1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: The 60's Part Two

This is where the sixties properly begin, with the Beatles being introduced. For the most part, this 10 pack albums was pretty solid... other then the rather bizarre end. Yup, french shouty music is lost on these ears...

The other thing that's happened with this project is I really miss vinyl. I miss listening to a side, and then flipping it over to see what side 2 is like. The Ray Price album is a real lost art with itunes and all that. I'm going to pick up some vinyl now, and maybe even buy a record player to listen to them on. Haw Haw Haw.

0034 Price, Ray – Night Life
This one is the type of corny country album I would typically hate. Ray however does a clever set up with a spoken word intro that introduces the album and thanks the fans. It made the whole thing more palatable, and I ended up really enjoying both the songs and his voice. Good stuff.

0035 Beatles – With the Beatles
This is where it feels like the sixties properly start. While this isn't their first album, is certainly kicks the doors down as far as sound and style goes. Nothing previous to this sounds like this. It's a dead solid album too, with the original material sounding better then the cover songs. For them to grow this far, this quickly after their first album is amazing. Now the nitpick. For this listening, I went with the 2009 stereo remaster. I didn't care for it. It's one of those odd mixes where the vocals are on one side and the music is on the other. Makes for a distracting time, so go with the superior mono mix on this one if you can afford the boxset.

0036 Dylan, Bob – Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
This one is even more staggering then the Beatles when compared to what has come before it on this list. The music itself is all solo acoustic and firmly planted in the folk tradition. The words though, it's hard to believe that someone of his age when this was recorded could come up with songs that ring so true. There's still nothing like it to compare it too. From this second album on, Dylan became a genre onto himself. This isn't my first listen to this album, and it wont be my last. Highly Recommended.

0037 Spector, Phil & Various Artists – A Christmas Gift for You
The only thing weirder then listening to a Christmas album when it's 30C outside is probably enjoying it as much as I did. Spector manages to make you forget about the typically boring arrangements that these typically have and makes you want to dance. Everything is up to the standard you would expect from Spector in this period. Worth checking out, especially if you typically don't like these types of albums.

0038 Cooke, Sam – Live at the Harlem Square
Sam puts on a hell of a show on this one, it pretty much sounds like church. The draw here is the songs are looser then the studio cuts, and it makes all the difference.

0039 Mingus, Charles – Black Saint & the Sinner Lady
Back to Jazz. Well, it's not as annoying or boring as the other stuff so far featured. Still, I doubt I'll ever sit down and listen to it again.

0040 Brown, James – Live at the Apollo
The hardest working man in show business pulls out all the stops on this live album. It's considered one of his best, and a stand out in R&B. What more is there to say? Listen to it all ready! For extra homework, check him out on The T.A.M.I Show.

0041 Getz, Stan & João Gilberto – Getz/Gilberto
This is the only Stan Getz album that Stan needed to make since it has "The Girl From Ipanema" on it. If you like that song, you'll like this album. If you have never heard that song, you fail at life.

0042 Beatles – A Hard Day’s Night
I'm a bit surprised this one is on here frankly. It's not a bad album by any means and features many of their most popular songs. It's more a case of not being all that different from "With The Beatles." "Beatles For Sale" would be a better choice as it leads into "Rubber Soul" as far as sound and songs go. Anyways, it's a good album, and I'm happy to report that the 2009 stereo re-master sounds better on this one, with a more natural mix. I still prefer the mono though.

0043 Brel, Jacques – Olympia 64
I honestly don't know if this was good or not. It's in French, so I have no idea what he's singing about. I'm guessing it's all love songs. He doesn't sing so much as talk through songs, so it's hard to appreciate the performance. That said, he's certainly passionate, I think he nearly cried at one point. He typically ends up shouting, and rarely to the music. The music is kind of all over the place, other then "Amsterdam" which is a re-working of "Greensleeves" and is the only song that musically sounds like a song. Again, it's in French so there isn't really any rhyming going on so it ends up all sounding like a Hitler rally with a sexier accent. It pretty much drove me up the wall and seeing that the guy looks like the type of Eurotrash that would fuck your mother, this is the first all out fail on the list for me.

But I can't say it's bad since I'm not familiar with this type of music. Maybe he's a genius, I just don't want to hear him ever again.

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Someone else is traveling this 1001 journey, so check out Liz's blog and offer her some support. She's in the 300's, most impressive!

http://www.1001albums.com/