My 50 favorite albums of all time... on this specific day
Or, I guess, in August, because I took forever to publish this
Favorite is a fake concept, to me at least, in regards to art. It means nothing. It somehow both does and doesn’t mean best, does and doesn’t mean most consumed, does and doesn’t mean most personally evocative, does and doesn’t mean most meaningful.
But, and this is important: making lists is fun. Very fun. A handful of years ago, my friends and pow-wowed to create our consensus list of the 50 greatest albums ever. A surefire, absolutely correct, definitely not flawed, perfectly-sampled list: four white dudes all in their early 20s picking stuff they’ve listened to for 10 months to 10 years.
Well, now our methodology has changed: we added two more white dudes and are now in our late 20s picking stuff we’ve listened to for 10 months to 16 years. This list is meant for no one other than ourselves, a fun exercise to kill the time as we waited for football season to start.
That being said: here’s where my ballot landed.
Note: I started writing this post in August and got insanely busy with work. But here it is.
50) Jason Isbell — Southeastern
I remember driving down with my mom to move to Charlotte for an internship, and every single album I tried to throw on was met with disdain. I put on Southeastern and she let it ride and didn’t complain. Mission accomplished, Jason.
49) Townes Van Zandt — Live at the Old Quarter, Houston, Texas
I don’t think I’ve ever listened to a live record that transports you onto a rusty barstool like this does. And Townes Van Zandt’s music is so intimate already, it’s a force multiplier.
48) Billy Joel — Turnstiles
This is a nostalgia pick, and I will never be too cool for my king William. I didn’t have an iPod until late in middle school, and would pretty much exclusively listen to Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits on my see-through green portable CD player. The popular album pick with him is probably The Stranger, but I love these songs.
47) Julien Baker — Sprained Ankle
For my money, this is still Julien Baker operating at her best. Sparse but big, absolutely gut-wrenching, and lots of reverb. Her Tiny Desk playing these songs is a total showstopper.
46) Aimee Mann — Bachelor No. 2 (Or, The Last Remains of the Dodo)
A more recent obsession of mine, Aimee Mann has this uncanny ability to feel like she’s bringing the house down vocally without getting loud or guttural. I’m also a huge fan of parentheticals in album titles.
45) Neutral Milk Hotel — In The Aeroplane Over The Sea
Could I have put this higher? Sure. Did I know other people would also vote for it? Yeah. Neutral Milk Hotel doesn’t need my help. Great album. Not sure what else to say.
44) Purple Mountains — Purple Mountains
I got into David Berman in the most regrettable way you can: digging into his discography post-death. But I did love this album at release. It is kinda weird to listen to now but still feels pretty worthwhile.
43) Hole — Live Through This
This is better than any Nirvana album. Argue with a wall.
42) Arcade Fire — Neon Bible
Growing up is realizing that this album is better than Funeral. Just hit after hit after hit. I say this all understanding that Win Butler is in all likelihood a severe piece of crap.
41) Death Cab for Cutie — The Photo Album
For most of my 20s, I was a very lame “the only Death Cab album I like is Transatlanticism” person, but I’ve come to the notion that this is their catchiest and best stuff, distilling the angstiness into some Built To Spill-ass riffs.
40) Phoebe Bridgers — Punisher
Because I liked her before she was cool. Duh. I was in on Phoebe since Stranger in the Alps, and while I’m kinda naturally hipstering and repelling from her a bit as she gets more famous, Punisher is so damn good.
39) Alvvays — Alvvays
Just archetypal music, another band that I can brag about being early-ish too. They popped seeing them at the Three Rivers Arts Festival and have been in constant rotation for almost a decade. Could very well have been Blue Rev.
38) Dogleg — Ender
Debated putting this on here given allegations, etc., but it’s just a choice via how much this album helped keep me sane during the pandemic, got me into the best running shape I’ve ever been in, and just rips.
37) Sioux Falls — Rot Forever
Just some of my favorite extended guitar riffs ever, this was the peak of this Sioux Falls/Strange Ranger project, and another staple of my running playlists, Copy/Paste in particular.
36) Bob Dylan — The Real Royal Albert Hall 1966 Concert (Live)
Bobby D. The GOAT. I get chills when he dedicates the song to the Taj Mahal then breaks directly into Rolling Stone.
35) R.E.M. — Reckoning
This was the only REM album I liked before I listened to the entirety of R U Talkin R.E.M. Re: Me? Just the best, they don’t miss. Maybe we’ll get some of these on The Bear in S3.
34) Young Jesus — The Whole Thing Is Just There
An objectively poorly-named band, but this is an album I can go for long introspective walks on the beach listening to. A top-tier memory is this past year, at a campground, getting stuck behind a train and listening to the entirety of 23-minute Gulf and still being stuck behind the same train.
33) Lorde — Melodrama
As someone who thinks Pure Heroine is pretty mid, this album is anything but. Also one of the better album covers of the 2010s.
32) The War on Drugs — A Deeper Understanding
Dads rock. I don’t always love albums that are as cleanly produced as this, but Adam Granduciel just goes fucking off and nothing else matters.
31) The Hotelier — Home Like NoPlace Is There
I used to hate this album. Then, I didn’t mind it. Then I started saving songs to Spotify. Then, I started running to the album track 1 to track 9, and regretting missing seeing them in DC on Tuesday god damn it.
30) Ryan Adams — Heartbreaker
Awful person, but it’s a personal list and I’m just going to be upfront and say I love this record. Unlike the Hotelier, though, I am not regretting not seeing him in Reading.
