Pleasant enough. Close to you is a lovely song that was played at my Auntie's funeral. Interesting cover of Help! The album is beautifully arranged and she's got a lovely, calming voice. Very easy listening. Won't be top of my playlists, but I might pop it on when my mum and dad next come over for a meal.
1000 albums to listen to before you die they said. That doesn't necessarily mean they're good! A car crash is unpleasant, but you feel compelled to look at it!
There are some really good songs on this album - Long Promised Road, Feel Flows, 'Til I Die are really diverting and demand repeated listening. Surf's Up is bonkers, but intriguing. Songs about dirty water and student demonstrations are well meaning but the songs are difficult to listen to, and I lost interest on songs about feet and trees!
Not a complete waste of time, and I'm glad I listened to it, if only to realise how beautiful and how bad the Beach Boys can be on the same album.
Marvin Gaye, the original Chef from South Park, wants to give his woman good lovin', probably a few times. A soul classic, but at my age, if I started listening to this too much, I'm just going to worry my wife! I preferred What's Going On.
Think of Deep Purple, you think of Smoke on the Water, and that mighty guitar riff is right in the middle of this album. Never Before and When A Blind Man Cries might be even better songs.
Beyond these songs, Space Truckin' is a bit Spinal Tappish and the other tracks rely to much on guitar solos and they don't really float my boat.
A 5 star album that became a big part of my life and helped me get through my mid twenties. There are so many happy memories associated with some of these songs, from listening to a group of primary school leavers rewriting one of the songs to sing how they had got through school with the help of a "Mitreball" to the songs blaring out through coach speakers on a football road trip through Germany.
For album highlights, close your eyes and stick a pin in the track listing's.
A great album and an enjoyable listen. Our Lips Are Sealed is the standout track for me, but Tonite and We Got The Beat are full of confidence and attitude. Belinda Carlisle's voice suits this music better than the middle of the road pop she was singing a few years later and the whole thing sounds like they were having a lot of fun. A few filler tracks towards the end, but altogether an above average album.
A pleasant enough listen. It makes me think of my father in law, who liked his jazz and big bands. It's not my go to type of music, but you have to appreciate the drama and musicality of it all. Let The Good Times Roll had me tapping my feet and Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying was another great production. I doubt I'll listen to the album again though.
The kindest way to describe 1984 is a bit of a shit sandwich. Jump is excellent, Panama follows it well, but then we get an assortment of strange and sleazy songs in the middle that give me the cringe. I'll Wait is a similar but poorer version of Jump, and the 2 songs at the end are passable.
After the opening tunes. I expected better.
Sure, this type of modern folk music isn't my go-to genre, but this is perfectly listenable. I enjoyed its peace and complexities and had the album on repeat during the day. There were no real highlights - Quiet Houses and Blue Ridge Mountains maybe being the most prominent in my mind - but the songs were consistent and I never felt a need to skip any.
I will check out more Fleet Foxes material when in need of a calm day.
A bit of Latin joy here, and great to listen to while you're pottering around doing the housework or preparing your evening meal, as it's impossible to listen to without swinging your hips and imagining that you're out there on the Strictly dance floor. If your only exposure to mambo, salsa and cha cha cha was stuff like Lou Bega's Mambo Number 5, this album shows you how it was done properly.
A solid 3 stars.
I knew almost half of the songs on Rubber Soul pretty well before I listened to this today, I was looking forward to listening to the entire album and fully expected to give it a 5 star review. However, maybe because The Beatles have set such a high bar, it didn't quite meet my expectations. Sure, songs like Norwegian Wood and In My Life are beautifully crafted and were a different style to previous Beatles songs. They showed their willingness to use a growing range of instruments to develop a more expensive sound, and some of the songs that were new to me, especially You Won't See Me and If I Needed Someone, are really good songs that I'm surprised I haven't heard before.
However, the country style Ringo Starr fronted What Goes On falls flat for me, and the lyrics of Run For Your Life are unnecessarily dark and end the album on a sour note.
Still, 4 stars is good. The fact I was expecting better shows how brilliant The Beatles were.
Where to begin?
Firstly, Hard Rock? Really? Seems far too Middle of the Road for that.
Next, lyrics: Now you fly, through the sky, never asking why. And you fly all around, 'til someone shoots you down. (This is from a song about a seagull that knows about the end of the world). It's hardly profound).
The most well known track, Can't Get Enough of Your Love, would be better off a couple of minutes shorter, and while I found the whole album pleasant on the first listen, I found myself getting bored when playing it through again.
It's not all bad - Bad Company and Movin' On maintained my interest for a few more listens, but in the main this is just pretty soulless 'dad rock'
R&B, hip hop and soul. Not normally my thing. But this album transcends it's genres and sends out important messages that were ahead of their time. Personal highlights include Ex-Factor, Forgive Them Father and Everything Is Everything, but there are many more.
I can hear Stevie Wonder influences in some of the songs, and you can see how this album has gone on to influence more recent artists, male and female, from a range of genres. It's a shame that her solo output was limited to pretty much this album. She had important things to say.
