225. Led Zeppelin - Led Zeppelin IV (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Black dog
2. Rock 'n' roll
3. Battle of Evermore
4. Stairway to Heaven
5. Misty mountain hop
6. Four sticks
7. Going to California
8. When the levee breaks

Review

These guys were on a roll, this is their fourth album and the fourth album in a row to show up on the list. And they are all really good. Zeppelin's brand of heavy blues with some folk mixed into it makes for extremely compelling music. It's wild, fun and loud! And here they have some tenderness mixed in, particularly in Stairway and Battle of Evermore.

Who doesn't know this album? It is Led's most famous album and has one of the best known songs in the history of rock. So well known in fact, that it is the target of countless parodies and has become the epitome of the sensitive hard rock track. There is a reason for this however, Stariway is an amazing song, and it stays with you for hours after you've listened to it. The lyrics are gibberish but the composition is extremely strong.

The rest of the album is probably even better than Stairway, for the simple fact that it isn't as famous and you aren't over-saturated by it. When the Leeve Breaks is an epic to rival Stairway To Heaven, and other tracks rock hard. Black Dog, Rock and Roll and Four Sticks are particularly hard. Misty Mountain Hop is a great bit of fun, Going to California is a great blues track and Battle of Evermore has Sandy Denny of Fairport Convention in it! Albums don't come much better than this. Buy it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Stairway To Heaven
2. When The Leeve Breaks
3. Black Dog
4. Battle Of Evermore

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

The album was recorded at Island Records's newly opened studios in Basing Street, London, around the same time as Jethro Tull's Aqualung, and at Headley Grange, a remote Victorian house in East Hampshire, England, as well as Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, CA

After the fairly negative critical reaction Led Zeppelin III had received in the autumn of 1970, Page decided that the next album would not have a title, but would instead feature four hand-drawn symbols on the inner sleeve and record label, each one chosen by the band member it represents. Page explained, "We decided that on the fourth album, we would deliberately play down the group name, and there wouldn't be any information whatsoever on the outer jacket. Names, titles and things like that do not mean a thing."

These symbols are the official title of the album, and Atlantic Records initially distributed graphics of the symbols in many sizes to the press for inclusion in charts and articles. The album was the first to be produced without conventional identification, and this communicated an anti-commercial stance that was controversial at the time (especially among certain executives at Atlantic).

Led Zeppelin IV remains a perennial favorite on classic rock radio and features "Stairway to Heaven", one of the most famous and popular rock songs ever recorded. This was the band's third consecutive U.K. chart topper, and it reached #2 in the U.S., lasting 259 weeks on the chart there. During the track's 35 years of existence, its combined radio airplay in the United States alone has totaled over 50 years.

In 1998, Q magazine readers voted Led Zeppelin IV the 26th greatest album of all time, while in 2000 the same magazine placed it at number 26 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. In 2003, the album was ranked number 66 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It is number 7 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of the 1970s. A 2005 listener poll conducted by Toronto classic rock station Q107 (CILQ) named Led Zeppelin IV the #2 best classic rock album of all time. In 2006, the album was rated #1 on Classic Rock magazine's100 Greatest British Albums poll. In 2006, the album was rated # 1 on Guitar World 100 Greatest Albums, voted by the readers.

Stairway To Heaven Backwards! Go Satan! (how far fetched is this?):



Very.

224. Emerson, Lake And Palmer - Tarkus (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Tarkus
2. Jeremy Bender
3. Bitches Crystal
4. Only Way (Hymn)
5. Infinite Space (Conclusion)
6. Time And A Place
7. Are You Ready Eddy

Review

Here's another one of those bands I have always loved, really. Since I was a kid I listened to Triology by ELP, being one of my father's favourite albums and the beggining of The Endless Enigma in Triology was what he always put on to show off the new amazing sound system he happened to have bought that year. Later, with stereo TV it was the beggining of Terminator 2... but I digress.

Tarkus is a good album, maybe not the best to come out of ELP but as it is one of the only two albums by them to make the list it will have to do. Actually, its a crime that Tarkus and Pictures At An Exhibition are here but Brain Salad Surgery is absent. Brain Salad Surgery is definitely ELP's best album and Karn Evil 9 is their best long suite, it also has one of the most recognisable covers in rock music.

