Favorites: Albums — Honorable Mentions
Because listing 1,000 favorite albums just isn't enough...
Look Around (1967)
Artist: Sérgio Mendes & Brasil '66
A&M Records
An absolute masterclass in pristine 1960s pop architecture, Sérgio Mendes & Brasil '66's Look Around is the exact point where complex Brazilian rhythms seamlessly merged with slick, American orchestral production. Operating under the legendary A&M Records banner, Mendes built a highly sophisticated, syncopated musical engine that felt entirely effortless. The structural brilliance of the album lies in the dual-vocal attack of Lani Hall and Janis Hansen—their icy, razor-sharp harmonies floating perfectly above the intricate, bossa nova-driven rhythm section. Best known for effectively stealing Burt Bacharach's "The Look of Love" and turning it into a massive, definitive crossover hit, the album is a vital, perfectly engineered document of global pop fusion. It is a brilliant, highly stylized palate cleanser.
Screaming Target (1972)
Artist: Big Youth
Gussie / Trojan Records
An undisputed, foundational pillar of the Jamaican deejay and toasting movement, 1972's Screaming Target captures Big Youth operating at the absolute height of his charismatic powers. Produced by a then-teenage Gussie Clarke, the album features the vocalist effortlessly riding heavily dubbed-out versions of classic rocksteady hits, transforming them with his highly rhythmic, socially conscious, and wildly inventive delivery. Beyond its massive musical innovations, the record stands as a crucial cultural bridge between the Kingston sound systems and the UK punk movement. The striking, impossibly cool cover art left a permanent imprint on the era's underground aesthetic—a fact famously corroborated by The Clash's Mick Jones in the documentary Westway to the World, where he vividly recalled just how eye-catching and memorable the packaging was to a young generation of British musicians. It is a vital, endlessly influential masterpiece of reggae history.
Love Punany Bad: Slackness In The Dancehall - Volume 1 (1995)
Artist: Various Artists
Priority Records
A crucial, unapologetic time capsule of 1990s Jamaican sound system culture, Love Punany Bad: Slackness In The Dancehall - Volume 1 captures the genre at its most raw and unvarnished. Focusing entirely on the "slackness" subgenre—notorious for its explicit, fiercely boastful lyricism and massive, booming digital rhythms—the compilation serves as a definitive who's who of the era's heavyweights, featuring tracks from legends like Shabba Ranks, Yellowman, Admiral Bailey, and Red Dragon. Beyond the undeniably infectious grooves, the album is a fascinating artifact of cross-genre pollination. Released by Priority Records, a label deeply synonymous with the explosion of West Coast gangsta rap, the compilation illustrates exactly how heavily the aggressive, bass-driven aesthetics of dancehall were infiltrating and influencing the American urban music market at the time. It remains a high-energy, completely unfiltered snapshot of a pivotal era in Caribbean music.