Before today, my only experience of Isaac Hayes was from Shaft, and his soulful, and hilariously inappropriate advice to the children of South Park, and this was a nice, relaxing listen today. A bit surprising that there were only 4 songs on the album, but the songs rarely got tedious, even when pushing quarter of an hour long. That said, my favourite song was the shortest, One Woman.
It's a solid 3 stars from me, but the highlight was when Spotify churned out Theme from Shaft after the album had finished. Absolute tune.
At last! After a few weeks of soul, folk and rock, an album that makes me truly FEEL something!
Settle down people with smutty minds - you know what I mean!
It's loud and intimidating but you want it louder. You want to be immersed in the aggression and strange, unsettling sounds and sequences and it reminds you of all the things that piss you off and how fucked up everything is at the moment. And you just bounce all over the place before emerging at the end, completely regulated. It's just genius!
Apart from the three singles, Narayan and Climbatize are brilliant and bookend Firestarter brilliantly. There's no real filler to be honest. A consistent stomper!
Thank you.
Very much a curate's egg of an album here. Some strange production choices ensure that my friends and I sang a more joyous version of He's Got The Whole World In His Hands during our primary school assemblies and some of the other songs sound like they were recorded in a swimming pool! However, there are saving graces in the New York City Song, and the incredible Your Own Back Yard which has a beauty and an honesty that brings shivers to the spine and tears to the eyes.
This transported me off to the US Deep South, swamp blues and spiritual voodoo magic, and you get a feeling of cultural significance. This is my introduction to Dr John and favourite songs are Jump Sturdy, and the incredibly strange Croker Courtbouillon, which appears to be about fish soup and for some reason stirred up memories ranging from The Addams Family to Scooby Do.
Not entirely my thing, but altogether an intriguing listen.
This was an album that I was aware of, had read articles about and noted, but never got round to listening to, so thanks for throwing this out. It's an enjoyable listen, but a bit of a surprise to be on this list.
Girls Just Want To Have Fun and Time After Time are the stand out tracks as you'd expect, but Money Changes Everything and All Through The Night (with a chorus that sounds copied by German band Freiheit on their hit Keeping The Dream Alive) are also high standard.
A whole range of genres with nods to 60s American Rock and Roll, it's pretty consistent throughout, but I'm not too fussed about I'll Kiss You or Yeah Yeah.
Still, it's a high 3 or a low 4, and today I'm feeling generous.
It's been a while since I had listened to this album. I had forgotten how good it was, from the emotional depth of Nightswimming and Everybody Hurts, to the lesser known tracks, especially Sweetness Follows and Ignoreland.
Nightswimming is one of those rare songs that I can remember where I was and what i was doing the first time I heard it.
Consistently good, timeless and deserving of 5 stars.
I really dont think my life has been enhanced by listening to this, and bearing in mind that I have been awarding 2 stars to albums that have at least held my interest for at least a few songs, this album gets the award for the first one to get a single star.
I liked Gimme All Your Lovin', it reminded me of parties in my teens. But the rest of the songs were either uninteresting or just poor, the guitar playing was bland and the lyrics were laughable (apparently, she has legs right down to her fanny!!)
A waste of my time.
Sometimes, less is a bit more, and you have to take 6 perfectly formed tracks over a mixture of decency and filler. There's so much to enjoy here, from the bonkers experimentation of TVC15 to the funk and pumping bass of Stay, from the opening 10 minute epic of Station to Station to the beauty of Wild Is the Wind. And then there's Golden Years.
Ive complained about bands that overplay on guitar solos before. Theres a subtle difference between self aggrandisement and just making a song that sounds better because of what the musician is adding to it. It makes the song, or the album, greater than the sum of it's parts. Excellent.
There's rock music, and then there's rock music! Having recently been underwhelmed by ZZ Top and The Black Notes, having another rock band on the 1001 was beginning to irritate me.
But this album's brilliant! From the thrilling opening of Cecilia Ann, through the rawness of Rock Music and the sheer 'weirdness' of Is She Weird, this album feels different and has a freshness that defies its 35 years. I have no idea what makes Stormy Weather so great, but I'm not going to overthink it, I'll just go with it. Awesome.
It took a while to get in to this album, and even after a few listens I can't get beyond describing it more than 'just alright'. Around this time I listened to comparable bands like The Strokes and The White Stripes, both of which did better albums than this. The songs don't change much throughout, although there were a few standout tracks in Next Girl, Howlin for You and I'm Not The One.
The Black Keys were new to me. They were OK but I'm not overly fussed about finding out more about them.
Dont mind this bit of spaced out soul-funk at all! Maggot Brain, the title track, is pure 70s chillout, and the fact that it's 10 minutes plus long doesn't bother me at all - i could listen to this all day. Also loved Hit It And Quit It and the sound effects thrown in to Wars Of Armageddon.
It's a total stoner album, and if i was listening to this with a big fat bifter it would be 5 stars all the way. But I wasn't, so it'll have to settle for 3.
