1001 Albums Summary

I never was a metal guy but if nu-metal had been the thing while I was coming up, I might have been a fan. Lots of low-key murmuring a la Deftones here along with Deftone repetitive riffs and effects, using the patented 90s quiet-loud-quiet formula. Not diminishing them though. They seem to have touched all the bases, sounding at points like Korn, above-mentioned Deftones, a little Incubus, maybe even a touch of Tool. However, 90% is unrelenting. It's high energy stuff. Maybe for workouts? Any band that tended towards a shoegaze vibe had a better chance of catching my ear and my money. Even screamed vocals can work if you're not 110% rage throughout the track, just ask Trent Reznor. Anyway, it's fine and I'd be equally likely to listen to Tool, i.e. not likely and wishing Clutch had come up in the algorithm.

Gorillaz, Gorillaz, 2001 ☆︎☆︎☆︎☆︎☆☆︎/☆︎☆︎☆︎☆︎☆︎ Six stars, why not? You didn't even have to know they would be prolific to accept the talent and concept here were spot-on. I like the fact that in a defining judgement of 90s Britpop, this album far outsold all of Blur's output combined, and you obvs could probably add like Pulp and some others in there and still have room. Fun shit, eh? Albarn was serious in his desire to bring forth all stripes of music in this band: Del the Funky Homosapien (who had already burned his delivery into our brains via Tony Hawk video games), his generous use of melodica (relegated to the background till now, used only by New Order and various ska acts) and this sort of hey guys, trip-hop doesn't need to be this dark, too-stoned sludge message made Gorillaz like really fun and genre-defying. So what if the alter-ego comic book stuff was maybe alienating to those of us well into adulthood. The graffiti vibe and modern day punk element all blended well with their output. Barely a poor track on the thing. I've got friends, former loves, who will pine about days of listening to Portishead and Massive Attack in chillout rooms and while I see the appeal, why stop there? If Massive Attack's Mezzanine is your glass of bourbon after a long day, once you're settled: come on, get happy with this record.

Elvis, Elvis Presley ★︎★︎★︎/ ︎★︎★︎★︎★︎★︎ Dammit, there's not a single song by The Clash on this whole-ass record. I've been had. Right, I get it. Father of your rock'n'roll. Maybe the first rock star, right? Kinda a non-dangerous rockabilly. My review: It's fine. Elvis, whether or not he's your hero, never meant much to me. So, like John Wayne, I just let his enjoyers do their thing. Is he all that much more than a sexy Pat Boone, when we ask ourselves seriously? Like a girlfriend said when I pulled the other Elvis's records off her shelf, "Elvis Costello, I sure thought he was important [in the 70s/80s]... Was he though?" And that's where I file Presley. We sure a lot of us thought he was important.

My Third: Note: I am in no way competent to review a jazz record, but we all have to step up when it's time. Since it's a trio playing well and riffing on some recognizable content (aren't all the good jazz tunes starting with a composition your mind can recognize? or making up a melody someone could turn into their own structured number? that's how jazz works, right, it's this fluid or energy like plasma that can express itself and be measured in numerous fashions?) it avoids the pitfalls of anything experimental or avant-garde (i.e. people saying _I don't understand it_ or _I can't dance to it_ or _jazz is stupid—why can't they just play the right notes?_) and instead evokes a scene in a subterranean club in Greenwich Village. If you can't picture Greenwich, it's a brighter, not-built-so-high part of Manhattan, but maintains its charm by crumbling and being bustling like the rest of New York—think some nice neighborhoods, some low-rent tenement porn on display, pizzerias and whiz-kid chefs on the same block but most importantly: there be artists here. Comics, creators, musicians shooting their shot and often within spitting distance of greatness. A Cincinnati office clerk might have spent her vacation to come and do stand-up at a club for two nights for no pay _but_ a shot at being seen by Marc Maron or Jimmy Fallon. Not only is it worth her while but it's fun to see someone live that dream in realtime. In the 40s, 50s, 60s, you're really playing among and for the musical elite if you've got a spot playing a set for New York bohos and the elites who slum it alongside them. And I donno Bill Evans from anyone but he's practiced and riffed and soloed all his life to be this fixture here and put it on wax, and nothing's off, it's really quite pleasant. If that sounds boring it's because those jazz acts that make this sound easy have made countless appearances in scores and soundtracks and movies and TV and being played on the sound system of your restaurant or coffee house or public radio station playing in your kitchen—the sound is ubiquitous, but it's talents like this trio who made it so. That's why I say: forget comparing this to pop music or other jazz you're familiar with and sink into the frame of the picture. Can you be Kerouac snapping his fingers at a dark table at the Vanguard? Can you be a CBS Records exec just stepped out of a cab and down half a flight of stairs below the street, sipping gin and smoking and feeling very accomplished, having brought this sound to the fore, to the masses? Can you be the person for whom this was the leading edge of culture, and you get to witness it in that basement? That's what this record is trying to do for you. Should you let it.

