8/10 Damon Albarn lashes out at MTV by doing some real goofy shit. Still greatly appreciate the Hip Hop and Dub influences, you can tell how much respect and love he had for what he was doing on this album. Lot of nice middle and high school memories had listening to this album, not the most perfect album in the world but special to me nonetheless :)

9/10 By no means am I principally opposed to Prog music, but I am a skeptic, and do find a lot of records in the canon to be self masturbatory at times, many priding themselves on the technicality and grandiosity on a surface level. Where’s the pith??? Moving Pictures has mostly everything that makes the best Prog records actually have an impact, using the progressive elements as a texture to a rich and colorful Rock album. Phenomenal drumming, kickass riffs and bass playing, really eccentric vocals, the timbre of this record is so rich and fun, while being completely palatable at the same time. The second leg of the album is great though it can’t beat that first half which I don’t doubt I’ll be coming back to. Cheese to the max, but it’s that good shit

5/10 I wanna completely put aside the messy background of this record and talk about the actual outcome of the music. Using other people’s culture in your art is not explicitly black or white, while some instances can be exploitative cultural appropriation, others can be really beautiful, inspired, and respectful. Paul Simon’s collaborations with African (mainly South African) artists and their music certainly feels respectful, their contributions to the sound of this album are excellent, and I don’t really think I can say this isn’t the way to go when working with other cultures to create your art. My main issue is with Paul himself, where in the beautiful blend of influences from South African music, we have at its core, a pretty weak American Pop Rock album. Paul’s writing on this LP doesn’t feel like it really goes far enough to warrant an album of this nature, while there’s no songs that really come off as offensive, I can’t say I would go out of my way to listen to this album if it was stripped of any of its influences and it was a plain American Pop Rock album. It ends up feeling inconsequential, like the people on this album were just a means to an end, and while I don’t expect Paul or any artist to change the world with their lyrics, it did feel kinda weird to completely avoid any mention of what his collaborators were going through in their country. I can’t help but pin this against an album like Remain in Light by the Talking Heads where the African influences feel fundamental to the album, not only musically with their blends of Post-Punk and Afrobeat and Afro-Funk, but lyrically by those genres as well. Brian Eno and David Byrne were inspired enough to push themselves out of a deep respect for these cultures, going out of their way to urge their audiences to look into the cultures and writings from the countries they were influenced by. Paul just doesn’t seem to want to go far enough, and it kinda shows in his attitudes regarding the criticism thrown at him by anti-apartheid movements at the time. It’s nice while it’s on but there’s very few songs that really wanna bring me back to it. No “Go white boy go” for you Paul.

8/10 blah blah blah “greatest album” something something “wizard of oz” something something “who up floyding their pink” blah blah blah ok. You get to a point where you’ve seen this album cover as much as the McDonald’s symbol, and truthfully society is much better off having a piece of art this universal to be permanently etched into the canon of music. I can’t pretend that they aren’t letting their nuts hang on this album, it only makes sense that an album like this would maintain such a big reputation. We can talk about how maybe its acclaim is overblown or that they have better albums, but I ultimately can’t bring it down too much. Go to a Walmart and if you’re not seeing this on some zoomer’s shirt, a boomer’s shirt, a shirt on the clothes aisle, on 5 posters, on a cashier’s water bottle, enough vinyl copies to stack straight to heaven in the electronics aisle, you’re living on another planet, for a 50 year old “overrated” album, pretty impressive. Anyone have weird the urge to watch Paul Blart Mall Cop 2?

9/10 The defining 90s Rock album was a decade too early, while Indie Rock had been on the rise at the time, I don’t think the genre would have a real blueprint until Surfer Rosa (and Doolittle but we’re not talking about her right now). The eccentricities, brashness, and shamelessness of Indie is captured in this 33 min runtime, from the very ugly and noisy Post-Hardcore, Post-Punk, and Cowpunk influences, to the hyper-emotional Grungey Alt-Rock cuts that MK Ultra any unstable youngling into bursting into tears and starting a band. Thank you Latinas

8/10 Jazz is the closest thing to “spiritual” music that exists, not on a grander metaphysical scheme or whatever but on a visceral feeling. I couldn’t describe to you in technical terms what makes it work, for sure none of it is accidental, but what’s important is that I feel the music. For an album named “Home is Where the Music Is”, we travel all around the world musically, not restricted by any borders, which feels intentional, everything is beautifully arranged and performed, it’s aa if you’re exploring different parts of the planet on every song, with a catch, which is the very somber and melancholy core of the album. It’s no doubt apartheid had a huge effect on the artists in question, there’s a duality in pride and pain, culture and oppression, diaspora and home, and we see the whole painting in its beauty and its tragedy.

6/10 “It just makes sense” is the best way I can put it. This album manages to be appeal to every youth in the mid to late 90s. Dexter’s goofy ass vocals over really energetic Skate Punk soundtracks the adolescent who’s too high on discontinued energy drinks eating shit on concrete trying to jump a set of stairs, and the shithead nihilistic teenage slacker who punches holes in his wall as he resonates with the very angsty, witty, songwriting. It’s fun, and annoying a lot of the times but mostly fun, and I wouldn’t really be upset at the thought of having this album in their Mount Rushmore of Pop Punk or whatever. Maybe I’ll enjoy it more once I learn how to do an Ollie

9/10 Extremely lush and ethereal, can’t blame anyone for the avalanche of flowers this record has received. One aspect that especially interests me is the fake language that’s sung all over this album, I think some may disregard this album as purely surface level and aesthetics, but I feel that if they wanted to emphasize the sound above everything else, they would’ve either went into an instrumental direction or extremely but effective basic lyrics (mbv). I think singing in a made up language is very intentional, when we listen to music in a different language and don’t have a translation easily available or available at all, none of our appreciation for the music is diminished. You might gain a bit more appreciation for the sentiment of the song if you did know it, but not enough to disregard it entirely or lose your interest in what exists. You still feel that there’s something behind the words, and that’s equally as important as the understanding of them. The singing feels eerily uncanny to a real language, it’s not complete improvisational gibberish, there’s a very real rhythm, cadence, and repetition in some of the words, and at some point the vocalist sings words in English, almost as if the band is tricking you into believing there’s a legible meaning in the song, and frankly I don’t think anyone sincerely criticizes other Dream Pop and Shoegaze bands for having illegible lyrics behind the walls of vacuum sounds. It reminds me lot of Julia Holter’s Aviary, an album mainly sung in English but with no coherent connection behind the words, rather the emphasis of the them and the feelings of the sounds of them. This album is the musical manifestation of goosebumps, it’s feeling at a deeper level, and that’s pretty essential isn’t it? Gheuahs, jakwour heroula auie, “ericplaysbass” aioenrs “gay” whjedjaw?

