28 Oasis - (What's The Story) Morning Glory? (1995)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drf800/f892/f89289qfmrt.jpg

 

The UK's seminal band of the 1990s built on the success of their debut to win the battle of Britpop with Blur, even if some may argue that they have since lost the (Gorillaz) war (UK#1, USA#4).

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

If Definitely Maybe was an unintentional concept album about wanting to be a rock & roll star, (What's the Story) Morning Glory? is what happens after the dreams come true. Oasis turns in a relatively introspective second record, filled with big, gorgeous ballads instead of ripping rockers. Unlike Definitely Maybe, the production on Morning Glory is varied enough to handle the range in emotions; instead of drowning everything with amplifiers turned up to 12, there are strings, keyboards, and harmonicas. This expanded production helps give Noel Gallagher's sweeping melodies an emotional resonance that he occasionally can't convey lyrically. However, that is far from a fatal flaw; Gallagher's lyrics work best in fragments, where the images catch in your mind and grow, thanks to the music. Gallagher may be guilty of some borrowing, or even plagiarism, but he uses the familiar riffs as building blocks. This is where his genius lies: He's a thief and doesn't have many original thoughts, but as a pop/rock melodicist he's pretty much without peer. Likewise, as musicians, Oasis are hardly innovators, yet they have a majestic grandeur in their sound that makes ballads like "Wonderwall" or rockers like "Some Might Say" positively transcendent. Alan White does add authority to the rhythm section, but the most noticeable change is in Liam Gallagher. His voice sneered throughout Definitely Maybe, but on Morning Glory his singing has become more textured and skillful. He gives the lyric in the raging title track a hint of regret, is sympathetic on "Wonderwall," defiant on "Some Might Say," and humorous on "She's Electric," a bawdy rewrite of "Digsy's Diner." It might not have the immediate impact of Definitely Maybe, but Morning Glory is just as exciting and compulsively listenable.

 

Wonderwall video

 

Don't Look Back In Anger video

 

Some Might Say (live at Knebworth)

 

(What's The Story) Morning Glory video

 

Champagne Supernova video

-

27 Kate Bush - Aerial (2005)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drh000/h069/h06904a339a.jpg

 

After a gap of 12 years, Britain's greatest female singer/songwriter returned with stunning double CD and then preceded to not promote it releasing just one single (UK#3, US#48)

 

Review by Thom Jurek

4.5 Stars

 

Fierce Kate Bush fans who are expecting revelation in Aerial, her first new work since The Red Shoes in 1993, will no doubt scour lyrics, instrumental trills, and interludes until they find them. For everyone else, those who purchased much of Bush's earlier catalog because of its depth, quality, and vision, Aerial will sound exactly like what it is, a new Kate Bush record: full of her obsessions, lushly romantic paeans to things mundane and cosmic, and her ability to add dimension and transfer emotion though song. The set is spread over two discs. The first, A Sea of Honey, is a collection of songs, arranged for everything from full-on rock band to solo piano. The second, A Sky of Honey, is a conceptual suite. It was produced by Bush with engineering and mixing by longtime collaborator Del Palmer.

 

A Sea of Honey is a deeply interior look at domesticity, with the exception of its opening track, "King of the Mountain," the first single and video. Bush does an acceptable impersonation of Elvis Presley in which she examines his past life on earth and present incarnation as spectral enigma. Juxtaposing the Elvis myth, Wagnerian mystery, and the image of Rosebud, the sled from Orson Welles' Citizen Kane, Bush's synthesizer, sequencer, and voice weigh in ethereally from the margins before a full-on rock band playing edgy and funky reggae enters on the second verse. Wind whispers and then howls across the cut's backdrop as she searches for the rainbow body of the disappeared one through his clothes and the tabloid tales of his apocryphal sightings, looking for a certain resurrection of his physical body. The rest of the disc focuses on more interior and domestic matters, but it's no less startling. A tune called "Pi" looks at a mathematician's poetic and romantic love of numbers. "Bertie" is a hymn to her son orchestrated by piano, Renaissance guitar, percussion, and viols.

