Debut album by the 21-year-old Mary J. Blige took elements of Hip Hop, Soul, RnB and New Jack Swing and fused them altogether to create a new sound, one that would become synonymous with the early to mid 90’s. Thanks to this, Blige came to be known as the Queen Of Hip Hop Soul.

The second album by Velvet Underground and the last to feature multi-instrumentalist and co-founder, John Cale. Following the disappointing sales of their debut record (can you believe that album was a commercial disappointment on release?!), their relationship with Andy Warhol soured. The got rid of him and at the same time parted ways with Nico. This album was a major shift in sound from their debut and was recorded in just 2 days. Its lyrical content was very progressive for the time, dealing with drug use, transsexuals, orgys and blowjobs.

A seminal album in punk and post punk, ‘Entertainment!’ was the debut album by Gang Of Four. The album features elements of Dance, Reggae, Funk and Dub. In their lyrics, the band addressed many left-leaning political issues, with even the artwork making a statement. The album cover shows a Native American shaking hands with a cowboy.

The initial concept for this album was a journey through the history of American music. It would traverse genres from Bluegrass to Appalachian music to Country and Western, Jazz, R&B and rock music before finally settling on an early type of electronic music played on a Moog Synth. David Crosby and Michael Clarke had been fired. Chris Hillman’s cousin had been hired to play drums but the band found they struggled to replicate their recorded sound live as a 3-piece. A young 21-year-old Gram Parsons was recommended.

On his debut album, Curtis Mayfield took a sidestep from the sound of The Impressions, the group which he had been a part of since he was 15 years old. Now 28 years old, he upped the tempo on a progressive album inspired by psychedelia and Blaxploitation.

Following the success of breakout single, ‘Creep,’ there was pressure on Radiohead to deliver something even better. After an arduous tour of the USA, the band cancelled their upcoming performance at Reading Festival. Thom Yorke had taken ill. Physically and mentally he was done. Their label, EMI, allegedly told the band that they had 6 months to get themselves sorted or they would be dropped from the label.

The album has sold 8 million copies to date and earned Keys three Grammy Awards. It features contributions from Timbaland, Kanye West, John Legend, Hugh McCracken and many others. Keys, herself, contributed to multiple instruments and produced most of the record.

Enter the mighty Led Zeppelin! Last time around this was also the first Zeppelin album to be featured. This, their fifth album was the first of their releases to actually have a title and not a number and thus the first of a new era, of sorts. Its iconic artwork was created by the legendary Hipgnosis, the company responsible for most of the iconic Pink Floyd album covers, amongst many others. Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones had both installed home studios, which allowed them to develop more sophisticated songs and arrangements, arriving at recording sessions with further developed ideas than previously.

At ‘MTV Unplugged’ sessions, band were expected to play their biggest hits acoustically. Nirvana preferred to stay away from the hits with Dave Grohl saying “We'd seen the other Unpluggeds and didn't like many of them, because most bands would treat them like rock shows—play their hits like it was Madison Square Garden, except with acoustic guitars.” This set was riddled with covers from artists such as Vaselines, Lead Belly, Meat Puppets and David Bowie.

I had just started working at a CD store when this album came out. It was one of our biggest sellers, as well one of the most stolen albums of 2003. How big you’re wondering? The album would go on to sell 9x platinum in the States, 4x Platinum in the UK, 3x Platinum in Aus and so on. It features his breakthrough hit, ‘In Da Club,’ a song that we would hear multiple times a night in da clubs.

Starting with the playfully upbeat ‘Gotta Get Up.’ I immediately recognised this song from the Netflix show, ‘Russian Doll.’ In fact, the song is so central to the TV series that it’s a character in itself. At the time I remember thinking that it was a Paul McCartney song I had never heard. As the album progresses, it continues to get better.

The album deals with themes of loneliness, lost love, depression and night life. All subjects that Sinatra was qualified to sing. This album would have been cathartic for Sinatra, a way to deal with all the emotions of the past few years. It’s one of the saddest yet most beautiful albums ever.

The Queen Of Disco once again teamed up with long-time collaborator, Giorgio Moroder aka The Father Of Disco to create arguably the greatest Disco record of all time. Not wanting to be outdone by contemporary bands of the time, this album fuses Disco and Rock, with elements of Electronic Dance Music, featuring Moroder’s signature synth sounds.

‘Down Every Road’ spans the majority of Merle Haggard’s successful career. Merle Haggard was the real deal. He was the outlaw that Johnny Cash fantasised about being.

The third and final entry from ‘Big Star’ is quite different to their first two records. Proving to be an incredibly diverse and interesting band, it’s a wonder they were never bigger. I’m not the only one. Alex Chilton never saw it as a Big Star record either, apparently claiming it to be a marketing move by the label. Jody Stephens claimed that it was essentially a solo record by Alex Chilton.

This album marked a shift in sound for the band, previously known for they funky punk sound with rapid fire rap-like vocals by Anthony Kiedis, they moved to a more commercial rock sound seeing Kiedis doing more melodic singing. Make no mistake, the rhythm section is still unmistakably RHCP. The guitar, however, is different. Uncomplicated and straight forward, yet still effective.

Officially known the world’s first Folk Rock album (or at least, the first album to be described by this new phrase). The album took its name from the lead single, a song that Bob Dylan had written and recorded just one month before the release of this one. The harmonies on that single, and the album in general are stunning. The blending of Roger McGuinn, Gene Clark and David Crosby’s vocals is magical.

“One, two, three, four, five, six!,” Jonathan Richman counts us in on ‘Roadrunner,’ the one and only single from the album. The band was formed when Richman was just 19 years old. By the following year he had secured the line up which included, amongst others, Jerry Harrison on keyboard and David Robinson on drums, both would subsequently go on to have successful careers with Talking Heads and The Cars, respectively.

Bjork is one of the most interesting artists in recent years. The Icelandic artist (and she truly is an artist) is not bound to genre or style. She is simply Bjork. Exploding through the stereo with ‘Army Of Me,’ it sets the tone for the record; expect the unexpected. She serves up a smorgasbord of Electronica, Trip Hop and Art Pop.

It’s a bit weird that this is credited to OutKast. Essentially it’s two solo albums packaged together. The first album, ‘Speakerboxxx’ is Big Boi’s album. Southern Hip Hop inspired by George Clinton’s Parliament-Funkadelic (Hip Hop just seems to keep on returning to this group). ‘The Love Below,’ Andre 3000’s album, is more jazzy, poppy, experimental and reminded me A LOT of Prince.