my Bob Dylan records, let me show you themSo, for Christmas last year, I got two pretty great books, albeit they are great for different reasons. The first, which this post is not really about, but in good faith bears mention and recommendation, is Factory Records: The Complete Graphic Album, a sturdy coffee table book cataloguing the complete visual design history of Tony Wilson's Factory label. Mr. Wilson was an acknowledged concept addict, and he and his compatriots made history with not only some of the most fantastic pop music ever set to wax (Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays et al) but some truly lavish sleeve designs. Most famously he ordered a sleeve for New Order's legendary 1983 single "Blue Monday" made to look like a computer floppy disk - the special die cutting required to achieve this effect ensured that every copy of the record would be sold at a loss. Needless to say, if you like pop music and the postpunk era, or if you're just a fan of graphic design, this is well worth your entertainment dollar.
For a somewhat different perspective, Rolling Stones' The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time gives you precisely what it advertises, only briefly pausing during the introduction (penned by no less a Last Supper attendee than Little Steven Van Zandt) to acknowledge the possible validity of opinions other than those contained therein. The list itself, the aggregated result of thousands of individual "expert" opinions, is in many ways predictably bland: The Beatles place no fewer than four albums in the top 10 - The White Album, Rubber Soul, Revolver, and number one on the list, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Abbey Road, sadly, is merely top 20 material). This isn't meant as a knock on the Fab Four, but presumably the principal purpose of lists such as this is to provoke conversation and promote a reassment/codification of the cannon (not to mention sell magazines and books, duh). The RS 500 is, on that count, about as provacative as Mitt Romney's suit-tie combination.
But of course a list of 500 albums is going to have room for a few, let's say, curious inclusions. The RS 500 is a product of its times, and like Rolling Stone magazine itself, is less concerned with shaping its readership's tastes than affirming them. Hence the following:
139. U2, All That You Can't Leave Behind
This selection, one of five picks for U2 (that's right, 1% of the list) is rated higher than both War (no. 219) and Boy (412).
Ahead of: Blondie's Parallel Lines (140) and OK Computer (161).
If this list was published today: not included.
270. Eminem, The Slim Shady LP
When this list was initially issued, Eminem was arguably the biggest male pop star on the planet. Certainly inclusion in the RS 500 was better and cheaper than a couple of gift baskets.
Ahead of: The Marshall Mathers LP (298)!, The Eminem Show (313)!!, Station to Station (319)!!! WTF OMG
If this list was published today: all three of Em's LPs wouldn't make the Blender 10,000.
312. No Doubt, Rock Steady
This is the one with video with the Jet Skiis, right?
Ahead of: again, Station to Station (319), Daydream Nation (325).
If this list was published today: Probably wouldn't be ahead of Station to Station and Daydream Nation.
480. D'Angelo, Voodoo
Bootknockin' music by this guy:
Rumor has it that he doesn't have those ridiculously fictitious abs anymore.Ahead of: Gang of Four's Entertainment! (482); Pearl Jam's Vitalogy (484). (Obviously this list is heavily skewed by the number of participants who were in 8th grade in 1995.)
If this list was published today: Excuse me, you're in R. Kelly's spot.
Another defect of the RS 500 (unless you think that Eminem rates the same number of entries as, say, Elvis) is the somewhat mystifying decision to consider Greatest Hits albums for inclusion. For a list ostensibly dedicated to the greater glory of the LP format, counting these career-culling comps is akin to including a Olympic sprinter in a wheelchair race. Further compounding the confusion is the fact that in the Editor's Note, Joe Levy tacitly acknowledges the absurdity of this stance, noting that several Greatest Hits comps included on the original list published in the magazine were excised from the version that appears in the book because they "simply repeated material appearing elsewhere on albums that made the list." Even this trimming doesn't fully eliminate overlap: hence the appearance of The Immaculate Collection as one of four Madonna entries, and Legend as one of five (ugh) for Bob Marley.
All in all, the RS 500 is recommended as a record of Baby Boomer-ism, a trojan horse designed by an allegedly youth-oriented publication to perpetuate a middlebrow bourgeois notion of "good taste" comprised mostly of commendible-if-safe inclusions peppered with the odd nod to Kids Today and, uh, rap album (Public Enemy= Important Socio-political Document). Act accordingly.
The RS 500 may be viewed in its entirety here.
