I was inspired by my friend's similar listing, and I'm now also going to list ten albums that have greatly influenced my taste in music. I'll proceed in chronological order, and apart from influencing my tastes, a second criterion is that I still listen to the artist today, at least in some capacity. I'll give a representative example of each album, and also give my opinion on the artist's creative output as a whole.
Without further ado: when I was at the age when I started listening to "adult music" for the first time (that being around 2005), my music catalogue was primarily composed of CDs from my dad's collection, ripped onto our family computer. The streaming platforms we know today weren't a thing yet. By far the most influential record out of my dad's collection was Queen's A Night at the Opera. The music had the rich melodies and harmonies I'd grown accustomed to listening to The Beatles (which was abundant in my dad's collection), but the new thing to me (and the influence on my taste in music) here was the heaviness. It is perhaps due to this record that I mainly listen to metal today. As an adult, it still surprises me how heavy the best track on this record – The Prophet's Song (don't @ me) – is, even by today's standards. On top of that, the track "Death on Two Legs" is lyrically so mean that I don't even know if one could get away with such savagery today. The only other songs that come even close are Woods of Ypres' A Meeting Place and Time and Dire Straits' It Never Rains.
My take on Queen: This is the best Queen record. The three earlier ones are worthwhile as well. I don't particularly care for the later Queen albums.
influence: heavy metal
excerpt: The Prophet's Song (YouTube)
This post was retroactively compiled on 2024-01-19 from an old Facebook post.