Uncle Retrospective's greatest 50 albums of all time.

Music
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I’ve had my albums picked and I’ve the bones of what I want to write for a lot of these albums written but I’ve been putting off starting this for months now.

I’m pretty nervous about jumping in here, not only is this a big task, the posters who have gone before me have written with such skill and passion that I’m not sure I can hold up to their standard, but fuck it. Fortune favours the brave, the stupid and the reckless.
As you’ll notice from the title I’ve only gone for 50 albums as I found I was struggling to pick a top 50. I love so many albums but there’s only a certain amount that it seems that I’m willing to put digital pen to paper over.

So here we go, my top 50 albums of all time.
There are many like it, but this one is mine.

I’ve tried not to repeat bands or Mogwai and Orbital would be all over this list.

There’s an added drinking game where you have to take a shot every time you see a reference to the World of Darkness role playing games. Some guy called Mark Rein•Hagen has had an incredible influence on my taste in music for someone I’ve never met.

But let’s start.

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50

The Chameleons - Script of the Bridge

I’d heard The Chameleons’ name bandied about in the music press for years, and usually in relation to Joy Division, so I’d always be on the lookout for their stuff. In second hand shops, or seeing if any of my new uni mates had any of their albums that I could tape off them, but all to no avail. I’d been burned too many times on music mag recommendations and wasn’t willing to splash my very limited cash on an unheard of band so that was it as far as I thought.
Luckily I got their Best Of CD to review at the Sunderland Uni newspaper Degrees North, (See what they did there) and was well impressed. Moody guitar music? A man with a deep voice and a general air of disillusionment? Perfect for a 20 year old me.

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Script of the Bridge is the band’s debut album, and as good as the rest of their music is, they never surpassed this. The thoughtful, considered lyrics, paired with the cold, almost desolate feel to the music was something they could never quite replicate.

There really is something bleak in this early 80 Manchester sound and having songs called things like A Person Isn’t Safe Anywhere These Days isn’t really invoking halcyon days. There’s a lot of menace on this album, it’s soaked through with the sounds of those dilapidated streets and abandoned factories. You can feel the threat of violence everywhere.

This album is also interesting as it’s happening as the post punk sound is mutating into something new. The album opener, Don’t Fall is an 80’s rock song, all reverb soaked snare and driving earnestness. There’s definitely some Killing Joke, U2 and Bunnymen similarities but this is 1983, this is a sound that’s still developing.

Thankfully the album isn’t all like that or it wouldn’t be on this list. Here Today has the kind of threatening riff that endeared them to the Goths while no one else was listening. I mean, The Chams are not goth and probably would have thrown punches at the suggestion, but you can see how it crosses over. Sometimes the lyrics do have odd wince inducing profundity:

“Is my creator god or man? Yes, yours too”

But fuck it, I’d rather that than someone singing yet another love song.

I’ve no idea how the band have gone un-championed in the 20 years of post punk necrophilia we’ve lived through. Their fans include Alcest, Interpol and… Oasis, with Noel citing them as a huge influence. Which I honestly can’t hear, but I’m not going back to check that out either.

If you enjoyed The Sound, then I think you’ll love this album.

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And I can pimp my blog here too! :smiley:

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Highlights for me on Script Of The Bridge would be Up The Down Escalator, particularly the bit after they’re dragging me down! where it goes all widescreen, woof, so great. I find a View From A Hill quite moving too, that lengthy outro, proto shoegaze maybe? Can’t help but make me think of dusk falling. I find the album cover genuinely hard to look at.

Looking forward to reading the rest of the countdown and seeing if and when The Cure will turn up

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They nearly didn’t! But @Scagden would have hunted me down, so I put them back in. :smiley:

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And I would have been right to do so. Well done for avoiding this fate: there’s nothing worse than having a middle aged teacher relentlessly pursuing you with a thirst for vengeance in his heart

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Strong start :+1:

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Thanks. :grin:

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Great record this. My pal’s big sister got us into them when we were around 17 and crashing at her flat when we went to gigs in Glasgow.

Always felt that Interpol owed a massive debt to the sound of this album in particular.

