1001 Albums Summary

Let's give it to Alex Turner. Starting with this album, he has become a world expert in the difficult and even perilous art of auto-fellatio. Such skills, requiring flexibility and a lot of patience, should be commended, I guess... Not every man (or artist) can give himself a blowjob and then let the whole world see the results. What is about to follow is a very long rant, and I *do* get the irony here. Maybe I should drink my own medicine when I criticize Turner constantly looking at himself in the mirror. I'm just a nobody and he's a world-famous artist. So why should you bother about some guy hating this album "with a passion"? What is it gonna bring you? Not much, I admit. The thing is, whenever I "criticize" some piece of music, I want to people to understand where the criticism subjectively comes from. It's a little too convenient to say "this is good/bad stuff" and not explain your own metrics. And this takes time. It would also take some cake to accuse me of being bad at self-editing when Arctic Monkey's are so utterly terrible at it in this record. I'm not talking about the individual songs' lengths here, or even the length of the whole album. I'm talking about the pointless meanderings in the songs (as short as they are), which could have been replaced with something else -- something *better*. Turner's skills don't include a knack for memorable hooks or any dynamic flair that could have helped the man structure his compositions away from the self-indulgent drivel often polluting this record for instance. Likewise, the so-called "psychedelic" overtones sprinkled throughout this LP are often quite stale. They evoke a simulacrum that's ironically of the sort the cryptic lyrics in this record seem to parody or criticize. Yet in spite of that (involuntary?) mirror effect, the thing fails to leave you with any deep thoughts about (post)modern online "simulations". What you have instead is just a bad taste in your mouth, lingering after 40 minutes of listening to Turner mostly singing to himself or a nearby love interest, in between two indirect allusions about virtual reality or politics, all of this with his pocket mirror at hand. Reading David Foster Wallace doesn't mean you have the chops to become his pop music equivalent overnight, mind you. Nor that you have the right angle for such endeavor in the first place. Likewise, vintage or retro textures straddling the pastiche line just for the sake of it do not always make exciting music either, whether old or "new". And neither do pointless ramblings about fame or consumerism or the internet automatically make great lyrical contents -- all those frankly sickening, hackneyed metaphors, or those unfunny puns such as "Star Treatment" in the opening track having the same name, they are just... grating. "Bear with me, man, I lost my train of thoughts," goes Turner at the end of the inoffensive second song, "One Point Perspective". You sure did, Alex. You sure did. But you've actually lost us from the get-go. The problem is that you're just using all those dystopian elements and ideas sprinkled throughout the lyrics to mostly speak about yourself and your feelings as a famous British rock star now feeling disconnected from the real world right after settling in LA. Hence why you're losing your "train of thoughts". Yet one can sense that you're still in quite a comfortable position, no matter how disconnected you are. So you can still play it cool, and with similarly cool vintage music in the background. Stanley Kubrick, obviously in Turner's mind as he populates his moon colony with all sorts of different "characters", sometimes applied those sorts of distanciated tricks to describe dystopia, of course. But then, Kubrick would break the big guns, the Strauss or Beethoven brass section blasting their way through the glossy screen to jolt the viewer. But where are the big guns in this record? Nowhere to be heard or seen. Not that *everything* is downright terrible or fully complacent in *Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino*. The music suddenly gets more interesting on third cut "American Sports", for example, thanks to that trippy, psychedelic organ in the background. But this specific cut is no real song, it's basically just a nicely instrumented short interlude with some vocal parts on it. The title track's is also OK, I guess, but "Golden Trunks" is definitely not: I dare anyone in here to convince me it's not a totally pointless dirge on a purely musical standpoint. Single "Four Out Of Five" thus instantly erases any memory of that so-called "song" which preceded it, thanks to its main hook, chorus and well-crafted final build-up. Unfortunately, the supposedly "meta" lyrics in the song -- actually just plain narcissistic -- are a little annoying, and even sometimes as grating as the bridge changing keys just because, well... why not? "I can lift you up another semitone", croons Turner during that bridge. Er... OK. What for, though? Does that make the song per se any better? In all honesty, Geordie Greep is a little more astute at sending those kinds of meta winks to the audience these days. Plus, he's better at layering his own parodic, borderline-cheesy instrumentation into something that truly sounds lively and one-of-a-kind. Cue Arctic Monkey's terrible waltzy, schmaltzy meanderings of "The World's First Ever Monster Truck Front Flip" in comparison, to witness everything that must NOT be attempted in that sort of parodic endeavor. It's just a cut that's totally dull. And once again, it's self-indulgent as f*ck. That's all too bad, because the deep synth tones of "Science Fiction" (probably one of the three cuts you can fully salvage here, along with the title-track and "Four Out Of Five") are great. And at least there's a thematic scope in the lyrics that's useful for once. But then, we grudgingly dive into the heavy-handed main riff of "She Looks Like Fun", alternating with more Serge Gainsbourg-adjacent shenanigans in anything but a graceful fashion. The seams are *so* visible here. And what's aggravating in this particular cut is that its protagonist knows he is just a boring prick, and yet tries to be a smart Alec (Alex?) about it: "Finally, I can share with you through cloudy skies / Every whimsical thought that enters my mind / There's no limit to the length of the dickheads we can be" Yeah sure, this here is also a barely veiled satire about social media, and I guess Alex includes himself in the people he criticizes, which is not a bad move on paper. The thing is, we never EVER get beyond the "dickheads" level. Bukowski is mentioned right after, by the way, and quite logically. One does not dare imagining how tedious and tiring Bukowski would have been in the digital age. So it checks out, I imagine... Then, a little later: "I'm so full of shite / I need to spend less time stood around in bars / Waffling on to strangers all about martial arts / And how much I respect them / Key changes..." Please no. Not *another* meta joke about key changes. Please. And if you don't want to be seen as a narcissistic twat, just stop wallowing in the thing that makes you look like such in the first place. Who cares what you tell those people about yourself in bars??? This constant look in the mirror is simply unbearable, just as Turner's next aimless, meandering vocals and lyrics in penultimate track "Batphone", that I don't even want to delve into. Just shut up, man. Shut up. The drowsy, aptly-named "The Ultracheese" then ends the proceedings on a final bum note. Once again, the whole thing is just terrible, devoid of any clear musical direction, just like that weird conclusion ending on a harmonic question mark. The vocals sound forced at times. The meter is often awful and verbose. It's everything good music involving a singer singing lyrics shouldn't be. And I'm not only talking about the last song in this LP here... I'm talking about *all the other duds* in it. Three or four decent cuts... A fistful of other discrete moments extracted from a couple of tracks here and there... *That's* the total sum of the music that's listenable in this thing. Everything else just... sucks. And might also incidentally explain why even among Arctic Monkeys fans, the once-stellar reputation the band originally had live has been sullied in the recent years. Maybe because their new artistic direction is mostly a chatty overrated borefest, and it shows onstage whenever they play new stuff (from this album and the next one). Simply put, the once fun and witty working-class garage kids have now turned to consensual bourgeois musicians, crooning about imaginary resorts for the space elite while expressing some distant irony about the whole situation (that's sadly never mordant or biting). To which you can add ultimately empty self-referential allusions here and there. OK, maybe Arctic Monkeys were never truly 'working class' in the first place. But if that's the case, at least that one simulacrum sounded far better than its latest iteration. To finish, one thing about the album artwork: it is admittedly gorgeous, and evocative of an interesting "concept" on paper. Yet you get it by now, said "concepts" are not necessarily conducive to genuine artistic success. So let this overall failure be a warning for future generations of musicians when the time comes up for them to renew their game. After all, said warning is often included in the album's lyrics anyway - a rare case where the poorly inspired artist is so defensive he automatically gives ammunition to his most fierce detractors: Cue the conclusion of *Science Fiction*: "So I tried to write a song to make you blush / But I've a feeling that the whole thing / May well just end up too clever for its own good / The way some science fiction does". I guess the comparison makes sense. Only in a parallel universe such as one explored in a sci-fi flick can *Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino* be considered as an "essential" album. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums (not exactly "Four Out Of Five" for this taqueria, huh?) 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 0 for now Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 0 for now Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 1 (including this one)

I didn't know the first thing about Ani DiFranco, and I want to thank whoever posted this album in the users list, because it allowed me to learn more about her. She's obviously a great singer and stellar guitar player (especially on acoustic guitar, from what I'm hearing here - awesome tones and a nice overall energy are coming out of her playing chops for sure!). And from what I've read online, it also looks like she's a good person, with her heart in the right place in terms of ideals. Which obviously can't hurt, and transpired in some of her lyrics -- admittedly also quite tormented at times. My first impression of *Dilate* is that Ani sounds a little like a more sophisticated indie version of Alanis Morissette, which is bound to be highly reductive for her fans, of course. DiFranco certainly sings better than the famous pop rock star, and she is more adventurous stylistically speaking. Yet there are commonalities, which includes a quite convincing way to express anger and frustration in interesting or poetic ways. It's the sort of highly expressive quality that make both women still endearing to listen to today. Listen to opener "Untouchable Face" to have a nice example of that for Ani. Not that this album is flawless. Just like with Alanis Morissette, there are also typical mid-nineties so-called "alt-rock" flourishes that didn't age that well (those supposedly groovy live drums breakbeats are a little hackneyed today, aren't they?). And there's also a couple of totally underwhelming cuts kinda spoiling the fun once or twice. I mean, what's the point of "Going Down", more like a pointless moody interlude than a song proper... ? But I guess that DiFranco is a free soul feeling the need to experiment with things so as to avoid formatting, which shows her good intents, at least. And when you listen to the very moving conclusion of the track that follows "Going Down" ("Adam and Eve"), you know that Ani surely has the goods people who like alternative folk and alternative rock would want so as to fall in love with her music. Same with breathtaking closer "Joyful Closer" (those angelic background vocals over that minimal and hypnotic acoustic guitar hook are a thing of wonder). Hence the cult following Ani still seems to benefit from today. Good for her. Not sure I will be part of that cult one day, but I leave the door open, at least. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 0 for now Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 1 for now (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 1

As one reviewer aptly put it in this section, post-2000 metal, postmetal and avant-metal are among the music genres done dirty in the 1001 Albums book (along with post-rock and several jazz classics -- other styles also explored by Kayo Dot in *Choirs Of The Eye*, incidentally). So I get why someone would want to place this particular avant-garde metal album in the list, just to set the karmic balance right in one swift stroke. Some of the tones (often owing more to postrock than to metal genres, to be honest), build-ups (gosh, that insane climax leading to black metal mayhem at the end of the third track!), and harmonies, whether darkly pretty -- the Lynchian and melancholic double-bass and piano-laden conclusion of "The Antique" -- or downright atonal, are impressive for sure, and you just can't deny the creativity and very open mindset that went into the writing and recording of this album. That said, and as the same reviewer also stated in here, it's admittedly a little weird to name this record first when so many other acts in adjacent subgenres have been ignored in Dimery's book. See that other reviewer's list when it comes to postmetal (to which I would add Converge, early Cult Of Luna, Neurosis, Gojira or Birds In Row). Same with post-rock, actually : no Mogwai or Godspeed You! Black Emperor's in the 1001 Albums book - if I had had more than one record to add in the users list, you would all have to review "Lift Your Skinny Fists...", along with the Canadian band's debut album that a user with good taste already placed there. So yeah... *Why* Kayo Dot first? Beyond that "contextual" perspective, I will add that I can also understand why some nonplussed listeners would perceive this LP as indulging a little too much in "noodling" instead of tighter compositional work. In some ways, *Choirs Of The Eye* sounds a little unfocused at times (especially for the sung vocal parts). I don't know... Maybe it's a little ironic that the spirit of The Grateful Dead can find its way in a 21st century metal band. I'm pretty sure that fan John Zorn would lambast me for such a caricatural take, though. What do I know, after all? I'm just a music fan with very subjective tastes among millions of others... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 0 for now Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 2 for now (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 1

Leaving a contribution to allow Alexander to run this app without ads is very nice. I wish I had the means set up a monthly payment myself. The thing is, when someone reviews only 15 albums in the first half of January 2025, and then suddenly stops, it gives you the nagging feeling that this person who was allowed to submit a first album before finishing the project -- thanks to their early contribution -- doesn't really have the chops to defend their choice in the grand scale of things yet. Too soon, young Padawan, too soon... I sincerely hope that this person is OK now, that nothing too serious distracted them from using the app, and they they just suddenly got bored with the whole thing. But if it's the latter, I don't really see why we should pay much attention to this particular album dabbling in a genre so stale and inoffensive it *does* become offensive after a short while, quite paradoxically. Hey, if you're reading this, whoever you are, let us know you're doing OK at least. Leave a review, once in a while. It would be nice. And if you're not OK, my heart goes out to you, very sincerely. Going back to *Stories*, I readily admit that its first two tracks are pretty effective in the EDM genre, thanks to some fun spiky synthetic flourishes that are not wearing you out yet at this early point. But then the whole shebang quickly goes down the drain, owing to an overabundance of cheesy arrangements and tepid chord progressions -- so predictable everything soon becomes a borefest. If you want electronic pop that's as "effective" and catchy as it is layered and daring, you can take your pick between acts as different as Jamie xx, Dua Lipa or Charli XCX. In comparison, there was nothing daring in Avicii's music, god rest his soul: it's just surface gloss filled with hooks that cross the grating line a little too easily. And to be honest, it's not that catchy either. Chances are that this thing will age as badly as Scritti Polliti or ABC -- the bad taste of the eighties (at least part of them) still has an imprint on today's mainstream commercial output, I imagine, as vastly different as the electronic genres involved are from one decade to another... Another point of contention is how perfunctory and devoid of true soul all the guest vocalists sound in this record. Looks like 2010s-era Chris Martin is surrounded by like-minded performers here, which certainly brings... cohesion to the whole project! Some vocal hooks slyly copypasted from older pop songs are also annoying as hell 2Pac's "California...!" even makes a sudden appearance at some point, too discrete to be a real homage, but also too obvious not to raise eyebrows. And speaking of hip hop influences, Wyclef Jean's featuring in one of the "deep cuts" from the tracklist -- some sort of half-baked reggae song -- is probably one of the most embarrassing things the man has done (and he has done quite a few since the end of the Fugees!). So all of this is obviously part of a very manufactured formula, like with the fistful of glossy "acoustic" country-rock-ballads-oriented cuts also recorded for this project. Oddly enough, those innocuous tracks actually made me want to explore the already gargantuan output of Zach Bryan, that I am not very familiar with, in an admittedly close range of "modern" countrified pop music harboring gentle and accessible melodies. Because anything sounds at least a little "authentic" compared to Avicii's music. Even the most streaming-friendly stuff out there. One track stood out in the album's second half, though, thanks to a more "extravagant" feel and a bouncier, far more original rhythm pattern. A little campy, maybe, but campy implies having something akin to taste instead of total blandness at least. That song is "Somewhere In Stockholm", and very ironically, its chorus, "I left my backbone/ Somewhere in Stockholm", sums up everything I think about the vast majority of the other songs, all interchangeable and lacking personality, and all written in "committees' to boot (but also quite logically, if you think of it). Because let's be honest for one second: where is the "backbone" indeed on this thing? Was the "real" Avicii a flesh-and-bone person, only a producer, or just a brand? Well the jury's still out on this one. But what it comes to stating whether this album deserves to be in this list, I'm afraid the jury has reached an unanimous decision here. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 0 for now Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 2 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 2 (including this one)

Wow. *Huge* thanks to whoever put that album on the list. I didn't know the first thing about aboriginal artist Gurrumul, and this posthumous album presenting rich orchestral pieces displaying his distinctive vocals is a thing of wonder. You feel like you're watching the stars in the night skies of North Australia as you listen to it. It's so humbling that you can discover so much great music after going through 1001 albums (actually far more than that, with everything that couldn't go inside the original list). Music is a whole universe, seemingly without any boundaries. To the person who added this record, but also to anyone potentially interested in orchestral music: the instrumentations and arrangements written by Errki Veltheim and Michael Hohnen for this record obviously owe *a lot* to the groundbreaking works of minimalist and postminimalist composers Steve Reich and Philip Glass. Very obvious influence here. So if you don't know those works and love this Gurrumul LP, I strongly advise you to check those names as well. It's a shame said key works are not in Dimery's book. I guess that the rationale was that there was no room for orchestral or "classical" music albums in his list, but I think that for their cases (and also adjacent contemporary Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, another obvious inspiration for mystical, mournful and hypnotic cut *Marrayarr* here), it's a huge mistake not to mention any of them. Because some of Reich and Glass and Pärt's full-length releases exactly fit with the 'modern album format'. Those composers are still alive, and they released LPs under their own names -- a huge difference with the usual performances of older orchestral music by symphony orchestras or smaller groups of classically-trained musicians all around the world, which would need their derivative 1001 Albums book with its own set of requirements. So in a sense, including *Djarimirri* sort of implies that you must also include ones from at least a couple of those minimalist composers. Not a problem for me. Not a problem at all. 🙂 Of course, what I'm saying here is a 100% "Western" perspective. Other positive views are possible. First, you'd need to point out that the minimalistic style of Reich and Glass also partly draws from the repetitive nature of African music, for instance. But more crucially when it comes to today's record, Gurrumul's enchanting or haunted vocals also bring specific warmth and emotion there that are obviously only his. It's the spark that probably makes the orchestral canvas around him accessible to many listeners with other tastes than mine. And there are also many instantly memorable vocal lines in those compositions ("Galiku", "Djolin", "Gaou"). I have sometimes stated that "global music" is so "large" that it would also need another book on the side. But listening to *Djarimirri*, it feels like it might also be unfair to exclude voices from all around the world in an overall list of albums to listen to before you die. Especially with a voice that is so stunning and beautiful. What we have here is a match made in heaven, nothing less. Hope that Gurrumul can smile from there after all this hard work. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 1 (including "Djarimirri*, which will join works by Reich, Glass and Pärt in my own list) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 2 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 2

Discovered who The Chromatics were through their inclusion in the soundtrack of the third season of Twin Peaks (The Return). Went back to this 2007 album right after that. It's pretty well-crafted synthpop / dream pop, but in the grand scheme of things there's nothing in this record that Beach House hasn't pulled off ten times better in the following years. First proper song "Night Drive" is a nice calling card for the rest of the tracklist, but it's not exactly thrilling either. "I Want Your Love" is overlong and a little cheesy. The Kate Bush cover is OK, but I don't really see what it brings to the original song. "Killing Spree" and "Tomorrow Is So Far Away" use the same "Diamonds Are Forever"-adjacent xylophone/ glockenspiel gimmick (remember that old James Bond title song?), which makes one of those cuts a little redundant (the first one for me). "Healer" is a little more exciting than the rest, with a nice build-up towards the end. "Tick Of The Flick" is, on paper at least, an interesting 15-minute (!) attempt to ape Kraftwerk's hypnotic dirges, but lack of clear stakes and intents makes it fall on its face after only five minutes. "Shining Violence" and "The Gemini" are shorter and wonderful moody instrumental pieces, though. But the songs in between are just a borefest for me. And that female lead singer definitely lacks punch to properly dynamize her performance. Fortunately, closer "Accelerator" is awesome and mesmerizing. Very cinematic, the way some Kavinsky cuts are. Crazy how only the instrumentals shine on the album's second half. So yeah, it's a mixed bag for me. Not excluding that album from my list of keepers right away because of its peaks, but I highly doubt it will make the final cut. To be honest, I also hold a huge grudge against the Chromatics because of a later hit song ("Shadows") which rips off the melody of Sonic Youth's "Wish Fulfillment" in such a blatant and even odious manner it's amazing the New York band didn't sue at the time (guess they had other fish to fry, or were just not greedy enough to give a rat's ass about it). But that song wasn't on *Night Drive*, so I guess in this doesn't weigh too much on my assessment here. The thing is, I just hope they didn't plagiarize any other artist in this particular album. That would not paint the project in the best of lights, right? 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 1 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 3 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 2

IN MEMORIAM To the loving memory of Prog Rock, who lived a life filled with hope and love and creativity until she was ruthlessly murdered by Rush -- under the orders of their masters the Eighties, before the latter gave her dead body to Marillion so that they could desecrate it even further. Truth be told, Marillion were ruthless in their own pervert ways: glossy tones and sounds that don't fit the genre well, supposedly "complicated" sections that are actually quite linear and conventional, unchallenging pop single drivel such as "Kayleigh", and some terrible lyrics and vocal performances once in a while -- all of this, and sometimes worse, is the ordeal Prog Rock's sweet remains had to go through under Marillion's hands. Astonishing since singer Fish looks like a good dude on a personal level. Yet his imitation of Genesis-era Peter Gabriel (sometimes straddling that near-invisible bad taste line dividing it from solo Phil Collins turf), all over Mike Oldfield-like guitar noodling and a couple of *Pink Floyd The Wall*-adjacent moments, is not merely derivative. It is a pastiche that, more often than not, is fully offensive for many dwellers of the music lands who still hold Prog Rock's memory dear to their heart. She was nothing but an innocent soul, was she not? To use Marillion's own words in "Blind Curve": Her childhood, her misplaced childhood... Give it back to her. Give it back to her. May she rest in peace now. Amen. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 1 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 3 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 3 (including this one)

Wow. From the first three tracks alone, it's easy to understand why this LP garnered such a cult status. And the rest is obviously filled with many other bangers effortlessly straddling the line between instantly likeable classic rock (drawing from the Stones and Led Zeppelin) and Alice Cooper / Cramps-adjacent quirkiness. Or so it seems. Because speaking of "seams", you never feel like the studio sessions were as erratic as they were reported to be (see the Wikipedia page -- Erickson was a very damaged soul, and it's awesome that others around helped him express his rock'n'roll genius). Tape splicing could do wonders ages before the advent of DAW software. All you needed was scissors and tape glue. Those songs are *so* cinematic, and you wonder why half of them haven't been used for retro horror films yet. And their vocal melodies and guitar hooks are as infectious as a zombie bite indeed! The 13th Floor Elevators were already an important milestone in the history of rock'n'roll. Looks like this is another one here, less famous, but maybe as important. So huge thanks to whoever added this album on the list. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 2 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 3 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 3

Snowed under with work today, which is a shame, because I need to place myself in an adequate, care-free mindset to truly appreciate a good dub record. From my short -- and probably inadequate -- listening session while toiling on a few things on my computer, *King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown* sounded like a well-crafted (and apparently groundbreaking) album in the genre. Truth be told, I also had a feeling that the record now seemed a little by-the-book from today's perspective, at least compared to the weirder, loonier, moodier, more whimsical and maybe also more endearing works and productions of Lee "Scratch" Perry and The Upsetters (as displayed in the *Super Ape* album). But what do I know? I don't pretend to have a very self-assured taste when it comes to Jamaican music (apart with household names such as Marley, Toots, The Congos and Desmond Dekker). And browsing through the album again now that my work is done, it feels that some of the tones, arrangements and interesting key changes in this LP have become more evocative and accessible. Maybe it's because winter night has fallen, and I wish it became a hotter Jamaican night... So I'm leaving this LP the benefit of the doubt. I hope that one day, I'll be able to return to it in more comfortable circumstances. In the meantime, here's a tentative grading for the album... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 2 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 4 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 3

Didn't expect a band like this to come up on this list. And especially one from the noughts in that genre. Streetlight Manifesto have the good taste to label said genre "punk with horns" and avoid any mention of "ska-something", at least. But you still quickly get the picture, I guess... It's also an extremely well-crafted record, with high octane energy all along (which is near mandatory in that style), and with quite spectacular horn arrangements indeed. The musicianship is stellar. Some of the choruses are infectious. As for the lead vocals, they are youthful, somewhat raspy and admittedly a little... vulnerable and slightly out of pitch at times, but in a manner that makes them pretty endearing in the long run. So more an asset than a flaw here. This band must have been a killer act live. Also, the impact of the first two cuts can't be denied. Opener "We Will Fall Together" amounts to five epic minutes that are instantly memorable, and equally agitated "Down, Down, Down To Mephisto's Café" still feels vital today -- with lyrics about acquaintances giving in to rotten ideas that resonate in a particularly striking fashion in early 2025. Not overly political, but the subtext still remains pretty obvious nonetheless. There are many other good moments like that in the LP. Truth be told, I have to admit it's a music genre I personally don't feel much connected to these days, like I might be a little too old and world-weary to have said music change my current tastes and outlook. But who knows? Maybe all I need is albums such as this one to rekindle the old punk flame. *Somewhere In The Between* actually made me want to revisit The Suicide Machine, an obvious influence on Streetlight Manifesto from a decade earlier -- if you enjoyed this album, check out *Destruction By Definitions*, by all means! The horns are missing there, but apart from that, you got the same hectic and melodic spark as the one found in Tomas Kanolki's band, which makes both acts stand out among the rest of the smaller, Mighty Mighty Bosstones-adjacent fry. In a sense, I could say why Streetlight Manifesto and not their obvious model? But in hindsight, that would just be the nostalgia factor having a say here. So yeah... Why not having your cake and eat it too? Why not *both* bands and/or albums? Beautiful artwork as well. Don't have much to say about it, but I had to point it out. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 2 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 5 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 3

Er... I want to be benevolent towards this project, but honestly, my heart's not in it. Talkin' Loud is a label that I respect for sure. They put that short-lived acid-jazz hype on the map, which was interesting, at least on paper. I still have good memories about Young Disciples' *Road To Freedom*, released in the early nineties, for instance... Yet if you flash forward to 1997, there was not much left to that hype by that point. And it even feels like the label was grasping at straws a little when they released that Nuyorican Soul album. Whoever added it to this list will disagree, of course. Yet objectively speaking, said album didn't exactly usher Talkin' Loud into the 21st Century. You just need to see their releases in the last fifteen or twenty years or so (mostly reissues, along with some very rare stuff nobody talks about now, whether "loud" or not) to realize all this. My main issue with *Nuyorican Soul* stems from its lack of cohesion. There are albums that go all over the place that I can love, but this is not one of them. Probably because the first two songs (singles to boot) -- basically displaying the same sorts of arrangements and harmonies over two different rhythm patterns -- sound like exceedingly boring dance club drivel to my ears. Fortunately, you soon go to more authentic-sounding latin and jazz tunes sprinkled with far more subtle layers of electronics and Meters-like funk instrumental regalia. Plus, there's Tito Puente himself on timbales and vibraphones! Needless to say, those tracks are the real meat within the LP. But you keep on wondering why that stuff right before those nice cuts sounded so... cheesy. Like a bad camembert aftertaste in your mouth when you try (and fail) to enjoy a tropical fruits juice afterwards... The last leg of this long album aims at a synthesis of sorts to gather all the loose threads, yet it also mostly fails in my book. The house music / neo disco-adjacent cuts are near-obnoxious. A rare hip-hop-influenced track fares far better than that at some point, even it doesn't exactly offer thrills either (oh, *Fresh Prince Of Bel Air*'s Jazzy Jeff is in the houuuuuuse, folks, ha ha!). And when the latin-jazz flourishes manage to take the upper hand again, they only end up sounding like illustrative muzak instead of truly soulful stuff. Probably because they're surrounded by too much material that neither rhymes nor reasons. It's that same smelly french cheese taste, lingering as you drink mango juice again... Don't get me wrong, I can still enjoy the stellar musicianship gracing many parts of this record, especially on the piano -- not to mention the high quality guests (George Benson, Roy Ayers, Jocelyn Brown...), who provided its professional-sounding vocal parts (including some fun scat at some point). Yet when it comes to the tones and moods displayed by the "Masters At Work" in *Nuyorican Soul* , most of them come off as way too artificial for me -- they're functional and perfunctory, even in that better middle section in the tracklist. Sometimes admirable musicianship isn't enough. You also need a vision. And what I see here is just a sanitized jazz or latin club populated by wealthy, good-looking interlopers who are ultimately uninteresting bores. Not the real deal. Ironic when the cast participating in the album have such credentials. But you can't shake off that impression once you step into the place. You being "I", of course. It's not the end of the world, I guess. The city is large after all, and there are probably other dives there that can offer more in terms of excitement. Even other cocktail bars, who knows? So it's time to go and pick up my coat in the check room now. The night is still young, and other far more significant locales might await us, just right around the corner... 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 2 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 5 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 4 (including this one)

The National has always sounded overrated to my ears, which does not mean they don't have assets once in a while. In a sense, they're very much like early Coldplay: their restraint and relative lack of dynamics passes off as subtlety for certain crowds, but I'm often wondering if said crowds might actually be too complacent and narrow-minded to invest in similar acts that offer the same sort of recipe, albeit with a little more *punch*, liveliness or genuine gravitas (more on that later) -- or if, conversely, those crowds' ears are attuned to very specific wonders that can't be found anywhere else, and that I would unfortunately be unable to perceive myself (which would make me the narrow-minded one here). Checking out the highest rated and lowest rated albums from the person who submitted this LP suggests that we see eye to eye about a lot of great music, which is always awesome, sincerely (and we also very majorly agree about which ones should be considered as duds, ha ha). So I guess opening my shakras a little can be worth the effort. That person can't be *fully* wrong here. On that same line of thought, it is also obvious that the omission of this record in the original list doesn't make a lot of sense since Dimery and co. chose to include *High Violet*. I didn't need the inclusion of *Boxer* in the users list to listen to it today. It's an album that I already revisit once in a while, if only to finetune my personal assessment of The National on general terms. Sitting in between the somewhat more abrasive, borderline garage tones of *Alligator* and the glossier soundscapes of *High Violet*, *Boxer* is The National's magnum opus, enough said. File that mind-boggling omission in the 1001 Albums book with the fistful of other LPs by a prominent act that were left aside for absolutely no good reason, even if another LP of theirs made the list, inexplicably. Dimery's book didn't have Weezer's Blue Album -- 1st in this users' list!-- The Breeders' *Last Splash*, Björk's *Homogenic*, Grandaddy's *The Sophtware Slump*, Lana Del Rey's *Norman Fucking Rockwell*, to which I would also add Nina Simone's *Little Girl Blue and probably another Fugazi album (which could be *13 Songs*, *In On The Kill Taker*, *Red Medicines* or *The Argument*, depending on the day...). Why oh WHY were all these albums ignored, for chrissake??? So even if I'm not a *huge* fan of the National, I want to support this addition in the users list, at least. Hence my quite positive mark. Sorry for the long rant up there (as usual). I don't have much to say about the album itself, oddly enough (and also, I have a lot of work today). Let me just say that the two consecutive slaps in the face that "Fake Empire" and "Mistaken For Strangers" are can't be easily dismissed. Those two songs are a hell of a way to open *any* record, and only for this, this one deserves to be noticed. Awesome chord progressions, vocals and instrumentation. And yeah, here are the dynamics I sometimes find lacking in the rest of the band's output. The rest of the tracklist offers material that I generally find as effective as the one found in Interpol, Other Lives or Tindersticks's best records. Maybe it's not enough to make fall in love with the album as a *whole*. But even with that in mind (and with some of those other records I've just evoked not making it to any list here), I still want to leave the door open for *Boxer*. So thanks to whoever thought of adding it here. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 2 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 4

The nostalgia factor is obviously very strong with this one, but looking back two decades ago, and realizing how this record still holds its own after all this time, I'm adamant it's not the only reason this debut album SHOULD be in this users' list. A few bullet points to explain why (I'm myself tired of my overlong reviews, so let's *try* to make this short, for once): a) The formula here is -- basically -- to take Gang Of Four's propulsive post-punk grammar (already from 25 years ago in 2005) and infuse a melodic earworms feast into it to round up some of its angles. And it's an unmitigated success in my book. To such a point that *Silent Alarm* just instantly crushed the (landfill) indie competition at the time. Honestly, it's one of the top 5 albums of 2005 for me, period. b) That drummer is a goddamn powerhouse. Matt Tong injects so much energy to the already bouncing guitar instrumentation that the whole shebang just quickly becomes irresistible. I remember dancing like a maniac to this LP in night parties with friends during the noughts. Not just to a couple of songs (opener "Like Eating Glass", "Helicopter", "Banquet" and "She's Hearing Voices" are the most obvious candidates for that). Once or twice, I have danced to the whole goddamn album! Rarely have drum'n'bass / jungle patterns over rock music sounded so good. c) Even with that bouncing instrumentation behind him -- which could have diverted too much attention towards it -- Kele Okereke still manages to offer something distinctive and soulful as a vocal performer and lyric writer. Many choruses are stellar. Some political undertones -- a bit wide-eyed and naive maybe, but never heavy-handed -- give welcome new dimensions to some of the songs ("The Pioneers", "Price of Gasoline"). And on many others, especially on the second side ("This Modern Love", "So Here We Are"), the romantic overtones are thrilling and cinematic. d) It's a bit of a shame that Kele never managed to fulfill the very high expectations this album triggered in its wake, and that it remains the high mark of the project to this day. Honestly, I have a feeling that some ego issues got in the way at some point -- especially when Kele sort of suggested that Tong shouldn't attract all the spotlights. Which was unfair, because the balance between the guitars, the vocals and the drums was actually perfect in this debut. Tong's input was consequently sort of reined in or toned down starting with the second album (admittedly harboring decent songs-- yet also lesser ones to an extent, which means that making them sound less hectic wasn't that justified). As a consequence, I wasn't too surprised when the band's personnel changed a few times in the following years. At the start, those (quite young) boys looked like such chummy and mischievous pals together. Including onstage, where I had the luck to see them give an incredible performance. Guess that reality is always a little more complicated than that. Especially when you have to factor in individual wishes or specific artistic ambitions. But this doesn't matter too much now. We still have this incredible record at least. Pretty sure that Kele and the rest of the original line-up of Bloc Party are still very proud of it 20 years later. They should be. 4.8/5 (or something) for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.8) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 4

"What's this borefest dross?" my partner went out when I played this album on the Hi-Fi. She's French, as I am, so it's a somewhat imprecise -- and less rude -- translation of the words actually uttered. But you get the picture, I guess... Right after this... appraisal, a conversation about what makes a good folk album followed. The gist of it was that *some* contemporary country-folk albums are way too clean-sounding to make you feel strong emotions, contrary to the Emmylou Harris, Gram Parsons or June / Johnny Cash of the past (aptly refered to in the admittedly impressive second track of this LP). That clinical cleanliness is a flaw that can even be found in Fleet Foxes, mind you (a flaw that's easily redeemed by the quality of their compositions and heartfelt performances). And it's also evidently found in that Devendra Banhart / Coco Rosie wave of noughts "vintage" revival in that style (not so easily redeemed in my book). All those acts (along with the golden age names) are obvious influences for this Swedish duo, who actually made a name for themselves by posting a Fleet Foxes cover on You Tube. Sisters Johanna and Klara obviously have the vocal chops to produce the technically pristine harmonies serving those sorts of tunes right. But do they have the flame? A quick aside: not all contemporary folk albums have this glossy sheen preventing more authentic-sounding tones to surge. Women artists such as Adrianne Lenker or Jessica Pratt are the Karen Dalton and Emmylou Harris of today. Plus, they write their own songs, just like Joni Mitchell or Judee Sill did. Sure, First Aid Kit do too. But it looks like they don't take much risks in their songwriting craft, generally speaking. Except with some of their lyrics, which are a little too on the nose or "flat", with the same "I need you, I love you" bags of tricks used from one song to the next. Not exactly the sort of risk that's an asset in the long run... And since the music 'plays it safe' anyway... Hereby lies the difference between a real wooden shack in Montana or Georgia -- a little messy inside, but displaying soul and life -- and a Starbucks Coffee rendition of it, folks! In spite of my cruel words up here, I will be less harsh than my partner in my final assessment of this album (she's always a little more severe for female performers, ha ha). That thing is a little quaint and perfunctory, but it's not horrible. Maybe the fact that First Aid Kit routinely favor the same notes for their vocal harmonies quickly wore my better half out as well, I don't know. If that's the case, she *does* have a point there too, I think. Those songs are probably better to listen to in single sittings (or in a playlist) than through an album format released by a single act / artist -- which, for me, is a very important factor to take into account for a list such as this one. Cuts such as "The Lion's Roar", "Emmylou", "This Old Routine" are surely worth a detour. Most of the rest isn't, but that doesn't make the record "bad" per se. It's not thrilling but it's pleasant at least. More like a timid "meow" than a "lion's roar". But who doesn't enjoy stroking a cat's pelt once in a while? Oh yeah, cats haters! Oddly enough, both my partner and I are cats lovers. Guess some cats (or kittens) have more personality than others... 🤷 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 5 (including this one)

- Inclusion of this Phish live album in the list - PROS AND CONS Pros: if really you want to mention the American cult phenomenon that Phish is in this list, you might as well include a live performance. As far as I know, their studio albums have by-the-book production values, and apparently, there are essential tracks in their repertoire that the band only play live. Plus, the coming-of-age-like cult phenomenon around the band was more centered around their concerts than any other communal experience their music can elicit. Hence this inclusion, I guess... The first half of the first disc is not unpleasant. "Bouncing Around The Room" (especially its final chorus supported by tapping solos on the guitar) and "Gumbo" are memorable for sure. And you can sense that for folks wishing to partake in the live experience, there's something fun going on. Cons : Starting with the second half of the first disc, a question surges, however: what's the frigging point? Sure, the players are very good at their trade and the music is often quote-unquote "good". Yet the let's-throw-everything-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks approach soon yields to listener fatigue no matter what it is that it is going on on a purely musical level. Besides, clichés abound so much in those performances that it feels like you're working in a Kodak laboratory. Jazzy flourishes, dad-rock guitar solos, quite tame hard-rock boogies, funky rhythms, reggae winks, inoffensive vocal parts, more off-kilter (yet also lengthy and gratuitous) atonal dirges... The whole sounds a little like Steely Dan on steroids, albeit without the sly undertones and the ultra crisp production values. Or like an eighties-sounding Grateful Dead without the hippie utopian ethos and a bag of mainstream stylistic tricks instead. Rarely have I listened to music where the stakes are seemingly so... low. This thing manages to sound both bloated and naive-as-fuck. And as a consequence, your emotional response may become as equally stilted and perfunctory. Worse, the fans loudly expressing their knowledge of the songs and which part they should sing after some cues from the band give you the feeling that you're not part of their club, and that unless you sign on a proverbial paper proclaiming you a member of the Phish fanbase until the end of your days, you'll *never* get what is so exciting about the band. Well, lemme tell you this: I'm not excited listening to this record, only mildly amused. Which is OK, I guess. But not more than that. Jam bands... Some of them are 100% oblivious of the difference between craft and genuine art. Sure, I imagine that it's because Phish actually don't care about the "pretensions" of art that they are so refreshing for their target audience. Good for them. Why should the rest of the world care, however? I might come off as pretentious myself, but I feel like I'm either too old or too young at heart to have time for any of... this. And with a double-album to boot, it's not the most convenient manner to feel welcomed to the "club" anyway... Looks like the cons far outweigh the pros for me. Wish I could have written a shorter review, once again. The record is already long enough. So I'm gonna stop here - both listening and writing -- just as the noodling on the unbearable "Tweezers" goes on forever. Skipped the end of it, actually. "What is a band without a saxophone?" asks Phish on the song that follows, the aptly-named "Simple". *My* question is rather this one: "What is a jam band without a clear-cut *vision*?". Give me a hundred records by King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard instead (they'll soon reach that number of albums anyway, ha ha). With their relentless drive and unhinged energy, King Gizzard can elicit all sorts of cinematic pictures in my head, at least. In comparison, Phish is just stale and cutesy. The only image they can trigger in my brain is: "jam band noodling on stage". Good music can be much more evocative than this, don't you think? 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 6 (including this one)

Not so sure choosing "guilty pleasures" for this list is really reasonable, you know. Especially when the original list misses so many essential albums in most genres. In that realm of blatantly commercial pop, I could have chosen quite a few records myself -- like that late seventies LP by Duncan Browne, along with albums released by Mike Oldfield during the eighties, Enigma during the early nineties, or even Dua Lipa these days. And then I would expect the 1/5 and 2/5 grades to pile up, of course. Guess that user doesn't take themself too seriously at least. Good for them. Kind of liked the opening song about "dancing girls", not so far from The Human League in their *Dare*-era artistic apex. And I also enjoyed second track "Wouldn't It Be Good", that I had indeed heard somewhere before -- which proves it is somewhat memorable, I imagine... Unfortunately, as soon as "Drum Talk" surged on my headphones, this thing became absolutely ridiculous. Sprinkling some "experimental" flourishes and rather imaginative baroque arrangements here and there can't possibly redeem how hackneyed the compositions, songwriting and production are throughout this LP. The second half of the first side is close to appalling. The vocal performance is even a little weak at times, and during those weak moments, it manages to be more grating than the gated drum sound -- which is, honestly, quite a feat. Oh, and the horns are *especially* annoying. The joke is gonna fly over the head of most English-speaking listeners, but I'm now waiting for a French citizen to add La Compagnie Créole to this list... The first half of the second side fares a little better, surprisingly. "Shame On You", "Cloak And Dagger" and "Faces" explore more ambiguous and evocative synth tones at least. But that ephemeral relief is then instantly erased by how utterly TERRIBLE the last two cuts are. "I Won't Let The Sun Go Down On Me" is cringe-inducing cheesefest garbage dross, and "Human Racing" sounds like a parody of Stevie Wonder in his worst eighties moments (instead of his best seventies works). Whenever I witness someone praising that sort of ridiculous eighties record, I sort of expect them to rant about those albums' "artistry" the way Patrick Bateman does in *American Psycho*. Which is both hilarious and terrifying. Here's me hoping that this particular user isn't secretly a serial killer. Given that I sense some welcome humor in their own review, I cross my fingers that my own rant is gonna make that person laugh. Hopefully. Just to save my skin, let me just add that technically, I'm rating this thing higher than *Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino* by Arctic Monkeys. At least, I'm feeling something listening to Nik Kershaw -- it might not be very positive emotions, but it's better than my near-total absence of emotional response whenever I listen to Alex Turner self-fellating. Yet seriously, and for once, I can't round up my 1.5/5 grade to a 2/5 one, the way I usually do when I hesitate between two scores. Because let's face it, this choice of an "album to listen to before you die" is damn weird in my book. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 7 (including this one)

More than an "apostrophe" ('), I think that in the grand scheme of things -- as far as modern music history is concerned -- this album is rather a "footnote" (*). Quite a singular one, obviously owing to the personality of its author. But a footnote nonetheless. * Not that Frank Zappa wasn't an important figure. For instance, one could state that his *Hot Rats* is close to a masterpiece, and I can heartily thank Dimery's book for allowing me to get acquainted with this great record. Like others, I have complained many times about the shortcomings of the original list (some of which could have been avoided, even if you take the subjectivity of its contributors into account). But let's face it, even with its flaws, the 1001 Albums book allows you to discover loads and loads of gems. *Hot Rats* can indeed be considered as a very rare beast. It's jam rock with a distinctive *vision*, and with precise and cohesive sonic aesthetics making it hold water more than fifty years after its release. Exactly the sort of thing that the Phish live album added in the users list can't be. And also it's *fun* (far more fun than Phish think they are, at least outside of their dedicated fanclub). And it's tight and concise within the requirements of "jam rock". Don't get me started on the overlong dirges of "A Live One". Please. So what about *Apostrophe*, you might ask? Well, it's got that *Hot Rats* spark in the title track, I'll give it that. Jam Rock at its finest, maybe only missing the violin and Captain Beefheart vocal parts that made that earlier LP a keeper, but still easy on the ear and fun to listen to. Yet as most Frank Zappa fans are probably aware of, the driven musicality and accessibility of *Hot Rats* is sort of an oddity in the rascal's discography, because it lacks... well, it lacks an overabundance of "Zappa oddities", quite ironically. Like, weird surreal spoken-word rants. More angular-sounding, quote-unquote "conceptual" music. Parodical intents both mocking and harnessing counter-cultural energy from the late sixties / early seventies -- which made *Freak Out!* an essential listen as well, admittedly, but which also triggered the absolutely terrible and cringeworthy *We're Only In It For The Money* (because the parody here crushed all sense of musical direction to shreds). And here's *Apostrophe*'s problem. It's also ripe with that sort of thing, which Zappa fans fawn over, and leave most other people cold. No real middle ground here. My gut feeling is that a lot of users in this review section are being awfully polite when they give 3/5 and 4/5 marks to this record. I'm gonna do the same, actually -- it's just that my similar grading is more related to the originality of the work than to how pleasurable it actually is. Because, if I'm being honest, that sort of half-concept album about dreams featuring "eskimos" -- the bulk of the LP's first side -- sounds utterly pointless to me. I don't care if it means anything or not, if it's a parody or not, and or what it could be a parody of. I don't care if there are any metaphors or innuendoes or whatnot. I simply don't care a lot for those lyrics, and I even don't care about explaining why. I usually love surrealism. But not here. Because the best sort of surrealism always transcends its hermetic nature to become intriguing or inspiring. It should never be gratuitous. It should speak to your soul. And maybe I'm wrong, but I have the sneaking suspicion Zappa was only speaking to his own soul here, and couldn't care less what other people might feel. Maybe that's what impressed his fans at the time. That gratuitous expressive drive, both relentless and aimless... I also sense that the *relative* commercial success of the album's singles helped people remember this record has ever existed. Fads of all sorts come and go, and even someone as iconoclastic as Zappa can get lucky and catch attention once in a while. Which is what probably occurred in 1974. Oddly enough, this is the point when I take a page out of *some* Zappa fans, who point out that there are less famous yet better albums in his gargantuan discography (which ones, though? Hard to find a consensus there either). Maybe it's because the man put out so many albums that trying to find a third one summarizing his anarchic mad genius eventually becomes an impossible endeavor. Commercial success, even of a limited nature, can be a factor to find entry points in an artist's discography, sure. But it can't be the only one. Otherwise, you would just need to mention the highest selling albums in a selected group of artists, and genuine critical assessment would simply go out of the window. Oh, I almost forgot! Right after the track "Apostrophe", you have "Uncle Remus", a piano-driven, very *subtle* topical song whose only real flaw is to be underdeveloped, for once (How long is this cut? Two minutes max?). It's a nice track, but it's not enough to make the whole album essential, at least outside of certain hardcore Zappa fan circles. So I'd better rest my case here and now -- this "footnote" is far too long already. This is a *no* for me. No "apostrophe" is needed. Only a full stop. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 6 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 8 (including this one)

My mileage about this band has changed so much over the years. Sometimes I found them kind of "important", and other times I found their "emo" undertones drowned by too much Coldplay-adjacent dross. When I listened to this album today -- probably their best -- I found it quite pleasant, in all honesty. The last track especially shone bright. Such heartfelt emotion. To the point that I can forget the partial lack of dynamics in the rest of the tracklist. Now the question is whether I prefer this to side-project The Postal Service anyway -- that I initially found more quaint and innocuous, in comparison, but listening to this other album again, I might actually revise my judgement as well. The thing is, chances are very slim I will eventually include *both* album. They are 3.5-4/5 album fodder, but not one for perfect or near-perfect grades. So I'm leaving the door open to Transatlanticism. Until... ? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 3 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 7 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 8

Wow. Just wow. I knew absolutely nothing about Gang Of Youths before today -- guess that many acts reaching local success Down Under have problems getting known outside of Australia. And I'm really, *really" impressed. At first, I was afraid the length of this album would become a flaw -- that the obvious dynamics of the *stellar* first three tracks would get muddled by too many hairpin curves. The thing is, the changes of pace are not a flaw here. They are actually assets to maintain your attention until the very end -- even the orchestral instrumentals winking at Jacques Lacan, of all people. Interestingly, reviews about this album - whether negative, neutral or positive -- tell you a lot about the reviewers first, like a Rorschach blot. What I'm about to say will probably sound controversial, but anyone comparing the band playing on this record to Killers or Bleachers comes off as self-deluded in my eyes. Because for me, there is more soul, heart and brains in 30 seconds of this LP that there is in the whole career of said Killers. Same with Bleachers (at least as I know, I haven't delved into everything). Even comparing Gang Of Youths to The National, U2, The War On Drugs or Japandroids (er... what?) is awkward to an extent. Gangs Of Youths' music is as memorable as the one of those other acts, I guess, but it's also richer in awesome arrangements and melodies, and generally livelier. Which leaves us with the most obvious influences, and those comparisons sound true this time: they are early Arcade Fire (to an extent), and, most of all, Bruce Springsteen. Singer / songwriter David Le'aupepe readily admitted his debt to the Boss, evidence enough of his humility. This humility goes even further than that, since the man once suffered from impostor syndrome and unchecked forms of perfectionism. Reading that on the band's wiki, I instantly wanted to give the big talented guy a hug and tell him he's doing better on an artistic level than 90% of the so-called "rock stars" out there. At least on this terrific record. I don't have the time today to mention all the great songs in details -- "great" for both the music and the lyrics, most of the time. There's one in its second half I just *have* to say something about, the one whose chorus goes "The heart is a muscle / And I wanna make it strong." It's not the best song in the album on a lyrical level. And yet, just like David says, listening to this heartfelt AND bright record makes me want to strengthen my own heart, so that it can help me appreciate more beauty and humanity in life. Those feelings are precious, and when music triggers them, it's simply bliss. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 7 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 8

I would agree with that other reviewer that this album is bland and soft like a hotdog. And not a very tasty one at that, especially at the end. Or, like that other user puts it: "...under the gloss, not a huge amount of substance, lyrically or musically." Pitchfork's Ryan Schreiber once explained all this a little differently, in a review so mean and ripe with sarcasm it is honestly hilarious to read: "You want to cruise around the housing development with the windows down, doing donuts in the cul-de-sac with your newly obtained permit, blasting music so empty and sincere even you could have written it." Boom. That review is admittedly also a little ironical at Schreiber's expense in retrospect, since the guy later sold out to the some of the worst soulless capitalistic forces out there (that happened a mere decade after, when he took that big fat bag of money from Condé Nast in exchange for the music website he had founded). Yet, in spite of all that, Schreiber's sarcasm still stands today. Even more so than in 2001, actually: "[Jimmy Eat World] are the best friends you can imagine. They know what you're going through, and they care. They care like a million hearts wrapped up inside a teddy bear holding a bouquet of understanding in one hand and an undying torch of reassurance in the other. They keep the flame of rock alive while giving you advice about the most important thing in your world: yourself." Not that there ain't two or three tracks to salvage in *Bleed American*: hit single "The Middle" has quite original ways to create addictive guitar and vocal hooks, which shows that its popularity at the time was probably deserved. "Your House" is also a pretty nice acoustic guitar-driven song. And if the gloss and shtick on the vocal parts of "Sweetness" are annoying from the get-go, you can't deny the strength of that track's massive rock instrumentation and production (see also "Get It Faster", to a lesser degree). But those vocals, for chrissake. Those goddamn vocals... The layers of saccharine inflexions and hackneyed tricks on most of the songs are up to such a ludicrous level that it's impossible for me not to take them derisively. Here's everything that emo-rock *shouldn't be* to stand the test of time. Good emo is a somewhat rare beast, but it *does* exist, and some of its most stellar proponents are certainly not neutered like this band is -- they *really* bare their soul and hearts, they scream their lungs out... In other words, they make you feel *urgency*, and not a watered-down simulacrum of it. There's a reason Jimmy Eat World is most often filed next to Sum 41 or Blink 182 (and toured with them, apparently). Because as they pandered to the lowest common denominator, those acts lost sight on the very concepts of authenticity and credibility. If the title "Bleed American" is supposed to be understood ironically, everything in this record suggests it should be taken in earnest instead. Another sure sign of artistic misfire here. Stylistic preferences and "authenticity" aside, judging this thing on its own merits is also terribly inconclusive. The instrumentation and compositions are so awfully *flat* on the second side of this LP, whether for so-called "ballads" where absolutely nothing happens on a musical level, or for the second-rate "rockers" that don't benefit from the exact same production values as for the singles on the first side -- and therefore elicited nothing but a yawn from me. So yeah, this thing aged like milk. As someone whose birth places him at the tail end of "Generation X", I have sometimes found younger folks than I am making fun of my favorite music styles and acts -- which is in the order of things: you need to put a spear through the golden calf of days yonder to assert your own take on culture. Yet now, it looks like millennials are put through the same test, and given how deeply inconsequential this supposed "masterpiece" truly is, it looks like the joke's on them today. Popular music from the naughts can still sound good in 2025. But seriously, guys, you need to separate the wheat from the chaff. Who looks a bit daft now, huh? I could have given a 1.5 - 2/5 marks to this thing. Yet because I pushed the "like" button on a few 4/5 well-phrased reviews -- since I begrudgingly enjoyed the manner in which the nostalgia factor experienced by some of my millennial brothers and sisters was expressed in those takes -- I feel like I need to set my own karmic balance right and counter my first benevolent posture. I really tried to open my mind here. Yet, one catchy hit and one decent acoustic song don't make a good album. Do you *really* think someone who's not in the target demographics aimed at by this record (whether now or then) would think: "yeah, it's a masterpiece". Think again. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency and production values + 1 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 7 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 9 (including this one)

So let me get this straight... From what I understood, this user chose this LP because its best songs are supposedly the first three ones -- and when this person takes a short drive, that's a nice album to play, because they can listen to those three songs in a row and not care if they don't listen to the rest... Am I getting that right? I don't get it. The metrics to choose an album in this list are considerably difficult, between choosing a magnum opus by a legendary artist inexplicably forgotten in the original list - whether a particular album or the artist themself -- ; or picking an album in the genres and subgenres criminally ignored by Dimery ; or selecting a hidden gem that most people have never heard of... And yet, through all those different metrics that this user could have chosen, *this* is what they go for? I really, *really* don't get it. It just looks like this person doesn't care that much for this LP. *LP*, I repeat, not individual songs. I'm an English teacher for French middle-schoolers. I sometimes ask the latter to suggest songs to study in class. The first time I've heard The Lumineers is when one of the students in my 'special needs' class asked me to play "Hey Ho" (from another album by the band) so that we can study its lyrics. Frankly, I was delighted -- you can't imagine the sort of terrible music some of those special needs students listen to (and no, it's not only a generational thing, it's just that those pupils are routinely fed with such crap that they can't possibly develop a somewhat cohesive taste in music). There's a reason "Hey Ho" is the most popular tune by the band: it's a proper folk-pop song, and it's somewhat pleasant to listen to, as quaint and inoffensive as The Lumineers usually are. Unfortunately, this song is not present in this album's tracklist, so I don't have similar personal memories to attach to the latter. I almost took a page out of the user who chose this record, just out of spite, I admit it: I almost decided to only listen to the first three songs, and they were so frigging underwhelming that I wondered if I would not go to a 1/5 grade and leave it at that. Fortunately, I dug deeper, and found out that "Angela", "In The Light" and closer "White Lies" are actually far better tracks than the first three ones in the album, contrary to what this user seems to suggest. So that's gonna be a 2/5 mark for me. FYI, 2/5 in my own criteria to assess albums in this app/website equals a 7/10 grade for more general purposes (5+2), so it's not as if I'm roasting this thing. I'm trying to keep an open mind here. Can I go higher than this, though? No, I just can't. What's frustrating with the other tunes is that *all of them* suffer from the same flaw: lack of development. I can't count the times when a song took a left turn into something that suddenly sounded genuinely interesting or inspiring, and then just... stopped. Here is the key difference between The Lumineers and modern folk-pop acts with a truly distinctive voice such as Other Lives, Fleet Foxes, Big Thief/Adrianne Lenker or Jessica Pratt. In one way or another, they transcend that folk genre through a generous use of their imagination, heart and technical skills. To be clear, it's not that The Lumineers are "bad". They're accomplished musicians who somehow deserve their commercial success. But honestly, with the sheer amount of music produced every day in the world, you need more than "accomplished musicians" for this list. You need genuine artistic *vision*. The real "Cleopatra" is remembered for a reason. She was a queen. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 7 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 10 (including this one)

And here I was thinking that those records by Nik Kershaw, Avicii, Jimmy Eat World and Arctic Monkeys were poor choices for this second list... I stand corrected. Far worse choices are actually waiting for us all, lurking just around the corner. "Out of the blue" indeed. If only this was an attempt to troll the other users, this could be funny at least. Alas, I'm not so sure this is what really happened here... Besides, a Rick Astley album would have pulled off that trick in a far funnier fashion anyway. Most of us here have probably been "rickrolled" online once or twice in their lives. That's part of the man's legend now. 😉 As another reviewer aptly pointed out, you only need to look at this laugh-out-loud ridiculous album "artwork" -- doing everything one *shouldn't* do in that realm -- to predict how cheesy and appalling the music's gonna be. The font used for the artist's name and album title is especially on point. Bad taste is not a criminal offence, fortunately. But you sometimes wish it is. I could have stopped there and not listened to the music. Honesty and curiosity made me listen, though. That's a half-hour from my life that is not coming back. Yeah, I know, that's only 30 minutes out of the 40 this album lasts. To be honest, I *did* skip to the next song before one was over once in a while. I have a couple of kinks, but self-harm is not one of them. 0/5 for the purposes of this list of albums you must listen to before you die. 3/10 for any purposes whatsoever related to the appreciation of good or at least *decent* music. In more details: 3 points because Debbie wrote *all the songs* in the album at the tender age of 16, which is indeed worthy of praise, I'm not gonna deny that. Then 5 points for stuff such as musical competency, large popular impact in the US (not elsewhere, crucially), "professional" production values, etc... To which I retracted half a point for *each* track. Because each and every one of those ten songs is an insult to the very concept of artistry itself. Pop music can be good music. But not when it's only mind-numbing, blatantly childish dross like that. So where's the "0" button here? Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 7 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 11 (including this one)

Sometimes life is simple. An unknown party using this generator suggests a gentle and sensitive modern folk album where a gifted artist wears his heart on his sleeve -- just as said artist tries to find meaning in a recent break-up, along with revisiting older family trauma -- and the thing is both evocative and memorable enough to make your day. I already knew Angelo De Augustine's name from that collab album he made with Sufjan Steven (which I haven't heard yet), but I had never listened to his music. This LP is obviously very close to Stevens' turf circa *Carrie & Lowell* (also in this list, which is great), with the same sort of soft falsetto vocals -- once or twice lacking a bit of personality, but most of the time distinctive enough to avoid being derivative of Sufjan's own artistry. There's also some sensibility in those very nice songs that's close to the one of Andy Shauf (unfortunately not mentioned in this list, I think). But once again, Angelo has a voice of his own, both literally and figuratively. It takes a bit of time for the record to find its groove, but once it does so, it's simply marvellous, as well as soothing and/or moving. ""Kaitlin", "Time" (with that enticing whistling part in the chorus), "Wanderer", "All Your Love" and "You Needed Love, I Needed You" especially shine. Glad I'm finally able to write a short review to tell my thoughts here. As I said, life is simple sometimes. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 8 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 10

Please make a thought experiment. Replace the "rock" instrumentation generally applied in this album with synthetic or mainstream pop tones, and you would quickly realize... that it's just a consensual pop album. And not a very good one at that. Not that I need this change of instrumentation to realize how much I despise that sort of music. This LP is such a bland borefest on a harmonic and compositional level, it's just mind-blowing for me that some people outside of Christian rock circles could possibly fall for it. There's a couple of very short redeeming moments sometimes. Very rarely, in a couple of cuts, those nice inoffensive surfers with a knack for corporate church services try their hands at something a little more original in some chord progressions in the verses (as in "More Than Fine" or "Redemption"). But they always return to cheesy, hackneyed, sugary major-chord dross for the choruses. So it's a hard pass for me. I tried very hard to forget this was Christian Rock, mind you. Hard to pull off when the wiki page for this record is so hypocritical. There was "universal praise" for this LP, the page goes. Yet the publications mentioned are *all* obscure Christian-minded websites or magazine. There's a reason other usual websites and the rest of the music press just ignored this thing. Because the music, as "professional" as it is, isn't worth much, and there's no reason to attract accusations based on faith (or lack thereof) from the target audience where you can just let the thing fly by and join the footnotes of music history at large -- without giving the opportunity to anyone to make a fuss about it all. Yeah, in other words, maybe ignoring Switchfoot was just the best move here. Yet my main reproach goes deeper than that. Oddly enough, my main reproach has something to do with the way spirituality in this record sounds so... underwhelming. Switchfoot wanted to avoid being "preachy", which is a good idea on paper. The problem is that they can only resort to vague generalizations once that idea is executed. And the vague generalization is not only expressed lyrically, it is also expressed musically. It starts with the very opener, some kind of post-grunge thing that has all the ingredients from ten years before the album's release, and is logically devoid of heart and stakes. But then, it gets even worse, and the whole glossy quickly thing goes down the drain of oblivion. This record does not sound like a trip to visit a community of faithful believers. It sounds like a trip to the mall. I might be an agnostic, I still want music with religious tones (whether undertones or overtones) to lift and inspire me, and even make me consider the possibility of a higher power. This religious impulse is actually the most probable origin of music itself. I can feel that "spirit" in soul and gospel. I can feel it in the sacred tintinnabulations of Arvo Pärt. I can feel it in the melancholy and existential questioning of Sufjan Stevens. I can feel it in the divine harmonies and infinite patience of Low. Those artists all have a very real and sincere Christian faith at the heart of their artistry. And they honor that faith in such a graceful fashion, that you can't help being in awe at them. When I listen to Switchfoot, I just feel numb. Not the best way to win new adepts, I'd say. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency and production values + 1 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 8 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 11 (including this one)

90s band with strong Queen, Supertramp and prog overtones, sprinkled with indie-rock / power pop shenanigans sometimes adjacent to Weezer. Very flourished and extravagant, with adequate production values for the music played. Yet oddly enough, not entirely memorable. At least for me. Nothing unpleasant. It's just that nothing really stood out either. Oh, and the artwork for the cover is downright horrible, but that's probably intentional. In that realm, see also Soul Coughing's *Irresistible Bliss*. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 8 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 12 (including this one)

Funny how the first track sounds like a draft of the second. But, gosh, that second cut, what a song! If only for "The Bug Collector", I want to give a hundred thanks to whoever posted this. I was aware of who Haley Heynderickx was, and could already place her in a folk universe not so far from Big Thief / Adrianne Lenker, Mitski or even early Joni Mitchell and Vashti Bunyan. So I can certainly see the appeal now that I give my full attention to her music and artistry. The album goes to some... uncertain places sometimes -- some of those undecided moments, like "Jo", sound indeed a little unfocused, on first listens, at least ; but others are fascinating (the long "Worth It", the piano in the second part of "Show You A Body", that echo-drenched guitar and horn part towards the end of "Untitled God Song). "Oom Sha La La" is a quite surprising, mock-lively penultimate indie-doo wop track. And closer "Drinking Game" is very nice. Expecting this one to grow on me. And last year's *Seed Of A Seed* seems to be in the exact same vein, with maybe production values sounding slightly more lush in some tracks in comparison (with more instrumentation). Some very impressive cuts on this one, too. Giving quite high marks to this thing. And leaving the door wide open to it. Modern folk and indie-rock album suggestions have genrally been great on this users' list. And it's something that was clearly missing in the original list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 4 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 12

Discovering this krautrock album a couple of years ago was like discovering a treasure trove from the distant past. Sure, it's not exactly a 5/5 album. There are some lengthy moments in the improvised jams on the second disc -- missing in the Spotify version, and that could easily be considered as bonus tracks today. There's also the somewhat awkward (yet also intense) performance by that male vocalist towards the end of the "Soap Shop Rock" song suite comprising the first four tracks as displayed on Spotify... But even with those few trinkets in the trove, the jewels covering them shine brightly. Especially if you love realizing that some of the current great acts sort of playing in that style (from Osees to Goat, King Gizzard and even Parquet Courts or Ty Segall at times) actually invented nothing. Even on that second disc's patchouli-scenting improvisations, you have many extraordinary moments in the "jam" genre. And they're not always so easy to pinpoint on the regular time frame usually associated to rock history as we know it. Some of them hearken back to the Velvet Underground at their most abrasive, others foretell Sonic Youth at their most melodic. Which is the reason why the improvisation thing sounds so fresh compared to other seventies jam rock fare such as The Grateful Dead or Quicksilver Messenger Service. And the same relative timelessness occurs with the more regular "songs" on the first disc. The first two cuts of "Soap Shop Rock" ("Burning Sister" and "Halluzination Guillotine") could have been recorded yesterday, for all we know. There's a wealth of enticing harmonies and epic chord sequences right after those two tracks, mixed with near-apocalyptic flourishes (like that distraught violin in "Flesh-Coloured Anti-Aircraft Alarm" making up for the unfocused vocal parts). Singer Renate Knaup displays her vocal chops in quite an unhinged manner as well on the first disc, and here, the performance nicely adds to the whole mayhem. "She Came Through The Chimney" is a nice little acoustic interlude, quieter and cinematic. And don't get me started on the extraordinary Can-meet-Black Sabbath "Archangels Guillotine", with its heavy guitars and bouncing drum patterns (that drummer was a full powerhouse whenever his services were needed). I literally got obsessed with that song from the first time I listened to it. A krautrock hit for the ages. *Yeti* is thus Amon Düül II's magnum opus, and given how the original list mentioned Can and Krautrock once or twice, it's kind of a surprise that this album didn't make it there. I also like their later LP *Wolf City* a lot, by the way. So if you enjoyed this one, check that other album out as well. And thanks to whoever thought of adding this album in the users list. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 12

So... This is what the ultimate edgelord user in this generator submits after shitting on the Beatles, The Clash, Pixies, The Velvet Underground, Bowie, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Elliott Smith, Radiohead and so on... ? Let me have a good LAUGH! Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. Looks like this user actually likes Blur, Beastie Boys, A Tribe Called Quest or Haley Heynderickx, so I'm able to personally and subjectively assess they can have a set of functioning ears once in a while. But personal preferences are beside the point. The point is: why using this generator if you hate *most* music anyway? Is it like a self-harm kink of sorts? I really, really don't get it. There's also a different theory to explain that 1.89 global score : even though said user is the fifth one who went through tall the 1001 albums of the original list, I wouldn't be surprised if they actually didn't listen to a very large part of those records and just went to their comfort zone and gave 5/5 marks to the only LPs they already knew in the list. If that's the case, that's akin to cheating for me. And it would also explain why said user only very rarely left a review. Which raises the most important question: why should I put in an effort and listen to Men I Trust if really that user didn't put an effort as well (or gives such impression)? The irony of the band's name in that situation is borderline hilarious. I simply refuse to *trust* the taste or supposed "better judgment" of that person. I did listen to parts of *Oncle Jazz* however. I can't blame Men I Trust for having such a weird fan. For me, it sounds like bland, inoffensive muzak, which got the "indie" tag only because they're technically "independent" indeed, even if they have nothing to do the music usually associated with that tag. It wouldn't be much of a problem if you didn't sound like a second-rate version of Chromatics or a third-rate version of Beach House. The thing is, this record does sound *exactly* like this. The end of "Days Go By" was OK, I guess. But not much stands out in the rest of those songs, and I very quickly lost interest after that. Interestingly, none of those songs (except from the one-minute instrumental introduction) is among the ten most played or "hot" tracks on Spotify. A sure sign that most of the people who did listen to this record in 2019 have quickly forgotten about it since. Polaris prize long list nominee or not, you wouldn't have me believe that such insignificant fodder for "chill playlists" has generated enough sufficient physical sales to have enough hardcore fans listen to this on vinyl or CD instead. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. Mostly because I don't want to be considered as an edgelord myself. Call me charitable here. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency and production values + 1.5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 13 (including this one)

"When Smoke Rises is the debut studio album by Canadian musician and poet Mustafa. It was released on May 28, 2021, through Mustafa's Regent Park Songs imprint. The album was produced by frequent collaborator and executive producer Frank Dukes with contributions from James Blake, Jamie xx, and Sampha, among others. The songs "Stay Alive", "Air Forces", "Ali", and "The Hearse" were released as singles prior to the album's release. The album is self-described as 'inner city folk music' and is thematically centered on Toronto's Regent Park community.[1]" That text up there is the review that the user who submitted this Mustafa album left when their own choice appeared in the generator. Such passion. Such flame. Yep, you get it, they did the same thing for each album. They merely copied and pasted the Wikipedia blurbs here associated to an album page, every single time. Maybe out of some sort of experimental drive to point out what we all already know here, i.e. that there's no such thing as objectivity in music appreciation. Or maybe out of laziness. Interestingly, this person only did this for the users list. There are no original list reviews to be seen on their main page. And their "all ratings" section is also missing, oddly enough -- even though they *did* grade the 1089 albums (the 3.26 average score kind of proves it). Another intriguing nugget about that user: their "lowest albums" section is empty, which speaks to their open-mindedness (or their awareness of the intricacies and challenges of being a musician). Yet, as if you counterbalance that benevolence, there are only 35 highest-rated albums from the original list -- most of them excellent choices in my own subjective book, sure, but also a sure sign that this mysterious person can be *very* picky. My grading philosophy is radically different (see below), but I do believe this one also makes sense somehow. I'm writing all this whereas I haven't listened to *When Smoke Rises* yet, by the way. But given that I have recently discovered Mustafa through a more recent album, I know what to expect, kind of. Namely a soothing and somewhat off-kilter mix of folk and indie-R'n'B, not always memorable when it comes to the rather by-the-book vocal lines, but at least sounding original, sincere and heartfelt enough. I guess you've already gotten an inkling of my overall impressions about the man's debut album through my grade anyway. I'm writing the review before listening to the album, you see. Only this one time. This here is my own way to get "experimental" as well. Now, to return to the copied-and-pasted Wikipedia blurbs on that person's reviews, one thing bugs me. When you go to the album pages in the users list, those reviews (and the gradings associated to them) are nowhere to be seen. I checked, I was meticulous... Is it a glitch in the matrix? Subtle censorship? Some shadowy cabal? This here will join the greatest mysteries of all time, the ones that keep on nagging me to this day. Like, who really assassinated Kennedy? Where did all those planes go when they vanished in the Bermuda Triangle? Or why on earth would anyone with a set of functioning ears enjoy Debbie Gibson's music? 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 14 (including this one)

Ha ha ha ha! Didn't expect that one to come up! For anyone with a flimsy grasp of the French language, know that the second track of this live album, "Tout le temps pareil", translates as.... "Always The Same". And you couldn't find a better way to sum up the record (and Les Sheriff's strand of punk rock in general). Maybe it's a self-referential wink, in a way. But I wouldn't be surprised if such wink went high over the heads of the band's core audience at the time. Les Sheriff were iconic for a couple of slightly older kids I hung out with as a teenager, back in the early nineties. In that overall French punk genre displaying strong working-class values, Bérurier Noir and Ludwig Von 88 were even more iconic, admittedly -- because they had released truly memorable anthems with a political edge. Les Sheriff never pulled that off outside of their dedicated fanbase, though. And it seems to me that they were never that political. Their shtick was more "beer and drunken fighting" fare and fanfare. And for anyone intrigued enough by the lyrics, just know that the latter already sounded a little dumb and mind-numbing for me at the time -- and that, in retrospect, they sound even *more* awkward, simplistic and pointless to me now. Not to mention the fact that the singer's quite heavy-handed delivery quickly gets on my nerves as well.... As for the music... Yeah, "Tout le temps pareil". That drummer is a powerhouse, and the band's live act certainly had a rowdy reputation among the fans. But the whole thing is so damn linear, c'mon -- there are so many ways good working-class-minded punk rock can avoid that sort of bland proposal devoid of real musical stakes. The kind of simplicity displayed here rarely justifies a 70-minute record. Gonna end my rant in French. There are a couple of things I want to add, but I'm pretty sure no one outside of France or Québec will care enough about it anyway... J'ai un pote qui joue dans un groupe et qui a ouvert pour les Sheriffs il y a pas longtemps (ils tournent toujours aujourd'hui). Le groupe de mon pote est très bon sur scène, dans une veine pop-punk pas si éloignée que ça des Sheriffs, finalement -- textes en français frais et sans prétentions, beaucoup d'énergie, une chanteuse-guitariste pour les voix lead... Pas forcément mon truc, mais rien qui justifie ce qui va suivre : mon pote s'est en effet pris des gobelet de bières dans la tronche dès le début du concert, avec un manque de respect évident de la part d'un public vieillissant et pas toujours très fin. Alors bien entendu, on parle certainement d'une minorité ici -- faut pas mettre tous les fans des Sheriffs dans le même panier, et ces derniers eux-mêmes n'y peuvent rien. M'enfin bon... Ça donne pas forcément envie de faire la promo de ce genre du punk à papa à l'international. Surtout quand il est évident que le phénomène a zéro chances d'y être compris ou réellement apprécié. Bref, c'est rigolo de voir ce nom-là sortir sur ce générateur. Mais ça va pas beaucoup plus loin pour moi.... 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1 for the artistry + 0.5 for the band's dedication and endurance, I guess). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 15 (including this one)

And so, finally, I've listened to an album by the Dave Matthews Bands, which I've heard so much about. And truth be told... I understand why so many people are derisive about this act. At times, this record sounds as if Pearl Jam and Tool had been taken to the vet so as to be castrated. Given that I'm not a huge fan of Tool, and that I think that Pearl Jam are overrated and boring for the most part, you can probably guess my exact mileage on that sort of glossy "jam-rock". Same meandering, sometimes gratuitous, dirges, but without the "alternative" edge (and layers of partly hackneyed gloss instead). Plus, the lead vocals sound particularly grating and "forced" for no good reason in some of those tracks. And they can't help the sometimes linear, sometimes decent music shine as it should. About what I've written up there... You have to forgive me for the weird metaphor about taking nineties bands to the vet. I don't really know where that came from... But I now imagine naming my two cats "Pearl Jam" and "Tool" (or dogs if I had some). And that thought strikes me as kind of funny. That's it, not much else to say. I'll see myself out. ---------------> 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 15 (including this one)

Sounds like a comedian trying his hand at singing songs. Musically speaking, it's rubbish. And lyrically, Adam Green is not even "too smart for his own good", he just uses a lot of ornate and "literary" words to say very dumb things, generally speaking. And he's a quite bad singer, to boot. Not "bad" in an endearing and unwittingly touching fashion. Just "bad bad", in a cringe-worthy, amateurish, self-conscious way. I have a hard time imagining how playing that sort of thing makes you wake up in the morning and think, "yeah, I need the world to hear all my songs, there's a flame in me that pushes me to do so, and I have something distinctive and personal to bring to the table". Not when you play such goofy muzak. Apologies to Alex Turner, that I roasted in my scathing and admittedly overlong review of *Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino*. At least the leader of Arctic Monkeys understands the concept of "artistry", even if I subjectively believe he comes off as pretentious and suddenly clueless about the ingredients of a good song. Conversely, you could state that Adam Green is humble in his ambitions, and is just having a bit of fun here. The thing is, I'm neither laughing nor finding his music worth the precious time of most people. A "dreamy, kind-of-cheesy companion piece" to my lowest-rated albums section indeed. I don't know, maybe Adam Green would be funnier if he decided to stop playing music and become a full-blown comedian. I've just read that he's also into film-making -- and also art -- but does he make "funny" films? As of now, I'm not interested enough to find out... On that line of thought, I'm wondering if some musicians whose career I follow could be good at comedy. I would bet on Andy "Falco" Falkous, of Mclusky, or Pavement's Stephen Malkmus. But I guess we'll never know the sort of... "gemstones" those guys could utter onstage on a comedy night. *Rimshot!* 0.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 1 5.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 0.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 5 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 17 (including this one)

Now we're talking. This second album by the legendary Canadian post-rock act was in my own shortlist of LPs to submit for this users section. Godspeed You! Black Emperor's debut being already in the list, I chose another record, eventually. But I'm obviously *delighted* that another user submitted *Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven* (and this not long after I entered the users "club" myself). I'm gonna repeat the same thing I always repeat when it comes to post-rock in the original list: it's a pivotal music genre that has been done dirty in the 1001 Albums book. So it's time to set the karmic balance right here. Now about the album itself: from that elated crescendo repeating the same heartbreaking leitmotiv in the first five minutes opening "Storm", to the eerie soundscapes ending "Like Antennas To Heaven" on a devastatingly melancholic, post-apocalyptic note, this two-disc release is filled to the brim with epic highlights. But what's even more impressive about this record is its stunning ability to evoke so many images and sensations related to the state of our fallen, late capitalist hellworld. A soundtrack for the end of times indeed, often sad-sounding and ripe with anxiety, but never fully devoid of *hope* (a keyword that has run throughout the Canadian band's career). A friend of mine once imagine the perfect video for the first minutes of the album: a lone beach being gradually peopled by dishevelled yet hopeful visitors moving in slow motion towards the viewer. This image haunts me to this day. The four 20-minute tracks/programs in *Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven* obviously encourage that sort of daydreaming. In fact, rarely has purely instrumental music (if you take aside the collage of field recordings often displaying distant endearing voices, as if remembered through the haze of old memories experienced in the afterworld) been so *powerfully* evocative. This album pulls off the feat of being like a sort of "platonic ideal" of what a great post-rock album should be, but it also transcends the boundaries of the genre at times (hence maybe why GY!BE have never been at ease with that tag). The collage aesthetics -- less noticeable in further releases, as great as most of them were -- is pivotal here. That interview of an old man reminiscing about Coney Island, lamenting that people "don't sleep anymore on the beach" there, is now as iconic as the music which follows it. Add the breathtaking acceleration within "Static", or the obsessive drilling guitars concluding the main section of "Sleep", along with another dozen of spellbinding moments like that, and what you have is an album for the ages. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 6 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 17

Often mesmerizing, sometimes baffling but always interesting, this record could have been recorded yesterday, and I'm delighted someone submitted it here. The music from Arthur Russell I had listened to so far was his most played tracks on Spotify, and given that said music seemingly oscillated between some sort of quaint disco and some sort of quaint country, that handful of more commercial-sounding cuts didn't really appeal to me. Quite the contrary happens here, though, and it's awesome. To me, this experimental album sounds like a stronger, more personal offering, and so only now can I grasp why Russell is considered as such a cult figure in some circles. There is definitely something soothing and touching going on in "World Of Echo", beyond the uncompromising, minimalistic soundscapes -- like an electronic-driven Nick Drake, as one other reviewer wonderfully put it. I can also link what Arthur does here to Thom Yorke's solo endeavors or The Smile. Same hypnotic grooves and inspired vocal adlibs, and some underlying tension beneath the gentle vocal performance. The reverb and delay-drenched cellos and percussions can take you to another world indeed. If you manage to go under the similar sounding surface, you soon realize how actually different and distinctive those songs are. "Kid Like You", the obsessive rhythm patterns of "Treehouse", and the melodies of "Hiding Your Present From You" and "Lucky Cloud" are currently my favorite compositions in this album, but I have a feeling that I can fall in love with all of them if I'm patient enough. Like the whole LP is a mystery I already can't help returning to in the future. So here I am lying in my bed after a tiring day, listening to this album again, and I feel this is exactly what I need now. Doesn't often happen when I use this generator, and this is probably what makes me want to include the LP in my list of mandatory listens, filed next to Laurie Anderson's *Big Science*, also criminally missing in Dimery's list. Will stop writing and enjoy the damn thing now. Good night. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 7 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 17

UK grime / rap. The production on this thing sounds more varied and adventurous than in the Dizzee Rascal album included in the original list. The first six cuts are terrific for that genre, and proper closer "Signs In Life" slaps as well ('Boys Love Girls" is not the real closer and just a somewhat goofy hidden / bonus track, so I kind of ignore it for my assessment...). This thing is, I found the second half of this record underwhelming to say the least -- lyrically to some extend, but most specifically musically, owing to the overeliance in cheap chiptune sound aesthetics (which aged quite poorly). And maybe there's also the fact that Kano uses so many different producers from one song to the next also turns the whole thing into an endeavor lacking in personality at some point (instead of truly surprising you when a new subgenre comes up). All of this sort of jeopardizes my initial intent to listen to the whole album all over again on day. To put it in a nutshell, "Home Sweet Home" is still a pretty good rap album. But I can't see it in my own list of 1001 Albums keepers (contrary to Little Simz or The Streets when it comes to UK hip hop). Sorry! Nice to know more about this gifted rapper, however. So thanks to whoever submitted this record! 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 7 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18 (including this one)

Review: Yes, the word 'pop' can be found in the 'hyperpop" tag, even though the layers of irony and hypertextual recycling used in that particular scene (including by Charli xcx herself) have often hampered its readability for a more mainstream audience. It's not so easy for a newcomer to the genre to have access the immediate pleasure of good melodies when there is so much pastiche going on at the same time -- and when said pastiche straddles the fine line between conceptual winks and plain bad taste within a song in a matter of seconds... In other words, hyperpop is often more "hyper" than truly "pop". How many devastating choruses or memorable synthetic hooks have there been so far in that genre ? Very few, and it takes the cake, really! Outsider listeners of that scene could therefore take the latter with a huge grain of salt -- until Charli made the waves she had always dreamed of at last, even spelling such ripples out for popular culture at large, thanks to those low-resolution Arial letters on the neon green cover of *Brat*. For anyone with ears that can tolerate an admittedly excessive use of Auto-Tune, many of the criticisms routinely thrown at the hyperpop genre thus risk becoming moot after this record. Because, beyond all the memes and the TikTok trends, *Brat* is also an album that reconnects with the requirements of the great game-changers of the past, surprisingly enough. Which is maybe how it will actually stand the test of time. Charli's latest checklist is impressive for sure, at least. A string of bangers without a single dull moment in and in between them? Check. A wide array of intents and moods that paradoxically strengthen the overall cohesion of the project? Check. A narrative drive which resonates with such musical dynamism, seeing Charli go from a superficial party girl to a more touching young woman afterwards? Check. The delirious and abrasive confidence of A.G. Cook's production (also responsible for the quite notable *Britpop* in 2024), along with the contributions of Keane, Gesaffelstein, Hudson Mohawke or Cirkut, here dusts off an electronic field that has often been threatened by inertia and artistic dead ends in the last few years. And the result will probably sound exhilarating for most fans of dancefloor-oriented shenanigans with strong French Touch influences Yet it is most specifically Charli's touch -- her millennial girl energy and sensitivity, not caring for one second about expectations and usual social "codes" (so as to better create her own?) – that makes Brat a true phenomenon. 'Bumping that' for sure. List of songs: The iconic opener "360" ; the hedonistic, ketamine-driven "Club Classics" ; "Sympathy Is A Knife", with its elated, stellar chorus ; the suddenly introspective and minimalistic "I Might Say Something Stupid" ; the somewhat cheesy and yet 100% efficient "Talk Talk" ; absolute banger "Von Dutch, with its incredible drop and infectious synth hook ; "Everything Is Romantic", with its string section, its crazy flute loop hearkening back to Björk's *Utopia* and its part-hectic, part-cinematic atmosphere. You can really see "Capri in the distance" listening to that one, with sunrays blinking on and off on Charli's face as she drives on Italian roads... The second half of the album then starts with "Rewind", with its tongue-in-cheek displaying of nostalgia and apt tape sound gimmick to illustrate the latter ; "So I" is a heartfelt ballad which also serves as an emotionally complex tribute to SOPHIE ; "Girl, So Confusing", harbors a distinctive feminine perspective in its lyrics (which allow Charli to mend fences with Lorde, of all people) and therefore makes the best of its bouncy instrumental ; "Apple" then struts along in a tongue-in-cheek, happy-go-lucky, meme-worthy demeanour ; "B2B" explores tighter, moodier, and more hypnotic harmonies ; "Mean Girls" is kind of wild, and it has that fun and groovy piano part at the end ; and the last proper song in the album is "I Think About It All The Time", a straightforward confession that sees Charli reflecting on potential motherhood and her wish to slow down at last. Finally, here comes outro "365", a high octane, cocaine-fuelled version of opener "360" that sees Charli forget all the good resolutions uttered in the track before -- because, well, she will always be a "brat" at heart, won't she? The cycle can thus start all over again. Yeah, I know, I know... Sometimes the lyrics may sound a little daft if the songs are taken individually. But as a whole, this record also tells a very specific story, and it's actually not that hard to relate to it even if you're not part of its core audience. And the musicality and energy are relentless anyway. [The "review" before the "list of songs" section up there is actually adapted from a short one I wrote for the Mowno music website, here translated from the French language. If you want to read the shorter original in its original language, you can find it thanks to the link below] https://www.mowno.com/articles/selection/session-de-rattrapage-les-oublies-de-2024/ Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 8 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 9 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

Stars went under my radar when they released this album. Which is surprising given that they're artistically related to Broken Social Scene, and that I really, really like that band. Listening to the first tracks of *Set Yourself On Fire* today, I also couldn't help thinking of Black Country New Road -- which shouldn't come as a surprise, since the latter are noticeably inspired by that sort of mid-noughts indie scene which also tangentially gravitated around Arcade Fire at the time. I admit that because I had a big day at work today, I couldn't do more than browsing through the second half of this LP, and that I should probably need to give the latter a more serious listen some time later. The thing is, and even with my incomplete listen, it seems to me that compared to all the references I've written up there (to which I could add another Canadian band named Clues -- far more abrasive and unpredictable), Stars sounds a little too demure and even timid to a fault. To me, it's not really the electronic flourishes which bring this lack of dynamics stakes, because those dynamics actually provide a quite distinctive flavour to a project also often displaying original textures and arrangements, as a matter of fact. This has more to do with the vocal parts, that I find a little too "gentle" and devoid of personality. But as I said, maybe I didn't focus on this record the way I should. So I'm giving this one the benefit of the doubt (in spite of tentative "neutral grade" that should normally place it out of my list of potential "keepers"). 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums? 8/10 for more general purposes? (5+3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 8 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 10 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

Being a lover of minimalistic, ambient music, it's a shame I had not paid attention to this album in 2000. There's sure was a thing happening in that particular field at the turn of the century, between GAS, the first albums of Tim Hecker, and William Basinski's Disintegration Loops series. *Pop* sounds repetitive at first but then this foray into darkly poetic woods easily reveals its sonic subtleties -- more a matter of (shadow) frequencies than proper music, admittedly, but the effect was undeniable on me. The two cuts where the bass kick... kicked in surely became exhilarating, especially for the breathless closer. Many thanks to whoever in this group took me to those memorable woods. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: approximately a fifth of them so far (including this one), I've temporarily lost count. Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: approximately a third of them so far Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: around half so far

I admit it: I burst out laughing when I saw Jimmy Buffet pop up on my phone this morning. But it turns out that thing ain't so bad, all things considered. Or at least, that there are enough highlights on this album to make up for the occasional bland song (as some other reviewers also pointed out, the duds are actually more noticeable on side one than one side two, oddly enough). I suspect that those highlights will soon becomes firm favorites of mine in an overall country-rock genre I'm not *always* at ease with. Surprising how those highlights actually sound good compared to most of Buffet's more famous songs. It was still the early seventies, and the man was only starting to embrace the cliché he would later become, while managing to sound relatively fresh and lively. Plus, look at that cover and tell me you don't want to be in his place, huh? I especially enjoyed the compositional work and dynamic arrangements in the memorable "Dallas" and the instantly catchy "Life Is Just A Tire Swing". And of course the lyrics about living a life of idleness and binge drinking on the beach are either witty or downright funny. Cue the gentler "A Pirate Looks At Forty" and moodier "Trying To Reason With The Hurricane Season" to have stellar exemples of that. Or spin the opener "Makin' Music For Money" again. It sure is a lazy and quite inert old-fashioned rock tune, even by 1974 standards. The song is musically devoid of anything interesting, *of course*, but it's also lyrically on point with the music's blandness -- a wink that both doubles down and redeems the supposed laziness Buffet often witnesses when he looks into the mirror. In other words, self-deprecation has rarely sounded so cool, and I can picture why one "handsome man" found this album endearing enough to select it here (I forgive you for hating *Kid A*, pal !). Guess all I needed to appreciate that sort of commercial country-rock music and make it sound cinematic enough for me was a sip of tropical Florida juice inside the usual C&W formula. Wish Dimery and co. had thought of that! Still not sure I can "reason with the hurricane season" and find a way to include this record in my own list of keepers. But as of now, I certainly keep the door open. The view of the ocean outside is magnificent, after all. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes? (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 9 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 11 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

Got acquainted with Alex Cameron through album *Miami Memory*, and I remember finding it a little boring and/or awkward. Earlier LP *Forced Witness* seems far, far better, in comparison. As another reviewer aptly puts it in this section, it is unclear whether the "Alex Cameron" heard here is a total fabrication -- one of the personas the artist routinely adopts -- or if the man behind the curtains sometimes peeps through the latter to show his real face. What's clear, however, is that a lot of the often laugh-out-loud offensive lyrics are memorable, and that the same can be said about the eighties-like music -- actually a little more sophisticated than what it sounds at first when you play it again. The vast majority of the songs on the first side are well-crafted. They verge on pastiche territory, but fortunately, they also have more earnest layers. There's just one song featuring Brandon Flowers that I find a little flat, confirming my distaste of The Killers. That said, I admit that Flowers doesn't ruin the show when he appears again for the great and catchy closer "Politics Of Love", nicely summing up the themes of failed masculinity explored throughout the record. Some of the choruses sung throughout this LP are infectious, which is essential for eighties-minded music. And "Politics Of Love" certainly harbors such a chorus. Too bad that the joke suddenly wears thin on "The Chihuahua" and "The Hacienda" on side two. Those two tracks are very, *very* weak songs that almost prevented *Forced Witness* from reaching my "High Rated Albums". But the last two cuts return to the quality level of the first side in no time. That was a close call, folks! Now is all that enough to make me consider this record as "essential" as a whole? The jury's still out on this one. Having it pop up today made me feel like a "forced witness" indeed. It's not so easy to have a record displaying so much sarcasm immediately click for me. I'm still a naive soul after all these years, I guess, and figures like Alex Cameron are sometimes a little daunting for listeners like me. But chances are that I might be happy to testify later, once the man's intent and off-kilter artistry becomes more familiar to my slow ears... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes? (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 9 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

Under the pink you can find a woman, Tori Amos, whose distinctive sensibility makes her truly unique. She exemplifies a romantic ideal made flesh -- "romantic" in the sense of the sublime aesthetics of the 19th century -- and as usual with that type of romanticism, a bit of grotesque is sprinkled here and there. This conflation fuels the elated, sometimes exaggerated emotionality in her vocal performance, a clear yearning to be heard, paradoxically through the troubled (or troubling) soliloquies of a tortured soul. This is how Tori's lyrics make unforeseen left-turns from the nonsensical to the sensual, or from a deep-seated melancholy to scary spikes of furious anger. And the result is cinematic. Tori's main instrument, the piano, is just perfect for those romantic aesthetics. Its notes twirl and swirl, displaying a virtuosity which is always serving her songs' musicality. Opener "Pretty Good Year", with its cyclical main riff illustrating the passing of time and the nostalgia it induces -- as if watching old photographies of your circle of friends when they were younger -- is a perfect first statement in that regard. Of course, secrets hover above that circle, some of them innocuous, others of a far darker nature, maybe -- you can hear that darkness in that very short aggresive "alt-rock" bridge coming out of nowhere. But gentleness then resumes, and everything is forgiven. Who knows who slept with whom, who hurt whom, or who had some unacknowledged crush on whom? This is how bittersweet feelings are bound to seep in, under the surface, "under the pink". Romanticism also implies rebellion -- *feminine* rebellion, obviously, with a touch of "hysteria" which often acts as a subtle revelator of the constraints of patriarchal oppression. "God" needs a woman to look after the mess He makes, Tori's scathing comments emphasized by the rattle of atonal electric guitars uncomfortably wailing and wincing in the background. Delicate "Bells For Her" finds solace in a clandestine lesbian affair, even if prejudice and secrecy will soon doom the two lovers. The use of a "prepared piano", with its strings blocked and stifled to make them sound like the titular "bells", is pitch-perfect to describe the dysfunctional feelings and infinite sadness cursing the characters of the song. "Cornflake Girl" sees Tori sneer against the conformism of suburban lives at the lively beat of a catchy pop song presenting the whole thing like a classic western flick -- climactic showdown with the bad guy "with a golden gun" included. Why don't you look for the keys for yourself, Honcho? Tori's fight is the fight of all women. It's just that it's tailored for a big screen here. In fact, the ambitions displayed in this record never divert from its blunt manners. The production, soundscapes and compositions owe a lot to pop music, of course, but it's just that the latter is "perverted" enough to become interesting. Some of those pop songs tell harrowing tales about violence and sexual abuse at times, picking that thread from where "Me And A Gun" left it on debut *Little Earthquakes*. Under the pink, the wounded flesh. Trent Reznor, known for being a somewhat scary and troubled performer at this stage of his career, sings surprisingly soft background vocals on "Past The Mission", a song dealing with this particular topic. What we have here is a quite subversive form of pop music, where values are inverted, and confusion can reign supreme. "The Waitress" even allows Tori to express maddening rage at a fellow employee in a striking chorus enhanced by military percussion and a rambling electric guitar line, yelling seemingly gratuitous threats thrown at another woman (instead of a man). The subdued tone of the verses suggest the screams and rage and threats probably all happen in her head -- it's dangerous for girls to truly express their feelings in this world. You know where all the supposedly mad women went in the 19th century. Yet how is it that Tori can make the lunatic asylum sound so attractive, and even *fun* at times? "I believe in peace, bitch" is a hysterical line indeed, in all the senses of the word. Sometimes you're brought back to an age where conventions corset you into a ridiculous pantomime, as in "The Wrong Band", whose voluntary quaint arrangements seem to illustrate musicians playing together as the Titanic sinks into the frozen ocean. Sometimes a quiet ballad like "Baker Baker" soothes you like a balm. Sometimes you're lost in a winter landscape and you wait for the night to fall, as in "Icicle". And sometimes you're floating with a "Space Dog", and you think you can glimpse Kate Bush in the distance, somewhere among the twinkling stars. And it all ends with the nine-minute epic "Yes Anastasia", with only Tori, her piano, and a grand string orchestra plunging you into a surreal historical film which takes place in different time periods and seems to involve lookalike characters so as to tell another tale of woe and violence and hope that only women can tell you. The chorus of that closer is a thing of wonder, but really, the whole track, and how it constantly pulls the rug under your feet, is simply amazing. It's a tour de force, and if you've never heard this song, we'll see "how brave you are" indeed once you get those goosebumps, just as Tori's crazed falsetto goes sky-high in the last minute of this album. *Little Earthquake* was an excellent solo debut revealing an immensely talented artist. But there was still something relatively "formatted" in it. In comparison, *Under The Pink* is *pure* Tori Amos. Unhinged, uncut, unapologetic, and yet still cohesive and always accessible somehow. You want to know what it feels like to have all that pain and passion under your skin? Ask a fellow waitress. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 10 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 18

John Mayer is an accomplished musician and singer, but let's face it folks, what we have here is so goddamn *generic*. Of course, the musicianship being what it is, you have stellar arrangements once in a while -- most specifically on the bridges and conclusions of some of the tracks in the first side-- but the songs themselves are way too predictable. With everything that was going on at the time of this album's release, and worse, with everything that had *already* occured, you can't help feeling this is just neatly-packaged and shrewdly-marketed soft-rock, with bluesy flourishes convenient enough to give an air of "authenticity" to the whole thing. Ultimately, said authenticity comes off as rather artificial anyway. This record is way too conventional, refuses to take meaningful risks, and so fails to inspire me. For me, it's more a simulacrum than a "continuum", and it gives the impression that John Mayer is just John Mayall for amnesiac millennials. Or maybe he's just a less lively clone of Lenny Kravitz, himself a generally boring clone of greater seventies rock stars. Next album, please. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for the production and musicianship + 1.5 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 10 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 19 (including this one)

Oh well. The epitome of 2010s/2020s manufactured, cold-sounding mainstream pop, trading in easily digestible songs with predictable chord sequences, cinematic washes of atmospheric synths (partly provided by Oneohtrix Point Never's Daniel Lopatin or Tame Impala's Kevin Parker), along with fashionable beats and crisp programming -- either catchy eighties-sounding ones as exemplified by Max Martin's contributions to the project, or more menacing trap-oriented patterns created by excellent hip hop producers such as Metro Boomin. An impressive blockbuster cast for sure, adding to The Weeknd's usual core team of contributors... But with such a stellar roster of producers around Abel Tesfaye, it's no wonder the Canadian R'n'B singer's auto-tuned vocal presence often comes off as stifled, perfunctory and mechanic at times, as if crushed by impersonal logistical constraints hampering productive spontaneity or genuinely interesting melodic sparks. This flaw is especially noticeable in the first half of this LP (which many "critics" still see as his magnum opus, in spite of its obvious shortcomings as an album). The Weeknd and his team of producers go as hard as they can for bass-heavy despondent moods and hazy atmosphere in the record's first leg (presented before the hits on the second half, but more on that later...), hoping to give an artsy sheen akin to the one of Frank Ocean's *Channel Orange* to the whole thing -- and unfortunately without ever providing the proper dynamics and relatable overtones most Frank Ocean songs effortlessly convey. Those mixed results give the feeling that Tesfaye often ad-libs or improvises his vocal lines around the chords' tonic notes (not so far from the way Future does it, for instance), and it's therefore a little difficult to sense what's really at stake in those early songs. Too often, the glitchy music just harmlessly drones, and there's not much that Abel can do to provide genuine thrills over this indistinct backdrop. "Hardest To Love"'s awkwardly syncopated, UK garage-adjacent drum part also doesn't help -- as if that strange drum programming sacrificed pop efficiency for so-called "originality", yet ultimately failing on both counts. This failure probably stems from the hackneyed, sickly-sweet nature of the song proper, along with its tired clichés about heartbreak, which never justify any sort of seemingly "sophisticated" arrangements in the first place. Same with next track "Scared To Live", basically. Of course, you can still argue that there are discernible melodical elements in those two compositions, as naive-sounding as those elements are. Because, even more crucially, the sound textures displayed elsewhere on the album's initial run most often take over genuine musicality anyway. It's all nightly neon gloss and surface effects, admittedly shiny once in a while -- as in opener "Alone Again" and follow-up track "Too Late -- but also a little too complacent, conventional, and even fully pointless at times, as in borefest "Snowchild". "Pyramids", this is decidedly not. As for Tesfaye, he is no Frank Ocean for sure. He's obviously not interested in bringing warmth or humanity to his digitally-enhanced vocal performance -- almost as if he didn't care about the songs. And neither is he Michael Jackson in this record, which is surprising given that Jacko had been his obvious model on an artistic viewpoint so far -- to the point of pastiche or mimicry on some older hit singles. Abel's trademark falsetto sounds too demure and distant for that on *After Hours*, implying that he probably just wanted to change his stride for this particular album to counter that old comparison with the idol of his life. Fair enough, but what is it that we *do* have instead? Well, it's unclear... Tesfaye's computerized act doesn't suggest any relentless robotic intent either, the way artists like Kraftwerk, Gary Numan or former collaborators Daft Punk once exemplified it. So you're just caught in some undecided soft-sounding and conventional dusk between man and machine, instantly disposable and irremediably inert. You feel like current AIs could have written this music at times. But you never feel such effect was consciously looked for. Not that this impression could exclusively be viewed under a negative light. In a way, said inertia and mindless artificially are also an apt way to musically convey the lyrical themes also found in this LP: isolation, paranoia, lust, relationship issues, self-centered concerns and the likes... More than ever, Abel sounds like a lost and disillusioned soul imprisoned in the solipsistic ivory tower money and fame has put him in, desperately looking for meaning and failing to do so. Those lyrics certainly don't call for empathy -- the man chose to live a life like this after all. And with copious amounts of sex and drugs helping Tesfaye find his pleasures where he can (whether he or his pop star persona), I guess he's doing alright enough compared to us plebes anyway... Interestingly, the song where Abel addresses those topics in the most straightforward manner is the one where he seems to wake up from the slumber of the record's first side at last. Oh the irony. Metro Boomin-produced "Heartless" is indeed the first item in a string of gems which almost goes all the way to the conclusion of the album, and its bouncy trap flourishes and menacing-yet-memorable chorus succeed in leaving an imprint that was lacking in the album's first leg. Following it, you have "Faith", a supposed deep cut with quite intense lyrics about death and addiction -- whose spiky synth pop instrumentation actually fares far better than the one found in many previous The Weeknd singles. Speaking of singles, the track that follows is none other than "Blinding Lights", the new-wave-inspired hit that has become The Weeknd's signature song for all the good reasons (that synth riff is simply infectious!). Next is "In Your Eyes", and yes, its horn section, white funk arrangements and major harmonies are cheesy as f*ck. Yet it's hard to hate the tune if you manage to convince yourself this here is indeed a song which directly came from the eighties -- one that you've heard countless times on the radio before, and that you've brought yourself to love through the sheer power of nostalgia. And "Save Your Tears" pulls off the same feat right after, with a slightly more driven energy also leaning on dream pop flourishes this time around, evoking some platonic ideal of what "eighties pop" songs should sound like in 2020. For once, Max Martin can be congratulated for his input. When it's so well crafted, standardized pop can certainly change your outlook on blatantly commercial music. This doesn't redeem the album's flaws, but at least it gives you the impression you're not wasting your time anymore. After a lesser song going back to the muddled turf of the album's first side, actually labelled as an "interlude" in spite of its normal length (translate: they knew it wasn't good enough), the title-track "After Hours" offers the last of many highlights in the album. Here, The Weeknd proves he can get "atmospheric" without losing the melodic thread too much, and the obsessive nature of the rhythm patterns does help the listener getting hooked. If only they had applied that formula earlier, especially for the first songs... One last drowsy "experimental" track later ("Until I Bleed Out", where the Oneohtrix Point Never and Metro Boomin respective patinas can be easily pinpointed, once again), and *After Hours* is over. Right after the album fades out, a question surges, though: what do you remember from it, even after several listens? Well that it's basically a half-baked EP to which a "greatest hits" one has been added so as to create a full album. In the dead of the night, a string of famous singles suggesting the cohesion of a Spotify playlist instantly erases the memory of the conceptual artistry clumsily displayed before. And so it all ends up with vampires counting their hundred dollars bills in a corporate hotel suite instead of seducing you. The album's very name and its artwork suggested a real gothic adventure instead. Alas, the adventure is short-lived. Guess all that blood on the man's lips was just fake after all. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for the production and musicianship + 2.5 for the artistry) Coda: Some contemporary or near-contemporary pop / R'n'B artists (such as Britney Spears, Pharell Williams or Drake) will be mostly remembered for their iconic singles, and buying a "best of" LP of their works is already enough for most people, if they buy any record at all (I do have a CD of The Weeknd's *The Highlights* at home by the way, bought for a couple of bucks / quid / euros at a second hand record shop). And other artists and musicians will always be remembered for their legendary albums. Guess in which category I consider The Weeknd fits in... Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 10 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 20 (including this one)

Saw Thee Oh Sees / Osees live twice and almost lost a rib in the moshpit the second time -- not that I was actively trying to mosh, but sometimes you have to go with the flow. It was all worth it though, the live reputation of John Dwyer's psych garage act being 100% deserved. So I totally understand why someone would select this record for the users list, even if I very rarely support the inclusion of live albums in this generator. The band's protean discography also explains why someone would go for this record -- here you have three or four pivotal studio albums represented at once, as the person who selected the album explained themselves. The thing is, the vocals and electric guitar sound of a band such as Oh Sees will unavoidably be less distinct in a live recording, and the studio versions of those songs still display unmistakable live energy no matter what. So with the exception of "Web", maybe (whose hazy pedal effects in this live version add something to the studio one), I consider that the studio versions will be better appreciated by most listeners, thanks to shenanigans like mike placements and double-tracked guitars. Besides, you can always argue that if really you had to select *one* Oh Sees studio album, *Floating Coffin* would be the one to go to. For a long time now, John Dwyer and co. have been starting their gigs with the iconic first track of this LP, (as exemplified in *Live In San Francisco*), and the rest of that studio album perfectly encapsulates what the agitated American band is all about, with excellent closer "Minotaur" also being the template for the slower "ballads" Osees often end their LPs with. It's hard to pick just one, admittedly (and I have a few suggestions down there for a possible second studio album to select). But choosing also implies that you're making a personal statement, and it might be easier for newbies to discover this weird wonderful band through an entry point recorded in a studio. But whatever the case may be, and whoever you are who thought of Thee Oh Sees, I bless your heart for thinking of that band of jittery rascals. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 10 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 21 (including this one -- but as said earlier, it's because I would select *Floating Coffin* instead, probably with a second studio recording that could either be *Mutilator Defeated At Last*, *A Weird Exits* or *Carrion Crawler / The Dream*...)

The only album SOPHIE released was she was still in this world goes from lush and expansive synth-pop ballads ("It's OK To Cry", "Is It Cold In The Water?") to arid, abrasive and bouncy Aphex Twin-adjacent electronic scorchers, "playfully aggressive and interactive" indeed (they are the crazy and lustful "Ponyboy", the unhinged and uneasy "Faceshopping", and the obsessive manifesto "Whole New World / Pretend World" which closes this LP). You also have an incredible electronic dance banger towards the end with "Immaterial". Gosh, this thing is objectively ridiculous, with its relentless handclaps and its chipmunk digital vocals, but my head can't help bobbing to it! This is fun. When it's done correctly, "hyperpop" sure has striking assets up its sleeves, and this album proves it then and again. On first listens, the album seems to gratuitously go all over the place, but then I felt like its vastly different moods sort of completed each other, oddly enough. You're sensing there's a very personal narrative going on, even if it's obfuscated and even baffling to a degree. It's a narrative that's indeed most probably pertaining to transhumanism or transidentity, and whatever the songs' topics really are, the music conveys a striking, hypermodern worldview. Under that light you can forgive the short dud "Not Okay" -- actually more like an interlude anyway -- just because you can easily feel it's part of that mysterious narrative. And if the jump from the dark and impressive hyper-ambient instrumental "Pretending" to dancefloor banger "Immaterial" seems jarring at first, subsequent listens actually made that jump strangely satisfying for me -- as if all the tension experienced in the first track was suddenly released in the second. It's very sad we'll never hear the second full-length chapter SOPHIE could have written in a less tragic universe. You sometimes feel like her potential for highly conceptual LPs wasn't fully explored yet at this point. But for a niche artist who was mostly known for her more conventional forays into dance-pop up to that point, this very idiosyncratic record feels like a bold and brazen effort, unafraid to take risks. SOPHIE didn't merely experiment with her music here. She was also experimenting with her audience's expectations. Hyperpop is a genre that is not always beyond reproach, given the weird and even sometimes downright goofy things it does with sound and music. But it most often has a very singular quality: it exudes a lust for freedom that is not so commonly witnessed in other genres. And in this day and age, it's at least one feature in this genre that's worthy of praise. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 12 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 21

Oh well. I've always found this indietronica album overrated, but I have to admit that listening to some of its details with a greater focus today has mellowed my initial harsh assessment. The first three tracks, "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight", "Such Great Heights", "Sleeping In", are actually pretty cool. The next three cuts are admittedly underwhelming (it's where Ben Gibbard's sickly-sweet and gentle vocals display their potential flaws), but everything after -- starting with "We Will Become Silhouettes" -- returns to nicely-done tones and moods. The last two tracks involve some jungle / drum'n'bass rhythms that already sounded quite dated in 2003, but from today's vantage point, this doesn't matter at all -- fads come and go, but they shouldn't be that relevant decades after the fact: when the music's good, it's good. So Ben Gibbard (from Death Cab For Cutie) and Jimmy Tamborello probably deserved their huge, long-standing indie success here. Of course, there is something to be said about the clean-sounding noughts aesthetics (generally streamlined to a fault) at the heart of the album's mostly homemade production values. But maybe the record sounding of its day and age brings it some charm today? Can't bring myself to immediately select both *Give Up* and Death Cab For Cutie's *Transatlanticism* for my own dangerously ever-expanding, potential 1001 albums list. I will have to make a choice at some point. But I'm still leaving the door open to both. At least as of now. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 13 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 21

Spanish prog rock / hard rock with poetic spoken-word sections and logical latin influences. Sometimes moving and well-crafted, other times awkward or hackneyed. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 13 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 22 (including this one)

After *Poseía Basíca* yesterday, and also that Debbie Gibson album not so long ago, it looks like the generator wants to show me the worst album covers of all time these days. I've said it before: it's probably a good thing that bad taste is not a criminal offense. But you sometimes wish it is. So Hellyeah is a supergroup featuring members of Pantera, Mudvayne, Damageplan, and Nothingface. Given how much I generally despise Pantera and that kind of redneck metal scene, I kind of expected to hate this, but it turns out I don't. To be honest, I often found this record ten times catchier, sharper and more efficient that anything Pantera ever put out. Who would have seen that coming? I have probably already pissed off Pantera fans writing all this up there, and I would lie if I said that the thought doesn't amuse me. :) That band was a phenomenon I could never understand. When you pretend to play "groove metal", you should at least convey some sense of said groove in your songs, instead of those awkwardly syncopated rhythm patterns. For me, Hellyeah does execute that mission a hell of a lot better than Pantera, to the point where it feels strange to think that they once shared the same drummer (if I'm not mistaken). This here is not enough to make me consider including this project in my own list of 1001 keepers, but I've had to go through far worse metal / hard rock albums in the original list, you know. Of course, the lyrics are often ridiculous, and the *whole* of "Alcohaulin Ass" is just dumb pop-metal shit. But I also admit that it's *tongue-in-cheek* dumb shit, and that this cut is perfectly placed in the tracklist, actually serving the first side's dynamics right somehow. As for the rest of the album, it does its job more than competently. If the choruses are sometimes memorable for wrong reasons, you can't deny that they ARE memorable. Plus, there's a right balance of melodicism and aggression in those songs, and the vast array of sub genres here explored -- going from nü-metal and metal ballads to Ministry-adjacent scorchers or Tool-inspired forays -- make for a somewhat pleasant listen. Those influences point to how derivative the whole thing is, but apart from that, I can easily picture why a metal fan would love this album. You know how the saying goes: don't judge a book by its cover. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 13 Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 23 (including this one)

The history of modern music is made out of cycles and, under that light, I can forgive Savages for being near-perfect clones of the legendary Siouxsie And The Banshees. You can also perceive the influence of Joy Division, Magazine and Patti Smith, very obviously, and I feel like all those references were sometimes preventing the band from acquiring a voice of their own when they released this debut. That said, this thing's done with so much conviction and competency that I can still consider it as an admirable endeavor. Apart from the inert "Waiting for a Sign" and the moody ambient and noisey interlude "Dead Nature", each one of the songs from this debut album has unmistakable drive and allure. And the performance is always intense no matter what. Savages' irruption in the post-punk music scene was also timely -- Jehnny Beth's distinctively feminine perspective was attuned to concerns that were about to be discussed on a larger scale in the decade to come. Sometimes an album tells you about the time it was released as well as -- or even better than -- news headlines. And even if you only take the music into consideration, this record is certainly one of the earliest examples of that British "crank wave" about to shake the late 2010s. Some cycles are important because they also serve as correctives. Rock music at large needed rougher sounds and more confrontational stances and postures after years of those tamer noughts aesthetics... Currently listening to Savages' sophomore album *Adore Life* (that I'm more familiar with -- and wasn't it in the original list, by the way?). I can't help comparing it to *Silence Yourself* now, and it's difficult to decide which one is the better album. *Adore Life* is a bit more streamlined, and feels slightly less rough and edgy -- cleanliness is very rarely an asset in that genre, remember? And that second album is also possibly less anthemic compared to its predecessor. That being said, it also feels less derivative, and displays more distinctively personal features. And its slower centerpiece "Adore" (an extraordinary cut) succeeds in the exact turf where "Waiting for a Sign" failed. I don't know... Sometimes one perfect anthem can equal three or four excellent ones, so it's really hard for me to single out my favorite between their two full-length releases... But maybe it's pointless to decide which LP is the best in the first place. There sure are better ways to "adore life", right? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* include in mine later on: 14 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't include in mine: 23

From Ty Segall's gargantuan discography, I find *Melted* (2010) and *Sleeper* (2013) quite enjoyable, I *really* like *Manipulator* (2014) and *Ty Segall* (2017), and I absolutely LOVE the tight and driven *Twins* (2012), along with sprawling double-album *Freedom's Goblin* (2018). That latter release has so many endearing "hits", by the way. And it also concludes on an extraordinary rendition of "Sleeper" (known as "And, Goodnight" there). It's an 'electric' version -- in all the senses of the word -- of a folksy song found in the album bearing the same name, and for me it perfectly encapsulates everything that's memorable in Segall's retro artistry. Compared to all that, *Emotional Mugger* feels like a very fine album displaying the goofier and more playful sides of the garage rock artist (also present in *Freedom's Goblin*). But unfortunately, it harbours very few of the bangers and highlights that make all those other LPs better entry points in my book. I'm happy to see Ty Segall's name pop up today, and it gave me the opportunity to revisit this full-length release, that I had kind of forgotten. But my initial assessment of it has not changed at all. It's a pretty cool record. But it's nothing revolutionary. My main point of contention with *Emotional Mugger* is this: the whimsical features of the songs are great, but once they're displayed -- usually from the very first seconds -- the compositions don't often surprise or go to other places. They just happen, conveying an unmistakable impression of self-indulgence at times (which is often found in Ty's lesser records). Segall is one of those artists who has a relentless work ethic, and is never happier than when he makes new music again, seemingly not caring a lot about its reception. In that category, see also Osees, King Gizzard, Melvins or Swans. But with such a knack for productivity, overall quality can be impacted at times. And clearly, this is what occured here. There are notable exceptions within "Emotional Mugger", fortunately, and those exceptions still allow me to place this record in my "high-rated albums". First there's the lively opener "Squealer", whose rhythmical hairpin curves never ruin its melodic appeal. And even more crucially, there's the insanely catchy "Candy Sam", probably among the ten best Ty Segall songs by my count. Finally, moody closer "The Magazine", with its ominous synth bass and its handclaps, is also worth a detour here. Yet essential album fodder, *Emotional Mugger* is not. I heartily thank the user who included Ty Segall in this list, but I also want to ask them a thousand questions so as to understand why *this album* and not one from the bunch I have mentioned at the top of this review. Guess it's probably a good thing I'm not part of the reddit group dedicated to this generator to discuss those things with other users. Because I would spend hours and hours on it lol. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 14 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 24 (including this one -- choosing at least two of the other Ty Segall albums mentioned up there instead).

