327
Albums Rated
3.12
Average Rating
30%
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762 albums remaining
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2010s
Favorite Decade
Metal
Favorite Genre
UK
Top Origin
Perfectionist
Rater Style ?
9
5-Star Albums
2
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You Love More Than Most
Albums you rated higher than global average
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Nightfly | 5 | 3.01 | +1.99 |
| System Of A Down | 5 | 3.26 | +1.74 |
| Bitches Brew | 5 | 3.3 | +1.7 |
| L'Eau Rouge | 4 | 2.32 | +1.68 |
| The Velvet Underground & Nico | 5 | 3.62 | +1.38 |
| Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby | 4 | 2.65 | +1.35 |
| Yeezus | 4 | 2.77 | +1.23 |
| Djam Leelii | 4 | 2.79 | +1.21 |
| Black Sabbath | 5 | 3.83 | +1.17 |
| Leftism | 4 | 2.9 | +1.1 |
You Love Less Than Most
Albums you rated lower than global average
| Album | You | Global | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lady In Satin | 1 | 3.23 | -2.23 |
| At Folsom Prison | 2 | 3.99 | -1.99 |
| Exodus | 2 | 3.94 | -1.94 |
| What's Going On | 2 | 3.94 | -1.94 |
| With The Beatles | 2 | 3.66 | -1.66 |
| Catch A Fire | 2 | 3.64 | -1.64 |
| The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill | 2 | 3.63 | -1.63 |
| The Genius Of Ray Charles | 2 | 3.63 | -1.63 |
| Bryter Layter | 2 | 3.51 | -1.51 |
| Blonde On Blonde | 2 | 3.5 | -1.5 |
Artist Analysis
Favorite Artists
Artists with 2+ albums
| Artist | Albums | Average |
|---|---|---|
| Black Sabbath | 3 | 4.67 |
5-Star Albums (9)
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Popular Reviews
David Ackles
3/5
Montana Song is way too epic for a Disney princess introduction.
To be honest, I kinda dig this. Definitely not my type of music, but it's just so lush and pleasant. This feels like cozy fantasy music (especially the last song, which is beautiful, by the way), except the fantasy land is, like, America (not that different, I know). Too much on the slower side for me, though.
7/10
2 likes
Einstürzende Neubauten
1/5
I like the concept of noise music, but I've found that bare-bones noise/industrial records like this one tend to be rather boring and not really appealing to me. I like when noise is used as an extension of other genres, to add more weight, texture, accetuate certain parts of the record. Kollaps, however, doesn’t do that and is mostly a sound collage of different noises without a concrete structure.
Look, I don’t hate noise. The genre that got me into music was metal, which tends to be pretty noisy. Noise rock and shoegaze are some of my favorite genres. And my favorite band, Swans, used to be a noise rock band and still frequently incorporates elements of noise into their music. I understand that all I’ve listed here is basically "child's first exposure to noisy music," but I'm totally fine with liking it. Kollaps is a lot more sonically offensive than most of the noise music I like. This is not a problem on its own. What I don't like here is that there's not a lot structure or musicality, which is also not necessarily wrong, but I think there's only so many of music conventions you can sacrifice before it becomes completely unengaging.
I'm not saying "This is literally not music!" and I actually find that kind of attitude to be incredibly annoying and unfair. Who is to decide what counts as music and what doesn't? This kind of discussions are stupid and pointless. People come up with all kinds of arbitrary boundaries, but always fail to explain why would any of that matter. Jazz is not music because "it's just improvisation"; hip hop is not music because "they're just reading words" (also, the ones who think that tend to be not the biggest fans of black people, but that's a different story); metal is not music because "it's just random noises and screaming," etc. You know, vocals didn't used to be a part of the classical musicians' (who’ve invented music theory) repertoire originally. Does that mean every song that has vocals is not music? People need to come to terms with the fact that music, just like any other art form, constantly expands it's bounties and evolves. Whether you like these evolutions or not is irrelevant and doesn't make them any less “music.” Experimentation and diversions from popular norms lies at the core of art and is what makes it so exciting. I think noise music is totally valid, and you're allowed to dislike it, but "this is not music" is not legitimate criticism. This is also not what I dislike about this record.
I don’t like when artists use the whole dynamic range their recording equipment allows as I have to lower the gain and make the quiter sounds way too quiet just so the louder ones don’t obliterate my eardrums. I like music to feel actually mixed. I like music to have structure. A typical framework of buildups and crescendos is far more satisfying to me because of the way it balances anticipation and relief. In place of that, Kollaps has quiet, droney backdrops occasionally interrupted my loud metallic noises or screaming vocals, which are not pleasant to the ear (and yes, you can make noise and screms pleasant). The title track is good, though, but it is also the one which the furthest removed from the rest of the album’s soundscape.
I wouldn’t call Kollaps completely unlistenable or a total disaster, but I can’t say I enjoyed it. It’s not for me. If you’re a big fan of noise, you may like this, but I personally wouldn’t recommend it.
3/10
1 likes
Prince
5/5
This album is incredible on a couple of levels. First, it is an actually great pop rock record (which is akin to a unicorn sighting already considering how oversaturated and unimaginative this genre is). And second, this little man made me care about vocals, which only a select few albums could do.
You know, it's surprising to me how little fun music a genre that is supposedly all about catchiness produces. Most pop rock bands focus so much on trying to produce something that as inoffensive as possible that they forget to make it interesting. And unfortunately, considering how many successful pop rock bands there are, this strategy seems to work. Some of the most catchy music I've heard unironically comes from prog rock, which has the opposite of pop rock's philosophy of simplicity. Why? Because there’s a lot more artistic expression in that genre. Instead of following the norms, they break them if that means creating better art. I don't know, maybe 4/4 songs mathematically engineered to be the most basic shit ever because statistics tell that that's what an average Joe likes is not that fun for someone who listens to more music than just what comes up on radio. I'm not trying to be snobby, but it's just frustrating to me how little effort some popular bands put into their music and still remain successful. This album, however, is nothing alike. This is some of the most fun and exciting music I've ever heard. This is what the genre is supposed to be like but unfortunately isn't.
I also don't find vocals all that fun, which is another huge discrepancy between me and an average listener. But Prince's singing is just so good on this record that I couldn't not pay attention to it. Such horny writing usually makes me cringe a bit, but Prince delivers it with such electrifying passion that it almost makes me believe that he's actually straight. Even through I have no interest in the subject matter this album presents, there's so much energy seeping through Prince's vocals that it's nothing short of contagious. There's a couple of laid back songs on this album that are not quite on the same level with the best bangers here, in my opinion, but even they have something to love about them, like that incredible screaming part in The Beautiful Ones, which a pretty mediocre track outside of that (yes, actual extreme vocals on a pop album).
Honestly, what a ride.
9/10
1 likes
Brian Eno
3/5
I feel like nothing happens in this album. Sure, there are chords and melodies, but none of that builds up to anything. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts has interesting ideas and is overall very well crafted, but these ideas are not expanded upon. Every song here feels like a good intro to a longer song... except the full version never comes.
1 likes
Kid Rock
2/5
When discussing art, I don't usually care about the political views of the artists as it is largely irrelevant to the quality of their work. Like, conservative comedians are bad at comedy not because of their views but because they lack the sharp, absorbing mind comedy requires, which is also the reason they arrived at these views in the first place. But everything has its limits. And for someone as outspokenly terrible as Kid Rock, there's no excuse. My judgment for the music of this racist bitch, who’s raging for the machine directly through his work, is always going to be clouded the same way it is, for example, for Kanye's music or Mold Lady's writing. My morals would simply not allow me to stop thinking about the vile shit they have said and done. But at the same time, I also don't feel bad for potentially misrepresenting them, so I guess that doesn't really matter since Kid Rock and his ilk don't deserve any sympathy in the first place.
That all being said, this album is... not terrible. Despite the fact that there isn't a single song I would consider good, there's a surprising amount of decent riffs, and the lyrics, although cringey, are mostly not obnoxious. The biggest crime this album is committing (besides being made by Kid Rock) is that it's just forgettable. Outside of the chorus of the opening track, everything else is pretty bland and monotonous (I don't think the flow changes a single time)... but not awful. This was before "owning the libs" became Kid Rock's entire personality, but all the lyrics here are the same basic edgy, boastful stuff about how "cool" he supposedly is, how much he supposedly parties, and how many women he supposedly fucks. I mean, this is the same guy who started a boycott of a beer company because the art on the can was forcing him to look at a woman, so take out of it what you will. Funnily enough, Eminem, who also failed to grow out of the same era of "dark" and "offensive" lyrics, is also on this album (not that his contribution is significant). He's probably the poster child of that style of writing, but unlike Kid Rock, Eminem could sort of write and definitely could rap, and seems to be a decent person (citation needed).
Yeah, I was expecting a lot worse. Devil Without a Cause is not unlistenable and even has its moments, but it's very basic, occasionally cringey, and a bit too long.
5/10
1 likes
1-Star Albums (2)
All Ratings
Derek & The Dominos
4/5
Incredible solos. Layla has one of the best riffs I’ve ever heard. The only problem is that it is 77 minutes of mostly the same idea. They’re doing a decent job of keeping it fresh, but the album still feels a tad bit repetitive.
OutKast
4/5
Honestly wasn't expecting to like this as much as I did. I was a bit worried about the runtime, but Stankonia managed to stay consistently good all throughout its a bit bloated 73 minutes. That being said, although I liked pretty much every track, there wasn't a single truly impressive one (apart from maybe B.O.B.). Also, unnecessary interludes are unnecessary.
Muddy Waters
3/5
I guess if you like blues, you'd get more out of this. For me, it just felt like one idea repeated over and over again, with the only highlight being Got My Mojo Working. Although not bad by any means, most of the music here wasn't particularly fun or interesting and felt outdated. It was an easy listen, though, so I can't say I disliked it.
R.E.M.
3/5
There's not really much I can say about this. It's just rather bland pop rock. Some catchy riffs, some fun lyrics, but nothing groundbreaking. Can't say it's bad, but this album is not something I would be excited to hear again. It's just fine.
Beatles
3/5
First off, who gave these people a second audio channel? Seriously, they use stereo way too aggressively. Sound stage? Nah, drums left ear, guitar right ear! It adds nothing to the music and is just annoying and distracting.
Okay, now to serious stuff.
This is my first The Beatles album. Furthermore, I've actually been avoiding listening to them. But why? They're The Beatles. Aren't they one of the biggest bands of all time? Of course, I'm aware of all the praise they get. But whenever I hear someone talk about The Beatles, it is almost always about how "influential" or "monumental" they are and rarely anything about the quality of their music. I'm not trying to downplay the band's impact on the music industry, but this is not what I'm looking for when choosing what music to listen to. Call me a philistine, but I don't care how important a specific song or album was to the history of music or how technically impressive it is—I just want it to sound good. Of course, I've seen praise for their music too, but none of what I had heard or read made me excited to listen to it.
That's why I avoided The Beatles—I was afraid that I was not going to like them. I realized that there was a pretty good chance that if I heard their music, I was going to become one of the very few people that don't care for them. And it's not like it's a simple unpopular opinion. Liking The Beatles is like some sort of a default opinion everyone who dares consider themselves a music nerd is simply expected to share. Not praising them is almost seen as flat-out wrong and an attribute of annoying contrarians and attention seekers. And I'm neither... well, at least I hope I am.
Look, I hate not sharing probably one of the most popular opinions in music as it will now forever sit at the back of my mind whenever I see people discuss the band and certainly don't want to be the person to go, "The Beatles? Yeah, they're mid," but unfortunately, this is what I got out of my first experience with their stuff.
So, does The White Album sound good? Well, yes... but I'm not impressed. Sure, It has a couple of bangers (Back In the U.S.S.R., While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Helter Skelter), but there are 30 songs here and most of the other ones are just decent to good. There's nothing wrong with the music here; I certainly didn't have any trouble getting through the album, but "decent to good" is not something you're supposed to expect from one of the most popular albums from arguably the most revered bands in history. The White Album is good, but it didn't grab my attention and felt like road trip music—pleasant but not exiting.
Maybe it was revolutionary at the time of recording, but it's not really an argument. The problem is not that it's old, the problem is that its outdated. There are amazing bands like Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Yes, Led Zeppelin, and many more that came immediately after The Beatles yet for me their music still feels gripping and fresh many decades later. And yes, it's likely that The Beatles actually influenced the creation of at least some of these bands, but it doesn't make their music any batter. The White Album, on the other hand, by today's standards, feels like simple pop rock with folk elements.
Yeah, I'm sorry, I don't get the appeal. My opinion may change when I listen to some of their other albums, but for now that's that.
Your mileage may vary.
7/10
Neil Young
4/5
Folk and country music is not my cup of tea, but Harvest is great. The low-key moments interconnect well with energetic electronic guitars and even some huge orchestral bits. The vocals are great and bring forth a nice vibe. Wasn't really a fan of some of the more laid back parts, but other than that, there's not much to complain about here.
Willie Nelson
2/5
Laid-back, vocal-based songs is probably my least favorite type music as there's usually not much to catch my ear. Not saying that Stardust is bad—the vocals here are great, and the instrumentation is… fine, I guess. I just didn't particularly care for any of the songs here since this kind of music is not for me. It was a little underwhelming.
5/10
Brian Eno
3/5
I feel like nothing happens in this album. Sure, there are chords and melodies, but none of that builds up to anything. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts has interesting ideas and is overall very well crafted, but these ideas are not expanded upon. Every song here feels like a good intro to a longer song... except the full version never comes.
Slipknot
3/5
Nu metal kind of got the worst of all worlds. It doesn't have the dark atmosphere or the songwriting of classic metal; it doesn't have the energy of early '90s metal; nor does it have the raw aggression and heaviness of modern metal. What does it have to compensate? I don't know actually, and this album certainly doesn't make things clearer. That being said, I personally don't have a strong opinion on nu metal and just find most metal from that era to be kind of mid, Slipknot included. But I recognize that there are also good things that came out of the nu metal era, like Deftones or System of a Down.
Nu metal seems to be treated as this bastard child of metal by much of the internet community, something you don't like but with whose existence you have to cope. For that matter, Slipknot being the poster child of the genre, it's hard to find any sort of civil discussion about this album, or any of their discography, really. For some reason, people seem to be more concerned with what is the age limit after which you're not allowed to enjoy Slipknot; whether or not you're a "poser" for liking them; or can you even consider nu metal as a whole "metal" (because that's an argument that exists, somehow).
But since nothing is going to stop children (be it mental or literal) from airing out their insecurities by stating that they definitely, without a shadow of a doubt didn't like a popular thing, let’s just not worry about any of this shit and talk about the music from Slipknot's self-titled, because this, at least in my humble opinion, is what music reviews are for.
I actually was pleasantly surprised with this album initially. Although simplistic, the first half had plenty of catchy riffs and lyrics. But that quickly started falling apart towards the second half. The riffs became monotonous and repetitive, and the vocals lost all of their charm. It is obvious that they just ran out of ideas after some time. This album just didn't have to be this long. Why commit to a 55-minute album when you don't have enough material? Just cutting this album to 35-40 minutes would've made it noticeably better (although all Slipknot albums tend to be on the longer side, for some reason). It also seems to have some problems with the mix. The guitars on some tracks sound overly compressed and sort of distant.
Overall, although I can't call this good music, I didn't hate it. The first half was pretty fun, but the second half has some boring songs and definitely drags the experience down. The people calling this unlistenable garbage are definitely overreacting, though—it's not that bad.
The Who
4/5
Nothing particularly special, just extremely fun, energetic riff rock. It’s simple and enjoyable. There's surprising amount of variation here, and the same riffs are not repeated over and over again (even in the 14-minute song). I wish they'd cut the talking out of the digital release, though, but it's not the album's fault.
The Killers
3/5
This is why I don't usually enjoy pop-adjacent music. It often isn't bad and actually a pretty fun first listen, but it so quickly becomes bland and uninteresting. Most of the time when I listen to pop music, I can't stop thinking, "This is just engineered to be inoffensive." I'm not trying to diminish The Killers' effort here, but since this is made for a wide audience, the result is a well-produced piece of decent but painfully unremarkable music. And this probably wouldn’t have been a problem if I hadn’t known what remarkable rock sounded like, but I do.
Air
4/5
I think it's extremely hard to make relaxing music not boring, but Moon Safari nails it. The first track set expectation extremely high (god, that bass), and although the rest of the songs didn't quite reach the same height, this album didn't disappoint. The songs here are chill yet atmospheric and engaging. The instrumentals are well-produced and are complemented greatly by vibey vocals. This album is not something I would've chosen to listened on my own, since calm electronic music without crescendos is not exactly for me, but I'm glad that I did.
I mean, Daft Punk if they were good, amirite?
Hugh Masekela
3/5
Jazz is one of the genres I don't fully understand yet, but I know that I'll probably get into later down the line.
As for this album specifically, honestly, there's not much to criticize here. Although I feels like it doesn't do a good job at separating itself from the rest, Home Is Where the Music Is is a solid jazz record with great performances all around. That being said, I don't understand why many artist are so averse to cutting their albums to more appropriate lengths. I'm not against long albums, but for the record to justify its length, in my opinion, it needs to either constantly rejuvenate itself with new and exciting ideas or be based around one idea and explore it with different approaches. Unfortunately, a lot of longer records, this one included, tend to fall under neither and be just repetitive.
7/10
Beatles
3/5
The Beatles continue to leave me woefully unimpressed. The music is nice, but "nice" is the highest compliment I can give it. It's enjoyable and has a couple of bangers, but it doesn't stand out. And this album is not something that I'd be particularly excited to relisten.
7/10
Missy Elliott
2/5
Quite basic and pretty uninteresting hip hop. It doesn't have any unique ideas, and most songs are not that catchy (Work It is a banger, though). It's not bad, but I got bored after the first half, so there's that.
5/10
Stevie Wonder
3/5
Good music, but not for me. Vocal-based music is just not that fun for me. I enjoyed the funky parts with more complex instrumentals a lot more than the relaxing soul ones, but unfortunately, they're not the majority. There's no denying that Stevie Wonder is a great vocalist, but I mainly enjoy music for the instruments, and there's nothing special about them on most tracks here.
7/10
Jimi Hendrix
3/5
I've listened to Hendrix's debut album a while back and wasn't impressed by it. Considering his reputation, I wanted to relisten to it for some time, since my understanding and taste in music have changed considerably since then. After listening to Axis: Bold as Love, I no longer think this is necessary, since the problems I've found with this album are largely the same.
Although I feel like Axis is an overall improvement at production quality, the main issue remains the same—Hendrix just can't write good music consistently. There's some genuine greatness here, and it’s hard to deny how good Jimi Hendrix is at playing guitar, but the rest sounds like generic psych/blues rock. From the two albums from him that I've heard, I would describe his music as "sparks of brilliance in the sea of mediocrity." To be fair, this is probably not his fault. As Hendrix, along with The Beatles, is seen as one of the biggest trendsetters in rock, it's the other bands that sound like him, not the other way around. But how good or bad the music was back when it was released is entirely irrelevant to how good it is today. And today Axis is still good but unimpressive.
7/10
Creedence Clearwater Revival
4/5
Short and sweet. Simple but fun. Great riffs, great vocals, great vibes. Doesn't have any sort of "wow" effect, but it does what it tries to do well.
Deep Purple
4/5
Hard rock is so fun, man. Deep Purple's Machine Head is perhaps a bit overplayed, but it's full of iconic banger with great riffs, impressive solos, and fun vocals nonetheless. The only complaint I have is that this album feels a little low energy. It's hard to explain exactly what I mean since I'm not familiar with music production terms, but the mix feels a bit barren, if that makes sense. There is not enough layers, not enough going on. Still a great album, but I wish it had more detail.
Tom Waits
3/5
I like weird experimental music, but some tracks here I did not like at all. This album is too inconsistent. Some songs are great, others are just boring. The second half, which is less experimental and has more conventional tracks, redeems it a bit, though.
Talking Heads
3/5
To me, Talking Heads is a band that makes accessible, decently fun, and very well produced music that, for some reason, has almost no charm to it. It's like pop but slightly better, excerpt slightly better is not enough for me to be a fan, because I don't like pop. Yeah, their music just doesn't impress me in any way. Their next album, Remain In Light, is slightly better, in my opinion, but I also couldn't find anything to praise it for.
Good music, but nothing remarkable.
7/10
Ladysmith Black Mambazo
3/5
Was skeptical going into this since I like loud, layered, complex music and a cappella is pretty much the antithesis of that. But this album turned out to be just... nice. It's easy to listen to, and I had no problem getting through it despite this kind of music being completely outside of my interests. But aside from being exceptionally accessible, there's nothing to praise this album for. It's too monotonous and not exciting. There's not a single song of even part of a song that stands out. This is nice background music, but it can't stand on its own.
Einstürzende Neubauten
1/5
I like the concept of noise music, but I've found that bare-bones noise/industrial records like this one tend to be rather boring and not really appealing to me. I like when noise is used as an extension of other genres, to add more weight, texture, accetuate certain parts of the record. Kollaps, however, doesn’t do that and is mostly a sound collage of different noises without a concrete structure.
Look, I don’t hate noise. The genre that got me into music was metal, which tends to be pretty noisy. Noise rock and shoegaze are some of my favorite genres. And my favorite band, Swans, used to be a noise rock band and still frequently incorporates elements of noise into their music. I understand that all I’ve listed here is basically "child's first exposure to noisy music," but I'm totally fine with liking it. Kollaps is a lot more sonically offensive than most of the noise music I like. This is not a problem on its own. What I don't like here is that there's not a lot structure or musicality, which is also not necessarily wrong, but I think there's only so many of music conventions you can sacrifice before it becomes completely unengaging.
I'm not saying "This is literally not music!" and I actually find that kind of attitude to be incredibly annoying and unfair. Who is to decide what counts as music and what doesn't? This kind of discussions are stupid and pointless. People come up with all kinds of arbitrary boundaries, but always fail to explain why would any of that matter. Jazz is not music because "it's just improvisation"; hip hop is not music because "they're just reading words" (also, the ones who think that tend to be not the biggest fans of black people, but that's a different story); metal is not music because "it's just random noises and screaming," etc. You know, vocals didn't used to be a part of the classical musicians' (who’ve invented music theory) repertoire originally. Does that mean every song that has vocals is not music? People need to come to terms with the fact that music, just like any other art form, constantly expands it's bounties and evolves. Whether you like these evolutions or not is irrelevant and doesn't make them any less “music.” Experimentation and diversions from popular norms lies at the core of art and is what makes it so exciting. I think noise music is totally valid, and you're allowed to dislike it, but "this is not music" is not legitimate criticism. This is also not what I dislike about this record.
