I have to hand it to SPIN — 25 years later, still going strong/making lots of lists. The idea behind this one’s simple: “SPIN‘s editors rank the most influential releases since the magazine’s beginning in 1985.” The results are less cut and dry. For starters, fans of the current zeitgeist will be bummed. (The great Gizzly Bear/Animal Collective War of 2009′s also deemed irrelevant.) Otherwise … Rap may feel represented. Axl gives you the finger. Pavement should ask why more of you didn’t check them out at Coachella. And Bono has another reason to be a pompous dick. There are plenty of exclusions (Jesus Lizard? Minutemen? Metal outside of Metallica?), but the gaps will be different for everyone. Let’s cut to the top of the heap.
25 Nas – Illmatic
24 Metallica – Master of Puppets
23 Daft Punk – Discovery
22 Eric B. & Rakim – Paid in Full
21 Oasis – (What’s the Story?) Morning Glory
20 My Bloody Valentine – Loveless
19 Jay-Z – The Blueprint
18 The Strokes – Is This It
17 De La Soul – 3 Feet High and Rising
16 The Pixies – Doolittle
15 Hüsker Dü – New Day Rising
14 The Beastie Boys – Paul’s Boutique
13 Sonic Youth – Daydream Nation
12 OutKast – Stankonia
11 The Replacements – Tim
10 Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral
09 Pavement – Slanted and Enchanted
08 PJ Harvey – Rid of Me
07 Guns N’ Roses – Appetite for Destruction
06 Public Enemy – It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
05 Radiohead – OK Computer
04 Nirvana – Nevermind
03 The Smiths – The Queen is Dead
02 Prince – Sign O’ the Times
01 U2 – Achtung Baby
Check out the 100 that came before these/their accompanying blurbs at SPIN.
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U2 sucks all kinds of ass.
Not to be a fanboy, but no Weezer?
I don’t agree with that list at all… Also, Where’s Coldplay at? How could PJ Harvey and Nine inch nails possibly be on that list without a mention of Coldplay!?
You would seriously place PJ Harvey and NIN on the same list as Coldplay?
Hasn’t Spin done enough damage including U2 on that list already?
Coldplay is on the list – Just not in the top 25. CLick on the Spin link..
ah lads…it’s only a list, subjective to their readers,don’t get so het up about it!
and u2 had their moments, joshua tree and war are fairly good albums
not sure if I understand achtung baby being number one,but yeh know live and let live
it’s weird that an album that could be argued should be #1 on the list isn’t even on it. Kid A really couldn’t make the list over American Idiot? Really??
I noticed this, too. WTF? A glaring omission to be sure.
Also, Achtung Baby? You’re really going to stand there and tell me that Achtung Baby was a better album than the 124 albums you listed before it + Kid A? Let’s exercise some achtung and not get carried away here, boys.
LOL. I forgot that achtung means danger and not caution. Now who’s the asshole?
actually it doesn’t mean danger. it means attention or caution. so you were right first time. =)
I clearly remember that Spin gave The Bends a terrible review (one star I believe) when it was released and now it is number 28 on the best albums of the last 25 years. I guess that tells you what Spin thinks of Spin’s opinion.
It’s time for magazines to stop pretending that Nevermind is better than In Utero. That’s nonsense. More influential? Maybe. Better? No way.
“SPIN’s editors rank the most influential releases since the magazine’s beginning in 1985.”
I couldn’t agree more.
I agree.. In Untero has always been my favorite. it’s so much more savage and self deprecating
“For starters, fans of the current zeitgeist will be bummed.”
It would be interesting if they had included years. At rough glance it looks like they only put 10-15 post-2000 albums in the top 100.
Spin is as culturally relevant as Rolling Stone.
Was there a big changing of the guard over at Spin in the last five years? Because on their last list they gave #1 to OK Computer and Pavement was also higher. Also I liked that list better.
http://www.spin.com/articles/100-greatest-albums-1985-2005
Actually, I used to subscribe to Spin about 5 years ago, and at some point, their Editor-in-Chief was replaced with this editor from Blender. So the content changed, the writing wasn’t as witty, and Beyonce was on the cover. It was pretty disappointing.
Yeah I liked it back then better too, particularly the Dave Eggers piece on the last page of every issue.
