The 70s, one side lame, one side awesome, one side groovy, one side jaded, a real bi-polar decade. Make sure it doesn’t have any razorblades, or it might go full 2000s on itself. Anyways here are the top 15 albums of the 1970s (Also we are counting when the recorded material was finished, but not released, so if an album was recorded whether live or studio in the 70s and released at a later date, it counts as a 70s album, anyways lets begin).
15: The Rocky Horror Picture Show - Film Soundtrack
Musicals fucking count in these lists, but don’t worry we won’t get too many of them unless I make a worst list, I genuinely wished someone Aaron Burr’d me when I heard Hamilton, pure Neoliberal Capitalist propaganda. But anyways let’s focus on the greatest musical of all time. Rocky Horror Picture Show isn’t just a movie, isn’t just a musical, but an event, an event that reminds me of my dad. He was a diehard superfan of Rocky Horror playing damn near every character in high school and always entertaining me with the soundtrack. He unfortunately passed earlier this year, but when I put this on, he never left. Its joyful, fun, raunchy and a laugh, just like him. Rest in peace dad, I love you.
Favorite Track: Damnit Janet
14: The Misfits - Static Age
Man, death is a fucking common thing in this list, get ready cause there’s more of them, but at least the death with this album isn’t real. Short, heavy and fun as hell tracks about cheesy b movies, political assassination and anything Glenn Danzig wants to croon out with that beautiful voice of his. Funnily enough as much as people call him “Evil Elvis”, the real Elvis was a pedophile and another Elvis-like figure is Morrissey, and well Morrissey is Morrissey, so while Evil Elvis really isn’t evil, he sure as well can fucking entertain. While this only officially released in 1997, all of the material was recorded in 1978, but due to label issues I believe. We never got this amazing fucking album until the nineties, good thing they went independent later but still. Hey at least we got the “Bullet” EP, which GOD BULLET IS A FUCKING AWESOME SONG. Really mind-blowing you know, just a direct shot in the head from a grassy knoll by a CIA agent, piercing really. Anyways let’s get out of the JFK jokes and conspiracies and you should get into this album.
Favorite Track: Bullet
13: The Stooges - Funhouse
I was a fucking idiot on the last list, I FORGOT THE STOOGES DEBUT. Hopefully the gods of Punk will forgive me for that, but still. The Stooges are one of the best bands of all time and as seen later onto this list, Iggy is one of the best artists of all time as well. But let’s keep it to Funhouse. Power, Rawness, Raw Power you could say is what makes this album just FUCK. Even more than Raw Power itself in my opinion. The Stooges are in a nihilistic thrill, nothing matters but booze, fighting and fucking GG Allin style and it’s never been more clear what Punk at the time was all about. But don’t dismiss Funhouse for being dumb fun, underlaying it is some amazing Free Jazz and Noise Rock elements that give the songs more of a kick than anything from the previous and latter albums. This is The Stooges at their peak in all its human beauty, and after writing that, I FEEL ALRIGHT.
Favorite Track: 1970
12: Television - Live at the Old Waldorf
Tom Verlaine is one of the best guitarists in the world on both studio and stage and this album proves it. This is all killer, no filler as they play all the high notes, but with Television, those notes don’t just go high, they are as tall as the twin towers, and unlike the towers, they never crashed. “Foxhole”, “Little Johnny Jewel”, “Marquee Moon”, “Venus”, “Friction”. This is one of the best live sets ever and the fact they end it all with a fucking superb cover of “Satisfaction” by “The Rolling Stones”. By the way, I decided to limit myself to only 15, but if we went to let’s say 20, “Marquee Moon” would’ve 100% been on it, but it’s an obvious pick and that would be cheap. But yes, “Marquee Moon” is also a fucking masterpiece, and you should 100% give it a listen as well. While alas ego got to Verlaine’s head and ultimately Television broke up, you won’t regret this album getting into your head.
