My discoveries per year

[dihansse]

And this is the first entry for the 1997 albums I will listen to with first the list to listen to or already listened to:

BEA Rank Title By Band DecadeRank - My Rank before
1 OK Computer By Radiohead 1 - 1
130 Homogenic By Björk 28 - To listen
148 Either/Or By Elliott Smith 32 - 11
178 The Lonesome Crowded West By Modest Mouse 41 - To listen
217 Urban Hymns By The Verve 48 - 16
219 Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space By Spiritualized 49 - To listen
254 The Colour And The Shape By Foo Fighters 53 - 8
313 F#A# By Godspeed You! Black Emperor 60 - To listen
323 Perfect From Now On By Built To Spill 63 - 3
380 The Boatman's Call By Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds 72 - To listen
418 The Fat of The Land By The Prodigy 82 - To listen
435 I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One By Yo La Tengo 87 - 14
560 Blur By Blur 112 - To listen
566 The Mollusk By Ween 113 - To listen
577 Mogwai Young Team By Mogwai 117 - already listened
617 Homework By Daft Punk 127 - To listen
723 Third Eye Blind By Third Eye Blind 149 - already listened
755 Buena Vista Social Club By Buena Vista Social Club 158 - To listen
765 Portishead By Portishead 161 - 29
860 Time Out Of Mind By Bob Dylan 179 - already listened
924 Dig Your Own Hole By The Chemical Brothers 199 - To listen
1028 Whatever And Ever Amen By Ben Folds Five 219 - To listen
1155 Be Here Now By Oasis 246 - 18
1193 Life After Death By The Notorious B.I.G. 253 - To listen
1231 Word Gets Around By Stereophonics 261 - already listened
1339 Strangers Almanac By Whiskeytown 288 - To listen
1346 Nimrod By Green Day 290 - To listen
1356 Brighten The Corners By Pavement 293 - 7
1403 Around The Fur By Deftones 302 - To listen
1415 Dots And Loops By Stereolab 304 - To listen
1438 Dig Me Out By Sleater-Kinney 309 - To listen
1479 In It For The Money By Supergrass 315 - 4
1546 Ultra By Depeche Mode 326 - already listened
1668 Pop By U2 355 - 20
1718 Baduizm By Erykah Badu 367 - To listen
1767 Butterfly By Mariah Carey 374 - To listen
1807 Dude Ranch By Blink-182 380 - To listen
2045 Flaming Pie By Paul McCartney 420 - 37
2155 Vanishing Point By Primal Scream 439 - To listen
2161 Come On Over By Shania Twain 441 - To listen
2227 The Velvet Rope By Janet Jackson 454 - To listen
2255 S.C.I.E.N.C.E. By Incubus 460 - To listen
2267 Fantasma By Cornelius 462 - To listen
2286 Bricolage By Amon Tobin 469 - To listen
2338 BBC Sessions By Led Zeppelin 479 - already listened
2341 Static Age By Misfits 480 - To listen
2377 Surfacing By Sarah McLachlan 489 - To listen
2433 Fabulosos Calavera By Los Fabulosos Cadillacs 499 - To listen

And I already listened to one album:
- Homogenic by Björk (nr 2 on the overall BEA top chart of 1997): to me this is the best album of Björk with some actually good songs like Joga. But even on this album there's still something that annoys me in her voice and delivery of her songs so after a bit of doubting I finally decided not to include this album as one of my favorites of the year.

I'm already listening to The Lonesome Crowded West by Modest Mouse.

[TheHutts]

[dihansse]

I feel that I’ve been listening to too many new albums these last months so I think it’s time to consolidate also because I’ve been reviewing my scoring system which means I haven’t rescored many of my existing favorite albums.
I’ve been thinking about different ways to tackle this and finally I think I’m gonna do it like this:
- focus of albums in my overall top 100 (which is one album per artist)
- re-listen to all the regular albums of that artists if I haven’t already
- which also means that if I haven’t yet listened to an album of that artist I will do this as well
- I will mainly focus on ordering my albums by preference before and after the review which means that:
- my preferred album could change
- in general that preferred album could rise or decrease its rank or could even fall out of the top 100
- I’ll try to compare with the overall BEA ranks to measure where my view of the artist differs from the BEA general view
- I will also focus on my favorite tracks on an album and try to give general catch phrase describing them: catchy, emotional, fast, experimental, epic, …
- First I’m gonna focus on albums that risk to fall out of the top 100
- And then I’ll try to switch between artists which have many albums and artists with only one or a few albums.