Still, Tarkus is much more acessible than Brain Salad Surgery, even if technically less amazing, it is still much above average in technical terms. The use of synths here is reaching maturity even if it does sound like a boy who has a new toy. If we compare it to other Prog bands of the time like Yes, there is a lot more to be said about ELP. ELP also presume to be intellectual while putting forward incredibly stupid and pretentious lyrics, but if you compare the Bach piece here to the one of Brahms in Yes' Fragile you realise that this is a less ridiculous band.

It is still prog so there is a constant level of ridicule and ELP are never as fun as Yes, there is no Roundabout here and when they try to be lighter in Jeremy Bender and Are You Ready Eddy it is no less than disastrous. Still the rest of the album is pure Progyness at its almost best, and Tarkus is near perfect Prog suite-bliss, if Karn Evil 9 wasn't better. Get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Tarkus
2. Bitches Crystal
3. Only Way (Hymn)
4. Infinite Space (Conclusion)

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia

Track 1: Tarkus is subdivided in the following way:

"Tarkus" – 20:35

* "Eruption" (Emerson) – 2:43
* "Stones of Years" (Emerson, Lake) – 3:44
* "Iconoclast" (Emerson) – 1:15
* "Mass" (Emerson, Lake) – 3:11
* "Manticore" (Emerson) – 1:52
* "Battlefield" (Lake) – 3:51
* "Aquatarkus" (Emerson) – 3:59


"Tarkus" seems to be the hybrid machine-animal depicted on the cover. The inner gatefold sleeve featured a sequence of pictures depicting battles between this armadillo-tank hybrid and other half-mechanical creatures, until its eventual defeat by a manticore. "Tarkus" then returns as "Aquatarkus", an aquatic version of the land-bound original. The band later chose the name Manticore Records for their self-owned record label.

Since the album got its name from its famous side-long suite on side one, many fans think of it as a concept album, but technically only the first half is, as the songs on the second side are not connected to the suite on the first side. Indeed, the lyrics to the "Tarkus" suite also seem to have little to do with the story as delineated in the gatefold pictures: "Mass" is musings on organised religion (as is "The Only Way" on the album's second side), while "Battlefield" is a more general song about war. Keith Emerson later said in his autobiography that he presented most of the piece fully formed to the rest of the band and as such Greg Lake was initially not pleased about the band's new direction.

The track "Battlefield" features one of the rare electric guitar solos from Greg Lake. The live version featured an excerpt from a King Crimson-song called "Epitaph" as originally sung by Lake on Crimson's first album.

Here you go, I just bought some plane tickets to Tokyo today so I thought I'd put ELP in Tokyo with the beggining of Tarkus, Eruption:

223. Don Mclean - American Pie (1971)

















Track Listing

1. American Pie
2. Till Tomorrow
3. Vincent (Starry Starry Night)
4. Crossroads
5. Winterwood
6. Empty Chairs
7. Everybody Loves Me Baby
8. Sister Fatima
9. Grave
10.Babylon


Review

If there is an overriding feeling in early 70's music coming out of the US, it is one of disappointment and lack of belief in the future. The 60's have failed, they were a great but failed experiment. The world hasn't changed, the hippies got suits and war raged on. Don Mclean is very much transmitting that here, and many of the albums reviewed here recently have done the same to some extent.

The title track of this album is one of the most famous pieces in music history, not just because it is a great song, that it is, but because it's a song about music with its obscure references to the Buddy Holly, The Beatles, The Stones, The Byrds etc... It is a great track because it manages to be an enigma which is fun to crack, and to be a supremely catchy and sing-alongy tune.

The rest of the album stands firmly in the US folksy tradition, making it sound a bit derivative sometimes, Vincent is a bit whiny and depressive as well as slightly pretentious. There are other gems here though, Crossroads, Grave and particularly Babylon are amazing tracks. So do get it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. American Pie
2. Babylon
3. Crossroads
4. Grave

Final Grade

8/10 (just on the outside of 9)

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The epic length and deeply personal nature of the song has made it largely resistant to cover versions; a few attempts have been made, however, first and most bizarrely by The Brady Bunch in 1972. Ska punk band Catch 22 made a reggae version of the song a staple of their live show and released several recordings of it; alternative rock band Killdozer recorded a thrashing, ironic version of the song in 1989. Additionally, several disco versions have appeared over the years.

