It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Definitely Maybe
People love one hit wonders, but they always leave you wanting more. People don’t like it as much when a band debuts with a thermonuclear explosion like Oasis did with Definitely Maybe, and the cynical would say it’s all downhill from there. Whatever you want to say about it the follow up, (What’s the Story) Morning Glory and its massive hits, you can’t say it was a step down in quality. Oasis led by songwriter Noel Gallagher were shot out of a cannon in 1994, from there it wasn’t downhill, but no looking back.
Freshly acquired from the Sony BMG music club when I was a Junior in high school, my neck snapped toward my cd player where I would find the track number 3, and that’s the first time I remember hearing, “Live Forever.” It would become, and remains, my favorite song. It has everything you could want in a Noel Gallagher classic, from the lyrics, “Maybe you’re the same as me, we see things they’ll never see, you and I are gonna live forever” to the used before, but never this well, chord progression and finally two simple but respectable guitar solos, timeless.
Written and recorded in a single night in Liverpool, “Supersonic” is the single we all wish we wrote. Noel once described that he wrote the song in about a half hour, they ordered Chinese take out and by the time everyone had eaten it, the recording was finished. “I need to be myself, I can’t be no one else” is the only ethos you need to take from this album if you don’t find three others sprinkled among the eleven tracks. On one of their live releases, Liam is heard heckling Noel to, “Write a coupla’ more of theses babies.” I’m sure he would if it were that easy. When you’re the brother who got all the talent, sometimes you write a hit in 30 minutes that Liam could only dream of, and the rest of the time you have to put up with him singing it.
If you catch me on the right day, I will tell you that, “Slide Away” is the best Oasis song, and the best song Noel Gallagher has ever written. If you catch me in a sour mood I will tell you it’s in the top five, and you should get your head examined if you don’t think Noel Gallagher is the best songwriter of my lifetime. Written during one of the numerous Definitely Maybe recording sessions, its origin story is the stuff of legend. Noel reached out to his friend and guitarist of The Smiths, Johnny Marr with a request for more guitars for the record. One of the guitars Marr sent was on old Les Paul that Noel took to his room for the night where he claimed, “The song wrote itself.” It is said to be written about Noel’s soulmate, a relationship that ended when they had to go on tour. You can hear what he lost, “Slide away, and give it all you’ve got, my today, fell in from the top, I dream of you and all the things you say, I wonder where you are now.”
I didn’t have a chance to get to how great the stolen riff is on, “Cigarettes and Alcohol“ or the fact that it kicks off with the huevos of, “Rock’n’Roll Star” or the magical jam session that is, “Columbia.” Noel is the only autograph I ever kept, the reason I learned guitar, the best show I’ve ever been to with my dad. Buy me a drink and I’ll sing you a song, it will probably be Oasis. Probably from this album, possibly you’ll like it. No, Definitely…Maybe.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: The Stone Roses
Sometimes wonderful things just sneak in under a deadline or requirement, a warm autumn day before the weather turns, finishing that gallon of milk before the expiration, the LeBron James block in game seven. The Stone Roses’ self-titled debut barely snuck into my lifetime with its release in 1989, and I wasn’t going to let this one slip through the cracks of this series. It is often considered amongst the best debut albums to ever come out of the United Kingdom, and it’s certainly part of the DNA of the Britpop movement that followed.
The record begins calmly and deliberately, a slow muted guitar and bass provide the canvas for the meandering lead guitar of John Squire to explore. “I don’t have to sell my soul, he’s already in me, I wanna be adored.” With very few lyrics, the passionate croon of Ian Brown is what makes the same words being repeated feel magical. While it could be argued that his voice is not great, it is iconic and actively vibes in a timeless way. He truly sings in the key of mellow, and it’s as soothing as aloe.
Not to be outdone, “She Bangs the Drums” follows as a much more radio friendly upbeat track featuring an amazing bass line from Mani. The chorus’ uplifting refrain of an unnamed lady drummer is fantastic, “Have you seen her? Have you heard? The way she plays there are no words, to describe the way I feel.” Britop legend Noel Gallagher, who took more than a few cues from the band, has claimed this as his favorite Stone Roses song and in England that is as good a stamp of approval as you will get.
While fellow Mancunians Oasis have always been outspoken supporters of Manchester City in European football, three quarters of The Stone Roses are fans of Manchester United. While this brings enormous warmth to my heart that they are fellow reds, the real testament is that since the early 2000s United players have walked out of the locker room at Old Trafford to the melodic and ascending track, “This is the One.” I loved the song before I knew this nugget, and what a great honor it is when a local artist is championed in this way.
