Friday, April 20, 2018

Top 100 Albums of 1979


Here are the top 100 albums of 1979 (per Billboard magazine’s year-end charts) and a few comments on each.  (Parentheses after the album titles indicates what format I have the album in; either CD, vinyl, or cassette. No parentheses means I don’t own it.)

1. Billy Joel, 52nd Street (CD, vinyl) – I should give Joel a lot of credit here; The Stranger was such a strong album that I would have thought he’d need a couple of years to come back with a good followup, or else there wouldn’t be enough worthwhile songs. I wouldn’t say this is as consistently great as The Stranger (side 2 is a little weaker, especially the overlong Righteous Brothers soundalike “Until the Night,”), but it’s a darn good album.

2. The Bee Gees, Spirits Having Flown – okay, I do have two Bee Gees studio albums, but I got them 30 years ago when someone was moving – if they weren’t free, they didn’t cost more than a dollar. (For the record, they’re Idea and Odessa, both from the 1960s – the latter is the red felt cover that I would have hoped would be worth a fortune nowadays; it’s not.) I saw this on CD in 2nd and Charles for four dollars last weekend and wasn’t the least bit tempted; all the hits are on any of their anthologies.

3. The Doobie Brothers, Minute by Minute (CD, vinyl) – I have a theory that the reason this and several other rock albums released in late 1978/early 1979 were the best-selling albums ever by their respective acts because there wasn’t much else for rock fans to buy. Disco was at its peak, and several other major rock acts (The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd) were in between albums or overdue for new ones. This album has sold more than any Doobies studio album at over three million copies, and only Best of the Doobies has sold more overall. Strange, because the band was falling apart at the time (Jeff “Skunk” Baxter and John Hartman both left early in the year over disagreements about their direction).

4. The Cars, The Cars (CD, vinyl) – This was a leftover from 1978, of course, but it continued to sell really well right up until the summer, when the followup Candy-O was released. It’s my favorite of their studio albums (I’m not one really one to judge, however, as I don’t have any of the others – just greatest hits sets). This one has also outsold all of their other studio albums, although Candy-O and Heartbeat City aren’t that far behind.

5. Supertramp, Breakfast in America (CD, vinyl) – Another all-time act best seller; this has sold over 4 million copies in America – the only other Supertramp albums to sell one million are the live album Paris and a greatest hits set. It’s a great album, and at least four songs are still in heavy rotation on classic rock stations to this day.

6. Donna Summer, Live and More – Donna was incredibly popular around this time, and I’m much more appreciative of her work than most white middle-aged guys (I have a few of her other albums), but this doesn’t really tempt me. Most live disco albums just play everything a little bit faster, and the arrangements usually aren’t as full (which is bad for disco; the strings and horns are minimized as a result). The studio (“And More”) side has a 17-1/2 minute medley of “MacArthur Park” and “Heaven Knows” with a third song, “One of a Kind,” which I already have on a various artists compilation. I guess the good news about that one is DJs could take a bathroom break when they played that one.

7. Styx, Pieces of Eight – Another Styx album I don’t own. Interesting that Tommy Shaw wrote and sang lead vocals on all three of the album’s hits (“Blue Collar Man,” “Sing for the Day,” “Renegade”); it was the Dennis DeYoung show from there on out.

8. Donna Summer, Bad Girls (CD) – Home of three more gigantic hits (“Hot Stuff,” “Dim All the Lights,” title track), but since those are all on the first LP (it’s a double album) I’m not sure how often the second one was played (unless you were a huge fan of “Sunset People,” I guess). Now on one disc on CD, which is how I own it.

9. Blondie, Parallel Lines (vinyl) – I hadn’t even heard of the band before “Heart of Glass” and “One Way or Another” started getting airplay on WDHA (The Rock of North Jersey), with “Heart of Glass” eventually hitting #1 during the disco era. I don’t think the album would have been as big a hit without the club play “Heart of Glass” generated, but it’s such a strong album that keeps listeners from being bored (12 songs, all less than four minutes long) that it’s hard to imagine it wouldn’t have become popular. I have two vinyl copies of the album; the second is a picture disk with one side the original front cover and the other a shot of Debbie Harry licking a vinyl album. It seemed like a good buy at the time.

