Blitzen Trapper – Black River Killer EP (2009)

I remember when I first heard the album Furr by the American West Coast band Blitzen Trapper. I was extremely impressed by their sound. Later on I discovered that Furr was actually the hight of their career. One of my favourite tracks on Furr was Black River Killer, a dark folk song about a murder. This song was very similar to some of Bob Dylan's storytelling songs. Then I saw this EP in a record shop in Helsinki and I noticed that there were six songs that weren't on Furr in addition to the title track, which made me buy it immediately. I don't think other songs on this album are necessarily Furr quality, but at least it's like a bonus track compilation of leftover songs from Furr. The album cover is very beautiful with the dark heavy-metal like text. The music itself doesn't really have anything to do with heavy metal though.

Junip – Black Refuge EP (2005)

Junip is a Swedish band led by the Swedish-Argentinian folk musician José Gonzales. His solo albums are hauntingly beautiful and hypnotic, filled with quiet folk songs played on a nylon string guitar. Junip has similar songwriting, but there are more instruments and the sounds are a bit bigger. I don't know if I can technically say that I own this album, because it's just a bonus CD on Junip's album Fields. Nevertheless, it's an individual CD with these songs that were released on this EP five years earlier in 2005, so I'm counting it separately on this list. The EP has just five songs and it's only 19 minutes long. This is the second EP from Junip and it does give quite a different view of the band than the more recent albums, which sound much more professional by their sounds. I kind of like the slightly lo-fi sounds on this EP though.

Placebo – Black Market Music (2000)

Back in the start of the millennium I used to love Placebo. Their dark and bleak music was perfectly melancholic for a young adult in Finland. The singer Brian Molko's voice has lots of nasal and it's not necessarily that pleasant for a more conservative ear. I used to love it, because it was so different from anyone else and it really worked brilliantly in the context of this band's music. Black Market Music, as an album, was my least favourite Placebo album for a long time. The first two albums were superior in songwriting and sounds, and even the album that came after, Sleeping With Ghosts, was more to my liking. Any albums since then, though, have been a move to a worse direction and today, Black Market Music is still a part of Placebo's golden era. I very rarely listen to Placebo anymore, but I still have lots of respect for their music.

Santana – Black Magic Woman (Best of Santana) (1986)

This is one of the first albums my family owned. Back in the 80's my father bought a portable CD player that we could connect to our stereo and even the car stereo. Back then, CDs were called laser discs. This is a German compilation album of Santana's greatest hits. The album cover is incredibly 80's. I had to spend some time actually finding the track list for this album, because the actual CD is in Finland. Fortunately, I was able to compile a playlist on Spotify for all of these songs. I grew up with Santana, because my father listened to it quite a lot, but when I grew up and started making more of my own choices in music, I have never really been much of a fan of Santana. It is basically a prime example of dad-rock and definitely very uncool. Even so, I think Santana is legendary enough that owning one album by them is justified. Although, I wish this was Abraxas on vinyl instead.

Muse – Black Holes and Revelations (2006)

Like I said in the previous post about a Muse album, I used to be really impressed by Muse's music back in the day, but nowadays I don't really listen to it at all anymore. Where I actually really liked Absolution back in the day, I remember that when Black Holes and Revelations first came out, I already kind of thought it wasn't that good anymore. I did, however, like a couple of individual songs from the album and ended up buying it on a CD because I happened to find it cheap somewhere. Thinking back to that time, I think I mainly bought it because of the song Knights of Cydonia. Muse has probably always been a very big sounding band aiming to play big stadiums, but on this album, I feel like they lost the last bits of being an alternative rock band and they just became a stadium rock band with huge sounds.

Various Artists – Black Fist Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1977)

I have no recollection how this album has found its way into my record collection. The best guess is that it was among the quite a few albums I got from my grandparents' place. Probably previously owned by one of my uncles. The other possibility is that I got it from some of my friends as a birthday present or something. The problem with this album is that I only have it on vinyl and the vinyl is in storage in Finland. This album is not available in its entirety online either, so I have to base this post on the couple of songs that I can find online. I'm quite surprised if I have indeed found this album at my grandparents' house. The film with the same name is about a black street fighter who goes to work for a white gangster and a corrupt cop. Seems like a similar kind of cult film as Shaft. the soundtrack is filled with excellent funk and soul songs.

Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca (2009)

I'll start off this post by saying that I'm not really sure what I think about the Dirty Projectors. The sounds are nicely unique and there are many elements in this music that I really like. Then again, the songwriting is quite noisy and not always even very pleasant to listen to. I like quite simple melodies in pop music, or at least melodies that are recognisable. Dirty Projectors seems to just improvise as they go along and it's usually not even according to any chord progression. There are just random noises here and there forming the songs. Animal Collective has used similar approaches in their music and, similarly to Dirty Projectors, I'm not too sure what I'm thinking about them. Maybe I'm just too conventional when it come to music. I mean, I only just started enjoying my first jazz fusion albums. Anyway, even if I think there's something genius about this album, I'm not sure if I like it that much.

Oxford Collapse – Bits (2008)

In the hindsight, 00's was a golden decade of guitar-driven indie rock. There were so many of these bands around that many, even really good, bands got lost in the mix. Oxford Collapse may not be even among the best such bands, but at least they have something else to offer besides clean garage rock with disco drumming. In addition to indie rock tradition, Oxford Collapse also draws influences from punk rock. There's also a certain element of noise and lo-fi in the sounds. The vocals are off-key and the main deal seems to be the attitude, rather than interesting songwriting. In that sense, I feel like the band is sort of similar to Modest Mouse or Titus Andronicus. I think I first heard about this band by borrowing the CD from a library. It was released by SubPop and at the time that was almost a guarantee of good music, so I took my chances and it paid off.

Miles Davis – Bitches Brew (1970)

Like I said in my previous Miles Davis post a couple of days ago, I listened to jazz quite a lot 15 years ago when I was taking bass lessons at Ebeli in Finland. Back then, however, I wasn't quite hardcore with jazz enough to get into jazz fusion. It was way too strange to me. I normally enjoy quite simple and clear melodies. More recently, I feel like my taste in music has evolved to be much more inclusive and I've started enjoying music I wasn't too keen on before. This broadening of the mind has resulted in me actually starting to quite enjoy some jazz fusion albums. Bitches Brew can be called one of the first such albums. By the end of the 60's, Miles Davis found himself in a situation where he wasn't popular with youngsters anymore. He decided to do something about it and invented a whole new musical genre while he was at it.

Keaton Henson – Birthdays (2013)

This is one of the most special albums I own. The big masses, especially outside of UK, have probably never even heard of Keaton Henson. He used to be a visual artist who just recorded songs for himself at his home. He only started publishing anything after his friend had recommended it after persuading Henson to send him some of his music. The first album was already an intimate and beautiful album, but the second album Birthdays goes beyond, being simultaneously a very tender and endearing album and an album full of anxiety and grief. Henson's high and trembling voice is filled with emotions. He may not be technically a good singer, but at least for me, his voice shows his soul a lot more than anyone who sings "correctly". Birthdays is a fantastic album that can shut the outside world away and take you to your own little bubble filled just with your own thoughts.

Miles Davis – Birth of the Cool (1957)

In the recent few years, I've found jazz again. I used to be quite into jazz when I took bass lessons in a jazz school in my native town Espoo in Finland. I even played in a few jazz bands organised by the school. Then again, I never really got into jazz that much back then and until very recently, I only owned a handful of jazz albums. After moving to London, I feel like my interest in jazz has rekindled. I've seen quite a few great jazz gigs in London and I've started buying jazz albums again. If I have to choose my favourite jazz artist of all times, I have to go with Miles Davis. His 50's and 60's albums are quite amazing. Birth of the Cool is a compilation album of some early recordings from 1949 and 1950. The style is quite different from Davis' later work, but that's only natural considering he wasn't really the clear leader of the band during that time.

Alice Cooper – Billion Dollar Babies (1973)

Alice Cooper has a reputation of being the number one rocker that Christian circles have attacked against because of his alleged satanic performances. From today's perspective, Cooper's music, especially the 1970's music, is quite mild rock music. The music is really theatrical and there are strong similarities to glam rock. However, the lyrics are probably what made Alice Cooper the least favourite musician of the Christian circles. This album includes topics ranging from horror to sexual harassment and even necrophilia. Also, I don't think it helped that on stage, Alice Cooper was decapitated with a guillotine, he had fake blood all over the place and the stage prop included whips, surgical table and hatchets. Also, just being a bit glam and wearing make-up probably wasn't to the liking of the Christians back in the 70's.

