Picking our list of the Top 100 '70s Rock Albums was no easy task, if only because that period boasted such sheer diversity. The decade saw rock branch into a series of intriguing new subgenres, beginning, at the dawn of the '70s, with heavy metal. Singer-songwriters came into their own; country-rock flourished. The era ended with the revitalizing energy of punk and New Wave. No list would be complete without climbing onto every one of those limbs. Here are the Top 100 '70s Rock Albums, presented chronologically from the start of the decade.
After recording a string of fusion records in the late '80s with his Elektric Band, Chick Corea returned to acoustic jazz with this trio date. Enlisting Elektric Band sidemen John Patitucci and Dave Weckl, Corea swings through ten tracks with noticeably mixed results. The leader is as romantic as ever, playing with bravado even on ballads, flawlessly executing complicated ideas, reveling in drama and melodrama. Patitucci's upright playing clearly betrays his electric pedigree; listen quickly to his solo on "So in Love" and you might mistake it for a Jaco Pastorius spot. Weckl has been accused of being a soulless technician serving questionable music in the past, and those who are predisposed against him will find nothing here to change their minds.
Late Richter's austere and roughly sculpted sort of pianism makes this 20 century piano music repertoire utterly captivating listening experience. Audience is spell-bound throughout the recital except a few insensitive people daring to sneeze and cough in most scerene moments. There is always something transcendental about his playing in his late years, if not as thrilling as in 60-70s recitals.
2007 digitally remastered reissue of this 1972 album from the band featuring future Stiff Records artist Jona Lewie. Blues rockers Brett Marvin & the Thunderbolts reached #2 in the UK with 'Sea Side Shuffle' in 1972, under the one-off jokey name Terry Dactyl & the Dinosaurs. There followed two more singles and an album using the name. Seaside Shuffle had originally been released by the production company Sonet in 1971. When the UK label took a license and promoted the single the following year, the single became an international hit. Differing to their parent group Terry Dactyl & the Dinosaurs served up an interesting blend of jug band and acoustic blues shuffle style sounds, not a long way from contemporaries Bronx Cheer and Mungo Jerry…
Other than two numbers cut for the Progressive label in Houston a couple years earlier (and thus far never reissued), this Atlantic session (put out as a Koch CD in 1999) was the recording debut for the remarkable Phineas Newborn. The 24-year-old pianist's playing on this trio/quartet date with bassist Oscar Pettiford and drummer Kenny Clarke (and occasionally guitarist Calvin Newborn) is virtuosic to say the least, on Oscar Peterson's level if not Art Tatum's. Newborn rips through the repertoire (which is highlighted by "Barbados," "Celia," "Daahoud," and "Afternoon in Paris"); try to tap your foot to "Celia" without breaking your ankle!