reposted from fb, 25 albums that shaped your life

whitelilywhitelily 155 Posts
edited February 2009 in Strut Central
Think of 25 albums that had such a profound effect on you they changed your life or the way you looked at it. They sucked you in and took you over for days, weeks, months, years. These are the albums that you can use to identify time, places, people, emotions. These are the albums that no matter what they were thought of musically shaped your world. Not necessarily your favorite albums of all time, but the ones that shaped your life. Okay, this is way more interesting than 25 things about yourself. I???ll do mine chronologically too. As a little kid, at the Sunrise house, the air filled with my dad???s music all day and all night. These are the albums that when I hear I still remember the strange plywood floors and secret attic alcoves we kids used to hide in during late night games of Murder, and how weird and still the day would get when the golden orange afternoon sun came through the skylights and illuminated all the dust in the air. Funny to think about how strange music sounds to children, who don???t really know much about life yet, and may not understand what a song is about, but instinctively recognize emotion and imagination and pain and passion and are so visual that lyrics can light up your head and make crazy elaborate stories adults can only dream of constructing???.1. patti smith ??? horses (Gloria, Free Money, echoes crazy memories, this album filled the dimmer spaces of my head as a child in such a huge way) 2. The Doors- not sure which album???.but I can remember the Doors playing all the time when I was little???.I distinctly remember standing on the stairs of the second floor of the Sunrise house just stopped in the middle of the stairwell to listen, ???this is the end???.my only friend, the end?????? that line struck me and made me stop and think and spin off into my imagination even at age 5 or whatever, and all the twangy tripped-out slow guitar sounds made my small mind wander far out in the distance beyond where it had ever been before. 3. The Clash???Sandinista! All four sides. To this day, my favorite album of all time. Partially because the memories, partially because how far and deep it reaches into strange lands musically, visually???.soft rolling dream-like soundscapes, very specific lyrics, visions captured of black and white England. I remember how scary all the war references were??? ???It???s up to you not to heed the call up,??? and all the helicopter sounds in Charlie Don???t Surf???.Who holds the key that winds up Big Ben? I???ve listened to this album so many times throughout every period of my life that it???s actually become so rooted in my brain that I can???t separate the music and the lyrics from my memories at all anymore. 4. Dire Straits-Alchemy- to this day if I hear that local hero coming home song or telegraph road it brings back such a strong flood of memories that I???ll probably start crying right there. Okay, time to move on to like 1985 or around the mid eighties somewhere???6-9 yrs. old???Mom???s taste was slightly more pop???5. The Police- Synchronicity???the song that really set off my imagination on this one was a little-known or paid attention to Police song called Tea in the Sahara somewhere near the end of the album???this song was an early indicator of Sting???s later habit of making slow bizarre songs with internationally based lyrics???. It was weird and eerie and filled with a sense of death and foreboding that I found interesting. ???My sisters and IHave this wish before we dieAnd it may sound strangeAs if our minds are derangedPlease don't ask us whybeneath the sheltering sky???6. Prince-Purple Rain???Dearly Beloved???we are gathered here today to get through this thing called life???.another album I???ve probably listened to a handful of times every year since it came out. Beautiful, sexy, deep, sad and rockin. 7. Tears for Fears-Songs from the Big Chair-another strange one???this is during the height of pseudo political 80s music???this album is strange indeed, moody and dark and psychological but maybe not very smart???anyway I used to listen to my cassette of it on my walkman over and over???.8. U2???Rattle and Hum???To the horror of my friends I knew every single word to every single song on this album and used to sing it out loud while listening to my walkman on field trips, trips to the movies, any car ride, and I???d refuse to be quiet or stop singing???anyone who thinks I???m weird now should just remember that I was always this way. This is a super sexy album, and kind of beautifully vast and sad at the same time. 9. The Clash- Combat Rock???Another one that however many times I listen to it still sometimes reminds me of being a child. Straight to Hell, Ghetto Defendant, and Sean Flynn are the songs I remember spacing out to as a kid???another walkman favorite for long car rides, luckily I didn???t like to sing to this one. Okay, on to teenage years: 10. Cro-Mags-Age of Quarrel???Still my favorite hardcore album of all time. ???You come into this world, with nothing except yourself??????11. Bad Brains???Rock for Light???What can I say? Anyone who knows this album well knows it???s one of the punk masterpieces of all time. I used to listen to it to snowboard and do Algebra homework. 