This one. This one I want to hear performed live. I want the bass to tickle the soles of my feet and rattle my ribcage. I want to dance and sweat and mouth all the words. More than many, this album feels like one piece of work, rather than a collection of songs. I've never seen Arcade Fire. I'm making all of this up. Here is my daydream: This works best in my mind if I imagine a smallish venue --- max. capac. at most 500 people, an old theater with red velvet curtains and a proscenium stage. We've got reserved seats (we are too old for general admission) in the 6th row and a warm whiskey buzz going. The first three tracks bring us in gently, but each of these rises and falls in tempo and intensity, building to a boppy finish at the end of Une année sans lumière. And THEN, Neighborhood #3 hits like a ton of bricks and we are overwhelmed with sound and light and maybe we can't breathe. Good thing Neighborhood #4 is next so we can take a minute to recover, continuing into the beginning of Crown of Love which builds some more, shifting to a crooning ballad and again to a disco finish that leads into the steady groove of the anthemic Wake Up which itself shifts to a dance party reminiscent of The Jam or Iggy Pop. Rebellion really feels like a finale. We're all on our feet, jumping to the beat in unison. It's hot. We all need water. Almost done. We know. We are elated, high on the show. Applause, clapping, stomping. We want an encore! We hear In the Backseat start before lights come up. We close our eyes, all breathing the same air. Music builds for the last time. It is too much but we don't want it to end. Instruments gradually drop out one by one. No applause at the end of this one. We exit quietly, our ears ringing, a tear in our eyes, a gentle smile on our lips.

Had no idea what I was about to listen to. I found the first track (I Wanna Be Adored) unbelievably boring the first time through and was afraid I was going to loathe the rest of the album. But I smiled through the remaining songs and immediately started the record over. Love the Brit-pop vocals and jangly guitar. I'll come back to this one. p.s. If no one's done it yet, "This is the One" would be the perfect soundtrack to the ending of a manic pixie dream girl movie.

Yay, a woman finally! I haven't listened to this one in a long, long time and it was wonderful to listen to it again. I love her voice, love her music. (Also, her hair. My god that HAIR!) Favorite tracks: Thing Called Love, Cry On My Shoulder, Nobody's Girl, I Will Not Be Denied, and I Ain't Gonna Let You Break My Heart Again.

When this started, I thought, oh lord this is not what my frayed nerves need today. And I turned it off. Then I restarted and turned the volume down and it was much better. I completely missed this band at the time but I dig this punky, grungey (grungy?), alt-rock sound. (My spell check likes grungy but my eyes don't.) Reminds me of Faith No More, Soundgarden, Elvis Costello. Misbeaten sounds like The Beatles feat. Frankie Valli. I love On a Rope, Young Livers (yes!), Ball Lightning, Suit City, and Come See Come Saw. WOW! I love this!

Hello! Feminist Killjoy here... I spent a lot of this listen making a mental list of some of the female artists that I hope are coming up. (We've been listening for a month and we've heard exactly one.) So, while this album wasn't unpleasant to listen to, it had me wondering if maybe Deerhunter's dad was on the judging panel? And this isn't to say I think they're bad. If they lived down the street and played the local clubs, I'd think they are awesome. I'd be super proud of them for making stuff. But I found most of this unremarkable in the grand scheme of music and I can't help but wonder who was passed over to include it in the 1001. My rating of them is low perhaps because I'm mad at the list-makers of the world. Songs I enjoyed: Earthquake, Desire Lines, He Would Have Laughed. (And I've listened to these three several times now and like them more each time. I'm glad I've heard them. They are good.) Song I actively disliked: Basement Scene

Wow! Wasn't expecting to love this so much.

Delightful. Really enjoyed it.

While I was very familiar with the singles from this album that were released in the US, this is the first time that I remember hearing the full album. I found most tracks on this record just OK. I can't deny that the opening riff of Money for Nothing is pretty great and I really liked The Man's Too Strong and the bass-heavy One World. The one track that I actively disliked was Your Latest Trick which seemed quite dated with all its 80s saxophone and reminded me of the theme from LA Law...and not in a good way.

I'm not sure that there are actually 11 different tracks here --- more like two and a half. What I'm saying is, some of these songs sound the same. Except Thug, which sounds like the theme from Seinfeld. But what the heck --- it's peppy and fun and I had a good time bopping around the kitchen making dinner and waxing nostalgic about high school cheerleading as I listened.

Tom Waits is one of those artists that I always felt I was just expected to like. So I resisted liking him for a long time. And then one day...I guess I finally heard the right song(s) or something and now I love him. It feels to me like he channels music from somewhere not of this world. Good variety of styles on this record. Not every song speaks to me personally (sorry Downtown Train) but there are a few that I love a lot (Jockey Full of Bourbon, Big Black Mariah, Gun Street Girl). I've heard the comparison to Cookie Monster before but this is the first time I've noticed that sometimes Tom Waits sounds like Christopher Lloyd (specifically on the title track here).

Had no idea what I was about to listen to. I found the first track (I Wanna Be Adored) unbelievably boring the first time through and was afraid I was going to loathe the rest of the album. But I smiled through the remaining songs and immediately started the record over. Love the Brit-pop vocals and jangly guitar. I'll come back to this one. p.s. If no one's done it yet, "This is the One" would be the perfect soundtrack to the ending of a manic pixie dream girl movie.

Not much variety from song to song but I appreciate their youthful exuberance. I hear a few of these songs fairly often when my husband's choosing the music --- Family Entertainment, Here Comes the Summer, Get Over You (which I guess wasn't on the original LP and was a bonus track on the digital stream I found) --- but most of these were new to me. Really liked Billy's Third, Male Model, and I Know a Girl. It's not a style of music that I feel the need to seek out but I don't hate it.

There's too much to say about this album. It's just terrific. Picked up on a lot of new things listening this time: disquieting stereo effects, interesting fade-outs and transitions between songs, lyrics I've never quite caught ("trying to make a dove-tail joint"). Such diverse musical styles but nothing sounds out of place. I love it mucho.

Songs are short, fast, and fun but kind of all the same. I can appreciate the album's importance for its time and its influence on other bands. And who doesn't love chanting "hey ho let's go"? But as a whole, the record doesn't exactly speak to me personally at this point in my life.

Yay, a woman finally! I haven't listened to this one in a long, long time and it was wonderful to listen to it again. I love her voice, love her music. (Also, her hair. My god that HAIR!) Favorite tracks: Thing Called Love, Cry On My Shoulder, Nobody's Girl, I Will Not Be Denied, and I Ain't Gonna Let You Break My Heart Again.

I like this album a whole lot and really enjoyed listening to it in one sitting for the first time in a long time. I loved feeling immersed in the fullness of their sound. Perry Farrell's vocals are simultaneously raw and melodious. While I really like the singles (Stop! and Been Caught Stealing) that made me buy the CD when it came out, I dig even more the theatricality of the later songs on the album, like Three Days, Classic Girl, and the nightmare circus that is Of Course.

I've never heard of 'em. I'm goin' in! All right! You wanna win me over quickly? Gimme accordion right from the jump! Or is it a harmonium? Either way, I am totally on board. Next song is the "everybody needs a bosom for a pillow" song! I know this one! (After looking it up, I know the Norman Cook (Fatboy Slim) remix.) Yes! Love it! Love the trippy groove of We're in Yr Corner and the silliness of Funky Days are Back Again. Appreciate the reminder that, "Good shit's all around, good people." Definitely will listen to this one again and am already looking into their other albums, starting with Judy Sucks on a Lemon for Breakfast, which...is that a clarinet on the title track? Swoon!

All I knew ahead of time is There She Goes, mostly from So I Married an Axe Murderer (which I watched again this summer and it has held up pretty well). I like this album! Different songs remind me of different bands --- lots of REM sounds, a bit of U2 and The Beatles, British Invasion era Rolling Stones and The Kinks, and even an iota of The Monkees. None of that is bad. The song Feelin' has me feelin' pretty darn good. (It's just too short!) Would have rated it a 4 after the first listen. Rounding up to 5 after the second.