“Most influential” is kind of a shaky standard for ranking albums. Assuming they mean most influential to the state of music as it is today though, I mean… even if you want to neglect the last 10 years… Weezer, Built to Spill, Neutral Milk Hotel, Modest Mouse… really?
A lot of music wouldn’t sound like it does today without those bands.
There’s 125 spots… I wonder why they thought Kanye West, Arcade Fire and the White Stripes needed two spots a piece instead of including many an omitted band.
I have to agree! Not having Neutral Milk Hotel and Modest Mouse is a tragedy.
It hurts. Moby over Neutral Milk Hotel. If only I could wipe by butt with HTML.
I have to give props to Lemon Jelly: ’64-’95 – one of the best and most underrated albums of the last 10 years, let alone 25.
Not that I dislike Achtung Baby, I just really don’t see how this rates above many of these other records. Not to mention that most of this list feels a little to out dated. Funeral at 66?! Yankee at 81?! But Hole at 55!!!! And leaving out Kid A – are you F—ing kidding me!!!! My list would actually have Kid A at No. 1, followed by Slanted and Enchanted. But everyone is entitled to their opinion.
Kid A should have been #’s 1-125.
No.
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This list is an abomination.
This list reminds me of buying Spin 25 years ago. I think I’ll buy another copy so that I can disagree with them and feel as though we’re having an important conversation. Like commenting on a blog.
“The Stone Roses” is way too low. Personally, it’s my favorite album of all time, but I’d settle for top 10.
yes!
although the rerelease with like 500 discs was a bit embarrassing…
I bought Achtung Baby on tape when I was 13 years old and I remember thinking it was pretty hit and miss.
Well then it definitely shouldn’t be #1
Prince and the Smiths should be a lot lower.
i dig the diversity of this list, but achtung baby? c’mon. we can do better.
also, too much outkast. they’re not that great.
U2′s Achtung Baby… Sigh… I’m really surprised how little love this record gets from readers of sites like this. Is it an age thing? I was 16 when it came out and I think it’s one of the greatest records of all time. I won’t go on to try and establish some semblance of indie-cred by listing current bands that I like to try and legitimize this statement (although I will say that other favorites in 1991 were Cocteau Twins’ Heaven or Las Vegas and Talk Talk’s Laughing Stock (which was released the same day as Achtung)). And I will concede to someone’s comment above that it may sound dated now. But I think it is one of the most dramatic band reinventions in the history of popular music. Even if you take it out of the context of U2′s other albums, I think it stands on it’s own amazingly… ah, I won’t go on. No one cares. Pitchfork left it off their top 100 of the 1990s and until they change their mind this will go unappreciated by far too many youngsters.
I feel so old. But thanks anyway, Spin.
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
AchtungBaby/ZooTV/Zooropa is my favorite thing to happen to music, but I can understand how it’s been more or less forgotten. As you mentioned, nearly all the press it receives focuses exclusively on the band’s reinvention, implying that it exists solely to contrast The Joshua Tree.
Critical perception aside, I would have guessed mid-90′s U2 to resonate more with the irony-addled indie music scene of today. Instead, glibly sporting tie-dye wolf shirts & trucker hats is “challenging” while streaming live feeds from Sarajevo in the middle of a television-themed rock show is not.
Didn’t know it came out the same day as Laughing Stock, what a day.
I am with you, Achtung Baby is one of my all time favorite records. There is no fat on that record at all. Solid from track 1 to track 12.
I was also 16 when it came out. It was a real facemelter then and I think it still is. I remember the day I saw the Fly video and I expected to see Joshua Tree PT II, instead came out the antithesis and in the words of the band, they chopped down their own Joshua Tree. Coldplay, are you frigging kidding me? Sorry but without U2 there is no coldplay, and most likely no Radiohead either.
The list from SPIN has some omissions and lists always generate this sort of response. I don’t even like metallica that much, but master of puppets is a seminal heavy metal album. It takes a nation of million to hold us back, or Rid of Me are probably the other albums that as soon as I heard it I was totally blown away.
Peter Gabriel’s US came out that same year, and in some ways I think it is a more solid album than SO.
I am glad MBV Loveless made the list.
Ride’s Nowhere would be another add, as would slowdive’s just for a day. I Second the above commenters statement about the cocteau twins and talk talk.
This list is crap!
