Top 100 All Time

To be honest, this EP is just on this list because of that first song Graze. It’s just so good I’ve been listening to it non-stop this year. I mean...the other songs are good too. Little Birds also gets rolling. Overall, this EP is noisy, ethereal, and heavy. It’s a great 20 minutes to disappear into.

These last four spots on my list are for some really short albums / EPs.

What happens when two musicians get married. This is just a great romantic album between a couple of pessimists. It’s warm. It’s about two people giving themselves over to each other and embracing inevitable heartbreak. It’s vulnerable and honest. But overall, the strongest emotion here, is love. It’s drenched this whole thing.

These last four spots on my list are for some really short albums / EPs.

This is my favorite Christmas album on the list.

Not sure why, but xxx has been my go to these last couple years during the winter. It scratches that seasonal depression itch. It’s perfect for driving around on the day before Christmas Eve to get last minute presents for everyone while you hate yourself for being so last minute. And you’re alone for the holidays (but not really, you’re just driving in a car for a second). And it’s cold and rainy and everyone is wearing jackets.

These last four spots on my list are for some really short albums / EPs.

I’m not quite sure what genre this is. Chill emo punk? Regardless, I think it has this beautiful melancholic angst. The lonely figure in the album cover fits the mood of the whole album. It’s like this feeling of being alone in this vast sad empty world...which is why this is an emo album.

“It only gets worse I promise” and “I walk this earth all by myself” are my favorite off of this.

These last four spots on my list are for some really short albums / EPs.

This album is such a mess which is why I love it.

“Get high and breath underwater” is so weird and choppy. The piano loop makes no sense.....but I get the song stuck in my head all the time. It’s beautiful and messy.

This album is very lofi. “groceries” and “every time I hear your name called” are these nice romantic sounding songs but with just enough distortion and effects to make it feel a little more raw, understated, and emotionally nuanced.

This album is great because each track is a little surprising. It has energy, heart, and vulnerability.

I can’t explain it...but this was perfect music for when I was bookkeeping at Raley’s at 3AM.

“If...” Is an amazing song.

I only started listening to them because Airborne Toxic Event likes them, and Louise’s dad likes them.

Once you get over the goth stereotypes, it’s pretty nice to listen to. Is this the OG happy sad music? They walked so The Smiths could run.

Recommended to me by Uncle Chad!

It has this cool 80s punk sound but still feels really modern.

Valley Boy is my favorite song off this album. It has a really cool start with these moaning solo guitar strums going back and forth.

Artificial Life would be great for a montage of someone in college during a coming of age movie.

The only song I skip, is Who Are Ya... I’d delete that song if I could.

Ludwig Goransson!!!

This soundtrack makes physics seem really cool.

This is a good movie, but the soundtrack makes it great. I’ve listened to this soundtrack so many times... It’s both beautiful and intense.

I had a shirt with a picture of his face that I got at his concert. I’m sad I lost it.

Don’t sleep on this album. It has a lot of good weird hits. Some good strong pop ballad things too.

When I started listening to really lofi rock with muddied vocals, I would listen to this a lot.

This music is almost too good. Its the perfect falsetto folk stuff...and is pretty similar to early Bon Iver...but a little better quality and more auditory depth, less lofi.

I remember listening to this album with Louise while we were on a second date. We were hiking, and ended up being out later than expected. But we listened to this full album on a dark drive home through the mountains on our way back.

Head in the Snow is my favorite on this.

This whole albums sounds like an indie movie.

The Funeral is also in How I Met Your Mother....it’s during the scene where he actually meets the mother.

Good rock album. Sad Disco is the grooviest and most likely to get stuck in your head. Goddamn is a great song too. This whole thing is stacked...the guy’s voice is both awkward and incredible.

I’ve listened to this album so many times...it’s amazing how many different settings this album is appropriate for.

Thanks for the rec Dylan!

MISTADABOLINA

Such a silly rap guy. But it sounds awesome. It’s cool in the same way oldies songs are cool.

Old skewl hip hop

The 2nd best homework album of all time. Not as punchy as Zeros, but still really good. The best song on this album is Parallels.

