Interesting to see that this one's average rating has fallen significantly - has there been a bit of a backlash against these guys? Some of the negative reviews mention car commercials and the like, so maybe that has been a factor.
It is easy to see why this would appeal to ad-makers. The songs have an immediacy and a bit of punch. It all sounds a bit processed, though, and lacking in personality. My overall feeling was that this is good but not very lovable
An old favourite of mine, and a touch of nostalgia is probably pushing it up from a 4 to a 5
Hüsker Dü had disintegrated by the time I heard them and Bob Mould's early solo work was good but very bleak, so it was an unexpected delight when his new band turned up with a set of much brighter, catchier tunes. The lyrics are still depressing but this is terrific noise pop. If you want the darker, more abrasive songs from the same recording sessions they are found on 'Beaster': the 'bad Sugar' they siphoned off from this 'good Sugar'
I've always slightly avoided Pink Floyd and I'm hoping this project will give me a chance to appreciate them more. This wasn't the best start, though. There are a handful of good songs of which Comfortably Numb is comfortably the best, and I love Gilmour's fluid guitar playing, but I found most of this quite turgid.
Probably my favourite Tom Waits album, above even Raindogs. It is typically eclectic and I love the way he orchestrates such a wide variety of sounds (including whatever a chamberlin is). The tone here is more percussive with lots of banging, clanking noises, which I very much approve of. You can hear the sinews creaking as he groans about mortality. Love it.
Loud, fast and fun, but I guess I like my punk a bit more abrasive
Iggy's collaborations with Bowie are fascinating. This one is more like a Bowie album fronted by Iggy, and I miss some of Iggy's usual energy, but it's good and it points ahead in a few gothy directions
I like this album but I can't say it is a great one, and it is strange to have this listed when Zen Arcade is both more exciting and more influential. This is fine, and 'No Reservations' is beautiful, but other Hüsker Dü albums deserve to be here instead
A familiar pleasure, but doesn't quite connect with me the way it did when I was young. Still great, of course, and hugely influential
Nick Drake's reputation has risen over the years, climbing from a deserved reappraisal to being lauded as a tragic lost genius. I don't honestly think his music quite matches up to the mythology.
Some people dislike the ornate production on this one. Personally I think it makes the most of some fairly slight material. There are not many memorable songs here (although I do love 'Northern Sky'). His singing is lifeless and his lyrics are not very interesting - it is just standard English pastoral with surprisingly little emotional connection to what we know of his life
I will give a better score to Pink Moon, where his music finally linked up more with his feelings, but as doomed singer-songwriters go I don't think he had the talent of an Elliott Smith
Enjoyable and atmospheric, I love these kind of soundscapes
Pretty good, if a bit sweet for my tastes. I can't argue with Homeward Bound and For Emily is lovely (I don't mind some sweetness). The dig at Bob Dylan seemed slightly incongruous
This is great. The only reason I am not quite giving five stars is because it is mostly covers
Glad to be introduced to this and there may be moods in which I want to revisit it, but not very often
The fire alarm at work was malfunctioning today and it sounded a bit like this. I mean that in a good way as these guys knew how compelling an ominous drone can be. I could have done without the cheap jump scares and lewd groans - I see Rolling Stone's original review called it 'absolutely puerile', and I can't disagree - but this is still a unique and impressive record
These are mostly songs I don't like but in the best possible versions. That makes it tricky to rate. I'm guided by two considerations:
i. I'm going to have to hear these songs anyway, so they might as well be done well
ii. It's Christmas
Go on then... 4 stars
Being more of a rock fan, I kind of regret the way rock has declined relative to other genres like hip-hop. But this is the kind of hip-hop I would have been happy to give way to - loud, angry and articulate, with a sound as confrontational as the lyrics
I kind of enjoyed this, even if some of that enjoyment was amusement. I preferred the first side which is more varied and sometimes closer to hardcore punk; side two is more consistently grinding. Neither set of vocals does anything for me. I'm glad to have listened to it but not often likely to return
I never really got the hype for this. Albarn was obviously trying out new ideas but I don't think things had really gelled yet. Demon Days is better
One thing I like about this is the way it takes the icy, alien sounds and turns them into something as everyday as a car journey
Subtle as a brick, but bricks work just great
I'm hovering between a four and a five here. I mean, it is really, really good and shows such a range of styles that Bowie was working with. The title track is absolutely great. This album doesn't quite settle into one of my favourites though, and it has some of Bowie's most theatrical vocals (which is a side of him I like less). So I'm going keep the five stars for a couple of his other albums and just give four to this one.