10. Rod Stewart, Blondes Have More Fun – This received a collective groan from my high school (which was nearly all white and mostly despised disco); “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy” told everyone he’d completely sold out, and the followup hit “Ain’t Love a Bitch” was interesting only for the shock value.

11. Kenny Rogers, The Gambler – The title track and “She Believes in Me” were the hits on this one. Kenny Rogers and The Carpenters are two of the very few multiplatinum albums that are completely unrepresented in my record collection.

12. The Village People, Cruisin’ – This is the one with “Y.M.C.A.” on it. And, yes, I have a Village People album (one of my fraternity brothers gave me Live and Sleazy after accidentally ordering it from RCA Music Service).

13. Cheap Trick, Cheap Trick at Budokan – yet another all-time best seller for this act; this has sold 3 million copies, mostly on the strength of “I Want You to Want Me.” Epic would have been better off issuing “Surrender” as the second single, but the studio version had flopped the previous year, so they went with a cover of “Ain’t That a Shame” instead. I had planned to download this from Freegal (there have been several rereleases with expanded track listings); I guess I’ll have to scour the record stores instead.

14. Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band, Stranger in Town (CD, vinyl) – another 1978 leftover, but this had two chart hits in 1979 (the mawkish “We’ve Got Tonite” and the essential “Old Time Rock & Roll”).

15. Van Halen, Van Halen (CD) – yet another 1978 leftover.

16. The Knack, Get the Knack (vinyl) – This must have sold a pile of copies to make the end-of-year chart this high, considering those charts usually reflected numbers roughly from November 1 of the previous year to October 31; Get the Knack was released in mid-June. I bought this on vinyl to close out my deal with RCA Music Service, and I wish I’d made a different choice.

17. Peaches & Herb, 2-Hot! – Two huge singles, “Shake Your Groove Thing” and “Reunited” made this a best seller. There have been seven different women billed as “Peaches” in the act, but only one Herb – who has worked in law enforcement a few times when they weren’t getting gigs (or royalties).

18. Billy Joel, The Stranger (CD, vinyl, cassette) – This came out in late September 1977. I wonder how many other albums were in the top 20 of the year-end charts two years running.

19. Toto, Toto – a group of solid studio players made themselves a top-selling act, and got all sorts of grief as a result. I’ve survived for years on a greatest hits set, but I have nothing bad to say about them – maybe their songwriting isn’t the best, but you can’t fault the talent playing the instruments.

20. Soundtrack, Grease – I guess this answers the question I asked in The Stranger entry – there have been at least two.

21. Poco, Legend (vinyl) – I’m kind of surprised this made it so high on the year-end charts; it was definitely a best seller for the band, but it never made it past #14 on the weekly charts. Phil Hartman designed the cover (a bunch of sources say he did the cover art, but I’m reserving judgment on that until I can dig up my copy of the album; designers often create the typography and placement but don’t necessarily create the art itself).

22. The Rolling Stones, Some Girls (vinyl) – another 1978 leftover. The band famously had to redesign the album cover after it turned out the cover designer hadn’t bothered to get permissions from the women pictured on the cover (most of whom sued the band); I wish I had the original cover, but I didn’t buy my copy until mid-1979 or so.

23. Dire Straits, Dire Straits (CD) – Very successful debut for the band, who benefited (again) from little competition at that point. Not their all-time best seller though; Brothers in Arms has sold over 9 million copies.

24. Earth, Wind & Fire, The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire Vol. 1 (vinyl) – Man, this is a good album. And I just realized one song (“Love Music”) isn’t available anywhere else, so I may have to download it and put it somewhere.

25. Foreigner, Double Vision – Critical backlash was starting to set in, as the general consensus was “not as good as the first album.” Not that their fans seemed to mind.

26. Led Zeppelin, In Through the Out Door – The band’s fans must have camped out at the record stores; this released on August 25 and still made it to the top 30 in the year-end list. I’m familiar with most of the songs but don’t have the album. (Which may be because, to this day, I feel weird about it because I misspelled the band’s name in a year-end music feature for our high school newspaper.) 

27. Soundtrack, Saturday Night Fever – Another leftover, this time from 1977.

28. Barbra Streisand, Greatest Hits, Volume II (CD) – This is the one with “The Way We Were,” “Evergreen,” and “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” on it – so if you’re trying to find a good single-disc Streisand set, this would be the best choice.

