Here is the entire 1974 COUNTDOWN, with links to the original posts. Following this are the other 1974 posts including live albums, film soundtracks and jazz.
And here is an invitation to add their your own favourite 1974 albums in the Comments… ranked or unranked, two or twenty, curated our plucked out of the ether, whatever tickles your fancy. I’m sure those who have stuck with the 74 FROM ’74 journey would love to read others’ picks as much as I would!
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#74 — #70
74 MACKENZIE THEORY — BON VOYAGE
73 KLAUS SCHULZE — BLACK DANCE
72 STANLEY CLARKE — STANLEY CLARKE
71 HELDON — ELECTRONIC GUERILLA
70 BOB DYLAN & THE BAND — BEFORE THE FLOOD
#69 — #65
69 LOU REED — SALLY CAN’T DANCE
68 FUNKADELIC — STANDING ON THE VERGE OF GETTING IT ON
67 DRAGON — UNIVERSAL RADIO
66 AYERS ROCK — BIG RED ROCK
65 HAWKWIND — HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN GRILL
#64 — #60
64 STEVIE WONDER — FULFILLINGNESS’ FIRST FINALE
63 GREENSLADE — SPYGLASS GUEST
62 ROBERT PALMER — SNEAKIN’ SALLY THROUGH THE ALLEY
61 PROCOL HARUM — EXOTIC BIRDS AND FRUIT
60 RICK WAKEMAN — JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH
#59 — #55
#59 DAN FOGELBERG — SOUVENIRS
#58 PFM — THE WORLD BECAME THE WORLD
#57 SPARKS — KIMONO MY HOUSE
#56 VAN MORRISON — VEEDON FLEECE
#55 WISHBONE ASH — THERE’S THE RUB
#54 — #50
#54 GRATEFUL DEAD — FROM THE MARS HOTEL
#53 GENTLE GIANT — THE POWER AND THE GLORY
#52 REFUGEE — REFUGEE
#51 KUSH — SNOW WHITE AND THE EIGHT STRAIGHTS
#50 LARRY CORYELL — INTRODUCING THE ELEVENTH HOUSE
#49 — #45
#49 JETHRO TULL — WARCHILD
#48 ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA — ELDORADO
#47 BILLY COBHAM — TOTAL ECLIPSE
#46 ISOTOPE — ILLUSION
#45 HERBIE HANCOCK — THRUST
#44 — #41
#44 QUEEN SHEER — HEART ATTACK
#43 FLEETWOOD MAC — HEROES ARE HARD TO FIND
#42 JACK BRUCE — OUT OF THE STORM
#41 ERIC CLAPTON — 461 OCEAN BOULEVARD
#40 — #36
#40 ROBIN TROWER — BRIDGE OF SIGHS
#39 TRACE — TRACE
#38 FRANK ZAPPA — APOSTROPHE (‘)
#37 MAHAVISHNU ORCHESTRA — APOCALYPSE
#36 LITTLE FEAT — FEATS DON’T FAIL ME NOW
#35 — #31
#35 EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER — WELCOME BACK MY FRIENDS…
#34 CAMEL — MIRAGE
#33 JOHN LENNON — WALLS AND BRIDGES
#32 RICHARD AND LINDA THOMPSON — I WANT TO SEE THE BRIGHT LIGHTS TONIGHT
#31 SUPERTRAMP — CRIME OF THE CENTURY
#30 — #26
#30 STEELY DAN — PRETZEL LOGIC
#29 THE COSMIC JOKERS — THE COSMIC JOKERS
#28 SKYHOOKS — LIVING IN THE SEVENTIES
#27 CAN — SOON OVER BABALUMA
#26 DAVID BOWIE — DIAMOND DOGS
#25 — #21
#25 SANTANA — LOTUS
#24 GONG — YOU
#23 FOCUS — HAMBURGER CONCERTO
#22 GRYPHON — RED QUEEN TO GRYPHON THREE
#21 ROBERT WYATT — ROCK BOTTOM
#20 — #16
#20 STEELEYE SPAN — NOW WE ARE SIX
#19 THE RESIDENTS — MEET THE RESIDENTS
#18 CLUSTER — ZUCKERZEIT
#17 VAN MORRISON — IT’S TOO LATE TO STOP NOW
#16 BILLY COBHAM — CROSSWINDS
#15 — #11
#15 LOU REED — ROCK ‘N’ ROLL ANIMAL
#14 POPOL VUH — EINSJÄGER UND SIEBENJÄGER
#13 BETTY DAVIS — THEY SAY I’M DIFFERENT
