My 1001 Albums Journey

Album	You	Global	Diff
Oxygène Jean-Michel Jarre	5	3.08	+1.92
Dust Screaming Trees	5	3.16	+1.84
System Of A Down System Of A Down	5	3.27	+1.73
The College Dropout Kanye West	5	3.31	+1.69
The Man Machine Kraftwerk	5	3.32	+1.68
Brilliant Corners Thelonious Monk	5	3.33	+1.67
Fear Of A Black Planet Public Enemy	5	3.34	+1.66
I Should Coco Supergrass	5	3.34	+1.66
The Downward Spiral Nine Inch Nails	5	3.35	+1.65
Garbage Garbage	5	3.38	+1.62

Album	You	Global	Diff
The Boatman's Call Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds	1	3.2	-2.2
Live 1966 (The Royal Albert Hall Concert) Bob Dylan	1	3.15	-2.15
Henry's Dream Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds	1	3.11	-2.11
Nighthawks At The Diner Tom Waits	1	3.01	-2.01
Sunshine Hit Me The Bees	1	2.99	-1.99
Live / Dead Grateful Dead	1	2.83	-1.83
Let's Get It On Marvin Gaye	2	3.78	-1.78
G. Love And Special Sauce G. Love & Special Sauce	1	2.74	-1.74
Grace Jeff Buckley	2	3.71	-1.71
Born In The U.S.A. Bruce Springsteen	2	3.7	-1.7

Artist	Albums	Average
Radiohead	4	4.5
Led Zeppelin	3	4.67
Pink Floyd	2	5
Jimi Hendrix	2	5
Nirvana	2	5
Johnny Cash	3	4.33
R.E.M.	3	4.33

Artist	Albums	Average
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds	3	1.33
Bob Dylan	5	2.2
Bruce Springsteen	3	2

Artist	Ratings
The Who	4, 2, 5

Fela Kuti

4/5

The fidelity is really good for a live album; sounds like a studio recording really. I like a lot of jazz and fusion albums from this time period, and this one isn't an exception. What makes it stand out from the American, Latin, European and Japanese stuff is use of the traditional instruments, which after reading about Fela Kuti makes total sense. It's good, though like all improvisational based albums of the time, it gets a bit mastrubatory with some of the solos, particularly the final track.

In The Court Of The Crimson King

King Crimson

5/5

One of the masterpieces of progressive rock, but obviously polarizing if you have negative opinions about the entire genre. For me, the only stinker is the ending of Moonchild, but even then the rambling second half serves to calm everything down before the big hit of the last track. Everything about the instrumentation in this album is so good. The harmonies, the absolute mastery of the instruments, the composition, everything. All timer.

Paranoid

Black Sabbath

4/5

Anyone who has ever listened to or made rock music owes a lot to this album, but rather than rehash that all it’s worth it to say that there are a few things that bring this down from perfection. Electric Funeral sounds like something my high school band of 16 year old burgeoning potheads would’ve written. Fairies Wear Boots could be a Tom Petty song if you turned off the distortion. Hand of Doom is two songs smashed together. If you ignore the 50 years of radio and pop culture saturation, the first half is a masterpiece of metal. This is one of those albums I switch out because I’ve simply heard it too much but that doesn’t change how good most of it is.

Let's Get It On

Marvin Gaye

2/5

I’ve never heard, or been cognizant of hearing maybe, another Marvin Gaye song other than the title track of this album. He’s an immense singer and this album is the soundtrack to many a disappointing and comically short sexual encounter, but I just can’t really get in to it. Purely subjective; I can only take so many love songs of this style without them all blending in to each other. I couldn’t help but think that it must be so frustrating to be the rhythm section of the band. I can feel it at the end of the Please Don’t Stay where the drummer tries desperately to escape the 4/4 with some speed and it’s pulled off well. The bassist meanders too when they can, which is nice. Completely unrelated, I laughed out loud at the now ubiquitous sensual deep breathing woman sample in “You Sure Love To Ball”, but that ultimately was my favorite track because of the key shift in the chorus. Theres a great cut of a Mike Jones album which consists of just the times he says “Mike Jones”. It’s several minutes long. I think someone should make a “baby” version of this album.

Peter Gabriel 3

Peter Gabriel

3/5

Musically the album encapsulates a particular 80’s sound but that’s probably because Genesis came up with it earlier, and both are ahead of their time considering this came out in 1980. The drumming especially has a great tone, which is intentional if you read up on it. Not playing cymbals and still getting a full rock sound is not something I’ve considered before and it really sounds great. The synths and other electronic elements can be a bit much at times but that is part of the sound. “Games without frontiers” is a good example of leaning too heavily in to it for my tastes. On the other hand, it’s perfect for “Lead a norma life”. “I Don’t Remember” is great and Gabriel’s voice really makes it sound like he’s losing it, like he did in so many Genesis songs. “Family Portrait” is another good one about a pitiable guy who is plotting killing someone but ultimately it’s a cry for help or, explicitly at the end, attention. This is a good album of its time with some standout songs but it just makes me want to listen to Genesis in the end.

Slipknot

4/5

I had forgotten how weird the percussion on this album sounded with the 4 drummers, at least half of which are just banging on trash cans. It’s a good weird for sure, and there’s still nobody that sounds quite like Slipknot. There is no resting throughout the whole disc, it’s all very in your face and I like that about them. None of the six hundred guys was like “we need to slow it down and make a radio single”. It’s almost difficult to listen to the whole thing even though I like angry distorted messes of music; it’s just so in your face the whole way through. This is the first album I’ve had to take a break from in the middle. Teenage me was a big fan, but in my old age I can’t give it perfect marks. It’s just too much.

Vol. 4

Black Sabbath

3/5

After listening to Paranoid recently, I feel like Sabbath sort of lost their "ahead of their time" attitude with this album. This is from the 70's and it very much sounds like it. I was trying to figure out if I'd actually heard any of these songs before and I have, especially "Changes" which is actually the worst song on the whole album! It sounds more like the worst of Ozzy's solo stuff than Sabbath really. "Supernaut" is the standout for me and it shows that the sound did develop from their previous albums in to something more complicated and less sludgy. Whether that's good or bad is subjective really. The latter half of the album is heavier except for "Laguna Sunrise" which sounds like a Zeppelin track (not a bad thing, just strange to hear). Overall it's pretty good, definitely a "put it on while drinking beer and doing something else" album.

Back to Mystery City

Hanoi Rocks

2/5

I'd never heard of these guys and now that I have, my idea that the greatest Finnish export to the world is Kimi Raikkonen is unchanged. This album is the soundtrack to a minorly successful summer movie about teenagers in California in 1986, directed by a German man and filmed in pre-war Croatia. Not bad, just fairly forgettable.

Music in Exile

Songhoy Blues

4/5

I really enjoyed this album, despite not being able to understand a single word. The blues flow is great but the “desert” part of their self described style is what makes this a unique album. You can tell the band listened to a lot of traditional American blues and rock and it’s the framework for what is otherwise a heavily localized style. The meters for each song are complicated but still really listenable in the sense that you can tap your foot to it all without thinking too hard. The guitar work is excellent without being full of itself. The drums are precise without being mechanical. It’s just put together really well. Al Hassidi Terei is my favorite track; I love the odd time signature and the fact that everyone (I’m assuming) is singing.

Electric

The Cult

2/5

Peace Dog has maybe the worst lyrics I’ve ever heard in a rock song. In fact if the singer, who has a great voice, just sang nonsense, the whole album would go up a star. This album is produced better than most modern albums I’ve heard. Everything is clear and the instruments have a very distinct tracking. After reading about it, it’s because Rick Rubin produced it. Remember when Jay-Z said “you crazy for this one Rick!” In 99 Problems? Same guy. He has a very particular skill and he’s probably the best at it. Anyway the songs on here are very much butt rock. The last two tracks are the best of them, in my opinion. It’s 80s hard rock, and it’s great at that but I just can’t take it seriously. I’d have to be on a particular mood to put this on again, and that mood involves shit beer and cigarettes. Honestly I can’t believe these are the same people that wrote “She Sells Sanctuary” which is such a good song.

Fear Of A Black Planet

Public Enemy

5/5

I hadn’t listened to this whole album since I was in high school a thousand years ago. For an hour long, there really isn’t a lot of filler. It goes hard from start to finish with only a few breaks to showcase old school dj skills or throw in weird or funny samples. I had forgotten how good Public Enemy were at the style of rapping at the time, and obviously they had a lot to say. There are hardly any goofball bits, it’s 99% social commentary. You can see why so many bands and artist with a serious message always cite them, and this album in particular, as a huge influence. If there’s any criticism to this album it’s that rap has evolved so far from the fast beats and long samples that it sounds a bit dated. But the message is still relevant and the songs still hold up. One of the best.

Sunshine Hit Me

The Bees

1/5

The opening track is kinda promising and then the second track hits you with that horrible blindingly white kid indie falsetto in a shit attempt to grab some sort of "I listened to my parents cocaine music and now I'm cool" cred. It's the audio manifestation of the mustache on 40 year old guy riding a fixie and wearing a flat cap. It goes extremely predictably on from there. Given this came out in 2002, this is music for ipod commercials. Maybe that's why it's on the list given the amount of stuff that sounded like this that came out in the following decade. “A minha menina” is not a butchering of the original mostly because they abandon most of the Portuguese in favor of new English lyrics. After that everything is fairly boring, though I wouldn’t be terribly irritated if I heard the beginning of “lying in the snow” if I was five beers in on a sunny Friday. I’m mad about how bad this is.

OK Computer

Radiohead

5/5

I don't know where to start or end, but this is one of my favorite albums of all time. Every song is great, even "Fitter Happier" which I think about every time I go in to the office. This was the last album they did that was almost entirely pure rock music and while I enjoy their later stuff, this was the peak of Radiohead. I wont hold the fact that they're English against them.

Since I Left You

The Avalanches

3/5

I like mix albums in general and the flow of this one is nice. These guys did some great work with the samples and production in general. I remember this album being played a lot the summer before I left Europe; lots of good memories associated with it. It's not groundbreaking and I think it's not nearly as good as some of their genre "Pair of DJ's or one dude making anglo pop dance music" contemporaries (The Chemical Brothers, The Crystal Method, Moby, Fatboy Slim, etc) but it is a fun album. Unchallenging dance music for a good time.

1989

Taylor Swift

3/5

I can’t say this album is bad because it’s decidedly not. The beats are infectious, the singing is clean and takes center stage, the production value is sky high and there is a decent amount of variation of moods throughout the album. I’ve heard so many of these songs so many times (my wife was a big fan the year this album came out, went to stadium shows and everything) but they’re still all listenable and fun for the most part. I can’t relate to most of the lyrical content as a middle aged man, but I’m obviously not the target audience. Of the songs I hadn’t heard before, I enjoyed “Clean” the most. You can hear Imogen Heap’s influence in it which is nice as I like a lot her work. The radio singles we’ve all heard a trillion times and they’re solid pop tunes. Taylor Swift also deserves a ton of respect for writing her own music. This particular genre is full of ghostwriters and committees and it’s cool that she wrote nearly all of this on her own. Biggest gripe is the “you could’ve been getting down to this sick beat” line followed by a very normal 8 measure 4/4 drum break. It’s not sick at all!

Rum Sodomy & The Lash

The Pogues

3/5

Lots of songs for drinking, some songs for melancholy moods and a few random Irish western movie soundtracks. I’ve heard a lot of the Pogues living where I do, and I still like them even with that. It’s kind of amazing this came out in the 80s because I usually associate Irish folk punk with The Dropkick Murphy, Flogging Molly, etc, who are more modern. Goes to show that they all ripped off The Pogues, or more charitably, carried on the tradition. A whole album of this style is a lot to listen to but it’s not bad. I like the beginning more than the end. I feel bad associating the whole style with drunken post - Bruins game shitshows, but I can’t help it. It’s not a bad thing, I swear. Big laugh at “Billys Bones” about a dude who joins what I can only guess is the UN expeditionary force in Lebanon and indiscriminately shoots everyone.

Live / Dead

Grateful Dead

1/5

What a interminable slog, Jesus Christ. "Death Don't Have No Mercy" was mostly a song after 45 minutes of musical diarrhea and then they follow that up with 7 minutes of literal amplifier feedback. I'm grateful they are dead.

At Fillmore East

The Allman Brothers Band

3/5

This is what a jam album should sound like, though I’m still not a huge fan of the endless meandering. Thankfully everything is in time and in key, it just goes on too long. I did like the old school blues covers. “Hot ‘Lanta” is a jam, and that’s about the length of blues improv can take. I know why they play so long, having played in bands with dead heads and the like, it’s fun to just jam over 12 bar blues and most of all it’s easy to sound good while doing it. The runtime is too long for me but I bet it was fun to be insanely baked or otherwise altered and be at this show. I’d put this on while doing something else no problem.

Giant Steps

The Boo Radleys

4/5

“I hang suspended” is great in the same way “if you want it, take it” is. The chord progression is interesting and made me want to listen to it a few times to really get it. “Leaves and Sand” is super 90s, just an overall great sound with hard dynamic switches and a not very apparent chorus and verse structure at first. The last set of lines has that dreamy distortion that’s so prevalent in 90s rock albums and I love it. “Barney (...and me)” is a good example of the parts of the album I find confusing. You can tell the band is trying some new, weird stuff but it kinda takes away from an otherwise really solid pop sound. I can’t hate on it because I get the artistic intent but it sounds forced. The flute, ok, but what is with the rest of the synth’d out glitch sounds? Weird for weirds sake. I guess that’s quintessentially of the era. Half of this album is pure strained radio rock of my teenage years, and the other half is the kind of experimental stuff that record labels were “allowing” at that time. I kinda love it. What a nice little surprise from his whole experiment, I had never heard of these guys and I thoroughly enjoyed this.

21

Adele

2/5

It’s a woman singing without auto tune. She’s good at singing, but I feel like this is an album for dentists offices or suburban shopping centers. Decent enough cover of “Lovesong” but again, pretty boring. I think the novelty of her voice in a sea of computer aided vocals was what made this popular but I don’t think it’s anything much more than well executed.

This Year's Model

Elvis Costello & The Attractions

3/5

The backing band (the Attractions) are the best part of this album. The drumming in particular is really good. The repeated riff on “Pump it up” is one of those guitar licks you hear all over the place; I now know where it came from. Maybe even more recognizeable when it’s the organ/keys doing it. This album is fine. Its the kinda stuff you hear in a brewery or a bar you like to go to after work. It's not bad and you can hear the influences it has on later records in the future. That could be why I didn't rate it higher, the whole concept has been done a lot better by what would come.

Oedipus Schmoedipus

Barry Adamson

2/5

First three tracks are great, particularly "Something Wicked This Way Comes" which I knew I had heard before. It's on the Lost Highway soundtrack apparently. That whole soundtrack is actually kinda similar to this album, including the presence of Atticus Ross, the guy you know is in Nine Inch Nails but couldn't pick out of a lineup. Anyway that's the end of the good bits. Apparently this artists whole deal is to make soundtracks to films that don't exist. The tracks with the vocal samples/takes are weird to the point of being disturbing ("It's Business as Usual" and "Dirty Barry" on top of that list). I see what he's going for but it would make a lot more sense if there was a film to attach to all of it. I think that's a good thing but I certainly don't want to listen to those types of tracks more than once. The whole middle of the album is mostly just this type of thing. The ending is slightly better, but the lounge singer with what sounds like some sort of a Korg sample backing track in "The Sweetest Embrace" makes me think of some really forced scene out of a Tarantino or Lynch movie. Again, it belongs in a film, so I guess it works. This is an art piece, not really an album you want to sit down and listen to for its musical quality. It absolutely achieves the feel of a soundtrack. I've been rating albums based on the criteria of wanting to listen to them over again, and I have no desire to listen to this again really. It gets an extra star for accomplishing what I assume is its goal.

Haut de gamme / Koweït, rive gauche

Koffi Olomide

3/5

The main thing I got out of this album was either the (obvious when you think about it) debt that Caribbean music owes to African (Congolese specifically) or that , this artist, if he sang in Spanish, mightve been an equally big deal in Latin America as he was/is in Africa. I wish I spoke some French or any of the other languages he’s singing in to pick up those bits because I’m sure he’s got some lines. Think I caught some Portuguese in there too unless “Obrigado” means something in another language. This music is fun, absolutely not the style I listen to regularly, but it’s a good time. I wonder how much of the backing is programmed vs performed; I bet seeing a band perform this live would be cool. I put this on while working and it ultimately faded in to the background. Not necessarily a bad thing. Album cover is top shelf.

Bubble And Scrape

Sebadoh

3/5

Never heard of them before, which is cool. I like the idea that they all write and perform all of the instruments, but one or maybe two of them are much worse than the other(s). This album goes from good 90's indie/rock to just atonal messes of bad shit. Songs like "Sacred Attention" are awesome, give me an album worth of those. "Fantastic Disaster" is true to it's name I guess. It's literally hard to listen to because it's all out of tune. If you ignore the turds (and there are a lot) this is a pretty good album. I've always liked guitar/bass/drum trios and this is no exception. Jut tell the one guy to get his ears checked.

Revolver

Beatles

4/5

Im not a huge Beatles guy but I like most of their stuff. Maybe at the time this was revolutionary but to me it just sounds like a nice, uncomplicated album of pop rock. “Love you to” is the only oddity since they use a sitar and some effects. “Tomorrow Never Knows” could also be described like that. Otherwise very straightforward songs we’ve all heard a billion times. I finally looked up the meaning behind “Dr. Robert” and it is supposedly a real person who prescribed famous people amphetamines. lol.

Good Old Boys

Randy Newman

2/5

I got exposed to this album a long time ago by some guys I knew in high school who took it incredibly literally. I imagine a lot of people still do that, though maybe Newman doing all that Disney stuff made people read up or at least think about the content of this album. It's still a bizarre listen, even if you know that it's supposed to be satire/social commentary. I don't actually like the genre, and Newman's voice has always seemed to belong to some big footed, gigantic headed cartoon character rather than an accomplished artist, but the songs are well written musically and the concept is interesting. So in the end, the idea is a good one. The technical execution is good. The songwriting is good. Unfortunately the whole style is just something I can't enjoy. To me this is like if someone wrote an incisive and biting commentary on America's foreign policy to be played entirely on a hurdy gurdy and a slide whistle and sang by Yogi Bear. Even if the message was conveyed well (big if), I can’t take it seriously.

Fuzzy

Grant Lee Buffalo

3/5

It's not exactly country and not exactly folk and not exactly rock, and that ambiguity makes it widely accessible which is something quite a few albums on this list haven't been. The title track reminds me a bit of a Radiohead song that I can't put my finger on, but that is very much a good thing. The acoustic 6 and 12 strings throughout the album give it an nice expansive sound that I think is sometimes let down by the singer. He goes a bit too hard on the Eddie Vedder enunciation and vibrato, though (old man voice) That Was The Style At The Time. Starting at "Soft Wolf Tread" it got a bit slow and too country for my tastes. I did enjoy hearing about handicams again in "Stars N Stripes”, it's been decades. If they just kept going with the momentum from the first half I would’ve liked it a lot more, but it lost my attention half way through.

London Calling

The Clash

5/5

I had a girlfriend a thousand years ago that took me on “the clash tour” in London where she lived. It was mostly shitholes where people claimed Joe Strummer had done something wacky or where the idea for a song came from. I’m sure 99% of it was made up but I have a lot of fond memories of this album because of that. It’s clouding my judgement of the clash as a whole because I still remember the shitty British day we spent splitting a single set of earbuds listening to this and Combat Rock over and over. It’s been a while since I listened to the whole thing though. Classics like “London calling”, “death or glory”, “the guns of brixton”, I remembered fondly and they still hold up. I rediscovered “Spanish Bombs” and “Train in Vain”. Even some of the more silly sounding things like “lost in the supermarket” and “wrong em Boyo” are good if you drop the veneer of being hardcore for a few minutes. I love this album; one of the few double albums I can go through without skips. Timeless.

The Bends

Radiohead

5/5

Another absolute classic from Radiohead. I don't enjoy it quite as much as OK Computer but every song is good. The moods change drastically and cover a wide range of emotions and sounds. I do find it weird that Street Spirit and High and Dry are among the most played songs off of this on Spotify as I think every other song is better. The intro to The Bends is one of my favorites, the vocal change in the chorus of Bullet proof is one of my favorites, the slow build of Fake Plastic Trees in its entirety is one of my favorites, etc, etc. Every song has a particular element that I really enjoy in addition to the song as whole. Just great.

Wonderful Rainbow

Lightning Bolt

3/5

Raw noise rock that is better than it should be. It’s a loud mess but somehow it all works. This is not a taking it easy album, and honestly I think it’s too much even for a workout, but if you listen to it maybe one song at a time with space in between it’s pretty great. I’m not really a fan of the genre but I’ve seen a few noise bands live and the energy is through the roof. I bet these guys were fun as hell live. “Crown of Storms” and “Dracula Mountain” were my faves. I absolutely don’t want to listen to this frequently but I didn’t hate it.

Rock Bottom

Robert Wyatt

2/5

OI LOIKE YEW MOSTLY LATE AT NOIGHT A BWA BWA BWA BWA WA WA WA WA WAAA This would be a lot better without the vocals. He's not a particularly good singer and the lyrics, when you can understand them (and they're played forward instead of reverse) are pretty dumb. The instrumentation is good, and as much as the keys wander in some songs they do form a cohesive pattern eventually, which is satisfying when it ultimately gets to that point. I listened to this at work and kinda regretted it. I feel like I should be laying down and highly medicated to "get" it, and I'll probably do that at some point, skipping some obvious parts. One listen really isn't enough, kinda like hearing "Music For Airports" by Brian Eno, which is one of my favorite albums, and I didn't really like the first time I heard it. That's probably not a coincidence since Wyatt is credited on at least one track there. Anyway I'm saying too much about an album that is 6 tracks, 3.5+ of which are mostly unlistenable squeals and rambling repeated lyrics about nothing in various British accents. The first “Little Red" track and "Alifib" are things I'll revisit. The rest couldn’t even be saved by bong hits unfortunately.

Bad

Michael Jackson

3/5

I love how you can tell which songs were singles by looking at the spotify play counts. Tracks 3-6 all have "only" double digit million plays vs the triple digit million for everything else. Once you listen to them you know why...they're not very radio friendly or, you know, good. There isn't much to say about this album that hasn't already been said. It's a pop music classic, if you were growing up or an adult in the 80's or 90's you've heard it whether you wanted to or not. I honestly don't know if this sound was invented or perfected by this album or rather, Jackson's army of producers. It does sound pretty dated though, either way. Like a really good midi file, intentionally or not. The computerized sounding basslines which were ultimately played by real bassists are impressive though. The triple slap runs in "Speed Demon" are sick. This didn't pull in the nostalgia like other radio music albums did for me. It's not bad it's just that I've heard most of this before and I don't really need to revisit it.

Fear Of Music

Talking Heads

4/5

Talking Heads’ music has always been a well performed mix of weird shit, great riffs and phrases, and serious commentary. David Byrne’s voice really rides the line between comical and impressive, all the time. This album really encapsulates that combo. The singles are the standout tracks (I Zimbra, Life During Wartime, Cities) and they walk that path the best. Songs like “Air” are too bizarre sounding to have that serious message the lyrics push, to me anyway. That's not a detriment to it, I think, because the dedication to a soundscape is there and it's not like the song is a missive to a government or something. I'm not sure if this album heralded the beginning of the 80's sound but it had to be close if it didn't do it by itself. Just the guitar work alone, on the production/fx end, is like nothing else of the time that I know of. The final track, "Drugs", is the oddest of all and is a great closer. It's experimental but not arhythmic and finishes with a simple volume fade, simple yet complicated. This was a good album.

A Wizard, A True Star

Todd Rundgren

4/5

After reading the description I thought I was gonna hate this. There's really only 3 or 4 tracks out of the 19 that are just noise noodling, and they are mercifully short and fit in to the rest of it well enough. I feel like if I asked an AI to generate 70's rock/pop it would come up with something like this, not in a disparaging way either. This is a perfectly listenable album to have on as an active listener or the background. I wasn't particularly paying attention to the track names as they went by, and I couldn't really recall any one specific track if anyone asked me, but I enjoyed the album as a single work. It felt much shorter than it's hour runtime and had plenty of change in feels, tempos, keys, genres even, etc to keep it interesting. Overall pretty good! I would listen to it again on a lazy day I had to myself.

Red Headed Stranger

Willie Nelson

4/5

I'm really not a country music person but this the kind of country I'll happily listen to. I like that the whole album is a story, Nelson's got a distinct and capable voice, and the songs are simple and performed well. Really nothing to complain about here. Good stuff.

The Message

Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five

4/5

I would love to know if the sample in “It’s Nasty” is the first known use of that in a hip hop song. I always associate with Mariah Carey but man is that everywhere. “Scorpio” is a good example of a song that does something cool but just overdoes it. The robo voice is cool but it ruins the whole song because it’s too present and too loud over the rest. The lyrical content and styles date the album but for the time period I imagine it was revolutionary. Still a good listen with solid work from all the rappers and producers involved.

Deja Vu

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

3/5

The vocals are obviously the stars of this album, and the three and four part harmonies are great. Some of them sound like a chorus pedal, some sound like an a cappella group, but they’re all great. The instrumental work, it’s a backdrop for the singing in all the songs except Carry On, imo. This album is extremely full of hippie-isms, which is fine because it was peak hippie time, but I laughed through Woodstock because all I could think of was that episode of South Park where they’re all stuck on the front of a festival. It’s a great song but I’d never listened to the lyrics that closely before; it’s super festie. I kinda got bored by the end as the songs all start to be a bit more slow and folky after “Our House”. Overall it’s good, but I’ll stick to the singles.

If I Could Only Remember My Name

David Crosby

2/5

This seems a bit like a worse version of yesterday's CSNY album, and that makes sense because it's 1/4 of it (and apparently featuring a ton of other people of that era/genre). It's missing the great harmonies that made Deja Vu a good album and it's unfortunately full of more aimless meandering. Cowboy Movie feels way too long for what it is, though Tamalpais High redeems it pretty quick by being a much better jam track. Unfortunately "Song with No Words" brings it back to being more tedious. I don't know, I don't want to give this a 2 but it's decidedly worse than the Crosby's work with his supergroup. If I could give this a 2.5 I would.

xx

The xx

2/5

What a dull listen. All the songs sound the same and the breathy vocals do nothing but just add tiny layer of humanity to it. Music for entry level luxury suv commercials. It’s not performed poorly or badly done it’s just boring as hell.

Blur

4/5

I liked Parklife more than this, though I'm not sure I've actually ever given this album a full listen through before today. That isn't to say I didn't like it, I enjoyed it quite a bit even, but Parklife has a better overall sound to it than this one. Song 2 is still the best one between the two of them, as silly as it is. The great thing about Blur is that they've always straddled a bunch of styles on their albums. This particular one has too many generic sounding songs that don't really take advantage of the band's weird capabilities. Songs like "Theme from Retro" and "Country Sad Ballad Man" are just too out there compared to the rest of them and kinda wreck the vibe of the whole thing. I realize this is probably intentional but for whatever reason it doesn't really connect with me. Other than that, the other songs are great. I enjoyed the majority of this album and it's a fun reminder that the 90's wasn't just grunge and boy bands.

Siembra

Willie Colón & Rubén Blades

4/5

This is a fun album, not the kind of stuff I usually listen to, but I couldn't help but tap my feet along to it. The musicianship is stellar, not a single note off or misplaced but definitely full of feeling. The style of the album is fairly uniform but the songs are catchy enough to really keep it interesting. I had to look up the story of "Pedro Navaja" after hearing "Smith and Wesson" in the lyrics and it's pretty brutal! Not the story I expected from the music. This was a great listen. Perfect timing for a Sunday of housework and taking it easy.

Music From Big Pink

The Band

3/5

The Band is a weird one for me. A friend of mine came back from his first year of college with a huge newfound fandom for them, and one summer our entire soundtrack was one of their live albums. His band covered "Long Black Veil" and I actually think his cover is better than the original. In any case I have a certain nostalgic relationship with them that affects my ability to objectively judge their output. I think this album is good, it's not as good as some of their others, but at least there are less references to the confederates in this one. I wouldn't call it revolutionary or particularly great but The Band are good at combining that lazy country style in to rock music, more so than the Allman Brothers and others of that persuasion. They're less polished and seem more authentic I guess? For me that's a good thing, for others it's a detraction. Long Black Veil, The Weight and I Shall Be Released are the picks for me, but the whole album is decent.

Purple Rain

Prince

4/5

SONGS ABOUT FUCKING I know and enjoy most of these songs but I think the last time I heard Darling Nikki it was just the first half. I love the double bass drum bit at the end, what a weird and satisfying addition. This isn't Prince's best guitar album but it's still virtuoso playing. It's hard to say he's underrated but I feel like he does get lumped in to lists where he is by far the best player. The songs on this album sound like you imagine the cover does. Like there is nothing more "Purple Rain" then this album blasting in the studio while Prince poses for that shot on the motorcycle. It is an exact pairing of audio to visual. Just perfect. All that said, this isn't a 5 star album for me. It's got just enough of what has become cheesey to my ears that it's a 4. But it's a high 4 for sure.

Time Out Of Mind

Bob Dylan

2/5

Bob Dylan is one of those artists that I never really enjoyed. He wrote some good songs and I feel like every time I hear his original performance of them, it’s worse than the version I heard before. His voice, while distinctive, is not for me. I was hoping I could be turned around by this, but not this time. Maybe when we inevitably go through his older stuff it’ll be better.

Movies

Holger Czukay

2/5

Too all over the place and German for my tastes. The dudes voice comes across as clownish and the music doesn’t really contradict it. I wonder if this supposed to be a soundtrack to a made up film like that other album. Maybe it works that way but eh.

The Village Green Preservation Society

The Kinks

3/5

I really enjoyed this one. I’ve covered a few more famous Kinks songs with a band I was in a long time ago but I had never heard this album for. The lyrical content is a quaint little take on what I would imagine suburban English life was at the time: unimportant and pretty banal things that even those of us that grew up elsewhere and in different circumstances can follow along with. Some are direct (Picture Book, Sitting by the riverside) and some are more abstract (Big Sky). I read that this is supposed to be a take on the way the bands life used to be and what it meant for England to get more globalized at the time. If you listen to it with that in mind, some of the songs become a kind of call out on boring weirdness, but if you take it literally they just sound like a sing a first grader would write. It’s a bit of weird way to straddle the two ideas and I’m not sure they pull off the more intellectual side of it. Lyrical content aside, this is musically a pop rock album. It’s cleaner and in my opinion more listenable than a lot of the other British stuff coming out in that era. That doesn’t mean that it’s particularly interesting though. Again, I’m not sure how I’m “supposed” to hear it. It’s s fine enough album but I bet the Kinks have much better ones out there. Maybe we’ll hear them later.

No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith (Live)

Motörhead

3/5

Motörhead rules. This was a great listen while fixing the stupid car I was driving today, I just wished that it was the studio versions of all the songs. I really don’t see how live albums are in this list; they’re almost always worse than the recorded stuff. There were a few songs I hadn’t heard before that I’ll have to listen to later on the studio albums. Except “jailbait”. For fucks sake Lemmy.

Virgin Suicides

Air

4/5

The only Air album I had heard before was “Moon Safari” which had a few good songs but wasn’t in the same elevated sphere as other pop electronic like Groove Armada, Zero 7, telepopmusik, and others. This isn’t as good of an album for the radio but I think the composition as a score is great. I haven’t seen the film in ages but the dialogue included in some of the songs on here reminded me of the disturbing plot. This was a good thing for tone setting, though I can’t imagine wanting to hear it with the movie fresh in your mind. This kind of music seems stuck in that era of mid to late 90’s to 2005 or so. Other than Massive Attack, who haven’t put out an album in forever, nobody really does this anymore. It’s a shame because it’s one of my favorite styles to put on to unwind, and this album is a great example of it. I would give this a 5 but the spoken dialogue in some of the tracks kinda takes away from it. I wish this was just a plain score with no vocals.

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary And Thyme

Simon & Garfunkel

3/5

Man there’s a lot of folk music in this book. The standout on this album is the first track, which is a traditional melody so while it’s a classic, they didn’t really write it. And maybe if you were high enough on 60’s dirt weed the idea of placing a news report over silent night seemed deep. I don’t get what’s supposed to be so great about this record. It’s fine? It’s short and the songs don’t go on too long either. It’s not bad it’s just not that good either. A perfect 3, or really a 2.5 but I do like the first track, like I said.

Guitar Town

Steve Earle

2/5

If Tom Petty sucked at writing songs and Bruce Springsteen didn’t suck at performing them it would be this guy. I really don’t like this era of country music at all and this is no exception. Trucks, the ridiculous Texas accent, my pretty baby, the good old boys, granddaddy, highway, my git-tar, this shit sucks. One extra star for not being out of tune and proficient lap guitar playing. Everything else is bad.

Mama's Gun

Erykah Badu

3/5

I didn't think I was going to like this as much as I did. It reminds me more of artists like early Bonobo or Morcheeba than the singles I had heard from her. Some of the songs are samey and her voice, while distinct and cool, does get a little weird at times. The instrumentation is spot on, and I love the groove the backing tracks pull. I liked the first half more than the second, which is like the reverse of the spotify plays. This isn't something I'll play all the time but I did enjoy it!

Ellington at Newport

Duke Ellington

4/5

What a nice change of pace; I played so many of these songs when I played the trumpet and to hear the real og's play them again is a treat. "Take the A Train" and "Dimnuendo/Crescendo in Blue" are my favorites and there is some real improvisational mastery on display from Ellington himself on the piano, the trumpet, and saxophone players. "Festival Junction" (both versions) also has a lot of great soloists and playing. Didn't expect to hear a drum solo ("Skin Deep") but that was pretty cool too. Jazz and other improvisational styles are the only live albums worth listening to, I think, though this one is particularly marred by the endless talking of the hosts. I don't mind a bit of intros from Duke Ellington himself but everyone else is just unnecessary. The recording quality isn't bad at all and the studio versions of most of these songs dont sound much better since the tech wasn't really there at the time to do deep mastering and mixing like we do today. It was a bit disappointing to not be able to hear the double bass work as clear as I would like, particularly in "Newport Up", as that is always better in a studio recording. I appreciate whoever did the remaster adding the bits where Ellington had to calm the undoubtedly extremely drunk and extremely rich Newport crowd down. Woodstock for the polo grounds, as it were. I do feel like the last half of the second disc in the remaster was recorded in a studio because everything comes through a bit more clear and that the audience interactions were spliced in; I'd have to look in to it but regardless it does sounds slightly better. I liked this a lot, I hope we get more jazz and fusion records on this list.

The Velvet Underground

3/5

“Candy Says” as an opener got me hyped up for something a bit more interesting and it only really paid off at the end with “Murder Mystery”. And that wasn’t particularly good, it was just interesting. The stuff in between is nice enough. Sad boi songs for thinking about girls you have a crush on. I think this would’ve appealed to me more when I was younger. It’s a pleasant listen, but not the stunning art piece that people make it out to be. VU is said to be a band that only really became appreciated after they put out a ton of work. I’m wondering if it’s because the market was kinda saturated with bands like this during the 60s and 70s and they ultimately had more staying power than the other bands due to persistence, money, or both. That isn’t to say they aren’t good, I like the style, it’s just not really a standout for me. Maybe I need to listen to more of the heroin albums.