I can hear their influence on The River Bottom Nightmare Band. I was kind of ok with it until Parchment Farm which is...problematic on a couple of fronts. There are better albums to listen to for this kind of psychedelic rock sound. I doubt I'll listen to this again.

I've heard of The Electric Prunes but the name is such an unsuccessful attempt at humor, I kind of assumed they were a parody, like Spinal Tap. But here they are. (And maybe Spinal Tap's got an album on this list so this doesn't really prove that they're a "real" band. In fact some of these songs reminded me of ST's Cups and Cakes.) Anyway... I liked this. The music definitely evokes a specific time period. These guys look awfully serious on the cover, though, for playing songs that are quite silly. I guess they're mad because their producer made them sing songs they didn't even write! How often has it happened that an all-male band sang so many songs written by a couple of women? (Oh, but looking closer, I guess they're recreating the B&W illustration behind them which is...what? Why isn't THAT the cover?) In addition to Spinal Tap, I was reminded of The Guess Who and The Hollies. I enjoyed I Had Too Much to Dream, Are You Loving Me More, Sold to the Highest Bidder, Get Me to the World on Time, and About a Quarter to Nine. The ragtimey Toonerville Trolley was a delightful surprise at the end.

I don't know. Listening to MJ mostly just makes me feel sad and conflicted now. Highlights of this album for me are the groove of The Way You Make Me Feel (you knock me offa my feet now baby --- hoo!) and when the chorus comes in at the key change in Man In the Mirror and also remembering how my college friend Laura changed the words to Bad and sang, "My dad...has had...a crush on Cheryl Ladd!"

"Obviously, doctor, you've never been a 13-year-old girl." This album is a mood. They used to use some of these tracks on This American Life a lot. That may have been why I bought the CD originally but I can't really recall now. I don't remember much about the movie other than thinking that it captured the 70s better than most movies set but not made in that decade. It was nice to listen to the whole album again. There's a sound on one of the tracks (maybe Dirty Trip?) that sounds like The Bionic Woman jumping. I like the album a lot, especially the last track with narration from the movie. That's some beautiful writing there. "Everyone dated the demise of our neighborhood from the suicides of the Lisbon girls. People saw their clairvoyance in the wiped-out elms and harsh sunlight. Some thought the tortures tearing the Lisbon girls pointed to a simple refusal to accept the world as it was handed down to them: so full of flaws. But the only thing we are certain of after all these years is the insufficiency of explanation."

Most of this was...fine? I guess? (shrug emoji) I like the guitar playing and the instrumentation but mostly this leaves me cold and wanting to listen to a country album that I like. I liked Hillbilly Highway. Good 'Ol Boy is ok, though I don't really get why someone from Iran partially owns his truck and it reminds me a little of the song Gettin' Bi from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. I do really appreciate the line, "I was born in the land of plenty, now there ain't enough." And I don't know that I like the song all that much but I sure feel the sentiments in My Old Friend the Blues.

Me, before listening to this album: I just don't get why people like Bob Dylan so much. Me, listening distractedly while cooking dinner: Yeah, I still don't get it. Me, as soon as It's Alright Ma starts: Ohhhhhhhhhhh...I get it now. I'm giving it 5 just for that experience.

I've only listened to The Jam's Greatest Hits and frankly I'm surprised we're listening to this album instead of whatever album Town Called Malice is on. I will be equally surprised if we eventually listen to more than one album by The Jam. (Side note: My husband said he knew of this album before he knew what "all mod cons" means and he thought it was something much cooler than it actually is.) I only recognize a couple of these but this is a fun album. The bass and the drums stand out a lot to me in an interesting way. Favorite songs: the cover of The Kinks' David Watts (oooooh, when do we get to listen to The Kinks?), Billy Hunt, Fly, The Place I Love, and Down in the Tube Station at Midnight.

When this started, I thought, oh lord this is not what my frayed nerves need today. And I turned it off. Then I restarted and turned the volume down and it was much better. I completely missed this band at the time but I dig this punky, grungey (grungy?), alt-rock sound. (My spell check likes grungy but my eyes don't.) Reminds me of Faith No More, Soundgarden, Elvis Costello. Misbeaten sounds like The Beatles feat. Frankie Valli. I love On a Rope, Young Livers (yes!), Ball Lightning, Suit City, and Come See Come Saw. WOW! I love this!

I admire their speed and their power and their talent. These guys can play. But other than the title track (which is great), there's not much on this album that makes me want to listen again. Similar to how the Ramones made me feel, I can see why other folks like them but they're just not for me right now. I think maybe they're good for adolescent dudes who are mad at their math teacher and I can't not take that personally today.

I don't love every song on this record, but the ones I love, I love an awful lot. These are hard rock songs with singable and often beautiful melodies. I'll Stick Around and For All the Cows are two of my favorite FF songs. I also like Good Grief, Floaty, and This is a Call. Before today, I'd never heard how this album was recorded and now my mind is blown. This is all just Dave? Whoa.

This record broke my heart and made me laugh out loud. He's a genuine poet and a heck of a story-teller. I loved pretty much every track (even Pretty Good with its glib mention of dog rape (WTH???)). This kind of album is the reason I'm here.

This album is not without some 80s cheese and some of the songs seem rather pedestrian in their themes (Allergies? Cars Are Cars? Write what you know, I guess). But Paul Simon is a poet and a prophet who can write a good melody and some great lyrics. (I also forget sometimes how freaking funny he can be.) I understand why I missed this album in 1983 --- it was a little grown-up for my 15-year-old tastes. But this sure appeals to me now. The title track, Song About the Moon, Think Too Much, and Rene and Georgette Magritte... are all really nice pieces of music. Train in the Distance and The Late Great Johnny Ace gave me chills.

Holy cow! This album is freaking fantastic! What have I been waiting for??? I think as a kid I bought just enough into the satanic panic of the 70s and 80s to believe at least a tiny bit that listening to Black Sabbath would invite Satan into my soul. (There were Christian protestors outside the brand new Events Center when Black Sabbath came to my home town in the early 80s.) And even after I became certain there was nothing to fear in this music, I had convinced myself that Black Sabbath just wouldn't appeal to me. They'd be too hard, too noisy, too mean. I even knew and liked half these songs already (War Pigs, Paranoid, Iron Man) but there was still a part of me that did not believe. Gah! Propaganda works, yo! Now I get why the powers that be needed me to be afraid. But the truth is we don't need to fear this bunch of hippies! The war pigs are the ones to fear! Anyway, my feelings about every single track on this record run the gamut from like-it-a-lot to oh-my-god-I-love-this-so-much! The drums, the guitars, bass, vocals are all amazing. When everything but the hi-hat drops out at the beginning of War Pigs? Sublime. The mellow bongo-ness of Planet Caravan? Smooth. The psychedelia Electric Funeral? Terrific. The bluesy grooves in the middle of Hand of Doom and Fairies Wear Boots? Bluesy and groovy --- and wicked! I love this record. More please!

Hello! Feminist Killjoy here... I spent a lot of this listen making a mental list of some of the female artists that I hope are coming up. (We've been listening for a month and we've heard exactly one.) So, while this album wasn't unpleasant to listen to, it had me wondering if maybe Deerhunter's dad was on the judging panel? And this isn't to say I think they're bad. If they lived down the street and played the local clubs, I'd think they are awesome. I'd be super proud of them for making stuff. But I found most of this unremarkable in the grand scheme of music and I can't help but wonder who was passed over to include it in the 1001. My rating of them is low perhaps because I'm mad at the list-makers of the world. Songs I enjoyed: Earthquake, Desire Lines, He Would Have Laughed. (And I've listened to these three several times now and like them more each time. I'm glad I've heard them. They are good.) Song I actively disliked: Basement Scene

I expected this to be shocking and it was. I was shocked by how boring it is. Next!

