Top 50 Greatest Music Albums
by HiImViibes

Update 4/16/17

Whew, it has been a long time since I last updated this chart, at least the text part of it. Since my last update four months ago I have been digesting a lot of music. I’ve gone from shoegaze, to Britpop, to post-punk, to indie rock, and most recently a bit of hip hop. It’s been amazing expanding on what I thought I would enjoy as far as music goes. I’m only scratching the surface too, which is incredible to me. Most of these albums landed in the thirty to forty range on the chart, which mostly comes from me enjoying the record a good amount, but not enough to put it over others that I have more history with. Also, I recently listened to “The King of Limbs” again, and I have such a hard time placing in the top fifteen, but I also enjoy it way too much to have it sit near the twenty spot. It’s such a grower of an album for me, always seems to get better. I plan to dabble a bit more in Britpop in the coming months, while getting into a bit of experimental rock. I plan to give some time to my favourite albums as well in my top twenty, so those may move a bit. I will mostly focus on digesting new music on a one to two albums per week basis, while updating the chart every week or so when I feel inspiration to do so. As always, suggestions are greatly appreciated, have a good one!


These are my personal favorite albums, not what I think are the greatest albums of all time. This will change as more albums are added to the chart though, and it will transition to a greatest albums chart. Every journey has to start somewhere though.

I would like to make a chart of 100 very well-crafted albums one day, but I haven't listened to 100 well-crafted albums yet. Up until a year ago the only album I was familiar with was Hot Fuss. I had been wanting to delve into tasteful music for a long time, but I didn't know where to start, this site was the perfect “Start Here” on my map. One day during a boring lecture, I went online to look up what the internet thought the greatest album of all time was, this site appeared. I bought OK Computer the next time I was in a record store, and listened to it on my way home. After that I was hooked.

I like having a physical copy of albums, and I usually don't listen to an album unless I own it. Unfortunately, this makes my wallet thin, and my list very short, for now at least. This list isn't so much A Greatest Albums of All Time Chart, it's more of a My Personal Favorite Albums Chart. I plan to listen to a lot more albums very soon to make this a more exclusive list, but I just wanted to get started on it. I'd like to listen to two or three albums a week and add them on, but some albums need more time to digest than others. I might offer my personal analysis of albums that I don’t have a deep connection with, which will make the process take even longer. I'm also not very picky when it comes to music so it might be hard to think objectively about how the albums compare, we'll see if that changes over the course of this chart's lifespan though. I will not be expressing my opinion of an album on this chart, or why it is at the position it is, not yet at least. Once the chart reaches one hundred albums that I feel deserve to be here, then I will give reasoning as to why it is on the chart, and why it is where it is on the chart.

I've left comments enabled on the chart so that people can leave suggestions as to what I should listen to next. As of right now nearly all of the chart positions are debatable, I don't see my top seven moving much though. Don't flame me too hard for typos and all of the Radiohead love, please. Thanks.

• Chart updated: 04/20/2017 01:45
• (Created: 03/20/2016 03:08).
• Chart size: 50 albums.

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21. (=)

Doolittle 

 Pixies

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[First added to this chart: 12/29/2016]

Year of Release:

1989

Appears in:

2,548 charts

Rank Score:

31,571

Rank in 1989:

1

Rank in 1980s:

2

Overall Rank:

18

Average Rating:

 88 (2,958 votes)

Comments:

293

26. (=)

The Queen Is Dead 

 The Smiths

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[First added to this chart: 09/24/2016]

Year of Release:

1986

Appears in:

2,497 charts

Rank Score:

33,852

Rank in 1986:

1

Rank in 1980s:

1

Overall Rank:

16

Average Rating:

 88 (2,922 votes)

Comments:

265

41. (40) 1

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Surfer Rosa 

 Pixies

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[First added to this chart: 07/05/2016]

Year of Release:

1988

Appears in:

1,313 charts

Rank Score:

12,004

Rank in 1988:

2

Rank in 1980s:

13

Overall Rank:

106

Average Rating:

 84 (1,871 votes)

Comments:

112

Total albums: 3. Page 1 of 1

Top 50 Greatest Music Albums composition

Country	Albums	%
	23	46%
	21	42%
	3	6%
	2	4%
	1	2%

Top 50 Greatest Music Albums chart changes

Top 50 Greatest Music Albums similar charts

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Top 50 Greatest Music Albums similarity to your chart(s)

Top 50 Greatest Music Albums ratings

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Rating	Date updated	Member	Chart ratings	Avg. chart rating
90/100  !	09/09/2019 08:09	Timooosterink	131	90/100
80/100  !	10/28/2017 14:55	PaperVinnie	452	81/100
60/100  !	09/08/2017 03:13	JulianR	570	75/100
85/100  !	09/04/2017 16:26	Weepingguitarman	43	95/100
70/100  !	09/04/2017 13:46	platus	309	81/100

Rating metrics: Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
(*In practice, some charts can have several thousand ratings)
This chart has a Bayesian average rating of 84.5/100, a mean average of 81.3/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 83.9/100. The standard deviation for this chart is 15.3.

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Top 50 Greatest Music Albums favourites

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Top 50 Greatest Music Albums comments

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Rating:  

90/100

From Timooosterink 09/09/2019 08:10 | #242383

Nice chart! lots in common!!

Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | 0 votes (0 helpful | 0 unhelpful)

Rating:  

80/100

From PaperVinnie 10/28/2017 14:52 | #200212

It's clear you put a lot of effort into the chart which I can respect, but you should branch out from Radiohead, man. I mean they are a good band and I respect them, but lists like this sustain the illusion that they're the greatest band of all time. Other than that, you and I seem to have a lot of picks in common and thats pretty cool.

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Rating:  

60/100

From JulianR 09/08/2017 03:15 | #197466

Radiohead is my favorite band and all, but are they really that good? Also, it would be nice if you tell a little bit about why you rank each album as such.

Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | 0 votes (0 helpful | 0 unhelpful)

Rating:  

70/100

From platus 09/04/2017 13:46 | #197237

Long live radiohead!

Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | 0 votes (0 helpful | 0 unhelpful)

Rating:  

70/100

From Oselju 09/04/2017 11:53 | #197232

Well, I suppose you love Radiohead !

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Rating:  

80/100

From Johnnyo 09/04/2017 11:50 | #197231

Really nice start. Nothing wrong with having a number of albums by the same band near the top of the list especially if, like me, you need to have a physical copy of the album. It certainly took me a number of years to get a reasonable collection together. Good hunting.

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Rating:  

80/100

From badger 09/04/2017 11:26 | #197229

I too started my musical discovery voyage with copious amounts of Radiohead, it's a great way to start. Keep exploring! If you have spotify, try looking for playlists of Radiohead's (or rather Thom Yorke's) office chart, great way to discover a lot of different styles

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Rating:  

25/100

From SamNassiri98 09/04/2017 09:20 | #197226

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Rating:  

75/100

From corenfro 01/04/2017 02:25 | #181661

Bumped up my rating a little after the revision. Maybe more diversity among time periods and genres but this is a solid list of alternative art-rock albums from recent memory w/ a few classics from days of old.

Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +1 votes (1 helpful | 0 unhelpful)

Rating:  

90/100

From magpie369 01/01/2017 21:19 | #181438

Great start! Since I only not too long ago started listening to music consciously I'm impressed of the 40 Albums that you like!
Recommendations for a potential next step would be The Flaming Lips and Grizzly Bear - psych rock and folk!
Have fun exploring further!

Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +1 votes (1 helpful | 0 unhelpful)

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