I don’t like when artists use the whole dynamic range their recording equipment allows as I have to lower the gain and make the quiter sounds way too quiet just so the louder ones don’t obliterate my eardrums. I like music to feel actually mixed. I like music to have structure. A typical framework of buildups and crescendos is far more satisfying to me because of the way it balances anticipation and relief. In place of that, Kollaps has quiet, droney backdrops occasionally interrupted my loud metallic noises or screaming vocals, which are not pleasant to the ear (and yes, you can make noise and screms pleasant). The title track is good, though, but it is also the one which the furthest removed from the rest of the album’s soundscape.
I wouldn’t call Kollaps completely unlistenable or a total disaster, but I can’t say I enjoyed it. It’s not for me. If you’re a big fan of noise, you may like this, but I personally wouldn’t recommend it.
3/10
Al Green
3/5
To be honest, I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to get out of soul. If it's supposed to be relaxing and easy to listen to, then it succeeds, but it doesn't do anything to be interesting. This is just inoffensive music with nothing exciting about it. There's nothing wrong with that, but I'm not having much fun listening to this, which is what I really want from music.
Ray Charles
3/5
I really liked the opening song, but most others were a little boring. I feel like this type of music works best when it's energetic. That’s why I enjoyed the first song a lot, but the rest not so much. I would've certainly rated this album higher if everything were like the first song. I actually want to find more of this sort of energetic big band R&B Fallout type beat music, but this wasn’t it.
David Bowie
3/5
Has it's moments, but it lack energy, in my opinion. The opening song is really fun, and I wish all the others were like it. I also wasn't a huge fan of the ambient part in the second half.
7/10
Ella Fitzgerald
3/5
Just pleasant easy-listening vocal jazz. Inoffensive, not bad by any means. I was expecting it to be too much of a "quantity over quality" thing (considering it's over 3(!) hours long), but it turned out to be quite enjoyable with a surprising amount of nice grooves. There isn't anything that would draw me to this album over any other one with a similar vibe, but it works well as background music.
Also, yes, I did finish it before writing this. Professionals have standards.
7/10
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
3/5
Pop rock (derogatory).
Yeah, that's an album that... exists. I don't know what I was supposed to get out of this one. The band clearly didn't know either. This might be the most mid piece of media I consumed in the past year. It's far from good, and it's also far from bad. It's extremely hard for me to imagine someone going, "Yeah, this is fire" over this, but also nobody is going to despise it. It's just so painfully... okay.
The Stranglers
3/5
Decently fun new wave, but nothing particularly special. I had a good time, through.
7/10
Beth Orton
3/5
I hate pop because most of it just focuses on not being bad instead of trying to be good. Central Reservation is such a nothing burger, with great vocals and pretty much nothing else. Why would I choose to listen to something that's not trying to be good when there's so much music that actually tries to be exciting and succeeds?
Like, being a good vocalist—and Beth Orton is a good vocalist—is not enough to make good music. You have to think about the other aspects of the composition too. But here, in the first half, everything outside of vocals is unremarkable, and in the second half, they just completely gave up, it seems.
Bob Marley & The Wailers
2/5
This is my first reggae album... and I'm unimpressed. It was kind of boring and way to repetitive. It's vocal-based music, which is not really for me. I like music to be exciting, but this is laid-back and not really atmospheric at the same time. It's fine but not that fun. Also, it is probably the remaster's fault, but some track have way too much bass and it overpowers the rest of the sound (more of a minor complaint).
5/10
Fatboy Slim
3/5
As much as I'm not a fan of electronic music, Fatboy Slim has a couple of iconic tracks under his belt that I love. This album demonstrates that he can make incredibly catchy music... but not necessarily that he always does. This album consists entirely of repetitive loopy songs with occasional interludes and minor additions to the loops. The problem with this style is that for the songs not to sound boring, the loops need to be really good. This album achieves this... with various degrees of success. And here's the issue: The average song length here is over 5.5 minutes, which is on a longer side for dance music. I don't mind The Rockafeller Skank begin almost 7 minutes long, because it's fun as hell, but there are some tracks here that are not that good (In Heaven, You're Not From Brighton, Acid 8000), so instead they feel like an overly long slog.
You've Come a Long Way, Baby is definitely of its time, but it has its charm and the songs mostly range from fine to incredibly fun.
7/10
PJ Harvey
4/5
A lot of singer-songwriter albums fall short for me because I don't care about vocals that much and the instrumentation is usually quite boring and doesn't do much to make the songs more fun. However, I happen to enjoy this heavy alt rock style of instrumentation, so Dry, while still maintaining a bit of that singer-songwriter vibe, is a lot more exciting to me. It's simple but fun, catchy, and overall a pretty pleasant listen. Gives some Nirvana vibes. Whoever mixed that needs to be taken out back, though.
Ghostface Killah
3/5
The more I listen to music, the more I realize that the classic vinyl 40-minute format makes the most sense for compilation-style albums. I don't have anything against longer records, but I think that if the required time commitment exceeds 40-45 minutes, the album needs to justify it (like having an overarching narrative/some other sort of progression, or a lot of variety). An hour of standalone songs is just a bit too long for me. And it's not like the songs here are impressive. Don't get me wrong, they're pretty good overall, but aside from The Champ, none of them are all that memorable. I would rather artists make shorter releases but focus more on quality. And interludes... Don't, just don't.
7/10
Johnny Cash
2/5
This album is quite unique in a way that all the interruptions, jokes, bickering, and audience reactions are left in on purpose. And although I'd usually prefer the recording to be as clean as possible, it's hard to deny that all the imperfections add quite a bit of charm to it. That being said, I just don't get what people like about vocals. No matter how much I listen, I don't understand what I'm supposed to be finding in vocal-based music. I like vocals to be just another instrument, not completely take over the song. For me, it makes the music so much less interesting and engaging, especially when the songs are as monotonous as these ones. I just don't get how I am supposed to like music there only one "instrument" is good and all the others just support it when there's music there every instrument is good simultaneously.
5/10
Pixies
3/5
Fun indie rock. There's not much more to say. It's pretty good, but lacks some extra punch, so I can't say it's great. To be honest, I don't really get the hype around Pixies' first two albums. They’re not impressive at all.
7/10
Black Flag
3/5
Just like My War, Damaged has horrible production. That being said, I prefer this album over My War because it's significantly more fun and energetic. But just like My War, it's way too simplistic to my taste, and where Dead Kennedys, for example, have been able to compensate with just how incredibly fun their vocals are, the vocals here are just fine, I guess. One song here (TV Party) even has a similar vibe, but the rest are quite a bit different, so I didn't like them as much. Still a good album, but there are other ones that do the same better.
7/10
4/5
First of all, this is one of the most sick cover arts I've seen... and second of all, the music is almost on par. I was not expecting much from this album as I don't have a great tack record with pop rock, but wow, was I impressed. Finally, pop rock that actually does its job well! Despite the sad name, it's a bunch of fun songs with simple but great riffs and vocals. It's a bit on the longer side but manages to hold up well. This is what pop music supposed to be. Sorry, Blur, I was not familiar with your game.
Radiohead
3/5
This might seem like blasphemy, but I'm not a huge fan of Radiohead. I don't really understand the universal praise they get and have always found their music a little... unsatisfying? I can't explain what exactly I don't like about their music. Not that it's bad, I just think that it could've been better. It's one step from great, it's a little unresolving, if that makes sense, and The Bends is no exception. I feels like it's 50% great, but the other 50% are just fine. Yeah, I don't know, just think some parts here a little boring. I might come around to enjoying Radiohead eventually, but the time is not now, it seems.
7/10
AC/DC
3/5
The title track is a generational banger, and I like it as much as I did the first time I heard it. However, the other songs here are kind of more of the same but have less energy, less memorable lyrics, slightly worse riffs, and slightly worse solos. It's a really fun first listen, but the tracks just blend together—not a lot of replayability here.
7/10
Wilco
4/5
Although I do like atmospheric music, this sort of calm, mellow, bittersweet songs are not exactly for me... but this album is such a vibe. It's so well produced and feels incredibly nice. Even despite the fact that I prefer more exciting music, outside of Radio Cure and War on War, I like every song here.
Prince
3/5
I like most songs here, but I can't say I love any of them. Prince is a good vocalist, and the production is great. But the songs are too empty and drawn out. It also doesn't justify its length. I would've preferred to have less but more dense and less monotonous songs.
The Vines
3/5
A perfectly adequate rock album. It's nothing special and certainly has some filler, but it doesn't have any tracks I would call bad, and overall it's pretty decent.
7/10
The Young Gods
4/5
I actually... love this?
With experimental music, I feel like you often either love it or hate it. And this is right up my alley. It mostly consists of repetitive drums and samples and frantic vocals, but they're occasionally interrupted by amazing riffs and melodies. I think this album strikes a perfect balance between being atmospheric and exciting, and I actually enjoy this kind of approach a lot. It didn't overstayed its welcome and was never boring. The only song I didn't really like was Charlotte, but it's only 2 minutes. Definitely not the finest work of experimental rock I've heard but great nonetheless.
Sonic Youth
2/5
Sonic Youth is one of a number of well-regarded indie rock bands I just don't understand the appeal of. This album is such a nothing burger. It has a couple of great parts, but it’s mostly just pretty boring. I really like their vocalists, which is impressive considering that I'm usually indifferent to vocals, but they were underutilized here. It's not "atmospheric" or "fun," like I've seen it being described—just kind of underwhelming.
5/10
Arcade Fire
4/5
Indie rock is a genre that's just fundamentally not for me. I don't like simplistic music, and unless it's something rhythmically complex (like post-rock or totalism), it tends to be boring. Funeral, however, despite its melancholic tone, doesn't have a single boring song. I can't say what separates it from the competition—maybe it's the chamber music elements, maybe the amount of passion its performed with, or something else—but what I do know is that Funeral is a great album. I can't say I'm exactly impressed by anything here, but it's still an incredibly engaging listen with its fair share of bangers. It's what I would've liked all calm music to be—an easy listen that still manages to stay fun despite its relaxing nature.
Gene Clark
4/5
Wasn't expecting it to go this hard.
As someone who enjoys instruments and doesn't care much about vocals, country and its branches are naturally not exactly my thing. But the instrumentation here has this spacey, almost progy vibe, which I love a lot since 70s prog is, like, peak music in my eyes. Although this is not as vocals-forward as country tends to be, it is still singer-songwriter country rock, but it's a lot more palpable for my ADHD brain.
Turbonegro
3/5
The beginning of this album is good, like, really good. Just purely optimized to be as fun as possible and nothing else, which I appreciate. Fantastic loud, fast-paced, headbanging riffs and exciting vocal. But after that, Apocalypse Dudes just doesn't go anywhere else. The rest of the album is more of the same but a little worse: less energetic, less engaging. It just becomes stale and monotonous after a while. I still liked all the songs here, but the album had set my exceptions way too high in the beginning and then delivered something that's still good but slightly worse than what I was promised.
7/10
Bob Dylan
2/5
It's hard for me to evaluate this one because there's just nothing in this album that appeals to me. No hate to Dylan's writing or vocals, but I don't care much for them; and the instruments are... there... I can't say there's anything offensive about Blonde on Blonde (aside from maybe the occasional ear-piercing harmonica parts—not all of them are, just most...), but there's also nothing I love about it. There are a couple of songs here that I would consider decent (namely, Memphis Blues Again, which is quite good, actually), but apart from that, It's a bit of a slog and pretty underwhelming for me since my music taste is too far from this.
5/10
Baaba Maal
4/5
Instrumentation tends to be an afterthought in a lot of folk music, and as someone who doesn't enjoy vocals, that puts most of the genre outside of my interests. But seeing a folk album that puts great emphasis on the instruments, and that are not the western-style ones I'm used to and don't particularly enjoy, feels great. Sure, it's repetitive, but when the repeating part sounds this good, it doesn't really matter. Also, hats off to the production team. Both the instruments and vocals sound extremely clean, and the noise floor that frequently sours the experience of chill folk records is almost nonexistent (apart from the first half of track 6, for some reason).
I know nothing of the culture this comes from and don't understand the language, but the vibes here are immaculate. It's lush and dreamy and pleasant to the ear. This is a relaxing, feel-good record done extremely well. This kind of style is not exactly for me (I enjoy louder, more layered sound), but although I wasn't blown away, I can't say I wasn't surprised by how much I enjoyed this.
The Monkees
3/5
Bands in the 60s were really competing in who can make the most mid pop rock album, huh? I mean, you can listen to this if you want to, but why would you choose this over something that actually tries to be good? It's not like it's bad or boring or anything, and it's pretty short. But it's not designed to stand out—just not to alienate anyone. This is not going to be anyone's favorite album unless you have some sort of nostalgia to it because there's just nothing impressive here. It's understimulating, unsatisfying, and aggressively fine.
Jimmy Smith
2/5
It's... listenable, I guess? This is the type of music you would hear playing from ceiling speakers at a restaurant or something. And how often do you pay attention to that? This is not really my thing. There are some moments here that I like (mostly the saxophone parts towards the end of tracks 1 and 3), but it's most pretty underwhelming.
5/10
3/5
I would not call this your typical pop rock album because, unlike most pop rock bands, Oasis are at least trying to make something good here. Are they succeeding? Well, yeah? Sort of? This feels like a lesser version of The Smashing Pumpkins' best records: Noisy alt-rock mixed together with quieter, more personal acoustic songs, but with worse riffs, solos, and writing; less eclectic and energetic.
This is the kind of album that makes me wish I used the out-of-100 rating system instead. In 95% of the cases, I infinitely prefer the out-of-10 scale because it's the most accurate system I can use without my decision paralysis murdering me. But the gap between scores in it is not narrow enough to describe "this is, like, 10% better than that other album I'd heard." And Morning Glory is about 10% better than an average pop rock album. It's not the most groundbreaking stuff the genre has to offer, but considering the fact that a lot of pop rock is scientifically crafted to be the most mid music humanity could feasibly come up with at that point in history, this is an improvement. A marginal one, but still.
It feels like they had some good things going for them—some solid riffs, some catchy choruses—but then a producer came in and said, "What if this 42-year-old Christian stay-at-home mother of two from Birmingham finds this too loud? We can't have that!" and they had to dial it down a little. And this is essentially what holds most of pop back—the fact that the artists are forced to sacrifice creativity in favor of mass appeal because that's what the shareholders want. I can almost assuredly tell you that they’d wanted to go full shoegaze-mode at a couple of points, but the invisible yet powerful hand of Capital said that that way, Wonderwall wouldn’t become every acoustic guitar player’s sleep paralysis demon, so we got what we got.
Still, Morning Glory is definitely not the most soulless corporate music I've heard. I think they had good ideas but failed to realize them to their full potential. This is definitely not a bad album, but it feels like it had a solid foundation that went somewhat underutilized. Like I've said before, it's 10% better than an average pop rock album. And since an average pop rock album, in my experience, is around a 6, let's round it up and say this is a 7. But it's a pretty weak 7.
7/10
4/5
Not a huge fan of the three short tracks here (they're not bad or anything, just not that interesting), but the long ones are nothing short of fantastic. If this album were just these three songs, if would be a 9. WAR combine elements of funk, soul, and jazz in a very effective way to create these incredibly fun, catchy, and atmospheric tunes. The shorter songs hold the album back a little, but they don't ruin the experience.
Sugar
3/5
Not much to say. Pretty basic but fun alternative rock. Not much to criticize and not much to praise. Very consistent, cohesive, catchy, and decent all around. I like alt-rock, so I'm probably rating this a bit higher than it realistically deserves.
7/10
The Who
3/5
It's pretty good but a bit basic. It's not as energetic or riff-driven as hard rock tends to be, but despite that being the main reason I like the genre in the first place, Who's Next is never boring. It's just doesn't do anything unique or that exciting.
7/10
Kid Rock
2/5
When discussing art, I don't usually care about the political views of the artists as it is largely irrelevant to the quality of their work. Like, conservative comedians are bad at comedy not because of their views but because they lack the sharp, absorbing mind comedy requires, which is also the reason they arrived at these views in the first place. But everything has its limits. And for someone as outspokenly terrible as Kid Rock, there's no excuse. My judgment for the music of this racist bitch, who’s raging for the machine directly through his work, is always going to be clouded the same way it is, for example, for Kanye's music or Mold Lady's writing. My morals would simply not allow me to stop thinking about the vile shit they have said and done. But at the same time, I also don't feel bad for potentially misrepresenting them, so I guess that doesn't really matter since Kid Rock and his ilk don't deserve any sympathy in the first place.
That all being said, this album is... not terrible. Despite the fact that there isn't a single song I would consider good, there's a surprising amount of decent riffs, and the lyrics, although cringey, are mostly not obnoxious. The biggest crime this album is committing (besides being made by Kid Rock) is that it's just forgettable. Outside of the chorus of the opening track, everything else is pretty bland and monotonous (I don't think the flow changes a single time)... but not awful. This was before "owning the libs" became Kid Rock's entire personality, but all the lyrics here are the same basic edgy, boastful stuff about how "cool" he supposedly is, how much he supposedly parties, and how many women he supposedly fucks. I mean, this is the same guy who started a boycott of a beer company because the art on the can was forcing him to look at a woman, so take out of it what you will. Funnily enough, Eminem, who also failed to grow out of the same era of "dark" and "offensive" lyrics, is also on this album (not that his contribution is significant). He's probably the poster child of that style of writing, but unlike Kid Rock, Eminem could sort of write and definitely could rap, and seems to be a decent person (citation needed).
Yeah, I was expecting a lot worse. Devil Without a Cause is not unlistenable and even has its moments, but it's very basic, occasionally cringey, and a bit too long.
5/10
Billie Holiday
1/5
Oh boy. Here we go, an album I can't come up with a reasonable defense for...
I've always been an advocate of approaching art patiently. I think if you don't finish something because it is "boring," you don't get to have an opinion about it because you haven't engaged with the art in its intended way. You don't get to judge the quality of the whole movie if you stopped watching halfway through because you thought that the prologue was too boring. To assess its merit, you first need to know what it was building up towards.
If someone were to ask me to create a long list of my favorite songs, probably 80% or even more of it would consist of tracks that are over 10 minutes long. Longer formats give musicians more room for artistic expression, let them paint a more full, bigger picture. By not being confined by time restrictions, they're not forced to be eloquent and can fill the composition with as much detail as they want. Of course, you can't expect a 20-minute song to be structured like a pop track. The parts will have to be longer, and there's going to be more of them. This almost inevitably leads to the emergence of more low-key or even "boring" parts.
But isn't this a problem? If some part is boring, doesn't it bring the whole song down? Well, in the case of long-form music, not necessarily. If I'm listening to something like GY!BE of Swans, the low-key parts are not going to bother me since I know that somewhere in the song, there is a part that is going to blow me away with it's sheer sonic power. Although this sort of minimalistic, quieter, more relaxed composition would usually be a problem for me, in this specific case, it is actually a benefit because it helps to establish atmosphere and build up anticipation before a huge reveal. A good build up enhances the crescendo by rewarding patience. This is what makes me like long songs so much.
In a typical pop or EDM song, before the chorus or the drop—the part that is supposed to be the most hype—you'll get, like, 30 seconds, maybe a minute, of build up. It just never hits that hard. Even when it's not bad, I never stop thinking that, compared to long-form songs, they fail to appropriately build anticipation. The composition of the song doesn’t do enough to make me hyped up for the drop—the vibes are just not there. It is certainly not impossible to achieve a similar effect in a shorter time frame. Off the top of my head, one example would be Fade to Black by Metallica. Before arriving at arguably one of the best riffs ever written, the songs spends 2 minutes on build up that does its job incredibly well. Still, although short build ups can be good, the strongest ones are always longer.
But how does this all relate to Lady in Satin? Well, that’s precisely the problem—it doesn’t. It doesn’t have any huge or impactful parts. Neither the instruments nor the vocals are going for anything catchy or interesting. Nothing stands out, there’s no build up, nothing to anticipate, and nothing to get excited about. There’s nothing to catch your attention. You can be patient and sit through it (like I did), but there’s no reward. This is worse than elevator music, because elevator music is at least trying to be pleasant. Imagine an album that consists entirely of the boring parts of long songs—it is meaningless since the entire purpose is build up. It’s not underwhelming—it’s just not “whelming” at all. This album is completely devoid of fun.
Even before I started listening to music, I sort of knew that vocal jazz would be at the absolute bottom tier of my preferences. This kind of music doesn’t attract me at all. I hate this slow and brooding style of vocals and instruments with no meaningful variation of tone or volume throughout the songs; no crescendos and barely any accents to break the monotony. Since then, I've learned that there's perhaps a bit more to this genre than I'd originally given it credit for, but I doubt that there's anything that would make me like it. This is just something that is fundamentally not for my taste. My ADHD brain simply can't handle something SO understimulating.
Lady in Satin is the absolute embodiment of everything I dislike about vocal jazz with not a single thing that would've made it a little bit more palpable for me. It doesn’t feature anything I typically enjoy about music. Although it’s not offensive in any way—it’s not going to blow your ears out or have any tonally unpleasant sounds—it is boring to an utterly absurd degree.
I know this probably reads like an angry rant, but it’s really not. I’m not angry. I just think that this is an extremely boring album—that’s it. Music is meant to be entertaining, and in my opinion, this is simply not.
On an unrelated note, this is the second vocal jazz album I've heard that uses the word "gay" at least once... I'm starting to think it might've meant something different in the 50s...
Black Sabbath
4/5
Black Sabbath is a great testament to just how far solid hard rock songwriting can get you. They might not have the most technically impressive or detailed sound, but by god, are these riffs and solos ever satisfying. Add some spice in the form of a little bit of extra heaviness, and you’ll get one of the most celebrated bands in rock (and metal) history (and for good reason). This particular album, though, is a bit inconstant and stylistically all over the place, but the highs are so high that I'm willing to forgive FX... but only begrudgingly.