Country singer Garth Brooks would also sing this song during concerts in the early to mid-1990s and, during Brooks "Live in Central Park" concert, he performed this song as a duet with McLean himself at the end of the concert. The audience of over 100,000 people were also invited to sing the chorus lines near the end of the song.

In 1999, parodist "Weird Al" Yankovic did a Star Wars-inspired lyrical adaptation of "American Pie" entitled "The Saga Begins" in which the lyrics recount the whole plot of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace through the eyes of Obi-Wan Kenobi. While McLean gave permission for the parody, he did not make a cameo appearance in its video, despite popular rumour. However, he has stated that at live shows he almost starts singing Yankovic's lyrics, due to his children playing the song so often.

A parody band known as ApologetiX wrote Parable Guy, a parody based on the parables of Jesus.

Recently, the Harry Potter website Mugglenet featured a parody of American Pie in their editorial "The U-Bend". Half-Blood Pie is a summary of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and can be heard here.

Singer Lori Lieberman attended a McLean concert; in describing the experience to songwriters Norman Gimbel and Charles Fox, she said he'd "killed her softly." Gimbel and Fox wrote Killing Me Softly about Lieberman's experience, and the song became a huge hit for Roberta Flack, and many years later for the Fugees. This created a unique Grammy situation: in 1973, Flack won Record of the Year, beating out American Pie, a song by McLean; in 1974, she won the same award for a song about McLean. Flack and McLean have performed Killing Me Softly together in concert at least once.

Almost any song parody site is rife with Pie-rodies; it's often the most parodied song on the site. A particularly clever one claims that the song is actually about Bill Gates, supposedly a Harvard classmate of McLean's. This is fiction, although a little-known fact is that while McLean was a freshman at Villanova University, a senior befriended him and urged him to pursue his musical dreams. The senior's name was Jim Croce.

On the Web parody site, Am I Right, the American Pie is considered as one of the most difficult songs to parodize, and successfully spoofing the song is a hallmark of a skilled parodist.

American Pie:

222. Dolly Parton - Coat Of Many Colors (1971)

















Track Listing

1. Coat of Many Colors
2. Traveling Man
3. My Blue Tears
4. If I Lose My Mind
5. Mystery of the Mystery
6. She Never Met a Man (She Didn't Like)
7. Early Morning Breeze
8. Way I See You
9. Here I Am
10. Better Place to Live

Review

Well people who know me know I have an appreciation for Dolly Parton, and no it's not the boobs. Frankly, however, this album disappointed me. It is not a bad album, it just disappointed me because I had big expectations for it. My knowledge of Parton has been restricted to compilation albums, and frankly I've been better for it.

Dolly is a really good song writer, but there is something in the writing which is also present in the cover of the album... kitsch to the extreme. The title track is the final example of this, a song about mommy's love and being poor of means but rich of heart, it comes across as sacharine and yet strangely compelling. In this album Dolly really shows her development as a songwriter, but she would go on to make much better tracks than any here.

I think my biggest gripe with the album is the fact that it is not different enough from Loretta Lynn to be original. Loretta's album, Don't Come Home A Drinkin' (With Lovin' On Your Mind), is not only the album with the best title in the world ever, but it is also a tour de force of country feminism. Loretta matches the sins of her lovers in every track, while Dolly is mostly a victim and that's sad. As it happens with a lot of country music, the tracks are sometimes hard to tell apart, several having identical beat and so on, but after repeated listenings you will get it, however. I would really stick with compilations for Dolly Parton, a great maker of tracks but not necessarily in the album format. Still, you can get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Coat Of Many colors
2. Travelling Man
3. She Never Met A Man (She Didn't Like)
4. Here I Am

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

"Coat of Many Colors" is a 1971 song by Dolly Parton which was the title song of a 1971 album. Parton has stated numerous times that it is her favorite of the songs she has written.

The song tells of how Parton's mother stitched together a coat for her daughter out of rags given to the family. As she sewed, she told the child the Bible story of Joseph and his Coat of Many Colors. The excited child, "with patches on my britches and holes in both my shoes," rushed to school, "just to find the others laughing and making fun of me" for wearing a coat made of rags.

