503
Albums Rated
3.39
Average Rating
46%
Complete
586 albums remaining
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Rating Timeline
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Top Origin
Wordsmith
Rater Style ?
72
5-Star Albums
23
1-Star Albums
Breakdown
By Genre
By Decade
By Origin
Albums
You Love More Than Most
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Lam Toro
Baaba Maal
|
5 | 2.72 | +2.28 |
|
Phaedra
Tangerine Dream
|
5 | 2.73 | +2.27 |
|
Arular
M.I.A.
|
5 | 2.83 | +2.17 |
|
Bone Machine
Tom Waits
|
5 | 2.86 | +2.14 |
|
Leftism
Leftfield
|
5 | 2.9 | +2.1 |
|
Smokers Delight
Nightmares On Wax
|
5 | 2.91 | +2.09 |
|
Eli And The Thirteenth Confession
Laura Nyro
|
5 | 2.94 | +2.06 |
|
Ghosteen
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
|
5 | 2.97 | +2.03 |
|
Savane
Ali Farka Touré
|
5 | 3.02 | +1.98 |
|
Dare!
The Human League
|
5 | 3.05 | +1.95 |
You Love Less Than Most
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Moondance
Van Morrison
|
1 | 3.71 | -2.71 |
|
Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness
The Smashing Pumpkins
|
1 | 3.68 | -2.68 |
|
The Queen Is Dead
The Smiths
|
1 | 3.66 | -2.66 |
|
The Marshall Mathers LP
Eminem
|
1 | 3.49 | -2.49 |
|
Disraeli Gears
Cream
|
1 | 3.47 | -2.47 |
|
Aftermath
The Rolling Stones
|
1 | 3.39 | -2.39 |
|
Doggystyle
Snoop Dogg
|
1 | 3.38 | -2.38 |
|
Neon Bible
Arcade Fire
|
1 | 3.35 | -2.35 |
|
Channel Orange
Frank Ocean
|
1 | 3.31 | -2.31 |
|
The College Dropout
Kanye West
|
1 | 3.31 | -2.31 |
Artists
Favorites
| Artist | Albums | Average |
|---|---|---|
| Bob Dylan | 6 | 4.83 |
| David Bowie | 6 | 4.67 |
| Beatles | 5 | 4.6 |
| Stevie Wonder | 3 | 5 |
| Jimi Hendrix | 3 | 4.67 |
| Johnny Cash | 3 | 4.67 |
| Miles Davis | 2 | 5 |
| The Clash | 2 | 5 |
| Ali Farka Touré | 2 | 5 |
| Bruce Springsteen | 5 | 4 |
Least Favorites
| Artist | Albums | Average |
|---|---|---|
| Van Morrison | 2 | 1 |
| Rufus Wainwright | 2 | 1.5 |
| The Rolling Stones | 4 | 2 |
| Neil Young & Crazy Horse | 3 | 2 |
Controversial
| Artist | Ratings |
|---|---|
| Arcade Fire | 3, 1, 4 |
| Marvin Gaye | 5, 2, 3 |
5-Star Albums (72)
View Album Wall
Popular Reviews
Amy Winehouse
4/5
This is almost unbearably sad.
Amy Winehouse released her debut album when she was just 19, singing about her life where the men that she craved love from were all weak, manipulative or needy. She sounds tired, cynical and world weary, and in retrospect it’s easy to see the path that she was already heading down. Nobody should be singing lines like “I’ve forgotten all of young love’s joy” when they’re not even in their twenties.
Rest in peace Amy.
6 likes
Talking Heads
3/5
This is the transitional album where Brian Eno came on board as a producer, turning Talking Heads from an arty NYC proto punk band into something that you could dance to. I haven’t listened to this album as much as some of the others - not because it’s not good, but because the live versions of some of these songs on Stop Making Sense (notably their cover of Al Green’s Take Me to the River) are even better than the ones here.
3 likes
The Auteurs
2/5
You know when you go to a medium sized festival and there’s the second stage for the b-list bands? Well, the Auteurs would be a solid act for some time late on Saturday afternoon as you are getting ready to meet your friends by the main stage to see the headliners. Musically they are 90s left field indie Britpop, with slightly (but not too) quirky vocals and the occasional burst of enthusiastic guitar work. Perfectly fine but nothing to write home about.
3 likes
The Soft Boys
3/5
This album came out at exactly the wrong time. It’s psychedelic beats and sitar breaks were ten years too late, the indie rock energy and quirky production were ten years too early and the actual release date fell in the middle of a printers strike so the album didn’t get reviewed in Melody Maker and NME. This is a shame, because there’s a lot to enjoy here, with the highlight being the full on rock freak out of Insanely Jealous of You.
3 likes
Ali Farka Touré
5/5
When young Ali was growing up in a small village in a remote region of Mali he earned the nickname Farka, which means donkey, because of his stubbornness. He wasn’t allowed to play music for cultural reasons, but he went ahead and made himself an improvised one string guitar from a tin can and a bit of string anyway. He quickly picked up the distinctive sound of the region and earned a reputation as a guitarist of note, learning how to sing in seven different languages too.
Some time in the 60s he heard the music of John Lee Hooker for the first time and wondered how this American musician was playing tunes that sounded like the ones he’d grown up with. He quickly realised that the blues must have been an evolution of the much older traditions that he knew. The instruments and languages may have changed, but the feelings were still the same.
I remember hearing this music on the radio sometime in the 80s on a late night show and was charmed by it, even if I couldn’t understand the words. The American musician Ry Cooder was similarly enchanted and tracked down Touré to make an album with him, bringing the best of both worlds together.
Apparently Touré wasn’t happy with his time in America, calling it a ‘spiritual car park’, and some of that sadness and longing for home can be felt here. It’s still a good place to start listening though and will hopefully lead on to people listening to other albums from this truly remarkable musician.
When I was a child Timbuktu was always a mythical place, as far away from home as it’s possible to be. Perhaps we’ve always had it wrong, and it’s Timbuktu that’s home and we are the ones who are lost?
2 likes
4-Star Albums (173)
1-Star Albums (23)
All Ratings
Creedence Clearwater Revival
4/5
Glorious swampy blues rock!
Tracy Chapman
3/5
I know the singles off this album but I don’t think I’ve listened to the album before. I remember thinking that this was sort of easy-listening, but it is actually quite tough going in places with some justifiably angry lyrics about poverty and racial injustice. Reminiscent of singer songwriters from the 60s, but with a definite 80s polish in the sound quality.
DJ Shadow
4/5
This is a remarkable album that rewards repeated listens. It’s complex, layered, playful and chilled at the same time. The samples are eclectic drawing from ambient, jazz, funk and film scores combined in sometimes surprising and unexpected ways. Definitely one to listen to on headphones!
The Police
2/5
Today's album is Regatta de Blanc by the Police, and another one where I am very familiar with the hits but not the rest. Oddly enough these were the bits that grated, with reggae being sung in a cod Jamaican accent by a white bloke from Tyneside. In contrast the standout for me was the instrumental title track and some of the spikier new wave style songs.
Beatles
4/5
From that iconic opening chord, the energy never lets up on this. A fantastic album, and the first that is all original material with no covers. Side one is effectively the soundtrack to the movie, and side two fills it out with songs written at the same time in a blaze of creativity.
Solomon Burke
3/5
I will admit to not being at all familiar with Solomon Burke, and I’m glad that I had the chance to fix that today. He has an amazing soul voice and this album was delightful from start to finish.
The Smiths
1/5
Today’s album is The Queen is Dead by the Smiths which I find really difficult to listen to now. The best that you can say is that 75% of the band aren’t obnoxious racist bigots.
Leonard Cohen
4/5
I had always heard that Leonard Cohen had a reputation for being depressing and hard to listen to, but I really enjoyed this album. It’s sparse musically, but the production really allows the voice to shine through. The lyrics are on a par with Bob Dylan with occasional bits of French.
There are some nice quirky elements, with whistling and an unusual twanging sort of noise which turned out to be a mouth harp in the background.
Count Basie & His Orchestra
3/5
Enjoyable big band swing jazz from Count Basie, with a hat tip to Neal Hefti for the arrangements who later went on to write the amazing Batman TV series theme music.
There are some nice quirky elements, with whistling and an unusual twanging sort of noise which turned out to be a mouth harp in the background.
The Coral
3/5
A band from the Liverpool area with psychedelic overtones, discovered playing in the Cavern Club - no, not those guys, it’s the Coral. Really enjoyed the mish mash of styles on this, sung in a Jim Morrison sort of style. Opening your debut album with a piratey shanty is a bold move, but one I like. Great stuff!
Beastie Boys
4/5
This is an album that demands and rewards multiple listens, preferably with a guide to the samples. There is so much going on here at so many levels, with samples used in surprising and unexpected ways, paired with some incredibly dense lyrics full of allusions and niche references. I can see why this wasn’t as commercially successful as their first album but it’s much more satisfying. It really does live up to its reputation as the Sergeant Pepper of Hip Hop!
Dire Straits
3/5
A bluesy, laid back pub rock album was an unlikely candidate for a hit back in 1978 at the height of punk, but somehow Dire Straits got away with it and went on to be one of the biggest rock bands of the 80s with MTV friendly anthems like Money for Nothing. There’s a lot to enjoy here, especially the hit song Sultans of Swing and the atmospheric guitar lines.
Coldplay
3/5
Can this album really be over 22 years old? I don’t think I listened to it at the time, but the singles are still as transcendent as ever, especially Clocks. I will always associate this particular sound with that era, just past the turn of the millennium, when the world seemed a relatively hopeful place.
The Only Ones
2/5
I was a little bit puzzled by this one. They are very much one hit wonders, with the excellent single Another Girl, Another Planet that I think was re-released in the 2010s. The rest of the songs on the album don’t really live up to that, with vaguely punkish guitars and nasal vocals but nothing that stands out.
Pretenders
3/5
I’ve really enjoyed listening to some of these albums from the late 70s and early 80s - my record buying at this time was mostly singles rather than albums, so this is a chance to catch up. I love the punky, new wave edge here - Chrissie Hynde definitely brought something unique to the music scene at this time
Yes
3/5
I’m not sure why I’ve not listened to much Yes before - I think that Jon Anderson’s high pitched singing style may have put me off a bit. This is very much in the 70s prog tradition with long songs and lots of guitar and keyboard noodling, so there’s plenty to enjoy, and the vocals fit in well, so no complaints on that score. It’s surprisingly funky in places too!
Hugh Masekela
4/5
Effortlessly cool blend of jazz and Afro beat that fills an entire double album without pausing for breath. Some funky uptempo beats mixed with some slower tracks for variety. Excellent listening.
Beck
3/5
Interesting mish-mash of styles switching from 60s west coast garage psychedelia to grungy hipster hip-hop with weird sound effects, slide guitars and record scratches. OK, I guess, but it didn’t really grab me.
Dinosaur Jr.
3/5
Enjoyably noisy indie rock album, with grungy vocals (although predating actual grunge by several years). True confession - I avoided this for ages because I thought that Dinosaur Jr were a novelty kids band or something. Doh.
Mercury Rev
3/5
I went into this with no idea what to expect and it turned out to be an enormous amount of fun. In places it sounded like the soundtrack to a Disney film directed by David Lynch featuring flugelhorns, wurlitzers and even a musical saw. Stay around for the hidden bit on the last track!
The Zombies
3/5
This was an interesting listening experience - I recognised the single from this but the rest was new to me. Definitely psychedelia with a distinctly English touch somewhere between Pink Floyd and the Kinks. I was interested to see that the band originally formed in one of the pubs that I used to frequent in St Albans, near where I grew up, so technically that makes them a local band for me!
Joni Mitchell
3/5
Enjoyably jazzy, breezy pop that’s very easy to listen to but has considerable lyrical depth. The songs flowed into each other pretty seamlessly, making this a good album to let wash over you, picking out something different each time.
AC/DC
5/5
The very definition of all killer, no filler - this album set the template for metal through the 80s. Absolutely blistering all the way through, with the only downside is that some of the lyrics haven’t aged particularly well, especially Night Prowler. Highway to Hell also feels bitter sweet, knowing the way that singer Bon Scott was to die less than a year after this was released. Still a classic though
Manu Chao
4/5
I really enjoyed this quirky album from Manu Chao - according to Wikipedia he sings in French, Spanish, English, Italian, Arabic, Catalan, Galician, Portuguese, Greek and occasionally other languages! A veritable one man DuoLingo! Lots of interesting little samples and snippets thrown in too - pretty sure I heard something from Galaxians at one point.
Minutemen
3/5
A double-album from an obscure punk band with 43 tracks? It starts with what sounds like jazz funk and then goes into Spanish guitar and a sketchy live recording. Hmmm. It’s a bit of a curate’s egg this album - I really liked the punk tracks, but I felt they were trying a bit too hard to sound like Talking Heads on the funkier tracks.
Public Enemy
4/5
Full of righteous anger and astute observations on the state of the world and racial injustice. It also rocks hard! Probably one of the best and most influential hip hop albums, but not an easy listen in places.
5/5
Definitely one of David Bowie’s best albums, exploring the psyche of his alter ego Ziggy Stardust. Full of absolute classics from start to finish and sounding timeless. Five Years could have been written now (and why didn’t we listen at the time?)
Beyoncé
3/5
By any measure this is a remarkable piece of work - 14 tracks accompanied by 17 videos and a slew of other bonus features, dropped as a surprise release with no pre-publicity. This is immaculately produced, with lots of interesting audio samples and flourishes, she has an amazing voice and the lyrics are interesting, but polished pop isn’t really my thing.
The Divine Comedy
4/5
This is a very appropriate album for Valentine’s Day, and it very much does what it says on the tin. Seven bitter sweet songs about love, with orchestral arrangements, clocking in at just over half an hour. This still has some of the quirkiness and humour of other songs by the Divine Comedy, especially the references to horses!
If you were a horse
I could ride you through the fields at dawn
Through the day until the day was gone
2/5
I’m not averse to a bit of prog when I’m in the mood, but to quote Joseph II this really has far too many notes for my taste. It opens with mad, free jazz style guitar noodling and never really calms down at any point. The 18 minute title track has some good parts, but it’s hard work to listen to. Apparently side 2 is supposed to be more folk and rock oriented, but it’s really more of the same, although the songs are a bit shorter. OK, I guess.
R.E.M.
4/5
This album is from the 80s but it sounds depressingly contemporary, with songs about a crazy world teetering on the brink of destruction, run by right wing politicians and money grubbing billionaires who are “loyal to the Bank of America”. The jangly guitars and Michael Stipe’s nasal vocals have dated a bit more than the lyrics, but I still found myself singing along with and remembering most of the words to “End of the World as we Know It”
Public Enemy
4/5
This is Public Enemy’s third album and it maintains the furious intensity of their previous release. The samples are even more on the nose in this one, and are self referential in places, talking about the furore that surrounded It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back. Essential listening but you will feel drained by the non stop sonic assault by the end.
Laibach
1/5
This album has two cover versions of the annoying one hit wonder “Live is Life” by Opus, sung in guttural German accents, which is probably two too many I think. There’s also a cover of One Vision by Queen which ends up sounding like a world war II era propaganda speech.
The rest of the album continues the totalitarian theme with pounding drums, grandiose orchestral stings, industrial noise and speech samples. It all makes me feel a bit queasy.
Joanna Newsom
4/5
This is an unusual one! It sounds like a 60s folk album, with added orchestration sung by someone with the phrasing of Bjork and the lyrical sensibilities of Nick Cave. There are five longish songs on this album and they require a certain amount of concentration to follow as it’s quite easy to let it wash over you. I’ll be listening again, which should tell you how I feel about it.
Machito
5/5
This is great! Utterly infectious Afro-Cuban big band jazz from 1957 with a great remaster that sounds as fresh as if it were recorded yesterday. This really put a buzz in a dull Thursday for me!
David Bowie
5/5
Listening to this album is almost unbearably poignant. I can’t help remembering the first time I heard it, sharing the experience with friends on the internet, thrilled that we were hearing a new Bowie album. We puzzled at the lyrics, especially the references to death, and enjoyed the cheeky bits about someone grabbing his cock. There were even callbacks to his very first album that we had listened to not long ago.
Then we got the news …
Arcade Fire
3/5
Entertaining lo-fi indie-rock with some nice flourishes. The track Neighbourhood #3 (Power Out) really reminded me of New Order for some reason.
Mariah Carey
3/5
Listening to this album is a bit like taking a bath in warm syrup - soothing and relaxing, but ultimately a bit over sweet. Mariah Carey has a gorgeous voice, but she does that thing where it warbles over half a dozen notes in a single word. It’s probably technically very accomplished, but it sounds like a real life autotune in places. The best song was a cover of Prince’s Beautiful Ones and I liked the tweeting bird noises too.
The Stone Roses
3/5
I didn’t really get the Madchester sound first time around, but now with a greater appreciation of 60s music I find I’m enjoying it more, oddly enough. I really enjoy this indie guitar sound that is firmly rooted in the 60s psychedelic tradition with some epic drums holding it all together.
ZZ Top
4/5
I think I first heard the track La Grange just before ZZ Top became the unlikeliest breakout stars of the MTV video boom with their album Eliminator. I was immediately hooked by this swampy, bluesy, southern rock with a nice mix of foot stompers and slower ballads. The album fits 10 songs into a brisk 33 minutes and is always a fun listen!
The Temptations
4/5
Well, this was a treat! Funky beats, black power and a nearly 12 minute cut of Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone that takes up half of side one. Side two is a little more laid back, but still gorgeous listening.
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
3/5
This album takes a smidge of country, a sprinkling of southern rock and a decent helping of good old rock ‘n’ roll to create something that sounds timeless, and if you didn’t know when it was created you probably wouldn’t guess it’s from the musical doldrums of 1976. Pretty good stuff all the way through, and one bona fide classic hit with American Girl at the end of its succinct 30 minute run time.
Donovan
3/5
Very 60s, much psychedelic, so hippy!
Is this the first album to name check Green Lantern?
TV On The Radio
3/5
Interesting mix of loops, quirky/provocative lyrics and a huge rumbling bass line. I hadn’t heard this before and was interested to read that they worked with Bowie on a later track which I will be checking out.
Fairport Convention
3/5
I came to this album expecting it to be full of fingers in ears, folderol-diddle-aye-day and songs about hobbits. To be fair, there is a line about “Oh My true love” in one of the songs, but this album has a nice mix of folk and some bluesy riffs on (gasp!) electric guitars. There are also a surprising number of Bob Dylan songs, an entertaining French song with what sounds like a hurdy gurdy and the classic Who Knows Where the Time Goes. Good stuff.
The Police
3/5
This was a proper curate’s egg of an album. Parts of it were excellent, especially the track Synchronicity II. Sting has mostly stopped singing in a cod Jamaican accent which is a plus point.
However, the hits dragged through overfamiliarity (if I never hear I’ll be Watching You again, I won’t complain). There are some real clunking missteps too, such as rhyming Brontosaurus with ‘lesson for us’ and the track Mother is simply awful.
Metallica
3/5
80’s thrash metal passed me by at the time - I always preferred British metal bands like Iron Maiden or Motörhead or the occasional bit of cheeky hair metal, and thought that thrash wasn’t for me. I was expecting this album to be hard work, but it turned out to be surprisingly accessible, with some interesting songs and allusions to the Cthulhu mythos. The whole thing is technically brilliant but it still didn’t completely grab me for some reason.
The Black Crowes
3/5
The 90s were supposed to be a grungy, cynical era, so this unpretentious rock and roll album is something of an outlier. I think this is probably the American equivalent of Pub Rock - no nonsense rock’n’roll, nothing fancy but good fun. A particular highlight is a foot stomping cover of Too Hard to Handle by Otis Redding.
Leonard Cohen
4/5
This album was recorded and released shortly before Leonard Cohen’s death, so unsurprisingly it deals with some heavy topics - love, pain and faith, but it manages to sound bright and positive too. Cohen is accompanied by a synagogue choir and a cantor in places, and the whole thing sounds very atmospheric and moving. I’d put this along side Nick Cave for an album to listen to in a darkened room when you have time to meditate on what he is saying.
Sonic Youth
4/5
Remember the other day when I was surprised that the Black Crowes didn’t sound grungy and cynical? Well, I think that Sonic Youth must have got an extra helping to make up for it. They’ve got fuzzed out guitars, laconic vocals, thumping bass and lots of swirling feedback. I don’t think I listened to this at the time, but I liked it a lot. The highlight was Tunic (Song for Karen) which sounds like it was a direct influence on Dry Cleaning’s Magic of Meghan.
Steely Dan
3/5
The only thing that I know about Steely Dan is that they were named after a steam powered dildo from William Burroughs’ drug classic The Naked Lunch. This album feels very polished and technically accomplished but like several other classic albums on this list, it didn’t grab me. According to Wikipedia this is classed as Yacht Rock, so maybe I need to own a yacht before I can appreciate it properly?
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
3/5
The early 70s must have been a difficult time for the flower power generation - the optimism of Woodstock giving way to the realities of settling down, raising children and (gasp!) maybe even getting a hair cut. This is an entertaining collection of folk rock songs, with the highlight probably being their version of Joni Mitchell’s Woodstock. Not entirely sure why the cover photo has them looking like something from the 1870s though.
Sonic Youth
4/5
If 1990’s Goo anticipated grunge, then 1988’s Daydream Nation harks back to the spiky sounds of post punk and new wave from 10 years previously. This really reminded me of Joy Division in places and I think that Kim Gordon’s bass playing compares well to Peter Hook’s. The only complaint I have about this is that stretching 12 songs over a double album is a bit much - I’d rather they’d cut them down to 3 minute bangers and kept it as a single album.
Fleetwood Mac
3/5
This is another classic album that I haven’t listened to all the way through before, although I knew most of the tracks especially *that* bit from The Chain which is the theme tune for F1 racing in the UK for some reason. The back story to this album is interesting too, with most of the band going through drug problems and divorces, and somehow still managing to produce a whole load of optimistic love songs. My highlight was Songbird, one that was new to me
Tito Puente
5/5
I was introduced to Tito Puente by the game Grand Theft Auto : Vice City. Every yellow cab in the Little Havana district would be playing Radio Espantoso and it’s impossible not to enjoy the infectious rhythms. This album is a good introduction to Señor Puente and my particular favourite is Mambo Gozon, but to be honest they’re all good songs, Brent.
A Tribe Called Quest
4/5
This is an effortlessly cool blend of hip-hop, jazz and some very cheeky samples that flows beautifully. I loved the way that the tribe is introduced in the first track, giving the album the feel of a party where you are meeting a bunch of new people who are all happy to include you in their musical meanderings. My favourite track was I left My Wallet in El Segundo which spins a yarn of an ill advised road trip into the desert.
Van Morrison
1/5
This is another album where my view of it is coloured by the current political leanings of the artist. Van Morrison seems to have turned into a tin foil hat anti-vaxer with his latest album having a song “They Own the Media”. No prizes for working out what he’s alluding to here.
I listened to this album anyway and didn’t really enjoy it. File in the bin with Morrissey, Clapton et al.
Brian Eno
4/5
Brian Eno is probably best known for his iconic ambient albums and his work with some of the biggest names in rock music as a producer over the last fifty years. However, his solo albums are not to be missed. He had an amazing set of collaborators for this album including Robert Fripp, Robert Wyatt and even Phil Colllins playing drums on a couple of tracks. Apparently over a hundred songs were recorded and whittled down to ten for the album over a two year period.
The music is interesting and varied, with some funky stuff on the first side and more introspective pieces on side two, giving hints of the ambient material he was also working on at the same time, albeit in smaller chunks. I like this a lot, but on balance I still prefer the previous album Another Green World which is one of my all time favourites.
The Killers
2/5
The Killers scored a massive hit with this debut album, but for some reason it doesn’t seem to stick with me. I’ve only just listened to it, but I doubt that I could hum the chorus to Mr Brightside if I tried. Musically it’s somewhere between Coldplay and Zooroopa era U2, with an oddly nasal sounding vocal effect applied to lead singer Brandon Flowers on all of the songs. Ok I guess, but I probably wouldn’t listen to it again.
Fela Kuti
5/5
Fela Kuti is another artist that I was introduced to by Grand Theft Auto, on the GTAIV soundtrack. This is a brilliant live album, high energy afrobeat with a touch of muscular 70s funk. Fela promises 4 songs at the start of the set, but listen out for a 16 minute bonus track featuring a drum battle between Tony Allen and guest star Ginger Baker from Cream.
Alanis Morissette
3/5
I think I avoided this album at the time, because, as the comedian Ed Byrne pointed out, having 10,000 spoons when you need a knife isn’t ironic, it’s just stupid. What would be ironic is if it turned out that a spoon would have done the job anyway.
Anyhoo, this album turns out to be good in parts. The slightly fey numbers didn’t really appeal, but there are some much harder hitting tracks about dysfunctional relationships that hit home for me, especially the non-radio version of You Oughta Know which was excellent.
Jane's Addiction
2/5
Usually with these albums, I listen to them and then have a look at the accompanying Wiki page. In this case, I read about them first and apparently they nearly split up in a dispute about royalties before they’d even recorded the album, with lead singer Perry Farrell claiming 50% of the rights with another 12.5% on top for the music. The band disagreed.
That’s probably the most interesting thing about this generally unremarkable 80s alt rock album. YMMV.
Radiohead
4/5
I didn’t really listen to Radiohead in the early 2000s even though, on paper, they were right up my street. I think it’s taken a good number of years for these albums to sink in, especially this one. I love the tape loops, obscure electronic instruments, glitchy effects, raw guitars and the concise but sonically dense songs. It’s not quite at five stars, but I think it will get there over time.
Pere Ubu
3/5
From the name of the band I was expecting some avant garde Belgian jazz from the 1950s, and to be fair there are some enjoyably weird bits to this, but it turned out to be more of a proto punk garage rock album and a fun listen. The highlight is probably the title track which shamelessly borrows the bass riff from Neal Hefti’s 1960s Batman theme tune.
The Doors
3/5
When I was younger, I had a ‘Best of the Doors’ compilation which was a pretty good selection of tracks from all eras of the band. However, the track order is burnt into my synapses so that when I hear Roadhouse Blues I expect it to be followed by LA Woman, which is kind of jarring when Waiting for the Sun comes on. Taken as a whole, this is a solid blues rock album although Jim Morrison’s voice sounds much older than the 27 years old he was at the time.
Aretha Franklin
5/5
Aretha Franklin was not just the Queen of Soul, but one of the greatest vocalists of all time. This album bridges the gap between gospel and soul, showing that when all is said and done, love songs are the same no matter who you are singing them to. The music sensibly does not get in the way of Aretha’s voice, which soars with emotion on every song.
The Young Rascals
3/5
This was a band that I hadn’t heard of before and the album was a bit of a mish mash of different styles - a sort of “Now That’s What I Call Generic 60’s Music!”. There was a bit of unthreatening R&B, a side step into West Coast garage, a spot of Spanish guitar and even some birds (or should that be Byrds) tweeting at the start of one track. I’m guessing that they were more popular in the USA but they only had one hit in the UK.
Hole
4/5
This album was overshadowed by two tragedies - Kurt Cobain’s suicide a week before it was released and the death of bassist Kristen Pfaff two months later from a heroin overdose. There was also a deeply misogynistic rumour that Cobain had ghost written some or all of the tracks on the album.
However, this album is easily strong enough to stand on its own. It’s post grunge rock with some very on the nose lyrics. Good stuff.
Aerosmith
4/5
True confession - I always assumed that Aerosmith were an 80s metal band and I had no idea that they started in 1970!
Anyhoo, this album is a gloriously swaggering 70s classic with nods to the Who, the Rolling Stones, Black Sabbath and the Beatles. They even channel George Formby on one song about whipping out his 10 inch … record. The original version of Walk This Way also shows them to be ahead of their time, anticipating quirky hip hop rhythms.
Elliott Smith
3/5
Another album where the artist was new to me and another case where they died tragically young. This is very much in the vein of 60s singer/songwriters but some of the lyrics are definitely something that wouldn’t have appeared in those days. By all accounts this was more of a hit after Smith’s passing, making some of these songs sound very poignant.
Neil Young
4/5
The turning point from the hippy 60s into the cynical 70s produced a lot of great music and this album is no exception. I was more familiar with Dolly Parton’s version of the title track than the original, but it’s still as bafflingly obtuse as ever. “Oh, Lonesome Me” is a masterpiece of self pity and staying in, but the highlight is “Southern Man” - a blistering attack on racism in the Deep South with some rocking guitar work.
Love
3/5
This is one for the ‘what were they thinking?’ files, both for the artist and the compilers of the list.
