Top 75 of 1995

After 1994 had seen me delving further into the world of metal, 1995 carried on that trend.  After progressing through Sepultura and Pantera onto the Earache roster, bands that I'd previously maybe only heard one or two songs by released albums that made me sit up and take notice.

So, as shown clearly in the chart, the albums of the year ended up being Paradise Lost's Draconian Times and Fear Factory's Demanufacture.  White Zombie's Astrocreep received an honorary mention alongside non-metal albums like Shelter's Mantra, Life of Agony's Ugly and Silverchair's Frogstomp.  More established bands in my collection like Carcass, Faith No More, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Senseless Things all had good albums too, even if relatively speaking they all lost their way a little.

But it wasn't rock and metal all the way, I'd started my musical journey away from pop with indie and Friday nights at the Middlesbrough Arena allowed that journey to continue.  With Britpop bursting forth I didn't quite look the part with my long hair, black T-shirts and army trousers, but strangely of all the genres I've dipped into over the years, Britpop was the scene that I felt a part of.

As the Arena included gigs on Fridays too, there were a lot of up and coming bands passing through the doors at that time.  The ones I saw during 1995 are listed below, Skunk Anansie being the only one at the Arena that really moved on to bigger and better things, although there were others like O***s that played there that I was quite happy not to have seen.

03/03/95 Velo Deluxe, China Drum (@Middlesbrough Arena)

31/03/95 Snuff, Bulltaco, Star 69 (@Middlesbrough Arena)

02/06/95 Skunk Anansie, Honeycrack (@Middlesbrough Arena)

09/06/95 Boo Radleys, Swervedriver, Ed Ball (@Middlesbrough Town Hall)

21/07/95 Blameless, Bulltaco, Laxton’s Superb (@Middlesbrough Arena)

22/07/95 Pulp, Sleeper, Menswear, Salad, Powder, Chumbawamba, Skunk Anansie, 60ft Dolls, Blameless, Catatonia, Cecil + Marion, The Bluetones, DetRiMental (@Leeds Roundhay Park)

21/09/95 Shelter, Understand, Shutdown (@Middlesbrough Arena)

06/10/95 China Drum, Honeycrack, Reverse (@Middlesbrough Arena)

17/11/95 Rub Ultra, Fat (@Middlesbrough Arena)

01/12/95 Bullyrag (@Middlesbrough Arena)

The Roundhay Park gig was later dubbed Britstock and was my first festival of sorts, a who's who of up and coming British bands, many of whom would have chart hits.  Note the appearance of Blameless in Middlesbrough on 21/07/95 followed again on 22/07/95 at Leeds, a gap of only 15 hours or so between me seeing them.  Curios in that list come from Fat, who were a rap/rock band featuring Woody from Madness on drums (Downtime made the shortlist for this chart) and Bullyrag whose guitarist took to wearing what was basically a tea cosy over his entire face and head in the early days while staring out members of the audience.

My own music remained mostly in the indie and punk arena too, mostly down to my playing skills.  Me and my brother recorded 3 albums and 2 EPs as Pyf Belly Machine as well as the extended incarnation of that band playing a gig at my college in February 95.  We were the least talented in terms of playing, but the only band that went to the college that were playing original songs.  And we were all right as well, rough around the edges but I still think we had some decent songs despite the constant instrument swapping.

Solo I recorded 2 albums and 2 EPs as Marvin (later to become Spraypaint), one each of which were recorded on my brother's new 4-track Portastudio.  The increase in sound quality coincided with an increase in songwriting quality and despite the constraints in playing produced one of the best songs I've ever written in One of These Days.

I also did an album and an EP as Uranium, which was my first attempt at rock music, although there were a fair amount of keyboards on there too as I was really attempting to be Guisborough's answer to Nine Inch Nails.  Results weren't amazing but I'd hone it a little in subsequent years.

As with last time I'll give a shout to the bands that made the shortlist but not the chart, so commiserations to Chemical Brothers, Carter USM, Schtum, Smashing Pumpkins, Lightning Seeds, Napalm Death, Presidents of the USA, Rocket From The Crypt, Sleeper, Bal-Sagoth, Charlatans, Saint Etienne, EMF, Die Krupps, Fat, Primus, Marilyn Manson, Extreme and Silverchair.  Maybe next time?

