This is the time of year when critics of all persuasions post their lists of the year’s best stuff. This is a noble pursuit. But let’s be real: 2023 isn’t even over yet. Do we really have enough distance to appreciate what was good and less good about the last 11 and a half months?
What if we actually need 20 years? If we do need 20 years, then the time has finally come to write about the best albums of 2003.
Now, as always, I want to lay out my methodology in advance so there is no confusion about how we got here. How did I determine these rankings? Let’s break it down into percentages:
Personal favoritism (Do I like the album? Do I play it a lot? Am I personally invested in how well it does on this list?) — 65 percent
General consensus (What do other people think? How well is it regarded now? How annoyed will I be by people complaining if it doesn’t make the list?) — 35 percent
Now, let’s rank!
30. Longwave, The Strangest Things
At the same time that I worked on this column, I was also writing my year-end list for 2023. Thinking about albums from two different years separated by two decades inevitably informed how I approached each list. For instance, as I pondered 2023, I constantly reminded myself that many of the records I have come to love over time were not considered classics (or even thought to be great) the year they came out. I understood that many of the records I consider great right now will probably slip from my mind in the future, and they will be replaced by albums I haven’t even heard yet.
There are many reasons why an album might be overlooked in the moment. But I want to focus for now on one particular reason: Because it seems (to use very 2023 terminology) “basic” or (to apply very 2003 slang) “meh.” But in retrospect, it becomes special because it’s the sort of record that no longer exists.
For example, let’s talk about Longwave.
In 2003, Longwave was a punchline. They were best known for having a connection to The Strokes — they were fellow NYC scenesters, they toured together, they presumably partied in the same bars and wore the same brand of skinny jeans. This was a short-term advantage (in that it surely helped Longwave land a record deal with RCA) and a long-term liability (since every single music critic compared The Strangest Things unfavorably to Is This It). Pitchfork summed them up thusly: “Longwave formed in 1999, ostensibly to carry a pale, whimpering torch for men with Brooklyn perms the world over.” This was back when Pitchfork was capable of authentic meanness. They hated bands like Longwave. They wanted us to listen instead to The Lemon Of Pink by The Books or whatever. And they were not alone. Another music writer started their review of The Strangest Things like this: “They look like the Strokes. They’re friends with the Strokes. They’re on the same label as the Strokes. They’re from New York like the Strokes. If it looks like the Strokes and walks like the Strokes, does it sound as good as the Strokes? In the case of Longwave, the answer is a resounding ‘no.’”
You get the idea. Over time, these dismissals calcified into common knowledge. Longwave stopped being a band and starting being a signifier of shitty post-Strokes rock. In Lizzy Goodman’s aughts-era NYC music oral history Meet Me In The Bathroom, the critic Andy Greenwald likens Longwave to Candlebox, the go-to signifier of shitty post-Nirvana rock. This is the verdict on Longwave. History has banged its gavel. Case closed.
As you have likely ascertained by now, I don’t exactly agree with this verdict. Longwave is a signifier in my mind, but they represent something more romantic. When I listen to The Strangest Things, I think about buying it for seven or eight bucks from my local Best Buy in the spring of 2003. Room On Fire wasn’t coming out for another seven months. (I don’t think it was even announced yet.) The very same music scribes who loved to drag Longwave were also proclaiming The Strokes the saviors of rock. They were going to topple nü-metal! Just like Nirvana defeated hair metal! This was all ahead of us. The exclamation points, at that time, were not yet ironic.
Of course, none of that happened. And we all know that such a thing was never going to happen. My point is that the day The Strangest Things dropped, we didn’t know that yet. Yeah, “indie” had a moment in the 2000s. If you resided in certain neighborhoods, it might have seemed huge. But it was never “Nirvana huge.” Not even close. When I listen to this record, I’m reminded of the final moment in human history when a rock band like this was considered not only commercial, but a potential blockbuster proposition. The Strangest Things sounds innocent to me — only the innocence is mine (and maybe yours). And that gives me a certain feeling now that I didn’t have then, like looking at a photo of a smiling person snapped just moments before he received his divorce papers or was smashed by a falling anvil.
29. The Stills, Logic Will Break Your Heart
The Canadian Longwave, which as I have established is a compliment in the context of this column.
28. Metallica, St. Anger
There’s something about years that end with “3” that (musically speaking) make them feel like pivot points. These are years where it feels like the previous decade is finally coming to a close, though it still is not completely gone. In 2003, this was compounded by the ongoing transition to a new century and the emotional, cultural, and political fallout from 9/11. People gravitated to curly-haired, leather-jacketed rockers from New York City because it reminded them of the 20th century. This wasn’t just nostalgia. It was a natural response to seeing the world you once knew being erased before your eyes. It made you want to hold on to those things while you still could.
One of those things was mainstream rock. You could literally see (and hear) it disappear in real time in 2003. It’s not just that would-be up-and-comers like Longwave already seemed like anachronisms. You could also detect this erasure from the new album by the best-selling metal act of the ’90s. Metallica did not set out to end nü-metal with St. Anger. They tried to learn from it. They committed themselves to becoming a post-guitar solo band. They adopted the most problematic snare sound in rock history. They wrote about lifestyles turning into deathstyles. It was their attempt to re-imagine rock’s future. But did rock actually have a future?
27. Zwan, Mary Star Of The Sea
It did. But after 2003, that idea Nirvana reinforced about an outsider taking over the mainstream and transforming it no longer seemed plausible. At least not if that outsider was a rock band. The stakes were lowered. Though, again, this wasn’t an incontrovertible fact of life at the start of the year. When Mary Star Of The Sea dropped in January, corporations were willing to sink millions of dollars into a post-Smashing Pumpkins band fronted by Billy Corgan that sounded a lot like Smashing Pumpkins, even though Billy was nearly a decade past his commercial prime. Why not? It’s not like anyone who had any better ideas. Why not make a video for the song “Lyric” in which Billy parades through the streets of Chicago while leading a group of adoring fans? Not Smashing Pumpkins fans, but Zwan fans. Because it was only a matter of time until this fantasy was a reality. How could Zwan possibly fail?
26. Stephen Malkmus And The Jicks, Pig Lib
The same day Longwave put out The Strangest Things, Billy Corgan’s old nemesis Stephen Malkmus released this record. A smart aleck in the moment might have noted that the former was an ascendent act and the latter was an indie-rock has-been. After all, Malkmus had tried to make the most commercial album of his life two years prior with his self-titled debut, the one where he kind of looks like Julian Casablancas on the cover. But we now know that Stephen was actually ahead of the curve. Let the Longwaves of the world reach for the brass ring, hover too close to the sun, and then go crashing back down to Earth. With Pig Lib, the ex-Pavementer was back in the business of making Pavement-like jams. Not Pavement-like jams of the “Cut Your Hair” variety. This was him reverting to Wowee Zowee mode. It was a good move. He was in his lane. And this pointed a way forward. For the rock bands of the future, aspiring to make Pig Lib will make more sense than trying to make The Strangest Things.
Not-so-fun fact: The Strangest Things and Pig Lib came out two days before the Iraq War started. I’m pretty sure I bought Pig Lib that week, and I listened to it the day the war started as I drove up to an Indian casino located in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I remember drinking Jack and Cokes while watching news footage and the NCAA men’s basketball tournament on the casino bar’s televisions. I think it was Fox News. They hate pig libs.
25. The National, Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers
The National were also ahead of the curve. Their second-rate status in the early aughts has been well-documented in pretty much every significant profile ever written about them. When I profiled The National 10 years after Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers, Matt Berninger was frank about his self-consciousness over feeling uncool in relation to other NYC bands back then. His comments in that regard always circled back to The Strokes; in our 75-minute conversation, he brought up The Strokes unprompted six times.
The National’s fatal flaw in 2003 was that they (unlike the local scene’s heavy hitters) had no visual aesthetic. They didn’t look awesome (like The Strokes) or colorful (like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs) or like Patrick Bateman’s co-workers (like Interpol). They looked like a bunch of dudes who moved to the big city from Cincinnati. And they sort of sounded like an alt-country band. In time, as we all know, this perception changed. Now, The National are BFFs with Time‘s Person Of The Year, and they are more famous than all the bands they came up with (other than The Strokes). But going back to Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers: I wish The National would make a record like this again! Give me more progressions like “It Never Happened” to “Murder Me Rachael”! I want the “jammy folk-rock that devolves into screaming breakdowns” version of this band! I’m a dirty lover who needs more sad songs!
24. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Fever To Tell
It anybody “won” Meet Me In The Ballroom, it was Karen O. Out of all of the semi-scuzzy and semi-famous rock stars in that book — and the scores of not-famous individuals whose only notoriety stems from farting into the same barstool as Carlos D — Karen O is the only person I would want to share a cup of coffee with. When it comes to Yeah Yeah Yeah albums, I feel like Fever To Tell ranks as one of the weaker efforts. The realization in the wake of “Maps” that they could write pop songs didn’t fully pay off until, say, It’s Blitz. But out of respect for Karen O, I’m putting their debut studio record on this list anyway.
23. Ween, Quebec
To be clear: I did not fart into the same barstool as Carlos D in the early aughts or at any other time. I did not fart into any barstools used by members of the NYC rock community. I was living in Appleton, Wisconsin in 2003. I was living with a woman who left me the following year for another woman. But that’s another story. I was having a good time in 2003. I was smoking a ton of weed and listening to a ton of Ween. That’s living! These habits eventually turned against me when I went through my break-up. What was once recreational would come to envelop me in fear and dread. But in 2003, the bad vibes of Quebec did not infect me. Quebec is obviously informed by the dissolution of Gene Ween’s marriage, and just as obviously by the extreme self-inflicted chemical damage experienced by both Gene and Dean. This was the era where if you saw Ween in concert, Gene might be alarmingly overweight on one tour and alarmingly skinny on the next tour. Meanwhile, guys with dead-looking eyes would walk up to you in the audience and offer every drug under the sun. But not in a fun way. It was dark and also kind of hilarious, like a Mad magazine parody of Altamont.
Anyway: Whenever I feel like romanticizing the year I turned 26, I put this album on and that feeling instantly goes away.
22. The Postal Service, Give Up
Another album that seemed fun in 2003 and then extremely depressing in 2004 after I was dumped and sleeping on my mom’s floor. Back then, I would just listen to the first two songs on repeat, over and over. I did this when the album was fun, and I did this when it was extremely depressing. Those songs are, of course, the most famous numbers from Give Up, “The District Sleeps Alone Tonight” and “Such Great Heights.” To be honest, I still mostly experience the album that way. If I had attended the 20th anniversary tour for Give Up this year, I probably would have hit the bathroom the moment they cued up “Sleeping In,” even though I think that’s a very good song.
Anyway: Whenever I feel like romanticizing the year I turned 26, and I don’t feel like listening to Ween, I put this album on and that feeling instantly goes away.
21. Cat Power, You Are Free
The album of Chan Marshall originals that came out after her most acclaimed record (1996’s Moon Pix) and before her most popular record (2006’s The Greatest). On most days, it’s my favorite thing she has ever done, though I acknowledge that You Are Free is very 2003 in ways that seem borderline inconceivable for a Cat Power record. Pairing the most painfully introspective singer-songwriter of her era with the producer of Soundgarden’s Down On The Upside, and then inviting Eddie Vedder and Dave Grohl to back her up does not seem like a recipe for a great Cat Power album. It seems more like a recipe to get Cat Power in the rotation on KROQ. But You Are Free is a great Cat Power album, even though it did not (I suspect) get her KROQ.
20. The Fiery Furnaces, Gallowsbird’s Bark
This brother-sister duo from Chicago is best remembered for their second album, 2004’s Blueberry Boat, which begins with an interminable 10-minute song that seemed designed to prompt countless nervous breakdowns in the minds of those persuaded to buy the album by Pitchfork’s effusive 9.6 review. (As a fan of Blueberry Boat, I say “interminable” with extreme fondness and admiration.) In comparison, their debut LP from the previous year sounds relatively conventional, though strictly in a Fiery Furnaces sense. Because of their superficial, brunette-boy-girl-tandem-from-the-Midwest resemblance to the White Stripes, they were sometimes plopped in the era’s “garage rock” bucket. Though their touchstones had less to do with the Stooges and Son House than Genesis and Grimm’s Fairy Tales. Nor did they have much use for Jack White’s “simple is better” ideology. Instead, they favored a 22-car pile-up approach to songwriting, cramming as many ideas and melodies and tempo changes and bizarro genre mash-ups into one song as most bands on this list compiled into a single album. If this isn’t the best record of 2003, then it must be considered the densest.
19. Loose Fur, Loose Fur
The end of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot’s long tail. Also, the beginning of the “Jeff Tweedy is the best guitarist in Wilco or Wilco-adjacent bands” era, which peaked the following year with A Ghost Is Born. For those too young to remember: Loose Fur is like Boygenius if they were made up of 30-something-year-old guys who used to hang out at Lounge Ax. Ryley Walker once described this record as “sitting at the end of the bar” prog rock, and I won’t bother trying to top that.
18. The Exploding Hearts, Guitar Romantic
If you want to see a 46-year-old power-pop fan cry, you should do one or more of the following things: 1) Scratch his vinyl copy of Chris Bell’s I Am The Cosmos; 2) Aggressively argue that Teenage Fanclub’s Bandwagonesque is “pretty mid”; 3) Feed him too many beers and then ask him to recount the tragic story of the Exploding Hearts.
Three months after releasing Guitar Romantic — their debut album instantly acclaimed as a charmingly scruffy amalgam of every great punk-pop record released in the late ’70s on the Stiff label — three-fourths of the band was killed in a van accident. The victims were between the ages of 20 and 23. If that is not the most horribly depressing backstory for a record ever, it’s pretty damn close. And yet, in spite of this horribly depressing backstory, Guitar Romantic is one of the least depressing records of this year or any year. These guys wrote rock songs like their lives were about to end. And they did such a good job that you can forget how that proved to be literally true whenever you put it on.
17. Constantines, Shine A Light
If you want to see a 46-year-old Canadian rock fan cry, you should do one or more of the following things: 1) Say the words “Gord Downie”; 2) Bring up the last five years of Arcade Fire’s career; 3) Feed him too many Molsons and then ask him to explain the failure of Constantines to take over the world.
I am strenuously attempting to not apply the overused term “under*ted” here, so I’ll just say that Constantines are the best rock band of the early aughts that inspires the least amount of conversation. Their excellent self-titled debut came out in 2001 right when the music press was fixated on the NYC rock revival scene. And their blue-collar sensibility was out-of-step at a time when critics couldn’t get enough of bands engaging in CBGB’s cosplay. By the mid-aughts, when everyone from The Hold Steady to The Killers to The National made Bruce Springsteen a relevant reference point again for hip rock bands, Constantines was sliding past their prime. If they had put out Shine A Light just two or three years later, we might be hearing “Young Lions” at football games today.
16. Songs: Ohia, The Magnolia Electric Co.
If I had made this list in 2013, I would have put this album at No. 26. If I make this list again in 2033, I suspect it will be at No. 6. My point is clear: The Magnolia Electric Co. feels more momentous with each passing year. Particularly in 2023, it’s the album from 2003 that sounds the most like it could have come out this year. While Jason Molina was oft-overlooked in his time as a sad-sack Midwestern country-rocker with a penchant for mid-tempo tearjerkers, he now can be credibly regarded as a modern-day Gram Parsons. And by that I mean his influence as a songwriter and roots-music stylist has extended well beyond his tragically short life. So many up-and-coming bands and artists who once were likened to 1970s Neil Young actually came up listening to 2000s-era Jason Molina. This record practically feels like its own genre now.
INTERMISSION
Top five albums I regret not including on this list
5. Broken Social Scene, You Forgot It In People
My biggest 2003-era indie rock blind spot. This album has just never connected with me. Peace to the reply guys complaining about this in my mentions.
4. Death Cab For Cutie, Transatlanticism
Ditto.
3. Pete Yorn, Day I Forgot
The most “I bought this CD for $8.99 at Best Buy” album of 2003.
2. The Mars Volta, De-Loused in the Comatorium
My favorite “I can’t believe how ridiculous this album is” album of 2003.
1. Jet, Get Born
All of the things I wrote about Longwave also apply to this record.
Back to the list!
15. The Wrens, The Meadowlands
In case you haven’t organically picked up on this running theme, allow me to spell it out: 2003 was a year of rockets that did not fully survive their launch pads. So many of 2003’s best albums were made by bands who looked like all-timers in the moment, and then something happened that prevented them from extending that greatness beyond their moment. Which should not at all diminish their moment, because most bands would never dream of hitting a peak like The Meadowlands. And when I say “peak,” I mean [dramatically rising vocal as the guitars swell into the red] peeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaak! Like their fellow New Jersey countryman Bruce Springsteen, The Wrens excelled on The Meadowlands at building their songs to near-unbearable crescendoes of voluminous feeling, like they were having mind-blowing orgasms while also ugly-crying their heads off. They pull this trick over and over, and it somehow works every single time. The Meadowlands is exhausting, but this is by design. It’s like an emotional StairMaster. It’s no wonder they were never able to make a follow-up album. As a listener, I feel spent every time I’m done listening to The Meadowlands. I can’t imagine what it was like to be the people producing those wondrous musical ‘gasms.
14. The Darkness, Permission To Land
Since we’re on the subject of wondrous musical ‘gasms — I already regret using this phrase — I must bring up 2003’s finest pop-metal album, as well as 2003’s finest parody of pop-metal conventions. At the time, this duality made Permission To Land a difficult proposition for some critics. Was this band stupid or “ironically” stupid, and therefore stupid in a more annoying way? The answer, it turns out, was “neither.” In 2003, there were a lot of bands attempting to replicate the sound and feel of late 20th-century rock music because the future already seemed scary and untenable (and also, paradoxically, dull and not terribly different from the present or the past). But a lot of those bands made the mistake of taking those sounds and feels at face value. They didn’t understand — like The Darkness did — that only by leaning into the ridiculousness of undead arena rock can you fully harness its power and make it your own. (Richard Linklater, Mike White, and Jack Black were on the same wavelength in 2003 with School Of Rock.)
The Darkness nailed this approach on Permission To Land. This record works as a collection of hooky pop-metal favorites, and it also works as a goof on hooky pop-metal favorites. These flavors do not work in conflict; they achieve a perfect peanut-butter-and-jelly alchemy. This is a real achievement. So real it couldn’t be replicated. On their next record, The Darkness spent about 10 gazillion dollars on hiring producer Roy Thomas Baker and acquiring a Roy Thomas Baker-sized pile of cocaine. The alchemy was gone. But, again, this shouldn’t diminish the original moment.
13. Warren Zevon, The Wind
After so much discussion of dying careers, let’s put it all in perspective by talking about a guy who actually died after putting out his 2003 masterwork. Though for Warren Zevon, the demise of his health made his career more robust than it had been since the late ’70s, which makes The Wind the ultimate example of “death as a good career move” in modern show-business history.
If my tone comes off as overly sardonic, I’m only trying to pay proper tribute to one of my musical heroes, whose final record is leavened with heavy doses of gallows humor. Of course, the most famous song from this record is “Keep Me In Your Heart,” the most emotional example of a Warren Zevon “remorse” ballad — shoutout to “Accidentally Like A Martyr,” “Reconsider Me,” “Searching For A Heart,” etc. — where the king of blackout Saturday nights re-emerges on one last Sunday morning to plead for his sins to be forgiven once he is gone. But when I play The Wind, I’m inevitably drawn to the cover of Dylan’s “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door,” which starts out as tasteless black comedy and evolves into a performance as violent and moving as the Slim Pickens’ death scene it soundtracks in Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett And Billy The Kid.
12. 50 Cent, Get Rich Or Die Tryin’
Unlike Warren Zevon, 50 figured out how to do the former without messing with the latter. And that’s because the man had singles. So many amazing singles! As we have established, I was in the middle of my barfly period in 2003. And if you were in the middle of your barfly period in 2003, you simply could not go out that year without spending serious time with Get Rich Or Die Tryin’. At the pre-party, it was “P.I.M.P.” At the bar, it was “In Da Club.” (I was never at “Da Club” in 2003. But that song made “Da Bar” I frequented in Northeastern Wisconsin feel like “Da Club.”) At the after-party, it was more “In Da Club” and “P.I.M.P” (and possibly the crappy MP3 of “How To Rob” I downloaded from Limewire). Were there other songs on this record? Possibly? (Checks notes) Yes. Yes there were.