I couldn't understand it, for I felt I was rich
And I told them of the love my mama sewed in every stitch
And I told them all the story mama told me while she sewed
And how my Coat of Many Colors was worth more than all their clothes

The song concludes with Parton singing the moral of her story:

One is only poor, only if you choose to be
Although we had no money, I was rich as I could be
In my Coat of Many Colors my mama made for me

Parton kept the original coat, now on display in her Chasing Rainbows Museum at Dollywood.

Shania Twain recorded a cover version of the song on the album Just Because I'm a Woman, a compilation of cover versions of some of Parton's songs.

Coat of Many Colors, (I particularly like the audience at the end):

221. Elton John - Madman Across The Water (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Tiny Dancer
2. Levon
3. Razor Face
4. Madman Across The Water
5. Indian Sunset
6. Holiday Inn
7. Rotten Peaches
8. All The Nasties
9. Goodbye

Review

Elton John, aka Reginald Dwight seemed consigned to bargain bins and the world of the incredibly crap until a few years ago when Almost Famous came out. In a particular scene of that film, in a bit of inspired soundtracking Tiny Dancer comes on... and you think... "That's a great tune!" Then, at least a part of John's output became cool again.

I already knew this album pretty well, as I searched this out after watching Almost Famous and then I rediscovered some of the older Elton John, like another album sadly not on the list: Honky Tonk Chateau. And it is a pretty good album. Elton is at his most orchestral here and it is a bit over the top, but it is mostly effective in giving the tracks an extra oomph, an extra emotional effect.

In the end this album is one which makes you rethink Elton John, make you stop thinking of Nikita and of some of the great tracks here. It deserves its place on the list most defintely it is a beautiful album, even if at time over the top. Taupin's lyrics are often risible, but the delivery is so expertly done that you soon forget about it. Get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Tiny Dancer
2. Madman Across The Water
3. Indian Sunset
4. All The Nasties

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

"Tiny Dancer" features a well-remembered piano-based melody during verses, typically inscrutable Taupin lyrics during the chorus, and an arrangement that at the start features pedal steel guitar and light percussion but, transitioning subtly halfway through one of the choruses, by the end is driven by Paul Buckmaster's dynamic strings, along with a barely heard backing choir. Clocking at 6:13, it was one of the longer radio singles of that period.

The song was written about Maxine Feibelmann, a dancer on Elton John's tour who later married Taupin. (Later, the song from the Elton John album Blue Moves called "Between Seventeen and Twenty" referred to the divorce of Bernie and Maxine Taupin and the fact that so much had changed from when they first met when he was aged twenty and she was aged seventeen.)

A non-starter as a single at the time (reaching only No. 41 in the U.S. pop chart and not charting at all in the UK), "Tiny Dancer" did not fade away, but instead slowly became one of Elton John's most popular songs. A fixture on adult contemporary radio stations, but played by rock stations as well, the song simply grew in popularity.

It was ranked #387 on the 2004 List of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Almost Famous:

220. Can - Tago Mago (1971)

















Track Listing

1. Paperhouse
2. Mushroom
3. Oh Yeah
4. Halleluhwah
5. Aumgn
6. Peking O
7. Bring me Coffee or Tea

Review

Wow, this is one of the most unexpected albums to ever appear on this list. It's unexpected because you really didn't think anything in 1971 sounded like this... hell, it would have been innovative in 1991. There are parts here which could really have come out of the club scene of the mid 90's.

The album is completely amazing, but it has listenable and non-listenable sides. All the tracks except Aumgn and Peking O are pretty listenable, those two are noise experiments with no real melody. This doesn't make them bad, but you need to be in a very specific state of mind to appreciate them. Aumgn is really scary and trippy, if you just stand in a dark room listening to it you'lll see what I mean. Today I was taking a nap with it playing in the background and I had the weirdest dreams. But really after a while you just want to skip those two tracks, as they are really long.

Another really long track is Halleluhwah and its the real highlight of the album. It has a drum beat which could be playing in a club or rave party today with very few people batting an eyelid. It's long, repetitive, funky and amazing. 18 minutes of funk-rock with an amazing beat. And this in 1971! The first three tracks are really nifty as well. And all in all this is probably the best album to listen to when high, but you should leave out Aumgn and Peking O unless you want a really bad trip.