Every Radiohead, Pixies, Pavement, and Smiths record kills everything else in the top 25 and Siamese Dream should be waaaay higher.
By the way… WHERE IS MEAT IS MURDER!
It literally makes no sense that Doolittle is ranked lower than Nevermind because Kurt Cobain himself has admitted the HUGE influence Pixies had on Nirvana’s music.
Good question. WHERE IS ‘MEAT IS MURDER’?!?!
I’m not sure how I feel about this list at all.
Sorry, just cause Kurt was influenced by the Pixies doesn’t automatically mean his album was worse, or less popular, or less influential as a result.
In my mind, the influence of your album does not “pay it backwards” to your influences.. though I may be open to debate on that one…
Achtung Baby spawned some classic singles, but there is filler on that album. Maybe not if you’re a hardcore U2 fan, but to the casual listener, there’s fat on that cow. Prince’s SOTT is a songwriting masterpiece, sure, but not the all-time classic that Purple Rain was. Kudos to Spin (I guess?) for freshening up the usual suspects in these lists, but if you have to start nominating substitute “all time best albums” because everyone’s tired of the same old showhorses, that might be a sign that it’s time to quit re-making this list.
If you’re under 30, you really can’t get Achtung Baby. U2 are the same band as the Rolling Stones (and maybe even less cool because they preach instead of imbibe). But it was really something in ’92 and it’s become mainstream since. Achtung stands the test of time, and as much as I love Arcade Fire, The National, White Stripes, etc… I don’t know if I’ll still be listening to them in 20 years.
With all that said, I agree that Siamese Dream, Pavement (I vote for Crooked Rain) and Pinkerton should be up there.
Great comment, awful shirtless picture. Siamese dream for president.
“25 years later, still going strong”
lol
Let’s face it. Lists are always subjective and for the most part the entire goal of a list such as this is to inspire debate or, at the basest of goals, to drive traffic to the site/magazine. That said (yes, I’m succumbing to Spin’s intentions, this list is littered with problems. First and foremost, as many people have pointed out, Achtung Baby, does not fall within the “idea” of this list at all – ranking “the most influential releases since the magazine’s beginning in 1985.” I can understand nominating a U2 album as #1, though I won’t agree with it, but not Achtung Baby. The bands earlier albums had a far greater influence on early College Radio and alternative music gaining mainstream acceptance. So, U2, maybe. Achtung Baby, no. Just looking at the albums on this list, Nevermind had fare more of an influence on music than Achtung Baby.
Speaking in regards to a band’s influence on college radio and the subsequent explosion of alternative music, I find it very odd that REM isn’t included until the high 30’s. For this dubious honor Spin chose Automatic for the People as the first REM album to include, which is confounding on so many levels. It’s not their best work (look to Life’s Rich Pageant and Document for that) nor is it the album that garnered the band a global audience. That album would be Out of Time, which also had REM’s highest charting single and gained the band their first Grammy awards (3 to be exact).
Returning back to the Top 25, I find it curious that they chose Nine Inch Nails’ The Downward Spiral over Pretty Hate Machine. I’m not sure there’s an argument that Downward Spiral was truly more influential than Pretty Hate Machine, and let’s be honest, all but the biggest NIN fan will still remember more songs off Pretty Hate Machine than Downward Spiral.
Spin also has The Strokes Is This It? at number 18. I’ll never deny it being a good album and that it came at the correct time, but, to date, I don’t see that it influenced rock ‘n’ roll all that much. At best, it influenced a sound that quickly became passé. It certainly isn’t referenced by the current trend of electro yacht rock that the hipster blogs are so infatuated with.
I’d leave out The Strokes altogether and address a slight that’s a tad difficult to digest – NWA’s Straight Outta Compton being ranked at 46 when so much of the past 20 years of rap was influenced to some degree by the West Coast sound they brought to life.
While I realize I previously stated lists are made to be argued against, there is an omission that makes this list criminal – Spin ranks Oasis’s (What’s the Story?) Morning Glory at number 21 but the album that led to the creation of Oasis as a band is placed at #69? (The Stone Roses) This is my serious “What The Fuck” moment for this list. Talk to any British band that released an album from 1989 to the present and they’ll discuss the influence of the Stone Roses. To not only leave them out of the Top 25 but to put Oasis above them is inexcusable.
