Blood, Sweat & Tears

I don't really know what this is! Quite good in parts, but with jazzy interludes in songs. Frankly, I've had enough of jazz over the last 3 albums. But, bits of this were actually quite good. I recognised spinning wheel. 2.5 I think. Might've given it more if I wasn't jazzed out

This is odd. Not "bad odd", but odd. At times very strong flower-power vibes with harmonies and strumming and other times veers into freewheeling jazz territory. Conclusion : I didn't hate it.

Part of that late 60s/early 70s rock turn towards Americana, BS&T looks to Jazz and Big Band as well as the more expected folk and blues, bringing plenty of horns and (unfortunately) flute and strings into a rock band template. The album is all over the place in terms of genre, but the horns sound good and the bass really does a lot of the heavy lifting giving these songs a bit of energy and momentum lost when the main songwriting instrument is the piano. The extended organ noodling is very boring, but the deeper groove jazzy jams with a trumpet/sax lead did draw me in. It doesn't always work, and when it does it isn't really that good - I'd rather listen to folk rock or jazz rather than both at once.

it had good songs to offer but i dont enjoyed this record that much unless from 3 songs

Very dated some decent songs. Are there any albums made this century on this list?

Mostly ecchhhh. Don’t care for the flute or the brassy parts, which is a lot of it.

Not amazing. A bit annoying and just noisy at some points

The vocals are decent but the songwriting is uninspired whilst the music is dull jazz rock. I'd rather play some Brian Auger.

Yeah ok suppose recognise spinning wheel. Not the music to shater your bones but not unpleasant. Must I listen, hmmmmmmm not so sure hombre.

It's an odd album, starts off one way, then goes in the complete opposite direction... it's all over the place! Were there parts that I liked? Yup, some good tunes in there. But as an album, it feels like a mess. 2.5

Sekavahko, jäi vähän epäselväks kokonaisuus - oliko sitä? Välillä kyllä toimi ja siinä mielessä tuli kuunneltua kyllä ihan ok

Very few albums can mix jazz and rock well, this isn’t one of them just a bit all over the place

This is what people who don't like jazz think jazz sounds like.

The needle combing through the grooves of my mind as I take some mind melting medication is etching a picture of you into my brain. The fear of this not being reality makes me buckle over and shit my insides into a bin. Is it a dream? Is it a nightmare? Is it the ramblings of a man so high on hallucinogens that he can't muster a decent memory? Is Nigel Spackman a real man, or is he just a concept?

This album feels confused.It’s nice in some parts but rambling and grating in others.I’m not a huge jazz fan so I guess I was already biased against it but the album itself doesn’t even seem to want to commit to just jazz,branching out into other genres such as rock and funk,which could be considered interesting but unfortunately it’s all just kinda bad?I liked the classical parts.Weirdest part was when the bass line was sunshine of your love by cream for like a minute.

Meh

A little all over the place. Nothing grabbed me. Spinning wheel was aight.

Talented people producing dreary music.

2.5

Not my music

No idea what to expect going into this one, which is kind of best case. Leads in with a folky little number; sleepy acoustic guitar and some flute melodies. Give way to some trumpets and drums that bleed in production. Goes from calm and sleepy to suddenly jazzy and infused with chaos / distress. Smiling Phases continues the latter half of Variations with a Hammond organ line mixed in with some smoky vocals. Feels sort of like a love child between Steppenwolf and The Guess Who. Digging the jazzy interlude into a piano solo. Feels like improv -- these guys probably jammed live. Kind of let this drift into the background for the next two songs. Sounded fine, but mostly forgettable. And When I Die is a weird number to me; kind of all over the place. It's sort of like polka met broadway in a back alley with southern rock. Not feeling the resulting fusion. It kind of reminds me of a shitty precursor to Karn 9 Evil by ELP. Odd to me that this it (according to Spotify) the third most popular off this album. God Bless the Child is kind of a goofy track as well. It has a southern bluesy vibe that breaks out into a little Latin infused jam before coming back to the bluesy vibe. Its not _bad_ necessarily, but its a weird thing to capture on wax. I had no idea that Spinning Wheel was by BS&T... I think I heard this song as a kid on some singing show (American Idol or similar). I think that the hook is rather catchy and his gravelly vocals contrast nicely with the rest of the brassy production. Composition is weird as hell; weird that this made it to radio. It bounces between brassy pop and white-washed jazz / soul that would be okay to bring home to momma in the late 60s. I'm a soft 2 on this one. There are bits and pieces to like on this album, but in general the compositions are a mess without fully leaning into an eclectic image. I feel like they had the idea to play multiple styles inside of a single playtime and then decided to make an entire album that way. End result is something that just feels messy and disjointed.

