Here Are the Sonics

So much unnecessary screaming. I did not need The Sonics Here.

Extremely unenjoyable to listen to

Didn’t enjoy this. Rubbish singing and the songs all sounded the same

Well that was shit! At least the Apple Music random played The Clash and New York Dolls afterwards.

I started listening to this a few weeks ago after seeing the album mentioned in a YouTube video about influential bands. I stopped listening after a couple of tracks as I found the covers to be pretty shit

3 numre inde er jeg ved at blive sindssyg over den konstante WOOOOOOW, og det blev aldrig rigtig bedre. De fleste numre har vi allerede hørt i bedre versioner på andre albums. Ved ikke om jeg synes jeg behøvede at høre den her for en eller anden akademisk baggrund for hvor garage eller punk eller whatever kommer fra

abrasive, in a bad way. bland, maybe not for its time, but at least to modern ears. that said, recording, mixing, and mastering as a garage rock band in the mid-1960s was likely no easy task, especially if you're just a group of musicians working on your debut album with no prior knowledge and experience on how to do all those thi... wait, they had two producers on this album? _and_ a sound engineer? surely it shouldn't sound THIS bad then??? come on dated and ultimately forgettable.

WAAAAH Waluigi would be proud

I can't with the screaming vocals in every song

Not for me. 1/5

i though this was one of that "you had to be there" and was also considering the year, but after checking other albums released at that time there's no excuse to be this much noise of a record

I don't mind bad production and often I think it adds to the music but it's this type of 60s abrasive production that I just can't stand. The Sonics here sound like the Beatles playing in a microwave. The covers, whilst I am not all too familiar with all of them, are much worse than their originals, and their own songs are really poor. I'll admit that this sort of music is not something I often enjoy, but this was particularly shit It's been just over two months since I've had a 5. Save me someone, save me

Never heard of these guys before. It looks like I have yet another 60s pop rock album on my hands. I'm gonna blow my head off, I swear. There can't be this many 60s pop rock albums that are worthy of my precious music-listening minutes, can there? "The Sonics" is also one of the blandest band names you could ever have for a musical act. Okay, okay. I'll stop bitching. Garage rock. Proto-punk. Hmm. Interesting genres, though I don't quite hear them. This just sounds like a regular rock and roll jig to me. I'm in awe at the twenty-eight minute runtime but I really, really did not like this one. The vocals are generally pretty obnoxious and the instrumentation regularly dips into being nauseating thanks to the poor production. "The Witch", "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Money" are decent, though that only comes down to the songwriting, really. My cheeks were clenched tightly throughout this album. At any time, without any warning, I would be assaulted by this band's unique methods of decimating my ears. Be it the hacky, rock-and-roll screeching, crunchy guitars or horrific sax numbers, I was genuinely in a flinched state while listening to most of this album. I normally listen to these albums through my laptop speakers, though I was punished greatly for the single, sordid occasion where I chose to listen to this album with my earbuds. Book time. A musical and cultural time capsule. First garage rock band to make a name for themselves. A regional act that left an impact in the Northwest America music scene. Wikipedia adds further credence to their influence over garage rock, though that's about it. I would snub this thing if I knew of 1001 albums that were more worthy than the ones on this list, but I'm kind of working with a deficit here. Being influential in any genre is a pretty good achievement, I suppose. I cosign this inclusion.

I went into this album with an open mind, but I got so much second hand embarrassment from the cover of Roll of Beethoven that I can only rate this a 1.

Why did white people love stripping the soul out of black music and putting out bad cover albums. Do the listmakers want to bring this to our attention or do they actually think this deserves praise.

