Best Albums of 1972

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1.

The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars 

 David Bowie

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"Was never a huge Bowie fan until hearing this record. It completely changed my opinion on him as a whole, I will probably do some more listening soon. Incredibly consistent album full of glorious 70's Rock. I enjoyed every second of it. Nothing negative I can really say. Killer record."  Reply

- xMUSICSNOBx | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +7 votes (7 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

3,038 charts

Rank Score:

41,195

Rank in 1972:

1

Rank in 1970s:

3

Overall Rank:

6

Average Rating:

 90 (3,592 votes)

Comments:

305

2.

Exile On Main St. 

 The Rolling Stones

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"For a bunch of white British guys they really nailed the dirty, gritty sound of American southern blues and rock and roll. This is a masterpiece."  Reply

- somefatguy157 | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +9 votes (9 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

1,974 charts

Rank Score:

18,565

Rank in 1972:

2

Rank in 1970s:

13

Overall Rank:

47

Average Rating:

 85 (2,375 votes)

Comments:

211

3.

Pink Moon 

 Nick Drake

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"There's a certain beauty to this album that is inescapable. It has no gimmicks to it, just Drake alone on his acoustic guitar. It's an atmospheric and ethereal record that I will be returning to for a while."  Reply

- camsh | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +9 votes (9 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

1,566 charts

Rank Score:

16,807

Rank in 1972:

3

Rank in 1970s:

17

Overall Rank:

59

Average Rating:

 86 (1,875 votes)

Comments:

144

4.

Close To The Edge 

 Yes

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"There's a feeling I get from Close to the Edge which I get from very few other albums. There's this feeling that it's bigger than me, almost towering over me. All three songs range from hard-hitting to peaceful at times, sometimes changing mood in the middle of the song. It's apparent that these ...""There's a feeling I get from Close to the Edge which I get from very few other albums. There's this feeling that it's bigger than me, almost towering over me. All three songs range from hard-hitting to peaceful at times, sometimes changing mood in the middle of the song. It's apparent that these tracks were extremely well planned out by extremely talented musicians. This is one of those progressive rock albums that's easy to love even if you're not a big fan of the genre. If you are a fan of progressive rock, it is essential, and with good reason."  [+]  Reply

- | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +12 votes (12 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

1,213 charts

Rank Score:

13,510

Rank in 1972:

4

Rank in 1970s:

24

Overall Rank:

86

Average Rating:

 85 (1,499 votes)

Comments:

122

5.

Harvest 

 Neil Young

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""Harvest" is Neil Young biggest commercial succes. The number one hit-single "Heart of Gold" is obviously one of the reasons why the album was so successful, but of course the album has a lot of other great tracks. Generally the album is among Young's softest and most melodic, and songs like "Out..."""Harvest" is Neil Young biggest commercial succes. The number one hit-single "Heart of Gold" is obviously one of the reasons why the album was so successful, but of course the album has a lot of other great tracks. Generally the album is among Young's softest and most melodic, and songs like "Out on the Weekend", "Harvest" and "Old Man" are prototype songs showing Young's melodic country side - all three among the very of best of his early solo-recordings. A couple of songs, "Alabama" and "Words", do have the harder rocking approach that Young would exploit further on later albums. The two ballads "A Man Needs a Maid" and "There's a World" are arranged with pretty heavy orchestration, which some may like, but which personally is a bit of a shame, as the songs really don't need this. "The Needle and the Damage Done" is an acoustic live-recording, so in a way you could describe the album as being somewhat heterogeneous. But with outstanding songs like "Heart of Gold", "Out on the Weekend", "Harvest" and "Old Man" the album will be a favourite among most Young fans"  [+]  Reply

- Rovers | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +3 votes (3 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

1,389 charts

Rank Score:

11,782

Rank in 1972:

5

Rank in 1970s:

29

Overall Rank:

104

Average Rating:

 85 (1,756 votes)

Comments:

97

6.

Transformer 

 Lou Reed

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"I guess I shouldn't have invested time and money into this album as I don't like Velvet Underground. I understand people have a passion for certain artists but I just can't get into this album or the Velvets. I have tried. I do like the hit "Walk on the Wild Side", but that is about as memorable ...""I guess I shouldn't have invested time and money into this album as I don't like Velvet Underground. I understand people have a passion for certain artists but I just can't get into this album or the Velvets. I have tried. I do like the hit "Walk on the Wild Side", but that is about as memorable as this album will ever be for me."  [+]  Reply

- Simon_bramhall | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +3 votes (5 helpful | 2 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

1,251 charts

Rank Score:

9,307

Rank in 1972:

6

Rank in 1970s:

36

Overall Rank:

145

Average Rating:

 83 (1,559 votes)

Comments:

94

7.

Machine Head 

 Deep Purple

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"I'm not really a fan of Deep Purple, but this is undeniably one of the greatest hard rock records ever. That opening riff on Smoke on the Water is one of the most instantly memorable riffs of all time and Highway Star is the ultimate fast car/hot chicks anthem. Throw in a beauty like Space Trucki...""I'm not really a fan of Deep Purple, but this is undeniably one of the greatest hard rock records ever. That opening riff on Smoke on the Water is one of the most instantly memorable riffs of all time and Highway Star is the ultimate fast car/hot chicks anthem. Throw in a beauty like Space Truckin' and you have a recipe for a classic."  [+]  Reply

- Decurso | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +5 votes (5 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

833 charts

Rank Score:

6,306

Rank in 1972:

7

Rank in 1970s:

60

Overall Rank:

251

Average Rating:

 83 (1,048 votes)

Comments:

59

8.

