The second set!

90

Gastr Del Sol 1998 Camoufleur It's a loose amalgam of jazz, folk music, rock and plain-ol noodling. And while that description might make you think of the Grateful Dead, Gastr Del Sol is defintely a mid-90's "post-rock" band, and not anything like a hippy jam band. Gastr's not going to make you want to dance in the mud; they're not going to make you want to to dance at all. Gastr's introspective experiments might get you humming along here and there, but that's it. This isn't party music, this is music for your head.

89

The Cure 1989 Disintegration It was their last great album. Maybe even their last good album. It's defintely the last one I enjoyed start to finish. And this is a fantastic start-to-finish album. But, as with Hitchcock's "Eye", finding the time and mood to sit down for these 72 minutes seems to come by less and less often these days.

88

Sunny Day Real Estate 1994 Diary This album is inextricably tied to my memories of a few months in winter 94/95, when I would spend my Sundays going from the record store where I would buy the single album I allowed myself that week, to Taco Bell where I would always order the same thing every week (because it only cost $2.50), to the cemetery across the street where I would sit in my car, listening to this record and eating my soft tacos - no cheese. It was a good time to be emo.

87

The Feelies 1980 Crazy Rhythms The Feelies came from the same era and scene as Television and Talking Heads, but somehow, they missed out on the attention. They've got that twitchy, nervous, late 70's, NYC sound, the clean interlocking guitars, strange and distant lyrics, and catchy, catchy songs. It's a fantastic little record. Not having a copy of it is a sure sign of mental deficiency.

86

The Shins 2001 Oh, Inverted World Context is everything. "New Slang" actually did change my life, in a small way: it was my introduction to the Shins. And I hated it. It was on a sampler I picked up somewhere, and I couldn't stand it. Later, I heard about this group called "The Shins", so I picked up this album - and I loved it, even "New Slang"! After pondering this change of opinion, I realized that what I had really hated about "New Slang" was that it was totally out of place on that sampler, with Whiskeytown and Lucinda Williams and Eva Cassidy and a bunch of other mainstream folk-rock. It needed to be surrounded by other Shins' songs because The Shins had, at least back in 2001, a very unusual but subtly brilliant sound - I needed to get used to the whole Shins sound before I could appreciate the individual songs.

85

Sea And Cake 1997 The Fawn This is a relatively smooth and shiny album for these guys, who were just starting their electronic phase. It's still guitar based, but here and there, sythesizers hum in the background. But it's also a mellow and subdued set of songs. It reminds me of Stereolab's "Dots And Loops", which had come out the same year - shiny and slick, but pensive, a bit of ennui in the margins. Just the way I like it.

84

Andrew Bird 2005 Mysterious Production Of Eggs As with The Shins, I first heard Bird on a sampler CD, didn't like his song in that context either, and eventually discovered him through other channels. I then realized he was responsible for that song ("Skin Is, My") on that sampler that I didn't like, and came to the same conclusion I did with The Shins - his sound is so unusual that it's off-putting to the unintiated when his songs are surrounded by more mainstream stuff. Perhaps I should avoid samplers? In any case, Bird is a genius and this is a fantastic album.

83

Pavement 1997 Brighten The Corners It's taken a long time for me to get back to this album. It's always been a bit of a bummer because it feels like the beginning of Pavement's decline. The songs are less experimental, fewer chances taken, a little safe. But, when I was doing this list of Pavement songs, I realized I actually do like this album. No, it's no "Crooked Rain", but it'll do.

82

Smashing Pumpkins 1991 Gish Their first album was their best. Before they got serious about themselves, before they fell apart. Yeah, a lot of the songs sound a lot alike, but it's a good sound! And Billy Corgan remains one of the great underrated guitar players; the solos here - multi-layered and probably painstakingly pieced-together - just blow me away.

81

Paul Simon 1972 Paul Simon I just discovered this one a couple of years ago (thanks to Spoon's cover of "Peace Like A River"), and I'm still a bit surprised it took me so long; why this isn't as widely revered as other classics of the era puzzles me (eg. Joni Mitchell's "Blue", Neil Young's "Harvest", etc.). Simon's voice and guitar playing are fantastic, as are the songs themselves. It drops a few spots in The List this time, because I've overplayed it over the last three years. I still like it though! Spoon, "Peace Like A River" NPR:

And here's the histogram, so far:

Oh happy day! Not only is it my darling wife's birthday, but today I start my fourth biennial Top 100 Favorite Albums List - there are links to the others are on my left-side nav bar. Yippee!