8/10 Very much the “Alt-Pop” Bible, the best aspect of Melodrama by far is Lorde’s songwriting, not only do we obviously get some of the best Pop hits of the late 2010s from this record, we get some pretty evocative lyrics, she details extremely vivid scenes and emotions in each song, and while they do feel extremely specific in their situations, they feel universal to the sad girls who resonate with the emotions and tone of the record (shoutout women). While some of the production does feel like it’s a product of its time, we do get some pretty amazing and moody beats that remain fresh to this day, and of course her vocals and harmonies are phenomenal, sure it spawned hundreds of Lorde clones and forced many Pop artists to sing like her but that’s more of a mark against the industry. While I think a lot of Poptimism in modern Pop is overblown and astroturfed, Melodrama’s an album that deserves its love and influence over others. You like Lorde? Her early work was a little too “Alt” for my tastes, but when Pure Heroin came out in '13, I think she really came into their own, commercially and artistically. The whole album has a clear, crisp sound, and a new sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the songs a big boost. She’s been compared to Lana Del Rey, but I think Lorde has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor. In '17, Lorde released Melodrama, her most accomplished album. I think her undisputed masterpiece is "Supercut", a song so catchy, most people probably don't listen to the lyrics. But they should, because it's not just about the shortcomings of long-term relationships, it's also a personal statement about the Lorde herself! HEY ERIC! *swings shobon at eric* TRY DISRESPECTING WOMEN AGAIN YEW SCHTUPID BASTARD!!!

5/10 It’s fine. This is probably one of those records that was very influential to people before 1985, but in retrospect becomes less impressive as the years go on. The guitars and drumming are pretty decent, there’s a lot of interesting ideas on here that I guess you could say were fresh for the time, but I struggle to retain anything past the first track. If anything it probably does a decent enough job of padding out record sections at thrift stores. the glove didn’t fit!!!

10/10 Illinois is one of the extremely rare pieces of art that capture the human condition. This universal work stands shoulder to shoulder with albums like Songs in the Key of Life, To Pimp a Butterfly, Dark Side of the Moon, What’s Going On?, perfectly piecing together a portrait of humanity, history, spirituality, sexuality, life and death. Haha sike! This story is actually Sufjan inviting you to learn about the great state of Illinois! What about Illinois? EVERYTHING! This album uses its setting to brilliantly portray these themes through different eyes, cities, historical figures, and events. Everything from the great city of Chicago, the Chicago Cubs, Illinois ghost towns, the Sangamon River, Abraham Lincoln, to Superman. It’s a beautiful synecdoche of things that I have a tough time putting into words, but we’re shown an inherent beauty to this state that feels representative of a beautiful human experience. On the other hand we also have some pretty horrific tragedy that comes with this state, from the colonization and genocide of Native Americans to John Wayne Gacy. Despite us seeing this state through different eyes we also see some deeply personal and emotional stories from Sufjan himself like his struggles with his faith and sexuality and dealing with the loss of a partner to bone cancer. This is an extremely dense record with that crams as much as possible within 74 minutes, and the only way to match up with these vast subject matters is to present them beautifully with a grand sound across the whole spectrum of emotions. Sufjan’s pristine guitar playing spans across Indie Folk, Indie Pop, and Indie Rock, and very cinematic proggy fusions of Classical music, Big Band, and Jazz, and all fronted by his God given vocals. It feels strange to see this album as being anything more than what the title suggests if you don’t “get it” but it really is a masterful artwork that captures more than you can imagine. Only 48 more states to go Suf!

9/10 Your favorite rapper’s favorite rap album, and it probably should be your favorite rap album. At the age of 16 to 20, Nas wrote and released a lightning in a bottle Hip Hop album, being not just incredibly impressive for someone his age but would be a permanent blueprint for East Coast and Hip Hop as a genre. Even if you don’t like this album as much as other Hip Hop albums that you could debate are better than Illmatic, you’d be a fool to believe this record didn’t earn its reputation. We get a young and hungry kid from Queens already establishing himself as king of the game on here, and while for most rappers it seems like a typical premature statement to make, Nas’ energy, rhymes, and subject matter have set the bar for some of the best rap has to offer. His clever rhyme schemes paint a very grim portrait of New York, specifically through his life as a teenager subject to poverty and crime. We get crack deals gone wrong, bodies pumped full of lead, police confrontations that lead to an intense chase or a deadly shootout, an overwhelming exposure to violence and hedonism is what Nas puts the listener through on this record. And while most “Gangster Rap” records might dive deeply into the intensity and brashness of these themes, Nas offers a much more introspective and philosophical side to this kind of writing. What do we get to counter this intense and horrific lifestyle? Survival and “realness”. We get a duality of nihilism and perseverance on Illmatic that proved to be one of the most essential rubrics for “realness” in the genre, Nas reaps his glory and reputation not with temporary hedonistic desires but with a better way out of this loop of trauma and destruction, and better displayed with how Nas lives his life now. It’s a great “Hero’s Journey” soundtrack with a bunch of the most iconic Boom Bap and Jazz Rap beats of the 90s, most notably by DJ Premier and many other iconic East Coast producers. Unfortunately this album really does overshadow the rest of Nas’ discography, leading to many modern listeners believing it was a fluke, that’s until Nas would release a string of records with Hit Boy almost 30 years later consisting of some of the best rap albums this decade, establishing him as a noteworthy contender for the GOAT yet again. Woke Nas be like “My style switches like a f****t but I’m bisexual”

