Boards

If it leaves you cold, its not because you're 18 - I'm 28 and there's still so much stuff that turns that light on for me. You're not dead yet!

Certainly more interesting than the bands they came up alongside.

Radiohead - Kid A
Before I heard this, I thought electronic music was all about trance and throwing shapes. I know it wasn't the first record to sound like this, but it was the first one I heard.

Primal Scream - XTRMNTR
Because you can be heavy without being metal.

Leonard Cohen - The Future
I've been obsessed with at least three of the tracks on here since I first heard them on the NBK soundtrack when I was 16

Deftones - White Pony
Kept intelligent metal alive for me in a teen-angst world of nu-metal bullshit

Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here (although I could pick almost any album of theirs)

My Dad took me to see them at Earl's Court when I was ten. All good things flowed from there.

15. DJ Shadow - Endtroducing
16. Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band
17. Radiohead - Kid A
18. Ricardo Villalobos - Fabric 36
19. The Fall - Hex Enduction Hour
20. Peaking Lights - 936

I'll keep the reasons to myself, cos noone likes to show they're dirty linen in public.

Pet Shop Boys - Actually
The first album I ever chose for myself, still listen to it fairly regularly

Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here/Dark Side of the Moon
Got these two around the same time, became instantly obsessed with them and had them on near-constant rotation for years (adding variety as I acquired other Pink Floyd albums). My permanent love for 'spacey' music begins here.

Bjork - Debut/The Best Mixes from the Album Debut for All the People Who Don't Buy White Labels
The first time I got heavily into music by a female artist, and the first time I listened seriously to dance music.

Then came 1995, which was an absolute explosion in my music taste, including:
---
Radiohead - The Bends
The soundtrack to a great deal of my teenage angst, I fell hard and fast for this album. Any subsequent guitar band had this to measure up to, which set the bar pretty high.

PJ Harvey - To Bring You My Love
Brooding, bluesy, sexual, almost mythical, this album enraptured me even as all my friends laughed and told me it was shit.

Leftfield
Somewhat unbelievably, I bought this album by accident. Can't even remember what I'd intended to buy instead, but possibly the best mistake I ever made. Solidified my interest in dance music.

Tricky - Maxinquaye
An amazing album in its own right, also opened me up to several new genres including dub and hip-hop.

Sparklehorse - Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot
This was my foothold into Americana
---

Mogwai - Young Team
At the time, this was simply a great album that was interesting for being almost entirely instrumental. What I didn't realise was that following the links to/from this would profoundly shape my music taste right up to the present day.

Kathryn Williams - Dog Leap Stairs
Opened me up to folk music and the whole singer-songwriter thing.

I could go on plenty more, but these are probably the ones that shaped me most.

Um let's see...

12: Korn - Issues

Yeah I listened to nu-metal at one stage of my youth and loved it. I was only 12 and enjoyed the swearing. Issues was an otherwise catchy and amusing selection of songs that I still adore to this day. Ah the nostalgia, felt like such a rebel listening to 'Falling Away From Me' on my discman on the way to school in the morning.

15 - Unknown Pleasures

I know, I know, how does a 15 year old enjoy JD? I'd listened to Substance already and really enjoyed their punkier moments (Kamakino, Digital, Transmission etc). I hadn't delved into any of their more album oriented work though, so I ventured one day after school to the local independent record store and picked it up on CD for 10 bucks. I didn't really know what to think when I first listened to it but something just kept attracting me to Unknown Pleasures. To this day, 'Day of the Lords' remains one of my favourite tracks of all time. I was also beginning to learn bass (Peter Hook being one of my first influences along with Colin Greenwood) so many of the basslines became my first learnt.

16 - OK Computer

Was properly getting into Radiohead and just could not help but tearing up over 'Let Down' or 'Lucky'. Beautiful melancholic music for any teenager. I just couldn't believe how cohesive the album was as well.

17 - Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours

A gorgeous album from start to finish. In Ghost Colours filled me to the brim happiness and sadness at the same time. Killer production by Goldsworthy and an album to be enjoyed in your room or on the dancefloor. Memories (not necessarily fond) of year 11 and people using me for my car...