This is probably the greatest homework album ever created. I listened to the Soft Moon all the time while finishing last minute papers in college.

There’s an intensity and repetitiveness that helps me lock in. Not a lot of lyrics to be distracting. And it’s dark and creepy enough to not let me fall asleep.

Regardless, this is great post-punk. Die Life is my favorite off this album.

It’s easy to get lost in the sauce on this, but I appreciate how the album doesn’t feel rushed. It’s ambient at its core, but it has some great pop-rock hits.

My favorites are Love Me, She’s American, If I Believe You, Somebody Else, and Loving Someone.

This album is super vulnerable and surprisingly religious.

I think this is the most normal music ever. And it’s 10/10 solid.

But don’t sleep on Billy Joel...this is great to listen to, I promise. He’s good at piano.

Scenes from an Italian Restaurant and Vienna are my favorites.

Can I interest you in a drive to a cold foggy beach where you can’t see anything?

This album reminds me of walking home from school my sophomore year in High School.

I really enjoyed The Black Keys then. This is when I started listening to rock that wasn’t just The Beatles or Led Zeppelin. It was blues, but it felt really modern and approachable. This type of 2010s indie rock just scratches a certain nostalgic itch for me. These songs are great for the summer and are very easy to listen to. They’re very catchy, and still get stuck in my head on occasion.

If I heard this album for the first time today, it probably wouldn’t crack my top 100. But I’ve listened to these songs so much, they have sewn themselves into my brain. Howling for you is awesome. Tighten Up is awesome. Sinister Kid is awesome....it’s all....100% solid.

This album wrecked my brain because I didn’t know music could sound this unhinged. I remember staying up late one night in highschool and reading all the lyrics to this album...I thought everything was super deep because I didn’t understand it.

Of course, “we’re going to be friends” is an outlier on this album and it’s a perfect song.

Its more blues, but it’s so hazy. This guitar playing seems so loose but the sound is so dense.

I guess this is considered psychedelic? I mean...it must have been pretty trippy back in 1968. But listening in 2026, it just feels like an elevated blues record.

Little Miss Strange is a fun outlier that has a classic 60s pop rock sound.

This album feels like an excuse for Hendrix to just solo over everything. I honestly just don’t think Hendrix can help himself. He’s just so free with how he plays.

The riffs are cool. The drums are cool. It cultivates this really engaging tone that is very noisy and kicks ass.

Perfectly Out of Place was my favorite song for a long time. It makes me tear up.

But the whole album is just amazing and spacious. His melodies are haunting. I love the way he does those pitch bends on the synths.

Great background music for either narrating a noir detective movie, or for having a glass of fancy wine with a mistress at a fancy restaurant.

But I just like to listen to this when I read. It doesn’t get in the way of what I’m reading, and it’s very calm, simple, and classy. As far as Jazz goes, this is on the mellower side of things...which is what I appreciate.

I heard about Lenker’s solo album before I knew about Big Thief. Maybe Big Thief has fuller sounding songs....but this album in particular is very refreshing, and light, and romantic. I’ll listen to the whole thing twice in a row and not get sick of it.

I tried to figure out how to play “anything” on guitar to help in wooing Louise (this was before we were married). But I don’t think Louise really likes the song and I couldn’t play it well.

zombie girl is another good song here.

I am grateful that he never found out how to cough. His raspiness is perfect for this sad album. I imagine him sitting in a corner of a parking garage smoking weed while his friend plays the box drum.

Is the sad necessary? Yeah probably.

“Ionlywantedtoonetimeseeyoulaughin”

This is the most purple album of all time. If you like the color purple, you should listen to this.

Each song sounds like a different type of purple. It’s all purple. The guitar sounds purple. The synths sound purple. The echo-y drums sound purple.

Let’s Go Crazy is indeed crazy. Darling Nikki is a random sexy song thrown in.

I tried to do a cover of When Doves Cry on garage band and it sounded really bad.

Is Baby I’m a Star technically the most fun song of all time? I think it helped him win the music contest in the movie.