Can make art rock like Prog bands would like to. This is the greatest exponent of rock transcending into art in the early 70's, you hear James Brown, Zappa, Velvet Underground and Stockhausen all in the same track. And then tracks like Oh Yeah and Bring Me Coffee Or Tea sound like Kid A/Amnesiac from Radiohead! Maybe it is because Can were making something separate from the Anglo-Saxon scene that they sound so fresh, but they do, and you owe yourself to listen to this album at least once. Get it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Halleluhwah
2. Oh Yeah
3. Mushroom
4. Bring Me Coffee Or Tea

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The name comes from a large rock formation off the coast of Ibiza that figures in the legend of Aleister Crowley.

Aumgn is a Crowley influenced Track.

CROWLEY FTW!


Mushroom:

219. The Doors - L.A. Woman (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Changeling
2. Love Her Madly
3. Been Down So Long
4. Cars Hiss By My Window
5. LA Woman
6. L'America
7. Hyacinth House
8. Crawlin' Kingsnake
9. Wasp
10. Riders On The Storm

Review

This is the last Doors album on the list and also the last album with Jim Morrison on it. The Doors were a very hit and miss band, we only had three albums by them here, because those were the only albums which were any good. Still, no album approached their first one which was and still is the best Doors album ever to come out, and the only exceptional one.

So, this album is a very bluesy affair, much more in the realm of Blues than Psychadelia really and it is quite a nice album. The style is more similar to Morrison Hotel then the self-titled album, so if you like Morrison Hotel you are likely to like this one.

What shines in this album are the more famous songs, L.A. Woman and Riders On The Storm really are the best tracks here and also the longest. The Doors have always been great at long, extended tracks, from the beggining as with Light My Fire, it's in the instrumental solos that they shine. Morrison's lyrics are teenage-angsty puerile and Blues with a bit of psychadelia thrown in is nothing new. Still it's a good album, so get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Riders On The Storm
2. LA Woman
3. L'America
4. Crawling King Snake

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

It is the only Jim Morrison-era studio album which the Doors did not follow up with a concert tour; Jim had moved to Paris by the time it was released and died a few months later.

In 2003, the album was ranked number 362 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.


Riders On The Storm:

218. Yes - Fragile (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Roundabout
2. Cans And Brahms
3. We Have Heaven
4. South Side Of The Sky
5. Five Per Cent Of Nothing
6. Long Distance Runaround
7. Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)
8. Mood For A Day
9. Heart Of The Sunrise

Review

More Yes, more prog loveliness and now they have Rick "The Wizard" Wakeman on the team! Yay... it all sounds slightly more pretentious and slightly more spacy. I found something pretty funny while researching this album... it was done on a shoestring budget because of all the stupid money they had to spend on Wakeman's synths.

Well, it was worth it. It is a better album than The Yes Album, it is also more fun. Roundabout is one of the great tracks of Prog, and for that alone the album is worth listening to. There are some nice Wakeman solos in the middle of the electric and acoustic guitars. Wakeman's Mad Skillz do come across as uneccesary and pretentious and the second track is a good example. Come on, Brahms!? I like it too, but how much more middle-brow can you get? And if you like Brahms so much could you get a tune that not everyone knows? Something you haven't lifted from Best Classical Music for Children and Housewives CD1?

The problem comes across again in the fact that Yes try to be the dog's bollocks while actually being just plain bollocks. They want to be all artsy and shit, failling miserably. They hit the mark on a few tracks, those which are just good music, like Roundabout or Heart Of The Sunrise... when they start playing Brahms on the synth they fail miserably. Get it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Higlights

1. Roundabout
2. Heart Of The Sunrise
3. Long distance Runaround
4. Mood For A Day

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

In the film School of Rock, Fragile is given to the keyboardist Lawrence as he is told to listen to "Roundabout". In the movie, Jack Black tells Lawrence to listen to Rick Wakeman's piano solo on Roundabout and it would "blow the classical music right out your butt".

Roundabout:

217. The Beach Boys - Surf's Up (1971)

















Track Listing

1. Don't Go Near The Water
2. Long Promised Road
3. Take A Load Off Your Feet
4. Disney Girls (1957)
5. Student Demonstration Time
6. Feel Flows
7. Lookin' At Tomorrow (A Welfare Song)
8. Day In The Life Of A Tree
9. Till I Die
10. Surf's Up

Review

The great thing about doing this project are all the discoveries that you come across and this one definitely blew me away. From the cover you know this is not your typical Beach Boys album, then the first song is called Don't Go Near The Water... the Beach Boys warning us to stay away from the water? Indeed.

