Pharoah Sanders · 1971 · The album that proves Pharoah Sanders could make a horn sound like a prayer without ever raising his voice.

The Pyramids · 1974 · A lost spiritual jazz-funk masterpiece from an Ohio commune that sounds like the sun coming up.

Oneness of Juju · 1975 · A band that built a commune around the groove, and this album is the sermon you can't escape.

Malcom Myers · 1974 · A percussion-and-synth ritual built to be ignored, which is why listening close feels like stealing a secret.

Curtis Mayfield · 1970 · The first solo album from the man who made Impressions sound easy, and then made them sound necessary.

Neil Young · 1974 · The one where he stopped trying to make friends and started making records that sounded like the inside of his head.

Ahmad Jamal · 1970 · Ahmad Jamal playing like he's solving a puzzle in real time, and the puzzle keeps changing shape.

Minnie Riperton · 1970 · Charles Stepney gave her an orchestra and she sang straight through the ceiling.

Mike Oldfield · 1973 · A nineteen-year-old in a converted barn made one of the strangest best-sellers of the 1970s, and nobody — least of all him — has quite explained how.

Gil Scott-Heron · 1971 · Bernard Purdie, Ron Carter, and a man who refused to sing.

Black Sabbath · 1970 · Four working-class lads from Birmingham accidentally created the sound of a generation after a horror movie and a bass string.

Deep Purple · 1970 · The album that made the organ sound like a chainsaw and everyone loved it.

Sandy Denny · 1971 · She had already written 'Who Knows Where the Time Goes' and was the only guest vocalist on Led Zeppelin's 'The Battle of Evermore'. This album is quieter and stranger than all of that.

Curtis Mayfield · 1971 · The sound of a man who had already written the future of soul and was just checking to make sure the crowd could keep up.

Aretha Franklin · 1971 · This proves that some churches don't have steeples.

Donny Hathaway · 1972 · Phil Ramone set up eight tracks in a 150-seat club and caught a voice so raw it still sounds like it's happening in the room with you.

Bill Withers · 1973 · He walked out nervous, cracked a few jokes, then turned Carnegie Hall into a living room. This is the sound of a man who knew he had nothing to prove, and proved everything anyway.

Antonio Carlos Jobim · 1970 · Creed Taylor took Jobim to New York and got a stoned masterpiece out of him.

Steve Goodman · 1971 · He wrote 'City of New Orleans' on a napkin during an Amtrak ride. The version on this record is the one nobody made for radio.

Kris Kristofferson · 1970 · A man who flew helicopters and swept floors before writing songs that feel like confessions.