The original album release ended on, “I am the Resurrection” so I will stick to that track list. While it is self indulgent at 8:12, almost half of that being the outro guitar solo, it’s a great album capstone. I would also be remiss to not mention how great, “Waterfall” is, no notes on that one. When I think of, “no skip albums” The Stone Roses is always top of mind, and the music it helped influence has always been intoxicating to me. One can definitely spend an hour more fruitlessly than giving this one a spin.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Californication
There is no official ambassador honor for the state of California, but perhaps they should give the title to the Red Hot Chili Peppers. There are no more prolific propagandists of dreams of a California lifestyle than them, stitched into the fabric of the culture. It’s debatable if this is their best album, they are a great band, but Californication hit hard for me in 1999 and I wasn’t alone. The record spawned six singles, and went on to sell over fifteen million copies worldwide, for a more modern take, three of the band’s top five most streamed songs on Spotify.
Californication marked the return of guitarist John Frusciante to the band, and his presence is felt throughout. His beautiful almost weeping clean guitar forms the framework of, “Scar Tissue” a single that can hook you within the first 15 seconds of the song starting. It features a mellow and lovable chorus, “With the birds I’ll share this lonely viewin’” and the hilarious verse, “Soft spoken with a broken jaw, step outside but not to brawl, autumn’s sweet we call it fall.” The bigger hits on this album are so easy to love.
The next track hits pretty hard in succession, “Otherside” features great storytelling about the pitfalls of confronting addiction. It’s dark in places, musically strong, and features this great opening verse, “I heard your voice through a photograph, I thought it up and brought up the past, once you know you can never go back, I gotta take it on the otherside.” The song is reflective and accessible enough that it doesn’t force the subject matter on a casual listener too heavily, it was a single after all.
The title track simply leaves nothing to be desired, five and a half minutes of Red Hot Chili Peppers bliss. If you catch the music video, it features the latest in what video games looked like at the turn of the millennium. The lyrics speak to the overwhelming cultural force that California is to our society and the world, and the possibilities that are only there beyond the superficial. “Space may be the final frontier, but it’s made in a Hollywood basement. And Cobain can you hear the spheres singing songs off station to station?” All of this comes to a head with Frusciante’s almost too perfect guitar solo, it silences whatever noise is going on in my head every time I hear it, at least for a moment.
I also want to give compliments to Lawrence Azerrad, know for his Pink Floyd album covers for the art, this cd begged to be picked up off the shelf even if you didn’t know the band. I remember the joy of buying this CD at the Ft. Wayne Best Buy back in jr. high, and that, ladies and gentleman, is an old sounding sentence. It can be argued as to whether this is the best Chili Peppers album, there are at least two others you could make a case for. In the end, this is the one that has, “Californication” on it, so all other arguments are probably moot.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Only by the Night
In the fall of 2008 there was an injection of youthful energy in the world of music, a new semester was in the works for me and a new Kings of Leon album was the music of the moment. It was one of the few times I can remember a rock band being the center of attention in the culture of my youth, all the better that it was for good reason. Only by the Night is a great album with two massive hit songs that propelled it in quick succession to the front of our minds.
Album opener, “Closer” puts us on pins and needles from the outset with the recurring delay guitar rippling like a foreshadowing of the heavy journey ahead. “Skies are blinking at me, I see a storm bubbling up from the sea, and it’s coming closer.” The song sets the foundation for the rest of this monster album with its six singles, but also immediately indicates it won’t be the smoothest ride. It won’t be sunshine and rainbows, but you should have no interest in getting off the ride. The eerily optimistic hungers you get from it will be satisfied.
If you’re looking for the banger of 2008, “Sex On Fire” is your hit, pun intended. This has the guitar string bend heard round the world, with all the distortion necessary to accentuate one of the steamier choruses of the year. “You, your sex is on fire, ah, ah, consumed, with what’s just transpired,” immediately followed by that massive guitar driving the point home. Radio play never killed this one for me, and when it came on at a party it was a cue to head for the keg line, as the were about to be a lot of empty cups.
Just a month later the equally compelling second single was released with a less sexy, more communal tone, “Use Somebody.” Lead singer Caleb Followill pangs for a companion from a dark place, “Someone like you and all you know and how you speak, countless lovers under cover of the street, you know that I could use somebody…Someone like you.“ The chorus of “oh-ohs” forms the pop friendly bones of the song and it is heavenly to hear a crowd echo this by the thousands, even someone like you.
