Reviews (page 7 of 7)
this made me wish I had decided to purchase ariana grande concert tickets on may 22nd, 2017 in manchester, england
2/10
This was pretty bland and boring. The vibe I got was - cheap production, home-recorded, amateur trying to sell CD's on a corner bad. The title of this album bugs me. Why not "Sometimes I Wish We Were Eagles"? (And why then are there horses on the cover?) It made me think of Kirk Van Houten's demo tape on the Simpsons, "Can I Borrow A Feeling". It's so corny I can't take it seriously. I wasn't feeling it and had to fast forward through every song. 1.5/5
Navel gazing with a primitive beat.
SPEAKING. NOT EVEN SINGING. 1/5
I tried, I gave it 4 songs before I gave up. I just didn't like it
Not speaking, not singing, not good.
Comically bad - besides non captivating talking voice, mix sounds amateur.
Sometimes I wish I wasn’t doing this challenge.
Hauntingly boring. The only tune I find to be vaguely interesting, musically, is Invocation of Ratiocination. Faith/Void is painful to listen to.
The latest addiation to my 1* brutality. There's nothing wrong with this but I forget it instantly
This was awful. Almost comically bad. It feels like he did the entire album by himself with a computer and guitar. The songs are all boring. He seems like he has a good voice, but is maybe singing in the wrong range? Something about his singing was just bad.
.
I found this album very dull
Terrible! Can’t sing. Songs bland and weird.
The name of the album irritates me for some reason and forshadowed how I felt about the songs. I didn't finish, I got as far as Too Many Birds before I gave up. That was a torturous 24 mins of my morning communte.
Country.
Sorry, not interested.
Vocals were nearly spoken word poems. I hated it. 1/5
Bad
Not my thing.
Sometimes I wish I there wouldn’t be albums like this on this list.
Awful
Nope, not me. Elton, Billy, James, even Jeff (Buckley) and Elliott (Smith) at times, but not this guy. As I've said in other reviews, it's not that I think it's bad, it's just not for me. Emphasis on the 'for' and not the 'me'. Nope nope nope.
I also wish this guy was an eagle so he couldn’t sing talk to me anymore. “Fucking me down” instead of “fucking me up” made me laugh out loud. I’m sick of hearing how these singer/songwriter fucks are usually considered lyrical geniuses & master storytellers or whatever when poetry is still like the least popular art form. Coffee shop open mic level shit. There ARE 10/10 singer/songwriter lyrical geniuses. He ain’t one. A song like “All Thoughts Are Prey to Some Beast” is a good track, but I can find things like saying “brain tree” twice when it was already established in the first line. I hate feeling treated like a dummy, I knew the metaphor, didn’t need to be reminded. Fine, but not a genius. Don’t think I needed to hear this before I died. This fucked my day down. 3 liked songs.
Nah
Music was ok but the vocal style was very odd
Where in the heck did you find this???
Just not my thing. I guess I don't dig the "I want to sound like I don't give a shit" style of vocals.
Not for me. I like the background music and some of his lyrics are cool, but the voice is too one dimensional for me and often oppositional to the song.
Not my thing, nothing special or a must listen here
Couldn't get through this. Sounded like he was talk-singing.
Wasn't really sure what this was.
Was this a joke? This seemed like some sort of musical theater versus a true album of something I really needed to hear before I die! I definitely could have done without ever hearing this album. Seemed like a wanna be Bob Dillon type with no talent. Every song sounded the same with just some random spoken lyrics.
Am I being punked? This album is terrible and the guy can’t sing. I thought, “how bad can 9 songs be?” When I thought it couldn’t get any worse that last song came. Even the title doesn’t make sense. I wish I could give this album a negative score.
This album answered the age old question of "what if yung gravy was a pretentious theater kid?". Some of the worst lyrics and singing I have ever heard. The only way I can sleep at night now is knowing that if I clap my hands against my ears really hard I can instantly blow out my eardrums before I have to listen to this again. Was this a joke that everyone else was in on?