The album is beautiful, it is a level of beauty that very few other people have ever achieved, the arrangements are heavenly and the tracks are damned original. This sounds almost like an album which could have come out the last few years from the best indie band in the world. Some songs have a sillyness, like Take A Load Off Your Feet which almost sounds like Devendra Barnhart while others have a sweetness and beauty which is amazing, like Disney Girls. And then you have the tracks which are just heartachingly perfect, like the title song. If I could fault anything here it is the fact that Student Demonstration Time really breaks the mood coming right after the nostalgic heart-braking Disney Girls, still it is not a bad song.

I am really gushing here, this is one of the best albums I've ever heard, not just on this list but ever. In a Beach Boys context it even beats Pet Sounds in my opinion. And the strangest thing is i knew none of these tracks when I started hearing it. And now I am really sad to put it behind me. But I tell you it is going straight to my mp3 player... and I really don't want to let it go. Listen to it, you'll love it. Get it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Surf's Up
2. Disney Girls
3. 'Til I Die
4. A Die In The Life Of A Tree

Final Grade

10/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The painting on the cover of this album is based on the sculpture 'The End of The Trail' by James Earle Fraser (1876 - 1953)

This lone figure on his weary horse is one of the most recognized symbols of the American West. By many it is viewed as a reverent memorial to a great and valiant people. To some Native Americans, however, it is viewed as a reminder of defeat and subjugation a century ago. The monumental, 18' plaster sculpture was created for San Francisco's 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition and received the exposition's Gold Medal for sculpture. The subject of immediate popular acclaim, the image was widely reproduced in postcard, print, curio and miniature form.

Although Fraser hoped his masterpiece would be cast in bronze and placed on Presidio Point overlooking San Francisco Bay, material restrictions during the First World War made the project impossible. Instead, in 1920, the city of Visalia, California, obtained the discarded statue and placed it in Mooney Park, where it remained, in a gradually deteriorating condition, for 48 years. In 1968, the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum acquired this original plaster statue, restored it to its original magnificence, and made it a focal point of the museum.

Brian Wilson does Surf's Up... it's better on the album, he's a bit out of it here:

216. John Lennon - Imagine (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Imagine
2. Crippled Inside
3. Jealous Guy
4. It's So Hard
5. I Don't Want To Be A Soldier
6. Give Me Some Truth
7. Oh My Love
8. How Do You Sleep
9. How
10. Oh Yoko!

Review

Artists who die young like Jimmy Hendrix or Nick Drake become incredible legends, the same case happened with John Lennon's solo carrer after he died. Imagine has become the best known album of any of the solo Beatles but in a way it is overrated. This is not to say it is not a good album, it is, but the one with the Plastic Ono Band was actually better alll-round.

Imagine, the track, has become impossible to listen to today with a clear mind, it has been so overused and so misused that it has become the kind of Fluffy Bunny Anthem for Teenagers (FBAT) that gets on my tits majorly. Of course very few of these people have actually listened to the lyrics which show a very particular kind of Utopia, where same kids would have no iPods to listen to their illegally procured Imagine.

Other than that there are some really good tracks here, Jealous guy is nice, although , but Oh Yoko! and Oh My Love are particularly good. What works in this album are the love songs, Lennon has lost a bit of his edge. There is no Working Class Hero here, there is a dig at McCartney and some half-arsed anti-war songs but nothing interesting. Also, this album ends up consisting of the Oasis songbook, from the opening strains of Imagine onwards this was the beast that spawned them, even more directly than The Beatles, so boo! Get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Oh Yoko!
2. Oh My Love
3. How Can You Sleep
4. Jealous Guy

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia article about Imagine:

The song has also received a number of criticisms due to what some have seen as practiced hypocrisy. Journalist and broadcaster Robert Elms said "Imagine" was written by a "multi-millionaire with one temperature-controlled room in his Manhattan mansion just to store his fur coats." Elvis Costello commented satirically on the song in "The Other Side of Summer," wherein he asks the question, "Was it a millionaire who said 'Imagine no possessions'?"

