71-80: Kid A to Rockin’ the Suburbs

71. Radiohead - Kid A

With this album, Radiohead stopped making anthems, and made this noise pop, these soundscapes, instead, pieces of music to study and write to, and also to criticize for not being songs, even though I play these whatevers all the time, trying, no, hoping, to find what I’ve lost: joy and excitement and hopefulness itself, for music and life and their glorious potential, to shock and challenge and be an event, when someone says, "Listen," and that’s what you do, sitting with them in silence and awe, sharing a moment of wonder and terror, fearing such sublimity will never strike again.

72. Alice In Chains - Jar of Flies

Old Matt: Why the hell do you listen to this? You’re not on drugs, you’re not suicidal–

Young Matt: Dude, I’m in high school. What’s your excuse?

OM: Well, it’s pretty–

YM: You sound surprised.

OM: It’s not like they’re known for their quiet reflections. They’re known, if at all, for their caterwauling "harmonies," as well as for putting the "in" in "heroin." It’s hard to justify liking this stuff.

YM: What’s there to justify? You said it yourself. The album’s pretty.

OM: You mean, the EP.

YM: Whatever. It’s quiet. With harmonies, yes. It’s unplugged–

OM: Shh! Just listen.

73. Beastie Boys - Licensed to Ill

All throughout high school, I hated this shit, grouping it with Coolio, Sublime, and beer as things I didn’t get or want to partake in, thereby making me boring at parties. (I always went, though, just to observe, hoping each time that something would happen. Also, I drank a lot of soda.) Everyone else would rap every word, the math of which seemed incomprehensible. (Weren’t we all seven in 1986?) Thus, this album wasn’t mine.

Later, I actually listened to it, loving the old-school beats and rhymes, wishing I’d been cooler in 1997. This album and hindsight are both funny things.

74. Jason Mraz - Waiting for My Rocket to Come

I’m hereby starting beef with this dude, hoping he’ll read this and diss me on record, thereby launching my recording career, and maybe letting me into his crew. It works for rappers, so why not singer/songwriters – especially ones who adore Young MC (an influence Mraz has actually cited)? Actually, despite his genre, and also despite his choirboy voice, Mraz’s hip-hop jones is clear. It’s there in his humor, but also his wordplay, disarmingly witty and polysyllabic. I want to write more songs like his, if only to paint in less depressive colors – and also, like him, to avoid trite cliches.

75. Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks

I’d never dispute the artist’s brilliance. And yet, I seldom listen to him, favoring people with prettier voices, prettier songs, and sometimes even prettier faces. Perhaps it’s because I heard him so late, or else it’s because his cult turns me off, or maybe I’m just a contrarian critic, favoring "artists" who don’t write their songs, but most of his music, sadly, fails to speak to me. It’s way too dense, too riddled with allusions, to resonate as more than an intellectual exercise – except for this album, his softest and prettiest. I listen, I mourn, I relate, I get it.

76. Nas - Illmatic

Ill-Matt-ic

Here, with wordplay witty, gritty
He chronicled a crumbling city
Here, with sampled subway trains
He rapped of people fleeing pain
Some through death and some through crime
Some through beats and some through rhymes
The best debut in all of rap
Then he made a bunch of crap

Still, his wordplay murders mine
Skillz this bad should be a crime
Even though my raps are wack
I battle Nas so he’ll attack
If he reads this, he will laugh
"What the hell is this?" he’ll ask
Yet I pray he’ll take his pen
And write a worthwhile rhyme again

77. GZA - Liquid Swords

Wanna get your nerdiest white friends excited? Ask ‘em about the Wu-Tang Clan! Raps about swordplay bond us together; heated arguments about our favorite Wu members (GZA) and solo albums (this one) make that bond inseparable. It also makes us really loud in bars. Really, really, really loud. This album, like the others, is best left undescribed. You’re better off hearing its sounds for yourself – its kung-fu samples and head-chopping beats, its battle raps and sword battle raps – than letting this white boy ruin it, excitably. Spilling more ink would lead to regret, kinda like spilling more blood. Or something.

78. Belly - King

If everyone I know is a representative sample, then I am Belly’s biggest fan. Some of you, I bet, have never even heard of them, much less listened to or bought their albums used. (However, if you’re curious, you’ll find them in the bargain bin, next to R.E.M.’s Monster and Hootie!) History will say they’re a ‘90s cliche, a Next Big Thing that never really was, a female-fronted curio better left unheard. Objectively, I might agree. Subjectively, personally, I disagree with history. I think, I feel, I know I love them, for sounding exactly like bands like this should sound.

79. Marilyn Manson - Mechanical Animals

He writes the songs that make the whole world kill – but only if you believe what you read. If you actually read his lyrics and interviews, it quickly becomes obvious that the most shocking things about this "shock rocker" are his deep insights into humanity – the depressed and occasionally depraved parts of humanity, sure, but humanity nonetheless – and his surprisingly tuneful way of conveying them. Few albums have changed my perception of an artist so completely, from willful ignorance to unabashed fandom. He writes the songs that make me want to re-read his autobiography. Music to spite other people to.