Side one is some pretty standard 60’s psychadelia, but side 2 turns out to be a 19 minute, full on, acid jazz rock freak out that the band themselves described as "a waste of a side of an album". It’s got harpsichord, harmonica, an extended drum solo and a bit where he starts screaming. I quite liked it, but I’m not sure I’d listen to it again!
Pentangle
3/5
Amiable late 60s folk rock, probably steering more to the folk end of the spectrum. A nice accompaniment to the hour I spent stuck in traffic on the way back from work, although I was tempted to skip the track labelled as a dirge, which did what it said on the tin!
Led Zeppelin
3/5
The previous album was a huge success, but for this one the band got carried away in the studio and produced too much material for a single album so they padded it out with unused songs from previous albums to make it a double. This means that there are a lot of self indulgent tracks on here that all go on a little bit too long or don’t fit, like the funky Stevie Wonder inspired Trampled Under Foot. Kashmir is still a monster track though!
Nina Simone
5/5
This is an astonishing collection of songs, ranging from light jazz to bluesy love songs and the white hot anger of Four Women - showing different perspectives on the lingering evil of slavery and racism in America. The common thread is Nina Simone’s voice, a husky burr that soars into the stratosphere when it needs to.
Air
5/5
Air are Daft Punk’s older, cooler cousins - smoking Gitanes behind the bike sheds and wearing stripy jumpers in a post modern, ironic way. They take the lush soundscapes of 60’s Nouvelle Vague cinema, add bloopy 70s modular synths and classic moogs, and top it off with some banging dance tracks (Sexy Boy and Kelly Watch the Stars being highlights). If you have the means to play it, the Dolby Atmos mix of this sounds immense!
Super Furry Animals
4/5
I think that this another case of mistaken identity. I assumed that Super Furry Animals were a novelty kids band, like the Wombles. However, they turn out to be a sort of Welsh psychedelic, shoe gazy, dubstep version of the Beach Boys with songs morphing from mellow piano introductions into glitchy electronica without pausing for breath. One track even features Paul McCartney chewing celery in the background. Enjoyably bonkers!
Gang Of Four
2/5
This is pretty much by the numbers post punk with agit prop lyrics about IRA prisoners, situationist politics and violence on TV. At one point he genuinely sings “Love’ll get you like a case of Anthrax and that’s something I don’t wanna catch”. The high point is probably the song about drugs (where he has a choice between Asprin and Paracetamol).
Meat Puppets
4/5
Having an eponymous album name is a sure sign of self confidence. This band know what they are doing, with 12 songs blasted out in under 30 minutes in an entertaining mix of thrash, proto-rap and country, apparently inventing the genre cowpunk in the process. Good fun!
4/5
Ok, I know that Bono is a pompous arse and that the band have turned avoiding tax into an art form, not to mention that I had an ex that played this all the time, but the opening to this album still makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. I suspect that is mainly due to the production work of Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois who conjure huge soundscapes evoking a mythic America. The wiki is a fun read especially Eno threatening to burn the master tapes!
David Bowie
5/5
It’s amazing to think that David Bowie was still a relative outsider when this album came out and that it sold poorly on first release. There is a lot here that points the way to the directions that his music would take with complex cinematic arrangements on Life on Mars alongside pop classics and lyrics namechecking Warhol, Dylan and the Velvet Underground. My high point is Kooks, an utterly charming song dedicated to his new born son.
Nas
3/5
New York hip hop has a very distinct sound, compared to the stuff being created on the West Coast at this time. This has a languid feel, almost jazz like in places, but we are definitely in the heart of New York for this. The lyrics hit hard, obviously from growing up in some very tough projects, but there are lighter tracks too with songs about chilling out with friends. Influential but probably not one I would listen to regularly.
Marvin Gaye
5/5
This album definitely hits hard while being easy to listen to. Songs about racial injustice, poverty, war and pollution by one of the great soul voices. Hugely influential at the time and it still is relevant today.
Marilyn Manson
1/5
Tedious, overblown, edgelord nonsense from someone that unsurprisingly turned out to be a massive wrong’un.
Bob Dylan
5/5
This is a remarkable album by any standard, containing three of the greatest protest songs ever written and setting the radical agenda for the sixties and beyond. For it to be just the second album from a little known 22 year old singer songwriter lifts it even further. This album also contains some self deprecating humour and lovelorn ballads, as well as a lovely, downbeat cover of Corina, Corina which was a highlight for me. Simply essential listening.
Talking Heads
3/5
On the track Psycho Killer, Talking Heads managed to sound like a postpunk band before punk had even happened. Tina Weymouth’s mammoth bassline and David Burns quirky vocals make this a classic. However the rest of the album doesn’t quite live up to this high point. I think I prefer their subsequent Brian Eno produced albums.
Culture Club
4/5
When Boy George first appeared on Top of the Pops back in the early 80s there was a brief wave of moral panic about ‘gender bending’ pop stars from the right wing press, recycling the same headlines they’d printed about Bowie and Bolan from 10 years previously. However, he soon silenced the critics with a series of top ten hits and a second album that was full of bright, soulful pop with backing vocals from Helen Terry giving a Motown vibe. Lovely stuff.
The Incredible String Band
3/5
This starts out like a simple folk album but rapidly mutates into something stranger bringing in multi-tracking, sound effects, weird instruments, psychedelic lyrics and a 13 minute concept piece about an amoeba. Very 60s but it makes you wonder what was in that mushroom stew they were eating.
Björk
4/5
This is possibly Björk’s most restrained and emotionally vulnerable album, with electronica dialed back in favour of swirling string arrangements and the lyrics describing the aftermath of a relationship breakdown. It definitely takes you on an emotional journey and I will be checking out the accompanying video art pieces that went with it and passed me by at the time.
The Smashing Pumpkins
3/5
Another one that bounced off me at the time, probably due to silly band name syndrome (I was reading Smashing in the UK sense of the word). I was expecting a scrappy grunge album but actually got a well produced post rock thing instead, even featuring (gasp!) string arrangements on some tracks. I mostly enjoyed it, but I think I probably would have loved it if it was shorter and scrappier.
The Rolling Stones
3/5
The 60s were all about the Beatles vs The Stones, so it’s interesting to compare this album with Let It Be. Both were recorded in makeshift studios with the bands in a fractious state. However the Beatles finished theirs in a couple of weeks, and punched up their sound with Billy Preston on keys, whereas the Stones took a year and sound hungover with tired blues songs. A couple of classic tracks here and the remastering definitely helps. Mostly average.
Doves
4/5
Oooh, this was an interesting one! Elements of shoe gaze, trip hop and a touch of electronica. According to Wikipedia they started as a dance music group with a hit single before a fire in their studio destroyed all of their work in progress, prompting them into a complete change of direction. It reminded me a little of Coldplay, but predates them by a couple of months. I like this a lot!
Bruce Springsteen
4/5
A seventy minute album from Bruce Springsteen about the fallout from 9/11 is a daunting prospect. From just about any other artist this might have come across as preachy or jingoistic, but the Boss manages to make this thoughtful and considered with light and hope amongst the darkness. The E-Street band are back in business for this album too, which really lifts everything. The highlight is My City of Ruins, dedicated to his beloved Asbury Park.
Manic Street Preachers
3/5
The disappearance of Richey Edwards in 1994 casts a very long shadow over this album. I get the feeling that the band wanted to turn this up to 11 and throw everything into it, but the result sounds a bit bombastic and, well, preachy at times. It really is very loud and worthy, but the quieter track Small Black Flowers that Grow in the Sky (written by Edwards) shows what the album might have been if he was still present.
Supergrass
4/5
Any album that starts with a ‘1-2-3-4’ is an automatic winner for me. I only knew the insanely catchy hit ‘Alright’ but I enjoyed the bouncy punk energy of this, combined with a bit of cheeky chappy humour in an 80s Madness style. They even channel 60s Bowie on We’re Not Supposed To with daft gnome voices. The final track Time to Go is a good closer, and a strong contender for a song to play at a funeral.
Nine Inch Nails
3/5
Well, this is cheery. Pain, degradation, despair and hopelessness set to music that sounds like being trepanned with an electric drill. I imagine.
Actually, I’m being hard on this. I do like harsh, industrial electronica - my introduction to NiN was via the Quake soundtrack and I really like the movie and TV soundtracks that Reznor is doing now. Hurt (at least the Johnny Cash cover) is a masterpiece. This is just a bit *too* grimdark for my tastes.
Bob Dylan
5/5
This is the album where Bob went electric, much to the annoyance of some of his die hard fans. I’m not sure why it was such a big deal, but the added punch really steps things up on side one, especially on Subterranean Homesick Blues where Bob effectively invents rap and the lyric video at the same time. Side two has some fine songs too, especially the classic Mr Tambourine Man. Highlight is On the Road again where he wakes up with frogs in his socks!
Throwing Muses
3/5
Coming to this album cold, my initial impressions were of a spiky, post-punk record with a strong Siouxie and the Banshees influence. I then read that the band were actually from Georgia, USA and started noticing equal amounts of REM and even a bit of B52s going on. This was interesting rather than essential for me.
Miles Davis
5/5
This is an album that does exactly what it says on the tin. Effortlessly cool, without being arch. The recordings on this date from 1949 and 1950 but sound vibrant and fresh. A perfect place to start for anyone who thinks that jazz is not for them.
Creedence Clearwater Revival
4/5
Gloriously swampy, blues rock that bounces along in a fun way, even as the lyrics deal with down and out musicians, doomed relationships and deadly weather. The album fits nine songs in just under half an hour and is a great way to kick off a rainy bank holiday weekend!
Bob Marley & The Wailers
5/5
After a disappointing tour of the UK in 1972, Bob Marley and his band were broke and didn’t even have enough for the air fare back home to Jamaica. Chris Blackwell of Island Records advanced them £4000 which got them their tickets and enough left over to put this record together in a decent studio. The result is one of the greatest reggae records of all time, mixing songs about slavery and oppression with gloriously blissed out love songs. Simply gorgeous!
Led Zeppelin
3/5
Listening to this again, it’s pretty clear that Spinal Tap really wasn’t all that much of a parody. When the opening track bangs on about being a ‘back door man’ giving every inch of his love there isn’t really any doubt about what he’s singing about. We also get a folky song about Gollum making off with the hero’s girlfriend in Mordor which I don’t remember from the books. Oh, and let’s not talk about the drum solo. The remastered version sounds good though
Mott The Hoople
3/5
The vocals on this are a curious mix of 60s Bowie, Ray Davies and Marc Bolan, and it’s no surprise to find that their biggest hit was the Bowie written All The Young Dudes and that they ended up working extensively with Mick Ronson. Entertaining 70s glam but not really at the same level as the acts that influenced them.
Steely Dan
3/5
This album feels more like jazz noodling and less like the overblown yacht rock of Aja, so I think I probably enjoyed it more (for some values of ‘enjoyed’).
Adele
4/5
Somehow I had avoided listening to the biggest selling UK album of the 21st century until now, and it’s a remarkable piece of work. Written by Adele when she was just 21 (hence the title) in the aftermath of what sounds like a toxic relationship with a much older man, it naturally deals with pain, heartache and redemption. Musically, it’s a mix of genres but I found that I preferred the simpler tracks with the highpoint for me being ‘I Found a Boy’
Beatles
5/5
This was the album that saw the Beatles transition from a jangly Merseybeat band into something much more ambitious. With the help of George Martin, they started playing with different instruments (sitars and fuzzed out bass), genres (country!) and studio effects. Lyrically they were a long way from hand holding romance with songs about dysfunctional relationships and existential angst, and the still shocking Run For Your Life as an album closer.
Keith Jarrett
4/5
So, the legend of this album is that in 1975 an 18 year old student called Vera Brandes somehow persuaded noted jazz pianist Keith Jarrett to play a late night gig at the prestigious Köln Opera house. Due to a mix up, an old, out of tune rehearsal piano was set up on stage with no time to get a replacement. Jarrett turned up late at the gig, suffering from back pain and with no time to eat, but still agreed to go ahead despite everything.
In this recording, you can hear Jarrett work with the limitations of the piano - avoiding the out of tune high notes and using different techniques to get better bass notes. He improvised for over an hour, including an encore, with the result being one of the biggest selling jazz albums of all time.
There’s an excellent Cautionary Tales podcast episode that goes into more detail about the background to this unique performance:
https://timharford.com/2019/12/cautionary-tales-ep-7-bowie-jazz-and-the-unplayable-piano/
Frank Zappa
2/5
All that I knew about Frank Zappa before listening to this album is that he had crazy hair, a crazy mustache and crazy names for his kids. Appropriately enough, this album is a crazy mix of jazz, funk, rock and psychedelia that bounces around all over the place. The album is mostly instrumental with crazy lyrics from crazy Captain Beefheart on just one song. Technically very accomplished, but it’s all a bit much.
Fatboy Slim
3/5
Right Here, Right Now, Rockafeller Skank and Praise You are amongst the very best dance tracks of the 90s taking samples of classic riffs and putting monster beats and breakdowns behind them. Unfortunately they are also the best things on this album by a long way. I could really have done with out hearing the track ‘Fucking in Heaven’ immediately after the first two bangers. Out of the non hit tracks, the highpoint is an old school acid track at the end.
Buddy Holly & The Crickets
4/5
12 songs in 25 minutes has to be some sort of record! These are all perfectly formed snippets of rock and roll that sound as fresh today as when they were recorded nearly 70 years ago. I hadn’t realised that there are also two songs written by Roy Orbison in here as well, and you can definitely hear his style. The world lost a unique talent on the day the music died.
The Isley Brothers
4/5
This was the album where the original 3 Isley Brother officially recruited their two younger siblings Ernie and Marvin, plus brother in law Chris Jasper to play a variety of instruments, and the result is gloriously funky with some amazing guitar work on show. If you have the means to play it, then the quad mix of Summer Breeze is an absolute highlight.
Wilco
3/5
For ages I had Wilco and Wilko Johnson confused, and wondered why so many Americans were excited about a legendary pub rock guitarist from Canvey Island. Today I found out that they are actually an amiable alt-rock band with country leanings and they were generous enough to put out this double album at the regular price. This didn’t set my world on fire, but it was a good way to spend an hour or so.
Bebel Gilberto
4/5
I think I might be in love. This is a gloriously sensual bossa nova album from Brazil sung by Bebel Gilberto and backed with electronica rhythms that veer into trip hop in places. There’s a tragic back story to the record on the Wikipedia page, but the result is well worth a listen and is one of the rare 1001 Albums that isn’t in the white male American/British rock demographic.
Depeche Mode
3/5
Depeche Mode somehow went from a squeaky clean and slightly effete synth pop band to a sleazy, leather clad, stadium filling behemoth honking out thumping diatribes against religion with Personal Jesus, and shimmering gloomscapes about depression with Enjoy the Silence. Turns out that all it took was lots and lots of those tasty, tasty drugs. The track ‘Clean’ is a little bit on the nose, although the Pink Floyd inspired bass line is excellent.
Stan Getz
4/5
Well, this is delicious! In 1964 jazz musician Stan Getz teamed up with guitarist/vocalist Joāo Gilberto (father of the very lovely Bebel Gilberto) for this album of Bossa Nova classics. The legend goes that they needed someone who could sing a verse in English for their version of The Girl From Ipanema, so they drafted in Astrud Gilberto (then wife of Joāo) whose breathy vocals made this a worldwide hit. Apparently she only got $120 for it!
Joy Division
3/5
1979 was a strange time in Britain. The energy of punk had evaporated and no one yet knew what to expect from the 80s. This album captured a particular zeitgeist with icily precise production and the immense bass line of Peter Hook. I was never really a fan of Ian Curtis’s gloomy, monotone vocals but this really was something quite unique. A shoutout for one of the most iconic album covers of all time, showing the radio pulses from a neutron star.
The Fall
4/5
The music of The Fall veers wildly between sublime genius and borderline unlistenable, often within the same album, and in the case of the track Paintwork, in the same song. Mark E Smith famously took the master tape back to his hotel room and then accidentally recorded part of an Open University lecture on stars over part of the song. They kept it in, and somehow it all works. This is a pretty good starting point for anyone who is Fall curious.
Coldplay
2/5
Every decade or so, an album comes out that defines the sound of the musical zeitgeist and breaks out to be a massive hit. However, these albums usually leave me cold. I listened to this, but tbqhwy it’s just dull and never catches fire in any way. I imagine that this is what middle class people listened to at dinner parties in the year 2000. I never went to any dinner parties, which might explain why this didn’t engage me. Your mileage may vary.
TLC
3/5
I had it my head that TLC were a girl pop band from the mid 2010’s, so I was pleasantly surprised to discover this slice of engaging R&B with some quirky interludes. The wiki page has the obligatory back story of drugs and crazy stuff, including Lisa ‘Left Eye’ Lopez setting fire to her boyfriend’s shoes and burning down her mansion. Yikes. Highlight is a cover of Prince’s If I Was Your Girlfriend.
Leonard Cohen
4/5
I avoided Leonard Cohen for a long time, believing the notion that his music was difficult and depressing. The first is simply not true - this is very easy to listen to, with a minimal approach to instrumentation and Cohen’s distinctive vocals. Whether it’s depressing is open to debate - these are extraordinarily intimate songs dealing with love, loss and deep emotions, and they may well stir memories of your own.
The Who
4/5
How did The Who go from amphetamine fuelled 3 minute mod rock bangers to writing a double album rock opera, complete with overtures, undertures, a symphony orchestra, sex, drugs, pinball and a comedy pervert Uncle? This is quite a piece of work - overblown and rambling, but with some genuinely thrilling moments. I think that I prefer the songs as part of the film, which at least puts them in some sort of context so you can follow the story (such as it is).
Dexys Midnight Runners
3/5
In 1982 Dexy’s Midnight Runners had a massive hit with Come On Eileen, everyone started dressing like a tramp in torn dungarees and wedding discos were never the same again. Apart from the hit, this is an interesting mix of Northern Soul and folky fiddle playing played with a po faced intensity that’s a little bit disturbing. I probably don’t need to hear this again until the next time I’m invited to a wedding.
Peter Frampton
2/5
I’ve been curious about this album for a while, as it gets a regular name check on the Ken and Robin podcast as an essential feature of an RPG night. Turns out it’s a live rock album that ticks all of the tropes including a ‘Hello San Francisco!’ to a crowd of politely whooping American college students. The high point is a cheesy voice box guitar effect. The low point is a cover of Jumping Jack Flash that bears no discernible relation to the original tune.
Anthrax
4/5
Anthrax are justifiably in the top 4 thrash bands of the 80s, if not all time. This album was produced in a clean, no-nonsense style that allows all of the guitars, drums and vocals to be well separated and clearly audible. The lyrics cover environmental collapse, grief, the plight of native Americans, as well as two tracks based on Stephen King stories and a phenomenal song about Judge Dredd from someone who is a mega fan of 2000AD. Enormous fun!
Gorillaz
3/5
Many bands adopt stage personas, hiding behind elaborate makeup or costumes. Gorrillaz go one step further, being an entirely virtual band with cartoon avatars drawn in Jamie Hewlett’s distinctive style. Gimmicks aside, this is pretty good stuff - lo fi beats and samples, with a bit of rap thrown in, although I wonder how successful it would have been if it hadn’t been obvious from the start that Damon Albarn was behind it all.
The Temptations
4/5
This was an unexpected treat for a Monday morning! This was the album that saw the Temptations add a psychedelic twist to the Motown funk sound, played with impeccable swagger. The highlight is the 9 minute epic Runaway Child, Running Wild which features Hammond organ and plenty of wah wah guitar riffs. Groovy!
The Rolling Stones
2/5
Let’s talk about the good stuff first. This album came out the year before Exiles on Main Street and is musically much superior. There are some really nice (but not exactly original) blues riffs on here.
However, it’s impossible to review this without addressing the steaming great racist, misogynist elephant in the room. Brown Sugar is the most gratuitously offensive song to ever hit the charts, and how it still gets played is beyond me.
M.I.A.
5/5
It’s rare to get an album that is completely new to me that I listen to twice in a row, but this is one of these. This debut from M.I.A takes glitchy, catchy dance beats and layers on lyrics that range from cheeky to sharply political. Maya Arulpragasam experienced life as a refugee from the violence in Sri Lanka when she was just 11 and this plays out in her music, but it’s done with irrepressible charm and wit. I absolutely love this!
The Who
4/5
After the sprawling rock opera double album Tommy, Pete Townshend came up with an even more ambitious project - Lifehouse, a dystopian sci fi concept album with a movie and an interactive live show. For various reasons, the project foundered but The Who rescued some of the songs for this album. The highlights are the first and last tracks - Baba O’Reilly and Won’t Get Fooled Again, both featuring epic modular synth riffs that elevate them to classic status.
Nick Drake
3/5
Nick Drake is another artist like Leonard Cohen with an intimidating reputation. Unlike Cohen, he died at the tragically young age of 26 only having sold 4000 copies in total of his albums. This debut album is simply produced folk, focusing on guitar and vocals with some restrained strings and percussion on some of the tracks. Lyrically, there are no prizes for guessing what the track ‘Memories of Mary Jane’ is about. Highpoint is a song about sheds!
Meat Loaf
4/5
I was today years old when I discovered that Bat Out of Hell is based on a sci-fi rock opera version of Peter Pan, albeit with more songs about sex and motorbikes, and not so many about one handed pirates and crocodiles with alarm clocks. This album is a blast though, with Meat Loafs reliably humongous operatic vocals and Jim Steinman’s over the top score. Highlight is surprisingly filthy song using baseball as a metaphor for risky teenage sex in a car.
Bobby Womack
2/5
This is a big old slice of funktastic 80’s cheese with a side of soul from one of the great soul voices that sounds like it would be great for a romantic night in. Sadly though, the songs don’t quite measure up to the singer. On “If You Think You’re Lonely Now” our hero whines about “his woman” complaining that he’s never there and is broke all the time, so he does the passive aggressive thing of threatening to leave her. Lovely.
Pixies
4/5
This is a great debut album and an economical 34 minutes in length. Post punk, alt-rock with a raw edge perfectly captured by the late Steve Albini’s production. There was evidently a bit of tension between the band and the producer, shown through some of the studio chatter that’s included here, but it seems to have pushed them to greater heights. Highlight is the track Vamos (Surfer Rosa) which is sung half in Spanish. Great stuff.
The Doors
4/5
By the early 70s, the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle had taken its toll on Jim Morrison, leaving him looking and sound considerably older than his 28 years. His voice had deepened to a husky burr, which suited the blues stompers that the rest of the band gravitated to. This is probably the best of the Doors albums, with the highlights being Riders on the Storm and the spoken poetry of WASP. Jim passed away in Paris just over two months after the album was released.
The Go-Go's
4/5
In the late 1970s, Belinda Carlisle, Jane Wiedlin, and Margot Olavarria were at the infamous last gig by the Sex Pistols and realised that they could do a lot better than the shambolic mess on stage. They played gigs for a couple of years, tweaking their sound to pop punk (with a hint of surf guitar) before releasing this phenomenal debut album in 1981. We Got The Beat is the ultimate new wave banger and is guaranteed to get you moving!
Brian Eno
4/5
This album pioneered sampling techniques, making found sounds like radio announcers and ranting preachers the lead vocal on top of a mix of Afrobeats and Middle Eastern rhythms. Eno and Byrne did take the time to clear the samples that were used, although a recording of part of the Qu’ran on the original release was removed from later pressings on grounds of religious sensitivity. This still sounds startlingly contemporary, despite coming out 40+ years ago
Iggy Pop
4/5
All too frequently with these albums we see someone producing an amazing album before succumbing to the rock n roll lifestyle. Iggy Pop did it the other way round, battling a heroin addiction with the help of his pal David Bowie who not only helped him get clean and collaborated on a couple of albums but paid for some expensive dental work, hence the goofy smile on the cover! The highlight is the thrilling title track, forever linked with Trainspotting.
Nitin Sawhney
4/5
This was a completely new one to me! The album starts with the series of nuclear weapons tests carried out by India and explores issues of identity and religion against a backdrop of international tension. Musically, it’s a mix of trip hop electronica and traditional Indian instrumentation and voices, and is an enchanting listen, despite the grim and thought provoking subject matter. It finishes with Oppenheimer’s infamous quote from the Bhagavad Gita.
LCD Soundsystem
4/5
I was introduced to LCD Soundsystem via the video game GTA IV, which made good use of the track Get Innocuous! mixing the in game gunfire to the staccato drums. The album matches quirky, danceable beats with a flat vocal style that shares a lot of DNA with New York acts like Talking Heads. Apparently, James Murphy hated recording his vocals so covered the studio with tin foil because reasons, hence the album name.
So hipster. Much New York. Very Dance.
Boards of Canada
4/5
Fun fact! Boards of Canada aren’t from Canada, but are actually a pair of brothers from Scotland producing a great mix of warm 70s modular synth sounds with samples and glitchy beats layered on top. I always make the mistake of thinking this is an ambient album but the beats creep up on me and I get sucked into the rhythm. Great stuff. Highlight is Aquarius which samples counting and giggles from Sesame Street in an enchanting way.
Stevie Wonder
5/5
Sometime around 1976 my Dad bought home a proper music centre with two cassette tapes - a “super sounds of stereo” sampler and Stevie Wonder. I can still remember the experience of hearing the room filled with this marvellous music, hearing each instrument in its own place on the sound stage. The highlight on this for me is Sir Duke, paying tribute to Duke Ellington and other jazz greats.
Simon & Garfunkel
2/5
This is an oddity and an album that I have never heard before. It has three classics (America, Mrs Robinson and Hazy Shade of Winter), quirky songs about zoo animals and extended sound clips of old people talking. Not what I would pick for a great album, especially one less than half an hour in length.
Amy Winehouse
4/5
This is almost unbearably sad.
Amy Winehouse released her debut album when she was just 19, singing about her life where the men that she craved love from were all weak, manipulative or needy. She sounds tired, cynical and world weary, and in retrospect it’s easy to see the path that she was already heading down. Nobody should be singing lines like “I’ve forgotten all of young love’s joy” when they’re not even in their twenties.
Rest in peace Amy.
The Strokes
3/5
I missed this album at the time - I think there must have been other stuff going on in September of 2001. First impressions are of a Britpop band trying to sound American. Second impressions came during the track New York City cops (understandably dropped from later re-releases) when it turned out to be an American band doing Britpop about five years late. Not bad though, with some Stooges style vibes. Minus points for a truly awful album cover though.
Bee Gees
2/5
This is an oddity. Like everyone else, I know all of the Bee Gees late 70s disco classics but I was completely unaware of this album from 1971 which for some reason seems to be themed around famous battles of the Napoleonic era. There are some reasonably enjoyable tracks here (and the odd clunker) but nothing essential. Even their voices don’t sound quite as falsetto as they would go on to be. Great cover though!
Billy Bragg
5/5
Woody Guthrie was an amazingly prolific songwriter, leaving a collection of over a thousand songs in a box after his death. Apparently Bob Dylan went looking for them in the late 60s but it took another 40 years before Guthrie’s daughter uncovered the trove and passed the works over to Billy Bragg and the band Wilco to set some of them to music. The end result is inspiring, uplifting and thoroughly enjoyable, and the politics are as relevant as ever.
Doves
3/5
I enjoyed the first album from Doves and this one moves on slightly from the previous shoe gazey sound with nods to prog alongside some bouncy, radio friendly numbers. The highlight is M62 Song which takes elements of Moonchild by King Crimson layered with traffic noises recorded under a motorway flyover in the middle of the night.
Lauryn Hill
5/5
This is arguably one of the greatest albums of all time, hitting home on just about every level. It opens with a school register being taken and the theme continues with a young woman figuring out life, love and everything, drawing from diverse musical influences and producing something that sounds almost effortlessly perfect. This was Hill’s only solo album but it stands as a genre defining achievement for all time.
Willie Nelson
4/5
Somehow Willie Nelson has managed to fit a whole Western tale of love, betrayal and revenge into 15 songs and 34 minutes without ever feeling rushed or constrained. This is evocative music, recalling dusty mesas and smoky saloons, a million miles away from the shmaltzy strings and glittering rhinestones of Nashville. Western music for outlaws!
The Soft Boys
3/5
This album came out at exactly the wrong time. It’s psychedelic beats and sitar breaks were ten years too late, the indie rock energy and quirky production were ten years too early and the actual release date fell in the middle of a printers strike so the album didn’t get reviewed in Melody Maker and NME. This is a shame, because there’s a lot to enjoy here, with the highlight being the full on rock freak out of Insanely Jealous of You.
Missy Elliott
3/5
After an oddly misjudged introduction from Busta Rhymes, Missy Elliot steps up to show the boys how Hip Hop is done. This is a highly accomplished debut album with a lot of depth and some surprising twists. The highlight is probably an unexpectedly cheeky cover of Pass the Dutchie which becomes a song about the joys of smoking dope.