7/10 I’ll be honest the immediate thought I had when I first heard the vocalist was “wow this guy kinda sucks”, then I learned he was British and it all made sense. It’s undeniably a huge influence on British Rock and Pop music for the next decades, and it’s quite a nice and fun listen. This is completely bigoted on my part but I can see why this sorta turns off Americans and mainly gets its flowers from the UK, any music that doesn’t mask its Britishness and isn’t the best music of all time will be spat out by most audiences outside of the UK (as we can see from Robbie Williams currently having a $135 million dollar Biopic bomb horribly), and truthfully that’s my biggest bone to pick with this album. It’s pretty decent, but I can’t take anything from it other than “it’s a good time”. WHALE AT LEASHT ARE SHCHOOLS DOUN’T LOOK LOIKE COLL OV DEWCHY

8/10 It is sorta weird seeing this album get its praise from music nerds after a decade of acceptance from the mainstream and the many records it influenced, we finally see a French House album not made by Daft Punk be perceived as good by everyone including snobs. And on that note, because I’m a whiney bitch, I always kinda hated the Daft Punk comparisons, (“Human After All” exists, we already know what Edgy Daft Punk sounds like and it did not go well), I think Cross does a completely unique and innovative thing here. Well that’s not true, I’m a lying bitch, Cross is still indebted to they who shall not be named, but there’s a better comparison to be made in my mind. Cross is to Cyber Punk what Discovery is to Retro Futurism. Justice takes these sample based fundamentals to an extreme, fusing them with very noisy almost Industrial Electronic music, the sample chops are glitchy and almost synthetic, opposing Daft Punks soulful humanism. It very much embraces a very dark and futuristic aesthetic that soundtracks our humanity’s impending doom (but in a cool way, not in the microplastics killing us and us being smothered by CO2 way). The record does get kinda get samey after a bit, which is really good for an EDM album but I’d prefer some experimentation for a setting like this. All things considered, the best Christian EDM album of all time!

5/10 https://youtu.be/-JlmvtAHhnc?si=dREm-vFXzf1y500a

7/10 Definitely a record that I feel would have a much deeper impact if I had the context of British history and culture. From what I can gather in the songwriting we get some pretty harrowing and loaded subject matter regarding England’s history, on Linda Thompson’s side especially, and there are some pretty hard hitting images on every one of these songs. However I find the content of the record to maybe be a bit underserved by the instrumentals. They’re quite nice while they’re on but don’t really leave a bigger impact when it comes to the heavier thematics of the record, and I know most of that is due to traditions in English Folk music, but I do wish there was something more symbiotic here to my American tastes. I too would be depressed if I was British.

11/10 Paz-core Degeneracy, hedonism, and nihilism, The Velvet Underground & Nico defined the underbelly for the 20th century on this once in a lifetime album. The entire ethos of this record can be summed up by its cover, a provocative allure, tempting you to look beyond the surface and unveil its depravity in all its glory. Lou Reed and Nico’s forced collaboration by Andy Wahrol magically concocts one of if not the most innovative and forward thinking Rock album of all time. An album that set the benchmark for Experimental/Art Rock, making The Velvet Underground your favorite band’s favorite band. We get “proto” everything on here, Punk, Drone, Noise Rock, Goth Rock, Post-Rock, Glam Rock, so much shit on here is scarily predictive for alternative music on this nearly 50 minute run time. In the midst of this chaos we also get some of the sweetest and most delightful Pop songs of the 1960s, Sunday Morning possibly being the most beautiful opening to an LP ever recorded. These rich and stunning tunes about love and beauty neatly resting next to some of the most nihilistic, ugly, and avant-garde music you’ll ever hear feels painfully ironic, but it somehow works. Nico’s contributions to the album, while brief and not planned, are especially impressive for someone who had just started out. Femme Fatale, a wonderful and tragic tribute to Edie Sedgwick (a Warhol actress who struggled with addiction and metal illness, very fitting), I’ll Be Your Mirror, a heartbreaking and touching song about wanting to be seen (allegedly written from Lou Reed’s experiences post-shock therapy due to his homosexuality as a teen), and All Tomorrow’s Parties, a weird pre-cursor to Goth music, especially with the subject matter reflecting the feelings of being an outsider. Nico’s vocals are perfect, just as heavenly as they are eerie. The absolute highlight here is Lou Reed’s songwriting, he presents to the world the ugliness of the world, specifically underground of New York. His words aren’t abstract, they’re not cerebral, they’re actually quite easy to understand, but they remain intensely evocative, stark, brutish, and loaded with subtext. Dope dealings, prostitution, sexual masochism, queerness, and the nihilistic beauty of drug addiction. That last part is especially compelling to me as it’s been a pretty cathartic subject matter in a lot of my favorite pieces of art, especially on the track ”Heroin”, an overwhelmingly beautiful and horrific depiction of an overdose, this song explores meaninglessness and bliss in death in a way I’ve rarely seen in a piece of art, in a strange way it feels Lovecraftian in an indescribable way, it remains as one of the greatest pieces of music I’ve ever experienced. The Velvet Underground gave a voice for the unorthodox, the rejected, and the counter-culture, many of our favorite artists are permanently indebted to this record, and it’s only fair that we keep appreciating its legacy as we do our best to maintain progress today. “The Velvet Underground’s first album only sold a few thousand copies, but everyone who bought one formed a band.” -Brian Eno

9/10 Who knew Elliott Smith on a budget would sound like Elliott Smith on a budget. Pretty fantastic overall even if I do enjoy the subtlety and lonely feeling of an album like Either/Or more, we still get some phenomenal songwriting on here with a lot of interesting and grander performances. Elliott’s influences are on a bit more visible display here, mainly bands like The Beatles with Elliott getting more instruments and bigger arrangements involved. Some stuff isn’t gonna stick as hard on a full 16 tracks but I can only see myself appreciating his growth the more I listen to his discography. https://imgur.com/a/K3ug1Nv

8/10 FKA Twigs establishes modern Pop and R&B on LP1 in ways we’re hearing more and more of even after a decade. Even though I prefer her work after this point, I still deeply respect LP1 as a sort of foundation for innovative and avant-garde Pop music in the internet age. Not only is she a great Pop and R&B songwriter, making these some very memorable songs by themselves, she fuses them with Deconstructed Club, IDM, Glitch, and Dupstep in an extremely fluid and organic way. There’s nothing that feels synthetic about Twigs’ music despite it so obviously being so futuristic. It’s super organic, and precisely crafted, of course with help from some of the best producers in the game right now (Arca, Sampha, Clams Casino and many more). Her voice is insanely hypnotic, I think that’s just an objective factor to everything she’s done but you can’t help but fall for these very psychedelic and ethereal vocal deliveries. An incredible start and she only gets better from here, I already know Eusexua will continue to deliver. Thank you women (+Robert Pattinson)!

