For some reason this album always puts me behind the lawnmower in the front left corner of my parents' front yard. Side 2 accomplishes more than some well-regarded concept albums.
I feel like Perfect Day sums up this album for me - genius songwriting which could be better covered by others. (Reed's Perfect Day is a really good track, but Kirsty MacColl's version with Evan Dando is definitive.) It feels unbaked in places - the weird oompah-band horns, half-hearted use of background vocals, inexplicable Dixieland band on the last track - and yet I kept thinking about other bands I'd love to hear cover the lesser-known songs. Certainly good as an album, with multiple standout tracks, but absolutely full of potential as a songbook.
I suppose this 4 rating is dependent on the context of listening on a Sunday morning. It's a great Sunday morning album - terrific grooves to get moving, but a lush production and comfortable tempo that remind you you're not actually going anywhere. Just enough pop song emotion to connect, but again, nothing that's a heavy lift.
I also like the structure to this album - opening with Chic Cheer and Le Freak, and closing with (Funny) Bone, as reminders that disco is party music, around a generally smoother, more soulful middle. Like a good party.
OK, I'm glad I listened to this because now I have some sense what the big deal is with Kanye. Definitely some great tracks and creative production. Ultimately for me and my musical taste, the album is way too long and about halfway through it started to sound repetitive (or I lost focus and couldn't hear the innovation between tracks... which is much the same thing).
Amazing. Every track a banger. All the opulence and excess I want from glam rock. I'm glad this came up pretty early in my 1001 Albums journey because it made me recalibrate my stars.
I liked the musicality, the lush production, and the variety. It is a big album, but they did a good job with mixing up the sound environment to stay engaging. I found it a good balance of funk, R&B, and hip hop. And I know not everybody enjoys skits, but I thought they worked; they sounded like someone cared about making a blackout-speed sketch that actually had something to say.
I liked some of the down and dirty treatment of sex. (I'll Call B4 I Cum, for example.) Other tracks veer into a misogyny that's almost unlistenable. I know we have to leave room for music that documents society without necessarily upholding it... but at some point, dude, you've made your point and maybe you should step away from the porn. Watch a cat video instead or something.
If the point of a soundtrack album is to interest me in the film, it worked. I really want to know how these multiple different sounds are used, from Western horns to '60s pop to the Indian classical music-influenced Bollywood sound.
It reminded me, in a way, of Adrian Quesada's Boleros Psicodélicos, as a place where multiple musical influences were meeting in new technologies. (In fact, Mera Pyar Shalimar reminded me very specifically of a couple tracks on that album.)
All that said, only 3 stars because, as individual songs, some gripped me and some failed to. Worthy musical experiments but I don't see a lot of re-listening potential for me.
Didja ever get the feeling you've been cheated?
I tried to listen with historical ears, mapping out possible influences and paying attention to the elements that will show up again in other punk and post-punk and heavy metal bands. And with open ears; honestly it struck me as less noisy and more competent than I'd been lead to believe. (Much as, yeah, better musicians and better producers are going to take these ingredients and make better albums.)
But it's so hard to separate from the story - the naked cash grab, the naughty boys saying naughty words and pretending it's revolution, the overwhelming boringness of nihilism. And, frankly, it was never written for a middle manager in his mid-50s. There just isn't anything there for me, except a historical artifact.
The great rock and roll swindle, indeed.
Definitely not what I was expecting, given that my knowledge of Iggy Pop is mostly "Lust for Life" and "Candy" and "The Passenger." Very moody and synth-driven; Bowie's fingerprints are all over it and while Lou Reed wasn't directly involved, I hear his influence very loudly.
It's good, but I'm not clear what makes it a top 1000 album. Maybe in a different mood or environment I'd feel differently. (Though in its defense, it feels like the last 3 times I said that, I also said those albums wore out their welcome. At a tight 39 minutes, The Idiot gets points for being concise.)
There are a couple fun singles on this album, and a bunch of fair ones. If one of these songs came up on a mix while I was at a cookout, at the beach, walking the dog, driving with the windows open, I'd think that was fun. But there's no combination of 2 songs that I particularly want to listen to in a row, and three is right out. As an album, there's just nothing here to hold my attention.