HAVE YOU EVER HEARD CHRISTIAN ROCK LIKE THIS????

It’s pretty fun. Is this pop punk? Idk.

He was interviewed on a podcast I listen to and he seems like a cool guy.

I also love this album cover

This is peak, joyous, hairband material. I remember listening to a greatest hits Def Leppard CD non stop in 5th grade. They were the first band I ever was attached too. I thought it was cool that there drummer had just one arm.

The Weeknd had like 100 producers working on this album. People like Diplo and Daft Punk gave this album a more upbeat edm feel.

90% of the songs on this sound the exact same, but it’s a good type of song. Kendrick is here. Lana Del Rey makes a quick appearance in an interlude. It’s perfect for driving on the freeway at night.

Lonely Night is my favorite on this, just because of the fun talk-boxy guitar synth thing. (Idk how they made the sound but it’s very cool)

This is the least annoying his harmonica ever is. This album is the last really good Bob Dylan album before I start to lose interest. It has such a specific tone and feel, I don’t know how to describe it. I like that he has organ.

Ballad of a Thin Man is a very surreal song that paints an odd picture.

Queen Jane gets stuck in my head all the time.

But my two favorites are Like a Rolling Stone and Tombstone blues.

Name a better album for cooking breakfast on a Saturday morning...I’ll wait.

This is Ray’s earlier stuff and it has a little more spunk.

Lonely Avenue is my favorite song to sing along to....out of like any song ever.

I know all the words to Right on Time. I sing along when I listen to it.

Bangarang is the dubstep staple. But Kyoto, Devil’s Den, and Breakin a Sweat are all fun too.

(I also think it’s funny that The Doors are featured on Breakin a Sweat...but Jim Morrison died in the ’71...there’s a video of the behind the scenes to making this song....and “The Doors” didn’t do much. They basically sample a couple riffs and then Skrillex makes a song and they watch him.)

Even though dubstep is dated and dead, I hope that it keeps a similar reputation to Ska Punk and Disco. I hope dubstep is looked at fondly, and appreciated for its brief time in the sun.

Super romantic and sleepy. I listened to this when I wrote my wedding vows

Maybe the best concert I’ve ever been to.

It’s summer pop-rock...but they’re deceptively amazing musicians and have some really beautiful harmonies and builds.

Monsoon is such a pretty song.

SZA is cooler than anyone I’ve ever met.

I really like how she has a great voice, but she doesn’t get carried away with showing it off. She has very cool hooks and does interesting things with the rhythm of how she sings. It’s basically hip hop but it sounds nicer.

Her voice is so haunting. There is no one like her. So much beauty, soul, and emotion in her songs.

Strange Fruit is so dark...

This is Prince’s most fun album. This was Clubbing music before edm (not technically...but kinda).

It’s funky and has some great synth sounds.

DMSR is my favorite. But there are tons of classics on this.

His lyrics are pretty good. It has one of my favorite lines: “I’m writing a novel, because it’s never been done before,” which I think is pretty funny and self aware.

But I like his singer/songwriter sound.

My uncle Chad recommended him to me, which is a surprising pull from him.

I remember listening to this album on the way to WinCo with my mom as a kid. WinCo was awesome because they had pizza bagels.

This is so nostalgic for me, and even the cheesiest of cheesy songs (Now Generation or One Tribe) being me tons of joy because I still remember all the lyrics.

This is CAKE’s most polished album.

It has an Arco Arena song on it! (Did you know they’re from Sacramento????)

This is the most relaxed Pink Floyd album that I’ve heard. So it’s nice.

I don’t have to be on drugs to listen to it.

SAIL

Skip over the song “People” but everything else is good.

I like that this has a bunch of really dense, thick guitars with little video game synths littered throughout.

Burn it Down is low-key hilarious.

Did you know Hobo J is from Sacramento????

I don’t like his spoken word stuff (90% of his discography). But I love this album, where he totally sells out.

Typical Story is a song I love to listen to loud. And I love that he has a Subaru song (I’m back on the Subaru team now 😎). And his slower songs like Happiness and I Want a Dog are pretty good too.