8/10 Came for Brian Eno, stayed for ????? This album is in a bizarre middle ground between a lot of things. It’s not quite Prog Rock, it’s not quite Experimental Rock, it’s not quite Goth Rock, but it’s way too buttery with those genres to be a traditional Art Rock album. Even Glam Rock feels like a weird descriptor for this, it’s definitely in the realm of a theatrical Rock album, although it’s not quite theater kid either (which is a good thing). This feels like a much more socially acceptable Rock record to play in public while still getting away with and belonging in the Weirdo Rock canon, it’s pretty fun and bizarre in a lot of ways even if the experiments don’t land every single time. They didn’t deserve you anyways my balding king….

7/10 80s nostalgia has been kind and not too kind to various scenes and moments in music. We’re very much still worshiping a lot of Synthpop today, retro-aesthetics have hugely been based off a lot of New Wave, but we’ve also been reevaluating and have been critical of the over saturation of Pop Rock. This is slightly irrelevant but I thought about the weird worship of City-Pop that’s occurred in the past few years, records that have been overplayed to death in Japan to the point where they’re mainly vinyl to overcharge tourists with, even though those records have been based off of a lot of our Boogie, R&B, Funk, and Rock fusions here in the states that haven’t had the same level of reappraisal. Is there ever going to be a moment in time where the Ameriboo that wears cowboy hats everywhere, quotes Family Guy, and eats McDonald’s constantly will walk into a record store and pick up a copy of a pretty decent album like Private Dancer for $80? I can only hope so. In a just world, Forget Me Nots is bigger than Plastic Love.

7/10 I think in recent years Coldplay has gotten the Nickleback treatment of most overplayed and overhated band in recent times. Probably because Coldplay still gets huge play everywhere and Nickleback doesn’t, they fucking dropped an album 3 months ago and I didn’t notice until writing this right now, time isn’t real anymore. But one thing I can say about Coldplay that I can’t say about Nickleback is “this is nice”. I can’t hate on any of this, even the lowest points on this album are completely inoffensive to me, I can see why everyone has been so kind to these albums in a way that isn’t just British people compensating for the lack of crossover hits in the States. Honestly the worst parts of this album are when they closely resemble the band they’re known to be the offspring of. Even though everyone is sick and tired of Coldplay, the best moments on this album are the most Coldplay Coldplay songs, and for the most part, they try not to venture off to the Radiohead abyss and do any more extra shit that they couldn’t accomplish, they make Pop songs, that’s all I really need for them to do. https://x.com/coldplaywisdom/status/294330347200593920?s=46&t=25slwivCYKHKuU9GWyCVDg

8/10 Pleasantly surprised by how fun and funny this record still is, considering the band’s reputation I would’ve assumed this album was way tamer and nerdier, but it’s actually quite unhinged at points in a way that I really like. They manage to be both witty and abrasive in really creative ways, offering some really interesting song concepts and Pop and Punk fusions that work really well, it really is unafraid to be what it is even if may seem a bit cringe or dorky at points. While it isn’t a perfect Punk album, it certainly deserves a mention amongst the best of the genre. The quirky teen from 1978 that listened to this probably got shoved in the smallest lockers.

9/10 Impressive. Very nice… You can’t help but really embrace a record’s vibe when it’s so out in the open like this. It’s not hiding anything, what you get on track one is what you will get for the following 7 tracks, and if you can pull that off effectively, you have a pretty masterful record on your hands. The American Jazz and Brazilian Bossa Nova crossover here is pristinely performed, with João and Astrud Gilberto’s lush and soothing vocals complimenting the brilliant guitar playing, and Stan Getz’s excellent Saxophone almost providing a lead role alongside the vocals (as well as some really nice pianos by Antonio), there is a perfect blend of expertise that captured the hearts of listeners world wide. It’s unbelievably relaxing, not in a sedative sense but much more associated with a feeling of mellowness and comfort, most of the songs on here are enough to put you in a peaceful trance, transporting you into a zone where the sun is setting and it’s just right. Super Mario RPG Sonic the Hedgehog, Donkey Kong 3 Adventures of Lolo 1 and 2 King's Knight, Dig Dug, Chew Man Fu Harvest Moon League Puzzle Pokémon ToeJam & Earl in Panic on Funkotron Castlevania, Fatal Fury, Ninja JaJaMaru-kun ActRaiser, Blazing Lazers, Bases Loaded, Mega Turrican Cybernator, Rolling Thunder, Dynastic Hero Bubble Bobble, Double Dribble, Double Dragon, F-Zero F-Zero X, and... Donkey Kong Jr. Math! Ninja Gaiden 1... Ninja Gaiden 2, Ninja Gaiden 3... CRUISIN'USA aaaa aaaaaaa aaaaaaaaa AAAAAAAAA

9/10 Miles’ first step into Fusion music is well regarded in retrospect similar to someone like Bob Dylan’s Bringing It All Back Home, and while it is a huge departure from his “traditional” work, being much more palatable for mainstream audiences who have begun embracing Rock music. The first side of this record is stagnant, with various isolated performances coming in and out of the mix pristinely playing along to a groove, and while it still has a lot in common with traditional Modal Jazz structures there’s various surprises and experiments that make these 20 minutes feel ominous. Continuing this ominous feeling for another 20 minutes is the other side of the record, this time with a surreal atmosphere, combining Ambient music with Rock, Funk, and Jazz in an incredibly smooth but elusive way, it makes sense why this album pushed some people away at first but it didn’t take long for them to really understand where Miles was headed. In a Silent Way works extremely well as a mysterious and hypnotizing soundtrack for the Manhattan streets at night, but it’s also an exciting teaser for what’s to come in Miles Davis’ career. Cool Jazz more like Drool Jazz! *Drives away in my 1984 Honda Elite*

