So this might be worth a try...

[The Curmudgeon]

Came across this page on Facebook and thought I'd share it here.

So it's called "20 Albums", a site where you make a profile and list your top twenty ever albums, and then they catalogue your favourites, cross-reference them with other bands and artists and recommend new bands and music that you might like going by your choices.

www.20albums.com/user/login

It can take a bit of fiddling around to sometimes get the album you're looking for ("Belle and Sebastian", for example, was listed as "Belle & Sebastian, Belle And Sebastian and Belle and Sebastian),but stick with it. They send you an e-mail every week to give you a recommendation. I've had nothing yet, so I figured this could be a fun "work in progress" thread we could revisit with any good choices made by the site.

For the record, my top twenty, and I just made a list of my favourite twenty records, I didn't ponder over whether I liked one better than the other, was...

1. David Bowie - Hunky Dory
2. Prince - The Gold Experience
3. Blur - Blur
4. Weezer - Pinkerton
5. Smashing Pumpkins - Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
6. Belle and Sebastian - Tigermilk
7. Adam Green and Binki Shapiro - Adam Green & Binki Shapiro
8. Arcade Fire - Funeral
9. Prince - Symbol
10. Beatles - Revolver
11. Idlewild - Hope is Important
12. Radiohead - The Bends
13. Bishop Allen - The Broken String
14. Manic Street Preachers - The Holy Bible
15. Bis - New Transistor Heroes
16. God Help the Girl - God Help the Girl
17. R.E.M - Monster
18. The Strokes - Is This It
19. Machine Go Boom - Music For Parents
20. Lou Reed - Transformer



So it'll be interesting to see what results pop up this time next week. I imagine more indie guitar bands and some classic rock, but we'll see. Watch this space.

So give it a try. You never know, your new favourite band might be an e-mail away...

[trashcanman]

So think they've got any folk/ska/thrash/punk/rap opera bands for me?

[trashcanman]

Just got my first set of recommendations. Weak. So obvious that I'm a little insulted that they'd think me so basic. Hey have you heard of this new band, The Pixies? You like that one Led Zeppelin album on your list? How about trying a different Led Zeppelin album? Or maybe some Pink Floyd? Ridiculous.

[The Curmudgeon]

I was actually talking to the guy who runs the site a couple of days ago. Nice guy by all accounts, but he said the recommendations right now are kinda generic (mine was basically, "oh, you like the Rolling Stones? Have you heard of that little band called Pink Floyd?") and most of the recommendations were for albums I already owned in the first place. He said that they start to get more tailored and interesting by about page 5. Try and see if there's any difference.

[trashcanman]

They need to do better than recommending Who's next, that's for fucking sure. Might be a solid resource for total music noobs, but for anybody who would bother to make a top 20 albums list, the picks are painfully obvious.