John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band

John Lennon's solo debut contains some of the most nakedly emotional songs ever recorded. Demolishing '60s mythology with almost pathological zeal, he castigates hippie hypocrisy on "I Found Out" and includes his former band among the idols he forsakes on the iconoclastic, deceptively mellow-sounding piano ballad "God." Psychedelic arrangements and imagery are replaced by ultra-minimalist production and raw passion, whether John’s mourning his mother's death with a feral howl over skeletal piano, bass, and drums, or embracing the underdog on the acoustic "Working Class Hero."