18 Pivotal Albums In My Musical Education

I'm gonna do this one chronologically, as I think that will be easiest. Autobiographically can get messy and this is just a blog post, not a cleaning house of my collection. There is no way this will ever be a comprehensive list as there are simply too many albums that have affected me over the years. These are simply some of the highlights.

For those of us who put a premium on the effect that music had (or still currently has) on our lives, albums tell a story. Just like John Cusack's character in "High Fidelity" while he's sorting his album collection "autobiographically" (see video below), music has and always will be a constant for me.

When I still had a record collection (close to 4,000+ pieces of vinyl; 12"s, 10"s, 45's, picture discs, whatever...), there was really nothing like pulling every record off the shelves and spending an entire day reorganizing. If you've never had a record collection close to that size, I can't even begin to describe how cathartic an endeavor it can be. It might happen, at most, twice a year but was closer to once every two years. Who am I kidding...it wasn't even a day long endeavor. It easily took a whole weekend.

But everyone's got their top lists of albums that come out in a given year or of all time. This one is different. These are the albums that, while I may not listen to now, were pivotal in some way at an important part of my life that is easily remembered through these albums and that, ultimately, lead me down some other musical avenues that lead down others that lead down others...etc.

Digable Planets - "Reachin' (A New Refutation of Time & Space)"

Eighth grade trip to Washington D.C., Spring Break of 1993. While in a music store, I bought this one, Soundgarden's "Badmotorfinger," and another tape (yes, all cassette tapes) that I don't recall now. We were in D.C. for four days and I had this one on repeat the entire time. It was unlike anything I had heard before, save for Arrested Development, but this one tickled my eardrums in the sweetest ways. The lyricism was unlike anything I'd experienced (and very little that came later, save for the stylings of Camp-Lo). It was poetic, it was surreal, it was new-agey hip hop, and after several years of not listening to it, I put it on in my car on the way to class one day and could still rap along to every lyric.

Standout Tracks: "Nickle Bags" and "Swoon Units."

Bjork - "Debut"

I first saw the video for "Human Behavior" on MTV (remember when they actually played music videos?) back in junior high and fell in love with it. It was new, it was weird, and her voice did something unexplainable to me. The entire album was all over the place musically; ballads, euro-house type tracks, and oddities like "Anchor Song." I have followed her success with every album since and while some albums were less successful to me than others, I listen to her often. This album opened my eyes to the female voice in the music world and the kind of power it could bring.  

Standout Tracks: "There's More To Life Than This" and "Aeroplane."

Pearl Jam - "Ten"

Like most everyone else at the time, I swooned over a lot of the music that was coming out of the Seattle area in the early 90's. Mudhoney, Soundgarden, Screaming Trees, etc., and this album was the one that broke the dam wide open for me. There was the funk element of Jeff Ament's bass, the often unintelligible scream-singing of Eddie Vedder, and the emotional wail of the guitar work of both Stone Gossard and Mike McCready. I would listen to this one long into the night, well after I was supposed to be asleep in bed, and let it crash me down into dreamtime. I was less impressed with every successive album that came out after this one, but it still retains a ton of reminiscence of my early days of really understanding that I had a love for music.  

Standout Tracks: "Garden" and "Release."

Smashing Pumpkins - "Gish"

The lesser known debut album by these guys became an instant favorite between me and my friends after we found out about it. Originally influenced by their second album, "Siamese Dream," (a far cleaner, more concise, but no less powerful collection of songs), this was the one we'd drive around to with the windows down and the radio cranked loudly. Billy Corrigan's voice was distinctive, almost whiny and tinny, but was backed by what can only be called one of the loudest, heaviest bands to ride the Seattle sound without actually having originated from the region. I stopped listening to them after their third album, a double-disc called "Melloncollie and the Infinite Sadness," but I always return to the first two albums. There is something unabashedly raw and focused about them that feels missing from later releases. This is the album that really made me want to play the bass guitar.  

Standout Tracks: "Tristessa" and "Bury Me."

Fugazi - "13 Songs"

I first heard this album (and the one below) in my friend Anthony Verheage's basement. I had been playing the bass for awhile, but was nowhere near his skill. I had brought mine over so he could teach me a few tricks and once we had worn out our fingers, he began playing different albums for me, purely because he too loved all kinds of music. This album was the combined effort of earlier EP's - "Margin Walker" and the self-titled "Fugazi." He played "The Waiting Room" with it's bouncy opening bassline and that was it for me. My love affair with Fugazi had begun and until their "indefinite hiatus" in 2003, I have collected everything they've put out. When I sold my record collection to move out to San Francisco, their records stuck with me and remain on my bookshelf now along with a very few others I simply couldn't part with. The band erupted out of the old New York hardcore scene from lead singer Ian Mackaye's first band Minor Threat, but you wouldn't know it to hear them. They are about as experimentally punk as you can get, playing with discordance and off-notes to create atmosphere and feeling. A truly amazing band.  