This album kinda sounds like the zoom meeting recordings pandemic. But I do think it captures the feeling of that moment pretty well.

It’s also nice to hear pretty piano embraced in house music.

This starts with a 10 minute psychedelic guitar solo perfect for doing drugs to. And then the rest of it is wholesome funk where it sounds like a big party.

Would I like this album as much if Amy Winehouse didn’t kill herself?

Wow. That’s a deep question....why would you ask me that?

I only heard this recently and it blew me away. I don’t know how to articulate jazz-thoughts that well... But lemme try....

With minimalistic art, each choice carries a lot of weight. There’s only 3 instruments this album, and the drums barely even count. Basically, this sounds like a sparse dialogue between a sax and a guitar. And each note they choose to play sounds better than anything I would have tried to do if I was playing alongside them (not that I’m really a good enough musician to do anything close to this..but even if I was just guessing what the next notes would come next, I’d be way off).

Good musicians know when, and when not to play. They don’t do too much. But every note they hit is intentional.

This is Radiohead’s prettiest album. It doesn’t scare me and it’s quite nice.

This is The Black Keys at their best. They are more grungy and gritty here. And while it’s less polished than their later stuff, the lofi-ness of this gives it a great mood.

Hard Row and Thickfreakness are my two favorites on this.

This is always what I end up listening to when it’s hot outside and I can’t decide what to play.

I’ve Found a Reason is both sad and beautiful. He kinda ruins it with his whisper bridge, but who cares.

I feel kind of embarrassed to like this one. But I think her voice is cool. Erykah Badu looks crazy now, but here she seems restrained.

Yes, Welcome to the Jungle, is one of the most famous rock songs of all time. And yes, Sweet Child o’ mine, and Paradise city have some of the prettiest guitar melodies....

But there are also some great songs about doing drugs. Mr.Brownstone is an ode to Heroine. And I think Night Train is about cocaine.

Van Halen was way better with David Lee Roth. This is a perfect hairband album. The first several songs on this especially are just so classic. Eruption? You Really Got Me??? It’s just cool.

I think it’s the way the singer sings their wordy verses...The best way I can describe it, is everything rolls(?). It just flows so well.

But this style is so unique to them, and I could listen to it all day.

Thanks for the rec Dylan!

Alien apes is hilarious. It’s a song about evolution in a “Christian” album which was probably just put there in spite. But it’s fun. And I guess there’s meaning to it.... something about embracing where you’ve come from.

Already Here and Walking with Our Eyes Closed are both so catchy too.

And then with all the bells and whistles that they pulled out for these three albums...one of their last songs is just so simple and nice. The Great Homesickness is a song about longing for God. It’s just acoustic. And it seems like after all these albums of synths and funky guitar playing, they end up back with a heartfelt love song.

One Wild Life is a 3-part album trio. So I’m just gonna merge all three together in these three consecutive spots

Michael and Lisa Gungor are/were Christian musicians famous for their song Beautiful Things in 2010. They toured megachurches and were super popular in the Christian music scene. However, this album-trio is an expanded version of what religious music can be: It’s about them falling away from Christianity as an institution and instead finding joy/God/spirituality in the beauty around them.

Light is a song about their kid who was born with a heart defect. It’s about them being overwhelmed by the love they have for their kid, despite their expectations of having a “normal” kid being completely shattered.

Some of the songs though, veers towards cheesy and preachy, but you just have to roll with it. Despite the lyrics being incredibly on-the-nose, I do feel like the concepts they are exploring are awesome. They’re things I’ve thought a lot personally, and I felt they did amazing at bringing these things to life.

One Wild Life and Stronger Together are especially cheesy. But they are both so fun. Stronger Together is especially cool to hear. It’s groovy, and at the end it has all these cool harmonies and over lapping vocals. And the message of both songs isn’t bad....it’s just...direct.

“You” is a great song about Gungor’s relationship with God... starting from birth, becoming an atheist, and finding God within everything. In the middle it has this crazy distorted, sloppy guitar solo as Gungor sits in a dark spot of feeling alone as an atheist. The song ends by reverting back to Jesus but with a newfound depth. Calling Jesus the source of Light, Brahmin, teacher, etc.