Very good. It made me realize how badly I need a guide through the history and subgenres of hip hop. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what I was responding so positively to. I like the sonic variety you get with multiple rappers with strongly different voices. I liked the way the samples had a very "live" sound - drums, horns, woodwinds, and base which, even if sampled, still carry the imprint of a live player. Lyrics which make an argument bigger than the individual. And it appears I'm a sucker for a good skit and a sample of movie or TV dialogue.
I had truly forgotten what a magnificent vocalist Michael Jackson was. That seems stupid as I write it, but his work on Thriller is so much more supported and nuanced than his later work, free of breathy unsupported tone and overaccentuated frilly consonants. The same can be said of Quincy Jones' production; quintessential early 80's synthesized sound which will eventually be overdone, but here still have human nuance to them.
The other thing which occurred to me is how much more I *watched* this album than listened to it. It's honestly hard to hear Thriller, Billie Jean, or Beat It and not play the video in my head.
As long as humans keep getting their hearts broken, we'll need big, overdramatic torch songs, and Adele may be the current queen of the genre. Adele's skill with a sad song gives us confidence when we have none, recognition when we feel alone, and on this album, acceptance when we need to move on. Is it all a bit much? Of course. But that's what the sign said on the way in, and when you need a torch song, nothing else will do.
All that said, I do think the uptempo numbers on 21 work better for me than those on 25, and it's not clear to me why they both belong on an "essentials" list. But that's a critique of the list, not the art.
To end on a high note, River Lea has amazing bones and deserves a raft of covers in different genres. I want to hear it in blues and Americana and roots rock...
It's the sound of the night. I admit that I don't have the music theory or jazz history knowledge to understand its revolutionary aspects; I just know that it's a fundamental sound, an immediate and vibrant connection to other places and times and moods. It's distilled cool.
Sounds like it would make for a pretty good workout tape, or a mix to listen to while driving (though that might lead to speeding tickets). Fun enough to move to.
It's possible that part of my problem with electronica is that I mostly know the genre through use on TV or movies. So the songs all seem about a minute or two too long. After about 3 minutes, I feel like we've established we're in a club/crime scene, Keanu Reeves has shot a bunch of guys, Vin Diesel has flipped a car over an orphanage, I get it, let's move on. That's not really fair to the music, but it's the cultural reference I have.
One for the "what ever happened to my cassette of this album?" pile. A delightful blast from the past, even if I was halfway through it before I realized I didn't actually know what was on this album and what was on their second, "Time's Up." Skillful mix of metal, pop, and soul.
I really wanted to love this album. I'd built it up in my head as something monumental, something that would shift my perspective, something I could be cool enough for.
Turns out, there's not a ton of "there" there, after the brilliant title track. (Even if I do think the single edit is more effective than the longer album cut.)
Actually that's not entirely fair... I definitely enjoyed the instrumental set of Sense of Doubt - Moss Garden - Neuköln. (Maybe throw in V-2 Schneider for good measure.) They're not at all what I was expecting and I quite enjoyed the stretch.
But then we have to deal with the stuff which sounds like Bowie and Eno trying to look smart, instead of just being smart. I could do without Joe the Lion or Sons of the Silent Age. Beauty and the Beast has a good hook but feels like they doesn't actually want you to like it. Blackout and The Secret Life of Arabia felt accessibly pleasant, but I think that's because they're on ground Bowie tread more successfully elsewhere.
Sometimes it's nice to be reminded that you're smart and cool enough without having to have the right album prove it.
You can sum up a lot of my reaction to this album with my reaction to the quote from Rhapsody in Blue which shows up in Birmingham Blues. It's arresting, it's surprising, it's... not actually saying anything. It sounds like it's supposed to be smart but it's just showing off.
Without a doubt, there's good songwriting on the album and production which was undoubtedly novel in 1977. But the fact is, every time I hear ELO, I wish I were listening to Abbey Road or The White Album. Or if I'm going to listen to soft rock, someone who does it without pretension, like the Carpenters.
2.5, rounding down.
A fascinating lesson in the materiality of music.
I buy "reasonably priced" everyday earbuds, and I drive them into the ground. I'm aware that the ones I'm using are on their last legs at the moment, but they've still been acceptable for getting the sense of a song. Except not for this album. The feedback and distortion sounded unlistenably tinny; I was constantly getting on the JBL app to try a different EQ setting just so the album didn't sound like the static-y fringes of a radio station's signal.
To be fair, I got home and listened again on my better headphones. With these, the fuzz did start to take on more shapes and layers, and the feedback, while still piercing, was less unbalanced. I could start to parse a little bit of what was going on.
