Is There Just One Single Album That Does It For You, Completely? Just One.


If you somehow got stuck in a situation (lol) and had to spend the rest of your life completely by yourself, all alone, on a desert island ... and, as part of your situation you only got to choose one album to spend the entire rest of your life with.

Let’s say, some weird circumstance, and you also had at your complete disposal the system of your dreams, that you had assembled thru the years. And thank goodness you were a prepper and you thought ahead to install a solar power system, so power would never be a problem either.

Kind of like Tom Hanks on that island, except instead of a just a soccer ball, you had your dream stereo setup and one album only.

One album and that’s it. Got to pick one. Not necesssarily your all time favorite album, just one you could live with for the rest of your life.

Is there any album that just completely does it for ya, on that level?

I’ll kick things off by sharing mine: Steely Dan, Aja

 

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These recurring threads are silly and fun at the same time. 

Aja? Walter Becker kept his platinum award in the outhouse to his Hawaii studio. And for good reason. It does not hold up. Add to that the simple fact that Donald Fagan was an anal-compulsive in the studio and that the pursuit of perfect musicianship from a technical perspective killed off the life of what could have been monumental recordings. I am a Dan-fan and for me Countdown to Ecstasy is their best, but it could have been so much better if Fagen had not obsessed over every aspect of the band's playing, mixdown, and production. 

The easy picks imho are Kind of Blue and Revolver. But being human I have sentimental favorites and for me they are ZZ's Tres Hombres and Alejandro's Real Animal. And for something no one or almost no one knows about there is Chuck Prophet's Age of Miracles and Southern Country on the Skids' Dirt Track Date. 

 

So I started by coming up with a short list of possible choices and came up with these, sticking with the heavyweights:

Grateful Dead - Live Dead OR Europe 72

Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks OR Blonde on Blonde OR Live at Royal Albert Hall

The Beatles - Abbey Road OR The White Album

Weather Report - Heavy Weather

Miles Davis - Bitches Brew

 

What it finally came down to was that I couldn't bear a life without Garcia, so my pick is Europe 72. I'm not sure why but I decided to exclude the Dick's Picks series and bootlegs in general; probably would have made the choice much harder than it already was.

 

 

I am thankful for NOT seeing;

Van the Man's Astral Weeks

Eagles (anything) but particularly HC

Fleetwood Mac's Rumours. 

Back to Steely Dan, as Aja is to them, Brothers in Arms is to Dire Straits.