Favorite Track: Little Johnny Jewel
11: The Residents - Meet the Residents
The Beatles if they were good. Anyways let’s get the most overrated band ever out the way (They come into mention at Number 9, Revolution 9 style (easily the best Beatles song btw)) and talk about this masterpiece. We have no idea who The Residents really are besides the main guy and even then, its left in a fog of mystery. But I feel something from this, The Residents in my opinion have always made statements about society and this is one in my opinion. The songs themselves feel like parodies of western pop culture at the time, the album certainly feels like it. The perversion of The Beatles, advertisements, everything really. This album is a perversion of cultural norms as much as the music is a perversion of music itself, God maybe this is what Harvey Weinstein listens to. But anyways, Hollywood Babylon aside, this album is brilliant if you simply want to get lost into the musical realms of it. Pat Buchanan and more NRx guys keeping talk about “The Death of the West” and while “The West Has Fallen” Chud Style, we were given the audio form of it 50 years ago. Give this album a listen, HECKIN CHUD.
Favorite Track: Infant Tango
10: Yoko Ono - Plastic Ono Band
The Beatles fucking sucked, and this is easily the best thing directly related to them. Yoko Ono’s experimental music period is fucking amazing and eclipses in both artistic merit and quality anything the Beatles ever did, including their greatest hits (Cynthia Lennon and Barbara Bach). Anyways, let’s not talk about domestic abuse anymore and onto this album. WHAT EVEN IS THIS, from the artificial ideas of genre, Experimental Rock, Proto-No Wave, Noise Rock, Free Jazz, fuck it lets even add some German shit. This album is more schizophrenic than a mass shooter groomed by the FBI, but unlike mass casualties and calls for stricter infringements on your rights, this album is amazing. It hits harder than a .357 Magnum on December 8th, 1980. While she now unfortunately makes music that first sold out with bores like “Approximately Infinite Universe” and now parodies of her work like “Warzone”, for this and “Fly” alone she commands respect for being so forward thinking and in my opinion birthing No Wave.
Favorite Track: Why
9: No New York - James Chance and the Contortions, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, Mars, D.N.A.
Speaking of No Wave, while I do not count compilations normally, this album is a special exception, why is it a special exception, cause fuck you, that’s why. On a serious note, due to the artists not really having other albums to fall back on besides James Chance and the Contortions and all of the songs being unique to this album besides James Chance’s, granted different versions. Speaking of James Chance, he unfortunately passed away from us quite recently (and hopefully this is the last mention of a recent death) and man, it’s been rough. Chance was one of the wildest men ever, from his music, to him famously decking Robert Christgau, BRO DATED LYDIA LUNCH AND ANYA PHILLIPS, he truly had it all. Rest In Peace to a great man who led a great life. The music on this album is raw, aggressive, decrepit, nihilistic, much like New York at this time. It feels like you are dodging knives actively trying to stab you as you bob and contort your head to the beat. However, the music is simultaneously different from each other in vast ways, the Funk-Punk hybrid of the Contortions, the Spoken Word beat downs of Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, the free improvisation of Mars and the Synth button mashing of D.N.A. really serve the uniqueness but common thread between all these acts. Get ready for a walk of dirty alleyways and homeless crack addicts with this album.
Favorite Track: I Can’t Stand Myself
8: Chrome - Half Machine Lips Move
What do you get when you combine The Stooges, Science Fiction, Bath salts and LSD, Paranoid Delusions and FUCK IT LETS ADD SOME CAN IN THERE, you get Chrome. After some Psychedelic folk turned into the harsher Noise Rock (a similar path to a future band on this list), Chrome was on a nonstop rampage. First with the album “Alien Soundtracks” and then their masterpiece, this album. It feels like you are going into the mind of a schizophrenic person who just watched “1984” and “The Day The Earth Stood Still” and its fucking awesome. Amazing visceral and powerful lyricism, wacked the fuck out instrumentation that is so heavy it puts any metalcore band to shame. I need to find an acid addict and have them trip on this album, from a distance and in complete safety of course, but still. Granted they are probably a filthy hippie if they still do acid, and the less of them the better I say. Either way, give this amazing album a listen.
