1001 Albums Summary

Boring dad rock with synths as a saving grace

Good and stuff just a bit too proto for me

Good album, don’t think it needs to be on this list though

Literally the coolest altruism has ever sounded

I think Nirvana made pretty interesting music, but I think this does highlight just how much more interesting Kurt was as a person.

First full album I've listened to of hers but it's a beautifully painted picture by a very talented musician that I've been missing out on

Much better than I thought it’d be, really good playing edit: I found out this was overdubbed in the studio vehemently, bumping down one star

Some okay jams but britpop as a whole flies over my head, sounds so bland.

I get it, well produced, well performed, but for what? Nothing enthralls me on it, doesn’t stand toe to toe with any of the other creative legends in English rock at the time.

Fun as hell even though it’s repetitive, and definitely shines a light on a sound a lot of people really wanna hear

First time listening to an album of his, and I wish I had listened sooner.

Some very good jazz… but I might need more context on why it should be on this list

Great playing, but does not really feel like it brings anything new or outstanding sounding.

Not as hard as Curtis to me but still great.

I really hate Aerosmith but still gave this a try and came out unchanged.

One of the most enticing albums ever, and it feels like its in a genre all its own, far too cool to be singer-songwriter or rock.

Respect Beck as a musician but I’ve only ever enjoyed his music he did for a video game lol. This album sounds like a 10/10 to the right ears I’m sure, but I wasn’t too hooked at the pristine but familiar textures and sounds.

This album is the definition of all killer no filler. Money Changes Everything is a phenomenal intro that leads into Girls Want To Have Fun, perfect songs to pair. When You Were Mine is a pretty take on Prince's hit, and Time After Time is a gorgeous 80's time capsule of a ballad. Side B might start with filler if you don't bop, but the bubbly synths in All Through the Night are pristine pop. Witness is one of those songs that I'm sure everyone in the world skips, but I love it, her vocalizing with the super jagged and colorful instruments that are playing a ska-type beat, I feel like Paramore calls back to this on their song called Now. I'll Kiss You? Yeah the party's starting to end, but it ends on a very fun Helen Kane impression, and it sounds just as amazing start to finish as it always does.

Almost gave it two stars because the playing was a lot better than that last Aerosmith album I got, but after reviewing the music as a whole again it dropped back down

Fantastic playing to my ears but I’m not very good at piano. The ideas he really rides here are super fun, I wish this was the kind of playing people lined up to see and smile to more

Gee man I sure love instrumental tracks in my rap album. Legendary hits from this band but their albums ooze with filler.

I know I’m not even 20 albums in but this is just so infuriating. 1001 albums is genuinely far too short to be including forgettable Anglo butt rock side projects. I tried my best to listen and be in the music, and I can’t remember anything besides the same recycled jangle-brit-pop garbage. Alex Turner makes good music. But not here.

The Ocean is really gorgeous. The rest is kinda boring but that one song is really good and the rest was easy on the ears so meh.

Very important album in rap’s canon and has some classic bangers, but man all these dudes were at their worst misogyny-wise during this time. Not to mention besides the hits, there are tons of duds.

Insane. Wow. Was expecting a little too much of the grandiose filler that eventually plagued prog rock, but this was felt very deliberate and necessary in every way. Shoutouts to Easy Money.

Thought it was ok post-punk, definitely understand their importance as they are an influence on some of my favorite British bands

I can’t help it, I’m so biased. Besides “Rusholme Ruffians,” this album is no skips to me and seems to not go out of fashion. At first, I thought that only “Queen is Dead” would be worthy of a place on this list, but coming back to this, it’s so much more solid, innovative, and downright cooler than I remembered.

The album SpongeBob listens to when he goes on walks and does his silly little dance. Honestly though, feels more like a proof of concept for Gorillaz, just kinda an ok samplefest.

Not my first listen, but certainly my most impactful one. Never really clicked until now, and it’s damn innovative as hell, clearly inspirational to many, and has a compelling story behind it with its anxious feelings of growing up.

Honestly, never been too crazy about this one, probably because it’s sandwiched between their two actual best albums. Still great, Orion was much better than I remembered, definitely gonna have that song on repeat for a while. But the rest is just fine.

I’ve given this album a shot plenty of times, but I always leave underwhelmed. Jamie’s fantastic though, and their influence on pop can’t be understated. I guess I just look for a certain different sound when I want minimalism.

Not the most groundbreaking jazz to my ears, but sounded good.

Honestly doesn’t feel too impactful, there are a million dudes with a guitar making simple songs with more aura than this.

Just too good texturally, too well put together, too emotional, relatable, and just surprisingly down to earth as an album despite its out-of-this-world themes, to give it anything less than a five.

First of all, this is just a two hour album. If you listened to something longer, I’m guessing you listened to Logical Progression LEVEL 1, which does not include the original on streaming. This is a bonus compilation that instead comes with two hourlong mixes of… this same bonus compilation but in one track for instrumentals, and one with vocals. Essentially, you listened to the same album three times and it wasn’t even the right one. The correct compilation can be found on Soundcloud or YouTube, and I personally listened to it on Soundcloud from an account called ‘DJ Jo Public,’ who has it split into two tracks. If two hours is still too much drum n bass for you, I highly recommend just listening to disc 2 (CD B). It’s the stronger half of the album but I loved this whole thing immensely as someone who’s dabbled in IDM, and I only ever first heard of it yesterday.

It’s alright, I just don’t feel a lot of influence from this nowadays compared to the rest of the hippie scene music.

Never liked big band as much as later styles, but this was much more in line with what I typically enjoy about jazz.

Actually my first time listening to a full record by these guys, always been turned off by comparisons to Coldplay and Radiohead… but I think those comparisons are unwarranted now and that they have a pretty idiosyncratic sound. Love that they blast on their instruments sometimes but not all the time.

Suffers heavily from having all the good songs up front, genuinely all good stuff but I rarely get past “Walk of Life.”

I usually hate large collections of songs, especially when they're shorter, but these guys are fantastic and in a lane of their own. They say a lot more than most do in punk with much less distortion and way better grooves.

Never been too crazy for Wilco but this is probably my favorite I’ve heard from them, and I’ll probably have to check out Bragg as well since I can’t tell the difference from their contributions here.

I feel like if you like dad rock, this must be pretty good. But I couldn’t find anything memorable for me at all.

I’ve never heard a full NIN album because I never liked their biggest songs. I definitely should have been trying a full album.

I’ve listened to Mustt Mustt before which is way more Western-tinged, and I honestly enjoyed this one way more. Much more interesting even if it can be just as repetitive, which I don’t think is a flaw.

I can feel the hurting behind a lot of songs here, but unfortunately most tracks fall far behind on either the production side or composition side.

Peak jazz funk before it was even cool

HFY man first time listening to this outside the gym and my arms still started swelling after

Certainly sounds like collapse, I’m reading a lot that this band belongs here but should have included a later, more accessible album of theirs instead, and that sounds pretty exciting to me. EDIT yeah coming back they have better stuff and I must bump down

Human League walked so New Order could run

Man what a weird album, but this is definitely one of the best weirdo-pop albums ever.

Previously, I never really got Sinead O’Connor. Yesterday I gave myself this same haircut so I felt much more connected and sympathetic towards this strong and emotive album.

Insane how fantastic this is back-to-back, has a dud or two like ‘Oh Father,’ but songs like ‘Til Death Do Us Part’ make up for it tenfold. A time capsule to a time where digitization could be scary for live musicians, but also proof that they will always be cherished.

Sick album title and way more nuanced thoughts in it than I expected.

Was jaw dropped the first time I listened to this album with all its twist and turns. Incredibly versatile singer and rapper who poetically depicts the cesspool that is LA.

Oldest Miles Davis album I’ve heard, and it puts into perspective how quickly this man adapted and morphed jazz at his will.

Pretty damn good for music for upper class art students

Absolute hot dog water. Tried to power through the first annoying radio song only to be followed by another radio song that I didn’t know was Adele’s. I like pop, I really do, but I cannot relate to or enjoy any of this wine mom garbage.

Very lovely to listen to honestly

I tried to be onboard but this melancholy throughout the album just never blossomed into anything exciting.

Some fun moments but not too enticing overall.

I think this is plenty forgettable considering the musicians themselves didn’t even flesh the songs out much, although I do like some ideas and will probably steal some of them for my own music. A xerox of a xerox.

Got halfway through but I really need this on streaming or on local download so I’ll edit this if I feel different, but I like the lyrics and subject matter a lot, the presentation got me excited cus it looks all Metal Gear, but it’s a tad bit too theatre for me.

Some good songs here but overall, a little too instrumental for me.

Was excited to hear this because I always thought Tiny Dancer was really cool, but there’s really not much other high points like that one on this album for me.