12. Jawbreaker-24 hour Revenge Therapy???my very favorite album as a teen, after I was done with my angry stage and entered my romantic stage. This was my very first breakup album. I listened to it after I broke up with my first bf then decided I was in love with him and cried nearly every day for months afterwards listening to this and The Cure. Condition Oakland is still beautiful, but I can???t stand Blake???s voice anymore. 13. Descendents- Somery???The soundtrack to my who-gives a F*ck let???s drink some 40s stage. Simultaneously full of heart and romance and blasphemous adolescent F*ck yous. ???Sitting there with your mouth full of beer, eyes are glazed, face is red, who???s gonna pick you up, and take you home with them tonight????College: 14. Sunny Day Real Estate-Diary???A beautiful album, not to mention the incredible artwork in the insert. I listened to this album so many times over and over that I might never ever be able to listen to it again. 15. and 16. Modest Mouse???The Lonesome Crowded West and A Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About???two albums my head got lost in all through college. I can???t even remember what else I listened to. These albums inspired roadtrips through Kentucky, train hopping, hitchhiking, and all the little zines I made along the way???colorful American landscapes and little love stories taking place at truck stops and trailer parks everywhere in every little changing nowheresville on the roadside. 17. Piebald???When Life Hands You Lemons???More romantic adventures in punk rock fairyland???when emo wasn???t such a bad word and guys with corduroys and sweaters and paperbacks in their pockets were the coolest thing in the world. 18. Pan Sonic ??? Aaltopiiri???beautiful ambient sounds, so quiet it almost sounds like your refrigerator humming. Obviously a boyfriend showed me this album because I never would have found something so rare and strange on my own, not knowing anything about electronic music, but for some reason this album really got me and I listened to it over and over and over again, especially to fall asleep to before somehow it disappeared. Okay, on to the Philly years: 20. Jefferson Airplane???Surrealistic Pillow???someone I was in love with showed me this album and it may have been this album that made me fall in love with him. It seemed like such a delicate feminine beautifully constructed slow burner of an album as humble as rolling hills. I found it strange and enchanting for a dude to be listening to it, it just really caught me off guard. I like every song on this album, to this day one of my all time favorite ps
ych records, just good throughout and also another great one to fall asleep and dream to. 21. Van Morrison- Astral Weeks???So many people have praised this album I won???t bother doing it again. Let me just say, I have to agree with the consensus that this is one of the best albums ever made. Slim Slow Slider. 22. Funkadelic???Maggot Brain???okay so I only listen to that one song from this, but it???s one of my favorite songs EVER. One time I was really stoned and I listened to it and it blew my mind even more. You could actually hear the guitar player???s fingers move ever so slightly across the strings in the quiet parts. 23. The Poppy Family ??? Which Way You Goin Billy???Another all time favorite psych record. This record is so good it makes you gag. How did they make something so popish and so dark and strange at the same time? It???s the perfect combination. 24. Country Joe and the Fish-Electric Music for Body and Soul???the definition of good psychOkay, this brings me up recently in L.A.: hmm???not sure if I???ve discovered anything worthy of this list in the past few years???.let???s say, 25. Animal Collective???Feels???beautiful throughout???.every dreamy song of it. Not sure if anything else makes the list.Other things that should be on this list: pink floyd the wall, beatles white album, 36 chambers, ready to die, illmatic, smashing pumpkins siamese dream, brightblack morning light s/t, bonnie dobson s/t, leonard cohen, the smiths, pixies, u2 boy, gandalf s/t, blues creation, heart dreamboat annie, flaming lips yoshimi, depeche mode violator, forever changes, radiohead, jesus and mary chain darklands, fleet foxes, nina simone baltimore, what color is love, dinosaur jr. yr livin all over me and green mind
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  Comments


