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01/01/07 10:24 PM: Favorite Albums of All-Time

Now that I’m done with my Top 40 of 2006 list, I figured I might as well keep going and do some write-ups on my favorite albums of all time.

The albums I’m going to describe in this on-going series are the ones that have shaped my current tastes. Many of these aren’t particularly “indie” or anything of that sort, they come from many sources.

And now, the first in the series. These are not in any order.

Tori Amos, Little Earthquakes (1992, Atlantic)

I was introduced to Tori Amos about 4 years ago, when I first started college. I’ve seen her live once, performing in Chicago with Ben Folds. It was called the “Lotta Pianos Tour.” Aside from classical pianists, I’ve never seen anyone play the piano like Tori Amos. At one point, she was playing two pianos at the same time. It was incredible. Say what you will about a hetrosexual male enjoying Tori Amos, I can take it.

Little Earthquakes is my favorite Tori Amos album, and “Crucify” is one of my favorite tracks. Everything on this record is wonderful, but for me it is also attached to many memories of my first year of college. This is going to be a common theme in this list of albums. For me, an album is especially powerful if I end up associating memories with them years after the fact. I can’t listen to “Winter” without thinking about sitting around in my freshman dorm getting used to college and wondering what the rest of my life would be like. It’s often said that the music you hear growing up is the music you will love for the rest of my life—and I think this is the reason why. It’s not so much that your taste gets locked in at a certain age, but that you associate so much with the songs.

Of course any song can become attached to certain events or memories, and that doesn’t actually mean it’s a good song. But if you have an amazing song, or album, and it is also associated with powerful memories, it will always be a favorite.

This entry is part of the Favorite Albums of All-Time series.