As their fourth studio album and follow up to 2007’s excellent, Because of the Times, Kings of Leon were already ascendant, Only by the Night put them into the stratosphere. This was the album where they broke into the United States, after years and albums of success in the United Kingdom. This Tennessee band of three brothers and a cousin rocked their way around the world before coming back to conquer America. I don’t love everything that comes out of Nashville, but when I listen to this album I can’t help but ask someone to pass the southern barbecue.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Is This It?
Rock and Roll debauchery has always held its appeal to me, when the cool band of the moment does something outrageous. Noel Gallagher once said, “Until you’ve actually thrown a television set out of a window, you don’t even know the sense of joy it brings.” The Strokes, led by stylish frontman Julian Casablancas were that cool, on edge band for me in the early 2000s. I have no accounting for hotel structural damage that they caused back then, but I always thought they might unleash that destruction at any moment.
The debut album Is This It was already on the hype train when it came out in 2001 on the heels of the success of their EP The Modern Age, which was released in the United Kingdom the same year. The first single from the album was, “Hard to Explain” rose to number 1 on the UK indie charts. This was our first introduction to the guitar heavy sound of The Strokes with the reverse reverb on Casablancas’ vocals, a defining sound of the early oughts.
In the vein of rock and roll mythology, good artists copy, great artists steal. With that in mind there was a definite and later blessed theft involved with the making of the single, “Last Nite.” The rhythm guitar intro is almost a direct lift from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’,“American Girl” something the band would later admit to in an interview that Petty himself referenced. Like a true crusader for the love of rock and roll, Petty never sued or was in any way negative about them lifting the intro, he laughed it off like the legend he is.
The easiest listening song on the album is probably the third single, “Someday” with its jangling guitars and somewhat hopeful lyrics, “You say you want to stay by my side, darling your head’s not right, ah, see, alone we stand, together we fall apart, yeah, I think I’ll be alright.” The music video was fun, featuring the band in a bar telling stories, sharing cigarettes and drinks, it would be rock and roll caricature if it didn’t look so natural and cool.
The Strokes were going to be the band that saved rock and roll in 2001, and their debut album Is This It? was going to be the blueprint. That kind of hype was something no band could ever live up to, but at least we got this masterpiece. If nothing else it shows the enduring power of rock and roll to have a record like this come out decades after the prime era of the genre. The energy of the record is also undeniable, and it clocks in at around 37 minutes, just enough time to make a memory tonight that will be hard to explain.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: El Camino
It’s fitting that the first album I really fell in love with after moving to Columbus after college was from Ohio homegrown legends The Black Keys. 2011’s El Camino was Akron duo Dan Aurbach and Patrick Carney’s 7th studio album together, the follow up to their multiple Grammy winning commercial breakthrough Brothers. It peaked at number two on the Billboard album chart in the United States and prompted my first opportunity to see them live.
Most of The Black Keys discography lived on my iPod for the four years I spent in college from 2006-2010, so I was not new to their greatness by this point. This was another example of an album that just fell to me at a perfect time in my life in addition to being loaded with great songs. It kicks off with, “Lonely Boy” which won them three more Grammys that year including best rock album. With its delectable chorus and lyrics of a man at wits end, “Well your mama kept you, but your daddy left you, and I should have done you just same.” The lead guitar piece drives it so well and you can hear almost immediately why this was a hit.
The best song on the album comes a few tracks later with the organ infused, “Gold on the Ceiling.” Following the wonderful guitar intro we are introduced to an organ from decades gone by and a crowd of rhythmic hand claps. “They wanna get my gold on the ceiling, I ain’t blind, just a matter of time, before you steal it, it’s alright, ain’t no blood in my eye.” This is the kind of song that fills an arena, and it was at capacity on that day as I scribbled notes of a show review to be passed on to a co-worker’s website.
Before the album’s through, the duo lament an indecisive lover on the compelling “Nova Baby”, “All this love of mine, all my precious time, you waste it ‘cause you don’t know what you want.” There are several other non-singles that live up to Black Keys polish such as, “Run Right Back” and “Stop Stop.” All of The Black Keys albums are, “just push play” intuitive to me, but this album’s cup runneth over and should be likable to just about anyone with ears. If I went deaf I would learn braille so I could read the lyrics to their next scornful love song.