1. My Dying Bride - The Cry of Mankind

2. At The Gates - Blinded By Fear

3. China Drum - One Way Down

4. Life of Agony - Let's Pretend

5. Anathema - A Dying Wish

6. At The Gates - Slaughter of the Soul

7. Paradise Lost - Forever Failure

8. Ash - Girl From Mars

9. White Zombie - Electric Head Pt 1

10. Red Hot Chili Peppers - My Friends

11. Paradise Lost - The Last Time

12. Paradise Lost - Once Solemn

13. Pulp - Disco 2000

14. Fear Factory - Self Bias Resistor

15. Paradise Lost - Hallowed Land

16. Cathedral - Hopkins (The Witchfinder General)

17. Fear Factory - Replica

18. Paradise Lost - Enchantment

19. Fear Factory - Demanufacture

20. Fear Factory - H-K (Hunter-Killer)

21. Paradise Lost - Shadowkings

22. Pulp - Common People

23. Shelter - Message of the Bhagavat

24. China Drum - Barrier

25. Faith No More - Ugly in the Morning

26. Faith No More - Digging the Grave

27. White Zombie - Super-charger Heaven

28. Fear Factory - Body Hammer

29. Misery Loves Co. - Need Another One

30. Life of Agony - Lost at 22

31. Shelter - Here We Go

32. Elastica - Blue

33. Ugly Kid Joe - Milkman's Son

34. The Gathering - Strange Machines

35. My Dying Bride - From Darkest Skies

36. Paradise Lost - Yearn For Change

37. Senseless Things - Something to Miss

38. White Zombie - Electric Head Pt 2

39. Faith No More - What a Day

40. Foo Fighters - I'll Stick Around

41. Senseless Things - 16.18.21

42. Senseless Things - Touch Me on the Heath

43. Elastica - Stutter

44. Blur - Country House

45. Black Grape - Reverend Black Grape

46. Boo Radleys - Wake Up Boo!

47. Faith No More - Ricochet

48. Pearl Jam - I Got ID

49. Boo Radleys - Find the Answer Within

50. Life of Agony - Seasons

51. Life of Agony - Damned If I Do

52. The Gathering - In Motion #1

53. Shed 7 - Where Have You Been Tonight?

54. Sugar Ray - Mean Machine

55. Rancid - Time Bomb

56. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Warped

57. Skunk Anansie - I Can Dream

58. Faith No More - The Gentle Art of Making Enemies

59. Faith No More - Cuckoo For Caca

60. Carcass - Keep On Rotting in the Free World

61. Cathedral - Utopian Blaster

62. Paradise Lost - Shades of God

63. Paradise Lost - I See Your Face

64. Shelter - Civilized Man

65. Rancid - Roots Radicals

66. Menswear - I'll Manage Somehow

67. Reef - Good Feeling

68. Reef - Choose To Live

69. Menswear - Stardust

70. Menswear - Being Brave

71. Supergrass - Alright

72. Senseless Things - Wanted

73. Green Day - Stuck With Me

74. Iron Maiden - Man On The Edge

75. The Gathering - Eleanor

Top 75 of 1994

After the years of musical discovery of the 1990s so far I'd moved through the indie of my brother's initial record collection through rock and grunge and found that I was being drawn more and more to heavier music.  I was still listening to the other styles of course, but new music was now coming more and more from the heavier end of the spectrum.

This was partly due to me venturing out into the world of music magazines myself, previously I had nabbed whatever my brother had bought, mostly Melody Maker, NME or Select, and browsed the features of interest.  But later in 1994 I started buying RAW, which was fortnightly if I remember rightly, I think the first issue I bought had Scott Weiland on the cover and came with a load of stickers which I later stuck to the bass that I got for Christmas that year.

As this was now MY magazine I could read it cover to cover and absorb everything, new bands to look out for, more detail about bands I liked that wouldn't be featured in the indie papers etc.  This was pre-internet of course though, so actually hearing the bands still meant watching out for a clip on The Chart Show or Noisy Mothers or waiting for a free cover-mounted tape, I wasn't in a position yet to just take a punt on a band I'd never heard.

In 1994 I turned 16, so I finished school with a decent 2 A*s, 1 A, 5 Bs, 2 Cs and a D and started college where I selected A levels in Maths, Chemistry and Computing and a one year GCSE in Media Studies.  In college you could wear your band shirts with pride and see other people's allegiances at the same time.  I think my early shirts consisted of Senseless Things, Pantera, Sepultura, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pearl Jam, Extreme and The Farm, so a varied selection.  My hair had also been growing out for about a year by then too and sporadic bouts of not shaving my chin kicked off the occasional appearance of my later permanent goatee.