This is much more playful than Can and occasionally strays too far into silliness, especially on the opening track. I enjoyed the rest though, particularly 'O Lord, give us more money' which deserves a favourable response from the Lord
Too shiny for me. And too precise
This is so close to being my kind of thing. I like the roughness of it. I like the readiness to try out ideas. I didn't think I could complain that the songs are too short. But... they are too short, and I wish some of them had been given a bit more space to grow. I might have loved it then
You can hear him start to branch out from Simon & Garfunkel here, with a wider range of influences. I particularly liked 'Peace Like a River' which I had never heard before
As a Brit, I am more familiar with Fun Boy Three's version of Our Lips Are Sealed, which has a much more sombre feel. I like both, and I guess I knew Jane Wiedlin could write a sparkling pop tune, as she did with Rush Hour. The more joyful take on Our Lips Are Sealed is typical of the album's mood. It's just a really fun album with most tracks matching up to the singles.
Long time since I last listened to this. I always thought it was good but overrated. I would now say it is very good but overrated
I am not fond of Clapton for various reasons but he is good here. The drum solo less so.
White people playing the blues? One of these reviews said it is like a white British person in 2010 covering 1990s gangsta rap. I can see their point... but rap is a genre much more built on recounting your personal experience. Blues has always had far more standard songs, so it is hard to argue that you have to have lived them to sing them. And aren't some of them relatable enough outside their origins?
One of the reasons why black American musicians found an appreciative but largely white audience in 1960s Britain is because divisions between races were less stark in the UK. The notion that black and white people should restrict themselves to certain kinds of music would have been quite alien here. So which aspect of US culture should we have appropriated: the blues? or the racial segregation of music?
Some of these songs are still inescapable thirty years later and I might be downrating it a bit because they are so overplayed. On the other hand, I was quite lukewarm about them at the time as well.
This seems like a real step forward from Spacemen 3, with a wider array of instruments and a dreamier, blissful feel. They got even better with Ladies and Gentlemen...
I was hovering between 3 and 4 but have rounded it down for spelling. That may seem harsh, but with no half stars available there are bound to be some narrow calls. Zorry Jazon
Bit surprised to see 'What's the Story?' scoring higher. This is better, and came before they got too irksome
I was aware of Cheap Trick but I don't think I had ever heard anything by them. At first I was puzzled by the 'pop rock' label because the first side just sounded like humdrum rock, about on a par with Status Quo. The second side had a couple of better songs but overall it wasn't great.
Didn't know much about Quicksilver Messenger Service. Some kind of hippy jam band. I like Bo Diddley though, and was intrigued that the whole first side of this album is listed as a song suite based on the wondrous 'Who Do You Love?' Turns out it is just an extended live jam which soon ran out of steam. Oddly, though, I enjoyed the bit where they seemed to get bored and just experimented with some different guitar sounds.
Side two started with another Bo Diddley cover: slowed down again but with more bite. Rather good and I liked this side better. It had some inventive guitar work, using feedback and sounds that are closer to the stuff I usually like. Not exactly Sonic Youth territory but not so far removed from it.
Is there any actual Bo Diddley on this list?
I am all in favour of the list including a band's most distinctive album, and this is The Cure at their most Cure
I quite liked the Cedar Room but most of this was really quite boring
Still not quite as good as Low
His most commercial album but still plenty of variety and artiness in these songs, and some real emotional pull to some of them
Synth-pop isn't a favourite genre of mine but there is no more essential example of it than this. Dated? Of course - that will happen with a style defined by using the latest technology of the time. But if this sounds quintessentially 80s it is because it set a large part of the template for what the 80s would be.
Very sleek production but has enough punch to keep me interested. Very good of it's kind
There is something about ELO that just rubs me up the wrong way. I think it is the combination of playfulness and overwroughtness. I don't mind playfulness, and I can sometimes tolerate music that is overwrought if I can feel the passion behind it. But the two things together? No. No. No
There are snippets that were alright. 'Believe Me Now' almost felt sincere for eighty seconds. And I can enjoy the sillness of 'Mr Blue Sky' for its duration. But a double album of this stuff is way too much for me
A bit folkier than I remembered, with acoustic guitars playing a big part. Stray Cat Blues is pure filth, in the good sense as well as the bad
A very consistent tone of heartbreak which could easily have dragged, but I found myself more drawn into it as it went on. A more vulnerable Frank without any brashness - I appreciated that
There are people I love who get a lot of pleasure from listening to Queen, so I am grateful for that, but personally I don't even like most of the singles. As for the filler on this... the car song, the seaside song and the prophet song do at least provide a wide variety of different kinds of trash. Remarkably, the ukelele song isn't even the worst. I didn't mind Brian May's '39' but I can't quite push beyond a 'didn't mind'.