Rhythm Nation 1814

Janet Jackson

3/5

This album is plagued by the very dated sounding instrument kit used. The synthetic bass and drums and the horn stabs are really a product of its time and were wisely abandoned years later when the sound went out of style. Jackson's singing is excellent but the songs really aren't there to overcome the sound for me. I realize it's subjective but I just can't get over it. The first half of the actual songs are overrun with it. That said I thought about this in the scope of modern popular music, and I'm sure that lots of albums we listen to now are going to sound like this to people in the future. What I can say is that the lyrical content is refreshing for a pop album. An equivalent artist of Janet's popularity is not writing songs like this now. It's not insanely deep or anything but it covers ground that is limited to less successful commercial artists these days. I appreciate that. The love songs on here are the Janet Jackson I'm more familiar with but they also suffer from the dated sound. It's not a bad sound at all, it's just so weird sounding now. I can't deal.

The Beach Boys Today!

The Beach Boys

2/5

This could be a very normal album by a celebrated good time group but the lyrics are some of the weirdest shit I’ve ever heard. Maybe it was different back in the day but “people say I’m mean and treat her bad” followed by “they just know what they see” is some weird shit. Don’t tell people to kiss your sister. I never realized “Help me Ronda” is about a rebound hookup. “Please let me wonder” is confusing…is this guy an incel or is he having second thoughts? I can’t figure it out. A lot of other artists could get away with this but the whole point of The Beach Boys is the singing and the clear enunciation of every word. The musicality (is that a word?) is classic beach boys. But yikes.

Meat Is Murder

The Smiths

4/5

Everything I know about The Smiths I mostly heard reading Morrissey jokes on twitter. I know he's a turd but this is kinda good. Incredibly pervasive emo lyrics aside (I know that's a trademark), the riffs on this are pretty good. The Headmaster Ritual" opening riff is weird enough to catch your ear and then they start going all over the place from country style to rock and mixes in between. There’s a lot of talent on display (ironically, to me, Morrissey himself is the weak point, he sounds too goofy a lot of the time) and all the instrumentalists have a good amount of range. “That Joke isn’t Funny Anymore” is my favorite of the bunch. The content and the instruments fit the voice perfectly, built to a nice crescendo by the end without fumbling half rhymes and unnecessary poetry in the lyrics. I really enjoyed that track. “Barbarism Begins at Home” is another good one, similar to the aforementioned track in that there isn’t too much wobbly lyrics and the groove is good. There’s probably several 60s bands that sing about the problematic nature of eating farmed meat but the tone and lyrics (and animal sounds) really drive the point home in “Meat is Murder”. I actually wonder if all of the band members were vegetarian. That might be the saddest song on the album. Anyway I liked this more than I thought I would.

Risque

CHIC

3/5

So this is where the Rapper's Delight sample comes from, wild. The bassline from there is so iconic that I didn't think it would get much better from there but nearly all of the more upbeat songs (My Feet Keep Dancing, My Forbidden Lover) definitely have that same good groove. They also sound like a lot of fun to play, even if they do get repetitive. Other than "Good Times" I'm pretty sure I've heard something from "Will You Cry" in some more modern rap songs. Particularly the strings, though I can't remember what it is. The song itself is pretty good too! The songs all seem to go on too long, but I get that. Remember this stuff was being played in clubs and you don't want ot change the song every two seconds while everyone is having a good time and needing more and more cocaine. You're just gonna need to ease in to the next one and let the groove go for a while. I enjoyed this, despite the songs going on a bit the album as a whole wasn't terribly long and I never really felt like skipping anything. The basslines really make the whole thing, but I'm biased.

Who Killed...... The Zutons?

The Zutons

3/5

This is the very essence of “landfill indie”, a term I really enjoy because it describes that mid-late 2000’s British sing song rock revival that all sounds like this perfectly. It’s entirely forgettable but not offensively bad. The instruments are played well enough, the songs are 90% 4/4 at a moderate tempo. The lyrics might as well be a bunch of phone numbers. The definition of average. 3 stars because I like the goofy saxophone and some of the one string riffs are good. Really it’s a 2.5.

Five Leaves Left

Nick Drake

4/5

I thought I was going to hate this but this was way better than I expected. This is what Bob Dylan is supposed to be. The songwriting is not incredibly complicated but it's complex enough to be interesting; whether Nick knew it or not he was touching esoteric bits of music theory with his songwriting and he actually knew how to perform it, on tape anyway. You can hear the influence of classical music in nearly every song, with subtle hints to the Baroque masters like Handel and Vivaldi evident in the suspended chords and key changes. His voice isn't annoying like so many other singer/songwriters and you can feel the emotion when he sings. The incorporation of strings in to so many of his songs feels right and unforced. I liked this way more than I should have. I'll have to give his other records a listen.

Superfly

Curtis Mayfield

4/5

I've heard the phrasing and cadence from "Pusherman" so many times in rap songs that I didn't realize it came from anything other than guys actually being pushers. I love finding stuff like this out. This is an album that sounds exactly like you would expect it to, and that's a good thing. I wonder if this or the Shaft (the original, not the Samuel L. Jackson redo thing) soundtrack is considered the real zenith of the genre. This isn't a bad thing - I like the sound and it definitely gives off a very specific vibe. The only thing I can complain about is that the songs do sound a bit all the same to me. The two instrumentals are a bit different but the full fledged songs sound a lot alike. That's probably me just not being tuned in to the genre though.

Stripped

Christina Aguilera

3/5

First thing: this shit is just way too long. This could have been two albums, especially at the time. The contents are actually not bad - I think she’s always been one of the better actual musicians in the sea of pop music from the mid 90s to the late 2000s. That said it is still fundamentally an album written and produced for mass market appeal. The standout tracks are all the singles, which makes sense. “Drrty”, “Beautiful”, “Fighter”, etc. The other tracks seem average to fine with nothing particularly bad in it. Just kinda boring stuff that doesn’t resonate with me, the absolute opposite of the intended audience of course. You could do a lot worse for a pop album. You could do a lot worse than Scott Storch as a producer of the time too, which for various personal reasons is still hysterical to me.

In Rainbows

Radiohead

3/5

Radiohead’s discography started to fall apart for me around “Hail to the Thief”, which had some good songs but not all of them were winners, or even that interesting. It took me a long time and many listens of “Kid A” and “Amnesiac” to really appreciate them both but I I got there and they were worth the multiple listens. I didn’t do that to try and understand the albums, I did that because they were genuinely good and improved listen over listen. Unfortunately, this album doesn’t feel that way. There are two or maybe three different styles of songs on this album. The fast tempo with experimental instruments, the Thom Yorke odd ballad, and “Videotape”, which is the best track in my opinion. Radiohead has way more range than this album lets on, and it’s intimately a disappointment. The songs are all listenable and even pretty good in some cases but as whole this album is a let down to me. I expect so much more. It’s really not up to the standards set by literally every album before it.

Moondance

Van Morrison

3/5

Pretty standard 70’s rock-folk with clear singing and good instrumentals. A lot of the songs blended together for me, but that’s his dedication to a style and nobody does it quite like him. The title track is famous enough that I’ve heard it in multiple places as an instrumental, including what I swear was broadcasts of an old Italian news program my parents would have on back in my youth. It’s an ear worm for sure. For someone in to the soft rock or pop jazz genres this is probably a masterpiece. For me it’s kinda pleasant background music.

Mothership Connection

Parliament

4/5

I could listen to Bootsy basslines all day, the man is just a machine of effortless mastery. Every one of these songs has such an incredible drive and rhythm. I'm not sure it makes me want to dance, but it really makes me want to smoke a gigantic blunt in a room with blinky lights. I think it's impossible to feel bad while listening to this. The lyrics are mostly self referential nonsense, so there's nothing to process other than having a good time. Even the solos just kind of blend in to the groove, you barely notice that more than a few of them go on for minutes. I was mad this morning for various reasons and this picked me right up. What a mood booster. I didn't even want to skip the vastly overplayed "Give Up The Funk".

Make Yourself

Incubus

4/5

Right in the nostalgia glands. Incubus was a sort of bridge between the rap rock bands and the old grunge bands at the time; not quite stupid enough to be nu metal but not quite soft enough to be indie. In a way they kinda dragged rock in to the 2000's on the radio at least. They still have a fairly unique sound. The guitarist sure loves his sitar emulation and delay, the drums are clean and the drummer has a good ear for dynamics in his snare hits. The bassist is probably too good for this kind of music and when he goes off you can tell. The singing is perfect for the sound, a bit overwrought some times but whatshisface has a large vocal range and doesn't strain himself to reach anything that would sound bad. More bands should emulate that. The lyrics are fairly terrible but that's ignorable. The DJ, well, he's there Because 1999. This is still a good album but there are some stinkers on here, as there always was. "Consequences" has such a weird chord progression in the verse that I always ended up skipping it because it wasn't "heavy" enough. It's actually a clever sequence but I still don't really like it. It's not even that bad of a song, I just want it to do something it doesn't. I've grown out of "I Miss You", a song that is so blatantly written for ex girlfriends, and kinda sounds off compared to the rest of the album. It seems like it should be a totally different album. "Drive" suffers from being overplayed and not being that good in the first place. The rest of the songs are awesome. I miss this level of distortion and feeling in rock music. It's just complicated enough with varying time signatures and progressions (Stellar, The Warmth, Pardon Me) to be interesting without making me feel like I have to put everything down and pay attention. The mixing and mastering is that clean sound without too much experimentation that I really like. All the various parts shine in their own way. A good album that captured the sound of the 90's and went just far away from it to be a standout in its own way.

The Next Day

David Bowie

3/5

I think I've always appreciated David Bowie more as a person and public figure than as an artist. This album doesn't really change that. The biggest compliment I can give it is that he is true to himself and the songs are distinctly Bowie. Unfortunately, his style never really appealed to me. He's the rock and glam version of a folky singer/songwriter that I don't care for most of the time. I'm surprised that this album appeared on here given his lengthy discography - is this really one of his top 5 ones? I'm sure we'll get more but this is pretty forgettable. It's not a bad album, I just immediately forgot each song after it played. I know they vary in tempo, key, etc, but they could all be the same, I wouldn't remember. I'd Rather Be High too, David.

Van Halen

5/5

Yes. Hell yes. The stupid ass slide whistle in “Runnin With The Devil” is the greatest circus instrument interpolation of all time. This albums pulls a ton of legendary Eddie playing in to the same lane as some of the greatest 80s (before they even happened!) nonsense ever produced and it manages to make a record far greater than the 7 brain cells it took to write all the songs combined. Every single song is just background noise for a huge riff and a huge solo, and it rules. The guitar is unmatched; just completely raw and unproduced. The rest exists to elevate the playing and it does so exactly adequately. I love it.

Odessey And Oracle

The Zombies

4/5

This is like a slightly more interesting Beatles album. “Care of Cell 44” sets the tone for a lyrically more challenging album than the usual britpop dreck. I don’t think it fully realizes that but I really liked that song and there was more than one where the content wasn’t just about being hippie style fucked up or being happy, Butchers Tale being another standout there. Despite being easy to follow, I think a lot of the vocal (and instrumental) harmonizing is complicated and well thought out, more so than a lot of the stuff in this genre. The first track and “hung up on a dream” are good examples. There’s also a theme of not over utilizing the organ and keys in here though featuring them in a big way. They never overpower anything despite taking center stage in many songs. The more I think about it the more I like this more than the beatles releases we’ve had. I don’t think either are really worth the status they’ve got in popular music but this is a good album that is different enough to make a mark. A nice surprise!

Junkyard

The Birthday Party

2/5

Nick Cave's voice is ridiculous in this. I don't really like him to begin with but he sounds especially absurd in this context. The whole album sounds like it was recorded in a corrugated steel hut, which I guess is intentional if you read the wiki. I like the idea and I've heard lots of punk music that sounded like shit but Cave's voice and the fairly bad songwriting in general ruins it. When you make an album like this the songs have to have more energy and they have to be good. This is a difficult album to listen to. Songs that might have been decent if someone else was singing: "Hamlet (Pow Pow Pow)", "Big Jesus Trash Can", "Kewpie Doll" "Release the Bats" is what actually good, but that's it.

Solid Air

John Martyn

3/5

The title track would be a good jazz number if Martyn didn’t mumble his way through the whole thing. It’s apparent he can do it from the other songs, why fuck this one up? It’s otherwise a good song! He does the same thing in “man in the station”. This album seems a bit divided about what it wants to do. It’s kinda jazz/lounge and kinda folk. I actually like the former but I could really do without the latter. I figured the whole album would sound like “Over the Hill” and I’m glad it doesn’t. Once you get over the first two songs which are the prime examples of the two styles, it does start to fit together a bit better. Beth Orton does a cover with “don’t wanna know about evil” with William Orbit that is way better than this one, but I feel that way about many covers of 70s singer/songwriter tunes. It’s a good song regardless. This isn’t a bad listen but I doubt I’ll put anything on it on a playlist other than the first track for drugs purposes. I was expecting a lot worse.

Channel Orange

Frank Ocean

4/5

I love the PS2 and street fighter sound effects in the beginning of the album, then “Thinking bout you” is such a good song that the following tracks seem like a bit of a let down. “Super Rich Kids” comes close to that high then we get to “Pyramids”, which is better than it has any right to be at 10 minutes long. What a bizarre ass feature of John Mayer in “White”; it completely works as a break before the last third of the album. This album goes on a sinusoidal path of great songs to not so great songs and back. The lows aren’t even that low though; it’s all good stuff. There are a. Couple of skips for me toward the end but by and large this is great. Really good sunny day driving album, and on multiple listens the lyrics are great too. Really enjoyed this one.

This Is Fats Domino

Fats Domino

4/5

I swear I didn’t realize Fats Domino was a real person until today; I thought it was a made up name from various 80s sitcoms and cartoons. A cursory look at Wiki shows that Fats was doing this well before Elvis and I think Elvis ripped him off wholesale. And he’s worse at it. I’m a Fats Domino truther now. I think it’s a bit of a cheat to use a greatest hits album in this list but I liked every track and it was mega short so hard to complain really.

Paul's Boutique

Beastie Boys

4/5

The sample work absolutely out does (and probably hides some of the inadequacies of) the lyrical content and style of the whole album. What a masterpiece of beat manipulation, and I guess it suits the three styles that the actual Beastie Boys have. The dust brothers must’ve spent an eternity creating this stuff, and it’s really great. Their rapping style is a real “you like it or you don’t”, but I did find it growing on me, like it does for all their other albums. It always takes me 2 or 3 songs to get in to it. I do love how they pass off the mic to each other within the verses rather than trying to do individual ones like so many other groups do, and they’ve always done it this way. “Car Thief” is my favorite here, and in addition to the way they rap it, the best lines are in it too (“The godfather of soul in the belly of the beast/smokin that dust at St. Anthony’s feast”). The B Boy suite might as well be a different album, and I feel like it’s the cuts they didn’t want to make in to a full song but were too good to drop. I like “Hello Brooklyn” the most out of it though the fast paced nature of it makes it all good. None of it feels over cooked for that reason. Fun record to revisit.

The Wall

Pink Floyd

5/5

This is an album that is going to appear in a ton of critics' top 10, let alone top 1001, so its inclusion is not a surprise at all, nor should most of the content be if you're older than 30, maybe even 20 if you had a certain kind of parent or still listened to terrestrial radio in 2012 or whatever. I know it's a classic but having listened to a ton of pink floyd in my life I don't think this is their best album, or even second. The thing it does really well though is be a concept/opera album without being overly up its own ass about that fact. It's still full of great standalone tracks that are tied in to the story without having to rely on full songs worth of context to make sense of them. It speaks to Waters and the rest of band's songwriting ability and storytelling prowess. Being able to pull a musical theme down through most of the first disc without ramming it down your throat the whole time is what film composers and classical composers do - it's rare for a rock band to pull this off. I think the second disc is better than the first, by a lot even. When I'm in a mood to listen to this album I usually skip the first disc entirely. It's an obvious pick, but I think if I could only listen to 5 songs for the rest of my life Comfortably Numb would be one of them. The harmonies, the carefully picked effects on the guitar, the instrumentation, the lyrics, it's just all great. It being on the same album as Hey You, Run Like Hell, Another Brick in the Wall pt X, and Mother is really something. I can't give this anything but a 5; I'd give it a 4 knowing their other work but I've given lots of lesser albums 4's and it wouldn't do it justice.

Django Django

3/5

I was prepared to be disappointed but within a few seconds of “Hail Bop” I realized that it was on the FIFA 13 soundtrack and FIFA soundtracks are always full of bangers. “Waveforms” is a good one in the same style. I wouldn’t quite classify this as landfill indie but it’s close. The production is too good for that and the songs are too interesting. Speaking of the production, I love the guitar on this album when it’s not just piped from acoustic. It’s super compressed and distorted to the point that it sounds like an electric twelve string. It’s been done before but I really like it. The vocal harmonies are also executed well, though I’m not sure if the singer is double/triple tracked or if it’s all of them. Either way it’s good. The second half of the album kind of lost me. Starting with “Wor” everything got a little derivative and simplistic. “Skies over Cairo” is literally just 12 bar blues but harmonic minor. Lazy! I think this is one of the better modernish albums we’ve heard but it is let down by a bunch of filler tracks that don’t distinguish themselves from anything else.

Music Has The Right To Children

Boards of Canada

4/5

I love Boards of Canada and this might by my second favorite release by them. I first got in to them relatively recently, during 2020, when I was looking for songs and bands that wouldn't make me mad or really force me to do too much thinking. I found them cruising around various Spotify generated playlists with the term "ambient". BoC's sound isn't really what I would call ambient, but I get the tag. They have a real talent for layering instruments and sounds, building appropriate dynamics, and resolving long running phrases in a satisfying way. This album has some really stellar examples of that in "Turquoise Hexagon Sun", "Roygbiv", "Open The Light" and "Olson". At the time when this album was released I remember a small scene of burgeoning "downtempo" groups, but none of them were as creative as Boards of Canada. They were really doing something ahead of their time with this album, and I'm kind of annoyed it took me so long to find them. The biggest complaint I have about this album are the short track interludes (Olson excluded because I think it could keep going for much longer), but even those are good bridges between songs that vary in tempo and sound. It's obvious that the album is not just a collection of songs but meant to be enjoyed as a whole work and those tracks are just connections. I could listen to this for a long time (and I have, multiple times). The "Trans Canada Highway" EP is still my favorite work of theirs but this might be next. Music that will forever be associated with a shit time in my (and many others) life, but in a good way.

GI

Germs

3/5

The wiki about this album says it’s the first of the hardcore punk albums out of LA and i expected a really shittily produced noise record. While it is noisy, the production is clean and you can hear every instrument and vocal clearly. Big points for that. As for the content, I really liked about half of this album or so. Communist Eyes, Lexicon Devil, Strange Notes and We Musst Bleed are all solid punk songs of the angrier and non pop variety. The back half of the album is pretty lousy and the final 10 minute track is just bad. As far as hardcore punk albums go this is a decent one but it doesn’t upstage things that came later for me. Also lol Pat Smear taking a leading role here, man gets around.

Homework

Daft Punk

4/5

This is not the best daft punk album. This is not even the second best daft punk album, yet it’s still a very good daft punk album. Listening to this brought me back to sweaty evenings in big room clubs in Italy smoking furiously and being assaulted with that droning 4/4 and constant layers and dynamic changes in one or maybe 2 samples. Really nobody was doing it like Daft Punk at the time and even at the infancy of their style it still sounds distinct. The beginning of this has all the old hits. I could probably do without a couple tracks in the middle on this, but once we get to “Oh Yeah” it all picks back up brilliantly to the awesome buildup destruction of “Alive”. Even with the songs I don’t enjoy in here this is still a non stop, no bullshit album. Great stuff.

Blood Sugar Sex Magik

Red Hot Chili Peppers

3/5

There was a time when the chili peppers were considered good and. It just Anthony Keidis’s California boop we doop skabadaboo band, and it probably started with this album. Make no mistake that it has plenty of that shit on it but they had plenty of good ones on here too. You can’t talk about this band or this album without mentioning Flea and the bass work, which is as usually one of a kind and expertly fitted in to the music. The opening track is a perfect example; it’s a completely bass driven track and it works. The singles on here are classics. Hard to dispute that but I’ve heard them so many times that I ended up skipping them. As for the less played songs I liked “power of equality” and “naked in the rain” the most. The rest were fine I guess. I really can’t deal with the goofy lyricisms and Kiedis’s voice as an adult. My hot take is that One Hot Minute is the Chili Peppers best album even though everyone hates it.

Leftism

Leftfield

3/5

I rather liked this, it's great working music. I imagine it's also great doing drugs music but it's a weekday and it's day time soooooo. I particularly liked the more mellowed out tracks (Song of Life, Original, Melt). Overall this is pretty good. I do wonder if this was the first popular "progressive house" album, before that was a name of a subgenre. That would explain the inclusion on the list. Nothing earthshaking, but definitely a good album for clubs and repetitive tasks. The only thing track I actively disliked was "Open Up" and that was just because I didn't care for the endless vocal loop of "BURN HOLLYWOOD BURN".

Pictures At An Exhibition

Emerson, Lake & Palmer

4/5

I was ready to dislike this. Pictures At An Exhibition is one of my favorite classical suites and it’s a live album, so I figured it would just be odd and sound like shit. I was right about it sounding a bit like shit (though not anywhere near as bad as it could have) but the interpretation of the work is really quite good. Adding lyrics and singing is always a risk when you’re using someone else’s music but it’s kept to a minimum and the singing is good, which I should’ve expected. There is a bit of what I would consider an overuse of the piano/synth/organ but you can’t just do everything on a guitar as much as I would like that to be the case. That said, the organ in the various calls to the promenade theme get more powerful as the album goes on (as it does in the original piano composition) as they go on and by the last one in the beginning of “The Great Gate of Kiev” brings it all home beautifully. The three part interpretation of “The Dancing Hut of Baba Yaga” is a highlight of this for me. All three of them shine technically throughout it and the timing of such a technical piece is constructed incredibly well without sounding robotic. The dissonance at the end of the middle section matches the original which is cool. I never knew this existed before today and I’m glad I got to hear it. What a turnaround from expectation to reality. Bit of a laugh at the last track which is not part of the suite but is another (goofier) interpretation of Russian classical music. I wouldn’t have put this on the album but otherwise it would’ve been really short so I get it.

Oracular Spectacular

MGMT

3/5

I generally like the MGMT songs I hear on the radio or in bars/restaurants. I think they have a pretty unique sound without being inaccessible. With that said, I think maybe I just only like their big hits. Time to Pretend, Electric Feel, Kids and maaaaaaybe Of Moons, Birds & Monsters were all good songs. I've heard the first three before and I like them. The last one was just "heavy" enough for me to like it. The songs on this album that are moodier or quiet don't really appeal to me. They turn the interesting voices and instruments that are their hallmark in to whines. It sort of makes me want to listen to some of their later stuff to see if it's the same. I like a few tracks off of "Little Dark Age" but if it's more of the same filler as this album then maybe it's not worth the time. This album is here for the uniqueness of the sound (which spawned a lot of garbage copies, I'm sure), which is good. It's an excellent combo of indie, electronic, disco, pop and lots of others. I can’t personally have a whole album of this though.

Blue Lines

Massive Attack

4/5

I love Massive Attack in general, and this album isn’t an exception. I sort of prefer their later stuff with less vocals but these songs wouldn’t really work with no singing. The vocals are part of the instrumentation, especially when the male singer is involved. His style just works with the beats. “Safe from Harm”, “Daydreaming”, and “Blue Lines” are my favorites but really they’re all pretty great tracks. I could probably live without “Be Thankful for What Youve Got”, it’s got that wackiness that makes it sound too much like a disco song. “Unfinished Symphony” is like that too but the backing track is so good I can forgive it. Other than that, they capture that late 90s euro lounge style without being cheesy like so many other imitators are. There’s obvious rap and reggae undertones as well, which all work excellently. Perfect music for having a drink in the dark with a good friend. The only reason this is a four is because I really do prefer the later stuff; when I put on Massive Attack it’s gonna be Mezzanine, 100th Window and even Heligoland. This album definitely holds its own though.

Dookie

Green Day

5/5

The second album I ever bought with my own money. Every track is an absolute hit. The line and melody of “Let’s nuke the bridge we’ve torched two thousand times before” has lived in my head for 30 something years. “Welcome to Paradise” being cleaned up from the version on “Kerplunk” was a great choice from whoever made it. The rare instance of a redo being better than the original. There are a million highlights to this album. Every song has something special. Musically this isn’t a difficult album to play but each of them plays really well and you can tell they’re all actually pretty talented. It’s not “real” punk but it’s the purest form of pop punk ever put to vinyl/tape/optical/etc. There is an obvious nostalgia element for me in this album but even as my tastes have changed and evolved this whole album is still really good. No skips - even on the CD where there’s a pile of negative time before the last joke track.

Rattlesnakes

Lloyd Cole And The Commotions

3/5

The singer sounds like someone heard David Byrne and said “what if this was uninteresting”. Or Bob Dylan and thought “no songwriting but marginally better singing”. With that out of the way the actual songs aren’t terrible. Was this the genesis of this era of British pop/rick music? If so then it’s a good beginning but I don’t know enough of the genre to know when and how it really started. You could say this is a great example of it anyway. It might be derivative of others but I don’t know what came first. The production and mastering/mixing is good. I like the clean guitar sounds and there are even bits of strings in some songs that make them more engaging. It isn’t unlistenable by far but it’s just kinda there. Background music for a movie set in the 80s or a modern grocery store. Really don’t understand why this is on here UNLESS it’s the first album of its kind, I guess.

The Suburbs

Arcade Fire

2/5

“Oh my god what is that horrible song they’re singing” is a great self reflection. “I feel like I’m living in a city with no children in it; a garden left for a ruin by a millionaire inside of a private prison” is one of the worst sentences and maybe the most tortured metaphor I’ve ever heard. “The Sprawl” is like if Radioheads “exit music for a film” was run through a Christian content guard website and was also shit. The music is good enough. The fast songs are just how many downstrokes on a guitar can you do. The slow songs are teenage poetry put to odd time signatures (which is at least better than regular time signatures) or something that sounds like a modern military march. It’s simple but gets the job done. I did like the post-rock style buildup in “The Suburban War”; made me want to listen to more of that though rather than the rest of this. I can see why they’re successful; the music matches the moods of the songs and it’s got a groove most of the time. The lyrics and the singing really throw me off though. They really ruin the whole thing. Ultimately if I’m going to listen to this kind of rock I’ll probably put on The Strokes, and lyrically I’m probably just a shitty old man that doesn’t get it.

In Our Heads

Hot Chip

3/5

I wasn't super in to this until "These Chains" which reminded me of the electronic dance pop music I liked back in the day. The songs before that were pretty forgettable for me. I guess the notability of this album is the return to mixing what is now called "EDM" with pop music and rock instruments. It's been done before certainly, and like I said there were bands and individuals making tracks like these well before 2000. I enjoyed "These Chains", "Night and Day" and "Ends of the Earth". I think the tempo in all three cases makes them more appealing to me than the rest. I wouldn't call this groundbreaking or anything; it's pretty good. Just not great.

Live At The Harlem Square Club

Sam Cooke

4/5

Another live album, but I enjoyed this one and it captures a live feel more so than albums that just happened to be recorded at a performance but were otherwise indistinguishable from a studio recording aside from worse quality. I’d never heard of Sam Cooke before this (at least by name) but he has a powerful voice that kept going til the end of the album. He’s a great singer and I like how he engages the crowd. From the start I thought of the band from Animal House and then “Twistin the Night Away” came on, which justified it completely. A great rendition too. This album was fun. Not a bad track on it and the “live” part of it is finally a plus rather than a detriment.

Funeral

Arcade Fire

3/5

I think this is better than the album we got a few days ago (Suburbs) but it still suffers from my personal grievances with the singing and lyrical content. The reverb on the singers voice that makes it sound like its inside a sheet metal structure and the sometimes inane and "so stretched as a metaphor it comes back to the literal interpretation" lyrics continue to bother me. I did enjoy the "neighborhood" suite, particularly #3 ("Power Out"). I liked the almost electronically consistent drum beat and the rhythm section in general. Given that's half the album, we're already doing better than last time. I think the appeal of Arcade Fire is this expansive, almost post-rock, epic sound, but mixed with that mid-late 2000's mustache and suspender instrumentation of unmastered pianos, fiddles (they would never be referred to as violins) and the occasional banjo. They do have it if you've never heard a band that does it really well do it before, and that's completely fine. I'm sure when I say 90's bands were doing brand new stuff people the age of my father would say "well these other old bands you've never heard of were doing it 20 years before that". After two albums I think I understand what's going on with them. I still don't particularly care for it but I get it.

Close To The Edge

Yes

4/5

The huge first track of this album is considered a masterpiece of prof rock. It has all the parts of one for sure - complicated rhythms, technical instrumentals, metaphorical lyrics, a central musical theme, LENGTH. I think I would have to listen to it multiple times to really appreciate it. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed it and it didn’t feel like 18 minutes at all, I just think there’s more there to understand, as there is with all of Yes’s big epics. It’s not quite as digestible on the first run like Crimson or other contemporaries are. I only listened to the first three tracks because that’s what’s in the original album and I wanted to stick with that. I think I liked “And You and I” the most out of all three tracks. The keys and voice work are classic Yes. The final track “Siberian Khatru” is the most straightforward part of the whole album. It’s a fun track, and the guitar is great in it. I want to give this a 3.75 so I’m going to round up. It’s a bit up its own ass but not more than any prog album should be.

Real Life

Magazine

3/5

This is a good example of an early post punk album. You can see the beginnings of 80's rock in here with some of the riffs and melodies. It sounds a bit like if David Bowie was more average, or if the Clash were less punk. It's good, but it's not very unique The mastering and production is great; I liked the guitar tones and levels especially. It's front and center without taking over. The bass is clear and punctuated, the drums are even and the cymbals aren't overbearing. "Shot by Both Sides" is the best track on here, it sounds like a faster and tighter Clash song, which I like. I also enjoyed "Recoil". In general the faster and more aggressive the song was, the better it sounded. On the other end I don't need literal circus music on "The Great Beautician in the Sky" at all, ever. The final track, "Parade" was also a bit of a stinker. An average album with some highlights and some turds. Good enough!

Os Mutantes

3/5

This was an interesting album; this is real psychedelic rock instead of something inspired by it. It’s cool that it’s in Portuguese, and you can hear some of the more Brazilian string and percussion instruments in the interludes between tracks and in the sound tricks that are played in production. This must’ve sounded insane at the time. My father in law has a great collection of Brazilian music including plenty from this time, and it doesn’t sound like anything else. I don’t know the exact timelines but it reminds me of the Beatles more out there stuff, just more raw and excited. The last track is the most “traditional” sounding one and even then it’s still very much their own sound. Anyway I liked it; not sure I would play it again but it was fun to listen to and was for sure groundbreaking in South America if not elsewhere.

At Folsom Prison

Johnny Cash

5/5

I loved this. The music, the banter, the announcements with inmate numbers, the laughing mid track, the lyrics, just all of it. I’ve somehow never listened to this despite always liking Johnny Cash, and it is such a great record. The recording it incredibly good for being recorded in what I assume is a prison cafeteria or auditorium. The singing comes through beautifully but none of the instruments are overshadowed. I rest can’t think of a bad thing about this. Really great.

Lust For Life

Iggy Pop

2/5

The lyrics to “Turn Blue” and “sixteen” make more sense after you know that Iggy was a bit of a weirdo sex pest. Moral objections aside, I didn’t particularly like this album. How many songs can you make out of 3 chords, chorus and verse included? There’s good three chord rock and then there’s this. It’s pretty boring and repetitive. I know Bowie is involved in this a bit and you can sort of hear it but the big difference is that Bowie writes interesting music and Iggy just kinda writes music. It’s really forgettable, especially given the real punk stuff developing around the late 70s. Also he sounds too much like Jagger of Jagger could produce more than 2 notes with his voice.

Master Of Puppets

Metallica

4/5

This is an album I listened to a lot when I was younger but I wouldn't say I really love it. There are some absolute screamers in here like the title track, Battery, and Orion and the rest of the tracks, while not as good, certainly hold up. The only track I don't like is Leper Messiah, which despite having a great title, goes on too long and has some not so great musical parts (descending chromatic order and then the odd vocal key shift in the chorus drives me insane) and key changes. I wish James and Lars weren't such absolute tools in real life. It really sours my attitude toward the band in general. For me this is the last truly great Metallica thrash album. The Black Album is a huge departure from the style and it's good in it's own way but then they went and changed everything and their latter stuff is mostly disposable commercial rock. I could go on but treating this album in a vacuum, it's great. It's a lot to listen to in one sitting and it does feel a tad dated away from the three tracks I mentioned earlier, but you'd be hard pressed to find a better and more perfectly executed example of the genre at the time. This is a defining album in metal in general.

Electric Music For The Mind And Body

Country Joe & The Fish

2/5

Just looking at the cover I was expecting to hate this. It's not great but it's better than I expected. I enjoyed "Super Bird" which is just shitting on LBJ, and I can always respect and laugh at dumping on a politician. The first two tracks are pretty catchy as well, and they have that whole jam band/psychadelic aspect down easily. It's not a genre I ever really want to listen to, though. The rest of it is largely forgettable. There's nothing particularly standout for me on the majority of the album. It's an American record from the 60's, and it sure as hell sounds like one. That's really it.

Arular

M.I.A.

4/5

The best part about this album are the simple yet interesting beats. Then her rapping, then her accent and lastly the singing. The singing is bad. The rest of this kinda rules. I have to get back to the beats because they’re just so well done. There’s no falling asleep 4/4 here, yet the whole thing is done with what I can only guess is a single sample set with an fx pad. The jungle, reggae, garage, dance hall, and rap influences are all evident and not pandering. Some of the lyrics are pretty out there but there’s a running theme of resistance, the state of refugees, revolution, etc. If I didn’t know about her already I would’ve been really surprised. Not the kind of message you expect from this kind of album. I liked “Bucky Done Gun”, “Bingo”, “10 Dollar” the most but the whole thing is a good time.

Remain In Light

Talking Heads

4/5

I wanted to like this more than I did. The percussion and rhythms throughout the whole album are awesome; and you can feel the influence they all took from Fela Kuti and his contemporaries. In the wiki article it’s mentioned that the band didn’t want to make this another David Byrne and friends album, which I feel they accomplished, other than the massive “once in a lifetime”, which is one of the most iconic Byrne songs ever. The second half of the album is the letdown for me and ultimately makes me not really want to revisit this more. “Listening Wind” and “The Overload” are such a drag compared to the first 4 or 5 songs. I get that you want to vary the tempo over an album but maybe the track ordering got lost in the grander plan. I actually wonder if I would’ve liked it more in a different order. Anyway it’s still a good album, it’s just not great for me.

Power In Numbers

Jurassic 5

5/5

Jurassic 5 gets unfairly lumped in to “old school” or “conscientious” rap without taking the fact that they’re more than the sum of those parts. This album is a great example of staying true to a style without sounding stale or dated. Nu-Mark and Cut Chemist really take this to heart; they've got plenty of skills but they know to keep it simple and let the three MC's really shine (Acetate Prophets excluded of course) I think “A Day At The Races” is a great example of executing their perfectly enunciated and technical style without sounding like something out of the 80s or preachy. The following track “Remember his name” perfectly blends in to the early 2000’s radio rap but without following that overproduced trend that was prevalent. "One of Them" is one of the few boasting/dissing "anyone else" tracks I've ever thought wasn't corny. There’s a reason J5 have been around as long as they have: their albums can only belong to them and they’ve never deviated from what they’re good at so far as to sound forced. On this one, the features fit right in; even Nelly Furtado which I thought might be a train wreck. Leaving Kool Keith as an acapella was a brilliant idea. Overall really excellent.