There are some records here that feel like they’re not even that influential to a lot of musicians, but that are just critic-praised for generations. I did enjoy this one, but it feels like that.

Had an ok time with Stars Are Stars and Crocodiles. That’s it really.

After years of being lukewarm to this, I actually really appreciated it this time around. Energetic and maximalist with a vision, and none of the chalkboard scratching sound that nearly all britpop sounds like.

Unpleasant and overly dramatic adult easy-listening for a pompous generation. The pinnacle of unlistenable singing lies in “When Do I.”

Interesting and well played but not exactly groundbreaking

Springsteen is still pretty new to me, and it surprises me how unique his style can be among his contemporaries.

Always a nice listen, always makes me scratch my head and wonder what it is I’m missing or that I don’t get about it, because it’s just that to me.

Hard to listen to this and find any flaws, definitely a must listen to for anyone wanting to make it big in pop rock

Might have to edit this one in the future, but I think he’s had better bands in other albums but this is my first listen of this album and I’m gonna focus more on lyrics in later listens

Okay, turns out I’m gonna love this band so I’m very biased towards them now

There’s a good amount of fantastic songs here but it’s also a very long album

This band definitely has chops and talent, but their strand of eclectic sound is a little too plain unenjoyable to listen to for me, soul sucking even.

mustve been inspired by panic at the discos second album

Hotel California is great but then the rest just kinda falls flat in comparison, kind of like with Making Plans for Nigel by XTC you can tell they worked their hardest one that one song and made an album to supplement it.

Erratic and fantastic at times but often focuses too much on their fun and not the listeners

Some of the best dynamics I’ve heard in jazz

Hadn’t heard this one in a long time and knew I wouldn’t like it as much as when I first found it, but I liked it even less than I thought. Just a bit too bright and visible for me, I like my shoegaze a little more spacey and dreamy.

Sounds so painfully like just a collection of demos, but maybe I’m just amazed that Paul would release such raw and rushed work.

I’m sure there’s no Soda Stereo or Almendra or Charly Garcia or Los Cadillacs or Invisible on this list but thank god we have some hip downtempo-tango for art school and ivy league students. It does sound super smooth.

Very gorgeous songs, love the instrumental breaks that go wild throughout as well.

Every moment of this album is super easy on the ears, perfectly mixed and complimented with confident lines from Common and Kanye who also dive just as heavily into introspective themes. Just super smooth overall.

wtf bro why she so sad I thought I was gonna have a fun pop bangers album here but I get a bit of that and it slowly gets to “Take Care” levels of crying in the club vibes 😭😢😭 Perfect production throughout.

Always felt the highlights on this one were “Mother” and “God,” with everything else being much needed catharsis for John, but does not make for much great listening music. The ending of “Remember” is always pretty funny though.

Started off a little too garage rock for me but turned into some real cathartic dissonance near the end

These guys have influenced quite a lot of musicians I like but I can’t remember what any of this album sounded like immediately after, but I’ll sit with it some more

I listened to a lot of Miles when I first got into jazz of course, but this one always felt much more lukewarm than his previous albums, such as the chaotic “Miles in the Sky,” which has always been my favorite record of his. This is probably my most attentive listen of this album and hanging around for the much livelier second disc was worth it, because they felt much less tense and build-up-ish than the first disc. Definitely enjoyed my time with it as a whole, though.

Wow, never been too crazy on Blur, didn’t like their debut and enjoyed Magic Whip quite a bit but why the hell did I never listen to this one cus it’s phenomenal.

Super charming album with really good production, hard to put into words the way it stands out if you look closely enough, because from a distance it sure does just look like an average album of its time, but I think this one will be on repeat for a long time for me.

Wanted to like this more than I did, but unfortunately psychedelia can come with insane innovation for a band or turn them into something that sounds all blended together, mushy and you can’t really distinguish one moment from another. I feel the latter on this one.

Not an album I expected to see at all, but very pleasantly surprised. Definitely not even a top 10 rapper for me but there are a lot of bangers hidden away here like ‘Pressure,’ and the production as a whole is top notch.

Absolutely skilled musicians, but what a drag of an album. I love all the genres these guys are influenced by and a lot of bands that have been influenced by them, but they make such boring music to me.

Honestly one of the most unnecessary and insulting inclusions in the list.

Pretty good 80’s popslop, goes down real nice and greasy like the unhealthiest, tastiest burger.

One of the top reviews is “I’m surprised this is on the list! Critics hate prog!” Dude was this the first album on your list? If anything, I expect to see all the top 20 from Yes, King Crimson, Genesis, etc., NOT because I want that, but because these writers have their heads so far up Anglo-rock’s rectum and they seem to love long, trite, instrumental noodling. That being said, I do enjoy some pretentious progslop noodling here and there. I love long songs too, I love having my attention demanded and earned. The fantastic first track to this album did just that. The B side dragged out and showed off in ways I didn’t really enjoy, but it wasn’t awful.

Thought I’d be mellow towards this but it was fun as hell and had my attention loud and clear for the lyrics. Good, clean, simple music whilst saying all the right things.

Was kinda nodding off until Juicy hit and this long album picks up way more after that. Plenty of tracks I would cut, but overall it’s bumpin. Minus one star for making me hear head or an imitation of head. Don’t know which would be worse.

Accurate album title.

Amazing stretch of songs on this album with tons of surprises. I thought it’d all be groovy like the first song, only for them to get jazzier and even includes a fantastic Talking Heads cover of Heaven, and they killed it. Very rare for this book to give me a new album this amazing. Really wish it happened more.

Just so unremarkable

Fun as hell hard rock with the best guitarist ever despited some dated stylistic choices.

Some really pretty gems in here, I’m left wondering if maybe there’s some other under-the-radar country records that could’ve taken its place because it sort of feels like it

This book is crucially lacking in non-Anglo based music, and I initially thought that while it was missing countless Brazilian classics, Brazilian metal probably would not need to be included due to that genre’s more homogeneous sound. And man, I was really wrong, these guys not only sound so distinct from most of their influences, but their own impact pushed well beyond their country.

Insanely creative and beautiful throughout, the fun Bjork has on this album is contagious

His voice sounds alright sometimes and his lyrics are very clever, but it’s not quite for me

Sounds unique for the time, but I feel like it hasn’t really impacted the music scene in any notable way.

I haven’t gotten the other M.I.A. album on this list yet but I’ve heard it before and enjoyed it a fair bit. Much more than this one.

Definitely my most enjoyable listen of this album, but man I’ve always hated Zero. Sounds so rancid and expired, but a lot of tracks I see myself coming back to. Definitely don’t love it, but it nails the teenage angst that Billy Corgan seems to bask in.

Great record even if it kinda falls flat after Last Night I Dreamt, but everything before would make for a 5/5 EP. Honestly doesn’t need to be on this list, but it’s a fun farewell record for The Smiths, massive shame it could not be a farewell record for Morrissey as a performer too.

Yeah it’s very good but the second half drags on, The Same Deep Water As You could have been perfect as the last song.

In high school when I found this, Going Mobile was quite the inspiration. I dreamed of decking out a van to make it livable and travel with a few trusted friends like many did, but it also shines on Keith Moon’s insane drumming, which would inspire me heavily when I'd pick up the drums five years later. Still blows my mind that you can just play really crazy for two bars and then just hit the snare and stop for a bit, just creates a really sick vibe with such simple playing. A real master of keeping you on your feet. Besides that song, the dramatic intro, and banger ending, I didn’t feel too crazy about the rest.

This is one of the best sandwiches ever

Some really solid freak folk, reminded me of Love

Surprised to see this one here, saw them live years ago and Look At Where We Are felt like my life’s theme song for a bit. That being said, the first song is insanely fun everyone I’ve shown it tends to love it, but there’s a reason I only show that song lol. The rest kinda drags on.

Hands down, one of the best feet on any album cover

I was absolutely loving the first half of this album, there’s some really funny bars throughout. Made me realize I’ve been appreciating this list for its hip-hop more than anything else I think. Like most albums over an hour, it began to drag, though.

Some sounds are super dated, but the hits and features are really fun to bump honestly. It’s a shame a lot of people seem to be pretty close-minded when it comes to this album, though.

Usually not a fan of grunge and its effects on rock, but there are some banger songs on this album like 4th of July. Love how much they go outside of the standard 4/4 too, they don’t overdo it to a proggy degree but they have fun with it.

Was listening the whole time looking like 😐

Maybe it’s because I’m at Rudy’s and I’m very high, but this album is just such a vibe and so pivotal to just being a dude. If you like this, you’re chill af and we should drink scotch whiskey all night long

Only my second album from this dude but I already know there is plenty of him and this one should be cut. That harmonica is harder to listen to than Xiu Xiu or Throbbing Gristle.