Simon & Garfunkel
4/5
Was not expecting to like this, especially not this much. Usually this kind of music would not be for me, but this is a rare example of a chill and soothing folk album that manages to stay fun the whole way through. It doesn't leave instrumentation in the gutter, it's not repetitive or monotonous, and all the crescendos here a extremely well made (the title track and The Boxer are so damn good). This is just a very pleasant and enjoyable listen. Wasn't a huge fan of the more laid-back song here as they're pretty much typical American folk that I find boring, but there are only a couple of those, so this is still a great album. This is not the kind of music I see myself returning to often, but I enjoyed the experience a lot.
Tricky
3/5
This is pretty good, actually. It's an extremely clean and well produced album that doesn't lack in ideas. Abbaon Fat Tracks has probably the single most horny rhyme scheme I've heard, and I love it. But it's too simple and repetitive for my taste, so I liked it but wasn't over the moon about it.
7/10
Janis Joplin
4/5
Fun, energetic, passionate blues rock. Just how I like it, but nothing groundbreaking... And Mercedes Benz is also there, I guess...
Blur
3/5
Blur's self-titled is their first attempt at evolving their sound and moving away from britpop. As such, this album feels more like a mish-mash of different styles than a coherent listen, with some parts being more successful than other. Although I'm not a huge fan of the more lo-fi sound they went with here, I don't hate anything about this album and actually like most of the songs. But its inconsistency definitely bring the experience down.
7/10
The Kinks
3/5
This is fine... I guess? It's not a bad album, it's just not that interesting and pretty outdated. It's not boring, but I didn't feel anything when listening to it. This sort of chill, easy-listening rock is not my thing, and this album doesn't do enough to differentiate itself from all the other similar ones.
Brian Wilson
3/5
A wonderfully produced concept album that unfortunately goes for a vibe I don't care for at all.
It's hard for me to come up with any criticism for this album. It has great, detailed, lush production with fantastic vocals. I think it's really good. The only problem that ruins that whole experience for me is that I don't like this pastoral, lively vibe. As a person who hates everything about the countryside, I obviously find the atmosphere this album presets significantly less romantic than Brian Wilson. It is also almost entirely vocal-focused—the vocals are on the top of the mix in most songs—and since I don't particularly enjoy vocals, this is another point that brings this album down for me.
Yeah, I think Smile is a great album that just happens to combine a couple of things I don't enjoy, therefore ruining the experience for me.
Aimee Mann
3/5
It's high-budget, well-produced pop rock. It's perfectly fine and listenable, but it's not trying to be good—and it's not. Kind of basic and a bit uninspiring but adequate.
David Bowie
3/5
Definitely a fun album with a nice vibe, but at the same time, that's nothing especially interesting or exciting about this. I enjoyed listening to it, but nothing stood out, and I don't think I'm going to return to it.
7/10
Alexander 'Skip' Spence
2/5
I don't hate this, but this is not that different from other American folk from that time, which I don't really like. It's too minimalistic, too monotonous, and not that exciting. On its own, the music is solid, but the style is just not for me.
5/10
Morrissey
3/5
As awful as Morrissey is as a person, this is just a collection of very solid pop songs. I don't think this says much, but this is a very well made and pleasant-sounding pop rock album—inoffensive but not to the point of being uninspired or boring. There's nothing groundbreaking here or anything that appeals to my particular tastes, but every song, by all accounts, is pretty good.
7/10
3/5
I loved how massive the beginning of this album sounded, but then it lost a great deal of its epicness, which soured the experience for me. The first four and the last track are great and pretty unique. They're overproduced but not to the point of sounding noisy or chaotic and are just extremely loud and anthemic, which I really enjoyed. All the other tracks mostly sound like Radiohead songs... and I'm not a huge fan of Radiohead. They're not bad or anything, but I was disappointed that most of the energy was lost in favor of just sounding like another band—and a band I'm not big on at that.
7/10
Primal Scream
3/5
Has really cool ideas and some fun, unique trippy parts, but half of the tracks feel like filler, with how simplistic and repetitive they are. Eventually the album stars to drag a little.
Donald Fagen
5/5
This is probably a cringe analogy, but since I don't care about vocals, finding a great pop album is like a legendary gacha pull for me. I find one at a rate of about one a year... and I guess this year is now locked in.
When I heard the first track, I thought there was no way any other song here would be on the same level, but then it just kept going. This album could be carried by atmosphere alone. I think it goes for a similar vibe to Japanese city pop, but unlike most city pop, actually achieves it. It's smooth, jazzy, and lush in a best possible way, with even some elements of rock sprinkled in when it's most appropriate. This is not my preferred atmosphere (I like something more heavy or energetic), but the effectiveness of the way this album achieves it deserves praise. And the production is just unmatched. This is one of the most clean and well produced albums I've ever heard, with its incredibly orchestral arrangements and vocals that, instead of overpowering the instruments like it usually is in pop, actually add something to the composition and sound fantastic.
9/10
Radiohead
3/5
Radiohead is a unique band. I feel like no musical act combines commercial and critical success like they do. They make weird, experimental music that somehow has mass appeal. It seems like everyone loves them, but for some reason, I consistently fail to understand why. Even though I already decided that I’m not a fan of their music a long time ago, this overwhelming praise makes me relisten to Ok Computer, Kid A, and In Rainbows on a semi-regular basis in case I start to “get” them someday. And here I am, sitting down to listen to Kid A again, thinking, like the clown I am, “This time for sure”… And for what seems like a hundredth time, I once again can only come up with a single compliment—it’s good… But that’s kind of it.
I don’t think I’m weird for thinking that Radiohead’s popularity makes no sense. They’re not making music to appeal to the masses and constantly experiment with their sound. Their songs are sophisticated and artsy, and you can’t dance to them. Like, this is the last band among the ones that don’t make their sound repulsive on purpose you’d expect to be popular. Yet they are. Radiohead make unusual music, but I wouldn’t call it challenging. They’re kind of a gateway drug into experimental music, but since a lot of the experimental stuff tends to be significantly more abrasive than Radiohead, most of their fans don’t seem to move past them. I'm certainly not inclined to call Radiohead fans pretentious losers (that would be friendly fire), but I get the impression that at least some of them say they like the band only because everyone else seems to. This is not meant as an insult to Radiohead fans. I don’t think liking them necessarily says something about your character, nor am I trying to spew some elitist bullshit about what bands people can’t like to not seem stupid to me (unless the band in question is, like, Imagine Dragons or something). Radiohead is just not a band I would expect to be popular, so the praise they get seems somewhat inflated to me. There probably is not an insignificant amount of people that conditioned themselves into enjoying them significantly more than they otherwise would have after seeing the overwhelmingly positive reviews. But I might totally be projecting, since the reason I constantly return to Radiohead is because the reviews totally conditioned me into feeling I’m missing something. There’s also not a single band I’m aware of that even remotely replicates the feel of Radiohead, and that may also be a factor. I don’t know for sure.
And the thing is, I don’t really understand why I’m not a fan of them. I like well-produced atmospheric experimental music, so they should be right up my alley. But somehow they’re not. Maybe it’s the focus on vocals, maybe it’s the dark, melancholic vibe. There’s not a single thing I can point at and confidently say, “That’s what ruins it.” This is especially true for Kid A, which is my favorite Radiohead album. The music here is good, even occasionally amazing. I like every song here, except that ambient one, but we don’t talk about that (and if you like it, I get it—I also think sex is kinda gross). Everything In Its Right Place is a fantastic album opener, and its first few notes have been stuck in my head since the first time I heard it; the lyrics of Optimistic and the melody of In Limbo are so unbelievable memorable; even the more industrial sound of Idioteque somehow appeal to me besides the fact that I don’t like electronic music that much; and The National Anthem is quite possibly one of the best songs I’ve ever heard. With this album more than any other one from them, I feel like it’s going to “click” eventually, but it’s been so long that I’m not that sure anymore. Radiohead’s songs are anything but forgettable, but at the same time, most of them are not that fun for me. I can appreciate the effort and talent that went into creating this; I get that probably some very specific mood I've apparently never been in would make this the most ethereal experience ever. But I just don't enjoy it that much on its own merit. I don't fully get it and don't know why. I can with utmost confidence say that this is good music, but for me, it doesn't cross the line of being something truly special.
Okay, Radiohead... next time for sure...
7/10
The Mamas & The Papas
2/5
Most songs here are a little bland and forgettable, but California Dreamin'... holy shit, what a masterpiece of a pop song. I don't hate this album, but there's just nothing that interesting here, and it's pretty outdated. At least it's short...
5/10
Metallica
4/5
As much as I agree with the sentiment that this album marked the beginning of the downfall of Metallica's songwriting and a shift towards a more soft, "mainstream" sound, I wouldn't count this album as a part of that downfall as it is, not unlike their previous ventures, great. Despite the fact that the Black Album, in my opinion, has nothing on Master of Puppets or Ride the Lightning, it is still filled with incredibly catchy, groovy riffs and Hetfield's satisfying vocals. Nothing here is revolutionary or boundary pushing, but it's not meant to be. Similar to something like Painkiller (although, in my opinion, not quite as powerful), it goes for this simple, catchy, headbanging metal fun and achieves it with great success. Although something tells me that the thing that had prompted Metallica to drop thrash was how hard they got mogged by Megadeth's Rust in Peace in that department. But who knows.
Also, why one of the tracks called Don't Tread on Me and the libertarian snake is on the cover? I'm not gonna google it just in case in means what I think it means... Rebellion is when you advocate for a system where corporations abuse people and the government can't do anything to stop them...
Cocteau Twins
3/5
This is the kind of album that is very good, I know is very good, but can't fully appreciate because it's not my kind of vibe. I know that it goes for this dreamy, ethereal atmosphere, and it also achieves it really well. But this type of sound is not really my thing. Even when listening to atmospheric music, I prefer it being more varied and exciting. Dream pop, however, is by definition very soft and monotonous, which is just not that fun for me. In short, Heaven or Las Vegas achieves its goal extremely well, but I'm not a huge fan of that goal; however, it's the quintessential dream pop album, and if you like that kind of sound, you'll like this.
7/10
R.E.M.
3/5
A bit too simplistic and low-energy for my taste, but overall all the songs sound nice. Can’t say anything bad about them; I'm just not particularly thrilled.
7/10
Madonna
2/5
I don't like pop. I never have. My distaste towards pop is what essentially got me into music. When exposed to popular music, I used to think, "No way all of it is this bad, right?" And thankfully, after digging a bit deeper, I found out that there's a huge amount of artist that are driven by the pursuit of artistic expression and not profit incentives. I feel like most pop albums I liked appeal to me despite being pop. If your main motivation for creating is to make a product to be sold to a wide audience, it will only result in good art accidentally. Pop albums are usually professionally produced but completely lack soul. This genre is popular because it's inoffensive and specifically created not to alienate anyone instead of trying to create something interesting. The wider audiences don't want good music—they want accessible music.
All of this is completely fine, by the way. I don't think that pop is harmful to music. If anything, exposing more people to the art form brings more potential musicians into the scene, and at least some of them are gonna stay for the love of the game and not money. I'm just a little frustrated by the fact that a lot of people seem to think that popular equals good, which is demonstrably untrue (and anyone who disagrees I challenge to sit through a single Ed Sheeran album). Not all pop is bad, of course (just most is), but enforcing strict boundaries on your artistic expression just to make sure that as much people like your output is certainly not helping make better art (I know this doesn't apply to all sub-genres of pop, but it should be obvious by now that I'm talking about pop of the corporate variety people like Taylor Swift make). I'm also not trying to shame anyone for liking pop. Most people just listen to whatever radio or the algorithm serves them, and nobody should be forced to exert effort to "understand" what "good" music sound like. I'm not gonna think less of you if you're convinced that Imagine Dragons produce straight bangers (well, maybe a little), and to think this is acceptable behavior is ridiculous. Despite what my affinity towards yapping sessions may tell you, I don't actually think it's that deep.
This album, however, is a bit more unique, in a sense that despite being a pop record from the beginning to the end, it doesn't stick to a single sub-genre. It's not as monotonous as most of the records in the sea of corporate music. What we have instead is a sort of smorgasbord of slop, each song equally as uncreative and uninteresting but in their unique ways (except Oh Father—this song is actually good). Rock slop, dance-slop, slop soul, baroque slop, and even psychedelic slop—we got them all here! But the uninspired nature of this album doesn't let this fact help. And although half of the songs are fine, the other is very boring, probably because of the extremely generic vocals and dull writing, making the experience of listening through it a little tedious.
5/10
Klaxons
3/5
Some songs here are not that good and pretty boring (and at least one with very poor production), but the rest, especially in the later half, are quite catchy and entertaining. There's nothing impressive here and the quality is a bit inconsistent, but overall I had fun listening to this album.
7/10
U2
3/5
Post-punk is like pop rock's younger, slightly less ugly sibling, in my experience. Like, it's sometimes fun, sometimes catchy, and there are some bangers made within the genre (Joy Division), but most of it makes me feel absolutely nothing. War is kinda more of the same. Can't say it's bad, but I'm largely indifferent to the music here. I also don't like the production that much. It sounds clean, sure, but it's so thin and weak.
Michael Jackson
4/5
To be honest, I like this album more than Thriller. The exceptional production is still there, but I think Off the Wall has less dead moments and filler (there's still some, though). It's more energetic, and the instrumentation is better, in my opinion. It's a simple but fun, catchy, and memorable album.
ABBA
3/5
The first 4 songs are very good, but the rest is on the boring side. I don't know why they switched the style on the B-side, but if they continued doing the same they had been doing on the A-side, the album would've been much better. It's still fine, through, just disappointing.
The Kinks
3/5
This is certainly in the better half of 60s' pop rock, but at this point, considering how far rock has evolved past that, this style is so outdated that I can't imagine preferring this over some more modern alternatives. Also, stereo... I hate aggressive use of stereo.
7/10
A Tribe Called Quest
3/5
I like the writing and the rhythmic beats and flow, but there's just nothing special about this album. If you want some chill hip hop, this is perfect, but that's not what I prefer this genre to sound like. I like something more energetic and aggressive (yes, I like pretty much the same stuff most white hip hop fans like, sue me). This album is a bit to repetitive for me: There is not enough iterations within tracks, or the same iterations repeat with some regularity. Good album, not really my vibe.
7/10
The Black Crowes
4/5
There's nothing all that special about this album, but I'm just very partial to this style of hard rock. It's fun and energetic with a bunch of catchy riffs and passionate vocals. Really enjoyed it.
Suicide
3/5
Way to minimal and repetitive for my taste. Every song is pretty much one chord progression repeated over and over again with minimal differences and some extra sound effects and vocals on top. They're not bad or anything, but I prefer music to be more detailed, varied, and exciting—and this is just not that. It's fine but would've been boring if it were longer than 30 minutes.
System Of A Down
5/5
This is totally a hot take, but I prefer SOAD's debut over Toxicity. Don't get me wrong, I think Toxicity is conceptually and lyrically superior... but this one is just so fun. Seriously, this is one of the most engaging album I've ever heard. Every song is amazing. It has a bunch of incredible riffs with the most perfect alt-metal guitar tone, and, despite being a metal fan, Serj Tankian is one of the very few extreme vocalists I actually like (not that I hate extreme vocals; they're just not for me—I tolerate them, but almost never prefer). I'll never grow tired of this album as it has almost no downtime. Every song is a constant onslaught of some of the most satisfying metal out there.
9/10
Queen
4/5
Can't really say much about this album. Fun, engaging songs structures, interesting guitar work with some epic moments, good vocals. Great album, but nothing impressive—I just love hard rock.
New Order
3/5
Not really my vibe. It's fine but lacks energy and excitement, in my opinion. This is just background music.
Tina Turner
2/5
She has a pretty good voice, but every song on this album is so basic and uninteresting. This the stuff you hear on your car radio. Sure, the music is playing, but you only occasionally remember that it's there just because nothing catches your ear. And the entirety of this album is that. Although I don't think it's bad, I don't really see a reason to go out of my way to listen to this. The title track is pretty nice, though.
5/10
Pink Floyd
5/5
Pink Floyd's best album (in my opinion) and one of my favorite albums of all time. A flawlessly executed work. Shine On You Crazy Diamond is genuinely one of the greatest songs ever conceived, and all other songs except Welcome to the Machine slap (it's not bad, I just don't really like the vocals, and the synths are a bit too much). It's not quite a 10/10 for me since “smooth” music like this is not really my thing and I like something more energetic, but it's extremely close. I'm totally nitpicking, by the way. It's a phenomenal album, but it doesn't suit my tastes as well as some others.
9/10
Kings of Leon
3/5
I don't really know what to say about this. It's not bad, it's not good. It's not fun, it's not boring. Just completely unremarkable and average.
LL Cool J
3/5
What originally turned me away from hip hop is that a lot of rap artists had seemed to hard-focus on lyrics and put pretty much all the other aspects of music production on the back burner. As someone who's a lot more fond of instrumentation than vocals and doesn't like analyzing lyrics all that much, for the longest time, I thought that rap was something that I'll never be able to get into. I've since learned that this approach to hip hop production is not at all universal. There's a lot of hip hop, especially in the last couple of decades, with more detailed and engaging (at least for me) instrumentals and more variety in lyrical delivery. But a lot of modern hip hop and most of the older hip hop still consists of basic, rhythmic, repetitive beats and flows with not much variation, of which I'm not huge fan.
This album is definitely of the more "traditional" variety. The tracks here are not bad, but none of them excite me. Like, I didn't mind this album playing in the background—the beats and the rapping are solid—but nothing about it made interested in paying more attention. This album is just pretty generic and not that imaginative. But if you're into this style, I can totally see you enjoying this far more than me. Cool J is a good rapper (can't really talk about the lyrics because I didn't pay a lot of attention to them), and the production is pretty clean. But this minimalistic approach is not for me. This album is fine, but it's not something I would consider relistening. There's a lot of hip hop I like, and none of it follows this formula.
Beatles
2/5
60s' pop rock being 60s' pop rock with the added benefit of horrible use of stereo. Not terrible but outdated and quite boring.
Buddy Holly & The Crickets
2/5
Extremely basic and extremely outdated. It's not bad by any means, but music has evolved so much past this. Compared to the options we have right now, this is just underwhelming. But it's very short, so that's nice, I guess.
5/10
Heaven 17
3/5
It's crazy to think that in the 70s, when synthesizers first started to widely appear in music, the prog bands got it right pretty much immediately, but the rest, for some reason, up until pretty much the 90s had... this...
This album is fine, but it's early synthpop, and it shows. It feels more like a proof of concept than a mature work, which is weird since we had had good synths a decade before that. It's too minimalistic for my tastes, and the instrumentation feels a little dry, especially in the second half. It's very much a product of it's time.
Jimi Hendrix
3/5
Along with The Beatles, The Jimi Hendrix Experience is another of the universally praised classic rock bands the appeal of whom I just don't get. I'm not denying Hendrix's skill or his influence, but, like, there's so much music right now that is just miles ahead of this, no?
This album is good. The riffs are solid (despite the outdated production, but that's not really the band's fault), I like his voice, and the songwriting is catchy enough... But the amount of praise this album gets feels so inconsistent with it's actual quality, in my opinion. Maybe it was groundbreaking at the time, but I don't think it held up well. I write this after the third listen, and there certainly have been times when it took me even more to "get" an album, but I just don't see what to "get" here.
It's solid. Don't understand the praise.
7/10
Curtis Mayfield
3/5
Not a fan of chill soul like this, but this is one of the better implementations that I've heard. Good vocals and pleasant melodic instrumentation. Definitely a bit too quiet and smooth for my taste, but that's just the genre. There isn't really anything to write home about, but a nice listen nonetheless.
7/10
Prince
5/5
This album is incredible on a couple of levels. First, it is an actually great pop rock record (which is akin to a unicorn sighting already considering how oversaturated and unimaginative this genre is). And second, this little man made me care about vocals, which only a select few albums could do.
You know, it's surprising to me how little fun music a genre that is supposedly all about catchiness produces. Most pop rock bands focus so much on trying to produce something that as inoffensive as possible that they forget to make it interesting. And unfortunately, considering how many successful pop rock bands there are, this strategy seems to work. Some of the most catchy music I've heard unironically comes from prog rock, which has the opposite of pop rock's philosophy of simplicity. Why? Because there’s a lot more artistic expression in that genre. Instead of following the norms, they break them if that means creating better art. I don't know, maybe 4/4 songs mathematically engineered to be the most basic shit ever because statistics tell that that's what an average Joe likes is not that fun for someone who listens to more music than just what comes up on radio. I'm not trying to be snobby, but it's just frustrating to me how little effort some popular bands put into their music and still remain successful. This album, however, is nothing alike. This is some of the most fun and exciting music I've ever heard. This is what the genre is supposed to be like but unfortunately isn't.
I also don't find vocals all that fun, which is another huge discrepancy between me and an average listener. But Prince's singing is just so good on this record that I couldn't not pay attention to it. Such horny writing usually makes me cringe a bit, but Prince delivers it with such electrifying passion that it almost makes me believe that he's actually straight. Even through I have no interest in the subject matter this album presents, there's so much energy seeping through Prince's vocals that it's nothing short of contagious. There's a couple of laid back songs on this album that are not quite on the same level with the best bangers here, in my opinion, but even they have something to love about them, like that incredible screaming part in The Beautiful Ones, which a pretty mediocre track outside of that (yes, actual extreme vocals on a pop album).
Honestly, what a ride.
9/10
The Zombies
3/5
Some solid choruses and fun writing here and there, but nothing particularly special. Don't really care for the vocals, and instrumentation has that characteristic 60s' outdated, recessed sound, which I don't like. It takes a lot to make me care about a pop record, and although this album is fine, it doesn't do enough.
Cocteau Twins
3/5
About on par with Heaven or Las Vegas but a bit more minimalistic. Similarly also, I can totally see why people enjoy this, but it's not really my thing. For atmospheric music, I would rather listen to post-rock or atmo-black metal; calm atmospheric music like dream pop/ethereal wave don't really do it for me. Shoegaze is pretty much a heavier version of dream pop, and I like it more also. This album is too relaxed and not very exciting, which I don’t really like. Still an enjoyable listen but didn’t blow me away.
7/10
Peter Gabriel
3/5
This is a more "artsy" approach to pop, which I appreciate. Red Rain, Sledgehammer, and Big Time are great, extremely engaging songs. The vocals are fun, and the production is fantastic, with a wide, immersive soundstage that sounds big and busy yet clean at the same time... But the rest of the songs are just fine and dragged my experience down quite a bit. They're way too quite and way to "ambient" with barely any accents, which I'm not a fan of. And when Don't Give Up manages to stay exciting despite the somber tone, the rest... not so much. This album would've been much better if all the songs sounded more like the first two, in my opinion.
