Channel 4 did another annoying top [n] [things] countdown programme on Sunday. Albums, this time. Of course, these are just designed to provoke arguments and discussion about why your favourite album (Frengers by Mew) was left out and why such utter toss (anything at all by Abba) managed to score so highly.

Anyway, I’ve got thirteen out of the top 100 albums, although some of them are on tape, stuffed away in a box somewhere.

• PINK FLOYD – Dark Side of the Moon
  A great, legendary album. Proof that prog-rock needn’t be po-faced ridiculousnes.
• COLDPLAY – Parachutes
  Hm. Not so sure. I mean, it’s good and that, but one of the greatest albums ever? Hm.
• THE VERVE – Urban Hymns
  Didn’t like this much when it first came out, but it grew on me. A bit, well, bland, however.
• THE SMITHS – The Queen Is Dead
  I was never a ‘proper’ Smiths fan, although I do appreciate their brilliance.
• RADIOHEAD – The Bends
  Well, I prefer it to OK Computer, but there you go.
• THE PRODIGY – The Fat of the Land
  I thought it was universally accepted that this was the point The Prodigy went boring and commercial? I mean, for goodness sake, they got articles in Kerrang! and Metal Hammer off the back of this album (although that may say more about rock music in the mid-90s than anything else)
• DIRE STRAITS – Brothers in Arms
  The true king of all Dad Rock albums. I make no apologies for liking Dire Straits. They’re bloody great.
• MOBY – Play
  It probably says something that, when I bought this album, I listened to it non-stop for two weeks. Since then, it’s been sitting, out of its CD case, underneath the chair in my old car, and I haven’t heard it since.
• JONI MITCHELL – Blue
  If you could distill emotion and then record it somehow, it would sound like Joni Mitchell, and if you took the very best of those recordings, you’d have Blue.
• PULP – Different Class
  It would be no overstatement to say that this album shaped my sixth form years. Comparisons between my appearance and Jarvis Cocker doubtless helped that, but as an album full of anthems for misfits, geeks and outcasts, you won’t do better.
• MASSIVE ATTACK – Blue Lines
  Everyone knows it’s great – but it’s almost so ubiquitous as to be dull now. Sounds kind of dated, too, which I never really thought would happen.
• PRIMAL SCREAM – Screamadelica
  A defining album of the 90s. Looking back, it’s a bit patchy in places, but it’s still brilliant irrespective.
• PAUL SIMON – Graceland
  If I hadn’t already said Frengers by Mew was the best album ever, this would have a pretty damned good shot at it. There is no good reason not to own this album. Also, it contains some of the best bass playing ever recorded (and I don’t just mean that recorded-and-reversed bit in Call Me Al, either).

The interesting (or not, depending on how you see it) thing, though, is that list is barely representative of my music collection. I think, over the years, I’ve managed to skirt round the edge of the mainstream, occasionally dipping my toes into it, but basically just amassing a load of albums that never make it into any top 100s of anything. And, with reference to the post below, I think I’m probably quite happy about that.

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