Napalm Death
4/5
If nothing else, Napalm Death certainly pack a lot into this album whether they are being paid by the song or the note. Twenty eight song songs in just over half an hour has to be some sort of record, with You Suffer clocking in at just 4 seconds. Genuinely amazing.
Listening to this is like standing on top of a cliff in a howling storm screaming into the wind and just as bracing. I’ve listened twice today and just put it on again for a third go.
Nirvana
4/5
Every new decade brings something that kicks against the excesses of the previous one. By the end of the 80s we’d grown tired of shoulder pads and overproduced corporate rock, so this album in 1991 was like a breath of slightly whiffy air. It still holds up (mostly) although in retrospect the references to guns on this are painful. It defined a genre, but we’ve yet to see a grunge revival. Anyone who doesn’t like this is a lamestain cob nobbler!
Iron Maiden
5/5
This album was my introduction to heavy metal, and what a great introduction it was too! Nerdy references to cult sci-fi like Children of the Damned and the Prisoner, songs about marauding Vikings and Wild West battles, occult spookiness and a suspiciously detailed knowledge of the price list of infamous brothel madam Cynthia Payne. The music is top notch all the way through, with galloping drums, virtuoso guitar, solid bass , and Dickinson’s soaring vocals.
The Magnetic Fields
4/5
Apparently Magnetic Fields frontman Stephen Merrit was sat in a gay bar in New York listening to Stephen Sondheim songs played on piano one day and set himself the challenge of writing 100 love songs. He scaled back the original target to 69 songs (fnarrr, fnarr) but this is still a monumental achievement. These are songs about love in all its varieties, each one in a different style with the three album set lasting just shy of three hours. Amazing stuff!
Belle & Sebastian
3/5
I think that I avoided this one at the time because I assumed that it was just slightly twee French pop. Turns out it’s actually slightly twee Scottish pop, but it won me around with a mix of light, summery tunes and lyrics ranging from the wistful to some pointed jabs at religion. I particularly liked the second track “Seeing Other People” which reminded me of Vince Guaraldi’s Charlie Brown theme music with a bouncy, jazzy feel. Lovely stuff.
The Offspring
2/5
To a teenage pop-punk fan in 1994, this probably sounded like the most important album in the history of the world, ever! In retrospect, it’s full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, sung by people whose greatest fear was that someone might call them a trendy asshole. It’s at its most fun on the middle eastern themed ‘Come Out and Play’ and the bouncy ska of ‘What Happened to You?’
Van Halen
3/5
There comes a time in the life of every rock band when someone discovers a synth in the corner of the studio and wonders what happens when they start randomly twiddling the knobs. In Van Halen’s case this gave us the worldwide monster hit Jump but it’s clear on this album where the rest of the band pushed back for more traditional rock songs about women’s legs and hot teachers. It’s no surprise that they broke up with ‘musical differences’ a year later.
R.E.M.
4/5
Some cities have a distinctive sound, and Athens, Georgia is one of them. REM were one of the bands that defined that sound - solid bass, punchy drums, jangly guitars and laconic vocals with lyrics ranging from the esoteric to the surreal. Michael Stipe has said that he still doesn’t know what Pilgrimage is about and he wrote it. Highlight is Radio Free Europe which one of my Athens friends sent me on a mix tape of local music back in the day.
The Monkees
2/5
When the Beatles started going weird, someone at NBC television had the bright idea of creating a family friendly boy band from scratch for a tv show, and maybe put out some records as well. The Monkees were duly assembled and released two albums, before rising up and seizing the means of production to record their own songs. This album is mostly harmless, but not particularly memorable. Highlight is a snarky song about the Beatles called “Randy Scouse Git”.
Marvin Gaye
2/5
Romantic meal, candles lit, now for some music. Whatever you do, don’t put this album on. It starts with a song about a child custody battle and goes on to anger, jealousy, self pity and the unfairness of paying attorney fees. After a bitter divorce, Gaye was contractually obliged to produce an album and give his ex 50% - he delivered this, which takes petty revenge to a whole new level. Save this for if you get dumped and want to know how not to respond.
Kraftwerk
5/5
It never ceases to amaze me that an album released 50 years ago, recorded using instruments made from spare electronics and tin foil, held together with string and duct tape, still sounds fresh and startlingly modern. The highlight is the title track, recreating a trip on an Autobahn through the medium of motorik beats and painstakingly crafted sound effects. This is a genre defining album, influencing artists from Gary Numan to Afrika Bambaataa. Stunning
Ella Fitzgerald
4/5
For a couple of hours this morning, I felt like I was in a 1960s Mad Men style Manhattan appartment, drinking a martini and listening to this box set on my Radiogram. Some of the best classic songs of the early to mid 20th century, sung by one of the very best vocalists, ranging from ragtime to jazz with a touch of soul thrown in. Apparently the original deluxe edition of this came in a wooden box for $100 (well over $1000 now). Totally worth it.
Funkadelic
4/5
This album does exactly what it says on the tin. It starts with an ominous voiceover (“I have tasted maggots in the mind of the universe”) before setting off on a musical journey spanning acid rock, funk, soul, prog and even a bit of gospel in case y’all need churchin’ up. The highlights are the title track and the closing ‘Wars of Armageddon’ both clocking in around 10 minutes. Truly funkadelic!
Depeche Mode
2/5
This was supposedly the album that marked the transition from fay electro pop dweebs to stadium friendly behemoths, but it’s not quite there for me. There’s nothing that grabs me in quite the same way as Enjoy the Silence or Personal Jesus on their later album Violater. The best track is probably the opener “Never Let Me Down” but the rest of the album doesn’t quite live up to this.
Sinead O'Connor
5/5
This is a heartbreaking classic of an album. While Nothing Compares 2 U is the best known song, other tracks have an equal or greater impact with howls of despair and anger, as well as more upbeat and joyful numbers. The only misstep is ‘Black Boys on Mopeds’ which is a clunking protest song about Margaret Thatcher, but it was 1990 so we can probably let this one slide.
Madness
3/5
When I was a kid growing up in the 80s a new song (and video) from the ‘Nutty Boys’ was always a treat, but I’ve never listened to a whole album. On this, their fourth album, they find a different tone, delving into nostalgia for childhood and family life, and tackling darker topics like depression and the aftermath of the Falklands War. This was originally a concept album but it drifted slightly (and let’s not mention the misstep of New Delhi and the cover)
The Notorious B.I.G.
2/5
This is album that requires listening to on headphones - the extraordinary number of MFPH and the toe curlingly explicit references to sex, violence and drugs make this extremely NSFW. Headphones also show off the dense soundscapes of dialogue, jokes, samples, music and rap. You could almost see this as an elaborate satire of a gangsta whose idea of luxury is being able to afford both Sega and Nintendo at the same time, but Biggie was dead by 24. Sheesh.
Talking Heads
3/5
This is the transitional album where Brian Eno came on board as a producer, turning Talking Heads from an arty NYC proto punk band into something that you could dance to. I haven’t listened to this album as much as some of the others - not because it’s not good, but because the live versions of some of these songs on Stop Making Sense (notably their cover of Al Green’s Take Me to the River) are even better than the ones here.
Fun Lovin' Criminals
3/5
A self-aware, sample heavy NYC rock/rap trio, popular with white kids - it’s the Beastie Boys, right? NOT!!! It’s the Fun Lovin’ Criminals (with the all important apostrophe). I actually enjoyed this quite a bit more than I was expecting, particularly when they slowed things down a little and cut back on the samples. The highlight for me was a delicious cover of John Barry’s We Have All the Time in the World.
The Beach Boys
2/5
This was the album that came out after Brian Wilson had to give up touring for health reasons, but a year before Pet Sounds. It’s an ok collection of pop tunes with two bangers (Do You Wanna Dance and Help Me Ronda) but a lot of filler for an album that’s less than 30 minutes. The worst bit is the last track which is just two minutes of studio chatter. I initially thought this was a special feature, but it’s on the original release. Lazy, lazy Beach Boys.
Dire Straits
2/5
I know this album off by heart and not through choice. When I was at university, the guy next door in the halls blew all his grant money on a cd player and only had enough left over to buy this, so he played it on repeat for weeks. I quite like Knopfler’s steel guitar on The Man’s Too Strong, but the rest of the album suffers from that overly bright 80s digital production, it’s way too long and the homophobic slurs in Money for Nothing can get in the bin.
Duran Duran
4/5
How 80s could this album be? None. The answer is none more 80s. This is where Duran Duran changed from fay Sci Fi nerd New Romantics into archetypal shoulder padded yuppie icons, with an era defining series of music videos backed up with some great music. Admittedly, Simon LeBon wasn’t the world’s greatest vocalist, but the rest of the band held it together with the standout being John Taylor’s phenomenal bass lines punching through the mix. Yacht-tastic!
Violent Femmes
3/5
If you’d asked me to guess the year and genre of this album from the title, then acoustic folk punk from 1983 is probably the last thing I’d have gone for. This turns out to actually be a lot of fun, written by an 18 year old high school student called Gordon Gano, mixing punky Lou Reed style vocals with bouncy acoustic guitars and lively drums. The highlight is the first track Blister in the Sun which I recognised from the Xbox Rock Band soundtrack.
Green Day
4/5
There comes a time in every band’s career when someone mentions the C word - the concept album. For a punk band known for three minute pop bangers this is a risky move. However the opening salvo of American Idiot still hits home, relevant today just by changing one word. The album looks American society at the turn of the millennium but not much has changed. Jesus of Suburbia sends shivers down my spine with the final ‘Are you leaving home?’. A punk classic.
U2
2/5
The second album from 1983 this week and it’s a complete contrast. I remember enjoying this at the time but it hasn’t aged particularly well. It’s po-faced and preachy, and you get the feeling that no one involved had any fun at all while they were making it. I can’t imagine U2 busking outside a Pretenders gig and getting invited to be the support act for a night. Knocking off a star from the 1001 albums rating until they start paying their taxes.
The Cure
4/5
Apparently Robert Smith had a bit of a crisis of confidence approaching his 30th birthday, thinking that he would soon be past his creative peak. He wrote most of the material for this album on his own, working through his feelings of despair and the band added musical gloomscapes to them. The end result is oddly uplifting, when you remember that Bob is now happily in his sixties and still collaborating with bands who are less than half his age. Gothtastic!
The White Stripes
3/5
I only really knew the guitar/drums garage rock stuff from the White Stripes so this album was a bit of revelation with a wider range of instruments on offer, adding piano, marimba and mandolin to the mix. There are also some variations in style too, and I particularly enjoyed the country feel on Little Ghost and the blues rock of Instinct Blue. Nice to hear Meg singing too. True confession - I always thought they were siblings but turns out they’re married!
R.E.M.
4/5
This is another album inspired by turning thirty, although with REM their songs tend to the wistful and abstruse rather than gloominess. The opening track Drive sets the tone for the album with sparse acoustic guitars blossoming into a stunning string arrangement from John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin. The remastered atmos mix also shines here, sounding intimate and epic at the same time. The highlight is still Stipe’s Elvis impression on Man in the Moon.
Nick Drake
4/5
Apparently Peter Buck from REM once asked producer John Wood how he captured the intimate sound on this album. Wood replied that Nick Drake had simply sat in front of a single microphone and played his guitar. It really is a captivating performance that was sadly to be Drake’s last as he passed away at the age of 26. I can start to understand why Robert Smith and Michael Stipe were so worried about passing thirty now.
Charles Mingus
3/5
The extraordinary musicianship on this can’t be denied but it has to be tempered by knowing that Mingus was a angry man, prone to violent outbursts. He once punched a fellow musician in the face so hard it permanently damaged their ability to play the trombone. His anger is reflected in the music here - aggressive hard bop with diversions into blues and classical guitar. Apparently this was originally written as a ballet which is something that I want to see.
Grateful Dead
3/5
This live album opens with what sounds like a band tuning up at a sound check, then bit by bit they all start noodling around a theme, someone randomly starts singing and before you know it twenty minutes have passed. I always thought that the Grateful Dead were a rock band, but this is closer to free jazz with extended improvisations. I can see the attraction of following them around to listen to this while getting stoned in a field somewhere. Hippytastic!
Garbage
3/5
Alternative bands from the 90s with one word names tend to blend into one for me and I initially struggled to remember anything from this one apart from Stupid Girl. However, I was pleasantly surprised by some of the more down tempo tracks on this that edged into shoegaze/trip hop territory, with the highlight for me being A Stroke of Luck with Shirley Manson’s voice flowing like warm honey. Lovely stuff.
Peter Gabriel
3/5
After leaving Genesis, Peter Gabriel put out four quirky, experimental albums titled Peter Gabriel 1-4. His record company asked for a more marketable name for his fifth album, so he called it ‘So’. I wasn’t keen on this album at the time - a combination of the mawkish ‘Don’t Give Up’ and the MTV earworm of ‘Sledgehammer’ put me off. Revisiting it reveals some gems though, especially ‘This is the Picture’ with Laurie Anderson and opener ‘Red Rain’. Sotastic!
Rufus Wainwright
1/5
From the name, I was expecting a bit of country music, but instead got something that sounded like a cross between Coldplay and Ed Sheeran, from a man whose idea of a big romantic gesture is putting his phone on vibrate. This is so inoffensive you could play it at a dinner party for maiden aunts, nervous vicars and people with heart problems with no risk of upsetting anyone. The only edgy thing here is the cover where he is holding a longsword by the blade. Do not want.
Deerhunter
3/5
I’m always intrigued when I get a band that I haven’t heard of on this project. This album starts out as fairly low key shoegazey indie before picking up with some nice 60s style psychedelia. Nothing world changing or revolutionary, but well done and good to listen to. The highlight for me is the Byrds-esque Memory Boy, dealing with the fallibility of nostalgia. A solid 3 stars for this.
Christine and the Queens
4/5
This album was exactly what I needed this morning. Queer French hyper-pop, performed with Gallic elan by lead singer Chris. Unusually, this is a double album with the same songs presented in English and French, and on balance I think I preferred the French ones which gave my schoolboy French a workout. This would go down a storm on Eurovision and I mean that in the nicest way possible. It’s accessible, engaging and fun, and I will seek out more! Eurotastic!
Buena Vista Social Club
5/5
Many of the best musicians in the world are to be found strumming away in dusty bars and concert halls, playing to a handful of local fans. In 1996 Ry Cooder went to Havana to record an album with some musicians from Mali, and for various reasons ending up recording an album of traditional Cuban music with a diverse group of local musicians instead. Everyone involved had a great time and the end result is an absolute joy to listen to. Soncubanotastic!
Nirvana
4/5
The conceit of MTV Unplugged is simple - get a big rock band to come in and play an acoustic set of their greatest hits. Nirvana approached the challenge differently, picking deep cuts and covers over hits, and featuring The Meat Puppets as special guests. Cobain sounds a little nervous at the start and also uses some amplification and effects in places. He passed away 5 months after this recording, lending it a poignant air, especially on Come As You Are.
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
3/5
Well, this was a lot of fun. Female fronted pop punk, with fuzzed out guitars and even more fuzzed out vocals, tracing a direct line from bands like the Pretenders and Siouxie and the Banshees. It’s not revolutionary or going to change the world in any way, but sometimes you just want something that hits all of the right notes without trying too hard. The highlight for me was the song No, No, No which is very appropriate for the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs.
Louis Prima
4/5
Louis Prima is probably best known as the voice of King Louis in The Jungle Book, but this album from 1956 is equally joyous. The album was recorded as live in the studio with an excellent group of jazz musicians, who are clearly having a ball, as well as Prima’s wife Keely Smith who provides a cool counterbalance to his wild flights of fancy. It’s a brisk 30 minutes of fun and one of the rare albums where I listened twice. Highlight is opener Just a Gigolo!
Joan Armatrading
4/5
Joan Armatrading has never quite reached the heights of superstardom, perhaps because she has always refused to play the tabloid fame game and kept her private life to herself. This album is a quiet gem, from one of Britain’s greatest singer songwriters, mixing songs of longing and regret with some gorgeously smooth jazzy R&B. There are some very pointed lyrics here too, especially Water with the Wine dealing with date rape.
The Velvet Underground
5/5
This isn’t an easy listen, but it’s a worthy inclusion on the list. It opens with the mellow ‘Sunday Morning’ but rapidly moves onto stranger ground with songs about sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, layered on top of growling feedback and odd instrumentation. Vocals are split between Lou Reed’s proto punk drawl and Nico’s harmonies. Brian Eno once famously said that not many people bought this album when it was released but everyone that did started a band.
Lou Reed
5/5
Mick Ronson and David Bowie were hugely influenced by The Velvet Underground and they repaid the favour by working on this album with Lou Reed. There’s definitely a glam feel to parts of this, but the lyrical content and Lou Reed’s distinctive style loses none of its edge. We still get boundary pushing tracks about trans people, sex of all flavours and a whole song about how nice it is to spend the day in the park off your head on heroin. Smacktastic!
Bob Marley & The Wailers
4/5
The 1970s in Jamaica were a turbulent time. Just before he was due to play at a peace concert Bob Marley, his wife Rita, and his manager were shot at and wounded. This led to him moving to London and recording this album. Side one is the stronger, mixing the spiritual and political, with powerful songs. Side 2 is more chilled and has the better known tracks. This needs to be listened to on the biggest sound system you have with bass turned up. Splifftastic!
Supertramp
2/5
My uncle used to be a bit of an audiophile back in the day. He had a fancy turntable and big speakers, and when we went round, he’d put records on to show off how good it sounded. This was one of those records. Technically fine, but lacking anything that grabbed me in any way. This is typically overblown 70s pop prog and I couldn’t tell you what any of the songs were about. I did like the ‘bloody well right’ bit and I think ‘Dreamer’ must have been a single.
Bob Dylan
4/5
Like Bringing it all Back Home, this album is also full of complex, multi layered songs, backed with an electric band playing with gusto and sung by Bob in his trademark honking nasal drawl. Every time I listen to Desolation Row, I swear that someone has put extra verses in that I’ve never heard before, and they still feel relevant - the bit about the passengers on Titanic arguing about which side they’re on feels very on the nose today. Bobtastic!
Deep Purple
4/5
Has there ever been a more thrilling start to an album than Highway Star on this one? It perfectly captures the feeling of driving like a maniac on an open road with some of the best guitar solo work on record. The album calms down a little after that with some nice bluesy rock before we hear *that* riff, familiar to anyone who’s ever been in a guitar shop, and probably the best song about someone burning down a casino. Funky Claudetastic!
Barry Adamson
3/5
When I was a kid, I used to borrow sound effects LPs from the library and record them on to cassettes to make mini audio dramas. This album is a little bit like that, except it also adds in a musical soundtrack for an imaginary film noir with the track names hinting at the unfolding drama. There are some nice nods to the genre with the Hitchcock tune and a stab at a Bond theme. I could imagine using this as a soundtrack for a seedy spy rpg. Cinetastic!
Cheap Trick
3/5
I think that every rock contract in the 70s must have had a clause that the band were obliged to record at least one live album in Japan. Thus we get Cheap Trick, in front of thousands of screaming Japanese fans, plodding through a competent but pedestrian set list. I always assumed that they were hard rock, but apart from the opening track this is closer to glam/pop. The highlight is a Chuck Berry cover where they somehow shoehorn in a drum solo.
Green Day
4/5
There are some men of a certain age, probably wearing an old Ramones t shirt that’s a bit too small for them nowadays, who would look at this album and complain that it’s not ‘proper punk’. I would counter by saying that here we have 15 banging tunes in 38 minutes, dealing with boredom, alienation, growing up in an uncertain world that just doesn’t care, as well as the usual teenage concerns of sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll. What could be more punk than that?
David Bowie
4/5
This is an album that I’ve previously skipped on Bowie’s journey from Aladdin Sane to the Thin White Duke. It’s R&B/funk aimed with laser sharp cynical precision at the American market, and on reflection it’s pretty darned good and sounds better than the R&B that Bowie release in the 80s. The highlight is probably a spectacular cover of Across the Universe but the bitter and angry Fame written with John Lennon is good too, and also foreshadows 80s Bowie too
Miles Davis
5/5
n 1959 Miles Davis decided to do something different, moving away from hard bop jazz. He assembled a crew of some of the best musicians around, gave them each a set of scales to improvise around, then lit the metaphorical blue touch paper. The result is like listening to a conversation as music is built up in real time with each player contributing to the piece. Music like this really should be heard live, but this recording is probably as good as it gets.
Country Joe & The Fish
2/5
This an album of its time, and the time is firmly in the Summer of Love in San Francisco. Whilst the Beatles made a token effort to hide their drug references, Country Joe & the Fish are openly passing round the reefers and whispering LSD over the outro. They’re not shy about sex either and the politics are far to the left. The highlight is the cheeky Superbird where he calls on the Fantastic Four and Doctor Strange to take out LBJ. Hippytastic!
Janis Joplin
3/5
In one of those ironic twists that this list throws up, after yesterday’s album about how lovely drugs are, today’s is from someone who died after a heroin overdose. Janis Joplin had an amazing voice, but on this posthumously released album you can already hear it cracking in places and she sounds much older than her 27 years. The highlight is Mercedes Benz where her prayers gradually get scaled back from a new car to the next round of drinks. RIP Janis.
Frank Ocean
1/5
This sounded intriguing from the description - a debut album based on the artist’s synesthesia where he experienced first love as the colour orange. In actually, this is fairly anodyne R&B (albeit with some NSFW lyrics about running out of condoms) interspersed with random and surreal sound collages. The highlight (or very middling light) is where he pays a confused Muslim taxi driver to act as his personal therapist by keeping the meter running. Weird.
Jimi Hendrix
5/5
This album not only broke new ground in exploring the sounds that it was possible to get out of an electric guitar, it pushed the boundaries of rock music genre mashups with the highlight being the sci-fi epic Third Stone From the Sun which veers wildly from acid rock to free jazz noodling to total freak out. Legend has it that Jimi liked to play so loudly in the studio that the neighbours complained about the noise. Another artist who died far too young.
Cream
1/5
On October the first, 1966 Eric Clapton watched Jimi Hendrix playing at the London Polytechnic. Shortly after, he switched from ripping off black American blues guitarists to, well, you do the math. Disraeli Gears tries to be a psychedelic acid rock album, but it plods and meanders, and manages to seem tediously long for a running time of just over half an hour. Ginger Baker is still a good drummer but Clapton can get in the bin.
Van Halen
3/5
I only knew Van Halen from their 80s hair metal era, so this album was a pleasant surprise. There are interesting parallels between this and Iron Maiden’s first album, with both having a punk edge, but this album also includes blues and even some vocal scatting on one track. The highlight is probably the showboating guitar solo from Eddie Van Halen on Eruption that segues into a cheeky cover of The Kinks’ ‘You Really Got Me’. Good fun all round.
Lupe Fiasco
3/5
For a rap album, this is actually quite sweet and thoughtful. Lupe Fiasco had a tough upbringing, but the thing that he missed out on most was making model trains with his absent father. The cover shows him surrounded by his favourite things, including a Nintendo DS. He tackles the thorny subject of misogyny in rap on one track and spends the outro thanking everyone by name who helped him. The highlight is a two part song about skateboarding. Nerdtastic!
Norah Jones
3/5
This is another one of those albums that struck a chord with the listening public as being something to put on if you were planning a cozy night in with your significant other. I’m not entirely sure quite how romantic the line about wanting to be turned on like a light bulb in a darkened room is though! It’s a nice easy listen though - a bit of piano, some folky guitar and smooth vocals from Norah herself. Not my usual cup of tea, but a solid 3 stars though.
Stevie Wonder
5/5
This is an album that I’ve skipped over previously going from Talking Book to Songs in the Key of Life, but it really is a quiet masterpiece with many standout moments. Living for the City hits hard with a story of a naive young black man moving to New York and ending up on the wrong side of the law, complete with dialogue and sound effects. There are brighter songs too, with Don’t You Worry Bout a Thing being an absolute joy from start to finish.
Creedence Clearwater Revival
3/5
Sometimes you just want an album of good old fashioned swampy blues and southern fried rock ‘n’ roll to stomp along to. Creedence Clearwater Revival might not be the world’s greatest band, but they really sound like they’re enjoying themselves on this and it’s infectious. Does this earn them a place in this list? Yes, if only for their audacious eleven minute cover version of ‘Heard it through the Grapevine’ which is a whole lot of fun. Bayoutastic!
4/5
This album opens with a huge bombastic blast with arpeggiated synths, huge guitar riffs and crashing drums, like Queen crossed with Phillip Glass. It calms down a little after that with Starlight sounding a bit like Coldplay, although Supermassive Black Hole returns to the big 70s glam rock feel. The standout for me is Knights of Cydonia which adds galloping horses and Dick Dale style surf guitar to the mix. Excellent fun all round. Sagittarius A*-tastic!
Drive-By Truckers
3/5
Even though I know this is a crowd funded concept album about the experience of living in the Deep South, it still confuses the heck out of me when they start singing about living in Birmingham. Anyhoo, this takes as its starting point the tragic story of Lynyrd Skynyrd and the plane crash in 1977 that killed half the band, as well as the pilots. It’s a wildly ambitious project, but they just about pull it off, tackling some touchy subjects. Bostintastic!
Janelle Monáe
4/5
I wasn’t expecting today’s selection to be an Afrofuturist concept album inspired by Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, but it turns out that it was exactly what I needed this morning. It’s gloriously textured and complex and I’m already listening for the second time. I’m also a sucker for any album that has an orchestral overture! My highlight is the psychedelic Mushrooms & Roses which explores the unexpected subject of robot sex. Droidtastic!
Blondie
4/5
I was a bit too young for punk back in the day but new wave hit me right in my adolescent wheelhouse. This album combines the exuberance of 50's rock 'n' rollers like the Crickets with the punk energy of The Stooges, as well as a touch of French nouvelle vague cool. Just about every song on this is a banger, but apart from the hits (and there are a lot of them!) the standout is the cheeky cover of Buddy Holly's I'm Gonna Love You Too. Peroxide-tastic!
B.B. King
4/5
Live albums are tricky to get right - there needs to be the right balance between the music and the between songs banter with the crowd. Fortunately this album hits all the right notes with a great atmosphere and phenomenal musicianship from the king of the blues himself. This still feels fresh, despite being recorded 60 years ago (and harking back to even earlier songs called out as “Real, real oldies!”). Not sure about his relationship advice though!
Frank Sinatra
3/5
This is a change of mood from the previous album, swapping some cheeky love songs for the introspection of In the Wee Small Hours. There’s a good selection of classic tunes, with I’ve Got You Under My Skin by Cole Porter being a highlight. I also found out today that there were two versions of the cover art - the original with Frank looking off into the distance was changed for one where he’s watching the ‘Swingin’ Lovers’ like a slightly creepy uncle!
Fairport Convention
3/5
After their previous album which was mainly Bob Dylan style American folk, and a devastating tour bus crash, Fairport Convention regrouped and produced this album which mixes traditional English folk tunes with (gasp!) electric guitars to great effect. The highlights are Matty Groves which is an epic tale of adultery, murder and revenge that builds for eight minutes, and Tam Lin which has all of the faeries, magic and big rock riffs that you could wish for
The Teardrop Explodes
3/5
Weirdly the original release of this album omitted both the title track and their biggest hit, but this version has those plus a couple of other b sides. Anyhoo, with this we are very much in the post punk era with a side line in obtuse lyrics. I struggled to hear what he was singing in places - for years I’d assumed that he was asking his mum to accept his reward. This is probably the best band to be named after a random quote from a Silver Surfer comic.
Electric Light Orchestra
4/5
This is one of those albums where I can clearly remember seeing the cover for the first time - that multicoloured flying saucer with a space ship about to dock promised great things and the album really delivered - mixing electric guitars with orchestral arrangements, some effective sound effects and twiddles, and impossibly catchy songs. The highlight is side 3 which is a sequence ending with the iconic Mr Blue Sky and the instruction ‘Please turn me over’
Arcade Fire
1/5
This was another band that passed me by in the early 2000s for some reason. Initial impressions were that this was by the numbers indie rock with a heavy Coldplay influence, but as it went on it grew more irritating. They threw what sounded like a choir of children into the mix but it was the singer’s voice that had a wheedling ‘please feel some emotions’ vibe to it. Anyhoo, turns out he’s a massive online sex pest, so this album can get in the bin.
Steve Winwood
2/5
Steve Winwood is an insanely talented musician. He was in three influential bands in the 60s and has worked with just about everyone in the music biz. However, this solo album (he played everything on this) falls flat for me. It’s amiable jazz-funk, but it suffers from weedy 80s home studio production and lacks a bit of oomph. The highlight is an unlikely collaboration with Viv Stanshall (of Bonzo Dog fame) who provided lyrics for the title track.