18 - The Horrors - Primary Colours

I originally dismissed them as a novelty 'horror punk' band when Strange House came out in 07 and I was so surprised by 'Mirror's Image' - thought the MP3 tagging was messed up and another band was infact playing through my headphones. Primarily misery but also anger resonate from this record for me and it was my first taste of anything resembling shoegaze which I am thankful for in the last two years.

19: The National - High Violet

20: Skying

Couldn't be bother with the rest :D

6/7 The Beatles - White Album
8 - School of Rock OST
10 - The Go! Team - Thunder, Lightning, Strike
11 - Sparklehorse - Dreamt For Light Years In The Belly Of a Mountain
12 - Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity / Deerhoof - Reveille
13 - The Unicorns - WWCOHWWG?
14 - Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca
15 - Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Scared Famous
I'm 16 now. who knows what will define this year.

Ie, what did you like that everything else was built on? Huh. Mine may be;
Blondie 'parallel lines' the first album I ever bought in 1979. Guitar pop.
Adam & the Ants 'kings of the wild frontier' the drums, oh the drums. 1981.
Cocteau Twins 'Treasure' 1985 alternative bias.
Beastie Boys 'Check Your Head' 1992. Hiphop and everything in one pot.

Nirvana and The Beatles when I was wee
then Deftones
then Refused
then At the Drive-in
then hardcore/screamo stuff; Circle takes the Square had the biggest effect
then Kid A by Radiohead and Ten by cLOUDDEAD
Turn on the Bright Lights by Interpol
then The Argument by Fugazi and Hidden World by Fucked Up
then everything else, or something

Michael Jackson - Bad - Was dangerously obsessed with this album when I was a nipper. Actually cried when the tape machine in my dad's car chewed up the tape. My brother repaired it with sellotape. Took me years to realise that there was not a song on here about a girl that worked in a library.

Metallica - Master of Puppets - This was very much a part of my brief flirtation with heavy metal. Lasted a few years. Dabbled in a bit of everything - Iron Maiden, first Rage Against the Machine album, Megadeth, Soundgarden - Kind of came to an end when I saw Metallica at the Barrowlands on the Load tour; shite. I think it was then that I realised that they only had one good song.

Nirvana - Nevermind - Heard/Saw Lithium numerous times on MTV Europe while on a trip to Holland - I was 13 or 14. Annoyed my parents all the way home by singing it over and over. Deep down I knew there was something very different about this band compared to the other heavy rock/metal stuff I was into.

Oasis - Definitely Maybe - Listened to that one on my headphones a lot when I was 14 or 15. See also Different Class and Shine Too. Totally fell out with Oasis when people played What's the Story every day/all day in the common room.

Supergrass - I should Coco/ Weezer - Blue album - Inextricably linked in my head. First time I'd ever bought two CD's at the same time. 2 for £22 in John Menzies. Played them both to death. Supergrass led me to a lot of other fringe britpop bands and Weezer started my love affair with American music - Americana and lo-fi followed.

Pavement - Brighten the Corners / Pixies - Bossanova - Bought them at different times but the pair of them were albums that took a while for me to 'get'. Especially Pavement. Once they got their claws in though they opened many doors and I started buying all sorts of things - Fountains of Wayne debut, Wilco and so on.

Wilco - Summerteeth - Prompted to buy it by a 5 star review in a music magazine. This took me a while but soon it was my most listened to album. I played that fucker to death. I remember it soundtracking a lot of direct modem-to-modem 1v1 games of Duke Nukem 3d - that were destroyed as soon as my mum picked up the phone.

Radiohead - Pablo Honey/The Bends/Ok Computer - Heard 'Creep' on some shite driving compilation CD thing that we got sent as part of Britannia music club. Bought Pablo Honey, took a while but eventually I liked it. The Bends reminds me of playing Tomb Raider on the first Playstation and Ok Computer of reading Lord of the Rings finally after having owned the book since I was about 9 or 10.

Jeff Buckley - Sketches... - Famously bought this on the way home from losing my virginity. The melancholy of the album suited my weird feeling of emptiness that accompanied this milestone.

Many more I could mention but I won't. You're bored already. I really can't think of the album that got me into dancey/electro stuff but I've always loved 'You got the love' from the first moment I heard it. Probably helped a bit. Also the first Otis Redding compilation I bought, after seeing him on telly in the Montreal Pop Festival I think, led me on to a lot of different stuff.

