Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
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The stories behind some of the most essential albums of all time, told by the artists who made them and Rolling Stone’s writers and editors. Each episode focuses on one album from the brand-new, updated version of Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums list, featuring fresh conversations with the people who made the music, classic interview audio and expert commentary. Episodes include the late Tom Petty on his solo classic Wildflowers, Taylor Swift talking about her career-changing 2012 album Red, and Public Enemy breaking down their political masterpiece It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.
Now we’re back with Season Two. Across 10 episodes, you’ll hear Dolly Parton tell the stories behind the songs on her 1971 solo breakthrough Coat of Many Colors; Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr delve into the making of the Beatles’ troubled final album, Let It Be; Britney Spears’ collaborators explain how she made 2007’s Blackout in the eye of a paparazzi hurricane; friends and relatives of Alice Coltrane look back at how she overcame tragedy to create her masterpiece Journey in Satchidananda; Rivers Cuomo and his bandmates reflect on the unlikely birth of Weezer’s Blue Album; and much more.
Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums is hosted by Senior Writer Brittany Spanos.
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Top 10 Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums Episodes
Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
11/17/21 • 42 min
What's Going On was R&B's first concept album, a suite of seamlessly connected songs tackling everything from police brutality to heroin addiction, inner-city poverty, and the dire state of the environment. When Marvin Gaye first proposed the project, inspired by a song brought to him by Four Tops member Obie Benson, Gordy told him it was career suicide. But when the title track came out, it was an instant smash, and Gordy immediately asked for more. Gaye channeled everything that was weighing on his mind, Terrell's tragic death from a brain tumor, his brother Frankie's harrowing experiences in Vietnam, the struggles of the civil-rights movement, all into a sobering yet healing treatise on troubled times.
In the season one finale of the Amazon Original podcast, "Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums", we take an in-depth look at What's Going On, which took the top spot on Rolling Stone's newly updated 500 Greatest Albums list. In the episode you'll hear archival interviews with Marvin Gaye, where he delves into his evolving mindset at the time. You'll also hear reflections on the record from Marvin's collaborator and confidant Smokey Robinson; esteemed singer Aaron Neville, Gaye's contemporary and longtime admirer; his biographer David Ritz; and even his beloved sister Zeola Gaye. Later in the episode, host Brittany Spanos leads a roundtable discussion on the history and still-vital legacy of What's Going On featuring legendary music journalist Nelson George, who interviewed Gaye during his lifetime; singer Devon Gilfillian, who recently covered What's Going On in full on his own new album; and director Spike Lee, who wove the songs of What's Going On throughout Da Five Bloods, his acclaimed 2020 film about a group of black veterans returning to Vietnam in the present day.
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Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums: Introducing Season 2
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
11/19/21 • 2 min
The stories behind some of the most essential albums of all time, told by the artists who made them. Each episode focuses on one album from Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums list and features fresh conversations with the people behind the music, as well as classic interview audio and expert commentary from Rolling Stone’s writers and editors. Season 2 takes you inside a new slate of classics: Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr break down what people got wrong about Let it Be, Dolly Parton tells the full story of her career-changing personal statement Coat of Many Colors, and collaborators, friends and admirers break down albums by Kanye West, Britney Spears, Alice Coltrane and more.
Season 2 will launch new episodes starting on November 16th, exclusively on Amazon Music and Wondery+.
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Lucinda Williams' "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
05/10/22 • 38 min
In the newest episode of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums, we dive into Lucinda Williams' 1998 masterpiece "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road," an album that helped define modern roots music and got Williams' long-overdue recognition as one of America's greatest songwriters. The album took six years, three producers, and some label drama to make, but Williams' perfectionism resulted in an arguably perfect album.
Williams joins Rolling Stone Country's Joseph Hudak to tell the stories behind songs like "Drunken Angel", and title track "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road" that affected Williams' father so much he apologized to Williams when he first heard it. Producers Steve Earle and Ray Kennedy in addition to Waxahatchee help flesh out the story. Later in the episode, Rolling Stone staffers Claire Shaffer and Jon Freeman join host Brittany Spanos to discuss the album's legacy.