Hooray! Some soul! I didn't think I knew this guy but once it started I recognized Cry to Me from that one scene in Dirty Dancing. You know the one. I also know He'll Have to Go but I'm thinking that maybe I really just know the first line, "Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone," from a TV ad for one of those compilation records in the 70s. (And maybe not this version. Maybe Elvis?) I really like this! Sexy, bluesy, lots of yearning. So glad to be introduced to it.

I freely admit that I've been living under a rock since about 1995. I was of course aware of Amy Winehouse and felt the grief of her fans when she died but I'd never listened to her music. (OK, maybe I saw them do Rehab on Glee...) I didn't know what to expect but it sure wasn't this. Musically, it's a joy to hear such a clear echo of the girl groups and soul singers of the 1960s --- I especially like the sample of Ain't No Mountain High Enough in Tears Dry on Their Own. The music sounds completely modern and nicely retro. Lyrically, it's sometimes hilarious (what kind of fuckery is this?) but mostly it's depressing as hell. I hear a woman trying desperately to numb her pain while trying to sound devil-may-care. And it is obviously so much worse considering how her short life ended. I can't imagine a bleaker sentiment than Love is a Losing Game. One or two songs are misses for me but overall I really like this album. I'm angry that we lost such a talent so early and I hope that she is resting in peace.

Jesus Fucking Christ, this record. If there were no lyrics, I would really really love this. I very much enjoy this traditional style of country with its banjos and fiddles and delicious guitar playing. The duet with Buck Owens is particularly good and it's great to hear Maria McKee on Send Me the Pillow. But as so often happens, toxic masculinity ruins the party again. My dude, your lady-friend is allowed to leave you. She's allowed to leave to be with someone else or just to get away from you (and your gun) or for no reason at all other than she wants to. And, yes, I know it hurts. It's super painful and will make you sad and angry and humiliated and that is HARD. I get it. But eat some ice cream, binge watch some TV, take a bath, and get some freaking therapy. This multi-song revenge fantasy is a misogynistic horror show and it makes you sound like a fragile baby. I'm giving this a 2 instead of a 1 for Buck Owens and Maria McKee.

For the first two songs, I couldn't really tell what musical language these guys were speaking. Once the bass kicked in on the superbly titled Whisperin' While Hollerin', I started to understand what we were doing. And then came the spare and lovely acoustic guitar instrumental Vastopol which is completely unlike anything else on the album but doesn't feel out of place. There is more great bass, funky guitar, and playing with time signatures in Mas Cojones, What Gets Heard, Time with You, and If'n. There are a couple of drum solos, which are good if you like that kind of thing. Some Things is fast and catchy punk-lite (in a good way). I came away thinking that these guys are decent musicians who like having a good time and I had a good time listening though I don't know how often I'll come back to this.

Are they trying to be silly? This isn't funny enough for me to believe they're not earnest but ... The songs I _almost_ liked were Breakpoint and, I can't believe I'm about to type these words, Tornado of Souls. But I've had enough metal for a while. Could we please have some Indigo Girls or Barbra Streisand or, as a friend of mine once said, "some goddamned Dolly Parton?"

Someone included Once Around the Block on a mixtape for me a while back but that's all I know of Badly Drawn Boy. I've always liked Once Around the Block because it's in 3 and sometimes you just need a waltz so I'm interested. First track is called The Shining and I'm nervous. Oh, a cello. How lovely. And a French horn? Go on... O! It's about the sun! And it's pretty! I love it. Next song is Everybody's Stalking (good Midnight Cowboy/Nilsson reference) and I'm dancing at the bus stop! (Can't really understand the lyrics but they might be creepy since it's about stalking.) I love this one, too! Also on my love list are Pissing in the Wind, Say it Again, Epitaph, the disco sound of Disillusion, and Stone on the Water (another waltz). The piano at the beginning of Magic in the Air reminded me of Hard Candy Christmas from Best Little Whorehouse... This Song is very strange. I listened to it twice on speakers and would have absolutely believed it was Simon & Garfunkel. But then I was relistening on headphones on my walk home and thought I might be having a stroke. There is some very very strange (and off-putting) stereo effect happening there. I almost fell over. There are a few tracks on this long album that didn't do much for me but overall I really liked this and will listen again.

What were you doing when you were 21? This woman was recording a masterpiece. Incredible.

Sweet and mellow, folksy and jazzy, double bass and marimbas, lovely melodies and a mournful voice. Side A was perfect for my state of mind on a lazy gray autumn Sunday afternoon. Side B's Gypsy Woman (title=ugh) went on way too long for me. Was grateful when that one was over. But overall, I really enjoyed this. Will look for more of him.

This is a band that I've seen on other people's T-shirts but I've never really listened to. And now I've listened to them. It's not at all that I disliked them. Not at all. But I can't really say that I liked them either. The music is fine but didn't make me feel a lot of feelings: good, bad, or otherwise. The instruments are standard rock band. Songs are melodious but not really pretty. A lot of the singing is more like pitched talking or yelling. And again I'm not saying this is bad, just not for me. Here are the songs that I appreciated: Teen Age Riot, 'Cross the Breeze, Eric's Trip, and Total Trash.

This feels like the kind of album that would be playing super loud at a record store and you'd be shopping and grooving and you'd pick up a copy and then listen on your walkman and it would feel like a wonderful secret. I loved this an awful lot. Even songs that started out kind of annoying (is he rhyming "mistake" with "mistake"?) built to something magnificent. Different tracks brought to mind wildly different things: Pristeen reminded me of Jesus Christ Superstar, Double Vegetation of The Who's Tommy, Promised Land of Leonard Cohen, Safesurfer of Pink Floyd. Several of the tracks are a total groove and a half: East Easy Rider, If You Loved Me At All, Soldier Blue, Not Raving But Drowning, Head. I was dancing along for a lot of it. And then we end with the easy, mellow Las Vegas Basement. I didn't pay much attention to lyrics. They seem repetitive but I didn't mind that at all. Love it love it love it. Thank you for this!

As a Seattle-ite, I'm glad I've now listened to a Mudhoney album. I was solidly...whelmed. I didn't want to leave the room because of it or anything but I'm not in a big rush to listen again. I did listen to it twice: once on headphones, mostly just paying attention to the music, and again on speakers while doing other things. I liked it better the second time. As my sole focus, there wasn't much there that caught my interest, nothing particularly unusual or catchy or moving. But while I was doing other things (making breakfast, answering emails), I found myself bopping around a bit to it. That's gonna elevate it from a 2 to a 3 for me. Thanks, though, Mudhoney for saving Sub Pop.

I really don't like looking at the cover. These guys make me nervous. I don't trust 'em for some reason. I really didn't like this the first time through and liked it even less the second time through. Couldn't really distinguish from track to track, lyrics are more speaky and shouty than singy, nothing really to grab onto. But I kind of got into the groove of it the third time through and really enjoyed Breadcrumb Trail, Washer, and Good Morning, Captain. If I were a different person, I can imagine listening to this late at night in a low-key hang with friends. But my friends and I are old and that would be past our bedtimes.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! This is so great! Listening to this just felt really good. Loved every track but special shout-out to Human Behavior, Like Someone in Love, and Big Time Sensuality. So good! Eleven stars out of five. ***********

How wonderful to listen to two women in a row! (Björk was yesterday. These two make a nice pair.) I've not listened to this one and didn't know anything beyond Running Up That Hill. I'm sorry I waited so long. Or maybe not. Maybe it needed to be now for me to appreciate it. Big Sky and Jig of Life were my favorites. I'm quite well taken with her voice, especially how it drops on the word "God" in Running Up That Hill. I sense a particular kind of authenticity in her music, that she's making exactly the kind of record she wants and needs to make and that makes me want to listen more. Excellent.

This is fine. Not unpleasant to listen to but nothing particularly stands out.