Oh well. Guess I have already expressed my overall loathing of Rush and Marillion's strand of prog rock on this app, so I don't need to repeat myself. And as a matter of fact, it would be sort of unfair to do so, given that this particular record isn't as horrible as the other Marillion LPs I have had the misfortune to listen to -- even if *Afraid Of Sunlight* remains awkward and/or heavy-handed to a degree. On a side note, how is it that Marillion fans always favor the most bland, nondescript pop ballads from this band? The most played song from this album on Spotify is "Beautiful", and it's quite a borefest on a musical standpoint, especially coming from a so-called "prog" band. And don't get me started on the song's lyrics, painfully laboring the most obvious point on "beauty" and consumerism. 🙄 Now to end on a somewhat positive note, the first two tracks of this album ("Gazpacho" and the fun Beach Boys pastiche "Cannibal Surf Babe"), along with grungier closer "King" -- also returning to the vernacular used in the opener -- are pretty good compositions. What's in between is a little inert at times, but I guess that 90s Marillion aping the artistic apex of Talk Talk is less obnoxious than 80s Marillion aping Peter-Gabriel-era Genesis. How is it that this band was always a decade behind, though? Maybe I could have pushed my grade to a 2.5/5 one (automatically rounded up to 3). But then I looked at the summary of the user who suggested this album... Hip Hop and punk are only found in his lowest-rated albums. There are very, *very* few indie rock LPs in his highest-rated ones compared to the expected essential classic rock household names. Oh, and the only lowest-rated album in that person's users list is the Godspeed You! Black Emperor debut. Like, whaaaat? Looks like some records displaying a true flame or a true "spirit" only manage to grate this user. I know it's probably a generational thing, but after listening to a new album each day for three years, I would expect someone way into their 50s, 60s or even their 70s to open their shakras a little. So why would I open mine? Under that light, I can't bring myself to add this half-point I've talked about earlier. So much for trying to end on a "positive note", I guess. 🤷 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 14 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 24 (including this one)

Being French, I obviously know "Lady Marmalade". You just need to hear it once, and then you are bound to remember the blunt offer in the song's chorus. Which makes the following tidbit taken from the hit single's Wikipedia page all the more hilarious: 'The song is best known for the French lyric "Voulez-vous coucher avec moi ce soir?" ("Do you want to sleep with me tonight?") in the refrain. "Lady Marmalade" is about a man's sexual encounter with the titular prostitute, but Patti LaBelle later claimed that she was completely oblivious to its overall message, saying: "I didn't know what it was about. I don't know French and nobody, I swear this is God's truth, nobody at all told me what I'd just sung a song about." ' Sounds mind-boggling (and even dubious) that the singer would never have the idea to ask or check by herself what the foreign words she had been tasked to sing actually meant. Ah, girl groups in the seventies... Don't know if you can call that era more naive or more perverse, but thanks to it, we have a lively proto-disco anthem for the ages at least! Member of the vocal group Nona Hendrix wrote half of the songs on *Nightbirds*, the rest (most often in the vein of the album's more famous single) being indeed suggestions or compositions by producer Allen Toussaint. I have to say that on a first listen, Hendrix's songs on the second side (plus Toussaint's own "All Girls Band") feel moodier and more personal than the ones on the first side (which yet still harbors other tunes penned by Hendrix). That second side also lets go of funk shenanigans to an extent, and instead explores a soul music turf that matches what a vocal group's repertoire would be during the sixties (therefore hearkening back to LaBelle's origins as a girl group in the previous decade). "You Turn Me On" is a terrific soul ballad, for instance. Formulaic to an extent for sure, but what a killer chorus! And the heartfelt vocal performance sure transcends the unavoidable formatting at play here. Giving a second spin to the record also reveals some of the details that went over my head the first time around -- either on the first side or in the second one: that obsessive two-note pattern played by Toussaint on the keyboard for "Somebody Somewhere" ; or that insanely groovy bassline on "Are You Lonely" (both songs are Hendrix compositions, by the way). The cuts that follow harbor less surprises, admittedly -- at least up to the slower and yet more airy title-track, whose wind arrangement I find quite sweet. I'm in two minds about including this one in my own list. Sure, with a legendary calling card such as "Lady Marmalade", it feels weird that the whole LP didn't join the other examples of famous soul-funk endeavors in the original list. Plus, that thing was ahead of its time with its *proto*-disco flourishes. Then again, and as good as the album really is overall, there's nothing after that hit single opening the proceedings that can match its iconic features. And it is my understanding that in a finite list of essential albums to select, most of the deep cuts need to be as striking or endearing as the more famous tunes in them. So we'll see... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 15 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 24

A ambient take on decay and entropy that's adjacent and yet also topically different from the ones of William Basinski, of "Disintegration Loops" fame. It's awesome that projects like this can see the light of day -- if I can use such a phrase for something so dark as an album inspired by Alzheimer's disease. On that note, the 6 album series "Everywhere at the End of Time" -- also using "plunderphonics" jazzy loops at first, then gradually turning into something far more sinister -- sounds like the longer, more ambitious and more harrowing, *hardcore" version of this particular record (broken down into the six stages of the disease for this later mammoth release). Browsing through it, you really get the feeling that it's a daunting task to sit through the whole project from start to end. Yet it might also be a task that conveys some incredibly eerie or even transcendantal moments. I have already haphazardly found some of those moments in parts of the project, actually, but it felt a little like cheating to use chance to hear them. Anyway... Much like *An Empty Bliss Beyond This World*, what we have here is a meditation of the frailty of human existence for sure, and I hope I can find the time to listen to it all one day. Of course, my last sentence also implies that the journey is here as intellectual as it is sensorial. Which raises the following question: are we really dealing with "music albums" here? Or are we dealing with full-blown contemporary art that happens to use music as a medium? Guess the jury's still out on this one. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 24

Norwegian band mixing garage pop tones à la The Hives with balkan rock, sprinkled with some Tom Waits-adjacent more atonal shenanigans once in a while (without his gruffy voice, unfortunately). It's an overall style that makes wonders for festival bills when you're an excellent musician, and Kaizers Orchestra sure are excellent musicians and performers, from what I can tell. Wikipedia tells me that *Maestro* is a concept album about a mental institution with a subplot dealing with the mafia (which seems to appear in most of their LPs). Don't need to speak Norwegian to understand that the narrative conceit takes over pure musicality in the album's second half, somewhat lacking in momentum at times. But the first side is a nicely executed string of lively tunes and quite memorable moments. Can't also help feeling that as good as this album is overall, it was also a little opportunistic if you replace it in the context of its release. Case in point, "Blitzregn Baby" rips off The White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army" during its final bridge (and it's not even officially credited!). Maybe this partially "derivative" nature also explains why the last half of the album, filled with more predictable compositions and arrangements, fails to truly impress. That being said, it would be unfair to deny the quality of this record, whose meticulous production values also help make it successful on an artistic viewpoint. If a list of 1001 pop-rock albums NOT sung in English existed, you could easily mention it there, I guess. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 25 (including this one)

Music appreciation can't exist in a vacuum. The reason this semi-bootleg live album is held in such high regard is because it was originally released at the start of the punk explosion -- allowing a new audience to discover how pivotal, seminal and groundbreaking The Stooges' music had been for that whole punk scene a few years earlier. It's mind-boggling just to think that this record sold more than the band's original studio albums at the time. Yet every Stooges fan worth their salt (including the person who suggested this album in the list?) knows this recording just can't beat said original LPs. Of course, Iggy Pop being who he is, listening to a historical document about his live antics is always nice, even with the expected poor sound quality -- not so horrible for a live recording of that era, at least for the first of the two shows documented here, but still pretty thin-sounding here. You can easily sense that the power of the performance guitars-wise is not fully transcribed here. But as some sort of moody or hazy music playing in the background in your home, the first side is still quite enjoyable, because it harbours two iconic *Raw Power* cuts (the raucous title track and the always extraordinary "Gimme Danger", reeking with lust and motor oil fragrances), plus the pretty cool jam "Head On", never included in any Stooges' studio albums, very sadly (better live or rehearsal versions of the song exist out there, though, but this one is still good). So all in all, that first half is worth the price of admission, at least The second side, documenting another gig which was the disastrous last show performed by the band before separating for decades to come, is obviously a far less satisfying affair on a purely musical level (see the Wikipedia page and the other reviews about that terrible gig). "Rich Bitch" is just a self-indulgent jam sprinkled with provocative lyrics (probably invented on the spot?). It's just hilarious hearing Iggy trying to rein in the slightly out-of-pace band in that song... As for "Cock In My Pocket", its lyrics are even more provocative, but the music is also quite derivative and unexceptional. And then, concluding the proceedings, you have rock standard "Louie Louie" (which Iggy would later record in the studio, during the nineties, for a memorable version included in his solo album *American Caesar*). Meanwhile, bikers in the audience are throwing bottles, eggs and other stuff at the band, and voilà, a legendary performance -- which would be cherished a couple of years later by all the new punks -- was born. Pretty sure those historical footnotes are not enough to make me include that live album for a list such as this one, though. For the die-hard fans only. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 26 (including this one)

Nineties American indie band, who have since managed to create a cult following for their -- at the time -- very lo-fi strand of indie-rock, also sprinkled with math-rock dirges. Too bad said maths are more akin to middle school equations on this debut, and not the sort of algebra those now accomplished musicians would delve into later (they're obviously far better performers today -- you just need to compare their recent outings to how out of pace the players are on closer "Duped" to *objectively* realize it!). Polvo have shown dedication to their art for more than three decades now, and that sort of thing is always commendable. Yet I still question their unnecessary convoluted artistry at times, to be honest -- and more specifically, the execution of said artistry in the first stages of their career To go into details as far as *Cor-Crane Secret* is concerned: Sonic Youth have been pinpointed as a key influence on this noisy debut, and you indeed have commonalities. But for me, we're actually closer to Sebadoh's partly self-indulgent waters here -- more Jason Loewenstein's scruffy turf than Lou Barlow's driven and moving songwriting, I have to point out, with that thing even dangerously verging close to Eric Gaffney WTF? territory. Even in the most saturated lo-fi/DIY indie-rock out there, you need some pop influences displayed at the right moment to seal the whole deal. Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr and even Sebadoh had those elements in spades within their iconic records. Not so sure Polvo has ever been interested in all that. Good for them if they can have fun in a different fashion, I guess. Just wondering if that choice doesn't give people like me -- definitely part of the target audience -- a reason to be a little picky... Not that this particular record deserves to be fully panned because of those shortcomings. Apart from the very good singles "Vibracobra" and "Can I Ride", highlights such as "Sense Of It" and "Channel Changer" manage to offer their share of catchy, dynamic riffs to propel the more off-kilter elements in the compositions. There's the right balance of gnarly aesthetics and teenage freshness in all those good songs. Wish that balance had been maintained in the album's last leg, however. The four last songs were a drag for me. The constant change of rhythms, some of the inert bridges, those cool guitars riffs in the songs' introductions being nothing but red herrings, the lack of real groove that could have sold the whole bizarre shebang -- which could maybe have been performed with more time in the studio... It all sounds a little gratuitous. Guess that Polvo didn't have the means to spend thousands and thousands of dollars for this debut. But the impression left here still screams the phrase "on a budget". You can still create terrific DIY albums "on a budget", you know. Looks like Polvo didn't have the magic formula or "Cor-Crane Secret" in them to pull that off. Harsh take, I know... But I can't help being blunt and honest here. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 11 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 27 (including this one)

Now we're talking. A quite extraordinary debut, which will surely be remembered as a "classic" of that late 2010s / early 2020s "crank wave" era, which helped revitalizing that late seventies / early eighties post-punk sound. Grian Chatten's vocal timbre and performance are the most frequent contentious points addressed by people who don't like this band, and if I can understand where that criticism comes from on a purely "technical" level, I just can't "get" it on an emotional one. Grian's voice, his peculiar sprechgesang diction, and his deep Irish accent are the elements that make Fontaines D.C. so distinctive and memorable on first listens. The most blatant evidence of this is that the band has evolved into a quite different rock act today, and yet they still remain themselves. And a lot of it is owing to Grian. I love many things about this album. First it's tied to a specific place, Dublin (the "D" in "D.C."), with songs exploring how its working class population lives or survives there, or how the city is being gentrified in other parts, forcing said working classes out and threatening the city's very soul. Much has been said about the Irish literary references influencing the band here (James Joyce's name being mentioned at some point, of course -- literary references the Fontaines have since somewhat distanced themselves from, admittedly). But even if the story was also used for promotional blurbs, those particular undertones do fit with the music styles being explored within this debut -- drawing from Irish pub rock almost as much as it draws from indie-rock or post-punk. You just can't fake that sort of authenticity or sensibility. The Irish band does a lot with very few things -- some simple and catchy melodic lines on echoey guitars, some very driven moments with a "live" feel, some witty catchphrases here and there (I always fall for "There is no connection available" in "Hurricane Laughter", lol)-- and this sense of economy is probably what makes the result sound so heartfelt and spontaneous, with the help of Dan Carey's simple-yet-deep-and-effective production values. Less is more, here, most definitely. I also love how the record builds up towards the best songs found on its second side. My most beloved albums often work like that, and those are specific dynamics that work so well in an album format. Not that the songs on the first side are not already iconic or excellent themselves. Short and raucous "Big" is a thrilling opener for instance, perfectly summarizing the album's overall themes and intent in less than two minutes. "My childhood was small / But I'm gonna be big" is just a memorable mini-chorus, c'mon! "Sha Sha Sha" is a tongue-in-cheek rendition of what an *Irish* surf-rock tune should feel like. "Too Real" and "Hurricane Laughter", just like "Chequeless Reckless" on the second side, are wild and driven cuts whose obsessive linearity pushes the music into motorik turf as much as into surf-rock. "Television Screens" is conversely a melodic indie-rock gem whose clear-eyed pop songwriting has always been underestimated by most (including by the bands themselves, given that they didn't often play it live). Grian suddenly *singing* here after three sprechgesang cuts always gets me. And the transition between the two sides delves into slower, moodier, more melancholic cuts "Roy's Tune" and "The Lotts" -- simple songs, once again, but so moving and evocative -- especially the latter Joy Division/The Cure-adjacent cut . But the real highlights and the most endearing moments are to be found at the very end of the LP: They're "Liberty Belle" and "Boys In The Better Land", whose infectious choruses and witty one-liners give such a timeless feel to the lively compositions, as if those perfect songs had always been around. It's as if legendary acts from the past going from The Velvet Underground to The Clash or The Fall were whispering to the Fontaines' ears here. "Is it easyyyyy? / Just to try it? / Is it the same old liiiiiii-iiiiiii-iiiiiie?". Or "If you're a rock star, pornstar, Superstar -- doesn't matter what you are -- get yourself a good car and get out of here!". So good. After that, waltzy "Dublin City Sky" feels like an elegant homage to local heroes The Pogues, almost a rip-off actually, but that closer is just pitch-perfect given everything that has happened before. This, kiddies, is how you write a debut for the ages. Just like that other reviewer, I saw Fontaines DC on the "Joy As An Act of Resistance" tour with Idles. Idles were indeed at the height of their power, and Fontaines were on the rise -- still a little stage-shy compared to the second time I saw them live, but those unobtrusive manners actually brought a tremendous charm to their performance. And I also remember twenty minutes of pure noise jam madness when the two bands played together at the end of their set. A lovely memory for sure. You may think all this has influenced my grading a little. Maybe it did, I don't know. Yet I wouldn't grade each and any one of the band's four albums this high. And even if I had not seen them live (or interviewed their drummer -- a story I won't delve into here), you can bet your Pogues boots this album would still receive full marks from me. This here is an LP that is undoubtedly pivotal for a whole genre and scene. As the original list is reputedly out of touch with current "rock" trends starting with the 2010s (not to mention other genres), the karma balance does need to be set right again, doesn't it? Now who wants to add one of the first two Idles albums to this users list so as to tip it further in the right direction? Please? 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 12 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 27

It's all very quaint, isn't it? Some nice "stories" once in a while, like the title track, "The Painter" or "The Tower". And I just love how the album goes from the kinky, tongue-in-cheek, roaring twenties yarn "Patricia The Stripper" to the synth-enhanced Christmas song "A Spaceman Came Traveling" -- it's quite a vast scope, lyrically speaking, ha ha. And also musically, I readily admit it. The story in closer "Just Another Poor Boy" doesn't quite work for instance, but that song is a gem harmonically speaking -- the two different key changes between the verses and the memorable chorus do wonders. And speaking of memorable choruses, "I'm Going Home" is a very nice cut as well. Unfortunately the rest of the songs -- around half of the album, going from lachrymose ballads to a few more kitschy novelty pieces -- is instantly forgettable. Plus, as a vocalist, Chris De Burgh often goes to an overkill mode that's quite laughable -- fitting to the tunes' lyrical contents, admittedly, but still a little grating to listen to at times. Also browsed through the man's eighties output, by the way: terrible, terrible pop drivel. But this shouldn't bear upon my assessment of this particular seventies LP, of course. What did give *Spanish Train And Other Stories* a bonus half-point however, is the fact that its original version was banned in South Africa at the time of its release, because of the supposedly blasphemous contents of its title-track. You have to give it to fascist morons: they can turn a somewhat inoffensive pop rock album with Christian undertones into the most subversive piece of art. Good for Chris De Burgh's legacy, I guess. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 12 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 28 (including this one).

French Canadian seventies airy prog rock. Oh well... I was already aware of who Harmonium were through an older colleague of my partner, who is a fan of the LP released before this double-album. Yet it looks like we have a quite different animal here, as the ambitions displayed in this particular release go way further than before on *L'Heptade* -- I should probably ask that fan if she has ever listened to *L'Heptade* (Harmonium is definitely more obscure in France, where I live, compared to Québec). The question is: did those newfound ambitions lead that seventies Canadian act to release a record absolutely worthy of the international household names in the genre? To be honest, my internal jury is still out on this one. First proper song "Comme un fou" is not bad by all means. I also loved the Debussy-indebted orchestral interludes, but I think they kind of stick out like sore thumbs, here interspersed within the band's mix of French chanson and prog shenanigans. You can easily sense those interludes were penned by a different composer. And only in the last couple of "symphonic" songs do the orchestral flourishes actually mesh well with the prog agenda. But more on that later... I'm also in two minds about Serge Fiori's lead vocal duties on this album. On the one hand, you can sense that something very personal is expressed through the singer's performance, and I like the fact that the production doesn't always puts his voice to the forefront -- French-speaking mixers working in the overall "rock" and "chanson" genres often follow some stupid "radio-friendly" requirements enhancing lead vocals for no good reason (the supposed primacy of lyrical contents compared to to the music probably explains that tendency). I'm glad such trend can't be found here at least. On the other hand, and even if they are mixed properly, Fiori's vocals often go from extremely maudlin to unnecessarily quaint or sickly-sweet, with over-affected mannerisms that are a little grating in the long run. Add the fact that lyrics within this concept album are (willingly) naive, wearing their heart on their sleeve, and it's difficult not to feel a little derisive about the results at times. Another point of contention is about the music proper. Once in a while, the novelty / "variétés française " elements sound a little formulaic and heavy-handed. And so do the hackneyed bluesy flavors of "Chanson Noire". Worse, some *extremely* drawn-out and meandering compositions don't warrant their sheer length (looking at you, "Le premier ciel" and "L'exil"), and this even in the context of prog rock. Take away the quite inert moments usually found in the first halves of those cuts, maybe those songs would work better. But as they stand now, they almost feel like filler tracks. Fortunately, the destination's worth the long journey. "Les premières lumières" et "Lumières de vie" see Harmonium offer some trippy, inspired instrumental moments that are close to cinematic, with or without a grand orchestra to back them (it's worth noting that it's when those moments are purely instrumental that they work best for me). And finally, "Comme un sage" is an extraordinary pop-prog song. Its length is perfectly justified here, helped along with a stellar, memorable climactic chorus where female backing vocals (a reviewer thought of Motown singers, interestingly) and the orchestral arrangements simply do wonders. Here I can compliment Fiori's vocal performance at last, which I didn't expect at first given how said performance didn't sit well with me during the rest of the album. Nice that such a long album ended on a high note. At least for me. All in all, I can understand why a French Canadian citizen could fall in love with this record. As a whole album, it's definitely not for me, for the reasons stated above. But I'm happy it gave me the opportunity to listen to "Comme un sage", which was worth the price of admission for sure. Who knows? If my partner asks me for a gift suggestion for her colleague's birthday, maybe I'll suggest a copy of this album. And this just because someone thought of it for this list, somewhere across the Atlantic Ocean... 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 12 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 29 (including this one). EDIT DU FUTUR/MESSAGE PERSONNEL: Toi qui vient de la belle province et qui a mis cet album dans la "User List", on pourrait essayer de correspondre à travers ce site, non ? Je sais, il n'est pourtant pas fait pour ça, mais ça pourrait être amusant de s'en servir autrement. "Like" cette review dès que tu l'as lue, et je saurais que tu as reçu le message. J'ai enregistré ton numéro d'utilisateur, il me suffira de descendre jusqu'en bas de ta page de "ratings" et de voir ta réponse dans ta dernière review (tu en es actuellement à The Zutons -- c'était il y a deux ou trois jours, d'ailleurs, et j'espère que tout va bien pour toi, vu que tu a l'air de laisser un rating tous les jours habituellement). Et pour voir mes propres réponses, fais de même sur ma propre page, en allant tout en bas des ratings partie "users list" : https://1001albumsgenerator.com/shares/61d7478d46b550187c92f00c Pour lancer la conversation : c'est quoi ton nom, et c'est quoi ton album préféré dans la liste originale du bouquin des 1001 albums (que tu n'as pas encore terminée) ? Mets-le à la fin de ta dernière review, après un truc du style EDIT DU FUTUR ou MESSAGE PERSONNEL POUR CYRIL. Bien entendu, si tu te sens pas d'essayer, je suis absolument pas vexé. C'est comme tu veux, cousin. 🙂 Bonjour de France, dans tous les cas !

British impressionistic neo-soul / R'n'B, with rather experimental instrumentation displaying a vast array of styles and a lot of minimalistic piano-driven flourishes. Probably a little overrated by professional critics. "Jittery with anxiety and indecision, yet poised and luscious" goes the Guardian's Alexis Petridis. Translate this as: "Decent compositions, unfortunately lacking memorable hooks and melodies, even if the tracks are well-performed and tastefully produced". As far as I know, the catchiest tune Sampha has ever written is the chorus for Kendrick Lamar's "Father Time", from *Mr. Morale And The Big Steppers (a quite *under*rated album this time around). And sadly, this chorus can't be found in *Lahai*. On a side note, the very short reviews left by the user who suggested this record were, more often than not, extremely grating and pointless. I count at least three French users on this generator who routinely wrote supposedly funny (and ultimately annoying) reviews like that. Kind of threw a shade on other French reviewers like myself, to be honest. Funnily, those reviews are as absurd as the tiny French-spoken interlude "Time Piece" in Sampha's LP. Yeah, you indeed wish you could go back in time and warn those users not to use the generator like that. I'm joking, of course. Or maybe I'm just in a sourpuss mood this morning, and listening to Sampha can't help, unfortunately. To be clear, my own prose has flaws as well: it is usually long-winded and admittedly takes itself a little too seriously. But hey, guys, at least I'm *trying* to formulate cohesive opinions here. College humour often ages poorly. In comparison, I find that (positive) review in the users' section where the reviewer's autocorrect turned Sampha's name into "Sampras" ten times more amusing than the arcane jokes penned by those other French reviewers. I'm now picturing a tennis game as an illustration to the songs in *Lahai*. Doesn't make the music any better, but at least it makes listening to it more interesting. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 12 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 30 (including this one).

I have not listened to a lot of dub albums in my life (I mostly own a couple of compilations dabbling in that genre, aside from *Super Ape*). Yet I can confidently say that this Lee "Scratch" Perry And The Upsetters LP is my favorite one in that reggae substyle. Actually, I find it way more imaginative -- and, yes, way more *melodic* -- than the King Tubby album selected by someone else in this users' list. Odd to read that it's the opposite for some other users here. What makes someone fully enjoy a piece of music is so mysterious sometimes... The first two cuts, "Zion's Blood" and "Croaking Lizard" are very memorable and I also absolutely love "Dread Lion" and "Three in One" at the start of side two, thanks to all their trippy details. The title track closing the original album is great as well. That weird obsessive flute gets stuck in your head just like ganja smell gets stuck in your fingers after smoking hemp. Everything in between the titles mentioned up there might be a little secondary, but I guess a good dub album is about *moods* first and foremost, and not necessarily a vehicle for a string of absolute bangers that goes from track one to ten. And under the right (smoky) circumstances, I'm pretty sure those other cuts can reveal their wonders. So potential fillers get a pass here, which won't happen so easily in other music genres, lol. I'm not too fond of the three bonus tracks added in more recent editions of the album, however (bonus tracks displayed in that Spotify link, by the way). Those extra cuts sound less imaginative to my ears, and it feels like they were recorded for a different session / project. Were they? Too lazy to check today. But anyway, the original album is great, and each time I listen to it, the more I can find endearing details in those tracks. So for me, it's a no-brainer: *Super Ape* must go and rip off trees from the ground of my top-tier list. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 16 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 30

Tom waits to front the Fun Lovin' Criminals, and the world passed by without noticing much. That's too bad because the first half of this LP is absolutely terrific, with all sorts of intoxicating arrangements the rather formulaic Fun Lovin' Criminals would have never thought of. That lead singer doesn't exactly nail what makes the Tom Waits persona so compelling, but this doesn't matter much given how unhinged and instantly memorable his lyrics and performance are anyway. Wish there were songs such as "Rob The Prez-O-Dent" these days to lambast the current orange gas balloon in the White House, or ones such as "Wintergreen" to say "OK Boomer" to all sorts of old farts. And the rest of the songs on that first half, mostly dealing with the throes of addiction for impoverished populations, manage to make that theme sound simultaneously cool and serious. Too bad that the second half of this LP is such a letdown after that, musically speaking at least. I can still appreciate the lyrical intent of a topical cut such as "Reagan's Kids", but honestly the compositions don't do it for me. "Mexico" also aims at offering a bouncier and more streamlined earworm in the middle of that second side, but said earworm fails short of making a lasting impression, unfortunately. Browsing through later That Handsome Devil albums, it looks like the band stayed on that rather inconsequential lane overall. That said, the touching accordion-enhanced ballad "Treefood" closing their debut redeemed its second half at the eleventh hour. If only there had been more proper songs like that in the LP's last leg instead of fillers... That last cut still manages to place *A City Dressed In Dynamite* in my "high rated albums" but that was a close call folks! And I'm afraid that won't be enough to keep this record in my own potential list of 1001 favorites. Handsome or not, the devil always lie in the details. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 17 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 30

Once again, a suggestion from someone who has barely started the project of giving a spin to the 1001 albums in the original list, which sounds a bit premature to me. And obviously, what I will be saying about *Ungodly Hours* must also be taken with a huge grain of salt given that I'm definitely out of its target demographics. Then again, I'm also way out of *Brat*'s target demographics, and yet I loved it. Make of that what you will... So let's get on with it. *Ungodly Hour* was mostly written and produced by Chloe and Halle themselves (thumbs up), its instrumentation, arrangements and vocal performances are lush-sounding (thumbs up), but the styles the record explores -- between nostalgic early noughts R'n'B and a couple of more recent trap-adjacent flourishes -- point to a very calculated compromise devoid of real stakes on an artistic viewpoint (thumbs down). At least for me. Also, where are the memorable earworms and bangers in this thing? "Baby Girl" and "Do It", strategically placed in the second and third postions, are not unpleasant to listen to, but it's not as if those tracks actually *slapped*. And the rest just tags along in a rather complacent fashion. "Lonely" has a rather pretty chorus, but that's it. And even if you consider this record as inheriting from the turn-of-the-millenium neo-soul wave (a wave I was never able to fully understand, admittedly), the songs proper rarely demonstrate any genuine soulful introspective yearning for me -- except "Overwhelmed", but that's more an interlude than anything else, followed by "Don't Make It Harder On Me" and "Wonder What She Thinks Of Me". By that point, way into the album's second side, it's too little and too late. And when closer "ROYL" cynically and opportunistically returns to trap rhythms, implying "Hey", we also listen to current trends, you know!", there's like a sour aftertaste in your mouth. Girls, when the time comes to revisit those trap sounds and assess their artistic merits in a decade or two, do you really think people will go to that sort of flat song first??? Think again. You need at least a little sense of danger or bombastic swagger when you dabble into that turf. Ask Cardi B, for chrissake. 🙃 Mall music that's richly produced and yet empty-sounding. I can't find any gentler words to summarize my take here. But hey, this album is still probably ten times better than the Christina Aguilera LPs found in the original list! Not sure it will age better, but at least I can end my rant on a somewhat *positive* note here. Now, excuse me, Chloe x Halle's music just reminded me I had to go shopping today. See you tomorrow for the next album. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 17 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 32 (including this one)

Oh well. Some kind of watered down or neutered version of Tool. Or like, a mix of Pearl Jam and prog dirges, with nü-metal artificial flavors sprinkled here and there, topped by meandering melodic vocal lines that almost feel like they're taking a page out of Muse's book in their all-too-clean delivery. Let's just say that your appreciation of *Sound Awake* will strongly depend on your mileage on the rather controversial bands and music styles I've just quoted here. But as far as I'm concerned, I tend to prefer prog-metal that feels a little more intense, abrasive and dangerous (think Mastodon or even Gojira). The production values sure are impressive and on point given the music genre. And the musicianship is beyond reproach. I just wish Karnivool didn't use so many major chords and harmonies as the basis of their songs. In several salient moments during the course of this record, they remember they should break that sort of borderline-cheesy harmonic grid and explore more off-kilter chord progressions. But honestly, it often feels like a very calculated afterthought. Like, nothing that occurs before gives you the feeling those more original chords will be used at some point. Good compositional work implies more than lining up parts that don't necessarily go with each other. And given that the pop songwriting isn't that memorable either, we're not left with much, eventually, in spite of some of the songs' lengths. One tiny detail in opener "Simple Boy" perfectly encapsulates why I can't fully take this album seriously, by the way. It's the way this opener rips off Led Zeppelin's drum part in "When The Levee Breaks" in the middle of the song. I can quite picture the band members telling each other they need something specific for the middle of the composition and the drummer looking suddenly struck by lightning: "Hey guys, I have an idea, we just need to steal that drum part from that other band! They're a bit niche, don't worry, no one will notice the theft". Lol. I know that Led Zep were huge thieves themselves, but c'mon guys! The seams are so visible here! Also, what kind of a name is 'Karnivool'??? Like Carnival and Cool. With a "K" because of... Korn??? Even the band's name sounds like unnecessary patchwork. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 17 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 33 (including this one)

Meat-and-potatoes seventies hard rock boogie, mixing the somewhat tasty ("Big Fat Mama", "Oh Baby") and the rather bland ("Paper Planes", "Don't Waste My Time" -- indeed, don't! -- or that hackneyed cover of the already heavyhanded Doors number "Roadhouse Blues"). Served with a side dish of lighter vegetables, some of them seasoned and well-cooked (the "While My Guitar Gently Sleeps"-adjacent ballad "A Year", sprinkled with very subtle synthetic keyboards flavors here and there), even if some of the other slower cuts are comparatively undercooked, quite unfortunately. The meal does what it intends to do, just like all the other Status Quo seventies albums, apparently. So why select this particular joint out of all the others? Who the f*ck knows? But I can't complain, I'm not hungry anymore, and I had quite a pleasant time overall. Just know that I left a generous tip on my way out (see my grading below). 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) PS: Like most kids growing up during the eighties, I knew who Status Quo were through their later hit singles "Whatever You Want" and "In The Army Now". I remember loving In "The Army Now"'s simple melody at the time, and it also talked to my distaste of war and all things military -- there was still compulsory "service militaire" in France at the time, and I didn't want to waste one year of my life for a service whose true usefulness seemed dubious to me. So yeah, what the song was about made sense to me. Of course, those sorts of "hair metal" hit singles were very cheesy -- all those eighties synths and/or gated drums! -- but you can't deny the stellar pop songwriting there, I guess. I've also browsed into the albums those two Status Quo singles were extracted from. Looks like the band was still mostly playing the same strand of hard rock boogie there, aside from the singles. And what's left of them is still doing that *to this day*, and in a rather decent fashion, I would even add. That sort of dedication is truly admirable. Then I went back in time, way before the release of *Piledriver*, actually, and found out they were first a second-tier psychedelic / baroque pop act following the sixties trends without having to blush too much, just like quite a few other bands that also dived later into glam or hard rock, during the seventies. So Status Quo must be one of the oldest acts still active today. And for that, they also deserve at least a bit of respect, I guess .. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 17 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 34 (including this one)

In the realm of epic "indie folk" from the British Isles, there's the visceral and layered renditions of immemorial traditional songs as performed by the young yet already seasoned bucks that Lankum are, and then there's the heavy-handed, Broadway musical-inspired, topsy-turvy stuff that the professional actors in this quite insipid project have released here. That duo is admittedly musically skilled, at least on a technical viewpoint. But artistically speaking, it seems to me they're out of their league. Sure, comparing two acts as different as Lankum and The Amazing Devil might be quite nonsensical. Maybe in the end, it's just a case of choosing the (amazing) devil you know. But I would never include the act who wrote, performed and released *Ruin* into my list of keepers. I certainly wouldn't sign them up with my blood, not to mention plain ink. Please listen to album *False Lankum*. If really you're into cinematic, quote-unquote, "folk music", you might be in for a treat. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 17 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 35 (including this one)

John Darnielle is the sort of songwriter that can cram so many words into a line so as to make it stand out on a literary or storytelling viewpoint, often risking to tip off the balance between lyricism and musicality, and yet very often getting away with it, amazingly. He is also is the sort of player that can strum on his guitar in the simplest, most direct fashion, and yet the way his excellent vocal performance adds to the chords is just enough to make everything work. Besides, I loved some of the minor / major harmonic changes in the root chords, an old trick that always gets me, as easy to pull off as it is. Finally, Darnielle is the sort of gifted artist that can record his songs minutes after they were written on a derelict cassette boombox -- before they fade out of his memory forever -- and the results will very often sound more heartfelt and effective than most normal, "professional" production values. That unstable hum of the cassette's wheels turning as picked up by the tape itself-- Darnielle even described the soon-to-jettisoned boombox as a second musician here! -- is truly enchanting, bringing so much to the atmospheric quality of those tunes about the lives of not-so-ordinary lovelorn characters and freaks. Plus, you can sense how the boombox is getting worse from one recording to another, lol. Which, in a way, perfectly illustrates who those characters are. I'm not familiar with the full-blown band version of The Mountains Goats, but I have an inkling the latter will be less interesting than what I can now find in *All Hail West Texas*. Because it looks like Darnielle plays the sort of songs where the "less is more" ethos will always be more attractive for me. And where should I start snyway? The man has been *so* productive! There's a midway point throughout the course of this LP where the monotonous, barebones lo-fi shenanigans might become a little tiring, admittedly. But after "Blues In Dallas" (the only track displaying a different instrumentation -- nothing fancy, just a casio keyboard / rhythm box, or something close...), the last two songs in the original tracklist are so good that I got as invested in them as I was for the songs at the start. Quite a feat given the lack of sonic variety within the album. Final assessment: here's a less crazed out but musically and lyrically more sophisticated version of Daniel Johnston-related "arts and craft", singer-songwriter indie-folk, which I will probably find endearing or even more in the long run. So many thanks to whoever put this album in the users' list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 18 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 35

Meat-and-potatoes southern country blues with soul flourishes, certainly not unpleasant to listen to, but whose songwriting and arrangements will most probably be quickly forgotten two or three albums later. That lead singer is very good. But he's no Van Morrison. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 18 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 36 (including this one)

Er... Ha ha ha ha ha. Seriously, how much more fake and plastic do you want music to be? Operatic lead singers from this symphonic metal act are always extremely skilled on a technical viewpoint. But they don't write their songs, and often get fired over very petty reasons after being involved in this goddamn circus for a few years. Probably because everyone involved in this lame (yet commercially successful) project is mostly driven by greed, ridiculous pride and a knack for cheesefest shenanigans that show close to zero sincerity. Could have gone to a 1.5 or even 2/5 grade for the grand aspirations adding to the technical skills here. But those aspirations seem so misplaced to my ears that I can't even go there. Bad taste is not a crime, unfortunately. But you sometimes (night)wish it is. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 18 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 37 (including this one)

I browsed through the other LPs released by this Norwegian singer with admittedly wonderful vocal chops, displaying synth pop / dream pop, sometimes verging closer to weird The Knife-adjacent territory, and I'm afraid what I have heard from those other albums felt a little underwhelming to my ears -- not bad by all means, but certainly not the best you can find in that genre. *Music For People In Trouble* is a VERY different animal, though, and I want to thank whoever added it to this list. I never would have found out about this record if I had only taken into account the most streamed albums by Susanne Sundfør. First, this particular LP delves into minimalistic folk turf that's way more artful and impressive -- like a (surprisingly successful) mix between This Mortal Coil and Joni Mitchell at times, with steel guitar touches that are as spacey as they are evocative. On first listens, some of the songs fly by without leaving much of an impression, but I suspect most of them can reveal their flavors in the long run. And others, like "Reincarnation", clearly stand out right away. Then the album (gently) pulls the rug from under your feet with some strange synthetic soundscapes actually *adding* to the whole journey -- that dark ambient instrumental interlude at the end of "The Sound Of War" was simply amazing. And finally it keeps its most impressive gems for the second side, a choice I always find as bold as it is dynamic, making you want to immediately spin the record all over again. "Undercover" and "Mountaineers" (featuring John Grant) are just extraordinary songs, sending you into a part mystical, part elated mood that very few artists can send you to (mostly thinking about Björk and Lana Del Rey here). Besides, the fact that those songs seem to link personal introspection with more global concerns makes it topically relevant, which is cream on the cake. But beyond its lyrical intent, that I would need to focus more on later, this LP simply makes me want to visit Norway's fjords. And in a sense, it feels like I have already visited them a little, thanks to the music on it. So thank you for the trip. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 19 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 37

Ambient dark metal with touches of industrial, shoegaze and post-rock. Long instrumental tracks with clear melodic vocals at times. A quite sinister background story explains Kris Angylus' intents here. Very cinematic, with a few heartrending harmonies bobbing out from those desperate abysses in some of its most pivotal moments. Like a mix of Jesu, My Bloody Valentine, The History Of Colour TV, Mondkopf and The Haxan Cloak, tainted with more metal-adjacent references I would be hard-pressed to pinpoint. The mix is murky, but in that overall genre, such technical "flaws" actually add to the despondent mood. Pretty sure this album can't make it to my list of keepers from 2007, but it's still worth listening to for anyone interested in that sort of despondent-yet-extremely-evocative music style. Metal can still be open-minded without sounding like a cheesefest farce, and thus come off as personal and intense instead. Looks like I'm still unable to swallow that stupid Nightwish album added to the users list, that I had to deal with the other day, ha ha. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 13 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 20 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 37

At last, here I am leaving a few words about the *most glaring omission* in the 1001 Albums You Must Listen Before You Die book, here rightly rehabilitated in this users' list (highest global score last time I checked, and not a *single* one-star review). Don't get me wrong, I also love *Pinkerton*, actually found in Dimery's list. But honestly, one can't go without the other. It is madness, folly and sheer cruelty to leave out this incredible debut, c'mon! Even Weezer themselves didn't recover from it. I'll be charitable and avoid mentioning any of the band's post-hiatus LPs released during the 21st century, by the way. Rivers Cuomo will get a pass for any hackneyed stuffed he has since released. And this forever. Because honestly, what can you do when the first album of your project instantly reaches such an iconic status? I guess the answer is just to have fun and sow your wild oats without thinking too much about the (mixed) results. As long as we can all still listen to this record... This is the list of songs: 1. "My Name Is Jonas" 2. "No One Else" 3. "The World Has Turned and Left Me Here" 4. "Buddy Holly" 5. "Undone – The Sweater Song" 6. "Surf Wax America" 7. "Say It Ain't So" 8. "In the Garage" 9. "Holiday" 10. "Only in Dreams" And EACH and EVERY ONE of them is an absolute banger -- playful, evocative, fun, memorable, melodic, witty, goofy, suddenly tearful and emotional, constantly sharp and on-point. So many infectious vocal hooks and guitar licks. The pitch-perfect, no-nonsense production values of Ric Ocasek, of Cars fame. The can of earworms jumping at you from one song to the next. It was the proverbial lightning, caught in a small blue bottle. I'd be hard-pressed to name only three or even four favorite cuts. That ternary riff -- partly played on acoustic guitar -- on "My Name Is Jonas" just tears out rock heaven from the start. It makes you want to grab your skateboard and explore the nooks and crannies of your small town for hours. "No One Else" is driven and lively. "The World Has Turned And Left Me Here" spins forever and ever in nineties rock wonderland, just as it expresses the feelings of a lovestruck young man / teenager in such a timeless fashion. "Buddy Holly" explores the 50's rock influences further through its legendary chorus. Speaking of choruses, "Undone (The Sweater Song) is simply the platonic ideal of nineties loud-quiet-loud dynamics, only bested by Pixies and Nirvana -- with weirder and/or darker tones for the latter that comparatively makes the wide-eyed, pop-crazed Weezer unique. Starting the second side, "Surf Wax America" provides rhythmical tensions and release to the 50s-by-way-of-alternative-90s formula, and the results are musically spectacular. "Say It Ain't So" offers another perfect loud chorus, adding to a more muted, slyly executed chorus. The simplicity of both the themes and music on "In The Garage" makes the latter timeless and iconic. As for "Holiday", it is the only track that might be considered as a deeper cut, and yet the way the word "heartbeat" is pronounced during its conclusion still makes it legendary. And finally, finally, you have "Only In Dreams". The epitome of a "heavy" song about a young nerd smitten by a love interest that's forever out of his reach. Bluntly put, it's also a song about masturbation (that insane instrumental climax at the end!). And yet there's nothing gross about it, there are just tons and tons of very human and touching feelings being expressed here. Which frankly, makes it the *best song ever written about masturbation*. And beyond its subject matter, the composition is just a perfect closer for a perfect record. How many times did I write "perfect" in this review? Well, maybe not enough, all things considered. What a ride, even after all these years. I swear that I didn't want to mention each and every track of this LP, at first, but I just couldn't help it. I'm gonna stop yaking now. Just one thing: this album also has one of the most ridiculous album covers of all times, and yet this artwork is such an apt way to present Weezer's music, I guess. Yeah, even THAT is the stuff of legend. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 20 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 37

This Québécois pop album with distinctive indie and electro-lounge flourishes often straddles the fine line between airy, easy-on-the ear aesthetics and... plain muzak. Some of the arrangements and chord progressions are impressive and effective, don't get me wrong (there are a lot of minor-major modulations, which I'm always a sucker for). The thing is, I think I would probably be more attracted to those songs if Daniel Bélanger had a deeper, stronger voice, and also displayed less mannerisms with in his performance, adding to moments where he sounds a little out of breath, oddly enough. Rêver mieux ? Chanter mieux aussi. I rarely say that sort of thing, because, you know, singers have the timber that nature has given them, and the vast majority of the professional vocal performers mentioned in these lists of notable LPs manage to bypass their potential limitations to offer something personal and effective as they sing. But here, the vocals don't quite work for me. Also, some of the lyrics sound a little daft at times. But I guess you can file that under my own "pet peeves" dossier -- ones I often have when it comes to the use of my native language in pop and rock, when I'm suddenly a little more picky. Now if someone from Québec (or elsewhere) suggested a Corridor album in this list, my tune would be vastly different. Hope someone does one day. Salut les cousins ! 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 20 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 39 (including this one)

The very definition of "vanilla", up to its yellow cover. Well, maybe that's unfair, because even vanilla can be delicious with the right recipe or combination of ingredients. A combination that I can't find here, unfortunately. Let's just say that as I started to spin this LP, I braced myself for a collection of bland, interchangeable clones of "Good People", a vague hit that I vaguely remembered. I was not disappointed. It looks like Jack Johnson is a peaceful, no-nonsense dude invested in ecological causes, whether in his native Hawai or elsewhere. I guess this contextual nugget helped his music being saved from the lowest grade on this app for me. But that was a close call. Lyrically speaking, the man's intentions are often laudable. But the problem is that even when he tries to "protest" about something (as in "Good People" and a couple of other cuts), the protest sounds so limp and passive that it's hard not to smirk about it all. I'm too old to follow calls for revolution without simultaneously trying to adopt a larger, more nuanced perspective to understand what's going on. But I'm also too old to waste my time with half-assed, innocuous whining failing to convey any real sense of what's truly at stake. Trying to reach a middle ground doesn't necessarily mean being bland and indecisive. Just like Jack Johnson's songs, I would even venture to add... 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 20 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 40 (including this one)

Everyone and their mothers know that the second B-52s album can't reach the iconic heights of their eponymous debut. Inserting some admittedly subtle new wave flourishes in their formula -- still a groundbreaking music style in 1980 -- was a good idea on paper. Too bad the results are mixed. The wonderful quirks are still here, of course. But so many songs in *Wild Planet* are too long or ultimately inert. Worse, some of the vocal performances, technically flawless, come off as functional and perfunctory at times. A couple of cuts (like "Devil In My Car" or closer "53 Miles West Of Venus") still stand out, and the whole remains decent overall. And yet we're far from the debut's league. Some critics have blamed the production values. Turns out that I have no real issue with the latter, apart from those discrete moments where the vocal parts sounded a little wrong. No, for me, the real shortcoming lies elsewhere: it's a lack of melodic earworms managing to leave a somewhat lasting imprint. And it makes that *Wild Planet* sound... tamer. The person who suggested this sophomore LP explains in their review that they bought it at the same time as the debut, and that for them, the two are like one double album of sorts. That's a way to form a personal attachment to a lesser work released by a band, I guess. Also, I went to the summary of that person, and found out that, like me, they love *Songs Of Leonard Cohen*. Unfortunately, I also found out that, bar one LP, *all* their lowest rated albums were made by rap / hip hop artists. All black. The only hip hop artist making it to the highest rated albums list is... Eminem. A-hem. Oh sure, there are black acts mentioned in that list. But only four: Michael Jackson, Prince, Tracy Chapman and Funkadelic. Like, you can let some African American artists eat at the table of the greats in your proverbial "house", but it's as if they have to show some extra manners first. Eminem gets a pass, though. That line of thought is a little off-putting, honestly. I get that some people don't like rap, and it's OK. But frankly, you have to look back to your music tastes at some point and think a little about how they might actually suggest some prejudiced conceptions going on in your head, even if they're partly unconscious and vaguely defined. And then you have to work on them. At least a little. Saying that Kendrick Lamar's TPAB is merely "gross and disgusting" in two vitriolic lines is not merely being unfair and tone-deaf. It's also betraying an appalling inability to understand lyrical nuance or storytelling prowess. Unless something "blocked" that understanding. What is it that scared you so much in that masterpiece? Was it the use of profanity? Well if you love Eminem's magnum opus, it can't be that. Was it the fact that "Alright" was the unofficial BLM anthem? Nah, you might not even be aware of that, for all we know. Or was it *To Pimp A Butterfly*'s striking artwork on its cover, consciously designed to question the prejudices impoverished African American youths still have to face today? Let's just say that as of now, your "house" looks very white indeed. I can already see some other reviewers thinking I'm having a go at "performative wokeness" here. I don't know, maybe I am. But in this day and age, I'd rather have that supposed flaw instead of the opposite one. All I'm saying is that some folks really need to open their shakras, whether for music tastes supposedly addressed to younger generations, or for one addressed to different, quote-unquote, "target demographics". Speaking of shakras, I tried to open mine once again for *Wild Planet* today. It didn't really work, sadly. But that doesn't mean that choice for the users list is bad per se. The B-52s are still a cool project, and their debut obviously deserved to be in the original list, no contest here. Let's just say that checking where today's suggestion came from didn't give me an extra incentive to add their second album in my own list. Blame me for being tone-deaf myself, or for "punishing" a historical act just for the aesthetic shortcomings of a single fan of them. Or blame an indeed "wild planet" these days, now triggering me to digress about stuff that admittedly has nothing to with the B-52s. But that's how it will go for me. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 20 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 41 (including this one)

Someone indulged in a little guilty pleasure, here, ha ha. When you see the summary of the user who added this album, that choice is indeed extremely surprising. But contrary to the person who suggested Debbie Gibson, I admit that I can somewhat understand the rationale here... Don't get me wrong, I think you're alright. Er... Oops, no, sorry, what I meant to say is: don't get me wrong, there's quite a share of cheesefest bops using awfully predictable chords and harmonies in this (relatively) long record. But they're cheesefest bops so confidently executed that some of the latter get a pass somehow (not naming any song, because your mileage on the less famous tunes will most certainly vary according to very specific personal tastes). And then you have three HUGE, instantly memorable hits that makes this album sound like a best of compilation: "You're Still the One", "That Don't Impress Me Much" and "Man! I Feel Like A Woman!". Not to mention the fact that the humour displayed on the last two cuts also help a lot. It's feel-good music that's a little daft, sure. But you can't deny the artistry that's needed to write said pop music. Of course, the Pavlovian factor is also explained by a generational thing. I didn't give a rat's ass about Shania Twain at the time of *Come On Over*'s release, but her songs were absolutely everywhere. This could easily explain why I can't help liking some of those tunes. That might not be the whole picture, of course, because listening to some of the deeper cuts without being too picky about usual pop formulas, I think this record as a whole actually didn't age that badly. When it comes to pop, there are far worse things on the radio and in streaming services these days. What's also funny about the "history" of this record is that it metaphorically (or "synecdochally"?) encapsulates Taylor Swift's whole career later on. Shania Twain started hers as a pop-country artist as well, and the "American" mix of *Come On Over* had rather prominent use of steel guitar and fiddles -- far more prominent than on the later pop-oriented "International mix", which was the version I was exposed to at the time, as I lived in Europe. Now that surely reminds you of Taylor Swift's commercial strategy from one LP to the next. The thing is, Shania's country songs were on average better and more dynamic that Taylor's. It then comes as no surprise that I tend to prefer the somewhat more "authentic" sounding "American mix" today -- proof that it's not only nostalgia speaking here. The "International mix" aged less gracefully, comparatively, even if I recognize that a couple of bops in it sound great as well. Now the question is: 3/5 or 4/5? Normally, I would say 3/5, but given that commercial pop albums in Dimery's list wasted so many slots for appallingly inane drivel that aged quite horribly -- released by Christina Aguilera, Janet Jackson or Bonnie Raitt -- the whole situation makes me want to set the balance straight on this one. If you consider it bad faith on my part, I will plead guilty. Which is quite logical for a guilty pleasure. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 21 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 41

Joe Jackson is an interesting and even intriguing figure, an obviously talented artist who performed in the overall rock / pop rock genre almost as much as he dabbled in lounge latin jazz and orchestral music. This Elvis Costello-adjacent debut has a fistful of (apparently) quite memorable "hits" in the "angry young man" style that surged at the same time as the late seventies punk explosion. The thing is, Jackson himself pointed out that the importance fans ascribed to this debut mostly came from their nostalgia. And browsing through his few later rock LPs, released from the late eighties / early nineties to the early noughts, it feels that some of those other albums might objectively be of the same overall quality indeed... In other words, I don't really know what to think about this one. Just like the early Costello albums, that I initially dismissed a little too quickly, maybe more songs on this record will grow on me. Or maybe they won't. Wait and see... As of now, it just feels like once the first three highlights opening the first side are in the rearview mirror, the rest of the album just tags along in the same vein going from uptempo rockabilly-inspired compositions to slower numbers, and this without offering any *real* surprise (bar one exception -- more on that very soon!). You even have the mandatory reggae cuts, so trendy to play after a couple of prominent artists nodded to the genre in the previous years. Yawn. ONE track on the second side goes against the grain, though. It's the short, loony and hectic-as-fuck "Got The Time", which could easily be included in Devo's repertoire without raising any eyebrows. Love what Jackson does with his vocals on this one, especially on the song's bridge. Many thanks to the reviewer who informed me that this song had been covered by Anthrax, of all people. This surely caught my attention. I was actually tempted to skip a couple of tracks as I was listening to the end of this album, and had I done so, I might have missed this gem. Just because of this review, I didn't, and I'm a wee bit wiser now for it. But can one single gem save an album's "half*? The jury's still out on this one. Even if the musicality throughout *Look Sharp!* remains top-notch, the rather mundane fashion in which the rest of the cuts follow one another ends up playing against this record as a whole statement. Costello's *This Year's Model* and *Armed Forces* have some of their best assets and tunes in their second halves, which always dynamize your experience of listening to whole albums. And apart from "Got The Time", I can't say that I'm sensing that in here. At least not yet. It's one thing to "look sharp" from the get-go. But you also need to have the goods where it counts as the night then moves on. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 22 (No way this album would have gone above a 3/5 mark, and therefore be placed in that category, without "Got The Time" adding to the first three songs. As of now, the chances of *Look Sharp!* joining my own list of keepers are very thin. But sometimes a grain of sand can trigger an avalanche...) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 41

Pretty cool Aussie vintage garage punk. Of course, The Chats are not trying to reinvent the wheel here, and you may wonder: why this particular album and not dozens of other excellent LPs in that overall genre also forgotten in Dimery's list, going from The Saints to Amyl And The Sniffers if you only stick to famous Australian examples? Right after *Get Fucked* was over, Spotify indeed sent me into a rabbit hole filled with other excellent punk or punk-adjacent acts from Down Under (Civic, Stiff Richards, RMFC, Private Function, Alien Nosejob...). And honestly, it feels most of those acts deserve a place in this users' list as much as The Chats do. That said, the guitar work on "Get Fucked" is solid and more versatile than what it first appears to be, and it's easy to perceive how endearing most of those songs would be for fans of that genre. The opener is awesome and has catchy vocal parts, "The Price Of Smokes" offers hilarious working class "wisdom" in the shape of repeated aggro one-liners set to an infectious "groove", and the last four cuts are quite memorable as well. Nice build-up here, it's quite important to not quickly wear your welcome out in that genre. If I had an unlimited amount of time on my hand, I would probably return to this LP. Likewise, if I found a cheap copy of it in a record shop in my European town -- chances that this happens are close to zero -- I would buy it right away. But I do buy a lot of records now, and when it comes to the purposes of this generator, 1001 is obviously too low a number to include a 100% derivative-albeit-well-crafted album such as this one. Yet the least I can do is to symbolically leave my door open to The Chats. Plus it's usually harder for Australian indie acts to get noticed outside of their borders. So I guess a good deed is in order here. Being apparently very polite and well-mannered lads, I expect the members of this Aussie outfit to flip the bird at me in return, just as they do on *Get Fucked*'s cover. You're welcome, c*nts! 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 23 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 41 ----- Émile !!!! Ça marche notre affaire !!! Ça me fait trop marrer d'utiliser le générateur de cette manière, et ça me fait trop plaisir que tu aies répondu. Donc salut, comment ça va aujourd'hui ?J'aime beaucoup la liste de tes favorites, c'est à la fois très varié et parfois original. Déjà je possède tous les albums que tu as cité, ce qui est bon signe. J'adore particulièrement *Fear Of Music*, en particulier ses "deep cuts", que je trouve en fait encore plus marquants que ses hits. Et aussi The Man Machine, qui est probablement mon Kraftwerk préféré à égalité avec Radioactivity. Je suis pas encore complètement rentré dans Ogden's Nut Gone Flake, qui est un peu zinzin, mais je l'ai aussi, et je sais que c'est un disque cool. C'est moi ou comme avec Harmonium, tu as un faible pour les disques un peu "narratifs" parfois ? Je vais te mettre ci-dessous ma liste de mes 10 favoris actuels (ils changent souvent). Désolé, j'ai pas trop le temps de développer pourquoi ces disques dans mon top 10, mais là je suis en sortie scolaire d'une semaine en Espagne avec mes élèves de 3e, et je suis grave occupé. Donc m'en veux pas si je réponds pas certains jours à tes messages. Oui, je suis prof. Personne n'est parfait, hein ! 😅 A part ça, je viens d'avoir 48 ans, et je vis tout près du Mans, dans la Sarthe. Je faisais de la musique autrefois, mais ça fait très longtemps que j'ai pas sérieusement touché ma guitare. Et sinon, en ce moment, j'écris plus ou moins bénévolement pour un webzine musical français qui s'appelle Mowno (google ça et "Cyril Servain", et tu trouveras mes chroniques). Et toi ? T'habites où au Canada ? Tu fais quoi de ta vie ? Voilà, en attendant ta réponse, voici mon top 10 actuel. 1.Radiohead - Kid A 2. Pixies - Doolittle 3. Sonic Youth - Sister 4. Nirvana - In Utero 5. DJ Shadow - Endtroducing 6. Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven - 7. Radiohead - OK Computer 8. Low - Double Negative - 9.Big Thief - Capacity - 10. Grandaddy - The Sophtware Slump - See you soon?

Some of the orchestral dirges and flourishes are surely impressive within this debut album, whose execution and high brow literary concepts (read "pretentious"? After all, did Edgar Allan Poe ask for any of this?) were still indebted to the greats of prog rock that had met success a couple of years before -- before Alan Parsons slowly verged into 'ore soft rock pastures. The thing is, you often feel like you have nice instrumental parts à la Peter Gabriel-era Genesis artificially glued to one another here, with lead vocals added as an afterthought on top of them, not offering much in terms of truly dynamic songwriting. I can understand why someone young and not knowing a lot about the genres tackled with here (prog rock and orchestral/classical) would have a revelation listening to this. But for someone older who already knows his... "classics", this feels a little like a second-tier choice, honestly. The "Pavane" in "The Fall Of The House Of Usher" is a wonderful instrumental gem, though. Maybe if this album had been 100% instrumental, I would have liked it better? 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 23 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 42 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde la review juste au dessus !

Oh well, garage-adjacent British rock from the landfill indie years. Like a more polished (and more musically competent) version of The Libertines, or a less polished one of The Strokes, which sort of equals... Franz Ferdinand coupled with The Arctic Monkeys (with an admittedly less spectacular drummer). Still ten times less annoying or ten times more interesting and more authentic-sounding than notoriously terrible acts in that overall umbrella genre -- such as Kaiser Chiefs or Razorlight. But it's maybe a little hard to blame the listeners that experienced somewhat understandable weariness for that noughts revival rock thing when they had to give a spin to this album through this app these days. Who knows, maybe the problem lies more with the "retro-rock genre" itself than in the way it is actually crafted here? In a sense, it's a little unfair to dismiss The Courteneers so quickly. There are quite a few well-executed highlights on this record ("What Took You So Long?" for sure, but also other ones I'm too lazy to name here, placed until the end of the tracklist). Likewise, the slightly mixed critical reception of this LP is a bit of mystery to me. Pretty sure there's been a share of far lesser albums in that style that were praised for no good reasons at the time. But let's face it, The Arctic Monkeys, The Strokes, Franz Ferdinand and The Libertines had been there first. Makes me mull over the randomness inherent to the whole music business game, in a way. Why do some bands make it to the next hot trend first, like two or three years before other similar acts manage to record their first LPs? I guess it's nice that this album was rediscovered by its target audience more recently at least. But does that make *St. Jude* a likely candidate for this list? The jury's still out on this one. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 24 (including this one -- because there might still be a chance this record grows on me, in spite of the déjà vu effect) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 42 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde deux reviews au dessus !

I have rarely heard something as ludicrous as what I'm hearing now. The instrumentation is hackneyed. The style is quaint at best. And the vocal performance is appalling. So weak. I'm actually staying in Spain for reasons related to work right now, and even this coincidence can't possibly redeem such a lame album. This utter catastrophe is not even ironical. It's in earnest! At least from what I can gather about *Hombres G*'s intentions... Including in that goofy, ugly-ass artwork... Parody or not, it doesn't matter anyway, this is just bad music, period. I listened up until "Marta tiene un marcapasos" because I've read it was a huge hit in its country of origin, during the eighties. Yet there's nothing to save in that single either. This is just a complete waste of time. And then I went to the profile of the person who submitted this LP. You gotta check it out for yourself, it's quite unbelievable. Turns out that the tone-deaf summary created by this user is ten times more appalling than the vocal performance on *La cagaste...*. I'm a huge Nirvana fan, believe me, yet having *Nevermind* as the *only* highest-rated album, then choosing so many hackneyed, heavy handed acts for half of the high-rated album, to finally shit on so many legendary musicians in the lowest-rated section (including quite a few that Kurt Cobain actually loved), is not only cringeworthy. It also deserves contempt. Add this dumb LP to the equation, another single highest-rated LP, in that person's user's list this time -- THEIR choice, of course -- and contempt turns to you face palming your forehead in front of such a farce. So obnoxious. Whoever you are, I never want to discuss music with you. Ever. Glad we'll never meet, I guess. 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 1 or 2/10 for more general purposes? Who the f*ck cares anyway? Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 24 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 43 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde trois reviews au dessus !

Some sort of funk / funk rock vaguely nodding to George Clinton or Red Hot Chili Peppers without leaving much of an impression. The grooves are often heavy-handed, the instrumental compositions lack crucial dynamic features and hooks, and a lot of the vocal parts are grating or annoying. A couple of "interesting" moments surge from the shapeless maelstrom here and there, like that ambient bridge in "Stronger Than Ajax / Save The Day". But they can't possibly redeem how devoid of real stakes or charm the whole thing sound. And they are often ruined by the meandering "sung" parts anyway. You want to discover a cool, more current Dutch band? Listen to Tramhaus instead. Cool concept for the artwork though. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 6/10 for more general purposes (5+1) For the record, this 1/5 mark is definitely not in the same league as the one I gave to Hombres G yesterday -- in truth a 0/5 album for me. Now here was a truly appalling LP! In comparison, Gotcha! Gotcha! Gotcha! is just a little boring / annoying. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 24 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 44 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde quatre reviews au dessus !

Other albums from Pedro The Lion I've browsed through seemed less interesting than this one. There are a couple of relatively underwhelming cuts in the middle, and David Bazan's voice is an acquired taste at times, but the first three songs are very solid and quite emotionally intense, and so is highlight "Second Best" on side 2. Don't have a lot of time to explore further today -- including the lyrical and narrative elements tied the "concept album" parts -- yet I have a good feeling about this one. Including it in my "high rated list" to get a chance to come back to it later. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 25 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 44 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde cinq reviews au dessus !

"Yamore" and "Madan" are two absolute bangers casting a long shadow over the rest of this album -- the first sweet and delicate, the second sweaty and lively like a wild night out in Bamako or Abidjan. Nothing as striking after that, but there are still plenty of evocative moments in cuts such as "Mousolou", "Koukou" and "Here". 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 26 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 44 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde six reviews au dessus !

I generally don't like the idea of live albums included in this list. It's somehow important that *Discovery*'s in it, but it seems that the rest of Daft Punk's career could be better represented through later studio LP *Random Access Memory* than through *Alive 2007*. Also, I sort of think that the global grading for this record is somewhat too high as it is right now. That being said, I readily recognize that the nature of this beast makes it special. It's as much a live album as it is a "remix" one (and a very propulsive one at that). And most of the different versions of tracks also found in *Human After All* within the tracklist can easily be considered as stellar improvements compared to the originals. Special mention for the slightly accelerated and higher-pitched version of "Television Rules The Nation". Now is that enough to include the album in my own list? I don't think so. Yet that doesn't mean that the music on it is bad. It just goes on a little too long at times, and it is not intended as bringing anything that's really "new" anyway. So it's just an off-shoot in the French act's discography -- an excellent one, but an offshoot nonetheless. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 26 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 45 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde six reviews au dessus !

Taylor Swift chronicles, episode 256: Today, as 2015 comes to an end and snow falls from the grey skies looming above her new manor, Taylor checks the overall charts performance of Carly Rae Jepsen's *Emotion*. Commercial failure, at least as far as female pop singers' standards go. Taylor draws a heavy sigh of relief, and takes another sip of her champagne glass as she sits in front of the hearth. Looks like she will remain the top bitch at this game for quite some time. Capitalism is always nicer when you're at the top, isn't it? In truth, and in spite of the few paragraphs I will probably scribble down there, I don't have much to say about this LP that's truly original. But it's because the story behind it isn't original either. A one-hit wonder wants to become more than that an album later and ruins her chances somehow -- because her shtick is so glossy and manufactured that even a large part of her target audience raises an eyebrow listening to it for the first time. Conversely, a minority of fans more interested in surface effects and marketing ploys than in truly compelling music think they are now becoming "niche" and "indie" just because they like that record, which had failed to hit the charts like it was intended to do. And everyone else smirks. Gimme a f*cking break. Because let's face it, most of the chord patterns and vocal melodies in these immature pop songs are so flat, and the identity of Carly Rae Jepsen so indistinct that the writing was on the wall from the get-go. There are almost no hooks or slightly off-kilter elements to go beyond the two-dimensional features plaguing the songcraft, performance and production of this thing. To put it in a nutshell, most of *Emotion* is just instantly forgettable. Three highlights still manage to leave an imprint somehow : opener "Run Away With Me", admittedly catchy, "Making The Most Of The Night", harmonically more interesting than the rest, and "I Really Like You" -- more annoying than endearing for sure, but undoubtedly memorable. Plus a couple of cool funky basslines here and there, within songs that are cloned from one another. We're still leagues under Dua Lipa's *Future Nostalgia* here, mind you. And more importantly, those basslines can't possibly bring the personality this project direly needs on their own. Worse, the sugar rush is often so extreme in *Emotion* that it makes me want to puke right away. And there's not much to give a little bit of caloric substance to said rush either. Taylor Swift looks like a tastier offer next to Jepsen -- not saying she is *that* all the time, just that Jepsen's writing committee come up with even blander results than the ones routinely churning Swift's deep cuts. And Charli XCX and her team look like goddamn Renaissance geniuses compared to Jepsen. Give it to hyperpop : the "hypertext" thing is the thing that prevents pop from becoming too complacent these days. Even the most outrageously commercial one. Now will Sabrina Carpenter follow Carly Rae Jepsen's destiny? Pop music cycles are like capitalism after all. They often repeat the same mistakes, don't they? Guess I'll yawn as well when that same old story happens yet again. In the meantime, can we be a little serious for one second? Please? 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 26 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 46 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde sept reviews au dessus !

When it comes to jazz fusion, there are a lot of admittedly heavy-handed shenanigans I can forgive to acts such as Mahavishnu Orchestra or Weather Report because what they were doing at the time was groundbreaking at least. But in the 2010s it becomes a little more difficult to do so. Don't get me wrong, the musicianship of Snarky Puppy is not merely solid, it is STELLAR, and reaches virtuoso levels that are even hard to comprehend. And yet for me, the awesome parts found in all those tracks are routinely mixed with quite a few questionable choices regarding arrangements, textures and rhythm patterns -- choices that unfortunately straddle the fine line between jazz fusion legacy and cheese-oriented dirges. I'm pretty sure that attending a Snarky Puppy gig must be a blast. But watching accomplished musicians do their thing on stage is not the same thing as spinning a record at home. Albums that are merely documenting live acts without evoking extra poetic and topical layers -- either through production, mood, tones or compositional skills -- don't exactly enter the category of "essential" for me. In the realm of "modern jazz", artists such as Shabaka Hutchings, James Brandon Lewis or Jaimie Branch often pull it off effortlessly. Not to mention some of the older jazz legends criminally omitted in Dimery's book. Those are the sort of genius artists I want to see appear in this users' list. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship + 3 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 26 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 47 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde huit reviews au dessus ! J'essaie de checker ton éventuelle réponse bientôt.

This is technically a compilation, and it's a compilation of recordings released when the modern album format didn't exist yet (it's just amazing to think that some of those cuts are *a century old* today!). So I can't bring myself to include this one in my own list of keepers. That said, I understand why a listener enamored with that early style of jazz would want to select it in his own list, whether virtual or real. It's like a platonic ideal of what late 20s / early 30s swing brass bands should sound like. The stop and go moments and hilarious "dialogue" between the instruments in "Jazz Lips" are simply amazing, for example. There are also hints of gypsy jazz sometimes, like with that slightly detuned acoustic guitar break in "Willie The Weeper". It's kind of a shame you rarely hear Louis' one-of-a-kind vocals in those tunes, but the man was first and foremost a trumpet pioneer, and only sang because the audience pushed him to do so. Opener "Herbie Jeebies" still provides a memorable example of Armstrong's vocal chops, though. And "St. James Infirmary" is a gem as well. Of course, with such an old music style, it becomes difficult to pinpoint variations and distinctive features from one track to the next as you listen to this compilation, and I sometimes lost my focus as I did so. Yet in truth, the variations in instrumentation and intents are manifold here, obviously. And this up until the record's end. So I have to thank the user who submitted this release. Because it's not the sort of music I would go to by myself, and this is what this list can be used for. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 26 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 48 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde neuf reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

I've wanted to listen to this album more intently for a long time, and was looking forward to it appearing in this list, knowing it was there. I knew that "Str8 Outta Mumbai" was a cool track for instance, but I didn't really know the rest. Alas this record popped on a day where I was awfully busy from 8AM to midnight, with barely a break in my schedule. Still managed to find out that the more you're into the tracklist, the cooler this thing sounds, even if the topsy-turvy nature of that beast, the convoluted history of its release and its "unfinished" status probably require some more time to tame it. Including this in my "high-rated" section as a reminder for later. *Tentative* grading: 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 27 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 48 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde dix reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

Oh well, Tool. The sophomore album showcases all the ingredients that make this band's music, sound, moods and tones so distinctive within the "prog metal" umbrella genre: off-kilter bars and rhythm patterns, eastern-inspired melodies for the bass and vocal lines, somber moods and tones, sudden brilliant surges of electric guitar, confrontational lyrics sometimes straddling the line between surreal and edgy, along with Maynard James Keenan's seedy and anguished vocal performance sealing the whole deal. The first leg of the album, going from catchy "Stinkfist" to aggressive "Hooker With A Penis", piles up one highlight after the next. Unfortunately, it's just more of the same after that, and that "same thing" rarely glows as brightly as the first tracks do. Not that there are any duds per se in the second half of the album, but the numerous prog elements fail to stand out as they should, and the murky uniformity of the soundscape is also detrimental to a truly dynamic listening experience. Tool admittedly tried to counterbalance that flaw through weird noisy interludes or a couple of more ambient bridges here and there, so as to add a little sonic variety. But that choice actually worsens things to an extent. Some of those interludes are not merely pointless or grating. They also make the record feel even more lengthy -- whereas self-editing within the proper compositions would have served the latter better instead. This lack of sonic dynamism is an issue that Tool would solve in next LP *Lateralus*, where the sound palette and the prog elements are far more colourful and striking -- justifying the length of the songs and album this time around. So for me, only *Lateralus* and debut *Undertow* within Tool's discography are worthy of a list of essential releases. But that doesn't mean that "Ænima* is awful overall, just that it is a transitory effort that is at least worth a listen for fans of the overall genre, even if it's ultimately second-tier. Hardcore Tool fans will disagree, of course, but what do they know? Most of them still think this band never went down from their peak as we speak, and their notoriously obnoxious fandom isn't convincing many outsiders to say the least. Funny that "Hooker With A Penis" is actually about one early example of those obnoxious fans by the way. Phish or Limp Bizkit might play music that's far less interesting or engaging than Tool for me (and, I guess, many other people). But from my personal experience, fans of those other acts are cool and unpretentious people, even when you express your distaste of those favorite bands of theirs. You only need to respect other people's taste and be polite about the whole thing, and communication is still possible. Whereas I'm pretty sure whatever *nuanced* criticism of *Ænima* I've actually managed to express up there has already triggered many Tool fans using this app. And I have to admit that the idea that those particular fans can't reply to me is *extremely* amusing for me now. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 27 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 49 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde onze reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

When supposed "positive" 4/5 reviews left in this generator are using words like "disposable" and "no soul" to qualify the music on this record, how can you expect the latter to be worthy of your precious time? This thing recycling tropes that pop divas like Madonna, R'n'B acts à la Destiny's Child and easy-listening stalwarts such as The Cardigans had already pulled off BETTER a decade earlier is just... awfully formulaic. In fact, it already sounded dated as f*ck in 2005, and yet was also too early to catch the poptimism wave somehow. Tough luck. Not that such later poptimistic wave has released a lot of good LPs in the long run anyway-- far from it, actually. But maybe *Come And Get It* would have found a far larger target audience if it had appeared in the *late* noughts at least. Yet even if it had done so, there's nothing that could have redeemed this epitome of fakeness and style-over-substance in my eyes. Commercial pop albums can be excellent. But to repeat what I have already said about the Carly Rae Jepsen LP that appeared in this generator a couple of days ago, those albums need to have flair and a strong identity. Which, once again, I can't find here. So let's explore why this pop album doesn't work. Opener "So Good" is somehow catchy yet it also sounds like a William Orbit-produced track Madonna could have recorded for *Ray Of Light* ten years earlier or so. "I Said Never Again" comes off like the result of a collab between Shania Twain and Robbie Williams' producing teams, here on a budget -- with the second British team ultimately having the upper hand. Gosh, I can already smell the fish and chips from here. Yet there's not even genuine English charm in that song, just strategic ornaments sounding way too cold and calculated to elicit any emotional response from me. "Crazy Boys"'s vocal performance, tight instrumentation and dreamy arrangements sounds far more promising at first -- as if Britney Spears sung over a Cardigans track. But when your pre-chorus comes off as catchier than the particularly bland chorus it leads to, you have a huge problem on your hands. The track never delivers on its initial promise, clearly. Go back to pop songwriting school, for crying out loud! And oddly enough, "I Will Be There" has the *opposite* problem: its chorus is evocative, but there is not much substance to the music in the background, only surface effects going from spacey (those nice-sounding synth layers) to hackneyed (that inert slow disco instrumentation). Things get even worse after that. "Negotiating With Love" thinks of itself as a cheeky bop whereas it is absolutely grating and terrible. Appalling stuff, period. "It's All About Love" is a slow R'n'B cut that's 100% predictable -- except for that Cure sample in the intro, a flourish that was most probably added at the eleventh hour so as to salvage the song from utter oblivion, to no avail. For all their "technical" skills, you can easily sense those producers clutching at straws so as to find *one good idea* for each of their compositions. But that Cure sample only appearing once during the course of the song is just pointless and useless. It neither rhymes nor reasons. After that debacle, "Secret Garden" is to eroticism and sensuality what plastic is to a wooden shed. Then "Nothing Good About This Goodbye" returns to Cardigans turf -- albeit with far less interesting chord sequences. "Some Girls" is basically a second-hand "Womanizer", and its background vocals going "hey" in the verses sound stupid and flat. They're supposed to bring energy to the whole thing, and yet only underline how out of breath Stevens often sounds compared to Britney. Next, "Je m'appelle" apes early Beyoncé without leaving much of an impression. Amazing how Stevens' producers circle back to the same three or four influences all over again, never really finding a way out of the ready-made formulas... I'm gonna stop here with the list of the songs. After "Je m'appelle", it's only more of the same variations exploring the same styles and influences listed up there without putting much imagination or striking harmonies to them. It's competently produced and performed. But there's no real spark. I will only mention closer "Dumb Dumb" as it's slightly more memorable than the vast majority of the songs displayed here. Yet even if those producers had written more memorable tunes, they would have probably failed making them sound one-of-a-kind anyway given what we can already hear in the actual "product". So few risks were taken for this thing. And consequently, It's just derivative dross that aged like milk from my current vantage point. Reading myself again, I'm wondering about something... How many times did I use the word "producers" in my tentative review? Well don't blame me, blame this album, because it's actually quite hard to use Rachel Stevens as the grammatical subject of my sentences when she's just one formulaic ingredient among the others. Because yeah, as you have probably already guessed, she didn't even write her own lyrics (bar one single exception), not to mention the music. You may as well think that this review is repetitive and goes into circles. But it can't be worse in that regard that the sort of "dumb dumb" pop I had to deal with today, you know. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5+1) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 27 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 50 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ douze reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

From Freddie Gibbs and Madlib, I was under the impression that *Bandana* was the superior album, but I have to admit I haven't listened to them albums a lot. So today's suggestion gives me the opportunity to catch up on those excellent hip hop artists and how they represent old school these days. There sure are highlights in *Piñata*: "High", with Danny Brown, the tough-sounding yet insanely driven and catchy "Shitsville", "Thuggin'", going to even darker territories, the more laid-back yet equally menacing "Real" and "Uno"...). The last quarter of the album is a bit of a letdown, with that slow cut where the sexual boasting becomes grating and ridiculous, and a title track that might be a little lengthy (albeit featuring the fantastic Mac Miller, among other guests like Wu Tang's Raekwon within this album). But it's nothing really aggravating in the long run, all in all. Cut this fat, and you still get a great LP with a proper length. So let's just say that *Piñata* is a nice appetizer while waiting for *Madvillainy*'s arrival. Yeah, I know it's in this users' list. It would be very funny if it appeared right after I push the "vote" button. Do you also get this suspenseful tingling in your soul when you do so? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 50 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ douze reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

OK, a friend of mine really loves this live record and for him it is THE essential Talking Heads album, and not any of the studio LPs. I get why this is the case for so many people, yet I suspect that it also allows the latter to have a "best of" record on their shelves which looks far cooler than that. And those fans are most often casual fans, are they not? Besides, and to put it in a nutshell, I have never found the versions of those famous songs from the NYC band's discography particularly mind-blowing in their arrangements and instrumentation -- at least generally speaking. It's still excellent material, of course, and it documents some live footage that is a must-see. But for me, it looks like *Stop Making Sense* rather belongs to a book named *The 1001 *musical DVDs /* You Must Watch Before You Die*. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 51 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ douze reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

I don't get it. No, let me reiterate that even more clearly: I don't get it AT ALL. Like, this thing has a 3.5 global score, a pretty high one, and people who chose John Coltrane's *A Love Supreme*, Leonard Cohen's *You Want It Darker l* or Drive Like Jehu's *Yank Crime* as their favorite albums from the original list gave it 5 stars. 5 stars to what is basically a... muzak LP, with a quaint, "funny" cover. Call me nonplussed, dumbfounded, flabbergasted. Guess that nostalgia for a time long gone must play quite a big part for that success. Unless all those people are all having a little inside joke here. This 1/5 grading does not come from a place of hate, by the way (contrary to some similar lowest grades). More power to the people who can understand the "charm" of this record. But as open-minded as I think I am, it looks like it's just impossible for me to take pleasure out of listening to this... thing, obviously competently thought out and played, and yet utterly devoid of stakes in my very personal opinion. That's life, I imagine. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5+1) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 52 (including this one). ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ douze reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

I find this one both interesting and maddening. It's interesting because the instrumental pieces are often intricate and delicate ambient electronic gems -- pieces such as "dullscythe", "do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do", or "Wind Tempos", with the latter example even exploring post-minimalist turf that's quite surprising in that context. Yet even with all those assets, this record is also maddening because when Porter Robinson writes proper songs, his vocal parts and their harmonies are so damn CHEESY in most of the tunes that I want to smash my Bluetooth speaker into the wall. To be clear, I have nothing against vocal manipulation through digital shenanigans: those things can now sound good to my ears depending on the way they are handled. I just have a huge problem with the notes and bland major-chord-driven vocal lines that just go nowhere fast on a compositional level. Like, where is the subtlety displayed in those predictable vocal lines? Quite ironic when you name one of your tracks "Musician". A few songs towards the end -- "Sweet Time", "Mirror" and the sober acoustic-guitar-enhanced "Blossom" -- manage to escape that curse, breaking the usual commercial pop formulas for something more interesting on a compositional level. Unfortunately, it's too little and too late. These days, Porter Robinson logically attempts to hop on the hyperpop train, to mixed results. Which leads me to the second major flaw in this earlier LP, i.e. its lack of cohesion. In a sense Robinson has always been hyperpop-adjacent, but *Nurture* attempts to be so many things at the same time, in a way that paradoxically does not always avoid bland results, that it becomes difficult to have a cohesive emotional response to this LP as a whole. Apart from that, it's a very competently produced record, and I'm not doubting the sincerity of Robinson's intents for one second. Yet I can't help feeling very derisive towards anyone choosing such an album for this list. More power to you, whoever you are. It's just that I'm afraid it's gonna be quite a hard pass for me. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5+1.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 14 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 53 (including this one). ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ treize reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent. 😀

Funny how an album almost nobody from my neck of the woods had talked about the time of its release retrospectively became the top one from 1998 (not to mention the nineties in general) for so many indie hipsters. I don't know, maybe *In The Aeroplane Over The Plane" is indeed a tiny wee bit overrated now -- the couple of cuts before the reprise of "Two-Headed Boy" concluding the tracklist might be a little secondary compared to the rest. But c'mon, it's still an album harbouring so many stellar moments, going from barebones acoustic guitar-driven performances to more arranged tracks lush with brass almost sounding balkanic in their intensity. Speaking of intensity, Jeff Magnum's vocal performance is quite extraordinary as well -- I guess you can either love it or hate it, but you just can't ignore it. I love it, of course. And the songs.... I've already mentioned the two versions of "Two-Headed Boys" and they're just incredible compositions based on such a great tune, of course. But there's also opener "King Of Carrot Flowers", "Holland 1945", "How Comely", etc... A good friend of mine once told me that I made him think of the song "Two-Headed Boy". I don't know how I should interpret this, but let's just say that Neutral Milk Hotel's craft and art certainly elicit that sort of emotional "reappropriation" in their audience, which surely explains why their magnum opus is so endearing for so many people. And also, why it has this place on this list. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5+4.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 15 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 53 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ treize reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

System Of A Down has a very special place in the (nu-)metal canon. Their style is immediately distinctive, thanks to the traditional Armenian and Greek influences, highly melodic harmonies on both vocals and guitars, and the bouncy, propelling rhythm section they use to enhance their riffs. Also, their lyrics often tackled political subject matters giving an extra dimension to their songs. And Serj Tankian is a powerful vocalist, equally at ease for screaming and singing. When SOAD first surged into public consciousness with their debut (rightly mentioned in the 1001 Albums book), they kind of made me think of a band succeeding in being like "Dead Kennedys on steroids", which also speaks volumes about the punk influences which also inspired them. Sophomore LP *Toxicity* is maybe not as cohesive and impactful as that debut was: the first third of its tracklist is a bit bumpy, as if a couple of songs could have been taken away without affecting the whole thing. Yet this record harbours three hit singles that are absolutely iconic for anyone even remotely interested in the band: the title-track, "Aerials" and "Chop Suey!". And starting with the latter song, said tracklist becomes perfect, whether through its deeper cuts and the way they follow one another, or it's iconic hits. Therefore, I will gladly add this album to the debut in my own list. And given its pretty high global score, it looks like many other users would do the same. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5+4.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 53 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 15 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

The music of this LP *slaps* yet it does not always slap if you take my meaning. Les Claypool is obviously a striking figure from the alt-rock world of the last thirty years or so, who deservedly managed to create a cult following around his main project Primus, thanks to his off-kilter artistry and undeniable mastery of his main instrument. For sure, a bassline played by Les sounds like no other. Yet one thing the man may not have totally mastered is the art of creating a 100% convincing album. *Sailing The Seas Of Cheese thus mixes the excellent, the good, the average, the bad, the weird, the funny and the not-so-funny. Like in other Primus LPs, there are tracks that I love and others that leave me cold there. And oddly enough, they all kind of sound like one another if you just take them in general terms -- so it's hard to put my finger on the elements in those cuts that tick my boxes and the ones I find off-putting. Maybe this comes from a relative lack of variety, betraying some self-indulgence on the band's part, as skilled as they are with their instruments. I would certainly buy a "best of" compilation from Primus if I saw it on record shop shelves one day. But a studio album from them? Let's just say that my shelves at home are full as of now. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5+3). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 54 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 15 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

The only deeper understanding I get from today's suggestion is that when it comes to The War On Drugs, *Lost In The Dream*'s inclusion is more than enough for a list like this. Don't get me wrong, the first side of this fourth album by Adam Granduciel's band harbors quite notable highlights (such as "Up All Night", "Nothing To Find", "Holding On", or "Strangest Thing"). There's nothing reaching the level of "Red Eyes", but that doesn't mean the songs are bad. Nevertheless, the second half of the record is just more of the same without adding many stakes to sustain my interest. You can pile up pristine guitar arrangements or invoke the spirit of Springsteen in your mainstream rock Americana all you want, there's not much you can do to dynamize the formula when the latter often uses the same sort of maddeningly linear ingredients composition-wise, no matter how fast or how slow the tempo is. Case in point: "Thinking Of A Place", which goes on forever for no discernible reasons. And there also comes a point when the Bob Dylan impersonation becomes simply annoying to an extent. In spite of the raving reviews from "professionals", I this pinpoint *A Deeper Understand* as the start of a fall from grace for The War On Drugs, even more obvious in the rather hackneyed follow-up LP "I Don't Live Here Anymore". One for the hardcore fans? 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5+3). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 55 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 15 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

The one thing I want from Joan As A Police Woman is that she gives me back my walking papers. Another way to say that I'm not looking forward to seeing her again... *Real Life* is not exactly a terrible album, mind you, but I really can't see what is so special about it. Adjectives such as "slinky" or "zingy" have been used by some professional reviewers to describe Joan's music, but what they're really describing here is her voice, not her compositions -- which very rarely strike me as particularly bright or memorable. "I Defy", with Anthony Hegarty (from Anthony And The Johnsons) and "Christobel" have something going on in them that could be endearing for some ears, I guess. But if the rest of the tracklist is decent, it still feels way too inert and devoid of stakes for me, ultimately. Like a Norah Jones striving to get an indie cred, or a Fiona Apple without genuine eccentricity. Refraining from giving a 1/5 mark to this thing so as not to be associated with the notorious edgelord who panned this debut at the top of this section. Yet I have to admit that if I disagree with the *manner* said edgelord eventually expressed his distaste for this album, I still see eye to eye with him as to why the latter is not a good fit for this list. Besides, edgelord or not, there must be a good reason why *no one* has written a five-star review for this record yet. Honestly, and given the first impression I have of Joan, I don't have enough time on my hands to spend time with her songs. Real life has its requirements, and some "slow growers" never really grow in you, even if you make an effort spinning them again and again. My gut feeling tells me Joan As A Police Woman is in that category for me, quite sadly... 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5+1.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 56 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 15 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

F*ck off. I mean, seriously, f*ck off. Max Martin, Mutt Lange and the interchangeable Swedish producers guilty of shitting this turd all over the world in 1999 have done ten times better elsewhere, and even there you could take the results quite derisively. But *this* particular teen pop LP deserves more than spite. This record deserves outrage. Because it is simply an insult to music and art in general. Charts and graphs are behind every single note of *Millennium*, and there's not a single moment that shows authenticity or genuine artistic ambition as a result. ZERO risks are taken here. All you have is formulaic chords, formulaic arrangements and formulaic intents. Anything to keep the target audience in their sterile comfort zone. And I'm not even talking about the poster boys fronting this thing, whose soulless and standardized vocal performances would make Britney Spears and Robbie Williams sound like Nina Simone or Leonard Cohen in comparison. No one in their right mind remembers the names of those guys today anyway. Because there's more feeling, sincerity and artistry in the moves of a food company employee wrapping plastic foil around frozen chicken thighs in an assembly line than in anything that comes out of the mouth of those dumb blokes. I'm dead serious here. Speaking of sincerity, I've also read the most popular reviews written by the person who submitted this album a long time before they would finish going through the original list, and I'm not doubting their seriousness and earnestness for one second. I'm just doubting their overall taste, sensibility, knowledge and listening abilities. But what do I know? I'm just an aging hipster guy among millions of others, probably taking good music appreciation a little too seriously... Hence the aggro tone in the first lines of this review. That said... well, f*ck off anyway. A leopard can't change its spots, I guess. 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 3/10 for more general purposes (3/5 for the production values + 0/5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 57 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 15 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

Hurley puts this Damien Rice debut album in his portable CD player and presses "play". The first fragile notes of "Delicate" reach his ears as he watches the other survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 go on with their lives on the beach that has become their home. Until... the song suddenly stammers and then just abruptly stops. Battery power is dead. Now they are all truly in the wild. Boom. Episode end titles card. This moment from the series Lost -- still iconic for quite a few geeks out there -- unwittingly reveals something about the whole album incidentally featuring that song (which the TV producers thus chose to illustrate their scene). Damien Rice's melancholic songwriting is indeed *extremely* civilized, often to a fault. It's not fit for a crazy island with jungles, smoke monsters and a mysterious local cult living there. It's actually the total opposite of that: it's very polite, well-mannered craft, and musically speaking, it does not leave much room for anything other than the expression of sickly sweet emotions. Where's the scruffy poetry also usually associated with the overall folk genre? Where's the mystery? Where's the soulful drive? Case in point, the instantly memorable "The Blower's Daughter". It takes enormous talent to pen such an iconic love song (here's that word again), but the problem with this admittedly very memorable tune is that it dangerously straddles the fine line between universality and caricature. And where similar albeit less catchy cuts follow this one, you just can't help sensing the lack of... energy. I'm a sucker for slow melancholic songs, I really am. But you often need some extra spice to make them work. Otherwise, you risk coming off as a little bland and predictable. Once in a while Damien tries other things, I readily admit it -- as with the deep male backing vocals of "Cold Water", or the opera singer on the closer of "Eskimo". Unfortunately, those more off-kilter ingredients sound awkward and devoid of real stakes to my ears. Probably because such flourishes can't fix what's so "safe" in the songs proper. So all in all, what we have here is a respectable LP which probably deserved its success in 2002 (see my score out of 10 down there). Yet said LP doesn't really speak to me as a listener. Therefore, I can't see how I would choose it for my own potential list of keepers. Funny that one of the plots of Lost involves a list of people to "save", by the way. Which makes me consider the sorts of reviews Hurley could write in this app. Pretty sure that would be a very interesting list, with or without Damien Rice. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 58 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

The rise of midwest pop princess Chappell Roan occured so quickly you're sometimes expecting her proverbial rocket to explode in mid-air soon, i.e. before reaching a position that would ensure she stays in people's minds in the long run. Plus, Chappell looks quite fragile as a person, and it wouldn't be so surprising to hear that her sudden fame has already taken its psychological toll on her, and this in ways that could even damage her future career. Not that I wish this for her, nor that any of those tabloid nuggets should influence your personal artistic assessment of her debut album, popping up on my generator today. Yet those dubious nuggets still provide a context that is helpful to express the very nature of this quite complex (should I say "convoluted"?) release, and this whether you like Roan's songs or not. In a sense, a few themes evoked during the course of this breakout album proactively address the potential *fall* Roan might go through one day -- it's all in the title, isn't it? It's that same old story -- the one of the pop star reaching the skies too soon, and burning her wings as she gets closer to the sun, unprepared. It's when the homecoming queen gets betrayed and trampled upon that you get the juiciest stories, right? Beyond the pop song formulas you can therefore sense some higher stakes at play in this record. And given the overall effect of the album's artwork, subtly suggesting that Roan is too unhinged and "dysfunctional" to become a beauty pageant winner in the first place, there might even be a second layer of irony here--one that could point to a tragic fall indeed. Musically speaking, the idea is translated through the idea that Chappelle refuses to say in one lane within the umbrella pop genre. Roan is not "stable" enough, she's all over the place. This is maybe how she both uses and subverts stereotypical tropes about how women artists are too often viewed as "hysterical" or "unreasonable". She is a product, yet you can't easily shoehorn her into one single category. That's how Chappell may appear as bold and daring for some, I guess. There's a darker side to that coin, though. Actually, it's because Roan and her team make sure that as many songs of theirs reach as many target audiences as they can that you may start to raise an eyebrow as you listen to this LP from start to end. In a sense, there's *too much* going on here. You have a little bit of everything for everyone -- some easily digestible melodies for general pop audiences, some bouncy rhythms subtly leaning towards hyperpop for younger gen-z and gen-alpha kids, unmistakable camp flair and a couple of LGBTQ-minded lyrics aimed at queer and gay audiences, a recycling of eighties pop tropes for the older gen-X audiences (think Madonna, Cindy Lauper or Eurythmics), even some winks at the indie world, like those sometimes coarse lyrics reminding you of Liz Phair, or that album cover hearkening back to Hole's *Live Through This*. This profusion of references, which is exciting and dynamic on paper, comes with a price, however. Who is Chappell Roan, really? It's hard to shake off the impression that she is first and foremost a product. A multifaceted one for sure. But a product nonetheless. To be clear, the problem is not "variety". The problem, at least as far as Roan's output in the *album format* is concerned, is whether or not she succeeded in self-editing said output so that you have a smooth ride from the first to the last cut, even with the many twists and turns on the way. And it looks like some minimum amount of self-editing would have indeed helped erase the pivotal flaws within this admittedly ly exhausting journey. Exhausting because many elements in this debut neither rhyme nor reason, and some stylistic jumps are even jarring, especially in the middle of the record. It looks like only a "maximalist", "productive" approach has been considered here. Hence that suspicion that Chappell is a product first, and that she is therefore not fully in control of whatever it is that she wants to say on a purely artistic level. I wish I could have avoided going into details here, but I need to explain why I'm subjectively so severe for a release which has objectively reached its intended goal within the pop market. Because we should be dealing with talking about art here, not commerce. And there can't be a "little bit of everything for everyone" in *any* record without checking if each style here harnessed holds water first. So let's do this one song after the other. "Femininomenon" is a fantastic start for the album, I'll give it that. It's a wild and fun statement, whose feminist sloganeering and upbeat dance rhythm is a subliminal promise for other cuts in that vein later (too bad those other songs are not as good, but more on that later). After that, "Red Wine Supernova" is less hectic, yet still lively and quite catchy, promising another type of songcraft that's closer to Taylor Swift's more formulaic trade this time around (but more on that later as well). Major problems arise as soon as the third track's irruption, though: "After Midnight" is an attempt at providing a neo-disco hit, but it only comes off as subpar Dua Lipa or second hand Jesse Ware. It's a rather unmemorable and predictable cut, and you can already sense that Roan and her team are out of their league for a couple of substyles they tackle with -- hence why more self-editing would have been preferable for the whole shebang. A lot of songs then go in pairs on a stylistic viewpoint, as if they were too scared to be parachuted on their own within the tracklist, and needed a like-minded companion next to them to properly exist. It's quite a strange choice tracklisting-wise, which ironically enhances the overall lack of cohesion impacting this project to an extent. Roan thus offers two ballads in a row, "Coffee" and "Casual", and both of them are about the same theme as seen from both sides of the fence: attachment and even addiction to the wrong love interest. The witty, near-universal lyrics of those cuts are the best thing about them, given that the music has already been heard a thousand times before, to put it in a nutshell. Then comes a pair of upbeat eighties pop supposed "bangers", "Super Graphic Ultra Modern Girl" and "Hot To Go". The first of these is actually so linear, predictable and heavy-handed that its hard for me to take it seriously. And if the second one fares slightly better, its shouted female group vocals are still particularly annoying. and I predict they will age like milk. After that, Roan reverts to slower pop with "My Kink Is Karma", digging the same revenge-fantasy-on-an-ex's-arse vein as the one routinely dug by Taylor Swift. And the result therefore feels derivative somehow. And so does the one yielded by the pair of torch songs following "My Kink Is Karma". "Picture You" and "Kaleidoscope" thus both straddle the fine line between a classic soft-rock feel and a predictability that verges on boredom composition-wise. Those tracks are far from being offensive, but they don't exactly offer thrills or ignite sparks either. So only *one* of these contractually-obligated ballads would have been more than sufficient here. Chappell is still a fine lyricist though, and her talent particularly shines on the couple of songs that follows -- both of them most clearly addressing gay and queer themes within the album. The enticing, synth-enhanced "Pink Pony Club" sees Chappell's protagonist dreaming about escaping Southern bigotry and going to L.A before a very eighties-like electric guitar solo. And new-wave-indebted "Naked In Manhattan" switches the scene from L.A. to NYC so as to narrate a lesbian love story, using this opportunity to namecheck David Lynch's *Mulholland Drive* and Lana Del Rey -- the latter a clear influence on the song following this one, (along with Weyes Blood, maybe). Because yes, we then take a plane back to "California", thanks to the most melancholic tune in the album -- still harboring quite lively tom drums on its final chorus to spice things up a little, yet definitely on the side of nostalgia and heartache. This song also illustrates the title of the album, by the way -- how a Midwest ingénue becomes disillusioned after her stay in California -- which brings much-needed cohesion to the proiect, since the song could be interpreted as the tune the now wiser "Pink Pony Club" protagonist would sing five or ten years later, "missing the seasons in Missouri", while knowing better about the empty promises of L.A.. Roan ties things up at the eleventh hour, but at least she does so. So it's funny how the last leg of the album is far more convincing and cohesive than its first two thirds, both for the lyrics AND the music. Even closer "Guilty Pleasure" provides the most, well, *pleasurable*, Eurythmics-indebted synth pop cut within the record (only bested by the extraordinary one-off single "Good Luck Babe!", unfortunately not released yet at the time). Roan's entranced final vocal performance in that closer allows her to end the album on a high note, in all the sense of the word, and given that I can more easily forgive a somewhat botched LP when it displays its best songs at the end, such late assets can only be a huge plus for me... Is that enough for me to consider including *The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess* in my potential list of 1001 essential albums? I'm still very unsure about this. I still think this LP is overrated, and that the person who submitted this album lacks perspective somehow (as well as every other reviewer who gave this a 5/5 mark, and there are quite a few of them!). And it's not only because the album is "recent" that I want to remain cautious here. It's also because, even if large selling numbers often equates long-term cultural impact, it's NEVER a sure thing. Music history proves it. ----- A coda: I want to be more specific about what I have written in that last paragraph up there, going beyond that particular Chappell Roan album. In their review for their own submitted LP, the person who chose this debut rants about how post-2000 pop has been snubbed by Robert Dimery and his team, and that doing so is turning a blind eye to the cultural impact of those pop artists within the "industry" -- artists such as Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Ed Sheeran, One Direction, Rihanna, Justin Bieber, Spice Girls, or BTS... My cringe-o-meter sure reached a sky-high level when I read some of those names, "poptimism" be damned, but my personal tastes actually don't matter that much. What matters for me is that I consider the line of thought being expressed here as quite questionable in a more "objective" level. And I'm gonna try to explain why. For starters, all sorts of important styles post-2000 have been snubbed in the 1001 albums book, not just pop music. It goes with the territory of a book project started at the end the 20th century, which is still limited by a finite number of entries for its subsequent 21st century editions. So why would you only set the balance straight for commercial pop, which already has a lot of exposure, and therefore needs less critical praise overall to exist and reach its audience, at least compared to more "niche' genres? Besides, and as I said earlier, it's not because an act sells a lot of copies within a decade that it is going to be remembered fondly in the decades after. When said acts are remembered at all! I would encourage the person who submitted this Chappell Roan debut to check the charts of the sixties and seventies. They would probably realize the sheer amount of artists reaching the top of those old charts that almost no one remembers about today -- contrary to a lot of other names who didn't hit those charts at the time, and yet are now considered as pivotal artists from those decades. In other words, you can't count on the music "industry" (a word that appears twice in that person's review, if I'm not mistaken) to tell you anything serious about long-lasting cultural impact. This is what "poptimism" forgot a little too conveniently, just to cater a little more to the market's needs. This doesn't mean pop music shouldn't be mentioned in lists such as this one. This just means that sales numbers are only a factor among many others when you try to pinpoint genuine cultural impact, especially in a field as subjective as music appreciation. Browsing through the high and highest-rated albums of the person who submitted this album, I'm pretty sure I could see eye to eye with them on a lot of things -- including the place pop music can take within an admittedly objectively-impossible-to-reach "canon" of essential albums. I already know this person to be very open-minded, given the albums they selected. The thing is, you can be open-minded while keeping a minimum amount of critical distance. And of course, no one is objectively right or wrong about those things. It's just that there are more or less convincing ways to "defend" your subjective choices. As a peace offering to this person, here is a made-up tracklist for *The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess* which, in an alternate universe, would have probably encouraged me to directly include the album in my own virtual list of keepers. This here is a way to state that I don't snub pop just because it is pop music. It's just that, like for every music style, the "flow" and the dynamics of an album's tracklist are very important for me. And that I'm 100% sure there were ways for Roan to shine (even) a little brighter in the album format. So here's that "more ideal" tracklist: 1. Femininomenon 2. Red Wine Supernova 3. Good Luck Babe! 4. Coffee 5. Casual 6. Hot To Go! 7. My Kink Is Karma 8. Kaleidoscope 9. Pink Pony Club 10. Naked In Manhattan 11. California 12. Guilty Pleasure 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 29 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 59 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Pas de nouvelle réponse de ta part, mais c'est pas un souci, je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

Terrific lyrics, with so many punchlines laughing at the face of pretty dark subject matters. Unfortunately, the music is inconsequential sophistipop most of the time. I get that the contrast between the two is intended, but the apparent primacy given to words over music in an LP is always gonna be a flaw in my book. And even if your book has different requirements, it is obvious that The Beautiful South constantly risk coming off as too smart for their own good here. Just picture them delivering those lyrics over quaint muzak with a deadpan expression on their face. I mean, c'mon. It's so easy to turn them into a caricature, because they already are one, right? What's a little maddening here is that there could have been easy ways to make the music way more interesting than what it actually is, and this from start to finish. Ironically, the band themselves give precious suggestions in a very small number of tracks on how this upgrade could have been pulled off. Hear the harmonically uneasy bridges on "Little Blue", for instance, like some unnamed evil presence bubbling beneath the tranquil, civilized surface. Or listen to the slower, more spacious "Blackbird On The Wire" and closer "Alone", which sound a little like a synth-laden, melancholic Leonard Cohen tune circa *I'm Your Man* (Is the title of the first example betraying some subliminal influence from the Canadian bard here?). Here are intents that go beyond the usual fare given by this LP for sure. And more of them would have been welcome. Not that more of those subtle yet pivotal flourishes would have changed the whole plan music-wise. Unfortunately, such different-sounding intents have stayed unexplored for the most part, and so the extremely competent personnel seemingly just do what they've been trained to do for five albums up to this point. And for me, it's a little... self-indulgent. To take another reference point from across the pond, around the same time this record was released, another potentially too-smart-for-their-own-good project like The Magnetic Fields, also using either male or female singers according to the song played, also knew how to create a cold, sophisticated backdrop for their equally wry and/or cutesy lyrics. But the difference is that they most often spiced things up with some zingy details here and there. Or conversely, they could let subtle forms of emotion be conveyed through the vocal performances. As they could let a universal chorus transcend their intellectual endeavors if need be. All sorts of elements that I find lacking in the cold, cold reptile that The Beautiful South generally is to my ears. So it's gonna be a "soft pass" for me. I can appreciate the 'literary' values of the lyrics, but there's no way the music of this thing can speak to my soul. Sincerely hope this does not give the blues to the person who submitted this album. It's just that "blue" might be the "colour" indeed, but when it comes to nineties indie, there are other ones on the palette. And I want to see them shine as well. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5/5 for the musicianship, overall performance and production values + 2/2 for the lyrics + 0.5/3 for the musical artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 16 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 60 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

Dreamy and edgy at the same time. To be honest, I had filed Yeasayer a little too quickly under the category of Animal Collective lookalikes just because of the bits and pieces from them I had heard up to this day, before listening to this debut. Not that I really stand corrected now: the music on *All Hour Cymbals* does suggest an AnCo lineage. Only it's a lineage that is way more streamlined and more melodic than most of the albums of that other Baltimore act. Yeasayer are also less wild and experimental than Animal Collective, in spite of the distinctive African undertones in there -- which were influencing so many American indie acts at the time. In a sense, this record is also a testimony of a time where indie buffs thought the fusion of rock and more "global" sounds were the sound of the future. Not much has since happened to make that prophecy come true, very sadly, but the intent was worthy of praise at least. And it did break ground anyway. For instance, It seems like Yeasayer's debut has unwittingly foretold the sort of sound an act such as Young Fathers would use across the pond a bit later. And if only for this they should be praised for thinking out of the box. Add the whiffs from the psychedelic seventies and the Beach Boys-like vocals over the experimental rock proceedings -- also so pivotal for Animal Collective -- and you have an excellent noughts recipe in your hands. What really linked Baltimore to the Californian beaches is to this day a mystery, but it's one that sure proved interesting, and which still sounds relevant today, at least to my ears. Is that all there is to say? No. Because, for me, what actually makes the album sound so good almost 20 years later is its obvious spontaneity, along with the incredibly soulful moments often gracing it -- best represented by highlights such as "Sunrise", "2080", "Germs" or "No Need To Worry". This here is the key ingredient that could make the LP go from "high-rated" to "highEST rated" in my own "book". The last leg of the record is admittedly a little more complacent in comparison of the energy displayed in its first half. But the overall oneiric mood in that last leg is still faithful to what the highlights set up so nicely before that. Closer *Red Cave*, for instance, is certainly one of the best psychedelic patchouli-scented jams ever recorded this side of the third millenium. Besides, the overall sound of this record is also very *organic* from beginning to end. Browsing through later Yeasayer LPs, it looks like electronic shenanigans there ruined whatever timeless aura the band had reached in their very first go at a full-length release, in spite of the many excellent songs you can find in those later albums. So even if I can't yet pretend to know everything about the band's career, as of now it looks like *All Hour Cymbals* is the one LP from Yeasayer's discography to keep here. Many thanks to the person who submitted it. It allowed me to fix a blind spot I had until today. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5+4) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 17 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 60 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

I'd rather remember Danny Elfman for the legendary movie themes he later composed for Tim Burton and others (Beetlejuice, Batman, The Nightmare Before Christmas, The Simpsons...) than for the eighties goth-pop, brass-laden new wave act that helped him make a name for himself (and so enter Hollywood circles). Not only has the sound of this thing aged like milk, but also some of the compositions on the second side were so annoying that it was hard not to skip to the next song only after 30 seconds. Before that, the first half of the record has its share of, well... *interesting* moments. Apart from the lame title track, that is, unfortunately placed in the second slot -- that dud goes on forever for no discernible reason and made the album lose one point all by itself... Yet if I try to forget that huge misfire, the choruses on opener "Just Another Day" and third cut "Heard Somebody Cry" are kind of catchy, the ska rhythm on "No One Lives Forever" is kind of fun and fits perfectly with the gothic mood of the song proper, and the guitar riff on "Stay" is pretty cool. So yeah, you could easily pinpoint a few redeeming elements within the tracklist, if you try to open your mind to them. But doing so can't possibly erase from your memory how bloated and sometimes even embarrassing the whole shebang comes off from today's vantage point. Like, those synth pop-funk rhythms that were all the rage in 1985, they're not so bad, you know. Yet Elfman is no Prince, and without the swagger and sly suaveness of a certain diminutive genius from Minneapolis singing, cooing or teasing you over said rhythms, most of the results just sound either derivative or awkward. Finally, anyone reviewing this record would obviously need to at least mention the "Weird Science" song, written for the daft John Hughes flick of the same name, here closing this LP. My take on that closer is pretty straightforward: it is that without the vague nostalgic memories associated to the film, there's not much that could salvage this umpteenth cheesefest cut. But in a sense, and in spite of Elfman's later complaints that the song was actually off-topic compared to the other tracks in the album, "Weird Science" also perfectly encapsulates everything that sounds *dead* wrong in this record today. Dead Man's Party indeed. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 6.5/10 for more general purposes Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 17 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 61 (including this one) ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

This is the album I submitted, and a lot of what's down there is more an explanation of the rationale behind this submission than a proper review. Not that I feel that I have to justify what remains a personal, subjective choice. But some people understood my intent while others didn't get it at all. So I hope to make said intent clear now, no matter what your personal mileage on Björk is. As many other users already noticed, there were already four Björk albums in the original list, *Debut*, *Vespertine*, *Medùlla* and *Vulnicura*. For me, the last two entries don't make much sense -- I really like some parts of those records, but later albums released by the Icelandic diva are probably more aimed at longtime fans like me, not at general audiences. Interestingly, one reviewer in this section has just informed me that *Medùlla* was actually axed in subsequent editions of the book, only to be replaced by *Vulnicura* later. I interpret those fidgety moves and counter-moves as Dimery and his team slowly realizing they had made a huge blunder when they initially snubbed *Post* and *Homogenic* (albums 2 and 3 in her discography). I guess that if the authors of the *1001 Albums...* book were able to take out some LPs to leave room for others in later editions of the book, they couldn't really add old ones. So for me, it looks like they tried to course-correct their early mistake in other ways, and it shows. All of this suggests that Björk's first four LPs can't seriously be omitted if you want to have a meaningful discussion about which albums from her you would eventually select for a list like this. Let me just point out that if only *three* records had to be chosen, I would actually favor *Post* over *Vespertine* -- a terrific entry, but the first in Björk's discography where she didn't really break any new ground compared to her earlier output. Yet no matter how many of those albums you end up selecting, *Homogenic* HAS TO be in there. If you only take "professional critics" into account, it's one of the most praised albums of all time, but more crucially, it also showcases music that could be considered as the platonic ideal of her artistry -- her most cohesive statement, "homogenic" indeed, with everything that makes her such a striking and idiosyncratic artist represented in it: strong pop impulses, avant-garde intents, wonderful and memorable melodies, abrasive and uncompromising electronic beats, impressive string arrangements, dreamy or nightmarish soundscapes, stellar songwriting and vocal acrobatics (love them or hate them, you can't deny the power of this woman's pipes!). Not to mention a few quirks and bold left-turns here and there. All those elements are found in most of her early albums, but here they shine with a very specific light -- direct, focused and refracting every small detail into a unified whole. I don't want to take too much of your precious time now, so I'm gonna try to go through the tracklist as fast as I can. Mingling Ravel's Bolero and Aphex Twin at his trippiest and most oneiric, and laced with a few off-kilter touches of an accordion (!), "Hunter" is an epic opener, tormented and cinematic. It's also a song that's very "meta". "I'm going hunting," warns Ms. Gudmundsdóttir, and from that very early moment in the album, you know she'll bring back the (sonic) goods for sure. More straightforward, "Jóga" is one of the most beautiful ballads ever written about friendship, both sweet and sublime, with a wide-eyed chorus soaring to the skies. There is a well-known string of hackneyed clichés about Iceland to use so as to describe a song like this, yet there's no beating about the bush here, those clichés are on point. Because the clash between the lush strings and the rumbling of the electronic beats in that wonderful tune DOES feel like the clash of snow and lava. Right after, delicate and fragile "Unravel" is a three-minute lesson in desire and longing in the shape of a ball of yarn, with Björk playing the part of a modern Penelope on the shore waiting for her own personal Ulysses, doing and undoing her work twice in a row. As for "Bachelorette", it is simply put an incredible whirlwind -- a 5-minute odyssey taking place over a deluge of sinuous, circling strings and chattering breakbeat jolts driven by the pointed spikes of a grand piano mercilessly hit on its lower keys. It's one of the most recognizable and most intense compositions Björk has ever written during her now long career, and as such, it almost singlehandedly warrants a place for *Homogenic* on this list. The rest is made up of admittedly deeper cuts, yet the vast majority of them manage to reveal a new side of the Icelandic singer -- and taken all together, they brush an unforgettable picture of the artist as a whole. With its stubborn ternary rhythm and its cycling synths, "All Neon Like" is a mystery hidden within an enigma -- still intriguing and potent to this day. Suddenly returning to the more naive soundscapes of the singer's recent past, "5 Years" dares you to embrace love. "Immature" is more like an interlude than a full-blown song, admittedly, yet its free form is more accessible than later experiments of this kind in the artist's discography. And the bouncy pop number "Alarm Call" aptly reminds you that Björk's references do not only include Bartok and Stockhausen, but also frigging ABBA! To conclude this eerie journey, Björk goes down to hell, and then surges back to reach heaven, with one of the most daring hairpin curves ever put to tape in the field of electronic music. Hell is "Pluto", of course -- a wry, dry, obsessional, take-no-quarter techno scorcher of a track that will have you clench your teeth and lower your head so as to weather the sudden storm. And heaven is the liquid and fully ambient "All Is Full Of Love" -- a tune so simple and self-explanatory it becomes iconic without the use of any sophisticated arrangements to back it up (even if its more fleshed-out and full-bodied single version is also worth a detour, by the way). Elated, once again, but also so evocative, that closer is one of the most solid pieces of evidence that this album represents Björk's set of skills at their most artful and yet also at their most effective. A rare combination, even for her. So yeah, file that mind-boggling omission in the 1001 Albums book with the fistful of other LPs by a prominent act that were left aside for absolutely no good reason, even if another LP of theirs made the list, inexplicably. Dimery's book didn't have Weezer's Blue Album for instance -- 1st in this users' list! And also, it didn't have The Breeders' *Last Splash*, Grandaddy's *The Sophtware Slump* or Lana Del Rey's *Norman Fucking Rockwell*. To which I would probably add Nina Simone's *Little Girl Blue* and also another Fugazi album (which could either be *In On The Kill Taker*, *Red Medicine* or *The Argument*, depending on the day...). I would love to see users add those other LPs one day -- just as I was glad to see some of them recently add essential records by Big Thief, Fontaines D.C., Charli XCX, Madvillain/MF Doom, Godspeed You! Black Emperor or Mogwai for instance. Yet as I finish writing this review, I'm happy I have actually chosen *Homogenic*. Because putting words on the page to explain why I love this album so much didn't only feel right. It felt good. Just as it feels good to witness other users with interesting tastes trying to set the balance right through this generator. Those choices might not be homogeneous / "homogenic" when you put them side by side. But they sure point towards the way music can make you travel through so many "emotional landscapes" of the soul. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 18 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 28 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 61 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent

I was never convinced by Titus Andronicus before, or at least I thought that their very personal strand of punk-rock-meets-pub-rock-meets-garage-meets-Bruce-Springsteen's-spirit was not for me. Turns out I had not listened to their magnum opus yet. And now I stand corrected. There's something going on in this record that works for my ears, as unhinged and out of control Patrick Stickles's vocals are when you first bump into them. And as wary as I am about "concept albums", the civil war context behind the LP's "concept" is clearly just a shrewd pretext to perform an ode to New Jersey working class here. And I like the idea, generally speaking. What I'm gonna say now will probably shock most Titus Andronicus' fans, but for my European ears, the band sounds a little like a hairy, more muscular American lumberjack version of the rowdy antics of The Libertines heard across the pond a half-decade before. And as weird and hilarious as that take probably sounds for many, it's actually one I'm at ease with. I also love the album's structure. From "A More Perfect Union" to "Richard II", you have an exciting string of raucous and dirty anthems rolling on all cylinders, but starting with "A Pot To Piss In", there's also a lot of room for melancholy and drones, interspersed with sudden and intense, surges -- often slower than the first half highlights, yet equally epic. The moment where that fat heavy bass hits on "Four Scores And Seven" is incredible, I really enjoyed the featuring of Wye Oak's vocalist Jenn Wassner on ballad "To All Friends And New", and "The Battle Of Hampton Road" is obviously a climactic closer that's worth a detour. Those bagpipes on it are a cliché off sure, but sometimes clichés work. The only real filler is "... And Ever", but as the 2-minute penultimate cut, it's more like a necessary transition -- tying the second track to the last epic song -- than a chore to listen to. I had my fears that this album would be too lengthy at first, but it's actually a breeze to go through. So many thanks to the user who suggested this record. That person erased a prejudiced blind spot that I unfortunately had before. Browsing through the rest of the band's discography, I'm not really sure that I can warm up to their other albums that easily, but it looks like I just needed a... "monitor" to help me understand why this act was so appreciated during the 2010s. Rimshot! 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 18 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 29 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 61 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 20 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

What's a little weird about this suggestion is that the user who submitted this LP literally dismissed its first side as made out of "fillers" and "throwaway tracks" -- their words, not mine. Well, apart from the excellent melancholic sea ballad who gave this record its name, of course. So why would you select this record along the dozens criminally omitted on the original list, then? Heck, you could actually submit Procol Harum's far heavier *Broken Barricades*, or their more extravagant and even downright *decadent* *Grand Hotel*. Here are albums whose tracklist and mix of highlights and deeper cuts sound a little more solid at least. At least on a first listen. Because, yeah, I have to agree with this user that *A Salty Dog*'s second side sounds more directly convincing overall -- which is always an interesting yet dangerous choice tracklisting-wise. Not that the first half doesn't have its share of more-than-decent The Band-adjacent songs with "The Milk Of Human Kindness" (unfortunately fading out as things get real interesting) and "The Devil Came From Kansas". But it's like the record starts proper in its very last leg, oddly enough, with the fascinating musical tales evoked through track "Wreck Of The Hesperus" (What a gorgeous piano arpeggio! What a gorgeous vocal line! And what gorgeous orchestral arrangements!), followed by the equally lush and equally orchestrated "All This And More" -- where the British band finally display the fully instrumental prog regalia they're most often associated with. After that, "Crucifiction Lane" is a moody torch song of sorts, and closer "Pilgrim's Progress" uses the old "Whiter Shade Of Pale" formula thanks to those distinctive organ arrangements played by Matthew Fisher -- a bit of a clone of the band's early hit, maybe, but acquiring effective nostalgic overtones real quick, maybe partly because of the shadow of its elder brother, and partly because it is placed in the last slot. I first thought I would never consider including this admittedly very good yet also quite uneven record, but listening to it a second time, I have started to mellow towards the songs I didn't have the time to mention in this tentative review, and the highlights shone even brighter. Slow grower? We'll see. In the meantime, this is the first time that a 3.5 - 4/5 mark from me follows a review that seems to be slightly more enthusiastic than the one of the user who actually submitted the album I had to listen to. Maybe because that user is an old sea wolf and a man of few words. But in that case, it would seem logical for him to choose a record named *A Salty Dog*, I guess. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 18 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 30 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 61 ---- Émile ! J'ai répondu à ton message. Regarde environ 25 reviews au dessus ! Je compte juste vérifier toutes les deux semaines environ. On est pas aux pièces, comme on dit sur le vieux continent.

