Music Opinions...on a blog? How original.

In a rare moment of musical decisiveness last weekend, my brother and I decided to respectively list our top ten favorite albums.  I pretty much universally shirk away from these type of things, I love to talk about music, but really it hurts my brain to even think about "favorites"...there's too many.  But both Rob and I did.

PS I hold The Love Thieves directly responsible this.  At that moment, listening to that song, I was sure it was in my top ten list of songs...even if the album didn't make the list.

10. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles

The Beatles in their experimental stage, don't need to say anything else.

9. Horses, Patti Smith

I've been a sucker for Patti since hearing the song Kimberly...I mean yeah, of course I love it, it's my name.  On top of that she's an f-ing great rock poet, amazing lyrics, love her voice, love her activism.  Saw her last year at Exit in Serbia, still kickass and championing for a cause.

8. Deep Cuts, the Knife

Awesome electro pop from my favorite Swede siblings.  I really really like lead singer Karin Dreijer Andersson, pretty much everything about her, and this album is why it started.  Synth pop meets creepy.  Jose Gonzales covered the most popular track from this album, Heartbeats, gave it a bit more fame in the "indie" scene, but try the original.  Love the twisted lyrics of this album.  Favorite song/music video of the album: Pass This On.

7. Highway 61 Revisited, Bob Dylan

Like a Rolling Stone, Ballad of a Thin Man, Desolation Row, the title track...'nuff said. 

6. Doolittle, Pixies

Great great great Alt rock, my favorite kind of rock, yeah I grew up in the 90's.  And this album (from 1989) laid the groundwork for my favorite alt rock to come...one guess, okay I'll tell you - Radiohead, big surprise, and on top of that it's ridiculous on it's own.  Some incredible writing on this album, plus I love it when girls rock just as hard as boys, and Kim Deal can definitely hold more than her own.  As Thom Yorke said at Coachella years back, "the Pixies changed my life."

5. Washing Machine, Sonic Youth

After the Pixies you suspected, but now you know...yes, I like noise rock.  And Sonic Youth is the cream of the crop in my mind.  Dissonance can be tough for people, mostly I think you either like it or don't.  For me good noise rock is intense, emotive, and yeah it goes there.  Sonic Youth goes there.  Washing Machine is definitely not SY's most accessible album, and according to most, far from the best, but I loove it.  The album's full of long jam songs, with highs and lows, three guitars going nuts, in this super intense, climactic way.  Plus I really like how much time Kim Gordon spent behind the mike this album.  Track suggestion: Little Trouble Girl to get a taste of K. Gordon, or if you're brave dive right in with twenty minute jam session The Diamond Sea and tell if you feel it.

4.  The Bends, Radiohead

The first Radiohead album I bought, first album I laid on my floor and listened to, first band I actually loved.  The album's just ridiculously good, probably the most accessible with so many hits, and weirdly simple in a refreshing way, nice to come back to after going crazy for the Radiohead that will develop over the 15 years after this album.  (Nice Dream), what a song.

3. The Velvet Underground & Nico, The Velvet Undergroud w/Nico

This is a really, really great album.  What better way can an album prove it than by being consistently relevant and universally considered great for nearly half a century?  Before the Beatles went experimental, the Velvet Underground were.  Before Frank Zappa was controversial, the Velvet Underground were.  Yeah, they're talking about drug abuse, prostitution, bondage, etc.  Love Nico's voice, too bad it didn't work out.  What makes this album all the more awesome is the fact that it was all recorded in one day with like no money.

2. White Album, The Beatles

What more needs to be said about this album that hasn't already been said?   The Beatles are the best, and this is a double album of the best.

1. Ok Computer, Radiohead

Did you think I could go anywhere else?  Honestly this blog is named after a song on this album.  Radiohead's magnum opus, the album every subsequent Alt Rock album will be compared to.  Great music that gets me every time I listen to it. Exit Music (For a Film), I have chills. 

Well, that wasn't too bad, picking favorites that is, wonder how long this list will stay the way it is?