'Songs From The Big Chair'

One day the world will understand what a brilliant band Tears for Fears was and what a mammoth three-song tour de force "Shout," "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" and "Head Over Heels" was in the history of recorded sound. Few could have a better triumvirate quite like that.

The one guy looks like Jon Cryer.

'Pump'

Got to give Aerosmith some credit: They kept their bit going for a long time and didn't stray too far from what sold records. Lug-headed, horny riff-rock that was largely about sex even if it was sex between a father and daughter. 

It's not good. It's not appealing even in a sexual way because Aerosmith lived in a world completely unlike our own, where casual sex simply based on who you were (as opposed to how nice you were, how you looked, etc.) was probably pretty common. 

When they weren't singing about complete sluts they wrote anthem-worthy warblers appealing to the disenfranchised teenage girl. Written, we can assume, just to get in their pants. 

About Pump, guitarist Joe Perry said, "When we went to do this album, we knew what we wanted, we wanted to strip off a little fat we felt on our last one. We didn't say 'We need a drug song or a child abuse song,' but when they fit, we used them. That's Aerosmith: we aren't bound by any rules."

Wrong, Joe. You are more bound to rules than any rock band in history. And the fact that you did it so stinkin' well is what makes you rich and able to hump girls in elevators. 

'Slipknot'

I listened to these guys play music. They wear masks.

'A Northern Soul'

A story of a band that breaks up all the time.

Basically, Richard Ashcroft is kind of a hard guy to get along with for one reason or another. I’m sure it’s not all his fault, but when you consider its him getting punched in the face by his guitar player and him having to reconcile with the drummer, bassist and same guitar player during a second break-up, you can see that there’s a central figure in all of this.

The band first broke up after the success of their break-out album A Northern Soul. Chiding their psychedelic first album, the band loosed the chains on Ashcroft’s lilting vocals and wrote basic rock songs.

Right before the release of their third single, Ashcroft broke the band up.

Although noting no regret, he got the band back together with a new guitar player about a year later. Next thing they know they are mega worldwide superstars thanks to the hit single “Bitter Sweet Symphony.”

Then they broke up again.

Six years later they reunited. Then they broke up again. This time for good, or so everyone thinks. 

'Yank Crime' & 'Scream, Dracula, Scream!'

This might be a first (and only) for the 1,001 Records You Should Listen To Before You Die.

Plenty of artists are involved in multiple records on the list. For example, The Beatles or Elvis Costello. But very few are involved with two different albums from two different bands within a year of each other.

This is the case with John Reis and his two bands, Drive Like Jehu and Rocket from the Crypt.

Reis was in the band Pitchfork (had the website Pitchfork been around in the late 1980s, I’m sure they would’ve given the band a poor review) with Rick Froberg. Pitchfork died and Reis’ attentions went two different directions. He formed the post-punk/hardcore outfit Drive Like Jehu with Froberg and Rocket from the Crypt, a punk band, basically.

“Different” doesn’t do the two bands justice. Rocket is a collection of two-minute, three-chord punk songs. Drive Like Jehu are orchestrated eight-minute multi-sectioned compositions with heavy guitars interconnecting into crescendo and release.

The two bands released eponymous debuts in 1991. Drive Like Jehu released its only other record, Yank Crime, in 1994 (which seems like a lifetime after Nevermind) and Rocket released Scream, Dracula, Scream! a year later. Drive Like Jehu promptly broke up even though they were the superior band, but there’s no accounting for taste, I guess.  

Ever friends, Reis and Froberg formed another band, Hot Snakes, together several years later. 

'A Little Deeper'

A simply tremendous artist from a rather unknown female rapper from England. Unlike some, her accent is negligible and sounds pretty American even among the production value.

A Little Deeper came out in 2002 and Ms. Dynamite has done one other album, released in 2005. In 2006, as part of a celebrity race car driving TV show, she was in a serious accident. Years before, her career was interrupted when she punched a cop.

After the accident she left the public eye and despite the announcement of a new album in 2009, it was never released. It takes a miracle for someone to have such an impact on popular culture even in a limited way so it should be no surprise when others fade away.

