#223: Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)

Emily: Eurythmics' Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) - the song and title track of this album - is honestly one of my favorite songs of all time. I remember a commercial for some '80s pop compilation CD that used to air when I was a kid that featured a short clip of the song with its classic music video, and I loved it. It played in the car on the '80s-'90s-and-today pop stations my mom would choose and I sang along to every word. Even today I'll still stop on it when I come across it on the radio and sing and dance along in the drivers' seat. Not surprisingly, however, I couldn't identify another Eurythmics song before today. I've noticed that '80s new wave and synth pop tends to work best for one song per album per artist (see: Soft Cell). Sweet Dreams the song is certainly the best song on Sweet Dreams the album - it's a perfectly synth-driven '80s pop song - but that doesn't mean you should throw away the rest of the album. Annie Lennox's soulful voice pairs so well with the electronic sounds of new wave, especially on the more upbeat dance tracks. It's worth at least one listen, and then you can put Sweet Dreams on repeat as many times as you want. That's my plan.
Favorite Tracks: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This); I Could Give You (A Mirror); Wrap It Up

Zack: So obviously the title track is just ludicrously famous. And the album overall stands as a testament to something I’ve written time and time again: New Wave – for the most part – sounds really dated now. But I think it’s more important to mention that I had no idea Atmosphere’s Shoulda Known sampled Somebody Told Me. For those of you who (sadly) don’t know, Atmosphere is one of the most critically adored and commercially “successful” underground hip-hop acts in the word (success being a relative term only applied to underground artists here) and the album where Shoulda Known appears, When Life Gives You Lemons You Paint That Shit Gold, is absolutely in my top 10 favorite hip-hop albums of all time, maybe even top 5. So when I heard that pulsating synth appear, I damn near lost my mind. Overall, I liked Sweet Dreams less than I enjoyed Duran Duran or a-Ha, but more than several other albums from the genre. I expected to love it, and came away not upset in the investment of the time. I’ll take it.

Favorite Tracks: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This); I Could Give You (A Mirror); Somebody Told Me

#222: Scissor Sisters - Scissor Sisters (2004)

Emily: Zack listened to this album before I did, and he let me know that it was not just a great album, but the kind of album that I would absolutely love. He knows me so well. Scissor Sisters' self-titled debut album is a fun, dance-worthy reimagining of disco. This isn't Saturday Night Fever Stayin' Alive kinda stuff, but something new and modern - perfect for any dancing queen (or king) to get up and shake it. Beyond its danceability, the band is talented, creative, and clever. They take pop tropes and add an independent aesthetic to create music that at once sounds like the guilty-pleasure genre you know and (secretly) love and also like something you've never heard before. For instance, they take Comfortably Numb - the Pink Floyd classic - and completely redevelop it into a dance song. Roger Waters himself even congratulated them on this unique spin. Scissor Sisters have made this blend of genres and worlds their staple, even in the face of controversy (a song titled Tits on the Radio generally doesn't go over too well with the censors). Give this debut a listen, and get in on their fun.
Favorite Tracks: Comfortably Numb; Take Your Mama; Laura

Zack: My expectations were exceptionally warped before hitting play on this album. I’d never heard of the band before, but the name Scissor Sisters just sounds like an '80s post-punk band. So I dutifully went and pulled previous reviews of the likes of Siouxsie and the Banshees and Bauhaus and got ready to hit change all on the band names, because that’s basically where we’re at with those nearly indistinguishable efforts. Lo and behold, this album is 20 years past that era and completely different in every way (although they do list Siouxie as an influence). It’s a glam rock masterpiece with added sprinklings of disco and electronic music. Did I mention that it’s a masterpiece? Scissor Sisters' album is just impossible catchy and virtually impossible not to love. Had a Wal-Mart executive just given Laura or the Pink-Floyd-in-their-roller-blade-phase rendition of Comfortably Numb or, hell, even the so-called offensive Tits on the Radio a listen, I’d be willing to wager that they wouldn’t have banned it for its apparent crusade against conservatism. They would have been too busy shaking what all that high fructose corn syrup gave them. Seriously, though, I could draw a million musical parallels between everyone from Elton John to Arctic Monkeys, but it’s better just to go get a copy yourself and realize why people in the UK bought over 7 million copies of it.

