Shazam
Artist: The Move
Community Score: 8.17

The single most accomplished album to be recorded by any of the Birmingham rock bands (which include the Moody Blues), Shazam is sort of Sgt. Pepper with an attitude, a mixture of expansive progressive rock worthy of the Beatles and high-energy music honed by years of playing loud on-stage. The rendition of Tom Paxton's "The Last Thing on My... Read More

Closer to It!
Artist: Brian Auger's Oblivion Express
Community Score: 6.50

The strongest studio recording by the Oblivion Express, Closer to It is Brian Auger's classic. Featuring his best-known composition, "Happiness is Just Around the Bend," this album soars on the strength of Auger's multiple keyboard attack. Auger himself takes the lead vocal slot for the first time on this recording, and though he relies on... Read More

See My Baby Jive
Artist: Roy Wood
Split Ends
Artist: The Move

Basically an improved version of Message From the Country, replacing that album's weakest tracks with some fine British singles, especially "Tonight," "Chinatown, " and "Do Ya." With the release of all of these tracks and the entire Message From the Country album on the 1994 reissue Great Move!, fans no longer have to seek out this package. ~... Read More

Fragile
Artist: Yes
Community Score: 8.40

The band's breakthrough album, dominated by science-fiction and fantasy elements and new member Rick Wakeman, whose organ, synthesizers, Mellotrons, and other keyboard exotica added a larger-than-life element to the procedings. Ironically, the album was a patchwork job, hastily assembled in order to cover the cost of Wakeman's array of... Read More

John Barleycorn Must Die
Artist: Traffic
Community Score: 8.20

At only 22 years old, Steve Winwood sat down in early 1970 to fulfill a contractual commitment by making his first solo album, on which he intended to play all the instruments himself. The record got as far as one backing track produced by Guy Stevens, "Stranger to Himself," before Winwood called his erstwhile partner from Traffic, Jim Capaldi,... Read More

10cc/Sheet Music
Artist: 10cc

10cc's first two albums, recorded under the sponsorship of entrepreneur and one-time pop star Jonathan King, are combined on one disc for this CD reissue. 1973's 10cc shows that from the start, the group had an uncommon command of recording studio technique; the performances are polished, the harmonies superb, and the production flawless and... Read More

Countdown to Ecstasy
Artist: Steely Dan
Community Score: 7.00

Can't Buy a Thrill became an unexpected hit, and as a response, Donald Fagen became the group's full-time lead vocalist, and he and Walter Becker acted like Steely Dan was a rock & roll band for the group's second album, Countdown to Ecstasy. The loud guitars and pronounced backbeat of "Bodhisattva," "Show Biz Kids," and "My Old School"... Read More

Stranded
Artist: Roxy Music
Community Score: 9.25

Without Brian Eno, Roxy Music immediately became less experimental, yet it remained adventurous, as Stranded illustrates. Under the direction of Bryan Ferry, Roxy moved toward relatively straightforward territory, adding greater layers of piano and heavy guitars. Even without the washes of Eno's synthesizers, Roxy's music remains unsettling on... Read More

Message from the Country
Artist: The Move
Community Score: 7.00

By 1971, it was clear that changes were in the offing for the Move. Message from the Country shows them carrying their sound, within the context of who they were, about as far as they could. One can hear them hit the limits of what guitars, bass, drums, and keyboards, with lots of harmony overdubs and ornate singing, could do. Indeed, parts of... Read More

Messin'
Artist: Manfred Mann's Earth Band

Opening with Mike Hugg's title track, which builds on Mick Rogers' intense riffing and the killer vocals of Vicki Brown, Judith Powell, Liza Strike, and Ruby James, Messin' is pretty intense and involving from its very first bars. It's also damned topical and serious, for all of the free-wheeling rock & roll spirits and the progressive rock... Read More