60's not my time

категорическое нет, мне совсем не нравится плохое качество звука и непонятные вскрики вместо пения. вот этот вайб старого гаражного рока 60-х вообще не мое

I respect my time too much to finish this. When every fucking song starts with a horrendously executed snare roll followed by the most soulless “owww” a white man could muster, I’m doing my ears a favor and stopping at track 7. It’s not getting better. What was the angle to white washing Chuck Berry? Was it not enough to hear John Lennon do it? At least that man actually was a fan of Chuck Berry. These dudes sound like someone put a gun to their heads in the studio and said “record these songs, or else!” WOOF

This reminds me a lot of early Beatles music in that they're a band of mediocre White guys taking songs by Black American musicians, covering them, and making them sound significantly worse. At least when the Beatles did it, it would be half of the album, but the sonics went the extra mile and gave us nothing but bad versions of someone else's songs. So then, the blaring question is "why the eff is this one of the 1001 albums you MUST hear before you die?" Why can't i just listen to Chuck Barry and go on living in the bliss of not knowing this cover band from Tacoma Washington ever existed? I'm at the point where I'm pissed off at the very idea of this list and the fact that some babyboomer from England decided he had the best music taste in the world and he should publish a book about how much everyone should listen 1001 albums worth of it.

Perfectly good screaming - virtually the end of Meat is Murder. Ridiculous buzzing too. Terrible version of Roll Over Beethoven. I don't know why this is better received by listeners here than Junkyard by The Birthday Party is; that's just as sloppy, but more immersive. The gothics of Junkyward are truly grotesque, whereas The Witch is a tame effort. The Birthday Party is trying to get at something. The Sonics are just trying to get through the songs. The Sonics’ significance is supposed to be their influence: they were from Tacoma, and grunge came from the same postcode. Yes, Mark Arm liked the screaming. Yes, Cobain fancied the drum sound. But these were passing infatuations in a polyamorous marriage with Kiss, Aerosmith, and Black Sabbath - the actual gods of their adolescence. Grunge did not spring fully formed from this garage. And it would have formed anyway. 1 I have very little to say about this. The Sonics suck. The production would be commendably awful if it wasn’t mainly in the service of recording worthless covers of songs that were bate out by 1965. An attempted second listen was aborted after a few waoows. 1/5

To me this is just some white guys trying to sound like Little Richard.

overall a very underwhelming album, nothing stood out to me. i liked roll over beethoven, but that is not even their original composition, neither did they sing it better than the original. the vocals were mehh... at a certain point it was just noise

1. uuitch - 1 2. Love - 0 3. Roll - 0 4. Boss - 0 5. Dirty - 0 6. Travel - 0 7. Psycho - 0 8. Money - 0 9. Dog - 0 10. Time - 0 11. Nine - 0 12. Molly - 0 A BUNCH OF COVERS DOESN'T MAKE AN ALBUM WTF

Not good

Underpinned with too, too many mediocre covers to be on this list

Dreadful. Amateurish.

How can an album full of covers with just extra 'aaaaoooowwws' be worthy of inclusion on this list. Surely 'influence' alone shouldn't count that much.

While I can appreciate bands like this that paved the way for many bands I listen to today and the sound they helped create I can't get in to this at all. The recording sounds way to bad and the levels are all over the place.

With a name like The Sonics and an album released in 1965, I expected lush, spacious atmospheres of sound that would usher in Revolver and Pet Sounds. Here Are the Sonics is basically a raw recording of a garage band. I don't know their story. Did they meet in an orphanage and devote all their earnings to save homeless and starving children? Did they separate Pangea into separate continents? Did they teach Hendrix to play guitar, or introduce Elton John to Bernie Taupin? Whatever their value is in the annals of music, it can't be for the music itself. Regardless of my expectations and immediate letdown, I see no value in this album being in the 1001 Best Albums list. The album is mostly covers done more poorly than the versions you've come to know and love. This singer needs to add the moniker "Howlin'" in his name. He repeats this howl on the same note song after song, like a harmonica that had one really worn-in reed you can bend with enough breath in order to add character while the rest of the notes remain sterile. He's a one trick pony; his band bought Mick Jagger off Temu. Three songs in, I was ready to quit, but I wanted to honor this project and give it a respectful listen. I was never rewarded for this respect. Lather, rinse, repeat. All flash and little substance. The piano and horns were good, though.