Today's the first ten, and over the next few weeks, I'll be posting sections of the new list, one every few days.

I used the same basic method this year that I used in 08: I took the previous list, added 49 new entries, alphabetized the list, then fed it into my little C++ record sorter program. After four days of answering 'Y' or 'N' to its 1500+ questions (ex. “Big Star : Radio City (1974)” > “Bob Dylan : Highway 61 Revisited (1965)” ? y/n), it spat out my sorted list. Happily, this list differs a lot (IMO) from the previous lists - lots of new records, a few surprises, lots of huge movements, etc..

And so, here we go...

100

David Bowie 1972 Ziggy Stardust When I was four or five, I had an awesome portable 8-track player shaped like a TNT detonator - you changed tracks by pushing down on the plunger and it made a big satisfying CLUNK! as it did whatever 8-track players did to switch tracks. I had Ziggy Stardust and something from John Denver, and I alternated between them for a good year or so. At least that's how I remember it. But the 8-track player eventually died. And then the 8-track format died, too. And I was Ziggy-less for the next 25 years. When I picked this up again in the mid-90s, it turned out that I had forgotten most of it - except the hits, the world won't let you forget the title track, or Suffragette City, or Moonage Daydream. But all the rest of it was brand new again. And, unlike a lot of things I liked when I was five (ex. the bleedin Irish Rovers), this I still like today!

99

Robyn Hitchcock 1990 Eye This is one of his many solo-acoustic records, and the first of his solo-acoustic records that I bought. So, it's a sentimental favorite of mine. Based on the number of YouTube pages I had to search through before I found a song from it, though, it seems to be one of his less-popular records. To me, it's one of those records that I have to hear start to finish, all or nothing; and it's one that I like to pay close attention to when it's on. So it doesn't get played as often as some of his other records, because I keep finding myself saying "No, I'm not really up for 'Eye'."

98

Unrest 1991 Imperial f.f.r.r. In a better world, Unrest would have been kings of the singles charts, in 1991. IMO, "Suki" (first link) and "Cherry Cream On" (2nd) are as blissfully catchy as anything anyone else has written, ever. Alas.

97

The Beatles 1967 Sgt Pepper This one is actually a recent acquisition for me. While it's impossible not to know most of the songs from this one, I don't recall ever hearing it all together. And, happily it's even better in album form! The things I hadn't heard are good, too! Sweet.

96

The Police 1979 Reggatta De Blanc If you're of a certain age, you just gotta like The Police. And yet this one just barely makes the list, and it's the only Police record on the list this time 'round. Why? Well, it's because overall, this one is just a tiny bit less played-out than most of their other records. It's not that it's not full of great songs, it's that I'm close to the edge of not being able to stand hearing any of them ever again.

95

Nirvana 1994 Unplugged I like most of the songs here better than their studio versions because it showed that Nirvana wasn't all about the loud/quiet dynamic or Kurt's screaming - though that was surely a lot of it. It turns out that they also had a bunch of really good songs.

94

Slint 1991 Spiderland Nobody ever did cold, hard, slightly-sinister math rock as well as Slint did. Frankly, I'm not aware of anyone who has ever tried, either.

93

Tortoise 1996 Millions Now Living Will Never Die Tortoise writes long, interesting, songs during which nothing really happens. It's a neat trick.

92

Andrew Bird's Bowl Of Fire 2001 The Swimming Hour This is the last of his records with the Bowl Of Fire group, and the first one that really breaks from his early style of pre-war jazz and folk music. In this one, he gets very close to his current style, but it's mixed up with things like country swing, dreamy 50's pop, and my favorite, the Ray Charles-esuqe "How Indiscreet" - linked above. This is also where "Why?", still a live staple, first appears.

91

Yo La Tengo 1990 Fakebook Most of this record is covers of obscure, quirky songs from the 60's. With their own understated charm, YLT turns these mostly-forgotten oddities into adorable little WTFs. None of these songs would have seemed like the kind of song that needed to be covered, to me. But luckily, YLT heard something in them.

And who among us does not love a histogram ?