There have been polls, voting and exercising the best and the worst of music albums of all time. Each album tells a fascinating story and many a time a fan has changed his or her mind on deciding the best pop albums. Understandably, pop albums have their good and their bad side, for it matters a lot to the music listener who would either tune in or tune out. Nobody quite knows why an album should arouse such passions, but they do.

The results here may frustrate you, as much as they may delight the person next to you, but then that’s democracy. Like any such poll, The Top Ten Pop Albums of All Time brilliantly illuminates our changing ideas of what constitutes a “classic album”. We can begin to see a few records of the recent past becoming the classics of tomorrow. Even at the highest end of the list you will find the 1990s being represented, but then before we go any further, let’s get down to what really got them there. It’s talking about the best work in music, vocals, orchestration, lyrics, compositions, album inlay and production. In the time – hallowed tradition of such countdowns, The Top Ten Pop Albums of All Time is not in reverse order as it’s not a chart rating. So let the countdown begin……… but before that, can you as a reader find yourself the privileged owner of any or maybe all of The Top Ten Pop Albums of All Time?

Verus Ferreira takes you on a nostalgic musical ride.

1 - Like a Prayer – Madonna

This is probably the album that showed Madonna in a different light, an album that made the diva come to an artistic age. ‘Like A Prayer’ earned her respect as well as critical analysis for her title song and video. The gospel influenced song whose video had a black man playing Jesus Christ, made her the talk of the town for sometime. Thus it would seem that the album is a deeply personal record whose soul barring nature produced some of her most elegant and dedicated work to date. Her track ‘Promise to Try’ an ode to her later mother or ‘Cherish’ shows the dance and the serious side of the once controversial queen of pop. ‘Love Song’ her raunchy duet with Prince is also a duet between a super singer and a super songwriter while ‘Express Yourself’ is another best song from the album, which was packed with ballads, grove, and rocky danceable pop.

2 – Purple Rain – Prince and the Revolution

While he takes a name change off and on, sometimes being referred to as a symbol, peculiar album titles notwithstanding, Prince and the Revolution cannot be forgotten for their music, crazy lyrics and punchy break beat sound. This album can be labeled as pop - rock if you really go to the nitty gritty of music genres. It is also the miniature artist’s first crossover album where he capitalized on much of the work by the likes of Sly Stone, Jimi Hendrix, and George Clinton. Prince recognized no boundaries between ‘black’ and ‘white’ sounds. He may’ve been a weirdo, but who really cares when you have music like this. He could go overboard when he cried on ‘When Doves Cry’ complete with minimal percussion and handclaps. His lyrics were subtle yet shrewd, sex and humor mixed, like when he sang… ‘I only want to see you underneath the purple rain……….’ His innovative style of behavior was also demonstrated in the movie of the same title. Other noteworthy songs include ‘I would Die 4 U’, ‘Darling Nikki’, ‘Let’s go Crazy’.

3 –Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band – The Beatles

Reversing back to the late 60s and you have the Beatles with their best - selling record ever. Upon its release the album’s effect was immediate and spectacular and turned a new leaf making record sleeves an art form. The idea for the album came from Paul McCartney while flying back from a Kenyan safari. His idea of adopting the persona of a fictitious band freed the Beatles from people’s expectations about their music and allowed them to be more experimental. ‘Pepper’ was the first Beatles album without any of the black American influence, which had shaped their music and as a result was a peculiarly English pop - rock edged album. ‘Pepper’ spoke on English culture, the House of Lords, afternoon tea, holidays on the Isle of Wight and Victorian circuses. The album had a very dreamy, druggy feel, though it produced some of the best tracks ever like ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’, ‘She’s leaving home’, ‘A day in the life’ and the unforgettable opening bars on the title track. This album was special because it also was a time when each band mate had a say for the last time after which each was at the others throat while recording their next album.