Favorite Tracks: Laura; Music is the Victim; Take Your Mama

#221: The Flying Burrito Brothers - The Gilded Palace of Sin (1969)

Zack: Wikipedia says this album was probably inspired by the Louvin Brothers, but I promise I didn’t hold that against them. Gilded Palace was a pretty good country album, a genre I have slowly begun to embrace more fully. While listening, I thought back to a conversation I had recently with a friend. She told me that she doesn’t like country music, and I told her I could probably get her to give it a chance. So throughout this album, I kept listening for songs that would be well-suited for a Beginner’s Guide to Country Music playlist. Sure enough, two stuck out at me. Dark End of the Street is an R&B song that they repurpose, which I thought showed the ability of country music to adapt and infuse with its own unique character. Hot Burrito #1 manages to be a sad country song while eschewing all that crappy twang that usually gets bottled up with it. Those two songs were definitely the most accessible, and generally the highlights for me.

Favorite Tracks: Dark End of the Street; Hot Burrito #1; Wheels

Emily: Also according to Wikipedia, this album is a major influence on the alt-country movement in the '80s and '90s, especially for bands like Whiskeytown and Wilco. Now, I enjoyed both of those bands tremendously, but apparently not for their '60s country-rock influences. I thought Gilded Palace of Sin was just okay. Some of it harkened back to the heavily twangy '50s country sound that I completely disliked, while other tracks went in a new direction with rock, R&B, and psychedelic influences. Those tracks, in my opinion, were the most interesting and most successful. I especially enjoyed the pair of Hot Burrito songs. While they had nothing to do with the Taco Bell delicacy, each track incorporated country emotion and connection with the sounds of the time, modernizing country music up to 1969. Perhaps that's where the influence on alt-country comes in - taking the old-school country genre, adding modern twists and turns, and coming up with something at once classic and original.

Favorite Tracks: Hot Burrito #1; Hot Burrito #2; Dark End of the Street

#220: Cream - Disraeli Gears (1967)

Zack: Behold: The first Clapton-related album I ever listened to. And it is indeed a marvel. For those of you curious about the exact path I took into Clapton fan-dom, I started, as I think many must do, by hearing Sunshine of Your Love. That is one killer of a song. So I tracked down the album it originated from and gave that a listen. I guess I was probably 16 or 17 at the time. Mind, meet blown. So then I went through Fresh Cream and Wheels of Fire (I skipped over Goodbye. Not sure why. It’s not particularly great, but Badge is a good song). From there I just grabbed whatever Clapton solo stuff my Dad had – August and Journeyman were the two that stuck out – and checked that out. They’re both kind of hit or miss, but Miss You (off August) remains one of my all-time favorite Clapton jams, no matter what Rolling Stone says. I located Riding with the King and Unplugged to vary it up as well. Both are awesome. I never made it to Derek and the Dominoes, other than Layla of course, or Bluesbreakers, but both are represented on the list and I eagerly await the opportunity. But to return to what launched my exploration, Disraeli Gears just has a bit of something for everyone. It’s kind of psychedelic, but there’s a real hard rock vibe as well. Of course there’s Clapton’s signature bluesy guitar and Ginger Baker’s jazz drums. All of these different components meld together perfectly to create a spinning sea of virtuoso musicianship. Besides for being my first Clapton exposure, it remains to this day my favorite example of his work.

