Do you have the time to listen to me whine?

Continuing my trip up Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Albums Of All Time...

#376 : In The Aeroplane Over The Sea - Neutral Milk Hotel (1998)

The Louisiana band nearly pulled off an indie-rock Pet Sounds with their second album, leavening low-fi guitar racket and twee folk with circus-y instruments like the singing saw and zanzithophone, as leader Jeff Magnum cut through the irony of the Seinfeld/Pavement era with his heraldic surrealist yammerings about broken homes, Anne Frank, religion, scary sexual awakenings, and other coming-of-age traumas. It’s weird, raw, harrowing stuff; if you think you can’t be moved by a song called “The King of Carrot Flowers Pts. 2 & 3,” hearing is believing.

I'd heard of this album as being very admired by those in the know, but I'd never heard it myself, so was intrigued to do so.  And it's an interesting one - it feels like I might like it, but it didn't get there on a first listen.  Bits of it reminded me of The Decemberists and Bright Eyes (which is a good thing) but it's generally a bit less polished and parts of it managed to be really quite annoying.  So, I think I'll hold off on passing judgement for the time being.

Wikipedia has a lot to say about the album - it's like that for "influential" albums.  It's interesting how the success of the album really affected Stephen Mangum's mental health which meant he couldn't face being in the band but also couldn't face telling the others - which affected his mental health further.  But eventually NMH took a hiatus and it sounds like everyone got to an acceptable place in the end where we all agree how influential this album is.

"Customers also listened to" a very strange mix including some that seem quite believable (Bob Dylan) and some less so (Natalie Merchant - really?).  I suspect I'd grow to like this more given a bit of time and a few more listens - but it feels unlikely I'll put the effort in, I'm afraid.  It's a very weird album cover as well.

#375 : Dookie - Green Day (1994)

The album that jump-started the Nineties punk-pop revival. The skittish Dookie was recorded in little more than three weeks, and singer-guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong blazed through all the vocals in two days. “Right from getting the drum sound, everything seemed to click,” their A&R man (and Dookie producer) Rob Cavallo marveled. Indeed, “click” is the operative word here, also describing Armstrong’s airtight, three-minute bowshots like “Welcome to Paradise,” “Basket Case,” and the infectious smash “Longview” — which Armstrong described as “cheap self-therapy from watching too much TV.”

Was this really 26 years ago?!?  I must admit, I came to the Dookie party a few years late, but this is indeed a great album which very much "clicks".  I'd be interested to know who doesn't like at least some bits of this album - "Basket Case" in particular is a masterpiece.  So short and so simple - but I bet there was sooooo much work that went into making it so short and so simple.

Wikipedia explains to me what dookie means and, having found out, I'm not entirely sure I really needed to know - I'll spare you the details.  Bizarrely, there seems to be a lot of complaining that the album isn't really a punk album, to which the band went "it's our band, we can do whatever we want" - which I'd have to say seems like a pretty decent response to me.  Personally, I find the US have a very strange definition of punk - but I also don't care about genre definitions (and it's something that Wikipedia in particular get very hung up about).  

"Customers also listened to" Blink 182, The Offspring and Weezer - all very American (actually all formed in California) with a distinctive sound.  I'm hoping this isn't the last we see of Green Day on the list and the next album in this set of three is going to have to go some to prevent this being declared the winner.

#374 : King Of The Delta Blues Swingers - Robert Johnson (1961)

“You want to know how real the blues can get?” Keith Richards asked. “Well, this is it.” The bluesman in question was Robert Johnson, who lived from 1911 to 1938 in the Mississippi Delta, and whose guitar prowess was so great, it inspired stories he had sold his soul to the devil. This 1961 reissue of Johnson’s original 78s was a life-changer for Sixties rockers like Richards and Eric Clapton; the moaning lust of “Terraplane Blues” and the haunted desperation of “Hellhound on My Trail” haven’t aged a minute.

So having had a minor jazz epiphany thanks to Charlie Mingus, am I also going to experience something similar with the blues courtesy of Mr Johnson?.  Errr - no.  Yeah, it's impressive and no, I don't care.

Wikipedia tells me how much everyone loves this album and the man, but I still don't care. And "customers also listened to" a load of people I don't care about either.  Yes, I'm a philistine - let's just move along now, shall we?

Green Day are the clear winners of this round for me.

#379-377 - OK Yeah Yeah
#373-371 - And the winner (by default) is...