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Urban75 Album of the Year 1974

Hurrah!

No one can have any complaints about how long it took me to post up the chart-toppers any more.
 
Knotted said:
I haven't any strong feelings about this one, but I didn’t think it was one of their better ones. That plastic jazz sound on this is it genius?.. I don't know is this a surprise?
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im surprised - urban75 and steely dan is a contradiction in my mind, but that was urban 20 years ago.
I like a few Steely Dan tracks in isolation but
 
2 - King Crimson -  Red

1722771742255.png

There's a point where a band reach a pinnacle and the difference with King Crimson is they stopped there. Somehow well put together with a certain depth and loose and improvisational at the same. Yeah I've talked myself round to this. Heavy prog rock.
 
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krtek a houby said:
Minnie Riperton, Ohio Players and Tower of Power?
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I haven't got the lists to hand but by memory there was only one vote for Minnie Riperton, two votes for Ohio Players but for different albums and I think no votes for Tower of Power.

Minnie Riperton not making the top 20 seems a shame.
 
These were all the no.1 spots

Henry Cow - Unrest
B.T. Express – Do It ('Til You're Satisfied)
King Crimson - Red
Tom Waits - The Heart of Saturday Night
King Tubby Meets The Upsetter - at the Grass Roots of Dub
Steely Dan - Pretzel Logic
Joni Mitchell - Court and Spark
Neil Young - On The Beach
Richard and Linda Thompson - I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight
Hawkwind - Hall of the Mountain Grill

If we're looking at it by number of votes regardless of position then AutoBahn wins with six votes followed by Court and Spark, Red and Natty Dread each with four votes. So Autobahn is in some sense the consensus album of the year even if nobody really, really loves it (highest placing was 3rd).
 
Belboid scoring has

1) King Crimson - Red
2) Joni Mitchell - Court and Spark
3) Kraftwerk - Autobahn
4) Steely Dan -Pretzel Logic
5) Bob Marley - Natty Dread
6) Neil Young - On The Beach
7) Tangerine Dream - Phaedra
8) Burning Spear - Rockin' Time
9=) Hawkwind - Hall of the Mountain Grill
9=) Little Feat - Feats Dont Fail me
11) Robert Wyatt - Rock Bottom
12) King Tubby Meets The Upsetter - at the Grass Roots of Dub
13) Richard and Linda Thompson - I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight
14=) Tom Waits - The Heart of Saturday Night
14=) Bowie - Diamond Dogs
16=) Sparks - Kimono My House
16=) Bohannon – Keep On Dancin
18) Rory Gallagher - Tour of '74
19) Fred Wesley And The J.B.'s – Damn Right I Am Somebody
20) Curtis Mayfield - Sweet Exorcist
21=) John Cale - Fear
21=) Dolly Parton - Jolene
23) Miles Davis - Get Up With It
24) King Crimson - Starless and Bible Black
25) Miles Davis - Big Fun

So arguably U75 has voted in a prog rock album for '74. What has happened to you all???
 
I went with

Henry Cow - Unrest
Robert Wyatt - Rock Bottom
King Crimson - Red
Ivor Cutler - Dandruff
Slapp Happy - Slapp Happy
Cos - Postaeolian Train Robbery
Mike Oldfield - Hergest Ridge
Fred Firth - Guitar Solos
Heldon - Électronic Guerrilla
Marek Grechuta - Magia Obłoków
Sand - Golem
Jorge Ben - A Tábua de Esmeralda
Can - Limited Edition
Kraftwerk - Autobahn
Dzyan - Electric Silence
The Residents - Meet the Reisdents
The Cosmic Jokers - Galactic Supermarket
The Cosmic Jokers - Sci Fi Party
King Crimson - Starless and Bible Black
Samla Mammas Manna - Klossa Knapitatet
Yatha Sidhra - A Meditation Mass
Cluster - Zuckerzeit
Harmonia - Musik von Harmonia

Reassessed Red at the last minute and decided it was both better than I thought it was and also ultimately formative for me. Forgot Joni...
 
missed this its class (one dud slow track) - very mid 70s JBs

The Soul Searchers - Salt On The Earth (1974)​




stumbled on it looking for a sample
this is the best known single from it


....recently reissued , and also spotted West Londons brilliant Honest Jons record shop opened in 1974
 
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Knotted said:
Autobahn is in some sense the consensus album of the year even if nobody really, really loves it (highest placing was 3rd).
Click to expand...
Autobahn is one of the most seminal seminal albums ever released. It's influence is hard to overstate, inspiring as it did, directly or indirectly, basically all electronic music since. It might not be the first electronic music, but it was the one that hit, that made large numbers of people want to make electronic music. I remember the first time I heard Autobahn as a kid, probably a rerun of their Tomorrow's World appearance as I was only one when it came out. It blew my mind, it sounded so alien and awesome and futuristic.

