At Folsom Prison Johnny Cash
Captures Johnny at the peak of his career. The prisoners give this live album a very unique energy.
CCR debut album
I had both of these albums and wore out the vinyl. Replaced them with 8 track and then Cassette tape.
That reminds me. The Who was touring as recently as last year. Does anybody know if 74-year-old Roger Daltrey still sings “I hope I die before I get old”?
Yeah, it probably says more about those particular songwriters than about the 1968 zeitgeist. Davies and Simon are the type of songwriters who like to create, and write from the point of view of, different characters, including older ones, and who have a sense of the past. (So’s Paul McCartney—see “When I’m 64,” “She’s Leaving Home,” etc.) But maybe this is an indication that Rock, which had always seemed to be a genre by, for, and about the young, was growing up.
The My Generation/Cry If You Want medley was played at almost every show over the last couple of tours.
Music’s like wine and 1968 was definitely a great year.
Who cares if the White Album is better than Electric Lady Land or if Beggar’s Banquet has more depth than Steppenwolf? Is it just coincidence that I was born this year? Could be. The thing is, there was something in the air, in the water or maybe both that inspired a generation of musicians and all sorts of musical genres started to mature and blossom that was the prelude to the greatest decade in popular music.
I doubt that we’ll ever see another ‘musical spring’ like that. Nowadays musical innovation is all a little far fetched or far off. But who knows. The world is full of surprises.
The Band’s Music from Big Pink did more than any other album to yank rock’s focus on psychedelia and re-route it to roots music and “the old, weird America,” as Greil Marcus wrote. Even Eric Clapton was eying the banjos and mandolins down at the guitar shop.
Village Green Preservation Society is my favorite Kinks album, which puts it high on my list of fave rock albums ever, but it was an offbeat effort even for Ray Davies, and didn’t really influence anyone else to start writing songs about Sherlock Holmes or strawberry jam or virginity.
Jaycat, thanx for mentioning Nyro’s Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. Laura don’t get enough love anymore. Nobody’s ever tried to sound like her after her glory years of 1968-1970, which makes Eli less of an “important album” and more of a solitary miracle displaced in space and time. I gotta go and listen to “Timer” now.
I thought the writer’s main point is that this record truly launched the STONES, the World’s Greatest Rock Band. And how weird and wonderful it was that this sound, these songs, seemingly came out of nowhere, that they aren’t reflected in the Stones’ prior body of work. I’ve actually had this conversation dozens of times. If you are of the belief that the Stones are forever and always the World’s Greatest Rock Band, no matter how much their post-Some Girls work was/is disappointing
(with the exception of this, where the hell did this come from? The Rolling Stones -- Doom and Gloom ( New Video ) - YouTube)
then you agree with this supposition. And I do. Even if you don’t, I think the writer made a compelling argument.
Jaycat’s post has enough gravitas to totally invalidate just about any argument that can be made for any single album.
Yeah, to me, the one little “prequel” to the post-'68 Stones sound was “Miss Amanda Jones,” from the Between the Buttons LP, recorded in late 1966:
Except I’m pretty sure Surrealistic Pillow came out in ‘67.
The last 20 years have seen quite a few landmark albums, especially in hip-hop but in other genres, too. you are going to have difficultly telling me there were so many important albums in 1968 that they all rank about The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, Speakerboxx/The Love Below, Kid A, The Marshall Mathers LP, Elephant, or Random Access Memories.
February of 1967. So not even a close candidate.
Me too. Wheels of Fire had the top of their live stuff (except perhaps Train time) and great studio stuff also. It was my most listened to album for quite some time.
What a great feast of albums there was in 1968.
And what a great exercise in futility it is trying to rank them by importance.
Excellent example.
Agreed.
I love the VU. But this was their worst album, IMO. I like a couple songs on it (Lady Godiva’s Operation and the Here She Comes Now), but the rest are forgettable.
My pleasure. I got to see her play sometime in the early 90s and I sure am glad I did. No one knew she wouldn’t be around that much longer.
Point stands, however. I was never a fan of JA anyway. 
My baby album, of course!
Oops. It’s all a blur anyway…