Garbage. Unadulterated garbage. It was painful listening to crappy versions of Do You Love Me and Roll Over Beethoven. The final nail in the coffin was their flat version of Good Golly Miss Molly.

How many times can one hear a grown man yell “WAAAAOOOOOOWWWWW!” before it grates on their sanity? It seems to me that this is here more for being an influence and being name checked by later bands(notably Kurt Cobain of Nirvana) instead of standing on its own.

An uncreative covers band that you could find in many a music venue. Why are they on the list?

This is like having your family guilt trip you into going to see your cousins cover band at some bar you never heard of on a Tuesday night. The drinks are watered down, none of your family shows up so the entire place is empty except for you and a bartender who would rather be anywhere else. They play and you discover why no one else is there but your cousin thinks you must be a great fan of the music, gives you a CD, and insists on listening to it together. That CD is this.

Lowfi production. Mostly covers and the orginal compositions didn’t do anything for me. Way too many “Wwwooows” screams.

Who? Sounds so dated now. Unremarkable, includes some terrible covers, for example, "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Walking the Dog".

No. They're wrong. I don't have to hear this, ever. FFS, this is absolute sh*te. Four fourteen year olds in their dads shed with instruments they hadn't seen til yesterday. The only reason to listen to this is to show how much better the Beatles and all the rest of the "British Invasion" band could play.

It makes no sense having a cover band on this list.

this is some sort of punishment

Ich habe ja nichts gegen Rock'n'Roll, aber das hier war nicht gut. Der Gesang war eher Geschrei und die Instrumente klangen irgendwie rau und dumpf.

Not my cup of tea.

If I have to hear one more YEOOOWWW I’m going to lose it. 29 mins and felt like a lifetime, not for me

I mean, I like the aesthetics of this. The screamed vocals, overdriven guitars and rhythms we will later call punk. It’s just that the songs aren’t all that good, I mean it’s either pretty bad covers of Chuck Berry or pretty bad original songs. I’m sure it inspired a lot of bands I like, but I don’t like the album as is. This only belongs on such a list for historical significance I guess. Right after this one Spotify gave me The Chocolate Watchband, this really drove the one star home. The Chocolate Watchband were an amazing example of how good garage rock can be, and The Sonics are not such an example.

Their covers are not that good

I like the Lo-Fi garage rock sound and DIY spirit - amping up the fuzz, shredding the vocal chords, direct raw performance, and pushing the recording into the red - but they have literally 0 ideas. They're even derivative in who they're ripping off! I'm sure this was a fun band to be in and to see live at the sock hop in 1966, but my god the mid 60s are the most over-represented era. It's as if the world would end if every micro step in the evolution of white guys learning how to play Chuck Berry and Little Richard songs wasn't represented in excruciating detail. Can't we just have the Nuggets compilation instead of all these mediocre 'proto-something interesting' albums with one ok song?

Total waste of time. Their obscurity is utterly justified. And wardrobe really should've done a better job for the album cover photo shoot.

was not into it

Really outdated and sounds like shit. It actually seemed to get worse as it went on, maybe from all the unnecessary screams into audio equipment that couldn't handle it

Some of the most obnoxious songs ever recorded

Marked down for every fucking scream. Whilst edgy on a 45 fucking annoying on an LP. Didn’t finish.

Even in 1965 this music couln't have been cutting edge. It plods, is bland and I had to turn it off after 3 or 4 songs. Its like being in an inescapable Dirty Dancing themed holiday camp. To think The Beatles were producing Rubber Soul and Revolver around the same time...