Dolly Parton
5/5
There’s no better illustration of Dolly Parton’s talent as a songwriter than the opening two tracks on this album. Coat of Many Colors is a heartbreaking story of growing up poor with a mama’s love. In contrast, the next one is Dolly at her sassy best with a cheeky tale of stepping out with a Travelling Man, with a killer twist. There are also songs of awful spousal abuse, spirituality and the simple joy of a flower meadow on a sunny morning. A pure gem!
Isaac Hayes
2/5
I’d always assumed that ‘Theme from Shaft’ was a one off novelty record, but it turns out that Isaac Hayes (who missed out on the title role) recorded the whole soundtrack for the film. The result is a double album of prime 70s funk and soul. Judged on its own merits, most of these tracks lack context so feel a bit aimless. The highlight though is ‘Do Your Thing’ - an epic 20 minute track which makes me feel like driving a car through some cardboard boxes.
Talking Heads
4/5
This album was the final collaboration between Brian Eno and Talking Heads, and it builds on the previous albums with complex Afrobeat rhythms and Byrne’s occasionally obtuse lyrics. The music relies on the absolute precision of drummer Chris Franz and bassist Tina Weymouth in maintaining repeating patterns for extended periods, until they become almost hypnotic. Fela Kuti was an inspiration for this, with a name check on a bonus track. Polyrhythm-tastic!
The Rolling Stones
1/5
This was the first Stones album to be entirely written by Jagger and Richards, and, after a promising opening track with Paint It Black it quickly becomes problematic, to say the least. The level of misogyny here is quite jaw dropping, from calling women ‘Stupid Girls’ to wishing they were ‘Under My Thumb’ as revenge for asking to be treated as equals. On side two they then wonder why they are having a hard time living on their own. You do the math, Mick.
The Auteurs
2/5
You know when you go to a medium sized festival and there’s the second stage for the b-list bands? Well, the Auteurs would be a solid act for some time late on Saturday afternoon as you are getting ready to meet your friends by the main stage to see the headliners. Musically they are 90s left field indie Britpop, with slightly (but not too) quirky vocals and the occasional burst of enthusiastic guitar work. Perfectly fine but nothing to write home about.
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
3/5
I’ve always avoided Neil Young in the past, mainly because I’ve assumed that he was an earnest hippy dippy folk singer due to his association with various permutations of Crosby, Stills and Nash. To be fair, this collaboration with Crazy Horse (not sure if that counts as cultural appropriation or not) is pretty good, adding some much needed blues rock guitar to his songs. Not sure about some of the lyrics on Down to the River though. Cinnamon-tastic!
The Yardbirds
3/5
Apparently Eric Clapton (and you should all know my opinion of him now) was a member of the Yardbirds but quit in a huff shortly before they recorded their debut album citing musical differences. As a result, this album is a lot more varied and interesting than it might have been, ranging from blues to psychedelic rock with the odd Gregorian chant thrown in for fun. Jeff Beck really knocks out of the park with his guitar on this, bringing some unique sounds.
Michael Kiwanuka
4/5
A 2019 release and a new one for me, and a very pleasant surprise. Michael Kiwanuka has a rich, soulful voice that easily stands comparison with any of the greats and the music is a timeless mix of 70s themed soul, funk, jazz and contemporary elements. It’s rare with these albums that I listen to them more than once, but this is definitely one that will be on repeat for a while. The Dolby Atmos mix on Apple Music is another plus- this really does sound lush
Eagles
2/5
1976 was something of a musical wasteland - the excitement of glam rock was gone, leaving only pomp rock, seedy disco and novelty songs while we waited for punk. This album is solid Dad Rock, and the first 3 tracks will be familiar to anyone who has ever heard one of those Jeremy Clarkson’s Driving Songs compilation tapes that you used to see in garages in the 80s. The hits are too well worn and the non hits aren’t that thrilling either. Snooze-tastic!
5/5
It is difficult to overstate just how revolutionary this album is. In just 4 years the Beatles had gone from a jangly boy band playing enthusiastic covers of American R&B songs to producing records of unprecedented depth and imagination. This album mixes rock and roll with surrealism, music hall with poignant kitchen sink dramas, Indian mysticism with farm animals. The final track ends with a huge crescendo that still stops me in my tracks. FabFour-tastic!
Kings of Leon
3/5
I was all prepared to hate this album, but then realised that for years I’d been mixing up the Kings of Leon with the Gipsy Kings, probably because of the long hair. Doh! Anyhoo, it turns out that this is quite acceptable indie rock with a bit of a garage rock vibe and the huge plus point that it’s an album from 2003 that crucially doesn’t sound like Coldplay. Highlight is Holy Roller Novocaine which has a lovely bouncy bass line. Not Coldplay-tastic!
Slipknot
2/5
This was my first time listening to Slipknot - the whole masks, costumes and “look at me - I’m EDGY!” shtick is a bit off putting if you’re not in the target demographic. However, first impressions of this were promising - I enjoyed the distorted feedback and metal guitar work, but I still find screamed vocals hard to follow. The lyrical content is as expected with song titles like Snuff and Sulfur. They’re good at what they do but it’s not for me - sorry!
Tears For Fears
3/5
This album is unmistakably from the mid 80s with that characteristic brittle production, booming drums and overly bright keyboard stabs thrown in at random intervals. I found that I preferred the quieter tracks to the better known stadium friendly anthems like Shout and Everybody Wants to Rule the World. Highlight was probably The Working Hour which opens like something off the Vangelis Blade Runner soundtrack. Note to self - not to be confused with Simple Minds
The Band
4/5
Probably the most influential band with a generic name that defies search engine optimization. They’re probably best known for backing Bob Dylan when he made his seismic step to electric guitar, but this eponymous album is a fine example of how good they are when they take centre stage. It still sounds fresh today, drawing on an American tradition that stretches back over a hundred years.
Ray Charles
4/5
A perfect wake up call - big band jazz with a bluesy twist centered around the voice and piano of Ray Charles. He was just 25 years old when this was released and this was his seventh album in just two years. Side one is bright and brassy, and the flip side is laid back and cool. My highlight is the reflective Am I Blue.
Genius? Yes, I think so
Frank Sinatra
4/5
It’s interesting that this album popped up today - Tom Waits has said that this is one of his favourite albums, and the themes of loneliness and introspection on this are certainly familiar ones. The cover sets the noir mood and song titles like “Glad to be Unhappy” and “I Get Along Without You Very Well” you know that you are in for some soul searching. Nobody does this better than Frank and this is much better than the cheery Songs for Swingin’ Lovers.
Beatles
5/5
This is the last album that the Beatles recorded together (although Let It Be was released after this). It’s as fine a coda to their career as you could wish for, although the tensions between them could be felt. Apparently John hated Paul’s “granny music”, Ringo had his moment with Octopus’s Garden and George had two of his best songs included. Side one closes with the relentless I Want You and side two with The End (and the cheeky Her Majesty). Sublime!
The Smashing Pumpkins
1/5
Remember how I said that Smashing Pumpkins would be better if they focused on being a scrappy indie band? Anyhoo, turns out they went entirely the other way in 1995 and released an incredibly overblown and tedious two hour long concept album. The punning album title is irritating too. It also turns out that the lead singer is a long time anti-vaxxer and far right loon, so he can get in the bin as far as I’m concerned
Elliott Smith
3/5
What is it about slightly fae singer songwriters with a 60s vibe on this list? I really enjoyed this album from someone that I hadn’t previously heard of, then clicked through to Wikipedia to read more about them and found out that they had died tragically young in mysterious circumstances. Expect a lot of wistful songs about lost love and regrets here, and the second listen through was even more poignant in places. RIP Mr Smith.
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
1/5
You know that guy.
The middle aged dad who used to be in a pretty cool band when he was younger, then gave it up for a while. Now he’s got the dusty old guitar down from the loft and is determined to show these darn kids with their modern music what real rock ‘n’ roll is, with proper guitar solos that last 10 minutes and edgy swearing and everything. Oh yes, and he’s also somehow turned into a republican and is startlingly homophobic.
Yeah. Fuck that guy.
Alexander 'Skip' Spence
2/5
This is a deeply weird album. I usually listen and then check the Wikipedia page, but in this case something made me look a couple of tracks in and the weirdness made sense. The usual sequence of events is to record a psychedelic folk rock album and then have a drug induced breakdown. Skip Spence attacked his former band mates with a fire axe after suffering severe delusions, spent six months in a secure institution and then recorded this when he got out.
Frank Black
3/5
I was never really a Pixies fan, which is weird because they were theoretically right up my street back in the day. Anyhoo, for this album Black Francis became Frank Black and released this mish-mash of post punk, surf-guitar, garage and reggae infused songs. It clicked into place for me on the track Ole Mulholland where I realised that he was channelling the spirit of Lou Reed on a song about the LA water system of the 1920s. Infrastructure-tastic!
Isaac Hayes
4/5
I was initially surprised to see that this album had just four tracks, clocking in at 46 minutes in total. Turns out though that this is totally justified, with each song being an extended and languorous performance, with the opening track being a version of the David/Bacharach classic Walk on By that totally fills every second of its 12 minutes. Side 2 has the even more epic By The Time I Get To Phoenix which feels like a mini movie in song form. Superb.
Queen
5/5
Bohemian Rhapsody is pretty much everyone’s number 1 song of all time. It’s a sign of just how good this album is, that it doesn’t overshadow the other tracks on here. As the title of the album suggests, this is a grand performance with flourishes, arias, jokes, nostalgia and plenty of hard rock. Some people might not like the 1920s style music hall tracks or Roger’s song about being in love with his car but they are essential parts of the tapestry. Superb!
Dirty Projectors
3/5
This initially washed over me, but I thought I’d give it another go and it’s definitely a grower. I do have a thing for lo-fi indie beats with slightly fae vocals, and one of the singers reminded me of Lily Allen or someone in that sort of oeuvre. The standout highlight track for me was Two Doves which had some gorgeous strings and minimal guitar. This isn’t going to set the world on fire, but it might spark an ember somewhere with someone who enjoys it.
Various Artists
3/5
Ok, let’s address the festive elephant in the room. We all know that the producer of this record is very much on the naughty list but on the plus side his nuts are now definitely roasting on an open fire somewhere hot. Anyhoo, this album pretty much defined the canon of Christmas pop songs in the 60s. The highlights for me are the classic songs from the adorable Darlene Love who is still with us and will be getting royalties from this. Merry Christmas all!
Def Leppard
2/5
I’m a little conflicted by this. On the one hand, they are a Sheffield band with a proper rags to riches story but on the other hand this is very much transitional album between their heavy roots and their monster pop metal sound of the late 80s. I was quite surprised by just how much they sounded like AC/DC in places here and there’s not much that really stands out, except for Die Hard the Hunter which includes air raid sirens, helicopters and gun sounds.
MGMT
3/5
I would have sworn that I hadn’t heard anything by this band, but then the track Kids kicked in with an infectious beat and hooked me in. This has a fun, glam, 70s vibe, reminding me somewhat of Sparks in it’s variety although the vocalist is nowhere near a match for Russell Mael when he attempts a falsetto on Of Moons, Birds and Monsters. A promising debut album that has put them on my listening radar.
Pink Floyd
5/5
When I was a kid, the local radio station would sometimes play classic rock albums in full late at night. I remember sitting out in the garden on a warm August evening, watching for meteors and listening to this album for the first time. It still has the power to send shivers up my spine, even after 40 years and countless listens. It’s nice to see that Clare Torry finally gets a writing credit for Great Gig in the Sky - her voice is the highlight of this!
Aerosmith
3/5
I’m not a huge fan of 80s Hair Metal (shhh, don’t tell my metalhead pals!) but I was pleasantly surprised by this 1976 album from Aerosmith. As with Toys in the Attic it’s a solid slice of 70s hard rock with some enjoyably funky bass lines, especially on the opening track Back in the Saddle. The lyrics haven’t aged all that well - Sick as a Dog is about throwing up in the loo and you don’t have to think too hard about what Lick and a Promise is referring to
Raekwon
2/5
Gangsta rap as a genre is a relentless assault on the senses, more for the lyrical content than the music. This album from Wu Tang Clan alumnus Raekwon has some good points - the track Rainy Day featuring vocals by Candi Lindsay (aka Blue Raspberry) is gorgeous and the John Wu samples are always fun. However, the between track recordings of (apparently unscripted) conversations are hard to listen to. It’s a grim lifestyle with only one way out.
Scott Walker
4/5
Scott Walker was better known as one of the Walker Brothers (who weren’t brothers or called Walker), so when he released Scott 4 (actually his 5th album) under his own name of Scott Engel it didn’t trouble the charts, which is a shame because it’s really rather good. The songs range from the opening about the film The Seventh Seal as a Morriconesque western theme, to a song about the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, all sung in a gorgeous baritone.
Radiohead
4/5
Releasing an album of lost tracks and offcuts just seven months after the previous hit Kid-A was a risky move. However this album of experimental electronica and down tempo lo-fi beats just about pulls it off. I’m still not the greatest fan of Thom Yorke’s voice, but it works better here than on some of their rockier tracks. The highlight is Life in a Glasshouse featuring the trumpet of the late, great Humphrey Littleton. I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue-tastic!
The Allman Brothers Band
3/5
A live double album with just seven songs on it might seem to be a bit self indulgent, and to be fair it probably is. However, this is amiable southern rock with a bluesy lolloping rhythm that passes the time in an acceptable way. The real surprise is that the Allman brothers weren’t hoary old rockers when they recorded this, but they were only in their mid twenties.
White Denim
3/5
Maybe it’s a touch of Stockholm syndrome after listening to yesterday’s album, but when this one kicked in with a bluesy, southern rock feel I was ready for a long haul but it turns out there are 10 songs in 37 minutes on this one which is a lot more reasonable. The 10 songs are all pretty varied too with an interesting mix of styles from garage rock to fay indie to 60s psychedelia. Highlight is Drug which has the blunt chorus ‘We can take drugs!’. Quite.
Ramones
4/5
This is the quintessential punk album - 14 songs in under half an hour, every one starts with a count of “One, two, three, four!” before crashing in. The whole thing was recorded in a week for about $6000, and still sounds authentically raw and exciting. The only thing that still makes me wince is all the references to Nazis at the end - it might have seemed edgy and amusing in 1976, but today - ouch!
The Beau Brummels
2/5
This is an album from July 1967 that I hadn’t previously heard of, which is probably because it was overshadowed by a certain other contemporary album. Apparently they picked their name so they would be filed next to the Beatles. It’s quite unusual though and an interesting listen - it starts like a low key Bob Dylan singing country, then brings in a French accordion and veers off into some folk psychedelia. It’s all fine, but not particularly memorable.
Pixies
3/5
In some ways, I wish I could go back and tell past me to listen to this album when it came out, but in other ways I don’t think I would have appreciated it. It falls between post-punk and proto-grunge, but I don’t think I would have realised quite how much it draws from 60s garage as well as The Velvet Underground. Just listen to Here Comes Your Man alongside I’m Waiting For The Man and hear the direct line between them. Anyhoo, present me enjoyed this one!
The Dave Brubeck Quartet
4/5
In contrast to the wild free jazz of John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman from around this time, this is a measured and precise experiment with unusual time signatures played on the piano by Dave Brubeck while the alto sax of Paul Desmond swoops around like a big swoopy thing. Anyone listening to this is guaranteed to immediately become 100% cooler although wearing dark suits and spectacles may be a side effect.
Songhoy Blues
5/5
The Songhoy Blues band formed in Timbuktu in 2012 after being forced to leave their homes in the north of Mali due to political and religious turmoil. The music they make is full of joy as well longing for the lives they left behind. The highlight is probably the final track Mali that needs no translation to break your heart. This is Afro Beat with a rock edge and an unexpected gem on this list.
John Lee Hooker
3/5
John Lee Hooker was one of the all time great blues musicians, without a doubt. However, this album featuring contributions from Carlos Santana, Bonnie Raitt and Los Lobos didn’t really grab me. It felt a little bit too polished and well produced, and left me yearning for the rough and ready sound of Hooker’s early recordings. However, he was in his 70s when this was released, so you can’t really begrudge the old fella his pension plan.
Little Richard
5/5
Has there ever been a more thrilling two and a half minutes of music than Tutti Frutti? From the opening wop-bop-a-loo-mop to the raw power of Little Richard’s voice and suggestive lyrics that push all sorts of boundaries, this song has it all. Little Richard was a huge influence on the Beatles and taught them his trademark ‘wooo’, and they had Long Tall Sally as a regular part of their live sets, right up until their last gig at Candlestick Park.
Arctic Monkeys
4/5
After the musical doldrums of the early 2000’s this album was a breath of fresh Yorkshire air, with the tang of taxi exhaust, Lynx deodorant and chip shop vinegar. These lads are from just up the road from where I live and I’ve probably stood in the same queue outside the station waiting for a taxi to High Green via Hillsborough, please. Authentic Sheffield steel!
Wu-Tang Clan
2/5
I usually find gangster rap albums heavy going, but this one is a little easier than most. It has an engaging sense of humour with all of the kung fu movie samples and the music has a raw edge to it. Apparently it was recorded in a studio so small that only 8 out of the 9 band members could fit in at any one time, so they would organise impromptu rap battles to decide who was going to appear on each track!
Jimi Hendrix
4/5
Chas Chandler, the producer of this album, quit half way through the recording, and it really shows. There is a great album here, possibly one of the greatest rock albums of all time, but there is a lot of meandering before you get to the killer ending of All Along the Watchtower and Voodoo Chile (Slight Return). In some ways, I wish we could have a Get Back style documentary of the recording process to appreciate the work that went into this.
Beatles
4/5
With The Beatles
This was the Beatles second album, released just six months after their debut, featuring a mix of original songs and covers. Although the Fab Four were still only in their early 20s at this point, their experience of playing hundreds of gigs in seedy clubs has already made them into an incredibly tight and professional band, buzzing with energy and ideas. Their Lennon & McCartney team is kicking into gear and George gets a track too!
https://album.link/i/1441164362
Aretha Franklin
4/5
If you ever had any doubts that Aretha Franklin was the Queen of Soul then this album will lay them to rest. Starting with the definitive version of Chain of Fools, Aretha’s voice swoops and soars with effortless grace. These are mostly secular songs but she also includes a gospel track, People Get Ready, for old times sake, in case y’all could do with some churchin’ up. Fun fact - one of the backing singers is Cissy Houston, mother of Whitney!
The Kinks
4/5
After a shambolic tour of the USA in 1965, Ray Davies had a nervous breakdown and decided to focus on his songwriting. This album is the result, being a concept album with vignettes of nostalgia and longing for a lost rural England. There’s a lot of humour here and poignant character pieces about the inhabitants of Ray’s imaginary village. The music is uniquely English too, touching on music hall, folk and psychedelia. Utterly charming!
Sly & The Family Stone
4/5
This is probably Sly and the Family Stone’s greatest album, combining heartfelt soul, funk and gospel with some searing social commentary. The transition from the first track ‘Stand!’ into ‘Don’t Call Me N****r, Whitey’ is shocking, and justifiably so, especially to a comfortably off, middle class white man like myself. Apart from this, the highlights are the drum break on the instrumental Sex Machine and the joyous Everyday People.
Richard Thompson
3/5
I have an odd sort of relationship with folk. I start listening thinking that it will not be my cup of herbal tea, then something in it hooks me in. With this album, the mix of traditional instruments and electric guitars builds on Richard Thompson’s work with Fairport Convention but it’s the lyrics about the grubby, despairing state of Britain in the 1970s that really hit home for me. No jobs, no hope, except for a brief escape into a boozy night out.
Iron Maiden
3/5
I really don’t like Eddie. There, I’ve said it. That stupid 50s horror comic zombie mascot put me off listening to Iron Maiden for ages, which is a shame because they are really rather good. Their debut album is scrappy and full of punk energy (although they would hate being called punks!), and set the scene for the new wave of British heavy metal through the 80s. Charlotte the Harlot is still cringeworthy though.
Tom Tom Club
4/5
When I first heard Wordy Rappinghood I assumed that it was just a novelty single. It wasn’t until I saw the Tom Tom Club segment of Stop Making Sense that I realised that this was actually a side project of Chris Franz and Tina Weymouth, drummer and bassist of Talking Heads respectively. Turns out it actually has some really interesting and catchy tracks outside of the two hit singles. As might be expected Weymouth and Franz provide a rock solid core with Adrian Belew of King Crimson playing some funky guitar on top. The quirky lyrics and excellent vocals as well from Tina Weymouth make this a lot more than a novelty record.
Wilco
2/5
Not to be confused with legendary pub rock guitarist Wilko Johnson or the budget British household goods store, this is a band that seems to be held in high regard by some music fans. It started promisingly with some experimental noodling, but then I found it washing over me and not leaving much of an impression. I saw them described as a Rustbelt Radiohead but on this evidence they are more of a Chicago Coldplay.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
4/5
Don’t say you weren’t warned - this is an album that does exactly what it says on the tin. This is a collection of songs about death and bloody murder, from the perspective of both victim and murderer. This bitter brew is sweetened by the addition of guest vocalist Kylie Minogue. Apparently Nick Cave asked for the song Where the Wild Roses Grow to be removed from consideration for an MTV award because he didn’t want any Kylie fans buying this album by mistake without being aware of the lyrical content. It’s strong stuff, but it ends on a positive note with a cover of the Bob Dylan song Death is Not the End. Murder-tastic!
The Waterboys
3/5
There was a brief fad for Celtic folk rock in the 80s and the Waterboys were a prime example with their biggest hit being The Whole of the Moon in 1985. For this album a couple of years later, they leaned back towards a more traditional, folkier sound with violins, mandolins and flutes coming to the fore. I’m guessing this may have put off some of their earlier fans, but it sounds like they’re having a lot of fun with this, especially on the final live burst of Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land at the end.
The Kinks
4/5
At a time where everyone else was turning on and tripping out with cosmic psychedelia, Ray Davies writes a perfect picture postcard story of life in England in the late 60s. Same sex schoolboy crushes, trying to find a better job, moaning about the weather, romantic moments by a polluted river and afternoon tea. The Kinks really were something else.
Bruce Springsteen
3/5
I think the problem I have with early Bruce Springsteen is his vocal style. He was 25 when he recorded this album but he sounds more like a middle aged dad reminiscing about being a young tearaway than someone actually strapping themselves into a suicide machine. That’s not to say this isn’t a good album, but I much prefer the quieter and more reflective tracks like Meeting Across the River than the bombastic numbers.
Beck
2/5
Break up albums are rarely a good idea. Taking the emotional laundry of a ten year relationship and airing it in public isn’t going to end well for anyone involved. Listening to it feels uncomfortably intrusive and the music is very much of the 2002 sub Coldplay genre. Honestly mate, just get over it.
GZA
2/5
Ok, the good stuff first. I love the extended clips from the cult movie Shogun Assassin and some of the chilled lo-fi beats on this are really nice, making this less of a sonic assault than some hip hop albums. On the downside, the lyrics sound interesting but (and not to be prudish, but well) the endless torrent of mother effin n-words on every other line make it difficult to follow what he’s trying to say. Not my thing, sorry.
David Gray
3/5
This is yet another multi-million selling album from around the turn of the millennium that seems to have completely passed me by for some reason. It opens with an unusual combination of fairly upbeat dance adjacent electronica with a nasal sounding singer-songwriter (one review likened him to Bob Dylan!). It took me a while to twig that I’d heard him doing guest vocals on an Orbital album from a few years later. Mostly harmless.
Incubus
3/5
I’m not the world’s greatest expert on metal sub-genres but I was expecting something labelled as Nu Metal to be a little more metal. To my aging ears it was somewhere between post grunge indie and a poppier, more accessible version of Nine Inch Nails. One track even has some deeply ill advised rapping and scratching included (and a surprisingly funky bass line too). The lyrics include some swears to get the coveted Parental Advisory sticker but while they are trying to be Dangerous they end up being Mostly Harmless.
3/5
Oasis were the apotheosis of 90’s lad culture, swaggering and boorish and utterly convinced of their own greatness. They’d obviously grown up listening to Revolver on repeat and did a pretty good job of channelling some of the energy and attitude of that era, if not the musical or lyrical ability. One of the major problems I have listening back is the way that the sound is so compressed to seem louder. I can imagine them in the studio asking the technicians to turn everything up to 11. Blur were better.
The Clash
5/5
One of the earliest UK punk albums, beating Never Mind the Bollocks to record shops by at least six months (although not released Stateside until 1979, probably due to the track ‘I’m So Bored with the USA’). Also, definitely one of the most overtly political and influential, taking solid hits against racism, police brutality, US imperialism and the generally moribund state of the United Kingdom in the 1970s.
Musically, it’s rock solid, with accomplished musicians building on the 60s garage sound with a solid helping of 70s pub rock and nods to reggae/ska with a great cover of Police and Thieves. A five star classic, no questions.
Jethro Tull
3/5
1971 was an odd year for music, and this unusual mix of folk and prog is a prime example. We have weird vocals, elaborate guitar noodling, flutes, fingers in ears and plenty of standing on one leg. It’s definitely not a concept album though, at least according to Ian Anderson. There is a theme of organised religion in opposition to a more hippy, dippy god though, which crops up in several places. This probably seemed very deep and meaningful at the time but I suspect that a lot of the lyrics were chemically assisted.
Bonnie Raitt
3/5
Judging by the cover (and I know that’s a bad idea) I was expecting this to be more of a country album, but it turned out to be an amiable bit of 70s style funky bluesy rock/easy listening that put me in mind of Fleetwood Mac. I really loved Bonnie Raitt’s vocals on this, but the music didn’t really do it for me - the opening track is pure 80s cheese (and was somehow a breakthrough hit) but the rest is an improvement (even if she does somehow manage to rhyme ‘Queen of Sheba’ with ‘Amoeba’). I’m guessing this was a lot more popular in the USA than over here in the UK.
Skepta
4/5
#1001Albums
I came to this with no idea what to expect and ended up being pleasantly surprised. It’s interesting to compare this with the Genius SZA album that I listened to recently - they have some similarities - the spoken interludes and martial arts movie samples - but I ended up liking this album a lot more. It’s probably because I could understand what he was rapping about and I got a lot more of the cultural references from Fireman Sam to Knock Down Ginger. Good stuff and righteously angry.
The Clash
5/5
The Clash were never really just a punk band. Aside from the opening track which anticipates the nuclear paranoia of the 80s with a howl of despair, the music here is diverse and literate, covering jazz, ska, dub, Americana (with a nod to Staggers Lee) and good old rock ‘n’ roll. Even that iconic cover pays homage to Elvis Presley’s debut album, and rightly so. This is a band paying their dues and saying things that need to be said, as well as having a lot of fun with bouncy songs about the drudgery of shopping alongside political bangers about fighting fascism. As relevant now as ever.
Kendrick Lamar
3/5
For a small suburb of Los Angeles, Compton has produced a disproportionately large amount of Gangsta Rap albums. Ok, I get it, it’s one of the most deprived areas of the USA, and I can’t imagine how tough it must have been to grow up there as a young black man, but I really think I’ve listened to enough albums like this now. This one is probably one of the better ones, unusually featuring a Christian conversion prayer alongside the usual m— f—in n— words, but enough already.
Elvis Costello & The Attractions
4/5
This is probably one of my least listened albums from Elvis Costello and I’m not sure why because it’s really rather good. This is very much a back to basics album after the experiments with Americana on the previous album.
The opening track sets out a theme - this is literally uncomplicated rock, focussing on a raw sound and straightforward lyrics. Tokyo Storm Warning channels Bob Dylan circa 1965 with vivid scenes on each verse and similarly I Want You channels the Beatles She’s So Heavy with a repeated lyric that builds a claustrophobic atmosphere of an obsessive relationship.
Faith No More
2/5
This album starts promisingly enough with what sounds like a solid bit of late 80’s metal, but then we come to the second track. Oh boy. White people rapping is something that rarely ends well and shoehorning it into a metal track just makes it more toe-curlingly embarrassing. The previous lead singer Chuck Mosley just about got away with it, but new boy for this album Mike Patton is a fish out of water (literally, in the notorious shot of a fish flopping around in the video that went with this song). Almost unbelievably, it gets worse when he tries to be faux emotional with the track Zombie Eaters. No, just no.
The album very nearly redeems itself with a surprisingly faithful cover of the classic War Pigs by Black Sabbath, but the overall impression is of something that has dated very badly.
Crosby, Stills & Nash
3/5
Late in 1968 David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash all found themselves at a collective loose end, having either left or been fired from their respective bands. They teamed up to form an eponymous supergroup, recording this album just before playing at the Woodstock festival. Aside from the jolly Marrakesh Express about the joys of the hippie lifestyle, this album feels oddly melancholy, with songs about doomed relationships and a sense of a golden age coming to an end.
