Didn't dislike any songs ... though Razor Face comes close.
Laid back, chill listening. Nothing disagreeable, nothing amazing.
This is roots'ier than 'Drop the Pilot', but I was surprised to find that this is her 3rd studio album and I'd be happy to check out her earlier work too.
A solid 3.5
Can't believe this came out in '78. Still great listening 45yrs on.
This is a solid 4.
I enjoyed this album more than I was expecting. No idea what the songs are about but the beats, rhythms and melody were good. Particularly liked 'Al Hassidi Terei'. Getting a bit repetitive towards the end but not unpleasant.
There's a definite element of juvenile tantrum in some of these songs and I get a distinct 'emo' vibe. But there's some good stuff here too (probably the ones I recognise from airplay).
Maybe I should give it another listen.
Having read the background on this album, I appreciate the intent behind it and the risks Fela, and the band, took to produce it.
That said, I find this largely irritating. Each song being both very long and very repetitive, I wonder if this is supposed to be trancey, in which case you've got to be out of your gourd to appreciate it.
I get that other people really get something out of this, I just have no idea why. I've never understood why it takes, for example, 13 minutes of a repeating pattern with intermittent, random, soloing to 'say' something.
I suspect this will appeal to those to get Davis' 'Kind of Blue' style jazz but, with respect, not for me.
Starts out as fairly 'fluffy' flower pop tending to psychedelic rock.
The vocal brings to mind Philip Seymour Hoffman's character 'Sandy Lyle' in the movie 'Along Came Polly': mistaken belief of abundant talent despite ample evidence to the contrary.
Didn't mind 'The Castle' though.
Yeah ... no.
5
4
3 Let Love Rule, I build this garden for us, Does anybody out there even care, Be
2 My Precious Love, Fear, Freedom Train, Mr. Cab Driver, Rosemary, Blues for sister someone, Empty hands, Flower child
1 Sitting on top of the World
Have to admit, I was expecting (hoping?) to like this more. Fair bit of repetitious, musical masturbation going on.
Gave "Let Love Rule", "I build this garden" and "My Precious Love" a 2nd listen and decided I think them as much 2nd time around. The screechy 2nd verse kinda killed "I build this garden" for me. Could have been a 4.
2.5 plus 1 for playing all the instruments.
Largely unlistenable.
First album I couldn't bring myself to honour each song by listening to fully ... and friend, I've listened to some shit of late. The only possible reason I can discern for this being in a 1001 album bucket list is so you'll appreciate the other 1000.
Full disclosure: I just discovered the only thing worse than rap is metal rap. Fuck me, what a load of shite.
And for those that might think my review has got something to do with Kid Rock's politics and shitty PR, I know nothing of Kid Rock besides this rubbish and the other reviews I read. No, no, this is bona fide, genuine garbage.
Reminded me of when I was a kid and my older brother somehow came into possession of a record preaching some kind of religious crap. I never heard it myself but, evidently, he didn't think much of it because the last time I saw it, there were deep scratches and multiple cigarette burns. It was about as abused as a vinyl record could get without being sharded. That's what I'd like to do to this record.
Fuck off.
5
4 - Heroes
3 - Beauty and the beast (reminds me of Silverchair's last album)
- Sons of the Silent Age
- Moss Garden: Japanese mood music? But peaceful to listen to.
- The Secret Life of Arabia
2 - Joe the Lion: what a mess; I actually stopped playing to check if I had some music playing in another application
- Blackout: A 3 but for the intentionally off-key vocals
- V-2 Schneider
- Sense of Doubt: movie music?
1
I'm not sure if 1977-me would have been all that happy shelling out for half a record of mood muzak. Sure, Heroes (the track) is good, but it's not _that_ good.
While I didn't hate this, it's too incoherent for me. Feels like a jumble of songs randomly pulled from a few different piles, one of which is marked "Still born" and another "Ziggy rejects".
I suppose the theatrical aspect of some songs is to be expected but the muzak tracks don't achieve much for me.