8/10 Insanely sweet, Black femininity and sensuality explored through multiple lenses, all while providing catchy and grooving R&B cuts with Trap, Soul, Pop, and Funk influences that remain consistently great throughout these 30 minutes. I know the reception had to be warranted to an extent, especially since I saw many publications and even my friend’s really loving the Deluxe expansion, but I didn’t think it would be a really well balanced piece of work, which makes sense since there’s only 8 full length tracks on here, but no moment is really wasted, even if you aren’t big on some songs, the quality is not far behind. https://imgur.com/a/eLOY4U0

9/10 This album is permanently wedged between the underground weirdo Indie canon and an iconic 2000s Pop record, and it’s a shame there’s not a lot of really great artists that breach this Avant-Pop crossover enough because it absolutely warrants its legend status. Got really into AC last year and ran through most of their discog, and while there are other projects that I prefer, I can’t help but come back to the warmth and joy of MPP the most. https://imgur.com/a/C7oa6tG

8/10 Was pretty worried that there would be a significant drop in quality after the hit single but was pleased instead with a really good Proto-Indie Rock album that served to inspire quite a lot of important bands. It is really strange to seen an album this early be such a hit with the mainstream, especially since the record is loaded with bizarre musical styles, pretty explicit song topics, and a really awkward and anxious spirit to the whole thing, but it manages to be entertaining track after track even if not every one is a “Blister in the Sun”. My first exposure to this band is not this song but the cover of “Gone Daddy Gone” by Gnarls Barkley on Tony Hawk’s Project 8 when I was a babo and the awful music video made for it, I wish it wasn’t

8/10 My suspicion behind the mild acclaim behind this album can probably be answered by me listening to this back to back with Surfer Rosa. There’s not much of a drop in quality at all, in fact I’d say it pretty much deserves to be respected as an end of a great trilogy, but it’s obvious that people may have been disappointed by the peak that they reached on Doolittle, and I can’t really say I don’t understand that, no songs on here can really beat the highs on Doolittle or Surfer Rosa, but I still had a fun listen to this, it’s Pixies doing what Pixies do best. Super Mario R

9/10 Absolutely nothing wrong with a proto-wife guy album, pumped full of raw and fun ass Punky Garage Rock jams with contempt for cleanliness and conformity. Tunes that would prove to be pretty essential in developing and inspiring Indie, New Wave, and Post-Punk to come in pretty significant ways, not just in sound but spiritually. These very rough and awkward love songs written with a ton anxiety and a lot of heart proved to be an absolutely essential archetype in Rock music for the coming decades. Without this you wouldn’t have a Julian Casablancas, Archie Marshall, Will Toledo, Alex G, a bunch of emo nerds, a Rivers Cuomo, and you may wish that most of the people I mentioned are dead but that’s not the point! The point is that this record captured the hearts of the youth in a way that remains today, it’s the weird attraction of messy hair, baggy eyes, the anxiety riddled shithead slacker who blurts out his unfiltered emotions is just an undeniably hot person, and I would love to be his girlfren. Shoutout women (this guy gets it) https://imgur.com/a/aZUJa7G

6/10 It’s Meat-and-Potatoes, like probably the most “prime example” a Hardcore Punk album that there can be. I can’t completely disregard the impact of this record, while many artists do get their flowers from getting to first base before anyone else while underperforming in all other areas, I think GI at the very least offers a decent amount of spirit and bite to it even if a lot of the messaging isn’t as specific or bold as a lot of their successors. It’s still saying something, and I don’t necessarily demand that there be revolutionary text behind these feverish riffs and raspy vocals, it’s just that they also still remain “solid”. Did you know that if you stare into the circle long enough, you can see the image of a gullible dumb bitch?

7/10 Goodbye Yellow Brick Road is a record that demands a lot of attention for you, not because it’s challenging or deeply conceptual, but because it’s trying to make sure you don’t look away from the fire works, confetti, and jazz hands, it’s very much insistent that you understand this is a magnum opus you’re witnessing. It’s got a fat fucking budget, a new stylistic change on every track, a fake live audience to make you believe you’re watching a sort of theatrical masterpiece, make no mistake this is Elton’s tour de force, but he overdoes it just a little bit. I think the grandiosity of this album tries to compensate for some pretty weak songs on here, while I don’t think Elton is a weak songwriter, his limitations can be pretty clear, especially on a 17 track album, with some embarrassing satirical song choices and “nice while it’s on” tunes. Still, his overconfidence is warranted as a pretty damn good singer and songwriter, it definitely impressed a lot of people, and some phenomenal material is still on here in spite of the mess. Can’t wait to listen to the next most essential Elton John record; Sherlock Gnomes (Music From The Motion Picture)

6/10 Yeah it wasn’t a competition, the East Coast kicked the West Coast’s ass in the 80s, but we can’t say they didn’t try. Straight Outta Compton is rough, a bit messy, and straight up feels so stripped back and unfinished it’s awkward at times, but the best moments really do prop this record up really well. There’s no ignoring the significance of this album for the West Coast, and while it wouldn’t take until the G-Funk era for the West Coast to get its respect, there’s still a legacy that this album earned as a steppingstone for the genre. Still, you can’t help but see this album as being anything more than “playing catch up”, seeing what the East Coast has done by this point, it’s kinda pathetic sorry But I don’t wanna have sex with policemen! ☹️

7/10 This comes out of a complete ignorance to Tango, especially Nuevo Tango, but I was not expecting this at all. On a broader Pop culture level, I was exposed to Tango as a novelty genre for foreign dance music, and seeing “Nuevo Tango” as a stylistic branch in the genre, I was thinking this would be a sort of more contemporary than its orchestral parent. What I did not expect was the weird moments of terror, drama, and eeriness, the more exciting and intense moments of the record almost cut you off from a “Danceable” setting, being much more inspired by Jazz in its composition and dissonance. I feel like I’m watching an elaborate stage play, and it is mostly engaging all the way through. What doesn’t do much for me on this album are the more nuanced and subtle moments on the record, there are many long stretches of the album that feel like quiet instrumental filler preparing you for the real stuff, and although this is probably more known in the genre and I’m just oblivious to it, I found myself wishing these moments would end sooner. If Nuevo Tango is so good why haven’t they made a Mas Nuevo Tango hmmmm????