Lynyrd Skynyrd's Three Guitar Army and Ronnie Van Zant's growl resonate deep in my bones. These songs feel surprisingly like home. Maybe it's because Gimme Three Steps was one of the songs that my brother's garage band rehearsed in our basement. (We did not have a garage.) My brother must've had a Greatest Hits album on 8-Track or something because several of these sound familiar but not all of them. I've never heard this whole album before, I'm sure of that. At least 3 songs mention guns but I don't think they ever get used, just held threateningly. I said "uh-oh" when they started talking about the ghetto in Things Goin' On but the rest of the words seemed ok and then the honky-tonk piano came in sounding exactly like something Paul Williams would write for the Muppets or Bugsy Malone and I was totally charmed. I prefer the upbeat songs like I Ain't the One, Gimme Three Steps, and Things Goin' On to the ballads but I cannot deny that Free Bird is a great song even if it's nine minutes long and I've heard it a million times. If I get to see the original Skynyrd line-up in the afterlife, you bet I'll ask to hear Free Bird.

This one took me a few listens before I could really decide about it. I was excited to listen --- I'm not very familiar with Emmylou Harris but feel like I should be. The first time through, the songs just weren't taking hold. I thought they were pleasant and pretty but none of them felt like mine. I'm almost done listening for a third time and it's grown on me quite a bit. Her voice is great, there are some interesting guests singing harmony, the instrumentation is varied and fun, her songs tell a story. I'm most sold on One Big Love, Hour of Gold, and the title track. Those feel like they belong in my library. I also like Boy from Tupelo and My Antonia.

There's nobody that quite sounds like Kraftwerk. This is another of those bands that I appreciate and respect more than like. They're good. They're unique. They're interesting. And yet... Their music doesn't make me FEEL anything. I never have the thought, "Oh, I should listen to some Kraftwerk." This album is good. I have a hard time distinguishing between songs but I can tell that things change now and then. I find the affectless German thing quite charming and some lines stick in my head (We look around and change our pose.) I wasn't wishing for it to end but I wasn't all that disappointed when it was over, ya know? Normally, this kind of review would mean a 3-star rating from me but I'm bumping it up to 4 stars because, although I don't love them, my husband does and he doesn't love many things and so the fact that he loves Kraftwerk DOES make me feel something...happy.

I'm having another ohhhhhhhhhh-I-get-it-now moment. I've heard bits of this my whole life but never sat through the whole thing and kind of didn't think I'd like it that much. I listened to the 35th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, 1 hour and 46 minutes of music that I didn't want to end. Frampton's musicianship is astounding --- there's plenty of impressively spoodly electric guitar solos but then there's some lovely acoustic technique in Penny for your Thoughts and All I Wanna Be. And his voice! Smooth and lovely throughout, lots of variation. None of the fatigue or pitch problems you can sometimes hear in live recordings. I think of Frampton as a great guitarist but he can really really sing and he seems to be an incredible showman. In addition to the singles I was familiar with, I fell in love with several of these songs during this listen: Wind of Change, All I Wanna Be, I Wanna Go to the Sun, Shine On, and White Sugar. I didn't really love the cover of Jumpin' Jack Flash --- it just didn't seem to have teeth for some reason --- but I have renewed appreciation for Do You Feel Like We Do, all 14 minutes of it. So great!

This was fun. Mostly these are songs I either don't know at all or don't know well. Stand-outs were the catchy, danceable title track and the theatrical I Let the Music Speak, a glimpse into what B&B had in store with the musical Chess (which I love). I didn't find much else that was very distinctive on this album but even a run-of-the-mill ABBA song is nice to listen to. I listened to the Deluxe edition with seven additional songs. I don't feel like those added much. A friend mentioned that he liked how the original album ended so I listened again, stopping at the end of Like an Angel Passing Through My Room, and I totally agree: that's how the album should end. There've been a lot of albums in this project where the version I find streaming is a Deluxe version and that's clearly not always good --- it matters how an album starts and ends and what order the songs play. This is a reminder to try to find the original version whenever I can.

Well now I don't know how to rate this album. I listened all the way through twice and was quite well taken with it the first time, ready for 5 stars. But after a second listen, I'm tired, ready for it to be over, at a low 3. I'm not sure what happened. I find I like it best when I can give all my attention to the lyrics. That makes it hard to get anything done while I'm listening. Second time through, I had to get some work done so maybe that's why it grated. I did really like the first side both times, all acoustic with just Dylan "singing." His voice is definitely a parody of itself and I can't call it "pretty" or even "good" but honestly I can't imagine these songs sounding any other way. This is poetry talk-sung to some simple, sweet melodies. His musicianship really shines on the harmonica --- chords and single tones with dynamics! Whoa. I started writing down all the lyrics I particularly liked but had to stop pretty quickly because I'd be quoting entire songs. I like the second side less with more musicians and more electricity. I see now from the album's Wikipedia page that the audience agreed with me: "The first half of the concert was greeted warmly by the audience, while the second half was highly criticized, with heckling going on before and after each song." It wasn't bad but I wasn't as charmed. I'll split the difference and give the whole thing a 4. I'm glad to have listened to it but I may not listen to the whole thing again.

Loved the first few tracks, loved the last few tracks, but I got a bit bogged down in the middle. Overall, I like this Joanna Newsom-y kind of thing: a coffee shop guitar, quirky lyrics. The first lines and the last lines of the first song won me over right away and will be a hymn in my own personal church: "This is the soup that I believe in This is the smoke I'm always breathin' This is the way I share my breakfast ... Well we've known we've known We've had a choice We chose rejoice" I'm interested in hearing more from this guy.

This is not what I expected Portishead to sound like. But it turns out I was confusing them with Pigeonhead. Very different. Portishead's Dummy is pleasant ethereal background sound, the kind of music that they play to alert me that my time is up in the sensory deprivation tank. I've listened all the way through a few times and, other than Sour Times (which I know from something but I don't know what), not much leaps out at me. I'll rotate a couple of songs into my library but I'm not going to rush to find more.

A solid groove of an album. Songs weren't all that distinct from one another but I danced pretty much the whole time. The last track felt like the end of a long dance party and I felt good and ready to go home.

This was fine. I didn't love it. Some lyrics popped out and at best I mildly enjoyed some of the songs.

OK! I liked this the first time through. Liked it even more the second time through. Yep, the music is catchy, the rhymes are clever. All the talk of M-16s, M-10s, .9s, and the threat of death or prison makes me viscerally anxious, so I'm not sure if I'll listen to it regularly (and I acknowledge the privilege that I have that allows me to say and do that). But this is a great album and I can see why it's on this list.

Glad to see some rap finally showing up 53 albums in. And we got two days in a row! After Nas’ Illmatic yesterday, I was excited to listen to Common. But this didn’t appeal to me. I don’t particularly like Common’s rapping style. To me it felt disconnected from the music for the most part --- it's not that I want him to sing or anything but it almost felt like the lyrics and music were recorded independently so I had a hard time finding a groove. I definitely want to be exposed to more rap and hip-hop with this project but this just wasn’t my thing.

Haven't we already listened to this? A lot of these records from the mid-90s are all running together. I liked the first few songs: the title track, Come Together (not the Beatles), and I Think I'm in Love (with lyrics like "Just me and my spike in my arm and my spoon," think more Lou Reed's Perfect Day than Eddie Money's song with almost the same title). Sorta liked Electricity. But the rest was unmemorable and felt endless. Are the 1990s overrepresented in the 1001 Albums book or is the randomization front loading the 90s records for us? Everything's starting to sound the same!

