There Ain't Half Been Some Great Albums: J & K Quiz

Answer: Thin Lizzy

"Johnny the Fox" came out the same year as the much bigger album "Jailbreak", but I am fonder of "Johnny the Fox". It might come down to having heard the songs from "Jailbreak" more often on live albums, by cover bands, on the radio, on compilations, and getting sick and tired of them. However, it might be because the making of the album was more fraught with problems, and maybe that labour gave it an edge.

Thin Lizzy, and in particular singer and bassist Phil Lynott, had an effortless grace about them. As great as that slick, smooth style is in any group, it can make things bland. On "Johnny the Fox" the slick ease is there, but it has some rough edges that you might happily snag yourself on.

Answer: Kevin Ayers

"Joy of a Toy" was Kevin Ayers' first solo album. He had left Soft Machine, the group in which he played bass and sang, after they had toured the US as opening act for The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and then he fled to Ibizia. Despite claims that he had effectively given up on music, he was still songwriting and soon had the material for his remarkable debut.

What is immediately apparent on the album is that Ayers was interested in the frolicsome nature of music which Soft Machine had held dear but subsequently moved away from. The group's eponymous debut album, the only one Ayers played on as a member, had actually featured a song called "Joy of a Toy" whence this solo album's title came. The joy of the title, and the opening track "Joy of a Toy Continued", ran through "Joy of a Toy" and throughout Ayers' wonderful career. Nevertheless, his darker side was also to be found on tracks such as "The Lady Rachel", a song which became one of his many perennials.

There was a veritable feast of instruments on "Joy of a Toy", and a whole host of people helping Kevin sing his songs of rapturous revelry.

Answer: Siouxsie and the Banshees

"Juju" was Siouxsie and the Banshees' fourth studio album and in my opinion the group's most accomplished. They could get a bit dour at times, but there were so many layers on this album that it had more depth to soften the blow.

Guitarist John McGeoch had joined the group for the previous album, "Kaleidoscope", but he really shone on "Juju". His guitar playing was quite unique in rock music and sounds like it shouldn't be on a rock album, but it really works. Siouxsie Sioux's vocals seem to have taken on a new lease of life too, and the two fit so well together in creating something rather spooky.

Answer: Ivor Cutler

Ivor Cutler should be a household name, but it's a cruel world. Howbeit, it's the Cutler-less masses who lose out, not the late Ivor or his devotees. "Jammy Smears" features poet and frequent Cutler cohort Phyllis King. Both Cutler and King have often been described as eccentrics, but what that means is anybody's guess. My dad played me Ivor Cutler's stuff when I was a kid and it made absolute sense to me, more so than kids' stuff on the telly. It still does now I'm an adult.

Like many Ivor Cutler albums, "Jammy Smears" was a perfectly balanced collection of poems, vital insights, whimsical ditties, and grimly hilarious Beckett-esque tales. The best of the latter was "Life in a Scotch Sitting Room", of which we got two installments here. Also worthy of note is the existential spoken word piece "Big Jim".

Answer: Dizzy Gillespie

What I love about "Jambo Caribe" is that despite being a serious jazz big-shot as one of the innovators of bebop and much much more, Dizzy Gillespie put out such a lighthearted album. It's really to his credit that he never took himself too seriously, as many jazz artists, and more significantly jazz enthusiasts, did.

Perhaps he even went too far on "Jambo Caribe". By later standards I daresay his fake Caribbean accent might be inappropriate on a couple of numbers, as might be the casual sexism. However, I personally think we can excuse those faux pas given the delightful zest of the album, and put any gaucherie down to exuberance.

Answer: Bob Dylan

How could Bob Dylan follow up "Blonde on Blonde"? Nobody would have expected him to strip it all down, go back to acoustic guitar and a tale of an outlaw American folk hero. Having said that, "John Wesley Harding" was by no means a step back to his early folky days. It was very much the work of a mature artist who was doing anything but resting on his laurels. In fact, it sits perfectly between "Blonde on Blonde" and "Nashville Skyline" and makes absolute sense seen with the luxury of hindsight.