3 Years, 5 Months And 2 Days In The Life Of...

Arrested Development

4/5

The highlight of this album is definitely Headliner. The DJ skills and beats are all great, even if some of the songs get boring after a bit, it’s not due to the backing track. The rapping is good too, and the occasional singing, but I really like the DJing. The content is wholesome without being cheesy, yet with an angry-ish message. I wish we hadn't heard that Jurrassic Five album yesterday because I think I would've liked this more if I didn't have a better example of what this album is presenting fresh in my mind. This isn't a bad album at all, it's just comparatively not as good. The messaging is almost too literal, though I guess that's the point. "Tennessee" might have been the first hip hop song I listened to intentionally. I remember hearing it on the pirate radio station back in my youth, right after a Rage Against the Machine track. In a weird way they occupy the same "agenda", though I hate using that word. Hope for a better world, decrying the system and what it's done to everyone. This is good and it undoubtedly influenced a lot of hip hop later down the line. It's got some filler, though, and it didn't grab me nearly as hard as it could have.

Murder Ballads

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

2/5

"ooooo I'm nick cave and I sing in a forced low voice and write bad poetry and then me and some other guys put it to shitty music ooooooooo smoke cigarettes!!!!" I never got the hype around Nick Cave. This didn't change my mind. We get it you're gloomy and spooky and want to say "suck my dick" in to a mic, write a metal album instead of whatever this is. This is like if teenage horror fanfics was a musical genre unto it itself. I get that each one of these is supposed to be a song about a murder but if you want that there are a million old country songs and a million rap songs and a million emo songs, etc. that are all better than this. At least the instrumentation and playing is good. Saves it from being a 1.

Madman Across The Water

Elton John

4/5

It’s hard to describe what I really liked about this album. The songwriting speaks for itself. Elton John’s work is more than the sum of its basic instrumental parts. The progressions, structure and composition of each song is very listenable but not simple. The sheet music for nearly every song on here must be a trip to read. I think that’s what made it appealing to me, because I’m not really in to the singer/songwriter genre in general. It does get bizarrely repetitive despite the songs not fundamentally sounding like each other. Maybe it’s just the production where all the tones and dynamics are pretty much identical that makes it seem that way. This largely holds up for being written 50 years ago, except maybe “Indian Sunset” which has some lyrics which are questionable today, though tells a good story. It’s a shame because the music is great, maybe my favorite on the album. I don’t know if I’m gonna listen to this again but I’m glad I did. This is long lasting and timeless pop music.

Raw Power

The Stooges

4/5

“Look out honey cuz I’m using technology”: I had no idea that was a stooges line. Nice. Also “your pretty face is going to hell” also coming from this is news to me. I love learning about this stuff. Musically this is much more my jam than the solo Iggy album from a week ago. I like the raw punk style and the unrestricted guitar noodling. The songs all sound pretty similar, which is fine because it’s short. It’s all energetic with no bullshit. Even “I need somebody” is crunchy enough to not really stray from the main thematics. Overall quite good for the era and the genre.

Out Of The Blue

Electric Light Orchestra

3/5

I think I'm confusing ELO with ELP which are much more serious and less poppy than this. This is like if prog rock got mixed up with some hippies or the Beatles. It's not bad it's just way more pop music than I expected. The production is very high level and it has to be for all the instruments involved. It sounds like they are running a full orchestra (heh) on some of these tracks. "Across the Border" has a goddamn mariachi band in it. Also sounds like twelve string guitars, a billion synth modules, etc, etc. It's all very expansive in terms of the playing and instruments. It's quite long. And by that I mean about twice as long as it should be. This could've been two albums (and it is a double, after all). It could be that I'm not listening hard enough but I'm not really getting a lyrical thematic element that requires a double album to get across. I guess the songs are all similar sounding, but thats more of a detriment really. Like if Tom Petty was actually 3 Tom Petty's and wrote the same song a bunch of times with 300 different instrumentalists. Even "Mr. Blue Sky" which has 990 MILLION plays on spotify is only remarkable because of the vocoder. My favorite on here is probably "Wild West Hero"; shame it took an hour to get to it. I think the biggest feeling I got from this is that it feels like a record company made this specifically for radio. Very strange given that it's this big rock band putting out a long album. It's not unlistenable, it's not poorly made (in fact it's excellently recorded and mastered from what I can tell), it's just kinda boring to me. Music for shopping malls in the 80's.

Ill Communication

Beastie Boys

4/5

This album is a lot more refined than Paul’s Boutique which is good in an easier to listen to sense. The best songs on here are the ones with crisp or unique samples - Sure Shot, Root Down, Sabatoge, Sabrosa my fave of the instrumentals) etc. I don’t think there are any particularly hidden gems on here. The rapping hasn’t really evolved; in fact I think it may be more basic to introduce more melody to the songs. One of my favorite parts of this album is MCA playing bass. Some of the lines are so slick and using a standup bass is next level. Making your own sample is great work in general, for all the tracks where the instruments are original. I think that’s what makes this album a move forward in many respects. In general the beastie boys were in their own space between genres and I think this album was the first sign that they’d keep doing that for a while. I would rate this a 5 but I got sick of a few tracks that went on too long, and the punk tracks were not great, so 4 it is. I really loved the instrumentals (even the throat singing one), they weren’t long enough!

Something Else By The Kinks

The Kinks

3/5

This was a pleasant listen. I don’t think it’s as good or interesting as “The Village Green Preservation Society”. It the songs are the right length for easy consumption and performed well. There’s a couple of genre shifts (“No Return” sounds like a British person throttled a samba song) which is appreciated. Other than that it’s kind of unremarkable. I don’t hate it. I don’t love it. It’s a solid 3-.

The Pleasure Principle

Gary Numan

4/5

Once you get over whatever notions you have over the synth kit(s) being used it’s easier to appreciate this album. Some might never get over the sound, and that’s fine obviously, but then this album isn’t going to be for those people. The songwriting isn’t particularly incredible, it’s got singles (Cars, M.E.) that are great and songs that are more filler. The good thing about all the songs is of course what Numan does with the synths. There are no guitars on this album but you could’ve fooled me before I read that. There are “strings” but they’re obviously really processed too. The overarching sound of whatever moog model he’s using is like the sound of the 80s to me. Everything after was born of that synth sound. I will say that because of the dedication to one set of kits and probably only one or two actual keyboards the songs do sound a bit too similar. It drags on by the end because the songs are all basic 4/4 pop songs with varying moods at their core. Regardless, they are good pop songs and the uniqueness of the sound is what makes this album an important one. A fun listen and you can see why even the industrial rock that came later all cite him as an influence.

Raising Hell

Run-D.M.C.

4/5

The first four tracks of this are so good that it kinda makes the rest of it seem kinda average. After hearing the openers tracks like "Perfection" and "Hit It Run" sound really dated; they are missing that spark in the samples and turntable work that make the other tracks work. Those openers, though, those are all timeless. Sure the rapping is dated but for whatever reason I can't explain in those songs it doesn't sound that way at all. "Raising Hell" and "You Be Illin'" come close to that with the saxophone/guitar and scratch hits, but it's not quite there. This gets an extra star for how good the beginning is, otherwise it'd be a 3.

The Band

3/5

I forgot what The Band album we had before this one, but this is the one with the "Big Hits" on it. "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" and "Up On Cripple Creek" being those songs. They are far and away the best on the album. I wrote in the last review that the lazy country/rock combo is what makes The Band a bit unique among other rock bands of the time. It holds true in this album, maybe even more so than others. Unlike "Music From Big Pink" though they lean heavily in to it on this one, and I think that actively makes it worse. Too much twang and too much accent for my liking. I compared The Band to The Allman Brothers in the last review and this time I think the roles are reversed - the Allman Brothers are more interesting in everything other than the two singles I mentioned. This isn't a bad album, but it's not my style because I don't live in a saloon in Alabama.

Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols

Sex Pistols

4/5

This is great and its an obvious influence of the more modern punk bands of my youth (Rancid, the Ramones, nofx, etc). It’s high energy the whole way through and it doesn’t sound like total shit in the recording. I realize this is a bad thing for a lot of people, but I like it The lyrics shit on everything including themselves, which is an important part of punk music. Only real miss is “Submission” since the tempo is so slow relative to the rest of the album. The lyrics in “New York” would probably cause a shitstorm today, but different times and all that. The rest of it is perfect. Sure it all sounds the same but who gives a shit. It’s fine that they’re the record labels idea of an edgy band; they got it right for once. It doesn’t matter that other bands did it better or first. It’s dumb and it’s loud and I love it.

Hard Again

Muddy Waters

3/5

Not much to say about Muddy Waters that hasn't already been said. He and BB King are the absolute zenith of the blues in the 70s/80s/90s. What I like about this album is that it's not just the guitar that gets a pile of solo time. There's harmonica breaks, piano breaks, drums, etc. It keeps it a bit fresh. A lot of people put Muddy Waters in top 10 guitarist lists, and I can't say I disagree. He's very good at this particular style of playing where the feeling and progression matters more than the chops. like a lot of blues albums, this sounds very sameish all the way through. It just blends in to itself for the better part of 30 minutes. Doesn’t mean I didn’t like it, but when the chord progressions are largely identical it gets a bit stale. Overall it’s a good blues album but I wish there was a bit more variety.

Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)

Eurythmics

3/5

This is uhhh...very much not the style of music I listen to. It's produced extremely well and Annie Lennox's singing has a ton of range but it's just so goddamn 80's all I can think of is a John Hughes movie. Gary Numan's album the other day had the same sort of "stuck in a time period" sound but somehow this is less engaging. Fine for background music but that's it for me.

The Cars

4/5

Everyone knows the first three tracks, and they are all pretty great. It turns out the whole album is pretty great. The style is simple pop rock infused with that bit of new wave that keeps it interesting. "In touch with your world" is the only truly weird track and even then it's completely fine as an album cut, just not a radio tune like pretty much the rest of the album. "Just what I needed" is my favorite, but "Bye Bye Love" is probably the second. The hooks in both are just perfectly built through a tiny bridge section of a few bars and they both have a sweet synth in them that keeps it fresh. I really enjoyed this. It'd be a 4.5 if I could do that.

We Are Family

Sister Sledge

3/5

The amount of samples out of this album powered the diddy crime syndicate for decades. It’s fun listening to these older disco and r&b classics and trying to place what rap song I heard the two bar guitar lick in. Other than the entertaining sample game this is a straightforward disco album. It’s a good one, and a lot of it is catchy. It kinda fell off after the first four tracks (I skipped the title track because if I never heard it again it would be too soon). Great dancing music, well executed, not really my jam but you simply have to respect it.

Henry's Dream

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

1/5

Imagine if the most annoying person you know forced you to go to an off broadway musical they produced. This is the soundtrack. The best thing I can say about this is that "Straight to you" sounds like an old Hootie and the Blowfish song. I don't like Hootie and the Blowfish.

Repeater

Fugazi

4/5

This is classic 90's rock, and you can feel the transition from the late 80's to the very start of grunge in here. "Blueprint" in particular seems to be the proto version of every radio rock song of the decade, funnily enough. The whole album is hard enough to fit in to the aggressive mindset of the grunge trend but not so over the top that it goes in to metal and hardcore of the same era. It's angry, but not too angry. It's a really great blend. "Shut the door" is a good example of the musical tropes that would continue for other bands later. Namely the extremely quiet bassline and drums to screaming vocals and heavy guitar. Obviously not unique to a style, but the ending reminded me so much of "The Wind Below" by Rage against the Machine. "Merchandise" has such a weird chord major chord progression and the switch to the chorus is so different that it knocks you backwards; it's cool songwriting. Another review mentioned that this is music to actively do something to, not just to play in the background. It's true, this album makes me want to throw my idiot computer out the window and go fuck around outside, and I always appreciate an album that does that.

Bringing It All Back Home

Bob Dylan

3/5

I swear the only thing I hear in "Subterranean Homesick Blues" is Cartman singing "ME AND ARTEMIS CLYDE FROG GO SAVE SELMA HAYEK". I just can’t get over his voice. He’s like a less ridiculous Randy Newman. I know the songwriting is supposed to be the highlight of the Dylan experience, and there must be something to that because there are covers of these songs that I do really enjoy, just not these. Dylan’s performance style just doesn’t sit right with me; every lyric is half a step late and as a result everything sounds rushed and squashed together. Maybe his live stuff is different? I don’t know. Folk/singer songwriter stuff rarely gets me excited and I can’t say this did either. I know he’s a classic and revered and all that but not for me. Extra points for good songwriting.

Electric Ladyland

Jimi Hendrix

5/5

This album absolutely rips. Sure, there's a lot of noodling, but unlike a lot of other noodling albums most of the wankery on display here is good; great even. Jimi's a guitar legend for a reason and this album is a perfect example, though I would argue some of his live stuff is even better. The tone and feel he gets out of that guitar is really unlike anyone before or after. He doesn't have the best chops, he doesn't have the cleanest riffs, but none of that matters. It's all just, exciting maybe? I can't think of a better word. It certainly helps that the other two core members are also absurdly good musicians. The fact that the rhythm section is so frantic elevates the guitar to another level. I can't really have an objective review of this from nothing because I've been listening to this album since I was a teenager. The only songs I repeatedly skip is "Burning of the Midnight Lamp" because the harpsichord drives me nuts, and the second half of "1983" because pretty much nothing is going on. I love every other song; maybe not in their entireties but there is always something cool about to happen with either the drums, bass or obviously the guitar. The last two tracks being the last two tracks is simply unfair to the endings of other albums, and one is a cover for fucks sake. Never has an album finished as strong as this. I'd give this a 4.75, but I'm going to round up because of all the memories this album holds for me.

Talking Book

Stevie Wonder

3/5

There are some total bangers on this album and a few boring first dance wedding songs. The funk songs (“Maybe your baby”, “superstition”, etc) are incredible. The instrumental work and the vocals on those style tracks are killer, especially the synth/electric keys. The love songs leave me a bit bored to death though. The big hit of “sunshine” is fun enough to keep it going but the ballads just drag on for me. The singing is great technically, regardless. One song that seemed real out of place was “Big Brother”. Great message in the lyrics but it sounds like a Simon and Garfunkel tune. Really bizarre inclusion but it shows that Stevie has quite the range. Gimme a whole album of Stevie Wonder funk songs, instant 5. The rest I can do without.

Black Metal

Venom

3/5

I really wish the band would take the time to either re-record this, impossible now I'm sure, or to remaster it properly. The biggest detriment to it (and there are quite a few) is the recording quality. There is way too much reverb and echo. I'm not sure if that's intentional or if it's just the way whatever studio they did this was set up. The songs are pretty standard thrash metal from the 80's but it seems that Venom kind of invented or at least mainstreamed the genre. It really does sound like a shitty Megadeth record; like if these were the "parents garage" sessions, with lyrical maturity to match. I liked the title track, "Heaven's on Fire" and "Don't Burn the Witch". "Teacher's pet" is pretty absurd; like if Hot for Teacher by Van Halen was, well, this. The album did start to grow on my once I got over the sound quality. It's not stellar or anything but it's a solid "I'm mad and everything sucks!" album. I didn't bother with any of the bonus tracks, wasn't feeling it enough to bother with another albums length of it. The style has evolved and been made muuuuuch better. An extra point for originality at the time.

Triangle

The Beau Brummels

3/5

I'm assuming this album must be in here for historical reasons rather than pure musicality. It isn't bad; it's well played, the songs are well written (and musically interesting even), and it's not too long. I can't put my finger on what's supposed to be remarkable about it though. It sounds like standard 60's folk music album. I wont lie, the songs all blended together. There's nothing standout about this. I would give it a 2.5 if I could for being exactly in the middle, but lets round up because it isn't actually bad.

Live At The Witch Trials

The Fall

2/5

"lads, what if we make a punk album, but take out all the distortion and add a midi keyboard." I get part of the punk aesthetic is not being in time (or in tune), nonsensical lyrics and aggressively pushing your individual self over the song you're playing, but when you take out the loud noises and leave everything to be recorded on toy instruments, it sounds fucking awful. This is borderline unlistenable. Just awful.

Black Holes and Revelations

Muse

4/5

I think Muse were/are truly the last good pop-rock band. They songs are better than the usual diatonic chord progression stuff that most bands put out and they keep the instrumentation and singing complicated enough to be more than just background noise. That isn't to say they aren't also a bad pop band too - songs like "Starlight" and "Supermassive Black Hole" could be Coldplay songs, and I don't mean that in a complimentary way. I've always liked that Muse writes their heavier songs in some sort of double/triple time throughout the 4/4 with either the drums or bass hitting 16th or triplet note runs throughout verses and chorus sections. "Knights of Cydonia" is of course the biggest example with that killer bass run that, while "basic" musically, is really great to listen to. "Map of the Problematique" does it with the drums and bass and "Take a Bow" does it with keys. It's fun, I know it's cliche but I really do like it. Songs like "Soldiers Poem" and "Hoodoo" are their much older song "Unintended" just written again, in my opinion. It's not necessarily a bad thing but I'm not too fond of them knowing that the band is capable of better and more engaging songs. Ultimately outside of the heavy hitting tracks which are great, this album is so so; it's about half the album. I want a full album of songs like Knights of Cydonia, Invincible, Glorious, and Assassin. This has always been the issue I've had with Muse - they are so close to being a really fantastic band but they keep cranking out these (popular for sure) songs that sound like if Radiohead were married to a house song and three instruments. It's hard to blame them when that's what sells, I guess. The heavier stuff carries it's own sound (you could argue it's derivative, and probably be right) and I do enjoy it.

Live And Dangerous

Thin Lizzy

4/5

Prior to this I only really knew the big singles Thin Lizzy had, but it turns out their other stuff is pretty good. "Emerald" and "Suicide" could be songs by The Sword, which is awesome, "Massacre" is fast and sort of technical which I like. I thought "Dancing in the Moonlight" was gonna be a cover but it isn't, just shares a name with a very popular song to cover. In general the more the singer slams words in to sentences like in "The Boys are back in town" the more I like the song. He manages to make something I really normally can't stand sound just right. The wiki reveals that at least some of this album is studio overdubbed, which explains why the levels on all the instruments are even throughout and it doesn't sound like shit for the most part. That's a good thing, I think, but it is absolutely not a live album. To me it's a bonus - live recording tends to be garbage. I could do without "Still in Love with You" and "Baby Drives Me Crazy" which are boring and nearly 8 minutes long for some reason. I also think you could cut out a lot of the second half of this album without much lost. If it was 45 minutes or so it would be great. Overall I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought I would, though; a pleasant listening of what would become 80's butt rock.

KE*A*H** (Psalm 69)

Ministry

3/5

This might be blasphemy to some (heh) but I've always considered Ministry to be the shit version of KMFDM. I think I've seen Ministry live about 6 times, never as the headliner and never totally on purpose. They were good every time, don't get me wrong, but they never really were on my rotation as someone I followed. I've never actually listened to this album all the way through until today. The first thing I have to mention about this is that it is repetitive. The songs go on longer than they should; great for a mosh pit, bad for listening. The opener is a perfect example - there's an extra minute of the driving riff for no good reason really. And then it just keeps happening...nearly every song goes on for too long and doesn't provide a lot of variety. You better like that 8 bar phrase, is all I'm saying. "Psalm 69" seems like the most musically interesting track because it has more than one scale of notes in it! Favorites on here were "Just One Fix", "Hero", "Psalm 69", "Corrosion" and the classic "Jesus Built My Hotrod". I guess that's half the album so maybe I like them more than I'm letting on. I obviously enjoy it, this is absolutely my style, but please just use the whole fretboard guys. There are a lot of notes to play. I know you can do it!

Dance Mania

Tito Puente

3/5

This was an enjoyable listen if a bit repetitive. I can't help but compare it to the Willie Colòn album we had a while back which was really good. This is obviously earlier and maybe a progenitor, but it's not quite as dynamic and exciting. Standouts were the marimba or vibraphone solo in Hong Kong Mambo, which was cool from a novelty of instrumentation perspective. The Opener El Cayuco is probably the best track of them all. It's a fun album but it didn't keep me nearly as engaged as some of the other Latin music albums we've had.

MTV Unplugged In New York

Nirvana

5/5

This is a classic 90's album that everyone had in their big CD bible in their car at the time. I don't know if it deserves the reverence it gets, but it is really surprising how well these songs translate from the original versions in to acoustic ones. Some are obviously going to be fine (About a girl, Come As You are, Something in the Way) and others less so (Pennyroyal Tea, On a Plain), but they all manage to work in their own way. The covers are great, especially The Man Who Sold The World and Lake of Fire. Since this is effectively a live album and Kurt was always a shitty guitarist (technically, certainly not musically) it's funny to hear the random mistakes and mis-hits occasionally. The recording quality is good, and as it should be because this is a "quiet" set, and the production/mastering is good too. Not a lot to complain about here. I'd rather hear the original versions most of the time but there is something endearing about some exec deciding to just rip out all the distortion from these songs for kicks and them all still working and sounding great.

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

Kanye West

4/5

This came out as Kanye was transitioning from big time producer and rapper to mentally ill bajillionaire I think? Maybe it was before that was becoming apparent, it's hard to remember when exactly Kanye went from being a real inspirational success story with a ton of talent to this sort of odious and obviously disturbed person he is today. The production on this album is stellar of course, there are some really iconic beats on here (All of the Lights, Power) but I still think it doesn't really get to the level of his early work. College Dropout and Late Registration are such incredible albums that this one seems almost too polished and too full of itself to relate to. I know this is supposed be his opus, but I really don't see it that way. The songs with a ton of features fall flat entirely, the ones with artists that aren't rappers might be even worse. I know that Kanye isn't just a rapper, he's a producer, so it's not weird to be shown up in the rapping department, but it has to be said Pusha T is the best rapper on this album. His verse saves "So Appalled" from being a total throwaway track, and his verse in "Runaway" is great. I've been talking like I dislike this album, but I don't. I still think it's close to being great, I just know Kanye did better before, and probably wont ever do better again. Outside of the big singles, which are all excellent, "Hell of a Life" has a great driving beat, lyrics, and the chorus "sampling" Black Sabbath is great. Real shame he's a piece of shit now.

Is This It

The Strokes

5/5

This album is a product of a feeling that desperately needed to return to rock music at the time. It's a fun album, it's a party album, it's a simple album, all of which were things lacking at the time. I'm not even sure I liked it that much when it came out; sure I enjoyed "Last Night" like everyone else that owned a television or a radio, but that might've been it. I probably thought these guys were pretty lame. Since then I've become less of a teenager and more of an old man and hopefully less quick to judge. The Strokes sound like the Strokes and that's what's great about them. They pick a style (little to no effects, minimalist recording, 1 or 2 tempos, etc) and they do it perfectly. I don't really even care what they're singing about, it's a good time and it makes you want to smile. I don't know if I can pick too many tracks out of this album to single out as wanting to listen to over and over, because they're all pretty similar, and in a way that's a good thing. That's surprising to me because I usually dislike that kind of thing in an album. The only thing I can hate on is that this album spawned absolute shit like Franz Ferdinand and the Killers, who are so full of themselves musically that they lose the whole spirit of this style. Otherwise it's great. Also lmao that America got an alternate cover.

Pretzel Logic

Steely Dan

4/5

Backyard summer beer drinkin music. Not as good of a record as Can't Buy a Thrill, but it's still very much a Steely Dan album and that's good enough for me. All the hallmarks of that jazz/rock style they're famous for are there: the odd key changes, the technical keyboard, guitar, and bass parts, the offbeat instrument thrown in here and there. Highlights are "Night By Night", "Any Major Dude Will Tell You" (what a ridiculous and great title, btw), "Monkey In Your Soul", and "Pretzel Logic". I could very much do without "East St. Louis Toodle-Oo" which sounds exactly what you think it sounds like. For a weirdish band, this is a remarkably short album. I think that works in their favor though; the album as a whole isn't nearly as complex or put together as Aja or the aforementioned Can't Buy A Thrill and it's good that they didn't try to stretch out anything to make a long record for no reason. I wish I could make this a 3.5, but I'll round up because I like them.

Whatever

Aimee Mann

3/5

This album is painfully 90's, which isn't a terrible thing. The songwriting is actually clever and diverse with lots of variation. The singing is a bit off to me; she's not bad but she's got a weird twang in her voice that seems like it would've been shifted to pop-country if it came out a decade later. Throw in some lap guitars, jingoistic lyrics, and a cowboy hat and you have country music radio now. This album as a "must listen" might be true if we're trying to explore musical stylings of every decade. This is a time capsule of the 90's singer/songwriter. It doesn't have the edge of Alanis Morisette, or the terminally sad and emotional sounds of Ani DiFranco, or the whatever the hell Sarah McLaughlin was doing, it's just squarely in the middle. It's not bad but it really, REALLY, just fades in to the background after a while. It's the kind of music you hear in a cafe that has more than 1 location but less than 5. It isn't bad or performed poorly or mastered in a crazy way, it's just outdated. It's fine. Really just fine.

Dust

Screaming Trees

5/5

Another 90s as hell album but I am not complaining at all. Screaming Trees is a band I knew about mostly through their various members (Josh Homme, Mark Lannegan) and that one minor hit they had “Nearly Lost You”. I’m glad this came up because I’ve been wanting to check them out forever and this is a perfect reason. Turns out I’ve been missing out. This album hits all my old nostalgia buttons. Basic guitar-bass-drums-singer composition, great solos, aggressive sometimes but plenty of feeling, lots of key switches and riffs, etc. It’s a proto grunge album that somehow got written during the peak of grunge. I can’t say I disliked any of the songs. The whole album is great. It makes me want to go to the train station to buy cigarettes to hide from my parents. To make mixtapes for a girl I have a crush on. To bang out shit covers of songs we liked with my unreliable garage band. To sleep until 2pm on a Saturday and stay out all night bullshitting with my schoolmates and throwing rocks off a bridge in to a river. Yeesh.

Back In Black

AC/DC

5/5

AC/DC wrote 1 song a thousand years ago and have been rewriting it since. It's a pretty good song. Back in Black Versions 1-10 of it on this album are pretty solid.

Doggystyle

Snoop Dogg

4/5

A classic, not much more to say about it. It sounds a bit dated but the style itself isn't cheesy or anything, it's just it's own thing that nobody really does any more. This whole era of rap birthed an entire generation of pearl clutchers and I'm glad of it. People need something to be mad about I guess. I could do without some of the skit nonsense and other spoken word elements, which are hidden in the songs at this point rather than being separate (and most importantly, skippable) tracks. I would consider that part of the album cruft, as I would for nearly any other rap album of the time. Anyway, this is undeniably one of the most important albums in rap. The G-Funk style was perfected by Snoop, Dr. Dre, and Nate Dogg (and Warren G of course, who has the absolute anthem for this) and nothing else really sounds like it. The uniqueness of the beats, the drum/effects kit, the cadences and the occasional singing, all of it is great. Snoop's voice is so distinctive, and it elevates this album above nearly all of the other ones (maybe not The Chronic?) of the era. One star off for the skit stuff. Otherwise a great listen all the way through.

Rock 'N Soul

Solomon Burke

3/5

This is sang extremely well and performed excellently but I still can’t really bring myself to get in to this genre. Everything sounds the same to me.

Antichrist Superstar

Marilyn Manson

4/5

Oh boy, this album. This is one of the cases where you can say "yes, my parents were right, this guy is an irredeemable piece of shit" but not because of his music! It just turns out he's a garbage person, which maybe you could guess from the music and aesthetic but whatever. Thematically this album fit a niche that really was only mega popular in the 90's. A real "I fucking hate everything and I need to be extremely shocking but not so much that it gets me banned from too much." The lyrics pretty much all refer to violent or otherwise edgy sex acts, various blasphemies, body horror, etc. None of it is really profound, and none of it is necessary but it fits the image Marilyn Manson was cultivating. I imagine this is like what Alice Cooper or Ozzy was like to parents in the 70's. Musically it's more listenable to the lot of the real "extreme" music of the time. It's actually pretty good industrial/metal crossover. Like a more guitar driven and (much) less intelligent Nine Inch Nails a more rock oriented Frontline Assembly, a more machine based Slayer. Maybe it's nostalgia (I did listen to this in high school after all) but I actually like quite a bit of this album. Just have to ignore what I would now consider cringey lyrics; I know at the time I was like "wow cool!!!!!!". In general I think the album shines a more when the tracks are guitar oriented (The opening 3 tracks, Mister Superstar, the title track, 1996, etc) . The more industrial or less metal tracks just make me want to listen to a real industrial band to be rid of the mental image of Manson himself mostly naked and contorting himself in a video with half second cuts of worms eating a dead bird or something like that. Ultimately it's extremely difficult to separate the aesthetic from the music, which is a testament to what Marilyn Manson was doing at the time. I still find it hard to believe he's as edgy (though he definitely is as disgusting) as he pretends is/was, but he did a real good job of marketing himself and aligning pretty much everything in to this one style. I like this probably more than I should. I kinda want to like it less if I’m honest.

Time (The Revelator)

Gillian Welch

3/5

I guess this is where singer/songwriting was in 2001, when I had absolutely zero knowledge or desire to know about it. I mostly found this album to be too country for my tastes but there are a few gems in there. "Revelator" and "April the 14th pt 1" were both enjoyable and stayed away from twangs and banjos. Despite the intense length I liked “I dream a highway” as well. That’s what a sad song should sound like. The rest of these tracks sounds like something out of a 60's revival western or similar setting, which I didn't really enjoy as the message was too generic to get me to pay attention. While her singing is great from a technical perspective, her guitar playing is pretty trashy, even the title track which I liked had some really poor timings and (purposeful?) discordant bits. I didn't find either of these aspects to be particularly noteworthy. I've heard artists in bars at open mic nights that are just as good, to be honest. Maybe it’s the songwriting; it’s mostly simple but poignant on the good tracks. I’m giving this a 3 because the 3 tracks I mentioned are good. I’m sure the rest is someone’s style, but it isn’t mine.

American IV: The Man Comes Around

Johnny Cash

4/5

I enjoyed this, maybe not as much as Cash’s mostly original works, but he and his producers did a great job of making the covers fit with the guitar and voice style that cash is famous for. The “Hurt” cover got overplayed and I still prefer the original but this is a great cover. “Desperado” is similar. “Give my love to Rose” might be better than the Hank Williams version but maybe not better than Cash’s own version earlier in his career! It’s a great song anyway. There are a couple tracks I think didn’t really work. “Personal Jesus” just doesn’t hit outside do that 80s synth feel; the background piano makes it a little hokey. The Nick Cave duet is pretty bad because Nick Cave. This is a great legacy album for Johnny Cash to leave; its even more impressive when you read about how he could barely function while this was being recorded. It’s not his best work but it’s still good.

I Should Coco

Supergrass

5/5

This is an underrated album, and one of my favorites to come out of that 90s era of British pop rock. “Alright” is probably the song most people know from it due to it being in various tv ads and films, but I think almost all of the record holds up and is fun to listen to. This album has all the energy of a punk band without too much of the angst, and really excellent musicianship. The songs vary among a bunch of different rock sub genres, though none so deviant from the root style that it seems off. The difference between “alright” and “strange ones” is pretty stark stylistically but the core of the sound is there. That’s ignoring obvious ones like “we’re not supposed to” as well. My favorites are “Lenny”, “sitting up straight”, and “caught by the fuzz”. I love the frantic feeling this album has (minus the last few tracks) yet how well put together each song is. A total classic.

Tanto Tempo

Bebel Gilberto

3/5

Kind of an unremarkable samba/lounge album. The standout bits are the electronic/computerized flourishes in the beats that appear occasionally. The singing is good, and she sings as well in English as she does in Portuguese. I’m not sure this would be in this list if her father wasn’t João Gilberto, who is one of the biggest musical figures in Brazil. It’s fine but I’d rather hear his stuff to be honest.

This Nation’s Saving Grace

The Fall

2/5

This is the second album we've had by The Fall on this list and I'm not sure I understand why. It's better than the previous one (Live at the Witch Trials) largely because the whole tone is angrier and there is more distortion and aggressiveness to the tracks instead of wandering keyboard interspersed with yelling. The singing is still terrible but at least it's drowned out most of the time. Actually, you know what, this sucks. There are maybe 2 tracks on here that aren't just a single riff repeated over and over inside of a tin can with a drunk guy shouting in to a pair of headphones acting as a microphone. This is shit and I turned it off halfway through it's incredibly unnecessary 1 hour+ runtime. If there's something in the back half worth listening to I will never know.

Tommy

The Who

4/5

I hate saying that you have to listen to something in a certain way to really get it but this is one of those cases where it’s true. You have to listen to the whole goddamn thing in order. It’s a performance of a play, it doesn’t really make any sense any other way, and honestly there are no real standout tracks other than pinball wizard that you’d want to revisit in a vacuum. As a whole though, it’s a masterwork. There is a whole range of feelings in here that just aren’t present on so many other great albums. Sadness, depression, joy, anger, hope, etc. Songs rarely make me mad but boy do I want to beat the shit out of Cousin Kevin and Uncle Ernie (“Fiddle About”). I love the double meaning of “Amazing Journey” and the very literal interpretation of “Acid Queen”. “Underture” is a top 10 rock instrumental easily and it serves as a great pause in the middle of the album. Starting with “Sally Simpson” the album and the story get more grandiose as Tommy becomes this messiah and then a cult leader, and the emotions become more hopeful and confusing. In any case the whole thing has such a wide range, it’s quite a journey. I don’t know if it’s the remaster that did this but the audio mix is brilliant. Moon’s drums constantly shift between left right and center in the channels with different parts of the kit in different ears. The production in general is sky high. All of that is to say that I really enjoyed this, but if you have to listen to something in a certain way it’s not really something i can refer to as the best of anything. It’s a 4.5.

Strangeways, Here We Come

The Smiths

3/5

I don't think this is as good as the previous Smiths album we had, but maybe it has better individual tracks. "Stop me if you think you've heard this one before" is my favorite of the lot, but "Death of a Disco Dancer" is also really good. Morrissey does the thing where he says too many words per line a few times, but for whatever reason it comes off better on this album. The song themes are all typical Smiths depressing, sad, and mopey thematically, but the music is surprisingly upbeat. This is pretty much their whole deal and they don't deviate too much from it. I liked it, less than Meat Is Murder, but still pretty good.

Heaven Or Las Vegas

Cocteau Twins

3/5

This whole album is the soundtrack to a film about high school in the 80s. It’s certainly listenable and it isn’t too long. The singers accent provides both interesting new ways to pronounce stuff and songs where I don’t understand a word; it’s kinda great to listen to, and the singing is more than good enough to compliment the dreamy/wandering music. I think it’s mostly a good listen, but the style would get old fast with any more time spent on it consecutively. By the end I was thinking this was Enya singing over rejected REM songs.

It's Blitz!

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

3/5

More like meh meh mehs

The New Tango

Astor Piazzolla

3/5

What a strange album, but not in a bad way. I don't know anything about Tango music in general, but apparently this man (Piazzolla) is the absolute king of it. It's a pretty avant-garde (for the time) album that I would very loosely categorize as Jazz. The accordion like instrument that Piazzolla plays doesn't sound like much more than an accordion, but it seems deeper pitched and with a much wider range of notes. The Marimba/Vibraphone is also pretty cool, and surprisingly the two oddball instruments fit well together. Given I have nothing to compare this to I can't really rate it up or down on the average line on anything other than the listen I gave it. It's thoughtful music, maybe something you'd put on to seem sophisticated with a very specific crowd. It's not bad to listen to, just a bit strange. Almost like a film score.

Queen Of Denmark

John Grant

3/5

The tone of this album is insane. It goes from melancholy sadness to joking about Ripley killing xenonorphs to spewing slurs (I get the point but man that is quite a set of sentences). The bizarre New Orleans parade instrumentation in “Silver Platter Club” is comical, but is it supposed to be? That’s what I don’t get about this album. Musically it’s actually kinda great. I was prepared to hate this but the singing and playing is really excellent and the composition is fun. The lyrics go from normal lyrics to teenage poetry, but again that might be intentional. This is a weird but good album. I wouldn’t turn it off if it was on.