29. Bad Company, Desolation Angels (CD) – The band was on Led Zeppelin’s Swan Song vanity label, and I’m thinking this release was timed to stay away from In Through the Out Door. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Fantasy” was the hit here, which may have confused a few radio programmers (The Kinks had released the nearly-identically titled “A Rock ‘n’ Roll Fantasy” as a single the year before).

30. Chic, C’est Chic – This is the one with “Le Freak” on it (and the followup hit “I Want Your Love”). “Le Freak” is a great song, but it’s available on lots of anthologies and best-ofs. The disco backlash clobbered this band (as one essay explained to me, white guys outside of cities didn’t react well to a genre of music whose most visible artists seemed to be mostly blacks, women, and gays), but Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards had solid careers in production and songwriting for years after disco “died.”

31. The Jacksons, Destiny – These guys kind of lucked out. The first single released from the album was “Blame It on the Boogie,” which only hit #54 (although it did much better on the R&B and dance charts), partially because the song’s original writer, Mick Jackson (who is not Michael; he’s a British singer-songwriter) brought out a competing version at the same time, and no doubt the similar names confused people. Michael’s film, The Wiz, also opened at the same time this released in December 1978, and was not a success; neither was Michael’s solo single release from that soundtrack, “You Can’t Win.” But the next single, “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)” got lots of play as a disco track, and crossed over, hitting #7 and bringing this album with it.

32. Heart, Dog and Butterfly – Pretty good album for the band, with “Straight On” and the title track among its contents.

33. Rickie Lee Jones, Rickie Lee Jones – This was such a big deal when it came out, and the assumption was she would be around forever. Unfortunately, Jones has become kind of the Alanis Morrissette of my generation – she’s released a lot of music since then (some quite good), but she’s never had the kind of commercial success this album had.

34. George Thorogood, Move It on Over – I had no idea he had an album this successful.

35. Olivia Newton-John, Totally Hot – Newton-John’s career got a big boost from Grease. “A Little More Love” and “Deeper Than the Night” were the two hits from this album.

36. Barry Manilow, Greatest Hits – Two-album set. There are piles of Manilow compilations out nowadays, and this one is relatively hard to come by on CD as a result. (I don’t think it’s even available for download.)

37. Sister Sledge, We Are Family – This may be one of the cases where a single studio album might do just as well as a greatest hits set; the sisters only had two pop top 20 hits, and they’re both here (the title track and “He’s the Greatest Dancer”). I’ve got a two-disc best-of, but I got it for two dollars.

38. Van Halen, Van Halen II (CD) – “Dance the Night Away” is on this one.

39. GQ, Disco Nights (vinyl) – Unfortunate album title, as the album isn’t all disco (their remake of Billy Stewart’s sweet ballad “I Do Love You,” also here, was a top 20 hit). But nothing hit after this one for them.

40. Gloria Gaynor, Love Tracks – “I Will Survive” is on this album.

41. Linda Ronstadt, Back in the U.S.A. (vinyl) – Another one I got as a picture disk. “Living in the U.S.A.” and “Ooh Baby Baby” were the two big hits from this one.

42. Eric Clapton, Backless – “Promises” was a big hit, but Clapton might have been better served holding off on this one for a few more months – the biggest complaint I’ve seen about this one is weak material. Another Clapton album I don’t own; I’ve got to make better choices (his Pilgrim may be one of the worst albums I’ve ever heard by a major artist).

43. The Blues Brothers, Briefcase Full of Blues (vinyl) – Remember when John Belushi was the king of the world? This hit #1, Saturday Night Live was the most talked-about TV show, and Animal House was a huge movie. Anyway, it was easier to get the poorly edited The Definitive Collection than this on CD (that set has what’s getting off the movie soundtrack and their second album); too bad Atlantic didn’t do a better job of editing Belushi’s band introductions off that one.

44. Journey, Evolution – I don’t have any studio albums by these guys, and I can’t stand “Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’,” which is like half a song. Strangely, the first single, “Just the Same Way,” has Gregg Rolie on lead vocals – his wispy voice was the reason they brought in Steve Perry.

45. Spyro Gyra, Morning Dance (vinyl) – I liked this a lot better back then than I do now – I probably haven’t played this album in 30 years.

46. The Village People, Macho Man – This came out in 1978, of course. Casablanca knew what they were doing with these guys; put out as much product as possible while the gimmick’s still fresh. If they hadn’t parted ways with lead singer Victor Willis (who was the one who wrote their clever double-entendre lyrics) they might have lasted a little bit longer.

