33. Björk - Debut
There's a whole generation of indie fans who can still remember when they first heard Björk's voice. That mysterious grainy video on The Chart Show with the weird Icelandic vocals.
Some time later Eifion walked into the 6th form common room with a bright orange day-glo sleeve and (maybe misguidedly given the state of the stereo's needle) played Birthday to the assembled couple of dozen 16-18 years-olds.
And Dave Slave from the school's hard rockin' band The Slaves commented on his good taste.
Anyway, you all know what happened next - really fun first album, dodgy second album, reasonable third album, greatest hits/remix stuff, DEBUT!
The first time you heard Human Behaviour you knew that Björk's solo work was going to be like nothing you'd heard before. The genius of the beats, the pop sensibility, the voice. Of course we knew the voice, but in conjunction with these new tunes there was so much more than we ever thought might be possible, given the Sugarcubes gradual decline. From the quiet beauty of tracks such and Like Someone In Love and Venus As A Boy to the full on joyous dance tracks like Big Time Sensuality, Violently Happy, and the sheer unadulterated fun of There's More To Life Than This (Recorded Live at the Milk Bar Toilets) this was obviously the shape of things to come.
32. PJ Harvey - Dry
And so to the other half of that awe-inspiring duo who performed Satisfaction at The Brits that time.
When I was in Germany you would occasionally get a specially recorded John Peel show on BFBS radio, and if you were lucky, really late at night you could pick up Mark Radcliffe's Hit The North in the ether on Medium Wave on the old Radio 5. One of these sources was doubtless where I first heard Dress and Sheela-Na-Gig because I bought the album the first time I saw it in a shop. Sadly I had no way to get hold of the limited Demonstration edition but I was happy just to have found what, at that time, I thought was a pretty obscure little album by an unknown band (am I the only one who still files PJ Harvey stuff under P as it was the name of the band?).
I'm pretty sure I went without food for a while there so I could buy this.
31. Radiohead - OK Computer
Radiohead were the first band that I could genuinely profess to liking before they were famous. I can still see the box full of 99p CD copies of the original issue of Creep on the counter downstairs in one of the two Coventry HMVs.
There will be more talk about Radiohead in a future post, but for now let's think about OK Computer. It's a stunning album obviously, that much is a given. There's so few, if any, weak moments. Maybe Fitter Happier but in the grand scheme of things it's forgivable. The singles Paranoid Android, Karma Police and No Surprises along with Lucky (originally released as a single to support the War Child Help charity compilation album) is just about the greatest run of singles ever to come off an album that isn't by Prince or Teenage Fanclub.
"Why the relatively low placing then Matt?" I hear you cry. Well, it's probably just a matter of how little I actually listen to it these days. They remain one of my all-time favourite bands, and if you haven't seen them live then you've missed out, but I find myself reaching for Hail To The Thief or In Rainbows these days over this.
I do wish that I'd picked up a handful of those Creep singles though. Could have seen me through some sticky financial moments over the years.
30. Bonnie "Prince" Billy - I See A Darkness
Will Oldham. Palace. Palace Music. Palace Brothers. Bonny Billy. Anyone who tries to be a completist of this fella has their work cut out for them.
Many many years ago I needed another CD single to make up the 3-for-a-pound from the bargain rack in Prestatyn Record Shop and ended up with a copy of Palace's An Arrow Through The Bitch. I must have listened to it at least once I guess, but it never worked for me so it got filed away and forgotten about.
Then some years later I got copies of I See A Darkness, Ease Down The Road and Master And Everyone on one of the first CDs of these newfangled mp3s anyone ever did for me. I realised that on these albums the Prince had found his voice and I was hooked.
Of these three albums Master And Everyone is my favourite but it doesn't fall into this list's criteria so I See A Darkness is the one that makes the cut. More polished than the earlier Palace material it still has that grim menace but it's also great fun (or is that just me).
Oldham's sense of fun has always been the side of his music I've enjoyed the most, and his Greatest Palace Music reworking of his early lo-fi Palace material with a full Nashville country band is my all-time favourite BPB release, and the fact that he can turn this...
...into this...
...is a mark of the greatness of the man.
29. Belly - Star
One of the good things about being friends with Eifion is the fact that he has a penchant for collecting stuff on the coolest record labels. His Factory obsession introduced me to New Order, James, Happy Mondays, The Durutti Column etc; he always had all the limited edition ZTT stuff for all the FGTH, Art Of Noise, Propaganda & Act stuff; and his 4AD collection brought me Throwing Muses, Pixies, Wolfgang Press and the Mountain Goats.
Of course this brought along with it all the splinter groups and solo stuff such as The Breeders and Belly.
Prior to Red Heaven there were usually a couple of poppier tunes on Throwing Muses albums. Slighty more mainstream indie pop than your usual Muses fare. And these were usually the Tanya Donnelly ones.
Belly are really a one album wonder for me. I know some of you will argue that King is a superior album, but for me, apart from the fancier artwork of the limited edition it van't hold a candle to Star. This is probably because I love Star *so* much that I didn't feel the need for another Belly album.
1 comment:
I call my friend Marc the Bonnie Prince. I didn't know there was a Bonnie Prince...that guy.
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