So, it started innocently enough. Someone on Facebook tagged me in a post with a photo of Mark Hollis' solo album and this text:
I was given the task of choosing 10 albums that have strongly influenced my musical taste. One album per day for 10 days. No explaining, nor reviewing. Only the album covers. Every day I will ask somebody else to do the same thing.
Day 4 - I nominate ...So I decided to play along and I dug deep into my repertoire. The problem with me is I was always very much a 'singles' and Top 40 person. For me to sit down through a whole album was a rare thing. If you had asked me what singles influenced my musical tastes, it would have been a much longer, and potentially stranger, trip indeed.
And the rules stated 'no explaining, nor reviewing'. But sucks to that. These ten albums deserve a mini-explanation at least so far as I'm concerned. If you followed me this long, you know each song or picture tells a story or is strongly connected to some kind of memory for me. Each one of these albums is here for a reason. For my selections, rather than indicate favourite albums, I thought long and hard for the albums that influenced my musical tastes in such a way as to make a permanent change in the way I listen. Each description below is linked with a selection from the album with the exception of choices 1 and 3 which I could not locate on YouTube.
1: Korean Folk Songs
This album is mostly connected to one song for me. 'Arirang'. It is an old Korean folk song that is as ingrained with Koreans as is kimchi. It's one of those things that is as essential to who I am as a person as my genetic code is. Yeah. It's THAT important. A history about this folk song is found in this link here. Below isn't the version one the album, but a good example of how important it is. EVERYONE in the audience is singing along:
2: Sharon, Lois and Bram - One Elephant, Deux Éléphants
When you are in kindergarten, the types of music you have access to tended to be whatever you sang or nursery rhymes they decided to play for you. Then there was these guys. If you were Canadian and grew up in the 70s and 80s you know Sharon, Lois and Bram. Their songs were cute, and catchy. Every song inspired by numerous genres: Folk, jazz, big band and more. They wrote songs that were easy for kids to comprehend. Below, the title track from this album, the first little bit of French that I learned over forty years ago.
3: Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 9 in D minor ("Choral") - Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra - Ferenc Fricsay
The importance of this album and music has already been discussed here. Long story short, classical music was one of the things my mother liked to listen to, so I was exposed to a fair amount at a very young age. Below was one of my dad's favourites.
4: Star Wars: Original Soundtrack composed and conducted by John Williams, Performed by the London Symphony Orchestra
Another album that's come up in previous discussions here. It's STAR WARS! It made me understand the importance of music in films and how music is so important to the way a scene is perceived. This choice could easily have been 2001: A Space Odeyssey but they never released a proper soundtrack for that movie until 1996.
5: The Beatles - 1962 - 1966
Here was my introduction to rock and roll music. This album actually belonged to my big brother. It's a wonder the thing isn't scratched to hell. At four years of age I could barely read but I knew my favourite song, 'Help!', was the first song on one of the sides of one of the records. I would let the album play through because there were other favourite songs contained within, but it was important I hear my favourite song first.
'Yellow Submarine' was another favourite, largely because of the animated film that managed to capture my attention for the entire one hour and thirty minute running time. I imagine gave my parents a break from dealing with me, so for what it was worth, 'Yellow Submarine' was a great babysitter. One of my favourite memories of my brother was how he was determined to make me laugh, by changing up the lyric 'We all live in a yellow submarine' to 'We all live in a purple jelly-bean'. Six-year-old me laughed but was determined to explain how scientifically impossible that was. I failed in the explanation because I was laughing too hard.
6: Sex Pistols - The Great Rock and Roll Swindle
I've discussed the impact of Sid Vicious' version here. This album was the one that turned my musical tastes of mostly Top 40 pop on it's head, and directed me into the world of alternative and punk. I'd already been listening to ska lightly (read... I knew a handful of songs by Madness and the Specials already). This just just started me down the path to purchase more (among all the other alternative, punk and and ska that was to be found).