Lots of melodic and rhythmic unpredictability on this one. Interesting vocals and instrumentation, too. Sometimes it's really interesting and fun and sometimes it's hard work to listen. I loved Cannibal Resource, particularly the backing vocals and the guitar in the instrumental section mid-song. I loved Stillness is the Move, including the title (this is a band that likes a juxtaposition I think). Two Doves sounds like contemporary musical theater (that's a compliment coming from me) and contains the line, "But our bed is like a failure." And Remade Horizon is really great, again with the hooty backing vocals that I find so charming. Most of the rest didn't really work for me. Temecula Sunrise has extremely pedestrian, extremely depressing lyrics. ("Definitely you can come and live with us. I know there's a space for you in the basement, yeah. All you gotta do is help out with the chores and dishes." Poetic in its banality? Actually, kind of yes.) In The Bride, the handclaps after the line, "no one has any good reason to live," were...surprising. I'm giving this one a 4 because the songs I love, I really love, and I am giving them each a star.

Yes! I've listened three times all the way through and just started my fourth. This is exactly the kind of thing I was hoping from this project. It would never occur to me to seek out some Afro-Cuban jazz and, even if it did occur to me, I'd have no idea where to start. I love this! It's like a dance party in my kitchen. The crisp horns and percussion set my soul aflame and get my hips a-shakin'. I can't even pick any favorite tracks. I enjoyed every minute.

This was such a pleasure to listen to today. Cohen is on the list of artists like Bob Dylan and Tom Waits who I had to age into. I appreciate him in a way that was never possible before. I have a two-disc Leonard Cohen Essentials CD but haven't ever listened to any of his studio albums. So glad to be doing it now. The guitar work is exquisite, the lyrics emotionally deep. The chorus of children's voices is particularly effective but not overused. I favorited every track.

This album blows my mind. Every single time. This is a pop/rock album, right? But here's Eleanor Rigby, a piece of chamber music with pop lyrics; Love to You, with its tabla and sitar; Yellow Submarine, which feels like something written for Sesame Street; For No One, backed only by piano, percussion, and French horn; and Tomorrow Never Knows which still sounds, in 2021, like it's from the future. The rest of the songs are more traditional rock and pop but they are an eclectic mix that I find difficult to place in a specific time period. Here, There and Everywhere sounds like 1960 Beatles. Got to Get You Into My Life sounds like 1970s Wings (which is honestly ok with me). Here is a short list of the things on this album that make me exclaim, "Are you kidding me?" to these geniuses when I listen to Revolver: The too slow countdown + cough + in tempo countdown that open Taxman and the guitar solo in the middle. The psychedelic fuzzy guitar on She Said She Said. The staggered entrances of the instruments and vocals at the beginning of Good Day Sunshine and the change to the melody on "Sunshine" the last time through the chorus. The way the bass and the piano play with each other on I Want to Tell You. The entirety of Tomorrow Never Knows. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? This is my favorite Beatles album.

This isn't my favorite White Stripes album but I appreciate the intentionally spare style on display. I love Jack's youthful, crackly voice straining to hit the higher notes and Meg's steady volume on the drums. There's the perfect punk song Fell in Love With a Girl, the too short Little Room, the melancholy and melodic Same Boy You've Always Known, and Offend in Every Way somehow evoking gunslingers in the old west. A couple of the songs are relentless with the guitar, drums, and vocals all keeping the exact same rhythm pretty much the whole time (Expecting and Aluminum). My two favorites are This Protector (good lord, I am a sucker for a rock and roll piano) and the unexpected We're Going to Be Friends, which only a monster could dislike. ("Teacher thinks that I sound funny but she likes the way you sing.")

Holy holy, what an absolute gem of an album. Can't believe I've never heard it. The album starts with The Beach Boys telling me NOT to go near the water. What? This was unexpected. To be honest, this song is a little cheeseball and a bit too on the nose. It could've been (maybe was) a TV ad for water conservation. But other than the surprising message, this sounds like a Beach Boys song. Long Promised Road is a beautiful, beautiful pop song. I just love it. Can't believe it wasn't a bigger hit. Take a Load Off Your Feet is catchy and ridiculous. I knew Captain & Tennille's cover of Disney Girls but had no idea it was a cover of a Beach Boys song. This is another really lovely pop song with an achingly exquisite melody sung so beautifully by Bruce Johnston. When he sings "oh" in the chorus, it goes straight to my heart. I love this one. From that we go straight to a heavy blues riff and some sirens for Student Demonstration Time. This has some of the best lyrics including, "The pen is mightier than the sword, but no match for a gun." Fuck. Feel Flows definitely sounds like the Beach Boys singing but doesn't sound like a Beach Boys song. The instrumental section is prog rock with flutes and all. This is another one that I love. I don't know what to say about Lookin' At Tomorrow. I just don't. A Day in the Life of a Tree is from the p.o.v. of said tree accompanied by a sad carnival calliope. Again, Til I Die and Surf's Up sure sound like the Beach Boys singing but they are eerie and haunting and the opposite of the carefree surfing songs I've come to expect from these guys. They're stunning. I am so grateful to have been introduced to this precious piece of work. We've only been together, this album and I, for about 24 hours but already we are in a pretty serious relationship that I think is going to last for quite some time.

Whoa. This is dark. I am worried about Bonnie "Prince" Billy. His pain is palpable. I felt heart-sick the entire duration of my first listen. I think I'm on my fourth time through now. It is still dark but it gets prettier and prettier the more I listen. There's not a song I dislike on the album. I find the songs I See a Darkness and Today I Was an Evil One especially resonant, at least today. The record ends on a positive note (I think?) with Raining in Darling. "Oh, it don't rain anymore I go outdoors Where it's fun to be And I know you love me I know you do" love love love

Two words: Heck yeah!

This one. This one I want to hear performed live. I want the bass to tickle the soles of my feet and rattle my ribcage. I want to dance and sweat and mouth all the words. More than many, this album feels like one piece of work, rather than a collection of songs. I've never seen Arcade Fire. I'm making all of this up. Here is my daydream: This works best in my mind if I imagine a smallish venue --- max. capac. at most 500 people, an old theater with red velvet curtains and a proscenium stage. We've got reserved seats (we are too old for general admission) in the 6th row and a warm whiskey buzz going. The first three tracks bring us in gently, but each of these rises and falls in tempo and intensity, building to a boppy finish at the end of Une année sans lumière. And THEN, Neighborhood #3 hits like a ton of bricks and we are overwhelmed with sound and light and maybe we can't breathe. Good thing Neighborhood #4 is next so we can take a minute to recover, continuing into the beginning of Crown of Love which builds some more, shifting to a crooning ballad and again to a disco finish that leads into the steady groove of the anthemic Wake Up which itself shifts to a dance party reminiscent of The Jam or Iggy Pop. Rebellion really feels like a finale. We're all on our feet, jumping to the beat in unison. It's hot. We all need water. Almost done. We know. We are elated, high on the show. Applause, clapping, stomping. We want an encore! We hear In the Backseat start before lights come up. We close our eyes, all breathing the same air. Music builds for the last time. It is too much but we don't want it to end. Instruments gradually drop out one by one. No applause at the end of this one. We exit quietly, our ears ringing, a tear in our eyes, a gentle smile on our lips.

The earth didn't move but this is ok. I like this general style of music and there were a few stand-out moments. I like City Lights and some of its rhymes: laughin'/autographin', Stetson/gets in, and buildin'/killed him. The line in Have You See My Baby about talking to strangers because I'm a stranger, too, made me laugh. Dr. Boogie is pretty fun. Don't know that I'll play this whole album again but I like some of these songs enough to rotate them into play now and again.

Terrific. Chapman's at her best and most authentic with a spare arrangement, just her voice and guitar, maybe some percussion. A couple of tracks seem over orchestrated and overproduced, which unfortunately makes them feel dated. This is still a great album. Lyrics are bleak but vivid, some fine story-telling. Fast Car is on my top-shelf of favorite songs.

Oh, I like this. I like the style of music, the quality of his voice, and his ramblings. His folksy country-boy persona comes across as kind, gentle, and authentic. This despite his being raised in Brooklyn, his first exposure to rodeo being in Madison Square Garden of all places (according to Wikipedia). He sounds to my Wyoming-raised ears just like a genuine cowboy. I enjoyed this a lot.