#12 JACKSON BROWNE — LATE FOR THE SKY
#11 MIKE OLDFIELD — HERGEST RIDGE
#10 — #6
#10 BOB MARLEY & THE WAILERS — NATTY DREAD
#9 NEIL YOUNG — ON THE BEACH
#8 GENESIS — THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY
#7 HARMONIA — MUSIC VON HARMONIA
#6 KING CRIMSON — STARLESS AND BIBLE BLACK
#5 — #1
#5 KRAFTWERK — AUTOBAHN
#4 JONI MITCHELL — CAUGHT AND SPARK
#3 KING CRIMSON — RED
#2 YES — RELAYER
#1 TANGERINE DREAM — PHAEDRA
FURTHER 1974 FEATURES
So over to you… what are your favourite albums from 1974?
vinylconnection.com.au 
What a Herculean labour completed. well done Bruce! I still would have promoted your #65 by about 63-ish places though!
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Hawkwind should always be in search of altitude. Bravo.
I also imagine Bob Marley might be a high achiever in any ’74 list of yours.
What would be your #1?
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I’m really not sure, I have about 10 LPs in my Top 5 but no clear #1; it’s not a year that dazzles me. I rate Roxy’s Country Life, Blue Oyster Cult Secret treaties too, Winter In America as well.
Don’t think I’ve got a #1.
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Winter in America by Doug Ashdown? Wow. Now that is niche!
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1974 if not the peak of the 70’s sound so close. Skyhooks Living in the Seventies 50 years on is now my personal theme song as of January 7th. Other notable local releases for the year include; Stevie Wright Hard Road with the epic Evie. We found out later it was a most apt title. Ross Ryan My Name Means Horse singer songwriters were very much in vogue. Lesser known Sid Rumpo from Perth with First Offence. Dingoes had a top 40 hit with Way Out West from their self titled first album. Billy Thorpe transformation from 60’s pop artist to 70’s rocker was well documented in the compilation Rock Classics. Another band with origins in the 60’s Master’s Apprentices closed their chapter with Now That it’s Over. New band with the glam-rock scene moniker AC/DC released High Voltage Rock ‘ Roll. A portent of things to come.
Now some thoughts on overseas releases that resonated. Jethro Tull’s Warchild. Was reliably informed at the time, the album sleeve featuring Ian Anderson had Melbourne’s 70’s CBD as a background. Nothing like Melbourne today. Agree with many of your selections VC, but a few notable omissions, for the Angels. Minnie Ripperton’s Perfect Angel what a voice! So high and pure. Finally Gram Parson’s posthumous Grevious Angel. Hugely influential.
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Loved that trawl through the local scene, Woody.
I had plans for a dedicated Aus post, but ran out of puff. If I had, Ross Ryan, Dingoes, Sid Rumpo and Stevie Wright would all have featured (as would Jim Keays and Mandu). Acca Dacca will almost certainly appear if I saddle up again next year. High Voltage is a great debut. And I’m with you on Skyhooks as well!
Thank you.