1994 saw an explosion in recording my own music, still just primitively layering instruments over each other on a simple tape recorder, so the results weren't amazing.  I did two albums and an EP of my own music under the name of Marvin, all pretty bad, but the main concern of Pyf Belly Machine with my brother were even more prolific, 6 albums or about 7 hours worth of material over that year period.  After starting college, two of my mates hooked up with us to make it a "proper" band, the official lineup was my brother Peter on guitar/vocals, me on bass/vocals (or the top string of an acoustic guitar until Christmas when I got my bass), Gord on guitar and Darren on drums, but we swapped instruments a lot, I was probably the most guilty in that respect.

At the back end of 1994 we ended up playing a couple of gigs in Gord's garage (he had a big house with a triple garage, swimming pool and a sauna.....quite possibly room for a pony, if your mind was heading that way), we mostly played our own songs from the 2-piece version of the band's albums but also did covers of Girls and Boys, Everything About You and Jump Around.  I'd start the gig on drums, move to bass and a bit of singing, then guitar, back to bass before finishing on drums again.  About 20 college mates turned up to watch, let's just say if the other two weren't in the band we probably wouldn't have persuaded anyone to come.

That was a bit more background than usual......but I was enjoying myself remembering, anyway, music from 1994.  There were some pretty dark albums that came out that year, The Holy Bible being most prominent given the Manics were my favourite band, but The Downward Spiral was also up there too, given I'd been a Nine Inch Nails fan for around 3 or 4 years at that point.  Both incredibly dark albums, both giving the impression of decay in very different ways.  A few years later I would also discover the self-titled debut from Korn, taking a similar dark path but from a different angle.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, punk stirrings were felt across the Atlantic in the form of Green Day's Dookie and Offspring's Smash mainly, both featuring here.  Although interestingly Smash ended up with a lot more entries, not something I would have imagined beforehand with Dookie being the preferred album in my head.  There were also the beginnings of what would become Britpop, in particular with the release of Blur's Parklife.  This links in with me starting to go out for the first time, mostly to Middlesbrough Arena with it's indie club night on a Friday and second and third division indie bands playing often.  After my first gig experience in 1993, I had two more in 1994, seeing my beloved Manic Street Preachers for the first time in the February at Middlesbrough Town Hall, followed by Blaggers ITA at Middlesbrough Arena in the December.

But as mentioned before, my record collection was starting to take a metal turn.  One CD in particular helped this along a more extreme path, the Earplugged compilation on Earache records.  Two songs each from Bolt Thrower, Carcass, Napalm Death, Brutal Truth, Entombed, Cathedral and Godflesh - I would take a big interest in the first 3, some interest in the others, but I liked every song on there.  This, coupled with my choice of magazine and the emergence of bands like Machine Head putting metal back at the forefront, would lead me in to new unexplored avenues of music in subsequent years.

A quick note on bands that missed out as competition was fierce this time around and some good albums surprisingly didn't make the cut.  The full list of bands making the shortlist but not the chart were as follows: Godflesh, At the Gates, Shed 7, Ash, Carter USM, The Almighty, Stabbing Westward, Prong, Pro-Pain, The Farm, China Drum, Bad Religion, Stone Roses, Senser, Gun, Black Crowes, Spin Doctors, Sick of it All and Sultans of Ping.  Some of those I was particularly disappointed to see them not make the cut.....but you have to go with the best songs!

