Blog:TigerBlazer's Top 10 Albums

Since Allistayrian recently put up a list of songs he likes to come back to, I decided it would be okay for me to put up a list of my favorite albums, something I have wanted to do for a while now. This ranking is based on my personal preference.

10. Black Album (Metallica)
This may be the most unpopular opinion in the world, but I think this is the second best Metallica album. I found Master of Puppets to be extremely over-rated, and every other Metallica album I heard (So far. I haven't heard aything that was released after Black Album) to be better than it. Back to the subject of Black Album, I found it to be an extremely entertaining listen throughout. I think what the album does best is that the songs are well within the metal genre to satisfy fans, but it's accesibe enough to fans outside the genre that it works as an introduction to metal. Along with that, I enjoy the instrumentals, especially the ones for "Sad But True" and "Wherever I May Roam". I recommend this highly.

9. Tommy (The Who)
I actually only heard this album much more recently than the others on this list, but I think it has already become one of my favorites, so I put it here. One of the two rock operas on this list, Tommy tells of the life of Tommy, who became deaf, dumb, and blind after experiencing a traumatic childhood event. There are about 25 tracks in total, with a combination of super short songs to describe an event in the story as well as standard length songs that progress the story better while also being great in their own right. I always liked theinstrumentals in the album as well, and they get stuck in my head pretty easily after listening. The use of recurring lyrics (Such as "Tommy can you hear me?" showing up in a couple of songs) is also well done in my opinion.

8. Apollo 18 (They Might Be Giants)
Yeah, I bet you didn't see this coming. Beleive it or not, I'm actually quite the They Might be Giants fan (I got it from my uncle), and I enjoy their music a lot, and I find the lyrics to be quite entertaining. This was the first album I heard from them and I still get a lot of enjoyment from it today, despite having heard it over ten times. The songs are mostly short, but all of them are varied and very easy to sing along to. The most interesting aspect of the album is the "Fingertips" suit, a collection of extremely short songs that, while not having much of a flow, is full of variety and interesting to listen to to say the least.

7. The Wall (Pink Floyd)
The other rock opera on this list, I find this album to be a musical masterpiece. It tells the story of Pink, a man who has created a metaphorical brick wall around himself to be isolated from te outside world. Other than having a great concept already, the songs help tell the story really well, and work well in their own right. Songs like "Another Brick In the Wall, Part 2" and "Comfortably Numb" are easily some of my favorites. The album also experiments away from the rock genre in ways that I found highly successful, such as "The Trial". The instrumentals, especially David Gilmour's talents with the guitar, are truly something the behold. And along with being a great album, it even got a film adaptation, which I personally found to tell the story better and is one of my favorite films.

6. Ride the Lightning (Metallica)
I consider this to be Metallica's best album (as I said, I consider Master of Puppets to be over-rated), and was the first metal album that I ever listened to, and it was a good starter one for me to say the least. I will never forget listening to the album for the first time, and immediately being blown away by the opening track, "Fight Fire With Fire". From then on, the album is a great arrangement of tracks that not only count as great metal songs, but one song in particular ("Fade to Black") experiments with the genre in a way no other album really did at the time. The guitar riffs are pretty spectacular, especially the ones in "For Whom the Bell Tolls". The album contains much of Metallica's best work, such as the three afforementioned tracks as well as the title track and "Creeping Death".

5. Mother Original Soundtrack (Various Artists)
A pretty drastic change from the otheer albums I listed so far, this album is for the most part a recreation of some of the songs from the original Mother game on NES, with some of these new versions including lyrics that match the tone of the games. I found all of these songs to be incredibly catchy and better than the already great soundtrack of the game they are from. The lyrics are pretty good too. They may seem a little sappy at first, but they are incredibly good and are enough to brighten me up on any day of the week. The album also incudes a one track compilation of the original Mother soundtrack in its 8-bit glory and still shows how great the soundtrack of the original game is even alongside the recreations on this album.

4. Animals (Pink Floyd)
I will admit, I didn't like this album to much when I first heard it (I thought it focused way to much on instrumentals rather than the themes the album wanted to convey). I decided to give it another go about a month or two later afterword, and I gave it a serious re-assessment. As I mentioned, the album is a thematic one, and for the most part compares the behavior of humans to various animals (the low-life dogs, greedy pigs, and mindless sheep), with each subject getting over ten minutes of exploration between the five tracks. In terms of lyrics, I find this to be the best Roger Waters ever got a singing, and each song is powerful because of his talents. The instrumentals are never boring (except for some parts of "Pigs: Three Different Ones"). Overall, this is an album I highly recommend.

3. Fragments (Ben Brunty)
Basically the album that gives me waves of nostaligia every time listening to it. I listened to it for the first time when I was in 7th grade, the grade that I didn't finish the way I wanted it to because of the pandemic ruining that year for me, and listening to it does give me bitter-sweet memories of a year that started great, and went downhill. Putting that aside, the quality of the album itself is great. It is entirely instrumental, and each of them are incredibly memorable. You will most likely have at least one track stuck in your head after you first listen to this album. They have a combination fo different tones, with some tracks being fast, while others are calm and ambient, and makes listening to it from start to finish sort of a journey that you don't want to end.

2. Wish You Were Here (Pink Floyd)
I have a hard time deciding whether this or my number one pick are my absolute favorite album, but I have decided that this album is the one that takes the second spot. But that is far from a bad thing. The first time I heard this, which was about a day or two after listening to Animals for the first time, I too came away from this album a little disappointed at first. However, I gave it a second listen a few days later and immediately feel in love with it. Foremost, the first and last tracks, "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", have probably the best instrumentals I have ever heard in my life, and the few lyrics the songs do have are spectacular. The three other songs on the album are equally great, and the title track is probably one of the most emotionally charged songs Pink Floyd ever wrote.

Honorable Mentions

 * Atom Heart Mother (Pink Floyd): Would have been #11 on the list.
 * ...And Justice For All (Metallica): This album has some of my favorite songs from the band, such as the title track and "Eye of the Beholder" as well as having some of the best guitar riffs ever, but I some songs weren't to memorable for me which prevents it from being on this list.
 * Queen Greatest Hits (Queen): Great album and is full of iconic songs, but I need to be in a certain mood to enjoy it fully.
 * T-Rex EP (Ben Prunty): Another album that gives me a lot of nostalgia listening to it and the first three songs are ncredible, but I did find one or two songs to be a little repetitive.

1. The Dark Side of the Moon (Pink Floyd)
I think you may have seen this one coming. This was the album that pretty much changed my life, and is a major part in shaping the person I am today. It was the first album I willingly listened to from beginning to end, and if I never heard it, I probably wouldn't have become as music obsessed as I am today. To put it simply, The Dark Side of the Moon is a musical masterpiece. Each song transitions to each other perfectly. The lyrics are fantastic and have themes such as the passage of time and insanity that are within them are beautifully done. These lyrics are backed by emotional vocals, and vocals in "The Great Gig In the Sky", while having no lyrics, are stunning and beautiful to hear. The instrumentals are downright amazing, especially from the instrumental-only tracks such as "Any Color You Like". And of course, having that iconic cover art helps too. In short, not only is this my favorite album, but I consider it to be the greatest album ever made. Seriously, go listen to this if you haven't yet!

The End (Not a Beatles Reference)
Hope you guys liked this list. I don't have to much variety in music to be honest, but I have enough to have a list like this. Hopefully, you found something that you might want to listen to in the future, and I recommend highly that you listen to all of these albums, even the honorable mentions. Tell me what your top albums are below if you want, and let me know what you think of this list.