Sean's seems like a good template so...

Blur - Parklife (first time I loved an album that wasn't one of my Mum's MOTOWN/CARPENTERS records or my Dad's BEATLES/BEACH BOYS/ZEPPELIN)

A Tribe Called Quest - Beats, Rhymes & Life (although BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE is probably my favourite of theirs, this is the first 'heavy' album that truly blew my mind)

Primal Scream - XTRMNTR (first album I felt truly uncomfortable with on first listen and really perserved with and remains one of my favourite albums to this day. Totally changed my palette for music.)

Wire - Chairs Missing (the first album I bought after doing my own research and became obsessed with the BREVITY OF THE STRUCTURES, Encouraged me to really explore.)

Sonic Youth - Washing Machine (A life without SY is no life at all. This album led to so much of my music taste, and SY set the bar for nearly everything I listen to and the sort of defines parameters of what I want from music. THE COMBINATION OF ODDNESS AND WARMTH BUT, YEAH, WHAT HE SAID)

Squarepusher - Music Is Rotted One Note (has totally shape-shifted my taste over the past few years from a Elliott Smith loving Shins fan to increasingly 'getting' why people love 'dance'.)

Honourable mentions: Arab Strap -THE WEEK NEVER STARTS ROUND HERE, TORTOISE - STANDARDS, DO MAKE SAY THINK - & YET & YET and David Bowie - Low. And obviously stuff that I released, Coopers especially.

The Kinks - Something Else, The Delgados - The Great Eastern, Super Furry Animals - Rings Around The World, Aphex Twin - Druqks, Aretha Franklin - Young, Gifted & Black...

Age 6, 1980: The Beatles - Revolver. My Dad had 3 Beatles albums on vinyl and I'm grateful he had this one. My Mum told me to ask her to turn the record over when a side finished because I wasn't trusted with my Dad's stylus! My bro and I called Tomorrow Never Knows "the one with the seagulls"

14, 1988: New Order - Substance. My mates and I all went mad for Blue Monday 1988, the original having passed us by because we were too young. They were the first band I truly loved and are my favourite to this day. Making my way through the back catalogue over the next couple of years was amazing.

15, 1989: Pixies - Doolittle. I'd heard Monkey Gone To Heaven on ITV's The Chart Show and thought they were a goth band. So glad my friend lent me a copy of this. By now I realised that I love bands with great bassists...

17, 1991: Primal Scream - Screamadelica. It really was, and is, as good as the hype. Having said, that, I made a car tape with the single versions of Loaded and Come Together on it, as well as the American Spring remix of Higher Than The Sun, which is one of the best remixes I've ever heard.

18, 1992: David Bowie - Low. Because Bowie had a poor 1980s, I'd never really paid him much attention but decided to give the ChangesBowie compilation a go and started getting into his back catalogue through the Sound+Vision reissues. Low blew me away, completely. I had no idea this kind of music was possible in 1977, and it was my introduction to Eno, too.

19, 1993: Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85-92, Black Dog Productions - Bytes. I can't split these two. Equally brilliant but very different, at least to my ears. This started my addiction to what was then called 'intelligent techno', later IDM.

From that point I was listening to so much stuff and although I like plenty of albums more than the ones above, they were the real landmarks in shaping what I like.

when you are in your early twenties. After that, although there can be plenty of stuff you really like, it is rare for a new record to go into favourite album of all time contention.

My musical journey turned on a couple of weekends. Having loved Wings 'Venus And Mars' I couldn't wait for their follow up 'At The Speed Of Sound'. I bought it as soon as it came out. It was crap and I was crushed. The next week I bought the first Stranglers album and I never looked back.

My favourite album is always one of Robert Lloyd and the New Four Seasons 'Me and My Mouth', Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel 'Hole', Joy Division 'Unknown Pleasures' or Associates 'Sulk'.

13, Matthew Good Band - Underdogs
14. Radiohead - OK Computer
18. Broken Social Scene - You Forgot It In People
21. The Dismemberment Plan - Emergency & I
24. Wisp - The Shimmering Hour

Barring the first one, I still love all these records and are probably a fair reflection of my music taste.