Wowee! That was exhilarating! I am giddy. That's what I wrote last night. This morning I woke up to the news of the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict and I wasn't so giddy. This album's great though and I expect to be in the mood for it again someday. It had managed to fly under the radar for me all this time and I'm glad to be finding it now. I love that, though there are several different styles of music here, Queen is as unique a band as you'll find, hard rocking and broadly theatrical and fun (if you're into fun). Definitely will come back to this one again and again.

This was so fun! Love the extended version of That Lady with its wailing guitar solo and the other original songs especially You Walk Your Way and The Highways of My Life. And then there are a bunch of delightful covers that I wouldn't have expected to work but absolutely do. I loved the soulful Don't Let Me Be Lonely and Summer Breeze (more wailing guitar!) and the funky Listen to the Music and Sunshine. Terrific addition to my library. I'm really loving the records from the early 70s that have been showing up recently, new-to-me albums from familiar-to-me artists. Great fun.

I'd never heard of Hanoi Rocks. I think I would have really loved this album 30 years ago when I was listening to L.A. Guns and Motley Crue. I really liked Malibu Beach Nightmare and Back to Mystery City and, to a lesser extent, Mental Beat. The others felt like a bit of a slog for me.

Had a great time listening to this. Have always loved the Walk This Way, It's Tricky, and You Be Illin'. Great to hear the rest of this classic. Super fun.

Didn't have the luxury of a nice, long focused listen today but this provided a groovy ambience to my dinner-making. Nothing was particularly standing out until Bless My Soul and its delightful boings. I loved that track and the next, Cruise (Don't Stop), and Rise and its repRise. It's nice. I'll keep it.

I liked listening to this. Even the songs that are sad made me happy. I doubt that I'll listen again but I enjoyed being here for a while.

Well, I tried real hard to like this. I laughed out loud a few times -- perhaps I laughed loudest at, "Tell 'em how you feel, Kenny. Kenny Loggins." It was fine at first, kind of musically directionless, which isn't my favorite but I can respect it for a while. Lyrics seemed fragmented, short snippets rather than part of a story or even one theme. (Well, Friend Zone seemed pretty clear. But was maybe satire? Maybe not. So maybe not so clear.) Ultimately, I found it really hard to latch onto anything and it just overstayed its welcome. It felt like a friend of your roommate's who was kind of funny at first but whose humor wore thin pretty quickly and they were too drunk to drive home and are still at your house in the morning when all you want is coffee and some toast.

This was a great dance party. Tempos and styles changed but we kept grooving from start to finish. Loved it.

This is good, synth-y 80s pop. I don't think I'd ever heard the whole album. I liked Don't You Want Me well enough when it was released but I think I've heard it enough in the last 40 years. I really liked the songs on this album that were less familiar to me, especially The Things That Dreams Are Made Of and Seconds.

I knew Rich and Maps going into today but hadn't listened to the whole album before. This isn't really my kind of music and I don't know that I'll want to do the whole thing again but I listened to it a few times today and enjoyed it well enough. The opening of Rich is an excellent start to a record and I love Karen O's snarling, screaming vocals throughout. The lyrics in many of the songs include long stretches of a single word or phrase repeated over and over (rich-rich-rich-rich-rich-rich; choke, choke, choke; tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick; uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh-ooh; bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam-bam dunuh-dunuh-dunuh-dunuh). This totally worked for me. The almost gentle Modern Romance is a nice change of pace after so much screaming and blistering guitar. Love the sweet vocal quality, the simple steady beat, and the quiet jingle bells on this song. The last track Poor Song starts with an off-key mmm-chh that I could listen to all day and a line that is my personal philosophy, "Baby, I'm afraid of a lot of things, but I ain't scared of loving you."

Aerosmith! Yay! I don't know this album. (Is it just me or does the cover look cheap?) I love the build at the beginning of Back in the Saddle and there are some horse noises I've never noticed before...and some yodeling! Last Child is one of the songs that defines Aerosmith for me --- an edgy, hard-rocking blues sound where Steven Tyler gets to sing and screech. The rest of the songs are totally new to me. I do love Combination --- the lyrics have some clever rhymes and the chorus is hella catchy. When Nobody's Fault started, I had to check to see if I was still listening to Aerosmith. It's more heavy metal than blues-rock. Get the Lead Out is fun. (But why are you showing me your fist? is it to show off your new finger tattoos?) I love me a song with some na, na, na's, like Lick and a Promise. Home Tonight is a nice piano-heavy power ballad whose melody made me think of Chicago's Saturday in the Park. This was great fun!

Wow. This is something very special. Wow. She is soulful beyond belief, channeling something that the rest of us aren't in touch with. I adored every song but Rebento stopped me in my tracks. Tremendous!

Unfortunately for Stereolab, yesterday's listen was Elis Regina and she is a HARD act to follow. I really just wanted to keep listening to Elis. But I'm a good student and like to keep up with my homework so I made myself listen to Stereolab a couple of times today. It's good! Pleasant and unobtrusive, nice slow grooves. Favorite tracks were Metronomic Underground, OLV 26, and The Noise of Carpet. Now back to Brazil!

Sublime. I've been to church. I am stunned and grateful.

It's hard to "review" an album that I've listened to so much. It's like trying to review air or water. This album just IS. I listened three times today and tried to hear new things. I paid a lot of attention to background vocals and bass lines and unusual instruments. This music is layered and rich and there's a lot to hear. I am starting to really notice and appreciate Ringo, both on the drums and when he sings. There's something so hopeful and endearing about A Little Help from My Friends sung in his treacly voice. Some of my favorite bits are the "hey, hey, hey" in Fixing a Hole, how the vocals build in the chorus of Lucy, and that sweet clarinet in When I'm 64. I also love the lines "Vera, Chuck, and Dave," "And of course Henry the Horse dances the waltz," and "Fun is the one thing that money can't buy." Oh yes, this is a good one indeed.

Excuse me, I am too busy to write any notes about this album because I'm building a time machine so I can go kick my college-age self in the hiney and tell her to pick up a Fishbone cassette or two. She would have really loved this album. Listening to this was a wild ride! Such a range of styles. No two songs are alike: there were spoodly metal guitar solos, some funky ass bass, soulful keys and horns, ska rhythms and danceable beats, and some swoon-inducing twelve-string guitar. Fun tunes with lyrics to match but also upbeat songs that belie their serious social justice lyrical content. I had a great time listening to this and will listen again and again to make up for lost time.

This is fine. Not really my thing but not unpleasant. I listened twice. Probably won't listen again.

I capital L-O-V-E about half the tracks on this album. The loud, fuzzy downbeat of Devil's Haircut is a tremendous start for an album and the rest of the song is great --- gotta love a song with the word "leprous" in it. I also love the lyrically absurd Hotwax ("in the chain-smoke Kansas flashdance ass pants") and its extensive instrumentation --- there's some jazzy Charlie Brown piano in the background for just a few seconds near the ass pants line and some steel guitar that are both just delightful. Jack-Ass and Ramshackle are mellow, almost plaintive, and lovely. My other faves include The New Pollution (of course) and Where It's At (of course of course) and also the country-tinged Sissyneck. Beck's varied instruments and styles, clever sampling, and singable tunes make me a fan.

This was a rather dramatic soundtrack to my rather ordinary day. Evocative and cinematic, this album tells a story, going from smoky and sultry to mildly frenetic to romantic to grandly theatrical in a short 39 minutes. Not all jazz does it for me but this sure does. Love it.

I had a great time dancing for the first half-hour or so and then I was tired and ready to lie down. Terrific fun ... for a while.

Didn't have the time that I'd like to focus and listen a few times but I enjoyed the time I had with this album today. Great guitar, organ, and percussion. I particularly liked Mother's Daughter.

How odd to simply listen to an Elvis album. These songs and this sound has been so ubiquitous that it's hard to imagine a time before they existed. This was great. I'm so impressed with the musicianship and the marriage of blues and country. Very enjoyable.