 

But disc one's strangest and most lovely moment is in "Mrs. Bartolozzi," scored for piano and voice. It revives Bush's obsessive eroticism through an ordinary woman's ecstatic experience of cleaning after a rainstorm, and placing the clothing of her beloved and her own into the washing machine and observing in rapt sexual attention. She sings "My blouse wrapping itself around your trousers/Oh the waves are going out/My skirt floating up around your waist...Washing machine/Washing machine." Then there's "How to Be Invisible," and the mysticism of domestic life as the interior reaches out into the universe and touches its magic: "Hem of anorak/Stem of a wall flower/Hair of doormat?/Is that autumn leaf falling?/Or is that you walking home?/Is that a storm in the swimming pool?"

 

A Sky of Honey is 42 minutes in length. It's lushly romantic as it meditates on the passing of 24 hours. Its prelude is a short deeply atmospheric piece with the sounds of birds singing, and her son (who is "the Sun" according to the credits) intones, "Mummy...Daddy/The day is full of birds/Sounds like they're saying words." And "Prologue" begins with her piano, a chanted viol, and Bush crooning to romantic love, the joy of marriage and nature communing, and the deep romance of everyday life. There's drama, stillness, joy, and quiet as its goes on, but it's all held within, as in "An Architect's Dream," where the protagonist encounters a working street painter going about his work in changing light: "The flick of a wrist/Twisting down to the hips/So the lovers begin with a kiss...." Loops, Eberhard Weber's fretless bass, drifting keyboards, and a relaxed delivery create an erotic tension, in beauty and in casual voyeurism.

 

"Sunset" has Bush approaching jazz, but it doesn't swing so much as it engages the form. Her voice digging into her piano alternates between lower-register enunciation and a near falsetto in the choruses. There is a sense of utter fascination with the world as it moves toward darkness, and the singer is enthralled as the sun climbs into bed, before it streams into "Sunset," a gorgeous flamenco guitar and percussion-driven call-and-response choral piece — it's literally enthralling. It is followed by a piece of evening called "Somewhere Between," in which lovers take in the beginning of night. As "Nocturne" commences, shadows, stars, the beach, and the ocean accompany two lovers who dive down deep into one another and the surf. Rhythms assert themselves as the divers go deeper and the band kicks up: funky electric guitars pulse along with the layers of keyboards, journeying until just before sunup. But it is on the title track that Bush gives listeners her greatest surprise. Dawn is breaking and she greets the day with a vengeance. Manic, crunchy guitars play power chords as sequencers and synths make the dynamics shift and swirl. In her higher register, Bush shouts, croons, and trills against and above the band's force.

 

Nothing much happens on Aerial except the passing of a day, as noted by the one who engages it in the process of being witnessed, yet it reveals much about the interior and natural worlds and expresses spiritual gratitude for everyday life. Musically, this is what listeners have come to expect from Bush at her best — a finely constructed set of songs that engage without regard for anything else happening in the world of pop music. There's no pushing of the envelope because there doesn't need to be. Aerial is rooted in Kate Bush's oeuvre, with grace, flair, elegance, and an obsessive, stubborn attention to detail. What gets created for the listener is an ordinary world, full of magic; it lies inside one's dwelling in overlooked and inhabited spaces, and outside, from the backyard and out through the gate into wonder.

 

King Of The Mountain video

 

Nocturn

 

How To Be Invisible

-

26 Clash - London Calling (1979)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drd900/d952/d95264o1973.jpg

 

The Clash were better than the Sex Pistols and were always much more than just a punk band (UK#9, USA#27).