The trio posed for the cover photo in front of a derelict house before agreeing on the band name and went back a few days later to retake the picture in the right order, only to find that the house had been demolished. That’s a perfect metaphor for the end of the sixties and this album as a whole.
The Pogues
5/5
The Pogues are much more than an Irish folk band and this album proves it. Yes, we still get the traditional songs, although fewer than you might think - there were three out of fifteen that I counted on the original release plus a couple more on the expanded edition including the classic Irish Rover with the Dubliners.
The musical influences are broader and more diverse here - Middle Eastern sounds and wild Spanish fiestas sit comfortably alongside punk influenced folk (or maybe folk influenced punk) with a solid backing band of talented musicians.
Shane MacGowan’s lyrics and vocals are as distinctive as ever from the mawkish Christmas classic Fairytale of New York (with the unmistakable Kirsty MacColl) to ballads and shanties, and powerful political songs about miscarriages of justice and the scattered Irish diaspora. A great album that has stood the test of time.
Arcade Fire
4/5
I was all prepared to shrug my shoulders at this album - pretty standard, middle of the road indie stuff from Canadian rockers Arcade fire, with a loose sort of concept theme of life in the suburbs, but one track made me sit up and listen. Month of May is a certified banger - a solid Krautrock beat and even a nod to the Ramones with a ‘1, 2, 3, 4’ lead in, and some great lines about ‘kids all standing with their arms folded tight’.
I started listening a bit more closely to the lyrics, and there’s some nice stuff in here about run down shopping malls and soulless housing estates patrolled by police chasing kids on bikes, where you can’t even recognise the house you grew up in without looking at the numbers on the door. The last but one track is Sprawl II, which is a great 80s style vaporwave pastiche leading into the final section about the Suburbs.
Malltastic!
Haircut 100
3/5
Haircut 100 were the archetypal Smash Hits band back in the early eighties - clean cut young men with boy next door good looks, and I’m afraid to say I was a little bit dismissive of them as lightweight disposable tinkly bonk pop. The lyrics didn’t make any sense as far as I could tell - why was he so worried about going down to the lake, for starters?
Anyhoo, aside from the singles which instantly take me back to that halcyon summer of 1981, the rest of this album is surprisingly good. It’s much more in a Latin jazz funk style than I was expecting with slap bass, horns, marimbas and tinkly pianos. I would happily listen to a couple of tracks from this on a sunny evening with a cocktail in hand and not give two hoots about why he is singing about green escalators.
Favourite-shirt-tastic!
Cocteau Twins
4/5
This album is quite unlike any other on the list that I’ve heard so far. Dreamy, etherial vocals with random, constructed lyrics in an unknown language combined with swirling guitars and synth, recalling some of the ambient, gothic gloomscapes of The Cure. Underpinning it is an occasionally incongruous drum machine making some of the tracks potentially danceable to (at least in 80s era goth discos where everyone was dressed in black and swaying softly).
The result is a shimmering marble of an album, that I’ve listened to on repeat for most of today, occasionally singing along to lines like ‘Hocus Pocus Donimoka’ or words to that effect.
OutKast
2/5
What do you do if you are a critically acclaimed hip hop duo suffering from musical differences? You go off and record an album each, and then put both of them out as a double album under your joint name and hope that nobody notices.
This is a real curate’s egg of an album. Parts of it are excellent - I was particularly taken with André 3000’s (I wonder if his mum calls him that) up tempo jazz version of Favourite Things, and of course the sublime ‘Hey Ya!’. However, for every inspired line about shaking it like a Polaroid picture, there is one about how roses smell like poo poo.
If you cut out the utterly cringeworthy skits and picked the best tracks from both discs, you would have an absolute classic. As it stands, it’s at least an hour and a half too long.
Snoop Dogg
1/5
Before listening to any Gangsta rap album it’s a good idea to check Wikipedia to see if the artist in question is dead, a nonce or a Republican (or all three). In Snoop Dogg’s case it seems that he’s now a born again Christian (after being in the Nation of Islam and a brief spell as a Rastafarian for one reggae album). One can only assume that he doesn’t sing quite so many songs about his testicles nowadays. There’s also a disappointing lack of Peanuts references, presumably after legal action from the Charles M Schultz estate.
Johnny Cash
5/5
Johnny Cash had one of the most distinctive voices, not just in country but across all music. This album, recorded the year before he passed away, is a fine example of his range - combining his own songs, traditional numbers and an audacious range of covers from Simon & Garfunkel to Depeche Mode to the Beatles, doing them all justice. The example that most people will know is his version of Hurt by Nine Inch Nails, where he fills it with his own pain to the extent that Trent Reznor said that it was now Cash’s song.
As might be expected the songs all explore the theme of the fragility of life, melancholy and looking back. It’s a tough listen at times, as his voice cracks with emotion, but he is more than supported by great group of musicians including Billy Preston, Don Henley, Nick Cave and Fiona Apple, with production by Rick Rubin keeping things together. A fine album and a fine tribute to one of the all time greats.
Elvis Presley
4/5
In 1958 Elvis, being poor and working class, was conscripted into the US Army for two years of military service. On his discharge in 1960, he was eager to get back into the studio to make more music with his old band. This album has more of a pop sound than some of his earlier rock ‘n’ roll, but it still sounds good with great production in a state of the art studio. Elvis’s voice had also noticeably improved, especially on tracks like his spine tingling version of Fever.
Apparently Colonel Parker only wanted the band to record the bare minimum eight tracks to meet the contractual obligation, but they actually managed twelve album bangers in the allotted time (plus some classic singles), with some great bluesy R&B numbers as they warmed up and got back into the groove.
Unfortunately after this the Colonel got his way and Elvis went back to making films again, instead of immediately following this up with another album.
Blur
2/5
I remember hating Girls and Boys when it came out - an infuriating earworm that summed up the banality of early 90s lad culture. Parklife was a different story though, mainly for the fantastic guest appearance by the great Phil Daniels and a nice sense of humour.
I thought I might like the rest of the album, but it’s a bit hit and miss - I do like some of the tracks, especially the punk vibes of Bank Holiday and the places where they are trying to channel the 60s kitchen sink feel of the Kinks.
However, there are just too many jinky-janky, blokey-wokey, blinky-blimey faux working class pretensions from a group of art school students. Damon Albarn’s whiny voice really started to grate on me by the end of this too.
Elastica
2/5
In one of those odd coincidences that this list throws up, today’s album is from Elastica who were fronted by Justine Frischmann who was half of a Britpop power couple with Damon Albarn and thus indirectly responsible for him writing two of the most self pitying and mawkish breakup songs of all time when they inevitably split up.
Anyhoo, as the saying goes this album is both good and original. However, the parts that are good aren’t original and vice versa. Albarn makes a guest appearance on this on a couple of tracks and was caught out shamelessly ripping off a riff from Wire on the track Connection. The non-Albarn tracks are a bit better, but there are clear similarities to the New York punk sound of the Ramones and especially Blondie on the track Vaseline.
As with Blur, I really wanted to like this, but in the end it swung and missed for me.
Stevie Wonder
5/5
This album falls between Innervisions and Songs in the Key of Life and is sometimes an overlooked part of Stevie Wonder’s classic period. Perhaps the problem is that there is just too much good Stevie Wonder to listen to? This was his 17th album and the fourth out of arguably five of the best albums ever made.
There are no well known hits here (with just one number one single), just consistently great tunes in a unique progressive soul style. We have heartfelt love songs (Too Shy to Say) leading into lovely, squelchy boogie rhythms (Boogie On Reggae Woman) and it all flows perfectly. There’s a down tempo number about Creepin’ into someone’s dreams (with backing vocals from Minnie Ripperton!) that segues into a blistering funk attack on the moribund Nixon administration (with backing vocals from the Jackson Five!).
This is a great way to spend a Friday - I’ve listened to this twice in a row, and I’m just about to put it on again! Why not join me?
ABBA
5/5
This album comes with almost 50 years of cultural baggage attached, from Alan Partridge to the musical Mama Mia to every wedding disco I’ve ever been to, along with some of the most memorable songs of all time. If you can put that to one side and listen to this with no pre-conceptions then you are in for a treat.
The first thing to say is that this album feels a little like a greatest hits compilation, including ‘Dancing Queen’, ‘Knowing Me, Knowing You’, ‘Money, Money, Money’ and ‘Fernando’, but any of the other tracks can justifiably stand alongside these hits. This is immaculately constructed pop, across a variety of genres from cheesy Euro disco to dark cabaret to good old rock ’n’ roll, not forgetting the majestic instrumental title track. The lyrics have an occasional odd turn of phrase (‘Dum dum diddle, to be your fiddle’) which just adds to their quirky Scandinavian charm when sung by Agnetha and Anna-Frid with just a hint of a Swedish accent.
Eurovision-tastic!
Ali Farka Touré
5/5
When young Ali was growing up in a small village in a remote region of Mali he earned the nickname Farka, which means donkey, because of his stubbornness. He wasn’t allowed to play music for cultural reasons, but he went ahead and made himself an improvised one string guitar from a tin can and a bit of string anyway. He quickly picked up the distinctive sound of the region and earned a reputation as a guitarist of note, learning how to sing in seven different languages too.
Some time in the 60s he heard the music of John Lee Hooker for the first time and wondered how this American musician was playing tunes that sounded like the ones he’d grown up with. He quickly realised that the blues must have been an evolution of the much older traditions that he knew. The instruments and languages may have changed, but the feelings were still the same.
I remember hearing this music on the radio sometime in the 80s on a late night show and was charmed by it, even if I couldn’t understand the words. The American musician Ry Cooder was similarly enchanted and tracked down Touré to make an album with him, bringing the best of both worlds together.
Apparently Touré wasn’t happy with his time in America, calling it a ‘spiritual car park’, and some of that sadness and longing for home can be felt here. It’s still a good place to start listening though and will hopefully lead on to people listening to other albums from this truly remarkable musician.
When I was a child Timbuktu was always a mythical place, as far away from home as it’s possible to be. Perhaps we’ve always had it wrong, and it’s Timbuktu that’s home and we are the ones who are lost?
Ali Farka Touré
5/5
From his breakthrough record yesterday to his final album, recorded just before his death in 2006 and released posthumously. This is an album full of strangeness and charm, with traditional instruments like the ngoni and calabash alongside guitars and harmonicas and vocals in a mix of languages. You don’t need to understand the words to feel the powerful emotions running through them.
Touré said that he thought this was his best album and who are we to argue? I also read today that in 2004 he became mayor of his home town of Niafunké and spent his own money earned from his music improving the roads, building generators, and installing irrigation and sewage systems. I can’t think of a better legacy to aspire to.
Hot Chip
3/5
This album came out in 2012 but the sound is very consciously rooted in 80’s style electronica, with influences including the Pet Shop Boys (but not as orchestral) and Daft Punk (but not as French). I’m in two minds (or heads) about this - it’s a pleasant enough listen but ultimately it’s a little bit insubstantial. I get the feeling it wants to be counted as a dance album but there’s nothing on here that has quite enough oomph to get me out on the dance floor.
Sade
4/5
This is yet another album that I overlooked in the 80s, mainly because I didn’t have a cd player or get invited to the sort of dinner parties where this would be played as background music. Listening to this today shows that it really benefits from being heard through good headphones at high quality, rather than on a crackly AM radio - I’ve only just realised that she’s not singing about travelling to ‘Western Maine’ in Smooth Operator.
Sade has a voice that soars effortlessly on this, but she also has an equal writing credit on all of the songs on here, and clearly deserved the huge success that this album enjoyed. I’m not normally a fan of smooth soul/R&B but this is a cut above similar records from around this time.
Dinner-party-tastic!
Marvin Gaye
3/5
What’s Going On is one of the greatest albums of all time, with searing social commentary about racism, corruption and the state of the planet, so it seems a little bit of a step back for the follow up to be a short album about (and let’s be blunt here) making sweet, sweet love.
I mean, it’s not subtle - the opening track gets straight to the point and immediately proposes getting it on. At least let me take my coat off first Marvin, and a bottle of wine and some flowers might be nice too. It seems that the object of Marvin’s lust might have felt the same as he has to beg them to stay on the next track.
However, the rest of the album quickly returns to the hot and steamy stuff with the erm, climax, being the tracks ‘You Sure Love to Ball’ and ‘Just to Keep You Satisfied’. Well, quite.
However, if you are looking for an album to inspire some sexytimes and the object of your affections is similarly broad minded and in the mood, then this might a good choice.
John Martyn
3/5
What do you get if you team up a burnt out old hippy with the legendary dub music producer Lee “Scratch” Perry? The answer is the opening track on this album that sounds startlingly like modern trip hop, even though this came out in 1976. The rest of the tracks incorporate more of Martyn’s folk and jazz roots, also veering into ambient territory on the final track which apparently was recorded by a lake and includes ducks quacking!
The Byrds
4/5
1965 was a turbulent year for music. The Beatles had just invaded America and Dylan had gone electric (Judas!). The hippies were making their way to San Francisco and amongst them were the Byrds who bought all of these elements together with this album. The songs are a mix of Dylan covers, folk standards and original songs, with the most recognisable element being the jangly 12 string Rickenbacker guitar that is the centrepiece of their sound.
This album fed back into the musical zeitgeist, influencing Dylan’s nascent electric sound as well as the Beatles themselves with the riff from The Bells of Rhymney being a direct inspiration for George Harrison’s guitar on If I Needed Someone. The only slightly bizarre misstep is the final track which is a version of Vera Lynn’s wartime classic We’ll Meet Again, which obviously has a very different cultural impact in the UK.
Wild Beasts
3/5
I’m not usually a fan of falsetto vocals on a record, but there was a point that this one won me round, and that was when they started singing about girls from Shipley. Apparently Wild Beasts were originally from Kendall, but are now based in Leeds so that counts as just about local to me. The music also grew on me too, rapidly promoting this band to a solid contender for a Saturday afternoon at a music festival on a sunny day slot.
Bruce Springsteen
4/5
When this album came out, it was easy to dismiss it as a typical bit of jingoistic, flag waving propaganda. Indeed, Ronald Reagan himself started using the title track as a campaign rally song. However, when you start listening to what Bruce is actually singing the level of disconnect between the bombastic chorus and the verses is enough to give you whiplash.
Born In The USA is a bitter and angry song about the fate of American GIs coming back from Vietnam to find that there are no blue collar jobs in their home towns and then ending up broken and in jail from post traumatic stress. Other songs have similarly veiled barbs - Cover Me is again about coping with hidden trauma and Dancing in the Dark is about someone with a crippling lack of self confidence, at odds with the jaunty, danceable synth pop music.
For me, this album is at its best in the quieter moments, and I’m glad that he chose My Hometown as the closing number which mixes nostalgia with frank honesty about a town suffering from unemployment and racial tensions.
I think that this album is probably Springsteen’s ‘Dylan Goes Electric’ moment that took him from earnest folk troubadour to mega stardom, maybe alienating some of his earlier fans while gaining a whole lot more.
Flag-tastic!
Bruce Springsteen
4/5
It’s interesting to go back to this album after listening to Born in the USA, to hear the difference in the sound. Where the later album was bombastic, this album is quieter and more reflective with more piano and less sax, although there are some excellent hard rock tracks on here too.
There’s a slightly odd obsession with cars though - driving around aimlessly, tinkering in oily garages and racing late at night on empty strips at the edge of town. Perhaps it’s the car as a symbol of freedom for a working class kid, although maybe that’s more of an American thing? There are also songs playing with Old Testament themes of vengeful Gods and other familiar themes of urban decay and poverty.
The highlight for me was the song Factory, an utterly devastating indictment of working class drudgery and poverty that chews people up and spits them out at the end of a working day. This easily stands alongside songs on similar themes from Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie.
Radiohead
4/5
The turn of the millennium was a really strange time. It felt as if we had all been holding our breath as the clock ticked over and we had no idea what to expect from the 21st century. This album arrived at exactly the right moment, mixing weird, glitchy beats, ambient noodling, abstract vocals and discordant jazz breakdowns.
I can see why it took some people by surprise, but would you really have preferred another by-the-numbers collection of rock songs? I’m glad when musicians produce experimental work, even if it doesn’t always land. It took me a while to get into this album, but it’s definitely one that bears repeated hearings, revealing new facets every time.
Prefab Sprout
2/5
I was initially intrigued to listen to this one, mainly because I saw that Thomas Dolby had produced it and I have previously enjoyed some of his work. The album opens promisingly enough with a jaunty honky tonk style tribute to country singer Faron Young, but then it turns into a series of fairly bland and almost identical songs about nothing particularly memorable. It’s a pleasant enough listen, but it falls into the previously mentioned genre of unthreatening CDs to put on at 80s dinner parties.
Blandtastic!
Joe Ely
3/5
This is very much on the Western side of the Country and Western spectrum, with songs of lost loves in Amarillo and lonesome boxcars, as well as two songs about good ol’ honky tonks closing with a great Hank Williams cover. I always used to think that I didn’t like music like this, but it turns out it’s the schmaltzy 70s Nashville style that I’m not a fan of. Albums like this bring in elements of traditional blues, rock and western swing and I would happily listen to this in a dusty bar late at night with a beer in hand.
Boxcar-tastic!
Sister Sledge
5/5
Some albums suffer from being too familiar with the well known hits overshadowing the other tracks. This is not the case here and the music flows seamlessly from the floor fillers to the more soulful numbers.
This album combines the legendary disco beats of Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards from Chic with four amazing vocalists, who are actually all sisters with the surname of Sledge. The result is one of the greatest disco records of all time with the highlight being the anthemic We Are Family.
The only quibble that I have with this is the selection of unnecessary remixes tacked on the end of this edition that add nothing of any note to the original versions. These can be skipped without missing anything.
The White Stripes
3/5
You might think that cutting back a band to just guitar, drums and vocals (and a smidge of piano) would be limiting, but The White Stripes demonstrate a variety of different styles and sounds on this album, starting with mostly grungy garage rock and touching on acoustic folk, country and punk to various degrees. I think I might have avoided this at the time, thinking it was style over substance (and the pretence of being siblings was a bit creepy), but this is solid stuff.
The only thing I’d take issue with is the lyrical content of some of Jack White’s lyrics which come over as a bit whiney and ‘but I’m a nice guy, why don’t women like me?’. I’m giving it another listen though, which should tell you something.
Christina Aguilera
3/5
I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from this album, but it turned out to be an interesting mix of styles. Aguilera obviously knows her musical heritage and name checks artists from Billie Holliday to Etta James to make it clear where she is coming from.
This is a double album, with the first disc riffing on classic R&B sounds but I think that I preferred the second disc which goes further back bringing in jazz influences and even a 1940’s number in the style of the Andrew’s Sisters which she pulls off with considerable panache.
It’s probably not the sort of thing I’d listen to regularly, but I now have a lot of respect for Ms Aguilera for her depth of talent.
The Monks
3/5
Definitely one of the stranger and more obscure bands on this list, The Monks were five American GIs stationed in West Germany who started a band because they were bored. They performed on stage dressed in monk’s costumes with shaved heads, the music featured pounding drums and a heavily distorted banjo and the lyrics were equally wild, attacking the war in Vietnam amongst other things.
Nervous record companies refused to release their album in the United States because it was considered too experimental and controversial. In retrospect this can be seen as possible proto-punk record, crossed with weird art-rock and even a bit of skiffle.
Monk-tastic!
Billy Bragg
4/5
In the early 80s Billy Bragg built a reputation as a fiery socialist troubadour, just one man and his guitar, recording two critically acclaimed albums and playing benefit gigs for striking miners and supporting the Red Wedge tour during the ‘83 elections. For this difficult third album (which was the working title for a while) he moved away from his earlier raw sound, bringing in other musicians and backing singers, with fuller production. Would this be his ‘Dylan Goes Electric’ moment?
Well, it actually works! He still has the same vocal style, ranging from plaintive wails to strident anger (which is fair to say is an acquired taste), but the extra elements really add to and complement his songs. The first single Levi Stubbs’ Tears from this album marks the transition in style, with a powerful song about domestic violence that is heightened by a single trumpet picking up the melody at the end.
Other songs cover familiar topics for Bragg - the humdrum reality of life in 80s Tory Britain, forthright political commentary and wistful songs of love and romance and marriage. To be honest, I still just about prefer Life’s A Riot With Spy vs Spy but this album can stand alongside the earlier work as a solid start to a discography.
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
2/5
Ever wondered what grizzled old hippy Neil Young was getting up to at the height of punk in 1978? Turns out he was recording this mostly live album with a mix of acoustic and electric tracks, reuniting with Crazy Horse for a series of gigs. Musically it’s pretty much by the numbers folk-rock with no real surprises.
However, the lyrics read like something that someone who’d taken bad acid in 1970 might write. He starts by name checking Johnny Rotten, then on the next track he asks what happened to his old friends (presumably referring to Crosby, Stills and Nash) then remembers that he got bored of them and abandoned them because they were just dead weight to him. Ouch.
There are then couple of tracks that give the impression that he got stoned and fell asleep watching westerns on TV and somehow started dreaming about a man from Mars too. Very weird.
Cowboy-tastic!
David Bowie
4/5
When David Bowie had a minor heart attack towards the end of the Reality tour in 2004 and more or less disappeared from public view, we all assumed that he’d retired. What we didn’t know was that he’d re-united with long time producer Tony Visconti, patching up their differences and working on this album in secret almost ten years later, releasing the first track as a total surprise.
The title track (and the cheeky cover) made it seem like he’d never been away, riffing on his classic Berlin era sound whilst bringing it up to date and throwing in some experimental flourishes. It certainly doesn’t sound like someone who is ready to throw the towel in or be content with playing a greatest hits tour for the money. I’m not sure I’d pick this over Blackstar, but it’s certainly one of the better modern era Bowie albums.
The Sabres Of Paradise
4/5
I don’t normally pay much attention to record labels, but I will make an exception for anything from Warp Records from Sheffield who specialise in electronica and dance music. This record certainly lived up to my expectations, falling into three sections.
The opening tracks are all fairly sparse techno with minimalist beats but laying down some interesting patterns that build on each other. The record then moves into some heavier dub step with Middle Eastern flourishes and a richer soundscape to play with. The final tracks then come in with more of an ambient, modular synth feel with echoes of 70s bands like Tangerine Dream.
My personal highlight for this is the track Theme which sounds like it could be the soundtrack for a classic heist movie with bold, brass stabs and a god like bass line underpinning it. Absolutely epic stuff.
Motörhead
4/5
Motörhead were famously one of the hardest working heavy metal bands of all time, touring relentlessly with a dressing room booze rider of heroic proportions. Traditionally the Hammersmith Odeon would be the last gig on the tour, but ironically on this 1981 outing they didn’t play there, so presumably they were very tired by the end.
Anyhoo, this album does what it says on the tin. An absolutely blistering live set, starting with the iconic Ace of Spades and ending with Motörhead. There’s minimal banter between the tracks - just the name of the song and a quick dedication, and any crowd noise is not audible during the music. If you want live heavy metal, then this is the album for you.
James Brown
4/5
In contrast to yesterday’s live album, this one feels much more like being at an actual performance. There’s a fantastic opening introduction by Fats Gonder to get you hyped up, before James Brown himself comes on stage at his swaggering, sweaty, sex machine best. He has a fantastic natural rapport with the crowd, leading them in a call and response, feeling very much like the evangelical preacher he would go on to play in the Blues Brothers movie. Just an all round great live performance captured on vinyl!
The Cure
4/5
This album establishes its mood straight from the first track. We are very much in gothic gloomscape territory here, with resonant bass lines and sparse keyboards, before the tempo picks up for the second track and we hear Robert Smith’s plaintive, wailing vocals. The lyrical themes are also very much towards the darker end of the spectrum, especially on the spooky hit single A Forest. The definitive proto-goth album!
Goth-tastic!
Bob Dylan
5/5
Ten years on from the seismic shock of appearing on stage at the Newport Folk Festival playing an electric guitar (gasp!) Bob returned to playing mostly acoustic for this album. This is the classic Dylan sound of guitar, harmonica and those familiar vocals, plus a comparatively restrained backing band.
Dylan always denied that any of the lyrics were autobiographical but given that he was in the middle of a marriage breakdown at the time it’s hard not to speculate about some of them. As always, they are complex with multiple layers of meaning and literary allusions, especially on Tangled Up In Blue that explores different interpretations of the title phrase and casually name drops “some poet from the 13th century” set on top of a simple repeated guitar riff.
I wonder if those outraged folkies ever returned to this album and asked themselves what they were so upset about back in 65?
Bob-tastic!
Kings of Leon
2/5
This album had so little impact on me that I almost forgot to write a review of it! It’s very much in the BBC Six Music / Glastonbury indie stage on a Saturday afternoon vein of middle of the road mid 2000s rock music. The only bit that made me wince was when these 30 something rockers started singing about a girl being “only 17”. Yikes.
Tori Amos
4/5
Up until today, I think that Tori Amos occupied the same mental pigeon hole as Alannis Morrisette in my head. However, as seems to be a regular occurrence with this list I was pleasantly surprised again. I found out that she started out in a short lived and not very successful 80’s electro pop band before pivoting into being a singer/songwriter in the vein of Joni Mitchell with a large helping of Kate Bush.
The crucial aspect for this album is that the songs are really rather good, ranging from the confessional to strong messages about the empowerment of women in the face of oppression, set to a mostly piano led accompaniment. I hesitate to call it a highlight, but the song Me and a Gun about her experience of being raped is utterly devastating.
Sabu
4/5
Luis ‘Sabu’ Martinez was a regular on the New York Jazz scene in the 50s, playing conga with greats like Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. For his debut album as band leader on Blue Note he focused on music from his Cuban/Spanish heritage with a mix of rumba rhythms and traditional son styles.
As might be expected drums are foremost on this album, with complex, hypnotic poly rhythms and some harsh percussion that sounds like someone banging a tin can, interspersed with yelps and some unusual call and response bits. Also making an appearance is the distinctive tres guitar of Arsenio Rodriguez. Fabulous, life affirming music to brighten your day.
U2
2/5
As previously mentioned, I have a complicated relationship with U2. I liked their early songs, full of righteous anger from four young men growing up in the middle of the troubles. However, their songs quickly became preachy and pompous, and they lost their edge (but not their Edge).
The mega successful Joshua Tree had its moments, but as with this album the good bits are entirely down to the production work of Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois. The high points are the singles ‘Even Better Than The Real Thing’ and ‘The Fly’, but there’s still a lot of tedious filler on here (I’m looking at you, ‘One’).
Pay your taxes Bono.
Elvis Costello
4/5
Elvis Costello was something of an oddity and impossible to pigeon hole when this debut album was released in 1977. He sported Buddy Holly style specs, a greasy quiff and a punk sneer. Was it punk or rock ’n’ roll? Maybe we should just call it punk ‘n’ roll.
The songs are great though, already showing the remarkable talent that would dominate the UK charts through the late 70s and early 80s. The music doesn’t quite match up, and it was only after this album was released that the Attractions band was formed.
The Louvin Brothers
4/5
This is an album that does exactly what it says on the tin. Songs of heartache, sorrow, loneliness, doom, disaster and tragedy, and one song about how great it is to live in Kentucky. The Louvin Brothers sing in glorious close harmony, accompanying some fine music, mostly in a bluegrass style, although there are also a couple of gospel songs added to this album in case y’all could use some churchin’ up.
However, it turns out that real life was to tragically imitate the art. Of the brothers, Charlie was the sensible one but apparently Ira was the bad seed, prone to drinking and fits of temper, and after they parted ways in 1963 he died in a car crash a few years later. Sad.
Astor Piazzolla
4/5
This is album features an unusual combination of instruments - a piano, a violin, a vibraphone and a bandoneón (a sort of accordion) - playing avant garde tango music that crosses over into jazz and classical minimalism with repeating patterns and themes. There’s a playful air to this as the violin and bandoneón bounce off each other, picking up on the rhythms established on the vibraphone. Perfect for a sunny day with a cool breeze blowing through the windows.
Slint
4/5
Grungy, mostly spoken word punk with a nice edge to it. I really enjoyed these tales of creepy carnivals, vicious vampires and sinister sea captains told in a voice that ranges to a mumble, to a shout, to a scream accompanied by wailing guitars and rumbling bass lines. There’s a very eerie ambient hidden track on the end of this album too.
Fleet Foxes
2/5
I have nothing against folk music, per se, but I think it’s best experienced in the snug of a traditional pub, whilst drinking a pint of real ale, and played by women with long hair and floaty dresses, or men with straggly beards and chunky jumpers. Needless to say, fingers should be jammed firmly in lugholes.
This album is in the American west coast folk tradition of the 60s, but it sounds too clean and overproduced, lacking in any sense of authentic lived experiences. The general effect of it was to wash over me, and not have any impact. I suspect that they might be better live.
