#6
In My Life
by Judy Collins

Review: The best record of torch songs ever made. Theatrical pieces like "Marat-Sade" and "Pirate Jenny," plus tyhe scariest Leonard Cohen tune of all time, "Dress Rehearsal Rag." But it is the slow charmers, "Sunny Goodge Street" (Donovan), "Think It's Going to Rain Today" (Randy Newman), and "In My Life" (Lennon) that cement Collins as a formidable selector of tunes. She isn't a classically great singer, but her song choices and interpretations here are terrific. She was more than a singer, she was a culture-maker. This is lovely, mostly sad (my favorite) music.

#5
Way To Blue: An Introduction To Nick Drake
Nick Drake

Review: This disk is a sampler of the strange and interesting music Nick Drake made in the late 1960s. Afflicted by terrible depression, Drake went his own way as a songwriter. His songs seem more wistful than sad. If you like this collection — and how could you not, if you have read this far — you will want to have the other four LPs he made before committing suicide at 24.

#4
The Belle Album
Al Green

Review: Soul perfection. Is there any doubt who Belle is? It's gotta be God. You should hear him hint at the high notes as he draws close to his vision — my dog looks up when I play it. My friend Brit and I agree that this is Green's best record, and that Green is the best singer of soul music, and the most reliably great pop singer, album to album, who ever lived. Runners-up: Van Morrison and Otis Redding.

#3
Later That Evening
Eberhard Weber

Review: Languorous chamber jazz led by Sweden's greatest bassist and composer. Weber, like Mingus a generation before, is a composer and a bassist. Working with the very original, very un-bebop, un-blues-based saxophonist Jan Garbarek, he crafts s distinctivley Norwegian brand of orchestral jazz, loaded with rich intimations and unusual modes. I love to work to this. Introducing a promising young guitarist named Bill Frisell.

#2
Grace
by Jeff Buckley

(5 year old) Review: I know this is a great record, but everyone I lend it to flips it back to me. What am I feeling that they don't feel? This guy is the best rock poet since Patti Smith, and his band is astonishing. Think of it as Verlaine meets Led Zeppelin, a music of enormous yearning. He died in a swimming accident before completing his second LP, and it threw me into a tizzy as severe as when I heard Howard Cosell announce on Monday Night Football that Lennon had been gunned down. I so wanted to hear more music from this man.

#1
My Goals Beyond
by John McLaughlin

Review: John McLaughlin has made many records, some of them wonderful, like the first two Mahavishnu Orchestra LPs, and many of them awful. But here is his treasure, 50 minutes of acoustic meditative splendor, including a luscious version of Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Porkpie Hat." Never mind the apostrophe problem in the title: this record must be heard to be believed.