Full disclosure at the outset - i can't stand Mick Hucknall! However, he is one fantastic singer, and this album covers bases of jazz, blues, soul and pop, all of which he sings brilliantly. Strongest tracks on the album are Holding Back The Years and Money's Too Tight To Mention, and song that is so hugely apt now - we're talking 'bout Donny, Donny! - and there's no let down on the unreleased tracks either, with Heaven being a standout. I can't hear Red Box without thinking of the 80s kids programme 'Don't You Open That Trap Door though.
No 5 stars due to Mick, but a solid 4.
So, where do you go after the RocknRoll of Faith, seductive pop of Father Figure, disco funk of I Want Your Sex and blues of One More Try? Well, it looks like mediocrity! The opening 4 tracks are really good, if you pop off for a quick loo break during I Want Your Sex part 2, but there isn't too much that stands out beyond that. Releasing Monkey and Kissing a Fool scraped the barrel that was the George Michael cash cow at the time and the rest of the songs are just filler. A middling 3 stars because of the opening songs.
I'm not a fan of gothic rock, but I had gothy mates in the 80s and went to party's where there music boomed out (I was the one in the Erasure, or Pet Shop Boys t-shirt looking a bit out of place) so listening to songs like This Corrosion, and the stonking bass of Lucretia My Reflection bring back happy memories and are decent tunes. The rest of the album doesn't really hold much for me. I'm not really sure what it all means. I recognise that it's an important album in the goth genre, but it doesn't make me want to listen to much more.
I like a lot of The Cure's songs, and spent a lot of time last year listening to Songs Of A Lost World. This early album had a far sparser feel to it. The instrumentals A Reflection and The Final Sound set an unsettling tone that carries on in songs like Secrets and At Night. Stand out track is A Forest. The Cure went on to bigger things and I prefer that more expansive sound, but this was decent work.
It took a long time to get through all 28 songs on this double album, but it was worth it and it was to the bands credit that there were shifts in genre throughout. So some of the rockier, grungier songs didn't float my boat, but there was plenty for me to enjoy in the quieter moments of Galapogos, By Starlight and Farewell and Goodnight. And it's a pretty impressive feat to put together so many different tracks, and be consistently good. A first listen to the Smashing Pumpkins for me, and I doubt it will be the last.
A quality album from a quality band. There are so many nods to influences such as The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Who, yet The Jam forged their own path and became massive influences to bands that followed, such as The Stone Roses and Arctic Monkeys.
English Rose, 'A' Bomb in Wardour Street and Down At The Tube Station At Midnight are favourites here, and album that I'm embarrassed to not have heard before. I'm looking forward to more Jam albums in the 1001.
I've grown up listening to Simon and Garfunkel. My parents loved them, my wife loves them and I was lucky enough to see Art Garfunkel live a few years ago. Bookends contains a few of the classics, in Mrs Robinson, America and Hazy Shade of Winter. Old Friends and Punky's Dilemma are also warm, comfortable songs.
Save the Life of my Child doesn't really fit with the rest of the album, and feels a bit jarring, while Overs and Fakin' It, while not unpleasant, just seem to be going through the motions. A low 4 stars.
Yesterday morning, I was all "Keith who?" and wondering whether I was going to stay awake during piano compositions of 25 plus minutes. But then you listen to the music. You marvel at the improvisation, the handspeed, the endless jaw-dropping connotations around a simple theme or motif and the thrilling segues between the sections.
And then you find out about the story, the late night concert and the 'broken' piano and you realise the genius of the musician you are listening to. Of the albums I have listened to so far, this is the most mindful and moving. It is real time emotion, where one subtle key change can instantly elevate or totally devastate you.
It is a beautifully crafted musical collection, and the easiest five stars that I'll ever give.
I first listened to this album a few months ago, just before Glastonbury 25, and it made so little an impression that the only songs I remembered when listening again this time was Maggie May, which I'd already heard to death! Mandolin Wind is a decent song, the opening title track doesn't let the album down and (I Know) I'm Losing You rocks out nicely, but it's just too unmemorable and in a few months I'll have forgotten that I listened to it again.
3 stars - average score for an average album.
Oh, this takes me back! It was 2004, my first born son was one year old, and this album and Hot Fuss by The Killers were on repeat play in our house, and over 20 years later it still sounds fantastic. Loads of fun songs here, from the stomping Laura through to the downright Filthy / Gorgeous, plus an art of taking complete ownership of a cover version by making it completely different from the original Comfortably Numb! But highlights keep coming, from the poignant It Can't Come Quickly Enough to the brilliant The Skins, so good it only scraped on as a bonus track!
An essential pop album from the noughties. 5☆
At first listen, wasn't a big fan of all the emotional self loathing and drug promotion, but after coming back to it a couple of times I had to admire the albums raw openness. It compares well to other albums of a similar genre, like Nevermind or something by Pearl Jam, and this was probably first out of the stable. Tracks that stand out for me include Rooster and Them Bones.
A low 4.
Points of interest to me here. I loved the cover of Just A Gigolo that David Lee Roth did in the middle 80s. It was one of our party standards at the time and it was good to hear the original. 1 star earned.
A second star is earned by learning that this is actually King Louis, the King of the Swingers, and due to my dad's love of The Jungle Book, it was a film that I was brought up on. If I Want To Be Like You was on here, I'd have pushed up to a low 3 stars, but a high 2 will do. It's fun and happy enough, but I lost interest after a couple of plays. Glad I listened. Next!
