Great riffs, but some of the vocal melodies would benefit some work. For me, this album is inferior to the debut, to paranoid and to master of reality.
Superb catchy Power Pop record with amazing basslines, melodies and vibe. Most songs stick and the production is slick. The ballads are pretty and incredibly english.
Great listen.
8,5/10
The 2nd best Christmas album of all time and one I listen every year. To me this is the best example of Phil Spector's influential wall of sound production. I definitely see how it influenced Brian Wilson and how It's considered a classic to this day. This album contains the definitive versions of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" and "Christmas".
Holiday classic.
9/10
Incredible rock masterpiece, all the songs are perfectly crafted and it never get boring. The length of the album is also perfect and do not drag out like The Wall does.
10/10
Classic pop, but a lot of songs are paling in comparison with the hits on this one. Great album either way.
This album is, at points, very good, like on the opening suite Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding which is one of the best thing Elton John ever produced. Unfortunately, its length and fillers are big downsides that keeps it from true perfection.
7,5/10
Puzzling choice for that book. I love bossa-nova and I like Astrud, but this album choice is strange. Her first album is way better than this one. This one feels uninspired. The arrangements are sometimes too prominent which doesn't compliment the tunes well. Sometimes the songs are just pure cheesiness. I don't get it.
5,5/10
It's standard alternative rock from the 90's. I found the album quite fine, but a bit too one dimensional. The guitars are absolutely shredding it during the whole thing and are very loud. To me this is nothing really special, not boring or anything, just a bit nondescript.
It's ok
6,8/10
It was fine, I wouldn't listen to this type of music usually so it was cool to listen to it as part of this challenge. Found it a bit boring, but some of the arrangements and guitar parts were beautiful. The craft behind the album is also apparent. I respect it more than I enjoy listening to it.
6,6/10
A great classic throwing back to influences from 60's early indie music like the Velvet Underground but never sounding like pastiche or copy-cat. The songwriting is stunning and the stories told through the lyrics are fun and diverse. Most of the music here is acoustic guitar driven tunes that are superbly elevated by beautiful orchestral arrangements. Some of the best examples of this are the trumpets on " Stars of Track and Field", the strings on "The Boy Done Wrong Again" and recorder, trumpet and organ on " Judy and the Dream of Horses". The influence of this album can be heard in great albums by Sufjan Stevens, Arcade Fire, The Shins and Fleet Foxes. For me the one-two punch of Tigermilk and If You're Feeling Sinister is one of the best combo of debut and sophomore albums of all time.
Stunning.
9,7/10
Look I know it's a classic, but a lot of tracks don't really do it for me here. I found this album to be great but not excellent. It drags a bit in the end, especially the 2 last tracks. However, I recognize that the hits here are great and that the production of the album is stellar.
7,8/10
Great folk album, but I guess that the beauty reveals itself more in the lyrics, which I rarely give much attention on first listen. Will definitely listen another time and read the lyrics. Some songs here are classic and beautiful, like "Bird on the Wire". Overall, I liked this one.
7,4/10
This one was fun, the instrumentation makes this album more varied than other Cohen albums. The cheap synths and backing vocals really make the songs shine more at points than the usual plain acoustic guitar. It is really cheesy and feels dated, but not in a bad way. The album is mainly cool fun and goes by like an 80's action pop corn flick. For some reason, some songs sounded a bit like David Berman's songs in Purple Mountains. First we take Manhattan is an awesome opener and the title track is a classic. Jazz police is AWFUL though.
Fun.
7,8/10
Great psychedelic album with lots of gems like the opener "The American Metaphysical Circus", "Cloud Song" et " Stranded In Time". This album feels like the long lost companion album to Pink Floyd's Pipers at the Gates of Dawn. I can definitely feel this album's influence in modern neo-psychedelic bands like Stereolab and The Flaming Lips.
Interesting
7,7/10
This was a quite good Bob Dylan album. It shows Bob's strongest asset , his immaculate songwriting, in good form. The production is also great, the eerie soundscape by Daniel Lanois complement the songs very well.