Ironic name, it sounds like it was played through blown out speakers

!!! Introducing Sonic the Hedgehog !!! Well this makes me appreciate some of the other albums from 1965 a lot more! Mostly covers, and I know one song from an advert (and their own 'Psycho' sounds almost identical). Not great on the ears. !!!Una Estrella!!!

Malogen, poorer covers of some great songs

!!!it’s shit!!!

Bad sound quality recording. Tracks are not really my taste either

It’s a decent garage band album……that’s it. The covers were not exceptional - just ok. They also live to wail…..too much.

Rockabilly music. Think “Johnny B Goode”. It would’ve been okay but the singer’s constant screaming really made me dislike this album.

Nope

YEOWWWWW!!! This sounds like it was recorded through a walkie talkie. I understand that it was the 60s and quality equipment wasn't as plentiful as it is today, but Jesus does it make it difficult to listen to. I wouldn't mind if it was just a poor recording as much if it wasn't for the repetitive and obnoxious songs. It's just a scream, basic rock jam, scream, repeat. I don't care how influential they are, they're not for me. 2/10 Would I listen again? It would be very difficult for someone to make me listen to this again.

Although I love 60’s music never heard of The Sonics before. Probably because as far as I can tell they never had any success in the UK. Listening through the album I don’t know how they made this list. Maybe because according to Wiki some quite influential musicians say that they themselves were influenced by them. The few original songs are just standard 60’s rock and roll. The remainder (and majority) are second rate covers which bring nothing new to the originals. The recording quality is chronically bad. I know it’s just 60’s tech but even allowing for that it sounds as if it was done on a low budget. The number of covers also indicates just one or two takes so the whole thing could be done it has little time has possible. I streamed this on Tidal and all I was getting was sound from one speaker. That could be Tidal’s fault but the whole listening experience was poor only helped by the fact that the album was less than 30 mins long. I think overall and not meaning to be rude to our American cousins, this album is very American centric and came in response to the real explosion of UK groups about that time and who put The Sonics week into their shadow. 1/5 28/4/24

This is a pretty rotten album. Production is terrible, vocals are awful, its almost all badly performed covers. 1/5

good lord the number of shit early/mid 60s albums on this list that were just nothing but rock & roll staple covers. It's bad! same goes for Rolling Stones' debut album!

Minimum of three “screams” per song. Best song was Strychnine (L was thinking about taking some and screaming by the end of the album.) Too many cover songs. Was that kazoo heard on a couple of songs? Or just out of tune instruments? Either way, it gets (0.3*s)

Not really my vibe. Interesting pick!

Guys, if it’s showing as red, you need to turn your instruments down or move back from the mic. I don’t understand why the fuck anyone would choose to listen to this. You could be listening to The Beach Boys or The Beatles or Chuck Berry or Rufus Thomas or literally anyone who didn’t record their album using a paint tin suspended from a light fitting.

I give up on trying to find a funny response to this album, it sapped all the energy in me

oh boy. this album is mostly... irritating. lame uninspired progs, songs that sound so similar you wonder if the player is skipping, ear-bleeding mastering. speaking of ear-bleeding this singer. whoever he is. he looooooves to just hold that microphone really close and SCREECH. like he's SCREAMING into that mic. every single song he does it. UWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUGHHH!! is it that necessary?

Not my cup of tea

Not my type.

The Sonics would be fantastic if you heard them in a bar in 1965 but on a list of must to albums?? No. The 4 original songs aren’t bad but we don’t need another bad quality recordings of Roll Over Beethoven and Good Golly Miss Molly. 3.8/10

Old, bad covers album.

ik rock standards are just part of the package with this era of recording but i'm not super into this being mostly covers. still can't believe how square this is to be considered early punk. 1.5

This sounds like a rock album made in the 60s. Not sure how to describe it in words, but I would be able to pick the era pretty easily on first listen. I was not a fan of this album at all. I will be glad to never hear another "woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow" screech again.