Murmur

R.E.M.

4/5

I think this album is on here because REM were such an influential band to so many acts that would come later and this is the first real definition of their sound. I don’t think it’s their best album but it’s still a great one. To think this came out in 1983 is crazy; it sounds right out of the early 90s, probably because so many bands releasing music then grew up listening to this. I’ve always had a gripe with the way Stipe sings. His lyrics are sometimes confusing which is fine, it’s the way he pulls his words together and sings with a disaffected drawl vs when he talks. In any case, he stuck with it and it’s part of their songs now. The rest of the composition has their own distinct way of doing things. The guitar never uses too much distortion, and the bass is really clever, using the whole fretboard in every song. It’s that kind of stuff that makes REM who they are - 4 distinct parts that are really more than the sum. This album in particular has a much more upbeat tone than some of their later stuff. The opener, “radio free Europe” sets the speed and feel for the rest of the album. The only stinker in here I think is “Catapult” which is almost too pop for me even though this album is very much guitar pop. This is a foundational rock album for the music to come in the following decades. It could come out today and still be relevant.

The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill

Lauryn Hill

4/5

I remember this being a very big deal when it came out because it pushed the boundaries of soul, r&B, hip hop, and a bunch of other genres and it was especially big because a woman was doing all of that. I really prefer the songs where she's rapping vs just singing as I don't think her singing is particularly great (though it is perfect for her style). What I can say is that if this was made today the producers would absolutely ruin everything by digitally "correcting" her voice, which would take away quite a bit of this album's appeal. The way Lauryn Hill sings matches the instruments and beats really well precisely because it isn't perfect; it's a grittier type of singing set in songs with instrumentation that would traditionally require a much more r&b type sound. I guess that's credit to her and her producers for coming up with it. Has a few of those ever present 90's skits in it but there have been much worse offenders than here and they're sort of themed at least instead being a voicemail recording. Annoying that they're embedded in to the tracks though. I general I think this is a solid album and a good capture of the innovation going on at the time in the r&b and hip hop spaces. The second half drops off a bit (though maybe in terms of pure musicality I like Every Ghetto, Every City the most out of the whole album), but overall it's very listenable today and carries an important message.

Youth And Young Manhood

Kings of Leon

3/5

This is like if the Strokes and that one band Jet made a subpar group together and recorded an album while drunk. I really can't stand the singer's voice and cadence but the guitar, drums, and bass are all fine. The songs are really generic, though the faster ones are better. I don't know why this album is on here; it's pretty boring radio rock from the early 2000's. It's ok I guess. I would give it a 2.5.

Joan Armatrading

3/5

This is a pretty standard singer-songwriter album. It’s not really standout in any way, though she is a great singer. I think the first track might be the best one. The supposed single, “Love and affection” is pretty average and could be sang or performed by anyone to the same effect. Joan Armatrading’s voice is the unique feature here and even that doesn’t really do it for me. Sure, it’s performed well and she’s got a great alto/near tenor tone but that doesn’t save it from the bang average songwriting.

Led Zeppelin

5/5

It's hard to say anything that hasn't already been said about this album but I'll give it a whirl. It's a masterwork; a completely unique sound in the rock world that very few have been able to really replicate. My favorite bit about zeppelin, especially the early stuff, is that everything sounds like it's barely in time yet is perfectly in time, every time. The drumming in particular can sound like rocks being thrown at the kit and yet every rock is hitting the heads at exactly the right time. The same goes for every other instrument, even the voice, but it's so apparent in Bonham's drumming. There are a lot more bluesy songs on this album than there are in later zep works; depends on if you like blues guitar if that would be a good or bad thing. There's nothing very innovative about "You Shook Me" for example, except the fact that it's them playing it, which gives it a whole new feel. These are all vague platitudes, but it's hard to explain. The solo, for example, isn't a blues solo, it's a rock solo in a blues song and does it ever work. The biggest complaint I have about this album is that "How Many More Times" goes on for too long without a really interesting bit in the whole thing. Sort of related, but "I can't quit you baby" is just a basic blues song without the same greatness as "You Shook Me" has. You can do better boys. Other than that, it's a brilliant album. I’ve given much lesser stuff 4s so 5 it is.

Grace

Jeff Buckley

2/5

Jeff Buckley needed to be in a band. This would’ve tempered his tortured and over performed singing a bit and let some of the genuinely good songwriting shine. “Grace” (the song) sounds like a smashed up version of an old Radiohead song, and I kept thinking that if he just toned it down a bit it could be pretty decent. Unfortunately for the rest of the album a lot of it doesn’t even have that exciting and interesting writing that the first two tracks have. Compounded by Buckley’s unnecessary operatic vibrato it makes for a pretty lousy experience. The lyrics are over the top and the songs end up being parodies of themselves. I liked this less and less as it went on, not to the point of hating it but just being bored of it. If I never hear fucking “hallelujah”, performed by anyone, again it’ll be too soon.

Darkness on the Edge of Town

Bruce Springsteen

2/5

Springsteen is one of those guys that I get why people like but I can't relate at all. I grew up very America-adjacent and this type of music never really meshed with me because I never experienced any of the kind of stuff he talks about either directly or through my parents. And that's before you get to his voice and singing which I don't like in the first place. The execution of all these songs is fine; the only thing really performed badly is the ending of "Something In The Night" and it's entirely Bruce being unable to hit the right notes. I could do without the saloon style piano and sustained off key notes overall. Musically Springsteen has his own style that includes those things and still has countless imitators, I just don't really enjoy it or find it that interesting. As far as "pretend working class dude that is insanely from Jersey" goes I'll take Bon Jovi over this.

Parallel Lines

Blondie

4/5

This is pretty good, I only really know Blondie from their singles and occasionally confusing them for Goldie, who is absolutely not the same style. It's like if Devo was fronted by a woman and was less, well, Devo about things. Fun 80's style pop-rock without any over reliance on 80's staples like synths and drum machines. I thought the opening track, "I know but I don't know" and "11:59" the picks of the rest. It's funny that they're different from the big hits; they're almost like new wave punk songs without any of the grime of the actual punk movement. They're better than the singles in my opinion! I didn't think I'd like this as much as I did. Good time.

Nothing's Shocking

Jane's Addiction

4/5

I didn't realize this came out in 1988; it's such a 90's album that I guess was pretty ahead of its time. It's more than proto-grunge, it's straight up grunge but it's unique in the genre. Perry Farrell has a divisive voice, but I always though it fit perfectly with Jane's Addiction's heavier tracks, which most of this album is. Even in "Jane Says" I think it works, works great even. Dave Navarro's guitar work is just right. He's got enough of a funk feel in his playing that it fits with the syncopated drum and bass work without sounding just like someone through an electric guitar at an 80's band. I know he's a weirdo (and so is Farrell) but I've always liked his playing in any band he's been in. I like that "Standing in the Shower Thinking" is like the alpha version of "Been Caught Stealing", which is basically the same song but better and cleaned up. I think a lot of people attribute that particular style, sort of a weird grunge/ska/funk mashup, to Jane's Addiction in general. It's less funk than RHCP while still having a good groove, and Farrell is a better singer than Kiedis. That's not really all of them though; immediately following is "Summertime Rolls" which drags on a bit like "Ted Just Admit It" but it displays the range of the band well. "Mountain Song" is what I really like about the band in general; heavy ass groove with Farrell going nuts on the mic - it's where his voice really matches up with everything else going on. I think Jane's Addiction is underrated as a formative band of the grunge era, maybe because Perry Farrell is an egomaniac and Navarro was probably better known for being the "worst" guitarist for the Chili Peppers and being on reality TV. I've liked this album for a long time before realizing how old it actually is, and that makes it even more impressive for me.

Synchronicity

The Police

3/5

I don't know enough of the Police discography to know what songs are on what albums but there is no way this is their best one. There are a lot of good songs on here (both Synchronicity tracks, and basically the back half of the album) but the first half kinda lets it down, culminating with "Mother" which is just hard to listen to. Sting's "desperation" voice is like a shit version of David Byrne with none of the charm. Reading the wiki reveals that the song, along with "Miss Gradenko" which is also kinda bad, weren't written by Sting, and it shows. The back half though, wow. Everyone's heard "Every Breath You Take" a trillion times, but it is a fundamentally good song, so I'll gloss over that. Synchronicity II is the kind of song that makes you realize how talented the Police are at playing their instruments. While it's not quite the basslines that Sting came up with earlier, it's still great, the drumming is mega crisp and the guitars and keys are present without being overpowering in the way the classic reggae inspired Police songs have always been. King of Pain is the same way. Murder By Numbers is a bit of a letdown after the interesting arrangements in "Tea In The Sahara" as it's a bit bland, but still a good song and very much in that Police style. I guess this is supposed to be their best album but I think I like the older style a bit more now that I've researched what songs are on what. A couple of absolute bangers doesn’t save the whole thing though.

25

Adele

4/5

This was way more enjoyable than I expected. It’s still very much not what I listen to day to day but it’s hard to deny what a great singer she is. I like that she deviated from the usual r&b/pop a bit by doing a Spanish/jazz guitar backed song and even something with what sounded like live drums (When We Were Young). The only song I fast forwarded was “River Lea”, which was was uncharacteristically bad. It’s unfortunate that it’s the only non love song. The themes are a little stale after a while.

Songs In The Key Of Life

Stevie Wonder

4/5

The range on this album is obscene. From tracks that are really just poetry with an ironic backing (village ghetto land, black man), straight funk songs, jazz fusion, r&b, Spanish language, it’s great. There’s even what sounds like synths in here, though they just be super processed keys or guitars. In any case, the variety is really high here. This being a double album is not necessarily the best thing, though. The content is mostly really great but it has a run time that feels just too long, especially given how many songs devolve in to jams by the end. I’m not saying jams are a bad thing, especially the ones on here, but they do seem like filler at a certain point and a double album really shouldn’t have too much filler. I think the second disc isn’t nearly as good as the first just from quality. Other than “As” and “isn’t she lovely” it’s like a whole album of b sides. This is a pretty big work but I think the length and the amount of non hits sort of diminishes it. The best tracks on here would make a 5 star album easily but there’s just too much.

Blonde On Blonde

Bob Dylan

2/5

I just can’t with this man.

Shake Your Money Maker

The Black Crowes

4/5

Man, are all their songs just on this album? Did the Black Crowes just put out one album in 1990 and ride that for eternity? I mean more power to them, just crazy that every song I've ever heard from them is on this album. The singles are all great; they're like if Skynyrd wasn't a mess or if Corrosion of Conformity weren't a hard rock band. For once the piano and organ don't feel out of place in a 90's album. I prefer the faster songs than the ballads, but that doesn't take away from the feel of the whole thing, and if it was all uptempo it would be too manic. Of the songs I hadn't heard, "Struttin Blues" was my favorite. Just a good fun time, played well and not too long. I really liked this! It's wild to me that nearly half the songs on here are genuine hit singles. What a way to blow your load early.

Sign 'O' The Times

Prince

3/5

I have a lot of respect for prince and his earlier albums are very good but this kinda sucked. It’s just distilled 80s electronic sounds with Prince’s (excellent) voices behind it. The songs are generic and it goes on forever. Really disappointing for what is supposed to be his best work.

Dusty In Memphis

Dusty Springfield

3/5

As far as soul singer albums go this is pretty average. She's a good enough singer but I don't really see what makes her stand out among the crowd of other soul singers of the time, and maybe before and after as well. "Son of a Preacher Man" of course is a big hit, but that's the songwriting doing the work. Her performance is certainly fine, good even, but it's not like someone else couldn't do the job on that song. I liked "The Windmills of Your Mind" the best. It was also the only song not in a basic major key, I think. Easy listening. Short, not bad, not really memorable.

Doolittle

Pixies

4/5

I like that this album kinda runs around multiple (rock) genres without ever losing the key Pixies sound. There are pop songs, punk songs, proto-grunge songs, etc. Since nothing is super long, if you don't like one you could just keep listening because it'll end soon enough. I love the bassline and drums in particular in their sound. They're always so crisp and interesting, never just there because they have to be. I'm not as much of a fan as the vocals as others are but they work just fine here. Musically this is really great. Not much to complain about at all. I enjoyed this.

Oxygène

Jean-Michel Jarre

5/5

I absolutely loved this and I had never heard of this guy before. It’s pure synth fantasia, evolving from soundscapes to recognizable popular song structure then devolving back again in to a soundscape and experimental manipulation for the ending. I didn’t want it to end. Some of the “high level” solo tracking sounds the tiniest bit dated, I can’t figure out why but it does, but that doesn’t take away from it. To think this was made in 1976, it’s incredible. This could come out today on a niche label and you wouldn’t even have to label it “retro”. I need the vinyl for this yesterday.

Pearl

Janis Joplin

4/5

My mom used to belt out “oh lord won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz” whenever I asked for something expensive so I’m well aware of Janis here. I didn’t expect to enjoy this as much as I did; I have to admit I figured her for much more of a folk singer than a rock singer, and she is very much the latter. I won’t say too much about her singing, which is powerful and unique in a “I smoked so many cigarettes between now and 2 hours ago” way. I mean that as complimentary as possible. The band though, that’s what makes this record. The sound they produce matches her voice perfectly. It’s never all put together but it’s so smooth at the same time. The instrumental blues track was probably my favorite though “move over” is also great. A nice surprise from something I groaned at when I opened the page this morning to what it actually is.

Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret

Soft Cell

2/5

The cover of this album and the title on it makes me laugh. The word “erotic” combined with these two guys is close to parody. I have to say the same thing about the music. It’s peak 80s synth in the bad way. The singers voice isn’t bad but he can’t control it properly and his lyrics are pretty bad. The instrumental backing is either noodling woodwinds or generic beeps and boops. Tainted Love is the best track and they didn’t write it (though they made it in to the hit it is with the synth work, so credit due there). I looked up the original track listing to make sure I didn’t actually have to listen to an hour+ of this, and thankfully the original ends after 10 tracks. This is not very good. 2 stars for tainted love and sex dwarf (somehow the best original with the best name and insane topic).

Blackstar

David Bowie

3/5

Somewhere in here there’s a great album. I can pick and choose bits of each song that I really like but they often go on in a weird direction or otherwise fall apart. I’m not talking about saxophone noodling or instrumental breaks, I mean completely changing the tone either via the actual key or the instrumentation. The first track is a great example, the first five minutes and the last minute are great, but what is that weird thing in the middle? Unnecessary. The same happens at the ends of a few other songs. Things I really enjoyed: the songwriting and the drums. Man, the drums. Whoever that is did amazing work. Crisp jazz/rock beats that go beyond keeping a rhythm and in to tonal music all themselves. Bowie’s vocals are good as always but a bit uninspired. There are some points where I felt that he was warbling over the scale for no reason. Overall pretty decent. Wouldn’t turn it off.

At San Quentin

Johnny Cash

4/5

I love the album from Folsom Prison, and this one is similar enough in style that it's almost as good. The banter, the boos at mentioning the warden, and the story about Cash's 36 dollars are all great and there is a good variety of songs on here. I like that the setlist is "fluid" in the sense that he asks what the crowd wants to hear and it's actually coordinated enough that he plays the suggested songs in addition to the "planned" ones. Only complaint is that it's a bit short! It could definitely be longer. I'll have to watch the TV recording of it as well, I bet it's great.

Low-Life

New Order

4/5

There’s one thing that really lets this album down, and it’s the vocals. The dude just can’t sing and stay in tune. It’s the one time I’ve thought “auto tune would improve this a lot”. It works on some of the more energetic tracks like “sunshine” but otherwise it’s almost annoying enough to make me stop listening. Thankfully there are plenty of long instrumental breaks to keep it from being a disaster. And those instrumental breaks, they’re really great. The programmed or effects covered drums and the guitar tones are my favorite bits of this. The instrument production is super high level and creates a really enjoyable 80s rock sound tinged with synths and electronic music. I would easily listen to an album of their instrumentals. The singing lets this album down and I’m annoyed by that because it could be really good.

The Gershwin Songbook

Ella Fitzgerald

2/5

uuuwhat good, is sitting, alone in your room? Come here the music plaaaayyy! Life is a cabar-oh fuck me! What were you just doing? What? Nothing! Oh no, don't tell me nothing, you were just singing a show tune! You're crazy, I'd never do that. You can't be suicidal if you're singing show tunes! I am suicidal. You're not even depressed! Of course I'm depressed, look at me! I'm very fucking depressed! You fucking poser! Hey man, I'm not a fucking... You're not even British!

Iron Maiden

3/5

I’m glad Iron Maiden stopped making songs about showing your dick to women on the street? Is that what prowler is about? Fucks sake. The rest of it is very “early thrash”. I liked “phantom of the opera” because it was weirder than the rest but I enjoyed the whole thing for the most part. Bruce Dickinson is a better singer than this guy; glad he ultimately joined. “Transylvania” skips over the singing and it sounds a lot more like than the Maiden I’m familiar with. Everyone else sounds great, the bass lines in particular are relatively simple for this kind of music but they work really well.

Africa Brasil

Jorge Ben Jor

4/5

This was great. I know there are some serious lyrics in here from my extremely poor Portuguese but the whole thing just feels like a good time. I think this album also has the biggest use of the cuica drum I’ve heard ever. It’s a fun little addition that is very Brazilian. I liked “o filosofo” and “taj mahal” the most. I wonder if the song “a historia de Jorge” is a self hype song, because if so I like that he was making those in 1975. In any case, this was a good listen and it’s cool that we got someone other than Joao Gilberto (who is great too of course) from Brazil.

The White Album

Beatles

4/5

I've never actually listened to this all the way through. In fact, I've probably played a few of these songs more than I've listened to the recordings. I was in a band where I was the youngest member at the ripe age of 34, and we played a loooot of Beatles because most of the other members grew up on this. I can say that playing some of these songs is a lot more fun than listening to them. Obla-Di was a big crowd pleaser, and it's got a really fun bassline, but man is that a goofy song. There are some seriously great tunes on here (While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Back in the USSR, Blackbird, etc) but there is the usual acid fueled 60's jingles like Wild Honey Pie, Don't Pass Me By and the aforementioned Obla-di. I imagine a lot of people include Revolution 9 on there, but I always have to laugh because I've inserted "Number 9....number 9....number 9" in to so many stupid moments of my life. I don't think this is the masterpiece so many other people say it is but for a double album it goes by surprisingly quick and there are some genuinely great songs on here, and even what I would consider the not so great ones are perfectly fine.

Liege And Lief

Fairport Convention

3/5

I didn’t think I’d enjoy this that much but I guess I was in a mood for British traditional music today. Makes me want to play dungeons and dragons or read a King Arthur book. I liked “deserter”, “Tam Lin”, and “reynardine” the most. The singer has a great voice and her accent is just enough to lend “authenticity” to all of it. I think the best songs are all traditional reworks rather than originals but it’s a nice sound, and the performance is good.

Bad Company

3/5

This was largely forgettable. "Bad Company" (the song) is easily the best one. The rest kinda blend together and aren't that interesting. That isn't to say it's poorly performed or written badly, just really bland. There are a billion bands who sound like this from the 70's and 80's. It's fine.

Court And Spark

Joni Mitchell

3/5

This album has such a weird feel. It’s like it should be a steely dan album of things that were cut from their actual albums. She’s got a great voice and a huge vocal range but it doesn’t really click with me. I can’t put my finger on it but I just didn’t enjoy the melodies and found it all kind of lackluster. I like all the parts, just not the whole.

A Girl Called Dusty

Dusty Springfield

3/5

Much like the previous album we had, this is perfectly fine, pretty bland 50's/60's pop music. It's not something I'd listen to regularly but wouldn't be annoyed if the whole album played in the background. It's funny to me that her debut album was all covers, but I guess that was relatively normal at the time this was made.

American Pie

Don McLean

3/5

We've all heard the one song on this album, which is the first, and it appears that he uses the same musical modes/progressions in the rest of the songs too. It's really weird - Till Tomorrow has the same hook intro as American Pie...it's literally the same notes. Vincent follows the same thing, so does Empty Chairs and Everybody Loves Me. It's not a bad progression but that's a lot of re-use. It's one thing to have a motif throughout your album but it's another to use the same notes in the same order. Vincent is a good song anyway, despite the sad subject matter. Overall this album didn't really leave me impressed. The re-use of phrases in nearly every song really turned me off. It's fine, but the songwriting doesn't really stand out like other more prominent folk singers of the time. It's perfectly well performed, just pretty dull. The album title is fitting as it really is just that song over and over.

Heaux Tales

Jazmine Sullivan

3/5

It's nice to get something so modern on here, and I like the theme of having women talk about their various "heaux tales" throughout the tracks. A rare example of spoken word interludes adding to the album; though I like the idea more than the actual content. Musically this sounds very modern. It's hyper produced and you can tell her voice is pitch balanced, ran through seven thousand filters, etc. That isn't to say she's a bad singer, when it comes through she really can sing pretty well and has a great range in terms of vocal tone (nearly tenor to soprano) it's just not exceptional. The content of the album is overtly sexual, as the title implies, and some of it is laughably vulgar (On It). I don't mind it, but the juxtaposition of what is essentially the narration of a porno clip with a soulful plea for someone to show her what it means to earn the right to participate in it is very funny to me. This isn't unique to her at all, lots of artists do this, but I do laugh every time. This is a pretty average modern rnb album I feel. There’s maybe one stand out track in “Put down your feelings” but this isn’t anything I haven’t heard done before.

Sound Affects

The Jam

3/5

This is like if the clash were a pop punk band, of the time anyway. It’s like the feel good version, without any of the actually interesting parts of the clash. It’s easy to listen to, the bass in particular sounds great, but it’s pretty generic to me. I can’t believe “that’s entertainment” is the big single off here; it’s the worst song on the album.

Diamond Life

Sade

4/5

It's interesting that the group made their whole "brand" around the singer, because the rest of the instrumentals are all really equally impressive. I know smooth jazz/pop has a reputation for being corny or generic but there is some serious talent on display in this album. The saxophone and the bass stand out but the keys and drums carry the rhythm as well. I like that the songs mostly have a solo/instrumental break in them in addition to the vocal parts to showcase all that. The vocals are unique; she's got a great low voice that fits well with the overall sound of "dark lounge possibly host to crime enterprises" band. "Smooth Operator" is such a banger that I'm kind of annoyed it's the first song on the album. It's funny that it's nowhere near the amount of streams as "Your Love is King" on Spotify - the latter is not anywhere near as good of a song. "Cherry Pie" is another really good one and somehow doesn't sound as long as it's runtime would suggest. I was surprised by this. This is the precursor to the 90's wave of european trip hop which I really like so I guess it isn't too much of a surprise. You do have to get over yourself when listening to it though or it's going to sound like elevator music.

Maggot Brain

Funkadelic

4/5

Not what I expected out of a Funkadelic album but I guess this is before the “Parliament” bit. This is still pretty funky but it’s a rock album for sure rather than a funk one. The ten minute opener is good for your joint and realizing you’re stoned before getting in to the rest of it. It’s a good solo, not the best, but I did like it. Like a less impressive Jimi. Out of the more traditional songs I liked “hit and quit it” and “super stupid” the most. The first is more of the funkadelic that I know of and the second really comes in to itself toward the end as an excellent 70s rock jam. Could really do without the second half of the last track. I feel like I wasn’t fucked up enough to appreciate it.

Modern Kosmology

Jane Weaver

3/5

It's nice to hear something a bit modern here. This reminds me a bit of Portishead if they sped it up a little and were less sad; the wispy sort of vibe and the electronic bits all kind of add up to a relaxing listen. The title track and "The Architect" were the best of the bunch. The instrumental kit on a lot of the other songs sound a bit too much like yamaha keyboard presets run through some filters. That goes for nearly almost all of the album. Her voice and the songwriting are the parts that stand out rather than the backing tracks. I didn't mind this but it wasn't awe inspiring or anything.

Maxinquaye

Tricky

4/5

This album is maybe the best example of one of those links between electronic, hip hop, and even rock music of the 90's. You can hear the influence that Massive Attack had on Tricky (obviously from being part of them) the most, but quite a few of the beats are pulled straight out of the UK's dub and hip hop scene of the time. His own rapping/singing is much more of a UK style than American one. Martina Topley-Bird's voice is a great foil and she's much more prevalent in this album than I remember. All of this combined makes for a really excellent and unique album that pushes further through genres than Massive Attack and other pioneers of the trip-hop sound really ever did. "Overcome" and "Aftermath" are the standouts for me. The first being a remix of "Karmacoma" kinda leads the way for how the album is going to sound and "Aftermath" is just an excellent slow burn trip-hop classic. The latter half of the album gets a bit sluggy, with some misses (Brand New You're Retro, You Don't) but overall it's still pretty great. I've been listening to this for decades and it holds up really well.

Highly Evolved

The Vines

3/5

This is about as good as you were going to get for post 2001 radio rock, that weird time between the grunge bands and the indie rock re-do. Some of these songs, usually the more aggressive ones, are pretty great. "Get Free" and "1969" are good rock songs, if lyrically pretty dumb. The album kinda falls apart when they try to get introspective. "Autumn Shade" and "Country Yard" are just filler. "Factory" serves to remind you that, yes, they listened to and liked the Beatles. The rest of this is pretty generic to be honest. It's not that memorable but it's fine.

Coat Of Many Colors

Dolly Parton

4/5

This was a funny listen in the morning. Very much not what I start my day with on most occasions but it slotted right in effortlessly and even had me humming along to some of the songs. I feel like Dolly Parton is the woman version of Hank Williams or even Johnny Cash. The subject matter isn’t about killing people or being robbed in a bar, the songs are mostly about emotional states, but the simple song structure and poignant lyrics are just like her male counterparts. Coat of Many Colors (the song) is a touching tale about a mother’s love and being broke. My Blue Tears is a sad story of being betrayed, again, told to her mother. In fact, her mother comes up a lot in this album. The whole thing feels really genuine and hopeful at times. It made me smile. I’m not a country music guy but after some of these classics we’ve heard my opinion probably would’ve been much more favorable in the 60s and 70s. What a change this genre has taken.

The Queen Is Dead

The Smiths

3/5

I think I "get" the Smiths at this point since we've had three albums worth and other than a few songs, this may be the worst of their albums. The title track and "Cemetry Gates" are the best ones - the others are either seemingly wacky (Frankly Mister Shankly, Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others) or cursed by that Morrissey maneuver of cramming a bunch of extra words in to a sentence to make it sound like rambling. At this point I know it must be intentional. I wouldnt' say this was bad, but I really only enjoyed the first track, like something I would listen to again. The rest can stay on one play.

Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus

Spirit

4/5

I have never heard of this band and I don't think I've ever heard their songs. They've got a really great range of styles that captures a lot of the sounds of the psychadelic movement without being completely lost clowns like some of their contemporaries. The opener is a straight up classic (well, obviously not called that at the time) rock song. Good vocal harmonies, good playing, etc. Things do get weirder as the album progresses, and it goes from the goofy (Animal Zoo), the pure lounge (Love Has Found a Way, complete with tape reversals), to the real psychadelic shit in Space Child and When I Touch You (my personal fave), with the latter even incorporating a bit of early early metal with the tempo and riff. In fact, really everything between Space Child and Soldier is more like a long suite than necessarily individual songs. A band more up it's own ass would've labeled them PART I-VII or something. Out of context, because I really don't have any for this band, this is a good to great classic rock album. I can never remember what decade the bands of this type were from, but this album slots right in the Cream, Zeppelin, even King Crimson records of the day. I liked it quite a bit.

KIWANUKA

Michael Kiwanuka

5/5

I didn’t think artists were still making music like this any more, let alone winning awards for it. This album has a great blend of pop, rock, soul, and a bunch of other things all mixed (figuratively and literally) really well. I wish there were a few more songs as energetic as “You Ain’t the Problem” but every song on here is great. In a way this reminds me of the Frank Ocean album we had a bit back. It’s got a core feeling (expressive rock?) but it reaches out in so many directions and the lyrics aren’t so exacting as to pin it down to a series of events. “Piano Joint”, “Hard to Say Goodbye” and Living in Denial” are the kinds of things I want playing when I’m trying to just get everything out of my head and relax or tune out. They’re unobtrusive without being background music; a rare feat. I really enjoyed this one. This is the kind of stuff I signed up for.

Garbage

5/5

This was one of my favorite albums as a teenager and I was hoping it would hold up. Thankfully it absolutely has. I think Garbage went a bit downhill after this album but I could hardly fault them for getting worse over time as this is one of the best examples of the 90's rock transition from everything being analogue on "must be played on real live instruments all the time" to becoming more accepting of programmed drums, synths used beyond playing piano parts, vocal manipulations, etc. Aside from the genre evolution, the songs are just great, and Shirley's voice is that perfect mix of feminine and aggressive. She's just at home in the slow melodic "Stroke of Luck" and "Milk" as she is in the much more powerful "Supervixen", "Vow" and "Stupid Girl". All of Butch Vig's production is stellar here. It's such a clean album from every perspective - not a note wrong or mistimed in the whole thing. "Only Happy When it Rains" is one of my favorite songs from anyone. What an expression of the universal feeling of being miserable and accepting, even thriving, in it. Still a lot of love for this one, I'm so glad it's just as good as I remembered.

Seventeen Seconds

The Cure

4/5

This is good Cure album, maybe the best one that I've heard. It's got the trademark "everything is horrible" lyrics, the way too tight drumming and the moody instrumentals that make them so good. "A Forest" is the best song on here, and the biggest hit from what I've read, which makes sense. It's basically a depressive mood pop song. I can't help but compare them to the Smiths since we've had both for a few days. While Robert Smith is obviously less of a turd than Morrissey I think he's a better singer too. Maybe not as stylistically unique but he's a lot less abrasive to listen to. Good music for a gloomy day.

The Slim Shady LP

Eminem

4/5

This album spends a lot of time being edgy for being edgys sake but it is absolutely a milestone in the evolution of rap. It sounds dated in some ways (the immature lyrical content, the horror-core stuff that has sort of fallen out of favor in popular rap) but in terms of raw skill, Eminem was really just getting started here. It’s a look in to what would come when his themes evolved and he got more serious. With that said, there are serious themes in here too, but it’s the pure talent that makes it great. Nobody sounds like Eminem and it’s not because they don’t try. And even the goofy toilet humor has a layer of exacting skill that you can’t miss. This isn’t his best album but it’s maybe his most important. Remember when this came out everybody was trying to ride that line of what’s acceptable to say on tv/radio/etc. This pushed boundaries.

White Ladder

David Gray

2/5

This is insultingly bland. Music for department stores. The first track actually started ok; not my thing but a decent groove. It all goes downhill from there. This gets an extra star for not being actually bad, it is just the absolute zenith of boring nothing music.

I Against I

Bad Brains

3/5

Well, it's an 80's hardcore album. It was ok, better than a lot of the slop you hear from the era but not terribly indistinguishable from a lot of other bands. I do like the odd reggae references here and there and the track where the lyrics were recorded over a jail phone is pretty cool. I wonder if that or the hip hop albums where they do that came first.

Like A Prayer

Madonna

3/5

This is like the Michael Jackson albums we had a while back in that it defines the entire sound of an era. I've never been a huge fan of Madonna in general, especially as she got older and weirder, but it would be foolish to ignore her catalog based on her increasingly bizarre personality. This album was/is the quintessential pop music album for a time span of something like 20 years. People are still listening to this now, obviously less so, but the songs are enduring. The title track, Express Yourself, Cherish, Spanish Eyes, while not modern sounding, easily slide in to pop music rotations even today. I think the religious overtones, which became even more explicit in videos and performances, add an extra layer to this which served well for marketing the album I'm sure. She's not at the level of someone like Sinead O'Connor but there was (for the time) some pretty explicitly sacrilegious stuff in there. Even the titles of a few of the tracks could be considered a bit over the line, and of course her own stage name. There's no denying the impact of this album, but it's still fundamentally not the kind of music I enjoy, hence the lower rating than it maybe deserves.

Let's Stay Together

Al Green

3/5

Beyond the first track, which is extremely popular of course, I found this to be pretty generic. He's a good singer and I do like the key changes in a lot of the songs, but if you asked me to name one other than "Lets Stay Together" I wouldn't be able to tell you. Perfectly fine, nothing extraordinary.

The Man Machine

Kraftwerk

5/5

I love this album in all its forms, and its one of the few albums I think is vastly improved by a remaster. You can talk all day about Kraftwerk and how they invented an entirely new genre, but that's been said a billion times. The whole album not only defines a new musical genre and influenced countless future electronic and pop acts, but it practically created an aesthetic beyond music. When you think of retro future, the soundtrack is this. The post "atomic" space age, transistor based robotics, synthesized assistant voices, everything of that style owes so much to this album. I think every track is good, but my favorite is "Spacelab". I put it on nearly every quiet/ambient playlist I make. Using it as a seed to tweak various algorithmically generated playlists usually results in something good. I'm not entirely sure what it is about it but it speaks to me. There are lots of other Kraftwerk songs I like on other albums but this might be the only one I can go all the way through every time. Not a single thing I don't like about it.

In Utero

Nirvana

5/5

I’m not sure I like this album more than Nevermind but I do still enjoy it quite a bit. The sound is the tiniest bit more evolved as is the songwriting and performance. There’s still plenty of raw anger (Scentless Apprentice, Pennyroyal Tea, Milk It) and nearly every song has the quiet-loud-quiet-real loud dynamic but for whatever reason the songs sound musically more advanced than previously. It’s still very much a Nirvana album but judging on the pure amount of “I have to listen to this again” songs I think Nevermind edges it out. That said I’m comparing a great album to another great album. I like all of it. Its awesome. It’s the slightly more sophisticated side of them and it makes me sad that we’ll never hear what would’ve come after.

At Newport 1960

Muddy Waters

4/5

Well, it's a blues album and it's live. It's definitely well recorded but the blues is one of those genres, especially older recordings of it, where everything sounds really similar to everything else unless there is a big solo in the middle of it. Unfortunately there aren't really enough variations or breaks in the songs on this to differentiate the songs from one another. Nothing is bad, it's just all very similar. I know that Muddy Waters is an excellent guitarist, but it's not really shining through on this album. I suspect part of it is to appeal to a majority white crowd at a ritzy festival, and the fact that it's recorded live and missing a lot of that bass tone that would come through on a studio session. The studio versions of some of the songs on the remaster prove that second point, in my opinion. I think "Soon Forgotten" and the "I've got my mojo working" set are the best on here, largely because the tempos (one slow and one deliberately quick) allows the instrumental and vocal range work to come to the front. I honestly hope we get another Muddy Waters album on here because this doesn't showcase how good he is.

Billion Dollar Babies

Alice Cooper

3/5

I've always assumed that Alice Cooper was that band/person to bring "horror" or "shock" rock to the mainstream. By today's standards it's pretty light on shock value, but maybe in the 70's talking about banging a corpse to a lighthearted major key guitar tune was a big deal. This album doesn't necessarily have a lot of that horror or shock stuff in it other than "Raped and Freezin" and maybe "I Love the Dead". That's a welcome thing because I find that stuff pretty ridiculous, not in an offensive way just a "this is dumb" way. I've actually unintentionally seen Alice Cooper live a couple of times when he's supporting a modern act, and their (his?) live shows are really fun. The theater and his character are bombastic and entertaining. They use a ton of props, the band members all participate and he brings out actors and actresses to tell whatever story is going on. In a live setting, the simplistic rock music really goes well with the theatrics; you don't have to pay too much attention to the music to fully grasp all of it and it's more like watching a really goofy musical. It's a pretty good time with laughs and excitement. Now, to the music, there's nothing really groundbreaking about any of this. In fact, there's nothing really "shocking" about any of it other than the occasional undead based lyrics. Everything's mostly a four/four basic rock tune in a major key. "Unfinished Sweet" is the exception, that's a properly written very 70's rock song. Everything is performed fine, nothing really bad about it, just fairly unremarkable in a sea of basic rock bands. You can tell that Alice Cooper exists to tour and do live shows, which they're still doing today, and they do it well. I think "Elected", "Billion Dollar Babies" and "No More Mr. Nice Guy" are the standouts, though "Unfinished Sweet" is my favorite because it's the most complex. Could do without "Raped and Freezin" just because its' weird and "Sick Things" which just kinda sucks. This is a lot of words to say that it's fine. It's a decent rock album.

