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textualdevianceAnother one that's been going around FB:
Think of 15 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.
I had to spend a lot of time thinking about this one, and whittling down my list. I still couldn't come up with only 15, because there were a few that came together as a whole to define a given period in my life. Also, since I'm rather older than the people this is probably aimed at, I'm giving myself more items to account for longer years spent listening!
1--1970s) Simon & Garfunkel: Bookends/Linda Ronstadt: Greatest Hits
In my very early days of pop music appreciation, I got hold of these two, and listened to them a lot. The first reminds me a great deal of my teenage foster sister, who lived with us when I was little, and who very much embodied a particular style and culture of the time. I also listened to Helen Reddy's Greatest Hits albums, and whatever was playing on the radio stations my dad worked at, which included a lot of country, plus crossover stuff like The Carpenters and Olivia Newton-John
2--1980/81) Abba: Super Trouper
Though I did a great deal of singing along with the radio as a kid, I'd say that this was sort of my first introduction to being a fan. My friend up the street, who was two years older, introduced me to Abba, and I went nuts. I sang along with every song on this album, plus a couple more (The Visitors and a couple of Greatest Hits albums) at every opportunity for about three years. This obsession was shortly followed by a massive crush on Rick Springfield and a year of listening to most of Fleetwood Mac's albums.
3--1982/83) Duran Duran: Seven and the Ragged Tiger/Men at Work: Business as Usual & Cargo/Corey Hart: First Offense
I still have a vinyl single of Hungry Like the Wolf, back when it was printed by Harvest Records. That wasn't really what hooked me, though. What hooked me was New Moon on Monday, and the sheer huge amount of visibility the Fab Five had on MTV at the time. I was absolutely convinced I was going to marry Nick, though I would've settled for any of them. In their heyday, Duran Duran was the boyband of the moment. (Only better, since they were actually talented. ;) )
I also got my fetish for all things Aussie thanks to the lovely lads of Men at Work and crushed out on Corey Hart. Sigh... So dreamy. :)
1982 & '83 were my introduction to all things New Wave. Such a HUGE explosion of great stuff on that front: Missing Persons, Heaven 17, Roxy Music, Culture Club, The Psych Furs, Adam Ant, The B-52s... Totally shaped everything I subsequently became in my teens.
I also had a brief flirtation with being a metalhead in 1983--albeit a power pop one. I listened to Ratt, Dokken, Van Halen, Night Ranger & Ozzy.
4--1984/85) Berlin: Love Life
For the entirety of a summer when I was 13, this and Pleasure Victim were on constant rotation on my turntable. I was downright obsessed with Terri Nunn. Still have a crush on her. The summer I was 15, I followed every minute detail of the chart rise of "Take My Breath Away" (even though that was on the subsequent album, Count Three and Pray.) The soundtracks for all the John Hughes teen movies were also a big deal for me then, and thanks to having a country station down the hall, I also bought a Restless Heart album.
5--1986/early 1987) Hair Soundtrack/RHPS Soundtrack/Standing at the Sea (The Cure singles)
The school friend who introduced me to RHPS listened to the Hair soundtrack (plus The Cure and Depeche Mode.) in her Bug all the time when we were driving around. It seems incongruous, I suppose, but in a way, it helped turn me into the (then) modern version of a counter-culture hippie: Funky haircuts, black clothes, and a ton of weird makeup and jewelry. We were goth, I suppose, but that was before it was called that.
6--1987) 'Til Tuesday: Welcome Home/Howard Jones: Human's Lib & Dream Into Action/Tears for Fears: The Hurting & Songs from the Big Chair/Pseudo Echo: Love an Adventure
Once I'd more fully established myself into the RHPS/alternateen community in Reno, this is the kind of stuff I listened to a lot. Still think Aimee Mann is one of the best songwriters, ever. TFF were kind of my emo band, and Pseudo Echo were my favorites for dancing. I also associate Pseudo Echo with my first boyfriend's best friend, who introduced me to them.
7--Late 1987/Early 1988) The Bobs: Songs for Tomorrow Morning & My, I'm Large
Shortly after my ex and I started dating, I was watching PBS in his house, and saw this special come on with these weird-looking people doing acapella songs, including a version of a Led Zeppelin tune. I was absolutely hooked. And since we were both in choir at his school at the time, we started getting into all things acapella. But it was mostly about The Bobs. We sort of followed them around, going to all their nearby shows, for about five years. It was crazy, but fun. I still like their stuff, but it reminds me too much of the ex, so I can't listen to it much.