'Queens Of The Stone Age'

I like a band with an identity, with a home. Upon releasing their eponymous album lead singer and guitarist Josh Homme said, "I just wanted to start a band that within three seconds of listening, people knew what band it was.”

No one is like Queens of the Stone Age. I can pick out one of their songs within probably 10-15 seconds of the song starting. Furthermore, they’re probably one of the more unforgiving bands to have a hit on rock radio the last 25 years. “No One Knows” from Songs For the Deaf is as scorching of a song as the Queens have released and it’s still really great.

The Queens’ roots go down to the stoner rock group Kyuss. After they broke up, Homme toured with the Screaming Trees and eventually decided to start a new band. After several line-ups, it settled on Alfredo Hernandez on drums and (after completion of the album) Nick Oliveri on bass (Homme played bass on this album). Of course, Homme, Hernandez and Oliveri were essentially Kyuss.

Queens also has its roots in the deserts of southern California and you hear it in the music. There’s a dry irritation and heat that comes off the songs. It’s stark and scary. It runs hot and yet you can’t get away from the cold nights. It’s rock music for coyotes. 

'Shalimar'

This is an odd choice for the list. It’s a soundtrack to a Hindi film in 1978 called Shalimar. It starred what appears to be some of the more popular Hindi film stars of the day in addition to Rex Harrison.

Harrison plays a dying crime lord who challenges the best thieves in all the land to steal a precious gem, Shalimar. S.S. Kumar plays a low-level thief, who through a series of misunderstandings and identity theft is adopted into the inner sanctum of the criminal underworld.

I haven’t seen the film, but I can only assume Kumar succeeds in either stealing the diamond and/or bringing down Harrison’s dastardly crime syndicate and getting the girl. There’s always a girl.

It’s not a Bollywood film as I’ve learned only refers to films produced in Bombay (now Mumbai, but once the “Hollywood” of Indian cinema, hence the name). The soundtrack, however, is unique as it is a multi-layered collection of 1970s kitsch, traditional Indian instrumentation with a healthy splash of Western music.

Otherwise, I can’t see much of a reason why this soundtrack is on the 1,001 list. Outside of being "ultra stereophonic." 

'Stand!' & 'There's a Riot Goin' On'

Culturally, it’s hard to find a musical artist that was on par with Sly and the Family Stone. The band encompassed the late 1960s and early 1970s like very few ever did.

There was the rock and hippie angle with socially conscious lyrics of both Stand! and There’s a Riot Goin’ On. Shortly after the success of Stand!, the band played Woodstock already making them a pillar of the cultural times.

Furthermore, with the song "Everyday People,"

they actually coined a phrase, “Different strokes for different folks.” How culturally impactful is that?

Their biggest impact is being virtually the first band of note to have a multi-ethnic and multi-gender band including Sly’s brother and sister, and two white guys, who the Black Panthers were later put pressure on Stone to replace with African American players.

After the success of Stand! the band really hit a rough patch, which in many ways was exacerbated by his rampant drug use. He would later end up broke and busted multiple times for drug possession (it’s rumored that he carried a violin case full of illicit drugs around). It resulted to ruin his career as it was always a gamble of him or a bandmate missing a show. He retired until recently when he’s gigged with family and friends. Otherwise, he’s been a recluse and rumored to be living in a van down by the river, quite literally. 

'Soul Mining' & 'Infected'

The The is basically Matt Johnson and a revolving door of special guests and musicians including The Smiths' guitarist Johnny Marr and Jools Holland.

Outside of a relatively clever band name, this is not remarkably better or worse than most pop-electronic music from the 1980s. 

One note that is worth mentioning is that Matt's brother, Andrew, did some of the artwork for The The under the name of Andy Dog. This included the original cover for Infected, which featured a demon masturbating and apparently completing. The album was pulled and an edited version was released. You can see the unedited version here. 

I would love someone to interview the Johnson brothers and just ask them what exactly they were trying to do. I don't know if the controversy helped with album sales. It probably didn't hurt, but that seems like a pretty shallow reason for doing something. 

