Having completed my Best Albums of 2022 report earlier this month, it seems a good time to update the running list of my most-loved albums. As an orderly music nerd, I’ve been keeping lists of my favorite albums since the very early ’70s, when I was a zealous grade school Steppenwolf fan. My tastes have evolved dramatically over the years (though I still love Steppenwolf), so it’s always fun (for me) to review and update this list periodically, dropping things that haven’t aged well from year to year, and adding new things that excite me and seem to have staying power.
The fact that I’ve posted lists like this here online for so long also seems to catch the regular attention of various search engines, such that I get a lot of interesting connections and comments arising from these posts. Which is good, as I’m always happy to hear from other list-making music nerds. Well, except when their commentary is limited to “Dude, you suck, Y U NO include [their favorite album] here?!?! LULZ ZOMFG 11!1!!1!”
For many years, this was a “Top 100 List,” typed out on various typewriters and word processors and computers as my technology matured. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve felt entitled to expand the roster beyond the century mark, since I’ve listened to a whole lot more music now than I had when I was a whole lot younger. I also used to exclude “Greatest Hits” and other compilation or live albums as a point of principle, but I’ve gotten less uptight about that, too, since for some artists, their best work may have appeared on singles that only saw long-form release via “Best Of” collections.
So here’s this year’s update, in alphabetical order by artist name. Maybe you’ll be reminded of some old favorites and give ’em some nostalgia spins. Or maybe you’ll find something new to rock your home world. Or maybe you’ll just sigh and wonder what the hell goes on in my head to produce an all-over-the-place listing like this. It’s all good. As is the music.
- 54-40: 54-40
- Albion Band: Rise Up Like the Sun
- Asian Dub Foundation: Rafi’s Revenge
- Bauhaus: The Sky’s Gone Out
- Bee Gees: Main Course
- Birthday Party: Mutiny/The Bad Seed
- Black Angels: Wilderness of Mirrors
- Bogmen: Life Begins at 40 Million
- Bongwater: The Power of Pussy
- Bonzo Dog Band: Keynsham
- Bonzo Dog Band: The Doughnut in Granny’s Greenhouse
- Bowie, David: Low
- Bowie, David: “Heroes”
- Bowie, David: Lodger
- Buggy Jive: The Buggy Jive Mixtape
- Burning Spear: Marcus Garvey
- Bush, Kate: Hounds of Love
- Butthole Surfers: Hairway to Steven
- Butthole Surfers: Locust Abortion Technician
- Camberwell Now: All’s Well
- Cale, John: Honi Soit
- Cale, John: The Island Years
- Camp Lo: Ragtime Hightimes
- Cave, Nick and the Bad Seeds: Henry’s Dream
- Chap: Mega Breakfast
- Check Engine: Check Engine
- Christian Death: Catastrophe Ballet
- Clash: Combat Rock
- Clash: London Calling
- Clean: Mister Pop
- Cleveland, Reverend James: Sings Songs of Dedication
- Clutch: Book of Bad Decisions
- Clutch: Elephant Riders
- Clutch: Robot Hive/Exodus
- Coil: Horse Rotorvator
- Coil: The Ape of Naples
- Collins, Phil: Face Value
- Coup: Sorry to Bother You
- Coup: Sorry to Bother You: The Soundtrack
- Cramps: Bad Music for Bad People
- Culture: Two Sevens Clash
- Cypress Hill: Black Sunday
- Dälek: Absence
- Dälek: Gutter Tactics
- Davis, Jed: Failing Upwards
- Death Grips: Ex-Military
- Death Grips: Government Plates
- Devo: Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo
- Dogbowl: Flan
- Dogg, Snoop: BUSH
- Dolenz, Micky: Dolenz Sings Nesmith
- Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment: Surf
- Eagles: Desperado
- Eider, Max: The Best Kisser in the World
- Einstürzende Neubauten: Haus der Lüge
- Emerson, Lake and Palmer: Tarkus
- Emerson, Lake and Palmer: Brain Salad Surgery
- Eno, Brian: Here Come the Warm Jets
- Eno, Brian: Another Green World
- Eno, Brian: Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)
- Fairport Convention: Unhalfbricking
- Fairport Convention: What We Did On Our Holidays
- Fall: Hex Enduction Hour
- Fall: The Real New Fall LP (Formerly Country on the Click)
- Fall: Imperial Wax Solvent
- Family: Bandstand
- Family: Fearless
- First Aid Kit: Palomino
- First Aid Kit: Stay Gold
- First Aid Kit: Ruins
- Fleetwood Mac: Future Games
- Fleetwood Mac: Bare Trees
- Fleetwood Mac: Rumours
- Focus: Live At The Rainbow
- Funkadelic: Maggotbrain
- Gabriel, Peter: Peter Gabriel (III/Melt)
- Gang of Four: Entertainment!