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

Give 'Em Enough Rope, for all of its many attributes, was essentially a holding pattern for the Clash, but the double-album London Calling is a remarkable leap forward, incorporating the punk aesthetic into rock & roll mythology and roots music. Before, the Clash had experimented with reggae, but that was no preparation for the dizzying array of styles on London Calling. There's punk and reggae, but there's also rockabilly, ska, New Orleans R&B, pop, lounge jazz, and hard rock; and while the record isn't tied together by a specific theme, its eclecticism and anthemic punk function as a rallying call. While many of the songs — particularly "London Calling," "Spanish Bombs," and "The Guns of Brixton" — are explicitly political, by acknowledging no boundaries the music itself is political and revolutionary. But it is also invigorating, rocking harder and with more purpose than most albums, let alone double albums. Over the course of the record, Joe Strummer and Mick Jones (and Paul Simonon, who wrote "The Guns of Brixton") explore their familiar themes of working-class rebellion and antiestablishment rants, but they also tie them in to old rock & roll traditions and myths, whether it's rockabilly greasers or "Stagger Lee," as well as mavericks like doomed actor Montgomery Clift. The result is a stunning statement of purpose and one of the greatest rock & roll albums ever recorded. [in 2000 Columbia/Legacy reissued and remastered London Calling.]

 

London's Calling video

 

Train In Vain video

 

Guns Of Brixton (live 1982)

-

25 The Beatles - Sgt. Peppers Lonely Heart Club Band (1967)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drc500/c529/c5293648k41.jpg

 

The most historically important album in the history of Rock'n'Roll (UK#1, USA#1).

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

With Revolver, the Beatles made the Great Leap Forward, reaching a previously unheard-of level of sophistication and fearless experimentation. Sgt. Pepper, in many ways, refines that breakthrough, as the Beatles consciously synthesized such disparate influences as psychedelia, art-song, classical music, rock & roll, and music hall, often in the course of one song. Not once does the diversity seem forced — the genius of the record is how the vaudevillian "When I'm 64" seems like a logical extension of "Within You Without You" and how it provides a gateway to the chiming guitars of "Lovely Rita." There's no discounting the individual contributions of each member or their producer, George Martin, but the preponderance of whimsy and self-conscious art gives the impression that Paul McCartney is the leader of the Lonely Hearts Club Band. He dominates the album in terms of compositions, setting the tone for the album with his unabashed melodicism and deviously clever arrangements. In comparison, Lennon's contributions seem fewer, and a couple of them are a little slight but his major statements are stunning. "With a Little Help From My Friends" is the ideal Ringo tune, a rolling, friendly pop song that hides genuine Lennon anguish, à la "Help!"; "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" remains one of the touchstones of British psychedelia; and he's the mastermind behind the bulk of "A Day in the Life," a haunting number that skillfully blends Lennon's verse and chorus with McCartney's bridge. It's possible to argue that there are better Beatles albums, yet no album is as historically important as this. After Sgt. Pepper, there were no rules to follow — rock and pop bands could try anything, for better or worse. Ironically, few tried to achieve the sweeping, all-encompassing embrace of music as the Beatles did here.

 

Sgt. Peppers Lonely Heart Club Band video

 

Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds video

 

Ringo Starr - With A Little Help From My Friends (live 1987)

 

A Day In The Life video

-

24 Radiohead - The Bends (1994)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drc900/c925/c9259556m0o.jpg

 

Their second album proved that Radiohead where more than one hit wonders, and set themselves up to be hailed as the new Pink Floyd (UK#6, USA#88)

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

Pablo Honey in no way was adequate preparation for its epic, sprawling follow-up, The Bends. Building from the sweeping, three-guitar attack that punctuated the best moments of Pablo Honey, Radiohead create a grand and forceful sound that nevertheless resonates with anguish and despair — it's cerebral anthemic rock. Occasionally, the album displays its influences, whether it's U2, Pink Floyd, R.E.M., or the Pixies, but Radiohead turn clichés inside out, making each song sound bracingly fresh. Thom Yorke's tortured lyrics give the album a melancholy undercurrent, as does the surging, textured music. But what makes The Bends so remarkable is that it marries such ambitious, and often challenging, instrumental soundscapes to songs that are at their cores hauntingly melodic and accessible. It makes the record compelling upon first listen, but it reveals new details with each listen, and soon it becomes apparent that with The Bends, Radiohead have reinvented anthemic rock.

