Loved how it opened, was immediately pleased by the energy/taken with it (Mambo Sun). Loved the general vibes / upbeat rhythms. Exactly what I reach for in the morning. Could easily see myself windows down on a road trip blasting this as I speed by cornfields (the next stop on the road trip is near Peoria, Illinois.) Stand outs: Cosmic Dancer, Bang a Gong obviously. Cosmic Dancer felt like Bowie’s Space Oddity.
lol first impressions I was like yesss only 6 songs / 40 minutes
I realllly did not like how it opened or closed. Just not my style. Reminds me a bit of video game background music and in the wrong mood (an irritable one) it would make me lose my mind. ESP The Robots and The Man Machine. after a second listen some of them grew on me. The Model was the standout but I liked Metropolis once words came into play.
Oh I'm EXCITED about this one - just in the first 30 seconds I'm EXCITED. It's my style. The beat, the lyrics, the musicality - they got my number. Can't help but bop my head. I would get out of bed to start the day for this song.
Can confirm that I've played "Movin on Up" many many times as my "get out of bed and start the day" motivational song - in US, France, and England. Works across continents. It's the exact type of "morning montage happening in tandem with the opening movie credits" that used to be big in rom com films in the 90s and I do enjoy a cinematic morning. So that's the stand-out but Loaded also jumped out at me. I love the intro to it. Don't' Fight it, Feel it was great first listen, although on repeat listens the warbly whistle gets old.
Okay wow - I did NOT know American Pie was the FIRST song on the album. What a wild choice. I don't know that I've ever listened to any other song on this album before this.
i absolutely love American Pie so that song alone existing on this album gives it at least 3 stars. But it's also hard because if no other song lives up to the genius of the first one, it's just a great song, not a great album. The next few songs are kinda sleepy / background music to me. They blend together. I hate Vincent, mostly because I hate the van Gogh painting it evokes/is presumably about and I'm mad at Don for writing a dumb song about it. It already gets enough attention. In general, the other songs feel...basic? In lyrics and musicality. Just..amateur. Not original. Not memorable.
Winterwood is alright. So is Empty Chairs. But I will likely very think to play them again.
Then all of a sudden we get the Don I first fell for back with Everybody Loves Me, Baby!! YES! And then he immediately puts me back to sleep with Sister Fatima. Okay I liked how The Grave ended a lot. Babylon I've heard before and it's better (middle of the pack). Honestly, sounds like a Catholic hymn.
McLean's voice reminds me so much of another famous artist but I can't place who I'm thinking of. Whose style/voice am I thinking of?? I think any of his contemporaries who have an even slightly similar sound blow him out of the water - Simon & Garfunkel, Leonard Cohen, etc - with more original melodies, lyrics, more musicality. Disappointing, Don, but now I know why I never knew American Pie had a whole album after it.
Wait....am I really into Alice Cooper?????????
Loved "Elected" (maybe I'm too into GOTV right now) and "Hello Hooray." Generation Landslide stood out too. Mary Ann -- LOVE the pianoooo. Unexpected after some of the more shout-y songs.
I loooooove the transition from Sick Things into Mary Ann. The piano at the beginning. Really made me appreciate the art of an album and listening to songs in the intended order and with the intended context an artist wants you to listen to them. Did not like I Love the Dead.
Liked this enough that I kept listening to the live versions and the live version of Billionaire dollar Babies SLAPPPPS. The guitar riffs!!! And how the drums intermingles with them. Am I really gonna give him five stars????
Honestly overall the live versions are super worth listening to for the extra passion in the delivery of the lyrics & the musicianship of all the extra riffs. And the original album version of raped & freezin (don't love the title or the lyrics?) didn't do anything for me but the live version made me take notice in a good way. No More Mr. Nice Guy was great live too.
Not that shocked now that I like his sound - I love Ace Frehley's "Back in the New York Groove" and Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take it" and his sound reminds me of it.
VERYYY different sound (kinda Elvis?) but was into Model-T too. Damn this guy has range.
Edit: I listened to this full album 3x through in 24 hours after never hearing any of the songs before. Big fan.
Only song I had saved from this album previously was Champagne Problems. With TSwift, I'm typically more of a "listen to one song per album on repeat" kinda person, less of a full album fan.
Tis the damn season was nice. The songs all kinda blend together for me. I kept checking the album thinking I'd be further through it by now. Honestly, I considered giving this a 2 because I think it's fine listening but majority of the songs themselves were forgettable for me. She has some clever lyrics but the way she sings majority of these songs doesn't call enough attention to the lyrics for me - I would need to read them in order to really hear them.
i like negative space and static resistance okay once they get going - the intros and outros were not my style.
Opener was alright too.
pretty bold to name an album hookworms though. made me think of earworms and then made me think every song would be catchy and stuck in my head.
They sound like a band that might be playing in a backroom in Brooklyn (knitting factory, baby's all right) and I'd dance my head off and be like man that was fun but never catch their name.
