1001 Albums Summary

80% generic early '80s drivel, 20% amazing synth runs that will be burned into my brain from now on. Truly inconsistent album, hopping between cuts I'll most certainly be coming back to and others I couldn't wait to be over. Highlights: While You See a Chance, Night Train

Edgy, so edgy! The album is a bit of a mess, not just in terms of the mixing (I can barely make out the vocals on most tracks), but the way it generally all comes together without feeling purposefully dynamic. I can appreciate the ambition of bringing together so many different styles and sounds, but it often ends up feeling more like a jagged collage than a beautiful painting. The upside is that I've never heard an album quite like this before, though I do see it as something of a precursor to acts like Linkin Park. Highlights: March of the Pigs, Closer, Ruiner, The Becoming, Hurt

I listened through this album during my attempt to make my way through the 1001 Albums chronologically, so I was somewhat dreading running back through this 3+ hour collection. Even calling it an album is somewhat misleading – it's more like 5½ albums rolled into one package. I'm not the biggest fan of show tunes in general, but Ella obviously has an amazing voice and makes what (in the hands of a lesser singer) could be an absolute slog into something tolerable. There are a decent amount of highlights across the 59 tracks, but most cuts aren’t particularly distinct from one another – if all my favorites were gathered into one short album and the rest were absent, it'd probably get four stars from me! Highlights: Let's Call the Whole Thing Off, Things Are Looking Up, 'S Wonderful, The Real American Folk Song, I've Got a Crush on You, Boy What Love Has Done to Me

Despite seeing Elton John in concert and knowing almost all of his hits (thanks to my wife, who is a huge fan), I had never actually listened through any of his studio albums prior to this challenge. MATW has made me understand why Elton is known for his singles, rather than his albums – outside of a couple highlights and some wacky bits of instrumentation here and there, this LP is just not that memorable. I didn’t find myself aching for the album to be over, but I also can’t really see myself coming back to listen to any of the songs outside of the obvious one that everyone knows. Hopefully there’s a fantastic album from EJ yet to come on this list! Highlights: Tiny Dancer, Razor Face, Holiday Inn, All the Nasties

The artwork goes insanely hard. The album itself isn’t my favorite, but it is pretty decent – it’s sonically a bit all over the place, with occasional lyrics about environmentalism and social justice somewhat bringing things together. The unique arrangements and effects across the board are ultimately what sell the album for me – I can’t really see myself coming back to any of these songs individually in the future. Highlights: Take a Load Off Your Feet, Feel Flows, ‘Til I Die

As an American who was only familiar with "Song 2" before this challenge, I was immensely looking forward to digging further into Blur and hopefully finding some gold. Unfortunately, I didn’t end up particularly enjoying this album. It feels like Blur is trying to poke fun at different rock trends across the tracklist, but the lack of context made it hard for me to tell whether or not I should be taking anything seriously and I tried to just enjoy the music for what it is. There are a few tracks I thought were decent, but I didn’t come away from this album with a new favorite from the band ("Song 2" unfortunately reigns supreme, for now) and I spent most my listen itching to move on to something else. Highlights: Song 2, Theme from Retro, You’re So Great, Look Inside America

This is the seventh album I've had to listen through for this challenge and is fortunately the first that truly feels like essential listening to me! The songs are generally catchy, aren't overly long (outside of "Sex Machine," but even that one doesn't feel like it goes on for nearly 14 minutes) and are loaded with brilliant musicianship/lyrics across the board. Even the bonus tracks from the 2007 reissue are pretty good! There were a couple tracks I wasn't in love with on first listen, but the main thing holding this album back is the mixing – I found myself struggling to hear certain vocal/instrumental passages that I would have loved the mixes to focus on more. Highlights: Stand, I Want to Take You Higher, Somebody's Watching You, Everyday People, Sex Machine

I legitimately didn’t know pop punk existed in the ‘70s until I heard this album. It’s certainly not a slog to get through (as the songs are both short and fast-paced), but pretty much every track is interchangeable. Something I can appreciate retrospectively for what it presumably added to the cultural conversation, but not something I can really see myself coming back to over later (and better) pop punk albums. Highlights: Male Model, I Know a Girl

I literally looked up which ABBA albums made the list just yesterday and the algorithm gave me The Visitors as today's listen. Huh. My dad had a major ABBA obsession for a few years, so I know all the hits like the back of my hand. However, I had never given one of their proper studio albums a listen, so I was pretty excited to see what this LP had in store! Fortunately, The Visitors is a very good album. Yes, it's a brilliant display of vocal/songwriting/mixing/production talent, but it also comes with a whirlwind of emotions, effectively serving as both a breakup album for the band and a response to the divorces each member went through during the months prior. Admittedly, nostalgia does play a role in how much I enjoyed the album as a whole, but these songs hold up much better than other songs I enjoyed during my adolescence. This is the closest I've come to giving an album on this list five stars. However, if I'm going to give something a perfect score, the deep cuts need to speak to me just as much (if not, more) than the hits and that's just not the case here. Not to say songs like "I Let the Music Speak" and "Two for the Price of One" are bad, but they don't shine nearly as bright as the album's more known tracks. I even ran through the album again after sleeping on it and the chasm somehow seemed wider the second time through. Probably worth noting that the Spotify version has four bonus tracks compared to the original LP, though none of them feel out of place to me. I'd even say that the album is probably better with them included! "Under Attack" legitimately might be a top five ABBA tune for me – what an absolute earworm. Highlights: The Visitors, Head over Heels, When All Is Said and Done, One of Us, Slipping Through My Fingers, The Day Before You Came, Under Attack

I'm a simple man. Get a Scottish guy to play some moody guitar and I'm probably going to enjoy it. Really, the main thing holding this album back is that Bert doesn't have a particularly astounding singing voice, but it gets the job done on the more lyric-focused tracks like "Needle of Death." Needless to say, the purely instrumental cuts were generally my favorites here! Seems to be how other people are feeling too, considering how many streams "Angie" has compared to other tracks. I listened to about half of the album while reading The Electric State and it actually added quite a bit to the already uneasy atmosphere of the book. Would definitely recommend pairing this LP with a road trip through the desert or some post-apocalyptic media! Highlights: Smokey River, Oh How Your Love Is Strong, Veronica, Needle of Death, The Casbah, Angie

This is the first album released during my lifetime that I've had to rate for this and it's a fitting one! The College Dropout is one of those highly-regarded LPs that I've never had the chance to properly listen through – albums like this are exactly why I felt like I needed to finally commit to doing this challenge. Kanye West's debut album isn't the first I've heard from him (it's actually the eighth, including KIDS SEE GHOSTS), but I think you could make a case for it being his best. For the first seven tracks, it feels like a bona fide five star album – the beats are incredible and uplifting, the track-to-track flow is impeccable, the bars are clever and unique. There's a sense of adolescence & humility that I've never really heard from Kanye prior to this point and it makes me understand (ever so slightly more) why his day ones have stood by him through his many controversies in the decades since. The College Dropout is a great album, but it's not perfect (for me, anyway). The album has a pretty sizable dip from tracks 8-13, in which it veers into fairly generic early/mid '00s club hip-hop territory without much of the character and charisma found on the rest of the project. There are interesting moments during the dip ("The New Workout Plan" is a highlight) and I don't outright hate any of the songs in that chunk, but I probably would have enjoyed the whole album like 25% more if it went straight from "Jesus Walks" to the first "School Spirit" skit. Overall, it's a solid project and one that I feel I've truly missed out on all these years (which is ultimately what I'm looking to get out of each album on this list)! It also inspired me to finally check out Late Registration and Graduation, since [SPOILER] neither made the cut for this list. Might share some thoughts on those in my eventual reviews of MBDTF and Yeezus, assuming there's anything relevant to share. Highlights: We Don't Care, All Falls Down, Jesus Walks, The New Workout Plan, School Spirit, Two Words, Through the Wire, Family Business, Last Call

I feel like I shouldn’t like this album – pretty much every characteristic of it is borrowed from what came in the decades before (arguably much better) and this is one of my least favorite decades for this kind of rock music (Bob Seger’s "Old Time Rock & Roll" is maybe one of my least favorite hit songs, full stop). And yet… I somehow feel drawn to it at the same time. Maybe it’s John Fogerty’s distinct stanky vocals, maybe it’s the rowdy energy some of these songs bring to the table (see "Travelin’ Band") or maybe I’m just insane. I definitely wouldn’t say I LOVED this album and there were very few true highlights, but I couldn’t bring myself to rate Cosmo’s Factory any lower than three stars. It’s not one I’ll be revisiting actively, but I won’t turn it off if it happens to come on! Highlights: Travelin’ Band, I Heard It Through the Grapevine, Long as I Can See the Light

I need to admit something. I am 28 years old, have lived 1/3 of my life in Washington and I’ve never listened to a grunge album before today. I’ve walked through the Nirvana exhibit at MoPOP, I’ve even bought records from Sub Pop, but my entire experience with grunge up to this point has been "Smells like Teen Spirit" and "Come as You Are" (hearing them probably fewer than 10 times in total). Diving into grunge is something I’ve been dreading because it’s a genre with so many beloved albums and I don’t want to be that guy who gave it a shot and didn’t “get” it. Prior to EGBDF, I genuinely thought grunge was just dudes singing poorly over rough rock instrumentals with depressing lyrics. The idea of it being a genre with legitimate musical proficiency had not really crossed my mind. That’s why Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge came as such a pleasant surprise to me – it’s an album that simultaneously had me moshing in my kitchen and gave me a fair bit of musical intrigue to really sink my teeth into. The album’s title (referring to the most basic level of music theory) is brilliant because the songs feel like a middle finger to the rules, even when there’s so much evidence of technical skill visible in between the cracks. It’s not a perfect album and there were a few tracks that honestly didn’t do much for me, but the high rock energy, slanted rhythms and occasional harmonica solos gave EGBDF enough unique flair that I can easily see myself coming back to it sooner rather than later. This was an excellent first impression of grunge and (for once in my life) I’m actually looking forward to digging in further! Highlights: Generation Genocide, Something So Clear, Thorn, Into the Drink, Broken Hands, Who You Drivin’ Now, Pokin’ Around

Another artist I had never heard of prior to this challenge delivering another rock solid album – should I even be surprised at this point? This is also the second album of my lifetime that I've had to rate for this and the first chronologically, with the LP releasing just five days after I was born. This might be the understatement of the year, but Either/Or is a very melancholic listen. Reading about Smith's death while working my way through the album only added to that sense of unrelenting sadness it carries. I'd say almost everything here is a worthwhile listen – the songs are highly effective. At the same time, it's hard to say I "enjoy" this album the same way as the others I've rated highly because it's not something I'm willingly going to put on (beyond the initial listen through) at this stage of my life. I don't desire to be brought down in the way Either/Or provides and (by the grace of God) I'm not having frequent enough depressive episodes for this album to be good mood music for me, even if only on occasion. That said, I'm going to break my own rules a bit. By almost every measure, Either/Or is a three star album for me – one that I appreciate musically, enjoy a few songs on and wouldn't mind listening to if it happened to come on, but that I'm unlikely to intentionally revisit. However, I'm going to give this album four stars because it's got the indisputable quality of a higher-tier album (even if it sounds VERY 90s) and is one that I ought to keep in my back pocket in case I'm ever in the right mood for it. R.I.P. Elliott Smith, gone way too soon. Highlights: Alameda, Ballad of Big Nothing, Between the Bars, Pictures of Me, Rose Parade, Say Yes

Johnny Cash is one of those artists I always point to when I talk about the sort of country music I actually like, but I had admittedly never listened to a full album from him until today. The timing is quite interesting as well, as I listened to "Hurt" less than two weeks ago after hearing the original NIN record! Part of me is a little bummed that my first full Johnny Cash experience isn't a studio LP and that it's the second album in a tetralogy of live albums, but another part of me is happy that this was the one I got to hear first, because it's a good one. At San Quentin is a special album – not just for the music itself, but for everything that happens in between. The prisoners add so much atmosphere to the LP, from booing a guard bringing Johnny some water to laughing during relatable parts of the songs to shouting song requests up to him before he plays "I Walk the Line." It might sound corny, but I don't think I'll ever forget the reaction to Johnny telling the story of how he ended up getting arrested/fined in Starkville for picking some flowers or him playing through "San Quentin" (a song he wrote the day before the concert) twice in a row because the crowd loved it so much. This is an album that tells a story so effortlessly, cover to cover – it's no wonder why it made this list. One could probably make a case for this being a five star album, but the rough recordings and the occasional miss in the curation department does honestly hold the LP back (if only slightly). I also want to leave space for At Folsom Prison to blow me away even more, so I'll give At San Quentin a very respectful four stars! Highlights: Wanted Man, Darlin’ Companion, Starkville City Jail, San Quentin, A Boy Named Sue, (There’ll Be) Peace in the Valley

I had never heard of Moby Grape prior to this challenge, but the fact that this album made the “Uncontroversial Albums” list with an average rating of three stars had me a bit worried. Would Moby Grape be one of the weaker entries on this list? Turns out, nope – it really just is a three star album! The reasons why probably vary from person to person, but for me it’s a collection of good rock songs that just don’t do anything particularly unique or interesting. The fact that it incited a bidding war between labels somewhat perplexes me, but I guess they must have been confident fans of this style in the ‘60s were going to eat it up. As with many of my threes, it’s an album I wouldn’t mind being put on, but it’s probably not something I’m going to go out of my way to listen to. The fact that the full album isn’t currently on Spotify makes doing that extra difficult for me anyway! Highlights: Hey Grandma, Fall on You, Come in the Morning, Omaha, Changes, Indifference

The Generator recommending albums in a random order is a double-edged sword for me – on one hand, it prevents me from getting too bored of a particular sound/era and giving up, but on the other hand, it makes it so I often end up listening to albums without as much context as I'd like to have going into them. I have not yet heard 36 Chambers and I really would have liked to listen to that one first, but I suppose the Generator giveth and the Generator taketh away. Raekwon is not an artist I'm incredibly familiar with (I literally only recognized his name from an old Flume track that I quite enjoyed), but I went into this one with an open mind. Most of these these post-ETWT solo albums are highly regarded and I wanted to make sure I could properly digest this one, even without the context I desired. Only Built 4 Cuban Linx... is an album that I enjoyed, but I honestly wish I got more out of it. RZA's production across the entire project is incredible, Raekwon & Ghostface Killah play well off of each other and deliver some impressive bars and numerous guests bring just as much heat (including RZA himself, who might have the craziest flow of the entire album on "Wu-Gambinos"). At the same time, OB4CL feels bloated from an overabundance of skits that are often confusing (with several voices talking over one another) and don't add much to the songs they're part of. I also felt like there were many times were verses started/ended in different spots than they should have (based on the cadence of the beats) and that made a lot of the tracks feel sort of off. Ultimately, it's an album I appreciate for a lot of reasons, but also one that is dragged down by a lot of little things that add up throughout its 1+ hour runtime. It's definitely got me looking forward to hearing more RZA-produced albums like Enter the Wu-Tang and Liquid Swords, but the Purple Tape is probably not one I'll have in heavy rotation in the future. Highlights: Knowledge God, Rainy Dayz, Guillotine (Swordz), Can It Be All So Simple (Remix), Ice Water, Wisdom Body, Ice Cream, Wu-Gambinos, Heaven & Hell

Considering the Generator gave me The College Dropout less than a week ago and Only Built 4 Cuban Linx... (an album by Raekwon that was produced by RZA) just yesterday, getting Kanye West's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy today has me beginning to wonder if it truly is randomized. I'm catching on, Generator – you better watch your back! In all seriousness... MBDTF is one of the few albums on this list that I actually have heard, but it's been quite some time (probably around six years since I last spun it). Since then, he's released five new albums (haven't bothered to check out the most recent three, as I've heard nothing but bad things about them) and I've been properly educated on all his pre-2010 albums. That said, I feel pretty much exactly the same way about this LP as I did back in 2019 – these are some of Kanye's most iconic tracks, bundled together in a pretty odd way, with some baffling mixing decisions. If you don't think about it too hard, it FEELS like near-perfect album... However, for someone like me, who actually cares about an album telling a story through its direction and sequencing, it does fall flat. Don't get me wrong, MBDTF is a pretty strong album – it just plays more like a greatest hits reel than a bona fide concept album (which it's clearly trying to be). My biggest takeaway from revisiting the LP after finally hearing Kanye's first four albums is that there's a little bit of each project here – you'll find the chopped-up soul of The College Dropout, the infectious beats of Graduation, the emotional auto-tune of 808s & Heartbreak and even a little bit of Late Registration's conscious lyrics here. If someone were looking to get into Kanye West (no idea why they would in 2025) and knew basically nothing about his music, MBDTF would be a great place to start because there are so many potential avenues to explore depending on which style they're feeling. Kanye may not be a very good person, but My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is a pretty notable and enjoyable piece of his storied career! Highlights: Dark Fantasy, POWER, All of the Lights, Devil in a New Dress, Runaway, Hell of a Life, Lost in the World