But the album ends beautifully with a worship song, led by Lisa. The song is titled vapor (which is probably a nod to the temporary-ness of life explored in Ecclesiastes). But it sounds like a Psalm...where it’s like a direct prayer to God and talking about how all of nature worships God.

The first songs on this again are so fun and light, but it seems so technically precise it’s just fun to get on board with.

Whale is especially crazy. I get chills when listening to it. They have this cool back and forth scattered harmony run and then follow it with these crazy back to back to back to back to back phrases that seem so rushed and abrupt and powerful. It just hits you in the face.

Wonder gives me the chills too. It’s this light acoustic song that turns into this thicker song with these deep brass swells that sound better the louder it is.

At the heart of these songs is something very natural and honest.... Then everything explodes with synths and weird rhythms and it makes every that much more bright and colorful, while still keeping its essence of being authentic.

I saw this CD at target, and thought the album looked cool, so I played it on my phone.

Fast-forward a few weeks and I’m listening to it with my mom on the coast near Bodega Bay driving around hills.

Smooth Sailing has to be the smoothest song. But, River and Coming Home are my two favorites on this.

This one is really good I promise.

Its filled with great noisy punk songs (Teeth is a wild ride). But then there’s also some really groovy bass lines/riffs throughout this whole thing.

Cigarette Daydreams is one of my favorite songs ever. It’s Just Forever is also very good.

I listened to this non stop when I first heard it. I learned how to play Ain’t no Rest for the Wicked on Piano (I can’t describe how much joy that song brought me).

I also had a CGE tshirt for the song Tiny Little Robots

Conner got me this CD for my birthday or something. Then I brought it with me on a road trip with David.

The very first song Babel, starts off on such a fun note.

Lover of the Light is a classic. Holland Road is good. Hopeless wanderer...

I don’t know who was first, but it’s like they’re an evolved version of the Lumineers. Its a wall of banjos and guitars and he’s got a cool gruff voice and its classic 2010s indie rock but folk(?).

Icelandic music hits different.

This is a go to driving in the mountains album. I love Sloom.

Ty Segall makes a LOT of music. But this album of his stands because none of the songs were actually his: it is entirely made-up of covers from old 60s/70s songs.

The entire album is drenched in this sludge, garage punk. The very first song, Low Rider, is this slow and methodical trudge, with a creepy throaty singer. Then there’s this strange, dark, alien, buzzing (which is very menacing, very cool, very fun)....and this is very different to the Low Rider song we hear at the beginning of the George Lopez show. But it’s still somewhat recognizable enough for it to be catchy and interesting. (And yeah, it’s cheesy that he uses a weird whisper at the end...but who cares, it’s fun. The album cover has a fudge sandwich).

And each song on this albums is this cool re-imagination of something old and vaguely familiar.

Isolation is a minimalist sort of song about loneliness when John Lennon sings it.. And then Segall’s version keeps the melancholy of the original, but adds on more sludge and heaviness. It’s gritty and fuzzy, but still slow and minimal. The tone is very much in line with garage punk, but his call and response with his guitar during the bridge is a perfect John Lennon impression.

So the simplest reason why I like this album: Ty Segall turns old songs into garage rock.

I feel like many punk albums can get old really fast. But this one never gets too screechy or whiny. Each song is totally unique.

Archangel Thunderbird, I’m a Man, and Hit it and Quit it, are probably the most fun on this album.

At her concert, she was so positive and girly. And then she would sing all these sexual songs and dance all sexual with her back up dancers. I was a little uncomfortable that she was just doing all that in front of us....it seems like she should be a little more private....

Regardless, the songs were nice. I think it’s indie R&B. It’s very light. Good for Saturdays. I’m a big fan. I can listen to her non stop without getting sick of it.

There’s probably a political reason people like Bob Dylan. But to me, it’s enough that his lyrics sound smart, and it’s a nice change of pace from typical songwriting vocabulary.

He took Appalachian folk and gave it to New Yorkers. Which is a sound I want to be a part of.