Furthermore, was the record label thinking the same thing assuming that repackaging would cost less than the free advertising they'd get for having a demon ejaculating on himself? 

'Shadowlands' & 'Ingénue'

Not to take away from the massive steps forward the United States has made in accepting of the homosexual community, but k.d. lang came out of the closet in 1992, during the very heart of her massively successful career. And no one seemed to care.

lang is sorta weird for several reasons, none of which include her sexual preference.

For one, she sings and plays pretty weird music. At the time, however, it was popular to like country-ish pop, easy-listenin’ rock. It’s why Bonnie Raitt sold about 10 billion albums and why Dwight Yoakum wound up so popular that he became a part-time actor.

k.d. lang got popular by playing this moody country adult contemporary that nobody that liked country listened to but everyone that was pretty lame loved. There is no way this should have been popular. The only explanation was that it happened in the 1990s and a lot of weird things happened in music during the 1990s.

What also is weird is that the United States fully embraced an openly gay celebrity. The same year she “came out of the closet,” lang’s album, Ingénue, went double platinum. Double platinum. It was mega-popular. Every one over the age of 30 bought this album. These are the same people that 20 years later are thumping their Bibles and bemoaning the rhetoric of same-sex marriage, basically condemning the country as a modern Sodom. In fact, they did more for normalizing homosexuality than anyone.

Plus, lang is Canadian.

k.d. lang is extremely popular and there’s no viable reason why she should be outside of the fact that Americans love lesbian Canada pseudo-country contemporary adult pop music. Go figure. 

'#1 Record' & 'Third/Sister Lovers'

Big Star, a lesson to all artists. It’s fleeting and no matter what you have going for you it probably will never happen. If it does, it doesn’t last long.

Alex Chilton had the name. He was the lead singer of The Box Tops and had a hit record with “The Letter.” Then there was Chris Bell, the talented guitarist and lead singer. Two really legit songwriters and artists, one with a claim to fame. Furthermore, the band was based in Memphis along with the distribution power of Stax Records.

On top of all that, Big Star was a power pop band built around melodies and hooks. They weren’t anything out of left field with its foundation based in The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Critics loved them.

Yet, their career probably peaked recently when a documentary about the group was released and interest in the band probably hit an all-time high.

What went wrong?

Stax Records couldn’t promote the band appropriately. This responsibility was eventually given to Columbia Records, who did not want to mess with small-label band so copies of the record couldn’t be found in the record stores.

Bell later quit the band as they continued recording and continued finding a dead end through distribution and marketing. He would die in a car accident at age 27.

So, before you declare a band as being eternal or some sort of pillar of the zeitgeist, remember that there’s thousands of better bands and artists that never got the chance. 

'Led Zeppelin I' & 'Led Zeppelin III'

Order of an individual’s favorite Led Zeppelin album, chronologically.

Everyone initially loves Led Zeppelin IV or ZOSO because of “Stairway to Heaven.”

Then they realize it was just an indulgent jack-off session so they start to like Led Zeppelin II because it has a lot of radio hits and by this time you’re an older teenager and it’s also a plodding mess of hard rock and early metal.

You age. And you adopt Led Zeppelin I as your favorite album because it’s “genuine” and “pure Zep” because it’s them doing blues, which is all Led Zeppelin really were. At this point, you’re a true asshole because you like a British band solely for ripping off poor, unknown black Americans, who did all these songs and did them nominally better.

You age a bit more and probably are reaching your mid-20s when you realize that Led Zeppelin IV (ZOSO) is, again, the best IN SPITE OF “Stairway to Heaven,” which remains a pretty overrated song.

After a multi-year respite and dalliance with Houses of the Holy and Physical Graffiti, you finally come to the conclusion that Led Zeppelin III is the best album because by this time you are 30+ and not a total retard. Although, in the back of your brain, you still think Physical Graffiti might still be better.