1. Bush - Comedown

2. Pearl Jam - Better Man

3. Bolt Thrower - ...For Victory

4. Machine Head - Davidian

5. Manic Street Preachers - This Is Yesterday

6. Inspiral Carpets - Saturn 5

7. Manic Street Preachers - Faster

8. Bush - Little Things

9. Stone Temple Pilots - Interstate Love Song

10. Soundgarden - Black Hole Sun

11. Offspring - Genocide

12. Nine Inch Nails - Heresy

13. Weezer - Buddy Holly

14. Manic Street Preachers - Yes

15. Pantera - I'm Broken

16. Pantera - 5 Minutes Alone

17. Bush - Machinehead

18. Pulp - Do You Remember the First Time?

19. Blur - Girls and Boys

20. Pearl Jam - Spin the Black Circle

21. Green Day - Basket Case

22. Pearl Jam - Nothingman

23. Bush - Glycerine

24. Green Day - Welcome to Paradise

25. Manic Street Preachers - Archives of Pain

26. Megadeth - A Tout Le Monde

27. Cradle of Filth - The Forest Whispers My Name

28. Nine Inch Nails - March of the Pigs

29. Nine Inch Nails - Hurt

30. Emperor - I Am The Black Wizards

31. Offspring - Gotta Get Away

32. Offspring - Smash

33. Soundgarden - The Day I Tried To Live

34. Machine Head - Old

35. Manic Street Preachers - PCP

36. Therapy? - Screamager

37. Green Day - When I Come Around

38. Offspring - Self Esteem

39. Offspring - Nitro (Youth Energy)

40. Blur - Parklife

41. Manic Street Preachers - Judge Yr'self

42. Manic Street Preachers - Revol

43. Bush - Everything Zen

44. Blur - End of a Century

45. Nine Inch Nails - Closer To God

46. Dog Eat Dog - Who's the King

47. Nine Inch Nails - Ruiner

48. Manic Street Preachers - 4st 7lb

49. Korn - Faget

50. Therapy? - Trigger Inside

51. Soundgarden - Fell On Black Days

52. Cradle of Filth - To Eve The Art of Witchcraft

53. Cradle of Filth - The Principle of Evil Made Flesh

54. Bolt Thrower - When Glory Beckons

55. Machine Head - A Thousand Lies

56. NOFX - Leave It Alone

57. Offspring - Come Out and Play

58. Offspring - Bad Habit

59. Offspring - Something to Believe In

60. Bolt Thrower - Remembrance

61. Bolt Thrower - Lest We Forget

62. Pantera - Becoming

63. Dog Eat Dog - No Fronts

64. Rollins Band - Liar

65. Cradle of Filth - Summer Dying Fast

66. Emperor - Cosmic Keys to my Creations & Times

67. Soundgarden - Like Suicide

68. Korn - Ball Tongue

69. Korn - Blind

70. Filter - Hey Man Nice Shot

71. Therapy? - Nowhere

72. Helmet - Wilma's Rainbow

73. Obituary - Don't Care

74. Napalm Death - Plague Rages

75. Brutal Truth - Choice of a New Generation

Top 75 of 1993

Compared to the years of musical discovery that were 1991 and 1992, looking back at the albums and songs in my collection from 1993 there were a lot of strong contenders but not as much in terms of volume.  There were some excellent albums released in 1993, but it didn't seem as though there were that many of them.  Hence this chart is dominated by a few prominent releases.

Back in 1992, through the influence of The First of Too Many album and the Easy to Smile single, Senseless Things had established themselves as my favourite band.  I got background information in the form of newsletters (no internet back then of course) and wore my blue Pop Kid shirt with pride, they were MY band.

But in 1993 I sent off for and received a pack of goodies from another band who, through a flurry of singles and a great debut album, had also got my attention big time the previous year.  I'd already read the interviews in my brother's Melody Makers, NMEs, Selects etc. but now I was reading uncut manifestos, background information, lyrics, I had badges, stickers and a membership card.  Impressive stuff for a 14/15 year old.  And then came the second album which impressed me even further, time has pegged it a little further back in their overall album rankings but then it was fresh and new.....and of course that band was the Manic Street Preachers.  1993 saw them become my favourite band and they're unlikely to ever be dislodged from that status.

I suspect, as with 1992, that I was catching up a little in terms of the previous year so some of the albums I bought in 93 would have been from 92.  But those I did buy that year were the aforementioned Gold Against the Soul by the Manics, Senseless Things' Empire of the Senseless, Pearl Jam's Vs and Sepultura's Chaos AD, all on cassette (my dad had a CD player in 93 but I didn't, meaning that I could only ever play my only CD - Rollins Band's Tearing single - downstairs).

Another major first from 1993 was something that happened on the 5th October at Middlesbrough Town Hall - my first gig.  Headliners Carter USM were obviously the main draw but support band Sultans of Ping FC were also well known to me at the time through Where's Me Jumper and Stupid Kid and to be honest I think I ended up enjoying them more.  The first band on were called Blink, pretty unremarkable although I imagine they were the Blink that caused Blink 182 to add the 182 onto their name.

1993 was also the year I first started making music, if you can call it that.  In the March, a couple of months shy of my 15th birthday, I recorded 6 solo tracks under the name of Listy.  Predominantly recorded on keyboard they were pretty awful, one track even just consisting of me singing alternative words over the top of Shadow by The Lurkers (the actual song itself, not a cover), renaming it Neale James is a Saddo after the radio DJ.  In May me and my brother teamed up to record Totally Spontaneous Masterpieces under the name of Sludge From the Bottom.  A list of pre-planned song titles based on TV and in-jokes were created off the cuff using a keyboard, a guitar and our voices.  Filling a one hundred minute tape.  Let's just say I don't listen to it very often.