Ege Bamyası 

 Can

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"Paperhouse's hazy, washed out introduction to Tago Mago felt like softly slipping into a fever dream, slowly building to a plateu of fuzz guitar freakout, a fitting start to over 2 hours of material cut down and scraped together from sun-dried psychedelia and apocalyptic avant-garde experimentati...""Paperhouse's hazy, washed out introduction to Tago Mago felt like softly slipping into a fever dream, slowly building to a plateu of fuzz guitar freakout, a fitting start to over 2 hours of material cut down and scraped together from sun-dried psychedelia and apocalyptic avant-garde experimentation. At the time, Ege Bamyasi wouldn't have sounded like anything but a natural progression to anyone who had heard Tago Mago, it's very distinctly Can. It has it's differences however, something which is apparent right from the opening moments of Pinch, which put the listener straight into the action. That dissonant note at the beginning and Damo Suzuki's muttered 'Ohh yeah' establish that you've caught them right in the middle of a jam session. There's no build up, no wait for them to lock into the groove, it's like you've walked into the venue to see Can on stage in full flow, playing off eachother masterfully. That sound is a guitar but it's not immediately apparent, Michael Karoli's constantly sustained feedback meanders between the lo-fi gurgles of pond-life during nighttime to the wails of birds and insects above. The keyboard and percussion cut in and out without warning, sometimes ambient and sometimes alien. Holger Czukay teases you with a bassline caught between a strictly percussive role and the all out jazz-funk of 'Halleluwah'. The duality is present in Suzuki's vocals too, there's no middle ground between mumbled and shouted on Pinch, this may be my favourite of his performances with the band. The abrasiveness is restricted to the second half of "Soup", the beginning of which is signified with an explosion and proceeds to out-weird "Aumgm" and "Peking O". Elsewhere, Ege Bamyasi is arguably Can at their most accessible during the Damo Suzuki period, sandwiched between the noisy second half of Tago Mago and the ambient qualities of Future Days which had less room for vocals and more room for field recordings. Can stop short of the 4 minute mark on three occasions, each time sounding as close as they ever got to a conventional pop song (in fact Spoon was a hit in Germany). The music never comes across as a "watered down" version of previous material though, the flavour created by the bands interests and influences is just split into easily digestible chunks. Maybe i shouldn't use food metaphors on an album with such a strong food theme, hmm."  [+]  Reply

- badger | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +10 votes (10 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

638 charts

Rank Score:

5,136

Rank in 1972:

8

Rank in 1970s:

79

Overall Rank:

326

Average Rating:

 83 (741 votes)

Comments:

28

9.

Thick As A Brick 

 Jethro Tull

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"That this album is just one song will immediately put a lot of people off, but it's a very rewarding listen, filled with memorable hooks, intriguing lyrics and is an impressive performance. Also one of the best albums for stopping classical music snobs in their tracks when they declare rock to be...""That this album is just one song will immediately put a lot of people off, but it's a very rewarding listen, filled with memorable hooks, intriguing lyrics and is an impressive performance. Also one of the best albums for stopping classical music snobs in their tracks when they declare rock to be unsophisticated, non-melodic, unintelligent etc. And the newspaper album sleeve is a brilliant read, penned in Ian Anderson's inimitable style."  [+]  Reply

- NecroBadger | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +3 votes (4 helpful | 1 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

649 charts

Rank Score:

4,825

Rank in 1972:

9

Rank in 1970s:

85

Overall Rank:

348

Average Rating:

 83 (864 votes)

Comments:

44

10.

Foxtrot 

 Genesis

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"The album that proved that Genesis would be prog masters. Everything gels together so well here. There's hardly a moment where you're uninterested. Watcher of the Skies is a perfect opener and a contender for Genesis' best song, and of course Supper's Ready is fantastic as well. Get 'Em Out by Fr...""The album that proved that Genesis would be prog masters. Everything gels together so well here. There's hardly a moment where you're uninterested. Watcher of the Skies is a perfect opener and a contender for Genesis' best song, and of course Supper's Ready is fantastic as well. Get 'Em Out by Friday is an underrated gem that's more than worth your time. Those three are essential, everything else is strongly recommended. Perhaps even more importantly, Foxtrot began a four-album run that remains unmatched in true progressive rock (unless you count Pink Floyd's Dark Side-WYWH-Animals-The Wall as true prog)."  [+]  Reply

- MetaKoopa99 | Helpful?  (Log in to vote) | +4 votes (4 helpful | 0 unhelpful) A maximum of 5 top-voted qualifying comments are selected for each album. To provide the best experience for visitors, comments are excluded if they refer to data corrections, contain excessive profanity, are written in all caps, are non-English, are too short, consist of conversations between users, or contain lists of best tracks etc.

Year of Release:

1972

Appears in:

627 charts

Rank Score:

4,801

Rank in 1972:

10

Rank in 1970s:

86

Overall Rank:

349

Average Rating:

 82 (867 votes)

Comments:

62

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Total albums: 1,000. Page 1 of 100

Best Albums of 1972 composition

Top 1,000 Top 500 Top 250 Top 100

Artist	Albums	%
Various Artists	12	1%
Jimi Hendrix	4	0%
Deep Purple	4	0%
The Rolling Stones	4	0%
Elvis Presley	4	0%
James Brown	3	0%
Procol Harum	3	0%
Show all

Country	Albums	%
	428	43%
	201	20%
	67	7%
	36	4%
	33	3%
	29	3%
	23	2%
Show all

Compilation?	Albums	%
No	944	94%
Yes	56	6%

Live?	Albums	%
No	951	95%
Yes	49	5%

Soundtrack?	Albums	%
No	986	99%
Yes	14	1%