My 1001 Albums Journey

And my heaven will be a big heaven / And I will walk through the front door So much I love about this album. It was important to sensitive kids in the 80s. It’s great, maybe not perfect but close enough.

Along with Nevermind, the album that most defined an era. It’s terrific

This is a great album full of spectacular drums, bass and guitar. I could listen to it all day. In fact, I just did. That's Entertainment and Start! are classics for a reason (sure, Start! lifts the bassline from Taxman, but if it didn't bother the Beatles, it doesn't bother me). Boy about Town though, which I'd never heard before Is two minutes of joy. What a great song. I love the horns on this track and god, the drums are great. Hard to find a weak spot on this album. Really good from start to finish and the drums and bass are killer throughout. If Peter Weller was just a little bit stronger as a vocalist, this album would have been a monumental classic and broken through in North America. He's not quite show-offy enough for the US.

I don't hate it, but I think this album could have been so much better if the arrangements and production were simplified. I often find myself asking "did this song really need a cello or a harmonica or a xylophone?" In contrast to the instrumentation, the vocals are a bit generic and lacking a punch that would lift this above the other bands of the day. Not sure I'd come back to this album again, but "American Guitars" is a good tune that I hadn't heard before. I also liked "Housebreaker" and "Idiot Brother"

Overproduced and self-indulgent. I’ve never listened to an album that so desperately needed an editor to step in and kill half of what’s going on. Every song seems to have 20 things happening simultaneously, making it impossible to pay attention to anything. I’m sure there are great songs here, and I wouldn’t mind listening to a stripped-back version of some of them, with more focus on Beyoncé’s voice and less layered synth, tinny drum sounds, random background vocals, samples, and pounding bass. The whole thing gives the effect of trying to listen to multiple radio stations at the same time. Ultimately, this is one star because there’s not a single song I would include on a playlist, and as an album, it just a tedious bore that goes on and on and on.