Maggot Brain is the first full album I've listened to from the world of the great George Clinton and, to be honest, I was hoping to get a bit more out of it than I did. The musicality on show is excellent, but the first & last tracks feel like they have a completely different sonic identity than the middle five tunes and I was hoping for the "funk" part of Funkadelic to come out a bit more than it did. It's an album I can appreciate and I certainly didn't have a negative experience running through it, but it's not something I can really see myself putting into heavy rotation. Highlights: Can You Get to That, Hit It and Quit It, Super Stupid

I’ve known Carlos Santana as the funny “Smooth by Santana feat. Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty” guy for so long (yes, I have the t-shirt) that I never even considered the possibility of him being a serious musician with critically-acclaimed albums. You could definitely say that Abraxas came as a surprise to me, not only because it’s somehow nearly 30 years older than Supernatural (an album which is pushing 30 itself), but because it’s legitimately good fusion/psychedelic rock that goes so far beyond the boundaries of the “guy plays catchy Latin guitar melodies with popular singer” music he’d later score so many radio hits with. That said, Abraxas is a bit all over the map stylistically. It’s all perfectly listenable, but I definitely see myself gravitating toward certain cuts ("Black Magic Woman" is the big one) than the project as a whole. It’s a textbook three star album for me! Highlights: Singing Winds Crying Beasts, Black Magic Woman / Gypsy Queen, Mother’s Daughter, Samba pa Ti

Another CCR album only eight days after getting Cosmo's Factory? I would have probably preferred someone new to start my work week, but I suppose I'll take it. I enjoyed Bayou Country about the same amount as I enjoyed Cosmo's Factory (three stars), though I do feel like the songs here have a little more identity compared to the 1970 album. BC is also a few minutes (and four tracks) shorter than CF, so I'd say I'm slightly more likely to return to this one in the future, but not enough to give it four stars. My main takeaway from Bayou Country is that Creedence Clearwater Revival wrote that "rollin', rollin', rollin' on the river" song and that it's apparently called "Proud Mary?" I might have gone my entire life without knowing that and I've heard the song at least a dozen times (probably more). Highlights: Graveyard Train, Good Golly Miss Molly, Proud Mary, Keep on Chooglin'

Slipknot is not a band I expected to show up on this list, but getting All Hope Is Gone as today's assignment was something of a welcome surprise. Despite the mixed things I've heard about their music and my lack of desire to dig deeper (based on what I HAVE heard from them), it's obvious they have a massive, enthusiastic fanbase and this was a good excuse to see what all the fuss is about. Unfortunately, I don't think AHIG is a very good LP. It's an album that is trying to be edgy, but often comes across quite dull. It's an album that is constantly trying to comment on modern religion/society/relationships, but doesn't have anything compelling to say. It's an album that tries to be accessible, but isn't catchy enough to stick with you. It's an album that is practically drowning in musical proficiency, but doesn't do anything interesting with that talent. Maybe I'm being a bit dramatic, but I am struggling to understand how anyone (outside of the most dedicated metal fans) felt like this LP was essential listening material. Some of the more melodic passages of the project (choruses, guitar solos, etc.) didn't even feel like they made musical sense when listened to in context. Like, was getting two Slipknot albums really necessarily when a band like Dream Theater doesn't even get one? The nicest thing I can say about All Hope Is Gone is that I didn't actively hate it while listening to it – Corey Taylor's yell-singing gets a bit grating by the end of the album, but the project as a whole generally didn't do anything risky or irritating enough to completely put me off. Slipknot will avoid a one star rating from me for now, but this is easily the worst album I've had to listen to for this challenge so far. I'll still give their self-titled LP a shot when the Generator gives it to me (assuming in good faith that they did SOMETHING to hook people in the '90s, beyond the mask gimmick), but I'm definitely less excited to do so at this point. Highlights: Psychosocial, Snuff

Albums like this are half the reason I’m doing this challenge to begin with – to hear ambitious genre crossovers from artists I likely never would have found otherwise. The little quote/blurb on the cover immediately hooked me and I had to listen to Ananda Shankar as soon as humanly possible. This album definitely delivers on its promise of combining Western and Indian music, though the execution certainly isn’t perfect. It sets out to do such a specific thing, but does that thing in so many different ways that it comes across a bit clumsy and lopsided. I couldn’t help but let out a laugh hearing songs from the Rolling Stones and the Doors covered in such a bizarre (yet legitimately good) way, with the songs recreated relatively faithfully, aside from the vocals being swapped with sitar interpolations. These are the kinds of tracks I’d sneak into a playlist while hanging out with friends or family, just to see how long it takes them to notice and what their reactions are like. The Ananda Shankar originals are generally the highlights for me, with songs like "Snow Flower" and "Metamorphosis" sounding genuinely compelling sonically. They make me feel like I’m floating through the galaxy in an endless Bollywood space opera. I can’t quite bring myself to give Ananda Shankar the four star rating that it probably deserves, as its longest cut (the 13+ minute "Sagar," which takes up about a third of the album’s running time) was honestly kind of a snoozer, but this is an LP I’m probably going to be telling people about for years. Highlights: Snow Flower, Light My Fire, Metamorphosis, Raghupati

Finally, some bona fide jazz! I’ve been waiting for the Generator to give me something in this vein and a John Coltrane album was honestly the perfect place to start. A Love Supreme isn’t unlike a tasty sandwich – it’s got good bread as the first and last thing you taste, but the real flavor comes from what’s packed into the middle. "Acknowledgment" and "Psalm" are good jazz, but "Resolution" and "Pursuance" (particularly the former) really steal the show here with Coltrane’s sharp, killer saxophone melodies and the rhythm section’s tense, fast-paced grooves. I went into ALS crossing my fingers for a five because jazz is a genre I have so much admiration for and I’ve heard so many good things about this album in particular, but I unfortunately can’t ignore the noticeable dip in quality between the middle and outer tracks. Even "Pursuance" doesn’t quite reach perfection, as it ends with a baffling three-minute bass solo from Jimmy Garrison, which (despite some amazing performances from him on the rest of the album) comes across more like chord noodling and scales practice than something truly inspired, bringing my enjoyment of it down ever so slightly. A Love Supreme is solid four star album, largely because it’s built around what could very well be one of the greatest jazz recordings of all time ("Resolution") and stays on its feet pretty well during its other 25 minutes thanks to its solid writing and instrumental chemistry. Will most certainly be coming back to this one! Highlights: Resolution, Pursuance

Muddy Waters is another name I hear come up from time to time, but if you had asked me to name a song by him (or even what genre he was known for) prior to today, I probably would have failed. For that reason, I'm glad this album is on this list. At the same time, it kind of feels like At Newport 1960 was chosen over one of his studio albums as an excuse to include a variety of his early career hits by proxy, as it isn't a particularly compelling live album (compared to something like At San Quentin by Johnny Cash). That said, it's an interesting time capsule with really good recordings (especially for 1960), but Muddy's blues formula wore out fairly quick for me here. It does pick up some momentum around the time he plays "Tiger in Your Tank" (and you can tell the audience gets a second wind around that point as well), but it's stylistically just not my thing. I'm a white man in my late 20s – who would have thought? Speaking of, I learned during my research of this album that "I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man" was actually the origin of the "stop-time riff" that would eventually be popularized by Bo Diddley. As a young white adult, I mainly know the riff from George Thorogood & the Destroyers' "Bad to the Bone," which Thorogood apparently pitched to both Waters and Diddley before deciding to just record it himself. I genuinely can't imagine having the kind of self-confidence it would take to essentially rip off someone's song and then pitch that ripoff to them. Insane. Highlights: I’m Your Hoochie Coochie Man, Baby Please Don’t Go, Tiger in Your Tank, I Feel So Good, I’ve Got My Mojo Working

I'm not going to beat around the bush here – I've never really considered myself a Christina Aguilera fan. I definitely wouldn't say I'm a hater or anything like that, but her hits never did much for me. That said, her career was already several albums deep by the time I turned 10, so it's probably fair to say that I wasn't in her target demographic during that time of my life. I've also been more open to the pop girlies of recent years (mainly Sabrina Carpenter, Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, Olivia Rodrigo and Lady Gaga), so I was happy to give this album a fair shot. Aguilera's mission on Back to Basics is made clear in the opening moments of the album: to pay tribute to the soul/blues/jazz artists who paved the road before her. For the first few tracks, it feels like that's (at least somewhat) the case – the very next track after the intro is a full-on gospel tune (which oddly features Steve Winwood, the first artist the Generator picked out for me), followed by two soulful, upbeat tracks produced by the talented DJ Premier. The latter of the two ("Ain't No Other Man") is especially fun and probably the single best track on the entire album. Unfortunately, what goes up must come down and down it goes indeed. After these first four tracks, the names Aguilera dropped on "Back in the Day" (Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Etta James, John Coltrane, etc.) come across as little more than lip service. The following nine songs aren't all that bad (and "F.U.S.S." is legitimately a highlight), but are fairly forgettable for mid-2000s pop/R&B. Even some excellent sample-heavy production from Premier and Mark Ronson couldn't elevate the tail end of the first disc even close to the heights of "Makes Me Wanna Pray" or "Ain't No Other Man." First disc? Oh yeah – Back to Basics is a double album. If BTB was just the first disc, it probably would have been an easy three star rating for me. Unfortunately, disc two completely tosses out the "tribute to the trailblazers" concept to focus on more standard Xtina fare and it's all the worse for it. The only true highlight here is "Candyman" and songs like "Nasty Naughty Boy" sound incredibly out of place on the album that gave us "Makes Me Wanna Pray" less than an hour earlier. Why this second disc wasn't released as a separate EP or saved for a future album is beyond me. It makes BTB feel so much more bloated than it already was and it completely loses the character than made the first disc remotely compelling. I'd even go as far as to say that listening through the second disc actively harmed my impression of the first – I let the album loop back to the beginning to re-listen to those first few cuts and the idea of it being some kind of tribute started to feel like a cruel joke in hindsight. If I can find some positives in this album, it's that Christina Aguilera has a great voice and knows how to show it off here. I can also appreciate her straightforward style of writing lyrics – it's often easy to know exactly what she's talking about without having to read into it too much. Additionally, I think it's nice that she attempted to put some respect on some of the great Black artists of the 20th century, even if the execution wasn't fully there. Ultimately, Back to Basics has too many good qualities for me to give it one star, but it's not an album that I ever want to hear from front to back again. Highlights: Makes Me Wanna Pray, Ain’t No Other Man, F.U.S.S. (Interlude), Candyman

They say not to judge a book by its cover. The same often goes for albums and Roxy Music’s self-titled LP is a prime example – I’m not sure what I expected going into this one, but it certainly wasn’t what I got! I don’t have a ton to say here, other than that I appreciate how weird the album lets itself get at times. The songs themselves generally aren’t astounding and they get much less memorable in the project’s back half, but there are at least a handful of interesting listens here. I don’t know if I’m the only one who feels this way, but I reckon Brian Eno’s contributions to this particular album are probably a bit overstated. Yes, he was a part of Roxy Music’s lineup at the time of this album’s release, but he’s not credited as a writer or producer on any of the songs. I love Eno as much as the next guy, but to think of this debut album as a “Brian Eno project” is probably a bit disingenuous – Roxy Music seems to be Bryan Ferry’s brainchild first and foremost. All in all, not my favorite album of this challenge so far, but I found much of the music to be decently compelling and I’m interested to eventually hear Roxy Music’s other entries on the list! Highlights: Re-Make/Re-Model, Ladytron, If There Is Something, Virginia Plain, Chance Meeting

Depeche Mode is one of the few artists on this list that I own and enjoy an album from (in this case, Violator), so I was definitely looking forward to giving another one of their albums a go! My first impressions of Music for the Masses are pretty positive! It's a nice mix of catchy synthpop and more experimental cuts, with everything somehow managing to fit together in a way that makes sense and doesn't feel too jumbled. I also very much appreciated the gapless transitions between certain tracks – they really made the album feel like a cohesive story in a way that not a lot of other albums on this list have for me. If there's one thing that holds the album back, it's that it sounds exceedingly '80s and lacks a certain timelessness as a result. MFTM is often epic in scope and provocative without being overly edgy, which puts it a notch above comparable albums like NIN's The Downward Spiral for me. I'd even say I like it about as much as Violator (the band's most celebrated LP) based on memory, but I'd have to hear the two albums side-by-side to know for sure and I'll probably wait to do that until the Generator decides to give me the latter, which could be several months from now. Will report my findings when the time comes! Highlights: Never Let Me Down Again, Strangelove, Sacred, Behind the Wheel, Nothing, Pimpf

Oh hey, this album shares a name (the first one, not the second one) with my son! I gotta be honest... I knew next to nothing about the Kinks prior to listening to Arthur. I think the first time I heard about the band was when my high school French teacher was telling us about a song called Kinks Shirt by Matt Nathanson, whom she may have had a minor obsession with. I've also apparently heard "You Really Got Me," but I never could have told someone it was made by the Kinks until today. I'm aware that I'm missing the context of several albums to be making a statement like this, but the Kinks often come across as a Walmart-brand version of the Beatles on AOTDAFOTBE. The LP was also released after every Beatles album (excluding Let It Be, which was recorded before Abbey Road), so I don't think it's unfair to say that that their influence is strongly felt here. With a name like "the Kinks," I was honestly expecting something with a bit more bite. That said, I don't think Arthur is a bad album at all! It starts off strong with "Victoria" and has a pretty enjoyable run of tracks from "Brainwashed" through "She's Bought a Hat like Princess Marina," which all felt like they brought something unique and memorable to the table. All in all, the LP isn't something I can see myself revisiting in my own free time (especially since a few more Kinks albums are coming up), but I'll probably show it to the kiddo someday for fun! Highlights: Victoria, Brainwashed, Australia, Shangri-La, Mr. Churchill Says, She's Bought a Hat like Princess Marina

Listen... I get that this kind of music has an audience (and it's probably the exact same people who get genuine enjoyment out of true crime shows), but that audience does not include me. So many of the tracks on Murder Ballads ("Song of Joy," "Stagger Lee," "O'Malley's Bar") make me feel gross, like I need to go take a shower to wash them out of my system. Of course, not all art is designed to make you feel good and I've enjoyed my fair share of downer albums (heck, I gave Elliott Smith's Either/Or four stars), but it just feels like Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds went a step too far here. PJ Harvey and Kylie Minogue ultimately saved Murder Ballads from getting a one star rating from me – their respective duets are genuinely compelling music, even if the subject matter isn't my favorite. I can commend the musicality on show throughout the LP as well, but it's generally hard to appreciate while my ears are being assaulted by some of the most vile lyrics and rank vocals I've ever heard in my life. Highlights: Henry Lee, Where the Wild Roses Grow

Portishead is another band that I've heard of in passing but have never actually gone out of my way to listen to (or knew much about, to be honest), so I was definitely curious to hear what they'd bring to the table on Third. At the same time, I'm often annoyed when the Generator gives me a mid/late-career album as my first exposure to an artist and that definitely rings true here. Then again, I've heard Beth Gibbons on Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers and Geoff Barrow on Meow the Jewels, so maybe that's all the context I need! /s I don't love Third, but I also don't hate it. The album sits in a bit of a weird spot where I can appreciate the experimentation of it, but also don't feel like all of the elements necessarily work together in complete harmony. I guess the main thing holding Third back for me is that Beth Gibbons' vocal/songwriting style just doesn't sound right over these kinds of instrumentals. That aside, I definitely found myself gravitating toward the more electronic-influenced cuts like "Hunter," "The Rip" and "We Carry On" (which weirdly reminded me of "Rollin' & Scratchin'" by Daft Punk). "Machine Gun" is an interesting cut too, but I feel like its best moments are in its final minute. All that said, I’ve seen Third described as a sonic departure from Portishead’s first two albums and I’m actually quite excited to see how Beth Gibbons sounds in more of a trip hop or acid jazz setting (especially the former), because I can somewhat picture it working. Crossing my fingers for the Generator to give me Dummy soon! Highlights: Hunter, The Rip, We Carry On, Machine Gun

