Suede – Dog Man Star (1994)

Normally, when people talk about Suede, they compare the debut album and Coming Up and most people find their favourite Suede album in one of these two. To me, Dog Man Star is the best Suede album. It has Bernard Butler's fabulous guitars on it, it's glam, it's dark, it's innovative. It doesn't have as many hits as the other two albums, but the long artistic songs towards the end of the album are what make this album the best one for me. Even the album cover looks cooler. I wasn't always of this opinion though. For a long time, I mostly just knew Suede through their compilation album and I didn't really know all the individual songs found on the albums. Dog Man Star wasn't that well represented on the compilations, which meant that I didn't even know what I was missing. Nowadays, Dog Man Star is one of the greatest albums of the 90s on my personal list.

British Sea Power – Do You Like Rock Music? (2008)

British Sea Power was probably not very well known around the world, but they definitely were one of the important indie rock bands to me in the mid-00s, the era of guitar-indie bands. Their second album, Open Season, was an amazing album and I would say it's still their masterpiece. I've listened to that album a lot over the years. Do You Like Rock Music? had to follow that album, so obviously the expectations were really high. I don't think the album really could fulfil those expectations and overall this album was a bit of a disappointment, while it is still a very good album if you don't consider what came before. There are some fantastic hits on the album, but it's not as strong throughout and there are some parts where I get a bit bored. I really like the CD cover of this album, with its uneven cardboard surface that sets it apart from other CD case design.

Joanna Newsom – Divers (2015)

Joanna Newsom's music is something truly special. There aren't many other artists or bands in this millennium that would have such a personal sound. Newsom plays the harp and sings with vocals comparing to Kate Bush. Most of her songs are long and filled with dreamlike fantasy music filled with orchestral instruments and sounds of nature. I first fell in love with her music by listening to Ys, which I still think is her greatest album. Divers was released only three years ago, but it bears a special significance for me, because this was the album that was released before I finally saw Newsom live here in London, at Hammersmith Apollo. Her live performance only strengthened my appreciation for her. The way she used the harp both as a rhythm and melodic instrument was truly impressive. Also, she had just as fantastic vocals live as she has on the albums.

Cream – Disraeli Gears (1967)

I have never been much of a fan of Eric Clapton. He always sounded like dad-rock, even when he was young. And indeed, my dad really liked Eric Clapton, so I heard a lot of his music while growing up. It took me quite some time to realise that there was also some quite good albums he was on, but it definitely wasn't his solo stuff. Cream had its roots in blues rock but it evolved quite soon into a psychedelic rock band. The sound of the band is quite raw. All of the instruments sound really authentic without too much studio magic. This kind of sound must've influenced bands like Led Zeppelin who were just starting out in the late 60s. You can hear the blues influences in the style the band plays, but the sounds are heavier and there are some excellent hypnotic melodies on the album. I would go on to say that this is the best thing Clapton ever made.

Fool's Garden – Dish of the Day (1995)

Fool's Garden is very much a one hit wonder band. In fact, so much so that not many people even know this is the band behind the 90s hit Lemon Tree. That song was a massive hit, but other than that, no-one really seems to know any other songs from this album. There are a few other good songs on this album though. I never bought this CD myself. My sister had it when we were teenagers. When she moved away from home, she left a bunch of CDs behind that I gladly gave a new home for. This is one of those CDs. I haven't listened to this album that much, but I really do enjoy a few songs on it and I've been glad to have them in my shuffle lists for years now. It would be interesting to know whether younger generations have any recollection of this band or album. It might just be one of those bands that were only important to one generation.

Mike Oldfield – Discovery (1984)

Discovery is yet another Mike Oldfield album I got from my father's vinyl collection when he gave up owning a turntable. Discovery was released in 1984 when the sound world of music had already changed to what we know as the 80s pop period. This has had a massive impact on this Oldfield album as well. In his previous album, Crises, he had moved away from experimental synth progressive rock and presented a couple of mainstream pop songs that did very well on the charts. The most famous of these was Moonlight Shadow, performed with Maggie Reilly. She also performs on this album and there are various mainstream pop songs on this album. For this reason, Discovery is by far not my favourite Oldfield album. His strengths were precisely in experimental instrumentations and strange long songs, which are almost absent on this album.

Various Artists – Disco Gold (1975)

This is one of those mystery albums I own. I can't really remember where I got it in the first place. It either came from some of my relatives, or potentially I got it from one of my friends as a rogue purchase at the flea market. Anyway, this is a disco compilation album released in 1975 when disco wasn't really that strongly established genre yet. Most of these songs sound more like funk or soul to begin with. What's curious about this album is that I don't really know almost any of these artists. Usually disco compilations are filled with well-known artists, but this album is more obscure. It's really good though, because most of these songs are better than your average disco hit. I never expected anything interesting from this album but actually there are a few quite good songs on there that I could imagine listening to.

Alice in Chains – Dirt (1992)

When grunge conquered the world in the early 90s, I was still just a young boy just becoming interested in pop and rock music. Most of the popular music around that time had quite heavy guitars and metal, at least in Finland, had become mainstream. This had an influence on my first music choices and I spent my time listening to Metallica and Guns n' Roses, but also Nirvana. Back then, Nirvana was really the grunge movement for me. I mean, I did know about Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains and Stone Temple Pilots as well, but they never interested me as much. A few years ago, however, I started intentionally listening to these grunge bands again and I found myself understanding all of these other bands a lot more than as a kid. I ended up buying many of those classic grunge CDs I had known back then but had never truly embraced, including this one.