I think I have only covered one band of the top 100 in this way, the Beatles, and I’ll try to follow the steps I just described (except there is no before and after because I already did the process):

Current rank in my overall top 100 (one album per artist): 17th with Help! (1965).

And this an overview of the different albums:

1.Help! by The Beatles (1965; my rank: 23; BEA overall rank 221). Not many people will rank Help! as the best album of the Beatles as many esteem this is only a movie soundtrack (BEA ranks it as only the 8th album of the Beatles, even behind Let It Be, which I find incredible). To me this is the first genial album by The Beatles and one where they still couple a certain innocence to fantastic catchiness and already a lot of sparks of their future success. I must admit for me it has a special place in my heart because I literally discovered the Beatles by seeing the movie which isn’t very good but at that moment I was completely mesmerized by the music and until many years after that the title track was my favorite song ever. Which brings me to my favorite tracks:
- Help: catchy, harmonics, upbeat but yet full of despair: interesting to note is that the track was originally intended to be played at a most slower speed.
- You’ve Got To Hide That Love Away: Slow, simple, country atmosphere, emotional depth
- You’re Gonna Lose That Girl: catchy, harmonics, simple
- Ticket Ride: fantastic intro, catchy, simple
- I’ve Just Seen A Face: catchy, simple, country
- yesterday: slow, simple, emotional depth, heartbreaking

2. Rubber Soul by The Beatles (1966; my rank: 79; BEA rank: 22 and also only the fifth Beatles album by BEA): so also an album which in my esteem much better than generally acknowledged with the following best tracks:
- Norwegian Wood: slow, emotional depth, Indian atmosphere
- Nowhere Man: lyrics, emotional depth, harmonics
- Michelle: simple, slow
- Girl: simple, slow, harmonics, heartbreaking
- In My Life: harmonics, slow

3. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles (1967; my rank: 108; BEA rank: 5 but also third Beatles album by BEA): indeed an album that really works as a unity with the following outstanding tracks:
- She’s Leaving Home: slow, harmonics, violin
- A Day In The Life: experimental, emotional depth, epic, great outro

4. A Hard Day's Night by The Beatles (1964; my rank: 131; overall rank: 226 but only 9th ranked Beatles album): so again an album that in my esteem should be ranked higher because it contains a number of track which are already genial at his early stage of their career. Best tracks:
- If I Fell: slow, emotional depth, harmonics

5. Revolver by The Beatles (1966; my rank: 132; overall rank: 4 and ranked second overall):
- Eleanor Rigby: Harmonics, violin, lyrics
- Here, There And Everywhere: slow, harmonics, emotional impact

6. Magical Mystery Tour by The Beatles (1967; my rank: 142; BEA rank: 77 and 6th ranked Beatles album): this is a tricky one as it can be viewed as just a collection of songs but there are some great ones here
- The Fool On The Hill: one of my most favorite; slow, lyrics, emotional depth

7. Abbey Road by The Beatles (1969; My rank: 158; BEA rank: 3 and first ranked Beatles album): I suppose I will the most enemies with Beatles lovers with this choice but in my opinion the album is not consistenly great overall with silly songs like Maxwell, Oh Darling, Octopus’s Garden, Mean Mr Mustard; so only the 7th in my opinion but still one of their top albums anyway with especially
- Something: slow, emotional depth, great guitar part, epic in a way
- as an aside: maybe the individual parts of the end “symphony” are maybe not their best but as a whole it really works

8. The Beatles (The White Album) by The Beatles (1968; My rank: 161; BEA rank: 13 and the 4th ranked Beatles album): this is their lowest ranked of their masterpieces and it is ranked so low because this is in fact already a compilation of solo albums which is further proven by the recent re-release (although on the Esher sessions they still seemed to get along). Apart from a few still classic tracks there is a lot of filler on this album in my opinion especially since there are so many tracks here. But still one classic:
- Blackbird: slow, emotional depth, great classic guitar part

And then the albums I don’t consider Beatles classics:

9. Beatles For Sale by The Beatles (1964; ranked as the 11th Beatles album on BEA): already a few good songs like I’m A Loser but not yet developed as on their next albums
10. Let It Be by The Beatles (1970; ranked as the 7th Beatles album on BEA): they just weren’t a band here anymore but still a few good tracks like Across The Universe and the title track
11. With The Beatles by The Beatles (1963; ranked as the 12th Beatles album by BEA): and here also still in their early stages with All My Loving as the best track
12. Please Please Me by The Beatles (1963: ranked as the 10th Beatles album on BEA): idem with I Saw Her Standing there as the best here
13. Yellow Submarine by The Beatles (1969; ranked as the 18th Beatles album on BEA): a few good ones with All You Need Is Love and Only A Northern Song
14. Meet The Beatles! by The Beatles (1964; ranked as 17th Beatles album on BEA): in fact a bit the same as With The Beatles and also an album not yet fully the Beatles as we know them now.