There's some really good songs on this album. Under The Bridge is a brilliant, desolate song and Give It Away contains endless fabulous riffs. But 17 tracks is a lot to maintain consistency, and although there are other notable high points (Breaking the Girl, Suck My Kiss) there's too much bland in there. If songs like Apache Rose Peacock and Sir Psycho Sexy weren't on it, it might have pushed up towards 4 stars, but it'll have to settle for a middling 3.
Steven Morrissey is rightly, and predictably, indignant about a lot of things here, and he communicates this beautifully in some of these songs. It's very difficult to disagree with anything that he says as well, and after listening to albums full of artists struggles against drugs and personal demons, it's not a bad thing to hear someone railing against the intolerance and the lack of action of others. In an album highlight, I'm glad that he has forgiven Jesus's. I can imagine that a lot of gay people haven't. And there's a beautiful simplicity to I'm Not Sorry that makes it instantly memorable.
A highly listenable 4 star album.
First heard this during the first COVID lockdown, and for a debut album, it's brilliant. To produce radio friendly tracks such as the brilliant Electric Feel, stylophone-esque Kids and stonking opener Time To Pretend, and then throw in complexity and intrigue on tracks like Weekend Wars and The Youth (with it's totally unexpected key change!), this is a record that gives on many levels. It drops off a little towards the end, but definitely deserves a high 4 stars. Not sure what happened to MGMT after this, but I doubt they hit this high watermark again.
This album takes emotive topics such as police racism and the Monsters 'among us', allied to the pride and beauty of being black, and mixes it all with hints of contemporary R&B, gospel and downtempo trip-hop. It's a bit Nightmare on Wax-ish and not bad at all. And telling people to put their guns down in such a calm, matter-of-fact way gives it more impact. High points for me were found in Hard Life, Eternal Life and Monsters. The music's not all to my taste, but the fact that we need songs like this is a poor reflection on society as a whole. I'd not heard of SAULT yesterday, but now I'm interested in checking out their back catalogue. Thank you 1001. A high 3☆.
There was a bit of nostalgia here listening to Fight For Your Right and No Sleep 'Til Brooklyn, and Slow And Low was OK, but beyond that I struggled to get anything from this. Taken at face value, it's shouty, tedious frat-boy hip-hop. If you take it as a satire, it remains shouty, tedious, frat-boy hip-hop but you don't have to take it so seriously. However, back in the day, I don't remember it being labelled as satirical (a group of English comedians released a song called No Sleep 'Til Bedtime to cash in a bit), and it seemed to be championed by the people that maybe it was poking fun at! Either way, apart from a few songs, not for me. A low 2.
This was a nice present of a Christmas Eve recommendation. I love this album, and can still remember seeing Tracy Chapman performing at Wembley on Nelson Mandela's 70th birthday concert. After that, she was the name on a lot of people's lips and I, like thousands of others, bought the album on the strength of what we'd seen. It wasn't disappointing then, and its aged really well. A lot of issues from then; apathy, racism and domestic abuse, are still massively relevant. Behind the Wall is such a chilling brilliant song, but then, the whole album is consistently excellent.
I remember playing the cassette for the first time, getting to the end of Side 1, rewinding the tape and listening to it again. I did that for a week, worried that Side 2 couldn't possibly be as good. Listening again now, I do think the standard drops after Baby Can I Hold You, but only slightly. A high 5.
Many thanks to who or whatever decided that this would be an ideal pre-Christmas drop for the inbox. I held it back until Boxing Day, and now I feel that my presents were a little bit more shit than I remembered yesterday.
So it's not a good time to review such a highly regarded album. How do you want your music? Songs like Day Of The Lords and New Dawn Fades are towering, emotional pieces of work and is a massive outpouring that ultimately didn't help Ian Curtis for much longer. You want your music to make you feel something, and this so does, but I'm reaching for a feel good album to listen to now.
Happy Christmas readers. A low 4 for Joy Division.
After a few listens, I'm still not quite sure what this is. Is it a concept album? Is it a soundtrack to a film or play? Is it an educational experience? Is it a bit of self indulgence on the part of the Drive-By Truckers? I haven't a problem that they were moved to write an album about Lynyrd Skynyrd, George Wallace and the duality of the Southern US states. Ronnie and Neil kicks the album off well, with a properly beefed up guitar riff, but I lost interest pretty quickly after that. I'm just not sure why I needed to know about this. I'm glad you're not all racist, but I sort of guessed that anyway, just like I don't think you all sit on your porch and play Duelling Banjos. Not bad, but I won't be listening to it again. A low 2
Thank you Darlene Love, The Crystals, The Ronettes and Bob B Soxx & the Blue Jeans for putting me in a right Christmassy mood. It's great that these versions of the songs are standards in themselves over 60 years after release. Would, and maybe should have been 5 stars, but it has to lose one for the Elephant in the Room, sitting in the corner with a gun in his hand, controlling the knobs and levers.
