Uriah Heep – ...Very 'Eavy ...Very 'Umble (1970)

When I was about 14 years old, I started to lose interest in the 90's heavy metal and hard rock bands like Metallica and Guns n' Roses. What replaced them, was 70's heavy rock. The sounds very more authentic and I was intrigued by the clearer way of singing. The most obvious bands in this category were Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Deep Purple. My father had listened to these bands in his youth and we had some vinyl albums at home where I could start my plunge into this genre. He also had one Uriah Heep album (Demons & Wizards) that I really liked. That album led me to listen to Uriah Heep and it became one of my favourite bands in that time. ...Very 'Eavy ...Very 'Umble is the band's debut album. It's not their best one by far, but there are a couple of really good songs nevertheless. I have this album as a remastered jewel case CD, which doesn't really give full justice for the authenticity of this kind of album, but that was what was available in those days.

Metallica – ...And Justice for All (1988)

This is one of my first CDs ever. I must have been around 10 years old when I got this CD. Metallica was one of the first bands I was a fan of. Metallica must also be one of the heaviest bands I've ever really liked. Growing up in Espoo, Finland, metal music was really popular. Lots of young people were wearing black band T-shirts, they had long hair and all the other characteristics of heavy metal fans. All the young boys around there were impressed by the visual side of metal music. Monsters and skulls were considered cool. Even I had many band T-shirts with skeletons or monsters on them and I remember drawing Metallica logos into my notebooks in school. I was never into "growling" and thus Metallica was one of the heaviest bands I was into. I have also always wanted music to have good melodies. ...And Justice for All is among my favourite Metallica albums.

Various Artists – (Ăhk-to͝ong Ba͞y-bi) Covered (2011)

So, this is the first compilation album in this blog. (Ăhk-to͝ong Ba͞y-bi) Covered is a compilation album of U2 cover songs by various artists. I'm not much of a U2 fan. I mean, I do like some of their 80's stuff, but I've never really actively listened to the band. I got this CD for free as a bonus CD buying a bunch of other albums. I was fairly excited about this album though, since it featured some interesting artists that I have listened to Quite a bit. I'm not usually a fan of compilation albums, but I do like them if there's a good idea, or it consists of songs that are not available on artists' own albums. This is the case with this one. Most of these cover songs only appear on this compilation. Some of these songs are quite different from the originals, which is always a good thing for a cover song.

Oasis – (What's the Story) Morning Glory? (1995)

It doesn't make that much sense for this album to come up here in the alphabet, but this is what the spreadsheet decided to do because of the bracket at the beginning of the album title, so who am I to judge. There are some albums that have defined whole generations and are such a big part of collective popular culture knowledge that if you don't know them, you're somehow weird. This is what can be said of Oasis' second album. Their first album had already been the fastest selling debut album of all times, but (What's the Story) Morning Glory? really changed the world. I was really into Britpop as a teenager, but for some reason Oasis wasn't as important to me as Blur or Pulp for example. My big sister owned this album way before me so I only bought the CD when she moved away from home. Nevertheless, I had listened to this album a lot and as I've grown older I've understood the significance of this album more.

Sigur Rós – ( ) (2002)

I you would describe this album to a person who knows nothing about Sigur Rós, it would probably sound like the most pretentious album ever. The album's name is just empty brackets, the CD album cover is made of translucent  material with naked trees and there's no track listing. The whole album is sung in "Hopelandic" which is a completely made up language. I think anyone who knows Sigur Rós would not, however, find this approach pretentious or even strange, considering how amazing their music is. I bought this CD immediately when it came out. I had already fell in love with Sigur Rós after their previous album Ágætis byrjun. When this album came out, I was thrilled and it fulfilled all of my expectations, but at the same times it didn't, in my opinion, manage to beat the previous album. It's a fantastic album to relax to and it will take you away from this world.

Rick Wakeman – 1984 (1981)

Here's another vinyl record that I have gotten from my father's collection. He was really into progressive rock and especially liked the fact that many strange instruments were being used. There are lots of ridiculous elements on this album, but sometimes drawing the line between ridiculous and brilliant is quite difficult. There are amazingly strange synth sounds on this album. Most notably the ones that sound like an electronic pan-flute. The amazingly high-pitched vocals of Chaka Khan further enhance the strangeness of this album. There are some amazing organ solos here though. I especially like the raunchy rock organs. At times this album gets very funky. The album is based on George Orwell's book 1984. Wakeman is known for his concept albums. The album cover kind of looks like modern Soviet art.

