Top 885 albums of all time

[desh]

So the best radio station ever is currently counting down the top 885 albums of all time. Now, this is a much less compelling countdown than last year's countdown of the top 885 songs of all time. I probably can't even name the albums that 75% of my favorite songs come from. But it should still get interesting around the top 50 or so.

I'm definitely keeping my eye out to see which Beatles album is their best, how Animals measures up to Pink Floyd's 3 other popular ones (and how their others measure up to those 4), if TMBG's Flood gets the respect it deserves, if U2's newer stuff deservedly gets ranked near Joshua Tree, whether newer groups (Decemberists) can get anywhere near the top, and a few other things. My best guess for the number 1, right now, is Dark Side of the Moon. Though I reserve the right to change my guess later.

What do you think the best album ever is? What do you think they'll think the best album ever is?

Comments

[krisispm.livejournal.com]

They ranked Garbage's eponymous LOWER than Norah Jones completely shit second record, so i have to recuse myself from having an opinion based on the fact that their rankings SUCK ASS.

[desh]

I'm not sure if you noticed, but http://www.xpn.org/885ATGA.php, down at the bottom, has Peter Mulvey's top 10.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

i don't grok this "best", neither as applied to a radio station, nor as applied to art. how, please, is it measured?

[desh]

In the case of albums and this contest, it's based on listeners' votes for their top 10 albums. The votes were collated and tallied somehow.

In the case of the station itself, I'm sort of joking. "Best" is just my opinion. And that of a lot of my friends. But really, it's commercial-free, program-based (so there's more variety, and you know when you can listen to the blues show or the folk show or whatever), not run by Clear Channel, and does a more creative job of playing modern rock/alt/blues than any station I've ever heard of.

[desh]

Besides, it's just fun to talk about "Best" when you know you can't really answer the question. Do you remember Brunching Shuttlecocks' "Good Or Bad"? It's shut down now, but the gist was that you voted on a bunch of arbitrary things as to whether each was "good" or "bad". The more absurdly you try to squeeze subjectivity into objectivity, the more fun it is.

[pkzimmer.livejournal.com]

If you look as an album as a complete work, with each song both being good in and of its own right and fitting in with the rest, I can give you a few I think are great, in no particular order. I won't even attempt to rank them.

Dark Side of the Moon - Pink Floyd
Joshua Tree - U2
Hail to the Thief - Radiohead
Ten - Pearl Jam
The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars - David Bowie
Supernatural - Santana
Appetite for Destruction - Guns N' Roses
Led Zeppelin II - Led Zeppelin
Electric Ladyland - Jimi Hendrix
Sueños Liquidos - Maná

and a bunch more, but I think it would get a little silly if I just went on.

[desh]

Nice list. The only major rock classing you're missing from that, that I can think of now, is Springsteen's Born To Run. It's got 2 of the top 6 songs of all time, after all.

But I have to wince when I see Ten up there. I mean, it's my favorite album from one of my favorite bands, sure. But why don't the other albums I love from other bands I love belong up there too? I know that Live's Throwing Copper will be way down on XPN's list, even though I think it surpasses Ten. It's somehow easier for me to accept if all the albums from my favorite bands are ranked poorly, rather than just some of them. (Pink Floyd doesn't apply to this theory, since they're Just Different, Dammit.)

[pkzimmer.livejournal.com]

Throwing Copper was ok, but I never really got into Live.

[outcastspice.livejournal.com]

i also think Dark Side. also, Massive Attack's "Mezanine" is great.

[myq.livejournal.com]

Nas - Illmatic

[estepha.livejournal.com]

the beach boys' pet sounds should, and probably will be up near the top.

[desh]

Oh, definitely.