This was decent enough and got my feet tapping and hips swinging a bit, but I found it a bit repetitive in terms of the music and the lyrics, and I didn't get the same amount of interest with this that I had with the Funkadelic album, Maggot Brain, so this mark is relative to that. I wasn't surprised to hear hints of Kool and the Gang - this album clearly influenced some of their work - but Give Up The Funk sounds so similar to Fame by David Bowie. I wonder which came first.
A high two for me. It was alright, but I'm not a huge fan.
When this came up, my first impulse was 'another American rock band? This list is beginning to get predictable!' However, this album is nothing like predictable, and although it's guitar heavy, it's too simplistic to call it rock. Lots of elements are crammed in to make a distracting piece of work. The New Pollution reminded me of Tomorrow Never Knows by The Beatles, and Where It's At was packed with fun and cheekiness. It's just different! I'd only heard Loser by Beck before today. This has made me want to explore their other work. A solid 4☆.
Was expecting African beats, but got so much more on top. While the lyrics make him sound justifiably irritated with things going on in his world, he still comes across as a joyous, fun and optimistic singer and song writer and this album has had me swinging my hips for a few days - it's very catchy. And even though the songs are long, they dont outstay their welcome. Another reminder of why I wanted to check out the albums on this list. Solid 4☆
This album starts pretty well. I was familiar with Connection, Line Up's a good opener, Annie reminded me of Blondie and Car Song has a cheeky little riff. However, as much as I've complained in the past about over-long songs, here the opposite is true. More than half of the songs are under 3 minutes, a lot of them are under 2. Just when you start getting into a song it ends, and it's frustrating. I'd have liked to hear a bit more of Indian Song and 2:1, and I'd have preferred a minute and a half less of Vaseline. Of The later songs, Waking Up stuck on my mind for it's similar riff to No More Heroes and Never Here, which has time to breathe, is suitably angry. It's all very Punk, but as I drifted towards the end, I could only question why I really needed to listen to this, and I couldn't come up with an answer. A low 3.
This is a decent live album by a reasonable rock band, but i truly fail to believe that there aren't well over 1000 albums more worthy of my attention than this. It's not poor - Come On, Come On is a strong opening and Surrender builds up to an anthemic crescendo, but too much of this is just... ordinary. There's a karaoke version of Ain't That A Shame, and Need Your Love starts well before descending into mediocrity when you're expecting a big finish. And letting the crowd know when to rock out and then to go home is just so Spinal Tap! A low 2 for being bang average.
Smashing Pumpkins make their second entry into my 1001 albums list, and I'm not liking this one as much as I enjoyed Mellon Collie... It's not bad, there's just very little that grabs my attention or interest beyond Disarm, Soma and Silverfuck. It's well produced and put together and some of the out-tros are diverting to the point of being over the top and more in keeping with a live performance. Just over 50 albums in - maybe I'm getting rock fatigue - this gets a low 3 stars.
This is pleasant enough without being spectacular. I was a fan of Elephant, but this was 10 years later and it sounds like Jack had mellowed out a bit and matured his musical style. My personal faves included Sixreen Saltines and Freedom at 21, which reminds me of 7 Nation Army, although anything off the first half of the album is worthy of a listen. The second half dlips a bit, but there's nothing bad on it. It's consistently slightly above average so gets a high 3 stars.
This turned out to be a genuine surprise. After the first song and the beginning of the second, I was ready to hit 1 star and blame it on metal fatigue. Thrash has never been my thing and the only song from the genre that sticks in my mind is Enter Sandman! However, I stuck with it and it paid off. Sanitarium is such a great, melodic song and I've never heard a military rhythm played on a guitar like it is in Disposable Heroes. Plus, playing the title track earns me street cred with my sons through it being played on Stranger Things.
Granted, Battery and Leper Messiah are too metal for me, and The Thing That Should Not Be is just too 'chuggy', but this album has been played, loud, multiple times over the weekend and I've felt better for it. A solid 4☆.
After listening to this 3 or 4 times, its rarely got above background noise, never mind essential listening. The real issue that I have with it is the segues off from a reasonable tune into forgettable bits of drivel before returning to a point where you can't understand why you're still listening to the same song, with Track 1 and 6 being cases in point. Track 3 is a bit better, and probably my favourite, but it still sometimes occasionally meanders into blandness.
Track 2 is a live instrumental track, I think.
Track 4 is shit.
I've listened to Track 5 four times and can't remember anything about it!
I like Owner Of A Lonely Heart, so I might give 90125 a listen. This unessential album avoids the ignominy of 1 star through a few decent moments but I won't listen to it again, but I do wonder if Rick Wakeman added a bit more oomph to the keyboard solos on later albums.
A low 2☆.
Wow! Here's an album that raised lots of questions in my mind, not least What cheese did I eat last night? After the first two songs, I was hoping that it was going to be a covers album with apocalyptic introductions before Death Troll came out and sang Like A Virgin or Careless Whisper, but alas, it wasn't to be. However, there's a lot to enjoy about it still. There's an 80s Terminatoresque soundtrack quality up to a point, probably up until the last 2 or 3 songs where it gets a bit too repetitive. Highlights are Trans National and The Great Seal, as well as the 2 covers which had a high entertainment value - I'll feel a bit let down if they were taking themselves really seriously when they recorded them. My first exposure to industrial music was enjoyable - it's a high 4☆ from me.
