Tough to say how or why this was groundbreaking as I was/am not a part of the scene but other say it's so and I'll take their word for it. Overall a fun listen with electronic, hip-hop and some rock influences. Would I listen again? It's very possible.
Highlight: "Sabotage"
Lowlight: "Ricky's Theme"
Initially it was all a bit too "samey-samey", however as the album progressed, the tracks started to differentiate themselves. Definitely a mood. I enjoyed the listen and would go back to the well again. Maybe I should start smoking…
Highlight: Teachers
Lowlight: The Stranger Song
I do not have an objective opinion of this record. The Bends (and OK Computer) informed the majority of my musical taste in the mid/late 90's. Basically a flawless record that made you wonder where they could possibly go from here. But oh, just wait….
Highlight: Black Star & Street Sprit (Fade Out)
Lowlight: Planet Telex
Imagine being 42 years old, sitting in front of your computer at work, and pressing play on your new listening assignment, "It's that gal band that play a couple of fun tunes!" Memories of America's Funniest Home Videos classic montages run through your mind - pants falling down, drunk granny at the wedding, dogs wearing sunglasses, and the like. Once you press play you're instantly faced with the realization that this is nothing like you thought. You adapt or die! It's equal parts punk, new wave, and rock with super slick production. I came back for seconds!
This record absolutely rips!
Highlight(s): This Town/How Much More/Fading Fast
Lowlight(s): Skidmarks on My Heart
It's often the case in movies when Navy Seals are training, they're in the cold water at night, pouring rain, doing burpees, holding up heavy logs over their head, suffering…..that was me for 56 min. Less the logs of course, and more of the suffering.
Sometimes an album is acclaimed not because it's exceptionally great, but because it sounds exceptionally different from everything around it at the time and in the scene. This is a case study in how even music critics can lose their wits.
Highlight(s): New York, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down
Lowlight(s): Where to even start?
Apparently I'm very familiar with the work of Billy Joel, who knew?
Highlight(s): Scenes from an Italian Restaurant
Lowlight(s): Just the Way You Are
It's slightly odd listening to a British band blatantly commandeer southern rock and blues but it’s well done and is a very good album in all honesty.
Highlight(s): Sway/Wild Horses/Dead Flowers/Moonlight Mile
Lowlight(s): Sister Morphine
No doubt inventive for the time but the sound is probably a victim of its own success. Less a specific band or song but more a nod to a general time and place. If I'm going to be listening to something like this I'll take it in the form of Primal Scream.
Highlight(s): *N/A
Lowlight(s): *N/A
*Each track was indistinguishable from the next, or the one prior.
Well that's certainly a lot of sounds on one album. Probably could have been one song but it was a fun listen all the same.
Highlight(s): Always Be There/Stop for Love
Lowlight(s): Don't Give Up
If someone told me to close my eyes and imagine what a Stevie Wonder album sounded like, never having listened before, I probably would have come up with this actually.
I'm not going to find anything new to say about CCR that hasn't already been said. I'll leave it at that.
Highlight(s): Wrote a Song for Everyone/Sinister Purpose
Lowlight(s): Night Time is the Right Time
I wasn't aware they are such a straightforward hip-hop group.
Highlight(s): Rolling With Heat/Thought @ Work
Lowlight(s): The Seed/Water
I won't lie, my heart sunk when I saw this one. I was expecting the worst and honestly it was a reasonably decent album with a handful of good tunes. Delightfully surprised and somewhat glad to have this one in the rearview.
Highlight(s): the Scientist/Green Eyes/Warning Sign
Lowlight(s): God Put a Smile Upon Your Face/A Rush of Blood to the Head
Pretty scattered and helter skelter but does just enough to keep the songs on the rails. I hear the B-52's and early 00's dance punk.
Highlight(s): Barmy/My New House/Paintwork
Lowlight(s): I Am Damo Suzuki
It would have been interesting to hear this stuff with fresh ears, when it was evil and urgent, not campy.
Highlight(s): The Rage
Lowlight(s): United/You Don't Have to Be Old to Be Wise
That's a lot of good signing
I had a foggy notion of what the Pogues sounded like but this was better than expected.
Highlight(s): Bottle of Smoke/Fairytale of New York
Lowlight(s): N/A
Not sure what makes this essential. I could probably think of a few other things to listen to before I die (ever heard the Littlest Hobo theme song?).
This album is firmly in my wheelhouse. My uncle bought me this album for housesitting in my teens (a weekend of sipping green liqueur and smoking menthols I found in his freezer). A straightforward rock record with all of the oddities and feedback that would later be center of their sound. Perfect listen!
I loved it! Can't fully explain it. Don't need to.
I'm not sure all elements of this record aged well. I think I can admit this was probably groundbreaking for the time, although cannot say fully why. It oscillates between mega-hits and stinkers. He spends too much time tripping over himself to say even more offensive and shocking things.