In general I think I consider the Beatles as the best rock band ever (although I rank their best album only 17th) because of the fact that their the first very good band overall and because of their consistency in a short period of time: in the period between 1964 and 1969 they released 8 masterpieces which also showed a real trajectory in terms of their legacy value and impact of future generations (atlhough Scaruffi and Afterhours don’t seem to agree with this).

The next band I’m gonna cover in this way is Screaming Trees, a band which currently holds rank 100 in my overall top chart so is in danger to drop out of my top 100 but certainly deserve to remain in it in my view.

[Repo]

[dihansse]

[Repo]

[dihansse]

(The) Screaming Trees was a band originally from Ellensburg Washington but then moved to Seattle. After a first demo in 1985 they issued many albums first for SST and then for Epic Records. The main character of the band and one of my favorite artists is the singer Mark Lanegan who also starred as a solo artist and was member of a number of other bands like The Gutter Twins and The Twilight Singers.
The mean feature of Lanegan is his very deep and smoky voice and the music of Screaming Trees can be best described as a mixture between punk, garage rock and just plain classic rock. While they are because of their location in Seattle partly part of the grunge scene, they never were really part of it although their main album, Sweet Oblivion was released in the middle of the grunge frenzy in 1992 and this was also the album I got to know them by. They officially broke up in 2000 although their last album was released in 2011.

To me this band, together with Hüsker Dü and the Replacements (as well as Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr which were also part of the SST label) were at the head of the indie scene in the middle of the eighties and maybe they came a bit too early to really profit from the success of that scene in the nineties.

These are the Screaming Trees albums which were already in my top possession/top charts and their rank before I relistened to all their albums:
My rank Title Year - BEA rank - BEA album rank
177 Dust 1996 - 2846 - 2
207 Invisible Lantern 1988 - 24382 - 7
284 Sweet Oblivion 1992 - 2290 - 1
319 Uncle Anesthesia 1991 - 13997 - 4
337 Buzz Factory 1989 - 11402 - 3
not ranked Last Words: The Final Recordings 2011 - 44357 - 11
to discover Clairvoyance 1986 - 21875 - 5
to discover Even If And Especially When 1987 - 25762 - 8
to discover Other Worlds (EP) 1985 - 36259 - 9

After that listening session this is my final ranking in reverse order:

Three OK albums:

9. Clairvoyance by Screaming Trees (1986; BEA rank: 21556 and ranked 5th ST album; my overall rank: not ranked ): this is the first official album with SST although their first demo was released as an ep after this album was released. Nevertheless I’m gonna attribute the best track of that EP, The Turning to this album. Overall this album was still not of the quality of the other albums and if there is one album you don’t need to listen to it’s this one except for:
Best track: The Hurting: raw, emotional

8. Last Words: The Final Recordings by Screaming Trees (2011; BEA rank: 34521 and ranked 10th ST album; my overall rank: not ranked): this is the other side of the spectrum: although they split officially in 2000 they still released a last album in 2011 they recorded in 1998-1999. Although this is still vintage Screaming Trees stuff, there are some hits and misses on this album. It certainly is worth listening and as a fan, I was very happy to listen to another ST album when it was released but if you’re looking for their best output you can give this one a miss.

7. Other Worlds by Screaming Trees (1985; BEA rank: 26367 and ranked 9th ST album; my overall rank: 211): this is the EP I was talking about earlier: the songs are not bad but still sup par, except for The Hurting, which can also be found on Clairvoyance.