11. The New Pornographers, Electric Version
In case you haven’t organically picked up on this running theme, allow me to spell it out: Canadians were killing it in 2003. And these particular Canadians were killing it the hardest. And writing this column reminded me just how hard they killed it. The New Pornographers were one of my favorite bands from 2000 to ’05, the period that encompasses their first three albums: 2000’s Mass Romantic, 2003’s Electric Version, and 2005’s Twin Cinema. For reasons I can’t recall now, I fell off after the fourth record from ’07, Challengers. And then I stopped listening to this band for the entirety of the 2010s. Flash forward to my decision to rank the albums of 2003: I put Electric Version on and I immediately wonder why the New Pornos aren’t still one of my favorite bands. I remember that Carl Newman was in his “New Wave Genius” phase in the early aughts. I recall the magnetism of Neko Case in her power-pop guise. I realize that a compilation of Dan Bejar tracks from the early New Pornographers albums would be my favorite EP of the 2000s. I know now that the laws of CanRock greatness have not changed. It was never about them. It was on me, always. Thank you for this lesson, Electric Version.
10. Beyoncé, Dangerously In Love
There are a lot of bands on this list. There are a lot of bands on this list because I like bands. But there were also just a lot of bands in 2003. And many of those bands were “The” bands. Three-letter grammatical articles were sexy as hell in ’03. It’s another part of the past that no longer exists in the present, and like I already said this makes me feel wistful. Which is another reason why there a lot of bands on this list. I’m working through something here.
One band (or group) that no longer exists is Destiny’s Child. They performed their final show (to date?) at the 2006 NBA All-Star Game, the one where LeBron James became the youngest All-Star Game MVP in NBA history. But Destiny’s Child was unofficially finished the second Dangerously In Love was released. When this record went six-times platinum, Kelly Rowland’s fate was sealed. Now, I’m not blaming Beyoncé for the decline of groups in all corners of the pop world since the early 2000s. (The blame goes to Justin Timberlake, who went solo from NSYNC the previous year with his first solo LP, Justified.) But for all the ways that Beyoncé has influenced culture in the past 20 years, pointing out that a superstar frontwoman does not need to pretend that she is collaborating with less famous band members is one of the most decisive and the least discussed. And this album was the start of that.
9. Drive-By Truckers, Decoration Day
More bands! Along with The Magnolia Electric Co., this album has influenced more music from 2023 that I love than any other record on this list. Jason Isbell set forth on becoming the Jason Isbell when he wrote the title track and “Outfit,” but those contributions shouldn’t overshadow the worlds of southern grime and petty crime created by co-leaders Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley on this record and beyond. On the back cover photo, they present themselves as a humble bar band that plays on the weekend for beer money. And then you play the songs and it’s like someone finally had the brilliant idea to combine Charles Portis, Tom T. Hall, and If You Want Blood You’ve Got It. Drive-By Truckers have reasserted that formula on numerous wonderful albums, but this one belongs near the top of that wonderful pile.
8. The Shins, Chutes Too Narrow
As we get closer to the end of this column, we will be playing a recurring game called “Is The Album They Put Out In 2003 Better Than The Album They Put In 2001?” Let’s start with The Shins. Is Chutes Too Narrow better than Oh, Inverted World? To answer this properly, I’m afraid I have to use weaselly, lawyerly language. Oh, Inverted World is the one I love the most, for musical and nostalgic reasons, and it’s the one I reach for most often. But if I’m forced to be pedantic, I have to concede that Chutes Too Narrow is probably “better.” The songs are more consistent, the musicianship is greater, and the production is sharper.
Whatever Alvvays represents in the early 2020s, The Shins represented in the early 2000s. Just incredibly well-executed indie rock, with a level of craftsmanship only witnessed in Amish furniture.
7. My Morning Jacket, It Still Moves
Is it better than At Dawn? Yes. As well as every other MMJ record. I still remember getting a promo CD. I remember it because I was working for a small-town daily newspaper and I didn’t get promo CDs all that often. And also because the cover of It Still Moves is very memorable. You don’t usually see a grizzly bear growling at you from behind a CD jewel case. (Not even when the band is literally called Grizzly Bear.) Bands refrain from putting bears on their album covers because a bear signifies a rare amount of majesty and power, and you don’t want to implicitly promise that your music also possesses a rare amount of majesty and power if you can’t back it up. But this, obviously, was not a problem for My Morning Jacket.
6. Fountains Of Wayne, Welcome Interstate Managers
My thinking on Fountains Of Wayne was forever transformed after reading Glenn Kenny’s review of this album in The Village Voice, in which he compared the New Jersey power-pop band to Steely Dan. The comparison, of course, makes no sense musically. But it makes all the sense in the world when you consider that both bands are led by brilliant songwriting duos preoccupied by characters that are (in Kenny’s words) “white guys who can’t get what they want or what they need, or if they ever do get something along those lines, can’t hold on to it.” If I can extend the comparison further, I consider Welcome Interstate Managers to be FOW’s “Deacon Blues” record. The songs are populated by losers who dream about drinking scotch whiskey all night long and then dying romantically behind the wheel. They just need to get their shit together, because they can’t live like this forever. (Also, “Stacy’s Mom” is “Hey Nineteen” in this analogy.)
5. OutKast, Speakerboxx/The Love Below
Should I extend the comparison even further and classify Andre 3000 and Big Boi the Donald Fagen and Walter Becker of hip-hop? Surely not. It’s hard to imagine Fagen and Becker making an album as sprawling (and occasionally unfocused) as Speakerboxx/The Love Below. (A better analogy is packaging Kamakiriad with 11 Tracks Of Whack and calling it a mid-’90s Steely LP.) This is easily the most flawed “great” album of 2003. But as bloated as Speakerboxx/The Love Below is, it can’t really be overstated how much of a unifying force OutKast was at the time. Everybody loved them. Everybody. Their approval rating was higher than George W. Bush’s after 9/11. Even after “Hey Ya” and “The Way You Move” became inescapable smashes, they were impossible to hate. When they won the Grammy for Album Of The Year, it was tempting to point out that the honor was for OutKast’s weakest record. But only if you were a petty crank. Out of all the culturally ubiquitous musical acts of the last 20 years, OutKast is by far the coolest and the easiest to root for.
4. Radiohead, Hail To The Thief
It’s four songs too long. It’s probably the least great Radiohead album of the 2000s. (You can never use the word “worst” in relation to this band.) And the title feels a touch too obvious as early aughts political commentary. I concede all of these points. Here is my retort: Listen to the final 117 seconds of “There There.”
3. Jay-Z, The Black Album
What is it about NYC-based musicians who announce their intentions to retire, prompting them to stage a “final” show at Madison Square Garden only to un-retire a few years later? Before LCD Soundsystem did this in the 2010s, Jay-Z did it in the 2000s. In both instances, the un-retirees lost some of their status in the process. For Jay-Z, the early aughts run from The Blueprint to the MTV Unplugged with The Roots to The Black Album to the concert film Fade To Black was one of the greatest of the 21st century. (You could also add The Grey Album in there — remember being excited about new Danger Mouse music??) If Jay could have had the fortitude to just stay gone, he would be more myth than man right now. Then again, he’s a billionaire who’s married to Beyoncé so who am I to question his judgment?
2. The White Stripes, Elephant
Let’s resume our game of “Is The Album They Put Out In 2003 Better Than The Album They Put In 2001?” Is Elephant better than White Blood Cells? I say no. I think I’m in the minority on that one, but I shouldn’t be. Elephant put The White Stripes on the map as a mainstream juggernaut, and “Seven Nation Army” made Jack and Meg immortal Jock Jams icons. But the record loses focus between “There’s No Home For You Here” and “Ball And Biscuit,” and you’ll never convince me otherwise. Nevertheless, the Hail To The Thief rule also applies here. Yes, it’s four songs too long and it’s not quite as good as the three albums that precede it. But it’s still Elephant by The White Stripes. You can’t not put it at the 2003 mountaintop.
1. The Strokes, Room On Fire
Is it better than Is This It? The conventional wisdom has taken a weird turn lately. I was one of the people who for years pushed the “Room On Fire is greater than Is This It” argument. And now I’m seeing more and more Strokes heads take up the cause, to the point where I’m having second thoughts. Is This It has the hits and it stands as a definitive moment. But Room On Fire is the one I hold closer to my heart, for both musical and extra-musical reasons. On the former count, The Strokes play their asses off on this record. “Reptilia” is the hardest they have ever rocked, and “Under Control” is the sexiest they have ever swung. On the latter count, Room On Fire didn’t get the love that it deserved in ’03. “It sounds just like the first record,” we said. What in the hell did we want from these guys? Were people expecting them to make Kid A? They made a prime-era Strokes record! It was awesome! We just didn’t know how good we had it.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Concert films are having a moment. The most popular movie in America right now, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, just grossed $130 million worldwide in its opening weekend, the best start for a concert film at the box office ever. In December, Beyoncé will attempt to match that with her latest concert movie, Renaissance. And then there’s this fall’s popular IMAX re-release of Stop Making Sense, Jonathan Demme’s 1984 film about the Talking Heads that is widely considered one of the finest concert pictures of all time.
All of this is … a little surprising? After all, we live in a time in which live footage of musicians has been devalued to the point where every single person on Earth with a camera phone can act like an amateur Jonathan Demme shooting live concerts for worldwide distribution on YouTube. The theatrical concert film at this juncture might have seemed like a novelty, the cinematic equivalent of an album pressed on limited edition colored vinyl, a throwback to a distant time when Baby Boomers turned Woodstock and Gimme Shelter into cultural events back in the 1970s. Sure enough, when I asked my six-year-old daughter if she wanted to see The Eras Tour, she innocently asked, “What a concert film?”
Then again, the ubiquity of shaky and grainy live videos online might explain, rather than contradict, the sudden revival of concert films. If there’s one thing that The Eras Tour and Stop Making Sense share, it’s that they both give audiences a communal (and dance party) experience that’s similar to what they get at a live show. They both testify to the power of concert films to preserve singular moments in time that can be relived, miraculously, by audiences whether they were there for the actual concert or not. And this experience feels special in a way that scrolling through endless videos online does not.
As a lover of concert films, I was glad to introduce my daughter to the genre via The Eras Tour, even if The Eras Tour itself is not a great concert film. Shot over three shows in Los Angeles at the end of the campaign’s American leg, The Eras Tour ranks among the most gigantic of all concert movies, running for more than two and a half hours with minimal edits to the original setlists. The idea is to present a typical Taylor Swift show “as is,” which is great for those who saw the tour (or wish they had) but also results in a misshapen and bloated movie. Though, again, the bloat appears to be the point. Many concert films attempt to shrink the distance between performer and audience, in order to make the viewer feel as though they are, finally, on equal footing with the stars on stage. This is not that kind of concert film.
The filmmaking philosophy of The Eras Tour centers on reinforcing the cultural inevitability of Taylor Swift — we are meant to understand that she is the biggest, and the most talented, and the nicest, and the most loved, and also that everyone in the world is a fan, and if you’re somehow not a fan you better get with the program, bud. This is communicated via countless aerial shots of the stadium that convey the overwhelmingly enormous huge-osity of Taylor’s fame, as well as a tendency to film Taylor up close from low angles that emphasize her larger-than-life stature. When she’s not singing, she’s making “Oh, go on!” faces at her worshipful audience, who Taylor insists is her one true soulmate with 70,000 heads. The overall package is less like a “normal” concert film and more like one of those iPhone promotional rollouts that were once famously conducted by Steve Jobs, another master showman and genius capitalist. Even if you are not as personally moved by the product on display, you can’t question (or effectively counter) the world-conquering marketing savvy.
(For the record — after I made it clear, repeatedly, that Taylor Swift was not going to show up in person at our theater — this was my daughter’s take on The Eras Tour: “That was almost the best movie I ever listened to.” This is probably more relevant to the core audience than what I expressed in the previous paragraph.)
If The Eras Tour is not a great concert film, what is? That is what I’m setting out to explore. Come with me as we review my top 30 concert films of all time.
30. Tourfilm (1990)
Let’s get back to my daughter’s question: What is a concert film? While it might seem like a straightforward concept — a concert film is a film that depicts a live musical performance — there are myriad nuances that muddy the waters. I will address these nuances as they arise on this list, but for now I want to talk about what differentiates a concert film from a concert video.
Countless bands have released concert videos. These are live performances that are shot on tape and earmarked for direct-to-video release. (In the modern era, they are shuttled to streaming platforms as either VOD movies or as exclusives for a particular platform.) These videos typically are geared toward pleasing a fanbase, and therefore function like utilitarian products — the fans like the artist, the fans want to see the artist play live, and there is no need to provide those fans with some grander thematic point or filmmaking sensibility. (This also explains The Eras Tour.) While some of these videos have their merits — to pick one example out of the ether, Metallica’s Cliff ‘Em All is essential for anyone who missed the band’s era with original bassist Cliff Burton — I have tried to leave them off this list, as they don’t feel to me like proper concert films that match the caliber of what I have included.
Similarly, live concerts shot for television have been excluded. An obvious instance of this subcategory is any episode of MTV Unplugged, of which the most obvious example is the Nirvana episode. Is this an iconic musical experience captured on tape? Of course it is. But it’s not a concert film. It’s a concert video. So it doesn’t belong here.
[To make another Nirvana-related distinction: Live At The Paramount (shot on film, cinematic sensibility) is a concert film, and Live At Reading (shot on tape, released direct to DVD nearly two decades later) is a concert video. They are both great, though neither are included on this list.]
Now, there will be times when I might appear to violate my own rules. Putting Tourfilm at No. 30 could be construed as such a violation. This document of R.E.M.’s Green tour, culled mostly from a performance at Greensboro Coliseum in November of 1989, is more or less a straightforward presentation of a live concert. It appears designed to service the needs of R.E.M. fans who either couldn’t see the Green tour in person or want to relive the experience in perpetuity. It was released on VHS in 1990, so it is (technically) a concert video. But in other ways that I can quantify (and some admittedly that I can’t) Tourfilm really is a concert film. For starters, it says “film” right in the title, and I trust R.E.M. enough to take this at face value. But it actually was shot on film. And the black-and-white cinematography feels cinematic. It has atmosphere. You want to look at it as much as you want to want to hear it. Tourfilm is a mood. And mood matters.
29. 1991: The Year That Punk Broke (1992)
Setting aside these annoyingly pedantic “what is a concert film?” matters — for the moment anyway — let’s get down to the business of figuring out “what makes a great concert film?” Again, this might seem like self-evident consideration, i.e. a great concert film is a film that that depicts a great concert. And surely musical quality is a significant part of the equation. But in order for a concert film to truly go to the next level — where it’s not simply fleeting entertainment enjoyed by a niche of fanatics, but a lasting work that can hold the interest of a non-committed viewer — it has to signify a specific musical movement or moment in time. I’m talking about a film that can magically transport the viewer back to a critical turning point in cultural history. An artifact that can make you feel like you were at Woodstock, Altamont, or the Pantages Theatre in 1983. An essential landmark for amateur historians. A time capsule. 1991: The Year That Punk Broke is that kind of concert film.
Directed by Dave Markey, 1991 follows Sonic Youth on their summer tour of Europe with Nirvana, when they were a young, up-and-coming band about to release their major-label debut, Nevermind. We see both bands on stage, and we see them goof around in various backstage green rooms. Both acts are at the top of their games musically, and at the bottom of their games comedically. (1991 might have ranked higher if Thurston Moore didn’t come off like the most irritating man in rock history whenever he doesn’t have a guitar in his hands.) But what makes 1991 historically significant is that Markey happened to be around at a critical inflection point between the “college rock” 1980s and the “alternative rock” 1990s. What in any other context would have been merely an excellent tour unexpectedly became an important one. When the documentary was released in theaters in 1992 — and on video the following year, which is how most people (like me) saw it — it already seemed like a wistful portrait of Kurt Cobain in the final weeks of his relative obscurity, an impression that has only deepened over time.
28. Okonokos (2006)
My Morning Jacket’s tour in support of Z might not necessarily represent a historical moment in our shared cultural history. This film, however, does mark a critical inflection point in my own personal narrative, i.e. the moment when I switched from smoking pot every other day in the mid-aughts to every single day in the late aughts. My marijuana intake has been curbed in the interim, but the sight of Jim James’ billowy facial hair in Okonokos still gives me a contact high.
27. Born To Boogie (1972)
Here’s another attribute that can elevate a concert film to greatness: Whether it brings the dead back to life. 1991 does this. And Born To Boogie also does this. A compilation of two performances filmed in 1972 at what is now known as Wembley Arena in London, Born To Boogie resurrects Marc Bolan of T. Rex, the swaggiest of all the early ’70s glam rock superstars, at the very peak of his fame. Tragically, Bolan would be dead just five years later, felled by a car accident two weeks before his 30th birthday. But in this film, we get to see him as he lived — as a man who was fond of donning shirts emblazoned with his own face while playing perfectly simple rock songs expressing his deep desire to have sexual intercourse with automobiles.
Speaking of attributes that elevate a concert film to greatness: Born To Boogie includes a guest appearance by a clearly inebriated Ringo Starr, who is a linchpin of the interstitial sketches as well as a jam session with Elton John on “Children Of The Revolution.” This will not be the last time that a clearly inebriated Ringo Starr shows up in a concert film on this list.
26. Jazz On A Summer’s Day (1959)
Talk about bringing the dead back to life. Here we are transported to the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, a place where giants still roamed the Earth: Louis Armstrong, Mahalia Jackson, Thelonious Monk, Dinah Washington, Chuck Berry, Chico Hamilton, Eric Dolphy, and more. Jazz On A Summer’s Day takes these historical legends and gives them flesh-and-blood, in-the-moment vitality. This is made possible in large part by the photography of co-director Bert Stern, whose intuitive grasp of how to capture the intimate details of live performance cinematically presages the work of future masters like Jonathan Demme, Martin Scorsese, and Murray Lerner.
The only reason this film isn’t ranked higher is the specter of the movie it could have been. As the film critic Richard Brody has noted, the 1958 festival also included Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington, Mary Lou Williams, and Max Roach — none of whom are in this film. What’s here instead is footage of 1958’s American Cup yachting competition, which is weirdly interwoven with the musical performances. Was this an early premonition of yacht rock? Perhaps. But surely Donald Fagen would have preferred to see Miles over boats.
25. Elvis: That’s The Way It Is (1970)
Another “resurrect the dead” concert film. Like Kurt Cobain in 1991, we see Elvis Presley in That’s The Way It Is right before his tragic decline. He’s in Las Vegas, he’s in the white jumpsuit, he is already on a cocktail of pills, but he’s still lean and tan and hungry and landing all of his shadow karate blows. Like Marc Bolan in Born To Boogie, he emanates serious “I’m awesome!” energy throughout. (That includes the pre-show rehearsals, where Elvis wears what appears to be a shirt made out of silky curtains stolen from a Howard Johnson’s hotel while jamming on “Get Back.”) The film’s signature sequence occurs during “Love Me Tender,” when Elvis exits the stage and strolls through the audience at the International Hotel and starts kissing every woman who walks up to him, like he’s Jesus Christ himself curing the sick and the lame with his sweet lips. Of all the artists on this list who might claim that they make love to their audiences every night, Elvis comes closest to performing this task literally in That’s The Way It Is.
24. Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars (1979)
The Elvis: That’s The Way It Is of glam rock. The “I’m awesome!” energy here is literally out of this world. Director D.A. Pennebaker takes the opposite approach with this depiction of David Bowie’s final concert as Ziggy Stardust in 1973 from what he adopted for his 1967 Bob Dylan movie Don’t Look Back. Whereas Don’t Look Back is very much an anti-concert film — it’s edited in such a way that the performances are frequently cut short in a manner meant to emphasize how tired and rote they are — in Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars we see Bowie in his most outrageous guise right before he decided to blow up his career. Both films represent the binary of rock mythology, though they end up ultimately at the same destination. Don’t Look Back is an early instance of a rock star stating “this world is bullshit” as a critique, and Ziggy Stardust is an example of a rock star stating “this world is bullshit” as a celebration. They’re both right.
23. Wattstax (1973)
Ziggy Stardust belongs in a subgenre of concert films we’ll call “EVENT” concert films. This is a movie that isn’t just capturing any old concert or tour, but an all-caps EVENT that was consciously planned to be meaningful ahead of time. With Ziggy Stardust, Bowie was capturing his own (artistic) suicide. The Last Waltz is another obvious example, and another example of a musical act orchestrating their own funeral. (Though 4/5ths of that particular act later decided to rise from the grave.) Woodstock is an equally obvious example. Gimme Shelter also belongs in this category, though the predetermined “meaning” of the event (The Rolling Stones create a West Coast Woodstock) did not end up being the actual meaning (The Rolling Stones unwillingly create the conclusion of the Woodstock era).
