There Ain't Half Been Some Great Albums: U & V Quiz

Answer: The Libertines

"Up the Bracket" was The Libertines' debut album. It was a huge critical success immediately on its release and also sold well. It has maintained its reputation and is often cited as one of the greatest albums of all time.

What The Libertines did so well was write catchy pop songs and perform them in a nonchalant manner. The band oozed with charisma and managed to charm a wide range of audience with their laddish tales told with poetic brilliance.

Of course, everything for the group eventually careered out of control spectacularly, but when they were good, they were great.

Answer: Twisted Sister

"Under the Blade" was Twisted Sister's debut album. It took ten years from the band's founding for them to get an album out and when they managed it, it was on a small British label.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Twisted Sister were making a healthy living constantly gigging in their native New York state, but they just couldn't break through to a wider audience. The Twisted Sister story is one of bad luck, record company executives stuck in the 1960s who were reluctant to sign such a weird act, and eventual success. That success was largely down to the group taking British audiences by storm on a sink-or-swim trip they made across the Atlantic in 1982.

The album "Under the Blade" had a really tough sound thanks to UFO bassist Pete Way's production which further enamoured the group to the British heavy metal fans, but pushed them further away from the major labels and the lucrative American market they later conquered. It also had a set of songs that explored every metal trope going.

Answer: Darkthrone

"Under a Funeral Moon" was Darkthrone's third studio album. It was their first to fully dive into black metal. It was either a masterclass in postmodern metal or the epitome of contrivance depending on how you looked at it. Mind you, if you really didn't get it, it was probably just noisy rubbish. Essentially, what Darkthrone did was make an album which purposefully sounded like it had been recorded with very rudimentary studio equipment and then copied countless times, i.e. the sound of an obscure tape of obscure origin.

What could be heard through the murky, fuzzy surface sound was some fabulous black metal songs which had taken all the best bits of underground extreme metal and woven them into Darkthrone songs.

The band at this point was a three piece with mainstay Nocturno Culto on bass and vocals, the soon-to-depart Zephyrous on guitar, and the band's driving force and main spokesman Fenriz on drums. By the next album it was just the former and the latter, and so it stayed for many brilliant years.

Answer: Killdozer

Killzozer's fifth studio album "Uncompromising War On Art Under The Dictatorship Of The Proletariat" was a brilliantly-packaged bit of irreverence towards the pretensions of rock music. Beyond the Soviet art styled cover, in the liner notes each track was given a Marxist reading.

Apart from sticking their fingers up at the rock establishment, Killdozer also produced a stonking album. Among the choice cuts was an ode to an altruistic pet on "Knuckles the Dog (Who Helps People)", the tale of a benevolent police officer on "The Pig was Cool", and a love song which sounded like Black Sabbath at their doomiest on "Peach Pie". However, for my money the standout track was a cover of Black Oak Arkansas's "Hot N' Nasty". Killdozer were always great at covers, and this one was no exception.

Answer: Johnny Cash

When Johnny Cash recorded "Unchained", he had released umpteen studio albums on several record labels. However, "Unchained" was the second album in what became known as his American Recording series which went on to his demise in 2003 and beyond.

I have never heard a Johnny Cash recording I couldn't appreciate and it would be preposterous to try and pick the Johnny Cash album which best summed him up, but I reckon the America Recording albums were pretty special. I think putting somebody of Cash's stature in the setting producer Rick Rubin did was a stroke of genius. That set-up included empathetic musicians of the highest caliber, i.e. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers plus some special guests. The choice of material on "Unchained" was equally masterful. It might have been disastrous for Cash to cover artists such as Soundgarden and Beck, but it actually just proved that a good song is always a good song, and that a true pro can sing anything.

Answer: Joy Division

"Unknown Pleasures" was Joy Division's debut album, although they had recorded four tracks in 1977 and independently released them as an ep called "An Ideal for Living" in 1978.

On its release, much of the music press hailed the album as a triumph, albeit a bleak one. It wasn't a particular mainstream commercial success, although it soon became an underground classic. When the group gained more attention due to singer Ian Curtis's suicide, their albums started selling more copies despite the group being defunct.

The unsung hero of "Unknown Pleasures" was its producer, the late Martin Hannett. He was the one responsible for the weird sound effects and even odder cold, detached sound. Loathe as they were to admit it, the three surviving members of the seminal band eventually admitted that their quintessential sound can be attributed to Hannett, although bass player Peter Hook has underlined that they, the musicians, had to provide the substance.

Answer: The Divine Comedy

"Victory for the Comic Muse" was The Divine Comedy's ninth studio album. By that point, The Divine Comedy's linchpin, Neil Hannon, had honed down exactly what the outfit was all about to the extent that they were even able to record it in live takes. That's quite a feat when you realise that on this album The Divine Comedy comprised of a huge ensemble.

The Divine Comedy's music has been described as Baroque pop, chamber pop, easy listening, cocktail pop, and I daresay many other things. Neil Hannon has always had an acute talent for sharp wit, nostalgic melancholy and whimsy in both his lyrics and the music which accompanies it. It's admirable that he has managed to steer it clear of becoming contrived artifice and has been able to make meaningful music without loosing the fanciful frolicking.

Answer: Uriah Heep

"...Very 'Eavy ...Very 'Umble" was Uriah Heep's debut studio album. It was anything but a success with the pundits, one famously one promising to kill herself were the group to prosper. Prosper they did, but I have no idea whether she kept her oath.

It could be argued that "...Very 'Eavy ...Very 'Umble" was not a particularly cohesive album since the 'Eep couldn't quite decide whether they wanted to play thumping heavy metal, progressive rock, or bluesy hard rock so they opted to do all three. I think it worked because they had enough personality to stamp their identity on whatever they did.

The standout track was the classic-to-be opener "Gypsy". It started off like it were going to be a prog rocker, but then switched to bashing the listener around the head with what was at the time considered heavy metal. It had cringe-worthy lyrics but David Byron belted them out with such earnest it sounded like the profoundest song you'd ever hear. Fantastic.

Answer: Van Morrison

The enigmatically titled "Veedon Fleece" was Van Morrison's eighth studio album as a solo artist. It wasn't well-reviewed at the time of its release and sank out of sight, only to reemerge years later on several personal favourites lists. It's the Van Morrison album I'm fondest of along with its spiritual companion album, "Astral Weeks" (1968).

I think Van Morrison has always been at his best when he's playing folky music imbued with laid-back jazz, and letting his mind go wherever it may roam lyrically. To many that's just self-indulgence, but I find it cathartic.

Answer: Blue Cheer

"Vincebus Eruptum" was Blue Cheer's debut album and probably the most representative of why they were so great. Their sound has been described as all sorts of things, but at the end of the day they were essentially a power trio playing bluesy rock. How they played it was what made them special. Blue Cheer at the peak of their powers were sloppy, sludgy, cack-handed, and very, very loud.

Half of the album was made up of cover versions: "Summertime Blues", "Rock Me Baby", and "Parchment Farm" (sic). The first was actually a surprise hit single for Blue Cheer, but the last was the album's highlight in my opinion. The other three tracks were originals, and the standout song of that bunch was the groovy "Out of Focus".

Blue Cheer had as an erratic career as one might expect from a group who named themselves after a strain of LSD. The mainstay was the late great Dickie Peterson who handled bass and vocals.