I don't think this is special or original enough to put on this kind of a list though? But I think I need to continue to forget the premise (1001 albums to listen to before you die) and just accept their position on the list and react to them as albums alone.
oooo Bobby D. Already predisposed to love it. Haven't spent much time with this album before.
He is my once and future king of singing about heartbreak and heartache. And I can't believe I hadn't had some of these in my go-to catalogue before when Melodramaddy came out to play over the years. Could've used the diversification instead of pining and licking my wounds to Don't Think Twice it's all right, Boots of Spanish Leather, Sad eyed lady of the lowlands.
Specific songs:
Lovesick right out the gate - yes. yes. captures the feeling and then that twist ending - YES.
"Sometimes
The silence can be like thunder
Sometimes
I wanna take to the road and plunder
Could you ever be true?
I think of you
And I wonder...
I'm sick of love
I'm tryin' to forget you
Just don't know what to do
I'd give anything to
Be with you"
And then Standing in the Doorway -- also captures the sentiments entirely.
"Yesterday everything was goin' too fast
Today it's movin' too slow"
"Don't know if I saw you if I would kiss you or kill you
It probably wouldn't matter to you anyhow"
"I been ridin a midnight train
Got ice water in my veins
I would be crazy if I took you back
It would go up against every rule"
"You left me standin' in the doorway cryin'
Sufferin' like a fool"
"Last night I danced with a stranger
But she just reminded me you were the one"
God I wish my heartache were as productive as his. To create a whole album with your pain? It would make me fling myself recklessly into the next emotional high, knowing that the emotional low that could follow would still potentially produce greatness. I wonder if listening back to it brings him back to those feelings or if they are muted after performing certain songs live enough times.
I love that the lyrics progress along the phases of feeling. I can hear the evolution/rollercoaster of his reaction stretch across the album.
Tryin' to Get to Heaven's lyrics stood out for me too in terms of how accurately they capture the feeling:
"Every day your memory grows dimmer
It doesn't haunt me like it did before"
"You broke a heart that loved you"
"When you think that you lost everything
You find out you can always lose a little more"
"They tell me everything is gonna be all right
But I don't know what "all right" even means"
I just want a six pack and a balcony when I hear this album. Staring out to the horizon and wallowing alone.
Not Dark Yet - love the repeated "its not dark yet but it's gettin' there"
"I've still got the scars that the sun didn't heal
There's not even room enough to be anywhere"
"I ain't lookin' for nothin' in anyone's eyes"
"I know it looks like I'm movin' but I'm standin' still"
Cold Irons Bound - loooove how it opens. This is the first song on the album where I started involuntarily smiling listening to it.
"Reality has always had too many heads
Some things last longer than you think they will
Some kind of things you can never kill
It's you and you only I'm thinking about
But you can't see in, and it's hard looking out"
"I'm gonna remember forever the joy we've shared
Looking at you and I'm on my bended knee
You have no idea what you do to me."
AGAIN WITH THE LYRICS BOB. You really are one in a million.
Make you feel my love is the only song on the album I'd really spent time with before; honestly, Adele's cover is superior. I really love it. But there's still something working for me about his approach in the context of the album that doesn't work for me so much when I've heard it stand-alone. Stand-alone, I don't think he sounds earnest enough? It's almost troll-y - doesn't sound effortful, sounds casual when the lyrics themselves are so earnest and effortful. The album version - at first I was surprised by the transition (felt abrupt) from Cold Irons Bound and Make You Feel my Love. But then I was like - isn't that apt? You go from big-timey bold whiskey-slugging tough guy one day and then sappy and desperate and hyperbolic and melodic, playing the piano in an empty room at 3 AM singing sadly to yourself, the next. A real rollercoaster.
Lol the boldest choice to end with a 16 minute song. Bobbbb. I'll have to come back to that one.
I like reggae, but this didn't feel like memorable reggae. No stand-outs for me. Best reggae experience for me is driving around an island with the windows down (preferably Block Island) and I think the album would fare well there but again - no song that got stuck in my head or made me want to sing along.
God, Bruce has so many five star albums in my book. Having that many five star ALBUMS is much rarer than having many five star songs. Born to Run, Born in the USA, The River, Greetings from Asbury Park, to name a few. What a gift to the universe Bruce Springsteen is.
I grew up on this music and still guzzle it from the firehose any chance I can get. But listening to it as a studio album in one fell swoop did make me realize two things: I've listened to all these songs as singles more often than I've listened to them in the context of an album - I honestly forgot how he had one energetic, creative banger after another on this. Thunder Road (in my all-time top five favorite songs), Tenth Avenue Freezeout, Backstreets, Born to Run, She's the One, AND Jungleland on the same album? Even Night and Meeting across the River (which leads into Jungleland perfectly) are two I've heard less but still shine. It's an embarrassment of riches. Also I realize I've listened to the live versions of a lot of these more frequently than the studio version - he's one of those artists that I crave the live version - partly because I've had the pleasure of hearing him sing all of these songs live before, and his concerts are always transcendent, where I feel blissed out by joy, and partly because there's nothing like the energy and inventiveness of him live, even if it's a recording.