Wattstax is yet another “EVENT” concert film. In this instance, an all-star show featuring many of the brightest lights on the Stax label — Isaac Hayes, Rufus and Carla Thomas, Albert King, The Staple Singers, The Bar-Kays — are assembled in Los Angeles to commemorate the 1965 uprisings in Watts. Director Mel Stuart actually seems more focused on the “EVENT” part than the “concert film” part. A collection of Black American voices — including Richard Pryor and a pre-Love Boat Ted Lange — talk at length about what has and hasn’t been gained from the Civil Rights struggle since the mid-’60s, to a degree that nearly outweighs the performance footage. Though the musical acts ultimately have the last word. And by that I mean Isaac Hayes — in full Black Moses regalia, a true paragon of the “I’m awesome” vibe — who brings down the L.A. Coliseum with waves of wah-wah guitars and exhortations about the physical, spiritual, and sexual power of John Shaft.
22. Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story By Martin Scorsese (2019)
If I may return briefly to the annoying pedantic “what is a concert film?” conversation: Another important distinction I had to make while writing this column is differentiating a “concert film” from a “documentary about a concert.” Wattstax qualifies, to me, as a concert film because of the time capsule factor. It is bearing witness to an important musical moment, and documenting it for the benefit of future generations who seek to re-experience that moment cinematically. Meanwhile Summer Of Soul — Questlove’s Oscar-winning 2021 feature that is surely the most acclaimed music film of the last decade — is a documentary about a concert. It gathers performers and experts to reflect on an important musical moment in retrospect, and it uses that testimony to highlight the deficiencies of concert films historically to properly represent the full spectrum of the human musical experience. This is a worthy endeavor, but it’s not exactly a proper concert film.
Rolling Thunder Revue could also be classified as a work of criticism that comments on other concert films. Many of the interviews are pushing deliberate exaggerations, fabrications, pranks, and goofs, in a manner that is meant not only to obfuscate the truth but to suggest this kind of film can’t ever really purport to present “truth.” But herein lies another wrinkle in the “what is a concert film?” question: In Summer Of Soul, the concert footage is subordinate to the overall thesis. It is presented to support the assertion that the 1968 Harlem Cultural Festival was unfairly ignored by music historians, which is reiterated by talking heads who frequently philosophize over the music. Whereas in Rolling Thunder Revue, the music and the tomfoolery tend to exist side by side. Stefan van Dorp does not step on Bob Dylan screaming out “Isis,” and vice versa.
21. Under Great White Northern Lights (2009)
What it really boils down to when separating “concert films” from “documentaries about concerts” is the ratio of “talking about music” vs. “playing music.” And this becomes extra sticky when considering one of the most common subgenres of the concert film, the “backstage” concert film. This is a movie that purports to show you the “real people” behind the performers on stage in between clips of them actually performing on stage. But some movies put so much emphasis on the backstage life that they no longer feel quite like concert films. This applies to the aforementioned Don’t Look Back. It’s also true of 1991’s fantastically entertaining Madonna: Truth Or Dare and Les Blank’s brilliant but obscure Leon Russell movie from 1974, A Poem Is A Naked Person. Even though these pictures feature some incredible live performances, they feel more invested in the world outside of the stage than the one on it.
Of course, figuring out the “talking about music” vs. “playing music” ratio is not an exact science. There are films like Under Great White Northern Lights, which follows the White Stripes on a 2007 tour through small Canadian towns. There is plenty here that doesn’t take place on stage. We see, for instance, Jack and Meg eat raw meat with Inuit tribal leaders. But in the end, Under Great White Northern Lights still feels like a concert film, because it documents — like Ziggy Stardust and The Last Waltz and so many “EVENT” concert films — the end of something that was about to be gone forever.
20. U2: Rattle & Hum (1989)
Another movie that pushes the “talking about music” vs. “playing music” ratio. There’s also a separate argument that the “talking about music” scenes are so preposterous that they disqualify the inclusion of Rattle & Hum on this list. Clearly, I disagree. I also disagree with the old quote — credited, perhaps apocryphally, to Howard Hawks — that a good movie has three good scenes and no bad ones, at least when it comes to concert films. Good concert films can have bad scenes if they are memorable, quotable, or amenable to satire. In that respect, Rattle & Hum must be counted as one of the most consequential concert films. Yes, I want The Edge to play the blues! Yes, bring me a gospel choir! Detractors stole this movie from “best concert films” lists, and I’m stealing it back! (Also, let’s not pretend that Phil Joanou didn’t shoot the hell out of the concert sequences. Bono’s armpit hair is as artfully composed as any shot in Raging Bull.)
19. Fade To Black (2004)
This movie falls into several concert film subgenres. It is an “EVENT” concert film about Jay Z’s star-studded retirement show in 2004. It is also a “backstage” concert film about the planning of said show. (It also shows Jay making The Black Album, which is actually more interesting than the concert footage. The single greatest musical sequence in the entire film is Timbaland introducing Jay to the music that will become “Dirt On Your Shoulder.”) In addition, Fade To Black falls into two categories we haven’t discussed yet: “Madison Square Garden” concert films and, even more specifically, “Fake Retirement Shows at Madison Square Garden” concert films. (This will be the last time I refer, directly or indirectly, to Shut Up And Play The Hits.)
18. The Song Remains The Same (1976)
The most bombastic and ridiculous of the “Madison Square Garden” concert films. I have been a Zeppelin fan from the age of 13, and I have watched The Song Remains The Same more than I can count. But I don’t know that I have ever finished The Song Remains The Same. The official running time is 138 minutes, but during the “Dazed And Confused” and “Moby Dick” sequences it feels more like 13,800 minutes. Even the fiercest cares of insomnia are powerless against those scenes. What doesn’t help matters is that it is physically impossible to not be stoned while watching this film. You don’t even have to take drugs, just the sight of Peter Grant doing battle with an army of faceless mobsters automatically implants paralysis-inducing amounts of THC into your bloodstream via your glazed eyeballs.
17. Songs For Drella (1990)
Whatever The Song Remains The Same represents about the enormity of live music, Songs For Drella signifies the opposite. Celebrated cinematographer Ed Lachman — a collaborator of Robert Altman, Steven Soderbergh, Todd Haynes, and Jonathan Demme — films Lou Reed and John Cale performing their 1990 album about the life and death of Andy Warhol without an audience at the Brooklyn Academy Of Music. He keeps the camera trained on their remarkably weathered faces as both men confront their shared pasts, failures, and survivor’s guilt. It so unrelentingly intimate that you feel a near-telepathic communication between these guys, like when they tenderly exchange slight nods early on before Cale plays the stunning “Style It Takes.” At the other end of the emotional spectrum, there’s frightening rage from Reed as he sings about wishing he could pull the executioner’s switch on Valerie Solanas — who shot and nearly murdered Warhol in 1968 — while castigating himself for not visiting his friend and mentor in the hospital. What subgenre of concert film does Songs For Drella fall under? It is a subgenre unto itself.
16. Amazing Grace (2018)
Similar to Summer Of Soul, this concert film was a long-running reclamation project. Originally filmed by Sydney Pollack in 1972, it captured the making of Aretha Franklin’s 1972 gospel live album masterpiece Amazing Grace as it unfolded at New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles. Then technical issues caused the footage to be shelved for 25 years until it was discovered by filmmaker Alan Elliott, who finally put together his own edit in 2011. But the film was sentenced to purgatory once again after Franklin sued Elliott for misappropriating her likeness, and then again in 2015 after Elliott tried to show the film and Franklin blocked him. Once Aretha passed in 2018, her family cleared the way for Amazing Grace to see the light of day, at which point it earned great critical acclaim. So yes, in a sense, Amazing Grace was made and released literally over the subject’s dead body. But it also makes a convincing case for Aretha being the voice of God, so perhaps this can be chalked up as a “she didn’t know what was best for her” situation.
15. Festival! (1967)
My favorite unsung concert filmmaker is Murray Lerner, whose specialty was immersing himself in music festivals like an anthropologist studying an instantaneous subculture in order to reveal the ways in which live concerts act as mirrors for their times. Lerner’s best films have that “time capsule” quality all great concert films have, but they also go one step further by simultaneously exposing the aspects of these festivals that will eventually read as unwitting self-parody. Lerner’s breakthrough was Festival!, an Oscar-nominated doc that shows the evolution of music and culture in the mid-’60s via footage shot at the Newport Folk Festival from 1963 through 1966. The most famous sequence concerns Bob Dylan’s historic “electric” performance in 1965 that rankled folk purists and changed rock music forever. Meanwhile the bulk of Festival! shows you why such a provocation is necessary. Much of what was satirized in The Mighty Wind can be directly tied back to this film — the goofy folk dancing, Pete Seeger singing “Green Corn,” the self-seriousness college students sitting cross-legged in the audience while cos-playing America’s hardscrabble past. That Festival! manages to also be entertaining even when the music delves into unrelenting corniness only adds to its charm.
14. Message To Love (1995)
After Festival!, Lerner took on a much different kind of festival: 1970’s Isle Of Wight, the infamous post-Woodstock U.K. boondoggle marred by protests from would-be pseudo-socialists who insisted that the festival be free. And those people were prepared to make it happen by tearing down the walls separating the paying customers from the freeloaders. Lerner was tasked with filming the entire festival, and he used that footage over the course of several decades to spin off concert films featuring The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Leonard Cohen, The Doors, Joni Mitchell, and others. But the best product of this project was Message To Love, a compendium of performances from all of the above artists that also shows the madness of putting on a festival during the slow collapse of ’60s idealism. (The understandable exasperation of the organizers later inspired a classic Oasis song.) Message To Love functions as a kind of sequel to Festival! — this is what Dylan’s plugging in his guitar begat — but it’s also an answer film to Woodstock, which glamorized the consequence-free utopianism that Message To Love exposes as untenable at best and a dangerous fraud at worst.
13. Woodstock (1970)
Speak of the devil! Woodstock unquestionably is the most important concert film ever made. It’s fair to say that every movie on this list that came out after Woodstock is in some way informed by it, either as an homage or as a critical response. It’s also more ambivalent about the starry-eyed kids rolling around in the mud than the legend might suggest; a good number of the interviewees don’t seem headed toward a particularly healthy place once the festival wraps. And the best performances truly are wondrous. (Shoutout to Jimi, Sly and The Family Stone, Santana, and The Who.) But the running time is only slightly shorter than the actual festival, and the dubious mythology that this film created is at least partly responsible for creating two “official” sequels in the ’90s, the last of which is one of the great disasters in music festival history.
12. Monterey Pop (1967)
The prequel to Woodstock, and slightly preferable because it’s less hyped and much shorter. But the best test is comparing Jimi Hendrix performances. Jimi in Woodstock is a God on Earth — no less an authority than Ian MacKaye considers “Villanova Junction” to be “one of those most incredible pieces of recorded music,” which must be counted as the one degree of separation between Dischord and Wavy Gravy. However, Jimi at Monterrey Pop is simply one of the greatest rock performances ever captured on film, if not the greatest. (It’s too bad that the movie only includes one song from Jimi’s set, or else Monterey Pop would be higher on this list.) But the historical significance of at least half of the performances in this film — particularly by Otis Redding, Janis Joplin, and The Who — maximizes the “time capsule” value.
11. Festival Express (2003)
This documentary about a 1970 train tour across Canada starring The Band, the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, Buddy Guy, the Flying Burrito Brothers, and others is a “backstage” concert film in which the best live performances actually occur backstage. That’s not to slight what actually happens on stage — the footage of The Band rivals anything seen in The Last Waltz, particularly since Festival Express captures them in their prime rather than their death throes. But even that can’t compare with the priceless slight of Rick Danko, Janis Joplin, Jerry Garcia, and Bob Weir — all of whom appear to be extremely knackered, presumably on the prominently featured display-sized bottle of acid-spiked Canadian Club whiskey — slurring their way through “Ain’t No More Cane” as the Festival Express train rumbles through the Canadian wilderness. All but Weir are gone now, which makes watching Festival Express feel like witnessing a very happy (and happily wasted) ghost story.
10. Homecoming (2019)
Lest anyone forget: Before the pandemic gave Taylor Swift her shocking resurgence to all-time pop star heights, the unquestioned queen of live-music spectacle was Beyoncé. And this concert film about her historic appearance at Coachella — the ultimate all-caps EVENT of the early 21st century (at least before the Eras Tour) — is the most significant movie of its kind in the past decade. Among its many achievements: Homecoming made it all but impossible for an indie-rock band with a half-assed live show to credibly take the stage at the nation’s top music festival. Beyoncé set a new bar that few artists can manage (or afford) to reach. It remains to be seen how the Cold War of opposing Taylor vs. Beyoncé concert films will shake out in the closing months of 2023 as far as box office grosses are concerned, but Homecoming (which is also directed by the star) suggests that whatever Bey does next will likely win out in terms of quality.
9. Pink Floyd: Live At Pompeii (1972)
If you are an indie-rock band with a half-assed live show, here’s some free advice on how to level up: Book a trip to Italy, set up your gear in an ancient Roman amphitheater, do not invite an audience, plug in, take your shirt off (the guitarist anyway), and blast off into a 20-minute space rock jam. This strategy works swimmingly for Pink Floyd — a band no one would accuse of having an overabundance of charisma — in Live at Pompeii, the greatest “take some drugs on your couch” concert film of all time. As if to emphasize the ordinariness of Pink Floyd when they’re not standing like supermen in an ancient Roman amphitheater, the live clips are interspersed with footage of the band recording their landmark album The Dark Side Of The Moon, including some scintillating looks at the fellas eating lunch in the studio commissary. But just when you think these long-haired English accountants couldn’t be more dull, you’re transported back to that fuzzy-brained region between outer space and inner space.
8. Rust Never Sleeps (1979)
Speaking of fuzzy-brained regions: Rust Never Sleeps not only is one of the 10 greatest concert films, it’s also an illuminating trip through the fascinating recesses of Neil Young’s brain. In one respect, this film testifies to the power of Neil’s turn at the end of the ’70s from a folk-rock troubadour who played Woodstock to a fire-spitting hard-rocker taking early stock of his generation’s failures while professing sympathy for the youth’s leading disruptor Johnny Rotten. In another respect, Rust Never Sleeps is about how Neil was so obsessed with Star Wars that he made his roadies dress up like Jawas. As with all things Neil, the silly can’t be expunged from the profound — the logic of Rust Never Sleeps is that if you’re going to play a mind-melding rendition of “Cortez The Killer,” you might as well conclude the song by slipping into a reggae rhythm and adopting a Jamaican patois.
7. The T.A.M.I. Show (1964)
The only problem with putting this film — a compendium of performances by some of the biggest rock and soul acts of the mid-’60s (the Rolling Stones, the Beach Boys, the Supremes, Marvin Gaye, the Ronettes) filmed in front of gaggle southern California high school students gathered at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium — at No. 7 is that six films now have to follow James Brown. And as Keith Richards learned the hard way, you don’t under any circumstances want to follow James Brown. It might be best to put the cape over this column and stumble off the stage …
6. Hammersmith Odeon, London ’75 (2006)
But I can’t do that! Not yet! We’re almost to the end!
The “cape over James Brown’s back” bit immortalized in The T.A.M.I. Show is the finest bit of pop-music stagecraft ever committed in a concert film. But if anyone can possibly follow that, it would be Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band circa the Born To Run tour. This legendary gig recorded in London on November 18, 1975 shows Bruce in his early scruffy-haired, floppy-hatted incarnation, leading his similarly scruffy-haired and flopped-hatted bandmates through some of the most romantic and anthemic (and long) songs of his career. There were no half-measures for the Boss at this time — his insane mix of idealism, romanticism, ego, and ambition prompted him to believe he could write the greatest rock song ever (“Born To Run”) and the greatest rock album ever (Born To Run) and then promote both with the greatest rock show ever staged. The hubris would be obnoxious if it came from anybody who was not Bruce Springsteen in 1975. But like Babe Ruth calling his own shot, Bruce that night in England had talent, fate, and dumb luck on his side.
5. Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll (1987)
It takes a special kind of musician to set out consciously ahead of time to play an epic show that people will still talk about 50 years later. But it might be even more special to play an all-time gig against your will. This is the story of Chuck Berry in Taylor Hackford’s wonderful Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll, an “EVENT” concert film (it’s Chuck’s 60th birthday show) and a “backstage” concert film (about how Chuck is an ambivalent participant in his own 60th birthday show). As Hackford details, Berry is not a man given to extravagant tributes to his own world-changing art. His usual approach to playing the old songs is to fly into a random town with only his guitar and a change of clothes, hook up with a pickup band of local musicians he meets five minutes before showtime, get the check from the promoter, play the gig, and then quickly exit in a rental car back to the airport. So when he is faced with playing a massive concert with an all-star band that includes Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Etta James, and Linda Ronstadt, he responds not with gratitude but with skeptical grumpiness. The same guy who is fine with casually recruiting the best bar-band musicians to be found in Akron or Poughkeepsie suddenly is hyper-critical of how the guitarist from the Rolling Stones plays the lead lick from “Carol.” That this all comes across as endearing says a lot about the affection with which Hackford approaches Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll. We see Chuck holistically as both a comically cantankerous tightwad and an all-time genius songwriter, guitarist, and showman.
4. Sign O’ The Times (1987)
The popularity of Stop Making Sense in IMAX naturally leads one to wonder about other concert films that might warrant the big, big screen re-release treatment. To me, the obvious choice is Sign O’ The Times, the rare concert movie that might be even more exuberant than the Talking Heads picture. Shot mostly at Prince’s Minneapolis area enclave Paisley Park, Sign O’ The Times spotlights Prince tearing through a setlist composed largely of songs from the 1987 double-album of the same name, and fronting one of his all-time best bands (highlighted by drummer Sheila E., the film’s most prominent co-star). Like Stop Making Sense, Sign O’ The Times has a loose narrative thread that makes it feel like a real movie rather than simply a filmed live-music piece. But the effortless musicality of Prince at his peak — the way his powerhouse vocals and burn-the-house-down guitar solos come out of him like he’s exhaling carbon dioxide — would make this a riveting watch in any context.
3. The Last Waltz (1978)
The greatest “EVENT” concert film of all time. (It’s also the greatest Thanksgiving movie, but that’s a topic for a different discussion.) The “time capsule” value is obvious, but The Last Waltz also is timeless in terms of presenting a certain kind of eternal “rock dude” cool. Whole genres of music have sprung up in the years since The Last Waltz for musicians and fans who are obsessed with how amazing the members of The Band look in this movie. As long as Americana exists, there will never not be a moment when a certain segment of the music-listening audience isn’t attracted to people who wear big hats, grow fuzzy beards, and smoke way too many cigarettes. And, whether they are consciously aware of it or not, those people will be chasing the high of seeing Garth Hudson magically materialize at the end of “It Makes No Difference” with the sweetest saxophone solo in concert-film history.
2. Stop Making Sense (1984)
My overriding thought while watching The Eras Tour was this: For all of the awe-inspiring enormity on display, there isn’t single shot in the whole movie that I am going to remember. Meanwhile, Jonathan Demme gives you dozens of memorable images in Stop Making Sense. This is the best-directed concert film ever. For anyone who wants to know how to make this kind of movie, Stop Making Sense is your 85-minute film school. It goes beyond just showing you a band, as many concert films “only” do. You actually learn something about how musicians interact in all kinds of telepathic (or even seemingly supernatural) ways to build grooves into songs, and songs into overpowering emotional experiences. (The best example is this scene.) But Demme isn’t just concerned with the “stars” on stage. I can’t think of another concert film where you feel like you get to spend quality time with each musician. Whether it’s David Byrne and Tina Weymouth or Steve Scales and Lynn Mabry, Demme treats whoever is on screen like the most important person in the room. A small moment: When Bernie Worrell comes out for “Burning Down The House” Demme stays with him for a few extra beats after the rest of the musicians come in. Most directors would’ve cut immediately to a wide shot of the entire band, but I think Demme just liked hanging with Bernie. Demme similarly gives every musician a hero’s welcome. When Chris Frantz comes out for “Thank You For Sending Me An Angel,” he does this incredible spin on Frantz from behind all while Byrne is singing the first verse. It’s like a big bear hug. This whole movie feels like that.