80. Ben Folds - Rockin’ the Suburbs

Surely, you have your own favorite artists, those artists whose B-sides you’ve purchased on the Internet, whose work makes you feel like you know them, and like them – like, if you got to hang with them, you’d be, like, BFFs – and though they might break their piano stools in concert, or crack your shit up with their giddy profanity, they also understand how to get inside your head, and also your heart and your soul. (It’s metaphysical.) Listing them empirically limits your expression – ranking your most-favored favorites, like, sucks – when all of their work, in whole, is what moves you.

91-99: (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? to I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning

91. Oasis - (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?

If a band wants to pick a band to rip off, The Beatles are a better choice than most. You don’t have to be a virtuoso on your instrument, you don’t have to be a genius with your lyrics, and you don’t even have to enjoy your band mates’ company. All you need is love – and tunes. (Numerous Beatle references probably can’t hurt.) No band has ripped off The Beatles more blatantly than Oasis, so few have come as close to the early Beatles’ tunefulness. (Others are much more original about it.) Mind-sticking melodies + universal platitudes = this collection of cocksure classics.

92. Dave Matthews Band - Crash

I finally saw this band in concert, which means I saw them years too late. I really should’ve seen them in college or earlier, when I would’ve appreciated their jamming much more, instead of checking my watch on a work night. But at least I’m not sick of their songs anymore. In college, you see, their music was everywhere: every dorm room, every lawn, every open mic night in every campus coffeehouse... I never needed to play my copies, hearing everyone else’s every day. Now I can miss this band’s best work and hear it with fondness instead of dread.

93. Neil Young - Harvest

Reading reviews of Neil Young today, I’m struck by the claim that he almost sold out. What, because this album’s accessible, Young can’t be an iconoclast anymore? For someone who’s made a career out of changing, why wouldn’t this change also be acceptable? I don’t know, and I don’t care. It wouldn’t be the first time a "sellout" album spoke to me. I know I love the lyrics and melodies. I know I love how American it sounds, despite or because the artist is Canadian. I know I’d love to make such a statement, capturing the world in three-minute tunes.

94. The Who - Who’s Next

The best drum solo in all recorded history. The least cheesy use of a synthesizer ever. One of rock’s most famous screams. A cover with rock gods peeing on an obelisk. Yes, this album truly has it all. Despite or because it’s not a concept album, Who’s Next is more cohesive – and better – than Tommy. (Of course, at sixteen, I disagreed, vehemently.) Credit is due to Pete Townsend’s songcraft, which reaches its zenith on "Baba O’Riley," which pointedly articulates a strange "teenage wasteland." Exhibit A that words are overrated, but playing your heart out never, ever is. Play it loudly.

95. Hole - Celebrity Skin

"God, this guy has horrible taste. This shitty band appears on here twice? What about my favorite band? Or anyone more important than this? I’m sick of him praising this copycat crap. His stupid, indefensible, subjective beliefs... doesn’t he know how objectively they suck? I bet he’s gonna say he heard this in college, and its ‘bittersweet sound’ reminds him of something – emotions and feelings and homework and shit – or else he just likes it, you know? He likes it! I bet he’s not being contrarian either. He actually likes this shit unironically. This is something we have to debate."

96. Smashing Pumpkins - Adore

"Dude, we get it. You love the ‘90s. Since Billy’s the decade’s quintessential rock star, at least among those who didn’t die, you like him more than you can explain. Despite and because your moment has passed, you bought his comeback album, didn’t you? You claim to like it, but do you? Really? Isn’t it just a reclamation project, for Billy and you and everyone else, now that we’ve all moved on to other people – which, in your case, are quiet singer/songwriters? Thus, despite Adore’s techno touches, doesn’t it preview the stuff you like now? Quiet? Melodic? Wussy? It’s you!"

97. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication

"What, no Foo Fighters? Green Day? Sponge? Didn’t you mention The Toadies earlier? Weren’t you into Spacehog in college? I know you like to sing along – you’re probably a dork who likes to try to harmonize – so I guess this album is ‘perfect’ for that. I guess it’s loaded with ‘hummable tunes.’ I’m sure it reminds of you of people and places, since that’s what you seem to value in music, as well as its, I don’t know, ‘fiery fretwork,’ ‘lecherous grooves,’ and ‘lyrical gangsterdom.’

"You gave your game away too early. I’d write a poem, but you’d get surly."

98. Marvin Gaye - What’s Going On

Finally, an album that’s actually important, not just to me, but also to the world, as Marvin’s questions remain unanswered. What’s going on? Well, that one’s easy. War, greed, poverty, racism... the sorts of ills a pop song can’t cure. And that’s why Marvin’s asking why. If everyone knows what’s going on, why don’t we try to better this world? Why don’t we stop to listen to each other? If nothing else, we should listen to Marvin. Spreading love and soothing pain, Marvin’s voice comes close to breaking – all the hearts of everyone listening. Even his sighs convey the truth.

99. Bright Eyes - I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning

The newest and Dylan-est of all the "new Dylans," Conor Oberst transcends this lame shorthand. Sure, his band’s music is pure Americana, a mix of country, folk, and rock. Sure, he wields his pen like a sword, which actually makes his liner notes readable, to see if he really said what you heard. Dylan’s the best, but Conor’s just Conor, an artist who’ll inspire "new Conors" in the future. In a world of computers, he’s bringing wordplay back; you other troubadours don’t know how to act.

I still want someone to be the new me. Take that to the bridge.