Blog Posts by Robert of the Radish

Last year a fellow blogger asked me to create a list of 10 albums that have changed my life. Not necessarily my all time favorites, but those that have had the biggest impact on me.

It was a great idea, and I took the bait.

But where to start? There have been hundreds of albums that have literally "changed my life", but I've sliced them down to a mere 10. Every one of these has increased my love of music by leaps and bounds, and opened my ears to whole new genres and possibilities. Most of them are adored by many, and I still stand by their quality today, but the impression they've left on me also has much to do with the time I first heard them. Everyone should do a list like this, the exercise forces you to look back on your life and revisit the music that's molded your taste. 

As a side note, I left out two albums because they are not available. The Beatles - Rubber Soul and Husker Du - New Day Rising.

1. Rush - Moving Pictures
The first album on my list is probably the most

In the late 1980's the alternative rock movement spun off a subgenre penned as "shoegazing" by the New Musical Express. The moniker comes from the low-key performance style of the genre's practitioners.

That is, shoegaze musicians would play while almost motionless on stage while staring at their shoes, never acknowledging the audience. Most agree that the album instrumental for the development of the shoegazing style is The Jesus and Mary Chain's 1985 debut Psychocandy.

Psychocandy provides the starting point and captures the essence of the genre's fuzzed-out, distorted, wall-of-sound instrumentation, and vocals that are just under the surface, but with big pop hook melodies. A swirling combination of psychedelia and teenage shyness wrapped up in an image that was the antithesis of the rock star.

It's a sound that sunk it's teeth into me the first time I heard Psychocandy in 1986, and it has not let go since. Of course, as with all classifications of music, the genre has overlaps,

Music, and just about everything else, was overshadowed by the terrorist attacks against America on September 11, 2001. But now, over 6 years on, we can look back at the music that defined 2001 with a clear mind. And there was a lot to love. It was an important year for music, if only for the fact that it would be the last one before America was thrust into war. Songwriters had not yet begun to consider the new world in which we live.

2001 was the start of a new millennium and music was supposed to be created by robots and machines. Instruments would be played by simply thinking. Although these futuristic predictions did not come true, computers and technology did have a significant impact. Music continued to branch out in 2001, with room for more styles than ever before, and artists became empowered by home recording technology and the Internet.

This playlist includes 6 and 1/2 hours of the very best music released in 2001 as selected by consensus among the world of music criticism.

The 1930's were years marked by worldwide suffering caused by the great depression. About two months before the clock struck midnight on January 1, 1930, black Thursday happened. The great Wall Street crash of '29 ushered in an economic depression that would last most of the decade and the Dow Jones Industrial Average would not return to it's pre-crash levels for 25 years.

The 30's were a time of pain and hardship and a period that would see nations march into yet another world war. However, one of the cultural benefits was the amount of great music produced in the 10 years between 1929 and 1940. Music experienced a boom during the 1930's, in part, because musicians could draw on the creative energy created by hard times and partly because audiences were hungry to escape the dim realities of life. This energy between artist and audience sparked a creative explosion that gave us some of the most memorable songs ever written.

This playlist contains 95 of these classic standards as

Like many sub-genres of music, Jump Blues can be hard to pin down. There's a good deal of overlap with big band, swing and blues. There is  disagreement on particular songs and artists, but I have done my best to represent the genre in this 21 track playlist.

With it's birth in the 1940's, Jump Blues is marked by up-tempo numbers and big band influence, but was usually performed with bands of a much smaller size. Upright bass and drums usually laid the foundation, while a new-fangled invention called the electric guitar was used mainly as a rhythm instrument. Piano was also present in both a rhythm and lead role, while saxophones or brass horns helped punctuate the songs. Vocals were decidedly bluesy, but would also include shouted vocal lines ala Big Band and Swing.

The "Jump" comes from the up-tempo, driving rhythms that literally made the listener want to jump up and dance. As with most great American musical forms, African-Americans take the credit for the birth of Jump Blues and

You wouldn't think that classic rock and dance music would be caught in the same room together, but when nobody's looking, those two little whores can't keep their hands off each other.

This playlist contains remixed, danceable versions of classic rock songs. Some are close to the original with a heavier drum track, some could be considered a cover, and some will leave you scratching your head.

If you're an open minded music fan who can enjoy both classic rock radio, and dance music, you'll surely appreciate these remakes. Heck, even if you just like a good gimmick there's entertainment value here.

The list includes songs by AOR staples like The Rolling Stones, Elton John, The Doors, The Police, David Bowie, ZZ Top, Steve Miller, Yes and others, but as re-tooled by the likes of Fatboy Slim, Dr. Dre, DJ Malibu, Nazz and more.

The Playlist:

1. Miss You (Dr. Dre Remix 2002) - The Rolling Stones

2. Listen To The Music (DJ Malibu Mix) - The Doobie Brothers 

3. Loving The Alien - David

Last year I posted a playlist of Hip-Hop Drinking Songs and wrote about the hip-hop community's love of, and ultimate rejection, of Cristal champagne due to perceived racist comments by the company's managing director, Frederic Rouzaud.

However, hip-hop's love of Hennessy cognac continues to this day. One of the most famous urban party staples, "Crunk Juice", is made by combining Hennessy and Red Bull energy drink. This playlist features a double-album's worth of hip-hop tracks that mention Hennessy somewhere in the lyrics.

From Wikipedia — Hennessy is a leading, and the oldest, manufacturer of cognac.

Hennessy currently sells about three million cases of cognac each year. Recent innovations include trying to broaden the appeal of the drink beyond its traditional base of older drinkers, by introducing new products such as "Pure White" and "Fine de Cognac" and marketing them accordingly. Cocktail recipes have also been popularized, such as (the previously mentioned) Crunk Juice, a