Arguably The Greatest Of All Time

Amazon's music blog has been doing these Top 100 lists this year. So far they've done four: 100 Greatest Debut Albums, 100 Greatest Romantic Albums, 100 Greatest Singer-Songwriter Albums and 100 Greatest Indie Rock Albums of All Time. I haven't poured over them all just yet but I'm sure as with any so-called "definitive" album list, there will be no shortage of debate over the rankings, inclusions and exclusions. Without delving too deeply, here are a few quick thoughts:

- How can Elliott Smith's Either/Or rank significantly above both Liz Phair's Exile In Guyville and Neutral Milk Hotel's In An Aeroplane Over The Sea on the Singer-Songwriter list but on the Indie Rock list it gets edged out by those two albums? It doesn't make much sense. I can understand how The Magnetic Fields' 69 Love Songs might be less romantic than the Postal Service's Give Up, despite 69 being a better Indie Rock (or overall) album because great albums aren't always romantic. But I don't get the disparity between the Singer-Songwriter category and Indie Rock category. Do you see what I'm getting at?

- My quick scan didn't pick up on any albums that were featured on all four lists. A few albums and/or artists were featured on three lists though. Postal Service, Liz Phair, um, maybe that's it.

- Several albums on the Romantic list have multiple songs that aren't very romantic. Are those albums really among the 100 Greatest? When trying to set the mood I don't think Usher's "Yeah!" or "Throwback" would be a good choice. Am I alone here?

- The Debut list has a decent number of hip hop albums, which is nice. The funny thing is that for all the declarations of Notorious B.I.G. as the greatest rapper of all time, and one who has only two proper albums to his name, Ready To Die sits beneath Jay-Z's Reasonable Doubt, Kanye's College Dropout, and Eric B. & Rakim's Paid In Full.

- Speaking of Kanye, the writers/editors took a nice little jab at 808's & Heartbreak by claiming it was eligible for the Singer-Songwriter category had it been a better album.

All in all, whatever. I love lists and music and these are semi-interesting, conversation-worthy pieces. I'm just glad Tha Carter III didn't sneak it's way into all four lists somehow.