But listening to the album now, while it's good, basically the all ideas on it have been done better since. The sprawling 20 minute version of Autobahn is basically a krautrock song played on synths. At the time Krautrock wasn't much available in the UK and wouldn't be for another couple of decades, so that added to the alienness. I remember when Can and Neu! seemed these mythical acts that were more talked about than heard, my mate Mark had a copy of a Can album recorded on a cassette which was like him having some holy relic. While the focus is understandably on the title track, being half the album, Kometenmelodie 2 on the B-side is no less influential, sounding as it does like half the synthpop tunes recorded since. So while it's hard not to include it on any list of the best albums of 74, it doesn't blow my socks off like some of the other albums released. I guess the same applies to other people.

Anyway, here's my list:

B.T. Express – Do It ('Til You're Satisfied)
Bohannon – Keep On Dancin
King Tubby Meets The Upsetter at the Grass Roots of Dub
Dadawah - Peace & Love - Wadadasow
Fred Wesley And The J.B.'s – Damn Right I Am Somebody
Mulatu Astatke - Ethio Jazz
Rufus feat. Chaka Khan - Rufusized
Commodores – Machine Gun
Lafayette Afro-Rock Band – Malik
Burning Spear - Rockin' Time
Betty Davis – They Say I'm Different
Bo Diddley – Big Bad Bo
Celia Cruz & Johnny Pacheco - Celia & Johnny
Keith Hudson & Family Man – Pick A Dub
Kraftwerk - Autobahn
LaBelle – Nightbirds
Marcia Griffiths – Sweet & Nice
Crown Heights Affair
Kool & The Gang - Light of Worlds
The Love Unlimited Orchestra Arranged & Conducted By Barry White – Rhapsody In White

I fucking love 1974. It never goes for long without me listening to something from this year.

Thanks for running this as always Knotted :):thumbs:
 
Spandex said:
Autobahn is one of the most seminal seminal albums ever released. It's influence is hard to overstate, inspiring as it did, directly or indirectly, basically all electronic music since. It might not be the first electronic music, but it was the one that hit, that made large numbers of people want to make electronic music. I remember the first time I heard Autobahn as a kid, probably a rerun of their Tomorrow's World appearance as I was only one when it came out. It blew my mind, it sounded so alien and awesome and futuristic.

But listening to the album now, while it's good, basically the all ideas on it have been done better since. The sprawling 20 minute version of Autobahn is basically a krautrock song played on synths. At the time Krautrock wasn't much available in the UK and wouldn't be for another couple of decades, so that added to the alienness. I remember when Can and Neu! seemed these mythical acts that were more talked about than heard, my mate Mark had a copy of a Can album recorded on a cassette which was like him having some holy relic. While the focus is understandably on the title track, being half the album, Kometenmelodie 2 on the B-side is no less influential, sounding as it does like half the synthpop tunes recorded since. So while it's hard not to include it on any list of the best albums of 74, it doesn't blow my socks off like some of the other albums released. I guess the same applies to other people.

Anyway, here's my list:

B.T. Express – Do It ('Til You're Satisfied)
Bohannon – Keep On Dancin
King Tubby Meets The Upsetter at the Grass Roots of Dub
Dadawah - Peace & Love - Wadadasow
Fred Wesley And The J.B.'s – Damn Right I Am Somebody
Mulatu Astatke - Ethio Jazz
Rufus feat. Chaka Khan - Rufusized
Commodores – Machine Gun
Lafayette Afro-Rock Band – Malik
Burning Spear - Rockin' Time
Betty Davis – They Say I'm Different
Bo Diddley – Big Bad Bo
Celia Cruz & Johnny Pacheco - Celia & Johnny
Keith Hudson & Family Man – Pick A Dub
Kraftwerk - Autobahn
LaBelle – Nightbirds
Marcia Griffiths – Sweet & Nice
Crown Heights Affair
Kool & The Gang - Light of Worlds
The Love Unlimited Orchestra Arranged & Conducted By Barry White – Rhapsody In White

I fucking love 1974. It never goes for long without me listening to something from this year.