It only took 32 days, but we’ve finally arrived at an album that I actually own a copy of! It’s been a hot minute since I’ve given The Fat of the Land a spin and I’m super into breakbeat at the moment, so I went full poggers when I saw that this LP as today’s assignment. Weirdly, I don’t honestly have that much to say about TFOTL. It’s just sick breaks with pretty memorable hooks! Every track is distinct, but also feels like it belongs alongside the other tracks. The album is also a tight 10 tracks and there really aren’t any stinkers in the bunch. I guess the only bit of negativity I feel about this project is that the songs are fairly long and generally pretty repetitive, so if you’re not feeling a specific idea, it’s going to get old real fast. I’m very used to repetitive dance music and even I felt like some of the tracks went on a smidge too long. That aside, The Fat of the Land is a great listen and a perfect time capsule for late 90s rave music. Keith Flint really shines here too – rest in peace, twisted firestarter. Highlights: Smack My B**ch Up, Breathe, Funky Sh**, Narayan, Firestarter

This sort of thing seems to be happening a lot lately, but I found out about Fugees only a week or two ago because I wanted to see if Lauryn Hill ever released any music beyond Miseducation… and here we are. Part of me is a little salty that I didn’t get to experience Hill’s only solo album completely blind (since I’ve heard so many great things about it over the years), but The Score definitely wasn’t a bad place to start! In a lot of ways, this LP reminds me of Raekwon’s Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… (which I got to hear/review a few weeks ago) – both could be described as East Coast hip-hop albums that are over an hour long, feature three core artists and tie tracks together with skits. The Score was also released only six months after OB4CL, which is a pretty wild coincidence. I don’t bring this up to disparage either album (there are probably loads of other rap albums I have yet to hear that fit the same criteria), but to paint a picture of how much I enjoyed The Score by comparison – it does so many of the same things, but in a way that I found more engaging and approachable. There’s so much chemistry to be found here, especially between Lauryn Hill and Wyclef Jean – they often trade off verses, double each other’s lines and take turns on hook duties, which just works. Pras definitely has a presence on The Score as well (and he’s never unwelcome), but it usually takes the form of a verse later in the track that helps break up the repetition of the other two MCs’ back-and-forth dynamic. Lauryn is an amazing vocalist and lyricist, which comes out in both her bars and hooks on this album. I didn’t realize Wyclef could rap prior to hearing The Score (electronic music is my background, so I’m mainly familiar with him through his collaborations with Avicii), but he’s got some great moments as well, excluding the poop bar on "How Many Mics." He might even have the most insane flow on the entire project during verse three of "Family Business" – I had to relisten to that one a few times! The skits/interludes aren’t amazing in isolation, but they do a good job providing space between similar types of beats and introducing the next track. There’s actually quite a bit of cross-referencing across the project, which really makes it feel like a true ALBUM (as opposed to a loose collection of tracks, like many of the other LPs on this list are). If there’s one thing holding The Score back, it’s that it’s pretty long and the formula does get a little bit tiring by the end – there’s variety, but not enough to carry me through the full hour plus successive listens. It’s certainly an album I can see myself revisiting, but enough to warrant buying and putting it into regular rotation? Probably not, at least for now. Either way, The Score gets a strong recommendation from me – possibly one of the 5 best albums out of the 38 I’ve had to listen to for this challenge so far. Highlights: How Many Mics, Ready or Not, The Beast, Fu-Gee-La, Family Business, Killing Me Softly with His Song, The Mask, Cowboys, No Woman No Cry, Manifest

When I searched for Ryan Adams on Spotify to find this album, all I could think was “Bryan Adams has an evil twin and his biggest song is a cover of 'Wonderwall'?” Fortunately, Heartbreaker is actually a decent listen. It’s a good reminder for me that country music can be great when it’s a vehicle for genuinely good songwriting/storytelling, rather than gimmicky songs about Fox News talking points and big green tractors. There were a fair few forgettable tunes on Heartbreaker and the harmonica bits sounded basically indistinguishable from track to track, but that’s the most negative thing I can really say about the album. I’m glad I got to hear it thanks to this challenge and there are definitely a few songs here that I can see myself coming back to! Highlights: To Be Young (Is to Be Sad, Is to Be High), Oh My Sweet Carolina, Damn Sam (I Love a Woman That Rains), Come Pick Me Up

As someone who only knows Paul Simon & Art Garfunkel through other artists’ covers of "The Sound of Silence" and "Bridge over Troubled Water," I was pretty excited to (for lack of a better phrase) finally get my S&G cherry popped with Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme! It’s also the duo’s first album on this list chronologically, so that made it doubly exciting. From the moment this album starts, it’s obvious that there’s enormous musical talent behind it. "Scarborough Fair / Canticle" really sets the tone for a project loaded with a wide array of instruments, engaging storytelling and occasionally dark themes. I can’t overstate just how instantaneously the first moments of the project hooked me. While I don’t think I thoroughly enjoyed any of PSRAT’s other tracks quite as much as the intro, the quality certainly doesn’t fall off! It’s hard for me to believe some of these songs came out in 1966 because they just feel so timeless. I literally listened to the album twice in a row because I felt like there was still so much more enjoyment to get out of it. Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme isn’t QUITE a five star album for me, but it probably would have been in constant rotation if I were born 40 years earlier and electronic music didn’t exist. Looking forward to discovering more gems from Simon & Garfunkel before this challenge is finished! Highlights: Scarborough Fair / Canticle, Patterns, Homeward Bound, The Dangling Conversation, A Simple Desultory Philippic, A Poem on the Underground Wall, 7 O’Clock News / Silent Night

I genuinely had no clue what I was getting into with this album because the Wikipedia page for it had no genre listed, the Spotify version of the album is named incorrectly and the band’s current most popular track has artwork that looks like approximately two dollars were spent on it. That said, Our Aim Is to Satisfy actually isn’t bad. As a first exposure to Red Snapper, it left a decent impression on me. There were a fair few highlights, like "Keeping Pigs Together" (which sounds like the theme to an early 2000s spy flick that doesn’t exist), the more ambient-leaning "Belladonna" and the jaw-dropping closer "They’re Hanging Me Tonight." On paper, OAITS is an album I should love – trip hop with jazz influences, repetitive dance structures and occasional rap vocals is honestly right up my alley. Some of the songs just got so tiring so quickly or didn’t quite hook me as much as I hoped. While I can’t see myself coming back to this one in its entirety anytime soon, Our Aim Is to Satisfy got its hooks deep enough in my that I’m definitely curious to check out some more Red Snapper! They’ve got a new album that came out just a few months ago (and appears to be a bit more jazzy), so maybe I’ll start there. Highlights: Keeping Pigs Together, Some Kind of Kink, The Rake, Alaska Street, Belladonna, They’re Hanging Me Tonight

I genuinely had no idea who the La's were until I loaded up their Spotify page and saw that 3/5 of their top tracks were different versions of "There She Goes." At that point, I realized that they were the minds behind a song I've heard dozens of times (though admittedly, I'm much more familiar with the cover by Sixpence None the Richer than the original). Ironically, it looks like the original outperformed the SNTR version by only one spot on the UK Singles chart and didn't even come close to the cover on the Billboard Hot 100. I can't say I particularly enjoyed this album, but I also didn't hate it! It kinda just felt like background noise at a certain point, like the sort of thing I'd passively hum along to while walking around the grocery store and trying to decide whether I want to buy store brand or name brand applesauce. It did have a little bit more edge to it than I expected from the band that made "There She Goes," but not enough to push it beyond a middle-of-the-road three star rating. One thing I will say is that the LP did pick up a bit toward the end, with "Looking Glass" being a truly surprising standout! I also liked "All By Myself" and "Clean Prophet," but neither of those were part of the original album, so I can't let my opinion be swayed too far – it'd probably be the same rating regardless, though. Highlights: There She Goes, Freedom Song, Looking Glass, All By Myself, Clean Prophet

I had never heard of the The prior to this challenge, but of course it's a band that makes a genre with "post" in its name... classic. I honestly don't have a lot to say about Infected. It starts off somewhat strong with the title track, which is fun, energetic and even features a trumpet solo. While it doesn't necessarily take a complete nosedive after that point, it never quite hits the same highs again. I certainly didn't hate having it on, but tracks 2-8 all just kind of blended together into a sea of forgettable '80s mush. If there's one thing I really took away from this album, it's that I apparently have no idea what post-punk actually is. Infected just sounds like other '80s dance pop to me – in my head, it's much more similar to something like Depeche Mode than bona fide punk rock. I guess that's part of what makes it "post," but I'm still struggling to figure out where exactly the "punk" comes in. Highlights: Infected

When I reviewed Music for the Masses, I said I'd probably listen to it again when the Generator gave me Violator so that I could compare them side-by-side to figure out which one I like more. I fully expected that day to come months (or even years) down the road, but here we are... just 10 days later. I'm a man of my word though, so I listened to both albums back to back earlier today. To be completely honest, I think I enjoy MFTM a little more! Violator definitely has some stronger highlights ("Personal Jesus" is maybe the most unique Depeche Mode cut I've heard and "Policy of Truth" & "Enjoy the Silence" might be their catchiest tunes, full stop), but in terms of the flow, cohesiveness and average level of quality across all tracks, I reckon the earlier album has it in the bag. Violator is pretty stylistically similar to MFTM, so I don't have a lot else to say that I didn't already say in my review of that album. I guess I'd recommend actually checking out the bonus tracks on the deluxe version, since most of what's there genuinely rivals many of the nine tracks on the original LP. The songs are a bit more electronic-influenced, but if your tastes are anything like mine, that's probably not going to be an issue! Highlights: World in My Eyes, Sweetest Perfection, Personal Jesus, Enjoy the Silence, Policy of Truth, Clean

This album makes me want to slowly remove my glasses several dozen times while staring at my computer with an astonished expression and eventually join an anti-government rebellion with my hacker son to save the planet from an alien invasion. Highlights: When Will They Shoot, The Predator, It Was a Good Day, We Had to Tear This Mothaf**ka Up, Who Got the Camera

This album is how I imagine ABBA would sound if they forgot how to write good music and rebooted with a tone deaf Miley Cyrus as their lead singer. No disrespect to Marianne Faithfull – she had a distinct voice, made an audience for herself doing this kind of music and clearly didn’t have an easy life. At the same time, I’m glad this is her only album on the list because I don’t think I could take another batch of tracks like these (even if it’s as short as Broken English is). The one redeeming factor for me is that a couple of the tracks ("Why’d Ya Do It," for example) have SOME compelling instrumental moments. However, they’re few & far between and don’t save the songs from being completely unreplayable in other regards. Never again. Highlights: N/A

Getting flashbacks to listening to Blur's self-titled album here because The White Stripes are also a band that I could only have named one song by ("Seven Nation Army") before today and I'm once again starting my journey into their discography with a mid-career album that I feel like I'm missing some context on. I can imagine that either White Blood Cells or Elephant probably would have been a better place to start, but hey... can't win 'em all! From the opening moments of Get Behind Me Satan, it was obvious that this album wasn't going to be for me. The vocals on "Blue Orchid" are so grating and the instrumental is fast yet fairly straightforward – it just doesn't come together in a satisfying way to me. I had similar feelings about the rest of the album, though there were a few key moments that stood out (which I'll detail below). The Nurse: This song is composed in such a funny way – genuinely gives me a similar sensation to listening to 100 gecs (and GBMS came out like 12 years before they were even a thing). Little Ghost: A fun little dip into bluegrass! Still not really into the vocal style on this album, but I feel like it works better here than on other tracks. Apparently Jack White wrote it in 10 minutes at a friend's house, which checks out. The Denial Twist: This is the kind of music I actually expected to hear on a White Stripes album and it's not bad! I could see myself coming back to this track from time to time. I'm Lonely (But I Ain't That Lonely Yet): A stripped-back, emotional closer to the album. I wish it was capping off something I enjoyed more, but I can appreciate it for what it is. I'd be interested in hearing the first take with the mandolin and drums included. Highlights: The Nurse, Little Ghost, The Denial Twist, I’m Lonely (But I Ain’t That Lonely Yet)

Porcupine is the second post-punk album the Generator has given me in the last week and I'm sort of beginning to understand what makes this genre what it is – it's the vocals. Much like the The, what separates Echo & the Bunnymen from their instrumentally-similar mainstream counterparts are that the vocals are written and performed in a more edgy/moody way that (seemingly) intentionally clashes with the tones of the backing track. That said, just because I feel like I have a better understanding of something doesn't mean I enjoy it. Porcupine makes me feel like I'm listening to a U2 album with more outside-the-box compositional choices – a couple of tracks gave me a similar soaring, anthemic feeling to some of the Irish band's better cuts, but most just didn't do anything for me. I'm seeing a lot of people comparing this band to the Cure, which makes me both excited and worried to dig into the latter once I'm deeper into the list. Hopefully the other two E&TB albums to come are better than this one. Highlights: The Cutter, Heads Will Roll

Generator, I’m BEGGING you to start giving me some albums from people I’ve at least heard of. I really don’t mind getting an underground project here and there, but this is happening almost every day. Give me some Beatles, some Bowie, some Björk… heck, I’d even take some Beastie Boys at this point. Who on earth is Mike Ladd and what is he doing on this list? Like many albums the Generator has assigned to me thus far, Welcome to the Afterfuture is an LP that I appreciate more than I enjoy. It's weird and frequently psychedelic, with bars that made me cringe more often than not (e.g., "you can't burn me in a teepee, watch me as I go pee pee"), which put me off of it almost immediately. Simultaneously, I can't say I've ever heard an album quite like this one from its era – its beats are so distinct and its vocals seem to bathe in how off-kilter they are. WTTA actually did pick up some momentum for me around the middle, starting with an El-P jumpscare (I had no idea he was part of Company Flow) on the track "Bladerunners." While his bars sound pretty primitive compared to what he'd later do with Run the Jewels, it was still a pleasant surprise getting a verse from someone I'm relatively familiar with on this album. There are certainly other highlights, but the only track on Welcome to the Afterfuture that I legitimately enjoyed and plan to revisit is "Red Eye to Jupiter" (and I've already given it a second listen). It manages to be bombastic/over-the-top in a really fun way and somehow feels ahead of its time, almost like a precursor to the jazz rap and nerdcore that became quite popular in the mid-2010s. Ultimately, I think having a more seasoned, polished MC on these kinds of beats would have made WTTA a more enjoyable album for me, but that would also cause it to lose a lot of its unique character. I'm happy to remember this album as one that wasn't necessarily for me, but still managed to stand out from every other hip-hop album on the 1001 Albums list. Highlights: Bladerunners, To the Moon’s Contractor, I Feel like $100, The Animist, Red Eye to Jupiter (Starship Ni**a), Feb. 4 '99 (For All Those Killed by Cops)

I just want to say that I love it when I get an album from an artist with only one entry on the 1001 Albums list. It just displays so much confidence, as if Robert Dimery is saying "This artist is pretty good overall, but they've got one album you HAVE to listen to." Assuming it's something I actually enjoy, it also gives me a good excuse to dig deeper into their discography during my free time without feeling like I'm spoiling anything I'm going to have to listen to later on. The Cardigans' First Band on the Moon is a great example of this sentiment – they're quite literally a one-hit wonder and the album surrounding that hit ("Lovefool") is something I likely never would have listened to if I hadn't started this challenge. It would have been a shame to have never heard the rest of the LP because it’s actually quite good! The Cardigans’ Spotify bio describes the band as specializing in “sugary confections that would grow annoying very quickly if they weren’t backed by solid musicianship and clever arrangements.” I almost can’t believe they would willingly admit that, but yeah… it’s pretty much spot on (at least, when it comes to this album). First Band on the Moon could have easily fallen into a sea of ‘90s pop schlock with these kinds of vocals, but the grooving bass lines, witty lyrics and compelling compositional choices really elevate the album. Songs like "Been It" and "Step on Me" even sound a bit ahead of their time – they could sit alongside recent Sabrina Carpenter releases completely comfortably. I was originally leaning toward giving FBOTM three stars, but I willingly let it loop back to the start and kept listening to it (even enjoying most of the songs more the second time through). By my own standards, I think that makes this one at least a four star album. Moments like these really make me wish the Generator’s rating system was a bit more granular – at least give us the option to do half stars! Highlights: Your New Cuckoo, Been It, Never Recover, Step on Me, Lovefool, Iron Man

🎵 ‘cause I’m an island boy, oh I’m an island boy, imma just keep wagwan, you gonna keep that gun, imma be staring at the sun, I’m just full gazin’ 🎶 Highlights: Message in a Bottle, Reggatta de Blanc, Deathwish

