100 Albums You Would wish for...from a Genie

@mofimadness Not sure how much you dig vinyl, but the OG can be had in EX condition real cheap. Haven’t heard the ‘22 remaster.  
I say this not so much as an analog disciple as much as a fan of…gosh, how do I put it…a particular…cinematic(?) quality the LP format of this LP presents, with it’s calculated Side A—>Side B format and remarkable album art.  
I also wouldn’t recommend reissues that tack on “Lady Day” as a bonus track.  
Even if it was a good song, it messes up the album, and I don’t think it’s a very good song anyway, personally.  
Just wanted to throw that out there.

@mahgister Quick fix:
Qualifying statements like,
- “music is about visible architecture and rhythmical times”
- “music is not about tonality versus atonality”
- “music is about feeling, willing and thinking”
- “in serialism music is disconnected of the natural rhythms of human metabolism”

with a simple statement of “in my opinion,” or “in my experience” cures such statements of their erroneousness.

Everyone’s opinion is valid. One may be better at arguing the usefulness of their opinion than another, but this has no bearing on the validity of a person’s opinion.
Thusly, if you were to qualify those statements of yours in such a way, they would be entirely valid statements.
When such statements are made without that qualification, their validity is dubious at best, non-existent at worst.

8,000,000,000 people here, each of them with a definition of what music “is” and what music “is about,” each of them perfectly valid.
There is no practical definition for “music” other than “created sound.”

For many people, music is indeed all of the things you said it is not, and is indeed none of the things you said that is. They, just as you, are entirely valid in those definitions.

Many people pick a streaming station and let the algorithms decide the sounds their speakers emit. Music for them is something of a utilitarian aid to daily modern life.
For many people, music is indeed “about” tonality versus atonality.
Many people are non-plussed with music that presents traditionally “beautiful” harmonic and rhythmic content. Something else excites them, music with less traditional harmonic and rhythmic content, something that would likely cause the former person to cover their ears and promptly turn the music off.
Many people are in love with something like Schubert, Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninov or, in modern terms, Mancini, Bacharach, and Wilson.
Shoenberg, Boulez and Ligeti, or Beefheart, Can, or late-era Scott Walker won’t do much for them.

Again, beyond “created sound,” there is virtually no practical definition for what music “is” or what it “is about.”

@mahgister “There is no scientific consensus about sound and hearing... what is a sound perceptive quality and information and how we access it ...“

We are humans that experience music.  
Is that something we can agree on?

If the answer is yes, then not even Ludwig Van Beethoven himself can “tell” me, or you, or anyone, what music “is” with absolute authority.  

That person emitting “music” from the onboard speaker of their cell phone in a sonically cacophonous environment (airport, busy urban bus stop, shopping mall, etc.) is experiencing music in a way that is just as valid as you or I listening to music in an immaculately engineered listening room with the highest quality equipment in the world.  
As disagreeable, perhaps even vile I find the former’s behavior to be, as antithetical to music appreciation as I find that behavior to be, I don’t get to “tell” them “what music is.” Perhaps I may muster the gumption to politely ask them to use headphones out of respect to the thousands of other humans around them, but my personal feelings about what music “is” are my own.  
They are not “facts.”  
You are speaking with grave authority on matters that are purely subjective.
 

@mahgister I said, “you are speaking with grave authority on matters purely subjective.”   
That’s not “putting a label” on anybody. It’s called, “conversation.”

My bit about people listening to music on phones vs. gear made solely for music reproduction etc. was just a hypothetical scenario I made to prove a point.  
It had nothing to do whatsoever with anything you had previously written.

You somehow took that as being all about you; you took it personally.  
You said I was “putting a label on you.”

It’s called, “conversation.”

This is all very curious behavior. 

You then said I had “limited opinion or understanding.”  
An inexplicable statement, given the content of our exchanges at that point, and, more importantly, uncalled for.

“For sure music is not a mere "subjective" mess randomly distributed in all cultures, that we must treat as superficial subjective tastes in a relativistic manner as you suggested ...Those who think so are ignorant thats all..” 