Then there is the Behemoth Rhapsody. I don't always hate it. There are parts of it I quite like, and then it always ends up with the scaramouche fandango stuff and I am back to hating it again. The album ends with 'God Save the Queen', of all things, but nothing can.
I was never keen on Suede. I didn't care for Brett's melodramatic vocals and they were usually a bit too glam for me. That was mainly based on the singles, which tended to show their Mott the Hoople side. This album is more varied than I expected and pretty consistent in quality, with some quieter songs I enjoyed
Less/More
Interesting to see another comment mention Young Marble Giants. It does seem like a much-more polished (and very well-produced) update on them
As a child I really enjoyed this and maybe 12 year old me still would, but it has not aged well - worse than the earlier stuff before they added all these layers of synthetic sheen to the chortling misogyny. Great beards though
As much folk as country, with influences from much further afield than Americana within the echoey backing. Quite enjoyed it
Very varied, covering a huge range of styles. Always kept me interested
The Mercury Prize has a disappointing record when it comes to identifying acts that will have a lasting impact. Too many winners have been people whose moment soon passes, and few exemplify that more than Klaxons.
They may have made reference to writers like Pynchon and Ballard but this only has a flashy surface without much content and it doesn't reward repeated listening. At least their name was apt: like a klaxon the sound is frantic and attention-grabbing but I was happy when it sped away into the distance
As a kid in the 80s I remember disliking the following album, Seven and the Ragged Tiger. The stuff up to Rio was alright but we still viewed them as pretty boys that the girls liked while we listened to cooler stuff like, er, Genesis. This album has aged better than I expected, possibly because their best musician was the bass player and there tends to be more emphasis on that now
I knew the name fIREHOSE but didn't realise their connection with Minutemen. This is a bit stop-start at times but I definitely enjoyed it
There is no doubting the skill but this is just so lifeless
The worst track is a vapid cover of East St Louis Toodle-oo. It was so weak I ended up listening to Duke Ellington to see if the original song is really that bad. It isn't - it is quite playful and kind of fun, with a bit of moodiness in the background. The way Steely Dan play it is just so damned careful. What is the point of that? I am not a big jazz fan but one thing I definitely don't want from jazz is predictability
I mean, I really like this but is it a 4 or a 5? I'm going to give it the extra star because it has influenced so much music I like - especially through I'll Feel a Whole Lot Better, which is just the blueprint for every great jangly song since
More house than I remembered. Human Behaviour is really good
I'm in a record shop in 1990 and they're playing Welcome to the Terrordrome. I belatedly realised that hip-hop could be as exciting as the rock I mainly listened to, so I will always be grateful for that. I don't think this has aged quite as well as It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back as there is more filler but Fight the Power is still great
Previous Nick Cave albums I have heard have been slightly disappointing, even though he seems like the sort of artist I should really like. So I wasn't particularly looking forward to this double album, but it's excellent. Lots of hard edges, a few good choruses and the gospel elements really work with the dark blues core. A rare five stars on first listen
I prefer the live version of No Woman No Cry and this didn't quite grab me as much as Catch a Fire
A concerted attempt to be current in 2000, which did not set it up to age particularly well. She could still find some songs that worked for the dancefloor but too much of this feels like her trying on clothes that don't quite fit. The last song about authenticity is a bit ludicrous when this is Madonna using clumsy autotune and dressed as a cowgirl
I skipped the bonus track. You know the one
Much better than Eliminator
Completely new to me, as the Humpty Dance wasn't a hit in the UK. I'm not sure we were missing much.