blud songwriting avout love: thank you miss for loving me.. thank you thank you thank you 100x incredible songwriting kynäviekko "Had "Variations on a Theme" and "Blues, Pt. 2" been omitted from the album, it would have felt so much more cohesive. But they're there. And they're awful. And so "Blood, Sweat, & Tears" earns a middle-of-the-road 3 stars." Herra kusipää tyhmyri.. TÄTÄ ALBUMIA EI OLISI LISTALLA ELLEIVÄT NUO KAPPALEET TEKISI TÄSTÄ UNIIKKIA TEOSTA SAATANAN HUO RAN PENIKKA NUO KAPPALEET ANTAVAT TÄLLE ALBUMILLE TÄHDEN NUMERO #2... IHAN RESPECTABLE SCORE ON 2 TÄHTEÄ EIKÖ HERRA YMMÄRRÄ SITÄ HÄH.. enempää ei toki heru souless songs.. "Unfortunately, there aren't enough bright spots to tip the scales into a positive score" objektivistille 3 on hyvä respectable albumi.. ei täällä paskaa olla tultu kuunneltana.. voi kaikille albumeille vitoista heh.. Gaussin käyrästä jos kuulltu heh englanti poika kirjottana lukioko missattu pitkä matikka a-level matikka... .. 3.00 average.. ei ymmärrä ei voe käsittää..

More like Boring, Boring & Boring if you ask me. I've heard a few of these songs thousands of times on the radio and they never made me want to delve deeper into the band's catalogue. It's just basic rock/jazz fodder for the classic rock machine.

This was so horribly uninspired it's nearly a 1, but at least it's competent... so it's saved, but barely.

While I might admire Al Kooper's vision to fuse rock and jazz (particularly big band jazz), he had left the building by this second LP, and BST were on their way to becoming a harbinger of everything that is loathsome about over-engineered 70s jazz-inflected rock music. According to the wikipedia page, the band has had more than 165 members over the years, and the band has essentially become as franchise instead of a band. In his lengthy contemporary review, Jon Landau of Rolling Stone dismissed the album, writing; "The listener responds to the illusion that he is hearing something new when in fact he is hearing mediocre rock, OK jazz, etc., thrown together in a contrived and purposeless way." I could not agree more. Spinning Wheel is pretty great song, but everything else on this album is just awful. Of the covers, there is a not a single song where the BST version has anything to offer compared to earlier versions. God Bless the Child made me vomit into my mouth a little bit. Blues Pt. 2 is an appalling pastiche of blues riffs and posturing. The more I listen to this, the more I dislike it. Very recently, I purchased (for $2) a Taiwanese bootleg pressing of BST Greatest Hits from 1972. It has five tracks drawn from this self-titled album. It is worth $2 just for Spinning Wheel and Lucretia McEvil, but the rest of the album probably needs to go on skip. Or in the skip.

Blood, Sweat & Tears is the second album by the American jazz rock band Blood, Sweat & Tears. It was commercially successful, being certified quadruple platinum in the US and winning the Album of the Year Grammy in 1970. Fun fact: this was one of the first albums to be released with 16-track recordings - allowing better mixing and overdubbing. The music on this album was more popular in general, because the songs weren't as adventurous as the first album. This made some critics state that the album is mediocre while being more accessible to listeners. I enjoyed this album for its "mediocre" rock which I felt had a jazzy, country spin to it. My favorite tracks were the first and last because these are adaptations of Erik Satie classical movements which are amazing on their own.

Good fun and some good tunes

Meh. Not really into this, but also didn't actively hate it.

Not a fan of this one, uninteresting soft rock songs made worse with schmaltzy orchestration and incessant jazz solos.

This album was a mess and not very listenable.

Vad i fan rökte de på när de gav denna album of the year de va semi ass 1-2

Not my bag at all

Uff, esta vez no estaba de ánimo para esto

Fun but all over the place

well, that was a thing. this album was so schizophrenic and all over the place that once you kind of got into a song, it took a weird left turn. and it was like that with most of the songs. depending on where you were at in the album, you could get: what sounded like game show theme music; random harmonica; random wooden blocks played that imitated a galloping horse; a lead singer, who at times sounded to me like he was doing a bad impression of tom jones; and a random callback of the cream song “sunshine of your love” during an almost twelve minute instrumental. to be honest, the only song that i particularly cared for was “spinning wheel”, which i really dig. everything else to me sounded terrible and non cohesive. i just don’t get it. i guess the song that i enjoyed the most was the last song, because then i knew this album was almost over.