The rest of the list is fairly agreeable, for the most part. I think everyone will argue about some band or album to some degree (perhaps The Replacements’ Let It Be rather than Tim, or Husker Du’s Zen Arcade over New Day Rising) but, you know, create your own magazine and make your own list, right? Just, don’t leave The Stone Roses out of the top 10. Because, I’ll find you, and I’ll hunt you down…
http://www.theredbeardedhipster.com/
words
2 live crew’s as nasty/clean as they wanna be went to the supreme court TWICE
I mean … yeah. “Kid A” should be in the top 10 (nevermind the top 125) no matter what your criteria … most influential, greatest album, best vocal performance, most beautiful fucking lyrics, &c. I am OK, however, with OK Computer being their highest ranked Radiohead LP.
NMH’s absence is also glaring, for sure. “It’s Blitz!” is not the YYY’s best album. REM should be higher up, as should Wilco. More Smiths, more Pixies, please.
but it’s aight.
Correct me if I’m wrong. I didn’t see any Weezer , Sufjan Stevens , Modest Mouse , or The Postal Service? right…………………..
you don’t see any Weezer because the only people they influenced are Grandaddy.
Achtung baby is a great album. Great. Whether or not it’s #1 is obviously debatable (that’s what these lists are for though, right? debate?) But I agree with what was said above. Maybe U2 aren’t the hippest thing right now, but they were killing it in 91. And those are still great tunes. Zootv was revolutionary, achtung baby was an amazingly successful reinvention for the band, for any band, especially on the heels of the hugely successful Joshua Tree. It’s a solid album. and deserves to be high on the list.
Also.. (excuse me, let me just pull out my soapbox.. there we go, ahem) Is Bono really a “dick”? pompous, okay, sure, i guess, he is only one of the biggest rock stars in the world. but, I mean doesn’t he spend most of his time championing worthy causes? maybe this comes off as self-righteous, but he’s still just trying to make positive change in the world. is that so bad? his ego doesn’t come close to approaching the likes of Kanye or indie darlings like MIA. you don’t have to love him, but I just don’t understand why he warrants so much loathing.
done now, thanks.
The editors at Spin must have used the dart-system to make this list. They must’ve used the blindfold this year.
No Wilco
wow. really? just.. wow. that’s like if the FDA forgot one of the food groups in the food pyramid version 2010. fucking savages at spin need a great giant butt-punch in the taint. and i’ll be the one to do it if the time is right. deplorable. god DAMMIT.
More than any other band I can think of, it’s extremely easy to forget that U2 were once a great band. They put out 4 classic records (War, Fire, Joshua Tree and Achtung), and Achtung Baby is simply their best album. It deserves to be high on this list.
That being said, Achtung Baby is obviously not the best record of the past 25 years. It seems like a sort of bizarrely strategic move for Spin to name this the best (I’m not sure if they have a truthful, democratic way of voting for these albums). If I had my way, I’d probably put Neutral Milk Hotel at #1. But Spin isn’t going to put Jeff Magnum on the cover.
This list is Spin’s desperate grab at relevency and a legacy. It’s a list of albums dating back to when the magazine started, as if they music before ’85 doesn’t matter or whatever. And that’s fine I guess, Spin is trying to look like an important rock magazine and this will probably sell some mags. I just don’t think going all-in on U2 is the smartest move.
NO SUFJAN STEVENS??!?!
WHAT KIND OF MUSIC LIST IS THIS?
What kind of world do we live in that Queen Latifah makes this list but Mc Lyte does not, and there is no Sufjan acknowledgement. Spin, who made your list? What sad world are you living in?
remain calm folks. this is spin we’re talking about here, which is about as culturally relevant as kellogg’s frosted mini wheats. i mean, seriously, who eats that crap?
I don’t think that this list as as bad as everyone is making it out to be….and as far as “cultural relevance”, SPIN is one of the best mainstream music magazines out there right now who try to focus on the music at least. When I was in an airport, they had Britt Daniel on the cover. It’s a pretty decent magazine…they named “Merriweather Post Pavillion” the best record of ’09. A few omissions in my opinion:
The Verve – Urban Hyms (I can’t believe no one mentioned this. Absolute classic.), Sonic Youth – Goo, Weezer – The Blue Album…Incredibly influential.
And if we are talking about influential…I’d add Oracular Spectacular too. Sue me.