This is the first reggae album I’ve had to listen to for this challenge and also the first I’ve ever heard from the Bob Marley sphere start to finish. I’m a bit bummed that my first Wailers experience is from Peter Tosh and not Marley himself, but I suppose I’ll take it. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t roll my eyes a bit when I saw that Legalize It was today’s assignment – on the surface, the album seems to be a caricature of what people perceive reggae to be. I definitely didn’t go into it expecting fine art and it’s fair to say my expectations were met. Listen… I don’t care about marijuana. I’ve never smoked it, I don’t want to smoke it and frankly, I most likely never will. I want to resonate with Tosh’s plight on the title track, but I can’t relate to it and it comes across like an overly preachy advertisement. Fortunately, that’s the only track that gives off “you like weed, we get it” vibes and it becomes pretty inoffensive reggae fare after that point. I can’t say I ever truly hated the album, but it also just didn’t have enough engaging lyrics, instrumentation or composition to make me feel like it’s worth ever revisiting. "Till Your Well Runs Dry" was the one track that felt like it had some soul to it and I liked that it also played around with its genre a bit. The others just kind of felt like vaguely uplifting tunes I’d hear while looking through fresh fruit at the farmers market. Hopefully some more memorable reggae is coming in my near future. Highlights: Till Your Well Runs Dry

I just watched Mic the Snare’s Madonna DEEP DISCOG DIVE on Nebula (not sponsored) a couple weeks ago and he had good things to say about Ray of Light, so I was pretty excited to get it as today’s assignment! This is actually the first Madonna album I’ve heard cover to cover and it was honestly the perfect place to start as an electronic music fan. Ray of Light could have easily been another generic ‘90s dance pop outing, but Madonna clearly approached this album with respect for the genre and the result is pretty exceptional. I listened to Ray of Light twice today and I honestly feel like it could go toe-to-toe with pretty much any other electronic/dance album from this era (excluding Discovery by Daft Punk). The first half of the LP is genuinely amazing and it only slightly loses its stride in the back half. I was fully prepared to give Ray of Light my first five star rating around the time I was six tracks deep, but I unfortunately did lose a little bit of steam toward the end and I’d be lying if I said I enjoyed tracks like "Sky Fits Heaven" and "The Power of Good-Bye" to the same degree as those first several tunes. But yeah, Ray of Light is a good one – catchy vocals, grooving beats, masterful production, tasteful experimentation and occasionally thought-provoking lyrics make the album an experience that I’m excited to continue reliving in the future! I’m also looking forward to checking out some of Madonna’s other stuff from this era in the future. Highlights: Drowned World / Substitute for Love, Swim, Ray of Light, Candy Perfume Girl, Skin, Nothing Really Matters, Frozen, To Have and Not to Hold, Little Star, Mer Girl

Alright, so quick story... I grew up listening to CCM almost exclusively and Coldplay was the first "secular" band that I ever got really into. I was obsessed with their latest album, completely wore it out and bought every other CD from them that I could get my hands on. However, that album was not A Rush of Blood to the Head. It also wasn't Parachutes, X&Y or even Viva la Vida. It was Mylo Xyloto. I'm of the opinion that Coldplay has never released an outright bad album (excluding Music of the Spheres – we don't talk about that one), but my feelings about each LP generally boils down to how distant it is from that MX sound I fell in love with back in 2011. Hopefully that makes what I'm about to say a little easier to stomach. A Rush of Blood to the Head is, objectively, a pretty good album. The songs are memorable, poignant and moody, with solid instrumentation and appropriate energy backing it all up. The run from "Politik" to "Clocks" is the stuff of legend – just so many iconic tracks in there. I can completely understand why this is the one that people point to when they talk about how Coldplay used to be good. At the same time, it's barely a top five Coldplay project for me (and it might be even lower, depending on my mood). It's actually been quite some time since I've listened AROBTTH, so I was excited to revisit it and see if my opinions have changed at all. Listening to the first five tracks was like catching up with an old friend – I knew all of the songs like the back of my hand and enjoyed them just as much as I did way back when, while scenes from the music videos came rushing back to my memory. Listening to the back half was more like making small talk with a distant relative – these are songs that I've heard before and vaguely remember, but never connected with on a deeper level. I wouldn't even say that the quality dips from "Daylight" to "Amsterdam" (in fact, a few of those tracks ended up being highlights of this listen), but the songs after "Clocks" just don't stick quite as easily. If someone told me to hum the chorus of "Green Eyes" or "A Whisper" with a gun to my head, I genuinely don't think I could do it. Would I have this same issue with some of the deeper cuts on Mylo, Viva la Vida or even Ghost Stories? Doubtful. Another thing I can't shake is just how much Coldplay was trying to sound like Radiohead during this stage of their career. For better or worse, Mylo Xyloto completely altered the band's direction and helped make them into an act that doesn't take such obvious inspiration from any one source. Now 10 studio albums deep, Coldplay has been sounding like the band that made MX for half of their history and I'm honestly fine with that (even if it has led to some weaker projects here & there). Though there are a few other Coldplay CDs I'd pick off the shelf before A Rush of Blood to the Head, I can't deny that it's a beloved, classic entry in the band's discography and one that I enjoy just as much as any other four star album from this list. Give it a shot – I'm sure you'll find something to love here! Highlights: Politik, In My Place, God Put a Smile upon Your Face, The Scientist, Clocks, Daylight, Green Eyes, A Rush of Blood to the Head, Amsterdam

As of today, I'm officially 50 days into this thing. While I'm less than 5% of the way through the full list, this feels like my first significant milestone – the last time I attempted to make it through chronologically, I only got about 30-40 albums deep (right around the time the Beatles started showing up) before I called it quits. Needless to say, I've enjoyed my experience infinitely more this time around, even if listening to the albums in random order has resulted in some annoying instances of jumping into a particular artist's discography at a weird point. While part of me was hoping that the big 5-0 would be something more sentimental to me or one of the top 20 rated albums globally, I suppose it's fitting that such a milestone is accompanied by an artist I couldn't have named one song from (as that has been my experience for most of this challenge so far), with an album that I actually found to be pretty enjoyable. My first thought upon seeing that today's album was going to be Déjà Vu by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (featuring Dallas Taylor & Greg Reeves) was "wow, that's a lot of names." The volume of musicians present here is reflected in the music, which often features quartet-style singing and layered instrumentation. The boys also switch off on writing/vocal duties frequently, with each member of CSNY doing writing and lead vocals at least once on each side of the LP. While it might seem jarring on the surface, I personally love how effortlessly Déjà Vu jumps between folk, country and rock & roll – the variety on show almost gives it a compilation-like vibe, while still managing to keep things tight and cohesive. Other reviews have called it a perfect inflection point between the '60s and '70s, which I think is a completely fair assessment – it was quite cool hearing hippie music that features tempo changes and straight-up guitar solos (an element of rock which hadn't quite reached its peak just yet), such as on the opening track "Carry On." This certainly isn't my favorite kind of music to listen to casually, but I spun Déjà Vu twice in a row and started to let it play through a third time before I decided to cut myself off and get started with my work day. It's a pretty good album and deserves at least a four star rating, even if it's not something I can see myself coming back to super frequently! Highlights: Carry On, Almost Cut My Hair, Helpless, Woodstock, Déjà Vu, Country Girl

Blonde On Blonde was my first proper Bob Dylan experience and I went into this album with both excitement & anxiety. Much like going into my first grunge album several weeks back, I knew the chances of this not being my cup of tea were greater than 0% and I didn’t want to be the guy who didn’t “get” one of the most legendary American artists alive. We’re talking about a guy who is old enough to have performed at the March on Washington and is still kicking (with him releasing a new studio album as recently as 2023). Fortunately, understanding Bob Dylan’s appeal did not take long while listening to Blonde On Blonde. Yes, his vocal choices (which I’m almost hesitant to call “singing,” as I think even skilled musicians would have some difficulty transcribing most of his inflections into actual notes) are certainly unusual, but I feel like that’s a huge part of the album’s charm. The instrumentation is also solid and serves as a nice contrast against Bob Dylan’s less tonal vocals. The first few songs in particular got their hooks in me and I never found the tracks to get grating like I thought they might be. Simultaneously, the length of BOB (wait a second…) and its reliance on various rock/blues compositional tropes took the experience from four stars to three stars by the time I got to the end. While I can’t see myself revisiting Blonde On Blonde in full anytime soon, it’s an album I certainly respect and I’m looking forward to digging further into Bob Dylan’s discography as I continue making my way through the 1001 Albums list. Highlights: Rainy Day Women #12 & 35, Pledging My Time, One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later), I Want You, Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again

I feel like I'm listening to a bunch of stoners (who used to perform as a youth group band 4-5 years ago) try to write music that sounds punk, but not quite nailing it. Can't say I hated listening to It's a Shame About Ray, but I didn't really enjoy it either. It's certainly not essential listening material in my book. Separately, I noticed that the Lemonheads' top song on Spotify was their cover of "Mrs. Robinson" and that it was on this album – I didn't want my first impression of the iconic song to be a cover, so I decided to listen to the original and mildly spoil Simon & Garfunkel's Bookends album (which is on this list) in the process. I later realized that the cover isn't actually a part of the original album and that I could have just not listened to the bonus tracks. My bad on that one. Highlights: Confetti, It’s a Shame About Ray

Leonard Cohen is another one of those artists I’ve heard of, but never actually listened to. Considering how many albums he’s got on the 1001 Albums list though, I do appreciate the Generator dropping me in at the earliest possible point in his discography! Frankly, I had a similar experience with my first Leonard Cohen album as my first Nick Cave album a few weeks back – I can’t really find myself resonating with this style of songwriting, even if it’s not all uncomfortably explicit murder ballads this time. My enjoyment of the LP did pick up toward the end and I found Cohen’s voice much less grating than Cave’s, but still not enough to push Songs of Leonard Cohen higher than two stars for me. A bit scared to dig further into his discography, but hopefully things get better from here! Highlights: Master Song, So Long Marianne, Stories of the Street, One of Us Cannot Be Wrong

PJ Harvey was one of my favorite parts of one of my least favorite albums that I’ve had to listen to for this challenge (Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds’ Murder Ballads), so I genuinely had no idea what to expect from Let England Shake. Regardless, I went into it with intrigue and an open mind! The album opens up with a catchy xylophone melody, backed up by a lively beat that switches between 4/4 and 3/4 time – this immediately caught my attention and got me hopeful for some bops to come. The following few tracks were slower and less ear-catching, which made me zone out for a bit and not really give the album my full attention. But then something interesting happened. I was listening to "On Battleship Hill" and I just got this sense that I was missing something and needed to start the album over without any distractions, so I did that. I also put the lyrics up on my TV so I had something to look at and hoped it would elevate the listening experience. The second time through, I enjoyed Let England Shake a lot more. I was able to appreciate the subtleties in the instrumentals, the poetry in the lyrics and how well the theme of war was presented here. Everything about this album is so raw in sound, yet so refined in scope. Nothing got me thinking as deeply or struck me as profoundly as some of my favorite albums do, but PJ Harvey had a vision here and I can admit that it was executed to near-perfection. Let England Shake isn’t one I can see myself coming back to super often, but I imagine I’ll get more and more out of it each time I do! Highlights: Let England Shake, The Glorious Land, The Words That Maketh Murder, On Battleship Hill, England, Written on the Forehead

I listened to my first CSNY album (Déjà Vu) just a few days ago and enjoyed it a fair bit, so I was interested to hear what a Neil Young “solo” outing would sound like! Frankly, I think Young is better off with Crosby, Stills & Nash attached. The tracks centered around Neil’s vocals honestly came across as either forgettable or outright annoying to me. I was genuinely leaning toward giving this album two stars until it started showcasing some instrumental depth on Down by the River and a couple of the subsequent tracks. Ultimately, the instrumental-focused cuts are too good for Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere to get anything less than three stars from me. Big ups to Crazy Horse and Bobby Notkoff! Highlights: Down by the River, Running Dry (Requiem for the Rockets), Cowgirl in the Sand

Upon getting Leonard Cohen's debut album a few nights ago, I asked my wife if she was familiar with his music. Her response was something to the effect of “I’m not, but I know Lynyrd Skynyrd!” I didn’t even realize “Lynyrd” was meant to be pronounced like “Leonard” until I saw the title of this album, so I may have incorrectly corrected her on that one. Sorry Mandy – love you tons. Prior to today, I could have only named "Sweet Home Alabama" and "Free Bird" from Lynyrd Skynyrd's catalog (and I hadn't ever actually listened to the entirety of "Free Bird"), so you could say I went into their debut album largely blind. I’m glad that ended up being the case because this one was quite fun to experience with minimal expectations! These guys really know how to write and perform Southern rock. There’s honestly not a bad song here – the highs are high and the lows are still pretty good! "Tuesday’s Gone" is only the second track and it’s good enough that it could have been an impactful closer on any other album. I say “any other album” because "Free Bird" really is the perfect ending here – after dozens of minutes of buildup, the sensation is almost orgasmic when it finally gets to that iconic guitar solo. It goes crazy for like four minutes and only lets up when the track eventually fades out mid-solo. I was genuinely tempted to give this album five stars because of how good "Free Bird" is, but restarting the LP from the beginning helped me snap back to the reality that this is a four star album with a really strong finish. Even so, I think everyone listening to Free Bird without the seven tracks in front of it is doing themselves a disservice – the payoff is worth the wait and the wait is filled with solid tunes. Completely separate note, but I never noticed how similar Ronnie Van Zant sounds to Anthony Kiedis (or vice versa, I guess) until today. There were moments on this one where I genuinely felt like I was listening to RHCP. I hope I’m not the only one who hears it! Highlights: Tuesday's Gone, Simple Man, Things Goin' On, Mississippi Kid, Free Bird

Oh look, I finally have an excuse to check out Talking Heads! My strongest memory related to this band is that David Byrne’s "Like Humans Do" came pre-loaded onto my family’s PC and we listened to it a bunch (probably a dozen times, at least) so we could look at the cool visualizer on Windows Media Player. Simpler times… I wish I could say I loved More Songs About Buildings and Food – the album being the first Talking Heads project produced by Brian Eno and being described as marking a shift toward a more “danceable” style definitely got my hopes up, but it was quickly apparent that it just wasn’t my cup of tea. At this point, I should probably just expect that I’m not going to enjoy an album if its Wikipedia page lists post-punk or new wave (or both, in this case) as its genre. The vocals come across as unpleasant and annoyingly countercultural in pretty much every instance of those two genres that I can think of, though I’m sure some album in that space will come along and blow my socks off eventually. Fortunately for MSABAF, some solid instrumentation, cheeky lyrics and occasionally catchy hooks elevated a few of the tracks for me, which decidedly puts a one star rating out of the question. I really want to like Talking Heads, so hopefully one of their other albums will do more for me! Highlights: The Good Thing, The Girl Wants to Be with the Girls, I’m Not in Love, The Big Country

I've never heard of MC5 before today, but this type of rock music is almost always going to be something I enjoy more live and in person than as a rough recording. I didn't completely hate this album, but I think I finally understand where the cliché of Silents yelling at their Boomer children to "turn down that noise" came from – it's so hard to pick out any of the actual musicality here between the blaring instruments and harsh vocals. Highlights: Ramblin' Rose, Motor City Is Burning

Lou Reed is a name that I hear thrown around in music discourse pretty frequently, but I must admit that I’ve somehow gone my entire life without once hearing a song from him or the Velvet Underground until today. The only things I even knew about him were that he passed away several years ago, that he did a very polarizing collab album with Metallica and that people talk about him as if critics pretend to enjoy his music for clout. I didn’t even know what kind of music he made, though I assumed it was some kind of ear-splitting avant garde rock (based on context). That said, you can probably imagine my surprise when I put on The Velvet Underground & Nico and heard "Sunday Morning" for the first time – my very first thought was “oh, this is lovely” and then my mind started racing with questions about why people would have to fake enjoying music that could have just as easily been from the Beatles. I carried that sentiment through most of the album. Sure, there were some provocative lyrics here and there, but the music at large felt par for the time period – just good old ‘60s tunes. The first track that got truly weird was "Heroin," but even that came across as an appropriate balance of accessible/experimental. Admittedly, things did fly off the rails a bit toward the end of the LP (especially on the closing track "European Son"), but it never became so abrasive that it didn’t feel welcoming to my ears. I honestly struggled much more with Nick Cave and Marianne Faithfull earlier this year, so I’m actually hopeful for some other “fringe” albums to win me over. Am I enjoying this album enough to give it five stars? Nah. Not all of the songs hit for me, I wish the weirdness unraveled in a more linear way and I would have liked it if Nico had a bit more room to shine (maybe some duets with Lou Reed and more prominent background vocals) – the album is called “The Velvet Underground & Nico,” after all. All in all, this felt like the perfect introduction to the world of Lou Reed and I’m looking forward to hearing more! I’m tempted to give Lulu a spin, but I technically haven’t listened to a Metallica album from front to back yet, so maybe it’s best I wait. Highlights: Sunday Morning, Femme Fatale, Venus in Furs, Run Run Run, Heroin, The Black Angel’s Death Song, European Son