Some amount of nostalgia listening to this - I think my dad must have had an album of theirs. But my overarching feeling about all of this is that they're just trying to hard to be awesome and clever. The lead singer's vocal style is the inescapable emblem of that attitude. I want to like it because of the skill and musicianship but I can't get past that other stuff.

I was reading up on this album, and it apparently beat Abbey Road for the Grammy in 1970?! I'm not even the biggest Abbey Road fan, but that's a snub and a crime. This album is really weird. Starts with a cover of a classical piece, then goes into a Traffic cover, there's an 11 minute full-on jazz jam and it all ends with another classical piece. Overall an interesting enough listen, but definitely not my kind of music.

Past it (and Spinning Wheel isn't enough to save the day)

Some good moments but overall not something I'd be looking to listen to again

The album has a 60s psychedelic touch to it that can be very interesting, but also can be dragged out at times.

Rätt trist alltså

Det svänger egentligen rätt bra om några låtar men har sjukt svårt för sån här jazz-rock-fusion. Chicago-vibbar.

The blood is the blood you'd have to squeeze from a stone before I'd ever willingly listen to this ever again. The sweat is the sweat pouring from my forehead as I have nightmares thinking about the time I listened to this record. The tears are the tears I cried when I first heard this and thought about all the things I could have been doing instead that were more interesting or less painful, e.g., watching paint dry, or sticking needles in my eyes.

Jazz again

Märkligy

meh

this… did nothing for me I’m afraid. I was glad when it was over. ALSO just when you THINK it’s over the last song is almost TWENTY MINUTES LONG so enjoy that.

Jazz / Prog nonsense. I think. I’m not even sure what the fuck that was. But not worthy of a second listen to try and figure it out.

Mine for listening to this mess or theirs for writing and recording this? There were a few bright spots in each song then it all turned a bit jazzy. It sounded like a band having an identity crisis. This was a 1970 Grammy award winner? Astounding decision making.

No thank you

What a bunch of self-indulgent crap. Their playing was tight: good for them. However, the arrangements and composition were a meandering sap-fest that made no sense at all. If this does it for you, then great. But for the rest of us.....

This one’s not for me, sorry. Another album I don’t understand why it’s here. But then again, who am I to decide who deserves a spot on this list? It was a huge struggle to get to the end, but I made it… though I think I lost a lot of blood, because I feel pretty weak :-(

No es el género de música que escucho. No me gustó

Blood, sweat and tears is what's needed to get through this pretentious mess. Strangled vocals pretending to add emotion, pseudo classical/jazz horns, cod-psychedelic lyrics, boring tunes. This album can fuck right off. Best Tracks: And When I Die; Spinning Wheel; You've Made Me So Very Happy

This album was like a dive bar in the cascades. Not exactly my favorite sound but I heard some inspiring stuff. Favorite track off the album was More and More - Live at Cafe Au Go Go, NY.

Didn’t like it at all. All over the place stylistically with a mishmash of all the things I hate - jazz, overblown horns, funk, drum solos. Nope.

Makes you realise how blummin' good the Beatles were this is not remotely innovative

???????????????????

Jazz rock like this has got to be in the bottom five genres

mixing a lot of stuff here and unfortunately some of the stuff is the wankery jazz that makes me feel physically unsettled

What in the MOR jazz rock is this? That version of God Bless the Child sounded like if Joe Cocker had been the guest singer at the gymnasium dance in West Side Story. There’s certainly a lot going on but I don’t feel like any of it really gelled.

They tried every genre on this thing. Who asked for this? A bunch of talented musicians making kind of stupid music

This is a lot of really well played nothing, if this were to have pivoted and been an instrumental/jazz album instead I think I would rate it much higher. Even then, the music wasn’t terribly memorable. I find the lyrics to be pretty shallow and uninteresting; in general this seems like a way station on the sad slide from soul/r&b into yacht rock.

Not a fan at all.

Horseshit. Just appalling nonsense.