Favorite Tracks: Sunshine of Your Love; Tales of Brave Ulysses; SWLABR

Emily: Unlike Zack, I know next to nothing about Cream. I first heard Sunshine of Your Love on Guitar Hero back in the day, and that song is fucking awesome. Also really easy to play on Guitar Hero. I don't know much beyond that. Oh, also that Eric Clapton is in the band. Yeah, I don't know all that much. I'm glad I got a bit more exposure to Cream by listening to this album in its entirety. You can clearly hear the late-'60s influence swirling around through a blend of blues guitar with psychedelic ambiance. Sunshine of Your Love still embodies this best with one of the best basslines and guitar riffs in all of rock music. So whether you're a Clapton expert like Zack or just a former Guitar Hero player like me, Disraeli Gears is a classic album worth listening to.

Favorite Tracks: Sunshine of Your Love; Strange Brew; Tales of Brave Ulysses

#219: Sex Pistols - Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols (1977)

Zack: I think it’s fair to say that the big three of punk are The Ramones, The Clash and the Sex Pistols in some order or another. Technically, The Ramones were first, and The Clash had the longest stretch of sustained excellence. But I’ll be damned if anyone did the whole punk rock thing as hard as the Sex Pistols did. I mean, damn. The Ramones had a 22-year career that included 14 studio albums. Since my first London Calling experience, I’ve listened to every Clash album but their debut (on this list, so I’ll get to it) and Cut the Crap (unanimously understood to be terrible) and they really were just consistently great, even though they updated and expanded their sound pretty much at every turn. To be put in the same level with those two when you were around for two years and have exactly one album is an impressive feat. And they definitely earned that spot. This album is so consistent throughout. The instrumentals are more aggressive than The Ramones. Even if I compare them to Give ‘Em Enough Rope (the most apt comparison I can come up with within that era), there’s just a sharper edge, a certain violence, that you don’t hear elsewhere. It’s something that we heard echoed in The Dead Kennedys and The Germs, but the general attitude that they imparted in their music sticks out from the contemporaries we’ve already experienced and shows just how monumental their influence was, even though they only had one album to do it.

Favorite Tracks: Anarchy in the UK; Pretty Vacant; God Save the Queen

Emily: Somehow, in all of my time listening to punk and punk-influenced music, I have never listened to the the entirety of the Sex Pistols debut (and only) album. I'm a bit embarrassed by this fact too, since essentially all of punk music and culture can be traced back to this album. It has the bouncing-but-sneering three-chord sound, the loud scream-sung vocals, the social and political commentary, and - most importantly, at least to me - the punk attitude. That angry, vocal, don't-take-shit-and-don't give-a-shit attitude that became an absolute staple of the movement that followed and its many revivals and iterations. The Sex Pistols embody punk because they created it, and everything that followed built and developed off it. So if you've ever been a punk fan, or a pop-punk fan, or a post-punk fan, or an alternative fan, or a grunge fan, give this album a listen. My guess is you'll be a fan of it too.

Favorite Tracks: Anarchy in the UK; God Save the Queen; No Feelings

#218: Mylo - Destroy Rock & Roll (2004)

Emily: I listened to this album without any context, meaning I was completely unfamiliar with the album beforehand and as I listened I had no Wikipedia or other source to inform me. Sometimes this is the best way to hear an unfamiliar album, at least for me, because I go in with no judgment or preconcieved notions of the era, artist, or genre. For the better part of two train rides, my ears were filled with Mylo's DJ-produced electronica. I speculated as to its origins: '80s spoken-word samples of rock and pop albums to be eliminated from the Bible Belt in the title track seemed to age it, but the repetitive beats seemed like a recent predecessor to the current EDM and dubstep craze (minus that genre's heavily dropped bass lines). Was Mylo a peer of Daft Punk, or Aphex Twin, or some random Swedish DJs I've never even heard of? Turns out he's pretty modern - Destroy Rock & Roll is a British product from 2004. While listening, my questions and speculations kept me engaged even when the repetition inherent in this style of music bored or irritated me. A a few tracks used unique samples and looping techniques that had me listening closely and (discreetly) bobbing my head, but 5 minutes of the same 3 beats over and over and over again was just too much for me on a few tracks. It was simply too long - cut this album in half, and I would perhaps have been a bigger fan.
Favorite Tracks: Destroy Rock & Roll; Drop The Pressure; Valley of the Dolls