I hated this when I first heard it. It’s nothing like their dense electropop stuff from their first two albums.

But i eventually grew to like this more than the rest of all their stuff (just skip over the rap song on this).

This album sounds like a grunge/metal guitarist trying his best to make a down to earth pop album....The juxtaposition between those two worlds is what I think makes this a fun listen.

This album for the most part is pretty calming. It’s nice to hear the lightness of all the instrumentation and then Victoria Legrand’s deep vocals.

But 10 Mile stereo, if you listen to it loudly, is a powerful song. It might have been the best song they did at their concert.

I had this CD and I played it in my PT Cruiser all the time. This minimalistic pop style seemed pretty new to me at the time.

I’m not music historian...but it also seemed like it was at the beginning of that dark pop era in the 2010s with Halsey, Melanie Martinez, and then later Billie Eilish.

Ribs, Buzzcut Season, and Tennis Courts are my favorites.

Sometime Around Midnight is one of my favorite songs of all time. There’s a bunch of good hits on this too. Some of these songs don’t even have choruses which is kinda cool (wishing well).

Coherently, this isn’t as tight as the other beatles albums, but it has some classics and some good deep cuts.

“Happiness is a Warm Gun” is so underrated.

“Blackbird” is a song my mom would sing when I was a kid.

We had an instrumental version of “I Will” play at our wedding when the guests were being seated.

The song “Birthday” HAS to be about my grandma Kathy because Paul McCartney and her have the same birthday. And it’s about him sharing a birthday with someone.

This is the album people usually think of when they think of when they think of Led Zeppelin. There are just so many good songs on this.

Going to California and When the Levee breaks are my two favorites.

Very approachable and moody shoegaze album.

The best cover of “I Will Survive.” It’s good. It’s not bad. It’s supposed to sound like that.

What genre is CAKE? Good question. They are Lackadaisical Rock or Ironic Rock. They dgaf.

This is best listened to while wearing flip flops and/or driving to get fast food.

A rockabilly guitar + TRUMPETS IN EVERY SONG + a guy who can’t really sing = something absolutely groovy.

Did you know they’re from Sacramento???? (Yes, everyone knows that)

Fun anecdote: When I was in my church band in High School, the worship leader told me he used to hang out with them. Then he told me they smoked a LOT of weed. So I asked him if he thought it was okay for Christians to smoke weed. He hesitated... realizing he couldn’t possibly tell a high schooler that it’s okay to smoke weed....so he told me “not right now.” And I got the memo.

Also, my mom recommended this band to me. And I went to see them play live in Vegas with my uncle. It was a great time.

This one’s a little embarrassing. But they sampled led zeppelin songs! I know all the words to Paul revere. Brass monkey is awesome. No sleep till Brooklyn is awesome.

Thanks Rick Rubin!

This is some wild blues weirdness with Brittany Howards amazing voice.

This is a good rock album for driving in the rain. My mom’s old coworker recommended Spoon to me and I was surprised they were good.

Knock Knock Knock is one of my favorite songs of all time.

This is the bluesiest White Stripes album. They even cover a really old blues singer named Son House with the song Death Letter.

Let’s Build a Home and Jumble Jumble are my favorite on this. (Apple Blossom was in the movie Hateful 8.)

Honestly, Lucy In the Sky with Diamonds is the worst song on this album.

Every song is so good. I love how it’s a pop-rock album with a big-band aesthetic playing in it throughout.

A day in the Life is one of my favorite Beatles songs. I brought the lyrics into one of my English classes in middle school to analyze the lyrics.

Andy Warhol produced this one! And Nico is heavily featured on this thing throughout.

People say this is one of the first alternative albums...which idk if that’s true. But I think it’s definitely one of the first lo-fi albums.

It’s 60s rock, but there’s this underlying dark tone that makes the album really cool.

When I think of Beach House, I think of this album. It’s lush and pretty. It’s warm and dense. I’ve listened to this album so many times.

It also sounds equally amazing (if not better) if you listen to it at half speed...which is incredible. How many albums can you do that with?