Funny how the opinion of "the dean of rock critics" and basically only Spin magazine helped to put this local American indie rock / indie folk act in the spotlight. The first side of *Funeral Dress* is sure filled with plenty of hooks and nice catchy tunes. The title-track rips off The Undertones' "Teenage Kicks" is VERY obvious ways, but when it's done artfully -- leading to an end result that still sounds authentic and entertaining -- theft can be worthy of praise, I guess. Too bad the LP clearly loses steam after its last stellar highlight "Crooked", though. Without the propulsive hooks of Wussy's best songs, the thin sound of the near-DIY-recording values and the anachronistic nineties tones become more apparent, unfortunately (I love the nineties, those were my formative years, but honestly, the second side is just "more of the same" to my ears). That said, there's so many tracks on its first half that I suspect I could find endearing in the long run that I want to give this record the benefit of the doubt as of now. And it's not as if the second side was made of terrible tracks either. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 18 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 31 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 61 By the way, I also browsed through Wussy's last album, released in 2024, and its sound was not only deeper, but the far more seasoned performances by the two male and female vocalists in the group made me think of Low circa *The Great Destroyer* and *C'mon* -- when the Duluth act were sounding the most straightforwardly "rock" during their perfect career. Which, coming from my mouth, can only be a compliment, of course. ------- Salut Émile, D'abord, désolé pour le retard, quand j'ai vu ta première réponse, j'étais en sortie pédagogique d'une semaine en Espagne avec des élèves, comme je crois te l'avoir dit. Et quand tu as envoyé ta seconde réponse sous le grand classique de Bowie, j'étais en formation à Athènes, et je devais consacrer beaucoup de temps à tout ce qui se passait là-bas, entre le stage et les visites. Et entre et après ces deux voyages, je devais AUSSI rattraper mon retard pour une grande partie de mon taf (qui n'est pas QUE donner des cours). Bon, en gros, c'est un mois pas comme les autres, et j'ai eu très peu de moments pour me poser. Ça me permet de répondre à une de tes questions, cette précision. Celle sur le temps que ça me prend de faire mes reviews toujours trop longues et académiques, ha ha! Ben ça dépend, en fait. Ça peut aller de vingt minutes à deux heures si j'ai l'impression de ne pas arriver à dire tout ce que j'ai envie de dire sur un disque. En vrai, pour une chronique "sérieuse" telle que celles que j'écris pour Mowno, ça peut me prendre jusqu'à quatre ou cinq heures. Même si une bonne moitié de ce temps est en fait consacrée à éditer et enlever des choses, paradoxalement. Pour ce générateur, j'écris comme ça me chante, à la truelle, et je me préoccupe rarement du style. Disons que faire ça m'évite de passer du temps sur des conneries sur le web. Pour ce qui est du processus d'écoute, je fais un premier passage de l'album le matin au lever, puis un second le soir, généralement (j'écris en même temps). Il m'arrive de zapper des milieux ou des fins de chansons lors d'une de ces deux écoutes, mais c'est rare en fait. Bon et puis, il y a les albums que je connais déjà, où c'est plus rapide. Même s'il y en a moins dans la users list (mais c'est ça qui est intéressant, aussi). Et toi ? C'est quoi le secret pour faire plus court et y aller le coeur léger (je ne fais jamais volontairement long, tu sais 😉). Mais surtout, c'est quoi ton processus d'écoute ? Questions fort intéressantes, ma foi. Sinon, tu as 24 ans ??? Marrant comment je pensais que tu étais plus vieux. Y a plein de fois où je m'imagine qu'un reviewer est de tel ou tel format et âge, et après je me dis: "mais en fait c'est ptet une personne totalement différente ?". Marrant de voir la confirmation de ça ici. A part ça, tu es designer graphique pour quel genre de site ou de produit ? Et tu joues de la basse dans un groupe ou vraiment juste pour déranger les voisins ? Et dans quel style ? Rock ou autre ? Autres réponses à tes questions: le code secret pour apprécier Radiohead, c'est de les voir comme les bardes de la solitude et de l'aliénation postmoderne, ainsi que de la mélancolie qu'elles inspirent. Et d'aimer les chansons aux constructions imparables et pourtant souvent barrées, ainsi que les voix d'anges torturés. Le tout décliné de façons très différentes d'un disque à l'autre. Thom Yorke a moins ma sympathie ces temps-ci, mais il y a plein de choses qui partent de son groupe pour moi. Avec The Bends et OK Computer, tu tiens déjà une bonne explication du truc. Kid A est le next level. Et In Rainbows permet de chiller en redescendant de ce sommet. Le reste est au moins un cran en dessous, pour une raison ou pour une autre. Reste sur ces deux-là en plus de ceux que tu as cité, et tu pigeras peut-être. Bon pour Sonic Youth et cette intw de Nardwuar qui part en cacahuète, tu mets le doigt sur un truc un peu malsain, c'est vrai. Mais, de très loin, j'ai jamais trop compris le délire de Nardwuar non plus. C'est un personnage ironique ou non? Le postmodernisme mène aussi à l'absurdité, faut croire. Mais tu peux peut-être m'expliquer le personnage.... Ce que je sais moi, très subjectivement, c'est que SY est un truc musical incroyable -- même s'il faut d'abord trouver la porte d'entrée qui te convient dans leur longue discographie. Et ça me paraît donc un peu réducteur de les ignorer juste pour ce moment pas glorieux et même franchement très con, je l'avoue. Pixies and Godspeed are music gods, enough said. Voilà, il est presque minuit chez moi, et faut vraiment que j'arrête là. Au plaisir de lire ta réponse. Deux semaines d'écart entre chaque message, ça te va ? (pour de vrai, cette fois !). Te sens pas obligé de répondre à toutes mes questions en une seule fois. On peut essayer de faire plus court pour cette correspondance aussi, et ça sera plus rapide et dynamique. Et j'essaie de checker ta prochaine réponse plus vite, promis ! Signé Cyril (mais tu peux m'appeler "Clément" si tu veux 😉)

Oh well, Blink 182. Obvious musicianship (there's a reason most drummers are fawning over Travis Barker's skills), a game-changing success on a commercial standpoint, and streamlined production values all the way. Yet this album sucks for one main reason: because the vocal lines suck. And by that, I mean, they suck balls BIG TIME. Let me double down on that: those vocal lines are unimaginative, repetitive, harmonically flat, and pandering to the lowest sort of common denominator only the worst sort of pop out there can do (whether pop punk or plain pop). So as hard as the Californian band try to branch out towards emo, post-hardcore and abstract hip hop on this post-breakout release, their efforts are bound to fail. Probably because the fruit was rotten from the start with those lame, aseptic pop vocals. In a way, the end results even come off as far worse than in *Enema Of The State* -- where Blink 182 had at least the honesty to NOT pretend they were something else than they were, thereby managing to convey something that felt truly *fresh*, no matter how childish their elected genre was. Yeah, I know they were also commercially successful with this later eponymous record. So what? "Gangnam Style", Kid Rock and Vanilla Ice were as well. Since when should that sort of thing be *this* important when you supposedly play "punk" stuff? I can readily recognize that the string of four songs from "Asthenia" to "All Of This" on side 2 fares slightly better than anything on the first side. And it's quite nice to hear the featuring of Robert Smith -- of all people! -- in the latter track. Yet those vocals by The Cure's singer so easily outshine whatever it is that this Blink 182 singer blabbers in the song's underwhelming chorus, that the whole composition becomes a striking example of how the album goes wrong in so many areas overall -- in spite of a couple of redeeming moments here and there. Interesting to read that one of the band members, Tom DeLonge, was frustrated with the standardized process behind the writing and recording of this LP -- looks like the "branching out" thing didn't go as far as he wished, leading to his departure and quite a long hiatus after that. Maybe he would have successfully jettisoned the whole pop punk shtick had he truly had his say? Sadly, we'll never know. Before that, Travis Barker moonlit as Transplants' drummer with guys from Rancid and their entourage, and it was nice to hear his amazing, energetic skills for a project that was truly fun AND versatile this time around. Yet let's be honest for one second, the Blink 182 guys have never been the sharpest knives in the drawer on a creative standpoint. Oh, and their lyrics are often quite dumb. Should it come as a surprise for jocks who actually played porn videos almost 24/7 inside the San Diego villa where they spent months and months recording this thing? Very soulful indeed. Honestly, you can sense that sort of rock star bullshit in most notes played in this record. When Fleetwood Mac spent a shitload of money snorting endless lines of coke from a salad bowl during the *Rumours* studio sessions, they partly did it out of heartache, at least. And they had the decency to record all-time classic songs in the process. In comparison, Blink 182 just recorded a disposable record which even divided their fanbase. So there's no way on earth you can convince me this thing should be considered as "essential". 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5/5 for the musicianship and production values + 1/5 for the actual, topsy-turvy artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 18 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 31 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 62 (including this one) ------- Émile, j'ai enfin trouvé le temps de te répondre ! Désolé pour le retard ! Va voir sous la review du "Funeral Dress" de Wussy au dessus !

This, *Meddle*, and *Atom Heart Mother* could all easily have their rightful place on the list for me. I know my last suggestion would be a contentious choice for many listeners -- maybe not as attuned as I am to the "pre-post-rock" undertones of that underrated 1970 album, if you can forgive me for the monstrous tag between quotations marks here... But part of the Pink Floyd mystique is also how "divisive" they could be, in spite of their enormous commercial success in the second part of the seventies. Guess I'm just happy to add one more point of contention to the overall debate here, lol. Speaking of divisive and contentious choices, *Animals* was certainly one as well for some of the professional critics who initially gave a mixed reception to this 1977 record -- an expansive and ambitious one for sure, but also a stifling and less accessible opus to an extent, especially after the lush and somewhat airy soundscapes of *Wish You Were Here*. Yet look at the global score for the album on this generator today! So the "critics" probably had it all wrong. Pretty sure that among those still alive today, a lot of them have since changed their minds anyway. Why all the initial hate, though? Well, Pink Floyd was so huge at the time, and their previous two releases had been so ubiquitous that any off-kilter move from the band was bound to be divisive indeed. The punk explosion had also reshuffled all the cards, and "dinosaur rock" had suddenly become the golden calf you needed to put your spear through. Which is a little ironic given how dark, despondent and disillusioned *Animals* is itself -- in a sense very much in tune with the "no future" punk mantra of 1977. As a couple of users here noticed, the Orwellian overtones of this very dystopian album also make the latter a transition towards the paranoid delusions of grandeur of *The Wall*. You can consider those later aesthetics either as a success or as partly failed, but you just can't deny how striking Roger Waters' intents were in terms on overall impact on pop culture. This LP, contrary to the bulk of *The Wall*, is still unmistakably "prog" however, with its long suites, trippy guitar work by Mr. Gilmour, and some incredible production values -- the way Waters's vocals repeatedly fade into an ominous synth chord on "Sheep" is a thing of wonder still giving me goosebumps to this day, for instance. I guess you can't reasonably cram more than five Pink Floyd albums in a list such as this one -- "objectively" speaking, going over five entries can only be applied to The Beatles, even if I know that some folks would easily add David Bowie or Neil Young to that category. But honestly, someone also adding Pink Floyd in the latter has my subjective vote here. And *Animals* weighs a lot in said vote. I will spare you a track-by-track rundown of the album -- I imagine other fans have done that perfectly well in this section. Instead, I will end this presentation with a personal memory from my younger years. Just as another reviewer in here, I first thought that the factory on the artwork, evoking a dead sheep on its back with erect stiff legs, was a total invention -- odd how this photography looks like a painting when you see it from afar, by the way, adding to the illusion. One day, as I travelled from France to London by train, the exact same factory suddenly materialized through the windowpane very close to us, just as the train took one last curve towards the center of the British capital. Just like that other reviewer, I had never seen any other picture of the former Battersea Power Station before. And that place was real, not just an artistic feat of imagination. The way I stood corrected was way more dramatic than looking at a picture, though. It was like stepping into a dreamworld for real (or a dystopian, nightmarish one). And I guess that personal memory is fitting for a record where so many striking and eerie elements are lurking right around the corner, just waiting for your ears to catch them... 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 19 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 31 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 62 ------- Émile, j'ai enfin trouvé le temps de te répondre ! Désolé pour le retard ! Va voir sous la review du "Funeral Dress" de Wussy au dessus !

Too bored by this record to even write a proper review. I will mostly cut and paste quotes from its Wikipedia page, then... " Dan Martin from NME compared the album to Green Day's American Idiot, positing that "it's a piece of work that will challenge every preconception you ever had about the people who made it." " Er... sorry to rain on your (black) parade, but every preconception I had about that sort of overblown-to-ridiculous-proportions "emo rock" have just been confirmed when I spun this record filled to the brim with saccharine vocal lines -- which I did not merely find quite flat on a harmonic level, but also often actively annoying in their forced delivery -- whether screamed or sung. Guess that critics praising this thing, whether now or at the time, have been impressed by the rock opera storyline and the admittedly significant seventies influences (a bonus half-point for that). But in doing so, they sort of hailed this record as a platonic ideal for the "emo" tag that can't possibly represent the whole picture. More quotes to finish, not joining the wagons of critics heaping praise on this record: " The Observer gave the album a one star review, saying, "...it reeks of a band with ideas above its station."  Theon Weber of Stylus praised the album's use of Queen influences, but went on to summarize the album as "...a goofy record of bubblegum punk, with Queen lapping at its edges and enough good tracks to justify the smattering of empty screamfests." " Empty screamfests. Couldn't have phrased it better myself. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 6.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 19 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 31 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 63 (including this one) ------- Émile, j'ai enfin trouvé le temps de te répondre ! Désolé pour le retard ! Va voir sous la review du "Funeral Dress" de Wussy au dessus !

One of the most surprising or unforeseen things to come out of the late noughts is that the corpse of prog rock -- once murdered by the likes of Rush and Marillion in my own personal fantasy music history book -- got revived by post-hardcore acts such as The Mars Volta (someone needs to add *Frances The Mute* in this list, by the way). The Dear Hunter is another one of those acts and through the long narrative of their "Acts" series (different meaning) they seem to have created the most "exquisite corpse" indeed. Fast forward to 2015's "Act IV", and the post-hardcore undertones have mellowed to a more general prog rock direction, sprinkled with large indie-rock chunks and the expected grand orchestra flourishes. Less original, maybe, but Brian Crescenzo certainly has a knack for memorable choruses and melodic vocal lines. There's a couple of bum notes stylistically speaking on the second half of this record (not too fond of the somewhat heavy-handed -- and probably partly ironic -- "King Of Swords" and "If All Goes Well", which curiously veer towards British landfill indie of the preceding decade). Yet those bum notes aside, The Dear Hunter sure know how to create a dynamic and varied tracklist for that sort of overambitious record. As other reviewers pointed out, starting the story through a middle chapter feels a bit weird, though, and this even if you don't care about the tale in first listens -- I needed to browse through the earlier "Acts" to witness the initial musical direction of this project, and I have to say that I prefer the perfect balance between post-hardcore and prog found in those earlier records. The pompous grandiosity of the later entries, conveyed through increasingly streamlined and lush-sounding production values, can become a little overbearing and even stifling at times. This already occurs in Act IV, and it looks like Act V is even less restrained in this regard. Oh and is this series finished or not? What I've read online suggests an incomplete project, at least if I understand correctly. What's the point if we don't have the end of this story? Plus, it looks like The Dear Hunter also released quite a few *other* concept albums and EPs during their productive career, instead of finishing their main yarn. So I'm wondering now... Is Brian Crescenzo the G.R.R. Martin of indie prog? There are not enough minutes and hours in my days for me to try to find the answers to those questions. I thank the user who submitted this album because it allowed me to know a little more about this project, and I leave the door open to the Dear Hunter in my own virtual list of potential keepers. But honestly, this is the sort of suggestion sending you into an endless rabbit hole, which is always interesting, but can also easily make you feel burnt out when using this generator on a daily basis. I don't know... Maybe I AM burnt out? It's been more than three years now... One album a day, one "review" at a time... Time to take a break? Well... Let's just say that if a Deerhunter LP had been suggested instead of a The Dear Hunter one, I wouldn't feel this worn out.... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 19 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 32 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 63 ------- Émile, j'ai enfin trouvé le temps de te répondre ! Désolé pour le retard ! Va voir sous la review du "Funeral Dress" de Wussy au dessus !

I checked the lists of the person who submitted this LP and it looks like even a broken clock can be right twice a day. Ouch, that one was mean, I readily admit it. Yet if I can only argue with around 15 choices of albums in this person's highest-rated selections from the original list (not so bad out of 76 LPs), there are so many gems in the lowest-rated one that I just can't bring myself to adopt a conciliatory tone here. Also, hitting under the belt seems fair given the edgelord vibes in some of the short reviews left by this particular user. "1,2 Kung Fu" indeed! You reap what you sow. At least, that situation allows me to keep it short and (bitter)sweet for once. In all fairness, *1,2, Kung Fu* is an excellent little indie album, and it goes to a lot of interesting directions while keeping the whole shebang surprisingly tight and cohesive. Davey Newington's neo-psychedelia can harness Air, Ty Segall and Andy Shauf with equal ease. And so many songs in the album are catchy and memorable. So kudos for the suggestion, I absolutely mean it. I'll be on the lookout in case Boy Azooga finally manage to release *2,3, Tai Chi*. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5+4) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 20 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 32 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 63

"The song "I and Love and You" was chosen as the Starbucks iTunes Pick of the Week for September 22, 2009". That's a red flag for sure. Rick Rubin might have wanted to add a fresh addition to the Americana roster in his American Recordings label, but the Avett Brothers are no Johnny Cash, even if they write their own songs more than competently. "Quotidian" and "sappy" goes the Pitchfork review. I can't help agreeing. Where's the grain of sand, the unexpected quirk or bump on the road that can make your heart pace a little faster? Well, it's nowhere to be seen. Or heard. "Kick Drum Heart" sure attempts to illustrate my metaphor above through one rare lively cut. Same with "Slight Figure Of Speech", which bizarrely explores Violent Femmes turf. But those short songs only come off as a joke of sorts, or worse, goofy interludes that are emotionally unconnected with the rest. And everything else sounds so earnest and... professional. The vocal performances are sometimes a little thin sounding, but oddly enough not enough to make you feel genuine vulnerability -- they're just conveying the idea that the two brothers are doing their best in the studio space, and actually pulling it off on a technical level, but without much fanfare either. To finish, I will return to that Pitchfork review, which starts like this: "Do the Avett Brothers ever wake up feeling cranky? Mean-spirited? Less than generous? Their songs all communicate an unfailingly chummy earnestness that stems from candid introspection and unbidden love for their fellow man, and perhaps more than their brotherly harmonies or their rambunctious take on string-band Americana, that sincerity is their chief appeal. Of late, however, the Avetts' self-reckoning has grown so overbearing that it borders on obsession and threatens to limit their musical range..." Once again, I can't help agreeing. Damn, I hate it when I agree with those MFs! Here's for me waking up and feeling cranky this morning, I guess. 😉 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5+1.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 20 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 32 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 (including this one) --- Émile, je viens de voir tes dernières réponses. Je mets la mienne ci-dessous bientôt. 🙂

5% battery left in my phone. I decide to not plug it now, and so end my review before I'm out of juice. That will force me to make it short for once. Listening to Olivia Rodrigo's GUTS made me want to revisit my overlong review of Chappell Roan's *The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess* and actually edit it to include that other record in my "maybe" list (after refusing to do so at first). Just as I'm doing right now with *GUTS*. Sure, both albums straddle the fine line between witty, imaginative pop songwriting / production and very standardized lines of thoughts to make the songs more palatable for mainstream audiences. Yet I get why they do this somehow. For Olivia, that standardization hearkens back to nineties "alt-rock" aesthetics, which shrewdly allows her to speak to both teenage girls / young adults and older guys whose musical references never went further the year 2000. Two markets, one stone. A little too easy, but smart nonetheless. When you see the (for me) impeccable music tastes of the person who submitted this album, you somehow get the idea that this sort of overexposed pop can still manage to talk to demanding music listeners. Which is no small feat, very objectively. Not that the idea to submit this sort of record would have occured to me. And just like for Chappell, if I had had my say on the final "product", I would have edited out two or three cuts from this thing (here ballads that bring nothing really thrilling to the table -- Chappell's ballads are better overall, by the way). For the rest, you have the usual female vocal pyrotechnics over quite a lot of electric guitar, and depending on your mileage on those sort of vocals, you can either find this performance effective or tiring. My mileage being quite neutral, I can live with most of those songs, I guess. I don't know how many modern women pop singers I can include in my list of keepers without looking like a complacent consumer of whatever "popular" phenomenon is routinely churned out by the music industry, but I would lie if I said there is no craft and care poured into those sorts of records. Oh, I almost forgot: "Vampire" is a hell of a good song. There, I said it. Now, thank you for allowing me to make it short, Olivia. I can't say if it took you "guts" to co-write and record this album, but at least you managed to leave a somewhat memorable imprint on this li 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 20 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 34 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 --- Émile, j'ai donc lu tes deux dernières réponses. Je mets la mienne ci-dessous bientôt. 🙂

Crazy-ass hip hop album and a wild ride into the deranged mind of one of the most important rappers (and producers) who has ever lived. Rest in peace, DOOM. You kept the true flame of the genre alive at a time where a lot of your colleagues sort of lost the thread, and you did it on your own mad terms to boot. This is why you are a legendary figure today. Very aptly-named, the album feels like a grand buffet in a four-star hip hop restaurant. Sure, the four-part skit collage with a million samples from superhero cartoons in the second quarter of the LP is probably a little hard to stomach for some listeners (this part nearly drove my partner crazy when I played the album in our living room the other day). Especially when you have so many other interludes at the end and beginning of the other tracks including real lyrics. I personally feel those skits bring a lot of mood and personality to the table, though -- especially the last one in the four-part collage, "Fig Leaf Bi-Carbonate", whose beats and brass section would have been great for a proper song. Strange that Doom chose to gather all the individually-named skits in such early slots, but for me their grouped presence doesn't hurt the album's flow that much. Also the LP ends on a strange note with "Kookies" -- spectacular on a lyrical level, but a bit muted and low-stakes on a musical one. Maybe the impossibility to use the original Sesame Street sample in the track played into that, I don't know... That said, everything else in the menu is just so damn perfect. The basslines are especially lively, the musical styles harnessed here go from boom-bap to old-school funk, and yet everything sounds tight, cohesive and catchy as hell. Doom's flow is hypnotic, here enhanced by a very raw sound capture that enhances the authenticity of the whole thing. From the get-go, "Beef Rapp" gives you the impression that MF Doom is rapping in his kitchen rather than a studio, with the TV on behind him blasting the soundtrack and dialogues of one of those cartoons he was so obsessed with. Some guests come to the kitchen sometimes, like Angelika on "Guinnessez" for a stellar featuring (whatever happened to that excellent female rapper?), while Dumile / Doom's chorus on the same song is one of the best old school hip hop choruses about love relationships this side of the 21st Century. Before that, "Deep Fried Frenzy" is also a moving trip down old school memory lane, whose suave synth-enhanced funk groove digs as deep as it can get. But most of all, you have four absolute highlights in this joint that make it a mandatory listen for any rap / hip hop fan out there: jittery "Hoe Cake", the Madlib-produced, psychedelic "One Beer", the mesmerizing, electric-guitar-enhanced "Rapp Snitch Knishes", and the laidback yet lyrically aggressive "Vomitspit". It's actually quite hard to describe what works so well in those cuts, but let's just say that each shine with their own special light -- one which only MF DOOM's artistry can exude. So it's one for the ages, as original and so distinctively personal as those songs are. Actually, this album is one for the ages probably because of those very assets. Like a lot of other musical genres, good hip hop suffers much from standardization, and everything in this record seems to resist the very idea. And on that subject, I'm waiting for Madvillainy now. I can't wait to read what other reviewers have to say about that one as well. See you then. Here's my tip: 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5+4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 21 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 34 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 --- Émile, j'ai donc lu tes deux dernières réponses. Je mets la mienne ci-dessous bientôt. 🙂

Yesterday, I had *Mm.. Food* to review, and today, this is *Madvillainy*'s turn! What are the odds, right? My little pinky tells me this can't be a coincidence. Either this generator is set to make the two MF DOOM entries in the users' list follow one another, or someone is closely following my progression... Like, maybe, an overarching presence behind a comic book villain's mask, ready to let a sardonic laugh come out of his mouth. Am I getting paranoid here? You tell me. Oddly enough, I might have less things to say about this album than *Mm.. Food*. There are even days where I prefer the latter's livelier and more extravagant moods to the far stranger ones of *Madvillainy*, to be honest. Yet *Madvillainy* exudes with a very special aura that makes it precious. And a lot of it comes from the perfect symmetry between Madlib's minimal, ascetic production and the very arcane lyrics of the American rapper -- here served with an economical yet masterful flow suggesting both mathematical precision and unbridled creativity. No hooks. No choruses. Just a mad stream of consciousness that jumps from one relatively short track to the next, like a flipper ball tossed around by an army of tiny bumpers, never letting gravity do its normal work. The album is not 100% perfect by any means (and neither is *Mm.. Food*, by the way). A couple of cuts not putting Doom's talents to the forefront (like "Eye", sung by an obscure vocalist on the second side) could have been left on the cutting room's floor without changing the whole deal. But when MF Doom shines on this one, it's just dazzling. Apart from a rare straightforward song such as "Strange Ways", free association indeed reigns supreme in this feast of alliterations and hemp-soaked hallucinations. And the imagery here is dense like the cloud of marijuana smoke that followed Doom wherever he went, in keeping with the equally hypnotic curves of the music. The constant play-on-words, the non-sequiturs, the surrealistic touches... I'm pretty fluent in English, but I have to admit that trying to follow those lyrics even gets frustrating at times for a guy like me, who's not a native speaker. But it's*never* boring. And it still feels fresh today. Just like Madlib's best cuts on a purely musical level ("Accordion", "Meat Grinder", "Raid"...)... And when the two men are at the absolute top of their game at the exact same moment, you simply get the stuff of hip hop legend. It's "Figaro", a two-minute miracle turning Doom into a sort of Mozart of the rap mic, conveying the same sort of seemingly effortless talent as the old Austrian composer -- actually requiring gargantuan skills. Or it's *ALL CAPS" and its anthemic nature without ever a sing-along or a hook in it. No, *Madvillainy* is not a 100% perfect rap album. But it's probably the best "imperfect" rap album of all times -- instinctual and inexhaustible, difficult and accessible, high-brow and laid-back, simple yet complex, everything all at once and everything a hip hop head has ever dreamed of -- without necessarily remembering the dream the next morning. A mystery hiding in an enigma, just like the best comic book villains out there. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5+4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 22 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 34 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 --- Émile, j'ai donc lu tes deux dernières réponses. Je mets la mienne ci-dessous bientôt. 🙂

Sometimes I Sit And Write Reviews As I Listen To My Daily Suggestion From The 1001 Albums Generator. And Sometimes I Just Sit. I'm generally a 'music first, lyrics later' kind of guy, but I make exceptions for a couple of rappers and Courtney Barnett. Nice pairing, right? And what am I saying? Barnett's music on this debut is often excellent anyway: it only sounds a bit mundane if you don't pay attention to its many awesome arrangements -- a mistake I did in 2015, that I'm not repeating today. The partly spoken-word, partly sung vocal performance is also very distinctive, even if I imagine it's not to the taste of everyone. What is it with Australians and sprechgesang, by the way? Sometimes Barnett retrospectively sounds like a more poised version of Amy Taylor from Amyl And The Sniffers -- and it's an (involuntary?) lineage I find quite amusing, to be honest. As I suggested earlier, it's not the only thing that's fun in those songs. Because beyond the deadpan vocal delivery, you often stumble upon hilarious lyrical nuggets in the album... Like in the mock-existential "Dead Fox" or "Nobody Cares If You Don't Go To The Party"... On that note, "Aqua Profunda!" is my exact experience working out at the swimming pool, when I routinely try to impress someone in the next lane and most often fail miserably at it. Except that I don't end up sinking like a stone, at least. Or... not yet? Returning to the music, there are also lots of endearing catchy earworms to be found in Barnett's initial artistry: cuts such as "Elevator Operator", "Pedestrian At Best", "Debbie Downer", or "Dead Fox", once again... And they perfectly balance out the more melancholic compositions, where Courtney sometimes goes through more philosophical musings that could be either ironic or totally in earnest. All those pairings between different intents, miraculously converging into such a cohesive whole, make for a great listen indeed. The hype around Barnett has petered out quite some time ago now, but I really think it was warranted at the time, and I wouldn't be surprised if this LP became a future "classic" in the foreseeable future. At least that's what comes into my mind when I sit and think about it. The rest of the time, I just sit and listen with a grin on my face. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5+4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 23 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 34 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 --- Émile, j'ai donc lu tes deux dernières réponses. Je mets la mienne ci-dessous bientôt. 🙂

If you've ever wondered what The Smashing Pumpkins would generally sound like without the divisive vocals of Billy Corgan, the rockier highlights of this record are the closest approximation of that idea out there. Strong "Cherub Rock" whiffs on this record's most famous single, "Stars", for instance -- a single released about the same time Corgan and co. conquered the charts, not so coincidentally. With a "somewhat-rough singer with a flat affect" instead, as the person who submitted this LP has the honesty to describe, in spite of his love for the album. I realize this 'alternative' kind of singer could be divisive all by itself today, for very different reasons. But being a "child of the nineties" myself, I can easily subscribe to those sorts of subdued vocal aesthetics anyway -- which were very common at the time as well. That said, the initial comparison with the Pumpkins -- also useful to describe "The Pod" and "I Hate It Too" -- would be way too reductive given that Hum also successfully explores many other aesthetics: space rock ("I'd Like Your Hair Long") ; minimalistic post-rock turf adjacent to a more streamlined and reined-in Slint ("The Very Old Man", "Why I Like Robins", right in the middle of the album -- and also the terrific closer "Songs Of Farewell And Departure") ; or somewhat cold metallic tones vaguely reminiscent of Helmet, and also unwittingly foretelling Deftones. Worthy of note, Chino Moreno has expressed his love for the band, as mentioned in the Wikipedia blurb for *You'd Prefer An Astronaut*. Kind of wishing the user who submitted this record could also have added a Deftones album to the second list, to be honest -- but at least his choice allows me to fix a blind spot I had about 90s "alt-rock". Last Hum LP, *Inlet* (released in 2020), heavier in its unmistakable stoner rock riffs, also sounds pretty good, by the way. So thanks for the suggestion. I doubt there will be room left for it in my own virtual list of keepers. Maybe shoegaze-related opener "Little Dipper" is a little too underwhelming for me to make it happen -- why such a linear song in the first slot? Beats me. 🤷 But I certainly leave my door open to Hum in theory. Because had I discovered this record at the time of its release, chances are that I would have loved the bulk of it as well. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 23 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 35 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 64 --- Émile, ma dernière réponse sera écrite dans l'album de demain. J'ai utilisé ma propre DeLorean pour éditer cette review afin de te prévenir. J'en profite d'avoir un pur disque de centre d'achat, comme tu dis (dernier album de 1975, lol), un de ceux pour faire les chores de la journée, comme passer l'aspirateur, pour consacrer l'essentiel de la review à cette réponse. See you tomorrow !

Probably one of the most overrated band of the 2010s, here in a later album released as their trend was finally starting to peter out. Which triggers an extra level of perplexity in me. Couple of redeeming points: the iteration of the "The 1975"-named opener track for this record (continuing the band's tongue-in-cheek tradition) admittedly has pretty cool melodies and arrangements. And so does the Steely Dan-adjacent "Part Of The Band" (as much as this band is musically overrated for me, they've always managed to record a couple of decent cuts for each of their album). Besides, the last four tracks are listenable, I guess. But the rest is just, as usual, the most generic 80s dross you can find this side of the 21st century. And I still don't know if the worst crime here is whether those other songs are so cheesy or so unmemorable. Not that I really care to find out. Because the mix between the salvageable tracks and the cheesefest cuts doesn't make a whole lot of sense anyway -- even if you want to have a benevolent take of the admittedly very competently produced recordings overall. As a result, the tracklist neither rhymes nor reasons and becomes a chore to go through, diminishing whatever assets *some* of the individual songs may have. All of this could warrant a 2/5 grade, but then you have to add the Matt Healy factor to the equation. Which thus becomes a substraction. That guy is, simply said and politely put, a self-centered douche. You know it from his stupid public "statements" online, which he routinely regrets afterwards (before yet another dumb tweet). Even Charli XCX, who has dated one of the band's members for a long time now (George), recently let on in public (and in very diplomatic terms) that Healy was sort of a nut job, and that he should be kept away from a phone as much as possible. More importantly, you can obviously sense how obnoxious and eyeroll-inducing Healy is through his lyrics. Oh, his heart can be in a right place sometimes, like when he tries to assess the state of our current culture and sort of lambasts individualism in our postmodern internet age in this album's opener -- obviously including himself in the criticism. The thing is, such mirror-effect is a double-edged sword given that almost *every* aspect of this discussion goes through his narcissistic, self-entitled, rock star "persona"'. It's sort of shooting yourself in the foot here. And even if you try hard to ignore the narcissist impulse, the end result feels way too "chatty" and heavy-handed, ruining whatever good lyrical ideas Healy had about the subject in the first place. Not that he always has good ideas. Here's for example what he had to say about the first lines of this song to Pitchfork -- and, in extension, about all the other lyrics in the album: "There are so many good dick jokes on the record. It’s all about my dick. I’m obsessed with my dick for some reason. I’m trying to figure out what that represents. I think it’s because there’s such potency to the idea of the dick, and so much fragility in modern masculinity, and my masculinity. I’m obsessed with that duality, of just, like, having a dick." So, basically, the guy admits... being a dick. Do we really need to comment upon *this*? That said, maybe Healy should stick to "dick jokes" and so spare us some of his "deeper" thoughts once in a while. At some point during the course of this LP, Matt's nihilism even encourages him to suggest that "wokeness" (whatever that word means, or whatever online caricature of the idea Healy has found online) is actually as bad as QAnon. When your brains are fried by doomscrolling, I guess you can end up equating one with the other, because nothing is real anymore. Yet you have to be a hopeless idiot not questioning your internet behavior to spurt out stuff like that. At some point, you need to look back on whatever it was you were thinking, and just go: "OK, wait", instead of writing that sort of dumb shit in your lyrics and keeping it as is. That sort of thing will age like milk, if you want my prediction. Heck, with all the fascists or near-fascists in charge of so many places right now, it *already* sounds desensitized and out of touch with reality. But maybe all of this happens because Healy is nothing but an old fart in disguise, hiding behind convenient cynical layers an "old man yells at clouds" mindset. In the same album's opener, it's for instance hard to state whether he is first and foremost feeling sorry for himself or for the seventeen-year-olds he refers to in the chorus -- because they're supposedly living through some sort of internet-enhanced dark age. Hey Matt, maybe today's youth are gonna be somewhat fine, because they're better equipped to navigate those digital waters than you ever were. But what do I know? One thing's for sure, though. What's truly hilarious, beyond the opinion itself, is the fact that this neurotic mock-edgy goofball never once asked himself whether young people *truly* needed advice from someone as self-deluded as he is. Looks like this guy confused the size of his pecker with the size of his ego. Wouldn't be the first time this happens, after all. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential album. 6/10 for more general purposes (5+1) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 23 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 35 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 65 (including this one) --- Speaking of "being funny in a foreign language", I'm currently using this generator to exchange words with a very nice French Canadian chap, and the rest of this text is part of our correspondence. Don't know if we are really "funny" when we write to each other, but it's pretty cool directly reaching out to someone else in a space not intended for that. The internet is like most things in life, it's a tool. And it's up to us to make it something that can challenge modern alienation. Or at least try to. Sure feels nicer than listening to the nonsensical ditherings of a narcissistic twat, just because his once-trendy band made him famous. ---- Salut Marty McFly. Pardon, je veux dire Émile, ha ha. Elle m'a bien fait rire, ta ref à Retour Vers Le Futur. J'ai moi-même découvert le bouton "edit" sur ce générateur il y a pas très longtemps, et j'essaie de ne pas en abuser -- tant pis pour les fautes. Déjà qu'il y a pas assez d'heures dans une journée pour écrire ma daily review. Je devrais faire comme toi, y aller plus tranquille quand il y a un album que je sais que je vais aimer, et l'écouter dans les bois. Il y en a pas si loin de chez moi, mais il faudrait que je prenne mon vélo. Ça m'a toujours fait rêver les bois canadiens. Des fois je regarde sur Google Maps en mode satellite, je prends un coin au hasard dans ton pays ou autour de la frontière des US, et je regarde le paysage de l'espace. Weird, hein ? Réponses à tes deux dernières questions. Je suis prof d'anglais. Une autre raison pour laquelle je tartine autant sur mes reviews, peut-être. Ça me fait un entraînement pour écrire sur quelque chose dans cette langue. Et ça change des textes un peu limités pour les élèves de mon collège (de 11 à 15 ans). Les voyages scolaires ou de formation, c'est aussi parce que je suis un des deux référents européens de mon école (programme Erasmus). Tu crois qu'avec l'autre gros ballon de baudruche menaçant à la Maison Blanche, le Canada aura envie de rejoindre l'Europe ? Je blague, mais si ça arrivait je postulerais tour de suite pour une formation chez vous. 2e question, mes artistes préférés de ces dernières années. Impossible de tout mettre, donc je vais cibler des choses qui pourraient ptet te plaire. J'ai parcouru ta highest rated list, et relu tes réponses. J'ai donc enlevé tout ce qui est trop post-punk ou noise, ce qui a pas l'air d'être ton truc. Pareil pour le rap et le hip hop (tu dis clairement que tu "comprends pas" ça dans ta review d'un des mecs du Wu-Tang). J'ai aussi enlevé certaines chanteuses pop ou électro. Pour l'indie-rock, j'hésite, donc je vais tenter des suggestions quand-même... Première d'entre elles, un groupe QUEBECOiS et FRANCOPHONE (très rare pour moi), que j'ai vu sur scène à Nantes, en plus, et que j'adore. Il s'agit de Corridor. *Junior* et *Mimi* en particulier. J'imagine que tu connais ? Le chanteur a aussi un projet folk en solo qui s'appelle Jonathan Personne. J'aime un peu moins, mais sur scène, ça reste cool. Après ça, je te fais une liste non exhaustive, toujours en essayent d'imaginer là où tu pourrais accrocher (je me trompe certainement, mais sur un malentendu...) Big Thief (l'intégralité de leur discographie -- commencer par les deux premiers peut-être, Masterpiece et Capacity). Vu trois fois sur scène. Je suis assez dingue de l'écriture d'Adrianne Lenker (aussi vue en solo) Nick Wheeldon - Gift Un anglais qui vit à Paris et qui est tombé dans la marmite Bob Dylan / Big Star après des années garage rock. C'est quasiment un copain, il est longtemps sorti avec une pote. Mais je te jure que c'est pas pour ça que je le cite ici : il a un talent de songwriter incroyable, et il y a d'autres albums récents que celui-là à explorer ! Low Mais où commencer ? Carrière de 30 ans, tragiquement interrompue. Je le cite parce que les derniers albums sont juste pour moi aussi bons que les premiers, dans un rendu pourtant totalement différent. Mais tu peux commencer par *Things We Lost In The Fire* dans les plus anciens (cité dans la users list, au passage). C'est généralement calme et souvent mystique. Rest in peace, Mimi Parker. Ensuite, en vrac : Andy Shauf -- The Party et The Neon Skyline (soft-rock / indie rock) Father John Misty -- Mahasmashana (soft rock / indie rock) Lankum - False Lankum (dark folk irlandais) Being Dead -- Eels (indie rock un peu cinglé) MJ Lenderman -- Manning Fireworks (indie folk rock) Mitski -- The Land Is Inhospitable And So Are We (vintage pop / dream pop) Jessica Pratt -- Here In The Pitch (vintage pop / dream pop) Et bizarrement, le dernier Vampire Weekend (pop rock), Only God Was Above Us, alors que j'étais pas un énorme fan d'eux avant. Et toi ? Faut que je te laisse, je dois aller à un "conseil de classe". C'est une bonne idée d'écrire les réponses en plusieurs "sessions" plus courtes. La prochaine fois, je ferai ça. Mais là, j'étais inspiré par tes questions. A+ Cyril

The very definition of poised, tranquil pop folk. A very self-assured vocal performance, maybe a little too pristine and perfect for the genre, but still authentic-sounding enough. Nice songs and some very interesting arrangments once in a while. That lively boogie piano on "Lillian Egypt"... That high-pitched synth line sounding like a theremin on "Good Man", along with those low-pitched, deep male backing vocals... The only problem about the inclusion of this album here is maybe how generic and devoid of real surprises the whole thing sounds, in spite of those discreet off-kilter flourishes. You'd just need more imaginative chords to wake you up at some point, or a vocalist willing to take far more risks in one way or another (even if Josh Ritter does so in the -- admittedly too long -- spoken word bridges of "Thin Blue Flame"). The lyrics are also fine enough, I guess. Yet I wouldn't bet on that horse -- ultimately looking like so many other ones of them -- to become the memorable folk thoroughbred this extra list really needs. Thanks for the suggestion, though. There are better choices for me out there, but also far worse ones! 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential album. 8/10 for more general purposes (5+3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 23 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 35 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 66 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

2 Mael Brothers + 1 legendary disco producer (Giorgio Moroder) + 3 absolute bangers ("Tryouts For the Human Race", "Beat The Clock", and the title track). + 2 fun and excellent lively tracks ("Academy Award Performance" and "La Dolce Vita") + 1 moodier cut hearkening back to Kraftwerk ("My Other Voice") + 1 overall album brightly foretelling future synth pop and new wave shenanigans (at its best) + 1 radical and groundbreaking left turn in the band's discography + quite a few melodic earworms, either through vocals or keyboards + many typical Sparks quirks navigating between irony and earnestness + one cinematic, relentless electronic drive... = one album criminally overlooked in the original list. Sometimes maths is simple. Number one in the heaven of underrated yet incredibly influential LPs. Sparks have released a lot of great songs throughout their career, but *this* is how they managed to craft a memorable gem in the album format. A fine companion to *Kimono My House* for sure. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 24 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 35 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 66 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

This one has been underrated, or worse, ignored by so many "professional critics" for so long, it's simply one of the most outrageous case of musical talent not being recognized fairly. From opener "Frank Sinatra" to that Willie Nelson cover at the end of the tracklist, this album oozes with fun, groove, catchy melodies, witty lyrics, off-kilter instrumentation and, most importantly, instant charm. "The Distance", "Friend Is a Four Letter Word", "Open Book", "Daria", "It's Coming Down"... So many memorable and endearing tunes in there. This collection of songs is just perfect, and the fistful of tongue-in-cheek covers sprinkled among them ("I Will Survive", "Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps"...) is just a riot. Each and every person I know who is aware of this album simply loves it. So, clearly, I can't see why allmusic and the likes are unable to recognize *Fashion Nugget* for the nineties masterpiece that it is. One that hasn't aged a day, to boot (Cake were too much their own thing to follow the trends of the day, and this paid off an incredible amount of dividends on this LP in the long run). This needed to be added to the users list, period. And in a sense, nostalgia makes this one sound even better and timeless today, if that makes sense. An album which starts with the following lines down there can only elicit the most heartfelt responses, because it's as if the performer singing that song had finally equalled his avowed model on the radio and joined him to croon to all the animals under the starry night sky. "We know of an ancient radiation That haunts dismembered constellations A faintly glimmering radio station While Frank Sinatra sings Stormy Weather The flies and spiders get along together Cobwebs fall on an old skipping record..." Great music can produce this kind of miracle, right? All you need is a good tune and poetic imagery like that. So here's me hoping that the first thing aliens living hundreds of light years away hear from earth is this song. They would hear many horrible things about us afterwards (musical or otherwise). But at least, with a start like that, maybe they'll remember we're not *totally* hopeless... Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 25 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 35 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 66 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Not so bad. *Rose Mountain* starts like a mix of X, L7 and The Geraldine Fibbers, and I guess there are worse references out there. I readily believe they're a great act to see live. The thing is, I'm still unsure whether this admittedly cool rock album has what it takes to be included in a unfortunately very restrictive list that cannot go over the 1001 number. Maybe it's because this LP seems to lose a little steam in its middle section. And if you only take into account Mannequin Pussy's recent irruption in that realm of woman-fronted rock / punk rock acts, the competition suddenly becomes one notch fiercer. I want to give Screaming Females the benefit of the doubt, tough, as I often do with well-crafted records such as this one. Wait and see... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential album, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 25 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 36 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 66 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Just like that one reviewer, I would have preferred reviewing the legendary pre-punk Detroit band also going by the "Death" moniker... But I have to admit I'm still pretty happy to have listened to this record, if only to know more about death metal history. Looks like *Symbolic* mostly impressed at the time through its more melodic dirges and subtle prog-rock flourishes (quite striking on the second side!). Of course, this has triggered endless discussions between "purists" and more open-minded fans of the genre. And of course the latter were ultimately right. Apart for that debate, some of the main riffs are instantly memorable (which is not necessarily a given in that subgenre), the guitar solos are admittedly gratuitously pyrotechnic, but most importantly, always fun and imaginative, and the topical elements evoked in the lyrics are worth exploring, I guess (but more on the lyrics later). Also worthy of note, some very subliminal hardcore punk influences can be pinpointed in this record. Oh, gone are the definitely faster cuts I found in Death's earlier albums as I browsed through them -- which supposedly also influenced grindcore acts so much. Maybe we're missing out on them a little here, yet let's be honest for one second: in those earlier albums, that sort of more "orthodox" death metal was produced on a budget anyway, and it is borderline unlistenable for newcomers today. In comparison, *Symbolic*'s sound and production values aged far better -- even if the reverb on the drums come off as somewhat awkward at times. A very minor gripe, but I needed it out of my chest. Trying as hard to be as objective as I can be, you see. One flaw that I often associate with this genre, for instance, is the manner some parts in the songs are "glued" to one another, yielding to compositions that neither rhyme nor reason for me, and I can find that flaw in the LP to an extent. But I get that for certain fans this aspect probably brings a key element of surprise preventing those tracks from becoming too linear, which is something I also tried to consider as I listened. At the end of the day, that thing is probably crafted just as it should have been. So if you're not the target audience, it's probably better to leave your expectations at the door, and assess the album on its own merits. Of even better, try to "feel" it. "Without judgement, perceptions would increase a thousand times" goes Chuck Shuldiner at some point (may he rest in power). I can only applaud the idea, even if some of the man's lyrics sound hamfisted once in a while. But maybe the problem is that I'm still "judging" those lyrics according to standards that can't apply for metal at large, instead of "feeling" their message. A little food for thought here: good art is not always about being pleasant or skilled, but following the best idea that can truly enhance the aesthetics you dedicate your creations to. And I thank Death (and that nameless French Canadian user) for offering us an illustration of that concept on this generator. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential album, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5+3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 25 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 37 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 66 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Hell is paved with good intentions. This user wants to shed light on a representative of the Boston hardcore / metalcore scene, but instead of choosing Converge, early Cave In, Bane, In My Eyes or Have Heart, they selected... Killswitch Engage. To each their own, of course, yet I can't help rolling my eyes here. Because for me, this amounts to praising a KFC meal without ever considering the long history of cajun cuisine or southern soul food as a reference point. I'm not gonna deny it, the names I've mentioned up there have been forgotten or even ignored right away by most people not versed in the American HxC scene. But so is Killswitch Engage today. So why them and not the others? I have a theory: the person who chose this record originally didn't know much about the Boston scene anyway, you can sense it in their own review when they explain how they discovered this band (i.e. more or less on a fluke). Of course, there's nothing wrong with that at first. But two decades down the line, you've had plenty of time to dig further and find out for yourself that this later band is just a bastardized mongrel offshoot of everything that was originally good about that whole local scene. To be more specific, what bastardized the hardcore aesthetics here are those *horrid* clean vocals peppered on most tracks -- so flat on a harmonic level, and just ruining whatever urgency could be felt in the songs' verses. You can sense that Linkin Park had already messed with those (metal)heads, and opened Pandora's box to unleash all sorts of cheesy supposedly "pop" choruses on a target audience that had never asked for that sort of thing in metal and punk hxc in the first place -- and yet were swayed into it for all the wrong reasons. Ugh, so cheesy. Ironically, a recent hardcore-adjacent act named The Armed has recently managed to incorporate (hyper)pop in their extreme sound in ways Killswitch Engage could only have dreamed of. But some guys will only follow their own nostalgia to single out old acts in their favorite niche genres, instead of finding ones that can feel truly *vital* today. This is how HxC risks becoming a folklore museum, by the way (and it is very much one now, sadly, see Turnstile's success -- understandable, yet so bent on regressive pleasures beyond the hyperpop gloss). But I digress here, as usual... So yeah, as much as I love (well-crafted) pop melodies in most other genres, here they're simply not working for me. Which is why I'd rather focus on the extreme metal parts in this record. Not that the latter are perfect either. Relative lack of variations and dynamics go with that whole HxC territory, I readily admit it... But here said lack becomes so obvious that the whole listening experience ends up coming off as stale and stifling. Go and listen to Converge, early The Armed, or any of the names dropped up there, for pete's sake: here's how you can create an aggressive wild ride from one song to the next, instead of a complacent and self-indulgent testosterone showcase leading to nowhere (except sudden hackneyed pop vocals). Too often, there's no way to know where one cut ends and the other starts, unless you're checking your phone. A sure sign that those songs are pointless for me. And the lyrics, you might ask? Flat and unconvincing calls to raise consciousness through a vaguely defined "revolution" (most often personal, and rarely "collective", or so it feels like this). Nothing specific about the ways society is sick and how *we* can try to fix it. And as a so-called answer to those woes, nothing that can beat a cheap tattered self-help book found in your local secondhand shop. Yeah, I know, I know... This *also* goes with HxC territory, from "positive" hardcore bands to more "emo"-related acts -- and not even the bands I've mentioned up there are immune to that sort of criticism. But given how ironically unengaging Killswitch Engage's music is on a general level, those damn lyrics are just the last straw. Hesitated between a 1/5 and a 2/5 mark before I wrote this review. But reading myself again, I really can't see how I can go above 1. Sorry. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 6/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency + 1 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 25 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 37 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 67 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

The Things We Lost In The Fire is time, and the time it takes to take it, doubling down on itself and making you tally the seconds ticking on the clock. *Slowcore*, a tag Low was said not to be at ease with, and yet the best one we have to articulate the magic of their music. You slow down your bodily rhythms until they fit with each movement of the needle. The one stuck to the long groove on your record, here spinning in front of your hypnotized eyes. And the one gently bouncing on the wall as each second is counted. The Things We Lost In The Fire is the chiaroscuro wonder of songs that could be either sung as a lullaby to the little ones or as a paean to the moon, howled by gentle and sad creatures of the night. The Things We Lost In The Fire is the infinite melancholy and the delicate touch of the band as they handle their instruments -- here helped by a bunch of guests that all bring their incredible skills to the same goal: awe you, finding your soft spot, make you shudder, make you cry -- as long as you open your ears and your soul enough. The Things We Lost In The Fire is family memories, demonstrations of faith, tender acts of love, sudden moments of defiance, elegiac folk hymns to the present time... Sometimes they're conveyed through a walk in mysterious, hazy woods, where everything feels so ethereal you could think you're strolling on the lunar surface ("Whitetails" or "Embrace", foretelling through analog aesthetics the barren digital landscapes of *Double Negative* and *HEY WHAT* two decades later -- hereby proving how consistent Low has always been in spite of the many stylistic turns during their perfect career). Other times those emotions are served courtesy of a generous array of heartbreaking melodies and subtly climactic surges ("Sunflower", "Dinosaur Act", "July", "Like A Forest", "In Metal"). The Things We Lost In The Fire is Steve Albini and how his ethos, recording methods and sound aesthetics simply transcend each and every detail in this extraordinary record. Steve has recorded so many pivotal albums from great acts it is easy to lose count of them. But by my book, this LP is among the ten best records he has ever "non-produced". Rest in power, Steve. The Things We Lost In The Fire is Mimi Parker's voice, soft and yet always self-assured, the mossy rock over which Alan Sparhawk's own gentle vocals anchored themselves so tirelessly, husband and wife harmonizing on eternal songs filled with longing, pain and relief, either mystical or deeply humane. I want to believe that when the world lost Mimi, God was the first to cry -- and if not him/her/them, whatever higher power in the skies had the sheer luck of hearing those songs through the static routinely sent from our forlorn planet. Whoever you are, you who chose this record for this list, and wherever you are -- whether on the snowy plains of Minnesota or lost in the outback in Australia... thank you. I don't need any pretext to spin this LP, just like the vast majority of the other Low albums you can find in their discography. But I think I needed to hear this one today. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 26 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 37 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 67 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Mad respect for that "wave" of American post-hardcore / emo-adjacent acts that brought us so many excellent LPs at the turn of the 2010s, and keeps on doing so today. La Dispute, Defeater, Touché Amoré... The latter are admittedly the ones I'm less familiar with among the three I've quoted up there, but that doesn't make them less good -- it's just that an undefined set of circumstances made me go to the two other acts first. From all the Touché Amoré records I've listened to so far, it looks like the Angeleno band is the one in that bunch displaying the least variations from track to track (or from album to album, even) -- to the point when it sometimes becomes a little hard to differentiate their songs or memorize their discrete part. It's all the more ironic since vocalist Jeremy Bolm is not merely good with one-note screamed vocals, he also has a great voice for "clean-sounding" sung parts (as in "Benediction"). And using just a little more of the latter would have added needed dynamics to this LP, I think -- just like Defeater did when they added barebones acoustic songs to their hardcore punk scorchers in their own early concept LPs, or when La Dispute switched from agitated dirges to very slow atmospheric cuts, with the bpms in the songs going from one side of the spectrum to the other... That said, what Touché Amoré lose in variety, they make up for it tenfold through the strong cohesiveness of their musical offerings. The one-two-three punch of "Eight Seconds", "Palm Dreams" and "Softer Spoken" in the middle of the tracklist is for instance a great example of such convincing cohesiveness -- just like the one of the first three songs on the album, actually. And when the band's different assets (melody and aggression ; screamed and sung vocals) are all brought to the same track on a silver platter -- like in the awesome "Skyscraper", featuring the equally awesome Julien Baker -- everything perfectly aligns. Add the confessional, often heartbreaking lyrics, and the very personal concept at the heart of this particular record, and you have a more than decent contender for the users list. While La Dispute excels at poetic dirges and metaphorical ditherings, and Defeater kills it penning full-blown working class narratives, what Touché Amoré does is obviously more straightforward and/or less topical as a whole. But that doesn't make the results less interesting overall... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 26 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 67 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Just like the Egyptian ruins shown on *I Am*'s artwork, Earth Wind And Fire's hits have been deservedly preserved in public consciousness, to the detriment of their albums' deeper cuts, now mostly forgotten and buried in the sand. The question is, which albums from their golden age in the late seventies harbored the most valuable deeper cuts? Let's all pretend we are archeologists here. After all, isn't that what we're all doing on a daily basis with this generator? There seems to be two groups of listeners when it comes to *I Am* (1979): those who think this LP is their highest achievement in the album format -- quite a large one given the incredibly high global score given to the record -- and those who consider it marks the start of their artistic decline, in spite of the legendary success of single "Boogie Wonderland". I have to admit I am part of the smaller second group, along with a lot of "professional critics" out there. Not that I always agree with them, but here I definitely do. In general terms, *I Am* favors a 100% commercially-minded effort -- a somewhat watered down, more streamlined version of the band's funk craft. Not unpleasant to listen to, yet not as rewarding as previous full-length releases from them. I don't mind the more pronounced disco influences, it made sense that EWF would eventually catch that train, even if belatedly. What I do object to is the rather formulaic approach to the tracklist, which lazily uses the three clear highlights in the record (the sensational opener "In The Stone", proudly showcasing a trademark bombastic horn section and killer vocal harmonies ; the groovy and iconic "Boogie Wonderland"; the classic ballad "After The Love Has Gone") as a template to then copy and paste their elements and intents on far lesser compositions, instead of trying to explore other territories. Hits don't necessarily yield to great LPs, unless you cram more and more of them in a tracklist. Ironically, EWF could have done so. If only they had included "September" in the tracklist (their most famous and recognizable song, released both as a single and as part of a compilation released the year before), the album would have appeared as more solid overall. The other option would have implied including more daring, quote-unquote "experimental" elements. Like, something akin to the fun and lively Brazilian influences found on previous LP *All 'n All* (maybe my favorite of theirs, in spite of the fact that the only timeless hit in it is "Fantasy"). Alas, Maurice White and his brothers / companions do none of those things. And you can clearly sense a lack of stakes on the second side of this album as a result. Crucially, this is also the album where Maurice White started to systematically hire the help of outside writers -- didn't know that before, but I was definitely not surprised when I read the credits of the songs. For me, this conveys the idea that his heart was not fully in it, and that the main idea was to capitalize on the good work that had been done so far. Fine, maybe he had no choice after all if he wanted the band to remain relevant just a little longer. But you can definitely feel something has changed in *I Am*, and not always for the best. Let's be honest for one second here: if really all you want on your shelves is catchy and memorable EWF songs, a "greatest hits" collection will get you covered. But if what you want is a good funk studio album that's varied and dynamic enough, there are definitely better choices in Earth Wind And Fire's discography. Not all the best archeological finds get retrieved at the Temple of Memphis or the Giza Pyramids. Sometimes you have to dig a little further into the desert. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 26 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 68 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

a) Live albums from famous acts always take a slot that could be put to far better use. I could maybe make a exception or two to that rule of thumb, with Mötorhead's *No Sleep 'til Hammersmith*, Thin Lizzy's *Live And Dangerous*, or even *Frampton Comes Alive* because those historical and iconic recordings easily supersede the studio efforts from these acts. But I would only do this on the condition that none of those acts' studio LPs should be included in the list. Now, can that Bruce Springsteen live album replace his own iconic studio works? The answer is no, clearly. b) The user who submitted this live album only has three LPs released after 1980 in their highest rated list (!). Nothing that's really wrong with their other choices, but I still want to roll my eyes and whisper "OK Boomer" here. I know, that's not very elegant of me. Nobody's perfect, I guess. c) That piano is too goddamn loud on too many songs here. And to be honest, I'm not even sure this record fully does justice to the power of a performance by the boss on a purely sonic and mixing standpoint. And this, even if the performances seem flawless... So, no no way. Nice try, though. 🙂 Not grading this one the way I usually do, because I don't even think the usual standards apply. Going for a neutral position on the stars line, and that's it. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 26 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 69 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Pretty good neo-classical album. Yet to be honest, I find the fact that the user who submitted it won't even give a 5/5 grade to it a little weird. Besides, when you quote Steve Reich or Philip Glass in your review (if I remember correctly), the least you can do is to give a slot to their iconic albums ignored in Dimery's book. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 26 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 70 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

The late seventies will never cease to amaze me. You may think you know all the major influential artists from that time period, and then some unknown party will inform you still have much to learn. I knew absolutely nothing about Graham Parker, and I'm glad someone corrected that for me. *Squeezing Out Sparks* indeed seems to split the difference between The Clash and Elvis Costello -- actually beating the latter at his own game in terms of verbal and melodic hooks. And the results are just magnificent for me. One track bored me, "Love Gets You Twisted". But everything else is great. What I often like on those witty songs is also how they build up to so many catchy elements in their conclusions -- whether they are guitar arrangements, vocal hooks or a more impressive rhythm sections. I think I understand what pleased the critics so much at the time. And it's a shame this record is kind of forgotten today. Guess it's up to us to fix that, right? 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 27 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 70 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

FINALLY, someone thought of adding this gem to the users list! Looks like it's someone who's particularly picky when I see their lowest-rated albums list, by the way... But since *Last Splash* was in my own top-five selection of LPs criminally omitted in Dimery's book, I guess this person will still be forgiven here. Because, hell yeah, this one is pretty f*cking high in my own ranking, let me tell you that! For those who are not in the know, we're talking about the 1993 sophomore album by The Breeders, a landmark of early '90s alternative rock that effortlessly captures (or so it seems) the restless energy and ragged charm of that era’s indie explosion. Fronted by Kim Deal, stepping fully out of the Pixies' shadow, The Breeders crafted a record that is both sonically adventurous and disarmingly playful. From the opening dissonance of “New Year” to the off-kilter surf rock of “Flipside,” *Last Splash* moves with a sort of controlled chaos, where melody and noise are constantly pushing against each other, helped along by Jim McPherson's explosive drumming and Mark Freegard's equally explosive production values -- more hi-fi than lo-fi for this one, and yet still coming off as extremely warm and authentic-sounding. The standout single “Cannonball” sure became an unlikely MTV staple, thanks to its lurching bassline, its foghorn-like backing vocals, and its "in the shade" lively chorus -- here flawlessly applying the good old Pixies quiet-loud-quiet dynamics with extra feminine charm. There are also its very cryptic, tongue-in-cheek lyrics (admittedly found everywhere else in the LP). Plus the unmistakable quirks, like when Josephine Wiggs haphazardly hit the wrong note on the bass for the intro. The merits of this LP go way beyond this defining anthem of alt-rock’s golden age, though. Tracks like “Invisible Man” -- dreamy and catchy at the same time -- or “Do You Love Me Now?” -- a lethargic, mock-romantic number built on incredibly slow... suspensions -- showcase Kim Deal’s ability to craft emotionally resonant songs on this lush nineties alternative rock canvas. Elsewhere, “Saints”, a sunburnt celebration of a state fair complete with braying riffs and lines like "pony in the air" (once again reflecting Deal's brilliance at abstract yet immediately recognizable imagery) charges ahead with a punky exuberance that balances sweetness and grit. Same with "Divine Hammer", which delivers two and a half minutes of flirty pop perfection. Last Splash has its share of bangers for sure. Yet there's more than meets the eye (and ear) here. First, just like for "Cannonball", there's the band’s willingness to embrace unexpected quirks and abrupt stylistic changes -- which gives the album a sense of spontaneity that still feels fresh to this day. Case in point, the elliptical shuffling and muttering of "Mad Lucas", or the experimental, cinematic feel of the near-instrumental "Roi", where everything seems to evolve in slow motion, and where the "shot leaves you gagging for the arrow" indeed (Zeno couldn't have put it better!). Let's not forget "Hag", which starts like a wry description of a witch whom Kim Deal is at odds with, and yet ends up like an ode to the stars, just as said witch flies through them perched on her broom. Isn't Kim jealous of her sorcery after all? She shouldn't, her own *melodic* sorcery is impressive enough...As for "No Aloha", it is a startling hybrid of desert island balladry and churning punk-pop, underlined by Kelley Deal's minimalistic guitar lines. Surreal feminist rock at its best here, unafraid to take risks, but most of all unafraid to have fun. A small miracle. Kim and Kelley's mega-watt charm is one of the main reasons said miracle could occur, I imagine -- up to their endearing harmonies on the country-tinged "Drivin' on 9" (a cover of a song by fellow Ohio band Ed's Redeeming Qualities) -- hearkening back to the origins of the project as a folk duo involving the two Dayton twins. Yet every other contributor -- up to Vaughan Oliver and his insanely beautiful album artwork -- played their part perfectly for this record, which is why the end results sound so good. So, to use the words of that retrospective review by The Quietus, "what makes Last Splash endure isn't just its influence on later indie and noise-pop bands—it’s the personality embedded in every track". It's indeed a messy, joyous, and vital album whose strength lies in its very idiosyncracies. Plus, it's a record from an era where the underground briefly took the spotlight, which gives it extra historical value today. It’s playful, weird, even jarring at times—but that's precisely what gives it life. And it's still accessible no matter what, embodying the spirit of early '90s indie rock at its most unpredictable, yet always in a fashion ultimately enticing and exciting. *Last Splash* made waves. And if you listen to it right today, it will keep on doing so. ----- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 28 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 70 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Some transitional albums in a band's discography are sometimes the most endearing for certain subsets of fans, so I can easily picture why a few of them would choose Vampire Weekend's sophomore LP instead of other ones. Not sure it would be my first pick, *Contra* being neither as fresh as the eponymous debut nor as sonically sophisticated as third album *Modern Vampires Of The City*, but what do I know? I didn't like the band at all at the time there was so much hype around them, and it took me last year's *Only God Was Above Us* (my all-time favorite album of theirs now, oddly enough) to fully realize the sheer genius this act was capable of. It's a genius which can actually be found in each of their previous records when you listen to them again -- except for the underwhelming *Father Of The Bride*, a solo effort by Ezra Koenig but in name, still sounding way too flat for me. The pleasure one can get from Vampire Weekend indeed comes from the three-dimensional aspects of the arrangements, and when the Paul Simon influence is handled subtly enough, there is an unmistakable joy that spurts from your speakers when you spin those LPs. The dynamics in *Contra* are very similar from one side of the LP to the next. In the first half of those sides, you have catchy hits that are mostly mixing indie rock, African influences and Animal Collective-adjacent electronics : "Horchata" and "White Sky" on the first side, plus the more straightforward ska number "Holiday" using the "A - Punk" formula once again... ; and for the start of the second side, you have "Run" (love its slightly dissonant conclusion, for instance), the hectic "Cousins", and the more dancefloor-oriented "Giving Up The Gun". The rest is admittedly quirkier and/or more atmospheric, but even with those deeper cuts, I can't deny the charm oozing from Vampire Weekend's music. Beyond the happy-go-lucky, airy surface effects of compositions penned and performed by four Ivy League college boys supposedly born with a silver spoon in their mouth, there's a soulful richness there which makes those boys' songs instantly playable again for me. Heck, I have already played the album twice since I started writing this review, and I still want more. So I guess I was wrong to mistrust the hype at the time. My mind was set in the past, and it's always a mistake. Glad that -- for me, but also for quite a few other listeners out there, at least from what I saw online -- Vampire Weekend remains relevant today. It's rare that a late effort by an act makes me reconsider everything that has occured before. Just the half-point Koenig and co. needed to join my highest-rated albums list in this generator. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 29 (including this one -- unless I also choose the eponymous debut, *Modern Vampires Of The City* and/or *Only God Was Above Us*, and I feel there's one VW LP too many in my list...???) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 70 --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

Being French, I obviously know who Mylène Farmer is, and I would lie if I said I can't enjoy her synth-pop hits sung with a ghostly, ethereal voice, often sprinkled with subliminal goth undertones and romantic literary influences. Even if I also have to admit I have enjoyed those hits in an admittedly very "guilty pleasure mode" up to now, ha ha. Just imagine a cheap mall / supermarket version of This Mortal Coil mixed with Eurodance and you're not so far off the mark! Mylène is also famous in France for her music videos, by the way, since her composer and producer, Laurent Boutonnat, is a filmmaker too. Boutonnat has obviously never recovered from the shock he experienced the first time he watched Stanley Kubrick's *Barry Lyndon*, and some of the most famous videos he shot for Mylène were thus 15 minutes - 20 minutes cinemascope period piece films with a lot of extras, stunts and all sorts of spectacular scenes that would normally not illustrate top 40 pop hits. Plus, they were very *saucy* films -- kinky stuff that was shown on the telly in hours where you didn't usually see things like that. Which probably left an imprint on the teenager with raging hormones that I was at the time, lol. All of this is very fun and nostalgic, but it would be a stretch to consider Mylène's albums aged like fine wine beyond their hit singles. The latter for *L'autre* are "Désenchantée" (probably her biggest song), "Je t'aime mélancolie" and "Regrets". Interesting tidbit about that particular tune, it's a beautiful duet with Jean-Louis Murat, who had quite a huge cred as an "authentic", near-indie representative of "chanson française" at the time this song was released. So in a sense, what we have here is our own version of "Where The Wild Roses Grow"... It was really as if the French equivalents of Kylie Minogue and Nick Cave were recording a song together (to the surprise of everyone). And this years before the two Aussie artists did that sort of thing themselves... Yet once again, this footnote can't possibly justify the inclusion of the album in the list for me. Because, as I suggested earlier, the rest of the tracklist comes off as quite hackneyed and/or awkward from today's vantage point. "Agnus Dei" is an interesting moody opener exploring Enigma or Enya turf, I guess (like some other openers found in Mylène's other albums). But then, you have incredibly shallow and clumsy so-called techno-dance tracks such as "Psychiatric" -- the very definition of the word "filler", also found in many of her other LPs (at least that I know of) -- to the point when the damage done to the flow and cohesion of said records is always hurt beyond repair. I'm not gonna bother mentioning the names of all those lame songs. They're instantly forgettable for me anyway. Besides, *L'autre* doesn't even harbor all of Mylène's hits. The most important of them (apart from "Désenchantée" and "Regrets") are to be found in previous LP *Ainsi Soit Je" (they're "Sans contrefaçon", "Pourvu qu'elles soient douces", and the title track). So I imagine a greatest hits / best of album covers everything you need to know about Farmer in 2024, if really you're curious about her. Anything else is overkill, really. I really, *really* tried to take this inclusion seriously and listen to this thing with fresh ears. Didn't work, though. Sometimes popular success in one country or another doesn't equate full artistic one. It was fun to see what will ultimately be a curio for most English-speaking users of this generator appear here, though. The world of music is really infinite, isn't it? 🙂 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 29 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 71 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai mis ma dernière réponse sous l'album de The 1975 au dessus...

An EP (not an LP) released by Arca not long before they/she lent their electronic production skills to Björk and Ye. Of course, the whole thing is disconcerting, odd and even disturbing, as if it was first and foremost addressed to an audience of psychotic drug addicts, I'd be tempted to add... Yet *Stretch 2* remains worthy of admiration because it managed to foretell the sorts of weird tones, moods and intents mainstream hip hop would start to use not long after 2014. This music is so unstable it feels dangerous sometimes. Aphex Twin is an obvious template for the kind of creator Arca is. Too bad that she/they don't have Richard D. James's knack for infectious hooks that peppered his own oeuvre. The second half of this record is stronger. The conclusion of "Tapped In" is subtle and terrific, thanks to its mesmerizing high-pitched synthetic whistles and wails. The strange grooves and off-kilter vocal flows of "Strung" and "Brokeup" are fascinating. And "Manners" is an very soothing closer, all things considered. We're not so far from Oneohtrix Point Never turf here, and it's surely an asset. That said, something is still lost in translation here for me. To say it rather bluntly, thinking this record is a good contender for this list is simply... a Stretch. Canned laughter, please. And even with my very surface knowledge of Arca's body of work, claiming that this EP is the best entry point into her discography is... a Stretch 2. More canned laughter. Like, can you really imagine that the *follow-up* of a very early EP by any artist is their magnum opus? These days, Arca's most streamed tracks are a sort of goth reggaeton that has a flimsy relationship to her beginnings. Now either her early experiments OR her latest ones are gonna leave some sort of imprint in the future, but I would be very surprised if *both* did, to be honest. In other words, it is too soon to know whether her music is relevant in the long run. Interestingly, the user who selected this record was VERY generous in their ratings (average grade of 4, approximately). But instead of choosing easily digestible music, they chose a 100% experimental artist releasing very demanding and "difficult" stuff. Which goes against the cliché I had about those sorts of users being a little too indulgent and complacent overall (and conversely, that fans of edgy stuff would snub most of the albums in the original list). Good that my expectations were thwarted here. The human mind and all its surprises will never cease to amaze me. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 29 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 72 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai lu tes dernières réponses ! J'essaie de te donner les miennes dès demain. Mais dès aujourd'hui, je peux te dire que je n'ai ABSOLUMENT RIEN A VOIR avec le fait que le générateur te harcèle avec des albums de Sonic Youth, ha ha ! Y a de quoi effectivement devenir parano quand tu utilises ce truc tous les jours et qu'il te fait des coups pareils, lol.

Never heard of Mary Chapin Carpenter before. Actually better than a couple of modern C&W albums from the original list, here under the influence of other staple figures who brought distinctively feminine topics to the genre, from Dolly Parton to Loretta Lynn. Some of the arrangements in the highlights also subtly borrow pop rock vocabulary, recalling what REM was doing at this exact time. The first three tracks ("The Hard Way", "He Thinks He'll Keep Her" and "Rhythm Of The Blues") are excellent for the genre, and also display some striking moments lyrics-wise. Too bad that the rest then tags along in a decidedly conventional fashion. Her version of Dire Straits' "The Bug" is decent, but can't beat the original. The slow and moody "I Am A Town" aptly evokes a long summer afternoon in the Midwest, "I Take My Chances" is a pretty good song with a lively chorus, and the title track and closer, another slow and moody cut, wraps things up elegantly. But apart from that, there's not much that catches your ear on a first listen. Five or six good tunes out of twelve is not so bad, though. It's just that it's not enough for the requirements of this list. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 29 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 38 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 73 (including this one) --- Émile, j'ai déjà écrit un bout de quelque chose au dessus, et je vais faire comme toi, des réponses au compte-gouttes -- ça devrait ENFIN être plus rapide ! GeoGuessr, j'adore le concept, et oui, j'y suis allé plusieurs fois il y a quelques années. Ça me fait une piqûre de rappel que tu m'en parles. J'y suis retourné là, et j'ai vu que la version illimitée était maintenant payante. C'était pas le cas avant, non ?

Oh well, Bon Iver. I guess that for a lot of people out there, nothing can beat *For Emma, Forever Ago*. And I have to concur, in spite of the critical rave routinely overrating the man's later achievements. That doesn't necessarily mean that said later achievements are not worth checking out. It's just that Justin Vernon now practices the art of obfuscation to such a high degree (both lyrically and musically) you can't help sensing some misplaced pretensions in his current craft (see his latest album *Sable Fable*, for instance) Since his debut, Vernon has thus hung around with rappers and embraced electronic and digital tools that are a far cry from the "cabin-in-the-woods" aesthetics of his first LP. Nothing wrong with broadening your horizons, I guess, and the results undeniably testify that Iver's instincts led him to a productive place artistically speaking. Even if there's arguably something sounding a little too distant and "bourgeois" in the man's efforts now. "Effort" is a keyword here, for better or for worse. A lot of energy is used to perform sophisticated vocal arrangements around the man's naturally impressive voice -- often digitally enhanced here, yet sometimes surprisingly "naked", which brings interesting dynamics to the whole thing. You sometimes wish the vital urge that goes with memorable vocal lines could be more present through this record, just as it was in FEFA. There's indeed something a little stifling in some of those songs, to put it in a nutshell. Yet Vernon's voice still manages to pierce that haze and deliver the sorts of delicate folk pleasures he got known for. It's just that "folk" turned to "folktronica" here. And for one as for the other, it's the melodic details that make a difference. Vocally, of course, but also instrumentally. The music is lush and worthy of admiration for sure. Some of the sonic details were groundbreaking at the time. Hiring the services of BJ Burton (who also produced Low's masterpiece *Double Negative* or Charli XCX) was an excellent move to help fix the production issues sometimes found in the man's previous record. All of these assets sometimes feel a little disconnected from the vocal performance, but you can also elect to consider this discrepancy as some form of contrast producing its own kind of emotions. I won't quote the individual tracks I prefer (most of them on the first side) because I won't bother copying and pasting the strange names of the songs and their off-kilter typography for this review. Just know that among my favorite cuts you can find the 100% ambient "____ 45 _____", with the extraordinary Colin Stetson on saxophone. So, overall, what you have here is a good album. Not necessarily *stellar*, but maybe Vernon wasn't striving for that sort of direct effect in the first place. Guess all he wanted was to give the word "intimate" a 21st century spin. This is where artistic ambitions don't necessarily fit with conventional approaches. A lot of Justin Vernon's ambitions might indeed seem misplaced at first in this third Bon Iver LP. Yet a lot of them ultimately pay off, and increase the replay value of a lot of those tracks. Not the least paradox in a record already filled to the brim with them. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 29 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 39 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 73 --- Émile, suite de mes débuts de réponse au-dessus... Hyper content que tu sembles aimer Corridor ! Si je ne me trompe pas, tu ne connaissais pas, c'est ça ??? Si c'est le cas, je suis pas peu fier de les faire découvrir à un cousin de la Belle Province ! J'ai copié la liste de refs que tu m'as laissée dans les notes (j'en connais pas beaucoup). Bon il y en a une incontournable pour moi, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard ! Assez gros fan de ce qu'ils ont fait ces 15 dernières années (pas de tout -- c'est presque impossible de tout connaître vu leur productivité, de toute manière -- mais je possède quand même une grande partie de leurs albums jusqu'à The Silver Cord, soit en copie originale, soit en copie gravée). Tiens, cela m'amène à une nouvelle question pour toi, au passage... Tu es vinyl, CD, stream, ou un peu de tout ? Pour revenir sur KGATLW, je pense que Nonagon Infinity et Polygondwanaland sont des chefs-d'œuvre. Mais il y en a beaucoup d'autres derrière que j'adore. Et "The Spinning Tap", sur Omnium Gatherum est un titre absolument iconique pour moi. Je dois par contre avouer que je n'ai pas du tout aimé les deux derniers albums, que je trouve ampoulés et sans reliefs dans leurs délires boogie / symphonique. Leur musique a toujours été "chargée", mais là, ça manque de silences et de pauses pour *vraiment* relancer la machine. Bref, j'attends le prochain changement de style (qui devrait vite arriver)...

Stoked to see this one popping out today (unless I'm mistaken, last time I checked the full user's list it was not there). This debut from Sports Team splits the difference between Art Brut and Pavement in a perfect fashion (people only thinking about Arctic Monkeys or The Libertines here should probably broaden their horizon a little). It's witty, melodically astute, fun and lively from start to finish, and most of all, it's a non-stop collection of alt rock bangers. And this to the extent that I can't even see the point of mentioning them all. There are so many memorable lines and hooks in *Deep Down Happy* it's easy to lose count of them all. If you like indie-rock with a sprechgesang frontman conveying strong Jarvis Cocker, Stephen Malkmus and Shame's Charlie Steen's vibes, you just got to listen to the whole thing and be amazed. Had this debut been released in the late nineties / early noughts, you can bet your boots it would have become a classic. Here's me hoping it becomes one in the near-future, in spite of the later year it was released. To be honest, I have once feared for Sports Team's chances to pull this off. I was indeed under the impression that this record had been somewhat underrated by the professional critics back in 2020 (not that the reviews were bad, but they should be even more raving than that for such an impressive debut). Reading the album's wikipedia page, I've learnt that *Deep Down Happy* was actually nominated for the Mercury Prize, so I stand corrected. But most of all, I've learnt that this up-and-coming band met considerable commercial success in the UK with this LP and its singles (which might also explain why Sports Team have since watered down their initial messy punk energy for subsequent releases -- a story so predictable I won't even bother elaborating on it). Two takeaways from this: 1. The audience knows more than professional critics sometimes. 2. What goes on in terms of culture inside the UK's borders doesn't always cross the English Channel or the Atlantic Ocean. That's the world's loss when it comes to this particular album, I guess. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 30 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 39 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 73 ---

To make a good jam rock album, live or otherwise, you need your jar to be hermetically sealed from excessively derivative dirges and lack of conceptual imagination. Otherwise, your jam is gonna rot or grow mushrooms, and be unfit for general consumption. King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard can pull it off in their best records. Other acts can't. The latter are only conveying the impression you're politely watching bands with admittedly accomplished musicians doing their thing in a perfunctory fashion -- instead of taking you to other worlds displaying fantastic sceneries. See my review about that Phish live album for more details. Not giving the lowest grade to this thing, though, because a few choice moments in those overlong tracks can be enjoyable in a live setting, I guess. But mostly, I won't put Pigeons Playing Ping Pong in my stinkers gallery because of that dumb review currently topping this section (obviously written by a stupid edgelord). You must have quite a high opinion of yourself and your taste to ask someone to rethink their lives just because they like music you hate. Even in jest. This is dreadful, not funny. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 30 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 39 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 74 (including this one) --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Je rajoute juste ici que l'on ne fête malheureusement pas la Saint Jean-Baptiste en France (le fils de ma copine s'appelle Baptiste, au passage, mais même lui ne la fête pas -- il me disait justement l'autre jour que les "bonnes fêtes" patronymiques le saoulaient, ha ha). Je tiens à te dire ici que je compte également écouter dans les jours qui viennent ta liste de recommandations, et que comme toi, je laisserai des mini-reviews ici. Faudra un peu chercher au milieu des publications... Pour l'instant, pas le temps, malheureusement-- j'ai une interview en visio d'un groupe australien prévue dans deux jours pour Mowno, et j'ai commencé à explorer la discographie de son leader, que je connaissais en fait très mal. Talk soon, I hope

Very cool. Aussie mad genius JG Thirlwell mixes various elements generally found in The Birthday Party / early Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds, Einsturzende Neubaten, The Killing Joke, Sisters Of Mercy, Swans and Nine Inch Nails (anticipating the latter), and adds his own extravagant parodic touches owing to big band and classical shenanigans (played on synths, with a layered result that's pretty impressive for the eighties!). The result comes off as some sort of hectic industrial off-Broadway musical whose tempos never stay in one place long -- often manically accelerating mid-song -- filled with crazy percussions that have lost none of their groundbreaking power decades later. To return to some of the references I mentioned up there, it's as if The Birthday Party had decided to organize their swamp blues chaos a little, or as if Neubaten had realized being fun (and even funny) was actually not a crime punished by the thought police. Who said freaks left to their own devices couldn't have a good time in a dystopian world? With only six proper songs and four interludes, the only thing missing in this album is one pivotal highlight that could have specified the overall concept underlying Foetus' music (although opener "The Throne Of Agony" comes close to it) -- I don't know, something up to the level of Nick Cave's "The Mercy Seat", maybe... But it's probably absurd to expect Thirlwell would even bother trying to please the masses when his thing was all about having fun in the studio and come up with the most bizarre ideas he was able to muster up. In a way, it's because extravagant figures like him exist, working far from the spotlights, that other ones such as Nick Cave, Trent Reznor or even Michael Gira eventually end up reaching said masses later on. Guess a tribute of sorts is in order here, hence my rounded up 4/5 grade. Squares won't get it, of course. But what do they know? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 30 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 40 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 74 --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous...

A British second-rate version of Foo Fighters, itself an offshoot of greater things in the nineties (should I really need to explain why Dave Grohl's band can be considered as such here?). Decent and even well crafted at times, but ultimately secondary in the grand scheme of things, 1001-Albums-wise. Three pivotal issues are plaguing this record. A) a lack of memorable choruses in too many tracks, which is always a big problem when you're writing and playing that sort of melodic alt-rock. You have quite a few catchy hooks, but that's the minimum required for that genre. B) wishing to "expand their sound", Biffy Clyro got the respective meanings of the adjectives "epic" and "streamlined" confused somehow. Of course, it did them good on a commercial level (even more so on follow-up album *Only Revolutions*), but two decades down the line, the lack of real stakes is more than apparent. "GGGarth"'s production values are massive enough (even if a notch under your usual Foo Fighter LP in the same time period), but now said production sounds devoid of that special off-kilter grain that could have made the man's efforts immune to old age. C) one last comparison with Foo Fighters that's unfavorable to Biffy Clyro, the vocals. Dave Grohl's voice will always be more impressive -- and even moving on many highlights -- thanks to that gravelly timber of his. Simon Neil's voice is far meeker, and therefore not immune to ridicule at times given the things he attempts to do here. Redeeming factors? Maybe the prog-rock influences when they are subtly handled or even subliminal (like that nice Hammond organ far in the background of "Now I'm Everyone"'s *truly* epic finale). Which is unfortunately not the case in the existential, Albert Camus-inspired opener "Living Is A Problem Because Everything Dies". Worse than the clichéed orchestral arrangements there, you have to bear with that supposedly "grand" intro to the song, trying to create "suspense" through rhythmical spurts. The worst idea ever on a musical level. I understand that this is tied to the theme of the song (see its title), but the result just sounds bad and awkward, period. In that realm, see also pointless interlude "9/15th". No, the most important redeeming factor that I can see here is when Biffy Clyro deliver songs lively and memorable enough (there's three of them: math-rock-influenced "Now I'm Everyone", "Semi-Mental" and its roaring chorus, and also "Saturday Superhouse" to a degree). The rest is not bad (usually), hence my somewhat benevolent grading in spite of my harsh criticism up there. But those other songs are quickly forgettable. If you're interested in that overall genre, and yet looking for something sounding authentic enough -- with a collection of bangers from start to finish in one single LP, and with a vocal performance reaching the intended emotional level -- I suggest you to discover the last two albums of French band Daria instead. Far less streams there, of course, and far less dough injected into the production. But the songs are simply better, and the arrangements more propulsive. A healthy dose of post-hardcore will always be necessary to glue that sort of alt-rock puzzle with pop inclinations together. Otherwise all the pieces end up falling in the floor for me. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 30 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 40 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 75 (including this one) --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

A precious compass in dark, uncertain, and perilous times. A compass whose needle spins and flutters—but a compass nonetheless. That’s how Big Thief’s first double album, *Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You*, will be remembered. After four LPs written and recorded in as many years—not counting Adrienne Lenker’s two solo records up to that point in time—it was already clear the band’s creative well ran deep. Still, nothing quite prepared us for this. Credit drummer James Krivchenia, listed here as lead producer, with the inspired idea: dispatch Lenker, along with himself, guitarist Buck Meek and bassist Max Oleartchik, across the United States to record with four different engineers. The journey took them from the wild forests of the Catskills to the arid plains of Arizona, from the lush canyons of Topanga near L.A. to the high altitudes of Colorado. Fraternal twin LPs *U.F.O.F.* and *Two Hands* already carried the seeds of this idea: to let yourself be guided by place and encounter, to follow instinct without any predefined plan. This double album is the full flowering of that approach, and it belongs squarely in an American pop music tradition whose roots go back to the 1970s—Fleetwood Mac, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell—even further, perhaps. Make no mistake, though: *Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You* isn’t just looking in the rearview mirror. Big Thief’s compass and its four cardinal directions indeed lead us to even more promising destinations when you take a look at the whole map. To the north, confident urban textures take shape—soft rock, indie rock. Sometimes they're raw—see the sprawling, reverb-drenched "Little Things"—and other times they're more experimental, like "Time Escaping", where hacked acoustic guitars evoke gamelan percussion. Also to the north lies "Simulation Swarm", a hypnotic standout track built on a carefully restrained groove and a guitar solo so wildly brilliant it manages to outshine many of today’s guitar heroes—and this without a trace of overdrive distortion. To the south, by contrast, we return to the kind of heartbreaking folk ballads that endlessly stream from Lenker’s beautiful soul. Rarely has a meditation on accepting death (here a metaphor for romantic separation) been as moving as the one found in "Change", the opening track. There’s nothing grim here—just a gentle call to savor every memory, every moment of life. Once heard, a line like “Death / Like a door / To a place / We’ve never been before” stays with you forever. Other heartbreaking moments include the biblical lyricism of "Sparrow", or the apocalyptic romance of "The Only Place", the former lifted by Lenker’s stunning harmonies, the latter propelled by nimble fingerpicking reminiscent of Elliott Smith. So far, so Big Thief. The pleasure of hearing them excel once more at the craft they've honed since *Masterpiece* will surely feel familiar for anyone who already knows that Lenker is a once-in-a-generation kind of artist. But from the east and the west come new fresh breezes, and it’s here that the double album format proves to be pivotal--because it gives those new sounds the room to thrive and bloom as they should. Take "Heavy Bend": its opening bars could easily be mistaken for something off Björk’s *Vespertine*—a featherlight breakbeat, a classical guitar with harp-like tones, a subtle trip-hop shimmer that somehow feels completely natural. That thread continues on "Flower of Blood" and "Blurred View", which closes the first disc somewhere between Broadcast and Portishead. The title track had already foreshadowed this turn earlier during the course of the album. "Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You" indeed best epitomizes this approach, while retaining the emotion of Lenker's haunting vocals. It's an approach which is relatively far from the original live rendition of the song, with its newfound ambient textures, meandering steel guitar, and percussion made—literally—from ice cubes. Yet it's one that has equal potency for sure. Opposite these experimental stretches, a flurry of country and bluegrass cuts are sprinkled in salient moments, which keeps the album from buckling under the weight brought about by its heftier intents. Fiddles and winking existentialism thus run wild on the laid-back ditherings of "Blue Lightning", the exhilarating whirls of "Red Moon", or the comical spurts of "Spud Infinity", here performed by the American band with a tongue firmly planted in their cheeks. It needs to be said: for a tune whose title refers to potatoes, "Spud Infinity" really brings the heat. Cheerful and open-hearted, and filled with musings on the impossibility of kissing your elbows and the mystery of human existence, the song manages to be both disarming and oddly uplifting, in the most potato-like way imaginable. It's as if that cut was a joyful soundtrack playing in the background while Adrianne and friends are watching the fragile blue ball that our planet is from a tiny space station, amazed and enthralled at the whole spectacle. There, but also elsewhere, Lenker’s lyrics thus move effortlessly between intimate confession and cosmic wonder. Yet they never drift into pretension. They remain grounded, often funny, always human. On paper, such a collage of sounds and ideas shouldn’t work. “What should we do now?” one band member even wonders aloud after the conclusion of the final track. It’s true that, in this musical inn of many flavors, the second disc feels less immediate than the first. "Love Love Love", for example, plays like a half-finished jam accidentally caught on tape—almost as if the album were offering its own behind-the-scenes footage. And "Wake Me Up to Drive"—for all intents and purposes a lo-fi demo, admittedly endearing but ultimately very goofy—is as languid and heavy as a nap in the passenger seat, waiting for your turn at the wheel indeed. But it would be unfair to fault *Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You* for what no one in 2025 would seriously criticize in *Tusk* or *The White Album*. Entropy—the slow unraveling of time—is a central theme here, and Big Thief embraces it fully, allowing the form to mirror the content. More than anything, this album only does what all great double albums should: it promises hours of playful exploration through its hidden nooks, hairpin turns, missteps, and revelations. That promise is even echoed, implicitly, by the narrator in "Promise Is A Pendulum", speaking to their beloved: I can’t create all these beautiful things nature gives us, they seem to say—but by describing them to you, I’m trying to create something vital between us. To seek, to move forward without cynicism, to open oneself to another without guile—such things feel rare today. And so even when Big Thief give themselves the permission to stumble, something honest, alive, and intelligent continues to rise from the music, carried by flawless songwriting and the creative spark and perfect chemistry of four musicians working in a state of grace. As we said—an inexhaustible well. ---- This is the review about the album I wrote for the Mowno music website in February 2022, here translated and adapted / updated from the original French version (which you can find in the link below). https://www.mowno.com/disques/big-thief-dragon-new-warm-mountain-i-believe-in-you/ ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 31 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 40 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 75 --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

Whoever put this album in the users list... A thousand thanks to you. I don't know who you are, and you're not leaving reviews on this generator, but I'm pretty sure that if we met at the local tavern over pints of barley wine after a hard day of harvest work on the fields, we would quickly spot one another and talk about our favorite bards and troubadours in the fiefdom. Don't let the mean hobgoblins, bogles, imps and leprechauns routinely mocking you in this house keep your spirits down. They can't understand vital art that speaks to the soul of our kindred folk through incredible melodies and lyrics. All they can hear is a weird old guy with a strange voice -- they only hear it out of tune, the poor deaf bastards! -- and they can't possibly grasp that the quirks and idiosyncracies of the music actually add to the latter, instead of ruining it. But you and I know better, of course. I was first aware of who Richard Dawson was through later LP *2020*, and if I rapidly understood he was to be associated with the crazed off-kilter DIY craft of figures such as Daniel Johnston, Vic Chesnutt, Gus Englehorn or Jean-Luc Le Ténia -- even going back to The Incredible String Band ("Fairport Unconventional" goes the Allmusic review) -- I have to admit that this later album didn't immediately click with me. Now my mind is more attuned to Dawson's music, thanks to you. I just needed the proper entry point, and boy does *Peasant* feel like a fabulous introduction! From the very first song, I grasped what his thing was all about, without even paying that much attention to the lyrics: spinning middle-age yarns through the point of view of various village folks not so different from the modern freaks and other people left on the margin of our own society -- which is probably no less cruel than the one of days yonder. What a bright idea! Yet beyond the overall concept, it's the extraordinary kitchen sink instrumentation and imaginative songwriting -- filled with so many endearing details and absolutely killer chord changes-- that sent me over to the moon right away. I even love the sound of the man's broken acoustic guitar! And gosh, that choir work in the climaxes of some of those songs... So cinematic and marvelous (and indeed not so far from the Balkanic flavors found in Neutral Milk Hotel, as the less clueless reviewers in here rightly pointed out). When "Ogre" started to blast its wonderful racket in my headphones, I immediately fell in love with the whole thing. Touching "Soldier", mini-epic "Weaver", along with all the other DIY folk bangers "Scientist", "Beggar" and "Masseuse" immediately made an impact as well. Stoked that I'm now familiar with all those gems. A good entry point is always pivotal, isn't it? I think I'm now ready to listen to Dawson's other albums with an ear that's properly prepared for them (including the one released this year). Of course, you sometimes feel that his wild, boundless imagination needs to reined in so as to not quickly tire newcomers like me. But I can understand why hardcore fans who fell in love with the man's artful music a long time ago would disagree with me. They dived in earlier than I did, hence why they're more ready than I am for that sort of adventure. For me, at least, the proper limitations are set in *Peasant* so as to channel the best of Richard Dawson in one single LP without him losing the listener in too many convolutions. We'll see if I explore said convolutions further in the years to come. So yeah, I'm going to give full marks to this record! Just like for Robert Wyatt in the original list (another ancestor of the Northumbrian prog folkster), you need to set the karmic balance right at some point Thank you, anonymous user, whoever you are. And cheers! Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 40 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 75 --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

I really, *really* tried to have this record click with me -- especially since my partner loves Valerie June's later LP *The Moon And Stars...*. Unfortunately, it didn't really work. June's vinegary voice is simply extraordinary, and Dan Auerbach's vintage production and arrangements are tasteful as f*ck. The updated slave narrative undertones of "Workin' woman Blues" hearken back to pivotal shapes taken by American folk music in the past, "Wanna Be On Your Mind" and the title track have a classic soul and rhythm'n'blues feel that could indeed be deemed cinematic, "On My Way" even successfully explores fiddle-enhanced C&W turf, and the whole thing exudes with good intentions and more-than-competent handling. Yet there's the other side of that coin to consider for me: the utter lack of real surprises, ultimately. Indeed, no real harmonic or melodic spike attracted my attention here (bar one exception, but more on that later). Everything plays along some sort of well-established program, tastefully, but also in a fashion that sounds a little vapid to my ears. Worse, the accumulation of those decent-yet-streamlined-to-a-fault cuts ends up giving a "meat-and-potatoes" effect to the whole thing. Good taste sometimes hides lack of imagination and very conventional reflexes. It's one thing to properly convey a "vintage" feel, which is already admirable on a purely technical standpoint. But it's another to make said vintage aesthetics feel artistically *vital* in the 21st century. I know I'm probably being too severe for a lot of people here, and for the record, I'm not trying to rain on their parade, I'm just being honest about the whole thing. Plus, there's the exception I have mentioned earlier, which is the barebones acoustic closer "Hey", incidentally one of the compositions Valerie June wrote without the help of Auerbach. At last, some welcome ambiguity lingers in the chorus of that song. Which made me wonder whether June should trust her instincts more and not let too many outsiders interfere with her writing process, at least if her goal is to leave a stronger imprint as a creator and not simply as a performer... But what do I know, huh? So even if that cool melancholic track *did* click with me, it's too little and far too late for me anyway. I really wanted to add that album cover to my gallery of high-rated LPs. Yet I would lie to myself if I did so. Objectively and intellectually speaking, there's not much to fault this album with. But subjectively and in purely sensorial terms, I'm clearly bored when I listen to it. Please don't tell my girlfriend, lol. ---- 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 40 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 76 (including this one) --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

As bitter as Richard Edwards sounds in that 2015 interview retrieved through his main band's wikipedia page, there could very well be an alternate universe where Margot & The Nuclear So And So's was as big as its avowed models (mostly Radiohead, or so it seems--with a bit of US indie artists drawing from Americana for good measure--acts such as Neutral Milk Hotel or Bright Eyes). Guess a complicated story music-business-wise, along with health complications for the band's leader, saw to it differently. The bowels disease the man has sure looks debilitating, and I can only express my support here. If you can allow me to give my extra two cents about the whole situation, I guess that naming your act with a moniker as long and weird as Margot & The Nuclear So So's didn't help. I had time on my hands this morning, so I have just asked Chat GPT to rename the band while keeping in mind their artistry. I know, what a loony idea. Among hackneyed results, OpenAI came up with good ideas such as Violet Hour or Antlers For Amelia. So, in my mind at least, there's an essential act named like that in an alternate universe, which every indie buff knows there. Admittedly, a name such as Margot & The Nuclear So So's also nicely fits with the many convolutions of some of the songs found in *Not Animal* (some of them great, others maybe not that necessary). Follow-up LP *Buzzard*, recorded with a very different line-up, sure sounds way more straightforward and livelier, comparatively. To the detriment of the richer arrangements in *Not Animal*. For me, a middle ground between the two approaches, with slightly more pointed production values for each, would have been insanely great. But that version of the band's best album only exists in that fancy alternate universe of mine, I'm afraid. Speaking of "alternative versions", it's interesting to read that this LP project also exists in vinyl in a "director's cut" form--one extremely difficult to find online, and with a VERY different tracklist displaying a lot of songs absent from the official version of the album while erasing others. Preferred by the deciders of the band's label at the time, the official version still harbors enough highlights to be mentioned in my high-rated LPs, fortunately. The trippiest songs and the folk ballads are put to the forefront here, while the more abrasive cuts (some of whom have memorable instrumentation) are lodged in the second half. Quite an original way to order the tracklist, even if some spots and strings of songs could have ended up sounding more dynamic had they been organized differently. In a sense, you can feel that this record has a complicated story, and that its flow suffers as a result. Just like my review? Also, it's really bizarre that Margot's mastermind and singer thinks the best song in the album is "Shivers" and yet that the track is missing from the "band's version" of *Not Animal* (named *Animal!* Are you following this?). Is it me, or does that guy *also* unnecessarily complicates things once in a while? Hence maybe why the music lacks the pivotal drive that could have made it stand out from the pack for more general audiences... Giving the benefit of the doubt to this one, though. Can't go further than a rounded up 4/5 grade myself here, but it does feel a little unfair that zero 5-star reviews are to be found in this section. Surely, there was a potential larger audience for this act, and it's a bit sad that label shenanigans and other sorts of mishaps have prevented Margot from finding it. Glad that one user thought of this album of theirs so that I could discover them at least. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 41 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 76 --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

Chuckles, not Chucklehead. Don't see what the fuzz is all about. More retro than sexy... OK, enough with the lame puns. It is quite admirable to select a record (and band) with so few streams but let's be honest for one second: this nineties watered down funk stuff borders on self-parody at times. Some tracks are listenable, I guess, which is why I won't put the record in my stinkers gallery. But others are annoyingly linear or incredibly bland vocally speaking. Music appreciation is subjective, of course. Just imagine: you go to college in Boston during the nineties, you routinely see this band live in local venues, you're having the best years of your life then, and you're having many, many great memories attached to them... Now, decades down the line, you're the FIRST user finishing going through a strange internet niche thing called *1001 Album generator* and you are asked to leave your own album suggestion, and you're thinking of... Chucklehead's *Fuzz*, of all albums! Just because it's you and your memories! This is how Chucklehead finally ended up being first at something in their career. And ironically, they're probably not even aware of it... Unless this user is... one of the band members???? Gosh, I wish I could know who all of you people in here really are!. But I guess that in truth, the overall mystery makes it all the more interesting, doesn't it? 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 41 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 77 (including this one) --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

Trip hop / Electronica that obviously sounds a bit dated today. But I guess that if you listened to it with an appropriate mindset, this supposed flaw actually adds to the trippy experience. Yeah, I know, I know... Boards Of Canada will always beat old electronic bands at this game. Retro-futuristic nostalgia was a pivotal element of their soundscapes from the get-go. Alas, we're not talking about the Scottish act now -- even if I hear them a little in the last two tracks of *Suzuki*: "Doris Dub" and outro "Pearl Off" I knew who one half of Tosca was (Dorfmeister, from that other Austrian electronic duo Kruder And Dorfmeister). But I had never heard about this project before. "Suzuki" is an extraordinary track. Its main hook is very memorable, and its zen-like flourishes as subtle and enticing as jasmine fragrance. The rest tags along nicely, with a lot of unobtrusive moody cuts and some subtle seventies-adjacent arrangements that are quite cool once in a while. As a smooth electronic album, *Suzuki* is not exactly groundbreaking or totally idiosyncratic, but it works exactly as it should. And the last leg of the LP is especially effective. "Ocean Boat"'s off-kilter use of vocal samples brings some extra edge to its smooth groove, and "The Key" is an awesome cut, with its melancholic piano clashing with a busy bassline that's not so far from the one Massive Attack sampled for their own "Safe From Harm". When the music's that good, it doesn't matter if it sounds a little old. Unsure whether this record deserves a slot in my ideal '1001 albums list', though--the middle of the LP might be a little 'meat-and-potatoes' for this genre on first listens... But I want to give it the benefit of the doubt and place it in my "high-rated list" anyway, so as to give me the chance to return to it later. Who knows, maybe some other cuts from this one will eventually grow on me? Zen bliss never surges right away, does it? Unless you work on it first... ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 77 --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

Pretty sure there are now AIs able to routinely create a typical They Might Be Giants song (whereas ones able to harness the genius melodic and songwriting spark of a John Lennon, a David Bowie or a Kurt Cobain will not be found for a still a long time to come). "Derivative" doesn't even begin to cover how hackneyed and even artificial this band mostly sounds on a purely musical standpoint, whether for their early endeavors or for this late career release. I get that hardcore fans of this act consider the many chunky quirks found everywhere throughout their discography as evidence of their humanity. But I see the exact opposite. Everything sounds as if it was created in a laboratory, with Flansburgh and Linnell applying all sorts of ready-made formulas to pen weird shit that is -- generally speaking -- as goofy on first listens as it is forgettable two hours later. In a sense, their shtick only sounds like a *simulacrum* of humanity for me. Not that the formulas of the two mad scientists don't yield to some memorable songs once in a while: the ones in *Join Us* ("Can't Keep Johnny Down", "You Probably Get That A Lot", "Canajoharie") are to be found very early on, for instance. In spite of the sarcasm I expressed up there, I believe both AIs and They Might Be Giants can actually write stuff that is at least vaguely entertaining from time to time, which is no small wonder. It takes some enormous musical skills (or huge data treatment power) to mathematically select all sorts of ideas so as to make your compositions sound both stylistically diverse and unpredictable. Which is why I won't give a 1/5 grade to this thing. However, there is a major issue that needs to be pointed out in *Join Us*, just as in any TMBG albums I've had the opportunity to listen to: when the formulas are left to their own device, so to speak, you end up getting so much dross that you just can't help dismissing the whole thing. In *Join Us* that dross is exemplified by inconsequential tunes such as "2082", or worse, by truly obnoxious duds such as "Spoiler Alert", "Dog Walker" or "Three Might Be Duende", that are polluting the end of the album so much that they ruin whatever good impression a couple of songs might have triggered before (like with the fun, bouncy, brass-enhanced "The Lady And The Tiger"). And yes, sure, the lyrics are witty, but so are the ones of Flight Of The Conchords, a comedy act who never really pretended they were a genuine band -- even if one suspects the latter might have ripped off Flansburgh and Linnell, among other influences. The point here is that it's honestly difficult to take They Might Be Giants seriously, as skilled as its core songwriting duo is. When the line between earnestness and parody is so thin, what it is we are supposed to *feel*? Pastiche could be the way to go, but unfortunately, They Might Be Giants never fully get there either. So we're just left in a blurry limbo, whose effects might include queasiness, eye-rolling and tiredness... After all, this is the major difference between The Magnetic Fields and They Might Be Giants, two acts that are arguably very close on paper. In the craft of the first, there's a distinct poetry, or a fragility, or an overall conceptual instinct, which elevates their output to the rank of works of art. Whereas They Might Be Giants remain desperately stuck to the level of craft. Enough to generate a cult following that arguably goes beyond a niche phenomenon now, as years went by. But not enough for a list such as this one. No, I won't join you guys. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 78 (including this one) --- Émile, il y a déjà une partie de mes réponses au-dessus. Il y en aura d'autres en dessous..