 

My Iron Lung video

 

High & Dry video

 

Fake Plastic Trees video

 

Just video

 

Street Spirit video

-

23 Prince - Sign O' The Times (1987)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drd600/d686/d68630e36l6.jpg

 

Prince has never come close to equalling this album since it's release 20 years ago (UK#3, USA#3)

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

Fearless, eclectic, and defiantly messy, Prince's Sign 'O' the Times falls into the tradition of tremendous, chaotic double albums like The Beatles, Exile on Main St., and London Calling — albums that are fantastic because of their overreach, their great sprawl. Prince shows nearly all of his cards here, from bare-bones electro-funk and smooth soul to pseudo-psychedelic pop and crunching hard rock, touching on gospel, blues, and folk along the way. This was the first album Prince recorded without the Revolution since 1982's 1999 (the band does appear on the in-concert rave-up, "It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night"), and he sounds liberated, diving into territory merely suggested on Around the World in a Day and Parade. While the music overflows with generous spirit, these are among the most cryptic, insular songs he's ever written. Many songs are left over from the aborted triple album Crystal Ball and the abandoned Camille project, a Prince alter ego personified by scarily sped-up tapes on "If I Was Your Girlfriend," the most disarming and bleak psycho-sexual song Prince ever wrote, as well as the equally chilling "Strange Relationship." These fraying relationships echo in the social chaos Prince writes about throughout the album. Apocalyptic imagery of drugs, bombs, empty sex, abandoned babies and mothers, and AIDS pop up again and again, yet he balances the despair with hope, whether it's God, love, or just having a good time. In its own roundabout way, Sign 'O' the Times is the sound of the late '80s — it's the sound of the good times collapsing and how all that doubt and fear can be ignored if you just dance those problems away.

 

Sign O The Times (live 2004 Rock'n'Roll Hall Of Fame)

 

Housequake & If I Was Your Girlfriend (live 1987)

 

The Cross (live 2000)

-

22 Primal Scream - Screamadelica (1991)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drc400/c476/c47609pj8np.jpg

 

The first Mercury Music Award winning album. The Scream have never come close to matching this album before or since (UK#8, USA # did not chart)

 

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

5 Stars

 

There's no underestimating the importance of Screamadelica, the record that brought acid house, techno, and rave culture crashing into the British mainstream — an impact that rivaled that of Nirvana's Nevermind, the other 1991 release that changed rock. Prior to Screamadelica, Primal Scream were Stonesy classic rock revivalists with a penchant for Detroit rock. They retained those fascinations on Screamadelica — one listen to the Jimmy Miller-produced, Stephen Stills-rip "Movin' on Up" proves that — but they burst everything wide open here, turning rock inside out by marrying it to a gleeful rainbow of modern dance textures. This is such a brilliant, gutsy innovative record, so unlike anything the Scream did before, that it's little wonder that there's been much debate behind who is actually responsible for its grooves, especially since Andrew Weatherall is credited with production with eight of the tracks, and it's clearly in line with his work. Even if Primal Scream took credit for Weatherall's endeavors, that doesn't erase the fact that they shepherded this album, providing the ideas and impetus for this dubtastic, elastic, psychedelic exercise in deep house and neo-psychedelic. Like any dance music, this is tied to its era to a certain extent, but it transcends it due to its fierce imagination and how it doubles back on rock history, making the past present and vice versa. It was such a monumental step forward that Primal Scream stumbled before regaining their footing, but by that point, the innovations of Screamadelica had been absorbed by everyone from the underground to mainstream. There's little chance that this record will be as revolutionary to first-time listeners, but after its initial spin, the genius in its construction will become apparent — and it's that attention to detail that makes Screamadelica an album that transcends its time and influence.

 

Come Together video (single mix - inferior to album version)

 

Movin' On Up video

 

Loaded (live at 1994 Reading Festival)

 

Higher Than The Sun video

-

21 Rufus Wainwright - Want One (2003)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/drg000/g038/g03882es5ya.jpg

 

America's answer to Antony Heggarty keeps the family tradition of great musicianship running. Another artist who should be bigger than what he actually is (UK# did not chart, USA#60)

 

neumusic review

4 .5 Stars

 

Rufus Wainwright fans love him for his musical innovation as much as his goofy charm. And on Want One (the artist was so prolific that a second volume will be released next year), Wainwright supplies both: gorgeous, hugely orchestrated Tin Pan Alley, cabaret pop and the occasional giggle.

