Perfect albums.

    My son (14) and I often chat about music when we are in the car. He asked what were my favourite albums, and while there are many, it made me think about which ones were perfect, those where you like every track, in other words, all killer no filler. These are mine:


    Genesis - A Trick of the Tail


    Pink Floyd - The Dark Side of the Moon


    Marillion - Script for a Jester's Tear


    Fleetwood Mac - Rumours


    Blondie - Parallel Lines


    Meatloaf - Bat Out of Hell


    ABC - The Lexicon of Love


    The Manhattan Transfer - Pastiche

    Marillion - Clutching At Straws

    Marillion - Afraid Of Sunlight

    IQ - Subterranea

    IQ - The Seventh House

    It Bites - Once Around The World

    The Beatles - St. Pepper`s Lonely Hearts Club Band

    Manfred Mann`s Earth Band - Watch

    Genesis - Trick Of The Tail

    Pendragon - Not Of This World

    The Who - Who`s Next

    Elton John - Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

    Rolling Stones - Aftermath

    Supertramp - Crime Of The Century

    Supertramp - Even In The Quietest Moments

    Jethro Tull - Songs From The Wood

    Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here

    Men Without Heads - Pop Goes The World

    The Flying Burrito Brothers - The Gilded Palace Of Sin

    The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds

    David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars

    Dire Straits - Communiqué

    Dire Straits - Making Movies

    Fleetwood Mac - Rumours

    First we learned to walk on water.

    Then we tried something harder.

    - Red Seven -

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    Genesis Selling England

    Genesis Trick

    The Who Who’s Next

    Fleetwood Mac Rumours

    Sinatra Songs for Swinging Lovers

    Joy Division Closer

    Led Zep 4

    Pink Floyd Dark Side

    Beethoven Third Fifth and Ninth Karajan 63 DG

    Miles Davies Kind of Blue

    Beatles Revolver Rubber Soul Sgt Pepper’s & Abbey Road

    Vaughan Williams almost any recording of Lark Ascending

    Wings Band on the Run

    Kate Bush The Hounds of Love


    lots of runners up including a few Moody Blues, more Beatles and Genesis, some Sibelius, Radiohead, probably more Sinatra and some Ella Fitzgerald, early Rod Stewart, where do we stop??

    These are not necessarily my favourite albums or the ones I play most but I think they represent top flight artists at the top of their game with very high levels of consistency/production/composition etc

    Beatles - Revolver

    Bowie - Hunky Dory

    Genesis - Lamb

    Magazine - Secondhand Daylight

    PG - 3

    XTC - The Big Express

    REM - Green

    Sugar - Beaster

    Throwing Muses - The Real Ramona

    Radiohead - The Bends

    Angel Olsen - All Mirrors


    Honorable mentions also for -


    Eno - Before & After Science

    The Charlatans - Us & Us Only

    Radiohead - In Rainbows

    XTC - Mummer

    Julia Holter - Aviary

    Goldfrapp - Tales Of Us

    Abandon all reason

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    Beatles - Revolver, Sgt Pepper, Abbey Road, Rubber Soul, A Hard Day's Night

    Dire Straits - Making Movies, Brothers In Arms

    Led Zeppelin - Led Zeppelin IV, Physical Graffiti


    There is not one Genesis album I feel I can describe as perfect. I think Duke & Invisible Touch come close. While I Can't Dance is my favourite overall a couple of tracks leave it short of perfection.


    Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers

    Elton John - Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

    Wings - Band On The Run

    Bob Dylan - Blood On The Tracks, Highway 61 Revisited

    Phil Collins - Face Value

    Peter Gabriel - So, 3

    Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here

    Mark Knopfler - Sailing To Philadelphia

    David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust

    Midnight Oil - Diesel & Dust, Blue Sky Mining

    Oasis - (What's The Story) Morning Glory?

    Bee Gees - Main Course

    Jethro Tull - Aqualung

    Queen - A Night At The Opera


    I will stop there or I will just be listing all my favourite albums.

    I concur with a lot of those. I'm a big LZ fan though I think Physical Graffiti is flawed by sides 3 and 4 simply being not up to the perfection of sides 1 and 2 so it trails off rather than builds. If they had rearranged the track order I think it would be a better album.

    Steely Dan: Royal Scam

    Neil Young: Harvest

    Eagles: Hotel California

    Traffic: John Barleycorn Must Die

    Genesis: A Trick of the Tail and Selling England by the Pound

    Quote from MoonlitKnight

    Steely Dan: Royal Scam

    Neil Young: Harvest

    Eagles: Hotel California

    Traffic: John Barleycorn Must Die

    Genesis: A Trick of the Tail and Selling England by the Pound

    Back in my Eagles fanatic days, I thought Hotel California was a perfect album. I now think it is far too dominated by Don Henley ballads.


    If there is anything close to a perfect Eagles album these days I would say Desperado. All members get equal representation & the songs are excellent.