The rest of the late '80s were kind of a wash for me, because pop music was drifting a lot more toward rap and bubblegum, and away from the rock and new wave I had loved so much until then. I listened to a little bit of new age--Enya, Patrick O'Hearn, Clannad, etc.--but I didn't find my groove again until I moved to Portland in late 1990.
8--1991-1994) The B-52s: Cosmic Thing & Good Stuff/They Might be Giants: Flood & Apollo 18/Tori Amos: Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink/Sarah McLachlan: Touch & Solace/Suzanne Vega: 99.9/Annie Lennox: Diva/Veruca Salt: American Thighs
This was most of what I listened to when the ex and I first moved to Portland and started hanging out with the RHPS crowd there. I was also introduced to NiN around this time, but that didn't become significant until later.
My budding feminist awakening coincided with the rise of Sarah and Tori. There was a time when I listened to almost every female singer/songwriter I could manage, and that continued for several years, but really had its genesis in 1992, when I saw my first Sarah concert and fell in love. (And yes, I went to Lilith Fair later.)
I also, I'm embarassed to say, listened to Wilson Phillips.
Later in that period, I finally started catching on to alternative. Nirvana and the rest of grunge was a little too loud for me, but I loved a lot of the other stuff: Belly, Green Day, Letters to Cleo, Garbage. Veruca Salt was what I listened to the most, though. I distinctly remember playing it in my car when I was delivering pizzas.
10--1995-97) Alanis Morisette: Jagged Little Pill/Bjork: Post
1995 was the year of chaos. The ex and I split up, I met M and moved to Medford, dropped out of school, etc. Alanis and Bjork were a perfect soundtrack for this nuttiness. We also ended up using Head over Feet for our wedding song two years later. Heh. This was also when I started listening to a lot of NiN, since M's high school best friend was crazy about them, and we were hanging out with him and his wife a lot at the time.
Over the next couple of years, I also listened to No Doubt, Foo Fighters, Super Deluxe, Ben Folds Five, The Dandy Warhols and the Batman Forever soundtrack.
11--1998-2000) Tori Amos: Boys for Pele
I listened to a few other things around this time--Eve 6, Barenaked Ladies, Smash Mouth, Nina Gordon--but Tori really kind of defined this point in my life, primarily because I was desperately in love with a friend who was desperately in love with her. We had a horrible falling out, however, so I have a very hard time listening to any of her stuff now.
This was also when I hooked up with chorus, so a lot of my musical brain was taken over by singing.
12--2001-2003) Coldplay: Parachutes & A Rush of Blood/ World Without Sundays
Everything pop culture in my life at the time was absorbed in fandom, so it's probably not surprising that even the music I listened to was fandom-related. Bonus points if you can figure out what the Coldplay connection is.
13--2004-2005) Steve Burns: Songs for Dustmites/Franz Ferdinand/ The Bravery/The Killers: Hot Fuss/Keane: Hopes & Fears/Scissor Sisters
Thanks to the recs from one Mr. Wood, I finally started getting back into modern music, after barely skimming the surface for many years because most of it sucked.
Keane was probably the most emotionally connected of all of these. Bend & Break is still one of my favorite songs, and something that can take my breath away.
I also listened to the ESOTSM soundtrack. Jon Brion's a genius.
14-2005-2007) The Shins: Chutes too Narrow & Oh, Inverted World/The New Pornographers: Electric Version & Mass Romantic/OK Go: Oh, No/Goldfrapp: Supernature/Keane: Under the Iron Sea/Tom Petty: Highway Companion
Attempting to recapture lost youth, my return to school was accompanied by catching up with a lot of the stuff that The Kids These Days were listening to. The summer I did my internship, the Keane and Tom Petty albums were basically all I listened to.
15--2008-present) ?
I haven't really latched on to albums so much lately. I've mostly been assembling random songs, and filling in my back catalog from ages ago with stuff I never had the album for but always wanted. I've enjoyed bits of Lily Allen, Mika, Aliens, Apples in Stereo, MGMT, Cobra Starship, & The Fratellis, but nothing's really spoken to me as an album, yet. Probably the closest I'd come to being really into the whole album is Ann Wilson's cover album (Hope & Glory), because it is 100% awesome. Seriously, she does Led Zeppelin. And you know you've always wanted to hear her do that, yes?