Haven’t heard Father and Son in a long time, a real heartstring tugger for anyone who’s had a nuanced relationship with their dad. Really thoughtful album and from an amazing singer-songwriter.

Have heard this album so many times and I still cannot remember a single song off of it. A shame cus I do really like their poppier hits.

mmmm this is some pretty well done noise, first time knowingly hearing this band but I’ve definitely heard that first song before. Definitely see this as an inspiration for all sorts of shoegaze

Immediately after this album, Kanye quickly became the braggadocio that everyone knew him as before he fell from grace down to an incel-leading nazi. His recent edgy middle-school level behavior is plenty reason to avoid him and his work, but here he was a struggling artist pleading for equal recognition to his bosses like Jay-Z. Nearly every song on this album is about a very real sort of struggle, whether it be money, family, faith, or being on the brink of death. The only time he’s ever really been relatable, even if his discography all the way to KSG was great. I’ll need to find the time to play this on CD because I can’t give this any streams because I’m not funding the next Nazi Super Bowl ad. Steal this record, it’s absolutely his best.

Cabaret levels of self indulgence that results in some of the most stale and forgettable music I’ve ever heard. Maybe they copied pop hits or maybe vice versa (I’m assuming a decent mix of both), but every chord progression here is familiar in a way that just makes me want to listen to something else. Free Form Guitar was when it started to sound cool to me, until it started sounding like he was failing notes in Guitar Hero. Liberation had me thinking I’ve made it finally, but it drags on and on with endless solos that, for all their skill, don’t ever sound interesting. Out of a score of 25, this gets a 6 to 4.

Of course there’s better, but for a lot of people, this is a crucial gateway into bossanova and maybe Brazilian music or jazz as a whole. It gets nothing but love with any easygoing audience.

Brief, intense, powerful, and sick as hell.

Definitely have this blasting whenever me and the boys want to imitate transatlantic accents, but man sometimes the lyrics just feel so damn lazy. No wonder rock musicians realized they can just write their own stuff, why bother with something like “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off?” Why bother past disc 3 anyways? I do very much appreciate “Looking for a Boy” for us short kings finally having an anthem, and “Boy! What Has Love Done to Me!” for us toxic kings finally having an anthem.

Solid up until My Friend Goo, it started to all mesh into a similar sound after but stayed listenable at least.

Prog hasn’t aged well with me, usually it just feels like too much, but this certainly isn’t. Every minute is well spent, the fantasy is still beautifully there. If you didn’t enjoy it, I think you literally need to take a hike with this album, preferably somewhere with mountains and oceans.

Really good, radical stuff, even if it can get a tad bit repetitive

I love a good bit of ambient and electronic music, like Oval, Boards of Canada, and OPN, so I absolutely see how this was important as an influence to these genres. I definitely feel like it has to have influenced game soundtracks like in The Talos Principle or Myst as well. Super bizarre and anemoic, and I love it for that.

Completely boring album from a guy who has obviously done much better

Enjoy the Silence and Policy of Truth were sick. The rest was alright to me, I’ll give it more tries though.

A beautiful rendition of songs I’ve not heard the original versions of anyways

joethe lion .

Would’ve loved this with crazier drums

Very fun, amazing energy

Some really good songs like “Punch Up at a Wedding” and “Where I End and You Begin,” but overall half of the album is worth a skip.

Actually surprised I didn’t like this one really, but it skews a bit too far into some style I don’t like. Feels a bit more cliche than some metal bands I like.

Yeah there only needs to be two Led Zeppelin albums on this list and this is definitely not one of them

Very lucky to be assigned his debut as this is my first time listening to a full LP from this guy, and man he is talented. But it doesn't grab my attention at all because it doesn't feel like he does anything original. Didn't remember a single moment besides Watching the Detectives, but oh whoops turns out that's a bonus track!

Hmm yeah not a big fan of this at all. Repetitive in a Talking Heads way but not quite doing anything interesting with it.

What a talented musician, but I’m not going to listen to this ever again lol

Constantly bouncing between being everything I do and don’t like about anthemic stadium indie rock, but Sprawl II was very pretty at least.

I remember when Folklore came out and I was decently surprised by how solid it was for a new Taylor Swift album, but when this album dropped I felt like I had enough Taylor for the year lol. Yeah, it’s good, probably better than Folklore, but in today’s Showgirl era and her unrelenting thirst for even more popularity, I’m kinda fatigued of hearing her.

Honestly, much better than the Sex Pistols.

Most enjoyable listen of this album for me so far, used to not be to into it but there’s some great songs here I’ve overlooked

One of my favorite bands honestly, but this album could easily not be in this list, especially when they have better ones that weren’t included. They were barely getting started with letting the creativity flow here.

Man, I feel left out still not being too amazed by this guy. Hazey Jane I was beautiful, so I’ll come back to this every once in a while. Maybe I’ll get it when I’m 30 or something.

He’s got an insane voice, but the music backing him is pretty uninteresting to me.

A fantastic dive into poppier sounds while embracing all of the charm the band has.

Sick, cathartic, acoustic work of art

Amazing guitarist and singer, probably the closest thing to blues I can enjoy.

cool

A long time ago these guys bored me to death, but their older stuff has been growing on me lately. Just perfect, easy, dreamy music.

Love the way they ride songs out in really groovy fashions like Lost in the Supermarket or Clampdown. This album is pretty long though, and I wouldn’t say there’s no filler.

These guys play great and the songs sound fine, but I don’t hear any lasting influence from them. The style gets old as well, since they’re not making any new sort of noises.

Fun fusiony dan, I forgot they sounded like this for a bit lol

A very pioneering collage of jams, love the endless ideas that come out of Eno

Funny to get this after Eno’s solo debut, but even his ideas don’t catapult Talking Heads’ talent to the sky just yet; the songs are a little weirder and more alive, but they don’t strut all over the place in style the way they do on later albums.

Sometimes bored me but sometimes caught me very intently listening.

Cool album, All I’ve Got to Do points strongly to their quickly maturing songwriting skills

a fun performance .

While it definitely fizzles out around the end, this is Stereolab’s most fun album imo. Perfect percussion with melodies ranging from silly to gorgeous. Crazy, sturdy, brutal

I appreciate the never-ending, hard energy, and I’m sure this was very important for inspiring electronic acts I enjoy like Squarepusher, but I could use a change of pace here and there in some way, sound wise.

John Lennon’s best and a top 3 post-Beatles album. Love or hate the title track, it kicks off into a great time right after and showcases John’s finest ballads. One of my favorite tracks, I Don’t Wanna Be a Soldier, is a tense, primal track with a sick groove, the kick drum doesn’t get this crazy again until Oh Yoko, surprisingly. Also a fantastic closing song with a beautiful piano.

Has a really strong first half, but dissolves into lukewarm tunes for me late into the album. The last track is especially a snorefest.

Awesome I love Punmk Rock music .

Really solid band but I was only amazed by the first track.

Oh wow, I did not expect this to be as awful as it was. It’s always good to step out of one’s comfort zone as a musician, but hearing Jack White mess around on a marimba for half an hour was annoying.

Their brand of noise rock is at a perfect crossroad with their pop sensibilities on this one

One of the most cohesive and listenable albums ever thats mostly sample based, to me. Really cool and hypnagogic.

Wow awesome these guys made a song based off the Kanye’s Power riff

I think I’m becoming a Panda Bear fan honestly, really interesting musician and the other guy is cool too

I’m really not vibing with Reggie’s music, I’ve learned from this list. Even though all of my favorites of his are on this record (Funeral For a Friend, Bennie, Saturday Night etcetc), a ton of the tracks to me lay a static wall of generic rock to me that’s too focused on sounding grandiose in performance but not in actual musical diversity.

I praised “Into the Court of the Crimson King” in my review for sampling Kanye and this showed up as I confirmed my review

Never liked this one much, but I appreciate the energy and influence it brought to its time. I enjoyed a lot of the tracks more this time around, but the weird stuff Zappa always does are still a major turn off, like the whole last three tracks. Feels like he never does it with meaningful intent.

goddamn impressive, not a listenable second on this

Definitely better than the last Prodigy album I got

What the hell, I knew the hit track but did not expect the rest of the album to be just as insanely fun for different reasons, feels like a fantastic record and a history lesson too because of the pirate radio concept.

Amazing album, nostalgia inducing, but the best part of it has to be its review page on this site. Whether it’s one to five stars, most of them are written way more cringey than normal here lmao

Never been big on downtempo cus it’s just too… down. But an alluring smoothness absolutely brings the value of this up to me, I just certainly don’t play it often because there’s so much more interesting music that can be just as mellow to me.

