Tag Archives: best albums

Permanent Records: The Updated Albums List

I’ve added three more “best albums of all time” lists to the best albums meta-list.  Thanks to Make Lists, Not War reader Keith Nutter for the update suggestions.  As before, the meta-lists includes every album on at least three of the original source lists.

Here are the links to the updated lists:
Best Albums of All Time – Ranked
Best Albums of All Time – Chronological
Best Albums of All Time – By Artist

In addition to rearranging the meta-list somewhat, the new lists added 35 new albums and 14 new artists.  Here are the new-to-the-list artists:

  • The Avalanches
  • Beyoncé
  • Dave Brubeck
  • Daft Punk
  • Fleet Foxes
  • GZA
  • Lorde
  • Madvillain
  • M.I.A.
  • Mobb Deep
  • Slowdive
  • Solange
  • Talk Talk
  • Vampire Weekend

The latest update has increased the number of recent albums on the meta-list, which is heavily weighted towards music of the 1960s and 1970s.  Here are the 15 albums on the meta-list from 2010 on.

  • Kanye West  My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (2010)
  • Arcade Fire  The Suburbs (2010)
  • Adele  21 (2011)
  • PJ Harvey  Let England Shake (2011)
  • Kendrick Lamar  good kid, m.A.A.d city (2012)
  • Frank Ocean  Channel Orange (2012)
  • Kanye West  Yeezus (2013)
  • Vampire Weekend  Modern Vampires of the City (2013)
  • Kendrick Lamar  To Pimp a Butterfly (2015)
  • Sufjan Stevens  Carrie & Lowell (2015)
  • David Bowie  Blackstar (2016)
  • Frank Ocean  Blond (2016)
  • Beyoncé  Lemonade (2016)
  • Solange  A Seat at the Table (2016)
  • Lorde  Melodrama (2017)

 

Sound Effects: The Updated Album Meta-Lists

I’ve updated the Best Albums meta-lists to include the most recent Rolling Stone list of the 500 best albums. I also added the new albums from the latest edition of 1001 Recordings to Listen to Before You Die. The meta-lists include every album on three or more of the 35+ original source lists. Here are the links:

Best Albums of All Time – Ranked
Best Albums of All Time – Chronological
Best Albums of All Time – By Artist

Please forgive me for failing to update the number of lists the album is on in the Chronological and By Artist lists (provided in parentheticals). I’ll get to this eventually.

There are 27 new artists on the updated meta-lists:

1. Adele
2. Animal Collective
3. Anita Baker
4. Mary J. Blige
5. Boogie Down Productions
6. Cocteau Twins
7. Ornette Coleman
8. Earth, Wind & Fire
9. Elbow
10. Herbie Hancock
11. Howlin’ Wolf
12. Ice Cube
13. Janet Jackson
14. Kendrick Lamar
15. Cyndi Lauper
16. LL Cool J
17. Lynryd Skynyrd
18. George Michael
19. Charles Mingus
20. Motörhead 
21. Neutral Milk Hotel
22. Frank Ocean
23. Raekwon
24. Toots & the Maytals
25. Gillian Welch
26. Hank Williams
27. X-Ray Spex

The artists with the most albums on the meta-list are familiar names:

1. Bob Dylan: 11 albums
2. The Beatles: 10 albums
3. The Rolling Stones: 8 albums
4. Led Zeppelin: 7 albums
5. Bruce Springsteen: 6 albums
6. Neil Young: 6 albums
7. David Bowie: 5 albums
8. Jimi Hendrix: 5 albums
9. R.E.M.: 5 albums
10. U2: 5 albums
11. The Who: 5 albums