The concept could actually have been interesting because the idea of substituting technology for sex is more relevant now than it was in 1990. It could have been a prescient exploration of how that might affect human intimacy. It isn't, of course. It's a silly adolescent fantasy about making women disposable (and men, but mostly women). Oh well
It's quite good but nothing groudbreaking or outstanding. I think I liked the last track best where it turned a bit shoegazey
Two contrasting sides, with their new style on side 1 and the older style on side 2. The funkier first side is more interesting, although I am not sure we needed to hear the crying child in Runaway Child, Running Wild
'I'm in love with rock and roll'. Me too, Jonathan, me too
It is not a work of genius, but it is the work of someone honest and guileless, and sometimes that is worth treasuring. I found it a bit of a mixed bag, in truth, but there are a couple of great garagey songs that I really enjoyed (She Cracked, Roadrunner)
My favourite Bowie
I want to be cool and say I like the second side best but actually it is tracks 4-6 that form my favourite sequence on any Bowie album. Sound and Vision is a brilliant single with the confidence to leave the vocals until half-way through, knowing it has enough rhythmic interest to keep us entertained. Then I love the way the guitars and synths weave in and out of each other on Always Crashing in the Same Car, a woozy masterpiece on the verge of collision. I kind of like his voice here too - sometimes he is a bit too theatrical but on this song he sounds completely washed out and distant. It was obviously a bad time for him, but it works for me. Be My Wife is a forgotten single that is actually one of my favourites of his. As a rule, sad songs are slow songs. This one is achingly lonely but still keeps up momentum with a propulsive piano riff leading into some gorgeous weeping guitars.
The rest is very good too, but that section is the highlight for me
This is so much of its time, but it is a time I remember and I was one of the indie wallflowers that Loaded dragged uncertainly onto the dancefloor. It is such a mixture of styles that some bits have aged more than others: the acid house elements are more dated than the gospel, dub and what bits of rock survived the mixing process (it always seemed much more Weatherall's album than Gillespie's). It certainly brings back memories but is not really an album I have carried with me
I was once a bookish young man but I was never daft enough to imagine that was cool or sexy. Lloyd Cole's naive pretentiousness was always a bit annoying, to be honest, but I might excuse his naivety more now I am so much older than he was. Decent songs, on the whole
'I had the taste of blood and chocolate in my mouth, the one as hateful as the other' - Hermann Hesse, Steppenwolf. Bit surprised to learn that is not where the title comes from
Costello even angrier than usual, and may be his nastiest album. I Want You is a great song but it leaves a bitter aftertaste
I miss Cale here, and regret that no band would showcase as much discordant viola again. Murder Mystery would be better with him involved. But this album showcases what a fine and sensitive songwriter Reed had become
As someone born in 1970 just up the M69 from Cov, this totally speaks to the world I grew up in. That grimy, fertile mixture of industrial decline and emerging multiculturalism is the grit that 2 Tone grew out of.
Amazing that a brand of dance music is such a potent vehicle for anger. Yet it clearly is, and each successive wave of ska has brought it closer to punk. I don't think it ever got more pointed than this, though.
I don't know why, but somehow I never really click with Stevie Wonder. That is obviously on me, not him.
The nearest comparison I can make is when I hear some younger people say they don't get Prince. My first instinct is to say: Can't you hear how talented he was? How many styles he brought together? How incredibly prolific he was? And they say something like 'yeah, but it doesn't do much for me'. So that's me with Stevie Wonder. I admire him but I am rubbish at listening to him
Not my kind of thing and there were parts I disliked, but at least they still sounded like a rock band and I've Seen All Good People was just about good enough to scrape it up to a 3
I loved the rhythms in this and the samples just provided a wide array of sounds to sculpt with, so it didn't really matter where they came from. I think that's one of the joys of sampling - that you can take an excerpt from one context and transpose it into something completely different.
I am tempted to say that this shows some of David Byrne's talent without him spoiling it by singing, but that would be a bit mean
I am not quite as grubby as I used to be, but this sound is still too squeaky clean for me
His voice isn't very good, the lyrics are trite and the composition is competent but obviously derivative
He puts everything into it, though, so I will give him two stars for effort. Well done for trying
I love a bit of 'uncertain piano', and it only takes a moment of the title track to set me drifting on an ocean with a neon bottle floating beside me
Transitional albums are often the most interesting snapshots into an artist's career, and Eno was just starting to feel his way towards ambient. It was interesting to learn that he was stuck for ideas when he started recording it. Hard to believe, when you hear the results. But it seems like that lack of a clear intention made him experiment with lots of different techniques, and helped us end up with this collection of all kinds of beautiful
A bit of a surprise to me, as I only really knew Goldfrapp for glitzy stompers like Ooh La La. I like this more and the airy songs give her wispy voice more chance to shine