22-Pistepirkko – Big Lupu (1992)

22-Pistepirkko had a really long career. They started their career in 1980 and only stopped playing very recently. In their career they have made some amazing albums, but also some albums that don't really impress me that much. This one belongs to the latter group. What makes this interesting, is that this album includes probably the most well known song of theirs and even I think it's one of the best ones they ever wrote. The problem is that this is pretty much the only amazing song on the album. There are some other rather interesting ones, but they don't really stand out from band's other work. 22-Pistepirkko has been quite ambitious in their career and they have made fame for themselves even outside of Finland, especially in Germany and Denmark. Band's name, meaning a ladybug with 22 dots, may not, however, be the best title for a band that aspires to break outside of Finland.

Matthew E. White – Big Inner (2012)

Matthew E. White is an American singer-songwriter, whose music is really difficult to place in any particular genre. The general sound is quite similar to many indie pop bands of the 2010's, but there are some psychedelic elements and some soul elements as well. Also, the extensive use of horns mixes things up even further. White's debut album is named with an appropriate pun, Big Inner, beginner. I first found Matthew E. White from Rough Trade's listings and I remember being impressed by his song Big Love. I didn't, however, really get into rest of his music. Then, a couple of years later, I saw this album in a sale with just a few pounds and went for it. I still think that some of the songs are fantastic, but the whole albums don't really impress me that much. I don't know exactly why, because on paper, this music should work really well for me.

The Rolling Stones – Big Hits, Vol. 2 (Through the Past Darkly) (1969)

Even though I've created this system where I go through my albums in alphabetical order according to the album name, trying to avoid bands from the same band appearing right next to each other, sometimes it's unavoidable, when the albums have similar names. This, second compilation album of The Rolling Stones was released three years after the previous one and there's a clear change in sounds. Where the first compilation album was full of rock songs with influences from soul and RnB, this second album shows that The Rolling Stones were also influenced by the late 60's psychedelic movement. Many of the songs on this album have psychedelic elements, but there are also some more straightforward rock songs on this album. Out of these two compilation albums, this one is my favourite.

The Rolling Stones – Big Hits (High Tide and Green Grass) (1966)

In my previous posts about The Rolling Stones, I have mentioned that the first years of the band saw many of the band's most popular and best songs, but the albums in the early years were not that compact wholes and thus not that interesting as albums. That's why this first compilation by The Rolling Stones actually provides a great way to enjoy their best songs from the early years. In 1966 when this compilation album came out, The Rolling Stones was just about to grow up big time in their sound and the fact that this album is a compilation of the best songs before that period makes the time period meaningful. This is the pre golden-age compilation. From a historical perspective, this album along with vol. 2, Through the Past Darkly, which was released a few years later, form the important core of the early years of the Rolling Stones.

Lee Ranaldo – Between the Times & the Tides (2012)

It took me a while to understand the brilliance of Sonic Youth. A couple of first times I was listening to their music, I was too distracted by off-key notes and noise elements to really enjoy their music, but I did always really like their guitar sounds and the general idea of their experimental approach to music. I only truly got interested in the band after listening to some of those later albums that had a more melodic approach, such as Rather Ripped and The Eternal. Those albums led me back to their earlier albums and now I can't even see how I couldn't see the brilliance of Daydream Nation or Goo before. Many of my friends have said the same thing about Sonic Youth as well. If you're one of these people I'm talking about, you should really check out this solo album by one of the founders of Sonic Youth. It's much more straight forward than the Sonic Youth albums, but has similarities in sound. It works as a gateway drug to full-on Sonic Youth.

The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Belong (2011)

The Pains of being Pure at Heart was one of those new indie bands at the end of the naughties that I got quite excited about. They basically didn't invent anything new in music, but they did what they did extremely well. I feel like today it's completely impossible to create anything unique and new in music, because pretty much everything has already been done. This has created an era that consists of just different types of retro. There is no shared youth culture and shared experience anymore, because all the music is easily available and each musical genre has their own fans, but people outside of that bubble usually know very little about that genre. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart is channeling early 90's shoegazing sounds and combines them with catchy and danceable indie pop that has echoes of 80's mainstream pop.

Wilco – Being There (1996)

Most people who listen to Wilco these days, only focus on the band that it became after yankee Hotel Foxtrot. I agree that it was a significant change in their sound and started a new era, but I also want to emphasise that the band had some amazing songs before that, and Being There is definitely the greatest pre-Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Wilco album. Like most double albums, this too, is probably a bit too long and it would've been an amazing album, had they just picked the best songs for one album. Nevertheless, I'm kind of glad this album was released as a double album, because even the songs that are not that particularly interesting are still very much worth listening to. Already on this album, Wilco started experimenting with sounds and some of these songs would definitely work on the later albums as well.