Zack: I haven’t shied away on this blog from discussing my affinity for the Foo Fighters and pretty much all things Dave Grohl (Probots included). That love extends to their last album – Wasting Light – which just so happens to have been recorded in Mr. Grohl’s garage using only analog, and therefore features absolutely zero digital enhancement. It’s a great album, and won the Grammy for Best Rock Album. I remember (it happened two years ago, I’m not exactly stretching far back here) when they went to accept that award, and Dave Grohl talked about how proud of it he was because he inferred that a moral victory for natural rock music accompanied that weird little figurine or whatever the hell it is. The group of friends fucking around in a garage, making music that sounded exactly like them and not some computer-enhanced super-band iteration had won. Chock it up for the good guys. That same night the Foos did a live mashup with Deadmau5 and Lil' Wayne, but Atmosphere told me I “have to let people be hypocrites,” so I’m letting it slide. With that context in mind, I found this album pretty interesting. Obviously you have the title, and it’s an electronic/chillout album through and through. It’s completely synthesized, and so I guess should be an affront to real rockers everywhere. But I don’t think that’s the case. If anything, it seemed to me to be a love letter to rock music. The most obvious example is the album’s namesake track, which samples the “Invocation for Judgement Against and Destruction of Rock Music” by Church Universal and Triumph. That’s an actual church, mind you, not a Lupe Fiasco side project. And the dialogue usurped for this purpose is an unabashed condemnation of rock, used in these circumstances as something to be mocked. Seriously, how dumb do you have to be to mispronounce David Bowie’s name? He’s hardly Krist Novoselic. The point of the song is clear: Listen to these fucking morons not understanding the value to all these musicians that we grew up listening to. But it’s sort of a theme build upon throughout the album. Even if Mylo is producing music a different way, using different techniques, he’s still appealing to a shared cultural context that we all share, one forged by the audial storytelling done by plenty of the names listed on that song. Mylo can’t exist without all those rockers that predate him, and he knows it. So he never sat out to destroy rock & roll, just to celebrate it.

Favorite Tracks: Destroy Rock & Roll; Sunworshipper; Emotion 98.6   

#217: Pere Ubu - The Modern Dance (1978)

Zack: I often find myself wondering why there aren’t more experimental synthpunk bands out there, and contemplating if this is a niche market worth conquering. Only now, in this late hour, do I learn that Pere Ubu has that subsection of music lovers covered, and has done so pretty consistently since 1975. They even released an album this year. I hadn’t heard of this band before this list-related escapade started and had absolutely no idea that they are seemingly this influential. On The Modern Dance, you can hear New Wave and post punk about to be born. I’m pretty sure Sonic Youth descended from its womb a few years after its release, and I picked up a bit of Butthole Surfers as well. And, perhaps most remarkably, it doesn’t sound dated. If you had told me this album was released any time between 1972 and 2011, I wouldn’t have blinked. It just sort of has a well-preserved sound to it that is really impressive for its age. As an overall album, I thought it was alright. But it was still really cool to get to listen to this overlooked but seemingly important corner of modern music history.

Favorite Tracks: Street Waves; Life Stinks; Over My Head

Emily: When I first encountered Pere Ubu, I thought it would be one dude playing Latin American music (or something along those lines). Much like Steely Dan, Pere Ubu is not a person. It's a whole band. And they don't play salsa or bachata tunes, but rather experimental post-punk-ish rock. They experiment with different noises and sounds beyond instrumentals, but combine them with garage and other rock rhythms. This prevents them from venturing too far into Captain Beefheart territory (though one song veered dangerously close) while remaining innovative. Pere Ubu also works with post-punk before punk was even over, perhaps blazing a trail for that genre in the early '80s. It's different without being weird, attention grabbing but not in a negative way. Others perfected this sound in the years following, but Pere Ubu - though obscure - was one of the first to go there.

Favorite Tracks: Real World; Street Waves; Non-Alignment Pact