Introduction
The Rough Guide to Essential Rock CDs is not just another list of the "Greatest Rock Albums Ever Made" - it's a guide that packs the whole story of rock into just two hundred pages, celebrating the best albums by one hundred bands and artists, ranging from the zillion-sellers to the wilfully obscure. The expected "All-Time Greats" are here, but more deeply buried gems are keeping them company: Elvis, Joni Mitchell, Madonna, the Beatles and the Stones get their entries, along with the likes of Bikini Kill, PJ Harvey, Sleater-Kinney, Tortoise, Jeff Buckley and Aphex Twin.
It was of course hellishly hard to select a mere hundred records from the countless number released each year for the last thirty years. We began with a list of all the indisputably classic acts and all those we think have in some way pushed back the limits, taking the music into uncharted lands. The job of cutting this initial batch of nearly one thousand was made a little easier by the decision to bring out Rough Guide Essentials devoted to Soul, Blues, Reggae and Country, but even so, many long afternoons and arguments were spent trimming down the huge list: who was it to be - Frank Zappa or the Cramps? Suede or the Kinks? In the end, by limiting even the biggest names to a single album, plus an alternative recommendation at the end of the review, we believe we've come up with a handbook that encompasses every shade of rock. The bulk of the recordings come from the 70s and 80s, the "Golden Age" of the rock 'n' roll album, a time before the sheer volume of releases made it impossible for any one person to keep fully up to date with everything that went by the name of rock music. We've given the originators their due as well, peeking into the 50s and taking a closer look at the 60s explosion. And we've stuck our necks out by recommending the pick of the 90s.
So, this is a book of the boppiest, brainiest, scariest, dumbest, loudest, most sincere, most skilfully executed, most sloppily performed recordings by the glammest, saddest, quietest and noisiest performers of the last three decades. Recorded at the highest-tech palaces, live in concert or during snatched half-hours in backstreet studios by artists and producers with hugely differing intentions and levels of ability, all these recordings have one single thing in common; they are each, in their own way, marvellous and life-changing.
Al Spicer
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