Lettre ouverte aux spectres du jury des Grammy Awards 1970. Messieurs les jurés (paix à vos âmes, si tant est que vous en ayez une), Je vous écris depuis une époque que vous n'auriez sans doute pas comprise. Une époque où la musique peut tenir dans une petite boîte sans fil, où l'on peut accéder à presque tout ce qui a été enregistré en quelques secondes. Et c'est dans le cadre d'un projet un peu fou, une sorte de pèlerinage sonore à travers 1001 albums jugés "essentiels", que je suis tombé sur votre... œuvre. Votre décision ou plus exactement votre crime de lèse-majesté musical. Je veux bien sûr parler de cette funeste soirée de 1970 où, dans un accès de folie collective ou de surdité avancée, vous avez décerné le prix de l'Album de l'Année à "Blood, Sweat & Tears". Je dois vous avouer que la première écoute fut un choc. Pas un choc esthétique, non. Plutôt le genre de choc que l'on ressent quand on met les doigts dans une prise électrique défectueuse. Un spasme, une convulsion de mauvais goût qui a secoué mes enceintes et mon âme de pauvre rocker élevé au son de The Cure et des Pixies. Comment avez-vous pu ? Je vous pose la question sans détour. Qu'est-ce qui a bien pu traverser vos esprits ? Étiez-vous à ce point terrorisés par la jeunesse, par la contre-culture, que vous ayez ressenti le besoin de récompenser son exact opposé ? Car cet album, c'est l'anti-rock par excellence. C'est le rock tel que l'imaginerait un directeur de banque qui voudrait "faire jeune". C'est un monstre de Frankenstein musical, une créature boursouflée, où des cuivres assourdissants, dignes d'une comédie musicale de seconde zone à Broadway, viennent piétiner sans vergogne les restes d'un pauvre groupe de rock qui n'avait rien demandé. C'est une musique terriblement sérieuse, qui se prend pour ce qu'elle n'est pas. Elle se drape dans des atours de "complexité" et de "virtuosité", mais elle est aussi profonde qu'une flaque d'eau. C'est une musique de frimeurs, pour les frimeurs. Le genre de disque qu'on devait mettre à l'époque pour impressionner ses invités lors d'un cocktail dînatoire, entre deux conversations sur le golf et les placements en bourse. C'est de la musique d'ameublement, du bruit de fond de luxe. Et ce chanteur... Avez-vous seulement écouté ce chanteur ? David Clayton-Thomas. Il a la puissance vocale d'un animateur de supermarché annonçant une promo sur le papier toilette, et la subtilité d'un marteau-piqueur. Chaque note est forcée, chaque intention est surjouée. Il ne chante pas, il pavoise. Pendant ce temps, dans la même catégorie, il y avait un petit disque sans prétention. Un truc enregistré par quatre jeunes de Liverpool. Ça s'appelait "Abbey Road". Ça vous dit quelque chose ? Un album qui, plus d'un demi-siècle plus tard, continue de faire pleurer, rêver, et vibrer des millions de gens. Un disque dont chaque note, chaque silence, est un miracle. Vous aviez l'or entre les mains, et vous avez choisi le plaqué. Vous aviez l'éternité, et vous avez choisi la naphtaline. Sachez que l'Histoire, elle, n'a pas été dupe. Votre décision est devenue une blague récurrente, un cas d'école de l'égarement critique. "Blood, Sweat & Tears" a rejoint le cimetière des gloires éphémères, tandis qu'"Abbey Road" trône au Panthéon. Je ne vous en veux pas, personnellement. Votre erreur de jugement m'a au moins offert une bonne tranche de rigolade et le sujet de cette lettre. Mais par pitié, si vous vous réincarnez un jour, faites-le en vendeurs de moquettes. Laissez la musique à ceux qui l'aiment vraiment. Avec mes salutations les moins respectueuses, Un passeur de disques du futur. Note finale : 1/5

No me ha gustado

I’ll be honest - I listened to this weeks ago and forgot to rate it. I have zero memory of it beyond that it sucked.

Awful

Didn't care for this one.

Bad

Fuck rating albums. Just let me listen.

I hated all the tempo changes in every song. What is this record even trying to achieve? It was incredibly obnoxious - constant tempo shifts, pseudo-religious lyrics, and what sounded like some weird Western music influence. Every song tried so hard to be everything at once and just ended up feeling messy and all over the place. I didn’t enjoy the singer’s performance either, and the organ (an instrument I particularly despise) on Blues, Pt. 2 almost killed me - the song felt like it would never end. I did appreciate the long break from the singer, but unfortunately he eventually started croaking again. The voice cracks were painful.

not for me at all

For the time, this might have been fine. Although looking at the history on this site, I'm seeing albums from 1967 from Jimi Hendrix and The Byrds and The Doors, so maybe this isn't old enough to get a pass. I don't quite think it's objectively bad, but I had to start skipping around after a few tracks as this was hard to get through. I feel like a 1 is probably too harsh for this album but that's what I'm going with since I couldn't force myself to finish it. 1.4

I did not enjoy

It was interesting to pick out a couple bits that I've heard sampled, but there's not much of actually want to listen to here.

This was a bit of a mess. It seems to be more about showing off than trying to nail a consistent sound or style. Some bits work, some don't, but I found it so all over the place that my attention drifted pretty fast.

