I, Memesheep

[theweaselking]

Think of 15 albums that had such a profound effect on you they changed your life or the way you looked at it. They sucked you in and took you over for days, weeks, months, years. These are the albums that you can use to identify time, places, people, emotions. They might not be what you listen to now, but these are the albums that no matter what they were thought of musically shaped your world.When you finish, tag 15 others, including me. Make sure you copy and paste this part so they know the drill.

In no particular order:

#1: Alice Cooper, Hey Stoopid (1991)
The first album I ever remember buying with my own money, Hey Stoopid was also the last REALLY AWESOME Alice Cooper album, before Zombie Jesus ate his brains and made most of his music suck. I found it through Wayne's World, like, I'm sure, a billion other teenagers. Even now, you can't go wrong with Alice doing duets with Ozzy, backed by Slash. And half the album is still just plain good shit.

#2: Metallica, The Black Album (1991)
Yeah, yeah, "sellout", "soft rock", whatever. Newsflash: Cliff Burton *made bad music*, and Metallica were quite awesome for a long time before "napster" was a word. And this album, with a half-dozen single-worthy tracks, was awesome.

#3: Def Leppard, Vault (1995)
Mike, SHUT THE FUCK UP. This album is awesome, and you suck. For those expecting me to go more metal, keep reading. This is a Greatest Hits collection from a band who, in part, *made* modern music in to what it is today, while being pretty cool in the process.

#4: AC/DC Back In Black (1980)
What?

#5: Alice In Chains, dirt (1992)
If you don't like Rooster, Dam That River, God Smack(yes that IS where Those Guys got the name from, sheesh, they couldn't even be remotely awesome like The Sisters Of Mercy), Down In A Hole, or Would, you're defective.

#6: Apoptygma Berzerk, You And Me Against The World (2005)
Love To Blame excuses everything. Also: Synthpop, man. Who ever thought of synthpop?

#7: Johann Sebastian Bach, Toccatta And Fugue In D Minor (who cares? Find a version an LISTEN.)
Who knew that classical music would be basically heavy metal with a full orchestra? Bach. Bach fucking knew. That's who. Asshole.

Bach, along with a select few others, was my first inclination that heavy metal was just classical music with different instruments.

#8: White Zombie, Astro-Creep 2000: Songs Of Love, Destruction, And Other Synthetic Delusions Of The Electric Head (1995)
I think my first major musician crush was Sean Yseult. Which made my girlfriend at the time very enthusiastic, until she realised that Sean Yseult was a woman. The point is, here, that this is one of THE legendary hard rock albums, with the most awesome album name EVER, and also the music is actually generally pretty cool.

#9: VNV Nation, Matter + Form (2005)
This is a placeholder.

It doesn't matter that you can't tell VNV Nation from Kovenant or Apoptygma Berzerk or Pale A.D. or Bruderschaft (HAH! TRICK QUESTION). What matters is that the music is the music that I listen to, really loud, when I need to think.

#10: Blue Oyster Cult, "Secret Treaties" (1974)
What do you MEAN, old music doesn't inherently suck?

Hey, to me, it was a revelation.

Is it any wonder that MY mind's on fire?

#11: Public Enemy, Apocalypse '91 (1991)
Yeah, yeah, tell yourself that A Nation Of Millions and Fear Of A Black Planet are better, but How To Kill A Radio Consultant is flatly brilliant, and the Anthrax version of Bring The Noise paved the way for the entire 1990s and 2000s "nu-metal" and "rap-metal" movements. Which sucked, but that's not Public Enemy's fault.

#12: Ozzy Osbourne, **** (***)
Aw, fuck, I gotta PICK?

#13: Lordi, The Arocalypse (2006)
Proving to me, once and for all, that the taste of the masses is not entirely in the mouth, Finland's Lordi are half comedy act, half rock band, and half PURE GENIUS for entering AND WINNING the contest that launched Abba and Celine Dion.

If you don't like Hard Rock Hallelujah, I'm afraid I cannot respect your opinion on musical matters. At all. Ever.

#14: KMFDM, WWIII, (2003)
Another placeholder, I'm afraid, serving as substitute for the band's entire discography. Although I occasionally lament the lack of awesome angry patriotic CANADIAN songs along the lines of Stars And Stripes or World War III, I am also generally happy to have never needed one.

#15: Skinny Puppy, The Process (1996)
I'd never heard of "industrial" before. It launched the career of Nivek Ogre (KMFDM, Rx, Pigface, PTP, the Tear Garden, the Revolting Cocks, Ministry, Repo: The Genetic Opera) and cEvin Key (well, really only Skinny Puppy, but still). And it's a KILLER fucking CD.