 

The album begins with "Oh What a World." Its anchoring tuba loops between Ravel's "Bolero" theme and a choir of harmonizing voices. The song blossoms into its circular structure and Wainwright sings, "Wouldn't it be a lovely headline?/ 'Life is Beautiful' on the New York Times," unveiling a fully orchestrated arrangement that looms as large as the wondrous yet improbable pronouncement.

 

Things get grandiose on "I Don't Know What It Is," which chugs along with its soaring melody and kicky chorus. Another thing Wainwright fans appreciate is his invariable wit. It's not uncommon for a Wainwright lyric to be filled with cultural allusions, everything from an obscure reference to Greek mythology, Ravel (as previously noted) or "Three's Company," which is mentioned not once but, yes, twice in just that one song. And notice another literary quality: the album's consistent train motif. "I Don't Know What It Is" has an insistent rumble and horn-blasted clatter that resembles a moving train. Wainwright's point? Perhaps he's saying he's an emotional vagabond, his heart drifting wearily from one place to another.

 

Thematically the album explores Wainwright's newly sober world view; he certainly has been candid about the ugly, drug-fueled journeys on which he's embarked previously, his lovelorn past and his own family issues, especially struggles with his father, musician Loudon Wainwright III.

 

He once sang about excesses. Now, on Want One he pines for simpler things. On the wistful title track, Wainwright disavows the fame and fortune he hammily sought. "I just want to be my dad/ with a slight sprinkling of my mother/ and work in the family store," he sings against the muted, misty backdrop. The song slaloms along, settling into its beautifully subdued pace and dreamlike atmosphere.

 

Family matters abound elsewhere. "Dinner at Eight," one of his most poignant songs, discusses abandonment by his father. Its plangent, elegant piano melody is finessed by supple strings and Wainwright's pleas. "Why is it so that I've always been the one who must go/ That I've always been the one told to flee/ When in fact you were the one, long ago, actually, in the drifting white snow/ You left me," he sings. The result? Heartbreaking.

 

Thank goodness Wainwright's theatrical side hasn't abated. Want One provides plenty of histrionic moments. "14th Street" is all glitter and pizzazz, a stew of background vocals, a brassy chorus and all out revelry. The song, like Wainwright's persona, is over the top, splashy and so much fun. "Vibrate" also supplies some chuckles. In it Wainwright sings of aging. His clever banter is offset by a choir of plucky violins and measured piano playing. "I tried to dance [to] Britney Spears," he sings, followed by this, the kicker. "I guess I'm getting on in years."

 

Want Two is reportedly darker, more operatic and farther afield than much of this album. Fans are eager to get their hands on it. But one thing's for sure. There's plenty on Want One to keep those of us who dig Wainwright's music busy until next year's release. Whether you listen closely, for the sonic textures, or in a cursory fashion, scouting out the allusions galore, with each listen you'll likely appreciate something different. Rufus Wainwright wouldn't want it any other way.

 

Oh What A World (live performance)

 

I Don't Know What It Is (live)

 

Go Or Go Ahead (live)

 

Beautiful Child (live)

 

Dinner At Eight (live)

-

20 Stevie Wonder - Songs In The Key Of Life (1976)

 

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/dre100/e129/e12993zhy8t.jpg

 

Stevie Wonder's career high a double album magnus opus (UK#2, USA#1)

 

Review by John Bush

5 Stars

 

