1. Charlie Parker & Dizzy Gillespie - Bird & Diz

From 1951, this is the album that really got me into jazz. Be-Bop at its best. Still looking for an original copy on vinyl. Be-Bop jazz has always been my favorite and this one just takes the cake.
2. Gene Vincent & The Blue Caps - The Screaming End (Best Of)

When I was first getting into rockabilly this was my favorite. The guitar playing on these early recordings is just phenomenal. Race With The Devil blew my mind back then and still does. Gene Vincent was just so cool. His voice, attitude, and image must have been completely wild at the time.
3. Link Wray - Rumble (Best Of)

It really dosn't get much cooler than Link Wray. One of the most underrated/overlooked guitar players of all time. He popularized (some claim he invented?) playing entire songs using only power chords and was one of the first guitarists to intentionally distort his guitar and give it a fuzz effect by puncturing holes in his amp speakers. His instrumentals are very primitive, but also so wild for when they came out. His first single, Rumble, was banned when it was released in 1958 due to its connotations to gang violence. Pretty cool for just an instrumental.
4. Nuggets (Box Set)

This one really inspired me. 4 discs of mid 60s garage punk and psychedelic rock. Not many of the bands here were big hits. A lot were just one hit wonders. What I found so cool about this stuff is the genres of punk and psychedelic can be traced back to this music. Neither of those genre's were what we think they are today. These groups were wild for their time. The 1950s started rockabilly and rock & roll, but in the mid 60s is when it really started to progress. The invention of new equipment like fuzz, the wah-wah pedal (though not much if any of that on here), phasing and other studio techniques were all new to the ears of, well, everyone. That combined with the popularization of drugs led to many creative new discoveries and experimenting with music. This box set led me to purchase full albums of maybe half of the artists on it. Instead of listing all those albums, I'm just including them all in this box set...except:
5. The Sonics - !!!Here Are The Sonics!!!

This album really changed my life. Listen to most popular music coming out in early 1965 and then listen to this bad boy (The Witch, the hardest song on the album, came out as a single in '64!) In 1965 it must have sounded like your speakers were about to explode when this came on. I might argue that Punk rock can all be traced back to this album. It was as wild as it got considering the time period.
6. The Velvet Underground & Nico

Honestly, it took me a while to come around on this one. Once I really listened to it though I realized how cool it was. Songs about meeting your drug dealer, heroin, and bondage weren't exactly typical in 1967, nor were the droning psychedelic viola sounds in Venus in Furs or the noice chaos of European Son. The Velvet Underground were street punk anti-hippies. They wrote songs about what affected them and didn't care if people didn't like/get it.
7. The Beatles, Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band

My first introduction to psychedelic rock. I didn't really get exactly why it was so cool or groundbreaking when I first started listening to it in middle school, but who cares. I don't really know what to say about it. It's obviously just great. No one had put out an album like this at the time. Rock and roll was never the same after it.
8. The Grateful Dead

First things first. Fuck deadheads and the dumb dancing bear and skull logos. I don't know how that all came about, but this album was before all that. The band denies that this is an accurate representation of what they sounded like at the time, but I beg to differ after hearing bootlegs from this time period. The sound of the band hadn't developed into what people associate with the Grateful Dead, but I prefer this early sound. It draws from country, jug bands, blues, and improvositional jazz. The organ driving psychedelic garage rock wouldn't sound at all out of place on the Nuggets box set. Also some great guitar work, especially on Viola Lee Blues.
9. Blue Cheer - Vincebus Eruptum

No one knows or can agree upon where heavy metal as a genre began, but this is probably a good guess. Favorites of the Hells Angels, these guys were pretty damn heavy for 1968. Start to finish this album never lets up and basically kicks your ass the entire time. The first time I listened to it on vinyl it gave me a headache. I love the end of this album too. Some of the heaviest, loudest noise just coming to a screeching halt.
10. Iggy & The Stooges - Raw Power

Like Vincebus Eruptum, this album just never lets up. One of the hardest most solid rock & roll albums ever. I first got it on the remastered CD and recently got the original mix on vinyl. The remastered CD is definitely more powerful. Every song just sounds so violent like a good rock & roll album should. Awesome guitar playing, songwriting, and overall attitude.
11. Bruce Springsteen - Born To Run
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I got into this album a few years ago now. I always grew up with this cornball image of Springsteen with his Born In The USA phase. When I heard this album that all changed. I could never write music or lyrics as complicated or poetic as him. This album, along with his first two, are just great. I hear a lot of Van Morrison in the music. The lyrics paint such vivid pictures of late teenage American lifestyle. If you think Springsteen is just cheesy, get this album. If you already have it, get the 30th Anniversary Box Set that comes with DVDs of a documentary and a complete live concert from '75.
12. Television - Marquee Moon

Wow. This album is just great. Every song. Some of the best guitar playing ever on this album. It really opened up my eyes to a whole new style of playing. The CD has great bonus tracks like the single Little Johnny Jewel. Along with the guitar playing, the lyrics are great too. Tom Verlaine's voice is so unique. This album still sounds fresh today.
13. Ramones

This album was really influential on my guitar playing. It's so effective being so simple and short. This is what punk is all about. It's just good rock & roll. There are none of the punk clichés that came after this album because it set all the standards.
14. The Clash (UK Version)