  • When I had posted it in my profile, it was 20 albums, so...

    Pink Floyd-Dark Side Of The Moon
    Pink Floyd-The Wall
    Led Zeppelin-s/t
    Led Zeppelin-Led Zeppelin II
    Led Zeppelin-Led Zeppelin III
    Led Zeppelin-(untitled 4th album)
    Led Zeppelin-Houses Of The Holy
    Chicago Transit Authority-s/t
    Chicago-Chicago II
    Parliament-Mothership Connection
    The Beatles-Revolver
    The Beatles-Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
    The Beatles-Abbey Road
    Black Sabbath-Master Of Reality
    S.O.D.-Speak English Or Die
    Public Enemy-It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back
    Beastie Boys-Paul's Boutique
    Wu-Tang Clan-Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
    DJ Shadow-Endtroducing
    The Avalanches-Since I Left You

    Those were the 20 I came up with immediately.

  • BreakSelfBreakSelf 2,925 Posts
    What a great post.

    I'll see if i can come up with something this evening.

  • The one I did was 16...

    1. Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
    2. Thelonious Monk - Genius of Modern Music
    3. Ornette Coleman - The Shape of Jazz To Come
    4. Pink Floyd - Piper at the Gates of Dawn
    5. Sonics - Boom
    6. Sneetches - Sometimes That's All We Have
    7. Otis Redding & the Jimi Hendrix Experience at Monterey Pop
    8. 13th Floor Elevators - Easter Everywhere
    9. Beatles - Revolver
    10. Mississippi John Hurt - Original 1928 Sessions
    11. Velvet Underground - Velvet Underground
    12. Big Star - #1 Record
    13. Leon Russell - Leon Russell & the Shelter People
    14. Byrds - Dr Byrds & Mr Hyde
    15. Buffalo Springfield - S/T
    16. Love - Forever Changes

  • jamesjames chicago 1,863 Posts
    What a great post.

    Indeed. Philadelphia back in the building.

    I'm not going to have time to contribute to this until after the weekend, but I'll definitely get it in.

    Also, I have a special request that some of my coasting heavyweights quit fessing and post the fuck up in here. If you've got time for the dumb shit, you can certainly make time for this.

    Another special request: I'd be particularly interested in hearing about albums that shaped folks' adult lives.

    Thanks. See you soon.

  • jamesjames chicago 1,863 Posts
    Also, what is "fb"?

  • Also, what is "fb"?

    facebook


    Can I also add Sides 2 and 3 of Love's Doggone because for years that's all I heard from the album (it was passed on by my dad, I believe) until I bought my own copy. Before then, I grew up knowing "Doggone" as "the cool song with the tympani drum solo".

  • MoogManMoogMan Sao Paulo, Brazil 1,173 Posts
    3. The Clash - Sandinista! All four sides. To this day, my favorite album of all time. Partially because the memories, partially because how far and deep it reaches into strange lands musically, visually???.soft rolling dream-like soundscapes, very specific lyrics, visions captured of black and white England. I remember how scary all the war references were??? ???It???s up to you not to heed the call up,??? and all the helicopter sounds in Charlie Don???t Surf???.Who holds the key that winds up Big Ben? I???ve listened to this album so many times throughout every period of my life that it???s actually become so rooted in my brain that I can???t separate the music and the lyrics from my memories at all anymore.


    Great post!

    I'm just curious here: is your Sandinista! a 2 records album?
    I ask cos' brazilian issue has 3 records.


    Peace

  • No, you're right it is three records, six sides. For some reason I always think of it as two albums rolled into one, Sandinista one and two, therefore I was thinking four sides, but yeah, six.

  • marumaru 1,450 Posts
    how do i do this on facebook? do i need to be tagged or some shit?

  • No, just copy and paste the top of mine, go to "write note" on your profile, make your list, then tag your friends.

    : )

  • ageage 1,131 Posts
    It's funny, cause the original post started off as 10..then 15 (the one I got) and now..bumped up 10 more?!?!
    Crazy..I had a hard time struggling with the first one (15) too many titles came to mind!

    It was fun though

  • BamboucheBambouche 1,484 Posts
    I've told Lily this already, but reading her writing is comparable to finding an old diary. Not so much that the details are similar, but the way we reflect and process is pretty eerie. I'm not blessed with her brevity, so I won't make it anywhere near 25. Anyway, I'm on my way to have a hamburger with JRoot, so this will be abbreviated.


    Another special request: I'd be particularly interested in hearing about albums that shaped folks' adult lives.

    An interesting proposition. I assume it's true for a lot of us, the music of our youth was weighted with a lot of personal baggage. Tender, silly feelings that sentimentally tied us to those albums. The thing about growing up, it doesn't afford you the same luxury to metamorphose an album into a manifesto on a broken heart. Finding a way to connect Robert Smith to everything you have ever felt. That shit takes time.