It’s like Bill wrote a poem and had a band play some cool music and then tried to read the poem over the top of the music and just made up a random tune as he goes. I’m between 1 and 2 stars because I actually enjoy the music, but I can’t stand the lazy feeling random meandering of the vocals. Update: I’m feeling physically ill at the number of times he’s told me it’s time to put God away. I want to throw something at him to make it stop.
Disturbingly boring. Impressively dull
If I wanted to listen to Leonard Cohen, I will just turn on Leonard Cohen.
Oh horses again, it gives nick cave... Well it's confirmed Did not like it!!
meh. not grear. not even good. boring as hell
👎🏻
Nope
This is what I imagine Mormons listen to to be edgy. Awful!
Hated this ❤️
This shit kinda sucks. It’s like a crappy high school music teacher tried making a demo tape. Sure Mr Callahan can play music, but he sings for shit. Ahh, he’ll just talk the lyrics, man…. It will be artsy. We’ll slap a picture of some out of focus horses on the cover, and I’ll get my buddy who works at the holistic crystal shop to put some copies on the counter. People who make their own deodorant and eat plain organic lentils for lunch everyday will eat it this shit up.
Country version of Leonard Cohen? This is boring as shit. Can't believe it came out in 2009. Sounds 20 or 30 years older.
Absolute garbage. A cure for insomnia
A poor leonard Cohen with a Bontempi - terrible lyrics.
it was no my stilo
If Bill Callahan, the former coach of the Oakland Raiders and the Nebraska Cornhuskers, recorded an album, I’m pretty sure it would be better than this. Sometimes I wish this list didn’t exist.
Holy monotone crap Batman! How is this an album I must hear before I die? This was downright torture to listen to someone so tone deaf. Just the same voice droning on and on and on and on. YUCK
no
This sucked.
Sorry, just cant reconcile the voice to the music. But good voice for audiobooks and good music for sesame street and sing alongs.
All talk-singing and sing-talking sucks. The sing-talkers/talk-singers should all have their vocal cords removed and save us from the pain of listening to them. I would also say the vocalist was out of tune, but I'm not sure there was a tune, and the songs were moving so slowly it would be hard to tell anyway. The production also sucks. The music is decent enough but is buried deep behind the ever-present talking. Some parts were so bad I couldn't help laughing.
not my thing
Exceptionally uninspirational and boring. I don't understand at all why music critics would consider this dreary rubbish to be among the most important and influential in popular music
No
Not in my edition of the book! 2009. 1 star. Sounds like he's on a significant dose of Prozac. Tedious, pretentious lyrics and no tunes. Bonus point for the string arrangements. "It's time to put God away". More like time for Bill Callahan to consider another career.
Leonard Cohen if he had no talent whatsoever
Completely pointless country-folk singer/songwriter, that's all too reminiscent of the pointless country-folk singer/songwriter stuff from the sixties.
The Good: Horses enjoying a delightful afternoon munching on grass The Bad: The fact that I don’t have any grass… The Ugly: The state of my ears after having gauged them with pencils thanks to Mr. Gallahan’s “singing” I believe that this is album 176 for me, and I am really struggling to understand what the point of the 1001 list is… Though I am not keeping track, this is, yet again, another album where someone who should not be allowed to record his voice, is allowed to do so, and on top of that has made me waste 50 minutes of my day. Also: country? Really? Soon DeLaSoul will be listed as Jazz I guess. To all of you who are fans of Bill, I feel sorry for your loved ones who have to endure listening to this too. 1* because that’s the minimum I can give, if not it would be 0*
Not a top 1,000. Sound generic and simply nothing special
Dumb, boring
this really was not for me. something about his vocal delivery or the way it was mixed just drove me absolutely nuts. eid ma clack shaw dealt me psychic damage
One arm drummer and 3 chord guitar for this karaoke singer in the Cracker barrel. No I didn't like it.
I don’t get it
This is... "experimental" I guess. I couldn't get very far with that vocal delivery. Definitely from the tail end of an era of artists that adopted unlistenable as an aesthetic. The music seemed alright, from what I heard. This is the musical equivalent of a 20 something with a nice body who goes out of their way to wear the least flattering clothes they could find at the thrift store.