This might be the most important album to me ever. This is the one thatreally got me into punk. Musically and lyrically I thought it was perfect. It's angry, fast, intelligent, and draws from all of thier influences so well. The Clash really had everything figured out - the look, sound, attitude. This was one of the first legit records I bought as a kid. I found the original UK issue, complete with the original British price sticker on it, used for $20. That was a lot for me to spent on a record when I was in 8th grade, but it was totally worth it.
15. Suicide

This is one of those albums that still sounds fresh today. It's just so weird. Just two guys playing simple electronic punk music. The beats come from a cheesy early drum machine, the organ/synth parts are violent (Ghost Rider, Rocket USA) or draw upon 60s pop (Cheree, Johnny) and the vocals are threatening and sparse, monotonally sung while Alan Vega would taunt the audience at shows, swinging around a chain at them.
16. Elvis Costello - This Years Model

My dad got me into Elvis Costello pretty early, in 7th or 8th grade. This Year's Model was always my favorite, but now I might like My Aim Is True a little more. I always loved the sound of This Year's Model though. It must have sounded so fresh when it came out. All the songs are super catchy and the lyrics are so clever.
17. The Clash - London Calling

I could never decide which Clash album I liked better, this or the first one. I guess I like them both the same. I love how different every song on this album sounds. You can really hear all their influences melding together, from rockabilly, to reggae, and rock & roll. I love the attitude of the band towards this album. People criticized them for not being "punk" anymore but they just laughed them off saying that punk is really just being able to do whatever you want, not just a specific style of music. Every song on this album is just perfect.
18. The Cramps - Songs The Lord Taught Us

It took me a while to get into the Cramps. Once I had already been listening to rockabilly and garage rock for a while a got what they were doing. The fuzz guitar and reverb drenched guitars sound so cool together. Most of The Cramps songs were ripped off from obscure 50s and 60s songs but who cares. They gave them such a new life, adding their horror movie imagery, hiccupy, echod vocals and primitive drum beats.
19. The Mummies - Never Been Caught

This album was pretty important to me too. This really kick started my interest in garage rock. I first heard the mummies on a jukebox at a movie theater in Milwaukee that I used to go to all the time that only played old movies from the 30s - 60s. I tracked down this album and loved it. The Mummies didn't give a fuck. They didn't care if their instruments weren't in tune, if someone played wrong notes, or that it sounds like their album was recorded on a cassette player in their bathroom. They didn't release anything on CD (until about 10 years later) only vinyl. They ripped through garage rock standards and their own material faster and more agressive than onyone before them, or possibly since.
20. Man or Astroman? - Destroy All Astromen!
After seeing Los Straitjackets early in high school, I started listening to surf music. Man or Astroman? was definitely my favorite surf band. They took 60s surf and kicked it in the ass. They upped the tempos, and updated the surf drum beat. Pretty musch every surf song has the same drum beat, but MoAM? added a more punk beat to the already chaotic intricate surf rock. Each song has samples from cheesy 50s and 60s B-movies that add to the space age sound of the album.
21. White Stripes - Elephant

Although I had known about and liked the White Stripes before this album, and now think that some of their other albums are better, Elephant is what really got me into them. It got me into the blues. I loved the variety of songs on it too. I loved the re-working of Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground and the lyrics of The Hardest Button to Button. I pretty much learned to play guitar along to this album so it's got to be on here.
22. The Coral

In the summer of 2002 I picked up a free promo DVD at a local record store. On it were videos for The Raveonettes, Porch Ghouls, Mooney Suzuki, The Coral and more. That's where I first heard all of those bands that I came to love. I still listen to this album pretty often and never get sick of it. I love the sound of it. It sounds so modern yet has 60s psychedelic, garage, folk and sea-shanty vibes. I haven't heard too many albums that combine their influences while maintaining to sound fresh so well. The lyrics are great and there's excellent playing on everyone in the band's parts too.
23. The Raveonettes - Whip It On EP

OK so the Jesus and Mary Chain may have done the sound first, but, honestly, I think the Raveonettes did it better...or at least more exciting. I love how short this release is. It comes on, does it's job and it's over. The lyrics are great, beat-inspired tales of running from the cops, lying girls, and being on death row. It really spoke to who I was and what I was interested in at the time (not necesarrily all the subject matters but the writing, aesthetic and musical styles). I got to see them live before they were anybody and they were so nice too. They were so psyched that me and my friend Scott were such big fans that they gave us free official t-shirts, hung out with us for 2 hours before the show and signed our home-made shirts. What a great night.
24. The Kills - No Wow

Again, I don't necessarily think this is their best album, but this (along with the Black Rooster EP) is what got me into them. I loved how minimal the music was and the dynamic they have when performing. I was already into Suicide and i thought this had a similar feel.
25. Death From Above 1979 - You're a Woman, I'm a Machine

My friends Matt and Khoa were going to see these guys at the first Intonation festival so they gave me the CD before they went. What's not to love here? Fast, dirty rock n roll played by just two dudes with no guitars? Sign me up. I spent hours playing bass along to this album. Really inspired the sound for my last band.
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