This is another Danger Mouse produced album. I love how it’s both kinda dark, but mostly silly.

Can I call this Zombie hip-hop for white people?It’s dead cartoon characters singing/rapping about death and stuff. It’s pretty chill, pretty cool.

Kids with Guns is an underrated song on here.

This is a great grunge album for doing yardwork.

I think this was her first album produced by Jack Antonoff (Fun., Bleachers).

All of these are great love songs. And while they can er on the side of being a little dramatic...I’m bought in. There is so much great romantic imagery in the lyrics.

And I’m not really into ballads or slow songs like this... usually. For whatever reason, these songs all are able to strike a chord with me.

Fuck it I love you, Cinnamon Girl, Hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have, the Greatest....they are all very haunting, stripped down, and beautiful.

Doin Time is also surprisingly fun.

Debaser? I barely even know her!!! 😂😂😂

This album is just cool. Garage + grunge + squealing guitars.... It feels like it’s ahead of its time.

Wave of Mutilation, Monkey Gone to Heaven, La La Love you, and Hey are my favorites.

When I started listening to Nirvana, my dad told me about this unplugged show.

I thought it was so cool to see the weight beneath all the noise of what Kurt Cobain was doing. Overall, it’s a very interesting sound.

The last two songs are amazing. Idk if this was one of Cobain’s last performances, but it does sound like it could have been. It’s so sad....

It’s hard to pin down what makes Fred Again.. so good. But these cheesy clubbing songs are actually emotional. Eyelar and Danielle are my favorite on this.

This album has some of my favorite hype songs. When I needed to motivate myself to run or workout or something, I would listen to Black Skinhead or I am a God.

Bound 2 and Blood on the Leaves are also these really cool songs where Kanye sampled some old stuff in a very interesting way. It’s also just cool that Billie Holiday is featured on this in a way.

This is the only band that I can say I liked them before they were cool. This album came out right before “Feel it Still.”

I don’t really know how to describe this album...but it’s weird and unique. It’s that post-modern pop stuff I listened to a lot in late high school and college.

(This one was produced by Danger Mouse which I find interesting)

I remember making people listen to this CD in college whenever I was driving. Unfortunately the sound system in my Subaru Outback was probably pretty underwhelming, and people probably judged me for having this pink butt CD.

But this album is so fun, especially the first half. It’s these upbeat electrobeats and then St Vincent just has these nasty guitar solos every so often.

The pretty songs are later in the album, and those are great too. New York and Dancing with a Ghost are really nice.

Objectively, it’s the best album of all time.

I can picture my dad absolutely nailing the air drums on the back half of this album.

I remember the lyrics to Golden Slumbers painted above Kieffers bedroom when he was born.

I remember listening to Octopus’ Garden as a kid, then Here Comes the Sun..

I had a Beatles piano book and tried to play “I Want You (she’s so heavy)”.

It’s Abbey Road....it’s great.

I don’t know if anything musically genius is going on here. I actually thought the album was pretty mid when I first listened to when it came out.

But! The album coincides with Jollet’s memoir....and after reading the memoir, all the songs took on a whole new emotional weight. I have listened to this album so many times. I’ve gotten chills, I’ve teared up... These are great rock anthem songs, and it’s like they’re coming from the voice of a kid. It’s an album where Jollet looks back at his life when he was younger, and gave a voice to all these complicated feelings of navigating difficult family issues.

This album is about how he loves his dad, but also about how he was grateful and lucky that he overcame/escaped his terrible childhood situation. His brother didn’t.

And we meet all these people in Jollet’s life and we get to see Jollet try to process through his complicated upbringing as if we were a fly on the wall to a therapy session.

The best song is All These Engagements. Carry Me is a close 2nd.

This album is Nirvana at their best.

A few of my friends in Middle school were obsessed with Nirvana. But it took me awhile get on the same page...I eventually grew to kinda like a few songs on Nevermind.

Later, I was on a trip to Oregon with David, my freshman year of highschool. He made me listen to Scentless Apprentice on some big Skull Candy headphones... It was so loud and so grotesque, but I let myself get swept up in it anyways. The song really wrecked my brain...It was dark, twisted, and unsettling....but it was interesting. It was doing something totally unique, and was expressing something that I hadn’t really experienced in music before.