Thank you, 1001 Robot, for giving me this album today. It was a balm for my soul at the end of a sad week. There is a delicacy, a clarity, a precision to every note of this album. Tempos are steady, slow, and deliberate, giving a sense of being suspended in some warm, gooey, sweet syrup. These are some of my favorite standards delivered by musicians of the highest order. Perfection.

Really surprised by this one! It's so different from Fever to Tell which we had just two weeks ago. The sound is cleaner and seems more intentional. Dance beats but still an alt-rock sound. I dig it!

I've listened to this album seven times today...so far. I am in awe of Lorde's powerful voice and story-telling, her strength and vulnerability, her fearlessness. I wrote down some of my favorite lyrics but there were a lot. Lots of favorite songs, too. This deserves more than five stars.

Welllllllllllll...I was having a pretty good time at this party. I've always liked The Humpty Dance. It's cheeky and fun. The next track talks about verbal rape but ok, I guess that's just some macho posturing and it was 1990 and all. Rhymin' on the Funk, The New Jazz, and Underwater Rimes are fine with their "smooth flow" and "dope rhymes" such as "mobster" and "lobster." (Sincerely! Not sarcasm! The quotes are from the album!) These guys mostly seem silly and fun. And then...the last half of the record felt like I was listening to a joke where I wasn't exactly the punchline but the joke really wasn't meant for my ears (and maybe as a woman, I was punchline-adjacent). I won't say I was offended by all the sex talk --- I'm a feminist killjoy, not a prude --- but I didn't enjoy it and wanted to leave the party. I'll just take The Humpty Dance and go.

Maybe this is a slow burn and with a few more listens I would love it. I really loved Up With People from its first hand-claps and thought during the first listen there was another song that I liked a lot. But on the second listen I realized it was just another version of Up With People. The rest was fine but nothing else particularly grabbed me. Nice and mellow though.

Didn't know much of PJ Harvey aside from 50ft Queenie, which is a great punk song but I didn't know how I'd feel about a whole album. Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea was a wonderful surprise. This is solid alternative rock with a grown-up point of view. During my first listen, I favorited half the tracks. During the second, I favorited the rest. I love this.

Listening to Nick Drake gives me deep feelings of warmth and safety. It's like being swaddled and held. I find this ironic and profoundly sad considering the animosity that apparently existed between this talented artist and his own brain. I'm grateful for what he left us with.

Wasn't expecting such a fun surfer rock/rock-a-billy sound from The Cramps. This was a good time. The cover of Fever was superb.

This is an old, old favorite that I used to listen to on my walkman in college. Aside from a couple of lyrics that still make me cringe, this is a brilliant piece of work. Great songs, great riffs, great vocals. I will always love it.

I like The Black Keys and have listened to a couple of their albums so I was excited to see this. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with Brothers. I like their general sound but most of these songs just blended together into a big mush. Howlin' for You, Ten Cent Pistol, and Sinister Kid stood out from the rest but just barely. Maybe a couple of their albums is all I need.

Another album that lands in the "well, it's not _bad_ but why is it here exactly?" category. Thought it lacked pizzazz.

They had me charmed from the ba-ba-ba ba ba at the start of the Peter Gabriel-esque Halfway Home. I love this song a lot a lot a lot. My love continues through Crying, Dancing Choose ("bought a sweater for his Weimaraner, too"), the funky bass and glorious chorus of Golden Age, Love Dog, and Dogs of Light. And finally, my favorite, Shout Me Out, with its tempo change and wailing second half. The songs are hard to categorize but this record is good good good.

I've never been very into Depeche Mode and hadn't listened to Violator prior to today. It's good! It's really good and gets better each time I listen to it and I want to keep listening to it. In addition to the great Personal Jesus, I do enjoy Enjoy the Silence, Halo, Policy of Truth, and the very fine Clean. I'm not done with this one yet.

Glad to confirm my feelings about The Cure: I can see why they appeal to some people but they don’t hold much appeal for me.

A wonderful Christmas surprise.

A very nice mellow interesting listen.

This is fine. Tolerable. But if I were dating someone and they said this is their favorite album, I'd probably break up with them because we wouldn't understand each other emotionally. This album isn't bad but I find it uninspiring.

Maybe it's because I heard Steely Dan a lot as a kid, but there's something about this album that seems very grown-up to me, like something a friend's cool (but not too cool) parents might listen to. I was surprised to learn that Walter Becker and Donald Fagan were in their mid-20s when this was released. They sound older than I will ever feel. AND I love it! It's not at all gloomy but they seem like they take the music seriously. There's interesting percussion and great guitar throughout. Rikki Don't Lose that Number is a terrific pop song. Pretzel Logic has a groove (but I'm scratching my head at the lyrics about minstrel shows). OK, maybe I lied a little --- Charlie Freak's lyrics are pretty gloomy but the dark lyrics are juxtaposed with a rollicking Linus-and-Lucy-like piano and some jingle bells. And I love the bass and sax in Monkey in Your Soul. At a short and sweet 34 minutes, songs are varied and interesting and I didn't feel like there was too much filler. It zipped along.

Everything about this is wonderful, from the title and the cover to his voice and his powerful lyrics. Half the songs have a practical, everyday romanticism to them and the other half protest the oppression of the working class. Every song is terrific. The Peel Sessions Album is one of my husband's favorites so I've heard Billy Bragg a lot but in a much more stripped-down setting --- just Bragg singing and accompanying himself on electric guitar. Very interesting to hear a studio album with more instruments and back-up singers. Love the violins on Train Train and the piano on Honey, I'm a Big Boy Now. There is lots of poetry to talk to the taxman about. My favorite: "Mother shakes her head and reads aloud from the newspaper As Father puts another lock on the door And reflects upon the violent times that we are living in While chatting to the wife beater next door." Oof.

Enjoyed it more than I expected but likely not enough to seek it out again.

I've been waiting for The Kinks. I don't know this album aside from a few songs. I loved every track. Super great.

I've always disliked the title of this album. It feels like a set-up --- if you don't like the record, it's because of your prejudices. Well...to this "little hungry schoolgirl" who loved Wham! and Faith, this album _was_ disappointing at the time. I like it more now than I did in 1990. I count Praying for Time and Freedom! '90 among my favorite songs. I also really like Waiting for That Day and Heal the Pain. While I can appreciate Michael's need for more respect as a song-writer and the state of his personal life at the time, this album seems overly serious. I would have liked a bit more fun and a bit less scolding. This album is nevertheless very very good.

Interesting to listen to Cohen's first album not long after listening to his last. Not a lot of variety in this one --- most of the songs are easy to mistake for Suzanne. But Suzanne is a lovely song so not much harm in that.

What a glorious piece of work this is. An incredible example of what's possible in rock music. A grand display of hutzpah and talent. I love it very much.

This was a very enjoyable listen. The disco beat and interesting lyrics provided a great soundtrack to my cold, wet, gloomy walk today. Top-notch exuberance!

Wow. This is something. I'm glad I had the time to give it a focused listen. I think it might not be quite so great in the background but, as an activity all its own, this album's got layers galore to explore. It's symphonic with its movements and recurring motifs, one piece of music rather than a collection of songs. Tantalizing snippets of the familiar melody from Good Vibrations appear early in the album in Song for Children. Heroes and Villains and Surf's Up are similarly teased before those songs actually start. The instrumentation is incredible: strings, brass, woodwinds, a deep percussion bench, whistles (so many whistles!), power tools. So much to discover on repeated listens. (I appreciated the inclusion of the instrumental Heroes and Villains bonus track to hear some of the sounds I missed the first time through.) Lyrics are often child-like and nonsensical, often just repeated words, phrases and sounds, using the voices as more instruments as opposed to a means to tell a story. I'm so grateful that Brian Wilson found the strength to come back and finish this after a tough 40 years. It did indeed make me SMiLE.