This one might have to join my slowly-growing rotation of non-holiday albums that I play in December after I get tired of Christmas music. Hard to explain why, but Starlight just felt like sitting around the hearth, drinking hot cocoa with the lights down low and the smell of a fir tree in the air. In other words, it was a pretty nice listen! I was definitely expecting something more strictly “country” from Willie Nelson’s first cover album (which I would have been completely fine with), but the style he went for here was a breath of fresh air. While it’s not something I foresee myself putting on all the time, I’m definitely planning to come back to it when the mood is right! Slightly off-topic, but today I learned that Willie Nelson is 92 years old and that he is not only still active, but has already released two studio albums (his 77th and 78th) this year. What an absolute machine! I’m not super educated on his discography beyond Stardust, but the fact that he was making music this good 22 albums into his career cements his GOAT status in my book. Highlights: Stardust, Georgia on My Mind, All of Me, September Song, Moonlight in Vermont, Someone to Watch Over Me

KIWANUKA is the newest album I’ve had to listen to for this challenge by a country mile (beating out PJ Harvey’s Let England Shake by about eight years) and it’s one I’m surprised I haven’t come across before, as I’ve been much more active in music discourse during the past 10 years than the previous 10. Regardless, reactions from this community looked really positive, so I went into Michael Kiwanuka’s third album with high hopes! Okay, it’s pretty good. There’s a nice balance of bops and more moody, low-key cuts here – I tend to prefer the bops, but the musicality on show never really dips, so I’m okay with a few breathers here & there. KIWANUKA makes me really curious to dive deeper into psychedelic soul since it seems like the genre both influenced and was influenced by a lot of other styles I tend to enjoy. I’ve been giving out fours left & right lately and I hate to add yet another onto the pile, but this is one I can easily see myself revisiting/recommending and there’s not a single bad song here (though maybe one too many interludes breaking up the pace of the LP). I’ll have to check out Kiwanuka’s previous album Love & Hate soon, since that one seems to have garnered even more acclaim than this one! Highlights: You Ain’t the Problem, I’ve Been Dazed, Piano Joint (This Kind of Love), Living in Denial, Hero

Amnesiac is the first Radiohead album I’ve had to listen to for this challenge and, while it’s not the first album of theirs I’ve heard, it might be the one I’ve been exposed to the least. Not to say I’m massively knowledgeable about the band’s discography, but most of their albums have at least one song I’ve heard or are brought up enough in wider music discourse that I at least recognize its name/artwork – that was not the case here, so I went into Amnesiac virtually blind. After listening through it, do I feel like I’ve been missing out all this time? Honestly, not really. I’ll always appreciate Thom Yorke’s drive to make thought-provoking, experimental music, but this particular batch just didn’t have a lot of tracks that landed for me. What happened the majority of the time was that a song would open up with a cool idea that would make me turn my head a little a go “oooooh,” but then it would get looped to the point of annoyance and/or not progress in an interesting way. Only a few cuts on Amnesiac left enough of an impression on me to make me want to revisit them, so I wouldn’t say the album is a MUST listen – I feel confident that there are much better Radiohead LPs coming later on! Highlights: Pyramid Song, You and Whose Army, Life in a Glasshouse

To give some context for this review, I have no nostalgia for or emotional attachment to the music of Metallica. I have never listened to one of their albums front to back and I've only heard bits & pieces of a few tracks ("Nothing Else Matters," "Master of Puppets" and "One") thanks to Hardwell, Stranger Things and Guitar Hero III. Yes, I'm THAT normie. In spite of this (and partially because of this), I've quietly been very excited for the Generator to eventually give me some Metallica. The combination of how much I liked Lynyrd Skynyrd's debut album and how much I disliked Slipknot's All Hope Is Gone made me curious how the band most synonymous with metal (and the best-selling artist in the genre) would fare. I also listened to my first Lou Reed album very recently and was waiting to give Lulu a listen until I could ingest some "normal" Metallica, so getting their self-titled LP as today's assignment was a huge treat. At least, I thought it was going to be a treat. I won't beat around the bush here... I can't say in good faith that I'm a fan of this album. I guess my main issue is that I just don't really like James Hetfield's vocals and they're pretty hard to escape from here. Most of the tracks have decent guitar solos and those certainly help break up the longer vocal sections, but the instrumentals are rarely ever compelling enough to make sitting through minutes upon minutes of unbearably “masculine” vocals worth the wait. Another thing I knew about Metallica going into this album is that Lars Ulrich is often referred to as a bad/terrible drummer. I always assumed people were being needlessly harsh (and I still think that, for the most part), but I can kind of see what they're talking about after listening through The Black Album. His drumming usually gets the job done here, but it's not particularly technical and there were a few moments where it sounded like he was wandering off the grid, which got a bit distracting. I did enjoy this album a few degrees more than All Hope Is Gone and feel like it deserves a higher rating, but I'd also be more annoyed with someone putting it on over other albums that I've rated three stars, so I'm a bit stuck here. I'm feeling nice today, so I'll go three and cede that perhaps this is a good album in a genre I generally don't care for – I like metalcore, alternative metal and progressive metal, but maybe thrash metal just isn't my thing. Oddly enough, I think I'm even more excited to listen to Lulu now – I just can't envision how Lou Reed & Metallica would work together and I have to know what it sounds like! Will report back on that in my next Metallica (or Lou/TVU) review, assuming I have anything interesting to say. Highlights: Enter Sandman, Holier Than Thou, Wherever I May Roam, Nothing Else Matters

I feel like there's a certain type of listener who thinks music reached its peak with early '70s soul and I honestly can't say I blame them – there's a kind of innocence in albums like Let's Stay Together that just can't be replicated in modern records. As a child of the '90s who was raised by the internet, I suppose this kind of music has never really spoken to me. I definitely wouldn't mind it being put on while out throwing a frisbee or having a picnic, but I don't think I'd ever listen to it recreationally. Highlights: Let’s Stay Together, So You’re Leaving

We've once again arrived at an album by another English artist I only know one song by, which happens to be on said album. Magnificent. I was 10 years old when Paper Planes came out. Though I hadn’t really started listening to music recreationally at that point, it was honestly never one of my favorite hit songs. It’s memorable and has a fun gimmick (in that half the chorus is just sound effects), but it’s not something I’ve ever intentionally put on during my leisure time until today. Part of me has a lot of respect for Kala – some really left field decisions went into its production and I can’t think of many enduring pop albums from this era that took those kinds of risks. However, another part of me finds many of the resulting tracks somewhere between mildly annoying and near unlistenable (which doesn’t bode well for its rating, regardless of anything positive I can say about it). The highest praise I can give M.I.A. here is that I feel like she walked so Charli XCX, SOPHIE and 100 gecs (artists who released some of my favorite albums of the last decade) could run. Kala may sound a bit primitive by comparison, but it was ahead of the curve back in ‘07 and it’s got a couple fun tunes here & there. Highlights: Hussel, XR2, Paper Planes

George, listen. I know that the storytelling in country music isn’t always meant to be taken at face value, but you can’t open your album with a sob story about how lonely you’ve been since your wife/kid left you and then also include a song about knowingly sleeping with a married woman on the same album. It makes you sound like a hypocrite and I can’t empathize with you at that point. I suppose The Grand Tour is a pretty decent listen overall, though. The one song you actually wrote here ("Our Private Life") was a favorite of mine. Even so, I don’t think I’m invested enough to check out your 79 other studio albums any time soon – I’ll leave that to someone crazier than me. Highlights: The Grand Tour, Once You’ve Had the Best, The Weatherman, Our Private Life

I would generally consider myself to be a fan of piano music (not necessarily classical music), but The Köln Concert is honestly one of those albums I appreciate more than I actually enjoy. Reading about the backstory of the show and learning that Keith Jarrett came up with an entire hour of music on the fly instead of playing what was planned, then seeing that the recording of the concert ended up becoming the bestselling solo jazz (and piano) album of all time… I’m impressed, to say the least. At the same time, the music definitely felt improvised. There were some really cool pockets of musical prowess here and there, but there were also stretches of these songs that seemed to just go in circles for minutes and minutes on end, which diluted the experience a bit. While The Köln Concert is a solid three for me (based on how much I enjoyed listening to it in reality and how likely I am to actually revisit it), I would say the uniqueness of the story surrounding it automatically puts it in the “essential listening” category – every music fan should hear this recording at least once. Highlights: Part I, Part II B, Part II C

I had mixed feelings on this one. It comes across a bit vanilla as far as grunge goes and I only really enjoyed one song the whole way through ("Witness"), but I also didn’t necessarily dislike anything here and there were some awesome instrumental bits in basically every song. Not sure if I’ll revisit Dust any time soon, but I wouldn’t mind coming back to it at some point to hear its high points again! Highlights: Halo of Ashes, Sworn and Broken, Witness, Traveler

Considering I didn’t know Alice Cooper and Alice in Chains were different artists until today, I’m surprised at how much I enjoyed School’s Out! I have obviously heard the title track before, but had no idea who made it until today and certainly didn’t expect the album it’s from to be as varied and weird as it is. It even gets a bit jazzy here and there, which was a nice surprise! I wasn’t in love with every song, but I’d definitely like to listen to the full album again, which puts it square in the four star camp for me. Highlights: School’s Out, Gutter Cat vs. the Jets, Blue Turk, Public Animal #9, Grand Finale

Not to say that I disliked my last Bob Dylan assignment, but I was a bit bummed to get another album from him so soon after Blonde on Blonde. He’s apparently got seven LPs on the list though, so I guess it doesn’t hurt to knock another one out! Blood on the Tracks was actually a pretty good one to follow up Blonde on Blonde with, as it represents almost a decade of progress – his songwriting chops were still very present, but there were some different vocal delivery and stylistic choices across the project that consistently kept things interesting. It even sounded like he was singing genuine melodies on a few of the tracks, which wasn’t really the case last time! Overall, I think I liked BOTT just a little more than BOB, but probably not enough to push it into four star territory. It doesn’t help that the longest song on the album was also the one I found to be the most insufferable – I’m not particularly eager to give the LP another front-to-back listen any time soon, despite it containing some fairly strong highlights. Side note, but I finally listened to "Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door" today since it released in the interim between BOB & BOTT and wow, what a tune. No one ever told me just how good that original version is! Highlights: Tangled up in Blue, Simple Twist of Fate, You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go, Meet Me in the Morning

Based on all the negative reviews, I didn’t expect the Triffids’ Calenture to be very good. While I didn’t dislike it as much as I anticipated that I might, don’t take that as an endorsement – it’s still not great. Like many albums I’ve given two stars to, the best thing I can really say about Calenture is that I didn’t actively hate listening to it. After a few tracks, it just kinda became ‘80s background noise, falling somewhere between Nick Cave, U2 and Depeche Mode on the musical spectrum. The thing is, all of those acts have songs I actually like and that wasn’t really true of the Triffids here. Hometown Farewell Kiss was probably the one I got the most enjoyment out of since it had an unusual bit of twang to it, but it’s honestly not something I’d go out of my way to listen to. Part of me wants to give this one star just for wasting my time and giving me nothing worth talking about or revisiting in the future, but I’m trying to be conservative with my ones/fives and it was at least a competently-made album at the end of the day, even if the songwriting was lacking. Highlights: Hometown Farewell Kiss

I wasn’t familiar with Nanci Griffith prior to today, but I found The Last of the True Believers to be a pretty refreshing listen! I think that’s partially due to the music being legitimately good and partially due to it being only the seventh album from a solo female artist that I've been assigned so far. TLOTTB is an instant mood booster – I don’t think I could be sad, angry or anxious while listening to the LP with genuine intention. Griffith’s vocals have a warm, old-timey charm to them, the mixing is great (I love that I can pick out everything happening without much effort) and there are a few really solid instrumental solos that pop up from time to time. If there’s anything preventing me from giving this album five stars, it’s that not every track smashes it out of the park (though there are no truly bad songs here). Its musical direction also isn’t particularly unique – songs like "Landslide" by Fleetwood Mac kept coming to mind as I listened through the LP. It’s a good one, just not quite a top tier album for me! Highlights: The Last of the True Believers, Love at the Five & Dime, Banks of the Pontchartrain, Goin' Gone, One of These Days, Love's Found a Shoulder, The Wing & the Wheel

I've never actually listened to Arcade Fire until today, but I have three quick stories that should help illustrate what my impression of them was before going into Funeral. 1. My first serious girlfriend (who I had a pretty traumatic breakup with) was one of those annoying "hipster" girls who was really into amateur photography and indie rock. Arcade Fire was one of her favorite bands. 2. I once saw a new Arcade Fire CD (can't recall which one – probably The Suburbs or Reflektor based on the timing) on sale for like $1.50 at a Brookstone in Maine and considered grabbing it, but ultimately decided against it – I just had a gut feeling it wasn't going to be my thing. 3. That whole "Paft Dunk" stunt at Coachella back in 2014 (along with Win Bulter dedicating a song to "all the bands at this festival playing real instruments") left a bad taste in my mouth for a long time. I'm sure it was in good fun, but anyone clowning on the kings of French touch presumably weren't putting out music I was going to enjoy. With all that out of the way... I tried to go into Funeral with an open mind, but it was hard not to hear the album as a bunch of pretentious indie rock. The vocals were so unintelligible that I had no idea what I was even hearing half the time. I can't say I genuinely hated it the whole way through, but there also wasn't much I really enjoyed. This is one I'd be okay not coming back to – hopefully one of Arcade Fire's other Book Albums will do more for me. Highlights: Crown of Love, Rebellion (Lies), In the Backseat

There are certainly worse albums I could have gotten on my wife and I’s fifth wedding anniversary. Highlights: A Change Is Gonna Come, Down in the Valley, Shake, My Girl, Wonderful World, (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction

I honestly think this is the most torn I’ve ever been between giving an album one star or two stars. On the one hand, about half of these songs are absolutely torturous – they sound like they could only be enjoyed by that one snarky peer who clowns on everyone else’s music taste, but listens to villain themes from Disney musicals in their free time. On the other hand, there is legitimate musical talent here if you’re willing to listen for it. I also can appreciate how many different styles Tom Waits attempted on this album, even if that destroyed any semblance of cohesion Rain Dogs had. A lot different things could be said about this album, but I think everyone can agree that Tom Waits really went for it here. He took some big swings on Rain Dogs – most of them were misses for me, but it takes balls to make an album like this and I can respect that enough to at least give it two stars. Highlights: Tango till They’re Sore, Big Black Mariah, Time, Union Square

Coming from the electronic music world, the vast majority of my experience with Lana Del Rey prior to today had been the two remixes Cedric Gervais did for her back in 2013 and the several collabs with the Weeknd from his albums. If I’m being honest, I don’t think I had heard a solo original from her in at least 10 years, as the only ones I can distinctly recall ever listening to were "Summertime Sadness," "Born to Die" and "Young and Beautiful." That said, I’m not completely blind to modern music discourse and I know she’s been on a bit of a hot streak with critics on her last few albums – her music never really resonated with me before, but I’ve been wanting to dip my toes back in at some point. I imagined that my first full album from her would be NFR or Sunset Blvd (or maybe even Born to Die, for the nostalgia), but hey, I’ll take Chemtrails! This album made it immediately apparent that Lana’s writing had improved significantly over the previous eight years. Her vocal delivery also came across as more animated than I could recall and the stripped-back instrumentals gave her lots of space to shine. I won’t say every song smashed it out of the park, but Chemtrails over the Country Club had a decent number of highlights and I never found myself disliking what I was listening to. I was a bit torn between giving this one three or four stars, but I think I’ll go with the lower option since I could probably live without hearing it from cover to cover again (though I wouldn’t mind if someone else put it on). Listening to Chemtrails has given me a new sense of urgency to check out some of Lana’s other recent work and she doesn’t have any other Book Albums, so I just might have to listen to those in the next few weeks! Highlights: Chemtrails over the Country Club, Tulsa Jesus Freak, Let Me Love You like a Woman, Yosemite, Breaking Up Slowly, For Free