Thanks for running this as always Knotted :):thumbs:
Click to expand...

Just on Autobahn, Brian Eno commented somewhere that we have the wrong idea about genius in that it's an individual thing cooked up by a great mind but rather that it is something emerges from vibrant scenes (totally paraphrasing here). I'm thinking the same happens with importance and influence. So I'm trying to be resistant to the idea of Kraftwerk being this mega influence. Electronic music was already happening and popular electronic music (electro pop, industrial, techno etc.) was going to happen at some point. And really Cluster/Harmonia were arriving there in a somewhat different way at the same time. However, it was Autobahn that took off. And also the deadpan delivery is both unique and hugely influential to be fair.

For me I love it because it's both a joy to listen to, it's a proper composition with different sections that fit together and it's a very definite idiosyncratic artistic statement, and Kometenmelodie 2 is so much better for Kometenmelodie 1 and these are perhaps the things that are the least seminal about it. Soft Cell for instance were never going to make side long tracks about transport. I like the idea of it being an odd peculiar thing at the time better than I like the idea that it was the start of all electronic popular music.

Good call on the Mulatu Astatke btw. Another one I missed.
 
Knotted said:
Just on Autobahn, Brian Eno commented somewhere that we have the wrong idea about genius in that it's an individual thing cooked up by a great mind but rather that it is something emerges from vibrant scenes (totally paraphrasing here). I'm thinking the same happens with importance and influence. So I'm trying to be resistant to the idea of Kraftwerk being this mega influence. Electronic music was already happening and popular electronic music (electro pop, industrial, techno etc.) was going to happen at some point. And really Cluster/Harmonia were arriving there in a somewhat different way at the same time. However, it was Autobahn that took off. And also the deadpan delivery is both unique and hugely influential to be fair.

For me I love it because it's both a joy to listen to, it's a proper composition with different sections that fit together and it's a very definite idiosyncratic artistic statement, and Kometenmelodie 2 is so much better for Kometenmelodie 1 and these are perhaps the things that are the least seminal about it. Soft Cell for instance were never going to make side long tracks about transport. I like the idea of it being an odd peculiar thing at the time better than I like the idea that it was the start of all electronic popular music
Click to expand...
Yeah, I totally agree with that Eno point about genius being something emerges from vibrant scenes, that electronic music was going to happen and was happening anyway, but like you say, it was Autobahn that broke through and took off. I watched some documentary which interviewed loads of the early synthpop acts from the late 70s and all of them said it was Kraftwerk that inspired them. If affordable synthesisers had been available a few years earlier it could've been Popcorn that inspired a generation of people to make electronic music, and the history of electronic music could've evolved in a different way...
 
I ended up lumping with
King Tubby Meets The Upsetter at the Grass Roots of Dub
Charles Earland – Leaving This Planet
Stevie Wonder - Fulfillingness' First Finale
Dub Specialist – Better Dub
The Light Of Saba - The Light Of Saba

Miles Davis - Big Fun
Burning Spear - Rocking Time
Hamilton Bohannon - Keep On Dancin'
Curtis Mayfield - Sweet Exorcist
Conrad Schnitzler - The Black Cassette

listened to Autobahn but didnt get that far as its dated and boring :) :D (sorry)
Conrad Schnitzler - The Black Cassette by comparison though was jaw dropping for its time... great find...I think indelible ink posted that
 
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ska invita said:
I ended up lumping with
King Tubby Meets The Upsetter at the Grass Roots of Dub
Charles Earland – Leaving This Planet
Stevie Wonder - Fulfillingness' First Finale
Dub Specialist – Better Dub
The Light Of Saba - The Light Of Saba

Miles Davis - Big Fun
Burning Spear - Rocking Time
Hamilton Bohannon - Keep On Dancin'
Curtis Mayfield - Sweet Exorcist
Conrad Schnitzler - The Black Cassette

listened to Autobahn but didnt get that far as its dated and boring :) :D (sorry)
Conrad Schnitzler - The Black Cassette by comparison though was jaw dropping for its time... great find...I think indelible ink posted that
Click to expand...
All liked, nay, loved... but that Autobahn dis...
 
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To be fair Autobahn has a dated sound and it doesn't exactly slap. In 1974 Schnitzler, Schulze, Cluster and Tangerine Dream all sound more like the actual future.
 
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