Then three very good albums:
6. Even If And Especially When by Screaming Trees (1987; BEA rank: 21594 and ranked 6th ST album; my overall rank: 173): This is the first album of the classic Screaming Trees period which ran for about 10 years and which has a large number of excellent tracks and of which one classic in my opinion:
- Classic track: Back Together: exhilarating, raw

5. Buzz Factory by Screaming Trees (1989; BEA rank: 10687 and ranked 3rd ST album; my overall rank: 147):
two Classic Tracks:
- Subtle Poison: Mark Lanegan screaming his lungs out: Walls Are Closing In Right On You
- The End Of The Universe: bluesy and epic and very guitar driven

4. Invisible Lantern by Screaming Trees (1988; BEA rank: 23670 and ranked 8th ST album; my overall rank: 92): Just filled with great tracks
but one Classic track: Smoke Rings: Dark Clouds Are Moving In: very classic Screaming Trees

and finally three Classic albums (which are all three very close to each other):

3.

Uncle Anesthesia by Screaming Trees
(1991; BEA rank: 11947 and ranked 4th ST album on BEA; my overall rank: 56): big swear word from Tilly because this is his favorite Screaming Trees album. And this is probably also their hardest rocking record and one record chuck full with classics but one outstanding classic: Story Of Her Fate: a track which changes gear a number of times during the track which makes it very propulsive and explosive (and the smoker's cough at the end is the icing on the cake).

2.

Dust by Screaming Trees
(1996; BEA rank: 2822 and also ranked second ST album on BEA; my overall rank: 55): There is a period of 4 years between their previous albums and this one and I suppose there is a reason for that. This one sounds a lot more experimental and I think purely on a musical level this could be their best but the two other classics just below and just above have more swagger. Dime Western has an Indian druggy atmosphere and there are a few fantastic slower songs (Traveler, Look At You) which just show what an emotionally apt singer Mark Lanegan is. And Halo of Ashes (again a bit of Indian atmosphere) and All I Know are just outstanding and hard rocking Screaming Trees songs. I could say all tracks or no particular track are classics on this album.

1.

Sweet Oblivion by Screaming Trees
(1992; BEA rank: 2129 and also first ranked ST album on BEA; my overall rank: 50): this is the album which was released in full grunge period and also the album I first heard of them and I suppose this has something to do with the fact that I rank this one as their best. The absolute classic on this album is also their best known song I guess:
Classic track: Sweet Oblivion: grungy is the word but in the best sense

And I must say, in listening back to nine fo their albums in three days I wasn’t bored for a minute. Many people might find that their music is a bit samey but that’s certainly not the case if you give these guys a thorough listen.
In general I adapted my scoring so much that at once the Screaming Trees jump on my Best ever albums (one album per artist) from rank 100 (with Dust) to rank 36 (with Sweet Oblivion) and this is just based on the score of this particular album. I'm sure that if I would take into consideration their legacy with three classic albums and three very good albums they would be in my top 10 (together with of course also the Beatles).

[Repo]

Nice synopsis!

Completely agree with these rankings besides the nitpicking of having Uncle Anesthesia & then Dust ahead of Sweet Oblivion. But, yeah, those are their three undisputed classics and essential Hard Rock for the 90s.

[dihansse]

So I saw an Allmusic.com recommendation on a new 2018 album of a band I had never heard from, We’re Your Friends, Man by the Bevis Frond, and I started listening to it without a lot of expectations.
But I was startled: what a bomb of a guitar album: one hour and 25 minutes of pure bliss and large chunks of that pure guitar bliss: 20 tracks of it with the best track in the end: You’re On Your Own goes on for 13 minutes but never a dull moment.

Then I saw that Bevis Frond had already released 20+ albums so I started listening to their last but one album: White Number. This album is even longer (24 tracks) and the longest one even takes more than 42 minutes and is like it title suggests: a guitar jam. And again never a dull moment and also here I found a track that I already see as one of my all-time favorites: Begone.

So I listened to 11 more of his albums…

How to describe this band: by one British guy: Nick Saloman. He already started in the sixties but really started a band which he wanted to sound like Hendrix/Byrds/Wipers and that’s exactly what he sounds like but maybe you should add a bit of J. Mascis and Robert Pollard. His music was always described as psychrock and that’s certainly how he sounded in the beginning but gradually the music was more and more turning into classic/indie guitar rock with a sensitive touch and unlike a lot of his earlier fans, when I listen to the band with a fresh ear, the music sounds better and better as the years go by: while in the beginning there was still a whole lot of noodling while his tracks on especially his newest albums have become less DIY and much more focused (which is maybe a contradiction as his albums and tracks become longer and longer).