Never heard of Bill Callahan until now... and wished I never did. Total puke of an album.
wtf is this album
Really un enjoyable and monotoned
For some inexplicable reason I really wanted to like this but I just didn't. Very boring, must be an acquired taste.
Good voice, poor album.
The cheap motel-style cover art should tell you everything you need to know about this album. There is nothing interesting or unique about it. Musical melatonin.
Total snooze fest
I don't think I'd call this country. Folk, maybe. I hated it, hated his voice hated the vibe. Definitely won't be pulling this up again
1. jim cain - 1 2. zhauu - 1 3. dove - 1 4. zephyr - 1.5 5. birdz - 1.5 6. friend - 1 7. beazt - 1 8. invocation - 0 9. faith - 1
ruim
Nah
I don't get it. Did this guy take some kinda cocktail of antidepressants? I think this music was designed for drowning yourself in the bathtub.
awful
Sometimes I wish i we’re an eagle so I didn’t have to listen to this album
Talky alternative Country.
I was really giving this a chance, hoping it would catch my interest. Nice mellow melodies, and then the next song was talk-sing. And the next. The whole album is talk-sing. I think if I checked out his other albums (not gonna), they'd all be talk-sing. I mean, there's a lot of Leonard Cohen songs where he isn't really singing, and a lot of Michael Gira, and Edward Ka-Spel - so I should be okay with this, right? Nope. It just felt forced to me, and grew less and less compelling as the album went along. Kept expecting him to order a sarsaparilla and tell The Dude he should swear less. Oh, and one star deduction for an album cover and title that made me wonder if I should even try to listen to it . . .
Those horses on the album cover are warning you - stay the fuck away from this album. "Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle" {sic} because an eagle could not play this album. Couldn't play any other albums either, but it would almost be worth it. Why? Just why did this make a list of any arbitrarily large number of albums that you must listen to before you die?
It all sounds the same, and it sounds derivative. It's not something I need to listen to again.
“Alternative country” - worst combination of genres possible. Hold the country and give me the full blast of alternative instead please.
man what is this
Zzzzzzz
known country music hater hates country album
Not terrible, just so bland it's soul crushing. Not even notable enough to be mad at.
kinda boring 2/5
Artistilla ei ole taitoa tai kiinnostusta erotella hauskoja ideoita hupsuista. Hänellä ei myöskään ole riittävää huumorintajua matalaan puhelauluun.
Anesthesia in musical form.
it's time to put this album away forever
Gave this many chances, and while a few tracks felt soulful, the overall vibe just didn't speak to me, and I found the repeated lyrics pretty underwhelming. It's time to put this record away.
Chill album, didn’t like his style of singing, he was mostly talk singing and that doesn’t appeal to me
I question who this pseudo-intellectual nonsense is for. Most people who want to write shitty poetry aren't paid by a label and given studio time to do so, myself included. The songs are trite and overindulgent, gummed up with strings and heavy thesaurus work. I can imagine this being the sort of album someone from a "hip" place would claim to like to have "indie cred." Fucking nonsense.
If Nick Drake and Bill Callahan would be that baby. And Ayers would deny paternity to this mawkishness. *snore*.
Bill had potential, but delivered some weird vibes
I don’t need any more sing-talking pseudo psychology in my life. I already havre Tom Waits. Also, a 10 minute track proclaiming god dead in 2009? It’s been done man. In the 60s. Everyone got the point then. Maybe if it made a point I would cut it some slack but instead it repeats itself 75 times without elaborating on the concept. It’s shallow and hollow like the rest of the album.
i could barely get thru a song its so boring 1.5/5
Had not heard of Bill Callahan. Tried to listen to the album but couldn't. Would like to hear/read a description of how it ended up on best album of year lists and this one.
no.
No. Just... no. Pretentious AF. Boring production, lazy performances, and stupid lyrics. I got more and more mad at it as the album progressed. By the end, I was absolutely blind with fury that I had to sit through 48 minutes of this garbage, navel-gazing, fake, cowboy wannabe nonsense.