Willie Nelson
4/5
Willie Nelson is probably best known for his authentic style of outlaw country music, so it was something of a surprise when he teamed up with Booker T Jones to record an album of great American songbook classics from Hoagy Carmichael to Irving Berlin to George Gershwin. The result is really rather affecting, with Nelson’s slightly quavery voice adding emotion to well worn songs with music from Jones on organ and piano complementing him perfectly. Just goes to show that you should never pigeonhole people into single genres.
Cowboy Junkies
4/5
Today, in not judging an album by the cover (or band name), I was expecting a country record, but this turned out to be closer to blues or folk, with an interesting mix of styles and influences. Save for the first track, the whole album was recorded in one day with no overdubs, using a single microphone set up in a church which lends a unique ambience and live feel to the recording.
The highlights are a riff on Blue Moon by Elvis and a cover of Sweet Jane by the Velvet Underground, with vocals from lead singer Margo Timmins being spine tingling throughout.
Pavement
3/5
Amiable post grunge slacker rock that sort of shambles into view, plays a series of songs about nothing much in particular (skateboards are mentioned at one point) and shambles off again, presumably to have a nice lay down somewhere. I mean, I didn’t hate it but it didn’t really grab me either. The highlight was a spacey instrumental riff on an old Dave Brubeck number that came out of left field.
John Martyn
2/5
I’ve previously spotted a genre of music best described as albums to be played during dinner parties in the 80s. Well, this album sounds like the sort of thing that would be played at *those* sort of parties in the 1970s. You know, the ones with men with droopy moustaches and flares, and women in inappropriate kaftans, where they all put their car keys in a bowl at the end of the night. This is weirdly bonkers semi improvised jazz/funk/folk that makes no sense whatsoever.
Bruce Springsteen
5/5
There are two Bruce Springsteens. There’s the happy go lucky fellow, goofing around on stage with his best mates from the E Street band, playing a four hour show to a packed stadium. Then there’s the other one, alone with his guitar and a four track recorder, wracked with self doubt and trying to write songs of pain and darkness from the heart.
The original plan was to record these songs with the band, but for various reasons they never quite came together so in the end he released the original demos more or less as is. The result is haunting and deeply personal.
The title track is a proper murder ballad, telling a true story of a spree killer on the run with his girlfriend, coming to a gruesome end in the electric chair. Other songs cover familiar ground of poverty, brushes with the law (from both sides) and used cars, telling authentic stories, accompanied with just an acoustic guitar and occasional harmonica. The one song that stuck with me was Highway Patrolman, with a story about a policeman and his brother Franky who ‘just ain’t no good’. Is blood thicker than water? This song might have the answer.
Blur
3/5
Released at the tail end of Britpop, this album saw Blur finally move away from their blinky-blimey, mockney pretensions and shift into a more post-grunge, indie style. Ironically, their shortest track Song-2 was the one that finally made an impact in America and it’s probably the best thing on here. The rest is mostly ok, with the most interesting part for me being the 8 minute experimental track Essex Dogs which reminded me of David Bowie from this era.
Jungle Brothers
3/5
This album is a perfect example of how hip-hip is not synonymous with gangsta rap. This is an art form that can be playful, funny, thoughtful and inspiring without resorting to sexism and homophobia. Musically, this album plays with cheeky samples and inspirations from jazz, to funk, to Afro-beat and even a bit of doo-wop scat thrown in, mixing it up so things never get dull. Genuinely engaging and fun!
Johnny Cash
5/5
Recorded live in San Quentin prison in 1968, this is as raw a piece of music that you will ever hear. Cash sings from bitter personal experience of the prison system and connects with his audience in a visceral way, bantering and dealing with hecklers as he introduces each song. There are certainly rough edges to this recording - Cash complains about the camera crew getting in the way (with an iconic photo of him flipping the bird in anger) and struggles with an out of tune guitar.
However, the songs are where this album shines. It opens with a cover of Dylan song and several classics, before Cash sings about his experience of being fined $36 and thrown in jail for picking dandelions by the side of the road, and the blazing fury against San Quentin prison itself which is a “living hell” that does nothing to make convicts better people when they leave. This song was such a hit with the crowd that he gave an immediate encore with both performances on this disc.
The full concert is available on YouTube and it’s well worth watching.
https://youtu.be/PSLsfwTbo4Q
Randy Newman
2/5
Wow, the tonal dissonance on this album is something else. I knew that Randy Newman had a thing for mawkish tearjerkers on film soundtracks, but I really wasn’t expecting the opening track on this to be about the slave trade. Yikes. We then crash zoom into a cabaret style song about a jaded and debauched star, followed by a supernatural number and then one about a dancing bear. Wait, what? We also get a cheery number about starting a nuclear war for the fun of it.
Bob Dylan
5/5
This was Dylan’s third album after going electric, and probably one of his best. He’d got the band that he’d been looking for and moved recording to Nashville, making good use of the studio ambience by removing the screens between musicians, adding to the live feel. Talking of the music, he’s a long way from his folk roots here, comfortably playing a mix of blues and rock whilst still being recognisably Dylan.
The first track is a boozy stomp, hitting back at the critics who were still throwing metaphorical stones at him, but after that we get a blues number followed by the incomparable Visions of Johanna, the highlight of the album for me. This is Bob telling stories in ways that feel natural and honest, getting to heart of complex relationships and emotions with precisely the right words. You could listen to just this song a hundred times and still find something new in it each time.
Fiona Apple
3/5
I was initially expecting this debut album from Fiona Apple (no relation to Tim Apple) to be along the lines of other singer/songwriters like Alannis Morrisette and Tori Amos, but I ended up preferring this to both of those. This is actually closer to a shoe-gaze sound (with the occasional torch song) and has considerable depth and complexity to it. I then found out that she was just 18 when this album was released and had written the songs during her teenage years. Wowzers!
Scritti Politti
2/5
How did an anarchist punk band from Leeds, with a name inspired by an Italian Marxist and fronted by a welsh art student singing in a falsetto voice over a cod reggae beat played on a Casio keyboard break into the top ten? Beats me too. It’s kind of catchy, and it turns out that the cheap keyboard sounds are actually played on an expensive Fairlight synthesiser (those distinctive brassy stabs are a dead giveaway and date this album precisely to 1985). The 80s truly were a weird time.
Cypress Hill
2/5
I know that this is a critically acclaimed hip-hop album, but something about it was niggling me and it finally struck me on the third track, Hand on the Pump. It opens with a sample of Duke of Earl by Gene Chandler, and I realised that I would much rather be listening to the original.
They’ve just taken a classic intro to a song and chopped it up, without adding anything new or it having any relevance to their track. I have nothing against sampling per se, but it needs to have a reason for being rather than artists acting like a kid in a candy store grabbing everything in site.
Paul Simon
5/5
I clearly remember hearing this album for the first time, with no idea of what to expect. That distinctive accordion wheezing followed by staccato gunshots of the drums, and a lyric that evoked the horrors of South Africa under apartheid.
Yes, this was controversial at the time, with a cultural boycott in place but Simon was clearly championing black African music by paying the musicians three times the going rate and giving writing credits. It certainly brought bands like Ladysmith Black Mambazo to a much wider audience than they would have had otherwise.
Does it hold up now? Well, I’ve listened three times and I’m listening again which should tell you something.
Duke Ellington
4/5
The Newport Jazz Festival (like its Folk cousin) had a reputation for being cerebral and (small c) conservative, which was why it was such a revelation when Duke Ellington pulled off this barnstorming performance that had the normally staid crowd dancing in the aisles. Due to problems with the recording the original release of this album was mostly a studio performance recorded the next day, but in 1999 another tape of a radio broadcast surfaced enabling us to hear the full show for the first time. This is really live jazz at its best! Nice!
Curtis Mayfield
4/5
This is an album that deserves to stand alongside What's Going On by Marvin Gaye as an inditement of the state of America. Mayfield sings of poverty, violence and oppression counterbalanced by love and faith. A great soul album, in the truest sense of the word.
Pet Shop Boys
4/5
This was the moment that Pet Shop Boys went from being purveyors of cerebral, arty music into producing huge, gay, disco stomps and cemented their place in their British pop star firmament. There’s a lot to enjoy here, but the references to Lady Di on ‘Dreaming of the Queen’ now feel very poignant. Stay for the hidden track after Go West at the end!
Rufus Wainwright
2/5
Not much appears to have changed since the first album which very much underwhelmed me. He still sings in that affected, Thom Yorke style where every syllable is drawn out until it collapses under its own weight and you’ve lost track of what he was singing at the start of the verse. I genuinely thought he was singing about being “under the pastries” at one point.
Musically, there elements of classical stuff and hints of Phillip Glass, but it’s mostly inoffensive stuff. There’s nothing like the weird experimental pieces on a Radiohead album, for example. Apparently iTunes wanted me to listen to the Canadian version of this album, which turned out to have some bonus live tracks sung in French which I ended up liking quite a bit more than the rest! How aboot that, eh?
The Mothers Of Invention
1/5
Judging by the cover I was expecting some sort of parody version of Sgt Pepper’s by the Beatles, but what I actually got was almost aggressively bad. Unfunny skits, unlistenable experimental interludes and lyrics that were written by someone who hated both hippies and ‘the man’, trying to show how ‘CRAAAAYZEEE’ they were but sounding like a budget Dr Demento.
Red Hot Chili Peppers
3/5
This album saw the return of original guitarist John Frusciante, who had left the band some years previously after struggling with drugs and alcohol. The recording process sounds like they had fun, creating a relaxed west coast garage feel with a mix of punk, funk and laid back vibes. There are a couple of instances of white people rapping, but fortunately not too many to spoil things.
De La Soul
4/5
A hip-hop album, heavy with samples and opening with a skit - I should hate this, right? Wrong. Compared to other hip hop albums of the era, this is playful, jazzy, progressive and funny too. The samples here are eclectic choices (and also from a time before anyone thought to get clearance for them from copyright holders!). As well as classic soul and funk, we get artists like Hall & Oates, Johnny Cash, Steely Dan and The Turtles. There's also a cheeky French language tuition record thrown in for fun!
Legal problems with the samples used kept this album off digital platforms for a long time, causing the band to release everything for free on Valentine's Day 2014 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of this album's release. The good news is that an edited version with the samples still causing problems removed or replaced is now available to stream.
Three-tastic!
The Replacements
3/5
I’ve not heard of the Replacements before listening to this album, but Apple Music told me that this was their third album with a more mature approach. However, the songs mostly deal with teen angst and one of them has the marvellous title of Gary Got a Boner. Good natured punk fun!
Megadeth
3/5
It’s said not to judge a book by its cover, but in this case this album does exactly what it says on the tin. From the parental advisor warning to the Iron Maiden style apocalyptic zombie thing, it’s clear that this is good old-fashioned thrash metal with pounding drums, galloping bass, growling vocals and lots of fast, twiddly guitar. It’s a brisk 36 minutes in length with songs about war, death and the occult, and not a lot else. It certainly kept me awake on a dull drive back from the office today. Thanks Megadeth!
The Flaming Lips
3/5
I could have sworn that I hadn’t heard anything by the Flaming Lips before, until the track ‘Do You Realise?’ came on and I remembered it being a hit back in the early 2000s, probably because it sounded a bit like the Coldplay style that was practically compulsory back then. Fun fact! Justin Timberlake appeared with them dressed in a shark costume when they played this on Top of the Pops!
Anyhoo, that track isn’t a good example of the rest of the album which starts with a four song sequence with a sort of sci-fi concept with nice bloopy synths and a narrative about the eponymous Yoshimi. I really enjoyed this bit, but the album lost a bit of focus after that. It’s still enjoyable in a vaguely shoe gazey style though.
A Tribe Called Quest
3/5
In one of the weird coincidences that this list throws up, this album was masterminded by Q-Tip who also appeared on the De La Soul record that I listened to the other day. It also makes for an interesting compare and contrast - this album pulls to a tighter beat with the vocals higher in the mix, but then layers a jazzy feel on top of the core sound. Again, this is the sort of hip hop that I can get on board with.
Johnny Cash
4/5
“Hello, I’m Johnny Cash”
Has there ever been a more iconic opening line to a live album? Probably not. Some people might ask why there are two Johnny Cash prison albums on this list and I would say that they are both equally good, with distinct differences in tone. This album feels a little more playful, although the subject matter is as dark as ever - death, poverty, addiction, heartache and the brutal reality of life in prison. Cash even manages to find humour in a song about an inmate on death row counting down the minutes until his execution.
The final track, Greystone Chapel, is notable for having being written by inmate Glen Sherley who was sat in the audience with no idea his song was about to be performed. He did actually work with Cash for a while after his release from prison in 1971, but he never managed to fully escape from his troubled past, Folsom having failed to deal with his many problems, and he sadly took his own life in 1978 aged just 42.
Killing Joke
4/5
1980 was a weird year in Britain. We’d come out of the 70s into a bright, new future of yuppies and royal weddings, but there was a distinct sense that society was rapidly splintering with the Thatcher government busy driving a wedge between the haves and the have nots. There were grim times ahead.
This is a fascinating snapshot of a transition point in music, moving from punk to the darker side of new wave and an industrial/proto gothic sound, influencing later bands like Nine Inch Nails and Soundgarden. I think this was probably overlooked at the time, especially in comparison with Joy Division and there is some great electronica here too. Excellent stuff.
Lucinda Williams
2/5
I’m not averse to a bit of Americana and I initially had high hopes for this album - songs like the title track and one called Barbed Wire and Concrete have a gritty, Springsteen-esque feel to them. However, the reality fell somewhat short - it’s fairly by the numbers alt-country stuff, with barely a fiddle or banjo to be heard. There’s also a car crash of a production process detailed on the wiki page, with 90% of the songs being scrapped and a falling out with her long time producer.
Brian Wilson
5/5
Listening to this album is bitter sweet. Brian desperately wanted to complete this album back in the 60s as a follow up to the classic Pet Sounds but for various reasons it was never finished. The stress of this probably contributed to his problems with his mental health and the eventual breakup of the Beach Boys. He was finally able to lay this to rest in 2004 with a live performance and accompanying album but you can’t help wondering how things might have panned out if everything had gone to plan back in 1967. Rest in Peace Brian.
CHIC
4/5
One of the defining sounds of the disco era, with Bernard Edwards’ funky bass lines laying down a solid groove for Nile Rodgers’ guitar licks to embellish producing music that is guaranteed to get you dancing. This is an album that you could put on at the start of the evening and happily play on repeat with no complaints from your party guests.
Method Man
4/5
This one grabbed from the outset, an unexpected snatch of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition played on an old modular synth followed by a sample from a king fu movie (which is pretty much de rigueur for anything related to the Wu Tang Clan). From this point on, the obvious samples are dialled down and the music is dark, downbeat and dangerous. The lyrics have a cheeky sense of humour though, with one typical dis being ‘Yo Momma don’t wear no drawers!’. I also enjoyed a lyrical riff on the song ‘I Will Survive’ and a surprisingly sweet and heartfelt love song called ‘All I Need’.
4/5
I have a soft spot for this album, on the logical and sensible grounds that everything from Sheffield is super. The hits from this were ubiquitous at the time, but it’s only listening back now that I can appreciate just how much work went into them - it’s a truly lush affair, with sweeping arrangements from Anne Dudley, cutting edge electronica using a Fairlight CMI from JJ Jeczalik, overseen by producer Trevor Horn. It’s no coincidence that these people would form the nucleus of the Art of Noise just one year after this.
The songs all hold up I think, even the spoken passages that make it feel a lost soundtrack to a fifties movie in places. Martin Fry is a classic crooner who knows how to tug at your heart strings, with love and heartbreak being the theme that holds this album together. Classic 80s!
Kid Rock
1/5
OK, I went on a bit of a journey with this one. I initially expected some sort of child friendly novelty music, but the opening track sounded intriguing right up to the point it turned into a white guy rapping. Alarm bells were starting to go off, but I still thought it might turn out to be something like the Beastie Boys (who really are the exception that proves the rule with this sort of music). I then went to check his Wikipedia page, which ticked every single red flag - confederate flag on stage - check, anti vaxer - check, Trump supporter - check. OK, I’m out.
King Crimson
4/5
Well, this is wild.
This classic prog album opens with ‘21st Century Schizoid Man’ that combines an full on Fripp freak out rock guitar solo, freeform jazz, angrily political lyrics and an eerie intro produced when someone accidentally rested their arm on a malfunctioning reed organ.
The second track ‘I Talk to the Wind’ calms things down a little with a flute dancing around the melody, before we get to the mellotron heavy ‘Epitaph’ to close side one. Flipping the album over, there are just two tracks - Moonchild and the cosmic weirdness of the title track which is like some sort of fever dream that builds to an epic climax.
Prog-tastic!
Muddy Waters
4/5
In an uncertain world, it’s always good to start the day with a song that begins “Everything gon’ be alright this morning”. There then follows 50 minutes of gloriously raw, foot stomping blues from one of the all time greats, recorded in just three days with a very live feel to it. It’s one of those albums where it feels like you are in the room with the band, listening to them play.
Alice Cooper
3/5
I always thought that Alice Cooper was just theatrics and Grand Guignol but this album has an interesting set of songs, at least from a musical perspective with well produced 70s rock. The lyrical content is a little more dubious, with songs about psychopathic dentists, necrophilia and the less said about Raped and Freezin’ the better. On the plus side, Elected covers the subject of corrupt politicians with sharp observations written while Richard Nixon was in charge, and is unfortunately even more relevant today.
Jazmine Sullivan
4/5
This was a revelation for me - an extraordinarily frank and smart hip hop album talking about life, sex and relationships from a woman’s perspective. Each song has a short spoken word section that introduces the themes and they are the polar opposite of the painful skits that are usually found on albums like this.
The music is mainly down tempo with gorgeous vocal harmonies showcasing the lyrics. My only quibble is that this technically an EP rather than an album, but I’ve just seen that there’s a deluxe version that is immediately going on my playlist.
Jimi Hendrix
5/5
This album is a bit overlooked, coming just seven months after Hendrix’s debut Are You Experienced. It’s probably the weirdest and most experimental of his albums too, with a very strange intro and lots of strange audio phasing effects in the production mix. Lots to appreciate here, and it points the way to Electric Ladyland.
Sam Cooke
4/5
This album was recorded in 1963, but not released by the record label until 1985, apparently worried that this performance would damage Cooke’s reputation as a pop singer. Well, to put it bluntly, RCA are idiots. This is a fantastic performance - raw, unfiltered and soulful, bantering with an enthusiastic crowd and full of energy. Definitely one of the all time great live albums.
Radiohead
3/5
I think I’ve finally worked out why I didn’t get on with Radiohead back in the day. It goes back to their first album and the ubiquitous hit single Creep, which came across as an attempt by some lamestain cob nobblers from Oxfordshire to sound like a Seattle grunge band, and was enough to put me off.
This album marks the start of their transition into a more experimental and interesting style, with Thom Yorke’s distinctive vocals (probably an acquired taste), obtuse lyrics and interesting guitar noodling. It’s not quite as compelling as the later albums, but worth a listen though.
Milton Nascimento
4/5
I wish that the 1001 Albums list had more albums like this - a genuine surprise and a perfect accompaniment to a hot and sultry day. Even though I couldn’t understand most of the lyrics, I enjoyed the changing moods and instrumentation which was almost Beatles-esque in places. Definitely something out of the ordinary!
Roxy Music
2/5
OK, I thought that I liked Roxy Music, but it turns out that I just like the early hits with Brian Eno freaking out on his cobbled together synthesisers. This album has a couple of interesting rock/blues tracks and a seriously odd one that sounds like it was recorded in a 1930s Berlin nightclub followed by something that sounds like a combination of lute and medieval crumhorn. Other than that, this album is just a stepping stone on the road to their easy listening 80’s era album Avalon.
Oh, and minus several stars for the seriously dodgy sexist cover
Black Flag
4/5
I was somewhat intimidated by this album’s reputation - hardcore thrash punk from wild-eyed Californian anarchists, but it’s surprisingly accessible. Listening to it is like standing on a cliff top in a storm, being buffeted by the wind and feeling the danger and exhilaration of something raw and primal.
There’s the classic punk sound, reminiscent of The Ramones, but they play with that simple structure by changing the tempo and adding new elements. OK, some of the lyrics are screamed and difficult to follow, but others are compelling songs and some highly effective spoken word passages from Henry Rollins in the title track Damaged I, showing where he would later go with his poetry.
My favourite track was probably TV Party, about the joys of watching your favourite shows like Hill Street Blues and Dallas, whilst drinking a few brews. There’s a twist coming though - what if your tv is broken? Oh noes!
Punk-tastic!
Metallica
4/5
Oddly enough this album opens with the classic Enter Sandman with a riff that is almost grunge (it was 1991, after all), but quickly settles down into familiar heavy metal territory with a heavy, doom laden song about being scared of nightmares. Apart from that, The Unforgiven plays with a spaghetti western vibe and Don’t Tread on Me gleefully nicks a riff from the song America from West Side Story.
Metal-tastic!
The Cars
2/5
The Cars are probably best known for their MOR hit ‘Drive’ which was featured as part of the Live Aid concert in 1985, however this album dates back to 1978 and is categorised as New Wave which seems slightly odd. My first impression was that this was closer a 1970s art rock sound, along the lines of Roxy Music and that ilk. It was a pleasant enough listen, but nothing revolutionary - I remembered the track ‘Best Friends Girl’ which was a modest hit in the UK at the time, but the rest of it washed over me.
Pixies
3/5
I’ve always thought that Pixies were sort of the evil goblin godfathers of grunge and hard to get into, but this album actually turns out to feel more like a 60s garage/surf guitar record and is quite a lot of fun. I mostly enjoyed listening to this, but I was slightly disappointed that they didn’t include at least one proper bossanova track.
Massive Attack
5/5
It still seems slightly incongruous that the city of Bristol should be responsible for the entire trip hop genre, but in retrospect this mix of laid back vibes with a hidden edge fits the place perfectly. This is easily one of the best albums of the 90s, albeit overshadowed by Britpop a few years later and a ridiculous controversy during one of the Gulf Wars where they were forced to change their name to Massive for a while. Unfinished Sympathy is the best known track on here, but everything else is worth listening to on the best headphones that you can lay your hands on.
Missy Elliott
3/5
Ok, I’m in two minds about this album - it’s gorgeously produced, and Missy herself has a huge amount of sass. However, it opens with a spoken introduction (including a stunningly uncomfortable reference to the current president of the USA) and there are more of these throughout, feeling almost like a dvd commentary track. I get the sentiment, and the call for rap rivalries to be settled through words rather than violence is heart felt, but they still feel out of place.
Missy can also be as crude as male rappers (equal opportunities!) and there is some cheeky use of sound effects (guess what a cat miaowing is a reference to), but her feminism seems a bit reductive. It’s a positive thing to sing about female sexuality but then she limits it by going on about keeping your man happy so his eyes don’t wander. I mean, really?
The best track is a collaboration with Beyoncé in the form of a phone call between the pair of them, and I wish more of the album had been like that.
The Beach Boys
3/5
If anyone mentions the Beach Boys, you automatically think of sun, surf, sand and girls (in roughly that order) sung by fresh faced, smiling Californian dudes. Alarm bells already start ringing with the cover to this album depicting a defeated spear carrier on a dying horse, looking like a Scandinavian death metal illustration. Whilst the music sort of sounds like the Beach Boys of old, the subjects include death, student riots and pollution with only a couple of moments where Brian Wilson’s genius shines through (notably in the title track which was a hold over from the legendary lost Smile album).
It’s the Beach Boys Jim, but not as we know them.
Fats Domino
5/5
An all time classic, starting with a classic rhythm and blues sound and developing into the rock ‘n’ roll that we all love, influencing both Elvis and the Beatles along the way. This must have been impossibly exciting to hear for the first time back in 1956 and songs like Blueberry Hill still send a shiver down my spine.
The Associates
2/5
Say what you like about the 80's but they certainly had the best one hit wonders. Party Fears Two by the Associates was one of those, and bizarrely went on to be the theme music for Week Ending, a topical comedy programme on BBC Radio 4 that I listened to for many years. The rest of this album is best described as experimental, if the experiment is how can we sound like Sparks crossed with David Bowie playing using a cheap 80s synth and guitars filled with piss (seriously, the wikipedia article is an eye opener!). It's a bit of fun and bought back a few memories but I don't think I'd go back to it again.
The Stooges
5/5
There are many arguments about what exactly is the first punk album, but it’s clear that while Funhouse doesn’t qualify as punk (the songs are too long for starters), you can trace a line from this to the New York scene and just a few years later to the UK.
It’s a remarkable piece of work - raw, uncompromising, and bringing in elements of the West Coast garage sound with hard rock and a noticeable proto-motorik drum sound that anticipates Krautrock by at least a year. Iggy is on fine form with this (the coughing fit in the middle of TV Eye notwithstanding). Perfect for a freak out!
Simon & Garfunkel
3/5
Way back when, we used to visit my uncle and this was one of the albums that he would regularly put on to show off about how good his expensive hi-fi system was. For me, this album evokes rainy Sunday afternoons and an air of almost unbearable sadness at the prospect of Monday morning and school.
The songs all feel mawkish and self pitying, and a lot of the lyrics make no sense when you stop to think about them. Ok, I can understand why you might prefer being a sparrow to being a snail but this is not a choice that’s likely to arise in the real world, is it? Also, how do you lay down like a bridge? Babies can’t drive! Nonsense nonsense nonsense!
The Boxer is good though, mainly for those booming drum crashes in the chorus. Objectively this is a classic album, but I’ve listened to it enough times in my life.
Megadeth
3/5
There is a particular genre of heavy metal which seems to have been explicitly created to appeal to adolescent boys - the cutesy misspelled names (‘deth’), the badly drawn covers with EC Comics style horror mascots and let’s not even start with the lyrical obsession with gruesome subject matters.
In this case, it’s clear that you shouldn’t judge an album by its cover. It kicks in with a blistering pace, with fast, complex and accurate musicianship that wouldn’t be out of place on a 1970s prog album including surprising digressions where they suddenly throw in a bit of Spanish guitar halfway through a track.
The lyrics are also surprisingly on message - ok, so they mainly deal with war and violence but very much from an anti-war stance, talking about the human cost of war (especially religiously inspired conflicts) and there’s a nice dig at ‘military intelligence’ too.
Good stuff all round.
George Michael
4/5
Anyone who grew up as a teenager in the 80s will remember Wham as the ultimate disposable teeny-bop boy band who everyone thought would have a string of number one hits before flaming out and being replaced by the next sensation. No one expected that George Michael would mature into a one of the best singer song writers of his generation starting with the album Faith in 1987 followed by this one in 1990.
Of the two, this is the more introspective and heartfelt record with fewer obvious hit singles. Apparently this made Sony nervous and they failed to promote it properly in the US, leading to long running legal wrangles. This didn’t stop it being a huge hit in the UK though, and it easily stands as one of George Michael’s best albums, made even more poignant by his tragic death in 2016.
Michael Jackson
2/5
OK, let’s start with the good. This is objectively a fine album, musically speaking. Quincy Jones is clearly the driving force behind this and his trademark production genius is to the fore, and there are songwriting credits for Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney too. The bad, is that it’s very difficult to listen to this knowing what we do about just how damaged Jackson was and how that manifested itself in his later life.
Black Sabbath
5/5
Black Sabbath were a band born out of sheer bloody mindedness with their unique sound being a combination of guitarist Tony Iommi’s adapted playing style after losing the tips of his fingers in an industrial accident and Ozzy Osborne’s doom laden vocals that were a perfect fit for songs about the occult.
The album opens with wind, rain and an ominous tolling bell, before that famous tritone chord kicks in like something out a Hammer Horror movie, with a song inspired by a nightmare that bassist Geezer Butler had about waking up to see an ominous black figure pointing at him. Other songs take Tolkien and HP Lovecraft as inspirations, although we are now a long way from the hippy, dippy sixties.
This is widely regarded as the first true heavy metal album (although Ozzy was reluctant to call it that), and it’s certainly one of the biggest influences on the metal scene as evidenced by the bands that contributed to Black Sabbath’s final show just a couple of weeks ago as well as the outpouring of love for Ozzy himself from fans and fellow artists. It was a fine way to bow out - rest in peace Ozzy!
Shivkumar Sharma
4/5
This is exactly the sort of album that there should be more of on this list. It’s an improvised piece based on traditional Indian musical raga forms, telling the story of a day in the life of a shepherd. As well as the evocative sounds of the tabla and santor, there are also guitars and flutes which made this a crossover between Indian and Western music and influenced people like George Harrison and David Crosby.
