This album seems to contain every hit I've ever heard from CCR. Honestly most of it's pretty uninteresting musically, and lyrically is so heavy with old school masculinity (the recurring theme of "my woman left me and I don't know why" is such a bad take - that doesn't just happen for no reason). Very 70s, very "dad" energy, and older than both my parents. Not mad I listened to it, but hoping the list gets better from here.
I came into this with no clue how to pronounce the name of the album, assuming it was maybe "aha", later learning it's supposed to be "asia". For the life of me I cannot tell if this album is taking itself seriously. Long-winded instrumentals abound, but there's some solid musicianship and interesting instrumentation to back them up. Overall this feels more like a collection of songs than a cohesive album. Definitely more fun in the back half -- it feels to me like the two sides should be directly swapped, to open with the upbeat classic "Peg" and close on the extended fade-out of "Deacon Blues".
I was excited for this one coming in and holy heck was I correct in that excitement. The first two tracks are the obvious hits, but the album continues on to invoke a strange, hazy, chilly, waking-dream state of a world. It's hard to pinpoint what exactly I find so good about this. There's such a variety of mood and tone and style, and a few odd tracks I'd never listen to as standalones, but it all fits together so well as an album. I've always meant to listen to more Kate Bush and really glad I did today.
This feels like it could be the gold standard for a style of jazz that, as far as I know, peaked 10-20 years prior to its release in 1958. I wonder if it sounded dated at the time. That's not a knock on this album by any means; it runs the gamut from moody ballads to uptempo (sometimes really uptempo) swing and everything in between. What it lacks in vocals it does its best to make up for in other ways, mostly successful.
As an aside, I'm realizing how tough it is for me to rate on a 1-5 scale. In my head this is an 8 point something out of 10 -- does that make it worth 4 stars or 5?
If you remove all the production, the layered strings and reverb and sound effects, what you're left with is this kind of milquetoast singer-songerwriter sound. But of course you can't remove all that, because it's part of the album. I mistakenly read a 1-star review of this album before listening that called it boring, setting up my expectations (and expectations are everything) Unfortunately, I think I probably agree. I don't feel worse-off for having listened to this album but it didn't really do anything for me.
I'm much more into the backing tracks here than the vocals or the lyrics. The whole thing feels like a mixtape in a cool way, but so many of the songs have really juvenile or gross themes. Fun at times, but overall not all that memorable for me.
More CCR already? I guess that means we're getting it out of the way early. Much more enjoyable than Cosmo's Factory, though still not super into it. The hits are more my style and the instrumentals don't drag on forever, which is great. "Bad Moon Rising" was definitely stuck in my head all day.
Aside: a week in and I need a new personal rating scale or I'll never use numbers below 3. Aiming for roughly "I would refuse to listen to this again" to "I need to listen again / it's a favorite album". By this standard most of my first week's ratings would drop by one.
Some tracks are great. A couple of them make me never want to pick up this album again. This is clearly made for an audience that isn't me, and that's fine.
This has all the hallmarks of something I should really enjoy. It pulls influences from a number of different highly-compatible places. The problem is the result sounds impressively artificial. Nothing particularly stands out or surprises or makes any major changes to the formulae from which it borrows, and we get this washy, boring mishmash of all its components. I can't pinpoint much that's objectively wrong here, but I don't find anything very compelling, either. It gets a little better in the back half, but not enough to make up for the first.
For whatever reason I expected this to be much more straight-ahead punk and not nearly so glam as it is.
Know this album well. Really enjoy it, not an absolute favorite and not sure if it'd be my top Beck choice, but it's an all around solid one.
This is weird but I mostly like it. It's very 1980, for sure. The problem I'm having is a few tracks drag, and a few tracks Really drag with repetitive instrumentals that really just feel like they're there for padding. 4 for content here, minus 1 for padding.
Not sure what the story is but this one wasn't available on Spotify. This isn't my usual style but I enjoyed it quite a lot. The instrumentation is simple but there's some good musical complexity, and so much feeling.
I can't tell if I genuinely like this album more than the other hip-hop selections so far, or if I wan just lucky to have discovered it when I was younger. Either way, I think it's a really solid one.
Maybe I'm just tired but this album pretty much put me to sleep. Seems well-performed and well-recorded (though the production choice of switching drums and bass left/right between songs is really... Something), and it does a great job of showcasing his voice, which is probably the point. It's just sort of boring (and it's not like 1969 was a boring year for music in general).
Love this album. It's tough to pretend to be objective when it's one I've known and loved for years.
For me, this album starts really strong but sort of falls apart as it goes on. Maybe it's an A-side / B-side thing (assuming in 1988 this would have been most consumed on cassette) but the first half is these weird pretty interesting messy post-punk tunes, and the latter feels mostly straight-ahead rock (with a bit of pop sprinkled in).
Well, this brings a lot more of the punk sound I expected from this band. It's just really boring and drags on, which is kind of crazy for a sub-40 minute album.
I remember at one time enjoying this album more than I did today. It sort of feels like a collection of songs from an era, not really a cohesive album. The music is generally good, if a bit bland compared to later Beatles. But I think, as an album, I could live without it.