Radio stations in America allegedly have been known to edit the song to remove or obscure the line "and no religion too". One station even went as far as to change the line to "and one religion too"

When the Liverpool airport was named after Lennon, a phrase from the song, "above us only sky", was painted on the ceiling of the terminal. When commenting on this, the panel of Have I Got News for You joked that the baggage handlers' motto was taken from the same song: "Imagine no possessions".

In the Iranian left movement, the song usually relates to Mansoor Hekmat and his party, the Worker-Communist Party of Iran. The WPI plays the song in all of its meetings and demonstrations, and in its TV channel. Within Iran, the song is sometimes sung in protests and symbolizes the left movement, especially the WPI.

John Lennon, Yoko, Chuck Berry and some crazy hippie woman prepare macrobiotic food:

215. The Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers (1971)
















Track Listing

1. Brown Sugar
2. Sway
3. Wild Horses
4. Can't You Hear Me Knocking
5. You Gotta Move
6. Bitch
7. I Got The Blues
8. Sister Morphine
9. Dead Flowers
10. Moonlight Mile

Review

Before I started this project I never had any idea of why there were so many Stones fans, but after such a great sequence of Stones albums, particularly Beggar's Banquet, Let It Bleed and this one, I have seen the light. We are in 1971, the Beatles are dead and the Stones go on to make great music.

I am not advocating that the Stones are the better band, mind. What the Beatles did was so revolutionary the even if they only have three I albums I really love they are all too important not to make them the most influential band of their time. But the Stones are honestly a more consistent band, they very rarely put a foot wrong in these last three albums.

This album is a work of greatness, some songs are infectious like Brown Sugar, some are just pretty like Wild Horses and some are undestilled brilliance like Sister Morphine. The Stones cover hard hitting themes, many of which are realted to their first hand experience of drugs, sex and rock 'n roll. And if only they had stopped doing albums in the mid-seventies maybe, just maybe they would have been contenders to the title of greatest band ever. It's sad not knowing when to quit, but his album is a gem. Get it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Sister Morphine
2. Brown Sugar
3. Wild Horses
4. Can't You Hear Me Knocking

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

When Decca informed The Rolling Stones that they were owed one more single, they cheekily submitted a track called "Cocksucker Blues" - which was guaranteed to be refused. Instead, Decca released the two-year-old Beggars Banquet track "Street Fighting Man" while Allen Klein would have dual copyright ownership - with The Rolling Stones - of "Brown Sugar" and "Wild Horses".

The artwork for Sticky Fingers - including a real zipper - was designed by Andy Warhol and featured the lower torso of actor Joe Dallesandro (not Mick Jagger, as a number of fans at the time have speculated) in a pair of tight jeans.

Mick Taylor was reported to have had a hand in composing "Moonlight Mile" but was denied a co-credit.

In 1989, former bassist Bill Wyman opened an American cuisine restaurant entitled "Sticky Fingers".

In 2003, Sticky Fingers was listed as number 63 on the List of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time while in 2003 the TV network VH1 named Sticky Fingers the 46th greatest album of all time.

Brown Sugar:

214. The Allman Brothers - At Fillmore East (1971)

















Track Listing

1. Statesboro Blues
2. I Done Somebody Wrong
3. They Call It Stormy Monday
4. You Don't Love Me (You Don't Care)
5. Hot Lanta
6. In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed
7. Whipping Post

Review

Here's another long jamming album, much in the tradition of The Greatful Dead, and particular their Live/Dead album, which was very long and very dependant on jamming. Fortunately, however, this is a much more accessible album and also a much less dull one.

The Allman Brothers impress here with their technical skills and actually some quite innovative guitar playing. They are really good. This is not to say I loved the album though. The first few tracks are standard white blues band fare, which had been done to death better by other groups like Cream. The album is also much too long, and some of these first tracks could have been skipped. I would have been happy with just the last two tracks, making a nice 36 minute album.