4/1089 Scroobius Pip: _The Beatles? *Just a band.*_ Have they got some bangers? Definitely, and this record is no different. Hugely influential? Undeniably. A PBS kids show version of rock'n'roll? Assuredly.

My one two three foe five FIFTH Sufjan Stevens: Illinois 🌟🌟🌟🌟 This period of music—that is acoustic guitars and choirs and horns and handclaps—I ignored or missed out on. All I'd ever heard was All Things Go. Wow, most of it is really powerful. Particularly John Wayne Gacy (though morbid, it of course wonders how'd this happen? and mourn the children) and then, WOW Cassimir Pulaski Day, which I don't totally get but holy shit it's sad. So I was listening to Crazier Things, Chelsea Cutler and Noah Kahan's tear-jerker and I thought Cassimir is like that, but here's the kicker It seems real. Cutler/Kahan are singing something that maybe happened. But it's young love whatcha gonna do. Sad regardless. Stevens is singing something that probably happened. Even if it's just a poem though, it's deeper. That might be the whole album. A poem that might have happened.

Day Six: Thelonius Monk, _Brilliant Corners_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Getting through the jazz records. Not qualified to speak on them. But I guess Monk was the second-best-selling jazz player of all time. And you know: good for him. That he was born as jazz was in its nascent phase and had his influences and his training (classical training that he eventually withdrew from, and playing in a high school he dropped out of, by this time knowing his path to playing the unorthodox and becoming his own style) knew what he wanted and pursued it. I like to think he had the edge and the talent and vision of, say, Dizzy Gillespie without the _put on a kind face and play for the people, get the job done and be upright and personable_ (he didn't, didn't have the time nor patience for the people or the press or the critics, had his style and his music and that was that) and the fire and fury of Miles Davis but was reticent. While neither suffered fools, Monk seemed to have his private _pride_ in a take-me-or-leave-me way... none of this _motherfucker! ain't a backstory to me: I'm just good!_ seething that Davis was known for. So flamboyant Miles Davis has some funny anecdotes to his life (breaking his legs because he crashed his Lamborghini so decisively) but Thelonius Monk is solely known for upholding a jazz man's mystique and proving his chops, if eventually also nbeing known for demanding and unstable ways. I assume the only doubters were outside of jazz circles and that every family member, friend, musician universally loved him even as his genius gave way to irascibility and madness. Again I'd say: imagine his charisma, bringing the talent together that he did, the records he sold and legendary shows he played and imagine the power he conveyed at his piano and in this way you maybe feel the full force of him even when you're listening to a 70-year-old record like Brilliant Corners.

Jacques Brel, _Olympia '64_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I thought _Good God, more jazz??_ But no, definitely more along the lines of French folk balladeer. What would this sound like if he wasn't speaking incomprehensible gibberish? Well, Leonard Cohen obviously. Man, this is great cigarettes and coffee music. This would be the soundtrack to my life as I cross bridges with _mon petit ami_ on chilly morning walks. Even the opener, Port d'Amsterdam (though to Anglais-speaking ears, words that sound like a pet rodent) conjures images of sailing and coastlines full of mystique and bustling Euro towns and music and art that are simultaneously evolving independent of/ influencing/ being influenced by American folk and bohemian culture. I'm honestly shocked I never heard of the man before. Recommended.

Iggy Pop, _Lust For Life_ 🌟🌟🌟 I like it and had no idea what its singles Lust For Life and Passenger say about the album as a whole It had a pleasing mid-70s Rolling Stones/Bowie feel to it I had never heard the track _Tonight_ and found it absolutely stunning It's a grab-bag of stuff. More polished and socially acceptable than The Stooges, but maybe missing some of that garage energy too.