4 – Thriller – Michael Jackson

The Peter Pan of Pop had his second solo full of all the ingredients of a Top the charts best – seller. The album released in early December 1982, just in time for Christmas had sold more than one million units in the US. Tracks like ‘Girl is mine’ a laid- back mid-tempo duet performed and co-written by Michael and Paul McCartney blew the lid off the album. The rock-tinged ‘Beat It’ was the singer’s third single, which had an electrifying solo by guitar hero Eddie Van Halen. The album spurned more hits ‘Wanna be startin’ something’, ‘Human Nature’, ‘P.Y.T’, and ‘Say Say, Say’ a duet performed and written by Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney. ‘Thriller’ generated a truckload of honors, including a record eight American Music Awards and seven Grammy Awards in 1984 including Album of the Year. Michael Jackson and ‘Thriller’ earned four Black Gold Awards, four American Video Awards, and three MTV Video Awards. When the 14-minute-long ‘Thriller’ video aired, MTV ran it twice an hour to meet demand. The short film marked an increase in scale for music videos and has been named the best made music video ever and is considered the most important clip in music video history. The short film turned the album into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's best-selling album in history.

This year the album completes 25 years and a special edition ‘Thriller 25’ features all the original tracks from the album. Contemporary singers of this decade also pay tribute to the album by adding their masala to Jackson’s hits. The album also comes with a half an hour DVD that contains all his early videos. Surely a collector’s item for years to come.

5 – Arrival - ABBA

ABBA's standing has had its ups and downs from Eurovision to the group splitting in 1982. They had class and they had culture. Their groovy music set the standard of pop songs. Most may not be aware that ABBA got its name from the first names of the members of the group in an acronym as in Agnetha, Bjorn, Anni-Frid and Benny – ABBA. Recorded when they were at their peak ‘Arrival’ ABBA’s fourth album brings a mixture of their sugary pop songs with infectious ballads for good measure.  

The disco pop anthem, ‘Dancing Queen’ or even the repetitious ‘Money, Money, Money’, to the excellent string arrangements on ‘My Love, My Life’ and the funnily enough ’When I kissed the teacher’ goes down to being one of their greatest recordings ever. Though ABBA had many other super hits, this album stands out for a few tracks that gave the band its mid career boost.

6 –Take the Heat of Me – Boney M

Boney M has never quite gone out of style. They are one international act whose appeal spans over 2 generations. After German record producer Frank Farian recorded the single 'Baby Do You Wanna Bump?’ he created Boney M to support the song, bringing in four West Indian vocalists who had been working as session singers in Germany. The band members Marcia Barrett, Liz Mitchell, Maizie Williams and Bobby Farrell, made musical history until the curtain closed on them in the mid 80s. This unforgettable 80s album, their first ever, has Boney M with that same first single ‘Baby Do you wanna bump’, to the ever lovable ‘Daddy Cool', 'Sunny', ‘No Woman No Cry’ and ‘Fever’. Although they never had much success in America, the Euro-disco group was a European phenomenon during the '70s.

7 - ‘All the way – A Decade of song’ - Celine Dion

A tussle between the best pop albums from Shania Twain and Celine Dion and you have the latter winning it hands down. This collection of love songs has her very best and includes the work done from her early days to the very recent. This greatest hits album, plus seven new releases, is no different. The album title ‘All the Way’ was the last time Frank Sinatra’s family allowed a duet to be recorded. Songs like, ‘The Power of love’, ‘If you ask me to’ or ‘Beauty and the beast’, ‘Because you loved me’ and the very strongly worded ‘It's all coming back to me now’ and ‘To love you more’. There’s also the Grammy nominated duet with R.Kelly ‘I'm your angel’ and the 1993 smash ‘Love can move mountains’. This album would also go down as the album that has her ever famous 1998 super hit ‘My heart will go on’ from the movie Titanic. The tracks here are very inspiring full of emotion - upbeat, touching and thought provoking. Lastly a mention has to be made of her collaboration with Meatloaf on ‘It's All Coming Back to Me Now.’

8. Spice - The Spice Girls

The five Spice Girls met in 1994 when they answered an ad looking for young women who could sing and dance. The advertiser got more than he bargained for. The five namely, Geri Halliwell, Emma Bunton, Melanie Chisholm, Victoria Beckham and Melanie Brown, had spunk and the fire within themselves to set off any obstacles. Knowing a little about the industry the girls got the advertiser fired and took whole control of their own career. Next the five scantily-clad well contoured lasses flashing their knickers with kung-fu kicks did was create a ruckus in the music industry with their first ever singles that took off instantly. They kicked off their career with ‘Wannabe’, ‘Say You'll Be There’ and ‘2 Become 1’ that saw them through the first stepping stone to fame. The five co – wrote almost all their tracks on this 1997 album. Call it Hip-hop, dancehall reggae, dance-club beats and soft balladry and all thrown into this spicy pop stew with utter abandon. Vocal lines were filled with screams, but filled to the brim with Girl Power. It would be surprising if you didn’t own a Spice Girl album.