Standout Tracks: "Bulldog Front" and "Provisional."

Quicksand - "Manic Compression"

I used to buy a magazine called "College Music Journal" back in high school. Each month, they put out an issue chock-full of album reviews, bands to watch, and a cd of songs from almost everyone they talked about in that issue. A brilliant little rag that opened up the doors to a gargantuan amount of music for me during my high school years. One issue talked about Portishead's first album "Dummy" (another highly influential group for me) and this one, Quicksand. Quicksand, like Fugazi, was the afterbirth of a New York hardcore band called Youth of Today lead by frontman Walter Schreifels (who has since gone on to do several side projects post-Quicksand). Anthony played this sophomore album for me in his basement as well and I'd never heard anything so delicately angry before. Awash in guitar effects and low-tuned bass guitar work, this album was a sonic wall made by only four guys. The lyrics? Fantastic. The music? Mindblowingly good.  

Standout tracks: "Landmine Spring" and "Skinny (It's Overflowing)."

Morphine - "Good"

We didn't have any good alternative rock radio stations in Oklahoma City when I moved to Kansas City in 1995. Thankfully, 105.9 the Lazer, based out of Lawrence pumped out new music to Kansas City all the time. Morphine was one of those bands (along with Soul Coughing) that I got turned on to as soon as I arrived. A three-piece pseudo-jazz outfit, lead singer Mark Sandman played a two-string bass alongside a drummer and upright bassist. They made songs that were both homages to the old jazz crooners, the lonely sax players in dark New York alleyways at 2am, and raucous rockabilly equally. If you've never heard any Morphine before, go out and grab any of their albums, but this is the one for me.  

Standout Track: "You Look Like Rain."

A Tribe Called Quest - "Midnight Marauders"

Ask any fan of true fan hip hop and they'll tell you this album is in their top ten. Possibly their top five. Released in 1993, this album helped propel what some now call "conscious rap" into the musical lexicon and has been a staple of almost any good dj's record bag. Party jams, social commentary, lyrical word play; this album's got it all. As shown by highlighting as many of their peers in the industry on the front and back covers, this album was all positivity from front to back. I had been listening to a lot of guitar-based music by the time I heard this in 1995, but my band mate Jerry let me borrow the album. I had it for months and never wanted to give it back. This is another of those LP's I kept after selling off my record collection and has become the standard by which I judge all hip hop albums now. And really, I know that's unfair, but this collection of songs is one I listen to front-to-back, never skipping any. Ever.  

Standout Tracks: "Award Tour," "Electric Relaxation," and "Lyrics to Go."

Ella Fitzgerald - Any Album

I got first turned on to Ella through my ex-girlfriend Erika. We would spend hours curled up with each other in her room, napping away an afternoon with Ella playing softly on the cd player. Every time I put on an Ella album, I'm reminded of pillows and softness, the smell of rose water and relaxation, lazy Saturdays and lilting naps. I can't imagine nicer moments attached to an album than those.

Standout Tracks: "I've Got You Under My Skin," and "Wait 'Til You See Him."

Roni Size / Reprezent - "New Forms"

I graduated high school in 1997 and took a trip that summer to Germany. While there, I saw on the European version of MTV two videos: Prodigy's "Smack My Bitch Up" and Roni Size's "Brown Paper Bag." Up until then, I had no idea that electronic music even really existed. I didn't know anything about the various genres that made it up, I didn't know the performers, nothing. I wasn't as impressed with Prodigy, but the video for "Brown Paper Bag had me captivated. The opening bassline clinched it as well, a raw, but natural sounding upright backed by hard hitting double-time boom-bap drums. Once I grabbed the album, a double-disc of jazzy drum'and'bass, I was completely hooked. One of the earliest electronic albums I ever owned and still one of my favorites to this day, despite where the genre of drum'and'bass has gone since. It's the EDM album I use to turn other people onto the wider genre of dance music because it is so accessible without being hard on virgin ears.  

Standout Tracks: "Watching Windows" and "Share the Fall."

The Miles Davis Quintet Box Set - 1965-1968

My boy Scott worked at a music store in high school. For Christmas, he secured me this super dope box set of the Miles Davis Quintet. Six discs of pure excellence from the man himself. Every time I hear certain songs now, I see the colors of the discs they were on. This was my true introduction to the larger body of Miles' work which bubbled over into his more fusion work on "Bitches Brew" and "Filles De Kilimanjaro" later on.

Standout Tracks: "Pinnochio," "E.S.P." and "Nefertiti"

Fiona Apple - "Tidal"

Another amazing female vocalist. Lot of angst on this one but coupled with a very sultry, cool piano style. Where Tori Amos felt too classically trained for me to really get into, Apple's work felt more visceral and primal - untrained, but deliberate. This is the album my roommate John and I would put on when we got home from house parties in college. It was a good way to unwind after a night of nonsense and, often, drama.