Adele, 21 ⭐️⭐️⭐️ She's a force. What a voice. Like growly blues singer. I love that she gives an ever-so-subtle bit of working class Briton in her delivery. She's not Lana Del Ray trying to ape 50s movie starlet. She's Adele, dammit. She's like the singing equivalent of Megan Stalter. Out there. In your face. Brooding. Sexy. Honest. Not this effects-laden Billie Eilish. Not kinda one-trick Gaga. Or exciting-but-ultimately-gets-old Katy Perry. Just real, with songs that make you think "yeah, she's seen this for real." When she turns 25 I think her stuff gets more interesting but I get the appeal of her debut.

Harry Nilsson, _Nilsson Schmilsson_ Why not ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ It just feels good. No gimmicks. Interesting and catchy tunes. Nostalgia. Unfortunate drunken escapades with uppity Beatles notwithstanding, he seems like a solid guy, unfortunately checked out early like Gerry Rafferty and other brokenhearted troubadours. As much as I admire people like Hubert Selby who say _I'm talented—the world should hear my spin on things_ I'm equally (or more) enamored with the Peter O'Tooles of the world, or the Peter Sellerses who say _I'm talented *and* the world should hear my take on things *and* let's get drunk and fuck shit up and make a mess of it all._ And that's Nilsson, better or worse.

Peter Gabriel, _3_ ⭐️⭐️ Undeniably nice music for your stereo circa 1980, but ultimately incohesive and boring. Straight-up boomer music heralding the coming of very self-serious AOR and VH1 content for the white people who weren't young or plugged-in enough for the scads of cooler new wave, postpunk records emerging. World music, international political causes, and then some interesting electronic-infused music to go along with it. This is like the record KBCO was founded on, for the four people who will understand what that reference. So, like, would you rather listen to the voice of the youth in U2, INXS, The Cars or something you can dance or rock to... or listen to a rousing chant about Stephen Biko and the South African struggle? Most dated, dumbest track of the record: _Games Without Frontiers_. Really it's deeply stupid as it just rattles off children's names who apparently are stand-ins for warmongering world leaders. It hits a number of marks: egregious waste of Kate Bush talent. Pointless use of French (at least Talking Heads and The Police made it sound cool _and_ it sorta had a point). Probably the silliest 1980s radio airplay single and that's saying something for the 80s.

Kate Bush, Hounds of Love ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Eighties goodness. I can't tell you how pleasing it is to hear the first sounds of this album, Bush's Yeh-Yeah, Yeah, Yooooo s in Running Up That Hill and then the equally pleasing Doo-doo--doo-doo s and girl-like When I was a child, ...afraid of what might be and I don't know what's good for me and take my shoes off and THRRRROOOWWWWW them in the lake parts of Hounds of Love. You'll just have to imagine what it's like. Kate's always been like my mother. Though more accurately like the age of a kind older cousin from across the country who I get to see at family reunions. And I'll echo what others have said, that it's gorgeous, ethereal pop music (the Fairlight sounds made by her bandmates, maybe her brother, are just dreamlike) for the first half. And then the second half fades and turns into this wood-fluted celtic stuff that's reminiscent of Enya (though more accurately Bush would have inspired Enya, but none of it's particularly great, either woman's pub reels) and so we cap it at four stars. Fave on this one: Cloudbusting: an odd song, but not ruined by f'ing Stranger Things, so that's nice.

Chic, C'est Chic ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Three stars because much of the dance music we have or at least rhythm-backed tunes that allow dancing owe it to the disco era. Some pleasing stuff on here. I think for disco era I'd have to hear Moroder to give it 4 stars.

Turbonegro, _Apocalypse Dudes_ ⭐️⭐️ Yeah, I donno. Rough time, the 90s, when you had to be really edgy to stand out from the deluge of alt rock. These guys are OK. Contemporaries at the time would be like Kyuss, who were far better. Descendants might be Viagra Boys. Again, far better. There's a disconnect sometimes when bands form and sing in English. Sometimes they might not understand humor or what crosses lines. I think these guys meant to counter that with "we are wacky Norwegians who want to party equally with everyone" but instead come off as slightly racist tryhards. I will not be surprised when they surface as Red Hot Chili Peppers-type sex pests. It wasn't breakthrough, even for ironic hair metal. But it's not any of Scandinavia's problematic metal. So I'll give it an extra star. Not recommended.

