Mar 31 2025
If You Can Believe Your Eyes & Ears
The Mamas & The Papas
Monday, Monday is underrated compared to California Dreaming. I feel like that song was around more when I was young. Some good songs to start the album. Then, some duds up to California Dreaming. End well. There's some good sunshine pop on this but I am glad I own the 7" with the two big hits on it. There no reason to own the whole album.
3
Apr 01 2025
Chirping Crickets
Buddy Holly & The Crickets
It comes in hot with Oh Boy! and Not Fade Away. I like that songs are short and structured. After That'll Be the Day there's not a lot of interesting songs and and it all kind of sounds the same. I have Buddy Holly greatest hits so I don't think I need to buy this. Maybe I'd get the Oh Boy! 45.
3
Apr 02 2025
Music From Big Pink
The Band
I know I've listened to this before but the only song that I know is The Weight. The vocals are comforting and familiar. Long Black Veil is one that I've heard and like before. It end on a high note. The last 3 songs are pretty good. I don't think it's one I need to own.
3
Apr 26 2025
Hybrid Theory
Linkin Park
There is no way that I am going to like this. I lived through hearing the singles on the radio. There is no way a re-evaluation of this band will change much for me. We used to laugh at the "Shut up when I'm talking to you" line when I was a teenager and it's just as dumb now. Every song sounds the same. It sounds like 311. I think the only song that aged well is In the End. For some reason, it doesn't bother me as much.
2
Apr 26 2025
Violator
Depeche Mode
I can see why people like this album but it's not one for me. I think I'd like it as an instrumental album. I like the palette of sounds they use. There are just too many songs that I've heard too many times in my life like Personal Jesus, Policy of Truth, and Enjoy the Silence. I don't have nostalgic memories of these songs. They were just around. I did like the song Waiting for the Night, which hadn't heard before.
3
Apr 27 2025
Getz/Gilberto
Stan Getz
I will for sure like this. Doralice is great. Joao Gliberto's voice is so warm and comforting. The sax is very warm and cool jazz too. I like all the pieces individually but when it's all together it sounds a little like the type of music that you might hear at a restaurant that has white table clothes. Some of the songs drone on for too long. I think thats why I like the first 3 Joao Gilberto records a little more than this.
4
Apr 28 2025
Live At The Witch Trials
The Fall
I like Rebellious Jukebox and Mother-Sister, Industrial Estate, Futures and Pasts. I don't particularly care about the long, meandering, dissonant songs. I got easier to listen to as the album went on.
3
Apr 29 2025
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
Elton John
It would have taken a lot for me to actually like this album. I've absorbed so much Elton John in my life with out intentionally looking for it. I have a negative reaction to just hearing his voice. I'd be fine never hearing Candle in the Wind, Benny and the Jets, or Goodbye Yellow Brick Road ever again. But there are moments of this album that I enjoyed. The synth sound on track one. The "Jamaica" song. I don't mind Saturday Nights Alright. But I don't ever have to listen to any Elton John again although I have a feeling this not his only album on here.
2
Apr 30 2025
Basket of Light
Pentangle
This feels like proto prog. The female vocals are a little distracting. I like the guitars and the some of the hammered/ mallet instruments I have some John Renbourn and have listened to some Bert Jansch.
3
May 01 2025
Slayed?
Slade
This sounds like a million other classic rock songs. AC/DC and Kiss. Maybe if I was alive at the time I could discern the good from the bad or the original from the derivative. Weird blues songs about liking young girls. All these band couldn't help but be creepy. Mama Weer all Crazee Now sounds like it deserved to be a single and it pretty good for this genre.
2
May 02 2025
Happy Trails
Quicksilver Messenger Service
Side A is one long jam. Some good background music and very few vocals. I can appreciate it. Where do You Love is kinda jarring and goes nowhere. I had a mostly pleasant, positive experience with this album. You don't have to actively listen to it. It sounds better than most live albums.
3
May 03 2025
There's No Place Like America Today
Curtis Mayfield
I have never listened to this album all the way through. Some of the song titles look familiar. I know and love So In Love. Blue Monday People is hard. The drums and percussion fucking snap. Some really great songs and awesome production.
