I was cleaning up my iTunes yesterday, getting rid of duplicates and rubbish that I downloaded back in the heady days of Napster. Monty Python sketches are better on YouTube anyway. Especially performed by 419 scammers who have been scambaited.
Like this one.
Anyway. I digress. I was feeling a little nostalgic as I deleted dross and re-listened to some tunes I hadn’t listened to for a long time. So I undertook a little exercise. I tried to match an album to every year of my life. It wasn’t necessarily limited to an album released that year. It was more about finding an album that defines my memory of a year. It wasn’t even necessarily an album I owned. In one many cases in the early years I picked albums belonging to my parents (some I have since either pinched from them or purchased) It was fun. Sometimes I couldn’t split a couple of options. Here’s my list. I’m going to turn these into a bit of a series of posts. Because I can. Feel free to join in – comment with your musical memories.
The early years
- ABC for Kids, numbered albums
- Peter Combe, Toffee Apple (I think, I might be guessing here)
- Don Spencer, Feathers, Fur or Fins
- Dire Straits, Brothers in Arms
- Paul Simon, Graceland
- The Proclaimers, Sunshine on Leith
- Arlo Guthrie, The Best Of
- Tommy Emmanuel, The Journey Continues
- Jennie Flack’s Mugwumps and Snookles (though the more I look at her discography the more I think we had some sort of bootleg hybrid of her tapes, and Bullfrogs and Butterflies
Year by year
- 1997 – Backstreet’s Back – The Backstreet Boys, Hanson – Middle of Nowhere
- 1998 – The Living End – Self Titled
- 1999 – Powderfinger – Internationalist, The Whitlams – Eternal Nightcap
- 2000 – The Smashing Pumpkins – Siamese Dream, Custard – The Best of
- 2001 – Dandy Warhols – Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia
- 2002 – Muse – Showbiz, Weezer – The Blue Album, Radiohead – OK Computer
- 2003 – Muse – Absolution, Placebo – Sleeping with Ghosts
- 2004 – Radiohead – Hail to the Thief, Eskimo Joe – a song is a city
- 2005 – The Killers – Hot Fuss, Death Cab for Cutie – Plans
- 2006 – Gomez – How we operate
- 2007 – Gotye – Like Drawing Blood, The Panics – Cruel Guards, Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga
- 2008 – Athlete – Beyond the Neighbourhood, Architecture in Helsinki – Places Like This
- 2009 – Mumford and Sons – Sigh No More
- 2010 – Whitley – Go Forth, Find Mammon
Comments
Good stuff, I love lists like this. I’ll have a crack when I get the chance.