So I guess this is more sort of formative albums for me? Well anyway

12 System of a Down - Toxicity

Played this a lot when I was young, I can't remember if I liked it before Tony Hawks 4 (which had Shimmy on the soundtrack), or not. As far as I can remember I'd just skip all the songs apart from Chop Suey and Toxicity until that game came out. The first time I properly actually listened to something as an album

14 Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am.../Bloc Party - Silent Alarm

These two kind of changed the way I looked at music, and turned it into something that I'd actually seek out. I'll only really listen to Silent Alarm now days though, still a fantastic album.

16 Kanye West - Graduation/Radiohead - In Rainbows

Graduation was maybe the first time I listened to a hip-hop album in full I reckon, definitely the first time I had one on repeat. When I was 14/15 I thought anything that wasn't bands with guitars wasn't PROPER MUSIC so I hadn't really given it a chance as a genre before. It's my least favourite of his albums now though. In Rainbows was just fucking brilliant, I hadn't really listened to Radiohead beyond Creep/Just/Karma Police etc. before I heard this, it's still up there with my favourite all time albums.

17 Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion

This was when I first fell in love with an album that didn't have any mainstream roots, or rather the first time I fell in love with an album that I knew about solely due to the internet. So this kind of changed everything in that sense, since that's how I find out about nearly all the music I listen to now. Was also the first time I really liked something that sounded so 'weird' to me.

and then everything after...

I'm rubbish with remembering this sort of stuff, so i'll try my best with last.fm to help.

12- System of a Down. No particular album, I'd just watch a lot of videos during the sparse time I was allowed on our dial-up internet. They gave me a great love of catchy songs, and laid the groundwork for me rediscovering heavy music later on.

15- Muse. Sound crap now, but at the time sounded so ambitious and vast. They've got some really good influences, and feed them to you in easily digestible chunks.

15- Joy Division, Unknown Pleasures. As someone above said, I didn't really "get" this record as I do now for a while, but it still have a profound effect on me, especially during those depressed/angsty teenage days.

16- Sonic Youth, Daydream Nation. A friend showed me these on the way back from a geology field trip, where I could barely hear them over the sound of the minibus and the single crappy earphone. I pretended to like them, but decided to give them a proper listen when back at home. Again, although I didn't appreciate it as I do now, it began my love with noise and dissonance, and opened up so many doors of new music due to how influential they are.

17- Elliott Smith. I don't really know how I became obsessed with him, it just sort of happened. His songs carried me through many bad times, and also gave me more appreciation for the general skill of songwriting, chord progressions etc, which led to me "getting" bands like pavement.

Others include Loveless by MBV (taught me to learn drone-y music, that induce a drugged mood), Mogwai (long sprawling songs that are in no rush, also led to my recent dabble in classical) and others I can't remember.

Meat Loaf - Bat out of Hell
Iron Maiden - Number of the Beast
Alice in Chains - Dirt
Radiohead - OK Computer
Aphex Twin - Richard D James Album
Saul Williams - Amethyst Rockstar
Fantomas - Suspended Animation (Mike Patton phase in general)
Sunn O))) - Black One

Not really sure whether these were the most influential albums (Despite them looking like a fairly standard evolution for a white kid that started with rock music) but they definitely seemed important to opening up a lot of sonic doors once they clicked.

Must admit I never really 'got' hip-hop until Big Bois set at ATP last year, since then my appreciation has blown up. I think in general ATP (since the Mike Patton one in '08) has been a constant influence on diversifying my taste.

Interesting list since many of favourite bands and albums don't qualify. I love more music now than but as I've got older, they've become less 'landmarks'- they don't represent changes in my outlook or taste anymore, but these were the game-changers.

1984 / Wham! make it big
no-point trying to re-write history. I was 8 and fell in love with pop music

1989 / The Wonder Stuff - The Eight Legged Groove Machine
when music went from being a pastime to something more.

1992 / Beastie Boys - Check Your Head
when I realised music could be felt below the waist.

1994 / Prodigy - Jilted Generation
and so my love affair with dance music began

2000 / QOTSA - Rated R
after ignoring britpop in favour of breaks, guitars started to sound interesting again

2007 / Future of the Left - Curses
just when i thought i was getting too old to be a fan, rather than just a music enthusiast along came The Best Band in the World right now and (whisper it) even better than McLusky.

