The Music Never Ends

(On My Recommended Albums, 1960s-2010s)
by aLfie vera mella

I usually write a year-ender article for my music column in Filipino Journal, in which I would feature the significant album releases for the year that is ending. However, inspired by the now trending (among my fellow music enthusiasts on Facebook) List of Top 10 Albums, I instead decided to make a definitive list of my favorite albums from 1960s to the present decade. When I say "favorite," this means that I listen to these albums regularly and on a non-skip manner; and most especially, these albums encapsulate the kind of music that I really like and which largely influences my being also a songwriter.

Listening to these albums never fail to lift my spirits and to inspire my creative mind. And remember, these are just my Top 12 for each of the decades cited. Many equally great bands and albums obviously had to be shortlisted.

1960s:
The Ventures  - Walk Don't Run (1960)
The Cascades - Rhythm of the Rain (1963)
The Byrds - Turn! Turn! Turn! (1965)
The Zombies - Begin Here (1965)
The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds (1966)
The Hollies - For Certain Because (1966)
The Beatles - Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
David Bowie - David Bowie (1967)
The Left Banke - Walk Away Renée / Pretty Ballerina (1967)
Love - Forever Changes (1967)
The Moody Blues - Days of Future Passed (1967)
Pink Floyd - The Piper at the Gates of Dawn (1967)

1970s:
Caravan - In the Land of Grey and Pink (1971)
Bread - Guitar Man (1972)
Roxy Music - Roxy Music (1972)
Emerson, Lake & Palmer - Brain Salad Surgery (1973)
Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells (1973)
Yes - Tales from Topographic Oceans (1973)
America - Holiday (1974)
John Denver - Back Home Again (1974)
Camel - The Snow Goose (1975)
Rush - Fly by Night (1975)
Television - Marquee Moon (1977)
The B-52's - The B-52's (1979)

1980s:
Siouxsie & the Banshees - Kaleidoscope (1980)
Depeche Mode - Some Great Reward (1984)
Fiction Factory - Throw the Warped Wheel Out (1984)
The Lotus Eaters - No Sense of Sin (1984)
Spandau Ballet - Parade (1984)
a-ha - Hunting High and Low (1985)
The Cure - The Head on the Door (1985)
Everything but the Girl - Love Not Money (1985)
Tears for Fears - Songs from the Big Chair (1985)
Echo & the Bunnymen - Echo & the Bunnymen (1987)
U2 - The Joshua Tree (1987)
The Wild Swans - Bringing Home the Ashes (1988)

1990s:
The Lemonheads - It's a Shame about Ray (1992)
Shelleyan Orphan - Humroot (1992)
Sloan - Smeared (1992)
Spent Poets - Spent Poets (1992)
The Posies - Frosting on the Beater (1993)
Vanilla Trainwreck - Sounding to Try like You (1992)
Barenaked Ladies - Maybe You Should Drive (1994)
Gin Blossoms - New Miserable Experience (1992)
Toad the Wet Sprocket - fear (1991)
Blur - The Great Escape (1995)
The Boo Radleys - Wake Up! (1995)
Popsicle - Pospicle (1996)

2000s-2010s:
New Order - Get Ready (2001)
Belle & Sebastian - Dear Catastrophe Waitress (2003)
British Sea Power - The Decline of British Sea Power (2003)
The Postal Service - Give Up (2003)
The Killers - Hot Fuss (2004)
Nightmare of You - Nightmare of You (2005)
The Camerawalls - Pocket Guide to the Otherworld (2008)
Coldplay - Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends (2008)
This Final Frame - My Blue Heart ‎(2009)
Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History (2010)
The Wild Swans - The Coldest Winter for a Hundred Years (2011)
 Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - English Electric (2013)