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Your personal top 5 favorite albums that you felt should have been popular and aren't/weren't

post #1 of 63
4/6/10 at 12:36pm
Thread Starter 
So what are your favorite 5 albums that you are pretty sure there are not a lot of people who like them but that you think they should have? Any era. I'm not talking about complete one-off records by your cousin here ( ) - but major-label stuff that you feel like you are the only one who likes it.

Here are mine:

1. Big Country - Steeltown - everyone knows their first record, but I don't know anyone likes the second - but I think it's their best

2. Prefab Sprout - Two Wheels Good/Steve McQueen - may be better known in the UK, but I have never met anyone in the US who has heard of it or likes it - but it's an 80's pop masterpiece IMO

3. Aztec Camera - High Land, Hard Rain - same as above

4. King Crimson - Islands - even the King Crimson fans I know don't seem to like it, and yet I think it's one of their best.

5. Yes - Drama - the absence of Jon Anderson makes most Yes fans poo-poo this record, and yet as much as I love Jon, this is my favorite Yes album.
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post #2 of 63
4/6/10 at 1:01pm
Mmmmmm Prefab Sprout and Steve McQueen - one of my favourite recordings. I really do have Appetite for this album
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post #3 of 63
4/6/10 at 1:09pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by argentum View Post
Mmmmmm Prefab Sprout and Steve McQueen - one of my favourite recordings. I really do have Appetite for this album
Ha! Well I know you know the album well based on your clever comment!!!! Nice
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post #4 of 63
4/6/10 at 1:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post
5. Yes - Drama - the absence of Jon Anderson makes most Yes fans poo-poo this record, and yet as much as I love Jon, this is my favorite Yes album.
I'm a huge Yes fan, and I must say, Drama doesn't deserve the hate that it gets. It's fairly cohesive, much more than can be said about Big Generator and 90215. It gets a bad rep because Jon hates it so much, I think...
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post #5 of 63
4/6/10 at 2:06pm
Funny, I know quite a few people who still talk about Prefab Sprout…I actually met Paddy McAloon at that time…seemed like a nice enough guy.

As for Aztec Camera, I was really into that band. Roddy Frame is a fine guitarist (among other things), and at that time he was waayyy into jazzy chord progressions and stuff (check out "Release"), so I guess I was a natural fan. (Though back then, I wasn't the jazzhead I am now.) They also recorded a cool cover of Van Halen's "Jump". Funny, Frame was sooo drunk one of the times I saw him that at one point he tripped over a mic stand and finished playing his guitar solo seated on the stage.

As overlooked albums go, though, I think Aztec Camera's third disc, Love, is even more unjustly neglected. Granted, it was more a Roddy Frame solo project than anything else, but the songs are excellent and make for good pop-soul. The song that sticks in my head is "How Men Are"…the chorus asks: "Why should it take…the tears of a woman…to see how men are?" I dunno…maybe he was too thoughtful to be truly popular.
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post #6 of 63
4/6/10 at 2:27pm
Thread Starter 
See, this what I love about head-fi - I have fellow musical obscurists here
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post #7 of 63
4/6/10 at 2:38pm
'Don't Call Me Buckwheat' by Garland Jeffreys, beautiful first single.

'The Antidote' by The Wiseguys, quite nice actually.

Just to name a few. Whatever happened to The Blue Boy because 'Remember me' was a killer track. The debut album by Ladyhawke, I must buy it some time. I should stop now...
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post #8 of 63
4/6/10 at 3:16pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post

4. King Crimson - Islands - even the King Crimson fans I know don't seem to like it, and yet I think it's one of their best.
Rob, you are my new HeadFi hero.

I'm a huge KC fan, and while I can't say Islands is their "best" album by any objective measure, I can say that it's by far my favorite Crimson album. There's an indescribable vibe that just permeates the record from start to finish, Sinfield's lyrics hit the perfect mark for highbrow silliness, and "The Sailor's Tale" features what has to be the most electrifying four minutes of work that Fripp has ever put to tape.

I can't wait for a 40th anniversary edition DVD-A version... it must be coming, right?
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post #9 of 63
4/6/10 at 3:48pm
Richard Thompson Front Parlour Balads. Actually nearly anything Richard Thompson qualifies.