Probably don't need to listen to this before you die. There's better hip hop.

Bruce Springsteen, _Darkness on the Edge of Town_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️ There's what seems like a lot of The River here, and some seeds of Nebraska. It ain't bad. Music for cleaning your house, imo.

Black Sabbath, Paranoid 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 War Pigs in itself gets this album to three or four stars. Just incredible from the cacophony of siren wails to the grind of the guitar that really didn't exist before Iommi. But then! Speed it up! Make it manic! Osbourne makes you believe O, Lord, yeah! The crunchy groove of the verses. That kinda precision of a two-note repetition (turning a riff into a groove) is tougher to do than you think. And they nail it. And while some of their stuff goes from metal heaven to bong drum circle (see: Supernaut) and just kinda wreck the vibe, this one never gives up the edge. And that's one song! There's a reason grunge acts cited Sabbath among influences. Just raw. Listen to Kyuss "One-inch Man" and its riff is just a cleaner Sabbath. Listen to Helmet and they're just a 90s Sabbath. The influence is there for the good of all. The rest holds up. I mean there's the occasional miss.... Faeries Wear Boots and this silly Hobbitty bullshit. Like they could never quite separate entirely from the hippie era here. But in other tracks like The Wizard yaknow.... They do OK. We'll let it pass. Planet Caravan though is half jam, half jazz and it's brilliant. There's crossover between Sabbath and Zeppelin but it's tracks like this that really keep Sabbath on their own groovy side. I can't say I've listened to every Sabbath album, but this one brings it hard and I love it.

Janis Joplin, _Pearl_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Damn I thought I'd heard all of her stuff. Dang if she doesn't sing a whole helluva lot about wanting someone. But the stuff is incredible, just line after line of brilliance. Kept wanting to say "she's just doing whitegirl take on R&B" but no, this is no Pat Boone Wrecks Black People's Music album. It's just soulful. The Adele of her time.

Oasis, What's the Story, Morning Glory ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ What I'm gonna say ain't been said already? I liked some of their later and lesser-known work because maybe it wasn't so obviously Beatlesque. 'Cause listen if we're gonna go mod, why not listen to The Who or The Jam. Punk? Take your pick of others. For straight sneering rock'n'roll, they're up their with The Rolling Stones. Just maybe not on this record. I wished they'd poured it on with more Morning Glory, more Supersonic, fewer Wonderwall and Champagne Supernova singalongs.

Coldplay, A Rush of Blood to the Head ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Okay, they deserved their millions before they became a slightly better RHCP kind of band (recording the same thing endlessly) Solid rockers, some good downtempo numbers. Is it their best? I'd say so. Would I buy it? I'd buy it over any post-Achtung U2 album. It's got some compelling emotional songs and let's face it Chris Martin is the furthest thing from a problematic rock star so that gives this band enormous appeal just on its non-threatening credentials. Can we call this kinda post-Brit-pop? It's listenable but doesn't pack the long term punch of a Rolling Stones, Beatles, Who, Led Zeppelin album, or the sneer and edge of those 90s Verve-type rascals. And honestly, a postpunk contemporary like The Horrors I'd go pay to see, but Coldplay? Unadulterated Mom Rock. Eh.

Living Colour, Vivid ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ For the sorta second-rate radio friendly Bad Brains that they are, it's still a pretty good album. Cult of Personality is the lightning in a bottle which would they'd chase the rest of their days. Memories Can't Wait is great punk/thrash. But then you get to Which Way to America and you think.... They couldn't have done that in the internet era. This is basically I Against I in less effective capsule. Whatever they'll never have the cachet that Bad Brains had but I can't deny their debut was solid and they probably deserved more afterward.

