50. Nirvana, In Utero
It's really hard to separate In Utero from both Kurt Cobain's suicide and All Apologies. Historically speaking, it's a very misunderstood album, both underrated and overrated at the same time. Self-consciously ugly, In Utero will always be known critically as the album Nirvana made to push away the fair-weather fans, but the nervy, bare sound of the album actually gives the album character. Much like All Apologies, the other singles off of In Utero couldn't have existed on any other album (Rape Me would have no spot on Nevermind stylistically). If you can forget Cobain's suicide, and forget how All Apologies looms over the entire album as its best and last song (I have trouble doing this, knowing that we're inching closer and closer to the end), In Utero is a really enjoyable listen. It's unfair to think of this as Cobain's goodbye, but ultimately, that's forever what it will be.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: Off the List)
49. Black Sabbath, Master of Reality
As we'll see through the next few selections, I think it's unfair that Paranoid has always been considered the pinnacle of Black Sabbath's discography. If you know the Paranoid hits, and you know Sweet Leaf, it's easy to think of Master of Reality as Paranoid's not-quite-as-good younger sibling. Reality is better from beginning to end, though. Halfway through the album, you could be forgiven for thinking Sabbath fell back into the front-loaded pattern of Paranoid. Unlike Paranoid, though, the second half of the album holds up, too (that's probably just my opinion, but Paranoid gets a little too jammy for me on the second side). The two instrumentals fit very nicely on this album, Children of the Grave is one of Sabbath's most Sabbathy songs, and Into the Voidends the album better than any other Sabbath closer.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: About the Same)
48. Mastodon, Blood Mountain
I'll always consider Blood Mountain Mastodon's punk album. Sure, there aren't any punk trappings musically, but it's all in the attitude. Leviathan and Crack the Skye are filled with brilliant pathing and construction, but Blood Mountain feels off the cuff. I will sound contradictory when saying it's also their proggiest album, as that should stand in direct conflict of a declaration of punk sensibility, but this album just sizzles everywhere. It sounds like the wild dream of a madman, completely spur-or-the-moment, yet incredibly intricate by nature. These are songs that would take a mere mortal weeks to craft, yet Mastodon makes them feel improvised. It doesn't have too many of their best songs (Colony of Birchmen not withstanding), but taken as a whole, Blood Mountain rocks.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: About the Same)
47. Incubus, Make Yourself
Incubus is a band whose songwriting skills peaked way before their musical voice did. Most of their best and most popular songs are from Make Yourself and Morning View, yet the band has had a much better control of their sound ever since A Crow Left of the Murder. For a band that everyone seems to forget is good until they put a new album (I'm very guilty of this), Incubus has had a lot of really good singles. None stand higher than Pardon Me. As their singular best song, Pardon Me (and most of Make Yourself) straddles the line between youthful exuberance and the masterful pop craftsmanship typically found outside a band's early twenties (I'm not going to bother fact-checking their age at the time of recording). While S.C.I.E.N.C.E stopped kicking ass on your 21st birthday, and Incubus now seems to have entered a mature state of releasing good-but-not-great pop albums every 3-4 years, Make Yourself retrospectively seems like the album that had that best of both worlds.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: About the Same)
46. Death from Above 1979, You're a Woman, I'm a Machine
I went to see a QOTSA/NIN concert one time, and a friend of mine got lost on the way. DFA 1979 were the openers, and I had never heard of them. As I waited outside the arena for my friend to return from New Jersey, I heard this overwhelming racket that shook it's way outside of the building and into the sidewalk next to the Spectrum. We completely missed their set, not entering the Spectrum until just a few minutes before QOTSA's set. I've seen so many shitty opening bands that I didn't think anything of it, until I checked out their album a few months later. I'll never let my friend live it down. It rocks real hard, is catchy as hell, and flies by before it overstays its welcome (a big point for me).
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: Slightly Higher)
45. Beastie Boys, Check Your Head
Check Your Head is the Beastie Boy's grooviest album. License to Ill has the kitsch, Paul's Boutique is the masterpiece, Ill Communication and beyond have more hits, but Check Your Head plays better from beginning to end than all of them. Also more than on any of their other albums, the Beasties feel less like a rap group and more like a band whom also happens to rap here. The groove is constant the entire album, the songs are more like jams than pop songs, and your head keeps bobbing the entire time.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: Off the List)
44. Black Sabbath, Black Sabbath
43. Black Sabbath, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
As with the other non-Paranoid Sabbath albums, these great albums are sorely overlooked in retrospect. These are the two albums I think of when Black Sabbath is described as the first Heavy Metal band. The debut album has a few of their absolute best songs (Black Sabbath, NIB), and the song Sabbath Bloody Sabbath seems like the beginning of both 80's heavy metal and Ozzy's solo career.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: About the Same (Black Sabbath), Lower (SBS))
42. Baroness, Red Album
Equal parts brutal and artful, Baroness sounds like a band headed for great things (Blue Record, the follow-up, kicks a ton of ass as well, but it ultimately didn't quite make my list). You can still hear the band working things out, as their songwriting isn't quite as strong as their instrumentation and creative breadth, but what's here balances beauty, destructive chaos, meandering observation, classic rock guitar solos and thundering rhythms. Only a few songs stick out from the pack, but that's mostly because the pack fits together as a complete piece. Like most of the metal you'll find on my list, this one is meant to be taken as a whole, rather than cherry-picked on an iPod.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: Lower)
41. Mastodon, Leviathan
Often seen as Mastodon's best album, Leviathan is (as the title suggests) titanic. As just mentioned in my Baroness entry, not only is Leviathan impossible to take as anything but a whole, it fits together so well that sometimes it's hard to even differentiate songs (that's a good thing here). The concept of Moby Dick really works well with the music, portraying the harsh reality of the original book instead of the romanticized version of Ahab and his whale. The whole thing really feels like a fight to the death, twisting around underwater until it's all over. This is a dense album (again, in a good way) that takes a while to really understand and love, but it's definitely worth the effort.
(Revisionist Higher/Lower/About the Same: About the Same)
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