Whenever someone has an obvious, irrational dislike towards a whole genre, it tends to bug me a bit because I’ve believed that new sounds can absolutely be capable of sounding great and deserve to be their own genre. But I’ve given so many chances to punkabilly, both records and in concerts, and there’s something about it that I completely hate in an honestly prejudicial way, it makes me feel like I’m listening to butt rock bands playing in fields of corn, hanging around stinky people chewing dip. Country, bluegrass, and southern rock are fantastic genres that do not give me this vibe.

It was fading heavily into the background for me, but I was certainly attentive starting from the Water Song. The rest of the album continued to be a bore, though.

Dude, what the hell. I like jazz. I like Napalm Death. But dude, what the hell. I was begging for a steady swinging ride pattern the whole time so getting to Ecars felt like they through me on life support after repeatedly slamming my balls against saxophones and drums. My ears were ringing by the time the whole thing was done.

Saved this one for chest day at the gym because that just felt right. But it was actually boring me right up until I heard gunshots, which quickly transported me back to Guitar Hero III, getting my adrenaline up like crazy. And they just kept pumping it out after; The Shortest Straw has some of their goofiest lyrics, but what a gnarly solo. Dyers Eve is a great closer, but man, To Live is to Die might've been the highlight for me. Ride the Lightning is absolutely my favorite from these guys, but I definitely realized that this is a close second, despite the mixing issues.

Music’s completely boring and worth a 0, gets a star for introducing me to the hilarious Stanley Unwin.

Haha great album from a legendary band, but I’d personally omit it from the list. Forever Changes is their magnum opus and is lightyears ahead of this record, but both I’d say are still essential psychedelic albums.

“Everybody must get stoned” hell yeah instant 5/5

Love this band but they made far better records real quickly after this, but I can’t deny that there’d be no Joy Division without The Scream.

People of the Day was a hard ass song, but the rest was so cheesy I got diarrhea

This album is so forgettable that "pacific ocean blue vinyl" gets more results for blue car wrap than the actual record. I'm sure he gave it his all during the recording of this since he had so much to prove to himself, and the people around him seem to have supported this album. But it was insignificant when it came out, and it gets exponentially harder to miss this the farther it gets in the rearview mirror. It screams "midlife crisis of the late 70's," representing nostalgia of the past decade while also trying desperately to capture contemporary sounds.

Yikes, this certainly aged like 60 year old cream

I was expecting some pretty mid Strokestic Monkeys type stuff here, but these guys sound loads more confident and cool than their contemporaries

Wow, what a phenomenal first track. Left me wondering if it’d be a one-hit wonder type deal or a hidden gem, and it’s really somewhere in the middle. I was bored until Hudson Line which picked things back up and stayed rolling, Goddess on a Hiway is gorgeous and the rest continues to feel lush, but I was very surprised that it wasn’t as old as I thought. It sounds dated in a good way to me.

Actually really enjoyed the first song! But Earlybird was awful and my dog thought so as well.

A familiar basic celebrity name that I could never attach to any human face or voice, and while the former is completely forgettable, her ear-grating, overconfidently milquetoast performing will be ingrained in my mind as the one album I couldn’t stand while doing work. If I’m working, I can listen to goddamn ANYTHING. Not this. Pissed me off too much and I had to finish it in portions. Just so annoying.

I feel like Nile Rodgers doesn't get the credit he deserves as one of the most influential guitarists of all time, and it's absolutely because he's not a rock guitarist. But you can't name a single other guitarist who's had as many people dance to their music as this guy, I promise you, not one. Credit is also heavily due to bassist Bernard Edwards and drummer Tony Thompson, who could've put a drum machine and a metronome out of a job if they wanted to. Bernard is clearly a hitmaker himself with the first track Good Times showing his effortless-sounding perfect playing. And though the song length poses no problem here, I was worried that with Chic, they might've only had one good hit per album or so, but while things slow down on the next track, My Feet Keep Dancing bring it right back up, and we're treated to some amazing disco, song after song they keep it interesting but never switch up the locked-in groove. Criminally understated in its influence.

Dude, why does this band blow so hard? It takes a large amount of overcompensating to make this much beautiful composition sound so flat and emotionless. Track one has vocals that have perfected the sound of nails on chalkboard, and on a second listen, I thought I remembered Marley Purt Drive as a moment of relief on this album. No, it turns out it's still as dull, just not as insulting. Sound of Love was actually a decent song, though. But not an interesting moment after, unfortunately.

I was impatiently waiting for Marquee Moon during my listen to this album, I realized that those first three tracks never really stuck for me. But the playing on this 10 minute track is just so energetic, creative, and tightly knit. Prove It is probably my second favorite on this album, tons of lovely melodies there, but it's a pretty important listen for its spread across like everything indie and then some.

Whatever the hell this is, I'm a fan. The Eno influence is up front at first, and Daniibe is my favorite of this half. Smooth once the groove breaks out, love the bass. Sy Sawande and Ndelorel make up the peak of this album for me, the latter had a pretty sick transition into a ska style of playing. Yeah that was definitely a strange one, for this list especially. But a pretty good album.

Honestly this paints a perfect picture of "camp" in my head in a very good way. Electro-pop trios of a girl and two dudes is such a classic combo wish I found these guys earlier. It predates EMOTION by CRJ but that's the closest thing this reminds me of. The second half can be a bit filler but it ends fine. Very cool overall.

Was feeling pretty underwhelmed by this again, being my third or forth time trying out Elliott Smith. But catching up on his life story, while it shouldn't be necessary, definitely cements his eerie sound. Angeles is probably my favorite. Cupids Trick is a real nice surprise near the end of the album.

Well, the 14 min song was pretty solid, but none of the rest caught my attention much.

A lot of these "world" picks include some really weird decisions. So much good music from Brazil, but yeah let's get this random Yugoslavian dude's electronic drugged up loops on it. It's really alright though, I enjoyed A Noite Sem Fim among others.

Such a clear peak for the band in every way. Every song is distinct and feels just more meticulously crafted than the last, from Marr's sparkly guitar layers (Boy With a Thorn, There is a Light), to the constant, pumping rhythm of drums and bass (The Queen is Dead, Big Mouth). It sounds like they wanted to prove something to themselves on this one, and they came out with a near perfect album.

Was getting more and more exhausted each second, but Intervention kinda flipped that whole experience, and I feel like that's maybe because I prefer the pace of the songs after that. Both other Arcade Fire albums on this list I mostly disliked besides one or two stand out songs, but on this one I do genuinely enjoy the second half of the record a lot. Besides this, I have only ever come back to two Arcade Fire songs, Awful Sound and It's Never Over, both fantastic and beautiful songs and I'm glad I got to notice more of this band's talent here, even if it took three albums.

Some alright songs in here, and the quality is really good in terms of performance and production. But it's not very memorable, so I think I'll only listen to it a few more times then forget it.

Apple Music said "you might also like, Supergrass, The Stone Roses, The Verve, The Charlatans..." haha lol. I think The La's are better than those bands for the most part, but still a confusing one-hit wonder to end up on the list.

Solid crunch with the appropriate sense of politics for it, great album but it suffers for my rating because I just don't feel like throwing it on often.

Funny enough, I really liked the song I Can't Stand It. But the rest, I just couldn't stand.

I can respect a lot of what they're saying. I love some of their later hits. But I'm not a big fan of much on this album.

There is some really great playing in here and I would have loved the production and the guitar playing if I'd listened to this when it came out. Six years later, I'm a bit past these really rooted sounds, personally. It just didn't really grab my attention all throughout.

I got 25 already on this list, and I gave it a 1. I don't think that's gonna change after this, but I did expect this one to be great because it's being carried by way stronger, more dynamic singles than she'd release in the future. It's way better than I expected. The hits are as great as ever, but I didn't expect the deep cuts to hit way harder. Turning Tables, He Won't Go, and I'll Be Waiting all caught my ears constantly, and a Lovesong cover is always a nice surprise. I'm sorry I despise 25, but I'm realizing that I should give 19 a try.

Killer intro song, and all throughout I'm getting New Order vibes but with their own sort of sound font. Album blew by quickly in such a sweet way, it's gonna have to sink more but I loved every song on first listen.

Banger intro that leads into my favorite song on the album, Into The Light. It's an underrated and creative riff in my opinion, and its atmosphere perfectly swells into the next song, Arabian Nights. It unfortunately kinda drags, after this though. But it has an awesome front half.

It'll get three stars because I loved some of the fuzz solos throughout, I think one had a nice delay effect too. That's about all that really caught my ears.

Their most pleasant offering to me yet.

wtf

I have a lot of opinions about this album and Carlos Santana and "Latin" music as a whole, but I will simply acknowledge the bliss of listening to Samba Pa Ti. I think that song will just always hit me like that one critic in Ratatouille.

