SV

Best of each artist · One record per artist

Best debut

The first album, and often the hungriest. The best debut albums in the collection.

All 34Rock 11Pop 1Soul, funk and R&B 2Hip hop 7Electronic 4Folk, country and song 3Hard rock and metal 6
  1. 1 The Velvet Underground The Velvet Underground & Nico 1967 · Rock It sold almost nothing on release, but is said to have inspired everyone who bought it to start a band. Timeless classic
  2. 2 Nas Illmatic 1994 · Hip hop Nas was twenty and wrote like a veteran. Ten tracks without a single weak moment. Timeless classic
  3. 3 The Strokes Is This It 2001 · Rock Eleven short songs that made guitar rock feel new again in 2001. Modern classic
  4. 4 Joy Division Unknown Pleasures 1979 · Rock A band who could barely play, a producer who turned the room into an instrument – and a debut that still sounds like nothing else. Timeless classic
  5. 5 Patti Smith Horses 1975 · Rock Poetry and garage rock on the same record. Patti Smith opened with “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine”. Timeless classic
  6. 6 The Stone Roses The Stone Roses 1989 · Rock Self-assured from the first note to the last. “I Wanna Be Adored” is one of the best opening tracks on any debut. Timeless classic
  7. 7 Black Sabbath Black Sabbath 1970 · Hard rock and metal The title track began a new genre. No band has sounded so ominous on their first album. Timeless classic
  8. 8 Guns N' Roses Appetite for Destruction 1987 · Hard rock and metal For a long time the best-selling debut in the US – and still just as dangerous. Timeless classic
  9. 9 The Notorious B.I.G. Ready to Die 1994 · Hip hop Biggie’s life from the street to the top, told with humour, darkness and perfect flow. Timeless classic
  10. 10 Television Marquee Moon 1977 · Rock Two guitars talking to each other, and a ten-minute title track. Punk with the freedom of jazz. Timeless classic
  11. 11 Portishead Dummy 1994 · Electronic Trip hop got its face: Beth Gibbons’s voice over dusty samples. Timeless classic
  12. 12 Wu-Tang Clan Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) 1993 · Hip hop Nine rappers, kung fu films and grimy beats from Staten Island. Nobody had heard anything like it. Timeless classic
  13. 13 Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin 1969 · Rock In a day and a half of studio time the band found everything they would become: heavy riffs, blues and acoustic detours. Timeless classic
  14. 14 Lauryn Hill The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill 1998 · Hip hop Lauryn Hill’s only studio album as a solo artist, and it was enough: soul, hip hop and reggae in perfect balance. Timeless classic
  15. 15 Arcade Fire Funeral 2004 · Rock Written in the shadow of several deaths in the band members’ families, yet it sounds like life itself. Modern classic
  16. 16 Van Halen Van Halen 1978 · Hard rock and metal “Eruption” changed how everyone played the electric guitar. The rest of the album is a party. Timeless classic
  17. 17 Massive Attack Blue Lines 1991 · Electronic Bristol’s sound-system culture became a record. “Unfinished Sympathy” is still just as huge. Timeless classic
  18. 18 Oasis Definitely Maybe 1994 · Rock A band who believed they were the best in the world – and for thirty minutes they were. Timeless classic
  19. 19 Eric B. & Rakim Paid in Full 1987 · Hip hop Rakim changed how people rap: calmer, more advanced, with rhymes inside the lines. Timeless classic
  20. 20 Rage Against the Machine Rage Against the Machine 1992 · Hard rock and metal Funk, metal and hip hop – and a political fury that hasn’t cooled. Timeless classic
  21. 21 Leonard Cohen Songs of Leonard Cohen 1967 · Folk, country and song Cohen was thirty-three and already a known poet. The album has “Suzanne”, “So Long, Marianne” and “Sisters of Mercy”. Timeless classic
  22. 22 Pixies Surfer Rosa 1988 · Rock Quiet, loud, quiet – the template Nirvana said they borrowed. Raw and full of humour. Timeless classic
  23. 23 Arctic Monkeys Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not 2006 · Rock The fastest-selling debut in British history when it came out. Alex Turner writes about weekend nights in Sheffield with a novelist’s eye. Modern classic
  24. 24 Aphex Twin Selected Ambient Works 85–92 1992 · Electronic Made by a teenager in Cornwall, and almost everything electronic that followed owes it a debt. Timeless classic
  25. 25 Sade Diamond Life 1984 · Soul, funk and R&B Sade arrived fully formed: cool, elegant and with “Smooth Operator”. Timeless classic
  26. 26 Erykah Badu Baduizm 1997 · Soul, funk and R&B Erykah Badu launched neo-soul with a jazz feel and a voice all her own. Timeless classic
  27. 27 Bon Iver For Emma, Forever Ago 2007 · Folk, country and song Recorded alone in a hunting cabin in Wisconsin over a winter. A debut that sounds like a diary. Modern classic
  28. 28 Fleet Foxes Fleet Foxes 2008 · Folk, country and song Harmonies from another age, and a whole generation of indie bands who started singing in chorus. Modern classic
  29. 29 Billie Eilish When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? 2019 · Pop Made at home with her brother Finneas – and one of the most influential pop debuts of the 2010s. Modern classic
  30. 30 Missy Elliott Supa Dupa Fly 1997 · Hip hop Missy Elliott and Timbaland sounded like the future in 1997. They still do. Timeless classic
  31. 31 Petter Mitt sjätte sinne 1998 · Hip hop Swedish hip hop went from oddity to national favourite. Petter rapped in Swedish about everyday life and ambition. Timeless classic
  32. 32 Röyksopp Melody A.M. 2001 · Electronic Two young lads from Tromsø made an album that became the soundtrack to a whole era of adverts and cosy evenings. Modern classic
  33. 33 Entombed Left Hand Path 1990 · Hard rock and metal Stockholm death metal finds its sound – the chainsaw guitars from Sunlight Studio. Timeless classic
  34. 34 Korn Korn 1994 · Hard rock and metal A new way to sound heavy: down-tuned guitars, hip hop grooves and painfully personal lyrics. Timeless classic

34 artists in the list.