- Gang of Four: Songs of the Free
- Genesis: Duke
- Genesis: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway
- Good Rats: Tasty
- Grateful Dead: American Beauty
- Grateful Dead: Workingman’s Dead
- Hall, Daryl: Sacred Songs
- Hall, Terry and Mushtaq: The Hour of Two Lights
- Hanslick Rebellion: The Rebellion is Here
- Hitchcock, Robyn and the Egyptians: Element of Light
- Human Sexual Response: Fig. 14
- Human Sexual Response: In a Roman Mood
- Hurray for the Riff Raff: Life On Earth
- Hüsker Dü: Zen Arcade
- Jarre, Jean-Michel: Equinoxe
- Jazz Butcher: The Wasted Years
- Jesu/Sun Kil Moon: Jesu/Sun Kil Moon
- Jethro Tull: Songs From the Wood
- Jethro Tull: Heavy Horses
- Jethro Tull: Thick as a Brick
- Joy Division: Unknown Pleasures
- Joy Division: Closer
- Juluka: Scatterlings
- Kamikaze Hearts: Oneida Road
- Kaukonen, Jorma: Quah
- Keineg, Katell: Jet
- Killdozer: Twelve Point Buck
- King Crimson: Starless and Bible Black
- King Crimson: In The Court of the Crimson King
- Korn: Untouchables
- Korn: The Paradigm Shift
- Kraftwerk: Minimum-Maximum
- Kurki-Suonio, Sanna: Musta
- Lateef, Yusef: Eastern Sounds
- Lateef, Yusef: The Complete Yusef Lateef
- Laurels, L
- Led Zeppelin: IV (Zoso)
- London, Theophilus: Bebey
- Magma: Üdü Ẁüdü
- McCartney, Paul: McCartney III
- MED, Blu and Madlib: Bad Neighbor
- Minutemen: Double Nickels on the Dime
- Mitchel, Joni: For the Roses
- Mitchell, John Cameron and Stephen Trask: Hedwig And The Angry Inch
- Modern English: After the Snow
- Modern English: Ricochet Days
- Mos Def: The Ecstatic
- Mould, Bob: District Line
- Napalm Death: Time Waits For No Slave
- Napalm Death: Utilitarian
- Napalm Death: Apex Predator — Easy Meat
- Napalm Death: Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism
- New Order: Movement
- New Order: Power, Corruption and Lies
- Nyman, Michael: A Zed and Two Noughts (Original Soundtrack)
- Palmer, Robert: Pride
- PAS/CAL: I Was Raised on Matthew, Mark, Luke and Laura
- Phair, Liz: Exile in Guyville
- Pink Floyd: The Dark Side of the Moon
- Pink Floyd: Animals
- Pink Floyd: The Wall
- Presley, Elvis: Peace In The Valley: The Complete Gospel Recordings
- Prieboy, Andy: One and One Makes Three
- Public Enemy: Fear of a Black Planet
- Public Enemy: Apocalypse ’91 . . . The Enemy Strikes Black
- R.E.M.: Life’s Rich Pageant
- Renaldo and the Loaf: Songs for Swinging Larvae
- Replacements: Let It Be
- Residents: Animal Lover
- Residents: Demons Dance Alone
- Residents: Wormwood
- Richman, Jonathan: It’s Time For . . .
- Richman, Jonathan: Ishkode! Ishkode!
- Rolling Stones: Exile on Main St.
- Rundgren, Todd: Healing
- Run The Jewels: RTJ4
- Sepultura: Roots
- Simon & Garfunkel: Sounds of Silence
- Simple Minds: Sons and Fascination/Sister Feelings Call
- Snog: Last of the Great Romantics
- Snog: Lullabies for the Lithium Age
- Sparks: A Steady Drip, Drip, Drip
- Special A.K.A.: In the Studio
- Specials: More Specials
- Steely Dan: Aja
- Steely Dan: The Royal Scam
- Steppenwolf: Gold: Their Great Hits
- Swans: Filth
- Swans: Holy Money
- Talking Heads: Fear of Music
- Tastee, Gay: Songs for the Sodomites
- Television Personalities: Closer to God
- Ten Years After: Cricklewood Green
- The The: Soul Mining
- This Heat: Deceit
- Tosh, Peter: Mama Africa
- Tosh, Peter: Equal Rights
- Tracey, Stan Quartet: Under Milk Wood: Jazz Suite
- Tragic Mulatto: Italians Fall Down and Look Up Your Dress
- Tsukerman, Slava et. al.: Liquid Sky (Original Soundtrack)
- Utopia: Swing to the Right
- Various Artists: If You Can’t Please Yourself You Can’t, Please Your Soul
- Various Artists: The Harder They Come (Original Soundtrack Recording)
- Wailer, Bunny: Blackheart Man
- Wall of Voodoo: Happy Planet
- Wall of Voodoo: Seven Days in Sammystown
- Wasted: We Are Already in Hell
- Weasels: Uranus or Bust
- Weasels: The Man Who Saw Tomorrow
- Who: Who’s Next
- Who: Tommy
- Wings: Band on the Run
- Wings: Venus and Mars
- Wire: The Ideal Copy/Snakedrill
- Wire: It’s Beginning To And Back Again
- Wishbone Ash: Argus
- Woods Band: The Woods Band
- XTC: Black Sea
- XTC: English Settlement
- Yes: The Yes Album
- Young, Neil and Crazy Horse: re-ac-tor
- Zappa, Frank and the Mothers of Invention: One Size Fits All
- Zappa, Frank: Joe’s Garage, Parts I, II and III
The longest-running entry on this list, easy. Thankfully, I don’t have to listen to it on 8-track tape anymore.