This album is great in the same way a horror movie is.

Skrillex is fun. This album isn’t just growly bass drops (while it does have a few).

Lots of other dubstep/brostep artists make songs that place sole emphasis on “the drop.” The non-drop parts are only about building anticipation....

But Recess is more of a pop album with some awesome dubstep drops. Songs like “Recess” or “Stranger” have fun intros and verses before we even get to their drops. Doompy Poop and Coast is Clear aren’t even dubstep songs. They’re just catchy, unique, and delightful.

This album blew my mind when I first heard it in highschool. I listened to it over and over again. There is not a single song on this that isn’t great.

This album wrecked my brain a little bit and helped me start listening to music with more soul and r&b influence.

David and Ethan recommended this album to me. They thought I’d like it cause it was “weird.” But it’s not that weird (maybe besides Redbone and California).

But this album fits such a specific mood. I remember trying to find other similar sounding albums to this just because I wanted to stay in this mood for a lot longer. (This is how I heard of Funkadelic and Erykah Badu)

Also, now as a parent....a couple of these songs hit a little harder.

And Ludwig Goranson did all the music!!!! #nonstoppenheimer

This is riff city!!!

This whole album is built on these catchy blues riffs. And it’s like every band member is the main character. Everyone is making all these cool music choices, and nothing seems formulaic in this at all.

This is their most open and breathable album. It’s fresh and spacious, while also being built on these great grooves. Whole Lotta Love is my favorite song on here for this exact reason. Lemon Song is also very fun and has some great bass lines.

The top 3 songs on this are perfect.

This is some very cool mixture of garage rock with large anthem feels. It’s also a little emo, which might be because of their violin player who is a full-time time member of the band.

If I grew up listening to Kings of Leon, I might have had one of their albums here instead. But my family loves ATE. My uncle, Colton, started listening to them first. Then my mom and I also followed suit.

Mikell Jollet was a writer for Rolling Stone. He started his band after an interview with David Bowie, where David Bowie talked about “embracing the contradiction” when it came to song writing.

Each song from ATE feels like a contradiction of emotions. Each song is very angsty, and nostalgically romantic.

NOTHING ELSE SOUNDS LIKE THIS. Even Beach House hasn’t replicated the sound on this album. I’ve been trying to find something that sounds like this album...but nothing exists even close to this.

Lemon Glow changed my life. I remember driving into Jessup, and I heard the song....and then instead of parking and going inside, I turned up the volume all the way and listened to it like 5 more times and drove around in circles around the area. Them I tried showing the song to everyone I knew.

I wrote a full screenplay of a love story based on the song Pay no Mind. The screenplay probably isn’t good...but I strongly believe this song needs to be featured in a movie.

When she asked what kind of music I like, the first song I ever showed Louise, on our bus in Romania, was L’Inconnue. I think its one of the most beautiful songs ever made. There are so many interesting layers that fade in and out. It has this cool sound effect of a puddle before she starts singing some nursery rhyme in French. !The end of this song is crazy too, cause even though the song started pretty quietly and no drums really...it ends with a wailing guitar, dense drum fills, and layers of vocals singing over each other.

Dive has one of the most interesting drops/guitar solos I’ve ever heard. Half the song is building to this one moment, and then...the guitarist just hammers away at this single heavy note. Victoria Legrand’s voice continues to float over the whole thing, while the song continues to drive forward with all this noise.

Black Car sounds like a ringtone, but it gets really creepy. The drums on this are so heavy handed, it’s perfect.

Lose Your Smile and Dark Spring are also amazing songs. (Lots of BH fans think Lose Your Smile is their best song).

Every few weeks, I grieve.... Because Beach House will probably not make anything like this ever again. This is a 1 of 1. No shoegaze or dreampop record has ever come close to reaching this type of lush sound with this type of dynamic progression.

It’s been 8 years since I first heard this album...and everytime I listen to it again, it feels like a special occasion.