1965. 1 star for the kind of bearable track "Do you love me". This album is a drone of the same song over and over, very simple/uninteresting writing, riddled with annoying screams throughout songs. The three exclamation marks in the upper left corner of the album art is the most exciting thing about this album. Nope.

It’s not the Sonics’ fault, but this is extremely dated music. The loud, fuzzy punk sounds are reminiscent of the Kinks, but a year earlier they were putting out stone cold classics. This is a covers album. Apparently this influenced early punk acts like the Stooges. Good for them. I liked the 2 originals.

Hated it after just 2 songs and stopped listening.

WOOOWOOW 1/5

Early Pink Floyd meets early Beatles haha this is utter trash

Uitgezet na eerste twee nummers haha, klinkt als een dronken gast die mee aan het schreeuwen is

A lot of cover versions, not as good as the orginals,

this was so so so so terribly bad

Fun for one song, gets monotonous real fast.

Me aburrió. O sea, sí, supongo que hay que escucharlo para entender que influenciaron a otros grupos posteriores, pero no me gustaron

Eh not really my taste.

”Baby do you LHOOVE MHEE” ”RhYThm ÄND bLUEs” ”TAKE MY LOOVE AND RHAN AWAY WHAAAAAAAAAAA” ”TRY TY TYYY TYY TYY TRTY TY TYY TYYY TYYY” ”BEIBEE CREISEE….. PSAIKHOO” "WHOOOOOOOO-O-O-O" Paskaa Paskaa Paskaa

Not my style.

I couldn’t make it through this album. I tried but this music is just not for me. It sounds outdated and feels generic for the time. 2/10 Fav track: none Least fav: dirty robber

I’m not sure how important this album can be since every cover sounds way worse than the original. Get this off the list ASAP.

Puwing.

This is an album that has expired. I get that this is the basis of rock and roll, but it's just all bleached bones to me now to hear. My Dad would be tapping his foot!

Mixing is rather awful, I don’t care for listening to albums that “maybe” created a sub genre. unless it’s an album that’s actually doesn’t want to make me poke holes in my ear drums with a pin. There cover of good golly miss Molly is considered a hate crime in 38 states

Can’t tell an album by the cover, I suppose. I was expecting some harmonies, maybe some sweetness, but these guys sound like a completely unskilled and totally overexcited cover band from some region not known for its music or art scenes … oh, wait, that’s what they were.

More of the same american pie on cocaine crap. Lame.

this one can stay in the attic

I had to read some reviews to understand why this album might be included in a list of 1001 historically important albums. It seems that this is debatably a precursor to punk, a proposition that nonetheless seems to be disputed. Without this historical association I struggle to find any reason to elevate this album above the rest of the beatlesesque sounds of the mid 60s. If anything the shitty audio quality (which normally doesn't at all affect my judgement of an album) renders this album not only uninspiring, but almost unlistenable. 2/10

Somebody told this guy that he should do the James Brown "WAAAAOOOWW!!" scream as often as possible, and he took that advice to heart. At first it was mildly annoying, but by the end of the album (which feels much, much longer than 30 minutes), I was making a mental note to avoid this band in the future at all costs. Best track: Whichever one has the lowest WAAAOOOWW to time ratio. I'm not going to listen again to figure it out

First Listen: I hate bands that just have a bunch of other people's hits and don't do anything original with them. This is a 1/5 for me. This might have been great back in 1965, but now, it is just a compilation of other bands' hits. Nothing to see here folks. Next.

Not sure I understand the hype on this one. Pretty generic sounding bar band. I guess this came out around '65, sure doesn't sound innovative or forward looking. Sorry not drinking the Kool aid on this one. 1 🌟

blodige ører pga. lydkvalitet. De hyla kunne de vært foruten. Sonic weapon burde det hett. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_weapon

Hated it

I understand that it’s a classic but could not vibe

The music is too loud for me

Classic rock and roll recognised some of the tracks generally very enjoyable

Not my style