I thought I would take some time to feature a selected book of mine and promote it. This book is the first I have chosen. It cam out of a trip we made around Scotland with my good friends Pete and Trudy. As we drove we started discussing what the greatest albums ever recorded might be. It was great fun and generated a bit of heat and contention. We set about trying to decide the definitive best 100 albums – it got out of hand.
I came back and wrote this book.
This is the introduction:
Introduction.
From the age of ten years old I have been immersed in Rock Music, Blues, Reggae, Folk and R&B. It has awoken my mind and sensibilities and transformed my life. I cannot conceive what life would have been like without it. I have seen nearly all the major acts and met a number of the musicians. I have played music throughout my life and still regularly attend concerts. I’ve got two lined up this week and two the week after. It has been the background and foreground to everything I do.
This is my definitive selection of the 537 crucial albums that are the soundtrack to my life. This is entirely a personal view. I have made no attempt to be objective or academically accurate. For this reason you will not find albums by a small number of major acts or artists such as Queen, Yes, Genesis, the Smiths, Rod Stewart or Michael Jackson. I have seen three of these play live and listened to the music of all of them and it simply does not grab me. I find them lightweight, pretentious, obnoxious or annoying. On the other hand you will find in this book a large number of lesser known artists and bands who are absolutely brilliant, or have had a big impact on me. You may well find a number that you would find as amazing as I have found them. I am sure you will find some of the selections surprising.
We are all different. The fun is listening to someone else’s strongly held views.
So where do these views come from?
Well I have lived through the whole of the Rock era. I started collecting records at the age of eleven and have amassed a vast collection of CDs and Vinyl. I lived in London and used to go to at least three gigs a week. I went to most of the major festivals and benefits. I have met a number of the big names in Rock and was a regular at Abbey Road Studios. I have written ten books on Rock music. I ran the first ‘History of Rock Music’ course in Britain as an Adult Education programme. I ran that course highly successfully for four years. I introduced Rock Music into the curriculum at school and ran formal lessons on it.
In short I am a fully qualified musicologist – but more important is the fact that I’ve been a euphoric enthusiast for the bulk of my life! Music is transformational!
This book is more than a list. I have written about each of the albums with information on the music, band and my own personal views and experiences. Hopefully you should find that informative and interesting. It will tell you why I value that album and that artist so much.
Obviously I have not put these in any strict order. That would be silly. My choice would change according to my mood. What I might place first this week could be thirtieth next. I have attempted to space the artists and bands out so that they are not clumped together and place them in a rough sequence. The artists’ albums are loosely arranged in order of their brilliance and the top hundred albums tends to be, in my humble opinion, of higher quality than the second hundred etc. – though I have already noticed that there are a number that I would place higher and lower right this minute. But there you go – it is never ending. As Picasso said – ‘A work of art is never finished; only abandoned!’
The order of the albums is not really the point. What is important is that all 537 of them are brilliant and have something to offer.
I am sure you will all come round to agree with me because obviously I have impeccable taste in music.
Opher 8.10.2014
If you would like to purchase the book it is available on Amazon.
In the UK:
In the USA:
Reblogged this on Opher's World and commented:
This is a great one to argue with. Music is so personal. I bet there will be some of your favourites, a raft of albums you haven’t heard of plus some you think have been wrongly omitted. Whatever you think it is fun to hear what someone else thinks. Music is ultimately subjective.
Reblogged this on Words To Captivate ~ by John Fioravanti and commented:
Author and blogger, Opher Goodwin is promoting his latest book that features interesting analysis and interpretation of the music he grew up with: Rock, Soul, Blues, etc. Please, read on…