Rolling Stone reimagines its 500 Best Albums of All Time list with 240 new additions

Yes, this is lowering standards to the lowest common denominator to please those so-called "culture warriors" who judge the merits of music based on who made it or what group those who made it belong to and not artistic merit. Rewarding mediocrity/idiocy and those who create toxic culture brings down not only our culture as a whole but those groups that they pretend to serve.

I think you're my dad

Thanks man, that cracked me up. Your dad sounds like someone I'd hang out with.

I mean I've been trying to explain this on the internet but every time I do, people just start attacking me personally, going on my profile trying to find thing to diminish my opinion, even though I don't attack anyone and just state my opinion that music is not as good as it once was. There was a time when people were massively buying and listening to the Beatles and Queen and bands who pushed the limits of music and recording, and now they massively buy Taylor Swift and other manufactured pop material, that can't be good for musical evolution. It tells record companies to keep investing on instant reward pop music over real artists

I am impressed Jacob. Social media and the internet bring out the worst in many people especially those who are the most childish and thus would listen to the most childish music. It is sad that so many people have been infantilized by, as you call it, "instant reward pop music." Infantilization is pervasive all through our society as most of the biggest mass music, movies, etc become lower level, more base, cartoonish and childish every year. Just look at the prevalence of names that include things like BIG, Lil', Baby, etc. Even our political discourse and many of our political and thought leaders have become infantilized. I'm glad that you recognize the new ground that even massively popular bands like The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Jefferson Airplane, Queen, Supertramp, Moody Blues, Black Sabbath, Yes, Genesis, CSNY, etc broke by incorporating many different styles of music, experimenting with different states of mind/mood, instruments, sophisticated melodies/harmonies, etc into a cohesive sound with raw emotion mixing quite often with lyrics about personal, political, cultural and spiritual evolution/development/enlightenment. They challenged us to read Burroughs, Tolkien, Leary, Orwell, Huxley, Byron, Lovecraft, Ram Dass, etc. That is the opposite of most modern pop (with it's uber simplistic melodic structures & lyrics) and most (not all) of the mass appeal rap music which (not only lacks much in the way of musicality but often uses developmentally disabled language/spelling), instead of seeking to inspire and bring people up, dumb people down and bring out the most childish, narcissistic, base, anti-intellectual, violent, egocentric nature of humanity. Perhaps, the find that I find the worst is the lack of any shred of authenticity. So many laughably bad posers. I do like many modern bands but not the mass appeal stuff.

Anyway, sorry to be so longwinded. Thanks for speaking your truth to those sick souls and I'm sorry that they find unethical ways of attacking you. When they can't beat you intellectually, they go low. Keep speaking your truth and don't let them bring you down.

Yes, Madonna was uber influential and the most successful solo female artist of all time but didn't receive her due. There is no way to justify Beyonce's placing so high on here. Neither did George Michael get his due. "Older" is an absolute masterpiece that was a huge hit in the rest of the world but was largely ignored in the US after he came out. What about Frank Sinatra? Elton John, the biggest selling act of the 1970's. Crosby Stills and Nash's first album defined the 70's sound for at least the first half of the decade yet was way down the list. The Moody Blues' "Days Of Future Passed" virtually created progressive rock while King Crimson's "Court Of The Crimson King" defined it. How could the Jefferson Airplane's "Surrealistic Pillow" not be in the top 400 when it, along with Sgt Pepper, defined not only the Summer Of Love but psychedelic music for years to come?

The good news is that in 20 years, no one will be remembering much of the garbage that was added. It will sound like some of the cheesiest, most embarrassing 1980's stuff sounds now while the classics will still be classics as they have already shown their staying power as many regularly still chart today. I mean, listening to Kanye West is something no one wants to admit to doing these days but in 20 years, he'll be even more of a joke.

You are so right! This list is TOTAL FAKE! Places were bought or it's just a dozen people that work there personal taste. We can also say the list is AMERICAN as it only lists Albums that were extremely successful in US when released and keep being catalog sellers (even if those artists have much better works that didn't sell so well there despite causing more impact on the future of music and society).

I'm glad that you agree about the list. Good point about it being so American. I found it extremely biased against UK, Euro and other non-US artists. There was an agenda besides music to this list.