Herbert von Karajan
Debussy: La Mer, Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé etc. (with Berlin Philharmonic)

I sure did used to buy a lot of old Karajan recordings. Frankly I’m not sure what I heard in them anymore. Some are excellent (I still love his 1963 Beethoven cycle), but an equal number are generic and rote. This impressionist set is somewhat indifferent in my opinion, though the two works represented are abiding favourites of mine. Nowadays I’d default to more recent recordings, not just for sound quality but for better playing. 
Measure of gratitude: Middling. Thank you. 

Kid Koala
Some Of My Best Friends Are DJs
Your Mom’s Favourite DJ
12-Bit Blues
Live From the Short Attention Span Audio Theatre Tour

I liberated these from my employer’s vast collection out of sheer enthusiasm for Deltron 3030, a project Kid Koala was very much the tertiary member of. Nevertheless, he is an absolute virtuoso on the turntables, and one of the defining musicians of this particular bit of earth I live on. But frankly his recent, more ambient music is more mature and satisfying than these early albums. I still like them quite a bit. It’s a discography worth a deep dive into. 
Measure of gratitude: Noteworthy. Thank you. 

King Crimson
In the Court of the Crimson King
Lizard
Islands
Larks’ Tongues in Aspic
Red
Red (remix)
Discipline
Three of a Perfect Pair
The Power to Believe
The Collectible King Crimson, Vol. 4: Live in Warsaw, 2000

King Crimson was never my number one prog band, but they are the one where I understand it least when somebody doesn’t like them. It’s pretty nuts to think that in March 1969 Genesis put out a debut album that sounded like the early Bee Gees, in July 1969 Yes put out a debut album that sounded like a blend of Simon and Garfunkel and Cream, and then in October 1969 In the Court of the Crimson King came out and it was a fully formed prog rock album that we can identify as such in retrospect. There are so few genuine before/after moments in music history. That’s one of them, and it isn’t even their best album. These days I’m most in love with the mid- to late-70s hard rock era that brought us Red (“Starless” is a good candidate for best prog song of the 70s). But there have been times in my life when I’ve loved the antiseptic math rock Talking Heads pastiche of the 80s lineup best. Robert Fripp always said King Crimson was less a band than a “way of doing things.” Truly, it’s several different ways of doing things, all of which I admire implicitly. 
Measure of gratitude: Enormous. Thank you. 

Kraftwerk
Trans-Europe Express

I feel like I haven’t listened to Kraftwerk enough. I love Kraftwerk. I probably like Autobahn better than this, when push comes to shove. But there is something really moving about a bunch of extremely German Germans of the post-war era making an album that points towards the connection and cooperation of all European nations. Also, “The Hall of Mirrors” is creepy and awesome. 
Measure of gratitude: Substantial. Thank you. 

Kronos Quartet
Black Angels
Short Stories

Short Stories really doesn’t register here; I took it home from work and only listened to it once. It’s Black Angels we’re concerned with. The George Crumb composition it’s named after is one of the most extreme and wonderful works of 20th-century chamber music. Totally floored me when I first heard it in university, and it still does. The fact that this disc also contains a spectacular performance of Shostakovich’s eighth (and best) string quartet is secondary. The Kronos Quartet have been involved with some pretty tepid middlebrow projects in the years since this, but the impulse that started the group (specifically, to play Black Angels and other challenging music like it) is one that I wish had been taken up more widely. 
Measure of gratitude: Large. Thank you. 

Mo Lefever
Unposed

Lefever came to Fort McMurray for one of our annual jazz workshops and borrowed my friend’s homemade fretless bass. We all thought that was the coolest shit ever. This album is fun. One song was a CBC Radio theme for some time. 
Measure of gratitude: Small. Thank you. 

John Lennon
Plastic Ono Band
Imagine

I have dined out on my loathing of the song “Imagine” for some years now. And having read Cynthia Lennon’s memoir, the knowledge that while John was exposing radical openness in public he had cut himself off from his first family informs Plastic Ono Band in a not-so-great way. I still love the hell out of these albums. “Mother” is self-indulgence weaponized in all directions with an audacious lack of self-awareness. “Isolation” is one of pop music’s great koans. “Gimme Some Truth” slaps. “Oh Yoko!” is one of the most purely joyful songs ever recorded, and it’s in Rushmore to boot. John Lennon is a basket of problems, but it’s hard not to love him anyway. 
Measure of gratitude: Large. Thank you. 

György Ligeti
Chamber Music (Pierre-Laurent Aimard, London Winds, etc.)

I bought this mainly for Ligeti’s wind bagatelles, which are marvelous and frankly better than their solo piano renditions. Haven’t listened to it for a billion years, but I like it just fine. 
Measure of gratitude: Middling. Thank you. 

Magnus Lindberg
EXPO/Piano Concerto No. 2/Al Largo (New York Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert, Yefim Bronfman)

Liberated from work, seldom played, probably pretty good. Who can say? I certainly can’t remember it. 
Measure of gratitude: Negligible. Thank you. 

Love
Forever Changes

This is famously one of the most unheralded albums of the 60s, to the point where it may in fact be adequately heralded. Remarkably its best and most memorable song is the one that’s not written by Arthur Lee. Bryan MacLean’s “Alone Again Or” is something I find myself humming on a regular basis, even though I haven’t played this for a dog’s age. 
Measure of gratitude: Great. Thank you. 

Corb Lund
Unforgiving Mistress
Hair in my Eyes Like a Highland Steer
Losin’ Lately Gambler
Counterfeit Blues

I’m listening to Corb’s Cabin Fever as I write this, an album I used to have on CD and offloaded because I immediately bought it on vinyl. That’s how great it is. Joni Mitchell is clearly the best Canadian songwriter, but Corb Lund might be the runner up. This particular collection of albums is arbitrary, but every album he’s made is at least a minor masterpiece. Corb used to come to Fort McMurray every summer, but I never saw him because my family was resolutely anti-country. I first encountered him in (fuck, this is the worst) an ethnomusicology class, where I was assigned to give a presentation on Hair in My Eyes Like a Highland Steer. I nailed that presentation. It wasn’t hard. I was an instant convert. Still haven’t seen him live. Someday. 
Measure of gratitude: Massive. Thank you.