I can’t slot this album neatly into a sub-genre. Alternative country? Easy listening folk? It’s not quite country and not quite folk. The deadpan sing-speaking throughout is boring (reminds me of The National’s Matt Berninger baritone voice, but without the charisma). One point for the line “All my fine memories are fucking me down” in ‘Eid Ma Clack Shaw’. Overall: 1/10
Spoken word type of stuff isn't my jam. I'm sorry couldn't listen to all this album. I'm leaving for vacation tomorrow and want to crank some Quiet Riot or Twisted Sister!
Is Cowboy Folk a genre? The play by play of his nature walks might as well be narration of a low budget 70’s kids show. Hated the pretend John Prine vocals.
Quite dreary and boring
The power went out halfway through this album and it was a blessing. This is not for me.
Unbearable.
It's the "Hey, come and listen to the album your uncle recorded in a real studio with the money he won at that poker game last month" album.
Kind of slow and basic to me
Oh wow, no.
Sometimes I wonder how some of these albums get put on this list. Ugh, this was dreadful.
would give it a zero if i could.
Is this a parody album? I honestly cant tell. Its not good, in any case. 1/5
oh no, i did nOT wish I was an eagle clearly not my current vibe so I'll have to grade this down to maybe a 2* :((( sorry Bill
Geen fan van de stijl van de zanger, en de muziek was ook wat saai
Fucking sucks lol
Not enjoyable
martmuziek, eerste nummer is prima, rest zeik
If I could rate lower than 1 star I would
Huh? What just happened here? The only thing I came away with from this album is the fact that I could be a lead singer in a band that somehow got a recording contract. Oh and even though you changed one note, nice job stealing the bass line from Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer” on “Eid Ma Clack Shaw”
It’s timeeee to kill this guy. I’ve never hated a last song in my entire life this is so terrible it’s awful there’s nothing good about this disgusting slow boring grumbly album.
I don't even know what to say about this nightmare.
Unimaginative, unoriginal, and unintriguing. I was hoping that the lyrics would be interesting at the very least, but they’re very bad and I just can’t find anything good to say about this. It couldn’t end soon enough. 1/5
thanks to this list i now know that bill callahan is a shitty country version of tom waits.
Oh piss off, Bill, you nonce
I found his voice/ style of sing/ talking over the music really grating
Sometimes I wish this wasn't the album of the day.
Musically this album borders between easy listening and boring... tipping over into mind numbingly boring. Vocally, the narration of lyrics was akin to Rick Jones narration on Fingerbobs in the 1970s. (Kids TV show) In fact it would have better if monotone Bill had just broke into the Fingerbobs theme song (Google it). I can't imagine how anyone could choose to sit and listen to this album, it's just so depressing and mournful. For me, this album is a complete waste of time that could be better spent hovver boarding iover tha Alps n your pyjamas listening to pigs squealing along to a Lewis Capaldi song.
One of the most boring albums I’ve ever listened to. If I had paid money for this, I would be very upset. Total snooze-fest all around.
the tracks names are very mountain goats-esque anyway this album sucks sometimes i wish i we were an eagle so i could fly to your where you live and shit on your windshield
Its like if The mountain goats lost he soul in a deal with a violin player
This album is putting me to sleep. Definitely not what I need on a Monday (or most days really). Pretty horrid really, weird sounding instruments also, it felt like the guitars weren't tuned correctly and something was a little off. This is definitely not an album where longer songs are better. The way his voice is mixed it sounds like it's layered over the top of the music, but as with almost everything in this album, is not good at all. Best: Eid Ma Clack Shaw Worst: Jim Cain
I do not like the kind of speaking-singing that is happening here. I am not a fan of that kind of thing, so this does not vibe with me at all. The songs feel like you mashed Seven Swans Sufjan Stevens with Andrew Bird with Magnetic Fields. Despite liking each of those artists individually, I really do not like this.
What an awful album. I skipped multiple songs. This a knock off of Leonard Cohen singing bad songs but somehow worse. Bill Callahan is not only a bad head football coach, he is a bad singer.
Boring and forgettable.
I didn’t get this at all. Americana singer songwriter album with extremely monotone vocals that are almost talked instead of sung. The album is also very one note with very little variety. The lyrics are supposed to be poetic but I didn’t think they were anything to write home about.