The YouTube link has the original album:
https://youtu.be/yFWfF3Zow74
The Undertones
5/5
Life was tough for young people growing up in Northern Ireland in the late 70s - unemployment, poverty and the troubles all loomed large, as well as the universal concerns of teen angst and heartbreak. The Undertones focussed mainly on the last two with their songs that were instantly relatable to anyone who has ever sat in their bedroom wondering if they will ever get a girlfriend / boyfriend (delete as appropriate).
The late John Peel famously declared that Teenage Kicks was his favourite song of and played it twice in a row on his show. It’s still as good as it ever was, but there is a lot more to discover on this album with 16 songs clocking it at just over half an hour. It’s punk played with considerable verve and sung by Feargal Sharkey with his distinctive warbling vocals that were unlike anything else in the charts at the time.
Jeff Beck
2/5
The UK blues Rock scene of the 60s was a very incestuous thing. People would start bands, split up, go off on solo projects and then reunite for super groups. Jeff Beck was originally part of the Yardbirds but then fired in the middle of a tour.
This was his solo album featuring Rod Stewart on vocals, who, it has to be said, is not really the best fit for this sort of blues music. In fact there’s a good argument to be made that white blokes from England shouldn’t be really appropriating black American music like this. Weirdly enough this album also includes a version of Greensleeves which at least is authentically English. but doesn’t really fit with anything else.
The best track for me was the bouncy singalong Hi Ho Silver Lining (included on the bonus track version) which I remember from many a school disco back in the day.
Queen Latifah
3/5
Well, this was a lot of fun - I really enjoyed the variety of music here with Queen Latifah’s assured rapping on top. The guest artists are a treat too, with De La Soul being a highlight. The only downsides were a couple of tracks featuring men, and some of the 80’s house beats sounded a bit weedy in comparison with the more substantial soul and funk tracks.
LL Cool J
2/5
Ok, I’m starting to think this list might be deliberately messing with me. After saying that I sort of enjoyed a hip-hop album yesterday, it immediately throws me another one, but this time we’re back to the tedious bragging over tired beats. The only track that I really enjoyed was an ode to the joys of eating cornflakes, and I realised that the hip hop albums I like are the ones that have a sense of humour and don’t take themselves too seriously.
Hole
4/5
Courtney Love has been on the receiving end of a lot of misogynistic snobbery from the music press and a particular demographic of male music fans, who saw her as some sort of Yoko figure riding on the coat tails of Kurt Cobain and even wild conspiracy theories blaming her for his death. In response, she put out a string of excellent albums, of which this is probably the best - assured, polished and confident post grunge indie rock with some real bangers. My highlight was probably the final track Petals which is insanely catchy.
Shack
4/5
This was a band that I hadn’t heard of and they were classed as Britpop, at least according to Wikipedia. This washed over me on first listening, but then I went back and gave them another chance and that that’s when they grabbed me. This is closer to folk rock like the Waterboys or Echo & The Bunnymen, with a darker edge hidden under the jangly guitars and (at first hearing) cosy songs.
They’re from Liverpool with Irish heritage somewhere in the mix, and listening closely shows that they are singing about the experiences of being broke, trying to buy drugs and of a would be thief getting knee-capped for his troubles. Yikes. This probably explains why they were overlooked by mainstream music fans who preferred songs about boozy lads holidays and dog racing.
Scouse-tastic!
The Adverts
4/5
What do you do if you’re a bored teenager in the 1970s, living in a small village in the arse end of nowhere (or Devon as it’s properly known)? You grab a guitar, learn one chord and start a punk band! The Adverts certainly nail the Ramones sound, and they’re a lot more talented than their one chord reputation might suggest. Front man TV Smith has an authentic punk sneer and his songs are spiky and literate, and he’s well supported by Gaye Advert’s amazing bass playing that underpins some enthusiastic guitar and drums to complete the lineup.
The highlight is the (controversial at the time) Gary Gilmore’s Eyes that picks up a macabre death row request from the titular spree killer to donate his corneas to medical science before facing a firing squad. Probably the catchiest song about a murderous eye transplant to hit the top 20!
Eye-tastic!
Stephen Stills
2/5
Naming your band after a famous Confederate battle in the American Civil War is certainly a flex, but after reading the stories of how the band were made to work on multiple takes of tracks in marathon studio sessions, perhaps Stephen Stills thinks that slavery was a fine idea? Anyhoo, the resulting double album is a bit of a sprawling mess of different genres, but the best section for me is found on side 2 (or whatever the digital equivalent is) which features some nice bluegrass and country sounds amidst the 70s soft rock.
4/5
I mean, of course I’m going to love an album with a song titled “If Your a Wizard Then Why Do You Wear Glasses?“ (sic). This is great, weird, experimental stuff with tribal drums, songs about witches and witch trials, and references to the Brocken mountain legends. I’m pretty sure that this will polarise listeners, but I’ll take this over yet another hip hop or 70s yacht rock snooze fest any day.
The Birthday Party
4/5
You might expect an album by a band called The Birthday Party to be mainly songs about jelly, cake and balloons, but hello, who’s this shambling into the studio? That’s right kiddies, it’s our old friend Nick Cave fronting this post punk band and sounding like Tom Waits, if he’d decided to focus on heroin instead of booze.
This is reliably good stuff from Cave though, and clearly shows where he would be heading later with the Bad Seeds and his solo work. One track of note is ‘Release the Bats’ which was an early proto-goth song, featuring the memorable line "sex horror sex bat sex sex horror sex vampire sex bat horror vampire sex."
Goth-tastic!
The Good, The Bad & The Queen
2/5
Just a note for international readers - not everyone in the UK lives in London, or wants to live in London, or even just visit it for a day out to remind themselves why they don’t want to live in London. Even if you’re a Londoner, a concept album about London from well known geezer Damon Albarn and pals is probably a bit much. It didn’t really grab me as each track seemed to just be indistinguishable droning over a bit of plinky plonky piano like a drunken sing along in the Queen Vic, but probably not as much fun.
Saint Etienne
4/5
Mixing down tempo house beats and eclectic samples, with some gorgeous vocals this album hits all the right notes for me. Their most famous track is a cover of Neil Young’s Only Love Can Break Your Heart which is in strong contention for one of my favourite covers of all time. This track was recorded in two hours, featuring Moria Lambert on vocals and earned the band a recording deal and a respectable hit in the process. Lambert was later replaced by Sarah Cracknell who performed the rest of the tracks on this debut album.
I’m not sure why I missed this album first time around, but I’m glad I’ve found it now and I’ll certainly be listening to more of their work.
David Bowie
5/5
Every Bowie album is a transition, from one style of music to another and a change of persona too. This album saw Bowie going through a serious cocaine problem, on the edge of a nervous breakdown. He said goodbye to the plastic soul of Young Americans and became the Thin White Duke, a sinister drug addled anti-hero with dubious politics, and took inspiration from European electronica and Krautrock in particular.
The title track pays homage to Kraftwerk’s Trans-Europe Express as it opens with eerie electronic train sounds and builds up a metronomic beat before letting rip in a joyous stomping finale. Other highlights are Golden Years, which harks back to his earlier soul sounds and the final track Wild is the Wind which anticipates the haunting sounds of his Berlin albums and his later film soundtracks.
Spiritualized
2/5
It’s quite an achievement to make an album that you can listen to for an hour and have absolutely no memory of what you’ve just heard. As the final track finished, I genuinely struggled to recall anything about it. I guess it’s 60s psychedelia through a 90s shoegaze lens, with bits of ambient and drone music thrown in. In theory this should be right up my street, but it’s not quite as good as the bands that it tries to emulate - there are nods to the Velvet Underground, the synths from 70’s Who and Hawkwind, and possibly a bit of Brian Eno, but it never quite gels.
It’s billed as Space Rock but it never gets much beyond a disappointing sub-orbital flight.
4/5
This sounds exactly like the sort of 70s psychedelic prog rock album that you would expect to hear from someone called “Randy California” (stop sniggering at the back!). It’s a varied mix of different styles and it feels like it influenced other bands - the track Space Child wouldn’t sound out of place on The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway by Genesis which came out four years after this.
It’s also instructive to compare this with the 1990’s album Lazer Guided Melodies from Spiritualized that came up on my list yesterday - this is very much the sort of space rock that the latter album was trying (and failing) to emulate. Probably not the sort of thing I’d listen to regularly but a solid album nonetheless.
The Beta Band
2/5
If there’s a band from the early 2000s that I haven’t heard of then there’s probably a good reason. In this case the Beta Band are perfectly named - they’re fine, average, middle ranking, unlikely to trouble the charts and most likely to cover for a replacement afternoon slot on the second stage somewhere like Latitude or Truckfest. They won’t frighten the horses or upset your nan. I quite enjoyed the 60s vibe on some of the tracks and the dog barking on Outside. That’s about it.
Tom Waits
5/5
Let’s be honest here, if you aren’t already a Tom Waits fan then this album is going to be a tough place to start. It takes a very back to basics approach, recorded in a bare bones studio with concrete walls giving a raw, visceral sound.
The songs take no prisoners, dealing with death, murder ballads, religion (from mawkish to fire and brimstone Old Testament stuff) and the Earth dying screaming. Cheery.
Tom himself is on fine gravelly voiced form and sounds like he’s been gargling with bourbon and razor blades to get in shape. For anyone that can get on board with this, you’re in for a fine time with music that will stay with you for a long time.
Cocteau Twins
2/5
I was very taken with the Cocteau Twins early albums from the start of the 1980s. They had a certain otherworldly charm that was quite unlike anything else in the charts at the time. However, by the time this album came out in 1990 I think that they’d lost something. I mean, she even sings in English at some points!
The production also had that 90s plasticky, digital feel losing the analogue warmth of the earlier recordings. I guess that they were pre-cursors of shoe gaze but by this point, there were other bands who were shoe-ier and gaze-ier.
Belle & Sebastian
2/5
I’m not usually one to judge an album by its cover but in this case, come on, what were they thinking? I don’t care how arty and black & white it is, it’s still a topless woman pretending to breast feed a stuffed toy tiger. Once you get past this, the music is largely inoffensive folky, pop with one weirdly out of place electro dance number.
Common
3/5
The title and cover for this album make a powerful statement about endemic and systematic racism, and the music and lyrics back that up mostly. I really enjoyed the nods towards Afro-beat and jazz, with production from the great J Dilla adding a lot to the mix as well.
However, there is still an uncomfortable amount of casual sexism and homophobia on here. Apparently Common has now apologised for this, but it’s difficult to understand how you can be opposed to one form of injustice while not seeing yourself perpetuating the same attitudes towards other oppressed groups.
Metallica
3/5
There comes a time in every rock bands life when they’ve thrown all of the tellies out of the hotel windows and parked their Rolls Royces in the swimming pool, and they’re wondering how to spend their advance from the record company, and somebody (probably the bass player) suggests recording a live album with (get this man) a full symphony orchestra, because Bach was like, really metal, if you think about it, dig?
The rest of the band will try to dissuade him, but then the accountant says it would probably be good for tax reasons so they book an orchestra and set to arranging their tunes for maximum epicness and coming up with a rude joke for the title - Symphony and Metallica (abbreviated to S&M - do you see what they did there?)
The results in this case are actually pretty good - the conductor and arranger Michael Kamen uses the orchestra to set the stage for Metallica’s signature metal songs and the audience is clearly loving it (and singing along). All of the favourites are here, but the highlight for me is probably the classic Enter Sandman which sounds suitably awesome.
Classical-tastic!
Nightmares On Wax
5/5
Currently listening to this album on my best headphones sat outside enjoying the late August sunshine, and I already feel more relaxed. This is music for lazy days and cool evenings, effortlessly mixing classic beats and trip hop rhythms with aplomb. Unreserved five stars for this one.
Tangerine Dream
5/5
Back in 1973 modular synthesisers and sequencers were expensive, complicated and temperamental things. For this album, the band spent their advance on buying the latest technology available from Moog and then had to spend hours each day tinkering with it before they could start recording. Even when you finally got the sounds you were trying for, the analogue capacitors in the machines would start overheating and affecting the output in unpredictable ways. This can be heard on the title piece, a seventeen minute improvisation in the studio, where the sound starts to go a little wonky towards the end.
The end result is still something magical though - it has a warmth and random charm that is missing from modern digital synths and production technology, and the music points the way towards things like ambient and even acid house and dub sounds from decades in the future from when this was made. Genuine, pioneering musical genius.
Synth-tastic!
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
5/5
While he was working on his previous album Skeleton Tree, Nick Cave and his family suffered an almost unimaginable tragedy - his 15 year old son Arthur died in an accident in horrific circumstances, leaving behind a family wracked and broken by grief. While some of the lyrics on Skeleton Tree dealt with the immediate aftermath, this album is about the process of going through the grief of losing a child, dealing with anger, despair, poignant memories and ultimately accepting the unacceptable truth. It’s not an easy listen, but it’s an unforgettable one that speaks to a fundamental human experience.
Dead Kennedys
5/5
America is bitterly divided. A doddering celebrity president is weaponising the government to line his pockets while grinding down the poorest with militarised police actions. Foreign wars are used as handy distractions and the milquetoast democrats are worse than useless. Oh, wait, 1980 wasn’t all that different from now.
Damn, I wish this album wasn’t relevant today but it bloody well is. Songs like Kill the Poor, Holiday in Cambodia and California Uber Alles still hit as hard as they ever did, backed with rock solid classic punk tunes. Fourteen songs in just over half an hour, no messing. Listen to this and then go and eat the rich.
MC Solaar
5/5
French hip-hop was probably the last thing I was expecting today, but this hooked me straight away. My schoolboy French is pretty rusty, so he could have been rapping about his cat throwing up on the carpet or going down the shops, but whatever it was sounded effortlessly cool. MC Solaar himself is of Senegalese origin, so the beats mix in some Afrobeat with soul, jazz and a certain Gallic Je ne sais quoi. C’est fantastique!
Todd Rundgren
3/5
I had always thought that Todd Rundgren was an 80s rock guitarist and jobbing producer, but it turns out he has a lot of different strings to his bow, including a career that started in the 60s and this wildly ambitious self produced 1973 solo album on which he sings, programs the synths and plays just about everything. Musically this is prog with a sprinkling of 60s psychedelia and experimental electronica. Somehow he also managed to cram 56 minutes of music on to a single vinyl disc. Amazeballs.
Run-D.M.C.
2/5
Rock and hip-hop might have seemed like an unlikely combo back in 1986, but in retrospect who better for a group of misogynistic rappers to team up with than some misogynistic rock dinosaurs to sing about taking advantage of school girls at a high school dance. The rest of the album isn’t much better, including a whole song about their favourite brand of trainers.
Slade
4/5
It’s tempting to dismiss Slade as a novelty glam rock band, appearing on Top of the Pops with mirrored hats and outrageous mutton chop whiskers, but they were always much more than that. For a while in the early 70s, Slade were one of the biggest bands in the UK and they also managed a great comeback as a last minute replacement for Ozzy Osborne at the Monsters of Rock in 1980.
This album is a classic example of a rock solid band on top form, with a great selection of original songs and a couple of covers. Noddy Holder has a unique vocal style, and you can hear his Black Country accent creeping in. The rest of the band are equally tight, and as well as the stomp along numbers there are a couple of quieter tracks featuring (gasp!) a piano and even some harmonies.
Bostin!
Chicago
2/5
This is a bit of an odd one. There’s a solid album of pleasant enough jazzy soft rock here, but for some reason they decided to pad it out to a double by including some tracks recorded at and inspired by the infamous 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago and an utterly bonkers improvised experimental guitar freak out that wouldn’t be out of place on a Hendrix album. File under “What were they thinking?”
N.E.R.D
3/5
To be honest, I was expecting something a little bit more nerdy from these. There aren’t really any songs about the finer points of being a train spotter or what warp numbers in Star Trek mean, but it’s still a fun piece of rap/rock featuring Pharrell Williams and Lenny Kravitz amongst others. Probably a solid three stars but not sure if I’d go out of my way to listen to anything else by them.
Sonic Youth
4/5
Post punk, pre-grunge and completely different to just about everything else happening in 1987. In a weird bit of synchronicity, I found out the track Schizophrenia was inspired by Philip K Dick, just after I finished reading The Man in the High Castle yesterday. It’s very fitting - the album manages to be cerebral and sonically challenging - this is definitely one I’ll be returning to.
The Human League
5/5
The Human League (fun fact - named after a faction in a 70s sci-fi war game) were stalwarts of the early Sheffield avant garde electro scene. However, when half the original line up left to form Heaven 17 the future looked uncertain until front man Phil Oakey recruited two young women that he met in a club one night to act as backing singers and to bring a new dynamic to the band. The fact that they were still at school caused a few problems, when they had to be transported from recording sessions back to Sheffield to sit their exams! The 80s were a different time, but fortunately everything was above board in this case with no funny business.
The album showed a development from their earlier sound to a more pop sensibility, but they still retained a unique style in their songs. Apparently Oakey didn’t think that Don’t You Want Me was all that good, but he was overruled and it went on to be one of the defining hits of the 80s that still holds up today. There’s plenty of other good stuff here too with dance floor filler Sound of the Crowd, a cover of Roy Budd’s classic theme to Get Carter and a song about Judge Dredd.
Asymmetric-haircut-tastic!
The Saints
3/5
Australian punk is a new genre for me, but to be honest it’s pretty similar to punk from anywhere else in the world. The album opens with the update “Know Your Product”, a pointed blast at consumer culture, featuring an excellent horn section which definitely adds a bit of pep. The album sags a little after this but there are some nice touches of humour and political savvy. Judging by this album they were unjustly overlooked at the time, but interesting in retrospect and definitely an influence on the second wave of punk bands like the Boomtown Rats and others.
The United States Of America
1/5
You remember that guy in college? The one who thought he was a total legend and would come into the student bar with a traffic cone on his head saying “Look at me! I’m crazy!”, then he did too much acid whilst listening to Sgt Peppers and dropped out to go and live on a mushroom farm in Wales.
This album is the audio equivalent of that guy. They couldn’t afford $20,000 for Moog synthesisers so they built their own out of cobbled together oscillators and the result sounds like being attacked by a swarm of bees whilst wearing a metal bucket on your head. There are some more traditional psychedelic/prog songs on there with lots of audio tricks that probably sounded clever in 1968 but the result now is just about unlistenable and triggered my tinnitus.
The band broke up shortly after releasing their one and only album, and for all anybody knows are still living on a mushroom farm in Wales.
5/5
Bob Dylan is one of the greatest song writers of all time, no doubt about it. I know that his vocal style is a major stumbling block for some people, but this live performance allows the emotion behind his lyrics to shine through.
The first half is his traditional acoustic set, but the second half is where he goes electric, much to the dismay of some hidebound folkies in the audience. They were wrong then and they’re still wrong now. Bob plus a band adds an extra dimension to the music.
Judas-tastic!
Kanye West
1/5
Kanye West is one of the most successful rap artists of all time, so sure he must have some level of talent, aside from his far right politics? Well, I lasted about one and a half tracks and then looked up the rest of the lyrics online. There’s no pathos, warmth or humour to be found here - just an endless steam of mother-effin n words, bigotry, violence and sexism, with no redeeming qualities, like every other gangsta rapper from the 90s. Appalling.
Elvis Costello & The Attractions
4/5
The post punk period in the UK was an extraordinary blast of creativity. Where most punks were largely apolitical (the Clash notwithstanding), Costello's songwriting was a blast against the recently elected Thatcher government as well as covering traditional topics of love and relationships.
It's impossible to discuss this album without mentioning the use of the N word in Olivers Army, and anti-war song told both from the perspective of a soldier serving in Northern Ireland during the troubles and the racist politicians who sent him there to die. Costello was well known for being deliberately provocative (and indeed got into considerable trouble on a tour of the USA around this time by running his mouth off in an argument with Stephen Stills).
He doesn't use the word in this song any more but the fact that it was broadcast on Radio One and Top of the Pops at the time without comment says more about British attitudes at the time than it does about Costello himself.
Other than that, this is a fine collection of songs that have largely stood the test of time.
The Prodigy
2/5
This album came out at the arse end of UK rave crossing into 90s lad culture. The result is aggressive, misogynistic and unpleasant, and feels like you are about to be punched in the face by a drunk geezer in an England shirt. I like some of the music, but I really can’t cope with the lyrics or the way they’re sung. I get that the late Keith Flint is now seen as a sort of cuddly grandpa figure but he’s not very likeable on here.
Emmylou Harris
4/5
A friend of mine sent me the title track of this album on a mix cd many years ago and I’m now kicking myself for not listening to the rest of the album before now. The music here falls somewhere between country, folk and Americana with some interesting touches of world music from other places too.
This is Harris’ 19th album but the first where she wrote almost all of the songs, and there are some great guest cameos too, notably Patty Scialfa and Bruce Springsteen on Tragedy. The highlight is still Red Dirt Girl which takes me back to opening a letter from America and putting a cd in the player all those years ago.
Venom
3/5
I was a little bit nervous when I pressed play on this one, but it wasn’t long before I was genuinely enjoying myself. It opens with the sound of a chainsaw ripping through some sheet metal and then gleefully continues with occult songs name checking just about every demon in the AD&D Monster Manual.
It was when I got on to the track Buried Alive which has a comedy vicar performing a burial service as the sound of earth hitting a coffin lid fills your ears, that I realised that these guys were just having a laugh with an album so over the top that it seems designed to cause maximum offence to the moral majority types.
It’s only on Teacher’s Pet where the sexism and the implied story of a schoolboy being seduced by their teacher, that it threatens to cross the line into being genuinely offensive, but we are soon back to cheery songs about vampires and witches and devils.
With this album they pretty much invented the entire genre of Black Metal by accident, and unfortunately some later bands would take it all a bit more seriously.
Satan-tastic!
Ms. Dynamite
4/5
This really is a phenomenal debut album, sung from the heart with much to say about the experience of being a young black woman growing up in London at the turn of the millennium. Ms Dynamite herself is labelled as being a rapper, but I’d put this more in the camp of R&B and soul, and it compares very favourably with something like The Miseducation of Lauren Hill. An unexpected delight for a Monday morning!
Gene Clark
2/5
Gene Clark was a founder member the Byrds, but left after various disputes in 1966, and spent the next decade or so in various collaborations and solo projects. This album from 1974 is a bit of a hodge podge of country, folk, soft rock, jazz and gospel, and the lyrics are similarly diverse (and very possibly drug inspired). Apparently it bombed at the time, and in retrospect it’s interesting rather than essential.
Digital Underground
1/5
The idea of a hip hop sci-fi concept album about virtual reality sex at least sounded like someone trying something different, but the actual result was unpleasantly juvenile and prurient. The opening track is an incessant six minutes of rhymes about humping and then the next track uses the lyric “verbally raped”. Big nope from me at that point.
Tim Buckley
3/5
I’d always assumed that Tim Buckley was a slightly fay folk musician, but this album opens with a menacing anti-war song about the horrors of Vietnam. It’s followed by a series of increasingly psychedelic pieces, some in the folk tradition but others definitely edging into heavier rock. The second track has a sinister fairground calliope in the background and a later track obliquely references the way he abandoned his pregnant wife and divorced her just after his baby (Jeff) was born (“I Never Asked to Be Your Mountain”). Wow. Not much peace and bloody love there.
This is an album very much of its time, and that time is 1967 just after Sgt Pepper’s changed everything. There are lots of dark edges here and a sense of bad times to come.
Kelela
3/5
I initially wasn’t sure quite what to make of this album, but then I noticed that it’s a release on the Warp label which is always reassuring to me. It’s R&B at heart, but married with some gorgeous, understated electronica and immaculately produced. It’s a debut album and she lists her influences as R&B, Jazz and Björk which sort of makes sense if you think about the more laid back and ambient areas of those genres. I’m definitely intrigued by this album enough to listen to this again and investigate more of her work.
Common
3/5
You know that meme of the woman pulling a face after trying kombucha for the first time? When I saw that Kanye West was involved as a producer on this, I initially pulled the sour face, but then I saw that J Dilla was also credited on a couple of tracks so, well, maybe face? This is straight forward hip-hop/rap, but the usual barrage of mf’ing n-words is refreshingly low, and the backing music has a sort of 70s soul feel to it.
As expected, the two J Dilla tracks are excellent (‘Love Is’ and ‘It’s Your World’), the latter featuring a chorus of kids saying what they want to be when they grow up, from astronaut to obstetrician including duck and first African American female president, something that could have been sappy but is actually quite sweet in context.
Leftfield
5/5
Combining Afrofuturism with trip hop and very danceable dub and reggae inspired beats, this is probably one of the best dance albums of the 90s. I was initially drawn to the song Open Up featuring John Lyndon as a magnificently sneering guest vocalist, but there’s lots more to enjoy here. I particularly like the way that tracks like Release the Pressure and Afro Left build up into dance floor fillers. The production is immaculate and sounds great both on headphones and bass heavy speakers. Easy five stars from me!
Gillian Welch
4/5
One thing that I really enjoy about listening to these albums is the sheer variety of styles and genres that count as music. In this case, this is sparse and acoustic and I guess would be classed somewhere between country, folk and Americana. It was recorded in the same RCA recording studio where Elvis worked, which gives it a unique resonance and suits their style.
The opening track was their initial mic test in the studio, and a later track was recorded the very first time they had played it. It gives the album a very raw and immediate feel, with production that puts you right in the middle of the music. All of the songs are original compositions, but my favourite was Red Clay Halo which sounds like it could have been a traditional Bluegrass number.
Banjo-tastic!
The Damned
4/5
At the end of the 70s some punk bands went political, whilst others disappeared up their own nihilism. The Damned took a different direction, with this album that veers around like a dodgem car in a ramshackle fun fair. It opens with a clip of the actor who played Albert Tatlock on Coronation Street, lurching into a proper punk love song, followed by songs that range from proto-hardcore thrash to heavy metal to lovely piano interludes.
The lyrics pay tribute to characters from the Bunty (a 70s girls comic, m’lud) to Vampira from Plan 9 from Outer Space, and a thoughtful evisceration of organised religion. There are some cheeky snippets of studio banter, with the band clearly having a whale of a time. The album closer Smash it Up (Parts One and Two) was apparently banned by a pearl clutching BBC committee, but is actually a charming instrumental leading into a joyous riot.
Punk-tastic!
The Jam
2/5
Being in a band with your mates when you’re a teenager should be a hoot, a chance to lark about and play the music that you love. Judging by the cover of this album, the Jam make it look utterly joyless. This album was part of the late 70s mod revival (only ten years after the actual mod scene) and it feels like they’re approaching the music with exaggerated po-faced reverence rather than any sense of appreciation.
Their cover of David Watts by the Kinks takes a cheeky song about a homoerotic schoolboy crush and sucks the life out of it. Even Down in a Tube Station, the big hit off this album, comes across as preachy and overblown (and it really didn’t need 30 seconds of train noises on the outro).
The best song on here by far is English Rose, where Weller finally lets a bit of wistful longing into his voice with a nice bit of acoustic guitar and sensitive production.
Jeff Buckley
3/5
There is something inherently tragic about listening to an album from a rock star who died young. Looking at their picture on the album cover, forever frozen in time, with just their songs left to talk to us now.
In Buckley’s case, he released just this one album then died, apparently after a swimming accident, at the age of 30. There’s an additional level of poignancy here, because his father Tim (who had abandoned him as a baby) also died young, in his case from a drugs overdose at 28. Both father and son were not really appreciated when they were alive, but now have posthumous reputations that have grown as time has passed.
Tim Buckley’s ghost haunts this record - it was released in 1994, but it harks back to the folk rock sounds of the 60s and 70s, particularly in the cover versions of the songs Lilac Wine and Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. It’s difficult to know what directions Jeff may have gone in after this, and we’ll never find out.
Robbie Williams
4/5
Boy bands are inherently ephemeral creations. Some Svengali-like figure will assemble an identikit group from a crowd of young hopefuls, give them a carefully crafted selection of songs aimed with laser guided precision at the tween age demographic and then move on to the next pop sensation after a year or two. What happens to the young men involved when the hits dry up and their first cohort of fans grow up?
I would be hard pressed to name a single hit by Take That, or pick most of them out of a police line up for that matter, but for some reason Robbie Williams broke the mould. He was the cheeky one out of the group, and in the recent biopic A Better Man he was shown as an anthropomorphic chimpanzee character, and not really expected to do anything other than dance in support of the better looking boys at the front of the lineup.
His first solo album combines a bit of jaunty Brit-pop, some mawkish and surprising affecting ballads (Angels is one of the top songs played at funerals in the UK) and at least one genuine banger. OK, so a lot of songs are about how tough it is to date posh girls whilst being showered with drugs and booze, but something about this record rings true.
If you listen right to the end there’s a hidden track called ‘Hello Sir’ addressed to a cruel teacher who once told a young boy that he’d never amount to much, and should give up his dreams and join the army. I wonder if that teacher ever changed his ways?
