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The 75 Albums Every Man Should OwnKick off Esquire.com's Music Week with our unranked, incomplete, yet highly tastefuland informative list of the records your music collection requires. How many have youlistened to?

Plus: Albums that d idn ' t m ak e t he cu t (and never shou ld ), new songs , new bands ,and new pho t os ... of Katy Perry

Darkness on th e Edg e of Tow n , Bruce Springsteen

This is when Springsteen

became a man. He realizedthat once you break these

chains and jump in the car

and leave this rotten town

behind that was Born to

Run all those dreams of

freedom and redemption can

turn into nightmares of

hopelessness and, worse,

banality.

- The 75 Albums Every Man Should Own - Esquire http://www.esquire.com/print-this/best-albums-030909

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Phases and Stag es, WillieNelson

The heartbreaking chronicle of

a marriage gone south. From

Willie's perspective. And hers.

The Ston e Roses, TheStone Roses

Brit pop's platonic ideal.

Lust for L i fe , Iggy Pop

In 1977 Iggy ran off to West

Berlin with David Bowie to

record an album so juiced with

spleen that even cruise-line

commercials can't make it


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sound safe.

The Rise and Fal l o f Z igg y Sta rd us t and t he Sp iders f r om M ar s , David Bow ie

Only Bowie could pull this off:

an apocalyptic concept album

by a horny alien drug addict

alter-ego who wails his waythrough eleven glam anthems

en route to rock 'n' roll

suicide.

Live a t The Apol lo , JamesBrown

The way those teenage girls in

Harlem scream when he leans

into "Try Me" equals anything

the Beatles evoked on Ed

Sullivan, a full fourteen

months before that foursome

stormed American shores.

Wh at ' s Go ing On, MarvinGaye

He defied the Motown hit

machine with a deeply


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personal, socially conscious work, forever altering the terrain of American soul music. If

the Funk Brothers, Motown's most underappreciated backing band, sound especially white

hot, that's because it's the first record they ever got credit for.

Crook ed Rain, Crook edRain, Pavement

Makes you shout and rant and

cry and it surprises you and

challenges you and angers youand brings you to your knees.

Then it makes you hit play

again.

I l l m a t i c , NaS

How to be an MC.

Di re St r a i t s , Dire Straits

Like listening to your best


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friend sing beautiful songs about girls and loneliness and wasting time, if your best friend

was one of the smartest guitarists and lyricists of our time.

Amer ican Beau t y , Gratefu lDead

This 1970 studio disc is the

best introduction to the

greatest jam band of all time

without all the forty-five-minute jams from Jerry

and Co.'s exhaustive (and

exhausting) live catalogue.

Out o f S tep , Minor Threat

Eight songs. Nineteen

minutes, sixteen seconds. That

urgent enough for you?

A f t e r m a t h , The RollingStones

Mick and Keith's first album of


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all original material, including "Paint It Black." Recorded when they were twenty-two. This

was the British Invasion.

Pau l ' s Bou t iqu e , TheBeastie Boys

Rap music was stuck in a

robotic "boom bap" before this

record dropped. After, it

transformed from a nichegenre that did one thing to a

mainstream genre that

included everything.

Led Z eppe li n ( I ) , LedZeppelin

I shows off each of the band

members' singular superiority

(Page on "Communication

Breakdown," Plant on "Babe

I'm Gonna Leave You," Jones

on "Dazed and Confused,"

Bonham on "How Many More

Times") in a way none of their

next four nearly-

as-quintessential albums still

can't. It's a clinic.


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I m p e r i al B ed r oom , ElvisCostello

If only for "Beyond Belief."

The Cars, The Cars

Plays like a greatest-hits

album only it's their first.


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Being There, Wilco

Wilco unhinged and unsteady

and under-produced is better

than nearly any other band

including Wilco.

Des t royer , KISS

While most bands start out as

bands and evolve into cartoon

characters, KISS started out

as cartoon characters and

evolved into a band. By the

time they recorded Destroyer,

their fifth record, they were attheir peak, reached just

moments before they began

falling apart. (The iconic cover

art is almost prophetic, the

four members leaping off the

top of the mountain they had

finished climbing together.)

The lead track, "Detroit Rock

City," probably remains their

best song; "Beth" pulled the

improbable double-double of

giving birth to the power

ballad while also guaranteeing

that we'd never have to listen

to Peter Criss sing again.

The Bend s, Radiohead

Because Pablo Honey gave us

a taste of how good Radiohead

might become, and OK

Computer gave us an idea of

how weird they might become,


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but The Bends gave us just the right doses of good and weird in equal measure and at

once.

Get t in ' Ready, TheTemptations

What we talk about when we

talk about Motown.

H ighw ay t o H el l , AC/ DC

Because when you're

assembling your dream band,

Bon Scott should be standing

in front of the mic.

The Dic t ionar y o f Soul ,Otis Redding

Because no matter where she


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goes, no matter where he sees her, no matter what wrong she does, no matter how big she

gets, no matter what rough road she takes, she's still his baby.