Delightfully bonkers, and so much easier to listen to than a lot of other albums on the list. Deserving of its place through a total lack of pretention and it's kitsch punk attitude. Rock Lobster, Planet Clare and There's A Moon In The Sky are catchy, fun tunes that make me smile, so, notwithstanding the lack of emotional depth, I'll give this 'throwaway' album a low 4 stars.
Hooray! 57 albums in, and this is only the 2nd one that really falls into the electronic pop category. Truly my genre. Of course I've heard this album already. Of course it gets 5 stars!
A slight change in sound for the Mode and we get an album full of killer tracks. Personal Jesus is the lead single, but from a pure pop point of view, Enjoy The Silence is the standout track. Outside of the 4 released singles, Halo and Sweetest Perfection stand out and even the slightly unsettling Blue Dress doesn't allow the standards to drop. I loved it back in 1990, it's aged well and it was great to be reacquainted.
I feel like I turned up at this event at least 35 years too late! I was in university then, Val Kilmer was playing Jim Morrison in The Doors movie and Morrison himself was probably as popular on students walls as Che Guavara. Back then, I couldn't really see the attraction.
Even now, the bluesier elements of the album don't interest me too much, but there's a versatility to the bands, and indeed Morrison's voice, that suits the blues but then changes to suit songs like Love Her Madly, LA Woman and Hyacinth House. And the classic Riders On The Storm rounds off the album, unlike anything that has come before it. A really interesting album, floating from genre to genre, with more hits than misses. 4 stars earned - I'm sure I'll come across them again later.
Pretty much everything about this album screams of 70s cool. The cover. The Bowie / Ronson production. The Walk on the Wild Side.
There are timeless songs on this album - Perfect Day might well be one of my all time favourite songs, and Satellite of Love was a song that is hadn't heard before but instantly caught me with it's gorgeous melody and cracking outro. Elsewhere, there's lots of fun in songs like Andy's Chest, Hangin' Round and the jazzy Goodnight Ladies. It's just a joyous listen.
I've never considered myself a fan of glam rock, and I don't consider this album an example of that standard. This is just a meeting of mavericks working together to create a 5 star album.
There might be a day when I listen to this album and I get that light bulb moment of why it is so highly regarded, but I doubt it. There's a bit of charm I suppose, but so much of this is so awkward. I liked the opening song, but I quickly tired of the soundtrack style. Songs like Simon Smith... and Old Man just abruptly stop, while Memo To My Son and Let It Shine seem to fade out half way through. You Can Leave Your Hat on is a great song, but not with Randy's nasal style - he sounds bored! It's just so massively unsatisfying and a trawl to get through, even though it's barely 3 quarters of an hour long. 1 star. Next.
I'll admit that this became an unexpectedly pleasant experience, listening to the tales of outlaws, unrequited love and buffalo stampede among other things. This is so engaging and such easy listening. Robbins has a voice like velvet, the harmonies are gorgeous and after a few listens you could understand why he was revered by the likes of Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. It's not my go to genre, or era, but there are far worse albums on the list and I'm glad ive been introduced to this artist. Favourite songs are Big Iron and El Paso, and it's a solid 3*.
Learnt something this weekend. Listening to Drum and Bass while you're making the evening meal doesn't necessarily enhance your appreciation of the genre (I'll be honest, I had no idea what I was going to be listening to when I put it on!). However, I put it on when I went for a run next morning and got a new PB for the 10K, so thanks Brown Paper Bag with all of your Ross-On-Synths twiddly bits, and thanks Heroes with your soulful thumping beat. Sure, it's repetitive and pretty superficial, but I now know what the Amen Break is, I can run (and chop carrots) faster and my life has got a little bit better.
A low 4 stars for Roni Size, and a place on my workout playlist.
So here we have the original Proud Mary before Tina Turner reinvented it as a showtune and karaoke standard. And it sits nicely on a more mainstream blues album than has been churned out of the 1001 randomiser before now. It's all a pretty chilled, gentle push back against 'the man' with a few songs that will go onto the liked list, such as Born On The Bayou and Bootleg. Some of the tracks are a bit more forgettable and I'm not a fan of the Good Golly Miss Molly cover, but there's enough here for a solid 3 stars.
This falls right in the middle for me. Wild Is The Wind is gorgeous, I Love Your Lovin' Ways and Break Down... are strong songs, but it's all quite downbeat and didn't affect me the way that it's clearly inspired other people. And that has made it maybe the most difficult album I've had to review so far - i just feel I should be getting more from this than I have done, so I can't give it more than a 3.
The second 5 star David Bowie album on my 1001 journey, and this one is better than Station to Station. A great little narrative and an album full of timeless, melodic songs. I'd listened to it before and loved listening to it again. Apart from well known songs like Starman, Ziggy Stardust and Suffragette City, personal highlights include Five Years, Moonage Daydream and Lady Stardust. The weakest track maybe Hang On To Yourself, but it's relative and would probably stand out in a collection of other songs.