Jefferson Starship - Blows Against the Empire, Actually this isn't a Jefferson Starship album at all, at least for ther music that they became popular for. Actually this is really an album by the Planet Earth Rock and Roll Orchestra, and their best one except maybe for next pick.

David Crosby - If only I could Remember my Name. And sadly no one remembers the this album either, and another Planet Earth R&R release. Jammy, trippy, great vocals and they don't make'em like this no more.

Robert Fripp Exposure - 77 NYC Punk meets Crimson meets Daryl Hall meets Peter Gabrial meets Frippertronics & Brian Eno. Pretty much everything the '70s had going on and even was musically arguing about, against all odds, comes harmoniously together here. 'Nuff Said.

Guru Jazzmatazz - Most Hip Hop meets Jazz don't work, this one does.

Pere Ubu Modern Dance - Who Knew that Ohio could show New York's CBGB the true meaning of Avant Garde?

Gentle Giant In a Glass House - They went on for a very brief time to something approaching popularity. But this prog rock masterpiece was only available on import to the usa in the day.

Ok that's a start.
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post #10 of 63
4/6/10 at 3:59pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Olias of Sunhillow View Post
Rob, you are my new HeadFi hero.

I'm a huge KC fan, and while I can't say Islands is their "best" album by any objective measure, I can say that it's by far my favorite Crimson album. There's an indescribable vibe that just permeates the record from start to finish, Sinfield's lyrics hit the perfect mark for highbrow silliness, and "The Sailor's Tale" features what has to be the most electrifying four minutes of work that Fripp has ever put to tape.

I can't wait for a 40th anniversary edition DVD-A version... it must be coming, right?
I sure HOPE there is a 40th anniversary Wilson-remastered DVD-A of "Islands" coming! Haven't heard of one though.

And I am VERY glad to meet another "Islands" fan

Loving the lists too guys - keep 'em coming!
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post #11 of 63
4/6/10 at 4:24pm
Islands Rocks but u guyz mentioned it. So I went with Exposure. But I learned I can't count. Seven is the new five, right?
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post #12 of 63
4/6/10 at 4:31pm
1. Weezer- Make Believe. My favourite album by them. I'll think of more later.
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post #13 of 63
4/6/10 at 5:13pm
Lightning Seeds - Cloudcuckooland - Think Echo & the Bunnymem
The Tragically Hip - Fully Completely - Canadian 'Pearl Jam'
Brand New Heavies - Shelter - Smoothed out acid jazz
Atomic Rooster - Made In England - a friend gave this to me and has a prog rock sound also a great band name.

I can't think of any others but thanks for the Prefab Sprout name drop - great sounding album.
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post #14 of 63
4/6/10 at 6:51pm

Rodney Kendrick - Last Chance For Common Sense. Brilliant jazz pianist whose octet is funky, globalist…everything all at once. In places, it sounds like the music of Sun Ra and Randy Weston was transposed to the dancefloor.

Lucky Thompson - Lucky Strikes. I'm still amazed at how few folks know this tenor and soprano saxist, although he was literally at the top of the jazz game from the '40s (played with Charlie Parker) 'til he dropped off the scene and became a recluse in the '70s. John Coltrane got the idea to play soprano from him. If you're skeptical, look at the personnel on this album: Hank Jones, piano; Richard Davis, bass; Connie Kay, drums. Actually, this was his second or third perfect album, but whose counting?

Arto Lindsay - Mundo Civilizado. Lindsay was on the NYC noise scene for years before anyone realized he'd grown up in Brazil (a son of American missionaries) and knew samba, bossa nova, frevo, maracatu and the rest like the back of his hand. He made a string of records in the '90s that blended Brazilian sensuality with hard-edged NYC beats. On this (the second) disc, in addition to his own songs, he covers Al Green ("Simply Beautiful") and Prince ("Erotic City"). I've always thought it was one of the best records of the '90s.


Edited by tru blu - 7/27/10 at 2:57pm
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post #15 of 63
4/6/10 at 7:03pm
Most of the music I listen to was never really popular. I'm not sure that it would ever occur to me that any of them should be popular. Seems like when artists get "popular" their art starts to really suffer - or rather be strongly influenced by things outside themselves. There are certainly exceptions to that (Tom Waits comes to mind). I guess I don't assume others should share my tastes necessarily, and I'm not at all fond of "popular music" for the most part, so the notion occurs to me as more than a bit odd.
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