4
May 04 2025
Connected
Stereo MC's
I like this. It has a very similar sound palette to stuff that I already am into, like the Stone Roses and Black Grape. It is something that I'd keep around in my spotify and be happy about if it came up on shuffle. If I could give it a 3 1/2 I would.
3
May 05 2025
Fuzzy
Grant Lee Buffalo
This pleasant and I'm into the music. The vocals are a bit too theatrical and emotional for me. I can tell why the song Fuzzy was so well liked. I love the doubled up guitars. The song sounds sounds toasted and desert-y. Some of the songs are like a cross between Jeff Buckley and Bright Eyes. I wouldn't be mad if this came up on shuffle but I don't think I could tolerate a whole album.
3
May 06 2025
The Wildest!
Louis Prima
I don't know what to do with this. It sounds better than I thought a fifties records usually sounds. It sounds like a whole album not a collection of singles. But I have no real context for this. There are a number of songs on here I know from other covers and commercials. These songs are so ubiquitous I don't ever think that I'd actively search them out.
2
May 07 2025
The Sun Rises In The East
Jeru The Damaja
3
May 08 2025
From Elvis In Memphis
Elvis Presley
I like some songs that I heard from this era of Elvis like Suspicious Minds and Polk Salad Anne. This album was pretty good. I like the use of organ and choirs. The guitars are really twangy the drums are stopping. It's pretty swampy when it's rocking. Like the first song and "I'm Movin' On"
3
May 09 2025
Take Me Apart
Kelela
I was surprised to see I had 3 of her albums including this one saved in Spotify. I must have listen to this a some point. The production sound like things I listened to at the time. Hyperdub-adjacent. Some of this tilts past my tastes and feels overproduced. Blue Light is not my thing. I really like Waiting and S.O.S. Turn to Dust and Bluff might be my two favs. The ending feels more organic like a modern Sade.
4
May 17 2025
The Queen Is Dead
The Smiths
It's been a while since I listened to this. I thought I might have to re-evaluate this or grown out of this. However, it's just as good as ever. It's the Smiths at their most jangly. There are 5 or 6 perfect songs and no real duds to me. Cemetery Gates, The Boy with the Thorn in his Side, Frankly, Mr. Shankly, I Know it's Over, There is a Light and it Never Goes Out. I don't love the production on all Smith records but this hits a spot for me.
5
May 18 2025
Nighthawks At The Diner
Tom Waits
I own this record. It's been in my collection for 25 years. It's beat. I've tried to get into it multiple times. It flies over my head. Is it jazz? Is it a live album? Is it stand up? It feels like less than the sum of its parts. I don't know. It don't get it. I keep holding on to it because i feel like one day it will click. I guess it could see putting it on in the background because all the song are the same. But some of these long ass songs are tedious.
2
May 19 2025
We Are Family
Sister Sledge
I don't think I've ever listened to this before. Of course, the song We Are Family is ubiquitous. I can't imagine getting pleasure from hearing this after it being played at sporting events and in commercials for my whole life. Right from the first song you can hear this is Nile Rogers and Bernard Edwards. The dry guitar, and funky bass lines- It is a palette that I'm comfortable with. It's best when it stays uptempo. I like the songs He's the Greatest Dancer, Lost in Music, and Thinking of You. It runs out of steam towards the end.
3
May 20 2025
In Utero
Nirvana
It's hard to rate this album. I've heard most these songs in one form or another all my adult life. I can't imagine a moment where I'd say I really want to hear Heart-Shaped Box. I've never had any distance from that song. My initial reaction was that this album is a slog. Most because it was so familiar and very "noise rock" (harsh, on cusp of metal; "Senseless Apprentice") But, as i lived in it a bit (after track 4) It mellowed and I became more tolerant of it. Actually really like this version of Dumb and All Apologies.
3
May 21 2025
The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter
The Incredible String Band
I have some familiarity with this band. It was psychedelic sample fodder for me when I was younger. I owned a beat up copy of Wee Tam at one point. The palette is drone-y strings and background vocals, hand drums and off-key flutes and it is pretty consistent throughout. Vocals are a little dramatice and over the top. The moments I liked are the end of A Very Cellular Song, and Three Is a Green Crown. The song I I recognized and listen to the most is Mercy I Cry City, which I connect to things like Love, Tim Buckley, and Animal Collective in my mind. I think I prefer the Mike Heron songs. Closer to a 3.5.