Wish You Were Here

Pink Floyd

5/5

I love this album, and have for a very long time. I think “Shine on you crazy diamond” is one of the best musical tributes to anyone and anything ever written. It’s not bombastic or overly wordy. Just a memory of someone the band clearly loved (who wasn’t even deceased at the time). The other three songs are all special in their own way, though “welcome to the machine” isn’t as good of a standalone song as the others. This album shows what I would consider the two sides of Floyd. The diamond suite is their much less commercial, virtuoso and psychedelic side, while the three middle songs show their capability to write thoughtful accessible music for anyone. Few bands have been able to bridge the two worlds so easily, and even fewer have since. It’s a masterpiece, I like it even more than dark side of the moon and the wall. One of my all time favorites.

Appetite For Destruction

Guns N' Roses

4/5

I have an oversaturation problem with Guns N Roses, which might be related to listening to the radio too much in my car commuting days. I view them as a "safe hard rock" band that what used to be classic and hard rock stations would play constantly. Welcome to the Jungle and Paradise City are good songs, but I have heard them so much in my life that I am entirely sick of them. They make me have a visceral negative reaction. The other huge offender is "Sweet Child of Mine" which has always sucked, thankfully. There are plenty of great songs on this album that aren't the songs I mentioned though. Nearly every other one is actually. Slash isn't "underrated" as it were but he really is an excellent guitarist. "Nightrain" and "Mr. Brownstone" (the latter a big single in its own right, but not nearly the offender the other three are) are complete 80's headbangers, "Out ta Get Me" has that awesome descending guitar flourish in the verse and a killer solo, etc, etc. There are a few stinkers toward the end - everything after "Sweet Child" is purestrain butt rock. You can smell the marlboros and bud lights from here. The only songs I hated were the three I mentioned and it's not because they're bad songs. There are three divisions to this album: overplayed nonsense, genuinely excellent 80's hard rock, and largely forgettable beer drinking music. I can't remember the last time I listened to this all the way through and it was nice to remember that it's actually a pretty ok album. It's not great but it is exemplary of the genre and there is a time and place for all of this. It's a bar you have to drive to in the midwest, unfortunately.

Here's Little Richard

Little Richard

4/5

This probably sounded absolutely bonkers in 1957. You can see the influence it had on popular music that followed it and I bet you could count this is one of the first rock and roll albums. High energy, with a couple of traditionally slower tunes to even things out, and focused on the voice/lead instrument. "Tutti Frutti", "Ready Teddy", "Jenny Jenny", and "Long Tall Sally" might as well be the same song, but it's a good song so it's fine. The little falsetto punches, the instrumental cuts, and the high tempo make them all fun to listen to and probably were revolutionary at the time. The rest is all totally listenable and fun.

(Pronounced 'Leh-'Nérd 'Skin-'Nérd)

Lynyrd Skynyrd

4/5

This is another instance of a band having all the songs I know of theirs on one album. Literally half of the songs on here are classic rock radio staples. Makes me wonder how the hell they made it to today, though I guess the answer is they play those songs over and over. I hate to admit it but I liked this a lot more than I thought I would and certainly more than I wanted. There is something about the twangy electric guitar when it's not accompanied by some idiot going on about the big city liberals and his dodge ram pickup and the united states of america. That isn't to say that there aren't shades of the weird ideals of modern country and or ridiculous country/rock stuff in here (Simple Man the biggest offender), just that it's mostly about something else. Equally "southern" but stylistically more than philosophically. The rest of it is country tinged rock, and really well executed. Even the silly stuff like saloon piano solos and the organ sound right in here. I liked everything except "Things Goin' On" and "Mississippi Kid" because it's like they decided to be an average country and bluegrass band instead of a pretty great rock band on those tracks. It's embarrassing to me that I enjoyed this because I know the band is full of assholes, though maybe not at the time this came out. It's a tough one but purely objectively on the music it's hard to deny that it's good.

Horses

Patti Smith

2/5

This is like if the Clash wanted to be poets instead of musicians. The first two songs (one of which is a cover) are actually pretty good. The rest of it is spoken word with a crescendo/decrescendo pattern over and over. Birdland just doesn't end. Land: Horses... just goes on and on and on. I'm just not in to it. I cant' give this a 3 because I decidedly did not like it, but it's more of a 2.5 than a 2. I realize this probably influenced a lot of albums and artists that I do like but you can say the same thing about a lot of music that sucks.

Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots

The Flaming Lips

4/5

When this came out I was fully in my “this sounds like Radiohead so therefore it’s a ripoff”. It took me years to appreciate not only this album but the band as a whole. They’re really the best at the mashup between indie, alternative, and just weird. Nobody sounds like this while at the same time being super polished and being capable of writing totally different albums every time. Out of all the lips’ albums, this is my favorite. I haven’t listened to the whole catalogue but I think I’ve hit most of it and this is such a stalwart. It’s got the feel of a 90s band reaching to figure out what works in an increasingly produced and electronic made world. The theme helps of course but that’s what makes this so special. The music and the theme of the whole album line up perfectly. The title track and “it’s summertime” are my faves, though I like nearly all of it, the beginning especially. Only complaint is that by the end the songs start to melt together and the general vibe of it all is so relaxed that you forget what’s happening. That could be a good thing!

Boston

4/5

It's music for old nerds, made by old nerds. It's great. Sure it’s overplayed, but I am fond of nearly every song on here. It’s a bit too “perfect” in the instrumentation as even the guitar solos are double tracked in places and are perfectly in time but that’s their sound. Last three tracks aren’t as good as the beginning but not everything can be a huge hit.

Basket of Light

Pentangle

2/5

I didn’t realize there were so many of these British folk revival acts in the 60s and 70s. I also didn’t realize that this is supposed to be important music in some way. This one was worse than Fairport Convention and the other one we had of this genre. I couldn’t get in to any of it despite kind of enjoying that faux medieval sound. There’s a dirge in the middle of it that is just the worst choice out of every interesting traditional song there is. Points for the talent it takes to play and arrange all this stuff, but man this was not engaging.

All That You Can't Leave Behind

U2

2/5

I have to admit that "Beautiful Day" is a well written song that I enjoyed listening to. I didn't think I would even get that far. U2 has strayed so far from what they once were that they're just background noise. That giant residency at the Las Vegas Sphere has got to be the biggest musical event that absolutely nobody asked for. I know it wasn't this album, but when Apple forced every device they owned to get a (free!) U2 album it couldn't have been more appropriate. This is the "thing everyone has" of rock albums. It's so generic, there's barely a feeling in the whole thing. Quite literally just the first track. I can't believe the same people that wrote Joshua Tree wrote this, what a fall.

Gentlemen

The Afghan Whigs

3/5

Musically this is somewhere between the 90's and the mid-2000's, which is pretty impressive for an album written in 1993. It's different enough from grunge that it's unique but not so far removed that it misses that aggression, deliberate sloppiness, and volume that makes grunge so great. Lyrically this was written by a teenage boy, very fitting for the time and I imagine the demographic they were involved in. The less aggressive songs ("When We Two Parted") remind me so much of another band. This is going to sound insane but they sound like the less angry and male fronted version of Hole on these songs. The singer's vocal style is a lot like Courtney Love's - for better or worse. I didn't mind this, but it didn't really grab me in a particular way. I think it was ahead of it's time for sure, but not in the way that it's visionary, because what came after it in the future that was/is similar to it isn't so great that I consider it invaluable. Not a bad listen, not a great one.

My Aim Is True

Elvis Costello

3/5

This is better than the last Elvis Costello album we got and actually kind of ok. I think this could come out today and people would accept it; it might be niche but the production value is high and the songs are catchy and happy enough to be popular. I wasn't super impressed by it or anything but I got through the whole thing and it stood out to me for it's ease of listen if that's a thing? Decent background music for a party or something. Not bad.

Led Zeppelin II

Led Zeppelin

4/5

Maybe not the best Zep album but still a good one. There're only a few stinker 12 bar blues songs on here (The Lemon Song, Livin Lovin Maid, Bring it on home) and the rest go from "nobody else could really write this" to "yeah pretty great". That's what always gets me about Zep in general; they have this incredible songwriting talent and they always seem to jam filler in to their albums anyway. In any case, this is one of my favorite Bonham performances otu of all of them, and not just because of the solo in Moby Dick. The triple bass drum hit in Ramble On is permanently stuck in my head; it's a great shuffle move jammed in to a rock song that nobody else was trying to do quite as hard. Him and John Paul Jones carry the better parts of this album - not to say that Page doesn't have his guitar moments because the riffs Whole Lotta Love, Ramble On and Heartbreaker are classics, but they're the cherry on top for me. As usual Robert Plant is there, but I never really thought of him as a great singer (and he is a lyricist of...well, his time). In any case there are too many real classics on here for me to give it less than 4 and I like nearly all of it anyway, even the less inventive tunes.

The Blueprint

JAY Z

4/5

There are a couple of real classics on here (U Don't Know, Heart of the City, Izzo, Renegade) but a few of these fals flat. I cannot take "Girls Girls Girls" seriously just due to his voice and the way he says it. There are diss tracks that include that exact problem on them that I enjoy more, and thus associate that line with. Never Change and All I Need are largely forgettable, but not bad by any means. Lyrical Exercise could've been cool but Jay Z isn't good enough at rapping compared to some of his peers that it stands out. "Song Cry" is mostly a boast disguised as a love song which is a bit weird, but at least the beat is good. The production on this album is stellar and the beats are classic late 90's, early 2000's. Kanye's beats on here are very obviously him, as much as Hola Hovito is very Timbaland, likewise with Just Blaze, etc. I think the rapping is fine; Jay Z has never really been that great at rapping, just solidly fine, and the beats really make the album. Maybe that's the let down here. I think someone else might've made a better rap album with the same production. That said, this is a great "pop" rap album if there is such a thing anymore. It's accessible, nothing too scandalous, and you could hear it everywhere when it came out. I would even say I like everything except the two version of "Girls".

Heartbreaker

Ryan Adams

2/5

This was pretty average to bad. It’s modern country music disguised as rock in some bits. “Amy” was the highlight. I guess he’s also a piece of shit? Forgettable.

Follow The Leader

Korn

2/5

I'm not going to discuss the actual musical quality of this album because it's decidedly very outdated now, but you can't pretend that Korn didn't have a huge impact on rock music during this time. The singles on this album were on every TV channel and every rock radio station for years, all across the world. There were imitators who mostly were terrible, downtuning instruments so far that the strings are just flapping around like spaghetti doesn't mean that you sound interesting unless you really work it in to your sound like Korn actually did. I listened to this a lot as a teenager, not the whole way through, but a lot of it. I liked it then, I like it a lot less now. I wish the lyrics weren't so ridiculous and that Jonathan Davis went on less trips to the scatman dimension. There's a genuine cool idea in here musically but the vocals (both quality and content) just ruin it. I don't remember their first album (which I think is way better than this?) being so over the top, or maybe it just sounded better because there was less complaining? I don't know and I don't really want to go listen to it now. "Justin" and "Seed" are the best songs on here, it's a shame they're buried deep in to the album and everything else is pretty terrible.

Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea

PJ Harvey

3/5

I've definitely heard a few PJ Harvey songs before but never really sought her music out. This album is a decent one, and it's got a good mix of brooding songs vs relatively poppy rock songs. I think I like the former more, especially the ones with Thom Yorke. That isn't necessarily because of his performance, but because the songs are just better. "Beautiful Feeling" is my favorite just from the songwriting perspective. I think the 4 or 5 tracks on the album are the best and it tapers off after "You Said Something", though "Horses in my Dreams" is a great low burn. Solid indie/alternative all in all, I'd listen to more of her stuff if it came around. Wish I could give it a 3.5.

Elephant

The White Stripes

3/5

I’ve never been a huge fan of the white stripes, mostly because every song they write sounds the same. I get that the super stripped down sound is intentional but it’s not for me. It’s fun for 15 minutes but then I’m pretty much done. It’s not bad I just don’t get why people go nuts over this. Maybe it was because it was a nice change of pace from the sea of garbage being made in the early 2000s.

Tres Hombres

ZZ Top

3/5

Hard rocking explicitly boozy blues rock; kind of exactly what I expected. The biggest surprise was that the guitarist/singers voice doesn’t always sound like it does in “La Grange”, and I have to admit it was a bit disappointing that it didn’t. While every song is essentially 12 bar blues, there’s enough variation in it between the guitar riffs and the drums that it doesn’t all blend together. The songs are definitely similar, but they’re all distinct. The biggest departure is “Hot, Blue and Righteous” which is an attempt at a slower song. Doesn’t quite come off. Anyway this was good. It’s a 3.5. I think I’d like a greatest hits collection more than just this album because I do like a few more of their songs not in this album.

More Songs About Buildings And Food

Talking Heads

4/5

I liked the second half of this album. The songs up until “Found a Job” were definitely Talking Heads songs but they didn’t grab me until that one; after that it became much more enjoyable and less repetitive. “Artists Only” is my favorite but I do like the tempo changes in “I’m Not In Love” and it’s that tempo change that really makes the whole back half good. This isn’t really a 5 for me just due to the beginning of it. The rest of it is a good journey through several genres that was a fun listen, like they always seem to be.

The Stranger

Billy Joel

3/5

It’s all the hits. I don’t really like Billy Joel at all but he’s an exceptional pop music musician and singer.

Catch A Fire

Bob Marley & The Wailers

4/5

Like many people I think Marley's music is best enjoyed while fairly baked and completely relaxed. I don't think this album is a revelation or anything, but it is definitely relaxing. I don't have the ear that some people do for reggae music, but I can appreciate a groove well enough and this album has that throughout. Stir It Up, No More Trouble, and 400 Years were my favorites but a lot of the songs blended together, which unlike plenty of other albums, isn't a bad thing here. This is a 3.5+ for me, not quite at the 4's I've given before, but I'll round up because it's much better than average and I never wanted to hit skip.

The Fat Of The Land

The Prodigy

5/5

All gas no brakes. Forgot how good this whole thing is, every song is great.

Live 1966 (The Royal Albert Hall Concert)

Bob Dylan

1/5

If someone besides Mr. Burns could sing these songs that’d be great.

Roxy Music

3/5

This is kinda like if the talking heads weren’t as good and lacked that bit of imagination that makes them special.

Brothers In Arms

Dire Straits

3/5

For me the biggest appeal of dire straits has always been Mark Knopflers insane guitar work. Nobody sounds like him or gets the tone he does, and that’s honestly what’s lacking in this album. It’s there but it’s not front and center like it is in their earlier work. This is fundamentally an 80s pop rock album that really doesn’t get anywhere close to displaying the virtuosity of the band. “Money for Nothing” and the last track aside, there isn’t any of that crazy solo genius that Knopfler is so good at. Sure there are solos but they could be played by any competent guitarist. And some of them just go on and on and on. For whatever reason I never listened to this the whole way through until now and it’s really a disappointment. It’s still totally listenable but Dire Straits is better than this.

Debut

Björk

4/5

I generally like Bjork; she’s weird enough without being completely incomprehensible and her voice and accent are unique in popular music. My favorite song of hers isn’t in this album, though there are plenty of good ones here. I like the way the producers mixed everything and played with volume levels in odd places (There is More To Life Than This) and Bjork decided to jump around genres. There are a few tracks here that don’t really work or come off as attempts at something that don’t make sense. “Like Someone In Love” just sounds like someone said “hey what if we did a lounge piece from the fifties with this”. It’s not great. The following track is like a Madonna b side and that absolutely works. I don’t really care for it but it’s more appropriate? Not sure how to describe it. Anyway this is good. I think Bjork is at her best when the beats are aggressive, in a minor key, or otherwise a bit more “dark” and there’s not as much on here as some of her other albums, but the “modern art” takes on 90s dance music are great.

Live At Leeds

The Who

2/5

This kinda sucked, and I like The Who, a lot even. Out of all the Who records to pick this one is close to the bottom. Keith Moon goes hard on this, but he does on every studio album too which all sound better than this. The mix isn’t even that bad, it’s just worse than all the studio ones. The medley towards the end is cool but you could just listen to all the songs instead; the links between them all don’t add much.

Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space

Spiritualized

2/5

This was boring and it’s been done a trillion times better by bands before and after. Oooh I have big feelings and that turns my song in to a cacophonous mess! Nobody’s ever done that before! Can we have some violins too? Let’s slowly crescendo up and add a repeated phrase for three minutes. Maybe we sing about heartbreak. Damn. Now we’ve got a unique record. One thing saves this - a song on Radiohead’s Kid A ripped a song in this album quite bit. “No God Only Religion” is basically the same song as “The National Anthem” down to the trumpets and driving bassline. Thom with an h you have a lot to answer for.

The World is a Ghetto

War

4/5

I really like the sound War has; it really is the funk meats soul meets rock meets latin that is called "world music" now because music critics are largely white americans and brits. This is the real pure version of that sound with a uniquely american twist. When I saw the runtimes of some of the tracks I was ready be put to sleep but "City, Country, City" is one of the best jams I've ever heard, live or otherwise. The key solo about 3/4 of the way through is so good, and the groove goes on so smoothly throughout the entire piece. "Cisco Kid" is a total banger (and is sampled by a great Redman and Method Man song) . I didn't like the last three tracks as much as the first three, but ending with "Beetles in the Bog" to bring up the tempo was a smart move. In any case, I liked this. I'd like to listen to more of their albums now; I only knew their big hits.

Sea Change

Beck

4/5

Sad Beck is kinda all right, not as good as happy and wacky Beck, but it's better than I expected after reading the reviews. Listening to a whole album of what are essentially break up songs is a big downer and I had to split it up in to multiple sessions. Not because it's particularly poignant in my life right now but because one can only listen to so much acoustic/string/big feelings songs in a row before getting depressed Some of this ventured in to nearly country music due to the chord progressions and the occasional slide guitar, but not in a bad way. Otherwise it's a pop album, a more than decent one. I think the highlight is "Guess I'm Doing Fine", though I also enjoyed “Round the Bend” and “Already Dead”. A lesser artist would've made a bad album of complaining but Beck is good enough of a singer and musician to make it sound earnest. A perfect album for a specific mood.

Modern Life Is Rubbish

Blur

3/5

Decent enough 90s British rock album. So far we’ve had two blur albums, neither of which has been Parklife, which seems strange to me. That’s a great album, this one is just fine. It turns in to background music a bit, and it’s long. I don’t really know why it’s in here, but there are much worse albums to pick. Pretty average.

Listen Without Prejudice Vol. 1

George Michael

3/5

There is one huge hit in here in “Freedom ‘90” but outside of that the crossover appeal is low I think. No doubt he’s a talented singer and songwriter but the tortured lover/artist theme is way too prevalent here for me to really enjoy it. These are well written and interesting songs even if I don’t particularly want to listen to it all repeatedly. “Something to Save” has a nice chord progression, especially toward the end. “Praying for Time” has a great message and good lyrical content. The ending of the album got fairly monotonous but it was still listenable.

Tusk

Fleetwood Mac

3/5

This is such a poorly assembled album. Every other song is good enough, and the ones in between are sometimes unlistenable. You could literally cut half the songs out of this album and then have a middling to good Fleetwood Mac album. Instead, what we get here is the result of letting a band that's a fucking mess internally shit out a bunch of incoherent experimental songs in between bouts of sobriety (or elation) where they wrote songs that make them famous. It's not even just that the off songs are not good, they sound like they've been recorded in a corrugated steel hut as well. I'm all for bands experimenting with new stuff but maybe put out an album of just that so everyone can politely ignore it. Predictably the stuff where Stevie Nicks takes the lead are the best ones. It really is almost 1 decent song, then 1 bad song, then 1 decent. I don't understand how they put this all together at the end because it makes no sense. All that said, even the good songs aren't great, but they're good enough. I'm giving this a charitable 3, it probably deserves less.

Neon Bible

Arcade Fire

2/5

I think I've come to terms with the fact that I just don't like Arcade Fire. The idea of recording this in a renovated church with organs and big strings and whatnot is pretty cool, and I applaud it. It works with about 3 of the songs on this record and the rest sound like shit and don't work out in my ears the way I suspect the band thinks they would. Ultimately, that's just because I don't like the way they sound at all. This is the third album we've gotten from Arcade Fire and they all sound the same. I think I was just the wrong age when they were a big deal to appreciate what they are trying to do as for me the whole thing is just a gigantic effort in attempting to sound huge and serious but it comes across as a parody of that. This album is the worst offender in this precisely because of the way they recorded it. They get close - "My Body is a Cage" and "Black Wave/Bad Vibrations" can almost be called ruined post rock, but it's still ruined. I have no idea if this is true but I imagine the male singer has an ego the size of a skyscraper and I bet he's insufferable. That's the vibe I get from all this. Personal opinion of course, but I am pretty done with this band.

1999

Prince

4/5

While long, this is a better prince album than the last one we got. The length even adds to it rather than detract as the songs are heavily funk leaning and there's plenty of room for good solos from multiple instrumentalists and jam style playing. I think my favorites are Little Red Corvette and D.M.S.R., which I hadn't heard before. It's not quite P-Funk level funk but it's got just enough of it to carry the grooves and it has that weird Prince flair that makes him what he is.

Pump

Aerosmith

4/5

Butt rock about fuckin. Some of the best to ever do that.

Apocalypse 91… The Enemy Strikes Black

Public Enemy

4/5

I don't think this is the best Public Enemy album but it is another good entry in to their work. I don't know if it's just me but I feel like this record is dominated by Chuck D while Flava Flav and Terminator X take a bit of a backseat. I think the production and beat work on this album is really great; it's that middle mix of the early ages of hip hop moving toward what would become the more deliberate and from scratch beats of the 90's. The sampling is there but the beat production has a lot of construction in it as opposed to one or two samples together, followed by a distinct set of samples later. Anyway I enjoyed this. It's not the masterpiece Fear of a Black Planet is, but it's still good. And that Anthrax feature at the end...nice.

In A Silent Way

Miles Davis

5/5

Perfect jazz fusion, well ahead of its time. When do we get Weather Report?

Blue

Joni Mitchell

3/5

It's a Joni Mitchell album all right. She has a lovely voice (with sometimes what seems like too much pitch range) but she does the thing that rarely every works - slamming 100 words in to a sentence that should be 25 words, tops. The songwriting is interesting, it's not just major chords and basic progressions. There are plenty of good transitions and structures, especially in the beginning of the album. Towards the end it becomes more and more classic folk/pop, which is not a bad thing. It's honestly a bit more listenable because she keeps the word salad throughout, and it's easier to deal with it when the song structure is basic. Not really my kind of music, but I can appreciate it all the same.

Bridge Over Troubled Water

Simon & Garfunkel

4/5

This flew by pretty quickly. The variety on what is basically a folk/singer-songwriter album is way more than what I would expect from artists that are supposedly similar to the boys here. It's still fundamentally folk music but there is enough variability in the songs to make it seem greater than the genre is. There are plenty of time, tempo, and key changes/arrangements to keep you from getting bored and to me that's really rare for this kind of album. I don't want to give it a 5 because there are some skips on here (Keep the customer satisfied, so long frank loyd wright, why don't you write me) but the huge hits are huge for a reason and they really have cross-genre appeal. A 4.5 if there ever was one.

Idlewild

Everything But The Girl

2/5

This is the soundtrack to an anime that was only really successful in Slovenia before they gained their independence called “KYOTO POLICE EVENING”. There is a closing shot of a skinny disheveled man wearing a suit walking downhill while the city and a full moon rises over him in the background. His chief, an anthropomorphic 4 ft tall pig in a uniform, chases him down carrying several cup noodles which they eat on a park bench while the credits roll. Any song on here is playing.

You Want It Darker

Leonard Cohen

3/5

It’s poetry disguised as song. The spoken word smoking guy over laments has never been my favorite genre and this didn’t do much to change that opinion. The lyrics are good at least; Cohen has always been a better writer than performer. It’s fine. I’m sure it’s miraculous to some people but not me.

Apocalypse Dudes

Turbonegro

3/5

Remember that Scandinavian version of Bam Margera Gets Drunk With His Friends? I think this is the band that was in it all the time. It’s all right; very basic pop punk with goofy lyrics. It was pretty fun to listen to but nothing spectacular. Pretty surprised it was on here at all.

Harvest

Neil Young

3/5

Well it’s a Neil Young record. I had heard the big songs on here (Heart of Gold, Old Man) but not the rest. It’s mostly what you’d expect; I still don’t quite get the reverence afforded to the artist. He’s got a unique voice but the music is pretty bland and the performance is nothing special. Also what the hell is “a man needs a maid” about if not a literal desire to have a maid? Maybe I’m too dumb for this.

Moving Pictures

Rush

5/5

Rush is a polarizing band but it was this era that I think was the most accessible to anyone, not just those of us that like a lot of technical musicianship and men with high pitched voices. The first 4 tracks are all classic Rush songs, staples of classic rock radio, and ultimate Dad Rock anthems. Not even the mangling of the pronunciation of "barchetta" by Geddy Lee can make me annoyed by any of it. I love that that song in particular is unashamedly nerdy. It's based on some random work of sci fi writing about a future where gas engines are eliminated and the cops chase you around in flying cars to stop you from polluting. Just pure dork shit. The last three tracks are less in your face, and "The Camera Eye" in particular is one of those songs where the three of them just give in to progressive rock moves and keep playing on and on and on. Not a bad thing when you're this talented, but not for everyone. This might be my favorite Rush album but I wouldn't put all the tracks on my personal greatest hits collection. That's one of the great things about Rush - their sound evolved without too much deviation from themselves, so you get the various eras of the band throughout their insanely long career while knowing that it couldn't possibly be anyone else. Anyway I obviously liked this. If I could give a 4.75 I would, but I'll round up.

This Is Hardcore

Pulp

3/5

Man this wasn't bad but I don't know why I expected more. I'm not at all familiar with Pulp's work, but I know they're supposed to be this transcendentally good British pop/rock band more intellectual then Stella infused Oasis and less goofy than Blur, etc, etc. Sure the lyrics in here are a bit more mature (or just horny?) than some of the stuff the aforementioned bands talk about but I don't know...it comes off as skeezy or desperate in some cases. Surely that's intentional? In any case, I wouldn't call this a bad album, and if I came in with no preconceived notions about what it was supposed to sound like then maybe I would've liked it more. The beginning up until the end of the title track is better than the rest. Once you hit "Seductive Barry", which is terrible, it rapidly drops off a cliff. I would say only that last bit is bad, the rest is fine to kinda good even. And man, this would have been a great album cover and title for an actual hardcore album.

I Am a Bird Now

Antony and the Johnsons

2/5

It's hard to get over Anohni's tortured voice in this; I feel like that is going to be the divisive factor in this album. I think it's a bit overwrought but it is extremely unique in the same realm as Jonna Newsome. Some people love it, some people hate it. I think the songs on here are well written and well performed even, but you have to like the vibrato in her voice (and the double or triple tracked vibrato even like in "For Today I m a Boy") to deal with it. It's not something that you can ignore. It’s not for me. It’s just too much. I can respect it, but I can’t listen to this and say I enjoyed it. I’d give it a 3 but I don’t really want to listen to it again. It’s like a museum piece I don’t particularly want to see again but mostly understood.

Street Life

The Crusaders

3/5

Other than the first track I think this is largely unchallenging jazz music without much to distinguish it from the average of the genre. The thing about this style is that you have to have standout performances from one or more of the members, and usually the more the better. The first track has the vocalist, who is great. The rest of the tracks are just kinda there. It isn't bad, the solos are in there, they're just not really memorable. It's a bang average 70's pop jazz album; I wouldn't even call it fusion. It sounds like something you could license for cheap to have in your art school film about hookers or something. I'd listen to it again but I doubt I would remember even doing it.

Pet Sounds

The Beach Boys

4/5

Before anything I should note that I listened to the original 30 some minute album and not the 120 minute remaster that gets linked in here, so I don't have any complaints about length or weird changes in sounds. I knew the classics (God only knows, wouldn't it be nice, Carline, No, etc) but some of the other one's I'd never heard. They are, as expected, very obviously Brian Wilson Beach Boys tracks. At the time this must've sounded pretty wild. The production level for a 60's album is insane as they must've used so many tracks on what I'm guessing was largely analog equipment. There is a lot of complicated instrumentation in here, including some very unexpected instrumental tracks. I think that's what kind of gave it away as a mostly Wilson album. Musically it's more complicated than the other stuff I've heard from the Beach Boys, though some of the lyrics now sound like incel complaining. I did like "Sloop John B", which sure sounds like the story of an ill fated small boat captain on the worst trip ever. If there's a metaphor there I didn't catch it. This album was better than the traditionally upbeat and/or shallow beach boys tracks (which are good in a different way) and I recognize the absolute momentum shift it played in music production. Plus it's nice to listen to. I don't think of it as the absolute masterpiece many critics do but I'm just a guy.

Imagine

John Lennon

3/5

"Imagine" a shit beatles record, because that's what this is. It's missing a lot of what makes the Beatles great, and it's full of the stuff that doesn't. I don't think that necessarily makes it a bad album, but you can tell why John needed help writing songs. "Imagine" itself is easily the best song on the album, even though the meaning is rich coming from Lennon (and of course from that insane pandemic era celebrity video). There's one thing that I want to point out in particular: "I don't want to be a soldier mama" has a really interesting lyrical cadence, but it takes that 2-3 second line and just repeats it for 6 minutes. Was that really necessary? A single idea does not a good song make. This is the worst offender but I think that's the problem with this album - each song has one or two ideas and then beats them to death. Thankfully John realized that not all the songs need to be that long, so you actually don't get the sense of repetition outside of a few songs, but the theme is there. Aside from the title track, I liked the McCartney diss in "How Do You Sleep", "How" and "Oh, Yoko" from a songwriting perspective. Those three are a good ending to the album after a bit of a slog in the middle. The rest…eh. I don’t think it lived up to the hype at all.

Palo Congo

Sabu

3/5

I liked this album more when it was instrumental, and obviously the conga solos are killer. I don't know if they need to go on for as long as they do but I do like them as a change of pace from the usual albums we've had. Hand percussion is incredibly difficult to master and this dude seems to have found a way to do it. Where it does fall apart a bit is the call and response style (Billumba-Palo Congo). I suspect this is part of the style, but the voices being out of sync combined with the instruments not being entirely in step with each other triggered something in me that made it sound annoying after a while. Either the voices or the instruments can be off but not both; it gets a bit cacophonous. That's probably just my upbringing though and my preconceived notions of what things "should" sound like. Like a lot of other albums I liked the instrumentals the most (Asabache), or the songs with just a bit of voice work (the opener). When it brings everyone in it's just a bit too disorganized for me. Still not as bad as everyone in the reviews seemed to make it out to be!

Dummy

Portishead

5/5

awwww yeah it's time to be a depressed teenager again. I always liked how Portishead took trip hop more in a rock direction, despite not really being a rock band at all. All of the other players in the genre were more focused on electronic styles and Portishead's insistence on guitars and drums (in addition to all the electronic stuff) always endeared me to them. It gave a bit of life to the music which is decidedly sad and mopey, but in a good way. If they never put out another album after this it would be enough, it's got everything I like about this era and genre of music - great singing, complex sampling, live instrumentation, and most importantly a groove. There are are couple of songs that I think aren't up to the insanely high bar the rest of the album sets (It Could Be Sweet, It's a Fire) but this is nearly a no-skip for me. Favorites are Roads, Sour Times, Mysterons, and Wandering Star but really I like all of it.

Elastica

3/5

Not quite as excited as Veruca Salt. Not as talented as Sonic Youth. Not as visceral as Hole. Not as loud as Bikini Kill. Unfortunately not as interesting as any of them. Just kinda bland? I don’t mind it at al just don’t get why it’s here.

The Joshua Tree

U2

4/5

This is where U2 plateau'd, in my opinion. This is where they defined their sound and where it was executed perfectly, vs their later work which somehow manages to be derivative of itself. I once heard a radio DJ say "U2 can't really make an unplugged record because the electric effects do so much work on their songs" and he was right. This album in particular really capitalizes on that signature sound of quick delay and fast strumming to great effect. The more introspective songs like "With or Without You" are nearly post-rock songs before that was a thing. For an album made in 1987 it really sounds ahead of its time. Its where they deviate from that sound that the songs start to fall apart and sound just like generic rock music. In this album, that begins on "Trip Through Your Wires" and continues to the end of the album. None of the last 4 songs are memorable or even that good. Make no mistake - you have to like U2 to like this album. If no U2 song ever did it for you, you wont like this album, because it is a quintessential U2 album. I'm not a huge fan or anything, but I did enjoy most of this. It's a far cry from the write-by-committee commercial slop they put out forever later on. The first three tracks are absolute classics, even if they are overplayed, and "Bullet The Blue Sky" is even better than those to me. You can almost here the beginnings of a stoner rock song in there which I think is great for a band that isn't anywhere near that orbit.

Guero

Beck

4/5

This is a good Beck record, better than the sad one we got a few weeks ago. It’s got a good mix of genres while all being very much “of Beck” as it were. E-Pro is a certified FIFA banger, so I knew it wouldn’t be all bad. I also enjoyed “Earthquake Weather” and “Hell Yes”, especially because all three are different styles. Toward the end of the record things got a bit worse. “Farewell Ride” went too far in to corny cowboy territory and “rental car” was a bit too offbeat for me. Overall it was good. Would listen again.

Bayou Country

Creedence Clearwater Revival

3/5

This was pretty fun. “Born on the Bayou” and “Proud Mary” are good songs of course, but I also enjoyed the rendition of “good golly miss Molly” and “keep in chooglin”. Also, chooglin’, what a word. I think the only real boring song on here is “graveyard train”, it just went on too long and didn’t have enough going on.

It's A Shame About Ray

The Lemonheads

3/5

Very stereotypical 90's alternative rock that is a nice little time capsule to a sound that doesnt' really exist anymore. It's impressively "pure" in the sense that nobody is trying to bend a genre (though maybe it's due to this being what a bit of a pioneer in the pop-alternative rock category) or be overly artistic or deep. It's a pure good times album, with some occasional feelings thrown in there. I think the only song I'd heard before was the cover of "Mrs. Robinson", which is a great cover. I think I liked the title track the most though, it's got that simple structure with a nice chorus and chord progression without being tonally simplistic. I wouldn't call the rest of it totally forgettable but it works more as a collection rather than singles. I can't think of another standout on here, but they're all fine. I'd put the whole thing on while working or relaxing outside.

Elephant Mountain

The Youngbloods

3/5

I couldn't quite place what I was thinking of when I listened to this until I basically got through the whole thing. I think the best comparison I can make is if Steely Dan and the Grateful Dead somehow combined taking the not so great parts of Steely Dan and the few good bits of the Dead. I can't say I didn't like it, in fact, I listened to it twice because I was working during the first run through and didn't really take the time to appreciate it, though I could tell it was at least going to be interesting. I really liked the instrumentals, and according to Spotify anyway, I didn't like the songs that had the most plays (Sunlight, Darkness Darkness). Overall this was pretty enjoyable. It wasn't drugged out of its mind and it wasn't so country/western as to make it corny. The fact nothing really stood out over two listens is a bit disappointing but I don't regret doing it.