1. Gimme Shelter (1970)
I realize that, on some level, this is a perverse choice, particularly after The Last Waltz and Stop Making Sense. It’s certainly a downer ending for this column. Almost every other concert film on this list makes you want to be at the show depicted in the movie. But Gimme Shelter is not a bear hug. It’s a bear attack. Nevertheless, not all time capsules are meant to recreate dreams. This is the concert film as the ultimate horror movie, like Woodstock as directed by George A. Romero, a Night Of The Living Dead Hippie Dream. No other movie evokes the feeling of attending a concert-gone-extremely-bad as vividly as this cinéma vérité account of the Rolling Stones’ disastrous free festival at the Altamont Speedway in Northern California. Also: I do kind of wish I was at this concert? Not up front with the Hells Angels, of course, but at a safe distance from the violence and the brown acid. (This is also, partly, a “Madison Square Garden” concert film, and I definitely wish I was at that those shows.) What’s underrated about Gimme Shelter is that as the conditions worsen, the Stones play better and better. It’s the inverse of the endless good vibes in Stop Making Sense — instead of smiling musicians jogging in place, we see a terrified band running for their lives. There is no “getting it together.” There is no sitting down. It’s not gonna be alright. But you can’t look away.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
One of the most popular albums of the summer is associated with one of the biggest films. Barbie: The Album, the soundtrack to Greta Gerwig’s smash blockbuster, currently sits in the top five of the Billboard 200 after previously hitting the chart’s top spot. Two singles from the album, Dua Lipa’s “Dance The Night” and “Barbie World” by Nicki Minaj and Ice Spice with Aqua, reside in the Top 10.
In summers of the past, a top movie spinning off a top soundtrack would have been standard fare. But these days, a soundtrack album with legs is a unique occurrence. Barbie: The Album got me thinking about the history of soundtrack albums, and what characterizes the ones that endure as standalone works with their own identities outside of the films with which they are associated.
After thinking about this topic, I started putting together a list. I collected 50 albums in all. But before we get to that, we need to lay down some ground rules.
PRE-LIST ENTERTAINMENT: A PARTIAL EXPLANATION OF CRITERIA AND/OR A TRIBUTE TO EARLY AUGHTS NU METAL-CENTRIC FILM SOUNDTRACKS
Here are the things I will NOT be including on this list:
Albums based on musicals: A whole other thing and a whole other thing I am not qualified to judge. (This includes Disney films like The Lion King and Frozen, a decision that has no doubt royally pissed off my 6-year-old daughter.)
Albums based on film scores: Again, a whole other thing. What makes this especially tricky is that there are film scores that could also be classified as soundtracks, and vice versa. For instance, when a person from the worlds of pop, rock, rap, country, electronic, etc. is called upon to provide all of the music for a film, it might feel like a soundtrack album (in that the pieces of music work as actual songs) or it might feel like a score (meaning the music is inextricably tied with the visuals it is meant to complement or enhance). I have done my best to distinguish between the two. For instance, I did not include the brilliant score that Trent Reznor created with Atticus Ross for The Social Network. However, I did include the soundtrack that Reznor produced for Natural Born Killers.
(I have contradicted myself on this count at least four times. I will acknowledge each instance as we proceed.)
Concert film soundtracks: A. Whole. Other. Thing. But if I had included them, Stop Making Sense would be at No. 6 and The Last Waltz at No. 2.
Now, here are (some of) my biases:
Soundtracks that feel like standalone albums: Normally, I am veryinterested in how songs are used in films and TV shows. However, for this list, I am not concerned with it one bit. I am assessing these soundtrack albums purely as albums. I’ll give you an example: Goodfellas is one of the most famous movies ever for using rock and pop songs from many different eras. If I were making a list of movies that use songs with the greatest artistry, it would easily be in the Top 10. However, the soundtrack album for Goodfellas contains only 10 songs, a fraction of the number of tunes in the film. (One of the excluded numbers is Donovan’s “Atlantis,” aka the song that plays during the beating and near death of Billy Batts. This is a lethal exclusion.) Still a great soundtrack album, but it’s a different (and slightly less great) animal compared with the film.
(In the Spotify era, proper soundtrack albums are frequently overshadowed in searches by playlists that compile every single song in a particular film. From a practical, non-purist perspective, this makes sense. Nevertheless, I find this annoying and my list is meant to actively counteract the practice. I am not judging soundtrack playlists, I am concerned with proper soundtrack albums.)
Soundtracks released between the early ’80s and and the early ’00s: Is this merely a generational bias? No, it’s not merely a generational bias. This time period simply coincides with the era in which soundtracks felt like actual albums and not just promotional adjuncts to big films. At the risk of sounding like a geriatric man, a proper soundtrack album in my mind is a CD with a cracked jewel case that resided in your friend’s car for a good chunk of the late 20th century. If you are a person for whom the Minions: The Rise Of Gru soundtrack is generationally important, you are welcome to make your own soundtrack list in about 10 to 15 years.
Soundtracks that capture a moment in time: Circling back to the “standalone album” concept, I favor soundtracks that instantly evoke a particular aesthetic that links with a larger musical movement. To name an extremely obvious example: You can’t talk about the disco era without mentioning Saturday Night Fever. It is a definitive document of late ’70s pop culture, which is why it must be counted among the best soundtrack albums ever. (You also can’t discuss the sexual power of gold medallions interlocking with dark chest hair without mentioning Saturday Night Fever. But that’s a conversation for a different time.)
Good soundtracks from bad movies (or movies that have no good reason to have any kind of soundtrack at all): Here’s the part where I want to discuss the original soundtrack album for 2000’s Mission: Impossible 2. I couldn’t find room for it on the proper list. But it’s precisely the kind of soundtrack album I love. As possibly the most “the year of our lord 2000” album ever made, it definitely captures a moment in time. Limp Bizkit (of course) kicks things off. The next song is the Metallica original that leaked online and inspired Lars Ulrich to go after Napster and the Metallica fans who used the site to rob him. (This subsequently inspired Limp Bizkit to partner with Napster as a sponsor of their free summer 2000 tour.) Later, Foo Fighters cover Pink Floyd’s “Have A Cigar” with Brian May as Uncle Kracker rubs filthy elbows with Godsmack and Buckcherry. At the end, Tori Amos shows up and almost classes up the joint.
This album is not good. That’s why I didn’t include it on my list. But the idea of the Mission: Impossible 2 soundtrack is irresistible to me. I grew up in a world in which big-time summer action films were required to have an accompanying album compiling the dumbest aggro-dudes of the present year. But that practice started to peter out no long after Mission: Impossible 2. And that’s why I wanted to honor it.
(I could have also talked in this slot about the soundtrack album for Scream 3, which came out the same year and includes contributions from Creed, Slipknot, System Of A Down, Godsmack, Fuel, Incubus, Orgy, and Staind. Or really any soundtrack from this time that includes a Godsmack track. Because there a lot of soundtracks from this time that include a Godsmack track.)
50. The Breakfast Club (1985)
This album often ranks high whenever people make lists of soundtrack albums. (This is the last time I will acknowledge other soundtrack albums lists. This is the only soundtracks albums list from now on.) However, I think The Breakfast Club is overrated. As the most famous album associated with a John Hughes film, it definitely captures a moment in time. But it’s not the best John Hughes soundtrack. (That would be Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, which weirdly did not have an official soundtrack album until 30 years after the fact. How were people not clamoring in the streets for Yellow’s “Oh Yeah”?) What The Breakfast Club exemplifies is the kind of soundtrack that has one undeniable classic song — which of course is Simple Minds’ “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” — and a lot of tracks that sound like they came out of an ’80s soundtrack filler factory. No disrespect to Ken Forsey’s “I’m The Dude,” the song that scores the least convincing marijuana sequence ever committed to film.
(I should also mention The Graduate in this context, which did not make my list due to my previously stated criteria. In the history of films that memorably use pop songs, The Graduate is an obvious landmark. But since I am considering only the album and not how the music is used in the film, it must be pointed out that The Graduate soundtrack album surrounds a handful of Simon & Garfunkel jams with many more selections from Dave Grusin’s score, which for my purposes makes it less essential.)
49. Back To The Future (1985)
A lot of soundtrack albums follow the “one undeniable hit plus anonymous filler” formula, which explains why the form peaked before the Internet age. After that, you couldn’t get away with a transparent farce like the Rocky III soundtrack, which roars out of the gate with Survivor’s “Eye Of The Tiger” and then limply follows up with some nepo-baby Frank Stallone tracks. (Though it does eventually come through with the inevitable appearance of “Gonna Fly Now” by Bill Conti.)
As an 8-year-old in 1985, I convinced my mother to buy me the Back To The Future soundtrack because (like all right-thinking Americans of any age) I loved “The Power Of Love” by Huey Lewis and The News. At least — in accordance with the “one undeniable hit plus anonymous filler” formula — they had the decency to put the hit as the first track, which allowed you to rewind the tape immediately back to the start. But if you did get to the second track of the Back To The Future soundtrack, you found (unlike The BreakfastClub) some serious gold in the form of “Time Bomb Town” by ’80s soundtrack MVP Lindsey Buckingham. I don’t know if the song is actually about time travel, but it does have “time” in the title, which is good enough. (Sadly, you can’t get that song on streaming services but it is on YouTube.)
48. Last Action Hero (1993)
Along with playing to my “good soundtrack to a bad movie” bias, this is another “moment in time” soundtrack, and it’s an extremely specific moment at that. Last Action Hero approaches the summer of 1993 (when alt-rock was dominant) like it’s the summer of 1991 (when Terminator 2: Judgement Day merged with Guns N’ Roses’ “You Could Be Mine” to create a hype tsunami for mulleted teenagers everywhere) in a manner that captures the slow recognition of rapidly changing youth culture by corporate media in the last decade of the 20th century. (An accompanying soundtrack in that regard is 1992’s Wayne’s World, which introduced Alice Cooper’s “Feed My Frankenstein” to a generation just getting into Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.)
On Last Action Hero, the title track is by the quasi-acoustic thinking man’s metal band Tesla. AC/DC, Megadeth, Def Leppard, and Queensrÿche are also prominently featured. The inclusion of two Alice In Chains songs and a Cypress Hill track from Black Sunday are the only nods to modernity. (Unless you count Michael Kamen collaborating with Buckethead. And why wouldn’t you?)
47. Cruel Intentions (1999)
The opposite of the “one undeniable hit plus anonymous filler” soundtrack. In 1999, purchasing the Cruel Intentions soundtrack was a convenient way to procure both The Verve’s “Bitter Sweet Symphony” and Fatboy Slim’s “Praise You,” two of the biggest “homemade mixtape” hits of the late ’90s. Beyond that, you get the all-time best Placebo song (“Every You Every Me”), the 26th best Counting Crows song (“Colorblind”), and a Blur song for people who did not wish to fork over $18.99 to hear the rest of the recently released 13.
46. Beverly Hills Cop (1984)
I have a soft spot for this one because it was among the first soundtracks I ever owned. In my mind I had it categorized as a “one undeniable hit plus anonymous filler” soundtrack. That one hit (most of the time) is Harold Faltermeyer’s “Axel F.,” one of the great synth movie themes of the ’80s, though depending on my mood (or proximity to Buffalo Wild Wings) it could also be Glenn Frey’s cheese-sax classic “The Heat Is On.” But upon revisiting Beverly Hills Cop, it’s a deeper album that I remembered. It’s particularly rich with tasty mid-’80s electro-R&B cuts from The Pointer Sisters, Patti LaBelle, and Shalamar. (Though sadly it does not include the single greatest song featured in the film, Vanity 6’s “Nasty Girl.”)
45. FM (1978)
This soundtrack to a forgettable late ’70s comedy about a radio station is essentially Classic Rock: The Album, even if it predates the rise of the classic rock format by a few years. If you were to start a classic rock radio station — a questionable choice in 2023, perhaps, but I support it — this is the only record you would need to own. Bob Seger’s “Night Moves” is on this album. Foreigner’s “Cold As Ice” is on this album. Side Two (it’s a four-sided LP) begins with the Eagles’ “Life In The Fast Lane” and ends with Boston’s “More Than A Feeling.” Sadly, there is no moment to “Get The Led Out,” as it were, but that’s practically the only classic rock radio convention that’s missing here.
And then there’s the impeccable title track, which comes courtesy of Steely Dan one year after they released Aja and two years before they released Gaucho. “Give her some funked up Muzak, she treats you nice,” Donald Fagen sings, a perfectly pitched moment that registers both as irony and invitation.
44. The Color Of Money (1986)
If FM is the definitive late ’70s “Classic Rock Radio Before There Was Classic Rock” album, The Color Of Money is the ultimate document of a slightly later period in the mid ’80s that I affectionately refer to as “Michelob Rock.” This is a reference to the ad campaign that featured stars like Eric Clapton and Genesis, but it also applies more broadly to a brand of vaguely bluesy, well-monied, and state-of-the-art rock music made by aging rockers who were managing middle age by embracing synths and donning trench coats. That’s the scene captured perfectly on The Color Of Money soundtrack, an album that evokes the sound, feel, and smell of a medium-terrible bar in 1986 like no other. Michelob Rock icons like Clapton, Don Henley, and Mark Knopfler make an appearance, as does Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves Of London,” which was revived in popularity because of this movie.
(The only reason The Color Of Money isn’t higher on my list is that it doesn’t include Phil Collins’ “One More Night,” which goes unbelievably hard in the film. For all the props that Martin Scorsese gets for utilizing songs, he doesn’t get enough credit for merging Paul Newman’s melancholy with the signature ballad from No Jacket Required.)
43. Into The Wild (2007)
As I mentioned, I have tried to delineate soundtrack albums from film scores, which was among the most difficult aspects of writing this column. For instance, I really wanted to include Air’s The Virgin Suicides, an album I adore, because I think it obviously works as a standalone work apart from Sofia Coppola’s 1999 film. But on the album cover, it is clearly denoted as a score, not a soundtrack. (There is an actual soundtrack album composed of ’70s soft-rock songs plus a brilliant ’70s soft-rock homage by my beloved Canadian power-poppers Sloan. The soundtrack also includes two Air songs, including an instrumental version of a song that’s on Air’s score, which only further complicates matters.)
There are other issues with the soundtrack vs. score problem, which I’ll address on this list as we get to them. But for now, I will praise Eddie Vedder’s soundtrack (which is also kind of a score) to Sean Penn’s 2007 film about would-be survivalist Chris McCandless for communicating the movie’s anti-consumerist spiritualism with more heart and emotion than even Penn can manage. By connecting with the idealism of McCandless, Vedder re-discovers the muse that prompted him to write so many classic youth anthems in the ’90s.
42. Natural Born Killers (1994)
I already spoiled this one. (And I still have regrets about not putting The Social Network on here.) But Natural Born Killers truly is a satisfying experience as a pure mix of wide-ranging songs — Leonard Cohen into L7 into Cowboy Junkies into Dr. Dre — that express a solitary vibe of foreboding lunacy that (if you were a teenager at the time) seemed, like, totally fuckin’ crazy, man! And Reznor’s work as producer/curator really does take the soundtrack to the next level; he comes off like a decadent rock star whose real passion is making cool “diverse” playlists after the show on his tour bus.
41. Velvet Goldmine (1998)
I’m not ashamed to admit that this album introduced me as a 21-year-old college student to one of the best songs in the history of the world, Brian Eno’s “Needle In The Camel’s Eye.” For that reason alone it makes the list. The conceit of Velvet Goldmine is taking glam-rock songs from the early ’70s (like Roxy Music’s “Ladytron” and The Stooges’ “T.V. Eye”) and re-recording them with rock musicians from the late ’90s (like Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood, and Thurston Moore). Director Todd Haynes revived this idea for the soundtrack to his Bob Dylan picture I’m Not There, but it works better with Velvet Goldmine because it aligns with the film thematically (Haynes is concerned with the transformative power of glam rock via aspirational posturing) while also producing an album that’s really fun to play loud.
40. Above The Rim (1994)
This is an essential sampler of mid-’90s hip-hop and R&B, particularly the West Coast/Death Row variety. The Tupac songs are great and not overexposed. The SWV track is killer and Tha Dogg Pound does Tha Dogg Pound things. But I’m going to be honest: Back in the day, this was my Warren G and Nate Dogg delivery device. Before you could stream the finest G-Funk era anthem ever, “Regulate,” nonstop from your nearest device, you needed this album.
39. The Big Chill (1983)
The most Baby Boomer album that every Baby Boomer’ed. Which is to say: It’s the second most annoying “significant” soundtrack of all time. (The most annoying is Forrest Gump, which is The Big Chill for people who thought that the nostalgia in The Big Chill was too subtle.) I enjoy all of the songs on this album, but the baggage from the film is hard to overcome. Like, when I hear The Temptations’ “Ain’t Too Proud To Beg” in this context, I can’t erase the close-up image of Glenn Close’s ass moving in rhythm to the impeccable swing of Motown’s in-house band, The Funk Brothers. Nor can I forget Kevin Kline’s indignant rant about how there’s been no good music released since the ’60s. My appreciation of “Whiter Shade Of Pale” is only so strong. Nevertheless, I acknowledge this soundtrack’s historical significance — as much as any single album it codified the concept of “oldies radio” — in spite of my personal, Gen-X resentments.
38. Garden State (2004)
The Big Chill for millennials. That this soundtrack became a cultural shorthand for a brand of indie music that aging punks with Fugazi social-media avatars felt compelled to mock or outright condemn speaks to its stature. Love it or hate it, the Garden State soundtrack has an identity as an album that outstrips Zach Braff’s modest homage to The Graduate. Also: Natalie Portman was right. The first Shins album really will change (or at least moderately enhance) your life.
37. Clueless (1995)
I thought about putting Fast Times At Ridgemont High on this list, but the soundtrack is larded with too many past-their-time arena-rock acts that either worked professionally with the film’s co-producer Irving Azoff or palled around with Fast Times screenwriter Cameron Crowe. Both men were at odds with director Amy Heckerling, whose punk/new wave sensibility was more in line with youth culture at the time. You can tell that Heckerling got her way with Clueless, another L.A. teen comedy whose alt-rock soundtrack practically screams 1995 in bright pink letters. What that means is plenty of sugary bangers from the likes of Supergrass, Luscious Jackson, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Smoking Popes, Counting Crows, and The Muffs.
36. Romeo + Juliet (1996)
In Clueless, the protagonist Cher (Alicia Silverstone) refers to Radiohead as “the maudlin music of the university station” and, later, “complaint rock.” But in the mid-’90s, Radiohead was also “soundtrack rock.” And if you were a fan, you were often strong-armed into buying soundtracks with Radiohead songs that weren’t easily available elsewhere. In the case of Clueless, it was an acoustic version of “Fake Plastic Trees.” For Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, it was one of their best B-sides, “Talk Show Host.” While the original version could be procured by purchasing the “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” single, the sleek “Nelle Hooper remix” version included on this soundtrack became canon. (The band also supposedly wrote “Exit Music (For A Film)” for Luhrmann, but wisely held it back one year for OK Computer.) I also must mention the thoroughly delightful confection “Lovefool” by The Cardigans, a huge hit that subsequently helped to make the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack a huge hit.
35. The Crow (1994)
Low-key one of the most ubiquitous CDs of the mid-’90s. Every friend group had at least one person who kept this album inside of their Case Logic at all times. “Big Empty” by Stone Temple Pilots was the most popular track, but The Cure’s “Burn” might be the most beloved number in retrospect. (To all of the people who complained that I did not include “Burn” in my recent column by The Cure: I hear you, and you are correct.) Upon revisiting The Crow, I was surprised that it didn’t include any nu-metal. And yet the cumulative effect of putting The Cure, Rage Against The Machine, Nine Inch Nails, Helmet, and Pantera in the same bucket feels very nu-metal.
34. Judgment Night (1993)
The Crow soundtrack did not actually invent nu-metal, of course. That’s because nu-metal was invented one year earlier by the Judgment Night soundtrack. I am being (kind of) serious here. As any student of ’90s soundtracks will tell you, Judgment Night is a thriller starring Emilio Estevez (ha), Cuba Gooding Jr.(haha), Jeremy Piven (lol!), and Denis Leary (rofl!!) that nobody saw in 1993. (For a minute I thought I did see this movie, but I was really thinking of Walter Hill’s Trespass, which has virtually the same premise as Judgment Nightbut came out in 1992.) But the soundtrack entered the bloodstream of American suburbia and rewired teenaged nervous systems everywhere. The idea for each song was to take an alt-rock band and a rap act and have them collaborate. The resulting tracklist is pure chaos. Dinosaur Jr. and Del The Funky Homosapien? OK. Teenage Fanclub and De La Soul? Sure. Sonic Youth and Cypress Hill? Whatever. Pearl Jam and Cypress Hill? Now that’s when the early ’90s ended and the late ’90s began.
