the same thing its just tons of riffs and parts and solos and weird bits all woven together into perfection.

Yeah this one knocked my socks off - I wish I knew this 30 years ago.

[tragabigzanda]

Way out of the loop on this thread, but was it revealed that Shannon Hoon sang the harmonies on GnR Don’t Cry?

[liebzz]

Way out of the loop on this thread, but was it revealed that Shannon Hoon sang the harmonies on GnR Don’t Cry?

It was not revealed until just now!

[oasisfan35]

Way out of the loop on this thread, but was it revealed that Shannon Hoon sang the harmonies on GnR Don’t Cry?

It was not revealed until just now!

I totally thought you visited the Wikipedia page of each release. For Hoon on UYI: backing vocals on "Live and Let Die", "November Rain", "You Ain't the First", and "The Garden"; co-lead vocals on "Don't Cry" (both of them)

[VinylGuy]

I mean he was featured on the video...

[liebzz]

I generally do use Wikipedia to help, but I don’t always pay attention to all the details, especially if I have heard the album before. Makes sense once you say it (I am pretty sure I probably hadn’t heard of Shannon Hoon at the time I would have seen the Don’t Cry video).

[VinylGuy]

He was also featured on the booklet. He was a friend of Axl´s as a kid i think.

[tragabigzanda]

Way out of the loop on this thread, but was it revealed that Shannon Hoon sang the harmonies on GnR Don’t Cry?

It was not revealed until just now!

I totally thought you visited the Wikipedia page of each release. For Hoon on UYI: backing vocals on "Live and Let Die", "November Rain", "You Ain't the First", and "The Garden"; co-lead vocals on "Don't Cry" (both of them)

Never knew about these other ones, cool stuff. He was a talent.

[liebzz]

Neil Young - Harvest Moon

It’s really incredible what Neil Young can do to you, following Ragged Glory with stunning beauty. It’s even more impressive when you consider this album strings together time, not just lyrically but in terms of the timeline of the songs he worked on here to create an album that’s self-contained and never has a feel of a compilation - even the live Natural Beauty fits seamlessly into the framework of this album. I was floored once again by the opening 4 tracks here - Unknown Legend, From Hank to Hendrix, You and Me, and the stunning title track (frankly one of my favorite songs in life). One of These Days, Old Kind, and Dreamin’ Man are also all proper highlights here - just a beautiful album perfectly juxtaposed against his more jagged barnburners in the 90s.

The Essential Track: Harvest Moon

Up Next: Tom Waits - The Black Rider

[Higgs]

Yeah, one of my favourite bittersweet memories was from a few years ago. A good friend of mine passed away from cancer and I had the job of putting together a playlist for the graveside - we all got in and filled the grave after the ceremony so we were going to be there for a while. "Harvest Moon" comes on and I look over at his wife standing between her two sons, quiet, just swaying to the music. I picked that song just right.

[liebzz]

Tom Waits - The Black Rider

Even for Tom Waits, this score/soundtrack is pretty wild. Waits albums often create a sort of visual of a time and place for me, and this one is no different, even if it has nothing to do with a German folktale for which the music was conceived by Waits and William S. Burroughs. The visual I get on this one is the musical equivalent of a seedy boardwalk freak show, as is I am walking on the boardwalk and side streets around Coney Island soaking in the crazy collection of characters and freaks egging me on to whatever attraction or game is in store. Or at least the musical equivalent as these instruments collide to create a unique yet compelling piece. November, Just the Right Bullets, Russian Dance, I’ll Shoot the Moon, Flash Pan Hunter, Crossroads, Gospel Train, and Lucky Day are all pretty essential here. One hell of an adventure.

The Essential Track: November

Up Next: Sublime - 40 oz. to Freedom

[liebzz]

Sublime - 40 oz. to Freedom

On their debut album, Sublime sound like a band that might never get the chance to record again, so they threw down every sound they could muster, thanked and drew from every imaginable influence, and created a pretty wildly uneven album full of covers and originals. Some of the more memorable and know tracks here - the title track, Smoke Two Joints, Don’t Push, 5446 Was My Number/Ball and Chain, Badfish, Scarlet Begonias, What Happened, Date Rape, and Rivers of Babylon could have made its own more succinct record and been great. And they’re here will other ideas, some fascinating like KRS-One combining an acoustic track with samples, and some more half baked. But when you feel the need to fit it all in, something’s gonna give.