The Soundtrack of Our Lives – Behind the Music (2001)

For some bands that were around for many years and released many albums in their career, there's that one album that just beats everything else they ever released. Behind the Music is this album for Sweden's greatest rock band The Soundtrack of Our Lives. I would even go on to say that Behind the Music is one of the greatest rock albums ever made by anyone. Emphasis on the word 'rock'. From the first riffs it's clear that this album offers amazing tunes for rock fans. The riffs and drumming are simple, but the sounds are amazing and when has rock ever been about complicated tunes anyway. The Soundtrack of Our Lives (TSOOL) really knows how to make catchy rock songs that make you jump and sing along. They're also amazing live performers. This is one of the bands that I've seen live the most times, because they're always amazing on stage.

The Rolling Stones – Beggars Banquet (1968)

The Rolling Stones is a curious band, because their most popular songs are not on their most popular albums. The majority of their most popular songs are on the early albums, but those albums are not very exciting as albums. On the other hand, the end of the 60's and early 70's era saw many fantastic albums from Rolling Stones, but very few of these songs are so well known that people who haven't really listened to the Stones would know. Beggars Banquet is the first one of the so called golden age of the Rolling Stones where they released excellent roots rock albums. The influences on these albums are very much in the American blues, soul and folk traditions. It took me a while to get into the Rolling Stones at all. I had to learn to like soul music first before I understood the importance of these records.

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti – Before Today (2010)

Back in 2010 when this album came out, Helsinki-based music festival Flow was still mainly about providing a stage for promising new acts. Since then, it has just gotten bigger and bigger and now it's just a big festival with globally popular names. Back in the day, I used to listen through the mostly unknown listings of Flow Festival and make new discoveries. Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti was one of these bands. There was quite a lot of buzz around this band back then and a couple of years later. I listened to a few songs from this album and was sold, so I decided to buy the album as well to prepare myself for the gig. I wasn't really that impressed by the whole album, however. There are some really good songs on this album, but there are also songs that are so full of strange sounds that the original purpose of the album gets a bit lost.

Guided by Voices – Bee Thousand (1994)

Guided by Voices has a very long career. They're still making music having started in early 1980's and they have released more than 25 albums and a number of EPs and unofficial albums. The frontman Robert Pollard also has tens of solo albums. It may be difficult to know where to start if you want to familiarise yourself on what Guided by Voices is really about. I'd say, start from Bee Thousand and after that you can make a decision whether it's worth to explore any further. On Bee Thousand, Guided by Voices has made art of crappy studio techniques and of leaving outright mistakes in the finished album. I can't think of another album that would so perfectly fit the musical genre lo-fi. The sounds on different GBV albums are very different, but Bee Thousand is probably one of the most lo-fi ones and if you're a purist with sounds, it's probably difficult to look past this.

The Go-Go's – Beauty and the Beat (1981)

The Go-Go's was a groundbreaking all-female new wave rock band. There had not been that many popular all-female bands before the Go-Go's who would've made all of their songs and played all of their instruments themselves. Whether it's because other groups couldn't get record deals, or because women weren't encouraged to do rock in the same way back then, I don't know, but I can't think of many examples of bands like this before them. Many female rockers and other celebrities have mentioned The Go-Go's as major role models for them growing up. The Go-Go's were really popular back when this debut album of theirs came out. It was one of the biggest selling debut albums back then. It's strange how this band is now almost unknown for larger audiences. It's kind of a mystery which bands can sustain their popularity throughout the years even if they are not active.

Eels – Beautiful Freak (1996)

Eels is one of my all time favourite bands. Well, it's not technically a band. It's mainly the man called Mark Oliver Everett, or E. He makes amazing melancholic songs with fantastic, very personal, lyrics related to his own life. Beautiful Freak was the first album that was released with the band name Eels. Before then, he had released a couple of albums under the name E. He thought that by naming the band with a name that starts with E, he would get his albums quite close together in record stores, but then he realised that there are so many bands between E and Eels that it didn't really serve the purpose. Eagles, Echo & the Bunnymen etc. I simply love E's raspy voice. He can really sing almost anything and I'm happy. I don't think there's any another existing band or artist in the world that I would appreciate as much as Eels.