A seminal album, The Jesus Lizard's *Goat* is a nineties noise-rock classic and an essential record for anyone who loves the Steve Albini sound. Plus, David Yow's crazy vocal performance here is also one for the ages. The first side is packed with (rough) gems -- bangers such as "Monkey Trick" -- also a very "meta" song -- and "Mouth Breather", whose lyrical inspiration draws from a real life event which is both hilarious and astonishing (one involving Albini and Slint's drummer, check it out online!). Let's not forget opener "Then Comes Dudley" and the lively swamp rock of "Nub", where David Yow sorts of fantasizes about his guitar player having his arms amputated (!). "Seasick" also nicely exemplify Yow's unstable persona. "I can swim! / I can't swim!" he goes, which really gives you the impression you're about to drown. In keeping with those lyrical muddled waters, the musicians playing behind Yow are equally menacing. Tight drumming, deep basslines and great guitar hooks all around. Only, the music that's played here is like a perverted, very twisted version of blues rock -- which greatly benefits from the Albini sound treatment, by the way, just like PJ Harvey's own twisted blues rock in *Rid Of Me* would benefit from it two years later. Both records are indeed the platonic ideal of what an Albini recording should sound like, and only for this, they deserved to be mentioned in a list of the most influential recordings ever. After the prison-sex-fantasy-gone-horribly-wrong of "Karpis" and the lewd ratiocinations of "South Mouth" ("Sometimes we act like animals / We act sometimes like little girls"), the last leg of the album doubles down on the offensive card, thanks to the bonkers, deranged and very graphic "Lady Shoes". Then the western-flick-adjacent "Rodeo In Juliet" closes the proceedings on a less claustrophobic note, even if still quite an unsettling one. Think of Francis Bacon and William Burroughs put to tape, and you're not so far off the mark. Offensive, I said? Yeah, sure. The line between provocative art and sheer gratuitousness is often straddled in *Goat*. Yet the intensity and ambiguous goals that are displayed in this LP are also what makes it stand the test of time, beyond the purely musical merits. The greatest of all time indeed. At least in its genre. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 78 (including this one) --- Émile, je sais, ça fait un bout de temps que je te promets des nouveaux bouts de réponse (as-tu vu les derniers au dessus ?), mais je suis en vacances à la mer, et les journées sont courtes. Ça fait du bien de moins faire d'écrans, ha ha. Aussi fun que cette petite expérimentation sur le générateur a été, on pourrait aussi ptet simplement se contacter via les réseaux sociaux ou Messenger ? Dis-moi ce que tu en penses...

Yeah, I'm all for including post hardcore in the list -- a genre indeed done dirty by Dimery and co.. But why oh why would you consider this debut clearly produced on a budget (gosh, that HORRID drum sound!)? This waste of a slot IMHO is all the more maddening when the essential At The Drive-In albums -- either also produced on a budget (*In Casino Out*), or not (*Relationship Of Command*) -- are absent from the book. "Mall bands" is a term I've sometimes found online to describe that early and mid-noughts wave of post-hardcore Alexisonfire is arguably a part of. And given the cheap results as listened to here, this derogatory labelling seems just right for them. At least follow-up LP *Watch Out* (also mentioned in the users' list) is properly produced and more convincing dynamics-wise. And the other huge difference between the two albums are the vocals. In *Watch Out*, the performance of the two vocalists and the way they balance out growled and clean sung parts sounds great, whereas the performance of both is borderline ridiculous in that eponymous debut. Guess they just needed to get better at this, and also write less unnecessary convoluted compositions so that said vocal performances don't sound like an afterthought. The sung parts are also just more pleasant and memorable harmonically speaking in *Watch Out*. Whereas they are quite flat here. I will therefore probably include *Watch Out* in my "high rated albums". And this debut will also pop up in my stinkers gallery. A quick way to let everyone know my "controversial" mileage on this band. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 79 (including this one) --- Émile, je sais, ça fait un bout de temps que je te promets des nouveaux bouts de réponse (as-tu vu les derniers au dessus ?), mais je suis en vacances à la mer, et les journées sont courtes. Ça fait du bien de moins faire d'écrans, ha ha. Aussi fun que cette petite expérimentation sur le générateur a été, on pourrait aussi ptet simplement se contacter via les réseaux sociaux ou Messenger ? Dis-moi ce que tu en penses...

Oh well, Tame Impala. Some essential or near-essential LPs released by other acts since 2015 owe a lot to their highlights. And inside *Currents*, Kevin Parker's own last essential LP as of now, "Let It Happen" and "The Less I Know, The Better" are humongous bangers for sure. The rest tags along rather nicely, thanks to groovy basslines and abundant washes of dreamy synths. Listening to the record again, I can't help reminiscing about that hilarious meme comparing Kevin Parker's fans circa *InnerSpeaker* or even *Lonerism* to the ones from the time of *Currents*. The first are psych rock hippies sat on the floor of a wooden shack getting hits from a bong, while the second are corporate squares sipping champagne in a pristine environment. Of course, what's implied in the meme is that those people are probably the same persons a few years apart. Bohemian bourgeois taste sure explains the critical and commercial success of this act, doesn't it? Indeed, rarely has the old story about "selling out" been so clearly harnessed in a music album. Parker puts it best himself in the lyrics of one song, seemingly about a romantic break-up (like most songs in the tracklist): "They say people never change, but that's bullshit, they do". The meta impulse is very strong throughout this record, and I wouldn't be surprised to hear that said impulse was actually a very self-conscious one throughout the recording sessions. Because for all intents and purposes, Tame Impala mostly broke up with the indie world to embrace the mainstream here. Such self-consciousness can also work against those compositions on a purely musical level, admittedly. Perfectionism -- apparent from the results, but also from reports on the way the LP was recorded -- was surely pivotal to craft the highlights, but it also sometimes stifle the overall "feel" of other tracks. And all-too-clean production values can never save a weak tune anyway. Alas, Parker's obsessive, perfectionist mindset thus led him to miss the forest for the trees once in a while, at least in a couple of inconsequential duds that could have easily been left on the cutting room floor without hurting the tracklist's flow or even shortening that 51-minute album too much. Looking at you, "Past Life" and "Disciples". Parker's glossy falsetto unironically repeating "''Cause I'm A Man" in the song bearing this name is also objectively a little worthy of derision. Even if I also recognize that Kevin's candid earnestness in that track may sound quite idiosyncratic or even endearing for some ears. This song being about masculine flaws, it sorts of checks out anyway Sometimes you need a little time to understand what past hypes were all about. That won't make me enjoy huge misfires such as later LP *The Slow Rush*, but I now readily recognize how iconic *Currents* comes off ten years down the line -- thanks to its hit singles first, but also through its overall theme of change and evolution. Growing up is rarely a walk in the park, right? Moody and zither-enhanced closer "New Person, Same Old Mistakes" even hammers the point home in ways I now find impressive -- both for the somewhat tormented bass-heavy music and for the lyrical contents. That internal dialogue Parker goes through in that back and forth between lead and background vocals during the song's chorus -- representing the parts of him that want to move forward and the parts that can't let go -- is truly a thing of wonder, in all senses of the word. "Maybe fake's what I like" the Australian musician even suggests at some point. Beyond the synth-driven meta shtick, such candour actually raises some very universal questions about identity and authenticity. Pretty cool for a record I only considered as gravely overrated at the time of its release. Guess I changed as well. At least, can I have one more glass of champagne now? Please? ----- 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 79 ----- Salut Émile, ça va ? J'ai enfin un peu de temps pour te répondre (pourtant je suis en vacances, pas comme toi qui traîne sur le générateur en scred pendant le taf, ha ha). L'interview s'est très bien passée. Il s'agissait de Tropical Fuck Storm (tu connais ? Son leader officiait dans The Drones auparavant). Avec le décalage horaire, j'ai cueilli le chanteur du groupe au réveil à l'hôtel. Ils étaient en pleine tournée, à Portland, Oregon. Et pourtant le mec était adorable... J'imagine que l'info que je te donne ici est pas vraiment renversante, et que ça n'intéressera pas grand monde autour de toi, mais garde-la pour toi, s'il-te-plaît. Le rédac chef de Mowno est un peu parano avant l'annonce officielle du sommaire des magazines version papier, lol. Je crois effectivement que l'on est très raccord sur KGATLW, ce qui, au vu de leur discographie gargantuesque, signifie beaucoup. *Nonagon Infinity* en number ouane et *Polygondwanaland* en number two, je valide totalement. "Crumbling Castle" était aussi mon titre préféré d'eux avant que "The Dripping Tap" ne déboule en ouverture d'*Omnium Gatherum*. Et il reste mon deuxième titre préféré aujourd'hui. J'adhère aussi (quasi) totalement à ta liste d'albums essentiels. Je remplacerais juste *Fishing For Fishies* (que je trouve très sympa, hein) par *Float Along - Fill Your Lungs*, pour lequel j'ai une tendresse particulière, et qui a l'air de bien représenter leur garage rock des débuts... Le KGATLW version heavy metal de *Infest The Rat's Nest* et *Petrodragonic* ne me parlait pas trop au début non plus, mais pour les avoir vu en festival (prestation proprement sidérante) clore sur ce style-là avec un abattage incroyable après une performance de quasi-deux heures, je dois dire que je vous les choses un peu différemment maintenant. Le reste du concert explorait principalement Omnium Gatherum (ouverture parfaite avec "The Dripping Tap"), avec aussi un extrait de Nonagon Infinity. Je pouvais difficilement espérer mieux ! Tiens, au fait, c'est quoi les concerts les plus mémorables auquel tu as assisté ? J'ai noté tes deux dernières suggestions d'écoute. Ravi d'y trouver le *WIDE AWAAAAKE* de Parquet Courts, qui est effectivement un classique de l'indie rock moderne, quelque part entre Pavement, Talking Heads et Beastie Boys (en quelque sorte). Ce disque était d'ailleurs l'album de l'année 2018 pour Mowno -- avant que je ne fasse partie de la rédaction. Quand je te dis qu'il est bien, ce site ! 😉 J'ai compté le nombre de suggestions d'albums / artistes que tu m'as faites en tout et que je ne connais pas: il y en a sept ! Challenge : tout écouter avant la fin de l'été. Pour l'instant, je vais être bien occupé à traduire et retranscrire mon interview, mais j'essaie de m'y coller après ! Dans les jours qui viennent, je réponds aussi à tes questions sur ma sélection pour la users' list et sur comment je suis tombé sur ce générateur... Ah, au fait. Dans ma review sur Tame Impala au dessus, je t'ai piqué l'expression "humongous banger", que tu avais utilisé pour le "Tiny Dancer" d'Elton John. Tellement drôle ! 😄 Have a very nice day! 🙂

More tragical than hip in my book. Fully, completely non-essential. Here's what my first impression of this album was, at least. To anyone who is a fan of this Canadian band, please bear with me and try to go beyond that rude introduction of mine, though. Because there are also reasons I won't give a one-star mark to this record at the end of this review, in spite of the manner I've just dismissed it here. So maybe you and I can still see eye to eye somehow, even if you love The Tragically Hip... The first question is, am I being unnecessarily harsh on *Fully, Completely*? Maybe. Guess I have also exaggerated my initial boredom so that I could write the daft sarcastic catchphrases up there. Yet the linearity displayed by this record is so damn obvious that it became extremely difficult to focus on the music for me. Those 100% predictable chord changes, the flat vocal lines, the competent but ultimately bland performances and production values, along with the meat-and-potatoes effect of those MOR rock songs logically trying to catch the early-nineties "alternative" bandwagon... Yawnfest. No matter how fast or slow the tempos go, and no matter what sort of rhythm is used, what you have here always sounds the same, and it never sounds original or enticing enough for me. Folk ballad "Wheat Kings" showed a little promise at first, but the latter wasn't exactly held by the end of the song. And the rest was instantly forgettable for my ears. Plus, the drum sound still has its feet firmly planted in the eighties (also a predictable event given the release date of this album). Which is always unpleasant three decades and a half later. At least for that sort of rock trying hard to sound "authentic" enough So yeah, comparing this to Stone Temple Pilots seems about right. Rush also fits the shoe, I guess. Didn't read all the reviews in here, but at least no one dared mention REM to describe *Fully, Completely*. Probably because as relatively close to the latter as The Tragically Hip are on paper, the difference of intensity and songwriting chops between the two acts remains huge. Sorry, Canadian friends. I'm now aware that this act was quite popular in your neck of the woods at the time, and I don't want to hurt your feelings given the untimely death of Gord Downie... But your beautiful country has given birth to so many *more essential* albums shunned by the original list, and I'd rather give four or five stars to them. Speaking of which, I was also aware that another album by The Tragically Hip, *Phantom Power*, had been suggested for the users' list, and out of curiosity -- and also to save myself some time in the future -- I decided to listen to it as well... I fully expected to dislike it, obviously... But to my surprise, that other album actually sounded *fantastic*! And of course, most of the "professional critics" panned it at the time of its release. What a bunch of deaf bastards, clearly lacking a truly musical ear -- something that should be mandatory for their occupation, for pete's sake! For me, those critics were simply too thick and clueless to realize how the band had admirably upgraded their songs and overall sound by 1998... Let me also point out something here, by the way: knowing absolutely nothing about The Tragically Hip before today, the fact that Gord Downie passed away in such tragic circumstances -- something I've only read about *after* I listened to both albums -- didn't influence my takes on their music at all. Including the very positive one I'm about to preemptively write about *Phantom Power* here. *Phantom Power* is indeed way more dynamic than *Fully Completely*, thanks to its hairpin curves and impressive changes of gears. It is also way more memorable in terms of riffs and vocal lines, way more convincing and even moving in its harmonies, arrangements and chord changes, and way more heartfelt in its vocal performance... To the point that I might try to find a second-hand copy of that other album online, and will probably include it in my high-rated gallery the day it pops up on this generator. Here the comparisons with REM could be warranted, at least -- and it doesn't matter if the band was more than ten years late to really learn their lesson from the Athens, Georgia masters. Better late then never, right? Honestly, I didn't see that one coming after listening to today's suggestion. Hope my appreciation of *Phantom Power* will convince fans of The Tragically Hip that I *really* tried with *Fully, Completely* as well, that I really *listened*. Professional musicians are like us plebs, I imagine. They have their good days and their bad days, and they have albums where they just follow a plan that ultimately doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things, and others where they can be struck by genius inspiration. And I'd rather remember the latter, of course. Rest in power, Gord. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 80 (including this one) ----- Émile, curieux de savoir ce que tu penses de ma chronique un peu polémique sur le band canadien au dessus. Et sinon, il y a des réponses pour toi dans la review précédente, et d'autres qui viendront en dessous...

By all conceivable metrics out there, Ween should be filed next to These Might Be Giants and Phish in a folder labelled as "Weird genre-hopping acts with a cult following which did not necessarily yield essential masterpieces in the album format". Quite a long title for that imaginary dusty folder of mine, but if you can find a shorter one, be my guest. That said, my rating of *Chocolate and Cheese* will be slightly higher than the TMBG record suggested to me a couple of days ago, for reasons I will try to quickly explain now... Indeed, off-kilter highlights such as "I Can't Put My Finger On It" (anticipating the marine themes of *The Mollusk*), sarcastic break-up ballad "Baby Bitch", "Voodoo Lady" (splitting the difference between bayou blues recorded with an eighties synth pop flair and more abrasive noise dirges à la Sonic Youth), or the short pop gem "What Deaner Was Really Talking About" easily make up for the senseless drivel found elsewhere in the LP (more on that later), while still retaining the craziest aspects of the American band's music. Some deeper cuts can also be enjoyable, like the sixties psychedelic pop pastiche "Míster, Would you Please Help My Pony?", or that ambient instrumental homage to Funkadelic's Edie Hazel -- displaying impressive guitar-playing chops worthy of the artist Ween pays tribute to here. Said instrumental also helps underline the fact that the American act can manage to reach musical artistry that's truly inspiring from time to time, as ironic as it is on a more general level. In other words, there's more than meets the eye here. Of course, when Ween's music is bad, it's *really* bad. The opener on this album, some sort of rockabilly parody, epitomizes this lameness perfectly, and the professional production values actually make matters worse here. If that thing was lo-fi, just like in early Ween LPs, at least you'd get some sort of punk-rock-driven kick in the teeth. Whereas the actual result in the present track is just boring. Also, the offensive lyrics on a couple of cuts aged like milk. Provocative art is fine in my book generally speaking, but this stuff making fun of kids with an incurable disease, or repeating the words "AIDS" and "HIV" in a goofy tone of voice over polka-adjacent muzak, simply appear designed to make a couple of nineties college bros giggle in university dorms. Yeah, right, SO edgy. Yawn. Ween's surreal artistry is indeed often a double-edged sword on this LP. Pitchfork's Stuart Berman can praise the latter as foretelling absurdist internet aesthetics while still being in the "analog era", I'm pretty sure that *current* internet-driven college humour is actually more sophisticated than that on average. And also funnier, more importantly. Yeah sure, we now live in a digital era when the line between good taste and bad taste has been somehow abolished. But at the end of the day, even some of the most open-minded listeners out there will quickly recognize which songs are listenable and which ones are gratuitously grating in the tracklist of this 31-year-old LP. And this whether lyrically or musically. Looking at you, "Candi" and "The HIV Song". Still, a lot of other tracks surprisingly hold water in this bizarre record, as voluntarily messy as it is (it's all summed up in its title, right?). Credit the musicianship and the artistic flair here, probably. There is for instance more allure or more playfulness in Ween's vocal performances than what you can find in your usual These Might Be Giants LP -- whose own vocal performances often come off as amateurish in comparison (and the very wordy lyrics, as witty as they are, certainly don't help -- in that sense, Ween's surreal economy with words is far more interesting in the long run)... That said, *of course*, I WON'T include *Chocolate & Cheese* in my own list of "essential" LPs. Every alt-rock music fan worth their salt who is NOT part of the Ween cult knows their best album is *The Mollusk*, because it pulled off the incredible feat of being both wildly idiosyncratic and yet almost cohesive -- in spite of the expected changes in music styles. Plus, it harbours a popular gem such as "Ocean Man*, along with pretty cool prog-inspired cuts with specific Ween tongue-in-cheek twists in them. Waiting for someone in here to suggest this better album to include it in my "high-rated" gallery. Or possibly even in my *highest rated* one. Being a weirdo doesn't necessarily mean you can't be a little picky. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 81 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

'She said: "You're good with words, words won't save your life" / They didn't, so he died'. Oh the irony. Craig Finn's long strings of literary words about idle American youngsters spending their free time on booze and sex -- strongly inspired by Kerouac -- indeed won't save the overblown arena-rock simulacrum of his band The Hold Steady, filled with so many cheesy guitar licks and other stupid arrangements the latter often end up distracting from whatever strength the original compositions could have had under less hackneyed hands. Those overtones were already quaint in 2006. Twenty years later, they're simply unbearable. Too bad for the songs proper. Not that all the compositions are good anyway. Too many of them indeed go nowhere fast, often not holding the early promise of their bombastic introductions. But I guess it all depends on what it is you want from a good rock song, just like personal mileages vary on what a good book is. Anyone who's read *On The Road* indeed knows the plot of that novel is ironically quite static -- that it was just a mouthpiece to express fifties bohemian counterculture, whose real point was never to develop an entertaining story. Likewise, The Hold Steady's compositions are mostly backdrops for its singer's literary talents. Very few melodies and harmonies are memorable. Hooks are quite interchangeable. Progression is rare. It all checks out, doesn't it? Finn's (mostly) sprechgesang vocals are also an acquired taste, I imagine -- one you could try to dig if you put some effort into it. But the cost is probably way too high for any indie-rock fan who understands the meaning of the term "overkill". Interestingly, that raving Pitchfork review praising this album insistently labelled Finn as an American Jarvis Cocker, for reasons that partly eluded me at first -- in spite of the obsession of both artists for "common people" and sex. Then I saw a picture of Finn's geeky mug online, and it all checked out again. Guess looks and optics -- whether good or bad -- got in the way of that reviewer's better sense at the time. At least, Pulp have patiently learnt their way around a hit song as years went by. And they ended up writing legendary albums having truly interesting dynamics between said hits and deeper cuts. In comparison, Finn and his boys are merely going through the motions here, either musically or vocally / lyrically. Words won't save my life either, so I better stop yaking now (we have one flaw in common, Mr. Finn, I'll give you that...). But before I shut my trap, there's one last pivotal influence that needs to be finally addressed to explain what *Boys And Girls In America* is attempting to pull off. Should I really name it? Most of you readers have probably already seen Springsteen's name pop up several times in the reviews up there... So what of it? Not much. Why on earth would you go for a cheap secondhand copy of the Boss when you can get the original thing whenever you want? At least Titus Andronicus infused punk aesthetics in their own homage to the New Jersey legend, and Gang Of Youths could also take different (thunder)roads and avenues once in a while, never losing their natural elegance as they did so. Either way passes on the torch in a truly personal fashion. Whereas The Hold Steady seemingly stumble on the finish line. If they were even interested in passing on the torch in the first place... When your heartland rock feels so derivative, it becomes hard to believe you heart's really into it (even if it is). It only feels like you're just driving recklessly on the Boss Expressway, too intoxicated by your own shtick to realize your car has ended up on the wrong side of the road. Call that driving under the (anxiety of) influence. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 82 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

For an artist who hung out and played with Drive-By-Truckers, this is a surprisingly generic, by-the-numbers collection of tame folk songs with a lot of predictable chords, lyrics and vocal melodies. As a result, the whole thing comes off as interchangeable with a number of other acts in the genre, never really standing out from that well-trodden field in America's heartland. A couple of exceptions break that rule of thumb, fortunately, like the harmonically very nice title-track or the subtle and delicate "Crimson And Clay". Yet in that overall genre, I'd rather go to the frailty of Neil Young's voice over his own seventies folk jewels. Or I'd go to the lo-fi shenanigans of The Mountain Goats at his best. Or to the snarling political vignettes of Jesse Welles. Or I'd choose the stellar and soothing songwriting within Adrienne Lenker's ballads and country-twang gems. Anything that shows at least a little bit of *personality* -- musicians not necessarily aiming for perfection performance-wise, but striving for inventive and truly creative ways to wear their hearts on their sleeves. With modern ones such as Lenker, for instance, you have that impulse to compose the most breathtaking guitar arrangements over memorable and original chord sequences. Something a very competent yet ultimately-by-the-book artist such as Jason Isbell will probably never be able to pull off. Of course, I get that for the person who submitted this album, all the references I've quoted up there would probably display too many quirks distracting the listener from appreciating how great the songwriting actually is. It's a matter of personal taste, as always. For that person, the lack of salient features in *Foxes In The Snow* is probably what makes it some sort of platonic ideal in the genre. While for me, it's what makes it a borefest. And as usual, no one is necessarily right or wrong about those things... 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 83 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

Mmmmmmmmm... No. Spending the first five minutes of your 1993 album playing hackneyed soft-rock owing more to the eighties than to the nineties, while indulging in a cringe comedy yarn about an awkward picnic involving God (a meta-joke without a punchline, but also without real songwriting merits), is NOT the ideal way to open a record that would stand the test of time for me. What follows is even worse than that, as competently produced and performed as the music after the opener is. Crash Test Dummies's most famous song is actually boring beyond its central memorable wordless humming. And the deeper cuts found elsewhere are only deep in the sense that they go... nowhere. You also have the mandatory feminine background vocals on the choruses and supposed hooks, which are so damn formulaic and thin-sounding that they instantly took me out of whatever it was the Canadian band was attempting to do here. But I guess this is quite a cohesive choice given how formulaic the rest of the instrumentation and arrangements are themselves. Is that all? No, we still have to address the artistry of baritone-bass vocalist Brad Roberts. Long story short, it sounds like nails on a chalkboard to my ears. He's obviously a smart person -- honors degrees in English and Philosophy, which does not surprise me for someone who namedrops Sartre and TS Eliot in his lyrics. Yet very often, the man also sounds too smart for his own good. Mock-existential concerns can be somewhat entertaining on paper, at least when handled properly. But here they just come off as dreadful and pretentious as hell. And don't get me started on Roberts' annoying vocal inflexions -- maybe the only thing that's not formulaic in here, yet also a shtick that's clashing too fiercely against the conventional surroundings. When the absurd repeatedly doubles down on itself (an instrumentation that's going through the motions + quizzical lyrics + forced vocal performance), you get the impression of an overkill mode that simply becomes unbearable. I like music of all sorts, but never when it is so damn self-conscious. The cherry on the cake is probably Brad's weird interest for the word "pajamas", which makes me want to return to bed quick this morning... All of it is just so... clunky. I'm surprised. The person who submitted this album has pretty good music tastes. But hey, this person also selected Limp Bizkit's "Chocolate Starfish..." in their highest-rated albums... As Brad Roberts suggests it himself in his cheap philosophical ramblings, nobody's perfect. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and the production values + 1 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 84 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

This aged like milk. Anyone who wants to discover great metalcore / post-hardcore acts infusing electronic elements into their compositions should try to listen to early Genghis Tron or The Armed first. And the production values on this thing are simply horrible (bad dynamics on the mix, thin-sounding drums and backing vocals...). I don't know what's the most appalling thing here... Bad taste or bad ear? I've just learnt through one of the reviews in this section that Enter Shikari once opened for Linkin Park. That might explain a few things... Ironically, that sort of gig didn't bring them the expected level of fame the band probably hoped for. It warranted them a place on this users' list, though. Better than nothing, I guess. 1/5 for the artistry and purposes of this list of essential albums. 5/10 for more general purposes (4/4 for the musicianship, 0/1 for the production values + 1/5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 85 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus... Je me suis retrouvé à devoir écrire une chronique non prévue au départ pour le site, en plus de la traduction de mon interview. D'où le fait que les nouvelles réponses se font attendre. Sorry ! J'espère que tu profites bien de ton été...

I don't get it. Is it one very long song divided through chapters? Oh, it's a rock opera! Makes sense. Only wish there were *real* choruses for at least three or four pivotal highlights. Because there is nothing in the folk / rock rulebook preventing you from sprinkling memorable choruses in a rock opera, even if you have a story to tell. The story here is often more suggested than fully described, but that sort of vague execution goes with the rock opera territory, I imagine (see *Tommy*, for instance)... If a little quaint-sounding at times, touching and tender moments abound in that tale of doomed love between a young mortal woman and a shape-shifting fawn living in the taïga. If only the landscape of said taïga didn't look so flat overall on a compositional and dynamic level. There are admittedly a couple of cool hooks here and there -- especially for the villainous character of the "rake", to whom the liveliest and rockiest songs are dedicated. But of course, it's hard to picture an audience singing along to hooks about someone who murdered his three children (as cool as their return as ghosts at the end is). The conclusive track suggesting the ultimate tragic fate of the doomed lovers is also graceful and moving. Too bad that mostly everything that comes before that last run of songs lacks the oomph factor that could have made this project sound truly vital for my ears. The Decemberists come close to it, sure. But, for me at least, they don't get that far inside the forest to bring back a record that feels universal and essential in the long run. Excellent material for a year's end school musical though (a real musical adapting *The Hazards Of Love* did exist, see the Wikipedia page). As a parent, it would be a blast to see your high school teen(s) in such a production -- one that would still be difficult to pull off in those circumstances l, I guess. I'm not being sarcastic here. One cannot blame Colin Meloy for trying his talented hand at this project, and there's nothing in it to be ashamed of. That said, there are probably better Decemberists albums out there. As someone who only has a very surface knowledge of the band's career, I wish one of those potential better records had been picked here instead so that I could finally find my way in said discography. Another time, maybe? Just like Margaret and that fawn, some chance meeting could bring me to another fan-favorite Decemberists LP one day. Hope this leads to love at first sight. Possibly one that doesn't end up in tragedy. 3/5 for the artistry and purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 86 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus... Je me suis retrouvé à devoir écrire une chronique non prévue au départ pour le site, en plus de la traduction de mon interview. D'où le fait que les nouvelles réponses se font attendre. Sorry ! J'espère que tu profites bien de ton été...

Yeah, the original list has the eponymous 2013 album, but not its follow-up *Lemonade*, a more "intimate" affair inspired by Queen Bey's marital difficulties with husband Jay Z. Of course "intimate" for someone like Beyoncé involves dozens of collaborators, producers, session musicians and guest features (Jack White, The Weeknd, James Blake....). Pop stars will be pop stars, I guess. I'm not gonna lie, this is a pretty cool album, and for once Mrs. Knowles-Carter keeps it short. The first side is especially strong (magnificent opener, and lots of interesting dynamics in and between the cuts that follow). Some one-liners uttered by Bey throughout the record are also pretty memorable. For the second side, "Freedom", featuring a very sharp Kendrick Lamar, obviously steals the show. I question the decision to end the whole thing (on the original tracklist) with the Mike-Will-Made-It-produced "Formation", which sounds like an afterthought that sticks out like a sore thumb at the last minute (plus, I don't think that track aged particularly well -- there's been far more memorable stuff in that vein since). But otherwise, yeah, that's cool stuff. I checked out the highest and lowest-rated selections of the person who submitted this LP. Wish said person could be as open-minded as Beyoncé herself when it comes to genres -- her inspirations as an writer / executive producer go deeper than what happens on a surface level, believe me (that's obvious from the list of samples, interpolations and borrowings that helped her give birth to this record). Whereas the listener who chose her album is pretty close-minded. Almost everything with a punk electric guitar is left in the gutter here. Too bad for that individual that they can't see that good art can take on many forms. 3.5/5 for the artistry and purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 43 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 86 ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

The Gods are Belgian, very few people are aware of it, and they once wondered what would happen if Jacques Brel returned from the dead over a house music soundtrack sprinkled with strong hip hop flavors and other EDM influences ... And guess what? What actually happened was a worldwide success that's rarely seen for a record not sung in English. Of course, one could argue that Stromae is even more than the tags I assigned to him up there. He might not be right up my alley, I can't deny the very distinct voice he has, in all senses of the word. Puns and constant wordplay abound in "Racine carrée" -- to the point where they could make a French-speaking listener's head spin. Bangers also abound, especially in the first half. Being a French speaker myself, I'm quick to pinpoint them -- all of them have been played to death in the radio where I live. After that first half, the momentum created by the singer-rapper-composer loses its leg a little. Worse, a couple of duds at the very end come close to ruining the whole thing (aw, what a tragic way to stumble on the finish line and miss my high-rated albums list here!). Those duds are the pointless instrumental "merci" and closer "avf", featuring Maître Gims -- don't ask me about him, American and British friends, he's one of the most terrible mistakes made by the *French* gods in the last two decades or so. But I guess that's a story for another time, kiddies. Or not. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 43 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 87 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques récentes réponses au dessus...

What I like about this one is that it challenges what one may think a vegan / queer / anarchist band should sound like. Apart from that there's nothing in that bubbly and chipper pop punk LP that I haven't encountered in a slightly different form before, with the best albums of Get Up Kids, Superchunk or Built To Spill. The band also namedrops Big Star, Heart and Replacements, sure, but I guess those references are also part of that genealogy taken in a broader sense... Of course, this up here is an old-timer's POV. Younger folks having a blast listening to this style and not necessarily knowing everything in said genealogy are not in the wrong. They're enjoying life, and good for them. It's just that older folks can't have fun in the same way as the one they had as teens'. Besides, all those major chords and singalongs over them have a strong "déjà vu" effect for me, of course ("déjà entendu"?). Which obviously can spoil the whole thing to an extent. But maybe in the right set of circumstances, like during a gig or a party, I could truly dig those tracks? Also, and to return to the first lines of this tentative review, I have to admit that the manner in which the lyrics sometimes seamlessly mingle the personal and the political is worthy of admiration here. Rather than directly giving political messages, some of those songs choose to tell us personal experiences instead, but they are experiences from folks having a certain set of political beliefs that seeps into their daily lives and emotions, thereby making said experiences feel universal. This is a smart move, and it's actually smarter than what those lyrics let on first, at face value. And incidentally, this here is also probably why the band name-dropped Billy Bragg of all people among the artists who influenced them... Not sure that's enough for me to select this record in my own 1001 keepers. But if I don't *officially* leave the door open to it, I'm pretty sure I'll remember Martha's name starting today. And then, five or ten years into the future, who knows what may happen? One of the main strengths of revolutions -- whether personal or political --is that you rarely see them coming... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 43 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 88 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus..

The sea shanties and traditional celtic folk tunes on this record are good fun, but the Canadian band's own compositions -- mostly found in the first half -- are noticeably quaint and predictable on the whole. And it's relatively easy to say which is which without checking out the credits. Did it myself to pass the time, and I was rarely wrong. If just like me, you're interested in more striking and artistic ways to honor traditional shenanigans in this overall vein, you can either: - Go back to the Pogues -- Shane McGowan's personality and raucous vocals did wonders to make that tradition feel relevant and vital, and some of the Pogues' own compositions, whether famous or not, could rival their traditional models in ways that are still incredible today. - Or you can discover that extraordinary new Irish band Lankum, who injects gothic undertones, cinematic post-rock flavours and daring experimental impulses in their repertoire of tunes -- some of whom go back to the 17th century or something -- laced with a few stellar homemade compositions here and there. This band takes my breath away, and I will never tire of pointing people towards them. Last album *False Lankum*, released two years ago, was the entry point for me, and I haven't recovered from it yet. What was it we were originally talking about again? Oh yeah, Great Big Sea. Nice lads, proficient musicians, energetic performers. But no purveyor of essential albums in the long run. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 43 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 89 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus..

"This is commercial suicide," the label warned Faith No More when they first heard *Angel Dust*. And just like that, this record ended up becoming the best-selling album in the American band's discography. Takeaway: let the artists make their own goddamn choices. I respect the hell of Mike Patton, mostly through his many other acts on the side (Mr. Bungle, Tomahawk, Fantômas...), none of them "essential", admittedly -- even if a legal case could be argued for Fantômas's amazing collection of film soundtrack covers in *The Director's Cut*. That said, Patton's most important act Faith No More was not my thing when I was younger. On paper, I understood his partly ironical intents when he led the band to include so many hackneyed elements into their original metal shtick. But some tones decidedly sounded too cheesy for me. Revisiting *Angel Dust* today, I admit I was probably wrong and close-minded. The issue I still take with this LP is that its first four tracks go on way longer than they should have -- everything that's important in them is said in their first halves, and the overall album dynamics would have benefitted from some micro-editing there so that the first leg packs a tighter punch. Those minor gripes aside, the string of songs following "RV" -- going from "Smaller And Smaller", discovering unstable psych-metal turf Tool would soon start to explore, to "A Small Victory" -- *does* pack a punch. Even if it does it in a distinctive Patton-postal, certifiable fashion, of course. "Everything's Ruined" comes close to being a banger while never watering down the band's insane antics, "Malpractice" is sinister as fuck, and the aerobics background vocals taking a page out of the Jackson Five in "Be Aggressive" are simply hilarious put side by side with Patton's gross lyrics. As I said, let the artists have their fun. Not everything is perfect. Towards the end of the album, dud "Crack Hitler" should have been left on the cutting room floor for instance. But I enjoyed the "Midnight Cowboy Theme" penultimate interlude, incidentally foretelling *The Director's Cut*. And listening to closer piano-lounge cover of the Commodores ballad "Easy" in the context of the LP is priceless. Yeah right, Mike. After all the crazy shenanigans you submitted the listener to, you're now saying that you're an "easy" guy? So you're the one leaving the girl, and not the other way around... Sure. So yeah, I would happily replace Dimery's Faith No More pick in the original list with this one. Compared to the genre-hopping acrobatics of *Angel Dust*, *The Real Thing* aged quite badly, especially through its production values. Whereas *Angel Dust* still feels fresh and relevant today, in a day and age where the line between supposedly "good" and "bad" taste is so routinely questioned. It's actually quite ironical given the initial critical reception of this LP, which was not always positive at the time of its release... Recognizing artistic merits sometimes imply getting out of your comfort zone and letting go of some of your pet peeves to see if a piece of music works on some other level. Now, user who submitted this album to the list, can you do that for the Björk LP I myself submitted, and therefore change your 1/5 grading for it? After all, vocal acrobatics and genre-hopping adventures are also part of the Icelandic diva's handbook, are they not? Just kidding here. To each their own, as they say. 😉 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 89 ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus..

Oh well, Steven Wilson. I have to say that it's a little hard for me to refrain from expressing derisive takes about his gen-x fans (ironically sounding like boomers) when they fawn over absolutely *everything* the man did -- whether as a solo artist or in his original act Porcupine Tree (gradually adding lengthy metal and seventies prog-rock dirges to their nineties psych alt-rock shtick). Those hardcore fans talk of Wilson as if he was a groundbreaking genius or something, and it sounds quite laughable for me given how obviously derivative his music is (to his own admission, I think). I really tried with Porcupine Tree, several times, actually...But I just can't help finding most of their music either quite bland or very heavy-handed, or both (which takes the cake actually!). *Fear Of A Blank Planet* is OK, I guess, but it's not the revolution stans think it is. And the rest is quite forgettable. Especially if you compare it to truly groundbreaking artists also working at the time those records were released. That personal mileage about PT doesn't mean I can't show the respect Wilson deserves as an incredibly proficient, skilled and productive artist, though. And that includes his valuable work remixing classic albums recorded by seventies prog rock legends to help them stand the test of time, of course. About Wilson's solo career as a singer-songwriter and musician, what I already knew of it (not much, I admit it) suggested that said career was as hit-or-miss as the one of his main act (his recent solo foray in a relatively more streamlined strand of pop rock is an absolute borefest for my ears, for instance). Needless to say, I expected to be underwhelmed by *Hand. Cannot. Erase.*... Well, guess what? I was NOT underwhelmed by this album. On the contrary, I have to admit that it's objectively excellent, for two main reasons I will try to quickly pinpoint now: a) The overall concept behind this album, drawing from that heartbreaking event that took place in London, raises a lot of questions about modern alienation and the overall human condition. And that inspiration is used as a catalyst that's emotionally powerful throughout the record, whether musically and lyrically. Regarding those lyrics, they are a little oblique sometimes -- prog rock constraints play a part there -- but when you know what they're really about, most of them hit the mark in memorable ways. In closer "Happy Returns", that part about the lonesome protagonist counting years as if they were trains she waves at, unable to make them stop, tightened my throat in a fashion I didn't see coming. And the last words of the song (and album) are a tear-jerker for sure when you know what they are referencing. An extraordinary conclusion, enhanced by that eerie choir in the background. b) As suggested by my last lines up there, the music is often up to the task of enhancing the lyrical assets and overall concept. The prog rock tones -- drawing from Genesis and Yes to Pink Floyd's The Wall -- do feel genuine and authentic. The unavoidable meandering turns associated to that style are kept to a minimum. And as I said, the last track slaps, as well as the long epic one that leads to it. Oh, and the short indie-rock title-track reminds me of a mid-career Manic Street Preachers hit, hits which I have a soft spot for (even if they're drawn from albums that are mostly mixed bag affairs for me). So yeah why not? Except for one little thing... Due to his personal life, Wilson has strong ties with Israel, and he's already stated in the past that he can't comprehend why some international artists are calling for meaningful action to end apartheid there, including through BDS sanctions (FYI, that was before Oct 7 and the genocide in Gaza, but more on that later...). I understand that Israel's society is very warm and accepting, and when your wife is Israeli, it's hard to take a stance that goes beyond a vague "civilians, wherever they are, shouldn't die" so as to address the systemic issues plaguing the region, some of whom stems from the current fascistic leadership there (even if others go back from a long time ago...). I can even grasp that BDS might appear as too extreme for someone like Steve, that it sounds like a collective punishment for all Israeli artists. Then again, this situation can raise a few eyebrows. Especially when you've collaborated with a musician (Aviv Geffen, once aligned to the side of peace) who's now pandering to the illegal religious settlers in the West Bank -- a lot of whom routinely do everything in their power to make their Palestinian neighbors' lives miserable (check out Israeli human rights organization B'tselem to know more about that). Yet Wilson has remained silent about his old friend's new alignment. Because he now agrees with him? Worse, to this day, Wilson remains silent about the Gaza genocide itself. Sure, not every artist needs to take a stand in this. But the context for Wilson is different... After the horrible events of Oct. 7 (which MUST be condemned in equal measure, there's nothing to argue here), he tweeted to express his support for the Israeli victims, which was the right thing to do, of course. Incidentally, he also lamented about the probable future loss of civilian lives in Gaza (evidence that he knew what was going to happen, like a lot of Israelis). But then, he said that the IDF had to do "everything in their power to destroy Hamas", or something to that effect. A phrasing that has aged very poorly in two years time... I know there's a deep trauma in Israel because of that pogrom and the whole hostage situation, and I won't shed a tear for the Hamas leaders and the direct perpetrators of those crimes who have since been killed. Yet can you doom or ethnically cleanse two million people because of those crimes? No you can't. And yet that's exactly what's happening today. So yeah, beyond that awkward phrasing, Wilson has since made zero public statement to extend the expression of his sorrow to the Palestinian civilian victims of the war. Official number: 60,000 dead (plus the maimed, the displaced, the starvation, the rubbles everywhere...). You don't believe those numbers? Well, even if Hamas is inflating them, 10,000 or something like that would still be unacceptable. And yet the so-called "progressive" Wilson has nothing to say about this. And only two plausible alternative reasons can explain this silence: he's too afraid, or he looks the other way. Let me be clear here: in the face of the current tragedy, none of those reasons are valid enough. They can only show that the bulk of Israeli society is going down a very slippery slope through constant brainwashing, and that voices for peace over there must take the upper hand before it's too late. Even if it's *already* too late... Sorry for the lengthy political rant here, but this issue is too grave and serious to let it go. Because for me, opinions about those pivotal matters will decide who's in the right side of history in the foreseeable future, plain and simple. I'm gonna step down from my soapbox very soon, don't worry... Regarding 1001-albums matters, I will still give the positive grade I originally wanted to assign this LP for purely artistic reasons, yet I only do so begrudgingly. To be clear, I *don't* want to separate the person and the artist here. But I gotta maintain some sort of cohesion. Radiohead's Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood are for instance in a very similar situation regarding their take on this war right now (it's worse for them, actually, because RH are also known as a band that's far more "political" than Porcupine Tree). And yet, being an old fan of them, most of their albums are still in the high or highest-rated galleries for the original list, and it wouldn't make much sense for me to edit them now. Same thing with Kanye West, whose music I once loved, but whose revolting antisemitic, n*zi-praising rants have logically dismantled whatever legacy me might have had in the future. No one but me cares about those galleries anyway... What truly *matters* here is to inform potential readers of what I know about those artists' stances about that subject whenever I find one. Of course I'm not forcing anyone to share my own opinion, here expressed after the quick descriptions of those stances. Please rest assured that the factual parts up there are seriously sourced, at least. If you have time on your hands, a few keywords will help you find said sources... After that, it's up to everyone here to make up their minds on the issue. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 90 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus..

Yeah, not a bad effort from the former Hüsker Dü and Sugar leading member, probably unnecessarily panned by the critics at the time (while Sugar might have been slightly overrated, on the other hand). Guess the fact that Bob recorded everything himself, even using drum machines for the drums, wasn't to their liking. But honestly the sound of this LP aged pretty well. Interestingly, this album is far from being the most streamed stuff by the American rocker on Spotify. Are most Bob Mould fans still concurring with the old critics after all these years? There are some underwhelming moments, but the heights still make the album pleasant to listen to (ballads "Anymore Time Betweens" and "Fort Knox, King Salomon", indie-rockers "Deep Karma Canyon" and "Art Crisis". Not enough to include this in my own list of keepers (more essential moments of Mould's career are missing from the original book), but thanks for the suggestion. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 33 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 (including this one) ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus

"That's both chill and dark. So moody. I love it." Those were my fifteen-year-old stepson's words about "Humming", just when the song's theremin-like wailing over a slow ominous breakbeat surged through the family living room's speakers today. The boy can be quite picky when it comes to the "old folks"'s music tastes. But not here. And it makes sense somehow. The current moody sounds and playlists he digs -- whether from contemporary hip hop, or for what they now call "lo-fi" -- actually owe a lot to Portishead, most of the time without even knowing it. Not everyone could have predicted this during the nineties. Coming from Bristol, the same town as Massive Attack, Beth Gibbons and Geoff Barrow's act was shoehorned a little too quickly in the trip hop fad at the time -- for admittedly understandable musical reasons, but also with a blInd eye to the many elements within their sound already transcending the ephemeral genre. There's indeed more that meets the ear here. And if you know a little about Barrow and Gibbons, they certainly can't care less about trends and what's supposedly hip. So whether experimental (Geoff's side kraut band Beak>) or classical-sounding (Beth's initial love for soul music), their interests, tastes and abilities speak from the heart first, before pandering to music markets. The irony being that Portishead's success was humongous during their heyday. Of course, this was a blessing for Barrow and Gibbons, because this gave them the necessary means to hone their abilities and explore their sound further, without ever missing the mark overall in the years after they broke out. But said initial success may also have prevented less discernible listeners to understand how quintessential the band's music is *to this day*. For me, all three Portishead albums should have been included in the original list anyway. If *Dummy* has one or two underwhelming tracks verging a little too much on those now dated trip hop aesthetics, it most of all harbors a wealth of iconic cuts such as *Mysterons", "Sour Times", "Wandering Star", "Roads" and "Glory Box". As for *Third*, it is the more experimental, krautrock-inspired, post-hiatus one, and as such it's the late masterpiece that saw the band reinvent themselves instead of becoming a nostalgia act -- with moments so dark and effective it's easy to lose count of them. The Silver Apples-adjacent analog synth drive of "We Carry On", Adrian Utley's delicate acoustic guitar arpeggios on "The Rip", that cold and insane rhythm pattern on "Machine Gun", the bouncy groove and heartbreaking chorus of "Magic Doors", the sheer despair expressed throughout "Threads"... Gosh, all those moments can make the leftfield music lover's head spin... Comfortably placed between those two extremities, sophomore album *Portishead* holds its own perfectly well, thank you for asking. First, it's probably the most cohesive LP throughout the British band's short discography. Not only does it avoid having a single dud or underwhelming cut, but also, it laser-focuses on the band's initial vintage aesthetics as already displayed in *Dummy* in ways that makes the whole shebang feel even more visceral and effective, from "Undenied"'s Rhodes piano loop to "Only You"'s horn samples. Those vintage aesthetics are all exemplified in that clear-cut sixties-inspired artwork for the album, taken out of the video for *All Mine* -- which is incidentally the best spoof of a James Bond theme song you can find anywhere in music history. Second single "Over", cinematic and suspenseful, was also a perfect showcase for that sort of endeavor. Here, you could easily sense that Gibbons, Barrow and Utley were at the top of that film noir game they had initiated on the debut -- even making original recordings of theirs pass off as samples to give the intended seasoned sheen to their sound. Simply no one could beat them at this. Besides, and younger folks might not automatically realize this today, this record also took a couple of very daring turns at the time. I spent one week in England working as a sort of intern for a local radio in the summer of 1997, and said radio had received an advance copy of the opener "Cowboys". It was not even an official single from the upcoming album by the way -- labels had a lot of ressources re-promotion in those days... Anyways, listening to this song for the first time was a memorable experience for sure. The music was so eerie and high-pitched, and Gibbons' always stellar voice was so expertly twisted and deformed on this track, that I kept wondering if the 12'' vinyl should be played in 33 rpm instead of 45. Nowadays, with so many weird sounds being routinely churned out from either the mainstream or the underground, such impact has been lessened to an extent. But at the time, "Cowboys" felt close to a little revolution. In that league of surprising turns, also add "Half Day Closing", whose sheer intensity and near-atonal climax was kind of a shock as well. Finally, the string of highlights gracing the the album's second side speaks for itself. There's a good reason "Humming" is the opener in the band's *Live At Roseland Ballroom*. Here film noir turns to vintage horror flick, yet Gibbons' vocals feel so heartfelt and evocative the overall result has none of the corny pastiche effect you could have expected there. You really believe the intoxicating song is about a very real woman in pain, lost in gloomy, somber woods. After that, "Mourning Air" feels more laid-back, yet equally despairing. "Seven Months" returns to the strange tones of "Cowboys", with a killer main hook, and a slow rhythm pattern that's so obsessive it feels relentless. "Only You" is milder but equally hazy, with its coolcat John Barry-adjacent horn samples throwing you in the middle of a smoky, shadowy room. And "Elysium" sounds like yet another tortured exploration of a soul in distress that actually foretells the overall bleakness of *Third* in quite a surprising fashion. Closing the album, "Western Eyes" ends on a mysterious, ambiguous note that may or may not read as a political comment. Which is not necessarily off-topic in a film noir soundtrack potentially involving spies... "I feel so cold / On hookers and gin / This mess we're in" also goes the fake sample imitating Frank Sinatra or Dean Martin at the end of this enigmatic closer. Yet the real mess Barrow and Gibbons had made here was to both thwart and exceed their audience's expectation. Rare enough for a sophomore effort, and a lesson for trendy acts since. You can reiterate your previous formulas, but never forget to dig new grooves as well. And to pull this off, there are three things that may come handy: true soul, boldness, and a sense of mystery. All things that can perfectly sum up Portishead in one's ears. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 34 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus

"Heraclitus The Obscure" indeed, Joe Casey's dyspeptic presence, deadpan delivery and stoic stream of consciousness paradoxically storm through this record as strikingly as Greg Ahee's gyrating and melancholic guitar lines, Scott Davidson's pointed and driven bass, and Alex Leonard's either understated or propulsive drums do -- funnelling the whole thing to greatness as if the four men were cautiously driving at night on the dilapidated Detroit expressway. Subtle eerie touches of synths or pedal effects give a discreet extra sonic layer at times. And jumps through different rhythms from one track to the next also provide the necessary variety in what is admittedly a greyish, down-in-the-mouth, overall artistry. Very short fourth track "Caitriona" might sound like a relatively underwhelming interlude here, but everything else is stellar, especially opener "A Deeper Understanding" and "Here Is The Thing", but also "My Children", "The Chuckler", "Windsor Hum", "Night-Blooming Cereus", "Male Plague"... In closer "Half Sister", Casey circles back to the cryptic existentialism of the album's first cut (a private understanding indeed), so as to brand an infinitely unsettling question mark inside the listener's ear. No one can reach the truth, but Joe probably wants you to know you won't find it in capitalism or the entertainment industry. Bleak, yeah. But necessary. Mysterious and intoxicating, potent in the political subtext possibly animating those pessimistic songs, both elegant and abrasive, never heavy-handed, Protomartyr have been one of the pivotal forebearers of the American strand of that late 2010s post-punk revival whose ripples can still be felt today in the music landscape (along with Women/Vietcong/Preoccupations). Hard to say which one of their most prominent LPs is the most important, between *The Agent Intellect*, *Relatives In Descent* or *Ultimate Success Today*... One thing's for sure, though: this band will be remembered for the idiosyncratic and automatically discernible manner in which they seized that post-punk tradition, infusing unmistakable mundane Midwestern features into their work -- which seep through without ever letting the listener pinpoint where those features exactly stem from. Probably Casey's presence and vocals, I imagine... Just like the girl the man talks about in the opener and closer, I am thus "trying to reach you" with this review. And I will probably fail. But failing is OK when you love this act. Because rarely have human failures put to music been so evocative and even inspiring. Let the Heraclitus paradox flow here. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 35 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die..." Simply put, the cinematic magic of Blade Runner would have been impossible to reach without Vangelis. Which is why I'm stoked someone thought of this album. The only gripe I have with the latter, actually, is that the "minimalistic" version of the Main Titles, before the film starts proper, can't be found anywhere in that official version of the soundtrack. And it is not even found in disk 2 from the three-volume Anniversary edition -- although this second volume includes other pivotal music pieces taken from the movie that were absent from the first disk. Don't bother listening to disk 3, by the way, it's the Greek composer later trying to catch that genius spark that had seized him when he originally worked on the film, but given the inconsequential doodles there, those experimental attempts are mostly a failure. But yeah, the rest is stellar. it's evocative, dreamy, nightmarish, moving and filled with all sorts of mysterious sonic details, from weird electronic glitches to organic percussions or mellifluous middle-eastern touches -- suggesting a complex self-contained universe that gives extra depth to the whole thing. Just like other Vangelis' works, this soundtrack is also highly melodic -- obviously in very minor scales, which preserves us from the quaint flavors the man was sometimes also known for elsewhere. And even when Vangelis goes major here, like in the "Main Titles", there is still something downright sinister in the execution of those grand proceedings, in keeping with the mood of the motion picture. The way Film Noir tropes are here conflated with Sci-Fi-inspired tones and soundscapes is just so damn perfect. The heartrending synth solo in "Blade Runner Blues" especially shines in that regard. As for Dick Morrissey's saxophone performance on the "Love Theme", it is so over-the-top it sure borders on cheesiness, yet this music so obviously screams "cinema" in your ears that I don't think you need to have seen the film to dig the intent here. Just perfect, as I said. Of course, for me it's impossible to separate this soundtrack for the movie, one of my all-time favorites. As dystopian as it looked, I wanted to live in something similar to Deckard's messy appartement when I was a teen... This flick left such an huge imprint on my soul, I readily admit such emotional connection fuels my very subjective enthusiasm for this one album. That said, and without a shred of doubt in my mind, this record is also Vangelis' magnum opus, whether for film or not, and it's been incredibly influential throughout the years, just like Ridley Scott's cinematography. You can't count the acts using synths which, at some point or another, took a page out of this particular soundbook Mr. Papathaniassou left us here. And all those musical moments will *not* be lost in time, like tears in rain. At least not any time soon. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 36 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 44 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 ---- Émile, quelques réponses au dessus.

Smooth. Maybe to a fault, but smooooooth... One of the most mentioned Chet Baker albums, with its main legendary performer here exclusively playing the trumpet and not singing. Listening to this next to the swimming pool felt cool and classy. The personnel is stellar: Pepper Addams gently stirring things a little with the deeper tones of his baritone sax ; Herbie Mann's suave flute, as sinuous and sensual as young starlet's silhouette, Kenny Burrell and Bill Evans' always precise contributions on electric guitar and piano ; Philly Joe Jones' understated but pivotal drumming ; and Paul Chambers' perfect mastery of the bass -- always love when that man used his bow, so I wish he had done that more on this LP than only on "You And The Night And The Music (the album's closer, and one of its best cuts)... But that's OK, the way Paul snaps his fingers on those strings everywhere else still does the trick. A bunch of tracks (including opener "Alone Together" and "It Never Entered My Mind") do convey iconic undertones. I also really enjoyed the long-winded slow jam CD bonus track "Early Morning Mood". Let's be honest here, with everything that has gone on since 1958 in the field of jazz and even beyond, this record maybe feels a little too one-note and "by the book" -- like a lot of records from the fifties. But it's still very good. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 36 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 45 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 ---- Émile, j'ai enfin deux minutes pour te donner de nouvelles réponses. J'ai eu une otite carabinée pendant une semaine après mon retour de séjour estival. Pas pratique pour ce générateur. Mais par chance, je connaissais bien la plupart des suggestions durant cette période. Et sinon, j'ai enfin fini ma retranscription d'interview... Ravi de voir que Ogden's Nut Gone Flake soit tombé durant cette période pour toi. Là aussi, tu connaissais bien, et ça se sent. Ça m'a donné envie de réécouter en lisant ta review. Je réponds à deux de tes anciennes questions : Mon choix d'album pour la users list était le Homogenic de Björk. Il y avait tant d'autres choix possibles mais je me suis arrêté sur celui-là. Je sais déjà que t'es pas un grand fan (vu tes retours ici), mais dans ma review -- que tu pourras certainement reconnaître vu mes "codes" si tu recherches la page en ligne -- j'explique simplement que deux des quatre disques de l'Islandaise choisis par Dimery sont litigieux et que donc mon choix est plus un "course-correcting" qu'un ajout de 5e disque. En gros, c'est pas parce que tu es un grand fan que tu peux pas avoir le sens des priorités. Je suis tombé sur ce générateur parce qu'il m'a été suggéré par un parfait inconnu dans un commentaire Facebook. Je trainais pas mal sur des groupes FB à propos de la musique à l'époque, avec beaucoup d'australiens dedans (et je crois bien que c'est un Aussie qui m'a suggéré la chose). Voilà, c'est aussi simple que ça. Et ça a eu des conséquences pendant plus de trois ans ! On vit dans un grand village global maintenant, tu vois Faut vraiment que j'écoute ta sélection, et aussi peut-être réagir à ton message plus récents... J'essaie de faire ça avant la fin de l'été ! Enjoy the summer!

*Romance* is Fontaines D.C. throwing their boots at the stars and finding a strange kind of gravity up there. The Dublin quintet may have aimed for far more mainstream tones and intents with this fourth album, they still sound well-entrenched in the post-punk fringes -- like mercenary "cleaners" who may have more than one definition for the phrase "sanctioning a hit". Take the title track, for example. It doesn’t just open the album — it stalks it into existence, cloaked in dread and thick with theatrical menace, like Krzysztof Komeda scoring a lost Kubrick hallway scene. There’s a horror-film ambiance slithering through the song's ominous toy piano and haunted vocals, setting a tone of strange intimacy and cold sweat. “Starbuster” then snaps that spell without breaking it — with a syncopated pulse, an anxious vintage mellotron, and an elastic groove that wouldn’t feel out of place on a Primal Scream comedown. It’s Fontaines flirting with dancefloor tension and hip hop influences, but refusing to give in fully. Grian Chatten -- here inspired by a panic attack he once experienced in a busy train station -- sounds less like a streetcorner oracle this time around, and more like a rogue broadcaster from a pirate signal. At a breathless pace, he darts into a smog that suddenly turns into a mystical fog on the song's bridge, crooning, snarling and seducing you from there. A touch of genius from the Irish frontman: those gasping fits that punctuate each iteration of the hook — raw, urgent, impossible to ignore. It's a trick sharp enough to slice the daze of passers-by and stop them on their track in their morning commute. Will they catch their train after *that*? By the time the third cut kicks in, the picture is clearer — the band has reshaped its palette without abandoning its bite. “Here’s The Thing” is a bouncy, defiant rocker that could’ve spilled out of a 1996 Top of the Pops green room. There’s more than a whiff of the Manic Street Preachers in its guitar glory and lyrical existentialism, even if Grian Chatten’s delivery is less James Dean Bradfield sermon and more drunken swagger from a pub prophet with lipstick on his collar. A bit later, once "Desire"'s arena-rock ribbons of longing have finished circling back on themselves, “In The Modern World” dials down the urgency to a sighing haze of romantic strings that wouldn’t feel out of place on a Lana Del Rey record — all noir and wide-eyed, like an abandoned fairground in New York. The cut is Fontaines at their most cinematic, as if they had just discovered Lee Hazlewood, an obscure seventies art film, and a bottle of absinthe in the same afternoon. Right after, "Bug" is close to the lush tones of Echo and The Bunnymen at their folkiest — pastoral, spiraling, melancholy, without ever collapsing under the song's own weight. It opens like something ancient being remembered, a sound full of space and light leaking through leaves that sets the tone for the string of deeper cuts that follow: dreamy "Motorcycle Boy", the shoegaze diversion of ‘Sundowner,’ -- whose polished shimmer admittedly veers too close to simulation -- and intimate "Horseness Is the Whatness". Out of the blue, "Death Kink" shreds this calm, with a surge of abrasive Pixies-indebted indie-rock tones, twisted and giddy with menace. And then there’s “Favorite,” one last detour into the heart and a tune that feels like it’s writing itself while it’s being sung, with a sort of casual devastation that sneaks up on you — almost too tender to fully unpack. A glorious closer that owes as much to The Smiths as to REM. *Romance* is Fontaines D.C. stepping into a kind of accidental grandeur. They've sanded some of the jagged edges, not to fit in, but to make the cuts cleaner. It's a gorgeous pivot, haunted and humming — less a rebirth than a glitch in their own matrix, and all the better for it. ---- Additional note: I used AI (Chat GPT) to write the very first draft of this review, following a very long and specific prompt from me. Funny how even after that prompt, Chat GPT still got a lot of the musical references wrong, btw. The text was then heavily edited and completed. And so now, "here's the thing". I just want to be honest here. As much as I love *Romance*, I can also hear the criticisms stating it sounds a bit too clean and distant after the Fountaines' first three LPs. So I thought it would be fitting to use one of the new perks of our "modern world" to describe it ("I don't feel anything," goes Grian in the song using that phrase, remember?). After more than three years using this generator and leaving generally long-ass reviews in it, I might as well also use it as some sort of writing experiment to hone my humble craft. Hope you can understand the intent here, and not judge the results too harshly. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 37 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 45 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 91 ---- Émile, ENFIN j'ai trouvé le temps de t'écrire une nouvelle réponse : voir *Chet* au-dessous

Five takeaways from this suggestion: - It's nice that newcomers can contribute to the generator if they want to, and therefore pick an album at an early stage. It's nice for them, and it's also nice to help Alexander. - I always hope those newcomers won't give up the project after accomplishing like 10% of it. I've seen that before in that sort of situation. So I encourage this person to not let it go if they read me. Leaving more reviews could be nice as well. And it could also help us understand what makes you tick and where you came from when suggesting this Rita Ora album. - Let's be honest, this is a terrible choice in my humble opinion. But it gave me the occasion to compare this contemporary commercial pop record to Charli XCX's *Brat* -- not so far from it on paper -- to understand where the difference lies. And the difference lies in one single word: *personality*. Whether for the tones or the vocal lines, there are more daring turns in one song from *Brat* than there are to be found in the whole of *You And I*. Same if you compare it to a lot of other commercial pop singers (Dua Lipa, Jesse Ware, Chappell Roan, Foxes...), either using "writing committees" or not. One song manages to stand out: "That Girl". It's supposedly a deeper cut, yet it's the only thing that doesn't sound like a tune made up in an assembly line, as mindless and sugary as it is. But the rest just come off as particularly bad for me. Extra cringe points for the "na na" parts on the opener. When you have so many extra (shadow) writers on a payroll helping Rita "pen" her lyrics, the least they can do is finish the job correctly. - Only two years after the album's release, none of the songs from it are buzzing on Spotify -- apart from that cynical cover / reworking of Fat Boy Slim's "Praise You", bringing absolutely nothing interesting to the original, mind you. The nine other songs showing a significant uptick of streams these days are either from older albums, or one-off singles, or featurings... It's supposedly a free world, so yeah, go ahead and select contemporary pop if that's your thing. But when a commercially-minded effort fails to leave a lasting imprint -- in spite of the traction streaming services automatically give to that sort of blatantly self-indulgent music genre -- this simply means said effort doesn't even respect the standards it sets for itself. Yes, the streaming numbers this album has garnered since its release are huge compared to less accessible music. But you can bet your boots no one will remember this thing in ten years. It's already half-forgotten today, actually. - That album artwork is ridiculous. And its sleazy undertones are now suggesting things in my mind I won't even put into words. If only that sort of hint (about the music industry?) had been explored in the songs from this record, at least you would have some real provocative intent here. Remember Lana Del Rey's "Fucked My Way Up To The Top"? But I probably expect too much from Rita and her producers here, lol. 0.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 1. 5.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency and production values + 0.5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 37 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 45 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 92 (including this one)

Underrated gem. This is how power pop should be done for me, plain and simple. Even better than Big Star or Teenage Fanclub in my book. I know, what a shocking thing to say! This album (just like the one that followed) is not only highly melodic, it also harbors a dynamic and often very propulsive tracklist. It's a record that has been there for a large part of my life now, and its magical spell evoking the evergreen forests of the American Northwest has lost none of its potency for me on a purely musical level. From the bonkers guitar riffage of opener "Dream All Day" to the cinematic slow-burner closer "Coming Right Along", it's just a non-stop collection of jangle alt-rock jewels. Of course, the circumstances surrounding the split-up of The Posies' core songwriting duo after 35 years together are raising so many unsettling questions that my enjoyment of this LP is also tragically stained as a result today. Some of the stated facts surrounding the affair are still muddled, or sound inconsistent... But what's clear for me is that between the accusations that were launched and the staunch denials they triggered, the truth probably lies in the middle of all that mess, and this suggests the unflattering picture of a self-centered individual at the heart of those discomfiting events, as sweet and nice as he looked for most people (including other band members?). There's no smoke without fire, as they say in my neck of the woods, and the accused party must have *at least* made some critical mistakes during his interactions with those three or four women... The usual note related to that sort of situation needs to be added here: after I started this project more than three years ago, I have sometimes placed LPs by favorite acts of mine in my highest-rated gallery only to discover through later revelations or public statements that their stances or actions can be considered as (sometimes highly) problematic. In truth, I have neither the time and energy to remove those acts from my galleries, nor see the real point of doing this. Anyone can judge those artists according to what they know, their consciousness, and their own set of values. So in keeping with that logic, I will still place this record in my high-rated section of the users list. But I'm not saying you should "separate the person from the artist", EVER. Because *that* would be the cream on the shitcake. I long for the years when this sort of cake metaphor as related to The Posies would only be a reference to this album's title. But those years are gone. And there's no point pretending you can return to them, as much as I have loved this record. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 37 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 46 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 92

I was happy to see a Noname album pop up today, in the sense that I have wanted to seriously dive into her artistry for a long time now. This gave me the opportunity to see if there was more to the picture I already had of Fatimah Nyeema Warner's music in my mind. Because, let's face it, during my initial, admittedly superficial listens, the thing never automatically clicked in my ears. Alas, that deeper dive yielded no more genuine interest from me overall. Which is disappointing to say the least... Not that I have found absolutely nothing to enjoy in this record. For the most part, Noname's lyrics are evocative and nicely worded -- with some sophisticated layers that fit an artist who founded a book club under her own name, dedicated to militant essays and African-American literature... A valuable input into US cultural discourse indeed. As for the music, let's say I can appreciate the chords and mellifluous Rhodes piano arrangements displayed on opener "Yesterday", or the gently funky groove of "Reality Check"... Unfortunately, I also often find Noname rap flow quite lackluster and awkwardly paced, to be perfectly candid. Whatever your genre is, limits in vocal technique can sometimes give way to some thinking-out-of-the-box solutions so as to hit the mark you aim for, either through passion, intent or tactical diversions. But it's not really something I can hear in this record either, and therefore the demure energy and quite complacent, all-too-flat delivery of this rapper quickly devolves into... blandness. Worse, apart from the couple of exceptions I've mentioned up there, the limp neo-soul music with indistinct jazzy flourishes and sugary background vocals over which Noname raps often sounds extremely self-indulgent. It's so devoid of real stakes, striking features and memorable hooks, the thing quickly becomes a borefest in my admittedly subjective ears. So in retrospect, I really can't understand that hype around Noname which took place in 2016. I can only grasp that she somehow scratched a different sort of itch at a time where trap superstars or more streamlined hip hop figures were catching all the attention elsewhere. But it looks to me that in this "grassroots rap" subgenre, far better things have been pulled off since. For instance, right after *Telefone* finished, Spotify suggested a long string of other current indie hip hop artists (or hip hop-related ones), most of whom I also only have a very surface knowledge of, and yet those tracks managed to leave a clear imprint: they were songs by Open Mike Eagle, Milo, Aesop Rock, Little Simz, Sault, Billy Woods, Sudan Archives, John Glacier, Tierra Whack and so on... And guess what? 90% of those hip hop artists sounded WAY better than Noname. Wish someone had submitted one of those rappers' albums instead today. So, I'm sorry, but it's gonna be quite a hard pass here. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 38 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 45 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 93 (including this one)

An album basically featuring the initial King Crimson line-up, except without Robert Fripp and Greg Lake? Now that's the sort of arcane shit I have signed for when I started this project three years ago! Incidentally, this also allows me to indulge in one of my favorite thought experiments when I listen to music: "what if" scenarios. As in "what if, in an alternate universe, different line-up changes (or lack thereof) had radically altered the direction of the legendary prog-rock act as we know it, right after 'In The Court of ...'?". And it helps that the music is here pretty cool as you do that. I'm not gonna lie, though: as fun as the ride was, as of now, I don't really feel the need to spin the whole of this record again in the foreseeable future. I know my reviews are most often too long, so I won't bother you with a comprehensive list of the (frequently endearing) details found throughout this LP -- with a prog rock album, the details are often so numerous anyway that you end up piling up one paragraph after another when you try to describe the music. Just know that the musicianship is absolutely stellar here, that "Flight Of The Ibis" is a cute Beatles-adjacent love song -- if not exactly a memorable one --, or that I was thrilled to recognize the goofy, pointed bassline Beastie Boys later sampled from "Suite In C" for their hit "Body Movin'" (in a section that occurs not long after another moment where the piano incidentally went to McCoy Tyner and Debussy-indebted dirges I'm always a sucker for). And of course, there's the slow, grand and epic "Birdman Flies" and "The Reflection" from the "Birdman's suite" on side two, which easily reach the elated genius of "In The Court Of The Crimson King". As for the rest, it admittedly goes to quite quaint or by-the-book places at times, even if the thing is always *exquisitely* performed and recorded. So thanks for recommending that one. I might not place this LP in my own keepers, but it's mostly because of the lack of space there if you keep to the 1001 number (nearly an impossible task now!). And I'm glad to add the thing in my "high-rated list", at least. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 38 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 45 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 (including this one) ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

'In the review for [*A Beginner's Mind* in] AllMusic, critic Mark Demming felt that the album was "intelligent and well-crafted, and will appeal to fans of either Stevens' or De Augustine's recent work" but also that it was "less distinct than the music they create on their own." ' I concur. Demming kind of forgot to mention one thing (at least in that quote, I haven't read the whole review): this collection of quiet tunes also often sounds more sweet than twee, and it's most of all gorgeously recorded and performed. But he's right overall. It's probably a notch under *Tomb* or *Carrie And Lowell*. In keeping with my review of that De Augustine album placed in this user's list, I will keep things short for once. "Reach Out", the soulful and somewhat groovy "Back To Oz", and "Olympus" are standout tracks, and so are many songs on the second side, actually (don't miss them), including the generally barebones and yet always wondrous "This Is (The Thing)", "It's Your Own Body And Mind" and "Lost In The World". That second side incidentally sees Stevens and De Augustine go more on their separate ways songwriting-wise, and I think the results consequentially come off as stronger there. So, beyond its initial premise as a collaborative effort -- inspired by a topsy-turvy list of films both singer-songwriters watched together in a cabin in upstate New York -- this is, simply put, a good record and a pleasant listen. Thanks for suggesting it. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 38 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 46 (including this one? Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

This groundbreaking album is probably not an easy listen for people not versed in free jazz (a style which Coleman foretold here, as explained by the album's title). *Somethin' Else* sure is an easier listen in comparison. But in the right mood, I can "dig" the passion and technique here harnessed by Coleman, Cherry, Haden and Higgins. Besides, this is the sort of omission that prevented me from taking the original list seriously when it comes to jazz. Like, the book included John Zorn's bizarro tribute to Ornette but not one single record by the jazz master himself? Ridiculous. And that tribute album isn't even John Zorn's best work (by far) either... Twice ridiculous, then. Apart from that, I have nothing really specific to add to the review currently topping this section. It's just a perfect take, including that reference to the Refused album -- which actually made me discover the existence of *The Shape Of Jazz To Come*. Which reminds me... No one has added *The Shape Of Punk To Come* in the list yet, right? I have one simple question: when, goddamnit?!? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 39 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 46 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Two takeaways before I even listened to this record: - First time the generator shows me a user's album that hasn't been rated by anyone yet. This is exciting... - Very, VERY few black artists on the highest-rated list of albums from this user (only Youssou N'Dour, represented through "Immigrés", along with The Specials and Orange Juice -- where black musicians were only a tiny minority of the players, mind you). Guess that under that light, I wasn't really surprised to see lots and lots of hip hop artists in that person's worst albums list. "Loser-culture," goes that user when giving a miraculous 2/5 grade to 2Pac. OK boomer? What are you *truly* meaning here? *This* isn't exciting. It's actually quite depressing... About the album proper now: "Strange Town" is an excellent opener, driven and intense. However, the two tracks that follow are just decent British blues-rock that actually sounds a lot like Jimi Hendrix, yet *without the magical spark*. What takes the cake here is that this user also kind of shat on Jimi's whole artistry in one of their reviews! Where do you think the blues came from, huh? Local pubs in Sheffield? Think again. I swear to God that I *really* wrote my first two takeaways without listening to this record. So when I listened to its first leg, I thought: "The nerve this user has, frankly". Because beyond the subjective taste expressed here (no harm in that, of course), the picture painted here suggests hypocrisy that's a little maddening. If not worse... Tried hard to judge the record on its own merits, though -- and fortunately the title-track was striking enough to... put me back on track, so to speak. Made out of two sections -- one acoustic and one epic -- this song about the woes of war is where the early prog influences finally seep in to great effects. We're not so far from early seventies Procol Harum turf, but pulled off in an even more off-kilter fashion if that makes sense. "Ship On The Ocean" displays more streamlined blues-rock shenanigans again, but in quite a convincing manner. And "Garden" is another stunner whose slide guitar may recall Jimmy Page's artistry in Led Zeppelin, which is another "worst act" in that user's summary, by the way (sigh). Was cultural appropriation the issue this user takes with Led Zep? Looks unlikely. But I digress again... The vocals on "Garden" go to a very different, more understated place, though, and it's somewhat refreshing. "Status People" digs that Zeppelin groove further before "Rich Man, Poor Man" returns to the Jimi Hendrix vein. Closing the proceedings, "Eccentric Man" goes to even heftier intents, with a catchy vocal hook and an awesome guitar lick for the chorus. So in spite of my strong complaints up there, I'm really glad to have discovered this record and the band who released it. The start is a little too derivative, but The Groundhogs later proved to me that they had something very personal going on for them -- something which they even later amplified in subsequent releases, apparently to various effects. *Split* is great overall -- like a British response to Spirit's own alchemy of blues rock and prog -- whereas *Who Will Save The World?* appears as more heavy-handed and thin-sounding, quite unfortunately. But I guess that's a story for another time, kiddies. To conclude, I want to thank this user for submitting this record, while encouraging them to open their own shakras in the future so as to not come off as out of their depth to an extent. At the end of the day, everyone will have their preferences in genres or in acts from certain music genres. But you don't want to appear as prejudiced to defend those preferences, believe me. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 39 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 47 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Drowned In Sound's Benjamin Bland puts it like this: "This is a record drenched in deranged pomposity, from the massive riffs to the expansive keyboards and theatrical vocals. That's without even mentioning the bits that sound something like Sgt Pepper being performed by a Frank Zappa conducted London Symphony Orchestra on speed." Pretty on-point description. Amusingly, it also looks like Benjamin's surname doesn't fit him as a music listener (he unambiguously praises *Sing To God* after that). But beyond a taste for fringe music that screams anything other than "blandness" to your ears, you mostly need a natural tolerance for stuff that's basically a maximalist and restless neopunk treatment to prog rock inclinations. Not so sure many people fit that description, though, either at the time of this album's release or today. Hence the terrible global score of *Sing To God* on this generator. I'm not gonna lie, the first time I listened to the first half of the first disk of Cardiacs' magnum opus, I hated the whole thing. But my mileage is vastly different today. Is it because I have become someone who's a notch more sensible to extravagant and decadent art? And is it because I'm getting older that I'm more drawn to this type of decadence? This music is still incredibly hard to digest for me. Yet what fascinates me now is the the way Cardiacs insert so many off-kilter flourishes within their musical equivalent of a folly architecture. Those flourishes go from genius ideas (that zany heroic guitar solo in "Fiery Gun Hand") to totally pointless meanderings (the Barnum circus shenanigans in-between the two instances of that solo in the same song). I could go and quote examples of those two types of flourishes during the course of this double album, but you'd probably get tired before I do. Besides, chances are another benevolent listener would actually disagree with me on which part constitutes the genius ideas and which part can be filed under pointless dirges. This goes with the whole territory of unconventional "rock music", I guess. In hindsight, it seems unfair that Cardiacs were either ignored or destroyed by music criticism during the nineties. If the band had found ways to edit this album to a more reasonable length at the time, would that have changed the whole picture? Probably not. Luckily for them, other prominent crazy figures like Mike Patton have defended them -- yeah, recognizing the mad talent behind *Angel Dust* or Mr. Bungle or Fantomas and not the one behind *Sing To God* would be self-contradictory these days, right? Yet Mike Patton's acts met critical and/or commercial success while the other didn't beyond their niche cult following. And it sounds quite unfair now. But all of this is ultimately unimportant. What's important is the passion and dedication to a very personal artistic endeavor displayed by Tim Smith and Cardiacs from start to finish on this record. I might not "like" everything that's done here. But I can still find the whole thing inspiring or challenging in the best sense of the word. Even in the deepest reaches of each disk ("Manhood", "Wireless", "Nurses Whispering Verses"), there are so many exciting moments to be found among the mess. So I won't join the cult, but I won't condemn it either. And I can only picture myself appreciating this album *more* in the future, instead of less. For me, it's a sure sign that *Sing To God* **might** deserve a place in this list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 39 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 48 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Honestly, and very subjectively, I find this type of heavy metal so cheesy that it's impossible for me to appreciate it unironically. Objectively speaking, however, I recognize that the execution of this album is stellar, whether for the performance or the production values. That won't make me enjoy the music, but that can make me respect it at least. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5). PS: to whoever submitted this album, have you even realized that there are *zero* black artists in your highest-rated selection (whether from the original list or the one of the users), while there are tons of them in your "worst albums" galleries? So what's the story here? Having preferences in certain genres is alright, and you can't pretend you like other ones if you don't, sure. Yet this situation still suggests that opening your shakras *a little* would do you some good, you know. Besides, doing so could at least encourage people like me to open their own shakras re your album selection. Try to think of it. Avenged Sevenfold can do that sort of thing, btw, at least from what I have read online. Once proud Republicans, during the noughts, and unafraid to use the confederate flag in live settings, they have since apologized for that sort of shameful behaviour on their part and labelled it as "ignorant" stuff. It's never too late to learn, right? ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 39 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 48 (including this one, at least if I can bring myself to include albums in the very few subgenres I know I will never subjectively enjoy -- so as to make sure even those are properly represented in my own list). Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

"the car's on fire and there's no driver at the wheel and the sewers are all muddied with a thousand lonely suicides and a dark wind blows the government is corrupt and we're on so many drugs with the radio on and the curtains drawn we're trapped in the belly of this horrible machine and the machine is bleeding to death the sun has fallen down and the billboards are all leering and the flags are all dead at the top of their poles it went like this: the buildings tumbled in on themselves mothers clutching babies picked through the rubble and pulled out their hair the skyline was beautiful on fire all twisted metal stretching upwards everything washed in a thin orange haze i said: "kiss me, you're beautiful - these are truly the last days" you grabbed my hand and we fell into it like a daydream or a fever we woke up one morning and fell a little further down - for sure it's the valley of death i open up my wallet and it's full of blood." Not found on Spotify, because Spotify is part of the horrible war machine mentioned in that introductory speech up there, taken from the Canadian act's essential post-rock debut. Godspeed You! Black Emperor's art has indeed long riled against the corporate alliance between the music and war industries (see that paranoid chart on the back cover of their third album *Yanqui UXO*). And things are even clearer now. So it turns out Efrim and his comrades have been right all along, from the very start. And beyond the political stances and sadly resigned end-of-the-world speeches and soundbites, every second of the heartrending instrumental music on *F♯ A♯ ∞* also proves it. Music for the last days indeed. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 48 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Swedish folk, apparently adapting traditional tunes to make them sound hip or vital at the time of the album's release (1999). In that sense the results are not so far from what the Irish act Lankum is doing these days. Garmarna are not always as deep-sounding or intense, but when they get there, there's the same sort of cinematic quality exuding from their music. Listening to the excellent title track again, and then to the gorgeously dark and hypnotic melodies of "Bläck", the haunted fiddles of "Polska", or the uneasy, gurgles-laden mood of closer "Brun", the connection is even made clearer. So I *strongly* suggest this user to check out *False Lankum* if they've never heard of it-- chances are this 2023 album is right up their alley. Apart from that, the vocals are great, and the production is on point. Like a couple of other users in here, I tend to prefer the more brooding and ominous cuts in *Vedergällningen*. The big beat / electronic flourishes mostly found at the very start of this LP are cute, and they never ruin the tunes, yet they don't exactly bring something essential on the table for my ears. But that doesn't really matter. What matters is that the 100% traditional elements hit the mark perfectly. Which is where the music in this album sounds timeless for me. Also, right after the album ended, the algorithm of my streaming service sent me down a wonderful rabbit hole filled with many Scandinavian gems using traditional music as a starting point for all sorts of gothic and equally brooding undertones -- stuff like Kaunan, Wardruna, Forndom... a scene I knew absolutely nothing about this morning, before checking out my 1001 albums generator page. So huge thanks to this user for their suggestion. Without you and this generator, there would have been zero opportunity for me to discover all of this. This is what I signed for. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 49 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 94 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Pretty nice Danish indie from the noughts, taking a page out of Radiohead, MBV or even Interpol, but doing it very well. In that league of European acts from that time period having a distinctive knack for cool rock, Kashmir also remind me of Belgian band Ghinzu (check them out of you don't know them). Equally distinctive, Tony Visconti's production and the David Bowie and Lou Reed features. As great as all that is, it's not enough for me to include *No Balance Palace* in my own potential list of 1001 essential albums. This admittedly well-crafted record is still a little too derivative overall for that, and 1001 is a finite number, you know. But if you go to 2001, Kashmir would surely deserve a slot there. And actually, if really you want to talk about indie from the first decade of the 21st century, they deserve it far more that an act such as Doves, for instance, which yet have *two* of their albums included in the original list. So well done, lads. And thanks for the suggestion, user. --- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 49 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 95 (including this one) ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

Two humongous bangers ("Need You Tonight" and its sleazy funk regalia, "Devil Inside" and its catchy bush-rock guitar hook), to which you can add another couple of great hits ("Never Tear Us Apart", "Mystify"), plus some very nice deep cuts (like the somewhat topical and experimental, spoken-word-driven "Mediate"), interspersed with a few underwhelming rock compositions (example: "Wild Life"). If those weaker compositions had been replaced by one or two other bangers found on other INXS albums -- hits such as "Original Sin" or "Suicide Blonde" -- you would have an absolute masterpiece. Instead, what you get with *Kick* is a record that still managed to leave its mark on popular culture, with its two feet firmly planted in the time period it was released in. Which is not so bad for the purposes of this generator -- especially compared to some of the eighties dross selected in the original list (looking at you, ABC and Scritti Politti). Took a moment to check out the rest of INXS's discography, and found out that their 1992 album *Welcome To Wherever You Are* -- mostly taking a page out of *Achtung Baby*-era U2 -- is an LP that can be considered as criminally underrated, whether at the time of its release or today. Its only real crime was that it was recorded in the span of those few years in the early nineties, when music tastes evolved so fast that it was quite hard to keep the pace. But it would be a little foolish to blame INXS for that now. As for the rest of the band's career, a greatest hits compilation will probably get you covered, FYI. And yeah, *Kick* is probably the one album to remember from this Australian act, which was admittedly a very shrewd purveyor of radio hits towards the end of the eighties. So, in that sense, I support the choice made here. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 95 ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

OK Gen-X. I'm kidding, I'm a Gen-X myself. You do realize this aged like milk, right? I mean, I get that the intent is to be fun, airy and lively, with a throw-stuff-at-the-wall-and-then-see-what-sticks approach that can sometimes yield to great results (remember The Bloodhound Gang? As "stoopid" as they sounded, they knew their way around great hooks and memorable choruses). The thing is, great results very rarely happen here. Why, I hear you asking? Well, because beyond the fact that the whole thing neither rhymes nor reasons -- again, a flaw that can become endearing once in a while -- what strikes me here is how devoid of real emotional stakes the vast majority of the music is. Lots of stylistic curveballs are sent towards my way, and yet everything sounds artificial and vapid to my ears. In other words, the extravagant flourishes drawing from a vast array of styles (dance, latin, hip hop, trip hop, alt-rock...) can't possibly hide how beige, inelegant and harmonically colorless most of the music truly is at heart. And, again, it doesn't help that said flourishes sound so dated now. To a point where what I thought I could tolerate when the LP started quickly became unbearable for me. Given who James Di Salvio is -- a filmmaker who went into music by first dabbling in remixes, if I understand correctly -- it doesn't really surprise me that I cannot pinpoint true soul in this record mostly aiming for parodic exercises in style without ever thinking straight about substance so as to make the results even somewhat palatable for me. Not that Di Salvio is a bad musician per se. I fondly remember enjoying the remix he did of Jean Leloup's *1990* back in the day (see, I'm not as close-minded and allergic to mindless fun as you might think I am). So I guess I get where the man comes from artistically speaking... Leloup also sings (and talks dirty) in this record, by the way. And if his performance in *Dare I Say* is (willingly?) quite grating, all the other famous guest vocalists in the LP (Big Daddy Kane, Youssou N'Dour., Curtis Mayfield..) are admittedly doing a great job. Yet maddeningly, this one asset actually brings out one of the most nerve-wracking flaws in Bad Van 3000's artistry: how utterly *terrible* its in-house female vocalist (or vocalistS?) sound. We're close to a karaoke night session here, and I mean that in the worst possible way. Gosh, that meandering vocal performance on second cut "Loop Me" (along with the heavy-handed words sung here)... What. A. Dud. Anything positive to say about this record? Well, I kind of enjoyed "Speed" and "Predictable" in the middle of the album. All-out electric guitars in "Stepchild" were also welcomed. But then came the supposedly tongue-in-cheek "Love Cliché", where the joke ultimately sounds so cynical that I felt fully annoyed again. Closer "Rock Star", a supposedly ironic-yet-touching barebones acoustic ballad, subsequently pulls off one last hairpin curve on you, to mixed results, and then the whole ordeal is over at last. Wow. I gotta be honest here, my first thought when that LP ended was this: who in their right mind can possibly think *Discosis* is a somewhat essential album? Please forgive me for sounding so judgmental, I'm just telling you my most sincere impressions as they came listening to the album. On paper, I fully understand that the zigs and zags in this record can come off like a fun adventure for someone enamoured with the lively sounds and music styles Bran Van 3000 harness here, and more power to you if you're still fully enjoying that stuff 24 years later. If that can make you feel any better, it's not because I'm filing *Discosis* next to Backstreet Boys' *Millenium* in my worst-rated gallery that I think it is as bad as boys band dross (my grading system is a bit specific, so anything that goes from utterly bad to just middling is put in the same place in my summary). It's just that Bran Van 3000 is definitely not for people like me. And I tried to sincerely explain why, instead of gratuitously stating "this is bad stuff". So no hard feelings? 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (4/5 for musical competency and production values + 2/5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 96 (including this one) ---- Émile, as-tu lu ma dernière réponse sous la review de "Chet" ?

I don't like the all-too-clean sounding production values of this album. By 1993, there should have been ways to find tones for those generally well-written songs that packed a punch while standing the test of time. Of course, the other mistake would have been to include too many trendy alt-rock sounds that would have aged poorly as well. Something more organic-sounding, just like Suzanne Vega or Tom Waits' LPs in the same time period, would have fit perfectly. Too bad I can't find those tones in here. That said, David Baerwald has an interesting voice, in all the senses of the word. He knows his ways around a hook, as the second track proves it, and he is unafraid to explore off-kilter ideas and provocative topical themes in his songs (it's all in the album's artwork, is it not?). The tracklist ordering, which gathers the more experimental compositions on the first side to then offer more streamlined blues-rock or folk-rock in the second half, is also quite daring. And in said second half, cuts such as "A Bitter Tree" and "Aids & Armageddon" are stunning. I didn't know the first thing about this artist before today, so I heartily thank this user for submitting *Triage*. Looks like I can't include this LP in my own list of 1001 keepers (no room there anymore, lol), but I might return to Baerwald's music later, who knows? This very original album screams "potential slow-grower" from its very first notes, that much is obvious. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (4/5 for musical competency and production values + 3.5/5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 40 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 97 (including this one. Unless...?) ---- Émile, comment s'est passé ton road trip avec tes chums au Lac-Saint-Jean ? J'ai checké la région sur Maps, ça fait rêver l'Européen que je suis, tout ça ! J'avais jamais remarqué qu'il y avait un fjörd qui partait du Saint Laurent (à Tadoussac, donc), pour aboutir sur ce grand lac ! Magnifique ! Avec tout ça à faire, je comprends que tu aies mis le générateur sur pause... Si tu checkes ce message, c'est certainement que tu as repris tes écoutes. J'espère juste que tu n'as pas eu à te fader trop d'albums post-punk et new wave vu que c'est pas ta came, ha ha. À ce sujet, deux trois précisions, moi qui suis au contraire un bon client de cette crèmerie : 1) L'apparente sur-représentation de ces styles dans la liste s'explique par le biais britannique du livre des 1001 albums, c'est indéniable. Dimery est anglais, et j'imagine que la plupart de ses contributeurs l'étaient aussi. 2) Moi qui suit un grand fan de post-punk (et un fan un peu plus casual de new wave), je peux te dire qu'on trouve dans la liste des albums indispensables au genre (pour le post-punk, des disques essentiels de Joy Division, Gang Of Four, Siouxsie, Devo, XTC ou The Cure), en comptant une petite poignée d'oublis regrettables (au moins un autre LP de Wire et The Cure, et également au moins un disque des injustement méconnus The Sound). Mais il y a aussi des déchets à trier, c'est vrai. Par exemple un petit tas d'albums de The Police, New Order, Echo And The Bunnymen, Psychedelic Furs, The Teardrop Explodes... dont la présence est sujette à débat, surtout quand on trouve deux albums par tête de pipe. Et si on élargit aux "new romantics" -- adjacents à la synth pop et à la blue-eyed soul des eighties -- ça devient encore plus flagrant (for instance ces albums de ABC, Scritti Politti, Soft Cell, ou encore cet album tardif de Dexy's Midnight Runner, qui sont des purges absolues, beurk!) 3) Ceci dit, pour avoir rechecké la liste sur internet ce matin, à l'oeil, cette surreprésentation post-punk / new wave n'est pas aussi flagrante que cela. Ce qui m'a un peu étonné. D'où le fait que je me pose aujourd'hui la question suivante... Le biais (négatif) ne provient-il pas *en partie* des lecteurs / utilisateurs d'Amérique du Nord, au départ bien moins exposés à ces styles de musique dans la culture mainstream ou populaire ? C'est une question ouverte, hein. Le débat est lancé... 4) À ce sujet, je suis pas vraiment d'accord avec toi quand tu dis que le post-punk est un style "éphémère", vu l'assez énorme vague "crank-wave" qui a lieu en ce moment dans toute l'Europe, dont les racines remontent très clairement au post-punk. Tu as dû au moins entendre parler d'Idles, Fontaines DC ou peut-être Shame, mais je t'assure que ce n'est que la partie non-immergée de l'iceberg par chez nous... Ce revival arrive même à toucher d'assez jeunes générations (en gros des gens de ton âge), et donc à bien des égards, il est carrément en train de sauver l'idiome rock de sa mort programmée depuis 20 ans. En tout cas d'un côté de l'Atlantique. En plus, ce coup-ci, il y a des échos simultanés à cette vague qui se font entendre depuis quelque temps déjà en Amérique du Nord, ce qui n'était pas du tout le cas dans les eighties. Corridor est par exemple pas si éloigné que ça de cette résurgence post-punk si on écoute bien... Bon par contre, je suis TOTALEMENT d'accord avec toi pour dire que niveau jazz, la liste de Dimery est absolument indigente ! Miles Davis y est assez correctement représenté, mais c'est bien le seul. Si on trouve dans le livre quelques disques épars de John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, Herbie Hancock et Nina Simone, il y a pour chacun d'entre eux *au moins* un autre album légendaire qui devrait être ajouté (voire trois ou quatre pour Nina, mais j'avoue être un gros fan). Et ensuite, Dimery ne semble même pas savoir qui sont Sun Ra, Art Blakey, Horace Silver, Cannonball Adderley, ou, plus récemment, Kamasi Washington ou Shabaka Hutchings. Grosses, grosses lacunes ici. Il y a également des énormes lacunes dans au moins trois autres genres, d'après moi : le post-rock, le post-hardcore et le garage rock (des styles généralement joués par des musiciens nord-américains, ce qui n'est pas un hasard). Sans parler de ce fameux revival post-punk / crank wave, du hip hop actuel, ou des gros bangers pop du moment. Mais je crois que le livre a renoncé à se mettre sérieusement à jour depuis au moins 10 ans. Difficile de les blâmer, d'ailleurs : 1001 sélections, ça commence à faire serré après 70 ans d'albums... Dernière chose, le choix du CD. C'est trop drôle, je pense *exactement* comme toi, au mot près ! La seule différence, c'est que je paie (pas cher) mes pépites en euros, au lieu de les payer en dollars ! Bonne reprise suite à ton road trip. Cyril.

Elusive, poetic, improvisational, seminal (listen to "Hollywood", and tell me if you're not hearing something akin to the more experimental tracks on Radiohead's *Amnesiac*, for instance), this kosmische / kraut LP is as enigmatic and enticing today as it was when it was released in 1974. Enigmatic are Moebius' avant-garde soundscapes and gritty rhythm patterns, almost devoid of melodies, and yet strangely soothing. Enticing are Roedelius' lighter and airier compositions, displaying so many mysterious harmonies and subtle earworms patiently munching their way into your brain -- no surprise "Brain" was the name of the label which released this legendary record, I guess... The quite different intents from those two electronic pioneers are meshing seamlessly here, indeed offering something adjacent to Kraftwerk's *Autobahn*, but with a looser feel which stems from the duo's preference for concise lengths, free form and pure empiricism. A near-perfect balance, owing to the same set of avant-garde skills on a surface level, paradoxically yielding to quite contrasted results depending on who the composer is. And the outcome of that balance is a record that is firmly set in the time and place in which it was conceived, and yet also feels timeless five decades later. Listen to it on a lazy Sunday afternoon in the countryside and let yourself go into a pleasant daydream, just as you watch a gentle breeze brush through the foliage of trees all around you... If you're enjoying this LP and yet knew absolutely nothing about who Cluster were before today, I suggest you also check out *Muzik Von Harmonia* by... Harmonia, which is actually Cluster + Neu!'s guitarist Michael Rother. And then you can go to the extraordinary -- and yet belatedly released -- *Harmonia 76*, where the same trio united their forces with Brian Eno of all people. And of course, if you've never listened to Neu!, Brian Eno, Kraftwerk, Michael Rother's solo albums, or early Tangerine Dream, go there as well. You're in for a treat. But be warned... That kraut / kosmische rabbit hole is potentially endless. So you better have (sugar) time on your hands... 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 41 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 97 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus...

More like a RED CARD for me. I readily recognize that this record is very well executed, that its tracklist is dynamic, that "Only One" is an absolute banger, and that the fiddle is a very original inclusion in the pop punk instrumentation. So is it bad faith on my part to find the whole thing a waste of time? Probably... Yet let's be clear: that sort of act drowning in sugary major chords in the vast majority of their songs -- an act here "compared to Blink 182", and one that has also "toured with Fall Out Boy" -- is like all those other bands in this supposedly "pop punk" subgenre: a sheer betrayal of the true spirit of punk music. Call me a gatekeeper 22 years after the fact, I don't care. Commercialism is not the sin here, by the way -- after all, marketing shenanigans have often been part of the punk phenomenon as well, and this from the very start, in 1977. No, amnesia is the sin here. Superficiality is the sin. Skills are one thing. True soul is another. Which is where I don't feel ashamed about my probable bad faith. Simply put, Yellowcard, just like Blink 42 and Sum 181 and Dross 69, along with all those other similar early ought college bro bands, is to the punk ethos what a beef jerky is to real cuisine. Why should I even bother pinpointing objective qualities in that sort of stuff when none of those acts ever gave back to what they took from so as to make their core audience a little more aware of the very different-yet-manifold *authentic* shapes said punk ethos can also take on -- at least beyond that cheesy pop formula? "Everything is going to be alright!" Yellowcard mindlessly chant on "Believe". No it won't. Not when so many of your airy choruses are so damn formatted and predictable. This is where the pop songwriting chops of this band are also reaching their expectable limits, by the way. If you take out the punk word out of the "pop punk" equation, and simply take the commercial melodicism of this band at face value, you may still end up wondering if any of those songs really have something original to say, at least to a minimum extent. Newsflash: efficient pop songwriting can still be pulled off while thinking out of the box once in a while. It's true. As a matter of fact, this is exactly how pop music at large has evolved from early doo wop to Charli XCX today. So many huge strides, right? I understand that the point of *Ocean Avenue* was never to make such strides, and believe it or not, I can respect that at least. But are we talking about essential albums, or are we not? Let's return to the subject of punk now. As Minutemen's Mike Watt once said, true punk music is never about how fast you can play or how loud you can be. It's about letting your freak flag fly high. Maybe for some fans of this pop punk subgenre, tunes sounding like ad jingles, played by a band having a fiddle here and there, are indeed what letting your freak flag fly high looks like. Good luck with that, more power to you guys, et al. But for me, that sort of thing can only be a mirage. All style no substance. So, sorry user. Enjoy the sun in Florida or California or wherever you are while still listening to this. Yellowcard are releasing a new album in a couple of months by the way... Three or four singles are already out. How you like those apples now? 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 (and that's *damn* generous!) 7.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 41 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 98 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus...

It's slightly hilarious to me how the critical standing of this band lessened to an extent just as the production values bettered for their late noughts / early 2010s albums (while noticeably garnering more numbers overall on streaming services, maybe not that surprisingly). I actually think the critics are quite right this time around. The far more roughshod Modest Mouse LPs at the start of their career is where you can find their most effective or endearing material. In a sense, maybe that American rock band, very basically splitting the difference between Slint, Pavement and the emo wave to come -- through either mock white trash aesthetics or tortured existential tones, moods and lyrics -- didn't fully know what they were doing at the time. But their spontaneous and unpredictable flair still does wonders decades later. Of course, spontaneity often comes with a price. Just like *The Moon And Antarctica*, some editing to avoid the more self-indulgent patches in this very long album would have been welcomed on *The Lonesome Crowded West*. It's a little maddening that the critics, as right as they were in a broad sense to praise Modest Mouse, quite often fail to point this out. That self-indugent turf is actually circumscribed in a very precise spot on the record, that is to say the three subsequent tracks "Long Distance Drunk", "Shit Luck" and the 11-minute "Truckers Atlas" (the latter probably fun in a live setting, but feeling interminable in a studio album context). Yet if you consider those three cuts as b-side material / bonus tracks and skip them entirely in one go, you still end up with a record that holds its own quite perfectly while still being longer than a a 40/45-minute LP. So let's just call that fat cream on a delicious cake. In some ways, a choice cut of peaks in this album are even more memorable than the ones of *The Moon And Antarctica*. Some of them also rock a little harder, probably owing a different line-up at the time. Those highest peaks are "Heart Cooks Brain", "Doin' The Cockroach", "Polar Opposites" and closer "Styrofoam Boots..." for me. But there are many other gems to find in The *Lonesome Crowded West*. So thanks for the suggestion. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 42 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 98 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

In yet another instance of the "critics" vs. the audience, here is a case of the audience ultimately having the upper hand in my book. This album's success is mostly owed to two of its singles, "Losing My Religion" and "Shiny Happy People", which are huge bangers, of course. I kind of understand why that latter song sometimes had a mixed reception by the "critics" mentioned up there, given its oh-so-elated chorus, but for me this is a little unfair to sum up that hit to that only feature, even if it's so striking on a first listen. There are also some subtly melancholic minor-laden harmonies in its verse, and Kate Pearson, from the B52's, gives tons of vocal energy to the proceedings. Another point of contention is probably the nods to rap on the opener "Radio Song", courtesy to KRS One's participation. But, for me, being picky about that opener is kind of missing the tongue-in-cheek point of a song that is still otherwise very evocative and well-constructed overall. Speaking of controversial cuts, yeah I admit that "Belong" is a little lackluster, and also that "Endgame" is more a long "la la la" interlude than anything else. That said, I can't help feeling the "critics" acted as if there were never deeper cuts in previous REM albums. *Out Of Time* is not perfect. But this was also the case of LPs such as *Life's Reach Pageant* and *Document*, still top-tier REM records in my book. So OK, you may have two or three underwhelming songs max in this record, yet the rest is just awesome. Beyond "Losing My Religion" and "Shiny Happy People", you have three other lively wonderful compositions for instance. ("Near Wild Heaven", "Texarkana", "Me In Honey", also with Kate Pearson). You also have "Low", an incredible song and a masterclass in restraint and tension that will have you sitting on the edge of your seat the whole time. And finally, you have the full-blown folksy tones of "Half A World Away" and "Country Feedback" -- pointing towards the direction of subsequent LP "Automatic For The People" without ever having to blush about the comparison. So yeah, to be honest, I would happily trade *Green* for *Out Of Time* in the original list, while keeping the other three or four other REM albums mentioned there. Is that just me? Well, a whooping 3.96 global score as of now in this generator surely suggests this sort of positive opinion about that LP is actually shared by quite a few (shiny happy) people. Out of time, but not out of sight. And certainly not out of minds. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 98 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

From the original list, John Martyn's *Solid Air* had its moments (like the two folk gems "Over The Hill" and "May You Never"), and *One World* was a wonderful affair overall -- that latter album even joining my "high rated" gallery. From a first listen, it looks like subsequent LP *Grace And Danger* picks up the particular ball from *One World* to a similar effet (and sometimes admittedly mixed results). The title-track, placed in the second slot, sounds a little heavy-handed and awkward in its attempt to bring rock flavors to the whole thing, but subtle and delicate "Sweet Little Mystery" is soft-rock as it should be done. Really appreciate the fretless bass + synths + Rhodes piano-like keyboards instrumentation on a lot of tracks -- so smooth and cinematic! -- along with a couple of jazz dirges on cuts such as "Lookin' On" or "Save Some (For Me)" that indeed explore layered turf Joni Mitchell had explored a few years before 1980, when this record was released. Not necessarily essential, but worth a detour for people able to appreciate those sorts of tones... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 50 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 99 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Gautier Serre is one crazy motherf*cker for sure. But also a very talented one. I may not fully enjoy *all* of the many stylistic turns he dabbles in here, but I can 100% respect his overall intent. The very definition of "thinking out of the box" put into music. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 51 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 99 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Yeah, I never really spent the time to find the proper entry point to the discography of this band, having a very original, and quite accessible melodic take on the stoner metal genre, to the point where it can even sound like classic seventies rock. "Professional critics" were not really helpful given that they provide the same sort of (positive) grading to all their albums. So it's nice to know where to start. Actually, checking Baroness' streaming numbers also clearly indicates *Yellow And Green* as the one album to listen to first -- "March To The Sea" is a banger for sure, for instance. But it's nice to have confirmation from a fellow human being here. As I'm writing this tentative review, I haven't listened to the second disk yet (I have a big day at work), but on its own, the first is already a very nice self-contained album. The only real criticism I can give to those tracks is that some of them might go a little too long without their content always really warranting it, but I also understand the point is to be a little hypnotic, and it's not because that intent doesn't always work for me that it's not working for others. Anyway, looking forward to listening to the second part of this double album... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 52 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 99 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Yeah, I'm not so sure this is the first Johnny Winters album to select here. All stellar musicianship and guitar chops aside, the first three tracks are so generic in their 'good ole rock-'n'-roll" shtick they border on annoyingly offensive. That said, the three cuts that follow ("Raised On Rock", Stranger", "Mind Over Matter") are so propulsive and lively they sort of redeem that lame start. Those songs are also taking a page out of more rock / hard rock acts that were far more recent by 1974, and they do that very well. "Raised By Rock", in particular, effortlessly beats the original Elvis Presley version out of the park (a somewhat drowsy original version that came out around the time of this album's release, but which is here given a shock Led Zeppelin-adjacent treatment). The LP loses steam again after that nice patch of songs, alternating between styles (country, blues, blues-rock...) to nice effects sometimes, while reverting to a meat-and-potatoes routine on others. Nothing aggravating, but even if you want to feel benevolent about that last run, there's still the hackneyed first leg of the record to take into account. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 52 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 100 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

File under "So bad it becomes fascinating to an extent ". Beyond the eighties shtick -- already an acquired taste for many -- what makes this music truly appalling is the forced inflexions of Wendy James' vocal performance, along with the extremely lame choruses (very often just mindlessly repeating the titles of the songs). To me, everyone who can't realize this on first listens favors style over substance, period. And given the current 2.93 score of this thing, I fear that there's still a fair share of people who fit that description among those who finished the original list. A mind-boggling realization to say the least... Looks like the person who selected this record is not using this generator anymore, so I guess I can yuck on their yum without hurting their feelings. But if ever they return and read this, I apologize in advance for speaking my mind so bluntly. At the end of the day, and in spite of my personal judgment up there, the couple of 5-star reviews in this section prove that someone's garbage will always be another person's honey. "Trash city" indeed. 0.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 1. 5.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and production values + 0.5 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 52 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 101 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

I have discovered this record not so long ago so I'm pleased to see its cover pop up today. I can already hear people complaining there were already too many eighties British post-punk albums in the original list, even before reading the reviews... And I guess this new suggestion won't make them change their minds that easily. Sure, the 1001 Albums book is slightly anglo-centric... But as I said to my 1001 album generator chum Émile the other day, that perception might *also* stem from a statistical North American bias against that particular music style (many users are from there, aren't they?). A perception which is somewhat challenged by the ripples of the the current European crank-wave finally crossing the Atlantic these days... In many ways, The Chameleons circa *Script Of The Bridge* are part of that group of original progenitors of a rock idiom which is still relevant today, influencing many prominent acts on both sides of the pond, from Interpol in the early noughts to Fontaines D.C in 2025. (not to mention a bunch of slightly less known acts behind the latter: Deeper, Preoccupations, The Murder Capital...). So it feels like not including this album in the original list is overlooking the extent of that later influence, English bias or not. Maybe a way to counter British overexposure in the list would be to cross out one minor Elvis Costello entry in there and trade it for this record? Would that make our North American friends more open to the inclusion? Of course, you'd first need to convince them this album is not a run-of-the-mill exercise in that style -- which is not so obvious for untrained ears, I readily admit it. What The Chameleons have going for them in this LP is an ear for delicate flourishes and romantic overtones (which will eventually lead them to switch to slightly more dream-pop tones for their third LP *Strange Time*). *Script Of The Bridge* sounds less cold and robotic than Joy Division, less gothic and desperate than the famous "trilogy" of albums The Cure released in the same time period, less tortured and stylistically adventurous that the classic LPs of The Sound... But what the English band lose here, they gain it tenfold through a prophetic channelling of the post-punk agenda into more poised and accessible results. In a sense, they are wearing their hearts on their sleeves in this record. Add the infectious guitar hooks also announcing The Jesus and Mary Chain a couple of years later (example: opener "Don't Fall"), along with the memorable lines sung by Mark Burgess, and you have a formula which stands the test of time rather gracefully. Interestingly, the album's artwork reflects its musical contents quite perfectly. Its turquoise watercolor canvas looks bland at first, but when you focus on the details of that cover, the latter suggests a rather precise story of hope and longing, a need to escape your daily woes towards a dream world. Likewise, you need to bypass the rather flat and unobtrusive production values of this LP to truly appreciate the flavors of the music -- the subtle touches of those synth lines could have been made clearer, for instance. But for me, it takes little effort to adjust my eyes and ears to the actual artistry displayed here... I understand it's not so easy for non-fans of the genre, though. As many reviewers noted here, the first side is stronger that the second ("Thursday's Child", with its meandering vocal lines and slightly out-of-tune guitars, could have been easily left on the cutting room floor without hurting the tracklist a bit). Let's face it, though: 90% of rock albums out there have the same flaw, don't they? And the quite perfect run of tracks "Monkeyland" - "Second Skin" - "Up The Down Escalator" - "Less Than Human" on the first side easily redeems that flaw. Cautiously taking out one point and a half to my grading so as to not make non-fans of the genre roll their eyes too much, but honestly, I can see myself going back and edit my review in the future to include this record in my highest-rated gallery, if I get even more familiar with this record. We'll see if that's part of the script for, and if it is, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (4.5 + 4) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 53 (including this one). Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 101 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Repeating a once-smashing, groundbreaking formula (here summed up as big-beat electronica + grunge guitars + pop melodies + teenage angst) is not always conducive to full artistic success the second time around. As far as this listener is concerned, most of the music in the second Garbage album lacks the tension or infectious intents that made the legendary bangers found in their debut so memorable for me. I may have an interest for the styles explored by the nineties British-American act in *Version 2.0*, but I honestly consider that the latter pales in comparison to *Garbage*, plain and simple. This underwhelming nature is all the more frustrating given the fact that Shirley Manson, Butch Vig and their colleagues try so hard to dig the exact same vein that made them sound like a fully-formed act from the get-go. Unfortunately, the results on this second LP often fail to come off as elegant or convincing enough in the long run. Style over substance is the sin I see here. Case in point: the opener "Temptation Waits", where the guitar tones sound incredibly weak compared to its obvious (extraordinary) model "Vow" on the first album. This is not a passing flaw within the album by the way. Most of the songs on the first side of the record indeed appear as vaguely defined derivations from tracks on the previous LP. "I Think I'm Paranoid" is a three-legged clone of "Only Happy When It Rains" for instance, up to its vocal lines and the contents of its lyrics. Cloning technology was the talk of the day during the nineties, was it not? Yet such tech was far from being perfected back then... Too many times, *Version 2.0* therefore sounds like a lab reenactment that turned sour -- enough to make an illusion on the charts when the thing was released, but not enough to make it stand the test of time. Subjective opinion, of course, but negative reviews must always take a chance and pretend to objectivity to get their point across. Hope I'm not ruffling too many feathers here, to take an image that's fitting to Garbage's artistry (see the first album's cover). Worse, some of the vocal hooks and choruses on the album's first half (specifically on "When I Grow Up" and "Special") are so cloying, they actually sound like fodder for annoying ad jingles, instead of material that could be used for truly likable songs. And I dare anyone here to praise or defend the processed jungle clichés of "Hammering In My Head", a cut which aged like milk, period. Embarrassing to close the first side of your LP with such a dud. Interestingly, the second side fares far better than the first, thanks to a string of four cuts that finally sees the four accomplished musicians in the band flex their songwriting muscles at last. "Push It" finally equals the hits of the debut. "The Trick Is To Keep Breathing" is a sensitive ballad akin to "A Stroke Of Luck". "Dumb" and "Sleep Together" explore minor chords-driven industrial-pop turf tense enough to justify a visit. But then Garbage inexplicably ruins that good run with a very awkward cut ("Wicked Ways", yet another dud). And to close the proceedings, you have "You Look So Fine", quite a nice ballad as well... but basically "Milk 2.0", up to its synth line! And by that late stage, such a formulaic intent to create a connective tissue with the first LP feels almost infuriating, like an avowal of creative defeat... For me, the second best album in Garbage's discography will always be *Strange Little Birds*, which was released in the quite late year of 2016. "Night Drive Loneliness", "Even Though Our Love Is Doomed" and "Magnetized" is an extraordinary run of back-to-back songs in it, for example. The first is a hypnotic, film noir-inspired gem, the second is simply put the *best ballad the band has ever written*, incredibly potent and cinematic, and the third is as powerful, dark and propulsive as anything Manson and co. have ever released when they originally broke out. Of course, *Strange Little Birds* was mostly ignored or misunderstood by "professional critics" when it came out. The hype was long gone by then, you see... Here's me hoping for a reevaluation of that one, though (is the user suggesting *Version 2.0* for this generator familiar with that other record, by the way?). I can't help adding that subsequent LPs released by the band since 2016 have been slightly more favored by said critics compared to *Strange Little Birds*, but that I don't care for them at all, oddly enough. So, all things considered, it looks like the one and only album Garbage's target audience and I can agree on is the debut. But hey, one is better than nothing, right? After all, "2.0 versions" of softwares are rarely remembered in the same endearing way as the original versions are. Their supposed "novelty" quickly wears thin in public consciousness, and they ironically appear as more quaint than the original version years or decades after the fact. It's all summed-up in the double-meaning of the word "novelty", is it not? 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 53 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 102 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Yeah, well, as far as I'm concerned, the first Childish Gambino album to go to on this users list is clearly *Because The Internet* (I know it's coming, and I love this record!). Looks like my advice is in the minority when I notice the respective global scores of the two records, though. Another instance of me feeling like a black sheep in that particular pool of listeners. C'est la vie. To explain a bit further: nice touch from Donald Glover trying to explore the African American roots of classic rock in the opener, for example, but the manner in which he pulls it off simply gets on my nerves, to put it rather bluntly. What I sense is an intellectual endeavor that favors style over genuinely exciting substance. File under "try hard"? As a matter of fact, the Ludwig Göransson-led execution of many of the nice ideas Glover has for this record don't sit that well with me either, because they verge a little too close to pastiche. Glover is a postmodernist at heart, sure, but you can be one and yet find ways to make your hypertextual references somewhat shine a little more, instead of constantly looking into the rearview mirror. And tongue-in-cheek "Yo Mama" jokes are not enough to do that. For me, many of the funk, funk-rock and soul dirges found in *"Awaken, My Love!"* sound a bit shapeless or toothless tens years down the line (whereas *Because The Internet* still sounds sharp!). But hey, I guess Parliament - Funkadelic were often a bit self-indulgent as well in their heyday -- in an admittedly very endearing fashion. So it's part of that tradition, in a way. To be clear, *"Awaken, My Love!"* is not a "bad" album by any means. It has its share of highlights: "Boogieman" and its bass-heavy chorus, riotous "Riot" (why is that one so short, goddamnit!), or "Redbone" and its glorious guitar lick crowning the damn thing... But you can't go wrong when you sample / quote George Clinton's seminal funk and funk-rock acts at their best. In other news, "California" is kind of a prank made at the listener's expense, but it made me laugh, I admit it. So all in all, Donald has us covered with good stuff here. That said, I can't help thinking the man is sometimes too smart for his own good on a purely artistic level. I won't detail the many levels of the meta-joke that "The Night Me And Your Mama Met" actually is -- I'd need to explain the context behind the creation of the Funkadelic track "Maggot Brain", a track that Glover clearly has in his (dirty) mind here... The thing is, musically speaking, that other pastiche is... quite inert and boring, is it not? I imagine that being a smart-alec in such a sly fashion won't ruin Childish Gambino's popularity, though, as proven on this generator. Good for him! Oh, and speaking of extravagant 2010s hip hop figures with a taste for pastiche, I'm surprised no one has submitted a Tyler The Creator album yet in this user's list, by the way (a glaring omission in the original one imho, even if it's only one among dozens of others!). I might not fully appreciate *"Awaken, My Love!"*, it's still part of that group of recent or quite recent albums proving that we're living a glorious age when it comes to African American music. And it's high time someone thought of Tyler here! 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 53 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 103 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Yeah, to take a page out of the most popular review in this section -- a take that's a bit blunt, admittedly -- what we have here is a mixed bag to a certain extent. Not bad by any means overall, and singer Jonas Bjerre truly has an astonishingly high-pitched range for a male vocalist, but the overall results are maybe a little too patchy to reach the "essential" level required after 1300 albums. "Comforting Sounds" is stellar, a very moving ballad building up to an insane, fully emotional climax -- I love both versions of the song, by the way: the radio edit makes a clear impact on a first listen, but it's also nice that the longer one closing the original tracklist takes its sweet time building up said climax. Apart from that gem, the enticing and lively tones of the other banger "Snow Brigade" feel like they could have been recorded yesterday, thanks to a glossy sheen that is almost pre-hyperpop in its intents, very surprisingly. Rich Costley produces here -- the man surely has an ear for striking and effective details, which serves the song right. And "She Spider" rocks as well, even if it's in a more expected fashion by 2003 standards. Indie or alt-rock that hasn't aged a day, to put it in a nutshell. Yet the rest -- especially the more shoegazey cuts -- often sounds a little thin or unmemorable, I'd say. Good call from Mew trying to insert some surprising bridges here and there, but the latter don't necessarily bring a pivotal input saving most of those other songs from a "déjà vu" impression. That said, I heartily thank this user for making me discover this Danish act. 1001 albums podiums aside, it's nice to know about the existence of this band, and in spite of my minor gripes up there, they surely deserved to be more well-known at the time of this album's release. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 53 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 104 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Where Bleed American sounds too glossy and even cynical somehow, Clarity has some awesome, authentic-sounding emo tones, not so far from Get Up Kids. Enough for me to maybe consider it as a valuable entry in this user's list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 54 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 104 ---

Synth-pop/glam hybrid that's a little grating for this particular set of ears, generally speaking. Too often those landfill indie songs sound like a Flight Of The Conchords parody. "The Past Is A Grotesque Animal" is an extraordinary track though, driven, hypnotic, and not ruined too much by the off-kilter vocals. Maybe one reason to come back to this one later and see if I'll be more predisposed to it with a different mindset. Let's just say that Kevin Barnes' whimsical voice admittedly doesn't fit with the hangover I'm going through today, ha ha. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 54 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 105 (including this one)

Beyond its obvious musicianship, you need to judge *The Mantle* on very specific standards, since Agalloch opened their black metal fare to a vast range of other genres on that album -- and this years before other post-metal acts decided to do the same. Those standards can be summed up with two pivotal questions: are the different genres tackled here handled or served well? And do those different music styles mesh properly overall? For the first question: I'm no expert in black metal, so obviously, I can't fully judge if the vocals and guitar parts are pulled off well. Of course, this is where my own subjectivity plays a part: vocal parts seemingly sung by orcs or trolls will never *fully* appeal to me, I imagine... But beyond said natural reluctance, I also can't help sensing that the production values on this thing sometimes sound a bit thin whenever growled or saturated parts are put to the foreground. But can you really blame a niche band that has no other choice but to record on a budget, at least to a certain extent? The folk aspects are pretty cool, generally speaking. And they can sound deep and rich (which unfortunately strengthens the contrast with the manner the metal sections sound). Examples: the magnificent instrumental "The Lodge", closer "A Desolation Song", the folk elements of "And The Great Cold Death Of The Earth". The end of the album is far stronger than its start by the way, both in terms of aural sound and composition. The post-rock build-ups and shoegazey elements sound a bit lacking in terms of imaginative melodic writing though -- especially compared to the masters of the genre Agalloch tried to take a page out of here. In other words, the inclusion of those other elements come off as a flat attempt overall (Deafheaven would pull that off far better a decade later, for instance...). A quick note here: contrary to what I have to say about the black metal chunks, I feel like I can give my two cents about those other styles without feeling like a fraud, you know. And what my two cents say is that this particular part of the Agalloch formula is not exactly "good" here. One clear exception, though: "The Hawthorne Passage", once again towards the end of the LP. Excellent post-rock here. But by that point, it feels like this success comes a little too late... Last question: are all those styles meshing together well? Not always in my book. But maybe I'm just ill-equipped to answer this question given what I think about black metal on a very general level... 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums (and I admit my listening habits and very surface knowledge of the whole black metal genre play a part in my subjective assessment...) 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 54 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 106 (including this one)

Damn. I listened to this album last year, (maybe skipping some tracks as I did so), and I remember it didn't click for me at all. Guess my kitschy (hyper)pop attention was too much monopolized by Charli XCX's *Brat* at the time, and there are not many hypes in that overall genre (so far from my usual turf) that I can handle in the same couple of months. So when I saw *Imaginal Disk*'s cover pop up this morning, I thought I would have the same "meh" reaction today. And... the exact contrary happened -- minus a couple of minor gripes. Terrific! Long story short, the lush, sophisticated artistry and incredible musicianship channeled through many of those songs slaps me in the face now. See those killer groovy basslines and suddenly abrasive synth tones nicely supporting Mica's zingy, acidulous vocals -- probably an acquired taste for older guys like me, but one I'm now ready to open my door to. Like all "concept albums", *Imaginal Disk* has hefty intents at times, but the many musical tongue-in-cheek winks nicely counterbalance that weight. What I love the most about a lot of those songs is how tight and surprising their end sections and climaxes are. Those last-minute dirges often go to unexpected places, and they do it with a cinematic flair. Sure, the sci-fi flick feels more like Ed Wood than Steven Spielberg, lol -- but that's more endearing, actually. There are even moments where Matt and Mica's compositions evoke Kate Bush at her most extravagant. And once you spot all this, you just can't help taking them seriously. Starting in the middle of the tracklist, there is admittedly a bit of a sagging underbelly that could have been slimmed down to something having more focus (I would have edited out by-the-numbers "Love Is Everywhere", for instance). But bangers such as opener "She Looked Like Me", "Killing Time", "Death & Romance", "Vampire In The Corner" or "That's My Floor!" easily make up for that flaw... Two endnotes to finish this rant: Check out Magdalena Bay's video of their great live cover of Bowie's "Ashes To Ashes". Maybe you'll appreciate how proficient and self-assured their live band is. *Imaginal Disk* was released on the Mom + Pop label. It's the same label that harbors Underscores, who released another excellent (hyper)pop concept album two years ago, which flopped critically and commercially speaking, to my utmost surprise. If you like *Imaginal Disk*, maybe you'll enjoy that one as well. Funny how some hypes happen and others don't. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 55 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 106

Rest in Power, Ozzy. Yeah, the man was a legend, but for me the music on this album clearly pales in comparison to his heyday in Black Sabbath. Like all the albums of his solo career? Not knowing much about it, I can't be the judge of that, sure. Let's just say that what I heard here and there from said solo career screams eighties hair metal devolution to my ears. And that it's impossible for me to take this later sort of metal circus seriously. Case in point, this very album. Randy Rhoads -- may he rest in power too -- was a stellar guitar player, and his imaginative flourishes certainly shine on the first two songs from *Blizzard Of Ozz* -- quite nice cuts with somewhat memorable choruses for sure. Yet fun flourishes over an arguably formulaic canvas can't fully redeem the latter in my eyes. Black Sabbath are remembered today because they broke new ground. In comparison, *Blizzard Of Ozz* only sounds like a desperate attempt to remain relevant, as decent as its first two songs are. After those first two tracks, "Goodbye To Romance" is a very touching power ballad -- especially these days, I'm not gonna argue there either. But most of everything that follows is meat-and-potatoes fare -- pestered by thin-sounding production values to boot, even by 1981 standards. I can't even bother going through the details of the patchy tracklist, where the formula often reaches all the expected risible earmarks. So, to put it in a nutshell, choosing this album when truly influential Sabbath LPs *Master Of Reality* and *Sabbath Bloody Sabbath* are still missing in both the original and users lists is for me a mind-boggling thought process I can't wrap my finger around, period. Heck, even *Sabotage* -- arguably initiating Ozzy and Iommi's descent from their stellar period into a more fraught era -- deserves to be quoted ten times more than *Blizzard Of Ozz*. Besides, Ozzy or not, you can't expect me to give five or four points to something selected by a person who literally shat on Nirvana's two albums or the Stooges' three LPs for their original list reviews -- while also giving one point to the Velvet Underground debut, or one point to *Enter The Wu-Tang*, or one point to Kendrick's *good kid, m.A.A.d city*. I rolled my eyes so much at all this, I probably looked like a zombie. And that was fitting to the cheesy soundtrack that played as I did so, lol. I also can't help noticing the timing of this selection, i.e. a few weeks after Ozzy left us. I'm certainly not denying the sincerity of this particular user... Yet for me, the current very high global score reached by this record is mostly explained by the context, and not necessarily by the actual contents of the album. Music reception can't exist in a vacuum, people have attachments and affects, so there's absolutely no reason to lament the fact that they want to pay tribute to a recently departed iconic figure of rock history. Yet, let's face it: had this album been selected a year ago, you can bet your boots it wouldn't have approached the four points mark on a global level. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 55 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 (including this one) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

"Aciiiiiid! Po-li-ceeeee!" Ha ha ha, you indeed got to be totally bonkers to submit this particular Japanese noise record on the users' list! And that's exactly why I want to support that choice. I can't count the moments when, listening to this album, I went from "this is unbearable!" and "this is ridiculous!" to... "this is actually amazing!". From what I can hear in here, Boredoms must be a killer act to see live, and I hope I can enjoy this experience one day. I burst out laughing in quite a few occurrences going through the tracklist, and for me, that makes the nonsense in this LP -- also nicely represented by its insane, aesthetically illegible artwork -- everything but gratuitous. As a matter of fact, I very seriously think that *Chocolate Synthesizer* sounds ten times better, ten times more vital, and ten times more fun than *Trout Mask Replica* (which is on the contrary a downright sinister record). Oh, and as far as my own standards go for this user's list, this thing should be at least one full point higher than the Debbie Gibson and Backstreet Boys' albums. So I'm gonna grade it accordingly. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency + 3.5 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 55 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 (including this one -- I can't seriously place this record in the 1001 best albums of all time, but I swear that if ever I found a cheap copy of it in a record store, I would buy it right away! So a thousand thanks to the anonymous user that made me discover it!) --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

Cool album. I knew who Owen Pallett was through Arcade Fire, but I had never sat through a LP of theirs, and I really enjoyed the experience. There's a whiff of Penguin Café Orchestra and Arthur Russell in their minimalistic artistry, mixed with a more recent indie pop sensibility that makes their experimental songs endearing and cinematic. Owen has a good home indeed. I don't really agree with listeners who only hear a sadboy shtick in this record. I think Pallett often goes to far more tongue-in-cheek, whimsical turf than that ("Please, Please, Please" is weird as f*ck, for instance), actually making that tag sound unfair. And I don't think you need to witness the musician's violin loop routine onstage to appreciate those songs. I can only concede that the payoff at the end of some of those cuts -- most of them very short -- feels a bit thin on a first listen, but I suspect that the more you play them, the less that apparent flaw hinders your pleasure if you love those sorts of tones -- indeed not so far from the "Eleanor Rigby" template. Of course, there are clear standouts and less striking compositions in this record. Referencing their Canadian pals with whom Owen had recently recorded *Funeral*, "This Is The Dream Of Win And Régine" is an absolute banger, for instance. It also appears that the strongest cuts are to be found in the last leg of this LP, with "An Arrow in the Side of Final Fantasy", ripping off a Super Mario video game soundtrack (!), "Please Please Please", "Better Than Worse" (a rearrangement of a Bobby Birdman song), or the very delicate closer "The Sea". If ever you think listening to this sort of music for the whole course of an LP might feel a bit long for you, please go directly to the second digital "disk" on the deluxe edition of *Has A Good Home* (actually Final Fantasy's 7" EP *Young Canadian Mothers*, released not long after). That second disk encapsulates Pallett's pop genius in a neat little package, with different, more sprightly versions of "This Is The Dream Of..." and "The Sea", the absolute jewel "Spell For A Weak Heart", and a stellar cover of Joanna Newsom's "Peach, Plum, Pear". So make yourself some tea, sit on your favorite armchair in your living room, listen to this thing (either the original, or the deluxe version, or just the EP), and enjoy. If you love those sorts of tones, or are intrigued enough by the start of this album, you probably won't regret it. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency + 3.5 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 56 (including this one -- a thousand thanks for the suggestion, anonymous user, but I think I need to dig further into Pallett's discography to make up my mind about this one re my own potential 1001 albums list) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus.