7/10
The Sonics
4/5
A garage rock album that's actually been recorder in a garage, it seems. God, that recording quality... Yes, most albums from the 60s sound terrible by today's standards (and are not made for headphones), and I don't usually complain about this, but this album is so awfully mixed and mastered and sounds so crusty and peaky and that actively destructing. Outside of that, this album is actually great. Chaotic, extremely fun, and energetic. It has a couple of slower songs that are not on par with the rest, but overall it’s still very enjoyable.
The Byrds
3/5
Pleasant, melodic music with fun vocals, and unlike a lot of 60s' rock, even well produced. Not really my thing, but I still enjoyed it. Nothing all that special as it's still pop rock–esque writing (with folk elements), but the execution is better than average, in my opinion.
7/10
Willie Nelson
3/5
County is one of the genres I don't see myself getting into. I certainly don't have a hate boner for it like a lot of people seem to, but the vibe nor the sound of country don’t appeal to me at all.
This album is fine. But it's definitely not something I would relisten (or even listen on my own time in the first place). It's quiet, chill, and relaxing and is decent background music. If you enjoy this kind of vibe, then it's good, but it's not something I'm looking for in music.
Pantera
3/5
I remember when I first heard Pantera in elementary school, I though this was the heaviest shit ever, and almost too heavy to bare. It's surprising to me how soft their music sounds now that I've listen to a lot more metal. I mean, it's still on the heavier side, but it's so far from some of the most heavy music out there.
I find that when riffs are as slow as they are here, they need to be very heavy and groovy for me to like them, and this album, despite begin classified as groove metal, often delivers on neither of these aspects (there are still some good ones, through, like in This Love). The overall quality of the riffs is fine, but none of them blew my mind. Actually, the faster, thrashy songs here (Fucking Hostile, Rise) were my favorite by far, but these are the ones that divert the farthest from the rest of the album's soundscape, so it's not really a compliment.
I don't know, I was expecting more.
ABBA
3/5
I don't really like ABBA. They have some great songs, but on average, their music is whatever (which is typical for popular pop artists, to be honest). This album is no exception. I don't hate it, but it's just so unremarkable. For every artist, I would rather them release less music and focus on the quality. I don't care how much great music a band made combined over their albums; the most powerful experience is a single album with a very high concentration of bangers (compilations don't count since the songs in them were not originally designed to go together). ABBA can make good music, but their albums tend to have a couple of good songs (Dancing Queen, Knowing Me, Knowing You, and Money, Money, Money for this one specifically) and the rest is filler.
The Isley Brothers
3/5
Chill, well-produced music that manages to stay engaging throughout the whole album is quite a rare experience for me since I prefer exciting music, but this is definitely it. I can't say there's anything that punches above the rest in this album (apart from that solo in Summer Breeze), but it sounds nice.
7/10
Booker T. & The MG's
3/5
Just background music. Definitely not bad and has its moments, but most songs don't catch my attention with their pretty basic and repetitive melodies.
Sisters Of Mercy
4/5
Not usually a fan of repetitive music, but the melodies and riffs here are great. This album has great atmosphere, and the fun vocals make it engaging. Even the 10-minute track is a bop all the way through (but especially towards the end).
Throwing Muses
3/5
Nothing particularly special, but it's just fun, energetic post-punk with fun melodies and vocals. Not amazing but has a fair bit of variety and pretty engaging overall.
7/10
Moby
4/5
Was not expecting to like this at all, let alone this much. I don't like chill, repetitive electronic music, but the atmosphere here is fantastic. The beats and melodies are so groovy and fun that the repetitions actually helped. And there was enough variety to keep me engaged for the entire hour of runtime. There isn't any songs that blew my mind, but their average quality is very high, and overall this album offers a pretty coherent experience. It also gets a bit too ambient for my taste towards the end, but otherwise, it's great.
Rage Against The Machine
5/5
I agree that the fact that RATM were signed to Sony kind of diminishes their message. I don't think it means that they don't actually agree with what they're saying and just grifting or whatever, but it is a strange decision nonetheless and shows that they at least don't have the Fugazi-level of dedication.
I know that most discussions around RATM are centered around their politics (which is unsurprising considering the overtly political nature of their music). I personally listen to music just for entertainment and not political messaging. If I agree with the politics of an artist I already like, it just a sort of thing that makes me appreciate them even more but doesn’t necessarily matter otherwise. Someone like GY!BE, who have a grand total of zero words over all of their releases, having the words “Transphobes eat shit and die alone” strapped to one of their amps during shows (and their song and album titles, of course) certainly adds some sympathy points from me, but it doesn’t affect my enjoyment of their music in any way. And if the artist I like is a terrible person, my reaction is usually to just say “bummer” and move on. But no matter how compelling I or anyone else may find the message, I don't care if the music is shit... and the music of RATM's self-titled is decisively not shit.
This album has some of the best riffs of any album I've heard. They're funky, groovy, and just incredibly engaging and powerful. This album is also a rare example of a metal record where bass plays a huge role and is not in the background the whole time, which I like a lot. I like the vocals too, but I would say they're probably the weakest part of the album. Not because they're bad but because all the other parts are just that good. The writing is more important here, but Zack certainly can't deliver the same amount of power as someone like Serj Tankian.
Amazing album. Not perfect, but one I keep coming back to because these riff never get old.
9/10
Paul Weller
3/5
Was ready to hear some basic pop rock slop, but was pleasantly surprised. As usual with pop rock, the slower and acoustic songs didn't leave any impression on me whatsoever, but there's only a couple of those here and the rest is pretty good. There are well-written, energetic riffs and melodies and fun vocals. Nothing out of this world but still fun. There are even some really good instrumental parts, which I really like. Solid album.
7/10
Radiohead
3/5
Radiohead is not for me. They make good music, but it just doesn't appeal to me. I don't know, maybe emotional music doesn't really affect me, and lyrical content is not something I care about much. It's too quiet, too melancholic, without many energetic parts. I wouldn't call their music boring, but I would still rather listen to something more exciting. I do like it, just don't love it like most people seem to.
7/10
The Cure
4/5
Great, fantastically atmospheric album. Long but unique and with enough variety to stay interesting the whole time. The songs here are a bit low energy, which I’m not a huge fan of, but love this album either way.
Metallica
3/5
I like the idea of symphonic metal; however, I usually find the execution lacking. I think metal is perfectly capable of creating huge-sounding, epic songs on its own, so adding orchestral arrangements tries to fix a problem the genre doesn't have. I also feel like Metallica’s strong suit is energy and groove and not epicness. The problem with this album is that it’s just Metallica songs with a layer of orchestral music added without much thought, when the songs were not originally intended to give off the vibe it adds. They do have some epic song like The Call of Ktulu or Master of Puppets, and they sound great on this album, but the original versions are already phenomenal, in my opinion, so I have a hard time calling this recording better. I still like this, though. Outside of the gimmick, this is still Metallica’s early music, of which I am a huge fan, but I don’t think the orchestra adds much to it, to be honest. It’s also too long. The novelty of the gimmick wears off pretty quickly, and the fact that it’s 2 hours long just drags the experience down.
7/10
David Ackles
3/5
Montana Song is way too epic for a Disney princess introduction.
To be honest, I kinda dig this. Definitely not my type of music, but it's just so lush and pleasant. This feels like cozy fantasy music (especially the last song, which is beautiful, by the way), except the fantasy land is, like, America (not that different, I know). Too much on the slower side for me, though.
7/10
Jorge Ben Jor
4/5
Samba-rock is a thing, I guess. Gotta love the humanity’s propensity to look at any genre and go, “How can we make rock out of this?” Not complaining.
Wasn't expecting to like this album, but it pleasantly surprised me. It's chill yet incredibly fun, lush, and energetic music with an engaging atmosphere. I don't understand a word he's saying, but the vocal delivery is very passionate and endearing. There's nothing groundbreaking here, but I enjoyed it a lot.
The Who
3/5
This album certainly has some creative stuff, but for some reason, not enough punch. A lot of the songs feel like they're constantly building up towards something, and then just nothing happens. The hard rock tracks here have significantly more energy, but most of this album is not hard rock. These some very fun songs here (Overture, Christmas, The Acid Queen, Underture, Pinball Wizard, Go to the Mirror!), but others are just fine. Still enjoyed this album, but it definitely could've been better.
7/10
Girls Against Boys
4/5
A sonically pretty dark post-hardcore album, which is usually not my thing, but this one managed to capture me with its satisfying rhythmic riffs and great drumming. Pretty much every song made me nod along to the rhythm, which is more than most albums can do. I really like when the drums are mixed so forward, especially when they're this good (Spiderland moment). I wish more rock records did that. Despite the sombre tone, this album still has a great deal of energy and is pretty engaging. I thought it was going to become stale after a while (which is what usually happens with dark post-hardcore, in my experience), but the atmosphere here was great and it stayed fun the whole time. This is a kind of record you put on high volume without much hesitation and enjoy the ride. I don't think there's a song that particularly stands out on this record. None of them are exceptional, but the average quality is very high.
Joan Armatrading
3/5
A folk rock album with more forward instrumentation and detailed production than usual, which I like. Her voice is unique, and unlike a lot of folk rock, actually interacts with the instruments (not just accompanied by a monotonous guitar in the background). Nothing particularly impressive, and this album definitely has some downtime when the songs were too quiet for my liking, but better than average.
7/10
Bob Marley & The Wailers
3/5
There are plenty things I like about this album when it comes to groovy instrumentation, rhythmic vocals, and writing (mainly in the first four songs), but it is overall still feels like background music. I know that it's supposed to be relaxing since it's reggae, but I just don't enjoy music that is this quiet and devoid of energy that much. Also, the first half is way better than the second one, and it's not even close.
Brian Eno
3/5
Brian Eno’s music makes me irrationally angry. I feel like there’s so much unique and imaginative stuff in his work, but everything in between is just… whatever. Like, this album is so close to greatness, and the good moments are very good, but it doesn’t have good enough structure to hold them together, so I found myself just waiting for the next good part and not engaging with the music much. He experiments too much, so what ends up happening is that some songs are right ip my alley, and other are way outside of my taste.
Also, since he’s the inventor of ambient music or whatever, a couple of ambient tracks had to be on here… and they’re pretty boring. It isn’t really Eno’s fault, thought. It’s just that ambient music is fundamentally incapable with my tastes. I like music to be more exciting, and that’s just not the point of ambient.
7/10
Iron Butterfly
3/5
A "trust me, it gets better" album. It's like Tarkus, except the good part™ is at the end instead of the beginning.
I gladly gave Tarkus a pass despite half of the album being meh because the title track, in my opinion, is exceptional. But here neither the big song nor even the filler is as good. The title track mostly consists of different solos played one after the other with little to no backing from the rest of the band, when, or course, as anyone who listens to jazz would tell you, the correct way of approaching this is playing all of them together at the same time. The solos themselves are pretty catchy, but there’s nothing holding them together, and the song sounds a bit dry. But overall I still like it. As for the rest of the songs, they are just... there? There's not much to them. It's very obvious that they were an afterthought and only put there to reach that album length. Are You Happy is alright, I guess.
The Band
3/5
The way rock albums were mastered in the 60s makes them extremely hard to enjoy, to be honest. No matter what the vibe the artists were going for, it all just sounds so recessed and lifeless. And it feels like that the moment the 70s came, everything started to sound fine, for some reason. Off the top of my head, the only technically good-sounding rock album from the 60s I remember is In the Court of the Crimson King, and it came out close to the end of '69.
This particular album is fine. Nothing really special, and I forgot all the songs pretty much immediately after listening. Kind of bland but not bad at all, just not very interesting.
Jane's Addiction
4/5
I knew I was going to like this the moment I read the genres and descriptors for this album on RYM, and unsurprisingly, I did. Great riffs, incredibly fun and engaging songs. Definitely not the peak of music, but this is a "dumb fun" album done extremely well.
Siouxsie And The Banshees
4/5
The opening song is a banger, but the rest don't really do anything to stand out. I like the atmosphere of gothic rock and the pleasant vocals, but this album is a bit monotonous and becomes repetitive rather quickly.
7/10
Justice
4/5
Electronic music has a lot of potential since with electronic modulation tools you can make pretty much any sound imaginable. And since you don't have to know how to play any instrument, it is very welcoming for new artists. However, that accessibility (especially in the recent couple of decades) very quickly oversaturated the genre. I'm not the biggest fan of electronic music precisely because a lot of the artists don't seem to know what they're doing and use the simplest, most regurgitated compositions possible that for me, who used to listen to a lot of electronic music in my teenage years, became stale years ago. And even new trends tend to fall into the pit of mediocrity and self-cannibalization extremely quickly and ultimately fail to evolve (look at something like dubstep or, more recently, drift phonk). But when you encounter an artist who knows how to realize the potential of digital tools, you can discover some of the most interesting experimental music out there. This album is one of the examples.
The highs here are very high. I like the satisfying bass and the heavy, noisy sound with constant switch-ups and, apart from one song, no vocals, which I prefer. However, not all of the the tracks are as good as some of the highlights. And that's my main problem with experimental music in general. Sure, some artists can go on for hours, but what usually ends up happening is that some ideas turn out to be a lot better (Genesis, Phantom, DVNO, Stress) than other (Let There Be Light, Waters of Nazareth, One Minute to Midnight). Still, although this album is no Discovery, it is extremely unique and fun. Definitely worth a listen.
Nine Inch Nails
4/5
Oh, it's the person who made Johnny Cash's most famous song!
I don’t what it is about this album in particular, but most songs here are extremely memorable. Before relistening, I’d only heard it once a bit over a year ago. I’m terrible at remembering music, but here most songs almost immediately made me go, “Oh, I remember how it goes.” This is some really powerful noisy music that is produced so well that even on high volume, the loud parts are not painful. Despite being about 50% longer than an average album, it doesn't feel drown out; but the second half is quite a bit weaker than the first. It just slows down later on, with the songs becoming more personal and sensual. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course, but I preferred the more loud, angry sound of the first half.
On a side note, whenever I see someone talk about this album, I always hear Danny Brown in my head. "And it's a downward spiral / Gotta figure it out, out / I gotta figure it out, out."
Elvis Presley
2/5
The fact that this album is of huge historical significance doesn't mean that music in it is good by today's standards. I don’t believe that good art is timeless since any idea can be built up upon, improved, or evolved; and after some changes, the original iteration usually wouldn’t feel that good in hindsight. That is how I feel about this album. Sure, he basically invented rock, which has been my favorite genre by far since the start of my musical journey. But 70 years later, the genre has changed and evolved so much that the “original” rock album seems incredibly underwhelming. That’s definitely not entirely Elvis’s fault, of course. He didn’t have the decades of output to draw inspiration from (although, of course, he used other genres), and he had no access to the slew of technological advancements musicians have right now. The culture in the 50s was also entirely different. What today feels tame and basically sterile back then was seen as rebellion, and it certainly didn’t translate well.
I don’t really like this album. It’s not awful, but it’s a relic of its time that today feels uninspiring. Both vocals and instruments are not very fun, and in terms of energy, it basically has nothing even on a lot of rock albums I would consider to be on the slower side. I wouldn’t say that Elvis is a bad artist or whatever. It’s just that he was treading on new ground of a genre that hadn’t been studied before him. The only reason I didn’t rate it lower is because it’s short.
5/10
Bob Marley & The Wailers
2/5
Reggae is just not my thing, what can I say? It is supposed to be chill and relaxing, but I listen to music for entertainment, and that's just not what I find entertaining. It's kind of hard to assess this music by its merit (not that I usually do that anyway) because I'm just not that engaged when listening to it. It's a Bob Marley album, and it sounds like a Bob Marley album. If you like him, then I guess this one is for you. It has some interesting writing and good vocal performance, but other than that, I was quite underwhelmed. The title track is pretty fun, through.
5/10
Funkadelic
2/5
Most of the songs here are too minimalist and way too drown out. If you're into this sort of relaxing music, than you're probably going like this, especially considering that there's some great guitar work here. For me through, this was quite underwhelming and at times boring.
5/10
Adele
2/5
As this was released well into my lifetime and played pretty much everywhere you would expect to hear music, this is the exact type of music that made me dislike pop. Not all pop is terrible, of course—and this album is also not exactly the Ed Sheeran–level of awful—but a lot of popular music is such a slog to get through. It's fine to hear one song on radio and realize that it's virtually indistinguishable from the dozen other pop songs of a similar style, but hearing 48 minutes of only the highest-grade slop in a row is certainly not an experience I would ever look forward to. Like, this is not terrible. She can sings, and the album is well produced since, like, 50 engineers worked on it and probably millions of dollars were spent. But it is so uninspiring. It's the same tone, same structure, same themes over and over again. Saying that this music makes me feel absolutely nothing is an understatement. It's so unimaginative and so boring.
Saint Etienne
2/5
I don't like chill music. This album is too laid back and repetitive for me. Not bad, but feels just like background music and is not particularly engaging.
5/10
Crosby, Stills & Nash
3/5
Certainly in the better half of folk rock album I heard. Some songs still have the tendency to disappear into the background, but the core of this album is pretty fun a satisfying, with pleasant vocals and instrumentation. Chill but not boring.
7/10
The White Stripes
3/5
To be honest, I was hesitant to check out The White Stripes because I thought they were your typical pop-ified rock band. What I heard on this album, however, was quite a bit more interesting. There's nothing groundbreaking here, but it's pleasant rhythmic music with a decent amount of variety. However, most of the songs feel like they're missing something. It is way too minimalist (although not quiet or slow), and I think the songs would've benefited from more layers. But overall this is still good and a pleasant surprise by a band I wasn't expecting much from.
7/10
Billy Bragg
3/5
I don't like folk rock. There are some good parts here, but overall the music is just too slow and not very exciting. Not really my thing. I prefer music to be more present, and this just falls into the background and fails to engage me much. That being said, the music itself is not bad by any means.
Emmylou Harris
2/5
The whole music industry is a psy-op to make me care about vocals. It's not working.
Seriously, there's so much music that hard focuses on vocals and puts every other aspect of music production on the back burner. Most people (both casual and more dedicated listeners) seem to like it, but I just don't care. I can't definitively explain why, but vocals don't interest me. I'm rarely impressed by them even when they're done well. Most of my favorite music either has little to no vocals or uses them on the same level with instruments, not putting the spotlight on them. Like, I can appreciate good vocals, but they rarely contribute to my enjoyment of music much. Every time I listen to a highly acclaimed album with praised vocals (not talking about this album specifically—it doesn't seem to be that acclaimed—just in general) and think it's not that good, I feel like your average snobby contrarian who makes not liking the popular staff their whole personality. Of course, I'm not gonna fight strangers on the internet over extremely subjective opinions like they seem to do, but if I were to do that, I would be one of the people who call Radiohead mid, but, like, unironically mean it. There's no particular reason for my distaste of vocals. I just don't derive enjoyment from them, for some reason. Most of the time, it is certainly not the artists' fault. I'm not like other girls, and it's not my fault, okay?
Anyway.
This album is whatever. I listened to it, sort of forgot about it in the process of writing this. The first song was a banger. It's a rare example of a highly energetic country song, and I happen to like that style. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be that popular across the genre. Maybe I would actually enjoy something like bluegrass, but I haven't gotten to listening to any of it at the moment. The rest of the songs are... there. Slow, sensual songs are just not my thing. Didn't particular care for them, but it's not like they're offensive or anything.
5/10
The Prodigy
3/5
As far as repetitive music goes, this is definitely not one of the worst example, but it's also no the best. They stick to a formula that works well enough but doesn't produce anything particularly special. A couple of songs stand out (Smack My Bitch Up, Breathe, Firestarter, and Fuel My Fire), and the rest are still pretty fun but not that memorable.
7/10
James Taylor
2/5
Not bad but very samey and uninspiring. Pretty much every song is just soft vocals over acoustic guitar, which for me is not that interesting.
5/10
Elton John
4/5
I don't usually like pop rock, but I think these strings is what bring this whole album together. Vocals harmonized by orchestral arrangements sound so satisfying, and the choruses here a extremely powerful as a result. That being said, Tiny Dancer is by far the best song here, in my opinion, and the rest are not quite as good. Still a great album with no boring songs, which is a rare thing to hear from a pop rock record.
Nico
3/5
It's fine but completely unimpressive. I don't really enjoy slow, melancholic music, so this wasn't that engaging, but I can't say it's bad. Not gonna lie, the first thing I thought when playing this album is "Wait, this is the woman from The Velvet Underground?" which gives "Kratos from Fornite" vibes. She does have a pretty unique voice and delivery.
Snoop Dogg
4/5
The least corny gangsta rap album.
I don't understand why rap albums like interludes so much. Literally the only time I enjoy them is when they're good standalone songs. But that happens extremely rarely. Almost every time, this album included, straight up deleting them would make the result better. But apart from that, there's not really a whole lot of filler here. All the songs are surprisingly great. You know, this album is what people who hate rap think all rap sounds like. But Doggystyle doesn’t take itself seriously and stays exciting all the way through, with catchy, funky beats and fun writing. This album is not a masterpiece by any means, but it’s definitely an entertaining listen.
Rufus Wainwright
3/5
Yes, this guy sounds like Thom Yorke if he were gay (implying Thom Yorke is straight), I get it. That being said, maybe it's because I'm not a Radiohead fan, I don't really understand how this is worse? For me, it's on the same level of "pretty good but not really my thing" as Radiohead. It's the same well-produced slow, longing, melancholic music with almost no hype moments but a lot of aura, which is not particularly exciting to me but with so much effort and passion put into it that it prevents the music from being boring. I think the vibe here is similar to Radiohead, in good and bad ways.
7/10
3/5
Not really much to say about this one. It has decent variety, which is uncharacteristic for a pop rock album. There are a couple of great songs, but some of the other are meh. Other than that, good album, but nothing impressive.
7/10
N.W.A.
3/5
It's hard to overstate the cultural impact this album has had (especially Fuck tha Police), but it is admittedly outdated. Its reputation of a rebellion anthem is certainly undermined by them apparently being fine with misogyny, which, by today's standards, feels tone-deaf. That being said, I wouldn't put this up to them too much because, despite often being cited as an influence, this album itself was influenced by the cultural zeitgeist it was born in (and it was not pleasant for women, believe it or not). It is a product of its time, but that is not necessarily bad. You can't exactly expect every person from a group that has to constantly spend not an insignificant amount of energy and effort resisting an oppressive system to be an uncompromising progressive mind. Perfect victims don't exist and never have. But I guess the direction Ice Cube later went may imply that his activism was only self-serving after all. I don’t know. I’m not exactly educated on the story of this group and its members, so I’m just shooting off a hip here.
