Below are my top ten albums from the 1970 seventies, in order of gravity for the reader/listener. While compiling this list, I have taken into consideration the quality of the entire record in terms of music, song writing and production, as well as the album’s longevity, importance and influence on popular music as a whole. Hopefully I have here complied a less than obvious list of truly great 70s records, that everyone with even a passing interest in music should try to listen to - especially if you are below the age of 30 and were not around to listen to them the first time! Please feel free to comment, or add albums of your own choosing.
Number 10: Miles Davis – Bitches Brew (1970)
Avant-garde and Jazz-fusion is certainly not for everyone, and Bitches Brew is a perfect example of this fact. With two disks and only six tracks, two bass players, three drum kits, two pianos and very little vocals; this is still a challenging, confusing and bizarre record. It is however a very important record that fused rock and jazz, and it has had a lasting influence on both genres, as well as laying the foundations for funk. The production, the sparseness and the sheer erogenous nature of this work is very interesting and engaging, and if you can take it, being immersed in Davis’ soundscape can be rewarding and even captivating.
Number 9: Brian Eno – Another Green World (1975)
With Another Green World Brian Eno, producer, musician, and one time member of Roxy Music, essential created the ambient music genre. The instrumental content here is muddled, thick and often contains very little traditional structure. It does however demonstrate fantastic usage of (the then groundbreaking) effects such as treated synths, tape effects and rhythm generators, and has enchanting vocal content, delivery and production. Any ambient-style music released post-1975 will have been influenced by this.
Number 8: The Police – Outlandos d’Amour (1978)
There is a clear reason why so many people still listen to The Police – they wrote great, catchy songs that are continually enjoyable and relevant. Outlandos d’Amour was the debut album from The Police, and is full of youthful energy, exuberance and excitement, fusing the contemporary genres of punk, post punk, new wave and ska perfectly. Marvellously upbeat, with at times curiously dark lyrics, this album is a near-perfect aural experience.
Number 7: Elvis Costello – My Aim is True (1977)
This album combines quirky, simple instrumentation with excellent song writing. The upbeat mixture of punk with reggae and Buddy Holly style rock and roll continues to enthral, but it is Costello’s lyrics that perhaps most resonate with a modern audience. Each track on this album perfectly captures varying states of dissatisfaction, with work, with love, and with life, in a way that is matter of fact but not depressive. It is a microcosm for a continually British state of mind.
Number 6: The Specials – Specials (1979)
This was the first official release from the emerging genre of 2-tone, and in many ways is more an album of the 1980s, the future and of things to come than the 1970s. The overt fusion of black ska and white punk was fresh, exciting and different, and well represented the changing attitude of British youth away from the archaic attitudes of the national front that worryingly gripped the country throughout the 1970s. This album both addressed these oppressive attitudes and importantly provided transcendence from them through the upbeat music.
Number 5: John Lennon – John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band (1970)
This cathartic album contains some of the best work John Lennon ever completed. Free from the constrains of “The Beatles” brand, this was the first body of work Lennon completed where you really felt like he was making the music he wanted. This album is angry, negative, biting and fierce, with beautiful poignancy and lyrical mastery throughout. Everyone, working-class, English or otherwise, must listen to “Working Class Hero” at least once in their life.
Number 4: Lou Reed – Transformer (1972)
This album was Lou Reed’s most commercial effort, with fairly traditional instrumentation and song structure, and many tracks from Transformer are considered to be Reed’s definitive work. Cool, edgy, bluesy and glam, this album at face value is fairly upbeat and easy to swallow. Underneath this palatable exterior however is a wealth of drug-ridden angst and complex sexuality issues. With important contributions from both David Bowie and Mick Ronson, this album is the epitome of early 70s art rock.
Number 3: David Bowie – The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972)
This album, for want of a better description, is just so seventies. From the production of the album, to the timbres of the guitar parts, to its melancholic optimism, Ziggy Stardust just really captured the zeitgeist of the early 70s in the UK. A concept album based around Bowie’s well-known alter ego, this album is filled with some of Bowie’s best known tracks, such as “Starman” and “Suffragette City”. The album is a perfect example of glam rock, and fully established Bowie as the monumentally talented musician/performer that we all know he is.
Number 2: Kraftwerk – Trans-Europe Express (1977)
This album, without doubt, is one of the most important albums in the history of modern music. Here, with their sixth album, Kraftwerk fully and completely absorb themselves in early sequencer experimentation, essentially developing a style of music/instrument that continues to be prolific to the present day. Hip-hop was massively influenced by this Kraftwerk album, as well as disco and dance music variants, from techno to hard-house, and pop - pretty much any music that uses either synth, sequencing and sampling technology. This album was truly the beginning of something huge, and it did so in what is still a stupendously haunting and alien fashion.
Number 1: The Clash – London Calling (1979)
This is perhaps an obvious choice as the most important album to listen to from the 1970s, but apart form the prevalent title track, many have not really listened to much of this superb album from The Clash, and I strong advise that they should. Whilst “London Calling” is a truly anthemic, sonic synonym for punk, the rest of the album has 19 fantastic tracks, covering genres as diverse as rockabilly, pop and reggae. With gems such as “Lover’s Rock”, “Lost in the Supermarket” and “Koka Kola”, this album manages to both encapsulate the drive and raw dissidence of punk, as well as providing a definitive full stop to the genre, and the decade generally.
See this this article at Yoomoot: http://yoomoot.com/articles/top-10-albums-you-must-hear-from-the-1970s/