Think of 15 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.
I had to spend a lot of time thinking about this one, and whittling down my list. I still couldn't come up with only 15, because there were a few that came together as a whole to define a given period in my life. Also, since I'm rather older than the people this is probably aimed at, I'm giving myself more items to account for longer years spent listening!
1--1970s) Simon & Garfunkel: Bookends/Linda Ronstadt: Greatest Hits
In my very early days of pop music appreciation, I got hold of these two, and listened to them a lot. The first reminds me a great deal of my teenage foster sister, who lived with us when I was little, and who very much embodied a particular style and culture of the time. I also listened to Helen Reddy's Greatest Hits albums, and whatever was playing on the radio stations my dad worked at, which included a lot of country, plus crossover stuff like The Carpenters and Olivia Newton-John
2--1980/81) Abba: Super Trouper
Though I did a great deal of singing along with the radio as a kid, I'd say that this was sort of my first introduction to being a fan. My friend up the street, who was two years older, introduced me to Abba, and I went nuts. I sang along with every song on this album, plus a couple more (The Visitors and a couple of Greatest Hits albums) at every opportunity for about three years. This obsession was shortly followed by a massive crush on Rick Springfield and a year of listening to most of Fleetwood Mac's albums.
3--1982/83) Duran Duran: Seven and the Ragged Tiger/Men at Work: Business as Usual & Cargo/Corey Hart: First Offense
I still have a vinyl single of Hungry Like the Wolf, back when it was printed by Harvest Records. That wasn't really what hooked me, though. What hooked me was New Moon on Monday, and the sheer huge amount of visibility the Fab Five had on MTV at the time. I was absolutely convinced I was going to marry Nick, though I would've settled for any of them. In their heyday, Duran Duran was the boyband of the moment. (Only better, since they were actually talented. ;) )
I also got my fetish for all things Aussie thanks to the lovely lads of Men at Work and crushed out on Corey Hart. Sigh... So dreamy. :)
1982 & '83 were my introduction to all things New Wave. Such a HUGE explosion of great stuff on that front: Missing Persons, Heaven 17, Roxy Music, Culture Club, The Psych Furs, Adam Ant, The B-52s... Totally shaped everything I subsequently became in my teens.
I also had a brief flirtation with being a metalhead in 1983--albeit a power pop one. I listened to Ratt, Dokken, Van Halen, Night Ranger & Ozzy.
4--1984/85) Berlin: Love Life
For the entirety of a summer when I was 13, this and Pleasure Victim were on constant rotation on my turntable. I was downright obsessed with Terri Nunn. Still have a crush on her. The summer I was 15, I followed every minute detail of the chart rise of "Take My Breath Away" (even though that was on the subsequent album, Count Three and Pray.) The soundtracks for all the John Hughes teen movies were also a big deal for me then, and thanks to having a country station down the hall, I also bought a Restless Heart album.
5--1986/early 1987) Hair Soundtrack/RHPS Soundtrack/Standing at the Sea (The Cure singles)
The school friend who introduced me to RHPS listened to the Hair soundtrack (plus The Cure and Depeche Mode.) in her Bug all the time when we were driving around. It seems incongruous, I suppose, but in a way, it helped turn me into the (then) modern version of a counter-culture hippie: Funky haircuts, black clothes, and a ton of weird makeup and jewelry. We were goth, I suppose, but that was before it was called that.
6--1987) 'Til Tuesday: Welcome Home/Howard Jones: Human's Lib & Dream Into Action/Tears for Fears: The Hurting & Songs from the Big Chair/Pseudo Echo: Love an Adventure
Once I'd more fully established myself into the RHPS/alternateen community in Reno, this is the kind of stuff I listened to a lot. Still think Aimee Mann is one of the best songwriters, ever. TFF were kind of my emo band, and Pseudo Echo were my favorites for dancing. I also associate Pseudo Echo with my first boyfriend's best friend, who introduced me to them.
7--Late 1987/Early 1988) The Bobs: Songs for Tomorrow Morning & My, I'm Large
Shortly after my ex and I started dating, I was watching PBS in his house, and saw this special come on with these weird-looking people doing acapella songs, including a version of a Led Zeppelin tune. I was absolutely hooked. And since we were both in choir at his school at the time, we started getting into all things acapella. But it was mostly about The Bobs. We sort of followed them around, going to all their nearby shows, for about five years. It was crazy, but fun. I still like their stuff, but it reminds me too much of the ex, so I can't listen to it much.