System of a Down - Toxicity
Muse - OOS
Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures (led to discovering Interpol)
Interpol - TOTBL
Radiohead - OK Computer/Kid A
Iron and Wine - Our Endless Numbered Days
Mogwai - Young Team
GY!BE - F#A#
Low - Things We Lost in the Fire

Depeche Mode - Violator, first album I ever bought and started my musical journey.

My Bloody Valentine - Loveless, first album that blew me away entirely and taught me that immediacy isn't a necessary attribute for a good album (I thought the tape was warped).

Black Dog - Bytes, this and SAW 85-92 by Aphex Twin introduced me to electronic music which I've loved since.

Tom Waits - Bone Machine, tangentially got me into blues, and through his back catalogue, jazz.

Monsters, Robots and Bugmen - awesome post-rock primer that shaped much of my listening habits of the past 15 years.

And that's it for landmarks. Nothing really from the last 10 years.

6. Neil Diamond - The Jazz Singer
11. GN'R - Appetite For Destruction
13. Nirvana - Nevermind
14. Lemonheads - It's A Shame About Ray/Primal Scream - Screamadelica/Sonic Youth - Washing Machine
15. Blur - Parklife
20. GY!BE - F#A#
21. Tom Waits - Rain Dogs
22. The Strokes - Is This It
23. Wilco - YHF
26. Ali Farke Toure & Toumani Diabete - In The Heart Of The Moon/Glenn Gould - The Goldberg Variations

12 - Incubus - Make Yourself

14 - TooL - Lateralus

16 - Sigur Ros - Agaetis Bryjun

17 - GYBE - F#A#

Police - Regatta de Blanc
Rush - 2112
Journey - Escape
Green on Red - Gravity Talks
REM - Life's Rich Pagaent
Husker Du - Zen Arcade
American Music Club - United Kingdom
Yo La Tengo - May I Sing with Me
Dismemberment Plan - Emergency and I

7: The Beatles - Magical Mystery Tour
11: Nirvana - Nevermind
12: Oasis - (What's the Story) Morning Glory?
13: Manic Street Preachers - Generation Terrorists
14: Blur - Parklife
15: the Smiths - The Queen Is Dead
16: Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures
17: Jesus & Mary Chain - Psychocandy
18: Suede - Suede
20: Pulp - This Is Hardcore

Somewhere in college, I just got sucked into the postpunk/Britpop hole and I have yet to reemerge. I had periods of wearing out current albums in college (the Pipettes - We Are the Pipettes, Klaxons - Myths of the Near Future, for example) but I don't think they really shaped my musical tastes. I just listen to them now when I want to feel like I'm back in the dorms.

The Prodigy - Experience
Altern 8 - Full On Mask Hysteria
Orbital - Brown album
The Future Sound Of London - Lifeforms
Autechre - Amber & Tri Repetae
The Verve - A Northern Soul & A Storm In Heaven
Can - Tago Mago
Jah Wobble & Bill Lasswell - Radioaxiom: A Dub Transmission
Bjork - Vespertine
Sigur Ros - ( )
Bardo Pond - On The Ellipse
The Mars Volta - De -loused In The Comatorium
The Necks - Drive By
Talk Talk - Spirit Of Eden
Steve Roach - Structures From Silence

but leaving out all the stuff about how great The Doors are

I have them in my landmarks below, but I suspect you might be a slightly bigger fan than me.

My older brothers made me U2, R.E.M. & Nirvana tapes which WERE devoured, but the most treasured TDK-90 of all was of (What's the Story) Morning Glory with Oasis b-sides to fill up the 2nd side. Magic. Oasis led to listening to Beatles LP's proper, not just listening to the Red and Blue compilations in my Mum and Dad's car. Blur, Bluetones & Supergrass were my immediate Walkmen companions but it was The Bends/OK Computer that were the main event. Hairs would stand up on the back of my neck. When I finally saw them play Climbing Up the Walls years later I was an uncontrollable mess...this music literally shook me. I had a few flings after that; Gomez's Bring It On, Ziggy Stardust, Hatful of Hollow...but praise Science for Is This It. So, so perfect. Could've been stuck with Stereophonics & Travis but no, The Strokes came along and opened my eyes. (Blondie/Velvets?? The first time I evervfelt cool.) Is This It then bled into The Libertines and Up the Bracket and well, now I'm 28 and all that excitement's long since over, I realised I was a Blur fan all along, well, and Radiohead...and The Beatles.