47. Gino Vannelli, Brother to Brother (vinyl) – The big hit “I Just Wanna Stop” is here, along with the minor followup “Wheels of Life.” His material hasn’t aged well to me, but Google his photos sometime – man, this is a hairy guy.

48. The Charlie Daniels Band, Million Mile Reflections – The band’s biggest hit, “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” is here.

49. Talking Heads, More Songs About Buildings and Food – I’d probably pick this up if I saw it cheap, but it’s not high on my list. This hit based on their remake of Al Green’s “Take Me to the River.”

50. Joe Jackson, Look Sharp! (vinyl) – I heard “Is She Really Going Out With Him?” and the title track a lot on WDHA, and then when the album showed up as two 10-inch disks (with a button of the title logo as part of a special die-cut cover) and it wasn’t too expensive, I figured that was a neat collectible and took the plunge. It’s a great album and I’m looking for a reasonably-priced CD with the bonus tracks. (Too bad I left the button in my dorm room after freshman year ended.)

51. Nicolette Larson, Nicolette – This was the late Larson’s moment in the sun; she did her own version of Neil Young’s recent “Lotta Love” and turned it into a top 10 hit. She had a lovely voice, best heard here and on some of Young’s albums (American Stars ‘n’ Bars, Harvest Moon).

52. Al Stewart, Time Passages (vinyl) – His biggest solo album, featuring the title track and ”Song on the Radio.” Those were written with the express purpose of being hits (note the title of the latter song); Stewart’s preferred music is based on history (songs on this album reference Sir Thomas More, Versailles, and the abandoned brigantine Mary Celeste).

53. Steve Martin, A Wild and Crazy Guy (vinyl) – This album was split in half between a club appearance at The Boarding House and Red Rocks Ampitheatre. I’d get Let’s Get Small before this one, but it did win a Grammy for Best Comedy Album.

54. Santana, Inner Secrets (vinyl) – It sold a fair amount of copies, but it isn’t all that good. The singles were “Well All Right,” “Stormy,” and “One Chain (Don’t Make No Prison),” all of which were done better by their original artists (Buddy Holly, The Classics IV, and The Four Tops, respectively). I’ve heard “Open Invitation” and “Wham!” are much better, but it’s been so long since I’ve listened to the album I can’t really confirm it.

55. Chicago, Hot Streets (vinyl) – My parents got me the latest Chicago album nearly every year for my birthday for five years between 1974 and 1978 (unfortunately, they somehow missed the greatest hits set). This isn’t bad, but nothing stands out, and I don’t remember playing side two very much.
56. Neil Young, Comes a Time (CD) – WDHA played the title track plenty when this came out, but they somehow missed out on the single, “Four Strong Winds” (originally a hit for Ian & Sylvia). Now overshadowed by Rust Never Sleeps, which came out later in 1979.

57. Dan Fogelberg and Tim Weisberg, Twin Sons of Different Mothers (CD, vinyl) – Is it a mellow folk rock album? Is it a fusion jazz album? There’s no need to decide! Seriously, I don’t dislike this one, and I wish Weisberg had a few more albums available to judge his work (other than a best of, all his 1970s LPs are out of print).

58. Rick James, Bustin’ Out of L. Seven – This charted about as well as James’ first album Come Get It!, but none of the singles broke the way “You and I” did.

59. Willie Nelson, Willie and Family Live – This was a huge seller for Nelson; it’s moved 4 million units (of course, it’s both a double vinyl album and CD, which counts as two sales in the RIAA’s eyes). Emmylou Harris and Johnny Paycheck both guest here. Another one I wish I’d downloaded from Freegal.

60. Anne Murray, Let’s Keep It That Way – Let’s not and say we did.

61. Neil Diamond, You Don’t Bring Me Flowers – Neil got some mileage out of the title track, which had also been on his previous album as a solo recording; the duet with Barbra Streisand is here. (Diamond also cowrote the song, which certainly helped his bank account.) “Forever in Blue Jeans” was also a top 20 hit.