My boss at the time let me cut out early to scalp tickets for their show at the Schottenstein Center in support of the album and they did not disappoint. Certainly I’m biased, but I challenge anyone to name a better rock band from Ohio. I would certainly be thrilled if they would choose a Black Keys song for the Buckeyes to kick off to. I say this because Jack White of “Seven Nation Army” fame is from Michigan and that usually seems to be an important detail down here. Buckeye football aside, El Camino should be listened to at high volume.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Oracular Spectacular
Everyone should have a psychedelic rock album from their youth, and in 2007 we got ours. Oracular Spectacular was the studio album debut for soon to be indie giants MGMT, and nothing sounds more like my sophomore year of college than this record. Formed by Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden at Wesleyan University in 2002 as freshman, MGMT would explode into the mainstream with a blend of psychedelia, electronica and indie rock that was as catchy as it was brilliant.
The trip starts with the single, “Time to Pretend” a wonderful synthesizer filled ode to dying young and all the fun you can have. There is a point in everyone’s partying youth that this ethos seems plausible, if only momentarily. The hook during the chorus is instantly recognizable, and the lyrics were canon among college students at the time. As they agree to live fast and die young, the future seems absurd, “Yeah it’s overwhelming, but what else can we do? Get jobs in offices and wake up for the morning commute?”
Further on the journey we run into a song about a special lady with the magic touch in, “Electric Feel.” The grooving bass drives a stomping beat that makes you want to move, as slowly as you like of course. This one will hook you with its’ ear worm quality and its hard not to bounce with the chorus, “I said, ‘Ooh girl, shock me like an electric eel, babygirl, turn me on with your electric feel.’” Infectious doesn’t even begin to describe this song at a house party, and this album should come with glow sticks.
The highest charting single on the album, “Kids” which peaked at number nine on the billboard alternative list is one of the best songs of my college years. The synth-heavy track oozes with pop sensibility, the melodic lead synth line that permeates is contagious and it’s really fantastic on large speakers. I have never understood what this song was about, and I have never cared, it’s pop perfection. I have to mention the acoustic cover of the song by The Kooks in 2008 is also worth looking up, in the realm of indie-sublime.
This record came out during the perfect time for me to hear it, and I am nostalgic about it. It’s not rosy retrospection however and I am not overapraising it. It appears on Rolling Stone’s, “Top 500 Albums of All Time” 2012 list at #494, as well as on every roommate’s iPod from the late oughts. It’s a very easy listen with some drinks and friends or your favorite psychedelic sweetener, and it’s catchy choruses just may expand your mind as well.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: White Blood Cells
Alt-rock duo The White Stripes rose to prominence on the national scene with the release of their third studio album White Blood Cells in 2001. Their style was unique as a two piece that packed a bluesy punch who stood out as part of a garage rock revival along with bands such as The Hives and The Vines. The album set the stage for The White Stripes run of wildly successful albums in the oughts including the Grammy winning follow up, Elephant.
A guitar clicks into an old amplifier and there is a scream of raw Jack White noise as, “Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground“ defibrillates the album to life and gives indications for what’s to come. The sound shifts effortlessly back and forth from calm and comforting to distorted and angry as Jack describes what it’s like in the absence of his love. “Every breath that is in your lungs is a tiny little gift to me, a tiny little gift to me.” It’s a great way to kick off an album and it feels like you could have been in that, “Little Room” with them.
If you asked me for a raw sounding song, the first place my head might go on a good day is the lovable and brevity encapsulating, “Fell in Love With a Girl.” Coming in at just under 2 minutes, Jack White was surprised when it was selected to be a single for the album by the record company. It perfectly synthesizes the garage rock vibe of sounding a bit amateurish, but actually being pretty tightly put together. Besides, “Bobby said it’s fine he don’t consider it cheating now.”
The sweet and innocent acoustic finger picking and wonderful lyrics of, “We’re Going to Be Friends” splits the album up nicely with a story about two children walking to school together for the first time. It ends as beautifully as it begins with the thought of tomorrow, “When silly thoughts go through my head, ‘bout the bugs and alphabet, and when I wake tomorrow I’ll bet, that you and I will walk together again, I can tell that we are gonna be friends.”