Before that I'd mainly been listening to really pop Britpop stuff, I'd never heard anything like Think Tank, but I absolutely loved it. I think it mainly changed my opinion of what song structures had to be like- stuff like Jets didn't follow verse-chorus structures and I'd never heard anything like that before.

I think after that, probably Elvis Costello's My Aim Is True when I was 16. This was the point where I realised that great lyricism wasn't exclusive to dirgey acoustic singer songwriters, and didn't have to have "poetic" aspirations- it could be direct, cruel and very funny.

1993 The Beatles - Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band/Abbey Road
1997 Aqua - Aquarium
2000 Eminem - The Marshall Mathers LP
2002 Coldplay - A Rush Of Blood To The Head
2003 Radiohead - Hail To The Thief
2004 Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch
2005 Mew - Frengers
2006- John Lee Hooker - Too Much Boogie/Public Enemy - It takes a nation of millions...
2008- Burial - Untrue

Early teens:
Brief flirtation with metal:
-Blue Oyster Cult - Tyranny and Mutation
Discover glam rock:
-David Bowie - The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars
Discover indie (via Top of the Pops, then John Peel):
-The Smiths - Hatful of Hollow
-Billy Bragg - Life's a Riot with Spy vs Spy
-James - Stutter
Discover folk:
-Bob Dylan - The Times They Are A-Changin'

Late teens:
Discover folk-rock:
-The Byrds - Fifth Dimension
Discover country rock:
-Neil Young - After the Gold Rush
Discover US indie:
-REM - Life's Rich Pageant
-The Pixies - Dolittle
-Dinosaur Jr - You're Living All Over Me
-Husker Du - Warehouse Songs and Stories
Discover new wave:
-Magazine - The Correct Use of Soap
Madchester occurs:
-The Stone Roses - The Stone Roses
-The Happy Mondays - Bummed
Token hip-hop:
-Public Enemy - It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
Anticipate post-rock :P :
-Talk Talk - Spirit of Eden

Early 20s:
More indie:
-Teenage Fanclub - Grand Prix
-Sonic Youth - Goo
-Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
-My Bloody Valentine - Loveless
Unavoidably 'larging' it:
-Chemical Brothers - Dig Your Own Hole
-Massive Attack - Blue Lines
-Basement Jaxx - Rooty
Australian phase:
-Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - The Good Son

Late 20s:
Indie goes mainstream (but I don't care):
-Radiohead - The Bends
-Elliott Smith - XO
But I can still find stuff no-one's heard of:
-Sigur Rós - Agaetis Byjun
-Wilco - Being There

Thereafter:
Discover alt-country:
-The Jayhawks - Tomorrow the Green Grass
Decent music becomes popular again:
-The Strokes - Is This It?
Discover contemporary composed music:
-Max Richter - The Blue Notebooks
My indie renaissance:
-The National - Alligator
-The Decemberists - The Crane Wife
-Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
-Arcade Fire - Funeral

Errr... that's it. Sure I've missed some.

12: Ocean Colour Scene - Mosley Shoals: Second album I bought with my own money (The first was Eternal), loved it because it sounded like the music my Dad liked, but it was mine.

13: Blur - Blur: After buying the last one, I fell for Britpop in a big, big way, but 'Blur' was the first album that made me think about music. One of my early favourite bands making a record influenced by a load of music I'd never even heard of before, a lot of the early 90's American stuff, and it killed Britpop stone dead for me. I suspect it did for a lot of people.

16: Radiohead - Kid A: OK, OK, it's a massive cliche, but it's true. I'd never heard music like this before, and it changed my listening habits in a way no record really has since. Light years away from anything else I was listening to, I suspect I'd have 'got' electronic music (something that now occupies about 1/3 of my collection) a lot, lot later without it.