Ryan Adams – 29 (2005)

Ryan Adams is one of the most important artists to me. Or at least used to be. Right now as I'm writing this blogpost, I'm wearing a Ryan Adams T-shirt. 29 is probably the last Ryan Adams album that I felt really passionate about. Later albums have definitely had good individual songs on them, but I haven't felt the same kind of excitement about any later albums. I bought this album on vinyl. It looks brilliant with the dark drawing in the cover. The cover has actually been drawn by Adams himself, which is quite impressive. 29 is probably one of the most edgy albums by Ryan Adams. The sounds are very retro and there's minimal use of strange effects. Everything sounds very natural. The album is loosely a concept album. Every song on the album supposedly tells a story of a different year in the life of Ryan Adams in his twenties.

Blonde Redhead – 23 (2007)

Do you know the feeling when you've just discovered a new great band and they release a new album that turns out to be even more amazing than all of the stuff that had come out from them before. This doesn't actually happen that often, but it did happen with this album by Blonde Redhead. I had just discovered the band through a friend of mine, who played their previous album Misery Is a Butterfly to me and I was sold. Then 23 came out and it was something else. In addition to melancholic dream ballads that appeared on the previous album, there were high-tempo songs with amazing melancholic and dark sounds. This album is the band's peak. I don't think they ever manage to make something this magical ever again. I bought this album on vinyl and I'm glad I did, because the strange album cover with a four-legged woman looks great in a larger print.

Blur – 13 (1999)

As a teenager, Blur was one of my favourite bands. I even really liked their fashion sense (Adidas shoes and jackets). I have to mention straight away that I was NOT a fan of the fashion sense of Oasis even if I liked their music. I remember copying a bunch of Blur albums onto a minidisc from one of my friends, but later on I ended up buying all the albums myself. This all happened before this album was out. I remember finding this album a bit of a disappointment when it came out. It has a couple of brilliant songs, but the rest of it is a bit boring. This album, for me, was the true end of Britpop, which defined in large parts the 90's music for me. The end of Britpop led me to more contemporary sounding indie rock, so I guess it was a good change in a way. Despite of all that, Blur has historically speaking been one of the most important bands of my life.

Charlotte Gainsbourg – 5:55 (2006)

Charlotte Gainsbourg is nowadays probably better known as an actor than as a singer, but I, for one, was aware of her musical career before her acting career. I can't remember where I bought this CD, but I just remember thinking that this album sounds exactly like the French band Air and I like the band, so I'm going to buy this album as well. After buying the album, it became immediately apparent that it actually was Air who was playing on the background. The album actually sounds like a spin-off of Air. Gainsbourg's vocals sound very similar to the female vocals often found on Air's albums. The album sounds very French when it comes to sounds and Air is quite an apparent reason for this. But this is a great dream pop album and I think the collaboration with Air and Gainsbourg works amazingly well.

Focus – 3 (1972)

There are quite a few vinyl records I have pre-inherited from my father. He doesn't have a vinyl player anymore, so I enthusiastically agreed to take care of his vinyl collection. This third album by the Dutch progressive rock band, Focus, is one of those albums. I remember Focus from my childhood. My father used to especially like flute in popular music and Thijs Van Leer of Focus is quite a masterful flute player. My father also had his solo albums that were much more clearly focused (pun intended) on the flute. Focus, as a band, is probably best known for their ridiculous song Hocus Pocus. The music video for that song is a must see for anyone who wants to see just how ridiculous the prog rock movement can get. There's actual yodelling involved. This song is not on this album though.

Satellites – 02 (2013)

Like so many other albums these days, I found this in Rough Trade's albums of the month section. I remember going to the store and listening to the album with headphones. It became clear fairly quickly that I really want to buy this album. After that I realised that this album was also available on a website dedicated solely for this album. The CD I bought is in covers made of soft plastic, which makes the physical album different from any other CD I've ever owned. It had a smell that was familiar to me from He-Man figurines I used to own as a child. That chemical plastic smell now connects to two different things in my mind. It came with a bonus disc, which, for quite some time, I actually thought was the actual album. This bonus CD contains songs from the Satellites 01 album, but the production is slightly different.