At Mister Kelly's

Sarah Vaughan

4/5

I didn't think an unknown (to me) singer from the 50's would make an album I wanted to listen to, let a lone a live one, but this was great. For a live album this barely sounded like one; I guess the huge amount of microphones mentioned in the opening track worked a treat. Vaughn's voice comes through really well and she's got the exact timbre and tone for this kind of music. I also liked that she played around with the audience, especially in "How High The Moon" where she admits she doesn't know the words and references Ella Fitzgerald, all while singing perfectly. This was great. Not my usual style at all but really well done.

Live At The Regal

B.B. King

4/5

This is another example of where an album being live is actually a benefit - the crowd getting in to it and the way the guitar is sonically front and center in the recording gives the album a lot more of a concert feeling. That's important for a genre that can get easily bogged down in everything sounding the same. The transitions between songs are all smooth and the rhythm section keeps the groove going from one to another without skipping a beat. One thing that helps this album a lot is that the tempo changes frequently enough from traditional bluesy sway to something a lot more exciting at least a few times. You can easily fall asleep listening to a lot of blues music, but this one keeps you going. The opener, Please Love Me, and Woke Up This Mornin' are all good examples. I dont' think I'd heard B.B. King singing at this early in his career before and he sounds totally different from his later work, probably because he hadn't drank and smoked enough to change his voice yet. I like both but this version is a lot more lively and suits the music on this particular recording way better than his later voice would. The guitar is impeccable of course because he's always been great. This was fun - also not too long, which is alway nice. Maybe the best blues album we've had so far.

Kenya

Machito

3/5

This was good; I like a good instrumental album of any genre. I'm wondering where it stands in the history of the genre since it's so early for modern recorded music. It's the soundtrack to every scene out of a 60's/70's movie with a scene set in latin america. Not a bad thing, it's just extremely representative of the genre I think. That said one song kind of bled in to the next. It was fun and I liked it, just no standouts for me.

Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not

Arctic Monkeys

4/5

I don't know why I ignored this band for so long, this was great. I found myself air drumming in several songs and the energy stayed high for nearly the whole thing. "Still Take You Home" is an absolute banger, instantly on more than one playlist. This was like if the strokes were just a little more talented and more fluid with their songwriting. Really good!

Wild Is The Wind

Nina Simone

3/5

Incredible range in the voice, classic songs, but I kinda got bored. She's undoubtedly very talented but it's not really my style. Easy to listen to, hard to think of a reason I'd listen to it again though.

Cheap Thrills

Big Brother & The Holding Company

3/5

This is a great exhibition of Joplin's talent, but also the band's as well. When we had one of her solo albums I mentioned that her backing band was really good and complimented her antics, this is very similar though she's much more of a part of the band rather than the primary focus. If you look past the singing, the album is a pretty solid 70's era psychadelic blues/rock mix. The cover of "Summertime" is pretty interesting; I've never heard it performed like that. The standout is of course "Piece of my Heart" which is great and suits not only Joplin but that band's talent as well. The one thing I didn't particularly like about this was the amount of reverb or other effect that make it sound like it's being recorded in a concert hall. Apparently that was intentional and I think it detracts from it. It certainly sounds like an old recording but after hearing so many records from this time frame they could've made it a lot cleaner and I think it would've improved it significantly. This is of course not including the actual live tracks. This dragged on a bit by the end but it was never boring. There's a lot of high energy in this album which some albums of this type seem to not have enough of. I'm glad I heard this because it only reinforces my opinion that Janis Joplin is a really top shelf rock singer.

Time Out

The Dave Brubeck Quartet

5/5

Kind of crazy to have two (maybe more!) jazz standards in one record. Blue Rondo A La Turk and Take Five are things I played in high school that my teacher assured me were something eeeeveryone knew how to play. He was right of course/ The genre obviously existed before this album, but this is such a great example of it. Everything is just so damn smooth and the performances have just enough feeling in them to not be robotic. The recording itself is excellent. I could listen to this all day.

Emergency On Planet Earth

Jamiroquai

3/5

This was a weird album to come out at the time because I'm unaware of any other pop/funk/jazz albums to come out in the 90's that were this successful. People say that Jamiroquai has a really unique sound but I don't find that to be the case. They sound just like a lot of acid jazz bands back in the 80's and 70's just more palatable to the average taste (which is fine - no shade). They obviously take a lot of hints from Prince in general, I think Jay Kay is just less challenging Prince to be honest. All that said this isn't bad, but they take a lot of the long winded solo and instrumental stuff from more classic acid jazz music and just drag it on without doing anything really extraordinary. The first 5 songs are great, and then it just starts to sound mastrubatory. I liked the instrumentals and the inclusion of the didgeridoo, and the vibe of the whole thing is good. I just couldn't get through the whole thing without being bored. And I only listened to the first disc - I don't need live cuts and remixes of this. It's fine, and a testament to bringing "back" a genre from niche listeners, but I can't imagine listening to this for more than I did.

G. Love And Special Sauce

G. Love & Special Sauce

1/5

Oh no. I hated this. Not quite Nick Cave level because I know it takes a lot of weed to be play instruments this way at least, but still really bad. I'll give the producer credit for giving us the St. Anger snare before it was a meme. Real 20 something white trust fund baby with dreads energy in this one.

Step In The Arena

Gang Starr

4/5

This album was way ahead of it's time - Premier really captured what would become the beat style of the rest of the 90's really well on this album. It's the natural evolution of the pure sample based beats of the 80's going forward to the fully realized electronically created beats of the late 90's in to the 2000's. For me this was the era of some of the greatest turntablists in hip hop, and Premier is definitely one of them. Guru isn't the greatest rapper of all time but he holds his own and suits the beats really well. He has a couple of great lines and none of it feels forced or off rhyme/rhythm at all. "Check the Technique" is a classic, but I also really enjoyed "Beyond Comprehension" and "Here Today Gone Tomorrow" a lot. There's a lot of filler in this album, especially toward the end, that I think would be cut nowadays or be on a mixtape more than a full fledged EP. I do wonder if it was just the record labels sort of dumping everything they could on these since tapes and bootlegs were still very much underground and not something artists would promote like they do today. One note, which I can't help myself from doing, whatever sample the beat in "Here Today Gone Tomorrow" uses is the same sample as "Battle Flag" by Lo Fidelity All Stars (which in turn is a remix of another song), which is a great song. It's great and I actually wonder if Battle Flag took it from here or from the original. Overall this only really suffers from length. You could cut the entire rest of the album after "What You Want This Time" and not end up missing too much other than the good rapping on "Just To Get A Rep".

Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness

The Smashing Pumpkins

5/5

I was worried this would hold up worse than I remember it, despite listening to it in its entirety at least once a year. It holds up and maybe it just gets better every time. I do remember the first time I heard Smashing Pumpkins (it was either Gish or Siamese Dream) and I remember thinking who the hell could listen to Billy Corgan's voice for more than 5 minutes. I powered through it and now I can't imagine another singer fronting the band. It isn't a regular voice, but like Ghedi Lee for Rush it's unique and it works. The actual content is beyond reproach. It's the classic 90's quartet supplemented tastefully with keys and the occasional sound effects (the rocket launcher from Doom in Where Boys Fear To Tread, just perfect) that doesn't miss. It isn't too much, and it very much isn't too little. Sure, maybe the lyrics can be nonsensical or just about being sad or angsty, but everyone had those feelings when they were younger and that's who this album is for. There's ballads, there's heavy riffs, there's complicated instrumental layering, there's everything. I used to have a preference for the second disc because heavy songs were just a bit heavier, but I like the whole thing now and the first disc has plenty of big songs too (Jellybelly, Zero, Bullet With Butterfly Wings, An Ode to No One, etc). There are maybe 3 or 4 songs that I like less than others (We Only Come Out at Night, ah yes, the days surely are much too bright) but otherwise this is mostly a no skip, and for 28 songs that's impressive. Probably a big nostalgia hit but I love this album and it's one of the few double albums that I think is worth the listen in it's entirety. A classic.

The Real Thing

Faith No More

4/5

I don't know where people are getting that this is the record that spawned rap-rock. It certainly does have some of that in there, but this is practically a regular metal album. Sure, Patton does plenty of non-singing on this, but it's not really rapping is it. In any case, it is definitely a 90's hard rock/metal album complete with weird themes, a Sabbath cover and at least one crossover hit. There are a good amount of songs on here that I enjoyed beyond just "Epic". I liked "Surprise! You're Dead!", "The Real Thing", the instrumental "Woodpecker from Mars", and the cover of "War Pigs". I should mention that the bass work in this is really great. Patton is the star with this voice and all that, but the slap/funk bass gives the whole sound a unique feel. Makes the couple of stinkers that are "Underwater Love" and "The Morning After" more listenable and it enhances the good songs quite a bit.

Tonight's The Night

Neil Young

2/5

This was boring and got way too country by the end. I've yet to find the solo Neil Young that is supposedly so legendary. It's fine, but it's not even like Dylan where I may hate him personally but he knew how to write a song. These are just really generic sounding beer drinking songs from Texas or whatever. His voice is distinct, but not particularly great. That's about it, maybe it's just the tone and cadence of his voice that people love.

Talk Talk Talk

The Psychedelic Furs

2/5

Is that an electric saxophone in the first song? That sound is horrific - maybe it'd be better if it wasn't triple tracked with another version of itself slightly out of tune. If I heard that in the middle of the album I probably would've turned it off right there. It feels like that sort of out of tune and out of time feel permeates through the rest of this, unfortunately. It's hard to listen to; like you have to go fishing through the noise to hear the song in between the hooks. Even "Pretty In Pink" is subject to it, though I feel their producer must've told them to tone it down a bit for that one. Really didn't enjoy this.

Rumours

Fleetwood Mac

4/5

This is a good album but I dont' think it's the total masterpiece that some people do. The hits absolutely are hits and I enjoy them still even after hearing all of them 10000 times, and the deeper tracks are good but not 5 star good. "The Chain" and "Gold Dust Woman" are my favorites on here. I could do without "Second Hand News" and "Never Going Back Again". The rest of the disc are practically all major radio singles, and for good reason. They're catchy, they span a variety of genres, and are different enough that they could come from different bands in a few cases. That's kinda the reason Fleetwood Mac are as good as they are - they are really multiple bands in one, with a big part of that coming down to the vocals and the sheer variety between them. There's a lot already said about this album by everyone else, I dont' have any hot takes. It's better than good, but not quite great for me.

If You Can Believe Your Eyes & Ears

The Mamas & The Papas

4/5

This was a nice listen, kind of like the Beach Boys before they became more interesting, but with more mature subject matters and women singing as well. The vocal harmonies are the heart of all this and they are flawless. It's performed really well without being overcomplicated or overly technical. The song are written to be pop songs, and they succeed as such. I don't really have much to say about it. It's nice, easy to listen to, and not pretentious. It's not particularly interesting or challenging, but it doesn't have to be.

Manassas

Stephen Stills

3/5

This was fine I guess? There was nothing in here that stood out to me as exceptional. Even the big play count songs like "Colorado" and "Johnny's Garden" sounded pretty generic. At 21 tracks this is bloated and not really notable at all. It's just...generic. Still's voice by itself is nothing special, just regular dude that can sing pretty well. Don't understand why this is on here, it's like if someone wanted to play "70's hippie rock" in their movie but couldn't shell out any money for it.

Midnight Ride

Paul Revere & The Raiders

3/5

It's the monkees or the beatles or the kinks....but american, and less memorable! "Im Not Your Stepping Stone" is killer, but the rest of it is pretty bang average. It's not bad, just like "hey we're kids in high school in the 60's and this is on the radio". Also funny to me that it took five albums for them to make an album called "Midnight Ride". Maybe they just didn't want to be too obvious.

Nebraska

Bruce Springsteen

2/5

Is this when Springsteen decided he needed to be Dylan? While his voice is slightly more tolerable than Dylan's, his songwriting isn't anywhere near it. Maybe this is an album of poems set to music - again another Dylan style thing. While they stick with Springsteen's well known American working class guy with big or average problems, none of them are really good. The only one I got really invested in was "State Trooper" but it ended up going nowhere. I was hoping for a twist about a murder or something but it's just some guy that doesn't want to get pulled over and has a death wish I guess. I liked "Mansion on the Hill". The rest of this is marred by shitty singing, shitty production and shitty songwriting. This is pretty bad.

A Hard Day's Night

Beatles

3/5

I gotta say this is a really basic Beatles record. Sure the first track is a classic but the rest of it is pretty boring. I don't know what the chronological order of everything Beatles is but this has to be an early one right? There's none of the good stuff after they started getting more famous and went to India and whatnot. Don't get me wrong - they're good 60's pop songs, better than all the imitators, but that's basically it. I'm assuming this was innovative at the time. This is maybe just due to the rep but I expect a lot more out of the Beatles than this. This is an average album.

Eliminator

ZZ Top

3/5

The first three tracks of this are what I consider to be the final form of ZZ Top. They are representative of everything they became after this album came out. Whether that's a good thing or not depends on if you like them - those three songs set the tone for the rest of their catalogue, and diminished the more bluesy and Texas style rock influences that they were about before. I do like those songs, and I do like their style, but it's not nearly as interesting as Tres Hombres, which we had on this list earlier. It is at least uniquely ZZ Top. Songs like "I Got the Six" have the same format as the openers but the riffs just don't hit as hard. ZZ Top songs absolutely live and die on the strength of the basic riff and less so the solo, so if either isn't that memorable then the song kinda fades away from memory because they're all just 4/4 drums with a bass player mostly hitting the root notes otherwise. The one outlier is "Thug" which has a heavily produced bassline that I can't tell if it's synthetic or not. Reading about how this album was made makes me think it might be just a synth. It's not that good of a song so I don't care either way, just weird. This was pretty decent as far as 80's rock records go in general and it is an album that sounds like who it is, as odd as that seems. There are a few stinkers on here ("TV Dinners", "If I could only flag her down") but the rest of the tracks are fine and the first tracks are great. I wish I could give it a 3.5 but out of the 11 songs I think I'd only really revisit 4 of them, so 3 it is.

Rings Around The World

Super Furry Animals

3/5

Honestly a bit too weird to keep my attention. At a certain point I couldn't contain the urge to just listen to Ween or The Flaming Lips. These guys seem like the Welsh version of the aforementioned bands. It's definitely interesting, but others have done this style better.

A Date With The Everly Brothers

The Everly Brothers

3/5

As far as 50's early white guy rock and roll goes this is pretty good. The subject matter is of course about "boy and girl" but the music is surprisingly varied and well composed. The vocal harmonies are absolutely perfect and you know it's real because pitch correction didn't really exist in the form it does today. It's nice. Cheesy but nice.

good kid, m.A.A.d city

Kendrick Lamar

5/5

One of the great things about Kendrick, that so many other modern rappers lack, is that he's actually very good at rapping and telling a story. He can still express a vibe as well as anyone else, maybe more, but his real strengths are in the technical rapping and story telling. I love that he can change styles seemingly on a dime. He's got his own of course, but he can sing, speed up, imitate other rappers (the Eminem style verse in Backseat Freestyle is so exact, it's so well done), and of course weave a good story like the real kings of rap. The beats on this album are clean, mostly compiled from samples, or at the least sounding that way. There are no artificial synth sounds or digital sounding beats, even if they were made that way. It lends a seriousness to the work and works as a great homage (or great imitation, aspiration, etc), again, to the masters of the genre. The only negative I have about this is that nearly every track ends with some over the phone bullshit with people arguing or just talking at each other. It only adds something in the first track where it's tied in to the story being told, the rest just seems unnecessarily forced for no good reason. Oh and lol at "Poetic Justice", what a hilarious feature in hindsight.

1984

Van Halen

4/5

I love Van Halen but other than the hits on this one, the only good parts of the other songs are Eddie's solos. I appreciate David Lee Roth's cheese filled with cocaine style and the screamingly 80's obsession with what I can only describe as "loud sex". I can't get past his clown persona on this one, so much so that it makes me laugh. It's not necessarily a bad thing. I'm too young for this to really mark my party years but the aesthetic of drug fueled manic celebrations where everyone is smiling so hard they can't stop oozes out of this. You don't have to care about the lyrics (they're mostly terrible), it's just all about the feeling. Like I said, musically this isn't nearly as good as their earlier stuff, but the Jump, Panama, and Hot For Teacher are so good that it bumps it up.

Arrival

ABBA

4/5

I think Abba gets played in a lot of situations where you either don't necessarily want to be there or where the fun is mandatory. Think, weddings of distant relatives, work holiday parties, the thing your friend dragged you to in the middle of summer that's supposed to be a farmers market but is more like a middle school art show with expensive food, etc. That sours this music on an emotional level, but if you listen to it in its own context, I think it's really quite good. This is extremely produced and planned pop music, but it's before everyone could consult the almighty spreadsheet instantly and before the number of streams could be verified. It's not entirely programmed by a robot. It's got more than a few repetitive elements that are guaranteed earworms, sure, but there is plenty to go around that's genuinely musically challenging. The harmonies may sound simple but they really aren't, there are non traditional time signatures (My Love, My Life), choral "instrumentals" (Arrival, and why didn't they lead with this?), and a wide variety of keys and key changes. We all know the hits, whether we want to or not, but they're all very well written and plenty of modern musicians would struggle to perform them as well. There's also the particular charm of what is flawless English being sang with just a hint of a nordic accent. Not sure what I'm really getting at here other than a defense of Abba, but I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. A solid 4.

Grievous Angel

Gram Parsons

2/5

This is a country album, I don't get where the "rock and roll" part of it comes in, other than the Nazareth cover of "Love Hurts" which is completely unrelated to the cover of that song here. Was this the beginning of the end for country music? It sounds like it could have come out much later; it's much more modern than the date would suggest. I mean that in a disparaging way, of course, because modern country music is absolute garbage. The themes in here aren't as stupid as modern country but the sound is very very close. I think the only redeeming song in here "1000 dollar wedding" because it at least tells a novel story. The rest of this is pretty forgettable and generic sounding. I don't get where the accolades come from other than maybe pioneering the path to making a genre shittier.

Tarkus

Emerson, Lake & Palmer

3/5

The opening track is a 70's prog masterpiece and I loved every one of the 20+ minutes it ran. I do wish that Spotify indicated the 7 parts of it better, but musically it's pretty easy to tell when things change. The playing is phenomenal and the composition is fantastic, pulling back to classic music and mixing it with modern fusion, rock, jazz, etc. It's just great. The rest of it, which is a little less than half of the album, feels like filler. "Bitch's Crystal" is the standout, though I did like "A time and place" because it sounds like Jethro Tull with the overdrive bass and the organ. The rest of the tracks are pretty bad. I realize 20 minutes is a bit short for an album but I think they really could've just published that and this would be a masterpiece. Sadly the rest of it ruins it a bit, but it's still great work.

The Madcap Laughs

Syd Barrett

2/5

Gotta say this was pretty generic. I knew the story behind Syd and I expected more, but maybe time and the adoration from very famous old friends dilutes the hype. Not unlistenable but pretty boring. I liked the first track and that's about it.

Queen II

Queen

5/5

This was awesome, I'd never heard any of these songs before and they work so well as a full "opera" together. The sound is so unmistakably Queen, Mercury's singing is incredible and everything just feels so huge. The entire work has a super clean production and the segues between songs feel right. I don't know if I could pick a single out of here, because the whole of it is clearly meant to be listened to all the way through. I really enjoyed this, not a bad minute in here. Lyrically it's about half dungeons and dragons and I love it.

Born In The U.S.A.

Bruce Springsteen

2/5

This is the Springsteen I was expecting to hear on this list, not that I particularly want it. This is butt rock for a construction site before butt rock became more about butts lyrically than just aurally. I don’t even like the hits. I never have. It’s not even bad it’s just boring unimaginative dreck. Best track on here is “My hometown” which chronicles the story of a quintessentially American shithole. It’s depressing but it made me feel something and that makes this album a 2.

Here, My Dear

Marvin Gaye

3/5

There is a good variety of Marvin Gaye styles in here, from sexy songs not about sex, to sexy songs that include some sex, to sexy songs that are about being angry about not having sex any more, to songs about having sex. There is a tinge of late 70's/early 80's yacht rock in here too, from the three versions of "When did you stop..." which I find really funny for some reason. Singing is of course excellent, great instrumentation, typically sort of repetitive songwriting, though given the subject matter this time around the lyrics are actually more interesting than usual. I don't know that I needed an hour+ of this but it didn't feel as long as that in the end.

A Walk Across The Rooftops

The Blue Nile

2/5

I can see why this was a commercial flop when it came out, and why it gained popularity over time as a non-popular music album. It's got a lot of the 80's feel to it that popular music of the time had. The synths, the real and computerized basslines and drums mixed together, the particular tone of voice the singer has, it's all very 80's. I don't think I would call this revolutionary or anything, but it's a side of the 80's I hadn't really heard. It's experimental art pop using a whole different sound "kit" different from any I'd ever heard before. What it is missing unfortunately is much listenability. It fails to cross that line from interesting to pleasant, exciting, or danceable. It just kind of lives in the realm of cerebral, and not in a really good way. "Tinseltown in the Rain" is the radio ready track from this and despite the number of streams it has, it's not really any good at all. It's lacking the parts of the rest of the album that make it unique and just sounds whiny. I think "Heatwave" is a better tune and it's not really that good either. There's too much effort required to really appreciate this, I think. You'd have to have grown up at a certain age to really get this, I think, and even then you'd also have to be pretty far up your own ass to say it's great. A bit too pretentious for me - it's art school music for synth lovers that isn't far enough in either direction to make me want to care. It's a 2.5 for me but I'll round down because there are plenty of 3's better than this.

Brilliant Corners

Thelonious Monk

5/5

Hey baby that's jazz, deal with it!

Axis: Bold As Love

Jimi Hendrix

5/5

Not my favorite Jimi album but still full of great songs. Little Wing is in my top 5 of all time, and the only complaint I have about it is that I wish it was several minutes longer. This album continues the incredible synergy of the trio that make up the band; Mitch Mitchell's drumming in particular is absurdly good on this record. The fact that Noel Redding on bass handles a lot of the actual timekeeping on this record is brilliant. And of course Jimi's playing is it's own whole thing. The album runs through a lot of different tempos while maintaining Jimi's signature style, which one would expect. You could say this whole thing is just another Hendrix album, and it is. All of them are so good that it's a huge compliment. I dunno, there's basically I nothing I dont' like about this album. It's perfect.

Blunderbuss

Jack White

3/5

This stated out a lot better than it ended. The first 4 or 5 tracks are white stripes without any of the things I hate about them (shit drumming, overly simplistic songwriting, deliberately bad production) but then it devolved in to this saloon piano/ironic whisky drinking music that characterized the minimal sound of tue 2010’s. I guess you can give jack white credit for basically reinventing that sound but I still don’t like it. It’s not a terrible record but I can’t deal with the static voice filter, piano banging and 5 note phrases. Not for me but I get why people like it.

Music for the Masses

Depeche Mode

4/5

Depeche Mode is one of those electronic bands that utilize the surprisingly uncommon method of not using the same synth kit on every song. So many of these bands, especially in the early days of electronic music, have 7 or 8 drum/organ/effect packs that they just use over an over. Depeche Mode has always managed to stay away from that while holding their own style, and this album is a great example. It helps that the two of them have a distinct set of voices that characterize all their music but each Depeche Mode album I've heard has such a wide range of, well, noises, that it never gets boring. There are a few not so great songs on here, "Little 15" drags on and I don't really understand what it's about. "I Want You Now" is a clever use of voice as instruments but it's very weird. In general the second half lags, but it doesn’t take away from the first.

Phrenology

The Roots

3/5

I don't really know what to think of this album. It's fine enough and it's distinctive enough from a lot of other hip hop (though I know they don't use that label exclusively) albums to not just fall away beyond everyone else doing this, but I don't think it's particularly boundary pushing or really exceptional. The live drumming and instruments are cool but there are plenty of programmed (or digitally enhanced) beats on here that it's only really obvious when they live mic the drums or use the full band on the big hit "The Seed (2.0)". The rapping is pretty good; Black Thought has a great flow though he sometimes falls back on rap cliches, occasionally for a whole song ("Pussy Galore"). The features are fine, nothing really exceptional and I think Nelly Furtado in particular is wasted on the track she's on, despite being a good song. The artsy interludes and tracks are pretty shit. For a few minutes I thought "Water" would actually be a great use of ambient/environmental/experimental noise if it actually divided the album in to two halves, but it didn't at all, unless it was between the good half and the not good half. I liked "Sacrifice", "Thought@Work" and "Water" the most. The rest, meh.

Who's Next

The Who

5/5

This is the hit single album from the Who, and it shows. It's not got the intellectual highs and lows of Tommy or the big plan but it has their real strengths on display the whole time. Keith Moon is a monster on this album and the first and last tracks just bookend a great performance with absolutely legendary ones. Everyone else's work is great but the drumming is on another planet. I can't say I disliked anything on this album, only that I liked a few songs more than others (note I didn't listen to the 10 hour long rerelease, just the original tracks). It's classic, it's rock and roll, it's fucking great. I loved it.

Hunky Dory

David Bowie

4/5

This was a pleasant listen and reminded me that Bowie had stayed true to his style for a very long time. This could have been an 80's or 90's album from him and I wouldnt' have been able to tell, though obviously everything being remastered on the version I listened to probably helped with the production. I think "Queen Bitch" and "Changes" are my favorites from this. Some of the more slow piano oriented songs didn't catch my attention as much. I've been more of a fan of what Bowie stood for (musical experimentation, queerness, etct) than his actual music but this is legitimately good stuff. It's for sure background for me, but I wouldn't turn it off.

Morrison Hotel

The Doors

2/5

I'm gonna say it. The Doors suck and are boring. RIP Jim it took you dying young from drugs to make this band interesting.

Steve McQueen

Prefab Sprout

3/5

I guess the production value is quintessentially 80's. Other than that it's, well, not much of an album? Grocery store music, which has its time and place, but it's not this list.

The Stooges

3/5

I wanted this to be less boring but the songs where they don't go heavy are terrible. What on earth is "We Will Fall" doing on here? And "Ann"? They're both just boring drone with Iggy saying some random nonsense. Unfortunately that's a solid 15 minutes out of a 34 minute album. The rest of this is actually pretty great proto-punk. I like the tone of it all; it's almost doom-y. I just wish the bad parts weren’t so long.

Tom Tom Club

4/5

Hey it’s that sample! What this album does well is the very danceable beats and rhythms, without strictly being a dance album (maybe it is, I don’t know). Some of the songs drag on a bit but the kit and instruments are varied and fun. The singers add a nice variety to other kinds of dance music; they’re almost like the B-52’s with the double tracking. This was fun, I didn’t expect to like it as much as I did.

Rubber Soul

Beatles

3/5

This is supposedly the first Beatles album that isn't just a studio devised pop machine, and you can tell. There is enough sitar in it to be decidedly non western, there's some weirdness (the inhaling noise in "Girl", for example), variations in tempo, etc. It's definitely a landmark album for them and probably for pop/rock music in general. I don't think it's anywhere near as good as Revolver or Abbey Road, and I imagine it's mostly here for the mark it made on the genre rather than the quality of the music. It gets done way better by the Beatles themselves and by bands like the Kinks as well. It's pretty good, but we have the genuinely great Beatles albums already. Could've made room for something a bit more interesting on this list.

GREY Area

Little Simz

4/5

I wasn't really digging the really lo fi sound of the first two tracks, but it improved massively from there. "Wounds" is excellent, as is "Venom". Her rapping at speed reminds me of Busta Rhymes without necessarily trying to make the speed a huge focus - it just comes out that way. Lyrically the content isn't anything that innovative but it's solid hip hop with the subjects it does tackle. The beats are great and wildly varied, which is nice from both a listening and talent showcase level. I especially liked that this is very much an album by the artist - the features are few and are all left as features rather than making every track a collaboration where everyone is equal partners. I get that there is a time for that but sometimes I listen to rap records and the features overshadow the artist. This is absolutely not the case here and I think the album is better for it. The Michael Kiwanuka one though...that has his mark on it and it's a great track. This was really good and it was nice to have another album from an artist I've never heard of, and contemporary at that.

Fear and Whiskey

Mekons

2/5

This was not good. "Last Dance" was maybe the most listenable because the instruments were in tune and everything was mostly in time but the rest was a real struggle to get through. The unimaginative chord progressions of alt rock/punk without any of the aggression, speed, or individual ingenuity that makes it good - all mixed through the lens of a terrible singing and a wobbly fiddle. I did not like this.

Surf's Up

The Beach Boys

4/5

When you think of Beach Boys, you don't really think of this kind of album but this is the real legacy that they left. Gone are the barbershop quartet harmonies and 50's happiness, and what we're left with is still the vocal harmonies and talent that the beach boys have, but much more mature. The songwriting very much evolved to take elements from rock, soul, jazz, and other genres. While some of the subjects are still classic, they're no longer so saccharine that they sound dated. Not everything is in a major key, not everything is 4/4. I particularly liked "Student Demonstration Time" and "Disney Girls", though all of it is good to great. Some of the more weird stuff like "Day in the Life of a Tree" (complete with the midi sounding woodpipes and blocks) sound nothing like the old stuff but contain all the interesting vocal elements that they're famous for. Really all three of the final tracks showcase some of the songwriting and arrangement skills the band has, and it's a great way to close it all out. It's not something I'm going to listen to a ton, but I'm glad I got to hear it. I'm not enough of a fan to see where Brian Wilson was really left out, but apparently this isn't even one of the albums he was super involved in. Whoever was, clearly took some direction from him though.

Tidal

Fiona Apple

5/5

This is one of those albums that I never really listened to much when it came out, but obviously should have. The only modern singer I can think of with this kind of vocal capability and uniqueness is Adele. There are so many other singers out there that come nowhere close to this. The singing in here matches the tone of the music so well; she's got such a great lower registry and all of the feel of a smoky jazz lounge without seeming overly forced. The whole thing is great; there's not a bad track on here.

To Pimp A Butterfly

Kendrick Lamar

4/5

The strength of this album is not only the rapping, which is great, but the variance in styles all over. Also, like all good albums with a lot of features, none of them overshadow the main artist and they add something to each track that only they can. I don't think is quite as good as M.A.A.D. City, but it's still a great hip hop album. Also I swear I am hearing "Pyramid Song" by Radiohead in "How Much a Dollar Cost" but maybe I'm projecting. It's a great track in any case.

Seventh Tree

Goldfrapp

3/5

This was a nice listen. A bit more edge or a bit more instrumental substance would've been better for me, but I get the appeal. Perfectly good quiet background music for a perfectly good quiet background day.

Let's Get Killed

David Holmes

4/5

I don't know why this gets so much hate in the reviews. It's perfectly fine mid to late 90's euro electronic music. It's the score to a film never made (which seems more obvious when you look at Holmes's discography), and that doesn't detract from the actual tunes. It's 90's euro lounge, mixed with classic spy movie (I mean aside from the Bond theme remix which was pretty unnecessary, I think) and random snippets from interviewing people in New York. It goes through trip hop, breakbeat, maybe even a bit of jungle? It's all the fun genres of electronic music you don't really hear much of anymore. I don't think it's groundbreaking or anything but I liked it! It's a great example of the mix of genres electronic music was going through at the time this was released. Maybe you had to be there, I don't know. This doesn't deserve the shitty rating it's got. Also, what a great album title, c'mon.

Remedy

Basement Jaxx

3/5

This is extremely European 1999. There's really no other way to categorize this - everyone was on basic bad drugs and you heard this kind of stuff all night at every club you went to. Because of the aforementioned drugs, you went all night on this. It's not good for listening, but it is good for dancing, particularly when it's actually mixed instead of being track to track. I think this goes on for too long and the songs really sound the same, but that is almost what this subculture was at the time. It was all about keeping a very basic groove going, and they did that pretty will.

Talking Heads 77

Talking Heads

4/5

This is a weird one because I enjoy Talking Heads very much but I couldn't get super in to this album. It's missing something that the other David Byrne projects on here have had, and I can't put my finger on it. I just didn't like it as much as their other records and I didn't have any desire to dig deeper like I did with them. This isn't bad at all, just not as engaging as it could be. It's still a Talking Heads album so it gets points just for that, but comparing it to their other work I found it less experimental, less interesting, and less, well, good.

Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs

Derek & The Dominos

3/5

For whatever reason I didn’t know Clapton was in this band, and I thought Layla was just his song. I guess it doesn’t really matter because there isn’t much else about this album worth writing about. It’s standard blues rock, performed well but without anything really standing out. Clapton is a great guitarist (and a shitty person) but you wouldn’t really know it from this album. Other than Layla it’s not very memorable and the cover of Little Wing is straight up bad. I guess the album title really sums it up.

Ragged Glory

Neil Young & Crazy Horse

2/5

Oh god, Neil's voice with a garage rock band is fucking awful. The musical parts of it are bog standard country rock but when Young starts singing, it just makes it comical. His voice is not meant for this kind of music. And also the music is boring. This went on too long and offered a whole lot of nothing. Maaaayyybe some halfway decent guitar playing here and there somewhere buried in a 10 minute wank off.

Survivor

Destiny's Child

2/5

There's no denying all three of them can sing, Beyonce kinda blowing the other two out of the water, but they can all hold a tune in what I assume is only a very lightly autotuned album, if at all. The issue with this is the the beats and lyrics are really dated. The whole style doesn't really hold up to modern RnB, or pop in general really. The instrumental kits sound like fisher price toys and everything is in this staccato half rapped style which just sounds too much like the early 2000's and nothing else. This went on for way too long and the only thing really keeping it from being a 1 is that the singing is more than capable. Even Kelly Rowland's excel spreadsheet texting application can't make her singing bad.

Berlin

Lou Reed

2/5

I thought I was going to hate this but it turned out to be a bit better than I expected. I finally can put a name to "How Do You Think It Feels", which I've heard a bunch before but never cared enough to look up. The bassline is great, and it honestly feels like the most "complete" and accessible song on the album. I have to mention the more than a few minute length of the crying children in "The Kids". I don't say this as some sort of bleeding heart "think of the children" person, I say this as a father who was driven insane by these kinds of noises and I do not wish to relive any of that. The concept is good, and it tells a sad story well, but the music doesn't do it for me. I've never been a huge fan of Lou Reed's voice in any case so that didn't help. I can see how this was influential, and why people like it, but eh.

Hot Fuss

The Killers

3/5

This was better than I expected it to be, though still not great. Everyone's heard the singles a thousand times, and they're good for what they are: pop rock with a tiny bit of punk edge. It's when they lose that bit of edge that it starts to be worse. Prime example being the line "I got soul but I'm not a soldier", that's just awful. The following track, "Andy You're a Star" is also pretty bad mostly due to tempo and lack of chord changes in the verse. Basically after "All these things I've done" the songs all start to sound all the same and don't have a real catchy hook or interesting verses to do much. They're too similar to the *clap clap* HEY bands of the era without any of the annoying mustaches or ridiculous 17 person percussion setups. They definitely have a distinct sound, there's just not enough progression of it during the album. The playing is good and I like the tone all of the instruments have; you can distinguish all of them very well. But ultimately, if you like one of the non-singles you'll like all of them, and if you don't, you wont. Special mention for the last track, which sounds like that really bad Hoobastank song but about a indie rock instead of a relationship. Yeesh.

Unknown Pleasures

Joy Division

3/5

I know this is sacrilege but Ian Curtis's voice is a parody of itself at this point. At best he sounds like if David Byrne was a sad teenager and deadly serious. At his worst he sounds like the guy from the B-52's. The biggest example of this is "She's Lost Control" which to me sounds really off. Other than the vocal style, I actually really liked this. It's very raw and it's a great intro to what I guess is called Post-Punk, even going in to punkish songs like "Interzone". I like this more than I like the Smiths or the Cure, two bands that I think cover the same ground of depressed guy singing over single tracked instruments before the 80's really hit. Overall I think it's a good album, I just can't get over Curtis's voice; it's personal preference I know.