Good album
7,7/10
Pretty good Trip-hop classic. The female singer Martina Topley-Bird is amazing throughout. While pretty dark and cool, I feel like this album was a bit too atmospheric for my taste and no songs really stood out to me that much. I found the sample from "Glory Box" by Portishead to be pretty lazy given the genre and that it was released only one year prior.
7,0/10
Great comeback from MBV, with some songs reaching almost as high as some songs on Loveless, like the song "only tomorrow". Most of it is pretty typical MBV shoegaze goodness with immaculate sound and production.
7,6/10
I use to find this a bit overrated, but I thoroughly enjoyed my listening experience this time around. Maybe it's the use of good headphones or the fact that I'm getting old at 25y/o that made me enjoy that one that much. The album starts off very strong with the first 3 songs being big hits. The second half is a bit less interesting, with One World and The Man's Too Strong being the weakest tracks here. The sound engineering and production of this album is immaculate and the songs are mostly great. If this album was 45 min, it would be an almost perfect album, but the longer parts in the second half drag the album down to a 55 min which it doesn't have the songwriting chops to sustain.
8,4/10
It's a shame I never listened to this one before. It's certainly because I rarely enjoy rap, it's just not my style usually. This album really does deserve the praise it got when it came out. The flows and the beats are amazing and Little Simz really has an amazing presence throughout this album. The features on the album are also all amazing.
Solid
8,3/10
Good album by Talk Talk, which is a great band. This one is kind of transitional between their pop-hits era (see the amazing It's My Life) and their art rock era. I think it blends really well the strengths of both sounds, with pop sensibilities at their best on Life's What You Make It. Production is awesome, and the synth sounds of the album aged really well. The album cover is gorgeous too.
Beautiful.
8,4/10
Well, this album has a lot of things going against it. Its a live album, its a double album, it has a shitty cover of a great Rolling Stones song with a long drum solo. It should totally suck ass, but surprisingly it's not awful. While most songs presented here are pretty lame 70's rock (ex: Something's Happening, It's a Plain Shame), some songs are timeless classics. Those songs, Show Me The Way, Baby I Love Your Way and Do You Feel Like We Do are all fun 70's classic rock staples with stellar guitar work and cheesy pedal effects.
Do these songs make this a great album ? No.
Do these songs save this album from being a total snore fest ? Kinda.
Live albums are almost never good, but this one is passable.
Wah Wah
6/10
This one was interesting. Strangely the concept of the album is both its force and its weakness. While most of the music here is fine, I found the "movie soundtrack" concept with the spoken words pretty distracting overall, even if the concept is well executed. This concept is also what makes this album stand out in this genre I think. There are better albums in this style in the 90's. "Something Wicked This Way Comes" is a very cool song, even if it clearly samples the song "Spooky".
6,7/10
Great Neo-Soul album, pretty much as good as it gets in this genre. Just short of D'Angelo's greatness. Erykah's voice matches perfectly with the bassy atmospheric vibe of the album. I would say this album is a bit too long for my taste, but it didn't feel like it was full of fillers. Great music paired with immaculate vibes.
8,5/10
This is a perfect classic 60's album. This guitar sound is so influential it can still be heard in lots of indie rock records to this day. Perfectly crafted songs carried by lush jangly 12 strings guitar and gorgeous harmonies.
9,5/10
This one is a classic singer-songwriter album of the 80's. Sadly like many albums of the 1986-1989 period, cheesy 80's production choices have really not aged well. The pacing is also not the best in this album, as the best tracks are all on the 1st side. Fortunately, the immaculate songwriting correct these mistakes pretty well, as Fast Car, Talkin' Bout a Revolution and Baby Can I Hold You have aged like fine wine and are now considered classic tunes. Tracy's voice is also a highlight here and is pretty unique in that style.
Love this one.
8,6/10
Awesome Talking Heads album that feels get a bit overshadowed by Remain in Light, unfortunately. I prefer this one over Remain in Light, since I find that the talking heads typical "groovy" sound is there is full form while remaining accessible. On Remain in Light, this sound is going overboard a little bit in the experimentation in my opinion. Incredible songs here like "I Zimbra", "Cities" & "Heaven" are really representative of the genius of Talking Heads.