7/10 Signing Off exists in a strange stream of consciousness, with the political connotations of the lyrics, it very much seems to be a conscious record on a psychological level as much as a political level, and that’s what really draws me to the best parts of the album. Reggae as a genre has always been a structure for commentary, much in the same wat Folk and Blues music, and UB40 does a pretty decent job at conveying these themes with an introspective and melodic side, while it may get a bit redundant in some spots, I can’t help but still fall into this zone anyways. Then there’s the Dub aspect, a revolutionary sub-genre that serves to echo and elevate these sounds on a deep liminal level, which make these conscious statements ring that much more compelling. I really just think this liminal space of political thought and working class struggle really does its job, and I’m pretty interested in what more of this genre has to offer. Adding this to my “if a proletarian revolution happens” playlist next to Public Enemy, Dead Kennedys, and Taylor Swift

5/10 Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ok yes it’s revolutionary yes it’s ahead of its time yea it’s influential yes it's well respected, BUT…, I don’t think we would be saying these things had it not been for everything that came after it. This album was not super respected in the hardcore Hip Hop spaces at the time, not that it was hated or anything, but considering what Vanilla Ice did to Hip Hop at the time, it wasn’t a surprise that the record wasn’t as immediately influential, especially as it was the sort of Bible for “frat-rap”, not typically enjoyed by black audiences. This album is white, white as hell, and that wasn’t completely comprehensible in the genre at the time, that is until the years passed by as it gained more success and they finally released Paul’s Boutique, which could possibly be perceived as one of the best or the best Hip Hop album of the 80s. It was this and what came after that cemented the Beastie Boys not as white outsiders, but Hip Hop pioneers who respect the genre and chose to do their own thing as white rappers. Licensed to Ill has phenomenal ideas and forward thinking production, but it’s still very very white (again, not inherently a bad thing, but can be horrible if you make a weak rap record), and I think these rose tinted glasses kinda mask the obvious shortcomings regarding the not very great rapping, not very great humor, and not very great beats at points. Oh and just annoying half the time lol. It’s great in concept, kinda ehhhhh? in execution. It’s a fantastic blueprint, but when we look at it on a more “objective level”, what impact on the greater canon of Hip Hop is there really outside of being important to Pop culture? The biggest songs off this are novelty songs, overwhelmingly used in media to soundtrack something comedic, I can’t see any convincing argument behind the hits being some of the best songs in the genre, no one is out here thinking “No Sleep Till Brooklyn”, “Fight For Your Right” or “Brass Monkey” are the best Rap songs you’re ever gonna hear. The influence on Hip Hop definitely comes from the deep cuts on the record, but they’re still far from perfect, they just seem like ideas better executed on their next albums. It’s not trying to be great rap, and they’re just having fun and not being serious. But, they were all that and more on everything they made after that, and that shit was fire. Is this that Eminem album? EDIT: I originally gave this album a 3 star because I felt like maybe I was a bit too harsh about it, but I now just spent the past couple of hours re-listening to the following three BB albums back to back and, yeah, nah the quality difference pretty fucking huge, and that goes back to my main gripe with this. I still think we wouldn’t be hyping this album up this much if Paul’s Boutique didn’t permanently change Hip Hop for good, we just see a formula that they created work really well because they made it work elsewhere.

6/10 It’s a Frank Sinatra album, it’s nice while it’s on, there’s hundreds of people working to make every song sound nice, hundreds of songwriters ensuring Frank has something to talk about, and Frank does his job. It’s sweet, it’s got some fuzzy parts, but ultimately it’s from 1956, we have yet to have an important Pop music structure, a good album structure, and songs that want to make sure you’re going out of your way to listen to them. Frank is important, and he was trying to be ahead of the curb, but unless you’re really into Traditional Pop music, he really is held back by his era. Did you know Frank Sinatra’s last words were "I'm losing it"? Isn’t that fucked up or what? Anyways, here’s Wonderwa

7/10 It’s really good, and I think we’re past the point where annoying white people who don’t listen to Hip Hop keep claiming that this is the greatest Rap album of all time, it’s messy but I respect it a lot. Vulgar Horrorcore imagery, foul humor, genuine introspection, and pure unfiltered intrusive thoughts, that’s what you’re gonna get on this album. Being offended is exactly what Em wants, American audiences have been exposed to the oversaturation of violence, sex, celebrity coverage, conservatism, and media coverage. Now that there’s a pretty white face speaking what the counter culture was thinking, you have to hear whining and bitching from the media and Eminem in 2000. There’s a possibility we might roll this album but I’ll go ahead and say it anyways, I always thought the Slim Shady LP was the better sister album. What made Eminem, particularly “Slim Shady” so successful in both the mainstream and the Hip Hop community is best described by this Dave Chapelle clip FD Signifier (shoutout) used in his “Eminem and the White Rapper Problem” essay. https://youtu.be/XYzXoIF1JjE?si=ngDLttczUQbNUMpO I think the SSLP allows Eminem to be a lot more fun, absurd, grotesque, and ridiculous with his persona in a way that felt a bit less on the nose with what it was obviously doing, I think the Marshal Mathers LP does a bit too much to over explain what the bit is, since he had less attention on him and was a genuine Rap Anti-Hero during this time. Both also have some pretty great production featuring Dre and Em’s best beats. MMLP deserves its praise bit its flaws are blatantly obvious in retrospect. A lot of the humor is very dated, relies too much on gross out jokes and shock value for the sake of sounding mean, some songs where he’s talking down to you, couple of dogshit fearures, and truthfully some embarrassing moments where he shows too much of his intrusive thoughts and revenge fantasies, as much as we can respect how vulnerable and honest they are as an outlet for him. Eminem eventually followed up these sister albums with two albums of varying quality, MMLP2 which is a solid album in concept but ultimately fails because of his fixation on technicality and abuse of high IQ puns/dad jokes, sounding like a constipated robot now, and The Death of Slim Shady, which has the same problems but this time about cancel culture and how you couldn’t make a Slim Shady album today because everyone is too sensitive or whatever. But that kinda doesn’t mean anything now in an era where one of the biggest rappers on the planet is an attention whore down on his knees for Hitler, I promise you, no one cares that you said the R slur anymore Slim, you’re like 50 now, Nas is dropping better shit than you now, you have no excuse. It goes to show how far down Eminem has fallen today when he continues to live in the shadow of these two albums in the larger canon of Hip Hop while his white mediocrity continues to keep him afloat in the mainstream. Thank God we have Danny Brown to actually pick up the ball Em fumbled with XXX. Anyways, favorite track would probably be uhhh Ken Kaniff