I’m not gonna describe a lot of the 13 different albums I listened to (and I haven’t listened to his complete discography yet) but I can tell that most of them end up high in my different personal year charts (to be confirmed of course because I only listened to these albums once which already took me several hours: have I used the word epic already). This is the list in rising order :

one still fairly unfocused album:
13. Miasma by The Bevis Frond (made it to the 26th rank in my year chart of 1987)


five good albums:

12. Triptych by The Bevis Frond (jumped to the 11th rank in my 1988 year chart)

11. Sprawl by The Bevis Frond (at the 15th rank in my 1994 year chart)

10. Hit Squad by The Bevis Frond (my 7th rank of 2004):
most tracks are fairly standard but contains one track that has made it to my favorites: Through The Hedge

9. London Stone by The Bevis Frond (my 13th ranked album of 1992)

8. Superseeder by The Bevis Frond (my 7th album of 1995)

And then five outstanding albums.

7.It Just Is by The Bevis Frond (my 15th album of 1993)

6. Any Gas Faster by The Bevis Frond (my 9th album of 1990)

5. New River Head by The Bevis Frond (my 16th album of 1991)
Contains one of my no alltime favorite tracks: Stain On The Sun

4. The Leaving Of London by The Bevis Frond my 2nd album of 2011)
No all-time favorite tracks here but Johhny Kwango, Speedboat and Reanimation are the standouts

3. Example 22 by The Bevis Frond (my top album of 2015)
Also no all-time favorites but the very good ones are Are We Nearly There Yet?, Pale Blue Blood, Manual Labour and Well?

And to me already two classic albums:

2. (made it to the third rank of this fantastic year 2018)

We're Your Friends, Man by The Bevis Frond

These are two tracks which already made it to my absolutely favorite all-time tracks:
- Enjoy (the first track and 6 minutes long): It starts as a very upbeat song that which is impossible to sit still and this is only the beginning: than starts an absolutely irresistible twin guitar attack.
- You're On Your Own (the last track and 13 minutes long): starts with a wah wah fairly regular guitar solo that goes on for 1:40 to lead to a gorgeous sung part about galaxies and the like and blistering guitar solo starting round the 8th minute in the best tradition of epic guitar tracks like Free Bird. If you like guitar solos this is not one to miss!!!!!!!!!
And a special mention for Lead On.

1. (made it to the second rank in the year 2013)
White Numbers by The Bevis Frond

And one best track: Begone (6:24): starts with a Pixies base to quickly evolve into a very hard stomper leading to again a devastating guitar solo round the 3rd minute.
And the longest guitar solo I ever heard and really appreciated (42:11): Homemade Traditional Electric Jam.

I can only recommend this band to anyone.

[dihansse]

Time to go back to the original: 1997 it was:
- The Lonesome Crowded West by Modest Mouse (nr 4 on the overall BEA top chart of 1997): not their best album in my opinion but still good enough to make it to my top charts
- Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In...ritualized (nr 6): in 2018, their latest album was the best of the year. This one isn't as good but there are still some very fine tracks to be found here so also good enough to be part of my top chart
- F♯A♯∞ by Godspeed You! Black Emperor (nr 8 ): maybe also because I'm starting to become a bit fed up with these long postrock tracks but I didn't find a lot of interesting stuff in this album
- The Boatman's Call by Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds (nr 10): and all those Nick Cave albums I haven't yet checked out seem to turn out very good and this one as well. I especially liked (Are You) The One I've Been Waiting For?
- The Fat Of The Land by The Prodigy (nr 11): a classic and of course Smack Your Bitch Up and Breathe are a good start but the rest of the album couldn't get me firestarted like also Firestarter a but further.
- The Mollusk by Ween (nr 13): Ween is one of those bands which is appreciated by lots of people who have some taste in music but for the moment they haven't made the click with me yet. I can't sayt that some of the songs on The Mollusk were bad but no: the spark was not there.
- Homework by Daft Punk (nr 16): hits hits hits but the whole album is too long to fully enjoy.
- Buena Vista Social Club by Buena Vista Social Club (nr 18 ): Chan Chan is very good and I like the general feel of the album but overall all the songs sound a bit the same so finally not really my thing
- Dig Your Own Hole by The Chemical Brothers (nr 21): Block Rockin Beats is a killer but that's not enough to make this whole album worthwile although there are other good tracks to be found like Setting Sun and It Doesn't Matter.

The next album to listen to is Whatever And Ever Amen by Ben Folds Five.