Pink Floyd, _The Wall_ 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 It's all been said. It's a monument to excess. It's revolutionary. It's a band staking a claim to its own success and material and fortunes. It's the birth of a concept album that births a movie kinda based on it. It's (let's not kid ourselves, this is real) the birth of the 80s and all the self-importance and temple to boomerism that the decade would become. But it's still great. (Side note. My longtime girlfriend and I broke up this September 11 and I don't suppose I'll ever forget. We had a deal: don't buy each other's records because we'll certainly combine our haul one day and have very few duplicates. I broke that deal on Thursday, 9/11/25 and bought The Wall on vinyl. On the way home it flew into the street and was run over by a pickup. I'm not putting you on, the aftermath of a fucked up record is sitting on my coffee table. It's karmic, I told my ex. Goodbye, Blue Sky played. As did Comfortably Numb. It is emblematic of my broken heart, this album with tire tracks on it. Thoughts and prayers welcome.)

Ramones, Ramones 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Fascinating shit. They're dirty. You don't need to go far to see it. Look at the cover. Dirthead hair. Ratty canvas sneakers. But then get into the music. 53rd and 3rd, he ain't looking to hook up, score. He's hustling for middle aged guys looking to get off. Punk rock brought this to the fore... sometimes your addictions mean you're selling yourself to get what you need. That's a dirty part of punk rock nobody had seen yet. Not with Iggy. And the Brits weren't saying this part... yet (Shane Macgowan would later give is a sorta "everyone did it" kind of explanation ... if you need cigarettes or booze and a handjob is gonna take care of your money situation for a few days, well) Anyway, but the music is iconic. I don't give a shit for Blitzkrieg and the garbage that oughta be retired. That's not our fault though or theirs. It's like Rhino or Island or someone taking all of Bob Marley's "clean" (white student-friendly) songs and releasing the posthumous Legend. It's inoffensive. It kinda sucks. It's all some of us know. But the sheer joy of I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend or Let's Dance and their surf rock and doo-wop callbacks..... like it surprises me Scorsese doesn't put this stuff in his movies, it's that heartfelt. And it's the blueprint for the White Stripes and other tight garage rock revivalists. No Ramones? No Strokes. Massive stuff you cannot deny.

Funkadelic, _Maggot Brain_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Solid, if not something I'd listen to tomorrow. It did awaken my mind though to _black men brought rock'n'roll to the fore, and rather than immediately concede it to Elvis and a thousand others—and rather than carve out their own niche and stay there, a la R&B + hip hop—some said "this is still ours" and staked their claim._ (Chuck Berry and Little Richard, Sheriff and the Ravels, the Drifters, Bootsy Collins and Prince and Death, Bad Brains and Living Colour after them) Kind of a shame that record producers and artists had the antagonistic relationship they did, else Parliament and Funkadelic might have powered through into the 90s and beyond, rather than be discarded because the names and rights were owned and being squeezed for profit by their studio. Anyway, there's notes of Hendrix and Sabbath in Maggot Brain, though most of it is funk-oriented and meant to make you feel the groove and/or sing along with the chant-like refrains. And if I'm gonna close my eyes and listen to cosmic American music, with bands dressed in cool costumes full of sewn-on motifs and crazy makeup and headgear: I'll probably flip on Funkadelic over KISS anytime. It's not so hard to hear the jump from this directly to Afrika Bambaataa. Like not at all. So it's easy to see this as maybe George Clinton and Black Rock's last push to stay in mainstream pop, even as the genres had already splintered.