Standout Tracks: "Sullen Girl" and "Slow Like Honey."

V.A.S.T. - "Visual Audio Sensory Theater"

This band is...interesting. Imagine heavy industrial music but with benedictine monk chanting added over the top. It's a contradiction in terms, maybe, but it works. My friend Mandy turned me on to this one during my sophomore year of college late one night. She played "Pretty When You Cry" and it was a jolt to my system. Personally, if I'm in a weird mood and it's a choice between Nine Inch Nails or VAST, I'm going with VAST the majority of the time. I think the music is more intricately layered and far more interesting than Reznor's work (though I like Reznor). Lyrically, I find him more interesting as well; less "depressed angry teenager" and more "sullen angry adult with hindsight in check."

Standout Tracks: "Pretty When You Cry" and "Touched"

Braid - "Frame & Canvas"

My friend Steve turned me on to these guys that same year. Based out of Champagne/Urbana, IL., Braid was a four-piece 'emo' group back when emo didn't mean "whiny teenagers with shitty lyrics who buy their clothing at Hot Topic." He gave me their first album, "Frankie Welfare Boy, Age 5" and I was hooked. Their debut was loud, it was screamy, but there was a ridiculous amount of melody within the chaos too (check out the opening track "Angel Falls" to get an idea of what I mean). By the end of 1998, near the middle of my enjoyment of their music, they had broken up. This was an album that was raw, both emotionally and sonically, but with enough growth shown over the previous albums to have cleaned up the rough edges. Not five minutes ago, I found out they're playing a reunion show here in San Francisco on August 8th. And there's a new EP out. And I got real excited.

Hum - "Downward is Heavenward"

What to say about this album? I've mentioned it numerous times throughout the blog. I've recommended it to damn near everyone I know. It is yet another album that I never skip tracks on when listening to it; start to finish, in one listen, every time. I had the opportunity to see their reunion tour last November back in Kansas City. Since I'm only going to repeat myself on its importance to me again, go HERE to read more about this album and the others.

Standout Tracks: "If You Are To Bloom," "Green to Me," and "Apollo"

The Cinematic Orchestra - "Motion"

In 1999, when I bought my first turntable, first pair of headphones, needles, everything...and maxed out my credit cards doing it, my roommate John and I went to St. Louis one weekend. This album had come out sometime earlier that year, but I had no idea who they were; I just wanted to buy some records to play on my new turntable. What did I happen to find during my first completely uneducated record shopping experience? This, L-Fudge, Nightmares on Wax, some Beastie Boys, and a few others. Very beat heavy and very unintentional. There's a good possibility that this first trip to the record store completely directed me towards the more chilled out trip hop/lounge genres than I would have believed possible. I had absolutely no education in most of the artists (Beastie Boys being the one I actually knew and loved at the time), so it was a total crapshoot when I paid for them all at the counter.

This album, along with the Nightmares on Wax single ("Finer" / "Les Nuits"), was the nicest surprise. A full jazz band playing some super mellow, super lush instrumentals that were so expansive in sound they made me feel small. An amazing album that I still listen to on the regular.

Standout Tracks: "Night of the Iguana" and "And...Relax!"

Dj Cam - "Mad Blunted Jazz"
&
Dj Shadow - "Endtroducing"

When I finally flunked out of college from too much partying and not enough studying, I moved back to Kansas City and lived with my good friend Katie. Her older brother Josh had been a dj for years before I had ever even thought about doing it myself and we would usually head downtown to a super tiny joint called YJ's to hear him play every week. Whether he knew it or not, Josh's influence on my particular dj-ing aesthetic was massive. He downplayed electronic music and hyped the skill needed to play the more hip hop oriented beats.

He also played tracks off both of these albums (among many, many, many other albums that I've since added to my collection of listening enjoyment) while playing at YJ's. Graciously, if I ever wanted to know what he was playing, he'd show me and let me make notes in my little notebook. Once I really got moving with my own dj-ing, I frequently went back to these notes and found these records. Some got put into the rotation, others didn't due to my changing tastes. But these two albums...oh man. I CANNOT get sick of "Mad Blunted Jazz," no matter how many times I listen to it. And the further backwards I go through the history of music, the more I hear the samples in Shadow's "Entroducing." Believe me when I tell you it's not hyperbole to call these two albums absolute classics amongst most hip hop fans and almost all fans of trip hop and chillout. They're essential listening for any time of day or night.

Dj Cam Standout Tracks: "Sang-Lien," "Romantic Love," "Dieu Reconnaitra," and "Pure Pleasure"...but really, the whole album plays like one long musical foreplay session that shouldn't be ignored. 


Dj Shadow Standout Tracks: "Changeling," "What Does Your Soul Look Like, Pt. 4", and "Midnight In A Perfect World."


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