Besides "Heroes", I didn't mind "The Secret Life of Arabia". The rest, not so much.
4/10
5
4 - The Fix
3 - Starlings
- The Bones of You
- Mirrorball
- Grounds for Divorce
- An Audience with the Pope
- Some Riot
- One Day Like This (great film clip)
- We're Away
- Hotel Istanbul
2 - The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver
- lullaby
1
Never heard of Elbow, though I'm sure I've seen the film clip for 'One Day Like This' before. Generally, a pretty mellow listen. Nothing that set my hair on fire or anything but I'd be happy to have any of these tracks, except 'The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver' which matches the music and title pretty well, in my general stream.
Not bad. A solid 3/5.
5
4
3 - Bobo on the Corner
- Sabrosa
- Futterman's Rule
2 - Sure Shot
- Root Down
- Sabotage
- Eugene's Lament
- Ricky's Theme
- The Scoop
- Shambala
- Transitions
1 - Tough Guy
- B-Boys Makin' with the Freak Freak
- Get It Together
- The Update
- Alright Hear This
- Flute Loop
- Do It
- Heart Attack Man
- Bodhisattva Vow
Another album I couldn't bring myself to listen to fully. Damn near fucked the whole album off but stayed with it out of pure sense of duty.
As it was, the further down the tracklist I got, the less inclined I was to want to hear anymore.
How hiphop or rap or whatever this shit is swept the planet I'll never understand.
Didn't mind most of the instrumental tracks.
One thing I liked about this album is the number of short tracks.
One thing I disliked about this album is the number of tracks.
1001 Albums, seriously, I can't take much more of this shit. Send me something decent, for the love of christ.
2/10
Besides 'People Hold On', which brought back some memories, not a lot to say. Not for me.
I thought this might turn out to be a discovery but, no. Feels like half the record is not-too-bad-indie-alternative stuff and the other is someone's idea of the musical equivalent of Lloyd Christmas' "most annoying sound in the world". To quote another movie, "A bunch of jerk-offs making weird sounds".
Nope.
Besides Living for the City & Higher Ground, quite liked 'He's Misstra Know-It-All'.
Can't quite give it a 4 but it's a solid 3.5 for me.
Enjoyed this.
I'm glad I heard the music before reading about the back story. The imperfections only serve to emphasize the improvisation and I couldn't work out whether the infrequent calls made by the artist during the performance were from euphoria or annoyance. Having read the story about the piano, I'm sure both.
I would be happy to add this to my collection and check out his other work.
Besides the first track, I liked this more than I was expecting.
Frankly, I didn't know who Big Brother & The Holding Company was but, once you hear that voice ...
(you know I'm really having trouble with the whole 5-star system. 3 is too low. Giving this a 4 means I've underscored some of the previous albums I've listened to.)
Gave this a second listen, just to confirm the 'meh'.
Moog raga ... TF? Vigorously hated that!
Liked the last track, 'Universal Mind Decoder (Alternate Backing Track)', the most. A good old fashioned 'talent' tanty. Lol. And then Wikipedia tells me about the 'staffing' problems they had; uhuh, yeah ... makes sense.
Didn't really dislike it. Just not something I'd buy.
2.5
5
4
3 - Negative Space (3.5)
- Static Resistance
2 - Ullswater (would have been a 3, if not for the length)
- The Soft Season
- Opener (repetitious ... and ...... looonnng)
- Each Time We Pass (ditto)
- Reunion (why??)
- Shortcomings (2.5)
1 - Boxing Day
My heart sank with the opening bars to 'Negative Space' and I was thinking, "oh god no, another album of jerkoffs making weird sounds" ... and then, it all turned around. I ended up liking the first track.
However, perhaps my opinion will change on 2nd listen (update:nope), but this gets harder to listen to the further down the track list you go. While it's not as bad as I initially feared, it ends up being just too repetitious and each song becomes bland.
