Rock

From the opening seconds of “Zoo Station,” Achtung Baby announces itself with a roaring crunch, signaling the end of the earnest U2 of the ‘80s. Between the Edge’s snarling, textured guitars and Adam Clayton’s blood-pumping basslines, Bono’s mood careens from sarcastic and playful to heartbroken and hung-over. Fans were immediately deeply divided, deciding that the band was either brilliant or out of their collective gourd. Nearly two decades later, the album is considered a masterpiece, packed with classics like “Mysterious Ways,” “Until the End of the World,” and fan-favorite “Ultraviolet (Light My Way).” (And let’s not forget “One,” the beautifully ambiguous piece considered by many to be the best song of the ‘90s.) If you’re among the masses who believe U2 to be nothing more than the Irish fathers of Coldplay, take a listen. I guarantee you’ve never heard this side of Bono and the boys. – Reilly

As mentioned in all other assessments of this album, the influence of Ziggy Stardust permeates Axe Victim from Bill’s Bowiesque mullet down to the freeze-dried production, self-mythologizing content and plasticized space-age musical character of the songs. However, beneath it’s glam-bandwagoning lies an imaginative album that’s easy to enjoy if you’re able to lower the blinders to it’s Ziggy impersonations, while guitar hero worshipers will find in Nelson’s hyperactive cascades of fuzz an idol worthy of praise. Highlighted in the “Rock & Roll Suicide” inspired urban wasteland of “Adventures in a Yorkshire Landscape,” the axe-victimizing epic “Jets at Dawn,” anthemic “Jet Silver and the Dolls of Venus,” and shadowy orchestrated closer “Darkness,” Nelson and his Be Boppers turn in a set of over-literate but oddly engaging tracks whose charms are probably easier to appreciate given three decades of glam dormancy. Inevitably, Nelson would call an audible and leave Axe Victim a curious footnote to his prolific career, but it’s a forgotten son worth getting reacquainted with. –Ben

The big deal about Terry Reid is, as legend has it, he was offered, and declined, Robert Plant’s vocalist spot in the New Yardbirds, a group thereafter known as the Led Zeppelin.  If you can get past a missed Zeppelin connection and dig his action you’ll understand why he did not need to consider jumping into some upstart and unproven group of New Yardbirds!  His voice, flat out, is a powerhouse, and on this, his second album, Terry Reid, is full of heat…he out sings Lorraine Ellison on her classic “Stay With Me Baby”…his voice is simply great, as in great BIG.  Even as he’s obviously affected by Steve Marriott (Small Faces) and the Reid vs Plant case COULD be made, Reid’s phrasing is much less Plant’s wholesale Marriott mimic.  He has a pleading voice…brimming with feeling that just soars…this is an excellent album by an underrated, and relatively unknown heavy. –Nipper

It’s from the opening track that this is a faster, looser Band. “Strawberry Wine” is a quick, clumsy, lighthearted song—hardly “Tears of Rage,” that’s for sure. And there are plenty of such moments here, where the Band is honky tonkin’ their way through casual structures and tossed-off lyrics. The production, too, is a long way from the artfully rustic atmospheres of their previous two releases, but what the songs lose in aesthetic distinction they gain in punchy immediacy courtesy of engineering and mixing more typical of the time (by Todd Rundgren and Glyn Johns, respectively). Still, this is the Band, so don’t expect anything big and shiny. But I’ve made it sound like this is nothing special. It really is a terrific record, with at least half of the songs worthy of their prior efforts (“Sleeping,” “Time to Kill,” “The W.S. Walcott Medicine Show,” “The Rumor,” and the title track)—and fans of their two masterpieces will surely find things to love about this one; while those put off by the less-than-rawkous qualities of those albums might find this one’s breezier and (relatively) raunchier style more appealing—certainly more accessible. –Will

For me this was and still remains Randy Newman’s high water mark as a recording artist, the style and sound of the whole LP is sparse and as such rather menacing which suits the subject matter of these songs down to a tee but what makes this stand above other Newman classics (Sail Away, Good Old Boys, Trouble In Paradise) is that not before or since 12 Songs has Newman so convincingly stepped inside the skins of his dark, delusional characters, added to the fact there is not a single bad track on the whole record this stands for me as Neman’s Classic. –Derek

The debut album, “Safe as Milk,” begins to showcase the genius of Don Van Vliet (aka Captain Beefheart). The band’s trademark sound is already here beginning with Beefheart’s voice, one of the most recognizable and individual instruments in music. Next, the lyrics, which are abstract to say the least! Finally the music, a sort of weird extension of the blues blended with elements of free jazz and rock. This debut really only hints at what’s to come but it remains one of Captain Beefheart’s most enjoyable and accessible albums. –Jon

You haven’t really lived until you’ve heard “Sure ‘Nuff ‘n Yes I Do,” “Zig Zag Wanderer,” “Dropout Boogie,” Abba Zaba,” and “Plastic Factory!” “Safe As Milk” may be Beefheart’s most accessible album but it’s still weirder than almost anything else from the time – save maybe The Deviants or The Monks. –David

George Harrison emerges from the fractured Beatles with a winner on all fronts. The thing that struck me originally and keeps me coming back to All Things Must Pass is the huge, layered sound achieved by Phil Spector, wrapping the songs in a blanket that is cavernous and drafty, but awesomely lush as well. Tracks like “Let It Down”, “Art Of Dying”, and “Wah-Wah” are immense, echoing epics, while mellow cuts such as “I’d Have You Any Time”, “Run Of The Mill”, and “Behind That Locked Door” warm and inviting. Harrison lets his spirituality permeate the set of songs here, potentially a turn off, but his delivery is so affable and the songs so good that it only serves to unify and add substance the album as a whole. –Ben