This record sucks. Even this version of smiling phases sucks. This record really sucks.

#370. This one definitely doesn't do it for me. It could be fine otherwise if not for the trumpet. That trumpet, or whatever it is, is terrible. It's more annoying than Bob Dylan's harmonicas. I really hate that bit. I would be willing to listen to a remastered version without the trumpet to see if I change my mind, but for now I hate it. 1/5: painful.

This album is too many things all at once. I can't say I could ever get into it because it doesn't seem to know what it wants to be. Full disclosure, I detest Spinning Wheel. Always have my whole life. So that took me out of any cohesion as well. All in all, I don't really like any of these songs and I'm not convinced it's not just a collection of leftovers from various albums or sessions.

Faaark, opening with Variations on a Theme gave the wrong impression. Then Tom Jones Vegas set kicked off. We are all over the place. Album of the year, eh? Was there strong competition in 1970? Gather round kids, when I was a child there was no internet, we drank out of the garden hose, and Blood, Sweat & Tears was album of the Year. P.s. if the next band is from the 60s and features major flute action, I'm gonna pop a vein. Anyway, you might know the hits from AM radio or retirement villages, but I'd be so very happy if I didn't hear them again. One spinning star.

Take a bunch of songs that are good and then making them shit

Wtf is this shit

uhhh what did I just listen to?

This is awful.

Its very much of its time. Was B-List back then and now also very dated

Nicht gefunden

Did not enjoy

Never heard of them but knew a couple songs. Wouldn't listen again. 1/5

No, gracias

Good performances by talented musicians of songs I do not want to listen to again

This trout fishing for bland Americana sound is what people who like Kerouac ramblings listen to. Stand out songs Spinning Wheel and You Made Me So Very Happy can be enjoyed by older woman who will claim Pierre Trudeau once gave them a rose. And tell their teenage sons cooler friend they had a crush on Jim Morrison. Despite not having heard about The Doors until after Jim Morrison was dead. ⭐️

I really can't be doing with jazz fusion.

na

Not a huge fan. Im just not a big jazz guy. But does sample some interesting music. Blues pt2 samples cream’s sunshine of your love Also samples throughout: First Gymnopédie

its sounds like parody music, it just makes me think of Vic Reeves singing in a club style. i would expect to see Brian Potter getting Jerry to sing some of these.

RIP Michael Parkinson. Bet he loved this.

Oh lordy that was painful. Shortly after (quite bad experimental track) "Blues Pt 2 " I had to stop..classical attempts are notable for the hellish amateurism. This albums reassures me of my recent conclusions about this list. It's definitely not about the 1001 ***best*** albums. Some parts of the album are so bad they taint the okay parts. Definitely doesn't work for me. I'm starting to think think this list was put together by someone with very wide ranging and obscure tastes which seems to excessively and detrimentally favour uniqueness, curiosity factor or obscurity of the material (perhaps with an exhaustively éducative goal?) over enjoyability or objective quality. The quality/ enjoyment of the last 20 albums has been very inconsistent.

Well death freaks here's an interesting question: who spawned whom, BST or Chicago? Who came up with this model, with the horns and all the pseudo jazz shit? So if you are going to listen to this album before you get the intravenous drip ready, just be prepared for a very strange experience. The covers are odd. From Traffic to Brenda Holloway and everything in between. Was Laura Nyro a four old playmate of Jackson Browne? How was it that he was writing These Days as a toddler while Laura penned And When I Die? With both Laura's tune and Brenda's You Made Me so Very Happy, go and listen to the originals and you won't need this. The best track is the one of two originals, Spinning, David Clayton Thomas's finest moment, and the template for The Commitments. That's it really, it has aged badly...and I mean badly. Not worth wasting that illicit horse your family went and scored for you before you drop off the perch. Put A Hard Day's Night on instead...

Not my taste in music was just kinda there reminds me of a wedding I went too

I thought it was going to break into Jesus Christ Superstar at every moment. Musical

This type of jazz rock is really not my thing. Not a fan of this album, it just feels very dated and cheesy. I was real surprised to see that the album won the Grammy for Album of the Year and went quadruple platinum. It's telling to me that this album was so successful at the time but was never recommended by anyone when I was growing up as a big music fan, especially compared to lots of other classic rock that maybe didn't have this same mainstream success. I've definitely heard some of these songs in pop culture but would never come back to listen to this album. Constant decisions that just don't work for me. Standout Tracks: N/A

A few decent moments, but mostly just silly, badly-done genre mashing

No good

Não funcionou para mim a fusão da psicodelia baseada no progressivo com o jazz. Sou como forçado especialmente o uso dos metais e algo que parecia improvisação forçada.