17: Ghostface Killah - Supreme Clientele/ Jay Z - The Blueprint: The only hip-hop I'd paid any attention to before these were 'It's Like That' and Eminem, but these two came to me at about the same time and absolutely changed my perspective of hip-hop. Clever, modern (with a classic twinge), and they just sounded so GREAT, they not only opened my eyes to rap, but production too. Oh, and the latter made me aware of a guy called Kanye West...

18: The Streets - Original Pirate Material: Right place, right time. I thought it was a joke at first, now it's the most played album of my lifetime. It could've been about me, and I doubt I'm the only one who thinks that...

22: MIA - Arular: Pure ear candy, released about the same time I moved to London. In those first few months, it's all I listened too. Still sounds like the start of my adult life, and every time I get tired of packed tubes or expensive beer I listen to it and it reminds me how amazing this place is.

23: The Field - From Here We Go Sublime: I'd dipped in and out of 'electronic' since Kid A, but this was the record that floored me. I became obsessed with the loops, I'd think about them on the way to work, they'd stay in my head for days. It still sounds perfect.

23: The National - Boxer: "Ada I can here the sound of your life through the walls". Summed up my life at that point. Just come out of a relationship, played it incessantly.

26: Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy: Pitchfork gave it a 10 blah, blah, blah, overhyped, blah, blah, blah, guy's a jackass, blah, blah, blah. Couldn't give a shit, for me it's the complete record where production, words, guests, sequencing, samples, the lot come together to create something that transcends pop. It's not a hip-hop album, but it bangs like one, it's not a pop album but shorn of a few minutes here and there it'd be a perfect one. But instead, Kanye refuses to do any of those things and believes 100% in his convictions to make something a bit like modern art.

1997 - Ocean Colour Scene - Moseley Shoals: My first album. Bought it cos it was the favourite album of my older sister's boyfriend and I thought he was really cool.
1998 - The Offspring - Smash: My brother and I loved it. I remember sitting in the back of my uncle's car singing along to every single word, obscenities and all.
1999 - Eminem - Slim Shady LP: Heard 'My name is" on the radio. Loved it, couldn't find the single in shops, but I bought the album as soon as it came out. Started my love affair with rap music.
2001 - Linkin Park - Hybrid Theory: Well, it seemed to matter a lot to me at the time...
2001 - Daft Punk - Discovery: The first album that me and my closest friends all loved. We used to camp out in the garden and listen to it on a cheap CD player. I learned how to play the Aerodynamic guitar solo on keyboard. Still one of my favourite albums.
2004 - The Strokes - Is This It: I was pretty late getting into indie music, but this marked a change in my taste. I bought this along with two albums that haven't endured quite so well (Razorlight - Up All Night, Keane - Hopes And Fears).
2006 - The Black Keys - Magic Potion: A friend had introduced me to the band just before I left for Uni and this was the first album I bought when I got there. It was probably the first album I owned that was slightly removed from albums with broad commercial appeal. I remember thinking it was totally raw.
2007 - Kings Of Leon - Because Of The Times: A landmark because I considered them my favourite band at the time and I HATED this album. It's probably largely responsible for me actively seeking out new music, such as...
2008 - The National - Alligator: Discovering The National really opened up a while new sphere of music to me. Buying this album got me excited about music again.
2009 - The Walkmen - You & Me: Got this a week before graduating and it really defined that whole transition. It's now among my favourite albums.
2010 - Women - Public Strain: Not sure if it's a landmark or just my most recent favourite album. I suppose it helped me better understand (and love) dissonance/noisy elements in music. Even at this early stage I'm fairly confident it will be my album of the decade.
Honourable mention: Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication: Another album that played a large part during my early teenage years. Listening to it reminds me of hot summer days when I was young.

6: Automatic for the People - R.E.M.
8: Everything Queen
13: Nevermind/In Utero - Nirvana
Surfer Rosa - Pixies
The Downward Spiral - NIN
14: The Bends - Radiohead
QOTSA
15: OK Computer/Kid A/Amnesiac etc. - Radiohead
In the Aeroplane Over the Sea - Neutral Milk Hotel
16: Selected Ambient Sounds I & II - Aphex Twin
Tri Repetae - Autechre
Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
17: Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
18: Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
19: Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
Loveless - My Bloody Valentine
Loveless - My Bloody Valentine