Some people have just got 'it'. Bowie had it in spades and proved it on multiple occasions.
This was an education for me. I knew nothing about Television before this, but guessed I'd be listening to a punk album. It turned out so much more technical than that, and although i was still dubious after the first listen, after a second play I got a sense of how ahead of their time Television were and how their melodic style would influence bands such as The Pixies, indeed Venus sounds like a Stone Roses song. Friction and Guiding Light are other songs that demand attention. I'm not so keen on the opening and closing tracks, and Marquee Moon itself is overlong, but this would have been ground-breaking in the mid 70s and is deserving of the 4 stars I'll give it.
Sorry, but no. Just no.
I suppose it's a cult hit and it'll have a band of devoted followers and fair enough, each to their own. If I was in my teens and at a party, I'd probably have a bit of fun with it, but I'm not and it's just tedious! After each song, I got to wondering if there'd just be one song that could say was alright, but no. There are special places in hell's jukebox for I'm Cramped and Tear It Up. No redeeming features. A low 1 star.
Although i listened to this album for the first time today, I had listened to and really liked the follow-up, Room On Fire. In my opinion, Room On Fire is a better album, but that may just be because I heard it first and it became my version of the definitive Strokes album.
They are very similar, but they're both good and aside from the tracks that got radio play, Alone Together is a great song with the rest of the album being pretty consistent.
It's a high 3 stars - the follow up would have been a 4.
I sometimes wonder if some of these albums catch me on bad days! The problem I have here is that electronic pop and rock is my genre. It's what I like and I've not seen enough of it in the 1001. I was surprised when this popped up as my next listen - I remembered Stupid Girl and Happy When It Rains. They were OK singles. There are a few more reasonable songs such as Supervixen and A Stroke of Luck, but I'm just listening to the definition of unremarkable here. Depeche Mode, Gary Numan, New Order, they all released better albums that won't make this list, so why am I listening to this? A low 2.
It's amazing to think that this fantastic debut was largely ignored by the public when released in 1983. It's as if the world wasn't ready.
But it's the second R.E.M. album I've reviewed on the list, and the second to get 5 stars. There are many highlights, from the understated Laughing to the beauty of Perfect Circle, from the guitar driven Sitting Still to the piano driven Shaking Through. We Walk comes across as a bit of a novelty track and is probably the only slight misstep, but the rest is pretty faultless. They would go on to sell millions, but they would find it hard to better this.
My only real exposure to The Undertones had been Teenage Kicks up until now, so it's been an enjoyable few days listening to this punk-lite album and finding out how much fun they were. I had a vague recollection of My Perfect Cousin - I love those 70s 80s cultural references to bionics and Subbuteo. It's an album about growing up in a particular time and I wish I'd listened to it 45 years ago. Glad I listened to it today. Favourite other tracks included See That Girl and Hard Luck, with a word about the brilliant Under The Boardwalk cover - totally owned it! Feargal Sharkey's voice was far more suited to this rather than the mediocre pop he churned out in the mid 80s. A high 4 stars for putting a big smile on my face.
So then, this gets labelled as alternative country! It's far removed from Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings and quite unlike anything I've heard for a long, long time. I'm not a fan of the falsetto (What Else Could It Be sounds like a scene from The Muppet Show!) and it's a bit beige around the middle, but The Old Gold Shoe is a beautiful opener and Up With People has the most upbeat way of telling us that we're 'screwing our lives up.' The complex nature of Petrified Florist calls for repeated listening and a demand to know the possibly heartbreaking story behind it. Just about more hits than misses - an interesting introduction for me to Lambchop. 3 intrigued stars.
Having listened to Maggot Brain a few months ago, I was quite looking forward to this. However, I quickly started to lose interest, and I remembered what it was about Maggot Brain that became tedious. Overlong songs with repetitive grooves. The album is saved by the song that elevated the previously mentioned album - the live version of Maggot Brain absolutely nails an extra star on for this reviewer. Honestly could listen to that track all day. Not so for Groovalliegance or Promentalwhatever. A low 3 stars, but if I get stoned again, I'll relisten.
You can understand why Jimi Hendrix was held in such high regard and considered such a visionary. There are so many styles of music here, from short, experimental guitar instrumentals, jazz, blues, psychedelic rock. Not all of it's to my taste, but the guitar playing and overall craftsmanship of the album stands out. You can hear methods used in the production of the album that would have groundbreaking at the time, and it takes some cojones to lead one of your tracks with a kazoo, and then release the track as a single. From the lesser known tracks, I enjoyed Burning of the Midnight Lamp and the trip down the rabbit hole of 1983. There were a few less memorable songs, Little Miss Strange and House Burning Down among the weaker tracks, but I expected this album to show up on this list and it fully deserves it's place. 4 stars.
The first album I bought, containing the first single I bought (Antmusic). I didn't realise it's cultural significance when I was 11, I just loved the songs, especially Ants Invasion, and the rumours that went around that the effect at the end of that song came from sticking a microphone down an ants nest! Other unreleased highlights include Feeding Me To The Lions and Don't Be Square (Be There).
