1. The BeatlesThe White Album
I’ve chosen The White Album, although the biggest one for me as a child was Sergeant Pepper’s. I can actually remember the Beatles, I’m that old! I remember how huge they were. When Sergeant Pepper’s came out I was in Malaya in the summer of 1967. My oldest brother had come back from the UK with that album, The Velvet Underground & Nico and Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme by Simon and Garfunkel, and a lot of blues records that he’d been given by a friend of my dad, including a load of Leadbelly stuff. And we’d listen to all these amazing records during the long summer holiday. I’ll never forget hearing Sergeant Pepper’s for the first time. The songs were incredible. So I chose The White Album. [laughs] It’s perhaps the least accessible of the Beatles albums, but I love the John Lennon songs on it like ‘Dear Prudence’ and ‘Cry Baby Cry’.