    I guess I am saying records have shaped my adult life differently than they did in my youth. I still get quite moved by music, but I don't really write a 12-page letter to some girl in Solvang, quoting every other line in a song, telling her everything I've ever felt about every thing. At present, I am probably guilty of thinking about music much more than most of my friends, but it's largely an internal dialog. That is, they get bored with the discussion long before I do.

    But, here's a serious contender for adult life shaping:

    Antony & The Johnsons - I Am a Bird Now (Secretly Canadian, 2005)[/b]


    I'll get the stuff that gives straight folks the willies out of the way first. Antony is a chubby transsexuel who smiles a lot and sings mostly about sex change.

    His voice is an amalgam of Alison Moyet and Nina Simone. The live performances are just as devastating as the recorded material. I'm not particularly interested in transgender issues any more than a normal sympathetic person would be, so it's a bit odd that I would get so attached to this record. I don't know if this really means anything to the transgender community, but Antony being so popular must have some benefits.

    I instantly liked this album when it came out, and then it sort of just sat on the shelf without much attention. Until last winter. I don't know why it happened, but I was listening to "You Are My Sister" early one morning and I just wept.

    I'm 50/50 on most of the artists Antony works with (CocoRosie and Bjork I couldn't care less about; I'm indifferent to Boy George and Devendra Banhart), but even CocoRosie--who I wish disappeared from the face of the earth--don't bother me so much when in company with Antony.

    I was raised by dykes, so perhaps this has something to do with it, though I doubt it.




    I'm off to have a burger with JRoot.
    ~B

  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    1. Various Artists - Mardi Gras in New Orleans : When I go to the doctor they sometimes point out that I have a heart murmur. I tell them if they listen close its the bassline from Big Chief on permanent loop.

    2. Stevie Wonder - Talking Book : It was what was being heard seemingly whereever I went as a kid.

    3. Kiss - Double Platinum : first 8-track I ever had, played the heck out of it.

    4. Michael Jackson - Off the Wall : 2nd 8-track I ever had, nice change of pace from Kiss.

    5. Queen - The Game : 1st record I ever had, got a dragon on my back.

    6. Rick James - Street Songs : 1st cassette I ever had, along with being the 1st kid on my block with a Walkman that my dad brought back from a work trip to Japan.

    7. Van Halen - 1984 : Just thought it was cool as hell and helped me narrow the expanse between living in New Orleans and moving to Huntington Beach, California.

    8. The Doors - The Doors : Recorded onto tape from my neighbor and have been riding the snake ever since.

    9. Bob Marley - Legend/Natty Dread/Uprising : My study of Marley would last much longer but I remember seeing the 3 Little Birds video on Night Tracks when I was in 9th grade and I was hooked.

    10. The Cult - Dreamtime/Love/Electric : Through high school I was a Cult fanatic.

    11. The Beatles - The Blue Album 1967-70 : Used to listen to this every day before heading out to school for months and months on end.

    12. Jimi Hendrix - Are You Experienced/Smash Hits : Got heavy, heavy into Hendrix my junior year to the point that I was quoting lyrics in notes to girls.

    13. NWA - Straight Outta Compton/Eazy E - Eazy Duz It : Had these dubbed on either side of a cassette and couldn't get enough.

    14. Too $hort - Life Is Too $hort : Ronald Reagan walked up to me and said do you have the answer for the US economy and a cure for cancer.

    15. Soundgarden - Loud Love/Badmotorfinger : Balls to the wall.

    16. Nirvana - Bleach/Nevermind : Bought Nevermind the day it was released, but will always think of Bleach as their best album.

    17. A Tribe Called Quest - Low End Theory : This album more than any other reminds me of feeling like a bigshot on the UT campus.

    18. Eric Dolphy - Out to Lunch : I remember a particular Christmas being home in Houston and falling over backwards over this album, kicked a pre-existing affinity for jazz into high gear.

    19. Freestyle Fellowship - Inner City Griots : Blew me away, so deep, made me want to visit the Good Life.

    20. Pavement - Slanted and Enchanted : Listened to it twice in row in a semi-sleep state on acid once, so it got imprinted on the cortex, and I'm fine with that.

    21. Various Artists - Project Blowed : This is what I found when I eventually got to the Good Life.

    22. JT tha Bigga Figga - Playaz in tha Game/Mac Mall : Illegal Business : These albums are both so amazing, made me want to visit the Bay, wound up living there for 5 years.