Never been crazy about these guys. Cut Your Hair sounds like it would play at Chipotle and the rest of the songs are pretty boring.

Some ok songs, Carnt Sleep is a funny title. Stoned To Say The Least is a bit nauseating, but that could also be because I'm stoned. Nothing Can Stop Us has got to be the most colorful song on this album though, and wow it glows. I love it, extremely refreshing honestly after the past few songs. But that's sadly all that really popped for me.

Don't have much to say about this classic, even non jazz fans can feel the cool here

Soul Flower was cool until someone said they had herpes. The production and energy on the second half of the album was consistently bumping.

What? I've heard church music be more interesting and rebellious than this. edit: set and setting, placeholder rating until I finally take a road trip in the vastness of the land down under

Contrary to the album's title, I think this record perfectly captures the color of blue.

Goddamn it I personally love everything about this album. It's not their most essential or even essential listening, in my opinion, unless you're simply on this bizarre wavelength. An ugly panic attack translated into angsty punk informed funk, David Byrne vents about everything, from where he'll next move to and whether heaven is real, from the pain of breathing air to the guitar he's playing; it's a very matter-of-fact, what you see is what you get style of writing lyrics that so perfectly captures the energy of walking into a genius' bad trip. Not that he's the only genius behind this, as Eno is behind the boards, Jerry is essential for keys and guitar, Chris is precise on drums, and Tina is reserved when necessary and creative in all right moments on bass. I love the bouncy, bubbly tone in Mind especially, where it serves as the sole cheery sound in this eye-twitching song. Being around in 79 when this and Unknown Pleasures released must have been a dream come true for autistic, depressed people.

I've been wary to explore Bjork's later discography after being absolutely paralyzed and overwhelmed by Fossora and instead taking her step by step. But really, I've just had Vespertine on repeat. The fact that it's an almost completely a cappella album invites the assumption that is will be weird and must certainly invite a lot of immediate dismissal from people who'd prefer some more instrumental songs. I definitely didn't feel enticed to listen by that fact, but it continues a streak since her Debut, in my opinion, of near-flawless talent at self expression. Who Is It is truly a lot of fun, and it made a lot of sense to find out it was originally going to be on Vespertine, but I guess she knew she had a whole album's worth of this kind of music to make. Her textural obsessions make songs like Desired Constellation and Ancestors so simply ethereal. Triumph of a Heart is going to be a fun one to throw on in front of friends, but Oceania is really the crown jewel of the album. Absolutely shining track.

Geez, what an earsore of a Help cover. They Long To Be is super pretty though, but it's the only interesting moment to me alongside Another Song where Richard and Karen trade off two pretty fun solos. Great musicians, I sometimes catch myself in awe of some of Karen's performances as a drummer, it's a shame how fame treated them.

You know what, even if I'm not too keen on the stinky cheese-rank smell of this album, it sounds impeccably mixed for a dino album that I was guessing was from the mid 70's, but actually 69 which is a little crazy. But Zappa using one of the first 16-track recorders, which definitely accounts for having so many goddamn instruments but them all sounding clear as day. This dude is so smart but most of the time he's like Jacob Collier because he's too smart to ever be fun to listen to. But at least he's funny, and if you're in the mood for jazz electric guitar (I don't think I ever have been once in my life) he is a phenomenal player.

Here we go, third or fourth or fifth time listening to this I really don't know it's really that forgettable. My Best Friend and DCBA 25 were pretty fun songs but I can't imagine coming back to this one voluntarily again, because I really tried back when I was into acid. Got to the end of White Rabbit and I thought, "that's it?"

What the hell man, Richard III ends right when it starts sounding cool as hell. I hated Coco, I remember intently listening and being frustratingly bored, but listening so far may make me give it a second listen. The playing certainly feels a lot more varied and fun to listen to.

Oh wow a lot of musicians I enjoy like this album. But to me this album sounds like what I think Trout Mask Replica sounds like to normal people (that record I do enjoy)

I've always listened to Even Flow because the energy on that song is ferocious, but as a high schooler, I don't know why I wrote the rest of the album off as too "country" sounding to me or something, I think because it heads right into Alive, which is honestly probably my least favorite track on the record. Awesome ending on that song, but the visceral pace on Once and Why Go keep me way more locked in. Black may also be calmer song, but it certainly makes up for it with an encompassing, heavy atmosphere. This song sounds like rainclouds quickly approaching and it's sick. Jeremy can get just as tense for different reasons, and I think the vivid lyrics in it make it my favorite on the album. It's so hard hitting, like the whole damn record.

This was my first time ever listening to Nick Cave, and I'm really in awe. Sounds very delicate but like he used to be violent, and he's a master of dressing the right instruments and timbres for songs. Sounds like Michael Gira, but I suspect a much more musically inclined.

An obvious magnum opus, Kendrick's third album could compete against countless classic albums for its instrumentation, its artistry, its legacy, but Kendrick does not want to be compared to rock or pop stars. He wants his name to be next to people like Pac, Dre, and Biggie. He doesn't want to strip his identity from his image just to satisfy conservative media (this includes everyone offended by his music). But despite wanting to forge his own path, he still influenced the whole music industry and continues to do so. January of the following year, David Bowie dropped his last album "Blackstar," which had him listening to To Pimp A Butterfly as a strong influence. No surprise, Bowie held on to his hipness til the very end. Oops ok the album? Fantastic, Kendrick's bars are faster and denser than you can comprehend, Thundercat adds equally fat basslines on some songs like the first track and King Kunta, and the style switch up of the songs show amazing versatility while never quite breaking theme. For Free is just wild, insane to diminish it with an interlude title. These Walls is lush and psychedelic, it makes me see colorful trails. When this album first came out I was in high school, so I'd usually tap out after the banger that is Alright. The rest was too conscious for me then, but now it was simply eye opening, to see the introspection and mental battles Kendrick Lamar must have had with his idols, with his community, with the black diaspora. It was gonna be a 5 before I listened, but now it probably tops GKMC which was my favorite of his forever.

The first time I tried to listen to the records in this book, it was 2016 (wtfff 10 years ago...) and I was going in chronological order. In the Wee Small Hours really hit, but when I got to this I think I quit there because it felt so stupid to have a repeat artist so soon. Imagine if I called it quits every time that happened.

Eh I just had Kendrick and discovered Nick Cave through this the other day as well, so my standards felt pretty high. And then I also happened to read that this band got a $100,000 advance for this album that sounds like it was recorded with a Blue Yeti microphone. So yeah 🖕 u Guided By Voices, Listend By Noone, it should've been me instead, learn to finish your songs.

Glad to have heard this for the two Everything songs alone, that was a lovely stretch of five minutes. Can't Make a Sound was also nice, but that's about all that I loved.

Jesus, even if anybody needed more than one Radiohead album, six is overkill and this is easily the first to go of them. Some songs have some wicked sounds, they always have at least one or two good songs per record, but overall filler.

Well I first found out about Maggot Brain, it was because I had learned one of John Frusciante's songs is essentially a cover of the title track. It's quite a spiritual solo, I was actually in an intense Wordle game for the whole song. Well, all the way until You and Your Folks, Me and My Folks. Pretty tough word. But I really think the grooves were distracting me. I can do without Back In Our Minds, that bell is freaky, but love the jam on Wars of Armageddon (I'm so stoned why is that word spelled like that)

Man, The Police are understandably milquetoast for a lot of people, but when I first heard this album in high school they were sort of groundbreaking in my head because besides them being good at the reggae bit, they felt like a punk band without distortion like in No Time This Time (I found Minutemen later). I honestly think I looked them up after finding out Stewart Copeland did the soundtrack for the PS1 Spyro games. His drumming is super dynamic and energetic, but I think he shines more on other albums. Walking On The Moon has a very iconic hi-hat break with a vibrant groove throughout, though, when you're mellowed out enough to deal with Sting's awful Patois. As much as I love this record, there is a fair bit of filler (Regatta De Blanc, Deathwish, Contact), but Sting, Andy Summers, and Copeland's playing are tight as hell on this. The melancholy of Bed's Too Big Without You and Does Everyone Stare make them my favorites of this one.

Unfathomably underwhelming. Automatic genuinely caught my ear, that singing solely backed by drums after pauses was very cool, and then everything else faded back into chords and root notes and money beat and words.