I beg to differ.  
There are zero people on planet Earth that can “prove” one piece of music is “better” than another.  
My friends and fellow musicians (most of my friends are, like myself, professional musicians) know me to be…how should I put it…quick with an opinion.  
Sometimes the intensity of my opinions may be described as virulent.  
I can be pretty caustic.  
I’m also not an idiot and understand that my fancy-shmancy academic talk doesn’t amount to a hill of beans to someone who likes…gosh, I don’t know…Morgan Wallen, for example.
No matter the infallibility of my fluency in music theory, no matter the depth of my understanding of music history, no matter how deep of an understanding of the “nuts and bolts” of music may be, no matter how good at music I am, no matter how persuasive and academically sound my argument may be for the sheer suckiness of Morgan Wallen, it ultimately amounts to a hill of beans to the person who absolutely loves Morgan Wallen.  
It would result in a statement no more a “fact” than saying, “pizza is better than hamburgers.”

“Commercial music is not yoruba drumming... The content is not the same at all.... The experience is not the same at all”.  
According to whom?  
Again, not a fact.

The one reference to empirical fact you have made, your reference to the science that exists to support the idea that music can be physically therapeutic…that remedial listening may be just as effective via Morgan Wallen or BTS as Bach, depending on the person.  
“Inform yourself before you put a label on me.”  
Classy dude, this mahgister fellow.

1. Songs in the Key of Life - Stevie Wonder  
2. Where I’m Coming From - Stevie Wonder
3. Signed, Sealed and Delivered - Stevie Wonder
4. Innervisions - Stevie Wonder
5. Music For 18 Musicians - Steve Reich
6. In The Wee Small Hours - Frank Sinatra
7. Watertown - Frank Sinatra
8. On the Corner - Miles Davis
9. Bitches Brew - Miles Davis
10. ‘Round About Midnight - Miles Davis
11. Milestones - Miles Davis
12. Miles Smiles - Miles Davis
13. Dusty in Memphis - Dusty Springfield
14. Tapestry - Carole King
15. Randy Newman - Randy Newman
16. 12 Songs - Randy Newman
17. Good Old Boys - Randy Newman
18. Scott 2 - Scott Walker
19. Scott 3 - Scott Walker
20. Scott 4 - Scott Walker
21. The Drift - Scott Walker
22. Bish Bosch ​​​​​​- Scott Walker
23. The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady - Charles Mingus
24. Blues & Roots - Charles Mingus
25. Mingus Ah Um - Charles Mingus
26. Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus - Charles Mingus
27. Trout Mask Replica - Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band
28. Lick My Decals Off, Baby - Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band
29. Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) - Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band
30. Doc at the Radar Station - Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band
31. Ice Cream for Crow - Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band 
32. Taxi Driver, soundtrack - Bernard Herrmann
33. Fahrenheit 451, soundtrack - Bernard Herrmann
34. Les Stances a Sophie, soundtrack ​​​​​​- Art Ensemble of Chicago
35. The Beatles - Beatles
36. The Raincoats - The Raincoats
37. Odyshape - The Raincoats
38. Tago Mago - Can 
39. Ege Bamyasi ​​​​​​- Can
40. Future Days - Can
41. Soon Over Babaluma - Can
42. Pet Sounds - Beach Boys
43. Fear - John Cale
44. The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground 
45. The Velvet Underground & Nico - The Velvet Underground
46. White Light/White Heat - The Velvet Underground
47. Homogenic - Björk
48. Berlin - Lou Reed 
49. Off the Wall - Michael Jackson
50. The Delfonics - The Delfonics
51. Let’s Get it On - Marvin Gaye
52. What’s Going On - Marvin Gaye
53. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road - Elton John
54. Half Free - US Girls
55. Blood On the Tracks - Bob Dylan 
56. Highway 61 Revisited - Bob Dylan
57. Blue - Joni Mitchell
58. Court and Spark - Joni Mitchell 
59. Here Come the Warm Jets - Brian Eno
60. Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy) - Brian Eno
61. Another Green World - Brian Eno
62. Desertshore ​​​​​​- Nico 
63. Wowee Zowee ​​​​​​- Pavement 
64. Slanted and Enchanted - Pavement
65. Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain - Pavement  
66. Hunky Dory - David Bowie  
67. Station to Station - David Bowie
68. Low - David Bowie
69. “Heroes” - David Bowie 
70. Blackstar ​​​​​​- David Bowie
71. Either/Or - Elliot Smith
72. Controversy - Prince
73. Sign O’ the Times - Prince
74. Aerial Ballet - Harry Nilsson
75. Harry - Harry Nilsson
76. Nilsson Sings Newman - Harry Nilsson
77. Nina Simone and Piano! - Nina Simone  
78. Pastel Blues - Nina Simone
79. Fresh - Sly and the Family Stone 
80. Small Talk - Sly and the Family Stone  
81. Exile on Main Street - The Rolling Stones 
82. Lumpy Gravy - Frank Zappa
83. Hot Rats - Frank Zappa
84. ‘Frisch Mabel Joy - Mickey Newbury
85. Red Headed Stranger - Willie Nelson
86. In Utero - Nirvana
87. Kid A - Radiohead
88. Actor - St. Vincent
89. St. Vincent - St. Vincent
90. Fetch the Bolt Cutters - Fiona Apple
91. Hell - James Brown  
92. Hounds of Love - Kate Bush
93. Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
94. La Dolce Vita, soundtrack - Nino Rota
95. Illinois - Sufjan Stevens
96. Carrie & Lowell - Sufjan Stevens
97. Songs of Leonard Cohen - Leonard Cohen
98. Songs From a Room - Leonard Cohen
99. Songs of Love and Hate - Leonard Cohen
100. Cut - The Slits

