When the album culture started getting strong back in the second half sixties it was hard to predict how far and how long it will take it to develop, but some ten years later or so it was in full swing and it has produced such a strong batch of releases that have its impact to this day.
At the same time, 1975 can be seen as a year of transition in rock and other pop genres in general, with artists diversifying their themes but also bringing in new elements that would leave a serious mark on music. Arena rock and disco were on the rise, but the year also marks the birth of punk rock as we know it to this day.
If you pick any of the 20 albums below, those well-known (some of them even overplayed), and those possibly not that much, you can see (and surely hear) the importance they bear on the further development of rock music.
These 20 albums still very much matter
Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks
The Nobel Prize winner made quite a few very personal, intimate albums in his career, but this one possibly takes the top of that list. This is surely one of the best in his long and winding career, with not a single track here missing the mark in any way.
Patti Smith - Horses
Starting your musical career with such a strong debut, possibly one of the best debut albums around, is quite a feat in itself, but setting standards for punk, post-punk, and whatnot else is a feat only a handful of artists were able to achieve.
Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
This is where Pink Floyd reached full mastery of their sound, being able to combine their early psych days with all the developments of progressive rock without losing touch with other developments in rock and pop up to that moment.
Bob Dylan & The Band - The Basement Tapes
The music presented here was recorded quite a few years before this album was released, yet it presents some of the best songs Dylan and The Band wrote alone or together, circling around in bootleg album form long before this one became official, being also a source for some of the best covers of Dylan songs around.
Neil Young - Tonight's The Night
Being in grief and creating some dark music can be either cathartic or quite depressing. Luckily, both for Youn and the listeners, this one definitely falls in the former category, being possibly one of the best sad albums around.
Bruce Springsteen - Born to Run
If there ever was a full-blown, cinematic rock album, then it is this one. Combining his penchant for great lyrics and a wide-screen rocking sound, Springsteen establishes himself as one of rock legends with this album.
Steely Dan - Katy Lied
Quite a few critics were not that much amused with this album, but as it transpired, it included some of the strongest material by Fagen and Becker, who were becoming the band itself, announcing a slow shift toward a more jazz-infused sound.
Harmonia - Deluxe
Sure, there were other Krautrock bands that can be pointed to as early developers of ambient music, but this combination of some of the best purveyors of electronica at the time remains as one of the true landmarks of what became ambient as we know it today
Neu! - Neu! '75
Another Krautrock staple, again involving one of the musicians that worked within Harmonia (guitarist Michael Rother), this one was a primer, in every sense of the word, of what became known as “motorik,” so in vogue these days with artists delving in Krautrock.
Paul Simon - Still Crazy After All These Years
No wonder Simon started exploring various world music sounds after this album, as it represents a pinnacle in his part of the career that can be labeled as a true singer-songwriter. In many ways, it signifies the vane of the popularity of singer-songwriters at that time.
Joni Mitchell - The Hissing of Summer Lawns
Mitchell moved away from the "pure" singer-songwriter sound into more experimental areas a few albums before this one, but this just might be the most accomplished album of the second part of her career. Here, she leaves traces of her acoustic background upon which she builds something more adventurous.
Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Zuma
While Tonight’s The Night was the acoustic side of Young, this outing with Crazy Horse, his long-time collaborators, shows what he can do when he goes full electric, including “Cortez The Killer,” surely one of his career ‘electric’ signature songs.
Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti
How do you effectively summarize all that you have done before through new material on a double album, even pushing your sound into new territories? Zeppelin shows how with this one, the album that also includes the incredible “Kashmir.”
Roxy Music - Siren
This is where Bryan Ferry and co. were telling everybody that glam rock is over and that all things smooth should be in vogue, without losing songwriting and playing prowess, creating a sound that will play a strong role in the decade that followed.
Slapp Happy & Henry Cow - Desperate Straights
How can you define art rock as such? Well, you can combine a trio of two left-field poppers and a cabaret chanteuse with a truly experimental prog-rock band and see what happens. This one has passed mainly unnoticed by a wider audience but was deservedly loved by the critics.
10cc - The Original Soundtrack
With two brilliant albums before this one, the great combination of strong songwriters and players moves to another label and comes up with another set of brilliant songs, the last the four original members came up with together.
David Bowie - Young Americans
Bowie shifts his musical direction along with his appearance again, coming up with his vision of state of rock & funk at the time and creates yet another classic. Again.
Queen - A Night at the Opera
Sure, by now, this one might have been overplayed (and not by a bit), but it represents one of the most detailed studio creations done so far, with Qeen showing why they became a thing of rock legends.
Tom Waits - Nighthawks at the Diner
At the start of the Seventies, both Springsteen and Waits were hailed as the new Dylan(s), but as they progressed, they showed that they were true, individual (and great) artists themselves. This album is certainly one of the best in the first phase of Wait’s career, which some call the beat poet phase.
Electric Light Orchestra - Face the Music
This is where Jeff Lynne takes his penchant for a combination of late fifties rock and baroque pop to another level, some say from a chamber orchestra to a full symphony.