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

Neil Young & Crazy Horse

2/5

More Neil Young, great. This at least is while he could still sing and didn't sound like he was talking in to a mic without any of the musicians knowing about it. It's fairly boring, nothing really great or memorable in here. Just kind of a classic easy listening/soft rock kind of sound, and it’s not even good because Crazy Horse seems kinda shit at actually playing their instruments. Maybe the one notable bing is the "plagiarism" in this album in "Down By The River" which sounds a bit like old CSNY, but not as good since the harmonies aren't anywhere close. I dont' think this should be on here. It's entirely forgettable.

Vivid

Living Colour

4/5

I only knew the opening track before going in to this, and I like it a lot, so it was nice to find out that the rest of the album is pretty good too. It never gets back to the heights of Cult of Personality in terms of heaviness, but the rest of the album explains how they got to that point. The instrumental work is crazy good; all three instruments are played exceedingly well, especially the bass. The singer's voice has got some real range and he can sustain a note CLEANLY for a long time, unlike so many of his contemporaries. I like the mixup of punk, metal, funk, and a pile of other things. There are so many bands that say that they do all those, but Living Colour actually does. They even go in to butt rock a bit, and Glamour Boys is either the best satire done in a long time or just a lyrical misunderstanding with the backing track. I'm sure it's the former, but I like to think it's the latter. The only complaint I have here is some of the lyrics are corny - "I Want To Know" coming after "Cult of Personality" should be a crime. Also that Spotify somehow is missing two of the original tracks for some stupid legal reason I'm sure. More of this kind of stuff please.

Band On The Run

Paul McCartney and Wings

4/5

This is a good to decent pop rock album and an easy listen. None of this is particularly innovative except the multi part title track, but it doesn’t need to be. It’s well written, orchestrated, and performed. There are some Beatles-isms in here like the title track being a mix of different themes, “Picasso’s last words” having the organ and French samples, and all the nonsensical lyrics throughout. It’s very much McCartney’s work though because it never goes too far up its own ass like Lennon’s does. I didn’t love this or anything but it’s pretty good and a good example of how having just enough songwriting and scoring skills can make an otherwise boring idea into something fun.

Bat Out Of Hell

Meat Loaf

2/5

It’s been said but I have to say it again: the cover and title of this album vs the actual content is insane. This is a cross between a bad Queen album and a broadway musical. It’s so over the top and so dramatic, and not in a really good way. The songwriting is good in the sense that it’s complex and has some bizarre ass theme running through it, both musically and thematically. Meat Loaf himself has a good voice and a wide range, but it’s kind of lost in this total cheese fest that’s going on. This is a theater kids idea of a concept album I guess, and while technically it’s sound, the rest is too much for me. This is music for a person nearly diametrically opposed to me musically.

Green

R.E.M.

5/5

I really liked this, and every time I listen to the older REM stuff I think how influential they were to the entire grunge/alternative movement in the 90's. They were making 90's records in the 80's, and they were already at the top of their game well before anyone else had even started. There are a couple outliers that took multiple listens to really understand like "The Wrong Child" and "You Are The Everything" but after a couple listens (I listened to this a few times because I liked it so much) they're both really great in their own way, mostly emotionally. The rest of it is just conventionally good rock music. The arrangements are simple yet complex enough to show off the talents of the whole band. The lyrical content is somewhere between depressing and observational, with the occasional spark of joy or curiosity which is the hallmark of Stipe's writing. Stipe himself seems to have grown in to his own voice on here more so than the previous albums and it's less whiny sounding than before, which is is a big improvement. The instrumentals are as well written and performed as they've always been. This album is still as relevant to me as an adult as it was when I was a teenager first hearing it. It has the true staying power of a timeless record.

Rio

Duran Duran

5/5

This was great 80's synth rock. Everyone's heard the two big hits, but I didn't realize the rest of the album might be just as good. In fact, I think "Hungry Like The Wolf" might be the worst song on here, and it's not a bad song at all. What I kept thinking throughout this was that every one of these songs would still be a great song if it was covered in another style. You could turn all of these in to traditionally instrumented rock songs, and it would lose some of it's electronic charm, but the songs are so well written on their own that they would still be great without the synths. You could do house style remixes (which have been done for a lot of Duran Duran's songs) and they'd be club bangers. You could sample so much of this and turn it in to a great beat. It goes on and on. Special note for the cover art - it's incredible. I can't look away from her.

The Idiot

Iggy Pop

3/5

This is just a Bowie album with a different singer, and it shows. The songs aren’t particularly suited for Iggy’s talents until “China Girl” where he starts to move to multiple registers instead of just mumbling his way through an instrumental. Bowie singing all these would be better, I think. It’s not a bad album but the songs drag on in the way a hangover does. Just a bit longer than you expect and for no good reason, and by the end of it you barely even notice. I do like the last 4 tracks but half an album doesn’t make a great record, especially this short. I’d give it a 2.5 but I can’t so I’ll round up.

Hypocrisy Is The Greatest Luxury

The Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy

3/5

I went it mostly blind to this but the brief reviews I read covered it pretty well. This is a very political rap album pretty obviously influenced by public enemy and the like. It’s very political, unfortunately all still relevant today. What makes it stand out is that it’s almost a spoken word album. It’s more of a poetry set to music than it is rapping. When things rhyme they come out almost ridiculous, like the singing chorus in “music and politics”. It’s extremely direct and to the point lyrically, the beats are fine but not really stand out. While the messaging is good all I can think of is the intro to the music video for the song “1980” where Simon Rex is rapping mystical nonsense way too quickly. This album is almost too direct. Glad I listened to it though; our shitty societal problems in America are eternal it seems.

The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

3/5

Take the harmonica away from Bob please, but other than that, this was maybe the best Dylan album we've had. This is the kind of anti-establishment stuff I knew he had written and performed and for the most part it all takes off. I still don't like his voice and the harmonica playing but the songwriting is good enough. I actually made it through this one.

Led Zeppelin IV

Led Zeppelin

5/5

I agree with all the other 5 star reviews and I'll repeat for the jillionth time that Bonham's drumming is on another planet. Between insisting on a slow impossibly in time beat in Black Dog, playing with 4 sticks on, well, Four Sticks, and creating one of the most repeated grooves on the planet in When The Levee Breaks, he does all this other basic "incredibly good rock drummer" stuff. For me it's hard to get past how complicated everything on this album is yet how simple it is to listen to. All timer.

Behaviour

Pet Shop Boys

2/5

This is 80's radio synth pop at it's absolute peak I think, and peak in the sense that the genre is encapsulated by this album, not that it is the best. The singing is competent to good, especially since there isn't any obvious autotuning going on here. It's the musical parts that are so painfully casio keyboard kit that bring it down to me. The technology was there to make some really interesting sounds (see the Duran Duran album we got a few days ago) but this is right out of the sample kit that was included with every keyboard. The songwriting elevates it a bit but if you take the voices out it, it becomes elevator music. Thankfully the voices are center stage but I can't get over that part of it. It isn't bad, it's just aged pretty poorly and absolutely seems like one of those things that you'd have to be a certain age at a certain times to be in to it.

Born To Be With You

Dion

2/5

Utterly forgettable faux soul pop music. This was boring as hell.

Cut

The Slits

3/5

Interesting album of raggae and ska more than punk really. I liked it but I didn’t love it. Whoever says they can’t play their instruments is out of their mind; the songs, particularly the drumming, is spot on. This is much better than the unproduced and tin can sounding crap like The Birthday Party.

Heroes

David Bowie

4/5

I enjoyed this thoroughly as there was just enough fun weird Bowie stuff in the beginning before becoming a great Brian Eno album at the end. And Heroes, the single, is a great song anyway.

After The Gold Rush

Neil Young

2/5

I am extremely tired of this man getting foisted on us.

Mask

Bauhaus

3/5

This album oscillates between these weird dance style tunes (The Passion of Lovers, Kick In the Eye) and these songs that sound like a parody of a goth band, like Hollow hills and Of Lilies and Remains. IT's very weird in that way, and I've never really heard anything quite like it. It's almost as if they aren't taking this seriously, but maybe that's the point. In any case, I'm not even sure if I liked it or disliked it. There are points where they sound like Talking Heads, and points where they sound like The Cure, and points where they sound like shit. Considering the The Cure and The Smiths were around before this, I'm not sure what the big hype is around Bauhaus. They certainly are 80's Goth Rock, and maybe they are the archetypical example.

Black Sabbath

5/5

How appropriate given Ozzy kicked the bucket yesterday. This is a masterful beginning to metal and it's not only easy to see how it evolved from here forward, but how it sprung from the more rock and blues oriented stuff of the sixties. There's even a harmonica in here, and it's not even that out of place. The lyrical themes are in between the prototypical metal satan/death/misery stuff and outright blues/love songs. It's a weird mashup but it all works. The real greatness of this album though is introducing the idea of the monster riff to metal/rock. Every track has one pervasive riff that isn't difficult to play but is just the very definition of heavy. Nobody was doing that before this, and few have done it this hard since. Could easily listen to the whole thing multiple times.

For Your Pleasure

Roxy Music

3/5

I listened to this yesterday and I swear I can barely remember any of it, good or bad. It’s certainly an album.

Pink Moon

Nick Drake

4/5

I didn't expect this but I guess I'm a Nick Drake fan. The first album we had from him really surprised me with how much I enjoyed it and so did this one despite being a fairly big departure from the last one. It's so simple, just a guitar and a voice in the vast majority of it. His voice is just weird enough that it sticks out and he's actually a capable singer unlike a lot of his "folk music" contemporaries and the following movement. I wouldn't call this folk music though. Musically all of the songs are interesting and likely fun to play. They aren't incessant boring strumming, though they are strummed for the most part. The chord progressions are unique and the voice complements them really well. If I didn't know this album came out in the early 70's I wouldn't have believed you if you told me. It sounds almost 90's, and that's a good thing for me. The only knock I have on this is that the songs blend a little together; I couldn't tell you which one was which. They were all enjoyable, and I never though to skip or turn it off. It's a 4.5 for me precisely because there's nothing that's going to keep me coming back specifically. A really enjoyable listen though.

Sunday At The Village Vanguard

Bill Evans Trio

4/5

Even as a jazz enjoyer, I didn't find anything particularly standout in here. It's definitely well written, well performed, and well recorded. However, nothing took me by big surprise and made me want to listen to it again. That isn't to say I didn't enjoy it, it just kinda was. A great accompaniment to the morning's work but nothing really more than that. My wife commented that I needed a cocktail and a cigarette, and despite it being 9AM I agreed.

Vespertine

Björk

4/5

This was pretty good, very Bjork as expected, but maybe not as good as some of her other albums. I like aggressive and mad Bjork, but thoughtful and more ethereal Bjork is a good listen as well. Her voice is polarizing, and you'll get that on every album of hers so if you don't like one you're not going to like her other stuff. This album is a continuation of 90's and 2000's trip-hop while sort of bringing it in to modernity and closing out the genre. Her beats aren't nearly as repetitive as some of that genre, and they are different enough to make her stand out even if her voice wasn't already the interesting part. She chose good collaborators on this album, even if I've never heard of any of them by name. I liked this, I'd listen to it again in solitude.

Future Days

Can

3/5

This was cool, and something I had never heard before. I'm not terribly surprised the only song shorter than 8 minutes is the one with the most plays, since you can't really fit 10+ minute songs on random playlists. Others have mentioned this, but the percussion is what makes this album. The vocals are whispy and very "modern" for 1970, the guitars and bass are fun enough, but the drums and the other toys are what make this good. The drummer manages to take some very basic rhythms and make them interesting by adding off beat hits on the various drum heads or by inserting wood blocks and odd cymbals. For a steady groove it really has a lot of variety. That said, the last song, which is half the album, wasn’t really different enough for me to pay attention that long. I actually think it could’ve been two songs - nearly split at the 10 minute mark actually. The theme really only comes together in the last minute. It’s satisfying, sure, but I wish it had been combined a little better. I liked this but I sort of spaced through “Bel Air”, and I listened to it twice. Not enough to bump it up higher for me. I bet if this album had two more tracks I’d like it more.

Kilimanjaro

The Teardrop Explodes

3/5

The very definition of fine. Average to mildly good. Never heard of em before and probably won’t be able to pick them out of a sea of generic 80s British rock.

Document

R.E.M.

4/5

This was maybe not as good as the other REM albums we've had, though it's got a few of the songs everyone knows by them. It's slightly edgier and a bit more of a distorted sound than Green, or even earlier, and while it's ahead of it's time, it's closer to grunge than previous work. I think Monster would ultimately be the "grunge" album, but I digress. Stipe's work in this is great and he loses a bit of that drawl from his earlier songs; something I appreciate. The musicianship is typically excellent and the songwriting is as good as ever. Compared to the other REM albums we've had on here it's not quite as good, so not a 5 this time, but still a good listen.

(What's The Story) Morning Glory

Oasis

3/5

I think the last time I listened to this album was shortly after I graduated high school in the early 2000's. Oasis were kind of on the way out and they were doing a smaller (for them) stadium tour around Europe. They played the 15k seat or so soccer stadium in my hometown, which was a bit of an oddity because not too many bands of their stature would come directly there; they'd usually play Venice or Verona which are bigger cities with properly large venues. Anyway, they put on what I would consider to be one of the worst shows I've ever been to. There was no opener, they played album recordings of their own songs before coming on stage, they didn't say a single thing in between songs, and fucked off 30 seconds after they finished their set, no encore, nothing. I was really disappointed, and not because I even liked Oasis that much, but because I expected something more from what was a huge band just a few years back. I don't remember if this was when the two brothers hated each other the most or not, but I don't really care. That whole experience sums up this album. Sure, the big singles are familiar and I would even consider some of them to be good (Don't Look Back In Anger, Morning Glory), but the rest of it is pretty dull. I don't remember what was supposed to be so good about this. Considering some of the other Brit Rock bands that were around pumping out great material at the time (Supergrass, Blur, etc) this is really sub par. It's saved from total mediocrity by a few of the singles.

Red Dirt Girl

Emmylou Harris

3/5

I thought the first track was quite good but then it sort of fell in to generic inoffensive country music. I lost interest 4 or 5 songs in but got through it all anyway. “Bang the drum slowly” was a nice memorial tune, but other than that no other standouts. She’s a good singer, but her songwriting isn’t that captivating. It’s ok.

Djam Leelii

Baaba Maal

3/5

An interesting album that, like other African ones we've had, show how much Caribbean music owes to its African roots. That isn't to say that this album is Caribbean music, it's just a reference point for me as something I'm more familiar with. The track "Salminanam" in particular sounds so much like the lyrics should be in Spanish. I like the tone of the guitars in this album a lot, they are clean and only slightly distorted with a rich middle range. The drums are complicated and use a lot of percussion that isn't really present in the more anglo-centric pop music we get for most of these albums. My biggest regret about this is that I have no idea what he's singing about, which I imagine takes a lot out of these songs given the song structure is pretty repetitive. The instrumentation is good though. It's hard to quantify this against the other stuff in this list. It's definitely listenable and I didn't angle to turn it off every song like I do for some of the more familiar stuff, but I didn't find it extraordinary or anything. It's a nice change of pace, but nothing I'll be clamoring to return to.

You Are The Quarry

Morrissey

2/5

These lyrics are fucking terrible, and we all know that Morrissey as a person is terrible, so that's fairly expected. They ruin what is otherwise a fairly ok album. Like just change every word in every song and it'd be a halfway decent album. His cadence is always a bit rushed, but he did that with the Smiths as well and it's sort of part of the charm, if you're in to that kind of thing. I can't get over how corny and/or stupid the lyrics are. Also knowing he's a psychotic brexit banger moron really deteriorates the 1st grade level point of "Irish Heart, English Blood", just as an example. This was pretty bad.

Moon Safari

Air

4/5

Kinda wild we've had 2 Air albums on here. I like them but I wouldn't call them essential listening. This album represents that euro lounge aesthetic that a lot of (better) bands would push in to electronica/big beat/proto-modern-edm in the next 10 or 15 years. It's bit of an easy listening version of Daft Punk or a Telepopmusik with an edge. It's perfectly good chillout music, when that was a genre. Other than "La Femme D'argent" and "Talisman" I don't think any of the tracks are really big standouts, but as a whole it's a good listen. I do really like the aforementioned tracks as singles, though.

Back At The Chicken Shack

Jimmy Smith

4/5

Solid Jazz improv album, I only wish there was even more organ solos. He's a great player but only in the last two songs did the organ take absolute center stage. Side note, is this where that band "Jimmy's Chicken Shack" got their name?

Screamadelica

Primal Scream

2/5

Is this where that TV commercial sound of 1990-1996 or so came from? Faux electronic-rock that somehow comes off the worse of the two genres? A mix between the hippie revival and rave culture and pub rock? I always felt this style of music was strictly, and I mean strictly, for commercial purposes. It permeated European radio and television for every product imaginable for a long, long time. Even the album cover is stuck to that era. The straight rock songs on here, like "Damanged" and "Movin On Up" are fine enough, though kinda boring. "Loaded" is what happens when someone thinks they can make a whole song out of the opening chords to George Michael's "Freedom". The more electronic and/or dance songs are slightly better but even they are the absolute distilled essence of the early 90's and I seriously cannot escape the idea that this whole album belongs in a commercial for jeans or a compact car. The dub version of "Higher Than The Sun" is a high point, and I think this is what the producer was ultimately trying to achieve with a mix of genres here. For me it's the only fundamentally interesting track that blends a bunch of things well, with the others just being sort of exactly what you would expect if you told some modern AI model to just mash up some genres in a major key. I don't hate this album but for a reason I can't quite articulate, I dislike it. Everything in it seems like an obvious conclusion to a set of very basic ideas and I don't like that.

Fire Of Love

The Gun Club

3/5

It's like if the Clash were a bit more aggressive, and much less interesting. Also American. Also boring. This is far too long for a punk album, but at least it's a pretty decent example of the genre at the time.

Killing Joke

4/5

Killing Joke are a band I'd heard of largely through reading interview of other bands and seeing who is touring with bigger bands. They're constantly listed as influences to bands I like and bands I appreciate more than actually listening to. It was nice to finally hear them, and I'm not even disappointed like I usually am with these things. This album's opener is the best track by miles. "Requiem" has a great groove, and interested chord manipulation, and nearly industrial energy without being so negative that it's depressing. The feeling of that track is present throughout the album but Requiem really puts it all together the best. You can see why bands like KMFDM, Skinny Puppy, and other pioneers and banner wavers of Industrial rock/metal always cite Killing Joke; it's all the root of the sound of those other bands. It's when they get more intense like in "Requiem" or "The Wait" that they're at their best. honestly if they stuck to minor keys and sped it all up a bit I would like this even more. "Complications" and "Primitive" are also pretty good but those are more punk songs kind of crossed with something like the Cure? It's good whatever it is. I liked this.

Lady Soul

Aretha Franklin

5/5

Not a lot to say here. Queen of the genre for a reason.

Dire Straits

4/5

It's tempting to say that this album is just jazz blues rock parts 1-9, but it's more "Mark Knopfler and his backing band". His playing is so distinct and so crisp, and that's really what makes this whole record. His singing is thankfully an afterthought, and the tight rhythm section and additional guitar playing serve as the stage of Knopfler's mastery of the instrument. You could handwave it away as him being a good rock and blues guitarist and nothing more but the playing in the faster songs (Sultans of Swing of course being the big one) is really on another planet. Nobody, especially at the time, was getting that tone and individual-note-level clarity out of the electric guitar in rock music. To this day, there is nobody I can think of that can play like him. If it wasn't so full of feeling I would say it's a machine because it's just that clean. Anyone else with these songs wouldn’t be that good of an album. I would even say the songs aren’t especially creative beyond “Down to the Waterline” and “Sultans of Swing”. I can’t get over the lead guitar though. It’s really something.

What's That Noise?

Coldcut

4/5

Had to pull this one up on youtube because Spotify doesn't have it. Some of this is pretty generic pop-house euro stuff of the early 90's with better than average sample work. Some of this is the precursor to big beat stuff like Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim, Crystal Method, etc. I prefer the latter stuff much more than the former. Songs like "Fat (Party & Bullshit)" are clearly the inspiration for a whole movement that would come a few years later. Turns out these guys also founded Ninja Tune, which makes sense as well. In a way it's cool that I had no idea who they were before today. A good thing about this album is the varied samples and vocalists make it so it's impossible to really use the same sound kit for every song. While a lot of it has the same style of sound, not one song uses the same drums and the like from the previous one. It takes a lot of time and talent to produce an album like this. Overall I think this went on too long, but it didn't feel the 60+ minutes it actually is. I think the tracks I like more were supposed to be the breaks in between the "main" tracks with vocalists, but that doesn't really change the album much for me. It's fun hearing the samples I recognize, especially the whole bassline from Tupac's "Hit em up" in "Not Paid Enough" (obviously the original song that Tupac also sampled). There's definitely some Zeppelin drums in there and I thought I heard a Deep Purple riff as well, the little ding in "Smack my bitch up" by Prodigy is in "Beats and Pieces". I like the album cover too. This was better the longer I listened to it.

Olympia 64

Jacques Brel

3/5

This style of music, the "chanson", supposed to tell a story and to be theatrically performed. Unfortunately, like I imagine many people on this site and reading this book, I don't speak French! I can only judge it on the bombastic nature of the performance and the musical quality. Thankfully, both of those are fairly good. His voice is powerful and you can hear how he enunciates every word and changes the force of his voice when things get more emotional. So from a purely technical standpoint, it's good, and it's a style which I know really nothing about. It's not as interesting to me as some of the other non-english language styles we've had on here, but it's exactly what I would imagine would be in the soundtrack to any film or tv show set in France during the 60's and 70's. Subconsciously it must have some sort of cultural staying power.

Metallica

4/5

This is where Metallica started to really go to shit, but commercially really started to land. It's cliche to say it, but this is the sell out album. It made them gajillions, spawned a ton of radio hits, but it feels so much less intense and raw than all the previous albums. I know Bob Rock had a lot to do with it, but they ultimately wrote the songs and they kept writing these songs, so it's not some producer's curse or whatever. I still like "Enter Sandman" and "Don't Tread on Me", but I've been soured on the other singles. "Unforgiven" is just "One" but less interesting. "Sad But True" and "Wherever I may Roam" are too complicated for the supremely (relative to his peers) untalented Lars to keep up with, and they can't even get him to play in time in the studio. The more I listen to the drums on the songs that aren't just four/four headbangers the more I notice that he's slightly off beat nearly everywhere. It's infuriatingly inconsistent because everyone else is really crisp. Maybe it is that oversaturation that gives me a bad opinion of the more famous songs. The non singles still go pretty hard. "Through The Never" sounds much more like the old Metallica, and I didn't remember it at all. "The God That Failed" is similar. I dont' hate this album, I just don't think it holds up to expectations. Teenage me was way more in to this when I first listened to it 7 or 8 years after it came out. It was a bit ahead of it's time when I think about it. When "Load" came out I could say that the "old" Metallica was better, and they were. I'm going to give it a four because I've given much worse albums a 3 but it's really a 3.5.

The Specials

4/5

This was great; I'd never actually listened to the specials despite listening to everything they really spawned decades later. This is an upbeat album played by guys who are good enough at their instruments to not make it a mess. The singing is a bit of an afterthought, and it fits just right with the vibe and the music. A couple of the songs towards the end got a bit dull ("Stupid Marriage", "Too Much Too Young") but they picked it right up with the final two. I liked this a lot, was a good mood booster.

Destroy Rock & Roll

Mylo

3/5

I think this is a fairly decent dance album other than the title track. "Destroy Rock and Roll" is exactly what people make fun of when they want to trash this type of music, and they're right to. Lets just sample some guy talking and throw a basic four/four beat. Then repeat one line over and over in the middle because that's the build up. Trash. The rest of it is fine, but pretty boring. Every remix of "Drop the Pressure" I've heard is better than the original. The samples are all there but they don't really add much to the music, "In My Arms" excluded because the whole thing uses the Bette Davis Eyes hook. Not a lot to say about this; maybe critics attached themselves to this because it was a bit more clever than the generic house and trance music that was widely prevalent at the time in the greater electronic music genre.

Kid A

Radiohead

5/5

This is a tough one and it's a perfect example of needing multiple listens. It's still a great album, and it has some of my favorite Radiohead songs on it (Everything In Its Right Place, Optimistic) but the whole thing is a really slow burn. I remember the first time I heard it I was really quite mad because it's such a huge departure from Ok Computer, the previous album. Over time I grew to really appreciate it for what it is though, and came to the somewhat obvious conclusion that it's still the same band, just moving on to new things, and if they had just made another rock album it might not have been nearly as good. There are very few traditional rock songs on here, especially considering when it came out. "The National Anthem" is close, but even that dissolves in to an cacophonous noise track by the end and "How To Disappear Completely" I think featured in some movie or a TV show and kind've went off from there. This isn't a rock album at all, and the whole band stretches what it means to be (at the time) an instrumental ensemble in pop/rock music throughout. There's a load of synthesized and wacky instruments in here; I remember reading about a theremin specifically and you can hear it in multiple places. As an album it goes all over the place but never in a jarring way. There are a lot of non-lyrical (and some lyrical, but largely abstract and sometimes to the point of absurdity) emotions throughout the whole thing. Uplifting, depressing, angry, content, thoughtful, etc. It's one thing Radiohead have constantly done well throughout their entire career and this album is no different. I love the simple soundscape closer track as a finisher to the album as it brings it all home with just a simple ethereal chord set and leaves you satisfied, weirdly preparing for the next album (Amnesiac) which would go even further in to experimental yet accessible music. This is like a 4.75, but I'll round up because I do still really like it.

Eli And The Thirteenth Confession

Laura Nyro

2/5

Never heard of her before. Powerful voice with the enunciation of a drunkard. I can't get over how she slurs her words over and over. Please end a word when you say it. It's seriously all I heard through this whole thing. Ruined it entirely.

Machine Head

Deep Purple

3/5

Ok everyone who has ever picked up a guitar has played Smoke On The Water. The strength of that song is the very simple and straightforward riff. The rest of this album simply doesn't have that as much. The rest of the songs that try that formula come close but nothing hits as hard. "Space Truckin" is probably the nearest one. It's fine enough dad rock, but it's not any better than the contemporaries. "Lazy" is the next best song on here, and its' a solid rock jam which shows they can be pretty creative. Reminded me of the real core of 70's rock where everyone is a good instrumentalist and can just rock out for an hour if they want to. Some good solo work on here and some good jams but nothing super great other than the obvious Smoke On The Water.

Achtung Baby

U2

3/5

This is a decent enough U2 album but once again if you don't like their modern easy listening radio friendly approach to music you're not going to like this one any more than the others. In particular, if you don't like "One", you're not going to like half of this album, specifically tracks 3,4,5,6 which might as well be called "One" parts 1-4. It's basically the same song 4 times. "Mysterious Ways" is the obvious best track on here, between Edge finally getting to properly work with some guitar effects and the actually catchy songwriting. Everything after is kind of meh. Don't get the hype really, but it's fine.

The Grand Tour

George Jones

3/5

Average sounding old school country album before the genre imploded. I think the lap/slide guitar playing is quite nice and he's got a generally agreeable southern accented voice. The wikipedia entry for this album reveals a lot of personal drama between George, his ex wife, and what I guess was a falling apart marriage involving a third guy who co wrote some of this. It weirdly comes through since all the songs are about being a mess emotionally. The universe had it out for this guy in a weird way. Fairly generic but not poorly executed by any means.

The Downward Spiral

Nine Inch Nails

5/5

This is going to be a long one because I love this album so much for many different reasons. This is the album that introduced me to the concept of pre and post music production. Before this they were just names on a list that I assumed were for marketing or grifting purposes. For being made in 1994 the techniques and creativity on this album are so far ahead of their time. The technology available for mixing, creating and tuning every sound on this album was so far behind what we have now and yet it sounds better than things put out today. The entire soundscape of this album revolutionized what the words "grit", "raw", and "dark" mean with respect to music. Trent and Flood were, and remain, geniuses in this respect. Beyond the heavy and deconstructed guitars, drums, bass, synths, etc, this album is full of metallic and factory-like sounds that really drive the point home and create a proper "industrial" aesthetic. “Reiner” by itself is like a phd thesis in editing techniques. I’ll never forget how I thought that my headphones were broke. When the chorus only came in through what felt like the bottom left part of my ear. The horn stabs somehow don’t seem out of place and it all culminates in this extremely quiet voice that’s about to explode with everything else going on. Trent's voice is always between proper singing and yelling but never really either one. The lyrical content of this album isn't for everyone. I'm not saying it's the most profoundly presented thing, or even that some of it isn't cringey as an adult. If we ignore the embarrassment that our society has put on expressing anger and depression against religion, sex, identity, and so forth (I realize that's a big ask), then this album captures exactly what it is to fall down an ever more difficult existence of depression and fear. The album starts as the initial reaction to your life falling apart - being absolutely incensed and having an increasingly delusional view of having power over everything. We have the moments of false clarity (March of the Pigs - doesn't it make you feel better?) and projection on others (Heresy). Then we move on to desperation and the grab for self change that isn't coming (Closer, The Becoming). Another burst of violence and anger as the realization that none of this is working (Big Man, I Do Not Want This), a plea for someone else to end it (Eraser), an attempt to blame someone else (Reptile) for not doing it, then ending with the absolutely soul crushing final two tracks as the narrator gives in to it and simply falls apart. It's as a whole that the title of the album becomes clear and the concept comes in to itself. It takes on an entirely different meaning as a young person than it does as an adult, and maybe some people are lucky enough to never experience any of this as they get older, so maybe it just makes them embarrassed about things they thought in their youth. It's so much more than just angst though. I don't know where to begin with the actual songs. Every one is thematically perfect with the lyrics/lack of lyrics (or is it the other way around?) and they tread a line between industrial, metal, and rock like nothing else. I'm not even sure any of these songs hit the headbanging and more conventional heights of singles like Head Like a Hole or Wish or any number of songs from other NIN albums but there are parts that do and they're all over the album. The rest of it is really like nothing else at the time. Reznor took all of the existing industrial music of the time and transformed it in to something that is just beyond rhythmically beating a piece of iron in a german warehouse and being pissed off about it (which, to be fair, I also enjoy). The variety of styles in here that remain true to the theme of self destruction and deprecation is huge. It gets better with age, and it started out stellar in 1994. A complete masterpiece. I would give a 7 out of 5.

Live At The Star Club, Hamburg

Jerry Lee Lewis

2/5

Is Jerry Lee Lewis just a giant rip off of Little Richard? The songs all sound the same but it's missing pretty much all of the charm. I guess also he's a huge piece of shit. At least it was short.

The Number Of The Beast

Iron Maiden

4/5

I never really listened to Iron Maiden when I was the age that they were really appealing to. I did see them live more than once at festivals and they were always pretty good, and their music is definitely high energy and made for live performances. This record is a lot of fun in the sense that it never really slows down too much. Lyrically it’s a bit ridiculous but it’s only noticeable because Dickinson has great enunciation and a huge range for a metal singer. The rest of the band is tight and complex; the bass in particular is mixed really well and the talent comes through. This is a riff heavy, speedy, metal album that doesn’t pretend it’s anything else. Not everyone’s favorite thing but I enjoyed it a lot.

The Wildest!

Louis Prima

4/5

This is the kind of real dago shit the side of my father's family that ended up on Long Island like to play at family gatherings. My father has told me that this is the kind of stuff his parents/aunts/uncles/etc would listen to when he was growing up. When I was younger I always found it cringey because I associated it with this ridiculous self parody of Italian Americans, which I still do, but I've given up hating on that whole subculture and just kind of live with it now. Fundamentally (heh) this is fun music, it's (mostly) wholesome songs about having a good time or goofing around and the voices and instruments match the vibe. Keely Smith's smooth voice perfectly balances Louis Prima's gravely wail, and the band behind them are great for the style. This was the party music of the day, and it's still fun to listen to. The energy stays high throughout the album and I like that there are enough vocal breaks to keep things interesting. Whoever "arranged" the album did a good job with it. Overall this was an easy listen, and I never felt like I needed to skip something.

Bright Flight

Silver Jews

1/5

If you told me this was a project of a billionaire railroad magnates son created specifically by his butler to get this kid out of the house I’d believe you. Fucking terrible.

Ctrl

SZA

3/5

This was pretty good for a modern pop album. Despite the army of producers and editors the sound is mostly cohesive and the underlying musical style isn’t disjointed or all over the place. Sometimes this leads it to sound a bit generic but it’s good enough to not be background music. There are some complaints about auto tune in the other reviews but I don’t hear it, so it’s either really well done or a misunderstanding of the term. I think she’s got a great voice; not a huge range but it’s not necessary for the songs. Not bad, not anything super memorable for me but pleasant enough. The production is the best part.

Surfer Rosa

Pixies

4/5

This was enjoyable but maybe I’m missing something about why it’s so highly regarded. Maybe it’s the timing of its release being earlier than similar music, but hadn’t Dinosaur Jr been doing similar stuff for years? In any case, I enjoy the double singers, the upbeat sound despite the sometimes nonsensical lyrics, the interludes, etc. It’s a great indie rock album that is better than just Gigantic and Where is My Mind.

Electric Warrior

T. Rex

3/5

"Bang A Gong" is obviously a good song, the rest of this is a bit uninspired. Nothing hits as hard, and while the guitar playing is good it gets a bit repetitive. It's not quite funk enough and the singer/songwriter model doesn't work as well when it's a "classic rock" style band performing everything. I liked it, but it's nothing special.

Among The Living

Anthrax

4/5

This was great. You definitely have to be a metal fan to enjoy it but I think it combines the heavy instrumentalism of the Megadeths, Metallicas and whatnot of the time and adds in some explicit and unfortunately largely still relevant social commentary instead of just being miserable and focusing on the personal experience. Of course both kinds of content are fine, but it's cool to see this kind of band get that far in to society's problems rather than just doing the traditional "I'm sad and mad" bits. I don't know how to quantify this but because of the all agreed upon (Im assuming) stances on drugs, crime, the treatment of native populations, the obvious callout to politicians with fascist ideas, etc, the band seem to be all super in to it. The instrumentation is crisp, the singing is rapid fire and pronounced with not as much full on screaming as some of their contemporaries. Favorites were "I Am The Law", "Indians", "A Skeleton In The Closet", and "Imitation of Life" though the rest bangs too.

Haunted Dancehall

The Sabres Of Paradise

3/5

After reading a couple user reviews I thought this was going to be a lot worse than it was. My biggest complaint, which others have noted, is that it does have a fairly long runtime. I think this could have been cut by a quarter hour or more and it would've been fine. In fact I would've taken the last third of the album and just made a cool ambient album on its own. While I don't dislike it, I think it's not as interesting compared to some of the releases from the electronic music contemporaries of the time. It's particularly odd to see a Portishead remix on here, because they must've known each other and that song sticks out to me as maybe one of the best ones on the album. This is sort of a cross between ambient and IDM (I hate that genre name but it's not going away as a term) and more traditional 90's "electronica" big acts like the the chemical brothers, fatboy slim, etc. It's like you took them and smashed them together with a heavy does of Aphex Twin and more trip-hop style groups like Massive Attack, Sneaker Pimps, Telepopmusik and the like. This manages to be less engaging than all those other groups because nothing really stands out. This is foundational to those groups in sound, but not anything built on top of that foundation, which is what would make it better. I could definitely sit in a lounge or bar somewhere with this on and enjoy it even, but I don't know about anything further than that. It's music on a playlist of similar music as the perfectly fine filler.

