1994 was solid at the top, but I only had six albums under consideration. The two that missed out are Soundgarden Superunknown and Blur Parklife. Both great albums, but the top four were mostly locked in. I briefly toyed with Blur at number four, but I had to be honest with what I actually listen to.
No surprise, number one is Bee Thousand by Guided by Voices. Propeller was their breakthrough album, but Bee Thousand put them on the map. It's clearly the most important lo-fi album recorded. I have posted more about GbV and they are easily in my top 5 bands. Bob Pollard is still banging out albums and killer songs to this day. Out of all his great lyrics, my favorite is from Bee Thousand on the track "Hardcore UFO's". "Count the days that we have wasted from the start. Eat the words and build a playground in your head". There are multiple classic tracks on Bee Thousand that they still play live. "Tractor Rape Chain", "The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory", "Hot Freaks", "Smothered in Hugs", "Gold Star For Robot Boy", "Queen of Cans and Jars" and "I Am a Scientist". Tobin Sprout even got three songs on here; "Awful Bliss", "Mincer Ray" and "You're Not an Airplane". Love it!
Number two is Definitely, Maybe by Oasis. This is arguably the best debut album ever. "Supersonic" is one of my all-time favorite songs. I love how they rhyme supersonic with gin and tonic. One of my favorite lyrics is "You need to find a way for what you want to say, but before tomorrow". Definitely, Maybe would certainly be on a Mt. Rushmore of Britpop albums as well. They came right out of the gate with inexplicable confidence and swagger that was magical.
Number three is another lo-fi classic, Pavement's Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. This is my favorite Pavement album. The opening track is the awesome and controversially titled "Silence Kit". Or is it "Silence Kid" or "Silent Kid"? Whatevet it is it's fantastic. The big MTV hit from this album is "Cut Your Hair". The beginning lyrics are Malkmus at his whacky, throwaway best. "Darlin' don't you go and cut your hair. Do you think it's gonna make him change? I'm just a boy with a new hair cut and that's a pretty nice hair cut". Then the song goes on to make some hilariously commentaries about the music business. "Advertiser looks and chops a must...NO BIG HAIR!" Other standout tracks are "Gold Soundz" and "Range Life", but every song on CRCR is great.
Finally, I had to go with Weezer's Blue album. It's been a long time since I've liked a Weezer album, but there's no denying the greatness of The Blue Album. This album sounded like nothing else at the time and it's interesting that it was produced by Ric Ocasek. It really has no Ocasek fingerprints on it, unlike GbV's Do the Collapse. "Buddy Holly" is still probably in my top ten songs. "What's with these homies dissin' my girl? Why do they gotta front? What did we ever do to these guys that made them so violent?" I love how he rhymes "violent"with "front". It's almost like Rivers Cuomo put every great song he had in him on this album and has spent the rest of his career trying to write a great song again. Keep hope alive.
1993 is the polar opposite of 1994 for me. It's very weak at the top, but there's a lot of depth. I'm pretty sure I have four though. We'll find out tomorrow. Peace.
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