And where the Brothers impress is really on the long tracks, particularly Whipping Post; that's where they are able to develop their playing to a level which is interesting. The shorter cuts are just not that impressive. All in all a good album, but nothing to write home about. Get it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Whipping Post
2. In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed
3. You Don't Love Me
4. Hot Lanta

Final Grade

7/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

The most well-known rendition of "Whipping Post" by any other artist came in the most unlikely of circumstances, during Season 4 of American Idol. Contestant Bo Bice gave a shot in the arm to Southern rock with an impassioned performance during the show's semi-finals round, pleasing show judge Randy Jackson and propelling Bice to an eventual second-place finish.

heh

Whipping Post, at Filmore East:

Part 1:



Part deux:



The American Idols 4 version... not so good:

213. Isaac Hayes - Shaft (1971)



















Track Listing

1. Shaft
2. Bumpy's Lament
3. Walk From Regio's
4. Ellie's Love Theme
5. Shaft's Cab Ride
6. Cafe Regio's
7. Early Sunday Morning
8. Be Yourself
9. Friend's Place
10. Soulsville
11. No Name Bar
12. Bumpy's Blues
13. Shaft Strikes Again
14. Do Your Thing
15. End Theme

Review

This is one of the coolest albums on the list. As we had seen before Isaac Hayes has a particular talent for mood music, and in here he takes mood almost to the point of caricature. In the end this is great, but can become a bit tiring after a while.

Let me just say I had this on last night during Valentine's Day and it worked nicely. So if you have a lady who has a sense of humour this is the album to use. Of course you will giggle once in a while but that is the point.

This is both its highest and lowest point. The album works perfectly because it is background music, and that is how it worked in the film, but at times it can become quite boring if you are actively trying to listen to it. The songs which bear closer listening to are the three vocal tracks, the third of which is a respectable 20 minutes long. And that is another thing, it is also a pretty long album, about 70 minutes, so there is a bit of filler here, but it works as sultry background music perfectly. Buy it at Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. Shaft
2. Do Your Thing
3. Soulsville
4. Cafe Reggio's

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

Take a page from Isaac's Book:

"If you really want to know about the mind, the spirit and life itself, read Scientology: The Fundamentals of Thought. It will put you on the right path!"

Or not...

Nothing makes the ladies gag for it, like a guy discoursing on the evils of Xenu! Scientology: Geekdom taken to the level of Religion... hot!

That's proper bling, that is:

212. Carole King - Tapestry (1971)




















Track Listing

1. I Feel The Earth Move
2. So Far Away
3. It's Too Late
4. Home Again
5. Beautiful
6. Way Over Yonder
7. You've Got A Friend
8. Where You Lead
9. Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
10. Smackwater Jack
11. Tapestry
12. You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Woman

Review

You will know most, if not all the songs in this album and if you think they are covers, think again. Carole King was writing music for other artists for a long time before she put out this album, singing her own songs.

The sound is quite different from other versions of these songs recorded before and after this album. The production is purposefully unintrusive, giving the album a homely feel. Like Carole is actually just singing her songs in her house with a piano and her cat. This is actually quite lovely and in the end makes for a great album.

Carole is a superb songwriter and even though her voice isn't as polished as that of those who sung her songs this doesn't in anyway detract from her music. She is also putting out this album at the precise right time, whne people like James Taylor and Joni Mitchell are coming into their own, and the idea of the bucolic, soothing singer-songwriter is not something weird. She is not Dylan or Cohen, but that is not her objective, and what she does, she does perfectly. So, do buy it from Amazon UK or US.

Track Highlights

1. I Feel The earth Move
2. (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman
3. Where You Lead
4. You've Got a Friend

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

It has earned a spot as one of the quintessential recordings of the rock era. Tapestry was ranked US number 1 for 15 weeks and remained on the charts for over six years. The album also garnered four Grammy Awards including Album of the Year, Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female, Record of the Year ("It's Too Late"); and Song of the Year ("You've Got a Friend").

King wrote or co-wrote all of the songs on the album, several of which had already been hits for other artists such as Aretha Franklin's "(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman" and the Shirelles's "Will You Love Me Tomorrow". Three songs were co-written with King's ex-husband Gerry Goffin. James Taylor, who encouraged King to sing her own songs, and who also played on Tapestry, would have a #1 hit with "You've Got a Friend."

In December 2003, Rolling Stone magazine ranked Tapestry as the 36th greatest album ever. Also in 2003, the VH1 TV network named Tapestry the 39th greatest album ever. In 2003, it was one of 50 recordings chosen by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry.

Various artists combined to re-record all the original tracks for more than one tribute album; the first, released in 1995, entitled Tapestry Revisited: A Tribute to Carole King, and the second, released in 2003, entitled A New Tapestry — Carole King Tribute.

I Feel The Earth Move: