[herr_oberst]

I've long known that if the question is ONE ALBUM, I choose Blood on the Tracks. But one whole body of work, that's a different kettle of monkeys.

It will be a Rock and Roller. I love American Blues, I love American Folk, I love Americana, but I like Rock and Roll better. I've tried and tried to appreciate Jazz, but I'm frankly not intelligent enough to 'get' it. Classical is good, but as powerful a force as Moonlight Sonata is, I didn't chase that dragon despite Ludwig van's genius attempts to lure me. So Rock it is.

To paraphrase Paul, you could choose Glen Campbell or Carol Kaye, because you get the whole Wrecking Crew discography, and that's a wide variety, so that's a great idea..but their music tended to be used with poppier hit-oriented albums and if given a choice, my personal taste runs towards dark stories, preferably done in a minor key (Yvette, by Jason Isbell, has been in my ears at least once every day for the last week, for instance; there's nothing uplifting about that little tale except the way he turns his phrases...but I love that song)
So, for dark tales of human crisis and failure, yet written with beauty and grace maybe Cowboy Junkies? I might need to bring a noose along if I decide on the Junkies, so we better move on. As much as I appreciate the dark side, there needs to be alternative views for a balanced stay on the island. Pink Floyd. Now, there you go. And if I choose only Gilmore, then I can get the song Murder from About Face, in addition to all the Floyd music like Meddle and Another Brick in the Wall and Have a Cigar... (but do I get Vera? hmm, better continue the research.) How about the Stones. Tight. Some great Rock and Roll, some great ballads, and Monkey Man and Parachute Woman, but realistically I think we can do better. The Stones tended to chase what was popular, rather than push the boundaries, especially after say, Some Girls.

Clapton? Pretty good body of work there. He helped invent the supergroup. Yardbirds, The Cream, plus his solo stuff and his long collaborations with George Harrison, or JJ Cale (plus Delaney and Bonnie) make this a standout choice.

BHTM, Yes, ZZ Top, Fleetwood Mac, Bowie, Bob Dylan, The Who, ELP, The Beach Boys, The Beatles, The Band, Stevie Winwood, The Dead and many many more standouts would all be worthy of serious consideration, but what I've known since I started writing this little essay is that at the forefront of my mind, the one musical artist who gets me, and who I hope to never meet is Neil Young. (I say that because it's my understanding that you never want to meet your heroes, and I think that that is probably very true in this case). He was there almost at at the beginning with Buffalo Springfield (hey, he was in a band with Rick James before he hit it big!!), his musical style ranges from Rock and Roll to punk to rockabilly to country to folk to Americana to ballads to big-band swing, to protest music to concept albums to soundtracks to love songs. He was part of the supergroup Crosby Stills Nash and Young, (some say he was the real talent, but I don't think that's very fair) and lots of his music is very very good, lots more is Truly Great and some of it is Ethereal. (Soldier, or A Man Needs A Maid for example). Rust Never Sleeps and Live Rust are two albums that I thought long and hard about when I was choosing my Single Desert Island record, and while Dylan ultimately won out, Neil Young has been a force of nature that to me is truly remarkable and it would be a pleasant task and a labor of sonic love as a modern Robinson Crusoe to tease out hidden gems in the dozens and dozens of albums that he's given us during his long career.