As a youngster, sheltered from the more aggressive nature of the punk revolution, Adam And The Ants were the perfect post punk - new wave bridge that started me on my own musical journey, independent of what my parents listened to. Relistening now, over 40 years later, I still remember the lyrics and my own sense of rebellion. An absolute moment in time for a 5 star album.
"Fuck's sake" said my brain at the beginning of every song after the first couple of tracks. There is actually no need! I'm sure there are songs about the Holocaust, and Satan, and dismemberment, and your insides rotting that are sensitive and tuneful, but not here.
1001 has served me up with a portion of shit with a side order of shit and shitty sprinkles on the top. And no fucking gravy.
You can have PostMortem for pudding. It's the only thing resembling a track.
The bad thing about this app is the inability to give no stars. Posting the review is the only reason this gets a star. Fucking awful.
A nice mix of folk rock, blues and country and bit of easy listening that would be reasonable background music for a Sunday afternoon potter around the house while youre doing your chores. I doubt that makes it an album that I had to listen to before I died - I'll have mostly forgotten about it by this time next week - but it was nice enough. Particular favourites were So Begins The Task and Don't Look At My Shadow, and it's a low 3 stars.
A couple of years into the new millennium, I was working in a school in East London where the big name in hip-hop were So Solid Crew. I wish I'd heard of Jurassic 5 because, to my untrained hip-hop ear, this flows so much better and just feels cooler. A lot of the backing tracks are hypnotic and edgy and the work of the DJs gives the album an unexpected cohesion. Highlights include A Day At The Races, Sum Of Us and the brilliant I Am Somebody and there are other songs deserving to be added to my Liked Tracks. I feel my street cred would have gone up if I'd diverted my class onto Jurassic 5 and this gets a low 4☆ from me. Doubt you'll find So Solid on the 1001!
There are some beautifully arranged backing tracks on this 'Magnum Opus' of a Kanye West album, especially on tracks like Power, All Of The Lights, and particularly The Blame Game. But at some point in the song you just know that the droning prick will start his noise!
It's just depressing! West clearly has issues - he even sings about being a Monster - but dressing his narcissism and misogyny up and parading it through his album, exposing his flaws, doesn't make him a genius! Foolish critics, going down on your emperor, taking it all in and swallowing every last drop. This shit is fucking ridiculous!
By his rules, it's the fault of other women if he can't keep his dick in his pants, and it's the fault of his woman if she goes off with another man. Grow the fuck up and take responsibility you prick.
Which leads me to the next rule. You might be considered less of a prick if you didn't refer to women as pussy. But that's how you are - the phone call at the end of The Blame Game, the woman you 'love', who's only appreciated for one thing, and 'Yeezy taught me' even that. Degrading and depressing - 'I never met a bitch that didn't need a little guidance'. What the actual fuck!
And the fact that the music's quite good, and that he hides his issues in plain sight shouldn't be ignored. Jimmy Saville raised millions for charity, people turned their back on his issues. Jeffrey Epstein - great financier - massive issues. It's not rocket science!! A begrudging 1 star.
There We Are Then, Kanye.
C U Next Tuesday.
While I've always viewed Elvis Costello as a skilled and intelligent song writer, I've never been a particular fan of his work, and that remains the same after listening to this. There's nothing bad about it - Pump It Up is a solid pop rock track as is the Blondie-esque Radio Radio. The majority of the rest of the tracks just sort of passed me by, leaving me asking myself why he wanted to sing in an American accent when I knew he was from Liverpool! I think i was expecting it to be a little bit angrier, but found it a little underwhelming. A middling 3 stars.
I'm a Kid A veteran, and I'm still not getting it. I played it on release, returned to it a few years later to see if I'd missed anything and here we are again.
Like any album viewed as experimental, there are hits and misses. Motion Picture Soundtrack has a sad beauty and Optimistic harks back to the earlier, rockier Radiohead albums. The rest of it is pretty quiet, a bit repetitive in places, and doesn't have the impact of the 2 albums that preceded it. I might listen again in a few years time and see if something clicks, but I doubt it. It's OK, a high 2 stars, but some of it remains mundane.
There is just a beautiful simplicity and purity to Joni Mitchell's music that i so enjoy, and there are plenty of examples of it here. River will be my favourite Christmas track this year, while Little Green and Blue will be my favourite tracks with colours in the title. It's all very calm, quiet and easy to listen to, with a lovely musicality whether built through the piano or acoustic guitar. It's nice to have these tranquil moments - a worthy 4 stars.
This is the first Pink Floyd album that I have ever completely listened to and it comes with a weight of expectation. How does one of the most iconic albums from one rock's biggest bands compare to some of the other fodder on the list?
Pretty favourably really. It's a lot more electronic than I expected, making it sound a lot more current than it's 50 years. Favourite tracks were the title track and the sprawling Shine On You Crazy Diamond. Sure, it's indulgent and not all of it works - not sure about the squealing guitars - but this isn't ever just going to be background music and every element of each part has been carefully constructed. Not quite as keen on the record company put downs in the musical sense although lyrically they are spot on. An interesting first exposure, and i look forward to hearing more. 4 stars.