33. Batman Forever (1995)
When Christopher Nolan took over the Batman franchise in the mid-aughts, the implicit idea was that it would correct the sins from a decade prior, when Batman Forever was a willfully silly springboard for the lush, romantic pop smash “Kiss From A Rose” by the Heidi Klum whisperer himself, Seal. In modern times, Batman movies are stern, serious, and staunchly anti-pop. But this only makes the Batman Forever soundtrack more appealing as a departure from the present-day, long-established, and kinda drab norm. This album goes way deeper than you probably assume. U2’s “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me” is the other famous track, and a capstone of their Achtung Baby/Zooropa period. There’s much more beyond that, though. The original Nick Cave and PJ Harvey songs are way better than they need to be. Michael Hutchence credibly covers Iggy Pop’s “The Passenger.” Method Man does a theme song for The Riddler and does not embarrass himself. Some kind soul decided to kick Sunny Day Real Estate some much needed cash by including a number from “The Pink Album.” Does this soundtrack album need to exist? Of course not. And yet it more than justifies its existence.
32. Batman (1989)
Prince’s soundtrack to the first Batman somehow is even more ridiculous than Batman Forever. And it’s even harder for me to resist. At the time, Prince was at a low commercial ebb after a series of experimental and oft-brilliant records released in the wake of another soundtrack, Purple Rain. For Batman, Prince worked quickly and aimed once again for pop appeal, and the result was “Batdance,” his first No. 1 song in three years. “Batdance” (let’s be real) is also one of the dumbest tracks in Prince’s catalogue, but the frivolousness of the soundtrack works both for the film (as a manifestation of Jack “Joker” Nicholson’s ’80s decadence) and for the album, which is one of Prince’s most accessible and mindlessly enjoyable works.
31. Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid (1973)
Time to revisit the soundtrack vs. film score problem. There is a subgenre of film music that I will refer to as “Celebrity Rocker Makes Cinematic Instrumentals.” Notable examples include Mark Knopfler’s Local Hero, Neil Young’s Dead Man, and Richard Thompson’s Grizzly Man — all of which I adore. But none of these albums are on this list because they feel more like film scores than soundtracks. However, I am including Bob Dylan’s soundtrack to Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid, even though it could (and possibly should) be grouped under the “Celebrity Rocker Makes Cinematic Instrumentals” category. But I’m not doing that for three reasons. No. 1, it says “Bob Dylan Soundtrack” on the album cover. No. 2, it includes one of his most famous songs, “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.” No. 3 … well, there are a lot of tracks named “Billy” that sound more or less sound like the same song. But that song is incredible.
30. Shaft (1971)
An even more egregious example of a “Celebrity Rocker Makes Cinematic Instrumentals” album sneaking on the list. Isaac Hayes’ soundtrack to the blaxploitation classic is almost entirely instrumentals, and many of them are pretty forgettable. The exception, of course, is the title track, which is such an overwhelming dose of ’70s funk that it overcomes the overall weakness of the album (and the rigid methodology of this list) to land all the way at No. 30.
29. The Bodyguard (1992)
The first three songs are indisputable. “I Will Always Love You” speaks for itself. “I Have Nothing” would be the showstopper on any album that didn’t also include “I Will Always Love You.” And then you have “I’m Every Woman,” which coming out of Whitney Houston’s mouth can only be classified as truth in advertising. Those are the songs that made this one of the most commercially ginormous soundtracks in history. But if we dig past them we find … multiple Kenny G tracks. And a woefully unnecessary cover of Nick Lowe’s “(What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding.” And a forgettable Joe Cocker number that might as well be titled “Contractual Obligation.” This has to one of the most top-heavy soundtracks ever. But the top is enough of a peak for The Bodyguard to land inside the Top 30.
28. Good Will Hunting (1997)
If you have never sat in a car with your friends driving aimlessly at dusk while listening to this album, you probably were not between the ages of 16 and 22 in the summer of 1997. In the context of Elliott Smith’s career, Good Will Hunting might seem to contemporary listeners like a footnote, since we’re now all aware of the man’s genius. But in ’97, this soundtrack introduced most of the world to the greatest songwriter they had never heard of. Listening to it now, I was kind of shocked that there are songs not by Elliott Smith on the soundtrack. I don’t think we bothered to listen to Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street” or The Waterboys’ “Fisherman’s Blues,” even though those are great songs. Once you hear Elliott Smith, it is impossible to listen to anything else for a good long time.
27. Magnolia (1999)
Aimee Mann wasn’t as obscure before Magnolia as Elliott Smith was before Good Will Hunting, but Paul Thomas Anderson’s coke-fueled exegesis on grief and the tortured bonds between parents and children did put her music at the center of culture for the first time since her Til Tuesday period in the mid-’80s. Her songs are practically a character in the film, though as an album Magnolia is a more coherent (and far more succinct) expression of yearning for transcendence amid life-quaking emotional turmoil.
As a special bonus, you also get the two greatest Supertramp songs of all time.
26. Drive (2011)
Before he was a hit-making focal point of the Barbie soundtrack, Ryan Gosling was an avatar for all of us indie kids who suddenly became obsessed with the Tangerine Dream scores for Sorcerer, Thief, and Risky Business in the early 2010s. (Again, while I love Tangerine Dream, there are not on this list due to the soundtrack vs. film score conundrum.) Actually, the bulk of this soundtrack is composed of Cliff Martinez’s fantastically atmospheric score, which makes its inclusion here another of my aforementioned contradictions. My justification: Drive captured the zeitgeist as a film and an album, with the latter proving to be an influence on everybody from Taylor Swift to The Weeknd to countless throwback indie synth-pop acts.
25. The Harder They Come (1972)
What Saturday Night Fever did for disco in the ’70s, The Harder They Come did for reggae — it introduced the (white American) layperson to an entire genre and subculture. The star of the show, of course, is Jimmy Cliff, who contributed the immortal title track specifically for the film along with a trio of previously released killers: “You Can Get It If You Really Want,” “Sitting In Limbo,” and the painfully beautiful “Many Rivers To Cross.” The reminder is a top-flight sampler of highlights from the late ’60s and early ’70s from the likes of Toots & The Maytals, Desmond Dekker, and The Melodians.
24. Rushmore (1998)
When it comes to Wes Anderson soundtracks, there are Rushmore people and there are The Royal Tenenbaums people. These albums are Revolver and Sgt. Pepper for indie rock-enjoying cinephiles who came of age at the turn of the century. In this analogy, I must go with the Revolver equivalent. I value this album because it introduced me to the super fab “Making Time” by The Creation. I also appreciate all of the heart-tugging British rock ballads, from Chad & Jeremy’s “A Summer Song” to John Lennon’s “Oh! Yoko” to The Faces’ all-time credits closer “Ooh La La.” (This album also revived Cat Stevens back to his Harold AndMaude-level soundtrack glory.) But what really puts Rushmore over the top is The Who’s “A Quick One, While He’s Away.” As a fellow classic rock snob, I appreciate Wes’ good taste in choosing the live version from The Rolling StonesRock & Roll Circus, in which Max Fischer (and all of us dorks who related to him) is finally told, “You are forgiven.”
23. Help! (1965)
Let’s say you’re the biggest rock band in the world. Let’s say you’re the biggest rock band that has ever been in the world. Let’s say you’re coming off your first film, and it’s the greatest rock ‘n’ roll comedy ever made. Let’s say you react to your immense success by turning into wake-and-bake stoners. Let’s say that for your second film you basically want to spend the studio’s money by turning the shoot into an extended vacation — at the beach, on the ski slopes, at Stonehenge.
It sounds like a recipe for disaster. But even if The Beatles weren’t operating at full-strength on Help!, this is The Beatles we’re talking about. Only the first half of the soundtrack made it in the film, and it’s half classics (“You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away,” “Ticket To Ride,” the title song) and half deep cuts that are fine by band standards and pretty great by regular human standards. The second half is weaker, but it also has “Yesterday,” a song Paul McCartney literally wrote in his sleep. The overall album is in the bottom half of all Beatles LPs but in the upper echelon of soundtrack albums.
22. O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
Incredible soundtrack that I am docking five spots for influencing the course of folk music, mustaches, suspenders, and conspicuous hats in the 21st century.
21. Repo Man (1984)
The “cool older sibling from the ’80s” soundtrack album. As Alex Cox’s film mainstreamed underground L.A. punk, the soundtrack album traveled even farther as an entry point for suburban kids who weren’t already versed in Black Flag, Circle Jerks, and Suicidal Tendencies. Well into the ’90s, this album remained an essential text for anyone rebelling against ordinary fucking people.
20. Dirty Dancing (1987)
“Dad Rock” is a concept that has been endlessly discussed, dissected, and debated. But when the time comes to finally parse “Mom Rock,” the Dirty Dancing soundtrack album will have to be part of the conversation. It certainly is “My Mom Rock,” in that it was one of the only tapes my mother owned, which is why I know it by heart. About half of this album is oldies, and they’re all pretty terrific and surprisingly Scorsese-esque: The Ronettes’ “Be My Baby,” Maurice Williams and The Zodiacs’ “Stay,” Bruce Channel’s “Hey Baby,” Mickey & Sylvia’s “Love Is Strange,” and The Five Satins’ “(I’ll Remember) In The Still Of The Night.” But I think my mother preferred the contemporary tracks, particularly “She’s Like The Wind,” and not only because she had the hots for Patrick Swayze. As a music critic, I’m most interested in the most famous number, Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes’ “(I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life,” in part because it demonstrates that the gap between “Mom Rock” and “Michelob Rock” is incredibly narrow.
19. Top Gun (1986)
Speaking of Michelob Rock: Top Gun even outshoots The Color Of Money. Ronald Reagan did not literally produce this album, but he absolutely did in the figurative sense. Is this a compliment? Probably not. But Top Gun absolutely captures a moment in time as well as any soundtrack album. And what was that moment? It was a moment when the industrial-military complex was considered erotic. It was a moment when shirtless male volleyball was considered heterosexual. It was a moment when Kenny Loggins was considered an expert on identifying dangerous zones. It was a moment when people considered copulating to Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away” while sheets magically waved in the foreground. It was … a moment.
Loggins might be the star of Top Gun, but my personal MVP is Cheap Trick’s Robin Zander, whose incredible vocal (sorry) elevates“Mighty Wings” beyond “’80s soundtrack filler factory” material to (sorry again) a sky-high peak.
18. Goodfellas (1990)
Circling back to what I said at the start of this list: There’s a world of difference between Goodfellas (the music used in the film) and Goodfellas (the soundtrack album). To name one example: Only one song (Muddy Waters’ “Mannish Boy”) from the iconic helicopter sequence (when Ray Liotta is running around town trying to sell guns in a severe cocaine haze while being tailed by the cops) is on the album. There is no “Memo From Turner.” There is no “What Is Life.” There is no “Monkey Man.” An album with all of those songs (and more from the film) is maybe the best soundtrack album ever. The album that actually exists, however, is the 18th best soundtrack.
(Shout out to Mean Streets, which does not have an official soundtrack album, though it would be an all-time contender for the top soundtrack album crown if it did.)
17. Trouble Man (1972)
As I admitted, I have contradicted myself four times on the soundtrack vs. film score problem. The first three were Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid, Shaft, and Drive. This is the fourth. Trouble Man is a total “Celebrity Rocker Makes Cinematic Instrumentals” album. But it’s just too goddamn funky for me not to include it. If this undermines my credibility, so be it. It’s the cost of being a Trouble Man. For Marvin Gaye, this was the record between What’s Going On and Let’s Get It On, and it has an appropriate mix of social consciousness and full-on copulation vibes. Trouble Man also reiterates that Marvin was writing some of the most beautiful music created by anyone ever at the time, even before he opened his mouth and let out the voice of God himself.
16. To Live And Die In L.A. (1985)
Is it possible that I actually contradicted myself five times? To Live And Die In L.A. is officially billed as a soundtrack, but that feels like a technicality. It definitely could be a score. What if I said that the sort of moment that Marvin Gaye had in the early ’70s was also the kind of moment that (cough) Wang Chung had in the mid-’80s? Okay, I don’t fully believe that either. But I will argue that To Live And Die In L.A. is one of the best synth-rock albums of the decade. It both evokes the seedy underbelly of America’s glamour capitol as it stood at the time, while also inventing (or at least perfecting) many of the era’s sonic signifiers. But honestly, that’s just a bunch of critical jargon. I put this album here because “City Of The Angels” is the kind of song that will make me pull on the highway and drive way too fast, preferably in the wrong direction.
15. Miami Vice (1985)
When it comes to synth-rock soundtracks connected to crime thrillers, Jan Hammer is The Beatles and Wang Chung is The Rolling Stones. And Phil Collins is Bob Dylan. I will not be taking any further questions at this time.
14. Once Upon A Time … In Hollywood (2019)
Quentin Tarantino is the single most influential compiler of soundtrack albums in the past 30 years. Nobody comes close. He’s such a pervasive figure in this space that including one of his soundtracks on a list like this reflexively feels basic. But ignoring Tarantino would be an even greater sin, not to mention a bold-faced lie. I grew up on Quentin Tarantino soundtracks, my tastes as a younger man were influenced by Quentin Tarantino soundtracks, and I continue to enjoy Quentin Tarantino soundtracks to this day. For the sake of variety, I didn’t put Reservoir Dogs or either Kill Bill album on this list, though I do love them. (I even like the soundtrack for Death Proof.) But I am including Once Upon A Time … In Hollywood because it is the most immersive. While the mix of late ’60s pop-rock gems is delectable — yes, I did have a Los Bravos phase after this album came out — what really puts the album over is the selection of vintage commercials. Putting this soundtrack on is the next best thing to flying down Sunset Boulevard while riding shotgun with Cliff Booth in 1969.
13. Jackie Brown (1997)
Because this is the album that introduced Bloodstone’s “Natural High” into my life — as well as Bobby Womack’s “Across 110th Street” and The Brothers Johnson’s “Strawberry Letter 23” — the least I can do is put it at No. 13.
12. Parade (1986)
After he made Purple Rain and before he made Batman, Prince made another soundtrack for his film Under The Cherry Moon, which he called Parade. Perhaps he sensed that directly associating the album with the film, which was a bomb, was probably not going to make it more commercially viable. The album does include a song called “Under The Cherry Moon” as well as two tracks that reference Christopher Tracy, the character Prince plays in the movie. Other than that, Parade truly is a standalone work that functions as one of his strangest and most experimental records. It’s the peak of his post-superstar “psychedelic cipher” era. It also has “Kiss,” the sparse, demo-like funk-rock masterpiece in which Prince declares that you don’t have to watch Dynasty to have an attitude. Thankfully the song (and the album) have long outlived the utility of that pop culture reference.
11. The Rutles (1978)
The greatest musical parody album of all time, and it came out six years before This Is Spinal Tap. The soundtrack to All You Need Is Cash, a TV movie written and co-directed by Monty Python’s Eric Idle, The Rutles features 20 pitch-perfect homages to the various eras of The Beatles written by Neil Innes of the pranksterish British rock group Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. Innes nails the early Beatles (“Hold My Hand”), the mid-period Beatles (“I Must Be In Love”), and the late-period Beatles (“Cheese And Onions,” which was later covered by Galaxie 500) with equal skill. Sometimes he veers into quasi-plagiarism — Lennon and McCartney were later added as co-writers of some songs — but mostly Innes is a master of compiling Beatlesque attributes into shockingly good new songs, like a human A.I.
10. A Hard Day’s Night (1964)
How good is this album? It’s even better than The Rutles.
9. Trainspotting (1996)
A high point for Britpop, Iggy Pop, and heroin, though not necessarily in that order. For mid-’90s Anglophiles, this was one-stop shopping for cool music from the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s, a crash course in Lou Reed, New Order , and Primal Scream. Purchasing the Trainspotting soundtrack was the first step in fooling people into thinking that you knew about this music all along.
8. Dazed And Confused (1993)
The danger of the Trainspotting soundtrack in the late ’90s is that hearing it at an afterparty might be a red flag that hard drugs were about to be foisted upon you. In this “drug soundtrack album” dichotomy, the Dazed And Confused soundtrack was the less menacing alternative. It was merely an invitation to ingest weed and beer. I think that explains why the album went double-platinum at a time when alt-rock was ascendent and supposedly anti-boomer. In reality, a record that compiles hits by Aerosmith, ZZ Top, Alice Cooper, Kiss, and Black Sabbath was timeless during a period when the biggest bands in the world were shamelessly nicking from ’70s rock. Like the movie, the Dazed And Confused soundtrack is a testament to how aimless, drugged-out youth always feels a bit like 1976 no matter what year it is.
7. American Graffiti (1973)
The Dazed And Confused of the ’70s. Or is it the Dazed And Confused of the early ’60s? Either way this album pioneered the art of collecting a bunch of old songs and presenting them as a nostalgic portrait for an aging audience a decade removed from their teen years. To put it in modern terms: the American Graffiti soundtrack achieved in retrospect what the American Pie movie soundtracks achieved in real time, only it was with Beach Boys songs instead of Blink-182 tunes.
6. Boogie Nights (1997)
This was Dazed And Confused for my college years. As a compilation of disco bangers, this is probably more consistent than Saturday Night Fever, if not quite as historically significant. But the star of the show — aside from Night Ranger’s “Sister Christian,” which Boogie Nights transformed from an AOR also-ran into an ironic cocaine anthem — has to be “Feel The Heat” by Mark Wahlberg and John C. Reilly, the greatest bad song on a great soundtrack ever.
5. Super Fly (1972)
The fifth-best soundtrack album, the second-best soundtrack album created by a single artist, and the No. 1 soundtrack to a blaxploitation film. This is also the best example of a soundtrack album that expresses the ideas of the film better than the film. The emptiness of the American Dream, and the corrosive self-destruction that capitalism encourages, is fully interrogated by Curtis Mayfield on Super Fly, which otherwise sounds so funky and sexy that it doesn’t hit like an intellectual exercise but rather as street-level reportage.
4. Singles (1992)
A soundtrack album that captures a moment in time while simultaneously creating a moment in time. Released in the summer of 1992, Singles arrived just as alternative rock was blowing up. The soundtrack’s stars, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden, had just started playing together on the summer’s traveling Lollapalooza tour. Anyone who did not already own Ten or Badmotorfinger (and that was still a lot of people at the time) now had a handy sampler to introduce them to the scene. The album was even ahead of the curve in some respects — the excellent album opener “Would?” arrived three months before Alice In Chains’ harrowing second LP, Dirt. Another highlight, “Drown,” spotlighted Smashing Pumpkins, who were still relatively obscure about a year out from the release of Siamese Dream. As a movie, Singles pretty much came and went but the soundtrack became an immediate touchstone that in retrospect functions as a definitive document of a musical movement unfolding in real time.
3. Pulp Fiction (1994)
As I previously stated, Quentin Tarantino is the single most influential compiler of soundtrack albums in the past 30 years. And this is his single most influential soundtrack. Anyone who uses an old song to create an ironic counterpoint to on-screen violence, anyone who digs up a musical obscurity in order to give their film the imprimatur of discerning quality, anyone who mashes up surf rock with funk and country gospel to convey a chaotic but nevertheless coherent aesthetic — they are all in some way nodding in the direction of the Pulp Fiction soundtrack. It is their shepherd through the musical valley of darkness.
2. Saturday Night Fever (1977)
There’s a strong musicologist argument against this album, which is that a scene invented by queer, Black, and Latin artists ought not to be represented by a double LP headlined by three white male Australians. It’s such a strong argument that I wouldn’t dream of disputing it. I wouldn’t dream of it because I am a weak man. I am a weak man because I also can’t resist (affects the guitar sound from “Stayin’ Alive”) bwa bwa bwa ba da da bwa bwa ba da da da da. Even though (like you) I have heard it 1.6 billion times. Because Saturday Night Fever is indestructible. We know this because many people (even the Bee Gees) have tried to kill it and they have never succeeded. This album is so iconic and popular that it has endured endless success-to-laughingstock-and-back-to-success cycles. You can enjoy it as pop music, as a joke, as a dated cultural reference, and/or as a deathless classic. Just don’t expect it to ever go away.