I first listened to this album in its entirety when an AI recommended it to me a couple months ago. It's fair to say this guy is my preferred Elvis. Sort of funny that its most well known track, Alison, is actually the most different from the rest of the album. The standout for me is the opening track, also the shortest, but it's just such a bop.
Not totally my style, but really just some good classic folksy country.
A lot of this album is good. Really good. My difficulty is a lot of it is also really, really sleepy. I'm torn between ratings here. On the whole this is some really enjoyable pop music. Ultimately I think I need to rate high because I did pretty much listen and enjoy three times, getting interrupted partway through the first two.
I had exactly zero expectations coming into this one, never having heard of the group. The verdict for me is "eh". For what it's worth, 94 is pretty early to have their sound this developed, which is cool; bands like Fucked Up and ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead had similar sounds (on different points in the spectrum) coming into even the mid-2000s. From the first track, I thought this was going to be some generic hardcore punk but there's actually a lot going on here.
I don't have anything specifically against Metallica, but this album really just plods on compared to their earlier stuff that I'm more familiar with. Spotify also has me listening to a "remastered" version which I suspect is mostly a louder/more compressed edition, so that doesn't make it any easier to listen to.
There was a time when I thought this album was like the ultimate brilliance in melancholy. I am at a very different point in my life now.
I'd never listened to any Sam Cooke as a block like this, only as part of a radio or playlist. Boy, was he a performer. A couple awkward transitions (hard to tell if it's editing or done live) keep this from being a 5 as an album for me, but I can't imagine how much fun it must have been to actually be at this show.
This album is fine, but sort of all over the place. A few individual tracks are more notable than the album all together. Weird to learn that it's not actually a French group but just one English guy. I think I'm a fan of the style but would actually prefer not to listen to this again.
There's some fun tracks here but it didn't do much for me as a whole. I bet there's some "story" behind why this album is on the list, no way it's just the music.
Love it, 100%. I used to believe I liked Hunky Dory more, but this one really grew on me over time. Also, I might have just been trying to go counter to what felt like popular opinon.
I think I wanted to dislike this album but it's pretty solid with some really good standouts. All the 1-bar loops for backing tracks get really tiring through.
I like The Cure. This album is a drug-fueled slog.
I tried so hard for years to find this album on CD. King Crimson was one of those artists I'd decided I wanted to listen to chronologically, and I got stuck on literally the second album because I could not find it anywhere. Finally picked up a copy at some point and was impressed but maybe not in the right mood for it, and discontinued my chronological search. This is weird and beautiful and probably brilliant. I only wish the vocals weren't so jarringly mediocre.
This album didn't really do anything for me. It's very approachable, almost too much so.
There's a fairly wide variety of styles covered here, it'd be really hard for me to categorize this album. They're all done well and blended seamlessly. The levels here bum me out a little, it's as though every other instrument is given precedence over her voice, so in the more intense sections it tends to fade to the back. That said, really enjoyable, would love to listen again (or to more from her).
Some of the Christian undertones hit in a much weirder way than they used to here. I still think this album is, on the whole, absolutely brilliant.
About half an hour too long and very sleepy. Or maybe just tiring.
Initially I started listening to this on laptop speakers, then I thought better of it, assuming "it'll sound much better in headphones". I am here to tell you it sounds the same. There seems to be exactly nothing beneath the surface here. I'll admit there's some cool stuff rhythmically here and there. I did listen to the whole thing, but by halfway through I couldn't wait for this album to be over.
Maybe it's that I expected something electronic based on the artist name, album title and its cover, but this is... Somewhat off-putting and not all that great. It's pretty bland which really keeps it from a 1, because I probably wouldn't even recognize it if I heard it again.
Some really good stuff here but it gets old over the course of a whole album.
Disjointed and forgettable. Sounds like it was recorded by 3 different bands. Definitely not _bad_ musically.
It's Christmas music.
This is a weird one, but its highest points are when it's allowed to get weird. Influences are all over the place, at the same time sounding influential to so much that came after it. It's an album out of time in a way. It would be nearly as at home 10 years earlier or 25 years later. I struggle with a numeric value here, but I think "3.5" in my head means "4" in practice.
I bet in its era this was nigh unheard of. Today, there's a couple of standouts and a couple that just sorta take up space.
This album is now over 20 years old. I first heard it in high school, my second from this group, who were really my introduction to more technical, modern progressive rock like this. Basically immediately fell in love with the group, and then with this album especially, shocked I'd never heard anything like it before. There's no way I can pretend to rate this album objectively. In my heart, it's a 5 all the way.
Seems fun to play, not as much to listen to.
I love almost every one of these songs. As an album, it's maybe a little all over the place.
This one's fun. I like it a lot more than I remember; maybe my tolerance for repetition has increased. My gut says this will be rated pretty low on this site, which is unfortunate.
I should have known Nile Rodgers produced this album.
♪ Baby's got the bends, oh no. Don't have any real friends. ♪
Aggressively Irish. Not particularly for me today.