Thats 15. I could go on for 15 more, but those are the first 15 that came to mind.

Your turn!

Stolen from Phil B, who is sometimes known as satyrblade

Comments

Four legs good, two legs baaaaaad

[glitteringlynx.livejournal.com]

It will take me some time, but I can easily do this.

Also: 2, 3 and 4 are AWESOME albums. I proudly own all three.

[goblinpaladin.livejournal.com]

People who hate on the Black Album can go stab themselves in the eye.

[dolston.livejournal.com]

Back in Black is the greatest come back album of all time.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

So good that, 30 years later, nobody remembers they were gone!

[mcpino.livejournal.com]

re: #15

For "industrial," may I suggest you go buy EVERYTHING made by Throbbing Gristle, and then seek out Toiling Midgets?

[netdef.livejournal.com]

>> Who knew that classical music would be basically heavy metal with a full orchestra? Bach. Bach fucking knew. That's who. Asshole.

Bach, along with a select few others, was my first inclination that heavy metal was just classical music with different instruments. <<

Yep! Not just Bach though . . .

Somewhere I've a list of classical reverberations in modern rock/metal/country/etc music. Trying to find it again now . . .

[waldhornist.livejournal.com]

I made a short list here (http://jazz.madagasgar.com/ca_assignment.html) ages ago:

I could add a lot more to it now, but have never found the time!

[thathatedguy.livejournal.com]

Had I made a list of 20, Dirt would be there as well.
Now, since my name is not Mike, I will mock you for number three, as they are one of the worst rock bands to ever stuff a tube sock in their spandex.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Bad or not, they inspired a whole crapload of other bands.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Newsflash: Cliff Burton *made bad music*

This is one of your jokes right? The ones where you purposely say something controversial and toss ye olde Apple of Discord into the mix so that you can watch the mayhem that ensues, right? Please say that I'm right. Please. I can't imagine that you actually believe this fer srsly.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Burton: Master Of Puppets was his best, and it wasn't that great. Metallica's best music happened after he died, despite him.

It's like Ozzy and Randy Rhodes. Zakk Wylde SAYS he's totally unworthy to play Randy Rhodes tracks, but Zakk Wylde is also a far better guitarist than Rhodes ever hoped to be.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Metallica died with Cliff Burton. The music they made prior to his death is better, more nuanced, had more heart, more soul and Christ, it was even produced better. I'll stack just the bass line from Orion - just the bass line - up against anything they've put out post-Cliff and it'll win by a landslide.

What's really funny is that Cliff wasn't actually writing a whole lot of Metallica's music when it comes down to it. Six of eight on Ride the Lightning, three of eight on Master of Puppets, and one of ten on Kill 'em All, and only one of them he wrote alone (that'd be "(Anesthesia) Pulling Teeth" from Kill 'Em All). So, I'm not sure what "bad music" he made (or are you going to try to seriously argue that Master of Puppets - the song - isn't anything short of a legendary rock song?) but clearly it's without his ability, sound, and style that The Band Formerly Known As Metallica makes bad music.

[spartonian.livejournal.com]

LIES!

And Justice for All and The Black Album were just as good, if not better in some cases, anything pre-Burton death.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Keep telling yourself that and maybe it will magically come true ;)

[spartonian.livejournal.com]

With a few exceptions, I hear songs from Kill'em All and Ride the Lightning, and all I hear is obnoxious, distorted, noise when compared to One, Where Ever I May Roam, Sad But True etc.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

And whenever I hear anything post-Cliff I hear watered down retreads trying to be pop songs and tough guy rock at the same time. They remind me of little yappy dogs.

Please don't get me started on how their sound wimped out and lost all of its bottom end either. All you really need to do is put on any track from Justice, stop it in the middle, and then immediately put on any track from the Burton years in the middle. If you can't see what Cliff added and what they lost when he died, there's no helping you.

I also have to admit I've only heard about two songs with Rob on bass. I always liked his playing in ST and IG, but nothing stood out in the Metallica tracks I've heard with him on them.

[spartonian.livejournal.com]

I have very simplistic music tastes. I admit it.

I don't listen to lyrics in hard rock or metal. I listen for sick guitar riffs and a steady drum rhythm. If I could just tune out lyrics without a karaoke machine, I would. This is why I enjoy music from bands like Poison and Motley Crue. There's nothing profound to their work, but its an enjoyable listen if you're not sitting there critiquing the entire track.