1. Purple Rain (1984)
The only possible strike against putting this at No. 1 is that it’s (sort of) a concert soundtrack. Three of the songs (“I Would Die 4 U,” “Baby I’m A Star,” and the title song) were recorded live at Minneapolis’ First Avenue in August 1983. But those tracks were also overdubbed to the max. Also, it’s unclear if Prince performed those songs as himself or as his Purple Rain character, The Kid. But really, why in the world would I disqualify Purple Rain from its proper place on a technicality? Dearly beloved, we are gathered today to get through this thing called “soundtrack albums.” There were 50 entries and that’s a mighty long list. But I’m here to tell you there’s something else … the afterworld. In terms of the best soundtracks of all time, Purple Rain is the afterworld.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
There’s a truism about debut albums that an artist or band has their whole life to write one. And that is supposed to explain why the best debuts are so good — nothing that comes after will ever be prepared with as much thought or be accompanied by higher stakes. A great debut can make you, and it can also create framework by which anything you do afterward is judged.
Here’s a truism about me: I have spent almost my whole life listening to debut albums, and I think I have a good idea about what makes them good. That is why I have ranked the 100 best debut records.
Now, in order to do this, I established specific criteria that I will share in a minute. But generally speaking: My personal preference plays a role here, but I also tried to not be a complete authoritarian with my own taste. I utilized a variety of litmus tests to mitigate my own biases, which I am otherwise transparent about in this column.
Does this mean I was completely successful? Probably not. Are there choices that might upset some people? Certainly. Did I make room for the first Coldplay record but not the first Beatles album? I’m afraid so.
Let’s get into it.
100. The Exploding Hearts, Guitar Romantic (2003)
The most important thing to understand about debut albums is that they are first and foremost about hope.
It starts with the hope of the artist who dreams about making a record one day. If the artist achieves this dream, the hope transfers to the possibility that people will actually like their debut. If people like the record, the artist hopes to make other records that are also liked, hopefully more than this one.
But above all they hope that they don’t, in fact, suck.
That hope is attractive. It draws people in. Optimism posits that a debut is the first step on a journey toward fame, fortune, and a credible critical reputation. But the listener has hope, too. If you get in with an artist or band on the ground floor, you hope that your investment of time (and possibly money — artists hope you buy stuff!) will result in life-long engagement in which each subsequent record marks a new milestone in your life. The debut LP that defines your college years leads to the “difficult” sophomore effort that speaks to your early-20s malaise, which continues to the “mature” third record that coincides with the most crucial romantic relationship of your adult life. And so on and on until either the band breaks up or you die.
But we all know that most debut albums aren’t like that. Most debut albums are like most college basketball players — a one-and-done situation in which the early triumph is ultimately remembered as the single shining moment in an otherwise disappointing career.
But not all one-and-done disappointments are created equal. For instance, let’s say there is a band that puts out an excellent debut to rave reviews. And then, three months later, three of the members die tragically in a van accident. In that scenario, the band in question might be elevated in your mind as better than they really are, as they were cut down when the hope was still fresh and pure, before there was an opportunity to be let down by the “difficult” sophomore effort.
The Exploding Hearts is that band for me.
Is Guitar Romantic still on the indie-rock syllabus? I don’t hear it talked about much anymore, but it remains a potent hybrid of punk aggression and power-pop melodies that also has a deeply sad backstory. (The Exploding Hearts might be the last rock tragedy that is still under-covered by books and documentaries.) In my mind, Guitar Romantic personifies the “spend your whole life writing your first record” quality that debuts have, as well as the shooting-star trajectory that so many acts take afterward. It signifies hope, as well as hopes dashed. There are a lot of dashed hopes ahead of us on this list.
(I made a rule for myself that this list would not have any ties, but I could have written the same preceding words about Jay Reatard’s Blood Visions. RIP Jay.)
99. The La’s, The La’s (1990)
I could have also written those words about this album, though I am happy that Lee Mavers is still with us. It’s only his artistic life that appears to be over, which is just as well. When you write a song called “Timeless Melody,” and you manage to write an actual timeless melody, doing it 12 more times must be daunting. The only other option is becoming the most famous Gen X indie-rock recluse in Britain.
98. Alvvays, Alvvays (2014)
Before we go any farther, I must share the three most important criteria I applied while compiling this list:
1) I have to like the record. (This is 100 percent important.)
2) The record must be generally considered great or important by people who are not me. (This is 75 percent important in terms of getting on the list, and slightly more important in terms of where I ranked it. Though in the case of August And Everything After, it didn’t matter at all.)
3) Extra weight will be given to debuts that are clearly the best album in the artist’s discography. (This is also 100 percent important, as evidenced by the first two records on this list being one-and-done situations.)
It’s too early to say whether the first Alvvays album is definitely their best. (Plenty of people would say that Blue Rev beats it.) But the debut is the one I like the most, and it’s the one with my favorite Alvvays song, “Archie, Marry Me.” Therefore, because of Criterion No. 1, it goes here.
97. The Go-Go’s, Beauty And The Beat (1981)
The case I would make for the first Alvvays album is the same argument that’s made for Is This It — like The Strokes on their debut, Alvvays were in full command of their sound and aesthetic right away, to a degree where the subsequent records (while great) merely refine what’s on the first record.
I would say the same about the first Go-Go’s LP. This band is in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall Of Fame, and this album is 90 percent of the reason why. (The remaining 10 percent is due to the opening credits of Fast Times At Ridgemont High.)
96. Band Of Horses, Everything All The Time (2006)
It has been argued that white excellence may have peaked when Band Of Horses made “Laredo.” However, there’s no doubt in my mind that the debut is clearly their greatest work. Everything All The Time has a home on two of my personal lists — Best Debut Albums and Best Albums To Play In My Car On The First Day Of Spring When I Can Finally Roll The Windows Down. (The second list is closest to my heart, but it’s at least 250 albums long so I’ll probably never write that column.)
95. Joanna Newsom, The Milk-Eyed Mender (2004)
Another important criterion for a great debut album is especially pertinent here. It’s the “what in the hell is this?” factor. The first time you hear Joanna Newsom, it is physically impossible to not say “what in the hell is this?” Now, “what in the hell is this?” can be uttered in a good way (“what in the hell is this?!”) or a bad way (“what in the hell is this?!”). But it’s best if, at first, it’s neutral, in the sense that you literally don’t knowwhat in the hell this is and must listen obsessively in order to find out. Which is to say: The music is new and fascinating and enigmatic and rewiring your brain in real time. All debuts aspire to that and few get there. The Milk-Eyed Mender gets there.
94. The Jesus & Mary Chain, Psychocandy (1985)
The fifth criterion for this list is somewhat related to the “what in the hell is this?” factor, but it goes one step further. It’s a debut album that actually invents something. It doesn’t have to be a big something, it just has to be a something something. (The “invented a big something” debuts are naturally further down the list.) In the case of Psychocandy, the something was a collision of oldies radio and squalling noise that evokes the concluding Roadhouse sequences from episodes of Twin Peaks: The Return. There are countless artists posting albums on Bandcamp right now who stole all of their ideas from The Jesus & Mary Chain, and they might not even know it. They might think they’re ripping off The Velvet Underground, but they are really ripping off this band who ripped off The Velvet Underground in the mid-’80s.
93. Rage Against The Machine, Rage Against The Machine (1992)
This album invented the following: White college guys who wear Che Guevara T-shirts, the missing link in melding rap with Led Zeppelin between Licensed To Ill and that Puff Daddy song from the Godzilla soundtrack, the core lineups for Audioslave and Prophets Of Rage, (possibly) nü-metal, and a million tiresome arguments about whether you can be credibly socialist while operating within the corporate capitalist power structure, maaaaaan.
92. Tracy Chapman, Tracy Chapman (1988)
It gave the world “Fast Car,” the song that invented crying by yourself while shopping at CVS.
91. The New York Dolls, The New York Dolls (1973)
The sixth criterion will surely be the most controversial: No “historically important” debuts that can’t stand alone as truly great. This ties back to Criterion No. 3, i.e. “extra weight will be given to debuts that are clearly the best album in the discography.” In the same way that the MVP in sports is a regular season award, this best debuts list is fixated on the debut and not necessarily on the career that came afterward.
Therefore, Please Please Me is not on this list, because while it is clearly very good and extremely important, it is nobody’s favorite Beatles album. The same is true of Bob Dylan’s self-titled debut. I had a harder time leaving off the first albums by U2 and Metallica, because I love both of them, but neither debut belongs ahead of the best three or four records by those bands.
The first New York Dolls LP, however, does belong because in addition to being historically important, it also has the song where David Johansson snarls, “When I say I’m in love you best believe I’m in love, L-U-V.”
90. The Traveling Wilburys, The Traveling Wilburys, Vol. 1 (1988)
Let me tell you a story about unintended consequences: Because of Criterion No. 6, I also did not include debut albums made by Tom Petty, Electric Light Orchestra, and Roy Orbison. And then I made up a seventh criterion: If you make the list with one band, you can’t also make the list with a solo record or another band. Which meant that all five members of The Traveling Wilburys were now qualified to make it with The Traveling Wilburys, Vol. 1.
Is it possible that this was not unintended but in fact engineered by me in a manner that could be described as “rigging”? To quote Bob Dylan from “Tweeter And The Monkey Man”: Anything’s legal as long as you don’t get caught.
89. The Feelies, Crazy Rhythms (1980)
Let’s steer back toward sanity for a moment. The eighth criterion won’t be controversial at all: A great debut should be influential. This album is influential. It’s so influential it’s hard to imagine modern indie rock without it. It’s so influential that it has influenced bands that didn’t know they were influenced by it, which is the most profound kind of influence. For example, Rivers Cuomo claims he didn’t know this album before Weezer accidentally copied the album cover for their own influential debut record. Which makes no sense when you look at the cover of Weezer and all the sense in the world when you listen to Weezer.
88. The Black Crowes, Shake Your Money Maker (1990)
Influence is important, but it’s not that important. (It is only the eighth criterion, after all.) I could possibly argue that Shake Your Money Maker informs the sound of modern Americana and country music — I know for a fact that Jason Isbell rocked this record when he was in middle school, and the rhythm guitarist on this album now plays with Eric Church. But that’s not why I’m including it here. I’m including it here because it kicks ass, and debut albums that kick ass should not be taken for granted.
87. 50 Cent, Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ (2003)
The ninth criterion might also be controversial, though it’s really just a practical reflection of how most people listen to albums: A great debut does not need to be great all the way through if there are at least three-to-five undeniable peaks that everybody ends up focusing on.
I don’t know that I have ever actually listened to this album all the way through. Why do I need 16 other songs when I have “In Da Club,” “P.I.M.P.,” and “21 Questions”?
86. Air, Moon Safari (1998)
Of course, if your debut is great all the way through, that certainly isn’t a negative. I once called this “one of the best albums of the ’90s,” which is probably an overstatement. But I swear this statement is not: Moon Safari is like a Steely Dan record if Donald Fagen and Walter Becker were French and determined to write soundtracks to Stanley Kubrick films that do not exist.
85. Cyndi Lauper, She’s So Unusual (1983)
I’ve told this story before but it applies here so bear with me: The worst interview of my life occurred in 2001 when I was 23 years old. It was entirely my fault. My subject was Cyndi Lauper. She was already unhappy about doing a phoner with a very anxious cub newspaper reporter from a small Midwestern town. I could detect her disinterest and it instantly amplified my awkwardness. I delivered my questions with the calm assurance of George McFly asking Lorraine to the Enchantment Under The Sea Dance. Failure was my density. I mean, my destiny.
Finally, I really pissed her off. I asked, “So Cyndi, how does it feel to be judged by the standard of your smash hit first album?” What I learned about debuts that day is that artists don’t like to be asked that question. What was already a frosty vibe turned positively polar. More than 20 years later, the memory still makes me cringe.
And yet, even with all of that, I still think She’s So Unusual is incredible. That’s how good this record is. Not even my awkward 23-year-old self can ruin it.
84. Jay-Z, Reasonable Doubt (1996)
The only person on this list who made a debut LP so good that it set him on a path to marry Beyoncé.
83. Coldplay, Parachutes (2000)
“Pretty, lovely, fine, fair, comely, pleasant, agreeable, acceptable, adequate, satisfactory, nice, benign, harmless, innocuous, innocent, largely unobjectionable, safe, forgettable.” That’s how Pitchfork‘s review of this record opens. But that’s too many words. Here are the adjectives that actually apply: The first, the second, the fifth, the 11th, and the 15th. If we remove the irony, I would also include the 16th.
82. The Shins, Oh, Inverted World (2001)
Another Garden State soundtrack alum, which was great in the short term and perhaps not in the long run for the band’s reputation. There are Shins truthers who will insist that Chutes Too Narrow is better, but I chalk that up to “New Slang” fatigue. The debut really is the superior one, and it stands proudly in the “blue-themed guitar-pop” trilogy with Crazy Rhythms and Weezer on this list.
81. PJ Harvey, Dry (1992)
The same year that Tom Morello reimagined Jimmy Page as a turntablist, Polly Jean Harvey looked at Robert Plant, ripped his heart out with her bare hands, and installed herself as the reigning banshee wailer of bombastically violent blues-punk. While this is an instance where the second record, Rid Of Me, might in fact be better, the fearless audacity of Dry makes it impossible to deny even amid a golden age of classic early ’90s indie and alt-rock debuts.
80. MGMT, Oracular Spectacular (2007)
If you like this album at all, you like it more than the two guys who made it. The single most half-assed concert performance I have ever witnessed has to be MGMT’s encore on the Congratulations tour, when they cued up “Kids” and “Electric Feel” on an iPod and sang along to backing tracks like they were dragged along to office karaoke night. And you know what? Those tunes still killed more than anything off the “difficult” sophomore effort (which I love, by the way). This is what happens when you accidentally write anthems that a generation will forever associate with doing drugs and having sex in dorm rooms.
79. Billie Eilish, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? (2019)
As a man in his 40s, I am required to stump for this album. It is the designated “music for young people” record that every surviving ’90s alt-rocker on the planet — from Dave Grohl to Billie Joe Armstrong — has publicly endorsed. The Grammys similarly glommed on for the sake of much-needed hipness cred when they showered Eilish and this record with trophies. Without trying, Eilish bridged the generation gap by making an extremely internet-friendly record — her style of whisper-singing is ideal for earbuds and laptop speakers — that also cultivates an outsider vibe that feels very, well, alternative.
78. The Mothers Of Invention, Freak Out! (1966)
As a man in his 40s, I am also required to stump for Frank Zappa. Though, of all the artists I love, he is the one I am least invested in convincing skeptics to embrace. I completely understand why people can’t stand the guy. He writes stupidly complicated music and stupidly stupid lyrics. Personally, I think Zappa is 1) a genius and 2) one of the most obnoxious men who ever lived. These are not incompatible concepts. They are, in fact, intimately related. I have actually come to enjoy his obnoxiousness, though that’s likely a product of being Stockholm Syndrome’d by “Don’t Eat The Yellow Snow” during my pot-smoking twentysomething years.
If there is one record that non-fans might like, however, it’s probably this one, which offers a more palatable ratio of genius vs. obnoxiousness than any other Zappa/Mothers LP.
77. Lana Del Rey, Born To Die (2012)
The album that launched a zillion thinkpieces. The controversy Born To Die generated seems almost quaint now — were people really mad that a singer-songwriter named Lizzie Grant adopted an arch persona that celebrated video games, Diet Mountain Dew, and evening gowns? Back then, social media was new and there was anxiety about the authenticity of art that adopted the mood-board sensibility of Tumblr. But after a decade-plus of online brain poisoning, Born To Die practically sounds like an old-school singer-songwriter record, in which a witty and insightful tour guide takes you through her own fully realized world.
76. Father John Misty, Fear Fun (2012)
2012 truly was the golden age of giving yourself a wacky name and striking a messianic pose. A few years before this record came out, I saw Josh Tillman open for Phosphorescent in a small club when he was still in his J. Tillman guise, which wasn’t really a guise at all as it involved him singing very sad songs while seated on a stool and staring at the floor. The audience was unmoved. So while I had some reservations about even considering this a debut album, I ultimately concluded that J. Tillman died so that Father John Misty could live, and that this is where he really begins.
If you dig into the back stories of any of these albums, they are likely preceded by at least one of the following: A shitty ska album, a regrettable synth-pop phase, reams of bad poetry, or some other obscure false start that nobody cares about now. A debut is almost never an actual first album. A debut is the first album where you figured it out.
75. Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend (2008)
Lana Del Rey and Father John Misty immediately annoyed people who were not into the “giving yourself a wacky name and striking a messianic pose” thing. And that’s understandable — both of them were deliberately pushing people’s buttons. What’s less understandable is the rancor this otherwise delightful album inspired.
I can’t think of a record where there’s a larger gap between what was projected on the music and the music itself. Anyone with daddy issues who ended up misdirecting that anger post-adolescence toward Paul Simon’s Graceland hated this record. Apparently, this is a demographic predisposed to enter journalism! Music critics resented the members of Vampire Weekend for being young and handsome and confident and talented and preppy and good at everything. They were accused of cultural appropriation and wearing boat shoes on stage. It was all very intense for a few years there. And yet when you listen to Vampire Weekend 15 years later, it sounds … incredibly breezy and charming and impossible to hate! You put it on and it lights up any room! I still don’t know how I’m going to explain it all to my kids one day.
74. Dire Straits, Dire Straits (1978)
Has a dad-rock album ever dad-rock’ed more than this? I realized the best way to describe Dire Straits a few years ago when a millennial-aged co-worker brought them up on Slack, and said, “This is like if the Grateful Dead sounded more like Steely Dan.” I’m still not sure if this was a compliment or not but in my world it absolutely is.
(I would also like to mention that in my mind — because again there will be no “technical” ties on this list — that I am also slotting J.J. Cale’s Naturally here. You are free to insert this album into your mind as well.)
73. The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Gilded Palace Of Sin (1969)
Even if this album was bad it would still have to make the list based on the “it invented something” criterion. The Gilded Palace Of Sin is a foundational work of the Americana genre — what was known in the ’90s as alt-country — though what brings me back on summer nights at dusk isn’t necessarily the honky-tonk hippie vibe, but rather the heart-melting harmonies of Gram Parsons and Chris Hillman. With all due respect to queen Emmylou Harris, Gram’s bromance with Chris remains one of my all-time favorite duet partnerships. Dudes rock, yes, but these dudes also roll.
72. King Crimson, In The Court Of The Crimson King (1969)
This album didn’t necessarily “invent” prog rock, but it certainly set a high water mark for the genre. Along with Jethro Tull, King Crimson introduced the concept of sinister flute-playing to popular music, a true gift that doesn’t get enough appreciation.
71. The Stooges, The Stooges (1969)
More invention! Punk music of course is unimaginable without this album. Before 1969, nobody considered the utility of taking your shirt off, smearing your washboard abs with peanut butter, and singing about a desire to transform into a canine. This idea might seem obvious now, but back then it was truly revolutionary. And that’s because of The Stooges, Unfortunately, I had to dock this record 20 spaces because nearly a third of the running time is taken up by the interminable “We Will Fall,” which given its placement between two absolute bangers — “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and “No Fun” — makes it one of the most egregious momentum killers on any great album.
70. Bruce Springsteen, Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)
Let’s pause the conversation about debuts for a moment. Here is a much more specific topic: Third albums that feel like debuts, either because they were more commercially successful than the first two or because they’re way better than what came before. (Often both things are true.) Examples include Funkadelic’s Maggot Brain, Prince’s Dirty Mind, Janet Jackson’s Control, and The National’s Alligator. But the best example is Born To Run by Bruce Springsteen. That’s the record where the Boss finally arrives fully formed.
Having said that: I love Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. And I love it precisely because Bruce doesn’t have it together yet. The sound is thin and loose and semi-amateurish and way too reminiscent of Van Morrison. But the songs are there — any debut that has “Growin’ Up,” “Spirit In The Night,” “For You,” “Lost In The Flood” and “Blinded By The Light” must be counted among the all-time best.
69. Tame Impala, InnerSpeaker (2010)
Bruce Springsteen has nothing in common with this band save for one thing: Tame Impala became a markedly different proposition after its first two records. Currents doesn’t fit exactly in the “third album that feels like a debut” camp, because Tame Impala’s second record Lonerism is also a classic. But Currents certainly took them in a different direction from their fuzzed-out psych-rock sound of the early 2010s. A division exists in the fanbase between pre and post-Currents listeners, though the former feels like a shrinking minority. I love the whole catalog, though I do miss the days of InnerSpeaker when they felt like the blog-rock Pink Floyd.
68. Eric B. And Rakim, Paid In Full (1987)
One of the first “real” hip-hop albums I ever heard. (And when I say “real” hip-hop I mean no disrespect to Crushin’ by The Fat Boys.) It was the kind of music that my older, cooler neighbor liked. He lived on the other side of the duplex where I grew up, and sometimes he would invite me over to play rap CDs. His bedroom was in the basement, and he had this banner on his wall with the Public Enemy logo emblazoned on it, which was a very edgy thing for a kid from small-town Wisconsin to hang in his room in the late ’80s.