    Regarding Harvest, I have always preferred After The Gold Rush. Perhaps I should have included Rust Never Sleeps, as that is my favourite Neil Young album.

    Quote from FeelItComing

    Back in my Eagles fanatic days, I thought Hotel California was a perfect album. I now think it is far too dominated by Don Henley ballads.


    If there is anything close to a perfect Eagles album these days I would say Desperado. All members get equal representation & the songs are excellent.


    Regarding Harvest, I have always preferred After The Gold Rush. Perhaps I should have included Rust Never Sleeps, as that is my favourite Neil Young album.

    Desperado is excellent as well. I am a big fan of their first three albums with the bluegrass influences in some of their songs. As for Hotel California, it really only has one more ballad (Wasted Time and The Last Resort, the latter of which I would argue is far from a “typical” ballad) than does Desperado (the title track). You can’t go wrong with After the Gold Rush either. Somehow I managed to miss buying Rust Never Sleeps. I ended up buying Live Rust instead and playing it to death. Back-to-back Powderfinger and Cortez the Killer live are sublime.

    My Perfect album is anything that is good!....😁


    My collection is very big , so I pretty much like them all.


    The only music I hate is Rush and Heavy Metal.

    From over 100 choices so far only about a dozen feature female voices, though both those numbers reduce a bit when duplications are factored in. I'm not criticising our choices, it's just an observation of something I've noticed before in other threads - female voices are rarely mentioned around these parts.

    Quote from Noni

    The only music I hate is Rush and Heavy Metal.

    Impressive that you even manage to crowbar your hatred of everything Rush ever did into a 'Perfect Album' thread.

    Abandon all reason

    A few . Several live ones.


    A Trick Of The Tail

    Wind and Wuthering

    Selling England By The Pound

    Seconds Out

    Dark Side Of The Moon

    Wish you Were Here

    Animals

    The Wall

    Pulse

    The Kick Inside Kate Bush

    The Dreaming

    Hounds Of Love

    The Sensual World

    Aerial - A Sky Of Honey

    Hunky Dory - Bowie

    Ziggy

    Diamond Dogs

    Viva Roxy Music

    Overkill - Motorhead

    Ace Of Spades

    No Sleep Till Hammersmith

    Led Zeppelin IV

    Made In Japan Deep Purple

    Definitely Maybe Oasis

    Abbey Road

    Sgt Pepper

    Bursting Out - Jethro Tull

    Songs From The Wood

    Heavy Horses

    Master Of Reality - Black Sabbath

    Paranoid

    Dummy - Portishead

    Rumours - Fleetwood Mac

    Blue Lines - Massive Attack

    If You Want Blood ... You Got It AC/DC

    A Farewell To Kings - Rush

    Hemispheres

    Moving Pictures

    Roadhawks - Hawkwind ( yes it's a compilation but just the way it's put together)

    Space Ritual - Hawkwind.

    Warrior On The Edge Of Time

    PG 3

    So

    The Levellers

    Levelling The Land

    What Sound - Lamb

    How Dare You - 10cc

    The Yes Album

    Close To The Edge

    Going For The One

    The Joshua Tree U2

    Achtung Baby

    The Roaring Silence - Manfred Mann's Earth Band

    Contraband- Velvet Revolver .

    Libertad

    Innervisions - Stevie Wonder

    Good idea for a thread


    Here are a few I consider perfect per the original post.


    Genesis - Trick of the Tail

    PG - Up


    Suede - Dog Man Star, Sci Fi Lullabies (yes, a perfect double album of B sides)


    Smashing Pumpkins - Adore, Machina


    The Cure - Pornography

    Hole - Celebrity Skin

    Brodie Dalle - Blood In Gutters

    Protomartyr - Relatives In Descent

    The Foals - Everything Not Lost Will Be Saved pt 2

    Beach House - Once, Twice Melody

    Lana Del Rey - Ultraviolence

    Moby - Everything Is Wrong

    Dire Straits - Brothers In Arms

    Robyn - Body Talk

    Meat Loaf - Bat Out Of Hell 2

    Pixies - Trompe le Monde

    Whipping Boy - Heartworm

    The Pierces - You & I, Creation

    Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here, Animals

    Meg Myers - Take Me To The Disco

    Sharon Van Etten - Remind Me Tomorrow

    I've been a Hawkwind fan as long as Genesis. I didn't intend to include compilations but if I had, would have included Roadhawks. I bought this on release in April 1976 and it was one of my most played albums, brilliantly compiled as you say. Finally released on CD in 2021.

    Quote from thefarmer

    What Sound - Lamb

    This doesn't quite make my 'perfect' list but I have a few of theirs including this and they rarely put a foot wrong.


    A few other interesting ones on your list. For Rush I'd probably edge Signals over MP - the latter just misses out as I'm not keen on The Camera Eye. With U2 yes Achtung would be a contender but I'd lean slightly more to Zooropa and Original Soundtracks - I love that mid-90s phase.

    Abandon all reason

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