The Essential Track: 40 Oz. to Freedom

Up Next: Arrested Development - 3 Years, 5 Months, and 2 Days in the Life of…

[liebzz]

Arrested Development - 3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life of…

I feel like this progressive hip hop group is sort of a forgotten memory of non-gangsta rap in the early 90s. Clearly bucking trends with a more organic sound and focusing on an almost hippie-like political and social message, they dropped a few hit songs and even won a Grammy. This was their moment, with gems like Tennessee and Mr Wendal, a song about learning lessons from a homeless man. Children Play With Earth, Give a Man a Fish, Raining Revolution…you get the idea. Frankly, it’s pretty damn good, and I am glad I went back to this now, probably 34 years since I last heard it.

The Essential Track: Tennessee

Up Next: Us3 - Hand on the Torch

[liebzz]

Us3 - Hand on the Torch

Us3 unfairly was a one-hit wonder with Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia). The whole album is a fusion of jazz and hip hop, complete with samples of Herbie Hancock, Thelonious Monk, Art Blakey and more. This fusion works extremely well through nearly the whole album, with hip hop beats meeting jazz drums and largely socially conscious rapping. It may not have been unprecedented, but it is the earliest wildly successful single to do it in my immediate memory. The single might take you down memory lane, but the album forges some good territory of its own.

The Essential Track: Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)

Up Next: The Roots - Organix

[liebzz]

The Roots - Organix

The Roots are another band that mixes jazz and hip hop quite successfully and would make maybe the most successful career out of anyone as devotees of this. On this debut, they haven’t quite put it together on the song crafting level, mostly showing wildly talented chops from all involved without quite hitting a key track to bring it all into focus (that will come in further albums). There’s still plenty of enjoyment to get out of this one, be it the intro, Pass the Popcorn, the extremely long workout Session, Common Dust, Essaywhuman???, and my personal favorite here, Good Kusic. There’s also wild experiments like Writer’s Block to keep you thinking even if it doesn’t quite come together as it should. Hearing them before they fully gelled is still a worthy undertaking.

The Essential Track: Good Music

Up Next: GURU - Guru’s Jazzmatazz Volume 1

[liebzz]

GURU - Guru’s Jazzmatazz Volume 1

Guru introduces this album as an experiment - taking live jazz and hip hop production and fusing the two. Truth is it is so well fused that you can barely tell the jazz flourishes are live. In that respect, this is incredibly well composed. Guru’s delivery, which on its own is as smooth as the jazz playing behind him, really does fit well, with the guest vocalists similarly all fitting together. What is billed as an experiment does not sound risky in any hands here, I think a testament to just how good this is. Loungin’, When You’re Near, Transit Ride, and Down the Backstreets were all favorites here, but this is a strong vibe to linger on all album. Definitely worth your time.

The Essential Track: Loungin’

Up Next: Ben Harper - Welcome to the Cruel World

[liebzz]

Ben Harper - Welcome to the Cruel World

Early in Ben Harper’s career, his focus was on a modern folk blues, blending his acoustic weissenborn guitar with social and political mores, speaking out on race, gender, and greed, from specifics like Rodney King to general expressions of love, hope, and perseverance. Sounds heavy, but Ben Harper shows a light and humorous touch on songs like Mama’s Got a Girlfriend Now, and a romantic side on Forever. The album comes to an epic close with a gospel inflected recreation of the Maya Angelou poem And Still I Rise, titled I’ll Rise here, that ties all these ends together in a powerful statement. This is a beautiful album that I have always enjoyed as among his best works.

The Essential Track: I’ll Rise

Up Next: Dave Matthews Band - Remember Two Things

[oasisfan35]

Ben Harper - Welcome to the Cruel World

Early in Ben Harper’s career, his focus was on a modern folk blues, blending his acoustic weissenborn guitar with social and political mores, speaking out on race, gender, and greed, from specifics like Rodney King to general expressions of love, hope, and perseverance. Sounds heavy, but Ben Harper shows a light and humorous touch on songs like Mama’s Got a Girlfriend Now, and a romantic side on Forever. The album comes to an epic close with a gospel inflected recreation of the Maya Angelou poem And Still I Rise, titled I’ll Rise here, that ties all these ends together in a powerful statement. This is a beautiful album that I have always enjoyed as among his best works.

The Essential Track: I’ll Rise

Up Next: Dave Matthews Band - Remember Two Things

Had to dip in to the ol' MP3s to revisit this one, been quite some time but agree it is a lovely album.

[liebzz]

There was a point where I probably loved Ben Harper’s music nearly as much as Pearl Jam’s. I have seen him live over a dozen times…I am not sure what happened that I’ve not really listened to him in years, really since I saw him play a great show as double billed with Trombone Shorty on Pier 17 a few years ago, but nice to have him back.

[wease]

Goddamn, I love Trombone Shorty