Jump is a silly funny song to me, but Panama's a fun rocker. Drop Dead Legs has an insanely fun, heavy swing, Top Jimmy presents a lot of pep with a roaring solo, and Drop Dead Legs doesn't feel like it hides any influences, especially with the phaser on those drums. But the start of the B side with Hot For Teacher... insane drumming. Insane guitar soloing, the Van Halen brothers were pretty unmatched in speed then. But even ignoring that, Alex VH's tom drums evoke so much character, he makes them go from sounding like a motorcycle engine to a goddamn jazz big band ensemble. And on this solo and throughout the whole record, Eddie makes pinch harmonics, tapping, and sweeping seem easy at rapid speeds, seamlessly juggling all of these techniques while still rocketing up the charts. I can do without I'll Wait and Girl Gone Bad, but House of Pain is a fantastic bar fight closer.

This was annoying and boring

Nutty career that this guy's got, it's a very pretty album though like a lot of classic country.

That's funny, I just saw a Chili Peppers cover band last week, and I think they actually started with Around the World. Really fun intro really with a wacky chorus, but Parallel Universe switches up to a more post-punky vibe that continues on Otherside. Scar Tissue is easily their sound, but at its most refined for radio, which is a good thing. Not a big fan of Get On Top, it kinda screams filler to me from the especially lazy Keidis lyrics to the repetitiveness of the rest. Don't know why the cover band had to play this song too, though. They sounded better than this album though, and that's all thanks to Rick Rubin, who decided that every instrument should have clipping distortion when played loud enough, and none of these four do anything quietly besides for two songs, Porcelain and Road Trippin. I really like the contrast between the former to the rest of the album, such a beautiful level of control. Compare that to Easily, which to me, contains audio frequencies being shoved through cheese graters. The crash cymbals that open that song sound like some industrial machine, and then when Keidis starts singing the whole thing sounds like it's ran through a wah pedal left on near the top position. Just awful. It's hilarious that Metallica caught more hate from the decibel boosting than these guys when it ruins the Chili Peppers' music more. This Velvet Glove is my favorite song on the album, it's just a fun composition. My favorite song on this album is not on this album, Quixoticelixer I can honestly just leave this album behind in high school though, P!ATD is less embarrassing to listen to than this nowadays.

Second listen ever, bored me the first time but now it's getting a lot sweeter. Last time, I thought it sounded like Wilco, but I just listened to them today and they're way more boring than this. Everybody Hurts has always popped up in funny moments in my life, though. Warm listen, I do feel like I got a hug I needed.

I really like the mixing on this kick drum one song in. Exciting intro song in general. The second one didn't do anything for me but Wish I Was Skinny was a pretty indie tune. They're cool as hell for Leaves and Sand, that song just kept getting gnarlier. By Barney (And Me) I couldn't really tell one song from another but in a good way, their playing is pretty immersive. Honestly near the end, I've Lost the Reason speaks for itself and loses a bit of cohesion with this and weaker previous songs. 50 minutes or so with the right cuts would've made this an easy five, but man, at least The White Noise Revisited is a six on its own.

The solo in St. Elmo's Fire is still one of my favorites, what a legend Fripp is. Brian Eno is awesome because he was like the DJ Khaled of art rock except he wasn't stupid and could play instruments more than he'd like to admit. But they both get a whole lot of help from very talented features, and Eno has a fine-tuned ear for producing sweet, warmness like in The Big Ship. Little Fishes sounds weird but has some beautiful arpeggios. The B side is really just filled with gorgeous soundscapes, and I'm very upset I only had the A side downloaded on Apple Music cus it's taken down now lol. I think back then, I preferred longer, drawn out ambient songs because they didn't feel right to be the same length as a pop song. But Brian Eno was the guy who kicked down that door later anyways. Awesome music to listen to while while getting my OSHA 10

Pretty awesome album when you're hurting. But even if it caught me at a good (bad?) time, tracks 5 and 6 ran pretty boring to me, and they don't exactly run short. There's a song or two more that disinterested me, but you can really feel out your emotions on the dotted delay hits, and it's got a hell of an energetic ending. It takes a lot of focus, but it's a pretty album.

This was a boring drag of my ears through some dusty playing, and that ugly sounding bass tone didn't help.

The vocals make this one of the most unlistenable records on this list, the instrumentals make it essential listening in the techno world, the math adds up to a 3.

Beck is a good musician, he's proved that plenty of times. I think he did more so on Sea Change than here because bleh, from Earthquake Weather to Scarecrow I eagerly clock out and that's a good chunk of the record. This album is very well mixed and well played and well informed and blah blah but it's not riveting to me. Second track was funny. There are good moments here and there, but I probably won't come back to this.

Cool, but we can definitely drop this if we have At Folsom Prison

Y'know I've given "If You're Feeling Sinister" a lot of tries, but always leave holding onto only Get Me Away I'm Dying. But Tigermilk is super lush, feels like a cloud lullabying me with the evil tales of the world, and I really don't want to say much more because the denseness of some the lyrics hasn't set in, but the singer is quite the storyteller. Also props to Electronic Renaissance, insane to learn that that was made on Cubase in the 90's, that is cool.

I think the last time I fully heard this album was like 10 years ago, after learning about Dream Theater so I think that when I finally got to Yes I just never returned to this. And that makes sense, Tom Sawyer is cool for Neil Pearts solo and the rest is meh. And this is how I feel even into Limelight, the nerdiness kinda overcomes the fun. The Camera Eye and Witch Hunt surprisingly teetered more towards fun though, but Vital Signs catapulted towards it. Just an awesome groove.

Was honestly having a good time until the Old Castle when they started messing it all up by sounding like ELP. Blues Variation continues this nonsense. The Curse of Baba Yaga... cannot be sensibly designed for enjoyment. You ever hear a bar band play a cover but in a weird style? I rarely want to listen to classical but in this case, I'd much rather just listen to Mussorgsky. These guys didn't even try tackling Night on Bald Mountain, but I bet you any bar band can nail Float On.

Would've liked this a lot more if it were 40 minutes long or so

Wow, this sounds like they influenced the entire decade of 90's rock, which is impressive and unfortunate given the music.

I remember feeling mellow towards this album when I first heard it, but it's growing on me much harder now, Long Promised Road reminds me of another of my favorite Beach Boys songs, I Wasn't Made For These Times. Student Demonstration Time uses synths in some of the coolest ways I've ever heard ever. Feel Flows is really my final highlight, but it's a lovely one.

Sort of a long listen, but DJ Premier's beats are really awesome, I just had a hard time hanging on towards the end.

All that I can leave behind

yeah solid I don't remember much but he sounded pretty verbose with it

As a rapper, obviously Dre falls flat compared to a lot of his peers, and it shows with his reliance on features, but this actually becomes a feature itself. His guests have colorful lyrics, often absolutely hilarious, and the flows do enough justice to the beats. These instrumentals being the main highlight of this album for me, actually. I think that's gotta be the case for most people, because the decorative production is top-notch. Let Me Ride is probably the highlight for me here, the sample fills after the "rolling in my 64" line just sound so cool every time. It definitely drags in the second half, but still makes for some good moments like the Parliament parody, The Roach. It's also too influential to not be legendary.

Dude, I've loved the P-Funk I've heard, but most of these songs dragged on for too long, and I liked how they all started.

Well, it was really creative and pretty at times. The banshee screaming was not very enjoyable and pretty annoying, but the emotional moments like Cliche and Homemade are really inviting to me.

That certainly sounded like music made from a side member of a very popular band.

I went on a Steely binge a few years ago and I knew that this was not one worth coming back to, at all. You can make an excuse for Countdown to Ecstacy I guess, but this was especially bland by their standards. Title track was the best song.

I'm coming back to the last four tracks after a week and I honestly don't remember anything I heard before but I remember it was bumping hard, and it still is. So that's really solid.

It was pretty decent for British ska at first, but the second half was very weak.

Alright, this one's pretty heavily slept on

That’s the best version of Satisfaction I’ve ever heard

His music bores me to no end, this has been the worst offender and it's only not a 1 because I'd imagine I'd have a good conversation with the guy

Vinyl discount section

The intro all the way to track 7 is great, and the rest is just alright to me.

What an inspiration for never ever making a new sound over the course of minutes

Top shelf fart rock, that one hit song is ok but the rest reeks because it drags and has miserable sounding lyrics

No matter how dull the cover may seem (or how well it blends in to the rest of the fodder of this book), just about every electronic album I've been given so far has been pretty innovative and often pivotal to a lot of electronic I like. The NYC theme coming from all the samples this guy recorded there seems distinctly personal to David Holmes, and it's cool to get a snapshot of the city from someone not from there for a change. Really, I was a bit bored until Gritty Shaker, but things don't drop one bit after that, and Holmes shows off an impressive control of multiple styles. Don't Die Just Yet is a sick pseudo-rock song, and a pretty grand ending to a well weaved, vividly produced album.

Today I learned that the legendary Tony Allen was THE drummer for Fela Kuti, the band leader even. I'm sure most people find out about Fela before Tony, or both together, but it's cool to know I've been hearing that legend long before I realized it. Awesome music, I think I'd choose a different Fela Kuti album though.

This was my first listen of this album and I'm honestly blown away. Definitely a controversial figure, but her music stands strongly and distinctly.

There was honestly some awesome playing throughout a bit of this, but there's a LOT of this, and I would have rather found out about this guy through his solo works and not this muddy sounding compilation.

Mr Jones sounds like the Wipeout TV show theme, and the rest sounds about the same. It Goes On has a nice drum break, and that's about all that caught my ears.

Awesome drum solo in Harlequin, Jaco is also amazing, and I did not know Wayne Shorter was in this band, that's really cool. I also probably didn't know who Wayne Shorter was the first time I checked this band out.

Crazy amount of aura, skill, and cohesive vision on this one. The last song is unfortunately a bit of a drag, but the other three are tight, I'm gonna want to listen to it a lot this next month I think.

Some interesting moments, but Franz Schubert is especially a shimmering song to me. A nicer, much dreamier place to be than most of the songs

Beck throws all his influences at the wall and sees what sticks... it all kinda sticks and sounds gnarly and stuff, but also why?

freakin awesome, epic songs. i'm giving a star for every cool dude in this band

I can see the argument made for the other xx album, but this one's certainly a biased introduction. By the time this came out, their influence was already very felt across pop, but this record didn't push that already existing reach very much I think. It's still well produced with beautiful textures throughout, definitely coming back to it.

alright

Way too long, does not do enough in all that time. I think that Southernplayalisticadillacmusic or ATLiens should've been the pick for the list, too.

Only my second Bowie album so far, I'm sure one week I'll get two of his back to back. Changes, Life on Mars, and Quicksand are gorgeous songs, among Bowie's best which is a big list. There's some cool moments on the rest like Queen Bitch and Any Warhol, but the rest of the album I can take it or leave it. Always taking it on a long road trip of course.

The band name, their description, the album title, and the cover all point to what I thought would've been an easy 1. But the drumming is really interesting and so are some of the songs. It definitely bored me in the second half, it's a gimmicky act anyways, but it gets a lot more mileage than the rest of the fluff in this list.

While it's clearly personal and prying deep in there, the instrumentation could've been a bit more... latching in the first half, I think. Track 6 and onwards gets more creative and exciting with the playing, and the singing seems polarizing for most but I'm just fine with her voice. Certainly a surprising addition but one of the more thought-provoking ones.

Awesome, great playing and beautiful energy. Essential?

The hits are impeccable, but the songs sandwiched around them are pretty well crafted as well, with some like Big Brother being particularly thought provoking.

That was funny this really sucked

Screw it, I sang along the whole way. It's his best solo work by far. It sure sounds like patchwork but it's gorgeous like a mosaic. The synths are also so timeless, they all feel like I could pull them out of a Logic preset, but they just patched or dialed that stuff in! Awesome moment for Paul to prove he just needs to be Paul

Right off the bat, every minute of TC Honeybear reminded more and more of Father John Misty and I don't even like that guy that much. Just really sounds like he studied every inch of his style. And to be fair, I do think this Grant guy does it better. Always annoying when the white armchair activist feels they have a right to drop slurs that don't pertain to them, especially 40 of them back to back! Definitely dropping a star or two for that one

Oh man is she a genius, breezing through styles and juggling them all with grace. Could easily be a 5 if it made the right length cuts or if the bottom half had a bit more flash to it. There's hardly a bad song though (I think Come Alive sucked), and besides her genre surprises, features like Big Boi and Of Montreal on the same goddamn album are insane. Probably gonna binge all her stuff now.

They play really well, all the songs sound distinct, and they clearly have a vast array of influences. But I really didn't like any song besides Love Dog for some reason, and I thought that the whole thing would turn around after that. No, there was just more Arcade Fire theatrics in a more jagged, awkward sounding way to me.

Okay, I don't dislike these guys, but this really didn't interest me and most desert rock doesn't. I've only ever heard one of their albums before this, and what the actual hell? Why is Songs for the Deaf not on this list? And two other QOTSA albums are?

Good album, awesome closer, wasn't ever the craziest on these guys but I'll throw this on again

Awesome but it'd be nice to have more Spanish-language music that's actually from Latin America

So glad she decided to make some pop rock before sealing the hole. This album hits so hard.

I thought that ack ack ack thing he did in the first song was cool, but the rest was just a bit too milquetoast for me.

Anyone who thinks U2 is a crime against humanity would probably fall for all the propaganda they've spoken against. This album sucks but it's just "shrug and move on" bad.

What a fully loaded album, wow. Probably would have never gotten to this myself because I thought Transformer would be enough, but I'm glad I listened to it, because the band is excellent and the concept is strong. It's completely ear-catching to the end, it's as beautiful as it is ugly.

Super funny to see this one here, makes this book about as credible as a UFO documentary. Rollin will always be a fun listen and the drumming is pretty top notch throughout, but most songs on this album just suck and their intended audience only lives in rural America.

Really well constructed album with a clear vision, total bard energy. But this being my third Springsteen album, he's usually not my vibe at all and I only see myself coming back to Nebraska.

Honestly, it's stone age music to me. Ten years later, they were really forging some golden stuff in the 60's, but only because these guys inspired them so much.

For No One’s my favorite, such a gentle and pretty song. She Said is also a classic, I love throwing this one on instead of a Tame Impala song whenever that’s requested because no one who is tiktok brain damaged notices. The clear highlight is Yellow Submarine, though.

“haha I just said the f word and I’m not allowed to” shut up man, outlaw my ass, give me a country artist who’s actually killed someone

Didn't enjoy listening to this one bit but his lyrics are really kaleidoscopic in a frightening way

Wow, thought this would suffer from some bloat like most early rap albums do or maybe even have an excessive amount of skits, but neither are a problem. After the intro, we start out real hard with two bangers and have a quick one-minute song, What They Hittin Foe, as an interlude for a pretty funny storytelling song, You Can't Fade Me. So nice, I wish more rappers were confident enough to leave some shorter, fleshed out songs for spacing. Yeah, one may have a hard time agreeing with everything he says, but at least in the song, It's A Man's World, he gives the guest rapper Yo-Yo a better fighting chance than most 'battle of the sexes' style rap songs out there. He's definitely not winning any peace prizes, though. All in all, it feels awesome to bump with his booming voice and cool beats, and he's got his flow and rhymes down well.

Had an amazing time reading through the lyrics on this one, not so much in terms of listening though.

Nick Cave's been introduced to me through this list, and so far I'm excited to hear his evolution, I was first given the double album by the Bad Seeds and not a second dragged on it. This one was a rather tough listen though, I've never been the biggest on blues or rockabilly sounds, but I certainly hear the vision here. Not the worst, and it's absolutely influential as far as I can tell, but I'll have a hard time coming back to it.

From my research, 'Chill Out' would've been the obvious pick from these guys to include due to it being a pretty early example of electronic ambient music. But these KLF guys suck and don't have Chill Out on Apple Music so I'll have to steal it from somewhere. This album also seems to be pivotable to acid / rave / house, to such a high degree that I thought of it as 'generic' on first listen. After learning that these guys were performing this stuff live on goddamn Apple II's, they really do start to seem like The Beatles of dance electronic. Wish I could get a piece of the past to see the big picture, as well as their insanely cool sounding stunts at concerts.

Great album, just like with literally every other genre from metal to ska to avant-garde to R&B to hip hop to shoegaze to breakbeat to hyperpop, The Beatles invented the laidback 'stoner rock' genre with this record, as most evidently shown on Norwegian Wood, Think For Yourself, Nowhere Man, or really, ANY of these tracks that crawl deep in your head and make you go, "where'd that sound come from?" I'm sure they're more often known as the speed or LSD kinda band, but they're clearly not as head-banging as they were on Please Please Me here, nor are they shooting up into space the way they do on Sgt Peppers. Throw some ice down the pipe and let it rip, In My Life will blow you straight towards a sunflower field.

Much like Bob Dylan, a lot of what shines about this group is their penmanship much more than the delivery, the instrumentation, and their versatility. I've really always tried to like them but every time I listen I just don't remember any song at all. I understand the hype's gotta be for something but other rappers switch up their beats, flow, and tempo way more than these guys and if this album had that, I'd be all ears.

4chan weezer lyrics on top of faithfully recreated radio rock solos, that might sound right up your alley but I'm good.

This is insane, sounds like a perfect DJ's playlist filled with enough variety to keep the club going, but it's one cohesive album as well. Bingo Bango is probs my favorite, but I'm sure everyone will give a different answer after I show everybody I know this.

He really makes playing great and switching styles on the fly look easy, this thing gets jazzier than I expected.

Really fine album with some good, fun songs. Early glam was definitely its best era.

Wow, this album feels like it's in a league of its own, and I've tended to not like this sort of downtempo style. Tricky is just nuts for putting so much dense variety in songs that build on loops.

A patience-demanding album, but it can well reward you if the more whimsical side of prog from yesteryear has intrigued you, like from Soft Machine and Yes. Personally, I was quite bored until Alifib, but that's enough to make me want to come back to it in a bit.

Yeahh, that was a gnarly first song... but Waters first released that song 20 years ago, and had already re-recorded it 10 years before this. All the other songs blended with one another too well for me, and with a studio polish a little too shiny for what I expect from blues.

It's like if you took all the interesting bits of 60's music straight out of it. Every harmony sounds the same, and there's nothing raw and no edge left to keep any song interesting.

Some very interesting pondering from Nick Cave here. This is probably the most well written of his works that I've heard so far, but I've musically enjoyed some other albums of his more.

Cool color but I’m not too crazy about the album. Automatic For the People was nice but this era of R.E.M. just feels like the Smiths but I’d much rather listen to the Smiths.

Incredibly personal to a point that one would expect an emotional breakdown, but Gaye manages to wrap it up as intense catharsis instead. Even without reading the sad backstory to this album, every song title even shows the hurt, save for A Funky Space Reincarnation, but it certainly doesn’t feel out of place. This one’s gotta be one of the best picks for this list because it feels like it caters best to its intended audience, divorced men.

Fun listen, conceptually I feel like I should like this more. I do like it as an album, I just never come back to it.

Welp, it sounds like they're doing exactly what they want to do and getting their ideal sound down. The Frog Princess was honestly a pleasant listen. I think it'd be nicer if they copied more about the Beatles than just the goofiest sounding McCartney songs, and had more diverse lyric subjects. But I like it more than Pulp, at least.

I'm not crazy on her singing nor her spoken word style, but I think she used it very well on Kimberly. I enjoyed Land a lot, too.

Cool and dry sounding, will definitely be checking out Smog.

Not bad. Honestly, this list has done electronic music a great justice if this is the weakest entry I've heard, so far. It's well made, but doesn't seem too influential or significant, more of a passion project from Orbit who will probably be more well known for his collaboration and production with pop artists.

Had a lot more fun with it than I thought I would in the first half, but Alabama Song sucked. From there, I felt pretty warmly with it til The End.

A really cleanly and well produced album, with a very meaningful subject matter, but they could've been a bit more creative with the lyrics, no? They kinda got a Steven Universe vibe to it. And a whole lot of songs here just feel like long loops, unfortunately. But when they're groovin, they're really going. Favorites were Hard Life, Bow, and Eternal Life.

This one's nuts. Always loved Yoshimi but I didn't care much for Cloud's Taste Metallic, so I never checked anything else out. Stupid thought, because this is that clear, giant step forward from their sound then. Kaleidoscopic, but a bit more accessible and easier to throw on than Yoshimi.

Super intriguing confessions from a clearly troubled hippie. She lived a lot of life by this point in a way that people locked in suburbia could never understand, so maybe that's why I used to find it boring. Her guitar playing is also unusual and more interesting than I expected for an album from this time, it's awesome to learn she used open tunings.

Man, I don't think any Foo Fighters album should even be on this list.

This was a really funny listen. Some songs start off so strong and then Bon Jovi's got some silly lyrics or singing style going on and you just gotta appreciate the goofiness of it. I personally can just have Livin on a Prayer and leave the rest.

Loving this album is so much easier being in a time in my life where I'm super open to damn good country. But given the quality here, I'd probably love this even back when I was ignorant to the genre. The lyrics and Jennings' booming voice are just perfect accompaniment to some creative playing.

Awesome jazz exploration on this album, I'll have to give her album with Charles Mingus a shot soon.

One of the premier albums in the IDM genre, which stands for 'intelligent dance music.' Naturally, you do need a certain level of knowledge to understand and enjoy this phenomenal album, much like the other Warp Records alumni. The chilled-out tracks from this duo were pivotal for branching social and energetic electronic music out into a more reserved, yet densely textured genre for people with an above-average IQ.

atl hoe atl hoe I wish better rock music could come out of this state, not that this is bad but we've got a pretty big city and even guys like these who make it big (or just bigger, lol) don't exactly have a crazy amount of substance to their sound. A great, well produced album with some fun studio trickery, and I'll definitely come back to Helicopter. But the rest came and went without too much to note.

Well, no wonder they're still influential to this day.

I tend to like my rock ruthless, yeah, but more as a tool effectively used by the deserving hard workers, instead of the anarchistic free-for-all attitude this album encompasses. Never been crazy about this band, but I'm grateful all but two of these songs were fresh to my ears after reading that most songs on this album were unavoidable to certain people around the US. It's a really ugly album but at least it knows that, I'm sure that was goal in the first place. But honestly, I've only heard GnR's influence in Guitar Center's, high school music classes, and dive bars, so I don't really feel it pushed music in any meaningful direction.

I think that the only new thing this band brought to the passive, boring, pop punk formula of the late 70's was not finishing their songs.

I'm sure the author found it essential because of how amazed he was at hearing the end of Bass String tripping balls, but I'm personally disappointed an album by "Country" Joe is just psychedildo noodling. Sad and Lonely Times was the one good song.

Well, easy listening but I like them a lot more with Young in the mix.

Very talented singer, but a few of these songs were surprisingly monotonous. There were plenty of sweet moments, though, for me mainly being I Heard Love is Blind and Moody's Mood For Love.

Hell yeah, man. THIS is white culture. Some alright fairytale folk in here.

I've always been really indifferent towards The Doors, which makes me sad because we share a love for Aldous Huxley. Only a few of their hits really stand out for me, so unfortunately I just couldn't hang with any of these songs. The intense commitment to blues here really took it out of me, there's only so much you can do with that genre, I think.

I've always liked their hits but man I thought they'd be a little better and more diverse in their sounds than this. It's clear that Crawling and In The End were fleshed out the most, and the rest is perfect background music for sci-fi music videos of humanoids with cables for veins or something. They do deserve credit for that consistency I suppose. Might give Meteora a full listen again cus I did have that CD as a kid and I'm hopeful it's an improvement.

Solid pop, some songs are a bore and others are vivid stories.

Really hate this guy's voice. Despite the sleek musicianship, so many of these songs are downright unsatisfying, draining, and just not fun to listen to. The Bogus Man is the lowest sink on this album, such an unpleasant sounding outro.

That's an insanely disciplined band. An album of pure studio perfection.

STupid ass list has given me everything except White album now, meanwhile I still live in fear for the day I get a Morrissey album. BUt on to Abbey Road, a classic sure, they're the Beatles and they don't really have anything under a 4/5. I love this album, I always belt out Oh Darling, but I'm on everybody except Paul's side in regards to Maxwell's Silver Hammer; you can hear the rest of the band's tediousness and frustration with Paul really working this song up. The dude made them bring in an anvil for the bang bang sound, what the hell was he thinking? I also have my reservations on the B side melody, because even without their admittance of it, it is clearly just throwaway songs mashed up together. Even though it is a fun listen, it's a compressed White Album with less effort on it. Enough of my qualms though, because this is still the fab four. Besides Maxwell, Side A to me is one of the most perfect runs of songs ever for this band. Come Together by Lennon, Something by Harrison, Oh Darling by McCartney, and Octopus's Garden by Starkey; just these four make Side A so heavy. And then there's I Want You, one of the most unique songs in their catalog for its epic coda and next-level playing in the rhythm section. The End serves its intended purpose as well, showing off fantastic solos by each Beatle. Maybe I'll come back and drop it to a three, I basically scoop out the middle of the album. But what's left after is just so good.

As mild as I feel for Radiohead most of the time, I had a really nice listen with this one today, and I always thought it was just good. Really, I still think it's a bit overrated, but it's well made and amazingly executed.

This album and Simon's use of African music has been known to me all my life, honestly, but besides the song Al, I've never actually given this album a shot. So I'll let my cultural feelings about this one settle, but the music for the most part wasn't the most exciting anyways. The bassist was phenomenal, though, if it was solely him it would've probably been five stars.

Awesome and raw. I remember listening to this in high school, thinking "man, these songs suck." Except for Milk It, that's always been my shit.

What a landmark, even at 40 minutes, it's a lightning fast album that paints a strong view of Nas's New York. The World Is Yours has to be one of the best song ever, it's got one of the most quintessential scratch solos. Genius and influential.

I was really hesitant that Sepultura needed a second album on here, but I think I loved this one more than the other. It's just a different league of creativity, exploring some gnarly ideas. Murder is probably my favorite.