As for the music itself… it’s fine, I guess. In my experience, early attempts at something are very rarely one of the best, and this album, being what popularized gangsta rap, is no different. Gangsta rap is corny by definition, and it's not necessarily bad. Of course, these people are not actual criminals and won't shoot you for stealing their girl or whatever. Instead of trying to prove their innocence to the police in an environment that is stacked against them, they went, "Yeah, we do crime. What about it?" The boastful nature of the lyrics is born of frustration with the system and not of actual misanthropic hate or an attempt to appear "cool" (although there's certainly some of that too). The opening track is a banger through and through, and the second one is a classic for a reason, but the rest are just pretty basic. The beats are very repetitive and not that exciting. The dynamic between the rappers is pretty fun, though.
This album is not groundbreaking by any means and feels outdated both in its message and sound, but the music is not bad.
2/5
I'm honestly surprised by how many albums open with the best track and then have all the rest be in a different style and worse. It shows that they knew what the best song was, so they put it first to pull in the listener, and then refused to make all the other in the similar style... Why?
The opening song is actually pretty fun and energetic, which is when country works best, in my opinion. But the rest are just the same long notes sung with a rural accent and minimalist instruments in the background like in thousands other country albums. I don't care about vocals, so I don't find this style engaging. This album is just whatever, not something I would relisten.
5/10
The Incredible String Band
2/5
There is some cool ancient or medieval folk, but most contemporary folk music is sedative to me. It is just so monotonous, often with no standout parts, which for me is boring. The only monotonous music I enjoy is either using this monotony to create a captivating atmosphere or is comprised of extremely fun rhythms that I’m not opposed to hearing over and over again. And folk does neither of that, so it just falls into the background and looses my attention (since there’s nothing to pay attention to). This album is not terrible but just boring.
The Beach Boys
3/5
To be honest, I'm a little torn on this one. I always go into pop albums with cautious optimism since most pop records, even the highly regarded ones, tend to disappoint me, but I'm happy when I find something unique in this tired genre. I like how, unlike most pop albums, this one is not at all generic and, while still being on the calmer side (mostly), not minimalistic. But it is too inconsistent, both in terms of quality and style. I really like half of the songs here, but the the other is whatever. It feels a bit all over the place, with the tone constantly changing not only between songs but even within the songs themselves. I like the Wall of Sound production, though. It is a lot more interesting than the typical approach most pop albums go for where the instruments are only there as a background for vocals and don't stand out.
The only thing I knew about this album before going into it is that people hated Student Demonstration Time. But after listening to it, honestly, if you ignore the lyrics, it's kinda great. Yes, the lyrics that either try to tell that protesting is useless or urge to only protest peacefully are obviously problematic. And if it's not that, then it's been exceedingly poorly communicated. It is also a lot more loud and heavy than the rest of the album... but that's why I like it. Yes, I'm extremely biased. I like heavy blues rock and metal, a genre that it birthed, and I think Student Demonstration Time executed it extremely well and turned out to be very catchy. But yeah, the lyrics are cringe.
I feel like this album had a lot of potential but came a little undercooked. But overall I still enjoyed it.
7/10
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
4/5
Not really much to say. Pretty straightforward album with energetic, heavy riffs and enjoyable vocals. Pretty simple and nothing out of this world, but very fun.
Big Star
3/5
An interesting fusion of power pop with folky elements. I like power pop, but I prefer it to be more "aggressive," like the heavy Weezer-esque power chord spam. This is not exactly that. And although this album is generally more fun and energetic than most pop rock and folk rock albums, it's still a bit too folky for my taste.
7/10
Emerson, Lake & Palmer
3/5
As much as love prog, this is one of the worst prog rock albums I've heard. This is probably what all prog sounds to people who don't like it. It's so disjointed and unbalanced, and at times, it feels like it actively tries to avoid any kind of rhythm. There are parts where barely anything happens, and there are super enjoyable melodic parts where all the instruments play at the same time. It feels less chaotic and more so just straight up random. That being said, there’s enough good parts here for me to call this record fine. Keith Emerson is still an incredible keyboardist, and the better parts of this album (Blues Variation, The Curse of Baba Yaga) are energetic and epic and feel great. There was potential here, but there's just too much filler.
There's a medley included in the deluxe edition, and I feel it's the best way to experience this album (as long as you don't mind the not-so-great recording quality). It's actually great as it cuts down on the fluff and leaves the best part, of which there's enough here for a 15-minute song.
Yes
4/5
This album has three good songs. Yes, they're more than half of the runtime, but there are only three. Roundabout, South Side of the Sky, and Heart of the Sunrise (the best one, in my opinion) are fantastic epic prog songs with unique composition and satisfying vocals, but the rest of the songs on this album feel like filler and are just alright. All of them, even the better ones, feel out of place and an afterthought. I think the best one out the filler is Mood for a Day, and it's actually pretty decent, but even it feel like it's from a different album. It is so fun and satisfying even through minimalist acoustic songs is not what I usually enjoy, but this style is so different from the lush, psychedelic approach the big songs take that it still feels wrong. The same is true for all the other filler.
Overall, I still love this album because the long songs are incredibly engaging. There are no bad parts in them, and they don't feel drawn out in any way. Long-form tracks is when Yes really shines. All three of them arguably compete for their best work. But the filler on this album can easily ruin the vibe. Listening through this album felt like I was just waiting for the next good part at times.
Kate Bush
4/5
A pop album that is not only unique and interesting in its presentation but also actually fun and catchy? That is, unfortunately, very rare, but this album is one of the examples. I wasn’t expecting to like this one because I thought that Kate Bush was another one of the pop singers with slow, mellow music that I don’t like at all, but this album turned out to be completely different and much better than I was expecting. Most songs here are eclectic, engaging bangers with exciting ideas, most of which work quite well. I'm still not a huge fan of vocal-focused music, and although, I think this album is miles better in terms of instrumentation than 99% of pop records, the vocals, as good as they are, don't fully let them shine. This still was a blast, though.
Neu!
3/5
I'll probably have to give this album a couple of tries before I "get" it. It wouldn't be the first time. It took me 4 or 5 listens to get into Lift Yr. Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven, but now it is easily one of my favorite albums of all time and my comfort album of choice. It wasn't exactly the type of album I would usually listen or enjoy (as I usually prefer something more energetic), but the more I listened to it, the more I got enthralled by the atmosphere, and I think this album might be similar. I feel like there's so much beauty and soul here, no matter how chiché this might sound. This album was made to pursue a very specific vibe, and if you're in the correct mood for it, it could be completely mind blowing. But on my first listen, although I enjoyed it, I can't say it was all that impressive.
7/10
Supergrass
3/5
Simple but very fun. The beginning was great, but later on, this album lost a lot of its energy. Still, there's no song I dislike here. They're all pretty good, but I feel like only a couple stand out.
7/10
Black Sabbath
5/5
I would usually say that the longer some genre exists, the better it gets, as over time artists get a bigger and bigger catalogue of pieces they can reflect upon to find a way to improve. It doesn’t always happen, but it is usually the case; and in the instances it is not, most of the time, the genre is past its peak of popularity, and the improvements are not as noticeable because fewer people make it. Judging by that logic, Black Sabbath's self-titled, which is widely believed to be the first metal album, could only be mediocre at best... Except it isn't. Yeah, sometimes someone makes something so good that it is still arguably one of the best the genre has to offer even decades later despite technological advancement and countless talented musicians it’s seen since. And it’s not like metal lacks bangers.
It’s the riffs, man. This record is a collection of some of the best riffs out of any album ever, in my opinion. They’re simple but so satisfying and appropriately heavy (well, as heavy as they could make in the 70s, at least), further amplified by fantastic bass performance. One thing can’t usually carry the whole album for me, but the riffs from early Sabbath albums absolutely can. They’re just that good. I like Ozzy’s vocals too, and the writing is atmospheric and sounds pleasant. One problem I’m going to mention is that the treble can be a little obnoxious at times, but it might be the quirk of the specific version I listened to (I hate bad remasters, but most of them are bad somehow).
This might not be the heaviest or most technically impressive metal album, but the songwriting absolutely stood the test of time, and it is still incredibly catchy and fun.
Your left ear is going to love this!
9/10
Röyksopp
3/5
Chill beats to study to, but, like, good. Has some songs that are a bit too ambient for my tastes, but there are more pleasant beats and melodies. Not something spectacular, for sure, but it's nice.
7/10
Penguin Cafe Orchestra
3/5
Just some nice relaxing music. Pretty minimalistic, but being chamber music, has enough texture to not be boring. Not much else to say. Nice, chill music, but nothing special.
7/10
Herbie Hancock
4/5
Wasn’t a huge fan the first time I listened to this album, but after listening to the songs in random order a couple of times, it grew on me quickly. This is well-produced chill music with some great riffs sprinkled here and there. Very rhythmically pleasant and with an enjoyable soundscape overall. I like that it has no vocals. Really let’s the music breath. This albums is great. Not mind blowing but very enjoyable. This is background music, but it’s very high quality background music that doesn’t turn into noise even if you listen to it for a while.
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
4/5
This is not a band I was expecting to enjoy. This is the second album I hear from them (the first being their debut), and although it sounds nothing like the other one, I think it is as good, if not better. Compared to their debut, this one is not as riff driven and relies a lot more on electronic effects and synths and overall a has a lighter, more playful tone. Usually I'm not a huge fan of this approach, but this album executes it very well. At the same time, it sound big and lush. Even the more quiet songs here sound epic, for some reason, and I like that. The vocal are nice too. It’s just fun. Nothing particularly special, but it’s fun.
Arcade Fire
3/5
This is well made but just nothing special. I liked most songs here, but none of them are particularly impressive, and after a while, they started to blend together—not particularly memorable. This album is enjoyable, but aside from high production values, it doesn’t do anything to stand out.
7/10
John Prine
3/5
I don’t like country, but this album is fun. It doesn’t take itself seriously and goes for entertainment factor with its whimsical lyrics, which I like. It’s also not as slow and doesn’t go for constant prolonged notes like country tends to do. This style of instrumentation and vocals is still not my thing, because I prefer the music to be more complex and/or energetic, but this album was pretty fun.
7/10
Red Hot Chili Peppers
3/5
This is so white liberal core.
This is just basic funk rock. Relatively fun but nothing exciting. A bit too long, and the songs don’t stand out, but not bad by any means.
7/10
Leonard Cohen
3/5
It's pretty good. Some pleasant, well-produced background music that didn't impress me but was enjoyable.
7/10
Korn
3/5
I always thought that stylizing "R" as "Я" is kind weird. Like, it's an actual letter in some languages, so it just looks strange.
People like to shit on nu metal, but honestly, that fact that this is not the most complex, innovative, or serious music doesn't mean it's unlistenable. This album is fine. It's not the greatest thing in the world, but at least, it's not boring and has some great riffs. I like the guitar tone in this one, which is a bit deal to me personally. That being said, All In the Family is the worst song I heard in a while. Not only because of the constant use of slurs, but also because it's instrumentally, lyrically, and vocally terrible. Vocals as a whole in this album are just not good. I usually don't care about them, but here... No, just no. They actively make the songs worse. Bro can't sing, but he tries very hard, which makes it worse. But aside from that, the riffs carry the songs. They’re not exceptional but good enough to keep me somewhat engaged. But what’s with nu metal bands making albums over an hour long?
Alanis Morissette
3/5
This is music for depressed, angsty high-school girls from suburban families. Not that I'm judging; I'm just not the target audience. I liked the heavier songs here just because that grungey guitar tone is so good and they're more energetic, but most other were very forgettable. I would've probably liked it a lot more if I related/cared about the lyrical content, but I don't.
George Jones
2/5
Country has got to be one of the most uninventive genres. I’m not saying it can’t be interesting, but in the 60s and 70s American artists were producing country albums in such quantities that there was not enough time to innovate.
There’s nothing to say about this album. It doesn’t have anything you wouldn’t hear in any other country album from the same time period. He can sing, but the music overall is very generic, uninspiring, and boring. At least it’s short…
Red Hot Chili Peppers
3/5
I heard that this album was compressed to shit, but I wasn't expecting it to be this bad... It's loud for no good reason. It doesn't sound powerful, just dirty and unpolished. Loud mastering can sound good but not when it removes so much detail and sounds so peaky. This album certainly has its moments, but it's greatly held down by how ear-blastingly loud and overcopressed it is. The songs also were a hit or miss for me. And most of the better ones are not even that good (the title track is great, though). I got kinda bored during the second half. Overall, this album is not bad, but I won't listen to it again.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
4/5
Why do I keep enjoying every gothic rock album I hear?
This is the most interesting concept album I’ve heard in a while. I don’t really like vocal-based music usually, but his voice is so good that I, for once, thought that the vocals were actually a highlight of an album. Just the sort of “cabaret” vibe this album brings forth with its vocals and instruments is really cool. And the lyrics being exclusively about someone getting murdered help too. I wouldn’t say there’s anything particularly mind blowing about this album (it’s pretty much carried by the atmosphere alone), but it is a very pleasant listen.
Van Halen
3/5
Has some really fun songs, some less fun. Pretty good overall but very basic and completely unremarkable. The riffs overall are just not that great, and the energy is mostly carried by the vocals.
7/10
Fela Kuti
4/5
There is some music that is just hard to hate (not that I actively try anyway). This is great. Very enjoyable chill music that, despite the long songs, never fills repetitive or boring.
Jefferson Airplane
3/5
Had its moments (mainly the parts with emphasis on female vocals) but overall is kinda meh. I don’t really have strong feelings about this album. I didn’t hate it (and Somebody to Love is an absolute banger), but it went into one ear and out of the other. The songs meandered too much and had some parts where nothing really happened. It’s a fine album but somewhat uninspiring.
Amy Winehouse
3/5
I didn’t really care about the vocals (they’re fine, I guess), but the instrumentation on some of these songs was just incredibly fun, which is uncharacteristic for soul/R&B albums, in my experience. I'm of a belief that good instruments can carry any album, while bad vocals can't usually ruin one (not saying the vocals here were bad—just nothing special). The music was just so passionate and catchy that it didn’t really matter to me that it was a genre I don’t particularly like. I like how layered and detailed it was, and the rhythms and drums were great. That beings said, there were also the more typical for these kind of albums slow, melancholic, longing songs, which I rarely enjoy.
I don’t know. I enjoyed this album. But at the same time, although half of the songs were bangers, the other half was just not for me. I’m not sure what score to give this one. Will probably have to reevaluate it later. I’m certainly not opposed to relistening to this one, which is probably a sign of me liking it already.
7/10
Jeff Beck
2/5
Damn, that was boring... Genuinely one the least fun hard rock albums I've heard. Beck's Bolero was the only song I liked. The rest were not unlistenable but just not fun. Lacks energy, lacks passion. Didn’t particularly like this one.
Goldie
3/5
It's fine, I guess. I definitely didn't hate it but felt that there was not enough going on. Looking at the cover, I was expecting a sci-fi/cyberpunk sort of vibe, but at the end, I didn’t really get what the atmosphere was supposed to be. The songs didn’t really convey anything in particular atmosphere-wise. If the songs had leaned into trying to represent some sort of visuals, it would’ve been a lot better. A feature-length sci-fi-themed drum and bass epic would’ve slapped, but this is not it, unfortunately. This album had a lot of potential, in my opinion, but turned to be kind of disappointing.
Fairport Convention
4/5
The folk and country albums I like the most are consistently the ones that are more rock than anything else. But this honestly makes sense. If I don’t like a genre, there’s a far higher chance that the rare examples of this genre I do like would be the ones that are far removed from its conventions and are more like a genre I like more (rock, in this example). This is just a fun rock album with a tasteful amount of folk elements. On the slower side but not boring. And I also like British folk far more than American. Hearing the same uninspired acoustic guitar backing in most American folk and country records got annoying very quickly. And this album is quite a bit different when it comes to instrumentation, which I appreciate.
A Sailor's Life is just straight up a prog song. I really like these long, technical, guitar-driven songs. And although none of the songs on this album do quite enough to blow my mind, I don’t think there’s a single bad track here, but A Sailor’s Life still stands above the rest, in my opinion.
Elliott Smith
3/5
There's a lot to love about this album, but unfortunately, this is just not my thing. Overall, I like the vocals and instrumentation, but this somber, melancholic music doesn't interest or excite me in any way. I can appreciate it, sure, but I listen to music for fun and this is not that fun to me. Too slow, too grounded, and too minimalist. Good album, but I would've rated it higher if that kind of music interested me.
7/10
Nanci Griffith
3/5
It's fine. More energetic than country usually is, but still nothing special or exciting. Not much to say. It's not bad but also not interesting enough to be particularly fun. Just kind of whatever.
Les Rythmes Digitales
3/5
Pretty much every songs consists of a very repetitive vocal sample and some pretty generic rhythm on top of it. It's not bad, and there are some good songs here, but overall, this is a collection of probably the most generic electo house tracks I've heard. Fine but extremely basic and repetitive.
The Black Keys
3/5
Had to double check if I accidentally put on Imagine Dragons. Among all the albums I've heard, this is the one that closest associates with the term "Home Depot rock" in my head. It's the sort of thing mainstream rock radio stations would put on at peak hours. Like, it's not terrible, even sort of heavy at times, but it's the most safe, blandest, unimaginative shit you can imagine. I don't hate it as much as pop rock since there's a lest some cool riffs, but it's not much better.
The Prodigy
3/5
It's kinda hard for me to say anything overtly negative about Prodigy. I like their music. It's not the best thing ever—it can be repetitive or a bit too simple for my taste—but it's just fun. When I listen to them, although the music doesn't feel particularly special, I'm never underwhelmed or bored. This album is more of the same. Their over work from that time period has a similar vibe, so if you like it, this album is good.
7/10
The xx
3/5
If the best song on your album is called "intro," there might be a problem. I don’t know what to say about this album. I can’t say it’s generic because it’s not, but at the same time, it’s not really interesting and quite forgettable. There’s not much going on; it doesn’t have much to say. It’s not bad but not very engaging.
Machito
3/5
Some fun old-school jazz. Kinda the same stuff over and over again, but it's charming enough for me not to really mind. The high notes are a bit too loud at places, though, so some songs are a little grating, but nothing really serious.
7/10
Beck
3/5
Pretty unique album with many styles of rock (and some not even rock) explored. It’s decently fun and has a lot of variety, but doesn’t excel at anything.
Diversity can’t really carry an album on its own. This album does a lot of things and manages to stay engaging the whole way through simply because you don’t know what will come next. But none of the idea are really explored to their full potential. I would rather listen to a stylistically consistent album that excels at that particular style than to one that does a lot of surface-level renditions of different styles. The overall quality of songs on this album is fairly good, though, but it doesn’t peak very high.
7/10
Christina Aguilera
2/5
Damn, what a waste of talent on such an uninspired piece of work. Commercial art makes me so sad. Hating pop music is one of the few passions I have in life, so I'm not even going to pretend to hide my biases for this one.
What do you mean over 100 people worked on this? It’s not like this shit is easy to make anyway, so imagine what all of these people could've made if they actually cared about making something good instead of just selling a product. These things are not mutually exclusive, of course, but when money is involved, profit incentives usually take precedent. If each of these people made an album, I'm sure at least half of them would've been better than this. That being said, Fighter is a banger... Outside of the high production quality because of the high budget, that's the only compliment I can give to this album.
This sure is an album that exists. It even has music on it, believe it or not! Is it good? Not particularly. Is it trying to be? Not really. In a way, it's actually a successful project. It achieves the goals it had set for itself pretty well. It's just that none of what it does I want to have in music. This album and many similar ones don't fail at being fun, because they don't try to be fun in the first place. I say pretty much the same thing about a lot of big pop albums. But that's because they are the same! They're designed to be. They're made as a product that would succeed on the marker, not as a work of expressive art. It's an amorphous, featureless blob of sonic sludge (see how I avoided using the word "slop"; I'm very smart) masquerading as music. It's not made to have any artistically distinctive traits nor to appeal to anyone in particular lest someone finds anything about its contents offensive. But it fails even at that because there's at least one person who does find this offensive. Me. I do! And I like making things about myself, because I'm a narcissist. I’m offended that corporations see art as a cash cow and force artists to create things for money instead of artistic expression.
Am I unreasonable for thinking that out of all commercialized art, music gets the worst? Like there's a lot of great popular books, amazing high-budget video games, movies, and shows. And then music is like, "Best I can do is a bipolar drug-addicted Nazi. Oh, and by the way, have you heard this new k-pop album? It's like the previous one, but our analytics say it should sell 5% better among males aged between 18 and 24!"
I feel like I'm yelling at clouds at this point. And capitalism is my clouds. Not because it's harmless but because it's indestructible, ever-looming, and only makes you aware of itself when it wants to piss on your face. I hope pop music dies. I hope music as a whole dies, actually. This world never deserved it.
This album is not horrible. I liked 3 songs on it. The rest are neither here nor there. I listened to it and forgot it in a couple of minutes. There's nothing of interest here (except Fighter), but it's not going to kill your dog or anything (hopefully). It's just very boring. I don’t really know why would I want to listen to something like this when there’s so much music with soul and genuine artistic vigor put into it. You can’t appease everyone, so at least try to appease someone. Most of the pop music I like goes above and beyond to be different while retaining accessibility. A good pop song is a pleasant listen on any day and mood because that’s what they strive to be—a fun and effortless listen. Every one likes a good catchy song. But creating these songs requires effort. And unfortunately, effort doesn’t pay the bill… What pays the bill is producing as much marketable shit as quickly as possible. Pop music happens to fit this pipeline extremely well. And when your main goal is speed, all artistic curiosity dies somewhere along the line.
I have to listen to a prog album as a palette cleanser, brb...
Scheherazade and Other Stories by Renaissance is pretty great! It’s lush, detailed, and epic, with fantastic vocals. It has a nice medieval Middle Eastern vibe to it that is done very well, in my opinion, and surprisingly doesn’t fall to stereotypes about the music from that region. The last track overstays it’s welcome a little, but it’s far from boring. You should listen to this album instead of this shit.