Bruce, in my opinion, has it all - and what makes him so incredible is on display here: the musicianship (the piano, the riffs, the melodies, the bridges) in each song; the energy, effort, and earnestness of his voice & performance (you can HEAR him sweating and leaving it all on the floor for us - none of that lounge-y smooth style a lot of artists have now where it seems like they don't want to be caught expending effort??); the poetry of the LYRICS AND the fact that you can HEAR and understand most of them without having to look them up (so many poet musicians mutter their careful words so carelessly that you have to google the lyrics to actually make sense of them); and his prolific talent - every song on this album has a GORGEOUS and memorable intro (in addition to the rest of the song being killer of course), and an equally moving or energizing (depending on the song) unique ending. How does one do that?! They're all different and divine. Jungleland always makes me a little weepy at the beginning - weepy with gratitude and glee and nostalgia. Maybe because of how wrapped up my memories of these songs are with my McCormack Family. What an incredible way to end an album. God, I really just love and appreciate him.
First impressions:
This is not my style...but trying to stay open-minded.
I don't really "get" the album art + album title + song titles correlation or meaning. It's kind of hard to judge it as a cohesive album.
Genesis has a good opening for an album but then has a part where it sounds like a plane is taking off which I hated. Let there be Light has a nice beat for dancing but then very quickly becomes straight up noise pollution. I think most of these would make for great, mindless lose-yourself dancing, high at Red Rocks or drunk at Bowery Ballroom. I just would never put it on at home, or on a road trip, or really when sober, period. It's just really really hard for me to accept that I needed to listen to this before I died. There are better albums out there.
OH DANCE. Yes okay I've heard this one. This one is way better.
Okay but then we're right back with Newjack and the static noises making me think my phone/headphones are experiencing technical difficulties. Such a frustrating song. I'm just...angry now. I made it halfway through the song but had to skip. This album is stressful listening personally. I dipped my toe into a few more of the songs and it's pretty repetitive. Valentine was better than most; The Party was worst than most (DNF). I listened to the last four all the way through. Stress was aptly named. I had to give up on it after 2 minutes because it was just winding me up. Not really what I turn to music for, especially dance music. Just sounded like a horror movie with that background noise.
DVNO, Waters of Nazareth, One Minute to Midnight were better than the others.
After 3-4 songs, I stopped, and following day had to grit my teeth and muscle through the rest of the album just to be fair to the artist. Only song on here I'd ever think of listening to again is DANCE.
Standout: I won't share you. Listened to the album twice through because I always feel like I should like The Smiths more than I do. It's tricky. I'll fall for one song on an album but I find on a full album, the songs sound similar enough that they lose my attention. And to me, they sing kind of dispassionately which is not in my nature - I'm looking to be brought to high highs or reduced to low lows by great music. And on this album, I didn't feel strongly moved in any direction.
I put this on while working and the 10 min songs flew by. The album definitely feels cohesive (as in, I wasn't aware necessarily when one song ended and a new one began, unless I checked Spotify). If I focused on the music, I felt like I was in a facial/massage experience and this was the music playing over the loud speakers, washing over me. God that sounds worse than I mean it. I didn't like The Shepherd Girl. I really liked the Glacier Waters. Honestly, this music is such a different animal from what we've listened to before this that it feels hard to rate it. Overall, found it a relaxing listen. As it went on, I was particularly impressed with how clearly I could hear the detailed contributions of each instrument -- the individual strums, and yet the overall effect blended and balanced well together. I don't have the words for what I mean but maybe you get it.
Standouts: Victoria, Arthur, Mindless Child of Motherhood.
I love love reelin in the years so I was excited to explore this album of songs I hadn’t heard much before but overall was a letdown. Just kind of…boring…
Their live album is SO much better than the studio album - why did the studio album sap all the rock out of them? There's so much more energy in this live performance. The difference is kind of remarkable. Didn't really discover any net new songs here - everything that stood out for me I had already heard. Standouts: I want you to want me (though I might still give Letters to Cleo cover the edge although this is, again, SO MUCH BETTER than the horrifying plodding and passionless studio version of the song); Ain't that a Shame; Surrender. I think this might be a 2.5 rounded up to 3 for me.
Liked this way more than I expected - listened to it 3x through.
Not the sound I imagined from the album cover but I love it. How have I never heard them before? They are seriously up my alley. Also the song title "Naked, If I Want to" - amazing
good album to drive in during snowy conditions. standouts: killing me softly (of course); Zealots; No Woman, No cry cover.
Hate that I can't understand what she's saying most of the time - why even bother writing lyrics? I almost stopped after the first four songs.
better songs: Eat Yourself; Some People; Caravan Girl.
Have never listened to this album or band. Honestly, my kind of background upbeat music. I like the heavy percussion. But it's definitely background music for me. I don't think I'd seek it out.
Standouts: I can't make your way.
Holy shit it’s so many of my Van favorites. I grew up with this album. My parents were always playing it. Makes me wonder what/who that’ll be for my kids. This reminds me I need to get it on vinyl.