I just finished reading Hammer of the Gods, one of the most well-known of rock and roll biographies and although thoroughly entertained it didn’t take long for me to realize that Led Zeppelin were, in fact, total assholes. I mean, Jimmy Page’s opinions of women alone make you question their entire body of work and aesthetic. Women were basically third-class citizens to him.

John Bonham appears to be a total drunken lunatic. Peter Grant might have been one of the most unethical humans outside of genocidal totalitarians.

Robert Plant was no prince, but in comparison he comes off looking like a sweetheart.

It’s a revealing read to say the least. This was Jimmy Page’s band (I don’t think it ever became anything different outside of his heavy heroin addiction later in the band’s career). He was with The Yardbirds, they split and the record companies basically attempted to rebuild it with Page and some pieces including fellow session player John Paul Jones. They picked Plant and Bonham from the English hinterlands and took off.

It’s also noteworthy how American Led Zeppelin were. They didn’t cut their teeth on the British tours and clubs. They went to America almost immediately behind the name power of “The New Yardbirds” and Page. They toured excessively with an American stadium tour every year.

Knowing who these people were doesn’t necessarily change the way you enjoy their music. If you’re like me, you’re as tired of the 15 or so songs that they jam on classic rock stations as any bloc of songs in history. And it’s not like they’ve been overplayed, so to speak

; they’re just not very good. Zeppelin’s true brilliance comes with their lesser known songs. In fact, a good barometer to find these songs is finding out what songs guitar magazines put in their tablature sections. I ignored all those songs early in life and now they’re my favorites.

'The Nightfly'

Steely Dan broke up and Donald Fagen recorded a solo record, The Nightfly. On the cover is Fagen in a collared shirt and tie resembling the jazz DJs that he would tune into in the 1950s and 1960s in suburban New Jersey. 

Fagan said living in the suburbs was a prison. A bit of an exaggeration because the suburbs may be boring but they are far from as disastrous as Fagen would like to pretend. 

The album itself is strictly autobiographical with tales of listening to late-night jazz DJs and bomb shelters. 

Of course, by age 11, Fagen had become a self-admitted "jazz snob" and developed an "anti-social disorder." Maybe it was all the suburbs' fault. 

Worth noting that apparently he played in a band with Walter Becker and Chevy Chase (drums) while at Bard College where they all studied. Chase apparently has perfect pitch. 

'Pleasure Principle'

Stop and do this: Think about the top 20 most influential musical artists in history.

Write them down.

Disregard how good the artists were and consider only this question, "If this band/musician didn't exist, it would've set off an irretrievable set of events that would've changed pop culture forever." Meaning, without Band A a whole genre or Bands T, U, V, W, X, Y and Z don't exist.

Disregard, also, the first caveman to whistle or King David plucking his lyre. Also, try to disregard the influences of the influential. Do the Beatles exist without Carl Perkins, Little Richard, Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry? Probably not. But I don't think the Beatles' influence necessary should reflect on Little Richard, who was himself influenced by others.

Also, disregard most classical musicians. 

My list, in no order: The Beatles, The Ramones, Hank Williams Sr., The Clash, Metallica, The Rolling Stones, Beethoven, Run DMC, Tupac Shakur, Elvis Presley, James Brown, Black Sabbath, Jimi Hendrix, Madonna, Bob Dylan, Nirvana, Pink Floyd, Michael Jackson, Led Zeppelin and The Velvet Underground.

OK, expand your list to 25 and I dare you not to include Gary Numan. Before you laugh me off the Internet, consider that few were doing with synthesizers and electronic music in the 1970s quite like Numan. His influence would be notice immediately in the New Wave of the 1980s, but the influence I think reaches its apex among more edgey and artistic folks starting with Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails, DJs and dance and house music creators, hip-hop guys and even folks like Animal Collective and others that utilize almost exclusively electronic instruments.

Now, Numan wasn't alone. He was contemporaries of others like Kraftwerk, Can, Faust, the prog bands and Brian Eno. Numan didn't event anything nor what he probably the best, but he made it popular.

Again, Carl Perkins and Little Richard were never going to do what The Beatles were going to do.

