Jethro Tull This was
Ten Years After a Space in Time
Santana (any of the first 3)
Led Zeppelin (any of the first 3)
Cream Disraeli Gears
Those rare albums that are great on first listen.
You know the ones. They blow your mind and make you glad you're an audiophile.
Share your favorites.
For me it’s usually some style or vibe I haven’t heard before. My list so far is around 20, but I’ll keep it to my top 5. Feel free to share as many as you like.
!. Poe ‘Haunted’
2. Spirit “Twelve dreams of Dr. Sardonicus’
3. Midlake ‘The Trials of Van Occupanther’
4.Tori Amos ‘Little Earthquakes’
5. Skindive ‘Skindive’
124 responses Add your response
So, so many mentioned that I already own. That makes me feel very good. Quite a few that I probably need to get. Stanley Clark School Days Jeff Beck Truth Paul Simon There Goes Rhymin’ Simon Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall By the way, for those who mentioned Spirit, Twelve Dreams of Dr Sardonicus, it was reissued by Music On Vinyl, white vinyl and limited number of copies. It sounds really good and I highly recommend getting a copy, if they are still available. |
About 45 years ago when I bought The Who//Who’s Next my impression was, "Wow! This is a great album from start to finish!" Elton John: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Don't Shoot Me I'm Only The Piano Player Fleetwood Mac/Rumors and The Eagles Hotel California struck me the same way Jackson Browne: Running On Empty Linda Ronstadt/Simple Dreams Aliota, Haynes and Jeremiah: I believe was self titled. It had Lake Shore Drive, Uppers And Downers, Snow Queen, Long Time Gone on it. I wish I had a TT and still had that LP. Quite some time later I’d say the same thing about Lucinda Williams/Happy Woman Blues and her selftitled and Sweet Old World and Car Wheels On A Gravel Road and Essence. (Yes, I used to be a Lucinda Lunatic.) Steve Earle: Guitar Town and Exit Zero. Cowboy Junkies: Black Eyed man John Prine: The Missing Years I am sure there are others, but those are just a few that struck me as great stuff the first time I listened to it, and I couldn’t wait to listen to it again.
On edit I’ll say that when Bruce Springsteen/Darkness On The Edge Of Town came out I was not getting Bruce, but now I do not know why and it should have been on that list. |
I made a playlist of some of the suggestions. I got a little bored so stopped after the first page. I also ignored posts with more than 5-6 suggestions and I did exercise a tiny bit of editorial discretion. Also, if the album didn't come up immediately in Qobuz I didn't research it further. The playlist is supposed to be collaborative so feel free to add ONE song from the album you are recommending. Please don't delete anything. |
Here are a few: Every US Beatles album as it was released in the 1960s Linda Ronstadt: Hasten down the Wind, Simple Dreams, Prisoner in Disguise, Heart like a Wheel, Mad Love Kind of Blue - Miles Davis Forever Changes - Love It's a Beautiful Day - s/t Warren Zevon - s/t Mahler Symphonies 6 & 8 - Leonard Bernstein (first CBS CD release) Mahler Symphony No. 2 - Simon Rattle CBSO; Bernstein DG; Abbado/Chicago Mahler Symphony No. 3 - Bernstein, first CBS CD; Abbado/Vienna The 35-minute sequence on disc 2 of the Beach Boys’ 1993 Good Vibrations box set that comprised what might have been released as SMiLe, had that LP been released in 1967. All I had known previously was the single "Heroes & Villains," which I dearly loved, even as the rock press of the day was referring to the Boys as "Doris Days on surfboards." Oh, what we had missed. |
Going back in time again, I remember I felt that way about Jimmy Buffet: Changes In Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes and Son Of A Sailor Warren Zevon: Exciteable Boy Dire Straits: the first side of Making Movies and all of Love Over Gold and a bit more contemporary: Bruce Springsteen: The Ghost Of Tom Joad Josh Ritter Live At The Record Exchange EP |
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Oops! Sorry, @pinwa , I wasn’t paying attention to detail. I’ll come up with five songs from five of my many picks. From Linda Ronstadt/Simple Dreams: Carmelita (tough to pick just one from that LP/CD) From Jackson Browne/Running On Empty: Cocaine From Cowboy Junkies/Black Eyed Man: Southern Rain From Josh Ritter//Live At The Record Exchange EP: Girl In The War (however it is probably a cleaner sounding recording from the Josh Ritter/Girl In The War CD) From Steve Earle/Guitar Town: Guitar Town And since you said "5 or 6 picks" I will add Bob Dylan/Blood On The Tracks for my 6th pick, and the song I would choose from that is Lily, Rosemary And The Jack Of Hearts I am leaving my Lucinda Williams picks out of it, because for me to pick five songs by Lu would kill me . . . I would not no where to start. |
For he who wants no more than five, here are five more:
- Rockpile: Seconds Of Pleasure. A true super-group (Dave Edmunds, Nick Lowe, Billy Bremner, Terry Williams). - The Beat: s/t. Fantastic Power Pop! - Los Lobos: How Will The Wolf Survive? - Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks: Striking It Rich. - Mary Gauthier: Mercy Now (produced by Gurf Morlix).
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@bdp24 @immatthewj I'm not intending to maintain the playlist. I made it collaborative so that you and anybody else here can add their choices. I decided to ignore posts with more than 5-6 albums because it was too much work but if you want to add a dozen albums that meet the criteria of "great on first listen" feel free. I've never tried a collaborative playlist but I assume you can just make changes in your Qobuz account and it will propagate to the playlist but maybe that isn't how it works. |
There are many records I loved the first time for the music and still do. Focusing on Audiophile SQ, here are a few more. Roseanne Cash. The River and the Thread. SQ is breathtaking. Sarah McLaughlin. Mirrorball Sarah Jarosz. Build Me Up From Bones Tom Petty. Wildflowers Pat Matheny. One Quiet Night Bill Frissell. Everything he’s ever recorded plus many he plays on.
