Albums That Influenced You the Most

57Gregy · 2025-05-10T23:03:01Z

The 'Best Albim' (sic) thread got me thinking that there's no way I could pick a single album as best. There are too many great ones.
Instead, I wondered which albums caused me to want to write, play, record music the most?
The short, at this moment list:
Revolver.
The red album from Grand Funk.
Who's Next.
After The Gold Rush.
Boston's first album.
Uriah Heep's first release.
Machine Head.
Rockin' The Fillmore from Humble Pie.
Eat a Peach.

57Gregy · 2025-05-10T23:21:49Z

Jeez, I forgot Emerson, Lake and Palmer's eponymous first album.
Pronounced, from Lynyrd Skynyrd.

All of these albums were released between when I was 9 and 20. The 'formative' years. It may seem like I haven't listened to music since 1976, but I have. The variety of music available every day is astounding, and much of it is good. I went through a prog rock period when I listened to nothing else. My folk-rock years. Grunge in the 90's.

hockeyjx · 2025-05-11T01:09:01Z

For me (and this includes my early influences, and excluding classics like Dark Side of the Moon):

Ace Frehley and KI$$' Dynasty made me pick up the guitar to start
George Lynch and Dokken's Back for the Attack made me put everything in to overdrive

Then, some that really have done it for me since:

Depeche Mode - Violator
Days of the New - Green
Duncan Sheik - Humming
Devin Townsend - Addicted!
Vertical Horizon - Everything You Want
Toad the Wet Sprocket - Coil

Edited 19 hours ago by hockeyjx

Rain · 2025-05-11T03:52:32Z

The lists of artists who’ve inspired me is too long to even start, but in terms of specific albums that were corner stones, it’s a surprisingly short list. The Beatles are arguably my biggest influence in many ways but I could not pick one album. Same for The Cure or Depeche Mode…

If there had to be just one album on which everything hinges, it would be KISS Creatures of the Night.

I grew up in a very peculiar environment and it wasn’t until 6th grade that I realized that there was a world of music out there besides Elvis Presley. Then one afternoon after school, a friend brought his older brother's copy of Creatures of the Night...

In many ways, it set the blueprint for everything I’ve ever done musically, even if one would have a hard time guessing. It’s dark, heavy, focused, coherent and with drums as loud AF.

It also spoiled me a little for a bit because I was expecting all heavy metal to sound like this, with ridiculously huge drums. It was kind of a let down when I borrowed a friend’s copy of Love Gun. 🤣

Edited 19 hours ago by Rain

hockeyjx · 2025-05-11T03:57:11Z

4 minutes ago, Rain said:

If there had to be just one album on which everything hinges, it would be KISS Creatures of the Night.

My favorite KI$$ album as well!

T Boog · 2025-05-11T04:46:21Z

My top 10 most influential albums in order...

1. Slayer, Reign in Blood

2. Leif Garrett, I Was Made For Dancing

3. Venom, Welcome to Hell

4. Spice Girls, Spice World

5. Napalm Death, Scum

6. Debbie Boone, You Light Up My Life

7. Cattle Decapitation, Bring Back The Plague

8. Boy George, Boyfriend

9. Morbid Angel, Heretic

10. Britney Spears, Oops!... I Did It Again

Rain · 2025-05-11T05:03:14Z

14 minutes ago, T Boog said:

My top 10 most influential albums in order...

1. Slayer, Reign in Blood

2. Leif Garrett, I Was Made For Dancing

3. Venom, Welcome to Hell

4. Spice Girls, Spice World

5. Napalm Death, Scum

6. Debbie Boone, You Light Up My Life

7. Cattle Decapitation, Bring Back The Plague

8. Boy George, Boyfriend

9. Morbid Angel, Heretic

10. Britney Spears, Oops!... I Did It Again

A study in contrasts.

Glad to see a fellow Venom fan in the old CH.

Starship Krupa · 2025-05-11T09:13:57Z

I won't be able to think of all of them immediately. I've been into different genres over the years so what's influenced me has depended on what music I am making at the time.

