10/05/2026
Saw this thing going around and wanted to do my own. Here are the 9 albums that really built my music taste! Swipe to see each album, swipe to the end for the full picture. Do any of these make your top 9?
“No!” was the first album I ever owned. I was a baby. My parents got it for my on CD. I absolutely wore it out. Honestly I’ve probably listened to this album more than anything else in my life, but Last FM wasn’t a thing then so I have no record of it. This probably inculcated a lifelong love of weird, nerdy music and sprechgesang.
A few years after “No,” the Shrek soundtrack was another CD I owned that I blasted constantly on my little COBY CD Player/Radio. There’s honestly some sick stuff on here: Self, Rufus Wainwright, Eels, and Baha Men. Great intro record to 90s alt
A bunch of children’s songs sung in Connick’s signature jazzy style. My first jazz record. Still very tender to me. You should play it for your kids! The Jitterbug song kind of scared me.
As I got a little older, I remember finding the White Stripes on Pandora radio and thinking they were the coolest band I’d ever heard. Because of Pandora’s free mode, you couldn’t listen to whole albums… so I’d just start a bunch of “White Stripes Radio” stations in hopes that I could just hear more of their music. Everyone in my class knew “Seven Nation Army…” but I felt like I was in on secret because I knew “Dead Leaves.”
A rec from my dad. He played it for me and I remember my mom telling him maybe he shouldn’t haha. It felt like music that was a little too mature for me, and I loved that. I had never heard music as angry and as loud as RATM, and became obsessed. I learned a ton of random stuff by looking up their lyrics (what’s Agent Orange?) Always has been my go-to gym soundtrack for decades now.
The first vinyl record I ever bought for myself when I turned 16. Always been a big classic rock guy, and got this one because I knew my grandpa loved CCR. Such a special band.
When I first started living away from home, my mom (who’s always been a huge countryhead) bought this album for me. It’s such a beautiful and tender album - Johnny Cash’s tribute to the hymns he grew up hearing his mother si
