I suspect I've listened to this album at some point.  I think the only Metallica album I ever owned was Ride the Lightning, which I would have purchased probably in '85.  

They are definitely not something I want to listen to now.  

I didn't have enough to say in the "top ten influential albums" aside from what anybody could guess who has even a slightest impression of me from my posts in our music threads. In general though, each new Ozzy-era Sabbath record (aside from his final two) I picked up in the early 80s was a revelation. "Where has this been all my life" was my reaction to each of those records, but that says almost as much about my lack of social connections as it does about the music. Sabbath ain't the most progressive group, but the non-radio-friendly song structures impressed the heck out of me, after the heaviness and anger, of course. Ditto for the other classic metal bands, but Sabbath was the grand-daddy.

Our home was virtually music-free, which was a shame, because my dad, in his younger days as a single man, was a jazz drummer. I know he made some money off of it, but I don't know if it was ever a sole source of income for him. By the time my parents got married, he was a full-time alcoholic, to the point that any interest he had in the drums was supplanted by interest in whiskey. We had never-touched drum equipment in our garage for my whole childhood. But there were still some musical influences I got from my parents.

My dad had some cassettes of jazz festivals. I liked what I heard on those, but they were lost a long time ago. Once in a while I sample some jazz to see if I can find anything that I like as much as I liked those. But I pretty much gave that search up after a few decades, writing off my memories of listenable jazz as youthful exaggeration. Sabbath gets jazzy sometimes, and that will suffice.

The one lasting musical influence I got from my parents was Irish folk music. Every Saint Patrick's Day, we'd play the Clancy Brother And Tommy Makem record collection all day long. I still love that music and listen to it regularly. And I branched out a bit to other non-CBATM Celtic folk music.

I know we had some other records in the house, probably musical soundtracks and old stuff like Lawrence Welk. The only other song I specifically remember being played was that Green Beret song. Even as a kid, I cringed at the jingoism.

Yes, I assume my copy is at my brother's place, since he has all our old albums - I've never owned a turntable since moving away so it would be pointless for e to have any here. But when I listened to my cd the other day for the thread I realised that I must have one of these re-mixed versions or something because there were many times when it sounded quite different to my memory of the vinyl record. So I'll have to see if I can find another cd edition that's more like the original.

And finally, since I'm running behind, here is # 1. I'm going to fudge the rules a bit by using two, BUT, in my defense, others have done so, too, and it's because they both collectively achieved two parts of the same goal for me.

And this is once again and especially in this case, not in order of favoritism. It just took the longest to decide on the last entry, and this entry did open up a pathway I struggled to get into.


1. It's a 2-for-1...

Green Day: Nimrod (1997) / Smash Mouth: Fush Yu Mang (1997)




BACKGROUND:

So, my progress from rock to harder rock to metal was pretty straight and narrow. I didn't take a lot of detours or offshoots. I enjoyed a handful of alternative bands, but for the most part, I didn't like mixers with my rock at the time. It took me a LONG time to get into grunge, but that's another story for another time.

But being a teenager in the mid to late 90s, a lot of my friends were into punk and ska. And I. Was. Not. I didn't like the sound of it, I didn't like the musical phrasing, the rougher production quality, the whiny alternative vibe, any of it. There was a handful of isolated exceptions here and there. I loved Come Out and Play by The Offspring on the radio, which while not a punk song was by a punk band. I'd get into them eventually.

But yes, a lot of my friends were into them, and I didn't dig it at all until these two albums.

Green Day Nimrod:
I won this in a giveaway contest when it was new, and hey, free rock album. Green Day has a more commercial sound and wasn't as pure punk by this time, which annoyed their classic friends but made it a great entry point for me to get the punk flavoring in a dish I could enjoy. I listened to it a lot, and I started to enjoy a lot of the songs. This laid the groundwork for getting more into other punk bands, as well as gaining more common ground with my friends.

I wouldn't say punk is a favorite genre of mine even today, but there are quite a few albums by a fair few bands I enjoy a good bit, and a few I really like a whole lot. I've come to really appreciate the hardcore punk influence that the metal guys picked up in the 80s to make thrash metal and its successor genres, for sure. I'm more a metal guy, but I have a healthy enjoyment of punk music now, too, and this one opened the door.

Smash Mouth: Fush Yu Mang:
Like anyone else with two ears and a heartbeat in 1997, I heard Walkin' on the Sun incessantly on the radio. And I enjoyed the hell out of it. Catchy-ass song, great horn hook, cool retro vibe, fun vocal delivery, and doesn't overstay its welcome. What more could you want in a power pop song? But that was all I knew about them, until...

A friend of mine got it, and he put it on one day while we were hanging out playing Playstation. That's it, just Playstation. No number. There was just the one at the time.

Anyway, he was into the punk and ska side of things more than me, so he was more likely to put some on. What I wasn't prepared for was that the rest of the album sounded nothing like the single I heard all the time. I was still learning this was a common thing at that age. So, what I hear is an uptempo but fun, party-vibe sort of punk/ska band, but a bit diluted and wrapped in a more simplified pop-style packaging. And it worked. This was the first album where I actually enjoyed that punk/ska mixed sound, and it unlocked that path for me, too.

Like punk, I've never been a huge ska fan, and my tastes there are primarily in that 90s/00s punk/ska hybrid third (I think?) wave, but I didn't like it at all before this album, so it was my gateway album. I've gotten into a few bands and enjoy them a lot, especially early Reel Big Fish who perfected the style of ska I like.

So, because it made that path possible for me, it was worth mentioning, too.

My general tastes are much broader these days, but early on, these were pretty big expansions in what I was into and allowed me to meld better with my friends. I've since been to many concerts and bought a lot of CDs, and that wouldn't have included any of these guys if not for these two albums.

For my samples, I will pick songs that aren't as played to death on the radio and speak to the theme of the post.

EXAMPLES:

Green Day: Hitchin' a Ride




Smash Mouth: Flo

Unfortunately, his real-life escapades were not so murky.