    23. Sade - Greatest Hits : I can leave my body off of a some Sade alone, let alone the sex and weed.

    24. Z-Ro - Z-Ro's Greatest Verses : Mixed by Rapid Ric & DJ LL, this is what put me up on Ro, couldn't believe all that one dude could do with a mic.

    25. Billie Holiday - Greatest Hits : My daughter and I listen to Solitude, God Bless the Child, and Gloomy Sunday religiously every morning on the way to her school, to hear her sing is the most gorgeous sound in the world bar none.

  • Say goodbye on a night like this
    If it's the last thing you ever do
    You never looked as lost as this
    Sometimes it doesn't even look like you
    It goes dark it goes darker still please stay
    But I'm watching like I'm made of stone as you walk away

    I'm coming to find you if it takes me all night
    A witch hunt for another girl
    For always and ever and always for you
    You're just the most gorgeously stupid thing I ever caught in the world

    Say hello on a day like today, say it every time you move
    The way that you look at me now
    Makes me wish I was you
    It goes deep it goes deeper still
    This touch and the smile and the shake of your head and the smile
    And the shake of your head

    I'm coming to find you if it takes me all night
    Can't stand here like this anymore
    For always and ever and always for you
    I want it to be perfect like before

    Oh, I want to change it all
    Oh, I want to change
    Oh, I want to change it all
    Oh, I want to change

    stop writing in my own blood 3 [color:red] [/color]


  • 1.sgt peppers lonely hearts club band
    2.magical mystery tour
    3.abbey road
    4.muzsorsky-pictures at an exhibition/night on bald mountain
    i spent my formative years listening to these records, and singing these songs with my mom. i still have the beat up copies of those...im not really sure why my parents let me handle those at age 5. but i remember being really into the idea of a concept album...especially sgt peppers.then i left that music alone for twenty years before finally going back to it and realizing how timeless it is.

    5.police synchronicity
    6.michael jackson-thriller
    7.pink floyd the wall
    8.van halen 1984
    9.raising hell
    this spanned 3rd grade through 6h grade. i listened to the radio a lot... a lot of top40. i would tape songs off the radio and we would all bring our radios to school and sing pat benatar and quiet riot. but these four albums stood out. pink floyd a little later. strangely, i never saw the movie or listened to any of their other records. i was reeeeallly into every van halen record for a couple years. david lee roth was really unchained and the music was good. raising hell was recorded for me by a classmate (who i bumped into a couple months back) who dubbed it for everyone in class. this definitely made me pay attention to hiphop a little more (besides the joints that cracked top40 like whitelines and rappers delight which i didnt even realize was another genre)

    junior high school and the beginning of high school was all about metal for me and metallica was the shit. this was before ..and justice for all came out, but i listened to lal of their records...but kill em all the most. i liked ride the lightning a lot too. real dark, brooding stuff that lashed out angrily. thats probably what i wanted to do, but i was a good kid, so i didnt. but i guess metal fits real well into those awkward years before puberty...when shit gets real awkward.someone made me mellow out and listen to some zeppelin, which was real expansive for me...made me broaden my horizons a little and appreciate more than just one thing.and i wasnt a weed smoker yet, so i think this was the prelude into that mindstate.
    10.metallica-kill em all
    11.led zeppelin especially III (but really the first 5)
    12.guns n roses appetite for destruction

    high school. i was a punk. not punk rock. just real obnoxious. and the beastie boys fit the bill for that kind of thing. im surprised i didnt start seeking out the samples on puals boutique...wish i had, i would have got a headstart on what i started doing a couple years later. but i loved that sound.and i memorized all the stoned out irreverent lyrics. i was smoking weed at this point. the other three albums convinced me that i was a hiphop head. i dont know if i was or not, but they really shaped the way i was handling myself, or better or for worse, for a couple years.
    13.pauls boutique
    14.nation of million
    15.stribe low end theory
    16.cypress hill
    17.black sheep

    college years moved from a hiphop hellian (= young idiot) to freedom beyond the gates of hiphop, when i started looking for the sources of hiphop production and discovering amazing, sensitive, raw, real, heartfelt music that wasnt afraid to be vulnerable.
    18.diamond d,pharcyde- bizarre ride,kmd-black bastards
    19.cymandes first (i came back to philly from school and bought this off a guy selling records in front of my local lbrary. the whole cover screamed "DEEEEP" and the music was sublime, heartfelt rythyms grounded in earth.ths symbolizes to me what digging for records is all about. cymande is like the heart and soul of what seemed to me to be forgotten, unknown spiritual music
    20.curtis live- the first real soul album that i loved
    21.bob marley- the one with burning and looting (and legend...cause in my travels outside of america, "legend" often seemed to be the universal language that everyone understood)