October and November saw a slightly higher standard of improvisation, although still pretty dire, as our main 90s collaborative band was born - Pyf Belly Machine.  Best of 93 Sessions and Forks Brain Cake by the Lake Near Cirencester were the titles......it could only go up from here.....

But enough of that, back to the proper music.....a smaller number of bands made the shortlist this time but didn't get in the final 75.  Those bands consisted of Primus, KMFDM, Brad, My Dying Bride, Duran Duran, Saint Etienne, Thousand Yard Stare, New Order and Clawfinger.  I've always had the feeling that after Stone Gossard was part of the Brad album that he was never the same again in Pearl Jam.  His songs became less frequent, maybe even less interested and given his songs were some of the classics on the first two Pearl Jam albums that was a shame (no pun intended surprisingly).

One of the possible reasons for the lack of new album buying in 93 could have been that in terms of media I was still only reading my brother's indie papers and magazines, while I was moving further and further into rock and metal territory in terms of what I was listening to.  So, as shown with the Manics, Senseless Things and Pearl Jam, I was largely sticking to what I already knew.  In 1994 I started buying my own magazines, which blew everything apart, but that's for next time.

1. Paradise Lost - Embers Fire

2. Manic Street Preachers - From Despair to Where

3. Pearl Jam - Rearviewmirror

4. Paradise Lost - True Belief

5. Senseless Things - Too Much Kissing

6. Die Krupps - Fatherland

7. Carcass - Heartwork

8. Sepultura - Territory

9. Sepultura - Refuse/Resist

10. Manic Street Preachers - La Tristesse Durera (Scream to a Sigh)

11. Manic Street Preachers - Sleepflower

12. Smashing Pumpkins - Today

13. Pearl Jam - Go

14. Life of Agony - This Time

15. Pulp - Lipgloss

16. Skyscraper - Choke

17. Senseless Things - Primary Instinct

18. Mega City Four - Iron Sky

19. Life of Agony - Through and Through

20. Smashing Pumpkins - Cherub Rock

21. Die Krupps - Crossfire

22. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Soul to Squeeze

23. Faith No More/Boo-Yaa Tribe - Another Body Murdered

24. Tool - Sober

25. Senseless Things - Hold it Down

26. Senseless Things - Too Much Like I Know You

27. Manic Street Preachers - Donkeys

28. Carcass - Rot 'N' Roll

29. Manic Street Preachers - Life Becoming a Landslide

30. Manic Street Preachers - Roses in the Hospital

31. Carcass - This Mortal Coil

32. Sepultura - Slave New World

33. Sepultura - Biotech is Godzilla

34. Senseless Things - Homophobic Asshole

35. Manic Street Preachers - Patrick Bateman

36. Sultans of Ping FC - Stupid Kid

37. Sultans of Ping FC - You Talk Too Much

38. Life of Agony - River Runs Red

39. Pearl Jam - Animal

40. Pearl Jam - Daughter

41. Type O Negative - Black No. 1

42. Senseless Things - Keepsake

43. Suede - Animal Nitrate

44. Blur - For Tomorrow

45. Suede - So Young

46. Blur - Advert

47. Manic Street Preachers - Symphony of Tourette

48. Manic Street Preachers - Yourself

49. Paradise Lost - Widow

50. Paradise Lost - Dying Freedom

51. Pearl Jam - Glorified G

52. Carcass - Blind Bleeding the Blind

53. Sepultura - Propaganda

54. Carcass - Death Certificate

55. Cathedral - Midnight Mountain

56. Paradise Lost - Colossal Rains

57. Utah Saints - Something Good

58. Manic Street Preachers - Drug Drug Druggy

59. Manic Street Preachers - Gold Against the Soul

60. Pearl Jam - Leash

61. Die Krupps - Bloodsuckers

62. Sultans of Ping FC - Where's Me Jumper?

63. Blaggers ITA - Stresss

64. James - Sometimes

65. Napalm Death - Nazi Punks Fuck Off

66. Paradise Lost - Christendom

67. Nirvana - Heart-Shaped Box

68. Senseless Things - Runaways

69. Kingmaker - 10 Years Asleep

70. Inspiral Carpets - How It Should Be

71. Breeders - Cannonball

72. Senseless Things - Tempting Kate

73. Pulp - Razzmatazz

74. Carter USM - Lean On Me I Won't Fall Over

75. Jesus Jones - The Devil You Know