Favorite Track: March of the Chrome Police (A Cold Clamy Bombing)
7: Metal Box - Public Image Limited
John Lydon is the poster child of Punk, but the Sex Pistols are boring industry plants, and THIS IS EASILY THE BEST THING HES EVER DONE. Lydon might be a pure lump of butter now, but back then, WHAT WAS HE ON TO MAKE THIS. From tracks like “Albatross” which conveys the suffering of menial life perfectly, to “Chant” one of the most genius criticisms of propaganda ever. This album spews wisdom from the insane and spits it back out at you with pure energy. Indisputably catchy, uncomfortably distorted and weird, if Lydon should be proud of anything, it shouldn’t be his shitty boy band, ITS THIS. Never mind The Sex Pistols, Here’s Public Image Limited.
Favorite Track: Albatross
6: The Modern Lovers - The Modern Lovers
Probably the most direct descendants of the Velvet Underground besides the literal bandmembers. The Modern Lovers consisted of Jonathan Richman, FUCKING JERRY HARRISON OF TALKING HEADS, Ernie Brooks and David Robinson, however this album is really all about Richman, he is the main guy and Richman has something aching about him. He wants to be in a loving relationship with the right one and as a hopeless romantic as well, I sympathize. Fuck, just like The Velvet Underground, I can probably describe a girl I was into or still into with a song from here. Currently the person I am hopelessly in love with is “Hospital” but I have a suspicious feeling she’s soon to be back to the dating bar and well you know what that means if you listen to it. This album is raw, emotional and really hits a spot with me. As much as I love edgier, more experimental music, we all have a sweet side, and this certainly hits mine. Keep being you Richman, and yes, I am also like the Roadrunner, THATS RIGHT.
Favorite Track: Hospital
5: Gang of Four - Entertainment
As much as they are smarmy Marxists to my Mutualism, GOD THIS ALBUM IS AMAZING. The cold critical analysis of modern life, THE GUITAR AND BASS, his voice. The band sees everything in exchange, products, hierarchy and perfectly translates that worldview into music. Its cathartic in a way while listening the utter lack of romanticism into the album, fuck the closer says it all with “Anthrax”. While this can definitely turn some people off from the band, it turns me on like an 18-inch screen. GOD THIS ALBUM IS SO DAMN QUOTABLE AND CATCHY, it’s no better than the advertisements it tries to critique (Or the Xbox’s it tries to sell as “Damaged Goods”), FUCK ANOTHER REFERENCE. If Rishi Sunak had sloganeering this good and catchy, no way in hell he would’ve lost, but what can I say, it just wasn’t a “Contract in our Mutual Interest”. DAMNIT, anyways give this masterpiece of an album a listen.
Favorite Track: Not Great Men
4: Suicide - Suicide
In 1977, two men saw the end of the world. Alan Vega and Martin Rev. This is their vision, mass suicides of the proletariat, nuclear war, the unveiling of communist hypocrisy. GHOST RIDER LITERALLY. This album is some of the most depressive but thoughtful music ever put to wax. From the soothing croons of “Cheree” and “Girl”, with this distorted and really zombified fifties atmosphere, to the hung up, bloated corpse of Elvis on “Ghost Rider” and “Rocket USA”. Fuck he even shows he can relax a little bit with “Johnny” and he can be an urgent messenger in Che, but this is all in service to the most horrifying song of all time, “Frankie Teardrop”. Its minimal and simplistic but disturbing in telling the horrors of everyday life and how easily one can snap under the pressures of Capitalist society. It is one of the most effective criticisms of Capitalism ever put to song, and it doesn’t even mention it by name or structure. While we don’t live in the end of the world as Vega and Rev saw it as, it sure sometimes feels like we are, and you certainly do once you put this album on.