    post college, back in philly, diggin all the time for records. learning and being exposed to so much music...but only a couple stand out.these were all with me and listened to countless times when i was traveling alone for two years. but also with my close friends who i shared those years with before my trip.
    22.astral weeks- sensitive and sublime.
    23.air- sensitive and sublime. with astral weeks, my sought after "happy sad" genre of music
    24.sergio mendes-stillness. peaceful and serene and calm in the face of turbulence. a meadow with flowers in it and i was finally mature enough to realize that beautiful meadows arent boring or corny.also it is inextricably tied to someone who put me up on it and had a strong influence on me musically...big ups ben velez.
    25.manu chao- an indispensable record to my life. reminds me of travel, adventure, deep heartbreak, life and about 5 years where i was searching for my path.

    and i might as well add...
    26.quasimoto-the unseen. its so damn weird to make an album like this, but ive listened to it a million times and it never gets old. its got to have affected me somehow.i think it reflects my interests and outlooks to a degree. notable that it was conceived under the influence of mushrooms, which had a part in my rebirth.
    27.yeah yeah yeahs-fever to tell & show your bones. i listened to these a shit load this last year. not they type of music i generally mess with, but this really struck a chord. so many good songs. very sassy, be yourself and let other people worry about it attitude.

  • Bravo, 32. NICE LIST. Filled with your personality top to bottom. : )

    and Bam, I DLed Antony five minutes after reading your post and have been listening to it, it's GREAT.

    Coachella sure is gonna be fun this year.

  • lol i didnt even realize i put an extra 7 in!
    is that part of my personality too?

    :P

    what up lil!!!!

  • i was really feeling like i was at quarry hill when i read what you wrote



  • and Bam, I DLed Antony five minutes after reading your post and have been listening to it, it's GREAT.

    The first song on that album is absolutely fantastic

  • jleejlee 1,539 Posts
    didn't realize monseur robert gabriel was a fan of the Cult. as if dude wasn't legit enough.

  • i started responding to this question and i realized i can't post in this thread without crying.

    so i am going to fall back.

    i think i overworked myself tonight packing records for my move and the exhaustion has hit and my hands are covered with a mixture of dust from the sleeves of every record i own, i got a manicure for fun yesterday and it's all chipped now, going through everything makes my heart so heavy and the span of time and events and people and death and life which that represents to me is at times too much and i feel too overwhelmed.

    but this was a nice read.
    good job whitelily.

  • Wow, I know that feeling you're describing, AK. I kinda felt like that too when I started writing mine and thinking about being a kid and my parents, my old house, how those times and places are so far away they feel sealed in a bubble, almost unreachable...there's something so sad about remembering yourself in the past. Even if the people you spent those times with are still in your life it's like there's something alive and in the air in eras of our lives that we can never get back to. You can go to the same place with the same people, and still everything has changed. Time and space are only half the story, there's something else mixed up in it.

    Tall ass Tripdub with your tall ass list... : )

  • "Forgive me, Let live me..."

  • I'm still pretty young (25), so my 'adult life' has been relatively brief thus far --

    Minor Threat - Discography
    Operation Ivy - Energy
    Earthmover - Themes From Everyday Life
    Converge - Petitioning The Empty Sky
    Shai Hulud - Hearts Once Nourished With Hope And Compassion
    Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary
    Hum - You'd Prefer An Astronaut
    Modest Mouse - Lonesome Crowded West
    Modest Mouse - This Is A Long Drive for Someone With Nothing To Think About
    Neutral Milk Hotel - In THe Airplane Over The Sea
    Slum Village - Fantastic Vol.2
    Ghostface - Supreme Clientele
    Sam Cooke - Portrait of a Legend 1951 - 1964
    Songs; Ohia - Axxess and Aces
    Linda Jones - Hypnotized
    Animal Collective - Sung Tongs
    Mount Eerie - Seven New Songs
    Wolf Parade - Apologies To The Queen Mary
    Chuck Jackson - Mr. Everything
    Bob Dylan - Free Wheelin Bob Dylan
    Van Morrison - Astral Weeks
    David Ruffin - My Whole World Ended
    Richard Twice - S/T

    I must admit, I'd rather put together '25' singles that shaped my life, but that
    would be almost impossible -- You'd see me with like 20 songs tied for #1.