7: Arcadia - So Red The Rose
This one needs a bit of explaining. Most people would dismiss this as a Duran Duran album. At the risk of being one of those people who compare bands, let me flip this little comparison over. Talk Talk fans will understand me, so I'll let everyone else in on it. Seems every music writer needs to compare Talk Talk to Duran Duran. BALDERDASH! It's like comparing the novel 'War and Peace' to apples and oranges! That's how comparatively dissimilar they are. Oh... but they have a double name too. LAZY journalism! LAZY! But for me and for here, Arcadia's So Red the Rose was to Duran Duran what Spirit of Eden was to Talk Talk (yeah... yeah... I know it's a stretch... but hear me out). It was a direction they (Simon leBon and Nick Rhodes) wanted to explore (FYI, Roger Taylor seemed to just come along for the ride, but as with all awesome drummers did a wonderful job here) while the harder rocking boys (i.e. John Taylor and Andy Taylor) took off to play harder rock in the guise of the Power Station (with Robert Palmer and Tony Thompson), also great, but it was already what I was listening to and didn't educate me further). Arcadia went off into another direction, a little more pretentious, a little more arty, a little more depth. Unlike Talk Talk, they played by the rules and at their core, still a pop band. It wasn't, by any means, a ground breaking album, but introduced a different, slightly moodier and gothy side to Duran Duran.
Arcadia had Grace Jones do her thing for their lead off single 'Election Day'. If that's not über pretentious and amazing in it's own right, I don't know what is. It opened my ears to listen for less pop influences, and look for further depth in the midst of my Duran Duran love. Truth me told, I'm only a Duranie by default. I much prefer Arcadia and those handful of Arcadia-eque pieces scattered throughout their vast library. Below, one of the more light hearted pieces from the album and a video where Simon leBon gets to bust out his comedy acting chops to remind you, despite the moody Arcadia guise, at his heart, he's still the fun-loving happy-go-lucky lead singer of a heart-throb band.
8: Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine
In the 90s there was teenage me looking for something different. Nine Inch Nails came along and primed me for the industrial music scene. So very different than punk. Instead of angry reckless teenage rebellious abandon via the Sex Pistols, here was anger, angst despair all wrapped in a danceable package. Here was Trent Reznor screeching all this emotion that could easily have come from my own core at the time. But through all my late teenage angst, I was dancing because I could. Below, the second single from the album which was actually the first song I'd heard from it.
9: Talk Talk - Laughing Stock
But why not The Colour of Spring or even Spirit of Eden you ask? Because they contained singles. So for the most part, I was able to pull apart the albums; I was still able to listen to each track individually. Not so with Laughing Stock. It was the first album in many years that made me sit down and really listen, the way Mark Hollis wanted us to. I couldn't do that with Spirit of Eden. 'Desire' stands out so strongly, it might as well be a single. 'I Believe in You', is the same and has an accompanying video that further distances it from the rest of the album in my head. But try to pull out a track from Laughing Stock. Yeah, each track could stand alone, but at that point it's an like one of those optical illusions, you know, like that three pronged trident that is really two pronged, or is it? Something is not quite right when you stand them alone. You just need to hear it all. 'Runeii' stands alone here because even though it's the end track, it's intriguing enough (at least for me) to want to go back and hear everything back from the start. My hope is if you haven't heard the album before this track will make you want to see where it came from.
10: Rustin Man - Drift Code
Before Talk Talk, I would honestly, never have considered this album for myself. It wasn't Top 40, it wasn't what I was in to. It was as foreign sounding to me as the Korean Folk Songs probably sounded to you at first. But here it was, presented to me because he was the bass guitarist from the band. Ok... I'll see what it has to offer.
And it offered so much. Seventeen years in the making, this album doesn't sound like it's an album from 2019. It doesn't sound like it's from 2002. I can offer only this. It's one of these albums that doesn't place itself anywhere specific. It's music for the sake of being music. It's not an album you put on as background music. You put it on and you actively listen. It doesn't fit into any genre. It doesn't fit into any specific era. The songs can have a tinge of nostalgia, but make you look forward at the same time. It's an album that sits outside of time comfortably (... Why yes. I'm suggesting that Rustin Man is a Time Lord, musically speaking.. what of it? ;) ).
So while this is a recent addition to the albums that influenced my musical tastes, it's had a noticeable impact on what I choose to listen to. Don't get me wrong. I can still listen to Top 40 (to an extent) but it often gets tiring quickly. Every song is the same. Every song is catchy and quick to hook you, but there's such lack of depth I quickly loose interest. Rustin Man's music has just further pushed me to dig deeper into any piece of music, and really listen to the layers. If your song is as thick as a one page flyer for a takeaway restaurant, you'll have lost me by the time the song is over (especially if I'm not hungry). Rustin Man's music is a feast comparatively speaking. Sorry for the food analogy... it's lunch time now and I'm hungry.
Below, the first song I'd heard from the album, on the surface, a tale about a card game with the devil. Growing up, I had heard so many stories about people trying to best the devil, so there's your nostalgia bit. Then dig a little deeper and there's some food for thought (sorry!); that the way you live your life catches up to you eventually. Enjoy.
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