Once again, I am very pleasantly surprised by Black Sabbath. I really really love this. It's more psychedelic rock than heavy metal and a few songs barely count as "rock" music: Changes is a piano ballad for crying out loud and Laguna Sunrise could play over the end credits of a Western. I think Lenny Kravitz took some psychedelic funk inspiration from Supernaut when making Are You Gonna Go My Way. There were a few tracks that started out just ok for me but then they'd hit a bridge or a transition or a melody line that made me weak in the knees. The last track Under the Sun/Every Day Comes and Goes is the most like what I would have expected from Black Sabbath and I'm glad the entire record wasn't like that. But there's enough variety here to make that track a welcome ending. I don't know how often I'll listen to this but 20-year-old me would have listened a lot and I'm going to let her give it five stars.

This is the kind of thing I came here for. It wouldn't occur to me to seek this kind of music out and, even if I did, I wouldn't know where to start. And how else would I find out that Rod Stewart got sued for stealing the melody for "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy"? Lots of fun.

Hard to believe that it was 30 years ago that I bought this CD. I haven't listened to it in a long, long time and was reluctant to listen today. I figured I'd outgrown it. BUT I found the first 2/3 of the album absolutely exhilarating. This is great heavy metal with distinct and singable melodies and lyrics. Enter Sandman, Sad But True, The Unforgiven, Wherever I May Roam, Don't Tread on Me, and Nothing Else Matters are as thrilling to listen to today as they were back then. I really wish the album ended after Nothing Else Matters though. The last four tracks are tiresome if not downright silly.

This is incredible. I have heard of Laura Nyro but never listened. I always had the feeling for some reason that her music was somehow weird and would be a challenge to listen to. On the surface, it doesn't seem challenging at all --- I get a clear singer-songwriter pop vibe a la Carole King or Rickie Lee Jones --- and I can't figure out why she wasn't on the radio all the time when I was a kid. But, oh, yeah...melodies and rhythms and even styles change every couple of lines or so. She doesn't stay anywhere for very long...and I love it. My god, what a treasure.

There may be other bands with them at the top but no one is on a higher shelf of my Mental Library of Favorite Bands than Led Zeppelin. They make me feel all of the good stuff. There is a lot to appreciate in this album. At the start of almost every song, I catch my breath a bit and think, "Oooh this one's my favorite." And at the start of the next, "Oh, no wait. It's this one. This one's my favorite." On some of the tracks, I'm often glad when Robert Plant's vocals start back up again after a long spoodly middle but any given song is back to being my favorite by the end. Love them all.

It's great to hear more jazz. I like it.

Man oh man is this one fun. A rollicking good time.

Fun, synth-y, sax-y late 70s/early 80s pop. A clear influence on Duran Duran. Not my favorite but good enough and the right beats per minute for an afternoon walk in the sunshine. Love the cover of All Tomorrow's Parties.

Before today, all I knew of blur was their song from the Trainspotting soundtrack ("Sing") and the cover of their Leisure album with the lady in the flowered swim cap. I've listened to Modern Life is Rubbish many times today. It was good music to play while I worked, neither annoying nor overly distracting. And the more I listened, the more I liked. And yet, I'm finding blur very hard to pin down. Pretty much all I know for sure about them is they're British. I try not to read about the album before I write my review but I broke that rule today and that did help me make more sense of the album as an attempt to make something distinctively English, taking inspiration from Ray Davies and Paul Weller, after an unpleasant tour of the US. I can hear the essences of The Kinks and The Jam but with a 1990s sensibility, a British response to grunge. I really, really like every song on this album but there's something holding me back from loving it and I don't know what that is yet. I feel like I need more time with it. It's a solid 4 today but I can envision it inching its way up to a 5 eventually.

I did not want to listen to an indie rock band from the early 90s today and was throwing a bit of an internal tantrum about it. But these guys have won me over, distortion and atonal speak-singing and all. I wouldn't mind if they lived on my block so I could hear them rehearsing in their garage. I'm still a long way from calling myself a fan of early 90s indie rock but I'll be happy to have several of these tracks shuffle up in my rotation.

I've not seen any of Jacques Brel's movies but based on his music, I am guessing he's an extraordinary actor. I don't speak French well enough to know what he's saying most of the time but I sure as hell know what he's feeling. Very few artists get under my skin the way he does.

Much like when we listened to Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea, it took me a few tracks to find my footing with PJ Harvey's Dry, but once I did, I was a goner. I love this album, especially Dress, Victory, Hair, and Plants and Rags and especially-especially Sheela-Na-Gig and Happy and Bleeding. Swoon!

Goodness gracious. Vulnerable and raw. This is a fascinating album. Recordings of seemingly candid speeches are interspersed with songs inspired by the discussions. The way I said it makes it sound boring! But the pieces are largely about sex and sexual agency, so no not boring. I love Sullivan's voice. She's got a beautiful range and uses it with particular gut-wrenching effect on the track Lost One. My other favorites on the album were: Bodies, Pick Up Your Feelings, The Other Side, and Girl Like Me.

Clapton's recent and not-so-recent shenanigans render this pretty unpalatable for me. I get why your dad likes it but it's not for me today.

I think it really says something about a record if you have to pause occasionally to see if the sound you're hearing is the music or a truck backing up. (It was a truck backing up.) This record is squeaky and squonky, clickety-clackety-chrunchety. The vocals aren't exactly singing, more pitched shouting that reminded me of my Granny a lot of the time. I can't imagine the day when I will say, "You know what I'd like to hear today? Some Pere Ubu." But I did find this interesting, a unique listening experience. Kind of like getting a routine MRI (I get one every year) --- I don't really like or enjoy it but it's fascinating and there's only a tiny bit of pain and fear involved. And now I have to give it a rating from 1 to 5 and pretend that the experience of music is somehow one-dimensional, as though I could nestle Pere Ubu somewhere between Portishead and Leonard Cohen instead of on some other scale entirely.

Poetic and wistful but not brooding. Somewhere twixt indie rock and country. It's nice.

They've got volume and speed if you like that sort of thing. I'm finding that I need more...a poetic lyric here and there, a melody, a hook, a groove. I've tried keeping an open mind and looking for things to like but I think I'm ready to say that thrash metal just isn't for me.

Some great blues from JLH and some of 1989's more mainstream artists. Loved The Healer with Carlos Santana, I'm in the Mood with Bonnie Raitt, Baby Lee with Robert Cray, Cuttin' Out with Canned Heat, and Think Twice Before You Go with Los Lobos. I found the second half of the album much less fun. (I guess I like my blues to be fun.) I'd love to hear more from John Lee Hooker though.

Full of soul and exuberance, this album had me dancing and grinning from start to finish. I gave it five stars before the end of the first line of Tutti Frutti and it just got better from there. Whooooo!

Well, I have been on a journey with this album today. I had heard the name Everything but the Girl but I really didn't know anything about them. I didn't get a particularly good feeling from the cover art last night. I woke up early to get some work done this morning. I put on my headphones and pressed play. The mellow, danceable beats and smooth vocals were a great accompaniment to my workday. Made it all the way through the album and pressed play again. Still good. And then...I took a walk outside with it and it was much less interesting. Maybe the ear pods I wear when I'm walking give me less bass than my at-home headphones and that was the issue. Maybe the music is better as background than as my main focus. Maybe three times in a day was too much. They'd somehow lost their luster one way or another. Anyway, this is pretty good electronic-pop, but maybe just in small doses.

I'm not too keen on this many songs containing what sounds like earnest let's-get-it-on-ness. I liked the cover of Cruisin' and the smooth and jazzy When We Get By.

I've been meaning to investigate The Chemical Brothers for a while but hadn't gotten around to it. Glad this project gave me an entry point. This was a great soundtrack for my afternoon walk. Tempos were lively and kept me moving. I like it as background for work and kitchen grooves while making dinner. It's hard to distinguish between "songs" --- it's just one long dance party. Today that matched my mood and agenda perfectly.