Apparently, the album was conceived and executed in a very short space of time. What that hints at is that Dylan was really at the peak of his powers and could, or even creatively had to, just knock one out.

Answer: Traffic

"John Barleycorn Must Die" was Traffic's fourth album and very nearly didn't happen since the group had already split up and everybody had gone on to quite interesting new pastures.

Steve Winwood had become a rather unusual veteran at the tender age of twenty-two. He'd already been in The Spencer Davis Group aged just fourteen, then hooked up with Eric Clapton and the Powerhouse, followed by the super group Blind Faith, and then Ginger Baker's Air Force. Winwood conceived of "John Barleycorn Must Die" as a solo project but he must have been so worn out with all that chopping and changing that he just got the Traffic lads back in to record it.

It was a cracking album right from the catchy-as-heck, snappy, good-time opening track "Glad" through to the lengthy organ-fuelled, musing closer "Every Mother's Son".

Answer: Iron Maiden

"Killers" was Iron Maiden's second album and it came out just a year after their eponymous debut. It was vocalist Paul Di'Anno's last album before being replaced by Bruce Dickinson.

I'm definitely in the minority when I say it's my favourite Maiden release since even my fellow Paul Di'Anno fans seem to prefer the debut, but "Killers" just works perfectly for me. I like the killer theme running through the album, and I reckon they had their sharpest sound on this one.

"Killers" kicked off with the instrumental "The Ides of March" which segued brilliantly into the Maiden classic "Wrathchild". That was followed by one of the group's more successful attempts at a literary adaptation, "Murders in the Rue Morgue". "Another Life" was classic NWOBHM at its best, and then we got the second instrumental of the album, which payed homage to the mighty Mongol "Genghis Khan". The bouncy 1980s metal tune, "Innocent Exile", was a country mile from what was to become Maiden's signature sound, and the brilliant title track had every metal trick in the book. Next up is one of the least Maiden-esque tracks they ever did, the great "Prodigal Son". I reckon the next song, "Purgatory", was the weakest on the album, although the group must have thought the opposite since it was the album's only single release. Thankfully the album's closer, "Drifter", was a winner.

Answer: Metallica

"Kill 'Em All" was Metallica's debut album, and probably the first time anybody outside of the underground metal scene heard thrash metal. Its impact was huge although not necessarily immediately obvious outside of the metal subgenre. However, within heavy metal circles all the talk was about how anybody could top it. I still remember hearing it for the first time shortly after its release and being so excited that finally somebody was making music that fast and brutal.

However, on "Kill 'Em All" there was actually a huge range of stuff going on and it was certainly anything but wild, wanton destruction. Listening to it today, I realise it wasn't nearly as extreme as it seemed at the time. In fact, it was clearly just a simple step forward from the British metal that was around in the early 1980s. What is amazing is that it still sounds totally fresh and exciting.

Every track did exactly what it should, as did each group member. On "Kill 'Em All" it was of course the classic line-up of James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett, and Cliff Burton, and they sounded astonishingly lean despite being so early in their career. Even Cliff Burton's bass solo which opened the instrumental "(Anesthesia) - Pulling Teeth" was concise and essential.

To be honest, I love every single second of the fifty-odd minutes on offer here and hope I will still be "thrashing all around, acting like a maniac" well into old age.

Answer: Einstürzende Neubauten

"Kollaps" was Berliners' Einstürzende Neubauten's second album, and it was surely one of the strangest, most extreme things under the wide umbrella of music ever put down on tape. Later in their illustrious career, Einstürzende Neubauten introduced a lot more melody and traditional song structure, but back in 1981 they were using anything and everything to make an unholy din.

Of course, there's more to Einstürzende Neubauten's game than just making a racket, and on "Kollaps" there were glimpses of a tune here and there, but you know when two of the three musicians are listed as having provided percussion and the third one the ominous "noises" it's not going to be easy listening. The noise-merchant was Blixa Bargeld, who also provided lead vocals. One of the most appealing things about Einstürzende Neubauten's sound has always been Blixa's vocals. In the early days he really used his voice to accompany the abrasive sounds, but in later years he revealed himself as something of an oddball crooner. Sort of.