1001 Albums Summary

Excellent power pop music. I appreciate the more orchestral tracks, as well as some of the harder edged material. The noise tracks don't land as well for me, probably because of the amount of subsequent noise bands I've listened to. I'd be curious to know how they would have impacted my listening experience without having engaged with bands like Sonic Youth, Flipper and the Jesus Lizard. Nevertheless, I greatly enjoyed this, and look forward to digging into Big Star's back catalog.

Spectacular. A lot more folky than I expected. Ian Anderson’s voice is so clear and resonant, Martin Barre’s guitar playing is fluid and creative, and Clive Bunker’s drumming is more Bonham than Bruford. Any time the folk songs started overstaying their welcome, Bar would come in with overdriven guitar.

I listened to this on a drive from Tallahassee to Jacksonville after a weekend of visiting a friend. The only song I had heard before was “The Weight.” How I didn’t know any of the others is anyone’s guess, because this was fantastic. I keep mental notes of my favorite songs per album, and each song here could have been my favorite.

Less a traditional album and more a collection of singles. Nevertheless, I had never realized how many songs I knew originated as Little Richard tracks. His vocal performance is the standout, making the material hold up in a way that some of the other rock and roll pioneers’ work does not.

So cool how Bowie kept tabs on what was new in music and found a way to incorporate it into his work without pandering or sacrificing a shred of his unique style. The first side is Bowie’s take on krautrock, blending in the funk i fluences inherent to the genre and which he dabbled in on previous releases (Young Americans, Station to Station). The second is Bowie-fied Brian Eno ambience. While my personal favorite of the Berlin trilogy is probably Lodger, and my favorite overall is Ziggy Stardust, it is undeniable how influential, cutting edge, and all around “great” this album is.

Fitting that this was the next album after Bowie’s “Low.” I consider Miles Davis and Bowie kindred spirits in a way, both evolving with the times without sacrificing artistic integrity. It goes without saying that “Bitches Brew” is fantastic, picking up where Davis left off with “In a Silent Way.” I may prefer “Jack Johnson” and “On the Corner” as far as Davis’s “electric period” albums go, but this is undeniably his high-water mark from the era, insofar as ingenuity and popularity intersect. Portions of it even seem to preface the ambient and dark ambient subgenres of popular music which would emerge in the ensuing decade. Hard to believe that many jazz purists rejected this upon release. It may boast more electric instruments, but the language is still very much jazz.

I don’t know enough about the style of music to offer much insight, but I enjoyed this. Bits of funk scattered here and there, some psychedelic rock. Would be interested to hear more.

It always makes me sad listening to this, knowing that we would never get to hear where Nirvana would go next. It’s like the Beatles breaking up after 10 years, only obviously more tragic. Would Cobain have gone the Elliott Smith route and released acoustic songs without a backing band? Would they have embraced the personal orchestration of R. E. M.’s Automatic for the People (whose producer engineered this live album)? We’ll never know, but at least we have this. The performances are studio quality, and the song choices are sublime. Few hits included, making it truly feel like the fourth Nirvana album we never got. Brilliant covers of Bowie and Leadbelly join covers of Cobain’s favorite underground artists like the Vaselines and Meat Puppets (members of which briefly join Cobain and company onstage), introducing a generation of fans to some of the most exciting music ever made. I may be sad that it ended here, but I cannot fathom a more perfect coda for one of the greatest bands and songwriters of all time.

Glam rock with a Captain Beefheart weirdness. The songs are great and reminiscent of T Rex and David Bowie.

Really cool 60s surf guitar combined with subtle hip hop beats to make the score to some unmade spy film that Austin Powers would have referenced. Beth Gibbons’s voice is gorgeous. Less hip hop influence than most trip hop though, making Portishead distinct from contemporaries like Massive Attack.

Surprised this came out in the 80s. There were points that almost reminded me of Burt Bacharach. Not my favorite, but maybe it just has to grow on me.

Being a kid is wishing B. B. King’s band would shut up and let him play. Being an adult is knowing that subtraction cak be musical addition, and those horns fuckin’ rip. King’s stage presence is outstanding, no wonder he crossed over in a way that many of his contemporaries did not. It goes without saying that his ability to wrangle strong emotion out of a few simple notes is second to none. Surprised to find some Latin jazz influence on “Help the Poor.” Take a drink every time King “tells a story.”

Rocks so hard. Never really noticed how much funk is in their sound. They honestly do the funk/rock/rap thing better than a band like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who made that fusion their whole identity. The presence of a James Brown/George Clinton influence is probably what makes Rage so good and Audioslave lacking in comparison. Evil Empire is my personal favorite, but there’s no knocking this.

Pretty cool new wave pop songwriting. Not like the hits I’ve heard from Costello.

Maybe Hendrix’s druggiest album? Definitely the most psychedelic. Are You Experience bore more of the blues and hard rock influence, whereas Electric Ladyland brought the funk. This is pure psychedelic songwriting, and Spanish Castle Magic and Bold as Love are my two favorite Hendrix songs.

Dinosaur Jr.’s cousin who’s really into Captain Beefheart.

Really cool guitar rock with a strong English strain. Kind of like if the Kinks never shed their American influences and discovered punk.

Production and guitar tone are superb. If I have one thing to say about this album, it’s that Tom Scholz’s influence on guitar tech cannot be overstated. The songs are still good, even if I’ve heard them so many times on classic rock radio. I’m deducting one star though, because I think that this album marks one step closer to the Journey-fication of hard rock in the 70s, and one step away from more organic bands like Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, and even Aerosmith.

This album is my wife.