I had never heard of this album (or Supergrass generally) until about 24 hours ago, so I had next to no expectations going into it. If anything, I might have gone into I Should Coco with a slight bias against it since it’s yet another LP from a relatively obscure English rock band and I haven’t had the best experience with those kinds of Book Albums so far. To my surprise, I Should Coco hooked me almost immediately! The fast-paced energy, punk-influenced vocals and genuine musical proficiency on show all played to my tastes quite well. It also moved at such a fast pace that none of the songs felt like they overstayed their welcome and I never really had the chance to think about whether or not something was working for me – I was just jamming out nonstop! It took things going on like that for about nine tracks before I first got the sense that the album’s quality might be dipping. I actually would consider "She’s So Loose" a pretty solid highlight, but I didn’t like it quite as much as the previous tracks on first listen. "We’re Not Supposed To" came right after – it’s one that I wanted to like (for its weirdness and positive themes), but the whole “we’re not supposed to make love to you, because we know you’re younger” line just didn’t sit quite right with me. The final leg of the album is undoubtedly its weakest, with "Time to Go" being my least favorite on I Should Coco. Fortunately, that one is the shortest song on the LP and "Sofa (Of My Lethargy)" is good enough to save the last third from being completely skippable. There wasn’t a genuinely bad track on the album and I do appreciate the variety the slower songs add, but I do wish some better moments were saved for the end. I was actually quite torn on whether to give I Should Coco four or five stars, but listening through the LP three times today (in different settings, on different listening devices and experiencing different moods) and typing out my feelings here helped me come to the conclusion that it’s a very strong four star album. If it had just one masterpiece-level song and a slightly better final third, it’d be an easy five for me! EDIT: I recently listened to Iron Maiden's debut album for the first time, felt that it was a near-perfect album and strongly considered giving it five stars, but had a nagging feeling that I Should Coco should also be a five if I was going to go that route. I ended up listening to the two back-to-back (along with Blue by Joni Mitchell, the only Book Album I had given a perfect score to) and concluded that this album actually is closer to a five than the Iron Maiden LP, so I'm retroactively upping my score. Leaving the rest of my review (including my highlight picks) intact, though! Highlights: I’d Like to Know, Caught by the Fuzz, Mansize Rooster, Alright, Lose It, Lenny, Strange Ones, Sitting Up Straight, She’s So Loose, Sofa (Of My Lethargy)

There was a brief time in my life when I would tell people that my least favorite genre was classic rock. I've only recently come to the realization that "classic rock" isn't actually a genre, but more of an umbrella term used by radio stations to signal that they primarily play rock & roll from the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s. That said, I actually have enjoyed my fair share of classic rock albums from bands like Pink Floyd, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Alice Cooper (partially thanks to the Generator), but Def Leppard may very well be the perfect representation of what I previously imagined the "genre" to be. In other words, I didn’t particularly enjoy Hysteria. The lyrics on the album haven’t aged well and its music has aged even worse – it’s very much a product of its time and features many of the elements that This Is Spinal Tap mocked three years earlier. However, the biggest issue I have with Hysteria isn’t that it sounds dated – it’s that the songs just aren’t that compelling or memorable. Coming off of Supergrass’ debut album yesterday, this one just sounds so slow and bland by comparison. Even the album’s biggest hit ("Pour Some Sugar on Me") honestly didn’t do much for me. I don’t want to be all negative here, though – after all, two stars isn’t the worst rating I could have given Hysteria. "Women" was a pretty decent opening track and I enjoyed the "Gods of War" foreshadowing that was cleverly hidden in "Rocket." "Gods of War" might be the only track on the album attempting to say something (even if it’s a bit surface level), so I can appreciate that Def Leppard put in some effort to build up to it! All in all, Hysteria wasn’t really my thing and I’m doubtful there will be many glam metal Book Albums I end up rating highly (although Slippery When Wet is likely a shoo-in), but at least now I know which type of “classic rock” I can probably stay away from. We’ll see if Pyromania fares any better! Highlights: Women, Rocket, Gods of War

I’ve mentioned this before, but the last Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds album I had to listen to (Murder Ballads) made for one of the most unpleasant experiences of this challenge so far. Because of that, I was equally disappointed to get another Nick Cave entry so soon and thankful to be getting a second Book Album from him out of the way. My first impressions of The Boatman’s Call are that it has higher lows and lower highs than Murder Ballads – there’s nothing quite on the level of "Henry Lee" or "Where the Wild Roses Grow" on this album, but the worst songs here don’t give me that yucky feeling that many of the cuts on the previous album did. I’d also say the concept (if you can even call it that) of The Boatman’s Call isn’t as obvious or compelling as it was on Murder Ballads, but there are still lots of shared elements across the tracks this time around, from the lyrical themes (lost love, spirituality, etc.) to the instrumental palette to the mood and energy of the songs. Although I still can’t say I’m much into Cave’s voice or songwriting style, I did resonate with this one a bit more than the last. Some moments even came across as lovely and/or touching to me – who would have thought? His music just might be growing on me, ever so slowly. The Boatman’s Call is still a two star album for me, but it’s probably also one that I’d prefer listening to over some others I’ve rated the same (including Murder Ballads, which I’m actually beginning to appreciate in hindsight). Who knows, maybe I’ll enjoy the next Nick Cave assignment even more! Highlights: Into My Arms, There Is a Kingdom, (Are You) the One That I’ve Been Waiting For

Make Yourself is my 80th Book Album this year and the fact that I had never seen its cover art in my life made me question whether or not I had actually heard Incubus’ music before (even though I was pretty sure I had). Seriously, this artwork is one of the most Y2K-looking things I’ve ever seen and it doesn’t fit the vibe of the music at all – it feels like it should be the cover for a vocal trance compilation from 1998. With that out of the way, this was honestly a pretty tough one for me to get through. Brandon Boyd’s vocal style got grating very quickly and his lyrics/melodies came across as pretty amateur – it felt like I was listening to Scott Stapp sing freestyle over early Linkin Park instrumentals. The only track that felt like it had legs on the songwriting front was "Drive," which was understandably the album’s biggest hit. The band backing Boyd actually came across as quite solid to me – not amazing, but perfectly functional and occasionally proficient. One of my favorite tracks on Make Yourself was "Battlestar Scralatchtica" (terrible name for a song), where the band and DJ basically just jam/scratch for 3+ minutes. Songs like "Nowhere Fast" also have some really interesting things going on in the instrumental department, which I definitely appreciated. That said, even good instrumentals can’t make annoying vocals and sucky songwriting significantly more tolerable. I was actually considering giving this album one star until "Drive" came on and things sort of started to pick up after that... just not enough to bump it higher than two stars. It’s not a top 1000 LP of all time, that’s for sure. Highlights: Nowhere Fast, Drive, Battlestar Scralatchtica, Pardon Me, Out from Under

It only took rating and reviewing 80 albums, but I've finally arrived at my first album from one of the artists I've been most excited to finally check out: Prince. I knew next to nothing about Prince before today, outside the fact that he had a guitar shaped like his logo, that his performance at Super Bowl XLI is often considered one of the best (if not, THE best) halftime shows of all time and that people gas up his music as if he were the second coming of Christ. I haven't even heard "Purple Rain" before – at least, not to my knowledge. As you can imagine, I didn't know much about Sign o' the Times going into it. I remember a YouTuber I follow saying that Harry Styles' "Sign of the Times" reminded him of the title track (which, upon actually hearing the song, I don't agree with at all), but that's pretty much it. I hate to say it, but this honestly wasn't the best first impression of Prince's music. It's all over the place tonally and stylistically, going from a slow song about the unfortunate state of the world to an upbeat song about making the most out of life to a dance track for house parties in its first 15 minutes. I found out in my research for this album that it features several songs from Prince's scrapped Crystal Ball album (which itself featured songs written for his canceled Camille album) and yeah, that completely tracks. It certainly comes across as a project with multiple visions somewhat crammed together – there's even a live recording near the end of the tracklist, for some reason. On a more positive note, Sign o' the Times ended up being more electronic-influenced than I expected, which was a pleasant surprise. Every track I previously alluded to actually ended up being a highlight of my first listen and I even ended up listening to a couple of them (but not the whole thing) a second time. Listening through the album also made me realize Prince made that song that goes "I just want your extra time and your... kiss," which is one that I enjoy. All in all, I can appreciate the musicality and some of the ideas present on SOTT, but the album is too long and too all over the place to really make for something I'd want to revisit. I wouldn't necessarily be annoyed if someone put it on, but I don't think I'd listen to any of these songs recreationally (outside of "Housequake" and possibly "Play in the Sunshine"). It seems like the 1001 Albums Generator community liked this Prince album the least of the bunch though, so I'm nonetheless looking forward to checking out his other two entries! Highlights: Sign o' the Times, Play in the Sunshine, Housequake, The Ballad of Dorothy Parker, Starfish and Coffee, Strange Relationship, I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man, It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night

Paul McCartney's best-selling non-Beatles album right after my first Prince album? You're being awfully generous, Generator – where was this kind of energy when I got Mike Ladd, the The, Echo & the Bunnymen and Marianne Faithfull all in the span of a week? Band on the Run is the first Beatles-related album that I've been assigned and I'm not unhappy about it! Despite the fact that I've heard the title track on this album at least once or twice, I actually had no idea that Paul McCartney was in a band called Wings with his wife Linda. I'm no Beatles historian, but I feel like that should have come up at some point in my life! This album rules – there's really no way around it. Anyone dismissing McCartney's early "solo" material as bland or lacking depth really ought to get their ears checked. It's fun, it's clever, it's catchy, it's well-composed and it's even a little experimental at points. The title track and the closing track ("Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five") are the perfect example of this, with their various musical movements that help the songs keep evolving and stay interesting – the latter even brings it all back to the beginning with a snippet of "Band on the Run." There's not a bad track here, if I'm being honest! Not every tune completely blew my mind, but it all coalesced into a very enjoyable 41 minutes and I'd definitely listen to the full thing again. For probably the first time in my life, I'm genuinely excited to properly dive into some Beatles albums. Thanks Paul McCartney and Wings! Highlights: Band on the Run, Jet, Mrs. Vandebilt, Mamunia, Picasso’s Last Words (Drink to Me), Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five

Ah, another post-Beatles album from Paul McCartney! It feels like just yesterday I was rating/reviewing Band on the Run… oh wait. Honestly, McCartney’s debut solo album is nothing to write home about. He wrote much better songs before & after this and it’s not a particular interesting shift away from the Beatles either. It’s just fine. A lot of my favorite tracks weirdly ended up being the shorter instrumental cuts that are peppered throughout the tracklist – they just hit a sweet spot for me compositionally that the others rarely do. Still excited to dig further into the Beatles’ discography (as well as any notable solo work from the other members), but I’ve got a slightly worse impression of McCartney’s music after listening through this one. Band on the Run is still great though! Highlights: Valentine Day, Hot as Sun / Glasses, Junk, Oo You, Momma Miss America, Singalong Junk, Maybe I’m Amazed

Two weeks ago, I decided to take a temporary break from the Generator so that I could focus on familiarizing myself with the music for my church’s Christmas cantata (which I’m doing drums for). Knowing that Billy Joel’s The Stranger would be waiting for me on the other side of the break was very motivating – he was an artist I only knew a few songs from, but they were almost all songs I greatly enjoyed and I was interested to see how his style would translate into an album format! So, how did I enjoy the Piano Man’s sole Book Album? I suppose my opinion is slightly biased since I knew that “Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song)” and “Only the Good Die Young” were certified bops going into The Stranger, but I found it to be a pretty enjoyable listen! Most of the other tracks didn’t quite reach the same heights of those two, but I felt like the B-sides were more memorable than they were on comparable pop rock albums (such as Elton John’s Madman Across the Water). Admittedly, looking at some of The Stranger’s reviews on here has me scratching my head a bit. I can’t tell if people are rating this album low just to be contrarian or if they genuinely prefer music without a shred of commercial appeal, but I feel like rating it any lower than three stars is denying reality. It’s not perfect, but there’s a reason this music continues to cut through the noise almost 50 years later – Billy Joel is a brilliant songwriter and The Stranger sees him right in his element. Highlights: Movin’ Out (Anthony’s Song), The Stranger, Scenes from an Italian Restaurant, Vienna, Only the Good Die Young, Get It Right the First Time, Everybody Has a Dream

At Newport 1960 was one of the first 25 albums I had to listen to for this challenge and I can’t say it was a favorite – there wasn’t a whole lot of variety on show and I didn’t find its “live” aspect to be particularly compelling. That said, I want to like Muddy Waters and the experience certainly wasn’t awful last time around, so I was happy to get a proper studio album from him as today’s assignment! Unfortunately, I think I’m going to have to throw in the towel and take the L because Hard Again still isn’t really doing it for me. I hate to be the guy who doesn’t “get” an artist as beloved and influential as Muddy Waters, but I can’t make myself love an artist whose entire output I’ve heard is the same 3-4 formulas reused over and over. There are nine tracks on Hard Again and seven of them are twelve-bar blues. These songs are fine (perhaps even great) in a vacuum, but hearing one after another in an album format gets old fast. “Bus Driver” felt like a highlight until I heard the nearly-identical “Jealous Hearted Man” two tracks later and I couldn’t really connect with the rest of the twelve-bar tracks after that point. I truly mean no disrespect to Muddy and his influence on popular music, but legacy only elevates my enjoyment so much and I have to judge Hard Again by the same metrics as any other album. Any LP where 75% of the material is the same genre/structure/progression is probably not going to be one I’m eager to jump back into, even if listening through it was generally a positive experience. Highlights: Mannish Boy, I Can’t Be Satisfied

You know, when I started this challenge, I didn't realize I was committing to listening through nine different Neil Young albums. Not that it would have made much of a difference (as I probably would have done the 1001 Albums list either way), but it would have been nice to know that almost 1% of all the Book Albums were from a guy who sings like that. Jokes aside, Ragged Glory is my second Neil Young & Crazy Horse album and I have to agree with the Generator community on this one – it's not as good as Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (which itself is worse than Déjà Vu). There were a couple solid cuts and I didn't outright hate anything on the album, but it's certainly not something I'm going to willingly put on during my leisure time. Listening to Ragged Glory felt like overhearing a local rock band (comprised of middle-aged white dudes) at the pub while scarfing down an overpriced burger and tater tots – not the most unpleasant experience I can imagine, but it certainly doesn't evoke compelling art. This is fortunately Neil Young's lowest rated Book Album, so I'm hopeful that there are at least one or two gems among the six that remain! Highlights: Days That Used to Be, Love and Only Love

This is my third Bob Dylan album of this challenge so far and it’s a bit of a weird one – it was released after all of his other Book Albums, but was recorded a month before Blonde on Blonde came out (despite featuring live versions of several songs from that LP) and it wasn’t actually recorded at the Royal Albert Hall as the title implies. That said, I honestly don’t have a ton to say about Live 1966. It’s a decent live album and I like how much its sound shifts from disc to disc, but I wouldn’t exactly call it “essential listening.” I guess it’s also cool to hear Bob doing his thing in a live setting and coming across pretty much identical to the way he sounds in his studio recordings (not that I found that particularly surprising). Despite the occasionally awkward cuts and mixing on the second disc, listening to him perform with the Hawks actually has me quite excited to eventually hear a full-on rock album from him (assuming such a thing exists)! Bob Dylan’s voice over rowdy electric instruments just tickles my brain in a completely new way. Highlights: Fourth Time Around, It’s All Over Now Baby Blue, Mr. Tambourine Man, Tell Me Momma, I Don’t Believe You, Baby Let Me Follow You Down, Ballad of a Thin Man

Upon seeing that Van Halen's 1984 was my listening assignment for today, I came to a sudden realization that the names of a lot of the "classic rock" bands from the '70s & '80s have the same exact cadence... Led Zeppelin, Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, Van Halen. This might seem like a completely inconsequential thing, but I honestly think it might be one of the reasons I struggled to get into this era of rock for so long – I couldn't keep the artist names straight in my head and therefore couldn't remember which acts were making music I actually liked. Anyway, 1984 was alright. I liked the album a little bit more than Def Leppard's Hysteria and appreciated that it was only about half the length. "Jump" has that iconic keyboard riff, which (despite it not offering up much else) made it a highlight of the album for me. "Hot for Teacher" is unfortunately one of the better cuts on the LP – the lyrics have aged like milk, but it's one of the more technically impressive songs I've heard from this era. I also found myself nodding along to "Girl Gone Bad," which surprisingly seems to have been streamed quite a bit less than most of the other tracks. I feel a little bad giving this album two stars considering some of the company it'll be among, but it's just not quite as interesting/memorable as a lot of the albums I've given threes to and I'd be more annoyed than not if someone subjected me to it from front to back. Again, I just don't think hair metal is my cup of tea – these albums are likely going to continue getting low scores from me until I hear something that truly breaks the mold. Highlights: Jump, Hot for Teacher, Girl Gone Bad