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Once again, you’ve completed a mighty project, Bruce. The thought of ranking 74 albums would give me hives – granted, oftentimes, I tend to overthink stuff! 🙂
That said, my own look at 1974 albums resulted in an initial list of 40, of which I picked the following six – just don’t ask me to rank them! 🙂
– Joni Mitchell: Court and Spark
– Steely Dan: Pretzel Logic
– Lynyrd Skynyrd: Second Helping
– Eric Clapton: 641 Ocean Boulevard
– Supertramp: Crime of the Century
– Genesis: The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway
Except for Skynyrd, all of the above are on your list as well.
I love Dylan’s “Before the Flood.” That said, my list excluded live albums. 🙂
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Cheers, Christian. And thanks for being such a loyal participant. I looked forward to your diligent responses; in fact they helped keep me going at a couple of points!
The five where we overlap are a very strong set, aren’t they? Lynryd Skynryd were never on my radar, other than their pouty response to Neil Young’s ‘Southern Man’. (I think I’ve always got my Southern rock at the Allman Brothers counter.)
I sure get the choice to exclude live albums, and have done so in the past. But ’74 threw up a few absolute corkers, so I had a bet both ways and did a side-bar list as well as letting five sneak into the Countdown.
Now, where’s that 1975 spreadsheet?
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Thanks, Bruce, you continue to impress me with your wealth of knowledge! As for 1975, I’m planning a preview post in early January. 🙂
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Reading one through seventy-four as a countdown list, two things strike me immediately:
• the strength of the Australian selection
• the diversity of the music.
What’s not apparent in such a list is the knowledge and commitment of the writer: Phenomenal.
Thanks Bruce.
DD
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Appreciate that, DD. Diversity was certainly a ‘theme’ this time!
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I’m sure I have a few 74 faves (Some that you picked). My brain just isnt wired to do the research. What year are we in now?
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LOL. We are 1974 + 50, mate. 😅
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In my youth I always was always more interested in music from the early century, so I missed out on a lot of current music in the 70s, but I do have a few from your list: Lennon, Mitchell, ELO. Though I would add five that are not: Dylans Planet Waves, Frank Sinatra’s Some Nice Things I’ve Missed, George Harrison’s Dark Horse, Michael Nesmith’s The Prison and Big Star’s Radio City. All but the last I actually owned back in ’74. Great list! I’ll check out a few of them for sure.
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D’you know, Geo, I’m not entirely sure how the Big Star was overlooked. Should have been somewhere in the 20s, I reckon. My bad!
That’s a good selection you have named. I was hoping to read some titles that are not in the VC collection (or were passed over for one reason or another), so thank you!
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Once again, congrats on a great project, always fun to follow along. I went through my roster of ’74 records and made a list of the ones I’d consider for top of the pile stature . . . as it turned out, I ended up with 37 albums, half of your count, so that seemed fortuitous and I left the list at that level. Here’s what I came up with, sorted alphabetically. A good deal of overlap with yours, but some outliers as well . . .
1. 10cc, “Sheet Music”
2. Bad Company, “Bad Company”
3. Bobby Hutcherson, “Cirrus”
4. Cat Stevens, “Buddha and the Chocolate Box”
5. Dolly Parton, “Jolene”
6. Earth, Wind & Fire, “Open Our Eyes”
7. Eberhard Weber, “The Colours of Chloë”
8. Eno, “Here Come the Warm Jets”
9. Eno, “Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)”
10. Fela Kuti, “Confusion”
11. Focus, “Hamburger Concerto”
12. Funkadelic, “Standing on the Verge of Getting It On”
13. Genesis, “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway”
14. Good Rats, “Tasty”
15. Grateful Dead, “From the Mars Hotel”
16. Harmonia, “Musik von Harmonia”
17. Hawkwind, “Hall of the Mountain Grill”
18. Henry Cow, “Unrest”
19. Hot Tuna, “The Phosphorescent Rat”
20. Isaac Hayes, “Truck Turner”
21. Jethro Tull, “Warchild”
22. John Cale, “Fear”
23. Jorma Kaukonen, “Quah”
24. King Crimson, “Red”
25. King Crimson, “Starless and Bible Black”
26. KISS, “KISS”
27. Kraftwerk, “Autobahn”
28. Linda Rondstadt, “Heart Like a Wheel”
29. Mike Oldfield, “Hergest Ridge”
30. Parliament, “Up for the Down Stroke”
31. Roxy Music, “Country Life”
32. Slapp Happy, “Slapp Happy”
33. Steeleye Span, “Now We Are Six”
34. Steely Dan, “Pretzel Logic”
35. The Residents, “Meet the Residents”
36. Todd Rundgren, “Todd”
37. Yes, “Relayer”
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Enjoyed scouring this list very much, Eric. Quite a few of your entries were on my starting list; I would not wish to have to defend why some made the cut and others didn’t!
