Like your favorite bar band, we occasionally take requests. This one goes out to Benjamin Sutton at The L Magazine.

Wilco’sYankee Hotel Foxtrot is kind of the OK Computer of the alt-country set. The ambitious record is sprawling and adventurous — and everyone except Wilco’s record label agreed that the album was an instant classic. If alt-country is a genre, then Jeff Tweedy and company way transcended it. And the general public rewarded them for it — the album went gold, far surpassing anyone’s expectations.
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The way I see it, you may as well get the icons out of the way right at the beginning. And this album is chock full of icons. From Peter Saville‘s minimalist package design to the frontman Ian Curtis’ enigmatic presence, Joy Division’s debut album Unknown Pleasures pretty much has it going on. And let’s face it, is there anything cooler than the white illustration on the front? Take that, mix in the single “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” and the whole thing kind of exists in a haze of unapproachable cool.
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i’m not a font policeperson, nor do i aspire to be one. but i do agree with them on one thing: ikea’s choice to move from futura to verdana was a bad one. i remember my first awkward photoshop sessions in the nineties—i’d always use futura in all my creations—it was the coolest looking font that came bundled with my pc at the time. as a result, i have this soft spot in my heart for the bold sans-serif.
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Editor’s note: Is there a more appropriate record to kick off this project? We didn’t think so.

it’s hard to believe that my bloody valentine’s loveless album is nearly 20 years old. the first time i heard it, way back in the early 90’s, it pretty much exploded my ideas about what pop music could be. when i first heard the careening, overdriven guitar swells of “only shallow,” i was in my room working on something or other. i had to stop and listen to the whole disc in its entirety before moving on to anything else, it’s one of those albums, like sonic youth’s daydream nation that begs to be listened to straight through. it was immediately timeless for me. it’s easy to understand why it would have been so hard for kevin shields to follow it up.
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