I think I agree with you. It’s a way we have, in these small-ish musical communities, to forget that an overwhelming majority of people listen to radio-ready pop-candy hits; and don’t have the time, energy, or interest in the emotional investment necessary to really, deeply appreciate the art and socio-cultural impact of music that we all hold so closely. Pitchfork’s got their finger a bit closer to that pulse. Spin is looking at everyone, equally, even the Britney fans. Which publication is right? Both? Neither? Who knows.
In any case, I just needed a forum to vent my frustration towards kellogg’s frosted mini-wheats. I can’t keep that rage inside me.
Wow, one other dude and I jock the Stone Roses and get negged. Didn’t realize there was that much Stone Roses hate out there.
i’m gonna upvote this just out of solidarity for The Stone Roses.
in twenty-five years we haven’t done any better than U2? anyone who feels that way really has no business writing this kind of list, i wouldn’t think.
but more importantly, fuck Blackberry sidebar ads. and if i remember correctly, “BlackBerry Loves U2″.
Just a couple things…
- U2′s Achtung Baby deserves every bit of that #1 spot
- Bono is not a dick, haters are just jealous
- Achtung Baby is much better than Kid A, in terms of band reinventions and actual quality of the music.
haha i’m not really sure what to say to you right now.
shit list is shit. All the bands on that list are terrible. Oasis? U2? The Smiths? stupid fucking hipsters.
haha I couldn’t agree more Morissey is the ultimate hipsters idol. I just about died working at american apparel from hearing This charming man everyday!
http://spin100.blogspot.com/
Their list 5 years ago was better.
this list sucks
oasis and the strokes, top 25? utter pooh! the replacements’ tim? i don’t get the impression from the tough alliance or grizzly bear, two contemporary groups that currently stand out from the fray, that these top 25ers were vital and integral to there awesomeness!
http://vimeo.com/11382054
i dont care about the rest of the list. but damn right MBV is somewhere on there.
now that ive said something relevant, i would like to say this:
NOOOOOOOOOOO! i thought the double down horror was over! but it goes on forever! i will be reading stereogum on my deathbed and i will still have to hear about this goddamn over hyped sandwich!!!
how is achtung baby more influential than nevermind? or even the chronic? that’s a serious question. i’m not old enough to remember achtung baby.
or straight outta compton, or 2 live crew’s as nasty as they wanna be, an album that was addressed by the supreme court for not one but two separate issues???
I’m starting a band called “Nerds With Attitudes.” It’s gonna be a hugely influential Nerdcore Rap outfit, with kitschy throwbacks to hugely influential bands like Wu-Tang. Example: First album name: “We-Tang, because we is what we drank.” We’re gonna make Spin’s fuckin’ short list son.
not sure what this means, but it seems like a supreme court case could be pretty ‘influential’.
the worst list i’ve ever seen. My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth Daydream Nation, at least they got some right!!!!
how the hell is made in heaven by queen not on this list???
Hypothesis:
U2′s early years were spent buying into the music industry…Achtung Baby was the point at which they sold it…or sold out…under the pretext of selling out/self-mockery. Pretty enigmatic I guess…because they BECAME the music industry.
Will say that sonically it was good/great, but nothing new. Infact, they stole most of their influences from other artists to include My Bloody Valentine (Edge’s wall-of-sound). However, this doesn’t deter me from seeing why SPIN marked this album as the most influential; because no one courted big money quite like they did during the time. And, we all know what money does.
Furthermore, I believe that without Achtung Baby there would be no legendary Kurt Kobain (I think he would still be alive), no KID A, no Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and no ‘mainstream’ Indy…atleast it wouldn’t be so acceptable.
Not defending U2…I’m defending SPIN.
Feel free to disagree.
OASIS?!
?? This is Crap, OUTKAST- Aquemini was wayy better than Stankonia
Eminem – the Slim Shady LP and Marshall Mathers LP
wow!! its Great to see Outkast in the run.
I did like Stankonia a bit better than Aquemini
http://www.electricslim.com
But I think it is one of the most dramatic band reinventions in the history of popular music
film izle
ogame oyun oyna
Are you trying to kill me? NO SIGUR ROS? what the fuck sigur ros is probably the most innovative and unique band out there right now and it’s band members actually have tolerant personalities. Although I feel Appetite for Destruction deserves to be first, no voice compares to Axl Rose.