J. ERIC SMITH 
Alphabetic is a great order, because otherwise one could spend time (never to be recovered) deciding on the correct order for numbers 175 to 192!
I knew I would enjoy reading this from reading past articles. And lo, there’s The Albion Band as the second entry, and the two most-essential Fairport albums. I believe that’s the only Richard Thompson on there, though, which just shows that it’s your list instead of mine. 🙂
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I love me some RT . . . but in re his solo albums and the ones with Linda, I find myself in the same quandary that I do with The Beatles, there’s no one or two or three or four of them that STAND OUT above the others and everything else, so I rarely end up including them on my list. On that Brit Folky front, one that was a new add for me this year was The Woods Band one . . . I somehow missed that one all these years, though I knew and liked what the Woods had done before and after it. Holy Moly it’s been a mind-blower for me. Read somewhere that when Terry and Gay first left Steeleye that they were working briefly with McDonald and Giles from the Crim. That would have been an unholy alliance of massive contortions had it ever fully manifested, I think!!
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There are LOTS of folks who utterly HATE London Calling. I don’t get it. Songs from the Wood (which I bought as a cutout LP), Face Value, In The Court of the Crimson King, Rumour, Aja, Tommy, Band On The Run, and the Yes Album, for sure on my list, if I were to make one.
I haven’t listened to reactor in forever (have it on vinyl); I can recreate Mr. Soul in my head even now. I also have only on vinyl, and it’s unheard in this century, Swing To the Right. Conversely, I haven’t heard McCartney III enough to place it on the list.
Others I may have picked different albums by the same artists: Joni Mitchell’s Blue (and for that matter, Miles Davis’ Blue), Let It Bleed or Sticky Fingers by the Stones, Ziggy Stardust by Bowie, LZ III(!)
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I agree with about half to three quarters of these, which means I need to go listen to the rest.
Plus, I owe you a drink or four for turning me on to Buggy Jive. One of the 518’s best!
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Hooray!! And, yeah, Holy Moly is Buggy the real deal. So, so good!
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A fun list to read. A few random observations: (1) No Beatles? You’re an eccentric! (2) Nice to see the Brian Eno ones (“Another Green World” is a personal favorite of mine — I might suggest “Before and After Science” too) (3) “Aja” by Steely Dan is great from start-to-finish, full stop. (4). Genesis’ “Lamb” is the sentimental favorite, but my choice is always “Selling England.” Nevertheless, I’m glad to see you listed “Duke,” which is Tony Banks’ personal favorite. Well done. – Marty
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I love the Beatles and recognize their greatness, but there’s not one single album that moves me deeply as a standalone entity . . . I probably could add “The Blue Album” as a collection that had the highest capture of stuff I like the most. And I know in years past that I’ve had “Revolver” and “The White Album” on the list at different times. I also love Eno’s “Science,” and it has definitely made the list in years past. It’s just the one of his classic four “rock albums” that I spin the least these days. “Selling England” has some of my very fave Genesis songs, but it’s marred for me by “Battle of Epping Forest,” which I sort of actively dislike. I think “Duke” is a masterpiece, hands down. Glad Tony agrees with me!!!
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Ah, but it’s your list. That’s what’s important! I’ll always be a Sgt. Pepper’s freak when it comes to the Fab boys.
I think it was Mike Rutherford in the band’s oral history book (“Chapter and Verse”) who admitted that there’s very little air space left in “Epping Forest.” Peter crammed too many lyrics into that song, and the rest of them did the same with too many notes! The rest of the album is sublime, imho.
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Yeah, Mike said the same thing about “Watcher of the Skies” in terms of the lyrics. Rutherford’s actually my favorite part of Genesis, as I tend to be a listener who focuses on and likes the things/players that other people don’t pay attention to. His autobiography made me like him even more. In the videos that came out with one of the album re-release series some years back, there’s a great interview with Phil, laughing and rolling his eyes at the fact that Mike just couldn’t manage to write anything in “normal” time that a drummer could play without extra thought and effort . . .
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(Oh, and yeah, “Aja” . . . another contender for longest-running entry on this list. I have distinct memories of desperately saving money from newspaper route and odd jobs to buy it on the day it came out, at Roosevelt Field on Long Island. One of the greatest of the greats for me!)
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