The Beatles – Beatles for Sale (1964)

I don't know if the name of this album is just a joke on how albums were advertised back in the day, or if it's actually an ironic statement about the rough life The Beatles were living through at the time to make money for themselves and the record company. When this fourth album of theirs was released, they were at the peak of the so-called Beatlemania. They were touring around the world and this was their fourth album in less than two years. No band today goes through this kind of work anymore, but I guess back in the day they wanted to squeeze every penny out of the band. Maybe they thought that The Beatles was only going to be a short-lived fad and wanted to get everything out of it. To me, it sounds more like this kind of approach was the reason they started touring altogether a couple of years later and eventually split up.

Oasis – Be Here Now (1997)

According to some people, this album marked the official death of Britpop. In a way, I agree with them. This was definitely where the downhill of Oasis started. Then again, they faced an impossible task with their third album. Their debut album Definitely Maybe had been the fastest selling debut album of all times and (What's the Story) Morning Glory was one insanely successful. Their success could also be seen from the massive concerts they sold out after Morning Glory. So, I think it's fair to say that the expectations were ridiculously high and it was nearly impossible to improve from where they were. Despite all of this, I think Oasis could've pulled their difficult third album off a lot better. Some of the songs on this album are still quite good, but the production is way too bloated with a result that sounds really messy and overly produced.

Led Zeppelin – BBC Sessions (1997)

Led Zeppelin is one of the most talented bands that have ever existed. What I mean by calling them talented, is that every single member of that band was amazing with their instrument. Robert Plant's Vocals extend to amazing heights, Jimmy Page is one of the best guitar players of all times, John Paul Jones has incredible bass lines and John Bonham is one of the all time best drummers in the world. They have some amazing songs as well, but the main thing this band is known for is their incredible talent. Zeppelin used lots of different genres in their music throughout their career. This album is a compilation of studio and live recordings that were just rotated as bootlegs before the release of this album. I feel like it focuses more on the band's bluesy side than probably any other individual album.

Kalle Salonen – Barracuda Man (2016)

When I was on seventh to ninth grade, we had, in our school, a class for children with intellectual disabilities. I remember from many events in our school where kids from that class would perform. Some were dancing and some were playing music. I specifically remember this man, Kalle Salonen, who used to play piano really well already back then. Earlier this year, I found out that he had become a great groove jazz organ player. I went to see him play with some of my friends in Helsinki this summer. He had a great band and the music grooved beautifully. They even had a visiting star, Jukka Gustavson, one of the best organ players in Finland, playing with them. Kalle and him were kind of battling on solos. Barracuda Man album was there on sale and I bought it. It's a great groove jazz and funk album full of great songs.

Teenage Fanclub – Bandwagonesque (1991)

At the end of 1991, the respected music magazine, Spin, selected Bandwagonesque as the greatest album published in 1991. That's quite an accomplishment considering that in 1991, such albums as Nirvana's Nevermind, Pearl Jam's Ten and Guns n' Roses' Use Your Illusion were published. For many music nerds of the time, those albums were, however, overly produced and in some people's opinion, that was against the whole movement grunge represented. What makes this statement even more significant, is the fact that Kurt Cobain himself told everyone at the time that Teenage Fanclub, who had toured with them, was the best band in the world, pretty much based on the material on this album. I don't know if I completely agree with these statements, but it's still clear that this third album by the Scottish power pop band Teenage Fanclub had something really special. Even Liam Gallagher has called Teenage Fanclub the second best band in the world (after Oasis of course).

Midlake – Bamnan and Slivercork (2004)

I fell in love with Midlake's music after hearing their 2010 album The Courage of Others. I have always been a fool for melancholic tunes and folk music. It wasn't long before I dug up their previous album The Trials of Van Occupanther and I loved that album as well. It took me a lot longer to discover the band's debut album Bamnan and Slivercork. I found it in a London-based record shop on sale with a couple of pounds and decided to buy it having spent very minimal time listening to it before. On this album, Midlake sounds still a bit raw and they haven't found their sound yet. The sounds are quite lo-fi and the general sound of the album is perhaps closer to indie pop than to folk. There are no flutes that sound so great on the later albums and instead there are some lo-fi synth sounds and simple electronic beats etc.

