21. Miles Davis – Kind of Blue
Is it bad that I had to wait 21 albums into this audio odyssey before I got to an album…
Author: Quarkmonkey (page 9)
20. Ray Charles – The Genius of…
One of the first albums I bought when the iTunes store opened in 2004 and effectively emptied my bank account…
19. Ella Fitzgerald – Sings the Gershwin Song Book
One of the things that gets me as I’m ploughing through these early days in the late fifties is that…
18. Sarah Vaughan – At Mr Kelly’s
Sarah Vaughan was always the also-ran when sat alongside Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday, and to be honest she’d mostly…
17. Jack Elliott – Jack Takes the Floor
I guess one of the hazards of mining 55 years back is that the further back you go, the more…
16. Billie Holiday – Lady in Satin
THIS is why I started doing this 1001 Albums thing. I started doing this because I wanted to listen to…
15. Tito Puente and his Orchestra – Dance Mania Vol. 1.
Ah, the first flicker of the contemporary… Although Tito Puente died in 2000, from my point of view the first…
14. Little Richard – Here’s Little Richard
It’s kind of hard to really get a picture of just what Little Richard must have been for mainstream listeners…
13. Machito – Kenya
These were truly the days of Mambo. Once more, I was way out of my depths with this one, but…
12. Miles Davis – Birth of the Cool
As you may have gathered from my constant moaning about it, jazz has never really been my thing. These bebop…
11. Sabú Martinez – Palo Congo
You’ve got a lot to answer for Fidel. You and your decades-old socialist fortress in the Caribbean… You and your…
10. Thelonious Monk – Brilliant Corners
More jazz? Well if you insist. Actually, if all the jazz albums I had to plough through were like this,…
9. Count Basie – The Atomic Mr Basie
Well, as far as jazz is concerned, I’ve made my point right? Fast Show arty ponce blah blah blah… Well…
8. Buddy Holly and The Crickets – The “Chirping” Crickets
Slipping? Well OK I missed a day, but now I’m back on top of it. Hey, there’s a lot of…
7. Duke Ellington and his Orchestra – Live at Newport
Ugh. Jazz. Well, undertaking to list to 1001 Albums starting in the fifties meant that I was going to have…
6. Frank Sinatra – Songs for Swingin’ Lovers
More conventional than “In the Wee Small Hours” but magnificently packed with classics, this landmark album shows Sinatra at his swingiest.
5. Fats Domino – This is Fats!
Cheery, authentic and full of soul, Fats Domino’s debut says hello to rock and roll in style.
4. Louis Prima – The Wildest!
It’s all easy-to-digest Vegas swing with an Italian twist, but it’s hard not to listen without dreaming you’re in “The Sopranos”.
3. The Louvin Brothers – Tragic Songs of Life
Even for country cynics like me, there’s a lot of charm in this old album of heartache, pain and Leadbelly covers.
2. Elvis Presley – Elvis Presley
Fresh, full of fire and ready to change the world. This is the man who would be The King in glorious purity.
1. Frank Sinatra – In the Wee Small Hours
Quarkmonkey begins his journey through a lot of albums with a look at this 1954 charmer from Ol’ Blue Eyes himself, Mr Frank Sinatra.
1001 Albums and counting…
NOTE: This post first appeared on my now defunct personal blog. I’m a total bastard when it comes to blogging.…