"Shallowness at its most principled" quipped Robert Christgau. Once in a while, the so-called "dean of music critics" had perfect takeaways to sum up what a specific artistry was all about. Is it because I recently fell headfirst into the *Brat* hype that I can now reassess Lady Gaga on her own merits? Probably. At the time I thought her thing was the worst sort of pop trash, I admit it. But now, as far as my mileage on late noughts poptimism go, I can only give tribute to her distinctive voice -- in all the senses of that word. Gaga clearly stands out from that pack, and I would happily trade the two stupid Christina Aguilera albums in the original list for her. The first four RedOne-produced hit singles of *The Fame* (killer opener "Just Dance", "LoveGame" and its subtle North African flourishes, "Paparazzi" and its elated and stellar chorus, and "Poker Face", which is Gaga's most famous song for all the right reasons) are not only iconic, they slap me in the face today. Those bangers sound as fresh as they did in 2008, period. After that incredible start, you could expect this LP to lose its momentum quick, but actually, it keeps on delivering the goods for quite some time, far longer than I thought, at least. "Eh Eh" sounds a little cheesy, sure, but in an endearing fashion. And "Beautiful, Dirty, Rich", the title-track and "Starstruck" are excellent cuts in the genre, imaginative and lively. There are whiffs of the greatest pop singers of the past in those songs. Think Cindy Lauper, Madonna or Prince. The heavily auto-tuned "Starstruck" is even a great hyperpop song before that tag even existed. So yeah, there's even a bit of Charli foretold in this album *The Fame* *does* end up losing its momentum after some point, of course. The formula indeed wears thin on duds such as "Boys Boys Boys" (not as fun as the Sabrina italo-disco song bearing the same name, lol) or "Summerboy", even if "Paper Gangster" is still kinda cool with its piano riff and Arabic flourishes provided courtesy of Morrocan-born RedOne's production. Funny how the exact same ingredients as the ones of the first four songs, only arranged differently, can't work as well as in the latter though. "Brown Eyes" also reminds me of The Cardigans oddly enough. This more classic feel at the eleventh hour is endearing, I guess, but it still screams *deep cuts*, like everything in the last leg of the LP. This doesn't happen on *Brat* for me. Now only time will tell if the latter will age as well overall than *The Fame*. Because in spite of its shortcomings, *The Fame* still aged quite well on a general basis. Didn't expect to give such a cautiously positive review when this pop album appeared on the generator this morning. But I guess that if you're in the mood for the sort of escapism Gaga offers here -- feeling good is not about real fame or real money, she points out, it's about feeling valuable enough to act as if you had those -- you can consider this record as a fun ride. And it would be a little foolish to ask more from it. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for musical competency + 3.5 for the artistry) Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 43 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 56 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus

The 1/5 review currently topping this section is hilariously phrased, I gotta give credit to its writer here. Out of caution, I would just take out the quotation marks around the word *trauma*. Beyond the heaps of parodic or tongue-in-cheek fun that 100 gecs elicits for many open-minded listeners out there, you also need to understand their hyperpop / glitchcore thing as a symptom triggered by a deeply sick society -- one that routinely shits on its children if they ever take the chance to assert themselves far away from normative codes. It's all over the news, wordvomited by hacks and media pundits taking advantage of the rotten system to make a buck while pointing fingers at innocent people. Which is why I also see 100 gecs's absurdist artistry as a natural and paradoxically sound reaction to this sort of sheer insanity, condoned everywhere you look by the people that are supposedly in charge. Yeah, I know... It sounds as if recent news make me see things in 100 gecs that they never thought of themselves. It's a take that may sound far-fetched, and also awfully serious for such nonsensical music. Yet consider the following lyrics from "757": "Somebody's making money on my problems / The way that you're talking, you'd better wear a condom / I smell cowards and sons of a bitch / Everything quick, all smells like shit" There's a couple of other innuendoes like that in the album -- see the awesome nineties hip hop-influenced "The Most Wanted Person In The United States", for instance. Aren't trans folks and other people living in the fringe areas of US culture seen as criminals these days? Those innuendoes must indeed be understood in a specifically American context, and as seen from the vantage point of September 2025, they now subtly suggest some artists will never cry for the Charlie Kirks of this sick, sad world (and this for all the good reasons). This is the wordvomit I referred to earlier, and provocative art is *always* the right answer to those woes, not violence enacted on an individual. If Charlie Kirk's murderer had discovered 100 gecs and become a hardcore fan of theirs (given what we already know from his background, it's highly improbable he even knew who they were), chances are he would never had done what he did. And why? Because he would have become too busy spending time on things that felt good for him, while channeling his everyday frustrations into something that actually matters. Art. Music. Non-toxic transgression. Open-mindedness. Genuine self-confidence. All things that neither Kirk nor his assassin fully understood in their lives, very ironically. I'm 100% serious here. Besides, provocative art also reveals old farts for who they truly are. Case in point, the 1/5 review still topping this section as of today. Yep, that review has a grain of truth to it, sure... But it's also kind of hilarious how it is making its edgelord writer show their true colors. It's that "old man yells at clouds" mentality, all over again. When this person discovered Sepultura (their favorite act in the original list), rebellion was in the air, I imagine. But of course, it's impossible for this user to recognize how provocation can take on many other forms in the 2020s. The whiffs of rebellion have now become stale, even rarefied, when you read that supposedly "fun" review.. All that's left is a mindset deeply entrenched in the past. I think "OK Boomer" is now being slowly written in capital letters on someone's forehead, and ironically, that person is not even aware of it. Enjoy your retirement party, girl! It's probably gratuitous to use this space normally devoted to an assessment of the second 100 gecs album to rant against a user know for their own gratuitous takedowns in this generator. But in a sense, I think that sort of digression is in keeping with the overall spirit of *10,000 gecs*, which flips the bird at the very notions of conventions and decorum through its exhilarating sonic mess. Explosive opener "The Dumbest Girl Alive" will tell it better than I can ever do: "Text, text, text, text / Like you tryna start a fight". There are also levels of self-irony that many grumblers from my own Gen-X generation have lost track of for decades now : "If you think I'm stupid now / You should see me when I'm high / And I'm smarter than I look / I'm the dumbest girl alive". Or this: "I've got lightning in my veins / Walk around like Frankenstein / I did science on my face / I'm the dumbest girl alive". Long story short, those sorts of downright laugh-out-loud lines get me every f*cking time. But beyond the jokes, they also prove Dylan Brady and Laura Less' self-reflective sensibility and awareness of how their "freak" roles are challenging the rest of society. Which makes their supposed "nonsense" actually topical, in the best sense of the word. Of course, those lyrics would amount to nothing if the music wasn't so exhilarating as well. In that regard, the first three bops ("The Dumbest Girl Alive", "757" and "Hollywood Baby") are a slap in the face for me. Mixing everything from nü-metal to 8-bit chiptune to pop punk to ska in a pot-pourri annihilating whatever line you may initially draw to separate supposedly "good" and "bad" taste, 100 gecs make such conceptual endeavors feel fun and effortless. And they also have a trained ear for perfect earworms, as closer "mememe" also proves. So that's four absolute bangers in the same LP. Quite a high count in my book As for the rest of the album, it most often explores interesting stuff once you get past its apparently ridiculous tones and auto-tuned excess -- I especially enjoy "One Million Dollars", for instance. Generally speaking, I do believe Dylan and Laura when they say that 100 gecs is not a parody act, that they actually take their music very seriously. Of course, when they go to a full-on whitewashed ska-punk mode -- on the dissociative children tune "Frog On The Floor", or on a "I Got My Tooth Removed" that's painful to hear for more reasons than one -- I can't fully follow them there, lmao. But in a sense, you *need* those laugh-out-loud duds to make this (admittedly short) album what it is. And what is it, I hear you asking? Well, to use the apt words of the *second* review topping this list, this album is what happens when "artists set out to be radically themselves, and achieve it perfectly". More than ever, the world needs that sort of radical stance, if only to symbolically counter all the harmful ones out there. Whether you're able to enjoy it or not, *10,000 gecs* is talking about our very troubled times. And that makes it essential in my book. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 for the musicianship and production values + 4 for the artistry + 0.5 for contemporary relevance. Only time will tell if said relevance will still be felt in a decade or so, but for the meantime, I have no problem using it to place this LP in my my highest-rated gallery. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 44 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 56 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus

2023 album from an Autralian act I have never heard of before, whose roots go back to the original post-punk / new wave explosion -- before they infused psychedelic jangle rock, dream pop and even post-rock tones into their sound -- now delivering a long, ambitious record filled with moody compositions, pulled off fifty frigging years into their career? Sign me in. Australia is too far from the rest of the world and that's damn unfair. How many other pivotal Aussie bands like that have I missed over the years? Browsing through their discography, from their Echo And The Bunnymen-adjacent heyday in the late eighties to this particular album harboring so many lush tones and imaginative moments, it's obvious The Church have a knack for sophisticated chord sequences, evocative soundscapes and killer melodies. In *The Hypnagogue*, the execution of those intents make them sometimes sound like the lovechild of mid-career Swans and David Bowie (for sure, a very distinct influence on "C'est La Vie"), with various flourishes adjacent to more recent atmospheric rock bands like Preoccupations. In a nutshell, those veterans sound as fresh as the youngest acts in the genres they are tackling these days. And yet it looks like they've also slowly acquired extra gravitas over the years, which makes their latest output as terrific as what they released at the start of their long career. The best of both worlds, really -- old and young ones. So many songs shine in this sci-fi concept album (still not following its narrative as of now, but I'll crack that nut later on for sure). Opener "Ascendence", "C'est La Vie", slow and cinematic "Flickering Lights", the epic title-track, "Antarctica", closer "Second Bridge"... They're all extraordinary songs, and it's almost as if the rejuvenated line-up in the band were an up-and-coming act in my ears. A couple of slow cuts ("Aerodrome" and "These Coming Days") might feel somewhat extraneous in the second half, but it's only because the tracklist is long. Taken on their own, those songs are perfectly fine, so what we have here is just icing on the cake. *The Hypnagogue* indeed takes its sweet time to explore many dark tones and ominous moods, but as it does so, it always feels vital, sharp and relevant. Actually, I can't write a proper review about this LP as of now, because I'm just astounded by what I'm hearing here, right by the end of this great record. So a thousand thanks to the anonymous user who suggested it. Buying the deluxe edition of *The Hypnogogue* right now (also containing songs from its later companion LP *Eros Zeta And The Perfumed Guitars*). This album ticks all my boxes for that sort of trippy rock, and you can't imagine how excited I am to discover it today. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 4.5 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 45 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 56 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus

I have browsed through Spose's discography to understand where this rapper came from and why a user would select a later album of his for this generator. And I think it was pivotal to set my expectations right about *Get Rich Or Die Ryan*, which is quite a convoluted, complex project -- no matter what your mileage is on the different genres the "King Of Maine" tackles here. Long story short, when Spose made a name for himself in the mid-2010s (a "moderate success", in his own words), it felt that the man had not recovered yet from the "old Kanye" thing ten years earlier. Interestingly, "Here We Go Again", from this 2021 album kind of rips off Ye's flow and rhythm pattern on his mid-career bop "Black Skinhead". This is the sort of detail that gives a derivative scent to some of Ryan's raps on the first disk (and since Ye's legacy is tainted forever now anyway, it's even harder to enjoy such blatant inspiration today). Let's face it: that kind of thing makes you feel Spose is often eight or ten years late to catch the bandwagon, at least at first. Worse, the strand of rap-rock formula used in that first volume borders on cringe at times. Can't understand listeners here who consider "Dudes" and "Motherfuckers" as bangers, for instance -- in spite of the good intents expressed in the lyrics of the first, roasting the worst masculine instincts. Those sorts of songs sound hackneyed and cloying to my ears. As far as I'm concerned, I vastly prefer opener "Self Destruct", splitting the difference between early Why? and more recent SoundCloud rap / mumble rap. Unfortunately, second track "Self Help!" is probably the most self-indulgent and flat emo - hardcore dud I have heard in a long time. And this contrast sets the tone for the rest of the first disk, a very mixed affair. Fortunately, I took the time to listen to the second disk, and oddly enough, I absolutely love it! Mostly returning to older boom bap types of productions, Spose doesn't try to be trendy here, he just plays awesome music. Even better, the dark tones often harnessed (as in the first three cuts "Still Selling", "My Own Way" and "Never Stop") display a sonic depth that is mostly absent from Spose's most streamed tracks, taken out of his mid-2010s albums. As a matter of fact, it's nice to see a "man of the people" -- as I readily believe Ryan to be -- age so gracefully. Under that light, it feels that the first disk was a way for him to sow his wild oats in a messy fashion so as to keep his focus for the second (why not inverting the order of those disks, then??!!). And the man can still be fun and sarcastic on that second volume, as the quite funny "Metal Band" proves. The middle section of the second disk explores turf that feels more adjacent to MacMiller, and it's also nicely pulled off. And the last three tracks wrap everything up with a synthesis of sorts, with many wonderful results ("Signing Off"'s instrumental finale is simply extraordinary). "Hotline" is also a deep cut using a free-form of jazz rap so as to provide more various flavors to the whole shebang, and it's the sort of idea that brings a lot of dynamics to that second volume. Very surprised by this one overall. Taken as a whole, it's a sheer mess, but if you go into details, there were ways to create a one-volume rap album that would have been fabulous. Grading the thing accordingly, then. 3.25/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. (2.5/5 for the first disk, and 4/5 for the second, but I'm mostly taking the latter into account here). 8.25/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.25 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 45 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 56 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 107 (including this one -- as good as some of its bops are, it's still too much of a mess to fell "essential") --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus

Politically savvy, packing an undeniable punch riff-wise, Stray From The Path indeed sees its frontman sometimes taking a page out of Zach De La Rocha's book in his screamed hxc-type vocals, and he does it over effective and inspired metalcore, filled to the brim with sharp edges and bouncy twists and turns. Beyond the usual hardcore fare (think of a middle ground between Comeback Kid and Converge), there are bits and pieces of Rage Against The Machine, Botch, Helmet or even Korn in their music, streamlined into a very neat package. A near-perfect mix in my ears, to the point where I'm amazed there haven't been more bands who thought of sounding exactly like this fifteen years into their discography, just like Stray From The Path does here. I imagine that some gatekeepers have probably complained about that evolution, but when I witness the political integrity still expressed in those songs, I don't give a damn about their opinions. Among the many highlights of *Only Death Is Real*, ("Loudest In The Room", "Let's Make A Deal", "Strange Fiction"...) "Plead The Fifth"'s main riff even manages to reach the genius level of Tom Morello without aping Rage Against The Machine. Terrific album, whose overall political message is all the more important to hear right now, which is also a huge plus. Oh and the last seconds of the closer and title-track are a thing of wonder. Using what sounds like an African American slave song for that final moment ticks all the right boxes for me, whether on a musical level or for a societal one. Awesome job here. So, many thanks to the user who suggested this album. From what I see in your worst-rated sections, we might not see eye to eye on many music genres, but when it comes to metalcore and hardcore, it looks like our respective stars align. Thanks to you, I know Stray From The Path have also released an album this year (hope it's not the final one, as they said it was), and I'll sure be spending some time exploring it soon. Cheers, as they say in my neck of the woods (or not so far from it)! 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 4 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 45 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 57 (including this one -- right after listening to it, I also spun next Stray From The Path LP *Internal Atomics*, whose peaks impress me even much, even if the whole of *Only Death Is Real* feels more consistent, so I'm still hesitating between the two for my own potential list of 1001 keepers. Between Converge, Comeback Kid, Modern Life Is War, Ceremony and Defeater (plus a couple of other acts in that overall genre I may have forgotten about) I don't think I have enough room for a lot of modern hardcore albums, so I got to err on the side of caution here -- hope the user who suggested this album can understand). Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 108 --- Émile: voir ma toute dernière réponse sous le disque *Triage* au-dessus

For a long time I associated the 1977 punk explosion to Britain, because of all the seminal bands from there I won't even bother quoting here. I knew New York punk (and by extension American punk) had been a thing, but it looked like it came from a slower transition, with acts that had taken a page out of both Iggy And The Stooges and original rock-'n'-roll to see the (no) future years in advance. Those acts were The New York Dolls, Suicide, and not so long before 1977, The Ramones, of course. But in spite of their foresight, I still considered London as the epicenter of punk rock. After Johnny Thunders left the Dolls, he even brought his Heartbreakers there to record *I.A.M.F.*. Evidence enough that it was where everything really happened. And then I discovered this debut from Dead Boys. It was a slap in the face, actually as good overall as anything coming from early Damned and Clash, and the original 1001 album list missing that record indeed feels like a mistake (British bias?). You just can't beat the perfect string of five tracks opening this record, oozing with Stooges-adjacent tones whose every inflexion will very obviously scream danger and grit to fans of the genre. Stiv Bators was as authentic a punk as one can get, lustful and provocative, and his band had a knack for rough instrumentation that still sounded just melodic enough to push your buttons in all the right ways. The album loses steam a little at the start of its second side, with "Caught With The Meat In Your Mouth" and a cover of the obscure sixties psychedelic act Syndicate Of Sound cover. Besides, the more blatant misogyny of that second half didn't exactly age well. Yet starting from "I Need Lunch" up to the original closer "Down In Flames", the music effortlessly returns to the stellar level of the first side. In short, Dead Boys have delivered a punk masterpiece here, blunt, sharp and on-point. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 4.5 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 46 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 57 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 108 --- Hey, bien le bonjour, Émile. Ouais, ça faisait effectivement un bout que j'avais pas répondu, mais comme tu l'as certainement deviné toi-même, les rentrées des classes sont toujours des moments un peu chargés. Et en plus, faut se remettre dans le bain ! 😅 Pour répondre à tes questions les plus récentes : oui, j'en n'ai pas parlé la dernière fois, mais en ce qui concerne les musiques dites "du monde", la liste de Dimery fait aussi peau de chagrin. C'est un biais culturel, bien évidemment. Après, le format "album", d'origine occidentale, joue un peu aussi là-dedans. Pour tout un tas de musique traditionnelles, on parle plus d'*enregistrements*. Et en plus, quand tu rajoutes les artistes plus récents ou modernes qui ont depuis adopté le format album dans ces coins-là, ben 1001 disques pour prendre en compte tout cette diversité, ça fait un tout petit nombre, en fait ! Des fois, je crois qu'il faudrait des listes de 1001 disques / enregistrements par grande zone géographique. Une pour l'Afrique, une pour l'Asie et l'Océanie, une pour l'Amérique du Sud, et une pour les musiques traditionnelles de l'Europe et de l'Amérique du Nord. J'imagine que ce genre de séparation serait un peu controversé, mais en prenant aussi en compte les musiques actuelles occidentales qui composent 90% du bouquin de Dimery (qui serait une 5e liste), on pourrait en théorie écrire un ouvrage "global", avec 200 albums / enregistrements par zone géographique + 200 sélections issues du bouquin original. Une sorte de photographie globale des arts musicaux de par le monde. Ça aurait une toute autre gueule que la liste de départ, ha ha ! Bon, je te dis ça, mais c'est un domaine dont je ne connais pas grand chose. Tu écoutes quoi dans cette grande catégorie-là, d'ailleurs ? Dans ma discothèque, on trouve pas mal de Qawwali -- un pote m'a initié à Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan il y a longtemps maintenant -- un raga indien, cinq ou six artistes africains, un CD de musiques de Bali, le "Mystère des Voix Bulgares", trois albums de musiques brésilienne, autant en provenance de l'Amérique hispanophone, et... c'est tout. Plus une grosse vingtaine d'albums ou de compilations de reggae et de ska jamaïcain, ainsi qu'une toute toute petite poignée d'artistes plus récents - espagnols, japonais ou islandais. Des trucs épars, donc, absolument rien d'exhaustif. On peut pas être partout, hein. 😅 Ce sujet m'amène à parler de ma discothèque de manière générale. Pour répondre à ta question, la dernière fois que j'ai compté, il y a un an ou deux, j'en étais à pas loin de 2000 CDs. Je pense que j'ai facilement dépassé ce nombre aujourd'hui. Ils trônent dans le salon familial, ma copine s'inquiète parfois un peu de la place qu'ils menacent de prendre (euphémisme), mais globalement, ça se passe bien quand-même ! 🤣 Ah et moi aussi, je grave sur CD (ou brûle, comme tu dis) les albums introuvables ou trop chers dans ce format ! Et comme toi, je me fais chier à reproduire et imprimer les pochettes, ha ha ! Ça a démarré il y a un ou deux ans c't'affaire, et d'ailleurs c'est un peu à cause de King Gizzard, vu qu'ils ont totalement abandonné le CD à partir d'*Omnium Gatherum* -- comme un petit nombre d'autres artistes, souvent pour des raisons économiques. Je dois avoir environ cinquante exemplaires gravés dans ma discothèque maintenant (+ une dizaine brûlés il y a 20 ans, quand c'était "normal" de faire ça, lol). Bref, ça fait un autre point commun entre toi et moi. Juste... fais attention à l'avenir, OK ? C'est un hobby qui peut aller très loin ! J'ai déjà vu en ligne des photos de CDthèques de hoarders qui vont jusqu'à 10,000 exemplaires, et là ça va beaucoup trop loin, même pour moi ! 😅 Sinon, quels albums étais-je le plus surpris de ne pas retrouver dans la liste originale de Dimery ? Assurément le "Blue Album" de Weezer, d'ailleurs numéro un actuel de la 'users list'. C'est forcément celui-là pour moi, pour des raisons à la fois "objectives", mais aussi totalement subjectives -- vu que j'ai toujours surkiffé ce disque, avec zéro déchets dans la tracklist. C'est d'autant plus étonnant que le deuxième album du groupe américain, *Pinkerton*, est lui dans le livre ! Bon, je le kiffe aussi, celui-là (après ce second album, rien dans la discographie de Weezer n'atteint ce niveau initial, de toute manière). Mais ça reste totalement *absurde* de citer le second LP sans aussi inclure le premier ! Dimery a juste fumé la moquette ici. Si je reste dans le subjectif, il y a pour moi quelques autres albums à rajouter, aussi. Je citerai de manière non-exhaustive le *Fashion Nugget* de Cake, le *Last Splash* des Breeders, *The Argument* de Fugazi, les deux premiers albums de Godspeed You! Black Emperor, *Young Team* -- le premier Mogwai --, au moins un album de Big Thief, et peut-être aussi *In The Aeroplane Over The Sea* de Neutral Milk Hotel ou le *Construçao* de Chico Buarque (tiens, un des albums brésiliens de tout à l'heure, d'ailleurs !). Toutefois, je sais bien que l'impact de ces disques n'est pas aussi global que j'aimerais qu'il soit. Même s'il existe et que ces albums ont tous marqué beaucoup de gens... De manière plus "objective", certaines suggestions en ce moment populaires dans la 'users list' (le *Discovery* de Daft Punk, le *Currents* de Tame Impala ou le *Kick* de INXS) ressemblent effectivement à de gros loupés par rapport aux objectifs de Dimery, même si je reste un fan très casual ou un peu distant de ces albums-là... Et pour toi, donc ? Quel serait le disque oublié par Dimery and co.? Pour finir, oui, c'est pas bien, j'ai pas fait mes devoirs par rapport à tes suggestions ! Ah ces profs ! 😀😛😅 Objectifs des semaines à venir : faire des reviews plus courtes, et prendre le temps de checker tes refs (je les ai toujours dans mes notes !). Merci pour les souhaits de bonne rentrée, qui a démarré début septembre ! On se tient au jus, comme on dit par chez moi ! C. PS: Même si je crois que l'on sera rarement d'accord question hip hop, j'ai pas mal rigolé quand j'ai lu ta review "Fantano-Robot" du *Step In The Arena* de Gang Starr. ChatGPT ? Il y a des fois où l'IA simule bien la voix d'Anthony, et d'autres où je le vois pas du tout parler comme ça, par contre. Il n'est pas encore arrivé le moment où l'IA va totalement supplanter l'oreille humaine ! PS II: Je ne pratique aucune forme de design, mais la review où tu parles de ce premier cours de fac avec un prof appelé Sylvain, qui vous a demandé de concevoir des pochettes d'albums imaginaires, ça m'a quand-même rendu un peu jaloux. Ça devait le pied de faire ça ! Dans une autre vie, j'avais un pote qui faisait de la sérigraphie et qui concevait des pochettes de 45 tours / 7" d'artistes imaginaires, et créait même l'objet avec un disque réel dedans -- qu'il récupérait dans des brocantes, et qui n'avaient rien à voir avec les pochettes. Si ça se trouve je dois en avoir un exemplaire quelque part chez moi. Bref, ça m'a fait penser à ça, c't'histoire... Bonne fin de semaine à toi, A+ !

Sorry, as much as I've tried (and I *did* try again here), I never could enjoy Living Colour's music. I find their melodies flat overall, the production values of the albums they released in their heyday aged like milk, and the studio performance on the first couple of tracks is even out of pace from one instrument to the next, which is surprising coming from musicians with such a stellar reputation live. Sure, Vernon Reid is a technically proficient guitar player, but that can't redeem the late eighties sins this record is filled to the brim with, so apparent in its first half (gosh, that awful gated drum sound!). As a matter of fact, it was incredibly difficult for me to reach the end of this LP. "Type" goes on forever for no discernible reason, and in spite of its endearing main vocal hook, "Information Overload" probably has the most cloying and heavy-handed hard-rock riffs I have heard in a while. Add the expected virtuosic solo that actually doesn't bring much on the table. It's too bad, because the last leg of the album explores interesting turf at the eleventh hour. The softer and more lush jazz-funk tones of "Under Cover Of Darkness" fare far better than the rest, and Queen Latifah's featuring there is pretty on point in an old-school hip hop fashion. "Fight The Fight" and closer "This Is The Life" are distinctly atmospheric cuts that sound almost prog, and feel quite nice overall. And "Solace Of You" displays Afro-beat flourishes that aged pretty well compared to the American band's main late eighties shtick. That's the thing, though, isn't it? Living Colour are not remembered for those deep cuts today. They are remembered for said main shtick, mixing hard rock, funk and soul in a not-so-neat package in my ears. And in a somewhat close pot-pourri genre, I vastly prefer Fishbone, Faith No More or Bad Brains. So, in spite of that pretty good last leg in *Time's Up*, this one is no-brainer for me. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes: 4.5/5 for the musicianship and production values + 2.5/5 for the artistry. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 46 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 57 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 109 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Oh well, Vufpeck. As far as live "jam" albums go, I've heard far worse things. As a matter of fact, I think I prefer this one to the Phish record on this list (gratuitously going all over the place without the overall artistry that would fully warrant such unstable endeavors) or the Pigeons Playing Ping Pong thing. Vufpeck's funk performance is tight as hell, and in spite of some underwhelming cuts at the start of the second half, it looks like there are a lot of career highlights in the tracklist. It was interesting listening to the studio versions of those tracks, by the way. Here's the rare example of a jam band who knows how to infuse interesting production values into their studio albums (something Phish isn't really good at in my book). Of course, the downside of that is that you can't help feeling that something gets lost in translation for those live versions--something a fan of the band actually expressed in a review, by the way. But it shouldn't matter, because Vufpeck's live sound remains crisp and dynamic throughout, and for once, the crowd's enthusiasm (and participation in the performance) didn't distract me from the music. Hearing the audience singing "Dean Town"'s bassline was fun as hell, I'l not gonna deny it. Since when do you hear a crowd chanting a damn *bassline*??! Honestly, I also think that mostly staying in one lane here--namely a somewhat hard-sounding funk style--works in favor of the overall cohesiveness of this live album. My favorite cuts are "Animal Spirits", "My First Car", "Tesla", "Smile Meditation" and its wonderful acoustic guitar solo, "Beastly" and "Dean Town". Through them, Vulfpeck provides enough opportunities to make their stellar musicianship shine. Now if I could get my hands on a King Gizzard-level jam band tackling this funk genre so as to serve it with something evocative and imaginative enough -- beyond the band-noodling-on-stage shtick -- I would be head over heels. Unfortunately, not even the adventurous KGATLW have pulled that off in said genre. So I gotta wait for this future masterpiece with this record in my headphones, I guess -- and all in all, it doesn't sound so bad on a general level, as impatient as I am. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 46 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 57 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 109 (including this one -- but I leave my door open for a studio album, though. The question is: which one?) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Comparing this to the White Album is ridiculous. Yeah, the White Album is a mess as well... but it's a *beautiful* mess. My heart goes out to the open-minded, non-Spanish speaking listeners in this generator who were visibly delighted by the mix of genres -- latin or otherwise -- displayed in *Re*. Their heart is in the right place, and sincerely, I hoped I could join their ranks before spinning this one. Yet now that I did spin the record, I have a sneaking suspicion that what ticks those listeners' boxes is mostly related to the way different styles follow one another in *Re*, instead of them taking attention to the actual *substance" of those songs. Because, well, very rare exceptions in the tracklist aside (latin-prog opener "El aparato", the more traditional-sounding "Esa noche" and "Trópico de cáncer"), I found said substance a bit daft and even off-putting at times, to be perfectly candid about it all. I'm not even sure the atonal sections sprinkled throughout those songs are actually done *on purpose*. To me, the "critics" who later praised this (initially badly received) LP are just clueless about what makes music of all kinds sound *good*. Style over substance, as I just said. And apart from those critics, I guess that nostalgia also explains the current reputation of this one. File this into "you had to be there at the time to understand"? To be more specific: the hard rock, ska, alt-rock and industrial ingredients in *Re* now sound so hackneyed, heavy-handed and dated they're just an ordeal to go through. And as far as the latin elements are concerned, I might not be an expert, but I can't see what this LP has that probably dozens of other albums from that cultural area don't have. From what I've seen online, I'm sure that frontman and singer Rubén Albarran is an endearing figure in Mexican music history (plus, he supports Zapatistas, and that can only score an extra half-point in my book!). Unfortunately, I have to say that his nasal, forced vocal performance is grating to the umpteenth degree for me. Rarely have I heard in this list a vocal delivery that sounds so annoying to my ears. Like, just shut up, man... So yeah, sorry to yuck on your yum, gringos, but this one's not for me. I'm all for including Spanish language albums in this user's list, but c'mon, there's got to be better music in that category out there! Sure, you could find Manu Chao and Buena Vista Social Club in the original 1001 albums book... But when you think of the blatant omissions of stellar recordings by Tito Puentes, Rosalía, Lhasa de Sela, Natalia Lafourcade, Carla Morrison or Gustavo Santaolalla in said original list, the inclusion of *Re* in the users-curated one clearly gets on my nerves. Heck, I would even prefer finding a Bad Bunny album here! Those long reggaeton albums of his are bloated as well, but at least, you would have proper bops to listen to. Spent the rest of my afternoon listening to other, more recent Mexican rock bands so as to start to fix the obvious cultural blind spot I have about that country's rock scene. And I gotta say, it didn't take me that long to find gems released by acts such as Little Jesus, Hello Seahorse!, Porter, Los Dynamite, Zoé or Rey Pila. To anyone tempted to praise Café Tacvba, try to check those acts out as well if you have a little time on your hands. Then ask yourself this question: cultural impact aside, are those acts not sounding at least as "good" as Café Tacvba? Or even *better*, actually? It's an open question, you know. More power to you (and the user who suggested this LP) if you consider *Re* a fun listen. But real honesty would also require you to broaden the scope so as to know whether this suggestion actually holds water. Just my final two centavos here... 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes: 4.5/5 for the musicianship and production values + 1/5 for the actual artistry + 0.5 bonus point for cultural impact and Rubén apparently being a nice guy. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 46 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 57 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 110 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Didn't know the first thing about Nic Jones when I woke up this morning, but it's easy to understand why *Penguin Egg* was overlooked for the 1001 Albums book. By 1980, the golden years of British folk -- as most famously represented by Fairport Convention -- were already far into the rearview mirror, and apart from albums by Richard Thompson (from the same Fairport Convention), the English music press was probably too busy covering the punk / new wave explosion to spend enough time on less exposed figures playing traditional folk music instead. So, many thanks to the anonymous user trying to correct that mistake here. Of course, some listeners not versed into the genre might find this recording a little quaint overall, but as far as I'm concerned, my mileage on trad-folk fare has vastly evolved in recent years, and this now plays a part in the manner that I can appreciate this sort of album. I'll never tire of repeating this on this generator, by the way: the main cause of that evolution is falling in love with the work of Irish band Lankum, also mostly recording traditional folk songs (some of whom date from way, WAY back, ha ha), but doing it with a very personal and distinctive take. So I encourage anyone who likes this Nic Jones album to spin the records of those Irish musicians as well -- especially *False Lankum*, released two years ago. Now about *Penguin Egg*: "Canadee-I-O", "The Humpback Whale" and "Courting Is A Pleasure" are absolute gems. And beyond the timeless emotion seeping from Jones' vocal performance here, those songs also nicely showcase the man's abilities as a guitar player -- not only the picking and strumming technique, but also his use of open tunings or open voicings for the chords he plays. Here is, in a nutshell, what makes Nice Jones's performance sound so good to my ears. The rest of the tracklist might not be as striking on a first listen, but it's still perfectly fine traditional folk. Jones is sometimes joined by a very minimal group of supporting players, on recorders, accordions and the likes, and the result will play out nicely on your stereo in an idle Sunday morning. One last aside to end this tentative review: "The Humpback Whale" is a song originally composed by a folk scene figure named Harry Robertson, and if you go and find information about him, you'll discover the man has led quite an extraordinary life, related to his involvement in the whaling industry and how such a harsh life inspired him to become a songwriter. This anecdote is just an example of how albums like *Penguin Eggs* can also be entry points into a far larger world, where life stories and inspiring music feed from each other. If only for this, I have to support the suggestion I saw on my phone today. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 46 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 58 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 110 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Of course, I have known that Weezer's "Blue Album" was missing in Dimery's book for quite some time. It's the most blatant omission in the whole original list, as the global score for this iconic debut in the users' selection of LPs proves (highest global score as of today). 5/5 album all the way. But why the hell did I believe that Dimery and co. had included the American band's sophomore album in their list instead??? I have even just recently wrote that in a message to my chum Émile (also a user of this generator), and I was... totally wrong. Yet I could have taken an oath I had seen *Pinkerton* in those 1080+ albums... Looks like my faulty memory had just made up the whole thing. In a sense, this false recollection is fitting to the contents of Weezer's second album. Indeed, most of the songs in *Pinkerton* seem to be told from the perspective of a quite unreliable narrator -- some sort of alienated loner, lost inside his own fantasy world and identifying with that character from Puccini's *Madame Butterfly*, whose colonial male gaze here inspire the thoughts of a nerdy rock star that looks quite close to Rivers Cuomo's own persona. Frustration and self-denial thus loom over a lot of those melodic, indie-rock songs, and even a seemingly "sweet" tune such as "Across The Sea" is carrying some sinister undertones. There's indeed something a little disturbing in that story of a rock star replying to the letter of a foreign teenage fan in ways that could raise a couple of eyebrows today. And also back then, come to think of it. A friend of mine even pointed this out to me not so long ago : Pinkerton is a cool album, and it indeed paved the way to the emo scene about to surge in the decade that followed its release ; but in a way, this LP also foretells... the incel-adjacent corners of today's internet! And this part doesn't sound so good... Maybe that's what a lot of rock critics found unsavory at the time, without them being able to use those words back then. There sure are dark undercurrents troubling the stellar songwriting channeled throughout this striking record. And whether you can fully enjoy them or not, those undercurrents are part of the album's legacy. Let's be clear now: in spite of those elements (or maybe also *because* of them, even if it's a little unsettling to think so), *Pinkerton* remains Weezer's last great album to this day. Because there is an unhinged intensity in it that still manages to push indie-rock fans' buttons almost thirty years later. Plus, the music is fantastic: indeed, "Tired of Sex" does not only turn the masturbatory innuendoes of previous album's closer "Only In Dreams" on their heads -- like, yeah, now that you're a rock star, Rivers, you can have sex with all those groupies and even complain about it (unless those groupies are figments of your sick imagination again?)... That opener is also mostly an incredible lesson in tension-and-release dynamics perfectly illustrating the lyrical contents here, with that humongous, bouncy riff to push and pull you indefinitely. Then, "Getchoo" is a raucous number sending you to alt-rock heavens, "Why Bother"'s chorus offers a sing-along only equalled by the best cuts of the "blue album" itself, and "El Scorcho" is a sleazy tour de force where the band explores looser aesthetics while never softening their saturated edge. As for the rest, it is excellent nineties alt-rock fare with pop overtones. The unrequited love yarn "Pink Triangle" comes to mind here -- with its displaying of cis-heterosexual prejudiced thoughts on what lesbians and straight girls are supposed to look like being both exemplified and mocked here. Sometimes, it's just difficult to distinguish a ridiculous song from a great one with a ridiculous subject matter. That sort of thing happens a couple of times in this LP. But to me, those cuts are great songs, and only the 100% self-indulgent and pathetic moanings on the "confessional", barebones acoustic closer "Butterfly" sound bad on a purely musical level, really -- but given how that closer wraps up the themes displayed elsewhere in the record, it's still an apt conclusion no matter what. I remember hating that track at the time. Now I understand it was a way for Cuomo to signal us he had reached the bottom as a person -- even if not exactly as an artist -- and that he direly needed some time off to rethink his life, loves, and relationships to others. Hence the four-year hiatus that would follow. Nothing would ever be the same after that. Weezer would never record such intense compositions again, and Cuomo is probably a happier person and artist for it. But good lord, I still love this album! Because rarely have disturbingly candid rock songs sounded so catchy and fun to listen to. One for the ages, almost on an equal footing to Weezer's debut. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 4.5 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 47 (including the one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 58 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 110 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

I'm a huge fan of The Sopranos. Like, HUGE. I have watched the whole series three times, and I expect to watch it at least a fourth time before my final demise. So of course, I knew who Alabama 3 are. Beyond the choice of "Woke Up This Morning (Chosen Mix)" for the title sequence of The Sopranos, showrunner David Chase had very fine tastes that helped him soundtrack his masterpiece, and I encourage everyone here to check out the official soundtracks and unofficial playlists dedicated to the series. What's striking about those soundtracks is how Chase's selections used the music of artists who were pretty obvious for the story's New Jersey / Tri-State Area settings and its 40-ish / 50-ish-year-old mafioso characters (with music by legendary artists such as Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones, Muddy Waters, Frank Sinatra or... Journey!), to then mix that somewhat predictable backdrop with far more obscure acts, at least for American ears of that generation: indeed you can also find leftfield musicians going from Aphex Twin to Tindersticks in that soundtrack, and that mix of genres is what makes it a perfect one for the postmodernist aesthetics of the series. Chase also had an ear attuned to English music that went from the sixties to the noughts, which is probably how he stumbled upon Alabama 3's peculiar mix of blues, gospel and electronic shenanigans. Listening to the whole album, I gotta say that I wish the LP changed gears a little more so as to explore turf going further away from that specific formula as famously exemplified by "Woke Up This Morning" (or opener "Converted"). A lot of the "acid" technoid synth flourishes in those electro-blues tracks sound exactly the same for instance, and the vocals (both lead and background ones) often follow the same gospel-meets-singspeak template -- to the point where one can grow worn out by it towards the end of the album. But I would lie if I said this record was bad overall, even with a couple of duds here and there. There are even two endearing C&W cuts towards the end of the tracklist ("The Old Purple Tin" and closer "Peace In The Valley"). It's just that in the grand scheme of things, *Exile On Coldharbour Lane* can't be considered "essential" in my own proverbial '1001 albums' book. Hope the anonymous user who suggested this album doesn't hold too much of a grudge and ends up ordering a hit on me. But if ever the temptation comes, my best advice to this user, written in Soprano-meme terms, would be "Alright, but you gotta get over it." 😉 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 2 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 47 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 58 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 111 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

With *The Mollusk*, probably one of the most consistent Ween albums. Which doesn't mean *Quebec* doesn't go all over the place, Ween being Ween. Opener "It's Gonna Be A Long Night" sounds like Mötörhead playing a sixties garage pop song (very nice riffing on this one!), "Zoloft" is like weird kraut filled with flourishes that are coming off as both extravagant and dreamy, "Transdermal Celebration" is nineties alt-rock done right, almost in earnest, "Among His Tribe" displays evocative prog overtones that are a long shot from said alt-rock in the previous song, while bizarro "So Many People In The Neighborhood" or bonkers "The Fucked Jam" owe a lot to... the Residents! I could go on and quote each cut in the tracklist, but I guess you get the picture right now: Ween is doing their unpredictable Ween thing here, and it will obviously ruffle some feathers somewhere. The thing is, as multifaceted as Gene and Dean are in *Quebec*, they also manage to create a sequence of songs where the stylistic twists and turns paradoxically strengthen the whole shebang, instead of making a mess that would be too inconsequential (as in their early nineties album *Chocolate And Cheese*). And some discrete compositions channeling folk-rock influences into surprisingly elegant balladeer art can even be considered as gems. This is the case of "Tried And True", for instance, almost reaching the memorable melodic heights of "Ocean Man". In that excellent folk-rock league, see also "Chocolate Town", also harboring C&W tones, or the small gem that "I Dont Want It" is. And please, don't miss the last two songs in the LP. In "The Argus" (awesome finish on this one, thanks to the stellar guitar work!) and "If You Could Save Yourself (You'd Save Everyone)", you can sense an unmistakable "classic rock" feel, once again sprinkled with very subtle prog / psychedelic ingredients -- hereby proving that Ween is way more than a pastiche or parody act, but a true heir of their seventies forebears. Gene and Dean are following a specific tradition here, but with a sensibility that is fully their own. And that sensibility is fully showcased in *Quebec*'s last leg. My only real gripe about this collection of songs is that the payoff at the end of some compositions is a little underwhelming at times (even if it's always there, in one way or another). But apart from that, it's a very fine album. Also, it's interesting to read that Dean and Gene were going through a rough patch around the time the thing was recorded. It's as if that sort of hardship had encouraged them to increase their focus, whether in individual songs or for the conception of the tracklist. Not saying that artists should suffer to channel their unbridled creativity, of course. But in the case of Ween, the situation obviously led them to tone down their college humor shtick. And given my taste for album that can be adventurous without succumbing to self-indulgence, I can't complain about such partial self-restraint... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 47 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 59 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 111 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Yeah, I remember the hype about that one in 2011. That was during the tail end of the retro-rock wave, and The Vaccines had just managed to make the cut at the eleventh hour. Good for them, I guess. I even bought a cheap secondhand copy of this debut many years after, when that trend was already in the rearview mirror. I did it because this album is excellent beyond any concerns about ephemeral hypes and passing music fads. The production values feel a bit "safe" sometimes, but the tracklist is filled to the brim with instantly catchy earworms, which is never as easy to write as one may think. And even if the whole thing is derivative to a degree (think Beach Boys meets Ramones meets The Strokes, which is already quite a circular stream of influences, lol), you can't deny the talent and effort that has been put into those songs. If you wrote a book about that retro-rock wave in the noughts and how it invaded the mainstream, *Is This It?* could be the first chapter, and *What Did You Expect from The Vaccines?* would be the last. Maybe indeed that's enough to consider it as "essential", somehow. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 47 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 60 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 111 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

I don't have anything pivotal to add the the two four-star reviews topping this section as of late September 2025. Only four things, that I'll try to sum up as fast as possible: 1) Teenager angst and early eighties hardcore punk provocation can justify many things... That said, the homophobia expressed at the end of "I'm Not A Loser" is appalling. So here's what frontman Milo Aukerman had to say about those lyrics many years later... "A song like ‘I’m Not a Loser’ is completely unfiltered. That can come with some negatives too. [Guitar player] Frank [Navetta] wrote that and at the time, it was the ultimate teenage rage. It was targeting not gay people but the jocks at our school. The language is the hot button. These days, I’ve altered that. I want to get across the point of ‘you suck,’ but it’s been misunderstood. We have a few songs that we’ve come to regret how they’ve been interpreted." Yeah, Aukerman has stopped singing those homophobic slurs in the song for a long time now, because even aimed at heterosexual jocks, everyone today knows how that sort of language is dumb and destructive. Milo has indeed learned a lot since his years as a young adult. 2) Of course, there's at least a couple of other "unfiltered" moments like that in this debut, and it would probably be nonsensical to expunge those extra unfiltered moments from those other songs' lyrics -- not to mention impossible without altering the original intent of the latter. Some sort of hardcore punk "hot button" indeed. But understanding the context doesn't mean you can't be critical to some of the lines used on those two or three songs... 3) Musically speaking, *Milo Goes To College* has a quite rocky start on its first half -- derivative of better early hardcore acts such as Minor Threat, without packing the same punch from the get-go. But starting with the awesome Tony Lombardo-penned *Suburban Homes* -- whose relatively sophisticated instrumental harmonies in a punk context nicely serve the sardonic nature of the song, lambasting suburban conformity -- the second side takes off to an anthemic level that makes the whole thing a precious addition to any collection of punk records. Bill Stevenson's propulsive drums do wonders on "Kabuki Girl", as in other cuts from this LP. Frank Navetta was a six-strings powerhouse in most of those cuts too. And Aukerman's vocal performance is truly unhinged and absolutely thrilling in that second half. It's also fun to hear the boys try their hand at vocal harmonies in "Statue of Liberty" and closer "Jean Is Dead" -- with mixed yet endearing results. For better or for worse, what we have here is the birthing act of pop punk. Add two other highlights that are both filled with many interesting minor undertones -- "Bikeage", an angular and unsettling number about a 15-year-old junkie prostitute, and banger "Hope", a rough diamond about teenage lust and envy, inspired by a real break-up Aukerman went through -- and the whole second side comes off as near-perfect. 4) I have seen that written a couple of times elsewhere, but as sincere as my praise to all the musicians up there is, I'm also one to consider that the secret sauce in the first line-up of Descendents is Tony Lombardo. His very melodic basslines are so striking, and I can easily imagine how hearing them on this record for the first time must have been an ear-opener for someone like NOFX's Fat Mike. Also, it's amazing to think that Lombardo was eighteen years older than the rest of the band members who performed in this debut. Like, when the guy was their age, Bob Dylan, The Byrds and The Beatles were topping the charts. Some people know how to stay young for sure. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 47 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 61 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 111 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

However you choose to see it -- a legendary artist passing the torch to a younger one at the twilight of his life ; that young artist paying tribute to said legend by composing such a sumptuous piece for him ; an association between the two gently dissolving genre barriers so as to take the listener to another world -- you just can't deny the beauty displayed by this album, even if it may escape your grasp. Sam Shepherd (aka Floating Points) dilutes and sprinkles his ambient dots and synthetic splashes at the exact right moments, patiently weaving an infinite-sounding cocoon through the same repeated motif on piano and harpsichord. Slowly but surely, that motif builds up to extraordinary sections in the middle of the overarching composition, emphasized by pivotal contributions from the London Symphony Orchestra, adding cinematic and eastern-adjacent layerings to the compositions. Whiffs of Arvo Pärt and Henryk Górecki can indeed be scented in *Promises*, yet the latter is anything but derivative. No other record in the world sounds like this one. After that apex in the central movements, when everything gets quiet again, Shepherd subtly piles up electronic flourishes that could hearken back to Tangerine Dream or Klaus Schulze. Something awesome happened this morning when I listened to this part of the album again. Those flourishes mingled with the sound of birds warbling from outside my window, and I couldn't honestly tell which was which. It took the short yet intense free jazz surge that followed that moment to make me pinpoint the sound of the real birds again... This here isn't new age music by the way... It's for instance forever ambiguous whether you're supposed to reach immanence or transcendence while listening to the record. Depends on how you interpret the titular "promises", I guess. Towards the end of the piece, right after Shepherd stops playing his central motif in the middle of the eighth movement, some slightly sinister overtones even bob through the lush surface, probably pointing to the finality of all things. The atonal coda performed by the LSO in the next and final movement also clearly underlines that theme. Under that light, the repeated central motif was a heartbeat. When it stops, it's as if a soul leaves a mortal coil, travelling to another plane of existence. Yet even when *Promises* points to mortality, it remains soothing throughout somehow. Like a balm on the soul, it encourages acceptance, awareness, openness. As for Sanders, he brings the essential emotional core without whom the music would just linger pleasantly and not necessarily affect you this deeply -- waves of relatable melodies and sensations conveyed through his expert playing of the saxophone, which is both restrained and passionate somehow, evocative of the wisdom and frailty old age brings to your psyche. And the abstracted vocal scaterings the man performs at some key juncture can have the exact same effect on the listener, underlying the humanity expressed by the piece as a whole. I don't know much about Pharaoh Sanders' life and music -- my jazz tastes have first led me to figures such as John Coltrane, Miles Davis and Charles Mingus instead -- but it's easy to see why this album can be considered as another crowning achievement for him in a career already filled with those. One last promise that was held at the very end of a live lived fully. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 5. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 61 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 111 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

I'm not one to say pop punk is necessarily a betrayal of punk overall. But it has to be done right -- which means that a genuine punk spirit needs to be found there, with the minimum amount of transgression required to challenge an audience. And the pop elements must *also* be worthy of your time -- you got to have truly memorable hooks offering some welcome dynamics somehow, so as to not repeat the same sort of dross again and again. Heck, I love Green Day's *Dookie*, so I know bands can pull this sort of thing off with the right set of skills. What about blink-182 circa-*Enema of the State*, then? Are they both 'good punk' and 'good pop'? This LP is supposedly their magnum opus, emblematic of a specific moment in late-'90s/early-2000s music culture, after all... As far as punk transgression is concerned, you can put it in a nutshell thanks to that final line in opener "Dumpweed": "I need a girl that I can train". Eyeroll. Well, blink-182, good job for catching the incel spirit a decade before the word even existed! Not really what I call 'punk transgression' in my book, but I guess that's a way to represent the effect of raging hormones in a male teenager's body, and how said effect feels harder to go through when you're the odd one out living in the damn suburbs. That said, this doesn't change the fact you have to be a f*cking idiot to sing along to this song, whether then or now. Of course, I'm aware that there are layers of (self-)irony aimed at boys elsewhere in the album. But it's just that those layers are not particularly witty either. In an excerpt from *Enema of the State*’s 2000 tour booklet, lead singer Tom DeLonge actually had to explain the meaning of “Dumpweed,” stating: "Girls are so much smarter than guys and can see the future as well as never forget the past. So that leaves the dog as the only thing men are smarter than." Now that's a hilarious statement, and I'm left wondering why on earth Tom never thought of inserting such sharp one-liners in his lyrics -- lyrics that are on the contrary either vague, hackneyed or ham-fisted overall. Looks like the guy can be genuinely funny. The thing is, he was probably too lazy and complacent to ever bother about what he actually sings. Well, Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong or NOFX's Fat Mike certainly ain't lazy like that. What about the pop parts in the blink-182 formula then? Let's just say that the hooks are not that catchy to my ears, the chord sequences clone each other so fast it feels you're stuck inside a top secret Big Pharma laboratory, and even worse, the vocal lines, themselves cloned on an assembly line, are so goddamn... flat. While a lot of people hear something "bratty" in those vocals, I just perceive the latter as innocuous and devoid of any real flavor. Can you hear that as well? Consequently, I never could understand blink-182's commercial success. It makes me feel like the -- at the time -- young, en masse target audience for pop-punk just had awful music tastes. And it's something I refuse to believe to this day, in spite of said success. It's just mind-boggling for me. To be clear, the problem with this album is not that it should be groundbreaking or deep -- it would indeed be a little foolish to expect such depth from Tom, Mark and Travis, whose main goal is obviously to stick to their formula as much as they can. No, the *real* problem is that there were tons of better bands in that genre out there during the late nineties, doing this kind of thing with more bite and imagination, even as they stayed within the constraints of pop-punk or "skate-punk". Whether musically or lyrically, *Punk In Drublic*-era NOFX just wiped the floor with blink's daft, harmless tunes, just to take one example. And for a lot of people aware of that scene during the nineties, it was therefore a little difficult buying into blink's shtick when it broke out. Add the processed vocals and streamlined-to-a-fault production values (to make pop-punk palatable for general audiences, Jerry Finn had certainly done a much more subtle job six years earlier on *Dookie* -- and it's not the discreet addition of organ and synths here and there on *Enema Of The State* that can redeem that "streamlined" effect), and what you have here is a record clearly favoring style over substance. *This* here is what feels like a betrayal of punk for me, period. With all that in mind, *Enema Of The State* is still objectively a far better and more cohesive album than the later blink-182 LP suggested on the users list. Two massive singles surely gave it rocket fuel, one of whom ("What's My Age Again?) I still find extremely boring, with the other being quite alright ("All The Small Things", with its goofy surf-rock-adjacent "na-na-na" hook and subtle synth flourishes in the background). And I also like "Adam's Song". The chords, instrumentation and arrangements in it are not particularly original, but something happens there vocally and lyrically that makes that one stand out from the pack. I guess it's what a listener can expect from a good pop song, right? Plus, you can sense that the band members were (secretly) fans of The Cure at the time when you listen to that one -- just as they adapted Robert Smith's formula into a sunny-drenched, major-mode, California-friendly translation. It's very subliminal, of course. But the rest is just a borefest for me. Just not essential, in spite of its commercial success. *2* for cultural impact, maybe. And that feels generous. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes: 5 for the musicianship and "professional" production values + 1.5/5 for the.artistry + a 0.5 bonus for cultural impact. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 61 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 112 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Yeah, 65daysofstatic are probably a very underrated act, and it's a good idea to shed light on their idiosyncratic mix of Mogwai-like post-rock and Warp Record-adjacent electronic shenanigans, both pulled out very well and seamlessly mingled throughout this record. The production values and sonic treatments are not stellar on this second album (the drums and synths sound quite paper-thin, for instance), but it would be unfair to blame that on the band, who probably did the best they could with the budget they had for their time in the studio. And it doesn't really matter anyway: the music is always dynamic and interesting enough to make up for those shortcomings. Probably the best LP from their early career. About said career, I have quickly browsed through the band's later albums, and after a time period in the early 2010s where they didn't really seem to know how to take their distinctive mix up to the next level for their subsequent LPs (plus a couple of soundtracks for an old film, or maybe a video game), it appears that 65daysofstatic have ultimately favored the electronic part of their sound, to crisp and effective results. Their current music is very dark and moody, they don't always release a ton of physical copies of it, but it's awesome overall. No issues with production values here, they sound pitch-perfect to my ears. Check out album *replicr, 2019* and also a deep cut named "Górecki" -- most probably a tribute to the recently deceased Polish composer -- in another release. 65daysofstatic have gone a little niche in the recent years, but I think the outcome is great, and those later recordings also deserve to be mentioned here. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 4.5/5 for the musicianship and the production values + 4/5 for the artistry Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 112 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Apart from one night out in Porto a few years ago, enjoying locals both young and old performing it in a tiny café, I don't know much about fado, so that was interesting. This music style has a flair for drama -- in a quite retrained, subdued shape, in keeping with the Portuguese mindset? And it lies a lot on minor-major modulations, which I'm always a sucker for. "Nem às parades confesso", "Fado Português" and "Barco Negro" stood out. Love that insane bridge towards the end of the latter, with Amália's wordless vocalizations... The thing is, this is technically a compilation, so it shouldn't appear in this list. And if I browsed through a couple of English translations of the lyrics to try to know more about their overall contents, it still feels like the artistry displayed here evades my grasp. So can I truly, genuinely fall in love with this music style as a whole? Not even to the walls will I confess it. 😉 Not graded -- going for a "neutral mark" here. Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 113 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

I haven't given 2/5 and 1/5 marks to Rush in the original list to now give a higher grade to Dream Theater. I stand by what I said in those reviews. Inserting hair metal pyrotechnics into the prog rock vernacular just empties the latter of its poetic substance and cinematic potential. And it's the same if you do it the other way around and insert prog rock elements into hair metal. Call me close-minded if you will. I know how open-minded I can be, believe me (all you need to do is to compare galleries...). So I don't think I need lessons here, just like a lot of other people on this generator -- who also have very broad and yet demanding tastes -- don't need lessons about how to open their hearts to a vast array of musical styles. That said, I respect the stellar musicianship displayed in *Images and Words* a lot, and I admit that some of the extravagant, show-off flourishes in this record, such as the ones found in opener "Pull Me Under", can be kind of fun to listen to. But come on! If you take away the metal ingredients in "Another Day", "Surrounded" and "Wait For Sleep", what you have here is for all intents and purposes eighties pop dross. Without the metal guitar solo at its end, "Another Day" is basically an Avril Lavigne song, for instance. It's no dig against people who like Avril Lavigne, lol. It's just that the thought that Avril Lavigne and Dream Theater might actually have something in common would probably be considered ridiculous by fans of both acts. And yet... To conclude, the problem I have with this record might also stem from what I consider as flawed execution of an artistic vision. And this is where the prog rock elements actually sound worse than the metal ones, very ironically. Amazing how closer "Learning To Live" constantly goes from thrilling hooks and motifs to laugh-out-loud cheesiness in the space of its eleven minutes and thirty seconds, for example. Those sorts of medieval shenanigans in that closer hearken back to Genesis, sure, but they sound so awkward and overkill to my subjective ears... To the point where the totally clichéed metal elements felt like a breath of fresh air in comparison. Guess that overkill mode goes with the territory of the genre harnessed here, though. More power to you if that's your kind of thing. Metal power, of course. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes: 5+2 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 114 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Like the tangled mess of the New York subway map, the history of rock is full of unpredictable twists and strange connections. When Vampire Weekend jumped on board with their self-titled debut in 2008 (followed by *Contra* and *Modern Vampires of the City* a few years later), the indie old guard was instantly suspicious. Who were these Columbia University kids, suddenly riding a wave of hype that felt just a bit too big to be real? What’s with all these chirpy major chords? And that breezy voice—doesn’t it sound a little *too* much like Paul Simon? Wait a second… is this *ska for preppies* I’m hearing??? Yes, the band deserves credit for bringing Afrobeat guitar riffs, dusting off classic Brill Building-style pop, and even sprinkling some subtle hip-hop touches—ingredients that would go on to influence a ton of acts afterwards. But the damage was done. To many, they were nothing more than rich kids turning indie rock into a Cosmopolitan fashion accessory. Things only got worse when Rostam Batmanglij left and the band put out *Father of the Bride*, a patchy, bloated record that felt more like an Ezra Koenig solo project than a real band effort. After three notable albums, the hype bubble had eventually popped, and so the Vampire Weekend train seemed to have left the station for good. Which is why *Only God Was Above Us* felt like such a huge surprise last year. From the opening seconds, Koenig’s sly, understated voice made it clear we were in for a wild ride, against all odds: “Fuck the world / You said it quietly / No one could hear you / No one but me…” The distortion may be dialed down in the overture of first track "Ice Cream Piano", but when it hits, it hits hard. And what follows is a mad, joyful sprint that recalls the band’s earlier energy, but with a new trick: an avalanche of finely-tuned details that push their sound somewhere totally new. Jagged bursts of noise, Broadway-worthy string swirls, melancholy piano lines, whiplash tempo shifts… Vampire Weekend had rediscovered their live-wire spark, but now with a more ambitious, “grown-up” edge—thanks in no small part to Ariel Rechstaid’s lush production and a crew of handpicked session players. It all *feels* like it could fall apart, but somehow it never does. That’s especially clear in the next trio of C-gems —"Classical", "Capricorn", and "Connect"—which lay out the three main paths this album explores. Take "Classical": it’s got a lurching, heavy rhythm, guitars that squeal and charm in equal measure, a wild free-jazz sax, and a meaty upright bass. The old Paul Simon comparisons resurface here (helped along by sunny refrains and a 12-string folk guitar), but this is Paul Simon on speed and amphetamine, hurtling into unexplored urban skylines. And you can also gaze upon those shaky skylines in the tense, post-punk shadings of "Gen-X Cops" (a rare minor-keyed song in the band's discography), or in "Mary Boone", which mashes up a massive Soul II Soul breakbeat with choirs that sound like they fell straight out of heaven. Then comes "Capricorn", which slows things way down. Its distorted, foggy textures call back to Animal Collective, with a gentle drum groove and ghostly strings that feel like memories dissolving into mist. It’s a bittersweet ballad about aging gracefully—or not—and it kicks off a run of slower songs that showcase Koenig’s songwriting chops, from "Prep-School Gangsters" to the majestic closer "Hope". But among those three C-titled cuts sowing seeds throughout the rest of the record, the centerpiece is most certainly "Connect", and the only fitting word to describe the latter is: *incredible*. Incredible like its fast-paced piano arpeggios that sound part Bach, part Thelonious Monk, complete with tiny flubs caught on tape. Incredible like Koenig’s vocal, reaching for memories that could belong to the 1930s or the 2000s. Incredible like the whole structure—playful, unpredictable, never pompous—bringing to mind *Congratulations*-era MGMT. And that’s before you factor in the freewheeling drums, dreamy choirs, mischievous synth stabs, and the cheeky final double-bass note that closes the track with a wink. Follow this crazy rollercoaster to the end and you’ll be laughing in disbelief. There’s really nothing else in Vampire Weekend's catalog—or in rock history—that quite matches "Connect". And yet that spirit of restless invention carries through the whole record: sudden drum fills, abrupt swerves, warm textures one moment, strange surprises the next. Just listen to the last-minute brass that erupts in "Prep-School Gangsters", or the way an Afro-rock guitar riff gets swallowed by eerie synth washes in "Pravda". And then there’s "Hope". Eight stunning minutes, built on a deceptively simple piano line and Koenig’s aching, majestic vocals. The song slowly builds, tension rising until it finally explodes in a storm of horns and strings. It’s the album closer, and as such, it is obviously a farewell—maybe to a lover, maybe to New York itself, whose sounds and spirit haunt every corner of this record. Either way, it’s devastatingly beautiful. Forget the hype, past or present. With *Only God Was Above Us*, Vampire Weekend have finally delivered the density and all-encompassing emotional weight that had always seemed just out of their reach. “Each generation makes its own apology,” Koenig reminds us on "Gen-X Cops". Apology accepted, Ezra. Let us humbly offer ours as well. This text is a translation of the review I have written last year for the French music website Mowno. https://www.mowno.com/disques/vampire-weekend-only-god-was-above-us/ We now have an English version gathering some of the pieces written in the original French version of the website, by the way. https://www.mowno.com/en/ --- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 114 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Yeah sure, Yoko Ono was the single reason the Beatles broke up. And Courtney Love had Kurt Cobain murdered. And Eve encouraged Adam to eat the apple, dooming all humans to a life of strife and misery outside the garden of Eden. Yeah right. 🙄 It's just mind-boggling for me that after listening to 1100+ albums, and thus being immersed in the infinite variety of nuances as related to artistic expression, there are still some users on this generator stupid enough to believe that sort of misogynistic crap. But I guess it's also somehow reassuring for those users to have those oversimplified lines of thought in their head. What are you gonna do? 🤷 Fortunately, there are also folks who can connect their brain cells (and then connect them to their ears), so as to assess this double album for what it is. The first disc is of course only *relatively* more accessible. But some cuts are worth a detour. "Midsummer New York" is a pretty good opener, and "Mrs Lennon" is a melancholic song that's both sweet and touching. As for "Mindtrain", it is indeed not so far from Can (kudos to the user who just pointed it out here), and it showcases some endearing vocal tricks from Yoko. She is obviously a singer with a very "special" set of skills, here drawing from some sorts of cathartic primal scream shenanigans, but she does the best she can with what she has in those sorts of tracks, sometimes to extraordinary results, unhinged and yet artistically potent. There are truly some impressive moments in that performance. They're surreal, but they can also be evocative in the right circumstances. Of course, gratuitous nonsense such as "Don't Worry Kyoko" also abound, and I'm not gonna lie, that sort of nonsense sounds like nails in a chalkboard to my ears. Let's just say that the line is thin between the nonsense and the truly groundbreaking elements. But isn't it always the case in art in general? See the obvious wink to Marcel Duchamp that "Toilet Piece" is to have an example of how Yoko Ono self-consciously straddles that line. There are also extraordinary moments in the second disc, presented as "music for the mind", and thus obviously even more "radical". I really appreciated "You", whose hypnotic rhythmical pattern can truly send you into the weirdest trance. Of course, 23-minute "Fly", basically just Yoko babbling, wailing and hollering for those cathartic purposes I've mentioned before (plus some reverse-recorded instrument towards the end) will be an ordeal to go through for most people, understandably so. It's the ultimate artsy-fartsy performance of the album, which, at the end of the day, is still something I'm glad exists. And, for the record, I still find this piece easier, more moving or at least more interesting to listen to than *Trout Mask Replica*, to take an example of another polemical experimental release. So no, this double-LP is not "essential" by a long shot. But it would probably deserve a slot in a list of a hundred albums featuring the most extreme sorts of experimental music ever recorded, along with *Plastic Ono Bands*. Guess that's gotta count for something. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 2.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 48 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 115 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Absolute masterpiece. An album about grief, love and complicated feelings, that's yet never dragged down by its weighty subject matter, and is also expertly written and performed by an artist at the peak of his skills. As heavy as some of its topics are, this music always feels like you're watching a starry sky at night -- it points to that exact moment where you realize that all that has happened in your life is nothing to the grand scheme of things, and yet that it can still resonate with the whole of mankind, not to mention the cosmos itself. I've once read that Stevens is somewhat embarrassed by this album -- probably because of how forthright it is. But even here, as he says so, I can only be touched by the man's sincerity. And I'm glad that for this one LP, he abandoned the full-blown concept album thing -- as great as some of them are -- to embrace the universe in such a sincere fashion. As some other reviewer pointed out, Sufjan has had a rough time in 2023, and I hope he is better now. In my mind, he surely deserves it. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 115 --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

'Lo-fi' is among the pivotal music styles that changed my life forever as a young adult listener during the nineties, so, on paper at least, I have no issue with the *absolute* lack of production values in this record, ha ha. The question that automatically comes after that is this, however: are the songs in *Rip It Off* worth your time, and also worth risking a severe tinnitus bout? Or are they only style over substance (which in that case, wouldn't necessarily make them better than the most processed and "manufactured" pop out there)? Answer: it's rather the second option, unfortunately. There's a bunch of nice moments, especially in the second side, but it's not enough to make the album offer something that feels definitive or somewhat cohesive within the topsy-turvy requirements of lo fi aesthetics. Think *Slanted And Enchanted* or your favorite Guided By Voices album in the pack of important records from their discography. Also, a lot of the songs actually go nowhere in a compositional level. This is where GBV's equally fragmentary artistry yields to far more impressive results -- many, many songs by Robert Pollard can be as short as 1'30" and yet you never feel their potential has been squandered by the end of them. This is not merely to adopt a reactionary stance that would automatically state that things we "better before", by the way. Some bands who used similar lol fi sound aesthetics, and yet broke out later, are at least as good as Times New Viking (Surf Curse, to take one example). And this actually works within the confines of TNV's discography. Subsequent LPs *Born Again Revisited* and *Dancer Equired* are far, FAR better albums. The songs are more memorable, the tracklist is more dynamic, and so is the sound in those two other albums -- which sees the American band have their feet still firmly planted in the lo fi world, and yet also offer a recording that gives a minimum of clarity to serve the songs right. So why was *Rip It Off* originally singled out then, to the point where it became "best new music" on Pitchfork? Well, simply because it was their first release on Matador records, and their profile suddenly became hotter within certain circles. Sometimes the independent label world works exactly like the one of majors -- with far less promotional means, admittedly. And when you look back on music history, you also have to decode those contextual matters to help you sort out the wheat from the chaff. If you read between the lines of that Pitchfork review, you can actually realize TNV was actually being overrated one word after another: "TNV continue to straddle a sort of middle ground that might be too melodic and structured for real noise fans and too sludgy for indie-pop shut-ins, but by honing the hooks a little more, *Rip It Off* leans ever so slightly towards the latter. It doesn't rock as hard as the band's debut, nor does it have anything quite as instantly memorable as "Teenage Lust!", but it's their most satisfying front-to-back listen." Well it certainly isn't now. And, in fact, it wasn't really the case either back then. In essence, there's nothing in *Rip It Off* that you can't find in their previous LPs released by the far smaller Siltbreeze label. The thing is, being so praiseworthy to the band while they were still transitioning to greater things was not a favor for them in the long run. It might have made skeptics raise their eyebrows later, which is a shame since I feel the end of the band's career had better songs to offer -- listening to songs from that time period right now, and it's a blast, honestly! There are more chord changes, nicer vocal lines, more variety, lots of endearing details... Too bad they had to split after all that. Can't even give you a list of great songs, there's a whole bunch of them, and I gotta do other things now. So many, many thanks to that anonymous user for making me dig further the Times New Viking question. The thing is, *Rip It Off* is certainly not the album I want to remember from them, *Born Again Revisited* and *Dancer Equired* are. No offense, I hope. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 2.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 62 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 116 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. J'ai enfin trouvé le temps de répondre ! Regarde sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys !

Yeah, even if Operation Ivy wasn't the direct antecedent of Rancid, they would be remembered for the ska-punk / ska-core pioneers that they were. There's nothing in this compilation -- whose bulk actually equals the LP *Energy*, so it gets a pass here -- that Rancid didn't do better after, but that doesn't make this record a bad one at all. The "oh yeahs!" in "Bombshell" are always a riot to listen to. And that's only one example among many others. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 63 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 116 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt !

Meat and potatoes. Let's face it: had this cliché hard rock thing been released in the mid-eighties, maybe it would have reached some sort of "cultural" impact (I'm not even sure, actually, but let's just pretend). Playing that sort of thing 25 years later, though? Well, the skeletons on that awful album cover give you one of the rare "objective" answers the 1001 Albums quest can provide us. Also, seeing the galleries of the user who submitted this album is a very sad thing. Really gives you the impression that said user just hates music overall. Why do some people inflict such harm on themselves? It's just mind-boggling for me. I'm gonna take my own advice now, stop listening to Koritni, and go touch some grass outside. Have a very nice day everyone. --- 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 1 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 63 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 117 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Yeah, very distinctive songwriting at work here, and the music's not bad either -- matching the level expected from someone having a PhD in ethnomusicology. Whiffs of Cake, The Decemberists, The Magnetic Fields, Andy Shauf, Bill Callahan/Smog and David Berman/Silver Jews abound indeed. And yet it's still very much its own thing. The lyrics are often hilarious -- even if a little cutesy at times -- and Mathias Kom and Ariel Sharratt are one very precious item, at least when it comes to their duetting as vocalists. ;) "Realists" and "Sentimentalists", right in the middle of the album, drag the latter down a little -- clear lack of momentum here -- but everything else is great, especially opener "Grown Ups", "Amateur Rappers", "Barbarians", and closer "Industrialists". The album's sound is also warm and very well pulled-off (something that's lacking in the Canadian band's subsequent LPs in my humble opinion -- at least those I've admittedly only browsed through). So all in all, I'm glad one user thought of The Burning Hell, so that I could properly discover them today at last. If only "Fuck The Government, I Love You" (currently their most streamed track, from next album *Public Library*) had been written for this one... It's an absolute gem of a song, almost up to the level of a Leonard Cohen composition. Please check it out as well, users. Had this song been included in *People*, you can bet your boots it would have joined my highest rated list. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 49 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 64 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 117 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Yeah, Nerderbeat band Q65 had absolutely nothing to envy in its British and American peers. *Revolution* goes from sixties rock "The Life I Live", "I Got Nightmares" to the -- at the time -- nascent psychedelia ("Just Who's In Sight", not so far from the more experimental cuts of Byrds in 1966), to rhythm 'n blues ("Mr Pitiful"), to the original blues influences that were still prevalent in the mid-eighties (like in "Spoonful", or in that couple of covers of Bo Diddley and Willie Dixon songs). Some of the band's compositions are without a doubt up to the level of their English-speaking models, which is no small feat in that continental context, where a lot of bands just translated American and British hits into their own language. Shirt ballad "Sour Wine" is an extraordinary cut, for instance. So yeah, this record recalls the best of Animals, Small Faces or Byrds. But the band that Q65 can be the most compared with is obviously *Roger The Engineer*-era Yardbirds here, owing to the comprehensive, pot-pourri approach both acts shared from one side of the English channel to the other. And if the record is derivative to a degree, the musicianship still makes the Dutch band stand out from the pack. The interpolation of Ravel's Bolero just as the band jams on that 13-minute of Willie Dixon's "Bring It On Home" had me burst out laughing, for instance. And it's the sort of laugh that gives a timeless feel to this music, as "dated" as it is. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 65 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 117 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

As supposedly seminal as this record is for the whole emo subgenre, I have always thought its flaws were outweighing its assets, and giving it an extra quick spin today didn't change my mind. The melodies are a little inert, the songs often in the same key, and the harmonies are quite flat. Worse, the band isn’t always locked in; the instruments sometimes pull in different directions, with clashing accents and intentions. Something also rubs me the wrong way when it comes to the vocal performance, even if I take to account the requirements of this music style. And the pace in the tracklist sounds pretty complacent in my ears. So yeah, vastly overrated in my book. In that initial emo-adjacent scene, I obviously prefer Get Up Kids or Modest Mouse -- bands that are far more dynamic, either because of their catchy compositions or their far more adventurous dirges. Sorry, anonymous user. More power to you for liking this band, which is not a "bad band" per se. It's just that personally, those songs sound a little too "meat and potatoes" from 2025's vantage point. Still saving *Diary* from my lowest-graded gallery, though, because Sunny Day Real Estate admittedly pushed the envelope stylistically speaking with this LP -- who else played that sort of thing in 1994? But that's not enough for me to place the latter in a list of "essential" albums. Being the first at something doesn't always mean you're the best. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 1.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 65 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 118 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Excellent (and iconic) hip hop album. Dan the Automator sprinkles sparks all around this rap opera concept thing -- those cinematic samples of orchestra in proper opener "3030" are a thing of wonder, for instance (and it's only one stellar example of his programming skills among a dozen other ones). And Del That Funky Homosapiens displays serious mastery on the mike, both technically and narratively. The man's cadence and patterns do feel a little samey after a while, but honestly this is a very minor gripe -- his rap chops still shine until the end no matter what. This LP is also interesting in the sense that it points forward to some of the popular sounds about to surge during the noughts, in keeping with its futuristic ambience and themes. Dan The Automator would indeed produce the Gorillaz debut the year after, and it's hard not to think of Del's featuring in "Clint Eastwood" when listening to *Deltron 3030*. Besides, Damon Albarn appearing in the outro interlude sure showed that the whole Gorillaz thing was already in the minds of the team that gave us this record. So if you count that debut as an essential album, you sort of have to consider that other one as well. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 66 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 118 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

If I remember correctly, the only John Coltrane album included in the original list is *A Love Supreme*. Of course, if the latter had not be selected, everyone and their mothers would have lambasted the whole project, deservedly so. Yet even if you only have a basic knowledge of jazz, you also know Dimery and co did that music genre dirty anyway. In the case of Coltrane, this means that *Blue Train*, *Giant Steps*, *Olé*, *Africa / Brass* and *My Favorite Things* were ignored. Heck, even the live album at the Village Vanguard, or the one he recorded with Duke Ellington, should have been strong contenders for the list. So under that light I find today's users-curated suggestion by a little dubious to say the least. Like, can you truly ignore all those other awesome jazz records again if you're a Coltrane fan? Is this the one to go for first? Really??? Not that *John Coltrane And Johnny Hartman* doesn't harbor a couple of gems. Its version of "Lush Life" is great, for instance -- gosh, how wonderful that suddenly expansive finale sounds. Bossanova shenanigans on closer "Autumn Serenade" are also terrific. "My One and Only Love" is also pretty cool. McCoy Tyner does his usual magic on the piano from one track to the next. And Johnny Hartman is indeed a suave singer. A little too suave, maybe. In the other tracks, what I'm hearing is like a version of Chet Baker without any *genuine* vulnerability. Or conversely, I'm hearing a vocal performance that's a little too in earnest, without the snarling undertones Chet was also known for. This earnestness also works against the music itself at times. The affect sounds a little flat overall, and it's like Coltrane also needs to be reined in during his performance -- so as to not cast a long shadow on the singer, I imagine. And for one or two compositions -- such as "You Are Too Beautiful", which is so heavily formatted it becomes entirely predictable -- you can even say the whole thing becomes boring. Sorry, anonymous user. Can't count this one in my own imaginary "book". *John Coltrane And Johnny Hartman* plays just fine as background music. But it's not a record I can feel passionate about. And there are many John Coltrane records I do feel passionate about, you know. Hope you can understand... ---- 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 66 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 119 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Yeah, even in a genre heavily relying on samples, ripping off Public Enemy for the opener and Afrika Bambaata / Kraftwerk for the third track is not exactly the best look if you don't want to appear as 100% derivative. Sure, Sol Sonic Force are themselves invited later, but in that context, that feels a little like redundancy. The cut with Definition Of Sound is sort of fun -- I remember liking those two endearing dudes back in the day... Moody "The Darkside" reminds me of the sort of music I could hear when I visited London and went from one record shop to a thrift store in Camden Town, during the late nineties / early noughts. "Breakers Beat pt.1" is kinda cool as well. And beyond its ragga featuring, "B-Boy Stance" already felt *very* old school in 1998. So imagine now. Speaking of raggamuffin, the "toasters" featuring in this album go from efficient (Navigator on "Ruffneck") to ham-fisted (Tenor Fly on "Dancehall Vibes", an underwhelming track inexplicably placed in the second slot). In other (not so fresh) news, 'big beat' was hot in 1998, and Freestylers dig further into it during the well-cooked (yet ultimately generic) "Feel The Panic". "Hold Up Your Hands" feels like the party goes on until late at night with its reggae dub lively beats and sha-na-na shenanigans. As for closer "Warning", it mixes a sped-up Van Halen sample with drum'n'bass programming, because... why not? (I admit the thing works). To put it in a nutshell, from 2025's vantage point, this record kind of smells like leftovers from a fish and chips bought the day before at some joint -- food that may or may not have spent enough time in the fridge so as to be consumed the next day. I like fish and chips so I would probably eat the thing. But I can also understand people who would raise a eyebrow. File it under: "you had to be there at the time to get it". --- 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 2 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 66 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 120 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Yeah, it's pretty smooth soul-jazz-hip-hop electronica. Opener "Feathers" and "Luv(sic.)pt.3" stand out immediately. I was also smitten with "The Sign", where Pase Rock does a Gil Scott-Heron impersonation that's so convincing I had to check the credits to see if it was not a sample playing instead of a featuring. The rest goes to a streamlined pace that's somewhat pleasant but not exactly revolutionary in those genres. There are expert lounge-jazz piano playing effects nicely conveyed through the equally expert programming of the Japanese DJ. But as nice-sounding as the thing is, the less striking cuts still personally sound quite derivative to my ears, and also like stuff that could be used for as "illustrative music" for some informative video online. The best tracks are still making the obvious artistry valuable, though. Rest in peace, Nujabes. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 2.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 66 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 121 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Strong whiffs of TV On The Radio in this one, also displaying emo or post-rock flavors at times. The title-track can also remind you of M83. So file *Nearer My God* under the "art rock" label. There's not a single bad track in this LP, some intense instrumental or vocal moments shine bright, and yet, that being said, I still have trouble finding my footing listening to the album. It's not because of the variety of styles (all of them are well pulled-off). It's not the productions values. It's obviously neither the musicianship nor the way the music is written. So what is it, then? I don't know... Maybe it's because there are very few memorable vocal lines on first listens -- you can be intense vocally and yet still miss the dynamics that generally make a sung melody endearing. But given that everything else is excellent, maybe those vocal earworms will be easier to pinpoint after a few more spins... We'll see. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 67 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 121 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Maybe we've come as far as we could as a species. Sure, we created art and industry and philosophy. But our reign also led to endless wars, fascism, the invention of the atom bomb, not to mention the destruction of nature and the finite ressources the latter harbors... And it also led to Electric Callboy and their music album *Tekkno*. I don't know... Maybe it's time to hand the rule of our planet over to dolphins. Or to cats. Dogs, maybe? Heck, even tardigrades would be a better option. Anything but this bullshit. If what we have to face here is trolling, this is a near-genius move. If it's not, well, I hope that one day this user ends up renouncing their dark ways while listening to The Armed. In the meantime... --- 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 5/10 for more general purposes: 5 for musicianship and production values + 0 for the artistry. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 67 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 122 (including this one) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientô

Iconic soundtrack from a cult flick. Of course, something is lost in translation without the film, but there are enough endearing moments musically speaking. The first time I went to the States, I saw this movie in a theater with everyone there acting all sorts of crazy shenanigans to celebrate the movie. So I can't be totally objective, you see... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes: 5 + 3.5 ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 50 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 67 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 (including this one -- I might not be objective, I still recognize the quite derivative nature of the music -- glam and retro rock is fun in this film, but it can't seriously be considered as the equal of its models in the music world) --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt.

Yeah, with the debut, this is probably the right Tool album to select for this list. "Schism" is a prog-metal tour de force. And the rest stays in that vein in a fashion that's both cohesive, effective and cinematic. Weird time signatures, eastern-adjacent flourishes, a striking expression of anguish... These are the earmarks of this American band. And they shine brightly here. I'm always a little nonplussed about people -- whether fans of the band or not -- talking about how a listener's intelligence (or lack thereof) will decide whether you can enjoy them or not. For me, this is beside the point. Tool's musical aesthetics are one-of-a-kind, you can't confuse them with another band. This is a testament to their musicianship and artistic sensibility, and also make them relevant beyond ephemeral fads. But at the end of the day, personal mileages always explain why their artistry hits its mark or not. You don't need to be either smart or intellectually limited. You just need to share a similar sensibility. I kind of share it when the circumstances are right. And a lot of people from all ages share it too -- whether fully or partially. That's gotta count for something. ---- 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 51 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 67 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt.

Yeah, Robert Smith's return after years of silence made some significant waves last year, at least for people old enough to remember The Cure's overall career beyond "Boys Don't Cry". *Songs of a Lost World* is certainly impressive with its expansive moody soundscapes and its themes of aging, nostalgia and death -- which indeed fit perfectly with both the topics handled by Smith from the start and the concerns of the album's target audience. Musically speaking, the album mostly caters to die-hard fans of *Disintegration* -- in essence, it's like a 2.0 version of that iconic LP. I quite like both records, but I also think some of their songs are a little too long-winded or inconsequential at times: when they're hypnotic enough, the thing works ; but when they're not, there's a lack of dynamics for me. Case in point, "I Can Never Say Goodbye": in spite of the very touching and very personal subject matter of its lyrics -- a tribute to Smith's deceased brother -- I can't help finding the music and arrangements on that track strangely tame and inert. Likewise, "And Nothing Is Forever" doesn't bring much to the table placed as it is here, right after opener "Alone". Surely there must have been ways to make the tracklist feel a little more dynamic while still keeping its dark concerns intact. That said, Reeves Gabrels brings interesting guitar tones to those compositions. It's the first Cure studio album he participates in, although he has played with band live for quite some time, and it's nice to hear him bring the expertise he had previously displayed on later David Bowie LPs. And of course, some cuts such as "Alone", "A Fragile Thing", "Drone No Drone" or "Endsong" are either deeply moving or lively enough to reignite that old flame that made you fall in love with The Cure in the first place. To conclude, I'm primarily a fan of the band's bouncier post-punk beginnings (*Three Imaginary Boys*, *Seventeen Seconds*, *Faith*), along with that time period in the mid-eighties when they infused infectious pop melodies into their goth shenanigans -- *The Head on the Door* is a near-perfect record for me, for instance. So with that in mind, it's a little difficult for me to feel as enthused about *Songs of a Lost World* as other folks from my generation. Minus a couple of tracks, it's a record whose glacial pace only brings out one aspect of the band's artistry -- at the expense of other ones. That said, maybe The Cure releasing new songs in an earlier, more vivacious style this late into their discography wouldn't make much sense, I readily admit it. So I can also have very benevolent feelings about this late-career highlight, in spite of a hype that I consider as a little exaggerated when you're familiar with the rest of the band's late discography. The record is what it is. And if ever it turns out to be Robert Smith's "swan song" -- let me cross my fingers so that it isn't and that Robert can release many other records -- it would still be a striking way to cap things off. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 51 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 68 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt.

Chuck had already released two serious early rock-'n'-roll masterpieces in the album format during the fifties -- *After School Session* and *Berry Is On Top* -- and by 1964 (after some time in jail, I believe), he was already considered as a thing of the past by a lot of rock fans (the needle advanced very fast during the sixties). Not sure this album made him relevant again right away -- even if his work had been used or pillaged by The Beach Boys, The Beatles and The Stones while he was away from recording studios. And yet for me, many decades after the fact, this awesome record shines almost as much as the two others I've quoted up there. Many things can explain why I find *St. Louis To Liverpool* so endearing. First, Quentin Tarantino played a pivotal part in highlighting it, thanks to the use of the infectious "You Never Can Tell" in Pulp Fiction. But secondly, there are many other gems in this record, from "Little Marie" to "No Particular Place To Go". Chuck tells all sorts of provocative or just plain fun little stories that bring a very evocative mood on the table. Thirdly, the production values on this one is as crisp as anything recorded during that early rock era. The "panoramic" sound dynamics are insane (that tom fill on "Go Bobby Soxer"! That single lead guitar playing on the right speaker of "The Things I Used To Do"). And there's like an elegant, cinematic atmosphere to the whole thing that ticks all my boxes. ---- 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 68 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt.

A note to the user who selected this album. I really can't understand why you would repeatedly call yourself an "uncultured swine" in such a passive aggressive fashion just because you don't like the Beatles or Radiohead. I'm a huge fan of those two bands, but if it's not your thing, it's not your thing. Honestly, all I can see here is some sort of defense mechanism that takes away from whatever subjective take you may have on those artists. You're not "uncultured" because you don't like them. You may just be close-minded, but nobody can force you to open your shakras, right? Just say your piece and move on to what you can enjoy. And no, nobody asked you to erase your 1300+ albums on your i-tunes or i-pod just because you don't like those bands. Honestly, it's feels like playing a victim card for absolutely no valid reason. Are people harassing you because of your music tastes? I don't think so. Wear those tastes like a badge of honor, and don't blame others for them. Please. Starting a review like this might ruffle your feathers, but the reason I'm doing this is also to state that even if there's a couple of songs on the second half of this solo Tom Petty album I find quite boring or too predictable (mostly "Hard On Me" and "Find A Friend"), I'm not blaming anyone specific if they're not working for my set of ears. I'm not blaming myself, because I know the ingredients that are missing in *my* book, i e. some chords or vocal lines elevating those cuts to something a little more surprising. The album is one hour long, so I guess that leaving those two songs on the cutting room floor and keeping them for singles b-sides wouldn't have hurt the tracklist a bit. But I'm not blaming Tom Petty and his fans either. "Objectively", those compositions are not bad. You just need to be a die-hard fan to dig them, I guess. As for the rest, it is very good or excellent, and the first five cuts are stellar, enough said. "You Don't Know How It Feels" and "You Wreck Me" are obvious hits, "Time To Move On" sounds like a Bruce Springsteen Americana ballad, the orchestrations on the delicate title-track opener are subtle, and the ones on "It's Good To Be King" are even cinematic. A bit later, the barebones acoustic number "Don't Fade On Me" is small jewel. Yeah, after that, the record loses momentum at times, but producer Rick Rubin obviously saved Tom from the horrid production values of the more recent work he had released some years before 1994 (I really like the best ELO albums, but Jeff Lynne was definitely a poor choice to produce Petty -- as commercially successful as those other albums were). In a way, *Wildflowers*'s organic sound and no-nonsense aesthetics also served as a training ground for Rubin as he went on to produce other legacy artists during the nineties -- a switch that culminated with his series of "American Recordings" for Johnny Cash. And for this other reason, I think this album is quite important. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 69 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Didn't know the first thing about Charly Garcia, but I'm genuinely impressed by the songwriting, musicianship and production values of this record released during the early eighties. I even like the sound of the gated drums there -- often sounding deeper and weirder than their generic counterparts. The first side and the first half of the second side are stellar pop rock, with a lot of lush moments and arrangements being both accessible and quite sophisticated. So many earworms... The album loses its momentum a little at the end of its last leg, but it remains interesting ("Rap Del Exilio" reminds me of Talking Heads, for instance). I also enjoy how the guy can go from one style to the next while never losing the thread. Immense talent. It's easy to understand why he was so popular in Argentina. Plus it looks like the guy is a very interesting figure. He criticized fascists and the military junta -- something to keep in mind these days, from Argentina to the US. And he also has his own personal quirks, which are often found among the circle of great influential artists. Great find. Thanks for the suggestion. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 (including this one -- I'd rather err on the side of caution here : first because I feel that if you start to include pop rock stars who don't sing in English -- from Argentina to France, where I was born -- 1001 will obviously be too short a number. You would probably need another list devoted to those artists ; and secondly, the most streamed Charly Garcia track on my streaming service, the extraordinary "Nos Siguen Pegando Abajo" -- not taken from this album, yet beating The Police at their own game -- suggests that the artist has probably released other gems during his heyday. And the prog rock and folk acts he was a part of before he started his solo career also sound worth a detour. So I need to dig further here...). Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 123 --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Fell in love with Future Islands at the time of their extraordinary second album released in 2010, *In Evening Air* -- which no one talks about now, unfortunately. Saw them play live back then (great show -- Samuel T. Herring has a magnetic aura onstage), and I was even lucky enough to interview them for a local radio (very nice fellows). Being good at what they do, Future Islands have dug the same type of groove since that time. Including with *Singles*, arguably their breakout album. The thing is, I find the songs in it slightly less striking and memorable than in *In Evening Air*, and the album as a whole feels less intense and impactful for me. Also, Future Islands' artistry has always questioned the line between indie elegance and hackneyed pop cheesiness, and for me they straddle that line a little too clearly on cuts such as "Doves" and "Back In The Tall Grass". The rest is pretty good, admittedly. But is it "essential"? Of course, my own personal history with the Baltimore band is influencing this assessment. Maybe indeed I'm a little picky with *Singles* because this record was not the one I started with. Some acts never really change their game -- they're happy doing what they do from one album to the next, only evolving very slowly -- and as a result, the first LP of theirs you listen to often end up being the one you have the fondest memories of. It's the same old story that can apply to many bands and artists. So under that light, I'll still give quite a good grade to this album. One thing though: please check out *In Evening Air* as well. Maybe I'm "objectively" right to prefer it, maybe I'm not. But I admit I would be very curious to know what other listeners who have never heard of Future Islands before think of this one. When you spin "Light House" in *Singles* and you know that earlier album, you can't help remembering "Tin Man", "Vireo's Eye", "Walking Through That Door", or "Long Flight". All of them better songs for me, and also catchier and more propulsive. So many thanks to the anonymous user who suggested Future Islands. Because it brought me to those gems again today. :) ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 124 (including this one -- as you can already understand, it's gonna be another Future Islands album for me). --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Yep, it's a very good collaborative blues album, also documented through a film documentary that is probably a blast to watch, apparently. The sound is authentic, grassroots, sincere, heartfelt, you name it. "Honky Tonk" is a terrific acoustic cut, to take one example from a small group of highlights. Not sure what the project brings that would be pivotal to the overall genre, though -- even if I'm not a world expert, admittedly. Yeah, the cast is stellar. But it also points to the derivative nature of the whole accomplishment. Like, how many times do we have to hear the same frigging chord progression all over again? Case in point: the second track. Select key Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, BB King or Junior Wells albums and be done with it. Of course, you could probably say the same sort of thing about the two or three dozens of post-punk albums on my own list -- although they do harbor very different chord progressions from one LP to the next, mind you. Guess that subjective tastes have got to play a part at some point in the endeavor that gathers all here. 🤷 No shading on the sincere user who suggested this album, I hope. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 125 (including this one). --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

If cheesiness was an album. And this is coming from someone who turned into quite a fan of the best Steely Dan records. There are some salvageable cuts on this one (more on that later), but the vast majority of the songs are just a pain in the proverbial arse for me. It's all summed up in the two awful artworks done for this LPs. My eyes are still bleeding from taking a look at the first one on the Wikipedia page by the way, and it's insane that the band's entourage managed to flub it *again* when they went for a redo some years later! Some people are insanely talented, the music gods have bestowed upon them gifts and skills you can only be jealous of. And yet some of the same people are also cursed by shitty taste. Guess that that's how the gods can even things out somehow, at least for a few artists. Apparently, Barenaked Ladies often present themselves as Rush fans. Should I really need to elaborate here? Well, I will, if only to prove I have listened to the whole album. Which is quite an ordeal when so many ridiculously twee songs abound. One redeeming aspect, however: Barenaked Ladies can be excellent for touching ballads, miraculously. Those gems are "Wrap Your Arms Around Me", "The Flag", and also the tender (and admittedly livelier) "Brian Wilson" -- tactfully dealing with the subject of mental health. Oh, and closer "Crazy" is a wild ride that goes to all the right places melodically and instrumentally speaking, just as it harks back to CSNY in a wistful fashion (with an extra use of off-kilter bagpipes!). Hell of a way to save this album from my worst-rated gallery. The rest is just terrible, though. "Hello City" is a stupid opener. In "Enid", the lead singer indulges in overlong strings of words to tell a boring love story -- his overaffected vocal shtick making things even worse. "Grade 9" is a funnier song about the band's guys admitting they were unpopular geeks and nerds in high school (minus one, which is admittedly hilarious), and that song could have become endearing in other hands, I readily admit it. Yet the tame, whyteboy ska proceedings are simply unbearable in the track. As are many other cuts from this LP. Between the two good songs "Brian Wilson" and "Wrap Your Arms Around Me" (mentioned earlier), you have something as daft as "Be My Yoko Ono", for example. Jesus H. Christ, what a way to ruin the flow in the tracklist! To be clear, I'm usually open-minded for all sorts of adventurous shenanigans within an album, but Barenaked Ladies constantly changing lanes get on my nerves, especially since the results very rarely warrant it. "What A Good Boy" sounds like generic MOR pop rock FM radio dross (the year was 1992, goddamnit, so many better things were happening back then!). The latin flavours of "Box Set" are so hackneyed I simply want to puke...And the album being quite long, it goes on like that for quite a while, with a lot of songs managing to sound both obnoxious AND formulaic within their elected genre of the day. Which is quite a feat in Itself, lol. Worse, before the very nice closer "Crazy", you have that dumb hit "If I Had $1,000,000", which probably illustrates how we as a society have devolved from Pete Seeger's collective utopia, as expressed in "I Had A Hammer", to the validation of cynical individualism as an ultimate life goal. Yeah, I know, I know... Those lyrics are supposed to be ironic and goofy. But they only manage to come off as moronic. "If I had a million dollars / I'd be rich", the song concludes. Duh. It's one thing to be ironic. It's another to be so ironic you end up sounding complacent. Especially when your music too often underlines said complacency within individual songs. For all the stylistic twists and turns found in *Gordon*, it feels like the energy displayed in it could have been harnessed for better use. Or at least for something that doesn't sound so derivative and devoid of real stakes. "I'm crazy, just like you", goes Barenaked Ladies in the album's closer. That last track is very good, I say it again. But when you consider the record as a whole, rarely has madness sounded so safe and boring. ---- 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 126 (including this one). --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

Looks like "vaporware", taken in its broadest sense, is either one of two things : a) a new form of ambient music, admittedly harboring a hypertext ironic edge, but still trippy to listen to. b) some sort of concept thing supposedly triggering nostalgia by the manner you copy-and-paste and slow down muzak from decades earlier (so as to make some kind of point about postmodernist simulacrum and late capitalism). Unfortunately, *News At 11* is clearly option b), which is boring or even quite grating on a purely musical standpoint, even when you're aware of the intellectual concept behind it (and how it pertains to 9/11 here). I think I prefer when Cat System Corp. handles both options on the same album (as in *Palm Mall*), or when he strictly chooses option a) (as in his Hiraeth compositions). Also, Oneohtrix Point Never handled both options in stellar ways for his masterpiece *Replica*, which harbors those cut-and-pasted vaporwaves aesthetics in a manner that clearly pushed the envelope and yielded some evocative and haunting results. Also, William Basinski created the definitive ambient conceptual work about 9/11 with *The Disintegration Loops*, and *News At 11* pales in comparison to it, once again musically, but also conceptually, come to think of it. 9/11 is a historical event that's so striking that having some sort of escapist fantasy stating that it never happened sounds a little shallow. Also, the best cut in this record, "Evening Traffic" --:displaying a distinctively deep bassline -- is not to be found in the latest version of the album. Probably because its real original composer, Dan Siegel, threatened to sue. Sampling is a real art form. It can't be confused with merely stealing somebody else's music. You need to work on it and leave your own input, even if the latter involves minimal intervention. No "concept" in the world can do that work for you. Ask Daniel Lopatin, DJ Shadow, or Jamie xx. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums? 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 127 (including this one). --- Hey, Émile. Tu as déjà dû voir ma dernière réponse sous la review de *Young, Loud And Snotty* des Dead Boys ! J'essaie d'écrire la mienne bientôt

The quote-unquote "golden age" of hip hop has brought me to many wonders : ATCQ, De La Soul, Jungle Brothers, Gang Starr (you would also need to mention Public Enemy, Beastie Boys, Nas and the Wu Tang crew around that time, even if they explored more aggressive turf). By the late nineties, I had moved on to other things, however, and hip hop at large had done the same, for better or for worse. Still clinging to the smooth Native Tongues-related tones and moods of that golden age, Blackalicious were probably right to ignore current trends and do their own thing. And I was certainly wrong to ignore them, even though I probably saw their names pop up once or twice at the time. So it feels nice to catch up today. Unfortunately, as competently written, performed and produced as this debut album is, I can't really say that it thrills me -- contrary to what happened when I belatedly discovered Mos Def's *Black On Both Sides*, which was released the same year (in a close rap genre harnessing the same type of energy). Blackalicious wear their weird heart on their sleeves on a bunch of interesting cuts, both lyrically and musically ("Cliff Hanger", "Smithsonian Institute of Rhyme", "Beyonder"), they know their way around a catchy track or two ("Deception", "Shallow Days", "Dream Seasons"), and the rapping skills displayed are technically flawless. Yet it's hard to pinpoint a signature flow or a striking timber here -- as quirky and creative as some of the lyrics are, you can't really apply those adjectives to the overall "feel" of the purely rapped parts. Worse, inoffensive cuts such as "If I May" border on the generic and unremarkable. Blackalicious admittedly try to counter those shortcomings with the use of an off-kilter sort of singspeak for a bunch of hooks or choruses ("You Didn't Know That Though", "Reanimation"), but the problem is that the latter quickly feels awkward, and even becomes grating in the long run. Emphasis on *long* given that *Nia* goes on for an hour and fourteen minutes, filling the contents of a whole CD. Given how this LP loses the thread a couple of times here, a little self-editing would have felt welcomed, obviously. So yeah, thanks for the suggestion, but to return to the topic of other "old school" rap LPs released during the late nineties, this here feels closer to Jurassic 5 than to Mos Def. Translate as "It's good or very good overall but it's not *stellar*". I think I'd rather use my time to discover *current* underground hip hop artists now. They abound, you know (one example : the Griselda roster). Of course, I'll keep my door open for gems of the past, because like everyone, I have probably missed a few of them. And on that subject, every hip hop fan in here who has never listened to it should check out *Black On Both Sides*. Don't think it's been added to the users list yet. It should be. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 70 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 128 (including this one). --- Émile !!! On a visiblement été très occupés tous les deux, mais j'ai enfin le temps de répondre à plein de trucs en retard de ton dernier message, mais aussi de ceux qui précèdent... Je te réponds en deux temps. Un premier message sous ce disque, puis un autre demain (j'ai écouté toutes tes suggestions de cet été, je t'en parlerai dans ce deuxième texte de réponse...) Mais d'abord, pour commencer, moi aussi je lis TOUTES tes reviews avec passion, ha ha. D'ailleurs, celle que tu as laissée à propos de Kollaps est très bien. Oui, Einsturzende Neubaten c'est évidemment pas pour tout le monde (même si ça devient un poil plus accessible après). Ceci dit, mettre ça au même niveau que Kid Rock dans le score global, c'est n'avoir aucune sensibilité artistique, marde!!! Donc bien vu le fait de voir ça comme un bad trip digne d'une installation dans un musée d'art contemporain. A titre perso, j'aime ce disque au-delà de ça, mais j'ai aussi un faible pour les percussions métalliques, qui provient certainement de ma fascination pour le gamelan indonésien (tu parlais de ce pays dans ton paragraphe sur la musique du monde, tu te souviens). J'ai un pote qui en joue du gamelan, d'ailleurs, il a même été compléter sa formation là-bas, à Bali et Java, avec des maîtres du genre perdus au fin fond de la pampa. Assez impressionnant. Et maintenant, il fait partie d'un groupe qui intègre cet instrument dans son propre syncrétisme musical. Si ça t'intéresse, je peux te donner la ref du groupe dans une prochaine réponse. Pour rester sur le sujet de la "musique du monde"... Manu Dibango a vécu pas loin de chez moi, en Sarthe, donc je connais au moins vaguement ce qu'il fait. Le mec a été pillé par Michael Jackson et Quincy Jones pour le premier titre de Thriller, quand-même ! Antonio Carlos Jobim, je connais aussi, bien entendu. J'aime bien, mais à petite dose (je trouve ce genre de bossa de vestibule lounge sixties un peu inerte à la longue, même si c'est chiadé). Et dans un genre radicalement différent, Goblin, je connais un peu, en surface, mais faut que je recreuse. Au passage, j'ai du mal à considérer ces italiens comme de la "musique du monde", mais on s'en cogne, des étiquettes, hein! Pour le reste (Azymüth, Himiko Kikuchi -- Flying Beagle, my beloved --Casiopea, Masayoshi Takanaka), je connais pas du tout et ce sera l'objet d'un prochain message. Je reviens deux secondes sur tes reviews. Il est turbo-cool, le Odelay de Beck, hein ? Tu vois, ça c'est le genre de disque qui ouvrait des portes une décennie avant Gorillaz, et j'ai forcément plus de tendresse pour celui-là que pour Demon Days (voir plus bas). Question de génération, j'imagine... Et sinon, MERCI de dire que Reign In Blood de Slayer est une sombre marde, ha ha. C'est moche. Les riffs n'ont aucune classe. C'est assez inerte, en fait, et ça ne groove pas une seconde. Et en plus, les paroles sont tellement borderline... Je crois que le succès du disque s'explique surtout au départ par l'implication de Rick Rubin à la prod et le fait que ce soit sorti sur le label American. Mais ça ne fait que rajouter au côté "arnaque du siècle". Et pourtant, combien de vieux metalheads sont tombés dedans !!! A propos de ce que tu vois comme des oublis dans le 1001 Albums book, maintenant : J'ai donc jamais trop compris la vénération autour des albums Demon Days et Plastic Beach de Gorillaz, mais je sais que c'est culte pour pas mal de millennials, principalement parce que ça leur a ouvert des portes (si on écoute certains artistes rock de cette génération-là, quand ils parlent de ces disques). Bon, je veux pas avoir l'air de me vanter, mais en ce qui me concerne, les portes des musiques electro et hip hop étaient déjà ouvertes pour moi depuis un bail à l'époque... C'est ptet pour ça que j'ai pas été retourné par ces deux disques-là au début des noughts. Faut certainement que je réécoute, ceci dit. À propos d'Albarn, je reste un gros fan du Blur des nineties par contre. Ainsi que des trucs fait par Dan The Automator -- y compris pour le premier album de Gorillaz (surtout le single "Clint Eastwood"). Jamiroquai, je reconnais que c'est bien fait, mais le matraquage radio en France à l'époque m'a saoulé. Et puis, j'ai un peu de mal avec le personnage, qui joue à fond la carte écolo dans ses songs en collectionnant les voitures de luxe et en vivant une vie de jet setteur international en parallèle. Je trouve ça assez hypocrite. Not for me. Pas besoin de me convaincre pour King Crimson, dont j'ai découvert la carrière post-debut assez récemment. Il me semble que je te l'ai déjà dit dans un vieux message, mais je ne me lasse pas de le répéter. Red et Discipline (auquel perso je rajouterais Lark's Tongue In Aspic) sont des chefs-d'oeuvres absolus, enough said. J'aime également beaucoup les albums dit "officiels" que Robert Fripp et sa bande éternellement mouvante ont sorti à la fin des nineties / début des années 2000, dans un genre qui frôle souvent la musique dite "industrielle" (The Power To Believe, et surtout Thrak). Je te recopie ici ta liste des autres oublis du 1001 albums book, et je la valide à 100% : Breakfast in America de Supertramp, Fire of Unknown Origin de Blue Öyster Cult, RAM de McCartney, Thick as a Brick de Jethro Tull, et Days of Futur Passed des Moody Blues sont de supers albums, effectivement. Pour Blur, je préfèrerai toujours Parklife et l'éponyme, mais Great Escape est cool aussi, pas de problème. Ah, et Gentle Giant, j'aime beaucoup également. J'ai un album d'eux, produit par Tony Visconti, qui est super (je sais plus si c'est le premier ou le deuxième, flemme de vérifier). Le groupe n'est pas connu des vieux fans de prog dans mon entourage (dont je te parlerai demain, au passage), ce qui est assez étonnant... Bon je m'arrête ici pour aujourd'hui. La suite au prochain épisode !