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Phil Spector's "A Christmas Gift for You From Phil Spector", ft. Darlene Love
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
05/17/22 • 43 min
In this special holiday episode of Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums, our new podcast on Amazon Music, we delve into 1963's "A Christmas Gift for You From Phil Spector", an album that changed the way we look at holiday music. In 2019, Rolling Stone named it the best Christmas album of all time.
A labor of love that pulled together all the top girl groups, including the Crystals and the Ronettes, the album was initially an ill-fated flop, dropping the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated (or so the legend goes). After being reissued in 1972 the record found its place in both the holiday and rock & roll canons, and inspired everyone from the Beach Boys to Bruce Springsteen to take a crack at Christmas standards. There was darkness under that festive tree, however, as the infamous perfectionist Spector directed artists on the record with an iron fist and later took his obsession with guns to a far darker place when he killed actress Lana Clarkson in 2003.
Spector was unable to talk with Rolling Stone's News Editor Brenna Ehrlich for this episode (as he is serving time for second-degree murder), but she did chat with Darlene Love of the Blossoms about the fame of "Christmas Baby Please Come Home," La La Brooks of the Crystals about conditions in the studio, and Brian Wilson about how Spector inspired the Beach Boys. She also checked in with Spector fan, journalist Greil Marcus, to talk about the album's enduring fame. Later in the episode, host Brittany Spanos discusses the history, allure, and occasional ridiculousness of holiday music with Rolling Stone staffers Rob Sheffield and Jon Dolan, as well as comedian, Desus & Mero writer-producer, and podcast host Josh Gondelman.
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The Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
11/17/21 • 54 min
In early 1966, the Beach Boys arrived at Los Angeles’ Western Studios to hear what Brian Wilson had been up to. The touring version of the band – Mike Love, Bruce Johnston, Al Jardine and Dennis Wilson – had been on the road in Japan, singing surf hits like “Fun, Fun Fun” and “I Get Around.” Wilson, after suffering a mental breakdown on a plane the year before, stayed home, opting to work on instrumental tracks with studio musicians.
What the band heard stunned them. Using instruments like harpsichord, harmonica, strings, and even sleigh bells, Wilson had written a spiritual album that captured heartbreak, insecurity, pain and sadness of entering adulthood. According to legend, the Beach Boys did not like "Pet Sounds", and its commercial failure led Brian Wilson to lose confidence in himself and descend further into mental illness. As the band explained to Rolling Stone in this week's episode of 500 Greatest Albums of All Time podcast, the truth is more a little more complicated.
While "Pet Sounds" didn’t sell, it inspired generations of musicians, beginning with the Beatles, who, according to George Martin, said ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ “never would have happened” without "Pet Sounds". The album was voted number two on Rolling Stone's rebooted 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list, the spot it held in 2003.
Rolling Stone’s Jason Fine narrates the episode, which includes archival interviews with Brian Wilson, members of Wrecking Crew and more, as well as new interviews with several Beach Boys, plus members of Brian Wilson’s touring band, who brought the music of Pet Sounds to life on stage for the first time in 2000.
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Daddy Yankee's "Barrio Fino"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
11/10/21 • 41 min
In the mid-2000s, Daddy Yankee was a married father of three living in the Villa Kennedy public housing projects in San Juan, Puerto Rico. But he was about to change the world with an album that did perhaps more than any other to turn reggaeton - an underground urban movement out of Puerto Rico, drawing on influences like Jamaican dancehall, Panamanian reggae en español and hip hop - into a global force that produces hit after hit and fuels the careers of superstars like Bad Bunny and Ozuna.
In this episode of Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums, Daddy Yankee talks with Nuria Net, journalist and co-founder of podcast studio La Coctelera Music, about that game-changing album, 2004's "Barrio Fino". He breaks down his vision for the album (and for reggaeton itself), going in-depth about the struggles to get the establishment to take reggaeton seriously. Along the way we hear from producers like Echo and Luny Tunes (the massively important hit "Gasolina" was birthed in Luny's mom's house, where she would cook Dominican food for the artists) and from artists like De La Ghetto and Bad Bunny, who talks about first hearing "Barrio Fino" as a 10-year-old kid in Puerto Rico and testifies to the album's influence.