Also loved seeing some of your ‘outliers’ – Slapp Happy and Henry Cow in particular. Also enjoyed seeing unknown albums by artists I’m familiar with (Isaac Hayes, Hot Tuna).
Just the one artist that I’ve never heard of nor encountered: Good Rats. Part of me hoped they might be some kind of Zappa spin-off but Discogs tells me they are a “rock band from Long Island”. LOL.
Thanks for compiling a companion list. Great fun.
BTW, do you have a spreadsheet of your collection? One of the challenges I found was identifying incorrect information in my (pre-internet) excel file. In fact a couple of albums were late substitutions because I discovered late in the day that, say, my #47 was released in ’75. (Don’t tell anyone!)
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Good Rats are second order Zappa related: Flo and Eddie produced one of their albums. “Tasty” is their masterpiece, to these ears. My back story about them, and a recommended listening list, here:
I don’t have a spreadsheet, but I have tons of digital files at this point in lieu of CDs or vinyls, so data can be gleaned and sorted there. That said, it is often incorrect, so I think I checked most of these to make sure that they were actually ’74 releases in the US, and there were a few I dropped and a few I added when I went to various reference sites to confirm things!
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Ah, “’74 releases in the US”… that’s a helpful explanation of the occasional anomaly that I spied. Different year of release in a different territory. Thanks for clearing that up!
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Great work on this series Bruce – what a huge task!
As it turns out, I’m remarkably unfamiliar with 1974. For other years, I reckon I’d have a lot more albums that I would know and could pick from. Anyway, here’s my top 10 of ’74 in a rough order:
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That’s a very solid list, Ryland. Super.
I don’t know the Gene Clark but all the others were either ‘in’ or contenders. 🙂
Not yet sure how/if I’ll approach 1975!
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So many great album and hard to argue with your rankings. As for my favourites, these pring to mind:
The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway _Genesis
Todd _Todd Rundgren
Fulfillingness First Finale_Stevie Wonder
Here Come the Warm Jets_Brian Eno
Diamond Dogs_David Bowie
Autobahn_Kraftwerk
On the Beach_Neil Young
Get Up With It _Miles Davis
I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight_Richard and Linda Thompson
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Excellent albums, all of ’em!
In passing, I’ve just discovered why several US music-colleagues have chosen 1973’s Eno debut. Seems that although the 8-track of Here Come The Warm Jets came out in America in ’73, the record lagged behind the rest of the world and appeared in 1974. There you go; another fascinating micro-fact!
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I love this list and being a prog fan I love things like “Hergest Ridge” at #11, my fave Oldfield album. I would have included the Kinks’ “Preservation Part 2” as they are my favorite group. Interestingly, a lot of these picks I discovered later in life, as in “Phaedra”
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Cheers, Rick. Delighted to high five over Hergest Ridge! Somewhat to my embarrassment, I must confess I’ve never really connected to the Kinks albums, despite thoroughly agreeing that Ray D is a master songwriter. I guess we all have our indefensible likes and ‘luke warm’s! I have a copy of Muswell Hillbillies; should spend some holiday time with that, perhaps.
All the best of the season.
Bruce
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Well, “Muswell” is certainly a good one to have. Have a great holiday!
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