FUNKY
8,8/10
While I quite enjoy this album, I always thought that it needed some kind of pick me up to cheer up the atmosphere a little bit. It's dark and quite cold for a synthpop album.Nevertheless the material here is excellent and classic. Enjoy the Silence is a timeless song that aged like fine wine and Personal Jesus and Policy of Truth are also pure synthpop masterpieces. Dark, cold, but also very much enjoyable.
8,5/10
I think that this album gets overshadowed a lot when talking about good 80's album. It embodies so well the capacity that good synthpop has of bringing pop sensibilities while staying very artistically interesting and genre-defining. Don't You Want Me is a timeless classic at this point, but many songs here are absolute bangers, like Love Action and Things That Dreams Are Made Of.
8,4/10
This one has two major flaws. It's too damn long and it's a concept album with a bad concept. The story is not really well told and kinda suck. Apart from that, most songs are fine and the instrumentation is stellar throughout. The big highlight here is Tony Banks, that shines in all of the best tracks here ; The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway and The Carpet Crawlers.
7,9/10
I do this challenge to come across superb discoveries like this. This is a very good jazz that shows a lot of versatility. The trumpet of Hugh Masekela shines a lot here on the many different jazz-styles that are presented. I think that the piano work by Larry Willis is also a big highlight of the apple. Will definitely come back to this one !
8,4/10
I liked this one even though it's not something I will come to often that much. Most songs were very enjoyable and pretty and the project is well put together overall. My main perk with this album is that I didn't feel the collaboration side of it that much, since all the songs sounded either like Billy Bragg or like Wilco but never like a mix of the two sounds. Pretty cool album but I feel like these two artists have better albums
7,5/10
This influential proto-punk record is a not bullshit riff filled album full of bangers. Roadrunner and Pablo Picasso are the clear highlights here, but all the album flows super well and is short and sweet. The production is clear as hell and the melodies are on point. I completely get why this album receives such high praise.
8,5/10
Courtney Love doesn't deserve all of this hate. In fact she deserves way more praise for being one of the best grunge vocalist of all time and for dropping the second best grunge album of all time "Live Through This". This one is definitely not as good as "Live Through This", but still has a lot of great songs like the title track, "Malibu" and "Petals".
7,7/10
For me, this album is easily in the top 10 electric guitar album of all time. The mix of super harsh guitar noise with super melodic passages really showcases the full range of the electric guitar. The solos are awesome and badass and most songs sound fierce and very cool. The guitar also feel so effortlessly played. J Mascis is so freakin' nice man. The only downside is the last song, Poledo, which I find boring and useless in the track list.
AWESOME
9,5/10
Solid album with lots nice tunes. Mixes well pastoral folk to art rock. Especially liked the opener "Glad" and the songs "Empty Pages" and "John Barleycorn". Short and sweet. I did not like the blues track "Stranger to himself though".
Steve Winwood.
8,3/10
This was pretty chill bossa-nova with a modern twist, combining some trip-hop beats. Nothing super exciting or special with this one, but quite pleasant throughout while it was on. I preferred the slower songs here compared to the dancier cuts like the closing track, which was the worst song here in my opinion.
Chill.
6,9/10
Incredible album. The blend of jazz folk and rock that shine through all of the first side of the album is amazing. Moondance, It Stoned Me and Into the Mystic are all time classics of this period. The songwriting is intimate and strong without ever sounding pretentious. The second side of the album is not as strong but still shows some impressive songwriting and production from Van Morrison.
Stellar album
9,5/10
I didn't love this one unfortunately but not because it's bad, just because I do not really like this kind of crooner jazz. Some good songs here and there though. It's fine while It's on, but I won't come back to it.
6,8/10
This was better than I expected. I really like the Smiths but always felt like the strong point of the band was Johnny Marr and that Morrissey was a little bit overrated. I was wrong, a lot of songs here are beautiful, especially "Hold on to Your Friends".
Look I hate this racist prick as much as the next guy, but this was fine.