10/10 One of the first musical Postmodern masterpieces, Bob Dylan “Going Electric” is a bombshell moment in history, as silly as it may seem to our contemporary eyes and ears. He was a Folk hero of sorts, known as a “protest” singer who contributed politically and socially in the early 60s, his music clearly being sympathetic towards leftist causes and civil rights movements, but it began to weigh on him heavily. He was just fulfilling the lineage and traditions of Blues/Folk heroes of the working class before him, he had done a lot of good for various movements, but it wasn’t enough. Woody Guthrie hadn’t changed the world and he died of some brain eating disease, Dylan has to finish what he started. No, he was our martyr, he’s supposed to wrote the “finger-pointing” songs, he was supposed to change the world, and in the mean time he has to answer every stupid question the reactionary media had to throw at him. The civil rights movement succeeded, but we didn’t eliminate racism, so we killed MLK, we had a great president, but he bombed and killed the Vietnamese, so we killed JFK, hell, maybe if we kill Bob Dylan, things might finally change for the better around here. Dylan had enough, so he picked up an Electric Guitar. In 1965, Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited would be released months apart. The former (probably my personal favorite) would obliterate the minds of anyone with years, pissing and shitting and cumming everywhere, no one had really brought these contemporary Rock sounds to the mainstream yet, it was all still tied to Rockabilly, Beat, Mod, Surf and Blues. While this is still a sort of transition, it has the intended satire and dreamlike imagery that we come to know from Dylan. He ends the album with “It's All Over Now, Baby Blue”, a necessary end to the martyr (akin and echoes decades later with Kendrick Lamar’s Mirror). In just a few short months, it inspired Lou Reed to pass his Subterranean Homesick Blues fan art as revolutionary art in The Velvet Underground, the Beatles to smoke a joint and make good music for once, inspiring Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young, Townes Van Zandt, Joni Mitchell, Cash, I mean c’mon, he became a God to your favorite artist’s favorite artist. Highway 61 Revisited would be the completion of that transition, full electric, politics and poetry are transformed into philosophy and psychedelia, and his motorcycle, we all like motorcycles to some degree. We get constant dissections of people, starting off with the legendary track “Like a Rolling Stone”, a weirdly specific song about a Warhol actress falling from grace, but with an anthemic and universal chorus that rings out and echoes for generations. “How does it feel?”, why do these words tear us apart so much? Why is it so evocative yet esoteric? Are these albums aimless? Meaningless? Pointless? We asked him; "Are you hard on [people in your songs] because you want to torment them? Or to change their lives and make them know themselves?", Dylan replied while laughing, "I want to needle them." What the fuck does that mean Bob Dylan? What does any of this mean, why don’t you have the answers? Why don’t you explain the meaning to your songs to me so I know what to think? Whatever, it doesn’t matter anymore, art doesn’t change the world, it never did, but it’s a mirror, and we might become very shocked to death when we take a peak at our genuine selves, and that’s enough for introspection at the very least. Bob took this introspection very seriously, focusing more on his own life, the very next year releasing Blonde on Blonde, another critically acclaimed album about girls he likes, with some sprinkles of misogyny. What happened to all the deep shit? What’s with the abstract love songs? Your songs were supposed to have a subtle message, I read that off a movie magazine. In July 29, 1966, Bob Dylan crashed his motorcycle near his home, broke several vertebrae in his neck, and died that day, I guess we got what we wanted. Timothée Chalamet is a pretty good replacement I guess https://youtu.be/rBP9QKwW19Y?si=HmhbOJ9jOA0DjqtC (he is literally me) edit: eric has bitch ears

Woahh pretty momma I’m an orb/10 https://youtu.be/qY6UKPP-RC0?si=4xVe2n06cgOb836F

10/10 While many say that Bowie’s seminal swan song “Blackstar” is his most eerily predictive and reflective work, I’d argue Ziggy Stardust is an outright autobiography of his life. The Rock Opera about an otherworldly being, a Rock God, a queer androgynous sex idol coming to save our planet from our inevitable destruction with his masterpieces, but taken from us too soon as he’s subject to the worst consequences of fame and artistry. Listening to this album is like watching a legendary film, with fantastic performances, theatrics, and storytelling, it is an absolute must for anybody. Thank you gay people

7/10 Very sweet, akin to a Merryweather Post Pavilion, a nice intersection between slightly weirdo prog Indie music and incredibly sweet psychedelic Pop music. The Folk and string instrumentation all over the record is luscious, it’s what Derick P. Ass refers to as “dynamic”, you can’t hate the sound of this record at all. Songwriting its short and simple but gets the job done. I think what I sort of lack from this record is a more adventurous edge, there are ideas on here that feel like a much more interesting route but it doesn’t quite seem to want to take it that far, so it sort of stagnates just a bit when we keep dwelling on the short snippets of what could be. It could’ve been a compromise to release a more palatable album, but I can’t judge it too much for attempting that, I guess I just wish that if they restrained themselves, that they at the very least made greater or more interesting deep cuts than just pretty decent songs. I can see why women would choose this over men