Music

Madonna

2/5

I'm not sure if it's true but I don't remember pop music sounding like this before the 2010's. In that way it's a bit of a foray in to electronic music from a pop perspective that nobody was doing until a bit later, which is cool. That said, it sounds very much like it was the early version of EDM tinged pop music; the beats that aren't from the singles are pretty forgettable and Madonna might as well have been any other nameless singer with a female voice for some of them. The singles are decent enough; the title track has a unique beat and has more of Madonna's traditional vocal stylings than the other ones. I appreciate that someone took the time to suggest she go in to other genres a bit besides the overarching EDM but none of it screams "crossover hit" to me. "Don't Tell Me" is not going to land on country radio no matter how hard she tried. This is fairly mid. The non singles are pretty bad, the cover of American Pie is somehow more shit than the original. Points for probably pushing the boundaries of pop a little bit forward.

Exodus

Bob Marley & The Wailers

4/5

Kinda crazy this isn't the greatest hits album. It's Bob Marley, the best to ever do this, what else can you say. If you don't like raggae music then this isn't for you, if you do, well, it's the foundation and maybe the best version of the whole genre.

Back To Black

Amy Winehouse

3/5

I’m struggling to think that the extremely positive reaction to this isn’t due to a few obvious thing: 1) actually good singers were (and are) hard to come by now. 2) she died young She is a good singer, and the 50s/60s revival sound coupled with modern subjects absolutely works but I don’t think it’s that great of an album beyond that. Maybe you have to be really in to soul music.

Close To You

Carpenters

3/5

This is extremely yacht club/rich white people music. Karen (how appropriate) can certainly sing though; she has a really nice voice with a lot of range and she never struggles to hit low or high notes or really strains to hit anything. She's the real star of this album, and when her brother comes in you can see why. His voice is fine but it's always double tracked to hide something it seems. Instrumentals are fine, nothing terribly challenging, but that's what this is, very unchallenging pleasant music. Unless you like her voice a lot there's no reason to really listen to this over and. It's "nice".

Eternally Yours

The Saints

3/5

This was pretty good, though I was hoping there'd be more varied instrumentation beyond the first track. It's by far the best track of the album and the only one that says to me "This is a unique group worth listening to". I liked the rest of it too, but I wish they did a bit more. They clearly had the talent. It's basically a pop-punk album, if you can call something that in the 70's. It's not terribly aggressive and while the lyrical themes are mostly in line with punk music of the time, it doesn't have that edge that some of the more popular (or even the more interesting) punk bands did. Like if someone said "make a generic punk album that will get played on the radio" this would be it, minus the first track.

Public Image: First Issue

Public Image Ltd.

2/5

This was like post rock music without actually doing any of the buildup and release that the genre is known for. The one track that didn't follow this formula was the big hit, Public Image, and it's a fairly decent punk or post/punk song. This got really repetitive for no good reason. If you’re gonna play the same riff for a long time it should be a good riff.

The Velvet Underground & Nico

The Velvet Underground

3/5

I didn't particularly love this but I dont' think it deserves the hate some reviewers are giving it. It's basically a newer version of a post LSD journey Beatles album. It's definitely a bit drug addled and it's certainly "artsy" but I don't find that it's all just random noise or mumbling. I think the best example of what I'm talking about is "All Tomorrow's Parties" which is a cross between slower 70's rock and the stoned hippie aesthetic of the 60's. I don't love it, but it's a song that could fit on any number albums from earlier and would be considered perfectly acceptable there. Unfortunately it does devolve in to unlistenable at some points. The end of "Heroin" is terrible, that part is just noise and continuously sped up drums until the 10 second reprieve at the end. "The Black Angels Death Song" is backed by a horribly (intentionally?) played violin that ruins the rest of it, and the rest of it isn't very compelling either. Some of it is just boring; lots of the songs sound very similar to each other, and not in a "this is a unique sound" way. I dont' think they're very creative at all, the opposite in fact. If you think the stuff that came after this and is clearly inspired by it is great, then you'll love this. I find it all pretty dull.

The College Dropout

Kanye West

5/5

Maaaan, this is such a good album and I hate that I have to think about Kanye when I listen to it. Musically it created the baseline for rap for the next 10 years, and it was the culmination of all the production work Kanye had done for other artists for years leading up to it. The beats are so clean, the rapping is very distinctly Kanye (and the features of course), there is variety in all the beats and styles, everything is just excellent. Maybe lyrically it's a little "basic" but that's what makes it accessible. You don't have to know every term and you don't have to think too deep to hear what is ultimately a message of struggle with real life as well as expectations placed on people by their peers, society, work, etc. The biggest gripe is "Last Call" which goes a bit far up its own ass. As has been noted by pretty much everyone, Kanye is an asshole now. But man, this is great and I've had this album available well before spotify existed so I don't feel terribly bad about listening to it.

The Atomic Mr Basie

Count Basie & His Orchestra

5/5

A classic swing album by a master of the genre. The thing that gets me about this album is the absolute speed at which the energetic tracks are played at. The bass work is insane and rather than letting the rhythm section do all the work, the soloist keeps up the energy and is all over the scales. Even the backing horns, particularly in Double-O and Whirly Bird, are hitting a ton of notes cleanly and strikingly. The slower songs are great too, and it's where Basie himself actually shines a bit because you can hear the piano well. It's always noted that he didn't write most (any?) of these songs, but the arrangements by Hefti are enough. His band carries it all head and shoulders above the pretenders. Hell of a cover and title.

2112

Rush

4/5

This is the nerdiest album from a band full of nerds producing music exclusively for nerds. Is it the best Rush album? Probably not, but it is the most Rush Rush album. When Fry says "It's Saturday night, I have no date, A 2 Liter bottle of Shasta, and my all Rush mixtape" I like to imagine his mixtape was just 2112. Anyway this rules. It's not as truly epic as some other prog rock masterpieces but it's up there, and it has 5 perfectly serviceable Rush radio songs after the real part of the show.

The Age Of The Understatement

The Last Shadow Puppets

3/5

I’d never heard of this group before thus but I had heard of the individual parts that make it up. It is very much an exact amalgamation of those parts, with a ton of reverb. It’s not bad but I’d rather just listen to arctic monkeys. Pretty average.

Trio

Dolly Parton

3/5

We had a Dolly Parton and an Emmylou Harris album earlier, and while they are both more than competent singers (Linda Ronstadt is too obviously), there isn't much here to make me return to it. This just isn't my style and it wasn't quite as unique as Dolly Parton's solo stuff I heard before so it's just kinda there for me. If you're in to classic country music this is great, but given it's all covers (I think) it's not really a standout.

Unhalfbricking

Fairport Convention

2/5

We had this group before and they were much more interesting when they were doing really old and/or traditional english folk music. This is just boring 60's vocalisms without anything really different to make it stand out. Like it's really nothing.

Superunknown

Soundgarden

5/5

This is simply my favorite album of all time. Out of all the of the grunge bands, it was Soundgarden that really took hold of me when I was younger and I think this is their real peak, though I like all of their work. Soundgarden have always been the most talented of the big time 90's grunge bands, musically anyway. You can hear it in the odd time signatures this album starts with; My Way alone is already in 5/4 with odd breaks in between, Fell On Black Days is in 7/4, and later on you get to the really wacky shit like Limo Wreck being in 15/8. That's not even mentioning the tuning. If I remember right, 4th Of July is in CGDG or something equally low and strange. To someone who really enjoys the technicalities of music, all this stuff just makes for a wonderful listening experience, and it's not so obtuse that it's "math metal" and becomes unlistenable to most people. The performances or up to the task as well. Chris Cornell was always one of the rock singers with the most range and he has it all over this album. His voice is not only vocally wide ranging but the emotion he conveys with it is all over. From anger (obviously) to despair, to just a good time, he can hit it all. Thayil, Shepard, and Cameron are all immensely talented in their own rights and they write some really spectacular parts. I don't think the bass work on this album is quite as good is it is on the follow up, Down on the Upside, but the guitar solos and drums on this album are the best Soundgarden ever did. Thayil's solos in particular always make me smile. The production is excellent, the mastering is excellent, the artwork is excellent, etc, etc. It's just so good. Bury me with this album.

Pornography

The Cure

4/5

I liked this more than maybe any other work by the Cure that I’ve heard. It finally delivers on the promise of being dismally bleak, not only lyrically but musically. The first half of the album is a dark moody wreck and I love it. I think I was pretty done by the last two tracks, but I can see why the last track, which is mostly a droning song recorded in a basement, is there. It’s the final point of a miserable story that’s barely worth listening to because why would you! Nobody cares!!! Anyway this was good. I get it now.

Crossing the Red Sea With the Adverts

The Adverts

3/5

Pretty average 70s/80s punk album. I didn't find any of it to be mega compelling but neither did I dislike it.

Copper Blue

Sugar

3/5

This album bleeds "90's teen movie" energy. Every song could be a closing scene or some pivotal point in the plot. I don't consider this a terrible thing; there were plenty of bands doing this at the time. I feel like these guys are the maybe more edgy (but not by much) version of the Gin Blossoms or the Goo Goo Dolls. "If I Can't Change Your Mind" in particular feels like the result of asking an LLM to write a song about the girl that got away at a party. "Helpless" is a better song but has the same exact feeling. It's decent 90's alt rock that doesn't really have the killer riffs of some of the grungier contemporaries or the emotional range of the same ones. "Slim" is about as angry as it gets on here, musically anyway. This was a bit too generic for me; not unpleasant but there are so many better albums during this time period, surely.

Goo

Sonic Youth

3/5

I guess this was more of a big deal at the time, but I feel like I'm a touch too young for Sonic Youth in general to make the kind of impact it did on a lot of my barely older Gen X friends. I like when Kim sings on this, and I like the relatively raw sound of it, but things like the middle and end of "Mildred Pierce" just sound like shit. For all the platitudes of being pioneers in the experimental guitar department there isn't much in this that wasn't done by a lot of shittier punk bands at the time and before. Maybe that's it - they brought that raw and feedback filled sound in to alternative rock. Nothing I really will remember about this album, but maybe I just lack the context. It's fine, I'm sure we'll get the older stuff at some point on here.

Microshift

Hookworms

3/5

I'm not sure why this is on here other than the need for "recent" music. It's once again one of those choices where it's fine but it's not groundbreaking or terribly interesting. I do like the sort of post-rock mixed with electronic music buildups but nothing other than the 8 minute "Opener" was really standout to me. It's fine, if I heard it in a bar or a coffee shop I wouldn't even notice it.

Darkdancer

Les Rythmes Digitales

4/5

From the cover to the content this absolutely encapsulates late 90's european dance music. It's repetitive but there are enough layers to it to not make it monotonous, and it's a dance album. You're not there to listen to it contemplatively, you're there to get up and move. I unabashedly enjoyed this. I miss the old bigbeat/breakbeat style that this has and how corny it could get without giving a shit. This is fun. I liked all of it, even though I had to find it on youtube because spotify only has the first 20 minutes or so.

S.F. Sorrow

The Pretty Things

3/5

I don't know about this one. I applaud the effort to write a rock opera, but I feel like if you have to read the liner notes to know what the hell is going on you've failed a bit in the whole premise. Even after reading the synopsis I could only pick out a couple of obvious points (Burning Balloons, Baron Saturday, Loneliest Person) where the songs matched what was going on. I don't think they were lyrically quite there, though musically the emotions match up to the themes. The good things about this album are the production tricks and the emotional range. Whoever did the mixing/mastering and production work on here did a stellar job. There's lots of tricks of the left/right stereo, great guitar and bass tones, and more than a few vocal edits and effects. The songs run across lots of different feelings from very joyful (Journey), to angry (Old Man Going), to everything in between. The band themselves have a nice range. Overall I think this is kind of a failure of a rock opera but an otherwise decent 60's psychadelic album. I guess without the whole concept it would be pretty unmemorable so the theme is probably what makes it stick out, and why the author of the book picked this. Others would do it way better later on.

Face to Face

The Kinks

3/5

More of a psychedelic album from the Kinks than the previous ones we’ve had. I think they do a pretty good job of it, better than some pure psychedelic bands do it even. The first half of the album is definitely more pop than the latter, and they’re good at that as always. Decent enough and I can see why fans of them only warmed up to it later since it’s a fairly big departure from their earlier work.

My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts

Brian Eno

4/5

This was great precisely because it was weird. This is accessible experimental music. There aren’t going to be singles in here that you come back to, but as a whole it’s really a work of art. Though vocal samples are absolutely everywhere now and common even, I can’t imagine what it was like hearing this for the first time in the 80s. Every genre would ultimately take from this album, from hip hop to edm and everything in between. I know that tape tricks and even a bit of sampling had been done before but this is really something that bridges the gap between pure tech-flexing and regular popular music. Byrne’s songwriting comes through wonderfully with the love instruments and Eno’s touch is unmistakeable in the production. If I had to pick a favorite it would be “mea culpa” but I really do think this should be enjoyed as a whole, especially if you are an artist or musician yourself, even a dabbler. Also, headphones or a good sound system are mandatory. Really good stuff.

It's Too Late to Stop Now

Van Morrison

2/5

Im gonna say it. This was boring. Like incredibly boring. Background noise for an hour and a half. If an alien was asked to create generic earth music this would be it.

Here Are the Sonics

The Sonics

4/5

Thoroughly enjoyable 60's "hard rock". The whole album has an edge that their contemporaries didn't really have, and as much as it sounds tame today I bet it sounded pretty heavy at the time. I particularly enjoyed the tiny amen break in "Psycho"; a 5 second drum fill that really shows how much the band wanted to be aggressive. The saxophone, keys, and horns in some of the songs were also good additions and they weren't overused. My only complaint is that a lot of the songs sound very similar and maybe the decision on the track order would've helped that. A really simple fix to an otherwise great album. The covers, of which there are many, are all good and if you didn't know that they were covers, wouldn't stick out at all.

Marcus Garvey

Burning Spear

3/5

I can't be positive but I don't think I heard a single mention of smoking weed in this record, which is a new one for reggae music for me. On the contrary, it's all pretty revolutionary, and given the title it makes sense. I'm not a reggae connoisseur but I do enjoy it here and there and I liked this one.

...Baby One More Time

Britney Spears

2/5

Much like the destiny’s child album we had, beyond the hits this is bad. The big songs all frontload this album and the rest is completely phoned in. The classic pop music move of raising the hook by a half step to make the song longer is in nearly every song and the lyrics and beats are painfully dated. She’s not even a bad singer and she has some range but the songwriting after the first two sings falls off a cliff.

McCartney

Paul McCartney

3/5

Well that was an album featuring Paul McCartney. One of the first published wife guys it seems.

B-52's

The B-52's

4/5

This is real goofball stuff that sometimes goes on too long but they really are unique in popular music. I’m not saying nobody could sound like the B-52’s if they wanted to, I’m saying nobody does. The vocal are what make them I think. The instrumentation is funny and funky but nothing extraordinary. However, the three voices are perfect and they project just the right amount of silliness, aggressiveness and musicality. It’s plain fun listen to, and that’s something you can’t say about a lot of bands on this list.

Don't Stand Me Down

Dexys Midnight Runners

1/5

This was one of the worst pieces of shit I’ve ever heard.

Elvis Is Back

Elvis Presley

3/5

I feel like there are going to be more Elvis albums on here, because this doesn't have any of the really big hits. His voice is still less goofy on this one, but it's more of a collection of songs than any sort of cohesive album. The session musicians behind him are tight and play everything well, especially the backing vocals. I don't know enough about who he inevitably took these songs from, so I can't comment on the history behind it. I suspect it's not great, like so many industry creations of the time. Anyway this was pleasant, nothing really standout.

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Beatles

4/5

This is probably the easiest Beatles album we've had to listen to even if you don't like them. This is the archetypical thing you think of when you hear the name "Beatles". It's got full on pop music, the beginnings of their experimentation with south asian music, lyrical goofiness, lyrical seriousness, etc. It's all very Beatles. I'm not their biggest fan, but I dont dislike them either. I think this is a good album but I also don't think it's this grand masterpiece. It is fun to listen to and it has some genuinely great songs (With A Little Help, Lucy, A Day In The Life). The other tracks are good fun and there's a lot of varied instrumentation to keep it fresh (Within You Without You, Good Morning Good Morning). Not much else to say, it belongs on this list for the lasting impact it had on popular music and for being the zenith of the particular style and bedrock for a lot of things to come.

Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

OutKast

4/5

It's hard to listen to this and not divide it up in to two albums, and even both of them agree that it is a double album consisting of two bodies of work. I've always liked Speakerboxxx a lot more than Then Love Below, just to get that out of the way. Speakerboxxx is a product of its era in terms of lyrical content, nothing really groundbreaking but Big Boi is a good rapper so it doesnt' really matter anyway. His flow is unique to him, with aggressive stops mid sentence and coming in on off beats. The beats are mostly great, with the notable exception of the Bamboo beat used in a couple tracks/interludes that's too primitive for the content. The features are all complementary, with my favorite ones being on "Reset"; I've been listening to that song for ages and it's still good. There isn't a ton of innovation on here beyond the fact that the Outkast style is already innovative. I would say that the big singles, "GhettoMusick", "The Way You Move", have the most interesting beats, breakdowns and raps even. My favorites are the aforementioned "Reset" and "Bust". The Love Below marks the beginning of Andre 3000 going from traditional if different rapper to the weird phenomenon he is today. The piano and acoustic guitars in a bunch of the tracks gives out that crossover appeal that made him really stand out by himself as an artist. I can't say I'm a huge fan; it's definitely a unique style but I'm not enough of an R&B or love song guy to want to listen to it often. I get they're not strictly love songs but the whole sub-album is about that. "Roses" is the most Outkast song on the whole album though I know Andre is on a few of the tracks on Speakerboxxx. If I never hear "Hey Ya" again it'll be too soon, though it was a banger for a long time. I had forgotten about the drum and bass style version of My Favorite Things - what a weird but cool track. Anyway! This is a good double; there is plenty of material and it's cool that we see a duo split themselves up and take over half an album. I like that they address the fact that they're still Outkast in various places on both discs and that they're still doing it the way they always have. They knew the critics and press would be all over the fact that it's two separate albums. Overall I'd like this more if it was cut down to about an hour and a half instead of more than two hours (most of which would be cut from the second disc), but I dont' regret listening to the whole thing. It's fun, and it was a nice nostalgia hit.

When I Was Born For The 7th Time

Cornershop

3/5

I was just thinking about "Brimful of Asha" the other day and how I hadn't heard it in years. It's still a good song! I had never heard the rest of the album until today, and it's actually pretty good. The use of the sitar and the south asian drums are put in tastefully. There's even a little Beatles cover at the end (because of course...English band has to cover them during this time period or they were permanently jailed in the tower of London) I like the unashamed Indian cultural references with both the lyrics and the sound. It's easy to listen to and doesn't get in the way. Most of the songs have maybe 3 chords in them, but they're nice enough. Not bad, better than I expected from what I previously assumed was a one hit wonder.

Autobahn

Kraftwerk

4/5

It’s all really about the main 20 minute title track for this album. The “side 2” songs are interesting from a soundscape perspective, particularly the live flute bits in the last two, but they’re all kind of an afterthought. The main track is a fundamental piece of electronic music that sort of bridges the boundaries between “experiment to convey a mood” and “full fledged progressive <genre> song”. The track really does bring about a sense of a road trip on a highway. There are fun major key bits, scary bits when you’re surrounded by traffic moving much faster and carrying much heavier loads, slow bits when not much is going on, etc. From a perspective of painting a picture and feeling with music, it’s brilliant. In my opinion it’s also great to listen to. There’s a driving beat showing the constant motion of a car and stabs of vehicle synth noises, and even lyrics sung mostly without edits in places. I really like it as a piece of art, maybe a bit less as something I’ll put on to listen to for fun. It’s for that reason I’m not giving it a 5; Kraftwerk’s later stuff is simply more enjoyable to listen to. This is cool and wonderful in its own space though.

Stankonia

OutKast

5/5

This is the OutKast I remember the most, with just enough weirdness to make themselves stand out beyond their substantial lyrical and rapping prowess. Andre was beginning to show his eccentric side here but it hasn’t completely taken over and even songs that he’s the main point in, Big Boi doesn’t feel out of place. My favorite of all of it Bombs Over Baghdad because it really shows how insanely hard OutKast can go. All of their skill is on display and it’s such a driving beat. It's really all great though; it's rare I listen to an album this long without wanting to skip anything but that was the case here. Even the "Kim and Cookie" skit made me laugh the whole time. What a great use of pitch perfect harmonies telling a raunchy story.

Only By The Night

Kings of Leon

2/5

There's one notable thing about this album I think, and it's that the songs are written (or at least performed) by seemingly good musicians. "Closer" and "Manhattan" are both non trivial to play rock songs with relatively non-pop beats. It takes time to be able to play songs like that in time and in tune and no amount of computer can fix the first part if your rhythm section isn't actually good. The rest of this is really forgettable. The singer is distinct, but not in a good way, it sounds like he's always shouting. This is music for a suburban parent or socially inept teenager who is too afraid to listen to anything heavier and considers this "hard rock".

The Boatman's Call

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

1/5

fuck all the way off

The Sun Rises In The East

Jeru The Damaja

3/5

If this hadcome out a year or two earlier I think more people would have heard of it. The style is dated for when it came out, mostly because some absolute behemoths of rap music would release some incredible albums basically at the same time. I liked this, modern lyrical sensibilities aside, and the beats are some of premiers best. The cacophonous instrumental sampling actually works well with Jeru’s style. That said, the flow is a bit primitive and while Jeru is a good rapper he sometime seems to bite off rhyming techniques (finishing sentences on the on beat, splitting words at the end of a line) that he can’t quite land. Again, a year or two earlier and I think this would’ve been remembered in a better light. Strangely I never wanted to skip a track; the whole thing was good enough to listen to all the way and I even replayed a few songs (You Can’t Stop the Prophet, Come Clean). It’s better than average but not quite that 4 level for me.

Viva Hate

Morrissey

2/5

hey it's a crap smiths album.

Parachutes

Coldplay

4/5

oh no, I liked this. I know Coldplay is the ultimate in lame music but there are some really nice songs on here. I didn't know it, but this is their debut album and you can tell they started out as a regular band not some hyper produced pseudo edm/pop music group developed exclusively for selling singles to ClearChannel radio stations and spotify. "The old Coldplay was better" seems like an insane thing to say but maybe it's true. While I don't really rate Chris Martin's singing abilities his voice is perfectly fine for this kind of music, though you can tell he strains sometimes. The songwriting is a mix of what was once called "adult contemporary" and even a bit of post rock. There are four distinct instruments here, the classic drums, bass, guitar, and keys, and the distortion for the stringed instruments is very limited, if present at all. Songs like "Shiver" and "Trouble" are really well written and really nicely performed and produced. Even the very last chord change in "Yellow" is a thoughtful little shift that speaks volumes, even though that song was so wildly overplayed that I got sick of it years ago. Only in the last ten minutes did I get tired of listening to this. It's lame, it's overplayed, it's music for wine moms, I still like it. It's nice to hear simple love songs every now and then.

Nighthawks At The Diner

Tom Waits

1/5

I never understood the hype for Tom Waits. Ok man, we get it, you smoke and you drink and you're some sort of professional bum. I wanted to give this an extra star for the instrumentalists, especially the upright bass player who keeps this from being a complete mess, but this whole genre of "mumbling fucked up guy" is ridiculous.

Odelay

Beck

4/5

This is the Beck I first heard back in the day and what I mostly still associate him with. The whole wacky, unorganized, goofball aesthetic lyrics, with a pile of genres mashed up together via samples or just noodling around is his calling card to me. The album as a whole does go off in to a more nonsensical direction and is definitely free form. I have to wonder how many times a sample or an instrumental clip was recorded, smashed in to a song, and Beck or his producer just decided "eh it's good, just go with it" because there are some really jarring breaks in these songs. It's still a fun listen though. The singles are obviously singles, and even though the lyrics don't make much sense you can tell they are more "traditional" songs in the sense that they maintain a beat and don't stray too far outside of the "alternative" genre of rock than the others. I did like the non singles too, but maybe less so than the others. All that to say that it's pretty good. I like that Beck exists and I like that he writes all sorts of shit and I like this album.

Caetano Veloso

3/5

I always find it hard to review albums in languages I don't understand, but I think this in particular would sound really strange in English. It's a bit disorganized and doesn't stick to one genre, more like one sphere of influence, but I think all the songs are pretty decent. There's a lot of latin american instruments in here that you dont' always here, but oddly not a lot of the traditional Brazilian ones. I liked it well enough, an interesting listen.

Justified

Justin Timberlake

3/5

This album is really defined by the producers, because while Justin is a decent singer, it would be a pretty average white boy rnb album without all the backing. This is a Neptunes album featuring Justin Timberlake on every song, I think. That real instrument feel spliced with some synthetic stuff is really characteristic of the production teams involved and it's a highlight. I think Justin Timberlake is a decent singer, obviously very influenced by Michael Jackson, and has a lot of range, but that's not what makes this album interesting. I'm not going to dig in to the rest of his catalogue because this isn't my kind of music really, but I wonder what he sounds like without the guys in the studio.

Kick Out The Jams (Live)

MC5

3/5

I generally dislike live albums, and an aggressive punk band recorded live in 1969 sounds like a crime against hearing, but this actually works out. MC5 are raw enough in general to sound like shit all the time so it doesn't detract from their style to record them live. Really that's what this album is, loud, raw, and in your face. The only slow point is in the last song, Starship, and the rest of it is fast and loud. "Kick Out The Jams" (the song) I knew from Rage Against The Machine covering it, but the rest was new. It's nothing really exemplary, but I guess they were part of the real beginnings of punk and they could've put this out 5 years later and still sounded revolutionary. I do wish they played a little better but that's not what this is about. It's good fun.

Nilsson Schmilsson

Harry Nilsson

3/5

This is a really strange one because I had no idea who this dude was until today. I knew the songs "Without You" and "Coconut", but that's it. You could've told me that they were different people and it would've seemed obvious. The majority of this is pop music of the time. It's highly produced, especially for being made in 1971, with super crisp instruments and vocals. He can sing quite well, has good range (including the ridiculous accent he puts on in Coconut) and seems to be able to carry lots of different types of tunes. Lots of songs about being awake and not necessarily wanting to be, which matches the cover. I wouldn't say this is entirely forgettable, but I'll never be thinking "man I could go for some Harry Nilsson today". It's fine.

Hypnotised

The Undertones

3/5

Pretty average euro pop punk album. If you weren’t positive they were European, the references to University Challenge and Subbuteo in the song about Cousin Kevin give it away. The songs mostly sound the same and have the same juvenile (though not really in a bad way) content. Made me want to listen to the clash instead, to be honest.

Fragile

Yes

4/5

Honestly I’m a bit disappointed with this but my expectations were probably too high. I like Yes and I like their really insane concept albums like Tarkus but this doesn’t really reach those heights. It’s stuck between that and more traditional classic rock. “Roundabout” is easily the highlight and nothing else gets that good. I also enjoyed "Heart of the Sunrise" because it was like more of their really eclectic prog work. The only track I actively disliked was "Cans and Brahms" because it sounded like a midi demo track. This was still great to me but I kept wanting to listen to some other Yes stuff. You obviously have to be in to prog in general to want to listen to Yes, and this was no exception. I get the hate.

Beyond Skin

Nitin Sawhney

3/5

I actually thought this was pretty good. It is a bit of a background style, but I enjoyed the south asian influence in the songs combined with the late 90's early aughts euro dance influences. It's pleasant, easy to listen to and unobtrusive. I don't think it's terribly standout but I liked it.

Want Two

Rufus Wainwright

2/5

I’ve listened to (the reverend) Rugis Wainwright here and there but never sat down for a full album. It’s very much what I expected. He’s got that “Thom Yorke without the lazy eye” feel to the point that I think one of them ripped the bother off or they’re related somehow. I know that others have made this observation a million times but it really is uncanny. Content wise it’s sort of a very religiously inspired pop album. There’s a lot of choral and/or church music feel (the opening track the most of course) to this and the instrumentation choices are very western classical. It’s not bad and it’s a nice departure from more modern pop music. He can sing quite well and he’s got a weird way with words. The lyrics are strange and contain a lot of complaining but that’s not a bad thing. I can’t quite say why but I don’t really like this despite my objective platitudes. I would never say I’m in a mood to listen to this and it’s always going to be compared to Radiohead because of his voice. I’m not a huge fan of most singer songwriters because it’s all individualistic and necessarily gated to a style. This is no different.

The Rise & Fall

Madness

2/5

Ska always sounds a bit like circus music but this goes all the way with it. This is music for clowns with a guitar. I really didn’t enjoy this, but I can respect the talent it takes to write all these parts and perform them all this well.

Happy Sad

Tim Buckley

2/5

It's hard not to compare Tim with his son Jeff Buckley, since we've already had one of his albums as well. Whereas Jeff's voice takes over, in a bad way, in his work, Tim's is almost a second thought here. He has the same annoying (to me) vocal vibrato but it's not quite center stage. The jazz portions of this album, which are more than half of it, are pretty boring despite the neat instrumentation. The marimba in particular is a nice touch. I didn't get much out of this. Tim's voice isn't interesting enough to capture me and the instruments don't grab me beyond the variety.

Stand!

Sly & The Family Stone

4/5

I kinda expected more from this. It was good yeah, but not great? Maybe I was wrongly expecting it to be more funky than it was. I think my favorite song was Sex Machine precisely because it was mostly funk and didn't feel like 13 minutes at all. There isn't a bad track on here, though, all good stuff.

Lazer Guided Melodies

Spiritualized

2/5

This was a whole lot of boring soundscape that was maybe inventive at the time but has been done much better by countless others since. We've already had one Spiritualized album and this one is arguably worse. I can appreciate floaty, layered rock music, but it has to do something unique or eventually build to something like post-rock, but this really does neither. Maybe they were pioneers in the sense that nobody was making that kind of music in 1992 (which is not really true - electronic artists had been doing it for decades), but it hasn't aged well. I think the last quarter of the album had more to offer than the first 9 songs, which I couldn't tell you anything about despite just having listened to them in the last hour. The final four songs are a bit more upbeat and have more volume, if nothing else, than the rest. Angel Sigh might be the pick of all of them. I don't know, their other album wasn't good but at least it went somewhere. I say this as someone that enjoys ambient music, but this lies somewhere between pure ambient music and pop music without doing much of either properly. At least it's not offensively bad.

461 Ocean Boulevard

Eric Clapton

2/5

Putting aside Clapton's idiotic world views for the moment, this is a decent album of covers with 2 songs out of the 60's to round it out. When you hear Eric Clapton you think of some really solid blues guitar work with tight rhythms and good solos, but I don't really get too much of that here. Aside from the fact that the better songs are covers, none of his actual technical mastery of the instrument is on display here. The solos could have come from any competent blues guitarist and the on the songs that aren't blues, the guitar isn't particularly standout. The melodies in Let It Grow and Get Ready are nice enough but again, there's no real noteworthy guitar playing in my opinion. This is a pretty standard pop-rock album with a highlight being I Shot The Sheriff, which of course he didn't even write and apparently didn't even want to put on the album. And finally he's a huge piece of shit.

Reign In Blood

Slayer

4/5

Minus one point for lyrical content because it's decidedly teenage level shock content, but this is the absolute definition of speed/thrash. If you're in to that style this is what everything else is based off and it's rarely been done better.

Germfree Adolescents

X-Ray Spex

4/5

This was more fun than I expected, and a good high energy album for the morning. For once, the saxophone doesn't feel like an add-on, or a friend who wanted to be in the band but could only play saxophone. It adds to the sound and I think taking it out would actually ruin this or at least turn it to unremarkable. Everything else is a good amalgamation of speed, excitement and aggression, the way punk should be. For once an old punk album by a band I've never heard of isn't a complete mess. You don't need to know about anything here other than the fact that it's a good listen.

Selling England By The Pound

Genesis

4/5

If you dislike prog rock of any age you're gonna hate this. It meanders and goes all over the place in a very pleasing way if, and only if, you're in to that kind of thing. Honestly the songs are less than 5 minutes long are entirely forgettable, but Dancing With the Moonlit Knight, Fifth of Firth, Battle of Epping Forest, and The Cinema Show are bedrock examples of prog rock. They're not only archetypes for the genre, but they could slot in at almost any time period. You can be sure that modern popular prog acts like Dream Theater, Symphony X, etc all revere Genesis of this era as foundational work for their music. While I really enjoy the synth and guitar solos, I think Phil Collins's drumming is really insane on this. He's got all the chops required and then some. It's funny to think that the 80's sensation is also this amazing studio drummer, but he is, and always has been. Without getting too in to it, the biggest complaint I have about the really epic level songs in this is the lyrical content in "battle of epping forest" which made me think of a bunch of barber of seville level musical characters fighting each other and singing at the same time in victorian london or whatever. Musically it's incredible. This is a four because I don't think the shorter, more radio oriented songs, are really that great. They're fine, and they fit in to the album as a whole but they're on another planet from the progressive masterpieces in here. anyway, NEEEERRRRRRRDDDDSSSSS

System Of A Down

5/5

Man, I forgot how good this was. I remember the first time I heard this I had a problem getting over Serj Tankian's goofy vocalisms, but like Billy Corgan's nasal singing and Geddy Lee's soprano, I got over it pretty quick. System of a Down is very much the only band that's still sort of relevant from the nu-metal era of the 90's. For me they took the Rage Against the Machine political fuel and ran with it in a whole other direction musically. I very much like that they took inspiration from Armenian traditional music and rhythms while combining that with modern instruments and modern (at the time) metal instrumentation. It makes for a really heavy yet technically distinct style without getting too far in to the progressive mindset of total instrumental self indulgence or the pure stylistic methods of regional/folk styles. Serj has constantly had interesting (and good!) things to say and the way he expressed himself in his lyrics is unlike any other singer of the era. Sure there are some really insane things he says that don't make any sense but in this album and, especially in later ones, he hits just as hard as Zach De La Rocha's very literal lyrics when he wants to. I had forgotten that I could listen to this all the way through without a desire to skip anything. Not even the circus tuba in Peephole made me want to skip it. Really great stuff.

Blood, Sweat & Tears

3/5

Sometimes I wonder if this list takes some albums based on their big hit vs the work as a whole. This is one of those cases. The album is fine, Spinning Wheel is the highlight that most people will recognize, but the rest of it is kinda just there. The gymnopedie interpretations are pretty cool and the blues cover jam is interesting enough but not different than really any other big band/jazz combo couldn't do. I did appreciate the elements of jazz in this record but again, it's Spinning Wheel that really takes advantage of it. Good listen but not remarkable.

The Nightfly

Donald Fagen

2/5

This was pretty bad I think. Excellently performed, mixed, and mastered, but it's really just Steely Dan without any of the really impressive instrumental bits and songwriting. I think maybe the most "innovative" part of it is the chord progression in "New Frontier", but even that is fundamentally simple, just gussied up with suspended chords and a couple of off beat jumps. It'd be sort of embarrassing being caught listening to this because it's fundamentally really cheesy stuff. I'm too young (wow!) to have been around when this was pop music and it all sounds like an 80s cocaine binge before that was really out in the open. Like some wall street criminals just hitting their first big score and partying on the yacht one of them just bought.

Suzanne Vega

2/5

Proto Lilith Fair stuff, which has its time and place but would be done later by more accomplished singers. Her songwriting is fine, and it’s nice that there are very few instruments and it’s all fairy simple. Not really for me, but I am not the audience.

Buffalo Springfield Again

Buffalo Springfield

2/5

I'm not gonna say this was bad, but it was very generic sixties rock music. Nothing particularly great or memorable in here. We don't need everything that Neil Young has ever touched, please.

Sheer Heart Attack

Queen

4/5

Pretty great, like I’ve discovered that so many queen albums are. This is great hard, loud, and yet incredibly full of feeling. The flow of the album is great, and it’s a full work as opposed to a mishmash of singles. Lyrically it’s not quite as good as the other queen albums we’ve had but I still liked it. Excellent.

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