Shoegaze Week: Drowned in Shoegaze - 50 Essential Albums

someone else might be nice enough to do it

.. and yes I went straight for Ride .. personally I suggest that you add 'Nowhere' in place of 'Tarantula'

is 'a gilded eternity' on spotify? should be if it ain't.

dont have spotify, dont want to get spotify, would like to learn about some records though.

its annoying when people do it in threads as well, just give a freakin track list you bums!

Air-Moon Safari
Asobi Seksu-S/t
Blonde Redhead-Misery Is A Butterfly
Blonde Redhead-23
Boo Radleys-Giant Steps
Brian Eno-Desert Island Selection
Cabaret Voltaire-Original Sound of Sheffield 78/82
Chapterhouse-Best Of
Cocteau Twins-Blue Bell Knoll
Cranes-Loved
Crystal Stilts-Alight Of Night
Deerhunter-Microcastle
Early Years-Early Years
Gravenhurst-Fires In Distant Buildings
Jeniferever-Choose A Bright Morning
Jesus & Mary Chain-Psychocandy
Kitchens Of Distinction-The Death Of Cool
Liars-Liars
Lush-Spooky
M83-M83
Maps-We Can Create
Mercury Rev-Boces
Moose-Honey Bee
My Bloody Valentine-Isn't Anything
My Bloody Valentine-Loveless
Neu!-Neu! 75
No Age-Weirdo Rippers
Pale Saints-Comforts Of Madness
Radio Dept-Lesser Matters
Ride-Going Blank Again
Ride-Nowhere
Ride-Tarantula
School Of Seven Bells-Alpinisms
Secret Machines-Now Here Is Nowhere
Sigur Ros-Agatis Byrjun
Slowdive-Souvlaki
Sonic Youth-NYC Ghosts & Flowers
Spiritualized-Lazer Guided Melodies
Stereolab-Peng
Suicide-A Way Of Life
Swervedriver-Mezcal Head
Telescopes-As Approved By The Comitee
Throbbing Gristle-20 Jazz Funk Greats
Times New Viking-Rip It Off
Twilight Sad-Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters
VA-Sci Fi Lo Fi Vol. 3
Velvet Underground & Nico-Velvet Underground & Nico
Verve-Storm In Heaven
War Against Sleep-Invitation To The Forest
Yo La Tengo-I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One

the spotify download is genius. It's the reason why DiS rules over most other music sites.

but i think methodrone by bjm should have made it, especially if youre going to include jeniferever.

let alone 50 essential ones.

Seems to be an object in identifying random delay drenched tracks and labelling them shoegaze.

but there's some great stuff on the list.

From the above, I'd say the following would make a similar list premised on a narrower definition of shoe/nu-gaze:

Blonde Redhead-23
Deerhunter-Microcastle
Maps-We Can Create
My Bloody Valentine-Loveless
Pale Saints-Comforts Of Madness
Radio Dept-Lesser Matters
Ride-Going Blank Again
Ride-Nowhere
School Of Seven Bells-Alpinisms
Slowdive-Souvlaki
Stereolab-Peng (nice pick!)

Add to those the following:

Curve -- Pubic Fruit (first three EPs)
Curve -- Doppelgänger
Curve -- Cuckoo
Lush -- Gala
Pale Saints -- In Ribbons
Underground Lovers -- Leaves Me Blind
Underground Lovers -- Dream It Down
Chapterhouse -- Blood Music
Medicine -- The Buried Life
GB3 -- Circlework
Deerhunter -- Cryptogram
Soundpool -- Dichotomies & Dreamland

and I'd probably throw in (against the narrower definition) Ladytron's Witching Hour, because it's too good to leave out on a technicality.

I'm glad to see School Of Seven Bells in the list. Their new single, My Cabal is one of my favourite singles of 2009 so far, and I can definitely hear a MBV influence in the harmonious backing vocals and the beats.

Ferment should be in any big shoegaze album list, just for 'Black Metallic' and 'I want to touch you'. They've been conspicuous in their absence this week, I thought.

As someone who has seen all the great shoegazing bands & bought all the records it would seem unlikely I would have less than half of a list of essential albums. So there's either something wrong with my memory or something wrong with this list.

I don't need to remind anyone what the classic albums are, but I really must put in a mention for "Shot Forth Self Living" and you don't even include the best of the new: Electro Group & Panda Riot.

Lift to Experience - The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads
my bloody valentine - loveless
Rollerskate Skinny - Horsedrawn Wishes
LOOP - A Gilded Eternity
Dragon City - (self-titled)
These Are Powers - Terrific Seasons
Secret Machines - Ten Silver Drops
Dark Fog - The Ultimate Cult of Psychedelic Psychosis
Skywave - Synthstatic
Autolux - Future Perfect

This is a very tricky list to make, and I think a bunch of albums on DiS's list are not shoegaze. Also, I don't like lists where artists are named multiple times. Failure's Fantastic Planet and Built to Spill's Perfect From Now On just barely missed making my list simply because, as great as those albums are, I feel like they fall into the "space-rock" category, equal parts indie rock and shoegaze. A shoegaze album must be all about guitar alchemy. The guitar tone must give the impression of sound as something tactile and be the primary means by which the listener is immersed in a particular reality or emotional state. Within the headspace of the album, it should seem completely possible that the guitar player(s) could create any sound imaginable at will and either pat you on the back or punch you in the face with it. A few criticisms of the DiS list: M83 has WAY too much keyboard crap going on to be classified as shoegaze, for all those pedals Slowdive's guitar sound is almost completely without dimension, and No Age are a punk band, plain and simple. Some might object to the These Are Powers album on my list (I actually would have listed All Aboard Future since it is a little better but felt that that was perhaps too much an amalgamation of diverse influences.), but Pat's altered bass functions as both a bass and a guitar (!) and does the bulk of the heavy lifting texturally on that very eerie and hypnotic album.

shoegazing is a genre defined by it's classic EPs rather than it's albums.
<http://www.shoegaze.co.uk/shoegazeforum/eps-t2967.html>