I moved to Washington a little over 10 years ago and I've surprisingly only heard the name "Fleet Foxes" come up two or three times since – certainly not enough to pique my curiosity and make me dive into the Seattle band's music. That said, I was happy to finally have an excuse to check them out and went into their self-titled debut album with an open mind! I honestly can't think of a ton to say about this one. It wasn't unpleasant to listen through, but the songs rarely spoke to me. I'd certainly prefer listening to more of this over some of the "stomp clap hey" indie acts of the early 2010s and the sense of melody/harmony came across quite well (reminded me a little bit of Simon & Garfunkel and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young), which is probably the best thing I can say about it! Spotify auto-played "Helplessness Blues" after it ended and that made me kind of wish that song were this album's closer. Weirdly, the album also made me think about how far Imagine Dragons has gone downhill since their first album – probably because Robin Pecknold has similar vocal inflections to Dan Reynolds here and there. Perhaps they'd be making albums more similar to this one if "It's Time" ended up being Night Visions' biggest hit? How wonderful that we get to live in the timeline where "Believer" has over 3.5 billion streams. Sigh... Highlights: Ragged Wood, Quiet Houses, Your Protector, Blue Ridge Mountains

Someone should have told Pentangle about Ananda Shankar because they would have absolutely cooked together. Highlights: Light Flight, Springtime Promises, Lyke-Wake Dirge, Train Song, The Cuckoo, House Carpenter

I suppose I should have expected that a David Bowie LP would be coming sooner rather than later – the odds of one of his nine Book Albums showing up within the first 100 generations were greater than 50% and I'm currently at #91. Even so, the moment caught me by surprise on an otherwise unassuming Sunday! Expectations are an interesting thing because I feel like they can make or break a listening experience. I'm much more likely to positively rate an album that I had an unexpectedly good time with (take yesterday's Pentangle album, for example) than an album I expected to love from the get-go. Case in point, Station to Station is a good listen that suffered under the weight of it being my first David Bowie album. I've been waiting for this moment for such a long time and have seen so much praise thrown Bowie's way that no LP was ever going to live up to what I imagined it would be – the 38 minutes of music came & went and I just had an overwhelming feeling of "yeah, that was decent." I probably should have learned my lesson after I had a similar experience with Prince's Sign o' the Times just a few weeks ago, but I suppose I can't control the way my brain processes these things. At the same time, I could mentally fall back on that one being Prince's lowest-rated Book Album and that's not the case here – only two of Bowie's remaining eight are rated higher than this one. If there's a positive takeaway to all of this, it's that Station to Station isn't considered one of David Bowie's career-defining albums outside of this community (at least, not to my knowledge) – I don't see it being talked about nearly as much as as his first three book albums. If the Generator had given me Ziggy Stardust first and I felt the same way I do now, that might have seriously taken the wind out of my sails. If STS had to be sacrificed in order to recalibrate my expectations for my next Bowie album, I suppose it was a worthy cause! Highlights: Station to Station, Golden Years, Stay

Oh boy, my first Led Zeppelin album the day after my first David Bowie album? Here goes nothing, I guess. No pressure... At first, my experience with Physical Graffiti was pretty similar to that of Sign o’ the Times and Station to Station – the songs definitely weren’t bad, but the weight of my expectations was working against the LP and I spent most of my listen thinking “Really? This is what people are all hyped up about?” When “Kashmir” came on though, something crazy happened – I immediately recognized that riff and locked in. After that point, it felt like Led Zeppelin had no interest in slowing down and I was stuck on the ride whether I wanted to be or not. Fortunately, I continued to enjoy the songs on Physical Graffiti’s second disc almost as much as “Kashmir,” with almost every track being a highlight for me (despite the disc’s constantly shifting sound/style). Even the weaker cuts weren’t bad – they just didn’t quite reach the same heights as the others. I’ll also admit that I ended up enjoying the first disc more after hearing the second (though my highlights remained the same). I almost feel like the discs should have been swapped, as “In the Light” would have made for a great introduction and “Kashmir” would have been an amazing closer to the album. Overall, Physical Graffiti is among the best “classic rock” Book Albums I’ve heard so far – it might be the only one that truly rivals Lynyrd Skynyrd’s sole entry and it easily surpasses anything I’ve listened to from Def Leppard or Van Halen. I’m quite excited to dig into the rest of Led Zeppelin’s material (particularly LZ4), considering this one has their LOWEST average rating! Highlights: Custard Pie, In My Time of Dying, Trampled Under Foot, Kashmir, In the Light, Down by the Seaside, Ten Years Gone, Night Flight, The Wanton Song, Boogie with Stu, Sick Again

I've made a habit of checking the community reviews/ratings before listening to each Book Album (mostly to help mentally prepare myself for whatever I'm about to listen to) and the first thing I noticed on the page for The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter was how low the LP's rating was – seemingly lower than any album I've been assigned so far. I jumped over to the Global Stats page and sure enough, there THBD was... #8 on the Lowest Rated Albums list. As much as I'd love to be contrarian and say something like "The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter is actually really good, you guys just don't get it," it wouldn't come from a genuine place – this was a pretty unpleasant listen for me. It's got a lot of the right ingredients for a good folk album, but the way everything comes together just doesn't work at all. I know not all art is meant to make you feel good, but I don't think boredom and discomfort is what they were going for here. "Waltz of the New Moon" was one that didn't irritate me as much as the others, but I also wouldn't call it a highlight – compared to some of the folk this challenge has exposed me to, it's still not very good. Maybe if I hadn't gotten Basket of Light just a few days ago I'd feel slightly more positive about The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter, but it just sounds so weak coming off of such a solid Pentangle album. While it's certainly not the worst LP I've ever heard, the Incredible String Band's sole Book Album absolutely fits the criteria I've set for a one star rating. Marianne Faithfull is probably tired of being down in the one star club by her lonesome, so I'm sure she'll appreciate having ISB (not to be confused with IBS) there to accompany her! Good riddance. Highlights: N/A

I had never actually heard of Everything but the Girl prior to today, but seeing "electronica" in this album's genre tags definitely made me perk up! Although I'm mainly doing this challenge to hear albums/artists/genres that have historically been blind spots for me, it's always a pleasure getting to listen to some new electronic-influenced music – undoubtedly one of the more underserved niches here. Walking Wounded was an interesting one to begin my EBTG journey with because it seems to be something of a transitional album for the duo – they started to play with more electronic elements after Todd Terry's "Missing" remix became a massive hit, but they also weren't yet making full-on club music (like they would on 1999's Temperamental). The result is a unique LP that feels like it has one foot in each camp and it sort of works! The opener "Before Today" is an excellent example of what Walking Wounded sounds like at its best – it instantly hooked me with its chopped-up breakbeats, soulful vocals and atmospheric keys. The title track and "Good Cop Bad Cop" hit similar notes, to great effect. "Wrong" is a more straightforward house cut, but is a quality tune nonetheless. On the opposite end of the spectrum, you've got tracks like "The Heart Remains a Child" and "Mirrorball," which aren't bad per se, but don't do much to stand out from the plethora of '90s soft pop available. I'm certainly not the first person to bring this up, but EBTG's influence on a certain English trio is strongly felt here – I felt like I was listening to the xx for like half of Walking Wounded's running length and this album came out 13 years before the trio even started releasing music. Romy's vocals are extremely similar to Tracey Thorn's, so if you're a big fan of this album, her dance-influenced solo album Mid Air is a must-listen. Overall, Everything but the Girl's ninth studio album is solid – it's not quite consistent enough for me to give it a four star rating, but it feels like a strong three with a handful of songs I'd be happy to come back to! The two remixes at the end were a nice touch as well, since remixes rarely ever show up on core album tracklists like this (though these ones honestly came across as slightly weaker versions of the original tracks to me). Highlights: Before Today, Wrong, Walking Wounded, Big Deal, Good Cop Bad Cop

I think I audibly sighed when I finished rating yesterday's album and saw that I'd be listening to another Arcade Fire LP just a few weeks after getting Funeral. I was fully prepared to get a second heaping dose of pretentious indie rock from the guys who thought they were being clever by clowning on Daft Punk at Coachella 2014. However, in the weirdest twist of fate, Neon Bible ended up actually being pretty good! There are definitely some duds here & there and it's a bit more "stomp clap hey" than I would like at points, but there's some genuinely good music here and it's a lot more approachable than I expected it to be – more than half the songs ended up being highlights on my first listen. Outside my enjoyment of the songs individually, I also just feel like this LP paints a better picture than the previous one. The title, lyric themes, instrumental choices and recording location work in complete harmony together to create a one-of-a-kind album that I can definitely see myself coming back to (even if this style isn't usually my cup of tea). Hopefully The Suburbs ends up being just as good! Highlights: Keep the Car Running, Intervention, Bad Vibrations, Ocean of Noise, The Well and the Lighthouse, (Antichrist Television Blues), No Cars Go, My Body Is a Cage

I feel kind of bad giving this one a lower score since Dusty Springfield is only the ninth solo female artist I've gotten, but I honestly wouldn't feel right rating such an unremarkable covers album higher than two stars. A Girl Called Dusty surely isn't awful, but I have no idea what it's doing here – there's not a single original on the LP (unless you want to include "Nothing," which doesn't appear to have been previously recorded by another artist) and Dusty generally doesn't make up for that with powerhouse vocals or particularly exceptional arrangements. Even my highlight picks were kind of arbitrary – I only mildly preferred them to the other tracks. Highlights: You Don't Own Me, When the Love Light Stars Shining thru His Eyes, Twenty-Four Hours from Tulsa, Anyone Who Had a Heart, Don't You Know

When I listened to Station to Station for the first time on Sunday, I certainly didn’t anticipate that my week would be ending off with David Bowie’s most iconic album! Don’t get me wrong, I’m not mad about it – I’m just surprised to be getting two Bowie albums in the same week when it took listening to 90 albums before I even got the first one. Then again, I got two Paul McCartney albums back-to-back just a few weeks ago, so I suppose these occurrences are bound to happen every now and again. Where do I even begin with Ziggy Stardust? I suppose I’ll just establish that I found the album to be quite good, despite the crushing weight of my expectations (which probably would have been even higher if I hadn’t just come off of a fairly middle-of-the-road David Bowie album)! It’s got a ton of great songs, including the all-time classic “Starman” and the lore-rich “Moonage Daydream.” It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that I genuinely enjoyed the album from start to finish. At the same time, I do feel like there’s a discrepancy between the Ziggy Stardust that has lived in the minds of longtime fans and the album I just listened to. People talk about The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars as if it’s this perfectly-executed rock opera that tells the tragic story of an intergalactic rockstar who is destined to herald the Earth’s savior, but ultimately succumbs to the weight of his own ego and popularity. It’s a fair assessment, but only to a certain extent. In my experience, the album was more just a collection of good songs, many of which are loosely tied together through its lore in a somewhat non-sequential way. I did enjoy Ziggy Stardust more than most Book Albums (so far, anyway), but I honestly got more out of the album’s narrative from reading Genius annotations and Wikipedia summaries than from the actual lyrics of the project. I reckon the novelty of David Bowie making a rock opera centered around a character he conceived and then performing on tour as that character for over a year probably overinflated how highly people think of this album. Highlights: Five Years, Soul Love, Moonage Daydream, Starman, It Ain’t Easy, Lady Stardust, Hang on to Yourself, Suffragette City, Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide

Part of me feels like I’ve committed some unwritten sin by listening to an album from the Last Shadow Puppets before one from Arctic Monkeys, but I suppose that’s the luck of the draw. The Age of the Understatement was a pretty decent listen – I can appreciate that Alex Turner & Miles Kane went for a very specific sound and stuck with it, even if that sound got a bit tiring by the end. A few cuts on this album (especially the title track) remind me a lot of “Knights of Cydonia” by Muse. People like to clown of Muse for being Walmart Radiohead or whatever, but I feel like The Age of Understatement is proof that they’ve had at least a LITTLE influence on popular music. Highlights: The Age of the Understatement, Standing Next to Me, The Chamber, Only the Truth

Another Bowie album just two days after Ziggy Stardust? Being awfully generous, aren’t we? It was cool to finally give “Heroes” a spin, as The Next Day was the first David Bowie album I ever heard about and I always wondered why it had a second title that was crossed out. I only later learned that he had a different album called “Heroes” that had its art repurposed for The Next Day and I’m still not entirely sure why, even after reading up about it – maybe it’ll make more sense once I actually listen to the latter. Coming off of The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, “Heroes” kinda comes across like a contractual obligation. I know it’s not, but it sounds like a collection of singles that Bowie didn’t know how to package as an album, so he just made a hard pivot into ambient instrumental music during the second half to fill space. I wish I liked songs like “Sense of Doubt” and “Moss Garden” more, but they just don’t add anything to the album experience for me. “Heroes” certainly isn’t a bad listen – it’s got a lot of great tunes (some of which feel very proto-1980s) and I enjoyed the overall experience more than Station to Station, but I’m struggling to understand the vision here. Again, maybe Bowie’s 2013 followup will add some context and give me a greater appreciation of this project! Highlights: Beauty and the Beast, Joe the Lion, Blackout, Neuköln, The Secret Life of Arabia

I was SO close to getting Ziggy Stardust as my 100th album, but I suppose I can settle for another Everything but the Girl LP to fill the slot – Walking Wounded was a fairly pleasant surprise and I've been curious to hear what the duo sounded like before they started incorporating electronic elements into their sound! While I wouldn't call Idlewild an unpleasant listen, I would say its sound has aged like milk compared to Walking Wounded. The lyrical storytelling is decent and Tracey Thorn remains a compelling vocalist, but those aspects aren't worth sitting through 45 minutes of music this dull and Xennial-coded. Highlights: These Early Days, The Night I Heard Caruso Sing

I don’t have much to say about this one, to be honest! It’s not particularly remarkable, but also not a bad listen by any means – there are some fun songs and a few standout guitar solos peppered in the tracklist. Definitely wouldn’t mind getting another Eric Clapton assignment soon! Highlights: Sunshine of Your Love, World of Pain, Tales of Brave Ulysses, SWLABR, Mother’s Lament

This album was my first experience with Sonic Youth and I genuinely enjoyed it! It's got a good balance of melody, energy and noise, while still making sure things feel dynamic and varied. I want to know what the guy who called it "the epitome of art for art's sake" thinks about Nick Cave or Marianne Faithfull – I personally found Goo to be much more approachable. Highlights: Dirty Boots, Tunic (Song for Karen), Mary-Christ, Kool Thing, Disappearer, Cinderella's Big Score, Titanium Expose

I’m a 28-year-old dance music fan, but this challenge has somehow turned me into a man who gets excited every time I get to listen to a new Simon & Garfunkel album. I even replayed “Scarborough Fair” in preparation for today’s assignment and it was just as good as I had remembered! Bookends was an interesting one. I went into the LP knowing it was the one with “Mrs. Robinson” on it, but not much else. Ultimately, the album is kind of all over the place – there were certain songs that had me thinking “I can’t believe there was music this good in 1968” and others I would have been fine to skip. It feels like Simon & Garfunkel had grand ambitions with this one and the music often lives up to that, but the structure and flow of it all just doesn’t quite work for me. “Voices of Old People” is probably the best example of what I mean – it sounds interesting on paper, but comes out of nowhere and does little to actually enhance the album listening experience. Although I found Bookends to be an overall weaker album than Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, its highlights still had some of the best quality songwriting I’ve heard during this challenge so far and I’m still very much looking forward to my next Simon & Garfunkel experience! Highlights: Save the Life of My Child, America, Old Friends, Fakin’ It, Mrs. Robinson, A Hazy Shade of Winter

Going to come back to this one when I have a chance to actually write what I want to say! Highlights: Dy-Na-Mi-Tee, Put Him Out, Brother, It Takes More (Bloodshy Main Mix), Krazy Krush, Get Up Stand Up

Again, I completely understand how some people think this era of soul is peak, but it just doesn't speak to me in the same way a lot of other music (including neo-soul) does. I did like this album more than Al Green's Let's Stay Together and "Respect" is an absolute bop, but that's not quite enough to push I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You into four star territory for me. Highlights: Respect, Don't Let Me Lose This Dream, Good Times, Save Me, A Change Is Gonna Come

Many of my all-time favorite LPs (Ocean Eyes by Owl City, Immersion by Pendulum, Everything by Lido, vertigo by EDEN, etc.) have blue color schemes, so its a funny coincidence that I’m giving my first five to yet another “blue album” that is literally named Blue! One of my biggest hopes for this challenge was that the first album I’d give five stars to would be an album that I hadn’t heard before. Now 100+ albums deep into this thing, that hope was definitely starting to fade – I was kinda just waiting for a personal favorite from Justice or Kendrick Lamar to show up so I could finally get it out of the way. My expectations for Blue were fairly high, but it easily cleared them! Not because it’s some crazy, conceptual, deconstructed art-folk album, but because it’s just one great song after another. I love that it’s fairly short, uncomplicated and never loses its emphasis on Mitchell’s excellent vocals & songwriting. While Blue isn’t my “thing” in the same way that albums like Music for the Masses or Ray of Light or I Should Coco have been, it’s the first Book Album where almost nothing it could have done differently would have made me like it more – it’s simply perfect. Highlights: ALL OF ‘EM