(I promise I'm not goofing like I think T Boog was, my tastes really are this weird. I have a ticket to see Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass and Other Delights tour in Los Angeles this November, which will require me to drive about 7 hours each way between Oakland and LA)

Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass: Four Sider

My Bloody Valentine: Loveless

Brasil '66: Herb Alpert Presents

Bettie Serveert: Palomine

The Ramones' first three albums

Pink Floyd: Meddle (specifically "One of These Days....")

Terry Riley: In C

Lush: Gala

Neu: 2

Air: Moon Safari

The Beatles: Revolver

Sugar: Copper Blue

The Who: The Who By Numbers

Brian Eno: Discreet Music

Ulrich Schnauss: A Strangely Isolated Place

Gang of Four: Entertainment!

Com Truise: Persuasion System

The Orb: Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld

The Moody Blues: This is the Moody Blues (actually all of the "core seven" albums)

The Velvet Underground: The Velvet Underground & Nico

Joy Division: Unknown Pleasures

The Beach Boys: Surf's Up (actually all of their output from Pet Sounds through Holland)

Those are the first ones that come to mind. I'll often do a song and only notice who it was influenced by later.

Rain · 2025-05-11T10:11:08Z

34 minutes ago, Starship Krupa said:

I have a ticket to see Herb Alpert's Tijuana Brass and Other Delights tour in Los Angeles this November, which will require me to drive about 7 hours each way between Oakland and LA)

You're amongst friends. 😁 I'm also a huge fan. Well, maybe not quite as much as yourself. A 7 hours drive, man...

craigb · 2025-05-11T13:47:42Z

Wow! Didn't know Herb was even still alive! I saw them in Balboa Park down in San Diego (five minutes from Tijuana!) back in the 60's...

Just looked him up... He's 90!!! 😮

Starship Krupa · 2025-05-11T13:52:50Z

2 hours ago, Rain said:

You're amongst friends. 😁 I'm also a huge fan. Well, maybe not quite as much as yourself. A 7 hours drive, man...

It's one of those things: Herb Alpert putting together a new TJB and touring with them, at age 90, is something that I had thought entirely outside of the realm of possibility.

My mother got to see Herb and the original touring band (Bob Edmonson, Tonni Kalash, John Pisano, etc.) in 1967 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium and I've always been in awe of that. She says that it kicked the amount of ***** you would expect; he opened the show with the curtain closed, playing the opening fanfare of "The Lonely Bull" before opening the curtains as the whole band kicked in.

So given that the first show at the Dolby Theater (like Santa Monica Civic Auditorium 60 years ago, the current venue of the Academy Awards show) sold out by the time I found out he was touring, and then they added another show....it's like, when God answers your prayers, the least you can do is meet Him halfway. If I didn't go see Herb and the TJB on what is likely the last tour he'll ever do, I would regret it every day of the rest of my life.

I've seen some audience shot videos of gigs on this tour. Herb is playing well and the band is great. "This Guy's In Love With You" seems to always be an audience sing-along, and I foresee losing my 5hit when that happens.

A good friend of mine lives in Indiana, and before they added the second show, I considered going to see one of the shows at an arts center in the Indianapolis metro area, but as it turned out, they were already completely sold out.

I shortly thereafter found out that this year's Holiday Dapper Day at Disneyland is on November 16th, so I decided to hit that as well. Dapper Day is something that I stumbled upon almost 10 years ago completely by accident. I went to Disneyland and kept seeing all these sharp dressed, really nice people. It was pleasantly weird to be there with so many people who weren't slogging around in standard frumpy tourist wear, and I promised myself that I would go back someday.

The same old friend in Indiana is really into mid-century style and dressing sharp, and I talked him into flying out to hit Dapper Day with me. It is SO the kind of thing he will love. Again, if I didn't also hit Dapper Day, I might never make it again and would regret it greatly.

So it's a whole long weekend adventure. I can't remember the last time I planned and took a "vacation" like this. I'm also going to try to work in a pilgrimage to Professional Drum Shop in Hollywood while I'm down there.