Essential Studio Albums

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The Who - Face Dances

The first album in the post- Keith Moon era, and 3 years after their last album, but this one mostly fell flat for me. As if a tremendous amount of the intensity of the band dynamic got sucked out with Moon not there, the album feels almost grown up in comparison, but not really in a good way, mostly in a middle of the road blend kind of way. You Better You Bet is the known single, and it’s fine but it’s not what draws people to this band. The exception on this album is actual lot written and sung by John Entwhistle, The Quiet One, which captures just about everything great about the Who. You is also pretty good. Outside of that, this album feels like a band that could have left well enough alone. Granted, my recollection is vast improvement on the next one, but in this moment, it’s pretty sad.

The Essential Track: The Quiet One

Up Next: Iron Maiden - Killers

[liebzz]

Iron Maiden - Killers

Iron Maiden continue on here sounding like a breath of fresh air - a high speed one maybe - as perhaps the leading band of the new wave of British metal. Either way, this album takes off just as quickly as the first, even if it doesn’t reach those heights, with The Ides of March, Wrathchild, and Murders in Rue Morgue. The beast tracks here for me, again you can sort of hear a child McCready finding his guitar muse, in Innocent Exile, Killers, and Drifter. Not a sore spot on this album from top to bottom once again. Who knew I’d become an overnight Maiden fan.

The Essential Track: Innocent Exile

Up Next: Van Halen - Fair Warning

[liebzz]

Van Halen - Fair Warning

From an epic debut to now three subsequent albums that are consistently excellent. Mean Street is an intro to an album that plays a bit heavier than the others, both in musical substance and thematically. Not that we’re anywhere near serious territory, but the vibe here presents slightly more menacing than their party rock predecessors. Sinner’s Swing!, Hear About It Later, Unchained, So This Is Love?, and the closing salvo of Sunday Afternoon in the Park > One Foot Out the Door are all fantastic here. On the surface it seems like just another Van Halen album with David Lee Roth, but the level of consistency blinds how good it all is.

The Essential Track: Unchained

Up Next: Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

[wease]

Phil Collins - Face Value

This album must have surprised his fans quite a bit. As a band leader in Genesis, their albums had been largely complicated and not particularly emotional. So comparatively, this seems like Phil Collins laid bare, dealing with the emotional impact of the dissolving of his relationship. To that extent, there are parallels with Grace and Danger. This album though, has a mix of many different sounds, with the pop music really breaking through the din. The simple yet cathartic approach to In the Air Tonight makes it one of the better songs Phil Collins has ever been involved with, and I Missed Again is slightly less simple but similarly cathartic. There are certainly other highlights here, like The Roof is Leaking, Thunder and Lightning, and I’m Not Moving. The only real serious blemish on this is the cover of Tomorrow Never Knows, which is a square peg to close the album and disrupts the feel and focus this album otherwise had.

The Essential Track: In the Air Tonight

Up Next: The Who - Face Dances

Just think, Genesis turned down In The Air Tonight for the Duke album.

[wease]

Van Halen - Fair Warning

From an epic debut to now three subsequent albums that are consistently excellent. Mean Street is an intro to an album that plays a bit heavier than the others, both in musical substance and thematically. Not that we’re anywhere near serious territory, but the vibe here presents slightly more menacing than their party rock predecessors. Sinner’s Swing!, Hear About It Later, Unchained, So This Is Love?, and the closing salvo of Sunday Afternoon in the Park > One Foot Out the Door are all fantastic here. On the surface it seems like just another Van Halen album with David Lee Roth, but the level of consistency blinds how good it all is.

The Essential Track: Unchained

Up Next: Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

You have chosen…


Correctly

[liebzz]

Phil Collins - Face Value

This album must have surprised his fans quite a bit. As a band leader in Genesis, their albums had been largely complicated and not particularly emotional. So comparatively, this seems like Phil Collins laid bare, dealing with the emotional impact of the dissolving of his relationship. To that extent, there are parallels with Grace and Danger. This album though, has a mix of many different sounds, with the pop music really breaking through the din. The simple yet cathartic approach to In the Air Tonight makes it one of the better songs Phil Collins has ever been involved with, and I Missed Again is slightly less simple but similarly cathartic. There are certainly other highlights here, like The Roof is Leaking, Thunder and Lightning, and I’m Not Moving. The only real serious blemish on this is the cover of Tomorrow Never Knows, which is a square peg to close the album and disrupts the feel and focus this album otherwise had.

The Essential Track: In the Air Tonight

Up Next: The Who - Face Dances

Just think, Genesis turned down In The Air Tonight for the Duke album.