Anyway, I could front about the complex internal rhyme structure of Rakim’s lyrics like I knew what the hell I was talking about. But the truth is that when I hear “I Ain’t No Joke” I think about two white guys sitting in the basement of a crappy duplex and having their minds blown.
67. Daft Punk, Homework (1997)
What if I told you there was a song called “Da Funk” made by two French guys in the late ’90s and it was actually great? In the history of white people writing songs with “funk” in the title, this must be considered as part of the elite and non-embarrassing one percent.
66. Bon Iver, For Emma, Forever Ago (2007)
This is the 66th best debut album ever, but the backstory is in the debut album top 10. If you know the record, you know the mythology — guy loses his band and his girl, guy retreats to a cabin, guy writes and records some songs, guy releases those songs, guy becomes one of the biggest indie stars of the 21st century. For the next several years after For Emma, Forever Ago, my inbox was clogged with PR notices about would-be bards and nature boys who escaped into the wild and returned with a collection of heartbreaking tunes just like you-know-who. I’m convinced that the popularity of AirBnB in the 2010s was powered in part by indie musicians who booked cabins in the hopes of making their own For Emma, Forever Ago. But there is still only one For Emma, Forever Ago.
65. The B-52’s, The B-52’s (1979)
A criminally high percentage of the population only knows The B-52’s as the “Love Shack” band. (No shots at “Love Shack” by the way. It’s a funky little shack!) As a public service, I am sharing this video. I have watched it 25 times and I suggest you do the same. And then make this album a cornerstone of your life.
64. George Michael, Faith (1987)
One of the all-time cassette albums. What Faith invented was a path forward for one-time teen heartthrobs who yearn to make “mature” and sexy music for adults. Harry Styles owes this album a debt of gratitude. So do Justins Bieber and Timberlake. (Shoutout to Justified, which didn’t make the list but gets an honorary mention here.) So many artists have followed in George Michael’s footsteps that the pinup-to-genius pipeline no longer seems remarkable. But 36 years later, Faith remains the best example of this kind of record.
In the liner notes, George makes a point of stating that the album was written, arranged, and produced entirely by him, which by modern critical standards makes him a rockist. But the man was just rightfully proud of creating one of the best pop records of the era. By the way, he also plays most of the instruments, and I’m guessing that he catered all the meals and cleaned up the studio at the end of each day as well.
63. The Killers, Hot Fuss (2004)
This album has a reputation for being front-loaded, and it is, though I apparently like Side Two more than most people. While hits abound on Side One, I spent many after-bars in the mid-aughts winding down to “Andy, You’re A Star” and “Midnight Show.”
62. Jane’s Addiction, Nothing’s Shocking (1988)
We circle back to hope. In the late ’80s, these guys seemed like the reincarnation of Led Zeppelin. After two perfectly over-the-top masterworks that melded back-alley punk with naked-torso arena-rock theatrics, they essentially invented the alt-rock template that scores of other bands took to the bank in the ’90s. Jane’s Addiction meanwhile imploded in a mess of absurd egotism and drug addiction.
To make yet another sports analogy: Dave Navarro must be regarded as the Dwight Gooden of rock, a potential generational talent who shone brightly for a few years before flaming out in spectacular fashion. Last year, I saw a Navarro-less version of Jane’s Addiction open for Smashing Pumpkins, and Perry Farrell and his implausibly smooth face made me mourn for what was lost. Alas, as we’ve already established, this is a regular season award, and Perry Farrell’s implausibly smooth face from 2023 does not matter, and Nothing’s Shocking still stands as an incredible rookie season.
61. Jeff Buckley, Grace (1994)
Another tragic one-and-done situation. If Jeff Buckley doesn’t decide to take an impromptu swim in a Memphis river, what does his career look like? Does he become one of the great singer-songwriters of the ’90s? Do people give Thom Yorke a rougher time for aping Buckley’s vocal style on The Bends and OK Computer? Is it possible that Grace is actually held in lower esteem because it becomes one of many Jeff Buckley albums?
All of these questions are unanswerable, as is the one that bothers me the most: Why does this record sound like it was made by a man who knew he was going to die young in a strange and haunting manner?
60. Fiona Apple, Tidal (1998)
I debated not including this album on “anti-historically important debut” grounds, as I believe that this is easily the weakest of her five studio albums. Thankfully, I did not adopt this idiotic stance. While Fiona went deeper and harder on subsequent releases, the fact that she was still two months shy of her 19th birthday when this dropped is frankly amazing. At the risk of being overly granular — as if I haven’t already been granular as hell during this exercise — this might very well be the greatest debut album made by a teenager. I am exactly six days older than Fiona Apple, and I was working a customer service job in the summer of 1996, which is a million times less impressive than writing and recording “Shadowboxer.”
59. Talking Heads, Talking Heads: ’77 (1977)
Another album I’m penalizing slightly because the next three albums are all-time masterpieces. And yet Talking Heads: ’77 still makes the list because it’s great on its own. This album also deserves credit for pioneering the “anti-frontman frontman” archetype, in which David Byrne — at the height of arena-rock swinging-dick macho men — inverted the paradigm for magnetism in lead singers in a way that influenced an emerging generation of indie and alt-rock performers.
58. Elvis Costello, My Aim Is True (1977)
One more foundational anti-frontman frontman, who began a run of “articulate incel” rock classics with this record. Given his cuddly contemporary image, it can be disconcerting to revisit his early misanthropic era. (Even the tender “Alison” has a serrated edge if you imagine, as I always have, that Elvis is singing while looking at his love via an assassin’s scope.) The only track on My Aim Is True that’s not convincing is “I’m Not Angry,” which is like Marvin Gaye recording a tune called “I’m Not Horny.”
57. Son Volt, Trace (1995)
Cue the inevitable “Son Volt was better than Wilco in 1995” conversation. It’s a cliche but it’s true: The minute you heard Jay Farrar apply his ancient-beyond-his-years baritone to “Windfall” — which I will forever consider the definitive alt-country song — it was impossible not to think that this was the next great American rock band. Ultimately, the other Uncle Tupelo offshoot was the one that vied for the distinction. Not that this matters in the specific context of this list. For our purposes, Son Volt is still the band. (As much as I like A.M., it’s not included here.)
56. Devo, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! (1978)
One of my favorite songs on Trace is “Ten Second News,” an almost comically bleak song about a town outside of St. Louis that was evacuated in the 1980s after a mass chemical contamination. It’s a real toe-tapper!
The first Devo album addresses that same Midwestern rot from a funnier vantage. The concept of this band and their debut was that American culture was devolving, an idea that’s even more self-evident 45 years later. But what’s really incredible is how they covered “Satisfaction” and improved on it, teasing out the anti-marketing thesis and expressing it as a full-on musical nervous breakdown.
55. The Clash, The Clash (1977)
I know this is a punk masterpiece, but I’m giving the finger to purity on this one. I prefer the bastardized U.S. version released two years after the British debut, because it replaces the weaker cuts with ringers like “Complete Control,” “(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais,” and “I Fought The Law.” I feel this way because that’s the version I purchased on cassette from Best Buy when I was 12, and also because it’s just a better record. (If this is considered a contrary Clash opinion, don’t get me started on the greatness of Give ‘Em Enough Rope.)
54. Bee Gees, Bee Gees’ 1st (1967)
Before they strapped on the white suits and gold chains and fluffed up their chest hair, these guys were the finest Beatles rip-off band on the planet. Seriously, listen to this song and convince me it’s not secretly John Lennon.
So, how can I justify not putting The Beatles on this list while placing the Bee Gees so high? First, like Tidal, this album is staggeringly good given that two-thirds of the brothers Gibb were still teenagers. But beyond that, they were already writing timeless songs like “To Love Somebody” that stand with anything in the Bee Gees’ vaunted discography.
53. Nine Inch Nails, Pretty Hate Machine (1989)
You don’t have to look hard to findvideosonline of Trent Reznor looking like a huge dork in the years before this album dropped. You can take these clips in one of two ways:
1) “Reznor’s Pretty Hate Machine guise was a transparent posture and these videos undermine its power.”
2) “Reznor’s Pretty Hate Machine guise was a transparent posture and these videos make its execution even more impressive.”
Obviously, I subscribe to the second notion, though ultimately the staying power of this album is related to how it now plays as a fairly straight-forward (and melodic!) synth-pop album rather than the shock visuals of those old Nine Inch Nails videos.
52. The Sex Pistols, Never Mind The Bollocks Here’s The Sex Pistols (1977)
This album has been disparaged by purists and revisionists for “not being punk enough.” They argue that Never Mind The Bollocks Here’s The Sex Pistols is “merely” a snotty hard-rock record. I agree with those people. I love this album precisely because it’s not punk enough and instead sounds like snotty hard rock.
51. Pavement, Slanted And Enchanted (1992)
My thing with this album is that I like Crooked Rain Crooked Rain and Wowee Zowee more, which means I should slot it several spots back with the Elvis Costello, Talking Heads, and Fiona Apple debuts that are similarly great but less great than what comes after. Instead, I’m placing it just outside the Top 50 because this really is the definitive ’90s indie rock album, even if “definitive” isn’t exactly synonymous with best. In the proverbial “what would you play for an alien to sum up this kind of music?” scenario, Slanted And Enchanted must be regarded as the go-to soundtrack for any hipster extraterrestrial.
(“Phantom tie” shoutout to Stephen Malkmus’ brother-in-arms David Berman and the first Silver Jews record, Starlite Walker.)
INTERMISSION
Now that we’re at the midpoint, let’s all take a moment to complain about what I haven’t listed yet. I’m including myself in this conversation: Here are 15 albums that I’m upset about not making my own list.
DJ Shadow, Entroducing….. (1996)
Sky Ferreira, Night Time, My Time (2013)
Fiery Furnaces, Gallowsbird’s Bark (2003)
The Hold Steady, Almost Killed Me (2004)
Jackson Browne, Jackson Browne (1972)
Kris Kristofferson, Kristofferson (1970)
Roxy Music, Roxy Music (1972)
The Slits, Cut (1979)
Smashing Pumpkins, Gish (1991)
Sugar, Copper Blue (1992)
SZA, Ctrl (2017)
Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble, Texas Flood (1983)
Ween, GodWeenSatan: The Oneness (1990)
The Wipers, Is This Real? (1980)
Dwight Yoakam, Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. (1984)
By listing these records (unranked and in alphabetical order) I hope to underscore the following: 1) These lists are always inherently flawed because 2) they are compiled by inherently imperfect humans who 3) acknowledge that many of you will simply CTRL-F this list to search for your favorites and therefore 4) including some of those favorites here might trick those people into thinking I did include them.
Back to the list!
50. Pink Floyd, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn (1967)
Since we’re at the halfway point, let’s review the criterion for determining the albums on this list:
1) I have to like the record.
2) The record must be generally considered great or important by people who are not me.
3) Extra weight will be given to debuts that are clearly the best album in the discography.
4) The “what in the hell is this?” factor.
5) It’s a debut album that actually invents something.
6) No “historically important” debuts that can’t stand alone as truly great.
7) If you make the list with one band, you can’t also make the list with a solo record or another band.
8) A great debut should be influential. (This is similar to No. 5 though you can be influential without inventing something. To name an obvious example: Oasis was the most influential Britpop band of the ’90s and they stole proudly and blatantly.)
9) A great debut does not need to be great all the way through if there are at least three-to-five undeniable peaks that everybody ends up focusing on.
This album passes most of the criteria, except for No. 3. Pink Floyd is in the super-rare category of a band whose eighth album (The Dark Side Of The Moon) seems like their first in the minds of the general public. Nevertheless, it hits Nos. 4, 5, and 6 so hard that you can deny it a spot in the Top 50.
49. Snoop Dogg, Doggystyle (1994)
I’m going to add one more criterion that I’ve hinted at throughout but haven’t officially codified yet: A great debut should be extremely you. What I mean is that if you only listened to this one album, you would have a completely full and accurate view of the artist. That is definitely true of this album, in which Snoop Dogg stepped out of Dr. Dre’s shadow and presented himself as the laidback hustler of smooth streetwise malevolence, a man who could rap about being charged with murder like he was delivering an Al Green ballad. Plus: In the annals of filthy ’90s hip-hop album skits, “WBallz” is the pinnacle.
48. The Replacements, Sorry Ma Forgot To Take Out The Trash (1981)
This album is extremely The Replacements. And, as I have previously written, it also invented a personality type for a certain type of Midwestern guy who utilizes bravado and alcoholism to conceal extreme sensitivity and depressive tendencies. Unfortunately, that personality only works for Paul Westerberg, and only on the first five Replacements albums.
47. Interpol, Turn On The Bright Lights (2002)
When Pitchfork “rescored” a selection of reviews a few years ago, the decision to lower the score on this record from 9.5 to 7.0 was the most contentious. It was definitely the most contentious for me. But I also understand it. I get why someone who was teenager or younger at the time might wince at the lyrics or roll their eyes at the haircuts and dark suits. This really is a “you had to be there” album, and by “there” I mean “bars and clubs in the early aughts.” Dismissing it otherwise as pretentious or dour misses the point; for a certain kind of person in 2002, this was a total party record.
I was 25 when Turn On The Bright Lights came out, which means I am predisposed to rank it at No. 47 on a list of the best debuts ever. Twenty-plus years later, few albums transport me back to my barhopping era as vividly.
As we have seen, one of the most common conventions for a debut record is naming it after yourself. The idea is that you are introducing yourself to the audience, and that this album is a summation of everything you are and will become. It’s also simple and easy to remember — you’re not giving the public any more data than it needs at the beginning.
In the case of this southern-rock landmark, the band decided to do a fun variation on the self-titled debut by explaining how to pronounce the band name in the title. This is fine enough if you are speaking the title, but it is very difficult to remember how to correct stylize (Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd) in print. In the days before copy-and-paste, it must have been downright impossible.
45. Boston, Boston (1976)
(Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd) is a debut album that doubles as a virtual greatest hits LP. It boasts several of Skynyrd’s most famous tracks, including “Free Bird,” “Tuesday’s Gone,” and “Gimme Three Steps.” But the ultimate example of the “debut that doubles as a greatest hits LP” is the first Boston record. Every song on this record is a fixture on classic-rock radio. If your station has “The Bear” or “The Eagle” in its name, you simply will not be able to function without Boston’s Boston. But even with that high level of exposure, the best songs still hit like power-pop gems on steroids, starting with the first track, “More Than A Feeling,” which was already one of the greatest rock songs of all time before Kurt Cobain borrowed the riff for “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” (Shoutout to Bleach, which regrettably didn’t make the list. Yet another decision I regret, even though I can justify it.)
44. The Modern Lovers, The Modern Lovers (1976)
Am I the first person to connect Boston with The Modern Lovers? Let’s walk through this: Both bands are from Boston, obviously. Both bands put out their self-titled debuts in 1976. Both albums open with one of the greatest rock songs of all time. “Roadrunner,” like “More Than A Feeling,” also ranks as one of the best driving tunes ever. And both tunes are about listening to the radio and letting the music carry you away. Does anyone know how Jonathan Richman feels about spaceships? I’m this close to really landing this comparison.
43. Pearl Jam, Ten (1991)
The Boston of the ’90s. Not every song on this album was a radio hit, but it feels like it was. Ten is also a good example of a record that didn’t necessarily invent anything but was nonetheless extremely influential, mostly in ways that Pearl Jam themselves came to resent and even despise by the end of the decade, which I have explained in much greater detail elsewhere.
(Shoutout to Stone Temple Pilots’ Core, which was not a Pearl Jam rip-off record.)
42. Counting Crows, August And Everything After (1993)
Tupac’s favorite Counting Crows LP. If it’s possible for an album to sell more than seven million copies and still be underrated, it’s this one. “Mr. Jones” was the hit, but there are several other tracks that seem more important because of the era’s mixtape network. Especially if you were making a tape for someone that you were trying to seduce, August And Everything After was an essential text. “Round Here” was a good and sort of sexy (without being explicitly sexy) atmospheric opener. “Perfect Blue Buildings” was ideal for conveying a kind of brooding but sensitive intensity if you wanted the tape’s recipient to think you were like Luke Perry from 90210. “Anna Begins” was a powerful tool if you were interested in taking a friendship to the next level. (Though it was also very risky to include if those feelings weren’t reciprocated. “Anna Begins” was basically romantic dynamite.) “Raining In Baltimore” worked for signaling that you watched Homicide: Life On The Street.It seems complicated now but back then it was instinctual. Before Tinder, it’s how you got laid.
41. Pretenders, Pretenders (1980)
The best debut album ever made by a former rock critic, and I’m confident it will never lose that distinction. That is, unless I ever complete my concept LP about putting August And Everything After deep cuts on romantic mixtapes in the ’90s.
40. Crosby, Stills and Nash, Crosby, Stills, and Nash (1969)
It must be stressed that I am talking about CSN, not CSNY. CSN is superior to CSNY, even though CSNY includes the single most talented member of the collective (Y). That’s because CSNY equals the sum of its parts, whereas CSN is greater than that sum. Introducing Neil Young to the equation threw off the delicate equilibrium of the first record. On the debut, Crosby and Nash showed up to sing and contributed some really good tunes, and Stills did everything else (with an assist from Dallas Taylor on the drums). That system worked. Inserting Neil meant adding another admiral, and the balance tilted. But on this record, the Laurel Canyon hippie dream is flawlessly presented and feels as comfy as the front-porch sofa on the cover.
39. Brian Eno, Here Come The Warm Jets (1973)
I didn’t realize how good this album was for the first year or two after I bought it, because I would only listen to “Needle In The Camel’s Eye” on repeat. How do you listen to any other song when that’s your Side 1, Track 1? Clearly Eno himself did not think this though, given what the second track is called.
38. Steely Dan, Can’t Buy A Thrill (1972)
When I started listening to Steely Dan, this was the first album I checked out. Not because it was the debut, but because it was the most “rock” LP in their catalog. (One of the songs I knew going in even sounded a bit like Thin Lizzy.) This seemed like a smart approach in the late ’90s. Twenty years ago, the early Steely Dan albums were better regarded, while 1980’s Gaucho was dismissed as antiseptic, and this was all based on their perceived rockiness. But now “perceived rockiness” standards go against the grain of current conventional wisdom on this band. The “most Steely Dan” Steely Dan records — basically the super smooth post-Royal Scam era — are now the most beloved, while Can’t Buy A Thrill is viewed as one of the weaker efforts. So, given Criterion No. 3, Can’t Buy A Thrill might seem vulnerable. Only I still adore this record, even though I’m otherwise a Gaucho guy. It’s not their best record, but it’s also not “just” historically important. It sets a high bar that the subsequent records proceed to match or surpass through the end of the ’70s.
37. Weezer, Weezer (1994)
The unspoken criterion for this list is that any album that came out when I was in high school will be ranked at least 25 spots higher than it probably deserves. I’m stating it outright now in the interest of transparency, so that you may mentally re-align these records to remove my bias.
Anyway, here is my critical analysis of Weezer by Weezer: It’s the sound of being 16. Therefore, it must be regarded as the 37th greatest debut ever.
36. Van Halen, Van Halen (1978)
This is Weezer by Weezer for people who were born in 1962. It’s the heavy-guitar album you play on a loop while driving the same downtown loop with your friends because you have nothing better to do. I put it one spot higher because I’m trying to make an honest effort to mitigate my prejudices as we move up the list. But, again, in the interest of transparency: I will probably not do a good job with this.
35. Missy Elliott, Supa Dupa Fly (1997)
Van Halen also gets the edge because of the “what in the hell is this?” factor of “Eruption.” And this album gets the edge on Van Halen because it has an even greater “what in the hell is this?” factor.
Some historical context: In 1997, rap was coming out of the gangsta era and entering an imperial phase of wanton materialism. Super obvious samples ruled the day. Flashy images captured by a fish-eye lens set the visual template. Into this world enters Missy and her creative partner Timbaland with a sound that deconstructs funk and infuses it with bump-and-grind electronic textures and a bevy of found and/or distorted sounds. On Supa Dupa Fly, you hear echoes of ’70s soul — most memorably on the bracing single “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly),” which draws on a 1973 Ann Pebbles hit — mixed with chuckles, burps, sighs, and various other alien-sounding asides. The final result was infectious and weird and as forward-looking as any album in any genre at the time.
