This album surprised me quite a bit, in a good way. I have historically not cared for Black Sabbath at all, and I think this album starts out weak, but it picks up from there and became really enjoyable. I am now quite intrigued to check out more of their work.
This is a challenge to rate. The album has some really high highs and the lows aren’t too bad either.
At the same time it’s Kanye who’s a massive a-hole all around. It’s probably his best work though.
I’ll opt for trying to distance the art from the artist one this one for now.
I’m quite sure there was a place and a time for this album. Having missed out on that time and place makes listening to this album for the first time a rather miserable experience.
There are sections here and there where songs begin to sound pleasing, but those moments are seemingly intentionally ruined - if nothing else then by the absolutely atrocious vocals. I’m confident that they sound as they do intentionally, but that to me only makes it worse.
I remember loving this album so much as a kid. It’s one of the few ones I had as a vinyl so would play it a ton.
Coming back to it now and listening more closely, there’s actually more songs that I strongly dislike than those that I enjoy. The run of Thriller, Beat It, and Billie Jean is just as amazing as back then. But the greats are let down by some really questionable love songs like Baby Be Mine, The Girl Is Mine, and P.Y.T. Those songs are also well produced and Michael is a very talented singer but their lyrics and repetitiveness are enough to make me roll my eyes at times and actually become rather uncomfortable at others.
PJ Harvey has always been one of those artists that people around me have mentioned that they like but that I haven’t actually listened to before.
This is turning out to have been a massive mistake. This album is fantastic and the first one on this journey that I have started over from the start immediately after finishing it.
I haven’t been focusing so much on individual tracks to mention any particular stand outs in either direction yet, but I am suspecting that this is also something of an intention on the artist’s part.
I love this album and will seek out more of her music and add this album to my regular rotation.
I can’t believe I haven’t listened to Kraftwerk before this. The influences of their music on some of my all time favorite bands is unmistakable.
The vocal parts of the tracks sound rather crude at this point but I still think they benefit from having them. Other than that though the album is sublime.
This was a great album by an artist I’d never heard of before and in a genre I don’t often listen to.
I get the sense there’s a significance to it given how good it sounds and when it came out, but I’m not familiar enough with the genre to identify its influence.
Every time I hear Sinatra sing I’m blown away by how phenomenal he was. I hadn’t heard this particular album before, and it’s not really what I’m into these days, but his raw talent cuts through all that to make this a truly wonderful experience.
Already on the first song the only thing I can think of is how much I hate everything about this.
I went into this journey with the intention to listen to all albums in their entirety. As it turns out, this will not be possible I gave this album about 40 minutes before giving up entirely. The music was so awful that I suppose the artist found no other way to make listening to the album more miserable other than to make it nearly three hours long.
I used to love this album back when it came out and listened to it constantly.
Coming back to it now almost 20 years later, I can still see the musical talent on display but I struggle to see what bound me to it so.
All in all I walk away from the album feeling disappointed and remove it from my mental list of favorites.