The album would receive nearly universal critical acclaim and would go on to sell over a million copies. The part I love so much about The White Stripes is the stripped down nature of the two of them playing off of each other. Meg White’s powerful yet simple drums form the foundation for Jack to build a smoke-filled blues club on top of. Their marriage was long over by the time of this record, but the connection between them is lucidly clear, one bass kick and blues riff at a time.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: American Idiot
Why not Dookie? Because I wasn’t 17 when Dookie came out. The feeling of being neck deep in a Green Day wave was palpably similar to when they first exploded in 1994. Nothing was bigger in 2004 than Green Day’s punk rock opera American Idiot. The album has sold more than 23 million copies to date and there was a resurgence in Green Day’s popularity similar to the release of their major label debut with 1994’s Dookie. This was the Green Day album my generation grew up with.
Released in September 2004 with an election looming, lead singer Billy Joe Armstrong didn’t mince words with his thoughts on then President Bush. With the war on terror in full swing and Fox News, led by anchor Bill O’Riley in prime time, were incessantly selling the war. Fox would emerge as the propaganda arm of the Bush administration, and Billy attacked the zeitgeist: “Don’t wanna be an American idiot, one nation controlled by the media, information age of hysteria, it’s calling out to idiot America.” That lyric from the album opening title track sets the stage for what’s to come, it’s more than a rock opera about Jesus of Suburbia, they were making a statement.
Like many other Americans at the time who weren’t buying the bill of goods being sold about weapons of mass destruction, Billy continues with the chorus of, “Holiday.””I beg to dream and differ from the hollow lies, this is the dawning of the rest of our lives.” Later, before the track fades into billboard hit, “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” the bridge has Billy throw out, “Seig Heil to the president gasman!” As memory serves, this was not hyperbolic, and there were as many people calling Bush and Cheney fascists then as there are about Trump now.
Not everybody was caught up in the politics of the album however, a lot of people just really loved, “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” and what a tune it is. With that soaring chorus and the throng of people singing along, if you walked with Green Day you didn’t walk alone, “My shadow’s the only one that walks beside me, my shallow heart’s the only thing that’s beating.” It was a massive hit song with everybody from the Hot Topic people to the Hollister people, and that’s a rare event.
Thinking back about this time in music, I am glad I was a part of it. Every time I see the album art for this leviathan, I remember it fondly. Calling it the Millennials’ rock opera is fine with me, and it did eventually become a Broadway musical. Is it better than Dookie? No. Is it also great? Yes. American Idiot was a cultural benchmark of the mid 2000s and holds up today, let yourself drown in the power chords.
It’s a Wonderful Life of Albums: Get Born
Some would call it selling out, but I think it’s a pretty good sign if Apple calls and says we want to use your song to promote the music device that defined a generation. Australian rock outfit Jet’s debut album Get Born features so many great songs that if you weren’t there for it you might ask which one they used. “Are You Gonna Be My Girl?” is so upbeat and energetic, it’s as if they intentionally made the song to accent the black outline of a person dancing with an iPod to it.
The tambourine and bass intro that set the stage for the delectable main riff on, “Are You Gonna Be My Girl?” set the oughts on fire. It doesn’t require any sort of preparation, or greater thought process, it’s binary: Are you a human being or not? If you are, this song causes involuntary body movement in people. “So one, two, three take my hand and come with me, because you look so fine that I really wanna make you mine.” What else do you need?
There simply wasn’t a more fun song in the summer of 2004 than, “Cold Hard Bitch.” Back in the waning days of call-in requests to radio stations, there was a litany of hilarious dedications to ex-girlfriends and ex-wives. Often the DJ would egg them on until they let out a deeply satisfied, “She was a cold hard bitch.” The guitar on this track hooks you from the jump, and leads you down a road of playful misogyny, “Gonna take her home cause she’s over romancin’, don’t wanna hold hands and talk about our little plans alright.”
If you need respite from the rock for a moment you’ll find it with the breather ballad, “Look What You’ve Done.” It opens to a sad piano lamenting, “Take my photo off the wall if it just don’t sing for you, ‘cause all that’s left has gone away and there’s nothing there for you to prove.” In this song we see the versatility of the band and it provides some soothing mellow tones to an otherwise energy filled romp.
The album spawned five singles and sold over four million copies, it has something for everyone. The band enjoys a break from chasing tail and takes aim at the disc jockey on, “Rollover D.J.” “I wanna move but it don’t feel right, ‘cause you been playing other people’s songs all night.” “Radio Song” also offers a nice relaxed album track for you to fall in love with, this album uses all 48 minutes to the fullest. To not love this album, you would have to be some kinda cold, hard…Well nevermind.
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