Chimp-tastic!
Pet Shop Boys
4/5
As the 90s dawned, the Pet Shop Boys made a conscious step away from the harsh digital sounds of the 80s by using analogue synths and featuring Johnny Marr on guitar. They also brought Harold Faltermeyer in as a producer and Angelo Badalamenti for strings and orchestral arrangements. The result is a more restrained and thoughtful record than some of their better known big gay disco stomps of the 80s, harking back to their iconic first hit West End Girls.
I really enjoyed the lush electronica on this, with shimmering string arrangements set against songs of quiet grief for friends lost to AIDS in the 80s and introspective worries about the state of the world.
Carpenters
3/5
For an easy listening album, this is surprisingly difficult to listen to, but not for the reasons you might expect. It opens with the syrupy-sweet ‘We’ve Only Just Begun’ which weirdly enough was written as an advertising jingle for a real estate company to sell mortgages to newly weds. Things pick up a bit after a while with Karen Carpenter’s gorgeous vocals being perfectly suited to the three Burt Bacharach songs on this album, and a haunting cover of Help by the Beatles.
Reading the back story to this album revealed a tragedy waiting to happen. Karen was an extraordinarily talented drummer (just search for clips of her playing on YouTube) but her pushy parents and somewhat controlling older brother Richard forced her into the spotlight as lead vocalist, singing sappy songs instead of the upbeat numbers she preferred. Karen managed to play drums on a couple of tracks on this album, and it’s interesting to hear the jazzy, progressive sound on the final track ‘Another Song’ as maybe the style that she preferred.
Karen Carpenter was only 20 when this album was recorded, and her struggles with anorexia and the demands of being in the public eye are well documented. She recorded a solo album, fronting the $400,000 costs, and was devastated when the studio (and her brother) refused to release it. She also suffered in an unhappy marriage to a much older man and passed away from a heart attack aged only 32.
In retrospect, her recording of Help seems painfully prescient. Rest in peace Karen.
Big Star
1/5
Imagine an album of music made by people who are bored and irritated by the whole process and each other. This album from 1974 is exactly that and sounds as you might expect, a shambolic, rambling mess that was wisely shelved at the time. For some reason it attained a semi-mythical status through bootlegged tapes and was eventually released four years later. They really shouldn’t have bothered.
The Rolling Stones
2/5
Death hangs heavily over this album. Brian Jones, the founder of the band, was unceremoniously fired from the band a few weeks into the recording due to his drug habit and was found dead, drowned in his swimming pool, not long after. The day after the album was released the Stones played the infamous Altamont festival and a young fan was stabbed to death by the Hells Angels who had been hired as ‘security’ for the event.
The high points on this album are the first and last track, but a lot of their impact now is due to their use on every dime a dozen gangster movie set at the end of the sixties. The rest of the music is just more white men from England appropriating delta blues and honky tonk music, sung with Jagger’s louche and lazy drawl. I don’t need to hear this again, I think.
Adele
4/5
I remember enjoying 21 when I listened to it courtesy of this list, and this follow up is pretty much more of the same. The music has developed into a slightly poppier sound, even touching on a gospel sound on the track River Lea. She still seems to be singing from the perspective of someone much older than the 25 years of age that she was at the time, with a remarkable amount of wisdom and insight. Not really my usual listening but a fine album nonetheless.
Sonic Youth
3/5
I think that this album got lumped in with grunge-mania at the time, which is slightly unfair. It’s their seventh album, and pretty much in the same post-punk/experimental vein as previous releases. This is a varied selection of songs, alternating between vocals from Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon, and occasionally descending into howls of feedback and distorted guitars to thrilling effect. Good stuff.
Simon & Garfunkel
3/5
29 minutes long with 12 tracks - this is going to be a banging punk album, right? Well, maybe not. I haven’t listened to this album before, but a couple of the tracks are familiar from hearing them on the radio, ranging from nicely harmonised folk to bouncy pop and a Bob Dylan style rant about the government and numerous drug references. One odd surprise was a cover of the carol Silent Night overlaid with a grim news bulletin. Not as good as Bridge Over Troubled Waters.
Van Morrison
1/5
It’s not that he’s now a tin foil hat conspiracy theorist and anti-vaxer, it’s just that this album is dull. He takes what should be a thrilling set of soul and jazz songs and somehow turns it into a snooze fest. At no point does he seem to be engaging with the audience in any meaningful way and the whole thing just shambles on without ever grabbing me. This is a double album, and apparently only the first volume. I’ll take a pass on the rest.
Roni Size
3/5
Drum and Bass is something of an acquired taste, but I found the insistent rhythms on this overlaid with gorgeous vocals to be utterly compelling. The repetitive beats end up being hypnotic and almost fade into the background, in a similar way to minimalist classical pieces by Philip Glass do. Excellent stuff!
Maxwell
3/5
If I didn’t know that this album was from 1996 then the opening track here would convince me that this was a lost soul classic from the early 70s. It’s a great beginning, but the rest of the album doesn’t quite live up to it, being self produced smooth, jazzy soul with the occasional cringy lyric - I’m not entirely sure that promising to keep someone in a locked room having sex with them for days until the police come knocking is quite as romantic as Maxwell seems to think!
David Holmes
3/5
This sounds like the soundtrack to an impossibly cool blaxploitation flick or a 70s James Bond spy thriller set in New York, complete with breakbeats and sampled speech snippets. Looking at David Holmes’ discography shows that he has indeed made a respectable career in recording film soundtracks, so maybe this was an audition piece. Anyhoo, it’s strong enough to stand on its own and is a fun listening experience
Santana
4/5
This is an astonished rich piece of work, combining latin rhythms with blisteringly good rock lead guitar. I was amazed to discover today that Carlos Santana was only 22 when this was recorded. The highlight for me is a cheeky cover of Oye Como Va by the legendary Tito Puente. The only thing that drags this down is the horribly sexist origin of the album title and the associated artwork on the cover.
Thundercat
4/5
It’s always possible to tell when someone is having a good time putting an album together, and in Thundercat’s case the fun is infectious. The music is bouncy and funky, even if it does sound like the soundtrack to a Super Mario Galaxy game in places. The last case is a real possibility because it turns out that our Mr Thundercat is something of a nerd.
He dedicates one track to his cat Tron and another about how much he likes being in Tokyo visiting Gundam cafes and spending all his money on anime. He also worries about posting every single thought on Twitter. He does touch on some more traditional lyrical topics but even when he’s getting inadvisably drunk it’s on Bombay Sapphire gin.
Nerd-tastic!
Everything But The Girl
3/5
I remember Everything but the Girl as falling into that particular genre of music to play on CD at 80s dinner parties - low key and unlikely to upset any horses or maiden aunts. This album was a little more interesting though, tending towards trip hop/electronica (with a few restrained breakbeats) paired with Tracy Thorn’s smooth and slightly fey vocals. Solid, middle of the road easy listening.
Syd Barrett
3/5
It’s easy to make light of Syd Barrett being the archetypal 60s acid casualty or being the ‘lunatic on the grass’, but this is really a desperately sad story. He was clearly a very talented songwriter, founding the band Pink Floyd and writing most of the songs on their first album as well as inspiring their iconic early live performances which were as much about the light shows and the groovy vibes, as the music. However, he went through a mental health crisis that coincided with heavy use of LSD that caused his personality to change resulting in him being dropped from the band.
The record company then pressured Barrett into working on two solo albums, presumably so they could cash in on some of the notoriety that now surrounded him, but the results were mixed to say the least. He was supported by former bandmates Dave Gilmour and Roger Waters who helped with the music but the lyrics ranged from whimsical 60s psychedelia to uncomfortably weird, and were very different from the sort of cosmic space rock that Pink Floyd had moved onto. He later retired completely from the music business and lived a reclusive life until his death from cancer at the age of 60.
Rest in peace Syd.
Patti Smith
4/5
Patti Smith is definitely one of the most influential artists of the 1970s. She took the beat poetry of the 60s and married it to the New York punk sensibilities of the early 70s with a distinctive voice. You can trace a direct line from her to Blondie, Chrissie Hynde and others, and further out to artists like Nick Cave. The power of this album is found in the quiet moments that purr with menace and then explode into full on freak outs. Essential listening.
Rush
3/5
Rush never clicked with me back in the 80s. Although I was partial to a bit of prog, their mix of twiddly-diddly keyboards, earthquake level drums and a weird Canadian bloke singing Ayn Rand inspired libertarian sci-fi songs in a high pitched voice didn’t exactly appeal. I listened to the Dolby Atmos remaster of this and while the musicianship is undeniably impressive, especially Neil Peart’s drumming on the instrumental track YYZ, there are still far too many notes for my taste and the whole thing feels a bit cold and clinical.
Atlas Shrugged-tastic!
Coldcut
4/5
The 80s UK house scene was a time of extraordinary creativity and also something of a Wild West for sampling as bedroom musicians and producers gleefully grabbed whatever they liked from movie soundtracks, tv, and the entire history of recorded sound. At least Coldcut approached it with a sense of humour and did eventually get around to getting permission for their samples. This album is a great example of the time, with the highlight being a performance from Mark E Smith of the Fall alongside such luminaries as Yazz and Lisa Stansfield.
Ute Lemper
4/5
Imagine a decadent, smoky cabaret bar in Berlin, with a leering MC and a spot lit stage as Ute Lemper walks up to the microphone and brings the house down with an astonishingly varied set. We get Brecht and Weill cabaret classics, surreal whimsy from Neil Hannon, noir detective tales from Nick Cave, and New York minimalist opera from Phillip Glass, as well as songs from Elvis Costello, Tom Waits and Scott Walker. This was a real treat on a gloomy Monday!
4/5
PJ Harvey was another artist I missed out on in the 2000’s for various reasons, so I was glad to get the opportunity to listen to this today. This is solid, reliable indie rock with a great selection of songs tangentially inspired by New York City. Her voice reminds me a little of Chrissie Hynde, with a similar level of confidence and assurance. The only odd bit is when Thom Yorke turns up on one track and he felt out of place to me.
PJ Harvey
5/5
In one of those happy coincidences that this list sometimes throws up, yesterday’s album was PJ Harvey’s 2000 release Stories from the City and today’s is her debut. I’ve gone from not knowing much about her to being a fan in the space of 24 hours. This is a great album, unjustly overlooked in 1992 whilst the media at the time were obsessed with those cob nobbling bands over in Seattle for some reason.
Harvey is a great musician and her songs are boldly and unapologetically feminist without falling into riot grrrl cliches. The highlight is Sheela-na-gig which takes the idea of the male gaze and shoves it right back into the face of the patriarchy. I hope that some of the critics who were snooty about this record looked that word up and were suitably surprised when they did!
Can
4/5
Well, this is all kinds of awesome. It was released in 1973 but still sounds startlingly contemporary and timeless, ranging from dreamy ambient flow states to full on freakouts, with metronomic drum beats, electronic sound effects, abstract vocal stylings and noodling keyboards in the mix. Parts of this genuinely sound like trip-hop dance music released this year.
With typical boneheaded reductionism this got labeled as simply ‘Krautrock’ by the UK music press but there’s a lot more going on here than just a motorik beat.
Can-tastic!
Harry Nilsson
3/5
For most people these days, if you mentioned the name Harry Nilsson you’ll be met with a blank look, but there was a time when he was one of the biggest selling recording artists in the 70s. By all accounts though, he was a shy, private man who hated the limelight and preferred to spend his time getting outrageously drunk with his best friend John Lennon.
If you listen to this album, then there will be at least a couple of tracks that you will recognise from the jaunty Gotta Get Up, the maudlin Without You, the genuine rock banger Jump into the Fire or the (borderline racist) novelty song Coconut. This is a great example of a 70s album that mixes genres and moods with gleeful abandon but whether that makes for a cohesive listen is another matter.
Lime-in-de-coconut-tastic!
Stereolab
4/5
I was initially confused by this as I think I’d mixed up Stereolab with Stereophonics for obvious reasons. When I realised my mistake, this album really grabbed me - experimental, bloopy, Anglo-Gallic fun, somewhere between The Velvet Underground and Air with a diversion via the krautrock styings of Can and a touch of Bristol trip hop. The lyrics don’t make a lick of sense (“Crazy, sturdy, a torpedo”) but they don’t need to.
Galloise-tastic!
Ghostface Killah
2/5
I’ve tried with Gangsta Rap, I really have. However, for every clever rhyme or interesting musical motif there’s another scatological skit or a barrage of m-f’in n words or an inexplicable reference to Tony Stark. By far the best track on here is a harrowing childhood memory “Whip You With A Strap” which I wasn’t surprised to see was one of two tracks on this produced by J Dilla. Two stars, purely for that track.
Baaba Maal
5/5
This album is the reason that I stick with this list through umpteen tedious gangsta rap entries. It’s a delight from start to finish, mixing traditional Senegalese music with more familiar folk and western pop sounds. Baaba Maal was one of the inspirations behind the formation of the Afro Celt Soundsystem which builds on this fusion of different worlds. We really need more of this kind of thing!
Bad Company
2/5
The very definition of middle of the road - dad rock that keeps solidly in the lane of 70s guitar music without ever straying into hard rock or metal territory. The singer Paul Rodgers (now better known for his collaborations with Queen) is apparently from Middlesbrough but you’d never guess from his mid Atlantic accent. This is the sort of album that Jeremy Clarkson would listen to whilst driving on a motorway.
Quicksilver Messenger Service
1/5
Rarely have I had such a disconnect between the impression raised by an album cover and the actual music. I was expecting half an hour of jolly cowboy songs, but I actually got a 25 minute extended jam where they take Bo Diddley’s Who Do You Love (a proper 2 minutes 30 seconds banger) and drag it out into a drug fuelled 25 minute jam session wankathon. Side two isn’t much better, but at least they close the album with a version of Happy Trails. I’d much rather have had a whole album like that, to be honest.
Arrested Development
4/5
#1001Albums
3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days In the Life Of... by Arrested Development
https://album.link/gb/i/715906160
While the gangsta rappers of the east and west coasts were riding around in gold plated limousines, snorting drugs and occasionally shooting each other, Arrested Development from Atlanta were struggling for over three years just to get a record deal (hence the name of the album). The result is a world away from the gangsta scene, full of deft lyricism, heartfelt spirituality and songs with a social conscience. I actually liked this a lot, certainly enough to listen twice and I think I’ll be going back to it again.
The The
2/5
There’s no doubt that this is an album from 1986. We’ve got on the nose songs about AIDS, urban decay, US military aggression, Thatcher and Reagan, with lyrics that sound like they’ve been written by an angry student poet. The music is somewhat at odds with the words, having that characteristic brittle 80s production with brass stabs, horns, harmonicas, drums that sound like someone hitting a large cardboard box with a mallet and backing vocals from Neneh Cherry. I see what they were getting at, but this hasn’t aged particularly well.
Paul McCartney and Wings
5/5
The Beatles were always going to be a hard act to follow. The commonly accepted wisdom is that the songwriting partnership of Lennon & McCartney was the key to the Beatles success, and out of those two Lennon was the key figure. However, it’s interesting to look at their respective post-breakup albums to see how that theory holds up.
George dug deeper into mysticism, Ringo invited his celebrity chums into the studio for a jolly singalong, Lennon (who hated what he called Paul’s Granny music) released a bitter howl of betrayal aimed at his former partner, and Paul took two introspective solo albums and two more with Wings before he hit his stride with this one.
The original lineup of Wings had drifted away leaving just Paul, Linda and Denny Laine to work on this, with Paul pretty much in charge of the process. For various reasons they decided to record in a ramshackle studio in Lagos, contending with numerous problems including being mugged at gunpoint, risking a cholera outbreak, Paul passing out with breathing difficulties from a bronchial spasm and facing disputes with local musicians including the legendary Fela Kuti.
The end result is excellent though, and stands comparison with anything that Paul produced with the Beatles. The opening two tracks were released as singles and are genuine bangers, and the rest of the album has a good range of styles and themes from boozy drinking songs to a heartfelt message to John in a 50s style on Let Me Roll It that may have helped heal the rift between them. The album closer 1985 (which probably felt impossibly futuristic at the time) is another great track and still feels fresh with its use of synths.
Dammit, this deserves 5 stars!
Macca-tastic!
The Afghan Whigs
2/5
1993, and we’re back in grunge-adjacent alt-rock territory here. However, the lyrics on this made me wince - when you get lines like “I’ve got a dick for a brain” you have to ask if someone is being funny, ironic or are they actually serious? The theme of this album is supposedly the breakup of a toxic relationship and sounds pretty po-faced, so make of that what you will. When the album reached My Curse, a song about domestic violence from a woman’s perspective, the overall effect is pretty gut wrenching. I really hope this is not autobiographical. Not a fun listen or a particularly edifying one.
Big Star
3/5
In 1966 15 year old school chums Chris Bell and Alex Chilton went to see the Beatles when they visited Memphis on a whistle stop tour of the states. After playing in other bands for a while, they teamed up in 1972 to form a song writing partnership that they credited as Bell/Chilton on their album - no prizes for guessing where they got that idea from!
The result is an engaging debut, with some glam tinged rock numbers and quieter moments with some sweet vocal harmonies taking obvious cues from the Beatles and the Byrds, but good enough to stand on their own. Unfortunately the album didn’t do particularly well, leading to tensions in the band with Bell quitting after their follow up. He died not long after at the tragically young age of 27 in a car accident.
So, it’s an obscure relic of an LP, and mostly pretty good, but it’s tempting to imagine how things might have turned out if they’d broken through at the time and had the success they deserved.
The Jesus And Mary Chain
3/5
I loved Psychocandy when it first came out, but for some reason this one didn’t grab me in quite the same way at the time. The obvious difference is that the feedback and distortion from the first album is now gone, but there’s still the same dark, brooding atmosphere with that resonant guitar and drums booming somewhere back in the mix. It struck me for the first time how much this now reminds me of Lou Reed (in a good way) - I hadn’t listened to him back in 83 and certainly not heard Metal Machine Music which is another obvious influence on this wee band from East Kilbride. I’ll definitely be listening to this again and sending a Time Machine back to 1987 to tell past me to give this album a chance.
The Chemical Brothers
4/5
Reliable stalwarts of the British electronica scene of the mid 90s, this is a great debut album. The first six tracks flow into each other as a coherent set, with some great beats and carefully chosen samples. It’s obvious a lot of thought went into this as a showcase for their talents, and still sounds impressive given that they started developing these tracks using a humble Atari ST home computer. They also featured on the massively influential soundtrack for Wipeout on the original PlayStation which cemented their reputation with the cool kids and computer nerds.
The rest of the tracks feature guest vocals from Tim Burgess and Beth Orton showing they are capable of putting songs together as well as killer dance tracks. This album will definitely be getting a repeat listen today.
Laura Nyro
5/5
Every so often, this list throws up something genuinely unexpected that I hadn’t heard of before. In this case Laura Nyro is a singer songwriter from New York, and if I hadn’t looked at the date on the album I would have been hard pressed to pin this down to any time in the last fifty years. For an album released in 1968 by someone who was just 20 at the time, this sounds remarkably contemporary.
Nyro wrote all of the tracks here, and there’s a dizzying mix of genres, tempo and feel, often within the same song. She has a gorgeous, soulful voice and her lyrics are equally strong, especially with lines like ‘No one knows the blues like lonely women’ and Emmie, which is an unapologetic love song to a woman.
I wasn’t surprised to read in her biography on Wikipedia that she was a bisexual woman and a feminist, which is probably partly the reason that she didn’t get the public recognition that this album clearly deserved. She died at the tragically young age of 49 from ovarian cancer.
The album is strongest for me on the three stripped down demo versions of the songs Lu, Stoned Soul Picnic (her one reference to the hippie era) and Emmie, which feature just Nyro playing piano with home produced multitracked vocals. They sound utterly amazing and it’s worth looking out for this version of the album to hear them.
Apparently she was an influence of Todd Rundgren and Elton John. Hey, fellas - you might have let the rest of us know about her!
Sassafras-and-moonshine-tastic!
Randy Newman
2/5
You know Randy Newman, right? The chap who does sugary sweet songs for Disney films and amusing ditties about dancing bears? Well, hold onto your hats because the first song on this album is called Rednecks and includes liberal (in both the political and numerical senses) use of the N word. It turns out to be a satirical jab at both racist rednecks and snooty New York liberals, but wow, does this clang like a lead balloon nowadays.
Apparently this was originally intended to be a sort of concept album about the Deep South, but some songs were dropped at the last minute and replaced with others. We still get some mawkish drinking songs, one about the great Louisiana flood of 1927 and another about Birmingham (not the UK one, sadly).
Musically, this album is fine, but I seriously doubt I’m ever going to listen to it again.
Ray Charles
5/5
Music genres are funny things and often used as gatekeeping barriers for reasons completely unrelated to the actual music. Not that long ago there was much clutching of pearls (and other, viler, reactions) in the Country music establishment when Beyoncé released her Cowboy Carter album. However, such genre crossing is nothing new as today’s 1962 album from the legendary Ray Charles demonstrates.
He takes a fine selection of country classics and adds a soulful, jazzy, bluesy twist to them that works perfectly. It just goes to show that for all of their cultural differences C&W and the blues have common roots in the folk songs and traditions of the Mississippi delta and rural America. After all, songs like Your Cheatin’ Heart by Hank Williams speak to common human experiences of heartache as well finding joy in the simple pleasures of life.
This really is an album to wallow in, and if it gets R&B fans to listen to more Country (and vice versa) then the world is all the better for it!
Heaven 17
4/5
The early 80s electronica scene in Sheffield was an incredibly creative period. Heaven 17 consisted of Martyn Ware and Ian Marsh - two former members of The Human League - and vocalist Glen Gregory. They shared a studio for the recording of this album with their former band mates, which must have been an interesting experience.
The theme of this album contrasts funky street life with the burgeoning 80s yuppie lifestyle, nicely illustrated on the cover. Side one has the danceable beats whereas the second side tends more to the experimental electronica side. It still holds up well over 40 years later, at least to my aging ears.
The lead single, Fascist Groove Thang, got played on the John Peel show but was then banned by a craven BBC who were afraid of upsetting a right wing American president. Good job that sort of thing would never happen these days, oh, wait …
Steel-City-tastic!
Eminem
1/5
When I first heard this back at the turn of the millennium I thought it was some sort of novelty record for kids. In a sense, it is. Listening to the whole thing shows it to be nasty, misogynistic, crass and unfunny. Most egregiously of all, it made Dido into an international star.
Not stan-tastic.
The Prodigy
4/5
It’s difficult now to appreciate the scale of the moral panic that arose in response to early 90s rave culture in the uk. There were fulminating editorials in serious broadsheets, speeches in parliament and an authoritarian criminal justice bill where judges tried to come up with a legal definition of what constituted a rave so that it could be banned. The official definition turned out to be “music that includes sounds wholly or predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats” - gasp! The horror!
The police enthusiastically adopted their new powers to dish out a good thrashing to people they saw as dirty hippies, confiscating or smashing up sound systems and throwing people in jail for the most trivial of offences.
The Prodigy were one of the premier bands on the rave scene and this album is in part a response to the CJA with the refrain “Fuck ‘em and their law”. Musically this is solid dance music with good use of samples that don’t get in the way of the beats. Put on your best high court judges wig and robes and party on down to this one.
Rave-tastic!
Buffalo Springfield
2/5
Yet another permutation of Neil Young and one or more members of Crosby, Stills and Nash. In this case, Stephen Stills was the patsy (accompanied by a couple of others) and the result is a 30 minute psychedelic folk rock album that apparently took nine months to finish because they all fell out with each other and worked on their own pieces individually.
The end result is pretty much as you’d expect, sounding like a compilation album put together from vaguely similar 60s bands but with nothing to tie it together. Eminently forgettable.
Pet Shop Boys
4/5
West End Girls, their 1981 debut single, gave Pet Shop Boys something of a reputation as a band popular with the yuppie crowd as something to play in the background on cd at their dinner parties. Fast forward through six more years of Thatcherism and it’s clear that Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe had had enough. This album deals with the effects of capitalism, the loneliness of city life and most heart breaking of all, the human tragedy of the AIDS crisis on the song ‘Couldn’t Happen Here’.
There are plenty of bangers on here, but my highlights are ‘What Have I Done to Deserve This?’ featuring the legendary Dusty Springfield, ‘Rent’ and ‘It’s a Sin’ which is possibly their finest hour. The only downsides for me are with that brittle 80s production sound, but the remastered version goes some way to giving it a bit more oomph.
Ice Cube
1/5
Ok, I tried. I really did.
Ice Cube’s two previous albums had been (rightly) criticised for being misogynistic and anti-Semitic. This album was released in the wake of the Rodney King riots, and makes powerful points about racism and police brutality.
However, we get to the track Fuck ‘Em which features an excerpt of an interview where he is explicitly asked about calling women “bitches and hoes” and accusations of anti-semitism, and instead of apologising or moving on he just says ‘Fuck ‘em’ and waffles on for a bit. The next track is straight back in with the misogyny.
Nope, I’m out.
The xx
2/5
Do you remember that old comedy sketch about going for an English, where a group of Indians go to a restaurant and challenge themselves to order the blandest thing on the menu? Well, this album is the audio equivalent. It’s aggressively middle of the road and unchallenging.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s perfectly acceptable to listen to, just not very exciting. Apparently they came second in the Brit awards to Mumford & Sons, which tells you everything you need to know about where they stand in the pop firmament.
On the positive side, I did enjoy the lead vocals from Romy Madley-Croft who reminded me of Sophie Ellis-Bextor. There must be something about singers with double barrelled names that appeals to me.
My Bloody Valentine
3/5
My Bloody Valentine were pioneers of shoegaze, releasing two albums before being dropped by their record label and drifting apart some time in the 90s. Therefore, it was a bit of a surprise when founder Kevin Shields started working on unreleased material and put the band back together to release this album more than 20 years after the previous one.
The result is a bit patchy and experimental, but when it takes off it’s really rather catchy, particularly the closing track ‘wonder 2’ which takes shoegaze into experimental drum and bass meets ambient noise territory. Probably not one I’d listen to regularly, but I’d take this over a dull, boring record any day.
Morrissey
1/5
With songs like ‘National Front Disco’ it was always pretty bloody obvious where Morrissey stood on the political spectrum. Hard nope from me.
Shuggie Otis
4/5
Well, this was a rare treat. Funky soul from 1974, with most instruments and vocals handled by Shuggie himself when he was just 23. Of particular note is the innovative use of early analogue drum machines which give a hypnotic quality to some of these tracks. Utterly charming and delightful to listen to.
Mj Cole
3/5
At first glance I thought that the cover for this album was a pop up ad, or maybe a tribute to Sheffield’s much missed Cole Brothers department store (as name checked on Richard Hawley’s Cole’s Corner elsewhere on this list).
Anyhoo, it turns out to be an interesting mix of danceable drum and bass beats and smooth vocals, with jazzy interludes from classically trained artist MJ Cole. I particularly enjoyed the tracks with vocals from Elizabeth Troy, but the whole album flows nicely and is a good accompaniment to a rainy Monday morning.
Steve Earle
3/5
Country music is probably the most divisive musical genre. It’s very easy to be snooty about it or just see it as schmaltzy stuff for rednecks and hillbillies, and to be fair there is, as with every other type of music, a lot of dross out there. On the other side of coin, the very best country music taps into authentic America folk traditions and is played with genuine emotion and talent.
This album falls somewhere in the middle. I was all prepared to write this off as some sort of parody, judging by the opening title track which leans into the familiar tropes with glee. Indeed, one of the later songs is called ‘Good Ol’ Boy’ without a trace of irony.
However, it didn’t take long for Steve Earle to win me over. It’s obvious that he loves the music and the songs, and it’s nicely done without going over the top. On top of that, he seems like a genuinely nice guy - he’s a socialist, pro-choice and anti-death penalty, and he’s not been afraid to criticise the current president, as well as pointing out that the Democrats should do more to engage with working class Americans.
Not the world’s greatest country album, but a solid three stars nonetheless.
Incredible Bongo Band
4/5
I initially thought that this was some sort of joke - it’s obviously an obscure novelty record (that was inexplicably popular in Canada for some reason) but something about the first track, a cover of Apache, triggered a memory. This particular track was discovered by pioneering New York DJ Kool Herc who found that he could mix together two copies on different decks to get a drum break that went on forever. This discovery was one of the foundational moments of hip hop and the rest is history.
Let There Be Drums, the second track, was an even bigger rush of recognition. This was effectively the Madchester sound of the Stone Roses but 25 years early. You are hearing the origin story of Bez right here. The rest of the album, mostly covers of other popular songs but with added bongos and funky guitars, are similarly good, and this is easily one of the most sampled records of all time.
How 70s could this album be? The answer is none. None more 70s.
Bongo-tastic!