Having said that, a lot of early Metallica is distorted, with Hetfield just yelling, noise compared to stuff off Black and And Justice for All. I'm not sure how you can say there earlier work is better produced either, just by virtue of the technology and resources available to the band at the time.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

In light of that, I'm actually confused that you prefer Newstead-era Metallica over Burton-era. If you don't often listen to the lyrics and focus instead on the music, Burton is a far superior bass player to Newstead.

I said it was better produced because it brought out their strengths. There's a certain low fi quality (for obvious reasons) to the earlier work that brought out the distortion in the music better than the slick, newer stuff. When I said better produced, I meant it sounded better with their brand of music, I wasn't comparing the technology involved.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

If you consider low-fi, poorly-mixed, no-talent-required unmelodic bang-on-things-while-screaming to sound better, who am I to argue?

Oh, wait, I know the answer to that one.

It doesn't matter how good he is if the end result still isn't interesting or fun to listen to. Compare Hit The Lights with Enter Sandman? I'll take mid-period Metallica, any day.

On the same reasoning, I'll take Zakk Wylde-era Ozzy over Randy Rhodes-era Ozzy most of the time, too, because it doesn't matter, to me, that Wylde thinks he sucks and Rhodes was awesome. What matters is that *I* like Wylde's music more.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Are you seriously going to try to tell me that Cliff Burton had no talent? Seriously? Newstead banging away on a open string for 10 measures is talented next to someone who Ulrich and Hetfield mistook for a lead guitar player when they first saw him? "I don't like it" is one thing, "talentless" is a completely different one. You can "not like" Burton, but saying he's "talentless" especially in comparison with Newstead is just patently false.

Are you also going to seriously going to argue that every band should be produced the same, that every band's sound should be mapped out on the mixing board the same? That mixing and production can't bring out a band's sound better one way than another?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

The Ramones and The Sex Pistols might have been the greatest musicians ever to live. The fact remains, a monkey with a chainsaw COULD have replaced them and the music would have sounded the same.

I don't CARE how good he was. The music he made didn't require or show his talent.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

You're either confusing "I don't like it" for "not talented" or you are just monumentally unaware of what exactly Cliff Burton did in Metallica.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I seriously hope I'm misreading and you're saying that "industrial" and not The Process launched the careers of Nivek Ogre and cEvin Key.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Industrial launched their careers. The Process was the first album I ever saw them on.

[eididdy.livejournal.com]

Ah, ok. I was hoping I was misreading that. I personally like their older stuff better.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

It was terribly worded, I admit. But it was late and I was drunk.

[krfsm.livejournal.com]

Dude, VNV is QUITE easy to tell from Kovenant-with-a-K. Covenant-with-a-C on the other hand (the second one is the one with Eskil "I'm Swedish and So (Drunk and/or High) I Can't Really Walk" Simonsson)...

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

You know, I have enough trouble telling all the various bands with variations on "Covenant" apart as it is. You knew I meant the version that sounds like VNV Nation and Beborn Beton and Wolfsheim, so we're close enough, right?

[lordbleys.livejournal.com]

The Black Album aint bad at all.
I prefer Master and Justice, but the black album made them a lot of money. For every fan who yells "sell out" there's a royalty fee going into Hetfield's pocket.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

A lot of people retroactively started hating Metallica sometime around Napster.

[silmaril.livejournal.com]

This is a learning experience for me, I have to say.

*puts entry in "memories," heads off to Pandora*

Also, re: Bach: As someone who has played a few Bach prelude and fugues on the piano and listened to more, pretty much: Yes.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I'm a mad metalhead. I love complicated, fast, multiply-melodic and harmonic music. This leaves me with, basically, metal, some industrial, and classical to listen to.

[krfsm.livejournal.com]

How do you feel about Meshuggah?

[thadrin.livejournal.com]

"Black album" is only Metallica's third best album.
"Master..." is EASILY their best, and everything other than "Metallica" they've done since has been somewhere of a scale between "flawed" and "unlistenable shite".

fwiw I like what I know of your list. Ozzy? gotta be "Blizzard of Ozz" surely?
I just did my list (http://thadrin.livejournal.com/164351.html) ...and have only just realised I failed to include "Operation: Mindcrime". Bah.

USA! USA! USA! USA!

[normanrafferty.livejournal.com]

SIN, SEX, SODOMY!!
Time to end this parody!
TERROR, TORTURE, TYRANNY!!
The carcass of democracy!
POWER, PILLS, POVERTY!!
Victors rewrite history!
BULLETS, BOMBS, BIGOTRY!!!
Brace yourself for World War Three!

[holzman.livejournal.com]

Metal is the bastard stepchild of Classical and Blues.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Yup. I love it so.