62. John Stewart, Bombs Away Dream Babies (CD, vinyl) – I wasn’t happy to see a 2006 clip of Stewart on YouTube dumping all over the hit “Gold,” which drove the sales of this album. He called it “vapid” and “empty” and said he wrote it only to please RSO Records (I’m sure it did). I suppose it’s possible he didn’t mean it (he was diagnosed to be with early-stage Alzheimer’s less than a year later), but I doubt it. Anyway, this is about half of a good album (the songs “Lost Her in the Sun” and “Midnight Wind” also hit the top 40), but the second side is less than 15 minutes long and is a little weak. Still worth searching out (it’s virtually impossible to find nowadays on CD, and I’m pretty sure the CD download I did was from a pirated file).

63. Chuck Mangione, Children of Sanchez – The followup to Feels So Good was a two-LP soundtrack to a movie not a whole lot of people saw, but it still sold well enough to show up here.

64. George Benson, Livin’ Inside Your Love (vinyl) – I think I got this because it was mismarked as a single album at the record store. For some reason I remember the chorus of the single version of “Love Ballad” having different lyrics as the album version, for reasons unknown.

65. Earth, Wind & Fire, I Am (CD, vinyl) – Great album that would be much higher on this list, except (1) it was released in June (as noted previously, the figures for Billboard’s end-of-year lists were usually taken from November 1 to October 31 to allow time to calculate the results), and (2) the disco backlash probably hurt this band more than it should have (the third single, “In the Stone,” was one of their best songs ever, but didn’t come close to making the top 40).

66. Little River Band, Sleeper Catcher – A leftover from 1978, but it made this list on the strength of “Lady,” which dominated the AC charts for the first third of 1979.

67. Raydio, Rock On – The big hit on this one was “You Can’t Change That.”

68. The Pointer Sisters, Energy – I’m not super comfortable with the lyrics to the big hit “Fire” off this album, which in hindsight seem to be about date rape (or at least coercion). But it was a huge hit for the group at the right time (Bonnie Pointer had left to go on her own).

69. Eddie Money, Life for the Taking – “Maybe I’m a Fool” was a moderate hit from this one.

70. Meat Loaf, Bat Out of Hell (CD, vinyl) – Yes, this was still around in 1979. Epic released “You Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth” as a single early in the year, which managed to crack the top 40.

71. The Police, Outlandos d’Amour (CD, vinyl) – “Roxanne” wasn’t a gigantic hit for the band (it didn’t even make top 30), but it was big enough to put them on the map in the States. My CD copy is from their box set Message in a Box, which included the entirety of all five of their studio albums (back before record companies realized that wasn’t such a clever idea).

72. Boston, Don’t Look Back (CD) – Very weak second album by the band, which Tom Scholz will admit. (Of course, he also thought nothing of taking eight years between albums.)

73. Cheryl Lynn, Got to Be Real – Winning The Gong Show put her on the map, and even though the title track was her only pop hit, she managed to generate a few albums from it.

74. Electric Light Orchestra, Discovery (CD, vinyl) – Or Disco Very, as both band members and fans referred to this one, based on the initial single “Shine a Little Love” (and, to a certain extent, the later single “Last Train to London”). Fortunately for the band, “Don’t Bring Me Down” was released right around the disco backlash was kicking up and became one of their biggest hits.

75. Bobby Caldwell, Bobby Caldwell (CD, vinyl) – This became a major hit based on “What You Won’t Do for Love.” I’ve had two different copies of the vinyl album over the years, and “Can’t Say Goodbye” has two distinctly different mixes, for those who are fanatical fans.

76. The Allman Brothers Band, Enlightened Rogues – First album after a breakup/hiatus of three years (mostly because the rest of the band was pissed off at Gregg for testifying against one of their security guys at a drug trial). Their second top 40 hit, “Crazy Love” (not the Poco song) is here. Don’t have this one, but I’m keeping an eye out.

77. Elvis Costello, Armed Forces (CD, cassette) – One of his biggest albums here in the States – it would have been bigger if Costello hadn’t gotten into a bar argument with Stephen Stills and Bonnie Bramlett, which ended with Bramlett punching out Costello after he made some really, really stupid comments about Ray Charles (Google it for the details).

78. The Crusaders, Street Life (CD) – This was more of a fusion/smooth jazz band by this point, but a good one. The title track is probably one of my favorite songs from 1979, and even managed to crack to pop top 40.

79. James Taylor, Flag (CD, vinyl) – Not-great followup to his 1977 album JT. His remake of The Drifters’ “Up on the Roof,” written by old friend Carole King, was a minor hit. At least the album cover stood out on the racks.