I read somewhere they thought it was too simple.

[wease]

Phil Collins - Face Value

This album must have surprised his fans quite a bit. As a band leader in Genesis, their albums had been largely complicated and not particularly emotional. So comparatively, this seems like Phil Collins laid bare, dealing with the emotional impact of the dissolving of his relationship. To that extent, there are parallels with Grace and Danger. This album though, has a mix of many different sounds, with the pop music really breaking through the din. The simple yet cathartic approach to In the Air Tonight makes it one of the better songs Phil Collins has ever been involved with, and I Missed Again is slightly less simple but similarly cathartic. There are certainly other highlights here, like The Roof is Leaking, Thunder and Lightning, and I’m Not Moving. The only real serious blemish on this is the cover of Tomorrow Never Knows, which is a square peg to close the album and disrupts the feel and focus this album otherwise had.

The Essential Track: In the Air Tonight

Up Next: The Who - Face Dances

Just think, Genesis turned down In The Air Tonight for the Duke album.

I read somewhere they thought it was too simple.

Suckers

[liebzz]

Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

This is maybe one of the most ridiculous album covers of all time. I mean, can you imagine some take me serious metalhead roaming around Sam Goody with their proper mullet and ripped metal tee and jeans whilst holding this album in their arms!?

Thankfully, we don’t judge books by their covers and what’s inside is nearly as good (though not quite to that level) as Ozzy’s debut. Granted, a large part of that analysis comes from the guitar hero fireworks of Randy Rhoads, particularly on You Can’t Kill Rock n Roll. This album though is full of highlights and the first half in particular is spotless. Over the Mountain, Flying High Again, Believer, Little Dolls, and the perfunctory ballad-like Tonight are all great. The title track is also excellent on another great album. Choosing between Believer and Over the Mountain is a tough choice.

The Essential Track: Over the Mountain

Up Next: Motley Crue - Too Fast For Love

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Motley Crue - Too Fast For Love

I am not sure if this is the first of the tight leather pants subgenre - hair metal as it would be known. The first track on this album, Live Wire, is pretty iconic for that and really is a great track. Unfortunately that’s pretty much it for this album. The rest is a far less confident mesh of a whole lot of nothing special, weirdly replete with a lot of cow bell that I think is a toy connected to that massive drum set. The riffs are reminiscent of KISS and there’s nothing to really point to in the songs or in the playing of this band that, for this album, would make me want to pick up this album via-a-vis pretty much any of the peak era KISS albums, and I am not particularly obsessive about that particular era in any event.

The Essential Track: Live Wire

Up Next: The Police - Ghost in the Machine

[wease]

I was never into Motley Crue. I can’t stand Vince Neil’s voice. I did own Dr Feelgood back in the day but there were some great riffs on that one.

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I was never into Motley Crue. I can’t stand Vince Neil’s voice. I did own Dr Feelgood back in the day but there were some great riffs on that one.

Yeah we’ll get there. Those are mostly nostalgic listens. As a kid born in ‘78 with two brothers 4 and 8 years older, their cultural touchstones for rock music were really that era of hair metal, and speed metal. By the time I hit the 15 year mark, the landscape had already changed over to Pearl Jam, Nirvana, STP, AIC, and Soundgarden, but they were into those bands and I listened to it not really with any level of understanding from the time I was maybe 5 years old until 13 or so, so all that’s coming in part to see how it holds up in my middle aged experience of that kind of nostalgia. I haven’t heard a pure Motley Crue album since maybe 1991 until yesterday.

[liebzz]

The Police - Ghost in the Machine

I have enjoyed the first few Police albums, but none of them truly blew me away until this one, which i thoroughly enjoyed. It’s certainly front-loaded with the hits, but what surprised me is that the album never lets up and stays at that high quality from the hits to the deeper cuts throughout. Demolition Man, Too Much Information, One World (Not Three), and Omegaman struck me immediately in the same sort of way that Spirits in the Material World, Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, and Invisible Sun have for the years I have had their greatest hits. This one is worth a full listen and likely repeats.

The Essential Track: Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic

Up Next: Bad Brains

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Bad Brains

It is a bit of a strange dichotomy that Bad Brains lurches from hardcore punk to reggae and back again on repeat for a little over 30 minutes here. The band playing Banned in DC sounds nothing like the band playing I Luv I Jah and then sounds nothing like Pay to Cum. Banned in DC, FVK (Fearless Vampire Killers), and I - these are the tracks I recalled enjoying, though this is a tad off to me, be it the rough quality of the recording or whatever’s going on here. Yes, it’s a highly influential album, but I don’t know I am totally sold on it in the end.