My review of the Alexisonfire debut panned the latter, and there I said that the Canadian band's later LP *Watch Out* had the production values and compositional chops finally giving justice to their melodic post-hardcore / emo craft. I haven't changed my mind, even though I still think there are better things to be found in that genre. Some of the sung parts indeed still sound a little sickly-sweet for me. But that's a minor gripe for sure. Whether the music goes slow or fast, you have some very lush and enticing harmonies going on during the course of this record. Also, the post-rock tones discreetly sprinkled here and there work well (like at the end of "Hey, It's Your Funeral, Mama", a track that's otherwise rolling on all cylinders!). And the last track is indeed quite an effective and moving way to cap things off. I've also browsed through later album *Crisis*, by the way, and it looks like quite a good one, too ("You Burn First" is an extraordinary song!!!). So I probably need to dig Alexisonfire's discography further one day. Interestingly, the user who submitted this album -- who's a very open-minded listener, bonus point for that! -- asks in their review if "any other band sounds like this". Well, *exactly* like Alexisonfire, I can't really think of any good example, at least in bands balancing out sung and growled vocal parts... But if you broaden the scope to the overall post-hardcore genre, I'd say that there are lots of other bands displaying those sorts of emotions with that same energetic manner, while applying dynamics that I personally find at least as effective... The list is very long, from At The Drive-In (that you're probably at least aware of, benevolent user, and which probably influenced "No Transitory" and "Sharks And Danger" in *Watch Out*) to the Swiss act Coilguns (check out their genius last album *Odd Love*, by all means). In a more melancholic vein -- albeit one also more unnerving and uncompromising -- you have French band Birds In Row, once signed on the Deathwish label (they're as much fans of Cult Of Luna as they are ones of Alexisonfire, which will give you an idea of the scope of their music). Also, when Alexisonfire explore more straightforward hardcore turf, as in "That Girl Possessed" and "White Devil", they kind of remind me of other bands from the noughts such as Comeback Kid, Defeater, Modern Life Is War, and Have Heart -- all killer acts in my book. Hope those suggestions up there will help you discover new great bands. 😉 After all, that's why we're all using this generator, is it not? Now, I gotta say that what I found the most endearing in your review is your enthusiasm -- how you got all excited and carried away by your passion for this record, only to make fun of yourself right after, ha ha. The world needs more music listeners like you -- fun, enthusiastic and open-minded. Cheers! ---- My personal assessment of this LP: 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 71 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 128 --- Now if you don't mind, I gotta reply to a friend in French in the space down there. I'm indeed also using this generator for correspondence across the Atlantic Ocean. Benevolent listeners of the world, unite! Yep, even those who gave Backstreet Boys' *Millenium* five stars, ha ha! 😉😀 ---- Émile... Avant de commencer le compte-rendu de mon écoute de ta liste de suggestions de cet été, je me dois de faire un long retour sur Emerson, Lake et fucking Palmer... Bon, disons-le tout de suite... J'ai eu BEAUCOUP de mal à juste supporter leur musique jusqu'ici, ha ha. Je connais assez bien le sujet, vu que j'ai un chum qui est très fan de ELP -- c'est en gros lui qui m'a fait découvrir (et généralement aimé) les grands noms du prog rock seventies (Yes, Genesis, Jethro Tull, le premier King Crimson, toussa, toussa...). C'était il y a vingt ans déjà, quand on était à la fac. Et ELP, il a essayé maintes fois de me les faire avaler (en gros du debut album à Pictures Of An Exhibition en passant par Tarkus). Sauf que gros rejet de ma part. J'aime vaguement les chansons folk-pop faciles du premier album ("Lucky Man", plus d'autres dont j'ai oublié les noms) mais je m'ennuie ferme sur le reste du disque. Et en ce qui concerne les deux autres albums cités ici, leurs envolées virtuoses au son d'orgues turbo-kitsch, le tout sur des rythmiques et des patterns que je trouve inutilement compliqués (même pas "complexes", ce qui est normal dans le giron prog-rock, juste... "compliqués"), tout ça m'hérisse automatiquement le poil ! En apparté, mon pote aime pas la discographie de King Crimson, hormis *In The Court Of The Crimson King* (qu'il adore, par contre). Mais en fait, je suis même pas sûr qu'il a sérieusement écouté les albums. J'ai déjà essayé de le convaincre que Lark's Tongue In Aspic et Red sont géniaux, mais il se ferme comme une huitre. Je soupçonne une vengeance inconsciente parce que ELP m'insupporte, lol. Tout ça pour te dire que j'attendais de Brain Salad Surgery qu'il fasse avancer un peu le shmilblick sur ce sujet hautement épineux d'ELP (honnêtement, je sais pas si mon pote connait ce disque -- c'est possible que oui, mais j'imagine qu'il a pas insisté en voyant ma réaction pour les autres, ha ha). Et donc j'ai écouté... Bilan ? Ben le shmilblick avance... Mais il recule aussi dangereusement parfois. "Jerusalem" est une jolie ballade. Par contre, "Toccata" rejoue la partition de tout ce que je déteste chez ELP. "Still... You Turn Me On" est hyper frustrante -- je trouve le titre et ses arrangements très cools, mais il est beaucoup, BEAUCOUP trop court ! Foutez la "Toccata" à la poubelle et finissez ce morceau-là à la place, tabernacle ! Quant à "Benny The Butcher"... C'est premier degré ou second degré ? C'est pas pour troller, je te jure ! *Sincèrement*, j'arrive pas à savoir !!! Et pour la suite Karn Evil 9, c'est un peu le même topo que pour les quatre premiers titres... Ça alterne entre des moments que je trouve limite parfaits (le passage "welcome back my friend, to the show that never ends...", ainsi que toute la deuxième partie de la "1st Impression"), et d'autres que je trouve simplement horribles (l'intro et le final de la "3rd Impression", que je trouve encore une fois d'une laideur absolue !). Dingue comme il y a pas de juste milieu dans mon curseur pour ce trio légendaire ! Ceci dit, quand Emerson range son orgue maudit et passe au piano classico-jazz sur la "2nd Impression", ça m'a fait un bien fou ! (Il réussit ptet là ce qu'il ptet pas tout-à-fait réussi sur la seconde face de Tarkus). Et puis sinon, un artwork d'H.R. Ginger, c'est toujours cool, hein. Voilà. Même si je peux toujours pas *totalement* adhérer, je suis content que tu m'aies fait la suggestion. Déjà parce que je trouve ce disque plus écoutable dans l'ensemble que Tarkus et Pictures. Et ensuite, parce que si j'essaie d'être "objectif", je vous pas pourquoi çui-là devrait être mis en dessous de ces deux autres albums (il s'est grave fait démonter, ce disque, à sa sortie, ho la la...). Ce qui valide d'une certaine façon ton sentiment subjectif. Tes suggestions de cet été maintenant... Ikebe Shakedown - Ikebe Shakedown Cool cats. Nice instrumental cuts. J'ai écouté que quelques titres en passant -- un peu trop "dérivatif" dans un genre qui me passionne pas toujours, mais c'est vrai que dans une BO de film, ce serait diablement efficace. Ça me rappelle un peu The Meters, en moins minimaliste. Tu connais ? Chiac Disco - Lisa Leblanc Heu là, je peux vraiment pas -- j'aime pas sa voix. L'instrumentation funky est objectivement chiadée, hyper riche. Mais tout aussi objectivement (ou subjectivement ?), c'est... ultra-kitsch, une fois de plus, non ? Bon c'est assumé au moins, et elle s'amuse, ça ne fait aucun doute. Et le dernier titre est très joli, c'est vrai (modulations d'accords mineurs - majeurs sur la partie de cordes, carrément ma came, ça). Mais le reste... Heureusement qu'elle a c't'acccent acadien, au moins ça rend le truc un minimum fun pour moi. Si j'avais eu affaire à la même chose avec l'accent français plate, je trouverais ça carrément horrible. Sorry! Ping Pong Go - Ping Pong Go ENORME ! J'adore ! "Objectivement", les sons sont kitschs aussi, mais là ça me transporte dans un autre monde. Joies de la subjectivité. "Corvette", c'est littéralement du Jean-Michel Jarre des tous débuts sur du groove basse-batterie qui tape, mélange parfait pour moi. Et si l'album va aussi dans d'autres directions parfois (de l'électro-ambient à la jazz fusion) c'est très souvent trippant, fun ou hyper intéressant. Ça me rappelle un groupe ricain qui s'appelle (s'appelait ?) Maserati, qui fait certes ce genre de chose dans un registre beaucoup plus sombre, pas si loin que ça de Goblin, d'ailleurs. Et ça me rappelle aussi un autre truc ricain qui se nomme Trans Am. Tu connais tout ça ? Anyway... Thanks a bunch for that one. Je viens de checker discogs. Y aucune sortie physique de Ping Pong Go !!! 😭 Y a même pas un Bandcamp de l'album (y a juste leur dernier single, "Racket Man"). JE VEUX UN CD !!! Tu peux leur faire passer le mot, ha ha ? J'ai pas trouvé de vidéoclip en ligne pour Corvette non plus d'ailleurs, que des live (supers, d'ailleurs). Dommage, ça m'aurait ptet permis de voir sur quel genre de projet tu travailles ! Any Day Now - The Brooks. Pas mal du tout, dans une veine George Clinton / Parliament / Funkadelic, voire un peu Sly Stone. Je dois dire que ce qui me transporte le plus, ce sont les interludes orchestraux. Mais le reste a l'air cool. King - Gnome C'est très bien, ça passe tout seul. Après, je trouve que les éléments progs auraient pu être plus appuyés, un peu comme fait King Gizzard quand ils s'approchent de ce genre-là. Et sinon, dans un registre stoner / sludge, y a tellement de groupes qui sonnent comme ça pour moi. Le bar que je fréquente le plus chez moi, au Mans, passe beaucoup ce genre de groupe sur leurs enceintes. Pour presque chaque morceau qui passe, je trouve que c'est entraînant. Mais en même temps, mon oreille distingue pas exactement ce qui fait qu'un truc est au dessus de l'autre. Et ça me fait le même effet pour Gnome, en dépit de deux trois fantaisies très "belges" dans le disque, certainement. Ces autres cousins de la France (ou des Pays-Bas, si on parle des Flamands) ont le chic pour faire les choses de manière décomplexée, du rock au rap, en passant par l'electro et le jazz. On aime ou on n'aime pas, mais c'est souvent plus original que ce que font les français ou les modèles anglo-saxons. Et en dépit de ce que je viens de dire au-dessus, j'avoue que ça ressort un peu dans King, aussi. Lost Knights - Orgone Alors oui, c'est du funk, mais du funk LOURD. Et ça change pas mal de choses pour moi. Ce mélange entre Sly Stone et de trucs plus rock des seventies (que je saurais pas parfaitement bien situer -- Grand Funk Railroad ?) fonctionne à merveille sur moi... "Lay Your Life Down" est un énorme BANGER, ha ha. J'adore comment les hooks s'enchaînent au début et montent la mayonnaise avant d'aboutir sur un putain de bon refrain, qui sort de la gamme de départ sans prévenir. Les suites d'accord sont mortelles, catchy mais aussi originales. Les riffs défoncent. C'est le genre de truc que je kiffe, peu importe le genre. Je viens de checker, c'est un assez vieux groupe en fait. Et s'ils gardent toujours une base funk, ils ont l'air de changer de formule (et de line-up) assez souvent. Au passage, les chansons de Lost Knights ont pas l'air d'être dans les plus gros streams du groupe. Ce disque de 2022 était ptet un peu trop "rock" pour le public de départ ? Ils ont l'air d'être un peu revenus de ce style sur le LP suivant, d'ailleurs. Dommage. Bon, si je le trouve à pas cher, je l'achèterai peut-être ce disque d'Orgone, en tout cas. Choses Sauvages - Choses Sauvages. Tu dis que c'est du "bon pop-rock lofi d'ici", mais c'est très souvent hyper funky aussi, non ? T'es vraiment un funkhead, en fait. Je pense que tu bois les lignes de basses groovy comme du petit lait le matin, au point que tu ne vois même plus à quel point le monde et la musique autour de toi sont imprégnées de couleurs funk, rien parce que t'es dans le coin. 😀 Pour preuve, ce disque, que tu présentes comme du pop-rock. Y a un petit côté Hot Chip version francophone, aussi. C'est pas vraiment ma came (ptet à cause de la voix ? Bizarre, parce que je sais que la voix est pas si loin de ça de Corridor quand on écoute bien). Mais y a des moments incroyables quand-même (ces flûtes psychés à la fin de "Le palais des erreurs", magnifico !). Nuages est un morceau cool aussi, là encore pas très loin de Corridor dernière mouture. Voilà, je crois que j'ai fait le tour... Ah au fait : le dernier disque que je viens d'acheter est canadien/montréalais : c'est l'album de Yoo Doo Right sorti l'année dernière, *From The Heights Of Our Pastureland*, découvert seulement maintenant. Bon, j'imagine qu'il doit y avoir des gens par chez toi pour dire qu'ils lorgnent un peu trop du côté de Godspeed You! (avec une dose bonus de kraut et de post punk, quand-même).. Mais c'est tellement bien fait que je peux pas résister. Le post-rock qui sait à la fois être viscéral et sonner de manière organique est pas si courant que ça... Ah, et sinon, Yoo Doo Right a sorti un autre disque de jam cette année, avec Population II et Nolan Potter (que tu connais certainement). Je me demande s'il ne te plairait pas encore plus, ce disque de jam rock, d'ailleurs (ça commence par un truc motorik avec toutes sortes d'arrangements un peu foufous, donc je crois que c'est dans les cordes d'un Gizzhead comme toi). Le truc aussi, avec Yoo Doo Right, c'est que Mowno en avait parlé avant ces deux derniers albums (quelqu'un de la "boutique", comme on dit, les avait même interviewés, vers 2022), mais qu'on est totalement passé à côté des deux derniers, je sais pas trop pourquoi. Et c'est franchement dommage. Si seulement, j'avais un contact au Québec qui pouvait m'envoyer un mail une ou deux fois par an quand il y a *vraiment* un truc rock à ne pas rater là-bas... 👀 A bon entendeur... ? 😀 Bon, le temps de digérer tout ce que j'ai écrit, et que tu répondes à certaines de mes remarques, on se dit à dans deux semaines / un mois ? Je suis content d'avoir écouté ta liste de suggestions en tout cas ; j'ai découvert (et aussi aimé) plein de trucs ! A+ Cyril

Nice that I now have a proper entry point into Aznavour's oeuvre album-wise. Being French, I obviously know who he was, and his most famous songs ("La Bohème", "Emmenez-moi", "For Me... Formidable", "Comme ils disent"). But listening to *Que c'est triste Venise*, it feels like rediscovering him. Lots of strings-laced, teary-eyed ballads, plus some livelier cuts -- jazzy ones, samba ones, ones with subtle "yé yé" undertones, you name it. Our own version of Sinatra, with Armenian roots, also also writing his own songs. (Hier Encore" is like a French version of "It Was A Very Good Year", in a way...). Can't write more than this today, I have things to do. Ironic when one of the liveliest highlights in the album is named "Le temps". ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 (including this one -- feels like the 1966 album including La Bohème would feel more iconic, right? Especially since there are other great cuts in that one...) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 128 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Spreek je Nederlands? "Smalfilm" and "Astronaut" are absolute gems. The rest is pretty good "homemade" pop where DIY methods actually yields to very lush results, astonishingly. I understand why this album made waves in the field of neder-pop. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums.. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 52 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 129 (including this one -- Feel like this one could be placed in a separate book about modern pop rock practiced in other languages than English: the 1001 number feels way too small if you have to take all these other international acts into account) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

The 1001 albums book was near-flawless when it comes to classic British rock (or its American equivalent for that matter). Because, let's face it, not every music style was so nicely and properly represented in it. So yeah, the omission of this gorgeous Paul (and Linda) McCartney album was quite surprising in that context. And mixed critical reception at the time of *Ram* can't even explain this slight, given that the artist's first solo eponymous album had been panned as well (probably for better reasons), and that said solo album was yet included in the book. Like, what the hell, Mr. Dimery? To be fair, *Ram* deserved to be retrospectively reevaluated ten times more than *McCartney (I)* (and it has been reevaluated, fortunately, even if not by this particular book and list). Anyone with a set of normally functioning ears (Robert Christgau not being one of such people, apparently) can quickly understand"Too Many People", "Ram On", "Dear Boy", "Uncle Albert / Admiral Halsey" are absolute gems worthy of The Beatles. Ukulele-laced "Ram On" especially shines for me, thanks to its dreamy mood, Beach Boys-like backing vocals, and main melancholic melody -- whose off-kilter harmonies send me over to the moon each time I listen to it. "Dear Boy" also harbors those sorts of killer background vocals à la Beach Boys, by the way. "Smile Away" is another very nice highlight concluding the first side, and together with the other songs mentioned up there, they create a very strong first half. Your mileage on side two might vary a little. I personally find that there are actually as many wonderful moments in it as on the first side. Yet I can also agree that there is some lack of focus on at least a couple of twee tracks, to put it in a nutshell. Famously, McCartney can never resist being twee once in a while. At the time, it drove many people crazy, but you can't change a leopard its spots. And now, decades down the line, an all-too-cute cut such as "Heart Of The Country" is part of the record's retro charms, I guess. Besides, it's because Paul was open-minded and adventurous on a compositional level that all those wonderful, "whitealbumesque" moments also happen in that second side, from the weird psychedelia of "Monkberry Moon Delight" to the hypnotic orchestral flourishes of "Long Haired Lady"'s final section. Sure, "The Back Seat Of My Car" also explores *Let It Be*-adjacent, bloated turf, but the melodically astute elements in the composition still make it worthwhile. Being inventive for McCartney also implied enhancing his kitsch streak once in a while. To use another admittedly tired saying, you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs. McCartney, who was so inspired by the idea of domestic bliss at the time, knew it better than anyone else. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 53 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 129 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Yeah, Anton Newcombe has always been a dick, but this record (just like two or three other LPs within BJM's long discography) is iconic enough to justify its presence in a list such as this one. I unfortunately don't have the time to elaborate today, but "take it from the man": this one's most probably a keeper. 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums.. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 54 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 129 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

I have always considered this act as gravely overrated, whether when there was so much hype about them, or when the latter petered out. Those goth electronics were hot and hip for quite a lot of millennials at the time, but that trendy shtick lost its appeal quick, didn't it? Hilarious how this particular brand of punk chiptune dross, supposedly pointing to the future of the genre, now sounds so horribly dated. Yet even at the time it was possible to be derisive about the whole thing, I promise. Because if you scratch the pitch-black, supposedly "abrasive" surface of those tracks, you quickly discover there's not much substance under it. Even the darkest and most "nihilistic' electronic music out there must speak to the soul somehow. But this one here has always appeared as particularly soulless to me, and it makes the results sound appalling to my ears. Of course, now that we know that the whole project was most probably based on psychological and sexual abuse, it's easier to decode the actual dynamics that made the project what it was. The puppet singing those tunes rarely feels emotionally in sync with the music for instance -- when she even sings at all (amazing how Alice Glass is actually absent from quite a few key moments of side one). When she *does* sing, the result is formulaic or perfunctory enough to work on a purely technical level, yet the formula also instills that sense of emotional disconnection I have just mentioned. Maybe people perceived this as part of Crystal Castles' artistic intent back then. But as I said, now we know better. Of course, you can't blame a victim of abuse, especially when it takes so much courage to speak out after years of being harmed behind the scenes. Yet you're still left pondering about the circumstances that brought a lost and confused teenage girl at the start of the project to get herself trapped into such a dangerous corner. There were probably a lot of red flags from the get-go around Ethan Kath. And yet nobody in the band's entourage raised an eyebrow in any significant fashion? Eyeroll... I'm trying hard not to pass on any judgment here, believe it or not. Humans make mistakes, and nobody is above that sort of flaw. But damn, it's a story as old as Ike and Tina, and you could expect people with a minimum amount of empathy and connected brain cells to put their foot down at some point. And yet everyone involved in this matter, either directly or indirectly, had deluded themselves for quite a long time here. Luckily, Alice ended up taking things into her own hands, and found a way out. But the proverbial writing had been on the wall since the beginning, of course. It would take Glass even longer to reveal the extent in which Ethan Kath was damaged goods -- reportedly when she learned she was not his only victim, five years after she left the project. Which somehow speaks to her selfless intents. A couple of misogynistic twats have probably pointed out she also needed the publicity... But what do they know? One thing's for sure about Ethan Kath: whatever it is that the guy precisely did, he's a piece of shit. When Glass left him, he could at least have taken this as a sign that he had to reform and find ways to avoid new toxic cycles of abuse and/or distrust with his partners and collaborators -- whatever actually happened there. Ending the Crystal Castles project and starting afresh with something different -- something admittedly more under the radar -- could have been a significant step forward to reach that mindset, for instance. And this even if it meant losing quite a lot of money in the short run. And yet no, the guy cynically hired another girl, pretended nothing significant had occured, and tried to surf on the Crystal Castles brand as long as he could. Like, it's easy to believe Glass when she says she was not considered as a human being having agency of her own when you see how her former partner replaced her so easily. Let's face it, this is utterly pathetic. And as far as this particular case goes, this here is pathetic on both an ethical AND a musical standpoint. And this can only mean one thing: even if Glass had not raised her voice around the late 2010s, you can bet your farm boots that the cow would have been milked dry today anyway. So please, put this garbage project right where it belongs: in the dustbin of music history. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums.. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 54 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 130 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Spot-on choice from a user who's very often spot-on for their reviews and highest-rated picks. I don't have much to say about this album that hasn't already been said elsewhere in this section. *I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One* is sort of a mess, sure. But it's such an *endearing" mess, indeed making it a magnum opus within the band's long discography (which also harbors at least three other masterpieces). During the topsy-turvy proceedings of this record, Yo La Tengo alternates between abrasive noisy indie-rock with a fair for melodic earworms (the humungous -- and yet also tender -- hit that "Sugarcube" is ; "Deeper Into Movies" ; that cover of the Beach Boys' "Little Honda"...), delicate pop-folk jewels ("Stockholm Syndrome"), even more delicate and cinematic instrumentals ("Green Arrow" being my absolute favorite in that category), and hypnotic kraut-inspired dirges ("Moby Octopad", "Damage", the extraordinary "Autumn Sweater"). And many of these intents and aesthetics mingle and mesh in quite a perfect fashion (even if not exactly seamlessly) on a couple of longer cuts on the album's final leg ("Spec Bebob", "We're An American Band"). So yeah, not having YLT in the original list was a criminal oversight. And this particular album is probably the most obvious candidate to right that wrong. I once had the opportunity to meet Ira Kaplan for a 15-minute interview by the way, and he was an all-around cool guy, very grounded and chill. A real pleasure, which only amplified when I then saw YLT play live. There's always been a jazz "mood" around the band's loose aesthetics and artistry, and the latter is even more discernible today. And yet Ira, Georgia and James are still very much young souls when they play together. The best of both worlds, really. A quick aside to the user who selected this LP, before writing my traditional blurb breaking out how I decide to grade a daily album : I really enjoyed your review of YLT's *Electr-O-Pura*, taking the place of what should have been your piece about Kanye West's *Yeezus*. When I started this project four years ago, I knew West was already a lost cause, by the way, but I couldn't have anticipated how fucking low he could still go (I admit I was a fan before. No more). Had I known, I might have done the same thing as you did. Two or three Kanye albums are still in my high or highest-rated galleries as we speak, and I might go back there to erase them some day. So thanks for the reminder. In the meantime, it's great that you could use the opportunities offered by this generator to shed light on Yo La Tengo. So have a great day, whoever you are. ---- 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums.. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 55 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 130 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Yeah, that one was quite a surprising leftfield turn for Denzel Curry, who seems to aim for a more laid-back form of lounge jazz hip hop with *Melt My Eyez See Your Future*, one that certainly recalls the golden age of "conscious rap" while keeping some of the current features of the genre intact. It's a quite pleasant listen, and I don't doubt the man and his team's sincerity for one second. But if I should be fully sold on paper, I also have to admit I prefer the rapper's earlier LPs, oddly enough. Probably because their energy was more contagious than in here. There's indeed something a little generic in both the production and rap flows displayed throughout this album. Good for Denzel that he wants to grow as an artist, but I'm still considering this record as a transitory effort. Maybe one yielding to better things in the future? Hope I can see it with my eyes, at least if they don't melt before. ---- 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums... 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 55 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 131 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

*Neon Golden* is one of those albums that quietly reshapes what a band can sound like. The Notwist dissolve indie rock into warm electronics and understated emotion, crafting songs like “Pick Up the Phone” and “Thrashing Days” with meticulous care. Every glitch, beat, and guitar line is like part of a precise clockwork. Those elements are never showy — they're just perfectly placed to serve the songs right. Some of the electronic programming sounds a bit dated today, admittedly. What makes *Neon Golden" endure, though, is the fragile humanity beneath the digital polish. Said humanity can obviously be sensed through the plea at the heart of "Pick Up The Phone"'s memorable chorus. Just as it is found again in many other key junctures of the tracklist. “One With the Freaks” and “Off the Rails” shimmer with hesitant optimism, for instance, while “Consequence” closes with quiet grace. Markus Acher’s gentle, introspective voice is also a key part of the record’s sound, since the man's understated delivery very nicely matches the album’s blend of electronic textures and emotional subtlety. It is true that you sometimes wish his vocals were a little more... overstated, let's say. Nothing that would ruin the nightly mood, mind you -- it's surely a tricky balance to reach as a vocalist when there's such a delicate instrumental backdrop behind you. Just a little more presence would have done the trick for me. But I'm not only splitting hairs here, I'm mincing them into microscopic strands. So, to put it in a nutshell, what we have here is a record made for late nights and long reflections — precise yet deeply felt, digital yet unmistakably organic as well. And its last leg, as exemplified by the last couple of songs above, is just damn perfect -- to the point where this conclusion redeems whatever passing flaws you may have pinpointed before. When you get lost in such chiaroscuro surroundings, it's sometimes a little difficult to make out certain details and intents. But at the end of the day, this sort of ambiguity is all part of a "neon golden" territory, is it not? ---- 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 131 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Two humongous hits on the same album, "Just A Girl" and "Don't Speak". Unfortunately, the rest of this quite long record applies whyteboy ska / mall pop punk formulas on songs that very rarely warrant the time you spend on them. Don't get me wrong, the band is more than competent in terms of compositional skills and studio performance -- Gwen Stefani sure has a commending vocal timbre that hits all the right notes in a striking fashion. And the production values are top notch. Yet the whole thing ultimately feels vapid. Behind the many twists and turns of the arrangements, you can often sense a by-the-book writing process that's devoid of real personality music-wise. It's sun-drenched, sure, but also superficial. Like the worst clichés about California out there. In that context, the title-track closing the proceedings is a bit of an outlier. "Tragic Kingdom" -- the only song in here solely written by Gwen's brother Eric, right before he left the band -- is reportedly a dig at Disneyland. On a purely musical level, it's some sort of baroque extravaganza displaying Danny Elfman-adjacent goth undertones. Not exactly a pleasant listen, but a cut taking some amount of risks at the eleventh hour. At last. Eric Stefani is quite an intriguing figure by the way -- he knew the band was heading for international success, and yet he went back to become an animator for the Simpsons full-time before any of that happened. Maybe hearing the show's theme song (written by Elfman) all the time influenced him for the music of this cut, who knows? Like, it must have been in his head day in day out while he was drawing those cartoons... Interestingly, some of the track's lyrics incidentally seem to suggest the man was not made for the sort of rock'n'roll circus No Doubt had embraced by 1995: "The parade that's electrical / It serves no real purpose / Just takes up a lot of juice / Just to impress us". To be perfectly candid, those lines perfectly sum up my own take about this record: much ado about nothing. Except for those two hit singles, of course. I wouldn't call that a "tragic kingdom". Just an underwhelming one. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 132 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Espers take a page out of Fairport Convention's folk dirges, and infuse the latter with all sorts of spooky tones and moody psychedelic setpieces. Pretty good music with an excellent lead vocalist, yet I sometimes felt that the length of some tracks was not always warranted, especially during the first half of the record. But your mileage on that might depend on whether you think compositions moving at a glacial pace end up becoming fascinating, or, conversely, take a turn to the linear when they pile up this way. I'm a huge fan of Low, (lovely "Children Of Stone" is not so far from Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker's mark, to be fair), so I can get where people who love this act come from, and some moments in the second half of the record are indeed gorgeous. Yet I have to admit that overall, I prefer Fairport Convention's initial strand of folk music to this admittedly well-crafted reenactment. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 133 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Modern C&W that still sounds way better than a couple of examples of this genre in the original list. "Every Girl" and "7&7" are two lively and even exciting initial cuts, propelling the thing forward exactly as it should be propelled. Unfortunately, what follows is a little too "meat and potatoes" for my tastes. I like my honky tonk dish served with a minimum amount of ambiguity and/or originality. And I know I won't find such challenging flavors in this particular joint. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 72 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 134 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

Yeah, as that second most popular review in this section stated, this is maybe the most consistent Teenage Fanclub album (love the galleries of the user who wrote said review, by the way). Those power pop songs under the obvious influence of Big Star go from very good to great. In comparison, *Bandwagonesque* indeed has the best tracks (The Concept, Star Sign), but also some weaker ones. So I have nothing to add here, really. Guess that it makes sense that I would fast-raced today's review, though, given the title and artwork of this album. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 73 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 134 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

For me, Why's masterpiece will always be *Elephant Eyelash* and if you enjoyed this other album, I can only suggest you to give a spin to that earlier record as well. But yes, sure, *Alopecia* comes out as a close second favorite for me. Nice choice! 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 74 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 134 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

Yeah, I didn't like that other album of theirs in the list... But to my utmost surprise, this one actually actually sounds *fantastic*! And of course, most of the "professional critics" panned it at the time of its release. What a bunch of deaf bastards, clearly lacking a truly musical ear -- something that should be mandatory for their occupation, for pete's sake! For me, those critics were simply too thick and clueless to realize how the band had admirably upgraded their songs and overall sound by 1998... Let me also point out something here, by the way: knowing absolutely nothing about The Tragically Hip before today, the fact that Gord Downie passed away in such tragic circumstances -- something I've only read about *after* I listened to both albums -- didn't influence my takes on their music at all. Including the very positive one I'm about to write about *Phantom Power* here (actually written at the time I discovered this band, when *Fully Completely* popped up in this generator). *Phantom Power* is indeed way more dynamic than *Fully Completely*, thanks to its hairpin curves and impressive changes of gears. It is also way more memorable in terms of riffs and vocal lines, way more convincing and even moving in its harmonies, arrangements and chord changes, and way more heartfelt in its vocal performance... To the point that I might try to find a second-hand copy of that other album online. Here the comparisons with REM could be warranted, at least -- and it doesn't matter if the band was more than ten years late to really learn their lesson from the Athens, Georgia masters. Better late then never, right? Professional musicians are like us plebs, I imagine. They have their good days and their bad days, and they have albums where they just follow a plan that ultimately doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things, and others where they can be struck by genius inspiration. And I'd rather remember the latter, of course. Rest in power, Gord. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 75 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 134 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

those guitars tinkle, over thumps and drones, their bells swinging in the breeze ---- 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 75 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 134 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

a cinematic sound to get smooth and idle, banal yet groovy. ---- 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 75 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 135 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

"It's a different culture," as they say. Mixing two heavily cliché-laden genres (here metal and J-Pop) doesn't necessarily make the end result any less cliché. Also, when you have almost as many *different* composers as you have songs (almost one *for each different song*, mind you), the whole endeavor sounds primarily driven by capitalism instead of genuine art. There's a whole "economy" behind those Japanese "idol groups", and as open-minded as I can be, I can't help sensing that what we have here is very obviously the epitome of fakeness. THAT SAID, I would lie if I said there weren't a few moments in this project that had me laugh out loud, or that I found at least interesting or even daring on a compositional viewpoint. "Megitsune" and "Gimme Chocolate!!" are bangers in their own right in that 'kawai metal' genre. 'Catch Me If You Can" also goes to fun places, with its mix of SOAD, drum'n'bass and hardcore punk. And the album finishes kind of strong with "Headbangeeeeerrrr!!!!!" and "Ijime, Dame, Zettai" -- everything I should hate on paper, yet sounding so "ridiculous" -- in all the senses of the word -- that I just can't put this in my lowest-rated gallery. Otaku culture is a different planet for me, and I live so far from it that I shouldn't even be able to grade this thing. Yet I can quite clearly picture why a weeb or an otaku would fall in love with this, oddly enough. I teach English to middle schoolers for a living. This morning, ninth graders were asking me what I was listening to on my phone before class. I explained the concept of this generator to them, and when one of them saw that today's album was Babymetal, she was flabbergasted -- she's a big fan. Like, I gained so many cool points as a teacher in her eyes here, haha. And truth be told, she's a good kid, bright and everything. It's not hard to imagine her having good memories about this band for some time, even if she goes on to discover other things later. When you love music, you gotta start somewhere, right? ---- 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 75 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 136 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

I really don't get why so many reviewers in here consider *None Shall Pass* (2007) as a superior effort to *The Impossible Kid* (2016) within Aesop Rock's discography. Is it hip-hop head nostalgia for times when those reviewers were way younger and more hip during the noughts, instead of later years when they finally realized they were getting older? Well, if that's the case, it's pretty ironic given that *The Impossible Kid* addresses those sorts of topic quite a few times during its course... Don't get me wrong, *None Shall Pass* is cool as f*ck, but *Skelethon* (2012) marks the point when Aesop Rock's music started to match the insane quality of his flow and lyrics -- just as the rapper started handling production duties himself, not coincidentally for me (what a talented guy, right?). So let me state it while I'm at it: for me, *Skelethon* is another stellar entry in the rapper's body of work, just as *The Impossible Kid*, released four years later, is. About the latter album, the tracklist starts and ends very strong ("Dorks", roasting mainstream rappers and the media industry supporting them, opener "Mystery Fish", "Rings", "Water Tower", closer "Molecules" and its bassline going bonkers towards the very end...). Aesop Rock here explores alternative hip hop turf adjacent to El-P / Run The Jewels, with his trademark surrealistic lyricism to boot. Yet as great as those tracks are, I think the most impressive stretch of songs is neither at the start nor at the end of the record, but right in the middle of it. "Supercell" sounds like a ghost-in-the-machine sci-fi epic taking place in a barn around Christmas (don't know if I'm doing justice to the lyrics here, lol, but if you can picture what a song about this weird topic would sound like I guess I'm not so far off the mark!). "Blood Sandwich" uses two very specific memories about the rapper's two brothers to celebrate their family (one anecdote cryptically told, the other more straightforward, but both terrific in how evocative they are). "Get Out of the Car" could pass off as an interlude, but it's also a touching tribute to a rapper friend who passed away long ago and how the artist painfully tries to pick up the pieces from there. "Shrunk" starts with Aes filling out an medical form in ways only him can pull off, followed by a retelling of a first psychotherapy session that's rather confrontational, explained though all sorts of witty metaphors and innuendoes -- the lyrics are as bright and sophisticated as the music is catchy and infectious here; when this perfect balance is reached, Aesop's artistry becomes a near-genius thing. And "Kirby" is a cute and very surreal cut about the man's... cat, with a hilarious punchline saved for the end -- slyly referencing the subject of the previous track at the eleventh hour. Aesop Rock is famously known for having the most varied vocabulary compared to any other famous rapper out there (there have been very serious research about this, actually). But the man's set of lyrical skills are always used to serve the songs and stories he tells, instead of indulging in mere intellectual exercises that would turn emotionally sterile. You may not *get* what he raps about right away. But it always *rings true*. So yeah, I guess we could nitpick about which Aesop Rock album should be on this list, from his underground beginnings to *None Shall Pass*, to this year's *Black Hole Superette*. The man's career sure is consistent, I guess most fans can agree on that at least. But for me, Aesop's apex is around the time he released *Skelethon* and *The Impossible Kid*. Hence the grade I'm about to give now. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 (including this one, even though I think *Skelethon* could take its place, and it would be difficult to have two Aesop Rock albums in a finite list like this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 136 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

Pop-punk act goes full emo in the mid-noughts to buy themselves some artistic cred, succeed in that endeavor, don't do much for most of the decade that follows, return with another overrated album in the late 2010s, and then get immediately cancelled because their frontman had been a creep with underage girls two decades before. Oh, and like, nine years after the allegations against him surfaced, one user on a thing called *1001 Albums Generator* suddenly says : "oh yeah, I think it would be a good idea to select that Brand New album going full emo as a curating suggestion". A user who's obviously driven by their nostalgia instead of their better sense... Won't change a thing, though. Everyone who is still in touch with the current music world has already moved on to better things -- or at least to less awkward ones. To get a little more specific, I can get why an emo fan would consider this record as the *OK Computer* or *Dark Side Of The Moon* of the genre... but I also suspect that this impression is mostly due to the record's production values and arrangements (the ones at the end of "Limousine", intense and cinematic, are not so far off the mark, to be honest, and there are quite a few guitar arpeggios that can indeed remind you of Radiohead throughout the album) : yet even if there are salvageable parts in *The Devil And God Are Raging Inside Me*, the whole doesn't make much sense, especially today. And for me, most of the songs proper are at fault, given that they sound so meat-and-potatoes. Like, what do people hear in "Jesus Christ", currently the second most streamed song by the band on my streaming service? For pete's sake, that one is such a borefest! Nothing literally happens there on a harmonic or compositional level. Simply mind-boggling. There are so many bands that are more interesting and/or more emotionally potent in that emo umbrella genre, from Modest Mouse to La Dispute... And then comes the case of Jesse Lacey. For starters, I think that guy is mostly full of shit on an artistic level. Routinely comparing his music -- whether for this record or before it -- to bands such as My Bloody Valentine or Sonic Youth doesn't make *a shred of sense*, whatever your mileage is on those bands. Like, did the guy actually listen to his own music??? A quick sidenote here, by the way: professional reviewers stating this LP made as big a cultural impact as Nirvana's *Nevermind* are full of shit as well. Try to have this conversation with someone living in Europe, for instance. "Brand New? Who??? I don't what you're talking about...". You can bet your boots you won't have the same reaction when Nirvana's name pops out. PR blurbs can only go so far compared to reality. And secondly, well, there's the grooming allegations against Lacey, surfacing long after after the events occurred, mostly because the victims had to painfully process the whole thing in their damaged psyche. To be clear, yeah, it *is* a little unfair to sum up one man's life in a behavior he has had for a couple of years long ago, and the bad choices that resulted from them. But hey, Lacey's apology and public statements about his "sexual addiction" right after the allegations surfaced didn't do much to convince me the man took the necessary measure of what went wrong. Plenty of people have sexual addictions, and yet can draw the line about consent or their partner's ages. And the allegations clearly state Lacey repeated his offenses against the same victims, and that he did it without ever thinking about it twice. At least apparently... Maybe that's the hidden meaning of the phrase *The Devil And God Are Raging Inside Me*? Oh the irony. Because it just feels like the devil unambiguously took the upper hand at some point of Lacey's life, right? So yeah, this one goes directly to my lowest-graded gallery. And no, it's not because of the allegations, at least for the most part. No trial about them has ever happened, at least as far as I know. Lacey was publicly accused of SA and not full-blown r*pe, and there are often grey areas in those sorts of SA allegations anyway... No, my grade mostly stems about how middling and inconsequential the music is to my ears. But I won't lie, the allegations surely don't help me open my shakras. So even if I have no reliable information about any judicial case, as I said earlier, at least the artistic case is closed for me. Go and find some other people to convince. ---- 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 56 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 137 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

*Jeopardy* will always be the ONE for me. But each of the first three LPs by The Sound (for anyone not in the know, that's *Jeopardy*, *From The Lion's Mouth* and *All Fall Down*) is a gem anyway. Which means that I can only applaud the choice of this user. "Winning" is a killer opener, setting the tormented tone exactly as it should be set. Not-so-distinctive "Sense Of Purpose" was probably the lamest possible choice for a single when you look back -- bad luck has notoriously pestered this post-punk act, right? But more on that later... Most of what follows is stellar, though: "Contact The Facts" is an excellent earworm, going to all sorts of interesting harmonic places towards its end; "Skeletons" is a banger, driven and focused; "Judgement" and "Fatal Flaw" are moody numbers worthy of New Order in their *Power Corruption & Lies* era; "Possession" is clearly the thematic centerpiece of the album, this time more adjacent to Joy Division in levels of emotions, without ever aping them either -- that guitar solo is a whole other story that could never be found in a JD album, right? And that "fire!" vocal hook simply sounds iconic now, enough said; "Silent Air" is delicate and melancholic; and "New Dark Age" is a terrific closer -- so ominous, so "possessed", once again... Finally, there's an awesome hidden track at the end of the digital editions of the album, "Hot House" -- probably too "pop" and melodic for the rest of the album, which is a shame given that it's a killer song as well anyway (and that it should have been included in the tracklist proper anyway imho). I still think the peaks of *Jeopardy* are even higher than those found here, and that its tracklist is also more adventurous, more lively and more dynamic. But *From The Lion's Mouth* still holds its own to this day in a despondent, down-in-the-mouth, gloomy-yet-fully-melodic fashion, hereby giving textbook post-punk vibes that make it sound like a lost classic. Which it very much is. The Sound never reaching the level of commercial success they should have deserved to reach is one of the saddest stories to come out of rock history, especially when you take into account the tragic fate of damaged soul Adrian Borland years after his band split. And it feels very bittersweet that his act has now been fully reevaluated, joining all the iconic ones in that post-punk genre that were actually lucky enough to quickly experience fame, contrary to them. *Artistic* success was there for The Sound you just can't doubt it -- I hope that during his best days, Borland could feel it as well, and that he somehow knew people would fully recognize his talents one day. It's just so sad that he's not here to see it happen. Which, I admit, makes their discography feel even more special now. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 137 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Don't throw stones? Too late, I'm afraid. I have already decided to give a somewhat middling grade to this cheap secondhand version of that Elvis Costello / Nick Lowe / Graham Parker /Joe Jackson late-seventies / early-eighties trade. While most songs go from meat-and-potatoes to decent (or even good for a couple of them), there are also two or three tracks that are unbearably grating. And when the latter are the most memorable ones (example: "Who Listens To The Radio?"), you clearly want to shout... "next, please!". ---- 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 138 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

Somewhat lo-fi grassroots folk from a figure who dedicated his whole life to this sort of thing (rest in peace, Micheal Hurley). Apparently, this LP comprises a mix of old songs and new songs, like many other records of his, and some of the more atmospheric cuts sounded very nice to my ears. I never knew where to start within the man's incredibly long discography, so I thank this anonymous user for the suggestion. Not that I'm up to the point where I can consider the music as "stellar". At least, not yet -- there's obviously a meat-and-potatoes flavor to the album taken as a whole. But some of the chord changes were terrific -- which lets on the idea that if you spend some time with those songs you can easily go beyond their admittedly by-the-book surface after a few listens. A couple of lyrics sounded questionable indeed. For "Going Steady", it all depends on who the narrator really is, and the text is a little ambiguous about that, it's true -- if that narrator is someone as old as Hurley, the thing's creepy for sure ; but if it's a recollection of him when he was only a couple of years older than his underage love interest, as suggested by the last verse, it's no big deal, I think... As far as I can tell, everything in the album just implies that Hurley was a sweet old man who loved singing those old-fashioned tunes of his. Yet I can also understand why some reviewers are raising an eyebrow here. I'd tentatively say that those reviewers are crying wolf for nothing (pun intended -- Hurley loved to draw wolves to represent himself on his album covers...). But what do I know, really? Apart from all that, *Ida Con Smock* is simply a nice-sounding folk record. Oh, and the man could imitate an owl like no one else in the music business. That doesn't make this LP "essential", but it sure makes it endearing, at least... ---- 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 139 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus

I 100% support the topical intent behind this album, yet I can't help feeling that as an artist, Jon Batiste tries too hard being John Legend or J Cole where he has all the cards in his hands to be Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Gil Scott-Heron or Kendrick Lamar. To be clear, the man is an accomplished musician and everything, and there are some songs where the production and arrangements are cinematic and surprising enough to be pleasant overall. Yet, let's face it, on a compositional and harmonic level, a lot of those tracks come out as flat or streamlined to a fault. Exceptions are "I Need You", "Whatchutalkinbout", the virtuoso piano interlude "Movement 11'" and last proper tune "Sing". The rest sounds a little too meat-and-potatoes for me. Of course, it's nice that the album goes to all those different places -- from vintage r'n'b to rap, or from jazz rap to soul, and so on.. Yet without a clear overarching vision, and without inspiration that would make the compositions more than derivative exercises in style, *We Are* sounds like revolution processed through speakers in a clothes shop at the mall. I don't know... Maybe that's how revolution should be promoted these days -- yet it seems to me that we've known for a long time that the revolution will neither be televised nor used to sell a pair of jeans. At least the sort of revolution that would implement real change, whether in the music world or beyond. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and production values + 2.5 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ----- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 76 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 140 (including this one) --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

So sure, Psyche Origami were quite late to the game when it comes to laidback jazz-infused hip hop, here going back to the Native Tongues or Digable Planets-like eras (with some admittedly more noughts-adjacent flourishes here and there...). But who really cares about that now huh? Especially when the more "experimental" songs in the middle of this record's tracklist are so excellent. Those unsung gems are "The Wharf Song", "At Last" and "Dead Right" (the latter displaying a moody jazz piano loop that's so smooth and melancholic I instantly wanted to know who had been sampled there!). And beyond those jewels, everything sounds good, lively and on point for the genre anyway. Many thanks to the user who selected those (virtually unknown) rap artists. I love your reviews, by the way. Always short and yet very, very often on point, once again. The exact opposite to my overlong rants. Looks like I need to take a page out of your own (origami) book... In the meantime, I don't know if this album can make the fold and thus be included in my own list of essential 1001 albums. But on paper, at least, it could be. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 77 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 140 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

For a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *PetroDragonic Apocalypse*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland* and *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *PetroDragonic Apocalypse*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *Hop Along - Fill Your Lungs* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *PetroDragonic Apocalypse*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *Oddments* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland* and *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *The Silver Cord*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *Hop Along - Fill Your Lungs* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *KG / LW*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *Fishing For Fishes* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *Murder Of The Universe*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland* and *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *Infest The Rat's Nest*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *KG / LW* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *Paper Maché Dream Balloon*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *I'm In Your Mind Fuzz* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure for a band with this long a discography, this relentless rollercoaster of a psych-garage album is probably the best entry point into such extended body of work -- as good a jam rock record as *Polygondwanaland*, as wonderfully driven by a unifying concept as *Flying Microtonal Banana* or *PetroDragonic Apocalypse*, and as fun, melodic and lively as *Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms And Lava* or *Omnium Gatherum* -- a highlight for sure... 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 77 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 140 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus. Je profite de cette review de *Nonagon Infinity*, que j'ai trouvée assez amusante à écrire, pour t'annoncer que je compte te répondre demain ou après-demain. 😉

As per Wikipedia, "In 2003, Eric B. alleged the duo had not been paid in full for their work, and filed a lawsuit against the Island Def Jam Music Group, Lyor Cohen, and Russell Simmons." Oh the irony. To be clear, everyone and their mothers know this album has repeatedly been heralded as seminal and incredibly influential for hip hop at large. Of course, it's a little hard for younger rap fans to understand that today. As a matter of fact, I can relate with those younger hip hop heads, even if I'm a somewhat old guy. My entry points into the genre was through acts such as A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Public Enemy and the likes, only a couple of years down the line, and compared to those acts the instrumental minimalism of *Paid In Full* already felt like prehistory. Same with Rakim's flow -- stoic and groundbreaking for sure at the time, and yet admittedly sounding quite corny compared to everything that followed. But no rap act from the eighties -- be they Run-DMC, BDP/KRS One or the Beastie Boys -- is immune to that sort of retrospective take, right? So I will still place this record in my high-rated gallery, first for historical reasons, and also because those tracks are still pleasant and interesting to listen to decades later. To this day, I still prefer the jazzier and livelier peaks of *Don't Sweat The Techniques* (an overall great 1992 Eric B. & Rakim album, more furbished on a production viewpoint, yet also pestered by a couple of absolute duds -- including the opener, very unfortunately). Yet if really you want to have the more consistent and influential effort in the duo's discography, *Paid In Full* is the one to go first. The three instrumentals showcasing Eric B.'s scratching skills -- including one which is simply the instrumental version of one song, maddeningly -- are absolutely pointless today, sure. But the seven other tracks are flawless. And I repeat, the influence of this record on subsequent artists -- from M/A/R/R/S and PM Dawn to Nas and Eminem... -- is so pivotal. So even if I'm not sure I would include this record in my own potential list of 1001 keepers, I just gotta to consider the idea, at least... I might not be able to pay Eric B. & Rakim *in full*, but I can pay them the respect that they deserve, right? ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 78 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 140 --- Yo Émile, Comment va ? Je vais pouvoir, moi aussi, répondre en plusieurs fois, en reprenant point par point. Soyons méthodiques et synthétiques (ça me changera, arf ! 🙃) Je te cite à chaque fois... "Je suis content qu'on n'ai pas le même profil musical, il y a plus de spice et ça permet aussi de meilleurs suggestion d'écoutes qui nous sort de nos bands et genres usuels." 100% d'accord. Ça permet de sortir de sa "zone de confort", et je trouve ça très important en tant qu'audiophile à long terme. Pis après, y a cette histoire de "subjectivité" et d'"objectivité", mais j'en dirai plus là-dessus demain, suite à une autre de tes interventions / questions... "J'ai vraiment trippé sur le band MASERATI que t'as recommandé sous Ping Pong Go..." Excellent. On entend plus beaucoup parler d'eux, je sais même pas s'ils sont encore en activité... Le concert que j'avais vu d'eux dans l'Indiana il y a 12 ou 13 ans était bien cool, en tout cas. "Je te laisse le lien de l'animation que j'ai fait pour la chanson Corvette..." Ah ça c'était super, mec ! Parfaite animation pour le morceau, et ça m'a permis de laisser un commentaire sous le lien You Tube. T'as déjà dû le voir. Et maintenant, je sais quelle tête tu as aussi ! Tu te souviens de ta présentation de la Classe Américaine ? "Monde de merde", certes -- mais monde hyperconnecté. Jolie présentation d'un classique audiovisuel par chez nous, au passage. Entre cette aisance à l'oral et tes animations, t'as toutes les billes pour devenir un vrai you tubeur si tu le souhaites ! "Je serais aussi bien curieux d'entendre le band de ton chum qui joue du gamelan, j'ai jamais entendu parlé de ce drôle d'instrument, je me demande comment ça sonne" Bien tiens, voilà un lien vers la page du groupe. Il y a les sons du dernier album, plus des vidéos de live. Sur la plupart d'entre elles, mon pote Antoine est celui qui se trouve tout à droite sur la scène... https://www.promona.org/label/pagans/polypheme-wassim-halal-amp-gamelan-puspawarna--polypheme "Je pensais pas que tu lisais toutes mes reviews pour vrai!" Pas toutes, mais quasi-toutes, dès que je remonte le fil pour lire tes réponses. Celle assez récente sur Parliament m'a fait hurler de rire, d'ailleurs (en plus de la probable allusion sur ma remarque à propos du fait que le funk était partout autour de toi du matin au soir). Juste, fais gaffe à l'emplacement des fenêtres la prochaine fois que tu écoutes un truc avec George Clinton ! 😁 "Après +900 critiques tu perds du jus" C'est inévitable. Mais tu arrives bientôt au bout de la liste originale ! Bon, après y a la users list, et vu qu'elle gonfle dangereusement mois après moi, ce générateur commence à ressembler au Tonneau des Danaïdes ou au Rocher de Sisyphe. J'espère que je ne te porte pas un coup un moral ici. 🙃 "Je sais pas comment tu fais d'ailleurs pour écrire une dissertation universitaire à chaque jour, chapeau!" J'ai un secret, et je crois que je t'en ai déjà parlé : ça s'appelle la névrose obsessionnelle et je ne souhaiterais pas ça à mon pire ennemi. 🤣 "Pour revenir sur Kollaps brièvement, la vibe sur l'album est exactement la même que sur le génial film Funny Games, de Michael Haneke..." Énorme film, oui j'ai déjà vu il y a pas mal de temps, mais c'est difficile de l'oublier. Je crois que c'est l'un des seuls film de Haneke que j'ai vu d'ailleurs (avec La Pianiste, que j'ai beaucoup moins aimé). Je suis pas un expert en ciné, et je t'avouerai que les films disons "dérangeants" ne sont pas *tous* ma tasse de thé. Mais je n'ai aucun problème avec celui-là. De par son pitch, c'est une réflexion autour de la violence et de sa représentation, donc celle-ci n'est pas "gratuite" ici, en dépit des apparences. Dans mon souvenir, il y a un peu de moralisme à l'oeuvre, mais sans que j'ai trouvé ça donneur de leçon non plus (en gros, nous sommes tous coupables de quelque chose dans ces histoires de représentation de la violence). Faudrait que je le revoie aujourd'hui pour me souvenir de tous les détails, mais je souviens de la masterclass de mise en scène qu'on trouve dedans. Est-ce que tu sais exactement pourquoi *Kollaps* te fait penser à ce film ? "Ça c'est fou malade! T'étais voisin de Manu Dibango! Genre t'allais chez lui pis vous danciez sur du afro-beat jusqu'au petites heures de la nuit!" 🤣 Si seulement. On y a pas grandi à la même époque, et même si la Sarthe (et la France), c'est petit comparé au Canada, ça faisait pas de nous des voisins directs. En tout cas pas assez pour que j'entende de l'afrobeat de mon jardin ou de mon palier ! "Bon, je vais poursuivre demain, joyeux HALLOWEEN! (vous fêtez ça en France, right?)" Ah ça oui ! Les gamins en tout cas. Mention obligatoire de la chose tous les ans dans mon cours d'anglais pour mes petits sixièmes ! Allez, moi aussi, je vais poursuivre demain pour la suite de la correspondance. Ou ptet après-demain, j'ai souvent une très grosse journée le lundi... See ya!

It all started in India in the middle of the nineties: legend has it that a successful young Brit in the field of trance techno met up with a far older Australian-born bloke there, and that they had some good time together. The older guy had previously played flute for a subpar Jethro Tull-adjacent prog act in England during the seventies, and he's always been strongly inspired by Hindu mysticism, so it makes sense that he would find himself stranded in India to get involved in the Goa psytrance movement two decades later... So the two chummy chaps watch a solar eclipse, and enthralled by the cosmic spectacle, they decide to join forces to create the Shpongle project -- a project which, for all its mystical intents and neohippie purposes, sounds like... a secondhand version of The Future Sounds Of London or mid-career Orbital. At least for me. But apart from this subjective gripe of mine, the yarn about the origin of that project is a nice "feel-good" story, I readily admit it. Of course, there's an audience for this kind of thing -- probably other goa trance followers considering that are branching out *hard* as they start dabbling into those more downtempo rhythms infused with new age flavours. Plus other electronic fans gradually joining their ranks. This is how the "psybient" subgenre was born, kiddies! It would lead to two decades of music that often sounds "illustrative" and perfunctory to my ears, just like many "new age" relaxation recordings often sound so. But you might beg to differ on that admittedly harsh take, of course. That said, I just can't help considering that Shpongle's main aim is not necessarily to make good or interesting music that would actually break ground in any meaningful way. For me, their thing is basically catering to a market by using market-oriented methods -- like, retrieving whatever piece of cultural detritus lies in the way to artificially inject variety into your artistry for example. Did you care for a discreet dubstep pattern? Here it is, Sir. A bit of samba at the last minute? Here you go, Mam. Would you like some bagpipes in the background? Of course, we have some, it's on the house. And as you pull off this bag of tricks, you end up convincing your target audience said topsy-turvy artistry actually transcends cultural boundaries instead of being a simulacrum. Ain't life grand? Don't get me wrong, Simon Posford and Raja Ram are very talented musicians. Check out the recent "Improvisations For Flute and Piano" they have recently released under their own names, for instance. And the two last tracks of this Shpongle debut ("Divine Moments of Truth", followed by the 20-minute long "...And The Day Turned To Night", said to be the first thing they recorded together) are hypnotic and cinematic enough to hit their mark in quite impressive ways. Which saves this record from my lowest-rated gallery. Yet I really have trouble finding something genuinely moving or inspiring before that in the tracklist. And browsing through the rest of the duo's discography, I can't help considering their music as a piece of cultural detritus itself. Not that such harsh term should be taken in an exclusively pejorative sense. Awesome art often stems from such heaps of cultural detritus, and if you are subjectively sensing genuine transcendence in Shpongle's artistry, more power to you. It's another way to get attuned to the mystical cycles of life on this Earth, I imagine. Let's just say that I'll find my own transcendance elsewhere on Vinted or Temu, thank you very much. I'm kidding about Temu, of course! I am not *that* shpongled yet. ---- 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 78 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 141 (including this one) ---- Emile... La suite, avec toujours des petites citations de tes dernières réponses pour lancer chaque sujet : "J'ai vraiment une bonne relation avec la Bossa Nova, au point d'aliéner mon entourage. C'est un genre tellement polyvalent; tu veux lock in sur la job? Bossa Nova. Tu veux une ambiance relax pour souper en famille? Bossa Nova. Tu veux viber sur la plage ou autour d'un feu de camp? Bossa Nova. C'est le remède miracle!" Oui, je comprends tout à fait. D'ailleurs je me vois passer de la bossa avec un certain plaisir pour chacun de ces contextes. Le hic, c'est que si je m'assois face à ma chaîne hifi et que je décide de ne *rien* faire devant un disque (ce qui m'arrive de moins en moins, malheureusement), si c'est de la bossa nova ben... Je m'ennuie un peu. C'est ptet parce que je ne suis pas un "vrai" musicien, que je ne saisis pas les subtilités, I don't know... Bon ce qui aide pas, c'est qu'à chaque fois que j'essaie de passer Getz/Gilberto le soir dans le salon, ma copine me sort assez souvent : "on s'emmerde un peu, sur ce son, non ?". 😅 Je râle avec le sourire en retour, je lui dis qu'elle abuse... Mais au fond, je comprends pourquoi elle dit ça. Pour élargir sur d'autres artistes brésiliens, ma copine ne dit pas ça pour le Construçao de Chico Buarque ou Clube Da Esquina, au moins (RIP Lô Borges, by the way). C'est toujours ça de pris ! "J'ai été curieux, pis j'ai été voir ta critique [de Reign In Bloody], j'ai été surpris de voir un 3/5. Après l'avoir lu, je comprends que t'avais une approche beaucoup plus objective que la mienne, mais je me demandais en tant que critique musical combien de subjectivité tu peux injecter dans tes reviews?" J'ai mis 3/5 à *Reign In Bloody* ???!!. Mouhahaha, le con ! J'aurais juré que j'avais mis 2/5 ou 1/5 ! Ce jour-là, je devais effectivement être dans une optique plus "objective" au vu de la popularité du disque chez les metalheads des eighties... Mais ça permet effectivement de soulever cette question épineuse entre la part de subjectivité et d'objectivité, c't'affaire. Je pense que pour une review, fusse-t-elle en mode "casual" sur ce générateur, il y a toujours un dosage à effectuer entre d'un côté subjectivité, appétences harmoniques et sensitives personnelles, attraits ou rejets de base pour certaines sonorités, voire une petite dose de mauvaise foi, et de l'autre côté analyse plus "intellectuelle", prise en compte de l'impact populaire et/ou du contexte, et prise en compte du caractère potentiellement novateur de l'oeuvre, également -- si elle fait avancer le shmilblick dans son genre, si elle se place dans une vieille tradition tout en la renouvelant. Mais règle d'or, le premier *côté* devrait *toujours* l'emporter sur le second. Aimer (ou pas) une musique, c'est *d'abord* subjectif. Le second côté permet juste d'affiner les choses, de comprendre aussi un peu mieux ce qui se passe dans le son. Mais ce n'est jamais le plus important. Donc je crois que j'ai été un peu faux cul sur cette chronique de Reign In Bloody, visiblement, et que je n'ai malheureusement pas bien appliqué ma règle d'or ci-dessus. No way I can give a 3/5 grade to this thing *for real* (qui correspond à un 8/10 dans mon barème perso - 5 + 3). Qu'est-ce que tu veux, il y a des jours où on est plus faibles que d'autres, ha ha. Thanks for calling my bullshit here! 🙃 Pour finir sur "Demon Days et Plastic Beach"... J'ai toujours pas eu le temps de les réécouter... Ce que tu dis ne me surprend pas, c'est ce côté "ouverture de portes" dont je parlais moi-même... Je vais essayer de me mettre vraiment dans la tête de quelqu'un avec ton background quand je remettrais une oreille dessus (je sais pas si je peux, mais je vais essayer). Et pis aussi de tisser plus de liens avec Blur... On verra... "Je t'invite fortement à plonger dans le jazz-fusion et le funk japonais si tu te sens déprimer ou tu veux lancer un party en feu, ça marche de mon bord! Précision: My beloved n'est pas un band, mais plutôt une marque d'affection pour l'album Flying Beagle d'Himiko Kikuchi, que je considère fortement à rajouter à la user list." Merci pour la piqûre de rappel, je remonte ce nom. En parlant de "jazz fusion", ici dans son versant non japonais mais américain, on a déjà parlé de Mahavishnu Orchestra ensemble ? Du *Bitches Brew* et du *In A Silent Way* de Miles Davis ?Ou dans un tour autre genre de jazz fusion, de Weather Report ? Je voudrais pas me répéter... Mais si on l'a pas fait, il faudrait un jour évoquer ces disques-là ensemble. Jamiroquai ? "Ce qui aide, c'est qu'au Québec, à part Virtual Insanity, le band roule zéro sur les radios commerciales. J'étais aussi pas né quand ils étaient au top des charts, ce qui doit aider!" J'avoue que ça me fait toujours un peu bizarre d'entendre qu'un gars de ton âge soit revenu là-dessus... Mais bon, oui, énorme succès commercial en Europe (ou en tout cas au Royaume-Uni et en France). Plus gros encore qu'au Canada et aux US, je pense. C'est rigolo parfois ces différences de succès commercial entre les deux côtés de l'Atlantique, d'ailleurs... Et sur un sujet un peu similaire... "Je comprend vraiment pas pourquoi Gentle Giant n'a pas pogné plus que ça! C'est peut-être un trop jazzy pour les Prog Heads? Mystère!" Peut-être... Mais pour moi, il y a toujours un facteur à prendre en compte pour ces choses-là, qui n'est de fait pas lié à la qualité de la musique, ou pas directement : je parle ici en partie de la force ou la faiblesse de la machine promotionnelle derrière les artistes, la subjectivité des labels eux-même pour *beaucoup* ou juste *un peu* promouvoir leurs propres groupes ou musiciens, et, à l'époque de Gentle Giant, les choix des DJs et programmateurs radio. Cela n'explique pas *à chaque coup* la popularité ou non d'un groupe. Mais des fois, c'est aussi con que ça. Pourquoi Gentle Giant est plus connu que les early Genesis, finalement ? Ben ptet pour ça aussi, des fois... La suite au prochain épisode. Dès demain, je pense...

Maybe the joke has gone on for too long... And by that, I'm not sure whether I'm talking about this amateur-sounding album, or this users list when duds such as *Smell No Evil* pop up, or mankind and the space it takes up on this fragile blue marble of a planet, along with the myriad of stupid sounds it produces on a daily basis. Those sounds are sadly drowning out whatever beautiful or truly inspiring piece of music said mankind somehow manages to create once in a while. So how are you gonna plead aliens not to wipe us out after that, huh? The irony that what I have written up there could be used as inspiration for a "filk" song has not escaped me -- I'm very much a science fiction geek myself, you know... But I'll let the misguided user who suggested this particular dud mull over that irony first. If that person can sing -- hopefully better than the guys from Ookla The Mok -- and if they can play the guitar, maybe they can write a song about the pointless noise mankind routinely sends to outside star systems. That song will probably be more pointless noise itself, but what do I know? 🤷 PS: if I hear the word "monkey" once more today, I swear I'm gonna strangle someone. If ever I'm tried for murder, I'll have no choice but to call Ookla The Mok and the user who suggested this album to testify. You've been warned. ---- 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 4/10 for more general purposes: 3 for the musicianship and production values + 1 for the artistry A note on that last word, *artistry*: "Craft" might be a better word for the 100% derivative music on this record. Yet you have many examples of "craft" that are more effective, more directly endearing, and more moving out there in the world, so I'm not even sure I would go there... To be fair, the second section of "Challenge Of The Space Monkeys" offers such an endearing moment. But it only comes at the very end of this overlong record, and after all the pain and suffering I had to endure before that last-minute reprieve, do you really think it's gonna change my overall grade? Well, it's not so overly "complicated" to see it won't. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 78 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 142 (including this one) ---- Émile, part three... Moi aussi je vais essayer de faire court pour la 3e partie, surtout que je m'y suis mis tard pour te répondre aujourd'hui... "Ça m'a aussi fait réaliser que je suis genre immunisé au kitsch? (...) C'est peut-être la même sensation que de voir tes oncles/tantes qui s'habillent avec les mêmes vêtements qu'ils portaient quand ils avaient 20 ans." Ben c'est super bien décrit, avec cette métaphore-là. Après, le kitsch, pour moi, c'est toujours une affaire de subjectivité, de toute manière. En gros, si t'as de l'affection pour l'oncle ou la tante en question, tu peux trouver ça "endearing" leurs fringues flashy... Mais si ce sont de gros relous dans les repas de famille, les mêmes fringues flashy qui font saigner les yeux empirent forcément la chose. Après c'est aussi une affaire de cycles, je pense. À un moment, selon les "anti-modes", c'est le dad rock, à un autre le funk, à un autre encore, tout autre chose... Quand j'étais ado, par exemple, j'ai eu un rejet viscéral des années 80. Tout ces synthés et ces gated drums que l'on subissait au travers de tounes de marde qui passaient à la télé en permanence. L'horreur. C'était devenu viscéralement "kitsch" dans les nineties. C'est d'ailleurs pour ça que quand tu découvres un truc comme Sonic Youth dans les nineties -- alors qu'ils existaient depuis le début des eighties, en fait, mais que c'était tellement niche que ça n'existait juste pas dans la culture mainstream -- je te jure que tu te mets *enfin* à respirer. *ENFIN* un truc qui pue pas le fric et les années Reagan. ENFIN un truc qui a l'air vivant, dangereux, imprévisible. Je te mets l'exemple de SY, mais selon les jeunes en question, ça pouvait très bien être du hardcore ou du rock rap à la RATM... Pour prendre l'exemple le plus parlant, je suis pas certain que tous les jeunes de ton âge peuvent comprendre la libération que Nirvana a représenté à l'époque. Ça restait du music business, en vrai. Mais leur succès, c'était aussi le gros doigt d'honneur que tout le monde attendait. Mais je m'égare... Surtout que ce qui est paradoxal, c'est que j'avais aussi, en parallèle, des guilty pleasures de synth-pop que j'avais classifié comme kitsch suite à la "révolution alternative". Et comme ces sons-là sont revenus par la petite porte ensuite, j'ai pu faire la part des choses, et me dire qu'il y jamais de guilty pleasures sur le long terme. En fait, le vrai problème, c'est surtout quand les compos et/ou l'interprétation sont mauvaises (et il y en avait en fait un sacré lot aussi dans la musique dite "alternative" des années 90, quand tu reviens dessus). Mais quand elles le sont avec un son ou une esthétique qui t'a fait souffrir, en quelque sorte, parce que "trop" populaire à un moment, c'est là que ta perception subjective du kitsch surgit le plus violemment. Le premier réflexe, c'est le rejet viscéral. Un autre bon exemple pour moi, c'est justement Jean-Michel Jarre, dont je parlais pour décrire Ping Pong Go. Dans les années 90, n'importe quel jeune à la cool t'aurait dit que c'était kitsch. Et moi qui avait grandi avec ça gamin (par ailleurs fan de science-fiction), j'avais honte, ha ha. Sauf que ce que je n'ai compris qu'ensuite, c'est qu'il y a *deux* Jean-Michel Jarre : celui d'Oxygène et Équinoxe, ses deux premiers albums, qui sont poétiques, hypnotiques, à la "ligne claire", pas forcément tape-à-l'œil. Et celui qui est venu ensuite, avec des compos, des harmonies et des sons plates et laids, en plus boursouflés par la production eighties (celui de "Rendez-Vous"). Je défendrai toujours le premier. Le second sera à jamais définitivement kitsch pour moi (alors que j'ai tout aimé gamin). Voilà, je sais pas si ça éclaire ta lanterne, c'est juste ma version toute perso du concept. Ce qui me permet d'en remettre une couche sur Ping Pong Go, que je pourrais trouver kitsch dans le mauvais sens du terme, mais que j'aime premier degré. C'est juste tellement dommage qu'ils soient si "underground", ou plutôt pas foutu de faire connaître leur musique comme il faut. Mais ça, ça demande des compétences de promo et de démerde que tous les musiciens n'ont pas. On ne peut donc pas leur en vouloir... Je note le nom d'Angine de Poitrine. Pas encore eu le temps de checker le spectacle sur YouTube, mais c'est dans ma "to do list". Je t'en parlerai peut-être dans un prochain message... Cool que tu écoute Yoo II avec Nolan Porter. J'écoute aussi pas mal le Yoo Doo Right d'avant, comme je te l'ai déjà dit, je crois. Et merci de me faire découvrir des trucs de par chez toi. Tu sais que je peux être lent à m'y mettre. Mais je finis toujours par y aller. Gotta go, it's late now. See ya. 😉

Hey Matt Healy. Growing a beard is not so difficult, and whiskey can taste nice if you know which sort of whiskey to start with. I think that's what you should tell your younger self during your trademark nonsensical rants... But I guess you need to have reached some kind of emotional maturity for that -- for that, and also for a lot of more important things in life. Anything that's not related to your self-centered concerns, so awkwardly expressed here... I have already spilled too much ink on the case of Matt Healy in my review for the other The 1975 album on this list. In truth, there's not much to say about someone who writes and sings garbage such as "the smell of her hair reminds me of your feet" on a sad-sounding ballad that's apparently dead-serious and not a parody thing. So instead, this review will try to delve into the *music* of The 1975 in *A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships*. Yet to be perfectly candid, I kind of expect that this plan will be a waste of ink as well given the subject matter. Of course, I could be cute about the whole idea and only make a "brief inquiry" into said music. But some disasters are so impressive that you just can't help going slow-motion on them. My first words will be laudatory, oddly enough, because they are about "Love It If We Made It". It is indeed an excellent composition, laden with dizzying synth arrangements to boot. I have always liked that one. It's the one song by this band that proves that, technically, they could reach the skies in their endeavor to create topical postmodernist eighties-minded pop displaying some amount of artistic flair... Unfortunately, this song is not the rule, it's the exception. For a moment, I thought I could go over a 1/5 grade because of it, but it's simply impossible. Some cuts are listenable if you like mall music, I guess. Before "Love It If We Made It', "Give Yourself A Try" and "TooTimeTooTimeTooTime" could admittedly serve as decent additions to a chill "summer vibes" playlist, filled with other superficial-sounding tunes. In all honesty, the lyrics of the first are probably a little too grating for those types of playlists. But the second would fit perfectly, at least. Yet all lyrical concerns aside, and just to stick to the music, "decent" is still a far shot from "stellar" or "essential". This is how the quote-unquote "*OK Computer* for millennials" is supposed to start??? Are you serious? The thing is, that couple of early near-duds are not even the worst this record has to offer. No the worst is to be found after "Love It If We Made It". And more to the point, it's ALL the songs after the album's hit single. Those songs are ALL flat on a harmonical and compositional level. The dynamics are drowsy. The textures are hackneyed. The vocal hooks are annoying as f*ck, and somehow they still fail to leave an imprint in your head (thank the Lord for that!). And yes, I'm taking usual eighties pop aesthetics into account here (The 1975 are today's Scritti Politi, in short -- they're not even Duran Duran). It's just forgettable, all of it. How many times have I tried to reevaluate the band's music? Too many times. And it never works for me. There are some stylistic curveballs here and there, but it doesn't matter: those curveballs are just diversions showcasing the same sort of weak inspiration all over again, only presented differently. Whatever The 1975 tries to pull off, 99% of it always sounds bad or fake or both. Total borefest. On a sidenote, I couldn't help noticing that the user who suggested this record and I have quite a few albums in common in our respective galleries. So what the hell do they hear in The 1975 that I can't hear? Or more to the point, why is that user becoming so complacent to the point that they refuse to be picky for this band? Why can't you realize that The 1975 routinely creates the sort of dross you would barely register if it was labeled under another band's name on yet another corporate-looking Spotify playlist? Beats me. 🤷 When asked by Matt Wilkinson of Beats 1 Radio about the supposed similarities between *OK Computer* and *A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships", Healy had this to say: "I'm so humbled. It's amazing but strange also..." Translation: Matt Healy himself knows this comparison is a crock of shit. He himself knows the two just can't compare. And I'll take his embarrassed reaction as a redemption moment for him. Put yourself in the guy's shoes: how would *you* react if someone stated something so incredibly stupid about the actual quality of your work in front of you? Like, Healy can't say: "you're going a little too far, mate!". So maybe the man's not as hopeless as I thought he was... Maybe he's just a little lost inside the whole goddamn circus he has helped creating in the first place. And maybe he's like all of us, he's lost because the world is indeed mad and there's not much you can do to bring sense to it (as bizarro as Healy's lyrics are, I can still recognize that this particular topic is worth a visit on paper). Good for him if he makes a living doing stuff he loves and there's an audience for that. I might not like the guy's vibes, I don't hate him to the point where I would entirely blame him for the way his band has been overrated for too long now. That part of the equation is not his fault. But as a consequence, it's really, *really* hard for me not to blame the band's fandom (along with all those misguided "professional critics" who have praised Healy's act for too long now). You guys are wasting everyone's time, and more importantly, you are wasting everyone's time *for something that does not need more promotion anyway*. The 1975 are way too famous for the sort of crap they release. And yet just look at the global score for this album on this app! Have the bad news sunk in *at last*? For a "pop band" that supposedly caters to the lowest common denominator, this one is just considered lame by a majority of folks. So are you getting it now, fans? Or are you still in denial? And NO, it has nothing to do with a supposed "generational" thing, which is the selling point all those dumb "OK Computer for millennials" takes have used to shreds, quite maddeningly. The intellectual dishonesty and/or laziness of those sorts of taglines was obvious from the get-go anyway... It was a pitiful attempt to give prestige points to the whole debacle (and it worked!). Many quality modern pop acts don't need to resort to such manipulative shenanigans, fortunately. Take Billie Eilish, Rosalía, Charli XCX (incidentally the partner of The 1975's drummer, George Daniel, make of that what you will...), Lorde, Troye Sivan, Magdalena Bay, 100 Gecs and so on... I don't necessarily need to look into the past to express my love of their music. Because, as postmodernist as all those acts are, there's *also* something vital in their music *today*. It's the exact contrary of those tired tropes about how you need to rehash the past -- or pretend you do so -- just because it helps selling boring songs on a "market". Those tropes can only go so far after all when faced to what really going on musically... But to be fair, a brief "inquiry" into the neverending rules of making *good* pop music was enough to realize all that from the get-go (and maybe I should have started there). Catchy choruses. Dynamic and inventive arrangements. Propulsive moments. Harmonic surprises. Endearing melodies. A truly groundbreaking sonic palette. A minimum amount of creativity and soulfulness. Genuine emotions you can relate to. A lack of concern for what people might think of you as a person (Hi Healy!). Tapping into a higher power instead. And writing songs most people will care about and remember fondly as a result. Everything that, minus one song, this whole album is devoid of. ---- 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 78 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 143 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok...

Yeah, right from the "Intro" on the first disk --hiring Zola Jesus's vocal skills to here create an epic and cinematic duet with Anthony Gonzalez (aka M83) -- it's easy to grasp the sheer ambition of this synth pop double-LP. The first disk harbors quite a few electronic rock bangers, with the humongous "Midnight City" being of course the most memorable of them. And I simply love the couple of ambient tracks concluding that first disk ("When Will I Come Home?" "Soon, My Friend"). M83's music might be a touch too naive and airy at times, even kitschy to a degree. But set along the right images or "mind pictures", said music can create the most beautiful soundtracks ever written for an imaginary film. I have to admit I have not listened to the second disk as much as the first one -- to take one example out of it, "OK Pal" is only a lesser rendition of "Midnight City" for me. But revisiting that second half today yielded its own couple of gems -- including "Splendor" and most specifically the "Outro", forever ingrained in my memory as the moving soundtrack for the last couple of minutes of one of the best TV series of all time, *Mr. Robot*. Of course, quite objectively, *Hurry Up, We're Dreaming* is part of that family of overlong projects that would have benefited from self-editing and a shorter runtime. But even with that in mind, it's probably the right album in M83's discography to suggest for this users list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 143 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Huge fan of The Soft Boys here, a terrific early eighties rock act I had the pleasure to discover through the original list. So of course, I was looking forward to listening to a solo release by Robyn Hitchcock, admittedly playing in a far more 'barebones', 100% acoustic 'folksy' style here *Eye* feels sincere and personal from the get-go, and the man's vocal quirks there still sound very endearing to my ears. I would lie if I said this record fully conveys the idea that it's an "essential" album that should be included in a finite list of 1001 albums you must absolutely listen to before you for die... But it's still a very good record in its genre. Some cuts are obviously less striking than others, but then you have excellent tracks such as "Cynthia Mask", "Queen Elvis", "Flesh Cartoons", "Beautiful Girl", "Satellite" and "Aquarium" (I'm pretty sure that if they had been recorded with a rock band personnel, those songs would have shone more brightly). And most of all, you have two terrific highlights: "Executioner" and "Glass Hotel". If only for those two songs, the whole album is worth listening to for audiences with a taste for confessional singer-songwriter albums. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 144 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

To use the perfect words of another user in this review section : "It still sounds like a band that is massively constipated". This hilarious one-liner just nails the whole thing on its head, does it not? Let me elaborate: not only is the music on this record oh-so-linear, but most of it is also devoid of the necessary musical ideas that would justify its overlong dirges and overall bloated nature. And this whether for the slow metal tracks or for the couple of hardcore/thrash-adjacent ones sticking out like sore thumbs... Most of the songs go on forever, the guitar and drums sound awful and paper-thin, and the forced, overkill vocal performance is simply unbearable. Of course, playing a cover of "Summer Breeze" in that mock-goth style is funny, I readily admit it. But does that make the rest of the tracklist good or even decent? The jury's not merely out on this one. They have gone on an extended holiday trip, and have forgotten about the record right away. Good for them. I can't shake the feeling that the supposed layers of "irony" found in this album are a little too convenient or self-indulgent, you see. I'm not even touching upon the supposed "polemical" contents of the satirical lyrics here. A couple of them could indeed raise a few eyebrows today, but in truth, those lyrics are more ridiculous than really offensive -- the way satire originating from a self-described "centrist" band often comes off: lacking real bite. No, the irony I would like to focus on is related to the campy aspects of the music itself, and how daft those elements sound. Some Type O Negative fans -- such as the one who selected this record -- would probably throw a tantrum at me for doing so, calling me a hipster or an elitist. Anything to divert from the fact that their tastes will *also* be considered as questionable by a lot of other music fans *who are actually way outside those hipsters circles*. In other words, you can already see the usual bad faith strawman arguments coming from miles out on the horizon. To witness one clear example of that, please check out that particular user's review about Sufjan Stevens' *Illinois* Oh yeah, I know... Looks like I'm using such strawman arguments myself now. The thing is, after reading quite a few other reviews from the person who suggested today's album, I simply want them to taste their own medicine a little... 🙃 I can understand if you think doing that is somewhat off-topic, and I apologize for it. It's just that there are ways to be opinionated without projecting your own faults on the outside world, and I just can't miss the opportunity to suggest the idea to this user. Let's face it, those sorts of listeners -- appointing themselves as the "people's voice" or whatever -- often accuse so-called "hipsters" of favoring *style over substance*. But very ironically, in a lot of cases, *that's exactly what they're doing themselves*. When pastiche and tongue-in-cheek winks abound so much in someone's music, just as they do in the one of Type O Negative, who really cares about genuine musical qualities anyway? The exact nature of the compositional work doesn't matter. Melodic beauty doesn't matter, or becomes secondary. Taste, whether "good" or "bad", doesn't matter. Even sincerity doesn't matter at times. All that matters is that you're in on the joke. And this is how, as a listener, you end up unironically enjoying something that's probably designed to be taken with a huge grain of salt in the first place -- while looking down upon other acts not taking that pastiche road (or doing it outside your initial field of expertise). And you're suddenly judging all those other acts with a very stern and serious tone of voice to boot. To put it in a nutshell: without even realizing it, you quickly become the bottom line of your own ironical wisecracks about snobbery and elitism. Which is chef's (bloody) kiss here. A few -- even more direct -- words to the user who selected this album now: whoever you are, you have left your fair share of hilarious, smartly-written reviews on this generator, I certainly want to underline that as well. But it's far easier and far more natural for you to convey your spite and venom against artists you dislike -- through admittedly very witty turns of phrases at times (example: that memorable rant about the Ute Lemper album) -- than to convey your enthusiasm for artists you love. I also went down that road myself, with my own review for *Moving Picture* by Rush, for instance, so I can understand the appeal of those sorts of cruel reviews. But that appeal needs to counterbalanced by genuine enthusiasm elsewhere. An enthusiasm possibly conveyed by the sense that you know your proverbial shit. As far as I can tell, dear anonymous reviewer, you are rarely encouraging other users to engage with the material of those favorite artists of yours through a *reliable* description of it. All we have instead is pretty vague, and sometimes quite unreliable as well... Let's take one example out of your own review for this Type O Negative album: I can definitely identify the "50% Black Sabbath" influence in *Bloody Kisses* (here in its 'economy' version, admittedly, but still pertinent songwriting-wise, yeah sure...) ; but what of the postulated "50% Beatles" influence??? Is that supposed to be a joke? And if it is, is it supposed to be funny? Bad faith can only take you so far, I guess... I don't care what Peter Steele said about his own influences (may he rest in power). The fact that he liked the Beatles doesn't necessarily mean he *really* took a page out of their book composition-wise. At least not in any significant fashion... But can such misconception be a real surprise here? We're talking about someone who apparently dislikes the Beatles anyway (see their review about *Revolver* -- so yeah, that person is clearly coming off like a "philistine" on that Fab Four issue, to use his own word...). Likewise, what's so outrageous about Fiona Apple recording *Fetch The Bolt Cutters* through the GarageBand software? Can anyone else explain to me what's so wrong about that, especially given the very dynamic sonic results? To be clear: I don't care if you think Fiona Apple is overrated (maybe she is, at least to an extent...). But I do care if extramusical concerns -- not to mention readymade prejudice -- are having a misleading influence on the aggro/contrarian expression of your personal tastes... For Fiona Apple, to stay with this one example, it looks like this user's *real* concern is that she sounds like a "feminist icon" now, and they don't like the idea. I think we're all starting to see who you really are, my friend, aren't we? According to your review, you're ten years younger than Apple (and also ten years younger than me, for that matter!). So why that "old man yells at clouds" mindset, also exemplified through countless of other reviews about acts far younger than Apple, me, or even you? My heart goes out to you, really. Because getting old is indeed never easy. Sorry I have digressed for so long here. To return to *Bloody Kisses*, I can only say "more power to you" to the handful of other folks who think this Type O Negative album actually deserves a 5/5 mark. For me, it's quite the gigantic turd, but what do I know? Barring one exception, those 5/5 reviews are all quite fun to read at least, even if they're not especially convincing. As I suggested earlier, sincerity often sounds nicer than witticisms to express your enthusiasm for music -- and this whatever the music style you're enjoying is. Ultimately, does it really matter whether music fans are ironic or not, or whether they have "good" and "bad" taste? Everyone knows the endplan anyway: at some point, the Type O Negative CDs originally bought by the band's fans are passed on to some other people. Those particular CD boxes then stop being opened, among many others knowing the same fate (whereas some CDs by other artists are still played, at least once in while). Then, many decades later, all the CDs in the world are thrown away, because neurochips implanted in people's brains are definitely making any sort of physical copy utterly pointless. The ones by Type O Negative are the first to go, of course -- who even remembers their mere existence by that time? And yeah, in the end, it's all the CDs in the world that are discarded anyway -- minus a handful of ones kept as antique artefacts to be displayed in museums. For all the other items thrown into landfills, the booklets disintegrate and the plastic begins to slowly decompose. Climate change eradicates humanity long before the CD cases are broken down into their base elements. Eventually, as the universe expands beyond its ability to maintain thermodynamic energy, everything comes to a slow, frozen, irreversible halt. Yes, *again*. Here's to you, dear witty user. Since you love pastiche -- among other things -- I hope you can appreciate this final little tribute to your brilliant writing style. And believe it or not, I say this... unironically. 😘 (bloody kisses emoji) ---- 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 4/10 for more general purposes (4/5 for the musicianship and production values + 0/5 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 58 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 145 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok.

I won't make a "discovery" today. But through my rounded up 5/5 grade -- one in the ocean of perfect or near perfect ones given to this legendary LP -- I will help right one of the most obvious wrongs of the original list. When you listen to the string of absolute bangers on the first leg of this "French Touch" record ("One More Time", "Aerodynamic", "Digital Love", and "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"), it feels baffling to remind yourself that some of the most prominent "professional critics" out there were initially on the fence when it comes to this second Daft Punk album. Same when you tap your feet, bob your head, or dance away your worries on the dancefloor, thanks to the other gems on the second half of the LP ("Voyager", "Veridis Quo", "Too Long"...). Er... What is it that I was saying? Something about music critics, right? Back from the dancefloor, a friend sits across the night club table and looks at me with a quizzical stare on his face: "Are you Ok? What's wrong?" he lets out. I try to raise my voice: "I was thinking about music critics! I was remembering the middling reviews Daft Punk originally received for Discovery!" "What? Can you repeat?! The music's too loud in here!" "I was thinking about the bad reviews Daft Punk received for their sophomore album!!!" "Aw c'mon, man! Forget about that stupid shit! Shake a leg and come dance with us! The night is still young! And so are we!!! ONE! - MORE! - TIME! ..." ---- 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 59 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 145 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Sure, it's a "landmark album in the progression of twin-lead guitar harmonisation, later adopted by bands such as Thin Lizzy, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden." But being the first at something doesn't necessarily mean that you're leaving an imprint striking enough to be remembered as part of the GOATS. Don't get me wrong, *Argus*, by Wishbone Ash is a pretty good seventies rock album. But if its songs are nice enough, they're not exactly stellar. Either because they leave something to be desired development-wise -- which is a little surprising for an act displaying prog influences through five or six-minutes tracks. Or because those songs are a touch too derivative and meat-and-potatoes in the first place to justify their sheer length. So, to put it in a nutshell, this record is certainly a nice find. But it's not gonna revolutionize my perception of "classic rock" history -- the way Spirit did when I discovered them through the original list, for instance. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 59 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

As time went by, I've made my peace with the idea that Justin Vernon spent the rest of his career hanging out with rap stars while deepening his experimentation of electronic sounds, auto-tune and other sorts of glossy-sounding shenanigans. Some of those experiments have been great enough to justify the whole thing, after all. In short, I understand and respect the idea that talented artists don't want to repeat themselves, and would even point out that it's healthy that they don't do so. Yet I would lie if I said that I didn't wish Bon Iver could return to that cabin in the woods to cure his heartbreak in the same stunning fashion as the one displayed in this debut. And I'm pretty sure a lot of folks in his core audience feel this way, even to this day... Gems such as "Flume" and Skinny Love" are here to prove that a godsend type of inspiration struck said cabin. Of course you can't catch lightning in a bottle, and certainly not twice. But at least we've got this jewel now. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 60 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 79 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

in a psychic world, "darkside" opens gates to odd reflections of light A short addition to my haiku up there: when I played the CD edition of this album at home, I was in awe with the quality of the sound on it. I don't have a stellar Hi-Fi system, you see, and yet all the frequencies *slapped*, from the bass to the highest ones. So kudos to that anonymous user for having me digging my old copy of that Darkside LP, so that I can realize how great it sounds at last. ---- 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 60 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 80 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

I can forgive reviewers not invested in the genre to dismiss this record, but for those who say they are, you gotta be kidding me if you can't hear how stellar it is!!! Every single track slaps, the whole thing is intense from back to front, and most importantly, its hardcore punk aesthetics feels *haunted*: ghosts and ghouls abound here, disillusioned souls left on the margins of society, screaming what's left of their lungs out to paint a bleak picture of modern America. Those goddamn desperate lyrics... That goddamn voice perfectly attuned to the woes of the Midwest... Those goddamn guitar riffs, tight, infectious, heavy, angular, and yet filled with dread and melancholy at the same time... It's the platonic ideal of what a mid-noughts hardcore punk LP was supposed to sound (along with admittedly slightly different-sounding examples found in Comeback Kid, Have Heart or Verse's discography). For me, no other album from that specific era and adjacent music style suggested by users on this generator sounds *this* authentic. Plus, this one has been pretty influential, without Modern Life Is War ever fully receiving the credits they should have received. Without *Witness*, I'm not sure we would have had Defeater or Fucked Up a couple of years down the line, for instance -- at least not in the shape hxc punk fans came to know them. In short, a stone-cold masterpiece. ---- 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 61 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 80 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Gotta go for *Swimming* instead. Maybe even bangers-filled *GO:OD AM*, before MacMiller started collaborating with producer Jon Brion... That said, I realize that the tragic context around this posthumous album makes it precious for fans, and there are moments that are unambiguously fabulous in this one as well. Title-track "Circle" is a perfect barebones opener, atmospheric, moody (the fantastic jazz touch that vibraphone conveys!), but also poignant' And speaking of "poignant"... The lyrics of highlight "Good News" tighten the throat for sure, with its imagery about flying and yet feeling dragged down by your demons, the sincere manner in which the artist's existential questioning is expressed, along with musings about the possibility of an afterlife. All of which can't fail to recall the circumstances around MacMiller's demise (on lyrics about death, see also "Everybody"). Plus, the soft rock instrumentation on "Good News" makes the whole song so moving and cinematic anyway. "Blue World" and "Woods" also display the best the rapper's association with Jon Brion can offer -- with the first of those tracks feeling as slick and catchy as the second feels intricate and sinuous thanks to its killer lush arrangements. And if "That's On Me" is not exactly a highlight in the album, MacMiller going for a ternary rhythm here is certainly daring. Always love it when rappers try their hand on 3/4 bars, which is quite rare. As that Wikipedia blurb says, *Circles* was intended as a "companion album" to *Swimming*, and as a whole, it clearly feels like an off-shoot, and not its own thing. Besides, there are very clear weak points in the tracklist, with second cut "Complicated" -- showcasing the sort of musical self-indulgence MacMiller and his collaborators sometimes fell to -- being the most prominent of them. For me, that sort of self-indulgence can be found in spades on the second half of the record, decent overall, but with a lot of unobtrusive, meat-and-potatoes instrumentals. "Hands" sure tries to up the ante dynamics-wise. But for me, it's too little and too late. That back half just can't compare with the one of *Swimming*, with its insane build-up up until its very last song. In spite of my harsh and very subjective words up there, I still support that choice of an album because of its highlights. Only, I can't include it in my own list of 1001 keepers. Of course, I feel like a MacMiller album should be there. But which one? Guess the fans will discuss which LP from the artist is the absolute best for a long time to come... So thanks for bringing your input, at least. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 61 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 80 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

"Honky Tonk Woman", "Cry Me A River, "Superstar" and the incredible last run of "Space Captain", "The Letter" and "Delta Lady" sure are the highlights of this live album. And among all the covers Joe Cocker and his band and choir -- rolling on all cylinders -- perform within this double LP, it was also a treat listening to that barebones rendition of Bob Dylan's "Girl From The North Country", where Leon Russel sort of plays Johnny Cash to Joe's Bob. Same sort of treat with that soul / rhythm'n'blues version of Leonard Cohen's tearjerker "Bird On A Wire". Cocker and Russell certainly had a knack transforming songs written or performed by others to make them fit with their blues rock routine. On that, see also the Woodstock version of The Beatles' "With a Little Help from My Friends", of course. Speaking of that other cover -- absent from this record -- I get that *Mad Dogs & Englishmen* was indeed one of the two things that first brought Cocker his fame (the other thus being "With a Little Help from My Friends"). And that's why I can understand today's suggestion on paper. Normally, I shouldn't be inclined to include a live album -- with songs that are not written by the main performer to boot -- in my own list of keepers. And this one does have a couple of underwhelming moments, like that medley in the middle of the tracklist going on far too long, even by medleys' standards. But that last run of bangers, damn... I don't know... I suspect one thing is making the inclusion possible, namely the influence of Geese's last two studio albums, with their own postmodernist spin on that exact sort of classic rock imbued with strong rhythm'n'blues flavors (especially *3D Country*, even though *Getting Killed* is equally stellar). Yep, maybe Geese have indeed rewired my brain cells here. There are always ways to look into the past and make it sound vital again. And Joe Cocker, who made a whole career out of this as a performer, knew it better than most artists out there, after all. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 61 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 146 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

We're somewhere between Rush and Stone Temple Pilots here, so it's more like *Boring Midnight* to my ears. The production values brought by Warne Livesey -- who produced Midnight Oil's most famous hits -- give some welcome details and colors to those compositions, I can admit it. But those production values can't possibly hide how harmonically inert most of those songs are. I guess that the melodies of some hit singles played on local radios were "beautiful" enough to garner some memorable results on the Canadian charts. But for someone like me, those melodies sound lame. Same with the impossibly flat and meat-and-potatoes chord sequences accompanying the vast majority of those melodies. And so, as a consequence, the whole thing becomes instantly forgettable for me... Speaking of "harmonically inert" stuff, I'm gonna use the opportunity this review gives me to answer a very legitimate question the person who suggested this album asked in their raving review of Blink 182's *Enema Of The State*. But let me first quote the question, taken from that user's review: "I know some people don't like Blink or think they watered down punk, but it's just as cleverly irreverent as classic punk and way more melodic. So why hate on pop punk? A weakness of classic punk is limited musicianship and flawed vocals, and that's not here. It is FUN as hell." Music is always subjective, of course, and more power to you if you're having fun listening to Blink-182... But there are actually very clear reasons why a lot of users find their music BORING as hell. And it's not because I write the word in capital letters here that you will start to understand why Blink are very often not taken seriously. I need a little more argumentation than that. 😉 No, the only way for you to understand why someone like me rejects Blink-182 is to consider the concept of a "musical ear" and how the latter may influence your reception, emotionally or sensation-wise. Which will lead to a very long rant down there, I'm afraid. Some things can't be explained quickly. First, let me just point out that the "hate" is not necessarily about the music style itself. For example, I have nothing against "pop punk", as far as I'm concerned. I love Green Day's *Dookie*, just as I love a couple of NOFX albums -- not exactly "pop punk" in its most commonly agreed definition, but punk still filled to the brim with pop melodies... I believe that if you downplay subjective tastes to an extent, each musical style objectively provides good stuff and absolute dross anyway. And this, even if the latter can reach commercial success. It's in the nature of the capitalist beast to sometimes "elect" winners that might not necessarily deserve their success, after all... But that's a whole other debate I will certainly not touch upon here. No, as I said earlier, the real question is the "nature" of your musical ear, which is both innate and acquired -- most probably in quite equal parts. To be clear, some people who have never played a note of music in their lives may have a quite sensitive "musical ear". So this has nothing to do with being a proficient or even a stellar musician, and I think it's here very important to debunk the sort of misconceptions most commonly implied in that idea of "proficiency". Ironically, there lies the sort of elitism you're exemplifying yourself when you state this, dear anonymous user: "A weakness of classic punk is limited musicianship and flawed vocals". Yeah, a lot of punks are not the best guitar players or singers on a technical level (same with quite a few lo-fi, indie artists...). But when some of those "technically limited" punk artists write a riff, choose chords for a sequence, or create a vocal melody over said chords, it happens that a few of them are actually more astute, more inspired, and more original that some other folks who have studied music theory at the conservatory. And then, of course, you have the authenticity and intensity of the performance, which is the cream on the cake. There are key Nirvana albums in your gallery, dear user, so maybe you can get what I'm saying here... For me, the same phenomenon can be found in early or near-early punk records released by the Damned, The Clash, The Buzzcocks, Wipers, Dead Boys, and so on, where melodic astuteness AND uncompromising authenticity are both exemplified. The thing is, I don't consider Blink-182 as being "more melodic". They perform *a lot of* melodies, sure -- more than most of the names I've just quoted up there... But the real question does not deal with the notion of quantity. It's all about the notion of *quality*. Which, ultimately, is always a subjective notion. A simple query for you, dear user: what differentiates the melody used for a full-blown Blink song to the one written for an ad jingle or a TV commercial, according to you? Because, to be perfectly honest, I can't really tell the difference. Another quick aside here: given that Blink182 supposedly play "punk music", that airy, ad-jingle feel *does* appear like a betrayal of punk values for me. Same with the Californian band's supposed "irreverence" -- objectifying women in one song's lyrics hasn't aged very well, for instance, I hope you agree on that. Of course, some "classic punks" were not immune to that sort of misogyny either. Let's just say that when they come from the gutters, such sad pitfalls feel at least a little more "artistic" and emotionally potent than when they come from rich kids recording albums in Californian mansions. Maybe that's prejudice on my part, ironically. But that's yet another side-debate I unfortunately don't have the time to address here... So let's return to that question of melodicism instead: as you're already aware of, dear user, a lot of popular acts have been creating popular earworms for eons -- helped by radio rotation or streaming shenanigans that are often favoring such endeavors. Interestingly, this ability to create earworms can apply to both Nirvana and Blink-182. Or Madonna. Or Oasis. Or New Kids On The Block. Or The Beatles. Or Mariah Carey. Take your pick, from cheesy pop to prestige rock... The thing is, there are clear ways for a lot of listeners to separate the wheat from the chaff in that all-encompassing group of popular musicians, and this no matter what the music style is. Are the melodies -- either for the vocals, or the guitar licks, or the synth layers -- creating some welcome surprises along the way? Do they take "risks" on a harmonic level, avoiding the pitfalls of exactly following the harmonic grid of the chords over which they surge? Are the chord sequences themselves following a readymade grid to the letter, or do they thwart expectations as well, at least once in a while? Those are also the questions you need to ask yourself to understand why some people dislike Blink182. Maybe what I've just written sounds awfully "technical" to you. And yeah, there are probably music theorists out there who could explain all this using words such as "Ionian scales", "minor-major modulations", "cadences", or I don't know what else. But I swear to you that, for a lot of people -- both musicians and mere listeners -- that whole thing is 100% instinctual. Such instincts partly change over time, as you grow older, listen to a whole bunch of different stuff, and hone your tastes. But it's *never* "intellectual". It's simply sincere -- as sincere as your own love for pop punk. I'm not part of that group of music theorists I've just mentioned, you see, I've only read some stuff about all that online, and I would be a total fraud if I said I understand most of it. But I know that my personal appreciation of music is intricately tied to the way my brain is wired to look for beauty AND originality at the same time. When the melodies and harmonies are *both* catchy and surprising, that's where the strongest emotions surge for me. And honestly, I can't feel a damn thing when I listen to those of Blink182. As suggested in my side notes up there, music appreciation obviously goes beyond that question of melodicism. We could also discuss how the intent to create musical pastiches may or may not induce pleasure in some listeners, for instance, and how said intent reinjects a more "intellectual" sort of appreciation to those very instinctual sensations I've just discussed. You could also take as examples music styles where melodicism is very secondary (hardcore punk, some strands of metal, ambient and quite a few other experimental genres...) and yet can still elicit positive responses in subsets of listeners... But enough ranting for today. Rest assured that I don't merely want to "yuk on your yum* here, whether for Blink-182 or Matthew Good Band. The question you asked in your review of *Enema Of The State* was a very interesting and legitimate one, and I simply wanted to answer it the best I could. If ever you want to reply to my remarks, check out the album I've selected for the users list, and if you haven't reviewed it yet, leave your reply under your review. I'd be happy to read it, whatever said reply is. On this, have a great day, I mean that. 🙂 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 61 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 147 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Scottish singer-songwriter for gen-x or boomer audiences out of touch with "current" music, and who don't give a damn about it. Good for them. And good for Gerry Cinnamon that he can fill large concert halls without compromising with the music industry in ways that don't suit his personal ethics. That dig at said music industry's "cocaine scene" in opener "Sometimes" sure was amusing, was it not? That said, the man's music feels so derivative (and even hackneyed at times) that it's hard for me not to take it derisively. Most of the songs either go nowhere due to their short length, or wallow in clichés that make them sort of annoying (example: "Lullaby"). I understand why a reviewer here talked of a "guilty pleasure"... Can those obnoxious "la la la" and "la-di-da" be anything else in 2025? Also, the very cheap and "cold" production values of the first two tracks made them sound quite weird. Gerry's voice comes off as inauthentic there, which takes the cake given the music style he plays. Fortunately, the "production values" got slightly better right after in the tracklist, with a more barebones feel that serves the songs right, at least. The title-track is a gem, by the way, moody, folksy and... yes, cinematic -- indeed in an "erratic" fashion, but that's not a bad thing for this one track. Unfortunately, the fake drums returned for "Diamonds In The Mud", and they still sound awful. There are ways to make DIY drum programming convey the right sort of energy, but they're not to be found here. And then, it's already the end of this short album, with "War TV"... The anti-war sentiment expressed in that political closer is as relevant as ever -- we're not "progressing" indeed, not with the same sorts of pigs holding power for eons now -- and Gerry's Glaswegian accent brings a nice grassroots touch to this protest song. But hey, let's face it: we've heard that sort of song a thousand times before. And yet nothing changed. Maybe it's time for artists to find other ways to protest and effectively inspire revolt. Because it's clear that aping the old ways is now a simulacrum that has become totally ineffective -- just like most of the music on *Erratic Cinematic* is for me. The Times, They Are-a-NOT Changing, I'm afraid. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2 (4.5 for the musicianship and production values + 2 for the artistry) 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 61 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 148 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Forget about half of the LPs in this genre suggested by the original list. This here is the platonic ideal of what a country or C&W album should sound like. And it's been suggested by a user of this generator, not by a bunch of "professional critics". Why, you might ask? Well, for starters because it harbors a generous batch of perfect songs that are very hard to top. Not only the absolute gems "L.A. Freeway" and "Desperados Waiting For A Train", but also the touching cut "Like A Coat From The Cold", closer "Let Him Roll", mostly a spoken-word track musing about death and how you have to let old friends go (a coda to "Desperados...", in a way), or "Instant Coffee Blues", who depicts the awkward consequences of a one-night-stand with subtlety, sensitivity, and an acute perception of human psychology that speaks to the singer-songwriter's intelligence. But it's not only the words used by Guy Clark that make him one of the greatest. The problem I had with country music, originally, is that, too often, it is relying on shamelessly predictable chord sequences that made most of what l had heard in that style sound flat and boring. But if you "really* listen to Clark's music on this incredible debut, what you have is the exact opposite of that. On that front, the second side of the LP is 100% immune from such flaws. And if the second half of the first side is a little less impressive when it comes to the music, it's still excellent stuff overall. And that's not all. The very subtle changes of styles -- a touch of blues here, some more folksy flavors there -- offer quite a dynamic tracklisting, which, then again, are not found in your run-of-the-mill country albums. You also have killer arrangements, served by crystal-clear-yet-authentic-sounding production bringing an extra cinematic dimension to the whole thing. You have Emmylou Harris and a very young Steve Earle singing the background vocals. And if you like cream on your proverbial cake, you have three lively tracks ("Rita Ballou", "Texas 1947" and "Texas Cookin'") proving that Clark was as good providing fun and riotous stuff as he was writing perfect ballads. What can I say? This record is "Old *Number One*" indeed. I just wish the user (whom I heartily thank here) was as open-minded to rap as I now am to genres I was initially allergic to before starting this project. You really hate hip hop at large, your galleries are pretty clear about that. Is it the profanity? Or is it something else? Well your loss. And my gain when it comes to C&W and Country masterpieces. Because I'm adding this one to my shelves gathering my own personal collection of killer works by artists such as Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, Gram Parsons or Johnny Cash. So thanks again. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 62 (including this one). Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 148 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

jason molina soaring over stars, clouds and lands of ghosts weeping 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 63 (including this one). Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 148 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