29) Miles Davis — Kind of Blue
I put this record on when I’m cooking, or when I’m watching a stressful sporting event that I don’t want to listen to the commentary on.
28) Rilo Kiley — The Execution of All Things
This is just such an album of one piece, everything just fits. You could say that they…. executed all things.
27) Bruce Springsteen — The River
I go through phases with Bruce. If I did this list in two weeks, it might very well be Nebraska on here. But The River is (mostly) just a more fun album.
26) Bob Dylan — Blood on the Tracks
Like Bruce, on another day this could be Planet Waves or Desire or Bringing It All Back Home. I think this is probably Bob’s most accessible album from both ends, a midpoint of the folk and rock that hits that dot perfectly.
25) Courtney Barnett — Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit
I got into the music I currently like in college, and this album was one of my gateways. Listening to Courtney opened my eyes about worrying more about the intrinsic qualities of vocals rather than “do they sound like they could win American Idol”.
24) Built To Spill — Perfect From Now On
Sometimes dudes simply need to sit down and jam.
23) Waxahatchee — Saint Cloud
I’ve always liked Waxahatchee, but this has been one of my most-listened-to records since the pandemic, just a weight-releasing breeze of a record.
22) Hop Along — Get Disowned
Breaking news: I like Hop Along.
21) Pinegrove — Cardinal
Some of their newer stuff has been solid. But we’ll always have Cardinal. We’ll always have Cardinal.
20) The National — High Violet
I could justify putting every National album until, like, 2018 on here. But when I drove my 2001 Toyota Avalon through Franklin County, PA in 10-degree weather, this CD would be on repeat, the soundtrack in my mind to the frostiest nights of the year.
19) Oasis — What’s The Story, Morning Glory?
Just the funniest band of all time. These guys are psychos. But goddamn, they made some magic.
18) Carly Rae Jepsen — Emotion
Yeah, I’m gonna be that guy.
17) Band of Horses — Everything All The Time
Just capturing a moment in music in a bottle at the perfect second. A great driving record, and some of the best songs of the 2000s.
16) Kanye West — My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hack pick. Bad person. Whatever. Album is still as special as they come.
15) Bright Eyes — I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning
Along with Courtney Barnett, this was my other entry into not using Pandora to listen to music. I listened to this record a lot when my first dog died. Pretty cringe, but I would never lie to my Substack subscribers.
14) Wild Pink — Wild Pink
Interning in Charlotte, at a job that required me to sit at a desk in front of a computer aggregating stories for eight hours, I discovered this record upon release and became obsessed the instant I heard John Ross posit that the “Redskins hate the Cowboys because Kennedy died in Dallas.” Since, Wild Pink has just continued to become one of the best acts of the decade, and I’m very happy to have been in on the ground floor.
13) Japandroids — Celebration Rock
Another running staple, and another album that I think I elevate because everything just feels like it’s rowing in sync. I still maintain the OKC Thunder should use this song in stadium.
12) Bruce Springsteen — Darkness on the Edge of Town
Just some truly epic Bruce growling and wailing and hating everything and being miserable but also being happy and also saxophone. Yep.
11) Van Morrison — Astral Weeks
I just love venturing into the damn slipstream.
10) M83 — Hurry Up We’re Dreaming
From a song about a happy frog to an odyssey that makes you feel like a speck of dust on the mat of the universe’s doorstep, this album has everything I need.
9) Bob Dylan — Blonde on Blonde
“The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face” might legitimately be the best lyric I’ve ever heard, or it might not even be a top 30 lyric on this album. The greatest songwriter in history was on one.
8) The National — Boxer
I’ve kinda wrestled with the idea that The National is Aughts R.E.M. and I think it’s accurate. This is their Automatic For The People. Embarrassing admission time, though: I first heard Fake Empire via a Macklemore/Ryan Lewis remix.
7) Sharon Van Etten — Are We There
A special voice and a special album that holds a special place in my (and David Lynch’s) heart.
6) Father John Misty — I Love You, Honeybear
So many walks in college were soundtracked by this album, just an incredibly funny and catchy love story. My grandma got mad at me wearing a shirt with the album cover, though, thinking baby Father John Misty was Jesus.
5) U2 — The Joshua Tree
I used to make the jokes, too. “WHY DID THEY PUT THIS CRAPPY ALBUM ON MY IPHONE LOL!!!!” But then I grew up. And then I realized that U2 can do whatever the hell it wants, Bono can say whatever dumb, self-aggrandizing stuff he wants and they can put whatever they want on my phone. The Charles Barkley of music, a band that people of a certain age will only see as a butt of jokes and a meme, but real ones know the truth.
4) Lana Del Rey — Norman Fucking Rockwell!
The culture is lit.
3) Car Seat Headrest — Teens of Denial
I very much hope Will Toledo gets healthy, because as it stands I believe I saw his last show, when he ensured he didn’t have COVID then very much had COVID. No matter. I can just listen to Drunk Drivers in the meantime.
2) Built to Spill — Keep it Like a Secret
Doug Martsch wants to do two things: uncork the best guitar riffs of the 90s and chew bubblegum. And he’s all out of bubblegum.
1) Hop Along — Painted Shut
The last time we did this exercise, I was too chicken to actually put Painted Shut No. 1, even though it is clearly my favorite record ever. No more. Frances Quinlan is a marvel, bringing the most distinct vocals of the generation matched with just S-tier, evocative storytelling. I will unabashedly stan them until I leave this earth.
And that’s that. I don’t know if anyone cares, but it was fun to do. Tune in next month for my haphazard 2023 list! Here’s a playlist of my picks: