My 1001 Albums Journey

Albums Rated

2.73

Average Rating

Complete

1025 albums remaining

Rating Distribution

Rating Timeline

Taste Profile

1960s

Favorite Decade

Post-punk

Favorite Genre

Top Origin

Critic

Rater Style ?

5-Star Albums

1-Star Albums

Breakdown

By Genre

By Decade

By Origin

Albums

You Love More Than Most

Album	You	Global	Diff
Your New Favourite Band The Hives	5	3.12	+1.88
The Queen Is Dead The Smiths	5	3.66	+1.34
Station To Station David Bowie	5	3.7	+1.3
Histoire De Melody Nelson Serge Gainsbourg	4	2.75	+1.25
Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge Mudhoney	4	2.84	+1.16
Disintegration The Cure	5	3.85	+1.15
Supa Dupa Fly Missy Elliott	4	2.92	+1.08

You Love Less Than Most

Album	You	Global	Diff
Tracy Chapman Tracy Chapman	1	3.79	-2.79
Dire Straits Dire Straits	1	3.72	-2.72
The Joshua Tree U2	1	3.67	-2.67
Oracular Spectacular MGMT	1	3.61	-2.61
War U2	1	3.47	-2.47
Bat Out Of Hell Meat Loaf	1	3.44	-2.44
Lost In The Dream The War On Drugs	1	3.39	-2.39
Eliminator ZZ Top	1	3.38	-2.38
Bad Company Bad Company	1	3.26	-2.26
The Nightfly Donald Fagen	1	3.01	-2.01

5-Star Albums (4)

View Album Wall

Popular Reviews

Cheap Thrills

Big Brother & The Holding Company

4/5

Both Joplin and the band are raw and powerful. The cover versions are incredible. Album art by Robert Crumb. Not sure about the audience sound effects, but a great album nonetheless.

1 likes

The Queen Is Dead

The Smiths

5/5

For a while, my favourite Smiths album. Certainly the most assured and powerful. It remains a classic with some of The Smiths best songs.

1 likes

The Joshua Tree

1/5

U2 went to America and all I got was this lousy album. Pompous twattery.

1 likes

1-Star Albums (13)

All Ratings

Bat Out Of Hell

Meat Loaf

1/5

Didn’t know it was a musical. ML has great range and power. JS obvs a talented arranger. Campy nonsense. Title track is the best.

There's No Place Like America Today

Curtis Mayfield

4/5

Like a funky companion piece to MG’s What’s Going On? Positive vibes against the worst of the world. Photo that the cover is based on (by Margaret Bourke-White) is brilliant.

Siamese Dream

The Smashing Pumpkins

2/5

Maybe stunning 30 years ago. Felt a bit overblown and indulgent. Made me want to listen to Nirvana. BC is now a wrestling promoter.

Dire Straits

1/5

What you get when an ex schoolteacher and an ex social worker try and do Bob Dylan & The Shadows. Sound like every holiday turn I’ve ever heard. Punk wasn’t even cold at this point.

Abbey Road

Beatles

4/5

Patchy but very listenable. Some really great, heavy tracks.

Lost In The Dream

The War On Drugs

1/5

Just the sort of 80s, American, MOR, soft rock sound that has never done it for me.

Drunk

Thundercat

4/5

Like a fever dream of RnB, hip hop, jazz funk, soft rock and disco. Reminds me of Parliament/Funkadelic and mid-70s Mothers.

Oracular Spectacular

MGMT

1/5

The singles were, I suppose, the sound of the summer nearly 20 years ago. The rest of the album is pretty forgettable.

Hard Again

Muddy Waters

3/5

MW sounds great at 71 and there’s no doubt these musicians are at the top of their game. Strangely the electrification (Judas!) makes it more rock and somehow less blues.

Made In Japan

Deep Purple

4/5

Monumental sound of the MkII line up with Gillan’s powerful vocals. Featuring tracks from the first 3 MkII albums and is none-more-metal. Even has an extended drum solo!

Bitte Orca

Dirty Projectors

1/5

Interesting percussion and time signatures aside, this appears neither accessible nor interestingly avant guard.

Histoire De Melody Nelson

Serge Gainsbourg

4/5

Understated, laid back and dreamy. The combination of funk rock and orchestration is very effective. Love, illicit sex and death in less than half an hour.

Is This It

The Strokes

4/5

Pleasing enough indie garage-rock. Part of the early noughties indie rock revival that included The Hives, Rapture, Franz Ferdinand etc. Darlings of the NME at the time, there’s very little to date it.

Sunshine Hit Me

The Bees

3/5

Pleasantly inoffensive summer vibes. Best song is the Os Mutantes cover. The sort of album that you could put on at a barbecue and not upset anyone.

Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge

Mudhoney

4/5

A real find for me. Thrilling from start to finish. Stooges, Ramones and garage influences. Nice use of organ and harmonicas alongside the buzzsaw guitars.

Tracy Chapman

1/5

Insipid MOR bollocks. Like a homeopathic Joni Mitchell.

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

Neil Young & Crazy Horse

3/5

Decent enough late 60’s country rock with an as-live feel. Guitar interplay is really good.

The Nightfly

Donald Fagen

1/5

80s jazz-pop hell. Apparently the first album to be recorded entirely digitally. Sounds completely sterile.

Wish You Were Here

Pink Floyd

4/5

Epic landscape, Ennio Morricone style motif, keyboards sounding like horns. There’s sadness, anger and loss in the lyrics before the sax solo brings the love. The last few bars then become corporate and dark sounds begin. Welcome to the Machine… Country blues guitar herald Roy Harper in a big Stetson singing in American accent, Have a Cigar. Title track is angry and spikey. Shine parts 6-9 doesn’t quite echo the majesty of the opening. Brilliant nonetheless.

The World is a Ghetto

War

3/5

Lovely, funky, jazzy, bluesy, psychedelic stuff.

Elastica

4/5

Almost perfect indie-rock album. Rips through a flurry of great songs in 38 minutes. Mean girls with guitars.

Bad Company

1/5

The sort of stuff that yanks listen to on rawk radio stations. I’d have punched Peter Grant in the face for this shit.

Cheap Thrills

Big Brother & The Holding Company

4/5

Both Joplin and the band are raw and powerful. The cover versions are incredible. Album art by Robert Crumb. Not sure about the audience sound effects, but a great album nonetheless.

Mask

Bauhaus

3/5

Less gothy and more pop-funky than I expected. PMs Bowie-esque stylings are at the fore. Especially on the Deram/Newley sounding ‘Of Lillies…’

Iron Maiden

3/5

Definitely puts the NW into NWOBHM, this has a punky prog sound that owes as much to The Stranglers as it does to Sabbath. A very assured debut.

Tapestry

Carole King

2/5

Pleasant enough. CK has a nice voice but not much soul. It’s Too Late is a stand out. 70s easy listening versions of great songs CK wrote with her husband Gerry Goffin and writing partner Toni Stern.

Frank

Amy Winehouse

2/5

I get it. She had a pretty good voice and could write a song. Unfortunately the hype takes over and she becomes a legend for a generation. A Good Jewish Girl Gone Bad, the new Frank, Dinah, Ronnie, the first millennial to drink her way into the 27 club… In another world, I’d applaud her performance in some jazz dinner club, but I wouldn’t have bought her CD at the end of the night.

Rid Of Me

PJ Harvey

4/5

Aggressive, spiky and raw. Produced by Steve Albini, this brilliant album still sounds fresh and urgent today.

Songs Of Leonard Cohen

Leonard Cohen

3/5

Poetic, melancholy and timeless. Some beautiful songs but ultimately rather dour.

Bookends

Simon & Garfunkel

3/5

Not at all what I expected. A rich tapestry of musical styles and ideas. Snappy and bristling with creativity and detail.

Hot Buttered Soul

Isaac Hayes

2/5

Lovely voice. Fine instrumentation. But God it goes on. I fear that by the time Isaac had seduced me I’d be asleep.

Moss Side Story

Barry Adamson

3/5

Multilayered and moody instrumentals from the Magazine man. A dark ‘soundtrack’ that puts me in mind of Roy Budd’s ‘Get Carter’.

Ananda Shankar

2/5

Not really for me. Skilled and talented I’m sure, but largely the music washed over me. The cover versions have some novelty value.

Fleet Foxes

2/5

Ethereal American Folk, played very well with lush close harmonies and wistful lyrics. Done very well but doesn’t excite.

Water From An Ancient Well

Abdullah Ibrahim

3/5

Nice enough jazz album with occasional African vibe.

Blunderbuss

Jack White

2/5

Nothing really jumps out on this JW solo. Never quite as exciting as the WS. Has the feeling of being the soundtrack to a musical.

Eliminator

ZZ Top

1/5

Samey, guitar rawk with drum machines. Dodgy, sub-metal lyrics. Piffle.

Emperor Tomato Ketchup

Stereolab

3/5

Pleasant enough. Dreamy vocals over motorik beats.

Blood, Sweat & Tears

3/5

A mixed bag of jazz rock, pop, country blues, gospel and hippy dippy nonsense. Spinning Wheel is the standout track.

Surf's Up

The Beach Boys

3/5

In which The Beach Boys take a new direction. Environmental issues and lost innocence are the main themes. Patchy and often naive sounding.

Paranoid

Black Sabbath

4/5

Solid, seminal Heavy Metal album.

Your New Favourite Band

The Hives

5/5

“I think I’d have to say… The Best of The Beatles”. It’s a bit odd to have a compilation album in the 1001 Albums You Must Hear… list, but this is Alan McGee’s “gift” to us in the UK. Helping kick off the garage rock revival and The Hives worldwide success, these are a dozen perfect punk-pop tunes. Our “new” favourite band indeed.

Buenas Noches From A Lonely Room

Dwight Yoakam

1/5

Shite Hokum.

Fulfillingness' First Finale

Stevie Wonder

3/5

Pleasant enough album. SWs voice is beautiful throughout and some interesting music. Nothing jumps out as very special though.

Endtroducing.....

DJ Shadow

3/5

Very skilful hip hop instrumental album, but crying out for a rap in places.

L'Eau Rouge

The Young Gods

2/5

Reasonably interesting sound. Might make more sense if I spoke French.

Life's Too Good

The Sugarcubes

3/5

Weird and wonderful indie pop.

The Queen Is Dead

The Smiths

5/5

For a while, my favourite Smiths album. Certainly the most assured and powerful. It remains a classic with some of The Smiths best songs.

Cosmo's Factory

Creedence Clearwater Revival

3/5

Reasonably good rock, blues, country blues album. Cover versions are ok. The psyche-rock Ramble Tamble is a highlight.

KIWANUKA

Michael Kiwanuka

2/5

Pretty, soulful and light. Not sure if it’s for me though.

London Calling

The Clash

3/5

Hmm. One of the greatest rock records of all time? There’s undoubtedly some brilliant stuff on here, but if ever a (double) album could do with some editing… Often feels more like a showcase for The Clash’s expanding musical palette than a coherent record. I can imagine this being great fun as the setlist for a gig, but not all of it deserves the iconic status it carries.

What's That Noise?

Coldcut

3/5

Inventive, pioneering, hip-hop, cut-up beats. Here’s Yazz. Here’s Lisa Stansfield. Here’s Mark E Smith providing vocals on one of the first indie dance crossovers.

War

1/5

1983 was not the best year for music, but here U2 take the sounds of post-punk, rock and pop and fashion them into the most boring pap imaginable. How long… to sing this song? How long?

Born To Run

Bruce Springsteen

2/5

Theatrical and overblown. This sounds more like a rock opera than an album and could easily be a Jim Steinman composition.

Station To Station

David Bowie

5/5

Coming off the back of filming of The Man Who Fell To Earth, Station To Station is a Bowie classic. A sublime, cocaine-fuelled experimental fusion of soul, funk, disco and krautrock.

Supa Dupa Fly

Missy Elliott

4/5

Wonderfully self-assured debut. Produced by Timbaland and with Busta Rhymes bookending the guests, this is a perfect, full-fat hip hop.

Disintegration

The Cure

5/5

Immense, gothic and elegiac, Disintegration a soundscape of an album. Coincidentally, the first time I saw them on this tour, this is The Cure moving at a monumental, glacial pace that absorbs the listener in a vivid, dreamlike state.

Time Out

The Dave Brubeck Quartet

2/5

Pleasant enough “light” jazz. Nice.

Logical Progression

LTJ Bukem

1/5

Not really my thing.

Blood And Chocolate

Elvis Costello & The Attractions

3/5

Costello is angry and urgent. This feels much more like his new wave peak, but lacks some of the melodic hooks. Not bad though.

Music in Exile

Songhoy Blues

3/5

Desert blues. Exiled from Mali by the imposition of Sharia law which banned cigarettes, alcohol and music. You can keep the fags and booze but any culture without music is no culture at all. Guitar driven blues rock.

If I Could Only Remember My Name

David Crosby

2/5

Pleasant enough psychedelic folk, but nothing really jumps out.

Live 1966 (The Royal Albert Hall Concert)

Bob Dylan

3/5

Fairly pedestrian folk performance, livens up considerably on the second disc 😉

The Joshua Tree

1/5

U2 went to America and all I got was this lousy album. Pompous twattery.