"My Mind's Sedate" is an excellent opener in that groovy hard rock genre -- dynamic, lively, restless. Yet a very short moment in one of its repeated transitions, displaying melodic vocals in quite a blatantly "glossy" fashion, betrays the fact that we will be heading toward somewhat risible waters at times. Which is confirmed with the title track, pestered by some of the worst vocal parts on the album (more on that later), or with "Wait And See". That synth pattern in the latter sounds very good, but composition-wise, the song doesn't really go anywhere. Same with the two boring rock ballads "Pacifier" and "Only Time". Some time later, punk-rock-inspired number "Just Like Everybody Else" fortunately returns to the dynamics of the opener, and it fares far better, thanks to its killer riffs. And that one cut is at least devoid of those Rush and Stone Temple Pilots-adjacent shenanigans or hackneyed gen-x dad-rock rhythms that made some of the other tracks age like milk (another example of those lame shenanigans : "The Metal Song"). And on the other side of the musical spectrum, you have prog flavours on the ambient closer "Brightest Star", pulled off in quite an elegant fashion, even if the song itself sounds more like a final footnote to the tracklist than anything else. One other important influence behind some of those songs seems to be Faith No More. It yields to varying results, from the half-baked "Thin White Line" to the great "Life In Cars", also owing to Big Star, oddly enough. "Sport And Religion" is also an interesting cut, reminding me of what contemporary britpop bands such as Manic Street Preachers or Stereophonics were doing at the time, which is another surprise. And here Shihad were taking a page out of what those britpop acts did best, at least, and not the dross they could also produce. Plus, there's another great synth riff on that one, and you gotta admit this Kiwi band had a knack including those sorts of non-"rock" sounds into their rock compositions in ways that made sense somehow. What I ultimately like about this record is how open-minded to a whole lot of different rock styles it is -- even if my personal mileage on those different styles varies a lot, and so influences my appreciation of the songs, admittedly. And the album's sound manages to remain cohesive in spite of that variety (producer Garth Richardson's expertise probably helped a lot here). Of course, *The General Electric* is still the textbook definition of "hit or miss" for me. And it's amazing how there's very rarely a middle ground here. So with five songs that I absolutely hate (including all but one of its most popular tracks on my streaming service, very ironically), one I'm rather neutral towards (the aptly titled "Thin White Line") and six that I absolutely love -- even if they're not always placed in the most prominent points of the tracklist -- it looks like I should go for a rather neutral grade overall, right? Yet that's not counting how Jon Toogood's vocal performance gets on my nerves on the worst moments of this record. There's a hamfisted delivery on those moments which sounds so ridiculous to my ears that the needle is bound to tilt further towards the negative, I'm afraid -- at least if your measuring tool is about supposedly "essential" albums. For broader measurement, this record is certainly not among the worst ones I've had the misfortune to listen to. Vocals are always a key ingredient, are they not? If you can't vibe with them, it's always very hard to open your shakras... 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 63 (including this one). Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 148 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Random notes about this crank-wave masterpiece: The British Isles' post-punk revival is not exactly over yet (you can still see the very last ripples of its initial splash today), and yet this album is already iconic. Add this, Idles' debut *Brutalism*, Fontaines D.C.'s and Shame's own debuts *Dogrel* and *Songs Of Praise* to the original list. That's the sheer minimum you can do. "Never Fight A Man With A Perm" is a humongous banger. "Danny Nedelko" is a humongous banger as well. You'd be hard-pressed to find tracks this iconic (here's that word again) to define that post-Brexit, crank-wave zeitgeist. For all the folks who think the progressive politics of Idles' is mere "virtue signalling", eat my shorts. I don't even know what "virtue signalling" really means. Either you have virtues, or you don't and it's only wolf eats wolf out there. I'll defend to the death a song celebrating a friendship with an immigrant. That's not negotiable. Opener "Colossus" and closer "Rottweiler" are humongous pieces of music, period. "I'm Scum" is a riotous cut that's also a thing of wonder to witness live. "Samaritans" is a killer track with a killer chorus. "Television" is another gem with terrific hooks. "Great" is a hilarious cut that's catchy as hell. Shall I continue? Listeners who think this record is one-note, either musically or thematically, need to listen to "June" again, about the death of Joe Talbot's stillborn daughter. For all the people complaining about Talbot's sloganeering, let it be known that his line about toxic masculinity in "Samaritans", "This is why you never see your father cry", sends shivers down the spine of the middle-aged man writing these words every. fucking. time. The artwork of this LP could very well represent the potential bickering between listeners this generator could create if you gathered all of us in the same place. If only for this, you should give it a bonus half-point. 🙃 Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 (including this one). Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 148 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Odd to see this one pop out when there's no NOFX album on either the original list or the one curated by the users, to just to take one single example of melodic punk rock... Sure, *My Brain Hurts* predates the mid-nineties explosion of the genre, so it's sort of groundbreaking (even with the limited four-chords formula mostly harnessed here). But ironically, a lot of of those songs sound so meat-and-potatoes today -- with lyrics touching upon all the expected tropes in the genre -- that the groundbreaking aspect might get lost on you unless you check the release date. Of course, had I been a teenager discovering the punk scene around 1991, I would have said none of those words up there. The thing is, I'm not that kid anymore... I tend to "pile up" all sorts of music styles and acts in the list of albums I love, you see, and I usually never reject anything just because it has become out of fashion or marked in a certain era. Yet I have to face it: as a middle-aged man, there's no way I can pretend to love those types of songs now. It's sad but true. I prefer discovering current stuff displaying the same "punk" philosophy, even if it sounds miles away from what old punk fans have in mind when you use the word. Or conversely, I prefer going back to the original punk / hxc punk explosion, on the condition that the songwriting's good or original (tons of example there). The reason why NOFX is an exception in that rule of thumb that I can't listen to nineties melodic punk anymore is because --:on their best LPs at least -- the lyrics and music writing is so fucking astute. But apart from them... Don't get me wrong, some cuts still sound great on *My Brain Hurts*. My absolute favorite is "What You Hate" opening the second side with its propulsive drum and guitar arrangements. Excellent songwriting here. Right before that, "The Science Of Myth" is excellent as well for this genre. "Teenage Freakshow", with its touches of organ, is quite memorable. And so are "Making You Cry", "Guest List" and the title-track, even if they are already a notch under "What You Hate" on a purely musical standpoint. The rest is instantly forgettable, though. Not because it's bad *per se*, but because it's been heard countless times elsewhere, and because the music isn't "rich" enough to transcend the genre. Besides, as competent as Ben Weasel's vocals are, the man doesn't have enough quirks and idiosyncratic features to make him stand out from the pack of other melodic punk singers. At least generally speaking. Fat Mike has those quirks ; Bad Religion's Greg Graffin also has a very distinct voice, in all the senses of the word ; and to go back to the *real* origins of that punk subgenre, Adolescents' Tony Reflex was as quirky and idiosyncratic as you can get. If you liked this Screeching Weasel album and don't know the names I've just dropped, please check them out. You're in for a treat. One last exception in the tracklist of *My Brain Hurts*, however: Jimmy Cliff's "I Can See Clearly", of course. The vocals are pretty awful, but that's the sort of element that here adds to the fun of the cover. And the guitar arrangements are quite smart, and they help transition the song from one genre to another rather seamlessly... But is that enough to reconsider this punk album as a whole? Nope. Thanks for suggestion, I mean that. And no hard feelings, I hope. When you're open-minded to all sorts of music styles out there, you end up being quite picky. I hope you can understand... 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 81 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 149 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

If I had to choose *one* rock opera by The Who, I would pick *Tommy*, which for me is wilder and crazier than this one, and so harbors far more memorable moments overall, either bangers or extremely interesting instrumental dirges. That said, it doesn't mean that *Quadrophenia* doesn't have its fair share of stellar moments composition and arrangement-wise, of course. And it also has unambiguous bangers, like the first proper song 'The Real Me". Yet I think that the transitions between some of those great moments don't work as well as they do in *Tommy*. The jumps are either jarring, or conversely, the compositions and/or sections following one another sound a little too similar. I love Keith Moon's trademark drum fills on his toms, for instance, but after hearing them again and again and AGAIN here, you kind of grow weary of them. Which takes the cake, somehow. My impression is that the drums take the center stage to fill out a void somehow -- because the music doesn't go to all the places it could have gone to on paper. But what do I know, huh? Sure, it's hard to state that *Tommy* is itself a very "focused" work. As good and harmonically daring as it is, it also loses the musical thread once or twice. Yet it still seems to me that this *other* Who opera rock sounds *slightly* more driven AND more dynamic. The other problem for me being that *Quadrophenia* is also way more dependent on its storyline, which makes it harder to listen to "casually". Honestly, I can listen to *Tommy* quite casually if I want to, believe it or not. I don't necessarily need to follow its vaguely defined storyline through the lyrics. Whereas such way to listen is harder to pull off with *Quadrophenia*, in my very humble opinion. And this goes beyond the lyrics in the album, by the way. Take the instrumental title-track on the first side of the first disc: the music's on it is terrific, sure (I actually love that particular seventies synth sound, also found in Vangelis's records around those years, interestingly enough). But when that quite long instrumental track is over, you may end up wondering : "Okaaaaay.... but what was the point of all that? How come this overture isn't the very *first* track?". It's a main titles sequence of sorts, sure, but if you can't see what's happening on the "screen", the whole cut doesn't make a lot of sense. Worse, it doesn't transition well to the next (proper) song "Cut My Hair". Just as other tracks stumble on those transitory moments -- which is where *Tommy* sounds far more convincing to my ears, as admittedly quaint as some of its tones are. So yeah, if you add those shortcomings to all the rock cuts found in *Quadrophenia*-- admittedly very nice ones, yet sounding a little too close to other highlights found in previous The Who albums, you may end up finding that album somewhat lengthy, just as I do. This double-album is probably the last great full-length release by the band, just as Pete Townshend pointed it out himself.. Yet anyone who's not a *die-hard fan* might sense how "derivative" a couple of instrumental dirges already are here and there. At least this listener does. With all that in mind, however, there are still enough awesome cuts in this other rock opera to at least *consider* it for a list such as this one. And the first time the "Love Reign O'er Me" theme appears, on track "I've Had Enough" -- right at the end of the first vinyl disc -- is unmistakably striking. So when the whole song takes flight in the closer of the second disc, helped by Roger Daltrey's terrific performance, it's as good as the closers of *Tommy* and *Who's Next?*. Which testifies how good "Love Reign O'er Me" is given the closers in question. When the main character goes to the sea to meet his fate, you can really, REALLY feel the "operatic" stakes. That synth-laden chorus is simply incredible, enough said. And here you can never tire of listening to it, no matter how many times it is repeated. Besides, that whole meta-concept behind *Quadrophenia* -- where The Who in their mid-sixties persona appear themselves as supporting characters -- marks one of the first occurrences where a rock album as a whole looked into the past of the genre so as to find answers about the present. Nostalgia takes a part in it, but those feelings also need to be taken with a huge grain of salt. So in a sense, this double-album is about the loss of innocence, whether through its contents or its execution. And surely that's gotta count for something as well. So all of that is enough to make the album an apt candidate for the list, I guess. But is that enough for a final inclusion? Well, it all depends on which other artist gets snubbed because of said inclusion. The Who already have their fair share of stellar moments in my own imaginary list. Why they should be replaced for this one is not the real question for me. *Who* will replace them is, quite possibly. I'll see myself out --------------> 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 149 ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Why not? But also... why? I can see the appeal for someone who would have spent many hours playing this video game. Maybe that person had to stop in their track to listen to the soundtrack instead of playing, because the quirky and unpredictable music is on to a whole other level -- here transcending its original use as a backdrop for left, left, right, up, down, left combinations on a console controller... To mention more specific examples, "Katamari On The Rocks" is a gorgeous piece of music for sure, and "Lonely Rolling Star" is rather a stellar song. The bouncy "Wanda Wanda" even sounds like a Daft Punk unreleased deep cut. Yeah, this soundtrack can be *this* good. That said, you also gotta admit that the bulk of it sounds VERY derivative at the same time. To be honest, there's not that many samba spoofs, jazz pastiches and secondhand 8-bit electronica instrumentals that I can stomach in one go. Some of those electronic cuts, such as "Taste Of An Angel", are incredible, don't get me wrong -- worthy of Warp record artists. The end of *Katamari Stars* was also very moving, oddly enough. But the spell broke when that unruly children's choir surged in "Cherry Blossoms". Sure, the (voluntarily) out-of-tune lead kid vocalist singing after said choir popped out of nowhere sounds awfully cute. But it's hard to make sense of so many stylistic twists and turns by that point, without playing the game itself or seeing what's supposed to happen on screen. Or without a leading figure -- like a main composer or an identified singer -- guiding you through the topsy turvy range of styles and all-too-airy-and-cheery intents... I sometimes felt like overdosing on ecstasy at some key junctures of this tracklist, but not always in a good way, if you take my meaning... And that's not even counting how my cheesometer exploded when the last slow song "Ball Of Love" occured (a song that was probably written for the closing credits in the game, and one which, as such, is instantly skipped by most players once they finish the game, I suppose). So yeah, as wonderfully written and executed as most of the music on this soundtrack is, the useless cuts in it still take their toll. Besides, that thing just can't fit with the album format as we know it. At best, it sounds like a compilation, not an album. It's fun, generally speaking. But it doesn't have an album's "aura". Still putting this soundtrack in my four star galleries for all the pleasant surprises in it. But I won't include it in my own potential ranking of 1001 absolute keepers. It's just that if we start to accept video games soundtracks for this dangerously expanding list, we're not out of the woods yet, are we? Unless those soundtracks are pitch-perfect from start to finish. And for me, it's not *exactly* what we're dealing with here. Thanks for the suggestion, though. Not being interested in video games, either now or back then, there was *zero* chance I would have had listened to the great moments in this soundtrack had it not popped out on this generator today. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 150 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Could be included in the list of "101 *parody* albums you must listen to before you die". Although I suspect that later parody albums by "Weird Al" Yankovic are actually more spectacular, more entertaining, or executed better... Whatever the case is, this suggestion is essentially "derivative" so I can't see its real point. Including this would be wasting a slot for me, period. Call me a party pooper, I don't care. If really you want "funny stuff*, I'd rather include albums by Bloodhound Gang or even an obscure Frank Zappa LP. Anything not relying on goofy covers for the most part. With a users list that's dangerously expanding, I really wish you could give somewhat neutral grades to off-topic suggestions such as this novelty act *right away*, and then review a second album (or even a third one) for the day. Anything to skip the dross and address the real meat, if you take my meaning. I've heard there was a debate about that in the reddit group, and that the consensus was to keep things as they are for now. Wasn't there for that debate, so I don't have a say. Food for thoughts in the future, though? ?/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 151 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

What is it? Some sort of *No-Other*-era-adjacent Gene Clark, only more streamlined and -- at the time -- more successful? As some other perceptive reviewer noted, the Al Stewart also sounds like Neil Tennant -- but one that would have hit the charts in the seventies, only interested in the pop rock of that era instead of electronic music. I have a sneaking suspicion this soft-rock album is actually as good as quite a few other obscure ones from those same mid-seventies years. Jackson Browne comes to mind, here. But no way he can be the only example. I'm currently waiting in the emergency ward for some health scare that I hope will turn up minor. I know I'm gonna wait for another hour or so to see yet another doctor... and I feel old, you know. Truth be told, I probably feel as old as this particular album sounds today. To put it in a nutshell, it's hard for me to find those songs relevant or even catchy, as much as I like music from that era. Is it the whitish walls of those hospital corridors, like a visual version of those aseptic synths in "On The Border" -- otherwise a pretty good song??? Or is it because of a more general lack of warmth, maybe enhanced by my current surroundings? Like, "Sand In Your Shoes" is for me a mere spoof of a Bob Dylan song, and as such, it tastes like a hospital meal on a tray -- a long shot from a real dish cooked in a real Zimmerman restaurant. Likewise, the music in "Midas Touch" comes off as equally bland. Just like those goddamn corridor walls... The second side fares a little better, going back to the quality level of the opener "Lord Grenville". "If It Doesn't Come More Naturally, Leave It" is quite OK. "Flying Sorcery" is a little insignificant, but that unhinged violin at the end of "Broadway Hotel" is a thing of wonder. The synth bass on "One Stage Before" sounds deep, and its final guitar solo takes flight in rather admirable ways. As for the string sections on the title track, they bring a lot of emotions on the table, just as those short guitar and saxophone solos do. So when you focus on the details, *Year Of The Cat* paints a nice picture. But if you zoom out to look at the bigger one (mainly the overall quality and memorability of the songs), something gets lost in translation for me. In a sense, the arrangements take center stage, not the vocal melodies -- in spite of how astute most of the lyrics are. And as those arrangements take center stage, I kind of lose the actual chord sequences that are used. Just as I lose the songs per se, failing to leave an imprint on my memory. The doctor has not arrived yet. Listing the features of this record had occupied my mind for a while but there was no joy in this exercise. It feels like I've checked through a list of symptoms when I wrote about this album, just like that first doctor did when I entered the ER. I didn't "feel" this album, sorry. And chances are I won't return to it. Maybe that's unfair to Al Stewart. But his record popped up on a bad day, and I'm only human. Still wish I could review several albums at once to find or discover the ones I really love in this users list. Life's too short to watch whitish walls peeling off in front of you. That's what I'm gonna remember from today's suggestion. Hope you can relate to the idea, even if you don't agree with my personal take about this particular LP. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 152 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Very decent Polish electronic artist. Her edge is not as dark as the one found in acts such as The Haxan Cloak or Mondkopf, to take the first two examples that came out of my head, but you still have the same sort of claustrophobic mood as the one found in those two examples. "Message", "Hollow" and "Alive" are the clear highlights here. And if the rest tags along without making much of a fuss, it's still good IDM -- once in a while sprinkled with subtle and yet very distinct dubstep flavors... After listening to this album twice, I still consider that there are quite a few artists in that overall umbrella genre currently offering music that is even more striking and more evocative than the one written by Zamilska. Acts such as Bicep, Floating Points, Rival Consoles, UVB76, Forest Swords, Throwing Snow, Ital Tek, Tzusing, Jlin or Eskmo... Yet at the end of the day, I would be a fool or a fraud pretending I have the ultimate expertise in those matters. In spite of my personal tastes in said umbrella genre, I feel like your personal history with the latter most often takes full precedence over any so-called "objective" measurement of the music's efficiency -- a vantage point which is impossible to properly reach anyway. Sure, you could say the same thing for any music style, I suppose... But those electronic genres do rely a lot on transient moods, three-dimensional textures and ethereal ambiences, and I believe your state of mind when you discover an act in said genres ends up becoming pivotal for your future appreciation of it. Whereas for, say, rock and rap, it's always a bit easier to subjectively decide whether something sounds relevant or not. It's another way to state that there is nothing wrong in that user's choice, just as there's nothing wrong in the ones I've mentioned up there. In a way, it's impossible to agree on some sort of "objective" assessment to state whose *recent* choices end up as more influential or more commonly revered by fans of this music style. There's a reason why a lot of those fans always end up quoting acts such as Kraftwerk or Aphex Twin -- once 100% groundbreaking, and now ironically considered as "classics"... We still miss the hindsight for more recent stuff. And it's nothing new. Because this is the very paradox that has always marked genres supposedly pointing towards the future. So for me, podiums and rankings never made much sense for most forward-looking electronic styles anyway... As an old-timer, I could add that the future is always bleaker that what you expected to be in your youth. But that's a debate I won't touch upon here... At least, Zamilska's *Uncovered* provides an apt soundtrack for such bleak *present* moment. Why should we ask more from it? Podiums and ranking will have to wait for another time, I suppose. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 153 (including this one) ---- Emile... Ma propre balise temporelle... Tu trouveras mes trois dernières réponses sous les albums d'Eric B. & Rakim, Shpongle et Ookla The Mok

Far greater acts are casting a long shadow over this album, which was Shudder To Think's first LP released by a major label -- right in that couple of years in the nineties where everyone in the music business was looking for the next Nirvana... I might admit that *Pony Express Record* has been underrated to a degree, sure. But not to the point where it could join the restrictive club of the 1001 most essential albums of all times. Not with the obvious flaws in it, and not when it comes off as so derivative of all those greater things occuring at the start of this particular decade. Ascribing those long shadows to their different owners might help up understand what *Pony Express Record* is all about. You can for instance sense the influence of Faith No More, Afghan Wigs or Alice In Chains for the vocal performance, filled with all sorts of mannerisms -- ones sometimes going to interesting places, and other times missing the mark in quite a spectacular fashion. Let's just face it, those meandering vocals are almost unbearable in the last leg of this record, as they go from one pointless performative dirge to the next. A genius like Jeff Buckley could sure go beyond that personal impression of mine and spot brillance in said performative shtick (Buckley would even collaborate with the band on a song written for a soundtrack some years down the line...). Wedren's artistry sure was striking, even with if you take his influences into account. The thing is, whether Craig Wedren's supposed brillance actually fits with the instrumentation or not in this record is still a matter of debate today. At least for me. On paper, I really wish the man's glam-rock-inspired, anti-macho shtick could work out fine over the post-hardcore canvas performed by the whole band, because it would yield to a promising and totally original rock style. And for a couple of highlights such as "X-French Tee Shirt", well, Wedren's vocal performance *does* work (how nice does his vocal line sound, here circling around that obsessive one-note hook carrying the bulk of said single!). Yet for the vast majority of the other songs, Wedren's voice seems untethered to the music, and it even sticks out like a sore thumb in a couple of tracks. The fault might lie in how Wedren wrote those vocal melodies on his own compositions, I don't know for sure... But whatever the case may be, it's hard for me to grasp his real intents at times. Another long shadow to piece out here is related to the instrumentation and compositional work displayed throughout *Pony Express Record*. This is where drummer Adam Wade's remarks in that wikipedia soundbite up there can offer you pivotal clues, by the way... You can indeed smell some "grunge", "heavy" whiffs coming from Soundgarden's music in those songs, sure... But the longest shadow is cast by Fugazi, of course -- which is only natural for a Washington D.C. post-hardcore band, who were originally part of the Dischord label roster to boot. There are so many Fugazi-inspired flavors I immediately recognize in this LP, whether in those guitars alternating between seductive melodies and uncompromising dissonance, or in the distinct groove of the rhythm section (Shudder To Think had toured with Ian MacKaye, Picciotto, Lally and Canty, so *of course* they were in the first rows to learn their lesson). And the production of Ted Niceley, who also recorded the early Fugazi albums, naturally enhances those flavors. Yet as hard as I tried to focus on the music, the genius spark found in *13 Songs* and *Repeater* is still missing for me. What you have here is a very close rendition of it, but you don't have the sheer intensity exemplified in the records I've just quoted. A quick sidenote: Fugazi knew better than to accept the offers made by major labels around the time this Shudder To Think album came out. They always politely but firmly refused those, because they knew it would kill their hard-earned artistic (and financial) independance. On that subject, you need to read Picciotto's hilarious account of how Atlantic Records' Ahmet Ertegung once had the band literally "cornered" to make them an "offer they couldn't refuse". Jawbox and Shudder To Think actually said yes to those sorts of offers, which led them to a very different path... It's a contextual tidbit that can help explain why some users still remember *Pony Express Record* today, even if it didn't make waves that were that big. Signing to a major label had some short-term perks, like having your music videos on rotation on MTV, for instance... The other reason I'm alluding to those events is because Shudder To Think, now unsigned to any major label, has just very recently gone back to the Dischord roster to release two very nice songs ("Thirst Walk" and "Playback"). Honestly, those two songs are worth your time whether you enjoyed *Pony Express Record* or not. The current band sounds darn good, even after all these years, and in a sense I consider the current execution of their usual aesthetics far more convincing today than for this 1994 album. Not to say that Shudder To Think might suddenly become "relevant" now. But who cares about that, really? If the music's good, the music's good, right? To return to *Pony Express Record*, my personal opinion of that choice for the users list is that it's a very odd one for three reasons... First, as stated in my tentative "review" up there, the music on this album isn't stellar overall. This is only my subjective assessment, of course, and more power to you if Shudder To Think ticks all your boxes. In and of itself, it was a nice idea to make other users of this generator discover this band. But I fear that said discovery won't make a lot of people turn to their heels and reconsider everything they know about rock music during the nineties... Secondly, 1994 was one of the most extraordinary years for music ever, and there's still a dozen of great albums from that year ignored by either the original list or the one curated by the generator's users. Those take precedence for me, and with such a great number of omitted albums, I just can't take today's suggestion seriously. If you only consider heavy rock or indie-rock genres that are quite adjacent to *Pony Express Record* among those ignored jewels, you have Jawbox's *For Your Own Special Sweetheart*, Superchunk's *Foolish*, Kyuss' *Welcome To Sky Valley*, Sebadoh's *Bakesale*, Helmet's *Betty* and Shellac's *At Action Park*. If you broaden the scope to other strands of rock music, you also have gems recorded by Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds, Silver Jews, Beck (actually two of them!), NOFX, Liz Phair, The Magnetic Fields and Low. And if you broaden the scope *even further*, to other genres, there are still pivotal LPs released by Aphex Twin, Tortoise, Kristin Hersh, Gravediggaz or Joni Mitchell in that year to take into account... Finally, Fugazi's *In On The Kill Taker* came out in 1993 -- one year before this Shudder To Think major label debut. The legendary D.C. band then released *Red Medicine* in 1995 -- one year after. Given that the aesthetics of *Pony Express Record* shares some distinct DNA with those two other LPs -- once again unfairly omitted in both the original and the users' list -- I just can't help comparing it to them. And the outcome is unambiguous for me. Compared to Fugazi (which you can unarguably consider as mentors for that budding post-hardcore scene at the time), Shudder To Think doesn't stand a chance. Yeah, sure, MacKaye and Picciotto's vocals will sound more extreme and less mellifluous for neophytes in that genre. But given how weird and sinuous Wedren's own vocal performance comes off, I'm not even sure Fugazi's vocals would be less accessible for today's ears, all things considered. Sorry for the very long rant. I really tried to enjoy this record, but I couldn't. And I had to explain why as honestly as I could. To put it in a nutshell, I can't be part of the "Pony Express" team, mostly because I'm already part of the "Birthday Pony" team, you see. If you know, you know... 🤷 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 154 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là... Noyeux Joël !!! Et Onne Bannée !!!

Three quarters of The Talking Heads mostly sounding like a second-tier version of Garbage is not exactly my idea of a good time (remember that song?). And it's not the stellar list of guest singers here replacing David Byrne that is gonna change my mind. The compositions are not memorable enough to justify the whole thing in my eyes no matter what. What a wasted opportunity to add a truly relevant album on this list. I mean, c'mon! The very artwork done for this one will scream "derivative" to any knowledgeable person with a shred of sense left in their (talking) heads. And the music only illustrates that "derivative" label further, instead of thwarting expectations. Not saying that it was OK for Byrne to sue. Just saying that it was normal for listeners to grumble. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 154 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là... Noyeux Joël !!! Et Onne Bannée !!!

There's a saying in French for that sort of album competently going through the motions of its elected genre while rarely finding the spark that would single it out. And the saying goes like this: "Pas de quoi en perdre son latin" Translation: "No reason to suddenly lose your grasp of Latin". Sorry, but I prefer the quirks and dynamic idiosyncrasies of Can, Amon Duül II and Faust to what is, ultimately, a very generic take on "krautrock". The concept of writing and performing a psychedelic "mass" was promising on paper, sure. But the execution of that concept mostly provides a string of musical clichés that I find quite difficult to relate to. There are far better entry points to convert new believers to that style, which has had such a huge influence on subsequent generations of music lovers. Thanks for letting me know this band existed, though. This is what I signed for when I agreed to participate in the users' list, after all. I will light a candle so that more reviewers may end up loving seventies German rock, either through this record or the ones released by the other acts I've mentioned up there. As long as that faith is kept alive, kraut fans anywhere in the world will have my blessing. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 155 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

John Danielle reminiscing about his childhood and teenage years, plagued by an abusive stepfather and consequent early alcohol and drug problems, sure yields to quite a few striking lyrics during the course of this LP. The thing is, I would lie if I said I consider each and every song from *The Sunset Tree* compelling on a purely musical standpoint, contrary to what happens in *All Hail West Texas*. It's odd because that other The Mountain Goats album is just Darnielle playing the guitar and singing on an old tape recorder, and yet the tracklist there feels livelier and more dynamic. Not that the musicians playing with John on today's suggestion are doing a bad job. It's just that a lot of the songs feel incomplete somehow. There are exceptions, of course, like "This Year" (great chorus there), "Lion's Teeth" (a revenge fantasy ending in a frustrating stalemate, nicely served by the driven instrumentation), and "Pale Green Things" (a very moving barebones closer, where Darnielle files the case of his old abuser at last, when he learns about his death). But let's face it, apart from those examples, there are not enough memorable cuts in that record that would make me return to it. Thanks for the suggestion, though. It's nice that I know more about Darnielle's artistry now, as it's nice that I know more about his life story as well. This record is way more "confessional" than *All Hail West Texas*, which is goofier and more sarcastic in tone, generally speaking. It's great that Darnielle can use his songwriting skills to reach some catharsis, so I perfectly understand why some fans would fawn over this album. It's just that I can't "sense" the catharsis in the music itself. Not saying it's not there. Just saying it's out of my own reach. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 156 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

waves of bliss and awe a platonic ideal for modern ambient File next to the greatest acts in that genre (or ones in very adjacent styles): Brian Eno, Aphex Twin, Sigur Rós, Fennesz, William Basinski, Grouper, Nils Frahm, Oneohtrix Point Never, Julianna Barwick, Dylan Henner, Heinali... And thanks for putting this record out there. Three footnotes: Oliver Coates' cello on the title track is indeed a thing of wonder. I've just read that the artist known as "Malibu" is the daughter of an oceanographer. She might not be one herself, but the apple never falls far from the tree, doesn't it? One man studies the ocean. His daughter pays tribute to it through music. Makes sense. Malibu has just released a full-length album this year, *Vanities*, by the way. It's in a somewhat more "film noir" vein (soundscapes inspired by Los Angeles landscapes, or so I hear). It's excellent as well, and transports you to places that are equally evocative and breathtaking. So please check it out. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. Even though it's technically an E.P. But more on that later... 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 157 (including this one, because it's technically an E.P. -- *Vanities* might make the cut though, who knows?. I'm still putting this record in my highest-rated gallery anyway. Its global score is too low and it's too beautiful to go unnoticed by fans of the genre, I want to help turn the karmic balance the other way. Hope other music listeners and reviewers here will concur) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

Hell is paved with good intentions. At least that's one of the philosophical messages conveyed by this record -- a message which might also highlight its own strengths and weaknesses, quite fittingly... I didn't know a thing such as a "folk opera" ever existed (but why *shouldn't it exist*, after all?). Pretty good stuff, even if I could nitpick about one thing or two. Three pivotal elements are present in the album to make this project work. Yet I think another pivotal element is missing somehow... I'm gonna write one paragraph for each of those elements, so as to sort out my thoughts and decide how I'm gonna eventually grade this record. As you could sense in my introduction, I'm still in two minds about the whole thing... So please bear with me as I try to assess my own complex feelings here. First there's the overall concept, drawing from Greek mythology. Using the Orpheus and Eurydice yarn to a paint a harsh picture of capitalism, economic hardship and populist politics -- topics that are especially potent fifteen years later -- was a pretty smart move from Anaïs Mitchell. That song about building a wall says it all, doesn't it? Deep archetypes can sometimes explain current news. Mitchell tapped into something that's timeless somehow, which is certainly commendable. Secondly, the cast is pitch perfect -- Mitchell herself as Eurydice, the suave and romantic Justin Vernon portraying Orpheus, Greg Brown as the logically somber and ominous Hades, Ani Di Franco lending her slightly weary voice to impersonate Persephone, Ben Knox Miller doing a Tom Waits impression to play Hermes, members of That Dog for the Fates (bonus point for casting real-life sisters)... Such a cast does wonders to make the play compelling on a performance level. Thirdly, the arrangements drawing from all sorts of grassroots American styles are on point to echo the depression-era aesthetics of the story that's told. And their variety are very often bringing necessary dynamics here. All that being said, the last element I want to address points to what is clearly a shortcoming for me: it is how the songwriting doesn't always transcend the concept itself. The best rock operas can be listened to in two different modes, you see: one when you're following the story closely, and one where you're not because you're simply enjoying the melodies. The two ways to listen are allowed here, but *not until the end*. The album starts strong with a string of very catchy earworms (examples: "Way Down Hadestown", "Hey Little Songbird", "When The Chips Are Down", "Wait For Me"). But then it sorts of loses the thread on that front. The songs on the second half are often pretty. But they're not exactly memorable. Likewise, Mitchell opts for an anticlimactic finale music-wise to depict Orpheus losing Eurydice to the underworld. It's an interesting choice, possibly even a bold one concept-wise. But it still gives you the nagging impression that the project doesn't quite stick the landing, especially compared to the stakes established at its onset. I'm currently listening to the Broadway theatrical version of the project to see what changes were implemented to correct those flaws. Mitchell added more songs to both flesh out the story and create more moments packing a punch on a purely musical level. Two highlights are performed again in a "reprise" mode towards the end to give that climactic feel missing in the original album, without ever betraying the understated way in which Orpheus turns back to see Eurydice disappear in "Doubt Comes In". Somewhat predictable, and yet pretty smart, once again. Unfortunately, you're also losing the homely or "homemade" feel of the original folk album in the trade-off, mostly because the very Broadway-like performers don't have the quirks and idiosyncrasies of the guest singers in the studio version. Plus, those two-hour musicals always feel so damn long when you're listening to them without watching the performers on stage, don't they? So I'm gonna take a polite pass here, because I don't think I need to revisit *Hadestown* in the future, in spite of the good things in it. What will be *less* polite from me, however, is one last remark related to the user who suggested this album. Anyone who writes this for a review: "Bad music. I hate anyone who likes this", just deserves at least some amount of contempt. And this works for any famous name in those lists -- except maybe Kid Rock, for obvious non-musical reasons, and also for a couple of artists such as Kanye West, whose music I once loved, but that I can't seriously defend as human beings (again for very obvious non-musical reasons): anyone saying bad things about the subset of deluded fans ignoring all the red flags from those problematic artists might take a pass for me. But apart from those extreme cases, nope, you sound like a serious edgelord if you shit on other music lovers like that. And it doesn't matter what the music itself is. To return to today's user, the example I've quoted up there is just one example among quite a few others in that person's reviews. To be clear, I don't even like Throbbing Gristle's music, generally speaking. Yet I still want to ask this user the following thing: "Who the hell do you think you are?". It's OK to dislike the output of any musician out there. It's not OK to shit on those musicians' fans just because you have such a high opinion of yourself. Get off your high horse, for pete's sake. Oh, by the way: here, in this section dealing with *Hadestown*, I have also spotted a scathing and aggro 1/5 review from yet another edgelord who finished the project second (that Sepultura fan, also having such a high opinion of themself and their music tastes). That one has a problem as well. So imagine my delight when I've read that aggro review, meaning that another egregious user got served with their own medicine by one of their "peers" here. Frankly, it was hilarious seeing two edgelords clashing with each other like that. 🤣 It felt like I was watching some dumb wrestling TV program where two "evil" characters were annihilating each other. Sorry to end on that polemical note, which is admittedly off-topic, maybe even off-putting itself. I'm only voicing a minor nuisance after all, perhaps one that other users of this generator have experienced as well when they got to know some other reviewers' opinions. Or maybe I'm the only one to give a damn. I don't know... I just needed to get this off my chest, I guess. Sometimes, hell is also paved with *bad* intentions, and some of the reviews left by those two users are a clear example of that for me. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 82 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 158 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

How nice. What a lovely gift from Alexander and the Patreon community! Smooth jazz with a Christmas theme, evoking nostalgic childhood memories... At least I suppose that's how reviewers from the English-speaking world will receive this thing. Didn't know the first thing about Vince Guaraldi before today, you see... I guess American audiences are indeed more familiar with him because of his work for that Charlie Brown cartoon... I grew up in continental Europe, where Snoopy the dog is actually more famous than the Peanuts character kids, maybe because, for him, there were no specifically *American* features that didn't always speak to French or German audiences... Anyway, this soundtrack work is absolutely lovely. Beyond the themes dedicated to the cartoon characters ("Linus And Lucy"), or the more obvious Christmas-related tracks, you have small jewels like "My Little Drum", with its repeated vocal pattern. And most of all, you have two wonderful renditions of "What Child Is This? / Greensleeves". The introductory piano riff on the first version is stellar, enough said. Not exactly up to the level of the John Coltrane version, but still displaying sweet assets even that other great version is devoid of. I'll file this next to Dave Brubeck's *Take Five* on my very popular jazz releases shelves (yes, I have already bought myself a secondhand copy of this nice little record -- it's Xmas, after all...). Coltrane, Mingus and Davis are still a notch more relevant on a musical and cultural standpoint, but that doesn't mean this sort of smooth jazz album can't be excellent as well, as proven here. Merry Christmas to you all, wonderful users and reviewers! 🎁🌲🧑‍🎄🥂🎄☃️🧑‍🎄🌲🧑‍🎄🎄☃️ 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 83 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 158 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

When a bonkers industrial act turns into a bonkers neofolk project -- edgy, quaint, sophisticated, ascetic, kitschy, mystical, weird, grating, enticing, dreamy, nightmarish, naive and provocative all at the same time -- everything up there pulled off in one single outlandish avant-garde gesture. The nightly "The Bloodbells Chime" is one of the highlights of this experimental record, along with the traditional title-track, "The Frolic" and "The Inmost Light". David Tibet's nasal vocals may be an acquired taste for some listeners, but honestly, I've heard far worse in that league of quirky, artsy performers. And there's always some kind of deep emotion in his voice that I find relatable anyway... All in all, it was quite a pleasant listen, some time before dawn... And I also went down into the weirdest and most extraordinary internet rabbit hole as I spun this album (along with its companion EPs). Hypertext links have sent me to wikipedia pages about David Tibet and Current 93's long career, of course, but also to stuff related to the Industrial music scene (John Balance & Coil ; Steven Stapleton & Nurse with Wound, both here in the guest list...). Or they sent me to Nick Cave, also making a surprise appearance on two cuts: first there's one of the versions of "All The Pretty Horses", and then there's the ethereal spoken-word closer "Patripassian", sampling and looping an eerie choral hook written by... a 16th century Italian composer named Carlo Gesualdo. Because, yeah, the internet rabbit hole then went far, FAR deeper -- from Aleister Crowley to Patripassianism itself, or from the only castrato singer whose performance has ever been put to tape (sampled in the first EP of this conceptual trilogy) to that Renaissance composer I've mentioned earlier, primarily remembered for two things: his groundbreaking and prophetic mastery of chromatic progression, and the manner in which he ruthlessly murdered his first wife and her lover just as he caught them doing it (!). Gesualdo was a man who seemed to make a lot of people around him miserable, before ending his life as a depressed recluse. And yet he wrote some gorgeous music infused with all sorts of sacred tones pointing to gracious religiosity. It's the sort of paradox that -- in an admittedly very different musical field, involving very different sets of skills -- an artist such as David Tibet is bound to be drawn to... A few words in French to the user who suggested this album, as it is their native language: Merci beaucoup pour la suggestion. Je savais pas trop où commencer pour découvrir la discographie de Current 93... Mais ce disque a l'air d'être un très bon point d'entrée. Bonne fin de journée ! 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 84 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 158 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

Second-tier Scottish version of The Flaming Lips? This suggestion comes from a user who is clearly enamoured with that type of sound, given that *The Soft Bulletin* is their favorite album in the original list (I can only support that choice, even if I actually prefer *Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots*). Too bad that I didn't vibe with the music of Mull Historical Society, though. The songs are decent, don't get me wrong. But I can't really hear what makes them so special. Also, I was promised "kitchen sink aesthetics" here -- for which I can be a *huge* sucker -- and I have to say I felt particularly let down on that front, because what I listened to seemed a little streamlined instead, quite surprisingly. From Pavement and the early Beck albums to Klaxons, Parquet Courts and Richard Dawson, there's been quite a few examples of such kitchen sink aesthetics in other wonderful records released in the last thirty years or so. And honestly, I can't see why *Loss* would top or even just equal them. It's not zany enough for me. Sorry. Oh, the artwork for this record IS zany, I'm gonna give it that. But "zany" doesn't necessarily mean you can be totally "ridiculous". Sorry again. 🤷 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 64 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 158 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

Wow. Given the music I listened to during the nineties, of course I had heard of Unwound's existence ("Corpse Pose" does sound familiar). But unfortunately I had never gotten to spin one of their LPs. And it was such a MASSIVE blind spot on my part, I only realize it now that I'm reaching the last song on *Repetition*... This is an incredible record, ticking all the right boxes for me, and it's a damn shame I never thought of using my streaming service to check out Unwound's music before today. Forget that Boston Phoenix piece quoted on the Wikipedia page up there, clearly written by someone who didn't know the first thing about that post-hardcore / nineties DIY indie scene (not that *all* the references found in that quote were off-topic, but it doesn't make a shred of sense to compare Unwound to Green Day or Rancid anyway, even to praise the band in comparison). No, those songs here mostly draw from acts such as Unsane, Slint, Chokebore, Jawbox and -- very obviously -- Fugazi (you sure can pinpoint the long shadow cast by *Red Medicine*, released a year prior, on this particular album). Yet the thing to remember here is that the Olympia band have used those influences to the greatest effect (contrary to the very mixed bag offered by that Shudder To Think LP that another user suggested a week ago...). Unwound surely gave their own personal twist to that post-hardcore / noise formula, with a perfect balance of dissonance and gorgeous harmonies, that can trigger all sorts of emotional responses. Those songs can be intense and even violent. Or they can be tense and suspenseful. Or they can be quite moving. Experimental instincts perfectly align with a keen sense of melodicism inserted at the exactly right junctures. Which is how "Repetition* easily joins the ranks of the best albums released by the other bands I've mentioned up there... Among the songs within the tracklist, you have immediate highlights exploring all the different strengths of the band circa 1996: "Message Received", "Corpse Pose", "Lady Elect", "Murder Movies", "Go to Dallas and Take a Left" and "For Your Entertainment". And apart from the instrumental dub cut "Sensible" (secondary yet not unpleasant if you're in a "moody" mindset), each and every track has meaning and purpose if you listen to them the right way... I'm currently listening to the last two albums released by the band before they split up in the early noughts -- two LPs gathered in full in the reissue compilation *Empire*. Once again, Unwound was closely following Fugazi's more experimental footsteps for their own last two records, but this without ever aping them. And what I'm hearing now is gorgeous as well. The music, amping up the more various instrumentation already found in *Repetition*, and sometimes branching out to post-rock or math-rock, even foretells more recent acts such as Suuns, Black Country New Road or DITZ. I've heard that a new version of Unwound's line-up exists today, and I cross my fingers that they can release a studio album soon. I hear that they are the sort of band that have tirelessly worked their artistry and played in all sorts of venues in the most ethical way possible, and this without ever reaping their full share of rewards. So it would be nice for noise rock and post-hardcore fans of my generation to help tip the karmic balance the other way now, towards them. A thousand thanks to the user who suggested this album. At the risk of repeating myself, you just can't imagine how pivotal this suggestion was for me. But I suppose some "repetitions" are never tedious to hear again and again. Hope you can concur. 😉 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 65 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 158 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

"The Modern Leper" sure is a striking opener, as blunt and candid lyrics-wise as it is lively and catchy on a melodic level. And speaking of blunt lyrics about depression, co-dependency and self-loathing... The ones of "Keep Yourself Warm" are memorable as well -- but not always for the right reasons, maybe. There's indeed something that's both gross and a little too on the nose with than mention of "holes" at the start of the song (dealing with how sexual relationships can feel like when they're experienced without genuine love in mind). Which is where the admittedly very fine line between sincerity and self-indulgence is probably straddled. I understand that using the word "self-indulgence" to evoke a frontman who could be so hard on himself might come as a shock for Frightened Rabbit fans. But it's not because something makes you uncomfortable that it *automatically* has artistic value, mind you. Catharsis can only take you so far. You need additional assets to make those sorts of songs reach their full potential. The bulk of the album is very decent for that indie-rock / indie-rock genre, don't get me wrong. For one underwhelming "My Backwards Walk", you have one good tune such as "Fast Blood", so things are evened out quite cohesively. I also appreciated Scott Hutchison's voice for what it was. I think his "strangled" inflexions actually bring a lot of relatable emotion to his overall performance. And from what I've read online, it looks like this album is the main purveyor of those in the Scottish band's discography. That said, if you've just read about how Frightened Rabbit ended -- as I did -- before discovering this album, highlight "Floating in the Forth" might leave a bitter taste in your mouth. It's a great song and great confessional slow cut for sure. But the lyrics also precisely anticipate how Scott Hutchison would choose to end his life ten years later, up to the very location of his suicide (!). Honestly, that made me feel a little angry at him, in a "stop inflicting this to yourself!" sort of way. Either this or I felt like I was intruding on someone's privacy in a manner I should not be allowed to. It's quite hard to stomach, is it not? The bluntness of those lyrics, their poignant metaphor about having a boat -- or simply waves -- taking you to the next world... They're not cryptic enough, and so are nearly unbearable to listen to when you know about Scott's ultimate fate. To anyone going through those sorts of thoughts... be aware that hope can come in many forms -- through reaching out to friends or a family genuinely caring for you, or through mental health professionals. Anything that can help you get better. Be safe out there, alright? 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 65 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 159 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

Really? This is a very decent record harboring some nice songs, don't get me wrong, and Broken Social Scene have the necessary skills to make those songs work arrangement-wise (groovy basslines; a very lively horn section; some elated background vocals...). Yet you also have plenty of unassuming cuts such as the instrumental introduction of this LP, along with a bunch of compositions struggling to reach the epic heights they're aiming for. Nothing unpleasant there. But nothing unforgettable either. Selecting this album when the absolutely stellar *You Forgot It In People* is in none of the two lists is like pretending a pretty good meal at your local joint is more impressive than a delicious feast in a five-star restaurant. Maybe this user has very good memories of a Broken Social Scene gig around the time this record came out. Or maybe the quick reference to Gaza on the second track brought them to believe that those songs are still relevant to the tragic times we're going through twenty years later. And in that case, who am I to blame them? I'm not gonna lie, however, such inexplicable choices on this users section can be frustrating. What I can't forget in people is how they can get it all wrong at times... OK, just kidding here... Or at least utter what I've just said with the most tender tone of voice you can imagine. And don't count on me to say horrible things about what is still a very good band, generally speaking. It's just that you must select their peak first. How do you want younger folks to find their way into the rich history of the indie rock scene if you don't prioritize those peaks? You need unarguable *entry points". And for me, it's not because this LP is titled after the Canadian band's name that it can pass for one... 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 65 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 160 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben joyeux Noël et bonne année aussi !

Yep, that was the blockbuster album of 2022 -- that's right, as much as "monoculture", as the term was understood in the last century, is now dead and buried for good, you still have such watershed, coffee machine moments music-wise today (at least if you can still leave a door open to the "mainstream"). Truth be told, I felt a little annoyed by the critical rave at the time. When you're aware of the promotional powerhouse that's behind Beyoncé, you're tempted to roll your eyes at such a "capitalist" machine. But then I listened to this album with all the attention it deserves, and I can only agree that it's very good -- even excellent at times. Like on the two previous Queen Bey LPs, you have spectacular hits (yay), "committee writing" (sigh), overall flair in the vocal performance (obviously pyrotechnic / impressive / spectacular), crisp production values (basses slap on my hi-fi, as usual with her), some experimental twists and turns emphasizing the sonic journey in all the right manners, along with (admittedly) a certain amount of fillers that could have been trimmed so as to make the project more cohesive (mostly in the middle of the record here -- but once again, you still have an album having a "normal" length once the two or three underwhelming moments are taken out...). That last gripe of mine is also mitigated by the terrifically dynamic nature of the tracklist, constructed like a DJ set. Which is only fitting for a record paying tribute to disco and other related genres aiming to give a voice to African American and/or gay or queer culture. Concept-wise, this is quite flawless. Which makes you automatically forgive Mrs. Carter when she pillages hits of the past and the present to create her own music. All in all, a joyful and even relevant celebration of quite a few strands of popular music from the five last decades or so. "Act 2", *Cowboy Carter*, have since tried to accomplish that celebratory feat again for country-related genres, but it wasn't as successful overall on an artistic viewpoint. Yet you can't blame Beyoncé for her ambition, either there or back in 2022. I wish I had the time to go track by track, but as I said, the "mixtape" nature of this album allows to take it as a whole in spite of its rare low points. And the thing is, tonight is new year's eve, and I'm celebrating with friends myself. Who knows? Maybe I'll play *Renaissance* at some point, at least of people start dancing... Happy new year to everyone!!!! 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 66 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 160 ---- Post-scriptum to this user: you're a little narrow-minded when it comes to your music tastes, aren't you? Or maybe you're just opinionated... and well, in that case... more power to you. Here's me hoping that inclusivity can lead you to discover more flavors later in life. But even if that doesn't happen, we can still celebrate the things we agree on. In this day and age, it's more important than splitting hairs, is it not? ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben bonne année aussi !

Some guy from Propaghandi branches out to indie rock during the early noughts, and with his new band, writes and releases songs with very interesting lyrics, apparently serving an overall "concept" that's dear to his heart. Unfortunately, said songs are a little underwhelming at times when it comes to memorable melodies. Some arrangements work well, others miss the mark -- in the end, nothing to be ashamed of, but not 'essential album fodder'. With those sorts of records, I'm always wondering if the lyrical conceits and/or lyrical ambitions are not a trap for the songwriter, leading him to complicate the vocal lines whereas that wasn't needed here. Some of those songs feel so... chatty. Or, I don't know... Maybe it's just John K. Samson's voice rubbing me the wrong way. Yet I'm not sure it is that, because I have quite enjoyed his performance in his 2016 solo album *Winter Wheat*. All I can say for sure is that *Reconstruction Site* didn't click for me. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 66 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 161 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

After The Weakerthans yesterday, Less Than Jake today. Ominous coincidence? The negative comparative forms used to name those acts indeed kind of mirror my experience of the users' list these days. Where are the truly great albums left to review, goddamnit? I've seen the big names that should come by now, and yet they haven't popped up yet. Heavy sigh. I have to admit my mood this morning needed everything but ska punk from the nineties. I'm trying to judge this thing in its own merits, placing myself in the mindset of a teenager or young adult living in that decade (which I have been). But I would lie if I said the method is fully working... At least there's more intensity in the vocal performance on one single song from this record than there is to be found in the whole career of Blink-182. Funny to read on the *Hello Rockview* wiki page that auto-tune was so heavily used for its vocals parts by the way -- first registered use for a "rock" singer, according to the producer. You would never believe it on superficial listens (the "discreet", "merely-fix-the-bum-notes" method was obviously applied here). That anecdotal tidbit aside, the instrumentation and other production values expected for this genre are well pulled off -- sounding more pop-punk / skate-punk that The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, for instance, and yet still punchy enough to make this record lively overall. I'd rather return to my own ska punk references (The Suicide Machine -- that one feels truly PUNK! -- Capdown, the ska-punk tracks of Rancid and NOFX...), references that are clearly a little wilder and a little less streamlined. But that would probably be my own nostalgia speaking here (more on that later...). Oh and the lyrics sound "progressive" enough for my tastes, which I can only subscribe to The user who selected this album is a "perfectionist" -- very low global score for both lists -- but as far as I can tell, they leave thoughtful and balanced reviews, and I haven't seen a single heinous word in their takes, so I'm not gonna try to pick a fight with them. It just seems a little crazy that some of the greatest names in music history receive 1/5 grades from this person and yet this is what they suggest for the secondary list. But at the end of the day, music appreciation is always subjective, so more power to this user for raising their idiosyncratic flag high. To return to this album... According to Wikipedia: "NME listed the album as one of "20 Pop Punk Albums Which Will Make You Nostalgic", saying that it is "A soundtrack to shoving your friends, listening to 'All My Best Friends Are Metalheads' and wondering how you ever liked pop punk which didn't have a trombone." Yeah, well, this is just as I feared... It's never a good sign when the first selling point modern reviewers ascribe to an old album today is nostalgia. Honestly I feel "too old" for this music style now, at least overall... But I'm also too young at heart to prioritize said style when so many stellar albums in all genres have been released during the 2020s. Just to take an example somehow adjacent to this specific music genre, 100 Gecs' own use of ska punk in their zany and unhinged electropop albums is admittedly "unprofessional", mostly parodic and filled with all sorts of cheesy overtones. And yeah, it's HEAVILY auto-tuned this time around, ha ha! And yet, somehow, the best 100 Gecs ska punk tracks feel more alive, more vital, or just funnier these days than everything I've heard from Less Than Jake -- in keeping with the very strange times we are going through... The Wiki page also mentions that the CD booklet for *Hello Rockview* is a full-blown comic book, with the lyrics serving as dialogue between its characters. Wish I could browse through those pages myself. I guess this nice design idea also makes the album very endearing to Less Than Jake's fans. File this under the "1001 Best Album Artworks Of All Time"? At least for the booklet? 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 66 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 162 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

Stellar musicianship here, of course. And an admirable knack for composing platonic ideals of the genre. I've always loved watching a good bluegrass band live, and yet, oddly enough, I don't have any bluegrass act on my shelves, except that Nitty Gritty album. So maybe I could buy a cheap copy of this one if I could get my hands on it... There are also some interesting and evocative dirges into other adjacent genres within the tracklist: folk country, of course, (like the moving "My Alice", or the terrific instrumental "Seney Stretch"), but also into gipsy jazz / tex mex (the other terrific instrumental "Escanaba"), along with Western-like cinematic cuts ("Seven Weeks In County"), "cosmic" Americana ("Gild The Lilly"), psychedelia ("Stratosphere Blues" / "I Believe In You"), or even weird weed-infused experiments ("MOREBUD4ME"). Not that the project is perfect, far from it. There's something a little too "clean-sounding" and generic in the vocals and production values (looks like Jon Brion was involved, and I can recognize his very "professional" input here somehow). Also, the length of this double album sort of drowns the more adventurous forays into the sheer mass of more "by-the-numbers" bluegrass cuts (found either at the center or towards the end of this double LP). And what's the point of "Catch And Release" except making a quick wink towards Johnny Cash when he went through his spoken word routine -- a wink that ironically leads to zero... release? Worse, some compositions cover ground that has already been covered better before (did we really need another gipsy jazz -adjacent instrumental with "Malfunction Junction" when "Escanaba" was already this good?). And consequently, the whole thing lacks some punch and momentum in its last leg. You sometimes wish Billy and his producing team would have picked a lane and stayed there -- which is why some amount of self-editing would have been welcome maybe. It's in the nature of double albums to "lose the thread" at some point, but you gotta find a more dynamic and "spectacular" way to do it somehow -- and make it so that the sum of the tracklist equals more than its discrete parts, as admirable as some of them are. I know, I know... I'm probably nitpicking here. Lots of moments in this record would provide a nice soundtrack for an idle Sunday in the countryside, even if it's too soon to know if Billy Strings will leave an imprint on public consciousness in the long run. I'm amazed that the streaming numbers for this artist are so high (hence Jon Brion's involvement for this album?). The industry sure spotted the man's potential, beyond critics lists, prominent music websites reviews and even Wikipedia writers (there's not even a wiki page dedicated to this album, go figure!). Maybe ten years from now, people will laugh at reviewers for missing the talent that William Lee Apostol is. Or maybe everyone will have forgotten about him... But I'm happy for Billy Strings that he currently "lives the dream" given his grassroots origins and messy upbringing. It's a feel good story that could trigger a benevolent feeling towards another project of his in the future -- to the point where I could maybe include it in my own list of 1001 albums? Going through this particular record again, I don't think "this is it", at least not yet. But some "highway prayers" are answered once in a while... So I'm gonna keep an eye on Billy in the years to come, at least. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 66 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 163 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne pendant la période des fêtes. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

Yep, Turnstile sure made waves with this album in 2021 -- here showcasing their own streamlined, airy and genre-defying rendition of the sort of modern hardcore punk that was far from the spotlight two decades earlier (Comeback Kid, Have Heart, Verse...), helped along by a producer who mostly had hip hop and other urban music names in his résumé, oddly enough. The result is very good, even excellent on the first side of the record, thanks to fun and effective cuts such as "Mystery", "Blackout", "Underwater Boi" or "Holiday". The world was still reeling from the COVID crisis in 2021, and lots of music listeners just needed some "good clean fun" in their lives (to use the name of another old "positive-thinking" hxc band from the noughts that would be even more obscure for general audiences, lol). It was that moment in music history where the communal experience of a hardcore show had significantly gained some meaning. Right place, right time. I'm not gonna lie, given what I already knew about the genre, Turnstile still made me raise an eyebrow quite a few times when I first got to know them (it was through their previous LP *Time and Space*). Also, they have a tendency to rip off other bands from the past: on *Glow On*, for instance, Turnstile indeed rips off the introductory bassline of Dead Kennedys' "Holiday In Cambodia" for... "Holiday", of course! Or they borrow from Sly And The Family Stone's "Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Again)" for the vocal hook on the bridge of the -- absolutely bonkers -- "T.L.C."... As the sly foxes that they are, they just change enough notes or details to avoid being sued, I imagine. Oh, they're quite overt about the whole thing, thanks to obvious clues here and there (for those who have a long enough memory span, at least). Yet I still want to tell them I can see them pillaging all sorts of (good) stuff out there... That being said, it wouldn't make much sense for me to play the part of a gatekeeper here. Turnstile might not be the most original songwriters in the genre, but they have revitalized the latter, and you can only praise them for doing that in ways that still feel earnest and vital. The couple of stylistic U-turns towards electronic / urban music found in *Glow On* (for instance on "Underwater Boi", or "Alien Call Love", featuring Blood Orange) are well-executed. Those stylistic U-turns are -- quite logically -- even more pronounced on some highlights of *Never Enough*, the album the American band released last year -- unfortunately a notch less impactful as a whole, but still great enough. And Brendan Yates is a very distinctive vocal performer, which is absolutely pivotal for this hardcore style. I just can't bring myself to give this record full marks because the dynamics on the second half of this LP are not as impressive as the ones on its first side (even though "Lonely Dezires" is an excellent closer, tight and driven). One thing's for sure, however -- I'm ready to include "Glow On" in my own list of 1001 "essential" albums... on the condition that four or five other "modern hardcore punk" albums from the 21st century are represented there as well. After all, I think there's enough room in my list so that half a dozen albums in that style and era can "glow on" there. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 67 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 85 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 163 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

I distinctly remember listening to this record back in 2009 and *almost* buying it. To this day, I wasn't sure what it was that made me keep my money to myself instead. The first half of opener "Help I'm Alive" sure was an epic slap in the face. But somehow, I found that the track ran for too long after its relatively underwhelming "landfill indie" bridge. And to be honest, I sort of felt the same dynamic overall for the whole album. There's a lot of catchy melodies. Like, A LOT, which somehow raised a very rare question in my mind: "can there be *too many melodies* in an LP?" -- in the sense that they somehow stifle more adventurous or unexpected moments you also want to find at some point in an indie-rock record. I know, I know, this sounds like someone asking if there can be too much of a good thing served on a silver platter. But my point is that the instant catchiness exemplified throughout *Fantasies* somehow gives you the feeling there's not enough "substance" in it, just as pop rock bangers pile up one after another without ever challenging your expectations. I almost never feel this for that sort of generally propulsive pop rock band... Is it because of Emily Haines' sugary-sweet vocals? Is it because of the production values, maybe too rooted in the late noughts era they came from -- streamlined to a fault, and therefore potentially lacking some dynamics? Is it because of the chord sequences that are a little too *by the book" sometimes? Many songs remind me of The Cardigans without the constant harmonic modulations, (admittedly annoying to a degree), as if there was a sort of readymade "formula" behind the compositions preventing Metric to take some risks. It's very pleasant music overall. But in their wish to please at all cost, the Canadian rock band might also have diluted something that would give a more distinct extra "identity" to those tunes... So listening to this thing fifteen years later, I'm still a little on the fence about it, even though I WANT to love it so bad -- to the point that I might even buy a cheap copy of it online to see of the record finally convinces me on my hi-fi. Rarely have I felt so... undecided, either for the original list or the one curated by the user... Still giving this one the benefit of the doubt, though, and so including it in my 4/5 gallery. I hope the record as whole -- beyond its obvious highlights such as "Gold Guns Girls" or "Gimme Sympathy" -- grows on me somehow. I haven't given up on it yet. But it might take a while. .. To the user who submitted this album: thanks for the suggestion, and thanks for many of your fun reviews. Contrary to me, you know how to make them relatively short and to the point, and yet you also know how to express takes that are both personal and often quite convincing. So more power to you for flying your idiosyncratic flag high. That's the spirit for me. That said, ONE of your reviews angered me a little, the one about that Rita Ora album (to which I personally gave a 1/5 mark). In it you say: "No surprise that the other reviewers didn't like it. God forbid something stray from male-oriented rock every now and again." Jeeze Louise, the bad faith is astounding here. How can you get it so wrong, at least about *me* as listener, for instance? Yeah, I love many strands of rock and punk music, and yet you can also find Charli XCX's *Brat* in my highest-rated users gallery, as well as Chappell Roan, Olivia Rodrigo, Lady Gaga and Magdalena Bay in my 4/5 selection (to which I could add Dua Lipa, Jesse Ware, Rosalía, or even Madonna one day). It's not because I find Rita Ora's songs inert and unmemorable that I have instant prejudice against female pop singers. It's just that I have my own set of requirements for good pop music writing -- so forgive me if I fly my own freak flag high myself. If there's one thing that three years of using this app has told me, it's that not a single person's music tastes look like the ones of another. So categorizing users like that is certainly not painting the most reliable picture of what makes people fall in love with music in the first place, often beyond their own "favorite" genres... With that in mind, your selection still has my blessing. I might have my own (provisory?) reservations about Metric's *Fantasies* as a whole, I can still recognize good songwriting in it. And yeah, as "subjective" as the adjective "good" is here, you can't so easily file other subjectivities as if they were *all* examples of misogyny or bad faith takes themselves. It's actually NOT helping people taking Rita Ora's music seriously on paper, for instance -- no matter what it is that a user like me thinks about said music. Explain further why it's good for *you* instead, why it ticks your boxes. You'll be doing her the favor you think she deserves. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 67 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 163 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

Never got why prog fans fawn so much over Porcupine Tree. Their music isn't inherently bad, but it's so standardized you're losing almost all the quirks and idiosyncracies that made legendary seventies prog rock acts what they were. For a more modern rendition of those quirks and idiosyncrasies, go to The Mars Volta instead, as some other reviewer suggested. Everything after this introduction might sound extraneous, and I wouldn't blame you for skipping to the next review. That said, I feel the need to express in more details why Porcupine Tree's oeuvre -- here represented by this 2007 record -- sounds so overrated to my ears. First of all, *Fear Of A Blank Planet* comes off as quite an ironic title, in hindsight. As said earlier, the music is not necessarily horrible, and lots of efforts and skills have been harnessed to create it. But the problem is that those efforts don't necessarily pay off as they should. Some flaws are especially obvious for me, and here's a little list of them... The vocal performance in the record is rather bland. The lyrics are pontificating. The drums sound is uninteresting. The metal-inspired parts are often heavy-handed -- when they don't simply take a page out of the "Tool for Beginners" handbook (hate or like Tool, I think their rhythmically adventurous sort of artistry can be appreciated better in its original version). Worse, the general mood is dour, Porcupine Tree rarely finding ways to generate clear-cut dynamics or genuinely intense peaks... What you have instead is meat-and-potatoes prog clichés, pulled off through overblown and streamlined production values that can even recall the worst Muse albums sometimes... Also, Steven Wilson is a reactionary twat, at least on a purely artistic viewpoint. Here's what he told in an interview in 2016: "I think it’s possible to take a step back and be objective and say that the music of today really isn’t as good as it was." Yeah, right, you're being awfully "objective" here, man. OK Boomer? That's a pretty lame take if I have ever seen one. Tell me you're out of touch with the modern music world without telling me you're out of touch, Stevie. Finally, to go beyond the subject of music itself -- in an admittedly off-topic fashion --, you don't hear Wilson tell the press Israel is such a great country these days, which he has done at least once or twice in the past. Look, I understand... Huge parts of both his professional and personal lives are rooted in Tel Aviv, and the ties he has in that part of the world made the BDS movement sound appalling to him in 2016. But the sad truth is that, stuck in his own liberal echo chamber there, he never realized -- or *refused* to fully realize -- that the country he loved so much was also run as an imperialist power crushing Palestine in whatever way it could -- therefore fueling the most fanatical elements in the latter, to the detriment of civilian populations living on both sides of the ever-changing borders. For that imperialist power, the agenda has always been pretty obvious: anything to torpedo the peace protest and refuse to be accountable for the damage that had already been done. Yeah, sure, maybe Wilson was too naive to see that the state of Israel could morph into the criminal fascistic monstrosity that it is today, and I guess you can't ask a musician to be a geopolitical expert. But even if I can't blame a whole population for the decades of mistakes their leaders have accomplished, the writing has always been on the proverbial wall for anyone with sufficient knowledge and a shred of sense left in their brains. BDS was right all along. The current death toll, along with the volatile situation for every population living in the area, simply proves it for me. So yeah, Mr. Wilson, I think I can see why you prefer to keep quiet about those sorts of international politics issues ten years later. You might have expressed all sorts of grand ideas through your lyrics in the past, you know there are some other can of worms that should never have been opened elsewhere. Or at least you do now, considering how silent you suddenly are about what has been going in the last two years. There was one initial statement from you -- a statement understandably horrified by the Oct. 7 tragedy and terror attacks, but never nominally addressing the injustice that had *also* fallen on Palestinian civilians for decades -- an injustice which would only amplify tenfold in the two years to come. And since that statement, zilch, nothing, nada. Honestly, for me, it's pretty weak, especially in the face of the thousands and thousands of deaths in the Gaza Strip. Or that silence is possibly even worse that that... But as I said, maybe it's better to keep quiet than utter yet another stupid take about things you are ill-equipped to fully understand in the first place. Just so everyone knows, the last point I've made up there didn't influence my 2/5 grade (7/10 for general purposes not related to the requirements of this list of essential albums -- 5+2). I only gave my subjective assessment of the music with this mark. But I wanted to address that *other*, far more important issue as well through this tentative "review". Thanks for listening to me, I can get down from my soapbox now. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 67 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 164 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

I have left a couple of sourpuss comments about some users' opinions found in this generator lately. I don't exactly regret doing so -- some of those bad faith takes still sound cringe to me, and here again, I want to stress out that the problem is most often not the opinions themselves (to each their own, you can't *fully* argue with people's needs and tastes, obviously), but rather the manner in which those opinions were phrased... All that being said, I still feel like I need to tip the karmic balance the other way now. So I want to use the opportunity this Bruce Hornsby album gives me to pay a heartfelt tribute to all the wonderful music nerds who finished the original list, whose pert and on-point reviews help me navigate the complex waters of the users' list these days. Those reviews are a real help at times. It's not that I need the opinions of others to make up my own mind, no. It's just that reading those opinions help me set my own expectations right about an album, just as they help me know the sort of active listening I need to trigger: from a "you-will-really-need-to-open-your-shakras" mode (I never fully dismiss a suggestion because of genre -- even if, like everyone, I have my own story with them) to one where I can just let myself go with the flow. The users' list indeed mentions far more obscure artists for me on average and also zigzags between styles and quality levels in such an unhinged fashion... And it does this to the point where it becomes a little difficult to keep the pace of a daily listen at times! Luckily, you guys and gals most often summarize the essence of a record in ways I can never pull off myself with my own long-ass reviews. Even better, most takes are as well thought-out and phrased as they are honest and concise. Frankly, I'm in awe of that. Case in point, some of the 1/5, 2/5, and 3/5 reviews left about Bruce Hornsby's *Harbor Lights*. Some of those fabulous (and short) reviews about this LP are a little mean, sure. But their authors can also find ways to express their takes with a humorous wink, which also actually conveys the hard-to-express affect that comes with the inherent nature of any record -- whether said affect is "positive" or "negative". In that league, my favorite review is this one: "Absolute shoutout to the legend who found this album of the music they played at KMarts". Simply hilarious. Sure, you could argue there's a bit of bad faith expressed here as well. Bruce Hornsby's songs have all the earmarks of that sort of "muzak", yet it can also go to sophisticated jazz territory that brings it closer to Steely Dan or Joe Jackson. The thing is, you can't *fully* get rid of bad faith when it comes to music appreciation ; it's just that you need to find ways to express it that also says something relevant about the "culture" we're all immersed in. Music reception never exists in a vacuum. It's always carrying all sorts of cultural signs and "values" with it. Those values are not "fixed" forever, of course. Yet every genuine music fan, whether in the past or today, knows what it feels like to go to do errands in a supermarket and having to bear with the music played there -- one you have never chosen yourself, and yet are forced to listen to whether you like it or not. Supermarkets would never play Bruce Hornsby in 2026, but they could have done it back then, right? The dross played there never dictate music tastes anyway. As far as I'm concerned, I would rather have silence while I'm doing errands at the end of a very long day. Because that can be tiring and stressful, and you don't need an extra background stimulus you never asked for to boot. But maybe that's only me... More importantly, through this three-line review, you can immediately grasp how there's indeed something perfunctory and glossy in Hornsby's music -- as with this record, which came out in the early nineties, when general tastes for music were changing so fast, in ways the "industry" had not fully anticipated (another reviewer pointed it out: *Harbor Lights* was already "ten years later" when it was released). Under that light, the anachronism of *Harbor Lights* may come off as endearing for some users, I guess. But let's face it, it was also ridiculous for a lot of younger listeners. Another sort of scathing and yet beautiful review is the one where the reviewer is able to summarize the subjective effect of a whole tracklist with clear and precise words. Here's one about *Harbor Lights* encapsulating all those requirements: "Harbor Lights starts incredibly strong and sets expectations the rest of the album struggles to meet. The title track is excellent: great piano and guitar work, dissonant touches near the end, and a sense of momentum that feels playful and alive. The final song "Pastures of Plenty" captures that same spirit again, and "What a Time" briefly lifts the middle of the album with a bit of swing, horns, and genuine fun. Unfortunately, most of what sits between those highlights is far less interesting. A lot of the album suffers from stiff late-80s production, especially the drum sounds, which flatten otherwise capable songs into MOR jazz-pop. Tracks like "China Doll," "Fields of Gray," and "Rainbow's Cadillac" aren't unpleasant, but they don't say much either. The arrangements feel safe, and the energy drains away quickly. Hornsby is clearly a strong musician, but here the polish often works against him. When he allows dissonance, groove, or looseness into the songs, the album comes alive. When he leans into smoothness, it becomes forgettable. Two excellent bookends and one bright spot don't justify the slog in between." I 100% concur here. Each and every word of this review transcribes my own opinion, and those are my *exact* feelings. They're not objective feelings, of course. But shaped by the culture around us as we all are, you can talk of a "grouped subjectivity" at least -- one which I can certainly pinpoint in this review and the manner in which the reception of Hornsby's artistry is expressed. And here is also why I think it's an excellent review, beyond the particular opinion that's expressed there. Because it sums up many points in quite an elegant and economical manner, and rarely uses an aggressive word, as negative as the opinion is overall... I just need to add one thing now: Bruce Hornsby is a stellar piano player, but he's not a very good singer, is he? His vocal performance is lackluster on the opener and title-track (which is a shame because it's the best track songwriting-wise). Worse, he is off-key in quite a few moments within the performance. And this is absolutely jarring when you play that sort of glossy, lounge act sound. Either you play the music game with all its "professional" requirements, or you challenge it in spite of your limited technical skills so as to emphasize the artistic gesture first (emotions can surge out of both methods, after all). But you can't sit in between. That's just sloppy. And so, here is yet another long-ass review from me (actually more like a compilation of other users' reviews). Can someone teach me how to make them short and sweet, just like the ones I've just singled out here? Hope I can reach that point in the near future. Who knows, maybe it will feel like opening a door to a blue ocean of bliss, as seen on the right handside of that Edward Hopper masterpiece? ---- 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (4.5 for the musicianship and production values + 1.5 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 67 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 165 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

At LONG last! Nothing can beat the string of perfect desert-rock jewels "No One Knows" - "First It Giveth" - "A Song For The Dead" and "The Sky Is Falling" on the first side. This thing is wild. It's seductive AND menacing. It grooves and rocks in equal measure. Josh Homme croons like his life depends on it. His guitar roars and swoons effortlessly, like tires scratching on the asphalt. Oliveri's bass ticks like an indicator going bonkers. Dave Grohl's drumming is firing in all cylinders. And Mark Lanegan's appearance chills the bones, as if he was a ghost on the side of the road... A little later, QOTSA deliver the *perfect" melodic rock / motorik song with "Go With The Flow". Homme's vocal lines and mellifluous harmonies there are a work of sheer genius. And just as in "A Song For The Dead", the syncopated accents in the drums feel like bumps on a highway to hell. And yet the car drives even faster the more you go into the song. When has rock'n'roll ever felt so exciting? When? Even the supposed "deeper cuts" have a cult-favorite aura to them: "Gonna Leave You", "Do It Again", "God Is in the Radio", "Another Love Song", up until the gothic title-track and (almost) closer. It's always a whole trip to get lost in their cinematic twists and turns... This is an oversight so HUGE in the original book it almost ruins it. As huge as the one of Weezer's "Blue Album", if only in terms of cultural impact. Wouldn't be surprised to see this record joining said Blue Album in the users list's highest global scores in the near-future... I know I'm getting old and this LP feels sort of "dad rock" for the younger generations. But it's a dad rock CLASSIC now, just like the ones of The Who, Creedence or Led Zeppelin decades before it. Because when younger people want to start looking into the past, *Songs For The Deaf* is as good an entry point as the best records by those other legendary acts. So, Dimery and co, please take out the "draft" that the self-titled debut was, and place *Songs For The Deaf* instead. And add *Rated R* while you're at it! Honestly, you'll keep on looking like jokes if you don't do so. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 68 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 165 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

And here is a *second* highlight by this incredibly prolific Aussie band on this users list. I gotta hand it to KGATLW fans: they know their proverbial shit. When a band has such a sprawling discography, you could easily lose the thread and not select their most convincing LPs. This is not the case here. *Polygondwanaland* is a thing of wonder. Sort of a platonic ideal for the band's artistry, which is quite a feat for a band that tackles so many genres. Heck, just to address one little detail from the record, the discreet synth touches found there, supporting King Gizzard's jam rock guitar riffs and off-kilter polyrhythms, could even anticipate far later concept albums of theirs like *The Silver Cord*. This band has no stylistic boundaries, and yet they often manage to remain cohesive somehow, either within individual albums, or throughout their vast output (cohesive in a spiritual sense related to their dedication). And when their inspiration is top-notch -- as it is the case here -- their cinematic music can send you into the most evocative soundscapes ever. As in that AllMusic review, I could therefore state that Stu McKenzie and his pals are "in full command of their process and results". Case in point, the seductive and lively "Crumbling Castle", which is both one of their top 5 songs and one of their top 3 openers. And the rest follows suit as it should in a tracklist that's equally subtle and dynamic: the tribal "The Castle in the Air,", the terrific harmonic modulations at the end of "Inner Cell", the driven and adventurous "Horology", or the rampaging closer "The Fourth Colour." With five albums in 2017 -- including the other highlights *Flying Microtonal Banana* and *Murder Of The Universe -- KGATLW were at the apex of their powers in that era. So it makes a lot of sense to select this particular LP -- one that was given "for free" to the world to boot (hence why you can find all of its songs on the record's Wikipedia page -- except the opener, oddly enough). That disdain for the rules of the music industry also extended to the band later boycotting Spotify for all the right reasons. And yet it's also what made them popular somehow. A little food for thought here... So yeah, musical quality + cultural impact (there's a reason King Gizzard still has such a cult status today) equals... a relevant selection for this list. And when there are so many "continents" in your huge body of work, it's nice that you can find one example from it that can gather them all (or most of them, at least). 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 69 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 165 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

People Falling Asleep. Yeah, I know, that dig up there sounds gratuitously mean for what is ultimately a skilled and very competent artist. The thing is, Sam Fender's take on that sort of dad rock is still too complacent, still too streamlined, and still all-too-safe for me to ever consider the suggestion seriously. The War On Drugs had already pulled off that "retro" trick / soft-rock shtick ten years ago, and even back then, I thought the hype was kind of suspicious. But now, a decade later, the word "suspicious" doesn't even begin to cover how devoid of genuinely thrilling features Sam Fender's music is, in spite of the industry trying to push it down our collective throats right now. Minus one exception on the second side -- the slow and brooding "TV Dinner" -- everything else (especially the vocals) sounds so flat and so syrupy on a compositional level that my stomach sickens at the very thought of listening to this album a third time around. Probably because I find this sort of FM dross 100% "reactionary" on a purely artistic level. Wikipedia informs me of ONE positive thing to say about this record, though: "On 10 September 2025, *People Watching* was announced as one of 12 nominees for the 2025 Mercury Prize. It was later announced as the winner on 16 October 2025. Fender later donated the entirety of his £25,000 Mercury Prize winnings to the Music Venue Trust, which works to preserve the UK's grassroots music venues." Now that's a good and heartfelt initiative from a current artist if I have ever seen one last year. Doesn't change the fact that around 80% of the Mercury Prize winners are looked upon derisively a couple of decades later (check the list for yourself). But I can't hold it against Fender for having his heart in the right place, at a time where small live music venues are endangered. Apart from that, more power to this user for finding an artist to his liking in 2025. With so much exciting music released last year, I personally think users can do better suggestions than this record, so clearly fit for bland algorithm-driven playlists. Or they could at least select more artistically relevant artists truly representative of the current state of "good" music. Of course that opinion is highly subjective, just as each and every opinion on this generator is. And this, no matter the year any given album mentioned here was released, actually. Maybe it would be interesting for some users to know my list of personal favorites for 2025, so that they can see if my overall tastes can match with theirs beyond this particular review... So my favorite records last years were albums by Geese, Rosalia, Viagra Boys, Black Country New Road, Adrianne Lenker / Big Thief, Water From Your Eyes, The Armed, Tropical Fuck Storm, Caroline, Pile, Shame, Swans, Clipse, Ditz, Deftones, Alan Sparhawk, Fragile, Prewn, Lambrini Girls, Tyler The Creator, Andrea Lazslo De Simone, Horsegirl, BDRMM and TVOD. And I dare to believe that there is more vital energy, more imagination or more groundbreaking features in ten seconds from the albums those artists released in 2025 than there is to be found in the whole of *People Watching*. Sorry for being harsh here. Looks like I'd rather listen to an album named *People Speaking Bluntly* instead. It sounds less boring. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 69 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 166 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

Yeah, this album (Wilco's debut, I think?) is pretty cool in a grassroots sort of ways. But I think that Jeff Tweedy and co. did far better after, from *Being There" to *A Ghost Is Born*, and from *Yankee Hotel Foxtrot* to *Summerteeth*. Heck, even 2023's *Cousin* -- guided by the producing genius of Cate Le Bon -- sounds more appealing to me now. Wilco surely needed some more different stylistic influences to *really* take flight, and this relatively underwhelming album proves it for me. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 69 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 167 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

J-Pop album, with somewhat dated production values on it, but still better that the Christina Aguilera dross from the same decade in the original book. Distinctive influence from mid-career Madonna there, as some perceptive listener noted here. The thing is too long to garner significant interest decades later -- duds such as "One Night Magic" and "WINGS" in the second half could easily have been edited out -- but I didn't hate the rest, generally speaking. Some chord changes and subtle modulations were pleasant and catchy at least, and there's still a cohesive artistic vision supporting the whole thing, even if the tones and moods vary from one cut to the next. The ones found in the two versions of "Passion" / "Sanctuary" at the end of the streaming service version were very surprising, by the way. *Ray Of Light*-era Madonna influence again here, sure, but oddly enough, Utada's lines and gothic reversed-tracked background vocals made me think of... Tool! That's right, Tool, of all people! Listen to the song again, you might see what I'm talking about... Not surprised this cut is actually extracted from a popular video game. There's indeed something cinematic in it. On that subject of visual media... I find it interesting that a lot of reviewers couldn't help compare *Ultra Blue* to "anime music" when the album rarely offers the very odd meters for vocal lines often found in anime songs (vocal lines that can be very sloppy, just as they cram too many words for the lyrics). And the instrumentation on this record is way more dynamic and adventurous than the one found in most anime soundtracks. For me, those reviewers are clearly underestimating Western world music influences on Hikaru Utada's songwriting. Speaking of which, I also find it interesting that this Japanese pop star writes her songs all by herself. Here again, we are miles away from the usual J-Pop factory dross created in a lab, filled with "experts" paid by the hour. Will I return to *Ultra Blue*? Nope, there are to many music genres I'm genuinely interested in to waste what's left of my life on this sort of streamlined and rather by-the-book pop record (which this LP ultimately is in spite of its assets). But the user who suggested this still has my blessing for trying to broaden our horizons. I only wish they had not stopped using this generator after only reviewing one tenth of the albums from the original list. It's always hard to open our shakras when a user suggesting an album has not gone through the job most of us here have already done. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 69 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 86 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 168 (including this one) ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année!

My preference in Soul Coughing's discography goes to their sophomore LP *Irresistible Bliss*, which is a tighter and more effective album in spite of its (voluntary) ugly-ass artwork. But if *Ruby Vroom*'s full hour had been self-edited a little, especially on its second half, you would have had a perfect debut, thanks to its insane sense of groove, its crazed sampling, its drums and double-bass regalia, and M. Doughty's particularly distinctive voice, in all the senses of the phrase. Just so you know, the original, non-deluxe tracklist stops after "Janine". But whether you stop there or not, I think you can safely say that a stellar and very original 45-minute LP lies there somewhere. And it's up to you to find it. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 69 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 87 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 168 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année

Amazing how this album is already typical of its day and age and yet still addressing how online "garbage" discourse somehow seeps through the ever-elusive sense of "reality" today. Through its obfuscating concept about a rich African-American "boy" having all sorts of existential questions -- which lead him from hedonism and sexual urges to a suicide attempt, from innocent love and romantic impulses to drug dealing, and from idleness and apathy to what is possibly aggrandizing self-realization, fitting to the status of a mock-political prophet of sorts-- Childish Gambino takes us by the hand, leads us into a crazy labyrinth, suddenly cuts our Ariadne's thread on several key junctures, and leaves us there to find our way out. From a few discreet sources out there, it appears that Daniel Glover had gone through a very serious personal crisis before recording this album. And given how both original and effective the latter is, it looks like he had found a way for this crisis to fuel his artistic vision at least -- helped along by the incredibly versatile and resourceful Ludwig Göransson for instrumentation and production. So now, about what I wrote in the first lines of this tentative "review"... This LP is indeed *of its time* because it both displays and critiques the nascent fascination for internet culture and its postmodernist maze of memes and self-referential brain rot, so "normalized" right now you'd probably not use the same language to describe those things today -- which incidentally brings a somewhat nostalgic flavor to this thing, oddly enough, harking back to the more innocent times that saw the project's birth. And musically speaking, partial nostalgia also plays a part, given that in its most melodic highlights the album offers strong late noughts / early 2010s, r'n'b-infused hip hop flavours sounding slick, layered and glossy -- contrasting a lot with the more abrasive and experimental cuts also used to tell the story of "the boy" (but more on the album's overall structure later on). Think of an even more tortured version of Frank Ocean, or a truly intelligent (!) version of Kanye circa *MBTDF*, and you're not so far off the mark. Yet even if *Because The Internet* is of its time, it still manages to sound relevant *today*, because it shows said "internet' as a hall of deforming mirrors bound to lead to derealization and schizophrenia. And given the current political climate, such aesthetics are still potent. Not that the album is directly political -- even if the line "You got some silverware / but really, are you eating, though?" in "Sweatpants" sounds like a more scathing and more self-ironical version of Ocean's lyrics about "Super Rich Kids" (that line gets me every time!). The thing is, it sometimes feels like we're all trapped in the belly of that horrible internet beast today, and maybe it took a nerd like Donald Glover -- already invested a lot on that sort of online world -- to see where it would lead us more than a decade later. The passing reference to a far-right troll on the album's closer sure is prophetic, unfortunately. Let's just say that we're not out of the dark digital woods explored by this album yet, right? Now it needs to be said that, like all good rock operas of days yonder, with a script provided with it to follow the "story" (say The Who's *Tommy*), good rap concept albums can't really hold water if they don't have their fair share of bops. And fortunately, two pivotal "acts" in the five-act structure of the album (structured as a seven-act thing on the liner notes of the album's physical copies -- because why not?) are filled to the brim with those absolute bangers. I'm first talking about act 2 here: indeed, the album really takes flight on its onset on a musical level, with "The Worst Guys". Then it ups the ante with each successive track: "Shadows", "Telegraph Ave.", and "Sweatpants", culminating with the terrific choruses of "3005" (that goddamn "hol' up" hook!). Then, some time later, "Because The Internet" ends with a bang, thanks to another perfect string of three songs on its last leg: "Pink Toes", "Earth: The Oldest Computer", and "Life: The Biggest Troll" -- the latter having "Donald Glover" showing his face from behind the scenes in a meta-twist that's kind of predictable by this point, and that yet feels earned and emotionally powerful given what the lyrics say about the absolute need to connect with real people again. Twelve years before Kendrick Lamar said "Turn The TV Off", Childish Gambino had already told us to turn off the internet after getting lost into it. I have a sneaking suspicion that if the first request mentioned up here (Kendrick's) will always be more famous than the second, it's the second that will resonate the most for me in the future. Before and between those two acts filled with bops, you might ask? Well, what you have there is often more akin to ominous nightmarish vignettes used to narrate the "story" than songs proper, and yet those cuts never sounds grating or pointless to my ears on a purely musical level. They're actually interesting to go through, and come to think of it, you also have pivotal highlights there as well, like the opening "Crawl", lively and yet menacing "Zealots Of Stockholm", or the two "sweet-sounding" ballads "Flight Of The Navigator" and "Urn" (the second as short as it is blunt and intimate on a lyrical level). So with all that in mind, will some listeners think Glover overplayed his hand when he recorded this thing? Some will, unavoidably. Some will label the music on this LP "pretentious", "long-winded", or "overblown", most probably. That's not MY take, though. Because for me, the crazed-out rap flows and lush, seductive tones of *Because The Internet* are pretty easy to go through if you're a hip hop fan. And just like any great "rap opera" (or "rock-opera", for that matter), it is as pleasurable to listen to in casual mode as it is to do so when you willingly get lost in its intricate lyrics, topical contents, and suggested plot points. At the end of the day, that's how that sort of album should work. And when I see its global score on this generator, it seems like it actually works pretty well on its intended audience, at least. Which is all that matters, ultimately. Since I saw that 3.21 score, there's one thing online I'm not gonna be mad about at least. You gotta start somewhere to remain positive, in spite, or because of, the internet .🤷 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 70 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 87 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 168 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année

I'm having a shitty week. Work has been too demanding and not rewarding enough, I have made a couple of blunders that I need to fix, and I have no real motivation for it. The news are scary and awful, and "social networks" are a toxic cesspool which I willingly contribute to when I let my worst instincts take over -- I just can't help it, so many alienated souls just vomit their intolerance and bigotry online. But I have to face it: I am as alienated as they are, even if I think I'm not like "them". As someone rightly stated in another review here, "be kind, motherfuckers, be kind". Such a great way to put it. But the world is a sick sad place. Everything feels pointless. So I guess that in that context, it was the right time for me to have my first serious listen to this Songs: Ohia album, simpler and less ornate on a composition, instrumentation and arrangement level than *The Magnolia Electric Co*, yet maybe more straightforward in its expression of melancholic emotions or full-blown sadness, here mixed with flimsy and cautious hope. A couple of songs feel a little "samey" on the second side, but apart from that, Jason Molina's voice goes straight to the heart. All in all, the two albums often singled out in Songs: Ohia's discography might be different animals (say, an owl and a lionness), but they are equally poignant. The world lost a great artist and touching soul when Molina left us. Confessional music rarely feels this moving, and I wish I could take a page out of the book he left behind him to make my own confessional urges equally interesting. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 70 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 88 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 168 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année

Yep, this debut is one of the clear highlights of 2022 for me, if only because of its stellar singles, making such an impact for anyone still genuinely interested in the -- now long -- history of indie rock. And among those singles, of course, there's the unstoppable "Chaise Longue" and its tongue-in-cheek sprechgesang hook repeating that weird French word found in the English language over a propulsive, take-no-quarter beat. "Excuse me?" "What?" "Excuse me?" Where do Rhian Teasdale and Heather Chambers find such memorable one-liners, huh? "Chaise Longue" is not the only memorable single, though. You've got "Wet Dream"'s four-on-the-floor dance-rock regalia and handclaps, leading Rhian Teasdale and Heather Chambers to take a page out of the disco book with a huge wink. You've got cheeky and catchy "Ur Mum". You've got the bouncy, riot grrrrl-abrasive, and yet delicious "Oh No". Or you've got the wonderfully ironic ode to home and sedentary pleasures "Too Late Now", closing the LP on a terrific high note. So many instant keepers. Besides, the album is also absolutely fantastic because its supposed "deeper cuts" are actually as good as the singles mentioned up there, allowing the LP to thrive on a tracklist that's both varied and dynamic as hell, just as it goes from other spoken-word cuts to songs that are entirely "sung" elsewhere. Not a single dud is to be found in this tracklist. "Being In Love" is a killer opener. "... Piece Of Shit", "Supermarket" and Heather Chambers' "Convincing" are sweet and laid-back numbers going to all the right places. "I Don't Want To Go Out" quoting David Bowie's guitar hook on "The Man Who Sold The World" is such a great idea, and so is the song's chorus slowing down a notch (only a few bpm points) during its last iteration -- a very subtle change that yet completely turns the song on its head. Perfect production work by Dan Carey everywhere in the album, by the way. And, of course, Chambers and Teasdale's lyrics are both hilarious and precisely crafted. The duo very often lambast and lampoon and troll toxic men. But more importantly, they offer some precious laugh-out-loud moments as they do so (that "long-practiced" scream in "Ur Mum", so good). This is such fun stuff, c'mon! I was far less convinced by *Moisturizer*, released last year. Some of its singles were also terrific and memorable, but a lot of the rest sounded underwhelming to my ears, because the energy, songwriting and studio performance felt either lacking or a little "forced" there. Interestingly, a lot of the initial naysayers hurling dumb "industry plant" accusations on Teasdale and Chambers when *Wet Leg* was released seem to have changed their minds since (or at least stayed quiet), probably when they realize *Moisturizer* was equally popular for more general audiences. Oh the irony. Yet even if I consider *Moisturizer* sort of a letdown, don't count on me to change my mind on this debut. To put it in a nutshell, it's not because I'm not in love with Wet Leg's sophomore album that I'm gonna deny their overall skills all of a sudden. I value their debut so much, so maybe I was bound to be disappointed after it no matter what happens. Also, I really wish I could see Wet Leg play live one day, because from what I've seen online, Teasdale, Chambers and the boys backing them look like a killer act onstage. Third album will be pivotal to see if the band is here to stay in my eyes. One thing's for sure, though. That perfect debut IS here to stay. Because it gives such a fresh spin on the sort of women-fronted indie rock or indie-adjacent rock that has marked minds for decades now, from Blondie to The Breeders. Which kind of makes me want to say "ur mum" to those guys from the (misogynistic?) "old guard" who initially failed to see this. All day long, on a chaise longue, I could listen to this thing with a constant grin on my face. Isn't that what a great melodic indie-rock album is supposed to do to you guys? 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 71 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 88 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 168 ---- Emile... Je viens de lire ta dernière réponse. Je vais essayer de trouver le temps de rédiger la mienne bientôt. D'ici-là, ben bonne année

A somewhat off-topic pick. Off-topic because this black comedy LP is more akin to internet "content" than a proper album for me. "Content" is the name of *Inside*'s opening track by the way, and it's kind of interesting that Bo Burnham's comedy routine often comes off as the very symptom of the societal ills the man lampoons or lambasts. Yeah, of course, he knows it (wink wink). And you know that he knows it (wink wink wink). And he knows that you know that he knows it (one wink times a hundred occurrences). By that point, when you've winked so much, there's no tear left in your eye to cry about this comedian's depression -- here fuelled by social anxiety -- or lament about the sad alienated state of our late-stage capitalistic hellhole, or laugh about the 2020 Covid pandemic for that matter! (plus, this latter event marks the project in its era in such an on-the-nose fashion that it has simply aged like milk, and this in only five years!) Cynicism and self-irony can only go so far. By that point, we've gone into so many pointless circles that we end up right where we started. Excellent comedians know how to elicit laughs AND tackle controversial issues in ways that can help you feel engaged to what they say, either confirming your worldview or challenging your own bias. Burnham can even do this himself at times (more on that later). But too often, he's mired in his own personal issues and obsessions, and he is not even particularly articulate about the whole thing. Which is why his comedy feels sloppy. Good if the thing was "therapeutic" for him. But I can't really see why I should be concerned by all those vaguely-phrased, narcissistic impulses within the "album". If a friend told me those sorts of things IRL I could at least exchange views with them, and maybe even help them if they deem my input valuable. But what can we do here, except passively "receive" those partly-ironical confessions in an apathetic fashion? It takes some cake lambasting contemporary apathy after that! As I said, endless cynical circles here... What's missing in my rant up there? Yep, that's right, a word or two about the *music*. But this is clearly no fault of mine since the music is most of the time "accessory" in this project. Which is also why I broadly consider this pick off-topic... The hooks of "Content" and "Comedy" set the tone in a pretty convincing manner at least (the "angelic", mock-religious undertones of the first chorus in the second song hit pretty hard, lol). And "That Funny Feeling", "All Eyes on Me" and "Goodbye" right at the end also manage Burnham to land on his feet on a musical standpoint somehow -- even if those tongue-in-cheek moody cuts are nothing extraordinary, and should be taken with a huge grain of salt anyway. Yet the real problem is 90% of what lies in between. Unfunny snippets, derivative exercises in style, jokes without any punchlines, one-minute "interludes" piled after other one-minute "interludes"... Let's face it: too often, *both* the music AND the black comedy stink. Just as in any bad "album" of any style, those tracks are screaming the word "filler" to my ears: take them away, and there's not enough "matter" to carry the project into a full-blown statement having clear "pay-off" moments in its conclusion (as I said, a couple of individual tracks there are worth a visit, including one rehashing the best one-liners found in the LP's best cuts) ; leave those fillers as is, though, and the whole endeavor becomes an endless drag to go through. It's a lose-lose situation. Does the use of the word "filler" mean I'm finally considering the project as a proper "album"? Well, I'm trying hard to. But no way I can consider it as one that's "essential" anyway. Three exceptions are saving this thing from my lowest-rated gallery though, either on a comedic level, or on a musical standpoint, or *both*: "How The World Works", "White Woman's Instagram", and "Welcome to the Internet". Anyone who likes societal comedy set into a prefect soundtrack should listen to those three hilarious little jewels (and I'm not gonna spoil the fun by describing what those songs are saying, even if you can probably deduce that from their titles). Here you have some real bite that's missing elsewhere, and it makes me want to thank the user who suggested this LP, no matter how we might disagree about it overall. Had all the rest been up to that level, maybe I could have reached a 3/5 or 4/5 mark. Unfortunately, the rest is NOT up that level. Looking for a punchline to end this overlong "review", but why should I bother when, most of the time, Bo Burnham himself doesn't conclude his performances with a proper punchline anyway ? As the man says in one song, he gets "paid" to do all this. Well, I'm NOT getting paid to find punchlines on this generator. So yeah, why should I bother, huh? 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 71 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 88 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 169 (including this one) ---- Hey Émile ! Ça fait un bail que je dois te répondre, sorry ! J'ai été très occupé ces deux derniers mois -- il y a eu un petit souci de santé sans gravité, beaucoup de taf pour le collège et Erasmus, des trucs à faire pour Mowno... En parlant de tout ça, congrats for your new job at Publicis Montréal. C'est un peu toi le Don Draper québécois, maintenant, c'est ça hein ? 😉 Nan, j'imagine que tu es resté dans le graphisme. Et j'ai vu que tu étais toi-même bien occupé ! Réponses en vrac à ton dernier message : La Classe Américaine, c'est la découverte des plaisirs du Situationnisme en version light pour toute ma génération. Nous aussi, on a cité les répliques à foison !Les gars qui ont fait ça, travaillaient pour Canal + à l'époque, la quatrième chaîne de la télé française, ouverte à la fin des années 80. C'était à l'époque où la chaîne était 33% rebelle, 33% gauchiste, 33% gauchiste. Elle est depuis devenue 100% fasciste malheureusement, monde de merde indeed. Mais les gens qui bossaient dedans sont tous partis faire des choses ailleurs. Un des gars derrière le "flim" est devenu un "vrai" réalisateur de cinéma d'ailleurs... Pour ce qui est de la "users list" sur ce générateur... C'est une expérience vraiment différente. Ça va du encore plus obscur aux loupés très évidents du bouquin original, ce qui fait encore plus "montagnes russes". Mais j'ai quand-même découvert une poignée d'artistes notables... Donc oui, j'aime bien, mais je voudrais bien pouvoir avoir le choix de passer sur plusieurs disques par jour pour me concentrer sur les meilleurs, et aussi rattraper mon "retard". La liste gonfle à vue d'oeil au fur et à mesure où les participants finissent la liste originale, et à ce rythme, personne ne l'a terminera jamais. Un vrai tonneau des Danaïdes. Ou un rocher de Sysyphe. Je voudrais bien pouvoir des jours de "pause", et ne voir que les tous derniers ajouts au fur et à mesure où ils sont donnés. J'ai même envoyé un message à Alexander pour lui demander si l'option "plusieurs disques par jours" avait été envisagée. Il m'a gentiment répondu qu'il y avait pensé, mais que le consensus sur le groupe reddit après un débat à ce sujet était de ne finalement rien changer. Je pense que c'est une erreur, et j'espère qu'il reviendra sur sa décision. On verra bien... Sur le cinéma... J'en consommais pas mal jusqu'à la fin des années 2000, je suis fan absolu de certains réalisateurs (Lynch, Kubrick, Hitchcock, Scorsese, Paul Thomas Anderson, les premiers Coppola, quelques films de Tarantino et Jarmusch), et/ou de certaines œuvres phares (Blade Runner, La Nuit Du Chasseur, les trois premiers Alien, Moonrise Kingdom de Wes Anderson...), mais j'ai quasi-totalement lâché l'affaire depuis 15 ans. J'ai constitué une liste d'oeuvres apparemment marquantes sorties depuis 25 ans que je n'ai jamais vus. Il y en a au moins une trentaine (de mémoire y a Parasite, The Revenant, Get Out, Moon ou Moonlight)... Mais je n'arrive pas à trouver le temps de me poser devant un écran. Fait que ça change. Vu ce que je viens de dire de mes goûts cinématographiques, t'aurais une liste à me proposer ? Pareil, les séries, j'ai été un bien gros fan de certaines, mais je suis plus distant maintenant j'ai l'impression qu'il y a pas mal de chose surfaites qui ont une hype démesurée (dernier exemple en date, "Succession", dont les deux dernières saisons sur les trois m'ont décu. J'attends d'ailleurs de savoir si la fin de "Severance" a de bonnes critiques avant de me lancer. Par contre, *Mr. ROBOT*, c'est un truc incroyable, comme du Thomas Pynchon updaté à la dystopie actuelle, et la dernière saison, c'est banger sur banger, avec plein de twists bouleversants qui te donnent envie de tout revoir depuis le début. Sinon, je suis un fan absolu de The Sopranos et The Wire, les deux meilleures séries de tous les temps pour moi, indépassables (et finalement la matrice par laquelle toutes les séries "actuelles" se basent, sans en avoir le génie initial). Et y a bien entendu Twin Peaks, David Lynch oblige, dont les deux saisons originales ont forcément vieilli, mais qui reste l'autre matrice incontournable. Après ça, j'adore Mad Men (voir ma ref à Don Draper au-dessus -- là pareil, ça se visionne *plusieurs fois* un chef d'oeuvre de cet acabit, dirigé par un ancien de l'ésyipe des Sopranos d'ailleurs!), et sinon, j'aime beaucoup Six Feet Under et Breaking Bad, mais ces deux-là se placent un poil en dessous les précédents pour moi.... J'arrête mes réponses là pour l'instant. Je mets mes headphones, et j'écoute Angine de Poitrine dès maintenant. Je te ferai mon retour dans une prochaine réponse !

Contrary to what the spoken-word introduction to this gem is stating, some classics NEVER go out of style. And it's not the least paradox in this record filled to the brim with them. In its elected genre (mostly post-hardcore, but also so many other styles at once), Refused's *The Shape Of Punk To Come* is indeed one of those classics today. People taking issue with Dennis Lyxzén's voice are just taking issue with the music style itself for me. I can respect that, but they also got to respect how incredibly adventurous this record is, even if it's not to their liking. Just as they have to assess its left-wing topical contents for what they are, i.e. subjects that are still hotly debated today, almost thirty years later. There is of course a self-conscious romantic whiff to Refused's revolutionary lyrics, which can be deemed as "performative" by the most cynical listeners out there. I get the point, but for me, this sort of criticism is still missing one of the most extraordinary feats of this LP, which is how its musical form is so aptly mirroring its lyrical contents. Refused never stay in one single place in that magnum opus of theirs. They can be aggressive or highly melodic, electronic or punk, sinister or elated, down-in-the-mouth or seductive, catchy or challenging. The word "revolution" implies constant 180-degree turns, after all. *Of course*, there's also something a little pretentious here. But the instrumentation grooves like in few hardcore punk records. The sound and production values are clear, precise, surgical, and yet also rich and deep. And however grand the project's concept is, it's the execution transcending the latter that makes this album so valuable in my eyes. Trying to describe the tracklist is like trying to describe an ever-shifting beast. The dark syncopated bursts of opener "Worms of the Senses/Faculties of the Skull" thus lead to the bossanova-inspired pop instincts of "Liberation Frequency"'s verses -- whose restraint allows two loud choruses to explode with devastating might. You know the jumpscare is coming up. And yet could this *not* work? Then, the conceptual tour de force of "The Deadly Rhythm" -- with its crazed-out double bass imitating the rhythm of factory assembly lines -- abruptly switches gears to the airy tones of "Summerholidays vs. Punkroutine", about the joys and hardships of life on the road. Change of tone, change of settings. Yet the same fiery spirit. As for the stern -- yet also tongue-in-cheek -- nü-metal pastiche "New Noise", beating all those dumb nü-metalheads at their own game, it is unpredictable all by itself! That song slaps, but it also twists and turns at times. And this up until its final cavalcade, restless, uncompromising. After that, you've got the sonic barricades of "The Refused Party Program" or "Protest Song '68". You've got the aggro banger "Refused Are Fuckin' Dead". Or you've got the title-track referencing Ornette Coleman... You've got punk rock, but you've also got techno, drum'n'bass, jazz, accordions... Such incredible ambition here. But one that is also aimed at reclaiming people's agency. Of course, you may disagree with Refused's political message. Or conversely, you may consider that they were themselves a postmodernist simulacrum. Maybe they are, who knows? Yet even if they are, their music never fails to inspire those revolutionary emotions for the right audience. All it takes is sincere believers in those progressive agendas Not everyone is such believer, of course. About that, wikipedia has informed me of one thing: "Initially, the album was both a commercial and critical failure, with little media coverage and mixed reception from fans and critics alike; some even refused to rate it because of its stylistic divergence." Really??! In my neck of the woods, I had the feeling this record had made waves from the very start. That it had changed the rules, even. Everyone around me was listening to it around the same time I discovered it. And everyone instantly recognized the milestone that it was for the genre. But maybe us non-Swedes were one or two years late to the party, come to think of it. In those pre-internet (or rather, early internet) days, words of mouth didn't go so fast for underground bands in non-mainstream genres. Hence how Refused couldn't reap what they had sowed at the time. Which leads me to another thing on the album's wikipedia page: "The band went on tour to support the album, a tour described by the band as "emotionally devastating" and "an awful experience", which would result in their breakup after only eight shows." I know what Wikipedia refers to here. It's in that artistic "documentary" made about that awful tour ("Refused Are Fucking Dead"), which probably harbours some of the most depressing scenes I have ever watched in a film about a music band. The album has such dark moments as well, obviously. Yet it's so much more than that, like a manifesto made into sounds. And all it takes to enjoy its various wonders is to have a somewhat revolutionary flame left in your soul. A "chimerical bombination" indeed. "What frequency are you getting? Is it noise or sweet, sweet music?" asks Lyxsén. Well, it's up to you to find out. One thing's for sure, "we want the airwaves back". And by "we", I mean every hardcore punk fan out there. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 10/10 for more general purposes (5 + 5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 88 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 169 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham.

Efficient 2010s indie pop / indie rock somewhere between Foals, Hot Chip, Peter Gabriel, Radiohead and... Muse (!). A very distinctive high-pitched vocalist, lots of terrific earworms, some very lively and very memorable vocal hooks, a generous share of electronica, a few Afrobeat-inspired elements -- either for the guitar licks or the vocal parts (see "Regrets", for instance)... Plus some very dark lyrics, nicely contrasting with the overall melodic energy of those songs / compositions, and strangely resonant in the awful historical period we're all going through right now. In other words, this is quite a pleasant surprise, clearly a notch above the usual fry found in this generator for this genre and specific era of indie pop. The first three quarters of the album -- going from bangers such as "To The Blade", "Distant Past", or "Spring / Sun / Winter / Dread" to the brooding, dystopian centerpiece "Fortune 500", the R'n'B-inspired "Blast Doors", and the histrionic theatricals of "Zero Pharaoh" -- are excellent, generally speaking. The title track apes a little too closely Talking Heads' "Once In A Lifetime", sure. But even this very blatant "inspiration" can't bring me to hold a grudge against this Mancunian act, because that song is so well-executed anyway, along with the rest. And Stuart Price's production (exerted before the man became a household name for pop acts such as Dua Lipa or Jesse Ware) is stellar as well, just as it gives weight to those tones here going from the eighties to the noughts in their ambitious scope. Everything Everything deserve to become as successful as most of the bands I've quoted up there, and it's a shame this didn't exactly happen to them -- although from what I've read, they are still doing quite well these days, and have even managed to garner interest in this particular album for its ten-year-anniversary edition. I only wish the conclusion of the LP had been a little stronger. That last leg indeed feels a little underwhelming, especially after the many wonders occurring before. "No Reptile" is a quite intense experiment, but Jonathan Highs' vocals might be a weenie bit too unhinged there. And as "out there" and "over the top" as that vocal performance is, the song doesn't exactly pay off as you think it should when you reach its ending, strangely enough. Same for the "In Rainbows"-adjacent closer "Warm Healer", whose interesting off-kilter rhythms unfortunately yield to a dead-end of sorts. Those are very minor gripes though. So, many thanks to the user who has helped me get more familiar with this British band. The all-in-the-pot nature of this record -- in keeping with the act's moniker -- is pulled off as it should, on a broad level. And as nightmarish as the lyrics in it are, it *almost* feels like getting to heaven in a musical standpoint. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 89 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 169 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham.

Huge fan of *Music For The Masses* and *Violator* over here. Yet Depeche Mode's debut from their early Vince Clarke era doesn't really seem like a strong contender for the original list in my eyes. It's way too patchy, and also downright cheesy at times, like a caricature of that type of project -- lacking all the nuances and details that could ultimately transcend that sort of thing. Of course, *Speak & Spell* is bookended by two humongous bangers that I absolutely love ("New Life" and "Just Can't Get Enough"). And I can also get myself into the head of an excited eighties synth-pop fan discovering the band at the time of this debut's release. A case of "you had to be there to understand", maybe. That being said, let's face it, folks: Martin Gore is a better songwriter and composer than Vince Clarke. Or at least, he was about to become one. So, influential as this record is, I don't think there's room for it in a finite list of 1001 albums you should absolutely listen to. Guess I *can* get enough Depeche Mode songs after a while. But it surely does not mean I'm not a fan, mind you. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 89 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 170 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham.

Neil Cicierega explains his thinking behind the creation of the track "Imagine All Star People": When I decided to mash up Smash Mouth with John Lennon, of course I was thinking, 'This is super blasphemous, this is designed to make people angry.'" Various reviewers now explain how they consider "Mouth Sounds": "Hey! The Tears in rain monologue is in this one too. Guess it will go down in history. But not as much as all-star will. It will be passed down to generations through memory when WW3 inevitably wipes out all human connectivity and the internet. Then still, the years will start coming. And they don't stop coming. We must be fed to the rules, and hit the ground running. Cause didn't they say not to live for fun? Your brain gets smart, but your head gets dumb. So much to do so much to see, so what's wrong with taking the backstreets? Well, you never know if you don't go, you'll never shine if you don't glow. Hey now. You're a five star" "Do you know when people mix their senses and they can hear colors and taste sounds? Synesthesia? Yeah that, this album gave me that!" If you grew up in the 90s, this album will unlock good memories." "The Mouth cycle are my four actual favorite albums, I just didn't know we got to count them as real music since they are so obviously musical shit posts." "A few fun moments, Mullet with Butterfly Wings was my favorite, but the basic idea doesn't sustain an hour long exploration. Some of the mash ups were more amusing in concept than execution. Also looks like the sharer didn't actually finish the project?" "Listened to about 20 minutes on YouTube (full album is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjWkO15-gcE) and had to stop." "It's basically Girl Talk with memes. I would normally give it 1/5, but since I can recognize that there is some talent here, bumping up to a 2/5." "Yeah so Mouth Sounds will grab your attention early because it's a bunch of edge-lord mashups from 20 years ago and it's fun in bitesize, but then you have a WHOLE HOUR of it and it's pretty annoying pretty quickly. There's also a load of Smashmouth which again, the novelty wears off super quickly. It's a 1/5 because it's not good and it's only fun for a coupla minutes unless you're 12." "So, I'm familiar with Neil Cicierega's weird mashup albums, and, honestly, this is the worst of them. I have no idea why you would put this on here. I DO think one of these belongs on the list. It was a cultural phenomenon in its time, and while weird (and maybe bad), there is some significance here. It's still not very good." "Awful" "I was perhaps selfishly hoping/expecting these user-submitted albums would be entries that people thought were egregious omissions from the original book, i.e. albums/artists I missed out on for decades and get to discover for the first time (even if I hated them/it). Not just little K-tel pet novelty projects like this. Mashups? nah. It just feels throwaway and tiktok-ish, especially that I had to go to youtube to find it. Hardest pass for me." "Some people here treat it like avant-garde "comedy; others as a bizarre love letter to internet nostalgia. Others just think this is too... online. Coming at it from a listener’s perspective rather than an internet historian’s: this inside-joke of early 2000's internet culture relies heavily on recognition rather than on craft. If you’ve heard inventive mashup work (like Girl Talk’s Feed the Animals or The Avalanches’ Since I Left You) this feels lazy because, musically, it is. It's honestly a lot of slapping things on top of one another. Please appreciate it all you like with everything you recognise, but this really isn't for me. And I was there when this all came out. Didn't really appreciate it then either." "Given this was only on YouTube, I found it hard to listen and then adverts popping up in between songs, sometimes the adverts were not as annoying my as the samples themselves.." "Fuck mash ups, fuck this choice, fuck this album. Also, 2014? Surely not? Must have been like 2008 for it to be of its time?" My turn now: "See? I made a "smash-up" of reviews up there. That doesn't mean you can say I wrote a proper review myself, or even that this mash-up of mine is particularly good or creative. Which kind of illustrates my own opinion about this user's choice. Is "Mouth Sounds" "blasphemous"? Nah, it's simply lazy and fully derivative, sounds awkward in key juncture points, goes on for way too long, and the "music" gets quickly pretty boring anyway, except for a subset of late noughts / early 2010s internet nerds already getting out of touch. Let's face it, folks: from the onset, this thing was bound to end up in the deepest recess of "internet culture". It's like the dark web version of music history. Garbage. Waste. And waste of a slot here." 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 5/10 for more general purposes (3/5 for technical abilities and musical ear + 2/5 for the artless use of bops) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 89 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 171 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham.