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Yes, more so than Joy Division who were much bleaker than Interpol but they always got compared to JD more.

Really need to listen to The Chameleons properly, only heard a few tracks.

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I was just wintering yesterday if this was ever going to happen! Looking forward to it.

Chameleons seem to be having a bit of a moment now. After years of playing the Fleece in Bristol (approx 450 cap), they’re in the Marble Factory next time (around 1500)

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I was wondering the same thing. :smiley:

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That’s a great write-up. I really love this album - only got into them a few years ago and wish I had sooner. Managed to see them in Oxford last year and they were great!

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Holy Cow!
I’ve just discovered this thread. MNP and your good self are my favourite posters (because we pretty much have identical tastes :smile:) A lot of folk perhaps don’t recognise me because I keep a fairly low profile on MNP 100 films thread and don’t venture outside of that (apart from a few posts on the Neil Young thread) but I will probably pop up on here a bit. Perhaps I should say hello to some of you, my name is GothMoth and as Uncle Retrospective I like metal, techno, electronica and …you guessed correctly goth! Though on reflection I’m more of a metal head. Perhaps I should of called myself MetalMoth instead :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Great album by The Chameleons. No surprise Interpol were compared to Joy Division more, as no one seems to know about The Chameleons. Myself included until 2017 I think. If anything I’d heard a track here or there but never knew who had done them etc. But in September 2017 a friend asked me to join him for a small indoor goth festival approximately 2 hours from home for “Chameleons Vox” (apparently frontman Mark Burgess supported for non-original members) and I was impressed. Think I made sure to check out some of the music beforehand, but even if I hadn’t, I’d have been impressed. Picked up a nice copy of this album on vinyl shortly after. Somehow I’ve yet to check out any other albums, but I think it’s because I know this is their best (although the next two are also highly-rated on RYM).

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The American Dollar - A Memory Stream

It’s Friday night, the TV is out, so let’s open a beer and write about music!

The American Dollar are a post-rock duo from Queens in New York. I have no idea where I came across them but seeing as this album came out in the mid ‘00s, I’m guessing it was off The SIlent Ballet or After the Post Rock. They seem the most likely culprits.

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The American Dollar play an electronic version of post rock, and a friend described them as Sigur Ros without the noisy bits. Which is pretty close to be honest.

This album is beautiful.

The delicate interplay between the keys and guitar carve a space to let you just relax into the music. It always sounds bright and warm and clear. It’s languid in the best way, like a lazy summer day, where the sun is going down and you’re exhausted yet happy and you feel that this is how life should be.

Wow, that got hyperbolic.

This isn’t gossamer ambient music though that description may lead you to think so. There are drums right up the mix, driving, almost break beats, pushing this along. The opening tracks, The Slow Wait pt1&2 pull you into this world slowly lulling you in with its gentle piano before those drums I was talking about come pulsing in. It takes my breath away every time.

Bump is a full on post rock masterpiece that just soars but not with the usual layers of distortion, TMD just have their mix so all the instruments just build on each other and it lets the music fly. And that’s how this album works, gliding between the dazzling peaks and the chilled troughs, all while keeping me in my happy place.

And in a perfect segue, this brings me to the album highlight.

Anything you Synthesize was my go to song when I went traveling for 16 months a very long time ago. From chilling out in Vietnam, to climbing glaciers in New Zealand, to staring out a bus window in Columbia, it was a musical comforter that helped me deal with all the strangeness and loneliness that can come with long term travel. It still can act as a comfort blanket to this day, those opening piano notes still carry me away to beautiful places where I can feel the sun on my face and not have a care in the world.
Just listen to this.

Great times and a beautiful album remember them by.

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Only ever heard of The Chameleons on DiS (I’ve lurked on here for years). Never heard of The American Dollar. So far UncleR your choices are fairly obscure. I’m already trying to work out whether Ride The Lightning will be higher than Master of Puppets! Though to your credit I know you are more than just a metal head.

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I will listen to this LP right now, I do not know it.

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There’s only one Metallica album on this list. :grin:

It’s going to get a lot more alternative mainstream as it goes on.

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It better be the correct Metallica album!

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