34. Kanye West, The College Dropout (2004)
Remember when he was famous for making good music? His rookie season was truly excellent, and kicked off a run of (at least) five more classic records, when he could seemingly do no wrong. Or, if he did do wrong, at least it was a fascinating failure that might seem like genius a few years later. He was like O.J. Simpson coming out of USC! (Rather than O.J. Simpson coming out of a white Ford Bronco.) But 2004 is a long time ago now. Back then, Tom Cruise was still making dialogue-driven adult dramas and Kanye was putting out sweet radio hits like “Slow Jamz.” Were we ever so innocent?
33. Beastie Boys, Licensed To Ill (1986)
This album was a smash in the mid-’80s, and then it became the record that the Beasties had to live down for the rest of their career. And now it’s the Beasties LP I most enjoy revisiting. How do I justify this? Let me clear my throat: I concede that it’s not as clever as Paul’s Boutique or as adventurous as Check Your Head and Ill Communication. It is, in fact, far dumber and less accomplished than those records. Here’s what Licensed To Ill has that those other albums don’t: Uncut Id. Uncut Id is taking the riff from Sabbath’s “Sweet Leaf” and combining it with the drum break from Zeppelin’s “When The Levee Breaks,” and then inviting three idiots to chant “Ali Baba and the 40 thieves” eight times over it.
32. Wu-Tang Clan, Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) (1994)
I came up in an era where a pop song might be composed of classic rock samples and lyrics about being a huge scumbag. That’s what groups like the Beastie Boys gave us, and we loved it. But what was even better is that there were groups.
I love groups! I wish there were more of them today. But our favorite artists don’t have that “group love” instinct anymore. Now the question seems to be: Why join a group when you can be on your own? Allow me to answer that: Because an album by a group has a different energy than an album by a solo artist, especially debut albums. In a group, all the members are equally invested in that special “first record” hope. There are no hired guns here – everyone stands to gain if ineffable aspiration can be transformed into tangible reality. And that raises the stakes, as well as the potential. Hope blooms.
And you can really hear that on Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). This album is like that scene in The Dirty Dozen where Lee Marvin delights in hearing his soldiers bicker about how “we” aren’t going to shave any longer with cold water. In that moment he knows that these fighters, who came in as solitary psychopaths, now have a pack mentality. And he can unleash that pack on the world as a 12-headed monster.
Now, packs fall apart. It’s a law of nature. And groups often never recover that debut album energy. The debut isn’t really the first step toward greatness; it marks the inexorable slide into dissolution and solo projects. But we can worry about that during the next album cycle. For now: The Nazis can bring the motherfucking ruckus. But this Dirty Dozen (or so) ain’t nothing fuck with.
31. The Strokes, Is This It (2001)
Everything I said in the previous paragraph applies here. Though if I ever write a column about the best second albums ever, Room On Fire might rank higher on that list than Is This It does here.
30. Suicide, Suicide (1977)
If the only criterion was the “what in the hell is this?” factor, this would be in the top five. The CD edition packages the original album — a bare bones affair featuring Alan Vega panting and screaming over Martin Rev’s soundscapes created by ancient keyboards and punch-drunk drum machines — with the infamous live bootleg 23 Minutes Over Brussels, in which the audience violently attacks the duo as the set devolves into a riot. This was not an uncommon occurrence at the NYC band’s early gigs. And Suicide always gave as good as they got, attacking their audience sonically with a fearlessness that was both exciting and professionally ill-advised. “They came in off the street,” Vega explained later, “and I gave them the street right back.”
29. Nick Drake, Five Leaves Left (1969)
A subcategory of debut albums that’s about to become more relevant as we reach the highest levels of this list is the “classic in retrospect” debut. This is a debut that was ignored in the moment, but over time became a touchstone for future generations. Suicide is a record like that, and so is this.
In the case of Nick Drake, it’s not just his first record that came and went upon release. The three studio albums he put out before taking his own life in 1974 sold a grand total of 4,000 copies during their initial run. Let me repeat: 4,000 copies combined of three masterful British folk records that have since enchanted millions of listeners. A rounding error for Harry Styles was Nick Drake’s whole career. If I feel super depressed pondering this, I can understand why it also took a toll on Nick.
28. Big Star, #1 Record (1972)
Painfully gorgeous music is extra susceptible to “classic in retrospect” status. It’s as if the lack of commercial success makes the songs sound even prettier. (It is the opposite effect that money has on people.) On Five Leaves Left, Drake recorded live with a string section, which emphasizes the raw melancholy of downbeat ballads like “River Man” and “Way To Blue” and makes them hit your gut like a body blow from Mike Tyson in 1986.
The first Big Star record doesn’t affect the same sweeping grandiosity; it can murder you just with an acoustic guitar and a story about two kids walking home from school. Arguably the most famous “classic in retrospect” debut ever, #1 Record is relatively light-hearted by Big Star standards. It has that debut-album hope. It’s when the frustrations over not making it set in that their albums really grind you into dust.
27. John Prine, John Prine (1971)
When I interviewed him in 2018, I brought up a question I’ve long had about his first album: Why is he sitting on a bale of hay? “It’s taking me years to live down that record cover, especially with my family” Prine replied. “I grew up in the west side of Chicago and here I am on a bale of hay.”
As the Hank Williams of the upper Midwest, Prine wrote simple but affecting songs about regular people living regular lives in places like Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. And his core audience are those same people, and they play his songs over and over on long car trips to summer cabins in the northwoods. He sings with a twang, which (I guess?) tagged him as country by his label, Atlantic Records. But his self-titled first album — a “debut that doubles as a greatest hits LP” opening salvo that’s loaded with many of his best-known tunes — is really a masterclass in observational songwriting that’s influenced scores of artists across genres. And that’s because those artists grew up riding in the backseats of cars where they were exposed to John Prine over and over again.
My point is, the man should be sitting on a pile of brats on the cover.
26. Warren Zevon, Warren Zevon (1976)
A top five L.A. album. A “debut that doubles as a greatest hits LP” except none of the songs are hits (though some of them became hits when Linda Ronstadt sang them.) It’s Hotel California for perverts. The saltiest margarita. The sweetest air-conditioner hum. So long, Norman.
(This is technically not the first Warren Zevon album. 1970’s Wanted Dead Or Alive is technically his first album. However, I don’t think that counts. It feels like a footnote. It’s his equivalent of a shitty pre-fame ska album. Can I defend this on legal grounds? Not really. But I can defend it on “I really want Warren Zevon by Warren Zevon on this list” grounds.)
25. N.W.A., Straight Outta Compton (1988)
Another top five L.A. album. Admittedly, I probably prefer AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted or The Chronic. (I even have some love for Eazy-Duz-It.) But because of the seventh criterion, I had to either go with those albums or Straight Outta Compton, and you can’t not put Straight Outta Compton on a best debuts ever list. Plus, anytime I hear Dre say “I’m expressing with my full capabilities / And now I’m living in correctional facilities,” I can’t help but smile.
24. Wire, Pink Flag (1977)
As we approach the summit, I must point out two important facts:
1) This is the part of list where every album could legitimately be my No. 1.
2) 1977 is one of the three greatest years for debut albums.
The other contenders are 1967 and 1994. (In the modern era, it’s probably 2013, the year of first albums by Haim, Lorde, The 1975, Sky Ferreira, and Chvrches. None of those records are on this list but I’m giving them the honorary “phantom tie” shoutout here.) But for punk, there’s no question that ’77 is the all-time champ. This record is actually slotted by historians as “post-punk,” which shows you how fast things were moving that year. Just as punk was getting established, this London quartet said, “Hold on, we can write short and fast songs, too. But we’re going to sneak in a bunch of avant-garde and arty stuff as well as dashes of pop and prog. And then, 18 years in the future, Elastica will borrow some of our riffs and make an excellent debut album of their own.” (Shoutout to Elastica here.) “Prescient” doesn’t even begin to describe how forward-looking Pink Flag is.
23. Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin (1969)
I refer to the third criterion: “Extra weight will be given to debuts that are clearly the best album in the discography.” This benefits an album like Is This It, and it hurts an album like Led Zeppelin. A weird loophole of my methodology is that a band with six or seven classics in their catalogue will likely fare a little worse than a band with only one or two classics. That is how you end up with Led Zeppelin at No. 23.
22. R.E.M., Murmur (1983)
And that is how you also end up with Murmur at No. 22. I love this album. It is unquestionably a milestone in the history of American indie rock. I just listened to it and it holds all the way up. It’s an all-time masterpiece. And yet it’s probably my third or fourth favorite R.E.M. record released in the 1980s, and sixth or seventh overall.
21. Oasis, Definitely Maybe (1994)
People love to say that Oasis put out two great albums and then fell off the map. But this is not true. If I ever make a Best Third Albums list, Be Here Now will be there. (Even though the blurb will cost millions of dollars to write and run on 20 minutes too long.) I’ll go one step further: If I ever make a Best Sixth Album list, Don’t Believe The Truth will have a special place of honor. (Naturally, The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society will likely be No. 1.)
Of course, it is true that the first two Oasis albums are in a different league in terms of cultural significance. And Definitely Maybe is in a different league from (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? What distinguishes the debuts we’re about to cover in the top 20 is that most of them are obvious and deliberate attempts to make a paradigm-shifting masterpiece. Humility is going to be short in supply from here on out. Oasis set out to become rock stars with Definitely Maybe, they called their shot on the first song, and then they did it. And the records we are about to cover were borne of a similar mentality.
20. Frank Ocean, Channel Orange (2012)
For example, the drive to be great explains why Channel Orange can be credibly described as Frank Ocean’s debut, even though it was preceded by a well-regarded mixtape, Nostalgia, Ultra, only one year prior. The practice of referring to albums as mixtapes temporarily confused discography accounting in the early 2010s. It’s why The Weeknd is not on this list — House Of Balloons technically is not his debut, even though it’s basically an “album” that was released “first,” and that’s because it was classified as a mixtape. The Weeknd’s actual debut is Kiss Land, an album that lives down to its title.
Back to Frank: Nostalgia, Ultra really does feel like a mixtape because it’s a collection of promising sketches that doesn’t really cohere into something greater, while Channel Orange feels like his proper debut because it does cohere into a grander statement of artistic purpose and generational importance. (It also slaps harder.)
19. Liz Phair, Exile In Guyville (1993)
The most quotable indie-rock record of the ’90s. I’m convinced this is the rare debut that would have been a sensation in any era. This album would have exploded in the ’70s, and it would dominate social media if it came out next week. As much as I love Slanted And Enchanted, I’m not sure that record has the same impact if it was released in any year other than 1992. But Liz Phair singing “I want to be your blowjob queen” in a deadpan voice is timeless.
18. Ramones, Ramones (1976)
This record inspired practically every great rock band who came after (at least up through the end of the 20th century). And it inspired almost every terrible one, too. It’s so good that not even the indignity of absurdly rich men who launder their privilege by tucking their crisply vintage $300 Ramones T-shirts into their designer jeans can ever make this album seem lame.
17. Cheap Trick, Cheap Trick (1977)
How can I put this punk-adjacent self-titled debut with a black-and-white cover one space higher than the punk-centric self-titled debut with a black-and-white cover? Because I’m from the Midwest, motherfuckers! My bias for once overrules East Coast bias, and this is a top 20 rock album on any list, period. This one is for all the bands who played bowling alleys in Waukesha during the mid-’70s and didn’t get discovered by Aerosmith’s producer. To me, you will always be as legendary as any band who played CBGBs.
16. Nas, Illmatic (1994)
The Citizen Kane of hip-hop albums, in the sense that people eventually got so sick of seeing it at the top of best hip-hop albums lists that they started underrating it. Some critics have even talked themselves into believing that It Was Written is better. Honestly, I’m probably underrating it by putting it at No. 16. This really is a perfect record. My only criticism is that sleep isn’t really the cousin of death; according to physicians, not sleeping is the cousin of death.
15. De La Soul, 3 Feet High And Rising (1989)
This album undoubtedly is ranked so high because of the recency bias of De La’s albums coming to streaming platforms. It wasn’t that long ago that editors thought it was a good idea to assign takedown pieces of 3 Feet High And Rising because … well, there was never a good reason for that. Like Illmatic, it attained an undeserved reputation over time as a stuffy “canonical” hip-hop classic that was corny by modern standards. (And then there are the multitudes of skits — this is probably the most influential “rap skit” rap album ever.)
But now that 3 Feet High And Rising is accessible again, that tired myth has been put out to pasture. The volume of samples and arcane references that rapidly pile up amount to nothing less than a deliriously fun pocket history of late 20th century pop culture. In 1,000 years, historians will study this album in order to understand the after-school habits of American teenagers in the late ’80s.
14. Black Sabbath, Black Sabbath (1970)
Possibly the weakest of the Ozzy-led albums, but the “this debut invented something” credentials are off the charts. (Also, the bar for Ozzy-led Sabbath albums is impossibly high. This album slays by any other standard.) Simply put, we don’t have metal as we know it without this record. Nor do you have the mystical singularity of “Black Sabbath” by Black Sabbath from the album Black Sabbath.
13. The Band, Music From Big Pink (1968)
The most notorious instance of a group hitting a huge peak on the first record, and then heading into a steep, heartbreaking decline. It would be one thing if that fall was only artistic, but this band of bros also suffered an interpersonal deterioration so profound and troubling that it can’t help but color the otherwise pastoral innocence of Music From Big Pink. This is wonderful music, of course, but it’s an even better idea: Hang out in a cool house in the woods with your best pals, jam all day, party it up at night, and then put your music out in the world and become legends.
Like I said: A debut album isn’t really the first step toward greatness; it marks the inexorable slide into dissolution and solo projects. Music From Big Pink is Exhibit A for that argument. But when this album is on, I can’t almost forget all that.
12. John Lennon, Plastic Ono Band (1970)
This album is about trauma and bad childhoods and the salvation of finding the right partner. But above all it is an LP about moving on after your band breaks up. A solo record about the process of making a solo record, it’s extremely meta in a way that would only be acceptable coming from an ex-Beatle. If — to name one example — Scott Stapp had sang “I don’t believe in Creed, I just believe in me” on his first solo LP, it would not have hit as effectively.
11. Guns N’ Roses, Appetite For Destruction (1987)
I am glad GNR is still with us, and that Axl Rose has arrived at a place where he regularly drops kind and politically correct tweets. Incredibly, not even the people who quit or were fired from this band died prematurely. Nothing speaks more to the power of the human spirit than the resilience of these guys’ nervous systems. But as a thought experiment, imagine if the entire band went down in a plane crash in 1988. This would be a terrible tragedy, no question. I do not in any way wish that this happened. Buuuuuuuut, of the sake of conversation: No way Appetite isn’t No. 1 on this list in that scenario, no?
10. Madonna, Madonna (1983)
This is not a skipless album. It falls off considerably on Side 2. The quality gap between hits and filler is wide. Nevertheless: This record is at least as responsible for inventing modern pop as Thriller. A sexually provocative marketing genius from Michigan sets out to conquer the world by taking the grabbiest aspects of NYC’s punk and disco scenes and infusing it with pranksterish wit and naked ambition, and comes up with “Lucky Star,” “Borderline” and “Holiday.” When it comes to the fourth, fifth and eighth criteria, this one is hard to beat.
9. Lauryn Hill, The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill (1998)
When this album came out, it was obvious that Lauryn Hill was trying to make an album as good as The Wailers’ Burnin (which is evoked by the album cover) and Stevie Wonder’s Songs In The Key Of Life (which has similar range and heft) combined. She didn’t succeed, because it was an impossible task. But she did produce the most lauded and iconic debut LP of the last 25 years. And then she didn’t do much musically after that. This is a sad thing for the world but — given my flawed but nevertheless ingenious methodology — a good thing for this list. The stature of The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill only grows over time.
8. The Doors, The Doors (1967)
Yeah, I said it.
I loved this album as a teenager. Then I hated it in my 20s. And then I came back to loving it in my 30s, and that’s where I have stayed. It has the “virtual greatest hits LP” factor. It has the “what in the hell is this?” factor. (I refer to “The End,” a song that Francis Ford Coppola and I will defend to the death.) And it is way more influential than the haters will ever admit. Countless punk and post-punk bands have aped this record for decades. Anyone who reflexively mocks Jim Morrison probably loves at least one singer he has influenced.
Stop fighting the awesomeness of TheDoors! Break on through! Ride the snake!
7. Joy Division, Unknown Pleasures (1979)
Here’s one of the most notable Doors-inspired bands! In the biopic 24 Hour Party People, there’s a Doors poster hanging in Ian Curtis’ house, which we see right before he takes his own life. I don’t know if Curtis actually had a Doors poster in his living room, but you can hear him on this record taking what Jim Morrison started — singing doom-laden lyrics in a deep croon like an undead zombie prophet — and stepping even deeper into the pitch-black abyss. And then he died young, just like Jim, which proved that he wasn’t messing around.
6. The Notorious B.I.G., Ready To Die (1994)
Of all the big hip-hip debuts from ’94, this is the one I go back to the most. I’m pulled in by Biggie’s cinematic storytelling, the hard-hitting and relentlessly on-point production, and the disarming sweetness at the album’s core. Christopher Wallace wants you to know that he’s a bad man, but like Tony Soprano you can’t help but love the big fella. He has an indelible teddy-bear quality that draws you in and makes you instantly forgive the times when he refers to himself as “Bigga the condom filler.”
5. Television, Marquee Moon (1977)
I could write a blurb about why this is the fifth best debut album ever, but it seems more appropriate to convey my love of Marquee Moon by playing a long, lyrical guitar solo that fits beautifully with an equally complex and emotionally searching rhythm part. Nevertheless, I’m stuck with this blurb.
4. Leonard Cohen, Songs Of Leonard Cohen (1967)
To quote Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet: “Goddamn, you are one suave fuck!” To answer a question I posed earlier: 1967 is the best year for debuts. (I realize that no music critic will make this argument in 10 years. I am likely on the outer edge of music writers who revere the debut albums of 1967. The generational Overton window will inevitably shift. Nevertheless, this has no bearing on the actual truth of the statement.) Three of my top four are from that year, but this one might be the most radical. At the height of hippie trendiness, here was a genuine poet and author who dressed like an ad man from Sterling Cooper. And he sang sad and sexy prose over stately folk rock like he was reading it from stone tablets passed down from up on high. On paper, it sounds like the most pretentious music imaginable. And it might sound that way, too, upon first listen. But Songs Of Leonard Cohen has a way of taking over your life in the aftermath of your worst romantic experience, and then retconning it as your best romantic experience.
3. Patti Smith, Horses (1975)
Another Jim Morrison acolyte! And another poet! And another record that on paper seems horribly pretentious: Long and talky songs that merge Beat poetry and French symbolist writing with full-on evocations of rock mythology. But it all works because Patti is not some egghead intellectual but one of the realest rockers there ever were. So many people heard their own future when this record came out, and I think that’s because Patti manages to be both the fan and the star. Like another classic released in 1975, Born To Run, Smith treats music as a religion on Horses, and it’s impossible for me to resist joining her cult whenever it is on.
2. The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground And Nico (1967)
What can I say about this album that hasn’t already been repeated in 27 rock documentaries? The paradox of The Velvet Underground And Nico is that it explicitly warns the listener about the downfalls of being junkie, and also makes living the junkie lifestyle sound incredible. I realize this is not exactly a compliment, though it does suggest that Lou Reed was an amazing artist and an ineffective journalist.
1. The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Are You Experienced (1967)
Let’s review the criteria one more time:
1) I have to like the record. (I love this record)
2) The record must be generally considered great or important by people who are not me. (Are You Experienced is widely regarded as a classic.)
3) Extra weight will be given to debuts that are clearly the best album in the discography. (This is the best Hendrix record. At worst, it is tied for best with the two other studio records.)
4) The “what in the hell is this?” factor. (Have you heard this man play guitar? Imagine what it must have been like in 1967.)
5) It’s a debut album that actually invents something. (This is self-evidently true of this album.)
6) No “historically important” debuts that can’t stand alone as truly great. (Also self-evidently true that this is “stand-alone great.”)
7) If you make the list with one band, you can’t also make the list with a solo record or another band. (Was Jimi in the Traveling Wilburys? Pretty sure he wasn’t. OK, all good here.)
8) A great debut should be influential. (Self-evidently true.)
9) A great debut does not need to be great all the way through if there are at least three-to-five undeniable peaks that everybody ends up focusing on. (It’s great all the way through, but even if you disagree at least five of his most famous songs are here.)
10) A great debut should be extremely you. (No one is mistaking this for Eric Clapton.)
There you have it. Jimi is the best. I have a lot of hope for this guy. Wonder how his story ends.
Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