Numan did make it popular with Pleasure Principle being his most popular album. Numan himself is not too different from his stage persona (if indeed you define it as a persona that is separate from his own personality). He's suspected of having some social disorder like Asperger's Syndrome. He's been medicated for depression before. His distant and stoic self that's on the stage is little different than that persona at home. He's a dude that doesn't like other people. A true artist.

By the way, listen to "Random" from this album and tell me it could be re-released next week.

'Faith' & 'Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. 1'

I've never understood why George Michael was such a polarizing guy. I guess in conservative America in the 1980s a blatantly homosexual singer could turn heads. Then again, he sold a gajillion records, so most people had little problem with his sexuality at this point.

But my memory of the late 1980s might not be as accurate as I perceive. I don't remember a time when George Michael was never a heterosexual. And I'm starting to question that memory only because I recollect a time when I thought Michael was pretty cool with that quaffed hair, the stubble, earrings, leather jackets and sunglasses perpetually perched on his nose.

Michael admits to bisexuality and (despite Wham! being incredibly gay) basically going through women like air during his heyday of the 1980s.

Reading more about the guy, the more I sorta respect him. If you take his quotes as gospel about how he really feels, sexuality had less to do with how they were attracted to a male or female form. It had to do with love. He thought he was a heterosexual in the 1980s because he was in love with a woman. It had less to do with who he wanted to have sex with (I only assume he had sex with whoever he was in love with). Then, he fell in love with some guys and he's not so much heterosexual anymore.

I also get the feeling that George Michael is in love with falling in love.

Later, when Michael's sexuality was pretty well known and he started to get into legal trouble he suddenly became an uninteresting lightning rod that occasionally released pop records.

He's just a man who loves his anonymous sex in roadside bathrooms. It was one time!

OK, it was two times. And he likes weed. No big deal.

The guy's been around for 30+ years now and if enjoying things enjoyed also by heterosexuals (weed, sex with strangers) is the guy's biggest pockmark, then I think that's OK.

'Tea For The Tillerman'

If you're not listening to Tea for the Tillerman on a regular basis then you must be an idiot. It's necessary listening.

The A side of the record is as good of a side of recorded music then you'll find in the medium's existence. "Wild World," "Hard Headed Woman," "Where Do the Children Play?" and "Sad Lisa." Just enough blissful heartache to keep you going.

The album was released in 1970 just on the heels of Cat Stevens nearly dying after contracting tuberculosis, which precipitated him discovering religion, practicing yoga and becoming a vegetarian. We can only assume that the experience eventually resulted in him converting to Islam years later.

Fun fact: He adopted "Cat Stevens" as a stage name due to a laborious real name and because he thought people liked animals. Singer, songwriter, marketing genius.

'Third'

If you were a hardcore subscriber to Guitar magazine like I was, and you wondered why Allan Holdsworth kept getting mentioned, then Soft Machine is your answer.

He played guitar for this prog-rock group at two different times, although, coincidentally, not during the recording of Softs.

Not going to blow my prog-rock load right here because I've got a lot more to go. However, it is worth mentioning that Soft Machine had 20 different line-ups over an 18-year period of synthesizing your nuts off.

I don't know if Holdsworth is in the photo above, but I'd like to think he's the weirdo on the far left.

'Q: Are We Not Men? We Are Devo!'

I can't get over that the guy on the album cover looks like NFL quarterback and three-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady.


There's not really a photo on the Internet of Tom Brady in that style of hat, at least without sunglasses. there are photos of Tom Brady crying and I don't know why he's crying. It's depressing that he'd be so sad about something.

Also, Brady's been on a lot of magazine covers and he's had lots of hairstyles. Yet, I don't know what he even sounds like. Is that weird?

Why am I talking about Tom Brady? What's happening!?

Oh, GOD, Gisele Bundchen!

Eh, he also looks like Benedict Cumberbatch.

'My Aim Is True'

Elvis Costello's debut album after six years on the club and pub tour.

He kept working at his day job even after the release of "Less Than Zero" and "Alison" as singles. The record company eventually offered to pay him his wages plus a bonus, an amplifier and a tape recorder.

So decadent.