Mostly listening to rock music from the 60s and 70s, thus I am asking a biased question. My greatest debut album is From Genesis to Revelation by Genesis. I understand there were production issues in the making of the album but Gabriel's voice is astonishing on this LP. I wish I could find a live version of Into the Wilderness but can not. Any help in that would be appreciated. Look forward to hearing others opinions for selfish reasons as I want to grow my collection and appreciate the opinions represented here.
Inner Mounting Flame imho does not qualify as a debut. John McLoughlin did two LPs on Douglas - after he left Miles’s Bitches Brew band, before he formed the Mahavishnu Orchestra.
My best debut LPS would be, in no particular order, excepting The Doors which for me is a clear Numero Uno:
The Doors - The Doors Laura Nyro - More Than a New Discovery Jeff Buckley - Grace Little Feat - Little Feat Mark Almond Band - Mark Almond Band Joni Mitchell - Songs of the Seagulls It’s a Beautiful Day - It’s a Beautiful Day Crosby Stills Nash - Crosby Stills Nash David Crosby - If Only I Could Remember My Name The Byrds - The Byrds The Flying Burrito Brothers - The Guilded Palace of Sin Gram Parsons - GP (unless you think of The FBBs as a Gram Parsons backup band, which imo they are not: Chris Hillman was a huge contributor) Public Image Limited - Public Image Limited The Gang of Four - Entertainment! X Ray Spex - X Ray Spex (a one hit wonder, I am afraid) Scraping Fetus Off the Wheel - Nail Chicago - Chicago Hot Tuna - Hot Tuna
Dire Straits. It holds up better than any of their subsequent works, both sonically and performance-wise. It sounds like they just showed up at the studio and laid it down, effortlessly.
Janelle Monae-The ArchAndroid. Technically her second album (The Audtion came out seven years earlier but only 500 copies were ever made). In terms of sheer scope and imagination, it’s hard to come close to anything like this since the 70s.
Duran Duran. Their debut comes out of the gate with so much power and slick production. Much better than most of their “new romantic” peers.
DJ Shadow-Endroducing. Turntablist masterpiece.
Finley Quaye-Maverick a Strike. Delightful and unique.
Me’Shell NdegeOcello-Plantation Lullabies. Angry, funky, sexy. Much better than her later work.
Wow. To quote a letter in the latest issue of Stereophile, this thread is, with a few exceptions here and there, a memorial to OWGM - Old White Guy Music.
Ricmci, you have taste : ) Indeed very young Gabriel had fantastic voice perfectly fitted the music, and he soon would emerge as the perfect interpreter for symphonic progressive rock. Excellent songs, near all perfect pop tunes, and not a single dull moment really. Wonderful mix of pop and psych with a progressive touch, all the GENESIS musical aspects and character are already there, those soon would lead to the one of the very finest symphonic rock acts/prog bands performing on the planet. Well, in fact, the lads were not excited about Jonathan King´s quite naive lush orchestral sound production. That first album is just his fantasy, not what the kids really wanted to sound. They were under 20, they wanted to play rock music for goodness sake ! The best thing is they did not copy anyone but already had the sound and the musical style of their very own, they were about to create something extraordinary. And they did, FGtR is a fine pop album from the fantastic late 60´s.
The very first editions are too pricey for me, what later edition(s) would you recommend ?
And what exactly is their true first album for me, the wonderful Trespass. Now the sound is mature and dense, melancholic mostly but nothing light anymore, very fine in a pastoral way, yet very dynamic (proper stereo system required of course). Absolutely fantastic. And as unique as King Crimson´s sound on their incredible debut album just a year earlier. These bands created totally different rock music, nothing related to blues but rather in European classical music tradition. GENESIS were young geniuses, but sadly Trespass is (prog) rock´s most underrated album.
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