Bruce Dickinson – Balls to Picasso (1994)

Some time ago, I wrote about pretty much the same songs in another post about Bruce Dickinson's Live in Studio A album. In a way, it's a bit strange to write about this album after that, because this was the original album, where Live in Studio A was a remake of the songs played live in studio. The good news is that Balls to Picasso is a lot better than Live in Studio A. I still hold on to some things I said in that post about me not listening to this kind of music anymore at all, but at least the sounds on this album are a lot better. The songs are really not that exciting on this album either, but the better production makes the album more listenable. As I said back then, Dickinson's solo material is not as melodic and not as ambitious as Iron Maiden's albums, and today I would never even consider buying an album like this.

Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan – Ballad of the Broken Seas (2006)

While in the university, I used to have evenings here and there with a couple of my friends where we would play each other some of our favourite records that the others might not have heard about before. Someone brought this album to one of those evenings and I remember being really interested after hearing that Isobel Campbell was in Belle & Sebastian, which I adored at the time. Back then I wasn't yet familiar with the name Mark Lanegan, but later on he has come quite important musical figure to me through his solo career, through Screaming Trees and through Queens of the Stone Age. This collaboration between two amazing singer-songwriters is also really interesting. Their music is mostly Americana folk with some very dark sounds. I like how their voices are completely different, but work together well.

Fredator – Bad Jazz (2010)

For at least as long as I've been living here in London, I've really appreciated the Finnish jazz scene. There are numerous amazing jazz bands in Helsinki and other cities as well. In my youth I played bass in a jazz school and through that school worked as a volunteer at a jazz festival in Espoo. I got to be taught by some of the best jazz musicians in the country. Despite all of this, I didn't necessarily appreciate the scene as much back then. It may be because I've grown a bit and like to explore new music a bit more nowadays, but today I'm really excited that there's such a vibrant jazz scene where I come from. Nowadays, whenever I visit Helsinki, I usually buy one or two Finnish jazz records. Fredator is quite a recent band that I found while trying to Google what was going on in Finland's jazz scene.

Kevin – Bad Dream Stone Mystery (2006)

By mid-00's, Helsinki's music scene was full of indie rock bands that got their influences mostly from US-based indie rock bands. A vast majority of these bands chose to sing in English, because it kind of felt like the official language of this genre, but also that choice allowed them to dream big of an international career. I think it would be safe to say that none of these bands made it big internationally, but I can't really blame the bands, because there's some quite amazing music made around that time. Kevin was one of these bands that sounded ambitious and international. Their first album had had a big hit in the indie circles and I think many Helsinki rockers were looking forward to their second album, me included. Unfortunately, I feel like Bad Dream Stone Mystery is not quite as good as their debut was, but it's still a nice album.

AC/DC – Back in Black (1980)

I can't remember who exactly said it, but there is a saying that there are two kinds of bands in the world, bands like Led Zeppelin, who constantly renew themselves exploring new sounds, sometimes succeeding big time and sometimes failing, and then there are bands like AC/DC who keep doing the same thing for years and years, but doing exactly that really well. Even if this is the case, I think it's easy to pinpoint AC/DC's golden era. In my opinion, at least, it's in albums Highway to Hell and Back in Black. What makes this interesting, is that these albums have two different lead singers. Back in Black is the first album with Brian Johnson, who replaced Bon Scott who had died earlier in the year. Usually the death of the lead singer would be such a blow to the band that they would have to quit or change significantly. But not AC/DC.

Aavikko – Back from the Futer (2005)

For such a tiny country, Finland has a really rich music scene. Aavikko is a good example of a band that had courage to make music that wasn't very fashionable at the time, but that got some following from their uniqueness. Aavikko plays synth pop that seems to take most of their influences from late 70's Kraftwerk. The synth sounds are very retro and there are similarities to Nintendo video game sounds. There aren't that many lyrics in the songs, apart from occasional spoken word sequences. In a way, this band sounds like a simplified and early version of Public Service Broadcasting. Aavikko is from a tiny town called Siilinjärvi. They must've had all the time in the world to experiment with sounds and it really shows in the results. I think Back from the Futer is the band's best album. I bought it a long time ago on a CD in nice glossy covered cardboard case.