I wasn't quite ready for this jelly. Highlights: Survivor, Independent Women Pt. II, Emotion, The Story of Beauty

This album has a lot of interesting, compelling musicality to it and I can hear how it influenced a lot of records I enjoy, so I probably would have given it a four if I could make out what’s going on half the time. I get that the blurry, washed-out mixing is a stylistic choice, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. Highlights: Only Shallow, Loomer, When You Sleep, Come In Alone, Soon

Outside of it being produced by a convicted murderer, A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector is a solid holiday compilation! I appreciate the Generator giving it to me on Christmas, even if it somewhat broke the illusion of this whole thing being randomized. There are loads of Christmas classics on this thing and many of them (especially the ones from the Ronettes) are arguably the definitive versions of the songs. Darlene Love also stood out in almost all of her appearances, including “A Marshmallow World,” which I had never heard before – one of the current pop girlies should bring that one back! Ultimately, it’s not my favorite holiday album ever and I can’t really see myself putting it into regular rotation around this time of year, but I’m glad it’s on the list – Christmas music deserves some attention from critics too. Highlights: White Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus Is Coming to Town, Sleigh Ride, Marshmallow World, Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)

I mildly got into Massive Attack earlier this year after a client recommended them to me, so I was pretty stoked to have an excuse to finally check out their debut album! Blue Lines certainly wasn’t terrible and I appreciate that it’s here for its influence on trip hop (a genre I do tend to enjoy), but it honestly doesn’t hold up. Some of the vocal performances are genuinely awful and I spent most of my listen wishing I was listening to Mezzanine instead. I can’t help but wonder what these editors were thinking with some of these picks. Again, I do get the logic in including an album that serves as a genre’s genesis, but why bother doing that when the same artist’s best-selling (and basically faultless) LP is omitted? Highlights: Blue Lines, Five Man Army, Unfinished Sympathy, Lately

Boy in da Corner was my first grime album and I enjoyed it a fair bit! I was on the fence at first, but Dizee Rascal just kept reeling me in with solid flows and unique beats. I was surprised to find several proto-dubstep tracks (such as “Stop Dat,” “I Luv U” and “Seems 2 Be”), many of which could honestly hold their ground next to any number of UK revival tunes being released today. There were a couple of notable stinkers (“Jezebel” certainly hasn’t aged well) and the LP felt slightly bloated, but I’d say most of the tracks that I didn’t consider to be highlights were still perfectly listenable. Overall, Boy in da Corner is a worthy addition to my four star club and just might be one that I look out for at record stores to potentially add to my CD collection! Highlights: Stop Dat, I Luv U, Hold Ya Mouf, Round We Go, Jus’ a Rascal, Wot U On?, Seems 2 Be, Live O

Not exactly my cup of tea as far as punk goes, but these guys can SHRED. Highlights: Rise Above, Six Pack, Thirsty and Miserable, Police Story, Depression, Damaged II

Getting Channel Orange today felt like a legendary pull because Frank Ocean is one of those artists that people my age can’t shut up about and I’ve never actually listened his debut album. My one real experience with Mr. Hotdog Water was checking out Blonde right after it came out, thinking to myself “yeah, that was pretty good” and then never coming back to it again. The tune he did with Calvin Harris was cool too, I guess. This one’s decent – I feel like it gets WAY more hype than it deserves, but it did have its moments (though none of its highlights ever reached “loved” territory for me) and I can respect how he tried to bring everything together in a conceptual way, even if the execution wasn’t fully there for me. Probably not an album I’ll ever listen to from front to back again, but I’m glad I finally got to check it off the list! Highlights: Sweet Life, Super Rich Kids, Pyramids, Lost, Monks, Pink Matter

This album deserves massive props for its seamlessness – I can’t say I’ve ever heard an album in this vein do such a great job of blurring the lines where tracks end/begin. The instrumental performances are great as well! Not to say Eryka Badu isn’t a good singer, but the instrumentals are definitely a cut above. Mama’s Gun would have easily been a four if it were 20-25 minutes shorter. I started to lose steam the closer the LP got to the hour mark and it also seemed like it was spinning its wheels around that point. Not to say there aren’t good moments toward the end, but the songs just don’t have the same spunk and energy that they did during the first half. Highlights: Penitentiary Philosophy, My Life, Cleva, Booty, A.D. 2000

Today I learned that “Don’t push me ‘cause I’m close to the edge” is not originally from Happy Feet. Highlights: She’s Fresh, It’s Nasty, Dreamin’, The Message

In some ways, Black Metal is one of those albums where having the actual 1001 Albums book on hand would have been helpful – Robert Dimery apparently described Black Metal as the "perfect parody" and its inclusion seems to be due to Venom accidentally kickstarting a much darker wave of Norwegian metal with this album, despite the fact that they weren't actually Satanists themselves. On the other hand, knowing that the whole "Lucifer is my master" shtick was theatrical and not done in earnest doesn't make the music much easier to listen to. I can't stand the raspy, atonal vocals or the one-note lyrics, no matter how much of it is played for irony. The guitar work is solid all around and there were a couple cuts I thought were okay, but there's not much else here I'd willingly subject myself to a second time. I also just want to point out how funny the final track is – it's a preview of the intro of the first track from Venom's next album, which just slowly fades out like two minutes in. I can't imagine buying this LP in 1982, hearing this at the end and having to wait nearly two years to hear the full song (which is almost 20 minutes long). Not sure if it was an intentional joke on Venom's part or not, but it got a chuckle out of me! Highlights: Raise the Dead, Teacher's Pet

Trying to find a blues album that isn't super samey has been a real challenge. So has been trying to find a live album that is both immersive and actually adds something to the music that the studio versions don't. For the most part, B.B. King's Live at the Regal is an answer to both of those struggles! King's generational voice and wicked backing band, paired with memorable audience reactions (see "How Blue Can You Get?" for some great ones) make this one an absolute must-listen, even if blues isn't your thing. You really feel like you're there in that moment, with a drink in your hand and the scent of smoke in the air. There is a hint of redundancy from track to track, but I honestly think this is about as much variety as an artist can possibly muster while still keeping everything in the realm of blues. The bigger issue I had was that the track-to-track transitions kind of take a nosedive after "Please Love Me." I get why there's a fade out halfway through the tracklist (for vinyl-flipping purposes), but what's up with the weird cuts between "Worry, Worry," "Woke up This Morning" and "You Done Lost Your Good Thing Now"? I'm sure there's a valid explanation, but those moments definitely broke the illusion of experiencing a real live show a few times. Highlights: Every Day I Have the Blues, Sweet Little Angel, It's My Own Fault, How Blue Can You Get, Please Love Me, You Upset Me Baby, Help the Poor

I had never listened to an album from the Rolling Stones before today, believe it or not! The closest thing I had to a genuine experience with the band in the past was that I watched the 12-12-12 Concert (in which the Stones performed "You Got Me Rocking" and "Jumpin' Jack Flash") on TV and bought the live album version on CD. I'm sure I heard "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" at some point as well, but I couldn't tell you exactly when or if it had even a modicum of impact on my music taste. Now I've written about the weight of expectations before, but that wasn't as much of a problem with Sticky Fingers for some reason – probably because modern critics and fans don't seem to worship the Rolling Stones to the same degree as Prince or Bowie. Either way, it seems like this was a good place to officially start my journey with the band (seeing as Sticky Fingers is their highest-rated album by the 1001 Albums Generator community)! I don't get to say this very often, but I got to listen to a near-perfect album today. Much like my first five (Joni Mitchell's Blue), Sticky Fingers isn't some mind-blowing conceptual work of art – it's just one great song after the next. There were a couple tunes I didn't immensely care for and the music generally didn't strike me as one-of-a-kind in the same way a lot of my favorites do, but this is pretty much as good as rock and roll gets for me. Definitely looking forward to more Rolling Stones in the future! Highlights: Brown Sugar, Sway, Wild Horses, Can't You Hear Me Knocking, B**ch, I Got the Blues, Sister Morphine, Dead Flowers

It’s wild to think that I had never listened to a David Bowie album just two months ago and now I’ve knocked out nearly half of his Book Albums. Probably about time to start working my way through the Beatles’ discography, eh? Low was an interesting listen for me because, although it has a very similar structure to “Heroes” and is part of the same trilogy, my feelings about it are somewhat inverted – whereas “Heroes” felt like a collection of singles with an unnecessary instrumental detour in the back half, its predecessor comes across as more authentic in its approach. Perhaps more than any other Bowie LP I’ve listened to (including Ziggy Stardust), Low has a very specific sonic identity. It sounds weird and alien and psychedelic (sometimes to the point of annoyance), but it never loses that core sound. The ambient tracks especially feel like they’re feeding into that identity and ended up being the majority of the album’s highlights for me. Overall, I reckon Low has higher lows and lower highs than “Heroes”, but its commitment to a singular vision elevates it above most of the David Bowie LPs I’ve heard so far (Ziggy Stardust is still handily the top dog in my book). Big up Brian Eno! Highlights: Speed of Life, Sound and Vision, Always Crashing in the Same Car, Warszawa, Art Decade, Weeping Well, Subterraneans

Are You Experienced was my first JHE (and Jimi Hendrix at large) album, as well as my second “Highest Rated” album since I began this journey. Much like Ziggy Stardust, I enjoyed it quite a bit and I get the hype, but I don’t personally think it’s a five. Don’t get me wrong – the highlights are great and there are lots of them to be found. There are bits of solid songwriting, great vocals and legendary guitar work across a wide spectrum of rock & roll here. I’d gladly revisit Are You Experienced again, no doubt about that! On the other hand, the full album is longer than it needs to be and the inconsistent mixing got kind of annoying from time to time. For me, a five needs to have no skips and I can’t earnestly see myself getting giddy about coming back to tracks like “51st Anniversary” when there are no fewer than 12 other ones on AYE I’d rather listen to. I’m aware that the version I listened to on Spotify was actually the North American CD reissue from 1997, but the original UK edition (which is admittedly like 20 minutes shorter) also had a couple tracks that didn’t particularly stand out to me during my first listen. I’ll tell you what… I‘ve made a Spotify playlist with the original album tracklist that I’ll listen through when I get the chance. If my opinion changes, I’ll come back and edit my rating to five stars. For now, Are You Experienced is a high and respectable four. Highlights: Purple Haze, Manic Depression, Love or Confusion, I Don’t Live Today, Fire, Third Stone from the Sun, Foxey Lady, Are You Experienced, Stone Free, Highway Chile, Can You See Me, Red House

I've never heard of Emerson, Lake & Palmer, but I do enjoy me some prog rock! Tarkus is a bit of a mixed bag. The title track is a masterful display of musical prowess (which takes up the entire first half of the LP), while the others are relatively listenable, but often come across about as compelling as a condescending 13-year-old atheist – the “Check out this dissonant chord progression while I tell you why you’re a sheep for believing in God” kind of energy. It’s certainly not beating the pretentious allegations, but I can definitely see myself revisiting the title track in the future and there’s enough good material in the back half to save Tarkus from the two star club. Side note, but the artwork for this album is great. It looks like something you'd find on the sixth page of a SEGA Genesis instruction booklet explaining a game's bosses, while the actual boss doesn't even remotely resemble the artwork. Great stuff. Highlights: Tarkus, B**ches Crystal, A Time and a Place

Listened to this album while making breakfast and now I’m pregnant. Highlights: The Urban Theme, Sumthin’ Sumthin’, Dancewitme, …Til the Cops Come Knockin’, The Suite Theme

Oh yay, today I get to listen to a new folk album from [checks notes] Andy Samberg's wife? Obviously not trying to reduce a talented musician down to who she's married to, but that fact was not something I expected to come across in my research today! People are probably being a bit too harsh on this one. It takes serious skill to write traditionally poetic music this long without being insanely repetitive and I think Joanna Newsom has a pretty good voice for this kind of folk music. I was impressed that a track like "Emily" was able to keep me engaged for as long as it did – it never felt like Newsom's tank was running out of gas. I can completely understand how a certain kind of listener would be completely enthralled by these 7-17 minute songs. At the same time, I think that length is a double-edged sword. If you're really feeling something, the party keeps going long after a typical pop (or folk) tune would have ended. If you're not, having to sit through it is going to be pretty excruciating. That said, the two I really latched on two were the first/last tracks ("Emily" and "Cosmia"). "Only Skin" had some movements I enjoyed as well, but I'd generally say the middle three weren't as effective on me. Can you see where I'm going with this? There's nothing inherently wrong with this album – Newsom's extensive song lengths, unique vocal style, classical instrumental palette and archaic lyrics are going to be just as much of a strength for a listener prone to enjoy this kind of folk as much as they are a weakness to someone who isn't. As an electronic music fan who has been slowly getting into acts like Simon & Garfunkel, Joni Mitchell and Pentangle thanks to this journey, Ys landed right in the middle for me. Three stars. Highlights: Emily, Cosmia

Wait… Iron Maiden is actually good? IRON MAIDEN IS ACTUALLY GOOD??? Highlights: Prowler, Remember Tomorrow, Running Free, Phantom of the Opera, Transylvania, Strange World, Iron Maiden

Outside a couple of decent cuts, this was honestly a pretty unpleasant listen. Kind of boring and not particularly unique either. It’s only 35 minutes long, so I guess that’s a plus. Seems like my tradition of giving every new wave and post punk album two stars will live on! Highlights: Secrets, In Your House, A Forest

This album would been a 2/5 if Dimebag Darrell weren’t playing his absolute heart out at every given opportunity. R.I.P. Highlights: Mouth for War, F**king Hostile, This Love, Live in a Hole, Hollow

One of my favorite artists growing up was this Christian pop-punk band named Hawk Nelson. Their final LP with founding member Jason Dunn (Crazy Love) was released alongside a companion album called The Light Sides, which was essentially comprised of acoustic takes on their hits from the early-mid 2000s. I played the absolute heck out of it in middle/high school. That said, the concept of an acoustic punk album isn't entirely foreign to me and I was looking forward to hearing what Violent Femmes' debut LP would bring to the table! The two albums honestly aren't very comparable – both use acoustic instruments, have a sense of adolescence in the lyrics and are vaguely pop-punk, but that's pretty much as far as their similarities go. Violent Femmes' self-titled album skips right over the fun/nostalgic bits of adolescence and gets straight to the parts we'd rather forget: the sweaty, sticky, horny and toxic parts. The album makes me look back on the worst versions of myself, but in a relatively fun way that doesn't lead to complete self-loathing. "Add It Up" was probably my favorite on the entire album for that exact reason. While I appreciate how uncomfortable this LP can get and how unique of a sound it went for (especially in the early '80s), I just don't think it quite reaches the heights of my other four star albums and I can't really see myself revisiting the full thing. Maybe I'll check out Hallowed Ground someday if I'm ever feeling particularly angsty! Highlights: Kiss Off, Add It Up, Confessions, Promise, Gone Daddy Gone

Oh hey, it's album #0001! I vaguely remember listening to In the Wee Small Hours during my first 1001 Albums attempt, but I guess it didn't leave that much of an impression. By no fault of Mr. Sinatra (who, needless to say, has a great voice), I have a really hard time engaging with this album. The music is so ubiquitous that it's almost like ambient audio to me – completely harmless, pleasant background noise that does a pretty good job filling the silence at a get-together or while doing chores. I guess the main problem is that the more I pay attention to it, the less I feel like I'm getting out of it. The lyrics/music aren't particularly challenging and the songs more or less all sound the same, so giving it your complete and undivided attention is almost doing it a disservice. As a result, I ended up blissfully half-listening to In the Wee Small Hours for the majority of its runtime and letting my ears perk up at the occasional clever line or instrumental solo (the trumpet solo on "Ill Wind" was a highlight all on its own). If I ever listen to it again, it'll probably be in a fashion where I can just soak in its atmosphere and not truly perceive it. I'm sure this was a mindblowing album in 1955 though! Highlights: In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning, I See Your Face Before Me, Can't We Be Friends, Ill Wind, I'll Never Be the Same

The Yes Album is a pretty standard prog album for me, in that there are a few great 8+ minute tracks mixed in with a bunch of decent (but ultimately unremarkable) shorter ones. It comes across as a little less pretentious than ELP's Tarkus, but simultaneously much less consistent than Led Zepplin's Physical Graffiti, which makes me really wish there was an option to rate albums with half-stars so I could file it right between them. Oh well – a light four seems perfectly fair. I'm quite looking forward to checking out Close to the Edge, which apparently only has three tracks (with the first being nearly 19 minutes long) – seems like that might be a little more my speed! Highlights: Yours Is No Disgrace, Starship Trooper, Perpetual Change