The Readers’ Top 100

When I read the readers’ Top 100 list last Sunday I was pleased to note that I own nine of the top 10 albums and a full 50 of the 100 chosen.

My Top 10 omission? “Sgt. Pepper.” I know many consider this album the “Citizen Kane” of pop music. Unlike the classic Orson Welles film, however, the album doesn’t hold up. So many other Beatles collections simply have better songs. I would have to say that it is the No. 1 overrated album of all time.

HAL SUMMERS

Indio

*

It is hardly fair to give albums that were not ranked from one to 10 only one point each. Instead, they should have been given 5.5 points each, the average number of points 10 albums in a ranked list would have received. While I doubt this would have put any of my choices into the Top 100, it might have created significant differences.

It also would have been interesting to list the top 100 albums if each artist had only their top-ranking album listed (i.e., 100 different artists would be on the list).

JOSEPH L. THORNBURG

Glendale

*

There was one name inexcusably missing from the readers’ poll: the greatest popular singer of the 20th century, Frank Sinatra.

The Beatles do belong at the top, but I can’t come to grips with the fact that no Sinatra gems made the list. He has had 60 years of staying power and his theme and concept albums started over a decade earlier than the Fab Four’s did.

HARRY BLUEBOND

Valley Vilage

*

I wonder how Miles Davis’ 1959 “Kind of Blue” (No. 74) got mixed up in this? If one is discussing pop music of the ‘50s, how about Eddie Fisher, Patti Page, Perry Como and Bill Haley? But Miles? He’s so far removed from this category that they might as well be comparing electric guitars to oboes.

As they say, rock ‘n’ roll is for people who don’t understand jazz, but let’s put Miles in there anyway because he was way cool.

A. OVREGAARD

Burbank

*

Your voting system is possibly the best you could come up with, but it’s certainly greatly flawed. After all, how do you explain “Velvet Underground and Nico,” an album that barely entered the Top 200, coming in at No. 44. What that probably means is that a paltry 22 VU die-hards voted it their No. 1 selection, and BAM!, 223 points, good enough for No. 44. This is bogus!

Had I applied the effort, I could have coordinated Jethro Tull fans to make the band’s 1973 masterpiece, “Passion Play,” perhaps the No. 1 album of all time, according to this poll.

STEVE SMITH

Arcadia

*

Jackson Browne’s “The Pretender” and “Late for the Sky” albums were Nos. 101 and 102 and thus didn’t make it on the Top 100 list, right?

HANA YAARI

Los Angeles