The Essential Track: Banned in DC

Up Next: Joan Jett - Bad Reputation

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Joan Jett - Bad Reputation

This debut album from Joan Jett going solo (the next few would be with the Blackhearts and her first without the Runaways. I’d natural think it would be a transitional album, but instead is wholly essential. Jett has the punk rock sneer of The Ramones and the immediate pull of Tom Petty, a rare but highly effective combination that makes the entirety of this album compelling, from the classic Bad Reputation and You Don’t Own Me, to deeper cuts like Jezebel and Don’t Abuse Me. This album’s covers even hit the mark on Wooly Bully and Shout. Fantastic and I really had no idea going in.

The Essential Track: Bad Reputation

Up Next: The Go-Gos - Beauty and the Beat

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The Go-Go’s - Beauty and the Beat

A little more new wave and a bit reminiscent of 50s and 60s pop than Joan Jett’s punk and classic rock. This album is pretty fun without any comparisons though. Our Lips Are Sealed and We Got the Beat are the songs I knew coming in, but there’s plenty more on this album worth sticking around for. Tonite, This Town, the slightly off kilter Automatic (the starts and stops on this are really a nice touch), and Skidmarks on My Heart are all highlights here. Solid, quick and easy to enjoy album here.

The Essential Track: Tonite

Up Next: Simple Minds - Sons and Fascination/Sister Feelings Call

[liebzz]

Simple Minds - Sons and Fascination/Sister Feelings Call

For what it’s worth, if you asked me in my mind’s eye, what does the 80s sound like, I am pretty sure I would describe this band. Synth-heavy, mildly opaque music that has its own vibe going on, it just seems like the synthesis of the sort of new wave sound that defines at least a big piece of the era. This one has no hit song that I could immediately decipher, but that’s more than beside the point. There’s some real genius synth work here, and while I did enjoy most of this, nothing for me came close to 70 Cities As Love Brings the Fall (unless you could the Sound in 70 Cities reprise). This might be two albums fused together, but it does work as one document. The highlights might be in the former, but I found the latter to be more consistently excellent.

The Essential Track: 70 Cities As Love Brings the Fall

Up Next: Men At Work - Business As Usual

[liebzz]

Men At Work - Business As Usual

For the next few albums, we’ll be listening to some bands from the land down under…

I enjoyed this album, which boasts two 80s rock staples, Who Can It Be Now and Down Under. And like those hits, this album seems largely easy to digest pop rock, an almost Aussie version of The Police only lighter. Underground and Be Good Johnny are also solid highlights on this album, but the closer here Down By the Sea (not to be confused with The Little Mermaid of course) is a solid atmospheric tune and really a sense of this band’s potential.

The Essential Track: Down By the Sea

Up Next: Mondo Rock - Chemistry

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Mondo Rock - Chemistry

This is a nice little pop rock record. Chemistry, The Popular View, and Moves round out an easy first half, but the record really kicks on some of the songs in the second half, particularly Step Up Step Out and the unfortunately titled Mondo Sexo. Summer of ‘81 was also pretty solid here. Fun album.

The Essential Track: Step Up, Step Out

Up Next: Australian Crawl - Sirocco

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Australian Crawl - Sirocca

This might be the best of the three Aussie albums we covered in a row here. This album is more straightforward no frills classic rock, and I’m here for it. The opening trio of Things Don’t Seem, Unpublished Critics, and Love Beats Me Up is fantastic, and the album never really lets up from there. Trusting You and Resort Girls ended up being my other favorite highlights here from a rock solid album of good songs.

The Essential Track: Unpublished Critics

Up Next: Siouxsie and the Banshees - Juju

[darth_vedder]

Iron Maiden - Killers

Iron Maiden continue on here sounding like a breath of fresh air - a high speed one maybe - as perhaps the leading band of the new wave of British metal. Either way, this album takes off just as quickly as the first, even if it doesn’t reach those heights, with The Ides of March, Wrathchild, and Murders in Rue Morgue. The beast tracks here for me, again you can sort of hear a child McCready finding his guitar muse, in Innocent Exile, Killers, and Drifter. Not a sore spot on this album from top to bottom once again. Who knew I’d become an overnight Maiden fan.

The Essential Track: Innocent Exile

Up Next: Van Halen - Fair Warning

Love Iron Maiden's first two with Paul. That sound is more up my alley then the Bruce era, though I do like a lot of songs with Bruce.