Later in the episode, Nuria Net, Los Angeles Times music reporter Suzy Exposito, and De La Ghetto join host Brittany Spanos to discuss the album’s impact and legacy.
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Lauryn Hill's "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
11/10/21 • 45 min
After rocketing to worldwide fame in the early Nineties as an actress and a member of the Fugees, Lauryn Hill took a big risk with her solo debut, 1998's "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill". It made her an even bigger star at age 23, sold millions of copies, and won her five Grammy Awards, which is the most any woman before her had taken home in a single night. But in the years following Miseducation's blockbuster success, Hill all but exited public life. Though she has since returned to touring and has released one-off singles, she has yet to release a proper follow-up to her one solo album.
In the latest episode of Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums, Hill's collaborators and confidants detail the ambitious, personal recording process along with the complicated decades that have followed, including legal disputes with some of those same collaborators. While Hill rarely grants interviews, she also responded to e-mail questions from Rolling Stone for this episode, providing detailed new insights on an album that has become so influential and beloved that it landed at Number 10 on our brand-new poll of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, making it the highest-ranking hip-hop album on the new list.
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Alice Coltrane's "Journey in Satchidananda"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
03/01/22 • 40 min
Alice Coltrane spent the mid-Sixties in personal and musical bliss, starting a family with John Coltrane and touring the world as the pianist in his band. Then John died suddenly of liver cancer in 1967. Newly widowed at the age of 29 with four children to care for, she plunged into a lengthy period of despair. Sensing her pain, an old friend introduced her to his guru, Swami Satchidananda. With a new clarity — and a harp that John had commissioned for her before his death — she entered the basement studio of her Long Island home and recorded Journey in Satchidananda. Our episode retraces the entire arc of this remarkable 1971 record: We step into the basement where the album was recorded; speak to several musicians who played on it as well as Alice's daughter, Michelle; hear from musicians it influenced — including Flying Lotus, the grandson of Alice's sister; and hear archival interviews with Alice herself, delving into the remarkable story of a woman who crafted something beautiful and enduring in the time of her deepest pain.
New episodes of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums release every Tuesday, only on Amazon Music.
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Dolly Parton's "Coat of Many Colors"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
03/08/22 • 24 min
Dolly Parton takes us inside Coat of Many Colors, the 1971 album where she came into her own as a solo artist, as a songwriter, and as a storyteller. Over the album’s 10 tracks — seven of them written solely by Dolly — she explored topics like poverty, class, spirituality, nature, female empowerment, and sexuality. The album marked Dolly’s first significant steps out of the shadow of Porter Wagoner, the rhinestoned country star who gave Dolly her big break by hiring her as the “girl singer” on his TV variety show. Dolly tells us the stories behind the songs, including “Coat of Many Colors,” an account of a childhood that was poor in money but rich in love. Contemporary artists like Brandy Clark and Carly Pearce join to talk about the album’s legacy. It’s an intimate look at a deeply personal statement.
New episodes of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums release every Tuesday, only on Amazon Music.
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Weezer's "Self-Titled (The Blue Album)"
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums
03/15/22 • 30 min
In 1989, a teenage Rivers Cuomo moved from suburban Connecticut to Los Angeles to become a superstar hair-metal guitarist – and instead ended up the frontman of Weezer, one of the key bands of the Nineties alt-rock revolution. Cuomo and his bandmates tell the story of the unlikely birth of Weezer, and the making of a classic debut album that's still winning over new generations of fans.
New episodes of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums release every Tuesday, only on Amazon Music.
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FAQ
How many episodes does Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums have?
Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums currently has 23 episodes available.
What topics does Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums cover?
The podcast is about Taylor Swift, Album, Music, Amazon Music, Podcasts, Music Interviews, Music Interview and Music Commentary.
What is the most popular episode on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums?
The episode title 'Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On"' is the most popular.
What is the average episode length on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums?
The average episode length on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums is 35 minutes.
How often are episodes of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums released?
Episodes of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums are typically released every 7 days.
When was the first episode of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums?
The first episode of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums was released on Nov 1, 2021.
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