The Headph one Masterp iece, CodyChessnut

Thirty-six R&B songs recorded

on a four-track at home.

Makes you wish the lo-fiapproach wasn't almost

exclusively embraced by sad

white kids.

The Good, the Bad , andth e Ug ly Sound t rack ,Ennio Morricone

It's the Old West set to electric

guitar by an Italian, which is

somehow authentically

American.

Blood on th e Tracks , BobDylan

Because of the accuracy of


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"Tangled Up in Blue." Because of the heartbreaking confusion in "Simple Twist of Fate."

Because of the heartache of "Shelter from the Storm." Because you tap your foot through

all 8:50 of "Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts." Because "Buckets of Rain" is a beautiful

lullaby if you don't listen to the words. And because: "You're an idiot, babe. It's a wonder

that you still know how to breathe."

Take a Gian t Step / De Ole Fo iks a t Hom e, Taj Mahal

Taj Mahal: bluesman,ethnomusicologist,

underappreciated American

treasure.

Cat ch a F ire, Bob Marley

A record that purists and

people who have no use for

reggae can enjoy together and

in equal measure. Even if

they're not smoking a baseball

bat, like Bob is on the cover.

MTV Unp lugged in New


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York, Nirvana

It's the last time a huge band recorded a surprising album.

The Best o f Mississipp i John Hu r t (L i ve a t Ober l i n Col lege, 196 6) , MississippiJohn Hurt

You listen to this album and

you can't believe you're not

listening to two guitars and a

standup bass. But it's one

man: one very old, very

well-traveled man. He gives

them three gospel songs just

to get everyone settled and

then the real blues raw,

funny, dirty, and interrupted

occasionally (and endearingly)

by a forgotten lyric.

The T rave l ing W i lbu ry s ,Vol . 1 , The TravelingWilburys

Because Dylan, Orbison, Petty,

and Harrison.

Live a t t he O ld Quar te r ,Houst on, Texas, TownesVan Zandt


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Deep down inside, every red-blooded American man is a lovelorn, whiskey swilling cowboy

with a heart full of sorrow. The clinking of glasses in the background of this recording only

adds to the sweet misery.

Woke on a Wh a lehear t ,Bill Callahan

Because we're all just like a

bee that "tries to find

purchase in a turning spokefrom Memphis to Potomac

never giving up hope."

Rub ber Soul , The Beatles

It's the ultimate bridge record.

With hints of the drug-addled

Eastern influences to come on

Revolver and sing-alongs more

lyrically advanced than on

Help.

The Ve lve t Und erg roun d &Nico, Velvet Underground


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Makes you think that a woman's voice could do any rock band good. Lou Reed's heroin-

addled musical lifeblood, for so long dependent on grit and experimentation, is chastened

and made beautiful.

Work in ' Toge ther , Ike &Tina Turner

Because they never did

anything nice... and easy.

They only did it nice... andrough.

The Ear t h I s Not a Cold Dead Place, Explosions inthe Sky

Words sometimes mess things

up, fumbling, mumbling, and

sometimes we need to be

reminded what four super-

earnest guys can do with some

guitars and drums when they

really care about what they

leave behind. Chuck

Klosterman once wrote that

listening to Explosions in the

Sky could make hanging

drywall seem transcendental,

and he was right. Make this

record your soaringsoundtrack to just about

anything you might do

driving through snowy fields,

playing with your kids after

dinner, putting ink into the

copy machine and you'll feel

capable of achieving

something powerful and beautiful at the same time.

True Stor ies , TalkingHeads


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The better soundtrack would be the songs from True Stories the movie as sung by John

Goodman and Pops Staples and others. But this underrated record (underrated even by

David Byrne himself) will do.

This I s Hardcore, Pulp

As musical inspiration, fear is

underrated fear of getting

older, getting slow, losing your

booze, losing your woman.Also underrated: loads of dark

British cynicism to help you

cope with it.

Appet i t e f o r Dest r uc t ion ,Guns N' Roses

It's easy to forget, given the

bloated whale carcass they

became, that the first time

any of us listened to Guns N'

Roses, we sat in our

basements and looked at each

other like we had just heard

five guys ripping each other

into a thousand tiny pieces.

And we loved it. From the

opening wail on "Welcome to

the Jungle" to hearing Axl

Rose Who was this guy with

all the voices? banging

some groupie hooker in thestudio on "Rocket Queen,"

Appetite for Destruction, from

front to back, played like one

long tirade.

I n t he W ee Sm a l l H ou r s ,Frank Sinatra


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After getting dumped by Ava Gardner, Sinatra responds with a crushing meditation on

heartbreak and desolation.

Sket ches of Spain , MilesDavis

Because jazz masters too

infrequently step out of the

genre's improvisational

comfort zone and intosomewhere classical

somewhere with movements,

somewhere in Spain.