Favorite Track: Frankie Teardrop
3: Y - The Pop Group
1979 is seen as the most essential year for post-punk, multiple classic albums (multiple of which on this list) released that year, “Unknown Pleasures”, “Entertainment”, “Fear of Music”, “154”, “Metal Box”, etc. This however in my opinion is some of the finest post-punk ever made and probably ever will be made. From the single later added onto the album “She is Beyond Good and Evil”, probably the best love song ever made and one of my top 5 favorite songs. To the amazing experimentation and lucidity of tracks like “Savage Sea” and “Don’t Call Me Pain”, to some of the greatest most bellowing pleas like “Thief of Fire” and “Snowgirl”. It’s a damn shame they didn’t have more albums in their heyday, but don’t be too ashamed, Mark Stewart was a fucking genius and one of the pioneers of Industrial Hip Hop, a genre I am very much a fan of to say the least. This album is powerful, hypnotic and some of the most genius experimentation ever put to wax. LISTEN TO IT NOW
Favorite Track: She is Beyond Good and Evil
2: The Idiot - Iggy Pop
If you were asking where David Bowie was, here he is, behind the production table, but still here. I am genuinely shocked how this album hasn’t become “Literally Me” core such as things like “Grace” by Jeff Buckley or “The Queen is Dead” by The Smiths. This album hasn’t aged a day. Neither in its cold, bleak, desolate soundscape nor in its nihilistic, consumerist and uncaring lyrics. Iggy Pop is the modern man of today as are we, nothing has truly changed in these past 40-50 years, we all partake in mass consumption and “Mass Production” and ultimately Iggy takes us along for the ride as he is through a vicious cycle of partying, drugs, meaningless relationships, etc. I certainly relate to the last part, and even on the first 2 I certainly get behind. Iggy just takes you along and allows you to revel in the cold, desolate alleyway this album is a part of. However back to Bowie, THE INSTRUMENTATION IS INSANE ON THIS ALBUM, it perfectly goes along with the lyricism, and just everything completely immerses you into the debauchery of this album. This is Bowie’s finest work and one of the top 10 best albums of all time. If you are ever in a dark place, listen to this. Reject being a Beta Male, Alpha Male, Sigma Male, become “The Idiot” instead. Someone trying to be a good person, but ultimately caught in a corrupt, consuming world where the last thing to consume is himself, and revel in that. I could go on all day, but there’s one last spot.
Favorite Track: Mass Production
1: 77 Live - Les Rallizes Denudes
This and “The Idiot” are neck and neck for best album of the seventies in all honesty, but Les Rallizes needs more love and for that, they get the number one. OH MY GOD THE MUSIC IS ABSOLUTELY TRANSCENDENT. If “Suicide” pulls you into hell, “The Idiot” pulls you into purgatory, this album pulls you into heaven. Everything from the luscious, distorted, psychedelic guitars, working in perfect harmony with Mizutani’s amazing voice and rhythm, it just, OH GOD IT JUST FUCKING WORKS. Starting off as a psychedelic folk band, once he heard “White Light/White Heat” by The Velvet Underground, already an admirer of Lou Reed and with a hatred of modern American culture, Mizutani was all set for his life’s duty. To be the world’s greatest guitar player. While Verlaine and Albini (who will definitely be mentioned in the 80s list) are fantastic guitar players, they inherently rely on other guitarists, they play off one another fantastically. Mizutani is a one man army on the other hand, and with his guitar, you feel like you can touch the hands of a sacred deity long since forgotten by time itself. This album is a journey into purely psychedelic, noisy, bliss. Noise Rock at some of its finest and arguably the peak of the genre.
Favorite Track: Night of the Assassins
Hopefully you enjoyed my top 15 albums of the 1970s.