The Cure, Pornography 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Hey, kids! Like Joy Division? Wanna hear what mopey, sad, sexy stuff kept getting recorded after Ian Curtis's death? This is it. Definite English through-line from punk to postpunk to JD to the Cure. So damn dark and droney and wonderful. Like. For a certain demographic, you caught on to The Cure as they were really rising fast. The Head On the Door if you're lucky. Kiss Me if you knew that edgy cool fun girl in high school or at work. Disintegration if you were alive and listening to the radio. So what I'm trying to say here is if you're just starting to hear what wasn't pop rock radio in the mid 80s, you missed all of the edgy really underground new wave. The monsters of it, New Order and The Cure and The Smiths, you probably caught later—you'd be lucky if you'd been exposed to The Clash. Certain subsets of suburban America, insulated from daring pop culture: we know this. So when you crack like Japanese Whispers or Staring at the Sea you think backwards. Oh, holy shit... This is what the cool rich kids from the academy were into. Or the mysterious college girls coming out of mysterious record shops on the campus. You knew these bands had an edge but they were just out of reach. And you hear Primary or The Hanging Garden and it flips yo wig. Then you spin the whole album and this idea opens up to you: Polydor or Island or BMI or whoever, they want hits. Like whoever got INXS to cobble together the generic platinum Kick spent the rest of his days between his yacht and his penthouse. And when we think of Echo & the Bunnymen we think Lips Like Sugar and The Killing Moon and whatever brought them commercial success. But you go and listen to INXS's Shabooh Shoobah or Echo's Heaven Up Here and that's when they were the really badass jangly guitarred club rockers driving all the kids crazy. And that's Pornography: The Cure before Smith got bored with postpunk, gothic themes. It's a masterpiece. There's really not a hit on it and that's what makes its even ebbing, receding tide so calming and evocative of anther time. LCD Soundsystem wrote a song called You Wanted a Hit, and it describes them but also this idea. Yo. We're putting down some tracks to be a recognizable album with a theme and a sound for our time. What's gonna get fed to radio or streaming or sold as the initial single? We don't care. That's you production wonks. You do the marketing; we'll stick to the music. And often the albums that say that are the genius albums. There aren't a ton of reccs I get on 1,001 that I wanna go out and buy, but this is one.

Bob Dylan, _Bringing It All Back Home_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Not a Dylan head but man some of it is undeniably catchy and genius. _She Belongs to Me_ singlehandedly inspired The Velvet Underground Maggie's Farm is exactly why folkies hated Dylan's turn to electric blues and f em I'm glad he went and did whatever he wanted. It's All Over Now, Baby Blue just brilliant. Bob Dylan's 115th Dream has not only a funny intro, but I'm gonna guess inspired Arlo Guthrie. Maddening to listen to. It's so long. If you force yourself to listen to it, next thing you know you'll be talking to people about the brilliance of Zappa, Ween and probably Phish too. Skip it!

Alice Cooper, School's Out ⭐️ My first single star review! Early 70s had to be rough. Either you're a master of your craft, like Led Zeppelin or The Who. Or you're rebellious and powerful, like Iggy Pop. Maybe you're pioneering and on the fringe like Gram Parsons. Orrrrrr. You could be mixed in with this mediocrity of the age. Your Foghats and other such stuff that doesn't really even rise to the level of, say, Mountain. Bands that, sorry not sorry, you can guess their quality by the name and logo: Average White Band for instance. And you don't have the easy-going feel of what's to come, like Tom Petty and Fleetwood Mac. To be honest you don't even come close to the sinister feel of Black Sabbath and the in-your-face metal-adjacent rock of Guns'n'Roses and The Cult is still 15 years off. So you're stuck. You're Alice Cooper doing your best poor man's Ozzy. And hey. We all have limited time here. Go listen to Oz instead. Or The Eagles. Or Taylor Swift. Anything, really. Watch the movie Frank and you'll have come closer to quality rock'n'roll. Peace.

Franz Ferdinand, _Franz Ferdinand_ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ It's solid and listenable all the way through and borders on _banger_. This came from a solid rock'n'roll era, so not easy to do. Particularly enjoyable for its jumps between multiple styles. While enjoyable, not headed to back to revisit. But if a friend or date put this on the turntable, I'm down.

Gary Numan, Control 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 It's Krautrock in places, it's disco in others. I would say unique on all fronts. This is one of those albums where you're likely to know a few songs like M.E. and Cars, but the others are just as good. A remarkably same-sounding album throughout but in a good way. If there's a guy who came up and said "this is new wave and I'm not gonna change styles but just keep doing this" it's Numan and he must have inspired a 1,000 acts.

NWA, Straight Outta Compton ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Though this and Eazy-E really started L.A. hip-hop/gangsta rap, you could easily argue that these walked so Dre and Cube could run, and it's plain to hear on this record. Yeah, they're busting out a new style but it's very, _very_ 80s-sounding (I'd argue that Public Enemy and the Beastie Boys never _sound 80s_ because nothing in their era sounded remotely like them.) If it makes you nostalgic, go for it. I had way more fun bumping Dre, Snoop, etc. a few years later. They'd taken a tip from _real_ street players by that point and so found a more authentic sound. This era though... Sorry, but rap was still kinda a novelty game and it shows here. Cartoon misogyny. Maybe some genuine anger at the police but hey, at this point in west coast gangsta, you could say Sublime would have more cred.