I can hear Bowie a lot in this record. Frog Eyes as well.
Zany!!
Really very good. Feels ahead of its time. A band I've never heard of before too. This is why I'm doing this!
Did I hear that right? "There's a midget standing tall…."
Soooo pissed! I listened and thought this was a very good album for the late 90s. I double checked the release date...1992! This is doubly good given the year it was released. Wow
Some good songs on here, but why would I need to hear this before I die?
He just goes on like this for over an hour....
What a great album! Loved it
I like jazz, and this was certainly that
Turn down the suck!
In all honesty, this makes their later records even more amazing. How did they get from here to Dark Side of the Moon? Kudos
I've never listened to an Iron Maiden album before. My friends older brother was into them and I thought the album covers were the most satanic thing I'd ever seen. I actually liked the slowburn "Strange World" the best.
What am I missing here? I've heard similar music waiting on hold.
I'll have to take their word for it that this was genre defining but they're correct to include the album. Very good
I always hear them listed as an influence but have never listened previously. Really cool album
Pretty good. I think he was a victim of his own success at points. I recall an interesting podcast with the fellow who lent him the Alan Lomax field recordings that feature throughout. Moby never returned them....
If it weren’t for The Jungle Line I’d swear this was just one long song.
As an aside, my uncle is a HUGE Joni fan. Joni was also seeing some musician fellow from my hometown in Saskatchewan. We had one nice restaurant then and my mothers friend spotted them eating there. Once she left they grabbed her wineglass and gave it to us to give to my uncle. For weeks we had Joni’s lipstick embossed wineglass around our kitchen. I’m certain that antidote is at least as interesting as this album.
Incredible! Nothing more I can say. 5 Stars!
Well, that’s the sound of the Beatles. Next!…..
Well well, very good. The guy is Irish....never would have guessed.
Smoooooooooth! "Think" is a Jam!
To be a sax player in the 80's, you must have been in demand!
I was initially going to skip this one. I'm glad I didn't.
I'm a Sonic Youth fan. I own many albums. However, I think this was the first time I've listened to the entirety of Daydream Nation in one go. Trilogy was especially good.
So he’s just deconstructed the blues?
I was not initially pleased to see this one pop up. I have no relationship to this band and only really liked Nirvana from that era. This was always an album that someone's older brother had. This is a great album and goes pretty hard. I very much liked it! This is what this project is all about!
I can imagine myself, with an unironic mullet, wearing an unironic jean jacket, rocking out to this back in the 70's
Am I being Punk'd?....Ashton Kutcher, that you?
This takes me back. Dreaming of You will forever and always be a real jam. Calendars and Clocks was really good as well. Could live without the rest of it though.
I like challenging music. I have the ability to listen to challenging music. Challenging music is in my wheelhouse. But I could not get into this. Very repetitive.
I want to live in a world where the guy second from left can be on an album cover again.
I really want to like REM. And to a certain extent I do. But not sure this album is the masterpiece they say it is.
Found all songs on the album fairly similar, but all pretty good. Being Canadian I'm not sure if I'm allowed to dislike Neil Young
I can't think objectively about this band. They are almost mythical. Did they even actually make music? They did, and it's pretty good.
I can't think of anything to say about this album. That's perhaps telling.
Fun record. Different for its time. While they have some hardcore fans I'll likely not return to the album.
Is this their American blues cover band era? Or have they always borrowed heavily from the blues?
I think this was a moment in time, but the time has passed
I was assigned a GZA album yesterday. This is more my thing. Very cool
Very orchestral. Very long. But mostly entertaining.
This is what I love about music. 20 years ago I bought this album as a young man. It was ok but did not resonate with me. Fast forward, with a few more miles on the human spirit and a much evolved taste in music, and I get it. In fact I like it! Music will always wait for you!
Couple of hits couched in filler. I don't think I get it. Millions do, but not me.
Pretty fun record. Their new stuff is great too.
I know that Morrissey is battling is share of demons and public image issues but I'll forever be a Smiths fan and honestly most of what he's released solo is very good as well. This was as good as anything I've heard and loved in the past (Vauxhall & I, Southpaw Grammar, Kill Uncle etc). Perhaps he gave himself away in "We'll Let You Know"….."We are the last truly British people you will know"
Yup, that's an ABBA album. They were a very tight group!
I don't get it. Like, at all.
Tale of two halves. First half of the album is pretty generic. Everything from "Lovefool" on was pretty cool
When I think of early David Bowie I am always in awe of how brave someone has to be to get up on a stage and do this type of music and theatrics. Amazing really
An argument could be made this is their best album, or certainly their most accessible. I love when the drums kick in on "Drunken Butterfly", now that's punk rock!
No comment. Not good or bad. Just didn't elicited any emotion within me at all. Like plain oatmeal.