The rest of the late '80s were kind of a wash for me, because pop music was drifting a lot more toward rap and bubblegum, and away from the rock and new wave I had loved so much until then. I listened to a little bit of new age--Enya, Patrick O'Hearn, Clannad, etc.--but I didn't find my groove again until I moved to Portland in late 1990.
8--1991-1994) The B-52s: Cosmic Thing & Good Stuff/They Might be Giants: Flood & Apollo 18/Tori Amos: Little Earthquakes and Under the Pink/Sarah McLachlan: Touch & Solace/Suzanne Vega: 99.9/Annie Lennox: Diva/Veruca Salt: American Thighs
This was most of what I listened to when the ex and I first moved to Portland and started hanging out with the RHPS crowd there. I was also introduced to NiN around this time, but that didn't become significant until later.
My budding feminist awakening coincided with the rise of Sarah and Tori. There was a time when I listened to almost every female singer/songwriter I could manage, and that continued for several years, but really had its genesis in 1992, when I saw my first Sarah concert and fell in love. (And yes, I went to Lilith Fair later.)
I also, I'm embarassed to say, listened to Wilson Phillips.
Later in that period, I finally started catching on to alternative. Nirvana and the rest of grunge was a little too loud for me, but I loved a lot of the other stuff: Belly, Green Day, Letters to Cleo, Garbage. Veruca Salt was what I listened to the most, though. I distinctly remember playing it in my car when I was delivering pizzas.
10--1995-97) Alanis Morisette: Jagged Little Pill/Bjork: Post
1995 was the year of chaos. The ex and I split up, I met M and moved to Medford, dropped out of school, etc. Alanis and Bjork were a perfect soundtrack for this nuttiness. We also ended up using Head over Feet for our wedding song two years later. Heh. This was also when I started listening to a lot of NiN, since M's high school best friend was crazy about them, and we were hanging out with him and his wife a lot at the time.
Over the next couple of years, I also listened to No Doubt, Foo Fighters, Super Deluxe, Ben Folds Five, The Dandy Warhols and the Batman Forever soundtrack.
11--1998-2000) Tori Amos: Boys for Pele
I listened to a few other things around this time--Eve 6, Barenaked Ladies, Smash Mouth, Nina Gordon--but Tori really kind of defined this point in my life, primarily because I was desperately in love with a friend who was desperately in love with her. We had a horrible falling out, however, so I have a very hard time listening to any of her stuff now.
This was also when I hooked up with chorus, so a lot of my musical brain was taken over by singing.
12--2001-2003) Coldplay: Parachutes & A Rush of Blood/ World Without Sundays
Everything pop culture in my life at the time was absorbed in fandom, so it's probably not surprising that even the music I listened to was fandom-related. Bonus points if you can figure out what the Coldplay connection is.
13--2004-2005) Steve Burns: Songs for Dustmites/Franz Ferdinand/ The Bravery/The Killers: Hot Fuss/Keane: Hopes & Fears/Scissor Sisters
Thanks to the recs from one Mr. Wood, I finally started getting back into modern music, after barely skimming the surface for many years because most of it sucked.
Keane was probably the most emotionally connected of all of these. Bend & Break is still one of my favorite songs, and something that can take my breath away.
I also listened to the ESOTSM soundtrack. Jon Brion's a genius.
14-2005-2007) The Shins: Chutes too Narrow & Oh, Inverted World/The New Pornographers: Electric Version & Mass Romantic/OK Go: Oh, No/Goldfrapp: Supernature/Keane: Under the Iron Sea/Tom Petty: Highway Companion
Attempting to recapture lost youth, my return to school was accompanied by catching up with a lot of the stuff that The Kids These Days were listening to. The summer I did my internship, the Keane and Tom Petty albums were basically all I listened to.
15--2008-present) ?
I haven't really latched on to albums so much lately. I've mostly been assembling random songs, and filling in my back catalog from ages ago with stuff I never had the album for but always wanted. I've enjoyed bits of Lily Allen, Mika, Aliens, Apples in Stereo, MGMT, Cobra Starship, & The Fratellis, but nothing's really spoken to me as an album, yet. Probably the closest I'd come to being really into the whole album is Ann Wilson's cover album (Hope & Glory), because it is 100% awesome. Seriously, she does Led Zeppelin. And you know you've always wanted to hear her do that, yes?
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