Jimi Hendrix, Are You Experienced 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Never mind all the straight bangers that makes this basically a greatest hits compilation. Red House, Hey Joe (his opus, I believe), Manic Depression, even the stuff I don't ever wanna hear again, Purple Haze, Are You Experienced?... and it has a whole bench beyond that... Foxey Lady, Fire, Wind Cries Mary.... Really all you're missing from this album to get the full sound is Little Wing, Voodoo Chile, All Along the Watchtower. Ok so go down another layer....the slower, the more Beatlesque.... Love or Confusion, May This Be Love, Remember, even 51st Anniversary which is a great song about marriage (looks great at 50 years, right? What about the first three, the first 10, no picnic) Anyway it seems like he was into it all, no filler work here. And his best stuff imo was not the "Hendrix is a guitar behemoth" old white guy overplayed shit. It's the grooves. It's the percussion, the driving bass, the effects. And his basso profundo voice evoking not just hip 60s grooviness but also a master of blues. I went into it rolling my eyes and came out repeating a few songs. "Did I hear a direct link to Kravitz here. Some Foo Fighters here." etc. As good as classic rock gets, up there near Who's Next, and some second-tier Zeppelin.

Pulp, A Different Class ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ My 33⅓︎ review There's only a few modern British bands I like more (and by modern I mean post-Clash, post-Smiths, post-The Cure, etc.) namely The Verve, Chapterhouse, maybe Stone Roses. I think these goofy bastards grandfathered themselves in as spokespersons for Britpop by being at it for so long and always being cheeky (Oasis forever self-serious, Blur too laddy too arch, Radiohead being cold and distant like a modern Pink Floyd—we are art rock and don’t you ever forget it.) I liked the description of Pulp as working-class misfits. Common People and I Spy are hilarious examples of class warfare via preying on students for their naïveté and their cozy dorm rooms, credit cards, and desire to see anything that isn’t podunk home. Or bored wives who provide all that plus experience, higher credit limits and less guilt. The joke here is (and I think Cocker lets us in on it sometimes) that you can be as self destructive as you want: but they still have the property, the access, the bank accounts, the marriages and the futures that he doesn’t. Anyway, these guys also relied on their own sound, not fancy Blur production nor phony Beatlemania (guess who) to get their songs on the radio. And good for them because they aged so very well. Something Changed is like a sad bastard Every Day is Like Sunday but while it’s not quite the masterpiece that song is, it’s so much more relatable. Oh, some sad sack girl Morrissey dreamed up in Brighton or Blackpool is so very depressed and prays for the excitement of nuclear annihilation? That’s fiction. Or at least maybe it’s happened but it’s not his story, while Something Changed, you can imagine Cocker agonizing over Deborah like some lovelorn Ian Curtis. Oh wait. Sorted for Es and Wizz is like “why is my life going nowhere and the best I can do is seek out drugs and music?” in a song. And dirge-lites like this are why people love Britpop at its most stripped down. Monday Morning sounds like something you and your buddies might belt out because you’ve heard it 100 times and memorized it and it’s like a barfly anthem. But listen and maybe you hear the ghost of Ian Curtis singing about boredom again. Only this time it’s not Digital but Pulp laughing about how life sucks if you don’t check out. Maybe you oughta? It never seems mean spirited though. Cocker wants nobody to check out. Especially the guy whose wife he’s banging. That guy’s gotta keep buying his brandys and cigarettes and hotel rooms.

Arctic Monkeys, _Whatever Peepo Say What I Am, It's What Im Not Innit?_ 🌟🌟 If early 2000s British pop rock was a little too polished, then maybe late 2000s was a bit sloppy. From the very first words of this album, the lads are here to remind you how rough and tuff and working class they are. It's a fairly generic and unsurprising mix of punky radio and teen-friendly rock and it kinda bridges the gap from... like Franz Ferdinand to... Kasabian? But who cares really. I propose a new title. Whatever People Say Wire Isn't is What Arctic Monkeys Is---so go listen to Wire instead. Or another band with some original ideas.