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I agree with @pinwa that listing a song as a "starting point" for that album and/or artist is a good idea. If "a picture is worth a thousand words," then listening to a song will likely yield better results than reading about someone else's impressions of that artist, album or song. So, with that in mind, I've listed a song from each of the albums in my prior two posts, in case anyone wants to delve further: Jackson Browne - "These Days" Lloyd Cole & Commotions - "Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken?" Crack the Sky - "Ice" Dixie Dregs - "Ice Cakes" Mark Eitzel - "Southend On Sea" Robin Lane & Chartbusters - "Send Me an Angel" Leadon - Georgiades Band - "Glass Off" Love - "You Set the Scene" Joni Mitchell - "Just Like This Train" Prefab Sprout - "Hallelujah" ________________________________________________________________ David Bowie: "Hang On to Yourself" Echo & The Bunnymen - "All That Jazz' Michael Franks - "Monkey See - Monkey Do King Crimson - 21st Century Schizoid Man" Lou Reed - "Vicious" Renaissance - "Black Flame" The The - "Good Morning Beautiful" Paul Westerberg - "A Few Minutes of Silence" Wishbone Ash - "Warrior" XTC - "All of a Sudden" |
Not sure how you are defining "great", but if a CD doesn't make a strong positive impression the first time I hear it, I pass. If I were a person who often changed their opinion of music after initially disliking it, that could warrant a different approach. However, I'm not that type of person -- it's extremely rare that I change my assessment.based upon further listening. Therefore, 99.9 % of CDs in my collection are music I liked immediately at first exposure. Why spend money on music that doesn't completely satisfy? |
Some Albums I have always liked from the first time I heard them. There are a lot more if I took more time to think about it... Surrealistic Pillow, The Jefferson Airplane Truth, Jeff Beck The Pretender, Jackson Browne Rumours, Fleetwood Mac Rubber Soul, The Beatles Heart Like a Wheel, Linda Ronstadt Music for the Mind and Body, Country Joe and the Fish High Tide and Green Grass, The Rolling Stones Kind of Blue, Miles Davis Santana, Santana Aftermath, The Rolling Stones Unchained Melody: Very Best of the Righteous Brothers The Best of the Animals, The Animals CS&N, CS&N Dire Straits, Dire Straits Runaround Sue, Dion The Best of Ray Charles, Ray Charles The Doors, The Doors Beggars Banquet, The Rolling Stones East West, The Paul Butterfield Blues Band Bridge Over Troubled Water, Simon and Garfunkel Boston, Boston Bitches Brew, Miles Davis The Koln Concert, Keith Jarrett Blue, Cassandra Wilson Sarah Vaughn, Sarah Vaughn Bright Size Life, Pat Methany Sunday at the Village Vanguard, Bill Evans
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Many albums are challenging and are an acquired taste, but ultimately the most rewarding. BUT some albums are great just from the first time!
Not expecting to break any new ground with that list. |
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King Crimson - "In the Court of the Crimson King" Jethro Tull - "Thick as a Brick" Miles Davis - "Kind of Blue" Eberhard Weber - "The Colours of Chloë" Pink Floyd - "Dark Side of the Moon" There are many, many more but I also limited myself to five. I was late to the party in discovering Miles Davis and picked up "Kind of Blue" in a record store due to the partial review on a sticker on the record. Not having heard any Miles I took it home and played it having my mind blown. I think I played it every day for at least a month! "The Colours of Chloë" I heard on the radio. I heard one amazing track and thought "I have to find out what that record is". Then they played a different piece of music and I thought the same thing. I wondered when they were going to tell me what they were playing. Two more amazing pieces of music followed and then they finally gave out the play list - all four were from the same album! You can be sure I went out and bought it immediately. |
A little late to the party. I concur with many of the records mentioned already. Here are a few more that did it for me. There are many albums that captured me the first time I heard them, but the following still grab my attention listening with much, much better gear. Cat Stevens: Tea for the Tillerman Bruce Cockburn: Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws Cassandra Wilson: Blue Light ‘til Dawn Lorde: Te Ao Marama (a companion piece to Solar Power. The EP is sung entirely in Te Reo Maori - remarkable) Beyonce: act ii - perhaps the best pop album in a decade |
@rocketnj ++1 The Final Cut. |
The reason why you like music the more you listen to it is called neuroplasticity. The reason why you like an album or a song right off the bat is because it reminded you of something that you liked already. The reason why we audiophiles like our own sound systems is because we listen to it so often and enjoy it. Steely Dan "Aja" |
Lots of excellent choices and quite a few out of my “comfort zone” even though I have an eclectic taste in music. I have probably gleamed at least a dozen album titles from people’s recommendations that I am going to gather for headphone/2.1 stereo listening. it is always good to expand your horizons. Great topic. |
Wow what a great thread, keep them coming! Forgot my favorite Pete Townsend album with small faces alumni Ronnie Lane, "Rough Mix". A real sleeper album at the time , I think I was the only person in our group at the time who had ever heard or listened to it. Mellow Yellow by Donovan, Traffic - Welcome to the Canteen, Darryl Hall and John Oats- Abandoned Lunchinette, Joe Cocker - Mad Dogs and Englishmen, and a big thumbs up for "Tea for the Tillerman" listened to all of these on a continous rotation. |