One other album I listened to today is One of Us Is the Killer by The Dillinger Escape Plan, and if you don't mind metalcore, it's actually very catchy. I don't really know what gripe this guy has with the Soviet Union, though. My mom lived in the Soviet Union. She's a nice woman. Anyway...
Ms. Dynamite
2/5
Extremely unimaginative and boring. Some of the most uninteresting hip hop I’ve ever heard. Very basic and not particularly catchy production, no fun hooks or writing. Not offensively bad, but I got absolutely nothing out of this album.
The Rolling Stones
3/5
Oh god, it’s The Beatles for me all over again… Like, this is good, right? But I don’t really see anything impressive about this. It’s just like The Beatles: A couple of songs on the album are fantastic, and the other are kinda whatever. This is a good album, but it’s way too simple and outdated by today’s standards. A fun listen but nothing out of the ordinary.
7/10
Super Furry Animals
4/5
I don't exactly know what I expected from this album, but whatever my expectations were, it exceeded them. This album is just so unique, lush, and fun. It’s well produced, all the songs are consistently great, and there’s not a lot of downtime. This is a fun album with a great vibe, but I wouldn’t say it peaks all that high.
Black Sabbath
5/5
Although I slightly prefer the riffs on their debut, the songs on this album are even more memorable, and the noticeably better writing is probably why. I mainly remember Sabbath's self-titled for its riffs, but Paranoid also has a ton of iconic lyrics that are sang in a very pleasant rhythmic way. The tone of the album is, of course, very dark, but it is also extremely catchy. It’s crazy that Sabbath not only have been able to replicate the success of their first album—and arguably even improve on it—but also did it the same year. Crazy good album made by some crazy talented musicians. It is very simple, so I wouldn’t exactly call it the undeniable peak of rock, but Black Sabbath absolutely perfected the hard rock formula to a level no other band, in my opinion, has been able to since.
9/10
Hole
4/5
I’m insanely biased. I just like grunge. That guitar tone can so easily carry riffs it’s insane. I can’t say there’s anything special about this album in particular, but it’s so fun and has a bunch of great riffs. I liked the vocals too, but, again, nothing all that special about them. Simple but very solid record.
The Who
3/5
A decently fun but basic rock-and-roll-esque album. Not much to say. It's an alright album, but nothing stands out. Didn't really get much out of it, but it wasn't hard to listen or anything.
7/10
Deee-Lite
3/5
I think Deee-Lite Theme, What Is Love, and Grove Is In the Heart are great, but the other tracks are just background noise. Very basic beats, nothing that catches the ear. It's completely fine, but doesn't do anything all that interesting. Q-tip is on this album, for some reason, which was unexpected.
Faith No More
3/5
Not really on the same level with Angel Dust, but still pretty fun and catchy. Can’t really say I’m into this band. There hasn’t been a song from them that was memorable for me, but overall this album is still pretty good. I like the guitar tone, I like the riffs, but nothing strikes me as all that special. It follows a formula, and the formula is pretty decent. It’s like nu metal but with less obnoxious vocals and lyrics.
7/10
A Tribe Called Quest
4/5
This album is just a vibe. It’s so consistently catchy that it’s equally entertaining the whole way through. There isn’t a single bad or underwhelming track. I like Q-tip's voice, for some reason. It's just so unique and atypical for rap. His flow is really pleasant to listen to. I feel like this album doesn’t peak particularly high, but the average quality of a track is great.
3/5
PJ Harvey is a singer-songwriter for people who don't like singers-songwriters (so me). Since they usually focus on vocals more than anything else, instrumentation on singer-songwriters' albums tends to be an afterthought and pretty boring, in my opinion. But PJ Harvey has a bunch of great riffs and overall more present and exciting instruments, which I prefer over complete focus on vocals. This album, however, leans a bit to much into the singer-songwriter part for my liking and has more slow, laid backs songs, so I enjoyed less than Dry. The album is still good overall, but she has a least one album (I haven't heard any more) that is closer to my preferences.
7/10
Spiritualized
4/5
Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space is one of my favorite albums of all time, but I wasn't all that interested in checking out Spiritualized's other works. For me, that album captured such a specific, unique vibe that I had no faith in it being replicated with enough success anywhere else. Unsurprisingly, this album doesn't do that. What is surprising is that it's not that much worse. It is still incredibly hypnotic and atmospheric, just like We Are Floating in Space, but not quite to the same degree and with more downtime. This album doesn’t reach the same highs, but is still great.
Dennis Wilson
3/5
I have no thoughts about this album. River Song, Dreamer, and Time are kinda good, I guess, but the rest is very bland and forgettable. Not a bad album, but it literally doesn't do anything interesting.
Kanye West
4/5
Kanye West might not be a crazy lyricist or necessarily that good of a rapper, but he's a fantastic producer and absolutely knows how to make a catchy song (well, at least used to know). This album is full of extremely memorable bangers. The fact that the rapping here is not that special is compensated by this lush, maximalist production, which I absolutely love. Since hip hop is mostly focused on vocals, a lot of rap albums have very simple, rudimentary production (or at least used; I don’t really follow hip hop that closely, so I’m not entirely sure; most recent albums from the genre I’ve heard put a lot more effort into production), which is kind of boring to me. This album focuses more on the instrumentals, which I prefer. The only problem with this album is that it falls of a bit in the second half and becomes too slow and dark for my taste.
It really is a shame what happened to Kanye. He used to be such an amazing artist…
The White Stripes
4/5
This is great. I used to think of The White Stripes as a one hit wonder, with the only difference being that their "one hit" Seven Nation Army is actually a great song, but it turned out their music is consistently good. This album is simple, but there are a bunch of extremely catchy riffs here, and the vocals are satisfying. Yeah, there's isn't much to say. This album is just an incredibly fun time all the way through.
Stereolab
3/5
I wouldn't say this album is underwhelming, but it is unimpressive. I liked most songs here, but none of them I felt were special or memorable. This album kind of fell into the background for me pretty quickly, but it's not like it's bad background. This is only the second Stereolab album I've heard, and the other one (Transient Random-Noise Bursts With Announcements) was wildly different (and I liked it a fair bit more), so I can't really draw conclusions about them as a band yet. Their music seems to be pretty unique, but in this album in particular, I don't think it resulted in anything particularly great. I really like her voice and delivery, through. I don't usually pay a lot of attention to it that much, but her voice is so pleasant and soothing. Unfortunately, it's Fr*nch...
7/10
The Pogues
3/5
I like how playful and energetic Celtic music is. But this is the second album from The Pogues I've listened to and it's just more of the same stuff. I think that this music is pretty good at the baseline but doesn't have a very high ceiling as there doesn't seem to be a lot of place for iteration. This album is still an enjoyable listen, but it's nothing special.
7/10
Air
3/5
Although I loved Air's previous record, this album didn't do nearly as much for me. Like, nothing really happens in here. It kind of came and went, and I didn't find it all that interesting. Moon Safari was also quite ambient and downtempo, but it was far more expressive and powerful than this, in opinion. I mean, it's a score, it's meant to be in the background of a movies, so it makes sense. But on its own, separated from the movie (which I haven't seen), it's not that good—just fine.
Method Man
3/5
A lot of hip hop focuses solely on rapping, and this is just not for me. I never particularly liked vocals or payed a lot of attention to lyrics (I’m just lazy, to be honest) and enjoyed instrumentals a lot more. I’m not trying to downplay rap and its creativity. There’s a lot of rap albums that I like, but almost all of them have lush, varied, detailed production. Tical is not one of them. This is just a personal preference thing. A lot of rappers and their fans enjoy music in a different way from me, and that’s completely fine. There’s a lot hip hop I find really good, but the genre as a whole is not my thing.
It’s hard to argue with the fact that he’s a pretty good rapper. If that’s what you’re looking for, I guess this album is pretty good. For me though, these basic repetitive drum-machine-style beats with barely any progression or switch-ups are boring sometimes. This album is fine overall but not made for me.
Marvin Gaye
3/5
It’s honestly kinda sad how many legendary musicians I just don’t understand the appeal of. Am I just a miserable person? A philistine? Probably both. Although I would listen to pretty much anything and try not to judge genres, styles, or artists as much as I can, the list of my favorite albums is almost entirely dominated by records with large, overwhelming sound. Needless to say, this album doesn’t match my taste at all.
I completely understand why people may like this, but the vibe and the sound of this album and probably all of soul is not for me. It’s not offensive in any way, and I was fine listening to it while doing something else (like, it’s not boring), but it didn’t catch my attention at all. It’s well made, and the vocals are pleasant, but I just don’t care for love/break up songs and this chill, mellow vibe. It’s fine but not my thing.
Lauryn Hill
2/5
I do think this album is interesting. It's definitely unique in the kind of story it presents and the way it does it (least vague sentence in existence, I know; but I'm too lazy and stupid to explain what I mean exactly). But I didn't really vibe with it. Doo Wop is a banger, but I didn't find any of the other songs here particularly exciting (wouldn't say any of them are bad, through). This is hip hop with a heavy soul vibe to it, and I'm not a fan of that soundscape since neither 90s' hip hop nor soul appeal to me. It's too simple, too down to earth (although I completely understand that that's the entire point), and it's 77 minutes long. Although I wasn't expecting to like it, I was interested to listen to this album because it's pretty universally considered a classic, but I ended up finding it pretty underwhelming only because it doesn't fit my taste.
5/10
UB40
2/5
I don't really know how to assess reggae. It just all sound kind of the same to me, and I'm not really a fan of this genre's conventions (although I'm far from an expert and can't say I fully understand it, of course). Reggae doesn't appeal to me whatsoever. It's really hard for me to imagine an album of this genre that I would enjoy. So it's not really this album fault that I didn't like it all that much.
Yeah, I don't really know what to say about this album. All the problems I have with it are the same every other reggae album I've heard has. I felt like Tyler was by far the best song on this album, and the rest were just whatever (Madam Medusa is decent too, I guess). This album is inoffensive and even kind of nice in some places but just not interesting to me. It's too simple and repetitive, without variation or enough emphasis on certain parts of the composition, just like reggae is supposed to be—and I don't like it. It doesn't catch my interest at all. It sounds like elevator music, which is not a problem to me if songs build up to something, but reggae doesn't seem to ever do it. This is not my type of music, so it's really hard for me to enjoy it.
5/10
Queen Latifah
3/5
It started pretty fun and energetic, with less repetitive beats than usual, but fell off in the second half. I was enjoying it a lot in the beginning, but then it just turned into the same slow, monotonous stuff with very repetitive beats that is characteristic of hip hop from roughly that time frame, so I lost interest. The first half is pretty good, but everything after Ladies First is just meh, in my opinion.
The Flaming Lips
3/5
I mean, it's good but not really for me. I feel the same way about this as I do about Radiohead. The music is good and well-produced, but the vibe is not really for me. It's not boring or anything, but this warm sentimental tone is not really my thing. I think the concept of this album could've worked very well for me, but I would've preferred if it sounded more epic, but this album doesn't really do that and is instead relatively down to earth.
7/10
Leonard Cohen
2/5
It's not bad, I guess. I'm really not the type of person to appreciate this kind of music. I might be a sociopath, but dark, calm, sombre, melancholic music doesn't really have an emotional impact on me. It really only works for me through loud, overwhelming sound, which this album, by design, doesn't have. This album is way to simple and minimalistic, with mostly just a single acoustic guitar and maybe a couple of strings here and there all throughout the songs. Not that simplicity is necessarily bad, but I prefer something more structurally complex. The first song is really good, through, but I don't know how to explains why it feels different from the rest of the album (but it does).
If you like this, good for you, I guess, but I can't say I understand. For me, it was kind of underwhelming.
5/10
The Darkness
3/5
Pretty basic but fun glam-esque riff-driven rock album. There's nothing out of this world here, but catchy riffs are always good, and this album has a fair few. They kind of gave up in the second half, through, loosing a fair amount of energy. Still, overall, this is a pretty good album but not very memorable.
7/10
Blood, Sweat & Tears
3/5
It was playing in the background the whole time, and to be honest, I barely noticed it. I don't know, this album is just kind of lifeless? It doesn't suck—I don't hate it—but there's also almost nothing to love. It has a couple of pretty good moments, but overall is pretty empty.
The Stooges
4/5
Yes, this album is kind of basic; yes, the production is atrocious, but you can feel the raw power (get it?) even despite all of that. It's just so fun and energizing in both vocals and instruments. It's pretty simple and unpolished but so freaking engaging. The second half didn't quite leave up to the hype the fist half brought, but as a whole, this album is still great.
The Beach Boys
3/5
The Beach Boys is definitely not a typical pop rock band. They put way more effort into production than most bands in the genre, and their songs end up sounding noticeably more detailed and polished. That being said, I still find their music too safe and unimpressive.
It might be a little vague, but I don't think most people would disagree if I called their output "summer music." Their music is always bright and optimistic, and I'm just not into that vibe. I mean, it's an album. I listened to it. Didn't particularly hate anything about it, but I didn’t really like it. A bit short, but it's aight.
Lloyd Cole And The Commotions
3/5
Not really my thing, but this album is pretty cool. It's very well produced and sound clean. The atmosphere here is pretty pleasant. Nothing all that unique, but I enjoyed it.
7/10
Public Enemy
3/5
I don't like old hip hop. The beats are just way too minimalistic and repetitive, and the vocals barely interact with the instrumentals. They're just kind there, and I don't like that. The second half is a little better in that regard. They're still repetitive but a bit more energetic, so it's something. They mostly focus on writing, which is fine, but it’s not a part of music I personally care all that much about. This is a fine album, but I don’t think I’ll remember any of the songs here. Just not my thing.
Hole
3/5
I like this album, but I prefer their previous, more grungey one. I don’t have much to say about this one. This’s pretty basic alternative rock, but I like alternative rock, so I like this.
7/10
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
3/5
It's pretty cool. This is still not my type of music, but at least this album is more energetic than country usually is, which I appreciate. It's definitely too long, and I prefer a couple of long songs over a bunch of shorter ones, but I still had fun.
7/10
Dr. John
2/5
This album is... unique? It’s hard to describe it; I can’t say I’d heard anything quite like it before. It sounded like an occult ritual or something. But as for the positives, that's kind of it. It wasn't sonically offensive in any way, but there just was nothing that stood out to me. It’s easy to listen, and I wouldn’t call it boring, but it’s way to quiet and uneventful.
5/10
Pretenders
3/5
Pretty basic and simple but still enjoyable. There's nothing special here, but the riffs are fun, the vocals are fun. Good energetic album but unimpressive.
7/10
The Dave Brubeck Quartet
3/5
I don't dislike it, but it felt like (good) elevator music, which is not my preference at all. I actually quite enjoyed it, but this is not the kind of music I would remember or listen again. I prefer something more powerful and energetic. I get what kind of vibe they were going for, and I think they achieved it really well, but it's not something I'm looking for. And there's also a lot of jazz album that do kind of the same (can't say I'm well-versed in jazz, though). This is a cool album nonetheless.
7/10
Bad Brains
3/5
This album sounds like it tries to be very aggressive, but it falls markedly short of that. And the way it's mastered makes both the instruments and the vocals sound so anemic. It’s still fine and has some fun riffs, but the production holds it back a lot.
The Smashing Pumpkins
4/5
I love this album. Yes, it's way too long and has some filler, but I just enjoy heavy alternative rock and this loud, dense production style way too much. The first half is filled with so many bangers, and the second, despite being worse than the first one, in my opinion, still doesn't lack its variety and fun songwriting. Billy Corgan is not the best person in the world, and he's definitely not as talented as he seems to think he is. Don't get me wrong, there certainly have been musicians that were able to use their eccentricity to fuel their creative endeavors; Billy Corgan is just not one of them. Siamese Dreams and Mellon Collie feel like a fluke in the grand scheme of his discography, but it doesn't make them any less great. I find his voice a little annoying, but his melodic vocals generally helped more than they hurt on this album. This record is not perfect at all, but it's still and incredibly entertaining listen.
Kanye West
4/5
"I keep it 300 like the Romans" has been haunting me since I first heard it. Like, it's such a great song otherwise. Why did no one point this out to him during the whole recording process? But there's so much completely nonsensical writing on this album that it might even be intentional (the exact intentions are unclear to me, though). But for me, an album being stupid doesn't matter if it's entertaining, and Yeezus is fun as hell. It is very inconsistent and all over the place in both lyrics and production, but there’s a lot of variety and every song has something enjoyable about it.
Ignoring his more recent work, Kanye West proves that if you throw all of your genre's preexisting conventions and cliché out of the window and just focus on having fun, it can still result in some incredible music. He’s not a great writer, which would usually mean almost certain death in the hip hop scene (unless your name is Drake; I think his music is generally terrible, but he’s undeniably popular), but what he lacks in penmanship he more than makes up with his lush and varied production. Kanye used to make hip hop for people who don’t like rap (and now he makes hip hop for his schizophrenic hallucinations… and Candace Owens, apparently), and I, as a person who doesn’t enjoy lyrics or vocals all that much, prefer this.
I used to strongly dislike hip hop before I listened to some Kanye. The original idea behind rap was to deliver as much information as quickly as possible in a less restrictive than singing way, so, of course, tracks that chose rapping as their vocal vessel traditionally turned out to be very vocal-driven. And, like… I just don’t care about vocals and don’t enjoy analyzing lyrics. I don’t have an explanation why, but they don’t really bring me much enjoyment compared to just rhythmic structures and nice-feeling frequencies and their combinations instruments and electronic plugins produce. So I thought that this genre was not for me. However, I always knew that hip hop with high effort production is possible and was always curious how it might sound, and Kanye’s music is where I found it. And as it turns out, the rhythmic nature of rap can greatly enhance well-produced electronic beats. Yes, there is a lot of painfully basic and repetitive beats on one side of hip hop and unbearable auto-tuned mumbling on the other, but he proved that there’s a little something in this genre even for me. Of course, a track can have both good writing and production (e.g., Kendrick), but Kanye is so good at the latter that his less-than-stellar lyricism barely hurts.
Modern hip hop is very far away from where it was in the 80s and 90s. When I listened to some of it, I found out that there’s a significant amount of hip hop albums that don’t have the problems I used to associate with this genre. Recent releases put a lot more emphasis on production, and I think Kanye’s music is in no small part responsible for it.
I don’t have a conclusion or a clever segue into an outro. Fuck Kanye, but this album is nice—listen to it.
The Fall
3/5
The vocals are a bit underwhelming, but other than that, this album is pretty good. It's very simple in its composition and doesn't do anything impressive, but it sounds pleasant and is easy to listen. And I liked that goofy synth that sounds like a toy that in a couple of tracks, for some reason.
7/10
Thundercat
3/5
"Goku fucking ruuuiiined meeeee" was the last thing I expected to hear on a soul album lmao. I genuinely almost spit my water out.
I understand that soul is supposed to be comfort music. But for something to be considered comfort music, it needs to have entertainment value, and soul just doesn't work for me. Soul is usually way too laid back for my taste, so I just don’t have much fun listening to it. Calm music I like still usually builds up to something and has some exciting parts, which is not typical for soul. This album does have some good moments, though. This is not a generic soul album as it has a bunch of synths and modern pop culture references, and is generally more lighthearted (there’s even a Kendrick feature, for some reason). It’s… interesting, but as for how much fun I had listening to it, it’s just fine. The last 10 tracks or so are closer to more traditional soul, so I enjoyed them much less. I also think that some of the songs are way too short (the album is 51 minutes long, and there are 23 songs), not giving them ample time to breathe.
Count Basie & His Orchestra
3/5
There isn't much to hate about this album but also not much to love. It has a bunch of solos that range from unremarkable to pretty good but doesn't have much to offer in terms of catchiness or memorability. It's just kind of alright.
New York Dolls
3/5
That's gotta be the zestiest album cover you could realistically have in the 70s.
As for the music, this is extremely generic rock. It’s energetic and decently fun but doesn’t offer anything interesting. It’s not bad or boring, but painfully forgettable and unremarkable.
Depeche Mode
3/5
Some catchy tracks, but most are honestly quite forgettable. The opening track is by far the best one, in my opinion. I expected the rest of the album to sound some what similar, but the rest of the songs turned out to be slightly darker and were not as enjoyable to me.
3/5
This album is pretty consistent and catchy. But since it’s 60s’ pop rock, it lacked some wow factor for me. Shargri-La is fantastic, though. It has these layered instrumental crescendos that I really like, but they’re uncommon in pop rock (they probably didn’t intend it to have that much distortion, though).
7/10
Brian Eno
3/5
Kind of the same thing happens every time I listen to a Brian Eno album. He's obviously and incredibly talented musician. His music has a lot of brilliant moments, but what's between them ranges from alright to just boring. This album is no exception. The highs are very high, but there are a lot of parts where just nothing happens (and I’m not just talking about the ambient portions). Overall, I still enjoyed this album, but I feel like it had potential to be a lot better if it were a little more dense.
7/10
The Flying Burrito Brothers
2/5
Country was always meant for people who find the pastoral vibe romantic. I don't. For me, as person who lived their whole life in the city and never disliked it, having to spend a couple of summers as a child in a countryside house was depressive and boring. So yeah, I don't like country. And combining it with 60s' rock, even the best examples of which I don't like all that much, doesn't do this album any favors. It has two or three songs that are a bit different, but that's not enough. Although I didn't hate it, this album wasn't very engaging for me.
5/10
Led Zeppelin
4/5
One of my favorite hard rock bands and arguably their best album. They have a bunch of folk influences, but they're one of probably two artists who managed to find a way not to bore me out with them (I just don't like anything folk-related, unless it's metal, for some reason). Stairway to Heaven probably has one of the best climaxes of any song, ever. That being said, although I think this album is great and I love it, it is pretty inconsistent. I feel like Black Dog, Stairway to Heaven, and When the Levee Breaks are just way better than the rest of the songs on this album. I don’t think they’re bad or anything, but the average quality of songs here is not enough to reach the 9/10 territory. Like, this album is a roller coaster that has some songs that are groundbreaking in their catchiness, and the rest that is just solid but nothing special. Great riffs, great drumming, great vocals, but this album lacks a little bit of extra oomph for me.
Bruce Springsteen
3/5
I don't know what to say about this album. I felt it was pretty good but lacked something, but I can't say what exactly. I don't know, it was too soft-sounding for my taste, but beyond that, I can't say. It’s very well produced and a lot more detailed than typical pop rock albums, so at least it has that going for it.
7/10
R.E.M.