7,6/10
I don't really like crooner jazz, but I got to give it to Frank here, this one is good. The midnight vibe of the album is superb. The best song here is definitely the title track. Great vibe.
8,0/10
Well, this is annoying as hell. Some parts here and there are interesting, like some parts of "A Very Cellular Song" or the song "Witches Hat". Most of it sound like hippie minstrels that took too much drugs and decided to play multiple instruments that they don't really master. It reminded me a little bit of the annoying pirate that nobody likes at the beginning of Spongebob Squarepants.
bling bling bling
3/10
The number 1 album to get into jazz. The compositions here are stellar and tremendously well crafted. "Take Five" and "Blue Rondo a la Turk" are the real highlights here, but that doesn't take away from the richness and qualities of all the other compositions.
Perfect album.
10/10
Very cool progressive pop rock album with excellent fluidity and cohesion between the songs. This cohesion really make the album experience fun here and really put the themes on the forefront. The sound is super cool throughout too and influential on the indie sound of today.
Spacy
8,6/10
Exceptional 90's rock album that really pulls from the power pop classics. Influences from the Byrds and Big Star here are obvious but the album doesn't sound like a copycat since it really combines shredding alternative rock guitar. One of the 1991 an a definitive 90's rock classic.
9,5/10
This is not my cup of tea and it sounded a lot like christmas music, but it's undeniably a very well put together crop of songs. The instrumentation is luscious and rich, with the string arrangements being the highlight here. The songs are also more varied and interesting than on the other album of him here "The Genius of Ray Charles".
7,3/10
Teen Dream in a way kinda sound like it's cover; beautiful. The sound of this record is amazing with incredible piano passages doubled with Victoria Legrand's superb voice. This album envelops you with its sound in a way not a lot of album do. This is the first dream pop classic from this band that will put out a lot of other great albums. Zebra, Norway, Used to Be, Walk in the Park and Take Care are all gems.
9/10
Great catchy album by this group that had so much potential.
This album contains "Our Lips Are Sealed" and "We Got The Beat", which are both considered classic 80's songs. Pretty simple and straightforward album but it's fun throughout.
8/10
Original, catchy, fun and high intensity punk rock album that still stands tall to this day as a total classic. The unique voice of Poly Styrene and the use of saxophone really makes this album unique and special.
8,1/10
Transformer is a great and classic glam rock record and deserves the praise it got throughout the years. Some killer tracks like "Vicious", "Perfect Day", "Walk On The Wild Side" and "Satellite of Love" rises this album up there with other great rock classic. However, this album is far from perfect with fillers like "New York Conversation" and "Goodnight Ladies" paling in comparison with the great tracks here.
8,5/10
This one reminded me of good high school memories, when I was jamming a lot to this album. The long tracks here are outstanding with Roundabout and Heart of the Sunrise being the highlights. The shorter interludes range from forgettable to good, with Mood for a Day being the highlight.
Great prog
8,5/10
This one was better than I expected. I am not the biggest fan of Massive Attack, but this one was close to Mezzanine in vibe, an album I quite enjoy. Nocturnal, dark, groovy, it's a pleasant listen throughout, even If I found that it became a bit repetitive after the first half.
7,9/10
Yoshimi is a great and classic mid-00's indie rock album. The main strong points of this album are the amazing songwriting and the great instrumentation choices. "Do You Realize ??", "Are You a Hypnotist??", "Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell" and"Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1" are the hifhlights here in term of songs, but there are no weak tracks.
superb album.
9,4/10
This is a good album, but I found that it's mostly just good while it's on and that it does drag a little bit. The singles here pop and are memorable but overall as an album this is just fine.
7,3/10
This was a perfect album for Valentine's Day with its 13 love songs. This album is a total classic filled with hooks, harmonies and well written songs. Some fillers here and there but even those are better than the usual early beatles fillers.
Good album.
9,3/10
Great discovery, I never heard of this album before this list. This post-punk revival sound can often feel boring or repetitive, but on this album it works, mostly because of great instrumentation touches and genre blends. Not a big fan of the vocals on this one though.