But it's still not for me. It struck me as repetitive and monotone; nothing was able to cut through the fuzz and grab me. Maybe this would be an album that rewards careful listening and study, but frankly, the message I got was "listen or don't; it's all the same to us." So, I'm moving on.
2.5, rounding down.
I'd like this album better if it weren't in English.
OK, that was snarky, but let me explain. I have real trouble turning off the part of my brain that turns sounds into words and words into sentences and sentences into stories. So Wyatt's under-enunciated and occasionally under-supported vocals, produced like clouds and mixed too soft for my taste, are a big challenge for me.
But when I was able to corral that part of my brain, and accept that the lyrics are either gauzy and surreal or just nonsense holders for vowel sounds, I could try to appreciate this album like I would any other art music in a language I don't speak. And there is some interesting sonic stuff going on in the instrumentals, especially in "Little Red Riding Hood Hit The Road".
And then a snippet of English, or English-sounding phonemes would get through, and put my teeth on edge again.
Ultimately there's nothing here worth my effort. You know those songs on psychedelic albums that exist between the radio hits to give you time to decompress and just sort of float along? This is 40 minutes of those songs, building up to something that never comes (or maybe leading out of an awesome song you missed).
I absolutely adore this album. I love Jeff Tweedy's way of putting words together. (Pro tip: read his book "How To Write One Song.") I loved the crazed arrangements and instrumentation, the attempt to make something stunningly beautiful that will also make a record exec have an absolute fit. I love the way that thinking about this album makes me feel like I'm getting smarter. I love the fact that I finally listened to a "deluxe version" of an album and the "unified theory" remasters sound totally different than the originals, and maybe designed a bit to piss off fans who only want the album preserved in amber. I even love the way it made me ask if I've been too hard on prog rock. (I don't really think I have, but maybe I can listen with bigger ears.)
"We Are Family" might just be the perfect disco song. If that monstrous piano line doesn't make you want to move, check your pulse, you may be dead. And for those of us of a certain age, it brings up a delightful melange of memories... those awful Pirates uniforms, Gene Hackman in a dress, and family friends and relatives trying their best to boogie on down. It's the sound of communal joy.
I also really liked "Somebody Loves Me." I thought it was heartrendingly beautiful, a magnificent performance by Kathy Sledge which deserves to be known better.
The rest of the album... it's pleasant. Nothing wrong with it. It's lush and supersaturated like an evening news piece about the disco craze that's sweeping the nation. It's smooth dance music that's going to make anyone look good. But I didn't hear another "get on the dance floor" or "take them in your arms" number, so as an album I have to call it a 3.
My biggest take from this album is that CCR's cover of Good Golly Miss Molly deserves to be more famous than their cover of Proud Mary. Really excellent work on that track, bringing a heavy blues-rock sonic environment while not losing the swing and swagger of the original.
Apple Music tells me that the 7-minute "Graveyard Train" and "Keep on Chooglin'" are designed to establish CCR's cred in the jam-focused San Francisco scene. Maybe that's true, but to my modern ears they're each at least a minute too long, if not two. And that sums up a lot of this album for me - clearly some good stuff but also a lot of self-indulgence.
I wanted to like this album more than I did. That's probably because I've got some friends who speak highly of Jonathan Richman, but I get the feeling I just like his later stuff better. This album feels like a promising starting point, not a blast out of the gate.
The suburban take on Velvet Underground was hit-or-miss for me. I think the faster ones worked better for me - Roadrunner and Astral Plane will get into my rotation. The slower ones often felt a little unfocused, slipping past dispassionate right into low energy.
Unfortunately I found songs like Pablo Picasso, Someone To Care About, and I'm Straight downright creepy, and not in a good way. Turns out I'm less scared by Lou Reed singing about heroin than a suburban boy trying to be Lou Reed singing about how hard it is being a Nice Guy. These didn't sound like songs about people, they sounded like songs about somebody who wants roles filled in his life. I had trouble shaking the feeling that this album sells a lot of fedoras.
Maybe I should take a cue from "Girlfriend", which I think lets us in on the joke a little. You can't make your refrain "G-I-R-L-F-R-E-N" and not have a sense of humor about your Heavy Deep and Real feelings.
TL;DR: liked the garage rock, miss me with the art rock.