3/5
I don't get R.E.M. Their music feels consistently mid to me, and I don't really know what am I supposed to like about it. It sounds kinda nice, yeah, but it doesn't do anything special; the music feels formulaic. Most of their songs aren’t really memorable. I don’t hate their output in the slightest, but if I had to choose one artist to listen to on repeat, there would be 200 other ones before R.E.M. (they’d go before 99% of pop rock, though). I don't know.
I enjoyed this album fine enough, but It's the End of the World As We Know It and The One I Love were the only songs that stood out to me, because of their fun choruses. This sounds like a R.E.M. album, and that pretty much all I can say. If that's a good thing for you, I guess you would like this, but I feel completely indifferent to their style.
7/10
The Sugarcubes
3/5
Kind of just an unremarkable album. Feels a bit empty and underproduced. Björk is indeed there, but that's all I can say. I’m not a fan of Björk anyway, so I didn’t really care. I don’t know. I didn’t really get anything out of this album—listened and forgot. But I can’t say it was bad or grating in any way. Just didn’t excite me.
Beck
3/5
Apart from the opening track, I thought the first half was whatever, but the second half was great. This album has a pretty interesting blend of hip hop and rock without straight up being rap rock, which I enjoyed a lot. This album is pretty unique but still doesn’t have anything impressive.
7/10
Youssou N'Dour
3/5
The idea of folk music doesn't appeal to me whatsoever. By definition, it's music created by members of a certain culture for the members of the same culture any by people who had limited to no access to outside culture. Most of the time, because the creators had nowhere to draw inspiration from, it turns out to be way too structurally simple and limited in range for my liking. But after listening to some folk and folk-influenced albums from around the world, I guess what I'm gathering is that British people (and white Americans by extension) just have some trash folk music.
I mean, this album is not some sort of tribal music. It’s modern music recorded with modern instruments and with modern influences. But something like folk rock isn’t that either, and the problems I have with it are largely the same as with its acoustic counterparts. This album is chill but, at the same time, so energetic and catchy. This is not my kind of music as I prefer something more grandiose, but I still had fun. It’s layered and structurally pretty complex, which I massively prefer over the simple, down-to-earth approach of something like American folk.
7/10
Shivkumar Sharma
3/5
The vibe is nice, and I like these drums (whatever they're called; can't say I know anything about Hindu music), but that's about it. This album is fine. I enjoyed listening to it once, but I don't see myself ever returning to it. It's just way too simple and calm, which is not for me.
2/5
I feel like live albums only work if you already like the artist, and I don't really have much appreciation for Bob Dylan. I mean, I didn't die of boredom listening to this, so at least there's that.
The first half is just him singing alone with an acoustic guitar and a harmonica. I guess this has charm for someone, but for me this is just boring. Bob Dylan is a great writer, but for me, instrumentation is far more important. And here, since it’s just one person and calm songs, it’s extremely monotonous and unsatisfying. Again, I understand why some people may like this, but this is just not for me. I listen to music for fun, and this is not fun. The second half of the album is an a lot more energetic folk rock gig, which is actually pretty fun. Though, apart from Like a Rolling Stone, I didn’t find any of the songs all that exciting.
5/10
Thin Lizzy
3/5
I mean, this is pretty good—some fun energetic hard rock, which is pretty enjoyable—but at the same time, this particular album doesn't stand out whatsoever. They're not the best to ever do it, and there's a lot of albums that do the same.
7/10
TV On The Radio
3/5
This album is pretty unique and varied, but despite that, I can't say I enjoyed it that much. it's too calm and a bit too monotonous for my liking, and it didn't feel like it was building up towards anything. I definitely didn't hate it, and the amount of variety and interesting ideas kept me somewhat interested, but I can't say I would be interested to hear something similar to this.
Pet Shop Boys
3/5
Out of all the pop subgenres, synthpop (along with art pop) is probably the closest to enjoyable for me. It’s not something I would be able to listen to for hours on end without getting bored, but it’s better than most pop.
I don’t usually enjoy something that’s as chill as this album, but the vibe here is pretty nice. The opening track is the catchiest one, and the others are not as good, but they’re still pretty enjoyable. That being said, this type of music needs to really be exceptional to impress me (e.g., Imaginal Disk), and this album is not quite there (a bit too relaxed for my liking), but the atmosphere and the lush, detailed production are very pleasant.
7/10
Fats Domino
3/5
Not to be a hater, but this guy has one of the most annoying album naming schemes I've ever seen. I'm sure at least some part of his impressive sales numbers could be attributed to people accidentally buying the wrong record and then coming back to buy a different one.
As much as I dislike modern pop music, the situation with popular music in the 50s was much worse. Nowadays we at least have variety and a large selection of readily available music by indie/underground artists. It doesn't matter if you for some reason hate absolutely everything that's popular, because you can completely disregard every artist that has over 100000 monthly listeners on Spotify and still not be starved for chose. This wasn't the case in the 50s when your only chance of ever seeing your music getting released was to get signed by one of the record labels who controlled all the recording and pressing equipment. All of them were fighting for market share, and the only viable strategy, it seems, was to pump out as many different records as possible. This led to a lot of music at the time, regardless of genre, sounding extremely samey, since the musicians didn't have the time to make anything sophisticated and they were recorded playing whatever. To be fair, this didn't change much in the 60s or the 70s, but at that time we saw a lot more experimentation and innovation (both technological and artistic). And some of that music just so happened to get popular.
This album is not the worst example of that approach. It is a product of its time, and you won't find anything markedly different on it. It's completely inoffensive and sound like a thousand other albums from the same time period. This album might as well be called generic_50s_r&b.mp3, but at least it's very energetic the whole way through, so I though it was kind of fun, I guess.
Miles Davis
5/5
I was so seated for this one. You have no idea how seated I was. In fact, I wanted to go to the toilet, like, 10 minutes in, but I remained seated the whole way through. That's how seated I was.
Jazz sort of has a reputation of being a snobby genre because a lot of the highly regarded jazz records happen to be avant-garde. I understand how comments akin to "you just don't get it" can get frustrating. Everyone should be entitled to their own preferences. I also don't enjoy a lot of critically acclaimed albums. However, I personally think that there's nothing to "get" here. I think this just sounds awesome. I also think that people who don't agree that long-form songs are superior are just lying.
This album has some incredible consistency for something so purposely inconsistent. You don’t know what’s coming next, but every time, it sounds incredible—and that’s what made it so fun for me. I feel like jazz is the perfect genre for this sort of chaotic, polyphonic music. With genres that heavily rely on electric instruments like rock, due to their inherent loudness, detail tends to get lost in the mix, and the fact that you can’t hear every individual instrument clearly makes me enjoy it a little less. You can use it to your advantage, of course, but more often than not, I find the mixing/mastering job on chaotic/noisy rock or electronic records to be less than stellar. You can certainly also go louder with jazz (this album is not the most frantic and definitely not the most aggressively loud jazz record that I’ve heard), and modern jazz fusion, in my experience, also tends to fall into that trap. But when everything is set up so you can hear every musician as clearly as possible, if everyone plays something great at the same time, all of that combined sounds even better—and that’s what this album does. I still prefer music with more pronounced crescendos, so I can’t say this albums suits my preferences exactly, but this was genuinely one of the most engaging albums I’ve ever heard.
9/10
Doves
3/5
Don’t really know what to say about this one. It does what it does pretty well, but it doesn’t do much. Although I can’t say this album is generic, it didn’t stand out to me in any way. Still enjoyed it, though.
7/10
Milton Nascimento
2/5
This album just doesn't have anything I like in music. It's very vocal-focused, and the instrumentation is mostly minimalistic and in the background. It becomes a little more lively towards the end, but the majority of the record wasn't very interesting to me. Can't say I hate—it was pretty easy to listen to—but this album was ultimately pretty boring for me.
The Doors
4/5
Was expecting this to sound like The Beatles, so I was preparing to be disappointed, but it turned out to be quite different. It’s hard for me say much about this album because it is extremely simple. I think it balances its dark atmosphere with energetic songwriting really well. The vocals are fun and memorable. Every song is pretty catchy, and these organ melodies all throughout the album are great. It’s early stereo, though, so there’s some annoying aggressive separation (there’s a mono mix, but it sounds worse, in my opinion), but this is probably the best implementation I’ve seen. Surprisingly for an album released in the 60s, it is mixed very well. So yeah, can’t say this albums is all that special, but I was pleasantly surprised by how fun it was.
The Verve
3/5
A couple of good songs, but most others ones are forgettable. There’s a lot of parts on this album there barely anything happens and the music is basically a drone. It didn’t work to build atmosphere for me and was pretty underwhelming. I liked the noisier tracks here, but there’s only a couple of them.
The Roots
4/5
I really don’t like the monotony and repetitiveness of early hip hop, and I don’t really get why some people might prefer it over something like this album. Granted, I don’t care much about lyrics and vocals, and rap was intended to be a primarily lyrical genre, so that makes sense. But it doesn’t meant that this genre is incapable of producing something that appeals to me specifically.
This album couples engaging flows with exciting production. Every song sounds very different and has its unique beat that incorporates influences from various other genres. It’s also just very well produced and sounds extremely clean. This is the kind of hip hop I like: fast-paced and with a lot of thought and variety in production. I wouldn’t say there’s anything in this album that stands out as exceptional, but it’s very consistent and exciting the while way through.
Cat Stevens
4/5
Based on genres and descriptors, I wasn't expecting to enjoy this, but I was very pleasantly surprised.
A lot of these folk-adjacent singer-songwriter albums tend to be pretty boring to me. They’re vocal-focused and put the instrumentation on the back burner (sometimes to the point of only utilizing a single instrument). They’re made for people who want to listen to calm, sensual, emotion-driven songs about the author’s personal feelings and musings. Which is completely fine, by the way, but as a person who likes complexity and much prefers the sound of instruments over vocals, not what I look for in music.
This album, however, while also having the above-stated characteristics in some parts, doesn’t shy away from going loud and letting the instruments breathe. In my unbiased and scientifically tested opinion, every composition can be improved by a crescendo that is three times louder than the rest of the song—and these album has plenty. This approach to the genre is so much more satisfying to me. As someone who doesn’t like folk nor pop, a folk pop album that is written like it’s hard rock (minus the abrasive nature) is so much more enjoyable.
Billy Bragg
3/5
A couple of good songs but nothing to write home about. Most of them, although not bad, are forgettable. Overall, this album sounds pretty pleasant. I enjoyed it but can’t say much more.
7/10
Lambchop
3/5
Guys. I think we found where AI got its piss filter from.
I thought it was boring initially, but I kind of got into it later. I mean, this is just peaceful background music that doesn’t do anything to stand out, and that’s not for me. I pretty much never in the mood to listen to anything like this. But I guess his voice is pleasant, so I enjoyed it a little bit.
Drive-By Truckers
3/5
These guys have an unhealthy obsession with whatever chord progression Sweet Home Alabama starts with (and with Alabama in general considering they're from Georgia).
This album is way too long and, apart from some spoken word segments, repetitive. I don’t mind long albums, but when most songs are generic, it’s not that fun to listen to. The only song on this album I can say is great is Ronnie and Neil. I guess The Three Great Alabama Icons offered some interesting pieces of trivia I didn’t know about. But all the other songs are… there. I can’t say they’re bad—they’re fine—but don’t stand out whatsoever. As someone who doesn’t enjoy the vibe of the American South, they weren’t that interesting. But I appreciate this album for not over-romanticizing it and pointing out its flaws while also stating that there’re still a lot of great people in the South despite its reputation.
Bruce Springsteen
2/5
Don't know what to say about this one. Don't know what I was supposed to get out of it. Nothing caught my attention. The whole thing was very well produced but had no interesting ideas and was overall pretty underwhelming. I thought his previous album with its more prominent Wall of Sound production worked quite a bit better.
5/10
Radiohead
3/5
Not a huge fan of Radiohead, and this album sounds just like all of their stuff past The Bends. It has some great parts, but it’s not that engaging. I don’t know how to explain it. I like when they do more generic rock songs (like 2 + 2 = 5 on this album), but the “whininess” of their other songs is a turn off for me. That being said, the relative uniqueness of their music and superb production are enough to make it somewhat enjoyable.
7/10
k.d. lang
2/5
I don’t like country, and the background string arrangements in this albums don’t help at all. It is still way to quiet and monotonous for me. This albums was inoffensive but still boring.
The Offspring
4/5
This album is quite repetitive, but the energetic riffs and vocals make it fun the whole way through. Nothing really impressive, just enjoyable, catchy punk.
Joni Mitchell
3/5
Vocal-forward music is not for me, and folk rock is far from my favorite style of instrumentation. I don't care about vocals or lyrics all that much, and the instruments in these album tend to be in the background, which I also don't like. But in this album the vocals are not that monotonous and the instruments are a bit more present, so I through it was fine. I enjoyed Coyote and Song for Sharon quite a bit actually, but the rest were forgettable. This album is not boring but also not exciting. Just fairly enjoyable background music that is not really my thing.
Tangerine Dream
2/5
I don't like ambient music. I strongly prefer when atmospheric music builds up to something big, and ambient very rarely does that. I like music to be actively engaging, but being in the background is the whole point of ambient, so I usually find it quite boring. I can’t say I hated this album. It has some good parts and interesting texture. But music this relaxed feels underwhelming to me.
5/10
Rod Stewart
3/5
Not much to say. Just extremely generic rock. It is somewhat energetic and has some variety but nothing all that exciting. This album is not bad by any means, but it’s also not good.
King Crimson
4/5
I always liked King Crimson, but they were never among my favorites. I think their highs are extremely high, but they tend to struggle with consistency. Case in point, going from Epitaph to Moonchild is probably one of the most steep quality drops I've heard in any album (not because the latter is very bad, but because the former is really good), and it's 12 minutes long—more than a quarter of the album. But Moonchild, despite begin by far my least favorite song on this album, still, in my opinion, has the best lyrics and vocals (maybe on par or slightly behind the title track, though). KC kind of just like having some parts where nothing happens in their songs, of which I'm not a huge fan, and Moonchild is the most egregious example. Like, they're so good individually but for some reason don't always manage to showcase that together at the same time. If only they could combine all of their talent in one song and call it Starless or something. But that would never happen. I am also not a huge fan of I Talk to the Wind, but I can't say it's a bad song—it just doesn't fit my preferences, being too quiet and laid back. The three other songs, though, are incredible.
I think this album is imperfect and at this point slightly dated, but it created what is, in my opinion, the most consistently exciting genre of music ever. This album sort of puts the music industry as a whole into perspective for me. Like, it came out in 1969. Every time I listen to a mediocre rock album released in the 70s onwards, I always think, “Seriously? This came out after prog became a thing?” The genre whose whole idea was to attempt to introduce new concepts into rock created a lot of unique and exciting music, it turns out.
I’m a big proponent of the theory that art only gets better over time. It is like science, in a way. Artists discover new ways of creating stuff, and newer generations, as well as benefiting from technological development, get a bigger pool of knowledge to draw inspiration from. But although there have obviously been numerous great albums released since In the Court of the Crimson King, the vast majority of music still can’t catch up to the greatness achieved by prog musicians in the 70s.
The reason why probably boils down to commercial appeal, of which prog has none. It is widely regarded as “challenging” music, although I never understood why. For me, progressive rock never forced me to think about the complexities of its composition or whatever to enjoy it and just sounded great. But I digress. I guess most people tend to stick to what’s popular and never go out of their way to find something new because of the “if it’s popular, it has to be great” mentality. And musicians, when seeing this, might be inclined to replicate that popular sound to reach a wider audience, so music ends up staying stale. It probably wasn’t that big of an issue back when people had to buy music. Now that music is virtually free and consolidated basically in a single library (with minor variations between providers), we have a very easy metric of popularity, like the amount of streams on Spotify. Using that, people may dismiss everything that doesn’t reach their arbitrary boundary of popularity, and it reduces the chance of up-and-coming musicians to discover that music too and drawing inspiration from it. Yes, music creation is also a lot more accessible now, but only 1% (if not less) gets any amount of fame, so I can't necessarily say that there are more active "big" artists when before.
I don’t know how to conclude this. I’m stupid. Don’t listen to me.
Peter Gabriel
3/5
I'm a little embarrassed that it took me more than one album from Peter Gabriel to realize that this is the guy from Genesis. I was like, "I swear I've heard this voice before," the whole way through.
This album feels like a little more "artsy" pop rock. I don't know how to describe it. It's obviously not as simple as pop rock and pays a lot more attention to instruments, aiming for more variety through somewhat unique composition. And I enjoyed it more than an average pop rock album because of that. But it still mainly focuses on vocals (which I don't like that much) and tries to be more accessible. I feel like something is missing, but I don't really know what exactly.
7/10
The Magnetic Fields
2/5
It feels like the only thing this album is known for is being long, which is, like… okay? It’s a concept album, so what’s the concept? Being long? I mean, this is not even the longest album I’ve listened to. The only difference is that the longest album I’ve heard wasn’t long for the sake of being long, and had 10 songs instead of 69.
It's not that it's repetitive or monotonous—it's not. This album actually has a lot of variety when it comes to instrumentation and vocal styles. I don't even mind most of the songs here (but don't particularly like them either). Some of them are extremely low effort, sure, but I can’t say I hated anything on this album. There's just too many of them (69, to be exact). I would rather listen to a couple of long songs than a bunch of shorter ones. They’re much more memorable this way. After a while, despite the fact that the songs here are different, they started to blend together as I began to lose interest. None of them stood out, which is not surprising. If your goal is to record 69 songs for a single album, you can’t really afford to come up with elaborate compositions for each one of them, and it’s even harder if you’re also limiting yourself in subject.
Have I already mentioned that there are 69 songs on this album? At least one of them doesn't even have anything to do with love songs (Experimental Music Love), so the name is not even accurate. At least they’re not all about straight people, which is already more variety than 98% of love songs... Ah, I get it now. They were mad that straight people monopolized love songs, and this is an attempt to balance the scale—in one album, because why the fuck not.
The subject of love doesn’t interest me whatsoever, which definitely a part of the problem, but I also don’t like the execution. At the same time, I don’t see how it could’ve turned out any better. I just don’t think this was a good idea.
5/10
Cyndi Lauper
2/5
Very plain and forgettable pop rock with some synths on top. Not much to say. I didn’t really like any of the songs, but they weren’t bad. It doesn’t even have an occasional fun energetic song mediocre pop rock albums usually have. It felt a little lifeless.
5/10
The Velvet Underground
5/5
I don't even know why I like this. This album feels like it should be so not up my alley, but it somehow works incredibly well. The production is extremely overblown and sounds dated, but I think it also works somehow? It’s primarily a vocal-focused record, and although I don’t usually care about lyrics and vocals, it’s one of the biggest things that make this album great. I don’t know how they made the writing so satisfying—and consistently too. I can’t remember a single example of another album outside rap achieving something like this. I believe I’d only listened to this record once before, but I still remembered every song well. Every song is a banger, uniquely and memorable. This goes completely against everything that makes me enjoy an album, yet it is so incredibly engaging.
9/10
Julian Cope
3/5
Peggy? As in JPEGMAFIA?
I like this. Not every song hits, but on average, they’re pretty good, not generic and with some standouts too. I do think this album would’ve benefited from shaving off a couple of minutes, though. It starts to drag a little bit towards the end, and later songs are not that interesting, in my opinion. It's ostensibly and concept album. I don't know what the concept is, but cool, I guess.
7/10
4/5
Another classic prog rock album along with In the Court of the Crimson King that I love but don't quite think is a masterpiece. I can’t really explain why. Outside of the opening track, this album is not that memorable and lacks some extra punch for me.
A lot of the talk around this album is mostly concerning the title track, which makes sense because it is exceptional. And I think that’s largely the problem. The two other tracks are still very good, but they pale in comparison to the absolute magnum opus that is the title track. Every time I listen to this album (and I’ve listened to it a lot), when I reach the end of the first track, it feels like I’m done, and the other songs are an unnecessary weight that’s only there to reach a time goal. Don’t get me wrong, I still like them, but they just can’t match the title track in sheer scale and ambition. A lot of albums have standout tracks, but they rarely have ones that stand out this much. I feel like in any other album, I would find these two tracks to be fantastic, but not in the one that opens with arguably one of the best songs in the history of rock (that is also almost 19 minutes long).
Janelle Monáe
4/5
Admittedly, I'm a pop hater. Also admittedly, some pop albums are very good, which is annoying to me because they don't fit my narrative. People CAN make good corporate music, which makes the fact that they usually don't even more disappointing. It's so rare to hear a pop record that sounds fresh while maintaining accessibility and doesn't make me drowsy four songs in. Fortunately, they do exist, and this is one of them.
This album is just so nicely produced and flows so well you barely notice it's over an hour long. I prefer the catchy and danceable first half (with these satisfying Stankonia drums), but the more laid-back second half is not half bad either. Songs like Dance or Die, Faster, Cold War, Wondaland are so fun to listen to. This album features a big range of vocal and instrumental styles throughout its runtime, which definitely helped me feel engaged the whole way through, even though I wasn’t a huge fan of some of the approaches. The futuristic vibe was also very nice. This was the first pop record in a while I was genuinely exciting to listen through.
One big problem, though: on this cover, they look a lot like a certain Kanye supporter.
Pet Shop Boys
3/5
"Man, I also love Actually: Further Listening 1987-1988 (Deluxe) [2018 Remaster], what a coincidence!”
Pretty catchy and pleasant-sounding synthpop album but nothing outstanding. I liked the ”airy” production, but it was a bit too relaxed for me.
7/10
George Harrison
3/5
This album is very inconsistent because of its length. I really like half of the songs here, but the other half is very typical and unremarkable pop/folk rock. This album would've been, like, a 9 to me if it only included the best 10 songs or so. As it is, it's 100 minutes long and a bit hit-or-miss. Some songs are very fun and catchy and utilize the Wall of Sound production style incredibly well. They sound busy despite still being pretty calm lyrically, which I like. The jam band tracks at the end are also pretty cool, I guess. But the others are just whatever.
7/10
Steely Dan
3/5
Can’t think of anything to say. This is pretty good but nothing all that special. I don’t even know how a pop rock album is supposed to impress me without some heavy influences (I don’t really like this genre). This album has some, but not enough to make it a cut above the rest.
7/10
Billy Joel
3/5
There's so many pop rock albums. Who decided it was a good idea to have that many pop rock albums?