It's almost as if the band got together and said, "let's be weird". It does not feel organic. It seems like a great effort. And to name their album after the worst song on it. More than a few confusing decisions made on this record.
The "radioification" of the blues by a couple of dorky white guys.
Class politics never sounded so sweet! Great album. I probably got into "We Love Life" more, for reasons I'm not entirely sure of. "Common People" will never get old, no matter how many times I hear it. Special mention for "Sorted for E's & Wizz" and "Monday Morning"
I think by now we can just lump all the first albums, released in the 60's, by bands that would go on to global fame, in the same group. They all sound the same.
This is what I've been waiting for. Just gimmie a vibe for a day.
To my young mind in the 90s, this was perhaps the coolest record ever made. Perhaps a little drawn out as I don't think he left anything out. But still stands up.
Lots going on here. Deconstructed R&B with a millennial's perspective. Interesting
The album cover is not what I expect when I think of the Beach Boys. The songs themselves are similarly not what I expect. Overall a pretty solid album.
This sounds like every other REM song I've heard, but without the sense of adventure. Pretty standard stuff. Like Ken in the Barbie movie, this albums job is "Music"
I very recently finished "Just Kids" which was one of the best books I've ever read. Certainly makes the music more personal. The album is good, that's maybe the most I can say
I was surprised to hear a few fun songs on this record. When I think of S&G I think of ornate fingerpicking, some sweet arrangements, and morose lyrics. Not necessarily the case.
Always interesting to listen to old school hip hop and hear samples that have been used and reused recently. Paying respect to the OGs!
Several very sparse songs which featured their voices as the main instrument. I enjoyed
Frank Sinatra with a Brazilian twist....I liked it
I'm not well versed in speed metal, thrash or whatever this is. But it does not sound much out of date at all. Perhaps due to how little the genera has progressed or maybe how ahead of time these guys were. Possibly a bit of both.
I thought I knew what I was getting into with this one, generally speaking. I didn't know shit! What an interesting record. One of my very exclusive 5-star ratings!
I always thought this was a psychedelic album. Really more of a blues record.
I really like the idea of Bjork
They don't make music like this anymore
Never heard of her before. Bit samey throughout for my taste but shows her sense of humour in a few songs.
This brings me back to those heady days of early aughts indie music, where you didn't necessarily need to be good, just different, to garner media attention and a record deal.
The emperor has no clothes!
What original thought can anyone have about one of the most widely heralded and discussed albums of the last 50 years?
This album will receive one of my highly coveted and rarely bestowed 5 Star ratings! Not bad for four lads from sleepy London town.
This album could have been 10 tracks of Steel Claw. That one goes hard!
Oh super! 37.5 hours of The Who
Much more interesting than anything else going on at the time in my opinion. I've been given Beatles and Stones albums already. This tops them
This would have broken my brain if I were alive in 1978. How could you not believe that flying cars, moon cities, and recreational space travel were not imminent?
Getting this a day after Ozzy dies is wild. Or perhaps we all were assigned this? Who's to say.
I've never heard of this band before. Not that I've heard of every band, but I've heard of many. So that was neat.
I got the gist half way through.
This album was the center of my universe for two years, as an impressionable teenager. This arrived, seemingly, out of nowhere. Nothing like it existed prior and nothing has matched it since. It was a product of its time - an uneasy marriage of technology and paranoia. Easy 5 stars!
While Arcade Fire will never do anything better than Funeral, this is a very good album. This record is a course correction from the misfire that was Neon Bible. Great effort from a band than will likely never leave the shadow of their greatest work.
Very interesting album. Elements of Arabic music. Many cool bits of found sound. Long drawn out groovy tracks but always several other things going on within the song. Chill but keeps you on your toes.
This is exactly how I like my punk music. Crunchy, melodic, and with a big sound. Love the use of horns throughout the record. Great album!
Better than expected but that’s about all. Just not my scene
Little long but insane they arrived on the scene with a fully formed sound.
I don't have an opinion on this one...
Heavy stuff. Sounds current. Very cool
I'm a late 90's/early 00's indie guy. I'm supposed to like this. I mean it's not bad. Very creative. But very repetitive. Someone cranked the treble knob on this as well.
Pretty dated, cheesy lyrics and overproduced. Seems to be a lot of these albums on here so far. Running out of things to say about them
Many songs I recognized I didn't know he sang. He's like an old timey Conor Oberst. Even does a Rage Against the Machine cover. Good album
In my mind, this was always the album they were trying to create when following up OK Computer. This to me sounds like a natural next step. I was not a fan of Kid A and felt they unnecessarily messed with some of my favorite b-sides. Amnesiac was even worse. This is where Radiohead hit another home run after a couple whiffs.
I like Jack White. I think he's a cool guy. I think he supremely talented. I think he's great for the music industry. I don't begrudge him his success at all. I'd have a beer with him. I just don't connect with is music.
