Daveportivo's Cultural Evaluation Facility

So those of you who are familar with greatest hits albums, who use itunes to pick and choose or those who frequent singstar may well be familar with The Cure's goregeous single Pictures Of You, a delightfully tragic hearftfelt pop single. Hearing this song may have led you to conlude that Disintegration would be packed full of The Cure's best pop gems. If you made this presumption, you were dead wrong, the single Pictures Of You was editted down from an epic seven and a half minute mood music masterpeice into a four minute pop single. Disintegration is a mamoth album, huge in scope. The Cure work to create this giant (literally eight tracks clock in at over five minutes) atomspheric magnus opus, where songs brood and float around and slowly moving and merging from place to place, taking you on an emotional journey (normally a depressive one). It's a staggering accomplishment, driven by droning key boards and the Cure's trademark guitar twinkles and shimmers, you feel like you floating around inside the torturous landscape of Robert Smith's mind. The title track is the clear stand out, an atomspheric epic for the ages, Smith's vocal performance is sublime, changing modes and intensity as the song glides around in the throws of a mood swing, it's a sublime track and possible the Cure's best. When it comes to creating a mood and altering feelings Disintegration is the finest work by any band since Joy Division's endote Atomsphere in 1980. When you look back at the Cure while they will always be remembered as one of the 80s great hit makers, yet Disintegration will always be their career defining masterpeice.

I'm always bound to upset someone when it comes to ordering the Metallica albums and I'm sure some will be outraged to see the technical masterpeice ...And Justice For All slot in so low. However I have limmited space and I'm not here to justify why it finished below other Metallica albums I'm here to tell you why it deserves to be the 29th greatest album of the eighties. First of all ...And Justice For All is stacked with classic Metallica tracks most noticably One. The concensus choice for the greatest ever Metallica track, a huge epic, with machine gun blasts of guitar, a huge solo, some killer drumming and some of James' best lyrics. One remains Metallica's magnus opus. It's matched in scope by the albums title track, that while never threatening to be as vital as One it's full of anti-capitalist rage, and built of a series of monster riffs and a mamoth choruse. Seriously you have to feel bad for other bands, Kirk Hammett throws out more killer riffs in a single track than others can manage across a whole album. Elsewhere we have the chuggathon Harvester Of Sorrows and the pummelling Blackening as good a track as Metallica have ever penned. While there is no doubting the technical majesty and the extreme visceral drive of ...And Justice For All it's an album of one dimension, one gear, it lacks the subtly, nuance and dare I say the fun of their other records, yet when it comes to thrashing the holy fuck out of you, no album does it better than ...And Justice For All.

Having come from the angry and relentless ...And Justice For All we head back in time to Metallica's first album, and my personal favorite, Kill 'em All. This has one big factor that ...Justice lacked; Fun! This album is an absolute riot, you can hear that Metallica are still indebted to their early influences, the ligthening fast punk of the seventies and of course Black Sabbath. Hit The Lights sets the tone, it's visceral, it's fast as fuck, it doesn't relent, but it's not a pummelling, it's a laugh, it's Metallica being the best Irish/sea santy punk band in human history, with a thrashing riff that makes you want to jump up and down and bounce of the walls before Kirk launches into a killer solo. This was the natural evolution of music, and would redefine hard rock for decades to come, it was also a glorious contrast to the rest of the scene. Don't forget Metallica were from L.A. the very home land of hair metal and all it's excess, and here were four dudes full of anger who wanted to rock your socks. It's hard to imagine just how revolutionary this album must have seemed in that time and more than anything in that place. The album is loaded with classics (exlcuding the Diamond Head and Blitzkrieg covers on the '88 re-release), there's the Dave Mustaine penned Four Horsemen, the live staple Motorbreath, the fury of Whiplash and of course Seek And Destroy Metallica's live anthem, their eternal set closer. All in all Kill 'em All was a rock revolution and the most fun album Metallica have ever released, they were still finding their identity but they made one hell of a first impression.

It's completely fruitless to argue that Isn't Anything is better than Loveless, I like tough challenges and being contentious but that's a bridge to far even for me. Yet just because it's not the masterpiece doesn't mean it should be overlooked, not for one second. In many ways Isn't Anything was more daring than Loveless, this was the moment a bunch of ex punk rockers and indie popsters decided to give up the day job and created something new. Isn't Anything is incredibly brave, on release they must have worried that no one on earth was going to like this, the ways they fucked around with the guitars, warped the sounds and brought in huge waves of static, how they put the melody on the back foot, they really could have become a music footnote had this album failed. However we needn't of worried, Isn't Anything didn't fail, it ended up one of the most important and influencail albums of all time. It pretty much invented shoe gaze single handledly and spawned an army of imitators. Hell even when they were doing more traditional and pedestrain rockers like Cupid Come and (When You Wake) Your Still In A Dream they sounded more vibrant and more intriguing than most anyone out there. Yet it will always be the glorious burnt out torch tracks All I Need and Lose My Breath that will grab the critical attention enen though they are easily matched in quality my straight rockers Feed Me Your Kiss and the melodious Several Girls Galore. So make no mistake there's more to My Bloody Valentine than Loveless, Isn't Anything can deservedly be labelled one of the decades greatest records.

When it comes to talking about the greatest punk bands of all time and the greatest punk albums the deabate always seems to start and end with The Sex Pistols, The Ramones and The Clash. While there is no doubt that those acts are deserving candidates it's quite ridiculous how little mention is given to Husker Du. During the eighties they went on an unparrelled spree of releasing awesome punk albums while the genre was seemingly dying around them. Zen Arcade is one of those albums you just know is going to be great the second you press play. When the killer bass hook of opening track Something I Learned Today you can't help but say "fuck yeah" because you know this album is going to kick all kinds of arse. It's also a punk rock album in the truest sense of the word, half the tracks on this album were first takes, the band didn't have a producer, they just mixed them and threw them out there, how rock and roll is that? When it comes to influence they're as far reaching as they come Pixies, Nirvana, My Bloody Valentine, Green Day but fuck them, you know you've really made it, whe your a legitmate big deal, when you influence comedy, yes those lovely New Zelanders Flight of the Conchord couldn't resist pinching the riff from the brilliant Never Talking To You Again. Zen Arcade is a legitmate classic, a stylistic scatter gun, where ever they decided to land the results are devastating, ground braking and just plain awesome.