To be honest, I ran out of things to say about pop rock a while ago, and the albums individually are very rarely unique enough for the conversation about this genre's conventions to be an insufficient description of their sound—and that's kind of the main issue. Sure, they might have different influences, different vocal styles, different production styles, accentuate different instruments, and so on, but it just all still sounds like pop rock. I always get the impression that nobody on the production team is trying to make art (although I know they absolutely are), and the output feels the same as a thousand other albums before it. It's so watered down and fundamentally unimpressive that it's hard for me to find even the better examples of the genre fun. It's such a tired and rutted formula that should've become outdated in the 70s but somehow continued to be popular for decades onward. I listen to these albums once and might even enjoy them a little bit, but there’s absolutely nothing that would make me want to return to them later. What is surprising to me is how acclaimed a lot of these albums are. Even people who listen to a lot of music seem to generally like them despite the fact that they never push boundaries or try to introduce something unique. I just don’t get it.
As for this album specifically, it's good, I guess. Has some fun parts, has some not so fun parts. But like… whatever, man. It's one of the many, and I can't see myself getting excited about something like this.
7/10
Leftfield
4/5
They had woke albums in the 90s smh my head.
I didn’t expect to enjoy this this much. I’m generally not a fan of electronic music. It very rarely hits the vibe I’m looking for, but this one did just that. This album is 70 minutes long, but it’s so tightly packed with catchy beats and satisfying sound design that it is still engaging even towards the end. And this atmosphere that somehow feels tribal and futuristic and the same time is so nice. Yeah, great album, very enjoyable.
Ryan Adams
3/5
Was kind of expecting this to suck, but it turned out pretty good. I don’t know why it’s this long, though. It definitely starts to drag towards the end, but there’s a fair amount of fun and catchy songs, so the overall experience was pleasant.
7/10
Beastie Boys
4/5
A very fun and engaging hip hop album with a lot of variety (some of it Isn’t even hip hop). This album has a lot of influences, and every track sounds different. So despite it being on the longer side, you have no idea how the next song is going to sound, and it stays engaging the whole way through. The lyrics are fast-paced and also enjoyable. I wouldn’t say there anything outstanding about this album, but all the songs are consistently good.
Kanye West
4/5
I wasn't really enjoying it this much initially but eventually got into it. I definitely prefer his later, more maximalist records, and the soul-esque vibe this album has is also not my thing, but the atmosphere was still very pleasant. It's on the longer side, but the songs were pretty consistently enjoyable, so it didn't feel long. I understand what this skits/interludes were supposed to do to the story, but I didn't like them regardless. It felt like they were distracting me from the actual song, and incorporating them into the music (some of them are) would've been better.
Although I had some problems with this album, from the artistic standpoint, it's a wonderfully executed project that fully deserves its classic status. Definitely not my type of music, and I didn't get deep into was going on here lyrically since I don't really enjoy listening to vocals, but I fully understand why some people would consider this a masterpiece.
Marvin Gaye
2/5
I don’t like soul. I don’t think I’ll ever come to appreciate it. I like complex, grandiose, instrument-driven music, and soul is basically the opposite of that. It’s just not the type of vibe I enjoy, and this album doesn’t do much to differentiate itself from other soul records. So for me, although I can’t say it was hard to listen to, it was underwhelming.
5/10
The Clash
3/5
This album feels a little lifeless and lacking energy. I mean, it definitely tries to be energetic, but every song here, for some reason, sound like everyone was a little tired while recording it. This is probably a quirk of the recording, but this album sounds way too clean for what it tries to do and therefore lacking detail. It's not not enjoyably, through. It certainly isn't on the same level as London Calling (although I'm not a massive fan of that record either—it's not the most consistent thing ever, in my opinion), but it's still fine. It's just a little bare-bones and not as exciting as it probably should've been.
David Bowie
3/5
I don’t know what to say. It’s pretty good and not generic but doesn’t do anything all that special. The songs were catchy enough to be enjoyable, but that’s pretty much it.
7/10
Elliott Smith
4/5
Damn, that’s great actually.
I don’t like mellow, melancholic folk music. Still, Elliott Smith has an ability to make that kind of music not only bearable but even enjoyable for me. I liked Either / Or (which is probably his most acclaimed record), but I can’t say it stood out to me as something particularly notable. But the more pop-y approach this album took made it noticeably more fun for me. It just had so many catchy songs with satisfying vocals with detailed, multi-layered production more reminiscent of indie rock than folk, which I really liked. I can’t say this album blew me away, but it was a very pleasant and engaging listen nonetheless.
Raekwon
3/5
Some straightforward, decently energetic hip hop with basic, repetitive beats. Not my thing. They're good rappers, through. If that's what you care about, then I guess this album is pretty good. The production is very lo-fi and boomy, which I also don't really like. Can't say I have any strong feeling regarding this album. Didn't love, didn't hate it—it was fine.
Nick Drake
2/5
This kind of music is just not interesting for me. It’s very calm, mellow, and vocal-driven. Some people like it, but I personally don’t find it fun. It’s chamber music, so it’s not as painfully minimal as some folk, but it is still not exciting for me at all. I don’t think there’s anything specific about this album that made me like it less than I otherwise would. It just follows the conventions of a genre I don’t enjoy.
5/10
The Birthday Party
3/5
I mean, I get what they were going for but can't say I'm exactly a fan of the No Wave philosophy. There are a lot of music conventions some musicians accept as gospel truth, and purposely abandoning them can lead to some unique sound. But the thing is, I actually like a lot music conventions, and rhythmic and melodic music by extension. I certainly don't hate this, though. It's far from the most abrasive or dissonant music out there (not that being either of the two is necessarily a bad thing), so it's not like it's unpleasant to listen to, and it also has some cool moments. But this is still ultimately not my thing. The cover does look exactly how the album sounds, gotta give them that.
Pulp
3/5
I don’t know. This album felt a little sparse. There were some interesting moments, but most of the time, not a whole lot was happening. It was somewhat enjoyable but pretty forgettable.
Nina Simone
3/5
I don’t like vocal jazz, but this is far from the worst example. Vocal jazz basically removes everything I like about jazz—complex, eclectic instrumentation—in favor of a more relaxed, vocal-forward sound. And since I don’t care about vocals most of the time, I just don’t enjoy it. This album, despite the fact that she really likes stretching out syllables, which is probably the single-most annoying vocal technique for me, occasionally makes it work (most noticeably in Four Women) while also having some more energetic songs I generally enjoy a lot more than the laid-back ones. This album is fine. It’s very far from my taste, but it’s decently enjoyable.
Fleetwood Mac
3/5
I mean, I like this album. It is well produced and has occasional sparks of genius like in The Chain and Gold Dust Woman, but the rest is just woefully unimpressive. This albums is pretty much universally loved, and it’s not hard to see why. Even among pop rock, which is a genre that already basically does everything to be as inoffensive as possible, it is very accessible. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but I don’t like all the ways it limits artistic expression. This album is polished and, overall, enjoyable, but it doesn’t stand out as anything special. It’s very soft and very straightforward. It doesn’t try to challenge the listener and therefore, to my taste, can only achieve good results at best but nothing outstanding.
7/10
Neil Young
3/5
I pretty much only enjoy country/folk rock when it’s closer to rock. This album leans a lot more into its singer-songwriter side and is more calm and relaxed than Harvest, for example. Not my favorite style, but it definitely isn’t bad. When there’s more rock elements, it’s kind of good, otherwise it’s just meh.
The Beau Brummels
3/5
Just very generic folk rock. Not really much to it. It’s not bad, not that good either. If it were longer, I probably would’ve enjoyed it less. It sounds very clean, though, which rare for rock albums from the 60s, but this basically this album’s only big advantage.
Nick Drake
2/5
Yep, can confirm, this is a Nick Drake album. Some people really like this kind of music, but I’m not one of them. It’s too mellow and relaxed. I struggle to derive much enjoyment from it. It’s definitely not bad, and the fact that it’s chamber music certainly helps it feel less sparse, but this is still just not for me.
5/10
The Pretty Things
3/5
Pretty good psychedelic rock album but nothing outstanding. It’s decently consistent through, so it was enjoyable all the way through.
7/10
Curtis Mayfield
3/5
Actually pretty fun soul, which is surprising since I like basically nothing about this genre. There’s a bunch of funk elements, making this album overall more catchy and enjoyable for me. Still not my type of music, and there are some slower soul parts that I don’t really like, but this album is still good, I’d say.
7/10
Harry Nilsson
3/5
Yeah, it's fine. Didn't feel anything, but it's not like it was bad or boring or anything. Just a completely unimpressive pop rock album but totally passable.
The Hives
4/5
I'm very partial to this kind of punk music, for some reason. It’s very simple, but the riffs are great, the songs are energetic, and the lyrics are fun. I probably would’ve enjoyed it less if it were a bit longer. But as it is, although there’s nothing particularly impressive, this album is short and sweet and very engaging.
Deep Purple
4/5
As good as Machine Head if not better. Not really much to say. Great riffs, very engaging energetic songs, and a random fantastic 10-minute prog track. Nothing mind blowing but consistent and enjoyable.
Gene Clark
3/5
Definitely not the worst country rock album I’ve heard. I prefer the vibe of Gene Clark albums over more traditional country, but this album was still way too calm and mellow for me. I really enjoyed No Other (which was surprising to me because I very rarely like anything country related), so maybe the problem was that I was expecting something similar, but this album felt a lot less interesting conceptually and a lot closer to a lot of basic country rock I don’t particularly like. It was still fine, I guess, but certainly not on the same level as No Other.
Sarah Vaughan
2/5
I don’t really understand what I’m supposed to like about this. I don’t like vocal jazz. It’s just always the same quiet, laid-back songs with nothing special about them. Nothing stands out. Always the same vocal techniques, always the same relaxed instrumentation, always so basic and unengaging. I guess the vibe is decent here, probably because it’s live. There’s just nothing to like about this besides that. It’s not terrible, but extremely underwhelming.
5/10
T. Rex
3/5
Get It On is such a banger, and the rest of the songs on this album are not as great. I think this album is still pretty good overall, but it’s too simplistic and lacks some “wow” factor as well as variety. Enjoyable listen, but outside of Get It On, nothing exceptional.
7/10
Mariah Carey
2/5
Please stretch more syllables. Every syllable needs to be at least five times longer than in casual speech... God I hate that vocal technique so much.
This album is just so boring. The production quality is pretty good, but that’s the only compliment I can give it. I don’t know what I’m supposed to enjoy about this. It's just an hour of the same uninspiring and unimaginative stuff I’ve heard on radio a million limes. Most songs here are over 4 minutes long, which is not a lot, of course, but, holy shit, I now understand why average pop listeners have no patience for anything over 3 minutes. I guess they're just used to nothing fucking happening in their songs, so they have no faith in music being able to build up to something interesting. The songs are not long, but they feel like such a drag. They’re so monotonous and uninteresting. The only songs I kind of enjoyed was Fly Away but only because it has a somewhat decent house beat. Also, what's the point of a cover if the only thing you're doing to the song is making it worse? They looked at an actual great pop song and thought, “Nah, that’s not what pop is about. Let’s make it boring.”
It’s not complete trash. I guess if you’re into vocals, you may like her voice? I mean, she does all the same shit other vocalists in her genre do and no more. But I guess some people like it? For me though, it was a waste of time.
Run-D.M.C.
3/5
I’m not a huge fan of 80s’ hip hop as it is usually very simple and very repetitive, but this one is a lot more varied and energetic. There’s some rock influences, which I enjoyed, the flows are good, the rapping is decent. Pretty good album. It doesn’t push any boundaries, but it’s enjoyable nonetheless.
7/10
Grant Lee Buffalo
3/5
Enjoyable album. Not particularly memorable or exciting, but the vibe is nice and I had fun listening to it. It’s relaxed without being boring and features an interesting mix of alt rock and country. Pretty simple but good overall, I’d say.
7/10
Aerosmith
3/5
Straightforward and fun hard rock album. Not much else to say. Every song hits, but none of them hit particularly hard. Decent riffs, good choruses. Enjoyable album but nothing to write home about.
7/10
The Cars
3/5
This cover is terrifying, but the album is good. Has a couple of stand outs, and on average it’s pretty fun. It has a nice playful, uplifting vibe to it. Nothing overly exciting, but I liked it.
7/10
Sex Pistols
4/5
It’s kind of funny thinking how controversial this album was at the time considering that it now comes off as very typical, milquetoast punk. It’s nothing I haven’t heard before and the production is not good, but fuck it, I’m biased. It’s so energetic, with simple but satisfying riffs. I just enjoy this kind of music. It’s not high art or whatever, but it’s entertaining as fuck.
David Bowie
3/5
I was never a fan of Bowie to begin with, but this is the most forgettable album I’ve heard from him so far. I don’t know what to say. It’s just a nothing burger. It’s not bad by any means, but it didn’t stuck with me at all and left no impression. It’s fine, I guess, but not something I’d want to return to in the future.
Genesis
4/5
I don’t mind long albums, but I don’t particularly enjoy albums with a lot of songs. However, there’s so much variety in this album that it doesn’t feel long at all. I like Peter Gabriel’s voice, and like how Genesis harmonize his vocals (in general, not just on this album). There’s some story in this album, but didn’t really pay attention. It’s sounds good, and that’s what matters most to me. There are a couple of stand out tracks on this album, and they’re surprisingly evenly spaced out. I’m not saying that the songs between them are bad—they’re just not that impressive. No part of this album feels like it overstays its welcome because in the middle of the songs that are just great, there are a couple of even better ones all throughout the record.
Yeah, very enjoyable album. I love Genesis. They’re not one of my favorite bands, but their albums are almost guaranteed to have some seriously impressive stuff. Definitely one of the best “synthesizer prog” bands.
Lynyrd Skynyrd
3/5
It seems that Lynyrd Skynyrd have unfortunately decided to seal their fate early on in their career by putting one of the most iconic (and genuinely outstanding) rock songs of all time on their debut album. Yes, Free Bird is on this album, and that’s basically all most people are talking about. It’s really hard to explain how great Free Bird truly is and how much it eclipses the whole rest of this album. It’s an exceptional song, and that solo never gets old. It just never stops, and this is a trope I really wish was more popular not only in music but art as a whole (although I understand that writing something that expands on one idea this much is insanely difficult).
As for the rest of the songs, they’re decent. They’re obviously not even close in terms of quality and entertainment factor, and although some of them (Tuesday’s Gone and Simple Man) are better than the other, none of them feel boring. If you exclude the last track, it’s a fine and pretty consistently enjoyable album. It just so happens to have an insane jump in quality right at the end.
7/10
Randy Newman
3/5
It’s funny (not really) how American political satire doesn’t seem to age. You can say, “People are racist, and the government doesn’t respond to the needs of the working class,” and it might just remain true forever. It’s crazy how such a stagnant society is still (at least nominally) rapidly developing.
As for the musical aspects of this album, it’s fine. Not really much to talk about. Chill, somewhat enjoyable, but literally nothing special.
The Jam
3/5
Felt a little empty. I don’t really like the airy, echo-y sound of new wave, and this album is basically just that. Not bad but too minimal and not very exciting.
Beyoncé
2/5
I would call Beyoncé the most pretentious pop artist, but unfortunately Taylor Swift exists. I believe that she puts a lot of effort into her work or whatever, but what’s the point of talking about it so much when you have a team of over 100+ people, infinite budget, and the output is literally nothing special.
This is not the worst r&b/pop album I’ve heard. Most songs are just pretty uninspired and boring (and too drawn out) but not offensively bad. I like Haunted and Partition, but that’s pretty much it. Just another corporate album produced primarily by financiers instead of artists. Not unlistenable and well produced, but there’s little to find here in terms of artistic value.
5/10
Ray Charles
2/5
I don’t like vocal jazz. It’s has nothing I like about jazz, and the vocals used in this genre are as annoying as in pop. This album is not as mind-numbingly boring as some of its counterparts and has some energetic and even somewhat epic parts like in the opening track, but it’s still not good.
5/10
Madness
3/5
Pretty unique and fun album. Playful and quirky in a good way. Technical listed as pop rock and new wave, but although I find both of these genres to be generic, there was none of that here. There’s a lot of variety, different instruments, and influences used across this album, so there wasn’t really anything I don’t like about these genres. I enjoyed it, but nothing stood out as particularly exciting. Yes, there was a lot of interesting track, but I felt like none of them went all in and reached their full potential.
7/10
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
4/5
Wasn’t expecting to like it, but this album is actually great. Calm and surprisingly enjoyable atmosphere with beautifully layered instruments. Albums like this tend to be way too minimal and underwhelming for me, but there’s great texture here that easily offsets the minimalism. Great album. Not my type of music, but this is very well made.
The War On Drugs
4/5
I thought what to rate this album for a while. I feel like it is between a very strong 7 and a weak 8. But after some deliberation, I settled on an 8.
I have a weak spot for beautifully textured atmospheric music. This album wasn’t overloaded with vocals (although they’re also good) and really let the instruments breathe. The atmosphere is great, and the instruments build up to some very satisfying ethereal-sounding parts. Overall though, although I felt that the highs were quite high, some parts were a little drawn out and uneventful.
Bill Callahan
3/5
I like this. It’s mostly the lyrics/vocals that turn me away from country/folk music, but if they focus on atmosphere instead, sometimes it sounds quite nice. This is one of these examples. It’s nice, enjoyable, well-produced background music with a pleasant atmosphere that doesn’t put vocals on the forefront, which I personally enjoy.
7/10
Super Furry Animals
3/5
Kind of a hit or miss album. I liked the more heavy and energetic songs here, especially the opening track, but not all of the are like that. There’s nothing special here, but overall, still a pretty enjoyable album.
7/10
Chicago
3/5
I don’t even know what’s wrong with this album. Maybe the fact that it’s pretty close but not quite prog? I felt like it lacked big and impactful moments. They went for a jammy feel, but the songs ended up a bit too monotonous. I still think it’s fine, but I expected more, to be honest.
New Order
3/5
Not a New Order fan. Their music constantly leaves more to be desired. I liked The Perfect Kiss and Sunrise, but the other songs were meh. Not a bad album, but it feels too sparse and unengaging.
Tortoise
3/5
Big fan of post-rock but not the Tortoise brand of post-rock. Early post-rock like Tortoise or Bark Psychosis tends to be a little too monotonous for my taste, and I heavily prefer the crescendo-driven approach popularized by bands like GY!BE.
I remember listening to TNT and not enjoying it very much. However, this album I liked a lot more. It is also very relaxed, but I found the texture and atmosphere more enjoyable. The guitar work is great, and all the extra electronic elements work well. Still not really my type of music, but this albums was good.
7/10
Scott Walker
3/5
These whiny strings annoy me a bit, but other than that, this albums is pretty good. Better instruments than most pop, and the atmosphere is decent. Nothing really out of the ordinary, but enjoyable nonetheless.
7/10
Van Halen
3/5
One day after Chat Control passed listening to literally 1984.
Pretty basic album but still fun. Nothing out of the ordinary. Has a couple of highlights that are spread equally across the album, so it’s enjoyable the whole way through. Doesn’t have any songs that I’d outright call bangers but no bad ones too. Enjoyable album but pretty generic and unimpressive.
7/10
Depeche Mode
3/5
Considering this is one of the most well-known synthpop albums, I was expecting more, to be honest. It’s enjoyable and had a bunch of fun bouncy rhythms, but I didn’t think it was anything special. There are a couple of songs I really liked (Personal Jesus, Enjoy the Silence, Clean), but the rest are kind of forgettable. This album is pretty dark and calm, which is not my preferred style of synthpop. I like it when it’s more layered and energetic, and I felt like this one lacked in both departments. It’s not bad by any means, but not that exciting either. The atmosphere was still nice, and there were some great melodies, though.
7/10
Kings of Leon
3/5
Just Kings of Mid being mid. I liked the riffs on the first two tracks, but the rest were very forgettable. They’re not bad, but everything sounds samey and uninspiring. It’s fine as background music, but literally nothing stands out.
Slint
4/5
By all accounts, this is an album I should love. It is easily in the top 3 most influential post-rock albums, a genre half of my favorite artists make music in. It basically pioneered the most popular style of post-rock (after Glenn Branca, I guess) before the genre itself even had a name. I listened to it a lot, but I’m still excited to hear it again every time… yet I don’t think I fully get it. The songs are incredibly memorable; I like the atmosphere, the talk-singing, the storytelling of this album, and the loud parts are chills-inducing, but I think it lacks some extra oomph. I understand their intentions, but I think the slower parts are a bit too uneventful sometimes and could use more texture. There’s even a full song that I’d consider a nothingburger (For Dinner…). I don’t know. I probably rated some lesser albums higher. I still think this album is great, but I don’t vibe with it as much as I logically should, as it basically paved the way for a big portion of my favorite music. It could’ve been better. It is sad that Slint made pretty much nothing after Spiderland. It would’ve been interesting to see how their style might’ve evolved.
Electric Light Orchestra
4/5
This album is of a rather underappreciated genre—pop rock but actually fun.
I avoid saying that something sounds like The Beatles since it’s usually a nothing-statement considering how wide their influence is, but here I’ll make an exception—some songs here sound WAY too much like The Beatles. But although there are a lot of similarities (mainly in the vocals), it’s the stuff that is different that makes me enjoy this album quite a bit more than anything I’ve heard from The Beatles and their imitators. Primarily this big, incredibly satisfying orchestral sound. This album, for the most part, is pretty consistent despite its length. The songs are melodic and catchy, and this epic, uplifting atmosphere is maintained throughout the record. There’s nothing truly groundbreaking here since it’s still pop rock and had to sound accessible, but this album is still very fun.
Faust
3/5
Although I like a lot of stuff similar to it, krautrock is something I couldn’t fully get into. I don’t mind repetitive music, but the problem with krautrock for me is that it usually doesn’t build up to anything while also not layering or progressing the repetitions as much as I like. Look at something like Swans. Their songs have a lot of repetition, but the reason why they feel so good for me is because there is a lot of subtle detail and progressions that keep them exciting. Their repetitions also either build up to something big or slowly grow in intensity on their own. I feel that post-rock is a logical evolution of krautrock and it feels a lot more exciting because of that. I just think it’s a genre that I should like, and I’m kind of annoyed I don’t enjoy it that much.
I did like this album, though. It is repetitive but not really monotonous, and it had a lot of cool experimental stuff. Not something particularly exciting for me, because it’s krautrock, but still enjoyable.
7/10