Here's another obvious choice for this list, and a very good one, and I doubt we'll have many detractors this week, at least from anyone who had a pulse when this was released. Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath (1970)

A mere 30 minutes long, this was none the less the album where heavy metal was first forged. Its ponderous tempos, cod-satanic imagery (bassist Geezer Butler was a Roman Catholic and Dennis Wheatley fan), Tony Iommi's sledgehammer guitar riffs and Ozzy Osbourne's shrieking vocals all went on to define the genre and shaped most arena rock of the Seventies and Eighties. Without this...no Spinal Tap, no grunge or Kurt Cobain and, of course, no Osbournes.

While I agree with most of this, listing Spinal Tap was pretty weak when there were many real bands that were influenced by this record. How about AC/DC, Metallica, Judas Priest, Kiss ( I suppose they would be one of the 'arena rock' bands the author referred to), Iron Maiden, Motorhead....the list goes on and on. While I listened to this one a lot when I was a young lad, mostly because my friends thought it was the only record pressed that year, metal was never among my favorite genres, but to deny that this record "changed music" would probably be plain silly.

Swish