Mumford & Sons – Babel (2012)

I was a bit late for the Mumford & Sons party. Sigh No More had already made this band a phenomenon, but I only really discovered the band fully after Babel was released. More specifically, the song I Will Wait that was playing everywhere caught my ears and I was very impressed. This happened right in the middle of my folk phase, where I would listen to both more traditional old folk and the new wave of, especially American folk. Mumford & Sons is not really a purist folk band, since the songs are produced with way too modern sounds and there's no authentic acoustic sound in most of the songs. Nevertheless, I really liked the catchy pop melodies and the use of super fast banjo. I ended up buying both this and the first album Sigh No More around the same time from sale when the biggest fuss was over.

Sigur Rós – Ba Ba Ti Ki Di Do (2004)

This EP is not necessarily known to even that many people who consider themselves Sigur Rós fans, let alone other people. I remember when a friend of mine bought this EP when it was brand new and we listened to it quite a lot at the time. Back then I felt like this was a bit too obscure and the price was quite high for a CD that only had three songs on it. Later on I kind of regretted my decision not to buy it, because I started to like the amazing ambient sounds of the EP, but couldn't find it anywhere. This EP has been out of print for a long time. Fortunately, a couple of years ago, I found it second hand in a record store in London, so now I'm a happy owner of this great EP. This EP is mainly instrumental and there are only a couple of small moments when you can hear human voices, but even they are quite obscure.

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – B.R.M.C. (2001)

My attitude towards this album has changed quite a few times over the time I've owned it. I first heard my friend play it and it sounded excellent, so I also bought it. Actually, before buying it I copied on a mini disc. Fairly soon after I had purchased this album, however, I felt like I didn't really enjoy the songs that much and the songs sounded too un-melodic. Then almost 15 years later I happened to listen to them again and I felt like I was blown away how good they sounded. Clearly my taste in music had changed, but also this kind of dark neo-psychedelia had come back in fashion. In early 00's, this band was quite unique in its genre. No-one else seemed to make this kind of music. Now there are lots of cool bands that use these kinds of Krautrock-influenced psychedelic sounds and I have been very excited about those bands in the recent years.

Kent – B-Sidor 95-00 (2000)

Kent is a Swedish rock band that was hugely popular in the Nordic countries, but almost completely unknown outside of those countries. This is probably because the band sings in Swedish. They tried at some point making English versions of their albums, but the result was kind of disappointing to band's existing fans and thus that experiment didn't really lead anywhere. Anyhow, Kent is one of the most successful Swedish bands of all times and I think it's one of the best as well. Kent's first albums were still a bit unpolished and the last albums tripped themselves in too much focus on electronic instruments at the expense of good songwriting. But the albums in the middle of their career were excellent. This B-side collection includes non-album songs from the first five years in the band's recording history.

Villagers – {Awayland} (2013)

This is one of those albums that I ended up buying purely because the band had one amazing song. This song, Nothing Arrived, sounded like the early albums by Arcade Fire, but somehow it was even more melodic and lighter, which I really liked. This song appeared over and over again in Spotify's curated playlists and I had to investigate what this band was all about. Unfortunately {Awayland} wasn't as good as I might've thought purely based on that one song, but it still has its other moments as well, if nothing as exciting as this song. This Irish band mixes acoustic folk with 00's indie rock sounds and come out with melodic and well-produced music. This album sounds a lot like many other bands I've found in the last few years. It has clear echoes of 00's indie rock that I so cherished back in the day, but it has something more modern in its sounds as well.

Avi Buffalo – Avi Buffalo (2010)

I just wrote about Avi Buffalo's second album here in this blog a couple of weeks ago. This predecessor is not quite as impressive of an album, but it's still a great one, and definitely for a debut album. This album has a bit more of a slacker sound than At Best Cuckold. It reminds me of Mac de Marco in places, although I think Avi Buffalo is a better songwriter than Mac de Marco. There are some great melodies in these songs. He's also an amazing musician and the intertwining guitar lines are really phenomenal already on this album. I was introduced to Avi Buffalo when At Best Cuckold was released and it was introduced as one of the albums of the month at Rough Trade. Since then I've been listening to Avi Buffalo a lot and I also wanted to find out about his previous album, so I bought it second hand at Flash Back in Shoreditch.

Agnes Obel – Aventine (2013)

When I was working on my music geography blog a few years ago, I wasn't expecting that much from the music of Denmark. Most of the Danish bands I knew were not really that interesting and Danish music just brought to mind the awful 90's techno bands. When I started doing my research, however, I found out that there were quite a few great Danish bands that I hadn't known about before. Agnes Obel was one of the most interesting artists I found in this way. Her music is very beautiful and somehow haunting. The piano takes the lead in most of the songs with the vocals, sometimes with accompanying strings. For someone like me, who really enjoys beautiful melodies and clean vocals, this album sounded magical. I bought the album on a beautiful digipak CD. I've listened to it quite a lot since then.

