The 100 Best Australian Albums

Tue 26th Oct, 2010 in Local News

The 100 Best Australian Albums claims to be “the most comprehensive, authoritative (and possibly controversial) book about Australian music ever published”.

The list has been collated and written by three music journalists: former Rolling Stone editor and co founder of Juice magazine John O’Donnell; founding editor of Juice and Jimmy Barnes’ biographer Toby Creswell; and Playlisted: Everything You Need To Know About Australian Music Right Now author Craig Mathieson . Peter Garrett, Tim Rogers, Rick Rubin, Brad Shepherd, Richard Clapton and Nick Cave have all contributed guest essays to the book.

Midnight Oil, AC/DC, Cold Chisel, Crowded House, You Am I, The Go-Betweens, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Hoodoo Gurus, the Church, INXS, Paul Kelly and The Saints all have two albums on the list, whilst Jimmy Barnes, Neil Finn and Nick Cave all make three appearances through their multiple bands and solo careers.

Though the Divinyls missed the cut – with the books’ compilers reasoning that the band delivered great singles, but not great albums – there are ten albums by a female artists or by groups fronted by women making it far more female friendly than certain other Australian top 100 lists

The 20 Best Australian Albums:
1.Midnight Oil – Diesel and Dust
2.AC/DC – Back In Black
3.Crowded House – Woodface
4.Cold Chisel – Circus Animals
5.The Triffids – Born Sandy Devotional
6.Easy Beats – The Best Of
7.Paul Kelly and the Coloured Girls – Gossip
8.You Am I – Hi Fi Way
9.Skyhooks – Living In The 70s
10.Avalanches – Since I Left You
11.INXS – Kick
12. The Go-Betweens – 16 Lovers Lane
13. Radio Birdman – _ Radios Appear_
14. Daddy Cool – Daddy Who? Daddy Cool!
15. Richard Clapton – Goodbye Tiger
16. Bee Gees – Best of (Vol 1)
17. The Birthday Party – Junkyard
18. Hunters & Collectors – Human Frailty
19. Sarah Blasko – As Day Follows Night
20. The Saints – (I’m) Stranded

Read the full list of 100 albums

To coincide with the book’s release, there’s also a 5 CD set featuring key tracks from 95 of the 100 albums including tunes from Augie March, Paul Kelly, You Am I, John Farnham, Hoodoo Gurus, Cold Chisel, Radio Birdman, The Saints, Sarah Blasko, The Triffids, The Church and Empire of the Sun.