  • those times and places are so far away they feel sealed in a bubble, almost unreachable...

    yes thanks, it's true.

    ok this is all i can bear to put down right now since like i said my heart is weighing me down, and then i should probably get some rest........

    de la, 3 feet high and rising: it seems like yesterday but it was this week 1990 that my dad bought it for me. i was very young but obsessed with music.

    he bought this cd for me and for we drove around constantly listening to it, loving it and bonding through our obsession with how it sounded unlike anything else. i would listen to him in awe as he rattled off samples, he was a larger than life encyclopedia of music knowledge who knew and loved everything and everyone ....."this is cymande, this is steely dan, these are the mad lads...etc". i wanted all the information he could give me and it was endless and i will never forget that feeling of safety and closeness which that gave me. i felt like we understood each other deeply and i was emerging from childhood to be his peer, and how happy i was that we belonged together and shared blood. in that same span of weeks he bought me soul II soul keep on movin, the story of the clash a 2 cd compilation which had just been released, and took me to see wilson pickett play at the village gate. and then a week after that show he was dead.

    that's it. that's the epicenter. and i never listen to that album it much at all and haven't for a long time but this thread isn't about the g.o.a.t. it's about what shaped your life, right? so really, every other album before and after for me is a splinter off of that one cell somehow. all of them past and future will have weight and memory and i hope to keep finding new things that blow my mind and create new meaning and new love and new memory, i even found one today. but none will ever make time slow down like that again for me and shape me like that.

  • Wow.

    What can be said. That is very heartbreaking but beautifully told.

    I think a lot of people on this site would concur that they got their interest in records/samples/breaks and things from 3 Feet High and Rising too or at least that it was pivotal for them. But few were lucky enough to have a family member that cool, even for a short time, who was really able to show them the secret doors within that album.

    Sounds like it's a hard time of the year for you, probably getting some rest tonight is a good idea.

  • PrimeCutsLtdPrimeCutsLtd jersey fresh 2,632 Posts
    ok I'm gonna try to do this....

    1. Chuck Berry - johnny be good (the first song I remember feelin')
    2. Beach Boys - Hits collection ordered from a tv commercial (one of my first lp's)
    3. ac-dc - high voltage (tnt was a when i first heard it in 6th grade. I could easily put back in black or dirty deeds in this space.)
    4. van halen 1 - (soundtrack to my early teens)
    5. iron maiden - number of the beast (hit parader posters for days)
    6. the freeze - land of the lost (killer of my metal days...hardcore forever)
    7. minor threat
    8. dead kennedys - plastic surgery disasters
    9. agent orange/circle jerks/minor threat/raybeats cassette (i played the shit out of this cassette. Even the drop outs in the cassette sounded good. Thanks to Brian from the Electric Love Muffin for making this tape for me!!!)
    10. r.e.m. - life's rich pageant (many spins on cassette)
    11. black uhuru - reggae greats (one of my first reggae albums opened the door to some great reggae!!!)
    12. bob marley - catch a fire
    13. beastie boys - licensed to ill (my hacky sack soundtrack!!!)
    14. public enemy - it takes a nation of millions (not my first rap album but damn!!!)
    15. n.w.a. - straight outta compton
    16. janes addiction - nothing shocking (treated all my dorm mates to this album for hours and hours - sorry)
    17. dj shadow - endtroducing (started buying vinyl again around this time)
    18. jb's/james brown box set
    19. curtis mayfield - superfly
    20. grant green - live at the lighthouse
    21. upsetters - blackboard jungle dub
    22. poets of rhythm - discern/define (shows me new school can work it old school?)
    23. gang of four - entertainment (dig this way more than i did when i had the cassette of this years prior)
    24. jorge ben - Em T??bua de Esmeralda
    25. can - future days

    That was kinda tough. I don't know if I'm groggy from the asbury 45 session or the gin & tonics or both.

  • PrimeCutsLtdPrimeCutsLtd jersey fresh 2,632 Posts
    it's hard to do these lists. I'm thinking of other albums that i should have in there already.

  • Agent Orange....there's a name I haven't heard in awhile. I went through a stage of being totally obsessed with them around age 13. For a punk band there was something strangely mystical about their lyrics.
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