Fredi – Avaa sydämesi mulle (1974)

The cover art on this album is quite something. That moustache, that suit and the way he's holding the microphone are all phenomenal. Fredi is a Finnish singer, who has recorded lots of foreign songs translated into Finnish. He has also represented Finland in the Eurovision song contest with a song called Pump-pump, where the lyrics, loosely translated, go 'bum against bum, bump bump'. Fredi is a really good singer, but the music is mainly just translations of well-known songs and the production is often quite cheesy. Anyway, I kind of like the sound of the album. The musicians are talented and Fredi's voice really gets to show its best sides. I ended up owning this album, because my mother owned it and I got it from her when my parents didn't buy a new record player to replace their old turntable that broke.

R.E.M. – Automatic for the People (1992)

I remember the first couple of times when I heard R.E.M.'s music as a child. I liked Michael Stipe's recognisable voice, but I felt like the songs were actually quite simple and not that interesting. Later on, I discovered that R.E.M. is one of those bands that open themselves only after listening to their songs a few times. This is not very normal for a band as big as R.E.M. At least in the late 90's, they had become one of the biggest bands in the world. Personally, I've grown to like their 80's albums the most, even though all their hit albums were made in the 90's. Automatic for the People could be described as their most hit filled album. It's also their best-selling album of all times. The previous album Out of Time had already showed a new, more carefully produced R.E.M., but Automatic for the People sealed the change in the band's sound and they were on their way to the top.

Blondie – Autoamerican (1980)

I got acquainted with Blondie fairly late. I was studying in uni and suddenly I realised that many of my friends were listening to Blondie and it became quite apparent that Parallel Lines was the album to start with. Later on I realised that I actually did know a couple of songs by Blondie, but I had never paid any attention to the band. Parallel Lines became one of my favourite albums and I wanted to get familiar with other albums as well. I really liked the early albums by Blondie, but I also bought some of these later albums on vinyl when I could find good deals on them. That's how I ended up buying Autoamerican on vinyl from a Helsinki-based record store Black & White. I didn't much care for it in the beginning, but later on, I've come to appreciate this album as well. This album was quite a shift in the band's sound.

Sydän, Sydän – Auto (2005)

As some of you may have noticed, I only just released a blog post on another album by Finnish Sydän, Sydän and I mentioned that I bought that album in a pack with two CDs. This is the other one of those CDs and I think this is far superior to Au. On this album, there is a minimum amount of metal sounds and to me that's usually a really good thing. Especially when the band is so capable of making this kind of more melodic progressive and experimental rock. This was the album that got me interested in Sydän, Sydän. A friend of mine from uni had told me about this band and I was interested in finding out what she was talking about, so I borrowed this album from the library. At first I was just perplexed about the strangeness of the music, but even on that first listen, there were a couple of really good songs, which made me interested in giving this band a chance.

Various Artists – Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999)

When I started this blog I decided to go through albums, not artists, in alphabetical order so I wouldn't have to go through all the albums by the same artist in a row. Of course, this means that there are still some compilation album series that I have to post in a row. So, here is the soundtrack for the second Austin Powers film. This soundtrack is not by far as good as the first one. I probably wouldn't even have bought this one had I not found it in a sale basket of a department store for one euro. There are a few good songs on this album, but those ones I generally also have on another album. Much like the second film wasn't as good as the first one, this soundtrack is also a much blander experience as the first one. It has much more contemporary rock and pop music and less great old classics.

Various Artists – Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)

Some films have brilliantly curated soundtracks that work as stand-alone compilation albums really well. The first Austin Powers film's soundtrack is one of these. There's some 60's pop, seductive bossa nova, some jazz and more modern rock music. Putting the genres like this makes it sound like the album would be a bit all over the place, but in fact, the songs on the album fit very well together. At the time this film came out, I was listening to lots of 60's and 70's music and I was quite into the psychedelic sounds of the hippy era. When I first saw the film I thought, now here's a good soundtrack. I then bought the CD a little bit later when I found it with affordable price somewhere. I also ended up finding a couple of bands in this way that I've listened to more of later on. When the second Austin Powers album came out, I was looking forward to the soundtrack as well as the film.