Top 20 Albums of 1993

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1. Together Alone – Crowded House
2. Crash – Pogo Pops
3. Spilt Milk – Jellyfish
4. Suede – Suede
5. Some Fantastic Place – Squeeze
6. Modern Life Is Rubbish – Blur
7. Very – Pet Shop Boys
8. The Dodgy Album – Dodgy
9. Neste Sommer – deLillos
10. Republic – New Order
11. Dreamland – Aztec Camera
12. Sugar Baby – Chocolate Overdose
13. Orbital - Orbital
14. Songs Of Faith And Devotion – Depeche Mode
15. Altered Beast – Matthew Sweet
16. Nesten ikkje tilstede – Jan Eggum
17. Giant Steps – Boo Radleys
18. Republic – New Order
19. This Perfect Day – This Perfect Day
20. Come On Feel The Lemonheads – The Lemonheads

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:23 (twenty-three years ago)

Have you ever danced to Orbital, Geir?

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:27 (twenty-three years ago)

Orbital - like all good techno music - is listening music rather than dance music. I dislike techno's lack of traditonal melodies, but I like the way it is obviously "head music" in a lot of ways. Good techno is obviously a result of an intellectual proccess, not just improvisation and other sorts of coincidence.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:29 (twenty-three years ago)

Have you ever danced... at all?

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:30 (twenty-three years ago)

1993 doesn't look like a very good year

― duane, Monday, 3 March 2003 14:35 (twenty-three years ago)

Where is the damn Spin Doctors album? hahah.

― Chris V. (Chris V), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:37 (twenty-three years ago)

"head music" in a lot of ways. = focussed on psychedelic textures rather than melodies?

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:39 (twenty-three years ago)

Had music as in Focused on intellectual processes rather than coincidence, "feelings" and improvisation

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:40 (twenty-three years ago)

Geir do you consider yourself a good judge of intellectual processes?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:42 (twenty-three years ago)

"feelings" = harmful to good music?

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:45 (twenty-three years ago)

Giant Steps has elements of jazz and dub in there - surely = anathema to geir's modus operandi?

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:47 (twenty-three years ago)

"Giant Steps" also has elements of good melodies in it, although they got considerably better on "Wake Up" (their only truly consistently great album)

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:50 (twenty-three years ago)

Uergh.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:51 (twenty-three years ago)

Where I agree with Geir: I think melody is important.

Where I disagree with Geir: I think rhythm is equally (if not more) important; a song with a pedestrian melody but a wild key signature is going to attract me more than a complicated melody in 4/4. Also, I like listening to rhythms.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 3 March 2003 14:55 (twenty-three years ago)

neither melody nor rhythm are essential to create good music though, a good SONG, maybe...

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Music without rhythm or melody = a single note or chord held for an indeterminate amount of time.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:02 (twenty-three years ago)

METAL MACHINE MUSIC ROXOR U R ALL DEEF

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:02 (twenty-three years ago)

I've never heard _Metal Machine Music_ but every description of it I've ever read leads me to believe there's a lot of rhythm going on in it.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:03 (twenty-three years ago)

Music without rhythm or melody = a single note or chord held for an indeterminate amount of time.

Or it may be something like John Cage's 4.33. The first ever piece of ambient music (and still the most "ambient" piece of music there has ever been)....

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:11 (twenty-three years ago)

Except that it isn't 'cos it doesn't affect the ambience at all being silent.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:15 (twenty-three years ago)

i. geir, why do you exclude satie's furniture music from "ambient music"?
ii. do you like mark prenderg*st?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:15 (twenty-three years ago)

nick, geir is quite correct: 4'33" is not silent, and highlights and frames and dramatises the ambience

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:16 (twenty-three years ago)

Music without rhythm or melody = a single note or chord held for an indeterminate amount of time.

actually i was thinking of recent Autechre ;) but i dont like that anyway.

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:17 (twenty-three years ago)

If it changes notes, it instantly gains melody and rhythm. (It may not be a good melody or a regular rhythm, but both are still present.)

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:19 (twenty-three years ago)

Really? I thought the point was that it was silent. Oh well.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:20 (twenty-three years ago)

I gotta admit,I'm kind of curious about what pogo pops might sound like. What the hell is it?

― Scott Seward, Monday, 3 March 2003 15:24 (twenty-three years ago)

ii. do you like mark prenderg*st?

mark the ambient century has been sitting on my shelf unread for eons now. should i not even bother?

― mark p (Mark P), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:25 (twenty-three years ago)

nick the performer's instruction is "tacet" (ie WHATEVER YOU NORMALLY DO, DON'T): the result is that you get to listen to the room and the ppl in it = the ambience

mark p: the ambient century is one of a kind

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:30 (twenty-three years ago)

A, right. So it actually is a recording of people! They're just silent! I always had the idea that it was just 4.33 of silence, however that silence was acquired.

