Top 50 Albums of 1997:

1. Skeleton Key - Fantastic Spikes Through Balloon
2. Trans Am - Surrender To The Night
3. Mike Watt - Contemplating The Engine Room
4. Smart Went Crazy - Con Art
5. Elliott Smith - Either/Or
6. Camp Lo - Uptown Saturday Night
7. The Notorious B.I.G. - Life After Death
8. Radiohead - OK Computer
9. Janet Jackson - The Velvet Rope
10. Timbaland and Magoo - Welcome To Our World
11. Foo Fighters - The Colour And The Shape
12. Ben Folds Five - Whatever And Ever Amen
13. Jay-Z - In My Lifetime, Vol. 1
14. Spiritualized - Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
15. Dinosaur Jr. - Hand It Over
16. No I.D. - Accept Your Own And Be Yourself (The Black Album)
17. Missy Elliott - Supa Dupa Fly
18. Amon Tobin - Bricolage
19. Erykah Badu - Baduizm
20. Three 6 Mafia - Chapter 2: World Domination
21. Nels Cline and Thurston Moore - In-Store
22. Common - One Day It'll All Make Sense
23. Supergrass - In It For The Money
24. Puff Daddy and The Family - No Way Out
25. Wyclef Jean - The Carnival
26. The Geraldine Fibbers - Butch
27. The Dismemberment Plan - Is Terrified
28. Shudder To Think - 50,000 B.C.
29. Mystikal - Unpredictable
30. Daft Punk - Homework
31. Shania Twain - Come On Over
32. World Party - Egyptology
33. Busta Rhymes - When Disaster Strikes
34. Huffamoose - We've Been Had Again
35. Pavement - Brighten The Corners
36. Third Eye Blind - Third Eye Blind
37. Superchunk - Indoor Living
38. Björk - Homogenic
39. Michael Penn - Resigned
40. Scarface - The Untouchable
41. Morphine - Like Swimming
42. Hepcat - Right On Time
43. Ben Harper - The Will To Live
44. that dog. - Retreat From The Sun
45. Sleater-Kinney - Dig Me Out
46. Jurasic 5 - J5 EP
47. Lake Trout - Volume For The Rest Of It
48. Chisel - Set You Free
49. Pelt - Techeod
50. Wu-Tang Clan - Wu-Tang Forever

After doing entries like this about 1999 and 1998, I find myself somewhat eager to get over with 1997, which I think of as kind of the beginning of that late '90s period I feel very ambivalent and unenthusiastic about, and onto earlier years I have more visceral nostalgia for. I'm not sure if I think of 1997 as one of my least favorite years for music in the decade, or just one of the uncoolest, the tackiest, the most ickily '90s. My brother buying those Jay-Z and Missy and Timbaland and Magoo albums was probably a big step toward popular contemporary hip hop being really central to my taste, particularly as an album listener, and Vol. 1 and Welcome To Our World especially I love way more than almost anyone else I know. It was a decent year for mainstream rock, in some ways the last gasp of alt-rock radio's golden era as I remember it.

I was 15 in 1997, and I'd just started high school the previous fall and had kind of fallen in with some new friends that ended up being really influential on my musical taste, guys that got me into things like the Velvet Underground and Fugazi and A Tribe Called Quest and Television. So I think a lot of my memories of that year are tied up in discovering older music, more than what was new at the time. As I said before, '98 was the first time I made a year-end top 10, but I definitely thought about my album of the year in '97 and decided it was Ben Folds Five, with Spiritualized a runner up, because I wanted to be contrarian about thinking there was a better British rock album than OK Computer. I still like those album, I just like some others a lot more now. There are a ton of good ones I couldn't even fit into this top 50 (by Primus, Patti Smith, Portastatic, Depeche Mode, Roni Size, Free Kitten, Ken Stringfellow, Cujo, and so on and so on).



Top 100 Singles of 1997:

1. Foo Fighters - "Everlong"
2. Aaliyah - "One In A Million"
3. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones - "The Impression That I Get"
4. Busta Rhymes - "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See"
5. Third Eye Blind - "Semi-Charmed Life"
6. Puff Daddy f/ The LOX, Lil Kim and the Notorious B.I.G. - "It's All About The Benjamins (Remix)"
7. Makaveli - "Hail Mary"
8. Erykah Badu - "Tyrone"
9. Blink 182 - "Dammit"
10. OMC - "How Bizarre"
11. Wu-Tang Clan - "Triumph"
12. Nine Inch Nails - "The Perfect Drug"
13. The Beatnuts f/ Big Punisher and Cuban Link - "Off The Books"
14. Mark Morrison - "Return Of The Mack"
15. Better Than Ezra - "Desperately Wanting"
16. Radiohead - "Paranoid Android"
17. Jay-Z - "Who You Wit"
18. Notorious B.I.G. f/ Mase and Puff Daddy - "Mo Money Mo Problems"
19. Bruce Springsteen - "Secret Garden"
20. En Vogue - "Don't Let Go (Love)"
21. Live - "Lakini's Juice"
22. Third Eye Blind - "Graduate"
23. Camp Lo - "Lucchini (This Is It)"
24. Aphex Twin - "Come To Daddy"
25. Pavement - "Stereo"
26. Erykah Badu - "Next Lifetime"
27. Wyclef Jean featuring Refugee Allstars - "We Trying To Stay Alive"
28. Bjork - "Joga"
29. Everclear - "Everything To Everyone"
30. Foo Fighters - "Monkey Wrench"
31. U2 - "Discotheque"
32. Dru Hill - "Never Make A Promise"
33. The Geraldine Fibbers - "California Tuffy"
34. The Prodigy - "Breathe"
35. Foxy Brown f/ Jay-Z - "I'll Be"
36. 112 - "Cupid"
37. Soul Coughing - "Soft Serve"
38. Blackstreet f/ Ol' Dirty Bastard and Slash - "Fix"
39. Huffamoose - "Wait"
40. Hepcat - "Can't Wait"
41. Paula Cole - "I Don't Want To Wait"
42. Erykah Badu - "On and On"
43. Our Lady Peace - "Clumsy"
44. Scarface f/ 2Pac- "Smile"
45. DJ Kool - "Let Me Clear My Throat"
46. Mack 10 - "Backyard Boogie"
47. Ma$e - "Feel So Good"
48. Aqua - "Barbie Girl"
49. Jay-Z f/ Blackstreet - "City Is Mine"
50. Queen Pen - "Party Ain't A Party"
51. Freak Nasty - "Da Dip"
52. Smash Mouth - "Walkin' On The Sun"
53. Sugar Ray f/ Supercat - "Fly"
54. Ben Folds Five - "The Battle Of Who Could Care Less"
55. Janet Jackson f/ Q-Tip - "Got Til It's Gone"
56. Spice Girls - "Say You'll Be There"
57. Supergrass - "Richard III"
58. Big Wreck - "The Oaf (My Luck Is Wasted)"
59. Ben Harper - "Faded"
60. Bjork - "I Miss You"
61. Superchunk - "Water Hands"
62. SWV f/ Puff Daddy - "Someone"
63. Mary J. Blige - "Everything"
64. that dog. - "Never Say Never"
65. Blur - "Song 2"
66. R. Kelly - "Gotham City"
67. Notorious B.I.G. - "Sky's The Limit"
68. Our Lady Peace - "Superman's Dead"
69. The Roots f/ Raphael Saadiq - "What They Do"
70. Daft Punk - "Da Funk"
71. White Town - "Your Woman"
72. Goldfinger - "This Lonely Place"
73. Supergrass - "Late In The Day"
74. SWV f/ Missy Elliott - "Can We"
75. Dru Hill - "5 Steps"
76. Roni Size - "Brown Paper Bag"
77. Ma$e f/ DMX, The LOX and Black Rob - "24 Hrs. To Live"
78. Freak Nasty - "Da' Dip"
79. Timbaland and Magoo - "Up Jumps Da Boogie"
80. Usher - "You Make Me Wanna"
81. Bjork - "Bachelorette"
82. The Chemical Brothers - "Block Rockin' Beats"
83. Spice Girls - "Wannabe"
84. Busta Rhymes - "Dangerous"
85. Missy Elliott - "The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)"
86. Incubus - "A Certain Shade Of Green"
87. R. Kelly - "I Believe I Can Fly"
88. Supergrass - "Late In The Day"
89. Sting - "Roxanne '97 (Puff Daddy Remix)"
90. Puff Daddy f/ Faith Evans and 112 - "I'll Be Missing You"
91. Reel Big Fish - "Sell Out"
92. Dru Hill - "In My Bed"
93. Fiona Apple - "Criminal"
94. The Cardigans - "Lovefool"
95. Missy Elliott f/ Da Brat and Lil Kim - "Sock It 2 Me"
96. Sarah McLachlan - "Building A Mystery"
97. Hanson - "MMMBop"
98. Beth Orton - "She Cries Your Name"
99. The Verve - "Bittersweet Symphony"
100. Notorious B.I.G. - "Hypnotize"

Oh yeah, this year was really fucking good for singles. As much as it's easy to think of it as the year of Bad Boy, or of alt-rock sellouts with videos directed by McG, or 'electronica' hype, or whatever, there's a really rich variety here. Definitely kind of an odd transitional period, but one that sowed the seeds for a lot of great things that have happened in the 15 years since.

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