Oct 26 2022
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Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin
Babe I'm Gonna Leave You is good. The rest is just doing absolutely nothing for me. Some great riffs but they get lost in tedious wailing. Led Zeppelin are very talented but none of this is making me feel anything. That's just me though.
2
Oct 27 2022
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Metallica
Metallica
I'm guessing Nightmare by Avenged Sevenfold got a lot of inspiration from this (plenty of other bands too, but this album reminds me a lot of that one). Wish I could give 4.5s. I think Sad But True struck me the most, but plenty of great riffs, classic angry angsty metal.
4
Oct 28 2022
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Nothing's Shocking
Jane's Addiction
I love hearing music that is unique, music that's unlike anything I've ever heard before. This was that for me. Such a fantastic mish-mash of genres. So much fun to hear the random instruments they bring in on various songs. The syncopation, the instruments separating and coming back together, the whole glorious cacophony - I'm no music critic, I barely know anything, but this album really tickled me. I'll need to come back to it.
4
Nov 14 2022
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Either Or
Elliott Smith
I'm such an absolute sucker for slow sad stuff with acoustic guitar. It's not even funny. Sufjan Stevens vibes, but hints of angry angsty teen. I needed this today and I'm keeping it. Rose Parade is so simple and lovely and easy to bob my head to, love the three high notes that keep coming back. And I don't know how to describe it but Cupids Trick has the exact hollow frustrated sadness that I find most comforting when I'm in a bad mood, similar to Family Happiness by The Mountain Goats, but with more interesting chords.
5
Nov 15 2022
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In It For The Money
Supergrass
I am feeling very lukewarm on this one but G-Song is kinda fun. Very much expected Going Out to go "if you want to destroy my sweater" and was irrationally disappointed when it didn't. It's Not Me is vaguely interesting. Sometimes I Make You Sad has Primus vibes and I'm sorry but I have never been able to enjoy Primus. Not much else to say.
2
Nov 16 2022
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Suede
Suede
I had some fun with this one, but I just can’t get super excited about it like I have with some of these others. A solid album, I can see why it’s a classic, but I can’t see much more than that.
3
Nov 17 2022
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Lam Toro
Baaba Maal
A lovely change of pace. Absolutely love the percussion. The instrumentation for Daande Lenol is really pretty and Hamady Boiro is so much fun. Those two are my favorites. I’m afraid the rest of the album doesn’t really stand out to me.
3
Nov 18 2022
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Fever To Tell
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
I'm obsessed. I don't think I've really solidified my opinion on individual songs yet because right now I've just been taking in the entire album as one uninterrupted vibe, but Rich and Modern Romance and Poor Song and especially Maps are all just amazing. I love how gravelly and rich the guitar tone is, it's utterly perfect. This album bounces nonstop between sadness and anger and all-out fun. Plenty of repetition and yet I'm never bored. A keeper.
5
Nov 21 2022
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Live 1966 (The Royal Albert Hall Concert)
Bob Dylan
I know Bob Dylan is an icon and a legend and he has a lovely voice, I'll give him that. But the monotone singing just doesn't do it for me. Incredibly influential, incredibly important, not my thing at all.
2
Nov 22 2022
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The Slider
T. Rex
This sounds like every rock album ever, and I don't mean that in a good way.
2
Nov 23 2022
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Duck Rock
Malcolm McLaren
Certainly never would've guessed that this guy was British. Obatala and Legba were pretty great. For some reason the tracks with vocals were all underwhelming for me.
3
Nov 24 2022
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The Queen Is Dead
The Smiths
Just a good time all around. For some reason I thought The Smiths would be similar to Suede. Boy was I wrong, and I'm glad I was.
4
Nov 25 2022
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The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
David Bowie
I think I'm just forever gonna struggle with classic rock albums. Probably because they're classics. It seems unfair, but I've just heard this stuff over and over and I'm bored of it without ever even having gotten into it in the first place.
3
Nov 28 2022
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From Elvis In Memphis
Elvis Presley
I wasn't expecting to like this. A lot of the other classic rock artists that have come up have been very hit or miss for me. But apparently I'm an Elvis fan. Groovy, smooth, cinematic, beautiful. I'm on board.
4
Nov 29 2022
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Phrenology
The Roots
I need another listen but this was fun!
4
Nov 30 2022
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Tea for the Tillerman
Cat Stevens
Not fully my cup of tea, but the playing is masterful and the emotion in Cat Stevens' voice is lovely and this entire album is just so cozy and peaceful and happy.
4
Dec 01 2022
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Safe As Milk
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band
Call on Me is a fun time.
So is Yellow Brick Road - very much enjoying the rhyming in that one.
Whatever they're doing to their guitars in Dirty Blue Gene is pretty funky and fairly interesting.
Love the band name.
3
Dec 02 2022
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Isn't Anything
My Bloody Valentine
I'm guessing a lot of people hate this one, and honestly? That's fair. But I'd already heard albums like Vile Child by Milk Teeth and bands like Death Grips. I've heard weird, vaguely unsettling instrumentation and songs where voices get lost in a cacophony of slightly off-key, distorted noise. And I genuinely find it interesting. It feels like a commentary on the messiness of relationships. This sort of music is a tribute to people trying their best, to wandering paths, to moving forward despite uncertainty and confusion and pain. Can I understand the lyrics? Not really. Is that stopping me from enjoying it? Not at all. I'm not much of a lyrics person. I also find the melodies and chords quite soothing.
This is really good background music. You can kind of just float along like you're in a dream. Oddly enough, the more I listen, the more I feel like paying too much attention to this music does it a disservice. It's not really meant to be logical or consistent. If I scrabble for handholds, I may come up empty-handed. But if I let the music come to me without expecting anything from it, it works.
But when I take the time to focus on it, I have to wonder - how'd they do it? What were they DOING to get such a cavernous, reverberating...cloud of sound? Half the time you can't even tell what instrument it is. That's kind of amazing. Sound editing is an art. Whatever this is, I'm fascinated. It makes me feel like I'm falling into a bottomless pit full of dense, sunset-colored fog.
I don't know what's going on here. But it's cool.
4