Songs in the Key of Life was Stevie Wonder's longest, most ambitious collection of songs, a two-LP (plus accompanying EP) set that — just as the title promised — touched on nearly every issue under the sun, and did it all with ambitious (even for him), wide-ranging arrangements and some of the best performances of Wonder's career. The opening "Love's in Need of Love Today" and "Have a Talk With God" are curiously subdued, but Stevie soon kicks into gear with "Village Ghetto Land," a fierce exposé of ghetto neglect set to a satirical baroque synthesizer. Hot on its heels comes the torrid fusion jam "Contusion," a big, brassy hit tribute to the recently departed Duke Ellington in "Sir Duke," and (another hit, this one a Grammy winner as well) the bumping poem to his childhood, "I Wish." Though they didn't necessarily appear in order, Songs in the Key of Life contains nearly a full album on love and relationships, along with another full album on issues social and spiritual. Fans of the love album Talking Book can marvel that he sets the bar even higher here, with brilliant material like the tenderly cathartic and gloriously redemptive "Joy Inside My Tears," the two-part, smooth-and-rough "Ordinary Pain," the bitterly ironic "All Day Sucker," or another classic heartbreaker, "Summer Soft." Those inclined toward Stevie Wonder the social-issues artist had quite a few songs to focus on as well: "Black Man" was a Bicentennial school lesson on remembering the vastly different people who helped build America; "Pastime Paradise" examined the plight of those who live in the past and have little hope for the future; "Village Ghetto Land" brought listeners to a nightmare of urban wasteland; and "Saturn" found Stevie questioning his kinship with the rest of humanity and amusingly imagining paradise as a residency on a distant planet. If all this sounds overwhelming, it is; Stevie Wonder had talent to spare during the mid-'70s, and instead of letting the reserve trickle out during the rest of the decade, he let it all go with one massive burst. (His only subsequent record of the '70s was the similarly gargantuan but largely instrumental soundtrack Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants.)

 

Sir Duke / I Wish medley (live 1997 performance)

 

Another Star (live 1995)

 

Isn't She Lovely (live 1995)

 

Saturn (live 1995)

-

19 Nerina Pallot - Fires (2006)

 

http://www3.hmv.co.uk/hmv/Large_Images/HMV/5101132862.JPG

 

Forget Lily Allen or Amy Winehouse, Nerina should have been the biggest UK female artist of 2006 with this truly wonderful singer/songwriter album that somehow failed to catch the imagination of the public despite most music critics raving about this album (UK#21, USA# did not chart)

 

UKM.com Review

5 Stars

 

Wallowing in a hazy Sunday morning charm, FIRES is an album that exudes class and style - Nerina Pallot fast emerging as a talent you'll immediately warm to. As both a talented singer and songwriter, Nerina Pallot writes and sings the kind of songs to melt your heart - her voice a gorgeous thing of beauty, possessing the kind of range that can flit between intense whisper, soaring falsetto and sugar sweet pop.

In FIRES, Pallot delivers a record of rare beauty and whispered majesty - an album to place alongside Cat Power's The Greatest and Gemma Hayes The Roads Don't Love You as examples of sublime female singer/songwriters this year.

Not quite the intense experience that anyone witnessing Nerina Pallot live may have come to expect, FIRES instead is a record that works in elements of sugar coated pop, warm soul and 70s style singer/songwriter moves amidst its darker moments. As a classically trained musician, Pallot shows off her talents frequently - wringing raw emotion from her piano and guitar with a delicious grace. Songs like DAMASCUS and IDAHO reveal the more intense side, Pallot delivering stark piano led songs that drip with dark beauty and subdued emotion. The more textured likes of MR KING hint at a 70s Laurel Canyon influence, fingerpicked guitar patterns joined by warm keyboard washes and gentle atmospherics - the vocal melodies almost nursery rhyme like in their soothing simplicity.

EVERYBODY'S GONE TO WAR is a more overtly pop moment, indie rock guitar shapes and catchy melodies coming together in a song that brings forth memories of bands like The Sundays and The Primitives. With similar leanings LEARNING TO BREATH and HEART ATTACK, move in the same glorious pop directions - Pallots vocals taking on an almost operatic sweep as she hits the soaring choruses, a delicious blend of Siouxsie Sioux and Sinead O'Conner.

The sun drenched pop of album closer ALL GOOD PEOPLE finds Nerina Pallot about as far from the intensity of her darker material as you can get, walking a very fine line towards cheesy pop - and just about getting away with it.

An impressive and satisfying record, FIRES finds Nerina Pallot edging her way towards becoming a household name. Deliciously dark in places and refreshingly pop fuelled in others, FIRES is an album that holds your attention throughout - truly special and sublime stuff.

 

Everybody's Gone To War video

 

Sophia video

 

Learning To Breathe video

 

Mr King (live performance)

 

Idaho (live performance)

-