9/10 Blerrghhhhhhhhhhhhhh I’ve had to sit with this album being heralded as the Bible for music nerds for several years, either from it dominating the charts since 2000 on RYM (until TPAB) to seeing it everywhere on memes and publications, and now most songs are TikTok hits which makes this album inescapable. I really don’t care if you think it’s overrated, its reputation is beyond contrarianism or difference in taste, and I don’t really care if you think it’s the greatest thing ever made, it’s a bit like calling 2001: A Space Odyssey your favorite movie, I don’t really need to ask why. I am admittedly a sort of closeted Radiohead fan, I don’t talk about Radiohead unless its brought up, I find a lot of Radiohead fans annoying to an excruciating degree, and still find some of their praise and albums to he overblown and pretentious. But when Radiohead is at their best, it’s quite obvious why people won’t shut the fuck up about them. The main problem is that this album is absurdly good, phenomenal songwriting, concepts, performances, and production. For an album from 1997, it’s shockingly relevant today, even if we see its Y2K digital alarmism to be pretentious or coincidental, we can’t shy away from how unfortunately predictive it was, I’m not gonna keep up this bullshit that this album doesn’t have insane shit on it, from the opening “Airbag” which depicts the surreal transcendental exhilaration of surviving a car crash, the 3 act insanity of “Paranoid Android”, the cripplingly dark atmosphere of “Climbing Up the Walls”, or the choked up melody of “No Surprises”. It’s not the greatest album ever made, but when too many people see it as great, it’s hard to hide from it. https://youtu.be/pE3faY7VLck?si=_h6m8sTdc-fo-lq6

10/10 Beyond exceptional, my favorite hidden gem from this list so far, a masterful vintage Pop album that left me stunned from track 1 to 13. It’s actually insane how pristinely written and intricate this album is, not only are you getting these breathtaking Pop songs blending Soul and Jazz with engaging and brilliant songwriting, you’re constantly being surprised by the compositions and arrangements of these songs as well, there’s never a stale moment, it’s the mark of a genius songwriter who just had everything laid out in its right place. Listening to it now I instantly understand it as being a Godmother of masterful Pop music, seeing its sound echoed in some of my favorite artists (Fiona Apple, Kate Bush, Tori Amos), we are permanently indebted to this album in ways we have not realized considering Laura’s character. Even if her reserved presentation may have stunted her commercial success and image, her work speaks volumes, and it’s absolutely necessary for anyone to listen to this record, if not for the historical importance then at least for the perfection hidden under that elusive album cover. Shoutout bisexual white women!

6/10 Aggressively all right, fantastically ok, epitome of “nice while it’s on”. Yeah Americans might be self centered, egomaniacal, xenophobic pieces of shit with unreasonably high standards regarding the quality of Rock and Pop music, but maybe we aren’t easily impressed by your Britslop! Down on our knees in awe at the sighting of “Coldplay but more Radiohead-y” Britpop, we’re not ‘avin it. It’s nice though I’ll be real. Anyways, here’s Wo

9/10 Stellar, one of the most exhilarating and groovy live recordings you should listen to, Fela Kuti and his band the Africa 70 bring together a spiritual adrenaline through Jazz, Funk, and West African music on 4 extensive grooves. Kuti’s vocals guide these songs all the way through with anthemic words, hypnotic rhythms and passion. The strong backbone on this album is the percussion section, mainly Tony Allen and collaboration with Ginger Baker of Cream, it’s indulgent, intricate, and addictive, these uniting forces make for an absolutely killer live performance. It’s a stepping stone to the band’s more essential and politically charged work, but it amounts to a near perfect collaboration at the same time. https://youtu.be/M8fz9_SZrEs?si=dLV3DsHLN5afGkZN&t=180

7/10 The first half of this album permanently altered (or disfigured, depends on who you ask) the face of Rock music. Second half is alright. *plays the sickest air guitar solo you’ve ever seen in your life*

6/10 Foxbase Alpha by Saint Etienne is a landmark UK Dance Pop album

9/10 Alongside Surfer Rosa, You're Living All Over Me is a pretty defining album for Indie Rock in the 80s, while also being a complete knock off of Sonic Youth, Sabbath, and Neil Young. This time however, instead filling the role of angst and quirkiness, Dinosaur Jr. created what the cool kids like to call “Slacker Rock”, (aka Lo-Fi (aka Lo-Fi Indie Rock (aka music that sounds bad))). Taking the piercing texture and dissonance of Noise Rock, the feverish aggression, rhythms, and energy of Post-Hardcore, and the Punky-Metally fusions that resemble early Grunge, we have an Indie album that is defined by DIY, it’s defined by its limitations and rawness. It’s this ambition and handcrafted quality is what made the band so appealing to Indie and Alternative Rock as a genre, literally inspiring Sonic Youth to release Daydream Nation the next year, which is extremely funny to inspire the band you ripped off. It’s got so much heart and grit to it, makes sense why DJ is the only band to to touch the heart of a hard ass like Henry Rollins so easily, I do too wanna cry like a bitch to Little Furry Things. WAITER HEY WAITER HEY WAITER HEY WAITER THERE’S NOISE IN MY ROCK *vomits*

9/10 I struggle to have a set opinion on this album because it’s by all means fantastic, but something’s stuck in my mind. It’s got pretty great songwriting, Jeff conveys love, heartbreak, and positivity in his music in a really cathartic way, it’s got pretty great instrumentation, balancing angelic Acoustic balladry and punchy Alternative Rock. However, I think a lesser performer couldn’t sell this album. The absolute pith of this album is that God damn voice, it’s almost a religious experience hearing it for the first time. Not that the songs by themselves aren’t great, but they’re outshined, astronomically so. I’m sort of left wondering where he could’ve gone with such a gift, following in the footsteps of his father Tim who released some pretty adventurous and avant-garde Folk records, it’s here where I’m left wondering if Jeff had any plans or intentions to grow and explore more ventures, or if this album was the best of what he could offer. At 28 years old, both Tim and Jeff were taken from us far too soon. It’s a pretty cruel joke if that was the universe trying to make us think about it. It wasn’t Kurt Cobain blowing his brains out after In Utero, it wasn’t Ian Curtis hanging himself after Closer, it was a freak accident after one of the most beautiful albums of all time, and for some reason that disturbs me significantly more in my mind. The “what if?” question is pretty stupid anyways I guess, it’s silly to even contemplate, but Grace seems to calm these thoughts intentionally or not. If you don’t think Jeff’s rendition of Hallelujah is one of the greatest songs of all time, you are inhuman.