80. Waylon Jennings, Greatest Hits – I may have to find a copy of this (or one of his hits sets) at a used CD store sometime.

81. Instant Funk, Instant Funk (CD) – The single “I Got My Mind Made Up (You Can Get It Girl)” is a classic; too bad it’s their only hit (they did back up other artists, such as Lou Rawls, The O’Jays, and Evelyn “Champagne” King). About 35 percent of my CD is either the original “I Got My Mind Made Up” or various versions of same.

82. The Cars, Candy-O – Big hit album which came out in June. “Let’s Go” was the hit from this album, as well as “It’s All I Can Do.”

83. Bob James, Touchdown – The title track was offered to the producers of the TV series Taxi as a possibility for the theme song, but they went with “Angela” instead, which is also here.

84. The Babys, Head First – “Every Time I Think of You” is a rewrite of their first hit “Isn’t It Time,” but at least it’s something.

85. Diana Ross, The Boss – Title track was a major hit, although it took awhile for the song to scale the charts. 

86. Ian Hunter, You’re Never Alone With a Schizophrenic – “Just Another Night” was a minor hit for Hunter (formerly of Mott the Hoople), but the more recognizable songs are “Ships” (which Barry Manilow remade and turned into a major hit) and “Cleveland Rocks” (The Presidents of The United States of America did a remake that became the theme for The Drew Carey Show).

87. Alicia Bridges, Alicia Bridges – Remember “I Love the Nightlife”? That was her one major hit (she did have a couple of minor chart hits later on), but it sold a few albums.

88. Teddy Pendergrass, Teddy – This didn’t even have a top 40 single (“Turn Out the Lights” conked out at #48).

89. The Village People, Go West – Final significant studio album for the group; this one contains “In the Navy.”

90. Ace Frehley, Ace Frehley – All four Kiss band members released solo albums in the fall of 1978; most of them wound up being shipped back to Casablanca Records a few months later (all of them famously “shipped platinum” or 1 million copies, but none made it above #22 in Billboard). Frehley’s surprisingly had the most staying power, behind the infectious single “New York Groove.”

91. Aerosmith, Live Bootleg – This probably sold a lot less than the band expected. It might have helped if they’d included the studio version of “Chip Away the Stone” that was released as a single; the live version was the only one on the album.

92. Frank Zappa, Sheik Yer Bouti – Another one that sold big despite not having a hit single, but in this case “Dancing Fool” was his second-biggest single ever (behind “Valley Girl”).

93. Dionne Warwick, Dionne – This sold a pile of copies behind the singles “I’ll Never Love This Way Again” and “Déjà Vu,” which were Warwick’s first solo top 20 singles (thus not including her collaboration with The Spinners, “Then Came You”) in ten years. That massive fur coat she’s wearing on the cover sure dates it, though.

94. Kiss, Dynasty – The last big-selling Kiss album for a while, on the questionable strength of the single “I Was Made for Loving You,” which many in the Kiss Army disdained since it had a disco backbeat. Peter Criss actually only played on one song on the album; Anton Vig was the drummer for the rest.

95. Amii Stewart, Knock on Wood – another from the “who?” file; Stewart’s only top 40 single was the #1 title track, a remake of the old Eddie Floyd R&B standard.

96. Triumph, Just a Game – Canadian power trio that was a cross between Rush and The Who. The single “Hold On” just barely made the American top 40, but it still gets played on classic rock stations today.

97. Stephanie Mills, What Cha Gonna Do With My Lovin’ – The title track was a big R&B and pop hit. Not bad for a woman whose name had been made by portraying Dorothy in the Broadway version of The Wiz. (The movie version, which came out in 1978, was famously ruined when 34-year-old Diana Ross played Dorothy.)

98. Anne Murray, New Kind of Feeling – Same old mopey ballads.

99. Barry White, The Man – I actually kind of like Barry White’s stuff, but by 1979 his schtick had grown old and tired (“Your Sweetness Is My Weakness,” the only pop chart hit from this album, would be his last one until a 1990 collaboration with Quincy Jones).

100. Kansas, Monolith – Major flop for the band after the multiplatinum success of their two previous studio LPs Leftoverture and Point of Know Return, but it’s still their most recent platinum studio album.

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