Does Geir like Steve Reich's Music For Clapping?

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:36 (twenty-three years ago)

Mark S, if you get into a big serious argument with Geir, you will eventually end up whimpering on the floor.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:39 (twenty-three years ago)

ned, i wz asking a serious question actually: hongro-world seems quite precise and thought out, and i wanted to know where satie was positioned within it

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:44 (twenty-three years ago)

I have tried the same approach. You have been warned (but perhaps you will succeed where others have failed).

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:49 (twenty-three years ago)

(I find conversing with/arguing with Geir is very easy if you don't take the "Geir, you are WRONG" tack.)

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:51 (twenty-three years ago)

Heh. Now this is true, in retrospect.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 3 March 2003 15:55 (twenty-three years ago)

anyway i never argue seriously with anyone!

mark s (at the weekend) "Mum am I disputatious?"
mum s: "Yes! It is a great pain."

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:00 (twenty-three years ago)

why is New Order's Republic both 10th and 18th?

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:11 (twenty-three years ago)

i like most of geir's list, although i haven't heard a good few. orbital, lemonheads, boo radleys, blur, suede, new order - nothing to complain about there. but why are new order 10th AND 18th? let's see you defend THAT one, geir!

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:13 (twenty-three years ago)

but what other two places would you put it at MM?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:13 (twenty-three years ago)

and also kM?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:13 (twenty-three years ago)

that joke would have been funnier if Matos hadn't beaten me to it!

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:14 (twenty-three years ago)

the entire total philosophical problem with lists is that everything appears just once!! what conceptually limited rubbish is this?

― mark s (mark s), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:14 (twenty-three years ago)

start a new thread on this horrible problem mark s! (ps just read yr "Destroy All Music" essay in the Undercurrents book, nice work)

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:16 (twenty-three years ago)

it would be ok if they appeared in two places beside each other. but if they're several places apart, Geir is saying:

"The New Order album is better than the Boo Radleys' one, and it is also worse than the Boo Radleys one."

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:17 (twenty-three years ago)

or he's saying "i posted this list w/o reading it too carefully beforehand"

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:18 (twenty-three years ago)

perhaps he was taking into account his mood on particular days...

"No Boo Radleys today, it's too jazzy!"

"No New Order today, it's too rhythmic!"

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Monday, 3 March 2003 16:19 (twenty-three years ago)

Hmmm.. There seems to be a little too much New Order here.. :-)

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Monday, 3 March 2003 17:12 (twenty-three years ago)

SUEDE SUEDE SUEDE SUEDE

― Calum Robert, Monday, 3 March 2003 19:10 (twenty-three years ago)

i'm surprised i survived '93 if that was what was on offer

― Clare (not entirely unhappy), Monday, 3 March 2003 23:06 (twenty-three years ago)

So two vital questions should be answered before discussing further here, Geir.

1. Is Republic #10 or #18?
2. Who is going to replace one of the two Republic occurrences?

Actually I think this is my favourite of your lists, Geir. The albums by the Lemonheads and Blur would probably also have been in my top 20. Republic would have been om #21, I suppose.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Tuesday, 4 March 2003 14:16 (twenty-three years ago)

The #18 "Republic" will have to go away, and "Debut" by Björk is new at #20...

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Wednesday, 5 March 2003 02:20 (twenty-three years ago)

That Prenderg*st book is the most frustratingly written, lame-cliche-making, incoherent book about music I have ever come across -- it's all the more frustrating because it's about music I tend to really like.

― Clarke B., Wednesday, 5 March 2003 03:47 (twenty-three years ago)

''Music without rhythm or melody = a single note or chord held for an indeterminate amount of time.''

giancito scelsi to thread!

''That Prenderg*st book is the most frustratingly written, lame-cliche-making, incoherent book about music I have ever come across -- it's all the more frustrating because it's about music I tend to really like.''

read mark s review of it in the wire. and P's response in the next issue (which was really lame as well).

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 5 March 2003 14:31 (twenty-three years ago)

four years pass...

Haw @ 10 and 18, and everything else.

― roxymuzak, Friday, 22 February 2008 07:20 (eighteen years ago)

eleven years pass...

lol what a weird Pazz and Jop poll.

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 11 November 2019 03:29 (six years ago)

didn't know you approved of the Whigs, Alfred

― Simon H., Monday, 11 November 2019 04:33 (six years ago)

Weak year, but how ‘bout Cats and Dogs?

― quinn morgendorffer stan account (morrisp), Monday, 11 November 2019 05:17 (six years ago)

Oh sorry, I didn’t get this was Pazz & Jop only

― quinn morgendorffer stan account (morrisp), Monday, 11 November 2019 05:21 (six years ago)

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