Updated Rolling Stone ‘500 greatest’ list stays old-school

Neal Augenstein, wtop.com

WASHINGTON – If you believe Rolling Stone’s 2012 list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, bands just aren’t making the kind of music they used to make.

In updating its 2003 list, Rolling Stone added 30 albums, while displacing 30 from its 500 greatest.

The top 10 remain the same:

1. Beatles — “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”
2. Beach Boys — “Pet Sounds”
3. Beatles — “Revolver”
4. Bob Dylan — “Highway 61 Revisited”
5. Beatles — “Rubber Soul”
6. Marvin Gaye — “What’s Going On”
7. Rolling Stones — “Exile on Main Street”
8. Clash — “London Calling”
9. Bob Dylan — “Blonde on Blonde”
10. Beatles — “White Album”

With four of the Beatles’ albums in the top 10, some might question whether the Rolling Stones list skews too far toward its older readers.

The 2012 list includes three Kanye West albums — “Late Registration,” “The College Dropout,” and “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.”

Radiohead makes the list twice, for “Amnesiac” and “In Rainbows.”

Lil Wayne “Tha Carter III” joins the list, as does the late Amy Winehouse’s “Back to Black.”

Albums that slipped off the list include Beach Boys “Sunflower,” David Bowie’s “Changesone,” Elton John’s “Elton John” and Madonna’s “Music.”

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