Hey Moonbeam, listened to 1999 for the first time this weekend. I checked it out from library and popped it in on a drive to Chicago.

My short review: Never has an album so dense been so much fun to listen to! Some of it on first listen, oddly enough, actually sounded like nine inch nails, in it's innovative beats. But unlike Reznor's self-hating lyrics, which for me tend to have been appropriate during my last years of high school and when I'm in a particularly bad mood, Prince's words, shall we say, cover a little more timeless and positive topics. Definitely worth a few more listens before I can make a final say on it.

I personally think it would be a neat idea to have someone take a first listen to a top 10 album from one of us every now and then. I would be fascinated to see how someone hears an important album in my life with virgin ears.

Jonah, that is awesome! I'm glad you can see the appeal of 1999. It definitely was innovative well beyond its years, and looms very large in Prince's canon. I'd be up for the task you propose of listening to albums as well.

#872 - #881. Lots of 9's down to that though!

429-438.

Or so I thought, until I realized I actually had heard Can't Buy A Thrill at 431, and also Fishscale at 441.

Still going. Although now I'm mostly being saved by albums I don't like...

...Neil Young - On The Beach is all the way down at 477?! Travesty!

And, I finally lose 488-497. I almost bought Juju Music to save me there, but not quite.

Heh, fun note: My next ten album gap is 516-525. I bought Violator a few weeks ago but haven't actually listened to it yet. Just pop that in the CD player, an hour later I get down to 596-605 for my second gap.

The first one I don't own is pretty early, #36 Joshua Tree. Because I hate U2.

An update: one of my recent album purchases was Boz Scaggs' s/t debut album, currently #2150 on the list. So, now my first ten-album gap is from #2244-2253.

Funnily enough, 1000-1009:

1000 Count Basie - April in Paris
1001 Moby - Everything Is Wrong
1002 The Yardbirds - Roger the Engineer
1003 Ride - Nowhere
1004 Bunny Wailer - Blackheart Man
1005 The Go-Betweens - Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express
1006 Belle and Sebastian - Tigermilk
1007 Frank Sinatra - September of My Years
1008 Squeeze - East Side Story
1009 Metallica - Ride the Lightning

And what makes me kick myself, is I've been thinking of picking up East Side Story for years, but it's never seemed like a big enough priority - largely due it to being so low down the list on this site!

You should give Ride the Lightning a listen as well. I am not a Metallica fan but that's one of the best hard rock albums of all time and should be what Metallica is judged on (not the Black album). I'm not even a metal/hard rock fan and I love that album.

Well, I'm quite impressed by your scores !
My first gap comes at 176 : T.Rex - Electric Warrior and reaches 188 : The velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat

Update: I’ve now heard Dry. After that, I do pretty well through the 400s; then I get to this appalling 19-album yawning chasm:

520. Little Feat, Dixie Chicken
521. Missy Misdemeanor Elliott, Supa Dupa Fly
522. Al Green, I’m Still in Love With You*
523. Manu Chao, Clandestino
524. Curtis Mayfield, Curtis*
525. Sam Cooke, Live at the Harlem Square Club 1963
526. Echo and the Bunnymen, Ocean Rain
527. Neutral Milk Hotel, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
528. Albert Ayler, Spiritual Unity
529. The Avalanches, Since I Left You
530. Richard Hell & the Voidoids, Blank Generation*
531. John Martyn, Solid Air
532. Van Morrison, It’s Too Late to Stop Now
533. Talk Talk, Laughing Stock
534. Herbie Hancock, Head Hunters
535. And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead, Source Tages & Codes
536. Wilco, A Ghost Is Born*
537. Yes, Fragile
538. OutKast, Aquemini*

The asterisks mark the ones I’m REALLY embarrassed about.

schleuse! I'll send you #527 - what's your preference: vinyl, CD or mp3?

We're living here in the future, baby! What else but mp3?

And thanks.

Ok, I'll hook you up when I get home from work.

I know Mr. Wexler is a big fan of the album; are there any others out there?

I kinda like it, every time I listen to it, it seems to get better.

I'm with Neoptolemos - at first I was a little unsure why the hype, but it does set up camp inside your head after a while. Definitely worth hearing.

It is a strange sounding album upon first listen – no question about it. But I think once you get past that, the album is rewarding as hell.

One of my favorite aspects of it is that it’s the last album the band released (and when I say “band”, I’m referring to singer/songwriter/leader Jeff Mangum.) That was back in 1998 – and the guy hasn’t been heard from since! It’s almost as if he had nothing more to say, nothing more to record – he’d done everything he wanted to do with In The Aeroplane…

I know it sounds like I’m sucking this album’s d**k, but it really is that good. And I hate plugging Pitchfork, but the 10.0-rated review is worth a read here.

In the airplane is too expensive for here at NZ$25.95 - a little too much for one cd - I am looking forward to getting 'Loveless' now though which I have ordered for a reasonable price...

It's been a while since I've posted in this topic, and I've heard quite a few albums since, so I figured it would be interesting to see how far I'd come now. I'm not disappointed at all, I came all the way to 885-894.

I think I just lost this competition. It's 116-125

Outkast - Speakerboxxx, Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique - Neil Young - Harvest, Bob Marley - Natty Dread, Elvis Presley - Elvis Presley, Tricky - Maxinquaye, Pavement - Slanted and Enchanted, Tom Waits - Rain Dogs, Public Enemy - Fear of a Black Planet and Neil Young - Rust never Sleeps.

167-176 for me. I got further than I would think. I've never heard all of A Night at the Opera, Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, We're Only in It for the Money, I Am a Bird Now, Abraxas, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, Licensed to Ill, Stand!, Master of Puppets, and Electric Warrior. Some of you are probably surprised that I haven't heard some of these, but I haven't really heard much.