7,8/10
I don't really get why this album is on this list. It's not bad by any stretch, but it kinda gets in one ear and leave out the other instantly. The first track is too long and feel like boring toothless disco, the subsequent track feel like middle of the road jazz-fusion.
meh
6,6/10
Good debut album by Bjork, but not as strong as her later output. Great songs like "Venus As a Boy" shows what she would acheive later on.
7,0/10
This is a fine psychedelic rock album, but it is plagued by filler tracks that are really useless and boring. The whole album doesn't make justice to the AMAZING opening track "I Had too Much to Dream Last Night". The first 5 tracks are pretty good, but the second half of the album is a huge let down.
6,7/10
Look, as much as KD sing well, I can't stand this. I felt like a granny listening to this, with the mix of adult contemporary, country and crooner jazz. Elevator music meets twangy country.
4,2/10
First off, I felt like this record had lots of qualities. It was mostly well written and well recorded. However, it was long and didn't leave a strong impression on me, it was pretty similar all the way through and not that catchy. I won't really come back to this one
6,5/10
This garage rock album is pretty catchy. The first side is very good, riff filled and energetic. The second one is less good but still enjoyable. Pretty good album overall but not essential.
7,4/10
Great Punk album that is super catchy, fun and energetic. Pretty straightforward, but consistently good.
Classic prog album, one of my favorite album of all time. For me this is a perfect album, with incredible instrumental work, especially from Tony Banks and Steve Hackett.
While this was funny and the plunderphonics elements of it were interesting, I will not really come back to i, mostly because I'm not that much a rap fan and that their voice is pretty annoying haha.
6,9/10
I understand why this was there, as it is very influential for the grunge movement. This was pretty good, but less good than some other similar things in that genre.
7,4/10
Great album for studying, concentration and as background music, well crafted with gorgeous melodies and sound.
8,5/10
Not bad, but extremely overrated. Most of it is not memorable at all and many songs are stuck so hard in the 90's it hurts. It is also not focused at all, which can get annoying pretty fast in a long album lie this.
6/10
For me rockabilly of this kind achieve at two things, making boring punk and making boring rock n roll simultaneously. Some fun bits here and there, but overall pretty uninspired, uninteresting and frankly quite bad.
5/10
Classic heavy metal album featuring great guitar duetting by Glenn Tipton & KK Downing and superb vocals by the great Rob Halford. The solos are superbly executed and the riffs are catchy. Breaking the Law and Living After Midnight are now well deserved rock classics.
8,8/10
Boring and unexciting punk music with a unintelligible singer mumbling over uninspired riffs, but sure I guess this book needed another early punk release. Just listen to Dead Kennedys or Black Flag for exactly this but instead good.
4,5/10
This is not bad per say, I recognize the quality of the production and of many songs here, but I found it really boring as a whole. Not a lot of hooks and Bono's delivery is not that good.
5,5/10
Good debut album by Coldplay, with highly memorable hits and great melodies and hooks. I love Coldplay first 3 albums before they became boring and uninteresting. Good times.
8,3/10
Good pop album with a lot of new modern classics, like Blank Space, Style and Wildest Dreams. Unfortunately not all of it is great. Shake It Off is annoying and some songs, like This Love and I Know Places are not really memorable. The great production throughout keeps this album cohesive and fun.
7,5/10
Pretty good rock album with great songs and riffs. Lots of personality shown here. 8/10
I get why this album is so acclaimed, some real good songs are present here, like the classic "There She Goes". Unfortunately, I feel lie the tracklist loses momentum around the second half, and that the vocals can be kinda annoying after a while. 7,6/10
This was pretty much unbearable and annoying. Unpleasant is a word I could use too. Mixing bad blues and generic 90's punk seems as good an idea as deciding to walk barefoot on a rusty nail without a tetanus shot. 3/10
Pretty good early RnB/rock and roll album. Solomon as a lot of groove and sounds a lot like Otis Redding. Pretty nice.
7,6/10
Pretty good post-punk effort with great songwriting. Quite enjoyable.
7,8/10