CMX – Dinosaurus Stereophonicus (2000)

CMX was a massively popular Finnish band when I was a teenager. Everyone in Finland knew their hit songs by heart. This is a bit strange as they started off as a very alternative punk band. Then again, they quite quickly moved on to make more basic rock music with Finnish lyrics, which has always been very popular in Finland. Personally, I owned just one 3CD compilation album by CMX, which meant that I was never that familiar with their individual albums. Dinosaurus Stereophonicus was one of the first albums to be released after that compilation and I remember reviews saying that on this album the band had completely changed its course. I don't know if they've really completely changed their course, but there are some interesting experimentations on this album. The general style of the album is progressive rock, but there are several styles across the album.

Bright Eyes – Digital Ash in a Digital Urn (2005)

Bright Eyes released two albums on the same day in 2005. These albums couldn't be further apart from each other as far as Bright Eyes albums go. Digital Ash in a Digital Urn has an unusual amount of electronic instruments for a Bright Eyes album and the whole sound is quite futuristic and cold, whereas the other album released on the same date, I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning is all about acoustic folk and warm sentiments. I didn't know much about these albums back in the day and I had a choice of buying one of them on vinyl. I thought this one looked more interesting, so I bought it, but in hindsight, that was a wrong choice because I like the other album a lot more. Then again, I also own that one nowadays, so it doesn't really matter. I don't know exactly why, but this is probably my least listened to Bright Eyes album.

Oasis – Dig Out Your Soul (2008)

There's no denying the fact that the best Oasis albums are the first two albums. However, they do have some good music on their later albums as well. If the two first ones wouldn't be so perfect, I'm sure we would make a big deal out of these later albums as well. Dig Out Your Soul is the final Oasis album, released years after the band's golden years, at the time when the Gallagher brothers were mainly fighting and not getting along at all anymore. In some ways, Dig Out Your Soul is better than most other late Oasis albums and I think the reason for that is that Noel wanted to make a rocking album after many more acoustically oriented ones. Oasis is, after all, a rock band and that's what they do best. There are also a lot bigger orchestration on this album than on other late albums. I think it's appropriate that the band returned to its roots for the final album.

Pulp – Different Class (1995)

This is one of the greatest albums ever made! Growing up in Finland, Britpop mainly consisted of four bands: Blur, Oasis, Suede and Pulp. To me personally, Pulp has always been the most important one of these. My sister bought the album pretty much as soon as it was out and I've been listening to it ever since. I bought it myself as soon as my sister had moved out and taken her CD with her. Every song on this album is a hit and there are even some B-sides from these sessions that could potentially be chart-topping hits. The album has a loose theme related to the British class society. The name of the album came from Jarvis Cocker's friend who called something that was in a class of its own as Different Class. Cocker liked the double meaning of the phrase and used is as the title of the album.

Supergrass – Diamond Hoo Ha (2008)

I was really late to discover Supergrass. Of course I did know some of their early hits, such as Alright, but I hadn't really listened to the band systematically and I had no clue of their individual albums. Then, everything changed when my sister's ex-boyfried brought Road to Rouen to one of our family gatherings at the summer cottage. I was immediately impressed about the melodic and mellow songs of that album, which led me to buy it as my first Supergrass album, which also obviously led to the earlier works as well. So, what this all entails is that Diamond Hoo Ha, which is the band's last album, was actually my first new Supergrass album while I was interested in them. It's a lot harder than its predecessor, but I still quite like it. There are excellent powerful rock songs with great melodies and energy.

David Bowie – Diamond Dogs (1974)

Diamond Dogs is Bowie's last glam rock album. After this, he went on to release Young Americans, which was more influenced by soul and R&B. By the time Diamond Dogs was released, Bowie had already retired Ziggy Stardust and Diamond Dogs is the first album after the glam era where he's not accompanied by the Spiders from Mars. Then again, Bowie's hairdo and style is still very much similar to the Ziggy Stardust era and most of the songs have been written with the Spiders, which means that the album sounds very much like the swansong to Bowie's glam era. There are, however, some art rock influences that seem to anticipate the Berlin era albums and on the other hand, there are strong influences from early 70's Rolling Stones. Diamond Dogs is not one of my favourite Bowie albums, but it has its moments.

Blitzen Trapper – Destroyer of the Void (2010)

This is Blitzen Trapper's fifth album, but they had only made their breakthrough two years earlier with their album Furr. That's when I also heard about the band, so this was the first new album from the band while I was listening to them. Destroyer of the Void is not as clearly a hit album as the previous one was. There are more experimental approaches and slow songs on this album, which makes it slightly less commercial. Usually this kind of approach may really pay off, but in this case I feel like they don't reach their full potential. Saying that, Destroyer of the Void is still and excellent piece of work combining alternative country sounds with energetic power pop. Blitzen Trapper really knows good songwriting. Their songs have amazing melodies and excellent changes in style within one song.