We're getting old! Celebrating some album anniversaries.

Looking back on landmark releases by Morphine, U2, The Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy, and Nick Cave.

In chronological order…

U2 — The Joshua Tree (March 9, 1987)

What can one say that hasn’t already been said? I talk a lot about how superstardom isn’t good for an artist’s output, but this is one case where I’m proven dead wrong. Simply put, The Joshua Tree is the album where the stars aligned for U2: the Irish quartet’s fascination with America lined up with its musical development, creative maturity and skyrocketing popularity for what became its first — and arguably most definitive — imprint on pop culture.

As Rick Quinn writes in his new retrospective for PopMatters:

The Edge [speaking to band biographer Neil McCormick for his 2006 book U2 by U2] described the band’s work on The Joshua Tree as reaching for a “‘cinematic record’ where every song would conjure up a physical location.” He claimed that The Joshua Tree sought “music that can actually evoke a landscape and a place and really bring you there.”

For what it’s worth, I consider Joshua Tree just the beginning of U2’s hot streak, which for me runs up to and including 2004’s All That You Can’t Leave Behind, but you can’t argue with the sheer majesty of this record, which at times verges on folk rock in spite of how big the band’s lens was. It’s pretty stunning how intimate songs like “Running To Stand Still” feel considering that U2 was about to rampage over the next decade and a half like a worldbeating juggernaut.

The Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy — Hypocrisy Is The Greatest Luxury (March 3, 1992)

A classic! Before Michael Franti set out on a solo career, he fronted this Bay Area hip hop duo that, in my view, laid the groundwork for the high-octane socio-political commentary we’ve gotten from artists like dälek, Immortal Technique, and Killer Mike/Run The Jewels. Franti borrows a lot from the delivery and phrasing of Public Enemy’s Chuck D, but the soundscapes created by percussionist/metalworks artist Rono Tse really set this music apart, as does the incisiveness of the message. I’ll be going more in-depth on this album on the podcast. Some of the songs also feature guitar contributions from Charlie Hunter. If you haven’t heard this whole record, I couldn’t recommend it any more highly, and I have very fond memories of being stoned in a friend’s car as the two of us were blown away by it.

U2 — Pop (March 3, 1997)

Arguably the superstar Irish quartet’s most experimental release under the official U2 banner (I would give that award to their Passengers collaboration with Brian Eno, but that wasn’t a “proper” U2 album even though I consider it one), Pop is a galaxy apart from Joshua Tree — so much so that it might as well be two different bands. Though Pop fell short of Bono’s promise that it was going to be a full-on descent into electronica, I still feel like it stretched pretty far while also retaining the songwriting foundation that, 25 years later, we can see was still at its peak.

As I remember it, the band was hyping it up as if their goal was to keep de-constructing what a rock band was supposed to be — I remember a quote from Bono saying something to the effect of “We’re making music that doesn’t exist.” And they were clearly excited and inspired by the then-burgeoning electronic movement. Compared to what Bono had set the public up to expect, Pop came across as somewhat conservative, but I think it actually benefits from having one foot in and one foot out of the band’s flirtations with strangeness.

Bono also envisioned the album as a self-consciously satirical statement on consumerism. I think their efforts fell short in that regard, but that doesn’t detract at all from the music as far as I’m concerned, especially since the production takes front and center. “I just love the way that album sounds,” musician and longtime friend Mikey James (AKA Singing River) once told me, “even where I don’t care so much for the actual songs.”

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds— The Boatman’s Call (March 3, 1997)

I recently reviewed Nick Cave’s album with Bad Seeds bandmate Warren Ellis, titled Carnage, but to be honest I find Cave to be an artist of such depth that I have a hard time finding words to describe his music. Boatman’s Call really struck me for the richness of his style, and for that I think it’s the perfect entry point into his catalog.

Morphine — Like Swimming (March 11, 1997)

I cannot express the impact that the Boston-based trio Morphine had on my musical outlook, with their pseudo-cocktail sound built around two-string bass and baritone sax. Late frontman Mark Sandman had a way of conveying a mix of noir-ish allure that was almost cartoonish, but spiked with a genuine vulnerability that I’ve never heard anyone balance quite like that ever since.

After making a splash with the albums Cure For Pain (1993) and Yes (1995), the band signed to Dreamworks and put out Like Swimming, which is the album of theirs I enjoy most from start to finish. For me, the peaks on the previous two albums hit harder, but if my favorite songs from those records hit like a sugar blast, Like Swimming hits my system with a slow, sustained wave of satisfaction like macha tea or something.

And the album sounds like the cover looks, with arguably the most sumptuous production of anything in the band’s catalog. It’s also interesting because you can look at Morphine as part of what we might call the underbelly of the alternative-rock era. Although there was certainly a fair amount of attention paid to artists — Morphine, Soul Coughing, Pavement, Cake, and on and on — who didn’t fit the alterna-rock paradigm, the landscape at the time was quite fertile with artists bringing a touch of jazz and the avant-garde to the edges of the mainstream.

Like Swimming, I would say, makes for a great onramp to get to that realm.

Enjoy!!!!