Today’s Cool Album of the Day (# 1006 in the Series) is Ministy, With Sympathy This was the debut album by Ministry in 1983. I know the band hated it, but I loved it. Ministry is and always has been, Alain ‘Al’ Jourgensen. He’s used numerous sidemen throughout his career.  With Sympathy was their only release on Arista. They jumped to Warner Brothers for their next release which wouldn’t come for three more years. They did release some EPs to fill the void. Those were very good as well. “(Everyday is) Halloween” being the standout to me. Ministry progressed into a much harder industrial sound. This was more synth-pop, heck it was 1983. If you do know any...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#983 in the Series) is Missing Persons,Spring Session M. (Capitol) I don’t know many bands that would 100% fill the term “Cool” better than Missing Persons.  Not only did they have the “look” but they definitely also had the “chops” to go with it. They were one of the original bands that received a huge boost by MTV. The hot look of lead singer Dale Bozzio had a ton to do with that, especially when the ex-bunny dressed in only bubble wrap. Hot looks only take you so far without musicianship however, and as good as they looked, they played even better. Dale Bozzio’s “other half” was drummer Terry Bozzio.  This man...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#475 in the Series) is Bill Nelson, The Love That Whirls (Diary of a Thinking Heart) Who is Bill Nelson you ask?  Well, did you read our recent Be-Bop Deluxe feature written by one of our contributors Jim McCabe?  Bill Nelson was the leader/guitarist/front man for them. That piece triggered much discussion about Bill on the site and facebook.  Many people were not aware of the long and prosperous solo career that Bill has had.  So I’ve decided to come right back with one of his best solo efforts, The Love That Whirls (Diary of a Thinking Heart.) Be-Bop Deluxe pretty much called it a day back in 1978 with the release Drastic...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#767 in the series) is New Order, Get Ready In the early 80’s I sometimes was overwhelmed with the idea of how much undiscovered music there was. New Order was more underground and sub-culture back then, even though the mix of rock and dance music did become big and certainly New Order gained fame and popularity as years went by. But it was not with their best songs and tracks, like “Your Silent Face,” one of my favorite songs of all time, went largely unheard. The reason I bring this up is the same is true of this almost forgotten release from 2001. I forgot about it myself and couldn’t find the disc...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#569 in the Series) is the self-titled debut from A Flock of Seagulls. A Flock of Seagulls were always one of my favorite “new wave, techno-pop,””what have you” bands of the early eighties.  Why did I like them? I think it was because I always felt a little connection to the progressive rock bands that I was listening to at the time. The biggest difference was the obvious, most of their music was played over a straight up dance rhythm, but I really believe that in the body of a dance band layed the heart of a prog band. Why do I feel this way? The main reason would be guitarist Paul...

  Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#559 in the Series) is NEU!, NEU! ’75. While not a pro at reviewing albums, I fully understand that you are supposed to wait until the end of an article to pass final judgment on a record. In the case of NEU! ’75, I cannot. This is an all-time masterpiece. NEU! was formed in 1971 in Dusseldorf, Germany. Drummer Klaus Dinger and guitarist Michael Rother had just left an early version of Kraftwerk. Rother and Dinger did not want care for the synthesizer heavy direction that Kraftewerk were headed in and wanted to go in a more guitar oriented vein. NEU! was born. NUE! ’75 is the duo’s third release and bore...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#472 in the Series) is Graham Nash, Innocent Eyes. I’m curious how many people even heard of this album much less remember it and even much less, even liked it!  It wasn’t won of Graham’s better known albums, far from it.  I liked it, and I want to tell you about it, that’s really all that matters I guess. This was 1985 and 1986.  Graham didn’t really have much to do. His constant musical partner David Crosby was…. How can I put it nicely, ‘not available at this time.’  So he decided to record a solo album.  He’d done three already. The first was Songs For Beginners in 1971. This album did quite well....

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#348 in the Series) is Neil Young, Trans. Neil Young, Trans.  Love it _____, Hate It_____ You tell me.  I don’t believe that there was ever a more polarizing Neil Young album than Trans. I know people that absolutely love this effort. I know people that can’t stand it. I feel that Neil loved that! What makes people react this way?  Maybe you haven’t heard this album.  What caused the spilt reaction was mainly due to one thing.  That one thing was the vocoder.  What is a vocoder? I guess you could say it was the grandfather to today’s auto-tuner. Trans had nine tunes in all. Five of those nine had Neil’s vocal...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#303 in the Series) is The The, Soul Mining Matt Johnson is to The The, what Roddy Frame is to Aztec Camera, and what Karl Wallinger is to World Party. They’re really solo careers without putting their names up front.  In each of these cases, our star surrounds himself with different sidemen for each studio recording. Soul Mining was The The’s second most popular album. I think Mind Bomb edged it out for number one.  This one featured their hit ‘This is the Day.” You’ve heard it. If not, listen to it within the playlist below. As mentioned on a few of the comments on facebook, make sure you check out Jools Holland’s great piano...

Today’s Cool Album of the Day (#266 in the Series) is Midge Ure, The Gift. One of the worst things about this album is that it’s really very close sounding to an Ultravox album. One of the best things about this album is that it’s very close sounding to an Ultravox album! Especially if you’re an Ultravox fan like I am. I’m guessing if you didn’t know by now, Midge Ure is also the singer for the great British band, Ultravox. This was a side project, he didn’t leave the band. In fact, an new Ultravox album is in the works. The song that got the most play was ‘If I Was.’ Also getting some good recognition was ‘That...