3
May 22 2025
Movies
Holger Czukay
This doesn't sound like anything I've heard before. The songs are pretty long but it doesn't feel that way. There is something weird that happens every few bars or so. Shimmery guitars, synths and strange samples. Even the vocals are good. It's all pretty wild. I'm glad to have been exposed to this.
4
Jun 09 2025
One Nation Under A Groove
Funkadelic
Kind of a disjointed listen. I'm not totally sure what is part of the album. I have the LP of this and upon initial listen I really liked the title track and "Into You" and the rest was a little disappointing. I had the streaming version on with the bonus material and the live song. And it was a little more pleasurable experience, but what is the actual album here? The LP was a little underwhelming, but surely an 8 year old live song is not part of this album. IDK 3/5 i guess.
3
Jun 10 2025
Time Out
The Dave Brubeck Quartet
One of my favorite albums. Paul Desmond is so cool. Great drumming, as well. A pop album that has layers to it. Of all the classic jazz albums this the one I come back to the most because it's so listenable.
5
Jun 11 2025
People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm
A Tribe Called Quest
I know the big singles off of this. I'm pretty sure I listened to it in high school. Q-tip has one of those voices that grates on me. I think my perception of this is way skewed by Can I Kick It? The production sounds way less dated than i expected. The last two songs sound like they could have been made today. Theres less Jazz Rap than I expected. It's not Digable Planets. Some of the raps sound dated on a couple tracks never heard/noticed Luck of Lucien before. That's a highlight. Also liked Go Ahead In the Rain and Description of a Fool. Low 4
4
Jun 12 2025
Music From The Penguin Cafe
Penguin Cafe Orchestra
I have heard and loved the song "The Sound of Someone You Love..." I have good memories of walking around Seoul listening to it. I may have listened to the rest of the album at some point. The first song is pretty catchy. It's all really pleasant. I like the instrumentation in Giles Faraby's Dream. Sometimes it's nice to listen to something with very little percussion. Feels like a movie.
4
Jun 13 2025
Surf's Up
The Beach Boys
This is record that I own. I don't listen to it often. The songs that I most familar with are the last two. Til I Die and Surf's Up. Long Promised Road is great one. If I heard this out in public, I don't know if I'd ID it as a Beach Boys song. There's a couple clunckers in the middle.
3
Jun 14 2025
Raw Power
The Stooges
I've listened to this before all the way through at some point. But the only song that jumps out at me from the track list in search and destroy. The palette is blues based rock with a punk spirit. Search and Destroy and Raw Power seem like the standouts. Guitar is fucking wailing over everything. The production sounds so bad. If I got a 45 of Search and Destroy i don't think id feel like I was missing out on much of this album. The last two songs are pretty good too.
3
Jun 15 2025
Surrealistic Pillow
Jefferson Airplane
I've got a couple copies of this on vinyl. I always like this more than I think I will. Their are a couple of features that I enjoy here. 1) It's soaked in reverb. 2) The male female vocals are great. 3) The are still writing pop or folk songs with psych touches. There's noodly guitars but they are contained. No 10 minute songs that go nowhere. The song "Today" is so unique. The two singles hold up. Side B is better/ more consistant than side A.
4
Jun 16 2025
Let It Be
The Replacements
I don't know if I've listened to this all in one sitting before. I have "I Will Dare" on 7" but I don't know if other songs stand out by title. Some of this gets too classic rock for me. Even though i really like a lot of Replacement songs (and there is a number of songs I on here), it's hard for me to get through the whole of this album.
2
Jun 17 2025
Hail To the Thief
Radiohead
I own(d) this on CD when it came out. I was big into Kid A and Amnesiac when they came out. I'm curious how this holds up. 2+2=5 seems guitar heavy... kinda punk. The Gloaming stands out as being sonically different. I remember liking Myxomatosis and it holds. The palette of sounds is pretty different from song to song. I think its a little back heavy.
4