Perhaps the bar for a great British album was much lower in the mid-90's? I don't get it
Amazing that this was 1988. Easily stands up today.
I always wondered why people thought this guy was so good. Now I know.
Oft cited and finally listened to...solid 3 stars
I think this is what "cool" older guys would play to impress younger women
I don't get it. They were one of the biggest band in the UK in the 90's. How?
Overall pretty decent, although it could all be one long track. The little bits of silence throughout the album tipped me off that apparently one song ended and a new, different song was beginning. Without those, I'd be lost
So this is where many of the CCR hits come from. I recognized a number of songs. Very good album
Never really quite knew what drum n' bass was. Cool ambient elements throughout.
Did not like this as much as the other albums I've been assigned.
It's good. Very nostalgic. Would this record have been made without her being married to Kurt? Probably not. At least not this made this well. She's an opportunist who made the most of her opportunity. Can't fault her.
This sounds like nothing. Or an amalgam of early 90's sounds. Like a compilation, field recordings, or someone's best guess as to what will move records. Directionless. Formless. Tasteless. More of an aesthetic than a serious band. I have never understood their appeal and many years later still don't.
Silky Smooth and very Groovy
Much better than expected. Skipped the hits though. I think we're all sick of them at this point
This is not the album I would have picked. I can think of a few much better
What a pleasure to listen to. That was so much fun. The music was great, the lyrics we're silly. I thought it was amazing! It's been a while now since I've been able to award my coveted 5 stars but they've earned it!
This is a band name I know. Appeared in every music magazine in the 90's. Never heard a song until today. This album sounds like the 90's! Very nostalgic
I was prepared for some real suck. But honestly pretty cool record. Even heard hints of The Replacements.
Good if you like that sort of thing. Moments of enjoyment
Not the album I would have picked but I’m sure Distintegration or Head On the Door will appear on this list before I’m done.
I enjoyed it much more than I anticipated I would. I'd listen again.
I've tried several times over the years to listen to the full album. This was the first time I made it through. I think I'm supposed to like this album….like really like it. But I don't. Can't put my finger on it. It's good, just not OMG good. Maybe it's a grower, we'll see
Aggressively middle of the road
Embarrassed to admit that I had no idea that the Beatles wrote a few of the songs I was familiar with. A better listen than I expected.
I can hear what all the buzz is about. This kid has a future
The house I grew up in was not a musical one, and certainly not a secular music one, but of the very few CD's my dad did own, this was one. I recall playing it in my room as a 10 year old and being amazed. How is it that an album like this connects with a kid? This has always amazed me. 5 stars!
I always thought this band was simply Butch Vig's band. Famous for no other reason. I can say with confidence now that it certainly isn't the music.
Rather fun album from a chronically dour person.
I'm not sure which is more problematic, the music or the lyrical content
Yup, it's an album by The Who
Eclectic album. Other than that I'm not sure why we're listening to this
Apple Music labels this album as R&B/Soul, which it is at its core. But it's such fresh take on the genre. Amazing album. Each song so different. I loved it! Shades of Blood Orange perhaps. 5 Stars!
Super fun album! Very much enjoyed it
What's left to say about this album...
Many albums that run the stylistic gamut run the risk of trying too hard and the record being a watered down dog's breakfast. This does not fall into that category. Well done.
A bit same same for my taste but the good songs are great
The songs are great! I always had this image of the Beach Boys as this airy summertime fun band, and to an extent that's true, but the lyrics on this record are often pretty deep
Conflicting album. I like his voice and the songs are generally pleasing. But don't like the silly for silly sake.
Pretty good. Guy likes a long jam!
I liked it. Slightly more rock oriented than I thought it would be. Overall good record
Too long, listened to some. Liked their little jokes.
As with the last Peter Gabriel album I was assigned, it was much better than expected. Enjoyed this one.
Incredibly bad. Unbelievably bad
I've heard this era of rock/punk a few time before. It's wearing a little thin
I almost skipped this one as I've heard it many times before, however not in some years. I went back to it out of a sense of duty and it blew me away. I was a little too young when this came out for it to land in my wheelhouse but everyone's older brother had this album. Not a weak song on the record. Bands try for years just to have ONE big song, nevermind 13 of them. 5 Stars!
Little bit of everything on this one
Less rock and more vibe than expected. I liked it
Decent album. Not sure why it's so influential but it is. I've just read Thurston Moore's book and he references his love of Television multiple times. So I'll take his lead on this one.
I think this way cool. I'm getting into Jazz but don't know much about the genre. It kind of all sounds the same so I'm not sure why this is an important record but it's good and I enjoyed it.
A little dated but some good songs. Definitely against the BritPop grain
Waded through a lot of whateve-salad to get to this. This was a treat. Cool vibe!