Combat Rock, The Clash

Because the last great

recording by The Clash was

the original mashup album,

cavorting from righteous dub

("Know Your Rights") to

rollicking pub rock ("Should I

Stay or Should I Go") to a

bouncy disco anthem about

censorship in

post-revolutionary Iran ("Rock

the Casbah").

Road t o Ruin , TheRamones

Because the Ramones started


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getting serious in 1978. That's also when they brought in Marky to replace Tommy on

drums, making Road to Ruin the debut of what a lot of us consider the band's classic lineup.

Here they hustled their shared love of 1960s girl groups and New York City's needle alleys

to a new level, taking sing-along choruses and three-chord riffs and turning them into

high-school anthems, only two of which ran over three minutes. Road to Ruin is the

definition of tight.

Marquee Moon, Television

It sounds like nothing else outof New York's '70s punk scene,

yet Tom Verlaine's smart

songwriting and his guitar

battles with Richard Lloyd

left its most modern footprint.

An ima ls , Pink Floyd

Three dark, allegorical, andlargely instrumental tracks

over ten minutes each? Trust

us.


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Doo l i t t l e , The Pixies

This album sounds like the devil's rock band, if the devil was slightly overweight, well-read,

and funny.

The Adv ent ures o f S l ick Rick, Slick Rick

This is how you tell a story.

Ready t o Die , TheNotorious B.I.G.

This is how you foretell a

story.

The Unre leasedRecord ings, Hank W illiams


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Made up of recently unearthed songs that were almost thrown out with the trash after he

recorded them for a Nashville radio show. Worth it if only for Hank's spoken-word

introductions.

Te n, Pearl Jam

These eleven tracks were

always bigger than the Seattle

scene they epitomize.

Band of Gyp sys, JimiHendrix

Jimi Hendrix but blacker,

bluesier, better.

Br igh t e r Than Crea t ion ' s Dark, Drive-By Truckers


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Anthems of whiskey and women and helplessness and fear and trucks and guns and

whiskey and women.

Modern Sounds in Coun t ry and W est e rn Mus ic , RayCharles

Triumphant Ray, despondent

Ray, rakish Ray, vulnerable

Ray.

. . .And Jus t ice for A l l ,Metallica

Thrash metal somehow made

elegant.

Fa i r Warn ing , Van Halen

The least commercially

successful album from the


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David Lee Roth years. And the best.

Reasonab le Doubt , Jay-Z

The paragon of rise-from-

the-streets lyricism.

Pet Sound s, Beach Boys

The result ofRubber Soul

blowing Brian Wilson's mind

and forcing him to reinvent

the Beach Boys.


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Exi le in Guy v i l le , Liz Phair

Liz Phair can make you feel

ashamed to be a man. And to

want to make it up to her.

Look Sharp ! , Joe Jackson

Because with this album Joe

Jackson pisses on all of us

our hopes, our dreams, the

way we fall in love. And we

like it.

Song s in th e Key of L ife ,Stevie Wonder

Stevie Wonder can make

magic in minutes, but this

complex double album took

him two years to produce.


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Gritty, funky, and lush.

Rage Aga ins t t he Mach ine ,Rage Against the Machine

For its righteous indignation.

Wh o's Nex t , The Who

What the rock album has

aspired to be before and

since.

Le f t t o H is Ow n Dev ices ,Vic Chessnut

The fact that folk-rock singer-

songwriter Vic Chessnut has


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been partially paralyzed and bound to a wheelchair since he was eighteen would be

incidental if it weren't for the handful of songs on this quietly triumphant album that deal

with the subject.

Sy m phony N o . 5 ,Beethoven

Beethoven at his most...

Beethovenian.

Nigh t Beat , Sam Cooke

Heartbreaking and surprisingly

spare. The only time Sam

Cooke's music hinted at howtragic his life would turn out

to be.

Song s of Leonard Cohen,Leonard Cohen


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Only Cohen could make such simple lyrics, modest ideas, and almost-whispered vocals

seem so commanding.

Penthouse , Luna

Languid. Suspicious. Witty.

This album defined "cool." For

the indie-pop set at least.

Buen a Vista Social Club,Buena Vista Social Club

This album is so tightly

performed that it's hard to

believe that the musiciansyou're hearing were mostly

dormant before Ry Cooder

decided to form a Cuban

supergroup.


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Sm al l Chan ge, Tom Waits

Anthems for the alcoholic.

Johnny Cash at Fo lsomPr ison ( L ive) , Johnny Cash

Because the man knew his

audience.


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Harvest , Neil Young

An album so accessible that

Neil Young has been trying to

run away from it since 1972.

Ming us Ah Um, CharlesMingus

This is everything Mingus is:

generous, exhilarating, and

scary.


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Sy m phony N o . 5 , GustavMahler

In this piece of music is every

emotion a man can

experience.

Grace, Jeff Buckley

Hallelujah.

http://www.esquire.com/the-side/music/best-albums-030909


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