The fourth entry for the Boss and interestingly, this album’s previous spot was replaced by Springsteen’s ‘Nebraska.’ ‘Darkness On The Edge Of Town’ marked the end of a tumultuous three-year period for Springsteen. His 1975 released, ‘Born To Run,’ catapulted him to superstardom, which he struggled with. He was also in the midst of legal battles with previous manager, Mike Appel. With this record, he decided to take a somewhat less commercial approach and unlike ‘Born To Run,’ the band would record the songs pretty much as soon as Springsteen had written them.

Hendrix was particularly prolific, with the three albums he released in his lifetime all coming within 17 months. This, his second, came just 7 months after ‘Are You Experienced.’ Hendrix frantically wrote songs as he was promoting ‘Are You Experienced,’ and they were recorded with his band during their downtime from touring and TV appearances. Its release was almost delayed when Hendrix left the master tape of side A in the back of a taxi.

Missy Elliot had been kicking around a little before the release of this, her debut album. While in high school, her and three mates formed a group called Sista, which was signed to Jodeci member, DeVante Swing’s label, Swing Mob. Following the non-release of their debut recorded in New York, their contract was terminated and Elliot returned home to Portsmouth, Virginia. There she reconnected with childhood friend, Timothy Mosley, aka Timbaland, where the two would subsequently write and produce half the tracks on Aaliyah’s second record, ‘One In A Million’ (#314).

‘Fun House’ is the second record to be released by the iconic proto-Punks, The Stooges. Following on less than a year from previous entry, the self-titled ‘The Stooges’ (#488), ‘Fun House’ continued the band’s advancement of the seminal new genre of Punk. Initially, producer, Don Gallucci had each band member record in isolated sessions. They’d spend the day recording multiple takes of a song. The result was terrible, by the band’s account, and not representative of their explosive live set, which was famous for Iggy Pop’s incredible antics (including the popularisation of stage diving).

Credit where credit’s due, Drake is one of the biggest artists of our time. His streaming numbers are phenomenal. Personally, he does nothing for me and so listening to an album over an hour long was akin to chewing glass. Throughout the record, I kept wondering to myself if it was him singing/rapping or a guest. Other than the heavy vocal effects on most tracks, I don’t find him to have a distinctive vocal.

A worthy jump into the Top 100 by one of the ’90s most influential Alternative bands. ‘Automatic For The People’ was born immediately out of the sessions of previous release, ‘Out Of Time.’ While mixing that album at Prince’s Paisley Park, the quartet would record demos for ‘Drive,’ ‘Try Not To Breathe’ and ‘Nightswimming.’ Following the promotion of ‘Out Of Time,’ Mike Mills, Peter Buck and Bill Berry went to work on new music sans vocalist, Michael Stipe. Their intention was to make an album of faster rock songs, but they came up short.

The unrelenting ‘Master Of Puppets’ is Metallica’s Thrash Metal masterpiece. On their third record, the already veterans of the Metal scene were all but 23-24 years old each. ‘Master Of Puppets’ follows a similar formula to their previous release, ‘Ride The Lightning;’ opening with an acoustic guitar intro, before segueing in an up-tempo Thrash Metal number, followed by a lengthy title track, with an epic ballad in the number 4 spot.

‘Car Wheels On A Gravel Road’ was the fifth release for Lucinda Williams, an artist who’s a notoriously slow worker. Between this and her second album, for example, was 6, 4 and 8 years respectively. This was due to her perfectionism, which often became a bone of contention between her and her collaborators.

‘Red,’ Taylor Swift’s fourth release, was the album that cemented her as a fully-fledged crossover Pop artist. On ‘Speak Now,’ the preceding release, Swift had worked exclusively with Nathan Chapman on songwriting and production. With this one, she sought to learn from songwriters and producers that she admired, expanding the songwriting team.

‘Music From The Big Pink’ is the debut LP by The Band AKA The Hawks AKA The Crackers AKA Bob Dylan’s Backing Band. The album takes its name from the name of the house shared by Rick Danko, Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson just outside of Woodstock in NY, in which most of the album was written. In fact, it’s the same home in which ‘The Basement Tapes’ was recorded (#335). Following a 2-year stint touring and recording with Bob Dylan, the group decided to step out on their own and commit the songs they’d been writing to record.