@rpeluso Both of those OG LP’s probably cost me a combined $1.50.
I found an immaculate OG copy (well, warped, but no factor after a nice clamp) of Frisco Mabel Joy on the floor (not even in a carton or box, just on the floor) of a thrift store. I think they asked for 25 or 50 cents.
A few years later I found Watertown amongst the “Easy Listening” (I’m sorry, but that is such a dumb label 😆) section of a record store, the “Easy Listening” section being an entire wall, 10 ft tall, 15 ft wide.
Had plenty of time on my hands, so just started digging through miles of the stuff, most of the LPs covered with the kind of dust you “taste” as you keep digging.
A couple dozen Sinatra LPs in there, pulled out/inspected several, but was intrigued by Watertown. “Hmmm…what’s this one? 1970?…definitely a different type of artwork, presentation, ‘vibe’ from a typical Sinatra LP…ah, hell, let’s give this one a go…”
$1 later, I’m throwing that puppy on my turntable and standing in front of the speakers, mouth agape…”holy crap …this is a very special album.”
Over the past few years I keep coming back to it, and it’s emotional grip over me only seems to grow.
Just remarkable that he would say “yes” to a “concept album” (I’m not a fan of that term, but that’s pretty much what the album is) by Jake Holmes and Bob Gaudio in 1970, give the album absolutely everything he’s got, and somehow it comes off like a contemporaneous Lou Reed, Neil Young, or Scott Walker LP, yet somehow 100% Frank, and Frank somehow retains 100% of his dignity.
There’s not a shred of, “oh, poor guy, he’s trying to stay relevant.”
Not at all.
It’s just a unique, brilliantly written, brilliantly arranged, brilliantly performed, extremely sincere, empathetic, emotionally rich and flat-out gorgeous album.

Sometimes the Record-Buying Gods bless you.

@mofimadness wait a doggone minute…I just looked at your list and saw 2 compilations…🤔…you said no compilations…

Tisk, tisk, friend…😉

Hypothetically, it’s all good and healthy to maximize the fidelity of the media that supplies the thing you want; attention to acoustics & attention to gear made for music reproduction—> music…if one is a cinema lover, the equivalent for cinema, etc. etc.

In reality, inordinate attention to sheer fidelity at the expense of actually appreciating the beautiful, wondrous art (the part in bold italics being, supposedly, the whole point of the whole shabang) is a very real and very common hazard of saying, “I’m gonna achieve ‘the best!’”

Also, just wanted to add that Willie Nelson is a boss.  
He’s super beloved, super respected, and yet, in light of his resume, still seems a tad underrated from where I’m sittin’

@vandy357 I remember seeing an advanced-age version of Willie on Austin City Limits a few years back and his fluidity as a performer with his guitar and voice was just remarkable. Beautiful. A true artist. 

Willie’s catalogue of songs…fuhgettaboudit. 

@bdp24 This is a great point you make about super-revealing gear causing less-than-stellar recordings to be more pronounced in their less-than-stellarness.  
Tough thing about such listening habits.  
I suppose if one only listens to music that was recorded immaculately, the high-end stuff pays off marvelously.  
Listening to roughly recorded music exclusively makes the money, time and effort spent on maximized fidelity with home audio a really dicey proposition. 
Really tough for folks who have a super diverse taste for music.