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PODCAST

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix

Not all albums stand the test of time, but plenty do and Australian music critic Stevie Nix will bring one to you each week. He"ll cover all eras and most genres and tell you why each record is so revered and, equally, why it deserves to be. And he only uses six songs to do it.

music music commentary

All Episodes

46:25

A New World Record by Electric Light Orchestra

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/02/12

Send a text Released in 1976, this was the moment Jeff Lynne’s vision snapped into clarity. After years of experimenting with the marriage of rock and classical textures, ELO arrived here with a confidence and cohesion they’d never quite captured before. What you hear across this record is not a band searching for their identity but one fully in command of it — glam-infused, orchestral, and brightly melodic, yet never overwhelmed by its own ambition. Featured songs: Tightrope Telephone Line S...

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43:16

OK Computer by Radiohead

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/02/05

Send us a text OK Computer arrived like a dispatch from the near future — a warning, a prophecy, a mirror reflecting our increasingly complicated relationship with technology and modern existence. The album didn't just capture the zeitgeist; it anticipated it with uncanny precision. But OK Computer wasn't just forward-looking; it was also deeply connected to rock's past. Its ambitious scope and conceptual unity recalled progressive rock masterpieces like Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon. It...

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47:22

Are You Experienced by The Jimi Hendrix Experience

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/01/29

Send us a text Released into the heart of the psychedelic era, Are You Experienced announced the future loudly, imperfectly and irresistibly. It captures is a threshold moment. Jimi Hendrix didn’t gently evolve the three-minute song; he stretched it, bent it, overloaded it with texture and attitude, and then lit it on fire. His guitar work sounded futuristic not because it was flashy, but because it treated the studio, the amplifier and feedback itself as expressive tools. Yet for all its inn...

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53:34

King Of America by Elvis Costello

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/01/22

Send us a text King of America is an album born out of retreat and reset, following a period when Costello himself felt he’d lost the thread. It feels like an artist stripping everything back to find out what still matters. Even the name “Elvis Costello” barely appears: the songs are credited to Declan MacManus, the band is listed as The Costello Show, and the whole presentation suggests a deliberate act of distance from the persona he’d built over the previous decade. Musically, he moved awa...

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41:55

Graceland by Paul Simon

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/01/15

Send us a text Graceland introduced global sounds to mainstream Western audiences in a way that felt organic rather than exploitative. The conversations about cultural appropriation, artistic responsibility, and the relationship between art and politics continue to resonate. Simon's approach — collaborative rather than extractive, respectful of his influences while transforming them into something new — has become a model for thoughtful cross-cultural artistic endeavours. Yet the complex ques...

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47:43

Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/01/08

Send us a text The album's power lies in its refusal to play by the rules of either folk purity or contemporary indie rock. These weren't musicians interested in archaeological authenticity or preserving some imagined folk tradition in amber. Instead, they took the instrumentation and structural vocabulary of folk, bluegrass, and country music and weaponised it with the dynamics and emotional intensity of arena rock. The result was something genuinely new: songs that could pack the intimate s...

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47:23

Face Value by Phil Collins

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2026/01/01

Send us a text When Phil Collins released Face Value in February 1981, few could have predicted that this deeply personal debut would launch one of the most successful solo careers in pop music history. The album emerged from one of the darkest periods of Collins' life — a crumbling marriage that left him alone with his pain and a drum machine — and transformed that raw emotional devastation into something far greater than a simple breakup album. It became a watershed moment that proved Colli...

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47:20

The Stranger by Billy Joel

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/12/25

Send us a text The Stranger permanently altered the trajectory of Joel's career, transforming him from a struggling piano man to a stadium-filling superstar. More importantly, it established him as a serious artist whose work could connect with both critics and mainstream audiences. The album balances nostalgia with clear-eyed recognition of limitation and compromise. Its complex relationship with time and memory feels quintessentially American in its tension between idealism and pragmatism. ...

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50:29

Us by Peter Gabriel

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/12/18

Send us a text Us is particularly notable for its deeply personal lyrical content. While Gabriel's previous work often dealt with political themes or character-based narratives, this album turned inward to explore relationships, personal psychology and emotional vulnerability. Written during a period of intensive psychotherapy, the album is deeply personal — exploring his divorce, his subsequent relationship with actress Rosanna Arquette and the growing distance between him and his first daug...

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44:34

Night And Day by Joe Jackson

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/12/11

Send us a text Night And Day stood out by offering something sophisticated — a hybrid of styles that acknowledged contemporary trends and also classic songwriting traditions. Jackson's classical piano training is evident in the complexity of his arrangements, but he never lets technique overshadow musicality. And the integration of Brazilian and Latin American rhythms was ahead of its time, predating the World Music boom of the late 1980s. Featured songs: Another World Steppin' Out Breaking U...

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49:10

Bat Out Of Hell by Meat Loaf

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/12/04

Send us a text Bat Out Of Hell represents a singular moment in music history where ambition, talent and timing combined to create something truly unique. It demonstrated that rock music could embrace theatrical drama and technical complexity while maintaining emotional authenticity and commercial appeal. The album stands as proof that sometimes the most unlikely combinations — theatrical drama and rock music, teenage romance and classical influences, technical complexity and raw emotion — can...

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43:54

All Day by Girl Talk

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/11/27

Send us a text What makes All Day remarkable isn’t just the novelty of hearing Foxy Brown on top of Peter Gabriel, or Big Boi rapping over Portishead, though those moments are undeniably thrilling. It’s the way Greg Gillis transforms these fragments of cultural detritus into something bigger. He doesn’t just create mashups; he creates nostalgia factories. Featured songs: Oh No Jump On Stage Get It Get it Make Me Wanna Steady Shock Every Day

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32:03

Bitches Brew by Miles Davis

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/11/20

Send us a text Released in 1970, this double album didn’t just push the limits of jazz; it obliterated them. Bitches Brew is a chaotic, electrifying, and hypnotic masterpiece, fusing jazz, rock, funk, and avant-garde into something utterly transformative. Featured songs: Pharaoh’s Dance Bitches Brew Spanish Key John McLaughlin Miles Runs The Voodoo Down Sanctuary

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37:52

Back To Black by Amy Winehouse

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/11/13

Send us a text Blending retro soul with jazz, Motown, and hip-hop elements, Winehouse created a timeless sound that paid homage to classic music styles while pushing soul into new, contemporary territory. By bridging these genres, she infused Back To Black with an eclectic vibrancy, defying genre conventions and showing how genre-blending could convey deep, complex emotions. And in exploring themes of addiction, love, heartbreak and self-destruction, Winehouse went beyond typical pop narrativ...

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36:22

Blue by Joni Mitchell

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/11/06

Send us a text Released during a period of intense personal transformation for Mitchell, Blue captures a raw emotional vulnerability that continues to resonate. Her songwriting is both confessional and poetic, a delicate balance of personal revelation and universal experience. Musically, the album is minimalistic yet richly expressive, featuring open tunings, sparse instrumentation, and an emphasis on melodic storytelling.

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45:18

Nebraska by Bruce Springsteen

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/10/30

Send us a text Nebraska arrived at a time when the music industry was chasing bigger sounds and brighter production, but Springsteen went the other way. The album’s quiet power came from its restraint. Drawing on the folk traditions of Woody Guthrie and the fatalistic laments of Hank Williams, Nebraska stripped the myth of the American dream down to its bones. These were stories of debt, violence and fragile hope — told not with anger, but with empathy. It was a portrait of a country running ...

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35:31

Odelay by Beck

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/10/23

Send us a text As the alternative rock wave of the early 1990s began to fade, hip-hop and electronic music were rising to prominence. Beck, in collaboration with the Dust Brothers, bridged these genres, creating a groundbreaking work that fused alternative rock, hip-hop, folk, electronic, and psychedelic influences into a cohesive and innovative artistic statement. By treating genre as a fluid concept, Odelay inspired others to explore hybrid sounds and break free from traditional conventions.

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29:23

Red Headed Stranger by Willie Nelson

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/10/16

Send us a text Red Headed Stranger’s significance extends beyond its immediate narrative and musical achievements. It helped establish the "outlaw country" movement, which represented a rebellion against the slick production values and conservative attitudes of Nashville's music establishment. Instead, Nelson focused on capturing the immediacy of the performances, allowing space and silence to become as important as the notes being played. And the album's narrative complexity challenged the p...

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47:01

Horses by Patti Smith

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/10/09

Send us a text Patti Smith’s Horses, released 50 years ago today, remains one of the most startling and transformative debuts in rock history. Half a century on, it still feels raw, defiant, and ahead of its time, a record that blurred the lines between poetry, performance art, and primal rock and roll. Smith showed that rock could be intellectual without being pretentious, mystical without being escapist, feminine without being weak. Featured songs: Gloria Birdland Free Money Break It ...

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34:10

Elephant by The White Stripes

Classic Albums. Hosted by Stevie Nix ·

2025/10/02

Send us a text Elephant represents the perfect expression of the White Stripes' artistic philosophy. Their emphasis on authenticity, their embrace of limitations, and their respect for rock and blues traditions all came together perfectly on this album. Elephant is raw, it’s rebellious and it’s relentlessly innovative. From the iconic opening riff of Seven Nation Army to the bluesy swagger of Ball And Biscuit, this record is a masterclass in how to make maximum impact with minimal tools.

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73 results

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