Interesting. The vocals often sound very naive, but the artistry and variety of the instrumentation make up for it tenfold. The first three tracks are very nice, especially rocker "El Día Que Fue" (that I seem to have heard from somewhere before), and the touching ballad "Rosa Gris". I also appreciated the broad stylistic scope, going from Jesus And The Mary Chain- adjacent abrasive rock'n'roll flavours ("El viejo camino de la vía del tren") to symphonic Echo And The Bunnymen-related torch songs ("Cuento de la canción en la botella"). Some chord sequences and guitar arrangements are pretty smart and catchy on the livelier tracks ("Las Reglas del juego", "Musical ratonera", "Palabras sin nombre"). There are also moody exercises in style recalling The Stranglers at their weirdest ("El Chico de los ojos asustados"), double bass on some other soft-rock ballads, and fiddle for more country-like cuts (two instruments I'm always a sucker for). And yeah, you can also sense the influence of The Smiths on this thing. As for the production values, they are heavily footed in the eighties aesthetics, but I guess that was unavoidable for this sort of continental rock / pop rock band at the time. Can't fail to notice that this project doesn't include what seems to be the band's greatest hit ("En Algún Lugar", from their previous LP), and I still think this double album should have been edited into a single LP to pack a greater punch. Quite a few cuts feel like fillers on first listens, especially those whose length go no further than one minute and forty seconds on Side B, that I would have scrapped entirely. But you can't really blame Duncan Dhu for being so productive at this point of their career. You can't cut corners when you're writing an "autobiography", I guess. 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 89 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 172 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Excellent Brazilian percussion work, unfortunately everything else aged like milk, at least in my personal book -- from the "alternative"-like nineties funk-rock tones, which don't always pack the punch they're supposed to pack, to that sort of scansion for Chico Science's vocal delivery (may he rest on power), that I find a little heavy-handed and stilted groove-wise. Some cuts manage to stand out ("Manguetown", "Maracatu Atômico", moody instrumentals "O Encontro de Isaac Asimov..." - sampling Tricky's "Overcome" - or "Baião Ambiental", both clearly designed to be interludes and yet still simpler and a little more evocative). But honestly, the rest leaves me cold, and I don't think it's me being narrow-minded here. Pretty sure there are tons of Brazilian acts of all stripes that will be more to my liking, beyond those I already know. Thanks for trying though. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 89 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 173 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I'm French, and I've never heard of this project. Then again, I'm not an expert in obscure disco curios, lol. This one, taking a page out of Giorgio Moroder's book while displaying somewhat lo-fi tones, is absolutely endearing though, and I can easily understand how an extravagant artist such as Richard D. James / Aphex Twin could fall in love with it. Yes, the *exact same rhythm pattern* is used throughout the record, ha ha, with very slight changes to the BPM number -- and it's hilarious to think a real drummer, and not a drum machine, was used during the recording sessions to play the same thing all over again. The thing is, that pattern is so catchy AND strange / off-kilter that it quickly becomes infectious. And the arrangements and vocal hooks are very playful and adventurous, with a couple of full-blown and relatively memorable songs hiding in plain sight during the course of the tracklist (songs such as closer *No Regret*). Many thanks to the Finnish user who suggested this. We might not see eye to eye on many things musically, but when it comes to French early electronic artists (like your pick for a favorite album in the original list), our stars are aligned at least. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 173 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Interesting. Imogen Heap's original band, Frou Frou, was a borefest for me. But as far as mid-naughts pop albums go, I find this solo LP of hers to be far more daring and adventurous overall. I even think some of the songs in it were groundbreaking for the genre, foretelling some hyperpop tones a decade earlier, while still retaining elegance associated to more timeless songwriting chops. "Headlock" and "Loose Ends" are clear bangers, "Hide And Seek" is a minimalist vocoder-laden jewel -- experimental, cinematic and endearing all at the same time --, "Have You Got It One You?" is both melodic and hypnotic, and "Daylight Robbery" kind of rocks. A lot of those tracks could be released today and sound fresh and current -- readymade for pop charts. The rest is more run-of-the-mill, standardized fare, unfortunately -- especially on the second half. Some cuts still have a foot firmly planted in their era, and the all-too-sweet vocal lines can be sickening after some point. Pop with commercial ambitions most often has a clear peremption date written its forehead, and Heap is not immune to that kind of flaw. Sure, her streaming numbers are quite impressive today, especially with this 20-year-old album. Yet those numbers are also explained by a "product placement", as explained in the wikipedia blurb. And truly "legendary" pop music needs more than that to enter public consciousness. That last point is a very personal requirement of mine, sure, and one I don't apply for other music styles. The thing is, when you decide to release music with such blatantly commercial flavors, the industry's "logic" will help you more than for niche genres. So I guess I can only select the cream on the proverbial cake for such pop music records. It's a question of setting the karmic balance right. Not everything in art should be about sales numbers anyway... 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 174 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Mostly ska-punk or "ska-rock" (?). I can understand the appeal on paper, between the apparently topical lyrics and other shenanigans related to Mexican culture. Yet I would lie if I said I connected with this record. Musically speaking, it sometimes sounds like meat-and-potatoes fare for this genre: the meandering vocal lines, performed by a singer lacking clear distinctive features, sound a little cheesy and unfocused for me -- even if some instrumental melodies and percussion work behind him stand out sometimes. Oh, and the production values didn't age very well. Maybe I'm a little bit picky for this sort of thing, I don't know... But for most music styles, I need less streamlined "dynamics". In short, this record feels a little too "safe", even with the spicy Mexican flavors in it. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 72 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 175 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I say "yes". Born and raised in continental Europe, I didn't have the slightest idea of who Billy Squier is one hour ago. I had probably heard "In The Dark", "The Stroke" and "My Kinda Lover" somewhere before (how frigging STRONG this LP starts, my gosh!). But no way I could have earned a blind test point hollering his name before my opponents do. Of course, this record is very derivative. Most people notice the "nods" to Led Zeppelin right away, sprinkled with power pop flavors, or some Cheap Trick or AC/DC-adjacent extra riffage, alll of this conveyed through quite *subtle* early eighties production shenanigans (courtesy to German producer Reinhold Mack, whose genius skills I had not noticed up to now). So yeah, nothing really new under the 1981 sun. Yet I think the songwriting here is so convincing and catchy that the derivative nature of the album doesn't matter much. The choruses are stellar and the riffs are superb. The vocals most often slap. The arrangements are either daring or endearing. Besides, Led Zeppelin were (in)famous for the number of previous musicians they had ripped off themselves. So who cares if Billy's inspiration sounds so obvious here, the further you go into the album? What impresses me the most in this particular example of AOR release is how fun, solid and cohesive it is from start to finish. Heck, it's far more cohesive than any Foreigner or Heart album I've had the chance to listen to (I love some individual tracks from those acts, but let's face it, they didn't really know how to tracklist an LP). Every song in *Don't Say No* could be used to soundtrack a movie and add pivotal ambience to the scene. I even enjoyed the couple of ballads towards the end of the record quite a lot. And the fake "fade out" in the middle of the title-track and closer was so well pulled-off, it had me burst out laughing (sorry for the potential spoiler here) Instantly adding this one in my list of keepers. Maybe the reason *Don't Say No* wasn't included in the original list is because Squier very much appears to be a "one-album-wonder", which might explain why Dimery and co. dismissed him as a passing fad that wouldn't be remembered decades later. But they were wrong. Boy how wrong they were! 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 73 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 175 ---- A quick footnote about some reviewers' remarks: believe it or not, you can enjoy a lot of British post-punk albums from the original list, and still appreciate more "fun" stuff, such as Billy Squier's probable magnum opus. You can go through very different emotions in life. Why couldn't it be possible for music? Another afterword now, this time addressed to the user who suggested this record: Gosh, you really don't get hip hop at large, and Kendrick Lamar in particular. There was such bad faith in your selection of quotes from *To Pimp A Butterfly* in your review for it... C'mon, you know damn well you can't sum up the man's lyrics with those n-word quotes alone, and that the n-word itself doesn't have the same intent depending on who utters it and why they do so. Worse, it's totally dishonest to separate those quotes from the topical and lyrical continuum they came from. So you seriously need to explore the *true* reasons those lyrics are offending you... That said, and all disagreement about rap music aside, I want to warmly express my gratitude to you for suggesting this Billy Squier album. Thank you. Without you, I still wouldn't know who Squier is today. Now I'm ready to holler his name for a blind test session, if ever one of his hits finds its way into it. ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Yeah, I concur, can someone pay the ransom, PLEASE??? I left quite a benevolent review about the first, earlier Babymetal album submitted to this list. Sure, it was 'corporate' music performed by puppets, and also music written by technically-competent board members instead of full-blown artists... But some of the results in that earlier record still managed to sound fresh or fun somehow. This, in comparison, is ABSOLUTE dross. Everything in this album -- every stylistic curve beyond the 'kawai metal' format, and every cliché-laden intent found in the syrupy, meandering vocals backed up by heavy-handed guitar riffage -- sounds tired, cynical, pointless or simply exhausting to go through. I don't want to waste any more time on this stupid record. Life's too short. Alexander, please, we need to be able to skip albums for the users list. Make it so that if you skip one without leaving a grade to it, you can have another one for the day. I don't care if a given album gets a higher global score as a result, when only a couple of hardcore fans vote for it and the rest skip it. For me, the most important point of the users list is to discover good music according to your tastes. I don't care about podiums at this point. I just want to avoid the dross submitted by users either trolling most of us, or simply having appalling taste in my own "book". If people want to take this sort of music seriously enough to grade it, they have my blessing. It's just that everyone should be able to make a choice. 0/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums,. 5/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and professional production values + 0 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 73 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 176 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

And here it is, the third Vampire Weekend album suggested on this users list (and also the third LP in their discography). I have a complex relationship with this band, because I was not into them at all when they were trendy at the turn of the 2010s. But since *Only God Was Above Us*, released two years ago, I have made a 180-degree turn about them. The only album I don't like from this American band is *Father Of The Bride*. Everything else should be on this list for me, though, including the debut -- and it's just mind-boggling that it isn't given that it was when the hype was so high for them. What about *Modern Vampires Of The City* then? It's a far glossier album than the two that preceded it, but damn, it's got so much HEART. The songwriting is so catchy, the melodies are so sweet, the stylistic curves are negotiating so well. "Obvious Bicycle" is a tender opener, but it's with the magnificent tracks that follow -- banger "Unbelievers" and the timeless, Souls-of-Mischief-inspired ballad "Step" -- that the album really takes its stride. "Diane Young" is a fun Prince-adjacent romp, with its eighties pastiche tones and pitch-shifted vocal hooks. And the next five cuts are all excellent, just as they alternate between other poignant ballads and Afrobeat-inspired rockers. Paul Simon on steroids, taking a page out of Animal Collective's book once in a while. Sign me in. Yet as good as the middle of the record also is, it's with "Ya Hey" that Vampire Weekend reached the epic heights they had had in them from the get-go without ever finding a way to properly express them before. The artwork of this album fits with this gem so well. And after that centerpiece, "Hudson" and "Young Lion" are admittedly very dark, but also so cinematic, concluding the album on a fully haunting note. After that peak, it would take Vampire Weekend a lot of time to display such epicness again (with *Only God Was Above Us*). But I guess that's a story for another time, kiddies. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 74 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 176 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I've always had complicated feelings towards the second Boards Of Canada LP. On the one hand, its dreamy / nightmarish electronic tones seem more subtle than in their legendary debut *Music Has The Right To Children*, and also at times less "nineties-gimmicky". On the other hand, it seems to me that *Geogaddi* has slightly less memorable peaks overall. And when it comes to the Scottish band's work on post-apocalyptic textures and full-blown evocative cinematic ambience, I think their later album *Tomorrow's Harvest* is a superior effort. All that being said, I still want to warmly thank the user who suggested this (a huge BoC fan, apparently -- given that *MHTRTC* is their fave on the original list). Who knows? That suggestion might make me reconsider my ranking at some point, because maybe I haven't given enough time to this record to seep in compared to those I've quoted before. You surely need to take your sweet time to let Boards of Canada do their 'past-future' magic trick on you, after all. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 74 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 177 (including this one -- even though there's a chance I might buy this album one day) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Since white horses have taken Mimi Parker away from us all, this Low studio album -- the last one that will ever grace our ears -- will undoubtedly sound poignant to anyone with a soul attuned to elegiac songwriting, passionate performances, and daring production values. Truth be told, I was already in love with this album before the tragic news. But I admit it, the context makes it all the more precious to me. That said, and whatever your personal relationship or mileage with the band is, I think it's a safe bet to "objectively" state that Low went out on a bang here, and not a whimper. As far as I'm concerned, I'm a latecomer to Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker's artistry and this plays a part in how I received this particular album of theirs. Of course I had heard of Low before I fully dived into their music -- I had probably listened to a couple of individual tracks from them here and there decades ago... But my love affair with them has actually started with *Double Negative*, the LP that preceded *Hey What*, and it's the one that made me go back and explore their whole discography, turning the Duluth project as one of my twenty favorite acts of all times. It's a band that I will never have the chance to see play live, very sadly. Yet I still consider *Double Negative* as a criminally underrated album -- one that's for me as important as the masterpieces once released by Portishead, Radiohead or Yo La Tengo. *Hey What* thus picks up the ball from *Double Negative*, enhances the duo's elated harmonies compared to its predecessor, and somewhat tones down the abrasive, digitally-manipulated tinkering -- even if some discrete experimental moments in it still sound pretty extreme frequency-wise. Hear the unhinged, almost deafening blizzard of static on the otherwise lively, gorgeous and ecstatic "Days Like These" or "More" to find very clear example of that. Producer BJ Burton, here completing the trilogy he had started with "Ones And Sixes", outdid himself again. He helped Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker negotiate the perfect synthesis that *Hey What* is, summing up all the threads of this last era of the band's near-perfect discography. Just like for *Double Negative*, it's sometimes hard to say whether this record is minimalistic or "maximalistic". But that's what makes Low's music at the turn of the 2020s one-of-a-kind. "Ex-static" indeed. *Hey What* is indeed more than a "swan song". For me it comes off as fresh and uncompromising as their debut *I Could Now Live In Hope* was three decades ago -- and this as vastly different as those two bookends are. How many bands can succeed sounding this relevant and groundbreaking almost thirty years into their career, all of this while retaining their initial soul and heart??? Very, very few of them...Mimi and Alan still had the sacred fire in them at this point of their career. The fact that their life together (both as artists and domestic partners) was taken away from them right after this album's release is so damn unfair. But one can at least rejoice that they could leave us this incredible work while they were still together. What's also poignant in this record is that it also often looks towards the future. Low's music does not only embrace sounds, emotions and affects as they come, it also challenges your expectations of what heartfelt ballads should sound like in the 21st century. It's an album that's fully open to life -- whether its sufferings or its small blessings, here expressed through so many gracious acts of musical faith -- a simple yet heartrending vocal harmony here, a catchy melody there, a blast of echo-laden distortion elsewhere -- pushing some of the songs to truly epic heights. The tragic context gives an extra resonance to that life-affirming nature, sure. But even without said context, you'd have to be a little extinguished inside not to sense the passion behind the music. A quick sidenote here: as a music writer, I have had the insane opportunity to interview Alan last year through a zoom call, and that life-affirming spark is still with him today, I can guarantee that. The man was very generous with me, either through his words, his time, and his sincerity during the course of the interview. So even if I have never talked with Mimi, that's how I want to remember both her and Alan: people filled with life, benevolence and passion. I'm not gonna spend too much time dwelling on *Hey What"'s individual tracks -- this gem is best appreciated taken as a whole anyway. The incredibly epic opener "White Horses" thus transitions to "I Can Wait" (the inflexions of Mimi's voice going "I'm afraid" on this one moves me to tears every. single. time.) ; the lullaby-banger "All Night" (who else but Low can write lullabies-bangers???) gives way to the relentless waves of white noise in "Disappearing" ; you go from a "Don't Walk Away" that has so many foreboding connotations since Mimi's passing to the dark and obsessive rhythms of closer "The Price You Pay (It Must Be Wearing Off)". There is not a single dull moment in this record. Even its demanding, ascetic interludes are speaking to my soul. The clear centerpiece and emotional anchor of this album, though? It's "Hey", of course. You really feel like Mimi is singing from the heavens on this one, somewhere above the overcast skies blocking us from the light up there... "Hey..." one voice timidly goes several times over. "What?" another voice finally answers. And then, at that exact moment, a ray of light pierces through the thick dark clouds. I might be an atheist or an agnostic, you know. But when I hear something like that, I really want to believe in a higher power. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 90 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 177 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

The Ex's extensive discography is a continent I know I need to explore one day. Unfortunately, I have only approached its shore through a very nice concert of theirs in my hometown long ago. So long ago, actually, that it was years before streaming services -- now set aside by The Ex anyway -- existed, and also long before you could find the Dutch band's full albums on You Tube. The thing is, I really don't know where to start now to delve into that band's decade of genre-allergic artistry. I can't navigate You Tube as easily as I do streaming services. Damn, it's annoying that my listening habits are now so formatted by those streaming websites not even paying artists their fair due. As a result, it seems that The Ex's discography is once again put on the backburner. So can I really "start" with *Moa Anbessa*? I'm not so sure. The nature of this album makes it an arguable entry point -- because the real star here is the clearly versatile and talented Ethiopian saxophonist Getatchew Mekuria. Yet I know that the record also serves as a tribute to the obvious adventurous spirit of The Ex (apart from them, how many art-punk / post-punk bands have toured Ethiopia and Eritrea, and made contact with musicians there to play with them, whether in the studio and in live settings?). Maybe I shouldn't bother about that and just let the moody, hypnotic punk-jazz tones found in this record win me over as they should. This thing sounds close to cinematic for me. You feel as if this could play out in the soundtrack of an off-kilter Jim Jarmusch flick, or in any independent movie involving a very diverse cast challenging the concept of cultural borders. The sound is rich, deep, sometimes complex even. But it's also "feel-good" music at its core. The best of several worlds encapsulated in sixty boundless minutes. Yet, can I be one to really give a fair grade to this album? Not that I want to repeat myself, but as nice as *Moa Anbessa* sounds overall, the experience is still a little bit frustrating for me for contextual reasons. Indeed, I don't have a lot of time on my hand these days, which is a shame, because if I had had some time, I would already be diving headfirst into the discographies of all the talents gathered for this record (Getatchew Mekuria, The Ex, and also the other guests). Then, maybe, I could assess if this LP is "important" or not. Eh, let those podiums and rankings shenanigans be damned for once. Leaving a very good mark to this LP anyway. After all, if this album shows one single thing to me, it's that the world is a very large place, and that if all sorts of unpredictable encounters can happen in it, you can't be everywhere at once either. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 91 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 177 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

From the very first notes, Bohren & Der Club Of Gore's compositions in *Sunset Mission* instantly point towards Angelo Badalamenti's work for *Twin Peaks* -- to the point where the whole thing borders on pastiche from point A to point Z. That said, Badalamenti's original work for David Lynch's films was drawing very much on the idea of pastiche itself anyway, and the dark ambient / jazz tones of this record are pulled off so well, you sort of daydream about this music becoming the soundtrack of a Twins Peaks spin-off series. I could see myself buying this album to set up a film noir mood in my living room at night. I only wish there were more variations to those tones -- Badalamenti's soundtracks were actually far from being one-note, contrary to this record -- a very nice one, but not the stuff "essential" albums are made of in my book. File under "too derivative" for the 1001 album list. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 91 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 178 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Tally Hall's musicianship is objectively worthy of admiration. They know their way around rich instrumentation, harmonic modulations, chromatic flourishes and the likes. This allows them to dabble in many genres going from mock-sixties shenanigans (pre-prog psychedelia, zany folk...) to pastiche nineties alt-rock -- like a version of They Might Be Giants' conversational shtick with more ambitious production values. The thing is, in spite of all those assets, Tally Hall are pretty lame when it comes to write balanced compositions that could stick the landing, at least in this one record (I didn't dare delve further into their discography -- my mental health was at stake here, you see). So many things are thrown onto the wall during the course of *Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum*, and most of them instantly fall flat to the floor. Sections follow one another without ever making sense on a global scale. And there's not a single build-up here that could make you forget the novelty-act stench in their "artistry". How can you write so many pop melodies in an album without ever making one of them slightly memorable? As for the lyrics, it's either the now all-too-familiar case of a band being either too smart for their own good, or actually being not as smart as they think they are. I don't know, maybe I'm the dumb one here .. Yet I couldn't care less about what it was that Tally Hall wanted to say with either the individual songs listed here, or through the overall concept of the album. And it's probably because the whole thing seemed all too calculated and "controlled" for me to take interest in it anyway. On a surface level, those lyrics reminded me of the unfunny dithering of Adam Green. And on a deeper level, I don't know what they could evoke to me. Because, there again, I didn't care delving further. The lyrics of one tongue-in-cheek tune, "Haiku", made me smile though, I readily admit it. But let's be honest here, it's also because I interpreted those lyrics as a confession of sorts from the songwriter. Instead of penning something truly beautiful, inspiring, groundbreaking or genuinely challenging -- whether lyrically or musically -- all you got here is the personal ratiocinations that happen in your head when you realize you don't have what it takes to reach that sort of creative level. Under a certain angle, this "meta" aspect makes the song listenable -- in the sense that you can listen to it once and think: "OK, that's kind of witty". But under another angle, those ratiocinations are still a drag to go through, just like the rest of the record -- and this even when you know self-irony propels a lot of it. There is absolutely zero replay factor for me here. Including in that one song. Worse, why are the vocalists sounding so... *constipated* throughout this record? I can be OK with happy-go-lucky "mannerisms" at times. But I can't condone the sort of creepy Cheshire Cat smile those vocals are conveying in my mind. Beyond the cultural reference explaining the title of this album, it really feels like those very performative songs are gathered into a "mechanical museum" indeed, lacking in spontaneity or sincerity. And just when you think the performance couldn't get more stilted than what you have had to bear on the first couple of tracks, Tally Hall inflicts one of the most odious musical crimes you can find on the surface of the Earth: nerdy-sounding "white rappin'", overdosing on cheese and checking quite a few boxes of the bad taste book of infamous missteps. That sort of thing can be fun for a comedy act using music as a medium, such as Flights Of The Conchords. But it clearly becomes obnoxious for an act that considers itself a band with genuine artistic ambitions. Humour can't buy your way out of creative dead-ends. Reading myself again, I realize one thing: maybe I should have taken my own medicine at some point. Maybe I should have avoided certain "mannerisms" in my review as well. So let me blunt and sum up the whole idea behind my rant: I hate this album. To be clear, I don't hate the players, or the styles used, or the intents I can spot in this thing. I simply hate the results. And for once, I don't care if I'm being unfair towards a band that's obviously technically talented and put some real effort creating something they thought was original. It's just that I don't want to be part of that particular "mechanical museum". I want some air, and I just can't find any in it. Looks like Tally Hall has momentarily turned me into a Luddite, and I'm gonna have to listen to Kraftwerk's complete discography to fix that. Wish me good luck. 0.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 1. 5.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 0.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 91 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 179 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Part Springsteen / Tom Petty, part Replacements, conveyed through a canvas weaving all that was popular in the rock idiom during the mid-naughts (a whiff of White-Stripes-adjacent retro-rock flavors here, some post-Eels kitchen-sink flourishes there, streamlined to a fault at times), *Sparkle In The Finish* has some key American-grassroots-type-of-songwriting to it, suggesting Ike Reilly is as authentic a blue-collar performer as one can get. That being said, the album doesn't fully hold the promise of its title, as ironic as the latter probably is. Some vocal parts could have been handled a notch better (Reilly's timber is probably an acquired taste for quite a few listeners, even if it doesn't bother me right away, personally). The music styles that are harnessed here are varied, in spite of (budget-limited?) production values lacking depth and dynamics on a couple of patches in the tracklist. Some tonal shifts work while others don't. And a cursory listen of other releases by Ike Reilly (either under this "assassination" moniker, or under his own name) suggests that the man can get far more "organic" in his artistry than this. Don't get me wrong, you still have very good songs here, with some particularly endearing lyrics once in a while. I only wish those songs had been gathered in a bundle that looks less dated or loosely knotted. Nothing to be ashamed of in the long run -- there are even reasons to be proud of the overall result. But nothing essential in my own "book". 3/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 91 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 180 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Reading the vast majority of the reviews left for this NOFX EP was so frustrating. It's February 2026, a fascist takeover is well underway in the US and elsewhere, and you all-too-complacent, dead-eyed cows won't even address the topical contents of *The Decline*. Or if you do so, it's in terms that are so vague and unconcerned I instantly want to hop on my soapbox and go: "WAKE UP, you GODDAMN SHEEP, don't you realize FASCIST MONSTERS are EVERYWHERE now? They LIE and BRAINWASH ENTIRE POPULATIONS, and THEY WILL KEEP ON FUCKING GOOD PEOPLE UP while HELPING TOXIC BILLIONAIRES LINE UP THEIR POCKETS EVEN MORE if you don't TAKE ACTION! WAKE. THE. FUCK. UP.!!!" So, do I have your attention now? Right towards the beginning of the 18-minute skate-punk opera that *The Decline* is -- exactly one minute after vocalist and bass player Fat Mike starts strumming the root notes of the main theme he wrote for his delirious composition (a theme only fully developed later on, mind you) -- the NOFX frontman notably crafts a pun that's still 100% apt and potent to describe our current, very troubled times: "greediocracy". This play-on-words does not merely foretell the term "idiocracy", which seems to be the keyword to describe our late capitalist hellhole as promoted by increasingly mind-numbing media. It's also a pun on the word "IDEOcracy", describing how masses blindly follow "dear leaders" or party lines, sometimes to the point of willingly subscribing to what George Orwell called "doublethink". Let's just quote good ol' Uncle George here, to understand what "doublethink" really is: "To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself—that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word—doublethink—involved the use of doublethink." Many political ideologies are following this putrid agenda today. There's "Maga", of course -- an "ideology" which consists in blindly supporting whatever delusion or fascistic hoax-of-the-day Donald Trump puts forward to gain or keep his power. The examples of Ingsoc slogans in *1984* -- "WAR IS PEACE", "FREEDOM IS SLAVERY" -- are barely more overt in their absurdity than maga slogans, dumb catchphrases and other "talking points"... Yet "doublethink" had also crossed the political divide long before the Trump era -- to the point where all mainstream parties in the world have at least dabbled in it at some point. The goal is always the same: preserve the harmful illusions implemented by institutions that have always been "imperial" at their core, whether in the US or in former colonial empires elsewhere. And when said empires are crumbling, matters get worse -- something that Orwell didn't really envision when he wrote *1984*, by the way. What's painfully obvious to many people today is that the denial of reality to preserve "greediocracy" gets even more pivotal when empires are falling compared to when they were at the peak of their power. And "doublethink" plays a pivotal part worsening the situation for everyday people here. It's worth noting that Fat Mike not-so-incidentally points at this concept of "doublethink" towards the end of *The Decline*, during a final hardcore-punk cavalcade leading to the full-blown, trombone-laden main theme in the composition: "And so we go, on with our lives We know the truth, but prefer lies Lies are simple, simple is bliss Why go against tradition when we can Admit defeat, live in decline Be the victim of our own design The status quo, built on suspect Why would anyone stick out their neck? Fellow members of Club "We've Got Ours" I'd like to introduce you to our host He's got his, and I've got mine Meet the decline." Once Fat Mike "introduces" the "decline", all hell breaks loose. The build-up used as a musical backdrop for this scathing criticism of political complacency thus leads to an even more striking conclusion -- with its ironic trombone harmonizing with typical melodic hardcore-punk guitar octave riffs. And this final section is surely the most sardonic moment NOFX have ever put to tape in a career already filled to the brim with them. It is so intense, so desperate, and even so *heartbreaking*, you can only pump your first into the air to express the despair as to how American masses have been fed lies for so long without ever rebelling on a mass scale. That particular melody -- first displayed in the middle of the long track for one short single iteration, and then fully taking flight for its "cinematic" climax -- is, for all intents and purposes, a sonic spoof of a patriotic parade in the nation's capital, whose obvious fascistic overtones are not only conveyed through the sounds of marchers goose-stepping in the streets, but also by the desperation implied in the theme's root minor chords -- here covered by the mock-epic trombone theme. It's hard to know if the 18-minute song's conclusion is grotesque or sublime, or if you should snarl or cry -- it's probably all of this at the same time, a "doublethink" response itself, illustrating how one can never fully escape the toxic cognitive dissonance triggered by such propaganda, even when you are aware of its nature. One thing's for sure, though: the topical resonance of *The Decline*'s conclusion feels all the more urgent today than it ever was. In other words, the music is great, but it's also great because of the scene it helps describing -- a scene that should speak to the soul of every quote-unquote "anti-fascist" out there. Sarcasm doesn't necessarily mean cynicism. It can also be a wake-up call. Not so long before *The Decline*, Fat Mike and his gang of melodic punk ruffians had released album *Punk In Drublic*, arguably their magnum opus in terms of sarcastic societal songs packing a terrific punch in terms of catchiness and infectious melodies. NOFX would then leave some of those societal themes aside to an extent, so as to embrace more absurd forms of irony -- either on the underwhelming *Heavy Petting Zoo*, or the musically tight and excellent *So Long And Thanks For All The Shoes*. *Punk In Drublic* has remained the template of the Californian punks' artistry to this day, though. Some cuts in it had touched upon themes closely related to the vanities and delusions going with the sad state of the American Empire, and how ordinary people were routinely crushed by them ("Don't Call Me White", the cover version of Mark Curry's "Perfect Government"...). Yet as perfect and comprehensive as *Punk In Drublic* sounded for the melodic hardcore genre, it was still missing an epic tour de force that would sum up this overarching theme in one single, masterful stroke. And *The Decline* filled that void five years later, in 1999. Interestingly, Fat Mike has retrospectively expressed mixed feelings about the project -- not so much because of its actual results, but because of how the whole idea had quickly become a logistical nightmare for the band. Three different recording sessions have been used to complete *The Decline*, occurring in different studios with various state of success, which surely went against the band's initial wish to record the whole thing with as few takes as possible, in keeping with a punk DIY spirit that's the total opposite of the prog-rock overblown shenanigans usually associated with the word "rock-opera". "Don't try this at home, kids!" the EP's liner notes go -- as if NOFX was dreading the day when horrible fan cover versions of the song would see the light of day, performed by amateur bands ill-equipped to pull it off, at least decently. The reception of the EP was also pretty divisive in punk-rock audiences, which probably also left a bitter taste in Fat Mike's mouth. One of the most persuasive criticisms launched at the project was that the composition was not "seamless" -- that you could sense that it was made out of bits and pieces taken from unused songs, here pasted one after another. This may or may not have been the case -- no one will know now, and I doubt NOFX themselves know about this themselves today. Yet all those elements, here combined with each other, could indeed suggest that *The Decline* was sort of a joke that had gone on for too long -- a crazy, spontaneous "what if?" idea suddenly becoming too heavy and "costly" compared to the initial goofy intent of "let's make a punk opera". Yet assessing the state of a fallen empire crumbling at the seams now suggests the very "fragmentary" nature of *The Decline*'s narrative was the right move after all. The form mirrors the subject matter here anyway. Compare *The Decline* to Green Day's *American Idiot*, for instance, and it seems that the very earnest "Broadway-show features" of the latter round off the edges a little too much to be considered as real "punk". Worse, Green Day can't help reifying some key American "values" during the course of their lengthy libretto. And they keep on piling "acts", one after another, until their initial critical intentions become muddled beyond recognition for the sake of creating a supposedly entertaining "storyline". Green Day do brush the surface of *doublethink*, for instance, but they never fully delve into it. And this is where they lose the plot somehow. Compared to *American Idiot*, *The Decline* says everything that needs to be said in eighteen swift minutes. In between the song's introduction and its parody of a fascist parade at its end, Fat Mike only needs to explore three sub-topics to get his message across: guns, drugs and religion. For the first, hardcore-punk twists and turns illustrate the subject with all the necessary scared frenzy. For the second sub-topic, moodier, more "experimental" textures are harnessed -- with (gasp!) a couple of mock-prog-rock undertones here and there, symbolizing the stupefied state that goes with drug consumption as the only crutch against full-blown despair. And the illustration of religious fundamentalism firmly stands in between those two musical palettes. Guns, drugs and religion are here three key signifiers branding the fledgling American empire for what it truly is -- a society going through a slow "decline" indeed, down to the appalling state it is today, where all values of decency and solidarity are cynically trampled upon by the powers that be. Those signifiers circle around themselves exactly as they should, and the way they are musically handled conveys a pretty solid assessment of what's at stake. Pretty impressive for a song supposedly made out of "bits and pieces". No one knows if the civic surge witnessed today will be enough to course-correct the tragic state of affairs already denounced in *The Decline*. All we know is that four disheveled punk rockers were among those raising the alarm in their own way 25 years ago. Of course, they were not listened to as they should have been -- they only came off as eccentric goofballs ranting on their soapbox. But if you listen to the conclusion of *The Decline* today, the message was already clear as a bell. If you don't march in the streets against political complacency, those streets will be invaded by the worst ilk instead. It's never too late until it is. "Why would anyone stick out their neck?" Fat Mike snarled in 1999 to roast the sheep's status quo. Yet that status quo is long gone by now, and the reasons why we should all stand against the imperial monsters are abundantly clear today, aren't they? Those who know the truth can't prefer lies anymore. 5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 10/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 91 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 182 (including this one -- only because *The Decline* is technically an E.P.. But *Punk In Drublic*'s in it, of course!) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I absolutely love Jaco Pastorius' bass playing on Joni Mitchell's *Hejira*, and I can also appreciate his input on Weather Report's *Heavy Weather*, even if it's more an acquired taste for me. The sound he draws from his fretless bass is one-of-a-kind, and I most especially enjoy his taste for strumming harmonics out of his instrument. The more virtuosic parts of his artistry go over my head a bit, but I'm familiar with enough different stripes of jazz to follow the bulk of it nonetheless. So it was interesting finally discovering the man's solo output thanks to this eponymous album. The first striking aspect of this LP is probably how totally "non-cohesive" it is -- in the sense that the tones, textures and styles used in there have nothing to do with each other from one track to the next. Which brings its share of shortcomings for me. Second cut "Come On, Come Over", with Sam and Dave, is a somewhat meat-and-potatoes soul-funk song that's way too different from the rest, unfortunately. Same with the moody and meandering closer "Forgotten Love" -- mercifully short, and exclusively using a grand piano and a string orchestra -- on another musical extremity. The pivotal places those two underwhelming cuts occupy in the tracklist are detrimental to its flow and impact for me. Yet the rest is more to my taste. Most of the LP indeed follows two main threads: on the one hand, there are jazz-fusion jams displaying warm and even tropical tones (flutes, percussion, the uncanny steel drums used for the very nice "Opus Pocus", a more lively strings section on "Kuru / Speak Like a Child", co-written with Herbie Hancock...). And then there's 100% minimalistic stuff, subtle and soft-sounding, with Jacob playing alone at times, or with a very small number of other musicians. That strand is represented by the opener "Donna Lee" and album centerpiece "Continuum", by the very sweet harmonics within "Portrait of Tracy", and most especially by the cinematic "Okonkolé Y Trompa", which is a hypnotic delight thanks to its bass-congas-french-horn combination -- complex, simple and illuminating all at the same time. I can see myself returning to this album for this last strand of experimental, minimalistic jazz, because this is where Jaco's artistry feels both the most distinctive and the most straightforward for me. Yet maybe the lack of cohesion elsewhere will get on my nerves a little after a while, who knows? That said, "jazz virtuoso" albums don't necessarily have to follow the rules I ascribe to other music genres in that format. Pastorius was the sort of adventurous player that could probably redeem his weird, unruly stylistic choices through the sheer force of his musicianship. Some artists are way too extravagant AND way talented to be shoehorned in a little box anyway. And Jaco Pastorius was most certainly one of them. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 92 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 182 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

*Separation Sunday* holds better (steadier?) for me than the other The Hold Steady album on the users' list (infamously listed twice by mistake -- but no worries, Alexander has marked the second iteration as inactive now). I've just read the review I left for *Boys And Girls In America* again, and I was surprised by how scathing my words in it were. I remembered not liking that other LP and leaving a 2/5 grade to it. But I didn't remember being so critical. Listening to *Separation Sunday* and *Boys And Girls In America* back to back, I now understand a little better what it was that the latter was so direly missing for me, that I'm gonna sum up with the words "authenticity", "energy", and "drive" -- all of which are present in spades throughout *Separation Sunday*. For me, *Boys And Girls In America* was aping Bruce Springsteen's artistry a little too closely, and in the process, was pestered by streamlined and naive pop-rock pointless cuts, quite a few flat compositions, devoid of clear dynamics, and overblown production values trying to cover for those shortcomings -- not to mention a couple of cheesy keyboards arrangements here and there. Craig Finn's sprechgesang vocals also felt constrained or watered-down for commercial purposes, which made them sort of unbearable for my ears. Here, in *Separation Sunday*, I engage far more in the stories the man is trying to tell about dissolute youths losing their way in all sorts of Midwest seedy places. And it's probably because Craig's voice here conveys the right "narrator's aura". I only browsed through the surface of the "plot", mind you. But what I grasped seemed worthy of my attention, because the literary words penned by Finn have enough space to breathe at least, contrary to what occurs in the next album. Likewise, the music rocks as it should, unencumbered by useless flourishes. The horn arrangements are pretty cool. And the distorted guitars pack the right amount of punch, making up for the partial lack of identifiable choruses tenfold. This is a far more "punk" album, leaning closer to the Replacements among the band's influences -- its intents even foretelling crank-wave stuff such as Protomartyr, even if the compositions are far less complex, angular and artful than what you can find in the Detroit post-punk act's discography. A couple of cuts in the middle or in the second half are also a little too meat-and-potatoes for my rock music tastes (looking at you, "Charlemagne in Sweatpants"). But "Your Little Hoodrat Friend" and "Banging Camp" (whose guitar riffs incidentally or accidentally rips off Pavement's "Date w/ IKEA"), along with closer ""How a Resurrection Really Feels", are really great songs, for example. So here's me subjectively separating the wheat from the chaff. It took an album named *Separation Sunday* for me to do that, and also to redeem The Hold Steady in my eyes. Because even the most hopeless cases deserve as second chance, as this album's storyline suggests. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 93 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 182 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

"Oh, California is this very deceptive place; it's bright on the outside and a really dark place on the inside." Thus goes Mr. Bungle to describe the "concept" of *California*, and I gotta say the zany dithering displayed by this album fits the program perfectly, as exemplified by its door wop / flim noir opener "Sweet Charity", followed by the dystopian rockabilly of "None Of Them Know They Were Robots". I won't bother writing a proper review for this record, because the user who basically stated how this record sounds like a metal band produced by the ghost of Frank Zappa as they play stuff going from Beck to the Stray Cats has already nailed it on the head anyway. I just want to add that "Pink Cigarette" and "Retrovertigo" -- with its obvious nod to Bernard Hermann's score for the Hitchcock movie -- are awesome (and very twisted) ballads. And I also want to state that "Ars Moriendi" is like System Of A Down on steroids (if such a thing is possible), or that the thrilling tribute to Indonesian "tchak tchak" vocal groups on closer "Goodbye Sober Day" had me burst out laughing. Here I am writing the first draft of a review anyway, so I'd better stop taking now. There is not a single dull song on the album, and even if you need to be in a peculiar mindset to appreciate all of them, they still offer a treasure trove of certifiable, bonkers joys. Oh, and Mike Patton is a powerhouse vocalist, as always. *California* is at least essential listening for casual fans of the man's artistry (and a most essential one for his hardcore fans). I would personally place it next to Faith No More's *Angel Dust* (sorry, I never liked *The Real Thing*), Tomahawk's *Mit Gas* and Fantômas' *The Director's Cut*, whose adventurous, delirious, and very obvious "cinematic" tones make it sound quite close to the craziness experienced in this Mr. Bungle magnum opus. Not sure that's enough to include the album in my own potential finite list of 1001 keepers, but I certainly wish there would be room left for it when I die. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 182 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Pink Floyd. Pink Floyd live album. Pink Floyd live album from the later David Gilmour-controlled era. Pink Floyd live album from the later David Gilmour-controlled era, where they had clearly become a nostalgia act. I mean, who in their right mind has ever cared for the drivel within studio album *The Division Bell*, apart from "High Hopes", maybe -- which is still a pretty good song, I readily admit it? What a wasted opportunity. Unless I'm mistaken, *Meddle* is still absent from both lists, and I think it's a terrific LP. So why *this* instead? Precious live album *Delicate Sound Of Thunder* had been released not so long before 1995, if I remember correctly. Which is why *Pulse* sounds first and foremost like a cash grab for me. **** I tried to take a page out of the blissfully short reviews routinely left by the user who suggested *Pulse* to us all to pen my take up there. Looks like I failed, though. Being concise and to the point is definitely not my strong suit. So let me start again, this time *really* short. Here's the final version of my review: "OK Boomer" **** ?/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums -- I don't even think the choice can apply for this list -- rounded DOWN to 2. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and overall production values + 5 for the legendary songs in it, minus 1 for the lack of real stakes, 1 for the far less interesting compositions taken from *The Division Bell*, and 1 for the questionable sound / production values in it at times...) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 183 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Spanish punk rock. Mostly "carne y patatas" for the vast majority of the tracks (get it?). The drums sound awkward or heavy-handed sometimes, and the voice most often comes off weak, hackneyed, or "forced" compared to other stellar vocalists from that genre as played during the late nineties / early noughts. Some nice guitar octave riffs here and there. Yet nothing revolutionary compared to other pivotal acts in the genre. Oh, and that artwork is positively horrible (not in good way, lol). One terrific track is saving this punk record from my lowest-rated gallery, though: "¡Ay! Dolores". That awesome song has a simple-yet-clearly-infectious chorus, an incredible violin arrangement, and a terrific flamenco conclusion -- short, but complete with acoustic guitars, handclaps, and impassioned vocals by a woman. It's a composition that *instantly* stood out when I listened to this thing, and I wasn't surprised to see it in the most streamed tracks released by Reincidentes on my streaming service -- *after* I first listened to it, that is. So thanks to the user who suggested this. We might not see eye to eye about how great punk rock should sound like, but I gotta credit you for letting me know about this band, and how it visibly left an imprint in the alternative Spanish rock world thanks to that one song from the album. It's always nice to discover great tracks you would never have discovered without this app. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes (4.5 for the musicianship and overall production values + 1 for the artistry + 1 for "¡Ay! Dolores") ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 75 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 184 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

A mythical shoegaze album, basically a platonic ideal of the genre -- in a far less abrasive, more cotton-cushioned version of said ideal compared to My Bloody Valentine's *Loveless*. Yet the wall-of-guitar sound in it feels as enveloping and cosmic today as it was in 1993. This one is for tender-hearted dreamers and lovers. Moody, spectral and spacious all at the same time. The one thing I initially reproached this record with was that it was difficult differentiating the songs at first -- hence why the somewhat lukewarm reception when the LP came out. Maybe indeed its production could have used some extra bite at some key points... But like all fine wine, this record just needs a little time letting some air seep in to let all its flavours bloom. And subsequent listens easily reveal how great this thing is. "Alison", "Machine Gun" "40 Days", the dub-inspired mesmerism of "Souvlaki Space Station", the all-out guitars of "...When The Sun Hits", the irresistible cuteness of the "yeah, yeahs" on "Altogether"... So many great songs, and so many great tones... 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 76 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 184 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

"Creation Morning" and "Badlands Flashlights" are great compositions, in between Steely Dan and Joni Mitchell at the peak of her jazz-influenced era. John Martyn is also there somewhere. The tones are lush, the arrangements are very intricate, and the guitar playing is virtuosistic. Yet the result are not merely Bruce Cockburn showing off his six strings chops. It's also him creating very touching or endearing music, also exemplified by the very catchy vocal hook at the center of "Wondering Where The Lions Are", kind of foretelling Paul Simon's *Graceland* era. Conversely, the "yacht folk" of "Hills Of Morning" and "Northern Lights" are somewhat more streamlined affairs that feel less risky or less interesting on a purely musical viewpoint. And those songs are also a touch too linear and naive-sounding for my tastes in the genre involved here. The rest oscillates between those two extremities, often within individual songs. Textbook "3/5 album" for me, incidentally the global score for this one. The two instrumentals added in the deluxe edition are terrific, by the way. Why didn't Bruce Cockburn follow that sort of far more promising source of inspiration to strengthen the original tracklist of the album is beyond me... 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 76 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 185 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Since the user who suggested this doesn't leave any review, I'm gonna take a page out of his lazy book and copy and paste the introduction of Pitchfork review for this album, which I 100% subscribe to, for once: "The British singer and beatmaker’s largely self-produced debut album is a pleasant, frictionless listen that benefits from his obvious chops but is held back by his risk-averse tendencies.". Yeah, I don't think the world absolutely needs a more lethargic and less grinning version of Jay Kay from Jamiroquai, even if he is a stellar guitar player and competent vocalist (admittedly singing in a lower register). Covering songs by other artists with better songwriting chops (Stevie Wonder's *Isn't She Lovely", Patrick Watson's "Man Like You") only reveals what it is that Tom Misch is still lacking as an artist. "Water Baby" on the second side is kind of cool and lushly arranged. But each and every original song before and after is a borefest. In short, his dross is one of the reasons I hate Starbucks Coffee. Thanks, but no thanks for the latte. 1.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 2. 6.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 76 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 186 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

"Waiting For The Sun" is an excellent opener. Conversely, "My Happiness" is annoying to a degree, like a chirper, major-keyed version of Radiohead's "Climbing Up The Walls" -- which was dark and gripping instead. In a similar Radiohead's *The Bends* / *OK Computer* vein, "The Meter" fares far better, fortunately. "Like A Dog" takes a suddenly heavier hairpin curve, somewhere between QOTSA, Bowie and Led Zeppelin. Nice but very derivative -- you can sense the noughts retro-rock wave coming up here. After a short interlude, "Up and Down and Back Again", "My Kind of Scene" and "These Days" are rock ballads like Stereophonics or Manic Street Preachers have penned dozens of other ones like that: not necessarily bad songs -- sometimes very good ones, even. Yet just like most of their counterparts in the acts quoted up here, those slower compositions are never *unforgettable* tunes within *Odyssey Number Five*. By this point, the album's tracklist is lacking *crucial* dynamics, and the piano and double-bass alt-rock groove of "We Should Be Together", as interesting as it is is instrumentation-wise, is not enough to set the bar where it should be. This record doesn't take enough risks, damnit. And when Powderfinger does take a risk, the result sounds a bit aimless... With its awkward, meandering and loosely-knit instrumental bridges, the ironically-named *Thrilloillogy* even manages to lose the thread in what should have been a pivotal penultimate entry before the final mandatory acoustic cut. "Whatever Makes You Happy" pleads singer Bernard Fanning on that closer. Emphasis on "whatever". The problem here being that this last acoustic song is way too short and doesn't build up to anything special. Maddening how the last leg of the album is 100% underwhelming. To sum thing up, Powderfinger never reach the level of their obvious models, as competent and skilled as they are. It seems that Fanning is a good guy, generally speaking. But if *this* is the "best Australian album of all times" (Triple J's poll), I'm the frigging Pope. I won't excommunicate the user who suggested this. They even have my blessing. But I certainly won't include the album in my own codex. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and production values + 2 for the artistry). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 76 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 187 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

The Pros and Cons of this Album. Pros: - It harbours the same bleak and paranoid AOR tones as the ones found in its more famous "twin" *The Wall*, which left a mark on my soul when I was a teenager. - It is shorter than *The Wall*, and more cohesive than the latter's other off-shoot project *The Final Cut* (also recorded as a Pink Floyd album, contrary to what we have here) - Its four-note main theme / leitmotiv, as heard in the opening track and repeated a few times elsewhere, is simple, dreary and elegant all at once. - The album's title allows me to quickly write my review. Cons: - It is basically one long song going on at the same lethargic pace, divided into "chapters", but never going anywhere special compared to the couple of first cuts in the tracklist (bar one exception, but more on that later...). No real climaxes, no dynamic bridges, no revelatory moments on a musical standpoint... Roger Waters retrospectively admitting that the album "dragged a little" is probably the understatement of his life. The man is not usually prone to that sort of cautious remarks in public, is he? I guess he can only be cautious when he has to face his own shortcomings as an artist, lol. - The lack of variety in the music is near-maddening. One song / "chapter" out of two is anchored in the same A minor key, which only adds to the lack of rhythmical variety. This is where supposed "cohesiveness" becomes near-obnoxious. I actually prefer *The Final Cut* to this, even with the couple of duds in it. At least, there are some memorable "peaks" in that other album. In comparison, *The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking* is a decidedly "flat" affair. - Eric Clapton's guitar playing is surely impressive on a purely technical viewpoint, but it lacks that magic David Gilmour touch in Pink Floyd LPs. You can feel that Clapton is going through the motions at times. - The only reason the title-track stands out is because the rhythm section suddenly becomes livelier, after one side and a half of music laboriously plodding and trudging its way to the listener's ears. Yet taken on its own, that one song can't possibly reach the heights of *The Wall*. "Comfortably Numb" or "Run Like Hell" this song is definitely NOT. - Roger Water nicking some of the chord progressions found in *The Wall* feels so goddamn *lazy*. Having one example of such self-plagiarism in the FIRST MINUTE of the album (the chord sequence of the pre-chorus from "In The Flesh") had me roll my eyes so much I was tempted to do better things with my time than listening to this solo Roger Waters album again. Because, yeah, I did try to enjoy it before. And I tried again today, to no avail. - The story within this concept album also lacks the clear stakes found in *The Wall*. Midlife crises, adultery, paranoid delusions, the dread brought about by utilitarianism... Yes you could find all of that in *The Wall* as well, but there those topics felt "sublimated" by the artistry. The lyrics in *The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking* sound like ramblings found in a middle-aged man's diary instead, never edited into some final shape that could come off as moving or simply interesting to go through. This flaw only adds to the "clinical" feel of the album. The topics of alienation and solipsism link this record to the legendary work Roger Waters had previously accomplished in Pink Floyd, sure. But there's just no way you can emotionally respond to the protagonist of *The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking* in a manner as memorable as your response to "Pink" in *The Wall* is. - This is such a self-indulgent record overall. True, *The Wall* had some self-indulgent moments in it as well, but that sort of self-indulgence was actually in keeping with its storyline about a rock star descending into madness. One could even argue that it added to the dark story somehow. In comparison, *The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking* does indeed feel like an inconsequential bad dream -- one that will be quickly forgotten. Tellingly, the record is not even intense enough to be labelled as a "nightmare". And the near-absence of legacy this LP left actually seems to underline that sad state of affairs. Looks like the "Cons" clearly outweigh the "Pros" here. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and production values + 1 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 76 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 188 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

"Cause this music can put a human being in a trance-like state and deprive it for the sneaking feeling of existing. 'Cause music is bigger than words and wider than pictures. If someone said that Mogwai are the stars, I would not object. If the stars had a sound, it would sound like this. The punishment for these solemn words can be hard. Can blood boil like this at the sound of a noisy tape that I've heard? I know one thing. On Saturday, the sky will crumble together (or something) with a huge bang to fit into the cave." ---- What's also great about that pick is that the most touching and most personal review ever written about it is actually uttered in the very first seconds of the album, ha ha. I could leave it at that, I guess. But this record is so important that I'm gonna add quite a few extra words of my own... By this point, you can probably guess I've been fan of Mogwai for a long time. Yet as "subjective" as what I'm about to say is, I seriously think you don't need to be a fan to recognize how frigging *pivotal* this album is -- not only for a post-rock genre criminally ignored by Dimery in his book, but also for the whole rock idiom in general. In the (mostly instrumental) tracklist of this album you have three weird-sounding piano-laden interludes I'm not going to touch upon, because you need to be in love with the rest to dig them during the course of the tracklist. But I will say a few things for each of the main compositions. "Yes, I Am a Long Way from Home" thus starts with a spoken-word introduction, followed by an intricate bass riff that feels both sullen and hopeful somehow. The heart soars here... What is about to happen? Well, what happens is music evoking the barren highlands of Scotland under clouds -- a long way from home indeed for quite a few listeners. A poised yet still suspenseful two-note motif on guitars keeps you on your toes as the composition displays its delicate canvas for your ears. Pretty guitar harmonics and effect-laden waves take over for a while, then the bass returns and builds up to waves of distorted guitars taking flight into the grey skies -- waves rolling and crashing over your head, subtly adding layers one after another, in a telluric sound geology aptly pointing towards the idea of travelling the Earth, when you find yourself hiking towards a hilltop to eventually behold and gape at a natural landscape from there -- one you didn't imagine existed two minutes before. Next is "Like Herod", showing Mogwai doing a trick they often pulled off in the first era of their long career: take a very simple idea to its most extreme execution, and in the process, record a track that ends up becoming a platonic ideal for a whole genre. The main idea for "Like Herod" is to translate the "jumpscare" of a horror film into music. Everything is restrained and contained at first. The bassline is fully ominous this time around, the guitar arpeggios are claustrophobic... Everything goes even quieter for a while... until... BANG! A "screamer" blasts its way into your speakers!!! Repetitive, hypnotic -- "ugly", even -- that relentless guitar bend is like the evil-eyed creature creeping under your bed, or the one hidden in your cupboard. Its dark stare peers into your soul for most of the eleven minutes of this composition. "There be monsters", said the old medieval maps of the world about unknown territories. I think we've found one here... After the terror of "Like Herod", "Katrien" initially returns to more tranquil and welcoming shores. It's a cousin of the opening track, yet becoming more animated and more unsettled as the music moves forward. Its last mid-tempo surge on the drums even goes to a somewhat frantic pace, suggesting the mental image of escapees from a prison suddenly running for their lives... until a very dramatic key change for the last strummed chord ends the whole thing on a cliffhanger! Cinematic as fuck. And speaking of cinematic, "Tracy" is an absolute gem that could transcend any scene shot for a film. There's no "loud" here, it's all "quiet". And yet Mogwai being the masters of compositional dynamics that they are, the whole song feels like a soundtrack made to support elegiac cinematography taking its sweet time to document natural cycles under a twilight sky. Spatial echoes of guitar effects hover above a tender bassline, soon followed by somewhat disquieted drums stumbling upon jazzy fills. Then a glockenspiel motif double-tracks a delicate and thoughtful guitar lick -- one of the prettiest things ever heard in a post-rock album. More sustained waves of guitar delay finally end the song on most sublime notes, just as a prank call goes about in the background, where the caller makes up a story about one of the band members punching another in the face (every Mogwai fan knows the band has a very cheeky sense of humour behind the scenes, and here's a clear instance of it in this skit). The thing is, you really want to believe Dominic and Stuart have had a fight and the band went into a major crisis here, so persuasive and "dramatic" the music is. "Dramatic" might be too strong a word to qualify "Tracy" though, even if the song is among my ten favorite Mogwai tracks ever... "Meditative" and "immanent" are more like it. Like an out-of-body experience... On to another key track now. About this one, "Summer", let's just start by pointing out that Stuart Braithwaite has had very harsh retrospective words about the "Priority Version" of this particular song as found in *Young Team*. True, maybe the original version released as a single and in the *Ten Rapid* compilation is indeed superior and more subtly pulled off... That being said, "Summer" is by itself a tune strong enough to survive the more distorted treatment and more linear "reorganizing" this second version went through. What's amazing about Mogwai as an instrumental act is that they clearly have a knack for catchy choruses at times, even without singers to put words into them. And the one "chorus" of "Summer" is indeed a very important milestone for the Scottish band, and a template for many great things to come. So I'm glad it found its way into this debut, even in this *slightly* lesser version... "R U Still Into It" is a change of pace because there's finally a real vocalist taking center stage towards the end of the album -- here Arab Strap's Aidan Moffat, going into his sullen spoken-word routine. Mogwai do an excellent job providing impressionistic chorus-laden guitar touches to support Moffat's melancholy, oscillating between careful optimism and bitter cynicism during the course of those disillusioned lyrics. The music is actually very close to the one of Arab Strap -- it doesn't lead to revelatory moments, it just conveys the dredge of everyday life and the lack of perspective and personal growth in a relationship. That final piano lick feels fateful, even. And now, as I'm writing the last words of this overlong review -- not bothering about transitions between the songs, contrary to what the album does -- the last and most "essential" track from this album has just started playing in my headphones. Yes, this review has been written in "real time" so to speak, every paragraph stopping at the exact moment each main composition ended. And right now, as I'm typing those words, I'm listening to "Mogwai Fear Satan"'s hypnotic three-note ascending motif circling again and again in my ears, and it is sending the *exact same shivers down my spine* as the ones I felt almost thirty years ago, when I first listened to this masterpiece concluding this debut. Inexhaustible track, three decades in. Yes, this song is the ultimate Mogwai song, enough said -- not only is it filled with gorgeous arrangements and harmonies (that dreamy flute! those subtle guitar flourishes!) wallowing around its crystal-clear, simple-as-hell compositional core, but this mythical cut also sums up the sheer power of a whole genre when going into its quiet - loud - quiet mode. I remember watching the band play that legendary composition live once, in one of the concerts of theirs I've had the chance to attend. When the loud part hit again, it felt like a nuclear blast! I swear I could have seen the wave of sound going slow-motion through the crowd in front of me until it finally hit me in the face as well. It was like watching those "explosion bubbles" in the Akira manga, or in its anime adaptation. Awe, joy, terror and wonder all at once. And a whole mental landscape opens up thanks to the mesmerizing repetitions gracing this jewel from start to finish. Hard to say if this landscape is on Earth or from another planet... But said landscape feels as vast an astral plane as one can imagine in their mind's eye. This here is the sort of music that can fuel your imagination or heighten your perceptions tenfold. Not only does it speak to the soul, but it also tightens your heart and grips your senses. If the stars had a sound, it would sound like this indeed. As said elsewhere, *Young Team* might not even be the best Mogwai LP -- and fans will probably have a hard time agreeing which one is given how consistent their discography is overall. Personally, I hesitate between *Rock Action*, *Happy Songs For Happy People*, *Mr. Beast*, *The Hawk Is Howling*, and *Hardcore Will Never Die But You Will*, all of them profiting from the addition of fifth member Barry Burns -- not present on this debut apart from a "reversed" vocal skit, but later adding his own guitar, vocal and keys/piano skills to the formula. Yet even if some other Mogwai albums are "objectively" superior, "Young Team" was the band's debut, and it automatically gains extra points because of the aesthetical shock it ignited for a whole generation of rock fans at the time -- and also because of "Mogwai Fear Satan", all by itself. Before this album, many strands of experimental stuff labelled as "post-rock" already existed (strands best represented by Slint, Labradford or Tortoise, each creating very different sorts of music). Yet none of those strands were using the clear and straightforward dynamics Mogwai have used for decades now -- which also proved so incredibly influential for dozens and dozens of other acts later on. Most essential addition to the list, then, thank you. Mogwai has a rightful place among the many "young teams" that have had an undeniable impact in music history. And I'm so glad that the users list is finally giving this place to them. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 188 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

From the get-go, in "Political Scientists", Ryan Adams uses a lot of words, cramming their ways into verses not fit to contain them, and this only to describe scenes that don't make a lot of sense out of context. Why is that woman crouching under the sink in "someone's restaurant" to write "with her pen"? It's so vague. And why would it be important she writes the singer's name in such an uncomfortable position? Is it because he thinks she owes him her career, whatever it is that she does in life? Easy sarcasm about more recent Ryan Adams news here, I readily admit it... I mean... What's the point of this verse? Surreal or quote-unquote "mysterious" songwriting needs to elicit striking pictures in your head. But here the songwriting only provides a "so what?" moment. It's a very fine line, I'll grant that to Ryan Adams. But witnessing the man straddling said line *in the first track of this album* is quite disheartening. Sure, the build-up at the end of this opener is pretty nice,. But that's the least you can do in an album made of two initial "EPs" long enough to be considered as albums themselves. You need to be encouraged to go on. But "there's no guarantees" indeed that we're gonna get a good record at his early point. Will we get inconsequential dross instead? And am I feeling this because of the other two Ryan Adams albums that found their way into the original list -- including one that was so criminally OVERrated (the badly named *Gold*), which left such a putrid taste in my mouth, all those years after ? Looks like my predictions about inconsequential dross instantly come true right after the first track. Slow, lethargic and pointless "Afraid Not Scared" indeed proves quite fast that my fears were justified, very ironically. Likewise, "This House Is Not For Sale" sounds like a reject or a B-side from U2's later career. Conversely, "Anybody Wanna Take Me Home" is a far better song, even if it's in the same key as the one before, which sorts of ruins the surprise effect. That said, this cut is sort of catchy, I'm not gonna deny it. The title track is a good song as well, even if it marks the point where Adams' forced vocal performance start to get on my nerves. As for the ambient-sounds-and-fingerpicking-laden cover of "Wonderwall", it works very well, I recognize it. OK, so that's three good tracks (or at least decent ones) in a row now. Are my fears gonna be alleviated somehow? Nah, "The Shadowlands" kind of confirms my predictions again. Sure it's moody, but also kind of sounds "empty". "She's angry like a salesman / Who just couldn't make a sale" is the flattest, most terrible line in a song that I've heard for a long while. After that, nothing happens much in "World War 24", and "Avalanche" belies its title, even if it is the fourth good (or at least decent) track up to now, "My Blue Manhattan" and "Please Do Not Let Me Go" are tedious affairs using various vintage styles and trying to make them pass off for substance. And after that, the "messy" end of "City Rain, City Streets" is sort of interesting, even if the first half of the song is rather meat-and-potatoes. I still want to warmly thank the user who suggested this record because of the song that follows. Not only does "I See Monsters" ape Eliot Smith quite well, but it is also a tearjerker in its own right. Awesome vocal hook, terrific fingerpicking work, devastating lyrics... Fifth good song out of twelve for now. And the best one in the bunch here, by a long shot. Reminds me that Ryan Adams once wrote something like "Amy" on his debut. Unfortunately, I'm in two minds about "English Girls Approximately". On the one hand, it's nice to find that sort of Dylanesque track in a long album like this. On the other hand, it sometimes feels like Ryan Adams is overplaying his hand a little here, using forced inflexions on his vocals again to sell the idea he can pretend to reach that Bob Dylan level of epic songwriting... I'm suddenly reminded of those flat lines in "The Shadowlands'... What if those lines were a confession of sorts from Adams? There's the persuasive idea that he indeed acts "like a salesman / Who just couldn't make a sale", that the emotions he harnesses verge a little too closely on the purely performative side at times, as the album closer proves again. Let's face it, the seventies singer-songwriter rock simulacrum shtick exemplified by "Hotel Chelsea Night" -- peppered with female background (unfortunately very badly recorded here) -- can become annoying somehow. Sure it's better-executed than its equivalents in the terrible, ironically-named *Gold*. That shtick still feels more "authentic' in *Love Is Hell*, in a way -- just as it was more convincing in debut *Heartbreaker*, generally speaking. But it's still a shtick. Go and listen to an artist such as Nick Wheeldon in album *Gift* to hear the difference between a musician channelling those classic rock seventies shenanigans into brand new gems and one merely going though the motions as he tries to do the same thing. It's too bad, because there is another Ryan Adams standing right around the corner, the one of the touching penultimate track "Thank You Louise", rather in the vein of "I See Monsters". That's the most interesting artist here, and he's quite obscured by the one who took over in *Gold* -- clearly favoring style over contents, even when he tries to follow a more "intimate" direction. . Final count: six or seven good songs out of sixteen (including a cover of a very famous track), and the rest is instantly forgettable. Really, Adams should have edited his two EPs into a single-disc affair. Worse, the length of the album also means that it neither fully rhymes nor reasons. There is too much discrepancy between the good tracks and the lame ones. And that discrepancy is not even endearing in the long run, as some "double albums" sometimes prove to be. But we could have gotten even worse than this, so it's not so bad, all things considered. Leaving a rather benevolent grade, then -- exactly in between my 3/5 mark for *Heartbreaker* and my 1/5 grade for *Gold*. I'm being more benevolent that I thought I would be at first. Ain't life full of surprises? ---- 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 94 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 189 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Yeah, I remember the hype about this album and artist back in 2012. Even saw the guy play on stage at a festival -- it was kind of cool to watch, but the hype still went over my head back then. Since those days I've revisited Mac De Marco's discography, and I now admit he penned quite a few very nice songs -- it's just that those great songs were not immediately identifiable below the unobtrusive, cool-as-a-cat surface instrumentation -- groovy but streamlined to a fault at times. To be honest, I still think that De Marco's music borders on muzak once in a while -- even more so in later albums, which is why I at least have benevolent feelings towards the man's *de facto* LP debut bearing that very ironic "2" title. If you pay attention to details here, some chorus or hooks have weird things going on in them -- slightly darker undertones conveyed through very subtle psychedelic effects, or suddenly zany guitar work, or one sudden off-kilter chord change in a song or two. And conversely, you also have very sweet moments, like that falsetto singing on acoustic closer "Still Together", ending on a very sweet exchange between Mac and his partner, falling asleep at his side... I think if I had had to select a Mac De Marco album, I might also have selected the next one, *Salad Days*, which is sonically a tad bit more expansive and ambitious for some of its own peaks. But apart from that, the two LPs are pretty close affairs -- so one or the other could either possibly be included in my own list of keepers, granted there's still room left for Mac De Marco in it. I don't really know what else to say about this album, to use a phrase sometimes written by the reviewer who suggested this record, often at a loss for words. Maybe it's better to keep things simple and casual anyway, especially since that mindset perfectly fits with De Marco's artistry. "Casual" doesn't mean you can't be productive, by the way... Mac is actually prolific when it comes to recording demos, belying assumptions one can have about so-called "slacker-rock. See his 8-hour-long *One Wayne G* release on streaming services, so impressive in terms of quantity, to have unarguable evidence of that. It's a release that's probably harboring some gems among the small, monthly-demoed muzak fry. The jewel "Stratocaster" -- that I found through sheer luck as browsed through the 199 demos (!) -- seems to indicate that, at least. One last thing to conclude my disjointed rant... There's an alternate universe where Mac De Marco, instead of being an unassuming "slacker yacht-rocker", would have kept digging the glam-rock groove initiated by his first lo-fi EP "Rock And Roll Night Club", and thus kept on singing in a deeper punk crooner voice, somewhere between Elvis and The New York Dolls. And I would pay a high price just to check if he had also become famous in said alternative universe, and what sort of music he would play in 2026 in that different timeline... 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 95 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 189 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Such a weird mix of shoegaze, post-rock, noise rock, folk and alt-rock, with a US Southern hillbilly spin. As if Slint, Jeff Buckley, Godspeed You!, Grant Lee Buffalo, My Bloody Valentine, Drive-By-Truckers, The Smiths, Explosions In The Sky, and Cocteau Twins (whose members released this one-of-a-kind record through their label Bella Union) were all gathered in a Texas church to sing the praise of the Good Lord and announce that the end times are coming in elegiac and poignant chants sung over distorted and echo-drenched instrumentation. What a bizarrely awful piece of artwork, also. A portion of the users in this generator didn't automatically dismiss the music because of it, fortunately... As yet other reviewers also pointed out, it's hard to decide whether the religious imagery found in the song lyrics is tongue-in-cheek -- as a spoof of the obsessions routinely found in the band's native state -- or in earnest. It could possibly be a little bit of both. The many "meta' winks, just as when the trio of musicians themselves are compared to the three Wise Men in the early songs, indeed seem to point out those lyrics are at least partly-ironic. See also "Waiting To Hit", where Josh T. Pearson describes himself as "Just a stupid ranch hand, in a Texas rock band / trying to understand God's plan" in a hilariously self-deprecating line -- before bargaining with said God to help him pen a hit in exchange to him building a shiny city upon the hill, dedicated to the same Lord Almighty (that hit was never written, or most of you would already know this band -- therefore I guess that the shiny city upon the hill wasn't built either, unless it is represented by the LP itself). In this current day and age where fundamentalism is turning half the world crazy, toying with that sort of religious madness would probably raise a few eyebrows, right? Were the early noughts less "heavy" and worrying, allowing extravagant artists to have a little bit of fun writing half- sarcastic religious "concept albums"? Maybe... That said, I didn't grow up in Texas. So what do I know? All of this is very interesting, but it won't be very useful to describe the music. And there are also many things to point out here. The album takes its sweet time on the first disc to really get going. Maybe a little too much -- even though I did like some of those more ambient tones on this first half. But when it *does* start to roll up on all cylinders in the second disc, with "These Are The Days", that thing does wonders. A little one-note harmonically speaking, maybe, but some dynamics within the songs are really insane. The closer is also very memorable. And I love the guitar tones used throughout the record -- often amped through a Leslie Box, I heard, which creates this very pure and very hypnotic sound. If anything, the more disjointed first half is like a build-up leading to greater things, like the first half of a film using many scenes to introduce the stakes and the characters before the action begins properly. And those are often my favorite flicks, I got to say. But even if they're not yours, please give a chance to the second half of this double album. Even though I would tend to agree that The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads should have used a bit of self-editing, there really are some great things in the album, especially in its second half. I usually write overlong reviews, and I'm gonna stop here, because there's a lot to digest, and the one-album-a-day thing is not ideal to properly assess this sort of suggestion (as the global score here seems to prove, lol). I need to listen to this again to fully find my way into it. But let's just say that on paper, I think I can understand the "cult status" this (originally quite confidential) record has gained over the years. I would even venture to say it kind of foretells zany stuff happening in the field of rock music these days, like Wednesday or Geese. But all of this might be a little premature to state... As of now, I can only state I have a pretty good feeling about this one -- that it can indeed become a "keeper" for me in the years to come. Only the Good Lord knows if this particular prophecy will come true, sure. Let's just say that, as agnostic as I am, I place my faith in said Good Lord that this record becomes a post-rock / alt-rock classic for me one day. Amen. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 96 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 189 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

A close friend of mine loathes Muse, and I always have quite tender thoughts about him whenever I listen to them. In all fairness, I can understand why he's allergic to them -- at least on paper. To put it in a nutshell, Matthew Bellamy is a very interesting case in rock history. He's an extremely talented artist, so impressive for both vocal performances (the man's falsetto is one-of-a-kind, enough said) and guitar playing (those fingers of his are not merely nimble, they defy the laws of physics, while always retaining some amount of grace and measure). But with that blessing comes a curse: Bellamy admittedly relies a little too much on his skills, and in that process, he sometimes comes up short songwriting-wise. He can churn out extremely memorable and well-constructed songs, sure. But other times all you have is some sort of demonstrative shtick that can annoy you fast. So contrary to my friend, I think you can separate the wheat from the chaff here. Muse's bangers can be tons of fun for me, even if they have the subtlety of an elephant crashing its way into a china shop. In a sense, it's a story as old as Queen. What gets on the nerves of some listeners there is the exact reason the band has attracted so many fans in the first place. True, each and every album after *Black Holes And Revelations* is simply ridiculous, filled to the brim with terrible, overblown dross. But the first era of their career? I can live with it, honestly. Apart from that, yeah, it's pretty surprising that *Origins of Symmetry* wasn't included in the original list, because it clearly harbors some of the biggest hits of the band in this early era when they had not *fully* become a caricature of themselves. The first side is packed with those humongous bangers: synth-laden "New Born” and “Bliss", ripe with much punch and effective musical melodrama ; “Hyper Music”, whose slapping guitar, bass and drums work owes so much to Rage Against The Machine (Muse were big fans of theirs at the time), here transmuted into very bouncy and energetic non-crossover rock ; “Plug In Baby”, which is the platonic ideal of a Muse banger with its terrific guitar solo and infectious chorus ; and finally the long epic “Citizen Erased", angular and lively at first, and then slow and mellifluous. On a sidenote, the sci-fi and dystopian themes harnessed by those songs are also a good fit for the cinematic music in them. Bellamy is not the lyrics writer of the century, but no one is asking him to be anyway. There's a far bigger problem preventing me from giving full marks to this album, however. Let me put this quite bluntly: after such a raucous start, its second half is mostly composed of fillers. The first of them, "Micro Cut" is even an absolute dud exemplifying all the worst tendencies of Bellamy as a performer. That one should have been left on the cutting room floor, ironically -- and frankly, given the 55 minutes length of this record, this wouldn't have diminished its value on a purely quantitative level. The only real standout in that second half is the cover of "Feeling Good" -- obviously not at the level of the initial Nina Simone version, but once again, tons of fun to listen to. But one drawback generated by the inclusion of this cover is that the other songs next to it sound either bland or unnecessarily bloated in comparison. All of that being said, there's never been a perfect Muse album for me, and if really you had to include one, you'd better have most of the truly "greatest" hits in it. *Showbiz* and *Absolution* are more cohesive affairs, but the peaks in them are less numerous, and for some of them, far less punchy or impressive (even if they're good tracks). As for *Black Holes And Revelations*, it does have two other humongous hits in it, but it's also the start of the band's downward slope on a sonic and aesthetical level, even if you want to remain benevolent to their oh-so-grandiose, performative artistry. So I guess I could easily live with this one record being included in a "better" list of 1001 albums you must listen to at least once in your life (even if this would have never been my first choice). But only this one, OK? And please, don't tell my close friend I said so, alright? 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 97 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 189 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Bob Seger who? To the couple of boomer reviewers complaining that the original list harbors too many albums by supposedly unimportant acts, I would advise to broaden their horizons so that they could realize Bob Seger was never a household name outside of US borders. And now that this European listener has been exposed to his shtick, it's clear for him that Seger was for all intents and purposes a wannabe Springsteen. As far as I know, his real legacy is at least up for debate. The most streamed song of his on my streaming service is that cover of "Old Time Rock & Roll". This speaks volumes about the real nature of said legacy. In other words, who in their right mind can pretend Seger's songwriting chops left a pivotal imprint in music history? Of course, this doesn't mean his music is bad on paper. But this suggests that his fans repeating how important the man is might be projecting stuff that has no real bearing on said music history taken as a whole. About the album proper now: opener "Hollywood Nights" and "Brave Strangers" are pretty good cuts in the genre, I admit it. The first is a little too linear for my taste, but I'm not gonna complain about its energy at least. I guess that "Feel Like A Number" could be added to those two good cuts, but that thing is already a little too meat-and-potatoes for me, in spite of the tribute to American working class in the lyrics, which is never a bad thing. The rest offers boring ballads -- cheesy snoozefest in my book -- once again not providing much in terms of harmonic wonders. Even worse are the two extraneous, self-indulgent covers. "Old Time Rock & Roll", that I have already touched upon, and "Ain't Got No Money". And those covers are not even worth the effort I could spend roasting them. When I see the incredibly high global score for this record, I'm wondering if users are really using their ears. Maybe a cabal of old-timers exclusively (and desperately) looking into the past to force their tastes on people like me has taken over this generator, ha ha. Yeah, I feel like a "stranger in town" myself now, hence the paranoid rant. If at least this rant can give a wry smile to a couple of boomer users still having a sense of humour in here, I won't have fully wasted my time today. "Thank you for your attention in this matter", as another famous boomer yelling at clouds often says these days... 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 6/10 for more general purposes (5 + 1.5, minus 0.5 for the effect of the -- fully annoying -- global score of this thing for me) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 97 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 190 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I don't really know anything about Flamenco, and yet I can still sense the groundbreaking elements in this album. There's the Arabic harmonies in the genre being enhanced through middle-eastern scales and instrumentation in the opener and title-track, for example... I even wish that song had explored those influences a little more -- the fade-out at the end, just as the oud fully takes over, is a little frustrating... But it's the sort of frustration that also makes you want more, so it can't be a bad thing... There's also the jazz voicings found in quite a few tracks, grounded by the root notes played by the electric bass... Or the gipsy (and possibly also Brazilian) influences displayed in "Rio Anchor".... "Olé" sounds like a quintessential banger in the genre, up to its very name. Harmonically tense and texturally lush... "Plaza Alta" is also excellent, between its first "ambient" part and its livelier last section... I tend to prefer the second half of the record overall, but everything is impressive. With so much elegance, expertise, music writing genius, and virtuosistic moments in a purely technical standpoint, giving anything less than a perfect mark to this record will probably feel stingy for true amateurs of the genre. Even when you're not an expert, it's still very obvious Paco De Lucia placed himself within an old tradition he had quickly become the master of, but also challenged the codes of this tradition at times. And this distinctive impression really gives you the incentive to learn a bit more about this music style taken as a whole... In truth, I can't give full marks to this thing, because subjective leanings also play a part somehow, and I can't pretend I'm 100% passionate about the genre. That being said, *Almoraima* definitely comes off as perfect entry point for me (at the very least to know more about contemporary strands of flamenco). I'm still wondering whether it would be great idea to place so-called "traditional music of the worlds" in a supplementary 1001 items list (a list not merely dependent on the modern album format this time, given that gems in this very wide umbrella genre can also be found in pivotal compilations). But this sort of personal question is a bit abstract and "virtual" anyway. So at the minimum, I *got to* consider the inclusion of this Paco De Lucia album in my own potential list of keepers... 4/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 190 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I mean it’s fine but I don’t know why it should be on this list. I've just copied and pasted the bulk of another mini-review penned by the user who suggested this album and artist -- a review about Rocket From The Crypt, of all acts! Because ironically, this is exactly how I feel about this record now that I have finished listening to it. Thank you for making me discover this artist and performer, though. It's not because I'm not head over heels about *Older* that it's a ridiculous choice on paper. It's decent at least (see my mark out of ten in my specific grading system at the end). But it's not that striking a record to serve the real purposes of this list according to me. There's a couple of songs I really enjoyed: "Like It Tends To Do" is a very subdued (and yet great) cut, with extremely interesting and original tones / harmonies / voicings ; and "All Falls Down" is pretty cool because instrumentally it starts like an Andy Shauf track (complete with a woodwinds section), and then ends like a Phoebe Bridgers song -- which is mix of styles that works against all odds, ha ha. The rest feels a little too safe, streamlined or derivative for my tastes, unfortunately, in spite of a couple of cool chord changes or arrangements once in a while. Very simply put, it's Boygenius territory without the songwriting charisma and addition of talents. And as some other reviewer pointed out, it's not the sort of competition in an oversaturated field an artist such as Adrianne Lenker should worry about. Some lyrics sound decidedly flat or predictable for me. And musically, "Older" definitely lacks punch, as decent and competent as it is overall. Too many bittersweet ballads where the *sweet* aspects is emphasized a little too much... Guess the perks of getting "old" are not that numerous sometimes. 2/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 191 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Looks like the consensus in here is that a live album by a band that already has a studio LP on the list doesn't count (especially since the concert that is documented here uses all the highlights of this studio LP's tracklist). And I 100% subscribe to this take. I listened to *Z* again to ascertain what I about to say, and to put it in a nutshell, the studio versions of those songs sound way better than their live renditions on *Okonokos*, because they're here devoid of key production values... Also, the crowd noises. You need to have the band do their thing in a somewhat "pure" encapsulation -- not pestered by reactions to the music impeding on your own. Not that those audience reactions are terribly annoying in this particular example, at least generally speaking. But bar some very rare exceptions I won't even bother to mention, I consider that an entry point into a band's discography can't possibly include applause, or a fangirl in the crowd suddenly going bonkers in the middle of yet another slow-paced, derivative song -- and this for no "audible" reason. A little game, try to find on which track that specific moment happens. This might keep you on your toes while you listen to this lengthy record -- hopefully more than the music itself at times... Speaking of the devil, the length of this particular live album is another clear shortcoming for me and quite a few others. If you were there that night, this length makes sense, I imagine. But if you weren't, you really need to be a hardcore fan of this act to appreciate this Finally, the user who suggested this is incredibly difficult to please. I wouldn't say they're a "critic", as this generator says, because they never leave a review, and therefore don't explain their tastes. And I wouldn't say they're "picky" either, since they love Happy Monday's utter shite passing off as music, or whiny early Kings Of Leon albums (but this user is admittedly criticizing their -- even worse -- subsequent dross, fortunately, so he might get a pass here). Honestly, there are quite a few LPs this person gave a 5/5 mark to that I love myself... But being so difficult elsewhere gives you the extra incentive to have someone taste their own medicine a little. For all the reasons stated above, I need to subtract points to the grade I would initially give to the music alone -- noughts rock music that's pretty much a mix between The Flaming Lips, early Radiohead and Kings Of Leon before those choir boys sold their soul to the music industry devils, while also exploring the sort of elegant folk craft that would later make Fleet Foxes famous. Basically, what Jim James et al. are doing is southern rock channeled through somewhat "indie" tones, with a few choice stylistic curveballs here and there, such as the obvious reggae influences on "Off The Record". Most of those styles were popular at the time of the band's heyday and still sound decent today, I guess. But they also come off as banal overall in that live context, and even lacking in crucial dynamics once in a while. To be clear, that's gonna be only a half-point subtracted for each reason pointed out through my first four paragraphs, because I'm not as cold as the user who suggested this record. Of course, the final result of that substraction will sound pretty cold to this person anyway. I'm merely being honest, though. And I don't think this particular user is in a position to blame me for this. 1/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums. To explain the final grading: I would give a 3/5 mark to this live album if our list was exclusively dedicated to documented gigs (which is not its goal). Yet I subtracted 2 points to it for the reasons stated at the start of my rant (4 times 0.5 point). And that's gonna be 8/10 for more general purposes (4.5/5 for the musicianship and production values + 3.5/5 for the artistry). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 192 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Yeah, I think there's a case to be made here that this act has always been *seriously* overrated. This album is very competently performed and produced, sure. But it is also "streamlined" to a fault -- noughts so-called "indie" dross for the most part, fronted by a singer who often fails to provide either subtlety or interesting dynamics in his performance (those limp, annoying "ouh-ouh" vocal parts on "Phantom Limb"!). "Flat" is the word that automatically comes to mind here, and it also concerns the pedestrian songwriting in most parts of this record -- which is maddening to think of when reviewers state that *Wincing The Night Away* is among the band's supposedly "most adventurous albums". Because this particular adventure doesn't seem so thrilling for me. A couple of songs, such as "Red Rabbit" or "Black Wave", offer a form of ambiguity that's all too rare elsewhere. Tracks like opener "Sleeping Lessons" and "Spit Needles" are also relatively more intense than the rest... But there again, this intensity is not to be found in the piles of cheery tracks overdosing on sugar pestering the tracklist (and you can count the nearly unbearable "Australia" among those obnoxious and hamfisted cuts!). Too many songs come and go without making a distinctive point for me (including "Sleeping Lessons", actually, which fades away just as when the song could start to *really* get interesting). Nothing feels "vital" in this record fraught with too many missed opportunities. To sum things up, there are so many "modern" post-folk / indie rock acts of this type that have recently managed to leave a real imprint, from Grandaddy to The Flaming Lips, or from Other Lives and Fleet Foxes to Big Thief. And The Shins are not part of that league quickly transcending passing fads one or two decades later. Sensed that when I watch the band play at a festival around the time of this album's release. And I'm sorry to say I haven't changed my mind since. For an album evoking the subject of insomnia at some point, it is quite extraordinary that the music inside it makes me want to eyeroll my way into a deep slumber. So good night everyone. See you tomorrow. --- 2/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums 7/10 for more general purposes (4.5/5 for the musicianship and production values + 2.5/5 for the artistry). ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 77 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 193 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I've wanted to listen to this record for a long time. Not just hearing a couple of tracks from it here and there... I wanted to give my full attention to it. So today's suggestion was perfect, especially since I had a little time on my hands... The "pop punk for grown-ups" tag indicated by the user who suggested this already indicated one thing before I dived in: I would either hate this thing or totally love it. Either there was no way that apparently oxymoronic tag could work out, or a miracle had actually happened here. There was no possible middle ground. Since you've already seen the grade I gave to *Worry*, you already know what my verdict is though, right? :) Simply put, this LP is an extraordinary ride. To be totally honest, I had sort of given up on the music styles used there a long time ago, but now I feel as excited by them as I was as a teenager, when I started to rock to the greatest The Get Up Kids and The Suicide Machine albums of days yonder. And yet I *am* a "grown up" today, and I still feel like one. It's a wonderful paradox, and it takes a wonderful sort of artistry to pull it off in my book. Of course, this is no Blink-182 dross. Jeff Rosenstock has many things to sing about, topics that are both personal and political, for starters. But his lyrics never get in the way of the musicality of his compositions, at least in this one LP -- instead, Jeff's words perfectly fit the moods and intents of songs that go from restless or unnerved to elated and cathartic one track into the next -- songs that yet always stay pointedly melodic. Form and contents perfectly align here. As said at the end of the record's penultimate song, "love is worry" -- this is the moment the album's title stems from, and the music so aptly conveys Jeff's mindset in that regard. With so many people that are rotten to the bone holding power these days, caring for others in a capitalistic hellhole world can make you go through "worry" indeed, instead of making you feel validated. Yet caring is all worth it, even if the path can get difficult for reasons that are (once again) both personal and political. Actually -- and against all odds, maybe -- melodic punk-rock is a nice fit to deal with those so-called "adult" issues in a fashion that stays somewhat positive overall, without ever watering down the expression of the hardships experienced by people trying to pinpoint meaning into this sheer mess. In a sense, Jeff reifies a whole oft-maligned genre here, and it's no small feat. Of course, such reification can only happen if the music is great and manages to transcend clichés. First, there are quite a few killer arrangements and very nice ideas for chord sequences throughout *Worry*. But more importantly, there are so many instantly memorable moments -- infectious choruses, fun vocal lines, terrific guitar licks -- served by production values that feel equally deep, authentic, and punchy, courtesy of sound engineer Jack Shirley, whose résumé also includes the production of Deafheaven's black metal albums (another interesting case where the clichés of a very particular music style got famously challenged for the best). The choruses sung by large groups of people especially slap, and they bring a lot to the songs. And Jeff's impassioned lead vocals are stellar -- the nearly indiscernible frailty of some of his inflexions are never an impediment here, they provide charm, energy and warmth instead. In a record named *Worry*, you can't be looking for perfection anyway, as stated in the album's closer. You must look for humanity, and Rosenstock visibly has spades of it to provide for us. Highlights abound, so I'm not gonna be able to name each and every one of them. There's the slow and ecstatic opener "We Begged To Explode", or the sardonic "oh-ohs" in "Festival Song" -- indirectly lambasting the music industry --, or the incredibly catchy hooks of "Wave Goodbye To Me", or the tender yet very lively love song "I Did Something Weird Last Night"... "To Be A Ghost..." is also one of those cuts going to very interesting places for a pop-punk album, thanks to its off-kilter bridge verging on "post-rock" tones. Oh, and the subject matter this particular track deals with still resonates 10 years later, of course. See the opening lines of the song: "Fuck off, the internet / I'm tired of circling amongst apologists / who love ignoring the reality / of unarmed civilians executed publicly." On that thought, fuck ICE. And fuck any of the fascist jerks supporting them. Sorry for the expletives, but I needed this out of my chest, I guess. :) Finally, as you already know, this generator is dedicated to the album format, and I do think that *Worry* is one of those records that understands the power of this format more than most other records out there. You've got the very dynamic tracklist on its first side, sure... But most of all, you have the amazing structure of the second half of the LP -- indeed taking a page out of *Abbey Road*'s final "montage" of shorter, stylistically diverse compositions. That second half can remind you of the best cuts from The Clash, Rancid, Green Day, Elvis Costello, The Suicide Machine or even Weezer at times (as in the ternary hooks of "Blast Damage Days"). It is a "collage" that is no mere "conceptual" extravagance that would make the mistake of leaving musicality aside, mind you. On the contrary... It's a relentless onslaught on your senses if you're open to the substyles harnessed here (yes, even ska punk!). The performers never let their guards down, and this until the very last song. And surely, this has got to count for something in a list of 1001 albums you must listen to before you die... I spent some time browsing through other Jeff Rosenstock albums today, and as of now, I think *Worry* is indeed the right pick within the man's discography. But there are definitely other gems to be found inside his other records -- my favorites being the two "long" epic songs opening and closing his subsequent LP *POST-*, along with five or six far shorter highlights from his most recent full length release *Hellmode*. Had those cuts been gathered in the same album, you would have something matching the level of *Worry*, I think... I also browsed through the releases of Rosenstock's former lo-fi ska-punk act Bomb The Music Industry!, and I stumbled upon some endearing stuff there that made me think I would have liked this band a lot had I discovered them at the right age... Does anyone have a time machine in here? To return to the subject of Rosenstock's subsequent albums... Maybe Jeff's most recent output verges a little too much into somewhat self-indulgent territory at times, both lyrically and musically... Maybe indeed he's "getting old" -- even more than what was already suggested in *Worry*... Yet I think he's a voice that still needs to be heard today, at a time where political and personal complacency takes such a huge toll on us all. No, we "can't let them win". Hope everyone in this generator agrees. So, many, many thanks to the user who suggested this album today. Your name is James, right? Some friend of yours spilled the beans in her own review of *Worry*... So thanks, James. This is exactly why I'm using this generator: to give me incentives helping me filling out the blanks. And that *one blank* retrospectively feels HUGE given that I have always wanted to listen to this record. Guess that's one less worry to... worry about now. I'll see myself out ;) -------> ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 78 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 193 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

As a matter of principle, I refuse to listen to this thing. It will be a first in FOUR YEARS of using this generator. I was wondering about taking a short break anyway... So thanks, ha ha. No best of, no greatest hits, it's a golden rule. What's so difficult to understand here??? I'm pretty sure that Alexander must have specified this requirement to the person who suggested this, but they insisted anyway. Honestly, I can't blame Alexander for letting it go, why should he waste his time with a stubborn person? But I do blame the latter, however, to the point where I can understand people using expletives against whoever was thick enough to suggest this. The album format is a real thing, and users in here have put a lot of care and time trying to define what a good album is, because for them, it is a distinctively different experience from a streaming service's artist playlist or an official compilation. If you can't understand this after listening to 1089 albums from the original list, I don't know what to tell you. 🤷 Heck, and even if you start to include compilations, there are so many better options to explore first, with examples that are considered iconic now given that they very often were the clear entry point into an artist's discography for a whole generation of listeners. Out of the top of my head, you have *Legend* for Bob Marley, *Chronicles* for Creedence, *Greatest Hits I* and *Greatest Hits II* for Queen, *The Immaculate Conception* for Madonna, Leonard Cohen's own *Greatest Hits* documenting his early career, or Minor Threat's *Complete Discography* -- which, crucially, can be gathered inside *a single CD*... This last example also reminds me that *Canciones 1989* is apparently *a 3.5 hour compilation* to boot! Like, there's not even a clear willingness to "personalize" this compilation through a selection that would follow a specific mindset. Compilations can be exclusively made out of singles ; they can be choice cuts instead, gathering both hits and deeper cuts ; or they can favor less known songs and B-sides... Here you seem to have an "all in the pot" selection that isn't even interesting tracklisting-wise. So yeah, I still wrote a long-ass text for something I'm not gonna listen to anyway. All the more reasons for me not to waste my time going through this thing. I'll get acquainted with Extremoduro when someone suggests a proper album. ---- NON PERTINENT / NOT RATED ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 78 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 193 (I could have added one here with this non pertinent choice, but I'm not even gonna do that, I'm gonna just pretend this thing doesn't exist) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

To use the phrasing of the person who suggested this record: Am I biased against users who hate hip hop? - You bet I am. And the stupid and heavyhanded auto-tuned "alt-rock" dross they chose for this list isn't helping. I swore to myself I wouldn't add a word after listening to the first two horrible tracks of this thing, but then "Cradled In Love" assaulted my ears. This is not a singer performing here, this is a total fraud. And the song is just so bad. The addition of those two elements probably make it one of the worst pieces of music I have ever heard in my life. Maybe THE worst piece of music I have ever been subjected to. I'm deadly serious here. The rest simply returned to the "normal" levels of the first two tracks (i.e. "normally" terrible). Amazing how often the supposedly "picky" users in here (2.77 average rating for the global list for this one) actually reveal the extent of their *shitty* music tastes when they make their own selection. Oh the irony. Alexander, please... I want to be able to skip albums in the users list. *Please*. 0/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums 3/10 for more general purposes (3/5 for the musicianship and production values + 0/5 for the artistry). Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 78 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 194 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

After I reviewed *Next* from the original list, I instantly bought a "Classic Albums" 5-CD boxset of TSAHB LPs (including this one), so enamoured I was of the seventies band's very weird strand of glam-rock, at least generally speaking (buying that boxset was the cheapest way to get my hands on *Next* and debut album *Framed*). So I was looking forward to listening to this particular album again on my Hi-Fi today, instead of through headphones on a streaming service. In retrospect, *Tomorrow Belongs To Me* doesn't really feel like an album to select for a list like this within the British band's discography. Alex Harvey's antics still sound fun for me (and probably grating for quite a few other listeners), and the music sometimes keeps up with his extravagant performance (example: "Give My Compliments To The Chef"). But the songwriting is also decidedly "generic" in other parts of the record, for an overall patchy result. "Snake Bite" is as sleazy as you wish it to be, but it can't fully shake off the meat-and-potatoes feel of the composition. Conversely, "Shake That Thing" comes off as a bona fide banger in the genre. The most adventurous cut, "The Tale Of The Giant Stoneater", deals with environmental topics that are still relevant today, and it's the one song in the tracklist that truly feels epic in scope. Equally topical, the sardonic title-track (a cover from a sarcastic song in the Broadway show *Cabaret*) makes an interesting analogy between nazism and lack of awareness about the way humans are ruining our planet. As uneven as the album is, it still ties some songs together to make a point, which is somewhat interesting. The rest screams "work in progress", in keeping with the awful artwork. What I mean with that phrase concerns both the contents of the picture and its poor execution, by the way. Not sure Harvey and his team had that *meta* interpretation in their mind when they greenlit that terrible cover though. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 78 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 195 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Of all the days I could have had this one pop up on my generator, it has to come up *today*, when I had quite a shitty day at work, PLUS not enough hours of sleep the night before, PLUS an interview with a band on Zoom tonight, aimed for a feature on the music publication I write for these days (the interview fortunately went very well in spite of my tiredness, thanks for asking!)... Truth be told, I'm exhausted to death now, and there's no way I can do justice to this great record with my feeble energy and inadequate words. But in a way, this personal state of affairs is in keeping with the world-weary mood of *Ants From Up There*. Disillusioned-yet-poignant cuts like "Bread Song" and "Haldern" slapped especially hard when I took some time to revisit them today, at a moment where I was particularly fed up with bullshit coming my way. Lively opening song "Chaos Space Marine" and synth-enhanced / gently bouncing "Good Will Hunting" still managed to infuse the right amount of energy so that I stopped whining for a while. "Concorde" is on the surface, a more inert composition (never understood why it was chosen as a single, and put in such a pivotal, prominent place in the tracklist), but even this objectively "weakest" song in the album harbors some killer arrangements if you pay attention to details. Indie-rock sad fanfare, art-rock despondent extravaganza, melancholic post-rock conveyed via "minimalistic" arrangements and expressionistic lead vocals verging on sprechgesang... It's still hard to pinpoint the style of Black Country, New Road four years later. But the results are still very striking and one-of-a-kind. BCNR's sophomore LP is a more melodic and also more sprawling (even meandering?) affair than their influential and all-around great debut *For The First Time*, and this comes with a price dynamics-wise. But the peaks of *Ants From Up There* are still a thing of wonder now. And about that, the album really comes into its own in its perfect last leg. Of course, by that point, some might say it's a little late to convince doubting Thomases. I beg to differ, because "The Place Where He Inserted the Blade", "Snow Globes", "Basketball Shoes" are three timeless gems justifying every hairpin curves that have come before it. That last song trilogy has so many assets: poignant chords and harmonies (here's that adjective again), heartrending performances (especially on the first song's chorus), some very daring turns instrumentation-wise (especially those unhinged free jazz drums in "Slow Globes"), all of those things paving the way to an absolutely visceral overall result. "Basketball Shoes" is a cult song now -- even if Isaac Wood had not left the band right after the release of the LP, its final climax would still shine with that same, very impressive dark light. I'm glad that the rest of the band keeps on recording albums these days. They're still a great act live, and I loved *Forever Howlong* last year. It's still a little soon to say if Isaac Wood will be remembered as the Syd Barrett of his generation -- honestly, I only wish for him to live a happy life now, so that my stupid "boomer comparison" ends up coming off as totally nonsensical a decade down the line. . But as much as I love what BCNR are doing now, I have to admit the man had a very specific aura and artistic input. I know his mannerisms are an acquired taste for some -- maybe rubbing you the wrong way, just like my own whining at the start of this review??? But for many other indie-rock buffs, Isaac Wood is slowly becoming a genuine legend. *Ants From Up There* might be the last opportunity to hear his voice on a record. And if it ends up becoming his "swan song', what a swan song it is! A hell of a way to say goodbye, and leave an imprint in the history of British rock. 4.5/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums, rounded up to 5. 9.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 (including this one) Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 195 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I should like this one on paper. I've heard of this nineties act because their name is so close to the one of Jawbox (turns out they toured together). The album starts very well for the genre, with four melodic punk tracks à la Hüsker Dü that are not only only efficient but also have interesting chord modulations once in a while. The vocals lack a bit of personality, but it's not necessarily a deal-breaker by this early point. It's very "early-nineties" stuff, but for an album released in 1995, that first leg still feels committed to what was going on in so-called "grunge" / alt-rock circles at the time. "I Love You So Much But It's Killing Us Both" and "Fireman" are good songs. "Accident Prone" also explores longer and more stretched out Chokebore turf that still manages to make sense pasted next to the faster songs -- a turf Jawbreaker return to from time to time during the course of the tracklist, by the way. Unfortunately, *Dear You* clearly loses steam and momentum after that fourth song. The chords are too often bland, just like the vocal performance, and the music writing becomes complacent as fuck. Interestingly, a lot of later pseudo-"emo" acts I loathe apparently took inspiration from this record, so I could even blame the latter for the stupid dross they inflicted rock audiences during the noughts -- "emo and pop-punk artists, such as on My Chemical Romance, Saves the Day, and Thrice", says Wikipedia. Thanks for nothing really. "Jet black" is the only great cut in the second half of the album, thanks to an intensity that's crucially lacking elsewhere. It was very interesting reading what happened to the band after they released this record through a major label after years of being independent -- quite a bitter story of disillusionment and internal strife, in spite of their later reformation to celebrate "Dear You" as a "cult album" a couple of years ago. I remember Sonic Youth, who had made the same move to Geffen five years earlier, warning indie-rock bands they shouldn't follow their steps now that the "alt- rock" explosion was dying its slow death. Fugazi, who never compromised with majors themselves, predicted this as well. Jawbreaker should have listened to those more seasoned acts. To be clear, I'm not merely half-roasting Jawbreaker because they signed to a major label -- tons of acts that I love ended up doing it. It's just that for me, it seems this situation didn't help the band get a grip on what what was truly going on around them. When I read how much money the recording of *Dear You* cost, and how long it took its frontman to record his vocals and guitar parts (while the rhythm section half-botched their studio performance in a few days -- which is for me CLEARLY audible here), this screams "industrial accident" to my ears. It's also crazy that the producer who recorded Green Day's *Dookie* made such an unremarkable job here. Many albums that were recorded in that era using far less money sound so much better. The sound of this thing is so flat at times... It really feels that everyone involved in the label who thought Jawbreaker could become the next Nirvana with this record had very poor instincts and listening abilities. This record is not "bad" by any means -- I even really hate the fact that Pitchfork rated it with a 2.something review *twice* in ten tears, it feels so petty and unnecessary. But overall, I would tend to agree that the music in this record tends to come off as either derivative or uninspired. Interesting to discover for me. But certainly not "1001 albums..." fodder. 2.5/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums, rounded up to 3. 7.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 196 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I'm a little annoyed when I see the very consequent streaming numbers for Manchester Orchestra (including this album). I'm happy for the lead singer and songwriter of this band that he found a way out of whatever fundamentalist US Southern shithole he hailed from thanks to his artistry and job as a successful musician. But all the gloss thrown into the production of this album can't make me forget that there's actually something a tad bit empty at the core of the supposedly grand "indie-rock" statements released by this band. This tastes a bit like a midway point between Fleet Foxes and Other Lives (with some sprinkling of The National and Interpol?). But take away all the gloss, and it seems to me that there's not much substance to the music writing in here. Heck, when I see how frigging low Other Lives's streaming numbers are compared to the ones for this album, I can even sense anger boiling up in my heart... The first four cuts are still doing.a good job lining up memorable riffs and vocal lines, I readily admit it. But after the fourth song, two major problems surge: the music becomes way too complacent, and the fact that the synthetic-sounding production values are most often pushing those lesser cuts into an artificially-obtained amped-up level even comes off as pretentious. So many songs actually go on for too long. And the second problem is that Andy Hull's vocal performance quickly got on my nerves. It's "over-affected" and also unnecessarily "chatty" at times. This is quite strange, because I love other singers whose range and tones are very close to his (from Fleet Foxes' Robin Pecknold to Vampire Weekend's Ezra Koenig). And yet I don't like the man's high-pitched voice. Music appreciation is truly a mystery. As a result, I can only listen to this thing "from afar", so to speak, a black mile FROM the surface. I get what stans see and hear here, but I simply can't see or hear it. Likewise, I agree with some professional critics that the lyrical conceits and overall concept of this record are probably a little too convoluted to stick the landing in that particular department. But that's only a very minor gripe compared to the problem I have with the music after the fourth song. And even when the bloated production values take a back seat, as in the barebones acoustic number "The Parts", I'm still getting a little bored (whereas I should be moved, on paper at least). Nothing really happens in the song, right? Worse, closer "The Silence" is said to be a fan-favorite and yet I felt nothing listening to it. It was just pointless, meandering, all-too-"grandiose" dross for me, once again bolstered up by recording shenanigans that sounded very predictable and "obvious" in my opinion. I tried. I really tried. But this album's not working for my ears overall. More power to the fans of this LP, because Manchester Orchestra are still fine musicians and artists. But they're simply not for the person writing those words now. You just can't fall in love with every music out there, I guess. 2/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 98 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 197 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I really wish I could add a South American rock album sung in Spanish on my 5/5 gallery, and this one comes sooooooo close to it! My only gripe with Pescado Rabioso's *Artaud* is that its first side is a bit hit-or-miss for me: "Todas las Horas Son del Viento" is a wonderful barebones acoustic opener, wistful and erotic, "Por" is another very interesting acoustic cut, with a mesmerizing use of simple words to create a "mood", let's say, and "Supercheria" is relatively fun to listen to, if not essential. Second song "Cementerio Club", a somewhat placid and unoriginal blues jam, should have been placed later in the tracklist though, and "La Sed Verdadera" -- yet another fully acoustic number, doesn't do much for me. That second side, however! Three absolute gems out of four in it, plus a weird and quite dark piano-laden interlude of sorts ("a Starota, el Idiota") that fits perfectly with the "schizoid" aura of French playwright Antonin Artaud, who inspired the title of this LP. About that, I find it fascinating that songwriter Luis Spinetta considered the songs in this album as either following Artaud's worldview, or conversely as a response to the playwright's obsessions, here underlining the joy of living instead of its suffering. In a sense that creates an unpredictable adventure, both stylistically and thematically-- "schizoid" itself indeed, but also enacting the free-form optimism and utopian ideals of the early seventies. Pretty sure Gilles Deleuze would have approved! So I think I understand why this record released when the military junta in Buenos Aires got ousted symbolizes the idea of freedom from norms for so many Argentinians. Guess that the bizarre packaging of this LP also cemented the legend! As some commentators pointed out, the fact that the corners of the vinyl sleeves are bound to be worn out today speaks volumes about standardization and formatting in a "modern" world that has so much trouble accepting the "fringes" of society. That contextual explanation aside, the three gems from the second side mentioned earlier must be touched upon: first there's the long (and mostly acoustic) centerpiece "Cantata del Puentes Amarillos" (meandering on the surface, but actually mesmerizing if you pay attention to the details, especially when its psychedelic finale surges -- and equally understated and effective one, as paradoxical as it sounds). Then you have the great rock track "Bajan", graced by a very nice blues riff on the electric guitar. And closing the proceedings, you have the absolute seventies rock banger "Las Habladurias del Mundo", which ends the record on a very high note (what a great main hook on the electric guitar as well!). I get why Luis Spinetta got compared with Neil Young at the time (a personal idol of his). Oh and the sound of this record has aged like fine wine, either for the lo-fi acoustic tracks or the soft-rock songs. Not sure all those assets are enough to include the record in my own list of 1001 keepers, because of that darn patchy first side. But I think I'm gonna buy a secondhand copy of this album nonetheless (on CD, that is -- as you can guess, the original vinyl editions of *Artaud* are rare and wildly expensive, because of that zany sleeve and artwork). Therefore, many thanks to the user who suggested this album. Overall, it was a very nice discovery! 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums, possibly 4 (and therefore rounded up to that number) 9/10 for more general purposes (5 + 4) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 99 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 197 ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Once had this one on CD, but I lost the latter and never bought it again -- given that I'm close to a hoarder in that department, it's quite surprising that I didn't spend extra bucks on it to complete my hip hop collection, at least on first glance. I remember the hype around this act: Digable Planets was picking up the jazz-rap thread left by Gang Starr / DJ Premier and A Tribe Called Quest circa *The Low End Theory* at the time, and I get why some rap fans saw it as the "future" of the genre somehow. "Rebirth Of Slick (Cool Like Dat)" is an absolute bop, and the cool cat attitude, mixed-gendered personnel and overall intent still feel somewhat refreshing more than three decades later. All that being said, I fear that most retrospective assessments will reveal that Digable Planets were a league under their role models, very clearly. What irks me the most now is the lack of variety, both for the beats and the all-too-precious rap flows. "La Femme Fetal" is a track that favors spoken-words shenanigans over "rapping" -- I wish they had explored that direction further -- and the topical contents of the song are as important to listen to in 2026 as it was in 1993 (fuck the corrupt fascists within the Supreme Court these days). But apart from a couple of moments like that in the tracklist, the album just does its thing, and rarely dares getting out of its "groove". Won't buy that CD again, unless I find a very cheap secondhand copy somewhere. I might be a bit of a hoarder, copies sold online at the moment are way too expensive compared to the secondary importance I assign to this rap album. 3/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums. 8/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 99 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 198 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

I live in a country where English is not an official language, so believe me, I understand the temptation to add rock bands singing in other languages to this list. As I said elsewhere, I really wish I could bump into a user-curated suggestion of a rock album sung in Spanish, Portuguese or any other latin language that I would be inclined to add to my 5/5 gallery. Pescado Rabioso's *Artaud* came very close to it two days ago. But it still didn't make it. For me, *O Monstro Precisa De Amigos* is VERY far from that potential league, unfortunately. Ornatos Violeta are very fine musicians, of course, and they know how to compose a song. But honestly, their strand of late nineties alt-rock is still pretty generic, as lushly produced as it is. It was a specific rock sound -- splitting the difference between extravagant glam and dystopian dark balladry -- that Belgian band Ghinzu would for instance take to a far more promising direction five years later with *Blow* (with songs admittedly sung in English). I encourage anyone in here to compare the results... Stylistically, what both bands were doing five years apart is quite similar. But the respective executions vastly differ for my ears. Worse, Ornatos Violeta's lead singer routinely displays so many affectations in his vocal performance, and the whole album quickly became tiring because of this. I can indeed sense Faith No More's influence in here, but not anyone can be named "Mike Patton", you see -- you need an extra unhinged level of zaniness to make the results spectacular instead of grating. You could also argue that I don't like the vocals because I don't understand what the guy sings about... But I'm a "music-first,-lyrics-later" kind of listener, so please, believe me when I say I could write the same sort of criticism for similar singers using words I can understand... Final breakdown: not "bad", objectively speaking (the appreciation of a lead vocalist is always oh-so-very subjective), but certainly not in the league of "1001 albums..." fodder. So next, please. 2/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums. 7/10 for more general purposes (5 + 2) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 99 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 199 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Speaks volumes when the *single* 5-star review for this one (as of early March 2026) says: "Yes, I really did give this 5 stars." Like, this person knows the music is *objectively* terrible and yet just thought: "Fuck it, I'm just gonna headbang to it". *Some* metalheads are decidedly not the sharpest knives in the proverbial drawer.... But they're most often cool and chill dudes, I gotta say. Maybe they're right not to take themselves so seriously, who knows? The thing is, I *do* want to take this type of music seriously -- as seriously as any other music genre out there, that is. So, *in all seriousness*, let me just say this about *Walls of Jericho*: some guitar solos at the end of a couple of songs there can be fun to listen to, either in a guitar-nerd-sort-of-way or in a tongue-in-cheek-and-hand-raised-in-a-🤘-manner. But those vocals... Those HORRID, STUPID, RIDICULOUS vocals... And it's not only a matter of personal taste, it's also a matter of execution: that guy is out of key for the some of the more high-pitched shenanigans, and when he's not, there are still so many grating inflexions anyway. Like, yuck. At some point, there was one song that I found not so bad for the genre ("Metal Invaders"), but the lead vocalist managed to ruin the track's conclusion anyway with his obnoxious wailing. Fun fact, Helloween added fake crowd noises for fake live versions of their songs in the tracklist. On "Heavy Metal (Is The Law)" they clearly did this to create a disingenuous, totally made-up interaction between the singer and the "audience". I mean, c'mon, guys! This is so lame to pretend this interaction as recorded in here ever happened in the first place! Pretty sure the band's hope was to trigger their live show audiences to reproduce that moment in future gigs. Like, tell me about real spontaneity and authenticity within that particular metal subgenre after that... 🙄 I've listened to a couple of later Helloween songs to hear the difference between this vocalist and a subsequent one used by the band, by the way. The new one is more self-assured technically speaking. But his vocal parts still sounded stupid, so it's not as if Helloween got it so wrong compared to their own initial "goals" on this early LP. As for the rest of the instrumentation in the music they released later, it sounded way more sanitized compared to *Walls Of Jericho*. At least the music still sounds raw here. With those last points in mind, maybe I could feel benevolent and give some extra half-points to this thing... But you've already read my final grading, so let's cut the crap: 1/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums. Yes, I really did give this 1 star, ha ha. 6/10 for more general purposes (4.5 for the musicianship and production values + 1.5 for the artistry) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 99 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 200 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham

Trying to muster up the most offensive words I could throw at the face of the user who suggested this tasteless dross... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... I envy you. Yes, I envy you, because it must be nice and pretty comfortable being satisfied by the blandest, most unchallenging, most artificial "music" out there. This suggests you have it easy in your life -- at least in this department. But through this generator, you're not making our own lives any easier, you know. ... Now trying to muster up the most diplomatic words I can utter to the reviewers saying they have enjoyed (or even loved) the music Fall Out Boy was playing *before* this album... You're out of your mind, folks. This bullshit band has *always* sold out emo and punk to the worst commercial instincts out there, and they have *always* played terrible or obnoxious music. It's just that they initially had the right, "trendy" sound for your young undiscerning ears at the time, I'm afraid. But when they changed that sound and fully turned into a "boys band act", the scales suddenly fell from your eyes. How ironic. Oh... and to the naive user who wrote those lines, when they explained they were originally a fan of this band, but couldn't follow the direction they took with this record: "...After that, they pivoted into more pop/stadium rock anthem stuff. I don't know why bands take that trajectory, but they do..." Ha ha ha, what a daft remark! Well, should I remind you of the lyrics of that old Wu Tang Clan song, "C.R.E.A.M"? Do a little research if you don't know those lyrics... Very sincere bonus points to one user, though -- the person noticing that FOB was just trying to ape Imagine Dragons with this album, a year after that younger band massively hit the charts... That person made a pert and very perceptive observation. Yeah, maybe money wasn't the only motivation here... Maybe the band also wished to stay commercially relevant as a way to defy ageing. But if that's the case, this reeks of desperation to my ears, no matter how successful Fall Out Boy was in that endeavor. Besides, some acts can "go pop" and manage to "stay themselves" somehow. But you got to have a distinct *soul* in the first place. And I'm sorry to break it down for all the old Fall Out Boys fans out there, but there NEVER was such a thing as "soul" in that band's music. At best, it was stuff derivative of greater acts in the pop punk / melodic punk genre. And at worst, it was just formatted dross. Time to reevaluate your teenage fandom, I'm afraid. 🤷 Alexander, once again... Isn't there a way we can choose or skip albums? Please? 0/5 for the purposes of this list dedicated to essential albums. 3/10 for more general purposes (5 for the musicianship and "professional" production values MINUS 2 for the terrible artistry and how pointlessly bloated / overblown said production is) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 79 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 99 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 201 (including this one) ---- Émile, tu trouveras ma dernière réponse sous le *Inside* de Bo Burnham