9 - Music Box - Mariah Carey

This album was the turning point of her career music wise...and over the course of a few years, success wise. Since her self-titled 1990 debut, she had basically sung ballad after ballad with the exception of some up-tempo hits that are found here. This showed her versatility. This 1993 release her fourth, had Mariah pushing her sales over the all-important, Diva-essential 100 million mark.

Carey’s dizzying soprano vocal range is fabulous on songs like the immensely successful number ones from opening keyboards, high-pitched note, and dreamy vocals accompanied by drum-machines and synths in ‘Dreamlover’ to the fairly lush ‘Hero’ and the remake of Harry Nilsson's ‘Without You.’ Her lyrics are mushy when she croons ‘Dream lover come and rescue me."/...take me anywhere you want to baby now."

This album is one of Mariah's bestseller, for it also contains other big hits like the inspiring lyrics of the inspiring ‘Anytime You Need A Friend’ enhanced by her usual gospel backing chorus that includes Kelly Price. Her voice has very strong R&B styling here. There’s also the plain vocals on ‘Just to Hold You Once Again’ with its resonant organ synth and gospel choir, a la Whitney Houston you might think. Lastly there’s Clivilles and Cole of the C&C Music Factory who get Mariah bogeying down with ‘Now That I Know’ and ‘All I ever wanted’ with the unmissable skippy percussion. A perfect imitation of Linda Ronstadt or Barbara Streisand, her songs and production are the handiwork of Walter Anasieff and Careyherself.

10. Actualy - Pet Shop Boys 

Rock, pop rock, synth pop was brought on by the London duo of ex-Smash Hits journalist Neil Tennant and electro-musician Chris Lowe. Their third album ‘Actually’in 1987 proved they were no flash-in-the-pan pop sensation. Lyricist and vocalist Neil Tennant spoke about disaffected consumerism in ‘Rent’ and ‘Shopping’ with the grit that only a journalist could have done. While many picked them up as bankrupt singers, his partner, keyboardist and programming Chris Lowe, effortlessly proved them wrong, camouflaging clever commentary in the meaningful ‘It's a Sin’ a racy punchy groove of dance music and disco beats. The song has Neil singing about how growing up in the church he was taught that sin was inescapable. "…..everywhere I'm going to...it's a sin!".

The jewel in the album was ‘What Have I Done to Deserve This?’ a classic hit for which Lowe and Tennant that also got them singing with Dusty Springfield. 

The album was packed with some magnificent orchestration created by synthesizers and keyboards. Another trump on the album was the blissful 'One More Chance’. ‘Hit Music’ brings you back to the dance floor with the sounds of late 70s euro disco while ‘It Couldn't Happen Here’ was also the title of the movie the PSBoys made. ‘Heart’ uses a special vocal sampling of vowel sounds mixed and arranged into a rhythm pattern which creates the back beat of this number 1 single in the UK, while the slow ‘King's Cross’ brings us feelings of loss and regret.

Looking closely at the lyrics and you’d have ‘Shopping’ a statement on buying and selling, on society and influence while ‘Rent’ was the confessions of a person in a relationship where love is calculated by money and presents. The lyrics were unimaginable when Neil sings "……I love you, you pay my rent". Either way you look at it, this album is actually perfect.

Those who missed out on The Top Ten Pop Albums of all Time but surely deserve a mention are:

1)      Rio – Duran Duran

2)      Now and Forever – Air Supply

3)      Whitney – Whitney Houston

4)      Business as Usual - Men at Work

5)      Bridge over troubled water – Simon and Garfunkel

6)      Oops'…. I did it again – Britney Spears

7)      By Request - Boyzone

8)      Spirits having flown – The Bee Gees

9)      Black and Blue – Backstreet Boys

10)    She’s so unusual – Cyndi Lauper